Hooked On Bookz

Does reading really help one out of depression? Early this year, I posted an article about reading out of depression - where the writer wrote about how Saul Bellow's Herzog helped her out of depression. She said, "....I was able momentarily to forget my own problems and lose myself completely in the richly detailed and beautifully rendered world of the novel." Emma Thompson, an English actress, also sought refuge in reading . She claimed that she was "saved" by immersing herself in Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility. I'm sure there are many of us who find reading therapeutic. I'm one of them *wink* Anyway, did you know there's this term called ' Bibliotherapy '? It's an expressive therapy that uses an individual's relationship to the content of books and poetry and other written words as therapy. The Wikipedia explains, "The basic concept behind bibliotherapy is that reading is a healing experience. It was applied to both ...

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 ...

Oh my goodness, this is extreeeeeeeeeeemely funny! The gang was assigned to read 'The Catcher In The Rye' for school. They got super excited about reading it when Mr. Garrison told them, "It has some very risque parts and strong vulgar language. And in fact many schools across the country still ban this book because it's thought to be so inappropriate." And they wanted to read the entire book there and then. (You know, it has the same effect on me when 'so-and-so' started confiscating some books from our local bookstores. That's why I went out to get ' Where Is Justice '" And I'm glad I did! :D) Here are the clips :) And their reaction after reading the book LOL! Have you read 'The Catcher in The Rye' before? Do you think it was controversial? Too vulgar? Or you share the same sentiment as the kids of South Park? South Park image from Google Images

Title/Author: The Vagina Monologues/Eve Ensler Publisher: Villard Books No. of pages: 223 ISBN: 0-345-49860-1 In a nutshell The Vagina Monologues is an episodic play written by Eve Ensler, which has been staged internationally. Every monologue relates to the female's 'down there'. No. Sorry. Vagina. There you go, Ensler. I said it :P There's sex, love, rape, masturbation, orgasm, the various names of the vagina, etc. There are sections where Ensler asked questions like, "If your vagina got dressed, what would it wear?" , and "If your vagina could talk, what would it say, in two words?" and "What does a vagina smell like?" What I liked and didn't quite like When Ensler asked a six-year-old girl some of the questions above, and " What's special about your vagina?" to which the little girl answered, "Somewhere deep inside it I know it has a really really smart brain." (Now I know why we're the smarter specie...

Do you think books make great gifts? I DO! And so do these celebrities :) Do you share the same opinion as them? Hear what they have to say. My favourites are Jon Stewart's and Maya Angelou's ;) I usually give books as gifts to all those near and dear to me (Unless they tell me not to haha)! Because I think a good book can make a difference in one's life! When I buy a book for a friend, I either buy them a favourite book of mine, or a book I think they'd enjoy or a book they could learn something from. These are some of those which I can remember: 1) Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert: to a friend who was struggling with a divorce. 2) Horseradish by Lemony Snicket: A book that I enjoyed reading and thought he might like it too 3) Falling Leaves by Adeline Yen Mah: to a friend who loves family drama and thought the best are the HK drama series, until she read this book. 4) Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides: to someone who feels she's alone in this world. What abou...

That's shocking, isn't it? Wait till you read the rest: In a tale as old as time, here is a short list of classic books and other literary works that were originally attacked by critics and subsequently given bad reviews. * A Midsummer Night's Dream - William Shakeaspeare - performed in London in 1662. "The most stupid ridiculous play that I ever saw in my life." - Samuel Pepys, Diary. * Gulliver's Travels - Jonathan Swift - 1726. "..evidence of a diseased mind and a lacerated heart." - John Dunlop, 'The History of Fiction', 1814. * Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert - 1857. "Monsieur Flaubert is not a writer." - Le Figaro. * Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy - 1877. "Sentimental Rubbish" - The Odessa Courier. * The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald - 1925. "What has never been alive cannot very well go on living. So this is a book of the season only." - New York Herald Tribune. * Catch-22 - Joseph Heller - 1961. ...

I came across this post and thought of sharing it with you...I wonder what would have happened if the incident took place here LOL The famous Christ the Redeemer that overlooks Rio de Janeiro was somewhat smaller than I had expected. (But then again, this is true of all the iconic structures I was introduced to first in pictures, such as the Statue of Liberty, the Eiffel Tower or the Kaabah.) But it is undergoing extensive renovation, which makes the statue more interesting. The main point of the trip up the mountain, however, was the spectacular view of the city at magic hour, as well as the invisible line of the Atlantic sprawl meeting the sky. My mobile phone camera won't do any of that justice, so I will leave you with the statue instead: On the way down the Corvocado mountain, the train (which was the last of the day; it was almost 7pm and dark) shuddered to an unscheduled halt. We were surrounded only by jungle, but the train was packed with people, mostly Brazilian. And thi...