I had a great time participating in this challenge. The goal of the Book Awards Reading Challenge, was to read any 12 award-winning books from July 1, 2007 through June 30, 2008. Eligible books included the Pulitzer, Booker, Newbery, National Book Award, etc. prize lists. I'm now looking forward to Book Awards II, tentatively planned for February through November of 2009.

Favorite Book: Interpreter of Maladies, by Jhumpa Lahiri. I don't normally read short stories, but I had read Lahiri's novel, The Namesake, before this challenge. I was completely blown away by Interpreter of Maladies; those stories stuck with me for a long time and I eagerly anticipated and sought out her 2008 collection, Unaccustomed Earth.

Least Favorite Book: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, by Junot Diaz, which I was unable to finish.

What I learned: At the start, I was new to challenges but I knew I enjoyed reading prize-winners. Well, my participation in this challenge led me to sign up for several long-term projects (The Pulitzer Project, Read the Nobels, and The Orange Prize Project), and even host one myself (The Complete Booker)! I've discovered some great literature and know that I will continue to do so as I work through each project. Thanks 3M/Michelle for hosting such a fun challenge!

My List:

1. Invisible Man, by Ralph Ellison - National Book Award 1953 (completed 7/9/2007 - review)
2. The Optimist's Daughter, by Eudora Welty - Pulitzer 1973 (completed 8/10/2007 - review)
3. The Road, by Cormac McCarthy - Pulitzer 2007 (completed 9/2/2007 - review)
4. East of Eden, by John Steinbeck - Nobel Prize author, 1962 (completed 10/6/2007 - review)
5. Interpreter of Maladies, by Jhumpa Lahiri - Pulitzer 2000 (completed 10/11/2007 - review)
6. The Tenderness of Wolves, by Stef Penney - Costa/Whitbread 2006 (completed 11/9/2007 - review)
7. The Giver, by Lois Lowry - Newbery 1994 (completed 12/15/2007 - review)
8. March, by Geraldine Brooks - Pulitzer 2006 (completed 1/22/2008 - review)
9. The Sea, The Sea, by Iris Murdoch - Booker 1978 (completed 2/21/2008 - review)
10. The Bone People, by Keri Hulme - Booker 1985 (completed 3/30/2008 - review)
11. The Gathering, by Anne Enright - Booker 2007 (completed 4/2/2008 - review)
12. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, by Junot Díaz - Pulitzer 2008 (DNF 5/9/2008 - review)

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
Junot Diaz



This isn't really a review, it's just a brief post to say I started this book, but it flat out didn't appeal to me at all. I set it aside about a week ago, thinking I might come back to it. But I've decided against it; there's just too much other great literature begging for my attention.

This was my final read for the Book Awards Challenge. I don't feel guilty about not finishing it, because I've read loads of other book award winners above and beyond my challenge list. This one also counts towards the Pulitzer Project: again, I didn't read the whole thing but I can check it off my list: been there, done that.

The Gathering
Anne Enright
261 pages

"There is something wonderful about a death, how everything shuts down, and all the ways you thought you were vital are not even vaguely important. Your husband can feed the kids, he can work the new oven, he can find the sausages in the fridge, after all." (p. 27)

The Gathering is an intimate and painful look at grief. Veronica Hegarty's life has been turned upside-down by her brother Liam's suicide. Throughout this novel Veronica operates in a fog, disconnected from her siblings, her husband, and her children. She is barely able to function. As she reflects on her brother's life, she tries to piece together elements of their shared past, but her childhood memories are fraught with inaccuracies and inconsistencies. Liam's death also makes her keenly aware of her own less-than-satisfying adult life: "I was living my life in inverted commas. I could pick up my keys and go 'home' where I could 'have sex' with my 'husband' just like lots of other people did. This is what I had been doing for years. And I didn't seem to mind the inverted commas, or even notice that I was living in them, until my brother died." (p. 181) When did it all go wrong?

