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I Read It — April

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Remember we’ve changed things up a bit. Instead of only linking thoughts and reviews of books that we recommended here at 5 Minutes for Books or in our column at 5 Minutes for Mom, we invite you to share a review that you read at anyone’s recommendation.

You can link up any review from the previous month that shares that information. If you don’t share that information in your reviews, then write a new post for I Read It! and link back to the reviews as you add in the information.

It would be nice if you point your readers to this page so that they can check out the reviews that others link up as well.

For ease in surfing, leave the title of the book in the linky, along with your blog name.

Non-bloggers are welcome to participate in the comment section.

Find out about our upcoming community events at our Join In page. Coming soon:

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

Classics Bookclub: Link up your reviews!

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Classics Bookclub

Have you been reading the classics? Have you read any since we announced our “pick-your-own” sort of bookclub? I set some goals, loosely hoping to read one per quarter, or at least four over the year, and here we are at the end of the first quarter, and I’m cramming. I have not finished my book, but I am reading it. I’m fairly sure I’ll be able to link up a review by sometime tomorrow.

And though the traffic will probably slow down, there’s no time limit. I would say if we get too far into April you should save that review to link up the next 5th Tuesday (June 29).

This is our first quarterly posting of the linky that invites you to post up all your reviews from the last quarter (from January 1 on). The idea is not only that you will tell us what you’ve read and what you thought of it, but that it will still be like a bookclub of sorts, as those who have also read the book, or who are curious, surf around to your link, and join in the conversation (and for that matter, check out last quarter’s links as well).

For ease in surfing, please include the name of the title(s) that you read. You are welcome to post the review for any book you read between the end of December and now.

If you are still cramming, or didn’t even get to that point, just mark your calendars for June and share what you have then.

Find out about our upcoming community events at our Join In page. Coming soon:

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

Link up:

What’s on Your Nightstand — March

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Don’t ask me what the weather is like right now, but last week we had the most beautiful week here in Connecticut. For me, that means an opportunity to indulge in my absolutely, hands-down, favorite activity: Reading a book on the back deck while I soak up the sunshine. It’s not too cold, and not too hot. I’m outside so I feel as if I’m doing something other than just holing up and reading (not that there’s anything wrong with that). And I can encourage the kids to come outside as well — either with a book or some bubbles or sidewalk chalk — and there’s no denying that fresh air is good for them.

What about you? Does spring increase your reading time and desire or does it fall by the wayside as you get involved in other activities?

Please link your post telling us “What’s on Your Nightstand” below. You can tell us what you just finished or what you hope to read this month.

Take a picture of your pile, or just give us a few quick titles.

Tell us how you pick your books.

Address any or all of these topics: what you are reading, why you are reading it, how you are going to read it (If you really like talking about these types of issues, consider contacting me to pitch an idea for an On Reading column. We love guest contributors!).

Bloggers — Do you want a free book and a chance to win a $25 amazon gift certificate? Read my post to see if you want to read Fireworks over Toccoa and blog about it and discuss it with us here at 5 Minutes for Books. We are only taking a few more bloggers, and you have to be able to post about it by mid-April (it’s a really quick read). But if you are interested, send me your name and address and why you’d like to read it, along with a bit about your blog audience.

Anyone can read a big chunk of the beginning of the novel, and enter to win one of 300 copies at Fireworksovertoccoa.com.

Find out about our upcoming community events at our Join In page. Coming soon:

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

Link directly to your post telling us what’s on your Nightstand here. And don’t forget to visit around!

I Read It — March

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Remember we’ve changed things up a bit. Instead of only linking thoughts and reviews of books that we recommended here at 5 Minutes for Books or in our column at 5 Minutes for Mom, we invite you to share a review that you read at anyone’s recommendation.

You can link up any review from the previous month that shares that information. If you don’t share that information in your reviews, then write a new post for I Read It! and link back to the reviews as you add in the information.

It would be nice if you point your readers to this page so that they can check out the reviews that others link up as well.

For ease in surfing, leave the title of the book in the linky, along with your blog name.

Non-bloggers are welcome to participate in the comment section.

