Burton Book Review - Leafing through history: Blog Tour

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Jun 8, 2009

Book Review: "The Sitting Swing" by Irene Watson & Giveaway

BurtonReview Monday, June 08, 2009

The Sitting Swing, by Irene Watson
Paperback: 248 pages
Publisher: Loving Healing Press; Revised edition (July 16, 2008)
Genre: Self-Help, Inspirational, Memoir
ISBN-10: 1932690670
ISBN-13: 978-1932690675
The Burton Review Rating: 4 stars

Synopsis:
"Named for a childhood swing the author remembers as being impossible to get moving because of the rose bushes directly behind it, Watson's memoir recounts her fearful, highly sheltered years growing up an only child to Ukrainian immigrants in 1940s Alberta, Canada. Watson writes from the hindsight of her 50s, living in a Quebec addiction-recovery facility, where she has checked herself in for 28 days, unsure whether she can stay married to a husband she considers as overbearing as her mother was to her. Gradually, Watson uncovers the childhood wounds leading to her personality crisis: until age six, she lived in a log cabin in the wilderness within a few feet of her prohibitive mother, who pined for her dead firstborn son.
Watson was largely ignored by her farmer father, abused by cousins and neighbors, and unable at first to speak English at her schoolhouse or make friends. Denied expression and love within the family, she acted out and married a man who helped continue to make excuses for her lack of ambition. She undergoes a rigorous 12-step program and a systematic breaking down of her ego so that she can re-create herself. This is an earnest memoir, well structured, though the writing lacks rigorous urgency."

This is a rendition of Irene's life, which begins with her entry into a rehab facility at age 48. She then rehashes her life, recounting a harrowing ordeal of a childhood that she endured. It reads fast, with the feeling as if Irene is talking with you casually on a front porch. Unfortunately the events of her life cannot be misconstrued as casual; she has a domineering mother who probably has a few screws loose herself, and a father who was barely in the picture. She goes through some traumatic experiences and the fact that Irene lives to tell her story and then spin something as positive as this book is truly a feat in itself. Judging from the way her life was turning out you would have fully expected her to have made some serious wrong choices along the way.

Page 19:
"One matter stood out most of all - one matter that would make the biggest difference in their point of view and would so profoundly impact me that it could be argued as the defining period of my life, even though it was my parents' issue, and even though it happened some time before I was born. That matter was my brother, Alexander."

Amazingly, she escapes her parents and begins to live her life, yet how much can she take from a mother that won't let go even as Irene becomes an adult? What are the long-term effects of mental and physical abuse when the abused becomes an adult? And when Irene gets married, she wonders did she just marry another domineering figure to control her? Irene tells us how she endures the shame and anxiety of growing up in a dysfunctional family, and finally how she coped with it. How Irene was even able to write of her childhood memories and go through it all again is a triumph. I would have assumed the classic reaction would be to block it all out. What is heart wrenching is how Irene remembers simple things like a comment from her mother that Irene's 'tummy sticks out'. Three words that went a long way to fester Irene's hatred for her mom. Or it could have been: (page 81) "As I lay on my bedroom floor in a panic, that was the hour. It was the hour, at nine years old, when I knew I must get away for real. Mom left no question about whether she was my protector or my controller. The sooner I could leave home, the better it would be."

This revised edition of The Sitting Swing has the byline "Finding Wisdom to Know the Difference", referring to the popular saying by Reinhold Niebuhr: "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference." How many times have you muttered that to yourself? Irene is attempting to break the mold of the self-help genre to tell us her own inspiring personal story which really must have been extremely difficult, and is sharing her new-found strength with the average reader to remind us that it is never too late to heal.

About halfway through the book, Irene has completed the retelling of the events that lead her up to the rehab facility, and she then explains what she experiences and what her reactions are to the counselors lectures. This is when there is some foul language thrown in via one of the counselors, so I must warn you if that turns you off. But otherwise, I definitely recommend this book. I understand the stigma behind 'self-help' books and even 'inspirational'.. and many feel that is just not the genre for them. I tend to stay away from that type as well. But the insights along with Irene's story make this a worthwhile read. And even though you may not want a sad story about a child's reality, it gives you pause to think. Where do you draw the line between protective and oppressive? And as a mother myself, what off-handed comments have I made that are harmful to my daughter? I shudder to think. Although perhaps this is not a literary masterpiece, this is definitely an eye opening story that is told with a heart and soul that pleads for hope for our society today.

