Laura's Orange July 2011

I've read all the winners -- well, except for 2011 -- so my July reading will be mostly shortlisted books. These are my top 4 choices:

The Tiger's Wife, by Tea Obreht (having read all winners, I have to keep the streak alive)
Molly Fox’s Birthday, by Deirdre Madden (2009 shortlist & I have this on my shelves)
The White Family, by Maggie Gee (2002 shortlist, I have this on my shelves, & Darryl recommended it!)
The Memory of Love, by Aminatta Forna (2011 shortlist)

I'd also like to read Great House and Annabel, both from the 2011 shortlist, but I doubt I'll get to them in July.

I'll be posting about my reads here, in the 75 Book Challenge group, and on my blog.

Pumpkin will be reading with me:

I read The Tiger's Wife and Molly Fox's Birthday and liked them both. I hope you do too! =)

Imagine having read all the winners! well done.

I'm hoping to read the first winner this July. I picked it up at the second hand book sale. I didnt' realize that A Spell in Winter was a winner. I recognized Helen Dunmore's name, and it said it was nominated for an Orange Prize on the cover.

Will wait to see what you think of The White Family I have been recommended it too - is not at my library so need to buy it if I ever wish read it.

Ohh! Found your actual Orange thread! Such a cute picture of the oranges -as well as your cat!! Darling images!! Fancy having read all of the Orange Prize books! Good for you!

All I can say is that cat really needs it tummy tickled!

>5 vancouverdeb:: Hi Deb, glad you found me !!!
>6 primlil:: do so at your own risk. He's sweet most of the time but can snap in an instant!

Hi Laura - Stopping by the wish you a Happy Orange Reading! Love the picture of Pumpkin. I read Molly Fox's Birthday a few years back and I am curious to hear your thoughts on the book.

I'll keep you posted!

I'm oranging!

This afternoon I found some quiet time to curl up and start The Memory of Love. I thought about reading on the deck but it was too hot! Anyway I've read about 45 pages and am really liking the language, and finding the characters interesting.

I so love the cover of The Memory of Love. I think it might be worth the price of the book just to have that cover. She is so lovely and it (the cover) reminds of another, but I cannot remember what book or who tis.
Enjoy Laura.
hugs,
belva

>10 lauralkeet:: The Memory Of Love is another book which just gets better.

>11 rainpebble:: I loved the cover, too. She definitely suits the book!

I think the cover is quite evocative and it reminds me of something else too Belva. Wish I could remember which one ... I may have to go peruse my library.

Beautiful cover! Beautiful book!
I believe that The Memory of Love is good enough to keep you from being lured into a snooze by that cute Pumpkin.

Hi Laura! Enjoy Memory of Love. I know I really did -and as other's have noted -it gets better and better the further you get into it! And yes - Kate Atkinson seems to be a wonderful writer - judging by Case Histories which I just finished... and by One Good Turn which I've just started.

**psstttt* to #15 and #8 She's Laura. You're welcome. Signed, Linda.

Oh, yes, I will say I absolutely loved the cover of Memory of Love. It's the one good part of taking so long to read it - I got to enjoy the cover longer. And it was also worth the $1.05 late fee I accrued at the library.

Orange July Book #1
The Memory of Love ()
Reviewed on LibraryThing & on my blog

The Memory of Love takes place shortly after Sierra Leone's Civil War (1991-99). Adrian, a British psychologist, has returned to the country following an initial short volunteer experience. He's left his wife and daughter at home in the hopes of making a difference, helping the people of Sierra Leone recover from trauma. His methods are viewed skeptically at first, but eventually he begins to have a positive impact on his patients. Kai is a brilliant young surgeon working in the same hospital, and haunted by war trauma and lost love:

And when he wakes from dreaming of her, is it not the same for him? The hollowness in his chest, the tense yearning, the loneliness he braces against every morning until he can immerse himself in work and forget. Not love. Something else, something with a power that endures. Not love, but a memory of love. (p. 185)

Kai is still in love with Nenebah, a woman who left him some time ago. He also misses his best friend Tejani, who left the country to practice medicine in the US. Kai toys with the idea of joining him, and takes steps necessary for immigration, but is clearly ambivalent about leaving other loved ones behind in Sierra Leone.

