Book a Week 2017 - BW13 : Happy Birthday Robert Frost

[Jane in NC]

Jane here, reporting for duty while Robin is away.  Amy and I are just minding the store though. Robin graciously took time out from her family to submit the following:

 

 

I'm out doing the family thing, my father and all my sisters gathered from near and far to celebrate birthdays and anniversaries, while we tramp together, here and there and everywhere.   Today is the anniversary of Robert Frost's birthday and since he is one of my favorite poets, I'll leave you with you with one of his poems.

 

 

A Prayer in Spring

By 

Robert Frost 

Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers to-day;
And give us not to think so far away
As the uncertain harvest; keep us here
All simply in the springing of the year.

Oh, give us pleasure in the orchard white,
Like nothing else by day, like ghosts by night;
And make us happy in the happy bees,
The swarm dilating round the perfect trees.

And make us happy in the darting bird
That suddenly above the bees is heard,
The meteor that thrusts in with needle bill,
And off a blossom in mid air stands still.

For this is love and nothing else is love,
The which it is reserved for God above
To sanctify to what far ends He will,

But which it only needs that we fulfill.

 

******************************************************

 

Story of Western Science, Chapter 8 (I just realized that this was skipped last week in Robin's absence)

 

***********************************

What are you reading this week?

 

Link to Week 12.

[Jane in NC]

My year to date list is below.  The fact that I have listened to three audio books in recent weeks indicates that I spent a lot of time in the car by myself, making trips to Savannah, Raleigh and a second trip to Georgia (Saint Simons Island). 

 

I am still plugging away on The Right to be Cold, admitting that I am the slowest reader of non-fiction in the universe. In Praise of Defeat, the poetry of Abdellatif Laâbi, continues to amaze me.  This is a door stopper of a book at over 700 pages although I spend more time reading the English translations of the poems than the original French.

 

22) Sassafrass, Cypress & Indigo, Ntozake Shange, 1982 (first novel from the playwright)

21) Miracle at Saint Anna, James McBride, 2003, audio (WWII tale of the Buffalo soldiers in Italy)

20) Strange Shores, Arnauldur Indridason, 2010, translated from the Icelandic by Victoria Cribb

19) News of the World, Paulette Jiles, 2016 (five stars--Read this book!)

18) The Coroner's Lunch, Colin Cotterill, 2004 (police procedural set in Laos, 1975)

17) Raggity and the Cloud, Sophia Prokofieva, English translation from the Russian published in 1982 (Soviet fairy tale)

16) The Wilt Alternative, Tom Sharpe, 1979 (humor)

15) Kill 'em and Leave: Searching for James Brown and the American Soul, James McBride, 2016, audio (biography)

14) Himalaya, Michael Palin, 2005, audio (fun travel book!)

13) A General Theory of Oblivion, Jose Eduardo Agualusa, 2013, translated fro the Portuguese by Daniel Hahn (five stars)

12) The Lost Art of Dress:  The Women Who Once Made America Stylish, Linda Przybyszewski, 2014 (non-fiction; historical examination of the female academics who taught sewing, home economy, recycling)

11) Black Skies, Arnauldur Indridason, 2009, translated from the Icelandic by Victoria Cribb (police procedural)

10) Outrage, Arnauldur Indridason, 2008, translated from the Icelandic by Anne Yates (police procedural)

9) Arctic Chill, Arnauldur Indridason, 2005, translated from the Icelandic by Bernard Scudder and Victoria Cribb (police procedural)

8) Mrs. Bridge, Evan S. Connell, Jr., 1959 (five stars)

7) Death of an Englishman, Magdalen Naab, 1981 (police procedural)

6) Vulture in a Cage, Solomon Ibn Gabirol, translated from the Hebrew by Raymond P. Scheindlin (11th century poetry)

5) By Gaslight, Steven Price, 2016 (atmospheric chunkster)

4) My Brilliant Career, Miles Franklin, 1901 (inspiring feminist tale set in the Australian outback)

3) Sputnik Sweetheart, Haruki Murakami, 2001; translated from the Japanese by Philip Gabriel (meh)

2) The Underground Railroad, Colson Whitehead, 2016 (Fiction, five stars)

1) To Lie with Lions, Dorothy Dunnett, 1995 (#6 in the House of Niccolo series; epic fiction started in 2016)

 

[Faithr]

I just blogged about my books 10 (Laurus) and 11 (Measure of the Man).  Laurus is a magnificent book - a debut novel by a Russian Medievalist.  So that goes to my debut bingo square.

 

In progress:  H is for Hawk (on audio) - just started this.  I love nature books, author seems a bit odd to me though.

Particles of Faith by Stacy Trasancos (non-fiction on science and religion)  - this counts towards the bingo square where one's name has to be in the title of the book.

City of God - semester long book study

Ten Minutes a Day to Heaven (morning meditation)

[Ethel Mertz]

My reading progess these days is very slow. I am still making my way through The Firebrand and the First Lady. My fiction read is Ali & Nino by Kurban Said, published in 1937 - a love story between a Christian woman and a Muslim man. My read along with DS is The Lord of the Rings (along with 'Literary Lessons from Lord of the Rings'). I expect this will take us into the summer months.

 

Other books in my soon-to-start pile include Madeleine Albright's Prague Winter, Setting Free the Kites by Alex George (pre-read for DS), What We Do Now (a collection of political essays from the left perspective), and a few other library check outs that have been sitting around way too long.

[Jane in NC]

In progress:  H is for Hawk (on audio) - just started this.  I love nature books, author seems a bit odd to me though.

 

After all the hullabaloo about this book and given that I volunteer at a bird shelter, I was really keen to read this book in '15. I failed to grasp why it made so many "best of" lists.

 

H is for Hawk is a tale of the author attempting to deal with grief via training a goshawk.  She has much to say about author T.H.White who attempted to train one of these magnificent birds as well. 

