dieferrell

By day an educator, by night a reader. Bildungsromans, magical realism, and anything written pretty.

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Men in the Sun and Other Palestinian Stories

Ghassan Kanafani

This collection of important stories by novelist, journalist, teacher, and Palestinian activist Ghassan Kanafani includes the stunning novella Men in the Sun (1962), the basis of the movie The Dupes (1972, directed by Tewfik Saleh). Also in the volume are "The Land of Sad Oranges" (1958), "'If You Were a Horse...'" (1961), "A Hand in the Grave" (1962), "The Falcon" (1961), "Letter from Gaza" (1956), and an excerpt from Umm Saad (1969). In the unsparing clarity of his writing, Kanafani offers the reader a gritty look at the agonized world of Palestine and the adjoining Middle East. Born in Acre (northern Palestine) in 1936, Ghassan Kanafani was a major spokesman for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and founding editor of its weekly magazine Al-Hadaf. His novels, short stories, and plays have been published in sixteen languages. He was assassinated in a car-bomb explosion in Beirut in 1972.

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When We Lost Our Heads

Heather O'Neill

30%

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harrowings of hell

by ruiconteur

23 books

katabasis (n.) “descent”; often referring to a descent into the underworld, or the realm of the dead.

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11h

lizhmil

Thoughts from May 16 (DD)

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dieferrell commented on donotdisturb's review of Hunger Inc.: Building Solidarity Beyond the Food Bank

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donotdisturb

May 12, 2026

Enjoyment: Quality: Characters: Plot:

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Dracula

Bram Stoker

10%

dieferrell made progress on...

Dracula

Bram Stoker

dieferrell TBR'd a book

Convenience Store Woman

Sayaka Murata

The English-language debut of one of Japan's most talented contemporary writers, selling over 650,000 copies there, Convenience Store Woman is the heartwarming and surprising story of thirty-six-year-old Tokyo resident Keiko Furukura. Keiko has never fit in, neither in her family, nor in school, but when at the age of eighteen she begins working at the Hiiromachi branch of “Smile Mart,” she finds peace and purpose in her life. In the store, unlike anywhere else, she understands the rules of social interaction―many are laid out line by line in the store’s manual―and she does her best to copy the dress, mannerisms, and speech of her colleagues, playing the part of a “normal” person excellently, more or less. Keiko is very happy, but the people close to her, from her family to her coworkers, increasingly pressure her to find a husband, and to start a proper career, prompting her to take desperate action… A brilliant depiction of a world hidden from view, Convenience Store Woman is an ironic and sharp-eyed look at contemporary work culture and the pressures we all feel to conform, as well as a charming and completely fresh portrait of an unforgettable heroine.

dieferrell TBR'd a book

Di Kaki Bukit Cibalak

Ahmad Tohari

Perubahan yang mendasar mulai merambah desa Tanggir pada tahun 1970-an. Suara orang menumbuk padi hilang, digantikan suara mesin kilang padi. Kerbau dan sapi pun dijual karena tenaganya sudah digantikan traktor. Sementara, di desa yang sedang berubah itu muncul kemelut akibat pemilihan kepala desa yang tidak jujur. Pambudi, pemuda Tanggir yang bermaksud menyelamatkan desanya dari kecurangan kepala desa yang baru malah tersingkir ke Yogya. Di kota pelajar itu Pambudi bertemu teman lama yang memintanya meneruskan belajar sambil bekerja di sebuah toko. Melalui persuratkabaran, Pambudi melanjutkan perlawanannya terhadap kepala desa Tanggir yang curang, dan berhasil. Tetapi pemuda Tanggir itu kehilangan gadis sedesa yang dicintainya. Dan Pambudi mendapat ganti, anak pemilik toko tempatnya bekerja, meski harus mengalami pergulatan batin yang meletihkan.

dieferrell TBR'd a book

To the Lighthouse

Virginia Woolf

The serene and maternal Mrs. Ramsay, the tragic yet absurd Mr. Ramsay, and their children and assorted guests are on holiday on the Isle of Skye. From the seemingly trivial postponement of a visit to a nearby lighthouse, Woolf constructs a remarkable, moving examination of the complex tensions and allegiances of family life and the conflict between men and women. As time winds its way through their lives, the Ramsays face, alone and simultaneously, the greatest of human challenges and its greatest triumph—the human capacity for change.

dieferrell TBR'd a book

Tales of Space and Time

H.G. Wells

“...how small the vastest of human catastrophes may seem, at a distance of a few million miles.”

dieferrell TBR'd a book

The Woman in White

Wilkie Collins

Librarian note: Alternate covers can be found here and here. 'In one moment, every drop of blood in my body was brought to a stop... There, as if it had that moment sprung out of the earth, stood the figure of a solitary Woman, dressed from head to foot in white' The Woman in White famously opens with Walter Hartright's eerie encounter on a moonlit London road. Engaged as a drawing master to the beautiful Laura Fairlie, Walter becomes embroiled in the sinister intrigues of Sir Percival Glyde and his 'charming' friend Count Fosco, who has a taste for white mice, vanilla bonbons, and poison. Pursuing questions of identity and insanity along the paths and corridors of English country houses and the madhouse, The Woman in White is the first and most influential of the Victorian genre that combined Gothic horror with psychological realism. Matthew Sweet's introduction explores the phenomenon of Victorian 'sensation' fiction, and discusses Wilkie Collins's biographical and societal influences. Included in this edition are appendices on theatrical adaptations of the novel and its serialisation history.

