Book a Week in 2015 - Happy New Year

[Stacia]

re: Book of Chameleons

 

OK, I'm done with the chameleon / gecko now, and I agree with you: it is, indeed, lovely.

 

Definitely weird as well... I'm not sure I'd quite label it 'magical realism' since, other than the, er, peculiarities of the narrator, the rest of the action is more or less of this world (I agree with your comparison of Death narrating Book Thief)... but it's a looping, loping meditation on the fluidity of memory and identity and history, and shifting forms of "knowledge"... I don't think it's a spolier to say that its original title in Portuguese was O vendedor de passados, the vendor of pasts, and that the idea that the past is less solid or factual that we think, is central to it...

 

I've put Renditions on my list; thank you...

 

So glad to hear you enjoyed it, Pam. And, I agree that it's not a spoiler to give the definition of the title in Portuguese. I think it's also interesting given the context of location & the reality or unreality of the past. A lovely book.

 

A couple of my favorite quotes from it...

“So what do you think, Félix -- it is more important to bear witness to beauty, or to denounce horror?â€

 

and

“He takes a deep breath, and opens the door. In my other life I used to know people like that -- they're frightened by the sound of wind through the leaves, they can't bear cockroaches, not to mention policemen, lawyers, even dentists. And yet when the dragon bursts into the clearing, opens its mouth and spits fire, they stand up to them. Calm, cool as an angel.â€

 

I just love the image of that last quote & especially in the way it related (more than once) to the story itself. I guess the image of an everyday hero appeals to me, someone who will do the right thing or the needed thing in face of danger or personal distress.

 

I don't reread books often, yet I'm already considering rereading this one even though I read it just last year. It truly has earned a place on my very favorite books list.

[shukriyya]

LOL! I've done that before. I go back and fix my post, but someone has already quoted me and it's there for all to see. Want me to fix the quote I made?

 

Nah, it's ok. A good reminder of one's humanity :lol:

[Maela]

Can I join?  I'm new to this, but all last year I was envious of you all, reading so much.  :)  

 

I have a difficult time finishing books (well, nonfiction anyway).  I have a huge problem with getting interested in a certain topic, checking out 20 books about it, and reading just a few pages of each.  Then the books are overdue, I pay a lot of fines...  I even do this with some fiction.  However, if I have a goal of an average of one book a week, maybe that'll help me stick to it and finish?  

 

I'm probably not going to do any of the challenges.  My only goal is to read about a book a week, I guess.

 

Right now I'm working on:

• So Many Books, So Little Time: A Year of Passionate Reading by Sara Nelson:  I bought this one from a used bookstore purely for the title.  :)
• The Magic of Reality: How We Know What's Really True by Richard Dawkins
• Cleaning House: A Mom's 12-Month Experiment to Rid Her Home of Youth Entitlement by Kay Wills Wyma
• La Casa de los Espíritus by Isabel Allende:  My first adult novel in Spanish!  This one is going to take a LONG time.  According to my kindle, I'm 13% of the way through.
• Keep Calm and Parent On: A Guilt-free Approach to Raising Children by Asking More from Them and Doing Less by Emma Jenner

I am not going to allow myself to start a new book until at least three of these are finished!  I reeeeaallly hope I can stick with you guys!

 

Please let me know if I'm not doing this right.

[Stacia]

it's a looping, loping meditation on the fluidity of memory and identity and history, and shifting forms of "knowledge"... I don't think it's a spolier to say that its original title in Portuguese was O vendedor de passados, the vendor of pasts, and that the idea that the past is less solid or factual that we think, is central to it...

 

If you're ever in the mood for a similar topic, I'd highly recommend All Men Are Liars by Alberto Manguel. Another book I loved. Plus, it has awesome cover art.

 

 

In this gorgeously imagined novel, a journalist interviews those who knew—or thought they knew—Alejandro Bevilacqua, a brilliant, infuriatingly elusive South American writer and author of the masterpiece, In Praise of Lying. But the accounts of those in his circle of friends, lovers, and enemies become increasingly contradictory, murky, and suspect. Is everyone lying, or just telling their own subjective version of the truth? As the literary investigation unfolds and a chorus of Bevilacqua’s peers piece together the fractured reality of his life, thirty years after his death, only the reader holds the power of final judgment.

 

In All Men Are Liars, Alberto Manguel pays homage to literature’s inventions and explores whether we can ever truly know someone, and the question of how, by whom, and for what, we ourselves will be remembered.

 

[Stacia]

Can I join?  I'm new to this, but all last year I was envious of you all, reading so much.   :)

 

I have a difficult time finishing books (well, nonfiction anyway).  I have a huge problem with getting interested in a certain topic, checking out 20 books about it, and reading just a few pages of each.  Then the books are overdue, I pay a lot of fines...  I even do this with some fiction.  However, if I have a goal of an average of one book a week, maybe that'll help me stick to it and finish?  

 

I'm probably not going to do any of the challenges.  My only goal is to read about a book a week, I guess.

 

Right now I'm working on:

• So Many Books, So Little Time: A Year of Passionate Reading by Sara Nelson:  I bought this one from a used bookstore purely for the title.   :)
• The Magic of Reality: How We Know What's Really True by Richard Dawkins
• Cleaning House: A Mom's 12-Month Experiment to Rid Her Home of Youth Entitlement by Kay Wills Wyma
• La Casa de los Espíritus by Isabel Allende:  My first adult novel in Spanish!  This one is going to take a LONG time.  According to my kindle, I'm 13% of the way through.
• Keep Calm and Parent On: A Guilt-free Approach to Raising Children by Asking More from Them and Doing Less by Emma Jenner

I am not going to allow myself to start a new book until at least three of these are finished!  I reeeeaallly hope I can stick with you guys!