 

Admittedly falconry strikes me as an unusual pastime--this from the woman who volunteers at a shelter where a glove trained "educational" hawk resides.  In our case, the hawk is injured and cannot be released into the wild.  In my own mind, I try to reconcile falconry as a traditional cultural practice against man's brazen attempt to train a wild animal that cannot be domesticated.  I wish that the author had addressed this issue instead of writing about parading around town with a hawk on her arm.  We at the shelter would never do that with our bird.  Our hawk is on the glove only at educational programs--but it does not have to hunt for a living. 

[Loesje22000]

I finished Gösta Berling Saga this week.

 

I loved to read something from Selma Lagerlof again, and to see how typical her style is.

This book compares to Niels Holgerssons Wonderbare Reizen as it also contains a set of short stories, chained together with 1 person.

But this book seems to reach a border of (un) comfortable reading to/for me.

Lagerlof uses often myths, sages, fairytales in her stories, and that's okay, but after I while I become tired of witches, demons, pact with the devil and fairies...

It is not the front story of her tellings, but sometimes it voiced over? her actual story.

[Mothersweets]

I finished three books this week.

 

A Christmas Party by Georgette Heyer. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/26001172-a-christmas-party  This is a murder mystery and while I figured out who had done it, I couldn't see how they had done it. It was published earlier under the title Envious Casca. 

 

A Rule Against Murder by Louise Penny. #4 in the Chief Inspector Gamache series.https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25163393-a-rule-against-murder I have a bit of a crush on Inspector Gamache and I really like Penny's writing and the mystery was well done. The characters were very unlikeable in this one and I was finding it hard to believe that a family could be so consistently mean to one another. I listened to this on audio and while the narrator does an excellent job, I think I want to read the next few books in the series. I find I want to flip back to earlier parts of the story but that's hard to do when you're listening.

 

Born Standing Up:A Comic's Life by Steve Martin. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13013556-born-standing-up Well done autobiography. I've always liked Steve Martin and like him even more after listening to his story. 

 

The last two book were both on audio and I finished both of them while stripping the finish off of my kitchen chairs. I've spent all of Friday and Saturday afternoons stripping and sanding the chairs and oh my goodness what a job. My table and chairs are oak with a golden/orange finish and I want to update them and give them a weathered oak look - you know, do a Joanna Gaines Fixer Upper kind of look. It's turning out pretty well so far but I still need to do the table. Wish me luck :)                                

Edited March 26, 2017 by Mothersweets

[mumto2]

I am still working to finish this month's birthstone challenge. During the night I read most of the Winter Queen by Boris Akunin https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61463.The_Winter_Queen. The author is apparently a very popular author in Russia with some of his books being made into movies. In places this book was extremely clever so I will be reading more. In other places my slightly sleep deprived brain was in the middle a rather confusing action adventure movie. Apparently he purposely modelled this book after his vision f a conspiracy mystery and it was one big conspiracy. A pretty clever one actually. Another one is Agatha Christie style so that one I really need to figure out because I want to read it. The settings were very well done, 1870's Moscow, London, and St.Petersburg.

 

One of the Goodreads comments was that the book is absolutely wonderful in Russian......... ;)

[Negin]

I read The Diving Bell and the Butterfly - 4 Stars - This was a difficult read with regards to subject matter, but not when it comes to writing style. Jean-Dominique Bauby, the former editor of the French edition of “Elle†magazine, was paralyzed after a huge stroke. It’s amazing to me that he dictated this book letter by letter by blinking one eyelid, the only part of his body that wasn’t paralyzed. The fact that he managed to keep his brain engaged and alive given his situation is a miracle. This book is heartbreaking, insightful, and so uplifting. 

 

 

MY RATING SYSTEM

5 Stars

Fantastic, couldn't put it down

4 Stars

Really Good

3 Stars

Enjoyable

2 Stars

Just Okay – nothing to write home about

1 Star

Rubbish – waste of my money and time. Few books make it to this level, since I usually give up on them if they’re that bad.

[Matryoshka]

I finished an enjoyable week of reading this week - I finished 3 books, and I'd give them all 5 stars!

 

30. The Dispossessed by Ursula Le Guin - One of my favorite books, a reread, so no surprise I loved that one.  Interesting to read again just after reading Utopia.  The main character's society is, like Utopia, one where no one owns property.  Unlike Utopia, it is an anarchy (in the meaning of no official government or hierarchical structure).  Rather than slaves (or bonsdsmen) the grunt work has to be done by taking turns among all the people.  The lack of ownership extends toward feelings toward family members, so families are often separated for long periods of time.  This society is juxtaposed with a highly hierarchical, capitalistic, exploitative and somewhat decadent society on the sister planet.  Neither one is presented as being ideal, though - the main character is a brilliant scientist who cannot complete his work on his egalitarian homeworld because egalitarian systems resent and push down those who are exceptional (tall poppy syndrome?).  He goes to the other society where he has more peers, but they wish to take his work and exploit/capitalize on it for their own benefit.  

 

31. Romantic Outlaws: The Extraordinary Lives of Mary Wollstonecraft and Mary Shelley by Charlotte Gordon. (ebook)  I really, really enjoyed this book.  I knew something of Mary Shelley's life, but pretty much nothing about her mother's (Wollstonecraft, who died from complications from childbirth).  Very interesting and compelling read; it follows their lives in parallel and shows how much influence the mother had on the daughter's life in spite of their never having really met.  It made me think a lot about another book I read covering artists/composer/writers in Europe just a wee bit later than most of this book, Hungarian Rhapsody by Zsolt von Harsányi, which is a biography of Franz Liszt.  I'm not sure if you can get that latter book in English (I read it in German, translated from the Hungarian), but if anyone can find it, I highly recommend it.

