SylviaC Reads *ALL* the Books in 2016 - Part 2

I read for pleasure, roughly equal amounts of fiction and nonfiction, and am quite willing to abandon any book that I'm not enjoying. I only write a proper review if I really have something to say about a book, but I'll always give at least a brief reaction. My star ratings are based on how much I enjoyed the book.

I've just reorganized my bookcases to make my unread books more prominent, so hopefully I'll tackle more of those in the next few months.

---

The Chalet School Group is here: LibraryThing Goes to the Chalet School

Useful:
The New How To Do Fancy Things In Your Posts Thread

---

These are the books that I'm currently reading:

Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood - it was on the TBR shelf for a few years
Vittoria Cottage by D. E. Stevenson - for a group read
Winnie-the-Pooh by A. A. Milne - audio
The Heart Specialist by Claire Holden Rothman - for book club
Guide to Weather Forecasting by Storm Dunlop - bedside table
The Assassin's Cloak : an anthology of the world's greatest diarists - bit by bit

Booking my seat before the crowd arrives.

Move over, @pgmcc, you're hogging the couch. And you know there are more folks coming!

This party is certainly hotting up.

I ordered some snacks and the platters will be arriving shortly.

>4 pgmcc: Oh, good. I was just worrying what to cook for supper.

Saving my spot on a floor cushion.

I still love Winnie the Pooh! Who is the narrator on your copy?

Whew! I made it, better late than never.

Ooh! Hummus!

Make yourselves at home, everyone!

>7 aviddiva: The narrator is Peter Dennis, and he is very good, except for what seems like a excessive number of annoying little snorts from Piglet. Does Piglet keep snorting in the print version?

>9 SylviaC:
I have never heard Piglet snort in any of book versions I have read. Nor did I hear him snort in any of the films.

>10 pgmcc: Well then, it's a very annoying bit of artistic interpretation. The snort happens at the beginning and end of most of Piglet's lines, and sometimes even in the middle of sentences. The rest of the reading is fine, but since Piglet has a lot to say, the snort is hard to ignore. All the snorts sound exactly the same, so I think it must be an electronic sound effect.

I love Winnie the Pooh! It's my fall read aloud.

The snorting would be annoying, though.

Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. This one has been sitting on my shelf for a few years now, but I finally read it after being inspired by attending a Margaret Atwood event and by @clamairy's Apocalypse thread. I found it a bit slow going at first, but things sped up once I had a chance to sit down for a long enough period to really get into it. The reveal of how the main character and the world got to where they were is very slow, but enough hints are dropped that you can figure a lot of it out. The scariest thing about it is that most of the circumstances leading to the apocalyptic event are very believable extensions of current scientific and social trends. I'll start The Year of the Flood soon, and have MaddAddam on my Kindle.

>9 SylviaC: Piglet never snorted in any version I read, but in the audio I grew up with he had a very high squeaky voice.

>14 aviddiva: This narrator doesn't try to do different voices (for which I am grateful), but each character still sounds distinct. He sounds like he's reading a story, not putting on a performance. His singing may not be the best, but the snorts are the only irritating thing.

Piglet does not snort. He's a very refined little pig.

And I suspect Piglet tries rather hard to avoid drawing attention to himself. As snorting would surely do.

>16 Meredy: Piglet should be accorded more dignity than the snorts allow. They are rather flatulent sounding snorts, too.

>17 jillmwo: It does!

Winnie-the-Pooh by A. A. Milne. Audio. Yes, amazingly, I hadn't read Winnie-the-Pooh before. I was well acquainted with him, of course, as he is firmly embedded in popular culture, and I've read the odd story here and there, but this is the first of the complete books that I've read. My mother wasn't a Pooh fan, so I missed that early exposure (but she did used to sing the James James Morrison Morrison Weatherby George Dupree song to me). I didn't really think about it when my own kids were small, partly being put off by the Disney factor. Now that I've finally gotten around to it, I must say I enjoyed it immensely (apart from the aforementioned snorting). I think I'll have to start looking for some non-Disneyfied print copies of the Winnie-the-Pooh books. If I read any more audio versions, it will be with a different narrator.

>18 SylviaC: by all means, check out the originals. For the most part, Disney "bastardizes" stories. I loved the cartoons The Jungle Books and One Hundred and One Dalmatians as a child, but once I read the books, no more Disney for me!

On the other hand, Chuck Jones' Kipling adaptions are not bad.

I'm late to the party but I brought some CHEESE! Glad you enjoyed Oryx and Crake, I too thought it was excellent and chillingly plausible.

The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood. Parallel story to Oryx and Crake. It was interesting to see events unfold from two other perspectives in this book. It was a bit of a stretch to believe that so many of the people who individually survived the catastrophe had prior connections. I've enjoyed the first two books, and am part way through Maddaddam now.

Bad Kitty School Daze by Nick Bruel. Bad Kitty and Puppy have to attend a School for Wayward Pets. The usual Bad Kitty fun.

Glacial Period by Nicolas de Crécy. This wasn't what I expected it to be. I thought it would be pictures interspersed with text, similar to Motel of the Mysteries, but it was a straight out graphic novel. It is part of a series commissioned by the Louvre. In the far future, a group of humans and genetically modified dogs are exploring glacier-covered Europe, and discover the Louvre, which has been buried in the ice. They piece together various unscientific theories about the meanings of the works of art in the museum. The art-related story was much more engaging than the human interaction aspect of the book. Physically, I found it a little difficult to read, because the drawings were intricate but dim, and the print small, so I ended up taking off my glasses and holding the book very close. The great works of art are beautifully integrated into the story. I don't know yet whether I will keep this or not, because there were things that fascinated me, and other things that I hated.

I love Bad Kitty! I read the picture books to my students. Then the ones who read well will pick up the "chapter books."

Glacial Period sounds intriguing even with the flaws. I've often wondered how badly we've bungled things when it comes to archeology or symbolism in classic lit. How do we really know what that author meant unless we ask said author? However, I don't know if I'll read it as I'm not keen on graphic novels. Hmmmm

I think I've taken a hit with Glacial period. If I get hold of a copy I will bear your caveats in mind.

I'm actually intrigued by the whole premise of the Louvre Collection series (of which Glacial Period is a part). What a brilliant means of making a broader population aware of what a museum holds in their collection and how they think about it.

(If I ending up buying all of the series, I'm going to blame you, @SylviaC.)

>24 catzteach: There is a section of the story where one of the explorers puts dozens of paintings into what he believes is chronological order, and makes up a history of an ancient civilization, including anthropomorphic animals and flying children.

>25 Sakerfalcon: >26 jillmwo: I'm curious about the rest of the series, and may check to see whether they're available in our ILL system.

MaddAddam by Margaret Atwood. This one starts immediately after Oryx and Crake and The Year of the Flood end. The three books work well together, and everything fits together so neatly as memories are slowly revealed. The touches of humour range from dry to boisterous. (The creation of a certain flying god made me laugh.) I had a few quibbles, but who am I to tell Margaret Atwood how to write? But really, how did the strong, independent Toby become so steeped in jealousy? There are horrible, disturbing things that happen in all the books, but they aren't portrayed so graphically that they stopped me reading. The series is well worth reading, if you like apocalyptic fiction.

>13 SylviaC: >21 SylviaC: & >28 SylviaC: Okay, these are moving closer to the top of my massive PA mound. I did try the first one a few years back and had trouble just as you did, but I did not keep going. I will try again some time this year.

I read the Maddaddam trilogy as the books were released and enjoyed them, but probably missed some of the subtler connections between the books due to the wait for the next book. One day I will read it all in one go. I do agree with your spoiler, Sylvia, that annoyed me and seemed unlikely given what we had seen of her previously.

