Sandra's bookshelf: all en-US Fri, 11 Apr 2025 02:31:43 -0700 60 Sandra's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg Bonjour tristesse 61672
La villa est magnifique, l'été brûlant, la Méditerranée toute proche. Cécile a dix-sept ans. Elle ne connaît de l'amour que des baisers, des rendez-vous, des lassitudes. Pas pour longtemps. Son père, veuf, est un adepte joyeux des liaisons passagères et sans importance. Ils s'amusent, ils n'ont besoin de personne, ils sont heureux. La visite d'une femme de cœur, intelligente et calme, vient troubler ce délicieux désordre. Comment écarter la menace ? Dans la pinède embrasée, un jeu cruel se prépare.
C'était l'été 1954. On entendait pour la première fois la voix sèche et rapide d'un « charmant petit monstre » qui allait faire scandale. la deuxième moitié du XXe siècle commençait. Elle serait à l'image de cette adolescente déchirée entre le remords et le culte du plaisir.

Set against the translucent beauty of France in summer, Bonjour Tristesse is a bittersweet tale narrated by Cecile, a seventeen-year-old girl on the brink of womanhood, whose meddling in her father's love life leads to tragic consequences.

Endearing, self-absorbed, seventeen-year-old Cécile is the very essence of untroubled amorality. Freed from the stifling constraints of boarding school, she joins her father—a handsome, still-young widower with a wandering eye—for a carefree, two-month summer vacation in a beautiful villa outside of Paris with his latest mistress. Cécile cherishes the free-spirited moments she and her father share, while plotting her own sexual adventures with a "tall and almost beautiful" law student. But the arrival of her late mother's best friend intrudes upon a young girl's pleasures. And when a relationship begins to develop between the adults, Cécile and her lover set in motion a plan to keep them apart...with tragic, unexpected consequences.

The internationally beloved story of a precocious teenager's attempts to understand and control the world around her, Françoise Sagan's Bonjour Tristesse is a beautifully composed, wonderfully ambiguous celebration of sexual liberation, at once sympathetic and powerfully unsparing.]]> 154 Françoise Sagan 2266127748 Sandra 0 currently-reading 3.76 1954 Bonjour tristesse
author: Françoise Sagan
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.76
book published: 1954
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/11
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Hiljadu čudesnih sunaca 4707989


Kako vreme prolazi, u Avganistanu na vlast dolaze talibani, ulice Kabula ječe od puščane paljbe i bombi, a život se pretvara u očajničku borbu protiv gladi, surovosti i straha. Istrajnost dve žene nailazi na iskušenja koja nisu mogla da naslute ni u najgorim košmarima. A ipak, ljubav ume da čoveka natera na nezamisliva dela, da mu pomogne da čudesnim junaštvom prevaziđe najstrašnije prepreke. Na kraju ljubav pobeđuje smrt i uništenje.



Hiljadu čudesnih sunaca je nezaboravan portret jedne ranjene zemlje i istinski dirljiva priča o porodici i prijateljstvu. Istovremeno prelepa i teška, priča o jednom nemilosrdnom vremenu, nesvakidašnjem prijateljstvu i neuništivoj ljubavi.]]> 368 Khaled Hosseini 8674368778 Sandra 0 currently-reading 4.67 2007 Hiljadu čudesnih sunaca
author: Khaled Hosseini
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.67
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/11
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> The Elegance of the Hedgehog 2967752
We are in the center of Paris, in an elegant apartment building inhabited by bourgeois families. Renée, the concierge, is witness to the lavish but vacuous lives of her numerous employers. Outwardly she conforms to every stereotype of the concierge: fat, cantankerous, addicted to television. Yet, unbeknownst to her employers, Renée is a cultured autodidact who adores art, philosophy, music, and Japanese culture. With humor and intelligence she scrutinizes the lives of the building's tenants, who for their part are barely aware of her existence.

Then there's Paloma, a twelve-year-old genius. She is the daughter of a tedious parliamentarian, a talented and startlingly lucid child who has decided to end her life on the sixteenth of June, her thirteenth birthday. Until then she will continue behaving as everyone expects her to behave: a mediocre pre-teen high on adolescent subculture, a good but not an outstanding student, an obedient if obstinate daughter.

Paloma and Renée hide both their true talents and their finest qualities from a world they suspect cannot or will not appreciate them. They discover their kindred souls when a wealthy Japanese man named Ozu arrives in the building. Only he is able to gain Paloma's trust and to see through Renée's timeworn disguise to the secret that haunts her. This is a moving, funny, triumphant novel that exalts the quiet victories of the inconspicuous among us.]]> 325 Muriel Barbery 1933372605 Sandra 0 currently-reading 3.76 2006 The Elegance of the Hedgehog
author: Muriel Barbery
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/31
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> North Woods 71872930
When a pair of young lovers abscond from a Puritan colony, little do they know that their humble cabin in the woods will become home to an extraordinary succession of inhabitants . An English soldier, destined for glory, abandons the battlefields of the New World to devote himself to apples. A pair of spinster twins survive war and famine, only to succumb to envy and desire.A crime reporter unearths a mass grave, but finds the ancient trees refuse to give up their secrets. A lovelorn painter, a conman, a stalking panther, a lusty beetle; as each one confronts the mysteries of the north woods, they come to realize that the dark, raucous, beautiful past is very much alive.

Traversing cycles of history, nature, and even literature, North Woods shows the myriad, magical ways in which we’re connected to our environment and to one another, across time, language and space. Written along with the seasons and divided into the twelve months of the year, it is an unforgettable novel about secrets and fates that asks the timeless how do we live on, even after we’re gone?]]> 372 Daniel Mason 0593597036 Sandra 0 to-read 4.11 2023 North Woods
author: Daniel Mason
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/31
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Fates and Furies 24612118
At age twenty-two, Lotto and Mathilde are tall, glamorous, madly in love, and destined for greatness. A decade later, their marriage is still the envy of their friends, but with an electric thrill we understand that things are even more complicated and remarkable than they have seemed.]]> 390 Lauren Groff 1594634475 Sandra 0 Anger's my meat; I sup upon myself,
And so shall starve with feeding.
(Volumnija, Koriolan)

Reči Šekspirove junakinje odzvanjaju stranicama romana Suđaje i furije, naročito u drugoj poloviji (Furije) u kojoj priča postaje zanimljivija, dinamičnija, i provokativnija.

Ovo je priča o braku ispričana iz perspektive muža (prvi deo, Suđaje) i žene (drugi i dosta duži deo, Furije). Dajući poslednju, završnu reč ženi kao i daleko veći prostor da se ispriča "njena strana priče" autorka nedvosmisleno daje prednost njenoj interpretaciji događaja. To je ono što bih zamerila ovom romanu - strukturom obećava dve perspektive, "dve strane novčića", a suštinski nam prikazuje višeslojnost samo u drugoj polovini romana.

Dijalozi su prilično slabi, ali su zato neke rečenice tako fino izbrušene, prava poslastica...kao npr:

It occurred to her then that life was conical in shape, the past broadening beyond the sharp point of the lived moment. The more life you had, the more the base expanded, so that the wounds and treasons that were nearly imperceptible when they happened stretched like tiny dots on a balloon slowly blown up. A speck on the slender child grows into a gross deformity in the adult, inescapable, ragged at the edges.


]]> 3.55 2015 Fates and Furies
author: Lauren Groff
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.55
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at: 2025/03/31
date added: 2025/03/31
shelves:
review:
Anger's my meat; I sup upon myself,
And so shall starve with feeding.
(Volumnija, Koriolan)

Reči Šekspirove junakinje odzvanjaju stranicama romana Suđaje i furije, naročito u drugoj poloviji (Furije) u kojoj priča postaje zanimljivija, dinamičnija, i provokativnija.

Ovo je priča o braku ispričana iz perspektive muža (prvi deo, Suđaje) i žene (drugi i dosta duži deo, Furije). Dajući poslednju, završnu reč ženi kao i daleko veći prostor da se ispriča "njena strana priče" autorka nedvosmisleno daje prednost njenoj interpretaciji događaja. To je ono što bih zamerila ovom romanu - strukturom obećava dve perspektive, "dve strane novčića", a suštinski nam prikazuje višeslojnost samo u drugoj polovini romana.

Dijalozi su prilično slabi, ali su zato neke rečenice tako fino izbrušene, prava poslastica...kao npr:

It occurred to her then that life was conical in shape, the past broadening beyond the sharp point of the lived moment. The more life you had, the more the base expanded, so that the wounds and treasons that were nearly imperceptible when they happened stretched like tiny dots on a balloon slowly blown up. A speck on the slender child grows into a gross deformity in the adult, inescapable, ragged at the edges.



]]> <![CDATA[Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries (Emily Wilde, #1)]]> 60657589
Cambridge professor Emily Wilde is good at many things: She is the foremost expert on the study of faeries. She is a genius scholar and a meticulous researcher who is writing the world's first encyclopaedia of faerie lore. But Emily Wilde is not good at people. She could never make small talk at a party--or even get invited to one. And she prefers the company of her books, her dog, and the Fair Folk.

So when she arrives in the hardscrabble village of Hrafnsvik, Emily has no intention of befriending the gruff townsfolk. Nor does she care to spend time with another new arrival: her dashing and insufferably handsome academic rival Wendell Bambleby, who manages to charm the townsfolk, get in the middle of Emily's research, and utterly confound and frustrate her.

But as Emily gets closer and closer to uncovering the secrets of the Hidden Ones--the most elusive of all faeries--lurking in the shadowy forest outside the town, she also finds herself on the trail of another mystery: Who is Wendell Bambleby, and what does he really want? To find the answer, she'll have to unlock the greatest mystery of all--her own heart.]]> 336 Heather Fawcett 059350013X Sandra 0 currently-reading 3.98 2023 Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries (Emily Wilde, #1)
author: Heather Fawcett
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/04
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Zbunjenost 75608439
Uz očaravajuće opise prirode na našem i drugim svetovima, „Zbunjenost� predstavlja najnoviji i najdirljiviji Pauersov roman do sada, nežnu priču o dečaku koji se zalaže za našu ugroženu planetu podjednako strastveno kao što bismo i mi sami morali.



Prevod sa engleskog: Milica Kecojević]]> 336 Richard Powers 8664574626 Sandra 0 currently-reading 3.73 2021 Zbunjenost
author: Richard Powers
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/03
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[There's No Such Thing as Bad Weather: A Scandinavian Mom's Secrets for Raising Healthy, Resilient, and Confident Kids (from Friluftsliv to Hygge)]]> 34466962
Bringing Up Bébé meets Last Child in the Woods in this lively, insightful memoir about a mother who sets out to discover if the nature-centric parenting philosophy of her native Scandinavia holds the key to healthier, happier lives for her American children.

When Swedish-born Linda McGurk moved to small-town Indiana with her American husband to start a family, she quickly realized that her outdoorsy ways were not the norm. In Sweden children play outside all year round, regardless of the weather, and letting young babies nap outside in freezing temperatures is not only common—it is a practice recommended by physicians. In the US, on the other hand, she found that the playgrounds, which she had expected to find teeming with children, were mostly deserted. In preschool, children were getting drilled to learn academic skills, while their Scandinavian counterparts were climbing trees, catching frogs, and learning how to compost. Worse, she realized that giving her daughters the same freedom to play outside that she had enjoyed as a child in Sweden could quickly lead to a visit by Child Protective Services.

The brewing culture clash finally came to a head when McGurk was fined for letting her children play in a local creek, setting off an online firestorm when she expressed her anger and confusion on her blog. The rules and parenting philosophies of her native country and her adopted homeland were worlds apart.

Struggling to fit in and to decide what was best for her children, McGurk turned to her own childhood for answers. Could the Scandinavian philosophy of “there is no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothes� be the key to better lives for her American children? And how would her children’s relationships with nature change by introducing them to Scandinavian concepts like friluftsliv (“open-air living�) and hygge (the coziness and the simple pleasures of home)? McGurk embarked on a six-month-long journey to Sweden to find out. There’s No Such Thing as Bad Weather is a fascinating personal narrative that highlights the importance of spending time outdoors, and illustrates how the Scandinavian culture could hold the key to raising healthier, resilient, and confident children in America.]]> 304 Linda Åkeson McGurk 150114362X Sandra 0 to-read 4.10 2017 There's No Such Thing as Bad Weather: A Scandinavian Mom's Secrets for Raising Healthy, Resilient, and Confident Kids (from Friluftsliv to Hygge)
author: Linda Åkeson McGurk
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Hunt, Gather, Parent: What Ancient Cultures Can Teach Us About the Lost Art of Raising Happy, Helpful Little Humans]]> 54304028
In Hunt, Gather, Parent, Doucleff sets out with her three-year-old daughter in tow to learn and practice parenting strategies from families in three of the world’s most venerable communities: Maya families in Mexico, Inuit families above the Arctic Circle, and Hadzabe families in Tanzania. She sees that these cultures don’t have the same problems with children that Western parents do. Most strikingly, parents build a relationship with young children that is vastly different from the one many Western parents develop—it’s built on cooperation instead of control, trust instead of fear, and personalized needs instead of standardized development milestones.

Maya parents are masters at raising cooperative children. Without resorting to bribes, threats, or chore charts, Maya parents rear loyal helpers by including kids in household tasks from the time they can walk. Inuit parents have developed a remarkably effective approach for teaching children emotional intelligence. When kids cry, hit, or act out, Inuit parents respond with a calm, gentle demeanor that teaches children how to settle themselves down and think before acting. Hadzabe parents are world experts on raising confident, self-driven kids with a simple tool that protects children from stress and anxiety, so common now among American kids.

Not only does Doucleff live with families and observe their techniques firsthand, she also applies them with her own daughter, with striking results. She learns to discipline without yelling. She talks to psychologists, neuroscientists, anthropologists, and sociologists and explains how these strategies can impact children’s mental health and development. Filled with practical takeaways that parents can implement immediately, Hunt, Gather, Parent helps us rethink the ways we relate to our children, and reveals a universal parenting paradigm adapted for American families.]]> 352 Michaeleen Doucleff 1982149671 Sandra 0 to-read 4.11 2021 Hunt, Gather, Parent: What Ancient Cultures Can Teach Us About the Lost Art of Raising Happy, Helpful Little Humans
author: Michaeleen Doucleff
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Koljka i Sašenjka 82368969 Jedna je iz intimnog okruženja, to je nedavno preminuli rođak Koljka, iza koga su ostale stvari i uspomene.
Drugo je Sašenjka, u kome čitaoci odmah prepoznaju velikog ruskog pisca Aleksandra Puškina.
Iako odsutni iz stvarnosti, i Koljka i Sašenjka su deo razgovora, ličnih i čitalačkih iskustava, oni prema kojima se meri svakodnevni život.]]> 160 Uglješa Šajtinac 8652303770 Sandra 0 bookclub
Ovaj kratak roman dočarava onu posebnu ušuškanost, slatku usamljenost, i obuzetost unutrašnjim svetom koja je moguća samo onda “kad vreme stane�, kad se prekine nit prošlost-sadašnjost-budućnost i sve počne da živi “sada�. Tako, sasvim prirodno, iz pripovedača izranjaju dva duha prošlosti; prvi je nedavno preminuli stric Konstantin (Koljka) u čiju se staru kuću useljava sa svojom suprugom Milom, a drugi je, glavom i bradom, sam Puškin (od milošte, Sašenjka).

Roman me je kupio atmosferom, tom idiličnom slikom malenog, izolovanog banatskog dvorišta punom pernadi, mačaka, i pasa simpatičnih imena (Ebigejl, Lolika, Maza)... Kupila me je i ta prikaza Puškina koji se pojavljuje usred tog malog univerzuma da se onako šeretski izrazgovara sa svojim vernim čitaocem.

