Lori's bookshelf: all en-US Mon, 29 Aug 2011 10:05:49 -0700 60 Lori's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg One Hundred Years of Solitude 320 417 Gabriel GarcĂ­a MĂĄrquez Lori 4 4.10 1967 One Hundred Years of Solitude
author: Gabriel GarcĂ­a MĂĄrquez
name: Lori
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1967
rating: 4
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]]> On Beauty 3679 On Beauty is the story of an interracial family living in the university town of Wellington, Massachusetts, whose misadventures in the culture wars-on both sides of the Atlantic-serve to skewer everything from family life to political correctness to the combustive collision between the personal and the political. Full of dead-on wit and relentlessly funny, this tour de force confirms Zadie Smith's reputation as a major literary talent.]]> 445 Zadie Smith 0143037749 Lori 0 to-read 3.79 2005 On Beauty
author: Zadie Smith
name: Lori
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2005
rating: 0
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date added: 2008/04/06
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]]> Change of Heart 1609451
One moment June Nealon was happily looking forward to years full of laughter and adventure with her family, and the next, she was staring into a future that was as empty as her heart. Now her life is a waiting game. Waiting for time to heal her wounds, waiting for justice. In short, waiting for a miracle to happen.

For Shay Bourne, life holds no more surprises. The world has given him nothing, and he has nothing to offer the world. In a heartbeat, though, something happens that changes everything for him. Now, he has one last chance for salvation, and it lies with June's eleven-year-old daughter, Claire. But between Shay and Claire stretches an ocean of bitter regrets, past crimes, and the rage of a mother who has lost her child.

Would you give up your vengeance against someone you hate if it meant saving someone you love? Would you want your dreams to come true if it meant granting your enemy's dying wish?

Once again, Jodi Picoult mesmerizes and enthralls readers with this story of redemption, justice, and love.]]> 448 Jodi Picoult 0743496744 Lori 0 currently-reading 3.93 2008 Change of Heart
author: Jodi Picoult
name: Lori
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2008
rating: 0
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date added: 2008/03/16
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> <![CDATA[Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Addiction]]> 180066
David Sheff traces the first subtle warning signs: the denial, the 3 A.M. phone calls (is it Nic? The police? The hospital?), the rehabs. His preoccupation with Nic became an addiction in itself, and the obsessive worry and stress took a tremendous toll, but as a journalist, he instinctively researched every avenue of treatment that might save his son and refused to give up on him. Beautiful Boy is a fiercely candid memoir that brings immediacy to the emotional roller coaster of loving a child who seems beyond help.]]> 317 David Sheff 0618683356 Lori 5 4.04 2007 Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Addiction
author: David Sheff
name: Lori
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2007
rating: 5
read at: 2008/03/10
date added: 2008/03/16
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]]> <![CDATA[Confessions of a Prep School Mommy Handler]]> 1371679
Enter former Tate beauty queen and sports star Katherine Isabelle Ludington—Kitsy to her friends—who went to an Ivy, married an Ivy, and made a lot of money. Now, she is Wade’s VIP volunteer and a perfectly coiffed nightmare.

In between designing Louis Vuitton–inspired reunion invitations, dressing as Ronald Reagan for Halloween, and surviving surprise Botox parties, Wade tries to tame Kitsy and her pink Lilly Pulitzer–clad posse while reclaiming his self-esteem.

Following a year in the life of the super rich and super spoiled, Confessions of a Prep School Mommy Handler is hilarious, heartbreaking, and deliciously catty.


From the Hardcover edition.]]> 272 Wade Rouse 0307382702 Lori 0 to-read 3.37 2007 Confessions of a Prep School Mommy Handler
author: Wade Rouse
name: Lori
average rating: 3.37
book published: 2007
rating: 0
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date added: 2008/03/16
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]]> <![CDATA[Ender’s Game (Ender's Saga, #1)]]> 375802
But Ender is not the only result of the experiment. The war with the Buggers has been raging for a hundred years, and the quest for the perfect general has been underway almost as long. Ender's two older siblings, Peter and Valentine, are every bit as unusual as he is, but in very different ways. While Peter was too uncontrollably violent, Valentine very nearly lacks the capability for violence altogether. Neither was found suitable for the military's purpose. But they are driven by their jealousy of Ender, and by their inbred drive for power. Peter seeks to control the political process, to become a ruler. Valentine's abilities turn more toward the subtle control of the beliefs of commoner and elite alike, through powerfully convincing essays. Hiding their youth and identities behind the anonymity of the computer networks, these two begin working together to shape the destiny of Earth-an Earth that has no future at all if their brother Ender fails.]]> 324 Orson Scott Card 0812550706 Lori 5 4.31 1985 Ender’s Game (Ender's Saga, #1)
author: Orson Scott Card
name: Lori
average rating: 4.31
book published: 1985
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/02/07
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]]> <![CDATA[I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell (Tucker Max, #1)]]> 9010 The Book That Inspired The Movie

My name is Tucker Max, and I am an asshole. I get excessively drunk at inappropriate times, disregard social norms, indulge every whim, ignore the consequences of my actions, mock idiots and posers, sleep with more women than is safe or reasonable, and just generally act like a raging dickhead. But, I do contribute to humanity in one very important way: I share my adventures with the world. —from the Introduction

Actual reader feedback:

"I find it truly appalling that there are people in the world like you. You are a disgusting, vile, repulsive, repugnant, foul creature. Because of you, I don't believe in God anymore. No just God would allow someone like you to exist."

"I'll stay with God as my lord, but you are my savior. I just finished reading your brilliant stories, and I laughed so hard I almost vomited. I want to bring that kind of joy to people. You're an artist of the highest order and a true humanitarian to boot. I'm in both shock and awe at how much I want to be you."

Now with 16 Pages of Photos and a New Introduction

]]> 277 Tucker Max 0806527285 Lori 0 to-read 3.49 2006 I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell (Tucker Max, #1)
author: Tucker Max
name: Lori
average rating: 3.49
book published: 2006
rating: 0
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date added: 2008/01/31
shelves: to-read
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]]> The Diary of a Young Girl 48855
In 1942, with the Nazis occupying Holland, a thirteen-year-old Jewish girl and her family fled their home in Amsterdam and went into hiding. For the next two years, until their whereabouts were betrayed to the Gestapo, the Franks and another family lived cloistered in the “Secret Annexeâ€� of an old office building. Cut off from the outside world, they faced hunger, boredom, the constant cruelties of living in confined quarters, and the ever-present threat of discovery and death. In her diary Anne Frank recorded vivid impressions of her experiences during this period. By turns thoughtful, moving, and surprisingly humorous, her account offers a fascinating commentary on human courage and frailty and a compelling self-portrait of a sensitive and spirited young woman whose promise was tragically cut short.
--back cover]]> 283 Anne Frank Lori 5 4.19 1947 The Diary of a Young Girl
author: Anne Frank
name: Lori
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1947
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> Lucky 82970 243 Alice Sebold 033041836X Lori 4 3.77 1999 Lucky
author: Alice Sebold
name: Lori
average rating: 3.77
book published: 1999
rating: 4
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]]> The Almost Moon 783291 The Lovely Bones and Lucky.

For years Helen Knightly has given her life to others: to her haunted mother, to her enigmatic father, to her husband and now grown children. When she finally crosses a terrible boundary, her life comes rushing in at her in a way she never could have imagined. Unfolding over the next twenty-four hours, this searing, fast-paced novel explores the complex ties between mothers and daughters, wives and lovers, the meaning of devotion, and the line between love and hate.

