TSS - Book Betrayal

I'm really bummed this week. Like, I cannot ever remember having this icky of a book experience.

Last weekend I went to my local library to peruse this shelves. I wanted to walk away with a book that I had no prior knowledge of so I was quite thrilled when I came across Burned Alive. It's an autobiographical account of a woman who grew up in a small village in Palestine. When she was eighteen her brother-in-law doused her with gasoline and lit her on fire because she was unwed and pregnant. The novel heavily exposed the punishments of the honor law held in these cultures. Souad's story was painful to read, heart-wrenching, and nauseating.

I finished Burned Alive in a day. And when I closed the book, I wanted to immediately write my review because the story was *that* powerful. It was important to me to present my emotional encounter with this book.

Things came up that prevented me from having the time I wanted to do this review. So, I put it off for Monday. And that's when it happened.

Betrayed. By The. Book?

Essentially, I wanted to do a bit of an internet scavenger hunt because I am a self-professed ignorant individual when it comes to middle eastern politics. In part, that's why I was anxious to read this book. Instead of finding more information about Souad and her story, or the woman, Jacqueline who helped rescue her from Palestine and into Europe, I find articles debunking the memoir completely.

Now here's the thing, sure while I was reading it there were a couple of things that struck me as questionable. Most prominent in my mind was Souad's trip to the hospital after being severely burned where she claims that the doctors and nurses didn't give her any water or food because they wanted to kill her off, keep the honor code, not get involved, etc. I know basic physiology. Enough to know that we couldn't really survive without water for weeks. But, my justification for her thoughts and how they didn't mesh with what I know is, duh, she'd just been burned alive. She couldn't truly have been fully aware of everything that was going on while in the hospital room. In fact, I would guess she slipped in and out of consciousness quite frequently. I know I do when I just have a cold!

The articles brought up other evidence, like the treatment of the burn wounds, likeliness of her survival, and the village having a telephone. Yes, a telephone. a technicality that I read quite willingly because - in case you forgot - I'm IGNORANT of what type of technology other parts of the world have. If you tell me that a village has a phone, I'm gonna believe it. I mean, *I* have a phone. And *I*'ve had a phone all my life. Sure, I get that there are places that don't. But, really. If you say that you do, who am I to question it.

I'm not going to go further into the questionable-ahem-citations (except that Jacqueline and her volunteer organization no longer exists....) because, quite assuredly, it will just bum me out more!

And I've been trying to unbum myself since this past Monday when my bubble bursted.

I know I'm not the first. Hell,Oprah even got betrayed by Million Little Pieces. And perhaps the worse hoax that I've heard about is the book Angel at the Fence by Herman Rosenblat (Rosenblat wrote that he met his wife while a concentration camp, invoking this incredible love story. However, in actuality, him and his wife were set up on a blind date in NY).

Gosh, I'm sure that there are even more books out there that I could find if I decided to do the research. I just don't think my soul could handle it.

And honestly, I guess, in summation to all of this venting/bumming/whiny I want to ask, simply, why. Why betray a willing audience? Why distort life? Why capture something in humanity that should be exposed and shared if it's not authentic? I mean really, how do they go to sleep at night?

I hope in the case of Souad, if the story truly was false, that people didn't send money to the organization to show support. That just makes the deed so dirty! I'm glad the book opened some doors for me to research honor killings; I just wished that I had a validated book to rave about because it pointed me in that direction.

Walking Backward

Title: Walking Backward
Author: Catherine Austen
Pub Date: 2009
Pages: 167
Genre: Young Adult, Realistic Fiction
Challenges: YA

Josh is twelve years old. He has a little brother, Sam, who is four. Up until recently, his life was pretty normal. And then his mom died.

You would think that this would be a depressing book, wouldn't you? And although it deals with existential questions like what really happens to us when we're dead, it's equally thoughtful and humorous. Well, in that the humor borders on dry and nudges up against mouth-dropping-open.

