[amazon_image id=”0142402516″ link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” class=”alignleft”]Looking for Alaska[/amazon_image]John Green’s young adult novel [amazon_link id=”0142402516″ target=”_blank” ]Looking for Alaska[/amazon_link] is the story of Miles “Pudge” Halter, who goes to boarding school in Alabama—at his request—after telling his parents he thinks going there will help him seek “the Great Perhaps,” in the last words of François Rabelais. Miles collects the last words of famous people. Once at Culver Creek School, he quickly makes friends with his roommate, Chip Martin, better known as “The Colonel,” and Alaska Young, a free-spirited, intelligent, but troubled girl in his grade at school. He quickly develops a crush on Alaska. Alaska and the Colonel get Pudge into all kinds of trouble with their pranks, smoking, drinking, and sneaking around, but they also offer him a kind of acceptance he hasn’t experienced before. This next bit is a little spoilery, so I’m going to put it after the cut… Continue reading “Looking for Alaska, John Green”
Musing Mondays: December 12, 2011
This week’s musing [borrowed from an old BTT post] asks…
I once knew a man who read about WWII. He read everything he could get his hands on on the subject. He had a whole wall of books that were all about WWII. It amazed me. How could he continue to find one subject that engrossing? My mother, on the other hand, loves to read best sellers. I’ve known other people who read science fiction to the exclusion of everything else; for others it was philosophy, self-help, or history.
So, to the questions…
What kind of books do you like to read?
Why? Provide specific examples.
I consider myself more eclectic than the average reader, but my staple is historical fiction. I love history. It’s exciting to see my younger daughter turning into a history buff. My older daughter does not like historical fiction; she prefers contemporary fiction or manga. I remember how floored I was when she told me she didn’t like [amazon_link id=”0547550294″ target=”_blank” ]The Witch of Blackbird Pond[/amazon_link]. Granted, she read it for school instead of for pleasure, like I did when I read it, but I have enjoyed books I read for school, and the requirement to read it does not necessarily preclude enjoying it.
I have read 22 historical fiction books this year out of a total of 47 books. I would say that statistic more than any other shows my interest. I like to read about a variety of history periods, but one period I’m not much interested in is World War II. I know what you’re thinking: why? It’s an endlessly fascinating time period, and I get that. I happen to be more interested in Medieval, Renaissance, Restoration, Georgian, and Victorian England (so roughly 500-1900 A. D.), but I occasionally like Edwardian England, too. I have recently developed an interested in Revolutionary and Napoleonic-era France. Pretty narrow, interests, I suppose. In terms of American historical fiction, I like the Colonial era, the Revolutionary era, and the Civil War, but that’s about it.
I can’t say I have a weakness for any particular genre aside from historical fiction. I find it to be a fun way to learn more about history, and I myself have enjoyed the challenge of the research when writing it.
2012 Reading Challenges
I love reading challenges! Here are some 2012 reading challenges I’ve found and decided to try. I probably will add a few more, and once the calendar flips over to January, you’ll find permanent links to these challenges in the sidebar where all the 2011 ones are right now. What I need to be better about this year is actually participating on the blog challenge sites themselves—posting links to my reviews, and the like.
I participated in the Historical Fiction Reading Challenge 2011, and it was easily one of my favorite and most successful reading challenges of the year, so I wouldn’t want to miss it again. I’m going for the Severe Bookaholism level of 20 books. Sign up here.
The Where Are You Reading Challenge is another challenge I also did in 2011 and thoroughly enjoyed. You can see my Google Map here. I’ll post it again later in the month in my recap post. Sign up here.
I’m kind of excited about the Mixing it Up Challenge. The idea is to branch out and try books in different genres:
- Classics
- Biography
- Cookery, Food, and Wine
- History
- Modern Fiction
- Graphic Novels and Manga
- Crime and Mystery
- Horror
- Romance
- Science Fiction and Fantasy
- Travel
- Poetry and Drama
- Journalism and Humor
- Science and Natural History
- Children’s and Young Adult
- Social Sciences and Philosophy
I’m going for the “All the Trimmings and a Cherry on Top” level of participation at one book in each genre. Not sure what I’ll read yet, but I have a few ideas for some of the categories. Sign up here.
