rosalita jumps a little higher in 2018: Verse 5

Well, hello there! I’m Julia and this is where I will chronicle my year in books and other wordy things. I’m 53, I work in higher education, and I live in Iowa. I read books of all sorts (fiction, nonfiction, mystery, history, science fiction/fantasy), maybe fewer than in the past but hopefully better. (Better does not mean Serious, or Literary, or any such thing. It just means, you know, Better.)

And because I do a lot of reading outside of books, I’ll be tempting you once again with Clickbait!, my possibly-too-cute way to refer to links and comments to various internetty items of interest that I find interesting, amusing, or thought-provoking. Maybe you will, too! None of the non-book reading will count toward my 75-book total, of course. And after a year of not counting re-reads in my yearly total, I've decided to once again count all books. Thanks to everyone who chimed in when I was mulling this over late last year!

About those stars:
My system for assigning star ratings to books has evolved over the years, but this chart comes the closest to describing what I consider when I rate a book.
This book may not be perfect, but it was perfect for me.
I will actively recommend this book to friends.
A really great book with minor flaws, still highly recommended.
Better than average but some flaws. Recommended.
Entertaining but probably forgettable, recommended only for fans of the genre or author.
Readable but something about the story, characters or writing was not up to standards. Not recommended.
Finished but did not like, and would not recommend.
Some redeeming qualities made me finish it, but nothing to recommend.
Nearly no redeeming qualities. Really rather bad.
Could not finish, possibly destroyed by fire (unless it's a library book)

2017 in Review

I made the decision at the start of the year to only count new reads in my yearly total, and that turned out to be 77. I've read more in the past but that's OK. Every year has its own rhythm. Since I track reading dates in my catalog, I can see that the total number of books read in 2017, including re-reads, is 103. The consensus in an unscientific poll on my last thread of 2017 showed overwhelming support for counting them all in one list, so that's what I'll do this year.

I only rated three books as :
The Children by David Halberstam (nonfiction, history)
Uprooted by Naomi Novik (fantasy)
Calamity Town by Ellery Queen (fiction, mystery)

The list of books is a bit longer:
The Green Mile by Stephen King
Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz
The Western Star by Craig Johnson
The Glass Universe by Dava Sobel
Dearie: The Remarkable Life of Julia Child by Bob Spitz
Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie
Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal by Mary Roach
Middlemarch by George Eliot
The Trespasser by Tana French
The Fireman by Joe Hill

Of the 77 books I read for the first time, 38 were written by men; 37 by women, and 2 were written by a mixed male-female collaboration.

And that's about the extent of the stats I tracked last year. This year I'm also tracking whether books are ones I own or borrowed, to encourage me to read more of my own books.

March in Review


Lincoln: Biography of a Writer

Montana 1948
Travels With Charley

Orphan Train
The Strange Death of Fiona Griffiths
The Crossing Places (re-read)
The Gate Keeper (re-read)

A strong month of reading!

Full March stats

Life’s Full of Challenges
I have had years when I plunged headfirst into a bucketload of challenges, only to get overwhelmed and abandon most or all of them by summer. And I have had years when I have merrily read purely at random, only to have a sense of having under-achieved at the end of the year. Is it possible to strike a happy balance between the two? Let’s find out!

Nonfiction Reading Challenge

• January: Prizewinning Books
  • October 1964 by David Halberstam
• February: Biographies
  • Lincoln: Biography of a Writer by Fred Kaplan
• March: History
  • Austerity Britain 1945-1951 by David Kynaston

January TIOLI

• Challenge #3: Read a book that is on a list of best or notable books of 2017
  
  • Manhattan Beach
• Challenge #4: WIKI Rolling Challenge: Read a book with 'w', 'i', 'k', or 'i' in the title
  
  • Like Love
• Challenge #12: Read a book with a geometric shape in the title
  
  • Midnight Line
• Challenge #15: Read a book with a title that contains the letter 'u' at least twice
  
  • Autumn
• Challenge #16: Read a book with at least a two-word title, but containing no prepositions
  
