Blue Roses

We went to Border's today, after we bought Josh's wheelchair. It made me realize that, yeah, my blog is pretty damn shallow 95% of the time. <.g> Believe it or not, I do have interests outside of nsync. So, I figured I'd take at least a brief moment to recommend some books I've read this past week.

Find Me, Rosie O'Donnell
This was a fast read, but extremely well written and very intense. It's not a typical auto-biography, or linear in anyway, but I felt I came out of it knowing a bit more about what an extremely complex and flawed woman she is, but still one I really would love to know. Parts of it were hard to read...some parts I identified with more than I would have liked, other times she went farther than I would have. It's almost not even her story, in the way she presents it. I found myself wrapped up in Stacie and Melissa's lives just as much as I was Rosie's, and their problems hurt me. Like Rosie, I kinda want to fix them. <.g>
It's an unconventional format, but I enjoyed it. It worked well. Some chapters were a page long, others much longer, but they were all as long as they needed to be. It was moving and, again, intense, and the very ending almost had me in tears. But happy ones. Like I said, it's a quick read (took me only a few hours, 213 pages), but one well-worth reading, IMO.

Lucky Man, Michael J. Fox
This book knocked me on my knees. It's a far more traditional style than Rosie's, and far more dense...took me 2 days to read this one, and I loved every moment. It grabs you from the start...his sense of humor, dry wit, irony, everything is there from page one. It starts with the day of "The Pinky Rebellion," when his first tremor began. From there, it takes us back to before he was born, with his grandmother, through his time after Spin City. His determination and strength is demonstrated with every word, and I loved the look at his life and work.
I'm really not sure what else I can say about this...he's a good man, a good writer, and he shared a lot in this book. Definitely high on my list of recommendations.

The Giver, Lois Lowry
This wasn't the first time I read this book. I've been reading it for many years now, but it still holds the same resonance for me. It is a children's book, yes, and I've seen it read as young as 3rd grade in the schools, but it's so much more than that. Everything about it is metaphor, and it has to sail right over the heads of 8 year olds. It's about a boy named Jonas, who lives in a Community where everyone is the same. The committee chooses jobs, spouses, etc. Children are born to Birthmothers and every December are given to a family. There is no love, there is no sex (adults take pills to stop the Stirrings), no unemployment, differences are to be ignored, everyone does what is told - and everyone is happy. It's a perfect world, but at the price of giving up everything that makes human beings unique. When Jonas is 12, he is chosen to be the one person in the community to hold the memories of the past...of happy things like rainbows and birthdays (weather is climate controlled), and of horrible things like war and pain. I'm not describing this well, and I apologize.
But the book makes so many statements about everything, I believe...capital punishment, families, government/Big Brother, shallowness of spirit, human engineering and cloning, etc. One of my favorite lines is between Jonas and The Giver, as Jonas is realizing that he can see the color red (there are no colors in this society), because his friend Fiona's hair is changing. The Giver laughs and says that Fiona does have bright red hair, and that it and kinks like it must drive the genetic scientists insane...I love that because it shows that it's not actually possible to completely get rid of the differences. They're always there, even if they aren't seen or commented on. It's also kind of scary, because there were still people who were willfully trying to eradicate those things.
Watching Jonas move from acceptance of his life to fighting against what is set is an amazing journey for the reader, though,...if anyone has read this, I'd love to discuss it. I have some feelings on Elsewhere that are apparently not the typical reactions of people, but I feel is a valid interpretation. <.g> If you haven't read this, it's an excellent book.

Currently, I'm rereading Mansfield Park (Jane Austen), and next up on my list are Who's Afraid of Virginia Ham (Phyllis Richman), Night (Elie Wiesel), and Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood (Rebecca Wells), all of which I purchased today at Border's (along with a new CD, from Norah Jones. I plan to do a review and upload some songs this week <.g>). So, that's what I'm reading now. Hope you like at least some of them. : )