Ellen reads 75+ in '13 - August falls into September

Go Seahawks!

COMPLETED IN JANUARY

1. Howl by Allen Ginsberg
2. Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin
3. The Dovekeepers by Alice Hoffman
4. The Street of Crocodiles by Bruno Schulz
5. Maus I: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History by Art Spiegelman
6. How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less by Sarah Glidden
7. 420 Characters by Lou Beach
8. Guards! Guards! by Terry Pratchett
9. The Line by Olga Grushin

COMPLETED IN FEBRUARY

10. Stay Awake by Dan Chaon
11. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
12. A Grain of Truth by Zygmunt Miloszewski
13. The Hill Bachelors by William Trevor
14. Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich
15. Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

COMPLETED IN MARCH

16. The Story of Lucy Gault by William Trevor
17. Knots and Crosses by Ian Rankin
18. Ethel & Ernest by Raymond Briggs
19. Swimming Home by Deborah Levy
20. Pow! by Mo Yan
21. The Door by Magda Szabo
22. Brothers and Keepers by John Edgar Wideman
23. This Way to the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen by Tadeusz Borowski
24. The Snack Thief by Andrea Camilleri

COMPLETED IN APRIL

25. Dog On It by Spencer Quinn
26. Old Filth by Jane Gardam
27. The Lighthouse by Alison Moore
28. Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
29. Desert of the Heart by Jane Rule
30. Raj, the Bookstore Tiger by Kathleen T. Pelley
31. Safe Area Gorazde: The War in Eastern Bosnia 1992-1995 by Joe Sacco
32. Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood

COMPLETED IN MAY

33. Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver
34. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
35. Train Dreams by Denis Johnson
36. Marbles by Ellen Forney
37. Slow River by Nicola Griffith
38. Calling Dr. Laura by Nicole J. Georges
39. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon

COMPLETED IN JUNE

40. The Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving by Jonathan Evison
41. Liesl & Po by Lauren Oliver
42. The Art of Hearing Heartbeats by Jan-Philipp Sendker
43. The Likeness by Tana French
44. The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller
45. A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness
46. Voice of the Violin by Andrea Camilleri
47. The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell
48. The Waitress Was New by Dominique Fabre
49. Escape to Gold Mountain by David H.T. Wong
50. The Dispossessed by Ursula K. LeGuin
51. That Mad Ache (also La Chamade) by Francoise Sagan

COMPLETED IN JULY

52. Cop Hater by Ed McBain
53. The Three-Arched Bridge by Ismail Kadare
54. The Mugger by Ed McBain
55. The Bat by Jo Nesbo
56. Go Tell It On the Mountain by James Baldwin
57. Pusher by Ed McBain
58. Night Soldiers by Alan Furst
59. The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks
60. Life After Life by Kate Atkinson

COMPLETED IN AUGUST

61. Hide & Seek by Ian Rankin
62. Among Others by Jo Walton
63. The Testament of Mary by Colm Tóibín
64. Zombie by Joyce Carol Oates
65. My Friend Dahmer by Derf Backderf
66. The Carter Family: Don't Forget this Song by Frank M. Young & David Lasky
67. Light in August by William Faulkner
68. The Empty Family by Colm Tóibín
69. Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer

COMPLETED IN SEPTEMBER

70. Five Quarters of the Orange by Joanne Harris
71. The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith (writing as Claire Morgan)
72. The Road Home by Rose Tremain (gift from Paul)
73. The Foreign Correspondent by Alan Furst
74. The Night Bookmobile by Audrey Niffenegger

Books Acquired in 2013

1. Call It What You Want by Keith Lee Morris
2. Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe 1944-1956 by Anne Applebaum
3. Writing in the Dark: Essays on Literature & Politics by David Grossman
4. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon (sale table)
5. Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison (sale table)
6. 2666 by Roberto Bolaño
7. The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolaño
8. The Waitress Was New by Dominique Fabre (purchased in Los Angeles)
9. The Empty Family by Colm Tóibín (purchased in Los Angeles)
10. The Sea, The Sea by Iris Murdoch
11. The Belly of Paris by Émile Zola
12. Gulag: A History by Anne Applebaum
13. Germinal by Émile Zola
14. The Door by Magda Szabo (Book Depository)
15. Tokyo Fiancee by Amélie Nothomb
16. The Glass Ocean by Lori Baker (gift from Benita, to be released in August 2013)
17. Safe Area Gorazde: The War in Eastern Bosnia 1992-95 by Joe Sacco
18. This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen by Tadeusz Borowski
19. Lord of Misrule by Jaimy Gordon
20. My Century by Aleksander Wat
21. The Lighthouse by Alison Moore
22. The Story of Lucy Gault by William Trevor (used copy)
23. knots and crosses by Ian Rankin (used copy)
24. Swimming Home by Deborah Levy
25. Proud Beggars by Albert Cossery
26. Sandalwood Death by Mo Yan
27. Felicia's Journey by William Trevor (used copy)
28. Love and Summer by William Trevor (used copy)
29. My House in Umbria by William Trevor (used copy)
30. April Fool's Day by Josip Novakovich
31. Samuel Johnson is Indignant by Lydia Davis
32. A Severed Head by Iris Murdoch
33. Brothers and Keepers by John Edgar Wideman
34. Philadelphia Fire by John Edgar Wideman
35. The Quick Red Fox by John D MacDonald
36. Ten White Geese by Gerbrand Bakker
37. Revenge: Eleven Dark Tales by Yoko Ogawa
38. The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood
39. The Cat by edeet ravel
40. The Art of Hearing Heartbeats by Jan-Philipp Sendker
41. The Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving by Jonathan Evison
42. Hide and Seek by Ian Rankin
42. Desert of the Heart by Jane Rule
43. How It All Began by Penelope Lively
44. An Unsuitable Attachment by Barbara Pym
45. South Riding by Winifred Holtby (Virago Modern Classic)
46. The Man in the Wooden Hat by Jane Gardam
47. Fortunes of War: The Balkan Trilogy by Olivia Manning
48. Spoon River Anthology by Edward Lee Masters
49. The Threads of the Heart by Carole Martinez (lovely Europa Edition)
50. The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach
51. Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk by Ben Fountain
52. Foundation by Isaac Asimov
53. Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson
54. The Confessions of Nat Turner by William Styron
55. Cheating at Canasta by William Trevor
56. A History of the World in 10 1/2 Chapters by Julian Barnes
57. Remembering Laughter by Wallace Stegner
58. Spies of the Balkans by Alan Furst
59. Dark Voyage by Alan Furst
60. Exodus by Leon Uris

More acquired in 2013:

61. The Dispossessed by Ursula K. LeGuin
62. The Pure in Heart by Susan Hill
63. Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel
64. The Enchanted Life of Adam Hope by Rhonda Riley
65. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
66. The Orchardist by Amanda Coplin
67. Last Friends by Jane Gardam
68. The Dream of a Common Language by Adrienne Rich
69. Lilith's Brood by Octavia E. Butler
70. The History of Love by Nicole Krauss
71. The Big Sky by A.B. Guthrie, Jr.
72. The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers
73. Me and Mr. Booker by Cory Taylor
74. Calling Dr. Laura by Nicole J. Georges
75. The Road Home by Rose Tremain (gift from Paul)
76. A Fatal Grace by Louise Penny
77. In One Person by John Irving
78. On Sal Mal Lane by Ru Freeman (Booktopia)
79. A Hologram for the King by Dave Eggers
80. Five Quarters of the Orange by Joanne Harris
81. The Goodbye Look by Ross MacDonald
82. That Mad Ache by Francoise Sagan
83. Privileged Conversation by Evan Hunter (total trash, I acknowledge)
84. A Deadly Shade of Gold by John D. MacDonald
85. Cop Hater by Ed McBain
86. The Mugger by Ed McBain
87. The Pusher by Ed McBain
88. The Con Man by Ed McBain
89. Killer's Choice by Ed McBain
90. Killer's Payoff by Ed McBain
91. I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman (gift from Kerri)
92. A Fairly Honorable Defeat by Iris Murdoch
93. The Bat by Jo Nesbo
94. The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver
95. Light in August by William Faulkner
96. The Cry of the Owl by Patricia Highsmith
97. The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith
98. The Girl in the Plain Brown Wrapper by John D MacDonald
99. Pale Gray for Guilt by John D MacDonald
100. King's Ransom by Ed McBain
101. Killer's Wedge by Ed McBain
102. Lady Killer by Ed McBain
103. As Long as You Both Shall Live by Ed McBain
104. Bread by Ed McBain
105. Let's Hear it for the Deaf Man by Ed McBain
106. Sadie When She Died by Ed McBain
107. Hail, Hail, the Gang's All Here! by Ed McBain
108. Shotgun by Ed McBain
109. He Who Hesitates by Ed McBain
110. Ax by Ed McBain
111. Like Love by Ed McBain
112. The Empty Hours by Ed McBain
113. Lady, Lady, I Did It! by Ed McBain
114. See Them Die by Ed McBain
115. The Heckler by Ed McBain
116. Falling to Earth by Kate Southwood
117. The Bone People by Keri Hulme
118. Cavedweller by Dorothy Allison
119. The Art of Losing by Rebecca Connell
120. The End of the Affair by Graham Greene
121. Two or Three Things I Know for Sure by Dorothy Allison
122. Strangers on a Train by Patricia Highsmith
123. Sag Harbor by Colson Whitehead
124. The Redbreast by Jo Nesbo (sale book!)
125. A Curtain of Green by Eudora Welty (sale book!)
126. The Oath: The Obama White House and the Supreme Court by Jeffrey Toobin

Currently reading

.

Why howdy Ellen!

#67. Light in August by William Faulkner
4.5 stars

This may actually be a five-star read for me, but I'm leaving myself a bit of room to consider, especially since it's my first Faulkner. I want to read more of his works and I want to entertain the possibility that one of his other novels will exceed this one. The comments below are not meant to be a "review;" I am no more qualified to review this work than I am qualified to fly a plane. But I absolutely enjoyed reading it (as I enjoy flying in planes) and I do want to make some random notes about my reading experience.

Faulkner's writing is exquisite. The story is memorable and the characters, most notably the tortured and tragic Joe Christmas, are complex and rich with humanity. I think I missed some of Faulkner's humor (and I admit that it's hard for me to grasp humor in such a tragic tale) but this novel may warrant a re-read and perhaps I'll be more attuned to his humor with a second time through.

I love Faulkner's use of language. It's complicated. In a lot of places, I had to just go with the narrator. I mean, chapter 6 starts thus:

Memory believes before knowing remembers. Believes longer than recollects, longer than knowing even wonders.

Right.

But then there is the occasional passage like this in chapter 7:

He stood there for a while, leaning on the fence. The grass was aloud, alive with crickets. Against the dewgray earth and the dark bands of trees fireflies drifted and faded, erratic and random.

Beautiful. Faulkner frequently creates new words by combining two (or three) and, in his skillful hands, this devise works surprisingly well.