 

Please let me know if I'm not doing this right.

 

Welcome! You're doing it right!

 

Here's some incentive too. I really want to hear your review of Cleaning House. It's on my to-read list (but I guess I'd better hurry and read it since my dc are already teens :lol: ). So, please read it & let me know what you think about it. :)

 

[shukriyya]

Just for the record: though Chameleons was weird, I ended up liking it very much.

 

Mr Fox was just TOO weird.  No ground beneath my feet.  No narrative that I could hang on to, or sufficient consistency in the characters that I felt a pull to invest myself in what happened to them.  In fact at this very moment I do not remember what did happen to them, lol...

 

Yet as I recall, shukriyya, you were among the most avid on Team Night Circus?  Which I couldn't stand.

 

Really, you couldn't stand it? And yet it was among my top five. Coolio.

 

I wonder does that mean, anything you read I won't like and vice versa? Same goes for you, Stacia. I must say that a lot of you BaWers, from 2014 at least, consistently choose books that aren't my cup of tea and yet...I love you ladies :001_wub: You all have enriched my life immeasurably. It would be nice to have a few books where our inclinations and tastes intersect but perhaps the point is the love of books themselves.

 

[shukriyya]

I think so. I'm not sure you'll like Murakami at all. But, I think that if you do want to try him, Kafka on the Shore may be a good one for you, partially because of the Oedipus Rex theme in it.

 

But, I'm not sure he's your cup of tea. If you're looking for a little bit of magical realism/surrealism, I think you'd much more enjoy Mr. Fox by Helen Oyeyemi or the talking chameleon book that Pam thinks is weird. ;) :lol:  If you want to do a Murakami & you're wary of Kafka on the Shore, perhaps Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage may be more your speed...?

 

 

Okay, well I'm not feeling a huge pull towards Murakami given what I'm reading between the lines as, Shukriyya probably isn't gonna be too keen on this. Mr. Fox, however, which you all raved about last year with its beautiful cover(s) and lovely-sounding story is one that I can see perhaps liking. Not that I need anymore tbrs right now :closedeyes:

 

[Stacia]

Really, you couldn't stand it? And yet it was among my top five. Coolio.

 

I wonder does that mean anything you read I won't like and vice versa? Same goes for you Stacia. I must say that a lot of you BaWers, from 2014 at least, consistently choose books that aren't my cup of tea and yet...I love you ladies :001_wub: You all have enriched my life immeasurably. It would be nice to have a few books where our inclinations and tastes intersect but perhaps the point is the love of books themselves.

 

 

:D

 

I loved The Night Circus, fwiw. So we intersect on at least one book while Pam & I have intersected on a different book (or books).

 

Actually, shukriyya, I do think you'd love Mr. Fox & all its Reynard the Fox & Bluebeard allusions, wrapped up with Yoruba references & a feminist bent too. It's another one on my very favorites list. It's strangely wonderful & wondrous. And, like so many of the books that end up appealing to me, it has cool cover art too. :laugh:

 

 

[Stacia]

And, hey, shukriyya... we intersected on our love for A.S. Byatt's The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye.

 

I still think you would enjoy Mink River. And Galore too.

[shukriyya]

Okay, I shall put those three on my tbr list with the clear intention of reading them this year and skip our Mr. Murakami. Btw on my list this month is 'The Miracle Cures of Dr. Aira' ;)

 

I'm slogging through 'Deerskin'. Not loving it but sticking with it for now.

[*Inna*]

Is anyone interested in adopting 15 Terry Pratchett books?

Free for a good home.

[Southern Ivy]

I want to join! I just finished an easy fiction novel, but I see some of the lists already made and I think I might have to step it up a little. :) 

Do we need to have a list of books we want to read or can we just go based on suggestions on here? 

[*Inna*]

I want to join! I just finished an easy fiction novel, but I see some of the lists already made and I think I might have to step it up a little. :) 

 

Do we need to have a list of books we want to read or can we just go based on suggestions on here? 

 

I don't make any lists and only sometimes follow suggestions in this thread.

Now I feel like a rebel. :leaving:

[idnib]

idnib, I've seen reviews of that Japanese decluttering book.  It looks kind of fascinating, in a nutty sort of way.  Is it helping you actually declutter?

 

 

 

That's exactly right--it's fascinating in a nutty sort of way.

 

I think it will help me declutter. I'll actually put it into practice this weekend. You're supposed to pull out all of one kind of item and put it in the floor before you decide "what sparks joy." I haven't had time to find all of one kind of thing and do that yet. We don't have a lot of extra stuff as I got rid of about half of our stuff last time we moved. Hopefully I can get rid of more.

[idnib]

Now that I've become aware of Murakami I am seeing him everywhere. I saw 2 posters and someone reading a book just this morning going on errands. I think it is true you see things more once you become aware of them.

[JustEm]

I'm loving this author of the month challenge already. I'd never heard of murakami before so while at the library I merely picked a 2 of his books of the shelf without looking at suggestions here or reading about theplots. I'm almost done After Dark and am thoroughly enjoying his writing style. I also picked up Kafka on the Shore and will read that this month as well.

