Laura's 2008 Challenge List

In 2007, the NYT Notable Books Challenge was my introduction to the world of reading challenges, and I read 12 books from the 2006 NYT Notable Fiction list. I can’t resist Wendy’s 2008 Notable Books Challenge, which is so flexible as to allow reading from several different “notable books” lists. However, I also have several challenges and projects going, so I have only chosen books that were already on my TBR pile. Of course I reserve the right to add to or change this list over time!

2007 NYT Notable Books:

• What is the What, the Autobiography of Valentino Achak Deng, by Dave Eggers (completed 3/18/2008 - review)
• The Gathering, by Anne Enright (completed 4/2/2008 - review)
• Out Stealing Horses, by Per Petterson (completed 7/13/2008 - review)
• The Septembers of Shiraz, by Dalia Sofer (completed 7/20/2008 - review)
• Brother, I’m Dying, by Edwidge Danticat (completed 7/23/2008 - review)

2007 ALA Notable Books:

• The Secret River, by Kate Grenville (completed 2/3/2008 - review)

2007 Kiriyama Prize:

• The Space Between Us by Thrity Umrigar (completed 2/28/2008 - review)

Katrina's Review of The Space Between Us by Thirty Umrigar

The Space Between Us is a novel about the relationship between a servant and her employer in Bombay. One lives in the slums, the other in a nice apartment, one has to work long hours everyday the other complains if she has to make breakfast. Despite this their is a bond between the two women, they would not class themselves as friends for the social divide between them is just to great a step to bridge, but they rely on each other for support. And despite the social divide their lives frequently parallel each others. Until an event occurs which puts this bond to the test.
This book falls into that area of books about Eastern communities which we seem to be swamped with at the moment. Communities which have huge social and gender divides and which seem a million miles away from the concerns of the Western world. I certainly wouldn't say this is one of the best examples but it is a good read, some thing perhaps that fits in as an easy read between harder/heavier books. The relationships are well constructed, believable but I could see the conclusion coming from miles away, there were no surprises with this novel. I also felt that I would like to have spent more time seeing what life was like in the slums of Bombay. As seems to be a regular thing with these books, they were centred around the women giving us their views on the absent men in their lives.
I read this for the Notable Book Challenge Book 2 of 8
Other Bloggers thoughts:
Musings, Wendy's thoughts

Laura's Review - The Space Between Us

The Space Between Us

Thrity Umrigar

321 pages

In this novel, Thrity Umrigar explores issues of social class and the ways in which class impacts life experience and relationships. Sera is a wealthy Indian woman who suffered in an unhappy and violent marriage. Bhima is her servant, living in extreme poverty with her orphaned granddaughter Maya, who she has cared for since early childhood. Bhima has worked for Sera for years; the two women understand and care deeply for each other. Many times Sera has come to Bhima’s aid, using her status to secure better healthcare for a family member, arrange for Maya’s education, and help Bhima navigate government beaurocracy. And Bhima provided Sera with much-needed emotional support throughout her marriage.

On the surface it would appear the two women have overcome class differences and forged a deep and lasting friendship. Yet Sera will not allow Bhima to sit on her furniture. There are many other small indications along the way, until the novel’s climax fully exposes the chasm between the two women. In the final analysis, class differences reinforce one woman’s privilege and the other’s destitution.

While this novel takes place in India, where much has been written about the role of social class, supposedly egalitarian societies fall victim similar traps. Just this week I had a conversation with a colleague who was struggling with the importance of developing a diverse workforce. “I think we should just hire the best people,” he said. I was reminded of an article I read years ago: White Privilege, Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack, by Peggy McIntosh. The author writes, “Obliviousness about white advantage, like obliviousness about male advantage, is kept strongly inculturated [sic] in the United States so as to maintain the myth of meritocracy, the myth that democratic choice is equally available to all. Keeping most people unaware that freedom of confident action is there for just a small number of people props up those in power and serves to keep power in the hands of the same groups that have most of it already.”

Food for thought. ( )

My original review can be found here.