It is a challenging, moving, gripping story, written with the fluidity and strength of voice that only Alice Sebold can bring to the page.]]> 295 Alice Sebold 0316677469 Lori 3 2.71 2007 The Almost Moon
author: Alice Sebold
name: Lori
average rating: 2.71
book published: 2007
rating: 3
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> The Tenth Circle 10909
»In atemberaubender Weise erzĂ€hlt Jodi Picoult von familiĂ€ren MissverstĂ€ndnissen, von Verrat und Vergebung. Unerschrocken und mit tiefem VerstĂ€ndnis fĂŒr ihre Figuren ein absoluter Pageturner.« -Die Washington Post]]> 387 Jodi Picoult 074349671X Lori 4 3.53 2006 The Tenth Circle
author: Jodi Picoult
name: Lori
average rating: 3.53
book published: 2006
rating: 4
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> Nineteen Minutes 14866
Sterling is a small, ordinary New Hampshire town where nothing ever happens -- until the day its complacency is shattered by a shocking act of violence. In the aftermath, the town's residents must not only seek justice in order to begin healing but also come to terms with the role they played in the tragedy. For them, the lines between truth and fiction, right and wrong, insider and outsider have been obscured forever. Josie Cormier, the teenage daughter of the judge sitting on the case, could be the state's best witness, but she can't remember what happened in front of her own eyes. And as the trial progresses, fault lines between the high school and the adult community begin to show, destroying the closest of friendships and families.

Nineteen Minutes is New York Times bestselling author Jodi Picoult's most raw, honest, and important novel yet. Told with the straightforward style for which she has become known, it asks simple questions that have no easy answers: Can your own child become a mystery to you? What does it mean to be different in our society? Is it ever okay for a victim to strike back? And who -- if anyone -- has the right to judge someone else?]]> 440 Jodi Picoult 0743496728 Lori 4 4.16 2007 Nineteen Minutes
author: Jodi Picoult
name: Lori
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2007
rating: 4
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> The Pact 10916
So when midnight calls from the hospital come in, no one is ready for the appalling truth: Emily is dead at seventeen from a gunshot wound to the head. There's a single unspent bullet in the gun that Chris took from his father's cabinet—a bullet that Chris tells police he intended for himself. But a local detective has doubts about the suicide pact that Chris has described.]]> 512 Jodi Picoult 0061150142 Lori 4 4.03 1998 The Pact
author: Jodi Picoult
name: Lori
average rating: 4.03
book published: 1998
rating: 4
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> <![CDATA[And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street]]> 28351 Dr. Seuss's very first book for children!

A plain horse and wagon on Mulberry Street grows into a story that no one can beat! In this tale, Young Marco allows his imagination to run riot as he travels home from school one day. From a mere horse and wagon, young Marco concocts a colorful cast of characters, making Mulberry Street the most interesting location in town.

The signature rhythmic text, combined with his unmistakable illustrations, will appeal to Dr. Seuss fans of all ages, who will cheer when our hero proves that a little imagination can go a very long way � Who wouldn't cheer when an elephant-pulled sleigh raced by?

Now over seventy-five years old, this story is as timeless as ever. And Marco's singular kind of optimism is also evident in McElligot's Pool.

With his unique combination of hilarious stories, wacky pictures and riotous rhymes, Dr. Seuss has been delighting young children and helping them learn to read for over fifty years. Creator of the wonderfully anarchic 'Cat in the Hat', and ranked among the world's top children's authors, Dr. Seuss is a global best-seller, with nearly half a billion books sold worldwide.]]> 64 Dr. Seuss 0007169922 Lori 5 4.00 1937 And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street
author: Dr. Seuss
name: Lori
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1937
rating: 5
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]]> Fox in Socks 105551 An alternate cover edition exists here.

This is a book you READ ALOUD to find out just how smart your tongue is. The first time you read it, don't go fast! This Fox is a tricky fox. He'll try to get your tongue in trouble.

Dr. Seuss gives fair warning to anyone brave enough to read along with the Fox in Socks, who likes to play tongue-twisting games with his friend Mr. Knox.

"Here's an easy game to play. Here's an easy thing to say.... New socks. Two socks. Whose socks? Sue's socks."

But Mr. Fox Socks isn't about to let Knox off so easy. Soon Goo-Goose is choosing to chew chewy gluey blue goo, while tweetle beetles battle with paddles in a puddle (in case you were wondering, that's called a "tweetle beetle puddle paddle battle"). Mr. Knox gets exasperated: "I can't blab such blibber blubber! My tongue isn't made of rubber." But he catches on to the game before it's all through.

One of Dr Seuss' best, this must-read-aloud classic is guaranteed to get many giggles out of readers young and old.

Best Audience: Ages 4 to 8]]> 64 Dr. Seuss 0007158475 Lori 4 4.10 1965 Fox in Socks
author: Dr. Seuss
name: Lori
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1965
rating: 4
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]]> Horton Hears a Who! 7779 ‘A person’s a person, no matter how smallâ€�!

With his unique combination of hilarious stories, zany pictures and riotous rhymes, Dr Seuss has been delighting young children and helping them learn to read for over fifty years. Creator of the wonderfully anarchic Cat in the Hat, and ranked among the world's top ten favorite children’s authors, Dr. Seuss is a global best-seller, with nearly half a billion books sold worldwide.]]> 64 Dr. Seuss 0679800034 Lori 5 4.21 1954 Horton Hears a Who!
author: Dr. Seuss
name: Lori
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1954
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> <![CDATA[One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish]]> 7770 64 Dr. Seuss 0007173687 Lori 5 4.18 1960 One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish
author: Dr. Seuss
name: Lori
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1960
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> My Sister’s Keeper 10917 New York Times best-selling author Jodi Picoult is widely acclaimed for her keen insights into the hearts and minds of real people. Now she tells the emotionally riveting story of a family torn apart by conflicting needs and a passionate love that triumphs over human weakness.

Anna is not sick, but she might as well be. By age 13 she has undergone countless surgeries, transfusions, and shots so that her older sister, Kate, can somehow fight the leukemia that has plagued her since childhood. The product of preimplantation genetic diagnosis, Anna was conceived as a bone marrow match for Kate—a life and a role that she has never challenged ... until now. Like most teenagers, Anna is beginning to question who she truly is. But unlike most teenagers, she has always been defined in terms of her sister—and so Anna makes a decision that for most would be unthinkable, a decision that will tear her family apart and have perhaps fatal consequences for the sister she loves.

My Sister's Keeper examines what it means to be a good parent, a good sister, a good person. Is it morally correct to do whatever it takes to save a child's life, even if that means infringing upon the rights of another? Is it worth trying to discover who you really are if that quest makes you like yourself less? Should you follow your own heart or let others lead you? Once again, in My Sister's Keeper, Jodi Picoult tackles a controversial real-life subject with grace, wisdom, and sensitivity.]]> 423 Jodi Picoult 0743454537 Lori 5 4.10 2004 My Sister’s Keeper
author: Jodi Picoult
name: Lori
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2004
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> The Fountainhead 2122
This modern classic is the story of intransigent young architect Howard Roark, whose integrity was as unyielding as granite...of Dominique Francon, the exquisitely beautiful woman who loved Roark passionately, but married his worst enemy...and of the fanatic denunciation unleashed by an enraged society against a great creator. As fresh today as it was then, Rand’s provocative novel presents one of the most challenging ideas in all of fiction—that man’s ego is the fountainhead of human progress...

“A writer of great power. She has a subtle and ingenious mind and the capacity of writing brilliantly, beautifully, bitterly...This is the only novel of ideas written by an American woman that I can recall.”—The New York Times]]> 704 Ayn Rand Lori 5 3.87 1943 The Fountainhead
author: Ayn Rand
name: Lori
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1943
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/30
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Love Love Love this book! Ayn rand is one of my favorite authors.
]]> <![CDATA[Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (The Wicked Years, #1)]]> 37442 When Dorothy triumphed over the Wicked Witch of the West in L. Frank Baum's classic tale, we heard only her side of the story. But what about her arch-nemesis, the mysterious witch? Where did she come from? How did she become so wicked? And what is the true nature of evil?

