Around the World in 8 Months: Orbis Terrarum Reading Challenge
Welcome to Orbis Terrarum 2010!!!
This is year 3 of our big adventure. There are some different things going on this year, so read up.
Orbis Terrarum 2010 Challenge Rules:
*The Orbis Terrarum Challenge begins April,1st 2010(you are welcome to join later) through the month of November.
*For the challenge each reader is to choose 8 books (for the 8 months of the challenge).
*Each book must from a different country, I have decided to go by the country of origin of the author, or the country he/she lives in is fine as well-meaning NOT the country the book is set in!!
*You don't have to have a list, that means you can change your mind at any time. As long as there are 8 books you have completed the challenge.
What is different about this year in the Orbis Terrarum Challenge?? Well, there are some differences I think you will like, the above rules stay the same, but there are some options for your reading that I would like each challenger to consider.
1.) It has its own site, a part of my blog where I have much more freedom than on the old blogger site, check it out!!!
2.) This year I am allowing all the books to be from the same country and by the same author (although I would have you not choose your OWN country, because this challenge is meant to expose you to the world not your neighborhood!) For example, if you would like to focus on South Africa because you have an intrest in that then you can read all your books from that nation if you want.
3.) I want you to worry not about me putting up a post each month where you post your reviews, but that you'd post them in the appropriate continent location as you read along. These can be found by clicking on the images to the right. It has been a nightmare to try to organize these on my own, so I am asking (BEGGING) you to please first make sure your author’s country is listed in that particular Continent list, then include the nation of origin (or where he/she resides or resided or if you are choosing to go with where the author was born) of the author, as well as the title of the book. For example: (Absent by Khedairi- Iraq)or (Half of a Yellow Sun – Nigeria)
4.) The 2010 Orbis Terrarum Challengers Raising Funds for Clean Water Worldwide (optional!)
I am a big believer in not just reading about what is going on in the world, but about doing something about it. For this reason I am going to be reading away for Living Water International during the challenge and donating an amount per book. I also ask that you consider doing the same. If every one of us just gave $1 per book we read during the challenge, that is only 8 dollars, but if we all did it it that would be a good amount (last year we had 74 challengers, reading 8 books= $592 !)
You can make your donations directly by going to the Orbis Terrarum Challenge Fundraiser page. (They will send you a receipt for your tax deductible donation directly) Or by clicking the widget in the upper right of this challenge's page.
I'll post again on this soon.
However, you don't need to feel obligated to donate!!
Who wants to join in the Orbis Terrarum Challenge for 2010 (add your link below)?? Feel free to post about this challenge on your blog so that we can gather more international book travelers!!!
How to join??
1.) Sign Up here
2.) Write up a post about it on your blog so that your friends can join you. (feel free to use either of the buttons at the top of this post)
3.) Get a readin'!!! 
4.) Post a link to your review in the appropriate continent (click on images to the right).
5.) Contact me with any questions or comments.
SIGN UP for the Orbis Terrarum Reading Challenge here!!!! (still working with the site, let me know if something is off-I'd so appreciate it!)
Plants Don’t Drink Coffee
Plants Don't Drink Coffee
by Unai Elorriaga (in original Basque)
Translated by Amaia Gabantxo
208 Pages
Fiction
Archipelago Books
July 2009
In Plants Don't Drink Coffee the reader follows the story of four very diverse yet intersecting people while enjoying a ride of lightheartedness and depth. Tomas a young boy with the desire above all else to be intelligent, is the star of this novel or maybe one of the stars. He is precocious and witty and incredibly funny to read. When reading his thoughts you can hear him saying these things in a pre-adolescent, high-pitched and non-stopping excited sort of way. There is a main story which unites all four people that is clever and has a mystery feel to it, or adventure.
This book for me was a complete success. Unai did everything right in his writing and the translation was incredible as well (by Amaia Gabantxo). It was one of those books where you feel the need to keep reading it through the chapter breaks, and every time you sit down you want to lap it up. Reading about the Basque culture was very interesting to me, as it is a people group that intrigues me in their strength and resourcefulness.
I took this with me on the plane on my trip to Spain and it was the perfect read to keep my attention all through the long hours of sleeplessness on the plane, and then to help me pass some of my jet lag mid-night reading sessions after we arrived. Plants Don't Drink Coffee never failed to impress me, I loved most the honesty of the voice, the transparency of failures, the clever voice of a child and the witty actions of everyone. It is one of the best books I have read this year. Loved it.