>29 clamairy: I think you will like them, once you get going. The first one is the slowest, because it is basically a monologue, but I think I ended up liking it the best. It had the least violence, and that lone-survivor stream-of-consciousness vibe.

>30 Sakerfalcon: I'm glad I was able to read them all at once. I think it really helped that the connections were fresh. But, as I mentioned earlier, it was a bit far fetched that so many of the survivors were connected.

Texts From Jane Eyre by Mallory Orthberg. Audio. Texts from various literary characters from Medea to Harry Potter. Was a fun little novelty, but became tedious after a while.

Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren. Reread. Audio. I haven't read Pippi in a long, long time, so this provided a pleasant background while I did a boring job.

Ugh, I made the mistake of posting on a Pro and Con thread, so I'm doing penance here.

>32 SylviaC: I found that Texts became tedious after only a few pages. I do love Ortberg as the new Dear Prudence on Slate. She's so much nicer than was Emily Yoffe.

I'm intrigued by the Louvre graphic novel and will give those a bump on the ol' Mt. TBR.

>34 LibraryPerilous: I'd never heard of Ortberg. I only got the book because it was a super cheap Audible Daily Deal. The concept would probably work better as a one-time joke, rather than a whole book. Maybe if I read one conversation, than came back a couple of months later and read the next. Kind of hard to do with audio, though.

>34 LibraryPerilous: Wait, what? Posting here is a punishment? I think of it more as a retreat. :)

Hmmm... Bad Kitty sounds like something that the grandfather of a five-year-old might need to know about. Are all of the picture books at about the same level? I see the first one is an alphabet book, but she's already got a couple of those and knows her letters (many of which are the same as my letters).

>36 MrsLee: It did help salve the wound. :)

>36 MrsLee: Exactly. It's a somewhat protected place. :o)

>38 LibraryPerilous: Good!

>37 Jim53: It's nice of you to shared your letters with your granddaughter. You must be a good grandfather.

The Bad Kitty books can be enjoyed on different levels. There is a lot of humour in them to appeal to older children and adults as well as to young children. My teenagers still ask me to read Bad Kitty books out loud to them. Some of them are in picture book format, and others are kind of a combination of chapter book and graphic novel. Many of the books, in either format, have the alphabet element to them, but it is usually just one aspect of the story. They all have hilarious pictures of Bad Kitty wreaking havoc.

I have three of the picture books, and of those, Poor Puppy and Bad Kitty is the simplest, with straightforward counting, alphabet, and travel, with fun illustrations. Bad Kitty actually runs through the alphabet four times, but with a silly story to go with it. We get such things as "Endangered the goldfish", "Hurled hair balls at our heads", and "an eXcess of tyrannosaurus reX". A Bad Kitty Christmas has a fairly complex story, that actually had me in tears at one point when I read it to my kids. And even it runs through the alphabet three times.

Of the books in the other format, my favourites are Bad Kitty Gets a Bath and Happy Birthday, Bad Kitty. The only one that I didn't like was Bad Kitty for President, which is just a primer for American politics.

The Heart Specialist by Claire Holden Rothman. For book club. While I was reading, I would get absorbed in the story, but after putting it down, I was always reluctant to pick it back up again. The main character is Agnes, who was born in Montreal in 1869, and wants to be a surgeon. She is brilliant, but socially awkward, and experiences a lot of rejection and hypocrisy. Agnes' first person narration means that the motivations of other characters are filtered through her own social naïveté, and the reader is credited with the intelligence to infer what is really happening. The Prelude and first chapter take place in January, of 1874 and 1882 respectively, which sets a bleak tone that carries through the rest of the book. It ends in January 1919, shortly after the end of World War I. I found the ending very satisfying. As with many of our book club books, I'm glad I read it, and appreciate the quality of the writing, but am unlikely to reread it or pick up another book by the same author.

Vittoria Cottage by D. E. Stevenson. Reread for a group read. This has never been a favourite of mine. There are bits and pieces that I liked, and others that irritated me. Robert, James, and Harriet were all great characters, but I found Caroline disappointing. She seemed to be developing some spirit, then turned right back into a doormat. For some reason, I found the social distinctions to be more grating than usual, at least at the beginning of the book. That aspect did smooth out as it progressed, though. The thing that I dislike most is the love triangle that is at the heart of the book. It's a plot device that I never like, especially when all the parties deserve a happy ending. This the first book of a trilogy, so there are some plotlines that are left unresolved.

Homebodies by Charles Addams. One more book for my Addams collection. It was nice to see a few of his wonderfully creepy cartoons that I'd never seen before.

>42 SylviaC: there are scenes in the books that I really like, but I agree completely with the spoilers. Overall, not a favorite of mine at all. I think when I read it in the future, I'll probably dwell on the descriptions of some of the interactions between Caroline and Robert, Harriet and James and skip through the annoying bits (again, alluded to in your spoilers).

>41 SylviaC: I admire your willingness to keep up with the book group's reads. I realize that discussing good books, even those not to your taste, brings something into your life that you lack living in a rural area. I have this feeling that I would turn away from the same opportunity if I were in your shoes and my life would be less rich for it. I am SUCH a moody reader. I have an excellent book, Lab Girl that I was 174th in line for from the library when I reserved it. I won't be able to renew it, it is well written, the subject matter interests me and it described in a engaging fashion and I am not picking it up and reading it very often. In another mood, I'd read it in one or two sessions, putting aside other things so that I could read it. And this is a book I want to read, I can't imagine one that had too much violence, too much meanness, bleakness, cynicism or mostly unlikable characters and feeling that I had to read it because a book group chose it.

>44 MDGentleReader: The sheer awfulness of Leda doesn't help, either.
After a couple of decades of "safe" reading, I've been getting a little more adventurous in the last year or so, more like I used to be before work, marriage, and children took over my life. My kids are much more independent, my school-related commitments have been greatly reduced, chore time has been cut in half with our new packing machine, and both kids are old enough to take turns helping. So now that I can find some nice blocks of time for reading, I'm more willing to take a chance on something different. The book club is motivating me to finish some books that I wouldn't have otherwise, because if I'm going to be commenting on a book, I want to know what I'm talking about. And I'm motivated to attend book club because it is one of the very few things I do that involves adults who aren't family. (I'm not sociable enough to join a service club or church group, get involved in the arts community, or go out drinking—and that pretty well covers most of the options.)

I guess you could say that I'm a moody reader too. I used to read all of every book that I started, and for the most part, I enjoyed them all. But there came a day that I threw a book across the room when I finished it, after which I decided to ease up on my standards.

I've been reading for more than 60 years. In that many books, they can't all be good, and sometimes I feel now that I know the story better than the author does! So I jump over parts, or just give up, and I tell myself that I'm not a bad person.

I don't want to say that to a book club, so I rarely ever join them. But in the group I meet with now, we each discuss whichever book we want to and we have a good time learning about subjects and one another. I like that.

>46 nhlsecord: I often skip or skim, too, especially when there's violence, bullying, or nastiness, or if it's just boring. And I tell the group if I did, because I figure that says something about my feelings about the book.

The problem is that I would have to tell them that too often for any of us to enjoy my presence. I get the most enjoyment from LT discussions. That's a great thing!

Plush: Selected Poems of Sky Gilbert, Courtnay McFarlane, Jeffery Conway, R.M. Vaughan, and David Trinidad. A collection of works by gay poets, published in 1995. I recently discovered that one of my highschool friends had contributed to this book. The fact that it took me 21 years to find this out should give you some idea of how well we've stayed in touch. Each of the poets had a very distinct style, and I enjoyed the work of four of them but had trouble following the fifth. I liked Courtnay's best (l may possibly be biased), and would also like to read more by David Trinidad.

Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar... by Thomas Cathcart and Daniel Klein. This choice can be directly attributed to @Meredy. It proved to be exactly what I wanted—a light overview of some basic philosophical concepts. Just enough information to give me an idea of some of the broad categories, presented in an entertaining way. I have no background in philosophy, and was surprised at how much of it I had already encountered in my psychology and education studies, as well as in casual reading over the years. I borrowed the book from the library, but I might actually buy myself a copy for future reference.

>50 SylviaC: Wheee! Cool. I did indeed buy three more copies and send them to my siblings, and every one loved it. I know I'll read it again just for the fun of it, even though I'll know the punch lines.

>51 Meredy: I'm glad you recommended it, because it was just what I needed to fill a gap in my general knowledge, giving me starting points that I can follow up on if I feel inclined to. Plus, it was funny.

Seveneves by Neal Stephenson. This huge book is both apocalyptic (in the very near future) and post-apocalyptic (5000 years in the future). I read it in three days, which may have included some late nights and just possibly neglecting my family a little bit.

Part 1 was excellent. This was the preparing-for-the-apocalypse segment. The main characters were interesting, smart, and likeable. I liked the friendship between the two main female characters, and their competence. Characters, plot, and technical details were well integrated. The degree of cooperation between nations and their level of production may have been implausible, but who needs plausibility in a good apocalypse?

Part 2 was mostly tedious. It also happens to be the longest section. It peaked at the beginning with the destruction of the earth, and again at the end with the establishment of the Seven Eves, but everything in between was slogging through the mud (well, space) and politics. I like lots of science in my science fiction, but it got a little extreme here. The author pretty much lost me at the point where he used the term "delta vee" a dozen times in three pages.

Part 3 seemed like a different book from the rest. It takes place 5000 years later, with different characters, and in different settings. I was very interested in learning how their society had developed in the intervening years, both technologically and socially. I was also interested to see how the genetics played out. It seems improbable that there was so little interbreeding over the millennia, especially during all the time that the entire population was confined to a very small space. Given the strong attraction between Moirans and Teklans, those two races should have been strongly interbred. The actual storyline was less engaging. It just sort of meandered around between infodumps. The characters in this part weren't very well developed, and were mostly just pale shadows of their Eves. The only one who didn't seem to simply reflect the character of his progenitor was Bard, and we were given so little inkling of his thoughts and character that we don't know what he was really like. It would have been nice to have a glimpse into the thought processes of more of the characters, and to learn more about their backgrounds.

Quite a few people have said that they didn't find it as good as most of Stephenson's books, but I haven't read enough of them to judge that for myself. I thought the first part was fascinating, the second part tedious, and the third part a bit of both. Overall, for me, the positives definitely outweighed the negatives.

>53 SylviaC: I agree with a lot of your comments on Seveneves. I too found the second part to be a real slog, with an inexcusable amount of info-dumping. Some chapters read like extracts from textbooks. And I totally agree about the implausible lack of interbreeding over 5000 years - would the prejudices really have held up for so long? Think about how many times human alliances and loyalties have changed just in the 2000 years of earth's history that we study. I'm not so definite that for me the positives outweighed the negatives, but if he chose to write a sequel (and the end seemed to suggest that there could be one) I'd pick it up at the library. So far my favourite Stephensons are Snow crash and Anathem - the latter is a very different PA book.

Catch-up time!

>34 LibraryPerilous: I have stayed out of Pro and Con for a couple years. My blood pressure is lower. I can't imagine how it must be right now, with all the politics both here (USA) and abroad (EU) aflame in anger.

>46 nhlsecord: I have also learned to "give up" on books. Life is too short, and there are SO many good books just waiting for me to pick them.

>50 SylviaC: oh, that sounds interesting. I've read some of Francis Schaeffer's works, and have had to work at them because I have no background in philosophy. Some will be rereads, just because I know I didn't understand all he was trying to convey. I will reread the others for pleasure: I really like Schaeffer.

I enjoy LT for the conversations as well as the book bullets, especially "kinder" threads where people don't call each other names. Like here. :)

>54 Sakerfalcon: It seemed like Stephenson thought out the technology much more thoroughly than he did the genetics. And I would expect more behavioural divergence in 5000 years. Everything seems to be attributed to genetic factors. For instance, Ty is the default leader, just because he has the Dinan hero genes. Of course, one character from each race doesn't exactly give us a representative sample. At some point, I would like to read more by Stephenson.

>55 fuzzi: Thank you for your kind words!

>55 fuzzi: I have Pro and Con on ignore now. You aren't missing anything. :)

I find myself stepping away from most online chats these days. Yesterday, a man on a baseball site wrote sexist things after I politely said I didn't want to continue our conversation.

>53 SylviaC:, >54 Sakerfalcon: Seveneves was one of my Santa's picks last SantaThing. I'll be reading it soon, so I resisted the urge to click on the spoilers. Looking forward to reading it. It will be my first foray into a Stephenson novel.

>53 SylviaC: >57 LibraryPerilous:

Yes. Thank you for including spoiler tags! I have Seveneves on the TBR shelf and am trying to avoid reading too much about the book before I delve into it for myself. It's gonna be a while though; I recently read the entire Baroque Cycle so I'm not quite feeling up to another massive dose of Stephenson just yet! ;)

>58 ScoLgo: This will be my first foray into Stephenson's oeuvre. I'm looking forward to reading the Baroque books and Anathem sometime in the next few months.

>59 LibraryPerilous: I have read quite a few Stephenson titles and really enjoyed the ones you mention. My favorite so far has to be The Diamond Age. At <500 pages, (in hardcover), it is also one of his shorter works.

Oh, and before reading the Baroque books, you might consider tackling Cryptonomicon first since The Baroque Cycle is a prequel to that book.

>60 ScoLgo: Oh, thanks for the rec and the tip about the reading order for the Baroque Cycle. I read a few chapters of Anathem a few weeks ago. But I was on vacation at a beach, and I didn't have the brain cells available to digest it properly. :)

>55 fuzzi: Yes, Sylvia, as fuzzi said, groups like yours are just the way I like book clubs to be :)

The only other Stephenson book that I've read is Quicksilver. I liked most of it, but didn't feel motivated to continue the Baroque Cycle. He's definitely an author who requires concentration.

>62 nhlsecord: It's the people who hang out in the Green Dragon who make it such a comfortable place to be!

>51 Meredy: & >52 SylviaC:

I have a funny story about Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar.

First some background information about Amazon and its restrictions on delivery to certain destinations.

There are certain products that Amazon will not deliver to Ireland. In my experience these have mainly been in the categories of board games and electronic components and equipment. I believe some of these restrictions are cost related and that Amazon is being taken through the courts by the EU because such practices restrict the free movement of goods throughout the EU.

Amazon's restrictions do not become apparent until one checks out an order, i.e. after you have entered all the items concerned.

I ordered a copy of "Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar" from Amazon as I had been brutally wounded by someone on an LT thread when they fired this particular book bullet at me. (Not that I'm looking at you @Meredy.)

My son took the notion that he wanted to buy the components for building a computer and asked if I could order the parts through my Amazon account and that he would give me the money. I warned him that it was unlikely that they would supply all the parts to Ireland. He did his research and told me that Amazon did supply the relevant parts to Ireland.

Knowing that one did not discover restrictions until checking out I let him put all the items in my Amazon shopping along with my "Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar". Sure enough, when I went to check out I received the message that one or more of the items in my shopping bag could not be delivered to Ireland. I am sure you can guess, it was "Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar".