Chapter 14 is a beautiful description of a man on the lam and then Faulkner's transition into chapter 15 is perfect. In fact, more than in any other novel I've read, the transition from chapter to chapter caught my attention. Chapter breaks serve many purposes, I suppose, but they often just seem to provide a stopping place for the reader to go refill her wine glass. Faulkner uses chapter breaks to advance the story, to circle back to fill in narrative gaps, and to shift focus between characters. It is both more subtle and more effective than most authors manage.

This novel is going onto my "Favorites" list.

#8 - Hi Roberta! You're first to visit my new thread. :-)

Congrats on a brand spankin' new thread! Doesn't September just smack of new beginnings. I joined the Niece and her husband (large and in charge type) going to Staples to buy school supplies. I'd gotten a 15% off coupon and I traded it for the joy of back to school shopping. I know, I'm weird sometimes.

I'm making progress on Under the Banner of Heaven since I took the time to make my second Kindle work properly and I downloaded the book even though I own a hard copy. I really needed the larger font. It is a hard book to read.... but I'll say more about that at our meeting.

Enjoy this last bit of quietude.

Karen, I love shopping for back-to-school supplies (and I don't ever really need to do so). I have a thing about pens and post-it-notes. I have far too many of both in my desk drawer at work. :-|

So, you got a new Kindle and it seems like it took some time to make friends with it. I know I will join the ranks of Kindle-owners one of these days. I'm looking forward to reading Under the Banner of Heaven; I suspect we're going to have similar struggles with it.

I think there are drops of precipitation falling from the sky. Hmm.

Hi Ellen!

Did I screw up your monthly thread system?! I'm sorry. You shouldn't listen to my complaining.

Anyway, I love the photo up top (of course), and I enjoyed reading your comments on Light in August. He does get even better (in my opinion), so there's that.

I hope you're having a lovely Sunday. Nice job on those runs!

^ Kerri, you must not overestimate your power, my dear. I had been thinking for a few days that I needed to start a new thread. You just gave me the final nudge. :-)

I know that you and a couple of others have said that Faulkner gets even better than Light in August, so I left him that extra half-star. I do worry that his reputation for demanding much of his readers (which I do respect in an author) will turn out to be true and my RL will already be demanding too much of me. :-| Still, I plan to give Absalom, Absalom! a try next February.

It feels good to be running regularly. I think tomorrow I will take running gear to work and plan a 5pm-ish round-trip run to Gasworks Park and back along the Burke-Gilman Trail. Our weather is cooling off enough that I don't necessarily need to run in the mornings anymore.

#14 - Um, for the record, Kerri does not overestimate her power. She was simply responding to what you just said on her thread. :-) And she doesn't normally refer to herself in the third person.

I think you will enjoy Absalom, Absalom. I look forward to the re-read in February!

Good luck on that run tomorrow!

Nice new thread, Ellen! I'd ask you how you think the Seahawks will do this year, but I don't think I would receive an unbiased answer. ;-)

I enjoyed your comments about Light in August, which reminds me that I had wanted to read it after Jane's (janepriceestrada's) comments about it a couple of years ago. I own all five or six Library of America editions of Faulkner's novels, but so far the only book of his that I've read is As I Lay Dying; I think I enjoyed it, but it was certainly a challenge! I'll plan to read Absalom, Absalom! with you in February, and read Light in August in January. I'd appreciate it if you would mention the February read in your thread early next year, so that I don't forget.

Absalom, Absalom! is my candidate for Faulkner's masterpiece. I'll try to re-read it in February too.

Happy new thread Ellen!

I've not read any Faulkner, but I love your review of LiA, so I may need to rectify that!

I actually do have another Oates on my shelf already. Think it's called Big Mouth & Ugly Girl... So I'll give her another try.

Have you given any additional thought to when you want to do The Price of Salt?

Hi Ellen! So pleased you enjoyed Light In August. I loved the book, and also As I Lay Dying. Sartoris/Flags in the Dust (same book, different edits, varying opinions about which is superior) gave my sister Winter and me our code name for our mother: Narcissa Benbow.

Faulkner rules.

Rats. I've realized that I can't go for an end-of-the-workday run on Monday. I have a 4pm meeting scheduled with a colleague, the second half of which is to take place at Schultzy's (a pub).
Oh well! :-)

haha, I got to the end of post #5 and thought, oh That's not too many books to have acquired this year! Then I read post #6 :)

Happy new thread Ellen!

I love school supplies too but I'm more into fresh new spiral bound notebooks (college ruled please) and pretty folders.

Happy new thread, sister! I loved your review of Light in August - I am still working my way through it. And I also love school supplies - I'll just go ahead and admit my complete addiction to Sharpie pens and legal pads right now. I just adore both of them - one can never have too many! Hoping that your week is off to a good start - sorry about your not being able to get your run in this evening. But a pub...

Hi Ellen - Kudos on finishing Light in August. I didn't do a very good job of keeping up with the discussion. Nice comments -- I had picked out some of the same quotes.

My favorite school supply, bar none: The Ticonderoga #2 pencil. With eraser.

A classic, without doubt.

Hi Ellen- Congrats on the September thread! Loved your review of Light In August. I wish I could have joined you guys but I was booked solid. I WANT to start reading Faulkner again and I think I'll start with this one.
Looking forward to your thoughts on the Krakauer! He's one of my top NF writers!

68. The Empty Family by Colm Tóibín
3 stars

This is a mixed bag of short stories. A couple of them earn about 1.5 or 2 stars from me, but a few earn closer to 4 or even 4.5 stars. The end result? An okay collection worth working one's way through but with disappointments as well as rewards.

"Silence" was forgettable.

"The Empty Family" was a five-star short story, a wonderfully wrought first-person narrative with some lovely language: "I wish I knew how colours came to be made. Some days when I was teaching I looked out the window and thought that everything I was saying was easy to find out and had already been surmised." Ah yes; I completely resonated with this.

"Two Women" was poignant, engaging, interesting.

"One Minus One" -- meh.

"The Pearl Fishers" is a complex exploration of identity, sexuality, choices. The female character was disappointingly one-dimensional and shallow, but that is part of Tóibín's point here..... This story has one of my favorite sentences: "The future is a foreign country; they do things differently there."

"Barcelona, 1975" is simply a memoir of a young adult love affair, extremely explicit and (homo)erotic. I don't know that it's profound, but it's courageous.

In "The New Spain," Carme returns to Spain after 8 years away as a political activist in the UK -- our theme is the resolution of political commitment with family tradition, communism vs. inheritance of family wealth (and the resolution is less than fully comfortable on an individual level).

"The Colour of Shadows" is an excellent entry. Paul visits his aunt, who raised him, at a nursing home and spends time with her as she approaches her death. He makes a bold promise to her -- and finds a surprising peace.

Finally, "The Street" is the piece de resistance and singly makes the collection worthwhile. Malik is a young immigrant from Pakistan, making his way in Barcelona where he neither speaks the language nor understands the customs. At the mercy of Baldy, who makes arrangements and interacts with local officials, Malik finds himself emotionally and sexually drawn to the silent Abdul. After a tragic and brutal night, the two men face possible deportation or alienation from their small conservative community of barely-legal immigrants trying to make a living in this unfamiliar social and economic terrain. I'm avoiding spoilers here, but if you obtain this collection of short stories and simply skip to this one, so be it. This final story, all by itself, added a half-star to the collection's rating.

Okay, first things first:



For Richard and Karen and everyone who has ever loved a pencil.

#15 - sorry, Kerri, I didn't mean to challenge you unnecessarily.
(why do I feel like I've stepped into Oz?)

I think I will enjoy Absalom, Absalom!, too. I hope you'll be joining us for discussion in February?

#16 - hi Darryl! I will try to remember to mention the February read of Absalom, Absalom!. I think there are a few folks planning a Faulkner February (in which I will minimally participate), so hopefully we'll all get our act together.

And I can be unbiased! I have high hopes for the Seahawks but I have been a sports fan for too long to have high expectations.

#17 - Linda, I'm glad you'll join us in February! (I really must put this in my iPhone as a reminder....)

#18 - Hi Tina! I highly recommend LiA. I have a couple more Oates works in my stacks, and I need to return at least one of them (Missing Mom) to my cousin in L.A. when I visit this winter, so I'd better read that one this fall.

#19 - Oh, Tina, shall we read The Price of Salt in September? I'm game if you are.

#20 - Richard! If Sartoris/Flags in the Dust can provide a name for one's mother, that may be a novel I need to read.....

#22 - Megan! I love it, that you read post #5 and thought I had it all under control. P and I have been talking about saving for retirement and it seems that my book-buying is at least suspect in regard to any fantasy I have about retiring, um, early.

#23 - Morphy, I love Inkjoy pens, multi-colored post-it notes, and moleskin notebooks with squared lines.

..

#24 - Mamie, my sister! So, legal pads and the new Sharpie pens? Like this?

#25 - Beth, I'm pleased that you had noted some of the same quotes. I didn't keep up on the discussion as much as I might have liked, but it was a great read! I will continue to check in on the Group Read thread to see what folks have to say.

#26 - Richard, and #27 - Karen, see post #30 above, for you. *smooches* to you both!

#28 - Mark, I do recommend Light in August. I think it was a good first Faulkner for me.

I have read Into Thin Air and Into the Wild by Krakauer and liked them both. Apparently there is a young man missing (from Oregon) whose father is worried because his son was obsessed with Into the Wild. Someone is asking "didn't he read to the end of the book??"

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Okay, I'm going to read Under the Banner of Heaven and then I will read either The Road Home or The Sea, The Sea or.....
something else. :-)

>29 EBT1002: Good review! Just what I'd like to know about a collection.

>30 EBT1002: ooooo aaah Thanks!

Swooning over the pens and post-its here ... I love that stuff!

Good review of the Empty Family. It looks like we felt exactly the same way about it. Mixed, but some of his writing is stellar. I was also turned off by the graphic nature of a couple of the stories. I just didn't quite see the point.

>32 EBT1002: OMG, does the ink come in all those different colors? *drools* And I refuse to admit to how many partially written in Moleskins I own...

I love school supplies! Any kind will do! Their aroma is my 2nd favorite after books. I inhale deeply whenever I walk into Barnes & Noble, Office Max and my 3rd favorite aroma (lumber) at Home Depot.
You've made me sad that I did not fit Light in August into my reads this month. Oh well, something to look forward to in the future.
I read Under the Banner of Heaven years ago. My first Krakauer, in fact. It has led me to his other books and I haven't read a bad one yet.
BTW: Great pic of Seahawk's stadium. Nice design!

I love those squared Moleskins too!

Walking through the lumber section of Home Depot reminds me of childhood. My mom was a bookkeeper at a local lumber store during the housing boom of the early 1950s. All that freshly cut wood has a very special smell.

I also love love love the office supplies store. Honestly, I am still trying to give away all the office supply stuff I have stock piled for the apocalypse.

Oops! Not caught up, but wanted mark the spot so I can catch up later :)

I thought English teachers were the only ones obsessed with pens, notebooks and Post Its! I'm happy to see we are not alone.

Ellen, great review of The Empty Family -- I guess I'll wait on it. I have plenty of short story collections to choose from.

