I Need More to Read!

Tess Gerritsen

2011-02-20T17:29:00.000-08:00

I'm now into Tess. She wrote (writes) medical thrillers and authored the Rizzoli and Isles series. Yes, the one that is on TV. That's how I got on to her. I like the show and decided to try one of the books and I liked it. So I'm reading all the Macon Library has. Now I'm reading "Call After Midnight" a kind of spy thriller. I like the way she writes. Easy read with some excitement and intrigue.

First new post in years!

2011-02-03T08:01:00.000-08:00

Literally. I wanted to start off with a bang, so I'm going to talk about a book I read a couple weeks ago and then passed on to Jeremy. It's a Rex Stout, so probably many of you have already read it, but it's noteworthy I think. I love Rex Stout and have enjoyed every Nero Wolfe book I've been able to get my hands on, but this one really stood out to me. It's called Some Buried Caesar. It's thrilling for long time fans because Archie meets Lilly Rowan near the beginning, and manages to stir up some trouble with her throughout the story. Also fun is the fact that Nero Wolfe leaves his house and then spends most of the story looking for a comfortable chair. There were so many people with motive that I had a very difficult time figuring out the mystery, although Mr. Wolfe had it solved from the beginning. Jeremy and I were both wondering about one part of the book that never were solved. "What's the difference between a Catholic and a river that runs uphill?" is a joke that Archie starts and never finishes. Apparently there is no ending! A cruel joke played on the reader by not providing a punchline! I recommend it anyway. You can preview it on Google Books.

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

2008-09-07T16:08:00.000-07:00

I have been sick and this book was exactly what I needed for a long weekend home in bed. It creates a very good feeling--that there are lots of people out there willing to help their neighbor at their own expense. Has me questioning why I don't know my neighbors very well, and why so much has changed in neighborhoods in general. Anyway, it is very uplifting and has some really funny moments. All about post WWII and how the people cheered themselves up. Nice little romance in it also.

I have read many books in the last few days, but another of note is And Only to Deceive by Tasha Alexander. I picked it up because it said lovers of Anne Perry and Elizabeth Peters would enjoy it. It did not disappoint. Suspenseful and romantic historical novel. Full of feisty women who break the rules etc.

"Chester" (It's a Cat's World)

2008-07-13T15:35:00.000-07:00

I heard about this from Nancy Pearl on one of her NPR spots. Here is the Amazon description:

"Chester is more than a picture book. It is a story told and retold by dueling author-illustrators. Melanie Watt starts out with the story of a mouse in a house. Then Melanie's cat, Chester, sends the mouse packing and proceeds to cover the pages with rewrites from his red marker, and the gloves are off. Melanie and her mouse won't take Chester's antics lying down. And Chester is obviously a creative powerhouse with confidence to spare. Where will this war of the picture-book makers lead? Is it a one-way ticket to Chesterville, or will Melanie get her mouse production off the ground?"

The cat even crosses Melanie's name off the cover and prints "Chester" in the author's place. ;-)

Coincidently, I am writing this while sitting on the floor of the apartment, as Edmund took my only chair.

The Uncommon Reader

2008-06-13T09:25:00.000-07:00

I think someone recommended this already, but I don't remember who. It is a very quick read by Alan Bennett. The book is about Queen Elizabeth II finding out how fun reading is. She begins to read everything and annoy her staff. Here is a quick excerpt I thought some of you would enjoy.

"The librarian at Windsor had been one of many who had urged on Her Majesty the charms of Jane Austen, but being told on all sides how much ma'am would like her books put ma'am off altogether. Besides, she had handicaps as a reader of Jane Austen that were particularly her own. The essence of Jane Austen lies in minute social distinctions, distinctions which the Queen's unique position made it difficult for her to grasp. There was such a chasm between the monarch and even her grandest subject that the social differences beyond that were somewhat telescoped. So the social distinctions of which Jane Austin made so much seemed of even less consequence to the Queen than they did to the ordinary reader, thus making the novels much harder going. To begin with, at any rate, Jane Austen was practically a work of entomology, the characters not quite ants but seeming to the royal reader so much alike as to require a microscope. It was only as she gained in understanding of both literature and human nature that they took on individuality and charm."

For another excerpt from this book visit petrified.

Kansas Bookseller in the news!

2008-05-25T09:03:00.000-07:00

So the guy from our own Rainy Day Books was on Morning Edition! Here is the story--it is full of great looking book recommends. Everything these 3 booksellers recommended sounded GREAT! But especially the ones that our Kansas guy talked about. Not that I'm biased.

Email from BJ

2008-05-24T15:22:00.000-07:00

since it has been a year or more since i have posted on the book blog, i now don't know how to do it. i have a great book I'd like to post called Three Cups of Tea.

http://www.amazon.com/Three-Cups-Tea-Mission-Promote/dp/0143038257/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1211590121&sr=8-1

the book is a nonfiction account of a guy named Greg Mortenson went from being a mountain climber to creating a non-profit organization dedicated to building secular schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

i'd love it if you could throw this up there for me!

love,
bj

A Mystery of Errors

2008-05-17T13:14:00.000-07:00

For all you mystery lovers, try Simon Hawke's A Mystery of Errors. It is very funny and one of the main characters is Will Shakespeare! There were many references that I caught, and I am sure many more that I didn't. Here is a little of the author's own explanation from the afterword:

"It may be thought the height of arrogance to use William Shakespeare as a fictional character in a novel, and I imagine there will probably be those who will curl their lips with disdain at the idea, but at the same time, I have a strong suspicion that Shakespeare would have approved, or at the very least, been rather amused by the whole thing. After all, it is precisely the sort of thing he did himself."

Skippyjon Jones in the Doghouse

2008-05-12T07:46:00.000-07:00

Maci went to the bookstore with Leah, Stella, and Madeline this weekend. Leah read the new Skippyjon Jones to Stella and Maci. These books are a hoot. We brought "Skippyjon Jones in the Doghouse" home with us. Maci thinks is it great. She picked right up on the clapping to the songs (just after seeing Stella do it once).

NY Times Article

2008-03-31T10:18:00.000-07:00

Well it's not a book review, but I thought this article in the NY Times was very interesting.

Also, because it made me remember when I was first dating Adolfo and saw that he had "The Fountainhead" on his bookshelf. When I asked him about it, he responded that it had been a gift and he never read it. Phew!

The Abstinence Teacher

2008-03-29T08:12:00.000-07:00

I just read this book by Tom Parrotta. It was a different kind of book for me as there was no mystery. It was a book about people and the troubles some of them face. One main character was a health teacher (middle school) who responded to a student comment about oral sex "some people enjoy it." The fallout from that was kind of maddening. The other main character is a born again Christian who had been a doper in college. The politics and sociology of these two matching up was well done.

Funny Fiction List Request

2008-03-17T17:02:00.000-07:00

Ok, I looked online, but it is not listed. It's a 3 page pamphlet (front and back!) so I'm not likely to type them all in. But my library does have an EXCELLENT "find a good book" webpage. Check it out if you're stuck for something good to read.

Funny Fiction part II

2008-03-09T17:46:00.000-07:00

The Stately Home Murder. Could have been funny but not enough character development. Not a bad mystery though.

Emma by Jane Austen. Hilarious of course! I read this one already awhile back, but I may be reading it again just fun for. I was thinking of re-reading all the Austens this summer.

Royal Flash, From the Flashman Papers

2008-03-08T14:54:00.000-08:00

Take a peek at this book. I found it on a "Funny Fiction" List from my library. It was indeed funny. I am not sure about an excerpt, since the main character is a little... well, himself and not always appropriate. In fact rarely appropriate, but very funny. He is a MAJOR coward who has been decorated for bravery in war (I am planning on reading the first book to find out how that happened) and he looks at every situation in a way that provides the best outcome for HIM. Fortunately the situations are ridiculous. Funny adventure book.

Also read off the funny books list:

Faith Fox (not funny)

Mapp and Lucia (very funny! Hurrah it's also a series!)

Percy Jackson

2008-02-25T20:43:00.000-08:00

Madeline brought this home from school. I love to read a good kid book and picked it right up. We have both read through book three now, "The Titan's Curse" and are having a great time. These remind me of Artemis Fowl, by E. Colfer and Harry Potter. We have already pre-ordered the next one coming out in May.
Percy Jackson is a middle school boy who finds out his dad is Poseidon. It turns out this is why he has such bad ADHD, :-). He goes off to a camp for kids who have both a mortal and an Olympian god as parents. He is pursued by monsters and greek gods and has to drag up a good deal of knowledge about the Greek gods to figure things out.
Here is what Booklist had to say:
From Booklist
*Starred Review* Just after finding Bianca and Nico, two newly discovered half-bloods, Percy, Grover, Annabeth, and Thalia end up trapped between a helicopter and a manticore. Artemis and her Hunters save the day, but Annabeth disappears over a cliff; then Artemis rushes off to hunt a dangerous monster. Back at Camp Half-Blood, the Oracle foretells that Artemis must be rescued and makes a prediction that bodes ill for one of their number—but which one? Percy, who is supposed to remain behind while others pursue the quest, follows in search of the missing Annabeth. Their adventures range widely across the U.S., taking them to locales that include Washington, D.C., and the deserts of the Southwest and pitting them against the usual assortment of colorful adversaries. The Percy Jackson & the Olympians series is built around a terrific idea—that the half-mortal offspring of Greek gods live among us, playing out struggles of mythic scale—and Riordan takes it from strength to strength with this exciting installment, adding even more depth to the characters and story arc while retaining its predecessors' nonstop laughs and action. Tixier Herald, Diana
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

New Grisham Book

2008-02-25T20:11:00.001-08:00

I eagerly awaited the latest Grisham book and now it is here, and I have read it. Unfortunately, it is not my favorite John Grisham. I liked "Playing For Pizza" better I think.
For me the problem with this book is that he is busy making important political statements about our judicial system and not just spinning a good legal thriller. I imagine many people will enjoy this book, however I read for fun and it was just too real. "The Testament" still remains my all time favorite of his books. I refuse to read his nonfiction works (The Innocent Man and A Time to Kill) but have read and enjoyed all of his other books. If you like legal thrillers and don't mind real stuff you'll probably like this book. If you like to read mindlessly like me for pure pleasure, then maybe not.

Political Thrillers

2008-02-02T07:44:00.001-08:00

I used to like Tom Clancy but lost interest as his books "dried" up. Recently a colleague told me he liked Vince Flynn so on a lark I tried him. I'm hooked. Kind of like when I first read a Kathy Reichs. He does the thriller/suspense part quite well. For a political/spy type thriller, try him, you'll like him.
I've just read about Barry Eisler who apparently writes the same type and his protagonist is half American half Japanese. I'll let you know how that goes when I get one read.

