Kate’s 2¢: “Blinding Light” by Paul Theroux

“Blinding Light” by Paul Theroux

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ merely shares her thoughts about what she reads. Inho…

   The descriptions of the flora and fauna in this story is remarkable. It is interesting how, when blind-folded to go down the river in a canoe, his senses were heightened.

   While I didn’t care for the erotica in this work of fiction, I thought the observations of other people seeing the blind man and then, the actual blind man’s feelings were spot on.

   Spoiler alert: I kept reading this story to find out how it ended, only to feel deceived by having the whole thing a drug induced. dream.

Paul Theroux (‘The world’s most perceptive travel writer’–Daily Mail) is the author of many highly acclaimed works of fiction and nonfiction, including The Great Railway Bazaar (1975), The Mosquito Coast (1981) Riding the Iron Rooster (1983), and Mr. Bones: Twenty Stories  (2014). In 2015, Paul Theroux was awarded a Royal Medal from the Royal Geographical Society for “the encouragement of geographical discovery through travel writing.” This award, approved by the Queen, is the highest award attainable for a traveler, and Theroux joins the ranks of recipients including Sir Edmund Hillary, Admiral Richard Byrd and Dr. Thor Heyerdahl. His other awards include the American Academy and Institute of Arts & Letters Award for literature; the Whitbread Prize for his novel, Picture Palace; and the James Tait Black Award for The Mosquito Coast. His travelogue, The Old Patagonian Express: By Train through the Americas, and The Mosquito Coast were both nominated for the American Book Award. His novels Saint Jack, The Mosquito Coast, Doctor Slaughter and Half Moon Street have been made into films and his short-story collection London Embassy was adapted for a British mini-series in 1987.  Theroux holds honorary doctorates from three American universities and remains a highly sought-after speaker nationwide.

In The New York Times Book Review, Francine Prose called his story collection Mr. Bones “a series of characteristically dark and sharply focused snapshots from the world that Theroux has observed–and invented.” Theroux’s book Deep South: Four Seasons on Back Roads (2015), was described by Kirkus Reviews in a starred review as “an epically compelling travel memoir,” and a Publishers Weekly starred review called it “Theroux’s best outing in years.” In a starred review, Publishers Weekly describes the essay collection Figures in a Landscape (2018) as “a magisterial grouping of intimate remembrances, globe-trotting adventures, and incisive literary critiques.”  

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

Blinding light DB61580

Theroux, Paul. Reading time: 17 hours, 39 minutes.

Read by Gregory Gorton.

Disability

Psychological Fiction

Fifty-year-old Slade Steadman, a one-time bestselling author, becomes addicted to an Ecuadorian drug that temporarily blinds him but provides illuminary vision to write another book. When the blindness prevails, Steadman loses his cocky attitude. Explicit descriptions of sex, some violence, and some strong language. 2005.

Downloaded: April 25, 2024

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Kate’s 2¢: “Holler, child: stories” by LaToya Watkins

“Holler, child: stories” by LaToya Watkins

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ merely shares her thoughts about what she reads. Inho…

   These stories were ably read by various narrators, which added their original ethnic voices to enhance the authenticity of the story’s under-lying theme. Although, I didn’t appreciate the Ebonics, bad grammar, and poor English, these stories highlight how we all have human frailties and bleed red blood.

   This was a story included on the NLS cartridge automatically sent to me with books NLS have chosen.

From www.LaToya Watkins.com:

LaToya Watkins’ writing has appeared in A Public Space, The Sun, Kweli Journal, McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern, Kenyon Review, The Pushcart Prize Anthology, and elsewhere.She is a Kimibilo fellow and has received support from the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, MacDowell, OMI: Arts, Yaddo, Hedgebrook, and the Camargo Foundation. She is the author of Perish and Holler, Child.

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

Holler, child: stories DB116449

Watkins, LaToya Reading time: 7 hours, 7 minutes.