I love all of the Sharpie pens - they are fabulous! Can one have too many? I think not. And I forgot about Moleskin notebooks -right up there with legal pads!

Happy Tuesday to you!

You are making me itchy to reread some Faulkner!

And I'm getting itchy to go buy pens, and papers, and notebooks, oh, My! I shall resist. I have an entire box of Sharpies I have not used very much. And another box of water based markers that I let the kids use sometimes.

I should start doing Zentangle again, I think.

My younger daughter is a senior in high school. I told her she was not allowed to go school supply shopping without me since it was my last chance to perform that wonderful annual ritual. My husband thought I was crazy but somehow I think you all would understand ...

Hi, Ellen. I've been following your thread, but I'm not a Faulknerian, so haven't had much to contribute. Liked that review of The Empty Family. You intrigued me with the last story in particular.

My MBH is an office supplies maniac. We have to space out her store visits. Me, not so much, but I always have a blue felt tip pen on me.

Ellen, we understand Laura completely, don't we. So many important rituals when it comes to school and reading and learning and all the rest..... Totally get it!

I'm not crazy about pens and pencils, but I do like a nice pencil. They almost always write.

A few years ago I created a mailing box for my mother for a Christmas present. I purchased a plastic box with a snap on lid and filled it with all kinds of stuff for mailing. Packing tape (a couple of holiday printed ones as well as plain), a tape gun, labels of various sizes, scissors, markers, and stamps. The whole thing turned out to cost about $120.00, but Mom uses it all the time. She has trouble keeping all of the stuff in the box because others have found out she has it and they raid it from time-to-time, but it makes finding all the mailing stuff so much easier.

Happy New Thread, Ellen, even if it is 50 posts old already!
I will not be drawn into that school supplies craze, I will not! On the other hand, yesterday was one of my favorite days of the year: the kids came back to school, and I'm not there. Oh Joy!
(I'm happy for teachers who can be excited. I used to be one.)
And I love that you love *LiA*! I really ought to think seriously about *A,A* in February.

#35 - Thanks, Richard. I actually kept brief notes as I completed the stories and this is something I will do again. It helped me keep track of my responses to the stories and evaluate the gestalt.

I'm glad you like the pencils.

#36 - Laura, you are clearly not alone! I think pens and post-it notes are very popular around here....

#37 - Mark, I totally see your point about some of the explicit sex. I kept wondering how I would react to it if it were hetero sex -- and I decided that part of Toibin's goal may have been to push that envelope and get the reader to at least wonder if they would react differently if the descriptions of sex were, well, different. But I'm not sure.

#38 - Morphy - they do come in all those colors and the ink is smooooth. I don't actually care for all the colors because some of them are too light to be of much real use.

#39 - Hi Lynda! Another school supplies lover, yes! I'm sad, too, that you couldn't join us for Light in August but I totally understand. I'm not very far into UtBoH yet, but it has the feel of another engaging Krakauer read.

#40 - Rhian, I know. The squares make keeping notes in meetings more fun somehow. (really, the do!)

#41 - Hi Karen. Oh, I forgot to agree with Lynda (as you are doing) that the smell of lumber is another pleasant one, right up there with books and office supplies. :-)

#42 - marker noted, Kath. I hope you're able to stop by another time.

#43 - Hi Beth! It seems that English teachers and book lovers share more than their love of books. It's office supplies central around here! :-)

I'm glad you enjoyed my review of The Empty Family. I worry that I've turned folks off from reading his work and, really, that would be too bad because (based on this single work I've now read of his) when his work is good, it's very,very good.

#44 - Mamie! Sister!
Clearly, one can never have too many Sharpie pens.
I wonder what you all would think if you could see my lower left-hand drawer here at work. It's full of pens and post-it notes. All bought with my own money, I might note, not the hard-earned contributions of the taxpayers of Washington state.

Thank you - it's been a busy but fulfilling Tuesday. :-)

#45 - Lucy, join us for Faulkner February (if you can wait that long)!

#46 - Karen, I had to google zentangle. Nice!



..

#47 & #49 - Karen and Laura, oh yeah, we completely understand!

#48 - Joe! Good to see you. I'm glad you liked my review of The Empty Family and I do recommend that last story in the collection.
It seems like a good idea to have a blue felt tip pen always on hand. :-)

#50 - Benita, pens or pencils, to each her own. Kind of like books!
The gift box you describe sounds like it has taken on a life of its own! It's now practically a family heirloom. :-)

#51 - Hi Peggy! Stay strong, woman. You don't need school supplies any longer!
By the way, my administrative assistant said someone mentioned to her the many changes in our office, and when K wasn't sure what she was talking about, the person said, "well, I hear that Ellen is retiring."
Huh? WTF?? Why didn't I know about this? I must have won that lottery, after all. :-D

I am in for Faulkner February too! Wait, that' s also Fantasy February. Oh my! I can't believe we are talking next year already! LOL.

I am a pencil fan myownself. Also sharpies. Do. Not. Like. Gel pens. They won't write for me. ever. I like steno books, and college ruled notebooks, too. And page protectors! Duncan's medical records are protected page by page. ( copies of all office notes and tests)

:P

Powerball tomorrow, $116MM...about $5MM per year...that would do a lot to make a lot of readers quite happy.

oh, Power ball....

BTW, Storm won the second game with San Antonio by 1 point last night. They are looking good.

I'm liking the rain this morning.

Ellen -
So glad you enjoyed Faulkner's LiA. I loved your comments.
My first exposure to Faulkner really threw me for a loop! He leaves me so unsettled, but I do admire his writing (except for The Sound and the Fury). That one was too much for me with no good punctuation. Over time, as I am being educated, I am learning to accept and sometimes admire his style.

Great conversation on school supplies, too. LOL
"I love school supplies! Any kind will do! Their aroma is my 2nd favorite after books. I inhale deeply whenever I walk into Barnes & Noble, Office Max and my 3rd favorite aroma (lumber) at Home Depot."
As Lynda points out - it's all about the nose! ha!

Cait says she is really missing the back to school rush. Her job is on campus and classes started on Monday. I picked her up for dinner when she was done with work. While waiting in the car, I sat and watched the swarms of new students. They looked so eager and fresh-- and I don't know-- full of promise-- that I felt the tug, too.

Her grad school pendulum is swinging back to the U Dub. :-) But, she says, that would put her in China again next year. I've got to start saving the pennies (already) to make a trip to visit her this time.

Oh, a trip to China! Sweet. Well worth saving those pennies, and nickels, and dimes, and probably you'll need to save some quarters, too. Target has some great huge piggy banks, perfect for saving change for things like trips. I have one with Hawaiian flowers on it - I bet you can guess why, too.

Raining today. Nice change of pace.

Lovely morning, including a 32-minute run (3.1 miles) in muggy weather. It rained all night and stopped this morning. Perfect.

Good on you, Ellen. I'm particularly slow on muggy days ... or at least I use muggy days as my excuse for plodding times. I was doing particularly well getting runs every other day last week, but due to some early meetings this week, I've not yet gotten a run in. Bah! But I hope to change that tomorrow morning if I can. I don't like running in the evenings because I'm a bug magnet and will attract all the mosquitoes within a 100mile radius.

Try taking some extra Vitamin B 12, or stress Vitamin B complex. I've found that the little buggers do not like the smell of it. At least that works for me.

For all the school/office supply junkies here:

Ok, that's just freakin' cool.

Oh, I LOVE that X-wing--can I possibly manage that? If only I had a good view of the front...

One of my guilty pleasures for 30-some days at work was hitting all those school sales in August and picking up loads of spiral notebooks (10¢@), mechanical pencils, erasers, notepads, calculators (25¢@), binders, folders, gel pens, protractors, etc. to stock my "store" for the year. I do miss that, since I love them for myself as well. Clean, blank paper--yum!

I'm crazy for the junior sized legal pads in that soft lavender shade... I also love that there is an on-line source for this stuff called SupplyGeek.

oh! "supplygeek" eh? Hmmmm

Storm game tonight!

>66 laytonwoman3rd:: that's brilliant!
>69 laytonwoman3rd:: SupplyGeek? MUST check that out!

My work here is done. *dusts off hands*

>66 laytonwoman3rd: Awesomesauce! I'm sending this photo to my office supply maniac wife.

Good gosh how I love pens too y'all! I agree with Mamie on all things Sharpie! Some of my faves are the super thin markers. But I love your colored pens too Ellen! My current favs are a set in that same palette by Papermate. They are ballpoint & I smile every time I write in purple or turquoise. Geeky much? Yes, thanks. I might be. :)

September is great for me for PoSalt (so as not to confuse you thinking I was going to read PoSomethingelse). *grin*

I love that X-wing! Then I noticed that there would be pens without caps if I built one for myself. Not cool. Pens MUST have caps. Can't stand it when people loose the caps, or chew on the caps, or chew on the ends of the pens. I won't apologize - pens simply must have caps.

I am so obsessive about this that when a pen runs out of ink I save the cap so that I can restore a pen to usefulness with a cap from a pen that has gone on to its great reward.

Happy Friday!!

Ellen - I always feel energised on a clear morning after a night of rain; just not as energised as you!

Have a lovely weekend dear lady.

Happy Friday, everyone (and for those of you in the U.S., happy 3-day weekend!)!

I will try to catch up a bit later today but let me just say that the Sharpie X-Wing is very cool!!!!

I also got in another 33-minute run yesterday morning, and I'm working my way happily through Under the Banner of Heaven. Okay, "happily" is perhaps a misnomer as it's a sobering story, but it's very well written, seems to be well researched, and I'm learning a lot.

Yay for three-day weekends, Ellen! Have a wonderful time reading.

i did drop by to tell you that if, as you mentioned on my thread a week or so ago, you're interested in E. F. Benson's Mapp and Lucia books, the first is Queen Lucia in which you meet all the major inhabitants of Riseholme as well as Miss Mapp who comes a-visiting from Tilling. Miss Mapp, the next book, takes place in Tilling (the place pictured on my thread). i jumped the 3rd book as it wasn't part of the audio series and went on to Mapp and Lucia, which is probably my favorite.

a snippet of the BBC series is fun largely because it gives you an idea of Miss Mapp's "fierce" and persistent smile. Scales was superb and makes an incomparable narrator for the second 2 audiobooks. sadly, if available at all, they're now only available from Isis books in the UK.

blast you, i may have to try Faulkner. he sounds quite daunting in audio.

have a delicious delightful delirious delovely weekend, Ellen.

This was my birthday present this year!

Love those Parker pens!

Well done on the running Ellen!

I'm doing as much of nothing as possible this weekend, how about you? Did I miss a big plan somewhere up there? I plan to re-cover my dining room chairs and paint a thing or two outside. This morning though, I have to go out. Boo!

>79 EBT1002: Yes!

ETA: Go Huskies.

I have very fond memories of fall football, outdoors, eating crisp Washington apples covered in caramel, and yelling our fool heads off. We'd go to the stadium and sit on the blacktop, playing Hearts, while waiting to get in and get good seats. I hope the fancy new stadium provides good seating while also sitting in the cool Autumnal air.

