Posts Tagged ‘female appreciation month’
Dec
In which I go a bit list crazy
by Kaia in 2009
Everyone in the world are apparently doing “best of 00-talet” lists (er, do not know how to translate that, “the 00s”?), which is just too big for me. So I’m just doing the last year in a number of tens in alphabetic order. No ranking within each list, because that would be mean. And yes, I did this not too long ago, in the Lists of 30 sequence I did, but this is, um, different. Really.
Note: All pics are shamelessly stolen from my dear friend Google, except for a few that I took myself and the This is Arsenal one which comes from the LJ comunity GoonerGraphics and is actually my desktop picture…
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10 HIGHS
Because you should remember the good and pretend the bad never happened! Okay, maybe not, but I have no desire to list the lowest of the low of this year, so I’m just doing the awesome. (One year I re-capped what had happened each month and somebody said “whoa, you’ve got really shitty luck”, and she was right. So no re-capping. Just the best.)
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1 – All things Arsenal. It’s silly to put football down here, isn’t it? I don’t care. Since I was pulled into the Arsenal madness and started following every single game (as those of you following me on Twitter probably are painfully aware of) I’ve learned that sports are… um, brain washing. They make you insane and single-minded and you start saying stuff like “we have too many groin injuries” and “our boys are FRAGILE” and see nothing strange about it. (Other people, however, do.) So there. I’m sticking to this one, even though it’s kind of crazy and certainly nothing I would’ve thought a year or two ago… |
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2 – Becoming with kitten. Once a cat owner always a cat owner. Or something. I love having her around, even if she demands constant attention, climbs the Christmas tree and follows me into the bath room, prompting me to say “oh my God, shut your mouth and act like a normal human being!”. And I guess she’s not a kitten anymore,and nearly a teenager, but let’s not talk about that. I can’t afford to have her fixed for another few months, so let’s hope she stays this age for a good long time.
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3 – Blogging and Twitter as a substitute for TV. I wrote the first entry of this blog on October 29th, 2008. Since then it’s become something I write in, if not every day so at least every week. It helps me a lot, even though I sometimes wonder if I share too much. As for Twitter, it has been a great help in finding new blogs and news and current events and such. I follow something like 80 people, which is a lot less than most, but just what I can keep up with. This is also where I get nearly all my news. I don’t watch TV, save a few select shows, and rarely bother with the news. Because my blogroll and my Twitter-people are plenty smart and keep me updated. They’re awesome like that.
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4 – Finding fat acceptance. Everyone who reads this blog on a regular basis knows my stance on health and weight, so I’m not going to say it all over again, but a year ago exactly I felt repulsed by myself and my body, put myself in a strict regimen of 1500 calories per da (which yes, included weighing my carrots and quit eating corn because they are more “fatty” than say cucumber), took long walks in sleet and rain and everything inbetween, telling myself IT’S SUPPOSED TO HURT YOU DISGUSTING FATTY KEEP WALKING, and forced myself to wear too small, unflattering clothing to punish myself. It was pretty awful, and when I, a few months later, came across Kate Harding’s blog Shapely Prose it was all turned on its head. It was quite revolutionary, and while I can’t say that I never wish that my body would be smaller, I most of the time is fine with it. And that’s an amazing feeling. I do want to start exercising again, but not to lose weight, just to get fit(ter), and that is something I never thought I’d say… I don’t know what yet, my mind goes back and forth between yoga, horse back riding, a traditional and super scary gym membership and running/walking. Suggestions for alternatives are welcome.
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5 – Getting a diagnosis, and starting to take the oh so elusive B12. My quality of life has doubled since my medications were changed and I started taking B12. Being able to be awake for more than four hours at a time is AWESOME. Here’s to hoping the last addition of pills will make my lows less frequent! Under this one goes also “getting out of my depression enough to care about other human beings”, and “actually remembering people’s birthdays and favourite what-have-you, because my brain isn’t stuck in survival mode”. Big stuff!
(Note: These are not my pills. They are all boring and white and not all that exciting.) |
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6 – Moving. I was hesitant, because my old city was, well, a city, while this is pretty much just a, um, little town with nothing exciting going for it, but I think we can all agree that it was the best thing I could possibly do. I’m still not well, but feel at least a bit grounded, for what is possibly the first time in my life, and it’s amazing to be able to ask my family for help with shopping and stuff when I have bad days.
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7 – Re-learning how to cook. I stopped eating eggs when I was eight because I found them “gross”. I could only keep eating meat for as long as I did (until I was twenty) by sternly telling myself that it wasn’t really meat and meat didn’t come from animals and there was certainly no blood involved… Then I moved away from home and had to start cooking my own food (yes, our Mum spoils us), and within a year I was a vegetarian. I find fish and seafood equally gross and once started crying because we had to cut into a fish in biology and it had small fishies in its stomach. So, um, that is a prime playground for all kinds of food related quirks. For the longest time I didn’t let myself eat or I ate too much and felt crap about it. It’s only in the last year that I’ve started cooking because it’s FUN. I used to like cooking, when I was a vegan, but the step from being all obsessive-compulsive about foods and eating to actually enjoying it again… was a big one. This year I also did a brief stint as an omnivore, which lasted about two weeks. Then I returned to vegetarianism because, um, meat is still “gross”. Sorry. That hang up I can’t lose, even if I could put the animal welfare thing aside (which I can’t). In all it taught me why I’m a vegetarian all over again. All good things.
