Weekly Geeks is starting up again on January 10th! Head over to weeklygeeks.com for the details and to grab a new button or two.
Thanks to softdrink for the heads up.
Month: January 2009
Library Loot #1
YAY! Eva and Alessandra have come up with a weekly meme that I can totally get behind: Library Loot. And since trips to the library are a weekly thing for me, I will always have something to share.
My library pickings, at least during the school year have several elements to it: finding picture books for the younger set, finding middle grade books for C, and finding YA books for M. And then picking up whatever holds are there for me. And then there are the inevitable movies we always come home with, but I won’t list those. 🙂
For A and K:
I Love My New Toy, Mo Willems**
Today I Will Fly, Mo Willems**
Belinda Begins Ballet, Amy Young
‘Twas the Day Before Zoo Day, by Catherine Ipcizade; Illustrated by Ben Hodson
Dora’s Backpack (ugh. But they have to get one.)
Goodnight Goon: A Terrifying Parody, by Michael Rex**
Woolbur, by Leslie Helakoski; Illustrated by Lee Harper
Bear Feels Scared, by Karma Wilson; Illustrations by Jane Chapman
The Real Princess: A Mathemagical Tale, by Brenda Williams; Illustrated by Sophie Fatus
Nothing for C this week; she hasn’t finished last week’s selections yet.
For M:
13 Little Blue Envelopes, by Maureen Johnson*
The Son of Summer Stars, by Meredith Ann Pierce*
Alosha, by Christopher Pike*
Trickster’s Queen, by Tamora Pierce*
Trickster’s Choice, by Tamora Pierce
For me:
Saffy’s Angel, by Hilary McKay*
The Leanin’ Dog, by K.A. Nuzum
*Ones M eventually read.
**Picture books we really liked.
A Year in the World
by Frances Mayes
ages: adult
First sentence: “The silhouette of Alghero rises from the Mediterranean.”
At one point, while reading this collection of travel essays, I thought, “When Frances Mayes is lyrical in her writing, I feel lyrical.” Not a very lyrical sentiment, true, but an honest one. As I discovered before, when Mayes writes well, you feel like saving her words. Her books are not ones to be rushed through.
The problem with this book is that it’s really a series of disjointed essays, each on a different spot, and while some of them are wonderful, others are well, banal. (That and I have issues with the title. It’s not a “year in the world”, more like “several years bopping around southern Europe, Morocco, and Great Britain.”)
As Mayes is a lover of all things Italy, those chapters are by far the best. I want to visit Naples, Sicily, Mantova and wander the streets, shop in the markets, taste the food. Lay on the sun-kissed beaches, swim in the sparkling ocean. (Her work also brings out the adjectives in me.) She makes Italy so accessible, luxiurious, desireable.
When reading books I am often reminded of people. This one — the Italy and England/Wales chapters especially — made me think of my mom. I can understand her long-held desire to go to Italy now: it is a marvelous place.
But, aside from her love-affair with Italy, the places Mayes visits have their ups and downs. She gushes about Andalucia in Spain, but is underwhelmed by Portugal. She stays in a crummy house in Wales, but has a good old time with friends in Scotland (which is by far her most indulgent, and my least favorite chapter). Her husband gets food poisining in Morocco, they go on a cruise around the Greek Islands (she alternates between gushing about the ocean, making fun of the passengers, and lamenting that they can’t spend much time anywhere. Sounds like my cruise experience), but have a much better experience with a guided boat tour around ancient ruins in Turkey.
Even with its many imperfections, it’s a book worth reading. I vascillated between jealousy and what she was able to do (and afford!), and soaking the words in and feeling like I was there myself. There were times when it read like a guidebook (a very good guidebook, but one nonetheless), but I can’t complain, coming away with garden and food suggestions, book recommendations, and CDs to listen to.
And still, I may be sad to see it go back to the library. I did enjoy my travels; Mayes is an impeccible traveling guide and companion.
Delurk! Delurk!
It’s National Delurking Week. Yeah, I didn’t know either. But, thanks to Mother Reader, I am now informed (she’s so good at that). And in the spirit of the whole thing, I’d love it if you left me a comment. Either here, or somewhere else on the blog. (C’mon Dad, now’s your chance!) (Same for all you feed readers!)
In fact, let me give you something to comment about: what are you reading right now? Is it any good?
