Rhode Island Books

I did a report on Rhode Island and this book gave me tons of facts

I thought this book was very interesting. It showed pictures and a small map of the state. It talked about its attractions, history,where its people work, protecting its environment, and interesting facts.The Hello U.S.A. series is interesting to read.So is the One Nation series.

The book is fairly good on what to see but some of the discription of the places are a little overstated such as Lindos and it's tourist accommedations. This Island's tourist season is May through October, pretty much, the rest of the time the majority of the places are closed. The beaches are at best okay but there's a great deal of trash washed up and the roadsides are also suffering from litter. The book does not really point this out very well plus the included map is old and does not highlight the more passable roads.

Eve Burnett is an Englishwoman living in Rhodes, a Greek island. The daughter of intellectual parents, she knows that in order to live peacefully on the island she should not draw attention to herself, or her parents, and most especially not her brother. Eyes are everywhere on Rhodes since it is under the control of Italy and the Fascists. When her partisan brother goes missing and Eve is questioned, she is intrigued by the officer sent to ask her questions and finds herself agreeing to meet him. As their relationship blossoms, Eve is desperate to find her brother but when she does, she is disheartened to find herself having to choose between a brother and family she loves and the man she has fallen in love with.

Julio Falcone knows that Eve Burnett is hiding something. As a public figure, Julio must come across as being forceful and by the book, especially in front of his Fascist supervisors. Convincing Eve to meet him at various places soothes his soul as a man but as a police officer, Julio suspects there is more than what meets the eye where Eve is concerned. He just has to find out what she is hiding but in doing that, will he be able to live with the consequences of his investigation?

A Secret Treasure is filled with political intrigue and tension. Eve knows that her brother is doing something illegal; she knows it but she can do nothing about it other than deny her involvement and hide her brother and his treasure. Just for this alone, I found her quite loyal. Her love for Julio was another roadblock that Eve had to overcome because no matter what her feelings for Julio, Eve knew he was a police officer and could arrest her at a moment's notice.

Julio was not as he seemed. Loving to a fault, I think he gave Eve more room to be herself than he might have done considering his profession. He needed to know where her brother was first of all and Julio planned on finding out. I don't think his falling in love with Eve was a part of his plan, but it was a very big change in Julio's life. All of a sudden, he had someone else that needed his loyalty and I felt his dilemma. If he protected Eve then he could lose his job and/or life. If he didn't protect Eve, then she might not love him.

A Secret Treasure catches the readers eyes with its expertly written plot abounding with secrets and suspense. I loved watching Julio and Eve fall in love and the fact that they loved each other so desperately was just icing on the cake. Lindsay Townsend continues to release novels that are emotionally gripping. While A Secret Treasure is not as explicit sexually as some of her other novels, I hardly noticed. I was too involved with the story and Julio's dreaminess!

***Natalie S. for Wild on Books***

Scott Molloy is Rhode Island's foremost labor historian. Now a history professor and the University of Rhode Island, Molloy worked his way through graduate school working as a bus driver for the state's bus company. It was there that he began researching and studying the history of Rhode Island public transportation and the people who worked there.

In preparing this work, Molloy interviewed retired street car workers, poured through yellowed newspapers and dug through boxes of records sitting in the dusty corners of the bus driver's union.

His efforts have paid off. Trolley Wars tells the story of the rise of public transportation from the experiences of the people who made it work -- the workers.

This little book, almost a monograph, is a well-researched account of the 19th century beliefs that connected consumption (tuberculosis) with vampirism in the minds of many New England residents. To summarize briefly, when a relative died of consumption, s/he usually coughed up blood in the days before death occurred. Very often, other members of the household would contract the disease, which is highly contagious. Some people believed that the deceased, though buried, would return at night, longing for the company of their family, and if they could, they would see to it that they joined them in death. The custom of digging up the victim and....well, read the book if you'd like to discover what was done to prevent the dead from stealing away the living.

I was lucky enough to be given a copy of this book for review. It is wonderful. In RI, students in 4th grade study the state of Rhode Island. This book is an exceptional supplement for traditional school classroom but even more wonderful for homeschoolers. Day trip planned around each area presented in the book are a wonderful way to bring geography, history and so much more to life. I wish Amazon had this book in stock because I would buy several copies as gift for all mt daughter's homeschooling friends.

"Brick Lane" was a great read----it helps to have lived in the UK and to have met and known people similar to the characters in Monica Ali's book. Her colorful, descriptive style of writing really opens the mind to the world that she presented---we get more than a glimpse, we get the whole story.

