littlegreycloud tries discipline in 2011 (or not)

I have failed at a lot of things in 2010 -- I have not read my A to Z books, my reading was all over the place, things got hectic and I stopped posting here, I'm not even close to cataloguing all my books and I most certainly have not bought just one book for every two I read...

I did read 75+ books in 2010 (80, to be exact, even including the literal heavyweight ...and Ladies of the Club*, so my educated guess regarding that the 75er group would be right for me proved correct. (I suppose I could try for 100 if I really pushed myself, but where would be the fun in that?)

So I guess I'll just try again, with some or all of the above. As Hermann Hesse says: "und jedem Anfang wohnt ein Zauber inne" (approx.: there's magic to every beginning).

Susan in Berlin, wishing everyone a Happy New Year

*1344 pages and I still wished there had been more

I read And Ladies of the Club back in the 1980s. I had lived in southwestern Ohio for about a year at that time and recognized so many of the places mentioned or alluded to in the novel. I really enjoyed it. I think it was a miniseries or made for TV movie shortly after I read it as well.

Thanks for the tip about the miniseries/movie -- will have to check it out! I came across the book quite by accident -- read the title somewhere and was intrigued enough to check it out on Wikipedia. At the time, they had a long article about how the book became known (see http://tinyurl.com/39d8g9l), and after reading this, I just had to have the book.:)

They've since edited the Wikipedia article down to a fairly boring entry -- I don't think I would have bought the book based on that, so it's lucky that I checked it out when I did... (the reading gods meant well).

Welcome, welcome, old friend! I'm delighted to see you here and I'll look forward to seeing what you think about what you read. (I read part of And Ladies of the Club back in the 80's too. There it sits on the shelf, calling in reproachful tones for a finish.
Happy New Year, Susan!

Welcome back!

Glad to see you back with us again, Susan!

Thanks for the welcomes -- I hope the new year has started well for you all. Here it's a beautiful day, the sun is shining and I have just come inside from playing with the cat in the snow. I've finished my first book for the year, Louise Penny's A Fatal Grace aka "Dead Cold", which hardly needs recommendation here. This second instalment of the Armand Gamache series was as good as the first one, even though I suspected who the murderer was early on. But the "who done it" is not the main reason to visit Three Pines anyway. I'll definitely be getting "The Cruellest Month".

#4:

I see you all the time -- whenever I enter a book, I'm told you have it, too.:)

But do give the Ladies another try -- they're a bit slow to get going but really grow on you. And I enjoyed the political gossip -- almost regretted that I had already finished Game Change; it would have made an excellent companion read. Plus ça change...

#7: I love the Three Pines series! I am glad you enjoyed A Fatal Grace, Susan.

Thanks, Stasia. I just have to make sure I pace myself -- I prefer that she be several volumes ahead of my reading with her writing.:)

At any rate, book 2 of 2011 is done with as well -- Mons Kallentoft's Höstoffer. Not really sure why I keep reading these, especially given my intense dislike of the author -- it's a bit like eating junk food. They're getting weaker, too -- the resolution in this one was not very convincing (the murderer was someone introduced late in the book with a motive that seemed rather contrived) and the gimmick of having the murder victims contribute their thoughts is getting really old by now.

But -- and this I have to give Mr Kallentoft -- I'm still interested in the fate of the various people involved in the investigations. I'm wondering if Börje Svärd will come back to work now that his wife has died, if Karim will get over divorcing his and if Zeke will make peace with the fact that his son earns a lot of money playing hockey. And what the story is with Malin's parents. So I'll probably get the next one as well (used, of course), which should be the last one given that we have had winter, summer and fall already (although I would not put it past this guy to invent a couple more seasons, like that dictator who came up with days of the week named after himself and his mother).

How about you all -- do you read books whose authors you dislike?

While I'll be passing Höstoffer on, the mail lady has brought a new addition to my bookshelves: No Wind of Blame by Georgette Heyer. I tried one of her romances a few years back but decided that romance really isn't my genre, so I hope to have better luck with one of her mysteries.

I prefer Heyer's mysteries to her romances too, but I think I am in the minority in that regard - at least here in this group. I do enjoy one of her romances every now and again though.

