I got a slow start on my reading this year after nearly burning out in December trying to meet my reading challenge goals for last year. In addition, I took some time over my non-fiction selection this month, to savour ideas.

This year I’ve decided to go more slowly – and choose more freely. The core of my month’s reading list will be around a couple of challenges I’ve unofficially taken on, but because it’s unofficial if I don’t make it, I won’t stress.

Enjoy this month’s links!

1. WINTER: FIVE WINDOWS ON THE SEASON by Adam Gopnik (Non-fiction, Essays)
I chose to read this collection of Massey Lectures broadcast on CBC Radio to satisfy the Keyword Challenge hosted by Bev at My Reader’s Block. I also thought that with some insight on this frigid season, I could learn to dislike it a little less.
The five windows or views of winter that Gopnik considers are: Romantic Winter, Radical Winter, Recuperative Winter, Recreational Winter, and Remembering Winter.
This book is a fascinating mix of history, art, science, religion, popular culture, and philosophy and flows like a great lecture should. I highly recommend it.
Read this if: you’re a fellow winter-survivor and want to have ‘warmer’ feelings about this difficult season; you’re one of that unusual specie – a winterphile and want factoids to dazzle and convince your friends that you’re not insane; or you’re a lucky warm-weather inhabitant and want a taste of what the big chill is all about. 4½ stars
Thanks to Buried in Print who first tipped me to this book.

2. FLIGHT BEHAVIOR: A Novel by Barbara Kingsolver (fiction)

I approached Flight Behavior with mixed emotion. On one hand, I’ve loved every Kingsolver book I’ve ever read and rate her The Poisonwood Bible as one of the best books in my reading lifetime. On the other hand, I roll my eyes (quite literally) at heroines with names like Juniper or Venetia or, in this case, Dellarobia, AND the book was purported to be full of butterflies. Dreams of fluff danced in my head.
But Kingsolver tackles a very serious issue in Flight Behavior: climate change, and the real-life destruction of the wintering nesting grounds of North America’s Monarch butterfly population in 2010. That she peoples this drama with the melodramatically named Dellarobia who makes a series of decisions that alienated her from this reader does not lesson the importance of that main issue, or for that matter, the beauty of her writing.
For concrete (albeit fictionally set) consequences of a complex issue, you could do far worse than this book.
Read this if: you don’t think climate is really changing our world; you recognize that climate change is real and would like great party talking-points on the subject; or you’re a Kingsolver fan. 4 stars

3. SOME TAME GAZELLE by
Barbara Pym (Fiction)
This is one of those read-alongs I mentioned: LibrayThing’s Virago Group is reading twelve of Barbara Pym’s mid-twentieth century novels to celebrate the centenary of her birth. This happens to be the only Pym that I’ve already read, and I enjoyed it just as much this time around.
Read this if: you’re a fan of gentle English humour. 4 stars

4. THE OBSERVATIONS by Jane Harris (Fiction, Historical fiction)
The cover of this book (the debut novel for the author of Gillespie & I) tells me that it is set in 1863 Scotland, but other than a single reference to the “war in America”, the time period could be anytime in the 19th century. That it is Scotland, though, is obvious.
Bessy Buckley, a young teenager serving as a housemaid, is asked by her mistress to keep a journal. The blurb hints of something sinister coming of that, but Bessy discovers the purpose early on in the book and it’s not earth-shaking. In fact, I thought the book over-long for the plot.
But other critics have raved about Bessy’s voice – and rightly so. Harris has captured a working class Irish/Scottish street slang that is endearing, even though it is oftentimes crude. And that voice was strong enough to garner several prizes, including a shortlisting for the 2007 Orange Prize for Fiction.
Be forewarned: Bessy’s language is sometimes obscene. A mild example: “Once or twice he got a jack on him would have put your eye out, you could see it poking behind his trousers .” But her life has made her so. In fact, sometimes it seemed that Bessy’s lively voice did not allow the true impact of her tragic past to affect the reader.
Read this if: you want to be glad you weren’t born into a 19th century British slum. 3½ stars

5. THE BLUE DRAGON (fiction, graphic novel, translated fiction)
This oversized graphic novel (a little outside my usual genre) was recommended by Buried in Print, where you’ll find a longer review and explanation of the work. Written by Robert Lepage and Marie Michaud, illustrated by Fred Jourdain and translated from the Mandarin by Min Sun, The Blue Dragon is set in Shanghai and centres on a Canadian from Montreal who has come to China to adopt a baby girl.
I kept returning to the artwork over and over, and it has three alternatives for an ending – you choose. It’s quite thought-provoking.
Read this if: you’ve ever wondered about the life of Canadians in China, or the difficulty of adopting there for a single woman; or you ever read ‘choose your own adventure’ books. 3½ stars

6. WHERE’D YOU GO, BERNADETTE? By Maria Semple (Fiction, YA?)
After all the raves about this book last year, I was disappointed by this novel. I so looked forward to the epistolary format but, honestly, the emails, letters and articles seemed forced, and the plot farcical.
Was it a farce? (SPOILER ALERT!) What mother would leave her 13 year old daughter behind and go to live in Antarctica without a trace?
Or was I supposed to take seriously the serious issue of depression and related mental illness?
I’m just not sure what to make of this whole thing.
Thank you to Hachette Books from whom I won this book via Under My Apple Tree, hosted by Leslie.
Read this if: you want a slightly (?) farcical take on upper middle-class suburban Seattle. 3 stars

THE YELLOW BIRDS by Kevin Powers DNF
I started to read this acclaimed novel about a friendship, set during the war in Iraq, among other reasons because I wanted to try the Literature & War Read-Along, hosted by Beauty is a Sleeping Cat.
This year, I’ve determined that I’m censoring my reading more closely than I did in 2012. In particular, one big trigger for the red flags to go up is that four letter word that starts with f that used to be so shocking. Thing is, I want it still be to be shocking and I’m tired of its overuse in modern literature . I’m willing to overlook the occasional use within a novel – once or twice perhaps for effect but that’s my limit.
It’s a shame about The Yellow Birds, which I was looking forward to very much. The book begins with the narrator’s voice – and no profanity in sight. It was when the soldiers started speaking that the trouble began. And, yes, no doubt soldiers do talk like that. But I don’t want to read it. I put the book down at page 20.
It’s a shame to miss out on this story which I presume is actually quite good – but there are lots of other stories out there to fill the void.

