Booking Through Thursday

Today's question is: Okay, even I can’t read ALL the time, so I’m guessing that you folks might voluntarily shut the covers from time to time as well… What else do you do with your leisure to pass the time? Walk the dog? Knit? Run marathons? Construct grandfather clocks? Collect eggshells?

My answer: I write poetry and fiction. I watch some TV, and movies. I go for a walk every day (or try to, this winter has been bad for snow and ice). I garden 9 months of the year. I cook. I do tarot cards and astrology. And, I'm raising 3 kids, occasionally get out with my husband, and work full time! So I read when I get time, as my Gentle Readers know, I read! I try to spend time some quality time with my each of my kids each day, sitting with them while they watch a movie to answer their questions, or watching Holly-Anne do her little bit of homework, Graham do his puzzles - he likes one of us to sit by him to 'help' though he doesn't want our help! We go outside on the weekends and play. And with the eldest, since he is so seldom home much these days, when he is home I try to spend a bit of time with him as well. Mostly he and I watch a movie or tv together, since I won't play his violent computer or X-box games! I also am discovering I can spend hours blogging and reading other blogs, instead of reading!! TV shows I watch are:
Lost,
Battlestar Galactica,
The Office
Medium
Dr Who
House
Smallville
* I did watch all the CSI's, but have dropped them in favour of reading more!
English Premier League soccer (Sat morning/sunday must see tv in our household)
BBC Canada - mysteries - Dalziel and Pascoe, Silent Witness; Escape to the Country, home selling shows
TVO (Ontario Public Service Channel) - mystery programming (usually runs for several weeks, and are based on mystery book series)

I am late doing this meme, I was sick again yesterday at work, and am home again today. This flu bug just won't go away. My daughter's babysitter's family also has struggled with it through the week, and her kids were sick last night again. So, I might be back later, but for now, I'm going to go crawl under a blanket and put on a movie, or try to read.

The Door in the Hedge

This was a reread for me. I had read this book many years ago after it first came out, and along the way lost my copy. When I saw it in print again last year, I picked it up. It is a collection of four fairy tales retold by Robin McKinley. The Twelve Dancing Princesses, The Princess and the Frog, The Hunting of the Hind, and The Stolen Princess. Ms McKinley has kept to the original spirit of fairy tales in her retellings. The kingdoms are all unnamed, and if the princes and princesses have names - in the Twelve Dancing Princesses, none of the princesses are named, nor is the soldier who rescues them, nor the King - they are not as important as the roles played. There is a certain tone in fairy tales that if captured, makes the stories themselves the essence - in the Princess and the Frog (also known as the Frog Prince in other retellings), all the characters have names, but it is the character - the princess who is trapped somehow, the prince in disguise, and how they are freed, that is the essential part of the story. The names can change, and so can how the story is told, so long as that story is told. It is the same with each of these stories in this collection. There are moments of haunting beauty, of timeless and perfect description, but it is McKinley's retelling - her twist she puts on each, her version, and her choice of words that cast a mood - that make these so memorable. It is as if she has caught the spirit of the fairy tale and woven it onto the page. These are perfect. I was happy when the Golden Hind is freed by the princess, I was delighted when the princess talks to the frog; I felt the terror of the shadow of the evil that has enchanted the dancing princesses. These are delightful, wonderful versions to read to my daughter when she gets older. They are fun. Now, it will be interesting to compare these with Angela Carter's versions of fairy tales, which I have heard are much darker. And since I love the movie Ella Enchanted as much as I love A Company of Wolves, I suspect that I will like both kinds of fairy tales equally, though for very different reasons. For lightness of touch, beauty, and for charm, these are among the very best. There is a reason it was nominated for the Mythopoeic award.
Though, I have to say now, that I want to rewrite the Princess and the Frog my way now, since I remember the Muppets version also! which I loved also - the princess and her golden ball, and Robin (Kermit's nephew) who brings the ball up. There are so many versions of the Frog Prince, and I think I love them all, because as I said, it is the essential story that I love ....I even have a little metal frog with a crown who sits in my garden 7 months of the year.
I still don't have a copy of Ulysses, so what to read next? My newly-bought books, reading challenges, TBR, Christmas books?

Catching up and no worries about running out of books to read.....

