Category: Reading Challenge

Bibliophilic Book Challenge

2010 Reading Challenges

Posted on by Dana

I finally had an opportunity to peek at my feed reader and discovered two interesting book challenges for 2010. I plan to participate in both challenges, given I have the time. I have just discovered I will be teaching a fifth class (and yes, five different preps) next semester, and I will be taking a difficult grad school course. I must find time to read, however, even if it’s just listening to audiobooks in the car because I need it to feed my soul.

Bibliophilic Book Challenge

The first book challenge I’ll be participating in is the 2010 Bibliophilic Book Challenge. This challenge involves reading books about reading, and from what I gather, what I call “derivative fiction,” such as Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next series, can count. I have not decided with certainty what I will read, but I know one book will be Thomas C. Foster’s How to Read Novels Like a Professor. I thoroughly enjoyed his other book, How to Read Literature Like a Professor. I can’t stop recommending it to folks. The challenge consists of three levels:

  • Bookworm: Read three books
  • Litlover: Read six books
  • Bibliomaniac: Read twelve books

I know I can’t complete the Bibliomaniac level, and Litlover is possible, but unlikely, so I will only commit to Bookworm at this point. I just need to choose two more books. I will update once I have figured out what I’ll read.

Brontë ChallengeThe other challenge is the All About the Brontës challenge. In order to complete this challenge, I need to read or watch three to six Brontë-related books or films by the June 30 deadline. The flexibility of the challenge means that I will probably complete it, but aside from reading Syrie James’s The Secret Diaries of Charlotte Brontë, I’m not sure what I will do. I am thinking at least one audiobook, probably Wuthering Heights, which I’ve already read, but which I will be teaching this year, so it would be worth it to revisit. Again, once I figure out exactly what I plan to do for the challenge, I’ll update, but I will commit to three items at this point.

If you have a reading suggestion that would be appropriate for either challenge, I would surely appreciate it. Just leave a comment.

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Dracula

Posted on by Dana

While I didn’t finish Dracula in time to meet the deadline of the R.I.P. Challenge, I did finish it within days of the end of the novel’s action on November 6 of some indeterminate year. One of the things I’ve noticed about reading a book like Dracula, around which a cottage industry of adaptations, homages, and even an entire genre have sprung, is that the story in the actual book becomes altered to the point that the reader had different expectations. For instance, I had the idea that the character of Renfield had a much larger role and was a servant of Dracula’s. I didn’t realize the Count came to England, and I was surprised by Dracula’s small role in the actual novel.

The novel holds up well as a gothic tale. I wonder how it might have fared had Stoker chosen to tell it with a straight narrative rather than as a series of journals. He is constricted by what his characters are able to report. I don’t know enough about vampire tradition to know if Stoker originated some of the aspects we have come to associate with vampire narratives: the fear of garlic and Christian artifacts such as crosses, crucifixes, and the communion host; the inability to rise during the day and activity at night; and superhuman strength that grows more powerful over the ages. On the other hand, I was surprised to discover that sunlight didn’t necessarily seem to be harmful to the vampires in this novel. They avoided it, but when coffins were opened during the day to look on them, they didn’t disintegrate into dust as Anne Rice’s vampires do (and hers are not afraid of crucifixes).

I am glad I read Dracula. It is a great read for anyone interested in how the literary craving for vampires came to be, but you won’t find the seductive and charming Louis de Pointe du Lacs, Lestat de Lioncourts, or even Edward Cullens in this novel. Dracula is just a monster, and there’s nothing attractive or seductive about it.

I read Dracula with the iPhone app Classics. I usually have one book going in DailyLit, one paper book, and one iPhone book. I haven’t decided which book I’ll read next on the iPhone, but I haven’t finished Crime and Punishment on DailyLit, nor have I finished We Have Always Lived in the Castle in print.

A short update on NaNoWriMo: I am a little behind the wordcount. By the end of the day yesterday, I should have reached 11,667 words, and I am currently at 9,304. It might not seem bad to be behind by 2,363 words, especially compared with some folks who are working with larger discrepancies than that, but it also means that in order to be caught up by the end of the day today, I need to write 4,030 words. And that is a lot for one day. I’m not sure it’s going to happen, particularly as I have two grad school assignments due. But we shall see. The writing is not coming as quickly or easily as it did at first, I think because I really did sort of know how to start off. Cross your fingers for me that things pick up. I’d really like to win NaNo this year.