Joniece Abbott-Pratt; De’Onna Prince; Lisa Renee Pitts; Kacie Rogers; JD Jackson; Aaron Goodson

Short Stories

Family

“In Holler, Child’s eleven brilliant stories, LaToya Watkins presses at the bruises of guilt, love, and circumstance. Each story introduces us to a character irrevocably shaped by place and reaching toward something—hope, reconciliation, freedom. In “Cutting Horse,” the appearance of a horse in a man’s suburban backyard places a former horse breeder in trouble with the police. In “Holler, Child,” a mother is forced into an impossible position when her son gets in a kind of trouble she knows too well from the other side. And “Time After” shows us the unshakable bonds of family as a sister journeys to find her estranged brother—the one who saved her many times over. Throughout Holler, Child, we see love lost and gained, and grief turned to hope. Much like LaToya Watkins’s acclaimed debut novel, Perish, this collection peers deeply into lives of women and men experiencing intimate and magnificent reckonings—exploring how race, power, and inequality map on the individual, and demonstrating the mythic proportions of everyday life.” — Provided by publisher. Unrated. Commercial audiobook.

Kate’s 2¢: ”I’m A Fan: a novel” by Sheena Patel

”I’m A Fan: a novel” by Sheena Patel

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ merely shares her thoughts about what she reads. Inho…

   Cintra Godfrey did a good job of narrating this critique of culture using a mocking voice.

–The character maintains that she is not a main character in this ensemble, rom-com of betrayal, she is a supporting act.

–She is a fan and because of that, she can be cut out.

–Second generation immigrants have the  privilege of self-actualization

–I want to be rescued, so I retreat into delutions.

–I want the illustion, rather than my self-respect.

Fans pick their heros and make them part of the identity.

—

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Sheena Patel is a writer and assistant director for film and TV12. She was born and raised in North West London12. She is part of the 4 BROWN GIRLS WHO WRITE collective and has been published in 4BROWN GIRLS WHO WRITE (Rough Trade Books) and a poetry collection of the same name (FEM Press)1. Her debut novel, I’m A Fan, will be published by Rough Trade Books on 5 May 20222. Sheena is also among The Observer’s 10 best debut novelists of 20222.

   Early life[edit]

Patel is a second-generation immigrant[9] with a Kenyan-Indian father and a Mauritian mother. She was born in northwest London[10] and was a voracious reader from early in life, reading what she describes as a large amount of “filthy books” for her young age.[9]

She studied English literature at Queen Mary University alongside Sharan Hunjan[11] and Rosh Goyate. The three women, along with Sunnah Khan, formed 4 BROWN GIRLS WHO WRITE in 2017.

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

I’m a fan: a novel DBC29749

Patel, Sheena. Reading time: 6 hours, 15 minutes.

Read by Cintra Godfrey.

Psychological Fiction

A debut novel about a young British woman, power, intimacy, and the internet. Sheena Patel’s incandescent first novel begins with the unnamed narrator describing her involvement in a seemingly unequal romantic relationship. With a clear and unforgiving eye, she dissects the behavior of all involved, herself included, and makes startling connections between the power struggles at the heart of human relationships and those of the wider world. I’m a Fan offers a devastating critique of class, social media, patriarchy’s hold on us, and our cultural obsession with status and how that status is conveyed. Adult. Descriptions of sex. Strong language. Violence.

Downloaded: April 11, 2024

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Kate’s 2¢: “Grasshopper: A Novel” by Barbara Vine

“Grasshopper: A Novel” by Barbara Vine

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ merely shares her thoughts about what she reads. Inho…

   Kristin Allison did a good job of narrating this absorbing tale. The author had an interesting way of using flashbacks to fill in the back-story, but the ending is still a surprise.

   I enjoyed this unique story.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ruth Barbara Rendell, Baroness Rendell of Babergh, CBE (née Grasemann; 17 February 1930 – 2 May 2015) was an English author of thrillers and psychological murder mysteries.[1]

Rendell is best known for creating Chief Inspector Wexford.[2] A second string of works was a series of unrelated crime novels that explored the psychological background of criminals and their victims. This theme was developed further in a third series of novels, published under the pseudonym Barbara Vine.