Find out about our upcoming community events at our Join In page. Coming soon:

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

What’s on Your Nightstand — February

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Please link your post telling us “What’s on Your Nightstand” below. You can tell us what you just finished or what you hope to read this month.

Take a picture of your pile, or just give us a few quick titles.

OR tell us how you pick your books.

Address any or all of these topics: what you are reading, why you are reading it, how you are going to read it.

Find out about our upcoming community events at our Join In page. Coming soon:

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

Link directly to your post telling us what’s on your Nightstand here. And don’t forget to visit around!

I Read It — February

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Remember we’ve changed things up a bit. Instead of only linking thoughts and reviews of books that we recommended here at 5 Minutes for Books or in our column at 5 Minutes for Mom, we invite you to share a review that you read at anyone’s recommendation.

You can link up any review from the previous month that shares that information. If you don’t share that information in your reviews, then write a new post for I Read It! and link back to the reviews as you add in the information.

It would be nice if you point your readers to this page so that they can check out the reviews that others link up as well.

For ease in surfing, leave the title of the book in the linky, along with your blog name.

Non-bloggers are welcome to participate in the comment section.

Find out about our upcoming community events at our Join In page. Coming soon:

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

What’s on Your Nightstand — January

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Please link your post telling us “What’s on Your Nightstand” below. You can tell us what you just finished or what you hope to read this month.

Take a picture of your pile, or just give us a few quick titles.

Tell us how you pick your books.

Address any or all of these topics: what you are reading, why you are reading it, how you are going to read it.

Find out about our upcoming community events at our Join In page. Coming soon:

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

Link directly to your post telling us what’s on your Nightstand here. And don’t forget to visit around!

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

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Edit: Goal results are below.

I am glad that I participated in Maw Books Bloggiesta. Friday totally slipped by me, and I had a commitment Saturday morning, and I wasn’t really prepared mentally, but I think that I spent about 5 or 6 hours of time on it. Reminder for next year — and yes, I want to participate next year — be prepared (don’t forget about the first day!), and make plans.

But I’m going to keep working on these goals (namely indexing book reviews), and I’m glad that I was pushed to finally do a few things that I know I needed to do.

I also ended up “meeting” some new book bloggers, though not as many as I’d have liked. I left about 5 comments around the blogosphere.

2010 has been all about changes here at 5 Minutes for Books. We’ve changed up our community events like the Classics Bookclub and the Children’s Classics carnival (now a Children’s Classics Mystery Challenge) and we also tweaked the I Read It carnival. So far, response has been great.

But there are a bunch of other changes I’ve wanted to make to make the site more user friendly, and so I decided to join the Bloggiesta challenge at Maw Books. The idea is to take some concentrated time over a 3 day period (which started yesterday) to catch up on all that bloggy maintenance. It could be writing reviews that you’ve neglected writing, setting reviews to post, or cleaning up and organizing all of those behind the scenes things.

I have my own ideas, but I would love to hear feedback from you if there’s something that you think would make 5 Minutes for Books better. Just leave a comment.

As for my goals —

  • My primary task is to make our past reviews easier to search. This is also a mini-challenge being hosted by Beth Fish Reads. One relatively quick fix I’d like to add is a menu on our navbar that will take you directly to categories of reviews. I had thought about just using our tags, but all that does is pull up a list of the reviews in order by date. That’s not very user friendly, is it? So I suppose I can make a separate page for the categories. I’d like to divide them by Fiction, Non-fiction, Children’s books, and Young Adult reviews. Some Questions: How would you like it indexed? I’m thinking alphabetically by title? Would other categories be useful?(edit: I made a plan, and I tried to download the new nav bar, but I think I need to update WP press)
  • I also have several reviews I would like to write. I have at least four reviews that I need to get in draft, and if I think about it, I could probably write a few more. I would also like to write two On Reading columns (book bloggers — we are always looking for guest posters!) (edit: I wrote three reviews and no columns).
  • I figured out that it would be a lot more effective for me to set up the posts in advance for the regular community events that we host. What’s On Your Nightstand? and Kids’ Picks and I Read It! all happen each month, so I’d like to get those link-up posts ready to go for the next few months at least (edit: I’ve set up posts for all 3 carnivals for at least 3 months — woohoo!)
  • Our “Join In” page is out of date, since we’ve changed the way we are handling some of our Tuesday events, so I’d like to update that (edit: DONE!)