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8 – Starting to read again. When I was younger I was the sort of kid that snuck extra books from the library when we were only allowed to check out a certain number, which was supposed to be “just what we had time to read in a week”. I was found in hedges reading, I could be seen walking and reading at the same time and so on. When we did a reading challenge in fifth grade where we were supposed to read for twenty minutes every day I had to ask for an extra form cos I ran out of space after a week. And then another one. And another one. Somewhere down the line something (depression, I think) happened and I just STOPPED. In late June of this year I started reading again, mostly YA, and I’m happy to say that I’ve read 52 books since then. Yes, I counted. I keep track of them with my Book List, because I’m neardy like that. Reading gives me a million ideas, I learn neat turns of phrases, I learn what NOT to do and so on. During my non-reading phase I thought that reading was a waste of time, cutting into my writing time, but actually it works the other way around – it’s reading that gives me my best ideas!
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9 – Visiting Edinburgh. Going to visit Scotland and get to meet a dear, dear friend. I was gone four days, popped anti-anxiety meds like they were crack (they kind of were) and it took me two months to recover, but it was so worth it. I want to go back already, because I loved the city and Scots are, although difficult to understand at times, the loveliest people ever. I love their accents, I love the mountains sneaking up on me, I love the tiny, tiny gardens in the middle of the city and I looooved the roof terrace of the museum of something-or-other, all the book shops, the vegetarian baked potato shop, the insane hills and curvy roads and of course, the tiny taxis that drove like mad. Aside from seeing Jenn for the first time I think that going to see Amanda Palmer in concert was the highlight of the trip; she’s just amazing and I will mention her again in a bit…
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10 – Writing. As for writing this was a big year. I finished my first big novel manuscript (Eld) in April or so, I wrote a number of short stories, one non-fiction piece, in November I wrote a lovely YA novel that needs about fourteen more rounds of edits (Mundane Secrets), and I also started another project (The Past Didn’t Go Anywhere) that I’m dying to get back to. In all, I did a lot of original writing and almost completely stopped doing narrative RP-ing, and it feels great to move on from that. I try to write a little every day, but obviously some days are better than others. I’m hoping that next year, when I do this (if I remember), I will have something more substantial to add to this one…
(Note: This is what I’ve told myself every year since I was 15, and also, I don’t write on a typewriter, but I love this pic so much so I’m using it anyway.) |
Runner-ups:
New Years with siblings and cousins in Gothenburg last year.
New Years with cousins and siblings in Stockholm this year. (Sadly kicked off the list as I am NOT GOING).
EVerything involving my siblings and cousins. Seriously. They’re that awesome.
Buying Christmas presents and doing random holiday things because I want to! (A year ago I wouldn’t have wanted to.)
Weaving. (This one was kicked off the list because of the little old ladies fat talk.)
All my crafting and of course my business doing fairly well.
All the new music. (It got its own list instead.)
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10 AUTHORS
I read 52 books this year, and hope to get another two in before the 31st. The ones below are the ones that stuck most with me this year. Eight of these are YA, one is non-fiction and one is adult fiction. Four are part of a series, so I think we can agree that series and YA are my personal crack.
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1 – Cabot, Meg: The Airhead series (Young Adult)
These books look suspiciously fluffy from the outside (the paperback even more so, it’s pink and silver), but they are not. Trust me on that one. They tell the story of sixteen-year-old Em Watts who wakes up after an accident and finds her life tangled up with that of super teen model Nikki Howard – against her will. It’s really engaging, rather creepy, and full of drama. Airhead, the first book, is my favourite, mostly because Em acts kind of stupid in the second book, but I have yet to read #3, so I may change my mind. |
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2 – Crowley, Cath: The Gracie Faltrain series (Young Adult)
The story about Gracie Faltrain, who plays soccer with the boys, and has boy and friend and everything trouble. These books have a million different POVs, and I love them for it. Gracie is sometimes annoyingly dense, but the other POVs makes these books awesome nonetheless. My favourite character is Flemming, a totally minor character that I think you’re supposed to hate… Book #3, Gracie Faltrain Gets It Right (Finally!), is my favourite of these three. |
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3 – Harding, Kate & Kirby, Marianne: Lessons From the Fat-O-Sphere: Quit Dieting and Declare a Truce with Your Body (Non-Fiction)
I’m not big on non-fiction, but this one is amazing. It talks about Health At Every Size, debunks myths about fat people and gently lets you know that being HEALTHY is a good idea, whether you’re skinny or not. I so wish this book was available in Swedish, because I want my parents (and really, everyone I know, regardless of size) to read it. |
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4 – Lanagan, Margo: Tender Morsels (Young Adult)
This one was probably the hardest read, but also one of the most amazing books I read this year. It’s about Liga, who bears two children after being raped (two occasions, about a year apart), and who ends up in a different world when she is so wounded from these two events that she wants to, you know, throw her baby and herself off a cliff. Margo has horrified people on several continents with the contents of this book, and continues winning prizes with it. She deserves every single one of them too. |
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5 – Larbalestier, Justine: Liar (Young Adult)
This book is about Micah, who lies about everything. It’s absolutely fascinating to read her story, because you have no idea what’s true and what’s not and then you think you know and just as you figure it out she tells you that you were wrong all along. It’s a great book, and the narration is amazing, but I really can’t say much more about it without going into spoiler territory, so let’s just leave it at that. |
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6 – McCarthy, Maureen: Queen Kat, Carmel and St. Jude Get a Life (Young Adult)