Gregory Maguire creates a fantasy world so rich and vivid that we will never look at Oz the same way again. Wicked is about a land where animals talk and strive to be treated like first-class citizens, Munchkinlanders seek the comfort of middle-class stability and the Tin Man becomes a victim of domestic violence. And then there is the little green-skinned girl named Elphaba, who will grow up to be the infamous Wicked Witch of the West, a smart, prickly and misunderstood creature who challenges all our preconceived notions about the nature of good and evil.

]]> 406 Gregory Maguire 0060987103 Lori 5 3.52 1995 Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (The Wicked Years, #1)
author: Gregory Maguire
name: Lori
average rating: 3.52
book published: 1995
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> <![CDATA[Little Women (Little Women, #1)]]> 1934 This is an alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780451529305.

Generations of readers young and old, male and female, have fallen in love with the March sisters of Louisa May Alcott’s most popular and enduring novel, Little Women. Here are talented tomboy and author-to-be Jo, tragically frail Beth, beautiful Meg, and romantic, spoiled Amy, united in their devotion to each other and their struggles to survive in New England during the Civil War.

It is no secret that Alcott based Little Women on her own early life. While her father, the freethinking reformer and abolitionist Bronson Alcott, hobnobbed with such eminent male authors as Emerson, Thoreau, and Hawthorne, Louisa supported herself and her sisters with "woman’s work,â€� including sewing, doing laundry, and acting as a domestic servant. But she soon discovered she could make more money writing. Little Women brought her lasting fame and fortune, and far from being the "girl’s bookâ€� her publisher requested, it explores such timeless themes as love and death, war and peace, the conflict between personal ambition and family responsibilities, and the clash of cultures between Europe and America.

]]> 449 Louisa May Alcott Lori 5 4.16 1868 Little Women (Little Women, #1)
author: Louisa May Alcott
name: Lori
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1868
rating: 5
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]]> The Poisonwood Bible 7244 The Poisonwood Bible is a story told by the wife and four daughters of Nathan Price, a fierce, evangelical Baptist who takes his family and mission to the Belgian Congo in 1959. They carry with them everything they believe they will need from home, but soon find that all of it -- from garden seeds to Scripture -- is calamitously transformed on African soil. What follows is a suspenseful epic of one family's tragic undoing and remarkable reconstruction over the course of three decades in postcolonial Africa.]]> 546 Barbara Kingsolver 0060786507 Lori 3 4.10 1998 The Poisonwood Bible
author: Barbara Kingsolver
name: Lori
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1998
rating: 3
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> Brave New World 5129 Brave New World is a searching vision of an unequal, technologically-advanced future where humans are genetically bred, socially indoctrinated, and pharmaceutically anesthetized to passively uphold an authoritarian ruling order–all at the cost of our freedom, full humanity, and perhaps also our souls. “A genius [who] who spent his life decrying the onward march of the Machineâ€� (The New Yorker), Huxley was a man of incomparable talents: equally an artist, a spiritual seeker, and one of history’s keenest observers of human nature and civilization. Brave New World, his masterpiece, has enthralled and terrified millions of readers, and retains its urgent relevance to this day as both a warning to be heeded as we head into tomorrow and as thought-provoking, satisfying work of literature. Written in the shadow of the rise of fascism during the 1930s, Brave New Worldd likewise speaks to a 21st-century world dominated by mass-entertainment, technology, medicine and pharmaceuticals, the arts of persuasion, and the hidden influence of elites.

"Aldous Huxley is the greatest 20th century writer in English." —Chicago Tribune]]> 268 Aldous Huxley 0060929871 Lori 5 3.99 1932 Brave New World
author: Aldous Huxley
name: Lori
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1932
rating: 5
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]]> Romeo and Juliet 18135 Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare creates a violent world, in which two young people fall in love. It is not simply that their families disapprove; the Montagues and the Capulets are engaged in a blood feud.

In this death-filled setting, the movement from love at first sight to the lovers� final union in death seems almost inevitable. And yet, this play set in an extraordinary world has become the quintessential story of young love. In part because of its exquisite language, it is easy to respond as if it were about all young lovers.]]> 281 William Shakespeare 0743477111 Lori 5 3.74 1597 Romeo and Juliet
author: William Shakespeare
name: Lori
average rating: 3.74
book published: 1597
rating: 5
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]]> The Secret Life of Bees 37435 The Secret Life of Bees tells the story of Lily Owens, whose life has been shaped around the blurred memory of the afternoon her mother was killed. When Lily's fierce-hearted black "stand-in mother," Rosaleen, insults three of the deepest racists in town, Lily decides to spring them both free. They escape to Tiburon, South Carolina--a town that holds the secret to her mother's past. Taken in by an eccentric trio of black beekeeping sisters, Lily is introduced to their mesmerizing world of bees and honey, and the Black Madonna. This is a remarkable novel about divine female power, a story women will share and pass on to their daughters for years to come.]]> 302 Sue Monk Kidd 0142001740 Lori 3 4.10 2001 The Secret Life of Bees
author: Sue Monk Kidd
name: Lori
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2001
rating: 3
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]]> Of Mice and Men 890 “I got you to look after me, and you got me to look after you, and that's why.â€�

They are an unlikely pair: George is "small and quick and dark of face"; Lennie, a man of tremendous size, has the mind of a young child. Yet they have formed a "family," clinging together in the face of loneliness and alienation. Laborers in California's dusty vegetable fields, they hustle work when they can, living a hand-to-mouth existence. But George and Lennie have a plan: to own an acre of land and a shack they can call their own.

While the powerlessness of the laboring class is a recurring theme in Steinbeck's work of the late 1930s, he narrowed his focus when composing Of Mice and Men, creating an intimate portrait of two men facing a world marked by petty tyranny, misunderstanding, jealousy, and callousness. But though the scope is narrow, the theme is universal: a friendship and a shared dream that makes an individual's existence meaningful.

A unique perspective on life's hardships, this story has achieved the status of timeless classic due to its remarkable success as a novel, a Broadway play, and three acclaimed films.]]> 107 John Steinbeck 0142000671 Lori 5 3.88 1937 Of Mice and Men
author: John Steinbeck
name: Lori
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1937
rating: 5
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]]> Lord of the Flies 7624 182 William Golding 0140283331 Lori 5 3.70 1954 Lord of the Flies
author: William Golding
name: Lori
average rating: 3.70
book published: 1954
rating: 5
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]]> The Great Gatsby 4671 The only edition of the beloved classic that is authorized by Fitzgerald’s family and from his lifelong publisher.

This edition is the enduring original text, updated with the author’s own revisions, a foreword by his granddaughter, and with a new introduction by National Book Award winner Jesmyn Ward.

The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s third book, stands as the supreme achievement of his career. First published by Scribner in 1925, this quintessential novel of the Jazz Age has been acclaimed by generations of readers. The story of the mysteriously wealthy Jay Gatsby and his love for the beautiful Daisy Buchanan is an exquisitely crafted tale of America in the 1920s.]]> 180 F. Scott Fitzgerald 0743273567 Lori 4 3.93 1925 The Great Gatsby
author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
name: Lori
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1925
rating: 4
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]]> To Kill a Mockingbird 2657 "Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird."

A lawyer's advice to his children as he defends the real mockingbird of Harper Lee's classic novel - a black man charged with the rape of a white girl. Through the young eyes of Scout and Jem Finch, Harper Lee explores with exuberant humour the irrationality of adult attitudes to race and class in the Deep South of the 1930s. The conscience of a town steeped in prejudice, violence and hypocrisy is pricked by the stamina of one man's struggle for justice. But the weight of history will only tolerate so much.