Even though I’m late getting started, this is a good day, since I will spend much of the afternoon and evening sitting beside my husband as he cheers for (or yells at) his two teams — the Dallas Cowboys and the Texas A&M Aggies.

The NEW “I Read It” Carnival

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We’ve revamped a few of our Tuesday community events, but a couple of things have not changed — we will be here doing something each Tuesday, and we are committed to using this site as a way to build community in the book blogging world.

So to that end, we’ve expanded “I Read It!” Instead of it only appearing quarterly on the 5th Tuesday, it will appear the first Tuesday of each month.

Instead of only linking thoughts and reviews of books that we recommended here at 5 Minutes for Books or in our column at 5 Minutes for Mom, we invite you to share a review that you read at anyone’s recommendation.

You can link up any review from the previous month that shares that information. If you don’t share that information in your reviews, then write a new post for I Read It! and link back to the reviews as you add in the information.

For example, “This month I read a bunch of books, but I was especially excited to read Candor as recommended by Dawn at 5 Minutes for Books.” That sentence could appear in your review when it posts at any time throughout the month (hopefully linking back to the original review, or at least the blogger’s site). Or you could write a post telling your readers about I Read It, and include a sentence such as that, linking back to your original review(s).

This month might be a slow start because of the format change, but I hope you’ll think about it as you are reviewing and make a draft post keeping track of books and recommendations so that you can participate in the future.

If you’d like to write up a post this month talking about books that you read on someone’s recommendation for the whole of 2009, that would be cool too.

For ease in surfing, leave the title of the book in the linky, along with your blog name.

Non-bloggers are welcome to participate in the comment section.

Join in all our community events:

January 12: Children’s Classic Mystery Challenge — sign up or report on progress
January 19: Kids’ Picks
January 26: What’s on Your Nightstand
March 20 (5th Tuesday): New Classics Bookclub — sign up anytime, by end of January to enter prize drawing

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

What’s on Your Nightstand — December

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Usually even-numbered months publish at 7:00am, but since I messed up last month, I’m posting at midnight.

Please link your post telling us “What’s on Your Nightstand” below. You can tell us what you just finished or what you hope to read this month. I don’t know about you, but I usually read a lot over Christmas. We spend time just hanging out with family, which allows me to read a few pages while others are reading the paper or watching TV. We also drive about six hours, and my husband drives, and I don’t get sick in the car — so that’s prime reading time.

Things are changing on Tuesdays here at 5 Minutes for Books:

1st Tuesday (starting 1/5)— We are switching “I Read It!” from the 5th Tuesday to the first Tuesday. This is an opportunity for you to link up a review of a book you read on someone’s recommendation. Initially we asked for a book that we recommended here at 5 Minutes for Books, but we’re expanding it to include a book that anyone recommended to you. Tell us why you decided to read it, who recommended it, and if you agreed with his or her opinion of the book.

2nd Tuesday — Our Children’s Classics carnival is changing over to a Children’s Classics Mystery Challenge from January – June. See all the details (and the cute button) HERE.

3rd Tuesday — Will still be Kids’ Picks. It’s sort of the kid’s version of Nightstand where we have the opportunity to share a book each month that our child would recommend to others.

4th Tuesday — Of course we will leave Nightstand as is! We love the faithful participation, so we aren’t changing a thing.

5th Tuesday (starting 12/29) — We are moving our Classics here to the 5th Tuesday. Each quarter, we will offer you the chance to share reviews of Classics that you’ve read. You can select your own books, but it’s our hope that this will still be a place that those who want to read the classics can find community. On December 29, if you’d like to set a goal for the year you can, or you can simply join in when you read a classic novel and want to share.

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

Link directly to your post telling us what’s on your Nightstand here. And don’t forget to visit around!

