bookstep

Tell Me Tuesday

2012-01-24T08:17:00.002-06:00

What are you reading today?

For Mary

2012-01-23T08:16:00.002-06:00

from the book jacket:

Early one autumn afternoon in pursuit of an elusive book on her shelves, Susan Hill encountered dozens of others that she had never read, or forgotten she owned, or wanted to read for a second time. The discovery inspired her to embark on a year-long voyage through her books, forsaking new purchases in order to get to know her own collection again.A book which is left on a shelf for a decade is a dead thing, but it is also a chrysalis, packed with the potential to burst into new life. Wandering through her house that day, Hill's eyes were opened to how much of that life was stored in her home, neglected for years. Howard's End is on the Landing charts the journey of one of the nation's most accomplished authors as she revisits the conversations, libraries and bookshelves of the past that have informed a lifetime of reading and writing.

Tell Me Tuesday

2012-01-17T08:02:00.000-06:00

What are you reading these days?

The Reading Promise Continues

2012-01-10T08:12:00.002-06:00

Maria and I made it to 200 days of our Reading Promise. The date was actually Christmas Day, so we didn't do anything special for the anniversary. Maybe pancakes again on the 300th day?

Most recently, we read the first book in the Narnia series, The Magician's Nephew, which neither of us had read before. We'll at least read Lion, Witch and the Wardrobe, but are in no hurry to get to it, having read it before. Now, we are reading a funny little story about an French schoolboy with naughty friends, Nicholas by Gosciny and Sempre. I'm glad to see that there are others in the series because it's cracking us up!

From School Library Journal:

Grade 4-6–This classic book about a mischievous schoolboy and his friends, originally published in French in 1959, is now available in English. The expertly translated text is enlivened by artwork by a New Yorker cartoonist to create the unforgettable milieu of Nicholas and his rowdy friends. A collection of 19 escapades, the stories introduce the protagonist and his cohorts as they wreak havoc out of simple, everyday situations at school, on the playground, and at home. Pestering the substitute teacher, trying to adopt a lost dog, and quarreling over soccer positions (only to find there isn't even a ball) make for hilarious and timeless anecdotes that will have readers giggling. Adults will also appreciate Nicholas's childlike perception of each troublesome situation through his comments at the end of each adventure. These charming vignettes beg to be shared aloud in a classroom or library setting. A delightful choice for spicing up middle-grade collections and for exposing kids to stories from abroad.–Jennifer Cogan

Tell Me Tuesday

2012-01-03T14:38:00.003-06:00

Happy New Year! What are you reading this week?

Post Your Christmas Book Wish List Here!

2011-12-21T20:31:00.002-06:00

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-12-13T08:49:00.002-06:00

Maria and I are about to begin the Fourth Stave of A Christmas Carol. Today I will read the last three chapters of Around the World in 80 Days to my older history group. In a couple of days, I will read the last pages of Farmer Boy to my younger history group. Clearing the decks just in time to get some new books for Christmas!

What are you reading today?

Christmas Reading

2011-12-06T22:18:00.002-06:00

This is what I am currently reading to Maria for our Reading Promise. I love this story so much and love reading it aloud even mucher.

What are you reading now that it's December?

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-11-15T08:58:00.002-06:00

What are you reading today?

Why Read Moby-Dick?

2011-11-14T08:37:00.003-06:00

Here's the little gem that I read in the last few days. I loved it and smiled in agreement at least once in every one of the 28 short chapters. Of course Moby-Dick is as relevant today as it was when it was published 160 years ago this very day. It is the great American novel. It is so very detailed and specific in its account of 19th century whale fishery that it is virtually a handbook on the subject. It delves into the anatomy of the whale to such a degree that it is a science text. It is a travelogue and a play and a humorous short story. Under it all, the purpose of the monomaniacal captain pumps on as surely as the beat of a bull whale's tail under a sleek or stormy surface, oblivious to all else. But it's the craft and poetry of Melville's writing that tie it all together to make a perfect universe unto itself. It is good and evil; hope and hopelessness; life and death. Philbrick recognizes the greatness and importance of this American treasure, and I hope his book brings more people to read it.

Reading Aloud

2011-11-12T12:21:00.005-06:00

I think the reason I'm no longer reading is that I'm always reading. What? Well, ever since my younger daughter and I started our Reading Promise, I've been reading aloud to her for at least ten minutes a day. I also teach a number of homeschool classes each week in which I am reading aloud the following books:

Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder (to my three 5th graders)

Around the World in 80 Days by Jules Verne (to my four 9th graders)

Dear America: Hear My Sorrow by Deborah Hopkinson (to a mixed group of four)

And then there is the actual history text itself, which I read aloud from almost daily, and all of the picture books, poems, and articles that supplement our homeschool studies. When I get some time for myself at the end of the day, I'm just more likely to turn to a quick game of Scrabble on the iPod. I'm not whining; I love it all. I just realized that that is probably why I've read so very little for myself these last months.

However, I did just read one little, new book for myself. I will post it here soon. You might be able to guess the very topic that got me to carve out a little extra time. . .

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-10-04T06:24:00.002-06:00

What are you reading?

A Book for DRD?

2011-09-30T06:43:00.003-06:00

I was tidying up my usual section of the bookfloor last night at B&N when I came across this in Biography. It's new.

Of course, there is always this, too.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-09-27T08:45:00.000-06:00

Good morning! What are you reading? Please share!

Around the World in 80 Days

2011-09-24T10:15:00.004-06:00

I am reading this classic book aloud to my four 9th grade history students, and we are mapping Phileas Fogg's journey as he goes along. It is a real pleasure to read! It's funny and interesting and has great words in it. Recently, I've had the kids look up these words from the book: phlegmatic, chary, fellah, equanimity, and alacrity. Nothing like a well-written classic to broaden ones geographic and verbal horizons.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-09-20T07:20:00.001-06:00

And what are you reading these days?

Reading Promise Makes It to 100 Days!

2011-09-16T07:18:00.004-06:00

Back on June 11, I explained the Reading Promise that I made with my younger daughter (don't worry, Big Sis has a Great Movies thing with my husband--they're up to 50 Great Films watched and logged--more on that another time). The Reading Promise was kicked off on Maria's 10th birthday and was inspired by a book of the same name (written by Alice Ozma).

