KIRBC Notes, March 22, 2010

Winter’s icy chill had not yet abated, and yet eight brave book warriors still made the trek to my home, where they’d be warmed by close quarters and heated conversation. Here’s the down-low from our latest (themeless) meeting in Toronto.

Sarah recommends . . .

This American Drive, Mike Holmes

• a hybrid b/w novel and graphic novel.
• Drawings of food! Which can be a little bit distracting but “it’s not like War and Peace, right?”
• Kind of a diary of a road trip from Halifax to Texas – make or break relationship moment
• couple eating  their way across America
• light reading
• The ultimate endorsement: “It made my heart happy.”

Natalie recommends . . .

Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic, Alison Bechel

• a literary graphic novel
• memoir/ coming of age and coming out (for herself and her dad)
• family runs a funeral home
• JK wants to be adopted by Natalie’s family so she can be a part of their brainy family discussions
• named one of the top books of the year by just about everyone
• a really really rich experience
• Ed. Note: I’ve already received my hold notice at the library for this one. Go TPL!

Bad Behavior, Mary Gaitskill

• short story collection
• Lots of dark sexuality *collars in the room are unbuttoned*
• Unflinching eye, an honest writer
• “Secretary” turned into a Maggie Gyllenhaall movie.
• Dark, ironic humour

Reeder recommends . . .

Unsweetened, Jodie Sweeten (aka Stephanie on Full House!)

• Reeder drove all over Las Vegas trying to find the book
• made Reeder keep a People Magazine (with the headline “From Meth Addict to Mom”) for two years
• A 2 day read
• How Full House is a fast track to ruin (something we all secretly suspected)
• Missing info: how to do meth (much speculation ensues)
• Reeder also found the chapel where Jodie got married in Vegas
• Jodie was burned by Dancing with the Stars 4x
• a great photo section shared with the group (including mullet pictures!)

Bronwyn recommends . . .

Under This Unbroken Sky, Shandi Mitchell

• story of Ukranian immigrants trying to build a life together in Canada
• Extremely depressing and brutal, but still strangely uplifting
• comparison 1930s prairie literature used as an endorsement (!!! — Specifically cited: Wild Geese and As For Me and My House)
• book has cinematic feel because Shandi is a filmmaker
• caused some B. tears!

Tennile recommends . . .

Payback, Margaret Atwood

• A rare non-fiction foray for Tennile
• focuses on debts between people, concepts of owing and balance
• Margaret Atwood probably had a glass of wine while writing, since it “just flows from one ludicrous idea to the next” (in a good way)
• the idea for a t-shirt that says “What Would Margaret Atwood Do?” emerges. People on twitter confirm they’d buy it.
• Discussion of Atwood not being an economist lead to the spontaneous reco: The Undercover Economist

JK recommends . . .

Bitten, Kelley Armstrong

• smart, sassy, sexy werewolf story (more in my review)
• has solid review cred and a dedicated fan following
• refreshing to have a series you can look forward to once again

Mike recommends . . .

Under the Dome, Stephen King

• Mike reads this 1100-page beast standing up on the subway (it must be good!)
• Same basic plot as The Simpson’s Movie
• Mike admits to King’s “marked drop off in quality after he got hit by the car”
• takes place in a small town (which is under a dome) and then takes the shit out of the small town
• lots of meth (much like Unsweetened, similar story I’m sure)
• Tennile once moved into a place where she discovered stash of Stephen King books, making “every week a new nightmare.”
• NO JACKET COPY WHATSOEVER (which is basically the equivalent of writing, “Just buy it, I’m Stephen-fucking-King.”)

Ron recommends . . .

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Diaz

• The kind of book that hits you upside the head
• about a nerdy Dominican boy growing up in New Jersey
• It’s cool to read about other nerds – but here bringing it out of the white middle class experience
• Diaz nearly went crazy writing the book
• Writing like a force of nature
• Gripped within the first 5 pages
• Spontaneous Reco: Let the Great World Spin, Colum McCann
• Makes men cry
• Makes you a bigger nerd just by reading it

Loretta recommends . . .

