Sunshine Smackdown! Battle of the Prizes Challenge

Once again, I have to start off saying "I really shouldn't do this."

I really shouldn't do this, but I'm signing up for another challenge. It's The Sunshine Smackdown! Battle of the Prizes Challenge – American Version, which must qualify as the longest ever title for a reading challenge! It's being hosted by Rose City Reader and runs from May 1 to September 7, 2009 – May Day to Labor Day. And since it only requires three (or four) books, it seems really doable.

These are most of the details:

Chose three books that you have not read before:

1) One that won both the Pulitzer and the National;
2) One that won the Pulitzer but not the National; and
3) One that won the National but not the Pulitzer.

OPTION: For those who have already read all six of the double-dippers, or otherwise do not want to read one of those six, pick two Pulitzer winners and two National winners for a total of four books.

Read all books between May Day and Labor Day. Overlap with other challenges is allowed -- and encouraged!

You can read more about it and find links to lists of the award books on the announcement page here.

I've got these three books in mind for the challenge:

1. Double Winner: Rabbit is Rich, by John Updike. Mainly because I've wanted to read it for years, I've got a copy, and my husband is a real fan of the Rabbit books. I've never read any of them, so maybe I should take a look at Rabbit, Run first.

2. Pulitzer Winner: The Optimist's Daughter, by Eudora Welty. I like Welty's short stories, so I thought I'd try one of her longer works. And again, I've already got this one on my shelves. [See my review.]

3. National Book Award Winner: Victory Over Japan, by Ellen Gilchrist. I really enjoyed her In the Land of Dreamy Dreams when I read it many years ago. I've also read Drunk With Love, but I don't remember that one quite as well. Don't think I own a copy of this one, so I'm hoping the local public library has it on their shelves.

Booking Through Thursday: Worse?

This week's BTT topic:
Which is worse? Finding a book you love and then hating everything else you try by that author, or reading a completely disappointing book by an author that you love?

Ouch! Both of those situations are painful, aren't they?

But while it's always annoying to be disappointed by a much-loved author, at least you have the hope that his/her next work (or the next one you read, at any rate) will be more on target.

So I guess I'd say the first predicament would get my vote as the "worst." Fortunately, it hasn't happened to me very often. I can really only think of a few cases where I've been mostly disappointed by an author, after enjoying one of their works. The one that comes immediately to mind, for me, is Virginia Woolf. The first thing I read by VW was Orlando, which I loved and still love. Since then, I've tried to read several of her other works, and just never could get interested. Well, I finished Mrs. Dalloway and To the Lighthouse, and while I didn't hate them, they just weren't as much fun as Orlando.

I had a similar experience with Maeve Binchy. And there again, I can't say I've hated any of her books. I read her short stories and fell in love with her writing, but then when I sampled her novels, they just didn't seem to measure up. I've started several, and never gotten through any of them. But they always sound like something I'd love, so someday I'll probably give her another chance.

Hmmm. This is one of those "too early to think about" questions, isn't it? Not an easy topic to consider before the mental fog clears.

Wondrous Words Wednesday

Every Wednesday BermudaOnion hosts Wondrous Words Wednesday, and asks everyone to share "new to you" words you've found in the course of your weekly reading adventures. To take a look at more wondrous words, or to contribute some yourself, please visit Bermudaonion's Weblog.

Didn't find any new words in my reading this week, so these are a couple from one of the books I read earlier this year, Hotel Du Lac by Anita Brookner. I always find wondrous words in all her books.

exeat – 1) A license for absence from a college or a religious house; 2) A permission which a bishop grants to a priest to go out of his diocese.

From the book: "The tall thin beauty with the dog was never visible in the daytime and it was impossible to imagine her doing anything except eating ice cream and smoking, like a child on an exeat from school." [p. 66]

crepitate - To make a crackling or popping sound; crackle.

From the book: "Edith felt the hairs on the back of her neck begin to crepitate." [p. 100]

Hmmmm. These days, my joints seem to be doing quite a bit of crepitating.

Review: Solaris

Written by Stanislaw Lem
Published by Harvest/Harcourt, 1987, 205 pages
Translated from the French by Joanna Kilmartin and Steve Cox
Translation copyright 1970, Faber and Faber Ltd.

What's It All About?

From the publisher's synopsis:

"When psychologist Kris Kelvin arrives at the planet Solaris to study the ocean that covers its surface, he finds himself confronting a painful memory embodied in the physical likeness of a past lover. Kelvin learns that he is not alone in this, and that other crews examining the planet are plagued with their own repressed and newly real memories. Could it be, as Solaris scientists speculate, that the ocean may be a massive neural center creating these memories, for a reason no one can identify?"