"To Kill A Mockingbird" became both an instant bestseller and a critical success when it was first published in 1960. It went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 and was later made into an Academy Award-winning film.]]> 323 Harper Lee 0060935464 Lori 5 4.25 1960 To Kill a Mockingbird
author: Harper Lee
name: Lori
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1960
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (Chronicles of Narnia, #1)]]> 100915
Lucy is the first to find the secret of the wardrobe in the professor's mysterious old house. At first her brothers and sister don't believe her when she tells of her visit to the land of Narnia. But soon Edmund, then Peter and Susan step through the wardrobe themselves. In Narnia they find a country buried under the evil enchantment of the White Witch. When they meet the Lion Aslan, they realize they've been called to a great adventure and bravely join the battle to free Narnia from the Witch's sinister spell.]]> 206 C.S. Lewis Lori 5 4.24 1950 The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (Chronicles of Narnia, #1)
author: C.S. Lewis
name: Lori
average rating: 4.24
book published: 1950
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> The Secret Garden 2998
Mary Lennox, a spoiled, ill-tempered, and unhealthy child, comes to live with her reclusive uncle in Misselthwaite Manor on England’s Yorkshire moors after the death of her parents. There she meets a hearty housekeeper and her spirited brother, a dour gardener, a cheerful robin, and her wilful, hysterical, and sickly cousin, Master Colin, whose wails she hears echoing through the house at night.

With the help of the robin, Mary finds the door to a secret garden, neglected and hidden for years. When she decides to restore the garden in secret, the story becomes a charming journey into the places of the heart, where faith restores health, flowers refresh the spirit, and the magic of the garden, coming to life anew, brings health to Colin and happiness to Mary.]]> 331 Frances Hodgson Burnett 0517189607 Lori 5 4.16 1911 The Secret Garden
author: Frances Hodgson Burnett
name: Lori
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1911
rating: 5
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Still one of my favorite books. I can not wait to read this with my daughter some day.
]]> Oh, the Places You’ll Go! 191139 For out-starting upstarts of all ages, here is a wonderfully wise and blessedly brief graduation speech from the one and only Dr. Seuss!

In his inimitable, humorous verse and pictures, he addresses the Great Balancing Act (life itself, and the ups and downs it presents) while encouraging us to find the success that lies within us.

"And will you succeed?
Yes! You will indeed!
(98 and Ÿ percent guaranteed.)"

A modern classic, Oh, the Places You'll Go! was first published one year before Dr. Seuss's death at the age of eighty-seven. In a mere fifty-six pages, Dr, Seuss managed to impart a lifetime of wisdom. It is the perfect send-off for children starting out in the maze of life, be they nursery school grads or newly-minted PhD's. Everyone will find it inspired good fun.

With his unique combination of hilarious stories, zany pictures and riotous rhymes, Dr. Seuss has been delighting young children and helping them learn to read for over fifty years. Creator of the wonderfully anarchic 'Cat in the Hat', and ranked among the world's top children's authors, Dr. Seuss is a global best-seller, with nearly half a billion books sold worldwide.]]> 44 Dr. Seuss 0679805273 Lori 5 4.37 1990 Oh, the Places You’ll Go!
author: Dr. Seuss
name: Lori
average rating: 4.37
book published: 1990
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> <![CDATA[The Cat in the Hat (Cat in the Hat, #1)]]> 233093 Have a ball with Dr. Seuss and the Cat in the Hat in this classic picture book...but don't forget to clean up your mess!

Then he said That is that.
And then he was gone
With a tip of his hat.

A dreary day turns into a wild romp when this beloved story introduces readers to the Cat in the Hat and his troublemaking friends, Thing 1 and Thing 2 � And don't forget Fish! A favorite among kids, parents and teachers, this story uses simple words and basic rhyme to encourage and delight beginning readers.

Originally created by Dr. Seuss himself, Beginner Books are fun, funny, and easy to read. These unjacketed hardcover early readers encourage children to read all on their own, using simple words and illustrations. Smaller than the classic large format Seuss picture books like The Lorax and Oh, The Places You'll Go!, these portable packages are perfect for practicing readers ages 3-7, and lucky parents too!]]> 61 Dr. Seuss 039480001X Lori 5 4.19 1957 The Cat in the Hat (Cat in the Hat, #1)
author: Dr. Seuss
name: Lori
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1957
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2008/01/30
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review:

]]> Charlotte’s Web 24178 Stuart Little and The Trumpet of the Swan, is a classic of children's literature that is "just about perfect." This high-quality paperback features vibrant illustrations colorized by Rosemary Wells!

Some Pig. Humble. Radiant. These are the words in Charlotte's Web, high up in Zuckerman's barn. Charlotte's spiderweb tells of her feelings for a little pig named Wilbur, who simply wants a friend. They also express the love of a girl named Fern, who saved Wilbur's life when he was born the runt of his litter.

E. B. White's Newbery Honor Book is a tender novel of friendship, love, life, and death that will continue to be enjoyed by generations to come. This edition contains newly color illustrations by Garth Williams, the acclaimed illustrator of E. B. White's Stuart Little and Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House series, among many other books.]]> 184 E.B. White 0064410935 Lori 4 4.20 1952 Charlotte’s Web
author: E.B. White
name: Lori
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1952
rating: 4
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> Where the Wild Things Are 19543 38 Maurice Sendak 0099408392 Lori 5 4.25 1963 Where the Wild Things Are
author: Maurice Sendak
name: Lori
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1963
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2008/01/30
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review:

]]> The Beach House 7510 356 James Patterson 0446612545 Lori 4 3.86 2002 The Beach House
author: James Patterson
name: Lori
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2002
rating: 4
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date added: 2008/01/30
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review:

]]> The Giving Tree 370493
So begins a story of unforgettable perception, beautifully written and illustrated by the gifted and versatile Shel Silverstein.

Every day the boy would come to the tree to eat her apples, swing from her branches, or slide down her trunk...and the tree was happy. But as the boy grew older he began to want more from the tree, and the tree gave and gave and gave.

This is a tender story, touched with sadness, aglow with consolation. Shel Silverstein has created a moving parable for readers of all ages that offers an affecting interpretation of the gift of giving and a serene acceptance of another's capacity to love in return.]]> 64 Shel Silverstein 0060256656 Lori 5 4.38 1964 The Giving Tree
author: Shel Silverstein
name: Lori
average rating: 4.38
book published: 1964
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2008/01/30
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review:

]]> Memoirs of a Geisha 930
In "Memoirs of a Geisha," we enter a world where appearances are paramount; where a girl's virginity is auctioned to the highest bidder; where women are trained to beguile the most powerful men; and where love is scorned as illusion. It is a unique and triumphant work of fiction - at once romantic, erotic, suspenseful - and completely unforgettable.]]> 434 Arthur Golden 0739326228 Lori 4 4.07 1997 Memoirs of a Geisha
author: Arthur Golden
name: Lori
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1997
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2008/01/30
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review:

]]> <![CDATA[Marley and Me: Life and Love With the World’s Worst Dog]]> 12691
Marley quickly grew into an uncontrollable ninety-seven-pound steamroller of a Labrador retriever. Expelled from obedience school, even the tranquillisers prescribed by the vet couldn't stop him.

Yet through the chaos and the hilarity, he won hearts and remained a steadfast model of devotion to his family, even when they were at their wits' end. Unconditional love, they would learn, comes in many forms.]]> 291 John Grogan 0739461192 Lori 5 4.14 2005 Marley and Me: Life and Love With the World’s Worst Dog
author: John Grogan
name: Lori
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2005
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> A Million Little Pieces 1241 Before considering reading this book, please see the BookBrowse note on the book jacket/review page.