As soon as I described this one to my husband, he said I needed to sign up for it. I do have a small TBR mountain leaning against the wall on my side of the bed. Steve would be glad if I could plow through some of it. I’m not too insane, so I’m going for Pike’s Peak (plus, I’ve been there because it’s in my home state of Colorado), which requires me to read 12 books from my TBR pile. I’m not sure which ones I’ll read yet, but as I said, I have a huge stack, and I also have a lot of unread Kindle books. Sign up here.
How absolutely adorable is that button? This challenge asks participants to read free e-books. For the purposes of this challenge, ARC’s, library books, or books I’ve won can’t be counted. The books must be free, legally downloaded books. FYI NetGalley users, it looks like NetGalley books are counted as ARC’s for the purposes of this challenge, so they’re out, too. I’m going for the Coupon Clipper level of 12 books. Sign up here.
I have actually only read the first four books of Diana Gabaldon’s [amazon_link id=”0440423201″ target=”_blank” ]Outlander[/amazon_link] Series. I just recently downloaded all of the audio books with Audible credits I had saved up, so this challenge seems like a good incentive to actually listen to the books and actually catch up with the series. Sign up here.
You know of any other great challenges I should check out? Naturally, I’ll be doing the Once Upon a Time Challenge and the R.I.P. Challenge that Carl hosts once he announces them later.
Misery, Stephen King
[amazon_image id=”0451169522″ link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” class=”alignleft”]Misery[/amazon_image]You’ve probably seen the film based on Stephen King’s novel [amazon_link id=”0451169522″ target=”_blank” ]Misery[/amazon_link], even if you haven’t read the book, so you probably know the story: writer Paul Sheldon is kidnapped after nearly dying in a car accident and tortured by insane former nurse Annie Wilkes, who is his number one fan. Incredulous that Paul has written a novel she considers crass, she forces him to burn it and write Misery, the romance-novel heroine he killed off in his last book Misery’s Child, back into being in Misery’s Return. Paul undergoes the worst sorts of physical and psychological terror as he writes what ironically is certainly the best Misery novel he’s written.
I saw the movie when it came out, and having read the book now, about twenty years later, it seems as if the movie adhered fairly closely to the plot of the book. Kathy Bates was brilliant as Annie, and having seen the movie first, of course I pictured her in the role as I read. Annie Wilkes may be completely insane, but putting on my writer glasses, I can see she was a gift of a character for King. She is possibly the most frightening villain I’ve read precisely because of the realness of her character. On the one hand, she’s a completely psychotic serial killer who first murdered almost an entire family at the age of eleven; on the other hand, she can’t stand cursing, lying, or smoking. She uses lame expletives like “cockadoodie brat” and admonishes Paul for wanting a cigarette even as she contemplates murdering him. My husband says he thinks King is wary of people who don’t curse, that somehow, those people are a little unhinged.
One of the things King says in [amazon_link id=”1439156816″ target=”_blank” ]On Writing[/amazon_link] is that folks ask him why he writes the kinds of stories he writes, and his response is that he doesn’t have a choice. You have to wonder what kind of a place a novel like Misery came from. I always kind of enjoy books about writers. My NaNoWriMo novel is such a book. I’m not sure why, but that sort of window into the creative process is always interesting to me. I like to see fictional writers flying away on their keyboards, sweating through writer’s block, and triumphantly finishing a novel. It’s kind of weird to read books about writing, I guess, and now that you pin me down, I’m hard pressed to name another book like this that I’ve read.