Shantaram, Gregory David Roberts

• about man who is in prison in Australia and he escapes and he flees to Bombay where joins an Afghan mafia lord
• recommended to Loretta by an Indian friend, who praised its authenticity
• the first time Loretta has EVER cried in a book. I’m ordering IT IMMEDIATELY
• Based on a true story

Didn’t make it to this meeting? Never fear! The KIRBC will be back a month (hopefully with more chairs). New members are always welcome!

Tomorrow I’ll also be announcing a project for April that will be bringing the KIRBC and its members from near and far, to a computer near you!

Read Full Post »

Lullabies for Little Criminals, by Heather O’Neill

“In Lullabies, I wanted to capture what I remembered of the drunken babbling of unfortunate twelve-year-olds: their illusions, their ludicrously bad choices, their lack of morality and utter disbelief in cause and effect” – Heather O’Neill on Lullabies for Little Criminals.

I had to begin with this quote because it’s such a succinct indication of how real O’Neill keeps her depiction of childhood. In fact, she’s been criticized by some readers (hopefully just the sheltered ones who still believe in the tooth-fairy) for keepin’ it too real – a concept that I find ridiculous since much of the inspiration for the characters and situations came from O’Neill’s memories of her own upbringing.  Don’t get me wrong, I do sympathize with the need to quantify childhood with images of happy kids jumping-rope, but doesn’t it seem like blatant self-trickery to pretend that being a kid is always all sunshine and rainbows?

The fairytale land of childhood looks much different and not so squeaky-clean when it includes having a heroin-addicted father and being completely poverty-stricken, as it does for Baby, the protagonist and narrator in Lullabies. Growing up in Montreal’s red-light district, motherless, with no solid role models, and a father who’s in and out of rehab, Baby faces issues that no twelve-year-old should have to deal with. Yet, there’s a certain dissociative lightness and (much-needed) comic spin as Baby tells the story of her childhood in a voice that vacillates fascinatingly between adult and child. While her descriptions of the events in her life are speckled with a grown-up’s insight and understanding, they’re also sometimes purely hilarious in their naiveté. (SPOILER ALERT: In real life if I encountered a couple of thirteen year olds who were trying magic mushrooms, I would be concerned for them. But, when the kids in this book whipped up a spaghetti and magic mushrooms feast, because they thought magic mushrooms sounded “so cute”, my laughter could not be contained, unfortunately for my fellow ttc commuters.)

It’s not all fun though; O’Neill also delves into the seriously troubling relationships between children and adults, highlighting the ways in which kids are drawn to grown-ups and how they often find it difficult to distinguish between the well-meaning and the villainous. On that same wavelength, she paints a frightening picture of the seedy adults who weave themselves into the lives of children (children being the only demographic impressionable enough to embrace the dirtbags while unknowingly being exploited by them). When Baby get’s mixed up with the seemingly friendly neighborhood pimp it’s obvious that she’s looking for attention and willing to accept it indiscriminately.

Childhood fearlessness combined with her need for adult attention finds Baby in so many awful circumstances… I won’t lie, at some points it’s uncomfortable to read. If it were a movie I would’ve been cowering with my hand over my eyes. But, the thing is, the characters have such authentic personalities and relatable situations that reading this novel was like watching a close friend make mistake after mistake and being unable to reach out and help. All I could do was  non-judgmentally read and hope for the best. Most shocking to me was my ability to be non-judgmental of characters that are clearly flawed; I really wanted to condemn Baby’s father, Jules, as no-good junkie but it’s pretty impossible not to like him on some level. With his extreme lack of fashion sense, his ridiculous stories, and his genuine (often misplaced) love for Baby, O’Neill did an amazing job of portraying him as a person and not just an addict.

It makes sense to me that this book was the Canada Reads winner for 2007.  I loved the characters (or at least the characterization) and I didn’t find that O’Neill was keepin’ it too real; it’s so important to push these issues out into the open (regardless of whether it offends people’s refined sensibilities). Granted, I’ll probably never be able to look at scraggly little kids the same way again, but I think that’s probably a good thing.

