Booking Through Thursday: Interview Me!

Posted on by Dana
Share

:: When you re-read a classic you do not see in the book more than you did before. You see more in you than there was before ::

  1. What’s your favorite time of day to read? I can’t say that I have one. I read when I have the opportunity.
  2. Do you read during breakfast? (Assuming you eat breakfast.) I don’t really eat breakfast, but I do read on the bus in the morning on the way to work. If I am eating alone in a restaurant, I will read.
  3. What’s your favorite breakfast food? (Noting that breakfast foods can be eaten any time of day.) I guess it would be bacon. Love good bacon.
  4. How many hours a day would you say you read? If I am really into a book, I might read it all day, but on average, I’d say one to two hours.
  5. Do you read more or less now than you did, say, 10 years ago? Much more. I know there’s no way I read anything close to 50 books in 2001, for instance.
  6. Do you consider yourself a speed reader? Not really. I have learned to read faster than I used to, but I wouldn’t describe myself as a speed reader at all.
  7. If you could have any superpower, what would it be? I would like to fly. I think flying would be so cool. First, it cuts down on travel time because you aren’t bound by roads. Second, you’re flying.
  8. Do you carry a book with you everywhere you go? Only if I suspect I will have time to read. I bring one back and forth to work so I can read on the bus. I always bring one if I think I’m going to wait, but I don’t bring one to, say, the grocery store.
  9. What KIND of book? Whatever I’m reading at the time. Lately it’s been my Kindle.
  10. How old were you when you got your first library card? I honestly don’t know. I think maybe second or third grade, but I couldn’t say for sure.
  11. What’s the oldest book you have in your collection? (Oldest physical copy? Longest in the collection? Oldest copyright?) Another one I have no idea about. I do have a dinosaur book that I have owned since I was in second or third grade. That’s probably the longest in the collection. I am not really a book collector.
  12. Do you read in bed? Pretty much every night.
  13. Do you write in your books? Sometimes. Depends on the book. I highlight notes in my Kindle a lot. I only rarely write in paper novels, but I almost always write in professional (education) books I read.
  14. If you had one piece of advice to a new reader, what would it be? Read what you like. Don’t worry that other people don’t like it or think it’s not “good” literature. It’s more important to find enjoyment in reading than to allow someone’s opinion of what you read turn you off all the good books you could be enjoying. At the same time, be open to reading books you might not think you’re necessarily interested in. You might find you like them.
  15. What question have I NOT asked at BTT that you’d love me to ask? (Actually, leave the answer to this one in the comments on this post, huh? So I can find them when I need inspiration!) I have had a blog post in the hopper for some time about literary crushes, but I haven’t ever finished it. Maybe I would if it were an official BTT prompt.

photo credit: » Zitona «

Related posts:

Reading Rules

Out of Sorts

Reading Year in Review


Share
Downton Abbey

Downton Abbey Season 2

Posted on by Dana
Share

Downton Abbey

Who is watching Downton Abbey tonight?

If you’re not familiar with the series, you could do worse than this season one primer from Forever Young Adult.

Stuff I’m looking forward to seeing:

  • More Maggie Smith as Dowager Countess Grantham.
  • The will they or won’t they between Matthew and Lady Mary (if he was smart, he’d go for one of her sisters instead. I think Mary is awful).
  • Matthew is going to have to fight in WWI. What will happen?
  • Are Thomas and O’Brien going to get a real comeuppance for all their scheming?
  • How involved is Lady Sybil going to get in the suffragette movement?
  • What will happen between Bates and Anna?

I hear that a season three is also a done deal, though when it will air in the States, I don’t know.

All of this has made me want to read [amazon_link id=”0199549893″ target=”_blank” ]The Forsyte Saga[/amazon_link]. I tried out [amazon_link id=”B004H0ZHD4″ target=”_blank” ]Upstairs, Downstairs[/amazon_link] (the 1970’s series rather than the new one), and I admit I didn’t like it much. Also on my list: [amazon_link id=”0140232028″ target=”_blank” ]The Buccaneers[/amazon_link] and [amazon_link id=”0312658656″ target=”_blank” ]The American Heiress[/amazon_link] (which I found out in Britain has the much better and allusive title of My Last Duchess; I hate it that things are so often “dumbed down” for Americans).