Glad to hear I'm not alone on the "mystery rather than romance" front.:)

At any rate, am doing rather well (i.e. hitting good books) with my reading at the moment. In the mornings, I'm dipping into that day's selection of diary entries in The Assassin's Cloak (am finding it hard not to read ahead, however).

During the day and in the evening, I read either Dinge, die wir heute sagten (an interesting novel about life in an East German smalltown twenty years after reunification, but only for the German-enabled, I'm afraid) or Simon Lelic's Rupture.

The mail lady has brought Masha Hamilton's 31 Hours, which I'm looking forward to as well.

Have read in the paper that East German poet Eva Strittmatter (widow of the better-known author Erwin Strittmatter) died a couple of days ago, and am contemplating adding a volume of her letters to the pile on the nighttable.

I will be interested in seeing your thoughts on 31 Hours, Susan.

I'll make sure to post them here, although after Rupture I'll probably feel like something more gentle first.:)

I've finished my current audiobook today, Running Blind by Lee Childs. I must admit I have a soft spot for the Jack Reacher novels (which I only discovered last year for some reason). They're great as audiobooks -- exciting enough to keep me going at the gym, which is my no. 1 criterion.

Books come in:
This is where I leave you (spotted at a books swap site where I have credits, and it sounded interesting)
and Tauben fliegen auf ("pidgeons/doves fly up"), a belated Christmas present that i got to pick. The novel, which won Germany's equivalent to the Booker last year, is about a Hungarian family from Serbia that emigrates to Switzerland, where the parents "over-assimilate" (if there is such a thing), while the daughters are much more conflicted when it comes to who they are and where they belong. I've been wanting to read it for a while (since before it won the prize;) so I'm really pleased to have it now.

I like the Jack Reacher books too, Susan.

Hello and Happy Almost birthday to you Susan. I hope tomorrow is a delightful day for you!

Happy Birthday, Susan! I hope you have a great one!

Happy Birthday, Susan! Have a lovely day!

Felicem Natalem!! Happy Birthday, Susan!!

Happy birthday!

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to you!

Bonne anniversaire!

Oh wow, thanks to you all for the good wishes and the virtual cake! I did have an excellent day -- the significant other made pancakes for breakfast and then we headed out for a photo exhibition (Berlin in the 1950s), followed by a few hours of relaxation in a thermal bath. And the sun was shining all day! (Today we're back to grey and yucky.)

The only negative part was that my cat managed to sneak outside and promptly went to beat up the neighbours' dog, the little troublemaker -- but no doubt she thinks she had an excellent day, too!

Is that your cat on your profile? She looks beautiful!

She was... and I loved her to pieces. I adopted her at the age of ten and with a serious heart condition but I still got to have the pleasure of her company for 8.5 years. She was amazing! Her name was Wölkchen ("little cloud" in German, hence my user name). I still miss her a lot.

The little rascal I mentioned above is called Isla and was rescued from a Spanish killing station. She only has one eye and no hearing in one ear (and thus has trouble placing sounds) and unfortunately no fear whatsoever, so she's not actually allowed to go out on her own (she loves walking with me on a leash and loudly demands her walks twice a day) but every now and then she sneaks out. Her favourite place in the world is in bed with me, though, so I do a lot of my reading there. (She yells at us when she thinks it's time for bed and usually it's easiest just to give in.) I just added her picture to the page.

The third cat on the page is Charlie, and she's a stray who just turned up in our garden last year (she loves human company). We first put up a hut for her outside but the other strays kept beating her up, and so we ended up taking her in. She can't live with us as Isla would make her life hell, but my mother has a separate apartment on the ground floor of our house, and the two of them get along splendidly, even though my mother "never wanted a cat". Well, though...

This is probably more than you wanted to know.;)

No, I loved your cat stories!

I am new to the world of cats- but adopted a ten year old stray this summer and am now converted! Phoebe is a short-haired black and white cat. It turned out she was chipped but her previous owners weren't interested in having her back. She sounds a bit like Charlie as she's very nervous and runs away from other cats. My husband and I are dreading tomorrow as we have to take her to the vet's for dental treatment. She won't be happy-particularly as she won't have eaten since the night before!

I don't know what a Spanish killing station is but please don't tell me! I think I'd rather not know!