In Sierra Leone, silence rules the day: the war is simply not discussed; personal stress is suppressed, as if it's all a big secret. Most of Adrian's cases suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, having witnessed horrific violence during the war that they have been unable to deal with on an emotional and psychological level. And then there is Elias, the patient who on the surface appears the most "normal." Elias checks himself into the hospital, knowing he is near the end of his life. He has a compelling need to unload his personal story on someone, and Adrian begins meeting with him. Elias worked at the university, first as a lecturer and ultimately as dean. While his personal circumstances kept him away from most of the violence, he and other academics were arrested under suspicion of some vaguely described wrongdoing. Elias describes his response to this event, and its impact on important people in his life, in a matter-of-fact way but gradually Adrian realizes there's much more to Elias' story.

Aminatta Forna uses patient stories, gradually revealed through Adrian's therapy, to help the reader imagine the war's events. She also builds a web of people which I found fascinating. Kai and Adrian's lives intersect first on a professional level and later in deeply personal ways. The connections between people and events unfold slowly, and for me each revelation was very emotional. This is especially true of Elias; when his "sins of omission" are revealed, his real character becomes known, as does a connection that binds him with both Adrian and Kai. The ending was especially wrenching and yet somehow, just right.

This is a superb book; I was transfixed and couldn't put it down.

And I'm currently reading The Tiger's Wife.

Hope you like The Tiger's Wife! =)

Have you read Forna's debut? I wasn't terribly impressed by it, but it sounds like Memory of Love is much better!

Wonderful review of a wonderful book! The Memory of Love definitely seems to have our consensus this year!

Eva, was Ancestor Stones her debut? I have a copy of it but haven't read it.

Yes! I couldn't think of the title. I was going to have you compare them if you'd read them both. ;) I tend to be v picky about multiple narrators; I want them all to have a distinct voice/style rather than all sound the same. So that's why I wasn't a huge fan of Ancestor Stones: several 'aunts' (aka 'sister wives') telling stories but I couldn't tell who was talking unless the chapter was labelled.

Eva no, I haven't read anything else by Forna. I'll have to keep my eyes open for that one.

It sounds as if Forna's writing has developed since Ancestor Stones. The characters in Memory of Love are certainly distinct!

Good to know Dee, thanks! :) And sorry for hijacking your thread Laura. ;)

No problem at all!!

Thanks for the review of Memory of Love - another one I must get round to!

Orange July Book #2
The Tiger's Wife ()
Reviewed on LibraryThing & on my blog

In The Tiger's Wife, Téa Obreht weaves together fantastic tales filled with folklore and a bit of magical realism. Natalia and Zora are two young doctors, traveling to a remote village to administer vaccinations to local children. It's shortly after the dissolution of Yugoslavia, and political/religious tensions are still high. Just before leaving home, Natalia learns her beloved grandfather passed away while on a journey far from home. Her grandmother is justifiably distraught. She was unable to be with her husband at his death, and she doesn't understand what he was doing in the place where he was found.

Natalia mourns silently; she doesn't even confide in Zora. Her grandfather, also a doctor, was clearly a mentor and role model. As Natalia remembers visits she and her grandfather made to the zoo, she begins retelling stories he passed down to her, mostly about his life and the people of his village. The stories read like folk tales. The end of one story often led to another, to flesh out a particular character even further. This put me off at first, because I kept wanting to get back to Natalia, Zora, and the village. I struggled a bit with the magical realism in stories featuring "the deathless man," but I persevered and enjoyed them more than I thought I would.

I really wanted to love this book, but in the end I simply liked it. I spent the first half of the book frustrated, unsure where it was going. Then I got swept up in one of the stories and thought, "now we're cooking, I'm really going to like this!" I found the connections between stories interesting, and became emotionally invested in some of the characters. Unfortunately, I was unable to hold onto those feelings. Téa Obreht is clearly a talented writer, and despite my feelings about this book I'm looking forward to watching her career and reading more of her work.