One reason I read this novel (finally) was that King mentioned both the book and the character Annie Wilkes (and he clearly thought Annie was more interesting than Paul Sheldon) several times in On Writing, and I was struck with the desire to see what it was all about. It is fairly gruesome, but I think most people picking up a Stephen King book know what they’re in for without needing to be warned. The book is quick-paced and starts off right in the middle of the action. It’s a great on-the-edge-of-your-seat read.
Rating:
Full disclosure: I obtained this book from PaperBackSwap.
WWW Wednesdays: December 7, 2011
To play along, just answer the following three (3) questions…
- What are you currently reading?
- What did you recently finish reading?
- What do you think you’ll read next?
Wow, I haven’t played along with WWW Wednesdays in a long time.
I am currently reading several books. The main one is [amazon_link id=”0451169522″ target=”_blank” ]Misery[/amazon_link] by Stephen King. I have seen the movie, and I thought Kathy Bates was brilliant in the role of Annie Wilkes. I had never read the book, and I admit that reading King’s memoir [amazon_link id=”1439156816″ target=”_blank” ]On Writing[/amazon_link] is what prompted me to finally pick it up. I am enjoying it a hell of a lot. I’m also still dipping into [amazon_link id=”1439170916″ target=”_blank” ]The Emperor of All Maladies[/amazon_link] by Siddhartha Mukherjee. I can totally see why it won the Pulitzer for nonfiction. It’s not just an interesting subject; it’s well written. I tried reading [amazon_link id=”1613821530″ target=”_blank” ]Anna Karenina[/amazon_link] on DailyLit, but I finally had to admit I wasn’t into it when I had a huge backlog of unread book installments and no desire to even open them. I have to just say it: I’m not into the Russians. I have tried them and tried them, several times, and I have given them a fair shake. I think it’s time to give up trying to be cultured. I picked up [amazon_link id=”1466210303″ target=”_blank” ]Madame Bovary[/amazon_link] instead, and while it hasn’t grabbed me yet, I will give it more than two installments. I guess I’m also still reading [amazon_link id=”074348486X” target=”_blank” ]As You Like It[/amazon_link] when I think about it.
I recently finished a re-read of [amazon_link id=”9626343613″ target=”_blank” ]Sense and Sensibility[/amazon_link] read by Juliet Stevenson. I highly recommend her Naxos audio book readings of Austen’s works. I think the only one she didn’t record for them was [amazon_link id=”9626343567″ target=”_blank” ]Pride and Prejudice[/amazon_link]. Stevenson is a brilliant reader. I also recently finished [amazon_link id=”0142411841″ target=”_blank” ]Twisted[/amazon_link] by Laurie Halse Anderson, who consistently writes amazing books for teens that are straight out of the Judy Blume School of writing about what young people are really like and what they care about. I discovered that Laurie Halse Anderson creates playlists for her books, so given that I love creating Spotify lists, I went ahead and put her playlists in Spotify (at least all the songs that were available). Here is her playlist for Twisted. Naturally, you need to have Spotify to listen. Here are my reviews for Sense and Sensibility and Twisted.
The next book I read will be either Sherman Alexie’s [amazon_link id=”0316068209″ target=”_blank” ]The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian[/amazon_link], John Green’s [amazon_link id=”0142402516″ target=”_blank” ]Looking for Alaska[/amazon_link], or Laurie Halse Anderson’s [amazon_link id=”0142400017″ target=”_blank” ]Catalyst[/amazon_link]. I am in a YA mood right now (probably because I just went to NCTE). I also really, really want to read [amazon_link id=”0062024027″ target=”_blank” ]Divergent[/amazon_link] by Veronica Roth soon, but I don’t have it, and neither does my school library. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian was recently challenged here in my home state of Georgia. My daughter, however, says I should start with Looking for Alaska, but that I’d better be prepared to cry. I think I will probably read that one first just because she wants me to and so we can talk about it.
So, what are you reading?