A book with three POVs, telling three very different stories. The first part is about Carmel who is overweight and lets it consume her life in the worst kind of way, and we also get to see her come out of her shell and come to terms with herself and her body, and that without losing weight. Part two is narrated by Jude, who is going to be a doctor just like her Argentinian father that she’s never met. She becomes horribly depressed and it’s fascinating (and painful) to see how it changes everything before she manages to turn things around. Katerina meanwhile is rich and beautiful but not nearly as happy as everyone thinks… I love Maureen McCarthy; her book Rose By Any Other Name is brilliant too. |
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7 – McKinley, Robin: Deerskin (Young Adult)
A painful story of a princess who is the daughter of the most beautiful queen in seven kingdoms. When her mother dies her father goes mad and forces her to run from his violence and delusions, and that’s when things get interesting… This book goes into the same category as Tender Morsels, painful yet beautiful and IMPORTANT to read. Especially if you are a teen, which I’m not, but I love this book anyway! |
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8 – Murdock, Catherine Gilbert: The Dairy Queen series (Young Adult)
These books are about D.J. Schwenk, whose parents own a dairy farm. She’s quite sporty, and in the first book she decides to try out for the boys football team. In the second book she concentrates more on basketball, and her family is a big part through it all. I love the narration more than anything, and can’t wait to read book #3. So far, though, I think the first one, Dairy Queen, is my favourite. |
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9 – Rees Brennan, Sarah: The Demon’s Lexicon series (Young Adult)
A book from the POV of the dark, broody bloke that is the love interest in most books out there. It’s fascinating to see the thought process of a guy whose main complaint is “why are you talking so much?”, and I can’t wait for book #2, due to come out in May. Even though Nick is no longer the POV. (Or maybe because of it.) |
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10 – Waters, Sarah: Tipping the Velvet (Adult Fiction)
I know. The rest of the world read this book ten years ago. I didn’t. It’s amazing, though, and I love how authentic it feels all through it, with the theatre terms and old fashioned language and everything that comes with it. Now I want to see the movie, and also, I am so not admitting how long it took me to figure out what “gay girl” meant, which is amusing considering that the direct translation for an old fashioned term for “whore” in Swedish is exactly that. |
Runner-ups:
Cross, Shauna: Derby Girl (aka Whip It)
Gaiman, Neil: The Graveyard Book
Johnson, Maureen: The Bermudez Triangle
McCafferty, Megan: The Jessica Darling series
Pierce, Tamora: Protector of the Small series
Roberts, Tansy Rayner/Shearman, Robert: Siren Beat/Roadkill
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10 MUSICIANS
Note that Ani DiFranco isn’t making the list. That is kind of a first, I think. Nice to be moving on to new stuff, though! And no, I am not picking songs. I can’t choose just one. I am choosing an album that meant a lot for me instead, because I’m special like that.
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1 – Amanda Palmer: Who Killed Amanda Palmer?
It feels strange that I’ve only listened to her music for less than a year. It feels like forever. Before she went solo she was part of the group The Dresden Dolls and my favourite album of hers is actually the first Dresden Dolls album, but I would never have figured out how brilliant it is had a friend not zipped up and emailed me WKAP. So that’s the one that goes on my list. One of my favourites on this album is Strength Through Music which has the most chilling video ever. |
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2 – The Bird and the Bee: The Bird and the Bee.
Usually I like my music to be noisy in a very particular way. This album is everything but. It’s very smooth, and Wiki describes it as “a jazz-influenced electro pop project”. I guess that about sums it up. The first song I heard was Again and Again (video here), and I promptly fell in love with the simple and to the point lyrics: “You’re so stupid and perfect / And stupid and perfect / I hate you, I want you / I hate you, I hate you, oh / Again, again, again, again…” |
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3 – An Horse: Rearrange Beds .
This band I learned about from my Australian Music Fairy (yes, I just promoted her to that). We listened to it like crazy when it was just an EP, and then the whole album came out and there were YouTube videos and I started obsessing about Kate Cooper who is the singer and cute as a button. The song that first hit me like a ton of bricks was Company (video here), but I also really enjoy Camp Out (“This is a song for the one that I love / No, I haven’t met them yet / But I’m quietly confident”) and lately I’ve been all about Shoes Watch (“But I got so scared / That you might be a better me than me”). |
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4 – The Indelicates: American Demo .
This band was the opening act to Amanda Palmer when I saw her, and I fell madly in love in about two seconds flat. I love that the two front figures, Julia Indelicate and Simon Indelicate take turns singing, and that makes for very different listening experiences depending on the song. Two favourites, sadly not on YouTube, are Stars (“I’m in love with the boy next door / He treats me like a filthy whore”) and We Hate the Kids (“Absolutely anyone can play the fucking guitar”), but here is a link to America, which shows said vocal contrast between the two singers… |
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5 – Jenny Owen Youngs: Batten the Hatches.
Found this album by way of the excellent (and suitably depressing as all the songs I love) song Fuck Was I, which you can see here. I bought both her albums before going to Edinburgh, because I suddenly decided that I Had To Have Them for the flight. I hear Jenny is currently the opening act of Regina Spektor who is also the voice in the beginning of the song Voice on Tape (and don’t ask me how many months I listened to that song before figuring that out). |
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6 – Kate Nash: Made of Bricks.
I found out about Kate’s music through Female Appreciation Month, and it kind of hit me over the head like a well-placed brick (ha, ha, ha). She was this year’s Lily Allen, in a way, and the song Foundations inspired me to write a certain blog post, but I think my favourite song of hers is Mariella, which you should check out here, and not just because Kate has the most delicious British accent… |
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7 – Lily Allen: It’s Not Me, It’s You.
Lily’s first album was my post-break-up-fuck-you-I’m-doing-fine-really-I-am-music. I don’t think I listened to anything else for months. I didn’t get nearly as obsessed with this album, but it’s still a good one. I love The Fear (video here), Not Fair always makes me giggle and I Could Say is beautiful. Yes, really. |
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8 – The Lucksmiths.