>83 mckait: Kathleen - When I first read your message, and I got to the part about recovering the dining room chairs, I was thinking: I wonder where they went and why does and have to retrieve them on her own? As if someone had borrowed them and not returned them. But then I had a lightbulb moment and realized that you meant you were going to literally re-cover the chairs. This just proves that coffee should come before everything else for me - I am off to get my first cup!

Ellen - Good job on the running front! Stopping in to catch up and to wish you a weekend full of fabulous! Have a good one, sister!

Ellen - I ran my fastest mile yesterday ..and then petered out to something more reasonable for me in the next 2 miles. Haha.... but I felt good knowing my times are slowly but surely improving. I'd really like to get back to more decent times and to run 6 miles comfortably. I'm quite a ways away from that goal right now, but the small progressive steps I'm making are keeping me motivated and happy. .... also a little sore. So since it's raining this morning, I'm taking today as a rest day. :-)

69. Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer
3.5 stars

Jon Krakauer's storytelling is at its usual high level in this well-researched and thoughtful history of the Mormon faith. Using the 1984 murders of 24-year-old Brenda Lafferty and her 15-month-old daughter Erica as a springboard to explore the territory of fundamentalism, which he carefully sets within the context of the mainstream Mormon church and its dramatic growth in just two centuries, Krakauer effectively walks the line between stating the facts and commenting on their meaning. Like Timothy Egan, Krakauer brings history alive, developing his characters and describing settings and events with just a bit of novelistic flair.

I particularly appreciated Krakauer's treatment of the tension, in religion, between faith and verifiable fact. After describing the origins of the Mormon faith in Joseph Smith's experiences -- his communications from God, his discovery of golden tablets and interpretation of their ancient script through miraculous insight, and his ability to persuade others that he was a prophet -- all of which sound absolutely unbelievable to me (I mean, the story is unbelievable enough, but the fact that other people believed the story is incredible!), Krakauer nudges the reader's likely incredulity. He notes that, indeed, The Book of Mormon, the religion's sacred text, is "riddled with egregious anachronisms and irreconcilable inconsistencies." He tells us how Mark Twain ridiculed the text. Then he says:

But such criticism and mockery are largely beside the point. All religious belief is a function of nonrational faith. And faith, by its very definition, tends to be impervious to intellectual argument or academic criticism. Polls routinely indicate, moreover, that nine out of ten Americans believe in God - most of us subscribe to one brand of religion or another. Those who would assail The Book of Mormon should bear in mind that its veracity is no more dubious than the veracity of the Bible, say, or the Qur'an, or the sacred texts of other religions. The latter texts simply enjoy the considerable advantage of having made their public debut in the shadowy recesses of the ancient past, and are thus much harder to refute.

That is certainly true and I, as a relative nonbeliever, appreciated Krakauer's clear attempt to provide an objective history of Mormonism while exploring the emergence of the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints. Virtually all religions have fundamentalist fringes, and we can hardly judge all of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day saints based on the FLDS, but Krakauer is committed to understanding how this fringe of radical fundamentalists have developed, and how they produced the Lafferty brothers, Dan and Ron. Yes, it was Brenda's brothers-in-law who murdered her and her child, and they did it in the apparent belief that they were following the commandments of God. Many other radicals have killed in the belief that their actions were holy, but the intimate nature of these murders and the specificity of Ron and Dan's apparent communications from God make these murders particularly good territory for Krakauer's brand of storytelling.

This intimate and specific nature also make these murders ripe territory for exploring the intersection between radical faith and insanity. The chapter in which Krakauer tells of Ron Lafferty's retrial (his initial conviction was overturned because the Tenth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals determined that the prosecutors had not adequately proven that Ron was competent to stand trial) was particularly interesting. How do we determine where lies the line between radical faith and madness? If Ron Lafferty is determined not guilty by reason of insanity, are we never able to find someone guilty if their actions are based in religious conviction? Is anyone who talks to God crazy? If Ron Lafferty is insane, are not millions of Americans who hold as firmly to improbable religious convictions (such as, for example, the notion of immaculate conception) also insane? The testimony of the psychiatrists and psychologists, for both the defense and the prosecution, is fascinating.

I'm leaving out all kinds of important issues in this review. The role of polygamy in the history of the Mormon church, and the associated ethical and legal issues, are infuriating and interesting. Krakauer fails to full separate the issue of plural marriage from the issue of age-of-consent, but this may be because our society has not adequately separated these issues, one from the other. I suspect that most of us would have a less extreme negative reaction to the concept of plural marriage if so many of the "wives" were not so young! Still, this is a difficult facet of Joseph Smith's original doctrine to present objectively and Krakauer acknowledges this. His concern about the possible future in which Smith's orthodox (fundamental) theology dominates is evident. And I admit that it's a concern I share.

>32 EBT1002: *swoon*
I love the moleskin notebooks too, insanely so. I have had a moleskin diary for the last 7 years and just love writing my appointments in it each day I do. They are gorgeous, and worth every pricey cent :)

>87 EBT1002: And faith, by its very definition, tends to be impervious to intellectual argument or academic criticism.
Therein lies the problem with rationality and religion. imo.

A great review, you have me veeeery interested in this one, also, I am reminded I want to read the L Ron Hubbard Scientology text.

Time to try to catch up on my own thread!

#56 - Mark, I am also amused by the fact that we're already planning our 2014 reading!

#57 - Kath, pencils, eh? I must admit I don't understand that. Unless one is a crossword puzzle doer, which I occasionally am. I unapologetically use a pencil. :-)

#58 - Richard, I think I missed that Powerball opportunity but P informed me today that she purchased a ticket for this evening's drawing. One can but hope. I love my job but $40M or more, my retirement letter is in the mail.

#59 - Karen, that rain earlier this week was really nice, wasn't it? Of course, I'm glad to have it followed by a few days of sunshine.

#60 - Cee, my friend. How nice to see you here. I'm glad you enjoyed my comments about Light in August. I'm really glad I read it and I plan to tackle Absalom, Absalom! in February. I think the pages-long sentences in The Sound and the Fury would tax my concentration and patience.....

It's cracking me up how many folks around here love office supplies. I had a bit of time to kill before my haircut the other day so I wandered into Office Depot. I had to buy some Foray Advanced Ink pens.....

Love the back-to-school talk. I had fun buying school supplies for Haley this year. I know...she's only two! I made a "busy" binder for those times when we're out and about and she needs to sit quietly. I put coloring pages and blank pages in a notebook along with crayons...and scissors. I may regret that last choice. I will also admit to a post-adolescent love for colored gel pens!

Hey Ellen, did I miss some wedding pictures? I thought I was up-to-date on your last thread but I'd better go back and check. Hope you and P are having a fabulous holiday week end.

#61 - streamsong, it will be interesting to see where Cait lands. You know I'd love to have her at the U-Dub! If only so you would visit (or I'll join you both in China.....).

#62 - Karen, I'm with you. A trip to China would be very interesting.

#64 - Caro, I'm terrible about running in the evening. I sometimes wish I would be better at it but the truth is, once I'm home from a long day at work, I'm pretty much home. Comfy clothes and a glass of wine. I do want to try running late afternoons from work some this fall and winter, though. And I hope you get back in the swing of it in the coming week!

#65 - Karen, really? I'm also a total bug-magnet. They love me! P and I will go for a hike and the mosquitos will be swarming me and I will swear I'm going to lose my mind. Not one mosquito will be on her. Grrr. So, maybe I'll try the Vitamin B-12.....

#66 - It deserves repeating: I LOVE that X-Wing!!!! Thank you for posting it, Linda. :-)

#67 - Jim, yep. Freakin' cool.

#68 - Roni, if you try to replicate the X-Wing, I hope you take a photo and post it. You're very creative; I bet you can figure it out. Isn't it funny how much we all love office and school supplies? It just seems to go with the love of reading (and, for me, perhaps a bit of the fantasy of actually doing some writing....).

#69 - Linda, I love those lavender mini-legal pads, too. There's a website called SupplyGeek????
*goes to check it out*

#70 - Yep, it's supplygeeks.com Who knew? (Linda knew.)

#71 - Laura, I so agree. And SupplyGeeks.com is a fun site. I can probably resist buying through a website, though, because it's the smell and the feel and the color that gets me.

#72 - LOL, Linda! You should get a kickback, that's for sure!

#73 - Joe, how did your wife like the X-Wing?

#74 - Tina, in general, I think Papermate does a wonderful job of making pens. I need ballpoint pens rather than gel or rollerballs. The Inkjoy is pretty smooth and I also love the colors. Geeks? Yep, and proud of it!

LOL - I'm in for PoSalt in September. Laughing to think what we could read that would qualify for PoSomethingelse. PoSanity?

#75 - Benita, you had me with you until you got to the part about saving the caps for future pens. Sorry, my friend, but that goes over the top. Of course, I buy pens like I buy books so mine rarely run out of ink before I've moved on.

#76 - Karen, thanks for the Happy Friday wishes. I had a pretty decent Friday as it launched me into my 3-day weekend! {big smile}

#77 - Paul, thank you, my friend. You cracked me up (always a good thing). It was nice to have a good lie in this morning. Which means I got up at 7am.... But I gave myself permission to sit and read well into the second mug of coffee. Heavenly!
I wish you a wonderful weekend, as well.

#80 - Richard! Thank you! I'm enjoying my 3-day weekend so far. Tomorrow we're going for a strenuous hike in the Cascades, so I'll slow down on the reading a bit. Also, I'm not sure what I want to read next. I have a little September stack, but.....

#81 - Ellie, I'm on the hunt for Queen Lucia as it seems like the place to start (I always prefer to start at the beginning). When I see a copy, I shall immediately purchase it regardless of the circumstances.

I can't imagine doing Faulkner in audio. But I'm not much of an audiophile anyway, so there is that.

Thank you. I hope your weekend is also delicious delightful delirious and delovely!

#82 - Lucy, that is a lovely pen. I haven't usually had a high-end pen because I so like variety.

#83 - Kath, no real serious plans for the weekend. Today was laundry and a few errands (and I completed Under the Banner of Heaven), tomorrow we're going for kind of a big-ass hike in the mountains, and Monday is low-key. Tonight, of course, we'll watch the Washington Huskies. I wish I always had three days off. How are the recovered chairs coming along?

#84 - I love that "Keep Calm and Read On," too, Karen.
I'll be watching the Dawgs this evening. P is roasting a turkey (don't ask me why) so we'll have that. It's a bit warm for "fall football," but I'm enjoying the sunshine!

#85 - Mamie, my dear sister! You're cracking me up. I actually had the same momentary confusion to the idea of "recovering" the chairs. I thought we might need to see if Travis McGee is available. :-)

So far my weekend is just fine, so thank you for the fabulous wishes! You know they are coming right back your direction.

#86 - Caro: I'd really like to get back to more decent times and to run 6 miles comfortably.
I hear you. I have let go of speed now that I'm moving more firmly into my 50s (I used to be a very reliable 10-minute miler; now it's closer to 10:30 per mile, especially when it's muggy) but I would really like to get back to being able to get up on any given day and go run 6 miles. I won't run that far every day but I'd like that to be always within my comfortable reach. Right now I'd call 3 miles no problem and 4 is certainly something I can do on any given day. So, with just a bit of determination, I can get back there. It's maintaining it that is the challenge.