  • October 1964

February TIOLI

• Challenge #3: Read a book of which the title contains something you love
  
  • Slow Horses
• Challenge #9: Read a book with a tree or trees on the cover
  
  • And Justice There Is None
• Challenge #15: Read a book with a title containing the words Harry, Max, Rainy, black, red, or some variation thereof
  
  • The Black Ice
• Challenge #16: Read a book with a title word or author name starting with GOLDSILVERBRONZE in rolling order
  
  • Lincoln: Biography of a Writer
• Challenge #17: Read a book with an animal on the cover
  
  • Stephen Florida

March TIOLI

• Challenge #3: Rolling challenge: Read a book with a plural noun in the title, going up in alphabetical order
  
  • Travels With Charley
• Challenge #6: Read a book where the author's first name is also the name of a city or village in your state, province or the like
  
  • The Gate Keeper (Charles {City, IA} Todd)
• Challenge #9: Read a book first published in the last 10 years (2008 or later)
  
  • The Strange Death of Fiona Griffiths
• Challenge #14: Read a book with water on the cover
  
  • The Crossing Places

April TIOLI

• Challenge #1: Read a book with at least three pages starting with the same word, but NOT the word "the"
  
  • Where There's a Will
Challenge #2: Read a book where something you could find in the sky is part of the title

• Dragonflight
• Challenge #5: Read a book whose titles references a physical action a human can perform
  
  • Murder in the Mews
• Challenge #6: Read a book whose LT average rating is more than 4.0
  
  • Austerity Britain 1945-51 (4.3)
• Challenge #7: Read a book with a title that is inclusive
  
  • Ten Plus One
• Challenge #8: Read a book by an award-winning author, written earlier than the award-winning book
  
  • The Concrete Blonde (1996; Michael Connelly, The Anthony Award, 2009)
• Challenge #17: Read a book that is the second in its series
  
  • Winter Gets Hot

Currently Reading

  

Still plugging away with this one; it's a beast but a fascinating beast at least. The second is for my real-life book club.

Ooh! Ooh! Can I wish you a happy new thread?!?

Bwahahahaha!

Lots of new threads getting started today. I am hoping to later...

>6 katiekrug: Such a troublemaker you are, KAK...

Happy new thread, Julia!

>8 katiekrug: LOVE that!

Happy new thread, Julia!

Happy new thread!

Julia!! Happy May! Happy New thread!

Happy new thread, Julia. I love the topper. Very appropriate.

From your last thread - I love the Koontz quote -- I think that especially applies to women, who were often pushed into writing genre fiction -- or at least their work was labeled as such. And if we look at mysteries and SF today, we can see that a lot of great writing and interesting ideas can be found there.

Happy New Thread!

Howdy.

Thanks, everyone!

>13 BLBera: I agree with all of that, but also it seems that Dean Koontz has some emotional baggage he's lugging around regarding being a genre writer. I hope it felt good for him to get that off his chest. :-)

April in Review

The book I spent the most hours reading in April doesn't even appear on this list — Austerity Britain is a nearly 700-page behemoth that I feel like I've been reading forever. I'm quite sure it will have a prominent place in next month's stats, as I'm thoroughly enjoying it.

The other stat to note is that I did a very good job reading off my shelves this month: six of the nine books I completed are my own, as is the one I'm still working on. I wanted to make this a point of emphasis this year, and I'm pleased it's working out.




Dragonflight


She Came Back
The Concrete Blonde
Murder in the Mews
Ten Plus One
Where There's a Will


Winter Gets Hot
The Great St. Mary's Day Out
The Cold Dish

Author genders
Male: 5
Female: 4

Genre
Fiction: 9
Nonfiction: 0

Source:
Library: 3
Bookshelves: 6

Continuing series
She Came Back (Miss Silver, 9/32)
Winter Gets Hot (Emily Winter, 2/2)
The Concrete Blonde (Harry Bosch, 3/22)
The Great St. Mary's Day Out (St. Mary's, 7.5/9)
Murder in the Mews (Hercule Poirot, 15/39)
The Cold Dish (Walt Longmire, 1/13)
Dragonflight (Dragonriders of Pern, 1/17)
Ten Plus One (87th Precinct, 17/55)
Where There's a Will (Nero Wolfe, 8/48)

>17 rosalita: Apparently the diaries of my friend’s grandfather are one of the source documents in Austerity Britain. Not that i’ve ever read it ....

