Review and Giveaway: The Glimpse Traveler by Marianne Boruch

Opening lines of the book:

“There’s rain and there’s rain. Maybe there’s a difference at the edge of a continent.”

Why I read it:

I was born in 1970, a year before Boruch went on the road trip she chronicles in The Glimpse Traveler. I was curious to get my own glimpse into the American counterculture of the 70s.

What it’s about:

It’s a Thursday, almost spring, in 1971, when 20-year-old University of Illinois student Marianne Boruch meets Frances, a 21-year-old widow, who’s about to embark on a hitchhiking trip to California. Frances casually invites Boruch to tag along. The Glimpse Traveler recounts that memorable road trip.

What worked:

I always find it hard to review books I love, and The Glimpse Traveler is one of my favourites this year. What Marianne Boruch has done in this memoir is nothing short of extraordinary: nearly 40 years after the fact, she has managed to recreate a road trip—and a time period—so wholly that I felt like I was there, in the car (or van), speeding west and drinking in the sights with Boruch’s younger self. It helps that Boruch is a bit of an observer on this trip, which is driven by Frances’ search for answers; the reader can easily identify with her.

Although the title of the book refers to glimpses, there’s nothing choppy about this memoir—in fact I’m astonished that Boruch could remember so much of this road trip so many years later. The memoir’s short chapters drew me in, and Boruch’s occasional tangents only added to the magic of her story. As Boruch says, “Certain moments open and you fall right in, sucked back to some previous elsewhere” (p. 136). This is what she succeeds in doing in this memoir: taking the reader back with her to a moment in her personal history—it’s hard to believe this road trip lasted only nine days—while at the same time giving us a vivid glimpse into a pivotal time in American history.

On a side note, I was absurdly pleased that this book connected me to another of my recent reads, Fire Monks by Colleen Morton Busch (read my review), by mentioning the wildfires that devastated California in 2008. (Boruch and Frances visited Big Sur and stayed with painter Emil White, whose house was miraculously spared from the flames years later.)

What didn’t work:

There was nothing in The Glimpse Traveler that didn’t work: Boruch’s narrative is pitch-perfect throughout this spellbinding tale.
 
Favourite quote:

“Outside it would gradually turn to wheat and grazing land, to full-blown prairie, not simply land wrenched by sweat and axe from its woods. Because hadn’t it always been like this, endless and pretty much treeless? I knew those fields would eventually give way, rolling on and out to mountains I’d heard of, to this thing, the sea, only a word to someone of my land-locked childhood but the dazed, bluest eye of it, multiplied way past eight zillion times.

“That something sharp and tangled caught in me: what to call it exactly? We kept going, into day two’s long afternoon. Forgive me: I’m cutting ahead to that place for a moment, to us waiting for ride number whatever-it-was, dropped there a good long time by this time, midway through Nebraska. Was it the stillness of old wheat cut down to its jagged quick or that distant line of maple and ash? Was it the darkening sense of all those truly hard crossings and betrayals a century before? Our own waiting—not exactly legendary, its little half-teaspoon of not-quite-misery, three hours now, our hope for the flash of a car, that someone going in the right direction was generous. But it did something, to time.” (pp. 16-17)

Final thoughts:

I highly recommend this thoughtful memoir set in a turbulent period of American history.

Thank you to Indiana University Press for sending me this book to review.
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Other review: Sophisticated Dorkiness

You can also read reviews on the Indiana University Press site.

Author interview: Indiana University Press blog

Excerpt of the book: The Glimpse Traveler
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Would you like to win a copy of The Glimpse Traveler? Indiana University Press has generously offered to send autographed books to two of my readers. The giveaway is open to U.S. and Canadian residents only (no P.O. boxes). I will accept entries until 11:59 PM Eastern Time on Monday, August 29.

If you are a follower or subscriber, please let me know and I will give you another entry.

Make sure you provide me with a way of getting in touch with you. Entries without a blog link or email address will be disqualified.

THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED.
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Author Event: Susan Conley and Lily King at Northshire Books (+ Giveaway)

As I mentioned in my Mailbox Monday post yesterday, my friend Rowena and I were in Manchester, Vermont, last week where we visited the Northshire Bookstore, one of America’s leading independent bookstores.

We were lucky enough to be there for what turned out to be a fabulous author event: a joint reading by memoirist Susan Conley, who was touring her first book, The Foremost Good Fortune, and novelist Lily King, who was touring her third novel, Father of the Rain. As it turns out, the writers have been friends for 15 years and corresponded by email while they were writing these books (while Susan lived in China and Lily lived in Italy). They read us excerpts from their emails to each other, which had me alternately in stitches and in tears (mostly the former!)—I really hope they someday publish a book of their correspondence. They then read to us from their books: The Foremost Good Fortune is Susan’s memoir about living in China and surviving breast cancer, while Father of the Rain is a novel about a daughter’s relationship with her alcoholic father.

Susan Conley, me and Lily King

Getting a glimpse into their writing processes and then listening to excerpts from the final products was so inspiring! (I’m also fascinated by relationships between women writers.) I bought four books in the end, three for me and one for one of you (and had them all autographed, of course). These are the three for me (including Lily’s first novel, The Pleasing Hour):

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Would you like to win an autographed copy of The Pleasing Hour, Lily King’s first novel? The giveaway is open internationally. I will accept entries until 11:59 PM Eastern Time on Monday,
June 6.

