Author: Maibella Rhoiden, March 2018
Welcome to my new series, The Top 7. Each month I'll share 7 things about a particular topic and invite you to add to my list. Why 7? Because 5 is too few, 10 is too many, and 7 is one of my favorite numbers!
his month I'm sharing with you 7 of my favorite fiction books. In no particular order, they are:
- Kindred, by Octavia Butler
Summary:
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Dana, a modern black woman, is celebrating her twenty-sixth birthday with her new husband when she is snatched abruptly from her home in California and transported to the antebellum South. Rufus, the white son of a plantation owner, is drowning, and Dana has been summoned to save him. Dana is drawn back repeatedly through time to the slave quarters, and each time the stay grows longer, more arduous, and more dangerous until it is uncertain whether or not Dana’s life will end, long before it has a chance to begin.
There are thing that I will simply never understand about racism, things that I will never personally experience. Many times authors write about this topic in a way that doesn't help me to understand racism any better than I already do. Butler's writing was different. The fact that her main character is coming into her slave-life from a safe, comfortable, and generally non-racist home/work life allowed Butler to show the readers the reality of slavery through modern eyes. Dana was shocked and horrified over the same things that I would be shocked and horrified over; our reactions mirrored each other in a way that helped me understand the horrors of slavery as I never have before. Also, I expected Butler to protect her main character, give her a way to keep from getting hurt, give her someone to watch over her, give her something. Every time it didn't happen I was forced to acknowledge the realities of life as a slave - sometimes there simply were no choices or ways to get away.
- Remarkable Creatures, by Tracy Chevalier
Summary:
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In 1810, a sister and brother uncover the fossilized skull of an unknown animal in the cliffs on the south coast of England. With its long snout and prominent teeth, it might be a crocodile – except that it has a huge, bulbous eye.
Remarkable Creatures is the story of Mary Anning, who has a talent for finding fossils, and whose discovery of ancient marine reptiles such as that ichthyosaur shakes the scientific community and leads to new ways of thinking about the creation of the world.
Working in an arena dominated by middle-class men, however, Mary finds herself out of step with her working-class background. In danger of being an outcast in her community, she takes solace in an unlikely friendship with Elizabeth Philpot, a prickly London spinster with her own passion for fossils.
The strong bond between Mary and Elizabeth sees them through struggles with poverty, rivalry and ostracism, as well as the physical dangers of their chosen obsession. It reminds us that friendship can outlast storms and landslides, anger and and jealousy.
I was sucked into the story from the very start and thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. I was fascinating by the history of fossil hunting and the way accepted “facts” about fossils were beginning to change. Not only did enjoy the writing and the characters and the narration, but when I got to the end and found out how closely this book is based on fact I was beyond excited. This is the kind of historical fiction I truly love – the kind where I learn tons of facts not just about a time and place but about real people who really lived, all couched in a story that keeps me entranced all the way through.
- The Tortilla Curtain, by T. C. Boyle
Summary:
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In Southern California's Topanga Canyon, two couples live in close proximity and yet are worlds apart. High atop a hill overlooking the canyon, nature writer Delaney Mossbacher and his wife, real estate agent Kyra Menaker-Mossbacher, reside in an exclusive, secluded housing development with their son, Jordan. The Mossbachers are agnostic liberals with a passion for recycling and fitness. Camped out in a ravine at the bottom of the canyon are Cándido and América Rincón, a Mexican couple who have crossed the border illegally. On the edge of starvation, they search desperately for work in the hope of moving into an apartment before their baby is born. They cling to their vision of the American dream, which, no matter how hard they try to achieve it, manages to elude their grasp at every turn.
A chance, violent encounter brings together Delaney and Cándido, instigating a chain of events that eventually culminates in a harrowing confrontation. The novel shifts back and forth between the two couples, giving voice to each of the four main characters as their lives become inextricably intertwined and their worlds collide. The Rincóns' search for the American dream, and the Mossbachers' attempts to protect it, comprise the heart of the story. In scenes that are alternately comic, frightening, and satirical, but always all "too real," Boyle confronts not only immigration but social consciousness, environmental awareness, crime, and unemployment in a tale that raises the curtain on the dark side of the American dream.