#90 - Hi Donna! You have not missed any wedding pictures. We don't have any yet. We didn't take any, and we didn't hire a professional photographer. I know there were lots of photos taken because I heard the clicks, but we have yet to receive any or see any posted on FB. Still, the memories are sweet.

I'm having a hard time deciding what to read next. My September line-up looks like this (as always, subject to alteration):

The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith
The Foreign Correspondent by Alan Furst
Five Quarters of the Orange by Joanne Harris
The Road Home by Rose Tremain
Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
On Sal Mal Lane by Ru Freeman
Sag Harbor by Colson Whitehead

I also have a few books on hold at the library, but I never know when they'll come available.

I hope to read at least six in September, getting me to 75 books at the 3/4 mark for the year.
So, what to read first? Decisions, decisions......

Hi Ellen - Nice review of the Krakauer. I would like to read it one of these days. I love the Hurston and Harris books. You have some good choices for Sept.

I have about 30 pages left in Light in August, so back to it so I can finish it in August.

Thanks Beth! I love reading Light in August in August.

I've added The Dark Horse by Craig Johnson to my September possibilities list. :-)

oh, sister! i loved Price of salt. back in the day, it was one of the few titles we had, other than Mary Renault and Ann Bannon's now-classic Beebo Brinker books. the Beebo Brinker books were AWful. POS has a sufficiency of angsting and not a lot of humor, iirc, but worth it for historical value, if nothing else. fast read, not demanding and i wish to Aphrodite that it were available in audio. Dark horse is also a good one.

oh, oh, oh . . . i've been looking for 5 quarters of the orange and it's just appeared on NLS. narrator ain't the best but gift horse in the mouth and all that.

I really enjoyed Five Quarters of the Orange. A different take on the issue of collaboration and what it does to corporate living.

I need to get to the Mary Renault books - at some point.

UA has done it again. The Machine is once again in the news. This time they got embroiled in a local school board election. Two former Student Government Association presidents - both served as SGA presidents - ran for local offices. One for President of the School Board, and one as a school board member. The sororities and fraternities on campus hired fancy limos, all decorated with red, white, and blue, streamers and balloons, and gave away free drinks at local bars if members went and voted. Of course, those who voted were told who to vote for, and the end result is that the former SGA presidents won the election - both by very close margins. Looks like this one is going to the state election commission and now the Feds are getting involved because of possible voting fraud. The UA president is also being called on the carpet because she donated a substantial amount of money to the campaign of the former SGA president who was running for the school board position. The candidate is 26 years old and graduated from UA last year. Not married, no kids, so why is he running for school board? The papers say that the Tuscaloosa Chamber of Commerce created a PAC called Businesses for Better Education with membership primarily from the local developers and building contractors. This one is going to be fun and I think I will have to renew my subscription to the local newspaper just to keep track of it.

Here's the directions for the office supply x-wing fighter!

http://www.instructables.com/id/X-Wing-Fighter-from-Office-Supplies/

#101
You posted that just to torment me with thoughts of all those poor capless pens out there, didn't you. How will they ever get back to their partners? How will they find purpose in life without their accompanying pen?

Hi Ellen- Great, incisive review of Under the Banner of Heaven. I love Krakauer's work. I wonder what he will tackle next? I hope you are having a wonderful holiday weekend.

>101 drneutron: Jim, that is far too fun.

Wow Ellen! This is the most "happening" thread in town, I mean, on this site. We have so much fun, and on a three day weekend, too. BTW, I'm almost finished with Boneshaker which is our group's October book. Have you read it? I think it is a great quick and fun read and the references to Seattle are funny. She talks about Seattle being on the side of the Ocean! ha.

Have a great day!

Happy Labor Day, Ellen!

My wife loved the X-wing, particularly the Sharpie and "I knew she was the one".

Out of your Sept. list, I thought "Their Eyes Were Watching God" lived up to its reputation as a classic.

It's been a long time since I asked for a 'nice' pen - I get very attached to them and then either it breaks or I lose it or something terrible so this is a daring move. Essentially I am like you, like trying different pens. Although every now and then I like one and then they stop making that line.....

Yes, the Hurston is a great book. Furst is so good too. I'm interested in Highsmith and plan a whole reading frenzy of her work once I've acquired a few more, maybe next year, when I'm 'done' (so to speak) with Iris Murdoch. I didn't like the one Harris, but I was in a minority and I haven't read anything by the others so will await reviews with great interest.

I have been debating if I dare tell you about the 7 year pens. I may have mentioned this at our RL book group, Ellen, but I'm sure your fascinating followers will be interested. The place where we have our meetings has a wonderful bookstore, and it has a small "gift" section, and in that section there are some 7 year pens. When you read the packaging it asks if "you are tired of constantly losing pens"? Their theory is that since almost all pens run out of in relatively quickly no one values them, and if only you knew for sure that your pen would last for 7 years you would not misplace it. So, for a price (not small) you can buy their guaranteed to last for a long, long time pens. I have two. And truthfully, I do watch them like they were made of gold, and I've not lost either. I love them!

I rarely lose pens. I keep them stuck behind my ears. I use the cheap thin ones that come in packages of 12, and I keep using them until they run out of ink. What I don't like about pens is that the plastic they are made out of is not recyclable and the ink that gets left in them is toxic. I wonder if there is a pen made out of something biodegradable?

OMG! I got Inkjoy pens and I LOVE them! MINE. MINE. MINE. So easy to write with. So smooooooth. And pretty colors.

Mine.

#110
Next thing will be that you will be calling them "my precious." Resist. Let Frodo have them and take them to Mount Doom. It will save you. And mankind. (maybe not the elves, dwarves, fairies, etc., but it will save the rest of us.)

>101 drneutron: that, is awesome. :)

I have been cheated from the joy of assembling a pencil case for when Wilbur starts school soon, by MiL who has "bought everyone" a pre-filled pencil case for their 5th birthdays. Doesn't mean I cant buy one for me though, I suppose! I have a cool pencil tin that I would love to see packed to the brim with injky goodness!!!

I shall loll about in my bed, pretending that I am a walrus on a beach, as I think ever so kindly of you returning to the workaday world and sip my coffee whilst petting my dog's softly snoring self.

Well, this was a busy 3-day weekend. I neglected LT. :-(

The highlight was a hike in the Cascades on Sunday. 7.2 miles, much of it straight freakin' up!!
Okay, not really straight up, but we gained over 1300 feet in the last 1.5 miles, and then we had to come down. Two days later and my calves are still tight. Lake Serene, our destination, was lovely. Photos to follow later today.

Meanwhile, I also snuck in some reading.

Currently reading:

#98 - Ellie, I am looking forward to reading The Price of Salt this month. I'm surprised I didn't read it back in the 80s when I was particularly interesting in all things lesbian. But I never did get into the Beebo Brinker books, either, having heard from too many that they were, as you say, AWFUL! I'm loving Five Quarters of the Orange, even having realized early on that I've definitely read it before. That would be before LT, otherwise I'd have remembered.

#99 - Benita, I'm liking Five Quarters of the Orange a lot. I'd like to read something by Mary Renault, as well.

#100 - Benita, hi again! - Oh, the joys of working at an institution of higher education! I'm sorry there's a ruckus at your place now, but relieved it's not at mine. :-|

#101 - Jim, thanks for posting the link! All the office supply (and sifi) junkies around here will be so pleased. I think Sharpie stock may skyrocket!

#102 - Benita, I'm tempted to find as many images of capless pens as I am able, but I will resist torturing you in this manner.

#103 - Mark, hello! I'm glad you liked my review of Under the Banner of Heaven. It was a difficult book to review but definitely a recommended read. It will be interesting to see what our friend Krakauer tackles next. I have no doubt he is researching even as we write.

#104 - Morphy, I agree!

Sorry, folks, I must go finish getting ready for work. I'm anxious about all I must accomplish this week, and it's a short week. Yesterday off, of course, but I'm taking Friday off as well. Time for that postponed mini-moon.

I'll check back in later and try to catch up with others' threads (this is becoming a hopeless refrain).

Benita, I'm sure that whoever made the original X-wing pictured above (and all right-thinking copiers of same) used only the caps saved from retired pens. I'm SURE of it.

Absalom, Absalom! was one of the most difficult books I've ever read.

After Chocolat, Five Quarters of Orange is my next favorite Harris book. I'm so glad you are enjoying it. It's been awhile since I read a book by Harris. I have Holy Fools in my TBR Tower .. I really should move it up a rung or two and get to it before the year ends.

We harvested, roasted, and froze 13+ pounds of tomatoes this evening. The casseroles & pasta sauce in January will be scrumptious!!!

Oh. My. Word.

It has been a wonderful tomato year in Seattle!! (This is unusual, so I'm basking in it.)

I used to love "putting up " veggies fresh from the garden! I used to do tomatoes and beans ( dilly beans ). I agree, you will be remembering this summer all winter long... yum!

Morphy, you made me buy pens.

Time to freeze some of those blackberries, too!

Reading! Running! Roasting!
You know how to live, girl.
Do push The Road Home higher on your September list. I'm the site's cheerleader for that book. I did love it!

Okay, back to catching up a bit here.....

#105 - Karen, I don't tend to think of my thread as very "happening," but I do appreciate all my vistors. As you know by now, I had a splendid 3-day weekend and I've put Boneshaker on hold at the library. If I read it, that will be two books in a row that I've read for our Book Club!

#106 - Joe, thank you for the holiday weekend wishes. I'm glad your wife liked the x-wing. It may be the coolest thing that has ever been posted on my thread. :-)
I will definitely read Their Eyes Were Watching God this month. I've long wanted to read it, so it's time.

#107 - Hi Lucy! I would love to do a concentrated Highsmith read. Maybe that can be a 2014 thing. I will read The Price of Salt this month, but would love to read several of her other works. I meant to join you in some Iris Murdoch reads this year but keep doing other things. I hope to read at least The Sea, The Sea before the end of this year. I'm enjoying Five Quarters of the Orange but I can see how it could not be one's thing. I'm ready to be done with it and move onto something else.

#108 - Karen, I love the idea of a 7-year pen, and the "green" part of me thinks I shouldn't buy so many disposable pens, but my lust for variety tends to get the best of me. Still, at our next book club I will at least look at the 7-year pen. :-)

#109 - Benita, there are not biodegradable pens that I know of, but there are ones made from recycled material. It's a good way to go for those of us who love having so many of them. (I have, count them, 23 pens on my desk as I write).

#110 - Morphy, LOL ==== Thirteen of the 23 pens sitting on my desk right now are Inkjoy. I have blue, orange, green, brown, black, purple, another green, two more blue....

#111 - Golum. The best character ever.

#112 - Megan, make him a pencil case anyway! I know, five year olds don't always appreciate the handmade items, but eventually he will.

#113 - Richard. If I didn't love Stella so much, I'd dump that hot coffee right on your shirtfront. *smooch*

#116 - Linda, I'm sure you're right. I'll back you up all the way.