I have never seen such a restriction on a book before.

This has given me an objective of finding a copy of "Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar" when I am in Boston next week.

@pgmcc You're going to be on the east coast of the US next week and you didn't TELL us? (Forgive me, @SylviaC, as I hijack your thread to flog the man.)

>65 jillmwo: It has been mentioned here and there. @clamairy has a GD thread suggesting a New England meet up in Boston. I will be arriving on 9th and departing on the 20th.

I'm the ditzy one deserving of a flogging for not paying proper attention to the world around me. Off to see what may be managed temporally and/or financially.

>64 pgmcc: That must be one crazy book! Perhaps Amazon does not think the Irish need more ammunition for philosophical musings? We found Meredy's copy in an independent bookstore, so hopefully it won't be difficult for you.

>64 pgmcc: Ah, I think I figured out the problem: There are three Irish Jokes in the book. Two of them involve drinking. Amazon is very considerately refusing to force the Irish readers to be subjected to such stereotyping. Of course, by that reasoning, they also must not ship it to the US, India, France, Britain, China, Cuba, Poland, Germany, Australia, or anyplace with Jewish people, accountants, Christians, octogenarians, atheists, Martians, lawyers, travelling salesmen, or cows.

>69 SylviaC: I think you have hit the nail on the head.

Those people in Amazon are so considerate.

>69 SylviaC: Or pigs. I loved the pig joke.

>64 pgmcc: I just checked the Harvard Bookstore website, and they list this title. A visit to Harvard Square is worth it anyway, even if you just get on the MBTA Red Line somewhere, ride the subway to Harvard, get out and do a 360, and then get back on. Of course it's better to spend a little while and walk around. There used to be a lot of bookstores right around there; I hope some are still there.

Whenever I go back to the Boston area (which I hope to do next April), I always stay in one of the hotels close to the Square, which is in a strong sense "back home" to me. And somehow I always wind up in a bookstore.

I wish I could be there next week and join in this meetup. You're just going to have to do it again one day. Or, as MrsLee says, come to California.

>71 Meredy: Thank you for the advice re: Harvard Square. I also wish you could be in Boston next week.

I will have to urge my son-in-law to get tenure at Cal Tech. That could be difficult as his MIT background could mitigated against him. :-)

>72 pgmcc: And of course Harvard is just up the road from MIT. I used to live about halfway in between, off Mass. Ave. on the river side. I'd go back there if I could.

>73 Meredy: I am looking forward to see Boston and checking out those bookshops in Harvard Square.

>57 LibraryPerilous: people have really gotten rude.

In one of my favorite books by Robert Heinlein, a comment about culture, imo, is prophetic:

“Sick cultures show a complex of symptoms such as you have named...but a dying culture invariably exhibits personal rudeness. Bad manners. Lack of consideration for others in minor matters. A loss of politeness, of gentle manners, is more significant than is a riot.”

>75 fuzzi: Oh, I've only read one Heinlein, Orphans of the Sky.

Re: that quote, I sometimes ask people who write mean things online if they would say the same thing to someone's face. I usually hear crickets as a reply.

>76 LibraryPerilous: right. They're bullies behind a keyboard.

Friday is my most favorite Heinlein, and one of only two that I reread occasionally.

>77 fuzzi: ty for the rec. I've had that one on my list since I read about it in Jo Walton's What Makes This Book So Great

>78 LibraryPerilous: oh no, now you 'dun it'...another book bullet! ;)

>79 fuzzi: Sorry not sorry :)

>78 LibraryPerilous: >79 fuzzi: That one is waiting on my shelf!

>81 SylviaC: well, our local library does NOT have a copy, so I put in an ILL. We'll see if it can be found.

>82 fuzzi: I was lucky. The big Canadian bookstore chain had it on sale in hardcover a few months ago, for a really good price.

>82 fuzzi:, >83 SylviaC: I enjoyed it. Plus, I was able to delete a book from Mt. TBR. Of course, I added about 100 books to said mountain, but I'm okay with that.

Also, ha! A new study suggests that bookworms might live longer.

>84 LibraryPerilous: So if I keep reading a lot, I might live long enough to read all the books that I have waiting to be read.

>85 SylviaC: Heh. I think the science behind that only works if you stop adding titles to your TBR, otherwise you're into the half-life of Mt. TBR reductions.

>86 LibraryPerilous: ha ha! Funny.

>87 fuzzi: :)

Happy National Book Lovers Day, everyone!

Every day is Book Lovers Day here!

Encephalitis Lethargica: During and After the Epidemic by Joel A. Vilensky. I've been fascinated by this subject since reading Awakenings by Oliver Sacks. This book was written as a scholarly monologue, so while the prose isn't scintillating, it is thorough. Vilensky and his collaborators gathered together a huge amount of research, mostly from the 1920s and 30s, along with Sacks' work and some personal accounts, and compiled and analyzed it all. Being strictly a medical study, it provides minimal social context to the epidemic, and most of the case studies are stripped down to the basics. It is the opposite of Asleep by Molly Caldwell Crosby, which is full of social context and filler, but short on medical details. My favourite part of Vilensky's book was the chapter on "Self-Reports of Encephalitis Lethergica”. I was slightly bothered by noticing several very minor errors in word usage and typos, which should have been picked up by a proofreader—especially in a scholarly work published by Oxford University Press. An interesting note about my copy of the book is that it is inscribed to some friends by the author, and he shows a sense of humour.

>89 SylviaC: Indeed! :o)

Boy, Snow, Bird by Helen Oyeyemi. For book club. It's a strange book, echoing elements of various fairy and folk tales, though not actually retelling anything. I found it hard to get through the first section, with its troubled, morally ambiguous narrator. The second part, narrated by her teenaged daughter, is more straightforward and enjoyable, and allows the reader to see the first character through a different perspective. The third part returns to the original narrator, with less complexity than earlier, but the plot, inasmuch as there is one, gets stranger. Not a particularly satisfying book, though it did raise some issues to think about. I'm looking forward to hearing what the others have to say about it in book group.

The Greenwood Shady by Elizabeth Cadell. The other title for this is Brimstone in the Garden, which is more descriptive of the story. The supernatural element makes this different from the author's other books, but most of the characters are very typical. It is pretty much an ensemble book, which allows Cadell's usual eccentric supporting characters to shine. It also means that none of the three romances is particularly well-developed. It is light and fun, building to a rollicking, farcical climax. I'm glad that all of Cadell's books are being republished, since I would probably never have had an opportunity to read it otherwise.

>78 LibraryPerilous: I was able to get a copy of What Makes This Book So Great, and have been "dipping". One part that made me literally laugh out loud was this:

"Sometimes I totally kick myself over this, because when I finally get around to something unread that's been sitting there I don't know I can have passed it over with that "cold rice pudding" stare while the universe cooled and I read C.J. Cherryh's The Pride of Chanur for the nineteenth time."

Oh, that is SO "me" (I probably have read that book a dozen times, too), and reading that quote inspired me to start a reread of Rimrunners, ha!

>90 SylviaC: want
>93 SylviaC: want this one too. ;)

>92 SylviaC: May I ask who selects the books for your club?

>95 Marissa_Doyle: I think they're both right up your alley. The second is easer to get ahold of than the first, at least in ebook format. Cheaper, anyway.

>96 clamairy: The librarian always chooses. In our small library system the choices are pretty limited. There are only so many books that they have enough copies of to use for book clubs, and they have to circulate among the clubs at the 12 branches. Most of those are by Canadian authors—this month's was the first exception since I joined in January. The number of people at each meeting seems to range from four to seven, including the librarian and her husband (he's the only male member). I am definitely the youngest member, for the most part by at least a decade.