Animal Vegetable Miracle

2007-12-30T14:55:00.000-08:00

I LOVE Barbara Kingsolver. When Della introduced me to her I immediately read everything she ever wrote (sadly, not nearly as many books as I had hoped). Well, now she has a new one that J gave me for Christmas. I just started reading it 5 minutes ago and I am only to page 11, but it is FANTASTIC. So I thought I would post right away so that you would all go read it immediately and wouldn't have to suffer through one more minute of not reading this book. But you are going to have to go get your own copy, because there is no way you are going to be able to pry it out of my hands. Jeremy has already been circling suspiciously. I guess there is a possibility that once I read more than 10 pages that my ardor will cool, but I doubt it. I will let you know. Anyway, here is a tasty tidbit for you:

(Upon moving from Tuscon, AZ to Virginia--thoughts on agriculture in the US)
"We also have convinced ourselves it (farming) wasn't too important. Consider how Americans might respond to a proposal that agriculture was to become a mandatory subject in all schools, alongside reading and mathematics. A fair number of parents would get hot under the collar to see their kids' attention being pulled away from the essentials of grammar, the all-important trigonometry, to make room for down-on-th-farm stuff. The baby boom psyche embraces a powerful presumption that education is key to moving away from manual labor, and dirt--two undeniable ingredients of farming. It's good enough for us that somebody, somewhere, knows food production well enough to serve the rest of us with all we need to eat, each day of our lives.

If that is true, why isn't it good enough for someone else to know multiplication and the contents of the Bill of Rights? Is the story of bread, from tilled ground to our table, less relevant to our lives than the history of the 13 colonies? Couldn't one make a case for the relevance of a subject that informs choices we make daily--as in, What's for dinner? Isn't ignorance of our food sources causing problems as diverse as overdependence on petroleum, and an epidemic of diet-related diseases?

If this book is not exactly an argument for reinstating food-production classes in schools (and it might be), it does contain a lot of what you might learn there. From our family's gas-station beginnings we have traveled far enough to discover ways of taking charge of one's food, and even knowing where it has been. This is the story of a year in which we made every attempt to feed ourselves animals and vegetables whose provenance we really knew. We tried to wring most of the petroleum out of our food chain, even if that meant giving up some things. Our highest shopping goal was to get our food from so close to home, we'd know the person who grew it. Often that turned out to be us, as we learned to produce more of what we needed, starting with dirt, seeds, and enough knowledge to muddle through. Or starting with baby animals and enough sense to refrain from naming them.

(skipping forward a little)

Absence of that knowledge (farming) has rendered us a nation of wary label readers, oddly uneasy in our obligate relationship with the things we eat. We call our food animals by different names after they're dead, presumably sparing ourselves any vision of the beefs and the porks running around on actual hooves. Our words for unhealthy contamination--"soiled" or "dirty"--suggest that if we really knew the number-one ingredient of a garden, we'd all head straight into therapy. I used to take my children's friends out to the garden to warm them up to the idea o eating vegetables, but this strategy sometimes backfired: they'd back away slowly saying, "Oh man, those things touched dirt!" Adults do the same by pretending it all comes from the clean, well-lighted grocery store. We're like petulant teenagers rejecting our mother. We know we came out of her, but ee-ew."

One more opinion

2007-12-27T16:35:00.000-08:00

Here is Time's thoughts on the matter,one's non-fiction and the second is fiction:

http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/top10/article/0,30583,1686204_1686244_1691768,00.html

http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/top10/article/0,30583,1686204_1686244_1691840,00.html

One lady's opinion

2007-12-27T16:32:00.000-08:00

Here's the Boston Globe's pick for the best fiction of 2007, if you're interested. I'll also post Time's when I find it.

http://www.boston.com/ae/books/articles/2007/12/02/the_best_fiction_of_2007/

Mystery/Chick Lit/Historical Fiction

2007-12-15T15:24:00.000-08:00

Just read 2 books that fit into all those categories. The first was Birds of a Feather by Jacqueline Winspear. It was heavier on the mystery and I think it is actually a sequel to a book called Maisie Dobbs, which I suspect of being better than this one. This was a good book, but it kept referring to interesting stuff in the first book that I hadn't read.

The second cross genre book was a little heavier on the chick lit side. It was the Deception of the Emerald Ring by Lauren Willig and it was so fun! I bought it because it said "Pride and Prejudice lives on" on the front so I thought it was a retelling or something. Well, I was originally disappointed when it showed NO resemblance to P and P and I had been drawn in! But it turned out to be a fun adventure. It is also part of a series, and this is a series I plan on working my way through. Here is a teaser:

"In the course of her long career as de facto keeper of the Alsworthy menage, Letty had confronted all manner of domestic disruption, from exploding Christmas puddings to indignant tradesmen, and even, on one memorable occasion, escaped livestock. Letty had bandaged burns, coaxed her little brother's budgie out of tree, and stage-managed her family's yearly remove to a rented town house in London.

An attempted elopement was something new.

The whole situation was straight out of the comic stage: the daughter of the house hastily packing in the middle of the night with the help of her trusty (and soon to be unemployed) maid, the faithful lover waiting downstairs with a speedy carriage, ready to whisk them away to Gretna Green. All that was needed was a rope ladder and an irate guardian in hot pursuit.

That role, Letty realized fell to her. It didn't seem quite fair, but there it was. She had to stop Mary.

But how? Remonstrating with Mary wouldn't be any use. Over the past few years, Mary had made it quite clear that she didn't care to take advice from a sister, and a younger sister at that. She responded to Letty's well-meaning suggestions with the unblinking disdain perfected by cats in their dealings with their humans. Letty knew just how Mary would react. She would hear Letty out without saying a word, and then calmly go on to do whatever it was she had intended to do in the first place.

Rousing her parents would be worse than useless. Her father would simply blink at her over his spectacles and comment mildly that if Mary wished to make a spectacle of herself, it would be best to let her get on with it as quickly as possible and with as little trouble to themselves as could be had. As for her mother...Letty's face twisted in a terrible grimace that would undoubtedly lead to all sorts of unattractive wrinkles later in life. There was certainly no help to be found from that quarter. Her mother would probably help Mary into his lordship's carriage.

Letty looked longingly at the (fire) poker. She couldn't, though. She really couldn't."

No Flying in the House

2007-12-05T17:24:00.000-08:00

I read a book recently by Betty Brock called No Flying in the house. Most little girls have parents to take care of them but not Annabel Tippens. She has Gloria, a tiny white dog who talks and wears a gold collar Annabel never thought it was strange that she had Gloria instead of real parents. Until one day a wicked, wicked cat named Belinda comes to tell her the truth- she's not just a girl she is half fairy!
And she can do lots of things that other kids can't do such as kiss her elbow and fly around the house. But being a fairy isn't all fun and games, and soon Annabel must make a choice. If she chooses to be a fairy she'll have to say good-bye to Gloria forever.
I thought that this was a really great book. I think everyone should read it. I tried to find another book by this lady on Amazon. But the book was $55.00. It was a collectors item. I got this one for free at my school during "week of the young reader" week.

- by Madeline A.

MONK?

2007-11-23T21:35:00.000-08:00

Anyone read the Monk books? I just realized there were books. So, if I watch the show will the book be the same thing?

a total waste of makeup

2007-11-02T13:11:00.000-07:00

So Barnes and Noble were having a big sale a while back. I bought all kinds of books for $2.40 a piece. Keeping that in mind I was not too choosy in my selections. I mean for $3 if it is bad you don't feel bad for not reading it! So one of those purchases was a total waste of makeup by Kim Gruenenfelder. A little except picking up the grandparents from the airport before their granddaughter's wedding:
"Before I can ask my mother what deluded universe she lives in, we see my grandparents and Mawv coming down the escalator.
Grandama and Grandpa look like a couple of Protestants on vacation. They're dressed head-to-toe in L.L. Bean, including the shoes. If they were visiting New York, they'd have been mugged already.
My Mawv, on the other hand, is dressed in a beautiful pink dress that I swear I saw this spring at Bloomingdale's, and three-inch-high heels. A ninety-five-year-old woman in three-inch-heels.
If that sight doesn't cover the cost of admission, I don't know what does. Grandma holds Mawv's hand, treating her like an invalid who could break at any moment.
"Are you all right, Mother?!" Grandma screams into Mauv's left ear.
"Rose," Mawv responds in her normal voice, "I bought a hearing aid so that people wouldn't shout at me."
"Bernice!" Grandpa screams into her right ear, "Your hearing aid isn't working! You couldn't hear a word I said on the plane!" "NO, I was ignoring you!" Mawv (aka Bernice) mockingly screams back into Grandpa's ear. Then she returns to her normal voice. "I bought this damn thing because it said on the box that it filters out unwanted noise. But I can still hear every damn thing you say." She sees me and her face lights up. "Munchkin!"

The Thirteenth Tale

2007-10-29T17:46:00.001-07:00

This was a really good book. It's by Diane Setterfield and of course I looked her up and can't find any other books by her. Isn't that always the way. Well this book was so enjoyable that I kept it from the library till it was overdue, and those of you who know me well know how EXTREMELY rare that is! Ok, Ok, here's your teaser:

"Isabelle Angelfield was odd.
Isabelle Angelfield was born during a rainstorm.
It is impossible to know whether or not these facts are connected. But when, two and half decades later, Isabelle left home for the second time, people in the village looked back and remembered the endlessness of the rain on the day of her birth. Some remembered as if it was yesterday that the doctor was late, delayed by the floods caused by the river having burst its banks. Others recalled beyond the shadow of a doubt that the cord had been wrapped round the baby's neck, almost strangling her before she could be born. Yes, it was a difficult birth, all right, for on the stroke of six, just as the baby was born and the doctor rang the bell, hadn't the mother passed away, out of this world and into the next? So if the weather had been fine, and the doctor had been earlier, and the cord had not deprived the child of oxygen, and if the mother had not died...

And if, and if, and if. Such thinking was pointless. Isabelle was as Isabelle was, and that is all there is to say about the matter.

The infant, a white scrap of fury, was motherless. And at the beginning, to all intents and purposes, it looked like she'd be fatherless, too. For the father, George Angelfield, fell into a decline. He locked himself in the library and refused point-blank to come out. This might seem excessive; ten years of marriage is usually enough to cure marital affection, but Angelfield was an odd fellow, and there it was. He had loved her more than he loved his horses, more even than his dog. AS for their son, Charlie, a boy of nine, it never entered George's head to wonder whether he loved him more or less than Mathilde, for the fact was, he never thought of Charlie at all.

Bereaved, driven half mad with grief, George Angelfield sat all day in the library, eating nothing, seeing no one. And he spent his nights there, too, on the daybed, not sleeping but staring red-eyed at the moon. This went on for months. His pale cheeks became paler; her grew thin; he stopped speaking. Specialists were called from London. THe vicar came and left again. The dog pined away from want of affection, and when it died, George Angelfield barely noticed.

In the end the Missus got fed up with it all. She picked up baby Isabelle from the crib in the nursery and took her downstairs. She strode past the butler, ignoring his protestations, and went into the library without knocking. UP to the desk she marched, and she plumped the baby down in George Angelfield's arms without a word. Then she turned her back and walked out, slamming the door behind her."

Don't you want to know what happens now? I did. Although I didn't realize the book was a mystery until the last chapter! The whole thing is one big clue! It was awesome. Enjoy.

