射雕英雄传 (The Legend of the Condor Heroes)

Source; Google Image

Name:   Lidong  Duan

Country:  China

 Language : Mandarin

Title: 射雕英雄传 (The Legend of the Condor Heroes)

Author:  JinYong (Louis Cha Leung-yung)

Published : 1957

Summary:

The story is set in the Song dynasty and at the beginning of the Jurchen-ruled Jin dynasty's invasion of northern China. The first part of the novel revolves around the friendship of two men, Yang Tiexin and Guo Xiaotian, who became heroes in their own right as they fought the Jin invaders. They pledge to each other that their unborn children will become either be sworn siblings (if both are of the same sexes) or a married couple (if they are of opposite sexes).

The story focuses on the trials and tribulations of their sons after Guo Xiaotian's death and Yang Tiexin's disappearance. Guo Xiaotian's son, Guo Jing, grows up in Mongolia under the care of Genghis Khan. Yang Tiexin's son, Yang Kang, on the other hand, grows up in Jin as a powerful Jurchen prince's son. Guo Jing is mentored by the "Seven Freaks of Jiangnan" in martial arts but he is a slow learner and only manages to master part of the skills he was taught. However, he improves his skills after receiving advice from Ma Yu of the Quanzhen Taoist Sect. Yang Kang is tutored by Qiu Chuji, who is also from Quanzhen Taoist Sect.

The boys' personalities differ largely from each other due to differences in their upbringing. Guo Jing is honest, loyal and righteous, but slow-witted. Conversely, Yang Kang is clever, but scheming and treacherous. They eventually meet one another and their respective lovers, Huang Rong and Mu Nianci. The main story line follows Guo Jing and Huang Rong's adventures and their encounters with the Five Great Persons. Meanwhile, Yang Kang plots with the Jurchens to conquer his native land of Song. Yang Kang refuses to acknowledge his ethnicity and is strongly driven to acquire wealth, fame and glory. His treachery is slowly unveiled throughout the novel in the encounters he has with the protagonists, although Huang Rong ultimately outwits and accidentally kills him.

Assisted by Guo Jing, the Mongol army destroys the Jin dynasty, subsequently turning its attention towards Song. Guo Jing is unwilling to aid the Mongols in conquering his native land and he leaves Mongolia. Guo Jing returns to Song and helps his compatriots counter the Mongol invaders. On the other hand, Yang Kang meets his retributive end, leaving behind Mu Nianci and their unborn son. The Mongol invasion is halted by Genghis Khan's unexpected death, although Guo Jing and Huang Rong see countless civilian deaths due to this military conquest.

Recommendation:

The Writer Louis Cha Leung-yung, born 6 February 1924, better known by his pen name Jin Yong, is a Chinese novelist and essayist based in Hong Kong. Having co-founded the Hong Kong daily Ming Pao in 1959, he was the newspaper's first editor-in-chief.

Cha's fiction, which is of the WUXIA ("martial arts and chivalry") genre, has a widespread following in Chinese-speaking areas, including Hong Kong, China, Taiwan, Southeast Asia, and the United States. This book is one of his 15 works written between 1955 and 1972 earned him a reputation as one of the finest WUXIA writers ever. He is currently the best-selling Chinese author alive; over 100 million copies of his works have been sold worldwide.

He has many fans abroad as well, owing to the numerous adaptations of his works into films, television series, manhua (comics) and video games

Tôi Thấy Hoa Vàng Trên Cỏ Xanh (I see the yellow flowers on the green grass)

Source: Google Image

Student: Tammy Nguyen

Country: Vietnam

Language: Vietnamese

Title: Tôi Thấy Hoa Vàng Trên Cỏ Xanh (I see the yellow flowers on the green grass)

Author: Nguyen Nhat Anh

Year of Publication: 2010 ( best seller )

Summary:

This diary is about an adolescence boy’s life in a small countryside. His name is Thieu.  At the time, he was in seventh grade, living in a poor town with his little brother Tuong.  He loves his brother very much. Thieu has nature of being gentle, generous and innocence.  He also likes to play with little animals such as small snakes and insects.

He has desire and love for reading fairy tale books, especially the tale about the Frog and the Prince. For this fascinating reason, he looks after a frog underneath his bed. In contrast, his older brothers are the opposite of him, sly, and selfish. Serval times his little brother has been burden with heavy responsibilities because of many disruptions caused by the older brothers.

Thieu’s diary talks about an open harmonious relationship between brothers and classmates during their  childhood time. Dan is the name of his uncle who usually talks about the ghost at night. The brothers get scared but also excited even when they hear the same ghost story so many times.

