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Book a week in 2010 - Week 42


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Sunday is the start of book week 42 and the quest to read 52 books in 52 weeks. Have you started Book # 42 yet? Mr. Linky is all set up on the 52 books blog and ready for you to link to your reviews.

 

52 books blog - O is for the Ocoee Middle School - posted video I absolutely love of whole school singing Gotta Keep Reading. I've been geeking out in San Francisco at the Bouchercon convention and will be on the road traveling home sunday. Lots of talk about when I return. Happy Sunday.

 

What are you reading this week?

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This week I finished:

 

#55 - The God I Love: A Lifetime of Walking With Jesus, by Joni Eareckson Tada. Very inspirational.

 

#56 - Sky of Stone, by Homer Hickam. This is the third book in the Coalwood Boys trilogy, which I seem to be reading backwards! A page-turner! This man can write! Keeps you glued to the story, which is all-the-more absorbing since it is true.

 

Am currently re-reading a book I read long years ago:

 

#57 - Seventeen, by Booth Tarkington

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Read Bittersweet last week. Lots of good points from a "Seeker Sensitive" pov. I was a bit shocked at how secular this writer (dd of Bill Hybels) is. I haven't had time to write a review yet, but plan to soon.

Also started Leap of Faith about Charles and Emma Darwin. My intersest was piqued at a Darwin reinactment I took a group to last year for our Bio class. Elementary writing (I think it's Juv non-fiction) but lots of info.

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I'm in the middle (almost) of Drood by Dan Simmons. I'm really enjoying this book---it's a jumble of genres-- horror, suspense, historical fiction. Fascinating!

 

This makes it sound like something I might like.... I might have to check this one out.

 

I'm still working on C. So far, I love it. I find Tom McCarthy's writing just beautiful. He has such a wonderful way of describing a scene. It's a bit hard to classify, overall, but I'm enjoying the tale, wondering where it will take me...

 

 

From Booklist

 

 

"McCarthy (Remainder, 2007) takes readers on a literary roller-coaster ride that virtually hums and crackles. Serge Carrefax never could get the hang of perspective, but he’s preternaturally attuned to the radio waves studied by his inventive father. Born with a caul at the turn of the twentieth century, he receives preoccupied parenting on his family’s English estate, bonding most closely with brilliant older sister Sophie, who dies young and is buried in the family Crypt Park. During the Great War, he functions essentially as a finely tuned instrument, outliving most of his squadron and narrowly escaping execution, then is pulled from druggy postwar doldrums by a posting to Egypt to find a transmitter site amidst burial chambers. Like the filaments of silk woven on the Carrefax estate, themes stretch and intertwine in abundance throughout this novel, among them the meaning of the title itself: the protagonist’s surname, the titles of the novel’s four sections, a major motif, the symbol for the basic element of life, all of these? A marvelously inventive novel, swept along by the sheer energy of its prose."

Books I've read in 2010: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time; Good Omens; The Palace of Dreams; Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World; Lying Awake; The Remains of the Day; Iron & Silk; Lottery; The City of Dreaming Books; Half Broke Horses: A True-Life Novel; Clutter Busting: Letting Go of What's Holding You Back; The Power of Less; Stop Clutter from Stealing Your Life; The Bonesetter's Daughter; Life of Pi; Orphans Preferred: The Twisted Truth and Lasting Legend of the Pony Express; Whatever You Do, Don't Run: True Tales of a Botswana Safari Guide; Waiting for Snow in Havana; The Happiness Project; Ella Minnow Pea: A Progressively Lipogrammatic Epistolary Fable; The Dante Club; Conquering Chronic Disorganization; City of Thieves; Throw Out Fifty Things: Clear the Clutter, Find Your Life; Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen; Dead Until Dark; The Color of Magic; Fernande; Special Topics in Calamity Physics; Medicus; The Blind Contessa's New Machine; My Name is Red; The White Tiger; The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie; The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists; The Pirates! In an Adventure with Ahab; Parrot and Olivier in America; The Girl Who Played with Fire; Frankenstein; Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void; The Monsters: Mary Shelley and the Curse of Frankenstein

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Let's see.

