Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures

OK. Last post before another hiatus. In all likelihood, I will finish another book while I am at the lake, so hopefully I will post as soon as I get back...

Happy Summer!!

With their scalpel-sharp prose and unflinching gaze, the stories in Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures introduce a powerful new voice in Canadian fiction. 

In Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures, Vincent Lam holds in delicate and skillful tension black humour, investigations of both common and extraordinary moral dilemmas, and a sometimes shockingly realistic and matter-of-fact portrait of today’s medical profession. 

He brings to vivid and convincing life the disparate but interdependent worlds of school and home, heartbreaking young love and life-altering fear in stories that introduce us to Fitz, Ming, Chen, and Sri, young medical school students and doctors in Toronto. 

In “How To Get Into Medical School,” the impulsive Fitz and the ultra-rational Ming explore the possibilities of a relationship that is tested, first by the vigilance of a disapproving family and then by the extraordinary commitment demanded of medical students. In “Take All of Murphy,” three students face the challenge of their first dissection of a corpse — and the unusual quandary of deciding whether following the anatomy textbook or keeping a tattoo intact is more important. And in “A Long Migration,” perhaps the most lyrical of the stories, we see beyond Chen’s immediate world into the past of his family, and in particular that of his grandfather. Once a high-living and flamboyant member of the Chinese expatriate community in Saigon before the Vietnam War, now Percival Chen is dying in a Brisbane retirement home, and his grandson’s modern medical recommendations must make way for older potions that arrive for Percival from an older world. 

Riveting and precise, Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures looks with rigorous honesty at the specificities of the lives of doctors and their patients and brings us to a deeper understanding of the challenges and temptations that surge around us all. 

Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures is an astonishing literary debut, a collection of mature and intricate stories connected through the relationships that develop among a group of young doctors as they move from the challenges of med school to the intense world of emergency rooms, evac missions, and terrifying new viruses.


This book is a few years old, and I remember it came out while I was still working at Coles. It was one of those books that had a really interesting title and when it won the Giller Prize a lot of people were coming in to get it. So my book snob kicked in and I had no interest in reading it. I am somewhat interested to know what other books were nominated that year because I am not sure that I think this one is worthy. I mean, it was alright... but award winning? I'm not so sure. Word on the street is that the Giller panel really likes it when people who come from other professions become authors (Lam is a doctor) but I'm not totally sure of the accuracy of that statement.

I feel the need to point out that technically, this is a book of short stories, but I still read it more like a novel. You could read the chapters out of order, but there is a chronology that makes more sense to read them sequentially. The chapters (or stories) are very interesting glimpses into the medical profession and just how different each specialty is. The problem is that the four different doctors that the story follows are basically interchangeable. They are so similar in so many ways, and somewhat one-dimensional, that I'm not sure I could tell you which doctor did what. 

Can't remember why I decided I wanted to read this one. As I said, I had no interest in it when it came out, but somehow it made it on to my "to read" list that I have on my iphone, and then it was on sale on my eReader site. I'm pretty sure it has something to do with the fact that one of the doctors becomes an OBGYN, but I can't remember how I found this out...

Anywhoo, it was an interesting glimpse into a very highly revered (and somewhat often glamorously portrayed) profession. I would be interested in finding out what actual doctors thought of it and how accurately Lam portrayed his own profession.

Song of Ice and Fire: Book 2 - A Clash of Kings

Time is out of joint. The summer of peace and plenty, ten years long, is drawing to a close, and the harsh, chill winter approaches like an angry beast. Two great leaders—Lord Eddard Stark and Robert Baratheon—who held sway over and age of enforced peace are dead...victims of royal treachery. Now, from the ancient citadel of Dragonstone to the forbidding shores of Winterfell, chaos reigns, as pretenders to the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms prepare to stake their claims through tempest, turmoil, and war. 

As a prophecy of doom cuts across the sky—a comet the color of blood and flame—six factions struggle for control of a divided land. Eddard’s son Robb has declared himself King in the North. In the south, Joffrey, the heir apparent, rules in name only, victim of the scheming courtiers who teem over King’s Landing. Robert’s two brothers each seek their own dominion, while a disfavored house turns once more to conquest. And a continent away, an exiled queen, the Mother of Dragons, risks everything to lead her precious brood across a hard hot desert to win back the crown that is rightfully hers. 

