First of all, HAPPY WORLD BOOK DAY EVERYONE!! :) Let's spread the joy of reading, not only today, but every other day by sharing great reads with your friends and family, also, if you have too many on your shelves, give them to those in need...I came across this on guardian.co.uk and thought that I'd share it with you... "With or without TV debates, most thoughts at present in the UK are turning to the choice we will make in the forthcoming general election. However, the stark fact is that very many people in the UK will not be a part of that process; not because they don't want to necessarily, but because they lack the most basic skills to do so. They can't read. They cannot make a choice. It is a truly terrible democratic deficit." (More...) The thought of parting with your favourite books can be painful. To be honest, I had problems giving mine away. But just thinking of the impact it can make on a person's life helped the 'parting' a whole lot...
Title/Author: Message from an Unknown Mother/ Xinran Publisher: Chatto & Windus No. of pages: 212 ISBN: 978-0-701- 11840-25 In a nutshell Ever wondered why there are so many orphaned girls in China? Why many were given away for adoption? They have been adopted overseas, by around 120,000 families in 27 countries, but some others have suffered a worse fate. Just today, as I was about to complete my review of Xinran’s Message from an Unknown Mother, I came across this appalling headline: China Hospital Dumps 21 Babies as Medical Waste into River . This atrocity never ends. In China, it is known that most families are to have only one or two children, preferably sons, and abandoning, killing or aborting girl babies are common. In the West, many believe that it’s the ‘one-child’ policy that is responsible for unwanted girls, but from her research in the last 20 years, Xinran began to discover, there’s more to that. In a typical Chinese culture, the males have a higher status in the ...
Title: The Great Believers Author: Rebecca Makkai My verdict: 3.5 stars In a nutshell: The Great Believers was set in two places – Chicago and Paris, portraying a group of gay friends, mainly focussing on Yale (whom I love and could relate to when he spoke of his childhood) living through the AIDS epidemic in Chicago in the 80's; and Fiona in search of her daughter, Claire, in Paris year 2015. These stories moved back and forth throughout the book. What I liked: I cried myself to sleep the night I finished The Great Believers. It's a story of loss, love and redemption. I was especially drawn to the story that shed light on the challenges of American gay men living with AIDS in the late 80's and early 90's, and how ignorance had caused thousands of lives. I felt their heartbreaks and devastating loss of their loved ones and their own lives to AIDS, especially Fiona. She gave, and gave, and gave, and lost. And the ending was a tear jer...
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