Sunday Salon: The Shelf Awareness Interview
No, Shelf Awareness isn’t interviewing me, but I love to read their author interviews, and they always ask the same questions (at least in my limited observation). They’re fun questions, too. So should Shelf Awareness ever want to interview me, they can simply copy and paste.
On your nightstand now:
I actually have a stack of books against the wall more than a pile on the nightstand. In my stack are [amazon_link id=”0451169522″ target=”_blank” ]Misery[/amazon_link] by Stephen King, a few Sharyn McCrumbs I want to get to, [amazon_link id=”0711231893″ target=”_blank” ]Tea with Jane Austen[/amazon_link], [amazon_link id=”B001P3OLEM” target=”_blank” ]Burning Bright[/amazon_link] by Tracy Chevalier, [amazon_link id=”0060791586″ target=”_blank” ]The Widow’s War[/amazon_link] by Sally Gunning, [amazon_link id=”0312304358″ target=”_blank” ]Moloka’i[/amazon_link] by Alan Brennert, [amazon_link id=”0679781587″ target=”_blank” ]Memoirs of a Geisha[/amazon_link] by Arthur Golden, and [amazon_link id=”0152053107″ target=”_blank” ]A Northern Light[/amazon_link] by Jennifer Donnelly, among other books I dip into occasionally.
Favorite book when you were a child:
When I was in the third grade, it was [amazon_link id=”0142408808″ target=”_blank” ]Superfudge[/amazon_link] by Judy Blume because Mrs. Elliott read it to us, and it was impossible to check out of the library for months afterward. I also loved [amazon_link id=”0807508527″ target=”_blank” ]The Boxcar Children[/amazon_link] by Gertrude Chandler Warner. When I was a little older, [amazon_link id=”0385739893″ target=”_blank” ]Tiger Eyes[/amazon_link] by Judy Blume.
Your top five authors:
- J. K. Rowling: Her books are pure, imaginative escapism, and I am grateful for all the time I’ve spent at Hogwarts.
- Jane Austen: She is my literary comfort food. I can always turn to her for a good read.
- William Shakespeare: Unqualified genius and master of the English language.
- F. Scott Fitzgerald: Beautiful turns of phrase and poetic writing. I admit his place here rests on one book—[amazon_link id=”0743273567″ target=”_blank” ]The Great Gatsby[/amazon_link].
- Barbara Kingsolver: I so enjoyed [amazon_link id=”0061577073″ target=”_blank” ]The Poisonwood Bible[/amazon_link], and [amazon_link id=”0061765228″ target=”_blank” ]The Bean Trees[/amazon_link] is one of the few books I’ve read in one sitting.
I should note that list fluctuates, but it’s true for today.
Book you’ve faked reading:
[amazon_link id=”1461120292″ target=”_blank” ]The Red Badge of Courage[/amazon_link] by Stephen Crane. I’ve still never finished it. I read the Cliff’s Notes for a test in American Realism and Naturalism in college, and I earned a B on it. If I’d read it, I could probably have earned an A, but that’s the way it is.
Book you’re an evangelist for:
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver. I think everyone should read it, even if they don’t think they’re interested in Africa. What Kingsolver did with that book amazes me, and it’s the kind of writing I aspire to.
Book you’ve bought for the cover:
I’ve talked about this before, but I bought Alice Hoffman’s [amazon_link id=”0345455932″ target=”_blank” ]Blackbird House[/amazon_link] because I liked the cover, and it didn’t pay off. However, [amazon_link id=”0743298039″ target=”_blank” ]The Thirteenth Tale[/amazon_link] by Diane Setterfield and [amazon_link id=”B003WUYROK” target=”_blank” ]The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane[/amazon_link] by Katherine Howe, both of which I bought for their covers, paid off beautifully.
Book that changed your life:
This is a hard one, but I’m going with Harper Lee’s [amazon_link id=”0061743526″ target=”_blank” ]To Kill a Mockingbird[/amazon_link]. I never get tired of that book. It helped me look at my own beliefs and made me question what I would do if I were Atticus. Would I have the guts to do the right thing in the face of so much prejudice and opposition in the town, especially knowing I was licked before I began? The reason that Atticus is such a hero is that he did all this and so few people would.