BookBrowse Note: January 9th 2006: An article in the Smoking Gun claimed that James Frey (author of A Million Little Pieces and My Friend Leonard) fabricated key parts of his books. They cited police records, court documents and interviews with law enforcement agents which belie a number of Frey's claims regarding criminal charges against him, jail terms and his fugitive status.

In an interview with the Smoking Gun, Frey admitted that he had 'embellished central details' in A Million Little Pieces and backtracked on claims he made in the book.

January 26th 2006. Frey's publisher stated that while it initially stood by him, after further questioning of the author, the house has "sadly come to the realization that a number of facts have been altered and incidents embellished." It will be adding a a publisher's note and author's note to all future editions of A Million Little Pieces.]]> 515 James Frey 0307276902 Lori 5 3.68 2003 A Million Little Pieces
author: James Frey
name: Lori
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2003
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> A Light in the Attic 30118 Last night while I lay thinking here
Some Whatifs crawled inside my ear
And pranced and partied all night long
And sang their same old Whatif song:

Whatif I flunk that test?
Whatif green hair grows on my chest?
Whatif nobody likes me?
Whatif a bolt of lightning strikes me?...This 20th anniversary of Shel Silverstein's A Light in the Attic includes a CD of highlights from his Grammy Award-winning album.

Here in the attic of Shel Silverstein you will find Backward Bill, Sour Face Ann, the Meehoo with an Exactlywatt, and the Polar Bear in the Frigidaire. You will talk with Broiled Face, and find out what happens when Somebody steals your knees, you get caught by the Quick-Digesting Gink, a Mountain snores, and They Put a Brassiere on the Camel.

From the creator of the beloved poetry collections Where the Sidewalk Ends and Falling Up, here is another wondrous book of poems and drawings.]]> 176 Shel Silverstein 0060513063 Lori 5 4.36 1981 A Light in the Attic
author: Shel Silverstein
name: Lori
average rating: 4.36
book published: 1981
rating: 5
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]]> The Lovely Bones 492057
Once in a generation a novel comes along that taps a vein of universal human experience, resonating with readers of all ages. The Lovely Bones is such a book - a phenomenal #1 bestseller celebrated at once for its narrative artistry, its luminous clarity of emotion, and its astoniishing power to lay claim to the hearts of millions of readers around the world.

"My name was Salmon, like the fish; first name, Susie. I was fourteen when I was murdered on December 6, 1973."

     So begins the story of Susie Salmon, who is adjusting to her new home in heaven, a place that is not at all what she expected, even as she is watching life on earth continue without her - her friends trading rumors about her disappearance, her killer trying to cover his tracks, her grief-stricken family unraveling.

     Out of unspeakable traged and loss, The Lovely Bones succeeds, miraculously, in building a tale filled with hope, humor, suspense, even joy

"A stunning achievement." - The New Yorker

"Deeply affecting. . . . A keenly observed portrait of familial love and how it endures and changes over time." - New York Times

"A triumphant novel. . . . It's a knockout." - Time

"Destined to become a classic in the vein of To Kill a Mockingbird. . . . I loved it." -Anna Quindlen

"A novel that is painfully fine and accomplished." - Los Angeles Times

"The Lovely Bones seems to be saying there are more important things in life on earth than retribution. Like forgiveness, like love." - Chicago Tribune  ]]> 328 Alice Sebold 0316001821 Lori 5 3.67 2002 The Lovely Bones
author: Alice Sebold
name: Lori
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2002
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/30
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]]> <![CDATA[Where the Sidewalk Ends: The Poems and Drawings of Shel Silverstein]]> 240008 Where the Sidewalk Ends have been sold, making it the bestselling children's poetry book ever. With this and his other poetry collections (A Light in the Attic and Falling Up), Silverstein reveals his genius for reaching kids with silly words and simple pen-and-ink drawings. What child can resist a poem called "Dancing Pants" or "The Dirtiest Man in the World"? Each of the 130 poems is funny in a different way, or touching ... or both. Some approach naughtiness or are a bit disgusting to squeamish grown-ups, but that's exactly what kids like best about Silverstein's work. Jim Trelease, author of The New Read-Aloud Handbook, calls this book "without question, the best-loved collection of poetry for children." (Ages 4 to 10)]]> 175 Shel Silverstein 0060256672 Lori 5 4.56 1974 Where the Sidewalk Ends: The Poems and Drawings of Shel Silverstein
author: Shel Silverstein
name: Lori
average rating: 4.56
book published: 1974
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2008/01/30
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Under the Tuscan Sun: At Home in Italy]]> 480479
Frances Mayes entered a wondrous new world when she began restoring an abandoned villa in the spectacular Tuscan countryside. There were unexpected treasures at every turn: faded frescos beneath the whitewash in her dining room, a vineyard under wildly overgrown brambles in the garden, and, in the nearby hill towns, vibrant markets and delightful people. In Under the Tuscan Sun, she brings the lyrical voice of a poet, the eye of a seasoned traveler, and the discerning palate of a cook and food writer to invite readers to explore the pleasures of Italian life and to feast at her table.]]> 304 Frances Mayes 0767900383 Lori 3 3.77 1996 Under the Tuscan Sun: At Home in Italy
author: Frances Mayes
name: Lori
average rating: 3.77
book published: 1996
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2008/01/23
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review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother]]> 29209 291 James McBride 1573225789 Lori 4 4.13 1995 The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother
author: James McBride
name: Lori
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1995
rating: 4
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date added: 2008/01/23
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]]> The Joy Luck Club 7763 Alternate cover editions of ISBN 9780143038092 can be found here.

Four mothers, four daughters, four families, whose histories shift with the four winds depending on who's telling the stories. In 1949, four Chinese women, recent immigrants to San Francisco, meet weekly to play mahjong and tell stories of what they left behind in China. United in loss and new hope for their daughters' futures, they call themselves the Joy Luck Club. Their daughters, who have never heard these stories, think their mothers' advice is irrelevant to their modern American lives � until their own inner crises reveal how much they've unknowingly inherited of their mothers' pasts.

With wit and sensitivity, Amy Tan examines the sometimes painful, often tender, and always deep connection between mothers and daughters. As each woman reveals her secrets, trying to unravel the truth about her life, the strings become more tangled, more entwined. Mothers boast or despair over daughters, and daughters roll their eyes even as they feel the inextricable tightening of their matriarchal ties. Tan is an astute storyteller, enticing readers to immerse themselves into these lives of complexity and mystery.]]> 288 Amy Tan Lori 3 3.96 1989 The Joy Luck Club
author: Amy Tan
name: Lori
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1989
rating: 3
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date added: 2008/01/23
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]]> The Catcher in the Rye 5107 It's Christmas time and Holden Caulfield has just been expelled from yet another school...

Fleeing the crooks at Pencey Prep, he pinballs around New York City seeking solace in fleeting encounters—shooting the bull with strangers in dive hotels, wandering alone round Central Park, getting beaten up by pimps and cut down by erstwhile girlfriends. The city is beautiful and terrible, in all its neon loneliness and seedy glamour, its mingled sense of possibility and emptiness. Holden passes through it like a ghost, thinking always of his kid sister Phoebe, the only person who really understands him, and his determination to escape the phonies and find a life of true meaning.

The Catcher in the Rye is an all-time classic in coming-of-age literature- an elegy to teenage alienation, capturing the deeply human need for connection and the bewildering sense of loss as we leave childhood behind.