On August 3, I listed all the books that I had read aloud to Maria at that point. Since then we've finished these:

Old Mother West Wind
Fanny at Chez Panisse
Mary Poppins
Rabbit Hill
Ramona the Brave

Now, we are reading Julius Lester's retelling of the tales of Uncle Remus mostly because we love the ride Splash Mountain and were curious. The stories are strange! And violent! There have been deaths by chopping and scalding. And once an animal has been killed, he still might show up in another story. And, oddly, in one story, Lester brings things into contemporary times with the mention of television, Dr. Pepper, jogging suits, and Adidas. If I had it to choose again, I'd seek out the earliest collection of these old tales, not one done in 1987.

Anyway. . .Today makes 100 days of my reading aloud to Maria, and we are going to mark the day just like the father/daughter team in the original book: We are having pancakes. For dinner.

A New One from Selznick

2011-09-15T08:41:00.003-06:00

This just came out on Tuesday. Olivia read it and said it is almost as good as Hugo Cabret. I haven't read it yet, but I do like the heavily illustrated format.

Finished My Summer Reading

2011-09-14T06:15:00.002-06:00

Back on June 16, I showed you the list of books that I gave my eighth graders on their last day of school. I asked that they read a book from Column A and a book from Column B. I told them that I would do the same. Early on, I read Holes by Sachar. And this week, I finished reading Steinbeck's The Pearl. It is a haunting little tale about hope and greed. And it's poetic. In eighth grade I had to read Steinbeck's The Red Pony, and I hated it. But I liked Of Mice and Men. I think that's it for the Steinbeck I've read. Do we have any Steinbeck fans out there?

Lost in Space!

2011-09-12T06:36:00.002-06:00

I apologize to each of my readers and writers here at Bookstep for my long absence. Thank goodness you carried on a wonderful book chat without me in the last post. It's your blog too! If I get busy or sidetracked or forgetful, feel free to ask, answer, and argue here as you wish.

Moving forward!

I tried to read Nicholson Baker's The Everlasting Story of Nory, which is his take on the inner life of a quick and quirky nine-year-old. Some of what I read was cute or clever or kid-like, but he includes stories that little Nory makes up. If there's one thing I can't stand, it's little stories about things that go nowhere. Especially a fictional little kid's made up stories. I don't care. I tune out. It doesn't matter! Once upon a time, blah, blah, blah. That's my problem with most contemporary fiction. I can see them telling me a story, and I want out.

So I dropped the Baker book.

But I've now gone back to a book that has another child's voice in it. This one is done so much better. It's Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer. I started it last night, on 9-11-11, which is fitting since it deals with a child's loss of his father in the attacks on the World Trade Center (yes, Mary, another one). If I remember my reaction from the first time I read it, I loved every other chapter. I loved the chapters written in nine-year-old Oskar's voice. I also loved every other chapter in Foer's other book, Everything Is Illuminated. Maybe I should save time and just read half the book.

From Publishers Weekly

Oskar Schell, hero of this brilliant follow-up to Foer's bestselling Everything Is Illuminated, is a nine-year-old amateur inventor, jewelry designer, astrophysicist, tambourine player and pacifist. Like the second-language narrator of Illuminated, Oskar turns his naïvely precocious vocabulary to the understanding of historical tragedy, as he searches New York for the lock that matches a mysterious key left by his father when he was killed in the September 11 attacks, a quest that intertwines with the story of his grandparents, whose lives were blighted by the firebombing of Dresden. Foer embellishes the narrative with evocative graphics, including photographs, colored highlights and passages of illegibly overwritten text, and takes his unique flair for the poetry of miscommunication to occasionally gimmicky lengths, like a two-page soliloquy written entirely in numerical code. Although not quite the comic tour de force that Illuminated was, the novel is replete with hilarious and appalling passages, as when, during show-and-tell, Oskar plays a harrowing recording by a Hiroshima survivor and then launches into a Poindexterish disquisition on the bomb's "charring effect." It's more of a challenge to play in the same way with the very recent collapse of the towers, but Foer gambles on the power of his protagonist's voice to transform the cataclysm from raw current event to a tragedy at once visceral and mythical. Unafraid to show his traumatized characters' constant groping for emotional catharsis, Foer demonstrates once again that he is one of the few contemporary writers willing to risk sentimentalism in order to address great questions of truth, love and beauty.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-08-09T09:06:00.003-06:00

What are you all reading this week?

My Reading Promise with Maria

2011-08-03T12:29:00.006-06:00

My younger daughter and I have a "reading promise" in which I read to her every day for 10 minutes or one full chapter of whatever book we are currently reading. (See my entry from June 11 to see the book that gave us this idea.)

So far, since June 9 (her 10th birthday), we have read:

Ramona and Her Father
Ramona the Pest
The Marvelous Land of Oz
Beezus and Ramona
Ramona Forever
Ozma of Oz
Ramona Quimby, Age 8
Ralph S. Mouse

Right now, we are reading Old Mother West Wind, which is a sweet little book, but really is for a younger child. Still, Maria is sure to remind me if it gets to be late in the day and we haven't yet read. In order to keep our promise, she has waited up for me to get home from work around 10:30 at night (my husband's reading aloud to her wouldn't count), and once, Olivia and I had to wake her to ask if we should read after she feel asleep early on the floor while watching a movie (she said yes! she'd stay awake, thank you very much). We've almost made two months of continual reading!

Here's another blogger's take on Old Mother West Wind, which was published in 1910.
http://www.readingtoknow.com/2008/04/old-mother-west-wind-by-thornton-w.html

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-07-26T09:04:00.001-06:00

Yo! What'cha readin'?

TUESDAY!

2011-07-19T06:29:00.002-06:00

What are you reading?

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-07-12T08:01:00.007-06:00

I accidentally fell into rereading a favorite, Nicholson Baker's Anthologist, and finished it just last night. The first time I read it, I was struck with his poetic lines and images and unique little phrasings on every other page. I still love it, but now it's like a well-known road. I know where the twists and curves are, so I'm not surprised by them like I once was. But I still enjoy the view.

What are you all reading this week?

