Top Ten Tuesday #10

17 Comments

Posted on July 9, 2013

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke & the Bookish. It’s awesome. Every Tuesday, the lovely ladies over there give us book bloggers wonderful and fun topics to create our lists! Check out what others have posted by going over there! http://brokeandbookish.blogspot.com

Today’s topic is:

Top Ten Best/Worst Movie Adaptations

This was a difficult topic for me, as I almost always think the book was FAR better than the movie. When I tried to split the list 5 best and 5 worst, I had a list of 20 worst! (don’t get me started- as much as I loved the HP movies-that second Dumbledore still pisses me off)

So I forced myself to try to come up with what I thought was the 10 best-got 8. Here is goes-

1. The Help

I though they did a really good job adapting the story here- of course it loses a little something-especially since each character is so well defined and have such strong voices, but it was till a very good movie and pretty true to the book.

2. Jurassic Park

I actually saw the movie before I read the book- spilled popcorn all over my date when that Rex jumped out- and I am glad I did since it is a great movie but the book has so much more going on that I probably would have been disappointed.

(These next two are cheats)

3. Band of Brothers

I know it was a miniseries and not a movie, but it was SO well made-thank you Mr. Hanks. I loved this series SO much, that hubby and I still rewatch occasionally on DVD-at that’s 10 ours!!

4. Pride & Prejudice

I am talking about the BBC miniseries version-no offense Kiera Knightly-I love you but you are not my quintessential Lizzy Bennet.

Colin Firth= Mr. Darcy-that is all I am saying.

5. The Silence of the Lambs

So well written and creepy, though I personally thought Hannibal was a touch more good looking than Anthony Hopkins-my apologies, Sir Anthony.

6. Rebecca

One of my favorite novels really translated well into film-possibly my favorite Hitchcock-though I am STILL totally creeped out by birds. Laurence Olivier was brilliant as Maxim de Winter!

And Mrs. Danvers-perfectly creepy!!

7. Gone with the Wind

I love this book-and the movie stands up to it quite well. Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable-oh my!!

and my favorite-

8. To Kill a Mockingbird

To me, Atticus Finch is the best written male characters. Gregory Peck played him wonderfully.

What do you think are the best/worst film adaptations?

It’s Monday- I am back and posting again!!

6 Comments

Posted on July 8, 2013

Its Monday! What are you Reading? is a weekly bookish meme held on Book Journey by Sheila. It’s a great place to discuss your week in reading and see what others are reading too.

I am back from an AMAZING vacation in Bermuda with my husband and want to thank everyone for the well wishes! We had a wonderful time- here the view from our cottage 🙂

I want to stare at it all day…..

ok- back to reality-Here is what reading I have been up to-

REVIEWS POSTED

And The Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini-https://turnthepagereviews.com/2013/06/26/and-the-mountains-echoed-by-khaled-hosseini/

The Last Original Wife by Dorthea Benton Frank-https://turnthepagereviews.com/2013/06/27/817/

FINISHED

The Wishing Tree by Marybeth Whalen

CURRENTLY READING

Summerset Abbey by T.J.Brown

The Prodigal by Michael Hurley

UP NEXT

The Rathbones by Janice Clark

The Clock of Life by Nancy Klann-Moren

Whew! Back into the swing of things in this lovely heat wave in NJ!!

What are you reading? I would love to hear from you!

Pink Beaches-here I come!!!!

11 Comments

Posted on June 28, 2013

Turn The Page Reviews will be quiet for the next week, as my husband and I head to Bermuda to celebrate 18 years of wedded bliss (bliss will be me, on a lounge on the pink sand, reading all day long-heaven!)

While I am sorry not to post for almost a whole week, we will be staying where there is no internet-can you believe a place like that still exists???

Enjoy your week-read some great books-and I will check in when we return.

Until then!

Kerri

The Last Original Wife

4 Comments

Posted on June 27, 2013

The Last Original Wife

by Dorothea Benton Frank

published by Harper Collins

2013

Summary

Leslie Anne Greene Carter is The Last Original Wife among her husband Wesley’s wildly successful Atlanta social set. His cronies have all traded in the mothers of their children they promised to love and cherish—’til death did them part—for tanned and toned young Barbie brides.