Na kraju romana se Sašenja ovim rečima oprašta:

Reći ću, nastavljao je, ako me iko bude pitao, da mi je ovde bilo lepo. Najlepše je bilo pročati s vama. Čovek ne sme da zanemari govor, jezik, eto, to je! Jezik nas podseća da smo ljudi, zbog jezika volimo jedni druge. Jezik je ljubav. Šta je raj? To je mesto, ovo ne govorim iz neposrednog iskustva već više iz nadanja. Dakle, mesto gde ćemo se sresti sa svakim ko se prepoznao u našim pesmama i pričama. To je raj.

Ipak, moram priznati da mi ovaj roman stilski nije sasvim legao. Imala sam poteškoća da ispratim neke delove, dešavalo se da se vraćam više puta da bih razumela ko se kome obraća, mnoge reference su mi bile nejasne (sasvim očekivano, jer ne poznajem Puškinovu biografiju), a dijalozi sa kaluđerom koji obiluju ruskim rečima i rusizmima ostale su mi čista enigma.

Evo primera: Sostrastije? Nikakovo. Neiskusomužnaja ali ne i bezporočnaja! Jako u sladostrastiju otrokovica stasavala je, bezpečaljna, daže je to najpače jedno dosadno čadce.

Ako odlučite da se upustite u ovu čitalačku avanturu, preporučujem da malo prelistate Puškinovu biografiju, tek toliko da vam neke reference budu lakše za razumevanje.






]]> 3.52 Koljka i Sašenjka
author: Uglješa Šajtinac
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.52
book published:
rating: 0
read at: 2025/02/10
date added: 2025/02/11
shelves: bookclub
review:
Sećate se prva tri meseca korone i onog utiska da je vreme odjednom stalo, a mi ostali zamrznuti u prostoru-vremenu u kom smo se nalazili po izbijanju pandemije? U takav jedan “zamrznuti� mikrosvet uranjamo čitajući Koljku i Sašenjku, roman u kom je radnja smeštena u jedno mirno, banatsko selo dok tamo negde napolju besni “boleština� (korona se nigde u romanu ne pominje doslovce, ali naslućujem da se na nju misli budući da je roman objavljen 2022.).

Ovaj kratak roman dočarava onu posebnu ušuškanost, slatku usamljenost, i obuzetost unutrašnjim svetom koja je moguća samo onda “kad vreme stane�, kad se prekine nit prošlost-sadašnjost-budućnost i sve počne da živi “sada�. Tako, sasvim prirodno, iz pripovedača izranjaju dva duha prošlosti; prvi je nedavno preminuli stric Konstantin (Koljka) u čiju se staru kuću useljava sa svojom suprugom Milom, a drugi je, glavom i bradom, sam Puškin (od milošte, Sašenjka).

Roman me je kupio atmosferom, tom idiličnom slikom malenog, izolovanog banatskog dvorišta punom pernadi, mačaka, i pasa simpatičnih imena (Ebigejl, Lolika, Maza)... Kupila me je i ta prikaza Puškina koji se pojavljuje usred tog malog univerzuma da se onako šeretski izrazgovara sa svojim vernim čitaocem.

Na kraju romana se Sašenja ovim rečima oprašta:

Reći ću, nastavljao je, ako me iko bude pitao, da mi je ovde bilo lepo. Najlepše je bilo pročati s vama. Čovek ne sme da zanemari govor, jezik, eto, to je! Jezik nas podseća da smo ljudi, zbog jezika volimo jedni druge. Jezik je ljubav. Šta je raj? To je mesto, ovo ne govorim iz neposrednog iskustva već više iz nadanja. Dakle, mesto gde ćemo se sresti sa svakim ko se prepoznao u našim pesmama i pričama. To je raj.

Ipak, moram priznati da mi ovaj roman stilski nije sasvim legao. Imala sam poteškoća da ispratim neke delove, dešavalo se da se vraćam više puta da bih razumela ko se kome obraća, mnoge reference su mi bile nejasne (sasvim očekivano, jer ne poznajem Puškinovu biografiju), a dijalozi sa kaluđerom koji obiluju ruskim rečima i rusizmima ostale su mi čista enigma.

Evo primera: Sostrastije? Nikakovo. Neiskusomužnaja ali ne i bezporočnaja! Jako u sladostrastiju otrokovica stasavala je, bezpečaljna, daže je to najpače jedno dosadno čadce.

Ako odlučite da se upustite u ovu čitalačku avanturu, preporučujem da malo prelistate Puškinovu biografiju, tek toliko da vam neke reference budu lakše za razumevanje.







]]> Yellowface 62047984
So what if June edits Athena’s novel and sends it to her agent as her own work? So what if she lets her new publisher rebrand her as Juniper Song—complete with an ambiguously ethnic author photo? This piece of history deserve to be told, whoever the teller. That is what June believes, and The New York Times bestseller list agrees.

But June cannot escape Athena’s shadow, and emerging evidence threatens her stolen success. As she races to protect her secret she discovers exactly how far she will go to keep what she thinks she deserves.]]> 319 R.F. Kuang 000853277X Sandra 0 For aren't all the best novels born from some madness which is born from truth?

The truth is fluid; there is always another way to spin the story, another wrench to throw into the narrative.

Kakav je ovo page-turner, ljudi moji. Vadi iz mrtvih (ah, pun unintended, i možda mali spoiler alert?).

Roman je tako fino zaokružen a tematski vrlo slojevit. Preispituje pitanje autorstva, plagijata, kreativnosti, pravo na priču (da li imaš prava da govoriš u ime zajednice kojoj ne pripadaš), cenzuru, cancel kulturu, rasizam, uticaj društvenih mreža, slobode interpretacije, i još mnogo toga.

Preporučujem je ako ste zapali u čitalačku krizu i ako tražite dobar storytelling, priču sa dozom misterije, nagoveštajem nadrealnog, priču koja vas od prve rečenice uvlači u svoj svet i ne pušta do poslednje stranice.]]> 3.69 2023 Yellowface
author: R.F. Kuang
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.69
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at: 2025/02/06
date added: 2025/02/07
shelves:
review:
For aren't all the best novels born from some madness which is born from truth?

The truth is fluid; there is always another way to spin the story, another wrench to throw into the narrative.

Kakav je ovo page-turner, ljudi moji. Vadi iz mrtvih (ah, pun unintended, i možda mali spoiler alert?).

Roman je tako fino zaokružen a tematski vrlo slojevit. Preispituje pitanje autorstva, plagijata, kreativnosti, pravo na priču (da li imaš prava da govoriš u ime zajednice kojoj ne pripadaš), cenzuru, cancel kulturu, rasizam, uticaj društvenih mreža, slobode interpretacije, i još mnogo toga.

Preporučujem je ako ste zapali u čitalačku krizu i ako tražite dobar storytelling, priču sa dozom misterije, nagoveštajem nadrealnog, priču koja vas od prve rečenice uvlači u svoj svet i ne pušta do poslednje stranice.
]]> <![CDATA[Saving Time: Discovering a Life Beyond the Clock]]> 61358639 How to Do Nothing, Jenny Odell wrote about the importance of disconnecting from the “attention economy� to spend time in quiet contemplation. But what if you don’t have time to spend?

In order to answer this seemingly simple question, Odell took a deep dive into the fundamental structure of our society and found that the clock we live by was built for profit, not people. This is why our lives, even in leisure, have come to seem like a series of moments to be bought, sold, and processed ever more efficiently. Odell shows us how our painful relationship to time is inextricably connected not only to persisting social inequities but to the climate crisis, existential dread, and a lethal fatalism.

This dazzling, subversive, and deeply hopeful book offers us different ways to experience time—inspired by pre-industrial cultures, ecological cues, and geological timescales—that can bring within reach a more humane, responsive way of living. As planet-bound animals, we live inside shortening and lengthening days alongside gardens growing, birds migrating, and cliffs eroding; the stretchy quality of waiting and desire; the way the present may suddenly feel marbled with childhood memory; the slow but sure procession of a pregnancy; the time it takes to heal from injuries. Odell urges us to become stewards of these different rhythms of life in which time is not reducible to standardized units and instead forms the very medium of possibility.

Saving Time tugs at the seams of reality as we know it—the way we experience time itself—and rearranges it, imagining a world not centered on work, the office clock, or the profit motive. If we can “save� time by imagining a life, identity, and source of meaning outside these things, time might also save us.]]> 400 Jenny Odell 059324270X Sandra 0 Vrlo je detaljna i zalazi u neke oblasti koje su meni bile vrlo zanimljive i nove (npr. kako se protok vremena percepira drugacije u zavisnosti od toga iz cije vizure posmatramo svet).
Postavlja jedno odlicno pitanje: da li svi mi ZAISTA imamo na raspolaganju ista 24 h ili su okolnosti ipak malo slozenije? (pretpostavljate odgovor)
]]> 3.60 2023 Saving Time: Discovering a Life Beyond the Clock
author: Jenny Odell
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.60
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at: 2025/01/26
date added: 2025/01/28
shelves:
review:
Ova knjiga preispituje nas odnos sa vremenom, kapitalisticki imperativ "vreme = novac", i temporalnost konzumerizma.
Vrlo je detaljna i zalazi u neke oblasti koje su meni bile vrlo zanimljive i nove (npr. kako se protok vremena percepira drugacije u zavisnosti od toga iz cije vizure posmatramo svet).
Postavlja jedno odlicno pitanje: da li svi mi ZAISTA imamo na raspolaganju ista 24 h ili su okolnosti ipak malo slozenije? (pretpostavljate odgovor)

]]> Gitara od palisandra 43441016 U ovom romanu sve je na svome mjestu, kompozicijom podsjeća na velika glazbena djela i način na koji su skladana. Dapače, Kristina Gavran piše kao da sklada, plete mrežu riječi i događaja, pazi na tempo i light-motive i uspijeva postići sjajne efekte suptilnim izvođačkim nijansiranjem. Sjajno zamišljena, spajanjem prostora i vremena i dojmljivim referiranjem na bajku njezina je priča i ženska (na način koji nema veze sa 'ženskim pismom') i glazbena (ne na prvoj, nego dubinskoj strukturalnoj razini) i, što je najvažnije, svevremena. Priča o povezanosti sudbina, slučaju i 'slučaju', žrtvi i ljubavi, zavijena u plašt nekih prošlih vremena i žanrova koji naginju čudesnom i fantastičnom, jedna je od onih univerzalnih priča koje se mogu čitati uvijek i svuda s jednakim čitateljskim užitkom.]]> 216 Kristina Gavran 9532603263 Sandra 0
Scena sa šumskom boginjom svojom bajkovitošću osvaja čak čitaoce koji su inače, poput mene, tvrdi na elemente magijskog realizma.

Ovo je onaj roman o kom biste odmah nakon čitanja rado proćaskale sa najboljom prijateljicom dok pijete neki topli napitak i slušate kompozicije pisane za gitaru. Ako vam, pak, ponestane ideja za slušanje, no worries, autorka romana otpočinje svako poglavlje predlogom za slušanje.]]> 4.50 Gitara od palisandra
author: Kristina Gavran
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.50
book published:
rating: 0
read at: 2025/01/06
date added: 2025/01/09
shelves:
review:
Roman prati priče pet žena koje žive u posve različim dobima i prostorima a čiji su životi na neki način sudbinski povezani. Rasplitanje ovog klupka teče glatko, nežno, na momente dramatično, prateći ciklus (po)rađanja, kako kreativnog tako i onog stvarnog.

Scena sa šumskom boginjom svojom bajkovitošću osvaja čak čitaoce koji su inače, poput mene, tvrdi na elemente magijskog realizma.

Ovo je onaj roman o kom biste odmah nakon čitanja rado proćaskale sa najboljom prijateljicom dok pijete neki topli napitak i slušate kompozicije pisane za gitaru. Ako vam, pak, ponestane ideja za slušanje, no worries, autorka romana otpočinje svako poglavlje predlogom za slušanje.
]]> Dune (Dune, #1) 44767458
When House Atreides is betrayed, the destruction of Paul’s family will set the boy on a journey toward a destiny greater than he could ever have imagined. And as he evolves into the mysterious man known as Muad’Dib, he will bring to fruition humankind’s most ancient and unattainable dream.]]> 658 Frank Herbert 059309932X Sandra 0 to-read 4.33 1965 Dune (Dune, #1)
author: Frank Herbert
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.33
book published: 1965
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/09
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> North and South 156538
In North and South, Elizabeth Gaskell skillfully fuses individual feeling with social concern, and in Margaret Hale creates one of the most original heroines of Victorian literature.]]> 521 Elizabeth Gaskell 0140620192 Sandra 0 4.14 1855 North and South
author: Elizabeth Gaskell
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1855
rating: 0
read at: 2025/01/04
date added: 2025/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> All Fours 197798168
A semifamous artist announces her plan to drive cross-country, from LA to New York. Twenty minutes after leaving her husband and child at home, she spontaneously exits the freeway, beds down in a nondescript motel, and immerses herself in a temporary reinvention that turns out to be the start of an entirely different journey.

Miranda July’s second novel confirms the brilliance of her unique approach to fiction. With July’s wry voice, perfect comic timing, unabashed curiosity about human intimacy, and palpable delight in pushing boundaries, All Fours tells the story of one woman’s quest for a new kind of freedom. Part absurd entertainment, part tender reinvention of the sexual, romantic, and domestic life of a forty-five-year-old female artist, All Fours transcends expectation while excavating our beliefs about life lived as a woman. Once again, July hijacks the familiar and turns it into something new and thrillingly, profoundly alive.]]> 336 Miranda July 0593190262 Sandra 0 to-read 3.52 2024 All Fours
author: Miranda July
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.52
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Coming Home to Myself: Reflections for Nurturing a Woman's Body and Soul]]> 27237 280 Marion Woodman 1573245666 Sandra 0 to-read 4.23 1998 Coming Home to Myself: Reflections for Nurturing a Woman's Body and Soul
author: Marion Woodman
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1998
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> How to Love Your Daughter 63185084 The seemingly inexplicable estrangement between a woman and her grown daughter opens up a troubling question: What damage do we do in the blindness of love?

Thousands of miles from home, a woman stands on a dark street, peeking through well-lit windows at two little girls. They are the grandchildren she's never met, daughters of the daughter she has not seen in years.

At the center of this mesmerizing story is the woman's quest to understand how a relationship that began in bliss--a mother besotted with her only child--arrived at a point of such unfathomable distance. Weaving back and forth in time, she unravels memories and long-buried feelings, retracing the infinite acts of parental care, each so mundane and apparently benign, that in ensemble may have undermined what she most treasured. With exquisite psychological precision, Blum traces the seemingly insignificant missteps and deceptions of family life, where it's possible to cross the line between protectiveness and possession without even seeing it--and uncertain whether, or how, we can find our way back.]]> 272 Hila Blum 0593539648 Sandra 0
Every time I photographed Leah, with every cunning click of the camera, it struck me that I was choosing one version of reality among many.

Everyone hunts down their memories and mutilates them according to their own design.

Throughout my life, I've known only a handful of people who professed to have had a happy childhood. All the rest are survivors. Everyone was given either too much or too little. Life is always a long journey of healing from childhood.]]> 3.51 2021 How to Love Your Daughter
author: Hila Blum
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.51
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at: 2024/01/01
date added: 2024/12/23
shelves:
review:
I didn't understand until much later that I'd had to learn how to love the children of others while my love for Leah was the opposite of learning - it was the forgetting of everything.

Every time I photographed Leah, with every cunning click of the camera, it struck me that I was choosing one version of reality among many.

Everyone hunts down their memories and mutilates them according to their own design.

Throughout my life, I've known only a handful of people who professed to have had a happy childhood. All the rest are survivors. Everyone was given either too much or too little. Life is always a long journey of healing from childhood.
]]> Jadnici 18336409
Jadnici pripovedaju priču o Žanu Valžanu, koji je proveo devetnaest jezivih godina u zatvoru jer je ukrao veknu hleba. Pošto je izbavljen zahvaljujući dobročinstvu, pruža mu se prilika da spozna sreću, ukoliko bude uspeo da pomogne kćerki mlade Fantine. Međutim, istrajni policijski inspektor Žaver ne dozvoljava Žanu da pobegne od prošlosti.

