Reading Roundup: December

Book of a Thousand Days by Shannon Hale

This is a very good book, although I didn't feel as strongly about it as the Goose Girl series. If you liked those books then you will certainly like this one; the story is fairly similar. The voice of the main character is very strong and I liked her a lot, plus the diary format is interesting. I did figure out the major twist in the plot fairly early on, but it was still a good read.

Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See

I mostly liked this book, but it probably won't go on my list of favorites. The writing was generally pretty good and the characters and story were compelling, but sometimes I felt too much like the voice wasn't very authentic. It felt in places like the author was trying to cram in all the information about nineteenth century China that she could, and while I appreciated that, it tended to distract from the story too much.

Well Behaved Women Seldom Make History by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich

I liked this book quite a lot and think it would make a good read for a book group. It's a great introduction to women's history and I think it serves as a non-threatening explanation of feminist theory that could help a lot of people I know who are scared of that term. If you've studied feminism in depth you probably will find this book a bit boring; although Ulrich is a professor and scholar, she is writing for a popular audience at an introductory level. When looked at from that angle, I think this book is great.

Women's Ways of Knowing: The Development of Self, Voice, and Mind

I've had this book on my shelf for a while, but I never got around to reading it. I found many parts of quite interesting and thought a lot about how they apply to me. On the other hand, many of the examples and conclusions seem dated now, twenty years after publication. It would be interesting to conduct a similar survey of women who have grown up with the changes in education brought about by the women's movement and see how they are different. I felt like some things in the book were exactly like my experience, but others seemed foreign to me.

Finding Daddy by Louise Plummer

Several years ago Mr. Fob and I went to a reading by Louise at BYU. She read an excerpt from this book, which was still unfinished at the time. I was a little disturbed by the dark subject matter, but she thought it was fun to write a thriller. I've been looking forward to this book for a while, and it did not disappoint. My only complaint with the book was that it was too short--I wanted to know more about the characters' lives after the book ended.

Enrique's Journey by Sonia Nazario

This book is adapted from a series of articles in the LA Times and it's quite engaging. I learned a lot more about immigration than I knew before; I didn't know the extent to which immigration from other countries was affecting Mexico nor how many women with small children were leaving them behind to come to the United States. The New York Times has also been doing a series about immigration that has a lot of interesting new information as well. When I finished the book I wanted to know more about the people and families involved, but their future is still unknown.

The Island of Lost Maps by Miles Harvey

I really wanted to like this book. The subject matter was interesting and covered a lot of things that I like (true crime, history, libraries, maps). But I fell asleep twice while reading it. It was long and felt too often like the author was trying too hard to piece together things that weren't meant to fit. There were a lot of awkwardly phrased sentences as well and just plain tangents that left me feeling sleepy.

I Thought My Father Was God: And Other True Tales from NPR's National Story Project

This book was fascinating; it was a little like reading PostSecret and a bit like testimony meeting and a bit just plain weird. I really enjoyed it and found myself staying up late to finish it. Many of the stories felt a little strange and unpolished, but they were all very real and "true" as well. My only complaint was the title--I don't really like it, and it's not even the title of a story. When I finally got to the line itself within the book I felt disappointed. So--I don't like the title, but I loved the book. It was a great way to finish the year.

Movies

An Inconvenient Truth

After waiting for a very long time for our copy from the library I was eager to see this movie. Generally, I liked it. Most of the information in it was not new to me, but I thought the presentation was thoughtfully done and well put together. There were a few parts that seemed to be more about "why Al Gore is cool" instead of global warming, which I found weird. Also, it's good to watch the supplemental stuff on the DVD because there's a whole section of updates on some of the information from the DVD.

Volver

I'm now beginning to feel bad for ignoring Almodovar for so long, because he really is an excellent director. He manages to turn the tragic and ludicrous into something sweet and touching. This is another fabulous movie, not only because of the acting and the story, but the cinematography as well.

Frida

To be honest, I've never felt very attracted to Frida Khalo's work. I think it is interesting and certainly worthy of the fame it has gotten, but it's just not my style. However, I really liked this movie, especially the incorporation of her art in very interesting ways. Post-modernism is certainly the best way to go with an artist like Frida and I think this movie works on many levels. Just be warned: like one review pointed out, the movie depicts "hedonistic artists exploring their sexuality" numerous times.

The Gospel

The previews on this DVD were for the third Left Behind movie (it looked terrible), Rent, and DVDs of shows from the Seventies like Good Times and Sanford and Son. Apparently the marketers wanted to cover all their bases: religion, music, and black people. I enjoyed watching this movie and making some comparisons in my mind between Black cinema and Mormon cinema. The production values in this movie were higher than many Mormon movies I've seen, but I think if Mormons keep making movies this is where they could be in fifteen or twenty years. Anyways, I actually liked this movie a lot. The acting was decent, the story was interesting (and a lot of the details were new to me), and the music was great.

The Simpson's Movie

The main thing I thought when this movie finished was "it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be." It's really not. If you like The Simpsons you'll probably like this; if you don't, you won't.

Chocolat

This movie was very predictable in the plot and the characterization, and the direction wasn't spectacular. Nevertheless, I enjoyed it a lot and it was a good, fluffy, fun movie.

Marie Antoinette

Our last movie of 2007; after watching this and Lost in Translation I'm officially a Sofia Coppola fan. This movie is not like your usual historical costume drama, so I think that if you don't expect that you won't be disappointed.