Behind two brothers’ house is a burial-ground on a huge land.  After school, all the kids, go to this place and play fun games like Tick-Tack-Toe,Tag and I-Spy . They also collect leaves and flowers, which they break up pretending it is part of noodle soup or they are chicken or beef to purchase and sell.  The kids are so poor that their parents cannot provide meat for them to eat on a regular basis. When they play, they imagine that it is the leaves and flowers are real meat in order to prevent the craving.

The burial-ground is between Thieu’s parents’ house and Man’s house. Every time his mom tells him to go there to buy an egg or fish sauce. When Tuong wasn’t home, he is the one who always help his mom do things in the house because Thien is very good in school so they let him concentrate on his studies.

One day, Thieu has to pass the cemetery to get to his house. Initially, he was very scared to pass this area because of an image of a ghost came to his mind. He ran very fast as possible to get home. However, his house somehow was destroyed from a fire. His mom was suspected in the destruction of her home. There were bonds discovered in the ashes. Eventually, the authorities arrested his mom.

Thien likes Man but he is shy so he is not able to talk to him very much. Tuong and Man usually play together because they enjoy the same hobby. Thien used to play with other children,  but now he feels that he is too big to play kids’ games. Whenever the kids laugh,  they are actually trying to make Thien jealous of his brother.

Another day, Thieu heard someone talking and hiding behind the wall. It was Tuong and Man talking to each other about eating a chicken. He thought that they hid the chicken so they don’t let him eat. Thieu is angry although still caring, but now he is hurting. Now all the bad feelings is under his lip, and now he feels like he cannot breathe. As Thieu trembles, he goes and sees his brother and grabs the switch which his father uses to punish them. The poor little brother receives repeated beating on his skinny bear back by Thien until he collapsed on the floor. Then he looked on the table, surprisingly, there is not a single piece of chicken but rather just leaves. He was shocked and felt sorry for beating up his little brother for unjustified reason. However, Tuong has a big heart, so he forgave his big brother.  He always wanted to protect his big brother, especially from bullies. His love for his brother is huge and wide as the sea. After that incident happened, he told his brother and Man that if anybody ask about what happened, just tell them I fell down from a tree. However, they know that their father is going to beat Thieu with his switch or may even kill him. Thien felt regret about about this incident and about his obsession he felt for Man. He carries this burden to this day.

Recommendation:

Nguyen Nhat Anh wrote this book is about a diary of a young adolescence boy. This book is a best seller in Vietnam. You will really enjoy the vivid details of the country side life where children play simple imaginary games and fight over small things. You will get to read about exciting things like fairy tales and ghosts. In this diary, the children pretend that they are eating meat like chicken or beef when they know they will seldom have this luxury in life. There are a lot of emotions felt while reading this book, such as love, kindness, anger, sadness and forgiveness. 

风中的亲生 Feng Zhong De Qin Sheng (Harmonic Consortium)

Image from hard copy

Student: Zhao DiXiang

Country: China

Language: Chinese

Title: 风中的琴声 Feng Zhong De Qin Sheng (Harmonic Consortium)

Author: Fu Mi Jiang

Year of publication: December 2004

Summary:

It is a love novel talks about four young people in high school. The author and Lei Wang, Luo Zi, Wen Jing and Pen ZI De; they were all friends in high school. They did silly things more than you can count, and shared memories more beautifully than all the colors of a rainbow together. Lei Wang is the author’s friend, the author always feels Lei Wang is a strange person. However, the author also feels Lei Wang’s strangeness makes him cool and enjoyable. Lei Wang is the leader of sports in his class. Unlike Lei Wang, the author is the leader of music in his class. Luo Zi (a girl) is their classmate. Lei Wang liked her since they first met in the first year of high school. But she tells Lei Wang clearly, she wants her boyfriend to be a music student. After that, Lei Wang start to study music just for Luo Zi, the girl he loves. First, he studied Harmonica and wrote a song called “Belong Our Song.” From high school to college, his harmonica tunes were always with them as they grew up, and influenced their attitudes about life, love and friendship.

One day Luo Zi finally gave Lei Wang a response. For about a decade Lei Wang played his melodies for Luo Zi. Seeing Lei Wang loving play his melodies of youthful love for Luo Zi which made all of the friends feel amazing. Lei Wang’s gentle harmonica sound was like telling a love melody floating in the breeze to the end.

Recommendation:

This is a romantic novel that I found from the library. The title of the book was very attractive, so I decided the read it.

Feng Zhong De Qing Sheng is Fu Mi Jiang’s first work. It is a big step of his fine works, pure expression of the young lives as well as the interdependence of love, joy and the charm of a youth.

The content of whole book generally is about four high school students, their lives from high school to university. These students are very good friends to each other. The author’s expresses that young people are have a complexity of mood and emotion of setbacks. I think the author’s narrative left me very moved. It also taught me a good lesson, and most romantic novels usually have good end results. However, this one is not. It reflects some meeting and some interaction between men and women along some ambiguity, trust and honest. The novel illustrates the story wonderfully so you will never forget it.