Exiled: Memoirs of a Camel

2011-07-07T06:47:00.002-06:00

From Booklist:

Gr. 4-8. The actual history, found in a note at the back of the book, is fascinating: in the 1850s the U.S. army shipped camels from Egypt and tried to train them in the Texas desert, with hopes they would help the army "cope with desert terrain." Karr draws on the history, but she tells the story from the viewpoint of one brave camel, Ali, who is torn from his mother in Egypt, sold to Christians, and shipped to America to work with the Camel Corps--until the whole idea is abandoned and he escapes to blaze his own trail. History through the eye of a camel is a cute idea, perhaps for a picture book, but it's tedious here and seems contrived in a long novel, despite Karr's careful interweaving of the real events and people of the time. Even so, readers will have fun imagining the animal's physical experience with those clumsy "soldier-beasts" and "silly natives," and many will spot the parallels with slaves and indentured immigrants torn from their roots, never to return. Hazel Rochman

Ouch, Hazel. I kind of like it. I like to read about the sands of Egypt in the summer, and this book is fitting that bill quite nicely even though it is set in the desert sands of this country. Ali is a proud camel who is trying to figure out his place in life and keep his dignity despite being a beast of burden. I want to visit a zoo just so I can spend some time watching the dromedary camels, great ships of the desert.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-07-05T07:07:00.001-06:00

Tell us what you're reading this week!

Dig me! I'm reading fiction!

2011-07-01T09:48:00.002-06:00

For Christmas, my family gave me a book lover's calendar that our local library sells. You know the kind, a page for each day, a new book on each page, a good mix of new and old and true and not true. This caught my eye because it was described as a love story told by thirty-five characters, some of them inanimate objects (the emergency brake on a subway, for instance). And, well! It is fresh and funny and quirky and new. Reminds me of Nicholson Baker (!) and Jonathan Safran Foer (!) and even Salinger (gasp!). Who is this Rudolph Delson and where did he learn to talk in this code that goes right to my poetic little heart? And, Martha, I thought of you when I read pages 124-129 where the two main characters discuss naming Jennica's new Maine coon cat.

One of many paragraphs from Maynard and Jennica that made me smile:

On the train downtown from Practical Cats, a long-legged black girl wanted to know the cat's name. She was sincerely charmed by Congressman Cat. And her boyfriend, dressed like a gangster, was smiling amiably and humbly and even apologetically at me. It was like being in church, the air of fellowship this cat brought about.

This book came out in 2007 and was his debut novel. Anyone else read it?

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-06-28T05:59:00.003-06:00

Tell us what you're reading!

The Breadwinner by Deborah Ellis

2011-06-27T07:50:00.004-06:00

This young adult novel takes place in today's war-torn Afghanistan. The story follows Parvana, a girl who must cut her hair and dress as a boy to be able to work on the streets of Kabul selling trinkets and cigarettes and reading and writing letters for a small fee.

I read this book to preview it for my homeschool history classes for next year (our modern history studies will take us into the 1990's). I plan to read it aloud to my 9th graders but not my 4th and 5th graders due to the heaviness of the material and a few graphic descriptions. It is very well done and shows the terrible lack of women's rights and human rights in that part of the world without making a villain out of every male character.

Summer Reading

2011-06-16T08:15:00.002-06:00

I homeschool my 13-year-old daughter and her two good friends in English. This is what I handed them on the last day of school:

SUMMER READING INVITATION

I know you’ve just finished the hardest year of your schooling to date, and your work and obligations are technically over until after Labor Day. However, summer is a wonderful time to read, and there are so very many good books out there! I invite each of you to select and read one book from Column A and one book from Column B over the next three months. And to make it fair, I will, too. Enjoy!

Column A
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Animal Farm by George Orwell
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
The Pearl by John Steinbeck

Column B
Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card
Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
The Giver by Lois Lowry
Holes by Louis Sachar
Tangerine by Edward Bloor

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-06-14T06:59:00.002-06:00

What books are on your brain?

The Reading Promise

2011-06-11T09:07:00.002-06:00

From Publishers Weekly:

Named for two literary characters ("Alice" from Lewis Carroll and "Ozma" from L. Frank Baum), the author is the daughter of a Philadelphia-area elementary school librarian. Father and daughter embarked on a streak of reading-out-loud sessions every night before bed as Ozma was growing up. At first they decided on 100 nights straight of reading before bed—a minimum 10 minutes, before midnight, every night, no exceptions—then it stretched to 1,000, and soon enough the author was headed to college and they had spent eight years straight reading before bedtime, from Oz stories to Shakespeare. Reading with her father offered a comforting continuity in the midst of her mother's disquieting move away from the family, her older sister's absence as a foreign exchange student, and the parsimoniousness of her single father. Ozma's account percolates chronologically through her adolescence, as father and daughter persevered in their streak of nightly reading despite occasional inconveniences such as coming home late, sleepovers (they read over the phone), and a rare case of the father's laryngitis. Ozma's work is humorous, generous, and warmly felt, and with a terrific reading list included, there is no better argument for the benefits of reading to a child than this rich, imaginative work.

10 for Maria

2011-06-09T09:49:00.002-06:00

Maria woke up just before midnight last night, and instead of tucking her back in and helping her get right back to sleep, I suggested that we read one of our favorite books together. So for the first time ever, Maria was awake to see her birthday roll in, and as it did, we were reading Bread and Jam for Frances.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-06-07T08:35:00.000-06:00

What are you reading this week?

Moby-Dick (Greatest Novel Ever) Third Time Done!

2011-06-04T09:47:00.002-06:00

From "The Chase--First Day"

But suddenly as he peered down and down into its depths, he profoundly saw a white living spot no bigger than a white weasel, with wonderful celerity uprising, and magnifying as it rose, til it turned, and then there were plainly revealed two long crooked rows of white, glistening teeth, floating up from the undiscoverable bottom. It was Moby-Dick's open mouth and scrolled jaw; his vast, shadowed bulk still half blending with the blue of the sea. The glittering mouth yawned beneath the boat like an open-doored marble tomb.

The Wilder Life by McClure

2011-06-01T07:42:00.003-06:00

Having read and loved the Laura Ingalls Wilder books as a child, I was interested in McCure's book from the first. She's my age, has read the Little House series over and over, and, like me, never really watched the tv show, and when she did, saw it as something very different from the book series. Along with her devoted and supportive husband, McClure goes to all of the Little House sites in the Midwest (of which there are maybe 5? 7? I lost count). Her takes on the sites vary from excitement to disappointment as she searches for that personal thing that she is trying to get back from her own childhood, the feeling that the 'Laura World' always gave her. I like McClure well enough, she's funny and doesn't take herself or her search too seriously. Her companion also keeps things light as they tour yet another dugout house, watch another Little House Pageant, or sleep in a covered wagon through a bone-rattling thunderstorm. But there were just too many of the same kinds of visits described for me. The hardcore Little House fan would probably enjoy this level of description and detail of the various places where Laura Ingalls Wilder lived, but not having been to any of these places myself, they all kind of ran together.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-05-24T07:14:00.000-06:00

Hello, Readers! What are you reading this week?