Kelvin and the other researchers on the Solaris space station are being "visited" by loved ones who should not be there. Are the visitors as real as they themselves seem to believe? And if so, why are they there? How have they materialized in this place at this time? And is their sudden appearance benign or is it part of a more sinister development, somehow tied to the planet the scientists are studying?

What Did I Think About It?

In his novel Solaris, first published in 1961, Polish author Stanislaw Lem managed to pull off that most difficult and most vital of tricks for the science fiction writer – the creation of a completely unique and authentic (even though mysterious) fictional world. Or, in the case of Solaris, a unique and authentic body of literature and information about that fictional world. Much of the book is taken up with detailed descriptions of the discovery and documentation of the planet Solaris, and the academic industry that grows up around it over a period of years. I suppose, depending on your personal tastes, this can be endlessly fascinating or endlessly boring. I have to admit that after a few chapters of "Solarist" minutiae, I started skimming over the details in order to get to the actual story.

I've had Solaris on my TBR list for over thirty years now, ever since I first heard about it in the 1970s. But I probably wouldn't have been nudged into reading it if I hadn't finally seen the Steven Soderbergh movie from 2002, starring George Clooney as Kris Kelvin. It's a haunting, thought-provoking film that really caught my attention; I've watched it several more times. And since I read the novel, I've also seen Andrei Tarkovsy's 1972 version. Neither film is completely faithful to the book, though each is different in its own way. And the novel is, to some extent, both more and less interesting than either film. It's certainly more cerebral.

For me, one thing that really stood out in the novel (as opposed to the films) was the relative lack of modern computer technology. Which is a little odd, since science fiction of the time was full of early imaginings of cyberspace and computers. After all, 2001's HAL was only five or six years down the road. However, there's very little of that in Solaris. When Kelvin begins his research on the possibly sentient ocean that covers the surface of the planet, he does it the old fashioned way – using books from the space station's library shelves. In a way, of course, that was refreshing; but also a little strange and disorienting.

Would I Recommend It?

Though I hate to admit it, I was a little disappointed in the book. Maybe it's just a result of reading about it for so many years: I've seen it receive so much praise from so many reviewers, perhaps my expectations were just too high. I didn't hate it, though; and I'm still very impressed with Lem's achievement. But if you like your sci-fi speculation mixed with more than a passing nod at action and drama, this probably isn't the place to look.

---------------
20 in 2009 Challenge
2009 TBR Lite Challenge
Books Into Movies Challenge
Lost In Translation Challenge
Read Your Own Books (RYOB) Challenge
The 42 (Sci-Fi) Challenge
Winter Reading Challenge

Tuesday Thingers: All My Covers

This week's topic for the Tuesday Thingers group is about book covers:

Do you have any missing covers (they show as a plain gray book)? Did you have a favorite view (title, author, date entered)? Do you have any favorite covers? If so, is there anything they have in common?

This is a new one for me – I really didn't know anything about the "All Your Covers" feature at LT. I think it's really neat, but I have almost two thousand books listed in my library, and when I gave it a try, my covers just kept loading and loading and loading . . . until I got bored and gave it up. So I'm afraid I don't have a favorite view or a screen shot to share. But, yes, I have many, many "missing" covers; although in my library they don't show up as blanks because I've changed the default to the red marbled cover, which I have to admit makes all those "coverless" books look really garish when seen en masse.

Do I have favorite covers? Well, yes, I'm sure I do (I'm pretty opinionated, after all). But there again, to go through two thousand covers searching for all the ones I really love would take a bit more time than I'm eager to spend. But generally I'm attracted to covers with interesting artwork – I'm not too fond of the simple author/title designs, or covers with the author's name in twelve-inch type. And I'm also usually put off by "tie-in" covers, with photos of movie or TV stars. And there are some covers that I'm attracted to simply because they stir pleasant memories. These are just a few of my favorites.


Tuesday Thingers is hosted by Wendi of Wendi's Book Corner. If you'd like to see more or participate yourself, head on over to her blog and leave a comment.