Brick Lane is a promising debut that deals with a woman, Nazneen, who is raised up with the mentality that she cant change her fate. Married off to another Bengali, Chanu in London, she assumes a servile role in her matrimonial home. While the novel itself shows potential since it addresses the possibility of changing our destiny, the tome is sometimes marred by belabored and unnecessary writing/descriptions. For instance, the first page, about the mother preparing a chicken is way too descriptive and repititive. Then, the unintelligible letters sent to Nazneen by her sister, Hasina is hard to even comprehend what the story is all about. I mean, if they were mistakes here and there, that could be tolerable but forcing oneself to gain an insight on the sister's predicament/challenges back home was very hard and not worth immersing myself into. There are a whole lot of characters in the novel that you cant even figure out who is who in the novel. So, while the novel itself comes up with an interesting subject line,(is it possible to change one's destiny) it does not live upto the hype accorded it. For once, I cant see how it was 'wildly embraced by critics'... when it was monotonous to read the same thing over and over again.

Brick Lane begins well. The characters are wittily drawn -- the protagonist's husband, Chanu, wouldn't be out of place in Dickens (and I'm afraid he'd take that as a compliment, poor fool). The structure is promising - the protagonist in London and her sister back home in Bangladesh tell their stories in counterpoint. We see how poverty and culture constrain their choices. Their lives unfold in a series of carefully explored scenes, from which we can infer the years between. *SPOILER ALERT* But then, alas, the second half of the book drifts off into all the cliches of chick lit. The female protagonist has an affair - of course - with a handsome young stranger - and uncovers an ill-concealed family skeleton - I'm sure you can guess, it's always either suicide or sexual abuse isn't it? - and finds empowerment, and sisterhood, and sexual self-determinism, blah blah blah. The really interesting issues raised in the first half of the book - acculturation, labor economics, the development of love in an arranged marriage - are just dropped without resolution.

This noble is complete garbage. There are so many immigrants Indian novel emphasize Indian immigrant's economic contribution and upheld Indian culture as a whole. On the other hand Bangladeshi immigrant novels, drama, short films must depict Bangladesh in bad way and do an insult to our culture. I often wonder why. I mean immigrant writers from both origins are looking for their 10 minute of fame. That is totally fine. But why you have to pull out some bad smell from closet to do that? You think Indians don't have an ugly story to tell about themselves? But are they saying it to the world? Why would they? I understand that you can just ride along with the tide and make few bucks on the side. You say something bad about Bangladesh, you would get an award. You say badly about India, no one would buy your book. So the incentive is there.


Apart from my political view, this novel is not a representation of Bangladeshi culture: not of Bangladesh, and definitely not of Bangladeshi immigrant in UK. I understand that a writer is free to pick her character from extreme example or even beyond imagination. That's fine. But when you write a novel about a specific community (or you know that it will be portray as so), you must write something in the side to upheld the real picture and to do a fare judgment to that community. It is very fare to say that she knowingly ignore that part.

Here is a reader's comment "Monica Ali appears to be telling a story about what she knows best in her novel, Brick Lane. Monica Ali was born in Bangladesh and grew up in London. Most of us do not have background knowledge of Bangladesh, and this book gives us insight into that land and culture."

Imagine that!!

I did find this book intriuging enough to read it all in one go,which is quite an achivement considering it's size.
Unfortunately it did leave a somewhat of a bitter after taste.To use an analogy from the book itself,it was a bit like going to a Bangladeshi restaraunt pretending to be an Indian one(replete with Hindu statues that the propieters secretly disdain)
Ultimately i just couldnt escape the impression that it was more than just a bit phoney and designed specifically to cater to the imaginations of tourist, in this case, of the literary variety.
The book started off well for me assuming the voice of the doomed ,but dignified asian woman in suffering that was familiar from the pen of some great writers such as Amy tan,Jung Chan (wild Swans)Xinran (good women of china) et al.
I didnt consider this immediately as derivative as a part of me really wanted to like this book and the Setting was a new and exiting one in literature,the Mysterious Brick lane In Londons East End.Besides i thought, this was a voice that would serve the Bangladeshi womens experince quite well.

After finishing the book though ,and doing some research folllowing up my suspicions about the author ,it strikes me now as being very formulaic and calculating.

Although i frequented the heart of Brick Lane quite often in the early 90's,you dont need to have been to that area or lived there to pick up its lack of Authenticity .Any asian person with a traditional upbringing will tell you that no asian person ,let alone a village bumpkin like the books Heroine Nazneen, would think of her self and her life in a way that is described in this book.The charecter did not speak for herself,it was a voice imposed upon her by an outsider,a middle class,comofartable Oxford educated outsider,who has never lived anywhere remotely resembling Brick Lane.
It felt really infuriating having this village woman explained away through the sophisticated literary contrivances of an oppurtunist.You wanted to hear how Nazreen really felt. This book does not give women a voice as it purports,it takes it away. At the end i was fuming!!