I'm a Sucker for a Used Book

2011-05-19T11:32:00.002-06:00

Every time I'm in my local public library (which is usually a couple times a week), I have to check out the ongoing booksale on the lower level. It changes all the time, and I've gotten some real gems over the years. Recently I picked up a perfectly crisp hardcover copy of Ahab's Wife by Sena Jeter Naslund. Last week I got Where They Lived in London by Maurice Rickards, which will help me to find where Mozart, Dickens, and Twain trod and slept (if I ever get to London). I love library binding and pages that have turned soft and buttery after years of use. I couldn't resist library-bound copies of Bambi and John Christopher's The White Mountains, and my library's discarded set of Mary Poppins books are among my favorite possessions ever. Yesterday I bought this illustrated version of Misty, which was a Newbery Honor Book in 1948 and bears the barcode and stampings of my library. I like collecting and owning books as much as I like reading them.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-05-10T07:24:00.003-06:00

What are you reading today?

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-05-03T06:55:00.003-06:00

Last night, as I was helping to close B&N for the day, I was walking one of my usual sections (biography) when this caught my eye. It's by a 40-ish woman who loved (with a capital L) the Little House series as a child and is on a quest to recapture that love by rereading the books and seeking out the homes and lands of Laura Ingalls Wilder. I read the first chapter last night and found it to ring true and also to be quite funny. CGB, this book was written for you.

What are you all reading this week?

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-04-26T06:59:00.005-06:00

What are you reading today?

Bossypants

2011-04-25T12:41:00.003-06:00

Tina Fey offers this helpful information in case you ever find yourself the subject of a major magazine photo shoot:

The photographer will ask you what kind of music you want to play during the shoot. Remember that whatever you choose will be blasted through the loft and heard by an entire crew of people who are all so cool that the Board of Ed. officially closed school.

Just murmur, "Hip-hop," or make up the name of a hipster sounding band and then act superior when they've never heard of it. "Do you guys have any Asphalt of Pinking? [disappointed] Really? [shrug] Whatever you want, then."

Sometimes they ask if you want to hook up your iPod for background music. Do not do this. It's a trap. They'll put it on shuffle, and no matter how much Beastie Boys or Velvet Underground you have on there, the following four tracks will play in a row: "We'd Like to Thank You Herbert Hoover" from Annie, "Hold On" by Wilson Phillips, "That's What Friends Are For," Various Artists, and "We'd Like to Thank You Herbert Hoover" from Annie.

A Poem from Billy Collins' New Book

2011-04-23T09:15:00.002-06:00

What She Said

When he told me he expected me to pay for dinner,
I was like give me a break.

I was not the exact equivalent of give me a break.
I was just similar to give me a break.

As I said, I was like give me a break.

I would love to tell you
how I was able to resemble give me a break
without actually being identical to give me a break,

but all I can say is that I sensed
a similarity between me and give me a break.

And that was close enough
at that point in the evening

even if it meant I would fall short
of standing up from the table and screaming
give me a break,

for God’s sake will you please give me a break?!

No, for that moment
with the rain streaking the restaurant windows
and the waiter approaching,

I felt the most I could be was like

to a certain degree

give me a break.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-04-19T06:52:00.002-06:00

What are you reading today?

Movie Monday for Mary

2011-04-18T08:31:00.002-06:00

Mary asked if I'd do a Movie Monday to help give her and her husband Vince some ideas for movie rentals. Seems they've been out of the movie loop for a while. This is what she told me, "The last two movies we saw out were Seabiscuit and Frost & Nixon. I like escapes (Stargate) & based-on-true (Changeling). Vince likes action (Bourne) & mafia (Godfather). We both like justice (Shawshank Redemption) & classics (Dracula, GWTW)." Jim and I put our heads together and came up with these suggestions:

Mary:
Searching for Bobby Fischer, Quiz Show, The Social Network, The King's Speech

Vince:
Goodfellas, The Sopranos, Gangs of New York, The Departed, Band of Brothers

Both:
Spider-Man 2, Cool Hand Luke, Lonesome Dove, The Verdict, The Adventures of Robin Hood, The Queen, Crimson Tide

What other suggestions do you all have for Mary and Vince?

Just Finished

2011-04-16T09:28:00.002-06:00

I kinda skimmed, breezed, and skipped through this book, so it's mostly my fault that at the end of it I still don't understand why this lovely woman who won a show on Food Network, has a supportive and loving husband and two healthy children, and who got to spend months with her family traveling and eating in France is so unhappy. I think I missed something.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-04-12T06:50:00.003-06:00

Hello, fellow readers! What are you reading on this April day? (and Happy Birthday, Martha!)

The Call of the Sea

2011-04-11T09:02:00.003-06:00

This fine collection was edited by Peter Neill and came out in 2000. In it, there are excerpts, articles, poems, and pieces by Washington Irving, Owen Chase, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Edgar Allan Poe, Herman Melville, Mark Twain, James Thurber, Elizabeth Bishop, Rachel Carson, E. B. White, and many others. I was surprised, saddened and educated by the article "A Presentation of Whales" by Barry Lopez on the 1979 beaching of 41 sperm whales on the coast of Florence, Oregon. I've also read an excerpt from Thoreau's Cape Cod and reread Longfellow's "Wreck of the Hesperus." What a delight to have all of these marine-themed pieces gathered together in one vessel.

A New Kids' Book

2011-04-05T08:13:00.003-06:00

I picked up the advanced reader's copy of this book at B&N the other day and brought it home for Olivia (13 yrs). She really likes it so far. It comes out today. Be the first on your block to read it!

from Random House:
Kate, Michael, and Emma have been in one orphanage after another for the last ten years, passed along like lost baggage.

Yet these unwanted children are more remarkable than they could possibly imagine. Ripped from their parents as babies, they are being protected from a horrible evil of devastating power, an evil they know nothing about.

Until now.

Before long, Kate, Michael, and Emma are on a journey to dangerous and secret corners of the world...a journey of allies and enemies, of magic and mayhem. And—if an ancient prophesy is correct—what they do can change history, and it is up to them to set things right.