J.D. Salinger's (1919�2010) classic novel of teenage angst and rebellion was first published in 1951. The novel was included on Time's 2005 list of the 100 best English-language novels written since 1923. It was named by Modern Library and its readers as one of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century. It has been frequently challenged in the court for its liberal use of profanity and portrayal of sexuality and in the 1950's and 60's it was the novel that every teenage boy wants to read.]]> 277 J.D. Salinger 0316769177 Lori 5 3.81 1951 The Catcher in the Rye
author: J.D. Salinger
name: Lori
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1951
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/23
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]]> Animal Farm 7613
The book tells the story of a group of farm animals who rebel against their human farmer, hoping to create a society where the animals can be equal, free, and happy. Ultimately, however, the rebellion is betrayed, and the farm ends up in a state as bad as it was before, under the dictatorship of a pig named Napoleon.

One night, all the animals at Mr. Jones' Manor Farm assemble in a barn to hear old Major, a pig, describe a dream he had about a world where all animals live free from the tyranny of their human masters. Old Major dies soon after the meeting, but the animals � inspired by his philosophy of Animalism � plot a rebellion against Jones.

Two pigs, Snowball and Napoleon, prove themselves important figures and planners of this dangerous enterprise. When Jones forgets to feed the animals, the revolution occurs, and Jones and his men are chased off the farm. Manor Farm is renamed Animal Farm, and the Seven Commandments of Animalism are painted on the barn wall...]]> 129 George Orwell Lori 5 3.90 1945 Animal Farm
author: George Orwell
name: Lori
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1945
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/23
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]]> Pride and Prejudice 1885 Pride and Prejudice has remained one of the most popular novels in the English language. Jane Austen called this brilliant work "her own darling child" and its vivacious heroine, Elizabeth Bennet, "as delightful a creature as ever appeared in print." The romantic clash between the opinionated Elizabeth and her proud beau, Mr. Darcy, is a splendid performance of civilized sparring. And Jane Austen's radiant wit sparkles as her characters dance a delicate quadrille of flirtation and intrigue, making this book the most superb comedy of manners of Regency England.

Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780679783268]]> 279 Jane Austen 1441341706 Lori 4 4.28 1813 Pride and Prejudice
author: Jane Austen
name: Lori
average rating: 4.28
book published: 1813
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim]]> 10176 --davidsedarisbooks.com]]> 257 David Sedaris 0965904830 Lori 3 4.12 2004 Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim
author: David Sedaris
name: Lori
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2004
rating: 3
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date added: 2008/01/22
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]]> Running with Scissors 242006 336 Augusten Burroughs 031242227X Lori 1 3.77 2002 Running with Scissors
author: Augusten Burroughs
name: Lori
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2002
rating: 1
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date added: 2008/01/22
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]]> The Secret History 29044 559 Donna Tartt 1400031702 Lori 5 4.17 1992 The Secret History
author: Donna Tartt
name: Lori
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1992
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2008/01/22
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review:

]]> <![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 Lori 3 4.00 1931 The Good Earth (House of Earth, #1)
author: Pearl S. Buck
name: Lori
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1931
rating: 3
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date added: 2008/01/22
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]]> A Thousand Splendid Suns 128029
With the passing of time comes Taliban rule over Afghanistan, the streets of Kabul loud with the sound of gunfire and bombs, life a desperate struggle against starvation, brutality and fear, the women's endurance tested beyond their worst imaginings. Yet love can move people to act in unexpected ways, lead them to overcome the most daunting obstacles with a startling heroism. In the end it is love that triumphs over death and destruction.

A Thousand Splendid Suns is a portrait of a wounded country and a story of family and friendship, of an unforgiving time, an unlikely bond, and an indestructible love.]]> 372 Khaled Hosseini 1594489505 Lori 5 4.44 2007 A Thousand Splendid Suns
author: Khaled Hosseini
name: Lori
average rating: 4.44
book published: 2007
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/22
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]]> The Memory Keeper's Daughter 10441 401 Kim Edwards 0143037145 Lori 4 3.70 2005 The Memory Keeper's Daughter
author: Kim Edwards
name: Lori
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2005
rating: 4
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date added: 2008/01/22
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]]> Love in the Time of Cholera 9712 348 Gabriel GarcĂ­a MĂĄrquez 140003468X Lori 5 3.92 1985 Love in the Time of Cholera
author: Gabriel GarcĂ­a MĂĄrquez
name: Lori
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1985
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/22
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]]> Bleeding Kansas 50658
Into their lives comes Gina Haring, a relative of the Fremantles who is house-sitting the derelict family mansion while she puts her own life in order. Her lifestyle and beliefs will put her at odds with her neighbors...and test the mettle of a community being swept up in events beyond its control.]]> 448 Sara Paretsky 0399154051 Lori 0 currently-reading 3.31 2007 Bleeding Kansas
author: Sara Paretsky
name: Lori
average rating: 3.31
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2008/01/22
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life]]> 25460
"As the U.S. population made an unprecedented mad dash for the Sun Belt, one carload of us paddled against the tide, heading for the Promised Land where water falls from the sky and green stuff grows all around. We were about to begin the adventure of realigning our lives with our food chain.

"Naturally, our first stop was to buy junk food and fossil fuel..."

Hang on for the ride: With characteristic poetry and pluck, Barbara Kingsolver and her family sweep readers along on their journey away from the industrial-food pipeline to a rural life in which they vow to buy only food raised in their own neighborhood, grow it themselves, or learn to live without it. Their good-humored search yields surprising discoveries about turkey sex life and overly zealous zucchini plants, en route to a food culture that's better for the neighborhood and also better on the table. Part memoir, part journalistic investigation, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle makes a passionate case for putting the kitchen back at the center of family life and diversified farms at the center of the American diet.

"This is the story of a year in which we made every attempt to feed ourselves animals and vegetables whose provenance we really knew . . . and of how our family was changed by our first year of deliberately eating food produced from the same place where we worked, went to school, loved our neighbors, drank the water, and breathed the air."]]> 370 Barbara Kingsolver 0060852550 Lori 0 4.03 2007 Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life
author: Barbara Kingsolver
name: Lori
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2007
rating: 0
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date added: 2008/01/22
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]]> The Double 54120

Against his own better judgement, Tertuliano decides to pursue his double. As he establishes the man's identity, what begins as a whimsical story becomes a dark meditation on identity and, perhaps, on the crass assumptions behind cloning - that we are merely our outward appearance rather than the sum of our experiences.]]> 324 José Saramago 0151010404 Lori 3 3.91 2002 The Double
author: José Saramago
name: Lori
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2002
rating: 3
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date added: 2008/01/21
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]]> Blindness 2526 No food, no water, no government, no obligation, no order.

Discover a chillingly powerful and prescient dystopian vision from one of Europe's greatest writers.

A driver waiting at the traffic lights goes blind. An ophthalmologist tries to diagnose his distinctive white blindness, but is affected before he can read the textbooks.
It becomes a contagion, spreading throughout the city. Trying to stem the epidemic, the authorities herd the afflicted into a mental asylum where the wards are terrorised by blind thugs. And when fire destroys the asylum, the inmates burst forth and the last links with a supposedly civilised society are snapped.

This is not anarchy, this is blindness.

‘Saramago repeatedly undertakes to unite the pressing demands of the present with an unfolding vision of the future. This is his most apocalyptic, and most optimistic, version of that project yetâ€� Independent]]> 326 JosĂ© Saramago Lori 5 4.04 1995 Blindness
author: José Saramago
name: Lori
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1995
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/21
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]]> Life of Pi 832377 336 Yann Martel 0613599071 Lori 4 3.88 2001 Life of Pi
author: Yann Martel
name: Lori
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2001
rating: 4
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date added: 2008/01/21
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]]> The Red Tent 4989 The Red Tent combines rich storytelling with a valuable achievement in modern fiction: a new view of biblical women's society.]]> 324 Anita Diamant 0312353766 Lori 2 4.21 1997 The Red Tent
author: Anita Diamant
name: Lori
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1997
rating: 2
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date added: 2008/01/21
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]]> <![CDATA[A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius]]> 4953 A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius is the moving memoir of a college senior who, in the space of five weeks, loses both of his parents to cancer and inherits his eight-year-old brother. Here is an exhilarating debut that manages to be simultaneously hilarious and wildly inventive as well as a deeply heartfelt story of the love that holds a family together.