Here’s the blurb from the back cover of the book:

The first novel from a new literary voice brimming with sensitivity and lyricism, The Pleasing Hour is the story of an American in Europe whose coming-of-age defies all our usual conceptions of naiveté and experience. Fleeing a devastating loss, Rosie takes a job as an au pair with a Parisian family and soon find the comfort and intimacy she longs for with their children and the father, Marc. Only Nicole, the children’s distant, impeccably polished mother, is unwilling to embrace the young American. But when Rosie realizes that her attachments have become transgressions, she leaves for the south of France. There she learns about Nicole’s own haunted past and the losses that link the two women more closely than either could have imagined.

If you are a follower or subscriber, let me know and I will give you an extra entry.

Make sure you provide me with a way of getting in touch with you. Entries without a blog link or email address will be disqualified.

THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED.
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This giveaway is part of the Armchair BEA event. Visit the Giveaways Galore post to enter other Armchair BEA giveaways.

Review and Giveaway: Home to Woefield by Susan Juby

Home to Woefield by Susan Juby (published in Canada under the title The Woefield Poultry Collective) is the story of Prudence, a YA-author-turned-organic-farmer, who inherits a dilapidated and scrubby farm from her Great-Uncle Harold. Delighted with this opportunity to make her dreams come true, Prudence enlists the help of several locals: Earl, the gruff 70-something foreman who came with the property; her neighbour, Seth, a celebrity blogger who hasn’t left his house since an unfortunate incident involving his high-school drama teacher; and 11-year-old Sara Spratt, who’s looking for a home for her prize-winning chickens. Told in the alternating voices of these four characters, Home to Woefield is a side-splittingly funny and thoroughly modern back-to-the-land tale.

I briefly entertained the notion that I wasn’t going to like this book—for the first few chapters, I was a bit worried that Juby was making fun of her characters, who initially seemed like they were going to be caricatures of people whose passions (organic farming and blogging) are dear to my heart. For example, Seth introduces himself like this:

“Let me paint a picture for you in words. People don’t take my skills seriously, but there’s an art to it. There really is. When I was on a roll, I used to update my blogs eight, sometimes twelve hours a day. That’s eight or twelve hours of writing. Stephen King is probably one of the only other guys who writes that much. Him and James Patterson, although King’s the only one of those two worth reading. I wasn’t creating books, but there was definitely some storytelling happening. My mother used to call my blogging mental diarrhea, and my former father, Prince of Pubs, used to ask me if I was some kind of pervert because I was on the computer so much.” (p. 8)

However, it didn’t take long for me to realize how wrong I was—as it turned out, I snorted and giggled and guffawed through the whole book (and Seth turned out to be the character that cracked me up the most). I read parts of the novel out loud to Mr. B and found myself howling with laughter all over again (who knew that sheep shearing could be so funny?). Juby’s characters are wacky and original—more than once, she retells the same moment from two or three or four points of view, each as funny as the last.

Not surprisingly, this isn’t a very realistic story—although Juby does touch on some sensitive subjects such as alcoholism and family dysfunction—but it’s hilarious, quirky and sweet. If you’re in the mood for a laugh, this is the funniest book I’ve read in a long time—in fact, I can’t remember the last time a book made me laugh so much or so hard. I highly recommend it.

Thank you to Harper Collins for sending me this book to review.
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Home to Woefield is on blog tour with TLC Book Tours in March. Visit these other blogs for reviews:

Sara’s Organized Chaos • BookNAround (spoiler alert) • Colloquium (spoiler alert) • A Musing Reviews • A Bookworm’s World • Rundpinne • The Lost Entwife • Reviews by Molly • Tina’s Book Reviews • Book Club Classics! • Chrisbookarama

HarperCollins Canada also organized a Woefield blog tour:

The Written Word • Shelf Candy • Daisy’s Book Journal • The Literary Word • Failing the Rorschach Test • Burning Impossibly Bright • Mrs Q Book Addict

Other reviews:

Booking Mama • faerie writer • Hey, I want to read that • Leafing Through Life • Rayment’s Reading, Rants and Ramblings

Interviews with the author: Daisy’s Book Journal • Night Owl Reviews

Check out Phase II of the Great Hen Bag Giveaway on Susan Juby’s blog. (I want that hen bag!)

Susan Juby is going to be on Blog Talk Radio with Book Club Girl on Tuesday, April 5, at 7 p.m. ET.
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Would you like to win a copy of Home to Woefield? Harper Collins has offered to send a copy to one of my readers. The giveaway is open to U.S. and Canadian residents only (no P.O. boxes). I will accept entries until 11:59 PM Eastern Time on Friday, April 8.

If you are a follower or subscriber, let me know and I will give you another entry.

Make sure you provide me with a way of getting in touch with you. Entries without a blog link or email address will be disqualified.

THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED.
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Guest Post and Giveaway: Dani Shapiro, Author of Devotion: A Memoir

I’m thrilled to be able to offer you this guest post by Dani Shapiro, author of Devotion: A Memoir, as part of the TLC Book Tours for her book (read my review).
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While I was writing Devotion I came upon the Sanskrit term samskara. A yoga teacher explained one day during class that samskaras are the tensions, pressures, memories, stored in our bodies that are sometimes released through the practice of yoga. Someone might be in the middle of a pose—say, a very simple forward bend, and find herself suddenly weeping. Or laughing. Or shaking. Why? Because a samskara has been activated, released. I found this whole idea completely compelling, revelatory. As a writer, I found myself thinking that samskaras are like stories. Our stories, embedded in our bodies. They never entirely go away, do they? What has happened to us during the course of our lives continues to live inside of us. This isn’t a bad thing. It’s actually a very beautiful thing, if we understand it properly. Nothing ever really goes away.

Just last week, I found myself grappling with a samskara for the first time in a while. I wasn’t doing my yoga practice. I wasn’t meditating. No. I was on Ninth Avenue in New York City, leaving a restaurant with another couple after a long dinner. The two men—my husband and our friend Jack—were walking ahead, having hailed a taxi. I was trailing behind with our friend Holly, talking. Not paying attention to where I was going, or the slick pavement, or the high heeled boots I was wearing, when suddenly, I was down. Down, so, so, fast. I fell forward, somehow (I have no memory of this) and landed on my knee, and on my cheekbone. My face pressed into the concrete of Ninth Avenue.

Fortunately—and somewhat miraculously—I wasn’t hurt nearly as badly as I could have been. My knee took the brunt of it, and my face somehow didn’t get bruised. Holly and my husband helped me off the street. Shaken, I got into the taxi. I kept moving. There was talk of stopping for ice, of going back to their apartment. I wondered if I was more badly injured than I felt. I had hit my face full-force, after all. But I kept moving, kept going. We took the taxi uptown, got our car, and my husband and I started the two-hour journey home.

Here’s the thing. That fall set off a samskara for me. The next morning, I was completely shaken. Teary. Twenty-five years earlier, my parents had been in a terrible car accident that killed my father and gravely injured my mother. It was my introduction to suddenness, to randomness, to the thin, thin veil that separates us at any given moment from mortal danger. From change. Illness. Accidents. Death. I carry that knowledge—that story, that samskara—within me. I don’t think about it very often, but when I fell that night on Ninth Avenue, it was reawakened in me. Oh, it seemed to be saying. Remember this?

The feeling passed. A day, or two, and I no longer felt that jarred, frightened feeling. I no longer felt on the verge of tears. I was grateful to be okay. But my body had reminded me that everything that has ever happened to me remains alive within me. A story. A samskara. A slip and fall on Ninth Avenue brought to life a fatal car accident on a snowy highway twenty-five years earlier. It reminded me of life’s randomness, life’s fragility. It also reminded me to count my blessings. There is much we can learn from what we carry with us.
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Would you like to win a copy of Devotion? Harper Collins has offered to send a copy to one of my readers. The giveaway is open to U.S. and Canadian residents only (no P.O. boxes). I will accept entries until 11:59 PM Eastern Time on Friday, April 1.

To enter the giveaway:

Please let me know if you’ve ever had an experience with a samskara (even if you didn’t know at the time that that was what it was called) OR tell me why you want to read this book.

If you are a follower or subscriber, please let me know and I will give you another entry.

Make sure you provide me with a way of getting in touch with you. Entries that fail to answer one of the questions or that don’t provide a blog link or email address will be disqualified.

Good luck!

THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED.

Review and Giveaway: The Gifts of Imperfection by Brené Brown

I almost didn’t request a review copy of The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You’re Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are—Your Guide to a Wholehearted Life by Brené Brown because I really dislike the cover; however, the book’s subtitle called to me. Then I read the back blurb, which includes this passage:

“Brown explores how we can cultivate the courage, compassion, and connection to wake up in the morning and think, No matter what gets done and how much is left undone, I am enough, and to go to bed at night thinking, Yes, I am imperfect and vulnerable and sometimes afraid, but that doesn’t change the truth that I am worthy of love and belonging.”

And I knew I had to read the book. I cannot tell you how often I stress about the things I’ve left undone, not to mention feeling paralyzed by my own perfectionism. Brown is a researcher who has dedicated much of her career to studying shame, empathy, fear and vulnerability; in listening to people’s stories, she started to identify what she called wholehearted research participants, i.e. people who were leading amazing lives by “living and loving with their whole hearts.” This prompted her to ask “What did these folks value? How did they create all of this resilience in their lives? What were their main concerns and how did they resolve or address them? Can anyone create a Wholehearted life? What does it take to cultivate what we need? What gets in the way?” To answer these questions, Brown came up with 10 guideposts to wholehearted living: cultivating authenticity (letting go of what people think); cultivating self-compassion (letting go of perfectionism); cultivating a resilient spirit (letting go of numbing and powerlessness); cultivating gratitude and joy (letting go of scarcity and “fear of the dark”); cultivating intuition and trusting faith (letting go of the need for certainty); cultivating creativity (letting go of comparison); cultivating play and rest (letting go of exhaustion as a status symbol and productivity as self-worth); cultivating calm and stillness (letting go of anxiety as a lifestyle); cultivating meaningful work (letting go of self-doubt and “supposed to”); and cultivating laughter, song, and dance (letting go of being cool and “always in control”).