>18 SandDune: Oh, that's so cool, Rhian! Some of the most fascinating bits come from diary excerpts of which there are a lot. It's one of the most compelling things about the book — getting that ground-level view of what ordinary folks thought about things.

>18 SandDune: That is very cool.

So, Julia. When you're doing this reading from your shelves, are you sending the books to new homes, or keeping them? I do a decent job reading from my shelves -- it's the passing on of books read that is the hard part for me.

>20 BLBera: I usually donate paper books to our local library to put in their semi-annual book sale, but I'd be happy to also send a book to someone who would like to read it. And a number of the owned books I've been reading are ebooks, so I can't pass them along but at least I can archive them off my e-reader — to make room for more books, obviously!

Happy new thread Julia my dear.

Tuesday Clickbait



It's been a while since I offered up any clickbait to you all, but here's a good one from Penguin Random House:
A Season of Stories — "For a limited time in the fall and winter of 2016, we emailed eleven fiction tales, all written in the first person, directly to readers. Our mission was to make your inbox a better place with great storytelling, enabling you to dive into a great story when you needed a quick escape from daily stress.

This April, Season of Stories returns, with three more months of hand-picked short stories from acclaimed authors Trevor Noah, Jane Green, Victor LaValle, Joy Williams, Marie Lu and more. Each week, you’ll get a new short story delivered to your inbox in four installments, sent daily from Tuesday until the conclusion on Friday.

Hallelujah to the end of winter and the beginning of a brand-new season."

Julia I must tell you that I have a little Springsteen songfest whenever I see the title of your thread! And then I get to see what you've been reading and it's even better!

Karen O.

p.s. "Well, tell him this is his last chance to get his daughter in a fine romance. Because the record company, Rosie, just gave me a big advance!"

Happy new thread, Julia!!

>24 klobrien2: Hi, Karen! I have to admit that I still hum the melody of "Rosalita" every time I make a new thread. :-)

>25 scaifea: Thanks!

Someday we’ll look back on this and it will all seem funny

Happy new thread, Julia! We’re having the gift of rain today.

>27 Copperskye: Remember, Joanne: windows are for cheaters, chimneys for the poor, closets are for hangers, winners use the door! :-)

It keeps threatening rain here but nothing so far. We are quite dry so I hope we do get some eventually.

Happy New Thread, Julia!

We've got rain threatened here, too, and it'll be in the 80s. Well, it's better than more snow.

Absolutely better than snow, Joe!

>28 rosalita: So use it, Rosie, that’s what it’s there for...

“Alexa, Play Rosalita”

“Alexa, Louder”

:)

>31 Copperskye: :D

>31 Copperskye: Gosh, I have to go listen to that song! Actually, maybe watch it on YouTube. Springsteen gave the absolutely best concerts of my young adulthood. He played his heart out. Thanks for the memories!

Karen O.

Happy New Thread, Julia. Loving the warm weather but did not expect it to jump into July. I hope you are doing well.

>33 klobrien2: It's such a great song, Karen! I had to cue it up myself after all this great conversation you started. No Alexa in this house, though.

"Julia, play 'Rosalita'!"

:-D

Happy new thread, Julia! Glad you're still enjoying Austerity Britain - those books are very long, and the print is tiny.

I just realized that I skipped over Mark's message at >34 msf59: — sorry about that, Mark! Agreed on the weather — it was very humid the past couple of days but we had some big thunderstorms move through last night and that's helped moderate things a bit. I hope the relief gets to Chicago soon.

>36 susanj67: At least I'm reading an ebook so I can adjust the type size, Susan, but yes it's incredibly long! Good thing it's so absorbing to read.

>33 klobrien2: You started it Karen, so thank you! I hum a little every time I read Julia’s thread name.

>35 rosalita: Lol!

30. Where There's a Will by Rex Stout.

The three Hawthorne sisters — April, May, and June in reverse age order — are disconcerted when their millionaire brother, Noel, dies and bequeaths to each of them a peach, a pear, and an apple, respectively. The bulk of his estate goes not to his wife but his mistress. The sisters say they don't mind being cut out but are alarmed that sister-in-law Daisy intends to fight the will in court, thereby bringing them the short of publicity they can do without. They want Nero Wolfe to convince the mistress to give the widow half the money to prevent the lawsuit, but they soon have even bigger problems when Noel's apparently accidental death is found to be murder.