[mumto2]

Shukriyya -- I was busy taking a walk on a nature reserve and having dinner out when the subject of you reading Kafka on the Shore came up. Oddly while reading it I keep thinking of you because the book keeps drawing parallels between what is happening to the characters, re: spirit leaving body while living and traveling to another body, and Tales of a Genjihttps://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7042.The_Tale_of_Genjiwhich I believe is a favourite of yours. Just saying...... ;)

[Dicentra]

Who asked about whether Timothy Findley was worth reading? This thread is so packed I can't keep up plus the lack of multi-quoting, as we've all bemoaned, is another factor in keeping track of responses.

 

Anyway I read The Wars in university and I was deeply moved by it. It stayed with me for a long time. And despite the fact that it's a grim book about the realities of the front lines of war I recall it being quite beautiful in parts. Looking at the description for it now it's not a book I would be moved to read so context played a huge part in my enjoyment of it. I've become such a...lightweight in what I'm able to tolerate now. Or maybe it's just this season in my life. I'm so impressed by the breadth of aperture some of you have for taking in materlal. Jane, Stacia and Pam and Eliana might like this book.

 

Not Wanted on the Voyage is another that I think would appeal to some folks here. I found this first review topical in light of our recent Margaret Atwood discussion. Its opening paragraph echoes my own thoughts...

 

"It's one of my greatest frustrations that Canadian Literature has become almost synonymous with the name "Margaret Atwood." Every reading list that I've ever seen about Canadian Lit has been dominated by Atwood: "The Handmaid's Tale", "Alias Grace", "Oryx and Crake", etc. It's not that there's anything wrong with enjoying Atwood, (although I can't name many people that do), it's just that her work offers a very limited scope on what Canadian literature is all about."

 

I haven't read 'The Handmaid's Tale' and don't feel moved to do so now though I did try at one point. The MA I've read is all much earlier---Surfacing, Lady Oracle, Wilderness Tips, The Edible Woman, Cat's Eye. I enjoyed all of them immensely but don't feel moved to revisit them at this point.

 

Stacia, was 'Kafka on the Shore' the one you though I *might* like? I looked at a synopsis...hmm.

 

That was me. :)  I was thinking that he might be a good Canadian author for folks to try out.  A Canadian author who isn't Ms. Atwood, that is. ;)

[shukriyya]

Shukriyya -- I was busy taking a walk on a nature reserve and having dinner out when the subject of you reading Kafka on the Shore came up. Oddly while reading it I keep thinking of you because the book keeps drawing parallels between what is happening to the characters, re: spirit leaving body while living and traveling to another body, and Tales of a Genjihttps://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7042.The_Tale_of_Genjiwhich I believe is a favourite of yours. Just saying...... ;)

 

How am I to interpret this, I wonder? As a gentle nudge from the universe to put 'Kafka on the Shore' back on my tbr list? As an 'aw shucks' feeling of gratitude towards mumto2 thinking of me while she's out in nature and eating well? As the widening sky of generosity opening and closing beneath my feet at this lovely example of literary interdependence? Hmm, I'll be greedy and take all three interpretations leaving a seat at the table for any others who care to unfold themselves into my awareness.

[Robin M]

I want to join! I just finished an easy fiction novel, but I see some of the lists already made and I think I might have to step it up a little. :)

 

Do we need to have a list of books we want to read or can we just go based on suggestions on here?

you don't have to have a list, unless you want to make one. Depends on your reading style. Do you usually grab a book from the stacks randomly or have books you read when you are in the mood. Many of the gals create wish lists of books from the suggestions that sound interesting to them. Read what you want or dip your toes in with an author you normally wouldn't read, such as Murakimi. Have fun exploring different genres. There is no wrong way to do this. Glad you are diving in.

[Maela]

Can I join?  I'm new to this, but all last year I was envious of you all, reading so much.   :)

 

I have a difficult time finishing books (well, nonfiction anyway).  I have a huge problem with getting interested in a certain topic, checking out 20 books about it, and reading just a few pages of each.  Then the books are overdue, I pay a lot of fines...  I even do this with some fiction.  However, if I have a goal of an average of one book a week, maybe that'll help me stick to it and finish?  

 

I'm probably not going to do any of the challenges.  My only goal is to read about a book a week, I guess.

 

Right now I'm working on:

• So Many Books, So Little Time: A Year of Passionate Reading by Sara Nelson:  I bought this one from a used bookstore purely for the title.   :)
• The Magic of Reality: How We Know What's Really True by Richard Dawkins
• Cleaning House: A Mom's 12-Month Experiment to Rid Her Home of Youth Entitlement by Kay Wills Wyma
• La Casa de los Espíritus by Isabel Allende:  My first adult novel in Spanish!  This one is going to take a LONG time.  According to my kindle, I'm 13% of the way through.
• Keep Calm and Parent On: A Guilt-free Approach to Raising Children by Asking More from Them and Doing Less by Emma Jenner

I am not going to allow myself to start a new book until at least three of these are finished!  I reeeeaallly hope I can stick with you guys!

 

Please let me know if I'm not doing this right.

Forgot to add:

• Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown  I'm still at the beginning, but it seems to be about cutting out the unnecessary in life (not just stuff) and focusing on only a few things.  (which I need because although I'm a minimalist in most things, I'm obviously not in my reading habits)
• And I know I said I wasn't going to add anymore to my list until after I finished a few  :001_rolleyes:, but now I really want to add The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up.  