Children’s Classics – Books You Love to Give

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Children's Classics

Last month we talked about some of our favorite holiday books for kids and this month we’re here to talk about what books we love to give as gifts during those same holidays. I can’t say as I’ve had many opportunities to give children’s books to kids. However, now that my son is old enough to start making friends of his own and delights in giving gifts from himself, this is one of the top books that would make our Gift Giving list:

I reviewed The Five Chinese Brothers over on my own site, Reading to Know if you’d like to go and find out what it’s about. I think this is a marvelous, historical and magical piece of classical children’s literature and I just adore it. In fact, I recently found a copy of at a local used book store and I snatched it right up. Now I’m on the prowl to discover which of our friends does not yet own a copy and I will gift them with it! If you haven’t ever read The Five Chinese Brothers, I urge you to it!

In the meantime, I urge you to tell us what classic stories you love to give to others during the holidays, birthdays or any number of other special occasions. We invite you to link up your own blog post below, or leave a comment letting us know what children’s books you love to give and why. We do so love hearing from our readers and hope you’ll take the time to let us know what books are landing on your gift list these days.

Also, please join us for our other regular Tuesday events:

December 15 — Kids’ Picks
December 22nd — What’s on Your Nightstand

ONE MORE THING TO NOTE: We will be changing the format of our Children’s Classics for the months of January – June to a challenge format. We will have more information about that in the very near future so stay tuned for details!

Carrie comes by her book obsession honestly, having descended from a long line of bibliophiles. She blogs about books regularly at Reading to Know and Reading My Library.

Children’s Classics: Celebrate the Holidays

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Children's ClassicsThis is absolutely, hands down, my favorite time of the year. Once November rolls around I’m all about decorations, cookies, parties, presents, books, traditions, etc., etc., etc. You name it, I like love it! This season is just so full of celebrations, life and love and I can’t get enough of it. Therefore I am particularly excited about “hosting” the next two months of the Children’s Classics carnival here at 5 Minutes for Books because they are all about holidays.

Today is your chance to link up your children’s book(s) of choice that relate to any of the holidays that are coming up here in the next few months.

As for me and my family, we’re unpacking our Thanksgiving and Christmas books to make them available for much reading this season. One of the books that I slid of the top shelf the other day was Jan Brett’s The Night Before Christmas. Although the poem is a classic, the illustrated version by Brett doesn’t necessarily qualify as such – yet! However, I think it is destined to be a classic.

Illustrated in classic (I have to at least get the word in there, right?) style, Brett style, the border of each page spread tells its own story as you read this familiar poem:

“Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.”

That sets my heart stirring right there and I get giddy thinking of all the fun we are to have this holiday season. The songs, the food, the smell, the friends who we are anxious to see, the little boys in pajamas and “OH WOW’s” you hear everytime you see a house decorated in Christmas lights. It’s all so beautiful and books are just a nice added touch to the snowmen, candy canes, Christmas ornaments and Starbucks Eggnog lattes. I may just overwhelm myself with glee this year and you’ll have to set me back up on my feet come January to get me moving again. In the meantime, what’s your favorite children’s holiday book? You can bet I can’t wait to hear about it! Leave your link below and we’re ready to listen and learn.

Next month come back and participate again. The theme of next month’s Children’s Classics is:

December 8 — Children’s books you love to give (Share your best gift ideas)

Also, please join us for our other regular Tuesday events:

November 17 — Kids’ Picks
November 24 — What’s on Your Nightstand

Carrie comes by her book obsession honestly, having descended from a long line of bibliophiles. She blogs about books regularly at Reading to Know and Reading My Library.

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

And now — Add the link to your review of the holiday book you’d like to recommend. Or if you don’t have a blog, feel free to leave your thoughts in the comment section.

What’s on Your Nightstand — October

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Wet fall weather and cooler temps should invite nothing more than cozying up with a good book, but that hasn’t really been the case for me and many other of my bookish friends.

What about you? Is your Nightstand full because you aren’t getting to the books you want to read? Or perhaps you keep adding new ones to your pile.

Let us know! Write up a post and tell us what you plan to read this month, or some mini-reviews of what you just cleared off your nightstand.

Are you new to Nightstand? Do you want to know what it’s all about? You can find all the information you want to know at the What’s on Your Nightstand page.