The Sunday Salon

Related posts:

The Secret History, Donna Tartt

Sunday Salon: Time to Read

Sunday Salon: Easter 2012


Share

Divergent, Veronica Roth

Posted on by Dana
Share

[amazon_image id=”0062024027″ link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” class=”alignleft”]Divergent[/amazon_image]Veronica Roth’s novel [amazon_link id=”0062024027″ target=”_blank” ]Divergent[/amazon_link] is the story of Beatrice Prior, who lives in a future dystopic Chicago. After a cataclysmic war that Beatrice, the first-person narrator of the story, doesn’t know much about, Chicago divided into five factions: Abnegation, who believe that the cause of war is selfishness and seek to be as selfless as possible; Dauntless, who believe the cause of war is cowardice and seek to be as brave as possible; Erudite, who believe the cause of war is ignorance and seek knowledge; Candor, who believe the cause of war is deception and seek to be as honest as possible; and Amity, who believe the cause of war is unkindness and seek to be as kind as possible. At the age of sixteen, each member of this society takes an aptitude test that partly determines which faction they will join. Some people are best suited for the faction into which they are born, but those who are not leave their families behind because in this society, faction comes before family. Beatrice has always felt out of place in Abnegation. She doesn’t feel selfless enough. When she takes her aptitude test, the results are inconclusive, and her test administrator explains that she is something called “Divergent,” which is a very dangerous thing to be, though Beatrice doesn’t know why. All she knows is that she must keep her test results quiet. The day after the aptitude test, Beatrice must choose which faction she will join, and she shocks everyone by choosing Dauntless.

After joining Dauntless, Tris, as she is known, undergoes a tough initiation that hardens her mentally and physically and prepares her for her role in the faction that protects the society. Even in this competitive environment, she manages to make friends and develops an attraction to Four, her instructor. As she becomes more deeply involved in her initiation, she discovers something is not right about her society, which is perhaps not as invested in peace as she has grown up believing.

Fans of Suzanne Collins’s [amazon_link id=”0545265355″ target=”_blank” ]Hunger Games[/amazon_link] series will find much to like in Divergent, the first book of a planned trilogy. Tris is a tough-as-nails heroine not too different from Katniss, though with perhaps a little less confidence. Four is an interesting counterpart and love interest, too (more interesting than Peeta or Gale, in my opinion). The craziness of the Dauntless initiation will remind some of the Hunger Games, and certainly the dystopic future set in a world where people divided based on some arbitrary factor will look familiar, but the factions are more interesting than the districts of Panem. Your station in life in Panem depends so much on which district you are born into, and it seems fairly difficult to change your stars in Collins’s series, but choices determine everything about who you are in Roth’s dystopic Chicago, which I liked because it puts more responsibility into the hands of everyone. Rather than a ruthless Capitol victimizing everyone, Roth writes about a society in which everyone is responsible, to some degree, for the way things are, and are also ignorant of some facets of the society. I haven’t seen a lot of people compare this novel to [amazon_link id=”0547424779″ target=”_blank” ]The Giver[/amazon_link], but I thought of that book often as I read. In Lois Lowry’s novel, the society seems perfect, but Jonas discovers that they systematically execute those who are weak or ill or old. Feelings are suppressed. No one can see color. The weight of discovering what his society is drives him to escape, an event which might destroy his society, given that he has been chosen to the the society’s Receiver. I suspect something similar will happen with Tris. I can’t help but feel she’ll upend the whole society. Unlike Katniss, who knows her society is corrupt and unfair, both Jonas and Tris discover the darkness in their society when they both come of age and choose their role or have it chosen for them.

Divergent is a gripping, edge-of-your-seat read. I read it on the bus, which was a mistake because it nearly caused me to miss my stop several times and actually did cause me to miss my stop once. I can’t wait to read the next book in the series, [amazon_link id=”0062024043″ target=”_blank” ]Insurgent[/amazon_link], which is due out in May. The book leaves open several questions that I hope I learn the answers to before the end of the trilogy:

  • How did the society get like this? Lake Michigan is nothing more than a marsh. I want to know how that happened.
  • What is going on outside of Chicago? Are they the only people in the world, or just cut off from everywhere else?
  • If there are other people, do they have factions too, or is that just Chicago? If it’s just Chicago, what the heck is going on there?

