Category Archives: PopSugar Reading Challenge 2018

Book Review: The Invention of Wings

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Sue Monk Kidd The Invention of WingsThe Invention of Wings
Sue Monk Kidd
Historical Fiction
369 pages
Published 2014

The Invention of Wings is one of my PopSugar Reading Challenge books, for the prompt “A Book from a Celebrity Book Club.” It was Oprah’s 3rd pick for Oprah’s Book Club 2.0. Oprah interviewed Sue Monk Kidd in the January 2014 issue of O Magazine.

I can definitely see why Oprah was so affected by this book; the two main characters are Sarah Grimké, an early abolitionist and women’s rights activist, and Hetty Handful, the slave gifted to her by her mother when she turned 11. In an afterword, Kidd explains that she did try to stay mostly historically accurate, and Handful was gifted to Sarah when she was 11, though she apparently died not long after. In Kidd’s book, however, Handful survives. Sarah and her younger sister, Angelina, were real people, and really did most of what is ascribed to them in the book, though Kidd passes a couple of their deeds from one sister to the other. The Grimkés were from Charleston, South Carolina, and born into an aristocratic, slave-owning family headed by a prestigious judge. Their abolitionist actions get them exiled from Charleston and from their church. Meanwhile, Hetty, her ownership having returned to Sarah’s mother, dreams of freedom and plots rebellions of her own.

I was a little wary going into this book; I’ve read a couple of Oprah’s picks before, and generally found them dry and uninteresting. This one, though, was very well written. The voices of both women came through clearly, as did some of the brutality of slavery. Kidd also wrote The Secret Life of Bees, which got a lot of attention. If it’s anything like this, I might have to finally read that as well.

(I know the author is white, but I thought, being about slavery and abolition, it would still qualify for Black History Month.)

From the cover of The Invention of Wings:

A triumphant story about the quest for freedom and empowerment, Sue Monk Kidd’s third novel presents the extraordinary journeys of two unforgettable women: Hetty “Handful” Grimké, an urban slave in early-nineteenth century Charleston, and Sarah, the Grimkés’ idealistic daughter. 

Inspired in part by the historic figure of abolitionist and suffragette Sarah Grimké, Kidd’s novel is set in motion on Sarah’s eleventh birthday, when she is given ownership of ten-year-old Handful. The Invention of Wings follows these two women over the next thirty-five years as both strive for lives of their own, dramatically shaping each other’s destinies and forming a complex relationship marked by guilt, defiance, estrangement, and the uneasy ways of love.

 

Book Review: Turtles All The Way Down

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turtlesTurtles All The Way Down
John Green
Young Adult Fiction
298 pages
Published October 2017

So what the cover description of this book doesn’t explicitly mention is that Aza, the main character, has a pretty severe anxiety disorder. That’s really the core topic of the book – her thought spirals and dealing with life while caught in them. I trust John Green to write about these because he also suffers from severe anxiety. He’s talked about it in interviews and his vlogbrothers Youtube channel. (I’m a big Green brothers fan – what’s known as a nerdfighter.) So when John Green writes a character with anxiety, I believe that it’s a realistic portrayal. I loved the integration of technology in the story – two characters don’t just text each other, the text conversation is on the page, formatted differently, so it’s obvious these are text messages. I always love books that do that.

There’s not a whole lot I can say about the book without giving things away; a lot of John Green’s characters tend to wax eloquently about philosophy and things outside themselves, and Aza doesn’t do that because she’s so trapped within her own thoughts. She can’t think of the future or existential dread because she’s too worried about the microbes in her stomach getting out of control and giving her diseases. Definitely a departure from his usual story, though it does fit his standard MO of Main character meets other character who profoundly changes main character’s life in some way. (There’s a third part that is also consistent with most of John Green’s novels but it’s a spoiler.)

I think the book is a really good book for anyone who loves someone with anxiety. Or even for those who have anxiety themselves, to see that they’re not alone.

From the cover of Turtles All The Way Down:

Sixteen-year-old Aza never intended to pursue the mystery of fugitive billionaire Russell Pickett, but there’s a hundred-thousand-dollar reward at stake and her Best and Most Fearless Friend, Daisy, is eager to investigate. So together, they navigate the short distance and broad divides that separate them from Russell Pickett’s son, Davis.
   
Aza is trying. She is trying to be a good daughter, a good friend, a good student, and maybe even a good detective, while also living within the ever-tightening spiral of her own thoughts. 
 