It is my honour to bestow upon Plants Don't Drink Coffee my 'can't cluck enough' chicken award!
Secret Son
Secret Son
by Laila Lalami
291 pages
Fiction, International Fiction, Morocco
Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill
13, April 2009
An illegitimate son living in the slums comes to know that the story of his life is a lie, his father wasn't killed, and his mother is not a widow, but he was shielded from the truth. Set in Morocco, there is a difference in class systems and Laila Lalami captures the heart of this barrier with great depth. Her writing is pretty, practical and always honest, even when it hurts. There is one specific part where the son, Youssef narrates a chapter and in the subsequent chapter his new found wealthy father narrates that same time from his perspective, I loved that!
As in so much of the world, whether seen and spoken or ignored classes exist and the reprocutions of these systems are brought to life in Secret Son. This is a battle of the classes at its best. A son who should have lived the life of absurd luxury that his father is living, dinning on $300 plates of seafood, but because his mother was a maid he lives in the slums and they attempt to make ends meet. Will the wealth of his father entice Youssef to leave the mother who stuck by his side and had to forsake her entire family in order to keep him?
This is a book of relationships, dreams and the desire to make something of oneself, however most importantly it is of family, and the ties and bonds that hold us tight even after years and years of separation.
I enjoyed this read, but not as much as I started out to. Somehow there was a downturn three fourths of the way through, the story seemed to switch gears and become more political, less personal and I was lost in the mix. I did like the book, I just thought when I started out that I was going to love it and that was not the case. However because there are so many aspects of the book that severely intrigued me I do feel it is a good read. I went to Morocco when I was in high school, I am interested in the different class systems around the world, I love reading internationally and I am all about relationships in books and plots that twist around and around. If those are subjects you feel a drawn towards, you should check out Secret Son by Laila Lalami.
Laila Lalami's website
Blog filled with cool stuff and tour dates
Laila Lalami Author Book Event at Powell's Books:
Laila Lalami, the author of Secret Son was at Powell's and I was able to get up there with Alyce from At Home With Books to the author event. It was such fun, there were people asking weird questions during the Q&A (and I mean REALLY weird questions, that had nothing to do with the book!) and much more to laugh about. Laila Lalami was so sweet...even after I blurted that I had been to Morocco and didn't really love it. What is my deal!? I can't help but let the truth explode from my mouth. AHHH!
Of course, you know me by now, photos are a must!
If you haven't seen the Powell's Books podium...believe me it is the craziest podium ever. HUGE!
Laila was so sweet, very personable and just my size! (A big thank you to Alyce for these photos!!!)
Alyce got found some books to take home, she was a blast to hang with. Too fun.
Book Review: The Cellist of Sarajevo
The Cellist of Sarajevo
by Steven Galloway
256 pages
International fiction
Riverhead Books
March 2009
Living is very different when your life is under constant threat, when each time you leave the house you run, knowing you are observed and are very much a walking target. In these situations life takes on a whole value. What is important enough to actually put your life in their hands for? Then you wonder when it became an act of bravery to cross the threshold of your door. This is the everyday life, the new normal for those in Sarajevo during the siege. The Cellist of Sarajevo is a novel based on a non-fictional siege, and a non-fictional well known local cellist, Vase Smailovic a who played Albinoni's Adagio in G Minor for twenty-two days as a tribute to those who had been killed while standing in line waiting to buy bread. During this twenty-two day period not only is Sarajevo the cellist's audience, but the audience extends far beyond the well guarded borders of even Sarajevo itself, the world is his audience.
In a nation that is being torn apart, what will make those in the city stop and see that there still is anything worth living for? Society is not buildings, it is not libraries, or community halls-those are the shells that societies leave behind, the remnants and evidence that the people were there working together. Society is a community, the relationships held between people, and an understanding of an acceptable way to treat one another. When that society is under attack, a new normal emerges for its civilians, a new acceptable way to interact with others which is more an instinct than an interaction. When society as we know it falls apart and there are no longer any rules to how we should act, it is from within us that our actions arise. Those actions will prove a person to be a man or woman of courage and heart, or a human who only lives to protect itself.