Please visit the other blogs to follow Irene on her Virtual Book Blog Tour.

Also, Irene has a blog for which you can find more of her inspirational thoughts and essays. Irene's Weblog

Enter here for your chance to win an autographed edition of The Sitting Swing by Irene Watson.
1. For your First entry, Follow this blog Publicly, and leave a comment with your email address. If you are already a follower, let me know that too.
2. For Two Extra Entries, Blog This Contest. Leave me the link to your Blog post.
3. For One Extra Entry, Twitter about this Contest. Leave me your Twitter name so I can check up. (I am BurtonReview on Twitter)
4. You must tell me what is inspiring you to read this book, or how you would benefit from it.

Open to USA only, Ends June 26th Midnight Eastern Time

May 27, 2009

Book Review:"Mating Rituals of The North American WASP" by Lauren Lipton and Intriguing Info from Lauren Lipton!

BurtonReview Wednesday, May 27, 2009

"Mating Rituals of The North American WASP" by Lauren Lipton
Publisher: 5 Spot/Hachette
ISBN: 978-0-446-19797-7
Pages: 302 Trade Paperback
Release: May 29, 2009

Welcome to the Blog Tour for "Mating Rituals of The North American WASP" by Lauren Lipton.
The Blogs that have signed up to participate in the tour are all listed at Drey's Library.
Some of my favorite haunts who are participating are (in no particular order):
S. Krishna's Books
Morbid Romantic
Pudgy Penguin Perusals
The Tome Traveler's Weblog
My Friend Amy
Peeking Between the Pages
Diary of an Eccentric
Savvy Verse & Wit

The author Lauren Lipton has kindly accepted my offer to compose a little something for my blog in honor of the virtual tour, which is just below. After her post, you can find my own review of the book and the special something for lucky readers at the end of the post.. so be sure to read all! :)

The Burton Review left a wide berth for Lauren, and she answers the question:

What intrigues you?

--People intrigue me. People and their stories, whether outrageous or commonplace. I will inevitably sit on a bus or subway and by journey's end know at least one interesting fact about the former stranger next to me. This happens to me two or three times a week. I don't know if I begin these conversations or if they do, but over the years I have met a psychic, a government special agent, an emergency medical technician, a homeless musician. One time, on a flight from New York to San Diego, I ended up next to a former military pilot who for six hours told me stories about the Iraq War I've never seen printed anywhere.

I am writing this guest post on Memorial Day, returning home from Connecticut on a train to New York City. It's hot and crowded, and the man across the aisle has kept up a running commentary to his traveling companions about every last celebrity in the People magazine he is reading. After an hour (it's hard not to listen in), I now know Lionel Richie was raised in Joliet, Illinois, and that Ralph Macchio was actually in his twenties when he played the teen lead in The Karate Kid. It's a pity. I'm wholly uninterested in celebrities. I wish I knew, though, what this man across the aisle will be doing in Manhattan, what he did for Memorial Day, and whether the large entourage he's traveling with is his family or his friends.

I'm an inveterate eavesdropper, an anthropological observer of peoples' outfits, haircuts, reading material and grocery-store shopping-cart contents. At parties, I'm the one "interviewing" other guests about their jobs, under the guise of making polite small talk. I've learned some interesting tidbits about things like zoology and organic farming.

I often worry about coming off as prying or nosy. I hope people don't see it that way. I'm just fascinated by them. And I guess, in a way, it's my job. --Lauren Lipton www.laurenlipton.com

Lauren Lipton is a freelance journalist and author of two novels who lives in Connecticut. Visit her website to read more about her and author news.

Now to prove you are reading, you need to answer this question in your comments, along with following the directions at the end in order to enter the book giveaway. :) I'm mean.
The question you must answer in your comment is "If you met Lauren on a subway, what do you think you would talk about, and WHY? Or, if you were sitting near her on a subway, what would she be hearing from you if she were eavesdropping?"

And now onwards to my book review (I normally separate these things our but I wanted to just see how this worked, so what do you think?):

Book Review: "Mating Rituals of The North American WASP" by Lauren Lipton
The Burton Review Rating: 3.5 stars
Read an Excerpt here of Chapter One.

