I’m surprised that I made it through my childhood without reading A Little Princess (1905) by Frances Hodgson Burnett. I did remember watching the 1995 movie when I was babysitting, and I cried like a baby at the end. I guess it never occurred to me to read the book until I saw it on my List of 50 Books Every Woman Should Read Before She Turns 40, which will be dominating my reading for the next four months or so. Sara Crewe is a precocious and imaginative […]
All my life I had to fight
The Color Purple (1982) by Alice Walker was one of the books from my list of 50 Books Every Woman Should Read Before She Turns 40 that I was kind of dreading. I was not very familiar with the story, and I’d never seen the movie, but I’d obviously heard of it. I had a vague idea that it was violent, disturbing, and that horrible things happened to the protagonist. Also, for some reason I had the impression that it took place during slavery, and I just wasn’t […]
Meh
My book club chose Nine Women, One Dress (2016) by Jane L. Rosen as our latest book. It looked like a short and easy read, and I was hopeful that I would enjoy it. You can probably get a good guess at the plot from the title. There is one little, black dress of the season that significantly affects nine women’s lives. Some of the stories were entertaining, and Rosen did a good job of weaving the dress through her characters’ lives. I really enjoyed the beginning […]
Memoir and misogyny
I picked up The Woman Warrior (1976) by Maxine Hong Kingston because it was on my list of 50 Books Every Woman Should Read Before She Turns 40 and it looked relatively short. I thought it would be good to read while on my backpacking trip. Unfortunately, this book was a little hard to follow at times, so reading on my phone, in my tent, wasn’t the best option. I also discovered that even when my phone is on airplane mode, it apparently knows when my Kindle books need […]