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius is an instant classic that will be read for decades to come.]]> 530 Dave Eggers 0375725784 Lori 5 3.70 2000 A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
author: Dave Eggers
name: Lori
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2000
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/21
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]]> She’s Come Undone 5203
Meet Dolores Price. She's 13, wise-mouthed but wounded, having bid her childhood goodbye. Stranded in front of her bedroom TV, she spends the next few years nourishing herself with the Mallomars, potato chips, and Pepsi her anxious mother supplies. When she finally orbits into young womanhood at 257 pounds, Dolores is no stronger and life is no kinder. But this time she's determined to rise to the occasion and give herself one more chance before she really goes under.]]> 465 Wally Lamb 0671021001 Lori 4 3.91 1992 She’s Come Undone
author: Wally Lamb
name: Lori
average rating: 3.91
book published: 1992
rating: 4
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date added: 2008/01/21
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]]> Everything is Illuminated 256566 276 Jonathan Safran Foer 0060529709 Lori 2 to-read 3.91 2002 Everything is Illuminated
author: Jonathan Safran Foer
name: Lori
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2002
rating: 2
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date added: 2008/01/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> I Know This Much Is True 227711
One of the most acclaimed novels of our time, Wally Lamb's I Know This Much Is True is a story of alienation and connection, devastation and renewal, at once joyous, heartbreaking, poignant, mystical, and powerfully, profoundly human.]]> 897 Wally Lamb 0060987561 Lori 5 4.21 1998 I Know This Much Is True
author: Wally Lamb
name: Lori
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1998
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/21
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]]> <![CDATA[Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close]]> 4588
The key belonged to his father, he's sure of that. But which of New York's 162 million locks does it open?

So begins a quest that takes Oskar - inventor, letter-writer and amateur detective - across New York's five boroughs and into the jumbled lives of friends, relatives, and complete strangers. He gets heavy boots, he gives himself little bruises and he inches ever nearer to the heart of a family mystery that stretches back fifty years. But will it take him any closer to, or further from, his lost father?]]> 326 Jonathan Safran Foer 0618711651 Lori 5 3.98 2005 Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
author: Jonathan Safran Foer
name: Lori
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2005
rating: 5
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date added: 2008/01/21
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]]> Middlesex 925800 Virgin Suicides, Jeffrey Eugenides est de retour avec ce livre qui transcende tous les genres : c'est une idylle, une comédie postmoderne, une histoire de la littérature, un récit érotique, une confession, une élégie. Bref, un roman irrésistible.]]> 678 Jeffrey Eugenides 2879293626 Lori 4 4.21 2002 Middlesex
author: Jeffrey Eugenides
name: Lori
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2002
rating: 4
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date added: 2008/01/21
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]]> The Kite Runner 77203 371 Khaled Hosseini 159463193X Lori 3 4.34 2003 The Kite Runner
author: Khaled Hosseini
name: Lori
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2003
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2008/01/21
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]]> The Namesake 33917 Interpreter of Maladies established this young writer as one the most brilliant of her generation. Her stories are one of the very few debut works -- and only a handful of collections -- to have won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction. Among the many other awards and honors it received were the New Yorker Debut of the Year award, the PEN/Hemingway Award, and the highest critical praise for its grace, acuity, and compassion in detailing lives transported from India to America.

In The Namesake, Lahiri enriches the themes that made her collection an international bestseller: the immigrant experience, the clash of cultures, the conflicts of assimilation, and, most poignantly, the tangled ties between generations. Here again Lahiri displays her deft touch for the perfect detail � the fleeting moment, the turn of phrase � that opens whole worlds of emotion.

The Namesake takes the Ganguli family from their tradition-bound life in Calcutta through their fraught transformation into Americans. On the heels of their arranged wedding, Ashoke and Ashima Ganguli settle together in Cambridge, Massachusetts. An engineer by training, Ashoke adapts far less warily than his wife, who resists all things American and pines for her family. When their son is born, the task of naming him betrays the vexed results of bringing old ways to the new world. Named for a Russian writer by his Indian parents in memory of a catastrophe years before, Gogol Ganguli knows only that he suffers the burden of his heritage as well as his odd, antic name.

Lahiri brings great empathy to Gogol as he stumbles along the first-generation path, strewn with conflicting loyalties, comic detours, and wrenching love affairs. With penetrating insight, she reveals not only the defining power of the names and expectations bestowed upon us by our parents, but also the means by which we slowly, sometimes painfully, come to define ourselves.]]> 304 Jhumpa Lahiri 0618485228 Lori 4 4.01 2003 The Namesake
author: Jhumpa Lahiri
name: Lori
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2003
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[Reviving Ophelia: Saving the Selves of Adolescent Girls]]> 159760
Told in the brave, fearless, and honest voices of the girls themselves who are emerging from the chaos of adolescence, Reviving Ophelia is a call to arms, offering important tactics, empathy, and strength, and urging a change where young hearts can flourish again, and rediscover and reengage their sense of self.
]]> 293 Mary Pipher 1594481881 Lori 3 3.89 1994 Reviving Ophelia: Saving the Selves of Adolescent Girls
author: Mary Pipher
name: Lori
average rating: 3.89
book published: 1994
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books]]> 7603 Every Thursday morning for two years in the Islamic Republic of Iran, a bold and inspired teacher named Azar Nafisi secretly gathered seven of her most committed female students to read forbidden Western classics. As Islamic morality squads staged arbitrary raids in Tehran, fundamentalists seized hold of the universities, and a blind censor stifled artistic expression, the girls in Azar Nafisi's living room risked removing their veils and immersed themselves in the worlds of Jane Austen, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Henry James, and Vladimir Nabokov. In this extraordinary memoir, their stories become intertwined with the ones they are reading. Reading Lolita in Tehran is a remarkable exploration of resilience in the face of tyranny and a celebration of the liberating power of literature.

]]> 356 Azar Nafisi 081297106X Lori 4 3.64 2003 Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books
author: Azar Nafisi
name: Lori
average rating: 3.64
book published: 2003
rating: 4
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]]> Prep 9844 Prep, is an insightful, achingly funny coming-of-age story as well as a brilliant dissection of class, race, and gender in a hothouse of adolescent angst and ambition.

Lee Fiora is an intelligent, observant fourteen-year-old when her father drops her off in front of her dorm at the prestigious Ault School in Massachusetts. She leaves her animated, affectionate family in South Bend, Indiana, at least in part because of the boarding school’s glossy brochure, in which boys in sweaters chat in front of old brick buildings, girls in kilts hold lacrosse sticks on pristinely mown athletic fields, and everyone sings hymns in chapel.

As Lee soon learns, Ault is a cloistered world of jaded, attractive teenagers who spend summers on Nantucket and speak in their own clever shorthand. Both intimidated and fascinated by her classmates, Lee becomes a shrewd observer of–and, ultimately, a participant in–their rituals and mores. As a scholarship student, she constantly feels like an outsider and is both drawn to and repelled by other loners. By the time she’s a senior, Lee has created a hard-won place for herself at Ault. But when her behavior takes a self-destructive and highly public turn, her carefully crafted identity within the community is shattered.

Ultimately, Lee’s experiences–complicated relationships with teachers; intense friendships with other girls; an all-consuming preoccupation with a classmate who is less than a boyfriend and more than a crush; conflicts with her parents, from whom Lee feels increasingly distant, coalesce into a singular portrait of the painful and thrilling adolescence universal to us all.