No more!  I need to stop reading the recommendations in this thread.

[mumto2]

Okay, now I'm confused! Falling leeches???

 

 

 

Quick search inside on Amazon.......you are ahead of me in the book :lol: .

 

 

 

 

Which just proves that something that is making me go :ack2: and :blink: and :willy_nilly: , isn't registering for others.

 

 

Still love you, mumto2! :D

Tress, Since I now know what made you go :ack2: I have to admit to agreeing. I skimmed that part sort of instinctively and put it out of my mind. I have been busy waiting for a scene that I think someone mentioned on another of our Murakami reads. They described something that my dd would definitely not want to read. While she wouldn't be happy about the :ack2: part........she could be warned to skip it. The character name is distinctive.

 

I will be honest and say I am reading this totally with her in mind. It appears on many American reading lists for high school although it isn't part of what we are planning for her. Admittedly I think Strange Library is a better one for her to try first.

[Stacia]

I will be honest and say I am reading this totally with her in mind. It appears on many American reading lists for high school although it isn't part of what we are planning for her. Admittedly I think Strange Library is a better one for her to try first.

 

Kafka on the Shore is on American high school reading lists???

 

I'm actually a little surprised.

 

ETA: In case anyone is wondering, The Strange Library is a really quick read. Like 30 minutes or less. The print is so big & there are so many pictures, it's kind of like a longer picture book but aimed for the YA/adult market, not little kids.

[Pam in CT]

(still out of likes, by the way...)

 

:D

 

I loved The Night Circus, fwiw. So we intersect on at least one book while Pam & I have intersected on a different book (or books).

 

Actually, shukriyya, I do think you'd love Mr. Fox & all its Reynard the Fox & Bluebeard allusions, wrapped up with Yoruba references & a feminist bent too. It's another one on my very favorites list. It's strangely wonderful & wondrous. And, like so many of the books that end up appealing to me, it has cool cover art too. :laugh:

 

 

 

Yes, and as I recall shukriyya and I both adored Conference of the Birds and no one else ventured anywhere near it.  

 

I do believe a holistic Venn Diagram of BAW in 2014 might well form a Zentangle.  Hop to that, visual girl...

[guilfordlake]

I finished the first chap of HotMW.  I decided to add people and events to a timeline. (The kids have a timeline on the wall for their school work but I have a timeline in a notebook that I've always wanted to use for my own education, yet never have. Now I will.  Hopefully!)

 

Also, I figured I'd add a list of the other books I'm reading.

 

Becoming Jefferson's People: Re-Inventing the American Republic in the Twenty-First Century by Clay Jenkinson. https://www.fortmandan.com/store/product.asp?productID=34 I listen to Clay's podcast almost weekly so I'm eager to read this book.

 

The Complete Tightwad Gazette by Amy Dacyczyn http://www.amazon.com/The-Complete-Tightwad-Gazette-Dacyczyn/dp/0375752250Just to keep me in thrifty mindset.

 

Home Comforts The Art & Science of Keeping House by Cheryl Mendelson http://www.amazon.com/Home-Comforts-Science-Keeping-House/dp/0743272862/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1420580375&sr=1-1&keywords=home+comforts+the+art+and+science+of+keeping+house For fun :)

 

Smart but Scattered  http://www.amazon.com/Smart-but-Scattered-Revolutionary-Executive/dp/1593854455/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1420580423&sr=1-1&keywords=smart+but+scattered Looking for ideas to help ds.

 

And Dd and I will be reading together Benjamin Franklin's The Way to Wealth for her school work.

[Pam in CT]

Maela, you're definitely doing this right.  There is no doing it wrong, though we do try to do it with style...   :laugh: 

[mumto2]

Kafka on the Shore is on American high school reading lists???

 

I'm actually a little surprised.

 

ETA: In case anyone is wondering, The Strange Library is a really quick read. Like 30 minutes or less. The print is so big & there are so many pictures, it's kind of like a longer picture book but aimed for the YA/adult market, not little kids.

Easiest way is thishttp://mseffie.com/AP/APtitles.htmlis the master list of what has appeared on the AP since we took it. :lol: I spent a boring rather paranoid day over a year ago going into every AP class that had an open website and keeping stats on the reading lists. No idea where that masterpiece is now since we moved afterward. But Kafka was one of the huge winners for the more modern lit. Atwood did really well too. Dd and I compared our plans to the list and decided she was fine. Reality is due to locations of test centers and what is being offered where, she will most likely take the other AP for English if she takes one.

[shukriyya]

(still out of likes, by the way...)

 

Yes, and as I recall shukriyya and I both adored Conference of the Birds and no one else ventured anywhere near it.  

 

Ah, you're right. And also Incarnadine, we both *loved* that. And Untold, I can't remember if you liked this one. Actually I think you did like it but felt out of your depth contextually?

 

 

I do believe a holistic Venn Diagram of BAW in 2014 might well form a Zentangle.  Hop to that, visual girl...

 

Brilliant!

[Stacia]

I do believe a holistic Venn Diagram of BAW in 2014 might well form a Zentangle.  Hop to that, visual girl...

 

:lol:  Ah, but while I appreciate (& love!) the visual, that does not mean I can create it!

 

I'm not doing the zentangle thing. I've never been into drawing. (I did, however, spend a period of time oil painting, which I loved. That was a long time ago, though.)