The synopsis:
“After arguing with her live-in boyfriend about his inability to commit, Peggy Adams flies to a friend’s bachelorette party in Las Vegas, and wakes up next to a man she can’t remember. Hung over and miserable, she sneaks out of the sleeping man’s hotel room and returns home to New York, where her boyfriend apologizes for the fight and gives her a Tiffany box containing a pre-engagement ring. Not what she expected, but close enough.

But the next day she receives a phone call from the Las Vegas one-night stand, Luke Sedgwick, who claims she’s already married - to him! Both Peggy and Luke are ready for an annulment, until Peggy arrives in quaint New Nineveh, Connecticut, where Luke cares for his great aunt, and the old woman makes Peggy an offer she can’t refuse.”

So here's the Peggy gets married novel. Poor Peggy is feeling the sands of time and wants to get married, yet she did not expect to wake up married to a stranger after a drunk night in Vegas. They don't even know if they consummated their marriage, that's how drunk they were. OK so you don't really sympathize with Poor Peggy right off the bat. Then Peggy goes home to her knuckle-head-jock-not-ready-to-settle-down-boyfriend Brock and she pretends nothing happens. Nope, she doesn't tell her boyfriend what she's done; instead she decides to spend weekends with her new husband the WASP Luke in Connecticut and still run her soap shop in NYC, Jock-Brock has no idea for a year. Silly Silly Peggy.

With all these and more goofy events, we get sucked into Silly Peggy's story, and we want to yell at her to WAKE UP!! and be a little more realistic but the millions of dollars that could be at stake if she stays married to Luke is just too much of a draw for Poor Peggy; and her best friend supports her in this Silly decision... OK OK enough of the Silly Peggy and Poor Peggy. But that is what you feel as the reader feels as you skim through the book as she is such a nit-wit, yet it is a fun read despite Silly Peggy. The storyline I enjoyed the most was when we get to the history of Luke's WASP family. Luke of course doesn't want to actually be a WASP but he is the last of the Sedgewick line and therefore has a duty to its honor. Which of course he doesn't honor, but that's a whole other ball of wax.

This novel was a good read for those ready to get involved in a story where you sort of know what's going to happen, and you just have to sit through the main character making one foolish decision after the other. The shenanigans of this romantic comedy that Peggy gets herself into are laugh out loud funny. Although she is not someone you can really relate to, the story was overall an enjoyable and quick read for which I would recommend it for the women's general fiction and chick-lit readers. Lauren Lipton's writing was fast paced and I eagerly turned the pages to see what Silly and Poor Peggy (couldn't resist) would do next.

So how about it, are you ready to read all about Silly Peggy's Shenanigans? Miriam has graciously agreed to allow me to giveaway 3 of the Mating Rituals of The North American WASP to my lucky readers. Here are the rules:

1. For your First entry, Follow this blog Publicly, and leave a comment with your email address. If you are already a follower, let me know that too.
2. For Two Extra Entries, Blog This Contest. Leave me the link to your Blog post.
3. For One Extra Entry, Twitter about this Contest. Leave me your Twitter name so I can check up. (I am BurtonReview on Twitter)
4. Don't forget the special question!

You do not need to leave separate comments, all in one comment is fine. I will use Randomizer to select the winners, as long as you have completed the above requirements. You must be 18 years of age or older to enter. The giveaway is open to Canadian and US residents only. NO P.O. Boxes. One winner per household/IP address. I will email the winners and they must respond within 72 hours.

This giveaway will end on Thursday June 18th, Midnight E.S.T.

May 26, 2009

Teaser Tuesday

BurtonReview Tuesday, May 26, 2009

TEASER TUESDAYS is hosted by ShouldBeReading and asks you to:
♠Grab your current read.
♠Let the book fall open to a random page.
♠Share with us two (2) “teaser” sentences from that page.
♠You also need to share the title of the book that you’re getting your “teaser” from … that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you’ve given!
♠Please avoid spoilers!

"The Sitting Swing" by Irene Watson
End of Page 19:

"One matter stood out most of all - one matter that would make the biggest difference in their point of view and would so profoundly impact me that it could be argued as the defining period of my life, even though it was my parents' issue, and even though it happened some time before I was born. That matter was my brother, Alexander."

This book is part of the Virtual Book Tour on June 8, 2009, where I will host a giveaway for this as well; stay tuned!

