2030: The Real Story of What Happens to America by Albert Brooks

2030: The Real Story of What Happens to America
Albert Brooks

This novel is one awesome read. It is a novel that I started quite some time ago, so I thought that I should start it again and finish it to the end this time. Albert Brooks is hilarious, there were many part of the book where I was laughing out loud and people around me thought I was crazy. He writes about what the world will be like in the year 2030 and I could see him being correct in many areas that he wrote about. This novel is this generation's 1984 (1984 - George Orwell). 1984 has come and gone now and Orwell's book made a lasting impression for many decades and the argument could be made that many of the ideas that Orwell wrote about actually came true - we really have no privacy today and we are all slaves to our televisions. Albert Brooks takes a new look into the future this time and maybe what he says could come true...

The premise of the book is that, due to scientific advances in the medical field, old people are enjoying longer and more healthier lives (researchers found a cure for cancer 15 years prior - 2015). The young people are now stuck in a society of decreasing opportunity while the price for things continues to rise. The young people are supposed to provide for themselves, their elders, and pay off the world's debt. This causes a lot of problems in the book. The young people are becoming increasingly resentful towards the old people and acts of terrorism against the old people begin.

Here are some of the facts that the book presents in itself (fictional framework):

• Social Security and Medicare are money pits
• The national debt prevents the government from stimulating the economy
• American taxes are now over-the-moon (sky) high
• Iran is secretly building nuclear weapons now (2011)
• There is a group of lobbyist specifically for the interests of old people

The novel is so dense with many ideas, funny, and quite dark at some points - Albert Brooks had me at the first page. I couldn't help to read what was coming next!I hope you enjoy it as much as I did if you decide to read it!

Till the next review! (The Children of Men - P.D. James)
Rebekka. :)

Why We Broke Up by Daniel Handler

Why We Broke Up
Daniel Handler

"Stop saying no offence," I said, "when you say offensive things. It's not a free pass."

"The thing with your heart's desire is that your heart doesn't even know what it desires until it turns up."

I must say that it was a struggle for me to get to the end of this novel. I don't know if I just didn't like the story or the way it was written or that I was reading the novel off of my iPad. I just know that it was always hard to come back to the story and pay attention. Why We Broke Up got some pretty great reviews from some big people, but I just don't see what they enjoyed about the novel.

There was a very nice background story to this book, but the way it was written really threw me off. First of all the dialogue... it was so hard to follow. The reader really has to pay close attention to who said what right from the very beginning or you start feeling so lost. There were way too many run on sentences and the page long paragraphs were annoying. It felt as if there were no breaks in the story.

The whole thing was pretty annoying... I didn't like the main characters or how someone was just complaining on every page. Everything written was overly sarcastic or written in a rage of anger. It was hard to follow every step of the story, I don't even remember what the characters names were and I think that they were pretty easy names to remember. I just didn't want to read a book about complaining page after page after page.

One nice thing about this book is that it had pictures at the end of every chapter. These pictures related to what was going on in the chapter. It was nice to have a visual to look at and something to look forward too. I hope that if this book is on your reading list, that you do try to attempt to read it. Maybe you will like it, maybe you won't. But you have to be the judge of that.

Till the next review!
Rebekka. :)

Looking for Book Ideas!

Almost 20 books down, 30 to go!

I cannot believe it is almost the end of March! I am just finishing up my 14th book (Why We Broke Up) and my app tracker tells me that I am three books ahead of schedule. Maybe I will finish more books before December 31st!

I am starting my list for the next ten books that I should read and I am open to ideas! Some of the books that are on the list are:

1. The Shining - Stephen King
2. Twelve Years a Slave - Solomon Northup
3. PS, I Love You - Cecelia Ahern
4. The Great Gasby - F. Scott Fitzgerald

I need six more book suggestions to make this list an even ten. Help me out please?!

Keep on reading the reviews, I hope it is inspiring you to read more!

Till I write again!

Rebekka. :)

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

The Kite Runner
Khaled Hosseini

"For you, a thousand times over."

"There is only one sin. And that is theft... when you tell a lie, you steal someones right to the truth. Every other sin is a variation of theft."

Done my 13th book of the challenge and I have to tell all my readers that this book was AMAZING. Even though the story is so sad, I have never paid attention this much to a story. I literally couldn't put down the book to do anything. Once I started reading, that is what I did until I finished the novel in three days. I started reading this book without seeing the movie or not knowing anything about the story and I was shocked. I was so speechless after reading the novel, this review might not be the best - I don't know what to write without giving the story away, this is a story that literally everyone (readers and non-readers) has to read!

This has to be one of the most disturbing novels I have read to date. I was shocked in different parts of the novel and almost in tears for most of the book. The story broke my heart and I desperately wanted to find out how everything got resolved (or did it get resolved?) before the ending. The story starts out in the past (pre-war and pre-Taliban Afghanistan) and ends around the time of the Twin Towers in New York collapsing (2001).