Here are some of the things that stuck with me:

1. Brown talks about writing a blog post on the “‘dig deep’ button,” which she defines as “a secret level of pushing through when we’re exhausted and overwhelmed and when there’s too much to do and too little time for self-care” (p. 3). She turns this concept on its head, explaining that when wholehearted people get exhausted, they get:

• Deliberate in their thoughts and behaviors through prayer, meditation, or simply setting their intentions
• Inspired to make new and different choices
• Going: They take action

Ironically, while I was writing this review, I realized that I was relying on my own “dig deep” button, soldiering on and pushing through even though it was past two in the morning. (I think I already need to reread this book!)

2. Brown talks about how “one of the greatest (and least discussed) barriers to compassion practice is the fear of setting boundaries and holding people accountable” (p. 16). As she points out, “When we fail to set boundaries . . . we feel used and mistreated. This is why we sometimes attack who [a person is], which is far more hurtful than addressing a behavior or a choice” (p. 19). This makes sense to me and yet I find it very hard to practise. (Why is it so scary to set limits?)

3. According to Brown, “the . . . one thing [that separates] the men and women who [feel] a deep sense of love and belonging from the people who seem to be struggling for it . . . is the belief in their worthiness” (p. 23). This finding is a bit depressing because for those of us who struggle with feeling worthy it’s such a catch-22: I feel like I don’t belong because I feel unworthy of belonging; I feel unworthy of belonging because I feel like I don’t belong. Although there are no easy answers, Brown does offer some hope: it is possible to cultivate a sense of worthiness by sharing our stories and letting go of our attachment to what other people think.

4. Brown describes herself as a “take-the-edge-off-aholic,” a concept that resonated for me. She says she can definitely say “today I’d like to deal with vulnerability and uncertainty with an apple fritter, a beer and cigarette, and spending seven hours on Facebook” (p. 72). My own numbing tools of choice (some of which veer towards addiction) are food, the Internet, television, sleep, lack of sleep, book buying, reading and busyness. And the funny thing is that in the middle of writing this review, when I was feeling stuck and vulnerable and my negative self-talk was starting up with the How could you leave this to the last minute again?, I procrastinated by watching Brown’s TEDxHouston talk, and it was only when she said “We numb vulnerability” that I realized that I was avoiding my own feelings of vulnerability by watching this video! (Listening to this talk is a great introduction to the concepts she discusses in this book and will give you a very good idea of whether this book is for you.)

5. Brown’s research shows that, “Without exception, spirituality—the belief in connection, a power greater than self, and interconnections grounded in love and compassion—emerged as a component of resilience” (p. 64). She also found that, “Without exception, every person [she] interviewed who described living a joyful life . . . actively practiced gratitude and attributed their joyfulness to their gratitude practice” (p. 77-78). I’m still at the point where I have what she calls “an attitude to gratitude”: it’s something I think about, but not something I practise (at least not yet).

My only complaint about this book is that I wish it was longer (it’s only 130 pages excluding the endnotes): I wanted more stories and more details about who the wholehearted were. I also found that her final chapter about the research process was a bit short on details: it didn’t satisfy the sociologist* in me. Having said that, if any of the concepts she discusses resonate with you in any way, I highly recommend this book!

Thank you to Hazelden Publishing for sending me this book to review.

*I have a BA in sociology.
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The Gifts of Imperfection was on blog tour with TLC Book Tours in September and October. Visit these other blogs for reviews:

Silver and Grace • Simply Stacie • evolution you • Patricia’s Wisdom • Living Outside the Stacks • this full house • overstuffed • From Marriage to Motherhood • Rundpinne • Cynthia Lou

Read an excerpt from the book: Sober 24
To practise some of the things Brown writes about, participate in her Perfect Protest (watch the Protest Dance on the Being Joy blog for inspiration) and/or confess something imperfect about yourself on Karen Walrond’s Chookooloonks blog.

Visit Brené Brown’s blog: Ordinary Courage
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Would you like to win a copy of The Gifts of Imperfection? Hazelden Publishing has offered to send a copy to one of my readers. The giveaway is open to U.S. and Canadian residents only (no P.O. boxes). I will accept entries until 11:59 PM Eastern Time on Thursday, November 18, 2010.

For one entry, please let me know why you are interested in reading this book.

If you are a follower or subscriber, let me know and I will give you another entry.

Make sure you provide me with a way of getting in touch with you. Entries without a blog link or email address will be disqualified.

THIS GIVEAWAY IS CLOSED._______________________________________________

Happy Blogiversary to Me + Giveaway!

It’s hard to believe, but I’ve now been blogging for two whole years! (I technically started my blog on July 15, but I posted my first real blog post on July 21.) What an adventure blogging has been: I had no idea when I started that it would be so addictive, nor did I expect to meet so many other folks (both virtually and in real life) who are as crazy as I am about books!

To celebrate my 2nd blogiversary, I’m giving away one book of your choice to two of my readers (one book each). The only criteria are:
- The books must have been mentioned on my blog somewhere (anywhere except the “similar covers” posts).
- They must be available from The Book Depository for under $15 US.