Also, if it’s your first time, be sure to let us know when you link up (on the Linky beside your name). I think that our readers are pretty good about visiting around, but if you are new, we’ll give you a little extra-welcoming TLC.


Join in our other Tuesday community events:

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

Books on Screen: Where the Wild Things Are

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It’s Z-Dad and the Z-Kids from Bookie Woogie signing in! Thanks so much to 5 Minutes For Books for letting us share our thoughts on the “Where the Wild Things Are” movie. For our review of the original picture book, you’re welcome to peek here. The following discussion picks up where that prior review leaves off…

Dad:  Alright, what movie did we just see?
Kids:  “Where the Wild Things Are!”
Lily (age 6):  With a wild rumpus!
Dad:  How did you like it?
Isaac (age 11):  It was good.
Dad:  You didn’t sound very excited there, boy.
Isaac:  Woohoo! It was good!
Gracie (age 9):  I love it!
Dad:  The book takes just two minutes to read. Was the movie two minutes long as well?
Gracie:  The movie was three minutes.
Dad:  So they added an extra minute?
Gracie:  Ha ha ha!
Isaac:  No, it was hours longer.
Gracie:  There is good news and bad news. The bad news is that my favorite character from the book — the monster that I named “I-Walked-Into-A-Tree–Ouch” — he was not in the movie. The good news is that since he wasn’t in the movie, they didn’t give him a different name. So I can keep his name however I like. And I’m keeping his name “I-Walked-Into-A-Tree–Ouch.”
Isaac:  If you read the book, in one of the pages you see a monster that looks like he’s walking straight into a tree.
Gracie:  The page where they are howling at the moon…
Isaac:  He’s the monster on the right-hand side.
Dad:  So what things were the same in both the book and the movie?
Isaac:  Max.
Gracie:  The private boat.
Isaac:  Going across the water. The monsters. Max becoming the king.
Gracie:  The wild rumpus.
Isaac:  The book starts with Max chasing a dog with a fork.
Gracie:  And the movie starts with him chasing the dog with a fork.
Dad:  That was cool.
Gracie:  And “Don’t go… I’ll eat you up, I love you so.”
Dad:  So what were some things that were different? Either things from the book that they left out, or new things that they added…
Isaac:  Max ran away instead of getting sent to his room.
Gracie:  There was no “I-Walked-Into-A-Tree–Ouch.”
Isaac:  There was no sea dragon.
Dad:  Yeah, I was disappointed about that.
Isaac:  The fort was new. There wasn’t a fort in the book.
Gracie:  Yeah, they built the coolest fort out of sticks! It was shaped like a ball, and it was so sweet. So sweet!
Lily:  I know something about the movie. When Max got to where the wild things are, stuff happened that was the same as in his life. You know how the kids destroyed Max’s igloo? Well, Max helped to destroy the monsters’ old homes.
Isaac:  Lily, that’s the most you ever said in a review at one time!
Dad:  I know… and what an awesome observation. Lily figured that out all on her own.
Isaac:  Good job Lily!
Dad:  So, some things from Max’s world are mirrored in the Wild Things’ world. Does anyone remember from one of our other reviews what that’s called?
Lily:  Parallelogram?
Dad:  Close! Parallel. What other parallels were there?
Gracie:  Max told his mom, “I’ll eat you up!” and the monsters said, “We’ll eat you up.”
Isaac:  No one would listen to the goat guy. Same for Max.
Gracie:  First, the mom had a new friend and Max didn’t like it so he yelled, Rawr! And later one monster didn’t like that another monster had new friends.
Dad:  What did you guys think of the creatures?
Isaac:  They were cool. Which was your favorite?
Dad:  I love that big buffalo guy.
Isaac:  My favorite is the goat dude. He’s awesome.
Gracie:  My favorite guy was “I-Walked-Into-A-Tree–Ouch”
Dad:  He wasn’t even in the movie!
Gracie:  Maybe he was invisible! And he walked into every tree in the forest.
Isaac:  I liked the buffalo monster too, Dad.
Elijah (age 4): (walking in on the conversation)  There was a buffalo? How come you got to see all the cool things?!
Dad:  Do you think we should have taken Elijah, or would it have been too scary for him?
Gracie:  Elijah, do you get scared of yelling monsters?
Elijah:  No way! I don’t, Grace.
Dad:  How about you three? Were there any parts that made you scared or nervous? Lily climbed onto my lap at one point.
Gracie:  What happened?
Dad:  It was when one of the monsters was chasing Max through the forest to eat him.
Lily:  My chair was just squeaky and I didn’t want it making noise…
Dad:  Suuuure……
Lily:  I wasn’t scared.
Dad:  Is there anything the moms and dads reading this should know about?
Lily:  I know, I know. If your kids are scared of monsters putting people in their mouth and then spitting them out, do not come to this movie theater.
Dad:  So there were some potentially scary parts. It was a pretty funny movie too.
Lily:  The part where the bird monster had ************ was SO funny!
Dad:  Well we don’t want to give it away!
Lily:  Oh! Erase that! Forget what I said! Blah blah blah blah.
Dad:  The movie was also pretty sad. Gracie, you said you cried?
Gracie:  What. I’m sensitive.
Dad:  How many times did you say you cried? Seven?
Gracie:  Not seven. Several. I did say “seven.” But apparently “several” is different from “seven.”
Dad:  Did Max learn any lessons in the movie?
Isaac:  Not to call himself a king.
Gracie:  He also learned not to stand on a table and say “Feed me, woman.”
Dad:  That is a fine lesson to learn indeed.