This book gave me a lot to think about regarding illegal immigration. It's a complicated yet simple story of two families living in California and the ways that their lives intersect. These families couldn't be more different yet I identified with both of them in some way. I read this book a long time ago and I think I’m due for a reread …
- The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver
Summary:
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The Poisonwood Bible is a story told by the wife and four daughters of Nathan Price, a fierce, evangelical Baptist who takes his family and mission to the Belgian Congo in 1959. They carry with them everything they believe they will need from home, but soon find that all of it—from garden seeds to Scripture—is calamitously transformed on African soil. What follows is a suspenseful epic of one family's tragic undoing and remarkable reconstruction over the course of three decades in postcolonial Africa.
The novel is set against one of the most dramatic political chronicles of the twentieth century: the Congo's fight for independence from Belgium, the murder of its first elected prime minister, the CIA coup to install his replacement, and the insidious progress of a world economic order that robs the fledgling African nation of its autonomy. Against this backdrop, Orleanna Price reconstructs the story of her evangelist husband's part in the Western assault on Africa, a tale indelibly darkened by her own losses and unanswerable questions about her own culpability. Also narrating the story, by turns, are her four daughters—the self-centered, teenaged Rachel; shrewd adolescent twins Leah and Adah; and Ruth May, a prescient five-year-old. These sharply observant girls, who arrive in the Congo with racial preconceptions forged in 1950s Georgia, will be marked in surprisingly different ways by their father's intractable mission, and by Africa itself. Ultimately each must strike her own separate path to salvation. Their passionately intertwined stories become a compelling exploration of moral risk and personal responsibility.
This book is beautifully written, has engaging and dynamic characters, deals with difficult topics, and tells a fascinating story. It is compelling - one of those books that you just don't want to put down. I've read it twice and recommended it to numerous friends, each time with good results. I even convinced my book club to read it; it turned out to be one of our very best club books. It is both entertaining and haunting at the same time.
- The Little Stranger, by Sarah Waters
Summary:
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In a dusty post-war summer in rural Warwickshire, Dr. Faraday is called to a patient at Hundreds Hall. Home to the Ayres family for over two centuries, the Georgian house, once grand and handsome, is now in decline, its masonry crumbling, its gardens choked with weeds, the clock in its stable yard permanently fixed at twenty to nine. Its owners – mother, son and daughter – are struggling to keep pace with a changing society, as well as with conflicts of their own.
But are the Ayreses haunted by something more sinister than a dying way of life? Little does Dr Faraday know how closely, and how terrifyingly, their story is about to become entwined with his.
I'm really appreciate Waters' writing style. Her descriptions are very evocative; I can see the details of a scene very clearly as she describes it. Waters really captured the era: the sense of change, the aftermath of war, the modern vs. the traditional, and all of that crammed together in the English countryside. In addition, she took the prevailing sense of societal upheaval and turned it into the backdrop for what is essentially a gothic tale. VERY cool.
The story kept me on edge, constantly wondering what was going to happen, how things were going to be resolved. Things happen that make you wonder about the characters sanity and about the existence of a ghost, but you are never sure what to think.
- Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurtson
Summary:
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With haunting sympathy and piercing immediacy, Their Eyes Were Watching God tells the story of Janie Crawford's evolving selfhood through three marriages. Light-skinned, long-haired, dreamy as a child, Janie grows up expecting better treatment than she gets until she meets Tea Cake, a younger man who engages her heart and spirit in equal measure and gives her the chance to enjoy life without being a man's mule or adornment. Though Jaine's story does not end happily, it does draw to a satisfying conclusion. Janie is one black woman who doesn't have to live lost in sorrow, bitterness, fear, or foolish romantic dreams, instead Janie proclaims that she has done "two things everbody's got tuh do fuh theyselves. They got tuh go tuh God, and they got tuh find out about livin' fuh theyselves."
I first read this book as a teenager and I've reread it several times since then. In fact, I wrote my college application essay on the ways this book has inspired me. I love Janie. She is an independently-minded woman making her own way in a world that doesn't often approve of her. She isn't perfect but she finds a way through. This is an amazing read. It can be challenging due to the dialect, but it is worth the effort.
- The Old Man and the Sea, by Ernest Hemmingway
Summary:
Can I tell you how much I LOVED this story?! It was ... um ... amazing? heart-wrenching? beautiful? incredible? I can't decide how to describe it, I just know that I loved it. I loved the way the old man talked to himself, had conversations between his spoken word and his thoughts, while he was out at sea alone. I loved the physical contest between the old man and the marlin, and the respect the old man had for the fish and the ocean. I loved the way the story unfolded, even though I can't tell you more because it would spoil it for you. I loved the simple yet powerful language Hemingway used.
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Have you read any of these books? Do you think I'm crazy for loving any of them? What would be on your top 7 fiction books list?
