Out Stealing Horses

Out Stealing Horses by Per Petterson is the first book I read for the Scandinavian Reading Challenge 2010 hosted by The Black Sheep Dances. If you would like to participate, visit her blog. I would recommend this book as a wonderful place to start your exploration of Scandinavian literature and, while they cannot count for the challenge because I had read them earlier, here are two other books that I really loved that meet the criteria: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and Astrid and Veronika. I enjoyed all three books and am anxious to find my next Scandinavian book to read. If you have any suggestions, please leave me a comment.


Now on to my review of Out Stealing Horses. When I was a teen, I loved Henry David Thoreau's Walden and this book reminded me of how Walden made me think and feel about nature. Even if the story told by Petterson had not been engaging, I would have read on to try to capture that feeling of being one with nature.

The novel begins with Trond Sander, our near seventy year old narrator, working on a cabin in the woods in Norway. He is retired and his wife has died so he chose to leave his life behind and move to a cabin where his nearest neighbor, Lars, brings back memories of his youth with his father. Together Trond and his father visited this same area in the 1940s where they worked with locals to fell trees and float them to a sawmill. The story bounces back and forth between these times and over the course of the novel, the reader is drawn into both.

In the present time, Trond hoped to escape his own life to dwell in peace in the woods and depending only on himself. In the past, the reader learns with Trond that his father is part of a resistance movement smuggling Jews from Norway to Sweden. There are other secrets which I will not share - you will need to read the book to learn them.

In the end, Trond finds forgiveness within himself and welcomes the companionship of his daughter but continues to live in solitude, no longer feeling such pangs of lonliness. I loved every minute of this book.

TITLE: Out Stealing Horses
AUTHOR: Per Petterson
TRANSLATOR: Anne Born
COPYRIGHT: 2005 (English translation)
PAGES: 238
TYPE: fiction
RECOMMEND: I loved this book mostly because it reminded me that solitude is not lonely, rather it can be silence for the soul.
AWARDS: British Independent Foreign Fiction Prize (2006), International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award (2007)

Book Blogger Hop

Please visit Crazy for Books to add your link! It is a wonderful way to find new book blogs to read. I hope that you will also leave a link for me so I can come visit you if I have missed your link on the original post. Happy Friday to all! Here are the basic instructions:

ABOUT THE HOP:
In the spirit of the Friday Follow, I thought it would be cool to do a Book Blogger Hop to give us all book bloggers and readers a chance to connect and find new blogs that we may be missing out on! So, I created this weekly BOOK PARTY where book bloggers and readers can connect to find new blogs to read, make new friends, support each other, and generally just share our love of books! It will also give blog readers a chance to find other book blogs that they may not know existed! So, grab the logo, post about the Hop on your blog, and start PARTYING!!

Your blog should have content related to books, including, but not limited to book reviews.

If you start following someone through the Hop, leave a comment on their blog to let them know! Stop back during the week to see other blogs that are added! And, most importantly, the idea is to HAVE FUN!! Back to the top to visit Crazy for Books!

Island of the Blue Dolphins

I participate in a group blog ~ The Newbery Project ~ where we all read Newbery Award books with the hope of reading all of them one day! If you are a teacher or a mother, you might enjoy reading about these wonderful and historical books.
I remember when my children read Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O'Dell. It was many years ago but I still remember that my daughter cried while my oldest son tried not to cry. So I remember it as a sad book because a dog dies.

It is much more than that. This book was awarded the Newbery Medal in 1961. I was only eight years old and I wonder why (or if) I did not read the book. This was published in a time of women's liberation in the United States. I don't know that I would say that liberation is what this book is about, but certainly Karana moved outside female cultural roles as she survived alone on an island off the coast of California.

The book is based on the life of a real woman who lived alone on the island of San Nicolas from 1835 to 1853. She was named Juana Maria by a priest who was with her when she died only seven weeks after she was rescued by George Nidever. She is buried at the Santa Barbara Mission in California. To learn more, click HERE.


In Island of the Blue Dolphins, our heroine Karana stays behind on her island after the Aleuts killed many of the men of her tribe and the others had left on a large ship. She stayed because she could not find her brother on the ship. After her brother's traumatic death, Karana lives alone on the island. O'Dell uses imagery to help the reader visualize how Karana takes care of herself and the island. A strong girl, Karana does what she must do to survive. In the end, she has experienced joy and sorrow on the island. I liked the story and feel the students would as well.