You can find weekly book reviews by Isaac, Grace, and Lily at their blog Bookie Woogie. You can see samples of their art on their other blog Chicken Nugget Lemon Tooty.

Children’s Classics: Re-reading a Childhood Favorite

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We’re sort of doubling up here. Yes, in this post I’m going to invite you to link up your own reviews of a childhood favorite that you’ve recently re-read, but I’m also going to post a review of a delightful book that you might want to check out for yourself after cruising down memory lane in the pages of a book from your youth or childhood.

Shelf Discovery: The Teen Classics We Never Stopped Reading was such a perfect tie-in that I just had to feature it here today. This delightful collection of essays by Lizzie Skurnick takes a look at the impact that all the old favorites had on her. There are also guest essays by Meg Cabot, Laura Lippman and Jennifer Weiner.

shelfdiscoveryThe delightful books that are featured within this volume are probably many of the ones that people will cover today. I know that the book I read, From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler is included, in the very first chapter featuring great YA heroines. You’ll also find Sally J. Freedman, Meg Murray, Harriet (the Spy), and the Great Brain in this section.

The second chapter groups coming of age novels such as Are You There God, It’s Me Margaret? (of course!), Blubber, The Cat Ate My Gymsuit, A Ring of Endless Light and more.

Other chapters take a look at romance, supernatural powers, old-fashioned girls (including THE Old-Fashioned Girl by Louisa May Alcott, which perhaps someone will choose to read for our November bookclub featuring Louisa May Alcott) and so much more.

Each essay features a cover shot of those books we loved, which alone is enough to transport many of us to that time and place. The author also quotes liberally from the book that is in the spotlight, which may serve as a key to unlock those books that you had forgotten you remembered.

This booklist WAS my life. If like me you grew up in the 70’s and 80’s, this booklist probably helped define you as well.

Join in our other Tuesday community carnivals:

Our future Children’s Classics schedule:

  • November 10 — Celebrate the holidays (any Fall or Winter holiday)
  • December 8 — Children’s books you love to give (Share your best gift ideas)

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

And now — Add the link to your review of the childhood favorite that you revisited recently. Or if you don’t have a blog, feel free to leave your thoughts in the comment section.

Rooftops of Tehran Bookclub

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I’ve reprinted my original review here, and will link up my answers to some of the discussion questions on my blog. Please join in by linking up your thoughts below, or within the comment section if you don’t have a blog.

Originally posted here on May 29, 2009:

This was a lovely lovely book.