#117 - Richard, I'm interested in this. Absalom, Absalom! was one of the most difficult books you've ever read? You know, I don't even know what it's about, so perhaps I'd better look into it. Not that I will shy away from difficult; I won't. But you have piqued my curiosity.

#118 - Caro, Five Quarters of the Orange is only my second book by Harris (and now I've read it twice, go figure). I am liking it, although not as much as Chocolat (that seems to be consensus). I'd be interested in reading another by her; I'll keep an eye out for a copy of Holy Fools.

#120 - Mamie, the house smelled like a wonderful Italian restaurant last night. I am now craving spaghetti, so we may be going to our neighborhood restaurant tonight. It's called "That's Amore" which is the absolute, hands down, worst name for an Italian restaurant ever! But they have an awesome view of the city, excellent spaghetti and meatballs, and they're a 7-block walk from our house.

#122 - Kath, we have frozen a lot of green beans and, now, roasted tomatoes this year. We fell short on the fruit front this year. Usually we freeze a bunch of blueberries (I think we did about 5 pints this year), strawberries, and peaches. It's been an awesome peach year here, but we've just eaten them all and frozen none! We're lazy putter-uppers. It goes in the freezer or it gets eaten right away. No canning for me.

What kind of pens did Morphy make you buy?

#123 - Karen, that's a good idea. We're thinking we'll stop on our way back from Mt. Rainier on Sunday and get some fruit for the freezer. Blackberries. YUM.

#124 - Peggy, I see you in that cheerleader's outfit! I will definitely get to The Road Home this month.

Okay, that is three books that I have said are on the "definite" pile for September:
The Road Home
The Price of Salt
and
Their Eyes Were Watching God.

Deep breath.

The pack of Inkjoys I got has black, purple, green, orange, red, pink, light blue and dark blue.

^ Excellent!

OK, so Boneshaker is on the "definite maybe" list?

Remind me to show you my 2 7-year pens. I love variety, too. I have 12 different colored sharpies for my experiment with FlyLady's housekeeping system. ha ha ha

Progress: I make my bed everyday, and I do feel odd when I don't. I "Swish and Swipe" in the bathroom almost every day. (clean the toilet, and make a "lick and a promise" at wiping off the sink. FlyLady sez that way you'll never be ashamed to have visitors.)

The colored pens are for putting on the calendar the once a week, or every other week, or once a month household chores that are so easy to procrastinate, i.e. washing windows, mop the kitchen floor. Really I was a terrible housekeeper. And it has bedeviled me all my life. Having a clean house now has the added benefit of making it more attractive to potential buyers.

I think I may look for a near by art supplies place and go look at more colored pens. I am sure that will help me be a better housekeeper, don't you think? Plus, the kids are in school now, and I only have the dogs to pick up after.

Excellent summary & review of UtBoH, Ellen! I found it both compelling & disturbing reading. :)

Leave me a note on my thread when you're ready for PoS this month.

I'll read The Road Home with you this month, Ellen. I just started it tonight. I also received my copy as a gift from Paul, so it seems like we should read them together, sister!

Putting up anything is good, especially these days ! Most people ( like me ) don't do it anymore :)

Morphy made me buy

Paper Mate InkJoy 550 RT Retractable Medium Point Advanced Ink Pens
1 each of Black, Blue, Red, Purple, Green, Turquoise, Magenta and Orange

I mean Turquoise!

Green is my favorite ink color . . . but Turquoise! !

#131 - Karen, Boneshaker is definitely on the "definite maybe" list. :-)
I have it on hold at the library, so it will partly depend upon when I get it. I may have to squeeze it into that first week of October....
That's an interesting technique for attending to chores. So, does each procrastination-prone chore get a different color, or are the colors just to add some pleasure to the process?

#132 - Tina, I agree. UtBoH was a great read but I have found myself viewing the world (and, sadly, Mormons, who sometimes hang out in pairs on Red Square on campus and try to approach people to talk about religion) somewhat differently.

I'm home sick today (I feel really lousy) and if I can concentrate, I plan to finish Five Quarters of the Orange and start The Price of Salt. I'm so sick I don't even feel much like reading. Ugh.

#133 - Mamie! I love that we both received The Road Home from Paul, and that we'll both read it this month. Synchronicity.

#134 - Kath, I hope you enjoy your Inkjoy pens. I have that very same collection of 550 RTs. I also very much like green ink. I like the turquoise but it's a wee bit too light for most of my uses (especially if I'm writing on colored post-it notes!). Heh.

I'm home sick from work today. I wish I could say I'm playing hooky because it's thunderstorming in Seattle (this will be headline news this evening) and I am happily tucked up in bed with a book. The sad truth is that I feel lousy so, while I am indeed tucked up in bed, I'm not enjoying it much. Ugh. Still, I hope to do some reading today, in between sleeping and trying to keep something, anything, down. Did I say ugh? If not, ugh.

OH, you poor baby! I'm so sorry to hear that you are sick, Ellen. Hoping you feel better very, very soon.

^Thanks, Mamie. I get sick so rarely; it's really weird to feel this awful. I hate feeling so badly that I don't even want to read! What a terrible waste of a day at home with a thunderstorm!

True. So true. Hugs to you, dear.

I will have you to know, madam, that it is only by the exercise of IMMENSE self-restraint that I did not rush over here, full of the news that you're poorly, and post a dozen pictures of greasy foods.

IMMENSE. Self. Restraint.

Feel better soon.

*sending stomach calming potions*

*concentrating the feel better now mojo, and flinging it in a south-westerly direction* (I am pretty sure it will find you, mojo is very talented)

I'm so sorry to hear you are really sick, Ellen! Hope it turns around quickly.

#139 - thanks, Mamie.

#140 - Oh, Richard, thank you heartily! I really could not have taken it. I promise to remember your restraint and enact similar merciful restraint at some point in the future. Of course, I haven't posted kitten spam on your thread in months, so maybe this is just return karma?

#141 - Karen, that talented mojo may be finding me. Thank you! I'm starting to feel a tiny bit better. I did some work email and I even read a bit. :-)

#142 - Roni, thank you. I hope so, too. I'm a whiny sick person.

70. Five Quarters of the Orange by Joanne Harris
3 stars

The first two thirds of this novel were 4-star-worthy but the climax and resolution just didn't quite work for me. Gripping at times, the story of children living with their mother in a French village during WWII, the impact of small resistances and The Resistance, is beautifully told. Where she lost me is with the theme of many kinds of love. I liked her description of the man she married:

A good man, Hervé, a calm man with no sharp edges in him upon which I could be cut. I loved him --- not in the searing, desperate way I loved Tomas; but enough.

Nice. And I can resonate with that.

*Possible Spoiler Alert*
But in the end, Framboise Simon's return home is not as skillfully developed as I expect from Harris. The ending is too predictable, too neatly wrapped. Her decision to share her secrets, prompted by a crisis and a strong sense of self-preservation, just didn't ring true. Nor did her final love. Sweet, but not true.

Currently reading:

I was very happy that you and Mamie both are going to be reading The Road Home. Then I saw that you were feeling bad. And then that you were feeling a bit better. Continue the good trend! Don't go to work tomorrow though - you'll be awfully weak even if you feel O.K. A long weekend to recuperate sounds just about right.

I hate feeling so badly that I don't even want to read! What a terrible waste of a day at home with a thunderstorm! Oh my, that's the lousiest of the lousy, Ellen. Hope you feel better soon - knowing you, you probably will.

Let us know if we can get you anything virtual - not sure what would help, but here at least are some flowers for your bedside.

Ellen - I was so behind on your thread but I'm all caught up now. So sorry to hear you are feeling sick. I hope you are better very soon.

I have lots to tell you about the book I'm currently reading because I am enjoying it immensely. I should finish it tomorrow so I'll be back to dish about it then.

>138 EBT1002: oh isssssh, Ellen! what a bummer. maybe it will pass by the weekend and you'll be well enough to read? i hope it's a 24-hour thing, which is tiresome enough but at least not extended.

sending soothing thoughts.

Sorry to hear you are under the weather! I hope you're feeling better very soon - at least by the weekend. I hate being sick all weekend and then feeling better in time for work on Monday...

Also sorry to see 5 Quarters fell flat for you. I read it years ago and really liked it. Who knows how I'd feel about it today.

Hi Ellen - I hope you're feeling better. You have some good reading planned for this month. I haven't wanted to read Tremaine for a while, but I don't think I'll get to her this month.

Their Eyes Were Watching God is fantastic.

Can I come and eat some tomato sauce in the winter?

I'm not feeling well either Ellen but I'm still able to read. That's how I judge the level of sickness. If I'm too sick to read, I may need the ER or hospital. Stat!

Feel better soon dear! Take care of yourself. I know it's hard to sit still & not *do* anything but that's likely what your body needs right now.

Also sending some healing thoughts & mojo!

Another hoping that the weekend finds you back in the prime of health, Ellen. xx

I hope that all the pattering of rain and the occasional boom of thunder provides you with the perfect white noise for sleeping away whatever it is that you have.

I like Five Quarters of the Orange but will admit that there were some places that didn't quite work that well. I do think that it was a worthy effort at tackling a difficult subject - collaboration and its aftermath. In that respect I thought it was very nuanced in pointing out that there are many ways of collaborating ... and of resisting. And that there are consequences. Life changing consequences. This was a book I passed on to my sister and I hope to get my RL book discussion group to read it someday.

Feel better soon... Are audiobooks helpful at all when you're under the weather? They got me through a bad bout of flu back in late March -- there was no way that I could read, but I could definitely listen & enjoy that way.

Want to put in a good word for Alan Furst. I just watched Spies of Warsaw on DVD and was blown away by it, and am now going to be re-reading all of his books at some point over the coming months.

Re office supplies: I hold my pen in a weird way, and also find that my hand cramps up a lot. So I'm always looking for a lightweight pen with a thick barrel and a thick/smooth line. in recent years I have become addicted to Uniball gel impact pens, the bold (1 mm) tip. As for the Moleskine notebooks, I love the ones that have no lines at all!

>147 jnwelch: what a lovely set of flowers! And a lovely gesture.

Sorry to hear you are under the weather, Ellen. Maybe you are already starting to come right by now? (wishful thinking?) Take care!

Feel better soon, Ellen!

Ellen, I have just caught up with your thread and am sorry to see you're under the weather. Take care and feel better soon!

Hope you are enjoying your away time. Weather seems a little better today, and hopefully tomorrow will be better.

Hi Ellen, sorry to read that you haven't been feeling well and I sure hope it cleared up so that you could enjoy the weekend. My husband and I spent the other evening in Spokane and we quite enjoyed the thunderstorm there. Then driving across Washington yesterday, we hit more thunder, lots of rain and some brilliant sunshine - a little bit of everything!

Hey Ellen... Just popping in to say hey, check on you, & tell you I just finished PoS. I loved it! No review yet since I just completed it but I wanted you to be the first to know!

Hope you're feeling better. I've been in bed sleeping the majority of today & I think it's helped.

RIP dear Ellen.