 

So, maybe some of you graphically-minded drawing artists on here can create a Venn-Zen(tangle) of BaW people & books? (That really would be cool.)

[prairiegirl]

 

 

I bet Thunder Cake is Patricia Pollacco!!  My IRL reading friend adores Pollacco!  She did a mini unit on her books in co-op quite a few years back!  Aly really enjoyed them.

 

Yes!!!  Patricia Polacco is the author.  I love her books as well.   Thank you, Angel!

[Mnemosyne]

Are we starting a new thread every week or is this a master thread?

[Stacia]

I think since the new year started in the middle of the week, Robin said this week's thread would be a week & a half long. So, the week 2 thread should start on Sunday. The new BaW threads always are posted on Sunday.

[aggieamy]

DD is completely absorbed in the latest Flavia book.  She isn't even breaking for meals or playing. DH and I got a new rug for the livingroom and while we were putting it down (moving furniture, a few raised voices, doors opening and closing) she didn't even notice.  And she was sitting in the next room.  

 

Stacia - How's your son enjoying the book?  

[Stacia]

DD is completely absorbed in the latest Flavia book.  She isn't even breaking for meals or playing. DH and I got a new rug for the livingroom and while we were putting it down (moving furniture, a few raised voices, doors opening and closing) she didn't even notice.  And she was sitting in the next room.  

 

Stacia - How's your son enjoying the book?  

 

He's not thrilled with it. Normally he would have finished it by now, but he put it down earlier. He says he'll finish it, but he's missing some of the old familiars from the story (Dogger, Gladys, the villagers, Flavia's chemistry lab, etc...).

[Angel]

My library hasn't received the newest Flavia book, obviously, but I put it on hold this morning so I would not be behind a ridiculous number of people.  I'm already 6 in line!

 

I do think it will be different with her off elsewhere.   I wasn't sure how I felt about that at the end of the last book.  But since Flavia is one of my favorite characters, I'm hoping she will be just as brilliant and pull me in!

 

Someone up thread mentioned missing a few of the regulars.  I remember last year that a couple people said that the first few weeks of the new year were just too much to slog through so they waited till the threads got a little more manageable.  Maybe that's what is going on.  

 

Has someone alerted the tech people to the multi-quote problem.  I'm assuming so but thought I'd ask.  Pam, have you alerted them that you would like them to increase the likes ;)  I'm must be a "like" snob.  :lol:  I've only ran out once.

 

I'm almost to the end of As You Wish.  If you like The Princess Bride, you really do need to read this!  I have laughed out loud multiple times!  

[Robin M]

Are we starting a new thread every week or is this a master thread?

 

Every Sunday (Between 9 to 10 ish a.m. pst) I post the new thread and the conversation is continued in the new thread.  I'll post a link from the old thread to the new which closes out the old one.  Plus I'll add a comment in Recent Status Updates in the right hand column that the new thread is live.    This week was out of the ordinary since the new year started on Thursday, so rather than have a really short first week, combined to give folks plenty of time to get started. 

 

 

OtherJohn is looking into the multi quote problem, or so he said this morning.  Let's keep our fingers crossed he discovers what caused the issue.

[Pam in CT]

Ah, you're right. And also Incarnadine, we both *loved* that. And Untold, I can't remember if you liked this one. Actually I think you did like it but felt out of your depth contextually?

 

 

Brilliant!

 

Yes, exactly.  Loved Incarnadine; liked Untold but didn't have the grounding in the hadith to make as much sense of it as I'd have liked.

 

 

 

Fiona - one master list for the entire year???    :willy_nilly:  :willy_nilly:  :willy_nilly: ACCCKKK.   No no nonononono.  One week at a time (first week will evidently be a long week)...

 

 

 

(still no likes, btw...)

[Mnemosyne]

Every Sunday (Between 9 to 10 ish a.m. pst) I post the new thread and the conversation is continued in the new thread.  I'll post a link from the old thread to the new which closes out the old one.  Plus I'll add a comment in Recent Status Updates in the right hand column that the new thread is live.    This week was out of the ordinary since the new year started on Thursday, so rather than have a really short first week, combined to give folks plenty of time to get started. 

 

 

OtherJohn is looking into the multi quote problem, or so he said this morning.  Let's keep our fingers crossed he discovers what caused the issue.

 

Didn't catch that. Sounds good. :)

 

Still not getting much reading done. Got a video game I've been playing too much. :P

[Maela]

Someone mentioned Home Comforts.  I loved that book.  I don't remember if I read it cover to cover, but I do remember learning a ton! 

 

My dh loves The Princess Bride; I'll have to get him to read As You Wish.  

 

It's difficult keeping up with this thread!  Especially when I'm trying to spend more time reading.  :-)

[Mom-ninja.]

No more!  I need to stop reading the recommendations in this thread.

 

(Spoken in my best Borg voice) Resistance is futile. 

[Kareni]

Welcome to you both and all the other new posters!

 

I want to join!

 

 

Can I join?

 

I've moved on from my Young Adult sortie and have started a fantasy book which I came across while volunteering at the public library this morning.  The peril and pleasure of shelving books is that you might take them home.  The good thing about volunteering is that no one docks your pay when you read the inside front cover of a book or ten!

 

Radiant: Towers Trilogy Book One by Karina Sumner-Smith

 

 

"Xhea has no magic. Born without the power that everyone else takes for granted, Xhea is an outcast—no way to earn a living, buy food, or change the life that fate has dealt her. Yet she has a unique talent: the ability to see ghosts and the tethers that bind them to the living world, which she uses to scratch out a bare existence in the ruins beneath the City’s floating Towers.