Teaser Tuesdays: French Flicks and Magic Castles

This week, I'm continuing with The Old Man and Me, by Elaine Dundy, set in early 1960s London. In this snippet, our heroine who is calling herself Honey Flood (not her real name) is at a film with a friend:

On the screen all hell was breaking loose: a Brigitte Bardot film, crackling with carnality. As I relaxed into its comforting amorality I felt my Honey clothes becoming unstuck and myself slipping into Bardot's panties. [p. 82]

OK, lest anyone should start suggesting that this blog ought to be X-rated, I offer another teaser from one of the books I'm reading for the Once Upon A Time III Challenge, Knight's Castle by Edward Eager (sorry about the extra line):

Eliza opened her eyes and staggered to the door after Ann. And then she wasn't sleepy anymore.
Where the hall should have been there wasn't any hall, just great airy space, and far above them a round shining globe that might have been the hall light back in unmagic times. [p. 69]

Teaser Tuesdays is hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading. If you'd like to read more teasers, or participate yourself, head on over to her blog. And these are the rules: Grab your current read; Let the book fall open to a random page. Share with us two (2) "teaser" sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12. You also need to share the title of the book that you're getting your "teaser" from … that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you've given! Please avoid spoilers!

Review: The Book of God and Physics - A Novel of the Voynich Mystery

Written by Enrique Joven
Published by William Morrow, 2009, 347 pages
Translated from the Spanish by Dolores M. Koch

This review refers to an uncorrected proof of the novel.

What's It All About?

From the publisher's synopsis:

"Hector is a young Jesuit science teacher. He is also part of a group that, for years, has been trying to decipher the secrets of the Voynich manuscript – a mysterious book written in an unknown language and illustrated with enigmatic drawings – which first surfaced four centuries ago in the heart of the Holy Roman Empire. With a cult following of amateur and professional cryptographers the world over . . . the Voynich manuscript . . . has stumped the best minds for decades. . . . When a possible key to unlocking the Voynich is discovered in Hector's church, powerful forces conspire to keep the manuscript from being decoded."

What Did I Think About It?

There really is a Voynich manuscript. I first became interested in it several years ago, after reading The Rule of Four, by Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason. That novel is concerned with solving the mysteries of the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, a Renaissance text that also really exists and has baffled scholars for centuries. In my reading about the Hypnerotomachia, I came upon the Voynich – another mysterious book, written in the 15th or 16th century, by an unknown writer in a mysterious language and filled with undecipherable illustrations. The book is named after the Polish-American book-dealer Wilfrid M. Voynich, who acquired it in 1912. According to Wikipedia, the manuscript now resides in the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library of Yale University, and a facsimile edition was published in 2005. I found both books fascinating and very much enjoyed the Caldwell-Thomason novel, so when LibraryThing's Early Reviewer Program gave me the opportunity to read an advance copy of Enrique Joven's book, I was eager to get started.

From the initial synopsis of The Book of God and Physics, I was expecting something of an intellectual thriller. Sort of James Patterson with footnotes. And, to some extent, I think that's what Joven was aiming for. But if so, he missed the mark by quite a distance. There is a mystery in the book, complete with hidden passageways, secret messages, and surprise betrayals, and a tragic twist near the story's end. But those traditional features of the thriller are slowed down, and the framing story of Hector and his friends and fellow investigators John and Juana is almost completely buried by the convoluted discussions of background and research. The explorations of the Voynich's history and possible authorship are interesting in themselves, but alone, they're just not enough to hold a novel together. Joven seems mainly concerned with refuting the theories of Joshua and Anne-Lee Gilder (who are authentic figures, just as their book Heavenly Intrigue really does exist), which ultimately makes for some tedious reading.

Joven relies a great deal on the device of a super-smart student in one of Hector's classes, who becomes fascinated with a part of the mystery and begins bringing Hector the results of his research. I found this just a bit tiresome; but then, I'm generally put off by child prodigies in fiction, so that may just be my own prejudices coming to the fore. Still, I think I would have been more comfortable with Hector doing his own research. Also, I thought a lot of the dialogue was stilted and not very believable. However, I have a feeling that may just be a fault of the translation and not of the author's writing (I'm always reluctant to criticize dialogue that I've read in translation).

Would I Recommend It?

Although the publishers call it a "thrilling page-turner," this is not a book in which a lot happens. If you're looking for chill-a-minute action scenes, in the manner of Dan Brown, or Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, this is probably not the book for you. A great deal of the book (a great deal) is taken up with the historical background of the Voynich manuscript, its possible authorship, and explanations of its connections with astronomy and the history of the Jesuits (at least the book is aptly titled). While I enjoyed the book enough to keep reading right to the end, I can't say I'd recommend it for everyone. It's brilliant and makes for very interesting historical reading, but action-packed it's not. In the end, I think the abundance of historical exposition simply overwhelms what began as a very intriguing idea for a novel.

---------------
20 in 2009 Challenge

Lost In Translation Challenge

Read Your Own Books (RYOB) Challenge

Spring Reading Thing Challenge