>94 fuzzi: Haha. I'm glad you are enjoying it! And sorry not sorry that you were hit with a 'reread this book' bullet during. I feel you. I just returned a few ILL books, unread, to the library. I decided I'd rather reread The Perilous Gard for the fourth time this summer. :)

>93 SylviaC: This sounds like a cute book to read on a lazy summer day.

>98 LibraryPerilous: I always preferred The Sherwood Ring to The Perilous Gard. I've never really been a fan of the Tam Lin story. I guess I'll take ghosts over fairies.

>99 SylviaC: I love Barbara in the Sherwood Ring, but I find Peggy's story a bit underwhelming. One thing I like about The Perilous Gard's retelling of Tam Lin is that Pope takes the forced seduction and unwanted pregnancy portions out of it.

ETA: Once, while Googling reviews of Pope's fiction, I stumbled upon a website dedicated to rehabilitating the reputation of terrible colonel and defender of slavery Banastre Tarleton. I'm a bit sad that today's Googling did not help me to find the website again.

>100 LibraryPerilous: Perilous Gard is much more atmospheric than Sherwood Ring. It was one of my mother's favourite books, but she was more into mythology than I am.

See what you two did? Now I have to go reread both of them. ;)

>101 SylviaC: I actually don't like fairy tales that much. Hmm, I think one of the reasons The Perilous Gard resonates with me is the historical detail in which Pope situates her characters: the way she writes the fairies as perhaps pagans trying to hold to their way of life.

>102 Marissa_Doyle: Oops. :)

>102 Marissa_Doyle: Did we do that?

Well, now I've reread The Sherwood Ring and I want those Venetian glasses.

>105 LibraryPerilous: They're nice, aren't they? I love that scene. He shouldn't have underestimated her!

The Sisters of the Quantock Hills series by Ruth Elwin Harris:

The Silent Shore
The Beckoning Hills
The Dividing Sea
Beyond the Orchid House
(The American editions have been given the incredibly boring titles of: Sarah's Story; Frances's Story; Julia's Story; and Gwen's Story.)

I'm putting all four books together because they're so tightly linked. The series tells the story of the four Purcell sisters, who are orphaned in 1910, and their guardian's family. I think they are classified as young adult books. Each one is told from the perspective of a different sister, with some overlap in events. The first two books go from 1910-1920, the third from 1910-1930, and the last one from 1913-1936. Each sister has a very distinctive personality, and interprets events in her own way. There is enough overlap to tie their stories firmly together, but enough variation in their experiences that it doesn't feel like the same story is being repeated. World War I is the defining event of the series, with the characters experiencing the tragedies of the war and the long term after-effects.

I would like to have seen more of Sarah as an adult and there were a couple of supporting characters who who could have been developed further, but other than that, I really have nothing negative to say about these books. I was impressed with the author's ability to tie all the books together, yet keep each narrative distinct.

Equal Rites by Terry Pratchett. A fun way to while away some time when our internet was down. It's the third Discworld book I've read—the second with witches (Wee Free Men was the other). Granny Weatherwax was wonderful, of course. I love what Pratchett does with words, but I felt that he did it better early in the book than later. I liked it a lot, and am looking forward to reading more about Discworld.

What Makes This Book So Great? by Jo Walton. A fascinating collection of blog posts. Most of them are about different science fiction and fantasy books that she likes to re-read, a few are about other books (Gaudy Night, for instance), or just about reading in general. I didn't always agree with everything she said, but it was always worth reading. Since I couldn't look things up online as I was reading, my book is bristling with sticky notes.

>109 SylviaC: I read some of that book, congratulations on reading it ALL.

>110 fuzzi: The relay tower for our internet service got struck by lightning on Friday, and wasn't fixed until noon today, so I had lots of free time over the weekend. And I skipped the section with Stephen Brust's books, because they don't interest me.

I enjoy Walton's book as well (but also like you, skipped the bits about Stephen Brust's work). Re the titles in >107 SylviaC:, are those contemporary titles looking back in time or were they actually written in the 20th century? (And you're right that the American titles are utterly forgettable.)

>107 SylviaC: These sound charming.

I skipped the Brust chapters too.

I'm feeling a little miffed as an American that we get stuck with boring titles. *huffs off to the corner to nurse a PGGB*

>108 SylviaC: I'm glad you liked it :)

>112 jillmwo: They were written in the 1980s. During WWII the author was evacuated to her grandfather's house in Somerset, which he had bought in the 1930s from three elderly sisters who were all painters. That house is the anchor point of the series, and sisterhood and art are ongoing themes throughout the books.

>114 MrsLee: The solution to that is to order them from the UK. That's what I did. (Actually, I order a lot of used books from the UK, because it is almost always faster, and often cheaper, to get them to Canada.)

We'd better not tell Jo Walton we skipped the Brust chapters. She doesn't approve of skimming!

>116 SylviaC: I feel a little better after seeing some of Rex Stout's titles and the American titles versus the British titles.
America: Prisoner's Base, British: "Out Goes She"
America: And Be a Villain, British: "More Deaths Than One"
America: In the Best Families, British: "Even in the Best Families"

>114 MrsLee: PGGB = Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster?

>118 TempleCat: That's the one!

I remember reading the first three of the Quantock books when I was in my teens. I don't think the fourth one was available then, and by the time I found a copy I'd lost interest.

I really need to read What makes this book so great?. Or do I? My Tbr piles are already out of control!

>108 SylviaC: I listened to that one. Loved it. Might I suggest Wyrd Sisters? I loved it even more than Equal Rights, and maybe even slightly more than The Wee Free Men.

>120 Sakerfalcon: Each of the books goes off in different directions, but this one more than the others, because most of the book takes place in the 1930s. Also, I'm pretty sure she lifted a piece of the plot from an autobiography I read earlier this year. I suppose I could consider it a tribute, except for the lack of attribution. I did like the whole series, though—that last thing just niggles a bit.

>121 clamairy: It's not in my library system, but I should be able to get it through ILL. I'll give it a shot when I get a few other books out of the way.

Lucky Man by Michael J. Fox. After reading Encephalitis Lethargica : during and after the epidemic, I wanted to find out more about Parkinson's disease, and this happened to be handy. I wasn't a big fan of Fox back in the Family Ties days, but he kind of grew on me over the years. I didn't find his account of his early years particularly enthralling, but it was interesting to read about his maturation process.

>124 SylviaC: As a complete non sequitur, I accidentally almost injured him two years ago. We were both guests at a wedding. I have a tendency to walk very quickly, ducking and dodging in a crowd. He was heading for the restroom and I was barreling toward him at speed, under control but how could he know? He flinched and tried to protect himself, in the process losing and then regaining his balance. I sashayed around him, but saw the fear in his face. I apologized. I was no doubt exceeding the recommended speed limit for the conditions.

>125 stellarexplorer: I'm glad you both stayed on your feet!

>125 stellarexplorer: That sounds a bit like something from the kind of sitcom MJF would have starred in back in the day.

>125 stellarexplorer: said, "I sashayed around him, but saw the fear in his face."

I lurve that sentence. I'm picturing MJF's face going white as a sheet as the Stellar Explorer bears down upon him, calculatedly missing imminent collision by a mere whisker's breadth.

Can't remember the last time I sashayed. Must remember to do more of it in future.

>128 ScoLgo: ScoLgo, you can't know exactly how close your description is!

I believe we should all endeavor to sashay with more frequency.

Of course, one might want to keep it in check during those more sedate ceremonial occasions, don't you think? Sashaying in the midst of a coronation might not be quite right. (One might prefer instead to PROCEED rather than sashay....)

Of course, I move rather like Igor in Young Frankenstein so it's a moot point insofar as I'm concerned.

