Mini Book Review (sort of)

Room

By Emma Donoghue

I had this book on hold for about a million years at the library (I'm not much of a book buyer since I'm (a) cheap and (b) I generally don't ever read books a second time) so after waiting forever for this much hyped and anticipated book I was needless to say quite disappointed.  It's a hot book right now on book club lists, getting talked about by everyone and so perhaps I had built it up a little too much in my mind.

The basic premise is this:  A woman has been held captive in a single underground room since she was 19, is repeatedly raped by her captor and while there gives birth to a son who is now 5 years old and the narrator of the story.  I guess this was the main drawback of the story for me.  I found it dreadfully boring and slow to have it told through a child's perspective. 

I am the kind of person who finds stories like this extremely fascinating when they are in the real news and apparently this story was inspired by one of those cases, so I thought I would like this story a lot more than I did.  But, to be honest I didn't even read the whole book, hence the title of this post.  I was so bored in the beginning I sort of skipped to the middle and then skipped some more to the end just to find out what happened and get it over with. 

I don't know if it's because I just would have preferred to have the story told from a grown-up perspective or just that the kid kind of drove me crazy with the way he spoke.  I mean, I get it, it's the only world he's ever known and his mother did a wonderful job raising him considering the circumstances but it just didn't resonate with me at all.

I would love to know what you thought about this book if you've read it already, I'm beginning to wonder if I'm the only person who doesn't think this book is all that and a bag of chips.  I guess I'll just stick with the true life stories from the news to satisfy my morbid curiosities.

The Happiness Project

For the past couple of weeks I have been reading, The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. Intellectual and informative books always take me longer to get through. But anyway, My book club at church read it. I have always wanted to be part of a book club and now I finally am! I have really enjoyed reading this. Gretchen maps out a 1 year happiness project doing different things to help enhance her overall well being and feeling of happiness. She wasn't depressed or anything she just wanted to be happier. I love this book because she takes charge of her own happiness. She doesn't let the world or whatever happens to her determine it. She doesn't tell you specifically what to do to be happy, but you can learn from her project. Besides, we all have different things we need to do to make ourselves happy.

There are some negative reviews on the book. Some people thought she sounded arrogant because she talks about her great life. But, I didn't feel that way. Possibly because I read reviews before hand, and I decided I didn't want to judge her (or judge her book by it's cover ba ha ha). It's not incredible writing, but I didn't need it to be. I have simply enjoyed learning from her everyday stories. It also helped me to realize that I am personally doing a lot of things to instigate my own happiness. However, I have so much to work on.

Here is one of my favorite quotes from the book (It's kinda long sorry), "To be happy, I need to think about feeling good, feeling bad and feeling right...To be happy I need to generate more positive emotions, so that I increase the amount of joy, pleasure, enthusiasm, gratitude, intimacy and friendship in my life. This wasn't hard to understand. I also needed to remove sources of bad feelings, so that I suffered less guilt, remorse, shame, anger envy, boredom and irritation. Also easy to understand. And apart from feeling more "good" and feeling less "bad", I saw that I also needed to consider feeling "right."

I just loved that quote when I read it, and I wrote it down in my journal so I would always have it handy. The author goes on to develop her, "First Splendid Truth" which is, "To be happy, I need to think about feeling good, feeling bad, and feeling right, in an atmosphere of growth."

So I have been working on having more positive thoughts this week. Like when I am feeling stressed out at my job I say, "I love my job, I love my job, I am grateful for the money, It's so convenient." It actually helps. I notice that when I am positive, I work faster. Another time I was craving a candy bar really bad and I said, "It might make you feel good right now, but the long term effects will make you feel worse." And I resisted. I am pretty proud of that one, but I can't always resist the sweets. Not now that we have a Neilsen's Frozen Custard in Rexburg now! Yay!
I hope you enjoyed the review. Peace out sistas.

This 'n That

I have been savoring the sweet taste of victory since my last post! It is pretty exciting, I must say. (Oh, the things we moms get excited over!) I was prepared for that battle to be long and hard fought. But luckily, it only took a few days! Now he's done it 5 or six times, enjoyed his candy bar AND his ice cream cone (Cotton Candy Thrifty cone, to be exact!) and I am one happy, stubborn momma!

I must be going crazy because I find myself longing for summer vacation to be here already! I'm so tired of the school routine. Papers, homework, forgotten instruments, carnivals, reports, field trips, money for book orders, money for field trips, money for carnivals, money for tye-dyed t-shirts, I'm over it! This is bad because I'm sure that two weeks into summer I'll be pulling my hair out and wishing school was back in session!

Is anyone else as upset as I am that Corey and Leah from Teen Mom 2 are splitting up? I'm pathetic, I know, but that show is addicting and they were my favorite ones. I had high hopes for them, I wish they'd work it out and stay together for their family. And on that note- does anyone else still wish that John and Kate would get back together? Do it for the kids!!! Ok, I'm done now.
I always forget how good Fruit Stripe gum is and then the flavor runs out two minutes later. And it smells good too! You should get some, even if only for the memories of chewing it as a kid.