Seventeen-year old Pasha and his best friend Ahmed spend the summer exploring life and love and the unfairness of the totalitarian regime of 1973 Iran. The characterization of a young man’s journey from his late teens into adulthood is perfect — first loves, first stands on issues, hellos, goodbyes.

The language is beautiful, the story is strong, the characters are dear, and it’s suspenseful, so it pulled me right along. Parts of the story are told in flashbacks, so the reader is brought closer and closer to the crisis event, and you can’t help but keep asking, “What happened to change the course of events in these characters’ lives?”

When that crisis is revealed, the end of the novel continues in a suspenseful vein, as I yearned to find out what is going to happen to the characters that I had come to love.

An interesting section at the end has an interview with the author as well as a reader’s guide for discussion and then recommended reading, including sections for history and culture and memoirs/novels/poetry. Recommended titles include Funny in Farsi (linked to the review that Dawn did here a few months ago), as well as the House of Sand and Fog and Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books, both of which have been on my radar a while. In fact, I think I’m going to load up the House of Sand and Fog on my Kindle for my summer travels.

So, I’d say that if you’ve read, and enjoyed, any of those titles, you’d like this one too. The comparisons to The Kite Runner are also inevitable — although they are set in different countries, they both deal with events that precipitate a coming of age, set in the backdrop of a totalitarian regime. The Kite Runner is a wonderful book, but I think that Rooftops of Tehran has more heart, more range (since I laughed aloud a time or two in addition to being touched throughout), and is overall a better story.

A wonderful literary page-turner — my favorite kind of read.

Read more in Mahbod Seraji’s guest post “On Reading.”

Upcoming bookclub schedule:

  • November 3: Any work by Louisa May Alcott
  • December and January: off months — eat some extra holiday pie

    • Join us for our other community events each Tuesday:

  • October 13 — Children’s Classics: Re-read a childhood favorite (I can’t wait for this–both to read and read others’ thoughts)
  • October 20 — Kids’ Picks
  • October 27 — What’s on Your Nightstand

Managing Editor Jennifer Donovan seems to be stuck in the middle-east, at least in the pages, because she loves books with an interesting cultural setting. Read about her life in Connecticut (interesting to a transplanted Texan, at least!) at her blog Snapshot.

I Read It — September

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Have you read a book that we reviewed here (on this site or in our weekly column on 5 Minutes for Mom)?

Here’s your chance to let us know! Perhaps you liked it, as we did, or maybe you were a bit disappointed.

Write up a new review on your site and leave the link, or give us the links of reviews you’ve published since our last 5th-Tuesday “I Read It” carnival in June.

Just leave your link, or a comment with a short review or your thoughts, right in the comment field below.

Join in our upcoming community events (there’s something every Tuesday):

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

What’s on Your Nightstand — September

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It’s that time again — the fourth Tuesday of the month brings our most-popular community event: What’s on Your Nightstand?

Are you new to Nightstand? Do you want to know what it’s all about? You can find all the information you want to know at the What’s on Your Nightstand page.

If you’re new here — welcome! Also, to our regular participants, let me give you a heads-up that we have a bunch of current giveaways going on! We always have at least two current giveaways, but right now there are a whole handful!

But basically, just come here to 5 Minutes for Books on the fourth Tuesday of each month. You can either link up a post that you’ve written on your own blog about what is on your nightstand (what you plan to read in the upcoming month, what you’ve just finished reading — your choice!). Then visit around and watch your TBR list grow.

Non-bloggers are invited to participate by visiting the links and commenting on others’ posts and can leave their goals in the comment field.

By the way, I know that the uber-popular Fall into Reading Challenge hosted by Callapidder Days starts today. Feel free to link up the post that you wrote for that challenge here, or you can make a separate post and refer to your more comprehensive quarterly list. We would, as always, appreciate a link to this post, or at least to our homepage, so that your readers know where to find other participants.

Check out our new policy:

To make things fair, we’ll post it at midnight Eastern on odd numbered months and at 7:00am Eastern on even numbered months.

Now everyone gets a chance to be at the top of the Linky. You East-coasters can remember that your chance to sneak in earlier will come in October.


