Tag Archives: Spirituality

Book 74: By the River Piedra, I Sat Down and Wept – Paulo Coelho

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Coelho, Paulo - By the River Piedra, I Sat Down and WeptThis is Coelho’s second book I’ve read and although it wasn’t as good as The Alchemist, it was still incredibly well written and moving. I do have a couple more of his books on my shelf and plan on saving them for when I need a break from other books. However, I might need to read the other two books in the ‘trilogy’ (according to Wikipedia) Veronika Decides to Die and The Devil and Miss Prim sooner rather than later.

Deepika, over at Purplebooky reviewed this book and there’s really not much more to add. It’s a deceptively simple love story with religion interwoven and provides a lot of lessons on love, life and faith. Compared to The Alchemist, By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept lacked some impact (the love was definitely there, it just wasn’t as powerful) and the story is a bit less monumental. This is definitely not a bad thing because the simpleness of this story is part of what makes it so beautiful.

Click here to continue reading.

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Book 4: Hood – Emma Donoghue

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Hood is the first of the 40 books I’ve committed to in Reading Challenges for 2012.  It comes from the Mount TBR Reading Challenge and it feels good to cross one book off those three lists. And as mentioned sometime in the past, this is one of the novels my boss brought in for me to read – and it was interesting, not sure I would want to talk about it with her – see my reaction in the last paragraph before the recommendation.  But regardless, on to the review!

Written by the author of Room and Slammerkin, Hood is a moving story of love and loss.  Taking place during the week of Cara Wall’s funeral, the reader finds themselves at the mercy of Pen O’Grady’s, Cara’s lover of 13 years, sometimes tumultuous, most of the time lacking emotions. Using flashbacks and the days of the week, Donoghue tells the story of Pen and Cara’s relationship while showing Pen’s coping (or lack thereof) with Cara’s death.

Click here to continue reading.

Book 17: The Alchemist – Paulo Coelho

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You can always tell the books I enjoyed more based on the length of the blog and my voice in the blog.  I would probably skip posts of the books I don’t really like, but it would defeat the purpose of this blog, so instead you get somewhat whinny posts about a book that I don’t understand or just didn’t like, like The Prince.

Whereas when I read a book I truly enjoy you get a true feel for the book and why I’ve enjoyed reading it.  Thankfully The Alchemist is of the latter category.  Again this is a book I bought ages ago (recognize a pattern) that I never got around to reading.  This book was so good I read it in an afternoon (it’s only 170 pages).  What I enjoyed most about this novel was the spirituality without the religion.  An interesting fact according to Wikipedia (with a legitimate siting) is that the book holds the record for the most translations into another language by a living author.

We follow a young shepherd boy named Santiago as he realizes his personal legend.  He has always wanted to travel and thought the life of a shepherd satisfied this until he has a recurring dream which shows him the world is so much bigger than it is.  Through his adventures he meets a variety of characters from a gypsy, a king, an alchemist, bandits and thieves, and the love of his life.

Click here to read the rest of the review and for a few moving quotes…