When a rich City man comes to her with a young woman’s ghost tethered to his chest, Xhea has no idea that this ghost will change everything. The ghost, Shai, is a Radiant, a rare person who generates so much power that the Towers use it to fuel their magic, heedless of the pain such use causes. Shai’s home Tower is desperate to get the ghost back and force her into a body—any body—so that it can regain its position, while the Tower’s rivals seek the ghost to use her magic for their own ends. Caught between a multitude of enemies and desperate to save Shai, Xhea thinks herself powerless—until a strange magic wakes within her. Magic dark and slow, like rising smoke, like seeping oil. A magic whose very touch brings death.

With two extremely strong female protagonists, Radiant is a story of fighting for what you believe in and finding strength that you never thought you had."

 

 

I'm about a third of the way through the book and am enjoying it.  This is the author's first book though she's written short pieces previously; as far as I know, this is the first of her work that I've read.

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Nan in Mass]

Fiona, I am so sorry. Lots of hugs.

Nan

[Guest]

 

Fiona - one master list for the entire year???    :willy_nilly:  :willy_nilly:  :willy_nilly: ACCCKKK.   No no nonononono.  One week at a time (first week will evidently be a long week)...

:iagree:   On the one hand, it would be so much fun to make such a list... but it would have to be redone every week or so as my interests and reading mood shifted.. I love the way reading one book can cascade into a dozen interrelated books... or can lead me off from one tangent to another... it is as if each book is a door at the back of a wardrobe and opens a whole new world to me... sometimes even if I've read it dozens of times before.

 

 

DD is completely absorbed in the latest Flavia book.  She isn't even breaking for meals or playing. DH and I got a new rug for the livingroom and while we were putting it down (moving furniture, a few raised voices, doors opening and closing) she didn't even notice.  And she was sitting in the next room.  

 

I love seeing my kids lost in a book like that... well, unless I'm trying to get them to set the table or go to bed...

 

How did you end up liking Eight Cousins?  Weren't you reading it for a book club last month?

 

 

 

Yes!!!  Patricia Polacco is the author.  I love her books as well.   Thank you, Angel!

 

The Keeping Quilt is a beloved favorite here... and the transmission from generation to generation, with variations and new additions, becomes ever dearer to me as my kids grow up and our parents age...

 

 

 

 

Yes, and as I recall shukriyya and I both adored Conference of the Birds and no one else ventured anywhere near it.  

 

I do believe a holistic Venn Diagram of BAW in 2014 might well form a Zentangle.  Hop to that, visual girl...

 

I started it around the same time, but it got set aside for other things (it is still on my bedside bookshelf, and I was enjoying it very much... )

 

I'm not visual, but I love that image!

 

 

I want to join! I just finished an easy fiction novel, but I see some of the lists already made and I think I might have to step it up a little. :) 

 

Do we need to have a list of books we want to read or can we just go based on suggestions on here? 

 

Welcome, honey! 

 

Whatever works best for you... some of us prefer a large measure of serendipity in our reading journey, others like to have a tentative road map, at least for the first leg of the journey, or a set of goals or foci, but one of the most beautiful things about being here is the vast diversity... there are so many different approaches  - to reading, to a genre, to a specific book, and we get to see through so many different lenses.

[Nan in Mass]

I am scrambling to catch up but you are all advancing faster than I can scramble.

 

When people mention Canadian authors, I think of L M Montgomery. : )

 

Shukriyya, thank you for the poem. I think I would miss winter unbearably if I lived where there is no snow. How do you keep living without that period of stillness?

 

Caroline, what a great goal! I wish you all the best. Some of my clan read that bell labs book. It is a bit of a sideways approach, and there are probably better resources out there, there is a good description of the creative process, the stuff leading up to and following the eureka moment, in Drawing on the Artist Within. I,m in the middle of rereading it at the moment. You also might be interested in having your students do Draw Squad. It is much easier to work out solutions to design problems if you can draw things in 3D. It is also easier to convince other people to help you. I think, anyway.

 

Nan

[Nan in Mass]

Eliana, ayah, I think of them as abusive romances, but romances that involve "narssisistic, rape-y jerks" is better. Sigh. And thank you for the Tam Lin info. I seem to still be in fairy tale mode, with no sign of it wearing off any time soon, so I very much appreciate it. I think some truths are easier to explain as fairy tales, or the modern equivalent? Too bad about the lost post.

 

My family has large swaths of Three Men in a Boat memorized and quote it often. We all identify with so much of it and it is just our sort of pooh humour...

 

Nan

[Guest]

I'm slogging through 'Deerskin'. Not loving it but sticking with it for now.

 

Do you have puppies yet?  Or are you still on the mountain?

 

I think you'll appreciate the climax... but the more mundane pieces are something I love and I think doesn't speak to you... and you 'see' prose more than I do.  ...some prose styles jump out at me, but otherwise it isn't where I focus (unless it grates dreadfully)

 

I must say that a lot of you BaWers, from 2014 at least, consistently choose books that aren't my cup of tea and yet...I love you ladies :001_wub: You all have enriched my life immeasurably. It would be nice to have a few books where our inclinations and tastes intersect but perhaps the point is the love of books themselves.