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R.I.P. and NaNoWriMo Update

Posted on by Dana

R.I.P. ChallengeI am not doing well with the R.I.P. Challenge. Despite a strong start in which I finished half the challenge in short order, I have stalled toward the end and have not been reading much. I am blaming my iPhone. I have too many cool apps now, such as the Scrabble app, which have taken me away from reading. I am not at all certain I can finish my remaining two books, Dracula and We Have Always Lived in the Castle, without some serious focus over the last week. I’m reading Dracula on the iPhone, and judging from the progress bar along the top, I’m nearly 2/3 through the book. I have only read two chapters of We Have Always Lived in the Castle though.

Another distraction from reading has been my planning for NaNoWriMo. You can see my profile here. I am excited about my project, but I’m kind of at a loss as to what my plot will be. I think I know who my main characters are. I have worked up a plan that includes helpful websites, character maps, inspirational pictures and music, and possible plot ideas in Curio, but I don’t know what my “conflict” is. I don’t know what my story will be. Some ideas I’m playing with include:

  • a retelling of a Shakespearean play (leaning toward Macbeth or Cymbeline—and of the two, leaning more toward the latter) in the Kentucky coal fields
  • feuding families embroiled in murder
  • the hero’s journey
  • Greek tragedy in KY coal fields
  • unfounded murder accusation and imprisonment

The retelling idea is intriguing, but ambitious, and I’m not sure I am up for it. If I go with feuding families or murder, what is the story? Why am I telling the story? So I am not feeling really ready, and it starts in about a week.

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R.I.P. Update

Posted on by Dana

R.I.P. ChallengeI am putting Joe Hill’s short story collection 20th Century Ghosts aside. It’s not that I don’t like it; I just want to read a novel. This decision means I have to select a book to replace it in the R.I.P. Challenge. I took three books off the shelves and couldn’t decide, so I had Maggie choose for me again, and she thinks I should read Shirley Jackson’s We Have Always Lived in the Castle. The cover is really cute, and I know she’s a good writer, so I will go with Maggie’s choice. Of course, she may have picked it because the cat on the cover looks just like our Bella.

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Grendel

Posted on by Dana

John Gardner’s novel Grendel has been on my reading list for years. I have picked it up and read the first chapter or two several times. This time, the confluence of the R.I.P. Challenge and the fact that I am teaching Beowulf provided me with two excellent reasons to finish.

Beowulf is, of course, our earliest epic in English. It tells the story of a mighty Geatish warrior named Beowulf who comes to King Hrothgar’s meadhall in Denmark to help Hrothgar and the Danes with their monster problem: a creature named Grendel has been attacking the meadhall for twelve years. In Beowulf, Grendel represents the essence of evil. His motives are not examined aside from a note that he descends from Cain, which should explain everything. My own students became intrigued by Grendel’s story, and we did discuss his motives. I mentioned I was reading this book. Our library’s copy immediately disappeared, and I think some of my students have been waiting for me to finish reading my copy so that I could loan it out. As it turns out, Grendel’s motives, at least as John Gardner imagines them, are a little more complex than a descent from evil beings or jealousy of mankind.

Gardner tells the story of Grendel’s war against Hrothgar, as he calls it, from Grendel’s point of view. Gardner’s Grendel is on a quest to find meaning and determine his place in the world. The novel begins before events in Beowulf really start. Grendel watches as Hrothgar becomes king and builds his meadhall, and he watches Hrothgar gain power as his kingdom grows. Grendel is mesmerized by the man he calls the Shaper, who spins stories of the greatness of the Danes. Grendel remembers being present when the truth occurred, and yet he, like the Danes, wants to believe the Shaper’s stories. When Beowulf himself arrives toward the end of the novel, Grendel is drawn to him and mesmerized by him, a feeling echoed by Beowulf himself in the epic when he says he believes that he and Grendel have been drawn together in this fight.

Gardner’s creature is not the creature of the epic poem. He’s as vicious, but more thoughtful, and the Danes are not as great a people or as innocent as the epic’s composer would have us believe. Gardner, a professor of English, would of course have been familiar with the epic. Parts of the story in the epic are told again through Grendel’s eyes in this novel. I particularly liked the scene in which Unferth, the thane who challenged Beowulf’s prowess and was quickly shut down, challenges Grendel—interesting comment on heroism. Grendel’s description of the charismatic Beowulf were fun to read, too. We also have an interesting picture of Grendel’s mother. This book ends before her battle with Beowulf, of course, because Grendel dies before that time, but it’s hard to see, based on Grendel’s description of her, how she had the sentience to carry out her attack on Heorot. I enjoyed this novel, and I think we’re going to have to put it in the early British literature curriculum at my school. The novel’s ideas about the nature of good and evil and who frames history will make for interesting discussion.