TITLE: Island of the Blue Dolphins
AUTHOR: Scott O'Dell
COPYRIGHT: 2006
PAGES: 184
TYPE: fiction
RECOMMEND: I would recommend this to Middle School children who are naturalists (no matter what your definition) or for girls who need to learn that they can do anything they wish to do.

Teaser Tuesday

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

Grab your current read
Open to a random page
Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!


My teaser is from the book Out Stealing Horses by Per Petterson (translated from the Dutch by Anne Born):

Outside, the blue hour has arrived. Everything draws closer; the shed, the edge of the wood, the lake beyond the trees, it is as if the tinted air binds the world together and there is nothing disconnected out there. p. 91


This is a beautiful book by Norwegian author Per Petterson (in his former life, he was a librarian!). And stealing horses is not what we think here in the US of A - rather it means to go ride some "borrowed" horses and then, of course, take them back to their home. While many may find this a melancholy book, I find it has a sweet sadness to it that is comforting. I hope to finish the book tonight, so look for a review soon. BTW, thanks to The Black Sheep who is hosting a Scandinavian Reading Challenge - otherwise I would never have found this book. I look forward to reading others by this author. If you would like to participate in the challenge, just visit her blog and sign up. It is only six books by the end of the year and if they are all as good as this one - it will be a snap!

Sunday Sidelines

Good morning and happy spring Sunday to all. This weekend has been about flowers at our house. It all started because a friend gave us a very small moon flower. We nurtured it in the house forever - not because we had to - because we were lazy, err slow? Anyway, we wanted to see these large white blooms that we heard about - they only bloom at night, so we decided it was time to send this small plant to the real world. And of course this became a production. Here are some photos - hard to believe these five small pots of flowers took us all morning!



The moon flower is the leafy plant in the back of the square planter. We had to put a mini-arbor type thing in the back of the planter because moon plants like to climb. My favorite at this point is the red and white flower in the flower flowerpot. It is really beautiful to see. Maybe next weekend we will be able to do more.








I hope that you will take the time to read some book reviews of Holocaust Resources for children:
Angel Girl - A controversial story


A Family Secret - A graphic novel

And maybe come by and tell me about your week!

Friday and Book Blog Hop

Crazy for Books hosts a regular Blog Hop and this week it is a Book Blog Hop!!! She provides a Mr. Linky place for everyone to sign in and over the week participants try to visit as many blogs as possible. Perfect way to find new blogs to read...for that matter, a perfect way to find new books to add to our wish lists! Be sure to check it out! And if you are visiting here for the first time, Welcome!

An Unfinished Score

Let me begin this review with thanks to Unbridled Books for providing me with the opportunity to read and review this book. An Unfinished Score by Elise Blackwell is the first thing I have ever read that made me wish I had paid closer attention in freshman Music Class! Even so my lack of musical memory did nothing to diminish my enjoyment of this lyrically written and multi-layered novel.

The novel begins as viola player, Suzanne, learns that her lover, music conductor Alex, has died. The drama begins early as Suzanne hears this news over the radio while preparing dinner for her husband Ben and her best friend Petra. Although the adults in her life seem not to notice immediately that something is wrong with her, Petra's daughter Adele who was deaf from birth and loves Suzanne as she loves her mother is more attuned to the nuances of unspoken emotion. Except for Adele, music is what binds this group of people who share a home. As she moves through her grief, Suzanne remembers other losses which led her to Alex and away from her husband and friend.

For Suzanne, the loss of her lover Alex is at the core of who she will be. Even more so when Alex's widow blackmails her to complete a score Alex had begun before his death. The reader reminisces with Suzanne as she remembers her affair with Alex. We also struggle with her as she attempts to complete a score which makes little sense to her, causing her to question what she knew about her lover.

Had I not cared about the characters in the book, I would still have continued reading to experience the emotion of music that is expressed on nearly every page. Not capable of playing an instrument myself, I was mesmerized by the feelings of the composer, player, and listener.

Ultimately to me this is a novel of opposites and how they come together - the past and the future, the composer and the performer, the meaning and the interpretation. The reader is asked to consider these things as the novel comes to a startling conclusion. If I have time this summer, I plan to read the book again with my computer and headphones so I can stop and lister to each composition which is lovingly mentioned by Suzanne, Alex, Ben, Petra, and a wonderful group of supporting characters!

TITLE: An Unfinished Score
AUTHOR: Elise Blackwell
COPYRIGHT: 2009, April 2010
PAGES: 272
TYPE: fiction
RECOMMEND: Music lovers in particular will enjoy this novel, but even without such knowledge it is an enjoyable and quick read