I refuse to pick one for them, since they QUIT this year and anyway I love this graphic Google found me, which doesn’t belong to an album, I don’t think. This is a band I never thought that I would like. See above when I ask for noisy stuff. My Australian Music Fairy, however, disagreed and shared some music with me and got me hooked. She’s evil like that. I’ve got parts of four of their albums in my ipod and I so can’t choose one above the others. When I went to YouTube to see what there was of theirs on there I found this cover of The Smiths’ There’s a Light That Never Goes Out, which made me smile (disregard the video, okay?). |
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9 – Pony Up!: Make Love to the Judges With Your Eyes.
I extremely randomly tripped and fell over Pony Up! when a friend sent me their song Shut Up and Kiss Me (“If I left you wouldn’t miss me / I don’t care, shut up and kiss me”, and later bought some more of their stuff to see if I liked it as much. I kind of did. I don’t like everything they do, like most of this list, but they’re still pretty damn brilliant. From this album I especially like The Best Offence (”My self respect means more to me / Than you do / Or at least it used to“). |
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10 – Regina Spektor: Far.
I pretty much like everything Regina does, so I don’t think anyone was surprised when I started obsessing over this album. My favourite song from it is, by far, Folding Chair (video here), but Eet is brilliant too. My favourite Regina song right now, however? It’s a tie between Chelsea Hotel #2 (a Leonard Cohen cover, available here) and Mockingbird, apparently a play on a nursery rhyme or something, which you can see here. Neither are on this album. Sorry about that. |
Runner-ups:
Anything and everything by Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday
Rilo Kiley: More Adventurous
Yeah Yeah Yeahs: iTunes Originals
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STUFF, STUFF AND MORE STUFF
Wow. Nearly 4000 words now. That is crazycakes. I am pretty much done, but will toss in a short list of “extras” that I can’t fit in anywhere but still want to mention…
How I Met Your Mother, especially the unreliable narration.
Glee, and pretty much everything involving Mercedes and/or Kurt.
Post Secret, which is an oldie but I still love it.
Questionable Content, my favourite web-cartoon of them all, especially when there is Marigold and/or Hannelore.
The Guild, the best five minute episodes of web-TV you will ever see. With Felicia Day and Wil Wheaton, people!
Ill Doctrine and his defense of the Being Grouchy About the HAPPY HOLIDAYS Thing.
Shapely Prose and all its four (I think?) writers.
Bokhora, the most brilliant book review site in Swedish I know (the fact that their name translates to “Book Whore” helps).
Baby Power Dyke, blog that preaches the goodness of Rachel Maddow and recently got suspended (and un-suspended, thank fuck).
Any and all blogs by authors, publishers and literary agents that I read, which I can share if somebody cares, but the list is kind of long.
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I believe that’s all. Oh thank fuck for that, it would be sad to still be working on this by midnight…
Jul
Thirty people, thirty books
by Kaia in 2009
And all of them are definitely not female, but a good portion of them are. Some of these I haven’t read for a decade or more, but loved so much that I couldn’t not bring them to school and read on every single available moment, some time during my childhood or teens. Those blurbs may be a bit vague. And yes, I will re-read them. Some time.
You may notice that most books in Swedish are from ‘before’ and most in English are for ‘now’. Boktipset is a neat Swedish site where you can catalogue books you read and it gives you suggestions of other books to read. The Wikpedia links will tell you if these have been translated to your preferred language.
This is not a best of all times, that sort of list just gives me serious stage fright. Just… thirty really good books, in alphabetic order, divided on ‘then’, ‘now’ and ‘later’. Read them! Or not.
Number of books written by women: 25
Number of books written by men: 5
Number of books written in English: 15
Number of books written in Swedish: 13
Number of books written in a third languages: 2
Number of books by Swedish authors: 13
Number of books by American authors: 7
Number of books by Australian authors: 5
Number of books by British authors: 2
Number of books by authors of other ethnicities: 3
And as this list kind of got out of hand (over 5,000 words and counting), I’m putting just the list on top, click on each one that interests you to get to the blurb about it:
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15 BOOKS I LOVED THEN:
01: Boije af Gennäs, Louise: Stjärnor utan svindel (1996)
02: Boye, Karin: Kallocain (1940)
03: Ehn, Anna: Vårfrost (1995)
04: Gardell, Jonas: Ett ufo gör entré (2001)
05: Gripe, Maria: … och de vita skuggorna i skogen (1984)
06: Guillou, Jan: Ondskan (1981)
07: Holt, Anne: Död joker (1999)
08: Lassen, Caecilie: Lulu (1988)
09: Lindgren, Astrid: Bröderna Lejonhjärta (1973)
10: Lindroth, Lasse: Där inga änglar bor (1995)
11: Nilsson, Johanna: Hon går genom tavlan, ut ur bilden (1996)
12: Oates, Joyce-Carol: Foxfire (1993)
13: Plath, Sylvia: The bell jar (1963)
14: Pohl, Peter: Regnbågen har bara åtta färger (1986)
15: Skugge, Linda: Saker under huden (1998)
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10 BOOKS I LOVE NOW:
16: Crowley, Cath: Gracie Faltrain gets it right (finally!) (2004)
17: Hadley-Kamptz, Isobel: Jag går bara ut en stund (2007)
18: Jansson, Anna: Svart fjäril (2005)
19: Johnson, Maureen: The Bermudez triangle (2007)
20: Lanagan, Margo: Tender morsels (2008)
21: McCarthy, Maureen: Rose by any other name (2006)
22: Pierce, Tamora: Page (2000)
23: Rayner Roberts, Tansy: Power and Majesty (2010)
24: Rees-Brennan, Sarah: The demon’s lexicon (2007)
25: Rowling, J.K.: Harry Potter and the goblet of fire (2000)
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5 BOOKS I WANT TO ADD, BUT HAVEN’T ACTUALLY READ YET:
26: Crusie, Jennifer: Bet Me
27: Gaiman, Neil: The Graveyard Book
28: Larbalestier, Justine: Liar
29: Myracle, Lauren: Peace, Love and Baby Ducks
30: Vaught, Susan: Big Fat Manifesto
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13 BOOKS I LOVED THEN:
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01: Boije af Gennäs, Louise: Stjärnor utan svindel (1996)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia | English Wikipedia)
This book was the first one I ever read with a lesbian storyline. It’s about a woman named Sophie, who is wealthy, career driven and successful. And, um, married. When she falls in love with a woman she has to juggle these two worlds, one filled with feminist and political discussions, people of every sexual orientation and lots of vegetarian stews, and the other, which is fancy, with expensive foods, conversations about nothing and extremely hetero centered.