Apr 27, 2009

Review: "Follow Me" by Joanna Scott Blog Tour & Giveaway

BurtonReview Monday, April 27, 2009

"Follow Me" by Joanna Scott

Category: FICTION
Format: HARDCOVER BOOK
Publish Date: 4/22/2009
Price: $24.99/$27.99
ISBN: 9780316051651
Pages: 432
The Burton Review Rating:3.75

The book opens up with a guy jumping off a bridge.. and then we meet Sally the younger who decides to write the story that her grandmother, also Sally, told her to never write. I found myself getting lost in the family saga that began with Sally Werner/Sally Mole/Sally Bliss and reaches the granddaughter Sally.. Sally Werner is a teenager in 1947 when her life takes a left turn as she gets pregnant and ends up walking away from her newborn son. The aptly titled "Follow Me" has us following Sally as she meanders through her turbulent life. She has no real goals, she hops on buses or bumps into people and then lives off of the good-will of others. Eventually, we read about Sally falling in love, getting older, making strange choices and just getting used to life where she finally settles in some imaginative town in New York. The characters she meets are pretty much one dimensional and predictable yet the descriptions of what Sally sees and endures are easily rendered through the author's imaginative writing technique, which you could either love it or leave it. This is her life story for all its worth, and the fact that there is a lot of drama and issues that Sally endures is what keeps it going, however incredulous some events may seem.

The narrative is told with a concurrent storyline by the granddaughter of Sally, with the focus switching back and forth between the granddaughter and the grandmother. I am not a big fan of this, especially when we are talking about bouncing between 20+ years. Once the story gets going with the elder Sally, it feels like you are chugging along on a train and then the whistle blows and the brakes are squealing and STOP you are smack back into 20 years later again listening to the younger Sally. I think the author was trying to go for suspense, since she always squealed the brakes right when we reach a climax to Sally's storyline. But we don't see the younger Sally for too long of a period during the middle, it gets back into the elder Sally's life pretty quickly so it's a minimal complaint. Towards the end of the book there is even another way the book reads, as we are hearing word for word the contents of a recorded tape.

The writing itself is again in a league of its own, with one liners or phrases that are streamed together as if to show the subconscious thoughts of Sally. One can only take so much of the chatter (at some points it seems to be paragraphs of mumbles, questioning) although again I think the author is pulling for a sense of whimsy. And Sally the elder is definitely an impulsive one; she gets herself settled after one hardship, then she is off again running. The author at one point used an analogy of a theme park ride, going around in circles and no matter how much Sally ran she always came back to whatever it was she was running from. How logical and believable it can all be is an entirely new ball of wax..

And yet, even with these few criticisms of the book, I enjoyed the pace of the novel and the fact that I was always eager to pick up the book to see what foolishness Sally would get herself into next, no matter how mad she made me sometimes. I found myself caring for Sally and her legacy, and hoping she would for once make a sound decision. The viewpoint is unique due to the nature of the younger Sally discovering the wonders of her parents' union through the journey that the elder Sally had told her. And then it all finally ties back to the original guy jumping off the bridge, hence the notion that the choices Sally Werner made in her crazy life affected a lot of people.

The book teaches us about the bonds of the family, the strength of love and what the outcomes are when people are selfish with their love. Putting the book together with all of the writing techniques and Sally's idiosyncrasies, this is a book to be enjoyed for the package deal. The saga of Sally Werner, along with the wide array of people she meets is actually overall a page-turner and I do recommend it for those interested in feeling better about their own dysfunctional families.

The author Joanna Scott has written several novels & short stories with which she has won critical acclaim and awards. Her novel "Liberation" also portrays the stream-of-consciousness type of writing, and it has gotten good reviews as well, I think I might have to look into that one.

The wonderful Miriam at Hachette Books is once again hosting a Giveaway for 3 copies of this book! To enter:

1. For your First entry, Follow Me, AND leave a comment with your email address. If you are already a follower, let me know that too.

2. For Two Extra Entries, Blog This Contest. Leave me the link to your Blog post.

3. For One Extra Entry, Twitter about this Contest. Leave me your Twitter name so I can check up. (I am BurtonReview on Twitter)

You do not need to leave separate comments, all in one comment is fine. I will use Randomizer to select the winners. You must be 18 years of age or older to enter. The giveaway is open to Canadian and US residents only. NO P.O. Boxes. One winner per household/IP address. I will email the winners and they must respond within 72 hours.

This giveaway will end on Saturday May 23rd Midnight E.S.T.