I have other questions, but they’re a little spoilery.

I love dystopian novels. So much fun to read, and with the success of The Hunger Games, it looks like we’ve been seeing a lot of them lately.

I was glad I recently visited Chicago as it helped me visualize the scene much better than if I hadn’t, but I suspect Google Images and a good map would be nearly as helpful.

Oh, and I’m totally jealous of Veronica Roth, who wrote this debut novel when she was only 22 and studying creative writing at Northwestern.

Rating: ★★★★★

Other reviews of Divergent:

This one’s been on my TBR pile for a little while and qualifies as the children’s/YA choice for the Mixing it Up Challenge. Actually, it qualifies for sci-fi/fantasy, but I can’t double-dip.

 

Related posts:

Review: To the Bright Edge of the World, Eowyn Ivey

Review: House of the Seven Gables, Nathaniel Hawthorne

Review: The Poet X, Elizabeth Acevedo


Share
Teaser Tuesdays

Teaser Tuesday: Divergent

Posted on by Dana
Share

Teaser TuesdaysTeaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

  • Grab your current read
  • Open to a random page
  • Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
  • BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
  • Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

My teaser:

[amazon_image id=”0062024027″ link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” class=”alignleft”]Divergent[/amazon_image]“At the Abnegation table, we sit quietly and wait. Faction customs dictate even idle behavior and supersede individual preference. I doubt all the Erudite want to study all the time, or that every Candor enjoys lively debate, but they can’t defy the norms of their factions any more than I can.”

—location 193 on Kindle

Sorry that was three sentences, but it kind of needed to be. Curious?

 

Related posts:

Friday Finds—July 8, 2011

Sunday Salon Check In

Top Ten Tuesdays: Top Ten Rebels in Literature


Share

Moloka’i, Alan Brennert

Posted on by Dana
Share

[amazon_image id=”0312304358″ link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” class=”alignleft”]Moloka’i[/amazon_image]Alan Brennert’s historical novel [amazon_link id=”0312304358″ target=”_blank” ]Moloka’i[/amazon_link] tells the story of the leper colony on the Hawaiian island of Moloka’i through the life of one remarkable woman named Rachel, who is sent to live at the colony at the age of seven when she contracts Hansen’s Disease and is exiled to Moloka’i, forced to leave her family and live as a virtual prisoner.

Once on the island, she has a difficult adjustment, but she also finds a second family, friends, love and causes for joy that she never expected. She builds a life for herself on the island, and she endures her share of tragedy, but ultimately, the book is not sad, and I would even say I felt it ended on a triumphant note. I liked this passage at the beginning and thought I’d share it:

Papa tied up at the Esplanade, his children putting on a brave face as they escorted him back to the SS Mariposa, all of them quietly determined not to cry.

But almost as though someone were taking their secret thoughts, their hidden grief, and vocalizing it, there came—from the pier immediately ahead—a terrible, anguished wail. It was not one voice but many, a chorus falling like the wind. It was, Henry and Dorothy both knew, not merely a wail, but a word: Auwē, Auwwayy! (Alas! Alas!)

It sounded exactly like the cries of grief and loss that Rachel had heard the day the king had come home. “Mama,” she said, fearfully, “is the Queen dead, too?”

“No, child, no,” Dorothy said.

Moored off Pier 10 was a small, decrepit interisland steamer, the Mokoli’i. A distraught crowd huddled behind a wooden barricade, sighing their mournful dirge as a procession of others—young and old, men and women, predominantly Hawaiians and Chinese—were herded by police onto the old cattle boat. Now and then one of the people behind the barricade would reach out to touch someone boarding the ship: a man grasping for a woman, a child reaching for his mother, a friend clasping another’s hand for the last time.

“Ma’i pākē,” Kimo said softly.

“What?” Rached asked.

“They’re lepers, you ninny,” Sarah admonished. “Going to Moloka’i.”

“What’s a leper?”

Someone in the crowd threw a flower lei onto the water, but contrary to legend, it was not likely to ever bring any of these travelers back to Honolulu.

“They’re sick, baby. Very sick,” Mama explained. Rachel didn’t understand. The people didn’t look sick; they didn’t look much different than anyone on the other side of the barricade.

“If they’re sick,” Rachel asked, “why isn’t someone taking care of them?”

