This is a dramatic novel by George Eliot (the pen name of Mary Ann Evans) which was first published in 1861.
It is about a linen-weaver alien to the lands of Raveloe, exiled by himself after being falsely accused of theft and killing a deacon by not being by his side on his deathbed. Unaccustomed to Raveloe's ways and culture, Silas Marner lived a life of isolation at the Stone-pits, weaving for 15 years and tending to his monotonous life until a major event changed his life forever. Having lost his pile of gold yet gained the golden-haired Eppie, slowly, Master Marner blended with the townfolks of Raveloe and his life could never be the same again.
At first, I find this novel boring to read at, not looking forward on to anything that would make me feel interested. I just wanted to try a classic novel this time, but unknown of the adventures that lie beyond the pages. I slowly dragged myself up until half of the book and there, it came to me...the beauty of this masterpiece which George Eliot conjured. The love of a child which changed the life of an old solitary man, talking about ethics, family, religion, etc. This is the first novel I've read of George Eliot, and I'd be looking forward to more of her works.
01/09/10 this is the loud voice of women! we are as equally capable as men in a lot of ways, probably not all, but in a lot of ways...even better, so don't shut us down nor deem us lesser.
-honey-
Amira, a girl from a wealthy and powerful family, expects to be sold into marriage and to never step outsider her house without being swathed in black veils. But she's not prepared for the savagery of the husband she first meets on her wedding night. In a daring attempt to save her own life, she escapes with her baby to start a new life in the United States. But her past--and her powerful husband--won't give her up so easily...
01/05/10 love cats? like mystery novels? this would be best for you.
-honey-
With the approaching Great Food Explo, there's lots of delicious activity in Moose County-restaurant openings, a cheese-tasting, and a bake-off are planned, among other events. But there's nothing as tasty as a morsel of gossip, so when a mysterious woman moves into the New Pickax Hotel, the locals indulge in lots of speculation. Even Qwill is distracted. And when a bomb explodes in her room, killing the hotel housekeeper, Qwilleran, Koko, and Yum Yum have to put aside the treats and figure out who cooked up this murderous recipe...
Meet prizewinning reporter--Jim Qwilleran and his extraordinary Siamese cats Koko and Yum Yum-the most unlikely, most unusual, most delightful team in detective fiction!
01/04/10 a real page-turner! you can't wait to know what will happen next! i love this novel!
-honey-
IN THE HEART OF THEE COLD WAR, THEY SENT HIM TO PLOT THE ULTIMATE ASSASSINATION. NOW, THEY WANT HIM DEAD...
It is 1953. Joseph Stalin, the world's most tyrannical dictator, is teetering on the edge of insanity, and about to plunge the world into nuclear chaos. Only one man and one woman can penetrate the Iron Curtain and stop this madman, before it's too late.
But someone inside the Kremlin knows. And as the KGB's deadliest manhunter pursues these two CIA-hired assassins, another duel unfolds, between secret warriors of the West and East, with a U.S. agent caught in between. Now that agent must do the unthinkable: find his way to the heart of the Soviet Union and stop the mission he himself set in motion -- -before it ignites World War III.
01/01/10 if you're interested to read about ranching and cowboys, here's one for you. and yes, Janet Dailey speaks about values and the love of land here.
-honey-
A RICH AND SWEEPING STORY OF DECEIT AND DEVOTION
Janet Dailey's mastery of grand romance, divided loyalties, and searing passion has made her one of the bestselling authors of all time. In Notorious, her finest and most exciting contemporary romance, Dailey returns to the wild ranch country of northern Nevada, where a determined woman fights to protect her family's land.
Eden Rossiter is the owner of Spur Ranch, located thirty miles north of the small town of Friendly, Nevada. Strong, cautious, and beautiful, she struggles in a world where a spirited woman is not generally welcome. Notorious for having eluded a first-degree murder charge years before, Eden is also widely admired for defying Duke Depard, the ruthless owner of the neighboring Diamond D Ranch, who is resolved to drive her out of business.