 

32. Born a Crime by Trevor Noah.  (audio)  Thanks to all that recommended the audio for this one.  It was fantastic.

 

Still reading:

 

- From Beauty to the Beast - got the two Sibyl chapters done.  I will try to get to the three Queen of Sheba chapters this week, which will catch me up.

 

- Exiles of Erin - A slog.  I will get through this because I need it for a bingo square! :tongue_smilie:

 

Started:

 

- The Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys.  For my birthstone/Aquamarine challenge.

 

- Homegoing by Yaa Gyaisi (audio)  for Debut Author bingo square.

 

Came in from Overdrive holds list and about to start:

 

- Evicted, Poverty and Profit in the American City (ebook) for Finance bingo square.

 

 

 

 

Edited March 26, 2017 by Matryoshka

[ErinE]

DD11 is feeling better. Thanks everyone for your kind thoughts. No idea what the illness was: high fever, severe stomach pain, lethargy, but no other sinus, flu or cold symptoms. She returned to school Thursday and her personality is back in full force.The family spent yesterday outside working in the yard to clean up in the warming weather. I may actually get planters this year! I always enjoy the first part of spring, but as the clean-up chores pile up, I start looking forward to the summer days where it's too hot to do anything, but sit by cool water, read a book, and enjoy the sun.
 
Books read last week:

• Zorro by Isabel Allende. Fiction. A boy, born in Spain-occupied California, grows up to become a masked vigilante. My first Allende read, I adored her voice. It was as if she sat beside me as she told the story of Zorro's youth and why he fought for justice. She's able to write blocks of exposition that flow naturally without being an information dump. Loved this book and I plan to read more from Allende in the future.
• All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders. Fantasy. Nebula 2016 Nominee. A woman with magical powers and a man with scientific prowess fight to save a decaying world.
• Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman. Folktales and Mythology. A modern retelling of the myths of the Norse Gods. An enjoyable audiobook listen, Gaimain has a lovely voice. He could probably read the phone book and I'd find it fascinating. This isn't a child's book of mythology, unless the child enjoys the original versions of Grimms' fairy tales.
• Yellow Crocus by Laila Ibrahim. Historical Fiction. A slave woman nurses and raises the plantation owner's child. I was most drawn to the woman's voice here. The child, clueless as to the woman's emotional turmoil, says something innocent, but it feels like a dagger to the heart for the reader. The story neatly wraps up in the end, which felt false given the subject is slavery and its effect on relationships between mother and child. The narrative, except for a rape scene, seems young adult. I wish the author had focused more on the woman perspective and less on the child, but I've noticed I have a terrible habit of reading a book, liking it, then picking apart all the ways it could improve so I'm trying not to do that here. Overall I thought the writing was well-done.
• Complete Poems of Stephen Crane edited by Joseph Katz. Poetry. Poems from the author who wrote Red Badge of Courage. When I was young, I kept a notebook of quotes and poetry, where I also wrote terrible stories and prose. One of my favorites was written by Crane:

In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial, 
Who, squatting upon the ground, 
Held his heart in his hands, 
And ate of it. 
I said, “Is it good, friend?†
“It is bitter—bitter,†he answered; 
 
“But I like it 
“Because it is bitter, 
“And because it is my heart.â€

It spoke to me as a teen and I'm still drawn to it now.

• Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. Historical Fiction. A steamboat pilot travels up the Congo to find an ivory collector who terrorizes the local populace. Motivated by my read of Everfair (a book my thoughts return to often) and King Leopold's Ghost, I found the book less compelling than I'd hoped. I'm certain I read this back in high school, but I didn't remember much about it. It seems a product of its time, more interesting for its role in literary history, perhaps because I've read similar, more recent works exploring similar themes: the corrupting influence of power, the hypocrisy of colonialism, the refusal to destroy an innocent's delusions.
• The View from The Cheap Seats by Neil Gaiman. Nonfiction Essay Collection. Gaiman's voice is strongest when he tells his most personal stories. The first essays on reading are his most interesting while the rest of the collection seems to drift.

Inspired by the recent continuing education post on the boards and hoping to get out of my reading doldrums, I've decided to rotate through the WTM recommendations in my library selections: science, literature, poetry, biography, history, self-improvement. I've started Life on the Edge, an overview of quantum mechanics and biology and I'm reading The Red Badge of Courage. For poetry, I have In Praise of Defeat by Abdellatif Laabi and I chose a recently written biography of William Tecumseh Sherman. I'm currently listening to the Great Courses' A History of India and I have a few books on editing. I doubt I'll finish these in the next week, but I'm feeling more encouraged to learn something interesting.

Edited March 26, 2017 by ErinE

[Matryoshka]

After all the hullabaloo about this book and given that I volunteer at a bird shelter, I was really keen to read this book in '15. I failed to grasp why it made so many "best of" lists.

 

H is for Hawk is a tale of the author attempting to deal with grief via training a goshawk.  She has much to say about author T.H.White who attempted to train one of these magnificent birds as well. 

 

Admittedly falconry strikes me as an unusual pastime--this from the woman who volunteers at a shelter where a glove trained "educational" hawk resides.  In our case, the hawk is injured and cannot be released into the wild.  In my own mind, I try to reconcile falconry as a traditional cultural practice against man's brazen attempt to train a wild animal that cannot be domesticated.  I wish that the author had addressed this issue instead of writing about parading around town with a hawk on her arm.  We at the shelter would never do that with our bird.  Our hawk is on the glove only at educational programs--but it does not have to hunt for a living. 

 

I saw the author on some talk show and sounded vaguely interesting, and so I put it on my Overdrive wish list.  Think I'll take it off... 

[Stacia]

.

Edited November 2, 2017 by Stacia

[Butter]

What are you reading this week?

 

I'm currently reading Queen Victoria's Children, A Man Called Intrepid, and Rupee Millionaires.

 

Wednesday I'll finish The Doctrine and Covenants Verse by Verse, Volume 2 and The Doctrine and Covenants itself since all I have left is the last section and the two official declarations.  I think I'll do the New Testament next for my scripture study.

