Currently Reading | July 2014

just a picture of my cat

I have a problem. I can't just pick up a book I want to read and finish it. If I'm not hooked up on the first ten pages, I pick another book. But I still feel like missing out on something, because of not reading that first book, so I read a few pages of it here and there, just to know what it's all about. And if I can't find something really engaging for a long time, I may sometimes end up with up to 20 books on my currently reading shelf on Goodreads. Of course, that makes me feel like some kind of a loser, so I start shoving them on other shelves like “on-hold” or “dropped”, until I end up with what's I'm actually reading at the moment given.

So after the last book I've finished, I somehow managed to pick up three different books in the course of one night.

The first book I'm currently reading is Holes by Louis Sachar. I've picked it up because I've already seen the movie a couple of times. The story is based around Camp Green Lake, which is a juvenile detention camp located on the riverbed of a dried up lake. Kids at the camp are digging holes, hence the name of the book. The main character is Stanley Yelnats. He's a kid from a poor family. Stanley is sent to the camp for the crime he did not commit. He thinks that it's all because of a family curse. And later on in the book it turns out that the past actually has a lot to do with the camp and people there. I like how the book gives more information on the thoughts and feeling of the characters. I really missed that in the movie.

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins. It's the last book of the Hunger Games series. I've read the first two books in Russian, and had mixed feeling about them. It was a quick and pleasant read, but I wasn't too excited about the plot. Now that I've started reading the third book in English, I can tell that it's because of the translation. The original book feels like a completely different story. I will probably re-read the first two books in English later. What I've noticed about the Hunger Games series is that they show the side of a story that we don't usually see. They focus a lot on preparation and presentation of the main event, showing that everything has a lot more story to it, than what you see on the surface. All the steps are just as important as the event they lead to. In the first two books these were the Hunger Games, and now it's the revolution. I was surprised, how organised the rebels are. They have this whole structure with authorities. But the most surprising thing was that, just like the Capitol was using Katniss to create a hero for everyone, the same way the rebellion organisers are now trying to turn her into some kind of a leader for the people. I've only just started reading, so I won't be making any speculations about the outcome of this game.

Nation by Maria Matios. It's a collection of short stories and poems by a Ukrainian modern author Maria Matios. It's mostly focused on the years after the WWII, when the communists were destroying the old way of life and forcing people to live by new standards. Taking away their land, killing and sending away anyone who disagreed. I like how Matios puts a lot of real human emotions in her books. She not only shows the historical truth, but also writes a lot about traditions and superstitions. Every one of her characters has his own little tragedy. Maria Matios has this amazing gift of showing every single aspect of life in the span of 200 pages.

This time I'm planning to finish at least two of the books I'm currently reading. And I will try hard to keep my Goodreads shelves a bit more neat. :3 Then I'll make a review post at the end of this month, since I'll probably be too lazy to write one for every single book I finish.

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