And um, possibly the love interest is named Kaja. Purely coincidental, I swear.
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02: Boye, Karin: Kallocain (1940)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia | English Wikipedia)
Has been re-published in at least ten languages and a number of editions since it was first released. It’s a 1984-esque type book, about a military state where you feed people truth serum, report everything to the authorities and have to turn your children over to the state to become good soldiers at the age of seven. It’s quite SF, actually.
This is not so much the love for this book, as it is for Karin Boye as a person. She was a Swedish poet, and growing up I always thought it was so cool that our names were so similar. In the 1930s she started to live openly as a lesbian, despite this being illegal back then (that law was ditched in 1979), and being unhappy with having to “live as a man”. She commited suicide by way of sleeping pills at age 41, and less than a month later the woman who she called her wife followed suit.
My favourite piece of hers is actually the rather short poem Jag vill möta / I want to meet (click to read!), but she’s many good ones.
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03: Ehn, Anna: Vårfrost (1995)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia)
Elin wrote an entry a few weeks ago about books dealing with eating disorders (in Swedish, sorry) and whether they help or harm. It was a really interesting read, and brought this book to mind. I read so many, but this is the one that really stuck in my mind.
It’s about Klara, who is twelve years old and a swimmer. Her coach tells her (I think, it’s nearly fifteen years since I read it) that she needs to lose a tiny bit to move faster in the water, and it takes her into a downward spiral without an end. I remember that the book has a very open ending. Either she finds peace of mind and the strength to move on or she… doesn’t.
Man, I used to hate books that ended that way.
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04: Gardell, Jonas: Ett ufo gör entré (2001)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia | English Wikipedia)
This author is something as strange as a stand-up-comedian that writes tragic books, although admittedly with a bit of funny thrown in for good measure. What’s even odder, he’s not the only one on this list. Jonas Gardell was, I think, the first openly gay celebrity we had, here in Sweden. His books deal with that stuff a lot, feeling out of place and others pouncing on this fear.
This book is the second in a series of three, and in it Juha (which is actually a Finnish name) has a friend who is badly bullied by the others. He doesn’t defend her, as far as I can remember. What I do remember is that I was fascinated by Jenny more than Juha, and wishing that the book focused on her instead. Apparently there is a ‘25 years later’ book out now, about her and what happened when Juha wasn’t around. Tying up lose ends. I must read it.
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05: Gripe, Maria: … och de vita skuggorna i skogen (1984)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia | English Wikipedia)
Maria Gripe is one of our big authors, and has been translated a bit, but I can’t find a link to this specific one in English. She wrote a lot of books with magical or mysterious shades to it. I love many, many of her books, but this is the one I remember the most. It’s number two in a series of two, and is about a girl named Berta. She and her half-sister Carolin, who she didn’t know existed before she came to work as a maid for Berta’s family, go off together to work for a wealthy family.
I don’t remember many details, but I do remember that the girl they work for – it’s two siblings, a boy and a girl – is mute, and does not use sign language. Instead she writes her half of each conversation in a notepad, and she has all of these catalogued somewhere.
I need to re-read some of Maria Gripe’s work, because it’s been far too long.
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06: Guillou, Jan: Ondskan (1981)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia | English Wikipedia)
Jan Guillou is one of those people that you’d rather not like. He’s always in the papers, saying something moronic, and isn’t scared of creating drama. He is probably most known for his endless series of crime fiction about a spy and a historical fiction trilogy about a knight templar, taking place in the 12th and 13th century. Many of his books have been translated to English, but I can’t find a link to this specific one.
This book is semi-biographical and is about a boy who after getting in serious trouble is sent off to boarding school. There is a lot of bullying and downright abusive behaviour going on, and Erik, the protagonist, and his best friend are always at the receiving end. I first found out about it when our school arranged for us to go see a play based on it. It was a one-person-play, and basically consisted of the actor holding an endless monologue. It was so fascinating that I wanted it to go on forever. Afterwards I found the book at the library and read it over and over.
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07: Holt, Anne: Död joker (1999)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia | English Wikipedia)
Anne Holt is a Norwegian lawyer, journalist, politican and author. She’s most known for her books about the detective Hanne Wilhelmsen. I am not entirely sure if this particular one has been translated to English, but some of her books definitely have.
Most books about Hanne have a gruesome murder or several in focus, but I read them because of the small glimpses of her personal life. She is a very closeted lesbian, who has lived with the same woman for years, but always refused to acknowledge their relationship. This is very powerfully illustrated by the fact that she has, during over a decade, avoided to put their last names on their mailbox, instead going with only their initials. In this book her partner, Cecilie becomes very sick, and Hanne is forced to re-examine her priorities. The murder plot is, as always, well executed, but it’s the storyline with Cecilie that I remember. It’s also the reason I picked this particular book from this series.