No one answered her; and as that word, leper, hung in the still humid air, Dorothy dug her fingers into Rachel’s shoulders and turned her away from the Mokoli’i. (16-17)

This passage sets up the events in the novel beautifully and creates a thread, with the cry of Auwē, Alas! that is woven throughout the book. I liked Rachel a great deal as a character. The characters as a whole are well developed, and I think this book tells the important and little known story about Moloka’i respectfully and beautifully in a way that exposes the pain that the colony’s residents surely felt while still acknowledging that even in circumstances of pain and loss, it’s possible to find great joy and happiness. Rachel’s incredible life is a monument to the real residents of the colony at Kalaupapa, Moloka’i. I am very glad I was introduced to their story.

I will admit that for part of this book, it wasn’t coasting on a full five stars, mainly because Brennert does make some choices as a writer in terms of style that detracted from my enjoyment of the novel, but the characters and plot swiftly drew me beyond caring anymore, and by the end, I was in love with the book. If you have a mind to learn about Hansen’s Disease or late nineteenth and early twentieth century Hawaii, or if you just like a good historical novel, I highly recommend this book.

Rating: ★★★★★

Full disclosure: I obtained this book from PaperBackSwap.

Historical Fiction Challenge 2012

Mount TBR Reading Challenge 2012

Related posts:

Reading Roundup: May-June 2021

TLC Book Tour: Whispering in French, Sophia Nash

The Odyssey, Homer, Narrated by Ian McKellen


Share
A Young Girl Reading, Jean-Honoré Fragonard

2012 Reading Goals

Posted on by Dana
Share

A Young Girl Reading, Jean-Honoré Fragonard

Happy New Year! Let’s all hope we survive the end of the Mayan calendar this year, mainly so people on the “History” Channel (lately, I’m thinking some sort of federal authority ought to require them to use the quotation marks) will quit talking about it.

I met my reading goal of 50 books in 2011, which was my best ever year. While I do want to read more books this year, I am not sure I could read much more than 50, so I’m setting this year’s goal at 52, only a moderate increase over last year’s goal. It also rounds out to an even book a week.

I am participating in the following reading challenges this year:

All of these challenges allow for books to be counted for more than one challenge, which is great. Otherwise I’d need to pare back.

Last year I made it a goal to improve the tagging on my blog posts, which is still an area I need to work on. I am posting more regularly, and the review posts include the authors’ names now, which I think has contributed to making them more useful. I need to work on titling meme posts so that they are more descriptive of the content rather than just titling them after the meme and using the date. I need to get back in the habit of doing Teaser Tuesdays. I realized in looking back at my posts that I actually liked those posts quite a lot more than I thought I did. Also, I think it’s a good way to introduce readers to favorite quotes in books. Another goal I have for my blogging is to post more often about book and literature-related issues, which I started out doing, but gradually cut back on. In reflecting on my favorite posts of the year 2011, I found those types of posts were more frequently my own favorites, and it stands to reason that if I liked them better, perhaps readers do too.

I have some other reading goals for the year.

  1. Find the time/energy to revive the faculty book club I have led at my school. My colleagues have been asking me about it.
  2. Comment more on reading blogs. I subscribe to many in my feed reader, but I don’t leave comments as often as I think about it.
  3. Clean out my blogroll/RSS feed reader once a month and eliminate bloggers who haven’t posted in a while (unless they announced a hiatus and plan to be back).
  4. Read books set in a larger variety of locales. I don’t want to push it artificially, and I want to read what I want to read, but I did notice the books I read this year were clustered in two locations: the east coast of the U.S. and the U.K. I guess it makes sense, but even with the U.S., I only read two books set in western states (Colorado and Washington) and one set in the midwest (Wisconsin, though that was [amazon_link id=”0060558121″ target=”_blank” ]American Gods[/amazon_link], which is set all over America, and I picked the place the character settled down the longest).

Outside of reading, blogging, and reading about blogging, I have some more goals for the year.