 

I traded in some airline miles for Amazon gift cards and spent $101.06 of those gift cards buying 11 Kindle books that were on my wishlist (that, plus putting one book on hold at the library, cleared out my wishlist, actually).  Because, clearly, I need more books.

[Butter]

dp 

 

Edited March 26, 2017 by Butter

[Ellesmere]

After all the hullabaloo about this book and given that I volunteer at a bird shelter, I was really keen to read this book in '15. I failed to grasp why it made so many "best of" lists.

 

H is for Hawk is a tale of the author attempting to deal with grief via training a goshawk.  She has much to say about author T.H.White who attempted to train one of these magnificent birds as well. 

 

Admittedly falconry strikes me as an unusual pastime--this from the woman who volunteers at a shelter where a glove trained "educational" hawk resides.  In our case, the hawk is injured and cannot be released into the wild.  In my own mind, I try to reconcile falconry as a traditional cultural practice against man's brazen attempt to train a wild animal that cannot be domesticated.  I wish that the author had addressed this issue instead of writing about parading around town with a hawk on her arm.  We at the shelter would never do that with our bird.  Our hawk is on the glove only at educational programs--but it does not have to hunt for a living. 

 

 

I saw the author on some talk show and sounded vaguely interesting, and so I put it on my Overdrive wish list.  Think I'll take it off... 

The here and on previous BaW threads about this book have me less inclined to read it, too. I was interested because, birds, and it kept showing up on recommendations. But I have so many other books to read and while the book may be worth a try, it sounds like it's not for me.

[Ali in OR]

I finished 2 this week. I enjoyed Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walters which was our book club book for April. The Little Book of Hygge was fun for the girls and I. The content probably could have been covered in a magazine article and it gets a bit repetitive, but we all liked the cozy comforts of Danish living and are almost ready to move there.

 

Up next--I put a bunch of fluffy stuff on my kindle and am currently reading an add-on to Andrea Host's Touchstone series which I loved. I think it's called In Arcadia. Hidden Figures is probably out in my mail box, so I'll probably start that soon too.

[Kareni]

A one day only "tale of intrigue, romance, and revenge" that is currently free for Kindle readers ~

 

The Wicked Marquis by E. Phillips Oppenheim 

 

About the Author

E. Phillips Oppenheim (1866–1946) was an enormously popular English author of thrillers and romance. He wrote more than one hundred novels, composing them in as little as three weeks and publishing as many as seven a year. He is best remembered today for the classic spy novel The Great Impersonation (1920).

 

 

 

"From the top floor of his house, the marquis of Mandeleys can look for miles and see nothing he does not own—save one little cottage, just a hundred yards from his front door. It is the property of Richard Vont, whose family has been tenants at Mandeleys for generations, and who refuses to go away without a fight.
 
Eighteen years ago, the marquis took an interest in Vont’s only daughter, bringing her under his wing and spiriting her across England and beyond. With his encouragement, Marcia has become a famous novelist, but her father was left alone and bitter. Now he has come up with a plan to avenge his loss and destroy the marquis once and for all.
 
As the plot unfolds, the righteousness of Vont’s anger is called into question, as is the loyalty of his American mercenary. But no matter how innocent the “wicked†marquis may turn out to be, it could already be too late to save his life."

 

Regards,

Kareni

 

[Lady Florida.]

I finished The Draining Lake earlier today. Though I would have read it anyway since I'm working my way through the series, it fits Mystery March and Nordic authors. 

 

I'm down to only one book now - A Gentleman in Moscow. I can't decided what else to read but I know I need more than one choice. I've been looking through my Kindle content to see what I want to add to my currently reading list.

 

My book club chose A Man Called Ove for this month. I listened to the audio book in December, so I won't reread it. I'll probably just read a synopsis as a refresher.

[Onceuponatime]

This week I read How to Hygge. It wasn't very inspiring and didn't feel cozy. Like Stacia's simplicity book, it did not seem to make hygge accessible to the humble masses. The food alone was primarily ingredients that would be pretty pricey around here. The Little Book of Hygge was much more Hyggelig. (I think that's the word.)

 

I'm Still Working on the Summer Before the War. For some reason I'm finding it difficult to invest myself in the story, even though I can't really find anything to complain about. There are other things tempting me, so I might abandon it.

[Kareni]

I traded in some airline miles for Amazon gift cards and spent $101.06 of those gift cards buying 11 Kindle books that were on my wishlist (that, plus putting one book on hold at the library, cleared out my wishlist, actually).  Because, clearly, I need more books.

 

As do we all!  Enjoy your bounty.

**

 

I finished a couple of books lately ~

 

The Edge of the Blade (The Uncharted Realms) by Jeffe Kennedy.  This was an enjoyable fantasy novel; it's not the first in the series, and I'd recommend starting at the beginning.

 

"A HAWK’S PLEDGE

 

The Twelve Kingdoms rest uneasy under their new High Queen, reeling from civil war and unchecked magics. Few remember that other powers once tested their borders—until a troop of foreign warriors emerges with a challenge . . .

 

Jepp has been the heart of the queen’s elite guard, her Hawks, since long before war split her homeland. But the ease and grace that come to her naturally in fighting leathers disappears when battles turn to politics. When a scouting party arrives from far-away Dasnaria, bearing veiled threats and subtle bluffs, Jepp is happy to let her queen puzzle them out while she samples the pleasures of their prince’s bed.

 

But the cultural norms allow that a Dasnarian woman may be wife or bed-slave, never her own leader—and Jepp’s light use of Prince Kral has sparked a diplomatic crisis. Banished from court, she soon becomes the only envoy to Kral’s strange and dangerous country, with little to rely on but her wits, her knives—and the smolder of anger and attraction that burns between her and him . . ."

