I just cannot seem to stay afloat with many things at the moment...updating this reading blog being one of them. Oy vey! So is life, I guess. Just when you think you're recovered from one of life's little challenges, yet another presents itself. Winter has blossomed into spring, and I'm still trying to work my way through the stack of books I set aside for all of those cold, snowy days. Maybe that's the problem.....there aren't enough cold, snowy days in Georgia!
However limited, enjoy my latest recaps...
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| http://thebestnotes.com/ |
Set in rural Louisiana in the 1940s, Ernest Gaines tells us the joint stories of two young men. One, a young black man, nothing more than a kid, named Jefferson who is a reluctant party in a liquor store shoot-out which results in the death of the white store owner and him sentenced to the electric chair for murder and Grant Wiggins, another young black man who left this small, rural black community to attend university and then return to teach at the plantation school...a school in which Jefferson was his student. Through no choice of their own, the two men come together to form a bond stronger than either every imagined as Grant visits Jefferson in his cell at the request of his aunt.
Grant focuses his energy on Jefferson and attempts to explain the importance of Jefferson's death. At first Jefferson refuses to even acknowledge Grant, refusing the food his aunt has sent along. Eventually, though seen as a "hog" to his accusers, Jefferson and Grant embrace his fate and discuss heaven. When Jefferson asks Grant if he believes in Heaven, Grant says that he does not, and he explains that his atheism does not make him a good man. Jefferson, in turn, says he will save even Grant's soul if he carries the cross for the sinners on earth. Grant explains that the black community has spent centuries enslaved to white mean, and when Jefferson's lawyer referred to him as a "hog", he attacked the will and intelligence of the entire black society . As a result, Jefferson has the opportunity to stand up for his community as he embraces his role as, one might term, a martyr. He has, through no wish of his own, become a symbol to his people, and the way in which he faces and embraces his death comes to bear on their eventual self-confidence and potential of their collective futures.
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| http://ia.media-imdb.com/ |
1. Finish reading a book I dislike from the start
and
2. Write a review about a book I did not finish.
As such, I cannot write a review about this book. A selection for our Saint Francis Faculty Book Club, I tried to put myself out there and read something that was out of my comfort zone. Waaaaaaaaayyyyy out of my comfort zone. However, no go. Couldn't do it. With so many books out there that I truly WANT to read and so little time to do it, I put this one aside and faked my way through the meeting. That's what a good librarian does....shhhhhh.....don't tell! Heck, a few weeks later I even tried to watch the movie and couldn't follow THAT, either!
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| http://img2-2.timeinc.net |
The story of Ernest Hemingway and his wife, Hadley, the majority of the book is, shockingly, set in Paris. However, they are adventurous travelers, so the reader gets glimpses of America, Canada, Spain, Italy, and Austria during the post WWI culture of decadent and outrageous artistic development. With characters such as F.Scott Fitzgerald, Ezra Pound, and many other prominent artists of the time being large parts of the plot, we see just how Ernest was influenced both in his craft of writing and his personal life by so many outrageously unique individuals. The rampant drinking, socializing, and over-the-top personal exploits of this time were an eye-opener for someone who had a much different vision of that time period. Nothing seemed out-of-bounds or off-limits in Paris at this time, and McClain certainly captured it with style.
From Ernest's time in Spain researching the bull fights in Pamplona during his creation of The Sun Also Rises to his infidelity that, finally, leads to his divorce, she paints a picture of Hemingway that many of us had only read about before, not seen. However, she brings his mercurial personality to life and makes the reader cheer for Hadley to leave him to his own devices and demise (or, at least, I was cheering loudly).
I felt a range of emotions while reading The Paris Wife, from sadness to fury. At times I was irate with Ernest for being such a bum, seemingly the artists's plight, when he was capable of giving both himself and Hadley (and their son, no less) so much more. At other times I was sad that Hadley didn't have the self-confidence to leave Ernest when she knew he was cheating on her. As a whole, I'm very glad we chose this book as I learned so much about the world during that time and about Hemingway. And, as a result, I'm still totally okay with the fact that I don't care that much for his writing now that I know more about him as a man. :)
Other Books in the Works:
Beautiful Creatures by Margaret Stohl
My Foot is too Big for the Glass Slipper by Gabbi Reece
Once again I am vowing to be better, to do better, to persevere and get more reading accomplished over the next few months. Those who know better do better, right? Right!
