So, it’s the second half of January and I still haven’t written what my challenge is about. But, all in due time (sort of!).
First, a little list of books I read outside of 2016 Challenge and books I started to read, but didn’t complete.
Casey Watson – A Last Kiss for Mummy – Another book of Britain’s most famous foster mom. This time it tells a story of Emma, a fourteen year old foster child with an infant on her lap. Casey and her family form a bond with Roman, Emma’s baby, immediately, but with Emma herself, a process is longer and harder. As Crying for Help, the story is heartbreaking, and Casey seems like an angel wanting to help all those hurt kids. Also as before, the literary value is not that big. But I can forgive, because of the admiration I feel for every good foster family.
Santiago Pajares – El paso de la hélice – Not sure if that was translated into English. The Polish title is “Książka, kórej nie ma”, which means “A book that doesn’t exist”. My Spanish is not that great to grasp the meaning of the original title – the best I have is “A step of the spiral.” Yeah, well. A story about the bestselling series of books, and the search for the mysterious author, who fails to provide the last part. A story about a book that touches and changes lots of people’s lives? What more can I want? Some clichés, true, but still – great read.
– Nienachalna z urody –– Maria Czubaszek, recently deceased, was a Polish writer, satirist, journalist and more. A woman of many talents. But, I shamefully admit, that for me she’s “the woman who openly said she had abortions when she was younger.” Don’t get me wrong, though. I absolutely mean it in a good way. We need more women who would openly say they had abortions. That said, the book was just her thoughts on life, marriage, friendship, people. Her own, I mean. Her life, her marriage, and her friendships with people. But, through her book we can see also ourselves; she’s talking about things people think, but not too many say out loud. Enjoyable funny and a surprisingly fast read – surprisingly, for I usually don’t like non-fiction books. But I guess an exception proves the rule and all this crap. Oh, and the title could sort of be translated to Unimposing Beauty.
Richard Lourie – A Hatred for Tulips – a great psychological drama, about war and its effects on people, and especially about one boy with a great desire to make his father proud of him. The only one who deserves a full review, which I will get into later.
Some of those I started, but didn’t manage to finish:
J. Watson – Before I go to Sleep – This had potential. Really did. The trailer also had potential. I actually thought it was going to be phenomenal. So what went wrong? Maybe my expectations were too high. The story is about a woman with a rare disease – every time she falls asleep, she forgets her past when she wakes up. She keeps a diary to help her memory, but the diary tells her not to trust her husband.” She’s trying to figure out what’s going on, but it’s hard when you keep on forgetting everything you’ve learnt every time you go to bed. Okay, so one more time – what went wrong? I didn’t think it was too far-fetched. I just thought it was boring. Every day she would wake up and we would get yet another description of how she can’t remember he previous day and about how she’s surprised at her appearance – that she’s so much older than she remembers. I have a weird feeling that this might turn out to be quite existing if I had patience to wait/read that long.
Neil Gaiman – American Gods – This was supposed to be my “Book published in America.” What better book to put in the challenge under “published in America” than about American gods? But it turned out to be too mundane, complicated, and after around 150 pages I felt it didn’t make sense. And since it had a few hundreds more pages to go….
Luke Bradbury – Undercover – An Australian guy comes to London and as a way to make some quick cash, he decided to sleep with women for money. You know, a male prostitute. Initially it was interesting, enough to ignore the style, which was… not so good. But then it became repetitive and quote dull, honestly, so I didn’t waste my time.