A Clash of Kings transports us into a magnificent, forgotten land of revelry and revenge, wizardry and wartime. It is a tale in which maidens cavort with madmen, brother plots against brother, and the dead rise to walk in the night. Here a princess masquerades as an orphan boy; a knight of the mind prepares a poison for a treacherous sorceress; and wild men descend from the Mountains of the Moon to ravage the countryside. 

Against a backdrop of incest and fratricide, alchemy and murder, the price of glory may be measured in blood. And the spoils of victory may just go to the men and women possessed of the coldest steel...and the coldest hearts. For when rulers clash, all of the land feels the tremors. 

Audacious, inventive, brilliantly imagined, A Clash of Kings is a novel of dazzling beauty and boundless enchantment—a tale of pure excitement you will never forget.


I posted a longer description of this one because I really don't plan on saying much about it. This is really like a second chapter in a seven part book... kinda. Big things happen, and certain things are resolved but there is no real conclusion by the end of the book. I suppose that is why it makes such a great TV series.

There are a lot of things that happened in this book that I had wished had gone another way (someone wins when you want them to lose, someone makes a wrong choice, etc.), but it's tough to really complain about that because life doesn't always go how you want it to, so why would books! 

I find that I am not quite as compelled to read it as I was with the first book, I think it may be because I miss Ned, but still a really good read. I'm liking the series though! Now that I have most of the names straightened away and no longer need a family tree to keep everyone straight it's much easier to read more! On to book 3!

Mamma Guilt, Lake Time, and Blogging Hiatus

Hello all!

Sorry for the long hiatus. I scooted off to the lake and had very little internet access for just over a week. I decided to leave my computer at home and just get my internet fix through my phone on occasions. I checked in on Facebook occasionally and if I had time, I read a few blogs, so I'm somewhat caught up on everyone's lives! 

Just for the record, the irony is not lost on me that I said in my last post that I was liking getting out two posts a week only to pop to the lake and not post anything for over a week. 

I'm only home for three days, so you will be getting a post each of these days because I polished off another couple books at the lake. THAT really surprised me. Thank goodness for my ereader, because I was completely unprepared. 

Last year, I was taken by surprise because Rose napped more at the lake than I expected. Probably due to the fresh air, abundance of oxygen, and that business of going out and running around doing fun things almost every day. This year, she's on a more routine nap schedule, so it was more predictable. BUT being in an open concept cabin, after she goes to bed at night, most of the lights are off (at about 8:30pm) so both my mom and I went to our respective beds and read with our reading lights. So POOF! Second Song of Fire and Ice book DONE! Because I didn't forsee this (coupled with the fact that there is a glitch with the series on my ereader where I can't load more than one of them at a time) I didn't have the third book at my disposal, so I read a different book. I'm sure that those of you who are not interested in the Game of Thrones series will be thankful for something that isn't all blood and gore and violence (... ok, maybe a little blood, but we'll get to that in a couple of days). I'll polish up those reviews and then post 'em. 

I'm only back from the lake for a few days to work, but I'll be heading back up to the lake on Tuesday morning. Normally, I wouldn't be in such a rush to head back, I mean, I love going to the lake and all, but I'm not a big fan of driving for long periods of time. That's more of Roland's forte. I'd rather sit in the passenger seat and read or watch the landscape go by instead of watching the road, unable to put my feet up... so BORING and uncomfortable. But due to my childcare situation in the summer, I left Rosalie at the lake with my mom for the weekend while I came back to work. This is one of the most emotionally difficult things I have ever had to do in my life. 

It's not that I am concerned about her well-being (when I cried for the 3rd time before leaving the lake my mom said "Don't you trust me?" with a chuckle. The truth is that sometimes I might trust my mom more than Roland with Rosalie, she has a bit of an edge on the experience, and she's CPR & First Aid certified), and it's not like I'm afraid I will never see her again (when I got home and cried, Roland's response to my tears was "It's not like we SOLD her! She's with your MOM"), it's just pure and simple "mom guilt". This is the first time I have ever gone more than 12 hours without seeing Rosalie. I can't even explain why this upsets me so much. Could be that I don't want to miss anything, or that I am convinced that I am the only one that can take care of her, or that I am concerned that she will think I abandoned her... I don't really completely believe any of those things, but the thoughts make me feel guilty. It's not even like I am ditching her just to take a break, or that I don't want to be there. It's just that I need to go to work.... Yup. Irrational guilt. But that doesn't make it any better.