I've been sick the past two days with a version of the flu. Today I am home again because my daughter's babysitter and family caught the same bug and so I am spending the afternoon with Holly-Anne at home. If only this gave me time to read! Unfortunately I was so sick I couldn't read - Buffy tv watching and lots of sleep was all I could manage - so I haven't magically read anything, and missed Short Story Monday again. The good news is.......I went book buying today! I had to pick up the two books I had on order, and found 3 more.......
1. The Dark is Rising - Susan Cooper #2 in The Dark is Rising Series
2. The Dead Hour - Denise MIna
3. The Bloody Chamber - Angela Carter
4.Inkheart - Cornelia Funke
5. The Various Haunts of Men - Susan Hill

My excuse for picking up the extra books are - If I like the Dead Hour, I can give copies to my mother and other people through the year. Inkheart I wanted to read before the movie opens soon. The Dark is Rising, because I enjoyed book 1 and now I want to read the series this year! It will be fantastic if I can finally get the whole series read. For the books I'd ordered, I really want to read The Various Haunts of Men, which is book one in the Simon Serrailler series - again, if I like it, can get copies for other people. And the Bloody Chamber, which I have been meaning to read for at least 10 years, and thought was out of print and couldn't find a used copy anywhere. One of my favourite movies, A Company of Wolves, is based on a short story in The Bloody Chamber. And I had to put back two other books to get later, and promise myself I would come back for the Book Thief, and book two of Paul Park's Roumania series which is getting raves in the fantasy world, and promise myself that I would ration myself to buying a book a week! Obviously has not worked this month already. But I feel better!

I guess I shouldn't worry about running out of books to read!

My copy of Locus magazine arrived yesterday with the year 2007 in review, so of course I have been making a list of books from there to get next. Even the reviewers in Locus were saying that they didn't have enough time last year to read all the books that were published, in the science fiction and fantasy fields. So they had to choose what to read and review. I thought this was an interesting point they made, because it seems to me to be true of publishing in general now - there are so many books being published in a year, that it is impossible to read them all. So how do you choose, then? How do I choose? Do I read only reviews? Other people's lists of what it is good? Word of mouth? What is your selection criteria, Gentle Reader? How do you choose what books to read in a given year? My criteria has always been varied - I like a good story, and try to read as much as I can, in a given year. I check out newspaper reviews, magazine reviews, Book Magazine, Locus, Guardian Unlimited Books online regularly, Book Slut has good mystery and young adult fiction reviews online, and then the rest is by chance, by going into bookstores, and now blogs. Entertainment Weekly and Stephen King's column sometimes have interesting books to look out for. And always, there is everyone's Notable Book List of the year, plus award winners etc.

I can't say I am willing to read anything, and that is part of my problem. If so many books are being published in fantasy, and mystery, the genres I read most in, how can I read other areas too? How do I choose my books? Favourite authors, word of mouth, gifts, plus the areas mentioned above. And always, I want something good, something beautiful, meaningful, interesting, deep, thoughtful, moving, original. Exciting.

One of the things I have found, that I mentioned in an earlier blog, is that these book blogs help me find books I otherwise would overlook - books that were published years ago, books in other genres that I don't often read in, books that are good but have been overlooked in a time when so many books are being published. So I am most grateful to you, other book bloggers, for writing about what we all love so much - books.

And despite critical reviewers writing about book bloggers and our lack of credentials and/or books spoiling reviews, I can't help think that book blogs are more useful and fun than a disservice to the publishing industry. I got my sister to read Persuasion because of one of the blogs I wrote about the movie and how the book is better than any version made yet! So my hope is that our book blogs do just that - allow us to talk about books, and help each other find wonderful books to read. The best of our blogs allow us a peek into one another's lives as we live around our reading. Many of us have children, work, husbands, and we build reading in and around how we live. Or build our lives around our reading, I'm not sure which comes first!

Youngest child has just come home, my life calls - the last story in The Door in the Hedge will have to wait til after dinner, I'm afraid.... Happy reading, and happy finding new books to read this year!