  1. Continue the exercise regimen I started before Christmas. My Christmas present to myself (from the family, I guess) was a Wii Fit, which my sister said was great for beginners. I started a yoga/aerobic/strength training regimen that I have been faithfully doing every day for about a week (barring Christmas, mainly because I didn’t take the Wii down to my parents’ house, where we spent Christmas). It’s actually been a lot of fun to use the Wii Fit program.
  2. Learn to knit. My sister learned from watching videos, and frankly, I hope I can teach myself using videos or tutorials rather than take a class. But I should like to learn so I can make Hogwarts house scarves for everyone in the family according to their house colors (Maggie and Sarah are Hufflepuffs, Steve’s a Slytherin, I’m a Ravenclaw, and Dylan hasn’t been officially sorted in Pottermore, so I’ll either let him pick or sign him up for Pottermore when it’s out of beta). Maggie and Sarah seemed to like the idea of having Hufflepuff scarves, so it sounds like a plan.
  3. Cook more. It’s hard with work and everything else, but it’s more economical. I have done fairly well this year, but there is always room for improvement. I get bored of the same old things over and over. I like trying out new (simple) recipes and saving the more time-consuming/difficult stuff for weekends, holidays, or breaks. Cooking more means planning better and perhaps even a membership at one of those wholesale warehouses. I have a family of five, and we go through the food. I need to be smarter about the food budget. I have quite a few food-related books on my TBR list, too. I love watching TV about food and reading about food.

What about you? Do you have any reading goals or other goals for 2012?

Related posts:

Literature Carnival, Eighth Edition

So... What Do You Think?

Top Ten Tuesday: Ten Bookish Websites and Apps


Share

2011: A Reading Year in Review

Posted on by Dana
Share


Catalyst
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
Looking for Alaska
Misery
Twisted
Sense and Sensibility
On Writing
Bridget Jones's Diary
The Night Circus
The Man with Two Left Feet: And Other Stories
Those Across the River
The Ballad of Tom Dooley: A Novel
The Secret History
Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children
The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter
The Ballad of Frankie Silver
The Songcatcher
Adam & Eve: A Novel
A Room With a View
The Winter Sea

space
This was my best reading year yet in terms of meeting my reading goals. Actually, it might have been the first year I actively set reading goals.

  • Total number of books read: 50.
  • Fiction books: 46.
  • Nonfiction books: 4.
  • YA books: 8.
  • Audio books: 3.
  • Kindle books: 14.
  • DailyLit books: 2.
  • Books reread: 2.

2011 Reading Challenge

2011 Reading Challenge

Dana has completed her goal of reading 50 books in 2011!

hide

I recently posted my list of favorite books, but here is a quick list:

  1. Revolution, Jennifer Donnelly
  2. Water for Elephants, Sara Gruen
  3. On Writing, Stephen King
  4. The Songcatcher, Sharyn McCrumb
  5. The Paris Wife, Paula McLain
  6. Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, Ransom Riggs
  7. The Secret History, Donna Tartt
  8. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, Sherman Alexie
  9. Passion, Jude Morgan
  10. The Kitchen Daughter, Jael McHenry

Least favorite books of 2011 (no one-star books this year!):

Favorite book meme of the year: Top Ten Tuesdays.

Favorite reading challenge: The R.I.P. Challenge. Again.

Just a couple of days ago, I posted a list of my favorite blog posts for this year.

My Where Are You Reading 2011 reading challenge map (you can open it up and look all over):


View 2011 Where Are You Reading Challenge in a larger map

Related posts:

Booking Through Thursday: Periodically

The Story of Britain, Rebecca Fraser

Do You Hate Holden Caulfield?


Share

2011 Reading Challenges

Posted on by Dana
Share

Little menI took on a lot of reading challenges this year. How did I do?

Completed Challenges:

  • Historical Fiction Reading Challenge  2011: This was one of my favorite challenges, though I didn’t participate much at the blog hosting it. Maybe in 2012. I committed to reading 15 books for this challenge, and I read 22.
  • Steampunk Challenge: This challenge only required trying out one steampunk book. I didn’t like the one I read very much, but I haven’t given up on the genre. Still, I did just read the one book for the challenge.
  • GLBT Challenge: Like the Steampunk Challenge, this challenge just asked for readers to try fiction that could be classified as GLBT either because the author fit that description, or a character in the book did.
  • Where Are You Reading Challenge 2011: This challenge didn’t specify a number of books to read. All I had to do to complete it was track the settings of each of the books I read using Google Maps, which I did. Look for that map tomorrow.
  • Once Upon a Time Challenge: This challenge just asked that readers try fantasy/sci fi/fairy tales. I committed to one book, which I was able to finish.
  • R.I.P. Challenge: This is one of the best reading challenges every single year. I committed to reading four books for this challenge, and I actually read five.

