How I Learned English

This book was an interesting look into how one learns a language. (A second language). Working with ESL students on a daily basis, I was able to take a lot away from these stories and relate them back to my students. There were the common similarities; subtitles on TV or movies, reading everything in sight etc. I found it amusing that more than one author talked about National Geographic magazine. What's really funny is at my center, we have a whole shelf of these magazines and my students LOVE them. I just thought it was a funny thing, but now, after reading this book it seems this isn't such a strange thing after all.

Anyhow, this was an interesting read for anyone interested in language learning.

The Year of Magical Thinking

I am not sure I liked this book. I had a hard time relating to it. (Yes, I am young and have yet to experience any of the grief that the author obviously felt). The story was very sad, I admit, but that wasn't the part of the book that bothered me. I found the book quite pretentious. One thing that annoyed me was that she makes it quite clear that she and her husband are literary people who take literature seriously. If you haven't spent years in college didn’t study literature, you probably have no knowledge of these references. It was a bit tiresome. And these references would take her off onto stories of places she worked or lived for periods of time and sometimes I forgot what she began talking about in the first place.

Also, all of the medical references. She would go on for pages about all kinds of medical terminology that I just had to skip because I didn't understand a word of it. What was the point? I think maybe she was trying to justify how and why her husband died and what happened to Quintana. It was really actually boring to me.

Another thing was the incessant name-dropping. It was as if every single famous person they knew was mentioned in this book. But there was never a meaningful story to go along with it.. Its obvious she wanted to make sure everyone knew that she ran in a famous circle. It was really annoying.

My Sister's Keeper

This book was entertaining enough. (I at least finished this one!) I liked how the book rotated through different points of view for each character, though I don't think I really liked all the characters. The subject matter, though was fascinating. But somehow I don't see any hospital ever forcing anyone, even a minor to donate an organ, even if the parents were insisting on it.

I got annoyed with the whole romance between Campbell and Julia. It had really nothing to do with the major story line and it felt like wasted time reading through it. But with that said, it was a satisfying read. The ending wasn't actually a huge surprise. In a way, I thought it was kind of predictable.

The Zookeeper's Wife

So I am still having trouble with my choices lately. I tried really hard to get into this book. I couldn't finish it. There were too many unimportant details that I just couldn't get past. I had to skip the 4 pages about beetles! The whole premise of this book was interesting, but I also felt that it was a bit repetitive. It was also a bit dry for my taste. There wasn't much dialogue and there were too many characters coming and going and I couldn't keep track of them all. I had a hard time keeping track of the use of time in this book as well.

This book was set up interesting enough though. A fictional story based on a real life family who hid Jews in their zoo. The author obviously took a lot of time doing research about the family, the zoo and the time period.

I didn't finish this book. It was taking too much time and it wasn't keeping me interested enough to try and forge on.

The Headmaster Ritual

I have been having bad luck with books lately I guess. I just couldn't get into this one. I had a really hard time relating to anything in the book. There was too much history about North Korea and things that I didn't quite understand. It was too masculine for me. I usually really like books about prep school and the like, but this just didn't do it for me.

Delicate

I thought I was really going to like this book. But about 75 pages in, I was so bored I couldn't take it. The stories didn't make a whole lot of sense to me. I couldn't find anything to relate to. I have never really been a huge short story fan and it's books like this that remind me why.

Free Food For Millionaries

My goodness, this book took me over a month to read! It was too long in my opinion. There could have been a lot cut out and the book would have been just as good. Don't get me wrong, it obviously kept me intereseted for 552 pages. I enjoyed the changing view points. The Korean immigrant (or immigrant expriences in general) are always interesting to me. All of the characters had clever, interesting storylines. The ending left some to be desired though. I thought more loose ends could have be tied up.