May GeoCAT Challenge - North America

This topic not only covers a lot of physical space, but a myriad of literature as well!



Starting in the north with Canada, two authors immediately come to mind: Margaret Atwood, author of The Handmaid's Tale many among other works, and LM Montgomery author of Anne of Green Gables.

Canadian authors have won international awards: In 1992, Michael Ondaatje became the first Canadian to win the Booker Prize for The English Patient. Margaret Atwood won the Booker in 2000 for The Blind Assassin and Yann Martel won it in 2002 for Life of Pi. Alistair MacLeod won the 2001 IMPAC Award for No Great Mischief and Rawi Hage won it in 2008 for De Niro's Game. Carol Shields's The Stone Diaries won the 1995 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and in 1998 her novel Larry's Party won the Orange Prize. Lawrence Hill's Book of Negroes won the 2008 Commonwealth Writers' Prize Overall Best Book Award. Alice Munro became the first Canadian to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013. Munro also received the Man Booker International Prize in 2009.

Canada has any many other well-known authors. A good source for additional suggestions, here on LT, is the Canadian Author Challenge: http://www.librarything.com/topic/209622. If you like to combine challenges, the CAC authors for May are Michel Tremblay, Emily St. John Mandel.



Moving south, we come to the mainland United States. Included in the US are Alaska and the Hawaiian Islands. It's hard for me to mention just a few, but . . . if I think of books that influenced my life I have to mention The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. One of my favorite authors of Women's Fiction is Kristen Hannah, most recently known for the highly-acclaimed The Nightingale. My personal favorite of hers is Home Front.

The literature of Native Americans is an expression of how one sees the world and one's role in it. There is a strong inclination to mesh the life of the individual with the greater cycles of nature and the greater powers believed to be responsible for creating and sustaining the world. One of the many acclaimed novels in this classification is Love Medicine by Louise Erdich.

Some sources for American literature ideas include:
25 Great American Novels: http://americanliterature.com/twenty-five-great-american-novels
Famous Books in Every State http://www.businessinsider.com/most-famous-book-set-in-every-state-2013-10?op=1
American Authors Challenge 2015 http://www.librarything.com/topic/185195
American Authors Challenge 2016 https://www.librarything.com/topic/209611



Mexican literature is the topic with which I am least familiar. Carlos Fuentes is one of Mexico's well-known authors. Aura and The Death of Artemio Cruz are two of his popular works. Other internationally recognized authors include Juan Rulfo, Octavio Paz, and Amado Nervo. Favorite Mexican works include Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo, Like Water for Chocolate Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel, Los de abajo Los de abajo by Mariano Azuela, and Fiesta en la madriguera by Juan Pablo Villalobos.

Octavio Paz was awarded te Nobel Prize for Literature in 1990. The Labyrinth of Solitude is his most popular work on LT.

Chicano literature is the literature written by Mexican Americans in the United States. Chicano literature tends to focus on themes of identity, discrimination, culture, and history, with an emphasis on validating the Mexican American experience or Chicano culture in the United States. It is often associated with the social and cultural claims of the Chicano movement. It is a vehicle through which Chicanos express and represent themselves, and also often a voice of social critique and protest.

Some ideas for Mexican and Chicano reading can be found at:
http://theculturetrip.com/north-america/mexico/articles/top-10-contemporary-mexi...
http://www.buzzfeed.com/rigobertogonzalez/must-read-chicano-literature#.fgYGK330...

Happy reading in North America!!

I'm in the Robertson Davies Group Read, so I'll be "using" him for my Canada read. :)

>2 -Eva-: I love multi-purpose reads!

Ok, I'm Canadian, so any excuse to read more Canadian authors works for me! I'll have plenty to choose from; maybe I'll pick something from one of the Canada Reads competitions that I haven't read yet...

I'll likely read The Skull of Pancho Villa and other stories by Manuel Ramos.

I have a feeling I'll be reading a few that will fit--at the very least, Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers and Back Roads by Tawni O'Dell.

I hope some of you will consider joining the Robertson Davies Group Read, which was mentioned in Eva's post: http://www.librarything.com/topic/219842
Davies is one of Canada's most celebrated authors; most of his stories take place in Toronto and other parts of Southern Ontario.

In May, I'll be reading The Manticore by Davies. I also plan to read Signal to Noise by Mexican-Canadian novelist Silvia Moreno-Garcia and The Jaguar's Children by Canadian novelist John Valliant, both set in Mexico.

Also on the reading list is Firmin: The Adventures of a Metropolitan Lowlife written by American author Sam Savage and set in Boston.