Join in our other Tuesday community events:

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

Children’s Classics — Back to School

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Like that certain office supply store’s commercial sings to us lately, “It’s the most wonderful time of the year!” Yes, we’re talking back to school time! While our school calendar kicked off two weeks ago here in Maryland, I’m thinking it’s still pretty standard for other schools around the country to be starting sessions today, so welcome back everyone!

When it comes to children’s literature, the back to school theme is a fairly well addressed one, although it seems that my brain is focused on books aimed at the younger set– the preschoolers and early elementary kids who may be in need of a little encouragement or support during this transition time. You’ve got pretty much every single popular children’s television character working overtime in the pages of books these days, and they are all more than willing to help your young child ease into the school routine. I’m sort of a snob about tv-masquerading-as-literature as it is, but I don’t think those fit the Classics bill anyway. So, what are some classic back to school books?

I can think of plenty, and I do mean PLENTY, more recently published books on this theme. Back before I began my sterling career as a stay-at-home mom, I was first a preschool teacher, so this time of year meant lots of prep work, with my favorite being to stock the classroom library. Of course, we had some of the best around, David Goes to School, Mouse’s First Day of School, and Miss Bindergarten Gets Ready for Kindergarten. My very favorite, which unfortunately is not nearly as well-known as it should be, is the absolutely delightful, Matthew ABC. But again, can I call those Classics?

Clearly, I’m having difficulty with this, so I offer you up one title that perhaps has a questionable Classics status, but I’m pretty darn sure that if you have a kid in the preschool set (or one who has had the audacity to grow out of that age bracket within the last 7 years or so), you’re going to be familiar with this title.

If You Take a Mouse to School, by Laura Numeroff, brings back the adorable Mouse of the cookie fame, retaining the circular nature of Numeroff’s many books and introducing kids to the wonders of a classroom environment and routine– reading! science experiments! block building! While it may not be all that old, I’m going to go ahead and give it the Classics honor today.

What do you think? Is your pick a bit more traditionally classic than mine? Please link up your own Children’s Classics post with us below, or feel free just to be chatty in our comments section. Welcome back to school!

Join us each Tuesday. Except for Nightstand, which will still follow our alternating-time post schedule, we will be posting all of these at 7:00am Eastern time.

September 15 (3rd Tuesday): Kids’ Picks
September 22 (4th Tuesday): What’s on Your Nightstand?
September 29 (5th Tuesday): I Read It!
October 6 (1st Tuesday): Bookclub — Rooftops of Tehran by Mahbod Seraji

Mark your calendar with upcoming Children’s Classics topics:

October 13 — Re-read a childhood favorite
November 10 — Celebrate the holidays
December 8 — Children’s books you love to give

Now that Dawn has 1/3 of her children back in school, naptimes can once again be blogging time, over at my thoughts exactly.

What’s on Your Nightstand? — August

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Many kids are going back to school now. I don’t know if that will increase your reading time, or decrease it as a result of more general activities starting back up. I’m trying to regain a sense of discipline with the new Back-to-School schedule, including doing better setting aside time for my work-at-home job, but reading will not take a backseat.

Speaking of Back-to-School, check out all of our Back-to-School Giveaways (as well as the Back to School Giveaways that 5 Minutes for Mom is hosting)! You can still enter to win through August 30.

Are you new to Nightstand? Do you want to know what it’s all about? You can find all the information you want to know at the What’s on Your Nightstand page.

But basically, just come here to 5 Minutes for Books on the fourth Tuesday of each month. You can either link up a post that you’ve written on your own blog about what is on your nightstand (what you plan to read in the upcoming month, what you’ve just finished reading — your choice!). Then visit around and watch your TBR list grow.

Non bloggers can participate by visiting the links and can leave their information in the comment field.

Check out our new policy:

To make things fair, we’ll post it at midnight Eastern on odd numbered months and at 7:00am Eastern on even numbered months.

Now everyone gets a chance to be at the top of the Linky. We’ll start next month (at midnight), but you East-coasters can remember that your chance to sneak in earlier will come on the even-numbered months (first one is October!).


Join in our other Tuesday community events:

Check out our current giveaways. Subscribe to our feed. Follow us @5M4B on Twitter.

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