Na listi bestselera otkako je objavljen, roman Jadnici vešto prepliće lične sudbine sa turbulentnom istorijskom epohom u jedinsvenu, raskošnu i maštovitu dramatičnu priču o životnim nedaćama.]]> 947 Victor Hugo 8610000680 Sandra 0 Čekam da se slegnu utisci, pa pišem utiske...]]> 4.67 1862 Jadnici
author: Victor Hugo
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.67
book published: 1862
rating: 0
read at: 2024/12/16
date added: 2024/12/20
shelves: 1-chapter-a-day, a-year-long-read
review:
Pročitano pre nekoliko dana.
Čekam da se slegnu utisci, pa pišem utiske...
]]> Will and Testament 44003688 A controversial bestseller from one of Norway's most intelligent and highly-regarded novelists

Four siblings. Two summer houses. One terrible secret. A woman walks her dog in the snow, drinks wine by the fire and considers the inheritance dispute that's dragging her back towards the family she fled years ago, and the degree to which the horrors and conflicts of the past should be allowed shake her present.

This emotionally searing novel is at once a wrenching look at a family fractured and a meditation on the nature of trauma and memory.]]> 336 Vigdis Hjorth 178873310X Sandra 0
Potiskivanje zajedničke traume, ignorisanje bola, i brisanje priče koja bi narušila idiličnu sliku "srećne i normalne" porodice pokreće retraumatizaciju glavne junakinje, dajući njenoj priči težak, napet, i mučan ton.

Ovo je roman koji ćete pročitati brzo, ali "variti" sporo, danima.]]> 3.97 2016 Will and Testament
author: Vigdis Hjorth
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at: 2024/11/17
date added: 2024/11/17
shelves:
review:
"I was wearing my face for facing the world", kaže nam protagonistkinja, opisujući trenutak kada je po poslednji put pokušala da suoči svoju porodicu sa svojom traumom iz detinjstva, sa traumom čitave porodice.

Potiskivanje zajedničke traume, ignorisanje bola, i brisanje priče koja bi narušila idiličnu sliku "srećne i normalne" porodice pokreće retraumatizaciju glavne junakinje, dajući njenoj priči težak, napet, i mučan ton.

Ovo je roman koji ćete pročitati brzo, ali "variti" sporo, danima.
]]> <![CDATA[Think Like a Monk: Train Your Mind for Peace and Purpose Every Day]]> 51942513 Jay Shetty, social media superstar and host of the #1 podcast On Purpose, distills the timeless wisdom he learned as a monk into practical steps anyone can take every day to live a less anxious, more meaningful life.

When you think like a monk, you’ll understand:
- How to overcome negativity
- How to stop overthinking
- Why comparison kills love
- How to use your fear
- Why you can’t find happiness by looking for it
- How to learn from everyone you meet
- Why you are not your thoughts
- How to find your purpose
- Why kindness is crucial to success
- And much more...

Shetty grew up in a family where you could become one of three things—a doctor, a lawyer, or a failure. His family was convinced he had chosen option three: instead of attending his college graduation ceremony, he headed to India to become a monk, to meditate every day for four to eight hours, and devote his life to helping others. After three years, one of his teachers told him that he would have more impact on the world if he left the monk’s path to share his experience and wisdom with others. Heavily in debt, and with no recognizable skills on his résumé, he moved back home in north London with his parents.

Shetty reconnected with old school friends—many working for some of the world’s largest corporations—who were experiencing tremendous stress, pressure, and unhappiness, and they invited Shetty to coach them on well-being, purpose, and mindfulness. Since then, Shetty has become one of the world’s most popular influencers. In 2017, he was named in the Forbes magazine 30-under-30 for being a game-changer in the world of media. In 2018, he had the #1 video on Facebook with over 360 million views. His social media following totals over 38 million, he has produced over 400 viral videos which have amassed more than 8 billion views, and his podcast, On Purpose, is consistently ranked the world’s #1 Health and Wellness podcast.

In this inspiring, empowering book, Shetty draws on his time as a monk to show us how we can clear the roadblocks to our potential and power. Combining ancient wisdom and his own rich experiences in the ashram, Think Like a Monk reveals how to overcome negative thoughts and habits, and access the calm and purpose that lie within all of us. He transforms abstract lessons into advice and exercises we can all apply to reduce stress, improve relationships, and give the gifts we find in ourselves to the world. Shetty proves that everyone can—and should—think like a monk.]]> 328 Jay Shetty 1982134488 Sandra 0 4.18 2020 Think Like a Monk: Train Your Mind for Peace and Purpose Every Day
author: Jay Shetty
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at: 2024/11/10
date added: 2024/11/12
shelves:
review:

]]> Audition 3392668
Of the thousands who apply, Aoyama only has eyes for Yamasaki Asami, a young, beautiful, delicate and talented ballerina with a turbulent past. But there is more to her than Aoyama, blinded by his infatuation, can see, and by the time he discovers the terrifying truth it may be too late�

Ryu Murakami delivers his most subtle and disturbing novel yet, confirming him as Japan’s master of the psycho-thriller.]]> 208 Ryū Murakami 0747589488 Sandra 0 bookclub I felt it was a bit rushed towards the end and that it lacked psychological profiling of the two main characters.

It's a short read that will give you chills. A perfect October read if you ask me. ]]> 3.50 1997 Audition
author: Ryū Murakami
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.50
book published: 1997
rating: 0
read at: 2024/11/06
date added: 2024/11/06
shelves: bookclub
review:
A slow-burn psychological thriller with gore galore (but only in the last chapter).
I felt it was a bit rushed towards the end and that it lacked psychological profiling of the two main characters.

It's a short read that will give you chills. A perfect October read if you ask me.
]]> Song of Solomon 11334 338 Toni Morrison 140003342X Sandra 0 Belonging is the central theme that Toni plays with, questions, dissects, and redefines in the novel.

1) Belonging to our tribe, our people, our family, ... everybody who makes up our identity;

2) Physical assets, things, and possessions as our belongings (proof of success);

3) Belonging to someone we love or "owning" someone we love.

How does this sense of belonging define us? What are we truly grasping for? Something solid. Something to hold on so we can stay rooted. To belong is to be grounded in something/someone.

“It's a bad word, 'belong.' Especially when you put it with somebody you love ... You can't own a human being.�

Then, from there, Toni introduces the theme of flying (which could be interpreted as freedom, or escape) - and she does this both metaphorically and literally, which makes the story more lyrical, bone-chilling, and compelling.

"Now he knew why he loved her so. Without ever leaving the ground, she could fly."

The only way to be free, to truly love, is not to belong - to be ready to jump off a roof, a cliff (literally), or to jump into the unknown (metaphorically), to be fierce, to sing the "song of Solomon" in the face of death.
]]> 4.15 1977 Song of Solomon
author: Toni Morrison
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1977
rating: 0
read at: 2024/09/18
date added: 2024/09/18
shelves:
review:
Belonging is the central theme that Toni plays with, questions, dissects, and redefines in the novel.

1) Belonging to our tribe, our people, our family, ... everybody who makes up our identity;

2) Physical assets, things, and possessions as our belongings (proof of success);

3) Belonging to someone we love or "owning" someone we love.

How does this sense of belonging define us? What are we truly grasping for? Something solid. Something to hold on so we can stay rooted. To belong is to be grounded in something/someone.

“It's a bad word, 'belong.' Especially when you put it with somebody you love ... You can't own a human being.�

Then, from there, Toni introduces the theme of flying (which could be interpreted as freedom, or escape) - and she does this both metaphorically and literally, which makes the story more lyrical, bone-chilling, and compelling.

"Now he knew why he loved her so. Without ever leaving the ground, she could fly."

The only way to be free, to truly love, is not to belong - to be ready to jump off a roof, a cliff (literally), or to jump into the unknown (metaphorically), to be fierce, to sing the "song of Solomon" in the face of death.

]]> Autumn (Seasons Quartet, #1) 34272477 From the author of the monumental My Struggle series, Karl Ove Knausgaard, one of the masters of contemporary literature and a genius of observation and introspection, comes the first in a new autobiographical quartet based on the four seasons.

28 August. Now, as I write this, you know nothing about anything, about what awaits you, the kind of world you will be born into. And I know nothing about you...

I want to show you our world as it is now: the door, the floor, the water tap and the sink, the garden chair close to the wall beneath the kitchen window, the sun, the water, the trees. You will come to see it in your own way, you will experience things for yourself and live a life of your own, so of course it is primarily for my own sake that I am doing this: showing you the world, little one, makes my life worth living.

Autumn begins with a letter Karl Ove Knausgaard writes to his unborn daughter, showing her what to expect of the world. He writes one short piece per day, describing the material and natural world with the precision and mesmerising intensity that have become his trademark. He describes with acute sensitivity daily life with his wife and children in rural Sweden, drawing upon memories of his own childhood to give an inimitably tender perspective on the precious and unique bond between parent and child. The sun, wasps, jellyfish, eyes, lice—the stuff of everyday life is the fodder for his art. Nothing is too small or too vast to escape his attention.

This beautifully illustrated book is a personal encyclopaedia on everything from chewing gum to the stars. Through close observation of the objects and phenomena around him, Knausgaard shows us how vast, unknowable and wondrous the world is.]]> 224 Karl Ove Knausgård 039956330X Sandra 0
To je njegova najveća veština.

"U jesen" je kolekcija pisama nerođenoj ćerki i vrlo kratkih eseja. Svaka tema na prvi pogled deluje potpuno nezanimljivo, svakidašnje, neupečatljivo (npr. gumene čizme). Knausgor započinje suvoparnim opisom koji nalikuje tekstu izvučenom iz rečnika opštih pojmova. Zatim se upušta u slobodne asocijacije, unoseći misli i slike koje lete po tekstu, koje se prepliću, koje stvaraju čitavu kaskadu novih misli, osećanja i prizora. Čitaocu se otvaraju novi horizonti; čas se spušta u ponor, čas leti visoko i prodire u suštinu stvari. Takav se utisak stiče. A ono što te najviše zabavlja je što nikad ne znaš u kom pravcu će te pisac odvesti (zavesti).

Evo nekoliko odlomaka koje sam izdvojila.

"Without language the world would become overgrown: every single word is like a little clearing."

"This was what it was all about. Art was the exception. The exception opened up the moment, broke through time and created a presence, in the vortex of which everything became meaningful."

"Flaubert's sentences are like a rag rubbed across a windowpane encrusted with smoke and dirt which you have long since grown accustomed to seeing the world through. The feeling you get then, when for the first time in a long time while the world shines brightly again."

"A few seconds of dizzying intensity of being, is not the result of anything opening up, but its opposite, of something becoming denser."

"Only what slips through one's fingers, only what is never expressed in words, has no thoughts, exists completely."

]]> 3.77 2015 Autumn (Seasons Quartet, #1)
author: Karl Ove Knausgård
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at: 2024/06/01
date added: 2024/06/01
shelves:
review:
Knausgor ume da zgusne stvarnost, da otkrije slojeve i slojeve ispod površine, da otkrije neslućene dubine u običnim, svakodnevnim stvarima i pojavama.

To je njegova najveća veština.

"U jesen" je kolekcija pisama nerođenoj ćerki i vrlo kratkih eseja. Svaka tema na prvi pogled deluje potpuno nezanimljivo, svakidašnje, neupečatljivo (npr. gumene čizme). Knausgor započinje suvoparnim opisom koji nalikuje tekstu izvučenom iz rečnika opštih pojmova. Zatim se upušta u slobodne asocijacije, unoseći misli i slike koje lete po tekstu, koje se prepliću, koje stvaraju čitavu kaskadu novih misli, osećanja i prizora. Čitaocu se otvaraju novi horizonti; čas se spušta u ponor, čas leti visoko i prodire u suštinu stvari. Takav se utisak stiče. A ono što te najviše zabavlja je što nikad ne znaš u kom pravcu će te pisac odvesti (zavesti).

Evo nekoliko odlomaka koje sam izdvojila.

"Without language the world would become overgrown: every single word is like a little clearing."

"This was what it was all about. Art was the exception. The exception opened up the moment, broke through time and created a presence, in the vortex of which everything became meaningful."

"Flaubert's sentences are like a rag rubbed across a windowpane encrusted with smoke and dirt which you have long since grown accustomed to seeing the world through. The feeling you get then, when for the first time in a long time while the world shines brightly again."

"A few seconds of dizzying intensity of being, is not the result of anything opening up, but its opposite, of something becoming denser."

"Only what slips through one's fingers, only what is never expressed in words, has no thoughts, exists completely."


]]> Mladenka kostonoga 61237733 Roman koji slavi žene, buntovnice, pobunu i prkos. U priči o veštici Gili koja je ismevala sveštenstvo i vlast, koja je lečila, negovala i štitila druge, pre svega žene, a koja je zbog svog drugačijeg izgleda, shvatanja i otvorenosti bila meta progona uskogrudih licemera, Periš opisuje zadrt, okrutan, naizgled bogobojažljiv svet pun predrasuda koji, iako dva veka dalek, deluje jezovito blisko i odražava savremene probleme.

U Beču je 1882. godine policija privela, pretukla i saslušala guslara Želimira Periša (44, Zadar), koji je spevao ep o veštici Gili. Tu počinje roman Mladenka kostonoga, koji se nelinearno proteže kroz skoro ceo 19. vek i ispreda brutalnu priču o životu nesrećne progonjene žene.

U postmodernističku mozaičnu strukturu Periš uklapa 52 glave koje počinju desetercom i sažetkom, razigrano ih kombinujući s inkvizicijskim i etnološkim zapisnicima, propovedima, enciklopedijskim člancima, muzičkim kritikama, receptima�

Mladenka kostonoga pripoveda o vremenu pre dva veka, kada su se preplitale ideje racionalizma, nacionalnog identiteta i socijalne pravde, ali i odražava savremene probleme. Iznad sve metafikcije, intertekstualnosti i poigravanja formom, ovo je potresna priča o položaju žene, roditeljstvu, materinstvu, nepravdi i muci.]]> 560 Želimir Periš 866084016X Sandra 0 to-read, nextread 4.61 Mladenka kostonoga
author: Želimir Periš
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.61
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/05/29
shelves: to-read, nextread
review:

]]> East of Eden 4406
Adam Trask came to California from the East to farm and raise his family on the new rich land. But the birth of his twins, Cal and Aaron, brings his wife to the brink of madness, and Adam is left alone to raise his boys to manhood. One boy thrives nurtured by the love of all those around him; the other grows up in loneliness enveloped by a mysterious darkness.

First published in 1952, East of Eden is the work in which Steinbeck created his most mesmerizing characters and explored his most enduring themes: the mystery of identity, the inexplicability of love, and the murderous consequences of love's absence. A masterpiece of Steinbeck's later years, East of Eden is a powerful and vastly ambitious novel that is at once a family saga and a modern retelling of the Book of Genesis.]]> 601 John Steinbeck 0142000655 Sandra 0 to-read 4.41 1952 East of Eden
author: John Steinbeck
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.41
book published: 1952
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/05/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Letters to a Young Poet 46199 Listy do mlodego poety 80 Rainer Maria Rilke 0486422453 Sandra 0 to-read 4.32 1929 Letters to a Young Poet
author: Rainer Maria Rilke
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.32
book published: 1929
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/05/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Selected Poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke]]> 46201
The influence and popularity of Rilke’s poetry in America have never been greater than they are today, more than fifty years after his death. Rilke is unquestionably the most significant and compelling poet of romantic transformation, of spiritual quest, that the twentieth century has known. His poems of ecstatic identification with the world exert a seemingly endless fascination for contemporary readers.