I am loving your reviews Laura. They really give one a feel of the book. Thank you.

Nice review of The Tiger's Wife, Laura!

I'm conflicted, and it is coming to me in the next few weeks from the library. Overall it sounds alright.

Thanks Belva & Darryl. I was conflicted too, Elizabeth, having read reviews all over the map. It's worth reading. And I hope you enjoy it!

Great review of Memory of Love. I really enjoyed it too. Your review really covers the book very well.

Orange July Book #3
The White Family ()
Reviewed on LibraryThing & on my blog

Alfred White has had a long career as a London park keeper. His days are spent patrolling the park, monitoring its condition and making sure visitors adhere to park rules. Alfred is close to retirement, and has seen a lot of change over the years. He longs for the Britain of his youth, during and after World War II. He is especially upset by the influx of foreigners, changing the ethnic mix of his London neighborhood and, consequently, the park visitors.

One day Alfred collapses on the job and is hospitalized. His sudden weakness shocks his wife and adult children, who have grown accustomed to Alfred's firm, controlling hand. His adult children have all gone their separate ways, but are brought back into contact at Alfred's bedside. Darren is an established journalist living in the US, and is on his third marriage. Shirley is in a relationship with a black man, which caused a rift with her father. Dirk has been unable to establish an independent adult life, and lives at home while working in a corner shop. He has developed disturbing extremist political and racial views.

May, the wife and mother, held this crew together over the years. Like many women of her generation, her husband made all the decisions. When Alfred went into hospital, May found she couldn't even withdraw money from the bank on her own. But May is also strong inside, in her own way, and she has a suppressed intellect that remains an important part of her life:

She always liked to have a book in her bag. In case she got stuck. In case she got lost. Or did she feel lost without her books? There wasn't any point, but she liked to have one with her, a gentle weight nudging her shoulder, keeping her company through the wind, making her more solid, more substantial, less likely to be blown away, less alone. More -- a person. (p. 19)

Through short chapters narrated by different family members, Maggie Gee develops the White family's history and the nature of the parent-child and sibling relationships. Each of the children bear scars from their father's discipline and temper. Darren appears successful on the outside, but is deeply wounded inside. Shirley has been unable to have children, and struggles with issues of faith. Dirk is a ticking time bomb, prone to alcohol-infused bouts of temper as he acts out his resentment towards anyone better off than himself. Alfred and May, for all their flaws, have shared a long and loving marriage, and are likeable in their own ways.

This book is not for the faint of heart. There's a lot of sadness, as the entire family copes with Alfred's medical condition. May considers, for the first time, that Alfred may not always be there for her. Alfred struggles with weakness & infirmity. Each of the children relive their childhood and their relationship with Alfred, and rather than bond together each of them struggles individually. There are also many disturbing moments, particularly Gee's portrayal of racism and anti-immigrant sentiment. This would have been a 4.5-star book were it not for a too-tidy denouement about Shirley which struck me as both unrealistic and unnecessary. Still, this is a well-crafted story, with a strong emotional pull and an intense and startling climax.

Nice review, Laura. I was also quite disappointed by the denouement about Shirley, which caused me to drop my rating to 4-1/2 stars.

Well Darryl, I just increased my rating to 4 stars, but I still feel the same way about the denouement. I was thinking about this all afternoon and realized this would have been a 4.5 star book except for that ending.

Orange July Book #4
Molly Fox's Birthday ()
Reviewed on LibraryThing & on my blog

In this quiet, contemplative book, an unnamed narrator spends a day reminiscing about her long-time friend, Molly Fox.

Molly Fox is an actor, and is generally regarded as one of the finest of her generation. (She insists upon 'actor': If I wrote poems would you call me a poetess?) One of the finest but not, perhaps, one of the best known. ... She likes the fear, the danger even, of the stage, and it is for the theatre that she has done her best work. Although she often appears in contemporary drama her main interest is in the classical repertoire, and her greatest love is Shakespeare. (p. 2)

The narrator is a playwright, using Molly's house as a retreat to work on her latest play while Molly is away in New York and London. During the course of a day -- which happens to be Molly's birthday -- she relives significant moments in their lives, and reflects on their relationships with friends and siblings.