The overall effect of this book is absurdity,it is writing in a voice that the person who is supposed to be being written about would not recognise themselves!

Tower Hamlets and Brick lane has many many stories to tell.A true tale of the underbelly of this area would in reality be much more tragic and heartbreaking (but ultimately much more human) than this.I hope somebody delivers a novel of the quality this part of London really deserves.

very captivating. Not one of those books that doesn't get exciting until the end either. A must for any New Englander, Fisherman, or boating enthusiast.

I was very pleased when I read Eric Maroney's excellent Amazon review, which he wrote in June 2007, but I want to add a bit. He is right; the author, John Casey, is marvelous at describing boats, their construction, fishing, and a life at sea. And, yes, Casey is not as good at describing human relationships, particularly those the book's lead male has with the women around him.

But that's not the half of it. When I read the beginning of this book, I loved the image Casey painted of a man who makes his living working on boats and who is desperately trying to finish the construction of his own, impressive boat. Casey's language frequently compares people and their behaviors to boats and the seafront wilderness. I enjoyed Casey's numerous nautical similes and metaphors, even if I did feel, at times, as if I was back in a high school English class.

And then, midway through, the book becomes bogged down in the increasingly troubling relationships the lead male has with the women around him. I don't want spoil anything in the novel, but, if you read some more Amazon reviews, you'll find out pretty quickly.

But here's the thing: not only does Casey's imagery and writing seem to suffer when he writes about relationships, but the man who is involved in them doesn't seem like the same man Casey described earlier, forever working on and concerned with the creation and operation of boats. When the book switches modes, it seemed to become inconsistent.

And, beyond that, I simply didn't enjoy reading about the character's relationships with women. In part, the lead male's inner-dialogue seemed too foreign to me. I couldn't get involved in the story; I couldn't relate at all.

Don't get me wrong. I love reading about people who are very different from me. But there has to be something about them that draws me in, or keeps me interested, or to which I can relate in some way or other. I couldn't relate enough to Casey's seemingly-inconsistent character.

Some of this is my personal preference, but I suspect many readers will agree, as several other reviewers do, that John Casey is better with the sea life than he is with the personal life.

I first read this book as a 23 old Ensign in the US Navy. I have reread it every year since then, through job changes, three kids, and the inevitable complexities and disappointments of growing older. Every year, this book has more to tell me about my life, and, especially, great writing. Some of the reviewers here seem to be looking for books about uncomplicated "good guys" fighting uncomplicated "bad guys." There are plenty of books on the bestseller list for them. This book is for someone who wants to think deeply and read well.

Spartina has many virtues, but a firm moral compass is not one of them. Never has adultery as the centerpiece of a novel been made to look so effortlessly without consequences than in this work (and the union even brings about a child). There is none of the horrid aftershocks which adultery brings to a marriage; none of the reckoning. Dick Pierce's wife seems to accept that this had to occur, and makes no overall stink about it. Casey's greatest feat in this novel is his vast knowledge of boats, ships, navigation, fishing, and the life at sea. When Casey writes about this subject, you can feel him moving with his creative abilities unfettered. When he gets bogged down in human affairs, he is on less sure ground. But still, the novel has moving and memorable passages, and Casey knows enough of the human animal to paint him or her in many hues. There is a subtly to Dick Pierce which the reader does not expect, and this saves the novel from its moral flaw.

Spartina is the way fiction was always meant to be written - dense, full of plots and sub-plots, and full of characters whose flaws and general dispositions make them both likeable and detestable at the same time. Dick Pierce, a grouchy and mean fisherman who has been trying to funnel all of his money towards a boat he has been building in his backyard, Spartina. Casey provides a thoroughly detailed and engaging account of what life is like in the fishing communities of Rhode Island.

As an aside, this book is the perfect reason why the people who write the summaries or teasers on the back of a book or on the dust jacket should be shot. The person who provided the blurb in this instance makes a storm, which does come at one of the most important junctures of the novel, the central event. What makes Casey's work so wonderful is not the storm scene, where Pierce tries to ensure his boat is not destroyed in the harbor before his insurance policy kicks in, but all of the other little things that go on in the text. Casey is adept at providing the most minimal details necessary to understand the scope of a relationship between two people. I loved the scenes between Dick and his wife and children, as they provided a perfect snapshot of what it's like to be a father who wants to raise his children as best as he can, while at the same time, being as selfish as a person can be in terms of the way he lives his life.

The book reminds me of Hemmingway, not just because of the subject matter, but because of the simplicity of the prose. I can honestly say that this is the first National Book Award Winner that I think has warranted the prize and I hope that the next ones I read as solid as this one.

