Book #13 Sickened by Julie Gregory

So, I haven't posted in ages, but it's not because I haven't been reading! I read this over Spring Break a couple of weeks ago. This book is about a woman who grew up dealing with Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy. If you're not familiar with what this is, here is a basic definition: "a form of child abuse in which a parent induces real or apparent symptoms of a disease in a child."

For this woman, her mother was insistent on her having a heart problem. She malnourished her daughter and caused her to have minor health issues that she blew into major health problems. Her mother also did this to Julie's brother and foster children that she managed to get into her home.

I think the thing that struck me most about Gregory's experience was that what her mother did affected her life as an adult even after she managed to escape. At one point in the memoir, Julie talks about how her mother mixed up a box of cake batter and told her to eat it with a spoon for dinner while she watched tv. Yeah. Later, when Julie is out on her own, she has no idea how to feed herself, and actually continues this strange dinner ritual because she doesn't know any better.

This was an incredibly interesting story, and I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in people who have suffered various types of child abuse, or if you just want something that seems so crazy it's hard to believe.

A Break from Reviews: Thoughts on Monday Morning

For those of you who don't know me, I feel I should begin by saying that I am a teacher, and that I live in a state that just got a ton of snow. A TON. We missed 4 days of school last week, which means this is the first time I have had to work in a week, the first time I've had to be up at a particular time in a week, and the first time I've really had to think about something other than reading books and blogging in a week. WOW.

I had a wonderful lot of fun with all of my free time, including really getting my blog started, redesigning it, joining a bunch of book challenges, and reading book reviews on other blogs. If you haven't looked closely, I'm in 9 book challenges. Last night, in an effort to forget that I had to work today, I planned out what I'm going to read for each of them. That was an interesting endeavor, but it's something I'm glad I did. I figured out where my overlaps were, what I would need to purchase or borrow, and just what sounded interesting. I think I'll edit this post when I get home and show you my choices.

One surprising thing I enjoyed while doing this was looking up the nationalities of authors. For example, Oscar Wilde is a personal favorite of mine, and I had no idea he was Irish! I also realized that I couldn't have named an Australian author or book to save my soul. When I get it posted, check out my list and see what you think!

Book Challenge	Planning to Read
Nordic: (written by a Nordic author or taking place in Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and/or Sweden)	The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
British: Books by British authors	The White Queen, The Red Queen, Northanger Abbey, Pride and Prejudice, Sherlock Holmes, Wuthering Heights
Global: (Australia, Asia, Africa, Europe, North America, South America, +1 from a "continent" of your choice)	Haunting Jasmine (Asia), Like Water for Chocolate (South/Central America), Oscar and Lucinda (Australia), Snow Crash (Seventh Continent), The Yacoubian Building (Africa)
Eastern Europe: (Croatia, Ukraine, Bosnia, Serbia, Montenegro, Hungary, Belarus, Estonia, Albania, Bulgaria, Georgia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Poland, Czech Rep., Latvia, Lithuania, Russia, Romania, Moldova, and Kosovo.)	War and Peace, Three Sisters, Crime and Punishment, Dracula,
Historical Fiction: Any historical fiction	The White Queen, The Red Queen, The Name of the Rose
Ireland: (written by Irish author or taking place in Ireland)	The Irish Princess, Dracula
South Asian: (written by South Asian author or taking place in South Asia [Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal, and the Maldives])	Haunting Jasmine
Memorable Memoirs: Any memoir	Thin, Sickened: The True Story of a Lost Childhood, Intern
Gothic: any novel with Gothic characteristics	Wuthering Heights, Northanger Abbey, The Hound of the Baskervilles (Holmes), Frankenstein, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Jane Eyre, The Name of the Rose, The Fall of the House of Usher, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow

Book#1 Loose Girl: A Memoir of Promiscuity

Loose Girl: A Memoir of Promiscuity by Kerry Cohen was my first book of the year. It's about a girl who grew up feeling unloved and unnoticed, so she acted out and looked for love in all the wrong places (sing the song, you know you want to!).

My heart ached while reading this. I grew up in this incredibly loving home. My parents paid more attention that any teenage would want, but looking back on it, I'm so glad they did. I hate to think how I would have felt in Kerry's position. Her mom was self-absorbed and abandoned her daughter's to follow a dream. Her father was no more mature than Kerry herself. I don't think that my reaction to such treatment would have ever been to become a promiscuous teen or woman, but probably to have become more like her older sister, Tyler. Tyler became closed off and more what today's society would define as "emo." She just had a dark outlook, but she still tried to relate to her parents as best she could instead of rebelling against them.

Overall, I would give this book a 4 out of 5, although I have a feeling that your opinion of this book will be strongly affected by how well you can relate to her situation.

Let the Games Begin!

I have tried this blogging thing before, failed at it, and stopped. I'm trying again because I actually feel like I'm doing something worth talking about this year! Although technically, after too much free time in my 4th consecutive snow day, I'm now doing 9 (edit: dang it Stephanie!) things.

1. My own personal challenge: One book per week all year long (52 books)
2. The Global Book Challenge (7 books)
3. The British Book Challenge (6 books)
4. The Eastern European Book Challenge (4 books)
5. The Nordic Book Challenge (2 books)
6. The Ireland Book Challenge (2 books)
7. Historical Fiction Challenge (5 books)
8. South Asian Challenge (1 book)
9. Memorable Memoirs Challenge (4 books)
10. Gothic Challenge (5 books)

Links for numbers 2 through 10 are on the right side of my blog!

The personal challenge is the most important to me. I spent a lot of time in the past few years feeling overwhelmed, and I stopped making time for myself. I hardly read anything that wasn't for a class or something I was supposed to be teaching. My 52 book challenge is me making that stress-free time for myself each week to do something that I have loved since I was little. So far, I'm on track! Let's hope I can keep it up and even exceed my goal!

Now, as for the other challenges, I have a good friend of mine to thank for me finding the Nordic Challenge, but the rest was all me! I'm going to be reading 52 books this year, so why not make it a more social endeavor? Plus, these constraints will make me choose books more diverse than what I might normally choose on my own.