OH dear. No indication that the poorly feeling has passed. I hope that you are at least able to read.. or sleep well.. >>>>>feel better mojo

Wasn't her mini-moon this weekend? Hopefully she is all better and just on a lovely bit of vacation.

*knock, knock* Ellen, Ellen......... are you home? Can you come out a play yet?

*wanders away, head hanging*

71. The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith )writing as Claire Morgan)
3.5 stars

Comments later. :-)

Currently reading:

Hi folks. Sorry I've been awol -- between the stomach ughs and the mini-moon at Paradise Inn at Mt. Rainier, I've been simply out of commission. No wifi at Paradise. No surprise there, right?

Much to share and it will have to wait a bit, but here are the highlights: gradually improving tummy, lovely mountain, wonderful hikes, does with spotted fawns, hoary marmots, a lovely grandmother/mountain, and lots of time hunkered down in our room with books. Oh, and coming back to wired life to find that the Seahawks won. We also did a quick visit to P's father's first anniversary dinner. It was a good weekend and tomorrow Real Life resumes. Sigh. I don't have such a horrible Real Life, so it's okay.

I am loving The Road Home by Rose Tremain. Thank you, Paul!!!!

LOL -- by the way, the reports of my death have been grossly exaggerated. :-)

>170 EBT1002: Glad to hear it! Also glad to see that life has been mostly good for you lately :)

I have to admit that RIP gave me a moment of panic. I was all, "Wait! What??!"

Ah, good to know you're among the living, Ellen. No zombie stuff going on, right?

Glad to hear those tummy ughs are so gone!
Mini-moon sounds loverly ;-)
Oh - and I want new pens, too! *off to Google Inkjoy 550's*

Hope you are feeling better, Ellen. Boo to tummy troubles. Looking forward to seeing you back making the rounds. Gentle hug!

The unwired life is a nice change, but I'm now at the point where if I can't check my e-mail, I start getting nervous. Yesterday, while I had my cellphone with me, I was essentially unplugged from 6 a.m. until I got on the train to come home at 7 p.m. Felt kinda scary, even though it was a Sunday...

#146 - Peggy, your post cracked me up. The feeling bad was, well, it was bad, but I'm 100% myself again. I think it's fun that Mamie and I are reading The Road Home together since we both received it as a gift from Paul. Serendipity. My favorite.

#147 - Joe, thank you for the flowers. Clearly this group understands that "too sick to read" is extreme.

#148 - Roberta - Well, I haven't even skimmed through the posts on this here, my very own thread since my bad Thursday, so I'm looking forward to seeing what you came back to dish about. Of course, I can also check your thread (hopefully during my lunch break, if I get to take one, today). It's cool that you sound so excited about what you were reading!

#149 - Ellie, a belated thank you for the soothing thoughts. Thankfully, I'm back to being me again.

#150 - Joanne, thank you for the kind words. I was pleased that this time I was feeling better for the weekend, though still moving a bit slowly and definitely staying away from rich foods and alcohol. And I did like Five Quarters of the Orange, overall - it just fell off in the last bit.

#151 - Hi Beth. The Tremain is not disappointing so far; I'm loving it. I'll let you know if I think you should move her up higher on your TBR pile!
Plan your trip to Seattle this winter and we'll put on a pot o' pasta for dinner!

I haven't started Their Eyes Were Watching God yet, but I think it will be next, except for a couple of library books that are waiting for me....

#152 - Tina, sorry to hear you were also under the weather! At least you could read. As the day went on, I was able to engross myself in The Price of Salt. I need to write some comments about that one. And I need to check your thread to see if you've read it and whether you liked it. I did, with only a few reservations.

#153 - Paul, thanks for the kind thoughts, my friend.

#154 - Hi Benita. Well stated thoughts about Five Quarters of the Orange. I definitely give her credit for tackling a complicated subject and doing it quite well. I know that I can be a tough reader when it comes to the last 1/4 of a book. I'm a bit distractible so it's only the best efforts that keep me "in" all the way to the last page.

#155 - Suz, how nice to see you here! Thanks for the kind words. Audiobooks might be a good option for me when I'm under the weather. Perhaps I'll try that next time. I can usually only concentrate on an audiobook when I'm doing yard work.

I will definitely be reading the Alan Furst this month. I'm already a devoted fan of his, having read two of his works. I think our RL Book Club might be putting his most recent work on our 2014 reading list.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I'm not yet all caught up, but must finish getting ready for work. I will try to stop by later today (cross your collective fingers that I get an actual lunch break today!) to finish up here and check in on others' threads a bit.

Meanwhile, in case you're skimming through, wondering what I'm reading, I'm thoroughly enjoying The Road Home by Rose Tremain. And I plan to read the article in The New Yorker about Claire Danes. Picture me smiling. :-)

Anxiety-soothing mini-splurge today:

The Redbreast by Jo Nesbo (sale book!)
A Curtain of Green by Eudora Welty (sale book!)
The Oath: The Obama White House and the Supreme Court by Jeffrey Toobin

Okay, now I must actually work on the project that is creating this anxiety! :-)

Ohhh A Curtain of Green! Lurvely book, just lurvely.

Glad to see you're feeling better, Ellen. I've been seriously down for the count and only just able to read. I enjoyed Price of Salt a lot but still haven't written a proper review. I'll be home sick from work again tomorrow, so if I can muster the energy I will write my thoughts down.

#72. The Road Home by Rose Tremain
4.5 stars

This lovely book was a gift from Paul and it was spot on for me. I loved Lev, the protagonist who travels from his post-Communism Eastern European home to London to find work. It's the current day and Lev, whose wife died of Leukemia at age 36 (high incidence of this in their community -- go figure) and whose mother and 5-year-old daughter he leaves behind, meets Lydia on the long bus ride to London. Lydia becomes a touchstone and the holder of optimism for Lev, who is desperate to make his way in the world and to provide for his family. Some of the funnier scenes involve Lev's memories of adventures with his pal, Rudi, back in Auror, the hometown that is eventually doomed to modern progress. In any case, along the way Lev faces the brutal realities of life in a capitalist country and he encounters people whose kindness, humor, and resilience provide the meaning. Midway through the novel, the reader is provided with a detour into Lev's greedy and lustful wrestling match with despair. Neither compassionate nor condemnatory, the narrative simply allows us to view this facet of Lev's character. He is human and he is male, and at this point in his life he is lonely and riddled with need and self-doubt. Still, he seems to have a kernel of determination that cannot be extinguished.

Relentlessly optimistic, this is still no fairy tale. It's a delightful exploration of the immigrant experience, the meeting of cultures, and the persistence of hope and meaning in the face of their partners, despair and capricious fate. Filled with interesting and memorable characters, its deceptive complexity makes it a novel worth reading. Highly recommended and with thanks to Paul for the introduction.

Okay, back to catching up a bit.....

#156 - Hi Megan! I liked the flowers, too, and of course by now I am back to 100% me. Thank goodness.

#157 - Thanks, Diana!

#158 - Hi Laura, much better now, thank you.

#159 - Hi Deborah, the time away was wonderful and I'm chipper again.

#160 - Judy, that series of thunderstorms were remarkable for this area! Usually, in Seattle, there will be one brief rumble of thunder and everyone is talking about it the next day. For several sustained thunderstorms to loudly roll through the city is extremely rare. I kind of enjoyed it, but Abby was not happy.

#161 - Hi Tina. I also enjoyed The Price of Salt. "Loved" it might be a tad overstated for me, but I'll keep my copy for a possible reread sometime. That is saying something.

#162 - Roni! Thanks for the get-well kittens! They seem to have worked. :-)

#163 - Richard! "I'm not dead yet."

#164 - Kath, I should have come by and let y'all know that it was appearing that I would live. :-)

#165 - Mamie, you nailed it. Mini-moon, complete with wildlife sightings, good hikes, and bland food.....

#166 - Karen, here I is!

#171 - Hi Kath. Yep, I am among the living and spry. Well, the living.

#172 - Morphy - LOL (but maybe not so funny?). Richard does have a way of getting us to do a double take, does he not?

#173 - Joe, I am not a zombie. I feel like a zombie what with work kicking my butt this week (is it Friday yet???) but I don't seem to actually be one. Whew.

#174 - Cee, hello there, my friend. Did you get any of those inkjoy pens?

#175 - Mark, thanks for the gentle hugs. Gentle was very key there. Tonight I had a beer. I seem to be back among the living and thriving. Now if that darned weekend would get here.

#176 - Suz, I have only gone to work one day in the past five years without my cellphone with me. It was brutal. But vacation without it is quite another story. I figure it's good for me. As long as the UW doesn't decide they don't need me, after all, it's a good break from feeling so on call.

#180 - Richard, so you know A Curtain of Green? Had it not been on the sale table, I don't know that I'd have picked it up. Now I'm glad I did so.

#181 - Tina, I still haven't written a "proper review" of The Price of Salt, either. I'm not sure that I shall do so.

I don't know what I shall read next. I have a couple of books I said I'd "definitely" read this month, but I also picked up six books from the library today......

All I do know is that it's too damned hot here in Seattle. Ugh.

I'm a big Eudora Welty fan, and A Curtain of Green is one of those cool publishing stories that I so enjoy...she was an unknown woman writer, one magazine publication to her name, when she landed the contract for her first collection. She's THAT good! (At short stories...her novels are okay, not in the same league as her short stories.)

*shovel clang* Into the cart.

I'm upgrading The Road Home to 4.5 stars.

I was brushing my teeth and thinking "why not 4.5 stars? I never got distracted, I loved (most of) the characters, I relished the narrative, and I never wished I were done reading it." That latter, in particular, is high praise from me.

Real Life, particularly work, is demanding and stressful right now. It likely will be so through the end of September. I'll keep reading (duh) and I'll post when I can, but my persistent 11-hour work days plus the round trip commute of 1.5-2 hours (at least that is reading time!) are making it hard to really keep up around here.

Is it winter break yet?

Can you post on LT on your phone while riding the bus? I know you read on the bus, but it seems like you could tell us about it, too. Sorry work is kicking your butt right now. I know it probably will not be all that much easier until time for the end of the year holidays. Right?

The heat is making just moving hard for me. I'll spend the morning getting stuff done, and then I'll retire to reading, I think. Hope to get the porch painted today. Yesterday I did some prep, hopefully I can finish the prep and get the painting done today. It is a small porch but my RA is making my hands a little less than 100% useful. )-:

The weekend approaches.....

Currently reading:

.

#189- Karen, yes, the weekend approaches. That is a very good thing.
I can post on my phone but it's a bit of a challenge with the small format and the bumps along the way. In any case, I'll be around here a bit, will keep you posted on my reading. I started Bad Monkey last night because I felt like I needed something in the category of mind candy. We'll see how it goes. The first two chapters didn't grab me, but that may have been because sleep was doing so. :-)

I understand it got up to 93F yesterday. Hopefully not as hot today. If you do the porch painting, I hope it goes well. Stay hydrated!

The Tremain looks tempting....... glad you are better and that the mini-moons are so fun.

Ellen, thanks for the good advice.

