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One Hundred Years Of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)

As usual, I’m using the extra free time I get on vacation to catch up on some reading. I just finished the book “One Hundred Years Of Solutide” by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the winner of the Nobel Prize of Literature.

The book tells the story of the rise and fall, birth and death of the mythical town of Macondo through the history of the Buendía family and its unforgettable men and women, their times, their struggles, their curse and damnation – the solitude that would finally destroy them and the universe that they created and inhabited.

This is one of the best works of fiction I have read in a long time, it feels so real and true, no matter how unreal some events seem, it’s as if the writer is telling the true history of a real town; I totally agree with the people who call Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s style as magical realism, it totally sums up the feeling you get when reading it.

I really recommend this book to everyone who is into a good story well told, that will bring the characters and places alive in your imagination, and give them a life of their own.

If you’re interested in reading this book, you can buy it here.

The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)

I finished reading “The Lovely Bones” by Alice Sebold last night. I came across this book a number of times throughout the past years, and I thought it would be an interesting read, so it’s been on my to-read list for a while, the only thing that made me get around to reading it faster is that Peter Jackson is currently working on making a movie based on this book, and so I wanted to read the book before the movie was released.

The novel tells the story of Susie, a murdered 14 year old girl who recalls what happened to her from Heaven, and follows how the incident affects her family and those around her, as well as the different connections that are built between them.

I liked the approach to this book and how the narrator is the murdered girl, looking down from heaven and telling the events as she sees them in detail.

Another idea I really liked in this book is the concept of heaven described in it: Heaven isn’t a place that is the same for everyone, it’s a place that is personalized for every person according to their ever-changing dreams, wishes and imaginations.

I can pretty much see how the movie will turn out and I can’t wait to see it and see the different choices Peter Jackson will make while bringing it to film.

There are places where it feels a bit stretched out and you might start to lose some interest, but it quickly tries to catch up, and it’s a pretty good and interesting read all in all.

If you’re interested in checking it out, you can buy it here.

The Secret Life Of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)

Yesterday I finished reading “The Secret Life Of Bees” by Sue Monk Kidd. I’d picked the book up from the Waterstone’s in Manchester’s Trafford Centre a few months ago while I was shopping for books there, and I remembered hearing about it being a good read somewhere, most probably on a friend’s blog.

The book follows the story of 14-year-old Lily Owens, neglected by her father, isolated on their Georgia peach farm, and the trip she takes with her nanny Rosaleen in search of the truth about her mother, ending up in Tiburon South Carolina with three black beekeeping sisters.
The events take place in 1964, so all the racial tensions and the problems surrounding the Civil Rights Act are going on in the backdrop of the story.

It’s a great book, well written and narrated, that I truly enjoyed reading and that I went through really quickly. What got to me the most, although I guess it’s not the main objective of the book, is the passion surrounding beekeeping, and it got me wishing I could venture into beekeeping at some point in my life.

I really recommend this book, it’s light and a pleasure to read.
If you’re interested in checking it out, you can buy it here.

A Long Way Down (Nick Hornby)

This weekend I finished reading “A Long Way Down” by Nick Hornby. As with the other Nick Hornby books I read, this one was a delight as well, a light read, humorous and full of pop culture references.
High Fidelity is still my favourite book by him, and also my favourite movie based on one of his books, but this one isn’t far behind.

The story goes as follows: On New Year’s Eve, four people decide to commit suicide by jumping off the roof of a London tower block. By coincidence, they end up all four on the roof of the same tower block, and instead they form a sort of implicit pact to keep each other going on.

It’s not overly serious and neither is it a trip towards an unrealistic happy ending, it’s pretty realistic and tells life the way it is.
I really liked the way the four characters narrated the story from their different points of view, also giving you an insight into their respective personalities, I have to say it’s what I enjoyed most about the book.

I did get a feeling that the ending was a bit abrupt, and that it could go on a bit longer, but then others might have felt that it was stretched a bit; in the end, I guess it just simulated the pace of life events, bringing you close to an image of how the character’s lives would go on, and letting you imagine the rest, which I think is a good way to do it.

I ran across this book a number of times before I decided to buy it, I don’t know, I guess I just didn’t imagine what the story would turn out like at first, but well, it turned out to be quite a good read after all, and if you would like a light book to go through, and you have already read “High Fidelity”, then this book could be a good option for you.

The Devil and Miss Prym (Paulo Coelho)

I recently finished reading another one of Paulo Coelho’s books: The Devil and Miss Prym, which was a pretty good read.