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ChaoticSpice finished a book

Yesteryear

Caro Claire Burke

A traditional American woman, a beautiful wife and mother who sells her pioneer lifestyle of raw milk and farm-fresh eggs to her millions of social media followers, suddenly awakens cold, filthy, and terrified in the brutal reality of 1805—where she must unravel whether this living nightmare is an elaborate hoax, a twisted reality show, or something far more sinister in this sensational debut novel. My name was Natalie Heller Mills, and I was perfect at being alive. Natalie lives a traditional lifestyle. Her charming farmhouse is rustic, her husband a handsome cowboy, her six children each more delightful than the last. So what if there are nannies and producers behind the scenes, her kitchen hiding industrial-grade fridges and ovens, her husband the Republican equivalent of a Kennedy? What Natalie’s followers—all 8 million of them—don’t know won’t hurt them. And The Angry Women? The privileged, Ivy League, coastal elite haters who call her an antifeminist iconoclast? They’re sick with jealousy. Because Natalie isn’t simply living the good life, she’s living the ideal—and just so happens to be building an empire from it. Until one morning she wakes up in a life that isn’t hers. Her home, her husband, her children—they’re all familiar, but something’s off. Her kitchen is warmed by a sputtering fire rather than electricity, her children are dirty and strange, and her soft-handed husband is suddenly a competent farmer. Just yesterday Natalie was curating photos of homemade jam for her Instagram, and now she’s expected to haul firewood and handwash clothes until her fingers bleed. Has she become the unwitting star of a brutal reality show? Could it really be time travel? Is she being tested by God? By Satan? When Natalie suffers a brutal injury in the woods, she realizes two things: This is not her beautiful life, and she must escape by any means possible. A gripping, electrifying novel that is as darkly funny as it is frightening, Yesteryear is a gimlet-eyed look at tradition, fame, faith, and the grand performance of womanhood.

dieferrell wrote a review...

dieferrell

May 14, 2026

5.0

Enjoyment: 5.0Quality: 5.0Characters: 5.0Plot: 5.0

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Film critic Roger Ebert once said that movies are an empathy machine—a sentiment which many has repeated and extended to cover fiction as a whole (George Saunders and Richard Powers, among others).

A Man Called Ove is a good argument for this. The central trick here is in making you empathise with a really grumpy old man (by spending time with the guy and knowing him better). I'd describe the plot here as a love letter to other people and the idea of having a community in general. It's very sweet and very funny. Backman has a knack for creating a loveable cast of characters. For instance, thinking back on them now, on the conceptual level the hyper-imposeful Parvaneh exists as an obvious foil to contrast the reclusive Ove, but I didn't even think of this while reading the book because she just exists compellingly in this Swedish suburbia!

To an extent some of the book hasn't aged well itself (not in the "this has since become problematic" sense, more in the "oh wow this book conceives the concept of iPads and phones with cameras as new, which isn't true even for 2012"), but this adds charm to reading it today—it's almost a time capsule.

I took me a long time to finish the last few chapters because I basically didn't want it to end (the book had this cycle of Ove wanting to do something and getting interrupted because the community just won't leave him alone that is infinitely repeatable, I can see the premise being extended over like, 9 seasons of episodic television and really want that!).

Would definitely return to this whenever I need a comfort read, would definitely recommend.

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A Man Called Ove

Fredrik Backman

A grumpy yet loveable man finds his solitary world turned on its head when a boisterous young family moves in next door. Meet Ove. He's a curmudgeon, the kind of man who points at people he dislikes as if they were burglars caught outside his bedroom window. He has staunch principles, strict routines, and a short fuse. People call him the bitter neighbor from hell, but must Ove be bitter just because he doesn't walk around with a smile plastered to his face all the time?Behind the cranky exterior there is a story and a sadness. So when one November morning a chatty young couple with two chatty young daughters move in next door and accidentally flatten Ove's mailbox, it is the lead-in to a comical and heartwarming tale of unkempt cats, unexpected friendship, and the ancient art of backing up a U-Haul. All of which will change one cranky old man and a local residents' association to their very foundations.

dieferrell made progress on...

When We Lost Our Heads

Heather O'Neill

22%

dieferrell is interested in reading...