Over Sea, Under Stone

Finally! 20 years after hearing about this book, I FINALLY read it!!! and it was worth it. A very enjoyable children's fantasy, first in a series of five books. I have to go buy the others now, which I will do. I thoroughly enjoyed the Arthurian context, the mystery, the sense of menace, the setting in Cornwall, the children themselves. This book reminded me very much of Enid Blyton's books, the Adventurous Four, the Famous Five, all of which I devoured as a child. I can hardly wait to read these to my children when they get old enough to listen!! That's how much fun they are, and quick to read, and a great introduction to the basic Arthur - the grail, and the legends in Cornwall and a hint of the knights of the Round Table. Yes, I will be buying the other books as soon as I can find them. This book is one of five under the general title 'The Dark is Rising', won the Newbery Medal. I can see why. It is good writing, and by this I mean the characterization, the dialogue, and the description especially are so good, so well-written, that I can see the village and seaside, the wind on my hair, hear the sea on the rocks. And yes, I'd like to be there, too! There is an economy in her descriptions, a clarity - she doesn't waste words, she uses the perfect word to capture the scene. I found myself wondering what has happened to our writing lately, that this kind of clarity is missing. Or, perhaps I haven't read enough award-winning books!

So, the New York Giants won the Superbowl! We had it on in the background while I dozed and finished Over Sea, Under Stone. I'm getting another cold and feel sick and lousy, so couldn't do much this evening once the kids had their bath. I'm not sure I can even pick the next book to read, so until tomorrow then, Gentle Reader.

Oh - and as for Becoming Jane, the movie on PBS tonight?? Forget it. I've read her biography, and I'm not interested in a movie guessing about her motives for turning down the man she agreed to marry, because Jane herself did not leave anything in writing that says why. We only have conjecture, and what her siblings have said - family history/memory sort of thing. Jane herself, if she ever said exactly why, did not leave any copies for posterity. As she was already writing before she was asked to marry, my guess has been that she did not love him enough to give up what she had at home, even though she knew that she was risking much by becoming a spinster and burden on her family. Whatever happened that night after she agreed to marry him, no movie can ever capture. Anyway, if any of you Gentle Readers did see it, drop me a line and let me know if it was worth seeing.



And, as my Long-Suffering Spouse pointed out earlier today, next week - Colin Firth as Mr Darcy! Yes!!!!! One week to go....

Poetry reading day

I got this from Table Talk and from Books Please blogs (don't ask me to link to their site from within this blog, I still can't figure this out, technologically challenged as I am, see their blog sites at the bottom of my postings.......). I think it is an excellent idea:




3rd Annual Brigid in Cyberspace Poetry Reading

So, in honor of Brigid (who is the Goddess I am learning about this year) - St Brigid's Day, and Groundhog Day here in Canada (where we have a foot of snow that fell in yesterday's storm), here is my poem:

The Swan

Across the wide waters
something comes
floating - a slim
and delicate

ship, filled
with white flowers -
and it moves
on its miraculous muscles

as though time didn't exist,
as though bringing such gifts
to the dry shore
was a happiness

almost beyond bearing.
And now it turns its dark eyes,
it rearranges
the clouds of its wings,

it trails
an elaborate webbed foot,
the color of charcoal.
Soon it will be here.

Oh, what shall I do
when that poppy-colored beak
rests in my hand?
Said Mrs Blake of the poet:

I miss my husband's company -
he is so often
in paradise.
Of course! the path to heaven

doesn't lie down in flat miles.
It's in the imagination
with which you perceive
this world,

and the gestures
with which you honor it.
Oh, what will I do, what will I say, when those
white wings
touch the shore?


Mary Oliver, from "Owls and Other Fantasies"

Happy Cyberspace Poem Day! Enjoy the snow, and if you are somewhere warm - enjoy the signs of spring!

thursday Jan 22 book meme - FINALLY!

Here it is, the meme I've been seeing everywhere and trying to find some time to do....somehow the blowing snow and it being Friday night and the dentist being over, I can finally do this!! This is from Eva at A Striped Armchair:

Which book do you irrationally cringe away from reading, despite seeing only positive reviews? The Kite Runner I think the subject matter is boring - I really hate the idea of servants and novels of friendships between the classes. Ugh! I know it is politically relevant now, and illustrates Afghanistan culture and life about which we know almost nothing here in the West, but it doesn't interest me.

