Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Opening Sentence of the Day: From This Wicked Patch of Dust


Pilar Martinez stumbled into her mother's apartment, which had once been a church in El Segundo Barrio in Downtown El Paso.
-- From This Wicked Patch of Dust by Sergio Troncoso.  This book was released last week.


THE BOOK: In the border shantytown of Ysleta, Mexican immigrants Pilar and Cuauhtémoc Martinez strive to teach their four children to forsake the drugs and gangs of their neighborhood. The family's hardscrabble origins are just the beginning of this sweeping new novel from Sergio Troncoso.

Troncoso has many readings and appearances scheduled this fall. His next appearance is this coming Tuesday, November 1, 2011, at 7:00 PM at the Weiss Center for Children’s and Young Adult Literature, at New Jersey City University in Jersey City, NJ. His complete schedule is here.

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Teaser Tuesday Two-fer: Where the Crooked River Rises and Potluck

Two teasers this week, from two books I received from OSU Press.



But if I say "the old Hackleman place," his face lights up with recognition.  He pictures the plunge and curve of the road off the rim, the way the two-story house sits st the head of the valley, its windows squinting into the sun.
-- from the Prologue to Where the Crooked River Rises: A High Desert Home by Ellen Waterston.  There is a lot more geology in this book than personal anecdote above would suggest.  But that is what I like about what I call "random memoirs" -- they often head off in a direction I would not have anticipated.

Waterston founded and leads the popular Bend, Oregon literary festival, The Nature of Words. She is also offers workshops and retreats for emerging writers at her Writing Ranch.


My parents now live in Bend, in Oregon's High Desert, so it is interesting to learn more about that part of my state.


There ought to be some middle ground, I think, a way for a handful of people to hole up in a tiny undeveloped cranny and make it their own, to develop a little maybe, but not a lot.  Maybe it's too much to ask anymore.
-- Potluck: Community on the Edge of Wilderness by Ana Maria Spagna, essays about "the enduring human connection to place" from OSU Press.

Since I occasionally fantasize about living in cabin on a river outside some very small mountain town, I am fascinated to read about someone who actually lives this way.  I prefer the chapters on Spagna's life in a sparsely populated valley in the North Cascades of Washington state to those about her childhood and travels.


Teaser Tuesdays is hosted by Should Be Reading, where you can find the official rules for this weekly event.



Monday, October 24, 2011

Mailbox Monday


Thanks for joining me for Mailbox Monday! MM was created by Marcia at A girl and her books (fka The Printed Page), who graciously hosted it for a long, long time, before turning it into a touring meme (details here).

Serena at Savvy Verse & Wit is hosting in October.  Please go by and visit her wonderful blog.
I got two books last week:

Little Felted Animals: Create 16 Irresistible Creatures with Simple Needle-Felting Techniques by Marie-Noelle Horvath.  I bought this at Powell's the other day because the animals are adorable and I am sure I can find time for a new craft hobby. I'm sure I can.



Lift by Kelly Corrigan.  This was in the swag bag at the Women in Insurance and Financial Services (W.I.F.S.) conference I went to.  Corrigan wrote the extremely popular book, The Middle Place and was one of the keynote speakers at the conference. 





Sunday, October 23, 2011

List: The Man Booker Prize

The Booker Prize is awarded each year for a "full-length novel, written by a citizen of the Commonwealth or the Republic of Ireland . . . . The novel must be an original work in English (not a translation) and must not be self-published."

If anyone else working on this list would like me to post a link to your progress report(s), please leave a comment with a link and I will add it below.

So far, I have read 30 of the 48 winners.  Here is the list, with those I have finished reading in red; those on my TBR shelf in blue:

2014: Richard Flanagan, The Narrow Road to the Deep North

2013: Elinor Catton, The Luminaries

2012: Hilary Mantel, Bring up the Bodies

2011: Julian Barnes, The Sense Of an Ending (reviewed here)

2010: Howard Jacobson, The Finkler Question (reviewed here)

2009: Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall (reviewed here)

2008: Aravind Adiga, The White Tiger

2007: Anne Enright, The Gathering (reviewed here)

2006: Kiran Desai, The Inheritance of Loss

2005: John Banville, The Sea (reviewed here)

2004: Alan Hollinghurst, The Line of Beauty

2003: DBC Pierre, Vernon God Little

2002: Yann Martel, Life of Pi

2001: Peter Carey, True History of the Kelly Gang

2000: Margaret Atwood, The Blind Assassin

1999: J. M. Coetzee, Disgrace

1998: Ian McEwan, Amsterdam

1997: Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things

1996: Graham Swift, Last Orders

1995: Pat Barker, The Ghost Road

1994: James Kelman, How Late it Was, How Late

1993: Roddy Doyle, Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha

1992: Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient, and Barry Unsworth, Sacred Hunger (reviewed here)

1991: Ben Okri, The Famished Road

1990: A.S. Byatt, Possession

1989: Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day

1988: Peter Carey, Oscar and Lucinda (reviewed here)

1987: Penelope Lively, Moon Tiger

1986: Kingsley Amis, The Old Devils

1985: Keri Hulme, The Bone People (reviewed here)

1984: Anita Brookner, Hotel du Lac

1983: J. M. Coetzee, The Life and Times of Michael K (reviewed here)

1982: Thomas Keneally, Schindler's List

1981: Salman Rushdie, Midnight's Children (reviewed here)

1980: William Golding, Rites of Passage

1979: Penelope Fitzgerald, Offshore

1978: Iris Murdoch, The Sea, the Sea (reviewed here)

1977: Paul Scott, Staying On

1976: David Storey, Saville

1975: Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, Heat and Dust

1974: Nadine Gordimer, The Conservationist, and Stanley Middleton, Holiday

1973: J. G. Farrell, The Siege of Krishnapur

1972: John Berger, G (reviewed here)

1971: V.S. Naipaul, In a Free State

1970, The Lost Booker: J. G. Farrell, Troubles

1970: Bernice Rubens, The Elected Member

1969: Percy Howard Newby, Something to Answer For


NOTE

Last updated on October 15, 2014.

OTHERS READING BOOKER WINNERS

Farm Lane Books
Fresh Ink Books
Hotch Pot Cafe

If you would like to be listed, please leave a comment with links to your progress reports or reviews and I will add them here.

Friday, October 21, 2011

Opening Sentence of the Day: Where the Crooked River Rises


I ranched in the heart of Oregon's outback for nearly three decades.
-- from the Prologue to Where the Crooked River Rises: A High Desert Home by Ellen Waterston.

Waterston founded and leads the popular Bend, Oregon literary festival, The Nature of Words. She is also offers workshops and retreats for emerging writers at her Writing Ranch.

OSU Press sent this to me. I've been looking forward to it, in part because my parents live in Bend, in Oregon's High Desert.  




A Few More Pages hosts Book Beginnings every Friday.  The event is open for the entire week.

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