Registered for J4Shaw's Expat RABCK. The cover is different than the pictured one.

CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:

I'm mailing this out today as part of J4Shaw's Expat RABCK! Hope it reaches its destination safely!

(I meant to journal this before releasing it, but forgot. When I tried to do it after, the site thought I had 'caught' the book so I cancelled it, am adding it to this note:) I've never read this author--though I know her by reputation of course, certainly one of Canada's most famous authors. One of the reason I chose this book is that when I found it in the used bookstore I frequent, I just felt like I had to keep reading it, which I did, finishing it before I mailed it off. I didn't enjoy every story, but overall I found her a wonderful author--such a cool combination of wit and something right to say!

Travel far, little book! Travel well.

What a wonderful surprise, Lils74, that you were the one chosen to send me books in J4Shaw's Expat RABCK! Either it is superb Bookcrossing serendipity, or you may have helped it along a bit by asking to send to me (as I considered doing myself, but didn't get round to). Either way, I just love the amazing connections we make around the world with Bookcrossing.

And in case you don't know why I'm so enthusiastic, and to explain the back story to future journallers of this book, take a look at the journals for 'Hello Bunny Alice', which passed through both our hands, which means the book was read by an English woman in the Netherlands, travelled by itself to Nepal, where it was found in a secondhand bookstore by a Canadian, who set up an RABCK to celebrate the find, and the winner was a Dutchwoman living in Canada! The book has now been released in the wild in Toronto, and we're waiting to hear back from it. As a sidenote to the story, ckochlourens is coming to visit family in the Netherlands later this year, so I may get to meet her and her mother Motherof11, which would be wonderful. I have also just, coincidentally this morning, finished another Canadian book, which I took last year from Loveamystery's Two Worlds Virtual Bookbox, 'Silences of the Heart' by Elizabeth Latham, which is about a family pioneering on Vancouver Island in the early years of the 20th century.

Thank you so much, Lils74, for picking out a Margaret Atwood book for me to read. I've recently finished 'Alias Grace' and read 'The Blind Assassin' last year, and I thoroughly enjoyed both, so I'm looking forward to reading 'Good Bones'. I have read articles about Margaret Atwood which say that her style and subject matter can be very different from one book to another, so I'm interested to see what range she has in a book of short stories. I'm thrilled!

I really enjoyed these short stories. Some more than others, of course. I particularly enjoyed the one telling the story of the Little Red Hen from her point of view, which is a somewhat resigned feminist view. The one about the bat also amused me and talked about a bat getting tangled in somebody's hair and started with a passage about whether being reincarnated as an animal was a step up or step down. I finished the book on the train on the way to the Dutch version of a BookCrossing Unconvention on the beach at Castricum. So it was rather bizarre that the book I was reading on the train on the way home also had a story about a bat getting caught in someone's hair. This bat wanted to become a man because 'When men die they go to Heaven, but when bats are dead they are dead,' said Flitter. 'I want to go to Heaven when I die.' This is from one of the fables in James Thurber's 'Further Fables for Our Time'. Is this just coincidence or was Margaret Atwood inspired by Thurber's tale? I'd love to ask her. I wonder if she'd answer a question on Twitter.

I book-pushed this book onto somebody at the meeting in Castricum. I think it was Boekentrol but I may be mistaken. Up to that point I had been using it as a fan to wave some cool air in my direction as it was rather warm indoors.

This book has been released as part of the following BookCrossing challenges:
- The Ultimate Challenge - read and release books, with extra points for a monthly theme
- Reduce Mount TBR (To Be Read) - read and release books on the TBR list since before the end of 2013. My reading goal is 36 books.
- Pages Read Challenge - read a self-set target number of pages in 2013. My goal is 15,000.

You're not mistaken, bookguide, it was me you strongly recommended this book to. After I accepted the offer, you had to find yourself a new fan...

Margaret Atwood and I seem to cross paths quite regularly this year. This is the 5th book by her that I read, will read, or was recommended to read.

I look forward to read it and will get back to you once I'm done!

Mixed feelings about this book. Some of the stories I liked, some I disliked.
Favorite ones:
Gertrude Talks Back :-)
There Was Once
Let Us Now Praise the Stupid Women
The Female Body
Dance of the Lepers
Good Bones

I've put them in order of appearance in the book, which is not necessarily the order of most liked -> least liked of the favorites.

Witty, sarcastic, with (dark) humor, I liked them! The stories I disliked were for the most part stories I did not understand (the fun, pun, purpose of). Of course that's too bad, but completely on me.

This book will now travel on to the person who requested its first sentence from the VBB. I hope you like it.
Safe travels, little book!

Received via the First Sentences VBB. Looking forward to it as I love many of Atwood's novels but haven't yet read her short stories. This book is getting around :)