In Stephen Mitchell’s versions, many readers feel that they have discovered an English rendering that captures the lyric intensity, fluency, and reach of Rilke’s poetry more accurately and convincingly than has ever been done before.

Mr. Mitchell is impeccable in his adherence to Rilke’s text, to his formal music, and to the complexity of his thoughts; at the same time, his work has authority and power as poetry in its own right. Few translators of any poet have arrived at the delicate balance of fidelity and originality that Mr. Mitchell has brought off with seeming effortlessness.

Originally published: New York : Random House, 1982.]]> 356 Rainer Maria Rilke 0679722017 Sandra 0 to-read 4.40 1926 The Selected Poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke
author: Rainer Maria Rilke
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.40
book published: 1926
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/05/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Flaubert's Parrot 2176 Flaubert's Parrot deals with Flaubert, parrots, bears and railways; with our sense of the past and our sense of abroad; with France and England, life and art, sex and death, George Sand and Louise Colet, aesthetics and redcurrant jam; and with its enigmatic narrator, a retired English doctor, whose life and secrets are slowly revealed.

A compelling weave of fiction and imaginatively ordered fact, Flaubert's Parrot is by turns moving and entertaining, witty and scholarly, and a tour de force of seductive originality]]> 190 Julian Barnes 0679731369 Sandra 0 bookclub Na momente blistavo, genijalno, i duhovito. Te delove sam guštala, podvlačila, vraćala se na njih.
A onda stranice i stranice teksta toliko "meta" da sam žurila da dođem do kraja, to get over with it.

Ne znam da li bih ovaj roman završila da mi to nije bilo deo book club-a. Verovatno ne bih. Ali osećam da ovo neće biti moje prvo i poslednje druženje sa Barnsom i verujem da ćemo sa nekim drugim romanom nas dvoje kliknuti.

Ako imate preporuke, pišite. ]]> 3.67 1984 Flaubert's Parrot
author: Julian Barnes
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.67
book published: 1984
rating: 0
read at: 2024/05/18
date added: 2024/05/18
shelves: bookclub
review:
Nisam želela da saznam ko je pravi Floberov papagaj. Interesovalo me je samo zašto bi mi to bilo značajno. Why should I care? To me je pitanje vodilo kroz roman i usmeravalo pažnju na ono što se čita "između redova". Zašto je Džefri opsednut tom prepariranom pticom, i uopšte, Floberom?
Na momente blistavo, genijalno, i duhovito. Te delove sam guštala, podvlačila, vraćala se na njih.
A onda stranice i stranice teksta toliko "meta" da sam žurila da dođem do kraja, to get over with it.

Ne znam da li bih ovaj roman završila da mi to nije bilo deo book club-a. Verovatno ne bih. Ali osećam da ovo neće biti moje prvo i poslednje druženje sa Barnsom i verujem da ćemo sa nekim drugim romanom nas dvoje kliknuti.

Ako imate preporuke, pišite.
]]> <![CDATA[Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice from Dear Sugar]]> 63193458 An alternative cover edition for this ISBN can be found here.

An anniversary edition of the bestselling collection of Dear Sugar advice columns written by the author of #1 New York Times bestseller Wild--featuring a new preface and six additional columns. Soon to be a Hulu Original series.

For more than a decade, thousands of people have sought advice from Dear Sugar--the pseudonym of bestselling author Cheryl Strayed--first through her online column at The Rumpus, later through her hit podcast, Dear Sugars, and now through her popular Substack newsletter. Tiny Beautiful Things collects the best of Dear Sugar in one volume, bringing her wisdom to many more readers. This tenth-anniversary edition features six new columns and a new preface by Strayed. Rich with humor, insight, compassion--and absolute honesty--this book is a balm for everything life throws our way.]]> 400 Cheryl Strayed 0593685210 Sandra 0
Unlike the memoir that sweeps you off your feet in one fell swoop, this one allows a more leisurely reading pace.

I enjoyed it immensely and will continue recommending it to anyone interested in writing that is vulnerable, raw, compassionate, brave, and unflinching.



]]> 3.95 2012 Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice from Dear Sugar
author: Cheryl Strayed
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at: 2024/05/18
date added: 2024/05/18
shelves:
review:
I didn't think (believe) I could enjoy Tiny, Beautiful Things as much as I did her bestselling memoir, Wild. But I did. And I'm so glad I picked it up. And I encourage you to do the same if you'd like to read a book that feels like a hug.

Unlike the memoir that sweeps you off your feet in one fell swoop, this one allows a more leisurely reading pace.

I enjoyed it immensely and will continue recommending it to anyone interested in writing that is vulnerable, raw, compassionate, brave, and unflinching.




]]> Persuasion 2156 249 Jane Austen 0192802631 Sandra 0
Anne's patient, placid, and exceptionally discerning nature makes her a perfect character for this type of narrative strategy. She pierces right through each character, exposing their vulnerabilities, and flaws, and (re)discovering their humanity.

Here's a great example (my fave!):

"Mr Elliot was rational, discreet, polished, but he was not open. There was never any burst of feeling, any warmth of indignation or delight, at the evil or good of others. This, to Anne, was a decided imperfection. Her early impressions were incurable. She prized the frank, the open-hearted, the eager character beyond all others. Warmth and enthusiasm did captivate her still. She felt that she could so much more depend upon the sincerity of those who sometimes looked or said a careless or a hasty thing, than of those whose presence of mind never varied, whose tongue never slipped."

]]> 4.15 1817 Persuasion
author: Jane Austen
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1817
rating: 0
read at: 2024/04/28
date added: 2024/04/28
shelves:
review:
In this novel, Jane Austen relies heavily on internal dialogues to reveal the innermost thoughts and feelings of her characters. Most notably, the quiet, mild-mannered, yet wonderfully observant protagonist - Anne Elliot.

Anne's patient, placid, and exceptionally discerning nature makes her a perfect character for this type of narrative strategy. She pierces right through each character, exposing their vulnerabilities, and flaws, and (re)discovering their humanity.

Here's a great example (my fave!):

"Mr Elliot was rational, discreet, polished, but he was not open. There was never any burst of feeling, any warmth of indignation or delight, at the evil or good of others. This, to Anne, was a decided imperfection. Her early impressions were incurable. She prized the frank, the open-hearted, the eager character beyond all others. Warmth and enthusiasm did captivate her still. She felt that she could so much more depend upon the sincerity of those who sometimes looked or said a careless or a hasty thing, than of those whose presence of mind never varied, whose tongue never slipped."


]]> Klara and the Sun 54120408
In Klara and the Sun, Kazuo Ishiguro looks at our rapidly changing modern world through the eyes of an unforgettable narrator to explore a fundamental question: what does it mean to love?]]> 340 Kazuo Ishiguro 059331817X Sandra 0 bookclub
Ipak, mislim da čitanje Klare i sunca nije protraćeno vreme. Dopada mi se ideja da (spoiler alert!) naše "ja" nije nešto što se može obuhvatiti i replicirati uz pomoć veštačke inteligencije, da je satkano iz najtananijih niti koje gradimo u odnosima sa drugim ljudima, i da to naše "ja", naposletku, i ne pripada samo nama. Da se sopstvo gradi iz delića koji pripadaju ljudima koji nas vole ili kojima je stalo do našeg postojanja.

]]> 3.71 2021 Klara and the Sun
author: Kazuo Ishiguro
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at: 2024/03/03
date added: 2024/03/03
shelves: bookclub
review:
Knjiga koja me je vrlo zaintrigirala svojom premisom, podigla očekivanja na max, i ostavila samo znak pitanja na kraju... and not in a good way.

Ipak, mislim da čitanje Klare i sunca nije protraćeno vreme. Dopada mi se ideja da (spoiler alert!) naše "ja" nije nešto što se može obuhvatiti i replicirati uz pomoć veštačke inteligencije, da je satkano iz najtananijih niti koje gradimo u odnosima sa drugim ljudima, i da to naše "ja", naposletku, i ne pripada samo nama. Da se sopstvo gradi iz delića koji pripadaju ljudima koji nas vole ili kojima je stalo do našeg postojanja.


]]> The Midnight Library 52578297
When Nora Seed finds herself in the Midnight Library, she has a chance to make things right. Up until now, her life has been full of misery and regret. She feels she has let everyone down, including herself. But things are about to change.

The books in the Midnight Library enable Nora to live as if she had done things differently. With the help of an old friend, she can now undo every one of her regrets as she tries to work out her perfect life. But things aren't always what she imagined they'd be, and soon her choices place the library and herself in extreme danger.

Before time runs out, she must answer the ultimate question: what is the best way to live?]]> 288 Matt Haig 0525559477 Sandra 0
If you're looking for a cozy read about the meaning of life, and the endless possibilities of our unlived lives in the parallel universe(s), the power of regret, and the power of hope - this book is for you.]]> 3.96 2020 The Midnight Library
author: Matt Haig
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at: 2024/01/25
date added: 2024/01/25
shelves:
review:
“Maybe that's what all lives were, though. Maybe even the most seemingly perfectly intense or worthwhile lives ultimately felt the same. Acres of disappointment and monotony and hurts and rivalries but with flashes of wonder and beauty. Maybe that was the only meaning that mattered. To be the world, witnessing itself.�

If you're looking for a cozy read about the meaning of life, and the endless possibilities of our unlived lives in the parallel universe(s), the power of regret, and the power of hope - this book is for you.
]]> <![CDATA[The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself]]> 1963638 The Untethered Soul offers simple yet profound answers to these questions.

Whether this is your first exploration of inner space, or you’ve devoted your life to the inward journey, this book will transform your relationship with yourself and the world around you. You’ll discover what you can do to put an end to the habitual thoughts and emotions that limit your consciousness. By tapping into traditions of meditation and mindfulness, author and spiritual teacher Michael A. Singer shows how the development of consciousness can enable us all to dwell in the present moment and let go of painful thoughts and memories that keep us from achieving happiness and self-realization.

Copublished with the Institute of Noetic Sciences (IONS) The Untethered Soul begins by walking you through your relationship with your thoughts and emotions, helping you uncover the source and fluctuations of your inner energy. It then delves into what you can do to free yourself from the habitual thoughts, emotions, and energy patterns that limit your consciousness. Finally, with perfect clarity, this book opens the door to a life lived in the freedom of your innermost being.]]> 183 Michael A. Singer Sandra 0 4.19 2007 The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself
author: Michael A. Singer
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at: 2024/01/05
date added: 2024/01/05
shelves:
review:

]]> Oh William! (Amgash, #3) 56294820
So Lucy is both surprised and not surprised when William asks her to join him on a trip to investigate a recently uncovered family secret—one of those secrets that rearrange everything we think we know about the people closest to us. What happens next is nothing less than another example of what Hilary Mantel has called Elizabeth Strout’s “perfect attunement to the human condition.� There are fears and insecurities, simple joys and acts of tenderness, and revelations about affairs and other spouses, parents and their children. On every page of this exquisite novel we learn more about the quiet forces that hold us together—even after we’ve grown apart.

At the heart of this story is the indomitable voice of Lucy Barton, who offers a profound, lasting reflection on the very nature of existence. “This is the way of life,� Lucy says: “the many things we do not know until it is too late.”]]> 240 Elizabeth Strout 0812989430 Sandra 0
I still would NOT recommend reading it separately, without reading the other two books of the Amgash trilogy. (This is just my guess, I haven't read the other two, but I read some reviews.)

The narrative style is poor, with lots of repetitions and WAY too many unnecessary explanations (something along the lines of "I already wrote about this, but let me explain one more time").

However, towards the end, the story does pick up, unexpectedly; the characters have some rather interesting insights, self-realizations, and thought-provoking conversations.

There's a sense of closure at the very end that wraps up the story and puts things into perspective.

What this novel taught me is this: people, rather than places, can feel like "home". We don't always know why, we don't understand, and that is the big mystery of life.]]> 3.79 2021 Oh William! (Amgash, #3)
author: Elizabeth Strout
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at: 2023/12/15
date added: 2023/12/15
shelves:
review:
Well, the book got better towards the end.

I still would NOT recommend reading it separately, without reading the other two books of the Amgash trilogy. (This is just my guess, I haven't read the other two, but I read some reviews.)

The narrative style is poor, with lots of repetitions and WAY too many unnecessary explanations (something along the lines of "I already wrote about this, but let me explain one more time").

However, towards the end, the story does pick up, unexpectedly; the characters have some rather interesting insights, self-realizations, and thought-provoking conversations.

There's a sense of closure at the very end that wraps up the story and puts things into perspective.

What this novel taught me is this: people, rather than places, can feel like "home". We don't always know why, we don't understand, and that is the big mystery of life.
]]> Baumgartner 134899244
Paul Auster’s brilliant eighteenth novel opens with a scorched pot of water, which Sy Baumgartner � phenomenologist, noted author, and soon-to-be retired philosophy professor � has just forgotten on the stove.

Baumgartner’s life had been defined by his deep, abiding love for his wife, Anna, who was killed in a swimming accident nine years earlier. Now 71, Baumgartner continues to struggle to live in her absence as the novel sinuously unfolds into spirals of memory and reminiscence, delineated in episodes spanning from 1968, when Sy and Anna meet as broke students working and writing in New York, through their passionate relationship over the next forty years, and back to Baumgartner’s youth in Newark and his Polish-born father’s life as a dress-shop owner and failed revolutionary.

Rich with compassion, wit, and Auster’s keen eye for beauty in the smallest, most transient moments of ordinary life, Baumgartner asks: Why do we remember certain moments, and forget others? In one of his most luminous works and his first novel since the Booker-shortlisted tour-de-force 4 3 2 1, Paul Auster captures several lifetimes.]]> 208 Paul Auster 0802161448 Sandra 0 to-read 3.70 2023 Baumgartner
author: Paul Auster
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/12/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Color Purple 11486
Then her husband's lover, a flamboyant blues singer, barreled into her world and gave Celie the courage to ask for more - to laugh, to play, and finally - to love.]]> 295 Alice Walker Sandra 0 ...
This novel shook me. Made me smile. Made me cry. Made me want to hug someone.

It so beautifully portrays the indomitable spirit of downtrodden African-American women, their love for each other, their sisterhood, and mutual support.

It also questions faith, or rather, the root of faith. Where is God? Is it a "he" or a "she" or an "it"? How does one connect to this omnipresent being? Is it through prayer?

Does it really piss him off if you "walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don't notice it"?

Ah, so many questions.

Thank you, Alice Walker, for this story.
I think I will keep coming back to it.
]]> 4.22 1982 The Color Purple
author: Alice Walker
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1982
rating: 0
read at: 2023/12/07
date added: 2023/12/07
shelves:
review:
"I'm Poor, Black, I May Even Be Ugly, But Dear God, I'm Here!
...
This novel shook me. Made me smile. Made me cry. Made me want to hug someone.

It so beautifully portrays the indomitable spirit of downtrodden African-American women, their love for each other, their sisterhood, and mutual support.

It also questions faith, or rather, the root of faith. Where is God? Is it a "he" or a "she" or an "it"? How does one connect to this omnipresent being? Is it through prayer?

Does it really piss him off if you "walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don't notice it"?

Ah, so many questions.

Thank you, Alice Walker, for this story.
I think I will keep coming back to it.

]]> <![CDATA[Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing]]> 59641216
So begins the riveting story of acclaimed actor Matthew Perry, taking us along on his journey from childhood ambition to fame to addiction and recovery in the aftermath of a life-threatening health scare. Before the frequent hospital visits and stints in rehab, there was five-year-old Matthew, who traveled from Montreal to Los Angeles, shuffling between his separated parents; fourteen-year-old Matthew, who was a nationally ranked tennis star in Canada; twenty-four-year-old Matthew, who nabbed a coveted role as a lead cast member on the talked-about pilot then called Friends Like Us. . . and so much more.