Ok, revised some

2007-10-28T18:03:00.001-07:00

NOW the masterlist should have all the books I have read on it in bold. So I guess I need to start working on the non-bold ones even though some of them I might not. (Also, I highlighed Memoirs of a Geisha even though I only read the first few chapters. I'm done with it anyway. I didn't highlight Reading Lolita in Tehran, even though I started reading it 3 years ago. I'm not done with it. I'm going to try again sometime.)

Response to the Master List

2007-10-28T16:01:00.001-07:00

I wish I had a master list... I'm just trying to keep mine on Amazon, but I'm not very good at updating it (I usually go through it about once a year when xmas rolls around.) I've read several books on your list, and have been found seriously considering others in the corners of bookstores. Here are my opinions, if you are interested:

Achebe – I read this book and can’t really remember much about it. Although, other people rave about it, I don’t remember disliking it, but don’t really remember anything else either.

Alvarez – same as Achebe (and I own this one!) maybe I should just pick it up and read it again.

Berendt – I really liked this book, and just like everyone else, it made me want to go to Georgia on a little southern vacation.

Flagg – I think Fannie Flagg writes the perfect lazy Sunday afternoon novel. I think “Welcome to the World…” is not as good as “Fried Green Tomatoes…” but it’s still pretty excellent.

Golden – I would skip this one. I didn’t find it as compelling as other people told me. I would recommend Pico Iyer’s “The lady and the monk” for more interesting Japanese reads.

Haddon – I really liked this ‘book’ (I listened to this one.) Move this one closer to the top of your list!

Kingsolver – one of my most favorite writers. I own this one and really liked it. If you haven’t read “The Bean Trees” or “The Poisonwood Bible” read those first. (Although “Prodigal Summer” is very good, the other two are better.)

Letts – I could swear that I read this while staying at your apartment in KC once while you were in college! Are you sure you don’t already own this one?

McCourt – I had a *shrug* ‘whatever’, reaction to this book. I’m not sure why I thought he sounded whiny, but many other people liked this book.

Roy – whoof, excellent and heavy. My advice would be to not finish the book right before bedtime. I had a really hard time getting to sleep after reading this one, and I went back and read the ending twice, it was VERY good. (A less heavy and less excellent recommendation would be “the Death of Vishnu.”)

Wells – Skip this one. Really, I thought it was awful, horrible, brain poison. I think I finished it out of spite and have no idea why so many people thought it was good. Horrible traumatizing childhoods make for zany adulthood? I think not.

Masterlist

2007-10-25T18:08:00.000-07:00

Ok, this list is mostly for me. I have been keeping this list of the books Pam's book-group read and checking them off for the last 3 years. Now I just want this paper off my desk. What better way to save the list than on the book blog? Here they are:
Abraham, Pearl: The Romancer Reader
Achebe, Chinua: Things Fall Apart
Albom, Mitch: Tuesdays with Morrie
Alvarez, Julia: How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents
Atwood, Margaret: The Blind Assasin
Berendt, John: Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil
Bohjalian, Chris: Midwives
Brooks, Geraldine: Year of Wonders
Chevalier, Tracy: Girl with a Pearl Earring
Cunningham, Michael: The Hours
Dallas, Sandra: Persian Pickle Club
Diamant, Anita: The Red Tent
du Maurier, Daphne
Enger, Lief: Peace Like a River
Evanovich, Janet: One for the Money
Faulkner, William
Fielding, Helen: Bridget Jones Diary
Flagg, Fannie: Welcome to the World, Baby Girl
Frazen, Jonathan: The Corrections
Frazier, Charles: Cold Mountain
Glass, Julia: Three Junes
Golden, Arthur: Memoirs of a Geisha
Graham, Janice: Firebird
Gregory, Philippa: The Queen's Fool
Gulland, Sandra: Tales of Passion, Tales of Woe
Guterson, David: Snow Falling on Cedars
Haddon, Mark: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nightime
Hamilton, Jane: The Book of Ruth
Hegi, Ursula: Stones from the River
Hoffman, Alice: The Probable Future
Irving, John: A Prayer for Owen Meany
Irving, John: A Widow for One Year
Johnson, Charles: Middle Passages
Kaysen, Susanna: Girl Interrupted
Kidd, Sue Monk: The Secret Life of Bees
Kingsolver, Barbara: Prodigal Summer
Lamb, Wally: She's Come Undone
Landvik, Lorna: Patty Jane's House of Curl
Letts, Billie: Where the Heart Is
Martel, Yann: Life of Pi
McBride, James: The Color of Water
McCourt, Frank: Angela's Ashes
McDermott, Alice: Charming Billy
McEwan, Ian: Atonement
Monroe, Mary Alice: The Book Club
Moore, Christopher: Lamb
Moriaty, Laura: The Center of Everything
Morrison, Toni: Paradise
Nafisi, Azar: Reading Lolita in Tehran
Niffenger, Audrey: The Time Traveler's Wife
O'Carroll, Brendan: The Mammy
Patchett, Ann: Bel Canto
Patchett, Ann: Patron Saint of Liars
Perry, Anne: The Cater Street Hangman
Rowling, JK: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
Roy, Arundhati: The God of Small Things
Rushdee, Salmon: Fury
Russo, Richard: Empire Falls
Shreve, Anita: The Last Time they Met
Schlink, Bernhard: The Reader
Tyler, Ann: Ladder of Years
Tyler, Ann: The Amateur Marriage
Vreeland, Susan: Girl in Hyacinth Blue
Wells, Rebecca: Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood
Lethem, Jonathan: Motherless Brooklyn
Hosseini Khaled: The Kite Runner

Here are a few other Authors I wrote down for some reason:

Ahern, Cecilia
Gore, Kristin
Eggers, Dave

Yeah, desk is just that much cleaner now!

Briga-DOOM

2007-10-01T15:55:00.001-07:00

Ok, for all your chick-lit, murder mystery fans, here's a laugh: Briga-DOOM by Susan Goodwill. It was all fun and adventure. Here's a teaser:

Chapter One

"You look ridiculous, Kate," my aunt Kitty said.

This coming from a seventy-four-year-old in a black-feathered turban, yellow dance leotard, blue high-tops, and a red plaid mini-skirt.

I sighed and closed the door behind her. I felt ridiculous. Golf clothing was new to me, pink was not my color, and the socks, with their little pom-poms bouncing around my ankles, made me feel like the rear window of a Chevy low-rider.

Kitty and I stood in the lobby of the London family's dubious legacy, the Egyptian Theatre. She handed me a Styrofoam coffee cup.

"The outfit's for Ronnie's golf outing," I said. "He picked it out."

"Well, darling, you can always divorce him," she said, maneuvering her way across the loose floor tiles behind me. "They'll get easier now that you've gone through one. By your third or fourth, you'll slide through like a hot knife through butter."

That's the first page although my favorite parts are actually about dumpster diving and a naked bandit who mugs old ladies. It's fun and fast.

Non-fiction-who me?

2007-09-28T10:38:00.000-07:00

I'm not much of a non-fiction reader, but did pick one up recently. This is ironic because I've always advised people of the benefit of reading at least one non-fiction book a month. Anyway, I'm reading "Peter, Paul and Mary Magdelene" by Bart D. Ehrman. He is a historian who studies and writes about the early bible times. In this book he investigates all the found documents about or by these three (of course, many of their writings are not "by" them). He gives me a totally different perspective on what we read now. He explains the practices and customs that were prevalent during the period as well as a backround on the traditions that have migrated through the years. I'm anxious to read more of his books.

Here are a couple of links if you're interested in his CV:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bart_D._Ehrman
http://www.bartdehrman.com/

Lost Author!

2007-09-23T07:53:00.000-07:00

I read this great book a couple of weeks ago and then I forgot the title and the author so I can't get any more of them from the library! Help, help, help! Ok, her first name was MAYBE Phyllis and the book I read was about 2 look a like girls who switched places. She's a current author, but writes in a more "Austen-like" style. In fact she may have written a sequel to an Austen or Bronte book if I remember right. Anybody know who this is? I would like to read more of her stuff.

Also, I am looking for a clean and comfy reading chair for my classroom. I need something for story time so remember me if you are wanting to get rid of a chair...I will carry it away for you! I've been checking Craig's list, but so far the free or cheap chairs look pretty gross.

Piano Lessons: Music, Love, and True Adventures

2007-09-22T06:19:00.000-07:00

So I am very excited because this is the 1st book in my four year marriage that I have read before my lovely wife! One of my former English teachers (who I later worked with while teaching junior high) sent this to me because she thought it would be something that I would enjoy. The book is written by Noah Adams who is the host of NPR's All Things Considered. Adams reflects on one year of learning how to play the piano. He decided as an adult that he wished he knew how to play the piano. He loved the sound of the instrument and had always enjoyed interviewing pianists during his career at NPR. On a whim he decided to buy a $11, 000 dollar Steinway piano without knowing how to play a note.

Because I teach music, it was interesting for me to hear a beginner's reflection on learning an instrument. I also loved the background knowledge he gave about many different pianists, piano makers, and instruments. Several times during the nights that I was reading the book I wanted to get up and play the piano and experience some of the things he was talking about. I particularly liked this book, because of my interest in music, but I would recommend it to anyone, including my wife who is yet to read a page.

Quite a Year for Plums

2007-09-09T13:51:00.000-07:00

I just borrowed Quite a Year for Plums by Bailey White from Aunt Nancy. I have been sick so I think I may have missed some large sections. The reason I think I may have slept through part is that the last scene has a character named Lucy in it and I don't remember a Lucy being in this book. Ah well. I really enjoyed the parts I didn't sleep through, especially the 2 crazy old ladies Meade and Hilma. They really appreciated the out doors.

I also read recently 13 Moons. It is FANTASTIC. Go read it immediately. I wish I had not returned it to the library so promptly because nothing short of an excerpt can do it justice. Here is a video of Charles Frazier talking about this book and other things. You can click on "open tools" to skip to the topic you would like to hear.

Madeline L'Engle

2007-09-07T12:25:00.000-07:00

Madeline L'Engle died yesterday. I'm including the link to the NY Times article, if you are interested.

"A Wrinkle in Time" affected me in ways that few other books have. I still have nightmares which include scenes from that book. I was never able to read any of her other books. I think I began "A Wind in the Door" and had to stop, because the nightmares were too much to take. I also think she installed in me a deep seeded fear of suburbia.

That said, I loved "A Wrinkle in Time" because it was so vivid for me. I probably won't re-read it, though.

The End of the Affair

2007-09-06T12:14:00.000-07:00

Oof, this one took me some time and it never took hold on me the way I thought it would. I haven't read any Graham Greene before this, and I'm not sure I'm interested in picking up any more, if this is the way it's going to be. (I'm open to suggestions if someone would like to convince me otherwise.)

The story is narrated by a guy who has just been left by the woman he has been seeing, who is cheating on her husband. The guy and the husband happen to be friends. The narrator is angry, bitter, and vindictive. (How romantic!) He proceeds to alienate and abuse everyone in site, including taking a few stabs at Catholicism for good measure.