Bloggy Awards Musing
There are two things I really like about receiving Blog Awards:
1) Discovering blogs out there of people who read me and I had no idea they existed (sorry, but it’s true; I don’t have time for everyone). In this case, Rebecca at Just One More Page who gave me the Butterfly Award.
Here are the rules if you would like to participate:
1. Put the logo on your blog.
2. Add a link to the person who awarded you.
3. Award up to ten other blogs.
4. Add links to those blogs on yours.
5. Leave a message for your awardees on their blogs.
I’ll get to the awardees part in a minute.
2) Is the compliments paid when administering the awards. I’m cool! I’m the “antithesis of ethnocentrism” as declared by softdrink, in giving out the Kreativ Blogger award.
Here are the rules for this one:
- Mention the blog that gave it to you.
- Comment on her blog to let her know you have posted the award.
- Share 6 values that are important to you.
- Share 6 things you do not support.
- Share the love with six other wonderful blogging friends.
Things I do NOT like about Blog Awards:
1) Jumping through the hoops. But it’s not a strong dislike, so here I go.
Values that are important to me:
- humor
- good story telling (not sure if it’s a value, but it is important to me)
- honesty
- cooperation
- curiosity
- forgiveness
Things I do not support (they didn’t say it had to be values…):
- war
- kids screaming at each other
- taking offense
- demeaning women
- extremism
- SUVs
2) Coming up with lists of bloggers who haven’t received them. There are so many that I always feel like I’m leaving someone out. And even when I try to highlight new blogs, I feel like I’m shortchanging my bloggy friends I’ve known for a longer time. See that list over there on the right? I think they’re all cool, they’re all creative, they’re all worth reading. Which is why I link to them. So… if you’re on that roll (you can check, if you like), and you haven’t gotten either one of these awards, consider yourself having recieved it.
Yes, I know that’s a cop-out.
Ah, well. But now I’ve pacified the blog awards gods, and can go back to my reading.
Paper Towns
by John Green
ages: 16+
First sentence: “The way I figure it, everyone gets a miracle.”
First thing, I should mention that I got sad Margo from the library. (I said, when I checked out “Oh. It’s sad Margo. I was hoping for happy Margo.” The librarian looked at me funny.) When the book was released, my gut instinct was to go with happy Margo — it’s a much more attractive cover, and I like yellow. But after finishing the book, I think the sad Margo (who doesn’t really look “sad”) is probably the more accurate one.
Quentin has lived next door to Margo Roth Spiegelman since he was two years old. And he has harbored a crush on her for nearly as long. So when Margo pops into his room at midnight, three weeks to graduation, he’s unable to refuse her night of revenge and list-crossing. It’s this experience, fueled by his crush that drives him, when she disappears the next day, to obsessively follow her clues to figure out the mystery that is Margo.
Okay. So that’s the basic plot. But, like any John Green (like Margo Roth Spiegelman, John Green is just the sort of name you kind of have to say together) book, it’s not really about that. It’s one part mystery, one part road trip, and two parts unraveling. I liked the road trip part best, personally, but unlike Looking for Alaska, I actually enjoyed Q’s journey of self- and other-discovery. The book is anchored in Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself” (which I’ve actually never read, but now kind of want to), and the exploration of the way we interact with each other. The “mirrors and windows” as Green puts it. Q spends a lot of time wandering and sluffing off the last three weeks of school, intially because he wants to find Margo (the physical being), but eventually because he wants to understand Margo (the person). There’s a difference, and I think Green explores that both humorously and poignantly. And what Q discovers is why I said the sad Margo cover fits Margo, the character, better. The ending is both bittersweet and absolutely perfect, which I also appreciated.
Is it his best book? Hmm… probably not. (It’s not my favorite, either, but I did like it.) But it’s a good book. And a good book is always worth reading. Especially if it’s written by John Green.
Teaser Tuesday #1
Joining in, as part of my desire to expand my blogging from just reviews…
Teaser Tuesday is hosted by Should be Reading:
- Grab your current read.
- Let the book fall open to a random page.
- Share with us two (2) “teaser” sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12.
- You also need to share the title of the book that you’re getting your “teaser” from … that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you’ve given!
- Please avoid spoilers!
The book is A Year in the World, by Frances Mayes, which I’m reading for my challenge.
From p. 158; she’s talking about Italian food:
As you hop about in Italy, the variety from place to place is absolutely astonishing, especially given that most food springs from la cucina povera — the poor kitchen, the made-do kitchen. Wild greens, nuts, fish, game, fruit — all things free for the gathering — appear in every area but in different guises.