In an extraordinary story that only he could tell—and in the heartfelt, hilarious, and warmly familiar way only he could tell it—Matthew Perry lays bare the fractured family that raised him (and also left him to his own devices), the desire for recognition that drove him to fame, and the void inside him that could not be filled even by his greatest dreams coming true. But he also details the peace he’s found in sobriety and how he feels about the ubiquity of Friends, sharing stories about his castmates and other stars he met along the way. Frank, self-aware, and with his trademark humor, Perry vividly depicts his lifelong battle with addiction and what fueled it despite seemingly having it all.

Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing is an unforgettable memoir that is both intimate and eye-opening—as well as a hand extended to anyone struggling with sobriety. Unflinchingly honest, moving, and uproariously funny, this is the book fans have been waiting for.]]> 250 Matthew Perry 1250866448 Sandra 0 3.89 2022 Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing
author: Matthew Perry
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at: 2023/11/21
date added: 2023/11/21
shelves:
review:
Heart-breakingly beautiful, raw, and honest.
]]> Alias Grace 72579
An up-and-coming expert in the burgeoning field of mental illness is engaged by a group of reformers and spiritualists who seek a pardon for Grace. He listens to her story while bringing her closer and closer to the day she cannot remember. What will he find in attempting to unlock her memories?

Captivating and disturbing, Alias Grace showcases best-selling, Booker Prize-winning author Margaret Atwood at the peak of her powers.]]> 468 Margaret Atwood 0385475713 Sandra 0 Ah...

This book raises SO many questions: about the nature of our memory, re-construction of past events, self-identity, (un)willed forgetting and remembering, the role of women in the 19th century, the complex interplay between classes, and much more!

If you like open-ended questions with open-ended endings and a masterful storytelling - this book is for you.
]]> 4.08 1996 Alias Grace
author: Margaret Atwood
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1996
rating: 0
read at: 2023/11/16
date added: 2023/11/16
shelves:
review:
Are we what we remember or what we forget?
Ah...

This book raises SO many questions: about the nature of our memory, re-construction of past events, self-identity, (un)willed forgetting and remembering, the role of women in the 19th century, the complex interplay between classes, and much more!

If you like open-ended questions with open-ended endings and a masterful storytelling - this book is for you.

]]> The Road 6288
A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. It is cold enough to crack stones, and when the snow falls it is gray. The sky is dark. Their destination is the coast, although they don’t know what, if anything, awaits them there. They have nothing; just a pistol to defend themselves against the lawless bands that stalk the road, the clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food—and each other.

The Road is the profoundly moving story of a journey. It boldly imagines a future in which no hope remains, but in which the father and his son, “each the other’s world entire,� are sustained by love. Awesome in the totality of its vision, it is an unflinching meditation on the worst and the best that we are capable of: ultimate destructiveness, desperate tenacity, and the tenderness that keeps two people alive in the face of total devastation.]]> 241 Cormac McCarthy 0307265439 Sandra 0 The ending felt a bit naive, even for my optimistic standards.

The repetitive post-apocaliptic bleakness that seeped into every page of this book drained me, catapulting me into a horrible reading slump.

I don't know why I kept reading it so stubbornly.

Note to self: it's OK to dnf a book if you don't "click". ]]> 3.99 2006 The Road
author: Cormac McCarthy
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at: 2023/10/17
date added: 2023/10/17
shelves:
review:
I did not feel moved by the "carrying the fire" metaphor at all.
The ending felt a bit naive, even for my optimistic standards.

The repetitive post-apocaliptic bleakness that seeped into every page of this book drained me, catapulting me into a horrible reading slump.

I don't know why I kept reading it so stubbornly.

Note to self: it's OK to dnf a book if you don't "click".
]]> <![CDATA[Ako jedne zimske noći neki putnik]]> 6076347 Inteligentno je to i duhovito djelo kojim je slavni književnik postao miljenik književne kritike diljem svijeta.]]> 219 Italo Calvino 9537160149 Sandra 0 3.91 1979 Ako jedne zimske noći neki putnik
author: Italo Calvino
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.91
book published: 1979
rating: 0
read at: 2023/08/12
date added: 2023/08/12
shelves:
review:
Ako te zanima metafikcija, knjiga o knjizi, o citanju, o narativnom raslojavanju, o citaocu kao aktivnom ucesniku, o tome gde prica zapocinje a gde se zavrsava - ovo je sjajna knjiga za tebe.
]]> Small Things Like These 58662236
Already an international bestseller, Small Things Like These is a deeply affecting story of hope, quiet heroism, and empathy from one of our most critically lauded and iconic writers.]]> 128 Claire Keegan 0802158749 Sandra 0 to-read 4.13 2021 Small Things Like These
author: Claire Keegan
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/07/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Najskrovitiji spomen ljudi 159582034
Beskrajne inventivnosti i neponovljive ironije, Najskrovitiji spomen ljudi je izuzetan roman, radikalno i aktuelno istraživanje složenog nasleđa kolonijalizma, ali i izjava ljubavi književnosti i njenom bezvremenom uticaju. Knjiga koja se puno usuđuje � i trijumfuje.]]> 461 Mohamed Mbougar Sarr 8660840364 Sandra 0 to-read 4.59 2021 Najskrovitiji spomen ljudi
author: Mohamed Mbougar Sarr
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.59
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/07/16
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Magus 16286 The Magus is Nicholas Urfe, a young Englishman who accepts a teaching position on a remote Greek island, where he befriends a local millionaire. The friendship soon evolves into a deadly game, in which reality and fantasy are deliberately manipulated, and Nicholas finds that he must fight not only for his sanity but for his very survival.]]> 656 John Fowles 0316296198 Sandra 0 to-read 4.06 1965 The Magus
author: John Fowles
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.06
book published: 1965
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/07/16
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Suddenly Last Summer 161915 72 Tennessee Williams 0822210940 Sandra 0 ---
Read Tennessee W.
You can never go wrong with TW.
So much poetry and savagery in one little piece.]]> 3.95 1958 Suddenly Last Summer
author: Tennessee Williams
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.95
book published: 1958
rating: 0
read at: 2023/07/15
date added: 2023/07/15
shelves:
review:
"Somebody said once or wrote, once: 'We're all of us children in a vast kindergarten trying to spell God's name with the wrong alphabet blocks!"
---
Read Tennessee W.
You can never go wrong with TW.
So much poetry and savagery in one little piece.
]]> Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter 164006
She vividly evokes her friendships, love interests, mentors, and the early days of the most important relationship of her life, with fellow student Jean-Paul Sartre, against the backdrop of a turbulent time in France politically.]]> 359 Simone de Beauvoir 0060825197 Sandra 0 to-read 4.13 1958 Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter
author: Simone de Beauvoir
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1958
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/07/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Ice Palace 138110 176 Tarjei Vesaas 0720611229 Sandra 0 to-read 3.89 1963 The Ice Palace
author: Tarjei Vesaas
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.89
book published: 1963
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/07/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao]]> 297673
Diaz immerses us in the tumultuous life of Oscar and the history of the family at large, rendering with genuine warmth and dazzling energy, humor, and insight the Dominican-American experience, and, ultimately, the endless human capacity to persevere in the face of heartbreak and loss. A true literary triumph, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao confirms Junot Diaz as one of the best and most exciting voices of our time.]]> 335 Junot Díaz 1594489580 Sandra 0 to-read 3.89 2007 The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
author: Junot Díaz
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/07/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> A Tale for the Time Being 15811545
Across the Pacific, we meet Ruth, a novelist living on a remote island who discovers a collection of artifacts washed ashore in a Hello Kitty lunchbox—possibly debris from the devastating 2011 tsunami. As the mystery of its contents unfolds, Ruth is pulled into the past, into Nao's drama and her unknown fate, and forward into her own future.

Full of Ozeki's signature humour and deeply engaged with the relationship between writer and reader, past and present, fact and fiction, quantum physics, history, and myth, A Tale for the Time Being is a brilliantly inventive, beguiling story of our shared humanity and the search for home.]]> 432 Ruth Ozeki 0670026638 Sandra 0 to-read 4.06 2013 A Tale for the Time Being
author: Ruth Ozeki
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2013
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/07/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Outline 21400742
Beginning with the neighbouring passenger on the flight out and his tales of fast boats and failed marriages, the storytellers talk of their loves and ambitions and pains, their anxieties, their perceptions and daily lives. In the stifling heat and noise of the city the sequence of voice begins to weave a complex human tapestry. The more they talk the more elliptical their listener becomes, as she shapes and directs their accounts until certain themes begin to emerge: the experience of loss, the nature of family life, the difficulty of intimacy and the mystery of creativity itself.

Outline is a novel about writing and talking, about self-effacement and self-expression, about the desire to create and the human art of self-portraiture in which that desire finds its universal form.]]> 249 Rachel Cusk 0571233627 Sandra 0 to-read 3.68 2014 Outline
author: Rachel Cusk
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2014
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/06/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Physics of Sorrow 23129709 The Physics of Sorrow reaffirms Georgi Gospodinov's place as one of Europe's most inventive and daring writers.

Using the myth of the Minotaur as its organizing image, the narrator of Gospodinov's long-awaited novel constructs a labyrinth of stories about his family, jumping from era to era and viewpoint to viewpoint, exploring the mindset and trappings of Eastern Europeans. Incredibly moving—such as with the story of his grandfather accidentally being left behind at a mill—and extraordinarily funny—see the section on the awfulness of the question "how are you?"�Physics is a book that you can inhabit, tracing connections, following the narrator down various "side passages," getting pleasantly lost in the various stories and empathizing with the sorrowful, misunderstood Minotaur at the center of it all.

Physics of Sorrow will appeal to fans of Dave Eggers, Tom McCarthy, and Dubravka Ugresic for its unique structure, humanitarian concerns, and stunning storytelling.]]> 287 Georgi Gospodinov 194095309X Sandra 0 to-read 4.06 2011 The Physics of Sorrow
author: Georgi Gospodinov
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/05/24
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Things Fall Apart (The African Trilogy, #1)]]> 37781 Things Fall Apart is written with remarkable economy and subtle irony. Uniquely and richly African, at the same time it reveals Achebe's keen awareness of the human qualities common to men of all times and places.]]> 215 Chinua Achebe Sandra 0 to-read 3.73 1958 Things Fall Apart (The African Trilogy, #1)
author: Chinua Achebe
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.73
book published: 1958
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/04/11
shelves: to-read
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]]> Zamalek: Roman o kismetu 52913157
U srcu Kaira, na ostrvu usred Nila, decenijama je postojala antikvarnica krcata svakojakim blagom kao Ali-babina pećina. Radnju, najčuveniju u tom delu sveta, vodili su Kosta, glasoviti egiptolog, i njegova poćerka Arna sve dok kismet, zbog nekih Kostinih misterioznih greha, nije odlučio drugačije. Ova priča u kojoj se mešaju ovozemaljski i zagrobni život nije mogla da se dogodi nigde osim u Kairu, pa su taj pustinjski megalopolis, njegova tiha mahala Zamalek, ljudi, običaji i vrelina grada jednako važni junaci romana kao i Kosta antikvar i pripovedačica Arna, prašina koja stalno pada i Nil koji teče kao život.

„Zamalek je roman koji vam se u prvom trenutku čini kao putopis pun opisa čudnih običaja, leksikon egzotičnih pojmova ili nekakav uvrnuti bedeker o Egiptu. A onda, malo-pomalo, iz novootkrivenih delova istorije te zemlje i sjajnog opisa mentaliteta njenih stanovnika počinje da izranja priča. Ona se, kao ponornica koja je u početku hučala negde u dubini, u svoj svojoj snazi najzad pojavljuje na svetlosti dana, sa svojim junacima, njihovim neobičnim pojavama i zanimljivim biografijama. Ta priča postaje zavodljiva, napeta i dirljiva, da bi se na kraju ulila u okean uspomena. Ako je o Aleksandriji najbolju belešku napravio Lorens Darel, onda je, na sličan način, kroz uzbudljive sudbine svojih junaka i neobične trenutke iz njihovih života u kvartu Zamalek, Dejan Tiago-Stanković ovekovečio Kairo.�

Goran Marković]]> 352 Dejan Tiago-Stanković 8652136254 Sandra 0 4.36 Zamalek: Roman o kismetu
author: Dejan Tiago-Stanković
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.36
book published:
rating: 0
read at: 2023/04/08
date added: 2023/04/08
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]]> Semper Idem 8161223 424 Đorđe Lebović Sandra 0 to-read 4.82 2005 Semper Idem
author: Đorđe Lebović
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.82
book published: 2005
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/04/04
shelves: to-read
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]]> Plodovi zemlje 22037872 ------
PLODOVI ZEMLJE, najpoznatiji skandinavski klasik, veličanstvena je epska priča o Isaku i Inger, Adamu i Evi svog vremena, njihovim potomcima i galeriji likova sa severa Norveške, tom čovečanstvu u malom, koje pokušava da se snađe u previranjima novog doba.]]> 383 Knut Hamsun 8679580791 Sandra 0 to-read 4.50 1917 Plodovi zemlje
author: Knut Hamsun
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.50
book published: 1917
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/04/03
shelves: to-read
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]]> To the Lighthouse 59716
As time winds its way through their lives, the Ramsays face, alone and simultaneously, the greatest of human challenges and its greatest triumph—the human capacity for change.]]> 209 Virginia Woolf Sandra 0 to-read 3.81 1927 To the Lighthouse
author: Virginia Woolf
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1927
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/04/03
shelves: to-read
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]]> After the Winter 40189427 A shy young Mexican woman moves to Paris to study literature. Cecilia has few friends, and a morbid fascination with watching the funerals taking place in Père-Lachaise cemetery outside her apartment. She suddenly strikes up a close relationship with her neighbour, a sickly young man who shares her interest in death and believes we can communicate with the dead. After coming to entirely depend on him for company and routine, Cecilia is left devastated by his decision to go to Sicily for his health, and is left alone in an unfriendly city once more.

Claudio, meanwhile, lives in New York with the submissive, quiet, but very wealthy Ruth. She makes few demands of him, while acquiescing to all his desires and indulging his obsessive, misogynistic nature. He meets Cecilia by chance when visiting a friend in Paris and their two very different worlds collide with transformative consequences.

With startling intensity, humour and insight, Nettel conjures a dark fable about obsession, denial and our modern ability to reach out across the globe in search of love.

Translated from the Spanish by Rosalind Harvey

]]> 256 Guadalupe Nettel 0857055119 Sandra 0 to-read 3.84 2014 After the Winter
author: Guadalupe Nettel
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2014
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/28
shelves: to-read
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]]> Strangers I Know 62952116 Durastanti casts the universal drama of the family as the sieve through which the self--woman, artist, daughter--is filtered and known. --Ocean Vuong

A work of fiction about being a stranger in your own family and life.

Every family has its own mythology, but in this family none of the myths match up. Claudia's mother says she met her husband when she stopped him from jumping off a bridge. Her father says it happened when he saved her from an attempted robbery. Both parents are deaf but couldn't be more different; they can't even agree on how they met, much less who needed saving.

Into this unlikely yet somehow inevitable union, our narrator is born. She comes of age with her brother in this strange, and increasingly estranged, household split between a small village in southern Italy and New York City. Without even sign language in common - their parents have not bothered to teach them - family communications are chaotic and rife with misinterpretations, by turns hilarious and devastating. An outsider in every way, she longs for a freedom she's not even sure exists. Only books and punk rock--and a tumultuous relationship--begin to show her the way to create her own mythology, to construct her own version of the story of her life.