Challenges I Didn’t Complete:

  • Books I Should Have Read in High School, but Didn’t: This was my own challenge, and I failed utterly. I committed to reading six books, but I only read one. I hope other participants enjoyed it and fared better in their own quest to make up for books they didn’t read in school.
  • YA Historical Fiction Challenge: I committed to reading 15 books, and I only read 4. I think I was under the mistaken impression that I read more YA, but I guess I don’t read as much as I thought, and certainly not as much YA historical fiction.
  • Take a Chance Challenge: I wanted to try to read all 10 books in this challenge, and I think the idea made me think outside the box a little bit for some book selections. I wound up reading 7 books, which isn’t bad, but it isn’t complete either.
  • Gothic Reading Challenge: I came close to completing this one, and I really did think I might do it at one point. I read 17 of 20 books. So close, but not complete.
  • Shakespeare Reading Challenge 2011: I only read one of the six plays I committed to reading. I started a second, but I didn’t finish it. I usually read more Shakespeare than that. I chalk it up to not teaching literature this school year and having already covered Shakespeare in the literature courses I was teaching from January to May.
  • Sense and Sensibility Bicentenary Reading Challenge: Happy 200th birthday, [amazon_link id=”1936594528″ target=”_blank” ]Sense and Sensibility[/amazon_link]! I wanted to read two books for this challenge, but I only finished one. I tried to read a second, but it wasn’t grabbing me, and I didn’t finish. I sent it off to a new home via PaperBackSwap.
  • Being a Jane Austen Mystery Challenge: I never even started this one. I intended to, but I’ll be honest and say that without knowing how good these books are, I was afraid to buy them, and they never became available as free Kindle books or on PaperBackSwap (that I know of, anyway), so I was afraid to plunk down the money. I know, I know. I should just sample them on the Kindle and see if I want to keep reading. I should remember that Kindles have that feature. I keep forgetting about it, and it’s an awesome feature, for sure. But I do kind of what to see what would happen if [amazon_link id=”0553386700″ target=”_blank” ]Jane Austen met Lord Byron[/amazon_link].

Look for my 2011 Reading Year in Review tomorrow. That recap post is becoming a tradition.

On New Year’s Day, I’ll be posting my reading goals for the year 2012.

photo credit: katclay

Related posts:

R.I.P. Challenge Longlist

Top Ten 2013 Reading Goals

Time for 2023 Reading Challenges


Share

Favorite Posts of 2011

Posted on by Dana
Share

My Work Desk

Over the course of the year, I have written more posts in this blog than I have in my more popular one. For one thing, I think I was more focused on reading, and this blog proved to be a sort of refuge. I think I could branch out and write about other things here now. It feels like a more comfortable place, and I can’t explain why. I have had a really difficult time thinking of things to write about on my other blog, but I have had no such trouble with this blog, at least not this year. Before the year ends, I thought I would share some reflections about my favorite blog posts (and, of course, invite you to read them for the first time, or reread them if you choose).

January

  • Do You Hate Holden Caulfield?: This post grew out of a post and some of its comments I read over at Forever Young Adult, and it’s mainly a reflection about how we are entitled to the reactions we feel to books, and that sometimes those reactions change over time. In it, I examined how my own feelings changed for Holden Caulfield. However, the reason it’s one of my favorites is the comments received, particularly one from a student who was more or less asking me if it was OK to hate Holden Caulfield—he wondered because the reaction from his teacher made him feel like there was something wrong with not liking Holden. For what it’s worth, I gave him my permission.
  • Mary Novik: Author Interview: Mary was so kind, and I loved her responses to my questions. Mary Novik made me look at John Donne in a new way.
  • Byron was a Bad, Bad Boy: I was on a real Byron kick this year. He was undoubtedly one of the most interesting figures of the Romantic era. He’s so endlessly fascinating that you can even read an entire blog devoted to him.

