Jayne's Books

Can hardly believe that June is almost gone and that the school year is nearly complete.  It only seemed like it was May yesterday and suddenly a Canada Day long weekend is upon those of us in Canada!  Yay!

It actually was a  quite productive month, even though it really didn't feel like it.  This past month, I posted reviews for The House Girl and The Whole Truth (books that I completed before May's post but didn't have reviews for at the time of last months post).

I also completed and reviewed The Gods of Heavenly Punishment and The Help.

I am still reading the classics that I mentioned last month and have started a bunch more books.  It doesn't look like I am going to finish Villette before the 1st, but then again I have a bunch more days to work on it before I have to get it completed for The Classic Club's spin project (you list a bunch of books you want to read, they pick a number, and you have to read the book that corresponds with that number).  I am also …

After a fairly busy day, its really my first time sitting down and I am feeling like I need to say something...

Listening to... a variety podcasts.  There are a few podcasts that are from LibriVox of the classics that I am currently reading and managed to get a few of them down this past weekend.  I am also listening to a podcast on World War II, a podcast on the history of the English language, a couple on British history, one on World War I (its a project through the Imperial War Museum),  and a few on books/reading, including Books on the Nightstand (a really good podcast by Ann and Michael) and the New York Times Book Review and so forth.

Eating...  Right now nothing. I just a wonderful meal that included pull pork (it was so good).  I made a Spinach Strawberry Salad with a homemade dressing.

Watching... At the moment I am watching The National, but I have been watching a number of TV shows on DVD over the past week (including The Bletchley Circle and Upstairs Downstairs) and the od…

Yet another lazy Sunday in my household (which only consists of myself most weeks) and while I am looking forward to getting back to work, I am also looking forward to summer break and reading lots and lots of books.  And because I (a) can't think of anything else to write and (b) because I just have to, here is my list of potential summer reads:
• Twelfth Night • Where'd you go Bernadette? • A Constellation of Vital Phenomena • The Snow Child • Moby Dick • Wives and Daughters • The Thorn Birds • Dearie • Villette • The Light Between Oceans
I don't know how many I will actually get done off of this list, but I would think that I would likely get most of them done.  I will hopefully keep you updated.

The Book Blogger Hophas moved to the Ramblings of a Coffee Addicted Writer.  I hope you are able to join me.
This week's question submitted by Elizabeth.
When you are writing your reviews, do you write them as you are reading or wait until you are completely done with the book?
I usually wait until I have completely finished the book to write my reviews.  The primary reason being that how I feel at the beginning of a book is sometimes different how I feel at the end of a book and my opinions of the book change as I read.  I have read books in which I really didn't like the book at the start and by the end of the book I quite enjoyed the book and vice versa.

Spring has ended and summer has begun.  While I am sad spring has ended, I am happy that summer is starting.  For whatever reason, this spring was a bit emotional for me and reading seemed to be a secondary thing to do.  It wasn't that I didn't want to read, it was just that it was hard to get myself motivated to read.

But in the midst of it all, I did actually read quite a bit. Of the 8 books, I wanted to read/finish, I got 6 done.  One of them is still being read and one I just couldn't get myself to finish (it became really weird and I just couldn't understand what I was reading).

Here is my list of books that I wanted to read during the challenge:

1) War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy 
2) Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (review)
3) The Accursed by Joyce Carole Oates (review)
4) The Chaperone by Laura Moriarty (review)
5) A Red Herring without Mustard by Alan Bradley (review)
6) To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
7) The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegge…

Title: The Help
Author: Kathryn Stockett
Pages: 522
Published: 2011 (Originally published 2010)
Challenges: Chunkster Challenge, Historical Fiction Challenge
Genre: Literary Fiction, Historical Fiction
Edition: Paperback, Movie Tie-in
Source: Personal 

Description: Three ordinary women are about to take one extraordinary step.

Twenty-two-year-old Skeeter has just returned home after graduating from Ole Miss. She may have a degree, but it is 1962, Mississippi, and her mother will not be happy till Skeeter has a ring on her finger. Skeeter would normally find solace with her beloved maid Constantine, the woman who raised her, but Constantine has disappeared and no one will tell Skeeter where she has gone.

Aibileen is a black maid, a wise, regal woman raising her seventeenth white child. Something has shifted inside her after the loss of her own son, who died while his bosses looked the other way. She is devoted to the little girl she looks after, though she knows both their hearts may be broken.

M…

Title: The Gods of Heavenly Punishment
Author: Jennifer Epstein
Pages: 384
Published: 2013 (first published 2012)
Genre: Historical
Challenges: Historical
Edition: Hardcover
Source: Library

Description: Fifteen-year-old Yoshi Kobayashi, child of Japan’s New Empire, daughter of an ardent expansionist and a mother with a haunting past, is on her way home on a March night when American bombers shower her city with napalm—an attack that leaves one hundred thousand dead within hours and half the city in ashen ruins. In the days that follow, Yoshi’s old life will blur beyond recognition, leading her to a new world marked by destruction and shaped by those considered the enemy: Cam, a downed bomber pilot taken prisoner by the Imperial Japanese Army; Anton, a gifted architect who helped modernize Tokyo’s prewar skyline but is now charged with destroying it; and Billy, an Occupation soldier who arrives in the blackened city with a dark secret of his own. (via Goodreads)

Thoughts: I struggled wi…

Title: The Whole Truth : a novel
Author: Kit Pearson
Pages: 336
Published: 2012 (first published 2011)
Genre: Young Adult, Historical Fiction, Canadian
Challenges: Historical
Edition: Paperback
Source: Library

Description:It is 1932. Polly and her older sister, Maud, travel by train and boat from Winnipeg to an island between Vancouver and Victoria. Polly will live with their grandmother, the sisters? new guardian, and attend the small school on the island, while Maud will go to boarding school in Victoria.

Their extended family welcomes the girls warmly. New-school jitters give way to new friendships and even a new puppy, and slowly Polly feels that she is becoming part of a larger family she never knew until now.

But Polly and Maud have a dramatic secret, and they have promised each other never to tell anyone. A surprise arrival on the island, however, threatens Polly?s newfound happiness and tests the bonds of family love. Can Polly keep the secret and her new life on the island?
Thou…