The Emerald Atlas brims with humor and action as it charts Kate, Michael, and Emma's extraordinary adventures through an unforgettable, enchanted world.

http://www.randomhouse.com/kids/emeraldatlas/index.php

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-03-29T08:11:00.002-06:00

What are you reading this week?

Spent an Hour with This

2011-03-24T14:35:00.003-06:00

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-03-22T10:58:00.001-06:00

And what are you reading?

Rock Solid Documentary

2011-03-21T12:31:00.006-06:00

Watched this over the weekend--such a sad story of a life too soon over. Do you know who Harry Nilsson was? He wrote the hit song "One" that was made popular by Three Dog Night. He wrote the theme song to the show "Courtship of Eddie's Father." He wrote the children's album "The Point." He put the "lime in the coconut and drink it all up." He wrote and sang, "Without You" (I can't liiive, if living is without you. . .). He wrote the songs and lyrics for the film "Popeye" and gave the Monkees a hit with "Cuddly Toy." His most famous song, which he did not write, might be "Everybody's Talkin'" from the film "Midnight Cowboy." Nilsson seemed endlessly creative, but was self-destructive. I never knew what a sweet voice he had, how talented he was, or how many people he touched in the music business. So glad I saw this. I wish him back.

A Great Memoir

2011-03-18T10:57:00.003-06:00

It always comes down to the egg.

From Blood, Bones & Butter by Gabrielle Hamilton:

Soltner arrived and Melissa [the author's sister], in spite of my warnings, said she wanted to prepare him an omelette, if he wouldn't mind, and she was wondering if he wouldn't mind showing her how he makes them. She enlisted the instructor in him. And he was glad to oblige, but asked her to prepare hers first. So she made her omelette the way we do at home, perfectly delicious, dragging the beaten egg in from noon, three, six, and nine o'clock in the pan until all the loose egg had run into the pan and set. She let the omelette get a touch of golden color on the exterior. Then she filled the omelette, turned it in half making a half moon, slid it onto a plate, and kept it warm in the oven.

Andre Soltner picked up one egg and cracked it on the edge of the counter. With two hands, he split the egg open and deposited its contents into a bowl. With each thumb, he reached into each half of the shell and scraped out the remaining albumen that tends to cling to the membrane until he had thoroughly cleaned out the egg.

He said, "When I was growing up, this is how my mother got thirteen eggs out of the dozen." Then he put the shells into the trash.

I acutely remember how badly I wanted to be able to crack and split eggs with one hand when I was coming up. I had seen guys cracking eggs by the crate into large white buckets over a china cap using one hand to do the whole process and then flinging the shell into a trash bin set farther and farther away--which was part of the fun in an otherwise tedious task. That's how I'd seen it at Mother's and that's how Greg and I did it at Jake's, cranking it out to Guns N' Roses. I have become totally competent at this one-handed maneuver, regularly wiping down the streak of watery white that ends up on the fridge door or stove lip with every toss into a remote garbage can. But this story stopped me in my hot speedy tracks. I felt this strange mixture of admiration and contrition. I had lately been fascinated by the deconstructed, dehydrated eggs Benedict at the newest temple of molecular gastronomy. And had even been thinking that I wanted to learn how to copy the sous-vide seventeen-hour egg at the trendiest restaurant downtown where you will never get a reservation. But this story of this seventy-five-year-old man, cracking an egg slowly and accurately with his two hands and using his thumbs to get the thirteenth egg as his mother had done during wartime food shortages, put me right back on track.

He beat the eggs and poured them into the prepared pan and then he agitated the eggs with a fork, constantly, over low heat until the curd was soft and tiny, and when the egg had adequately set, he tapped the pan, with gusto, on the burner to take out any last tiny gasp of air and then--did he flip it in the air, did he set it on fire, did he get out the chemical compounds to make omelette "eggs"? He did not. He grasped the pan in his left hand and tilted it slightly toward the back of the stove. With his right hand, he tapped his left wrist, like a junky searching for a good vein, over, and over, causing a little vibration in the pan that pushed the omelette incrementally with every tap up against the lip and then, when cresting, back in over itself until the whole omelette was folded over into thirds, a perfect football shape, absolutely no color on it, just perfectly cooked yellow omelette, and he put the little torpedo onto the plate for lunch. The omelette. As prepared by Soltner with just two hands, a fork, and a saute pan.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-03-15T07:47:00.003-06:00

So, the Blood, Bones & Butter book started off amazingly, beautifully, then got kind of normal/regular, even gappy. Now, in the middle of the book, just as she is opening up her first restaurant (Prune in NYC), Hamilton hits a beautiful, poetic, big-idea-meets-great-language slick that I am happily riding . Lovely.

What are you reading?

A Chef's Memoir

2011-03-14T08:42:00.002-06:00

Don showed this to me yesterday at B&N and said, "One of us should probably read this." I didn't want him to be first. I'm a third through it already. What's better than a chef that can cook? A chef that can write.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-03-08T08:55:00.002-06:00

Hello Fellow Readers,
What are you reading this week?
Christine

Something New for Mary Sue?

2011-03-04T09:51:00.003-06:00

It's not a new book (2007), but if you haven't seen it or read it, Mary, it is unique. Martin Scorsese is making it into a film that should be out later this year. Publishers Weekly called it a masterpiece. I think Don would argue with that, but it is a special book, a quick read, and something quite different from your usual fare.

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. Here is a true masterpiece—an artful blending of narrative, illustration and cinematic technique, for a story as tantalizing as it is touching.Twelve-year-old orphan Hugo lives in the walls of a Paris train station at the turn of the 20th century, where he tends to the clocks and filches what he needs to survive. Hugo's recently deceased father, a clockmaker, worked in a museum where he discovered an automaton: a human-like figure seated at a desk, pen in hand, as if ready to deliver a message. After his father showed Hugo the robot, the boy became just as obsessed with getting the automaton to function as his father had been, and the man gave his son one of the notebooks he used to record the automaton's inner workings. The plot grows as intricate as the robot's gears and mechanisms [...] To Selznick's credit, the coincidences all feel carefully orchestrated; epiphany after epiphany occurs before the book comes to its sumptuous, glorious end. Selznick hints at the toymaker's hidden identity [...] through impressive use of meticulous charcoal drawings that grow or shrink against black backdrops, in pages-long sequences. They display the same item in increasingly tight focus or pan across scenes the way a camera might. The plot ultimately has much to do with the history of the movies, and Selznick's genius lies in his expert use of such a visual style to spotlight the role of this highly visual media. A standout achievement.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-03-01T07:49:00.001-06:00

What are you reading right now?

