Monthly Archives: March 2010

Book Awards Galore!

By monnibo | Published: March 17, 2010

The BC Book Prizes announced the 2010 Finalists on Thursday, March 11. Yes, this is self-promo since I work with the BC Book Prizes, but I really believe in what we do so I don’t care! There are some great authors and illustrators listed for seven different awards. We also organize a free Soirée and right now we’re planning our 7th annual BC Book Prizes On Tour. This tour takes finalist authors all over the province — we’re planning three legs: Northern BC, Kootenays, Okanagan and Vancouver Island. Sign up for email newsletters on our website to get all the updates. Canada Reads 2010 also concluded the debates on Friday, March 12. The winner was Nikolski by Nicolas Dicker, translated by Lazer Lederhendler. In my review of Nikolski, I mention I was pleasantly surprised by the translation. However, I’d like to comment that the Canada Reads debates weren’t as intriguing for me this year compared to last year. I remember painting my bedroom last March/April and listening to the debates. I kept thinking “oh I want to read that” for each of the books. I loved The Book Of Negroes and still really want to read Fruit: A Novel About A Boy and His Nipples by Brian Frances and Outlander by Gil Adamson. I think that this year they spent too long debating what makes a book “Canadian”, which was never really the point of Canada Reads. I guess that they [CBC/Canada Reads] need to make their criteria less vague [...]

Posted in Books, Personal, Sharing | Tagged bc book prizes, book awards, british novel, Canada Reads, canadian book, canadian book awards, giller prize, orange prize for fiction, pulitzer prize, uk fiction | Comments closed

8 x 10 by Michael Turner (book review)

By monnibo | Published: March 13, 2010

book review for 8 x 10 by Michael Turner

I picked this book up at the office, and it has been recently shortlisted for the BC Book Prizes’ Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize. I think it is best to start with the publisher’s description, because if I had been handed this book without recommendation or any idea what to expect, I would have been quite confused. Shockingly original and intensely intelligent, 8 × 10 is a series of snapshots of a world torn apart by war and migration. 8 x 10 is a work of fiction, written in spare prose. Its title is derived from a commercial portrait format (the 8×10 glossy) and is related to the structural layout of the book: the lives of eight people — and the lives they come in contact with — told over ten events, each. With respect to who these people are, no one is known by their names or their ethnicity but by their relationships to each other — son, mother, sister, father, aunt, etc. — and by their occupations — tailors, sales representatives, art gallerists, bartenders, soldiers. doctors, gangsters, musicians, etc. Some are known by their circumstances — émigrés, immigrants, refugees; others by their actions — thief, bully, murderer. We never know what year we are in, nor are places referred to by name. Events are fashioned so that we are unsure whether we are in North America, Africa, South America, Europe or Asia. All events are interrelated. A portraiture based on behaviour. [From the publisher, Random House Canada] Even though [...]

Posted in Books, Reviews | Tagged bc author, bc book prizes, book review, canadian book, michael turner | Comments closed

Illustrious Illustrations

By monnibo | Published: March 11, 2010

It’s been a long while since I participated in Booking Through Thursday, so here we go! How do you feel about illustrations in your books? Graphs? Photos? Sketches? As long as they relate to the text and illuminate it in some way, then I am fine with illustrations. I really enjoy when they add to the reading, such as the illustrated Book of Negroes; you read about a plant you don’t know of in the story, and there is a lovely illustration of it. Where I didn’t enjoy sidebar images and asides was Generation X; some of the stuff were just little doodles, cartoons, random witty headings. The problem was they only made sense if you read the text, read the sidebar notes, then reread the text to see how it applied. I love illustrated non-fiction. My favourite flipping/read-randomly book is The Oxford Companion to Shakespeare. There are so many themes and play-on-words within Shakespeares’ plays as well as period-references that lend very well to an illustrated companion. I don’t like illustrations when they dictate what the characters look like or exactly what a scene looks like. I think that the writing should be able to do this and stand alone. However, I recall my Literature 12 textbook having a number of illustrations, particularly for The Canterbury Tales. In this sense, I felt that illustrations of people were very poignant because the text itself is ironically flattering. On the other hand, I also have to say that I would never [...]

Posted in Booking Through Thursday, Books | Tagged Booking Through Thursday, illustrated books | Comments closed

Crochet Success!!

By monnibo | Published: March 10, 2010

Chelle taught me to crochet probably two years ago. She gave me a gift with a gorgeous crochet hook, WIP bag and 2 balls of KnitPicks Shine in garden green. It was a lovely gift and I went around in a circle crocheting double and chaining randomly in between. According to my Ravelry project page, I’ve been crocheting this since May 6, 2008. heh… Well look at me now: I had no plan, I just kept crocheting in a circle. I did have to rip back several times as I (1) learned to decrease and (2) tried to make it fit my head. Once my circle got too large, my idea had been slouchy hat, and I am proud to have pulled it off successfully. Then I grabbed some pink yarn — My Strawberry Cheesecake from When Sheep Dream which I won in the Hot Cocoa Swap (round 2) for my Marshmallow Diver. I crocheted the flower from the same pattern as wenchlette’s wedding flowers. I am really impressed with how it turned out. I did a few rounds of single crochet at the end to create a band. I wore it on Monday and it’s super easy to wear — tuck my hair behind my ears, place it on my head, and the bobby pins above my ears to hold it in place. I’m not much of a “hat person” because of my long hair, so this is the perfect compromise.

Posted in Crochet, FO, Knitting | Tagged Crochet, yarn | Comments closed

Fall On Your Knees by Ann-Marie MacDonald (book review)

By monnibo | Published: March 8, 2010

book review for Fall on Your Knees by Ann-Marie MacDonald

I know this post should have gone up sooner since the debates for Canada Reads begin today… but I procrastinated reading Fall On Your Knees and procrastinating writing this review. Why did I procrastinate? Tammy kept saying, “It’s so depressing, I’ve put it in my basement and just want to forget it’s there.” Which made me not want to read a depressing book after finishing the delightful Nikolski by Nicholas Dickner. I have to admit, yes it was a somber story, but it is quite brilliant writing. I enjoyed the characters, how honest they were, and how real they were. At times I felt the book dragged on, but by the end, I was fully satisfied. My favourite character is Mercedes because I think that she is an unsung hero of the family. I was also constantly in awe of how she maintains faith while questioning the ways of her God. At the start of the 20th century, James Piper sets fire to his dead mother’s piano and heads out across Cape Breton Island to find a new place to live, eventually eloping with 13-year-old Materia Mahmoud, the daughter of wealthy, traditional Lebanese parents. And so, from early on, Ann-Marie MacDonald establishes some major themes: racial tension, isolation, passion and forbidden love, which will gradually lead to incest, death in childbirth, and even murder. At the centre of this epic story is the nature of family love, beginning with the Piper sister who depend on one another for survival. Their [...]

Posted in Books, Challenge, Reviews | Tagged ann-marie macdonald, book review, Canada Reads, canadian book, fall on your knees | Comments closed

Monthly Archives: March 2010

8 x 10 by Michael Turner (book review)

Illustrious Illustrations

Crochet Success!!

Fall On Your Knees by Ann-Marie MacDonald (book review)

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