Nunca Estuve Sola (I Was Never Alone)

                      

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Student: Juan Portillo

Country: El Salvador

Language: Spanish

Title: Nunca Estuve Sola (I Was Never Alone)

Author: Martha Valladares (Nidia Diaz)

Year of publication: 1988

Summary:

Never was alone this book is a testimonial of Nidia Diaz. She was a daughter of the president and was a commander of guerrilla during the civil war in El Salvador from 1979 to 1992. Diaz made a narrative of six months while she was in detention at the base of National Police in El Salvador. She was captured by the soldiers in a helicopter from the air force. They took her to their camp by sudden surprise. Nidia was seriously injured as she was captured, interrogated and tortured for 16 days without any rest at the base of the National Police. The interrogators wanted to know information from her about the dome of the guerrilla. However, she didn’t give them any information.

Nidia was liberated after the guerrilla kidnapped Ines Guadalupe Duarte. This was an exchange for Nidia Diaz and other political prisoners. She made history during the initial protest by a group of people against the government, and when the rich people made a series of injustice acts against the poor population.

Recommendation:

The writer, Nidia Diaz, started with her ideological concept when she was a student at the National University of El Salvador. Later, she was a leader of students after that she was a commander of the guerrilla. Afterwards, Diaz was a member of the Negotiations the Peace Agreement signed in 1992. Now, Diaz is a member of the Legislature of El Salvador. If you want to know how women in El Salvador were active in the armed conflict and how they fought for their rights, then I encourage you to read this book. This book represents Nidia Diaz’s sacrifice for the freedom of her nation, the tortures, and the unpunished massacres.

Cánh Đồng Bất Tận (The Endless Field)

Image from hard copy

Student: Thu Phung

Country: Vietnam

Language: Vietnamese

Title: Cánh Đồng Bất Tận (The Endless Field) 

Author: Nguyễn Ngọc Tư

Year of Publication: April 8, 2006 

Summary:

The title of this book is named after the vast rice field in the Mekong Delta of South of Vietnam. A poor family led hundred of ducks looking for spillage rice seeds remained in the vast field after the harvest. The family has three members: an angry father, a miserable teen daughter and a son who is going through puberty.

Because of the poverty, the wife abandoned her husband with two children to follow a pass-by trader.  The two children kept waiting for their mom while the father changed his style of life.  He worked very hard, and took revenge on women with a lot of hatred. 

The family lived on a small wooden boat, drifted along the river with their herd of ducks.  They only set foot ashore to buy groceries.  The father was poor but good-looking.  When their boat stopped at one place, women were attracted by his cool manly appearance.  He did not promise make promises but he lured women into a new adventures with him. 

One time, the wife sold her house and cattle, and was ready to leave everything behind. However, the father just quietly left with his two children on a small boat with no goal for them.  The wife had no way to return to her own home. She became just like his ex-wife.

The daughter and the boy understood the hatred of their father, but they were too young to stop him.  They have sympathy to those women who treated them better than their own father.  Every day the children wandered on the field with the ducks. They were growing up naively and lonely.  They needed love but their father had no love for them.  He was cold toward the daughter because she looked a lot like her mom. 

One day, the father mistreated a woman that his son was fond of.  When she cried and ran away, the son followed her and never returned to his father’s boat. The son matured in becoming a man after reaching puberty.  However, the daughter remained in deep sorrow because she was desperately lonely.  She loved her father but he never paid attention to her.  The rice field became dry because of drought, poor people became poorer.  Some thugs stole their ducks but the father fought against them, and chased them away.  Angrily, they came back, this time they took revenge on the daughter.  While one was raping her, the others forced the father to look at the scene.  When the daughter saw the tears on her father’s eyes, in the pain of her body, she knew she would forgive all his wrong doing because he has love for her. 

Recommendation:

This sad story can happen anywhere in the world, where children are miserable because of the wrong doing from their parents.  The author, Nguyễn Ngọc Tư is a young woman. She lives in a very remote country where she is close to nature such as:  the river, the boat, the field, the rice plants, the ducks, and all other features of the countryside where people reside.  It is not the content of the story, but the writing that describes the life in the country that is so truthful, which made this book become a best-seller in Vietnamese literature.  Also, a movie was made based on this book, and it received an award for the best new actress (the daughter), the images and the director.