I think the only reason I finished the book is (well, I'm not working for one) I saw it being referenced in ways that confused me. Also, there was a movie made about it with Ralph Fiennes and Julianne Moore, not that it makes the book any better.

Why is this a classic? I'm confused.

On the plus side, it's very short!

Children's Books

2007-08-30T16:38:00.000-07:00

Anyone read Sheep in a Jeep? It's great. So many children's books have great rhythm and stories. I miss just great story telling. Anybody know of some adult fiction with a plain ol' great story?

how sad is this

2007-08-21T15:33:00.000-07:00

I just saw this article on the Yahoo! news.

In other news, I finished two books that I began long, long ago. One was Linda Gordon's "The Great Arizona Orphan Abduction" and the other was Elena Poniatowska's "Tinisima."

I was supposed to read Gordon's book when I was in school, so you can see that it's taken me a while to get through it. I did like it, but it's dense, and chock full of endnotes. So, if you are looking for a history lesson, it's a good one. If you are looking for a relaxing evening, not so much.

"Tinisima" is a fictional account of the life of Tina Modotti. Unfortunately, I don't know enough about Tina Modotti to separate fact from fiction, but it was a good book anyway. Poniatowska is an exceptional storyteller. I'm going to make an effort to try and read some of her books in Spanish. If you are new to Poniatowska, I would recommend "Massacre in Mexico" as your first stop.

Summer Reading

2007-07-21T06:24:00.000-07:00

First of all sorry no pictures. My scanner died. I did add links so you can see them on Amazon.

Well, it's been eclectic through the move. I had to turn in my library books and pack my books so I've just been reading whatever was around. I have read several things in the last couple of days. First, I discovered Anita Brookner and I read her Hotel du Lac. I really enjoyed her writing style although it was not a light summer read. It was a little more thought provoking. The book is from the perspective of a female writer who is weighing the options of being in love or being comfortable. It won a booker.

Ok, then I got to Pam and Earl's in Olathe and I started reading off of their shelves. I read 2 REALLY REALLY good books that you are going to want to run out and borrow right away. First is Water for Elephants. I have been reluctant to read this book because I assumed it would have a sad ending. It seems like contemporary fiction tends to have sad endings right now just because it's popular. Well this one has a great ending AND an exciting story to get you there.

The other book I have been reading at Pam and Earl's is Drop Dead my Lovely. It is just hilarious. A hermity book seller is reading Sam Spade novels when a stack of books hits him in the head and he wakes up believing he is a private eye. And the way he talks is so funny. Everyone thinks he's a nut case. Here's a little teaser for you:

"You're kidding with that suit, right?"
Oh, yeah. She also had opinions.
Which is generally jake with me. I'm not going to bust a clavicle patting myself on the back for it, but it so happens I approve of women having ideas of their own. When you consider the fact that women are the only minority that outnumber men, it makes the whole package easier to swallow.
I'd put an ad in the Village Voice for a part-time receptionist and she'd shown up before the press run was dry. Turned out she was an actress--yeah, I know: who isn't?--in need of a day gig between classes, auditions, and nervous breakdowns. Or is it nervous breaks-down? Court martial, attorney general, time immemorial, Nutty Buddy--some words are like people. The get perverse in the plural. From times immemorial, after courts martial, attorneys general traditionally enjoy Nuttys Buddy and have nervous breaks-down.
"I'm dead serious," I said. "It so happens I take great care with my appearance. And everything else, angel."
"Um...Pete."
There it was. That "um." I'd been hearing it all my life. The party of the second part was about to pop some frequently asked questions. "What? You're on the air, kid."
"Seriously. What's up with you?"
"Come again, doll?"
"That. The way you talk. With all these 'dolls' and 'angels.' And these zoot-suity clothes. And the hat. This whole hard-boiled thing. Are you serious or what?"
"Yeah, people ask me that all the time."
"So? What do you say?"
" I say I'm just a guy trying to stay clean in a dirty world. I'm a professional, and I wear what the professionals wear. Anybody who doesn't like it can send an e-mail to their congressman."
Stephanie suddenly looked sly. She said, one con artist to another, "Come on, Pete. You can tell me. This is a put-on, right?"
"Lady," I said, "you're looking at a man who doesn't do put-ons. Why? In self-defense. Because life as we know it is a put-on. The more you learn about the world, the more they change it into something else while you're in bed reading The New Yorker. The more convinced you are that you know the score, the bigger the pie they're baking to hit you in the face with out on the street. All a mug can do in a world like this is be a deliberate as possible. In everything."

The whole book is this great. Also, he is the worst P.I. I have ever read about. Love it!

2007-06-19T13:48:00.000-07:00

Well, since Uncle Paul is deviating with some action - I think I will add a little chick reading! I barely have a chance to read so when I do it is strictly for FUN! I think mostly because you can pick up a book after a week and remember what is going on.

The last book I read was "Hot Stuff" by one of my favorite chick writers Janet Evanovich. I doubt you learn much from this book, but it is still fun to read. If you are in the neighborhood, my mother was going to drop it off at grandma's house.

the death of a library card

2007-06-18T15:58:00.000-07:00

I canceled my library card today and it was more painful than I expected. Not only did I cancel my card, but I also returned the book I had been holding on to (way past the due date) because I still thougth I could finish it. I paid my fine and withdrew my request for a book (Savage Detectives). I had forgotten about the hold on the Savage Detectives, so that was a sad surprise.

AND THEN, the librarian proceeded to cut my library card into tiny little pieces with a pair of scissors, right in front of me! It was awful.

No time for reading. We'll see how many books I can find in English after the move.

Lee Child

2007-06-16T08:18:00.000-07:00

I'm deviating from the intellectual mode of this blog and inserting some action. This guy's protagonist is Jack Reacher, a drifter. He is ex-military MP and owns and carries nothing but his toothbrush (though he does have a bank account he accesses occasionally). He ends up in fortuitous situations that cause me a lot of excitement. His first is killing floor where he drifts into a town and immediately is charged with murder. I think my favorite is Dye Trying where he walks out of a store and bumps into a lady who is being abducted at the time so they just take him along. All of his are exciting, especially for those of us with wandering spirits.

Check it out! Free Book System

2007-04-29T06:38:00.001-07:00

http://bookmooch.com/

Chinese Lessons

2007-04-19T20:19:00.000-07:00

I just finished this book, which was recommended to me by a co-worker. The author was one of the first US exchange students to study in China after the Cultural Revolution.

This is the quote on the back of the book by the former US ambassador to China,

"John Pomfret has written a brilliant, insightful book describing the dark side and the human cost of the 'Chinese economic miracle.' His feel for China, based on years of living there, his fluency in Chinese, and his reporting genius cut through the sham and spin of much current coverage."

The book recounts the lives of five of his classmates and Pomfret's life and interactions with China, including his expulsion after the Tienanmen square massacre. This is a great way to learn about recent Chinese history and give more perspective to the current issues in China.

I would strongly encourage everyone to read this before the Olympics in Beijing.

d

The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio

2007-04-06T08:31:00.000-07:00

Terry Ryan wrote this book about her mother. It is pretty funny, as you would expect when there are 10 kids in one house. To help pay for expenses, the mother starts entering writing contests. And she wins--a lot! Here is a little teaser:

"She began her contesting career simply enough, with Burma-Shave roadside rhymes. In the 1950s you couldn't drive down a highway without passing a Burma-Shave roadside billboard campaign, six signs spaced at hundred-yard intervals down the road, one line to a sign, the last always "Burma-Shave". The verses were clever and meant to amuse, their content ranging from shaving to safe driving and current culture. My mother's submissions added to those topics an occasional touch of irony:

Race little roadster,
Fairly Fly.
You'll be
Used parts
By and by.
Burma-Shave.

Successful Burma-Shave jingles inserted a not-so-hidden advertisement into the mix, and in one entry Mom went for broke--if you don't shave close enough, you could kill yourself:

Hairpin turn,
Hotrod ditched.
Lost control,
His whiskers
Itched.
Burma-Shave."

Susan Vreeland

2007-04-06T08:28:00.000-07:00

Just a short note on Passion of Artemisia. It was sort of a let down. I really loved Girl in Hyacinth Blue, so I was looking forward to another book from this author. Only one thing really happens in this book though. Maybe if I had known more about the art ahead of time I would have enjoyed it more.

French Impressions

2007-04-04T12:02:00.000-07:00

by John S. Little--sort of. It's actually mostly taken from notes written by his mother while they were abroad. Cute stories about their adventures in France. Good book. Who loaned this to me? I'm ready to give it back.

The True Account

2007-03-20T07:28:00.000-07:00

Need something for the trip D? This book will be an excellent choice to distract you in busy airports.

I am sick so I have been reading a lot. This has been the best of the lot. It has many Don Quixote references and for good reason. This pure imagination and adventure. It is a narrative written by a kid about his crazy uncle and all they do together. I am going to give you a quote from fairly early in the book, so I don't give too much away:

(from handbills printed by the kid)

RUNAWAY UNCLE. Run off from Kingdom Common, Vermont, and UNCLE, Private True Teague Kinneson, about 50 years of age. His stature is tall, his countenance fierce, his clothes and gear those of a knight-errant, consisting of chain mail, a belled night-stocking over a copper plate in his head, a red sash, and galoshes worn high or low as the occasion requires. A former soldier with the Continental Army, a playwright, and a clasical scholar, this UNCLE imagines himself to have explored from the Pacific up the Columbia River, across the Rocky Mountains, and thence overland to St. Louis and the United States. Whoever conveys him safely home, or into the care of his nephew, Ticonderoga Kinneson, shall have 5 dollars from

THE KINNESON FAMILY
KINGDOM COMMON, VERMONT

This book flies by much faster than I would want. Very fun.

The Travel Bug Bites Again!

2007-03-19T21:52:00.000-07:00

Oh, dear... I'm supposed to be packing and here I am writing a post (read: wasting time).

I just read two really good books. One was expected to be good and the other was a risk taken in the library stacks. I read the second book by J. Maarten Troost, the author of "The Sex Lives of Cannibals." It is called, "Getting Stoned with Savages: A Trip Through the Islands of Fiji and Vanuatu." In this book, the author and his wife (the girlfriend from the last book) are holding down steady jobs in Washington, when they chuck it all (ok, he gets fired) and move off to an island in the South Pacific. He continues to write with a sense of humor which makes me laugh out loud. (While I was in the middle of this book, API walked into our bedroom to find me curled up with this book and snickering to myself. He thinks I am very strange.)

The title of Chapter 6: "In which the author ponders cannibalism and discovers that he just doesn't get it--not at all, cannot get past the icky factor--and so, left to his own devices by his beguiling wife, he decides to seek enlightenment on the island of Malekula, where until recently, within his own lifetime even, they lunched on people."

And, yes, you Spanish and French speakers out there, if you sound out the name of the Island you will understand that when Captain Cook named the island in French, he was not having a particularly good time.

You should probably read "The Sex Lives of Cannibals" first, but both are very, very good.