Eden stands up to Depard on her own--until a stranger drifts into Friendly. Soft-spoken and ruggedly handsome, Kincade takes up Eden's cause and becomes her ally against Depard. Although Eden has never trusted a man, together she and Kincade struggle through dangers and adversities, forming a unique bond, one that is strong and true. Gradually, Eden's reserve begins to give way to something unexpected, something she has been waiting for without even knowing it.
This book helped me understand a lot of things. It witnessed the most devastating events of my life, it was there when i smiled and it scooped my tears when i cried.
I noted on the important lessons it taught me:
Everyone seems to have a clear idea of how other people should lead their lives, but none about his or her own.
If you start out by promising what you don't even have yet, you'll lose your desire to work toward getting it.
When each day is the same as the next, it's because people fail to recognize the good things that happen in their lives every day that the sun rises.
Making a decision was only the beginning of things. When someone makes a decision, he is really diving into a strong current that will carry him to places he had never dreamed of when he first made the decision.
The closer one gets to realizing his destiny, the more that destiny becomes his true reason for being.
No matter how many detours and adjustments it made, the caravan moved toward the same compass point. Once obstacles were overcome, it returned to its course, sighting on a star that indicated the location of the oasis.
People need not fear the unknown if they are capable of achieving what they need and want.
We are afraid of losing what we have, whether it's our life or our possessions and property. But this fear evaporates when we understand that our life stories and the history of the world were written by the same hand.
Once you get into the desert, there's no going back. And, when you can't go back, you have to worry only about the best way of moving forward. The rest is up to Allah, including the danger.
You must understand that love never keeps a man from pursuing his destiny. If he abandons that pursuit, it's because it wasn't true love...the love that speaks of the Language of the World.
One is loved because one is loved. No reason is needed for loving.
If what one finds is made of pure matter, it will never spoil. And one can always come back. If what you had found was only a moment of light, like the explosion of a star, you would find nothing on you return.
The wise men understood that this natural world is only an image and a copy of paradise. The existence of this world is simply a guarantee that there exists a world that is perfect. God created the world so that, through its visible objects, men could understand his spiritual teachings and the marvels of his wisdom.
Listen to your heart. It knows all things, because it came form the Soul of the World, and it will one day return there.
Wherever your heart is, that is where you'll find your treasure.
You will never again be able to keep it quiet. Even if you pretend not to have heard what it tells you, it will always be there inside you, repeating to you what you're thinking about life and about the world.
You will never be able to escape from your heart. So it's better to listen to what it has to say. That way, you'll never have to fear an unanticipated blow.
"Even though I complain sometimes," it said, "it's because I'm the heart of a person, and people's hearts are that way. People are afraid to pursue their most important dreams, because they feel that they don't deserve them, or that they'll be unable to achieve them. We, their hearts, become fearful just thinking of loved ones who go away forever, or of moments that could have been good but weren't, or of treasures that might have been found but were forever hidden in the sands. Because, when these things happen, we suffer terribly."
Every second of the search is an encounter with God. When I have been truly searching for my treasure, every day has been luminous, because I've known that every hour was a part of the dream that I would find it. When I have been truly searching for my treasure, I've discovered things along the way that I never would have seen had I not had the courage to try things that seemed impossible for a shepherd to achieve.
"Everyone on earth has a treasure that awaits him," his heart said. "We, people's hearts, seldom say much about those treasures, because people no longer want to go in search of them. We speak of them only to children. Later, we simply let life proceed, in its own direction, toward its own fate. But, unfortunately, very few follow the path laid out for them - the path to their destinies, and to happiness. Most people see the world as a threatening place, and because they do, the world turns out, indeed, to be a threatening place."
From then on, the boy understood his heart. He asked it, please, never to stop speaking to him. He asked that, when he wandered far from his dreams, his heart press him and sound the alarm. The boy swore that, every time he heard the alarm, he would heed its message.
Before a dream is realized, the Soul of the World tests everything that was learned along the way. It does this not because it is evil, but so that we can, in addition to realizing our dreams, master the lessons we've learned as we've moved toward that dream. That's the point at which most people give up. It's the point at which, as we say in the language of the desert, one dies of thirst just when the palm trees have appeared on the horizon.
Every search begins with a beginner's luck. And every search ends with the victor's being severely tested.