If you could bring three characters to life for a social event (afternoon tea, a night of clubbing, perhaps a world cruise), who would they be and what would the event be? Thurday Next, from Jasper Fforde's series. I love her! Elizabeth Bennett from Pride and Prejudice. She is so lively and always full of opinions and ideas, and she's clever. No dinner party would be boring with her! the last person I'd love to bring alive is Mendoza from 'the Company' series by Kage Baker. She is outspoken, intelligent, and brave beyond belief, and in love with a man who reincarnates each time she shifts time. Her perspective on time and willingness to love each time is inspiring. I would hope to have either an afternoon tea or go on a cruise with these lovely woman characters, it would be fun and engaging discussion and lots of laughter, I think. And we could watch the men!

(Borrowing shamelessly from the Thursday Next series by Jasper Fforde): you are told you can’t die until you read the most boring novel on the planet. While this immortality is great for awhile, eventually you realise it’s past time to die. Which book would you expect to get you a nice grave?
Hmm....anything by Charles Dickens, unfortunately. I want to like him, I love the BBC productions - Bleak House this past summer was riveting and was my must-see programming - but every time I pick up one of his books, I start yawning and there is so much description that I yearn for action!!!

Come on, we’ve all been there. Which book have you pretended, or at least hinted, that you’ve read, when in fact you’ve been nowhere near it?
My entire Victorian Women in Literature course, I'm sad to say. I couldn't get through any of the books......yet I passed with a B, so obviously I learned how to read the first and last bits and listen to what the professor said in class! Now, of course, I occasionally think I might like to read George Eliot - see Middlemarch on my classics/chunkster reading challenges...

As an addition to the last question, has there been a book that you really thought you had read, only to realise when you read a review about it/go to ‘reread’ it that you haven’t? Which book?
No, I've actually had the opposite problem - I go to read something I think I haven't read, and it turns out I have! I'm not boasting; I can't remember reading a book thinking I already have read it, only to find out I hadn't. I'm sure I did when I was younger, but now that I keep lists, I find reading simpler!

You’re interviewing for the post of Official Book Advisor to some VIP (who’s not a big reader). What’s the first book you’d recommend and why? (if you feel like you’d have to know the person, go ahead of personalise the VIP)
I'd have a selection of books to reccomend, depending on what they like to read - for mystery, Gorky Park by Martin Cruz Smith, and Forty Words for Sorrow by Giles Blunt, Ian Rankin - Black and Blue; for science fiction and fantasy, Dune by Frank Herbert, and Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones, Riddlemaster of Hed by Patricia McKillip, for fiction: Bridget Jones Diary (it's so funny and what I call brain candy) by Helen Fielding, Life of Pi by Yann Martel, and yes, anything by Dan Brown - depending on if the VIP was male or female - and/or Diana Gabaldan. I really think that in this case, as with anyone I meet, I would try to find out first what they've read, and liked, so I would have a good idea of what to buy them, but the above (except for the last two) are my standbys and some of my favourites.

A good fairy comes and grants you one wish: you will have perfect reading comprehension in the foreign language of your choice. Which language do you go with?
Swedish. Alot of my favourite mystery writers are Swedish, and i would love to read the works in the original language.

A mischievious fairy comes and says that you must choose one book that you will reread once a year for the rest of your life (you can read other books as well). Which book would you pick? Hands down, Persuasion. I already read it at least once every two years.......

I know that the book blogging community, and its various challenges, have pushed my reading borders. What’s one bookish thing you ‘discovered’ from book blogging (maybe a new genre, or author, or new appreciation for cover art-anything)?
I think it's the challenges - they have inspired me to increase my reading. It helps so much to see there are people reading more than I do out there, because in my circle, I'm the bookworm, and yet I don't read nearly enough to satisfy me. The Blogging community has helped me read more, and to think about reading, and books, and the meaning of reading and the pleasure it gives me. I love that so many other people are reading and talking about books, too.

That good fairy is back for one final visit. Now, she’s granting you your dream library! Describe it. Is everything leatherbound? Is it full of first edition hardcovers? Pristine trade paperbacks? Perhaps a few favourite authors have inscribed their works? Go ahead-let your imagination run free.
My ideal library is a house filled with books. Ideally, I have a large room that has three walls filled from top to bottom with shelves, and the fourth wall has two or three large windows for natural light. I have reading chairs with lamps and tables (for tea, cookies, meals, to pile books) beside each chair, and at one end of the room, there is a fireplace set into one of the walls - with bookshelves set all around it- before which is a long sectional sofa, so that my family and friends can gather and talk. Neat ladder things, as Eva says in her blog, oh yes, so that I can get up to the top shelves! The floor is hardwood - everything is natural wood, the shelves are a light green, and there are carpets scattered about for warmth and colour. Some of the shelves do have pictures, but mostly it is books - new books, hard covers, soft covers, some are used copies because they are out of print or I'm collecting an older print series......it is a room devoted to reading and books! As you can tell, I already spend alot of time imagining how soon can I make this room a reality in our house! Plus, there would be bookshelves in every room of the house, but the bathroom.