R.I.P. ChallengeThis is the second book I’ve finished in the R.I.P. Challenge (the first being Coraline). I am still reading Dracula. I will start Joe Hill’s collection of short stories 20th Century Ghosts next. With two of the four books down before September is out, I’m feeling more confident that I’ll finish the challenge. I love taking challenges on, but I have a lot of trouble finishing them. Perhaps this year is my year.

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Birthday Books

Posted on by Dana

My parents gave an Amazon gift card for my birthday (thanks, Mom and Dad). I decided on the following books:

I am feeling a sort of Rebecca vibe, and many of these books seem to be along those lines. Also, I love Melvyn Bragg’s BBC radio show In Our Time. It’s possibly the R.I.P. Challenge at work, but I feel the creepy British manor or the streets of Victorian London are perfect for fall.

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Coraline

Posted on by Dana

Coraline Jones is bored. Her parents are too busy to play, and the weather isn’t cooperating, so she explores. Behind a locked door, she finds the entrance to a completely different world. Neil Gaiman’s novel Coraline is compared to Alice in Wonderland or The Chronicles of Narnia on the book jacket, and while the comparison is fair, Coraline’s world beyond the locked door is different: it’s far creepier and in some ways more believable than Carroll or Lewis’s worlds are. Every child knows that there is a mysterious world beyond the mirror or behind the locked door no one ever seems to open.

Gaiman is a master storyteller. I have thoroughly enjoyed all his books I’ve read, and I love to read his blog and even keep up with him on Twitter. He’s a true dry wit, which comes through in his stories as well as his blogging. The characters and the world he creates in this book, as well as the others, however fantastic, always seems believable and real. If you’ve not read Coraline, you should definitely pick it up. It’s a quick read, and though it’s classified as a children’s or young adult novel, I wouldn’t let that classification stop you any more than it should stop you from reading the Harry Potter series.

R.I.P. ChallengeThis book is the first book I’ve finished in the R.I.P. Challenge. I also plan to read Bram Stoker’s Dracula (currently in progress), John Gardner’s Grendel (my next selection), and Joe Hill’s 20th Century Ghosts. If I actually complete the challenge ahead of schedule, I may continue reading the creepy books, which are a perfect way to usher in the fall weather.

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Decatur Book Festival and R.I.P. Update

Posted on by Dana

Decatur Book FestivalTomorrow, the Huffs are heading to the annual Decatur Book Festival for the first time. I’ll be sure to share all the fun here.

Meanwhile, I think I’ve finalized the selections I will read for the R.I.P. Challenge. I have decided on Peril the First, which means I plan to read four books: Dracula by Bram Stoker, Coraline by Neil Gaiman, Grendel by John Gardner, and 20th Century Ghosts by Joe Hill. I am hoping that by picking books of a manageable size that I can actually finish the challenge, but I would like to read the others on my list at some point. I had settled on Dracula and Coraline fairly early on, but what finally made me decide on Grendel was a short excerpt in a supplementary textbook I use for teaching British Lit. I can no longer claim I’m any kind of Beowulf aficionado if I haven’t read Grendel. I decided on 20th Century Ghosts because of the recommendation of a Barnes and Noble employee who raved about it when I purchased it.

Meanwhile, my sister, who doesn’t have a blog, is going to read The Mothman Prophecies by John A. Keel, Strange Guests by Brad Steiger, and Kiss of Midnight by Lara Adrian. She has committed to Peril the Second. Perhaps if we all ask her really nicely, she’ll consent to guest blog here with her reviews. Or perhaps she will prefer to post reviews at the blog Carl has set up for the purpose. Either way, I hope she’ll share her thoughts with us.

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R.I.P Challenge Book Pool

Posted on by Dana

R.I.P. ChallengeI’ve narrowed my book pool for the R.I.P. Challenge down to the following books:

Dracula by Bram Stoker: the classic vampire novel.

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova: this would be a worthy follow-up for Dracula as its premise is that Dracula is *gasp* still alive.