So, anything here intrigue you? Anything you’ve read already – and agree or disagree with my assessment?

Links for Canadian Readers:
Winter: Five Windows On The Season
Flight Behavior
The Poisonwood Bible: A Novel
Some Tame Gazelle
The Observations
Blue Dragon
Where’d You Go, Bernadette: A Novel
The Yellow Birds: A Novel

I don’t know who is the genius behind Wordle but I’m sending out a big THANK YOU!

At Wordle, it’s free to create your own word clouds – and then you can change the orientation, colour, and font. It’s a little tricky to copy the image, but there’s lots of valuable FAQs to help you along.

This Wordle is Exurbanis at the end of January 2013.

I didn’t intend to read any picture books this month, but some of my library holds from last year started to arrive, and I couldn’t resist reading them!

Z IS FOR MOOSE by Kelly Bingham, illustrated by Paul O. Zelinsky

I reserved this book, which must be quite popular, in late November in a last minute effort to read a book beginning with the letter “Z” in the 2012 Eh-Zed Reading Challenge. In the end, I had to go with a compromise because Z is for Moose didn’t show up until January.

See if it was worth the wait.

IT’S OKAY TO BE DIFFERENT written and illustrated by Todd Parr

When our grandson visits us, everyone in town knows him – because he stands out. In any group of kids, he towered over his fellow three-year-olds and went nose to nose with seven and eight-year-olds. His skin colour is different too: in a rural village originally settled by Mi’kmaq (formerly MicMac) and then Scots, his half-Jamaican ancestry is very noticeable. So when I heard about It’s Okay to Be Different, I immediately reserved it at the library.

Did I find it helpful?

APPLES AND BUTTERFLIES by Shauntay Grant; illustrated by Tamara Thiébaux-Heikalo

Originally, I reserved this book at the library on the recommendation of a friend who had heard the author interviewed on CBC radio. Shauntay Grant was the poet laureate of Halifax, Nova Scotia from 2009-2011 so I expected a book of poetry. Imagine my surprise when I received a children’s picture book.

Here’s what I thought of it.

In Z is for Moose Zebra is having a talent show of sorts – animals and objects walk across the stage as called for each letter: B is for ball, C is for cat, etc.
Big, gangly moose is impatient and starts peeking on stage & asking if it’s his turn yet at letter D. Zebra is cool and continues to call letters – and then, after all of Moose’s finagling, chooses Mr. Mouse for the letter M.

Moose realizes he’s been left out and starts to push onstage, trying to appear for any letter. By the letter T, Zebra starts guarding the stage and Moose starts to cry. There’s a happy ending when Zebra announces that Z is for Zebra’s friend, Moose.

The illustrations are delightful: Zelinsky has depicted Moose’s gawky awkwardness and Zebra’s graceful calm is simple pictures.

Moose sounds obnoxious but he isn’t. Okay, just a little, but we like him right away and are somewhat aghast when he is passed over for the letter M. I’m not too keen on the idea that might be conveyed that being pushy and fighting with people is the way to get what you want (in this case, to be in the show) but somehow, that concept doesn’t seem to be what comes across. Instead, we identify with Moose, even if we might be a little embarrassed for him. Perhaps the lesson is that everyone can be included.

In any case, I felt good when I finished Z is for Moose, and rate it 4½ stars.

Link for Canadian readers:
Z Is For Moose

Everybody wants to belong – especially kids. So when a child is “different” from the others in his or her group, it can be easy for them to feel bad about themselves. Todd Parr wants every kid to know “You are special and important just because of being who are”, and he’s written It’s Okay To Be Different to get that message across.

Illustrated by the author with outlined-in-black figures that are painted with bright primary colours—blue faces, orange hair and so on—this book delivers the message in short, clear statements: it’s okay to have a different nose, it’s okay to wear glasses, to have an invisible friend, to have different moms or different dads, to be embarrassed, to be a different color…. I’m not able to imagine a situation Parr didn’t cover in these 30 pages.

Although I don’t agree completely with Parr (I don’t think it’s okay to eat macaroni and cheese in the bathtub, but that’s me – I’m a mean old mom), I love the statement this book makes. I think you’ll want to buy this one so you can re-read it many times. A solid 4 stars.

Link for Canadian Readers:
It’s Okay To Be Different

Apples and Butterflies tells the story of a young girl and her family on a fall holiday on Prince Edward Island, based on the author’s own memories.

Although this is subtitled: a Poem for Prince Edward Island, if there is a poem here, it is very free-form and I couldn’t recognize it. I know my poetry senses are untrained but then, so are a child’s (I assume the intended audience).

So I looked at Apples and Butterflies as “just” another picture book. From that point of view it was disappointing. The story does mention some of the delights of PEI but doesn’t develop them before the ideas float away. The illustrations seemed non-descript given the beauty they were intending to capture.

Sorry, Shauntay. I think it’s worth only 3 stars – plus another half for the Atlantic Canada connection. 3½ stars

Link for Canadian readers:
Apples and Butterflies: A Poem for Prince Edward Island