>131 jillmwo: I believe you mean Eyegore...

>131 jillmwo: I dunno--seeing the main figure in a coronation sashay down the aisle of an abbey somewhere, thirty foot ermine-edged velvet train in tow, might be fun...

>131 jillmwo: >132 clamairy: And of course his wonderful line enacted: "Walk this way"!

>134 stellarexplorer: Uh oh... cue the YF quotes...

"What hump?"

What a filthy mess!
Oh I don't know...some flowers a couple of throw pillows!

>135 ScoLgo: true enough, but I was trying to stay on topic by limiting it to ambulation references 8-)

"Blucher!"

;)

Totally works!

"Ovaltine?"

*breaks into song* Sweet mystery of life, at last I've found you

>141 jillmwo: You forgot the "Ah!"

>131 jillmwo: How strangely apropos that you triggered the quoting of Young Frankenstein only a few days before Gene Wilder passed away.

"Class... is... dismissed."

>143 ScoLgo: I thought of this, too. Gene was older than I thought and quite ill, but it was shocking news to me in spite of that. :o(

My son didn't know who Gene Wilder was until I described him as the less creepy Willy Wonka.

>145 SylviaC: That's how I described him to my daughter, Sylvia!

I need to go watch YF again.

stellarwoman was sadly reminiscing about the time she gave him a tour of her school in 1974. Speaking of which, I always wanted a tour of that factory!

I loved Gene Wilder in "Young Frankenstein", and in "Blazing Saddles". I also like him in a relatively unknown movie "Silver Streak", which is not a great movie, but still a fun watch. Richard Pryor is a hoot, and Patrick McGoohan is wonderful in that one.

Aristocrats by Stella Tillyard. A mixture of biography and history, this is a detailed look at the lives of members of an aristocratic family in Georgian England. The author did an impressive amount of research into both the minutiae of the four sisters' lives and the politics of the period. She quotes extensively from their letters and journals, which provides a sense of immediacy to the narrative. I was left thinking how much social change there can be over the centuries, yet human nature and behaviour remain the same. So now I'd like to find a copy of the illustrated companion that @jillmwo mentioned.

>149 SylviaC: *thumbs up*

>148 fuzzi: "Silver Streak" is one of our favourite films that we watch over and over again, laughing every time. I agree, Patrick McGoohan was perfect in the role he played.

Everything I Know About Love I Learned From Romance Novels by Sarah Wendell. I've said before that I'll read anything from the women of Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, but this proved to be the exception. There were a few chapters that I enjoyed, but I skimmed through the rest of it. It seemed to take itself too seriously as an advice book, and a high percentage of the text was made up of reader comments from the website. I'm probably not in the target audience. Beyond Heaving Bosoms was much better.

>152 SylviaC: Well that last title (and cover) look wonderful.
ARGH!!!!
Looks like I forgot to don my book-bulletproof vest.

>153 clamairy: It's hilarious, but also addresses some serious issues. It does a much better job of balancing the humour and the serious stuff than Everything I Know... does.

I don't read romance at all, but I do like Smart bitches, trashy books. Beyond heaving bosoms is tempting.

If anyone is interested in Seveneves, the ebook version is on sale now for under $3 in Canada and the US.

>156 SylviaC: Thank you!!!

I didn't move quickly enough. It's back up to $12.00 at this point. (Of course, I still have Anathem in ebook form on the TBR pile.)

>158 jillmwo: Odd, it's still $2.99 at Amazon Canada.

The People of Pern by Robin Wood and Anne McCaffrey. Reread. My previously scheduled reading was interrupted by a post on @fuzzi's thread, which forced me to revisit this gorgeous gallery of Pern portraits.

Note: My copy was misbound, and pages 97-112 are inserted between 144 and 145.

>160 SylviaC: I've had that happen to me too...misdirected by reading about someone else's read... ;)

>158 jillmwo: & >159 SylviaC: Yeah, it was $11.99 when I clicked on the link as well. I had said thank you before I even went to look. So I'll wait or borrow from OverDrive.

>162 clamairy: Well, darn. Amazon . com shows it to me as $2.69 in the search results, but $11.99 when I click through to the book page. Still $1.99 in Canada.

Emergence by David Palmer. An eleven year old girl survives nuclear war in a fallout shelter. Candy writes her story for posterity, in shorthand in a series of journals. Extraneous words like pronouns and conjunctions are mostly left out. I had no issues with the style, because that is pretty much how I read anyway, and it perfectly matches Candy's personality. There is just the right amount of humour, and the plot gains momentum until I found myself reading at 1:30am, squinting as the letters got blurrier and blurrier. Despite Candy's age, the book is aimed at an adult audience. There were a couple of plot points that I had issues with, but enjoyed the rest of the book immensely. I'll buy a copy if it ever comes out for Kindle, but I won't buy a 1984 paperback version because the font is too hard on my eyes.

Thank you @stellarexplorer!

I eschew most post-apocalyptic stories, but Emergence sounds fascinating.

>164 SylviaC: It makes me happy that you enjoyed it!

Six Impossible Things by Fiona Wood. A sweet, funny YA novel about a smart but socially awkward 14 year old boy who is starting a new life with his mother after family bankruptcy and the departure of his father. He gradually adapts to his situation, and makes new friends. Dan and his elderly dog are an appealing pair.

>167 SylviaC: I enjoyed this one too!

>168 catzteach: That's why I read it!

>164 SylviaC: That sounds great but used copies seem to be very expensive here in the UK. I'll keep it on my wishlist.

>167 SylviaC: argh! BB...

Good news: public library has a copy.

>170 Sakerfalcon: try bookfinder.com. eBay often has what is otherwise unavailable, too.

>170 Sakerfalcon: I was lucky to be able to borrow a copy. It is very hard to find. Too expensive online, and the condition would be questionable. It isn't available in ebook format. The only library copy I could find here is in a special collection in Toronto, and not available for ILL.

>172 SylviaC: However it is currently available in ebook form in the US. (as well as all the other formats.) I think, as a group, we need to start up an underground railroad to pass books across territorial boundaries.

>173 jillmwo: Emergence? No one on the apocalypse thread has been able to find it as an ebook. Where did you see it?

>174 SylviaC: I'm guessing jill is not referring to Emergence

>174 SylviaC: Ah, probably not. The order of posts was kind of confusing.

Stories of Famous Natural Disasters by Richard Garrett. Written in the 1970s, and feels dated. Kind of a lightweight overview. It was interesting to look at some events, like the 1918 flu, from a British perspective. (I'm not sure I'd classify that as a natural disaster, though—too many human factors involved in its spread.) There was a nice sprinkling of understated humour, but nothing else particularly notable.

>173 jillmwo: Hey! That's a great idea. We could use the postal system. :-)

The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer. Translated to modern English by J.U. Nicholson. Audio. I've been listening to this all summer. I'd only read a few bits and pieces in print before, but this was the whole thing. I admit that I did skip ahead on a couple of tales that were particularly long-winded and preachy (the Parson's Tale is 3 hours long). There were seven narrators, and they were all excellent!

>179 SylviaC: I've been trying to read that for so many years! I get started and just peter out or get distracted every time. Maybe I should try the audio version, but I would need to do it on a long trip or something, because I don't have a commute anymore.

>180 MrsLee: Normally I prefer print, but this was easier for me to tackle in audio. I had some slow, tedious jobs to tackle in the summer, and this worked perfectly. It was also good for hour-long drives, but didn't work so well for the 15 minute hops to town because I needed time to get into the flow. The kids are not at all impressed with some of my reading choices in the car.