[Ed. Note: JK also reviewed this book here]

Read Full Post »

KIRBC Notes for January 26, 2010

Despite the (unseasonably mellow) mid-winter cold, a group of intrepid book lovers conquered the 10/16-18 minute walk to the wilds of High Park to share their wide reading experience, and fittingly for the new year, make many new reading resolutions.

Marci –  Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett

• best if punctuation in the title is noted and read accordingly (!!)
• hardcore fantasy cover
• part of the Discworld series first of the guard series
• parody of the fantasy novel
• exploring a story from the perspective of guards rather than just making the peons and/or part of the body count
• thieves guild, dragons for the slayage and fantasy stand-bys (+ a magical library! JK (in after school special mode: “Like all libraries…”)
• “I think I’m just going to keep reading Terry Pratchett until I die.”
• Recommended by “the girl who’s in charge of Terry Pratchett”
• “To catch a dragon you have to tie a virgin to a rock.” Tennile: “That’s not a virgin.”

Michelle – The Amazing Absorbing Boy, Rabindranath Maharaj

• familiar Toronto locale, but makes you see it through different eyes
• 17 year-old Trinidadian boy who comes to live with his estranged father in Canada
• understands the world through comic books, so the book has a real comic book feel
• an immigrant experience story, but one you won’t roll your eyes at
• breakout book

Ashleigh – She Came to Stay, Simone de Beauvoir

• life-changing book for Ms. Gardner
• had a teacher who was one of Simone de Beauvoir students, when she lived across the street from Beauvoir & Sartre’s grave
• teaching philosophy through literature (teaching existential ideas through situations)
• thinly veiled autobiography
• autobiography 101: dedicate your book to your husband’s mistress
• works well as a companion to Being and Nothingness

JK – Important Artifacts and Personal Property from the Collection of Lenore Doolan and Harold Morris, Including, Books, Street Fashion, and Jewelry, by Leanne Shapton

• book posing as an auction catalogue for a valentine’s auction
• delicious little voyeuristic look into a relationship based on artifacts
• Lingerie! Marginalia! Mixed tapes!
• Not a true relationship but it seems so real
• Like looking through someone’s old stuff with the convenient back story included
• Closely track their relationship by the progression of possessions
• Absolutely absorbing to dive into the details of someone’s life even if you know they’re not a real person
• Read my review here

Reeder – Lullabies for Little Criminals, by Heather O’Neill

• top 3 of Reeder’s reads from last year
• young girl with a heroin addled father on the streets of Montreal
• finding the beauty in little things, even in terrible circumstances
• Canada Reads Champ 2007
• Reeder as mentor to misguided fictional characters: “I just wanted to be her friend and talk to her about life.”

B. Kienapple – The Mistress of Nothing, Kate Pullinger

• dark horse GG winner from last year
• Kate Pullinger called people out on twitter who didn’t know who she was! (including two members at this meeting
• A rather attractive older lady (Pullinger)
• Plot: 1860s Egypt – older lady (presumably rather attractive) who is the toast of English society goes to Egypt (land of death) with her lady’s maid to help her TB
• a passionate love affair starts up – spicy!
• doesn’t fall prey to orientalist fantasies, seems pretty well-rehearsed
• a good escapist read for January
• cover with the Binchy Blue of Heart and Soul

Cheese – The Carnivore, Mark Sinnett

• lots of book fondling because of the lovely cover
• 5 reallys before “enjoyed it.” (solid)
• more solid Toronto-based content – set during Hurricane Hazel in 1954
• doesn’t love to hate the characters, just fully hates them: “they’re awful people and they deserve each other.”
• about a relationship in which surviving each other is about en par with surviving a Hurricane
• Read Cheese’s review here

Tennile – Kiss of the Fur Queen, Tomson Highway

• Library bargain sale! $0.25, baby!
• Cover has prairies and dogsleds (JK says, “Yikes.”)
• Sold on it within 10 pages, didn’t put it down over 2 days
• about 1^st round of kids in the residential schools and how it affects their lives (sad, sad times.)

And that’s all folks! Tune in next month for a very special KIRBC project, in which I extend my domination of other people’s reading lists even more!  The great reveal to come soon!

Read Full Post »