Poor Phoebe, she won't be a happy kitty.:) But she's lucky to have found a home where she is loved and cared for. I do want to see a photo, of course.

As for owning cats (or being owned by them), I've always agreed with this poster:
http://www.schoeffling.de/content/katzen/plakat/index.html
("There are many things in life you can do without -- but cats and books are not among them!")

All fingers and paws crossed for your trip to the vet!

Thanks for those crossed fingers and paws. Phoebe is definitely not having the best day. She thought things were going badly when we refused to give her any breakfast ...and then we put her in a pet carrier!

I am going to quote the poster's message to my husband-he is a bit shocked by how much this treatment is going to cost! We haven't been able to insure her as the chip's details were only passed over to us by the previous owners this week. We plan to insure her now we can. It's sounds affordable as long as today's visit doesn't uncover any further medical problems.

Keep those paws crossed! Photo to come soon!

Hi LGC, glad to see you're giving it another go this year. You are already off to a fine start!
Belated happy birthday wishes :)

>30 Soupdragon:: I think pet insurance is a fantastic idea. We haven't purchased it for our cat as she doesn't go outdoors (so fewer injuries and such to deal with) but I envy the United States' exotic pet insurance. We don't have any of that here in Canada. It would make life with other animals (not just cats and dogs) a lot more affordable. Poor Phoebe, I hope she gets over the shock of the vet and is back to her normal self soon!

# 30: Poor Phoebe, I hope she was not quite as hungry as this one:
http://tv.gawker.com/5733100/the-worlds-hungriest-cat-is-also-one-of-its-cutest

Crossing fingers and paws that all went well at the vet and Phoebe has forgiven you. Dental care is important -- the plague on the teeth contains bacteria that are bad for the cat's heart -- so the money you spent now is well invested. We used to brush Wölkchen's teeth several times a week (she quite liked the poultry-flavoured tooth paste once she got used to the brush).

I still can't quite believe that someone would just give up their cat like that but she's definitely better off with you!

#31: Thank you! My internet connection has been flakey lately, so I'm a bit behind in posting. I have finished Rupture and am of two minds about it. It gave an interesting perspective on a school shooting committed by a teacher rather than a student (not a spoiler, we find out right away). I liked the way we get to hear different people's views on the event and of the perpetrator -- it's as if you find the investigator's binder and get to read the transcripts of her interviews. Interspersed with these are the events in the investigator's own life, and soon a parallel becomes visible. There was something missing, however, for me to fully connect with the protagonist and I can't decide whether it's because the author didn't quite pull the female perspective off or whether it's me... Would love to hear what others thought.

Anyway, where was I. Oh yes, books.:) I had to go to a hospital for treatment earlier this week, so I started Prinsessan av Burundi (crime novels are about all I can concentrate on in hospital waiting rooms). I've read earlier volumes in the Ann Lindell series but that was several years ago (Swedish books used to be quite difficult to get hold of here). I don't think it matters much as Ann Lindell is on maternity leave in this volume and we accompany her coworker Ola being in charge of a murder investigation for the first time. Eriksson's books are of the realistic/greyish/slightly depressing school of Swedish deckare, which I prefer to the chicklitty variant that has gained ground in recent years -- but then, I'm old-fashioned enough to reread the Martin Beck books every few years or so (not sure why LT lists them under Maj Sjöwall's name only, they should be under Sjöwall/Wahlöö, but I digress -- and the touchstone is not working anyhow).

Books come in:

The first Inspector Thanet Omnibus by Dorothy Simpson. I haven't read anything by her yet but am always ready to investigate a new (to me) British mystery writer. I went for the omnibus rather than just the first volume because I like chunky books and also because I don't like to judge a series by just the first instalment (unless I take a violent dislike to it, of course) but mainly since there is no sign yet of another Bill Slider omnibus by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles and I'm suffering withdrawal symptoms.

Also, Immer wieder Dezember (December, time and again). This is a memoir written by Susanne Schädlich, daughter of a East German writer who left East Germany with this family in 1977, when Susanne was twelve. Years later, after the wall fell and the archives of the secret service were made accessible, they had to find out that the writer's brother, Susanne's favourite uncle, had been spying on them and reporting to the secret service all along. The book is about adapting to life in the west, and about coming to terms with this betrayal, and probably prompted at least in part by the uncle's very public suicide a couple of years ago.