Coraline by Neil Gaiman: I’ve wanted to read this book for a long time, and this challenge gives me a good excuse. A creepy, huge house, a little girl who feels ignored, and an alternate universe inside your house. Sounds great! I absolutely love Neil Gaiman, so it’s a shame I’ve not read it.

20th Century Ghosts by Joe Hill: the bookseller at Barnes and Noble said this was a great book, and Steve enjoyed it, too. I love Joe Hill’s blog and tweets, but I’ve not read any of his creative writing yet. This is a collection of short ghosty stories.

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke: I started this one some time ago, and I was enjoying it. This one is a dark horse contender for the challenge because it’s extremely long, and I would like to actually finish the challenge this time.

Grendel by John Gardner: the Beowulf story told from the viewpoint of the monster. This one has been on my to-read list for years.

Ghostwalk by Rebecca Stott: I grabbed this one on impulse at Barnes and Noble a while back. The cover certainly looks creepy. Ghostwalk is a literary triller about Isaac Newton’s alchemical experiments and a string of murders. It’s only got three stars at Amazon, and I find the reviewers there are often generous. That kind of thing makes me nervous. Still will eventually give it a go since I own it.

A Dead Man in Deptford by Anthony Burgess: this one might be a long shot in terms of qualification (though Carl is very accepting as long as we think it fits the challenge). It’s about Christopher Marlowe’s espionage and murder.

I’m not sure which of the aforementioned books will ultimately make the challenge, but I am fairly set on Dracula and Coraline.

If you are participating in the challenge, I recommend the following books, all of which I’ve read. I don’t like to do re-reads for challenges, but I thoroughly enjoyed all of these books:

  • The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe: What if some of the witches in Salem really were guilty? This novel explores this question, along with creepy houses and strange goings on in modern-day Massachusetts. I couldn’t put it down, and my husband’s reading it now. Plus Katherine Howe is super nice, tweets regularly at @katherinebhowe, and even created a Facebook site for her main character, Connie Goodwin.
  • The Dante Club by Matthew Pearl: A string of murders based on punishments in Dante’s Inferno terrorizes 1860’s Boston as poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and his circle are working on a translation of Dante’s work. The problem is, a translation isn’t currently accessible to Bostonians, so who could conduct murders that so accurately mimic Dante’s punishments? Could one of the circle be the killer?
  • The Ghost Writer by John Harwood: If you liked The Turn of the Screw (which would also be an excellent choice for this challenge), you’ll enjoy this creepy story of Gerard Freeman and his pen friend Alice Jessell, a creepy old ancestral house, and ghost stories written by a grandmother Gerard never knew.
  • The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield: A love letter to the Brontës and a great read. This book centers around reclusive writer Vida Winter, who wants protagonist Margaret Lea to interview her. Margaret learns that truth is stranger than fiction and much creepier.
  • The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman: This book examines what might happen when it takes a graveyard to raise a child. Ghosts, vampires, werewolves, and creepy murderers, oh my!
  • The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins: One of the original gaslight books, I think. Who do you trust? What exactly is happening in that creepy house? And who is the Woman in White? What does she know?
  • Twilight by Stephenie Meyer: If you haven’t read this new take on the vampire legend, now is a good time. Don’t expect sparkling prose. If you’re a girl of the 1980’s, the high school experience will look very familiar.
  • The Lace Reader by Brunonia Barry: Set in Salem, this novel draws on the witchy setting. Towner Whitney returns to Massachusetts when her beloved aunt dies, but she is haunted by ghosts from her past and messages she can read in the lace.

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R.I.P. Challenge

Posted on by Dana

R.I.P. ChallengeCarl at Stainless Steel Droppings has once again opened up the R.I.P. Challenge. It’s one of the first signs of fall, and the challenge provides the perfect excuse opportunity for indulging in works befitting the season.

I will participate in Peril the First, which requires the reader to read four books of any length, from any subgenre of scary stories that you choose. I have to warn you I’ve never actually finished this challenge before. Cross your fingers for me, OK?

I am not sure which four books I plan to read, but one of them (is it cheating?) will be Dracula because I’ve already started it. I might try to finish Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian and/or Susanna Clarke’s Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, but I’m not sure, and beyond these potential books I’m not sure which others I will read, but watch this space. I’ll think about it some more and post an update here. Feel free to make recommendations for spooky, gothic, or scary books I can add to my list of potentials.

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