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08: Lassen, Caecilie: Lulu (1988)
(Boktipset | Personal webpage in Danish)
Lulu was one of those books I measured myself up to when I was younger. On the back it said that Caecilie was only fifteen when this book was published; at her webpage it says she was seventeen, but that her first book was published a year before this one.
Holding yourself up to such standards can kill your dreams faster than anything else.
This book takes place in Copenhagen in 1943, when Germany had invaded Denmark. 15-year-old Lulu stumbles into a movement that works against the war, and kind of accidentally gets a bigger and bigger part in it, while also struggling with the usual growing up thing. It’s a quite fascinating read, as I recall, and now I really want to re-read it and study the language, and how it was written.
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09: Lindgren, Astrid: Bröderna Lejonhjärta (1973)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia | English Wikipedia)
This title could (and has been!) translated to The brothers Lionheart.
Astrid Lindgren has written so many amazing books, many with supernatural / fairytale / fantasy elements. There is the book about Ronja the Robber’s daughter, that is set in medieval time, the one about Mio my son, who discovers he’s the son of a king in a fairytale kingdom, the one about the secret land underneath the rosebush, and oh so many others.
This one is one of my favourites. It’s about a young, sickly boy and his older brother Jonathan. Karl knows that he’s going to die from… TBC or something, I think, but what he doesn’t know is that his strong, handsome and thoughtful brother is going to die too. It happens when their house catches on fire, and the time afterwards is awful. When Karl finally dies as well (the poor mother!), he discovers that heaven isn’t, well, a heaven.
He ends up in a world where everything is shiny and nice, everybody is pleasant, he can swim and has a horse to ride. Everything is fine. Until he finds out that somebody is shooting down the doves carrying the post with arrows. This lunges him into a big adventure with a dictator, an underground rebel group, a nice grandfathery type man and, believe it or not, a dragon.
Ah, yes, Astrid knew her fairytales.
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10: Lindroth, Lasse: Där inga änglar bor (1995)
(Swedish Wikipedia | English Wikipedia)
I have no memory of this book whatsoever, but I do remember that I loved it so much that when I checked it out from the library I folded the corners of all the pages I wanted to copy down before returning it, promptly forgot to do this, and my best friend at the time checked it out next, unfolded all the corners and proceeded to tell me about this book she was reading that came with almost every page marked. Small town libraries and all that.
Lasse Lindroth was a Swedish stand-up-comedian, actor and author. Like Jonas Gardell he wrote tragic/comedic books, and this one is about an adopted boy that is rather badly treated by people around him because of his skin colour. Lasse was adopted from Iran, and I believe some of this was actually biographical. He used his appearance to mock racists and neo-nazis in his comedy acts, which they took rather a lot of offense to, as I remember it.
I say “was” because he was killed in a car accident at age 26, less than five years after his breakthrough, and only months after getting married.
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11: Nilsson, Johanna: Hon går genom tavlan, ut ur bilden (1996)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia)
Johanna Nilsson is a writer that I used to like a lot. She uses a very vivid language, and her books have titles such as (translated) Rebel with cold feet and The girl that invented life. This book is about bullying, lying and diminishing yourself until you almost disappear. It’s probably twenty years since I last read it. I’m due for a re-read.
Re-discovering books is one of my favourite pasttimes.
I found one of her books in the fantasy section of the library, so I’m going to get back into reading her stuff. She writers YA, and I’m not sure if that one is actually fantsy.
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12: Oates, Joyce-Carol: Foxfire (1993)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia | English Wikipedia)
This book is a quite fascinating read about a group of five teenage girls, Maddy, Lana, Goldie, Rita and Legs. They find themselves to be treated badly because they are girls, and are set out to avenge this, one way or another. My favourite part is the turning point; when they get back at a teacher who touches Rita inappropriately by writing graffitti on his car. They paint it only on the passenger’s side, which means he doesn’t see it before going home for the day, and displays the message of what he does to innocent girls to the whole town. After that he is ridiculed and retires from teaching.
After reading Foxfire I checked out nearly every Joyce Carol Oates book I could find at the library and did my best to read and appreciate them. Sadly the others are more surreal, hard to understand (at least they were at age fifteen) and lead me to writing a series of short stories about suicide and dead children, that my mother got ahold of read, and proceeded to have a Very Serious Talk about. In short, I learned not to leave my notebooks laying around and that some people think that everything they read is true.
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13: Plath, Sylvia: The bell jar (1963)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia | English Wikipedia)
I read this book when I was in a bad place myself. It’s always like that, isn’t it?
It’s about a girl who finds herself depressed, which gets progressively worse as the book goes along. Her first psychiatrist is not a good one and traumatises her further. When she decides not to go back her mother tells her that she knew she’d turn out all right in the end. Esther’s depression gets worse and worse, and ends with a number of suicide attempts and a stay in a mental hospital.
What I remember most from reading it was that I felt suffocated.
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14: Pohl, Peter: Regnbågen har bara åtta färger (1986)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia | English Wikipedia)
Peter Pohl is one of our most translated authors, and while many of his books (I especially recommend Johnny, my friend) have been translated to English this specific book does not exist in English, only Dutch and German. He doesn’t shy away from difficult subjects, and I have read books of his dealing with stuff like a family member dying, a friend dying, sexual assault, incest, bullying, problems in school, domestic violence, etc.
This book takes place in 1945, and is about a boy with a Swedish mother and a German father. He comes to Sweden after the war without knowing a single word of the language, and is forced to find his way in a climate where Germans are all but popular. Henrik, the protagonist, is actually named Heinrich, but as soon as he learns the language he takes this Swedish version of his name and refuses to speak German until he forgets how to do so in a desperate attempt to fit in. He is small and shy and careful and has quite a poetic language. The title can be translated to The rainbow only has eight colours and is a play on the fact that he insists that the ninth colour of the rainbow is “longing”.