Early life[edit]

Rendell was born as Ruth Barbara Grasemann in 1930, in South Woodford, Essex (now Greater London).[3] Her parents were teachers. Her mother, Ebba Kruse, was born in Sweden to Danish parents and brought up in Denmark; her father, Arthur Grasemann, was English. As a result of spending Christmas and other holidays in Scandinavia, Rendell learned Swedish and Danish.[4] Rendell was educated at the County High School for Girls in Loughton, Essex,[3] the town to which the family moved during her childhood.

After high school, she became a feature writer for her local Essex paper, the Chigwell Times. She was forced to resign after filing a story about a local sports club dinner she had not attended and failing to report that the after-dinner speaker had died midway through the speech.[5]

Personal life[edit]

Rendell met her husband Don Rendell when she was working as a newswriter.[3] They married when she was 20, and in 1953 had a son, Simon,[6] now a psychiatric social worker who lives in the U.S. state of Colorado. The couple divorced in 1975 but remarried two years later.[7] Don Rendell died in 1999 from prostate cancer.[6]

She made the county of Suffolk her home for many years, using the settings in several of her novels. She lived in the villages of Polstead and later Groton, both east of Sudbury. She was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 1996 Birthday Honours[8] and a life peer as Baroness Rendell of Babergh, of Aldeburgh in the County of Suffolk, on 24 October 1997.[9] She sat in the House of Lords for the Labour Party. In 1998, Rendell was named in a list of the party’s biggest private financial donors.[10] She introduced into the Lords the bill that would later become the Female Genital Mutilation Act 2003 (the intent was to prevent the practice).

In August 2014, Rendell was one of 200 public figures who were signatories to a letter to The Guardian expressing their hope that Scotland would vote to remain part of the United Kingdom in September’s referendum on that issue.[11]

Rendell was a vegetarian who was described as living mostly on fruit.[12] She described herself as “slightly agoraphobic” and slept in a specially made four-poster bed because “I like to feel enclosed.”[12]

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

Grasshopper: a novel DB52427

Vine, Barbara. Reading time: 16 hours, 17 minutes.

Read by Kristin Allison. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress.

Suspense Fiction

Mystery and Detective Stories

Psychological Fiction

Young Clodagh Brown loves heights but suffers from claustrophobia. As a teenager she climbed electrical pylons until an accident claimed her boyfriend’s life. While in London, Clodagh joins a group of eccentrics who enjoy climbing rooftops. But tragedy strikes again. Some violence and some strong language. 2000.

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Kate’s 2¢: “The waters: A Novel” by Bonnie Jo Campbell

“The waters: A Novel” by Bonnie Jo Campbell

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ merely shares her thoughts about what she reads. Inho…

   I really enjoyed the intricacies of this story, ably read by Lili Taylor. The family dynamics of this family will resonate with many a reader.

Copilot GPTs

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Bonnie Jo Campbell (born September 14, 1962 in Kalamazoo, Michigan) is an American novelist and short story writer. Her most recent work is The Waters, published with W.W. Norton and Company.

Life and work[edit]

Campbell attended Comstock High School (from which she graduated in 1980), and received a B.A. in philosophy from the University of Chicago in 1984. From Western Michigan University, she received an MA in mathematics in 1995 and an MFA in creative writing in 1998. She has traveled with the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus, and has organized adventure bicycle tours in Eastern Europe and Russia.[1]

Campbell teaches fiction at Pacific University in Forest Grove, Oregon, in the low-residency MFA program.[2] Campbell lives outside Kalamazoo, Michigan, with her husband, Christopher Magson. [3]

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

The waters: a novel DB119489

Campbell, Bonnie Jo. Reading time: 14 hours, 43 minutes.

Read by Lili Taylor.