February

  • Dearest Cassandra: This creative writing piece was written as part of a model project for my students. I wrote a letter from Jane Austen to her sister Cassandra detailing the events that happened after Jane inexplicably traveled forward through time to the year 2010. It was a lot of fun, and an edited version of the letter wound up in a book I’m currently writing.
  • Fanny Brawne: This post is all about my girl-crush on Fanny Brawne, John Keats’s fiancée.
  • Passion, by Jude Morgan: My enthusiastic review of the novel. It was a long book, and I felt accomplished after I finished it. I can’t wait to read Jude Morgan’s next one. He’s one of my new favorites.

March

  • Reading Update: Wolfe and Lovelace: I had just finished reading the story of how James Wolfe won a major battle in Quebec during what us Americans call the French and Indian War, and I recounted the story here.
  • Nostalgia: This post is more about where did all the time go? rather than books, but I like it, and I love the song in the video I embedded into the post.

April

May

  • Teaser Tuesdays—May 17, 2011: The most accurate and hysterical definition of criticism (in the sense of analyzing art or literature, not “finding fault with”) I’ve ever read. God love Jasper Fforde. He always makes me laugh. Also, I need to do Teaser Tuesdays again. If I do, I’m changing the post title construction (for Musing Mondays, too). These titles I’m using are not descriptive enough.
  • Historical Crushes: A longish post about all the historical figures I have historical crushes on. I want to write one about literary crushes (fictional characters), but it’s been in the draft stage for a while. I need to return to it.

June

  • Booking Through Thursday: Interactive?: I get tired of the doom and gloom posts about how the Kindle is killing books. We’re in the midst of a reading renaissance!
  • Best Dads in Literature: This post was surprisingly hard to write because there aren’t a huge number of great dads in literature. Sad.
  • Teaser Tuesday and Top Ten Tuesday—June 21, 2011: See what I mean about these titles? Anyway, this post has a great quote from Paula McLain’s [amazon_link id=”0345521307″ target=”_blank” ]The Paris Wife[/amazon_link] and a list of ten reasons I love book blogging.
  • Sunfire Romances: In which I describe my affection for the YA Sunfire Romances published in the 1980’s. Think less successful American Girls books for teenagers.
  • Music and Reading: A discussion of two of my passions.

July

August

September

October

  • Music: A kind of revealing post in which I discuss music. Note: I would change #3 now to “Closer” by Nine Inch Nails.
  • Surprise Endings: A discussion of the top ten endings that shocked me. Caution: here be spoilers!
  • Musing Mondays—October 17, 2011: More book cover porn!
  • Planning My NaNo Novel: In this post, I shared my process for preparing for NaNoWriMo using Scrivener, which is my new favorite piece of software. Scrivener put this post on their Facebook fan page, too.

November

  • On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, Stephen King: Perhaps the single most influential book I read this year and the best book of writing advice I’ve ever read. Inspirational!
  • I Won NaNoWriMo!: I was so proud of “winning” NaNoWriMo this year. It was my second time, and I think it was even sweeter than the first because I learned that the first time wasn’t a fluke. This was the year I finally felt like a writer. I am currently wearing my Winner’s Circle tee-shirt, which for some reason I felt compelled to order this year when I didn’t the other year I won. Go figure!

December

  • Sunday Salon: The Shelf Awareness Interview: In this post, I share my answers to the standard questions Shelf Awareness asks of authors they interview.
  • Writing Dreams: I had tea with the Romantic poets in April, and here in this post, I describe how Joe Hill and Stephen King gave me writing advice (except, I didn’t actually get the advice).
  • Top Ten Books of 2011: I enjoyed thinking about which books made my list of the year’s best.
  • 2012 Obscure Books Challenge: After I said I wouldn’t, I had an idea for challenge to host and threw up some pages inviting participation. God help me.

photo credit: DeaPeaJay

Related posts:

R.I.P. Challenge

The Story of Britain, Rebecca Fraser

Literature Carnival


Share
Obscure Books Challenge

2012 Obscure Books Challenge

Posted on by Dana
Share

Obscure Books ChallengeI said I wasn’t going to do this, and maybe I’m crazy, but you know, sometimes you just run with your ideas. I was looking at a copy of [amazon_link id=”143918271X” target=”_blank” ]A Moveable Feast[/amazon_link] that I checked out of my school library, and it had a list of Hemingway’s published books. Some of them I’d never heard of. I’m no Hemingway scholar, but I did teach American literature for a long time. It’s not shocking, I suppose that Hemingway wrote books I had never heard of, but it made me think. Hemingway was awarded a Nobel Prize and wrote many books that are now considered classics. It seemed strange to me that he had written these other books that received less notice, and I wondered if it bothered him that the books were not as well received as some of his others.