For one entry, please let me know which book you’d like to win!

+1 if you give me some feedback on my blog: What do you like? What do you want more of or less of? Do you have any suggestions for improvement?

+1 if you are a follower or subscriber (please let me know).

Giveaway is open worldwide (as long as The Book Depository will mail to you) and ends on August 25 at 11:59 PM Eastern Time. I will pick the two winners using Random.org.

Don’t forget to (a) let me know which book you’d like to win and (b) make sure there’s some way for me to get in touch with you if you do win. Failure to comply with either of these rules will disqualify you from this giveaway.

Thanks for reading my blog!

The Impostor’s Daughter by Laurie Sandell Out in Paperback + Giveaway!

The Impostor’s Daughter: A True Memoir by Laurie Sandell is a graphic memoir I reviewed last year—not only did I love it, but it sparked my interest in graphic novels/memoirs in general.

To celebrate the release of this book in paperback on July 12, Hachette is sponsoring a giveaway of 5 copies of The Impostor’s Daughter on my blog. The giveaway is open to U.S. and Canadian residents only (no P.O. boxes). I will accept entries until 11:59 PM Eastern Time on Thursday, July 29. I will select the winners using Random.org.

For one entry, please tell me the title of one of your favourite graphic novels/memoirs. If you haven’t read any yet, let me know why you want to read this one. Please be sure to provide me with a way of getting in touch with you. Entries that do not answer one of these questions or do not provide a blog link or email address will be disqualified.

Other ways to earn entries:
+1 if you comment on my review of The Impostor’s Daughter (if you’ve already done so, that counts too)
+1 if you are a follower or subscriber (please let me know)

Best of luck!

Mailbox Monday (June 21) + Giveaway Reminders

Happy Solstice to all my readers! For all of you in the northern hemisphere, I hope it’s as lovely wherever you are as it is here!

I received one book in my mailbox last week: Not That Kind of Girl: A Memoir by Carlene Bauer, another book for a TLC Book Tour in July. This one is a coming-of-age story written by a woman who was raised in evangelical churches. Although I hate the cover, what I’ve read of the book so far is really good. Bauer has a very unique voice.

What did you find in your mailbox this past week? For other Mailbox Monday posts, head over to Marcia’s blog, The Printed Page.
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I also wanted to remind you that today is the last day to enter my giveaway for a copy of Getting a Grip 2: Clarity, Creativity and Courage for the World We Really Want by Frances Moore Lappé. Read my review and then click on the image below to enter the giveaway.

Finally, I also wanted to mention a giveaway run by Lori at The Next Best Book Blog. She is asking participants to submit a letter written to a fictional character to the Letters with Character blog (and post a copy to her blog) in order to win one of 5 copies of What He’s Poised to Do by Ben Greenman. At the moment, only a couple of people have entered, so your chances of winning are good. (And even if you’re not interested in the giveaway, I recommend checking out the Letters with Character blog.) Click on the image below to enter the giveaway.

Giveaway Extension: Getting a Grip 2: Clarity, Creativity and Courage for the World We Really Want by Frances Moore Lappé

Because relatively few people have entered my giveaway for Getting a Grip 2: Clarity, Creativity and Courage for the World We Really Want by Frances Moore Lappé, I’ve decided to extend the giveaway by another 10 days until June 21.

Read my review to see if this inspiring book appeals to you and then read Ms. Lappé’s guest post and enter the giveaway!

The giveaway is open to U.S. and Canadian residents only (no P.O. boxes).

Best of luck!

Guest Post and Giveaway: Frances Moore Lappé, Author of Getting a Grip 2: Clarity, Creativity and Courage for the World We Really Want

I’m thrilled to be able to offer you this guest post by Frances Moore Lappé, author of Getting a Grip 2: Clarity, Creativity and Courage for the World We Really Want (read my review).
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None of us gets up in the morning vowing, “Today, I’m going to make sure another child starves.” And no one turns off the alarm asking, “How do I heat the planet?”

But that’s exactly what we’re doing.

So what could be powerful enough to have us creating a world not one of us would ever choose?

Ideas! Human beings, uniquely, see through a mental map. It determines, literally, what we can see, what we believe our own nature to be and therefore what is possible.

Now that’s okay, if our framing lens serves life. But I believe we’re alive in an era in which the dominant mental map, going global, is destroying life… creating a downward spiral that’s brought us to this crazy place: Where solutions abound yet we’re convinced we’re powerless to bring them to life!

And what’s at the center of this spiral of powerlessness?

Lack. The belief that there’s not enough of anything. Not enough goods—energy, food or parking spots in Boston. And not enough goodness, for at heart we humans are just “selfish little shoppers.” Once believing this about ourselves, of course we believe we can’t come together to solve problems. You know… democracy? We’re too flawed. Best turn over our fate to an automatic law to sort out outcomes for us—the “magic of the market,” Reagan called it.

Markets are great. But unfortunately for us we’ve fallen for one peculiar version of a market, one driven by a single rule—highest return to existing wealth, corporate chiefs and shareholders. But wait! Didn’t we all play Monopoly?

