November 2011 TIOLI: Author's Name is a Profession

ALLOWED

Embedded
Compound
Titles (King, President, Captain, Shah)
Slang (Dick for private investigator)
Obsolete (Turner, Cooper, Smith)
Illegitimate (Crook)
Foreign Language (Chevalier)

***

Check here if you have any questions.

Some possibles for me:

Ghost Story by Jim BUTCHER
Four Past Midnight by Stephen KING
Ragtime by E. L. DOCTORow
Prospero in Hell by L. Jagi LAMPLIGHTER

Original thread:
http://www.librarything.com/topic/125830

It's interesting to find this as a challenge as I had a challenge in mind for this month which was spookily similar to this one! Such a coincidence.

What about Tahir SHAH? Ah yes, I see you've allowed King so I am sure Shah is also OK. I'll be reading The Caliph's House.

Also, how do you feel about obsolete jobs like Turner, Cooper, Smith? Does it have to be a job which someone today could recognise?

> 2

how do you feel about obsolete jobs like Turner, Cooper, Smith? Does it have to be a job which someone today could recognise?

Good question because so many surnames are based on occupations!

All are fine. I've added them to the first post.

I started scrolling by author through my wishlist, found a book by Elizabeth Crook, and decided I'd better double check with you whether that's a legitimate profession for your challenge! Or perhaps better asked, Are illegitimate professions acceptable?

Yes!

I went with a straight forward profession, and have added Fashion Victim by Sam Baker.

I'm opting for royalty with The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver.

I decided to pick a book on my Kindle for this challenge so I went for A Praying Life by Paul Miller.

I found Mister Creecher by Chris Priestley in my stack of library books.

I will go with Snowdrops- A Novel by A.D. Miller. I can't put it in my 75'r recommended TIOLI as Darryl adored it not!

Paul - I added Snowdrops to the flower challenge.

I've added Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Philip K. Dick and The Old Curiosity Shop by Charles Dickens

I hope to read The Heaven Tree by Edith Pargeter. Pargeter is a more obscure and pretty well obsolete profession involving decorative platesterwork on the exterior of buildings. I don't know how common a surname this was when pargeting was more in demand, but I've only come across two instances of this surname - one the author mentioned here (who also wrote under the pseudonym Ellis Peters) and one the much loved and late lamented fictional character Nigel Pargeter in the BBC radio soap The Archers!

Here's an image of some pargeting:


and here's a picture of an actual pargeter at work - so they do still exist!

#14 I had no idea! Did you know that before the challenge came up?

Yes I did, there are a lot of pargetted buildings in Essex where I used to live (also in Suffolk), so that's when I first came across the term.

> 14

Very interesting, Genny! I never knew there even was such a profession. My husband is a concrete conractor and often gets hired to "parget" block walls. I remember the first time I heard that word, not knowing what "pargeting" was (or even how to spell it on contracts!). :)

#12 I thought of that too Kerry (honest!) but had already pencilled in Flowers for Algernon for that one.

#17 Apparently it can be spelled with single or double 't' - the surname too. I guess people in the building-related trades are likely to have come across the term, if not the profession, in the more general sense of covering and maybe decorating walls. Most pargeting is not as elaborately decorative as the examples above.

#18: Ok, I'll move mine over, it seems to be a love or hate read so I'm wondering which side of the fence I'll end up on.

> 19

I showed the pictures you posted to my husband. Both of us never realized that pargeting could be so decorative. Quite interesting, though!

I'm wondering if I could put The Lady and the Unicorn by Tracy Chevalier here. Would that be appropriate? An archaic meaning of "chevalier" is that of "knight." I see that obsolete terms are okay; what about terms from non-English languages?

Karen O.

I don't see why not.

I just finished The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver. Carrie's (#8) post reminded me that it would fit here!

Singh looks like it might work. Wikipedia says, "First used by the rulers of Indian dynasties, 'Singh' gradually emerged as a hereditary title to be used as a middle name, highlighting connections to a warrior status or occupation."

Who knew TIOLI would be so educational? Obscure animals, pargeting, Indian history...

I don't see why not. ("Chevalier" as a profession.)

Oh, goodie! I was hoping you'd see it that way.

Karen O.

25: who knew TIOLI would be so educational? Obscure animals, pargeting, Indian history...

I know! Wanting to make a case for "chevalier" made me do some research. So TIOLI is fun, AND makes us better informed!

Karen O.

I found in my TBR stack Michelle Obama: First Lady of Fashion and Style by Susan Swimmer.

I just added another one to the Wiki. I finished the audio of Haiti after the Earthquake by Paul Farmer yesterday. I got it through Early Reviewers, and it is somewhat dense (a lot of detail about the challenges of managing donations following the earthquake as well as an in-depth discussion of the reasons why the earthquake was so devastating given Haiti's economic conditions), but I really enjoyed it.