Book Review: My Sister’s Keeper, by Jodi Picoult

WARNING: I am told (by Holly in the comments) that the Amazon reviews have spoilers in them. Be careful!

I just finished reading this book late Monday night. I should just be honest and admit it was early Tuesday morning.

I like books that make me feel emotions I’m unfamiliar with. I like books that challenge my assumptions. This book did those things. I would give it a 4 out of 5, with the last point deducted for having a couple of side stories that seemed to detract from the plot (or add nothing) and having one character that didn’t feel fully fleshed out.

In summary, the book is about a thirteen year old girl Anna who files a lawsuit to be granted medical emancipation from her parents. She was conceived to be a perfect cord blood donor to her older sister Kate, who suffers from a rare form of leukemia. She has spent all of her life acting as donor in increasingly invasive and dangerous procedures for her sister. The latest thing she’s asked to do is to donate her kidney t oher sister, for whom the chances of yet another recovery look slim.

Given the controversial topic, this book could easily have been extremely trite and manipulative, squeezing the plot for people acting in shocking and scandalous ways. But instead, the author crafted a story full of real, flawed characters that have complex motivations and personalities. The relationship between the main characters and her parents and her sister vividly show that it’s not a simple case of her family treating her like she’s just a donor and that it’s not a case of her just wanting to be seen as a person. The pain and empathy between each set of characters is palpable, and it was unclear how the story would wrap up.

If you want to be challenged by the difficult decisions people make and struggle with your own sense of what’s right, I would recommend this book. Setting up some characters as “good” and “bad” in the story within the first few chapters became meaningless as I continued with the story because they simply became people who were trying their best with something they had never faced before. If you don’t like books that make you sad, stay far from this book.

The author’s prose flows quite easily, being simple and straightforward, rather than overly flowerly or overwraught. The use of multiple first-person views (each chapter is from a different character’s perspective) covering a two week period (with some flashbacks) was pretty good, although some character’s voices were not as distinct as others.

This is my second Jodi Picoult book. I’d also read The Pact a couple of years ago. It was also very well-written and has stayed with me ever since.

breathing out of sheer desperation*

*Title of blog entry stolen from a friend’s blog.

Seppo and I have been talking about b.o. as a result of A_B’s post about how much people stink and don’t know it. Somehow, it segued to my morning breath (everyone has it! stop looking at me!) which then made me wonder if the intensity is related to the fact that when I sleep, I generally breathe through my mouth because I have a hard time breathing through my nose while sleeping. Seriously, it sucks. I wake up every single morning feeling like my nose is so stuffy that I feel like I’m fighting for my breath. It doesn’t seem to be a lung issue because I feel fine when I breathe through my mouth.

Anyway, my conjecture is that sleeping with a slightly open mouth leads to greater overnight bacterial growth then sleeping with a fully closed mouth, because active saliva flow acts as a bacterial deterrent. Sleeping with my mouth slightly open gives bacteria the perfect breeding ground: wet, moist, and aerated.

To test this hypothesis, we purchased a box of clear nasal strips (the regular, non-mentholated, non-vapor kind) last night:

Whoa. When I put that on right before bed, I had this overwhelming feeling like I was taking my first good breath of the last… um… well, for as long as I can actively remember. Wow. Man.

This morning, I woke up and realized that I hadn’t woken up in the middle of the night last night, as I have for the last I-have-no-idea-how-long. Every night, I wake up a good three or four times and I wake up feeling so tired, so matter how many hours I had spent in bed. This morning, I won’t say I didn’t feel tired, but at least I had slept through the night! Woo!

As to the hypothesis, Seppo thought my morning breath was less stinky than usual. Certainly, my throat felt less dry than usual, as a result of not having to breathe through my mouth. I am gonna use these every night, yo.

When I took off the little strip, it felt like I was submerging myself under water. Maybe since I’m working from home today, I’ll just put one on while I work.

Romance Novel Rant

Related to my last post, one of my pet peeves is people who think romance novel == stupid fluff (and the corollary to that, that romance novel reader == stupid bimbo). Outlander is not a romance novel, but I’ve certainly devoured more than my fair share of romance novels.

Here is a new flash: romance novels range from absolute trite nonsense to brilliant works of literature just like any other genre. Shocking. Just as in other maligned literary genres (such as sci-fi, fantasy, graphic novel, suspense), there is a lot of dross to wade through before hitting gold. In each genre, there is a certain focus or theme that makes the genre what it is, and in the case of romance, the focus is on relationships, whether that means people falling in love for the first time or people examining their evolving relationship over a course of decades.

My two favorite “comfort reading” genres are historical romance novels and British cozies (term for murder mysteries that take place in tiny quiet British towns). Historical romance novels are interesting to me because unlike many other historical fiction, they spend a lot of time also covering tidbits like local customs, social hierarchies, and styles of dress, rather than focusing solely on politics.