There were very many feelings that I felt during myself reading The Kite Runner. It felt like I was part of the story and I was right there in Afghanistan with the characters. Hosseini made the story come to life and I just couldn't help to have all of these feelings. These include:

• Beauty - the beauty with reality and all of the ugliness that goes along with reality.
• Love - towards the book and the characters and everything that shouldn't have gone wrong to begin with.
• Hatred - against what happened, what shouldn't have happened, and at everything that did go wrong.
• Horror - the viciousness and cruelness that happens within the story, it hurts.

I feel that if I learn from a book, I considerate it highly valuable. Hosseini taught me about the history, language, and geography of Afghanistan, as well as the hobby of kite flying and kite running. The Kite Runner had all of the ingredients needed to create a great story tale and it definitely a read for everyone. Please read and find out what happens in the book (or watch the movie - I have heard that it is just as great)! 

Till the next review! (Why We Broke Up - Daniel Handler)

Rebekka. :)

The Giver by Lois Lowry

The Giver
Lois Lowry

"The worst part of holding on to memories is not the pain. It's the loneliness of it. Memories need to be shared."

"Even trained for years as they all had been in precision of language, what words could you use which would give another the experience of sunshine?"

I read The Giver in highschool, which was five years ago already, and I remembered I hated it. Now that I am older, I thought that I would give it another read to see if I like it this time - I didn't. To be honest, I don't know how anyone likes it but I guess people are entitled to their opinions. For me, the story just seemed to drag on right from the very beginning and I couldn't get into the story at all. This is the first book (12th out of 50) that I didn't like. I hope I like the rest of the ten books I picked out for this go around! Here are some of the reasons why I didn't like about it:

1. The book is boring and weird.
2. I didn't feel any emotion towards the main character (Jonas).
3. I didn't fully understand the book.
4. I really didn't understand why the ending is the way that it is.
5. I don't understand why this world that Lois Lowry made should have no color, no feelings, and no music so that people can live "decently".
6. I didn't understand why "bad" memories - war, loss - would make someone want to give up on their own life. It is like the characters cannot think for themselves, someone else is thinking for them and making them sad.
7. I didn't really understand this at all! haha.

The Giver is aimed for a children's audience (grade six-ish) but if adults don't really like the novel or understand what Lois Lowry is trying to get at, how are young children? Lowry uses oversimplification, emotional appeals, and dualistic morality to shut down reader's minds - this is what makes the story pretty confusing.We get morality from our culture that we live in, not from the people around us. Lowry thinks her view on morality is correct and only correct. Another bad thing that I didn't like about the story is that it doesn't have a clear ending to it, it is left open for reader's to come up with their own ending. I guess Lowry redacts the ending in the sequels to this novel - which doesn't really make sense. I know that since I didn't like The Giver, I have no intention to read the sequels and now I will never know the ending that she created. I will only know the ending that I made up in my head.

The story is not based in reality, Lowry creates an artificial world to suit her needs of the book. She builds this world to support the dualist morality that she is trying to push to her readers. Instead of writing about how poverty makes the world seem small and dull, she has the characters in the book unable to experience life how they would like too. Instead of writing about an impersonal government, she presents a "happy-go-lucky" commune. She contrasts "evil" with the idealized "goodness of emotion, beauty, and freedom".

If you feel like you want to read this book or have enjoyed reading it in the past, that is great! I hope that someone in the future will create a thoughtful and textual analysis of the novel that points out its merits, its structure, and its complexity - but that is just my opinion. If there are no wrong answers, can we really say that something has any meaning? I really wanted to like this book since so many people do and it is on so many lists of books to read, but I can't -at least I tried!

PS. The Giver is being made into a major motion picture and comes out this August! Some of the big name actors that are in it are Meryl Streep and Tayor Swift. I am a big Meryl Steep fan so here is to hoping that the movie is better than the book!

Till the next review! (The Kite Runner - Khaled Hoseini)
Rebekka. :)

The Reader by Bernhard Schlink

The Reader
Bernhard Schlink

"Is this what sadness is all about? Is it what comes over us when beautiful memories shatter in hindsight because the remembered happiness fed not just on actual circumstances but on a promise that was not kept?"

This book was amazing, I could not put it down to do any real life things. I finished The Reader in just under two and half days. The novel always kept me on my toes and I thought the ending was going to be totally different than what is ended up being. It was a good surprise, not a bad one.

The novel takes place in Germany during around the time of WW2 and onward (there are three parts to the book - the main character (Michael) in highschool; as a law student; and as a legal scholar). The novel focuses on law, memories, guilt, and illicit first loves. It also looks at what it means to love someone, how mush we can accept them and how blind we can be to those we love. Having all of these topics jammed into one book sure makes it hard to put down. The three parts of the book are:

1. Michael who is 15 at the time and still in highschool having an affair with Hanna, who is 36. They have the same ritual everyday together - he comes over to her apartment, they bathe each other and then they go into the bedroom. During all of this, Michael also reads out loud to Hanna.
2. Hanna's secrets are revealed and Germany's past is explored. Michael as a law student follows Hanna's case closely and is the only student who goes to the courthouse everyday. Michael's generation accuses their parents in the whole service of enlightenment - "Pointing at the guilty parties did not free us from shame, but at least it overcame the suffering we went through on account of it. I had to point at Hanna. But the finger I pointed at her turned back to me. But what gave rise to this swaggering self-righteousness I so often encountered? How could one feel guilt and shame and at the same time parade one’s self-righteousness."
3. Part three - you will just have to read the book to see what happens in part three. Is there grace or is there redemption? This part won me over for the whole book.