Last but not least: Månefjellet by Majken von Bruggen, a novel about a woman returning to her hometown for her father's funeral, where she meets her former best friend, her first love and assorted ghosts from the past. Will give me an excuse to work on my Norwegian readi9ng skills.

Hi Susan

There are times in my life when I can only read crime novels too. I think I read half of Ruth Rendell's Wexford novels once whilst waiting to hear if I'd been successful in an interview for a job I really wanted! Rupture sounds interesting- being the mother of school age children and having been a teacher, I have a lot of sympathy for stressed teachers -and the children who have to put up with the consequences of stressed teachers!

Thanks for your good wishes for Phoebe. And you too, DkPhoenix if you're reading! The dental treatment was quite major as she had to have some teeth removed. She was still floppy after the anaesthetic when we brought home on Thursday evening but rushed straight to her food bowl anyway. She then proceeded to use her claws and remaining teeth to remove the dressing on her leg which was supposed to have stayed there for two more hours. Looked fine underneath fortunately! She looked pretty sorry for herself yesterday but seems much chirpier today which is good to see.

We now need to keep the teeth which are left healthy. The brush sounds good but I'm not sure she'd let us use it on her!

That poor hungry cat on the video! He looked rather large though so maybe that's the stunt he pulls to get extra dinners. Very clever how cats look their absolute cutest when they want you to feed them!

Dee, so glad to know Phoebe is doing well after her ordeal (eating is always a good sign in my book). The brushing is a two-person job at the beginning -- one person to hold her, the other to use the brush (they should have small brushes at the vet plus the flavoured toothpaste). You'll probably have to start slow: one stroke with the brush and a treat to follow up, same the next days, until you can get two strokes in.:)

Don't keep us hanging like this, btw -- did you get the job? :)

My name is Susan, and I'm a bookaholic.

I do say this gravely. I try to be disciplined, I really do, and I promised myself that this year i would stick to me "only buy one book for every two you read" rule. But the road to hell... Consider this week, for instance (and dear god, it's not even over). Somewhere I stumble across someone mentioning Lion Feuchtwanger's The Oppermanns. I've never read Feuchtwanger because he was such a canon author in East Germany and I've always resisted reading what I was told to read, but this sounds fascinating and I think I could buy since I finished Rupture and Dinge, die wir heute sagten. (I ordered As Always, Julia for finishing A Fatal Grace and Höstoffer.) So far, so good.

Unfortunately, The Oppermanns turns out to be the middle part of a trilogy available in an attractive German edition, and of course, the trilogy is cheaper than buying each of the volumes separately. (You see where this is going, right?) As "luck" would have it, the trilogy works out to EUR 29, and I have an EUR 5 voucher for an online bookstore valid until February on orders of EUR 30 or more. (The one euro difference is not as ironic as it may seem as I have to add an English book or a "non-book" to my order anyway because bookstores here are not allowed to give discounts on German books due to the net book agreement). And I have been hankering after The Secret Lives of People in Love anyway. So, that's four books ordered right there.

I'm barely done with the above spree when I get an e-mail from Persephone Books that anyone who buys three books from them by January 24 can have Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, Flush or Cheerful Weather for the Wedding free of charge. Now, I already have Miss Pettigrew and have already given it as a present to everyone who would hold still long enough (if you don't have it, buy it *now*, it's the ultimate comfort read and even better than the movie, my adoration for Frances McDormand notwithstanding) and I'm not sure that Flush is for me but I've long been intrigued by Cheerful Weather which people seem to either love or hate. Not intrigued enough to buy it, perhaps, but if they're giving it away for free? And I anyway have a Persephone Books wishlist, which features Still Missing by Beth Gurion, Family Roundabout by Richmal Crompton and A House in the Country by Jocelyn Playfair. (Touchstones not working for these last ones -- is there an upper limit per post?) Exactly three books, how convenient! So there's another four books coming in...

I could, of course, try not to buy any more books until I have read sixteen of the ones I already have, but that is just so totally not happening...