Ok, so now we’re cooking with rambling! 😀 Anyway, the second point I was going to make is that even if you are hung up over the idea that something called a romance novel must be shallow fluff, the books of the Outlander series were seriously miscategorized anyway. They were originally published under romance, but got moved to historical fiction, then moved again to literary fiction, then again to romance, then for a bit to paranormal. I think it depends on your bookstore. My feeling is that it belongs in historical fiction because so much of the stories is about the major historical events and politics and how they impacted the people involved. The book also deals with love, relationships, and sex, which is why it is/was in the romance section.

One of the elements that I love the most (aside from the detailed descriptions of 1700s medical practices) is that it’s like real life: there is laughter, there is pain. Really bad things happen to good people and you hope they get through them. Some do, some don’t. But it’s all written in an engaging way. Some you root for. Some you hope never get mentioned again in the stories. There is moral ambiguity, questions of honor, loyalty, oaths, merciful killings? The stories are full of grit of the daily routine of life. I hate books that are just one-note: all suspenseful or all serious or all humor. They feel so lifeless to me.

Blah blah blah.

Book Review: A Breath of Snow and Ashes, by Diana Gabaldon

I just finished reading “A Breath of Snow and Ashes”, by Diana Gabaldon. I am not sure what I want to write here as I don’t want to give any spoilers, but I definitely liked it more than “The Fiery Cross”. I would rank the books as follows:

1. Outlander (1st book)
2. Voyager (3rd book)
3. Dragonfly in Amber (2nd book)
4. A Breath of Snow and Ashes (6th book)
5. Drums of Autumn (4th book)
6. The Fiery Cross (5th book)

Seppo asked me if I thought this would be the last book in the series. It was originally planned to be, but then again, so were the 3rd, 4th, and 5th books. What I’ve heard is that as the author writes her story, she finds that there is too much material before the “end” for her to cram into the current book, so she simply leaves it for the next book. However, this book did really feel like there were a lot of things being wrapped up, a lot of looming questions that had been answered.

All in all, it was a really satisfying experience. If I ever take an extended period of time off from work or something, I hope to be able to read all the books back-to-back again, which will take a considerable amount of time as each book averages around 1000 pages. The worst part is that the stories are so compelling that it is hard to put the books down to go to sleep once you start.

Hopefully, the following information will not be spoiler-y. (Click on this link to see my comments.)This book takes place between 1774-1776 in a colonial settlement in North Carolina, beginning with the seeds of rumblings of the American Revolution.

The story finds Jamie and Claire settled on Fraser’s Ridge, with their daughter Brianna, her husband Roger, and their child Jemmy residing in a cabin nearby. They’ve helped settle a group of Scottish immigrants in the area, people Jamie had known during Culloden.

Hmm. You know, I think I am going to give too much information. I am going to have to switch to my reactions and impressions rather than what happens in the story.

Ok, then. If you are a fan of the Outlander series, you will be extremely happy to know that a lot of the common open questions we have had over the years have come to reasonable, satisfying conclusions. The writing feels somewhat more fast-paced than the last book, and once in a while, I felt like it was really too much happening too fast. But that’s not necessarily a complaint, as it tries to convey the difficulty of living in colonial America, where everyday tragedies were, well, frequent.

Each character, many of them existing characters with a small set of newer characters, has a life of his or her own. You can see the person and understand each person’s motivations as things happen, and it makes sense. And yet, the plot unfolds in a way that keeps you in suspense, even knowing that the American Revolution is coming and that the Americans will win.

Eh. Just go out and get the book if you are a fan. It’s better than the last one, as I said. If you are not a fan, for the love of monkey, read Outlander first. I’ll even buy you a copy if you show any interest. Seriously. Leave me a comment and I’ll get you a copy.

resolutions

Another new year, another set of resolutions.

Last year, Seppo and I came through on setting a date for the wedding and starting the planning. I lost some weight. I wrote my second NaNoWriMo novel.

This year, I’d like to do the following:

• Health:
1. Finish my weight loss goal and ensure that there is a corresponding body fat percentage loss. Continue to grow more aware of the nutritional value of the food I intake. Try to eat only things I enjoy instead of cramming my gullet with general crap out of habit.
2. Work up to do a 5K run for my birthday? I want to evaluate my current running capability before committing to this. I suppose if I am really unable to run it, I could just walk it but it would make me feel really wussy. Haha.
• Work:
1. Figure out what I want to do with my long term career. Vague, but it would be good for me to stare at this goal everyday.
• Relationships:
1. Call my mom every week and don’t be a snot when I’m on the phone with her.
2. Go see my family at least twice a year, once they are all in the same place. I should really get it through my head that short trips are ok if it means that I can see them more often.
3. Email and call old friends regularly.
4. See local friends more regularly.
5. Really live out the idea that each action and each word can be a supporting brick in the foundation of my relationships, or it can be a separating brick in the wall between me and the people I love. Add to the foundation.
6. Take Mobi to more fun places and think of rainy-day activities for him to do.
7. Finish planning and get married. Haha.
• Home:
1. Learn habits to decrease clutter.
2. Learn habits to keep clutter out.
• Self-improvement and time management:
1. Learn one new major skill.
2. Limit tv to one hour max per weekday. If someone else starts watching tv that I wasn’t going to watch, go do something else.
3. Limit tv to three hours max over the weekend.
4. Limit book buying to maximum of one per three owned-but-not-yet-read book I finish.
5. Write a little blurb about each book and movie I watch.
6. No more dvds this year.
7. Unless I am instant messaging with my sister in Korea, no personal computer time after 8:30pm (except quick forays to look up map/movie/etc info).