In his long-awaited return, John Green, the acclaimed, award-winning author of Looking for Alaska and The Fault in Our Stars, shares Aza’s story with shattering, unflinching clarity in this brilliant novel of love, resilience, and the power of lifelong friendship.

Book Review: Born a Crime

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bornacrimeBorn a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood
Trevor Noah
Memoir
285 pages
Published 2016

I read this book, though I’d really like to listen to the audio book version. It’s narrated by Trevor Noah himself, and apparently very, very good. I totally believe that – the man is hilarious on The Daily Show. I still really enjoyed the stories Noah told, though I wish he’d gotten more into his journey as a comedian, and not just his childhood and teenage years.

Noah has an uncanny way of explaining background information that you need to know while not giving away the (actually somewhat obvious in hindsight) punchline. Even the background information is told in an extremely entertaining way – you can feel Noah’s everpresent grin through the pages. Even though the book begins (and sort of ends) on a sad note, the book itself is a happy, optimistic one. I didn’t laugh myself silly, like the next book I read (Jenny Lawson’s Furiously Happy), but I did have to giggle and read parts to my husband. (And he actually laughed at them, instead of looking at me like I was insane, which is what happened with Furiously Happy.)

I’ve been a fan of Trevor Noah’s since shortly after he took over The Daily Show, and this was an interesting peek at his background, and the very different culture he grew up in. I highly recommend this book.

Incidentally, I spotted someone reading Born A Crime at the Atlanta airport on the way home from Christmas vacation in my hometown, so this one knocks off the PopSugar category “book that was being read by a stranger in a public place”! This is also my first review for Black History Month.

From the cover of Born A Crime:

Trevor Noah’s unlikely path from apartheid South Africa to the desk of The Daily Show began with a criminal act: his birth. Trevor was born to a white Swiss father and a black Xhosa mother at a time when such a union was punishable by five years in prison. Living proof of his parents’ indiscretion, Trevor was kept mostly indoors for the earliest years of his life, bound by the extreme and often absurd measures his mother took to hide him from a government that could, at any moment, steal him away. Finally liberated by the end of South Africa’s tyrannical white rule, Trevor and his mother set forth on a grand adventure, living openly and freely and embracing the opportunities won by a centuries-long struggle.

Born a Crime is the story of a mischievous young boy who grows into a restless young man as he struggles to find himself in a world where he was never supposed to exist. It is also the story of that young man’s relationship with his fearless, rebellious, and fervently religious mother—his teammate, a woman determined to save her son from the cycle of poverty, violence, and abuse that would ultimately threaten her own life.

The stories collected here are by turns hilarious, dramatic, and deeply affecting. Whether subsisting on caterpillars for dinner during hard times, being thrown from a moving car during an attempted kidnapping, or just trying to survive the life-and-death pitfalls of dating in high school, Trevor illuminates his curious world with an incisive wit and unflinching honesty. His stories weave together to form a moving and searingly funny portrait of a boy making his way through a damaged world in a dangerous time, armed only with a keen sense of humor and a mother’s unconventional, unconditional love.

Book Review: The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle

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true confessions of charlotte doyle aviThe True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle
Avi
Middle-grade historical fiction
229 pages
Published 1990

This was my husband’s suggestion for “A Book Set At Sea,” one of the categories on the PopSugar Reading Challenge. It was a book he’d read as a child, and one I’d never heard of. It was a quick, easy read, as it was meant for children. Late elementary school, would be my guess. (Husband read it in fifth grade for a class.)

The book is set in the summer of 1832. Charlotte Doyle is setting sail across the Atlantic to return to America and rejoin the rest of her family, after finishing the school year at her boarding school. Things are a bit suspicious from the beginning of the voyage – the other two families that were supposed to be on board the ship didn’t make it, so it’s just Charlotte and the crew. Deckhands at the dock warned her away from the ship and refused to carry her things to it.

As the voyage winds on, Charlotte discovers that the crew intensely dislikes their captain and thinks he’s far too strict – he beat one of their number so badly on the last voyage that the crewman lost his arm. Torn between the “noble” captain, who represents everything she’s used to, and her own sense of right and wrong, she starts to notice how cruel he is to the crew. Ultimately, her life, and the lives of the crew, hinge on her decisions as the captain uses her to spy on the crew and report back to him.