 

ALSO

 

A favorite author, Sarina Bowen, recently released a book Goodbye Paradise which was a re-issue of In Front of God & Everyone which she had previously published under the name Nealy Wagner.  I was looking forward to reading the book only to realize I already owned it having picked it up as a free book a year or so ago; it was my lucky day.  I enjoyed it, but be forewarned that the book contains significant adult content.

 

 "Most people called it a cult. But for twenty years, Josh and Caleb called it home.

 

In Paradise, there is no television. No fast food. Just long hours of farm work and prayer on a dusty Wyoming ranch, and nights in a crowded bunkhouse. The boys of the Compound are kept far from the sinners’ world.

 

But Joshua doesn’t need temptation to sin. His whole life, he’s wanted his best friend, Caleb. By day they work side by side. Only when Josh closes his eyes at night can they be together the way he craves.

 

It can never be. And his survival depends on keeping his terrible desires secret.

 

Caleb has always protected Josh against the worst of the bullying at the Compound. But he has secrets of his own, and a plan to get away — until it all backfires.

 

Josh finds himself homeless in a world that doesn’t want him. Can Caleb find him in time? And will they find a place of safety, where he can admit to Josh how he really feels?"

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Faithr]

I saw the author on some talk show and sounded vaguely interesting, and so I put it on my Overdrive wish list.  Think I'll take it off... 

I haven't gotten that far into it, but I thought the author was a bit strange.  At one point she is explaining to her friends what it's like to have someone you love die. I mean she's a professor at Cambridge, so she's not a kid.  And her friends and co-workers aren't either.   And I thought what kind of circle does she live in where no one she knows has ever had someone they love die???    It struck me as the most self-absorbed thing.  Like until it happened to her she was completely oblivious that other people had their own pains and tragedies.  

 

And then when she started psychoanalyzing T.H. White she seems very triumphant about finding out that some nature writers were gay.  She thinks she's discovered that they must have been sublimating their pent up longings into their love for nature.  And I thought, gee there are plenty of not homosexual nature writers, what are they sublimating?  Or are you only sublimating if you are gay?  Can't someone be gay and just like nature and animals?  I hate cheap armchair psychoanalysis like that.  Although T. H. White did seem like he had a lot of issues going on, so maybe she's right.  Dreadful parents!

 

 

However, the book is on audio and she has a lovely reading voice!  And I am intrigued about her adventures in hawking.  So we'll see how it goes.

[Butter]

My book club chose A Man Called Ove for this month. I listened to the audio book in December, so I won't reread it. I'll probably just read a synopsis as a refresher.

 

My RL book club just met Thursday to talk about A Man Called Ove.  One woman enjoyed it, even though she never reads fiction for fun (she just prefers non-fiction).  The rest of us were all in the "it was okay" camp, but, interestingly, each of us for very different reasons.  We all had different things we liked and disliked.  It made for an interesting discussion.

[Violet Crown]

Well I was going to go through last week's thread, reply to lots of stuff, and talk about what I read this week and am reading now. Then everyone started throwing up, so here we are between retchings. Thanks for the Frost, Robin - a selection of his poems is one of the things I'm reading this week. Also continuing Hakluyt's Voyages, full of things I did not know, like how it goes when dragons fight with elephants, and where in Africa are the guys with no heads, and a much more accurate account of 16th-century China, acquired by translating the account of a Portuguese Jesuit. I'm going to use Hakluyt for my Seaworthy bingo square: Patrick O'Brien fans, there are plenty of firsthand accounts of exciting naval battles. In fact I strongly suspect O'Brien made use of Hakluyt.

 

Because Hakluyt and his 1300-odd pages is not enough, I'm starting dh's recommendation of the Gormenghast trilogy for the Dystopia square.

 

Excuse me now I am going to go bleach myself.

 

ETA: Oh and I finished Stephen Crane's The Third Violet, for the Name in Title square. About as unlike Red Badge of Courage as one could possibly imagine.

Edited March 26, 2017 by Violet Crown

[Narrow Gate Academy]

With two birthdays this week for the girls, I only finished the one Agatha Christie book The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, which is my 29th book so far this year.

 

Long term reads

📚ESV Bible - read most of First Samuel this week

📚The History of the Ancient World - I finished three chapters again this week (24-26) covering Crete, the end of the Happarans, and the Hittites

📚From the Beast to the Blond - I think I'm a little ahead. This week I read the first two chapters relating to the Queen of Sheba

 

Currently reading

📚The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up - I was looking on Overdrive and realized this book was both on my wish list and available, so I decided to read it for my nonfiction selection this week.

📚The Hidden Oracle - I didn't find any time for my audio book last week, so I'll try again this week.

📚The Invisible Library - I made a little progress this week, but has troubled concentrating.

📚The Mystery on the Blue Train - Normally I try to read series in order, but since I wanted to read this one for the gemstone challenge I will move it up the stack for this week.

 

I will of course toss all of these aside if either the new Bishop book or the new Briggs book becomes available. I'm still first on both hold lists. I've decided at least one of the librarians must have decided the books needed to be preread before leaving processing.😜 (Sigh... Still waiting albeit not very patiently. Another week and I may start planning a rescue mission for them.😹)

[Jane in NC]

Well I was going to go through last week's thread, reply to lots of stuff, and talk about what I read this week and am reading now. Then everyone started throwing up, so here we are between retchings. Thanks for the Frost, Jane - a selection of his poems is one of the things I'm reading this week. Also continuing Hakluyt's Voyages, full of things I did not know, like how it goes when dragons fight with elephants, and where in Africa are the guys with no heads, and a much more accurate account of 16th-century China, acquired by translating the account of a Portuguese Jesuit. I'm going to use Hakluyt for my Seaworthy bingo square: Patrick O'Brien fans, there are plenty of firsthand accounts of exciting naval battles. In fact I strongly suspect O'Brien made use of Hakluyt.

