Unexpected Read

In preparing for the new religious ed school year, I was going through my boxes and bags of supplies and materials, and I came across, The Faith-Filled Classroom. I decided to go ahead and read it before I started my lesson plans for the year. It had some really nice inspirations and a great ice-breakers section. It really motivated me to get excited for the fourth grade class I'll be teaching this year!

LOVED The Namesake!

I highly recommend this book! I really loved it and look forward to reading more of Lahiri's books and short stories. I also want to see the movie that is based on the book that was released earlier this summer.

Big thanks to Kathy for letting me borrow the book for my plane ride back from the States last week. I think this is the first book we've both liked and agreed about, lol.

Next up:

The Blood of Flowers

Anita Amirrezvani

Goodreads

Checkout my reading list on Goodreads - where you can see what your friends are reading.

www.goodreads.com

Moving on

After my second unsuccessful attempt to read The Poisionwood Bible, I just decided to pass on it right now. Before I left Louisville (oh yeah, I forgot to mention, I'm back in Germany now!), K gave me a book by Jhumpa Lahiri called The Namesake (the new 8/101). I started it on the plane, and so far so good. I'm excited to really get into it once I sleep off this jet lag and can function like a normal person again! In the meantime, here's what Amazon has to say about it...

"Any talk of The Namesake--Jhumpa Lahiri's follow-up to her Pulitzer Prize-winning debut, Interpreter of Maladies--must begin with a name: Gogol Ganguli. Born to an Indian academic and his wife, Gogol is afflicted from birth with a name that is neither Indian nor American nor even really a first name at all. He is given the name by his father who, before he came to America to study at MIT, was almost killed in a train wreck in India. Rescuers caught sight of the volume of Nikolai Gogol's short stories that he held, and hauled him from the train. Ashoke gives his American-born son the name as a kind of placeholder, and the awkward thing sticks.

Awkwardness is Gogol's birthright. He grows up a bright American boy, goes to Yale, has pretty girlfriends, becomes a successful architect, but like many second-generation immigrants, he can never quite find his place in the world. There's a lovely section where he dates a wealthy, cultured young Manhattan woman who lives with her charming parents. They fold Gogol into their easy, elegant life, but even here he can find no peace and he breaks off the relationship. His mother finally sets him up on a blind date with the daughter of a Bengali friend, and Gogol thinks he has found his match. Moushumi, like Gogol, is at odds with the Indian-American world she inhabits. She has found, however, a circuitous escape: "At Brown, her rebellion had been academic ... she'd pursued a double major in French. Immersing herself in a third language, a third culture, had been her refuge--she approached French, unlike things American or Indian, without guilt, or misgiving, or expectation of any kind." Lahiri documents these quiet rebellions and random longings with great sensitivity. There's no cleverness or showing-off in The Namesake, just beautifully confident storytelling. Gogol's story is neither comedy nor tragedy; it's simply that ordinary, hard-to-get-down-on-paper commodity: real life. --Claire Dederer"

7/101

I finished Miep Gies book about Anne Frank's family when they were in hiding. You can get it from the Anne Frank House online shop at www.annefrank.org.

I think I'm going to go back to the Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver and give that another chance. I fly back to Germany on Tuesday, so I'll have plenty of time on the plane to read. I'm about 1/4 of the way through it, but I just can't get into the story. I'm going to try though...

Halfway

I'm halfway through the Anne Frank book. It's a really good, quick read for me. Miep Gies is a clear, simple writer, but she writes with a lot of passion. It's interesting reading about Anne's story from someone else's perspective. Should finish it tomorrow...

Still reading

Trying to maintain a little normalcy in my life right now even though all I want to do is lay in bed and cry... I miss my cat :(



I did finish Flies on the Butter (#6/101). It was a decent story, but nothing great... It wasn't a bad airport read when I was flying to and from Kansas City. I picked it up on the freebie shelf outside the library, so I didn't expect too much from it anyway.


I am now reading Anne Frank Remembered: The Story of the Woman Who Helped to Hide the Frank Family. I bought this book last Summer when I was at the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam. It is written by Miep Gies, the women who hid Anne Frank's family. If you've seen the movie Freedom Writers, the class reads Anne Frank's diary and then meets Miep Gies at the end. I am usually more of a fan of non-fiction, and anything about the Holocaust (or any genocide, actually) piques my interest, so this should be a quick read...

I know I'm a little off schedule with the number of books I've read, but I'm not too worried. I knew I'd get a little behind on this trip and have to play catch up when I get back to Germany in a few weeks.

So sad

My precious kitty passed away yesterday. I'm sure if you're on here reading this, you already read our other blog, but if not, please look at Buddha's Tribute. I am just devastated at the loss of Buddha. I have spent just about every day of the last eleven years with her, and I am having a really hard time imagining life when I get back home to Germany (I'm still on my trip to the States) without her... I do take comfort in knowing that she did not suffer, and she received more love in her short life than most people get in a lifetime. She was my baby, my best friend, my battle buddy, and my companion...

Rest in peace my sweet little princess Buddha

6/16/96-8/2/07