>181 SylviaC: LOL, yeah, neither is my husband! I checked my Audible library, and I actually have this one!

Out of India by Jamila Gavin. This is an autobiography, which I would estimate is aimed at about the 8-11 year old range. The author tells the story of her childhood, growing up in India and England in the 1940s and 50s, with an Indian father and an English mother. Her father was very involved with Gandhi's independence movement. She does a good job of describing what she loved about India, without whitewashing the social and political issues of the era.

>182 MrsLee: We probably both bought it on sale years ago.

>183 SylviaC: Beg pardon, but I have to say this: it's Gandhi. In the Hindi (Devanagari) characters of his name, the "dh" is a single letter.

>185 Meredy: Oops! Wasn't paying attention when I typed that, and auto-correct accepted it. I went back and fixed it. Thanks!

>186 SylviaC: Thanks. That's one of the ones I'd like to treat as a global search-and-replace across the entire Internet.

>169 SylviaC: then I'm really glad you liked it!

Foot-Loose in India: Adventures of a News Chaser from Khyber's grim gash of death to the Tiger Jungles of Bengal and the Burmese battle ground of the Black Cobra by Gordon Sinclair. I didn't finish this, but still thought it was worth noting. Gordon Sinclair was a Canadian media icon, born in 1900. He started as a newspaper journalist in 1922, and was broadcasting on radio and TV until his death in 1984. This was his first book, written in 1932, shortly after his career really took off, and was a bestseller when it came out. Adventurous, exciting, swaggering, boastful, reckless, brash, and unrelentingly racist. He enters forbidden areas, armed with two guns and a club. He faces down bandits, rebels, tigers, cobras, and monkeys. He keeps talking about manliness. He interviews Gandhi in prison, bests him in every argument, and dismisses him as a mountebank. His Canadian readers loved it at the time, and further books of his travels sold well, too. It seems to be fairly well established that his stories were embellished, but he remained a popular figure all his life. I was only able to read a few chapters before the racism became too much for me. It was undoubtedly a typical western attitude at the time, but is pretty hard to take now. The book was interesting as an artifact, but not one that I want to examine too closely.

Far too many book bullets while reading your thread. Just stop it!

I've requested Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar, Beyond Heaving Bosoms, and Emergence (via ILL).

I have Seveneves from the library and should be picking it up soon. If I don't, I probably won't be reading it as it's the second time I've taken it out.

>190 Morphidae: Oops. Sorry! (Not really.)
Even though Seveneves is huge, it didn't take me that long to read it. I hope you manage to get Emergence. It seems like some library systems won't ILL it. And I'm sure you'll have fun with the other two.

>191 SylviaC: Yeah, yeah. I heard that, "Sorry, not sorry."

>190 Morphidae: nice to see you!

I know, these threads are dangerous...so many bullets flying...

>190 Morphidae: Far too many book bullets while reading your thread. Just stop it!

I've requested Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar,

@Meredy hit me with that one and I had to travel to Boston to get a copy.

>193 fuzzi: I've been hit here and there by book bullets. But Sylvia got me with THREE.

(>194 pgmcc: But you got it in Cambridge.)

I recently ordered a used hardcover edition of Plato and a Platypus from Better World Books, because I want to have my own copy. I may possibly have ordered a couple of other things, too.

>195 Morphidae: I bet you think that makes you speshul... ;)

>196 Meredy: "Pedant!"

...and I mean that in the nicest possible way.

>198 fuzzi: Not at all. It makes me annoyed (kidding) with Sylvia. It's dangerous here!

Otherbound by Corinne Duyvis. After the first third, I just skipped through the rest. I don't want to discourage anyone else from reading this, because it would be a very good book for many readers. Unfortunately, I just don't enjoy this kind of fantasy. The premise is that every time Nolan closes his eyes, even to blink, he is transported into the body of a slave girl in another world. The violence and misery of her life was what put me off. I do think that the author did an excellent job of portraying main characters with disabilities and sexual diversity, without those aspects being the focus of the book. Even though it didn't work for me, I still recommend that anyone who appreciates darkish fantasy with plenty of diversity check it out.

I've been like Neo in The Matrix in this thread trying to avoid the constant barrage. I might have been a bit too slow to avoid this second (or is it third) round of fire for Plato and a platypus walk into a bar.

*sigh*

>202 clamairy: If at first we don't succeed...

>202 clamairy: I'm certainly enjoying the thought of so many Dragoneers all at once sitting around and giggling philosophically.

For the record, @suitable1 looked for this title when he and I visited The Tattered Cover bookstore in Denver over the weekend during our highly successful Green Dragon meet-up in that city. The bookstore had sold out. (Coincidence? I think not....)

>203 SylviaC: & >204 Meredy: I'm happy to report that my town library has a copy on the shelf, so when I leave work today (I'm in the Historical Room one afternoon a week) it will be under my arm. :o)

>206 clamairy: Another sucker discerning reader!

MrMorphy will be picking up my copy at the library tomorrow.

Somebody in the Weird Little Novelty Volumes section of Penguin's sales and marketing division must be scratching his, her, or their head over this sudden and widely distributed upsurge in sales.

It's all because I went to meet MrsLee at a conjunction of bookstore lines in Mountain View.

>209 Meredy: And do you know how hard it has been for me to resist this book, considering all those here who have loved it? *Sigh*

>209 Meredy: >210 MrsLee:
Some people have crossed an ocean to get a copy.

>211 pgmcc: And the Charles River.

>212 Meredy: How right you are!

>211 pgmcc: It's a good book, but I don't like it that much.

Adventures in Being Human by Gavin Francis. Audio. I loved this book! I had few expectations going in, and just bought it because it was on sale, and the narrator sounded good in the excerpt. It is a series of essays about the human body, but they flow together so well that it feels more like a single narrative. The author is a doctor who is clearly fascinated by the intricacy and wonder or the human body. He starts at the brain and works his way down to the toes. It is a mixture of medical information, history, philosophy, and folklore. He looks at the achievements and limitations of modern medicine, and also considers how some other societies think about health and healing. My only warning for potential readers is that there is some pretty vivid surgical detail in places.

picked up the last copy of Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar at my local Barnes & Noble today.

OH, GOOD!! You finally got it. Now it's just a case of Read-Review-and-Report.

Shouldn't we get a group rate for buying so many copies?

>218 SylviaC: Shouldn't we get a group rate for buying so many copies?

It's a bit late now. @suitable1 bought "the last copy".

>219 pgmcc:

There may be another printing scheduled.

Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell. Another one that I'm surprised my mother didn't introduce to me when I was younger. Nice and relaxing, and works well if you can only read short bits at a time.

I do love Cranford...

I loved Cranford and the TV version also. I hope to read more of Gaskell.

>221 SylviaC: I think Cranford was a book bullet that @jillmwo aimed directly at me a couple of years ago. I did enjoy it. Glad to hear you also found it to your taste. :o)

>223 BonnieJune54: I didn't know there was a TV version. Might have to look for that.

>224 clamairy: Haven't read the book, but I loved the BBC version. Judi Dench, Eileen Atkins, Jim Carter, and others you probably know. Great binge watching.

>225 Meredy: I might have to start that tonight! Thank you!

The Silent History by Eli Horowitz, Matthew Derby, and Kevin Moffett. A science fiction novel presented as an oral history, beginning in the present and covering the next 30 years. Children are being born who are healthy and alert, but have no capacity for expressive or receptive language. Through short entries from numerous characters, many of whom reappear frequently over the years, we see how society responds to these silent children. The book is divided into six parts that correspond to social shifts in public interactions with the silent people.