 

 

:grouphug:

 

I found that my second year participating here (which was last year), that I perceived more overlap, more shared inclinations than I did the first year... even with the same people. 

 

I could just be where I was in my reading each of those years, or that spending more time here helped me see more common ground, or, perhaps, I have shifted as a reader from sharing this space with you all...

 

 

Can I join?  I'm new to this, but all last year I was envious of you all, reading so much.   :)

 

I have a difficult time finishing books (well, nonfiction anyway).  I have a huge problem with getting interested in a certain topic, checking out 20 books about it, and reading just a few pages of each.  

 

Yes, please!  It is wonderful to have you here.

I do that sometimes... I get lost in the abundance of choices and end up with lots of snippets and not as much satisfaction as I might like..

 

...and, as others have said: here, in our safe and happy place, you can't do reading 'wrong'.  ...do what works for you and we'll kibbutz and chat and cheer you on!

 

 

I just love the image of that last quote & especially in the way it related (more than once) to the story itself. I guess the image of an everyday hero appeals to me, someone who will do the right thing or the needed thing in face of danger or personal distress.

 

 

This had been on my TBR lists, and then you read it, and I checked it out, but never read it... I'll have to bump it back up the list and try again...  the everyday hero speaks deeply to me too...

 

 

I'm so glad that I've made more of an effort to continue expanding my around-the-world reading & to regularly & purposefully select books published by small/indie presses. I feel like my reading life has been greatly enriched by doing so.

 

 

 

...mine has also been enriched by your encouragement to read around the world... and now my mother has gotten hooked on Archipelago books!  (And she has been finding a number of them at her local used book store! She is almost as grateful to you as I am.  :grouphug:

[Guest]

After my iBookshelf debacle this weekend, I'm looking for other software recommendations. There must be people here who are using good book cataloguing software, right?

 

I use BookCollector.  well, I was using it, but haven't been keeping up (even before this influx of treasures)

 

If I remember correctly, the first 100 (?) books can be added in the trial version so you can get a sense of how it works and if it appeals.  

 

 

 

Eliana, re: Kaddish, Women's Voices - I'm glad you enjoyed it; I was a bit nervous about that... 

 

It was more than enjoyed, love.  It was something I really, really needed to read right now.  Thank you so much!

 

 

 

Thanks for the suggestion!  I have not read the book, only an excerpt -- about the story of Adam and Chavah, IIRC.   

 

In honor of the New Year, I have been going through my enormous stack of saved sections from assorted Sunday NYTs.  It's like I'm reliving October all over again!  But I came across this entertaining column, about couples disagreeing over books.  

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/02/books/review/have-you-ever-had-a-relationship-end-because-of-a-book.html?_r=0

 

I could send you one of my two favorites, so you could see how you liked it.

 

That's a neat article, thank you!

 

...I had mixed reactions. I can't imagine not loving someone (romantically or otherwise) over books, or not having a friendship, but the way dh and I align in our reading is very, very dear to me and has added another dimension to an already idyllic love.

 

 

...everything nourishes that which is strong already. 

 

or to quote Austen properly [re: music as the food of love, which is a Tempest quote]:

 

“Of a fine, stout, healthy love it may. Everything nourishes what is strong already. But if it be only a slight, thin sort of inclination, I am convinced that one good sonnet will starve it entirely away.†Elizabeth Bennet

 

 

 

If I had a bookshop owning husband, I could read everything while I was meant to be unpacking it, couldn't I? Kind of the way a kid reads the books they discover under their bed when they are supposed to be cleaning their room?

 

Maybe.  I've been discovering that packing and unpacking books is dreadfully frustrating.  There's all this work to get done, and it involves handling thousands of intensely fascinating books, but there isn't any time to sit down and appreciate them properly...

 

...but I think that sitting at the counter waiting for customers would be a fabulous time to read the stock!  (I'm not sure I could bear to let the books go...)

[Stacia]

...mine has also been enriched by your encouragement to read around the world... and now my mother has gotten hooked on Archipelago books!  (And she has been finding a number of them at her local used book store! She is almost as grateful to you as I am.  :grouphug:

 

Thank you, Eliana, for your kind words. :grouphug:

 

I have now started Rue du Retour by Abdellatif Laâbi, a Moroccan poet/author/playwright. Per wikipedia...

Abdellatif Laâbi was imprisoned, tortured and sentenced to ten years in prison for "crimes of opinion" (for his political beliefs and his writings) and served a sentence from 1972-1980. He was, in 1985, forced into exile in France.

 

Book description from Publishers Weekly:

Moroccan human rights activist, poet and novelist Laabi makes a stunning English-language debut with this account of his unexpected release from prison (following an international campaign mounted by Amnesty International and the French branch of PEN etc.) from prison after serving eight-and-a-half of a 10-year sentence for "crimes of opinion." A mosaic of memoirs, letters and stories relates his journey back to freedom. His most powerful passages are missives to his wife, Jocelyne, whom he calls here Awdah, Arabic for "return," and whose felt presence succors him throughout his incarceration. Perhaps to universalize his own experience, or to claim solidarity with political prisoners everywhere, Laabi describes his ordeal and recovery in the second person: "You will have to learn to walk again. One step, then another, always forward, in a straight line. It will no longer be that round, that circling around. . . ." Prison only reinforces his belief in the political merit of writing, his "tragic privilege": "And you are called to tell and to keep on telling. . . . Like Scheherazade, 'Write or be killed.' "

 

And, already I want to share a quote from the book. He (the character/himself) has just been released from prison...