Mini Movie Review

We had some half-price movie tickets that we needed to use so we snuck out on Saturday night and saw Hanna. I'm not such a huge fan of movie reviews. I've decided I don't need an expert movie watcher to tell me all the intricacies and details of a film and whether or not it lives up to his/her high standards for movie viewing. And sometimes if a movie gets great reviews and is really built up then it can be a huge disappointment when the movie doesn't live up to the hype. I usually enjoy movies because I don't go into them with all these high expectations and I can generally tell from a preview whether or not I'm interested in seeing a film. That being said, I actually wanted to see Hanna and it did not disappoint. It was well done, suspenseful, had enough violence for my husband and I think it only had one f-word (for those of you who care).

Mini Book Review

I just finished reading the book Dreaming in English by Laura Fitzgerald. It's a book I just picked up randomly at the library off of their new releases shelf. Apparently it's a sequel to Veil of Roses, which I haven't read yet, and I hate reading books out of order but hopefully it won't ruin it too much. This book is about an Iranian woman who comes to America looking for a husband because she doesn't want to go back to Iran. I love reading books about other cultures, I find them so interesting. I also love it when a book is set in a locale close to home because I can visualize it so well and this one is set in Tucson. It was an easy, fast, light read which is sometimes nice when I'm not in the mood to read something heavy. The thing I loved the most about this book is that it oozes love for America. It got me thinking about everything I take for granted as far as being blessed to be born in this country goes, and that's a very humbling thing, really. Don't read this book looking for literary greatness, it's mostly just a feel good love story which left me... feeling good!

That's it, I'm done! Peace out homies! And, as my two year old told me last night when I put him to bed, "Good night Mom, have a good day!" Soooo, good night and have a good day!

Favorite Childhood Books

When I was a child I loved to read. Nothing could compare to being swept up in a story so vividly drawn upon the pages of a good book. I have memories of creeping out of bed and into the hall to read by it's light, desperate to finish a book, staying up way past bedtime. I sobbed one night at the ending of Where the Red Fern Grows. My heart pounded throughout the suspense of The View from the Cherry Tree. I can hardly remember any of the books I read as a teenager, but the ones from my childhood have remained with me and it is these stories that I love to share with my kids. So, one of my favorite things to do is read these books to them at bedtime. I love to pick books I remember from those days and that I have loved all these years. This also happens to be one of my children's favorite things to do with me.

Some of our favorites are:

Amy's Eyes

by Richard Kennedy

I never forgot reading this book and so when my kids were old enough that I knew they would appreciate it I started searching for it. It could not be found at any library and when I discovered it was out of print, I was so sad. But, luckily I found it on Amazon and bought a used copy. I must say I was bursting with pride because my kids loved it as much as I did and we all cried together at the end.

The BFG

by Roald Dahl The kids and I have never laughed so hard in our lives! Honestly! Great fun!

Also great books by Roald Dahl: James and the Giant Peach, Matilda, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory; really, we love anything this man wrote.

The Secret Garden

by Frances Hodgson Burnett She writes such wonderful stories, full of vivid characters and rich scenery that you are able to jump right into. My kids loved this one and Little Lord Fauntleroy both equally as much. Her characters always learn great lessons and leave you wanting to be a better person.

Next up from this author: A Little Princess

Also highly recommended by my kids: A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle, Socks by Beverly Cleary (we are cat lovers around here), Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain, and Charlotte's Web by E.B. White

Another fun thing we like to do is watch the movies that correlate with the books, if they have one. We watched both the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory movies and did a comparison/contrast to the book. For the record: the new movie more closely follows the book, but we like the Willy Wonka character more from the older film. We've also watched James and the Giant Peach, Matilda, The Secret Garden, and A Wrinkle in Time.

What books did you love as a child? I'm always on the lookout for more ideas!

Book Review- Midwives

I recently read Midwives by Chris Bohjalian on the recommendation of my sister Tara. It's always surprising to me to read a book from a woman's point of view written by a man. And actually from the point of view of a teenage girl. She is relating the story of a delivery by her midwife mother gone bad and how if affected all of their lives. It was definitely an interesting read especially considering the fact that I have 5 children, all delivered in a hospital, and am currently pregnant.

I will admit that the first 100 pages or so, while the story was developing, were fairly graphic and somewhat difficult for me as a pregnant woman to digest. But, once I got past that part I found the story engaging and intriguing and I finished the book pretty quickly. In my opinion it wasn't an "I can't put this book down" type of book but it was good and I did enjoy it.

My knowledge of midwives is probably average as far as the profession goes so I loved getting to read more in detail some of what they experience during the prenatal and birthing process. Honestly, I've never really considered using a midwife in my own life but the whole situation is extremely fascinating to me. I say, to each her own when it comes to childbirth, although I will admit to thinking that some women are crazy to want to have a child at home. I have certain fears of birthing complications and my mind feels more at ease delivering in a hospital with a doctor who is capable of performing emergency surgery if so needed. Let's face it, how many thousands of women and babies have died during childbirth without the miracles of modern medicine? That being said, I do wonder what it would be like to deliver a baby at home without any medication or monitors to aid in the process and when I hear other women talk of the experience it does pique my curiosity, but not enough to actually go through with it (or give up that sweet epidural).

Anyway, I do recommend this book to anyone who has ever had a child or who hopes to one day have a child or who has found themselves intrigued with the process of childbirth and midwifery. I'm not sure that many men would find this book interesting although I could be completely wrong on this. Except for my husband who frequently comments on the books that I check out for him by saying, "I think this is more along the lines of something YOU would read."