You could probably cut this book in half and it would be a better read. Rice spoonfeeds us the plot, she overdescribes, and she throws in sappy red herrings. If she had built up Jane's betrayal without telling us everything about it, then revealed it to us at the same time Dylan found out, it would have been more compelling (though we may have suspected where she was going). The resolution was much too flat - I didn't see how the characters got to a place of forgiveness for a betrayal that to me would have been unforgivable. I really wish I could have edited the manuscript for her.
My biggest objection to the book is the way adoption is portrayed. The bio-mom is constantly referred to as "real" while relationships with the adoptive parents (who some would argue ARE the real parents) are trivialized.
I give it two stars because I kept reading, even though I wasn't enjoying it.

The main thrust of this story deals with a mother being forced to give up her child for adoption. "Identity is key" Jane says. "Even for birds."
Romance takes a secondary place to the themes of hurt and pain in this story. Jane and Sylvie were deeply hurt when their father walked out on his family.
Also in the background is the role of nursing homes where even a school principal or a banker or a stock broker can find themselves. But it is still possible to go to a barn dance and have some fun!
The name of this book was very well suited as in the last lines of the story the protagnist holds out her arms to her lover as music begins down below. "Dance with me" her eyes seem to say. A touching conclusion.

Dance With Me is a family saga romance that ties up multiple couples by the end. It's a story of two sisters. One is fair-haired, spinsterly and dutiful, while the other one is dark-haired, moody, and took off to live in the big city. Good daughter Sylvie has left her school librarian job to care for her failing Mom. Wilder Jane returns to the small town from the big city to lend a hand. This would be enough to make a good story, but Rice also throws in a family in conflict over selling the family farm to developers, an adopted teenage daughter searching for her real mom, and the tragedy of a murdered child. All these conflicts miraculously resolve by the novel's end. Even the mother enjoys her nursing home! The book is set in rural Rhode Island, which provides a well-drawn and somewhat unusual background for the story. This is the first Luanne Rice novel I've read, so I can't compare, but it would have been a better book if it had tried to do less, and did more with that was left. Instead, it's so formulaic that you can't share the characters' joy in their happy ending, because you can see it coming from page 1. Dance With Me is weak even for a beach read.

I can't remember when I have read a more annoying book as this one. Jane is one of the most annoying characters I've come across for awhile. I couldn't even feel sympathy for her. She is 20 when she finds she's pregnant; she didn't have to give her baby up-that was her choice. She's not 15 or 16 but old enough to make choices. Then even so people do move on and in 15 years she could have married and had other children instead of the obsession she had with Chloe. The whole book is over the top dramatic with nothing realistic. Now I'm sure most women who have to give a baby up never truly forgets and probably hopes one day she can see that child but for Jane to walk into Chloe's life when she is at the most vulnerable age is unconscionable. I didn't see Chloe as so sensitive as determined to have her own way with the whole environmental issues and etc. I believe in environmental issues but Chloe is over the top ridiculous. She's too young to even understand some of the implications. She is destructive to people who do not agree with her. I was disgusted with the language the author had Chloe and her friend use even to using the F__ word. Wasn't it interesting that the adoptive parents raised her and now walks in Jane the birth mother who is ever so cool and clear through the book Chloe takes pot shots at her adopted parents as if she has the maturity to judge them. Jane had no right to intrude in Chloe's life and I was very upset when she told Chloe who she was without having talked to the adopted parents first. That was horrible! I was adopted and I knew from the time I was a little girl and I didn't spend my growing up years pining for a mother who gave me away. IT happens! I was perhaps curious but not obsessed. I found my birth family (quite accidently-I wasn't looking) after my adopted parents had passed away. It was not all the drama portrayed in this book. My adopted parents gave me my values and education and though it was nice to find my birth family and answer some questions, it will always be the parents who raised me that will be the best part of my life.

I did feel sorry for Dylan and all he had been through and perhaps Jane could have been good for him if she hadn't lied and deceived everyone. She was supposed to be there helping with her mother and instead she was always sneaking off to see her daughter and leaving her sister to handle everything. I was just disgusted with her through the entire book and of course this being a work of fiction, the author made it all come out okay. In real life it could have been and probably would have been a disaster!

I have liked some of Luanne Rice's books like The Secret Hour, Summer of Roses, and Dream Country and some have been a bit annoying but this one was so annoying from start to finish that it will take me awhile to try another of her books!

As an adoptive mom i was not thrilled with this book on many levels. I was not happy with the (unfavorable)portrayal of Chloe's adoptive parents and the fact that there seemed to be no love between any of them at all. Ms.Rice obviously has not a clue about the true love and bonds formed between adoptive parents and their children. i know that this was a book only written about a particular family but i was truly disappointed with the way adoption was portrayed-for those reading about it will get the wrong impression of adoptive families in general.
I would not recommend this book at all.