 

Since I last posted I finished Hero of the Ages by Brandon Sanderson. Well written fantasy, but ultimately not my cuppa.

 

Also a biography of Mary Anning called The Fossil Hunters by Shelley Emling. Interesting, really, but had some really awkward writing.

 

And just about down with another Terry Pratchett book, this time Reaper Man. Good silly fun. I've been listening to it while crocheting baby toys.

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Yesterday, I finished C by Tom McCarthy. Overall, I really loved this book & relished his evocative descriptions of the time & scenery. To me, McCarthy writes like he's composing a beautiful symphony. The ending didn't quite hold up to his lovely style, imo; though the ending was apt, the writing just seemed a little 'off' (esp. in comparison to the rest of the book). Still, I enjoyed it & think it has a lot of interesting points that would make for great discussion. That said, it is not a book that will be everyone's cup of tea.

 

Last night I sifted through a big stack of library books I had & tried starting many of them, but didn't find any that really caught my interest. I guess I need to return that pile & try to find a few others....

 

Today, I read the novella Aura by Carlos Fuentes. It wasn't really my style of book, but it was creepy & chilling -- something I suppose is just right for reading in October.

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Another post from me. :tongue_smilie:

 

I've now started 2 more books.

 

No Shortcuts to the Top: Climbing the World's 14 Highest Peaks by Ed Viesturs with David Roberts:

 

 

"In the opening scene of Viesturs's memoir of his quest to become the first American to climb the 14 mountains in the world higher than 8,000 meters, he and a friend nearly get thrown off the face of K2 when they're caught in an avalanche. It's one of the few moments in the story when his life genuinely seems at risk, as his intense focus on safety is generally successful. "Getting to the top is optional," he warns. "Getting down is mandatory." That lesson comes through most forcefully when Viesturs recounts how he almost attempted to reach the summit at Everest the day before the group Jon Krakauer wrote about in Into Thin Air, but backed out because it just didn't feel right. His expertise adds a compelling eyewitness perspective to those tragic events, but the main focus is clearly on Viesturs and his self-imposed "Endeavor 8000." From his earliest climbs on the peaks of the Pacific Northwest to his final climb up the Himalayan mountain of Annapurna, Viesturs offers testimony to the sacrifices (personal and professional) in giving your life over to a dream, as well as the thrill of seeing it through."

Candide or Optimism by Voltaire, edited by Norman Torrey:

 

 

"Voltaire's Candide is a decidedly playful romp through certain parts of history, satirizing religion, philosophy, and government along the way. The title character is instructed in the concept of optimism, which through the course of the short novel, he finds unraveling about him. When first published, the novel was banned, but it has enjoyed a long life due to its scathing satire on society and the world."

 

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I read and enjoyed Spy Glass by Maria Snyder. This is the third book in a fantasy series and shares characters with her previous trilogy.

 

I also finished Cal Newport's How to Be a High School Superstar: A Revolutionary Plan to Get into College by Standing Out (Without Burning Out). This was an interesting book which I would recommend to those who have high schoolers or upcoming high schoolers.

 

Regards,

Kareni

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Another post from me. :tongue_smilie:

 

Candide or Optimism by Voltaire, edited by Norman Torrey:

 

 

"Voltaire's Candide is a decidedly playful romp through certain parts of history, satirizing religion, philosophy, and government along the way. The title character is instructed in the concept of optimism, which through the course of the short novel, he finds unraveling about him. When first published, the novel was banned, but it has enjoyed a long life due to its scathing satire on society and the world."

 

 

I was just talking about Voltaire's Candide with my daughter. I have never read it, and have decided she and I will read it together sometime this school year.

 

What do you think of it so far?

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I was just talking about Voltaire's Candide with my daughter. I have never read it, and have decided she and I will read it together sometime this school year.

 

What do you think of it so far?

 

I started reading it because I found my old copy from college & remembered enjoying it back then, lol. It probably helped to have my notes in it, etc.... It's good. (I've stalled out on it, not because I don't enjoy it, but because life is intruding at this point.)

 

Definitely would be great for school reading & discussion.

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