There was an American Author Challenge in 2014 too. The link to that is here http://www.librarything.com/topic/162960. The authors for that year's challenge were:

Willa Cather
William Faulkner
Cormac McCarthy
Toni Morrison
Eudora Welty
Kurt Vonnegut
Mark Twain
Philip Roth
James Baldwin
Edith Wharton
John Updike
Larry Watson

>7 mathgirl40: I think I will try a Robertson Davies book.

>8 Tara1Reads: Thanks for adding the 2014 AAC authors.

I just finished Robertson Davies' Fifth Business and really liked it. It was my first five star read of the year. While it
works well as a stand alone read, I hope to go on to the next two of the Deptford series during the group read. So I'll also try for Manticore this month.

I'm also hoping to read Frida: A Biography of Frida Kahlo by Hayden Herrera from my TBR stack.

I'd love to read Doc by Mary Doria Russell but I'm not sure I'll have time.

I always plan more books than I can possibly manage!

In addition to Robertson Davies' Cornish trilogy, I've set aside The Guid-Sisters, a Scots translation of Les Belles-Soeurs, by Michel Tremblay. It was a very random find!

Because they also fit with other challenges, I am likely to read:
Requiem / Francis Itani
and/or
The Day the World Came to Town / Jim Defede
and/or
People of the Deer / Farley Mowat
and/or
More Prairie Doctor / Lewis Draper (ok, I wasn't sure this would be in LT's catalogue and the touchstone didn't bring up anything, so I'll probably have to add it in; Dr. Draper was a doctor in the small town I grew up in in Southern Saskatchewan.)

For May's RandomCAT I plan to read Red Glass by Laura Resau, which also fits this category as it it set in Mexico and the US. And, as I'm doing the Robertson Davies group read, my next Davies book is A Mixture of Frailties that would fit here.

>10 streamsong: Doc is fantastic! You should definitely try to squeeze it in if you can!

I'm planning on Like Water for Chocolate by Mexican author Laura Esquivel for this CAT.

I'm planning to read Bootleg : murder, moonshine, and the lawless years of Prohibition and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

>15 cyderry: I read A Tree rows in Brooklyn so many years ago, that don't remember it at all!

I plan to finally read The Whites. I wanted to read it for the Tournament of Books in March, but couldn't get it in time from the library. As it perfectly fits the GeoCAT, it will be my first read for May. I'll see if I can fit other books in afterwards, there are plenty of options.

>17 Chrischi_HH: It also fits RandomCAT!

>18 luvamystery65: Sometimes things are too easy to see... Thanks! :)

I will be joining Vivienne in reading Red Glass both for this and the May RandomCat. I am also hoping to get to Prayers For the Stolen by Jennifer Clement which is also set in Mexico.

A little early, I finished A Crack in the Edge of the World: America and the Great California Earthquake of 1906. Lots of history and geology.

>21 mamzel: the early bird!

I really didn't think I would finish it before the new month. *shy smile*
It was quite riveting and I skipped all the appendices in the back.

Do I get a worm?

>23 mamzel:
Do you want one?? A little bird told me they're magically delicious. :)

I know I'm going quite off topic here, but we just completed Senior Projects here and one of the students did her project on vermiculture, built her own worm farm and everything. They are pretty cool critters!

I've heard that you can do sort of worm farm compost heaps and the results are worthwhile. I know I'll never get around to it, but it sounds fascinating.

I plan to read A Leaven of Malice, the second book in Robertson Davies's Salterton Trilogy. I'd also like to read a Mexican novel, but I know better than to plan ahead.

Incidentally, I recently read The Story of My Teeth by Valeria Luiselli and I recommend it if you like off-beat and unusual novels. it's set outside of Mexico City.

I am currently reading Agatha Award nominee Death of Riley by Rhys Bowen, the second of the Molly Murphy mystery series, set in New York City during the early 1900s.

>23 mamzel: It's all yours!

I read Two Old Women, An Alaska Legend of Betrayal, Courage and Survival by Velma Wallis, a story based on Athabascan Indian legend. The author was raised with traditional Athabascan values. This is a wonderful story of the importance of our elders to community. Strongly recommend this for the bingo card, indigenous people. And it is a quick read that will make you tear.

Having had the intention of focusing on Canada and Mexico this month, I have instead just finished a book set in the US. Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond is a gripping and shocking look at how low income Americans are made poorer and less secure in the housing market.