As winner of the 2007 Booker Prize, The Gathering has received more than its share of reviews. It seems to be a "love it or hate it" book, mostly because it is so bleak. This is, indeed, a very sad book. Each person seems to be lost in their own island of grief, unable to support one another. Veronica withdraws completely; her siblings are each caught up in their own childhood baggage and destructive behavior patterns. As the book draws to a close, the truth has proven to be elusive, and the future is uncertain. Those looking for neat and tidy endings will be disappointed, but I found The Gathering's stark realism to be both intense and memorable. ( )

Michelle (aka 3M) over at 1MoreChapter is sponsoring the Book Awards Reading Challenge, to read any 12 award-winning books from July 1, 2007 through June 30, 2008.  Eligible books include the Pulitzer, Booker, Newbery, National Book Award, etc. prize lists.  This is one I simply cannot resist; I am prone to using the prize lists for TBR ideas anyway.  And Michelle is graciously allowing overlap with other challenges, and I don't have to choose all my books before the start of the challenge, and there are prizes!  How could I refuse?  

My List (with links to LibraryThing) 

1. Invisible Man, by Ralph Ellison - National Book Award 1953 (completed 7/9/2007 - review)
2. The Optimist's Daughter, by Eudora Welty - Pulitzer 1973 (completed 8/10/2007 - review)
3. The Road, by Cormac McCarthy - Pulitzer 2007 (completed 9/2/2007 - review)
4. East of Eden, by John Steinbeck - Nobel Prize author, 1962 (completed 10/6/2007 - review)
5. Interpreter of Maladies, by Jhumpa Lahiri - Pulitzer 2000 (completed 10/11/2007 - review)
6. The Tenderness of Wolves, by Stef Penney - Costa/Whitbread 2006 (completed 11/9/2007 - review)
7. The Giver, by Lois Lowry - Newbery 1994 (completed 12/15/2007 - review)
8. March, by Geraldine Brooks - Pulitzer 2006 (completed 1/22/2008 - review)
9. The Sea, The Sea, by Iris Murdoch - Booker 1978 (completed 2/21/2008 - review)
10. The Bone People, by Keri Hulme - Booker 1985  (completed 3/30/2008 - review)
11. The Gathering, by Anne Enright - Booker 2007 (completed 4/2/2008 - review)
12. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao,  by Junot Díaz - Pulitzer 2008 (DNF 5/9/2008 - review)

The Bone People
Keri Hulme
445 pages


"A family can be the bane of one's existence. A family can also be most of the meaning of one's existence. I don't know whether my family is bane or meaning, but they have surely gone away and left a large hole in my heart." (p. 242)

Keri Hulme's Booker prize-winning novel is about the healing power of relationships and family bonds. Kerewin is an artist and recluse, unmarried and estranged from her family. Joe is a widowed laborer with a violent temper. Simon, Joe's foster son, lost his parents in a boating accident. Simon's specific identity is unknown, he cannot speak, and he has suffered severe emotional trauma. These three very lonely people come together when Simon breaks into Kerewin's house. Slowly, tentatively, Joe and Simon reach out to Kerewin. Slowly, tentatively, she accepts their attentions. After a long holiday at a seaside camp they are as close to a family as any of them have ever experienced. However, the dark side of each character looms large, and when the inevitable happens each character is shaken to their very core and must choose when and how to begin the healing process.

Hulme's writing style is unorthodox, yet I found this book difficult to put down. I was completely committed to the characters, despite their often significant flaws. The insights into Maori culture were interesting. Although I was a bit uncertain how the ending came together the way it did, I very much enjoyed the journey. ( )

March
Geraldine Brooks
273 pages

"Then what, pray, is the point?" His voice was a dry, soft rattle, like a breeze through a bough of dead leaves.
"The point is the effort. That you, believing what you believed -- what you sincerely believed, including the commandment 'thou shalt not kill' -- acted upon it. To believe, to act, and to have events confound you--I grant you, that is hard to bear. But to believe, and not to act ... That is what would have been reprehensible." (p. 258)

Louisa May Alcott's classic, Little Women, describes a year in the life of a mother and her daughters, while her husband is away serving in the Union Army. The father is absent for most of the book. In March, Geraldine Brooks brings the father's character to life and tells the story of that year from his point of view. Mr. March is a clergyman, so while he does not experience combat directly, he ministers to the wounded and dying. Initially, after a harrowing battle scene, he finds himself on a plantation that he had first encountered as a young itinerant peddler. Old relationships are rekindled, and he is reassigned to another regiment, and transported to a Southern estate under Union occupation. The slaves on this estate were under Union protection, and Mr. March was to provide them with the basics of an education. The novel's pace picks up at this point, and becomes considerably more violent as the horrors of war are revealed. March eventually lands in hospital, is visited by his wife Marmee, and returns home for Christmas just as he does in Little Women. In March we gain much more intimate knowledge of how the war scarred him, both physically and mentally, and how it affected his relationship with Marmee.