A hopeless case in Berlin

>39 littlegreycloud: Ha! I know how you feel. I also got the devilishly tempting email from Persephone Books. Flush has been on my wishlist, and my twisted little book buying mind feels like I am throwing away money if I don't take them up on this offer. So far resisting though.

>40 Tanglewood:: I am glad I am not alone.:)
For anyone who did not get the e-mail but would like to be tempted, here's the deal: order three books from the PB website at persephonebooks.co.uk by 24 January and request the free book of your choice (Miss Pettigrew, Flush or Cheerful Wedding) in the comments field of the order form. (I'm not sure I'm doing anyone a favour here but why should you be better off than Tanglewood and I?)

#39: Hey, hopeless case: You fit in just fine around here! lol

I am really trying to restrain myself from buying books this year, but it is a daily battle. I know exactly how you feel, Susan.

>41 littlegreycloud:: I received this email and instantly regretted buying three books from Persephone, the week before for my husband to give me for my birthday! Why couldn't I have waited?! Interestingly when I was deciding which ones to buy I started off with a list of six and divided them into buy now and buy next time. So I still have three waiting to be bought. Six in one month does seem a bit extravagent- though if half of them are presents maybe they don't count?

If I do succumb then like you, I'll go for Cheerful Wedding. I'm also intrigued by the mixed reviews and love the butterfly end papers!

>38 littlegreycloud:: Yes, I did get the job! That was a long time ago though. I now have a different job which I love but am keeping my fingers crossed will still exist after April. Redundancies coming up!

Hi Stasia,

Thanks for the sympathy.:) Btw, if you like Jack Reacher, you might want to check out Arne Dahl's A-team series. The first one is Misterioso (I don't think the English review on LT does it justice though). It's a group of people, not one, it takes place in Sweden rather than the US and the protagonists are actual police officers rather than lone wolves, but despite all these differences they somehow share a certain quality with the Reacher books.

# 43

Not that I want to be seen as an enabler or anything but I did receive Cheerful Weather yesterday and the endpapers and the bookmark are really very pretty. I wish there were bed linens available in the pattern, I'd buy them in a heartbeat.:)

Fingers crossed for your job!

PS: Which Pb books did you buy and which ones are still on the list? (I really don't think that presents count, btw...;)

I bought Still Missing, Family Roundabout and A House in the Country. Still Missing is just that but the others have trickled in over the last few days. Someone at the publisher lovingly labeled the envelopes 2/4, 3/4 etc., but 1/4 must have ended up in the bottom of the pile at the post office.

#45: I managed to resist. I am rather envious of those endpapers though and yes, wouldn't the pattern be lovely as bed linen? I will be interested to hear what you think of the actual story!

#46: How very frustrating about Still Missing-I hope it arrives soon! I can't actually remember all three that I ordered so probably a good job I didn't order anymore really! I gave the envelopes to Mr Dragon as soon as they arrived and won't be seeing them again until my birthday in February so I can't check. I know one was The Victorian Chaise Longue, I think another was Consequences but I really can't remember what the third one was. Oh well- it will nice to have a surprise on my birthday! I think the ones still on my list are Doreen, Katherine Mansfield's journal and The Etty Hillesum diaries! Or did I order the Etty Hillesum book? Hmm...

Well, poo. I missed your birthday, but I'm glad it was happy. (And my dearly-beloved Phoebe was a real joy. I have a tape cassette of her purring the deepest, best purr in the world.) Susan, you are really in the right place if you don't particularly want to repent of your book-buying sins. I just wish that I were only 16 behind. I'm practically 16 behind for this month!
Brushing cats' teeth is a thing we haven't been brave enough to do yet. Oh the guilt!

Hey Peggy,
Good to see you...

>I just wish that I were only 16 behind.

Well, it was sixteen for the books I had bought that week. The real problem is much bigger... as was brought home to me rather strongly the other day.

I keep a shelf with the books I recently acquired (just something nice to look at), and when I add new books to it I remove the "oldest" ones and put them in with the general population. (I also have a shelf with the books I recently read, provided I'm keeping them.)