My favorite passage from the book turned out to be my husband’s favorite, as well:

 

“What’s a hurricane?”
“The worst storm of all.”
“Can’t we sail around?”
Barlow again glanced at the helm, the sails and then at the sky above. He frowned. “I heard Mr. Hollybrass and Jaggery arguing about it. To my understanding,” he said, “I don’t think the captain wants to avoid it.”
“Why not?”
“It’s what Grimes has been saying. The captain’s trying to move fast. If he sets us right at the hurricane’s edge, it’ll blow us home like a pound of shot in a two-pound cannon.”
“What if he doesn’t get it right?”
“Two pounds of shot in a one-pound cannon.”

I quite enjoyed this little book, and it’s a great example of a girl bucking tradition and doing what she’s good at, gender roles be damned. There is a fair bit of violence – in one scene a man is severely whipped – but it’s not graphic. No sexual themes at all. Pretty suitable for kids as soon as they’re decent enough readers.

From the cover of The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle:

The Seahawk looms against a darkening sky, black and sinister. Manned by an angry, motley crew at the mercy of a ruthless captain, the rat-infested ship reeks of squalor, despair…and mutiny! It is no place for the lone passenger, thirteen-year-old Charlotte Doyle, yet for her there is no turning back. At first a trapped and powerless young girl, Charlotte dares to become the center of a daring and deadly voyage that will challenge her courage, her loyalties, and her very will to survive!

Book Review: Unbelievable

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unbelievableUnbelievable: My Front-Row Seat to the Craziest Campaign in American History
Katy Tur
Memoir/Documentary/Current Politics
305 pages
Published September 2017

This was my pick for the “song lyrics in the title” prompt for the PopSugar 2018 Reading Challenge. I feel a little like “Unbelievable” is a bit of a cop-out for the prompt, but it was already on my to be read list, and it works. And the book is fantastic.

This is the story of Katy Tur’s time on the campaign trail as one of the journalists covering Donald Trump’s campaign. It is, as she says, unbelievable. When it begins, she thinks it will be very short – as most of the American public thought. No one thought Trump would wind up being the Republican nominee. But as she attends rallies, and watches the vitriol of his supporters – which occasionally gets turned on her, as a member of the “lying, fake media,” she begins to realize he could, in fact, win this thing.

We experience Tur’s shock as he calls her out by name multiple times, leading to death threats by Trump supporters, and security being assigned to her specifically. Through all of this, Tur continues to do her job as a journalist, reporting on the travel, the rallies, the information from sources within the campaign as they criss-cross the country and promise ridiculous things.

I was worried at first that the book would be a dry rehash of the events, but it is far from it. Tur speaks with a refreshing, absorbing voice. Even knowing the outcome – that Trump is elected president – it’s a page-turner that didn’t let me go until the last page. Unbelievable is a fast-paced, fascinating book by a first-class journalist.

From the cover of Unbelievable:

Called “disgraceful,” “third-rate,” and “not nice” by Donald Trump, NBC News correspondent Katy Tur reported on—and took flak from—the most captivating and volatile presidential candidate in American history.

Katy Tur lived out of a suitcase for a year and a half, following Trump around the country, powered by packets of peanut butter and kept clean with dry shampoo. She visited forty states with the candidate, made more than 3,800 live television reports, and tried to endure a gazillion loops of Elton John’s “Tiny Dancer”—a Trump rally playlist staple.

From day 1 to day 500, Tur documented Trump’s inconsistencies, fact-checked his falsities, and called him out on his lies. In return, Trump repeatedly singled Tur out. He tried to charm her, intimidate her, and shame her. At one point, he got a crowd so riled up against Tur, Secret Service agents had to walk her to her car.

None of it worked. Facts are stubborn. So was Tur. She was part of the first women-led politics team in the history of network news. The Boys on the Bus became the Girls on the Plane. But the circus remained. Through all the long nights, wild scoops, naked chauvinism, dodgy staffers, and fevered debates, no one had a better view than Tur.

Unbelievable is her darkly comic, fascinatingly bizarre, and often scary story of how America sent a former reality show host to the White House. It’s also the story of what it was like for Tur to be there as it happened, inside a no-rules world where reporters were spat on, demeaned, and discredited. Tur was a foreign correspondent who came home to her most foreign story of all. Unbelievable is a must-read for anyone who still wakes up and wonders, Is this real life?

PopSugar 2018 Reading Challenge

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So I’m going to attempt the PopSugar 2018 Reading Challenge this year, in addition to my personal goals. I’m going to list off the prompts, and the books I have chosen for the prompts so far. I’ll come back and check them off on my master list, linked in the sidebar. (And link to my reviews.) I haven’t picked out every book yet, to leave room for books I find interesting throughout the year.