Set in 1939, this ninth series entry has possibly the most eclectic set of guest characters ever to grace Wolfe's office. The Hawthorne sisters seem to be intended as a sort of low-key colonies version of the Mitford sisters: The oldest is married to the U.S. Secretary of State; the middle sister is a brilliant scientist and college president; and the youngest is taking the Broadway stage by storm. Toss in a widow who wears a veil after a devastating archery accident left her permanently disfigured and a next-generation young female whom her own mother calls "a professional fiend," and you've got a bunch of women custom-made for getting on Wolfe's nerves.

Adding insult to injury is the distasteful aspect of a family fight about money; Wolfe has previously proclaimed that he would never take such a case since it would inevitably become "a game of tug-of-war using a dead man's guts for a rope." But it's the Depression and those orchids won't breed themselves. Thankfully, a good juicy murder soon pops up to make the whole puzzle more palatable for our finicky friend. Wolfe's discomfort also provides leg man Archie Goodwin plenty of opportunity for quips and scoldings, handed out as needed to all and sundry, but especially the boss. I enjoy this one more now than when I first read it, as my appreciation for Stout's masterful command of dialogue and repartee has increased over the years.

>38 Copperskye: I watched the E Street Band do "Rosalita" and then I had to watch "American Land" too! If you haven't seen/heard that one, it is wonderful. Very Irish-sounding, sprightly, makes you want to get up and dance.

I loved the Anne McCaffreys that I have read (it's been a while). I should get back into them, and I should start up with the Rex Stouts. Thanks for the great reviews.

Karen O.

Aw, Dragonflight was my favorite Pern novel, and I read all the original novels. I recently reread it, and though I still enjoyed it, I found a few of the scenes a little hard to take.

>23 rosalita: Thanks for that. I signed up.

Happy New Thread!

>40 klobrien2: You're welcome for the reviews, Karen — thanks for reading them. I am trying to convince myself that having re-read Dragonflight I have no need to re-read all the rest of them. I'm not sure it's working ...

"American Land" is delightful. The whole Seeger Sessions album has really grown on me over the years, after originally feeling a bit 'meh' about it.

>42 rosalita: Just the Dragon Song series, it's light!

>43 quondame: Oh, but I have to read The White Dragon since it was my introduction to Pern. And I do love the Dragonsong subseries, so those for sure. And I can't leave out Moreta's Ride ... and therein lies the problem!

Currently Reading

     

A library book came in so I've added it to the currently reading pile. I can't remember who on LT recommended it, of course. If it was you, thanks!

Stopping by to do a long overdue catch up on your thread Julia.

From your last thread and the discussion re Judith Flanders' non-fiction books, I've read both The Victorian House and The Victorian City. I enjoyed both but had some reservations about the structure of The Victorian City - from memory it was structured around the progression of the day so starting off with the very early morning and continuing through the day which I didn't feel completely worked. It also covered the period from 1810 to 1870 so not strictly just the Victorian period and didn't really explain the changes which would have taken place within London during those 60 years.

It was still interesting and worth reading though I thought Liza Picard's Victorian London did a better job of covering the same subject.

And I remember enjoying Austerity Britain (and it took me a long time to get through to) but for some reason I've never got round to reading Family Britain even though I have a copy on the shelf. If you continue on to FB maybe give me a nudge and I'll join in.

Wishing you (slightly belatedly) a happy new thread, Julia.

Have a great Sunday.

Happy Sunday, Julia! I'm hoping that it is full of fabulous for you.

>39 rosalita: Most excellent! I just picked that one up in a Kindle deal recently. And I will add my thumb to your most excellent review if you posted that.

Hi Julia!

>39 rosalita: Great review. I enjoy this one more now than when I first read it, as my appreciation for Stout's masterful command of dialogue and repartee has increased over the years. Good encouragement for me to reread the series!

