What Are You Reading???! - 'Half-Blood Blues'

You guys are in for a Real Treat!! This post is completely from Ninnera !! starting....>>>NOW! >>

"Today i begin my read of "half blood blues" the author is a black woman named Esi Edugyan who is both married and has a child (yes its possible to have a fantastic home life as well as a blossoming writing career).

since i spend 3 hrs a day on the subway..(and spend almost 130$ on my subway pass -___-)  Ive decided to put this time to good use...that being said i am committing to ONLY use my subway time to read this book and see how long it takes me...3 hrs a day in reading? A challenge im going to take on LOL.

This book is about a young, brilliant trumpet-player, Hieronymus, is arrested in a Paris cafe. The star musician was never heard from again. He was twenty years old. He was a German citizen. And he was black. 
Fifty years later, Sidney Griffiths, the only witness that day, still refuses to speak of what he saw. When Chip Jones, his friend and fellow band member, comes to visit, recounting the discovery of a strange letter, Sid begins a slow journey towards redemption. 
From the smoky bars of pre-war Berlin to the salons of Paris, Sid leads the reader through a fascinating, little-known world, and into the heart of his own guilty conscience. 
Half-Blood Blues is an electric, heart-breaking story about music, race, love and loyalty, and the sacrifices we ask of ourselves, and demand of others, in the name of art. 

 

"Folks think a lifetime is a thing stretched out over years. It ain't. It can happen quick as a match in a dark room." 
― Esi Edugyan, Half Blood Blues

 

"It's like that, I guess, when the past come to collect what you owe." 
― Esi Edugyan, Half Blood Blues

 

"I guess mercy is a muscle like any other. You got to exercise it, or it just cramp right up." 
― Esi Edugyan, Half Blood Blues

 

"It ain't fair. Gifts is divided so damn unevenly. Like God just left his damn sack of talents in a ditch somewhere and said, "Go help yourselves, ladies and gents.Them's that get there first can help themselves to the biggest ones. In every other walk of life, a jack can work to get what he want. but ain't no amount of toil going get you a lick more talent than you born with. Geniuses ain't made, brother, they just is. and I just was not." 
― Esi Edugyan, Half Blood Blues

 

Winner of the 2011 Scotiabank Giller Prize

Winner of the 2012 Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize

Winner of the 2012 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award

Shortlisted for the 2011 Man Booker Prize

Shortlisted for the 2012 Orange Prize for Fiction

Shortlisted for the 2012 Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction

Finalist for the 2011 Governor General's Award for Fiction

Finalist for the 2011 Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize

<<<< Cooool!! Let us know how long it took when your finished!! :) This book, along with the sixteenth round, seems like it would have a good history lesson in terms of what other parts of the world were like, and a little bit about how black people were treated, and how black people were treated by the law, early 20th century.

What Are You Reading???! - 'Hammer's Slammers'

If he's not sleeping, I can always count on my boy Rowan to be reading while he eats during our breaks on our over night shifts. So I knew when I asked Arthur this morning who was working in frozen and he said Rowan, that come break time, I would have a new victim, the first male. Evil laugh.* :)

The Complete Hammer's Slammers: Volume 3
David Drake
[a book with three books inside of it :)]
- The Sharp End (1993)
- Paying the Piper (2002)
- The Darkness

Cooool, the book has artwork too! I should have taken pictures of that. Oops. X_X

Rowan was a little nervous for me to take a picture of the book because of it's condition. It was just a little tattered, but it's because Rowan rereads all his books, so this is the fourth or fifth time his reading this volume.

So from my understanding, the book is about a mercenary unit, a group of soldiers who get paid to fight wars.
It's a science fiction book, but Rowan says it's a little darker than most, because the book is reflective of the authors experiences fighting in Vietnam.
One of the author's experiences that was shared with me was as follows:

Some scouts from the author's unit were sent to spy out a village. There ended up being enemy gun turrets that took out two of the unit's vehicles. The surviving scouts returned but they did not know where exactly the gun turrets were situated. So they sent tanks to flatten the entire village, no one knowing for sure but assuming civilians, women and children were killed.

The book focuses on the emotional experiences of the soldiers having to deal with the moral dilemmas that they are forced to deal to with.
Sooooo interesting!

738 pages, not bad for three novels.

What Are You Reading???! - 'Pure'

So one of the first things my good friend Leidy shared with me when we recently reconnected was that she had just started an awesome new devotional.

Pure - by Rebecca St. James
- A 90 Day Devotional for the Mind, the Body, and the Spirit

One of the many quotes Leidy likes so far, one that really made her smile is:

If he thinks highly enough of you and me to put His fingerprints on us, we can be assured that He has a purpose for every one of us."

For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
Colossians 1:16-17

Thanks Leidy :) encouraging to know God has a purpose for us all :))

What Are You Reading???! - 'The Sixteenth Round'

So last Sunday when we were at the finale presentation of the G.I.A. Productions 'Do You Remember Me' my homegirl Katherine shared with me and my friend Alisha an autobiography that she's reading.

The Sixteenth Round - by Rubin "Hurricane" Carter

The book seems to be about his trip from the boxing ring to a prison cell, and it seems like racism paid for the ticket.

To put it simply. The book looks like a good read, and two copies are currently on their way to my house from Amazon!

I'm interested in learning from this book about worlds I'm not familiar with; the black mans struggle in America in the earlier 20th century; the boxing world; and the American prison system.

I'm excited to read this book! I LOVE when people share what they're eating with me!

WHAT ARE YOUUUU READING???

Let us know! :)

Looks like Katherine has some other books to share as well :)

Quote: "I then began to realize why this cop was beating on me since one of my eyes had already been completely closed by my father's belt when he first saw me, the man probably thought that if my own father didn't give a damn about me why should he?"

Quote: "That began my first real awareness of my existence. I imagine such a blatant event was necessary to prod the faculties of my brain into full consciousness."

What Am I Reading? - 'The Joy of Marriage God's Way'

So also from www.twitter.com/naughty_ninjah 's dad's library, I'm reading 'the Joy of Marriage God's Way' featuring Beverly LaHaye and others. I'm not in love with it so far, but I haven't read much yet.

Quote: There is always help and healing available from God, the restorer of love and life."

What Am I Reading? - 'I Kissed Dating Goodbye'

So I'm reading 'I Kissed Dating Goodbye" by Joshua Harris for the second time and I'm reading it with my 'Willy Wonka Nerds' BBM Bookclub. Shoutout to Blackberry. Shoutout to bellajovenxo and aigentay :) I'm enjoying this book just as much as when I read it the first time a few years ago. A lot of golden truths in this book that have taken root in my perspective and have blessed me thoroughly.

Quote: "When we make God's glory and other people's needs our priority, we position ourselves to receive God's best in our lives as well." pg 24

What Am I Reading? - 'To Have and To Hold'

To Have and To Hold - A Guide to Successful Marriage - by Nancy Van Pelt. This is an amazing book I borrowed from my homegirl www.twitter.com/naughty_ninjah 's dad's library. I just finished reading it personally, and I'm currently going through it with a couple of friends who are preparing for marriage. Great book which portrays practically what marriage should look like. We don't have a lot of real life examples of that, so I think it's important we crowd out a lot of the negative examples we've witnessed with pleasant, successful images of what family life is supposed to be. :)

Quote: "We're not two lonely competing individuals. We are one, and nothing else in life can compare to it." pg 14