#MMDChallenge - To read, for fun, in 2018

I'm declaring my Reading Challenge for 2018 - as I want to commit to reading more in 2018.  Therefore, I've selected The Modern Mrs. Darcy's 2018 Reading Challenge.

https://modernmrsdarcy.com/reading-challenge-2018/ 

Twisty Mystery with Shades of Classics

Title: The Prisoner of Heaven

Author:  Carlos Ruiz Zafón

Publisher: Harper Perennial

ISBN: 978-0062206299

Pages: 304

Many years ago I read Carlos Ruiz Zafón’s The Shadow of the Wind based on a recommendation from a friend, and knowing that a lot of book clubs were reading it.  At first I struggled to get into the book, with some very long descriptive passages. But, I was eventually drawn into the idea of a Cemetery of a Forgotten books.  Since then, I’ve wondered what book I would select to be mine.  I don’t know yet.

When I was in New York, I found The Prisoner of Heaven in a used bookstore.  I wasn’t even looking for it. I was a little worried about reading the books out of order, considering there is another book between them – The Angel’s Game.  However, The Prisoner of Heaven promised that each book could stand alone, and the reader did not need to read them in order.  Fortunately, I took that advise and read The Prisoner of Heaven.

Daniel is all grown up with a wife and son.  He works with his widowed father at the bookstore, along side Fermin, who is soon to be married.  However, a creepy stranger enters the store and purchases a very expensive book and signs a scary, cryptic message for Fermin. Daniel begins to investigate and hears the full tale of Fermin’s life before the first book.  With shades of The Count of Monte Cristo, Fermin’s background returns to potentially ruin his marriage.  However, Daniel steps in to try and help investigate and free Fermin from his fear.  

I was entranced by the book – it had delightful language and an intriguing plot. I couldn’t put it down and anticipated picking it up when I had to put it down. Now I need to find the second one to see if it was just as good.

A Book about Stealing Tea!

Title: For All the Tea in China: How England Stole the World's Favorite Drink and Changed History

Author:  Sarah Rose

Date: 2011

Publisher: Penguin Books

ISBN:  0143118749

Tea and books - there is no better combination. Not even chocolate and peanut butter!  And this is a book about how tea got to be a British monopoly and the drink of choice for the British Empire.

Up until the first Opium War, the secrets of growing and processing tea was closely guarded by the Chinese Dynasties. But with the conquering of China in the war, many new trade cities were opened to the East India Company and paved the way for Scotsman Robert Fortune to engage in some industrial espionage and smuggle the tea plants and seeds of China into the fully conquered country of India and try to reproduce the conditions for tea growing and processing.  Not only did Fortune sneak into the interior of China twice to abscond with tea, he also had to figure a method of transporting thousands of plants and seeds across water and time without detriment.  Once in India, other gardeners took over the planting and tending the precious cargo and within a few decades, India became the main source of British tea.  This brief summary highlights none of the details included by the author that shows her in-depth research of Fortune’s journey and subterfuge.  

Much of the quotes from Fortune's time make me cringe with overt racism and discrimination against the conquered Chinese people.  Like most of the other conveniences of cheap modern life (such as sugar, cotton etc), the tea trade has been built on the subjugation of people and corporate greed.  However, the author highlights the enormity of the impact of Fortune’s theft and made me re-consider the origin of the drink I truly love.  Through out the book, I constantly remarked, like I do when watching How Its Made, “Hmmm… I never thought about how people came up with that idea.”  Modern tea plantations look idyllic and inviting, but the history is very complicated.

I wanted to ask her how the same thing could be so ugly and so glorious . . .

Title: The Book Thief

Author: Markus Zusak

Date: 2007

Pages: 576

Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf

ISBN: 978-0375842207

A book narrated by death – not a typical narrator. And death has a sense of humor and compassion for the book thief, Liesel who stole her first book at the grave-site of her brother. A handbook for grave diggers. When her mother sends her to a foster family, she meets a compatriot in her foster father, a painter and violinist. Her foster mother is rough and sharp tongued, but strong and smart. Liesel becomes frenemies with Rudy and is teased at school for being uneducated. With various traumas surfacing each night in her dreams, her foster father begins midnight reading lessons. Liesel learns the power of words and wielding word in WWII Germany as Hilter begins his campaign against Jewish people. Because of an old promise to her foster father, the family hides a Jewish man, Max, who also befriends Liesel and builds new stories with her. As Germany rises and falls, Liesel's childhood is filled with unique characters, the illicit pleasure of stealing forbidden books, and treading a fine line of secrecy and discovery. Being a book narrated by death, the body count is not unexpected but it is still difficult to comprehend. The author uses a very interesting tone and style throughout the book that at first was distracting but became comfortable over the first few chapters. It was originally intended as a young adult book, yet because of the movie released in 2013, the book has been taken up by adult reading groups.

Here is some background and discussion questions from One Book, One Chicago 2012

Other discussion questions from LitLovers