States I’ve been in

Via Angry Chad:

create your own visited states map
or check out these Google Hacks.

Pitiful.

Note: I was too lazy to actually rescale the image so I just put width and height tags around the image, which is making it look ugly.

May the fours be with you

I hate myself for my blog entry title. But I couldn’t help myself.

From A_B:

Four jobs you’ve had in your life: [senior] software engineer, web applications developer, private tutor, newspaper deliverer. I think that’s actually all my jobs, except florist assitant and billiard club drink deliverer/ball & table vacuumer/polisher.

Four movies you could watch over and over: Stand By Me, Grease, The Breakfast Club, The Sound of Music. I used to watch these movies every time they were on tv. And now that I own them, I watch them less. But I could probably sit through another twenty viewings each on them.

Four places you’ve lived: Bay Area (San Jose and Oakland), Boston Area (Cambridge and Boston), Philadelphia, and New York. The only places left are the 3-4 places I lived in Korea.

Four TV shows you love to watch: This list always changes. When I look at profiles for random websites (like friendster), I’m always surprised by what I had previously listed as my favorites at the time. But for all-time favorites, it would be Coupling, Seinfeld, Twin Peaks, and Hell’s Kitchen. This year’s go-to shows were/have been Hell’s Kitchen, Rock Star: INXS, What Not to Wear, and Desperate Housewives. Oh, and Prison Break. Hmm, and My Name is Earl. And Everybody Hates Chris. I keep violating the rule of four. Sorry Lost, but you fell off the list.

Four places you’ve been on vacation: Here is one I won’t violate. 😀 Let’s see… Korea. Er… I’ve visited family in Atlanta. And in Philadelphia. Oh, and I’ve been back to Boston. Sheesh. That’s it. That’s sad. Vietnam and even Canada were for work, so they don’t count.

Four websites you visit daily: The Gamers’ Forum, Google Reader, my “friends” link on Livejournal set up solely to track friends’ locked entries, one of the many travel sites I have bookmarked. I am cheating with Google Reader because that’s my aggregator. If I had to figure out what I hit the most within my aggregator, lately, it’s Seppo’s site, A_B’s site, AngryChad’s site, and Cute Overload, because they update the most frequently of people I know.

Four of your favorite foods: galbi, dwen jang jjigae with LOTS and LOTS of tofu (mmmmmmm tofu), odeng gook, dduk gook.

Four places you’d rather be: Any warm beach with white white sand with clear blue water, with my nieces, with my group of high school girlfriends, eating food with my best friend who does a little happy dance when she’s eating something truly tasty.

Four albums you can’t live without: Let’s not get dramatic here; I can certainly live without any specific album. But the ones I enjoy the most over time are Bon Jovi’s New Jersey, The Temptations’ Greatest Hits (cheat!), The Commitments’ soundtrack, and Jude’s Nobody Is Really Beautiful. I would have included something by New Order, but I sort of tired myself out on them in the first year of having my iPod. It’s my own fault. Plus, seeing them in concert really threw me off.

Merry Christmas Eve!

Today, I got my first firestation tour! Seppo and I had just finished grocery shopping for tonight’s dinner with Seppo’s parents and on the way back, we stopped off at the firestation to pick up some sandbags. (I’m sure Seppo has or will blog about the need for sandbags.) While we were there, they gave us a little tour. It was so cool! The station near Telegraph and MacArthur is fairly new and very cosy. The firefighter who was showing us around assured us that the big tv and leather recliners were not provided by the city and that the firefighters themselves had chipped in to buy them. He said that some people get annoyed if they think that the city bought nice things for them. My attitude is that I don’t jump into fires in order to save people’s lives, so even if the city DID pay for it, I wouldn’t be annoyed. It’s sad that they were in a situation where they felt like they had to explain it to people so that they could avoid potential misgivings.

Can something be so cute that it’s a crime?

Oh, mommy. It’s too cute.

up!

Most of the old web server content is now back up on the new server. However, I have to move over the old wiki data as well as the old message board stuff, and make sure all the directory access control points to the new directory structure. This should be all very straightforward, but I’m having a painful time with the phpBB migration, for some reason. I’m following every step down to the letter, but it screws up somehow. Boo.

Anyway, we now have a more reliable host for roughly $3.90 per month for two years. I won’t recommend them quite yet until we’ve been with them for at least a few months, but we are using www.dreamhost.com, so if you want to sign up with them, please quite “eingy” as your referrer. 😀 Also, don’t forget to google for “promo codes dreamhost” before signing up so that you can get the >50% discount like we did.