But, after all these years, you're not prepared to swear to anything. This is, in any case, one of the first principles of the conduct which now imposes itself on you and becomes part of your ethics-in-formation. Also perhaps just an acquired deformation -- you are always on the look-out, with a feeling of always being followed, totally alert, watching for the smallest gesture, the least word which might be a prey for the eyes and ears in the walls. Being under close observation creates bizarre reactions. One eventually begins to spy upon oneself, one interiorises suspicion. Watchfulness as a psychic phenomenon is nothing other than this internal splitting.

 

Still quite haunting words for the present day, no?

 

Though the book version I have is published by Readers International (London), I notice that some of his works are also published by Archipelago.

 

On a slightly related note, when I was looking through the Archipelago author page, I notice José Eduardo Agualusa (Angolan author of The Book of Chameleons) has a book listed, but there is no info yet. Maybe I can hope it is another of his that is in process of being translated??? <squee!>

[Jane in NC]

Using the Eliana method for multiquoting.  Thanks!

 

I'm missing Phoenix and LadyDusk.

 

Hear, hear!

 

 

In honor of the New Year, I have been going through my enormous stack of saved sections from assorted Sunday NYTs.  It's like I'm reliving October all over again!  But I came across this entertaining column, about couples disagreeing over books.  

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/02/books/review/have-you-ever-had-a-relationship-end-because-of-a-book.html?_r=0

Thanks for the link.  I loved the line:

 

 

[M]y love of Austen is between Austen and me; it doesn’t need cheerleaders.

 

I appreciate how books are recommended in this thread.  A former neighbor telephones and expects me to drop what I am doing to Read This Book Now.  Her passion is noteworthy but she and I have completely different tastes in books.  She has not caught on to that decades later.

 

Further, I would never expect anyone else to be interested in many of the books I read.  I am Cold War obsessed.  :lol: Nor would I expect anyone to dedicate months of their lives to read something like Dunnett's House of Niccolo series--which is amazing by the way.  I am still reading the fifth book in the series, The Unicorn Hunt, which I think might be my favorite so far.  There are background machinations happening that remain mysterious and have me completely intrigued.

 

My husband and I have different reading tastes, but they do intersect.  He is reading two books that are on my list, The Good Soldier Å vejk, which some may remember that I gave to him for Christmas because I want to read the book! The other is a book that my son suggested. 

 

As previously noted, I am still wrapping up HoAW.  Sitting with the volume one day, The Boy asked what I was reading.  I told him and noted that the chapter with which I was currently engaged fascinated me.  I had no former knowledge of the Indo-Greeks and Bactrian empire.  "If you are interested..." He went to his shelves and pulled out David Anthony's The Horse, the Wheel and Language, a copy autographed to him by the author.  My husband grabbed it and given my intention of wrapping up '14 and reading books from the dusty stacks, I did not argue.  Here is what the Wilson Quarterly has to say about this book which does tie into the Bactrians, etc.:

 

 

David Anthony’s book is a masterpiece. A professor of anthropology, Anthony brings to­gether archaeology, linguistics, and rare knowledge of Russian scholarship and the history of climate change to recast our understanding of the formation of early human society. The Horse, the Wheel, and Language begins with perhaps the greatest unanswered question of ­pre­history: How, when, and why did the ­Indo-­European family of languages emerge and spread to dominate Eurasia from the Atlan­tic to the Indian ­Ocean?

 

A couple of insights from Anthony’s remark­able book may give some of its flavor. DNA studies show that all the world’s domestic horses developed from at least 77 ancestral mares, but quite possibly from a single stallion. A relatively docile stallion would have little hope of reproducing in the wild, as he would have to compete with violent and dominant males, but he would appeal to people looking for a manageable breeder for a domestic bloodline. In Anthony’s perceptive summation, domestication meant that “from the horse’s perspective, humans were the only way he could get a girl. From the human perspective, he was the only male sire they wanted.â€

 

The strong likelihood of one sire for the world’s entire population of horses suggests a single point of origin for the ­horse-­dependent nomads of the ­steppes. A person on foot with a dog can herd about 200 sheep, Anthony observes, but on a horse can manage about 500. That is half of the key to the growth and spread of the steppe peoples. The other half is that once they had wheels, they could carry their own supplies and thus stay on the move indefi­nitely, fighting where they chose or running away if necessary. They could roam from the steppes above the Black Sea east into Siberia and west into Europe, and when warm and cold periods made the climate untenable for the early agrarian and urban settlements of the Mesopotamian region, the people of the steppes moved in. Language followed the ­carts.

 

 

 

Actually, shukriyya, I do think you'd love Mr. Fox & all its Reynard the Fox & Bluebeard allusions, wrapped up with Yoruba references & a feminist bent too. It's another one on my very favorites list. It's strangely wonderful & wondrous. And, like so many of the books that end up appealing to me, it has cool cover art too. :laugh:

 

 

 

Shukriyya--Mr. Fox was a fun read for me.

 

[Jane in NC]

A few more comments.

 

Welcome to the new members!

 

I am not joining the group for Murakami--not in the mental space for him. When I googled to verify the spelling of his name, I stumbled upon the news that Murakami will be penning an advice column:

 

http://www.salon.com/2015/01/06/haruki_murakami_to_pen_an_advice_column_for_fans/

 

(Stacia runs off to pen her Kafkaesque question for Murakami.)