If losing the social life and close friends she adored wasn’t painful enough, a series of setbacks shake Les’s world and push her to the edge. She’s had enough of playing the good wife to a husband who thinks he’s doing her a favor by keeping her around. She’s not going to waste another minute on people she doesn’t care to know. Now, she’s going to take some time for herself—in the familiar comforts and stunning beauty of Charleston, her beloved hometown. In her brother’s stately historic home, she’s going to reclaim the carefree girl who spent lazy summers sharing steamy kisses with her first love on Sullivans Island. Along Charleston’s live oak- and palmetto-lined cobblestone streets, under the Lowcountry’s dazzling blue sky, Les will indulge herself with icy cocktails, warm laughter, divine temptation and bittersweet memories. Daring to listen to her inner voice, she will realize what she wants . . . and find the life of which she’s always dreamed.

Told in the alternating voices of Les and Wes, The Last Original Wife is classic Dorothea Benton Frank: an intoxicating tale of family, friendship, self-discovery, and love, that is as salty as a Lowcountry breeze and as invigorating as a dip in Carolina waters on a sizzling summer day.

My Review

I was looking forward to reading this book, a I have enjoyed Frank’s novels very much in the past. What I especially enjoy about her novels is the way she brings Charleston and the surrounding islands to life. I love the way she describes the smells, sounds and sights of the area. This novel begins in Atlanta, where Wes and Les’ marriage begins to fall apart. Les goes to stay with her brother in Charleston to figure out what to do about her husband and grown children. It was wonderful to see Les become more herself away from her controlling husband and need children. The only problem I had was that Wes was totally insufferable, and I couldn’t understand how Les would have stayed as long as she did. This was a fun and quick read (one day!) and I was glad to be able to put it between two more time consuming novels.

Rating

3.5 out of 5

Sullivan’s Island, SC – Beach at Dusk (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Photo in or around Charleston, South Carolina (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

And The Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini

5 Comments

Posted on June 26, 2013

And The Mountains Echoed

by Khaled Hossieni

published by Riverhead Books

2013

Summary

In this tale revolving around not just parents and children but brothers and sisters, cousins and caretakers, Hosseini explores the many ways in which families nurture, wound, betray, honor, and sacrifice for one another; and how often we are surprised by the actions of those closest to us, at the times that matter most.

Following its characters and the ramifications of their lives and choices and loves around the globe—from Kabul to Paris to San Francisco to the Greek island of Tinos—the story expands gradually outward, becoming more emotionally complex and powerful with each turning page. (from Goodreads)

My Review

“It’s a funny thing… but people mostly have it backward. They think they live by what they want. But really, what guides them is what they’re afraid of. What they don’t want.”

And The Mountains Echoed is the beautifully written new novel from master storyteller Khaled Hosseini. I thought The Kite Runner was wonderful, and that A Thousand Splendid Suns was even better. Hosseini’s new book also takes us once again to Afghanistan before the fighting, where we are introduced to Abdullah and his baby sister Pari. Their’s is the beginning of this story which is told from many different characters and spans several generations. Rather than one comprehensive story, this novel is almost a compilation of interwoven stories that spans members and acquaintances of one family and their descendants.

I thought writing in this novel was just as beautiful and lyrical as one would expect from Hosseini. He makes the people and places come alive. What I found I did not like as much as I hoped was the actual story. It felt a little too disjointed, the changing of narrators with each chapter. I felt as though I was just getting to know a certain character, and then they were gone. I would have preferred just two or three narrator, rather than the nine the book gave us. At certain points, I was actually a little confused as to who was who and how they connected to the other characters. I would still recommend reading this book, as the author has once again produced a beautifully written piece of literature. Just begin aware that it is different from his previous novels.

My favorite quote-

“But there was no forgetting. Pari hovered, unbidden, at the edge of Abdullah’s vision everywhere he went. She was like the dust that clung to his shirt. She was in the silences that had become so frequent in the house, silences that welled up between their words, sometimes cold and hollow, sometimes pregnant with things that went unsaid, like a cloud filled with rain that never fell. Some nights he dreamed he was in the dessert again, alone, surrounded by the mountains, and in the distance a single tiny glint of light flickering on, off, on, off, like a message.”