 

Because Hakluyt and his 1300-odd pages is not enough, I'm starting dh's recommendation of the Gormenghast trilogy for the Dystopia square.

 

Excuse me now I am going to go bleach myself.

 

ETA: Oh and I finished Stephen Crane's The Third Violet, for the Name in Title square. About as unlike Red Badge of Courage as one could possibly imagine.

Frost credit is due to Robin, VC. All I did was copy and paste!

[Kareni]

Who brought up the topic last week of books with recipes as part of the plot?

 

Some posts that might prove of help ~

 

50 Essential Novels for Foodies

 

8 New Food Novels to Read This Year

 

Nom Nom Novels: Fiction with Recipes

 

10 Novels Every Food-Lover Should Read

(a slideshow is offered about halfway down the page)

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Violet Crown]

Frost credit is due to Robin, VC. All I did was copy and paste!

Thank you. Credit reassigned.

[melbotoast]

Hello, everyone. This week I am reading:

 

The Little Book of Hygge - I've been limiting myself to one chapter at a time, so I have a little spot of coziness to look forward to each day. An interesting coincidence: I have a meditation app on my phone that has a different daily meditation on various mindfulness topics; today's was on hygge! She pronounced it "hig-uh" though. I thought it was good that the pronunciation is right on the cover for this book. I frequently realize that I don't know how to pronounce words correctly, because I've only come across them while reading and haven't heard them spoken. I appreciate the help!

 

A quote I enjoyed: "Some Danes talk about their dough as if it were their baby, which they feed and care for. Sourdough is basically a gastronomic alternative to The Sims."

 

Howl's Moving Castle - This is for book club. I ended up going to a new library and getting a card because my usual library didn't have a copy. It will be fun to have another library to explore although I'll have to be careful because this library charges late fees :D

 

One Love, Two Hearts, Three Stories by J. Dawn King - I started this one because I needed something to read on my Kindle. It turned out to be a perfect bathtub read. Fluffy and relaxing, and also the stories are short enough to read before the water gets too cold.

 

Born a Crime - I started listening to this one because I needed an audiobook. I'm really enjoying it so far. I was really glad none of my kids walked in while I was listening to him describe using a sheet of newspaper in the kitchen instead of going out in the rain to use the toilet. They don't need any ideas :lol:

[aggieamy]

 

 

Story of Western Science, Chapter 8 (I just realized that this was skipped last week in Robin's absence)

 

 

 

Oops!  Good help is so hard to find ...

 

I am still working to finish this month's birthstone challenge. During the night I read most of the Winter Queen by Boris Akunin https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61463.The_Winter_Queen. The author is apparently a very popular author in Russia with some of his books being made into movies. In places this book was extremely clever so I will be reading more. In other places my slightly sleep deprived brain was in the middle a rather confusing action adventure movie. Apparently he purposely modelled this book after his vision f a conspiracy mystery and it was one big conspiracy. A pretty clever one actually. Another one is Agatha Christie style so that one I really need to figure out because I want to read it. The settings were very well done, 1870's Moscow, London, and St.Petersburg.

 

One of the Goodreads comments was that the book is absolutely wonderful in Russian......... ;)

 

That sounds like her perfect book for my mom for mother's day. She loves all things Russian and even spent six weeks studying abroad there in the 70's. 

 

And Happy Mothering Sunday!

 

 

I said it previously & now that I have finished reading it, I can confirm it is true... L’art de la Simplicité: How to Live More with Less by Dominique Loreau is my Wuthering Heights of simplicity books. And I think most of you know how I feel about Wuthering Heights.

 

 

 

Lol! Your feelings on Wuthering Heights is BaW legend!

 

Well I was going to go through last week's thread, reply to lots of stuff, and talk about what I read this week and am reading now. Then everyone started throwing up, so here we are between retchings. 

 

 

We've had that too. I blame the kids for bringing whatever it is into the house. Our entire circle of friends has had it and I just found out our nanny went to the ER this weekend with stomach pains. It must be super contagious. 

[Jane in NC]

Who brought up the topic last week of books with recipes as part of the plot?

 

 

That would be your foodie friend!

 

Interesting links.  Thanks!

 

[Jane in NC]

I am still working to finish this month's birthstone challenge. During the night I read most of the Winter Queen by Boris Akunin https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61463.The_Winter_Queen. The author is apparently a very popular author in Russia with some of his books being made into movies. In places this book was extremely clever so I will be reading more. In other places my slightly sleep deprived brain was in the middle a rather confusing action adventure movie. Apparently he purposely modelled this book after his vision f a conspiracy mystery and it was one big conspiracy. A pretty clever one actually. Another one is Agatha Christie style so that one I really need to figure out because I want to read it. The settings were very well done, 1870's Moscow, London, and St.Petersburg.

 

One of the Goodreads comments was that the book is absolutely wonderful in Russian......... ;)

 

 

 

That sounds like her perfect book for my mom for mother's day. She loves all things Russian and even spent six weeks studying abroad there in the 70's. 

 

 

My library lacks The Winter Queen so I started the Fandorin series with The Turkish Gambit--on audio, mind you!  Keeping track of the Russian diminutives was occasionally challenging.

 

I wanted to suggest that you also look at Akunin's Sister Pelagia series.  I have only read one of these books but I have been intending to read more.

[mumto2]

My library lacks The Winter Queen so I started the Fandorin series with The Turkish Gambit--on audio, mind you! Keeping track of the Russian diminutives was occasionally challenging.

 

I wanted to suggest that you also look at Akunin's Sister Pelagia series. I have only read one of these books but I have been intending to read more.

For those of you that were wondering about Amy's Mothering Sunday comment in the UK it is part of the church calendar and is the 4th Sunday of Lent. It seems to be a dangerous day for me. I usually spend it nursing my wounds. I have a skinned knee from a biking mishap. My pride is a bit bruised too.