I have finished reading a LT ER book, Pistols and Petticoats: 175 Years of Lady Detectives in Fact and Fiction by Erika Janik. This book primarily is about policewomen and detectives in the United States although the British experience is also mentioned.

I have collection from Alice Munro called Open Secrets - I've never read anything by her before so that's on the top of the list. Also thinking about Cat's Eye by Margaret Atwood. And, according to my catalog, I have Alias Grace, but I can't find it anywhere! hmmm

Sorry, I've been away for a while - my laptop died and I had to get a new one.

>29 Kristelh: Sounds like a good one - BookBullet!

>30 RidgewayGirl: also sounds interesting - a sad but true situation.

>32 LisaMorr: I read Alias Grace for my RL book club and swore I'd never read another Atwood. I then decided to give her another chance and tried The Blind Assassin. It currently resides in my DNF pile. I knw she's considered one of Canada's best contemporary writers, but I just can't get into her books.

>33 LoisB: Sorry to hear about your laptop! Interesting feedback Atwood - I've had a range of experiences with her, but would still read more. I read and loved The Blind Assassin and I thought The Handmaid's Tale was great. I've also read Bodily Harm, Surfacing and Lady Oracle, which I liked less well (in that order). I read Oryx and Crake also, but I don't remember it that well (it wasn't one of my favorite post-apocalyptic novels). I do intend to complete the MaddAddam trilogy eventually though.

I did finally find Alias Grace (two shelves worth of paperbacks in a cabinet - so glad I looked around because I found quite a few more, including another book I was planning on reading this month!), so I guess I'll have a choice of Atwood's this month.

I finished my first book for this month's challenge, a hold-over from last month, Strangers Below: Primitive Baptists and American Culture by Joshua Guthman. It was a very interesting read about a branch of American religion I knew little about.

Finished Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers; full review written...

I have finished Prayers For the Stolen by Jennifer Clement. An excellent book about women's lives in rural Mexico.

Glad to see you all are making great progress on this challenge!

I finished Red Inferno: 1945, an alternate history by US author Robert Conroy, which was partially set in Washington, DC.

Currently reading Fatal Grace by Louise Penny, set in Quebec, Canada. Mystery series

I've just realised that my first 2 books for May have both been set in Canada. Firstly Dead Cold also published as A Fatal Grace by Louise Penny (4 stars), and then Girl Runner by Carrie Snyder (4.5 stars).

I've just finished Girl Waits With Gun by Amy Stewart. It's an historical mystery which takes place in New Jersey, USA.

>42 staci426: Did you like it?

I have to admit I'm not planning to count anything set in the US. That's just too easy for me. I am reading a couple set in Canada, though.

>43 sturlington: Yes, I liked it quite a bit. I really liked the story and characters, especially being that most of it was based on actual events and people.

>44 LibraryCin: I thought about that too, but it didn't work out. I tried The Cunning Man but Pearl-ruled it after 120 pages. Fortunately, Last Bus To Wisdom was about an area of the country (Montana & Wisconsin) that I have never visited, so it was an interesting and informative read.

>45 staci426: Oh good, it's on my to read list. Sounds interesting!

I've only a few pages left to read of A Complicated Kindness by Canadian Miriam Toews, which is excellent. It will probably be one of my five-star reads this year.

I just finished Civil Wars of Julia Ward Howe

I've been doing the American, British, and Canadian author challenges all year so I know I'll have at least two books that count this month. I've already completed my American and Canadian author books for the month - Work Song by Ivan Doig (set in Montana) and Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel (mostly set in various locations in Canada and the U.S.).

People of the Deer / Farley Mowat
3 stars

In the late 1940s, Farley Mowat spent a couple of years in Northern Canada (what would be part of Nunavut now). This recounts his time there, spent with the local Inuit. He tells the story of the people and also explains the habits of the “deer” (caribou).

I like Farley Mowat, but (no surprise) I definitely prefer his books when the focus is on animals. In this book, I really enjoyed the parts about the caribou, but the rest varied – some of it held my interest and other parts didn't. I was impressed with his suggestions to help the people at the end of the book, though (and it's sad to see some things still haven't changed).

I finished Forty words for sorrow which is set in Ontario.

I finished The Moor's Account, a historical novel of Spanish exploration in Florida. Highly recommended!

Finished A Fatal Grace by Louise Penny set in Montreal, Canada in the fictional town of Three Pines. Enjoyable.

I finished Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage by Canadian Nobel Laureate Alice Munro. Sadly, I didn't much care for them.

>53 jeanned: Another BookBullet!