At any rate, a few days ago I had to remove books from the "new arrivals" that I bought less than a month ago! I guess I usually don't notice because I buy most of my books online and I don't have a precise memory as to when the mail lady brought them, but those books (a Fallada binge) I remembered buying in town on a specific day. Of course, I had good reason for buying them (as I always do) -- they were beautiful (see for yourselves: wouldn't you buy this one http://www.aufbau-verlag.de/index.php/geschichten-aus-der-murkelei.html and a couple more?) and they're published by one of the very few East German publishers to have survived reunification (privately owned by now but still following some of its old traditions, focusing on antifascist literature among other things -- they published all of Victor Klemperer's diaries, for example, which naturally, I also own.

But seriously, I can't possibly add a shelf-load of books every month (or rather, I can all too easily but really shouldn't). Just the other day, #?!")# abebooks sent a newsletter focused on tartan-clothed books (http://www.abebooks.co.uk/books/tartan-patterns-scotland-scottish-kilts/robert-burns.shtml?cm_mmc=nl-_-nl-_-110119-h00-tartanjnA-_-01book#row1) and you would think I would be able to resist such a silly pretense as this but you would be wrong.

I was intrigued by the title "Penelope's Progress", and as soon as I had read as far as: "On arriving in New York, Francesca discovered that the young lawyer whom for six months she had been advising to marry somebody more worthy than herself was at last about to do it. This was somewhat in the nature of a shock, for Francesca had been in the habit, ever since she was seventeen, of giving her lovers similar advice, and up to this time no one of them has ever taken it. She therefore has had the not unnatural hope, I think, of organising at one time or another all these disappointed and faithful swains into a celibate brotherhood; and perhaps of driving by the interesting monastery with her husband and calling his attention modestly to the fact that these poor monks were filling their barren lives with deeds of piety, trying to remember their Creator with such assiduity that they might, in time, forget Her.", I absolutely had to have it.

Susan @ but no interest in shoes whatsoever

#44: Susan, I appreciate the recommendation, but unfortunately my local library does not have a single book by Arne Dahl.

Sorry to hear it, Stasia -- but you can keep him in the back of your mind and perhaps the reading gods will send you a copy at some point.

At any rate, i thought it was time for a reading update (things have been busy). I finished Briefe aus Schulzenhof by Eva Strittmatter a while back, a volume of letters I rather enjoyed as undemanding "inbetween" reading. I do wish for an annotated edition of Strittmatter's letters, however. For example, a lot of the letters in this volume reference the problems her husband had after the publication of his novel Ole Bienkopp. By the time I encountered this book, it was a set text in school, so there has to have been quite a swing in the "official" opinion. I can (and will) research this on the net, of course, but there are many other things like that where the reader could use a bit of background information. (Not feasible and perhaps less necessary when this volume was first published in in 1977, of course.)

I'm saving the other two volumes for a later date (I bought all three in April 2009) but having enjoyed the letter-reading so much, I started on The Brontës: A Life in Letters. Juliet Barker has done an outstanding job in turning this selection of letters into a story -- linking the letters with short overviews of what was going on in the life of the family at the time of their writing. Warmly recommended!

On the crime novel front (I always have one going, I think), I was rather disappointed with Prinsessan av Burundi -- not sure how it got to be Sweden's Best Crime Novel of 2002, unless that was an awful year. I don't mind bleak and depressing and critical attitudes towards society and all that, but I could do with an interesting plot and a halfway satisfying conclusion. I do seem to recall that I liked other volumes in this series more, so will give Ann Lindell and her colleagues another shot some time.

For the time being, I comforted myself with Ruth Rendell's No More Dying Then and, for good measure, got started on Murder Being Once Done, which is looking great so far -- Wexford staying in London with his nephew and feeling somewhat out of his depth. There is a lovely scene where he wants to take a bus to a cemetery where a body had been found the day before but does not want to ask for the stop because he doesn't want the busdriver to think of him as one of those tourists who go to check out murder sites they've read about in the paper (which is exactly what he is doing).

I also finished my current audiobook (Wild Justice and, seeing The Finkler Question mentioned in one of the February tioli challenges, got started on that. (Chuckling to myself as I load the dishwasher and clean the kitty litter.)

I've also joined the group read of Cloud Atlas (just over halfway through) and am very glad I did. I started reading CA before (in 2007, I was shocked to see) but it somehow was the wrong book at the wrong time and got abandoned until now. An early contender for my favourite books of the year, I think.