At the end of the night one person (in my home, my brother!) had all the best property while I couldn’t even afford Baltic Avenue. That’s not too bad in a game—at least I got to go to bed at the end of the night. But in real life? Not so good. We end up with what in 2005 Citigroup glowingly named plutonomy… where the top one percent of U.S. households has as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent.

And the bad news doesn’t stop there. Tightly held financial power morphs into political power. For every single law maker there are two dozen lobbyists, mostly serving corporate interests working the halls of Congress.

FDR warned us: “[T]he liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to the point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is fascism…” That was 1938. And here we are.

Starting with the false premise of scarcity of both goods and goodness, we end up actually manifesting lack—as now half of American children depend on food stamps at some point in their childhood. And we end up with the ultimate oxymoron: “privately held government.”

So, from the premise of lack, we’ve deprived ourselves of the very tool we need to make a planetary turn toward life: true, Living Democracy. To break free, we must ditch the sweet notion “seeing is believing.” For our species, it’s the opposite: Believing is seeing. So the challenge? To believe in a world actually aligned with our real nature.

Its premise is… possibility.

And that starts with embracing all of who we are—the good, the bad and the very ugly. To align with all of our nature, we can identify the conditions that bring out the worst; and, by flipping them, create the conditions proven to bring out the best. And it’s happening—as real, Living Democracy is emerging.

My argument here is that we live in an era where the dominant mental map is life destroying. What can we as individuals do to create a frame that it is life supporting? What are the conditions shown to bring out the worst in us? And how do we create the opposite to bring out the best, to create a world we really want?
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GIVEAWAY DETAILS

The Small Planet Institute has offered to send a signed copy of Getting a Grip 2: Clarity, Creativity and Courage for the World We Really Want to one of my readers. The giveaway is open to U.S. and Canadian residents only (no P.O. boxes). I will accept entries until 11:59 PM Eastern Time on Friday, June 21.

To enter the giveaway:

Answer one of Ms. Lappé’s questions at the end of her post OR tell me why you want to read this book.

If you are a follower or subscriber, please let me know and I will give you another entry.

Please be sure to provide me with a way of getting in touch with you. Entries that fail to answer one of the questions or that don’t provide a blog link or email address will be disqualified.

Good luck!

THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED.

Giveaway Extension and Reminder!

Since very few people have entered my giveaway for 10 copies of My Little Red Book edited by Rachel Kauder Nalebuff, I’ve decided to extend the giveaway for another two weeks to May 17.

Read my review and then you can read my period story and enter the giveaway! (I’m hoping it’s not my period story that has scared folks away from this giveaway...)

I’m also giving away 1 copy of The Girls from Ames: A Story of Women and a Forty-Year Friendship by Jeffrey Zaslow, which is currently on blog tours with TLC Book Tours.

Read my review and enter that giveaway too!

Both giveaways are open to U.S. and Canadian residents only (no P.O. boxes) and close on Monday, May 17, at 11:59 PM Eastern Time.

Good luck!

Review: The Girls from Ames: A Story of Women & a Forty-Year Friendship by Jeffrey Zaslow + Giveaway

When I was younger, I looked upon groups of women having a good time in a public place with a certain amount of envy: although I’ve had close female friends since high school, until fairly recently most of my friendships had been one on one and I often felt uncomfortable in groups. So I was very curious to read The Girls from Ames: A Story of Women and a Forty-Year Friendship by Jeffrey Zaslow, the extraordinary true story of a group of 11 women friends who met in childhood—mostly in preschool, kindergarten or first grade—and thus have basically been friends for their entire lives. Because these women are about my age, I was surprised that I didn’t identify with them more, but then I didn’t grow up in the Midwest, didn’t have a lot of friends in high school (nor was I popular) and don’t have children now. This didn’t stop me from enjoying this book, however. As Zaslow says in his introduction, he has set out to write “the biography of a friendship, meticulously reported,” and in this he has succeeded. Because there were so many “girls” (and I must admit I bristle a bit at this term), he necessarily focused on some of them more than others, but the stories they shared made me laugh and cry and cry some more. (I also developed a little bit of a crush on Marilyn’s dad, a pediatrician and “beloved figure in Ames.”) Stories of mean-girl behaviour, secrets and the loss of loved ones (including one of the girls) are interspersed with lighter stories of celebrity encounters, goofy behaviour and girl bonding in the next generation. Occasionally, the way Zaslow wrote about Kelly, the most outspoken (and nontraditional) member of the group, rubbed me the wrong way, but overall this was a fascinating look at a unique friendship.

Thank you to Penguin USA for sending me this book to review.
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The Girls from Ames is on blog tour with TLC Book Tours in April and May. Visit these other blogs for reviews and giveaways:

Simply Stacie • Silver and Grace • chaotic compendiums • Rundpinne • Luxury Reading • Book Nook Club • Suko’s Notebook • Feminist Review • Bookworm with a View • Cafe of Dreams • Janel’s Jumble • Anniegirl1138 • Peeking Between the Pages • Life in the Thumb • lit*chick

Other reviews:

Boarding in My Forties • Book, Line and Sinker • Mother Daughter Book Club • Nonfiction BookPage • Offenburger.com • Story Circle Book Reviews • Walking with Scissors Reviews
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Would you like to win a copy of The Girls from Ames? Penguin USA has offered to send a copy to one of my readers. The giveaway is open to U.S. and Canadian residents only (no P.O. boxes). I will accept entries until 11:59 PM Eastern Time on Monday, May 17.