(On a parenting side note, I have now weaned Rosalie. This also may be contributing to my fragile emotional state. It made sense timing wise. I haven't pumped in months, and with her being with grandma for 3 days it made more sense to wean her for that rather than go back to pumping since she is now 15 months old and she really is fine with homogenized milk anyway. So I nursed her for the last time yesterday morning. To be honest, I was way more attached to it than she was at this point. I think for her, it was just part of our routine. I think she liked it, but she by no means needed it.)

So here I am. I was awake at 7am, after not falling asleep until 2:00, attempted to go back to sleep, gave up at 8:00, showering, starting the mound of laundry that I brought home from the lake that I will need to pack up and take back when it's done, and then eating breakfast and blogging. 

My plan for the weekend is to work, buy pajama pants, start reading the 3rd Song of Ice and Fire book, finish the laundry, pack it and load up the car before I work on Monday so on Tuesday morning we can just hop in the car and go. I'm hoping to be there by 11:00. 10:30 if I can swing it.

So that's a glimpse of my summer life, I won't be having internet access again once I am at the lake, so be aware it is likely there will be a long hiatus again. 

Have a great summer!

100 posts!!

It is my 100 post extrodinaire!! And will probably be the most boring post ever. I'm sort of using it as a sounding board for how things are going in this first year and a bit... my thoughts about blogging... ya know... meh...

So, I started this blog in June of last year, so it took me just over a year to get to 100 posts. I'm not sure how often I really expected to blog, but I suppose I would say that seems reasonable. At first when I had a lot to say, I was posting every day and that seemed like overkill, but I start to feel guilty after a week without a post... so between 3 and 4 posts a week seems reasonable.

I have discovered that my blog has evolved differently than I expected. It's slightly more "crap I want to talk about" moreso than book reviews. 33 book reviews in 100 posts. I think this is partially because I feel an obligation to put out relatively regular posts, and I am not reading books as quickly as I used to. But that's not to say I'm disappointed with my blog. I've started to LOVE blogging. I enjoy when I have to time to sit down and type out my thoughts, I do WISH that I had more time to read more books and maybe bump the ratio from a 2:1 to a 1:1. Maybe that'll be my goal. But I don't want to post less other stuff, I just want to post MORE book reviews...

At the same time, I have noticed that people generally don't comment on my book review posts. Which I find slightly disappointing, because I interpret that to mean that people don't like those posts as much. But considering that they are intended to be the entire purpose of this blog, I am going to continue to do them anyway. So, if you don't like them, too bad! ;P

According to my statistics, I am getting, on average, about 30 views per post, or this could also be interpreted as just less than 8 views a day. This is actually higher than I expected when I started the blog, so YAY ME! I was expecting about 3 views per post, because I think initally I only thought there would be 3 people I know interested in reading my blog. So THANK YOU for reading this, and reading my blog! I know it's not the most interesting of blogs, but thanks for reading anyway!

On the topic of audience, I have noticed that there are occasional spikes in the number of views I have from Europe, and generally these are from non-English speaking countries, so I am wondering if some teacher is using my blog in her classroom and saying "Correct this Canadian woman's terrible grammar" as a way to help kids learn English.... that, or they use my blog for my impeccable grammar skills.... Or neither. But this is my teacher-brain's reasoning behind the European following. So if you are from Europe and are reading my blog: Thank you again! And if you want to post what draws you to my blog, please do! I am VERY curious. :)

I am also looking for any feedback at all about anything! So please post my weaknesses so I can work on them, or things that you think are strengths so I can feed off of those!

Barbie Body Type

Link: Barbie Doll Created With Average US Womans' Measurements is Repulsive Hag

I was ready to be super mad about this article, until I read the first line. Then I automatically loved it.

I will also agree that people "should at least be open to the possibility that Barbie may negatively influence young girls", however I believe that girls are far more likely to be influenced by their parents than dolls. I read another article about how important it is for moms of daughters not to say negative things about their own body around their girls, because their thought process will lead them to doubt their own body image because they think you are perfect, but it causes doubt and confusion about their own body image when you doubt yours (Or something... I wish I could find THAT article too... phoo). 

