The Penguin Book of Christmas Stories: From Hans Christian Andersen to Angela Carter edited by Jessica Harrison

 

What is your favorite holiday short story?  I love holiday short stories.  One of my favorites is “The Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry.  That story is not included in this collection, but another O. Henry story is “A Chaparral Christmas Gift.” 

This is a collection of classic Christmas stories that is perfect for the lover of classic literature.  If you are looking for Hallmark type Christmas stories, this is not the book for you.  The stories take place at Christmas time, but many are poignant.  Many are translated from another language, like one of my favorites, “The Fir Tree” by Hans Christian Anderson.  Another favorite story was included, “A Christmas Memory” by Truman Capote.  Many other classic authors are represented at well including, but not limited to:  Langston Hughes, Ray Bradbury, Shirley Jackson, and Anton Chekhov.   It was an interesting collection, with many stories I haven’t read before.  I am going to get this as a hard cover for my collection next Christmas.

Review Copy from NetGalley.  Thank-you! I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

Laura’s Top Ten Books of 2009

I’m a little late getting to my annual list of favorite books of the year. My top ten books include books I read in the year 2009, but that weren’t necessarily published in 2009. I didn’t count books that I read again for at least a second time as I obviously love them, such as Wuthering Heights, Sense and Sensibility, Outlander, My Sister’s Keeper, Twilight, etc.

I read many good books in the year 2009 and was excited to join challenges for the first time, such as The Victorian Challenge , The Everything Austen Challenge, and The Classics Challenge. The books I picked for this list are books that I read, thought about, pondered, and have stayed with me through the year. (Also see my top picks for 2007 and 2008).

In no particular order, my top ten books of 2009:

1. Watchmen by Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons: This was my first graphic novel, and it was definitely a great first impression. Moore and Gibbon’s tale of an alternate world populated by super heroes was fascinating and thought provoking. The story, within a story “The Black Freighter” was also riveting and provided a great parallel to the story.

2. The Piano Teacher by Janice Y.K. Lee: The Piano Teacher was an unforgettable love story set in Hong Kong at the start of WWII. It was a painful story of what one sometimes has to do to survive.

3. The Help by Kathryn Stockett: The Help is a multi-faceted story, on one hand it is a great story about racism in the 1960’s south, but on the other hand, it is the story of a group of very strong women and their friendship. Overall, it is unforgettable.

4. Pride & Prejudice & Zombies by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith: I read many great Jane Austen spin-offs this year as part of the Everything Austen Challenge. PP&Z was my favorite though as it was a totally original concept that made me laugh out loud . . . a lot! Seth Grahame-Smith kept much of Austen’s original text, but changed just enough to create a great Zombie story. I like how Grahame-Smith was able to make a lot of inside jokes that Pride and Prejudice lovers would love as you read through the book. Now there are a lot of similar type spin-offs, but I’m not sure about them. For more serious spin-offs, I loved The Other Mr. Darcy by Monica Fairview and I think it is the best Pride and Prejudice sequel I have ever read.

5. An Echo in the Bone by Diana Gabaldon: I LOVE Diana Gabaldon. The only thing I don’t love is the long wait in between the books of her Outlander series. The long wait for An Echo in the Bone did not disappoint. It was a great novel and the only negative was that it had to end. The Outlander series is a fantastic historical fiction saga with great love, great characters, and great description. If you haven’t read the Outlander series, what are you waiting for?

6. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury: I finally read this classic for the first time and loved it. In beautiful prose, Bradbury wrote a great adventure story that includes the evils of banning books as well as the evils of being caught up too much in an electronic world.

7. The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder: What is the meaning of random “Acts of God?” Are some people’s lives worth more than others? This beautiful and short book explores very deep themes. I loved it!

8. Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout: Olive is not a woman that I liked, but her story is unforgettable. My entire book club loved this book and all for different reasons. A series of short stories that all involve the character of Olive Kitteridge, this book was a very interesting study on perception.