Kinetic, formally dazzling, and spectacularly original, this book is a funny and profound portrait of an unconventional family that makes us look anew at how language shapes our understanding of ourselves.
]]> 304 Claudia Durastanti 059308795X Sandra 0 to-read 3.54 2019 Strangers I Know
author: Claudia Durastanti
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.54
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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]]> Beograd je moje more 58810571 Beograd se u Marininim stihovima pretvara u gotovo imaginarni grad sastavljen od emocija i sećanja. Njegove ulice, tgovi i kafane preobražavaju se u beskrajno more.
Jednostavan stil Marinine poezije pojačava osećaj slobode i priziva miris mora, a izbor fotografija naglašava utisak da je pred čitaocem nešto duboko lično.

Dan je bio oblačan.
U Beogradu je padala kiša.
I moglo mi se da pomerim svet.]]> 87 Marina Bugarčić 8680426806 Sandra 0 to-read 4.25 Beograd je moje more
author: Marina Bugarčić
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.25
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/03/23
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]]> <![CDATA[My Name Is Lucy Barton (Amgash, #1)]]> 25893709 193 Elizabeth Strout 1400067693 Sandra 0 to-read 3.56 2016 My Name Is Lucy Barton (Amgash, #1)
author: Elizabeth Strout
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.56
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/10
shelves: to-read
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]]> A Way of Being 174876 A profound and deeply personal collection of essays by renowned psychologist Carl Rogers

The late Carl Rogers, founder of the humanistic psychology movement and father of client-centered therapy, based his life's work on his fundamental belief in the human potential for growth. A Way of Being was written in the early 1980s, near the end of Carl Rogers's career, and serves as a coda to his classic On Becoming a Person. More philosophical than his earlier writings, it traces his professional and personal development and ends with a prophetic call for a more humane future.]]> 395 Carl R. Rogers 0395755301 Sandra 0 to-read 4.23 1980 A Way of Being
author: Carl R. Rogers
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1980
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/07
shelves: to-read
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]]> Stoner 166997
John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]> 292 John Williams 1590171993 Sandra 0 4.35 1965 Stoner
author: John Williams
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.35
book published: 1965
rating: 0
read at: 2023/03/04
date added: 2023/03/04
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]]> Frankenstein 774732 Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley, is part of the series, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student and the general reader, including new scholarship, thoughtful design, and pages of carefully crafted extras. Here are some of the remarkable features of Barnes & Noble Classics:
New introductions commissioned from today's top writers and scholars Biographies of the authors Chronologies of contemporary historical, biographical, and cultural events Footnotes and endnotes Selective discussions of imitations, parodies, poems, books, plays, paintings, operas, statuary, and films inspired by the work Comments by other famous authors Study questions to challenge the reader's viewpoints and expectations Bibliographies for further reading Indices & Glossaries, when appropriate All editions are beautifully designed and are printed to superior specifications; some include illustrations of historical interest. Barnes & Noble Classics pulls together a constellation of influences—biographical, historical, and literary—to enrich each reader's understanding of these enduring works.

Mary Shelley began writing Frankenstein when she was only eighteen. At once a Gothic thriller, a passionate romance, and a cautionary tale about the dangers of science, Frankenstein tells the story of committed science student Victor Frankenstein. Obsessed with discovering "the cause of generation and life" and "bestowing animation upon lifeless matter," Frankenstein assembles a human being from stolen body parts but; upon bringing it to life, he recoils in horror at the creature?s hideousness. Tormented by isolation and loneliness, the once-innocent creature turns to evil and unleashes a campaign of murderous revenge against his creator, Frankenstein.

Frankenstein, an instant bestseller and an important ancestor of both the horror and science fiction genres, not only tells a terrifying story, but also raises rofound, disturbing questions about the very nature of life and the place of humankind within the cosmos: What does it mean to be human? What responsibilities do we have to each other? How far can we go in tampering with Nature? In our age, filled with news of organ donation genetic engineering, and bio-terrorism, these questions are more relevant than ever.

Karen Karbiener received a Ph.D. from Columbia University and currently teaches literature at New York University.

]]> 247 Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley 1593080050 Sandra 0 3.83 1818 Frankenstein
author: Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.83
book published: 1818
rating: 0
read at: 2023/02/05
date added: 2023/02/05
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]]> Kapetanova kći 27130201 Fototipsko izdanje 142 Alexander Pushkin 1517603854 Sandra 0 3.99 1836 Kapetanova kći
author: Alexander Pushkin
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1836
rating: 0
read at: 2023/01/12
date added: 2023/01/12
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]]> <![CDATA[Moja mama zna šta se dešava u gradovima]]> 54456801
Moja mama zna šta se dešava u gradovima, a ja znam zašto se u njih odlazi.]]> 63 Radmila Petrović 8681360108 Sandra 0 Poezija koja vrišti ljubav.
Tako sam ja doživela Radmilu.

"Trebalo bi zauzeti sopstvenu dušu
kao parče zemlje, navodnjavati je bistrinom
zasaditi zimzelenim biljkama
opeviti potrebu da te bilo ko razume

trebalo bi, definitivno, posaditi nešto"

]]> 4.50 2020 Moja mama zna šta se dešava u gradovima
author: Radmila Petrović
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.50
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at: 2023/01/11
date added: 2023/01/11
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Sirovo, nežno, snažno.
Poezija koja vrišti ljubav.
Tako sam ja doživela Radmilu.

"Trebalo bi zauzeti sopstvenu dušu
kao parče zemlje, navodnjavati je bistrinom
zasaditi zimzelenim biljkama
opeviti potrebu da te bilo ko razume

trebalo bi, definitivno, posaditi nešto"


]]> <![CDATA[Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less]]> 18077875 Do you simultaneously feel overworked and underutilized?
Are you often busy but not productive?
Do you feel like your time is constantly being hijacked by other people’s agendas?

If you answered yes to any of these, the way out is the Way of the EssentialistThe Way of the Essentialist isn’t about getting more done in less time. It’s about getting only the right things done. It is nota time management strategy, or a productivity technique. It is a systematic discipline for discerning what is absolutely essential, then eliminating everything that is not, so we can make the highest possible contribution towards the things that really matter.

By forcing us to apply a more selective criteria for what is Essential, the disciplined pursuit of less empowers us to reclaim control of our own choices about where to spend our precious time and energy � instead of giving others the implicit permission to choose for us.

Essentialism is not one more thing � it’s a whole new way of doing everything. A must-read for any leader, manager, or individual who wants to learn how to do less, but better, in every area of their lives, Essentialism is a movement whose time has come.]]> 260 Greg McKeown 0804137382 Sandra 0 to-read 4.05 2011 Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less
author: Greg McKeown
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/12/01
shelves: to-read
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]]> Man’s Search for Meaning 4069 Man's Search for Meaning has become one of the most influential books in America; it continues to inspire us all to find significance in the very act of living.]]> 165 Viktor E. Frankl 080701429X Sandra 0
"To be sure, a human being is a finite thing, and his freedom is restricted. It is not freedom from conditions, but it is freedom to take a stand toward the conditions."

]]> 4.38 1946 Man’s Search for Meaning
author: Viktor E. Frankl
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.38
book published: 1946
rating: 0
read at: 2022/11/30
date added: 2022/11/30
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Frankl contends that man is a self-determining being, namely, that 'man does not simply exist but always decides what his existence will be'. He further explains that this freedom of choice is coupled with responsibility. Half-jokingly, he proposes that "the Statue of Liberty on the East Coast be supplemented by a Statue of Responsibility on the West Coast".

"To be sure, a human being is a finite thing, and his freedom is restricted. It is not freedom from conditions, but it is freedom to take a stand toward the conditions."


]]> The Bell Jar 6514 294 Sylvia Plath 0571268862 Sandra 0
This sentence brings out the overarching sentiment of 'The Bell Jar' - at what point do we start perceiving the true nature of our sham reality, seeing all the cracks in it for what they truly are?

]]> 4.05 1963 The Bell Jar
author: Sylvia Plath
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1963
rating: 0
read at: 2022/11/29
date added: 2022/11/29
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"I wondered at what point in space the silly, sham blue of the sky turned black."

This sentence brings out the overarching sentiment of 'The Bell Jar' - at what point do we start perceiving the true nature of our sham reality, seeing all the cracks in it for what they truly are?


]]> Daljine 52678971 Zašto se bliskost koju tako snažno osećamo prema osobama, gradovima, vremenima najednom rastače i tanji? Kako se dešava da se ljudi koji se vole najednom nemo dovikuju iz daljine?
Magda Sabo svojim zavidnim i zavodljivim književnim talentom osvetljava veoma tanane i retko opisivane veze među ljudima, usložnjavajući ih do kraja romana gotovo do tačke neizdržljivosti. Ona nam otkriva da se često dičimo plemenitošću, dok u isto vreme zanemarujemo i povređujemo one koji bi trebalo da su nam najbliži. Daljine su snažna priča o odnosu koji će tek naći svoje mesto u svetskoj književnosti � odnosu između majke i ćerke.]]> 356 Magda Szabó Sandra 0 to-read 4.47 1963 Daljine
author: Magda Szabó
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.47
book published: 1963
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/11/17
shelves: to-read
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]]> The Year of Magical Thinking 7815
From one of America's iconic writers, a stunning book of electric honesty and passion. Joan Didion explores an intensely personal yet universal experience: a portrait of a marriage–and a life, in good times and bad–that will speak to anyone who has ever loved a husband or wife or child.

Several days before Christmas 2003, John Gregory Dunne and Joan Didion saw their only daughter, Quintana, fall ill with what seemed at first flu, then pneumonia, then complete septic shock. She was put into an induced coma and placed on life support. Days later–the night before New Year's Eve–the Dunnes were just sitting down to dinner after visiting the hospital when John Gregory Dunne suffered a massive and fatal coronary. In a second, this close, symbiotic partnership of forty years was over. Four weeks later, their daughter pulled through. Two months after that, arriving at LAX, she collapsed and underwent six hours of brain surgery at UCLA Medical Center to relieve a massive hematoma.

This powerful book is Didion's attempt to make sense of the "weeks and then months that cut loose any fixed idea I ever had about death, about illness . . . about marriage and children and memory . . . about the shallowness of sanity, about life itself."]]> 227 Joan Didion 1400078431 Sandra 0 Does that process ever end?

''As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end.''
]]> 3.94 2005 The Year of Magical Thinking
author: Joan Didion
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2005
rating: 0
read at: 2022/11/06
date added: 2022/11/06
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How do you rationalize death when you're in the process of mourning?
Does that process ever end?

''As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end.''

]]> The Yellow Wallpaper 8217236
In a private journal, the woman records her growing obsession with the “horrid� wallpaper. Its strange pattern mutates in the moonlight, revealing what appears to be a human figure in the design. With nothing else to occupy her mind, the woman resolves to unlock the mystery of the wallpaper. Her quest, however, leads not to the truth, but into the darkest depths of madness.

A condemnation of the patriarchy, The Yellow Wallpaper explores with terrifying economy the oppression, grave misunderstanding, and willful dismissal of women in late nineteenth-century society.

First published in January 1892 in The New England Magazine.

Excerpt:
Out of another I get a lovely view of the bay and a little private wharf belonging to the estate. There is a beautiful shaded lane that runs down there from the house. I always fancy I see people walking in these numerous paths and arbors, but John has cautioned me not to give way to fancy in the least. He says that with my imaginative power and habit of story-making a nervous weakness like mine is sure to lead to all manner of excited fancies, and that I ought to use my will and good sense to check the tendency. So I try.]]> 63 Charlotte Perkins Gilman Sandra 0 4.05 1892 The Yellow Wallpaper
author: Charlotte Perkins Gilman
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1892
rating: 0
read at: 2022/01/01
date added: 2022/10/31
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]]> A Room of One’s Own 18521 A Room of One's Own is an extended essay by Virginia Woolf. First published on the 24th of October, 1929, the essay was based on a series of lectures she delivered at Newnham College and Girton College, two women's colleges at Cambridge University in October 1928. While this extended essay in fact employs a fictional narrator and narrative to explore women both as writers and characters in fiction, the manuscript for the delivery of the series of lectures, titled Women and Fiction, and hence the essay, are considered nonfiction. The essay is seen as a feminist text, and is noted in its argument for both a literal and figural space for women writers within a literary tradition dominated by patriarchy.]]> 112 Virginia Woolf Sandra 0 4.22 1929 A Room of One’s Own
author: Virginia Woolf
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1929
rating: 0
read at: 2022/01/01
date added: 2022/10/31
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]]> <![CDATA[My Brilliant Friend (Neapolitan Novels, #1)]]> 35036409 My Brilliant Friend is a rich, intense and generous-hearted story about two friends, Elena and Lila. Ferrante’s inimitable style lends itself perfectly to a meticulous portrait of these two women that is also the story of a nation and a touching meditation on the nature of friendship. Through the lives of these two women, Ferrante tells the story of a neighbourhood, a city and a country as it is transformed in ways that, in turn, also transform the relationship between her two protagonists.]]> 331 Elena Ferrante Sandra 0 4.08 2011 My Brilliant Friend (Neapolitan Novels, #1)
author: Elena Ferrante
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at: 2022/10/31
date added: 2022/10/31
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Copenhagen Trilogy (The Copenhagen Trilogy, #1-3)]]> 53317528 Called a masterpiece by The New York Times, the acclaimed trilogy from Tove Ditlevsen, a pioneer in the field of genre-bending confessional writing

Tove Ditlevsen is today celebrated as one of the most important and unique voices in twentieth-century Danish literature, and The Copenhagen Trilogy (1969-71) is her acknowledged masterpiece. Childhood tells the story of a misfit child's single-minded determination to become a poet; Youth describes her early experiences of sex, work, and independence. Dependency picks up the story as the narrator embarks on the first of her four marriages and goes on to describe her horrible descent into drug addiction, enabled by her sinister, gaslighting doctor-husband.

Throughout, the narrator grapples with the tension between her vocation as a writer and her competing roles as daughter, wife, mother, and drug addict, and she writes about female experience and identity in a way that feels very fresh and pertinent to today's discussions around feminism. Ditlevsen's trilogy is remarkable for its intensity and its immersive depiction of a world of complex female friendships, family and growing up--in this sense, it's Copenhagen's answer to Elena Ferrante's Neapolitan Novels. She can also be seen as a spiritual forerunner of confessional writers like Karl Ove Knausgaard, Annie Ernaux, Rachel Cusk and Deborah Levy. Her trilogy is drawn from her own experiences but reads like the most compelling kind of fiction.

Born in a working-class neighborhood in Copenhagen in 1917, Ditlevsen became famous for her poetry while still a teenager, and went on to write novels, stories and memoirs before committing suicide in 1976. Having been dismissed by the critical establishment in her lifetime as a working-class, female writer, she is now being rediscovered and championed as one of Denmark's most important modern authors, with Tove fever gripping readers.]]> 371 Tove Ditlevsen 0374602395 Sandra 0 4.36 1967 The Copenhagen Trilogy (The Copenhagen Trilogy, #1-3)
author: Tove Ditlevsen
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.36
book published: 1967
rating: 0
read at: 2022/10/31
date added: 2022/10/31
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[My Family and Other Animals (Corfu Trilogy, #1)]]> 48132 My Family and Other Animals was intended to embrace the natural history of the island but ended up as a delightful account of Durrell’s family’s experiences, from the many eccentric hangers-on to the ceaseless procession of puppies, toads, scorpions, geckoes, ladybugs, glowworms, octopuses, bats, and butterflies into their home.]]> 273 Gerald Durrell 0142004413 Sandra 0 Vratiće vas u rano detinjstvo, izmestiće vas za trenutak u one duge, lenje letnje dane kada ste iz obližnjih šumaraka vraćali sa ponekim neobičnim ulovom, a možda vas je u stopu pratio neki novi sveže prisvojeni "Džeki"... Znate već na koje dane mislim. Nasmejaće vas do suza. Likovi su upečatljivi, šareni, fantastično opisani (jezikom koji često i vrlo prigodno aludira na krfsku floru i faunu), dijalozi kratki, duhoviti, a čitava priča upakovana tako da ju je prosto grehota čitati kod kuće. Jedno je sigurno, ako ugrabite ovu knjigu, letujete na Krfu ove godine, potpisujem!