Amy's List

I have finally come up with my list of Notables to read for 2008. I will definitely be reading these:

• The Space Between Us - Thrity Umrigar (Kiriyama)
• The Archivist's Story - Travis Holland ( PW)
• The Madonnas of Leningrad - Debra Dean (ALA)
• The Septembers of Shiraz- Dalia Sofer (CSM, NYT)
• The Reluctant Fundamentalist - Mohsin Hamid (NYT and PW)
• What the Dead Know - Laura Lippman (PW)

And I would like to read these if I have time:

• Brother, I'm Dying-Edwidge Danticat (NYT and NBCC)
• The Gathering -Anne Enright (NYT)
• The Ministry of Special Cases- Nathan Englander (NYT)
• Fieldwork - Mischa Berlinski (PW)
• In the Country of Men - Hisham Matar (NYT)
• The Worst Hard Time - Timothy Egan (ALA)

The Space Between Us - Wendy's Book Review

Thrity Umrigar has written a searingly honest novel about two women living in Bombay. Sera is wealthy, a Parsi who has lived a materially rich life, but suffered a violent marriage. Bhima, on the other hand, is poor and living in a slum with her granddaughter. The two women's lives intersect because Bhima becomes Sera's house servant.

The novel alternates between Sera's and Bhima's points of view - giving the reader insight into their personal histories which have made them who they are today. Although the two women have built a friendship with each other, filled with tenderness, they cannot escape the caste system into which they have been born.

Umrigar does an apt job of showing the gaping differences between the various castes in India. She writes with a sensitivity to women's issues which I found touching. She weaves a story which is almost predictable based on the rigid adherence to culture which we see from all the characters. Despite its underlying sadness, the novel does leave the reader with a flush of hope at the end.

Recommended. Rated 3.5/5 when read in April 2007. To read my original review, click here.

2007 Kiriyama Prize Notable Book List

"The Kiriyama Prize was established in 1996 to recognize outstanding books about the Pacific Rim and South Asia that encourage greater mutual understanding of and among the peoples and nations of this vast and culturally diverse region."

The Prize publishes an annual list of notable books in the fiction and nonfiction categories, which are also drawn from the judging process.

2007 Kiriyama Prize Notable Books

Fiction

Cellophane by Marie Arana (Dial)

The Teahouse Fire by Ellis Avery (Riverhead)

Plum Wine by Angela Davis-Gardener (University of Wisconsin Press)

White Ghost Girls by Alice Greenway (Grove Atlantic)

Astral Alibi by Prabhu Manjiri (Bantam)

Night of Sorrows by Frances Sherwood (WW Norton)

The Space Between Us by Thrity Umrigar (William Morrow/Harper Perennial)

Nonfiction

Glory in a Line: A Life of Foujita—The Artist Caught Between East and West by Phyllis Birnbaum (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)

Tiger of the Snows: Tenzing Norgay, The Boy Whose Dream Was Everest by Robert Burleigh, illustrated by Ed Young (Atheneum)

Iz: Voice of the People by Rick Carroll (The Bess Press)

The Weathermakers: How Man is Changing the Climate and What It Means for Life on Earth by Tim Flannery (Atlantic Monthly Press, USA; Text Publishing, Australia; and Allen Lane, UK)

Wild Borneo: The Wildlife and Scenery of Sabah, Sarawak, Brunei, and Kalimantan by Nick Garbutt and J. Cede Prudente (The MIT Press)

Incendiary Circumstances: A Chronicle of the Turmoil of Our Times by Amitav Ghosh (Houghton Mifflin)

Frog in the Well: Portraits of Japan by Watanabe Kazan, 1793-1841 by Donald Keene (Columbia University Press)

The Great Wall: China Against the World 1000 BC-AD 2000 by Julia Lovell (Grove Atlantic)

Nixon in China: The Week That Changed the World by Margaret MacMillan Penguin Books Canada (and from Random House in the US under title "Nixon and Mao")

Enrique’s Journey: The Story of a Boy's Dangerous Odyssey to Reunite with his Mother by Sonia Nozario (Random House US)

Mishima’s Sword: Travels in Search of a Samurai Legend by Christopher Ross (Da Capo Press)

Leaving Microsoft to Change the World by John Wood (Collins)