Some may argue that the relationship in the first part of the book is disgusting and a writer should not write about something illegal like that, but it made the book what it is. Good literature, like what Schlink is writing, makes us understand the complexity of the topic and cautious us against over broad and hasty judgments. Boys will be boys. Boys want to grow up fast and I think this is what Michael was trying to improve to himself and his family.

Schlink brings up some hard topics in the novel and readers really have to think about what he means by what he writes and puts the pieces of the puzzle back together. If we have a responsibility towards the past, to learn from it, and most people believe we do, then this book will help you to go some way towards fulfilling it. I highly recommend this read! And now to watch the movie....

Till the next review (The Giver - Lois Lowry)!

Rebekka. :)

10/40

Ten books down, forty to go!

This is the most that I have read - ohh in forever! It feels so good to read. It is nice to get lost in characters and escape reality for a little bit. Reading 50 books in a year seems easy now, reading 10 books in less than two months was a piece of cake.

The next ten books that I am going to reading & write reviews are:

1. The Reader by Bernhard Schlink
2. The Giver by Lois Lowry
3. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
4. Why We Broke Up by Daniel Handler
5. 2030 by Albert Brooks
6. The Children of Men by P.D. James
7. The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards
8. The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson
9. The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
10. The Emperor's Children by Clair Messud

If anyone has any suggestions for the next 10 books I read, please give them to me! I will need them and I am always up for reading something out of my comfort zone! Get ready for the next wave of book reviews!

Get ready for more!
Rebekka :)

The Hundred-Year Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared by Jonas Jonasson

The Hundred-Year Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared 
Jonas Jonasson

“Imagine that, death was just like being asleep. Would he have time to think before it was all over? And would he have time to think that he had thought it? But wait, how much do you have to think before you have finished thinking?”

After a long and eventful life, Allan Karlsson ends up in a nursing home, believing it to be his last stop. The only problem is that he's still in good health, and one day, he turns 100. A big celebration is in the works, but Allan really isn't interested (and he'd like a bit more control over his vodka consumption). So he decides to escape. He climbs out the window in his slippers and embarks on a hilarious and entirely unexpected journey, involving, among other surprises, a suitcase stuffed with cash, some unpleasant criminals, a friendly hot-dog stand operator, and an elephant (not to mention a death by elephant).

With the book having sold two million copies around the world, it has definitely charmed a lot of readers.  This story is the ultimate adventure of a lifetime and we find out so much of Allan's past life as we read along. I don't think I have ever read a book where the title actually sums up what is going to happen in the book - I thought that this was quite neat. There were really no surprises. The story reminded me somewhat of the Forrest Gump story.

Jonas Jonasson writes the book in past and present tense. One chapter will  be what is happening to Allan as he escapes and his adventures and the next chapter will be about his past and upbringing and why he's doing what he is doing. There were a few parts when I had to go back and reread parts because I was confused, but for the most part, it was a pretty easy read.

This book is pure entertainment. It is not the kind of book that you can laugh all the way through in, but there are many funny parts to the book. The situations that the characters get in are quite ridiculous. If you are looking for a quick, light read, this would be your book!

Till the next review!
Rebekka. :)

Everything Changes by Jonathan Tropper

Everything Changes
Jonathan Tropper

"Life, for the most part, inevitably becomes routine, the random confluence of timing and fortune that configures its components all but forgotten. But every so often, I catch a glimpse of my life out of the corner of my eye and am rendered breathless by it."

Another novel by Jonathan Tropper = another great read! I love going back to his books, I am completely hooked on them. You are always kept on your toes with what will happen next with his main characters and every book is completely different from the next. Tropper's books are fast paced and very easy reads.

Everything changes for Zack King, the main character, when he wakes up one morning and finds blood in his urine. While waiting for his results to come back, he deals with an unsettling career, an absent father of 20+ years trying to make a comeback into his life, his upcoming engagement party, and the fact that he may be in love with his late best friend's widow. I definitely recommend this book to all of my readers to find out what happens with all of this. It does get pretty crazy and it fact Zack's whole life changes around on him!

This is the kind of story that made me cry at one moment in the book and then burst out in laughter at other parts. Tropper's books always make me feel a variety of emotions while reading them. They are enjoyable and the characters in the book are extremely relatable. Like some of his other books, this novel is in the talks about becoming a major motion picture with of course Tropper writing the screenplay!

Some of Jonathan Tropper's other novels that we could both read are:

• How to Talk to a Widower
• The Book of Joe
• Plan B

Till the next review!

Rebekka. :)