Time to Vote!

Amidst the confusion and joy of Thanksgiving, we had a somewhat abbreviated discussion about The Lost Wife, which everyone seemed to like in varying degrees.

But enough about the Holocaust. Time to bring on Christmas cheer.

Here are our December choices:

Lost December, by Richard Paul Evans
1225 Christmas Tree Lane, by Debbie Macomber
The Puppy That Came for Christmas, by Megan Aix
Comfort and Joy, by India Knight
A Chistmas Blizzard, by Garrison Keillor
Christmas Homecoming, by Anne Perry

I know there are a lot, and we'll see how it goes. Since I'm not anticipating that there will be a lot of intense discussion about a holiday novel, maybe we can pick a couple, and people can just discuss the one we each read. I don't know -- I'm making it up as I go! Bec and I found these all at Barnes and Noble. Some might only be in hardcover, but they are all very inexpensive at B & N and Amazon.

Please vote by Sunday the 4th

A Different Look at Love

I hate books that make me cry. I hate movies that make me cry. I hate when life makes me cry.

I dislike crying at a book so much that I have been known to glance at the ending of a book that I suspect might end sadly to see if the main character is still living and breathing. Nothing makes me feel more cheated than having a character of whom I have grown fond die of some deadly disease at the end.

Having said that, I must tell you that I LOVED this book. I simply couldn't put it down. I would walk around the house reading it. I took it with me to the bathroom. If my hands weren't otherwise occupied, I was reading this book.

And obviously it wasn't because I wanted to see what happens next. I know how the Holocaust ends. And besides, they tell you in the first chapter that Lenka and Josef find one another.

I found Richman's writing to be hauntingly beautiful. I reread passage after passage just because I liked the way the words sounded.

The story was about love. Through all of the atrocities, in the end, the story spoke about the love people had for one another. Not just Lenka's and Josef's love, though that was intense. The love of Lenka for her family. The love of Lucie for Lenka's mother and her whole family. Even the love that Lenka and Josef had for their respective spouses.

I thought that the love displayed by the people in the concentration camps for one another was amazing (though there were some disturbing stories of people stealing from each other, but given the circumstances, it's not surprising). But what about when Theresa (the artist who could paint with such detail that Lenka thought she had gotten ahold of gold leaf) made that flower for Rita so that she had something beautiful to wear when she married? That almost took my breath away.

The stories about life in the concentration camp will haunt me for a long time. But I loved the will that people had to live. I particularly loved the idea that Lenka's mother kind of came out of her shell while teaching the children at Terezin.

I cried and cried and cried while reading this book. It scares me to think that there is a possibility of people forgetting that this happened or pretending that it didn't once all of the survivors have died.

I loved Richman's use of color to describe people and situations. I guess that probably tied in with Lenka being an artist. It made me sad to think that she was unable to make art after life in Auschwitz. But I was very happy that she found happiness (or some degree of happiness anyway) in her life with Carl

Didn't you just love Carl? The passages describing how Lenka stayed with Carl as he died were so touching and probably made me cry as hard as any other part of the book.

How did this book impact you? Did you learn anything new about the Holocaust?

While I think it's probably high time we read a more cheerful book, I have to say that this is one of my favorite books that I've ever read. Five stars in my opinion.