I'm sorry that work is being such a bugger for you right now Ellen. :(

It's almost the weekend! :)

Ellen - Great review of The Road Home -- I definitely want to get to it sooner rather than later. Have fun at work -- I have been pretty much absent here lately, too. Yes, isn't it time for winter break. On the other hand, I can't believe that we've had three weeks of classes already.

Yesterday, I was getting ready to leave a classroom, and the teacher who came in told me that as one of the students was exiting my class, he said, "Great class." Nice to hear once in a while.

If it helps ... I am not a big fan of Carl Hiassen so I would vote for starting the Alan Furst book. It is so easy to get lost in his world while surrounded by people and noise. I like to read his books when I am flying and sitting around airports. I also like Michael Dibdin and David Downing for the same reason. They create atmosphere and transport me to an atmosphere other than the one in which I find myself.

Why does work have to be so hard?

I had fun reading Bad Monkey, especially since his last book, Star Island, really disappointed me. But I think you need to be in the right mood for Hiaasen's brand of zaniness.

I am so far behind! Glad to see things going well for you. I have The Road Home on my SOMEDAY shelf...

I am currently immersed in fantasy. I was quite taken with Sookie, and then Mamie caught me with a book bullet, and I picked up a Patricia Briggs, Mercy Thompson book. Then a few more. I like it here in fantasy=land. ( yes, even when there are Vamps and Weres. )

Hope the weekend is a good one for you :)

That's good news that you're not a zombie, Ellen. Thanks for checking. You never know.

Sounds like a tough week; hope you're kicking back with P and enjoying the start of the weekend. We were talking about how some day there should be an Alan Furst group read. I've only read one of his, Spies of Warsaw, but I did enjoy it.

I strongly suspect P of making those two-day-old posts to throw us off the scent...Ellen is in fact sleepin' wit' da fishes (geoducks, I suppose, this bein' Puget Sound an' all).

I really need to get to Rose Tremain. Your review of The Road Home is the second this week that's giving me a hard nudge to dust off my copy of Music & Silence. I really should take it off the shelf and try and make it my next read. Maybe if I put it in my suitcase, I'll get to read it on my next trip.

>172 Morphidae: I have to admit that RIP gave me a moment of panic. I was all, "Wait! What??!"
Me too!!

>187 EBT1002: an upgrade! I love the considered approach to a re-grade.

I have only read one Rose Tremain, I found it too.....very.....well. I just didn't happen to love it.

#198
Those Mercy Thompson books might be a librarian thing. A colleague of mine loves them. She even preorders them as they come out. I haven't read any of them but I have got them on my radar and hope to get to them someday.

I did lots of yard work today so will make it an early night.

Nice to see that reports of your demise were greatly exaggerated and that The Road Home is what you took and that book and trip combined were kind to you. Have a lovely Sunday dear lady.

Wondering where Ellen is.............. Helllllllllllooooooooo?

Hope you are better, a bit too quiet around here!

It is rather quiet here... hopefully life is just to much fun and too interesting to find time for LT just now.

>203 benitastrnad: I hope you have a chance to try them, and that you enjoy them, as much as I do :)
I also suggest the Newford books by Charles deLint for anyone who likes Mercy, his books are wonderful.. as much as I'm enjoying Mercy, I think the Newford books are superior. There are a lot of them! consider checking him out, if you haven't?

#200 OMG Richard you make me laugh! Thank you.

Ellen?

I know it's not the rapture because Richard would be the first taken up!

>208 luvamystery65:: LOL. Too funny.

Ellen, I presume you're right out straight with work, so not panicking just yet.

We've been on an up and down saga for the past few days, but at last I found time enough to read your thread. Glad the tum trouble is over but sorry you're swamped at work.

Great reviews of L i A and the Krakauer books. We had some of the same reactions to the possibility of faith veering off to insanity.

Hope the weekend arrives soon enough for you.

BWAAAHAAAHAAAHAAA ME ASSUMED IN THE RAPTURE BWAAAHAAAHAAA

*wipes laugh-tears away with beach towel*

RL does get troublesome about now for those in the groves of academe. "Ellen" will be back. Can't risk us gettin' too suspicious yet.

#210 Oh Ye of little faith! I speak of the LT rapture in which those that readeth and posteth the mostest get taken up first.

Since you're still about squawking I am assured it has not happened yet. ;-)

The LT Rapture?? I believe, I believe!!

*peeks around the corner. . . . . . . finds an empty room*

The Rapture will pass me by. I'll be so involved in a book, I'll miss it. I'll look up at the end of a chapter and everyone will be gone.

My friends! OMG, this past week has been hell and the next week promises to continue said hellishness (with the exception of tickets to watch the mighty Seahawks trounce the cute-mascot-but-no-cigar Jaguars on Sunday). My September 30 deadline looms and I'm only able to work on the report outside what most sane humans would call regular office hours. Yep, that would be evenings and weekends. Huff puff. But, I will get it done and then I will share a virtual celebratory bottle of bubbly with my LibraryThing friends.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Meanwhile, I bailed on Bad Monkey (not in the mood) but loved The Foreign Correspondent (Alan Furst continues to please). I started The Dark Horse by Craig Johnson on the bus this morning and it promises to be just the kind of reading I need when work is so demanding.

If the rapture is as Roberta describes, Richard will clearly be one of the first two or three taken. Paul might go first.

By the way, I'm glad folks liked my review of The Road Home; it was a special novel.

Currently reading:

It has been about two weeks since my last run and the next day I might squeeze one in is Saturday. I know I'm a bit of an outlier, but I need my runs for sanity (and to counterbalance the food and wine). So, this is a reminder for myself.

73. The Foreign Correspondent by Alan Furst
4 stars

Another installment in the wonderful collection of WWII "spy" novels by Alan Furst. Carlo Weicz, our protagonist, is another ordinary citizen (well, okay, he's been involved in resistance newspaper writing and publication for a while) who gets pulled into low-level espionage activities in the years leading up to the second world war. As always, Furst's landscape is largely outside Nazi Germany. His focus here is more on fascism in Italy, and resistance in Paris and Italy. This one has a bit of romance thrown in for fun, and well done it is. A notch up on the complexity scale, this novel sucks you in but also makes you concentrate just a bit.

Whee! Wow! Lookee here, it's Ellen readin' and reviewin'! I'm just glad you're alive, if not well.

*nods sympathetically* I remember being so busy I had no time for breathing before I retired. I am sorry but I'm glad you can see the end of it and can look forward to less push later. Hang in there with your commitment to running. The more I deal with aging and physical issues, the more I recognize the toll stress visits on our bodies. Do whatever you can to balance the stress with renewal activities - like reading!

Take care.

Good to see you back, Ellen. The Foreign Correspondent sounds like a particularly good Alan Furst book.

Hope life settles down a bit for you. The start of the year is probably action-packed.

You've tempted me with your review of The Foreign Correspondent, Ellen. I have to add this to my obese wish list.

I know I'm a bit of an outlier, but I need my runs for sanity (and to counterbalance the food and wine).

I hear you....I definitely hear you on this one. I've managed 2 runs this week so far, this morning being the better of the two because I wasn't pressed for time and because it was slightly warmer. Tomorrow is shot because I have a 2 hour conference call tonight that starts at 2am so there's no way I'm going to get up at 6.30am for a run before work! I won't get any time at all this weekend to go for a run and on Monday I'm off on a long flight to Asia. So I am going to make sure I force myself out of bed on Friday morning for a long run.

Hi Ellen - You will get your report done. Go for a run and reward yourself when it is finished. I will have to try Furst -- you've said so many good things about him.

The LT rapture had me laughing out loud!! Richard & Paul are definitely the first two being taken! :)

But what will we do if they leave us behind? I think it should be a mass removal.

#226 Richard and Paul would never leave us behind. When they go first Paul will have the stats in order and Richard will make sure the bookshelves have no tchotchkes. Joe better not be far behind since he is so adept at catering. Everything will be perfectly in order when we get there. :-)

Ummm, not to put too fine a point on it, but "WHEN WE GET THERE" might be a touch optimistic....

#228 Richard it is the GREAT BOOK NOOK IN THE SKY. Of course we'll get there.

I know I usually can find the book place in a new city, I imagine it will be like that.... just look around and there it will be: The Great Book Nook in the Sky!

I'm in no hurry though, I have way too many TBRs here in my bookcases. The Real Estate lady agrees with Richard thought all the other stuff sitting on the shelves.... must go....

*smiling*

Ok, but think about this... since we're inventing our own version of "heaven".... It will be like the Tome Home only in the sky. And there will be (get this) --- wait for it -----

NEVER ENDING BOOKSHELVES that automatically refill themselves! All your favorites plus anything you ever wanted to read, but never found the time!

How's that?!

Richard and Paul are only going first to be sure everything is ready for the rest of us. ;0)

74. The Night Bookmobile by Audrey Niffenegger
3 stars

This is a whimsical graphic short story (come on, this is not a novel!) about the love of reading, and the possible dark side of giving one's self almost wholly to reading. I liked it.

#220 - Richard, I'm actually well enough. Just too dang busy.

#221 - Hi Karen. I've not gone for a run but I did walk from campus to the Madison Valley after work yesterday. This hour-long walk through charming neighborhoods with one of my favorite colleagues was a good self-care choice.

#222 - Joe, yep, the first of the year is action packed and I took on extra duties this year. The good news is that my new boss seems to get that I am overextended and I think something may shift in the next year or so. Whew!

#223 - Caro, read any Alan Furst. Some are better than others but he is an author that (so far) does not disappoint. I hope you got out there for that morning long run. I'm still looking for the time and energy, but one thing I know is that it will come. I do take breaks but I always get back to the running eventually. It's core.

#224 - Beth, thanks for the encouragement. I think you would like Alan Furst. His work is more complex than average.

#225 - Tina, yep, I was laughing about the LT Rapture, too.
And then (she said with some embarrassment), I had to go listen to Anita Baker. I mean, really.

#226 - Benita! You make a good point. Where would we be without Richard and Paul???

#227 - Roberta, you also make a good point. Isn't the Rapture supposed to be perfect? So, Paul will be there with the stats, Richard will ensure there is no unnecessary silliness, and Joe will provide food. The rest of us will just read. :-)

#228 - hmph. Richard. Have faith. :-|

#229 - Roberta, that is the spirit. So to speak.

#230 - Karen, ELIMINATE ALL SUPERFLUOUS TCHOTCHKYS. I hate to agree with your real estate lady, but there you have it.

#231 - Tina, I think you may want to read The Night Bookmobile. You're on to her concept.

Still working too much.
Still reading The Dark Horse by Craig Johnson.
Still planning to attend the Seahawks game on Sunday. :-)

Stopping in to say Hi!! Hope you get that run in and best of luck with the after hours work. : )

You must be about worn to a frazzle! This too shall pass. And then you'll have to undergo this:



But hey, you'll have kittens to make it all better, right?

#236 - Hi Beth, thanks for stopping by.

#237 - Richard, as much as I love you, I really have a hard time seeing how you equate that with a kitten hanging off a chair..... oh well. I am undaunted. *smooch*

I guess it's time for a new thread!