When a book changes your perception of the world...

Half the Sky is a real life look at the horrors of the oppression of women across the world. It was a truly moving and inspiring book, yet it was one of the hardest books I have read in a long time. As you can see from the blog,  I started the book and had to take a break in order to finish. All in all it was a life changing book and makes me want to do more for the our  local community but even our world.

Throughout my life, I have seen documentaries , read news articles, and just in general tried to be exposed to the greater problems of the world. I know we are blessed and fortunate to live in the United States. I've always tried to give back and support the bigger picture. This is hard sometimes to remember and grasp. After reading this book and I've sure watching the documentary, it is hard to believe that in America slavery has been gone for almost 150 years and women have had the right to vote for over 90 years, yet there are huge amounts of oppression, slavery and rape of women going on across the world. 

Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Across the World was a close hand account of women and their inspiring stories primarily in Southeast Asia, China, India, the Middle East, and Africa. Nicholas Kristof an Sheryl WuDunn share amazing stories of women surviving families who disown them, rape and sex trafficking, child marriages, and many other horrors that are still happening now. This was written in 2009 with fairly recent stories. More than that great NGO are named as well and a call to action is given.

This week I plan to spend some time doing some time researching all of the NGO to decide how I want to make a difference. I love the idea of supporting a girls education. Additionally, the idea of supporting global micro-financing for women has been shown to  greatly improve the quality of life.   

Below are many amazing links which I think will help you explore Half The Sky. Go out and make a difference. 

Half the Sky Movement Website

Half the Sky Documentary

Donation Links

Micro-financing- Kiva             GlobalGiving

Education- Room to Read ( There are many, many more)

Ted Talks

Sheryl on Half the Sky

Sunitha on Sex Trafficking

Happy Reading! Off to The Audacity of Hope

I am not sure how this one skipped High School Required Reading...

Well as everyone can tell, I am a little behind on reading. So I finished Treasure Island last night and was so impressed. Let me say it was not the best book I ever read, nor was it the deepest book I ever read, but it was so much fun.  I laughed and finally discovered where so many TV/movie life references come from.


Any true pirate lover has to read this book. (PS I am pretty sure Long John Silver the restaurant name came from this silly little book.)  No Way...

All in All it is a fantastic book written as a means for Robert Louis Stevenson to entertain his son. The target audience was young boys, what was created were accounts of many of the first portrayals of pirates in literature and later movies.

When Billy Bones leaves young Jim in possession of a map, the Squire and Dr. Trelawney decide they will go on a quest to find the treasure. In Bristol, the squire recruits soon to be pirates on this voyage across the Atlantic. The hunt for the treasure and the fight for survival on the island is your adventure to discover.

All in all it is a great fun book. Pieces of character development were missing outside of Silver and Jim. All female voice and presence is lost. These factors together, I believe, create cause for it sometimes being skipped in reading curriculum.


All in all good book. I am off to finish Half the Sky..

Happy Reading!

Springtime is here..Happiness and Cheer...

and distractions... So I read everyday, but sometimes that sunshine is just to wonderful.


Reading is falling a little behind this month, but how far is TBA because there is still a wonderful weekend ahead. I plan to read all weekend to catch up.

I am about 1/2 done with Half the Sky. I needed to break up the pace of the truly fabulous but hard to read book, so I started Treasure Island.

Half the Sky talks about women and oppression around the world in ways and means that we often do not address. I am excited to hear how it ends, but I also realized it is a pretty slow read.

Here is their awesome website for now... Enjoy the weekend and Happy Reading!

http://www.halftheskymovement.org/

Saying Good Bye... The end of Harry Potter

I have said in previous post that Harry Potter rescued my love of reading. In a time when I was burnt out and not sure what was going on with the world, I would read Harry Potter. Since 2001, I have read the entire series at least 3 times. I have read books 1-5 another 5 times. Harry Potter reminds us to fight for what is right that there is good in the world and amazing things can be accomplished with faith in people.

 With that being said, I would remind you that their is a dark side to Harry Potter when Ron, Hermione many other leads doubt question and lose faith in others. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is amazing. While the ministry is falling apart and Voldermort is reining terror, Hermione, Ron and Harry are on quest to discover and destroy Voldermort soul. As the book unfolds, I truly appreciated how brilliant JK Rowling is and was in developing this series.

All of the details, history, and pieces have been marvelously piece together to create a brilliant story. Now after 10 years of reading this story and watching the movies and going to the theme park, I think it is time to retire these books for a while. I have some great books to read over the next months and years. Harry Potter has earned a top spot on my shelf, but it needs to take a break for a while.

Enjoy one of my favorite series.

For a detailed review of many of JK Rowling's influences, check out Harry Potter's Bookshelf by J Granger.


Happy Reading.. about to finish Half the Sky and then on to Treasure Island..

Learning to Lead or Should I Say Lean

I first heard of Sheryl Sandberg after watching her TED Talk a few months back.

  I was a little distracted, but knew this was a great. Then a few weeks later, I watched the video again without any distractions with my roommate. I was empowered, amazed and questioning my life.  Some time that week, I discovered Lean In was coming out as an entire book and I immediately added it to my 100 list adventure.