Now Reading

2011-02-25T09:11:00.003-06:00

So far, I like the balance between biographical information and comparison and analysis of his works. This is the most in-depth information I've read about his time in WWII. I'll be looking to get my hands on his lesser known stories after this, no doubt.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-02-22T08:21:00.000-06:00

What are you reading?

Moby-Dick: Chapter 60 "The Line"

2011-02-17T18:31:00.003-06:00

The whale line is only two thirds of an inch in thickness. At first sight, you would not think it so strong as it really is. By experiment its one and fifty yarns will each suspend a weight of one hundred and twenty pounds; so that the whole rope will bear a strain nearly equal to three tons. In length, the common sperm whale-line measures something over two hundred fathoms. Towards the stern of the boat it is spirally coiled away in the tub, not like the worm-pipe of a still though, but so as to form one round, cheese-shaped mass of densely bedded “sheaves,” or layers of concentric spiralizations, without any hollow but the “heart,” or minute vertical tube formed at the axis of the cheese. As the least tangle or kink in the coiling would, in running out, infallibly take somebody’s arm, leg, or entire body off, the utmost precaution is used in stowing the line in its tub. Some harpooneers will consume almost an entire morning in this business, carrying the line high aloft and then reeving it downwards through a block towards the tub, so as in the act of coiling to free it from all possible wrinkles and twists.

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-02-15T08:19:00.002-06:00

Let's see how many people will tell us what they're reading!

Spending a Lot of Time with These on My Lap

2011-02-12T10:28:00.002-06:00

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-02-08T07:33:00.002-06:00

What are you reading this week?

A Snail's Mouth

2011-02-07T10:09:00.002-06:00

from The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating:

My snail possessed around 2,640 teeth. . .the teeth point inward so as to give the snail a firm grasp on its food; with about 33 teeth per row and maybe 80 or so rows, they form a multi-toothed ribbon called a radula, which works much like a rasp. This explained my snail's nodding head as it grated away at a mushroom; it also explained the odd squareness of the holes I had discovered in my envelopes and lists [that the author left near the snail's flowerpot overnight]. As the front row of teeth gets worn down, a fresh new row is added at the back and the radula slowly moves forward, being completely replaced over the course of four to six weeks. Radulae are adapted to a particular snail's diet and can be an identifying characteristic of a species.

My Current Read

2011-02-03T20:46:00.002-06:00

Don, I know you told me, but you should have told me! I'm really enjoying this little book. And it's got haiku from Issa. Signed, sealed, delivered.

From Booklist:
At age 34, Bailey was stricken with a mysterious virus while on a trip to Europe. Her healthy life had been full of activity, and now just the thought of getting up to get something was exhaustive. When a friend found some violets and brought her one in a pot, she also added a live snail below the violet’s leaves. Bailey wondered why she needed a snail, but after square holes began to appear in a letter propped on the violet’s pot, it occurred to Bailey that the snail needed food. She put a withered flower in the saucer below, and when the snail began to eat, Bailey realized that she could hear it eating—it was the sound of someone very small munching on celery. Soon the author realized she was attached, the snail providing an oasis of calm for her frantic and frustrated thoughts. She worried that the snail’s world was too artificial, so her caregiver created a woodland terrarium. Not only did the snail have a new home but Bailey had a new game: hide-and-seek with a snail. She began to read about snails, learning from scientists, early naturalists, poets, and writers, and found herself beginning to understand a snail’s world. And when her snail began to lay eggs, Bailey discovered that she might be the first person to record observations of a snail tending its eggs. This beautiful little book will not only make snail lovers of its readers, it will make them appreciate the small things in life. --Nancy Bent

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-02-01T07:57:00.002-06:00

What are you reading today?

A Fun Book for Kids

2011-01-28T11:11:00.002-06:00

Cooksin recently told me about this book, The Sixty-Eight Rooms, which is about a girl's shrunken adventures inside the tiny Thorne Rooms at the Art Institute. The rooms charmed Cooksin when she was a girl and are still an exhibit we visit when we're in the museum together, either with or without our own children. I checked out this book for my nine-year-old, Maria, as well as the coffee table book of photos of the actual Thorne Rooms. Maria is enjoying the story so far and loves reading about the details of the rooms. She especially likes that the little musical instruments all work.

A Memoir I Am Reading

2011-01-27T08:31:00.001-06:00

Tuesday!? Again!? How can that be!?

2011-01-25T08:26:00.001-06:00

Come out, come out wherever you are, and tell us what you're reading.

From Dreaming in Chinese:

2011-01-24T08:08:00.003-06:00

Day after day, then week after week, my route took me past the same group of young guys who were selling knock-off goods on the sidewalk. "Lady! Lady! You buy my bag! Come look my warehouse! I have Gucci! I have Prada!"
Each time, I dutifully slowed down, engaged for a moment, then declined the offers with a string of "Bu yao. Bu yao. Bu yao." "Don't want. Don't want. Don't want." I figure that some degree of tolerance is the personal duty I owe as a foreign guest in the country. After so many passages, I knew each hawker well enough to tell who had gotten a new haircut. They never seemed to recognize me. I was just another mark.
Finally, one day I had enough. I snapped, and dug for my new vocabulary. "Zuotian, bu yao! Jintian bu yao! Mingtian bu yao!" I shouted back. "Yesterday, don't want! Today, don't want! Tomorrow, don't want!"
They stopped cold, stunned. Then one irrepressible soul quickly recovered, and with a plaintive look whispered earnestly, "Houtian?" meaning "Day after tomorrow?"

Tell Me Tuesday

2011-01-18T09:26:00.000-06:00

Hello Fellow Readers! What's in your stack this week?