Makes me hungry. 🙂
Hunger Games
by Suzanne Collins
ages: 12+
First sentence: “When I woke up, the other side of the bed was cold.”
If you’ve been living in a cave (or at least not hanging out on the book blogs), then you haven’t heard the buzz about this one. The buzz that’s been growing — steadily — over the past six or so months. It started out as a trickle; one person here, another there… but by now it’s a flood. This is only a sampling of the reviews I’ve read of the book:
Cybils Science Fiction/Fantasy shortlist
Abby (the) Librarian
Fuse #8
The Reading Zone
Becky’s Book Reviews
Sarah Miller
Library Queue
My Thoughts Exactly
Shelf Elf
It’s All About Books
Squeetus
And it’s unanimous: this is an awesome book. (Of course I agree. I couldn’t put it down. In fact, I had to read it fast, because M was dying to snatch it away, especially after she learned that Collins wrote the Underland Chronicles, which is one of M’s favorites.) Click through if you want plot summaries or details.
Three things you need to know about this book.
1) You will not be able to put it down. If you do, in the event that you’re a nail-biting type of person, you will not be able to stop thinking about the main characters, or the events of the games, or whether or not they will make it out alive. And sooner rather than later, you will find yourself picking the book up again.
2) It’s graphic, but not gruesome. Collins is masterful at balancing brutality and humanity, and making us care for characters in the face of awful situations. It’s a dystopian novel after all, a cross between Scott Westerfield’s Uglies and Survivor gone horribly wrong.
3) You will finish it wanting more… and yet be completely satisfied with the current story. I was totally captivated with the plot, completely buying the ending, and then it ended. AH! Not since a Percy Jackson or Harry Potter book have I finished it and then immediately thought, “How long until I can read the next one?”
So go get it already and see for yourself what the fuss is about!
The First Estella (of the year)
It’s up. Go check it out… I haven’t had much time to browse today (been sucked into — surprise — a book), but it looks a lot better than I thought it would, given the holidays. Yay for us!
My contributions: two reviews about books from authors whose work I previously loved, and an article on firsts that I threw together last-minute (ssshhh) and am quite proud of the way it turned out. Oh, and we’ve got a new feature from Stacey at Book Thirty entitled Families in Fiction, which sounds like an interesting idea.
And for one last thing, non Estella related, this totally cracked me up. Yeah, he’s poking fun at me, but who says I can’t laugh at myself?
Aunt Nancy and the Bothersome Visitors
by Phyllis Root
age: 6-10
First sentence: “Aunt Nancy should of knowed Old Man Trouble was in the neighborhood.”
It’s a new year, and I’ve got…
another Middle Grade title?
Wait, I thought my part in the Cybils was over?
Well, it is, but my dear cousin Allison is a librarian in Salt Lake City and is on the Beehive Award committee. She needs readers to help with narrowing down their list. (All I have to do is read the book and give my opinion. Not hard.) Anyway. Since a lot of the books on their list were the same as the Cybils list, I happily said I would. Except that the four on my cousin’s part of the list weren’t on my Cybils list. (Are you still following?) Anyway, now that the Cybils are over, I can get to my cousins part of the Beehive Award list.
Whew.
There’s really not a whole lot to say about this book (hence the really long-winded introduction!), except that I liked it. It’s an easy reader book, designed for the younger set: lots of white space, great color illustrations beginning each chapter with black-and-white ones interspersed throughout the text. But, beyond that, it’s a series of four short folk tales, starring Aunt Nancy — that lovable, capable, witty aunt-type person that is immortalized in tales — outwitting Old Man Trouble, Cousin Lazybones, Old Woeful, and Mister Death. It’s very cleverly done and highly entertaining reading how Aunt Nancy ends up tricking each one of the visitors. Old Woeful is my favorite: an old woman who has a raincloud over her even when it’s sunny outside (don’t we all know someone like that?), she stops by Nancy’s house with a tale of misery. Everything Nancy is going to do is going to go bad. Until Nancy decides to start digging her own grave. Which completely unsettles Old Woeful, who then takes off, saying, “Aunt Nancy, you are about the gloomiest person I ever laid eyes on. I got to be getting along before you give me a serious case of the dismals.”
Now who wouldn’t want to spend a bit with characters (and well-told tales) like that?
The Book Nut 