I like books that are written in the "oral history" format, but keeping track of the repeat characters was a bit of a problem. Each entry was headed with a name, date and location, but the individual voices weren't always distinct. I had to keep checking the table of contents to see whether certain characters had appeared earlier in the book, and try to recall their backgrounds. This probably would have been easier in a physical book than in the ebook version that I was reading. I found that it lagged a bit in the middle, as different people told similar stories, but it picked back up again later.

There is an almost apocalyptic tone to the book. Although it takes place in the near future, the American cities and landscapes seem bleak and regressive. Many of the narrators are not particularly likeable, and even the most sympathetic ones have some pretty major flaws. There are lots of good intentions with unforeseen consequences, as well as prejudice, opportunism, and obsession. Fortunately, the bleakness is leavened by moments of love, hope, and kindness.

As someone with a lifelong interest in disability issues, and some professional experience with augmentative communication systems, I found that the book raised some important questions about the nature of language and communication, human rights, autonomy and self-determination, special education and medical ethics. Lots of questions, but no easy answers.

This will be a memorable reading experience for me. An interesting and unusual concept, fairly well executed. There were a few suspension of disbelief issues, but also very much that was entirely plausible. The book explored themes that are important to me, and helped to give form to some of my thoughts. So despite a few complaints, it worked very well for me on a personal level.

>227 SylviaC: Nice review, Sylvia. A thumbs-up from me.

>228 Meredy: Thank you!

It is a really nice review. And yet I still can't tell whether it would resonate with me as it did for you. I'm glad it did though.

>227 SylviaC: You raise an interesting question (or at least one that popped into my head). Is the use of oral history as a narrative technique the modern day equivalent of the 19th century reliance on diary entries? What would be the difference in how people speak and explain events?

>230 stellarexplorer: Yeah, I find it hard to say who I would recommend it to, because my own response to it is based so much on personal interests and experiences. From what I've seen of your tastes and interests over the years, I think you would probably find it worthwhile.

>231 jillmwo: I find it very similar to the use of diary entries, except that it usually involves a lot more viewpoints. It allows the authors to juggle several storylines, some of which may intersect later, while others can be dropped. It also allows for a wider view of the situation, as it is not limited to following one or two characters. A lot depends on how well the author differentiates the narrative voices. In this case, the grammar, vocabulary and syntax were too similar for some of the characters, given their differences in education, social class, and ethnicity. There were some very distinct voices, though, and some that evolved realistically over the course of the story. It is explained in the prologue that researchers used "an ambient dictation application that allows key subjects to record testimonials at their convenience from anywhere in the world," removing the limitation of the characters needing to be accessible to the researchers. (Unrelated: In retrospect, the prologue is brilliant. I had to go back and reread it after I finished the book, and admire the verbal sleight of hand.) One of the most satisfying things about the use of the oral history format in this particular book is the irony of the story of the silent children being told verbally, an irony which sharply intensifies with later developments.

Understanding Cultural and Human Geography by Paul Robbins. Audio from The Great Courses. This course looks at the interconnectedness of everything. Professor Robbins looks at geography from physical, human, environmental, cultural, epidemiological, economic, and political perspectives. It was very interesting, and I learned some things about bias in mapmaking, the shipping industry, human migration, and the politics of various war torn regions of the world. The second lecture was dedicated to refuting Jared Diamond's theory of geographic determinism. It would have been nice to be able to look at some maps while he lectured, but the few that were included in the supplemental material weren't accessible to me while I was listening—one of the disadvantages of audio. The delivery wasn't the best I've heard, but not the worst, either.

Anya's Ghost by Vera Brosgol. Graphic novel. I gave this to my daughter for her birthday, and she loved it and insisted that I read it. A teenaged girl with self-esteem issues acquires a ghostly friend and learns a lesson about acceptance. Very spooky, drawn all in black and white and shades of purple. I'm clearly not in the target audience, and I've never been a fan of teen angst, but I can see the appeal for young people.

The Duke of Olympia Meets His Match by Juliana Gray. I was drawn to this short novel because of some convincing reviews, and the fact that it involves a romance between a 50 year old woman and a 74 year man. Unfortunately, it didn't live up to the hype. I wanted to find out what would happen, but didn't find the journey particularly convincing. And it contained the most inept espionage I've ever encountered outside of comedy.

Sylvia, you must either read very quickly, or have a lot of free time. You consume books at a prodigious rate!

I suspect she doesn't sleep much!

>233 SylviaC: and >234 SylviaC:
Both sound like I would enjoy them, even though graphic novels are not my favorite. I was a geography major in college.

>236 stellarexplorer: >237 clamairy: A combination of factors has led to me having more free time in the last few months, including increased automation in the barn, no longer having to provide transportation for one of the teenagers, and the school tutoring program that I volunteer with not having started yet. I've also been making an effort to switch more of my computer time to reading time. I don't expect this level of free time to last, but I'm enjoying it while I have it!

I don't normally get through the audio books so quickly, either, but fourteen hours on the train last week helped with that (I can't read print in a moving vehicle). Also, I play them at 1.25 or 1.5 speed.

Plus I don't sleep much. ;)

>238 catzteach: If you have an interest in geography, I'm sure you would enjoy the course. I got it from Audible, and a lot of The Great Courses are available from public libraries, too.

>239 SylviaC: What goes on in the barn? Do you live on a farm, Sylvia?

>240 stellarexplorer:

What happens in the barn, stays in the barn!

>241 suitable1: Yet I'm sure the ladies in the barn cluck amongst themselves...

>241 suitable1: Shhhh!

>242 clamairy: What else would you expect from a bunch of old hens?

>240 stellarexplorer: I'm an egg farmer, and we recently bought an egg packing machine. Our packing time is down to a third of what it used to be. This falls into the category of: "Why didn't we do this years ago?" We also grow crops, but that's mostly my husband's field (pun intended). I never really got the hang of driving a tractor.

Do chickens have large talons?

>244 Bookmarque: I don't understand a word you just said. (Actually, I only got that because Google is my friend.)

>243 SylviaC: That is barely conceivable to me, as I have never before known any (professional) farmers, egg or other. But I am really happy now to know someone who does something that no one else I know does! And congratulations on the new acquisition!

>246 stellarexplorer: I still think it's pretty cool, myself! And I've been here for 20 years.

A History of the World in 6 Glasses by Tom Standage. Interesting but not earth shattering. A history of beer, wine, spirits, coffee, tea, and Coca-Cola, and how each one fits into a different ear of history. It is really 7 glasses, because there is an epilogue about water.

I'm rethinking my plan to read another book I have about the history of tea, because reading about the horrible abuses by the East India Company raises my blood pressure.

>248 SylviaC: I have this one sitting on my Kindle. Sometimes 'not earth shattering' is exactly what I'm looking for...

(Don't have any blood pressure issues, but an Irish temper that is probably just as unhealthy. What's the title of that other book, just out of curiosity?)

>249 clamairy: It's A Brief History of Tea by Roy Moxham. I read his The Great Hedge of India, which is about the East India Company and the salt trade, a few years ago. I think my outrage is cumulative.

The 6 Glasses book is a good choice for sometime when you want a nonfiction book that doesn't require deep concentration. Notwithstanding the EIC, and the slave trade in the spirits section.

>248 SylviaC: I enjoyed that, and felt as you did that it wasn't earth shattering, but interesting. I think I found the last drink about soda pop perhaps the era I had thought the least about in the concept of a beverage changing the world. Been awhile since I read it though. I think it was an audio book for me.

New thread at the link below.

I'm scared to click on the link to Part 3 having snuck in late at the back and promptly been peppered with bullets for Margaret Atwood (I read Oryx and Crake but you've sold me on the rest of the trilogy) and Glacial Period. Dangerous business, playing catch up.