>46 souloftherose: Thanks for stopping by, Heather! I appreciate the guidance on the Flanders non-fiction; I may look for the Picard book instead. I'm pretty sure I'll want to continue on to Family Britain but perhaps not right away, since they are such enormous chunksters. That's probably how you felt when you finished Austerity, too! But perhaps the collective will can help us overcome that later this year or early next year. I still have to find a copy, for one thing.

>47 PaulCranswick: Thanks, Paul!

>48 Crazymamie: That e-sale is where I picked up my copy of Where There's a Will, Mamie, and this why I re-read it now. There seems to be a Stout book on sale every month or so, so I'm haphazardly building an ebook collection. I've posted the review now; thanks for the reminder and the thumb.

>49 karenmarie: I would never discourage anyone from re-reading the Wolfe series, Karen! For me, it holds up to endless re-reads, whether in order or random order.

Your review reminds me that I really should read more Rex Stout, Julia. I'm missing Archie's smart mouth.

And yes, I did see Archie first. The 1960s beats 1975.

>51 Familyhistorian: I can't argue with your math, Meg!

*Wave*

>54 nittnut: "Stop! Don't go! Come back, Jenn!"

:-)

>15 weird_O: He comes.
He leaves his mark.
He leaves.

Hi Julia!
>23 rosalita: end of winter/start of winter, its all the same. Oh, hang on. No it's not. It is the exact opposite :):):)
So I light the fire, and carry on.

>56 LovingLit: I spent a fair amount of time the past few months envying your carefree summer adventures, Megan, as I threw another blanket on the bed and cranked up the central heating. I feel like I've gained an extra 30 minutes in the mornings, not having to warm up the car and scrape ice and snow off the windows. And the joys of just walking out of the house without having to find your boots, hat, scarf, mittens and coat will never get old for me.

>45 rosalita: If the new one is The Dry then it may have been me. Unless you don't like it, in which case I'm quite certain it was somebody else. So you're welcome! (Maybe?)

>58 swynn: The new one is indeed The Dry! Thank you for the recommendation, Steve. I haven't written my review yet, but I liked it a whole lot.

Edited to add: I just went back and looked at your thread where you reviewed it in March, and I even posted there that I put it on the library's holds list after your recommendation. So it's officially your fault.

>57 rosalita: we haven't had a snowfall here in many a winter! I wont mind when we do, as it is such a novelty for us. We do have to scrape ice off the windshield though, and when that happens it usually means a sunny clear day, as the front doesn't come if it has ben cloudy overnight. I love cold crisp but sunny winter days....its just the sludgy ones I tire of :)
Happy summering to you!!

>59 rosalita: *whew* And, you're welcome!

Happy new(ish) thread. I've been seeing The Dry around LT and Litsy and I think I'm going to have to grab it!

>62 ChelleBearss: I do believe you'd like it, Chelle!

>56 LovingLit: Yes, I stop in and leave. And even when I don't leave a mark...well, a mark isleft on my behalf. Looked at espresso/cappuccino makers at Amazon. (Mine is in decline and local stores have nothing.) Now Amazon is stalking me on line, trying to seduce me with lovely, mighty-looking makers...for $300 and up. Hard not to leave a mark.

Hi Julia, I recently picked up The Dry as it is getting a lot of good reviews here on LT. I am looking forward to getting to it.

Happy almost new thread!!

>55 rosalita: LOL Don't worry, I'm usually lurking. I just don't have much to say all the time. I am feeling a Hooray for not having to leave with hat, coat, mittens, boots and Boo for Pollen. Summer is arriving in my neck of the woods this weekend.

>65 weird_O: The ad stalking is uncanny and creepy, Bill. It's almost enough to make me stop shopping online ... almost.

>66 DeltaQueen50: I will look forward to reading your comments, Judy! I hope you like it.

>67 Berly: Thanks!

>68 nittnut: I do that a lot myself, Jenn, so no hard feelings over here. We went from high temps in the 50s to highs in the 80s, which isn't exactly my preference but still better than snow. At least we've only had one bout of severe weather so far; hoping that continues.

Lurking.

Lurking.

>57 rosalita: Amen, Julia. I've had to stop myself from grabbing a jacket as I leave the house.

I emailed my friend in Anamosa, asking about when in July might work for her. If she is busy, then I'll just choose a date.