The second book, which was a risky selection at the library, is "On Mexican Time: A New Life in San Miguel" by Tony Cohan. While I very much enjoy reading about the young couple, or lone woman, or whomever chucking it all and moving to France (See Julia Child entry), I am very wary of the people who travel through Latin America. Most of this genre are travellers and they don't settle, so the book is usually about breadth instead of depth. I wanted depth, and this book delivered.

I'm also wary of the views from above of the lowly Latino, but these folks get right in there and mix it up! Sure, they have gringo friends and european friends, but they also have Mexican friends. It was surprisingly good.

Well, we're leaving for our own adventure in Mexico on Thursday night and I haven't started the packing process yet. This could be the trip which decides our summer plans, so keep your fingers crossed for us!

d

Ooo, and this one too

2007-03-03T13:53:00.000-08:00

Lots of web-surfing procrastination going on today:

Library Smut

Book Reccomendation Database

2007-03-03T12:18:00.001-08:00

Check it out!

What Shall I Read Next?

Julie and Julia--Finished at Last!

2007-02-21T18:40:00.000-08:00

What a great recommendation! This was from one of Della's earlier posts and it is really enjoyable. It took me a while to read, because I read it one chapter per day...sorta blog style. I thought I would share what Julie Powell had to say about blogging:

"When we blog about our weight-loss problems and our knitting and our opinion of the president's IQ level, we do it on the blithe assumption that someone gives a shit -- even though there's a guy stuck in Baghdad who blogs, and a Washington DC staff assistant who gets paid by Republican appointees for sex who blogs, and our own jottings must all be dreadfully dull by comparison. Nowadays anyone with a crap laptop and Internet access can sound their barbaric yawp, whatever it may be. But the surprise is that for every person who's got something to say, it seems there are at least a few people who are interested. Some of them aren't even related."

I thought that last part was funny considering that I'm related to most everyone who reads this blog. Oh, and if you can't tell from that paragraph--beware Republicans. This may not be your book. Otherwise, enjoy! Thanks Della.

2007-01-30T17:49:00.000-08:00

I enjoy books that start out sad and improve over time. I like to see characters progress. This book shows change with the main character, Violet. Violet definitely progresses from her unfortunate childhood to her fairly normal adulthood. You see a lot of growth with several of the characters. I will be looking for more by Lorna Landvik because her writing style is poetic--but not to the point of being impractical. Oh My Stars makes you think without messing with your brain.

How to Murder a Millionaire

2007-01-24T18:31:00.000-08:00

This is yet another very light, requires no actual thinking book. Quite enjoyable if that is what you are looking for. This is very fun and has really good characters. They are not as predictable as characters in this kind of book usually are and they are very funny. Also, there are great clothes in them. If I can't actually afford to wear fabulous clothes the next best thing is reading about wearing them. I read through all of the books that have been written so far in this series and there are several issues that remain throughout and so far have not been solved. I won't tell you what the main unsolved problem is, but I like that it is still there. It makes for a little suspense in the series. Of course they are murder mysteries and have suspense because of the murderer in each book, but they aren't really about that.

My Life in France

2007-01-14T14:31:00.000-08:00

So you can shelve this book under the topic of books which make you want to move to France. As if you need more books in this section of your library!

I also got this for xmas and it is a book you can disappear into. Grandma recommended it to me.

Very, Very good!

d

MarJane Satrapi

2007-01-14T14:17:00.000-08:00

Alright, so the holidays are over, but I'm enjoying a quiet three day weekend and considering the books I read over the break. AJ gave me this one for xmas and if you haven't read any Marjane Satrapi, you should rush out and get "Persepolis"!

They are all graphic novels and the stories and the pictures work very well together. Satrapi tells a great story mostly from her or her family's point of view in Iran. I haven't read "Embroideries", about her life in France, but it's on my list.

I recommend Chicken with Plums (a story about her uncle), but you shouldn't start with it. Start with "Persepolis".

d

I Need More to Read!: Zorro

2007-01-12T13:48:00.000-08:00

I Need More to Read!: Zorro

Zorro

2007-01-12T13:29:00.000-08:00

This is the first time I have posted! I thought that I should pick up the slack since everyone else seems to be working or something. I start school next week so then my fun reading time will go away, but in the meantime I finished a book (a rarity these days). This book was a recommendation from Cali and it was a fun and easy read. I enjoy adventure books and so if you do as well I think you will enjoy this one. It's got sword fighting, pirates, gypsies, catholics, and of course a love story (but not what I expected). There is also some historical background presented and it was interesting to read this author's tale of how Zorro came to be. Hope you all are doing well.

Jeremy

Peter and the Starcatchers

2006-10-01T18:51:00.000-07:00

For those of you who don't know, just walking into a bookstore allows you one guilt-free book purchase. Just one. All the rest you buy are very bad, but one is completely acceptable. Anyway, Mom visited and can I help it if she needed to go to Borders? I finally was able to get Peter and the Starcatchers, which I have been looking at for a while. It was co-authored by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson, so it sounded awesome. Well, it lived up to the hype. It is a good read.

Actually, I think that a prequel to Peter Pan was a long time coming. There are a lot of holes in the Peter story that I have always been curious about. How did Peter end up the way he is? Why can he talk to mermaids? What really did happen with Hook's hand? Where did tinkerbell come from? Somebody else must have been curious also. The style is also pretty funny, very similar to Dave Barry's "Big Trouble".

Here's an excerpt from the chapter when you meet Black Stache--or you know him better as Captain Hook:

"The crew of the Sea Devil understood: If Black Stache laughed, you laughed. If he snarled, you snarled. If he breathed in your direction, you ran for cover. "Ratbreath," his sailors called him behind his back. It was said that he liked to eat his vermin raw with a touch of sea salt."

The Sex Lives of Cannibals

2006-09-26T16:26:00.000-07:00

I tore through this book. I really like the author and I will try to get his next book, "Getting Stoned with Savages." If you ever had an inclination to chuck it all and move to a very small island in the South Pacific, this is the book for you!

He also has ingenious titles to his chapters, such as:
"Chapter 2: In which the Author reveals the Fruit of his Research into the Strange Island Nation he has declared his new Home (which leaves much unknown), compensates for his Ignorance with his Lively Imagination (which is inadequate, very much so), and Packs (inappropriately)."

Therein lies:

"To picture Kiribati, imagine that the continental U.S. were to conveniently disappear leaving only Baltimore and a vast swath of very blue ocean in its place. Now chop up Baltimore into thirty-three pieces, place a neighborhood where Maine used to be, another where California once was, and so un until you have thirty-three pieces of Baltimore dispersed in such a way so as
to ensure that 32/33 of Baltimorians will never attend an Orioles game again. Now take away electricity, running water, toilets, television, restaurants, buildings, and airplanes (except for two very old prop planes, tended by people who have no word for "maintenance"). Replace with
thatch. Flatten all land into a uniform two fee above sea level. Toy with islands by melting polar ice caps. Add palm trees. Sprinkle with hepatitis A, B, and C. Stir in dengue fever and intestinal
parasites. Take away doctors. Isolate and bake at a constant temperature of 100 degrees Fahrenheit. The result is the Republic of Kiribati."

Enjoy!

Julie & Julia

2006-09-26T15:49:00.000-07:00

How appropriate of me to write a blog entry about a book, based on a blog.

From http://www.twbookmark.com/: "Julie Powell is 30-years-old, living in a rundown apartment in Queens and working at a soul-sucking secretarial job that's going nowhere. She needs something to break the monotony of her life, and she invents a deranged assignment. She will take her mother's dog-eared copy of Julia Child's 1961 classic Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and she will cook all 524 recipes. In the span of one year."

So some parts of this are really good, some parts are really funny, some parts made my stomach hurt (September 11 in NYC). It is, like a blog, kind of spotty and not always consistent in tone. Also, sometimes she is a little too forthcoming in her personal life. Sometimes a reader would like a little censorship. That, too, is like a blog - it's the first draft of the first thought in your head.

Over all, this is a book I have been circling for a while and I finally pulled it of the shelf at the library. I enjoyed it and recommend it for a quick and easy read.

d

Oliver Sacks

2006-09-15T14:41:00.000-07:00

Ok, I think everyone already read this book. But, I just finished "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat" and it's really good. It can get a little 'sciency', but they are clinical tales, so you should know what you are getting yourself into.

Oliver Sacks also wrote the "Oaxaca Journal"

In the mean time, I also read some terribly boring books on food that I won't burden you with at this time. Tonight I'm going to the lib to get a book on cd of "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time."

Enjoy your weekend!

d

Well...

2006-08-25T17:41:00.000-07:00

Too tired to read. Real jobs are hard. If I get a minute I read "The First Days of School" by Harry Wong. Really good book if you are a brand new teacher. No takers? Didn't think so. Weekend is here and I plan to spend a good deal of tomorrow reading. So more coming. If you want to know what I'm doing instead of reading you can check out my other blog.

Catching Up

2006-08-11T13:45:00.000-07:00

I have not been reading enough lately and have vowed to give my library card a good workout this fall. To start, I checked out Mr. Vertigo, Lamb (By Christopher Moore), Book Lust and Oaxaca Journal.
Mr. Vertigo was a wild read. I found it very entertaining - it is definitely one of the most creative books I've read lately. I loved how the kid talks in this street-wise "Hey, Mista, what's the big idea?" kind of way. I really, really liked Lamb! It was a cool spin on the old, old story, and Moore has a great sense of humor. I checked out Oaxaca Journal b/c Della said she read it on vacation, and I really like other Oliver Sacks books, like The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, and Awakenings. I will read that next.
And as for Book Lust, well, frankly Cali, if you checked out that book you would have no need for this blog!!! I have about 4 pages of a notebook filled with a 'to-read' list from it. Better get going... ;-)

Hoot

2006-08-09T17:28:00.000-07:00

I haven't read anything else by Carl Hiaasen, but this seems very different from his other books. I did see that he has written another young adult book now, and I think Hoot has a movie. Anyway, this was a very fast read and was pretty entertaining. A great young adult novel where kids make a difference. I thought they way they went about it was sometimes questionable. After all, usually I don't see vandalism and violence getting results, but it has a happy ending. I guess if it was all peaceful protest it would be sort of a preachy book. Anyway, it's recommended if you like new kid hero stories.

The Time Traveler's Wife

2006-08-04T06:24:00.000-07:00

This was one of Pam's book group books that looked good (so many of them do) so I grabbed it at the library. It's a little sci-fi of course...with the time travel element. But it is the kind of sci-fi that is easy to get into and you don't have to learn a whole new language to read it (those of you who have read Dune know what I'm talking about). It's mostly a character driven plot and I love the way the author sort of lets you look at their lives big picture instead of in a linear birth to death sort of way. It very circular and if I were the author I would have a hard time deciding where to start. Here's an excerpt of the main character describing his unusual problem to a friend who's not a friend yet:

"I am a time traveler. At the moment I am thirty-six years old. This afternoon was May 9, 2000. It was a Tuesday. I was at work, I had just finished a Show and tell for a bunch of Caxton Club members and I had gone back to the stacks to reshelve the books when I suddenly found myself on School Street, in 1991. I had the usual problem of getting something to wear. I hid under somebody's porch for a while. I was cold, and nobody was coming along, and finally this young guy, dressed--well, you saw how I was dressed. I mugged him, took his cash and everything he was wearing except his underwear...."
"I find myself in situations like that all the time. No pun intended. There's something wrong with me. I get dislocated in time, for no reason. I can't control it, I never know when it's going to happen, or where and when I'll end up. So in order to cope, I pick locks, shoplift, pick pockets, mug people, panhandle, break and enter, steal cars lie, fold, spindle, and mutilate. You name it, I've done it."