POPSUGAR 2018 READING PROMPTS

A book made into a movie you’ve already seen – Heinlein’s Starship Troopers
My husband’s been encouraging me to read this one, but I HATED the movie. He says the book is quite different. We’ll see.

True Crime

The next book in a series you started – Into the Drowning Deep by Mira Grant
I read Rolling in the Deep, a novella starting this series, a long time ago. Thought it was a standalone, I’m really happy to learn she continued to write more in this world!

A book involving a heist

Nordic Noir – the princess of burundi by Kjell Eriksson
Found this at Baltimore’s The Book Thing, and it’s a winner of the Swedish Crime Academy Award for Best Crime Novel, so I thought it would fit!

A novel based on a real person – Paula McLain‘s The Paris Wife or Circling the Sun

A book set in a country that fascinates you

A book with a time of day in the title – The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
I’ve been meaning to read it.

A book about a villain or antihero

A book about death or grief

A book with your favorite color in the title – Tolstoy and the Purple Chair by Nina Sankovitch

A book with alliteration in the title

A book about time travel – A Wrinkle in Time
It’s time I re-read this, before the movie comes out!

A book with a weather element in the title

A book set at sea – Avi‘s The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle
A childhood book my husband loved.

A book with an animal in the title – Turtles All The Way Down
John Green‘s newest that I’ve been wanting to read, and have a hold on at the library

A book set on a different planet

A book with song lyrics in the title – Unbelievable: My Front-Row Seat to the Craziest Campaign in American History by Katy Tur
A book about a journalist’s experience on the Trump campaign

A book about or set on Halloween

A book with characters who are twins – something about Jacen and Jaina Solo

A book with a female author who uses a male pseudonym – Swastika Night by Katharine Burdekin writing as Murray Constantine

A book with an LGBTQ+ protagonist – The Well of Loneliness by Radclyffe Hall
I also have a biography of Radclyffe Hall, so I’ll probably read them consecutively. I might use one of them for the advanced prompt of an author with the same first or last name as you.

A book that is also a stage play or musical – Harper Lee‘s To Kill a Mockingbird
A classic I’ve never read

A book by an author of a different ethnicity than you – Brown Girl in the Ring by Nalo Hopkinson
Canadian-Jamaican author, so it fits my Read Canadian Challenge as well

A book about feminism – Colonize This! Young women of color on today’s feminism
A book that’s been on my reading list for a while, and I recently bought from a used bookstore

A book about mental health

A book you borrowed or that was given to you as a gift – No is Not Enough
Given to me by my mother-in-law for Christmas.

A book by two authors

A book about or involving a sport

A book by a local author

A book mentioned in another book
I’ll probably pick one after I read Tolstoy and the Purple Chair, since it’s about reading!

A book from a celebrity book club – The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd
Oprah’s Book Club List

A childhood classic you’ve never read – Are you there, God? It’s me, Margaret by Judy Blume
Another suggestion from my husband

A book that’s published in 2018 – I’ll probably have a bunch of these to choose from, but currently it’s between The Girl in the Tower and Fire and Fury.

A past Goodreads Choice Awards winner – Rebel of the Sands by Alwyn Hamilton (2016)
It looks amazing, and there’s a second book in the series now. 

A book set in the decade you were born

A book you meant to read in 2017 but didn’t get to – Blackwing by Ed McDonald
An ARC I won through Goodreads but didn’t get around to

A book with an ugly cover

A book that involves a bookstore or library – Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore by Matthew Sullivan
Won a Kindle copy from Goodreads

Your favorite prompt from the 2015, 2016, or 2017 PopSugar Reading Challenges
This will probably be a book with a cat on the cover, from 2017’s Challenge. Because cats.

 

ADVANCED PROMPTS

A bestseller from the year you graduated high school – Tom Brokaw‘s The Greatest Generation

A cyberpunk book

A book that was being read by a stranger in a public place – Born A Crime by Trevor Noah
Spotted in the Atlanta airport on my way home from holidays with my in-laws

A book tied to your ancestry

A book with a fruit or vegetable in the title – Roald Dahl‘s James and the Giant Peach
Another childhood book of my husband’s that I’ve never read

An allegory

A book by an author with the same first or last name as you – To the Elephant Graveyard: A True Story of the Hunt for a Man-Killing Indian Elephant by Tarquin Hall

A microhistory

A book about a problem facing society today

A book recommended by someone else taking the PopSugar Reading Challenge