Holly R W > Recent Status Updates

The main character, Keto, has two grandmothers who live with the family. She calls each one, "Babuda." Their pet name for Keto is "Bukashka."

The summer before Gabriel turned 17, he stood over 8 feet tall, weighed 388 pounds, and could cross the pasture carrying a 100 pound yearling ewe under each arm.

Gabriel Fisher is a central character in the book. He is the giant referred to in the title. Here is a description. "At age 10, Gabriel stood 6 feet 6 inches tall, already 7 inches taller than Josiah (his grandfather) as a grown man. The day he turned 12, he stood 6 feet 11 inches and weighed 255 pounds.

Wow. This is good!

Molly's revelations of her mother, Erica Jong, are often cringe-worthy. I'm getting uncomfortable. This is reading like Mommy Dearest. As a child with no defenses, Molly had to make sense of this. I do feel for her, but question whether all of this should be made public.

Molly is writing about her childhood: "I want to tell the whole story not for any kind of pity, but for the hope that telling it will make me stop trying to relive it, will make my past go away. Even though I have spent my adulthood creating a different kind of life for myself, I am still stuck in the mire of my childhood.

Sometimes I get swept away by the writing of a book, because it's good. However, I just got jolted by a few wrong notes. The story is about teens who have gotten pregnant and who have been cast out by their families.

First of all, as someone who has worked with these teens, I know that this happens rarely. Now in the book, Emery and her infant have been cast out into a hurricane to fend for themselves?

DNF at page 75.

This is the story of Ruth, who is being raised in a Hutterite family in Michigan. It is a quiet story about her life and their community. Everything is shared. They have no personal possessions. They strive to live their faith in a communal way.

At first, I found it interesting, but now the writing has stalled for me. It is a little too quiet.

13 year old Leah is meeting her reclusive grandfather in his home for the first time after years of little contact. Her thoughts: "The smell was something Leah hadn't been prepared for - woodsmoke and musty books and what she thought must be Grandpa Rhys himself, some mixture of sweat and dirt and coffee and age.

Quote for Place. "He was in Ukraine, his Ukraine, not the modern one he'd hardly recognized. Finally, he was home.

As an adult finding himself at a crossroads in his own life, Steven decides to find out more about his father who abandoned him years ago as a child. Steven visits his Uncle Julian, who says that he had heard from Steven's father about five years back. Julian's impression was that his father was living in Oregon. "He mentioned Oregon a couple of times.

Lila's bachelorette party includes dinner at the White Horse Tavern, thought to be the oldest tavern in the U.S - founded in 1673. I was curious and looked it up. Here is the website. The food and atmosphere sound outstanding! https://whitehorsenewport.com/

Phoebe, (the main character), just one day after trying to kill herself, finds herself driving a vintage convertible on her way to a sailing adventure. Phoebe is with Lila and Lila's guests from Lila's wedding. "As they drive, this is what they all can agree on: Newport (Rhode Island) is beautiful.

Something about Backman's writing style rubs me the wrong way. Perhaps it's the sweeping generalizations he makes. An example: "Forget it! No one will understand" the voice inside our heads hisses to us. Then it repeats the same lies that all broken children have to listen to: "There's something wrong with you! No one else feels the way you do!" I hate that the author terms his characters 'Broken Children.'

There's so much violence in the book. Here's a quote: "Bulldog started the fight, Joar finished it. Bulldog fought like a madman, but Joar fought like a whole gang. When Joar got home his old man broke the radiator with him.

The main character in the book (Sybil) writes a chatty fan letter to real life author Ann Patchett. In the letter, she invites Ann to visit. "Please keep in mind if you ever visit Annapolis, I'd be glad to host you. (It's) just a stone's throw from D.C.

Yejide: "I could not imagine then that one day in Nigeria thieves would be bold enough to write letters so that victims could prepare for their attacks, that one day they would sit in living rooms after raping women and children and ask people to prepare pounded yam and egusi stew while they watched movies on VCRs that they would soon disconnect and cart away.

Curious about Facebook's campus? Here's a video tour of it. It's huge, employing some 12,000 employees. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xDkp-...

In 2014, Zuckerberg and his team visit China in order to try to establish Facebook there. At this point in the book, they're strongly considering selling FB to the Chinese government by promising that Facebook users' personal data would be given to the government - particularly users living in Hong Kong.

The author's dream job is shaping international policy for Facebook. After a year of pitching this, she persuades FB to create the job for her. She writes, "The first day, I get an assignment. I'm going to be in charge of one of the first visits of a foreign head of state to Facebook at our headquarters in California. Coincidentally, it's the prime minister of New Zealand, John Key.

Here's a Seattle reference, where the book is set. Per Mrs. Braxton, "Children, as you know, our Language Arts program is the first of its kind in Seattle.

The main character is a Language Arts teacher, who says this about an assignment he gives his students (writing postcards). "I've found this exercise to be a low pressure way to reintroduce students to the act of putting pen to paper, especially since it's likely that the only writing they did over vacation was with a keyboard too small to be operated by anything other than thumbs.

Here are photos of Petropavlovsk - Kamchatka where the novel takes place. https://www.shutterstock.com/search/p...

Here are typical temperatures. https://kamchatkalostworld.com/climat...

Since Ksyusha was involved in an indigenous dance group, I wanted to see the dances she might have been doing. Here is a video about dance. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzSI4...

A character in the story (Kyusha) is a 3rd year college student studying accounting. Her family lives up north and are members of the Even tribe. They are reindeer herders in Siberia. She is the first of her family to go to college. Sometimes, Kyusha is made fun of for her ethnic looks. I was curious and so, looked up her ethnicity in Wikipedia. Here is the article. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evens

Here are more photos of Rome. https://www.cntraveler.com/gallery/13...

Here is the link to the Borghese Gallery collection. https://borghese.gallery/collection/ It has both paintings and sculptures, often with religious themes. I looked at art work by Caravaggio, Titian, Raphael among others. Doerr mentions going to see a huge canvass by Caravaggio, hung in a church, which made me curious... I also saw a famous statue of David in my virtual tour.

Doerr writes of the sights and landmarks he sees. I just now explored the Sistine Chapel on line, which he visited. It looks much bigger than I imagined. I'm now exploring the Villa Borghese Museum in Rome. Here is the link to photos of the Museum's gardens, full of statuary, pruned trees and architectural wonders dating back centuries. https://borghese.gallery/villa-borghe...

Doer and his wife (new parents) are living in Rome with their 6 month old twin boys. They walk everywhere and push the babies in a large stroller, as they don't have a car. He writes - "Try this sometime: Park a stroller in the shade in Rome in winter. Within a minute, an Italian mother will stop. "The babies must be put in the sun," she'll say. Doer's babies are the only ones he sees outside.