The Omnivore's Dilemma

2006-08-02T16:12:00.000-07:00

Oh, my, goodness. I'm only 2/3rds of the way through this book and I had to write about it. This is the best book I've read this year.

It's non-fiction and about food production, which may not sound like the most exciting things to some of you, but this guy is great. He's a professor of Journalism at Berkeley and has written about food before (The Botany of Desire).

This is what the publisher says about the book (I can't seem to find an excerpt on line):

"Pollan has divided The Omnivore's Dilemma into three parts, one for each of the food chains that sustain us: industrialized food, alternative or "organic" food, and food people obtain by dint of their own hunting, gathering, or gardening. Pollan follows each food chain literally from the ground up to the table, emphasizing our dynamic coevolutionary relationship with the species we depend on. He concludes each section by sitting down to a meal at McDonald's, at home with his family sharing a dinner from Whole Foods, and in a revolutionary "beyond organic" farm in Virginia. For each meal he traces the provenance of everything consumed, revealing the hidden components we unwittingly ingest and explaining how our taste for particular foods reflects our environmental and biological inheritance."

The great thing about him is that he does not condemn the farmer or the consumer. Yet, he is reminding us to consider what we are eating and where we are shopping and what that implies. Also, he does not admonish the reader for her bad eating habits after he witnesses the industrialized food chain. Pollan does want the reader to acknowledge that the price you pay for your hamburger at the grocery store is more than just the amount of money you hand over.

For those of you who read My Year of Meats or Fast Food Nation (also recommended) this is better. I can't say enough good things about this book, and you should all run out and get it from your library right away. I think I may buy it.

d

Austen Mania

2006-07-27T08:26:00.000-07:00

I finally got to read the Jane Austen Book Club that Amanda talked about. It was great! I know Amanda already shared but now I am in a total Austen craze so I thought I would share the parts where she talks about everyone's perception of Austen:

"Jocelyn's Austen wrote wonderful novels about love and courtship, but never married."

"Bernadette's Austen was a comic genius. Her characters, her dialogue remained genuinely funny, not like Shakespeare's jokes, which amused you only because they were Shakespeare's and you owed him that."

"Allegra's Austen wrote about the impact of financial need on the intimate lives of women. If she'd worked in a bookstore, Allegra would have shelved Austen in the horror section."

"Prudie's was the Austen whose books changed every time you read them, so that one year they were all romances and the next you suddenly noticed Austen's cool, ironic prose. Prudie's was the Austen who died, possibly of Hodgkin's disease, when she was only forty-one years old."

"Sylvia's Austen was a daughter, a sister, an aunt. Sylvia's Austen wrote her books in a busy sitting room, read them aloud to her family, yet remained an acute and nonpartisan observer of people. Sylvia's Austen could love and be loved, but it didn't cloud her vision, blunt her judgments."

So I've been trying to figure out who my Austen is, but really she is all of those things. Isn't there a famous quote about every woman thinking she personally knows Austen better than everyone else? I looked for it but can't find it.

Fire and Ice

2006-07-23T15:40:00.000-07:00

Ok, so the title is a little bit terrible. But the book was a fast enjoyable read. I got tired of the Kate Shugak character several years ago, but when I saw that there was another series with a different hero I decided to try it. I just got tired of Kate because her character never evolved and nothing ever changed as far as the big timeline. This could happen with the new character, Liam, but I've only read one book so...so far so good. I really enjoy all the Alaska stuff. This book has a very detailed description of fishing for herring and it is really interesting. Fishing is a good career background for characters in a murder mystery. Very tough and competitive. The most appealing part of the story is the characters Dana Stabenow develops for this tiny Alaskan town. She drew me in with the people so I will probably be looking for the second in the series when I go back to the library.

Tales of Passion, Tales of Woe

2006-07-19T08:00:00.001-07:00

This was another one of Pam's book group books. She recommended it to me and I ended up reading the whole series. I started with this one, which is actually the middle, but it was a good one to start with. It left me with questions for books one and three. The series tells the story of Josephine Bonaparte. Honestly I had very little interest in Napoleon prior to reading this book, but Sandra Gulland paints him as an interesting character. We see him through Josephine as a very opportunistic general who is not anything like emperor material. He is also very arrogant. He carries his own hard-boiled eggs to dinners so that no one can poison him. He even changes her first name from Rose. Josephine is no saint either. She has tons of debts and a weakness for laudanum. Upon telling her aunt she has married:

"Why...that's wonderful," she said, crossing herself, "but to whom?"
"To a military man by the name of Napoleon Bonaparte. He's--"
"What type of name is that?" my aunt demanded, frowning suspiciously.
"It's a Corsican name, Aunt Désirée, and--"
"You married a Corsican?" She reached for a brass bell and rang it vigorously...(she calls for smelling salts and insults the corsicans thoroughly)...
"A church ceremony, Rose?" she asked, pulling and twistingng the green handkerchief, worrying it.
"No," I admitted. Bonaparte was anti-Church, but I wasn't going to tell her that.
I heard a sniff. Oh dear! Was she weeping? Dismayed, I reached out to comfort her, but she turned on me like a hawk. "Rose how could you?" she wept, dabbing her cheeks. "How could you have married a man with such a horrible name!"

Robinson Crusoe

2006-07-14T16:01:00.000-07:00

This is another one of those classics that I had been meaning to read for years. Over all it was an excellent book. Especially the first 3 quarters. Or even 5/6ths. But pretty much after he is "rescued" I lost interest. Also, I thought it was really annoying that each chapter begins with a overview of what happens in the chapter. For example "Friday tells me of the white mans in his country. I make a canoe. Keep another anniversary. The savages again land. We attack them and rescue a Spaniard. Friday finds his father." And then the chapter begins. What?! It gives away all the surprises. If I could only stop myself from reading those parts! My only other complaint is the end of the book. The last sentence is: "I sent them also from the Brazils five cows, three of them being big with calf, some sheep, and some hogs; which, when I came again, were considerably increased." So actually there is no ending.

I love the action in this book. It is very exciting and actually reminded me a lot of Fatu-Hiva by Thor Heyerdahl. Although that was a real reminiscence, they dealt with some of the same survival issues. I thought it was really funny the way he ends up describing how he built a canoe in great detail, but when he gets married it isn't really clear who the lucky lady is. I also thought it was funny the way you think through the whole book that he is just unlucky with the sea, but then the first time he travels by land he is attacked by wolves. So I think the moral of the story is: Stay home and listen to your parents. ( at least when they tell you that you are doomed to be lost at sea)

Kite Runner

2006-07-11T06:11:00.000-07:00

Ok, I won't say much about this one because I'm pretty sure I'm the last person on the planet to read it, but if it turns out someone else out there is the last person then I highly recommend this book. It's about a couple of boys in Afghanistan, so it isn't a cheerful sort of book, but it is very insightful. I learned a lot about the history of the country through this book. This is the way I prefer to learn history I think...through fiction. Anyway, it's well written and deserving of a second look if you get a chance.

2006-07-09T21:06:00.000-07:00

So, I've been listening to Robert Parker in the car and find this Spencer fellow entertaining. He is a really tough PI who always cracks the case. Also, he happens to be highly intellectual even though he is big and brawny.

I'm trying this link thing to see if you can read a review. He has some great lines, but since I listened to it I can't remember enough to put in here so you will have to listen for yourself.

I am now moving on to Twain.

Ruth Reichl

2006-07-05T16:01:00.000-07:00

I've been reading Ruth Reichl's Tender at the Bone and Garlic and Sapphires. I really liked them both. Tender at the Bone is about her childhood, with lots of really funny stories that often involve food. Garlic and Sapphires is about her stint as the food critic for the New York Times. She invents disguises so that restraunts won't recognize her. Both books include the recipes that appear in her stories and will probably make you hungry. I'm glad I read Tender at the Bone first, because you have more background about people and events that reappear in Garlic and Sapphires. I've been trying to find a favorite quote, but there are too many funny stories so you'll just have to read them.

Email from John

2006-07-03T12:12:00.000-07:00

I got permission from John to post an e-mail of his here:

I've had an interesting year of reading, although I'm
out of the reading mode until it's not nice enough to
do something rational. I'm reading quite an
interesting fishing book, well, make that "fly
fishing" book, called, "Rivers of Shadow, Rivers of
Sun" by Norm Zeigler. Not much fishing about it,
really. Sort of a "Blue Highways" sort of thing
centered around finding off-the-beaten-path of famous
European/Scandinavian rivers. Reading it is like
sitting over a glass of wine in a small European cafe
talking about people, rivers and the fish that we aim
to catch and sometimes do. This is a nice contrast to
"Footnotes from a Catastrophy" and some of the other
environmental glasnost books that seem to find their
way into my hands. Sharon dropped "Marley and Me" on
me and it was a nice flight book to and from Boston,
but in the end I couldn't finish the book. This winter
I went through a rash of Annie Proulx books after a
seatmate on a flight to Boston gave me one of her
books. "Close Range." "Accordian Crimes." A couple of
others. A very good writer with great
characterization. My brother gave me a Bush Attack
that I sometimes will read a chapter of before bed,
although there is so little I find either amusing or
even funny about the man, so the work usually bores
me. It's like reading about the one guy who is always
trying to crowd into a table of people he thinks are
friends, and is not intelligent enough to realize they
find he and his jokes stupid rather than funny. JGW

Cassandra French's Finishing School for Boys

2006-07-03T11:48:00.000-07:00

This book totally horrified me as I read it but the more I think back on it, the better it gets. I really loved Eric Garcia's Dinosaur series that I wrote about earlier (Anonymous Rex, Hot and Sweaty Rex, and Casual Rex). I also enjoyed Matchstick Men. Now after I say that I should have know that this book was going to be totally messed up because everything he writes has an element of loony in it. However, it starts out so Bridget Jonesy that I was caught off guard. She seems like the normal, shallow, chick lit heroine who hates her job and anyone who looks thinner than her. But in no time you learn that she has three men chained in her basement, and her mom is cheerfully under house arrest for telemarketing fraud. For a lawyer, she follows a very loose interpretation of the law in this book. Don't ask--you will have to read the book to follow her totally screwed up rationalization about how it is OK to kidnap bad dates and hold them hostage. I certainly can't explain her. Here is the first page for all of you who like a glimpse:

"There was a woman on television the other day who insisted that the best way for us, as humans, to achieve our goals is to grade ourselves, in every aspect of our lives, with stark and unrelenting candor. It's not good enough simply to think about these grades, or to tell them to a friend; according to this woman, who may or may not have been an actual doctor, you've got to write them down at least once a day if you want to make a difference in your life. There's no need, she said, to make any specific proactive plans for these changes to occur. The sheer act of writing them down, is eventually, enough to do the trick. Though I have a strong feeling the woman was a shill for the Bic pen corporation, it's difficult for me to resist what seems like a ridiculously easy method to turn my life toward the better. If all it takes to achieve happiness is a belly flop into the culture of constant self-evaluation, I'm ready to pull on a bikini and call myself a swimmer. To start, I'll give myself a C in metaphor."