He makes a few friends, but tragedy strikes. Repeatedly. This is the book that had my American ex going “do you Swedes have any books that don’t deal with death or horrible diseases or you know, being beaten to a pulp?”
I believe my answer was “… no.”
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15: Skugge, Linda: Saker under huden (1998)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia)
Linda Skugge is a journalist, author and blogger with a lot of opinions. She used to be rather radical and a feminist, but as she grew older she became more conservative and was never afraid to say so out loud. For example there is an article in which she stops identifying herself as a feminist, which, um, didn’t make people all that happy. In 2007 she had to quit blogging because people were jumping her too much. I believe she has since picked it up again, but I’m not sure as I don’t keep up with her anymore.
The best thing about her is that she always talks about being strong as a woman, of working, of being active and creative and personally make sure that you get what you want. If that’s not feminism I don’t know what is, but I do remember the drama following that article.
As all good emo kids I loved this book. It’s about growing up; about having friends that rip you to shreds in a heartbeat, about all the uncomfortable, painful, bad things that makes your teens the worst years of your life. It’s very honest and I remember loving it to bits. Back then.
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10 BOOKS I LOVE NOW
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16: Crowley, Cath: Gracie Faltrain gets it right (finally!) (2004)
This is book three of three in this series. They are all about a confident, driven girl, who plays soccer like it’s going out of style. She’s on an all boys team, and it’s all very fast paced, very fun, and there are enough points of view to make your head spin.
The first book is only from one POV, and loses a lot of speed because of it. This is why I prefer the third. I haven’t read the second yet.
Gracie deals with a lot of the usual teenager stuff, like having a sworn enemy because she stole your swing in kindergarten, and trying to make your nerdy best friend cooler so that people will like her and coming off as a total meanie instead. And so on.
Sadly the soccer terms aren’t exactly spot on, but I love the characters (especially the minor ones) too much to care.
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17: Hadley-Kamptz, Isobel: Jag går bara ut en stund (2007)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia)
Isobel Hadley-Kamptz is a Swedish journalist, author and blogger and this is her first book. It is semi-biographical, and tells the story about trying to conceive for years, and when it’s finally successful, having to abort the baby at 19 weeks because of a very rare disease.
It tells the story of suddenly being unable to find comfort in the one person you love the most, because you’re both too broken, and sheds a lot of light on the late term abortion debate. More than anything it makes it very clear that nobody does this sort of thing cheerfully. It’s a vivid and painful book, and is really hard to stop thinking about.
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18: Jansson, Anna: Svart fjäril (2005)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia)
I have to admit to having rather a soft spot for crime fiction. When my last relationship ended I did nothing but reading crime mysteries, because it was the only books that didn’t have love in them. I have many favourite crime authors, Anne Holt, Camilla Läckberg, Åsa Larsson, Liza Marklund, Minette Walters and Janet Evanovich are a few others. I don’t much care for crime written by males, for some reason.
This one is about a detective that has fled Gotland, which is an island just off the coast of Sweden where the author herself lives, to try to forget his crush on a married woman that happens to be the usual protagonist of Anna Jansson’s books. It has ingredients as suddenly appearing siblings, stalkers, arson and speeds towards the conclusion at a pace that is breath taking. This is how crime fiction should be written.
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19: Johnson, Maureen – The Bermudez triangle (2007)
(Boktipset | English Wikipedia)
I have to admit that I first got hooked by Maureen’s very funny, very sarcastic blog entries. She frequently asks her readers to ask her random questions that she will answer in blogs and/or tweets. Like for example Romeo and Juliet being total dating fail and how to write a query letter. So far I’ve only read one of her books, but I’ve got several more on my “some time I must read” list.
This is a story about three friends, Mel, Nina and Avery. When Nina goes away for the summer Mel and Avery falls in love, and the book is not about that fluffy puppy love summer, but what happens when Nina comes back and something has changed. It’s about awkward love, Irish chain restaurants, friendship that changes and most of all, it’s about growing up. It’s a very innocent book, with the most risque line being “She’d done things with aforementioned girlfriend that went well beyond kissing, things that might still be illegal in some of the more backwards states.”
Yet it has been banned in several school libraries for lacking moral fiber, promoting homosexual content, unprotected sex, underage drinking, and reckless promiscuity, to name a few. Fun times!
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20: Lanagan, Margo – Tender morsels (2008)
(Boktipset | English Wikipedia)
I was sent this book by my Australian book fairy, because she thought that there were themes in it that coincided with one of my own projects at the time. Once I had gotten the first draft down I read it, and holy hell.
This is a book so vivid, painful and amazing that by the end of it all you feel like somebody has turned you inside out and then back again. What’s even more wonderful? You liked it. The entire time.
It’s based on the fairytale Snow-white and Rose-red, and tells the story of Liga, who is fourteen when something awful happens. Twice. Somehow she ends up in a safe haven, giving her a place and time to heal. She bears two daughters because of these two incidents, Branza and Urdda, and the book is centred around the three of them.
The lesson you learn from reading this powerful book is that there is always an “after”, and no matter how awful it is at the time, you will make it through. And it will get better. Only not in a “happily ever after” sort of way. No, this is more of a “I hate you, world, and I love you at the same time, and I hate that I love you and love that I hate you” sort of situation.
This is one of my favourite books of all times.
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21: McCarthy, Maureen – Rose by any other name
(Boktipset | Booked Out Speakers Agency)
Maureen McCarthy is an Australian writer that writes long, gritty YA novels. I’ve read a couple, and it was a tough choice between this one and Queen Kat, Carmel and St Jude. This one won in the end, because I love the protagonist so much.