From One Chinese Book to Another

2011-01-17T07:58:00.003-06:00

From Booklist:

Fallows manages to take the relatively dry subject of translation and create a warm and witty memoir. Dwelling less on her own feelings then on the intricacies of language mastery, she shares experiences after she and her husband moved to China that taught her just how complex Mandarin can be. Such as the fact that there are 400 syllables in Mandarin as opposed to 10 times that number in English, making tone crucial in conversation. Fallows makes all this fascinating by writing in a thoroughly engaging manner that not only invites readers into her experiences, but also delights them with her discoveries. There is confusion with a Cantonese cab driver, the manicurist who envisioned “almost perfect happiness,” and the employee at Taco Bell who thought Fallows wanted to hug him (she was inquiring about takeout). From observations about maps, naming children, and the struggle over one language for a nation where over 300 million speak something other than Mandarin, Fallows takes readers on a ride through Chinese culture that is as entertaining as it is informative. --Colleen Mondor

I'm Readin'

2011-01-13T12:26:00.002-06:00

From the book jacket:

All decent parents want to do what's best for their children. What Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother reveals is that the Chinese just have a totally different idea of how to do that. Western parents try to respect their children's individuality, encouraging them to pursue their true passions and providing a nurturing environment. The Chinese believe that the best way to protect your children is by preparing them for the future and arming them with skills, strong work habits, and inner confidence. Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother chronicles Chua's iron-willed decision to raise her daughters, Sophia and Lulu, her way-the Chinese way-and the remarkable results her choice inspires.

Here are some things Amy Chua would never allow her daughters to do:
• have a playdate
• be in a school play
• complain about not being in a school play
• not be the #1 student in every subject except gym and drama
• play any instrument other than the piano or violin
• not play the piano or violin

The truth is Lulu and Sophia would never have had time for a playdate. They were too busy practicing their instruments (two to three hours a day and double sessions on the weekend) and perfecting their Mandarin.

But Chua demands as much of herself as she does of her daughters. And in her sacrifices-the exacting attention spent studying her daughters' performances, the office hours lost shuttling the girls to lessons-the depth of her love for her children becomes clear. Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother is an eye-opening exploration of the differences in Eastern and Western parenting- and the lessons parents and children everywhere teach one another.

Tell Me Tuesday 2011!

2011-01-04T14:12:00.000-06:00

It's a new week in a new year--what are you reading?

Documentary

2011-01-03T11:53:00.003-06:00

Jim and I watched this over the weekend. It left me feeling sad. Yes, Joan Rivers's humor has always been crude. Yes, she's made a life out of saying ugly things about many, many people. But I couldn't help feeling sorry for her. Joan Rivers is trying desperately to stay young, to be funny, to remain relevant in her field at the age of 75. She still works; she'll take any gig, sell any product. She is focused on making money and being productive, yet she is isolated and lonely in her ivory tower. In the course of the film, her long-time manager leaves her. She says that he was the last person who lived through the major events of her life with her, the only one with whom she could relive her earlier days in comedy. Comedy is a fickle business and a terribly difficult one for a woman to find success in let alone keep success in. How do you age gracefully in such a field? There is no comedy equivalent to Audrey Hepburn or Meryl Streep. There is no elegance. You have to claw and grab and cling to the face of the rock or plummet to the ground below. And Rivers isn't letting go.

The Pleasures of Cooking for One by Judith Jones

2010-12-30T09:20:00.003-06:00

I'm enjoying this beautiful book right now.

From Wikipedia:
Judith B. Jones (1924 – ) is a senior editor and vice president at Knopf. In 1950, she rescued The Diary of Anne Frank from the rejects pile. In 1960, she championed a cookbook no other publisher would touch, named it Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and became Julia Child's editor from then on. She ushered all of John Updike's books into print, including the posthumous ones, and edited many other important works both culinary and literary.

Jones writes:
An old wives' tale is that you can't halve an egg. So many single cooks will pass up a recipe simply because reducing it would entail using half an egg. But all you need do to make this feat possible is to crack a large egg into a small jar and shake it up. When the white and yolk are well blended, you'll have 3 tablespoons. So, for your half-egg, simply extract 1 1/2 tablespoons and use it as called for. Just refrigerate the remaining egg in the tightly lidded jar.

Post Christmas Reading

2010-12-26T11:56:00.000-06:00

What books did you give and/or get for Christmas?

Tell Me Tuesday

2010-12-21T16:07:00.003-06:00

Olivia and I have been enjoying this documentary over the last week. Fascinating. And over the top. And stunning. And ridiculous. And amazing. And archaic. Yet we are drawn.

I am, as ever, chipping away at Moby Dick. We have all the major players now and are sailing at a pretty good clip. Ahab has presented his goal to the crew along with his reward of a gold piece for the first to spot the white whale. I have a feeling they're going to go after him like they did the first two times I read the book. Watch out, boys. It's going to get a little rough.

What are you all reading (or watching!) in these pre-Christmas days?

Tell Me Tuesday

2010-11-23T12:08:00.000-06:00

Hi, everybody! What are you reading this week?

Babies

2010-11-19T08:48:00.002-06:00

The girls and I watched this documentary last night. It is as beautiful as I had hoped. Four babies in four different countries and cultures from their first days to their first steps. We were a little uncomfortable at first with the danger some of them seemed to be in on a daily basis (Don't put that rock in your mouth! Get that baby out of the group of wandering calves! Don't put your wrist in the dog's mouth, baby!), but once we calmed down and saw that no baby was going to get hurt, we enjoyed it greatly. It really shows that people all over the world are just people. And that babies are endlessly fun to watch.

Now Reading

2010-11-18T08:11:00.001-06:00

From Booklist:
That Padel is Charles Darwin’s great-great-granddaughter adds the allure of curiosity to her contribution to observance of his natal bicentenary. That’s good, because appreciative readers of this year’s celebratory batch of new biographies and new editions of Darwin’s writings stand to be keenly affected by this superbly crafted book. Rather than rewrite the letters, journals, and memoirs of her forebear and his associates, Padel pours them, as verbatim as rhythm and lineation allow, into unrhymed verses and stanzas most often resembling classical Latin couplets but also arrayed in repeating three-, four-, and five-line units and as faux blank verse. Padel’s own original writing fleshes out narration and description, though she is sparing with it, letting the native rhythms of the prose of well-educated yet nonliterary nineteenth-century upper-middle-class people envelop us with their intelligent passion. If she omits a few important episodes—most notably his experiences at Tierra del Fuego during the Beagle’s voyage—she definitely gives us a Darwin with whom we can wonder and feel, smile and weep. --Ray Olson

Tell Me Tuesday

2010-11-16T07:12:00.000-06:00

What are you reading?

