That Just Happened!

Shields, Carol.  The Stone Diaries.  Vintage Canada (2008).  Originally 1993.

 The Stone Diaries is the story of one woman’s life; a truly sensuous novel that reflects and illuminates the unsettled decades of our century.

Born in 1905, Daisy Goodwill drifts through the chapters of childhood, marriage, widowhood, remarriage, motherhood and old age. Bewildered by her inability to understand her own role, Daisy attempts to find a way to tell her own story within a novel that is itself about the limitations of autobiography.

From The Publisher

I enjoyed this book, Daisy was slightly reminiscent of the kind of woman Betty Friedan would disdain.  However, I think there are a lot of women who can relate to this.  Daisy is trying to figure out what makes her happy while, at the same time, trying to fulfill her role as mother, wife, daughter, friend, etc.  You can see her struggle with this her whole life and even at the end she is wondering if it was enough.  If she  was enough to everyone.  I liked how the book was divided into the major events most women go through.  I also liked how there were a few pages of pictures in the middle of the book.  It really added to the illusion that you were reading a diary or scrapbook. 

I am writing this review a little bit later than I had planned, but the fact that I had to reference the book a few times means it was not very memorable.

Themes include self-discovery, relationships, and family.

Beherns, Peter. The Law of Dreams.  House of Anansi Press. (2006)

Driven from the only home he has known during Ireland’s Great Hunger of 1847, Fergus O’Brien makes the harrowing journey from County Clare to Canada, travelling with bold girls, pearl boys, navvies, and highwaymen.  Full of vivid, unforgettable characters, The Law of Dreams is lyrical, emotional, and thoroughly extraordinary.

From the Back Cover

I really wanted Fergus to succeed. Really. There was something about him that made me want to help him any way I could.  To say I empathized would be accurate.  At times, I found the book a bit graphic, but I imagine it is pale in comparison to some of the horrific realities people in that time faced.   The women he took up with along the way did not get my sympathies as much, which is suprising because I am a woman.  I just thought that they were all a little too dependent, or whiny.  They seemed dishonest (although some of them were supposed to be, by profession), which I don’t think gives them a fair shake.

All in all, a pretty decent book and deserving of the GG Award for Fiction.  It is evident that a lot of research and thought went into developing this book.

The themes are class, finding oneself and survival.

I read this as part of my Governor General Literary Award Challenge.

Beherns, Peter. The Law of Dreams.  House of Anansi Press. (2006)

Driven from the only home he has known during Ireland’s Great Hunger of 1847, Fergus O’Brien makes the harrowing journey from County Clare to Canada, travelling with bold girls, pearl boys, navvies, and highwaymen.  Full of vivid, unforgettable characters, The Law of Dreams is lyrical, emotional, and thoroughly extraordinary.

From the Back Cover

I really wanted Fergus to succeed. Really. There was something about him that made me want to help him any way I could.  To say I empathized would be accurate.  At times, I found the book a bit graphic, but I imagine it is pale in comparison to some of the horrific realities people in that time faced.   The women he took up with along the way did not get my sympathies as much, which is suprising because I am a woman.  I just thought that they were all a little too dependent, or whiny.  They seemed dishonest (although some of them were supposed to be, by profession), which I don’t think gives them a fair shake.

All in all, a pretty decent book and deserving of the GG Award for Fiction.  It is evident that a lot of research and thought went into developing this book.

The themes are class, finding oneself and survival.

I read this as part of my Governor General Literary Award Challenge.