When you possess great treasures within you, and try to tell others of them, seldom are you believed.
Your eyes show the strength of your soul.
If a person is living out his destiny, he knows everything he needs to know. There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.
Then you'll die in the midst of trying to realize your destiny. That's a lot better than dying like millions of other people, who never even knew what their destinies were.
Usually, the threat of death makes people a lot more aware of their lives.
"You could have died later on," a soldier said to the body of one of his companions. "You could have died after peace had been declared. But, in any case, you were going to die."
When you are loved, you can do anything in creation. When you are loved, there's no need at all to understand what's happening, because everything happens within you, and even men can turn themselves into the wind. As long as the wind helps, of course.
Because it's not love to be static like the desert, nor is it love to roam the world like the wind. And it's not lvoe to see everything from a distance, like you do. Love is the force that transforms and improves the Soul of the World. When I first reached through to it, I though the Soul of the World was perfect. But later, I could see that it was like other aspects of creation, and had its owns passions and wars. It is we who nourish the Soul of the World, and the world we live in will be either better or worse, depending on whether we become better or worse. And that's where the power of love comes in. Because when we love, we always strive to become better than we are.
Everything that happens once can never happen again. But everything that happens twice will surely happen a third time.
No matter what he does, every person on earth plays a central role in the history of the world. And normally he doesn't know it.
As he was about to climb yet another dune, his heart whispered, "Be aware of the place where you are brought to tears. That's where I am, and that's where your treasure is."
Coelho, Paulo. The Alchemist. Published 1992. Translated by Alan R. Clarke. ISBN 0-7225-3292-8.
That there are no random acts. That we are all connected. That you can no more separate one life from another than you can separate a breeze from a wind.
-blue man-
Strangers are just family you have yet to come to know.
No life is a waste. The only time we waste is the time we spend thinking we are alone.
The 2nd Lesson:
Sacrifice is a part of life. It's supposed to be. It's not something to regret. It's something to aspire to. Little sacrifices. Big sacrifices.
-the captain-
Sometimes when you sacrifice something precious, you're not really losing it. You're just passing it on to someone else.
The 3rd Lesson:
Holding anger is a poison. It eats you from inside. We think that hating is a weapon that attacks the person who harmed us. But hatred is a curved blade. And the harm we do, we do to ourselves.
-Ruby-
The 4th Lesson:
Lost love is still love. It takes a different form, that's all. You can't see their smile or bring them food or tousle their hair or move them around a dance floor. But when those senses weaken, another heightens. Memory. Memory becomes your partner. You nurture it. You hold it. You dance with it.
-Marguerite-
Life has to end, but love doesn't.
The 5th Lesson:
*... ? where you're supposed to be? ... *... ? what is the reason for your existence? ...
-tala-
from the book, The 5 People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom *quotes not derived from the book...my own interpretation.
Nominated for Romantic Times Reviewers' Choice -Best Historical Romance in a Series 1999
Excerpt:
"He will father your children..."
When Catriona Hennessy, honorable Scottish Lady of the Vale, received this prediction, she was exceedingly aghast. How could she unite with a rake like Richard Cynster--a masterful man with a scandalous reputation? More shocking still was her guardian's will that decreed she and Richard be wed within a week! Though charmed by his commanding presence, and wooed by his heated kisses, she would not--could not--give up her independence.
So she formed a plan to get the heir she needed without taking wedding vows.Richard was just as stunned by the will's command. Marriage had not previously been on his agenda, but lately he'd been feeling rather...restless. Perhaps taming the lady was just the challenge he needed. But can he have the rights of the marriage bed without making any revealing promises of love?
"4½ STARS, EXCEPTIONAL! - A TOP PICK! And a K.I.S.S. Hero! Get ready to have your heart stolen by another Cynster in this wonderfully written, delightful tale that sizzles with sensuality. Stephanie Laurens knows how to enchant readers, not only with her steamy love scenes, but with her wonderfully real and memorable characters, as well. Thanks goodness there will be more Cynsters and more breathtaking romances to come from one of the most talented authors on the scene today." Romantic Times
This is a dramatic novel by George Eliot (the pen name of Mary Ann Evans) which was first published in 1861.