I would love to hear from others who have read this- What did you think?

Rating

4 out of 5

Khaled Hosseini

Author profile

born

in Kabul, Afghanistan

March 04, 1965

website

http://www.khaledhosseini.com/

Hosseini was born in Kabul, Afghanistan, in 1965. In 1970 Hosseini and his family moved to Iran where his father worked for the Embassy of Afghanistan in Tehran. In 1973 Hosseini’s family returned to Kabul, and Hosseini’s youngest brother was born in July of that year.
In 1976, when Hosseini was 11 years old, Hosseini’s father obtained a job in Paris, France, and moved the family there. They were unable to return to Afghanistan because of the Saur Revolution in which the PDPA communist party seized power through a bloody coup in April 1978. Instead, a year after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, in 1980 they sought political asylum in the United States and made their residence in San Jose, California.
Hosseini graduated from Independence High School in San Jose in 1984 and enrolled at Santa Clara University, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in biology in 1988. The following year, he entered the University of California, San Diego, School of Medicine, where he earned his M.D. in 1993. He completed his residency in internal medicine at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles in 1996. He practiced medicine for over ten years, until a year and a half after the release of The Kite Runner.
Hosseini is currently a Goodwill Envoy for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). He has been working to provide humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan through the Khaled Hosseini Foundation. The concept for the foundation was inspired by the trip to Afghanistan that Hosseini made in 2007 with UNHCR.
He lives in Northern California with his wife, Roya, and their two children (Harris and Farah)

Top Ten Tuesday #9

10 Comments

Posted on June 25, 2013

Today’s topic is:

TOP TEN BOOKS I’VE READ SO FAR IN 2013

(seems like a good time for it, since we are halfway through the year)

10. The Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline

a She Reads book club selection

9. Silver Linings Playbook by Matthew Quick

needless to say, better than the movie

8. The Bookseller by Mark Pryor

7. The Sandcastle Girls by Chris Bohjalian

(can’t wait for his new one)

6. The Lost Wife by Alyson Richman

so sad

5. The Orchardist by Amanda Coplin

beautifully written

4. The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult

her best so far

3. The Silence of Bonaventure Arrow by Rita Leganski

another She Reads book club selection

2. The Prisoner of Heaven by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

love this series- need to read again

1. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? #8

13 Comments

Posted on June 24, 2013

Its Monday! What are you Reading? is a weekly bookish meme held on Book Journey by Sheila. It’s a great place to discuss your week in reading and see what others are reading too.

Tough weekend- my son left to spend a month studying engineering in PA. I will admit, there were tears-mine. So, on to the books-I sound like a broken record when I say AGAIN, that I wasn’t that into reading that much this week. so, here is what happened-

This week, I finished-

And The Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini

I reviewed-

Sight Reading by Daphne Kalotay

Sight Reading-a review

I am currently reading-

The Last Original Wife by Dorthea Benton Frank

And up next is-

The Prodigal by Michael Hurley

For 2,000 years, Christendom has believed that faith and penitence are the narrow gates through which all who seek heaven must pass, and that the church on Earth holds the key. What if a forgotten relic, hidden inside an abandoned ship thought to have been lost at sea more than a century ago, suddenly reappeared and cast doubt on that belief? Who would seek to use it? Who would seek to destroy it? And whose lives would it forever change? Aidan Sharpe, a disbarred and penniless lawyer trying to rebuild his life on Ocracoke Island, finds love and destiny as he seeks the answers to these questions.

What are you reading this week?

Happy Summer Solstice- and a few tears..sniff, sniff

3 Comments

Posted on June 21, 2013

Happy Summer Solstice to everyone! This past year has certainly seemed like a loooong one. Ever since Hurricane Sandy, it seems like time has moved at a very different pace where I live. And now here we are at the start of what is shaping up to be a very good summer (fingers crossed). I am lucky enough to be in the middle of a wonderful book, but am getting a little ansty that life keeps getting in the way of me sitting down for extended periods so I can read that baby!!