For one entry, please answer this question: How old is your longest friendship? Mine will be 28 years old in September: I met my best friend in grade 7 in September 1982. I also have several other female friendships that are 15+ years old.

If you are a follower or subscriber, please let me know and I will give you another entry.

Please be sure to provide me with a way of getting in touch with you. Entries without a blog link or email address will be disqualified.
_______________________________________________

Period Stories + Huge Giveaway of My Little Red Book

A few days ago I reposted my (slightly updated) review of My Little Red Book edited by Rachel Kauder Nalebuff to mark the release of the second edition of this book. In my review, I mentioned that reading My Little Red Book had inspired me to write about and reflect on my own experiences of menstruation. So here’s some of my story:

I remember the exact date of my first period—and I usually have a terrible memory for dates—because it was three days before my thirteenth birthday and it was a much-anticipated event: It happened at school in the seventh grade on January 29, 1983—and I was the first of our threesome of friends to get it. I remember going to the washroom, seeing the blood and telling my friends, who were happy for me (and maybe a bit envious?)—it was exciting, a rite of passage, something we were looking forward to (albeit with some ambivalence). I don’t remember what happened next though: Did I have pads with me? Did one of my friends buy me one from a dispenser? I do know I was too embarrassed to tell my mother, but she figured it out and took me into the bathroom to show me where the “supplies” were (as we always called them), in the cupboard behind the bathroom door.

Flash forward to summer 1983. I was in Switzerland for a month, visiting a friend by myself and we went to Austria for a week to stay with her grandparents, who had a cottage on a lake. I guess I was still not used to the whole bleeding-every-month concept because I hadn’t brought any pads with me. One day, as Isabelle and I were lying in the sun on the dock, I could suddenly feel that I was bleeding through my bathing suit onto my towel. I was too embarrassed to say anything, but Isabelle noticed and asked if it was my first time. I recall nodding in agreement, and to my dismay she offered me tampons and pantyliners. Again, I was too embarrassed to admit I’d never used tampons and didn’t really want to. Instead I took one and went off to the bathroom and did my best to insert it. Clearly I didn’t do it right because by the time I got back to the living room, I felt strange and dizzy (and a bit freaked out). I hastily retreated back to the bathroom to remove it. I must have somehow managed with pantyliners for the rest of my period—I don’t remember. I didn’t use tampons again for years (and in fact have never used them regularly—I’m a reusable pad girl now).

What surprises me now, thinking back on this experience, is that I have no recollection of any other conversation taking place between me and Isabelle. I only remember being mute with embarrassment, while she was very matter-of-fact about the whole thing. (She was barely a year older than me.)
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Would you like to win a copy of My Little Red Book? To mark the release of the second edition of this book, Hachette has generously offered to send 10 copies of the book to my readers. The giveaway is open to U.S. and Canadian residents only (no P.O. boxes). I will accept entries until 11:59 PM Eastern Time on Monday, May 17.

For one entry, post a comment here. Please be sure to provide me with a way of getting in touch with you. Entries without a blog link or email address will be disqualified.

Other ways to earn entries:
+1 if you share a period story or answer this question: Do you use euphemisms when talking about your period? (I still call my period “my aunt,” but I don’t use the term “supplies” anymore!)
+1 if you make a relevant comment on my review of My Little Red Book (if you’ve already done so, that counts too)
+1 if you are a follower or subscriber (please let me know)

You can also visit these blogs and read their reviews:

Daisy’s Book Journal • Viva la Feminista

Good luck!

The Local News by Miriam Gershow Out in Paperback + Giveaway!

Last week, I found a lovely email in my inbox from Miriam Gershow, author of The Local News, which I reviewed last year. She starts off her email by saying:

I found your review of The Local News recently on She Reads and Reads during my (terrible) habit of Googling myself, and I was delighted by it. I’m listening to the Nick Cave song you mentioned as I type. What a wild and wonderful experience it sounds like you had. I could wish nothing more on a reader than to feel like she’s fully embodying the character that I wrote. I’m not sure if I can fully articulate how gratifying your experience was to read about.

To see what she’s referring to, read my review. Thank you, Miriam, for brightening my day!

The Local News was just released in paperback last month and is a Random House Reader’s Circle selection, with an additional 14 pages of author Q&A, a Reading Group Guide and an author bio in the back. Miriam is also one of the featured authors in this month’s Random House Author Chats, which means that book groups can request her participation in their discussions.

To celebrate the release of this book in paperback, Miriam Gershow and Random House are sponsoring a giveaway of one copy of The Local News on my blog! The giveaway is open to U.S. and Canadian residents only. I will accept entries until 11:59 PM Eastern Time on Tuesday, March 30.

For one entry, post a comment here. Please be sure to provide me with a way of getting in touch with you. Entries without a blog link or email address will be disqualified.

Other ways to earn entries:
+1 if you comment on my review of The Local News (if you’ve already done so, that counts too)
+1 if you are a follower or subscriber (please let me know)

Best of luck!