Rose is angry. She’s angry at the world, she’s angry at everyone in it, and most of all she’s angry with herself. As the book starts she sets out on a roadtrip, but the fun is sort of diminished by her mother tagging along. Also, the reason that she’s doing it, is to get to her dying grandmother.
In flashbacks we’re told the story of how Rose became this cranky and pissed off, and it is not for any reasons I would’ve imagined reading the back blurb or the first few chapters. Maureen McCarthy is an amazing storyteller, and I’m hoping to read many more of her books.
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22: Pierce, Tamora – Page (2000)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia | English Wikipedia)
Tamora Pierce is a rather fierce lady, with a blog in which she does not shy away from stating her opinion. There is nothing diplomatic about the way she speaks about feminism and politics, and just yesterday I laughed myself silly at her using the phrase “what in the motherfucking baby-frying universe”.
She has written a lot of fantasy, most which are about the kingdom of Tortall. Page is the second book out of four in the Protector of the Small Quartet series. They are about Keladry from Mindelan who is the first girl to ever train openly as a knight. This is far from appreciated by some of the older pages, and she has to endure rather a lot.
There is another series of four books called The Song of the Lioness, which are about Alanna, who also trained as a knight, but for eight years managed to pretend to be a boy. I want to read those too, but I still have half a book to go!
Kel is both annoyingly stubborn, amazingly strong, sweet as can be but kick arse at the same time, and in short a heroine you grow to like. She has a goal and she intends to get there, one way or another. One of my favourite things about this author is that she portrays fleeting crushes; Kel is so much more than her feelings for one boy, and I love that. I do wish that this series had been about half as long as it is. By the fourth book I am no longer as fascinated as I was by the first and second, and it’s a shame, because it’s a lovely story.
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23: Rayner Roberts, Tansy: Power and Majesty (2010)
Okay, so I should probably admit that this is my Australian book fairy, and that this book has not yet been published. It’s due to come out in early/mid 2010 at HarperCollins Voyager, and is the first in a trilogy (possibly I’ve already read about half of number two as well).
This book is a lovely mix of fashion, flappers, naked people, sky battles, magic and, well animals. Many, many animals. In the very first chapter Velody sees two naked men fall from the sky. One of them proceeds to steal her animor from her, which is, to simplify it rather a lot, what makes her able to turn into an animal of her own. She never knew that she could, and so she doesn’t miss it. Well, she may miss something, but she doesn’t know exactly what it is.
Of course, when he some years later dies and all this stolen strength is released again… shit happens. Rather a lot of it, actually. I really can’t make this book justice by recapping it, and I’d like you all to read it to see for yourselves. Um. Once it comes out, obviously.
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24: Rees-Brennan, Sarah: The demon’s lexicon (2009)
(Boktipset | English Wikipedia)
Sarah Rees Brennan has a rather well known blog with thousands of readers. She has a very distinctive narrative voice, both in her book and in this blog, and I always read it. I am such a fangirl.
Anyway.
This bok is about Nick, who is like, the anti-hero. In interviews Sarah has said that she dislikes that the dark, dangerous hero always turns fluffy, so she set out to write a book about a bloke that doesn’t. And, yeah, Nick is one of those people that look rather good, but doesn’t bother to chat you up. He spends most of the book wondering why people talk so much, doesn’t get the whole hugging and getting along thing because he doesn’t need anyone and disposes of bodies while being annoyed that he’s late for dinner.
Nick’s brother Alan is his exact opposite, and dispairs that his brother doesn’t seem to bother with actual feelings. They live with their mother, who is a former magician. She is wearing charms around her neck that she stole from the most powerful magician of all times, before plunging into mental illness. This means that the three of them are always on the run, because the magicians always seem to catch up.
Sarah is an absolutely amazing and EVIL writer, and this book takes you for quite a ride. I enjoyed it a lot, and while it’s currently not available in Swedish, it’s YA and a fairly easy read.
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25: Rowling, J.K. – Harry Potter and the goblet of fire (2000)
(Boktipset | Swedish Wikipedia | English Wikipedia)
Everyone knows what the Harry Potter books are about, right? Thought so. I have read and loved them all, some more than others. This one is my absolute favourite of the seven of them, and, well. I am not going to say much about it, because you already know.
Harry. Prophecy. Saving the world. You know the deal.
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5 BOOKS I WANT TO ADD, BUT HAVEN’T ACTUALLY READ YET:
Because I want an even 30, here are five books I am planning to read.
26: Crusie, Jennifer: Bet Me (2004)
About a curvy woman who loves carbs but never seems to eat, a man that has a bet about getting into her knickers and probably a few other things. I will have to get back to you on this one.
27: Gaiman, Neil: The Graveyard Book (2008)
About a toddler that escapes a murderer that kills his entire family, somehow ends up in a graveyard and is promptly adopted by the ghosts there in a very Jugle Book fashion. I’m told this is a good one.
28: Larbalestier, Justine: Liar (2009)
About Micah, a young girl that is unable to stick to the truth. She lies about everything, and when a murder is committed in her near vincinty, well, things get complicated. I’m really curious about that one.
29: Myracle, Lauren: Peace, Love and Baby Ducks (2009)
About fifteen-year-old Carly who has a problem – two, actually: her younger sister Anna’s new “real live Hooters-esque boobs.” I love me some YA and Lauren Myracle is one of those authors that certain conservative Americans consider so risque that reading her (very innocent) books will rot their kids’ brains away. That in itself is incentive to read her books.
30: Vaught, Susan: Big Fat Manifesto (2007)
About Jamie who wants to do everything, including fighting for her rights as a very fat girl. She writes a column in the paper about it, and it seems like this story has quite a few twists and turns.