As I write this happy post, I am also in the middle of helping my 14 year old pack for a summer course in Engineering up at Dickinson College in PA. I am so proud that he is doing this wonderful thing, but also my heart is breaking a little. He has never been away from home for so long, and I know he will come back different- more confident hopefully, but almost assuredly more grown up. I realize this is what we strive for as parents, to see our children grow into adults (hopefully able to function in society without us there to hold their hands and wipe their noses), but I can still feel sad, can’t I?

OK, enough of my bellyaching, I am sure most of you have better things to do-like enjoy the longest day of the year reading in the sunlight? I have sheets to fold and pack, sunscreen to scrounge up, etc. And we turn the page to a new chapter…..

Kerri

Thursday Quotables

3 Comments

Posted on June 20, 2013

Welcome to THURSDAY QUOTABLES- a weekly feature hosted by Lisa over at Bookshelf Fantasies where we highlight a great line, quote, or passage discovered during our reading each week.

http://bookshelffantasies.com

And The Mountains Echoed

by Khaled Hosseini

Sight Reading-a review

8 Comments

Posted on June 19, 2013

Sight Reading

by Daphne Kalotay

published by Harper Collins

2013

I received this book through Goodreads Giveaway program in return for an honest review.

Summary

On a Boston street one warm spring day after a long New England winter, Hazel and Remy spot each other for the first time in years. Under ordinary circumstances, this meeting might seem insignificant. But Remy, a gifted violinist, is married to the composer Nicholas Elko-once the love of Hazel’s life.

It has been twenty years since Remy, a conservatory student whose ambition may outstrip her talent; Nicholas, a wunderkind suddenly struggling with a masterwork he cannot fully realize; and his wife, beautiful and fragile Hazel, first came together and tipped their collective world on its axis. Over the decades, each has buried disappointments and betrayals that now threaten to undermine their happiness. But as their entwined stories unfold from 1987 to 2007, from Europe to America, from conservatory life to the Boston Symphony Orchestra, each will discover the surprising ways in which the quest to create something real and true–be it a work of art or one’s own life–can lead to the most personal of revelations, including the unearthing of secrets we keep, even from ourselves.

Lyrical and evocative, Sight Reading is ultimately an exploration of what makes a family, of the importance of art in daily life, and of the role of intuition in both the creative process and the evolution of the self. (from Goodreads)

My Review

I received this book through Goodreads (thank you!)

Sight Reading is a lyrical well written story that follows Hazel, Nicholas, and Remy. Through these well defined characters, we see the marriage of Nicholas and his beautiful wife Hazel end, when he falls in love with his young conservatory student/colleague Remy. Hazel struggles terribly to come to terms with her new life and the accompanying loneliness she feels. “For a moment, Hazel thought she might burst into tears. Sometimes things were hard, she reminded herself, that’s all: being told you were unable to be with, it was just a bit hard, especially when she wanted so badly for things to work out, and thought they might, thought there might be a joy for her that was something beyond herself. ”

Hazel is confronted with the seemingly happy marriage of Nicholas and Remy throughout the book, as the three of them co-parent their daughter Jessie. As Hazel eventually transforms from despair to contentment, and then true happiness, Nicholas and Remy’s lives suffer sadness and disappointment. The fate of their marriage looks bleak, until Nicholas’ composition shows Remy what she really means to him.

“Just a little string of notes. But to Remy they were a secret message just for her. She saw that now, as she began to play the solo section of the final movement. With each stroke of her bow she felt Nicholas’ love course through her, immense and many colored, nothing he could have put into words, nothing he could speak aloud.”

The author has written a beautiful story that gives the reader a glimpse into the world of classical music. I did not feel overwhelmed by the descriptions of music, despite the fact that I have very little knowledge of the subject. I especially enjoyed Remy’s journey through her musical life.

“The thought came to her, clearly, as she crossed Boylston Street. Her dedication to her violin meant she could love something complicated and demanding and extremely difficult, and that she could do so with enthusiasm and without resentment. It meant that she knew what devotion was, and commitment, and the sublime satisfaction of working hard at something until she accomplished it. She knew how it felt to achieve what at times seemed like miracles; she had witnessed beauty that left her speechless. She had known amazement up close, knew the glorious things this world held for anyone who chose to stop and listen.”

I would recommend this book. It was very well written and beautifully descriptive.

Rating

4 out of 5