From the Hardcover edition.]]> 420 Curtis Sittenfeld 081297235X Lori 1 3.44 2005 Prep
author: Curtis Sittenfeld
name: Lori
average rating: 3.44
book published: 2005
rating: 1
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]]> In Cold Blood 168642
As Truman Capote reconstructs the murder and the investigation that led to the capture, trial, and execution of the killers, he generates both mesmerizing suspense and astonishing empathy. In Cold Blood is a work that transcends its moment, yielding poignant insights into the nature of American violence.]]> 343 Truman Capote 0679745580 Lori 5 Wonderful author 4.08 1966 In Cold Blood
author: Truman Capote
name: Lori
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1966
rating: 5
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Wonderful author
]]> <![CDATA[The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference]]> 2612 The tipping point is that magic moment when an idea, trend, or social behavior crosses a threshold, tips, and spreads like wildfire. Just as a single sick person can start an epidemic of the flu, so too can a small but precisely targeted push cause a fashion trend, the popularity of a new product, or a drop in the crime rate. This widely acclaimed bestseller, in which Malcolm Gladwell explores and brilliantly illuminates the tipping point phenomenon, is already changing the way people throughout the world think about selling products and disseminating ideas.]]> 301 Malcolm Gladwell 0316346624 Lori 4 4.01 2002 The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference
author: Malcolm Gladwell
name: Lori
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2002
rating: 4
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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 Lori 5 3.94 2005 The Year of Magical Thinking
author: Joan Didion
name: Lori
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2005
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother]]> 19595
Who is Ruth McBride Jordan? A self-declared "light-skinned" woman evasive about her ethnicity, yet steadfast in her love for her twelve black children. James McBride, journalist, musician, and son, explores his mother's past, as well as his own upbringing and heritage, in a poignant and powerful debut, The Color Of A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother . The son of a black minister and a woman who would not admit she was white, James McBride grew up in "orchestrated chaos" with his eleven siblings in the poor, all-black projects of Red Hook, Brooklyn. "Mommy," a fiercely protective woman with "dark eyes full of pep and fire," herded her brood to Manhattan's free cultural events, sent them off on buses to the best (and mainly Jewish) schools, demanded good grades, and commanded respect. As a young man, McBride saw his mother as a source of embarrassment, worry, and confusion—and reached thirty before he began to discover the truth about her early life and long-buried pain. In The Color of Water , McBride retraces his mother's footsteps and, through her searing and spirited voice, recreates her remarkable story. The daughter of a failed itinerant Orthodox rabbi, she was born Rachel Shilsky (actually Ruchel Dwara Zylska) in Poland on April 1, 1921. Fleeing pogroms, her family emigrated to America and ultimately settled in Suffolk, Virginia, a small town where anti-Semitism and racial tensions ran high. With candor and immediacy, Ruth describes her parents' loveless marriage; her fragile, handicapped mother; her cruel, sexually-abusive father; and the rest of the family and life she abandoned. At seventeen, after fleeing Virginia and settling in New York City, Ruth married a black minister and founded the all- black New Brown Memorial Baptist Church in her Red Hook living room. "God is the color of water," Ruth McBride taught her children, firmly convinced that life's blessings and life's values transcend race. Twice widowed, and continually confronting overwhelming adversity and racism, Ruth's determination, drive and discipline saw her dozen children through college—and most through graduate school. At age 65, she herself received a degree in social work from Temple University. Interspersed throughout his mother's compelling narrative, McBride shares candid recollections of his own experiences as a mixed-race child of poverty, his flirtations with drugs and violence, and his eventual self- realization and professional success. The Color of Water touches readers of all colors as a vivid portrait of growing up, a haunting meditation on race and identity, and a lyrical valentine to a mother from her son.]]> 295 James McBride 159448192X Lori 0 4.15 1995 The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother
author: James McBride
name: Lori
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1995
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]]> Night 1617 Night is the terrifying record of Elie Wiesel's memories of the death of his family, the death of his own innocence, and his despair as a deeply observant Jew confronting the absolute evil of man. This new translation by his wife and most frequent translator, Marion Wiesel, corrects important details and presents the most accurate rendering in English of Elie Wiesel's testimony to what happened in the camps and of his unforgettable message that this horror must simply never be allowed to happen again.]]> 120 Elie Wiesel 0374500010 Lori 5 4.38 1956 Night
author: Elie Wiesel
name: Lori
average rating: 4.38
book published: 1956
rating: 5
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]]> Cloud Atlas 49628
Cloud Atlas begins in 1850 with Adam Ewing, an American notary voyaging from the Chatham Isles to his home in California. Along the way, Ewing is befriended by a physician, Dr. Goose, who begins to treat him for a rare species of brain parasite. . . .

Abruptly, the action jumps to Belgium in 1931, where Robert Frobisher, a disinherited bisexual composer, contrives his way into the household of an infirm maestro who has a beguiling wife and a nubile daughter. . . . From there we jump to the West Coast in the 1970s and a troubled reporter named Luisa Rey, who stumbles upon a web of corporate greed and murder that threatens to claim her life. . . . And onward, with dazzling virtuosity, to an inglorious present-day England; to a Korean superstate of the near future where neocapitalism has run amok; and, finally, to a postapocalyptic Iron Age Hawaii in the last days of history.

But the story doesn't end even there. The narrative then boomerangs back through centuries and space, returning by the same route, in reverse, to its starting point. Along the way, Mitchell reveals how his disparate characters connect, how their fates intertwine, and how their souls drift across time like clouds across the sky.

As wild as a videogame, as mysterious as a Zen koan, Cloud Atlas is an unforgettable tour de force that, like its incomparable author, has transcended its cult classic status to become a worldwide phenomenon.]]> 509 David Mitchell 0375507256 Lori 0 to-read 4.02 2004 Cloud Atlas
author: David Mitchell
name: Lori
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2004
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]]> <![CDATA[The da Vinci Code (Robert Langdon, #2)]]> 968 The da Vinci Code, The da Vinci Code, The da Vinci Code, and The da Vinci Code

While in Paris on business, Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon receives an urgent late-night phone call: the elderly curator of the Louvre has been murdered inside the museum. Near the body, police have found a baffling cipher. While working to solve the enigmatic riddle, Langdon is stunned to discover it leads to a trail of clues hidden in the works of Da Vinci -- clues visible for all to see -- yet ingeniously disguised by the painter.

Langdon joins forces with a gifted French cryptologist, Sophie Neveu, and learns the late curator was involved in the Priory of Sion -- an actual secret society whose members included Sir Isaac Newton, Botticelli, Victor Hugo, and Da Vinci, among others.

In a breathless race through Paris, London, and beyond, Langdon and Neveu match wits with a faceless powerbroker who seems to anticipate their every move. Unless Langdon and Neveu can decipher the labyrinthine puzzle in time, the Priory's ancient secret -- and an explosive historical truth -- will be lost forever.

The Da Vinci Code heralds the arrival of a new breed of lightning-paced, intelligent thriller utterly unpredictable right up to its stunning conclusion.]]> 489 Dan Brown Lori 2 3.92 2003 The da Vinci Code (Robert Langdon, #2)
author: Dan Brown
name: Lori
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2003
rating: 2
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]]> The History of Love 3867
Across New York an old man called Leo Gursky is trying to survive a little bit longer. He spends his days dreaming of the lost love who, sixty years ago in Poland, inspired him to write a book. And although he doesn't know it yet, that book also survived: crossing oceans and generations, and changing lives...

An alternative cover edition for this ISBN can be found here]]> 255 Nicole Krauss 0393328627 Lori 0 3.92 2005 The History of Love
author: Nicole Krauss
name: Lori
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2005
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time]]> 1618 226 Mark Haddon 1400032717 Lori 4 3.89 2003 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
author: Mark Haddon
name: Lori
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2003
rating: 4
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]]>