I give Eric Garcia a C- for getting inside the mind of a woman (I cannot see most of this behavior as female, but instead an extremely exaggerated version of how men might see women) and an A+ for writing an apparently fluff summer read that completely took me by surprise.

Fluke: Or, I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings

2006-07-01T08:51:00.000-07:00

So this is my first Christopher Moore, even though he's caught my eye several times. It was hilarious. The characters are really funny. This book is about 2 friends doing whale research and their 2 employees. One employee is named Amy, has no tan even though she's in Hawaii, and has no past. The other employee's name is Preston Applebaum, but he calls himself Pelekekona or "Kona", and he talks like this ( an actual excerpt is the only way to describe):

"Some rippin' sets North Shore, they be callin' to me this morning." The kid shrugged. What could he do? Rippin' sets had called to him.
Nate squinted at the surfer, realizing that the kid was speaking some mix of Rasta talk, pidgin, surfspeak and....well, bullshit. "Stop talking that way, or you're fired right now."
"So you the ichiban big whale kahuna, like Clay say, hey?"
"Yeah," Nate said. "I'm the number-one whale kahuna. You're fired."
"Bummah, mon," The kid said. He shrugged again, turned , and started toward the door. "Jah's love to ye, brah. Cool runnings," he sang over his shoulder.

I think the plot is really funny too, but I'm not going to share much because there are a lot of surprises. It's sort of a mystery. Kinda. Also, just a warning--this book starts out fairly realistic and then become more and more fantastic as it goes on. This is fiction that believes in being fiction.

Stephanie Plum #12

2006-06-27T11:42:00.000-07:00

Yeah, there is a new Stephanie Plum novel. She is the crazy 30ish female bounty hunter. Very fun reads. #12 is called Twelve Sharp by Janet Evanovich. It is really good so far. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0312349483/sr=8-1/qid=1151433454/ref=pd_bbs_1/002-1343251-9869657?ie=UTF8http://

Also on audio I've been doing Robert Parker, the ones with the private eye named Spencer. They are fun in the car.

I listened to A Wrinkle in Time, Madeline L 'Engle, which I hadn't read for a coon's age and it was still good!

Almost out the door!

2006-06-27T08:41:00.000-07:00

I'm leaving for vacation on Saturday (to Mexico), so I had to go fess up at the library and pay my fine in order to get more books.

I checked out Sixpence House (AGAIN), maybe this time I will actually be able to read it before the fines start. And, I also got the Short Stories by Gwyn Thomas (recommended by Max) and Our Hearts Were Young and Gay (recommended by AJ, a long time ago - pre-blog).

If I have a chance to get to a different library, I may be able to get the second book in the Hitchhiker series - although I'm concerned that my reading voice will not be nearly as funny as hearing Stephen Fry read the first book.

On the plans for the vacation, the boyfriend is going to take me to an English language bookstore. So, I don't have to worry about running out of books this time. Last vacation, I got a cold and was laying on the couch reading much more than I had anticipated.

I did read a few books recently and haven't posted anything about them. Mom & Dad came to visit and left me a stack of books. I tore through Oaxaca Journal (by the guy who wrote The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat), English as a Second Language (I can't remember the author, but it's about a girl who goes to England for a master's degree - fairly fluffy, but entertaining.)

Also a co-worker lent me the new Amy Tan book Saving Fish From Drowning. It was good, but I'm not sure I liked it as much as the others. I was annoyed by a few holes in the plot.

Have a great 4th!

d

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

2006-06-26T20:32:00.000-07:00

just finished this one, thanks to amanda for sending it to me in my birthday/christmas present. i liked it, but it has a want to send readers away confused. it's at the parkinson's now, ready for cali or jeremy, whomever gets it first.

Sleeping with Schubert--Not just for music nerds!

2006-06-26T19:20:00.000-07:00

This is a fun read. (it was a great beach book!) It reminded my a little of that movie with Lilly Tomlin and Steve Martin where they share a body--what was it called? Anyway, this girl has to share a body with Schubert. The steamy title is a little misleading, since she does EVERYTHING with Schubert after he "shows up". Here is an excerpt from the first chapter where she realizes something is wrong. It starts with her listening to the pianist at Nordstrom department store.

"I tried to walk away but his playing attracted me like a spectator to an Amtrak wreck. Occasional missed notes hit my body like flying glass. I outplayed him in my head, summoning the music's original beauty. When he left for his break, I calmly took his place on the piano bench and began to play.
Through all my grad-school piano lessons I'd only gotten good enough to recognize the skill in others. Suddenly I became an other. I was not like a lifeless puppet, nor a remote-control robot. All the movement came from inside. Muscles flexed, fingers moved, and my mind was filled with a comprehension I had no right to possess. I vibrated like a tuning fork as the music flowed outward. Visions slid in and out of focus. My brain engaged in a psychic tug-of-war with an unseen opponent.
It was a lovely piece I played, one I'm sure I never head before but which felt like an old friend...(chunk taken out here to save space)...When I stopped, the world of Nordstrom fell in on me again. The response to my music was, like, totally Californian. Most of the shoppers shopped on, unscathed by a miracle...(another sloppy editing job, sorry)...
"Hey, lady, how'd you do that?" I turned to see an adolescent boy in trendy, cool-kid clothes. He stared at me, stunned, as if he'd just discovered fire.
"I don't know," I answered. Then the world grew dark, the ocean rushed through my ears, and I gratefully passed out.

I love this excerpt because it was always my dream to sit down at the piano and have it miraculously sound good without having to practice first. After reading the rest of the book I changed my mind. Practice sounds easier than having a musical genius borrow your body.

wasting time

2006-05-22T05:56:00.000-07:00

so...it's finals time for me, so I checked out books I wanted to read from the library instead of studying.

This past week I read Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham, I picked it up randomly from the british fiction section, it was not overly amazing but a nice way to waste some time. It basically follows a guy's life, trying to decide what he's going to do for a career and his mistakes with women. the basic theme is that he keeps waiting for his life to start, not even realizing when he's actually happy. he falls in love with this woman who's no good and then he really annoyed me cause he acted like an idiot over this girl. but hey. I did enjoy it.

I obviously didn't get enough science in my life this semester, cause I also read The Double Helix, Watson's account of the discovery of the structure of DNA, which I would actually recommend as it's good and you don't actually need to know anything about complicated science or anything to read it and enjoy it I think... there's a bit of suspense, cause he's racing Pauling to discover (though of course I knew who won so there's that) and Watson was really young when he was doing this work, so a lot of the book is like "I had this great new idea of what to try, but there was a party and I thought there might be girls there so I got drunk instead". it was also a bit anticlimatic, but it is definitely an accurate portrayal of scientific research sometimes.

however, now I have to go back to reading books about british social policy and the history of Wales. see you soonish

Blue Like Jazz

2006-05-21T14:35:00.000-07:00

This is not typical Christian literature. He calls himself a "realist" and basically just writes about his day to day life. He also challenges a lot of fundamentalist Christian behavior (which should be challenged) and makes it plain that he thinks liberals can be Christians too (an idea very close to my heart). He also says things that a normal "Christian writer" wouldn't say, like that Powell's bookstore is a church for him, and that he gets "fed" at Reed University which is one of the most anti-Christian campuses in the US. I really identified with the way he wanted to apologize for a lot of so called "Christian" behavior that has not been very Christian at all. Also I loved his passion for Christ and his sense of social responsibility to LOVE. Anyway, I recommend this to anybody who is curious about a new, loving kind of Christian movement. Besides being very insightful it is just a good read. Here is a funny passage I liked:
"Here's a tip I've never used: I understand you can learn a great deal about girldom by reading Pride and Predjudice, and I own a copy, but have never read it. I tried. It was given to me by a girl with a little note inside that read: What is in this book is the heart of a woman. I am sure the heart of a woman is pure and lovely, but the first chapter of said heart is hopelessly boring. Nobody dies at all. I keep the book on my shelf because girls come into my room, sit on my couch and eye the books on the adjacent shelf. You have a copy of Pride and Prejudice, they exclaim in a gentle sigh and smile. Yes, I say. Yes I do."

Mr. Vertigo

2006-05-18T08:47:00.000-07:00

I just finished reading this book last night. It was a quick read and quite entertaining. The story is told by a man recalling his childhood/life as Walt the Boy Wonder. A boy who could fly. It is a very nice combination of magical realism and historical fiction set in the 1920s-40s.

Mr. Vertigo was recommended to me by Adrian and he thought I would enjoy it because the boy is a huge Cardinals fan. So, periodically he will discuss Rogers Hornsby or Dizzy Dean. It is a very fun book, with enough plot twists and a quick pace to keep the reader very interested.

I think AJ & BJ should read this. (Well, the rest of you should read it also.)

New York Times Travel Section

2006-05-15T10:51:00.000-07:00

Sunday's Travel section of the NY Times has an article about the Hay-on-Wye bookfair.

enjoy!

d

A Long Way Down

2006-05-06T08:44:00.000-07:00

This is the newest Hornby I think. It was not as good as About a Boy or High Fidelity, but it was much better than How to be Good which was terrible. This one was about four REALLY different people who end up spending a lot of time together. I was going to say they end up being friends but that's not quite right. They have a very strange relationship. The only thing they have in common is that they all tried to commit suicide on the same night (New Year's Eve). The best thing about this book is the way Hornby kept making fun of me as the reader because he knew that I wanted a happy ending where everything wraps up nicely. I would quote something along those lines except that Jeremy just took the stack of library books back to the library, so you will just have to read it to know what I mean.

The Glass Castle

2006-04-21T09:07:00.000-07:00

This is a true story but it doesn't read like one. Makes my childhood experiences seem pretty hum-drum. I really liked this memoir because it didn't play up some horrible, life changing experience and then blame everything afterward on that event. It was more about the general experience of growing up in a family with parents who refuse to provide for their children, and what the kids learned about survival. They were incredibly resourceful and creative. One of my favorite lines:
"A couple of weeks earlier, Miss Page had gotten the ax when the principal caught her toting a loaded rifle down the school hall. Miss Page said all she wanted to do was motivate her students to do their homework."
Also, I thought this passage was sort of the thesis statement of the book:
"One day Professor Fuchs asked if homelessness was the result of drug abuse and misguided entitlement programs, as the conservatives claimed, or did it occur, as the liberals argued, because of cuts in the social-service programs and the failure to create economic opportunity for the poor? Professor Fuchs called on me.
I hesitated. "Sometimes, I think, it's neither."
"Can you explain yourself?"
"I think that maybe sometimes people get the lives they want."
"Are you saying homeless people want to live on the street?" Professor Fuchs asked. "Are you saying they don't want warm beds and roofs over their heads?"
"Not exactly," I said. I was fumbling for words. "They do. But if some of them were willing to work hard and make compromises, they might not have ideal lives, but they could make ends meet."
Professor Fuchs walked around from behind her lectern. "what do you know abou the lives of the underpriviledged?" she asked. She was practically trembling with agitation. "What do you know about the hardships and obstacles that the underclas faces?"
The other students were staring at me.
"You have a point," I said."
That was a long excerpt. Anyway, my point is that this book is a first person perspective on poverty and it is really interesting.