success at the dentist, and Widdershins

Hurrah!!! I now have the screw implanted in my mouth, step one to getting my new front tooth implanted sometimes this summer! Ok, I'm on painkillers and you can plainly see the screw when I take my fake tooth/mouthpiece out, which I now absolutely have to do anytime I eat anything......so more grossing out my eating companions......but I'm half-way there, finally! No more dead tooth with many many root canals done, in the front!! Oh, and the dentist found yet another infection in the area where the bone graft went, so I'm back on penicillin. And painkillers while the screw and bone adjust to one another......the good thing is it let me leave work early today because of pain, and with the second winter storm in two weeks raging outside since 10 this morning, this is a good thing. I got home before rush hour started! Though our bus almost got stuck, with 10 cm at least already fallen.
The other good thing is I met my husband downtown, who got 'stood down' from his job with DND (Department of National Defense) because of the storm, so we were able to meet and grab a quick bite WITHOUT the kids (a treat!!!!) and it was in Chapters, so I took a quick look around. I did not buy anything, though I was so tempted......Pillars of the Earth is back out in paperback which though I was given a copy 10 years ago, I didn't finish and my mother raves about it, so I want to pick it up and try again, especially as now the sequel is out. And I didn't really look around since I have two books on hold at Collected Works and there are so many I want to buy that I feel guilty buying at Chapters when I want to support the independent bookstores. So I was good, and with the snow blowing past the windows, I just looked with my eyes......
I did take the opportunity to finish Widdershins yesterday. I managed to sleep off enough of the sedative by mid afternoon to be able to read - I couldn't do much else, even the tv put me to sleep, never mind sitting at the computer - so I read to my heart's content for a couple of hours before it was time to get Holly-Anne from her daycare, which is just down the street and all i could manage yesterday. It takes a long time for sedatives to leave my system, or so my three experiences with it has shown.

Widdershins did not blow me away the way I thought it would, and yet, I thoroughly enjoyed it. I think my main problem was I couldn't tell Whiskey Jack from Joe Crow Dog; whenever they spoke - and they are two of the main aboriginal spirit characters/real men in the book - I had to keep checking their names, even though as characters they are separate and fascinating. I'm not sure why. I love Geordie and Jilly, and how Jilly works out her problems is really interesting, especially how she resolves it. I really like the creative, original ideas Charles brings to his books and characters. I love all his characters. The Unseelie Court and the Native world are as ever fully imagined and realized, and especially 'the inbetween' - which he has made his own creation and which you will have to read yourself to find out about - is a place I'd give anything to visit, and I think the idea is, I can. So I'm not sure why the book didn't 'blow me away'; I think almost he had too many characters and stories, and so he didn't have enough time with some of his secondary ones who were just as interesting - in a way, this book should have been bigger. Now that I write this, I think so. I want more of all of them, more story, and I really want more Lizzie and Grey, whose story doesn't seem finished - or another story to come.
The characters are all well-drawn and lively, the music is fun, and there is real emotion as characters deal with death and change and the past affecting the present. It is a fantasy book unlike any other, and is very close to magical realism now, I think. It is well worth reading, and one of his best books, and has a better ending than some of his very early books. But it seems to me that he opened the door to a fascinating subject - fairie and the native spirits, and how they join or clash - and then shut the door on really exploring the mix, which I think would have made this book extraordinary. It is a difficult subject to write about, myths and the unseen world and this one, and this is a very good book. I highly reccomend this book, and I really hope if you haven't tried Charles de Lint, you will. He write about dark things in an uplifting manner - hope and faith sparkle through his books, and personal responsibility and choices. There's a reason why I've been collecting him from the very beginning!

Links: Eva

So now it's on to Over Sea, Under Stone, by Susan Cooper, which I have been meaning to read for 20 years!