october book update

October was a busy month and definitely interesting. It started with a marathon and vacation, and ended with a hurricane. However, during this time, I got a wide range of books in.

The Tiger's Wife by Téa Obreht

For last month's book club, we read The Tiger's Wife by Téa Obreht. Compared to 1Q84, it went by quickly. The story is about a woman's relationship with her grandfather and the stories of his childhood in the pre-war Balkans. On a trip over the border to treat orphans in a war-torn, newly established country, she finds out about her grandfather's death and recalls the story about "The Deathless Man" and "The Tiger's Wife". She does go out of her way to learn more about "The Tiger's Wife" after his death since she wasn't told the entire story. You flip-flopped around a bit, but quickly picked up the flow of the book. Although in some instances, I had to recall what had happened previously. I did have higher expectations due to the hype surrounding it. But overall, still a pretty good read.

The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference by Malcolm Gladwell
This has been on my list to read for a while now. I really enjoyed reading it (it must be the psych and econ major in me). It describes the theory of what the tipping point is for a wide range of epidemics, whether it's crime, social, or fashion, just like a virus does. The author goes into the 3 laws that help define this. A lot of studies are referenced for a wide range of scenarios—what points that may cause an epidemic and what doesn't. I found it really interesting. Outliers is on my list to read as well.

Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton

This was a pretty quick read. I read The Age of Innocence a couple of months ago and liked it, so I decided to read another one of Edith Wharton's books. There were some similar themes in both books. A visitor to a small Connecticut town meets Ethan Frome. On a snowy evening, all the various rumors around town get put to rest as Ethan's unhappy situation is recounted. It goes back decades when Ethan was dealing with his parents deaths, and being newly married. It seemed as a full life was ahead of him, but his wife's relative comes to town, and forbidden love and tragedy eventually occurs.

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez

This has been on the list for a some time and I had no excuse when my friend gave it to me. The story starts and ends with the fictional town of Maconda and the Buendia family that started it. Jose Arcadio and Ursula run away from their town looking for a new place to live since they are first cousins. There is this threat of certain things happening due to incest and they want to start over. Unfortunately, incest is a theme that runs throughout the duration of the family no matter how far away they run. As does solitude (obviously). Various characters go through periods of solitude. Too many to really account here. Also, time was a weird concept. People were alive way longer than normal. But then others died very young—usually in a strange way.

I think one of the most frustrating parts of the book was the repetition of the family names, in particular Jose Arcadio and Aureliana. I tried to get a handle on that since there are 7 generations of the family to account for. Good thing for Wikipedia! I definitely need to re-read this again though since I felt like a lost a lot with all the characters and crazy stuff that happened.

So I surpassed my goal of 30 books in 2012, which is great news. However, I set another goal of 50 on goodreads.com. I have a ways to go and at this rate, I may not achieve it. Especially if I continue to read lengthy books. I'll have to find a few more short ones!

34/30 books in 2012.