Human Relations

Family

“On an island in the Great Massasauga Swamp an area known as “The Waters” to the residents of nearby Whiteheart, Michigan herbalist and eccentric Hermine “Herself” Zook has healed the local women of their ailments for generations. As stubborn as her tonics are powerful, Herself inspires reverence and fear in the people of Whiteheart, and even in her own three estranged daughters. The youngest the beautiful, inscrutable, and lazy Rose Thorn has left her own daughter, eleven-year-old Dorothy “Donkey” Zook, to grow up wild. Donkey spends her days searching for truths in the lush landscape and in her math books, waiting for her wayward mother and longing for a father, unaware that family secrets, passionate love, and violent men will flood through the swamp and upend her idyllic childhood. Rage simmers below the surface of this divided community, and those on both sides of the divide have closed their doors against the enemy. The only bridge across the waters is Rose Thorn.” — Provided by publisher. Unrated. Commercial audiobook.

Downloaded: April 11, 2024

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Kate’s 2¢: “The Book of Dreams”, by Nina George translated by  Simon Pare“The Book of Dreams” by Nina George

“The Book of Dreams”, by Nina George

translated by  Simon Pare
“The Book of Dreams” by Nina George

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ merely shares her thoughts about what she reads. Inho…

   Xalvador Tin-Bradbury did a good job of narrating this story. The intricacies of the various relationships were fascinating. The son is a remarkable young man. I actually like the ending.

www.wikiwand.com

George writes also under three pen names. She writes non-fiction about issues of love, sexuality and eroticism, under the pseudonym Anne West. Under her married name Nina Kramer she wrote a thriller in 2008. She also wrote detective novels with her husband and co-writer Jo Kramer, their pseudonym being Jean Bagnol.

In 2012 and 2013 she won the DeLiA and the Glauser Prize. Her first bestselling novel was The Little Paris Bookshop (first published in German as Das Lavendelzimmer on May 2, 2013). She moved to Concarneau in France, where she now lives with her husband Jo Kramer.

George is a member of the administrative board of the Collective Management Organisation VG Wort. She is chairwoman of the VG-Wort ‘e-Book’ working group.[2]

Life and work

Nina George was born in Bielefeld. She dropped out of school before finishing high school and worked in various catering establishments from the age of fourteen. She began in 1993 writing as a freelance journalist and columnist for magazines like Cosmopolitan, Penthouse, TV Movie, and Frau im Trend. In 1997, she wrote the book Good girls do it in bed, bad ones everywhere under the pseudonym Anne West. She lived in Hamburg. In 2008, she appeared under the name Nina Kramer in ‘Thriller A Life Without Me’ about women’s reproductive health.

George is Member to PEN, Das Syndikat (association of German-language crime writers), the Association of German Authors (VS), the Hamburg Authors’ Association (HAV), BücherFrauen (Women in Publishing), the IACW/AIEP (International Association of Crime Writers), the GEDOK (Association of female artists in Germany), PRO QUOTE and Lean In. Nina George sits on the board of the Three Seas Writers’ and Translators’ Council (TSWTC), whose members come from 16 different countries.

Stop floating

Simon Pare Date of birth: 25 July 1972 Im Dörfli 13, 8615 Freudwil, Switzerland Nationality: British Tel. (+41) (0)44 940 2906 Mob. (+41) (0)77 485 2049 Email: mail@simonpare.net Literary translator (French and German into English) Member of the Society of Authors and the Translators’ Association (UK)

Translator, French, German. Simon Pare is British, lives in Paris and translates literature, non-fiction and film from German and French. His published translations include works by the Austrian author Christoph …

FromNLS/BARD/LOC:

The book of dreams DB94562

George, Nina; Pare, Simon. Reading time: 10 hours, 12 minutes.

Read by Xalvador Tin-Bradbury.

Human Relations

Psychological Fiction

On the way to see his son Sam for the first time in years, Henri is involved in an accident and winds up in a coma. Thirteen-year-old Sam and Henri’s former lover, Eddie, wait by his bedside while Henri floats in dreams. Translated from the 2016 original German. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2019.

Downloaded: April 3, 2024

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