 

Jane, I aleady have the first in the Sister Pelagia series marked on my wish list but thank you. I don't think I would have been able to keep the characters straight in the Winter Queen so huge credit for what had to have been really active listening. I was really grateful that the text always rather repetitively kept saying Fandorin rather than he!

 

Amy, I think your mom would enjoy this one. I am a bit curious about the movie.....

 

I went through at the beginning of the gemstone challenge and tried to identify either the first book or the next book in all the series I am interested in. The way I can scan my wish lists looking for the letter. I am enjoying spelling the stones far more than I imagined I would because of this.

[Stacia]

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Edited November 2, 2017 by Stacia

[Stacia]

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Edited November 2, 2017 by Stacia

[Mom-ninja.]

 

I said it previously & now that I have finished reading it, I can confirm it is true... L’art de la Simplicité: How to Live More with Less by Dominique Loreau is my Wuthering Heights of simplicity books. And I think most of you know how I feel about Wuthering Heights.

 

I like reading simplicity books. They're kind of soothing fluff for me, light, inspiring, etc.... But, this is not the case here. Supposedly this is a melding of her French sensibilities with her love of Japanese zen/simplicity, but it's as if she just put a bunch of trite commentary copied from various works into one place. Target audience? Not sure unless it is the rich & flaky. You're supposed to achieve a zen-like existence in mind/body/spirit, but doing so also necessitates Italian leather, pashmina, cashmere. For your personal meditation time, you definitely need thick cushions covered in only 100% wool or 100% silk. Eat & drink sparingly, yet other times, you are encouraged to drink champagne (of which you should purchase a crate of it no less). Of course, the eating sparingly will fit in well with her overuse of the word "slim" in the book. Because, even though appearances shouldn't matter I guess, she seems strangely fixated on women (no mention of men) needing to remain slim no matter what. And if you're going to use the word slim so many times within one section of the book, at least be industrious enough to use a thesaurus & vary the vocabulary a little bit. Please. Lots of the "advice" is conflicting too. So you read about doing one thing on one page, but within another page or two, you are being given seemingly opposite advice. Even though this is a small format book, it took me awhile to slog through the 200+ pages -- very few of which have any real or practical advice on how to achieve any of the things she espouses; I guess you're supposed to intuit that information? But, given what I guess to be the target audience, I'm not sure there will be a lot of intuiting going on. Sheesh. Skip this one unless you're looking for some cynical laughs. What an utterly ridiculous book. One star.

 

 

See, now this review pretty much makes me want to read the book just to see how awful it is.  :laugh:

[Stacia]

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Edited November 2, 2017 by Stacia

[Chrysalis Academy]

Do you ever finish a book, look up, and feel confused because you're not sure when and where you are? And who these people in your house are?  I spent the afternoon finishing up Seven Surrenders, the second half of the story begun in Too Like the Lightning.  I could say that I loved it, but it is probably more accurate to say that I was stunned by it. So many ideas, such interesting and complex characters, such remarkable world-building. I don't think I've ever finished a book then wanted to go online to find people who had read it just so I could talk to someone about it, but I'm going to go check and see if the author has a blog right now.  I think I've said before it's not a book for everyone - I'd love to have dd read it so we can talk about it, but it might be a little to R-rated for her at this point. But boy howdy, if you like speculative fiction, utopian sci-fi that whiplashes you between futuristic and Enlightenment ideas, if you like having everything you assume about people and the world challenged, this is your series. 

 

I don't know what else I'm reading. I don't even recognize my children, hardly. I'll have to post about other books tomorrow. For now I'm just going to try to hold on to this amazing world.

[Kareni]

I re-read a couple of books over the past few days.  These are both science fiction romances with sizeable fan bases -- witness the number of four and five star reviews on Amazon.  The books also have sizeable aliens -- in one book their skin colors are all the colors of the rainbow, in the other they're about seven feet tall, blue, and have horns.  The books are fun reads though they could both use a good editor.  (Adult content)

 

Grim (Tornians Book 1) by M.K. Eidem

 

"King Grim Vasteri is the strongest and most feared warrior in the Tornian Empire. He is the King of Luda, blood brother to the Emperor and his line will die with him. He will have no offspring for no female would join with him for once he was scarred he was considered 'unfit'. The Tornian Empire has been dying ever since the great infection caused the birth of females to become a rarity. Since then they have been searching the known universes for compatible females. The Emperor's discovery of a compatible female on a slave ship changed that. He'd ordered Grim to find his Empress' home world so more 'unprotected' females could be obtained, knowing Grim would never be allowed to Join with one.

Lisa Miller is a widowed mother of two little girls, Carly and Miki. Her husband died just a year ago, after a long battle with cancer and she misses him immensely. Friends want her to start dating again but in her heart, she knows there isn't a man on the planet she could love like her Mark. Who could love their girls like their own. Therefore, she'll stay alone.

When Lisa is discovered 'unprotected' at her husband's grave, she wakes on an alien ship heading for an alien world. Refusing to accept this she confronts the large males, demanding she be returned to her children. Seeing his chance to have a female, Grim agrees to accept and protect her offspring, if she agrees to Join with him and only him. Realizing this is the only way she can retrieve her children Lisa agrees and the Tornian Empire changes forever."

 

AND

 

Ice Planet Barbarians: A SciFi Alien Romance by Ruby Dixon

 

"You'd think being abducted by aliens would be the worst thing that could happen to me. And you'd be wrong. Because now, the aliens are having ship trouble, and they've left their cargo of human women - including me - on an ice planet.

And the only native inhabitant I've met? He's big, horned, blue, and really, really has a thing for me..."