The two met many years before, when Molly was cast in the narrator's play, and supported each other through the highs and lows in their careers and relationships. The narrator's older brother, Tom, is a priest who befriended Molly and may have counseled her through some difficult situations. Molly's brother, Fergus, suffers from undefined psychological difficulties precipitated by traumatic events in his childhood.

As the narrator putters around Molly's house, she recounts several events in her relationship with Molly, painting a clear picture but one that seems just a bit too cut and dry. I suspected there was more to the story than she was letting on, perhaps more than she was willing to admit to herself. I began to pick up on tiny clues to a deeper perspective. When Fergus drops in to visit Molly but finds only the narrator at home, he stays to chat and ultimately provides critical insight to Molly's character and history, casting entirely new light on everything that was revealed before.

This was a very interesting study of memory and point of view, and how personal experience shapes relationships.

Great review, Laura!

Molly Fox sounds like a winner. I'm putting it on my list. Thanks for the great review, Laura.

Thanks !! :))

Just a quick note to say that I'm off on vacation for a week, starting tomorrow. I'm bringing some good books with me of course (including Great House, my last book for Orange July), and I'll be lurking on LT via my iPad, but reviews will have to wait until I return!

Have a great vacation, Laura!

Enjoy your vacation! You'll have a great time!

I think you will really like Great House Laura.
Enjoy your holiday and come home rested.

Hope you had a great holiday, Laura - look forward to hearing what you've been reading.

#13 - The exact same cover image for Memory of Love was used for Someone Knows My Name (ISBN 9780732288921). Weird, eh?

Very weird! Also I am getting a wrong book when I click on your Someone Knows My Name.

Someone Knows My Name is also titled The Book of Negros, which is what the touchstone links to, I think. If you click on the touchstone, and then go to See All Covers, you'll be able to see the one that is the same as Memory of Love.

Gotcha. thanx HRO.

Orange July Book #5
Great House ()
Reviewed on LibraryThing & on my blog

Great House is an unusual novel that makes considerable demands of the reader. The book is made up of four loosely connected stories, but I didn't pick up on that at first. Part I has four chapters -- the first part of each story -- and felt disjointed, like four unfinished, disconnected works with weak character development. At the close of Part I, I was enormously frustrated. I broke one of my cardinal rules and read some reviews of this book. They inspired me to continue reading, and I'm glad I did. I finished the first story in Part II and was flooded with emotion. The same thing happened with the second, third, and fourth stories. And suddenly the book made sense, and I was reminded of a quote I'd flagged early on:

There are moments when a kind of clarity comes over you, and suddenly you can see through walls to another dimension that you'd forgotten or chosen to ignore in order to continue living with the various illusions that make life, particularly life with other people, possible. (p. 14)

I found myself warming to the characters which include a writer telling her life story, an older man reflecting on his relationship with his adult son, a man who discovers a secret his wife kept from him for years, and the adult children of an antiques dealer. Woven through Great House are themes of exile, loss, and betrayal, all in a Jewish context. It was fascinating, and I kept flagging quotes like this:

What is the point of a religion that turns its back on the subject of what happens when life ends? Having been denied an answer -- having been denied an answer while at the same time being cursed as a people who for thousands of years have aroused in others a murderous hate -- the Jew has no choice but to live with death every day. To live with it, to set up his house in its shadow, and never to discuss its terms. (p. 175)

Towards the end I could see how Nicole Krauss was building a kind of metaphor for the Jewish experience:

if every Jewish memory were put together, every last holy fragment joined up again as one, the House would be built again, said Weisz, or rather a memory of the House so perfect that it would be, in essence, the original itself. Perhaps that is what they mean when they speak of the Messiah: a perfect assemblage of the infinite parts of the Jewish memory. (p. 279)

Well as I said, this book does make demands of the reader. I'm not even sure I understood it all, but I felt rewarded in the end.