"Everything Happens As It Does" by Albena Stambolova *****

• Open Letter Series
• Bulgarian author
• Originally published in 2013
• p.11...."Movement and silence hand in hand.,  Intimations of other silences, of other movements, of someone walking next to someone, hovered around them.,  Each bend in the path made him anticipate the next.  It was anticipation too brief to invite fear, under the dome of the indefinite woods, dimensionless like a house never visited." ...I have felt this but could never articulate it!
• p.17..."Between the act of pressing the washing machine button and the mood of the person pressing it there was an entire universe of folly that people called their lives."...incredibly poignant!
• p.30...He disappeared from their life together, from the life of his baby, and from his own life, which had only just begun to acquire a life-like shape.  Or to be more precise, he tried to disappear, going back to the house he had always inhabited--the house of his mother."  crawling back to the womb
• p.42...."Until then she had only felt herself from within, she had learned a thing or two, but somehow one-sidedly, as if under an umbrella hiding half the world from sight,.".......lovely
• p.50..."There was no contact between her and the overall system that made the cafe function, as if they were meeting on a cloud, beyond time and space."
• p.55..."My bed is my ship, she often said to herself, my territory , my planet.  The planet of the Little Prince.  With his sheep."...interesting reference
• p.81...."Philip turned these questions over and over in his mind like coffee beans in a grinder.  At first they would spill with a deafening sound, then they would patter around, lullingly, until ground to a fine powder that covered everything inside.  Then the machine would stop turning.  Until the next time."
• p.83..."She was sitting, pensively sipping her glass of champagne, knowing that this thing here, this evening, this night...was all well, the way it was.  There was no fear, there was no reason to be doing anything different from what was being done.  What exactly was being done, Margarita did not know, and she did not care to find out."
• p.88...."As a matter of principle Maria did not permit herself such thoughts.  No analyses of any kind.  A snapshot was sufficient for her.  Analysis made one weak.  It interfered with one's goals.  People who believed they achieved anything by analyzing the situation deluded themselves.  They never achieved what they wanted, instead achieving something else.".....fatalism...theme of the book
• p.91..."The world accepts you if you don't try to think about it."
• p.99..."There was no anxiety, no worry about anything; there was only this, her, where everything happened as it did.".....TITLE
• p.101..."He decided to place his trust in a part of himself that was not his head and that--unlike his head--had never betrayed him."...spirit, soul, instinct?
• Review:   Lovely, lovely writing.  This author is Bulgarian, and the novel was translated into English.  So I hope the Bulgarian is as beautiful as the translation!  I was engaged by the protagonist from the first page, and completely intrigued by his psyche and his way of moving through the world, along with all the other characters.  The theme of this novel is fatalism, trusting in something other than the analytical mind that everything will happen as it does.  Fabulous!

"The Ballad of Barnabas Pierkiel" by Magdalena Zyzak *****

• A LibraryThing Early Reviewer selection
• Polish author
• Scheduled for publication in 2014
• Setting:  Fictitious country, Scalvusia, in 1939 
• Vocabulary:
• borborygmus:  intestinal rumbling
• ensorcell:  to bewitch
• bescumber:  to discharge ordure or dung upon
• gnathic: of or pertaining to the jaw
• p.2..."...I expreienced a sadness not unlike when one remembers one once had a childhood."
• Barnabas...the "unwitting lynchpin" in the story
• p.120..."Men don't betray each other after they have searched bushes together.  It's a matter of honor."
• p.209..."His life had become romantic at last.  His imagination had collapsed onto his boredom like a one-ton unicorn onto a pygmy pig."
• Review:  This is an Eary Reviewer edition I got from LibraryThing.com. It is the author's debut novel and I am stunned that this is a first.  This satire/allegory/theater of the absurd story is reminiscent of "Waiting For Godot".  I laughed, chuckled and almost wept over the plight of this cast of characters and their slapstick absurdity.  At the same time, it is a tragic tale of ignorance and blind acceptance of fear based rhetoric.  The kind of twisted logic that cost six million people their lives during WWII and continues to cost lives in the present day around the world.  The readers can choose to appreciate this brilliant novel as a funny tale of fools, or can leave themselves vulnerable to a profound tale of the absudity and tragedy of the creatures we call humans!

"The Cuckoo's Calling" by Robert Galbraith/J.K. Rowling ***

• Audiobook
• English author
• Originally published in 2013
• Review:   I enjoyed this book.  I liked the two main characters and thought the plot was interesting.  The only problem was that, in my opinion, some of the sleuthing process dragged on.  Fortunately I was engaged enough to want to find out "whodunnit".

"The Thin Man" by Dashiell Hammett. **

• Audiobook
• US author
• Originally published in 1934
• Review:  So-so....liked the movie better!

"The Shadow of the Crescent Moon" by Fatima Bhutto. ****

• Audiobook
• Afghani author
• Originally published in 2013
• Review:  A moving story of life in Pakistan, and the toll endless conflict takes on families, friends, and lovers.  When will it end?

2014 Blog.......

http://my2014readingjournal.blogspot.com/

"The Wizard of Oz" by L. Frank Baum *****

• Audiobook, narrated by Anne Hathaway
• US author
• Originally published 1900
• Review:  Nothing new to report