 

Regards,

Kareni

 

[Kareni]

A few currently free Kindle books ~

 

The first one caught my attention because I lived on Guam many moons ago: The Last Fruit Stand on Guam by Robert Hatting

 

This looks different!:  Undercover Amish (Covert Police Detectives Unit Series Book 1)  by Ashley Emma

 

The first two books in a series by Josie Brown:    The Housewife Assassin's Handbook

and The Housewife Assassin's Guide to Gracious Killing

 

Regards,

Kareni

 

[prairiegirl]

I finished The Woman in Cabin 10--did not like it at all. It was reminiscent of Girl on the Train. I am getting tired of unreliable characters. As I was reading I was inwardly screaming, "Pull yourself together already!!" It was a frustrating read.

 

For an online book club I am reading The Girl You Left Behind. I am not a JoJo Moyes fan but this is different from her usual fare. So far I am liking it.

[Violet Crown]

Erin, glad dd11 is feeling better. It's awful watching them suffer. I see you are in a Crane mood: The Third Violet is a romance, about equidistant from Henry James on one end and P. G. Wodehouse on the other. I recommend. I've never read his poetry; actually nothing by him until year before last, and now three of his novels, so maybe I need to try his verse next.

 

Wee Girl just fell asleep (again), shivering with fever, nausea and thirst. Can't keep even an ice chip down.

[mumto2]

:grouphug: VC

[Kareni]

Sending good thoughts to your house, Violet Crown; being sick is no fun.

 

Continuing to send good wishes to all who need them.

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Ausmumof3]

Hope all those with sick ones are soon better.

 

I'm currently finishing up "inside the mind of a dog" - it's a young adult edition and is a fun and informative read on what we know at the point about the way dogs work. Some information was new, other stuff felt like stuff you already know from having a dog but it's nice to have it scientifically confirmed of course. I really enjoyed the writers chatty style and descriptions of dog behaviour.

[Jane in NC]

I've read Akunin's 3rd Sister Pelagia mystery, Sister Pelagia and the Red Cockerel. I don't remember caring for it & when I went & looked on Goodreads, it seems I gave it one star back in 2011. At that time, I never kept notes about books, just my rating of them.

 

I don't remember it being as bad as a one star book, but I also don't remember it being something I liked.

 

:leaving:

 

This was an airplane book for me a few years ago.  It was a perfect distraction at the time and certainly better than a single star.  You must have been in one of your testy moods.  ;) :sneaky2:

 

[ErinE]

Erin, glad dd11 is feeling better. It's awful watching them suffer. I see you are in a Crane mood: The Third Violet is a romance, about equidistant from Henry James on one end and P. G. Wodehouse on the other. I recommend. I've never read his poetry; actually nothing by him until year before last, and now three of his novels, so maybe I need to try his verse next.

 

Wee Girl just fell asleep (again), shivering with fever, nausea and thirst. Can't keep even an ice chip down.

:grouphug: to your daughter. I can't stand it when my kids are sick and there's little I can do to make them well. I hope she feels better soon.

 

I'll add the book to my TBR list. I ended up on Crane by accident as I was browsing the poetry section in my local library. The volume was slim in contrast to the several thick books I'd already selected, and I remembered I'd liked his "In the desert" poem. His poetry is pretty grim. The ocean is a maiden's playground and a sailor's grave, deities are indifferent to human suffering, his beloved is indifferent to his affection. The version I read has a brief history in the foreword, going over which poems were rejected for publishing and for what reason. One poem "War is Kind" is particularly biting, contrasting the pomp of the military with the reality of war's causalities.

[Stacia]

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Edited November 2, 2017 by Stacia

[aggieamy]

VC - how is your family doing this morning? Are you guys feeling better?

[Angelaboord]

Not too much reading for me last week; my dh was out of town for 8 days, so I was flying solo. Remarkably, no one got sick or ended up in the ER, although our refrigerator did break. Still, I would call that a success. Usually somebody comes down with a fever or starts throwing up or ends up with stitches because he and his brother were sword fighting with sticks and got carried away. He's only home for a few days before he's gone again, though, so we may not be out of the woods yet.

 

VC, I hope your WeeGirl is able to keep something down today!

 

And for everyone who was having a hard week last week, I hope this week is better and that spring is coming to everyone soon. Literally and figuratively. [emoji846]

 

Also from last week... Nan, two of my boys are/were late talkers. My oldest, who is now 20, was my first late-talker and my current 4 year old is also a late-talker. They both followed roughly the same pattern. They didn't have very many words until they turned 3. Then the words started snowballing until at 3.5 they started using phrases and sentences and now with my 4 year old we are starting to have the beginnings of conversation. Incidentally, my 20 yo now wants to be a linguist. [emoji5] We have kind of a controlled experiment in our house with 9 kids and the same parents, so considering that my late-talkers are separated by 6 other kids who talked "normally", I don't think it has anything to do with parenting style. When my oldest was little and not talking, I read Thomas Sowell's book Late-Talking Children and I could have kissed him, it described our situation so well. I guess late-talking is often associated with "math, memory, and music" and tends to run in families, as it does in ours. My oldest disproves the math part, but he's very analytical and mainly enjoys languages for their grammar. My 4 year old seems to be very musical. Apparently, though, it is much more likely today for a late-talker to be wrongly diagnosed with autism than it was 16 or 17 years ago. I was kind of catching up on things with Stephen Camarata's book Late-Talking Children: A Symptom or a Stage?

 

I did read this week, but it was an e-book written by Elizabeth Foss for an online Lenten workshop about recovering from burnout. I enjoyed the book and it was 178 pages long; this should be enough for me, so why does it bother me so much that I can't put it on Goodreads??? Oh well. It will still make my big personal list. The title is Restore: Talking Together About Restoration.

 

I also read a bit of Black Lamb and Grey Falcon by Rebecca West. My kindle app tells me I am on page 30 of 1071. I really have no business reading this book. It is going to take me years. But I have really enjoyed these 30 pages. West is a wonderful writer mixing history and travelogue and memoir and her perspective on the interwar years in the Balkans is enlightening.

 

 

 

 

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