Favorite line from a book:
The last page of The Great Gatsby is beautiful:
And as the moon rose higher the inessential houses began to melt away until gradually I became aware of the old island here that flowered once for Dutch sailors’ eyes—a fresh, green breast of the new world. Its vanished trees, the trees that had made way for Gatsby’s house, had once pandered in whispers to the last and greatest of all human dreams; for a transitory enchanted moment man must have held his breath in the presence of this continent, compelled into an aesthetic contemplation he neither understood nor desired, face to face for the last time in history with something commensurate to his capacity for wonder.
And as I sat there, brooding on the unknown world, I thought of Gatsby’s wonder when he first picked out the green light at the end of Daisy’s dock. He had come a long way to this blue lawn and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that it was already behind him, somewhere back in the vast obscurity beyond the city, where the dark fields of the republic rolled on under the night.
Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that’s no matter—tomorrow we will run raster, stretch out our arms farther… And one fine morning—
So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
I never tired of The Great Gatsby, and that page contains so much gorgeous writing.
Book you most want to read again for the first time:
Oh, surely the [amazon_link id=”0545162076″ target=”_blank” ]Harry Potter[/amazon_link] series. The wonder and waiting for the plot to unfold was one of the best reading experiences of my life.
photo credit: chefranden
Twisted, Laurie Halse Anderson
[amazon_image id=”0142411841″ link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” class=”alignleft”]Twisted[/amazon_image]Laurie Halse Anderson’s novel [amazon_link id=”0142411841″ target=”_blank” ]Twisted[/amazon_link] is the story of Tyler Miller, a seventeen-year-old boy with a dysfunctional family, a nerdy friend nicknamed Yoda who is in love with Tyler’s sister, a crush on teen queen Bethany Milbury, and a deep and abiding hatred for Bethany’s twin brother Chip. Tyler, caught spraying graffiti on the school, is ordered to do community service and remain under probation. His community service, helping out with a landscaper and school janitors, allows him to bulk up. His new physique, coupled with his newly-acquired bad-boy reputation, attract Bethany’s attention. She talks Tyler into breaking the terms of his probation and his parents’ restrictions to attend a huge party, where something that happens that causes Tyler’s life to nearly come crashing down around his ears.
I’m not sure I liked this book as much as [amazon_link id=”0312674392″ target=”_blank” ]Speak[/amazon_link] or [amazon_link id=”B004R96SCO” target=”_blank” ]Wintergirls[/amazon_link], but I still liked it enough to devour it in about a day. Laurie Halse Anderson might be this generation’s Judy Blume. Her characters are real people, with real problems. This story has much to say about the cycle of abuse and the workings of dysfunctional families. It’s a quick read. Tyler is a likeable character. If I didn’t like it as much as Anderson’s previous books, it might be because the protagonists were teenage girls, and as a former teenage girl myself, I suppose I found them easier to relate to. There is nothing that rings false about Tyler’s character (or any of the others). If you like Anderson’s other books, you’ll like this one, too. Anderson cleverly ties together several motifs (see, Tyler? I get it) in the end in a way that satisfies.
Rating:
Full disclosure: I checked this book out of my school library.
Reading Update
I’ve not finished many books lately. I was writing a lot as I participated in NaNoWriMo, which took up a good deal of my time, but in addition to that, I picked some books I wound up not liking much to read during the month of November. I’m giving up on [amazon_link id=”140222267X” target=”_blank” ]Willoughby’s Return[/amazon_link] by Jane Odiwe. I am about halfway through it, and it’s just not grabbing me. There is no agreed upon style convention regarding sharing a character’s thoughts when you’re writing in third person, but I am not a fan of using quotation marks for this purpose. I think it causes confusion with dialogue or speech. Also, when I read a paragraph written in this style and rewrote it in my head to stay within third person, I knew I wouldn’t finish the book. Still, the book was instructive.