The Cellist plays, and it is not he that is the focus in this novel, but those he impacts, his audience. There are three main characters which the narrator follows on their daily routine and of which the reader learns their thoughts and fears. Music, as all forms of art, inspires people to continue on, to hope for a future in a better world, and even to remember the past. Every day during the twenty-two day tribute, the Cellist was giving an outdoor concert- the notes rising amongst the broken buildings, the burnt down libraries, and mending the dreams and hearts of the broken people. And yet, that is just the starting point of this novel- it is what those three characters do with the hope that has been given them that caries the musical notes beyond just the listeners who were inspired.
To read more about the period of the Sarajevo Conflict, please check out my review of Sarajevo Marlboro by Miljenko Jergovic .
Powell's Books Event:
Steven Galloway author of The Cellist of Sarajevo
I could not believe my luck when I saw that Steven Galloway was to be at Powell's Books! I was so blessed to go to that event last night. Brad (B) and I both got to go up and enjoy the full experience. We both knew that meeting the author could actually scar our already high opinion of the book somewhat, if the person who wrote the book is arrogant and rude, it does make it harder to love the book just as much. Don't you agree? However it was not an issue, as we came away delighted that he was an amazing person as well as writer, he was funny, clever, and very sweet. Like my grandma would have said " he had a good head on his shoulders!", and I am a believer in good heads. 
It was also really, super fun to meet up with Ali from Worducopia at the reading and chat a bit afterwords, but I thought she was in some of the pictures, but she seems to have escaped out of them! I'll get her next time.
My favourite quote from the author Steven Galloway was when telling us how he has a short attention span and it really freaks publishers out because they never know what to expect, he remarks, "You know, I wish I could write a good sexy werewolf novel. That is where the money is! I apologize though, if any of you are sexy werewolves that was not meant to offend". Yes, we were all laughing!
I got so shy when I met the author that all I could do was say, "My-favourite-character-was-Arrow. I-am-a-book-reviewer-and-really-loved-your-book!" Seriously, somebody HELP ME! I need to take boldness pills for next time.
Author Website: Steven Galloway
Flick Review: Slumdog Millionaire
Slumdog Millionaire (India)
Written by Vikas Swarup (novel) and Simon Beaufoy (screenplay)
Directed by Danny Boyle and Loveleen Tandan (co-director: India)
Awards, 8 Oscars as well as 71 other awards and 26 nominations (see here for complete list)
Released: 23 January 2009 (USA)
The Mumbai slums kid Jamal K. Malik (actor Dev Patel), possesses only the answers- nothing more. He is honest even if it will kill him despite his harsh life experiences. Jamal makes it to the Indian version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?". The film flashes back and forth between how he knows the answers, each being a gruesome experience (death, tyranny, betrayal) but each enables him to commit a fact to memory thus enabling him to answer another question correctly. Because of his success on the TV show his is thought to be a fraud, a cheat. For that reason he is interrogated, and with each blow any onlooker (as well as the interrogators) can see that this is no regular teen, his inner strength awes with a jaw-dropping force.
Love is a key element in Slumdog Millionaire. Jamal is loyal and faithful in his pursuit of one unattainable girl Latika (Actress Frieda Pinto)as children, as youths and still as teens. He encounters her over and over throughout their young lives only to have her taken from him just a second too soon. Are they meant to be, is it destiny?
I saw this movie almost a week ago and I can't stop thinking about it. I can't. I loved it on so many levels. I hated the violence, and it wasn't Hollywood violence, it was street kid raw gore. I disliked the villains in this film and that they made it their life goal to destroy Jamal, who I loved from the first second I saw him. As harsh as his past is, he becomes beautiful despite it, I am a believer. Oh, and the music is really fun!
Slumdog Millionaire easily earns a full-on 100% recommendation from me. I saw it in the theater and I will buy it when I see it out on DVD. My only slight warning is that if you can't handle violence, well you still should go, just be sure to cover your eyes, and go with someone who can nudge you when it is time to look again. It didn't bother me, but I was allowed to watch Die Hard as a 7-year-old. It is written: THIS IS AN ABSOLUTE MUST SEE.
Slumdog Millionaire trailer:
I reviewed this film as part of the Orbis Terarrum Film Challenge.