I never heard my mom call herself fat when I was young (she has made little remarks when I've been an adult though), I always thought (and still think) she is one of the most beautiful people on the planet. I mean, she's not going to win any Miss Universe pageants, but everyone that knows her loves her. Best roll model ever. 

And I never thought that I was "fat" because I didn't look like Barbie. But I also remember not liking when that little bobble thing that holds on her head would break, and you'd have to push her head down on to her neck and that would make her look "fat"... I actually think I hated it because it was then "broken" and it bothered me when my stuff got broken.

And I totally think the realistic doll is cute and I would buy it for Rosalie over the weird proportioned, original one. I love her butt. Is that weird? "I like [average sized] butts and I cannot lie..."?

Marriage Isn't Always Easy

Background reading: Blog Entry: Renegade Mothering - Meg Ryan Ruins Marriages

I'm gunna start out by saying I don't entirely agree with this woman, but I suppose if you want to sell your blog you have to say or do some pretty extreme things. Maybe I'm just not the violent type, but I have never imagined throwing heavy, blunt objects at Roland... although I have honestly thought to myself "I vow not to be as awful as B's mom when we get divorced". Actually, depending on how mad I get, sometimes it's "I vow to be 100 times worse than B's mom when we get divorced" But that is a high bar to set, and I only think that when I'm REALLY mad.

Roland and I don't fight often, but when we do, it's a blow out screaming match. Roland says really mean things, while I become obstinate and more difficult. I do this seriously on purpose, just to get him more mad. I know that I'm winning when he throws the tv remote or his cell phone, or crumples up the disposable Glad food storage container (when he did that one I honestly had to try desperately not to laugh) Generally, these fights are not resolved in the same sitting as they were began in. But after hours of the silent treatment to one another, slammed doors, and what not, one of us (generally me) approaches the other to calmly talk about what happened and how we can fix whatever we just fought about. Sometimes it surprises me how great the conversations are after the few hours of cool down time. I feel that I really learn a lot about him in those conversations. We are both honest and willing to fix whatever just pushed us over the edge (obviously, or else we'd be divorced by now)

But a lot of the things this woman writes completely rang true with me. Sometimes I DO have those thoughts of  “Who is this douchebag and why is he in my house?”, and when I read why she said the reason she has never left her husband is "Because I couldn’t stomach the thought of another woman being around my children." I got kinda mad. Not at her, because I completely agree... but at Roland, because I KNOW he would just go out and find someone else and I would want to beat HER face in with a club just because she wants to be another mother to my kids. They are MINE!... well, it could be argued that Brayden isn't really mine, but with all the crap he's been through he doesn't need a second questionable woman in his life. I mean, what right does she have to just walk right in and take over? NONE! And she better know it...

Oh right... Yeah... this woman doesn't exist, and might not ever exist... so I need to calm down a bit...

For the record, I don't think I'm the type to hop into other relationships if this one goes south, so that adds a little more fuel to my angry, hypothetical little fire...

But this article, in addition to the realization about my own relationship and marriage, has made me rationalize the way I react to others' public relationships. Maybe it's my cynicism, or complete lack of trust in what people say, but if you make a post on Facebook or your blog or twitter or whatever about how much you LOVE your partner and how fabulous everything is in your relationship, and this happens at daily intervals.... I automatically assume your relationship is struggling. I am sure these lovey-dovey posts are more to convince yourself that you are in love with your partner moreso than you are trying to convince me... and frankly, I'm not buying it. More than once this has been confirmed by the ever so public "[so-and-so] is no longer in a relationship" status that shows up on my facebook news feed slightly after. Go figure.

Unless it's like "My husband just bought me ______ for my birthday, I have the best husband ever and love him so much!" Then I believe you actually feel like that... at that moment... but it won't last forever. Next week there will probably be a post about how your moronic husband/boyfriend ran over the hose with the lawnmower for the third time this year.

That being said, I love how true the end of her blog entry is. When you see your hubby cuddling with the kids or fixing that thing that you broke, or brings you home a slurpee without being asked, you are just blown away by how lucky you are to have snagged such a good one. How much you love him, and how great of a partner he is in your life. Everything in balance, right?