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Your white shoulders
     I remember
And your shrug of laughter.

     Low laughter
     Shaken slow
From your white shoulders


White Shoulders by Carl Sandburg

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In Search of Respect: Selling Crack in El Barrio
by Phillipe Bourgois

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Hands down, my favorite book has got to be The Awakening by Kate Chopin. It may be the only book that has made me cry. Also my Jeep is named after the protagonist, Edna Pontellier.

"The voice of the sea is seductive; never ceasing, whispering, clearing, murmuring, inviting the soul to wander for a spell in the abysses of solitude; to lose itself in mazes of inward contemplation. The voice of the sea speaks to the soul. The touch of the sea is sensuous, enfolding the body in its soft, close embrace."

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"The world exists apart from him. He's rehearsed this often enough in theory; he's just never known it with certainty. It follows that his body is an object in space and that someday he will die."

Recently (within the last 2ish years I've been with Savanna) I've started to read more for pleasure that didn't consist of the newspaper, The Economist, CNN, etc.

Margaret Atwood has held a special place in my heart after my Junior hear in high school having read Cat's Eye - and at the time writing the longest (15 pages) and most exquisite paper.

Life Before Man is my second novel that I have read written by Atwood and it was spectacular. I ended the book feeling a so sad that these three main characters (Nate, Elizabeth, and Lesje) were out of my life.

It's actually quite a depressing book. It ends on an ambiguous note that leans more towards happy than sad. Themes of parent/child miscommunications & failures, relationship complexities betwixt lovers are written from the narrative of all three main characters in a sort of journal entry style.

The characters are all both unlikable and likable. They cheat on their former lovers. They're indecisive or power hungry. But they are all so tragic and shaped by their pasts that it's actually impossible to hate any of them.

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The Middle of Everywhere: The World's Refugees Come to Our Town by Mary Pipher

I had to read this book for my Migrating Memories anthropology class. The book was fairly good; 3.5/5 stars. Usually the books that I read for my classes are dense and boring, but this one wasn't too bad. Pipher is a psychologist and cultural broker for the refugees of Lincoln, Nebraska. She writes this book not as a academic resource, but to be read by everyone.
My opinion of the book is slightly biased since a) I work as a tutor at a local elementary school in the ELL classes. Many of my students are refugees because our city is a resettlement city. b) I'm interested in refugee law and policy and am considering taking that route once law school comes my way.
The book is equal parts refugee stories of personal loss and acculturation experience, exposé on the ugliness that often occurs in our society, life lessons that Pipher has taken from her experiences and wants us to have. The first 9 chapters are extremely interesting in that they detail her experiences in working with refugees of all ages. Naturally the stories range from hilarious to heartbreaking. There were quite a few times I found myself thinking, "wow... I never realized how 'such and such' is culturally ingrained" or "what. the. fuck?" The stories of loss, death, rape, and violence are pretty hard to get through sometimes. After reading about one particular woman I was filled with such deep sadness that I had to put the book down for a bit and just think about how lucky I am and if it were me, would I still be living today.
Unfortunately, chapters 10 -12 are extremely preachy. Perhaps coming from a family of immigrants myself (meaning... that my mom is an immigrant from the Philippines, not that my great great great great grandwhoever's came over on the Nina) I found myself feeling like she was talking down to me... as if I didn't already realize that American life is paradoxical. Sometimes I found her generalizing Americans and our culture or to be a little old-fashioned in her views of the internet and its function. She essentially said that the internet is not a community. To a certain extent I completely understand where she's coming from: you cannot substitute real people and relationships with interweb friends and family. People need personal contact. However, I don't think Pipher quite realizes the sort of ... comfort (?) that can come from an internet community. When I was initially going through my "OMG I think I might be a bisexual!!!" identity crises way back when MSN messenger and dial-up internet ruled my 8th/9th grade life, it was not my friends and family (mind you I come for a small rural town in Indiana) that I went to for consolation, help, advice, etc. It was the INTERNET! In a Sex and Gender course I took last year we read a book of personal stories of various transpeople in various stages of transition. So many of them said that the internet was one of the most helpful things in finding people to talk with, information, and feeling like a human again.
I was also extremely annoyed by her constant quoting of other authors and scholars. I love quotes, but seriously I felt like ever moral lesson started with: "So and So said that ....."
Would I recommend this book? Meh. I would probably guess that there are better written books about refugee tales. However, if time is on your hands I definitely think the first 9 chapters are worth a read... especially any of the personal life stories.