I was hooked on this story from page 1. Scenes from the American Civil War were interspersed with narrative describing how Mr. March came to be married to Marmee, their participation in the Underground Railroad, and his motivation for joining the Union army. He wrote letters from the front but, reluctant to burden his family with his daily horrors, he masked the truth. Marmee, on the other hand. felt lonely and resentful: "I am not alone in this. I only let him do to me what men have ever done to women: march off to empty glory and hollow acclaim and leave us behind to pick up the pieces." (p. 211) Their reunion was touched with both sadness and hope.

In letting her imagination run around the edges of Little Women, Brooks has written a memorable novel. Highly recommended. ( )

The Giver
Lois Lowry
179 pages

First sentence: It was almost December, and Jonas was beginning to be frightened.

Reflections: Jonas is a 12-year-old boy who lives happily with his parents and sister. He goes to school and plays with his friends, just like kids everywhere. But Jonas' world is unique in many respects. Correct word usage is of utmost importance. Families are made up of two parents, and two children -- always a boy and girl. All children experience their birthday the same day in December, through an elaborate community ceremony. When children turn 12, they are assigned their adult job during the ceremony. And the year that Jonas turns 12, he is assigned a very special role: that of The Receiver, the single member of the community who harbors all the memories of humankind.
Training for The Receiver role requires Jonas to spend time with the current Receiver, whom he now calls The Giver. The Giver is very old, and must transfer all memories to Jonas before he can be released from his responsiblities, and from the community. His gifts to Jonas are unique and special -- memories of snow and colors, for example -- and sometimes the memories are painful, such as war and death. The memories, and the deep feelings associated with them, have long been eradicated from the rest of the community in an attempt to create "sameness" among all people, and therefore harmony. Jonas and The Giver devise a plan to bring those memories back and enrich the lives of others. In carrying out this plan, Jonas himself becomes a true Giver himself.

This book packs quite a punch compared to most young adult literature. Would "sameness" really bring harmony and peace to our world? Or would it bring the emptiness pervading Jonas' community? Should we not then celebrate the differences in our world, rather than fight over them? This powerful, thought-provoking book will linger in my memory for a very long time. ( )

The Tenderness of Wolves
Stef Penney
371 pages

First sentence: The last time I saw Laurent Jammet, he was in Scott's store with a dead wolf over his shoulder.

Reflections: In the 1860s, Canada was a northern wilderness with fur traders and native people in tense coexistence. In the village of Dove River, a man is murdered. At the same time, a 17-year-old youth disappears and becomes a prime suspect in the murder. The disappearance rekindles memories of a long-ago tragedy, in which two sisters went off on a picnic and never returned. Local authorites and representatives of the Hudson Bay Company investigate the murder. And the boy's mother, Mrs. Ross, takes it upon herself to search for her son accompanied by a trapper named Parker as her guide.

Stef Penney weaves a character-driven tale of adventure and mystery. The characters are complex, and the story far from formulaic. Penney paints such a realistic picture of the frozen Canadian wilderness, that I actually felt cold and had to snuggle up in a blanket while reading. And while I did figure out one of the subplots early on, it did not mar my enjoyment of the book. This debut novel and 2006 Costa Book of the Year winner was a very enjoyable read. ( )