]]> 4.19 1956 My Family and Other Animals (Corfu Trilogy, #1)
author: Gerald Durrell
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1956
rating: 0
read at: 2022/08/17
date added: 2022/08/17
shelves:
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Kakva poslastica od knjige, ljudi moji!
Vratiće vas u rano detinjstvo, izmestiće vas za trenutak u one duge, lenje letnje dane kada ste iz obližnjih šumaraka vraćali sa ponekim neobičnim ulovom, a možda vas je u stopu pratio neki novi sveže prisvojeni "Džeki"... Znate već na koje dane mislim. Nasmejaće vas do suza. Likovi su upečatljivi, šareni, fantastično opisani (jezikom koji često i vrlo prigodno aludira na krfsku floru i faunu), dijalozi kratki, duhoviti, a čitava priča upakovana tako da ju je prosto grehota čitati kod kuće. Jedno je sigurno, ako ugrabite ovu knjigu, letujete na Krfu ove godine, potpisujem!


]]> <![CDATA[Снегови Килиманџара и друге приче (Snegovi Kilimandžara i druge priče)]]> 39738454 Reč je o Hemingvejevim opisima zajedničkih situacija savremenog čoveka i čoveka uopšte i njegovog agresivnog vremena punog izazova i protivurečnosti. "Snegovi Kilimandžara" su još jedna prilika da se Hemingvej predstavi novim, mlađim čitaocima na najbolji način, pripovetkama koje su ga proslavile širom sveta.]]> 101 Ernest Hemingway 8637907067 Sandra 0 3.50 1936 Снегови Килиманџара и друге приче (Snegovi Kilimandžara i druge priče)
author: Ernest Hemingway
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.50
book published: 1936
rating: 0
read at: 2022/08/02
date added: 2022/08/02
shelves:
review:

]]> Bajke južnoameričkih naroda 23510860 208 Miodrag B. Šijaković Sandra 0 3.00 1963 Bajke južnoameričkih naroda
author: Miodrag B. Šijaković
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.00
book published: 1963
rating: 0
read at: 2022/07/27
date added: 2022/07/27
shelves:
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]]> Башта сљезове боје 6706882 196 Branko Ćopić 8644101951 Sandra 0 4.30 1970 Башта сљезове боје
author: Branko Ćopić
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.30
book published: 1970
rating: 0
read at: 2022/07/26
date added: 2022/07/26
shelves:
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"И опет је све како треба под старим добрим небом. Звијезде трепере, мјесец путује, а доље у млакој тами, на својој вољеној земљици, човјек спокојно ужива у доброј комадешки пите."
]]> Norwegian Wood 11297
A magnificent blending of the music, the mood, and the ethos that was the sixties with the story of one college student's romantic coming of age, Norwegian Wood brilliantly recaptures a young man's first, hopeless, and heroic love.]]> 296 Haruki Murakami 0375704027 Sandra 0 And it was. I understand it's not your typical Murakami. (Still haven't read any other novels/stories apart from his non-fictional 'What I Talk About When I Talk About Running'.) There are no surreal/magical realism moments in this book, but it does have its own kind of magic. It pulled me into the world of Toru Watanabe and all the other fascinating characters. I had the tune of 'Norwegian Wood' playing inside my head throughout the novel. ]]> 4.01 1987 Norwegian Wood
author: Haruki Murakami
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1987
rating: 0
read at: 2022/07/05
date added: 2022/07/05
shelves:
review:
As a huge Beatles fan, I just knew that this book would be a perfect fit for me.
And it was. I understand it's not your typical Murakami. (Still haven't read any other novels/stories apart from his non-fictional 'What I Talk About When I Talk About Running'.) There are no surreal/magical realism moments in this book, but it does have its own kind of magic. It pulled me into the world of Toru Watanabe and all the other fascinating characters. I had the tune of 'Norwegian Wood' playing inside my head throughout the novel.
]]> <![CDATA[The Hobbit, or There and Back Again]]> 5907 Written for J.R.R. Tolkien’s own children, The Hobbit met with instant critical acclaim when it was first published in 1937. Now recognized as a timeless classic, this introduction to the hobbit Bilbo Baggins, the wizard Gandalf, Gollum, and the spectacular world of Middle-earth recounts of the adventures of a reluctant hero, a powerful and dangerous ring, and the cruel dragon Smaug the Magnificent. The text in this 372-page paperback edition is based on that first published in Great Britain by Collins Modern Classics (1998), and includes a note on the text by Douglas A. Anderson (2001).]]> 366 J.R.R. Tolkien Sandra 0 4.29 1937 The Hobbit, or There and Back Again
author: J.R.R. Tolkien
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1937
rating: 0
read at: 2022/06/07
date added: 2022/06/07
shelves:
review:
“So comes snow after fire, and even dragons have their endings.�
]]> Senka vetra 6087523 The Washington Post

Barselona 1945: grad polako zaceljuje svoje rane iz rata, a Danijel, sin trgovca antikvarnim knjigama, koji tuguje zbog gubitka majke, nalazi utehu u misterioznoj knjizi Senka vetra, koju je napisao izvesni Hulijan Karaš. Ali kada je krenuo da pronađe druge naslove istog autora, on dolazi do šokantnog otkrića: neko sistematski uništava svaki primerak svake knjige koju je Karaš napisao! Zapravo, Danijel možda poseduje poslednji primerak Karašovih knjiga. Uskoro, njegova prividno bezazlena potraga otvara vrata jedne od najmračnijih tajni Barselone � epske priče o ubistvu, ludilu i ukletoj ljubavi.

„Čudesno... majstorski napisano... Senka vetra je u krajnjoj liniji ljubavno pismo upućeno književnosti, namenjeno čitaocima koji su strastveno zaljubljeni u pripovedaštvo onoliko koliko i njen mladi glavni junak.�
Entertainment Weekly, Izbor urednika

Finalista prestižne nagrade Fernando Lara, toplo dočekan i od publike i od kritike, roman Senka vetra postao je literarni fenomen u Evropi i Americi.

U Velikoj Britaniji je 2004. bio najčitaniji roman od autora van engleskog govornog područja.

U Nemačkoj je 2004. bio najčitaniji roman od autora van nemačkog i engleskog govornog područja.

Veliki je hit u Italiji, u svim zemljama Latinske Amerike i Njujork tajmsov bestseler u Sjedinjenim Američkim Državama.

Knjiga je do sada prevedena na 36 jezika, objavljena u više od 40 zemalja i prodata u preko 7 miliona primeraka.

SENKA VETRA JE NAJČITANIJI ROMAN U ŠPANIJI U POSLEDNJIH NEKOLIKO DECENIJA!]]> 478 Carlos Ruiz Zafón 8677020233 Sandra 0 to-read 4.61 2001 Senka vetra
author: Carlos Ruiz Zafón
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.61
book published: 2001
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/03/30
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Natural Baby Sleep Solution: Use Your Child's Internal Sleep Rhythms for Better Nights and Naps]]> 25810680
Based on the human rest and activity cycle that occurs every hour and a half, here’s a scientifically based program for parents to help babies get all the sleep they need, both through the night and during the day. The method is simple, foolproof, and yields long-lasting truly restful daytime naps (which also gives an infant a head start on cognitive development and emotional intelligence) and consistent nighttime sleep—as beneficial for parents as it is for the baby. A simple program for sleep that delivers foolproof results.
]]> 192 Polly Moore 0761187472 Sandra 0 3.97 2016 The Natural Baby Sleep Solution: Use Your Child's Internal Sleep Rhythms for Better Nights and Naps
author: Polly Moore
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at: 2022/02/10
date added: 2022/02/11
shelves:
review:
This book will help you understand the intrinsic sleep pattern found in all newborns to 1-year-olds. Good news: it's way simpler than you might expect. You will probably get the gist of it in the first couple of pages. That said, the book does seem a bit repetitive, but don't give up on it yet. There are plenty of useful tips and tricks between its pages (self soothing techniques, teaching sleep independence, and more!).
]]> Braća Karamazovi I-II 23279674 981 Fyodor Dostoevsky Sandra 5
"I, čini mi se, u meni sad ima toliko te snage da ću sve savladati, sve patnje, samo da mogu sebi svakog trenutka reći: ja jesam! U hiljadu muka - ja jesam, sav se grčim u mukama - ali jesam! U klopci sam, ali postojim, sunce vidim, a ako sunce i ne vidim, znam da ono postoji. A znati da sunce postoji - to je već ceo život." ]]> 4.77 1880 Braća Karamazovi I-II
author: Fyodor Dostoevsky
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.77
book published: 1880
rating: 5
read at: 2020/03/13
date added: 2022/02/04
shelves:
review:
Roman koji se utiskuje u dušu, u ono najskrovitije, najsvetije mesto u mom srcu.

"I, čini mi se, u meni sad ima toliko te snage da ću sve savladati, sve patnje, samo da mogu sebi svakog trenutka reći: ja jesam! U hiljadu muka - ja jesam, sav se grčim u mukama - ali jesam! U klopci sam, ali postojim, sunce vidim, a ako sunce i ne vidim, znam da ono postoji. A znati da sunce postoji - to je već ceo život."
]]> <![CDATA[Prelazak na čvrstu hranu po meri vašeg deteta]]> 59069319
Prelazak na čvrstu hranu po meri vašeg deteta pouzdan je i praktičan vodič za uvođenje čvrste hrane, zahvaljujući kojem će dete izrasti u sigurnu osobu koja uživa u hrani. Roditeljima će pokazati zbog čega prelazak na čvrstu hranu po meri deteta ima smisla, a oni će biti sigurni u prirodne sposobnosti i instinkte svoje bebe.

Kroz praktične savete o započinjanju, kao i uvid u ono što možete da očekujete, Prelazak na čvrstu hranu po meri vašeg deteta preispituje stav da bebe treba hraniti na kašičicu i pokazuje vam zbog čega je najzdravije da dete jede samo od početka. Bebi ćete dopustiti da odluči koliko hrane želi da pojede i na koji način, kao i da sve isprobava brzinom koja joj odgovara.

Prelazak na čvrstu hranu je zdravorazumski, siguran, lak i prijatan pristup ishrani vaše bebe. Gotovo je s kašicama i prvim kašičicama, gotovo je s natezanjem oko jela. Jednostavno pustite bebu da sama jede zdravu hranu kakvu jedu ostali članovi porodice.]]> 201 Gill Rapley Sandra 0 PMD metoda je metoda ishrane 'po meri deteta'. I to podrazumeva da se od malih nogu gradi odnos poverenja prema hrani. ]]> 4.50 2008 Prelazak na čvrstu hranu po meri vašeg deteta
author: Gill Rapley
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.50
book published: 2008
rating: 0
read at: 2022/01/25
date added: 2022/01/25
shelves:
review:
Odličan priručnik za mame i tate, bake i deke, za svakoga ko želi da pomogne svom detetu da nauči da uživa u hrani, u različitim ukusima i teksturama.
PMD metoda je metoda ishrane 'po meri deteta'. I to podrazumeva da se od malih nogu gradi odnos poverenja prema hrani.
]]> Nečista krv 6754775
Knjiga je u celosti dostupna u docx formatu na sledecoj adresi:
]]> 252 Borisav Stanković 8684941284 Sandra 0
Istoimena, aktuelna serija koja se ovih dana emituje na RTS-u, a za koju kažu da koristi motive iz nekoliko različitih romana i pripovedaka sa juga, navela me da se vratim ovoj knjizi posle toliko godina... Na kraju nisam stigla da pogledam seriju, te nažalost ne bih mogla da povučem paralelu.

Ono što mogu da kažem jeste da sam bila iznenađena činjenicom da sam saosećala ne samo sa Sofkinim likom već i sa - gle čuda, gazda-Markom koji je, po mom mišljenju, takođe jedan tragičan lik...

Grozomorno upečatljivi ostali su mi opisi u kojima Sofka posmatra nove, crvene crepove na krovu svoje kuće osećajući ih kao svoje sopstveno meso, kao da su je već time raskomadali, zatim cveće koje stavljaju na kapiju na dan njenog venčanja koje je podseća na grobljansko cveće... Roman zaista obiluje ovakvim opisima i to je ono što bih istakla kao veliki stilski kvalitet.
]]> 3.85 1910 Nečista krv
author: Borisav Stanković
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.85
book published: 1910
rating: 0
read at: 2022/01/13
date added: 2022/01/20
shelves:
review:
Lektira koja je ostala nedočitana u srednjoj konačno došla na red!

Istoimena, aktuelna serija koja se ovih dana emituje na RTS-u, a za koju kažu da koristi motive iz nekoliko različitih romana i pripovedaka sa juga, navela me da se vratim ovoj knjizi posle toliko godina... Na kraju nisam stigla da pogledam seriju, te nažalost ne bih mogla da povučem paralelu.

Ono što mogu da kažem jeste da sam bila iznenađena činjenicom da sam saosećala ne samo sa Sofkinim likom već i sa - gle čuda, gazda-Markom koji je, po mom mišljenju, takođe jedan tragičan lik...

Grozomorno upečatljivi ostali su mi opisi u kojima Sofka posmatra nove, crvene crepove na krovu svoje kuće osećajući ih kao svoje sopstveno meso, kao da su je već time raskomadali, zatim cveće koje stavljaju na kapiju na dan njenog venčanja koje je podseća na grobljansko cveće... Roman zaista obiluje ovakvim opisima i to je ono što bih istakla kao veliki stilski kvalitet.

]]> A Christmas Carol 5326
Introduction and Afterword by Joe Wheeler
To bitter, miserly Ebenezer Scrooge, Christmas is just another day. But all that changes when the ghost of his long-dead business partner appears, warning Scrooge to change his ways before it's too late.

Part of the Focus on the Family Great Stories collection, this abridged edition features an in-depth introduction and discussion questions by Joe Wheeler to provide greater understanding for today's reader. "A Christmas Carol" captures the heart of the holidays like no other novel.]]> 184 Charles Dickens 1561797464 Sandra 0
Strike, Shadow, strike! And see his good deeds springing from the wound, to sow the world with life immortal!"]]> 4.06 1843 A Christmas Carol
author: Charles Dickens
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.06
book published: 1843
rating: 0
read at: 2022/01/16
date added: 2022/01/16
shelves:
review:
" It is not that the hand is heavy and will fall down when released; it is not that the heart and pulse are still; but that the hand was open, generous, and true; the heart brave, warm, and tender; and the pulse a man's.

Strike, Shadow, strike! And see his good deeds springing from the wound, to sow the world with life immortal!"
]]> Gospoda Glembajevi 6918013
Radnja se zbiva u Zagrebu, u kući Ignjata Glembaja u noći nakon proslave jubileja banke Glembay Ltd. 1913. godine.]]> 196 Miroslav Krleža 8642706449 Sandra 0 3.97 1928 Gospoda Glembajevi
author: Miroslav Krleža
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1928
rating: 0
read at: 2021/12/09
date added: 2021/12/09
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[What I Talk About When I Talk About Running]]> 2195464
Equal parts training log, travelogue, and reminiscence, this revealing memoir covers his four-month preparation for the 2005 New York City Marathon and takes us to places ranging from Tokyo’s Jingu Gaien gardens, where he once shared the course with an Olympian, to the Charles River in Boston among young women who outpace him. Through this marvelous lens of sport emerges a panorama of memories and insights: the eureka moment when he decided to become a writer, his greatest triumphs and disappointments, his passion for vintage LPs, and the experience, after fifty, of seeing his race times improve and then fall back.

By turns funny and sobering, playful and philosophical, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running is rich and revelatory, both for fans of this masterful yet guardedly private writer and for the exploding population of athletes who find similar satisfaction in running.]]> 188 Haruki Murakami Sandra 0 3.87 2007 What I Talk About When I Talk About Running
author: Haruki Murakami
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at: 2021/11/17
date added: 2021/11/17
shelves:
review:

]]> Upstream: Selected Essays 29358559 Upstream finds beloved poet Mary Oliver reflecting on her astonishment and admiration for the natural world and the craft of writing.