For example: Josh's dad, since the mom's death is hell bent on building a time machine. He spends his hours after work locked down in the basement because he's SO CLOSE to making it work. Josh of course realizes that his dad has gone off the deep end and decidedly says so in his journal (which we get the privilege to read). Amusing, but amusing in that sad way, yaknow?

Josh is also concerned about the legacy his mom could have left. He becomes a bit obsessed with the Darwin Awards (awards that are handed out the inanely stupid people, whose stupidity results in physical accidents or death). You see, although Josh's mom was brilliant (she was a professor at the university and everyone loved her) she had extreme phobias. Including a snake phobia. Plastic snakes freaked her out. Pictures of snakes freaked her out. And it just so happens that there was a snake in her car the day that she drove off to run errands, which OBVIOUSLY freaked her out - so she ran off the side of the road and crashed into a tree. Josh is FEARFUL that his mom's death will be awarded the Darwin Award and e-mails them, begging that they pass her story by.

In order to help deal with his grief, and maybe I see it as dealing, but a twelve year old boy wouldn't, his natural inclination is to research what all of the major religions believe about death and dying. Especially, how long is the appropriate time to mourn someone that you love. Which I think is a very important question for anyone, but even more so for a young kid who misses his mom but catches himself laughing every now and again.

I really enjoyed this book and because of its length was able to finish it in a couple of hours. I will definitely keep Catherine Austen on my radar. And since death is such a touchy subject and I honestly believe books are great therapy, I'm keeping this on my shelf for my students to enjoy.

(Oh, and I got this book from LT's Early Reviewers).

Love Story

Title: Love Story
Author: Erich Segal
Pub Date: 1970
Pages: 131
Genre: Romance
Challenges: GG

Love Story is not an adored novella because of its originality. Oliver the nth is a preppie Harvard athlete with daddy issues up the arse. I mean, how can Ollie compete with Daddy Does It All Perfectly - or as he refers to him, sonavabitch or Stony Face. Jennifer is the witty working class artiste who is studying music at Radcliffe. They meet, they fall in love, they marry, and Jenny dies of a rare form of leukemia. Don't scream, don't scream! I didn't give anything away because (a) you're not going to read this story because of the plot and (b) Ollie opens his story revealing Jennifer's death.

So why read this if not for plot? Oh my gods, the writing, of course! Segal writes both simply and eloquently; humorously and sentimentally; nerdy and literary. You gets me?

My emotional reactions (SPOILERS - DO NOT PASS GO!)

I didn't know what to think when I first opened this book. I had not heard a gosh darn thing about it until one day whilst reading Bookmarks they mentioned it as an all-time must read in the literary romance category. Romance normally doesn't pull at my strings. But I decided to take the risk. I found it on Bookmooch and Bam.

When I opened it and found out in the first page Jennifer was going to die, I thought: Oh well, okay. Now I know, I won't tear up. I'll be emotionally detached because I can prepare myself. Boo on the author for doing that!

And then I met Jennifer - Jenny - Jen through the eyes of Ollie and man alive did she kick butt. I was giggling and nodding my head at her shaming "Preppie" in this teasing-but for real sorta way. She was totally someone I would hang with.

Ollie's relationship with his dad was also interesting. In every scene he dogged daddy viciously. "Yes sir", "no sir", while never giving the man an opportunity to talk. Now, I realize that we walked into this relationship while Ollie was twenty and I am sure that there were tons of built up frustrations that the poor young Ollie went through to turn him into this bratty and disrespecting young man - but *still* I had to agree with Jenny when she kept on reminding Oliver that his dad loved him. But you know what was great? I mean, why this was so important to my love for this book? Even though Segal didn't go into detail about Ollie's life growing up in the shadow of his dad, you got it. I mean really got it. This book is a small book. A quick read. But the characters SPRUNG alive. I have read books that push 400 pages and I still don't feel a thing for the people involved.