Interpreter of Maladies
Jhumpa Lahiri
193 pages

• A Temporary Matter – A couple mourns the loss of a stillborn baby, and begins sharing secrets with one another during a power outage. Their grief, and the void between them, is palpable.
• Sexy – Miranda, an American woman, has an affair with a married Indian man. At the same time, her office mate consoles her cousin in India, whose husband has left her for a young English woman. Miranda meets the cousin on a visit to the US and, while babysitting her son, has a revelation about her own romantic relationship.
• Mrs. Sen’s – An Indian woman has recently arrived in the US, and provides after-school care for a boy while her husband teaches at a local university. She is isolated and lonely, is afraid to drive a car, and longs for friends and comforts of home.
• The Third and Final Continent – A young man, educated in London, comes to the US to work at a university. He is recently married, and waiting for his wife’s immigration papers to be processed so she can join him. For six weeks he rents a room from Mrs. Croft, a 103-year-old woman whose daughter visits once a week to deliver food. He contemplates the woman’s infirmity and isolation, as well as his own emotional uncertainty about life as a married man.

East of Eden
John Steinbeck
600 pages

First sentence: The Salinas Valley is in Northern California

Reflections: East of Eden is an epic novel which tells the story of two interconnected families, and explores the themes of good and evil through a loose retelling of stories in the book of Genesis. It is set in Northern California in the early 1900s. Samuel Hamilton is an Irish immigrant who settled in the area and bore a large family; one of his daughters was Steinbeck's mother. Adam Trask grew up in Connecticut and, after the death of his father, moves west with his new wife Cathy. Cathy is the very embodiment of evil, yet Adam is blind to her manipulative ways. She bears twin sons, Caleb (Cal) and Aron, but leaves them as infants and goes to work in a brothel. Adam is left to raise the boys with the help of Lee, a Chinese housekeeper.

Throughout the novel, each character grapples with issues of good and evil. This is especially evident in Cal, who struggles to overcome the darker tendencies he inherited from his mother. The father-son relationships are sometimes strained and quite poignant. Steinbeck reveals the evil present in each person, while also showing the individual struggles and choices that can overcome evil.

This book was published in 1952, late in Steinbeck's career. Ten years later he was awarded the Nobel Prize, "for his realistic and imaginative writings, combining as they do sympathetic humour and keen social perception." While this book did not have as much impact on me as Grapes of Wrath, I found the story captivating and thought-provoking. ( ) 

The Road
Cormac MacCarthy
241 pages

First sentence: When he woke in the woods in the dark and the cold of the night he'd reach out to touch the child sleeping beside him.

Reflections: A man and his son set out on a journey across a country which has been destroyed in some kind of apocalyptic event. This event apparently took place several years ago, but everything is still covered in ash. No life remains in the towns, and there are usually signs of a hasty departure, of townspeople fleeing to safety. Very few were spared; bodies appear in buidings, and even in the middle of the road. It is not clear how or why the man and boy survived up to this point. Now they are on their way south, hopeful of finding a better place.

Survival skills are paramount. Bands of robbers roam the land, looting and killing. Survivors often resort to cannibalism. The contents of homes and stores have usually been ransacked by travellers and bandits. Yet the man and boy explore every building they come across. Occasionally they find something: blankets, clothes, or food. At the same time, MacCarthy's describes in great detail these once-fashionable houses, in a way that made me question why we place so much importance on our homes and other material possessions.

The man's deep love for the boy permeates every sentence in this book. The emotional intensity is evident both in their will to live and in the ways they care for one another. MacCarthy manages to convey this deep feeling through the most basic dialogue, as in this example when they have just come across a bountiful store of food:

Go ahead, he said. Don't let it get cold.
What do I eat first?
Whatever you like.
Is this coffee?
Yes. Here. You put the butter on your biscuits. Like this.
Okay.
...
Do you think we should thank the people?
The people?
The people who gave us all this.
Well. Yes, I guess we could do that.

The most haunting aspect of this book was the boy's mother's death. She apparently committed suicide when it became evident the world as she knew it would be destroyed. She preferred to end her life; the man chose to remain with his son and try to survive. When considering what path I would choose, I realized how difficult this decision could be. There really is no correct answer.

This is a beautifully-written book that will remain with me for a very long time. ( )

46 / 50 (92.0%)

The Optimist's Daughter
Eudora Welty
180 pages

First sentence: A nurse held the door open for them.