Just an fyi. I'm doing next month's GeoCAT. I got a head start on planning last weekend and had hoped to have time to finish tomorrow, but I'm not sure it will happen. I bought a house and took possession today. I move on Monday. My apologies if I don't get the thread up till Tuesday. I will aim for Tuesday to be the latest! I'm so sorry. I thought I'd have some time tomorrow. I might still, but I can't guarantee it!

Congratulations on your new home! I'm sure a couple of days will not make any difference to the group. We all understand the pressures of moving. Now the fun begins!

>58 LibraryCin: Good luck with the move! We will be here whenever you're ready :)

>58 LibraryCin: Since the guideline is that the thread should go up on or after the fifteenth, you are under no pressure to get it up. We are able to get started on our books set in Central American and the Caribbean all on our own.

And congratulations on your new house! Enjoy making it your own.

>58 LibraryCin: Congrats on your new house! And no worries about the thread... as others have said, we'll be here when it is ready :)

I am reading The Postman Always Rings Twice for the AlphaKIT and I guess that it can be my book for U.S.A. during our month in North America. I hope to get some poetry by the Mexican Nobel Laureate Octavio Paz at the library today or Monday...

>58 LibraryCin: Congrats on your new home!

Thank you all, and just a note that june will be australia and new zealand. ☺

One more Canadian mystery for me: The cruellest month.

>65 LibraryCin: Yes, you're right. And I have The Luminaries planned for June.

>65 LibraryCin: I'll be reading The Secret River.

I just finished and enjoyed Cat's Eye by Margaret Atwood for Canada. I am also working on another Canadian book, Lives of Girls and Women by Alice Munro.

The June thread is up, but the images aren't working for me again (that is, the sizes won't change no matter what number I tell it to use to resize). I'm leaving it for the moment, but may just delete the images later.

http://www.librarything.com/topic/223454

I've finished three more books for the challenge: a picture book about Mission San Juan Capistrano in California, a short biography of a Jesuit priest executed during the Mexican Civil War, and a Pulitzer Prize winning anthropological history of the Mandan People of North Dakota.

Song of the Swallows by Leo Politi
Blessed Miguel Pro: 20th-Century Mexican Martyr by Ann Ball
Encounters at the Heart of the World: A History of the Mandan People by Elizabeth A. Fenn

The Body in the Wardrobe by Katherine Hall Page was surprisingly set mostly in Savannah, Georgia.

>71 inge87: >72 thornton37814: Good going!

I just finished Red Glass by Laura Resau, a unique book about a journey of transformation a group of people make from Arizona to Mexico.

I finished my second book for this challenge: One Thousand White Women: The Journals of May Dodd. It was a very interesting fictional story about a group of white woman who are part of a government program to provide white brides to the Cheyenne tribe in 1875 with the hope that it will help integrate the Cheyennes into the white American word. Fortunately this is fictional as it leads to an expected tragic ending. The storyline was intriguing and compelling and some of the characters were real. It presented a very good account of life in that time.

>75 LoisB:, I really liked that one when I read it.

Because so much of what I read is set in the US, I was mainly going to focus on Canada for the GeoCAT this month. However, for this book, because the Southern US is such a big part of the story, I am including this one here.

To Kill a Mockingbird / Harper Lee
3.5 stars

Scout and Jem are sister and brother, growing up in Alabama in the 1930s. Their father is a (white) lawyer, who is representing a black man who was accused of raping and beating a white girl. The kids, while mostly living their own lives, do sometimes hear about the “nigger-loving” father.

I read this in high school and remember it being one of the books I read for English class that I liked. This time around, I'm reading it for my book club. Overall, I'm rating it 3.5 stars (good). For much of it, though, I would have rated it 3 stars (ok). But the trial was the most interesting part (and it's the one part I remember from my first read of the book all those years ago) and it brought the rating up for me (would have been 4 stars just for the trial itself!).

Finished Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi--full review written!

I read Three Day Road which is set about half in Ontario Canada (the other half being in France during WW1)... written by Canadian author Joseph Boyden.

>79 leslie.98: I thought the war scenes in that one were amazing!

I just finished Lives of Girls and Women by Alice Munro which takes place in Canada. I really enjoyed Munro's writing. I am currently working on The Nature of the Beast by Louise Penny, number 11 in the Chief Inspector Gamache series taking place in Québec.

Finished, Deliver Us: Three Decades of Murder and Redemption in the Infamous I-45/Texas Killing Fields by Kathryn Casey. Way too close to home for me. It was well written and researched.