Which leads me to the ending. I knew Jenny was gonna die. Didn't I tell you, it opened that way? But when I realized I had only twenty or so pages left and knew the inevitable was coming I wanted to slow down my reading. I grew angry. Was I really going through my own process of dying? Mental check - yup, I denied that the author would end on that note, I bargained with myself...maybe I could stop reading and pretend that all ended well...anger - yup that was easy (don't kill off Jenny!!). Finally I just accepted the fact that I had to keep reading. And then, most surprisingly - grief. I teared up. I teared up having known that it was not going to end well to begin with. I teared up after spending only 130 pages with these people (and the font size was not ultra small, people).

Meet Jennifer and Oliver.

I waved the envelope at hear. She immediately recognized the letterhead.

"Hey - Harvard Law school! Have you been kicked out?"
"Guess again, you optimistic bitch," I yelled.
"You were first in the class!" she guessed.
I was now almost ashamed to tell her.
"Not quite. Third."
"Oh," she said. "Only third?"
"Listen - that still means I make the goddamn Law Review," I shouted.
She just sat there with an absolute no-expression expression.
"Christ, Jenny," I kind of whined, "say something!"
"Not until I meet numbers one and two," she said.

Reading Resolutions 2010

(This post was intended to be my Sunday Salon post, but in my attempt to rescue a poor puppy from the freezing cold weather yesterday I'm a day late.)

It's that time of year again to reflect on last year's reading resolutions and create new ones! I have to admit that this is one of my most favored times of year. I love reading the best of books (yours, Amazon, NYT, etc.) and seeing what you're goals are for the new year.

First, a reflection on last year (2009):

Goal 1 - In 2008 I only read four non fiction books, so for 2009 I wanted to read a 5 to 1 ratio. FAIL! But, I did read 15 books so that's got to be something right? Baby, baby steps! LOL.

Goal 2 - I wanted to make sure I took time out for "me" and read at least 5 days of the week. YAY! I'm going to say that I met this one, even though I have know way to prove it. I'm merely basing it on my average of pages read was 80 per day. I know that I had gone days without reading this year, but I must have made up for it somewhere!

Goal 3 - I wanted to incorporate short stories into my reading repertoire. FAIL! What I did realize this year though is I'm not a big fan of the short story. I don't know why but they don't satisfy me. Maybe this will change with time, but for now I'm accepting it and movie on.

Goal 4 - Not being a huge science fiction fan, I wanted to read at least 3 science fiction novels. FAIL (?) I truly only read one science fiction novel: Never Let Me Go. *But* I did read a handful of science fiction/fantasy young adult books: Hunger Games, Catching Fire, Forest of Hand and Teeth. So, maybe I met this one?

Now onto 2010's resolutions....

Goal 1 - I have to do something about my TBR list. And wait, let me clarify, my TBR list of books already purchased, mooched, received that I have on my shelf glaring at me. I created a separate LibraryThing account that lists all of the books that I own and haven't read. I've "originally" named it MustReadBooks(!) and the list sits at 171. So here's the thing, I realize that I will not be able to read 171 books this year. I also realize that it would be insane for me to lay down the law, if you will, and not permit myself to add to this collection (you and I both know that there are some awesome books coming out this year) or check out books from the library (I have signed up for some really cool challenges to push my limit). So, my goal is to at least read 50 books from my stack and by the end of the year and give away at least 20 that I realize I have no intention of reading anytime soon. It's not clearing my shelf, but this goal will at least put a dent in it!

Goal 2 - I want to re-read some of my booky favorites this year. In the past, I've always felt kinda guilty re-reading, ya know? It's like, there are so many fantabulous books out there that I haven't even read why re-read something that I know I already love. But then, I hate thinking back to these incredible books and going, "Damn, I remember that was awesome. I just don't remember really *why* it was awesome." And luckily enough for me, there's a challenge just for this thing!

Goal 3 - Poetry. Poetry. Poetry. Enough said. At least three collections (I will not include novels told through poetic conventions - collections only!)

Cheers and happy reading!