04-07-2006, 05:50 PM
What are you currently reading ?
I just finished a book which I enjoyed thoroughly, it is full of family life a real warm story with so many human touches. I have never read an Anne Tyler book although she features in many reviews. This one I highly recommend.
Digging to America by Anne Tyler
It was Friday, August 15th, 1997. The night the girls arrived. Two tiny Korean babies are delivered to Baltimore to two families who have no more in common than this. First, there are the Donaldsons, decent Brad and homespun, tenacious Bitsy (with her 'more organic than thou' airs, who believes fervently that life can always be improved), two full sets of grandparents and a host of big-boned, confident relatives, taking delivery with characteristic American razzmatazz. Then there are the Yazdans, pretty, nervous Ziba (her family 'only one generation removed from the bazaar') and carefully assimilated Sami, with his elegant, elusive Iranian-born widowed mother Maryam, the grandmother-to-be, receiving their little bundle with wondering discretion. Every year, on the anniversary of 'Arrival Day', their two extended families celebrate together, with more and more elaborately competitive parties, as tiny, delicate Susan, wholesome, stocky Jin-ho, and later, her new little sister Xiu-Mei, take roots, become American... While Maryam, the optimistic pessimist, confident that if things go wrong - as well they may - she will manage as she has before, contrarily preserves her 'outsider' status, as if to prove that, despite her passport, she is only a guest in this bewildering country. Full of achingly hilarious moments (Xiu-Mei's 'pacifier' party is worthy of 'The Simpsons') and toe-curling misunderstandings, "Digging to America" is a novel with a deceptively small domestic canvas, and subtly large themes - it's about belonging and otherness, about insiders and outsiders, pride and prejudice, young love and unexpected old love, families and the impossibility of ever getting it right, and about striving for connection and goodness against all the odds... And, the end catches you by the throat, ambushes your emotions when you least expect it, as only Tyler can.
I just finished a book which I enjoyed thoroughly, it is full of family life a real warm story with so many human touches. I have never read an Anne Tyler book although she features in many reviews. This one I highly recommend.
Digging to America by Anne Tyler
It was Friday, August 15th, 1997. The night the girls arrived. Two tiny Korean babies are delivered to Baltimore to two families who have no more in common than this. First, there are the Donaldsons, decent Brad and homespun, tenacious Bitsy (with her 'more organic than thou' airs, who believes fervently that life can always be improved), two full sets of grandparents and a host of big-boned, confident relatives, taking delivery with characteristic American razzmatazz. Then there are the Yazdans, pretty, nervous Ziba (her family 'only one generation removed from the bazaar') and carefully assimilated Sami, with his elegant, elusive Iranian-born widowed mother Maryam, the grandmother-to-be, receiving their little bundle with wondering discretion. Every year, on the anniversary of 'Arrival Day', their two extended families celebrate together, with more and more elaborately competitive parties, as tiny, delicate Susan, wholesome, stocky Jin-ho, and later, her new little sister Xiu-Mei, take roots, become American... While Maryam, the optimistic pessimist, confident that if things go wrong - as well they may - she will manage as she has before, contrarily preserves her 'outsider' status, as if to prove that, despite her passport, she is only a guest in this bewildering country. Full of achingly hilarious moments (Xiu-Mei's 'pacifier' party is worthy of 'The Simpsons') and toe-curling misunderstandings, "Digging to America" is a novel with a deceptively small domestic canvas, and subtly large themes - it's about belonging and otherness, about insiders and outsiders, pride and prejudice, young love and unexpected old love, families and the impossibility of ever getting it right, and about striving for connection and goodness against all the odds... And, the end catches you by the throat, ambushes your emotions when you least expect it, as only Tyler can.
my Open University tutorial... ok, so I just cannot seem to get it to read right! giggle