15. Silver Wedding - Maeve Binchy

This is the second of 3 books my grandparents leant me.
I like how Maeve Binchy has a knack for intertwining the stories of several people into one cohesive unit.
I liked that this book was an easy read after some of the denser stuff I have been into lately and that it only took me a few days to get through.
I like the sense of overarcing change that went through most of the characters as they prepared for this 25th wedding anniversary.
It was a book about relationships and the myriad of reasons people have for staying together and acting the way they do and for misunderstanding others motivations the way they do and although some of those reasons were bitter sweet they also seemed very true to life.
And I just felt like it could have been me, could have been my friends, my family, my life.

14. The Final Confessions of Mabel Stark - Robert Hough

It is a testament to how busy May has been that a)I didn't entirely finish this book before it was due back at the library (for a second time so I couldn't automatically renew again) and b)it has taken me more than 2 weeks since I returned the book to find a few moments to sit down and write about it. And now I am at the point where I don't really know what to say. I mean, I guess it is one of those books that is so extraordinary that it feels like anything you do say just does not do justice. It made me feel like I was sitting down with one of my grandparents and they were telling me the story of their life. It felt very intimate and beautiful and very strange all at the same time.
Mabel's life wasn't one I have much in common with. The closest I have come to lions and tigers would be in the nosebleed section watching a circus, so to read about someone who worked so up close and personal with those animals, who cared for a tiger practically from birth and slept with it and loved it more than she loved most humans ... well that was magical. And also a little unreal.
The book was crafted so that I felt like I was there, I was watching the circus, I was the one Mabel was telling her story to. And that is a powerful feeling.

Book Club: The Kitchen God's Wife - Amy Tan (#13)

Another book that took me way longer than I expected to get through. Definitely a testament to how crazy busy my life has been lately. In fact, I didn't even make it to the book club meeting last Sunday. I know that they discussed the issue of family secrets and family chemistry ... chemistry doesn't really seem like the right word but I'm drawing a blank on another word that would describe what I do mean. They also talked about language; how the author would occasionally throw in chinese phrases and then an explanation of how they would loosely translate into English. And they discussed how it was interesting to read a perspective on World War 2 that is not Eurocentric. All things that sort of brushed my subconcious as I was reading but not necessarily what I would have brought up on my own. Of course I am not always sure what I would have brought up until the words are actually coming out of my mouth .. or spilling out of my fingers here. Helpful isn't it?
Most of what my brain kept dwelling on while I was reading was pretty shallow. I kept thinking about Gilmore Girls and how the voice of the novel sounded exactly like Laine's mom. And then I would think about how much I want a Luke and then I would get distracted and put the book down. Maybe it wasn't just busyness that caused me to take so long.
I also kept thinking that I didn't have a basis for comparison. Because I don't know very many Chinese or even Asian people so I don't really know the culture or what it would be like to be a first generation child of immigrants from Asia. I guess technically I don't know what it would be like to be a first generation child of any immigrants since I am at least a 3rd generation Canadian on both sides of my family. But I am assured it is very different to be a child of an immigrant of European descent than a child of Asian descent. I am not sure if that clarifies anything or just makes this entry even more confusing.
I liked how the author stressed how you could be both strong & weak at the same time; how you could make choices that were good for you and maybe bad for others but that was ok; how the words fate and destiny are the same meaning and yet not the same meaning. I liked that this book made me think about my own perceptions and how they are so often rooted in European thinking, and how I wondered if there is ever any real truth or if truth is always a matter of perception.