I checked Laurie Halse Anderson’s [amazon_link id=”0142411841″ target=”_blank” ]Twisted[/amazon_link] out of our school library. I figured YA would be just the thing after the National Council of Teachers of English conference, where I heard about so much new YA I need to read, and a huge writing project. Plus I have read and loved two other novels Anderson wrote: [amazon_link id=”0142414735″ target=”_blank” ]Speak[/amazon_link] and [amazon_link id=”B004R96SCO” target=”_blank” ]Wintergirls[/amazon_link]. Laurie Halse Anderson shared the coolest picture of herself and Judy Blume on Facebook today. Blume was giving her a Defender of Free Speech award from the National Coalition Against Censorship. If anyone knows what it’s like to be in Anderson’s shoes, it’s Judy Blume. She must have been so excited to receive the award from one of her own personal heroes. I admire the both of them so much for writing the truth about kids.
I have been so out of the loop this month. What are you reading?
photo credit: Glenn Waters ぐれんin Japan now in Milano
I Won NaNoWriMo!
I just submitted my still-incomplete novel for validation, and I am so excited because…
I WON NANOWRIMO!
I feel like I should give a speech or something. First, I would like to thank my husband and kids for respecting my need to do this and for giving me the time and space to write. If Steve hadn’t taken this project seriously and supported my efforts to complete it, I just wouldn’t have completed it.
I want to thank Helen Fielding, Sarah Addison Allen, and all the other chick lit writers for giving me a model of the kind of story I wanted to write.
I want to thank Jane Austen and William Shakespeare.
I want to thank Scrivener, which is an excellent app that I will now be able to buy for 50% off because I won! Seriously, this app enabled me to plan and move text around, and it gave me the freedom to write and organize all of my notes in one place. Plus their word count was really accurate. I think the discrepancy between my Scrivener word count and the official NaNo word count was only 34 words, which is really close.
I think my MS Word count differed by a lot more than that when I won in 2009. Even though this is the second time I’ve won NaNaWriMo, it doesn’t feel any less thrilling. I don’t feel less a sense of accomplishment. I feel as exhilarated as I did the first time, and perhaps even more so because I managed to win even though I went out of town to a conference.
Here’s to hoping I can finish the darned thing. I think this one could be publishable if I can get it into shape, but then most writers probably think that about their work, or they wouldn’t bother. Still, at this point it’s too soon to be discouraged, especially because I managed to write 50,000 words of my novel in 30 days. Actually, 29.
NaNoWriMo News
NaNoWriMo is nearly over for this year, and with a current word count of 47,333 and two more days to write, I think I’m going to “win” this year. I am excited because I even went out of town to a conference and managed to keep up OK. I fell behind a little, but I had planned ahead and written a lot so that I would have some padding in case there was time I couldn’t write in Chicago. It was a great trip, by the way.
One of the “carrots” for me this year has been the 50% discount on the full version of Scrivener for winners. I can’t see using anything else to write fiction with, and I’m certainly not using MS Word or Apple Pages. Scrivener was designed with writers in mind. I keep forgetting it has templates for nonfiction and academic writing, too.
I am happy with most of what I wrote, but I gave myself permission to write stuff I know I’ll need to cut later just to have it down and move on to the next thing. I think it helped that I set the story in a place I know well. Although I did just manage to send my main character to London, she’s spent most of the novel a couple of blocks away from my house. I also didn’t worry a lot about pop culture references. The movie Anonymous and the breakup of Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore both made it into my book. Hey, if Colin Firth and Hugh Grant can both be mentioned in [amazon_link id=”0753158590″ target=”_blank” ]Bridget Jones’s Diary[/amazon_link], I think I’m OK.
Here is to the home stretch. May I have more time to read and thus update this blog on the other side of November.