Penned by Sterndal» book reviews

Reading aloud baby books

sterndal — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 00:45:38 +0000

Because I really want my 3 months old nephew to learn how to speak English, I’ve already started reading english books to our baby hoping this will acquaint him with simple english words and phrases. First, I tried Like Water for Chocolate (it was the only available english book in our house at that moment) but in the middle of reading it to him, I realized that the narrator talked about things like sexual desires, anger, unrequited love, etc., which are very inappropriate for minors, particularly for a 3-month old baby boy so I changed the book to The Birthday Burglar and A Very Wicked Headmistress. It’s just so funny because Baby Timberland kept on giggling and cooing while I was reading Tita’s recipe for Christmas Rolls, as if he already understood those things :) Honestly, I couldn’t find any book in my cabinet that suits his age. Margaret Mahy’s The Birthday Burglar and A Very Wicked Headmistress is suitable for children whose age are 10 years old and above. But I still tried to read him more grown-up books like Hannah’s Gift and Rain and I think he loves it! He likes it! He keeps on staring at my face specifically at my lips and he laughs and makes ”ooh-ooh” sounds. My mother, his grandmother, is against this because according to her, there is a proper age for studying and a conducive place for learning. She even cited my younger brother as an example. She enrolled him in kindergarten at the age of 4 (instead of the usual 6) and he became a consistent honor student but he also easily lost his interest in school. Of course I consulted this to Timberland’s mother, my sister, and she doesn’t mind as long as I don’t read to him my collection of Pugad Baboy Comic Book.

Re-reading VC Andrews

sterndal — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 16:27:29 +0000

To satisfy my love for reading, I always save a part of my salary for buying inexpensive books and magazines. This allows me to purchase anything that goes on sale at National Bookstore, Booksale and Buy-the-Book. I’m not exactly a big fan of VC Andrews, it doesn’t matter to me who wrote the book, I’d buy literally anything that catches my interest. But I find her writing style entertaining and the words used are often simple, which means to say I don’t have to constantly check my dictionary for definitions I’ve also read Sheldon’s and Rice’s novels but theirs are not cheaply priced and I’m honestly limiting my monthly budget to 500 pesos.

We will have a 3-day vacation for the Holloween and all I want to do for the holidays is to read, read, read! I missed reading! Since I started blogging last October 2008, that hobby has been put aside. I used to read at least one novel per week, now it’s amazing if I’d finish a book in a month. But I’m really going back to reading. Not that I’m giving up blogging. I just don’t want to forget my first love.

My budget for this month went to “The Frank Family that Survived.” It’s a great story, I cried over the fact that it was based on a true story. It also made me want to read “The Diary of a Young Girl” by Anne Frank but that’ll have to wait. For now, I want to re-read all family series of VC Andrews.

Unforgettable Mariam

sterndal — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 07:49:12 +0000

She is probably the most striking novel character I have ever known. I’ve already read the book, A Thousand Splendid Suns, more than two times and she still makes me teary-eyed. Based on the author’s description, there is nothing really special about Mariam. She is someone you can’t call beautiful, a village girl who never had the opportunity to attend a formal school, and a person whose experiences are mostly tragic.

I am not so sure if it’s because I am a true-blue daddy’s girl that made me relate to her story. I just grew up believing that Daddies are God’s most precious gift to little girls so I find it really hard to accept the part when she was given away to an arranged marriage by her own father. At the tender age of 15 (I think), she was forced to marry a man who is more than 20 years older than her. It wouldn’t be much of a heavy-drama novel if the man was nice to Mariam. But the evil brute abused her physically and emotionally. I was amazed on how she was able to forgive and find peace at the end. It’s just disappointing that her story is really happening in some places of the world.

I don’t like this kind of stories. I personally prefer feel-good books. But something happened at the last few chapters that made her character unforgettable and the book worth-reading