Just what exactly is Lean In and why is there so much buzz around this book? Finally, someone is speaking out and saying the cultural revolution that was fought for centuries is not over; in fact, we are close to heading in the wrong direction. Worse than that, study upon study is showing that men and women and viewed completely different in the typical business workforce. I have so many thoughts, issues and opinions on this topic. I did not agree 100% with every that was said in this book, but I did laugh out loud at parts, my heart broke at others, and I did question parts of life at others. One of the best part of this book was the real and honest conversation of creating a real life partner and having honest conversations about bringing kids into your career. Brilliant advice and empowering. Everyone should read  this book. It is not just for women or those in business or leaders. Everyone has something to add, share, learn, and gain from this amazing book.


One of my favorite quotes from the book is something like:
"Discussions change minds, minds change behaviors, behaviors change institutions...." Lean-In has created a create Facebook community along with great support to change how women and men support each other, talk about these issues, and discuss gender differences. To see other great quotes from the book check out this link.


Happy Reading...(Onto Half the Sky and Harry Potter 7)

(I started this blog at lunch on Monday...life is so precious. praying and thinking of all of those tragically impacted by the explosions in Boston. Such a sad horrible day as I finished this motivating post.)


For an extended look at my Lean In thoughts check back here, but here is a preview.

As an 8 year old, I figured out how to set of my family computer on the internet. (ok I just really wanted to figure out the answer to my homework, but I did it.) No one everyone ever told me this could be a career until I was almost done with college. Hence I became a statistics and lost my curiosity  in science and math.
I never even thought that men and women had different careers until I realized that many of guy friends were engineering. Now my current career helps all students find internships but I have had the privileged of working with great people help women excel in technology. Women in STEM... new passion to help the next generation.

Balancing a career and family.... well Happy Christmas. My mom, sister and I were on our way back from a movie when I was in high school Christmas day. My mother at this point told me I did not date enough, I was to involved in school, life, and everything else. I was driven, ambitious  My mother told me I would never have a career and a family. I said watch me. While I am not married right now, I can not wait for the day that I have both. I know it will be hard. I know that sacrifices will be made, but I know it can be done. Lean In showed me it was possible even more.

There may be more thoughts including with I ended up in service not in business or politics, but that is all for now..

Jennifer Weiner...Short and Sweet

The Guy Not Taken...From one extreme to another, both with the same goal... well sort of. Jennifer Weiner highlights eleven primary previously written short stories to highlight human promise, love, families, happy endings, and not so happy endings. All in all, this book center around Weiner great ability to not only develop characters but let readers connect with those characters.

In each story, the primary character grew with age and sometimes issues. From the 14 year old Nikki to the 70 year old Dory, the emotions of the story seemed real and almost everyone can relate to at least one story.


Overall, considering short stories are my least favorite type of anything genre to read, I thought this was a good book. Jennifer Weiner is a great author to read an almost meaningful chick lit especially if you want to be entertained yet connected.  (See Good In Bed and In Her Shoes). She spends much time developing these characters and creating the story, but they end (hence the problem with short stories). In all, this much much better than JK Rowling's Casual Vacancy.

Happy Reading... (Almost done with Lean In and will start Half the Sky tonight)

When books are not what you expected...

After nine long days of reading, I finally finished The Casual Vacancy by JK Rowling.  I am not sure what I was expecting, but it was not this. I love how JK Rowling wrote Harry Potter and all in all I think she is a great writer.

On a whole some people criticizer her for writing the Harry Potter books with not enough character development. However, they are children's books and have growing character development and interwoven depths as the characters age.

While I was not expecting Harry Potter, I was expecting an entertaining plot with a different story and maybe some of JK Rowling signature details. Instead JK Rowling decided that we should all know she can and will spend pages developing her characters even if it sacrifies the plot.

On a whole the basis of the book surronds Barry Fairbrother dies and his local seat in the Parish Council goes up for election. In this rural community in England, dirty politics, discontent for the poor, rape, welfare, scandals all sound like they would make an excellent plot. Instead tedious details and chapters of information make the first 350 pages drag. While the last 100 pages are pretty good, final answers to some of the stories questions are not always.

All in all this book was ok. If you like character development and literature read it, if not skip it.

Happy Reading! Off to catch up... Guy Not Taken and then Lean In (so excited)

Playing a Game of Cat and Maus

I admit I have never really taken the world of graphic novels seriously. When the book, Maus kept appearing on list of books you should read before your 30 or top 100 list I was intrigued and added it to my list. (For those of you that have not read all of my post, this was one large way I created many of my 100 books. After reading this survivors tale of a Polish family's attempt to escape the Holocaust, I was completely intrigued and impressed at the power of Artem Spiegelman words and pictures. He artfully portrays his parents fight for life in the 1940s as they hid, bartered, fought, and survived Germans taking over Poland and wiping out the Jewish population.

I read many books about the Holocaust both Fiction, memoirs  and historical accounts. The comics juxtaposed with the tough subjects make this book the Pultizer Prize winning novel it became. All in all the story is easy to connect with as parental relationships, marriage and lost make the loses in the story human.

 After reading the book, I realized there is a Maus Part 2, I think this will be on my list this year as I want to know how the story ends. (Here is the link for the complete set).

All in All a great book.

Happy April Fools and Happy Reading...

Off to explore some JK Rowling...