As she contemplates the pleasure of artistic labor, finding solace and safety within the woods, and the joyful and rhythmic beating of wings, Oliver intimately shares with her readers her quiet discoveries, boundless curiosity, and exuberance for the grandeur of our world.

This radiant collection of her work, with some pieces published here for the first time, reaffirms Oliver as a passionate and prolific observer whose thoughtful meditations on spiders, writing a poem, blue fin tuna, and Ralph Waldo Emerson inspire us all to discover wonder and awe in life's smallest corners.]]> 178 Mary Oliver 1594206708 Sandra 0 4.17 2016 Upstream: Selected Essays
author: Mary Oliver
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at: 2021/11/05
date added: 2021/11/05
shelves:
review:
"For me the door to the woods is the door to the temple."
]]> <![CDATA[The Book of Hope: A Survival Guide for Trying Times]]> 56268863
Looking at the headlines--a global pandemic, the worsening climate crisis, political upheaval--it can be hard to feel optimistic. And yet hope has never been more desperately needed.

In this urgent book, Jane Goodall, the world's most famous living naturalist and Doug Abrams, internationally-bestselling author, explore--through intimate and thought-provoking dialogue--one of the most sought after and least understood elements of human nature: hope. In The Book of Hope, Jane focuses on her “Four Reasons for Hope�: The Amazing Human Intellect, The Resilience of Nature, The Power of Young People, and The Indomitable Human Spirit.

Told through stories from a remarkable career and fascinating research, The Book of Hope touches on vital questions including: How do we stay hopeful when everything seems hopeless? How do we cultivate hope in our children? Filled with engaging dialogue and pictures from Jane’s storied career, The Book of Hope is a deeply personal conversation with one of the most beloved figures in today’s world.

And for the first time, Jane tells the story of how she became a messenger of hope: from living through World War II, to her years in Gombe, to realizing she had to leave the forest to travel the world in her role as an advocate for environmental justice. She details the forces that shaped her hopeful worldview, her thoughts on her past, and her revelations about her next--and perhaps final--adventure.

There is still hope, and this book will help guide us to it.]]> 272 Jane Goodall 1250784093 Sandra 0 to-read 4.19 2021 The Book of Hope: A Survival Guide for Trying Times
author: Jane Goodall
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/10/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Кад су цветале тикве 6251965
„Roman Kad su cvetale tikve spada u prekretnička dela od kojih počinju nove tendencije literarnog razvitka.� Predrag Palavestra

„Kao što se odavno kod nas nije desilo, kritičari su osetili potrebu da povodom ove knjige govore o svojoj potresenosti, zapravo o onim osobinama Mihailovićeva pisanja koje izazivaju snažan čitalački doživljaj.� Ljubiša Jeremić

„Roman Kad su cvetale tikve ima oblik monološke ispovesti: nekadašnja bokserska nada sa Dušanovca Ljuba Sretenović seća se događaja s kraja četrdesetih i početka pedesetih godina koji su ga oterali u emigrantsku čamu Švedske. Osnovna linija zapleta tiče se zbivanja u Ljubinoj porodici i njegovoj sportsko-ljubavničkoj karijeri, ali je sve to određeno i oplemenjeno pozadinom širih društvenih zbivanja. Mihailovićev roman je tako postao jedno od prvih umetničkih dela koja su dodirnula temu Informbiroa.� Vladeta Janković

„U jednom trenutku kada su posle romana Kad su cvetale tikve ideološke strele bile usmerene na ovog pisca, na njegovoj strani bio je poslovično oprezni Ivo Andrić. Bila je to izrazita potvrda ne samo njegove kolegijalne solidarnosti sa piscem u kvrgama moćne ideologije, već i odbrana pisca u čiju je pripovedačku reč i književnu budućnost Andrić iskreno verovao.� Petar Pijanović]]> 140 Dragoslav Mihailović 8690309152 Sandra 0 to-read 4.10 1968 Кад су цветале тикве
author: Dragoslav Mihailović
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1968
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/10/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Can't Hurt Me: Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds]]> 41721428 New York Times Best SellerOver 5 million copies soldFor David Goggins, childhood was a nightmare -- poverty, prejudice, and physical abuse colored his days and haunted his nights. But through self-discipline, mental toughness, and hard work, Goggins transformed himself from a depressed, overweight young man with no future into a U.S. Armed Forces icon and one of the world's top endurance athletes. The only man in history to complete elite training as a Navy SEAL, Army Ranger, and Air Force Tactical Air Controller, he went on to set records in numerous endurance events, inspiring Outside magazine to name him "The Fittest (Real) Man in America."In Can't Hurt Me, he shares his astonishing life story and reveals that most of us tap into only 40% of our capabilities. Goggins calls this The 40% Rule, and his story illuminates a path that anyone can follow to push past pain, demolish fear, and reach their full potential.]]> 366 David Goggins 1544512260 Sandra 0
What a beast!

He withstood severe beatdowns, constant bullying, blatant racism every step of the way, powered through unimaginable obstacles...and kept going, surpassing not only his own limitations but those of the human race, too. I don't think I've ever heard of someone showing up for an ultramarathon with zero preparation and running 100 miles on two broken legs. Have you!?

Please, pick up this book if you want to get into the mindset of his 'get hard' philosophy and explore all the insane pathways that a feverish tenacity will take you on.]]> 4.30 2018 Can't Hurt Me: Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds
author: David Goggins
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.30
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at: 2021/10/06
date added: 2021/10/06
shelves:
review:
Reading about his SEAL training water drills left me gasping for air. His ultramarathon recaps were utterly gut-wrenching. Growing up with an abusive father, scenes of violence left and right, all of it made me speechless... At the same time, I was in awe of what a man with a mind-over-matter attitude can accomplish. I like his no-bs approach, the unstoppable ferocity with which he tackles any challenge that props up in life.

What a beast!

He withstood severe beatdowns, constant bullying, blatant racism every step of the way, powered through unimaginable obstacles...and kept going, surpassing not only his own limitations but those of the human race, too. I don't think I've ever heard of someone showing up for an ultramarathon with zero preparation and running 100 miles on two broken legs. Have you!?

Please, pick up this book if you want to get into the mindset of his 'get hard' philosophy and explore all the insane pathways that a feverish tenacity will take you on.
]]> The Count of Monte Cristo 7126 The epic tale of wrongful imprisonment, adventure and revenge, in its definitive translation

Thrown in prison for a crime he has not committed, Edmond Dantès is confined to the grim fortress of If. There he learns of a great hoard of treasure hidden on the Isle of Monte Cristo and he becomes determined not only to escape, but also to use the treasure to plot the destruction of the three men responsible for his incarceration. Dumas� epic tale of suffering and retribution, inspired by a real-life case of wrongful imprisonment, was a huge popular success when it was first serialized in the 1840s.

Translated with an Introduction by Robin Buss

An alternative cover edition for this ISBN can be found here]]> 1276 Alexandre Dumas 0140449264 Sandra 0 to-read 4.29 1846 The Count of Monte Cristo
author: Alexandre Dumas
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1846
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/09/30
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> A Tale of Two Cities 1953 A Tale of Two Cities is Charles Dickens’s great historical novel, set against the violent upheaval of the French Revolution. The most famous and perhaps the most popular of his works, it compresses an event of immense complexity to the scale of a family history, with a cast of characters that includes a bloodthirsty ogress and an antihero as believably flawed as any in modern fiction. Though the least typical of the author’s novels, A Tale of Two Cities still underscores many of his enduring themes—imprisonment, injustice, social anarchy, resurrection, and the renunciation that fosters renewal.]]> 489 Charles Dickens 0141439602 Sandra 0 to-read 3.86 1859 A Tale of Two Cities
author: Charles Dickens
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.86
book published: 1859
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/09/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous]]> 41880609 On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous is a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read. Written when the speaker, Little Dog, is in his late twenties, the letter unearths a family's history that began before he was born � a history whose epicenter is rooted in Vietnam � and serves as a doorway into parts of his life his mother has never known, all of it leading to an unforgettable revelation. At once a witness to the fraught yet undeniable love between a single mother and her son, it is also a brutally honest exploration of race, class, and masculinity. Asking questions central to our American moment, immersed as we are in addiction, violence, and trauma, but undergirded by compassion and tenderness, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous is as much about the power of telling one's own story as it is about the obliterating silence of not being heard.

With stunning urgency and grace, Ocean Vuong writes of people caught between disparate worlds, and asks how we heal and rescue one another without forsaking who we are. The question of how to survive, and how to make of it a kind of joy, powers the most important debut novel of many years.]]> 246 Ocean Vuong 0525562028 Sandra 0 That is exactly how this novel reads - like a shipwreck where you hurry to salvage memories as if your very own life depended on it.]]> 4.05 2019 On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous
author: Ocean Vuong
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at: 2021/09/20
date added: 2021/09/20
shelves:
review:
"I'm not telling you a story so much as a shipwreck ---the pieces floating, finally legible''.
That is exactly how this novel reads - like a shipwreck where you hurry to salvage memories as if your very own life depended on it.
]]> Jane Eyre 10210 Alternate editions can be found here and here.

A gothic masterpiece of tempestuous passions and dark secrets, Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre is edited with an introduction and notes by Stevie Davis in Penguin Classics.

Charlotte Brontë tells the story of orphaned Jane Eyre, who grows up in the home of her heartless aunt, enduring loneliness and cruelty. This troubled childhood strengthens Jane's natural independence and spirit - which prove necessary when she finds employment as a governess to the young ward of Byronic, brooding Mr Rochester. As her feelings for Rochester develop, Jane gradually uncovers Thornfield Hall's terrible secret, forcing her to make a choice. Should she stay with Rochester and live with the consequences, or follow her convictions - even if it means leaving the man she loves? A novel of intense power and intrigue, Jane Eyre dazzled readers with its passionate depiction of a woman's search for equality and freedom.]]> 532 Charlotte Brontë 0142437204 Sandra 5
“I need not sell my soul to buy bliss. I have an inward treasure, born with me, which can keep me alive if all extraneous delights should be withheld...�

I would love to have read more about Helen Burns, too. She intrigued me very much. I was sorry to see her go so early on in the novel. She certainly left an indelible stamp on our heroine's heart and soul.

As a reader, I was badly shaken up by the depiction of poor old Bertha - reduced to an animal, punished for her mental issues by being locked up in the attic, her 'otherness' portrayed as something otherwordly, savage, and beyond comprehension, compassion or pity. In a novel that in many ways relies heavily on the Christian doctrine, mercy is so glaringly absent in the portrayal of Bertha Mason and I yearn to read a retelling of this story from her point of view.

That aside, the novel is brilliantly written and I understand why it should be hailed as 'the all-time best selling classic'. It is a real gem!]]> 4.14 1847 Jane Eyre
author: Charlotte Brontë
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1847
rating: 5
read at: 2021/07/19
date added: 2021/07/19
shelves:
review:
I loved Jane's character for her steadfast, unshakeable principles, her indomitable will and a strong sense of selfhood, her moral integrity.

“I need not sell my soul to buy bliss. I have an inward treasure, born with me, which can keep me alive if all extraneous delights should be withheld...�

I would love to have read more about Helen Burns, too. She intrigued me very much. I was sorry to see her go so early on in the novel. She certainly left an indelible stamp on our heroine's heart and soul.

As a reader, I was badly shaken up by the depiction of poor old Bertha - reduced to an animal, punished for her mental issues by being locked up in the attic, her 'otherness' portrayed as something otherwordly, savage, and beyond comprehension, compassion or pity. In a novel that in many ways relies heavily on the Christian doctrine, mercy is so glaringly absent in the portrayal of Bertha Mason and I yearn to read a retelling of this story from her point of view.

That aside, the novel is brilliantly written and I understand why it should be hailed as 'the all-time best selling classic'. It is a real gem!
]]> <![CDATA[Devotions: The Selected Poems of Mary Oliver]]> 34272476
“No matter where one starts reading, Devotions offers much to love, from Oliver's exuberant dog poems to selections from the Pulitzer Prize-winning American Primitive, and Dream Work, one of her exceptional collections. Perhaps more important, the luminous writing provides respite from our crazy world and demonstrates how mindfulness can define and transform a life, moment by moment, poem by poem.� —The Washington Post

“It’s as if the poet herself has sidled beside the reader and pointed us to the poems she considers most worthy of deep consideration.� —Chicago Tribune

Throughout her celebrated career, Mary Oliver has touched countless readers with her brilliantly crafted verse, expounding on her love for the physical world and the powerful bonds between all living things. Identified as "far and away, this country's best selling poet" by Dwight Garner, she now returns with a stunning and definitive collection of her writing from the last fifty years.

Carefully curated, these 200 plus poems feature Oliver's work from her very first book of poetry, No Voyage and Other Poems, published in 1963 at the age of 28, through her most recent collection, Felicity, published in 2015. This timeless volume, arranged by Oliver herself, showcases the beloved poet at her edifying best. Within these pages, she provides us with an extraordinary and invaluable collection of her passionate, perceptive, and much-treasured observations of the natural world.]]> 456 Mary Oliver 0399563245 Sandra 0 to-read 4.58 2017 Devotions: The Selected Poems of Mary Oliver
author: Mary Oliver
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average rating: 4.58
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]]> War and Peace 656
War and Peace broadly focuses on Napoleon’s invasion of Russia in 1812 and follows three of the most well-known characters in literature: Pierre Bezukhov, the illegitimate son of a count who is fighting for his inheritance and yearning for spiritual fulfillment; Prince Andrei Bolkonsky, who leaves his family behind to fight in the war against Napoleon; and Natasha Rostov, the beautiful young daughter of a nobleman who intrigues both men.

As Napoleon’s army invades, Tolstoy brilliantly follows characters from diverse backgrounds—peasants and nobility, civilians and soldiers—as they struggle with the problems unique to their era, their history, and their culture. And as the novel progresses, these characters transcend their specificity, becoming some of the most moving—and human—figures in world literature.


Tolstoy gave his personal approval to this translation, published here in a new single volume edition, which includes an introduction by Henry Gifford, and Tolstoy's important essay `Some Words about War and Peace'.]]> 1392 Leo Tolstoy 0192833987 Sandra 0 to-read 4.14 1869 War and Peace
author: Leo Tolstoy
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average rating: 4.14
book published: 1869
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]]> <![CDATA[The Good Earth (House of Earth, #1)]]> 1078
Hard times come upon Wang Lung and his family when flood and drought force them to seek work in the city. The working people riot, breaking into the homes of the rich and forcing them to flee. When Wang Lung shows mercy to one noble and is rewarded, he begins to rise in the world, even as the House of Hwang falls.]]> 418 Pearl S. Buck 1416500189 Sandra 0 to-read 4.00 1931 The Good Earth (House of Earth, #1)
author: Pearl S. Buck
name: Sandra
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1931
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]]> Lolita 7604 Librarian's note: Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780141182537.

Humbert Humbert - scholar, aesthete and romantic - has fallen completely and utterly in love with Dolores Haze, his landlady's gum-snapping, silky skinned twelve-year-old daughter. Reluctantly agreeing to marry Mrs Haze just to be close to Lolita, Humbert suffers greatly in the pursuit of romance; but when Lo herself starts looking for attention elsewhere, he will carry her off on a desperate cross-country misadventure, all in the name of Love. Hilarious, flamboyant, heart-breaking and full of ingenious word play, Lolita is an immaculate, unforgettable masterpiece of obsession, delusion and lust.]]> 368 Vladimir Nabokov 0679723161 Sandra 0 to-read 3.87 1955 Lolita
author: Vladimir Nabokov
name: Sandra
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1955
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]]>