As usual Coelho touches upon another important subject that leaves you thinking, re-thinking and exploring your inner self.

The book explores the parameters of Good and Evil, the eternal struggle between them, and their impact on the human soul, passing a message that there is no such thing as a person, or as humans in general, being inherently “good” or “evil”, all humans have both good and evil within them and what defines them are their choices, an idea that I totally agree with.

It might not be as powerful as “The Alchemist” or some of his other books, the characters might not be as full of life, and maybe the ending could have been stronger, but still the message does get across, and the goal of getting you to think is accomplished, something I love about Coelho’s writings.

I personally enjoyed this book, and would recommend it to people who have already enjoyed reading one of Coelho’s masterpieces.

My score for this book is: 7/10.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

Author JK Rowling has finally revealed the title of the seventh and final Harry Potter book. It will be called “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows”, she announced on her official website.

Speculation about the plot has surrounded the book after Rowling admitted two characters will die – some think it could be Harry Potter himself.

The book’s publication date is not known yet, but as usual, it is expected to be a really big seller, just like its predecessors.
Sales of all Harry Potter titles now total more than 52 million worldwide.

Another Bookworm Tag

So another bookworm tag is making the rounds; I’ve been tagged by Reflect Upon.

Tag rules: Grab the closest book to you, open page 123, scroll down to the 5th sentence, post the next 3 sentences on your blog, name the book and author, then tag 3 people.

So here goes…

“They came to a low room with a sloping roof (a penthouse, it seemed, built on to the north end of the house). Its walls were of clean stone, but they were mostly covered with green hanging mats and yellow curtains.”

— The Lord Of The Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien

I’ll tag: AquaCool, Sleepless Jojo and Tom.

The 10 Best Books of 2006

A list of the 10 best books of 2006 compiled by the NY Times:

– Absurdistan (Gary Shteyngart)

– The Collected Stories of Amy Hempel (Amy Hempel)

– The Emperor’s Children (Claire Messud)

– The Lay of the Land (Richard Ford)

– Special Topics in Calamity Physics (Marisha Pessl)

– Falling Through the Earth: A Memoir (Danielle Trussoni)

– The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (Lawrence Wright)

– Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War (Nathaniel Philbrick)

– The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals (Michael Pollan)

– The Places In Between (Rory Stewart)

Some of these books sound very interesting and will sure be on my to-read list.

[Source: NY Times]

The Fifth Mountain – Paulo Coelho

Ever since I read “The Alchemist“, I’ve been wanting to read more of Paulo Coelho’s books, and a few days ago, I started reading “The Fifth Mountain“, which I finished yesterday.

This book tells the story of the prophet Elijah, his flight from Gilead and the time he spent in Zarephath. Coelho delves into the prophet’s character, revealing the thoughts, doubts, and discoveries that Elijah must have experienced as he struggled to find his course in life amidst the confusion of war and political turmoil.

The story is really inspirational and as usual Paulo injects a lot of wisdom into it, making you think about the world around us, our roles in it and our relationship with God.

Just like “The Alchemist”, this book is packed with a bunch of inspiring quotes , such as the following:

“The words of the lord are written in the world around us. Merely be attentive to what happens in your life, and you will discover where.”

“It’s always necessary to know when a stage of one’s life has ended. If you stubbornly cling to it after the need has passed, you lose the joy and meaning of the rest.”

“A child can teach an adult three things: to be happy for no reason, to always be busy with something, and to know how to demand with all his might that which he desires.”

So to keep it short, I really recommend this book, it’s quite worth the read. I did enjoy “The Alchemist” a bit more, but this is a great book nevertheless.
I can’t wait to read another Paulo Coelho book.

I give this book a rating of: 8/10.

Paulo Coelho Free Online Event

An interesting free online event for all Paulo Coelho fans…

At 3 PM ET (7 PM GMT) on Wednesday, October 11th, Paulo Coelho will be discussing his books and answering readers’ questions online.

To participate in this free event, readers will need to register and login at 3 PM ET (7 PM GMT) on October 11th. Here’s the event’s registration page.

Throughout this web event readers can submit questions to Paulo and hear his responses. The questions will be posed to Paulo by a moderator — Beliefnet Spirituality Editor Valerie Reiss.
While Paulo is talking, participants can view a slide presentation about him and his books and submit questions via the event interface.

For more details about Paulo Coelho and his work: Paulo Coelho’s official website, HarperCollins.

Beliefnet’s feature on Paulo Coelho can be read here.