Filed under: book reviews, nonfiction | Tags: biography, haruki murakami, memoir, nonfiction, philosophy, quotes, raymond carver, running, short stories, what i talk about when i talk about running, what we talk about when we talk about love, writing
If you’re interested in running, or interested in writing, or interested in Haruki Murakami, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running* is “a kind of memoir centered on the act of running” that’s both an enjoyable and thoughtful read. Through this collection of essays and comprehensive journal entries, Murakami reflects on his start at running and novel writing, and how running has affected his life as a novelist.
I wouldn’t say What I Talk About… is one of Murakami’s most enlightening or brilliant works and it doesn’t have a mass appeal, but it does offer a curious insight into his life as an author. With the odd philosophical asides, this was a book I enjoyed and that inspired me to run (despite the cold!) and has re-interested me in reading more of Murakami’s works.
*A play on a Raymond Carver’s short story collection entitled What We Talk About When We Talk About Love.
Filed under: book reviews, nonfiction | Tags: culture, diane rehm show, feminism, feminist, in the land of invisible women, islam, memoir, nonfiction, npr, qanta a ahmed, religion, saudi arabia, sourcebooks inc.
Sourcebooks, Inc. kindly sent me a copy of the memoir In the Land of Invisible Women by Qanta A. Ahmed, MD, which was perfect timing as I had just heard Ahmed’s interview on the Diane Rehm Show and was quite curious about the book. Ahmed, “a British Muslim doctor,” is denied a visa to stay within the United States and quickly makes up her mind to accept a position in Saudi Arabia. Her memoir In the Land of Invisible Women offers a unique perspective of a western woman, professional doctor, and Muslim living within the kingdom.
I feel that most of what I know about Saudi Arabia has been my interpretation of evening news’ sound bytes. Via an original and interesting perspective, Ahmed takes the reader through her experience of Saudi Arabia, particularly in Riyadh [1], where she worked as a doctor for two years at the National Guard Hospital. In the Land of Invisible Women reads as a cross between a medical narrative and a memoir, and also manages to pursue two distinctly interesting themes: a western woman’s experience within the Kingdom and a lifelong Muslim’s interaction with more extreme forms of Islam.
My only complaint about the book regard some structural issues as some chapters read as disjointed. Assumedly the format is chronological, though certainly gaps of time are missing, but the reader at times is expected to make shaky leaps between one handful of chapters, for example, that focus on Hajj season to the next handful of chapters detailing Ahmed’s experience with romance in Riyadh. Relatively a minor distraction, but it did force me to wonder if I had managed to skip pages.
What I most appreciated about this book was Ahmed’s divulgence of her opinion and how she avoided becoming dismissive of other’s beliefs. The author is consistently willing to acknowledge the complex traditions and cultures that, for example, produce both negative and positive responses to wearing the abbayah. Nevertheless, Ahmed still beautifully asserts her arguments and confronts the anti-Semitism, the sexism, and the anti-western attitudes she experienced.
In the Land of Invisible Women gave me a lot to think about, and just not about the complexities of Saudi Arabia but also my country’s, the U.S.A., interactions within the Middle East.
[1] I now have a new appreciation for The Girls of Riyadh, a book I previously shrugged off as so-so pop-literature.
Other opinions: Book Addiction.
Conclusion: Available on Bookmooch.
Filed under: book reviews, nonfiction | Tags: lisa dale norton, memoir, nonfiction, quotes, shimmering images, writing
“You’ve always wanted to write a story about your life. You’ve been planning to do it, telling family and friends you are going to do it…but you haven’t done it.
Why not?”
Lisa Dale Norton’s Shimmering Images is a barebones and simplistic instructive-guide to writing memoirs. Shimmering Images gets its title from one of her recommended exercises to help the budding memoirist, which is to use “…a memory that rises in your consciousness like a photograph pulsing with meaning…” All of the activities are based on the work Norton does within the workshops she teaches across the country on writing.
I have no interest in writing a memoir at this time as I’m in my mid-20s and seriously not much has happened that many people would care to read. However, even for the non-memoirist Shimmering Images lends some good advice when it comes to brainstorming and structure. In straightforward instructions with limited detail, Norton provides a great guideline for writing. Though it warns away from more daring approaches to memoir writing, it seems like a good place to start from.
Conclusion: Bookmooching.
Other opinions: J. Kaye’s Book Blog.
Adventures in Reading 