The Jane Austen Book Club

2006-04-18T15:28:00.000-07:00

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0452286530/ref=pd_lpo_k2a_1_txt/002-0757692-9758466?%5Fencoding=UTF8

Here is the link to Amazon's listing of 'The Jane Austen Book Club', which I just finished. If you haven't read the Austens it will just be a quick, shallow read for you. For those who have, the Austen mimicry in the book club members' storylines is there to consider.

AJ

lots of catching up

2006-04-18T06:02:00.000-07:00

so i'm reading mostly heavy stuff right now. i'm most of the way through How the Irish Saved Civilization, and i'm 1/4 the way in to Collapse: How Societys Choose to Succeed or Fail. but i have read fun stuff lately; the five books of the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, and my favorite book of the past year: the Cobra in the Barn, a collection of true stories of people finding old/valuable cars by chance because their owners had forgotten about them.
--bj

Small Island

2006-04-18T05:53:00.000-07:00

This is a really well written book. It is written from four different people's perspectives during WWII in England, Jamaica and India. One of my favorite passages is written from one of the Jamaican character's perspectives:
"But for my I had just one question - let me ask the Mother Country just this one simple question: how come England did not know me?...It was inconceivable taht we Jamaicans, we West Indians, we members of the British Empire would not fly to the Mother Country's defence when there was threat. But, tell me, if Jamaica was in trouble, is there any major, any general, any sergeant who would have been able to find that dear island? Give me a map, let me see if Tommy Atkins or Lady Havealot can point to Jamaica. Let us watch them turning the page round, screwing up their eyes to look, turning it over to see if perhaps the region was lost on the back, before shrugging defeat. But give me that map, blindfold me, spin me round three times and I, dizzy and dazed, would still place my finger squarely on the Mother Country."
Entertaining and a very different perspective of England.

Long Time No See

2006-04-18T05:42:00.000-07:00

So I have finally found some time to read again. I've finished several of my final projects so things are starting to wrap up. If you want to see what I've been doing you can visit my portfolio. Not all of it works yet, mostly because I already got a job so it has not been a priority. However, most of it should work within the next month. Anyway, I should be posting more now that grad school is letting me have a little more time for other things.

New Books and the dangers of the Public Library

2006-04-14T16:44:00.000-07:00

I received an e-mail from grandma yesterday advising me to get a book called "Castles in the Air" about a woman and her husband/boyfriend/fiance/something who move into a dilapidated castle in Northern Wales. I found it at the lib, but on the way through the stacks I spotted 2 other books on my new booklist!

So, I also picked up "Stolen Figs: And other adventures in Calabria" by Mark Rotella and "Sixpence House: Lost in a Town of Books" by Paul Collins.

I have high hopes for "Sixpence House" as it is about a family who move to Hay-on-Wye.

I'm almost done listening to "Don't Get Too Comfortable", which Cali recommended below. It's pretty funny. I also recommend it.

I've decided, in order to read all my books in time to get them back to the library before the late fees begin accruing, I will just have to stop unpacking and cleaning my new apartment.

I finished the "Flame Trees of Thika", but I did so under the pressure of moving and mounting library fines, so I can't really say that it was a relaxing or enjoyable process. I still recommend the book, though.

Enjoy the weekend!

Sad, Sad Me

2006-04-03T12:44:00.000-07:00

This is just to apologize for not posting in a loooong time. I haven't been able to read much because I am trying to graduate on time. It really stinks too because Jeremy has been sick and so he's been reading non-stop. He's always wandering into the office saying "I just finished another book!" or "Boy was that a good one!". Hmph. So anyway, you all will have to pick up the slack for me for the next few weeks.

ok ok here's the list

2006-03-17T08:36:00.000-08:00

ok so as I have read tons of books by welsh authors this term and people have been asking me for the list, here goes.
Country Dance by Margiad Evans
The Small Mine by Menna Gallie
Cwmardy by Lewis Jones
Dat's Love by Leonora Brito
The Island of Apples by Glyn Jones
Sheepshagger by Niall Griffiths
My People by Caradoc Evans
Selected Short Stories by Gwyn Thomas
I've also read a bunch of history and sociology stuff, most interesting strangely enough was The History of Sport in Wales. I forget the author's name, which is probably bad as it was written by my lecturer...anyway as regards to the fiction books I listed above, my favorites were the Gwyn Thomas stories and the Lewis Jones book. Lewis Jones basically was trying to convert everyone to socialism, but actually ended up writing a pretty good book. Everyone in my class was expecting much worse. My People is kind of a stereotypical look at Welsh culture in the early 1900s, negative, though interesting. Sheepshagger was really kind of disturbing and gross so I don't actually know if I'd recommend it or not; it was good in that I was interested in it while I was reading it but afterwards I was really tired and creeped out. Ummm the Island of Apples is a magic realism book about a boy, it's kind of what is considered a typical Welsh novel. The Small Mine I also really liked, it's basically an industrial novel about the death of a miner. Country Dance was also good, small though so it won't fill time if that's what you're looking for. Dat's Love was not all that remarkable but I think maybe I tried to read it too fast; it looks at Welsh life from a different perspective than most of the other books but I do think it's accurate. Well I think that's a fairly complete list, eh? They're all good books in that they're well-written, but the subject matter is very diverse and they have different opinions about Wales which is of course what I've been studying.

Max's Reccomendations

2006-03-17T07:25:00.000-08:00

Max has apparently been reading tons of Welsh stuff and sharing with Grandma but nobody else. I haven't been able to keep up but she did e-mail me today....

"you should read some Gwyn Thomas I think; he's a comedian from the 60s, I think he's funny and he was really famous for a while so you might actually be able to find his stuff. maybe. some of these books are rather obscure so I don't know how feasible it would be for you to find them. He's funny in a dark sort of way at times but i did actually laugh out loud at some of his short stories."

So this is really from Max.

I Need More to Read!

2006-03-14T19:48:00.000-08:00

S is for Silence

Great book, another Grafton mystery. I am listening to it right now and can hardly wait to get back to the gym to get on the eliptical and put on the headphones. So, if I want to excersize it has got to be a great read. I'm sure it is not going to expand my mind nearly as much as anything A.J. is reading, but, who wants to expand their mind when they are sweating?

Other books I'm reading include the 2nd in the Paddington Bear series. We are getting through these quickly since I turned off satilite TV during Lent. Stella has made me read so many chapters a day of Paddington, she doesn't like for us to say "Paddington Bear" only "Paddington", that my throat is sometimes scratchy. Of course he is always doing something terrible which reminds me of Stella!

You don't want to read what I'm reading

2006-03-14T13:33:00.000-08:00

I just thought I'd say hello and thanks to Cali for setting up the blog. I just checked out three books from the law library on what law school is like, and I doubt you want to read those, although on her 'vacation' here this week, Mom managed to get through two of them. Paul, any reading recommendations for a person thinking about going into Tax Law? Please don't say the U.S. Tax Code. ;-P
I would offer my recent reads as suggestions, but I have a feeling no one will find them very interesting. I recently read a couple more Paul Theroux books - he is a long-time travel author who became famous for his books about travelling by train (in Asia and down the Americas)...he also does fiction. I am in the middle of The Black Sheep by Honore de Balzac. This is my second book of his and I am enjoying his wry commentary on the maneuvering of the French after the Revolution to advance their political/social status. I am also slowly trudging through Schindler's List, and I wonder WHY this ever became such a hit?? The story is important, of course, but the way it is written is confusing and tedious! Finally, I picked up 'Avoiding Prison and other Noble Vacation Goals' at the used bookstore the other day...this young woman has a quirky sense of humor that is getting me through the book, but her idiotic tendency to fall in love with guys in or just about to be in prison in Central American countries is kind of exasperating.
So, to conclude, you don't want to read what I'm reading.
(But I thought I would let you know, in case you wondered why I hadn't posted anything.)

Leah's Recommendation: Amelia Peabody

2006-03-13T17:47:00.000-08:00

These are great. Turns out curse of the Pharoh isn't the first though. I started reading it and there were a lot of references to past adventures so I got suspicious. Crocodile on the Sandbank is the first although both books have been realy fun. What a great feminist heroine! Thanks Leah.

Anonymous Rex

2006-03-13T17:33:00.000-08:00

Ok, Ok. I just picked this one up on a whim, I know it looks dumb. But it was great! A perfect spring break kind of book. Sort of a noir spin where dinosaurs walk among us as human imposters. The main character is a Rapter disguised as a human running a failing private investigation office. A lot of the detective work is done through a strong sense of smell. At first I thought it was too much, but then I was grateful for the twist to what would of otherwise been a pretty regular PI in LA kind of book.

Don't Get Too Comfortable

2006-03-06T06:48:00.000-08:00

This is what I am currently reading and it is hilarious. I almost avoided it because David Rakoff is a "new york writer" which is something I normally avoid like the plague. You know, the back of their books usually have words like "psychological" on them. But then I read the inside cover and it turns out he writes for This American Life which is my favorite. Also, he turns out to be very similar to me (except that I'm not male, gay or a new yorker). This is the excerpt which I totally identified with:
"Like most people, I like to think of myself as being spontaneous, ready for anything, fun. This is the evening's second hard-won insight: I am neither spontaneous nor ready for anything. I suspect that others would probably regard this news as about as momentous and surprising as when I decided to come out (which was about as momentous and surprising as if I had bravely announced to everyone that I had dark hair and opposable thumbs). I am no fun at all. In fact, I am anti-fun. Not as in anti-violence, but as in anti-matter. I am not so much against fun--although I suppose I kind of am--as I am the direct opposite of fun. I suck the fun out of a room. Or perhaps I'm just a different kind of fun; the kind that leaves one bereft of hope; the kind of fun that ends in tears."
I read this this weekend instead of going out. You may see what I mean.

Recent Reads/Listens

2006-03-03T16:18:00.000-08:00

Well I finished the Hitchhiker as read by Stephen Fry in 2 nights. It was addictive. He does some excellent alien voices, I wonder if they can get him to read the rest of the series.

I also finished the Mangoes book. Also very good and I had to go buy some fish this week - still no leftover papaya...

I also checked out "More Book Lust." Cali, if you haven't read "Book Lust" you should go to the lib and get it. It's an annotated bibliography of books to read and it's written by a former public librarian. I found "More Book Lust" in an odd part of the library - I think people may pull it from the shelf and flip through it, go find something else and leave the it behind.

Next it's on to "The Flame Trees of Thika: Memories of an African Childhood" by Elspeth Huxley. I'll let you know how it goes.

Have a great weekend!

d