Other Books I've read and reviewed about India:
Bitter Sweets by Roopa Farooki
The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai
The Septembers of Shiraz by Dalia Sofer
Slumdog Millionaire
Slumdog Millionaire (India)
Written by Vikas Swarup (novel) and Simon Beaufoy (screenplay)
Directed by Danny Boyle and Loveleen Tandan (co-director: India)
Awards, 8 Oscars as well as 71 other awards and 26 nominations (see here for complete list)
Released: 23 January 2009 (USA)
The Mumbai slums kid Jamal K. Malik (actor Dev Patel), possesses only the answers- nothing more. He is honest even if it will kill him despite his harsh life experiences. Jamal makes it to the Indian version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?". The film flashes back and forth between how he knows the answers, each being a gruesome experience (death, tyranny, betrayal) but each enables him to commit a fact to memory thus enabling him to answer another question correctly. Because of his success on the TV show his is thought to be a fraud, a cheat. For that reason he is interrogated, and with each blow any onlooker (as well as the interrogators) can see that this is no regular teen, his inner strength awes with a jaw-dropping force.
Love is a key element in Slumdog Millionaire. Jamal is loyal and faithful in his pursuit of one unattainable girl Latika (Actress Frieda Pinto)as children, as youths and still as teens. He encounters her over and over throughout their young lives only to have her taken from him just a second too soon. Are they meant to be, is it destiny?
I saw this movie almost a week ago and I can't stop thinking about it. I can't. I loved it on so many levels. I hated the violence, and it wasn't Hollywood violence, it was street kid raw gore. I disliked the villains in this film and that they made it their life goal to destroy Jamal, who I loved from the first second I saw him. As harsh as his past is, he becomes beautiful despite it, I am a believer. Oh, and the music is really fun!
Slumdog Millionaire easily earns a full-on 100% recommendation from me. I saw it in the theater and I will buy it when I see it out on DVD. My only slight warning is that if you can't handle violence, well you still should go, just be sure to cover your eyes, and go with someone who can nudge you when it is time to look again. It didn't bother me, but I was allowed to watch Die Hard as a 7-year-old. It is written: THIS IS AN ABSOLUTE MUST SEE.
Slumdog Millionaire trailer:
I reviewed this film as part of the Orbis Terarrum Film Challenge.
The Orbis Terrarum Challenge of 2009
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I am exceedingly proud to announce that today is the 1st of March, and the beginning of my favourite Book Challenge! I could be a little (just a liiiiittle) biased since it is my challenge, but I just love it So many of you from last time signed up, and now we are adding more and more challengers. Head on over to Orbis Terrarum Challenge Blog and see which challenges you are interested in. This year it has multiplied exponentially, check it out:
The Orbis Terrarum Challenge
Your mission, should you choose to accept: read 10 different books, written by 10 different authors, from 10 different countries in 10 months.
The Orbis Terrarum Film Challenge
This will be a blast and a great break from reading: this challenge is to watch 10 films, 10 different countries, by 10 different directors in the 10 months.
The Orbis Terrarum Bilingual Challenge
This challenge has several different options based on how bilingual you are, check out the link for the options, but really this is one that most would be able to stretch themselves to accomplish.
The Orbis Terrarum Poetry Challenge
In which you may consider yourself challenged to read 5 poems or poetry collections, by 5 different authors, from 5 different countries.
What do you think? I think it is time for you to join in!
This year the Orbis Terrarum Challenge (and all its other challenges) has its own blog, you'd better head yourself over there for some amazing insight into new worlds, new books and new friends!
Oh, and this little project took me and my little OT elves (Richard, Corinne, Ramya, and Trish) a million years to put together, I hope a conglomerate list of all the reviews to date helps! Check out, Books Reviewed by Orbis Terrarum Challengers listed by country.
Very happy travels people!!
The God of Small Things
The God of Small Things
by Arundhati Roy
322 Pages
International Fiction
Winner of the Booker Prize
Set in India, where fate journeys amongst a family, and a set of twins. Roy using poetry-like prose takes the reader to a place of mystery and magic, superstition and pain. The storyline is not straightforward, but weaves and hops and jumps around complicating the impact of its plot. Good, okay...but nothing near great.
My take on this? I didn't like it. I wanted to, I like liking international fiction but this was too dark, to sad, too much to handle. Not even that much bad happened in the book, but nothing good ever did take place.