Crazy Cat Story & Giveaway of Simon’s Cat by Simon Tofield

Before I give you any giveaway details, I wanted to share a crazy cat story, which one of the drawings in Simon’s Cat reminded me of. As many of you know, I am owned by two cats, Thelma (in box below) and Cairo (left, reading Simon’s Cat with me; click on photos to enlarge). Years ago, I woke up one morning lying on my belly, clutching something in my hand. When I opened my eyes and looked at it, it turned out to be a dead rodent, which Cairo had kindly deposited in the bed with me. Luckily my mother was visiting, so when I screamed, she came rushing in and took care of things. (Again luckily, there was no blood to be seen anywhere.) I vaguely remembered being woken in the night by Cairo running around madly, but I’d been too groggy to pay much attention.

More recently, both Cairo and I spotted a mouse running across the kitchen floor and under the fridge. Cairo then spent the rest of the day standing guard in front of the fridge, hoping the mouse would reappear. I must admit I’m kinda glad that (a) the mouse didn’t reappear and hasn’t been seen or heard from since and (b) Cairo is now too geriatric to be chasing (and killing) mice!

OK, enough about that, on to the giveaway details!

As I mentioned last Friday, Hachette has generously offered to send copies of Simon’s Cat by Simon Tofield to five of my readers. The giveaway is open to U.S. and Canadian residents only (no P.O. boxes). I will accept entries until 11:59 PM Eastern Time on Sunday, December 6.

For one entry, post a comment here. Please be sure to provide me with a way of getting in touch with you. Entries without a blog link or email address will be disqualified.

Other ways to earn entries:
+1 if you comment on my review of Simon’s Cat (if you’ve already done so, that counts too)
+1 if you share a crazy cat story of your own
+1 if you are a follower or subscriber

Best of luck!

Thelma, keeping an eye on things!

BBAW giveaway #4: Literary fiction

In honour of Book Blogger Appreciation Week, which runs from September 14 to 18, I will announce a giveaway every day from September 14 to 17 for a total of four giveaways! Each giveaway has the same rules.

HOW IT WORKS:
Only one book will be given away each day.
The winner may choose from the two books offered.
All books are new paperbacks shipped directly to the winner at my expense.
Since the books will be purchased from The Book Depository, I reserve the right to change the books offered should the ones mentioned no longer be available or should they become too expensive.
Giveaways are open worldwide.*
The deadline for all giveaways is Sunday, September 27, 2009, at 11:59 PM, Eastern Time.
You can only win one of the four giveaways but you may enter as many as you want!

TO ENTER:
+1 for commenting on this post and mentioning the book you are interested in (only one!)
+1 for being a follower or subscribing to my blog (please mention this in your comment)
+1 for each relevant comment made on any of my book reviews
(please note that each comment can only be counted towards one giveaway!)
+1 for spreading the word about this giveaway (leave me a link in your comment)

BOOK CHOICE FOR GIVEAWAY #4:

The Little Giant of Aberdeen County by Tiffany Baker (read my review)
No One You Know by Michelle Richmond (read my review)

Don’t forget to (a) let me know which book you’d like to win and (b) make sure there’s some way for me to get in touch with you if you do win. Failure to comply with either of these rules will disqualify you from this giveaway.

Feel free to also enter my other BBAW giveaways:
#1: Quirky nonfiction
#2: Contemporary fiction
#3: Historical fiction or nonfiction

Thank you for reading my blog!

*Note that in this case “worldwide” refers only to the countries on this list. I apologize in advance if your country isn’t on this list.

BBAW giveaway #3: Historical fiction or nonfiction

In honour of Book Blogger Appreciation Week, which runs from September 14 to 18, I will announce a giveaway every day from September 14 to 17 for a total of four giveaways! Each giveaway has the same rules.

HOW IT WORKS:
Only one book will be given away each day.
The winner may choose from the two books offered.
All books are new paperbacks shipped directly to the winner at my expense.
Since the books will be purchased from The Book Depository, I reserve the right to change the books offered should the ones mentioned no longer be available or should they become too expensive.
Giveaways are open worldwide.*
The deadline for all giveaways is Sunday, September 27, 2009, at 11:59 PM, Eastern Time.
You can only win one of the four giveaways but you may enter as many as you want!

TO ENTER:
+1 for commenting on this post and mentioning the book you are interested in (only one!)
+1 for being a follower or subscribing to my blog (please mention this in your comment)
+1 for each relevant comment made on any of my book reviews
(please note that each comment can only be counted towards one giveaway!)
+1 for spreading the word about this giveaway (leave me a link in your comment)

BOOK CHOICE FOR GIVEAWAY #3:

The Heretic’s Daughter by Kathleen Kent (read my review)

The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher or The Murder at Road Hill House by Kate Summerscale (I haven’t written my review yet but you can read one at caribousmom or Medieval Bookworm)

Don’t forget to (a) let me know which book you’d like to win and (b) make sure there’s some way for me to get in touch with you if you do win. Failure to comply with either of these rules will disqualify you from this giveaway.

Feel free to also enter my other BBAW giveaways:
#1: Quirky nonfiction
#2: Contemporary fiction

Thank you for reading my blog!

*Note that in this case “worldwide” refers only to the countries on this list. I apologize in advance if your country isn’t on this list.