The Checklist Manifesto by Atul Gawande

2010-11-09T07:58:00.005-06:00

A friend at Barnes and Noble mentioned this to me, and I started it the other night. Very interesting little book about how complex tasks from using medical procedures to building skyscrapers to flying jet planes can be made significantly safer by using checklists. It is not unlike a Malcolm Gladwell book; in fact, he endorses it himself.

From the book:
Checklists seem able to defend anyone, even the experienced, against failure in many more tasks than we realized. They provide a kind of cognitive net. They catch mental flaws inherent in all of us--flaws of memory and attention and thoroughness. And because they do, they raise wide, unexpected possibilities.

I'm Reading a New Book!

2010-11-05T22:22:00.002-06:00

After weeks and weeks of not being interested in any new reading, I found myself in my beautiful local library in front of the new nonfiction shelf. In the morning, when I stand with my back to the fireplace there, looking at one side of that bookcase, I've got to squint because of the sun coming down full on my face from the window in the ceiling. But when I go around to read the spines of the books on the other side of that same case, I've got the warm sun on my back and neck and tend to stand twice as long reading those titles. It was just such a morning that my eyes and hand fell upon this book on the bottom shelf of the sunny side of the case, Piano Lessons by Anna Goldsworthy.

The author is a concert pianist and she writes of her lessons from the age of nine with her teacher, a Russian woman, Eleanora Sivan, who is full of wisdom and intuition. I love the passages detailing their lessons.

I love Mrs. Sivan:

This is Mozart. Mozart is absolutely human being, and in love first with all the human, with people around him! And of course his favorite is young soprano, leggiero soprano--why? Because it is reminding him of little blossom, beginning to flower, beginning to bloom. And at the concert next week, you will play beautifully, and show them face of Mozart.

Mrs. Sivan again:

We talk about generosity. Liszt completely generous musician, and completely open. I admire this man more and more. Very interesting how enormously educated he was. Czerny was his teacher, which meant he had Beethoven roots, straightaway. But also, he learns from everything and everybody. Happy to give, and happy to take! Sometimes takes from Chopin, by the way, who not always so generous--except to piano, who he loves.

And:

You must remember, music is big and beautiful forest. You see every little tree and enjoying, but always you remember big forest.

Tell Me Tuesday

2010-11-02T07:19:00.000-06:00

Hello readers! What are you reading this week?

Dinner with a Literary Character (or two)

2010-10-15T08:15:00.002-06:00

I'm rereading Salinger's Franny and Zooey for the umpteenth time, and it got me thinking. Zachary Glass (Zooey) is a bit prickly and stand-offish, but I still think I'd like to meet him. Franny would be much warmer to have a chat with, and could even become a friend, I think. What character(s) from a book would you like to meet? Under what circumstances? A beer? A ballgame? A seven course dinner?

It's a New Tuesday

2010-08-24T09:28:00.002-06:00

I'm half-heartedly reading Julia Child's My Life in France and considering a few other books right now. What a drought. Can't get interested in reading much. Hopefully, you are enjoying a better summer reading experience. What's in your reading stack?

'Tis Tuesday

2010-08-10T07:34:00.000-06:00

What are you reading this week?

Movie Monday

2010-08-09T07:42:00.002-06:00

Jim and I watched most of the documentary Metallica: Some Kind of Monster (2004) last night. We love our documentaries, and this one is pretty interesting. Who would have thought that a band like Metallica would hire a "performance-enhancing coach" to help them through their power struggles and creative differences? The filmmakers set out to capture the making of an album (St. Anger) but ended up getting a band in therapy sessions and dealing with Hetfield's almost one year absence due to rehab for alcohol. At times, going to work for the members of Metallica resembled clocking in at any unpleasant job and dealing with passive aggressive and petty co-workers. Hard rockin' apparently isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Oh, Look! It's Tuesday Again!

2010-08-03T07:39:00.002-06:00

What are you reading in your Reading Cave (http://www.sakurah.net/collections/cave.htm)? And what is your pet reading (http://www.sakurah.net/collections/pet_cave.htm)?

Tell Me Tuesday

2010-07-13T06:46:00.000-06:00

What are you reading this week?

My Current Reread

2010-07-09T06:26:00.002-06:00

I usually think about ancient Egypt and the Nile River in hot, hot summer. This novel about the "heretic king" is one of my favorites. It tells his story in the voices of the people who worked for him or were in his family. Some hate him, and some admire him. It ends with the words of his wife, Nefertiti. Haunting.

Can anyone suggest a good movie set in Egypt or on the Nile?

Is anyone having trouble posting on my blog lately?

Rereading Frenzy

2010-07-07T07:35:00.003-06:00

I tend to think of books about the same time every year, connect them with a season. After I'd started this little gem (an advanced reader's copy from Barnes and Noble) again the other day, I saw that it has 7-09-09 on the spine. No wonder I was drawn to it right now.

You could call this book a poetry workshop in disguise as a novel or a little novel peeking out from behind a poetry workshop. I think it succeeds on both levels. No matter what Don says.

I finished it yesterday and am now rereading another hot weather book, which I will reveal tomorrow.

Tell Me Tuesday

2010-07-06T07:08:00.002-06:00

Hello, readers! What are you all reading right now?

Done with the Wind

2010-07-02T21:18:00.002-06:00

Well, I finally finished reading Gone with the Wind. I loved the characters. Scarlett is strong and selfish and uncompromising. Rhett is enterprising and impulsive and surprisingly tender. I don't know anything about Margaret Mitchell as a person, but there are some ugly racist passages in the exposition that suggest to me she did not see all people equally. That soured the book for me. No, I don't think I'll be reading any of the "sequels" that were written later by others. I prefer to make up my own ending for Rhett and Scarlett. I see them coming together again a few years later and forgiving each other. But there's not much story in calm happiness.

Tell Me Saturday

2010-05-29T08:10:00.002-06:00

What's this? Let's mix it up! Tell us something you've finished lately, are in the middle of, or have just begun. Let's talk books people!

Ellen O'Hara

2010-05-20T04:34:00.002-06:00

"As far back as Scarlett could remember, her mother had always been the same, her voice soft and sweet whether in praising or reproving, her manner efficient and unruffled despite the daily emergencies of Gerald's turbulent household, her spirit always calm and her back unbowed, even in the deaths of her three baby sons. Scarlett had never seen her mother's back touch the back of any chair on which she sat. Nor had she ever seen her sit down without a bit of needlework in her hands, except at mealtime, while attending the sick or while working at the bookkeeping of the plantation. "