I can see that her writing is amazing, but Roy seems to go too far to show that she can write at the expense of plot and depth of character. It is not personable at all. I didn't connect to a single character. I think Roy should write poetry instead. I wish I had a better review to give. This is an award winning book, but I don't really see how.
Sorry guys!
Give me your thoughts, did you like it? When did you read it? Did you feel you connected with the characters and followed the plot? I had to do so much re-reading because either my mind would wander, or I would just not understand what was going on....not a book for me.
Book Review: Beasts of No Nation
Author Photo by Seth Wening
Title: Beasts of No Nation
Author: Uzodinma Iweala
Pages: 176
Yearly Count: 70
Awards:
- The Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction
- Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction from the American Academy of Arts and Letters
- First-Place Winner of the 2005 2005 Discover Award, Fiction
- The Best Book of the Year by Time, People and Slate Entertainment Weekly New York Magazine
A boy soldier, Agu, a child of a nondescript age (between 9 and 12) and from an unnamed West African Nation, speaks forth of the reality of child soldiers everywhere. Written as a novel, Iweala has taken bits and pieces of child solders worldwide, and formed a conglomerate child soldier in his character Agu. Beasts of No Nation is filled with their inner thoughts, their heartbreaks, and what they are asked to do. Agu's own morals, ethics and survival take a backseat to the desires of his leaders, who all in all are only different degrees of jaded and violent in this war of confusion.
I read this during the read-a-thon, and I was impressed with the writing, the detail and the thoughts it stirred, but it was really hard to read about. I have become even more impressed with this novel after I read it and it settled in and I realized that the author wrote it when he was 23 years old. Inner war of the conscience plays a large part in Beasts of No Nation, of what Agu was taught, and what he is now forced to live. He was brought up going to church, reading the Bible, and now he feels nothing could be further from the beast he has become. This approach of conscience that Iweala used brought me inside Agu, to the thoughts and debates going on inside this child soldier, and really helped me feel a connection to him. Despite his outward actions of war and savage acts forced upon him, inside the war was just as strong, a battle of will, conscience and ultimately survival.
Commandant is shouting, but I am hearing him like he is speaking through one big bag of cotton. He is saying, let us pray, let us pray and then he is asking the Lord to be guiding us in everything we are about to be doing. I am thinking that we should not even be asking God for anything because it is like he is forgetting us. I am trying to forget Him anyway even if my mother would not be happying with me. She is always saying to fear God and to always be going to church on Sunday, but now I am not even knowing what day is Sunday (p. 44).
Author information I found interesting:
Stop Trying to 'Save' Africa article in the Washington Post by Uzodinma Iweala
Uzodinma Iweala Article in The Morning News
Galley Girl Catches up With Uzodinma Iweala Article in Time
I Don't Ever Want to Sit Back, Michelle Pauli, of Guardian interviews Uzodinma Iweala
Book Review: The Septembers of Shiraz
The Septembers of Shiraz
by Dalia Sofer
International Fiction
Pages: 338
I have already told you that I am Iran obsessed, right? Not just Iran, but also Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka...well, maybe just internationally obsessed. But this is the 4 book I have read from/ about Iran this year! I can't get enough, just can't. Okay on to the book!
After the Iranian revolution, the jewel dealer Isaac Amin is taken, arrested and does not know why other than that he is a Jew, with a family connection to Israel. Even though it would seems so, this is not a book of simply a prisoner wrongly accused. Isaac narrates some chapters and the others are narrated by the other members of his family, his wife, his young daughter and his son who is trying to make it in America. I felt that the interweaving of the different voices really made the novel. It broke up the prison scenes and showed life at the same time.
This was a great one. I loved reading it, and I loved thinking about the life of the people who lived in it. The writing is excellent, and I enjoyed the style as well. I have read that other bloggers thought the book emotionless, as if all the book were told in the same tone. I do not agree, I actually relied on the steady words of the narrators, on the calm tone of the pages. I felt that it was a voice of hope, that life will go on, things will change and suffering will be had, and yet there is a steady part in it all, a resiliency. I loved the voice of this novel.
I highly recommend The Septembers of Shiraz, uber-powerful book of resiliency in the midst of insanity. I wouldn't be surprised it something big happens with this one (ie a prize, a movie deal....you know something cool). enjoy.
Make sure to enter my GIVEAWAY of BELONGING!!
Did you review this too? Give me your link to post here
Also reviewed by:
Softdrink at Fizzy Thoughts