Most writers publish more than one book (Harper Lee is a notable exception). Not every book published by every writer is destined to become a classic. My book club chose to read George Orwell’s novel [amazon_link id=”0156196255″ target=”_blank” ]Coming Up for Air[/amazon_link], which I had never heard of until it was suggested. Sometimes there is a good reason why a book doesn’t become well known, but sometimes pretty good books are either overlooked or overshadowed by their more well known cousins. Almost every writer who has published a classic has published several books that are less widely read.

So I created a reading challenge based on reading lesser known works by well known writers. It’s called the Obscure Books Challenge.

Guidelines? Well, the books don’t have to be books no one has ever heard of, but they should be less well known. For example, everyone has heard of [amazon_link id=”0743273567″ target=”_blank” ]The Great Gatsby[/amazon_link], and if people read only one of Fitzgerald’s books, it’s probably that one. But he wrote several others, including [amazon_link id=”0486289990″ target=”_blank” ]This Side of Paradise[/amazon_link], [amazon_link id=”1743383843″ target=”_blank” ]The Beautiful and Damned[/amazon_link], and [amazon_link id=”0684830507″ target=”_blank” ]Tender is the Night[/amazon_link]. The first two appear to have entered the public domain and can even be downloaded for free on the Kindle. If you liked The Great Gatsby, but you haven’t read Fitzgerald’s other novels, perhaps this challenge will give you an excuse for doing so.

Or suppose you’ve read Mark Twain’s [amazon_link id=”0393966402″ target=”_blank” ]The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn[/amazon_link], but never heard of [amazon_link id=”1463710399″ target=”_blank” ]Pudd’nhead Wilson[/amazon_link]? I’ve read it twice. It’s not bad. It’s not Huck Finn, but it’s not bad.

If this challenge sounds like something you might want to try, head on over to the challenge page and sign up. You can post links to your reviews on the review page and be entered to win a giveaway each month. Giveways for each month will be announced on the review page so that you can decide whether you want the book in question and want to submit a review in order to be in the running for the giveaway. Note: the giveaway books may or may not be related to the theme. It depends on what I can get my hands on, so just keep an eye on the review page for details.

I am not going to go nuts and over-commit myself to my own challenge because I have already entered quite a lot of challenges that (if I’m honest) interest me more, but in the spirit of being a good host, I will participate at The Stranger level and commit to reading three lesser known books by well known authors. These are the books I plan to read:

[amazon_image id=”1743383843″ link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” ]The Beautiful and Damned – The Original Classic Edition[/amazon_image] [amazon_image id=”0684865726″ link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” ]True At First Light : A Fictional Memoir[/amazon_image] [amazon_image id=”0140434798″ link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” ]Villette (Penguin Classics)[/amazon_image]

I already happen to have copies of The Beautiful and Damned and Villette, and I should probably read them. True at First Light intrigues me for several reasons. First, Hemingway was working on it when he died, and his son Patrick edited it and published it a little over ten years ago. Second, it’s set in Africa. I don’t know why I enjoy reading books set in Africa so much. I should read more of them. I think part of me wants to visit Africa, but I’m also a little afraid, particularly after reading [amazon_link id=”0061577073″ target=”_blank” ]The Poisonwood Bible[/amazon_link] (such a great book!). It’s a place of such extremes: vast deserts, tropical rainforests, animals that don’t live anywhere else. The third reason I want to read this Hemingway book is that it’s mired in controversy over whether Patrick Hemingway should have edited and published it. The reviews are really split. Seems people either love it or hate it. Sounds like it provokes a strong reaction. Plus it’s available at PaperBackSwap, so I don’t have to buy it.

If I find I want to add books to this challenge pile, I’ll do so later, but for right now, these three books look good to me.

No more challenges. And don’t you all go posting any interesting challenges that I feel compelled to join!

Related posts:

Best Books of 2012

Top Ten Books I'd Give a Theme Song To

Emily’s Ghost


Share