I finished The Thousand-Year Flood: The Ohio-Mississippi Disaster of 1937 by David Welky.

You are all doing a good job with this challenge! although I had intended to read about Canada or Mexico, I'm happy with the 2 that I chose as they introduced me to a part of my country that I was unfamiliar with.

Starting The Orenda, by Joseph Boyden, which fits the "Canada" aspect of the GeoCAT.

>85 rabbitprincess: Oooh, that's one I want to read!

I started Queen of the South by Arturo Perez-Reverte. It's a book bullet from Judy (DeltaQueen50). Takes place mainly in Mexico. The author will be in town next month for a signing. Added bonus to read this now. Thanks Judy!

>86 LibraryCin: I've been told it's a difficult read, in the sense of visceral and emotionally draining, so I'm reading it on the bus. So far, so interesting. Boyden's description is excellent.

>87 luvamystery65: Enjoy, Ro!

I finished and reviewed The Lady in the Blue Cloak: Legends from the Texas Missions by Eric A. Kimmel & Susan Guevara, my first ever CAT-trick.

I finished Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko, which is about a Native American man returning home from World War II. Still mulling my reaction to this book.

Finished My Own Country: A Doctor's Story of a Town and Its People in the Age of AIDS by Abraham Verghese. It's the memoir of an Indian doctor who adopted America as his home and ended up specializing in working with HIV/AIDS patients. The book focuses on his time in Tennessee in the mid-80s, and on both his culture shock in Tennessee, having come from large cities, and the sort of culture shock the town experiences as HIV/AIDS begins to affect the town. It's the most powerful and worthwhile memoir I've read in some time.

Absolutely recommended, and certainly appropriate to the challenge--there were so many beautiful and worthwhile character studies here, and a sort of love story to this small town that accepted/welcomed the author in ways he hadn't expected.

I read Alice Munro's Open Secrets for this month. It's a collection of short stories set mainly in Ontario that are somewhat inter-related. I liked it.

>92 whitewavedarling: I agree!

My reads for May's Destination:North America (Including Mexico) - -

Hothouse Flower, Margot Berwin (Mexico)
The Daring Ladies of Lowell, Kate Alcott (Massachusetts, US)
This House of Sky, Ivan Doig (Montana, US)
Talking God, Tony Hillerman (New Mexico, US)
Station Eleven, Emily St. John Mandel (Toronto, Canada & Great Lakes region, US)
The Revenant, Michael Punke (American West) - 5/21
Short Nights of the Shadow Catcher, Timothy Egan (American West)

Finished Prayers for the Stolen by Jennifer Clement (Mexico)
Treve by Albert Terhune (Utah)
The Quiet Game Greg Iles (Natchez, Mississippi)

Thanks to all who participated in the May GeoCAT. I hope you learned a lot about North America and its writers.

I completed 2.5 books. I'm halfway through The Shipping News and am learning a lot about Newfoundland. My other two reads both dealt with the American west in the late19th, early 20th century. So, it was a productive challenge!

>97 LoisB: Thank you for being such a lovely host.

I finished one more last night. I hope to get the review written and posted tonight. If not, it may not happen till Friday.

More Prairie Doctor / Lewis Draper
3.5 stars

Dr. Draper was one of the doctors in the small town in Southern Saskatchewan where I grew up (population, about 1300). He was not my doctor, but the town is small enough, we certainly knew him (and I think I did see him as a doctor at least once...that I vaguely recall!) and my Dad was on town council with him for a while.

Anyway, this book is mostly anecdotes from when he was one of the resident doctors in the small town of Gravelbourg, Saskatchewan. It includes stories of his own home life and about his family, some medical/patient stories, his political life (he was a town counsellor, then mayor, and later went on to serve in the provincial legislature), and other stories about various people and/or events in town.

This book is obviously of more interest to a local audience. I enjoyed it. I got some updates on some people (though for some stories – I expect the medical ones – he used pseudonyms), which was nice. Stories of being a doctor in a small town were interesting; he was well-known for speaking his mind and he certainly does so in this book, as well. The book is – I believe – self-published (though there is the name of a small publisher, but I believe it's his own publication; he has also written a couple other books, presumably under the same publisher), so there are grammatical errors here and there, but overall, I enjoyed the book. It brought back some small-town/Gravelbourg and area memories for me.

I finished The Shipping News: A Novel last night. Interesting look at life in Newfoundland.

Finished just a few days late, but I had to include it because of its terrific sense of place: Olive Kitteridge, set in a small town on a bay in Maine.