9. True Compass by Edward M. Kennedy: Whatever your politics, Ted Kennedy lived a fascinating life. His candid biography was riveting and really brought history to life.

10. Say You’re One of Them by Uwem Akpan: I listened to the audiobook of Say You’re One of Them, and it was painful at times. It is hard to believe that such evil can still exist in the world. The stories did make you think about what it means to be human and what life is like outside of the United States.

And for a Bonus, a good light book for a good laugh, Bet Me by Jennifer Cruise.

What are your thoughts on these books? What favorite books did you have in 2009?

Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

It is hard to believe that I have not read Fahrenheit 451 yet. I’ve been meaning to read it since I was 15 and actually have an old tattered copy of it for about ten years or so. I have always loved the tagline, “The temperature at which books burn.” Luckily The Classics Challenge came along to finally get me to put it on the top of the pile!

Fahrenheit 451 is the story of Guy Montag, a firefighter who loves his job. In the future, firemen do not put out fires (houses are fireproofed), but instead start fires to destroy illegal books. Society has disintegrated. War is eminent, but society is obsessed with talking to their “family” on their 4 wall interactive televisions. Life is not respected; suicides, abortions, hit-and-runs are rampant. Literature has been downgraded to brief summaries on TV. Books are not needed, and are viewed as objects that cause thought and depression.

Montag has always believed in the evil of books. One day his thoughts start to change when he meets a young girl named Clarisse. Clarisse looks at the world through a different point of view. She likes to stop and smell the flowers and think about things outside what she is told to think. Her ideas, coupled with his wife’s attempt at suicide, and other events put Montag on a path of self-discovery. Montag attempts to change his life and the future of man-kind.

Bradbury had fantastic prose throughout the book that often had me stop to admire the beauty of the language. I enjoyed this book immensely and feel that its message is more than highly relevant today. This book was first published in 1953 during the height of the Cold War. In modern times we have the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and a public that cares more about the results of American Idol. We do live in a time in which people sometimes spend more time on the internet (blogging like me!) talking with Facebook friends or texting rather than talking to their friends or family in the same room or house. I think at times this is a bad situation, but at other times, I think that the internet and television actually help people in their understanding and reading of books. I love reading other peoples blogs and “talking” to them about books that my own friends and relatives don’t read.

Another way to interpret this book is as a treatise against the banning of books and censorship. Indeed in a fantastic “Coda” at the end of the book, Bradbury states,” There is more than one way to burn a book. And the world is full of people running with lit matches. Every minority, be it Baptist/Unitarian, Irish/Italian/Octogenarian/Zen Buddhist, Zionist/Seventh-day Adventist, Women’s Lib/Republican, Mattachine/FourSquareGospel feels it has the will, the right, the duty to douse the kerosene, light the fuse. Every dimwit editor who sees himself as the source of all dreary blanc-mange plain porridge unleavened literature, licks his guillotine and eyes the neck of any author who dares to speak above a whisper or write above a nursery rhyme.” Bradbury then goes on to describe how Fahrenheit 451 was censured in 75 sections to make it more suitable for school children. I know of nothing more ironic then the censoring of a book about the censuring of books.

In a world were people do not want the President of the United States to talk to school children about staying in school as it might be offensive, I find this highly relevant. I am very much against the banning and censorship of books. I could not believe that when I was in college, my own hometown attempted to ban The Catcher in the Rye from the high school American Literature required reading. The reason why was that people had flipped through and had noticed a few swear words. I always thought these people should have sat in the back of the school bus and realized there was a lot worse going on at school. Attempting to force only one message on people and shelter them from reality would be against everything that is America.

I could talk on this subject all day, but I’ll end here with a quote from the book, where Montag comes to a realization about society. “We have everything we need to be happy, but we aren’t happy. Something’s missing. I looked around. The only thing I positively knew was gone was the books I’d burned in ten or twelve years.”