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Books Previously Recommended by Laura
The Country Under My Skin by Gioconda Belli
This
summer, Nicaraguans are celebrating the 30th anniversary of the
Sandinista Revolution. I’m celebrating one of my favourite books.
The
Country Under My Skin: A Memoir of Love and War
is the fearlessly written autobiography of Gioconda Belli, a woman who
knew the Sandinista rebel movement from the inside out. Inspired by radio
broadcasts from Che Guevara as a little girl, she grew up to be a
revolutionary herself, maintaining her upper-class job at an advertising
agency during the day and acting as a subversive Sandinista at night. Belli kept me on the edge throughout the book, and
her tales of secret missions, love affairs with comandantes and
encounters with the Castros left me holding my breath. I was fascinated
by her multidimensionality and her ability to move from role to role:
passionate lover, gentle mother, secretive spy, strong-willed feminist,
eloquent poet, and Nicaraguan through-and-through. Above all, The
Country Under My Skin brings the Contra War to life and delivers a
rich history of 20th century Nicaragua. I can promise
that the country will get under your skin, too.
Thirteen Little Blue Envelopes by Maureen Johnson
Every teenager's dream is to travel to Europe-to leave the schoolwork
behind, pack their life into a backpack that is heavier than they are, and
go find themselves in a fishing village in France. I haven't managed to do
that in my year off from school...but at least I'm working in a great
little bookstore and can comfort myself with an adventurous book about
someone who did! The story begins with the shocking news of Aunt Peg's
death. Ginny and her family didn't know that she had brain cancer-they
only knew her as a healthy, free-spirited artist, full of life and
surprises. But Peg's sudden death is not her last surprise. She has also
left Ginny with a mysterious package containing 13 little blue envelopes
and a set of instructions that will guide her on her aunt's path through
Europe. Here's the catch: Ginny can only take what fits in her backpack
(minus all money, language help books, and electronics!), and she must
complete the task in each envelope before opening the next. Following
Peg's footsteps from England to Greece, Ginny meets gurus and artists,
falls in love, learns about her aunt's mysterious death, and finds her own
inner free spirit. For all those teens who are facing the start of school
and wishing they had gotten a little more adventure out of their vacation,
enjoy 13 Little Blue Envelopes! It's a great, fast-paced read that will
inspire you between homework assignments this fall. Red Bird by Mary Oliver
"Red bird came all winter / firing up
the landscape / as nothing else could." So begins Mary Oliver's
twelfth book of poetry, and the image of that fiery bird stays with
the reader, appearing in unexpected forms and guises until,
in a postscript, he explains himself: "For truly the body needs / a
song, a spirit, a soul. And no less, to make this work, / the soul
has need of a body, / and I am both of the earth and I am of the
inexplicable / beauty of heaven / where I fly so easily, so welcome,
yes, / and this is why I have been sent, to teach this to your
heart."
This collection of sixty-one new poems,
the most ever in a single volume of Oliver's work, includes an
entirely new direction in the poet's work: a cycle of eleven linked
love poems-a dazzling achievement. As in all of Mary Oliver's work,
the pages overflow with her keen observation of the natural world
and her gratitude for its gifts, for the many people she has loved
in her seventy years, as well as for her disobedient dog, Percy. But
here, too, the poet's attention turns with ferocity to the
degradation of the Earth and the denigration of the peoples of the
world by those who love power. Red Bird is unquestionably Mary
Oliver's most wide-ranging volume to date. |