Reflections: The Optimist's Daughter won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973, and is a short but stunning work. Set primarily in Mississippi, it's the story of Laurel McKelva Hand, currently living in Chicago, visiting the South where her father is failing. Judge McKelva was a pillar of his community. After the death of his first wife (Laurel's mother), he remarried a woman younger than Laurel herself. Welty, through small but significant descriptions of second wife Fay, makes the reader despise her in the first few pages. She is introduced on page 1 when Fay, Laurel, and the Judge are meeting with a doctor about the Judge's condition: "Fay, small and pale in her dress with the gold buttons, was tapping her sandaled foot." And two pages later, as the Judge is describing his medical problem: "Fay laughed -- a single, high note, as derisive as a jay's."

Laurel and Fay are forced together as the Judge's condition deteriorates, and he subsequently passes away. Fay is tremendously put out by his death, since it happens on her birthday. After the funeral she leaves town to be with her family. Laurel remains to sort through some of her father's effects and, since Fay has inherited the house, to remove memories of her mother, which she knows Fay will not respect.

Welty's writing is beautiful throughout, evoking a strong "sense of place". Here are just a few examples:

"The ancient porter was already rolling his iron-wheeled wagon to meet the baggage car, before the train halted. All six of Laurel's bridesmaids, as they still called themselves, were waiting on the station platform."

"The procession passed between ironwork gates whose kneeling angles and looping vines shone black as licorice."

"The gooseneck lamp threw its dimmed beam on the secretary's warm brown doors. It had been made of the cherry trees on the McKelva place a long time ago; on the lid, the numerals 1817 had been set into a not quite perfect oval of different wood, something smooth and yellow as a scrap of satin."

I was fully immersed in this book; wrapped in a blanket of beautiful prose.  I will likely read more of Welty's work.  ( )

41 / 50 (82.0%)

Invisible Man
Ralph Ellison
581 pages

First sentence: I am an invisible man

Reflections: Invisible Man was first published in 1947, and won the National Book Award in 1953. It is, essentially, a young black man's search for identity in white American society, long before Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. made his mark. The nameless main character has a series of experiences on his quest, reminiscent of Homer's Odyssey(there's even a "cyclops": at one point it's revealed that a larger-than-life character actually has only one eye!). He sets out on his journey remembering his grandfather's dying words: "Son, after I'm gone I want you to keep up the good fight. I never told you, but our life is a war and I have been a traitor all my born days, a spy in the enemy's country ever since I give up my gun back in the Reconstruction. ... I want you to overcome 'em with yeses, undermine 'em with grins, agree ' em to death and destruction, let 'em swoller you till they vomit or bust wide open."

Ellison portrays the characters, his life experiences, and various acts of racism in great, descriptive detail. The protagonist begins his quest on departure from an historically black college located in the Deep South, where the president acts subservient to white benefactors. He experiences more overt acts of racism finding employment in Harlem, and eventually becomes an activist member of a political movement. It appears he is accepted for his gift of oratory, but in reality he is being used by the white leaders of the movement to further their hidden agendas. He eventually realizes that as a black man he is invisible to whites, he simply doesn't matter.

Reading Invisible Man, I reflected on the "invisibility" of African Americans still today. Lincoln University, an historically black university, is only a few miles from my house. Over more than 150 years, Lincoln has produced notable alumni like Langston Hughes and Thurgood Marshall. Yet it is virtually invisible to the surrounding community, which is comprised of farms and housing developments, and is predominantly white. There are few public events, and rarely do I see Lincoln students in our local shops. However, there is one incident that haunts me, and makes me ashamed of the community I live in. One hot summer evening, we went to the local Dairy Queen. While there, a Lincoln University van drove up and several students came into the DQ, ordering ice cream and taking seats at a group of tables. Other customers came into the store, and every single one placed their order, and nonchalantly strode outdoors to eat their ice cream. I was appalled. We have such a long way to go to achieve equality and community.

I wanted to be enthralled by this book and unfortunately, I wasn't. Yet considering the times in which it was written, it is a bold piece of literature and an important, thought-provoking book.

33 / 50 (66.0%)

12,442 / 15,000 (82.9%)