No es cuestión de leche. Es cuestión de actitud (It is not a matter of luck. It is a matter of attitude)

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Student: Fray Mendoza 

Country: Venezuela 

Language: Spanish 

Title: No es cuestión de leche. Es cuestión de actitud (It is not a matter of luck. It is a matter of attitude) 

Author: Carlos Saul Rodriguez

Year of Publication: December 2012

Summary:

This book is related to the life of Carlos Saul Gonzales. He was born in Tachira, one of twenty four states of Venezuela. He lived in a town called Tariba. He talked about his mother in the book. Carlos decided to move to Caracas, which is a Venezuelan main city. He wanted to move there to have a better quality of life. At that time, Carlos felt very nervous because the negative things he heard from what people said about Caracas. His mother always said to him move forward in life, and that he can do everything he wants, and the most important thing is not about luck but getting a good job. Since then, he started studying a lot until achieved his Ph.D. degree. At the end of the book, he said that he has been helping as a Physician Coach for a Venezuelan soccer team. Finally, Carlos has become an inspiration to many people who now feel that certain important goals in life are not impossible to achieve. He is an example to others, especially when you have a dream; you just need to work hard in getting it.  

Recommendation:

I recommend this book because this book teaches others not to give up in any circumstances of life, and to always think positively. Also, this book mentions that if you want to achieve something, you need to be patient and work hard every day until you get it. Majority of people buy this book because reading this book helps people in becoming a better person, and it can help solve problems in their jobs, schools as well as in their personal and professional relationships.

Cho em gần anh thêm chút nữa (Let me be closer to you)

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Student: Khai Luong  

                        

Country: Vietnam

Language: Vietnamese

Title:  Cho em gần anh thêm chút nữa (Let me be closer to you)

Author: Gào 

Year of publication: 2008

Summary:

This short story is about the three people with many colors in their lives. One of the persons' name is Rin. He is the student of a medical university. He is very smart, very gentle and thoughtful. However, he is very poor. Rin becomes a professional photographer. This profession makes him drop out of school in order to learn the skills of a photographer. 

When Rin was a student at the university, he fell in love with the girl name Nguyen. She is a very beautiful girl, but she is very spoiled. Nguyen doesn't like Rin because he is a poor guy. However, before meeting Rin, Nguyen meets a guy name Duc, who is very handsome. Duc has a lot of money and he is able to buy expensive things for Nguyen. Nguyen loves Duc very much. 

One day, Nguyen discovers that Duc has betrayed her. When Duc was not with her, he hung out with many other girls. Later he married someone, and had a  family with three children. When Nguyen found out about Duc's family, she became extremely upset and wanted to kill herself. Therefore, Nguyen  thought that she will never believe in love again. 

After being heartbroken, Nguyen meets Rin when she was on the bus. Both of them talk about many things. Nguyen begins to feel that Rin is an interesting person. Slowly she begins to fall in love with Rin. 

After a month, Nguyen finds out that she is  going to have a baby boy. She knows that this baby belongs to Duc, so she gets very upset.  After giving birth, Nguyen  hides the baby boy from Rin. She feels that he won't be accepting of her baby otherwise she may lose his love forever. 

One day, Rin finds out the whole story about the baby boy. Although the baby is not his, Rin feels that he will always love Nguyen, and wants to marry her. Later, they get married. Nguyen is very happy now with Rin, and she recognizes that he is the true love for her. 

Recommendation:
Gào is a famous writer in Vietnam. She is only 28 years old and has written many books about love and the schools for the young people or teenagers. Gào talks about many things about young lives. Her books help many people understand about young love, and they are able to get the exact view about people in their practical lives. Many people read her books and feel the true good and bad things about the characters that play the roles in her stories. I think that in the future, Gào will become one of the most famous writers in Vietnam.

Sangre en el Diván (Blood in the Divan)

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Student: Valentina Guerrero

Country: Venezuela

Language: Spanish

Title: Sangre en el Diván (Blood in the Divan)

Author:  Ibeyise Pacheco

Year of publication: 2010

Summary:

The non-fictional novel titled Sangre en el Diván is written by Ibéyise Pacheco. The novel is based on the life of Dr. Edmundo Chirinos. He was a psychiatrist and politician  in Venezuela. He was the principal of the University Central of Venezuela. Dr. Chirinos created the Department of Psychology at that university. He was involved in several acts of rape. 

Dr. Chirinos used to sedate his patients in order to take advantage of them. He also took several naked photos for his female patients. In this novel, one of the most historical events occurred in Caracas, Venezuela in July of 2008.  Dr. Chirinos killed one if his patients, and her name was Roxana Vargas. Roxana was a student at the University Catholic of Santa Rosa and she was only 19 years old. The doctor had committed a serious crime, and was sentenced for 20 years in prison.  However, he was accused two years after the crime, and he died 4 years after in the jail because of health problems.  Dr. Chirinos died at the age of 78 years old.

Recommendation:

The writer Ibéyise Pacheco is an important writer in Venezuela. She wrote 251 pages with six chapters telling the history of the Dr. Edmundo Chirinos. She spent many months trying to get all of the information and getting interviews with Dr. Chirinos. The novel is based on real facts. No one thought that a person who is a professional doctor could commit such horrifying rape crimes on his patients.