Am also still enjoying The Assassin's Cloak every morning and always have a hard time not to exceed the day's allotment. I'll be going on vacation soon, though, and since I won't lug it with me, I'll have a bit of material to catch up on when I get back.

(More than you all wanted to know, I'm sure.)

I am glad to see that you are liking Cloud Atlas better the second time around!

Oh, I do -- I even kind of regret the narrative strands ending one after the other (I finished the second section of Tim Cavendish this morning). The book is very much like a matroshka doll -- you open one layer at a time until you get to the doll you can't take apart (Slosha's crossing) and then all that's left is putting it back together, one nesting doll at a time...

I tend to give a book more than one try -- I remember it took me three attempts to get into Midnight's Children which then turned into one of my favourite books (until I made the mistake of writing a term paper about it at uni, haven't opened it since).

#53: I always try and give books at least two shots. I am a very moody reader and sometimes my mood just does not feel like a certain book!

Yes, I'm still here -- or rather I'm back, after a great vacation (and getting married into the bargain).

As a result, not terribly much reading got done in February (it was a rather active vacation), but here goes:

After finishing Cloud Atlas and Murder being once done before our departure, on the trip I only read Songs for the Missing, The Private Patient and The Tourist, as well as about 700 pages of Erfolg (still working on that one) and I finished I denna stilla natt since we got back.

I enjoyed Songs for the Missing but not as much as I thought I would after really loving Wish you were here on vacation _last_ February. I'll still keep reading O'Nan, however -- maybe I'll turn it into a February tradition.

The Tourist was an airport bookstore discovery and an excellent choice for a long flight (I love confusing spy novels). Will definitely get the second part in the trilogy.

No grand plans for March except for finishing Erfolg. Have just noticed that I've read my last Anthony Trollope in March of last year, as well as my last Reginald Hill (The Wood Beyond, which was fascinating), so perhaps I'll move Lady Anna and On Beulah Height onto the reading pile.

A great vacation AND GETTING MARRIED INTO THE BARGAIN!!!!!
WOW!!! Congratulations, Susan! I'm off to your profile page to hunt for pictures.
Then I'm going to check out Penelope's Progress. Sounds funny!

Congratulations!

Oh, congrats - how exciting!!

Congratulations, Susan! Wishing both of you a lifetime of happiness!

Thanks for all the good wishes. It was actually more of an "elopement" than a wedding. We'd always said we'd get married when we've been together for ten years -- which will be in about three weeks -- and when we found ourselves in Florida (where we had met a bit over ten years ago) for a completely unrelated reason, we thought it was a bit of a sign. My dad died a few years ago, and the idea of having a big family wedding without him there was never too appealing to me. I know he would have been pleased, though -- six days before he died he told me to "do keep this one" (which was unusual as he was not in the habit of meddling in my personal affairs, something that cannot be said of my mother).

I may have to file for divorce, however.:) We used to have this routine whereby the significant other got up first every morning to make the coffee, so I could have another half hour in bed reading and having my first caffeine of the day. Ever since we got back, however, he sleeps in! I do hope it's just prolonged jet lag and not him having fooled me for all these years.:)

Florida completely cracks me up, btw -- if you're not from there, you can get married on the spot, but if you live in the state, there's a three day "cooling off" period. When we went to the court house to get a marriage license, we had to complete an application, and one of the questions was which marriage this was for either one of us (first for us both) but the drop-down menu had options up to "eleventh marriage". I think they may want to extend that cooling-off period a bit!

LOL!
There's a lot of old folks down there who might very well be on their eleventh! At that age a cooling-off period could be too late!

Congratulations! :)

The fact that they have an option for your 11th marriage is pretty sad but funny at the same time!

Congratulations too! 11 marriages (and 10 failed ones) doesn't bear thinking about...

Hope the early morning caffeine routine is re-instated now!

Congratulations, Susan!

Mr Dragon and I got married after ten years, too!

Hi Susan, just stopping by to see what's up here. Kinda quiet. Wedded bliss must have you finding other things to do besides reading :)

Well, I am seriously behind on threads, but I will wish you a belated 'Congratulations' too, Susan!