>65 weird_O: I wanted to throw some curve ball words into a private fb message the other day, you have remained me to do just that! Maybe I will message *meat grinder*, *tennis balls* and *flights to Madrid* and see what advertising I get :)

Hi Julia! So, what's the haps??

>71 BLBera: Sounds good, Beth. July will be here before we know it.

>72 LovingLit: 'Sup, Megan? It's all good up here. Little rainy today, but I don't mind that a bit. I need to write my review of The Dry soon, before I forget all the points I wanted to make.

And, we're back to jacket weather...

Mary said the last weekend of July works for them. You?

Hi Julia!

The first time I realized that Amazon was stalking me was when I had been looking at euphoniums for daughter and then there was an ad on Slate Magazine. Just plain creepy.

>75 karenmarie: I had the same thing happen with kayaks. I was doing some research before buying, and immediately wherever I went on the internet were ads for kayaks... Definitely creepy!

Hi, Julia!

Does next month suit you for Pilgrim's Rest, or would you prefer to leave it until July? (Usual story, ILL...)

>74 BLBera: Brrr, so cold and rainy here today, Beth. I had to turn the heat back on. Boo! Last weekend of July looks good for me.

>75 karenmarie: >76 drneutron: I usually don't notice it unless it's something unusual that I've been searching for. Then the weirdness really stands out. Creepy, indeed.

>77 lyzard: June works for me, but July is OK if you need more time to get hold of a copy, Liz. Still looking forward to your review of the last one ... ;-)

Aren't we all? :)

I'm okay either way too so I'll check in with Harry.

I'll plan for that Saturday in Iowa City, then. Pencil me in.

>79 lyzard: Coolio. Just let me know.

>80 BLBera: You are on the calendar, Beth! Woot!

31. The Dry by Jane Harper.

Aaron Falk has returned to his hometown in rural Victoria, Australia, for the first time in decades. He's only here to attend the funeral of his childhood best friend Luke, who has apparently killed himself and his family. Luke's parents can't believe he did it, and they ask Aaron, who is now a federal lawman who specializes in financial crimes, to investigate.

The backstory of how Aaron and his dad came to leave Kiewarra so suddenly all those years ago unfolds slowly, but it's clear from the start that a great many people do not want him back in town. Not helping matters is the devastating drought that has a grip on the area; its effects on his farm are thought to have been the catalyst for Luke's terrible crime. Harper does an excellent job of creating a community in crisis, and her descriptions of the drought-starved land are so vivid I found myself wanting a tall glass of water every time I sat down to read.

On the one hand, this is just the opener of yet another crime series. But Harper's skill with characters, plot and setting raise it above the usual debut. It also stands alone, so you could choose to not read any more and walk away satisfied. As for me, I'll more than likely read on.

>82 rosalita: I've added this to my list, Julia. I've heard lots of good things about it. Nice comments.

Thanks, Beth! I enjoyed it a lot.

32. And Four to Go by Rex Stout.

I've been really enjoying the periodic sales on Stout's Nero Wolfe ebooks. It's allowing me to slowly replace my paper collection with a virtual one, and giving me the perfect excuse to re-read each one as I buy it as well. Here we've got a set of four short stories, three of which revolve around holidays:

Christmas Party finds Archie trying to teach Wolfe a lesson about making assumptions, which embroils them both in murder when a textile designer (and former client) is poisoned at his firm's holiday fête.

Wolfe goes to drastic lengths to secure a sample of a rare orchid hybrid in Easter Parade, once again landing Archie in hot water when a wealthy woman is killed right in front of him on Fifth Avenue.

Fourth of July Picnic takes Wolfe out of the brownstone and into the wilds of Long Island when he reluctantly agrees to be the keynote speaker at a gathering of food-service union members. When a union official is killed, it's up to the big man and his sassy sidekick to finger the culprit before the law fingers them.

And finally, in Murder Is No Joke Wolfe uses a clever (and now obsolete) telephone trick first to prove that a murder occurred and then to solve it.

Generally speaking, I don't love the Wolfe shorts as much as I do the full-length novels. They put an emphasis on plot that Stout's abilities can't always carry off, his strength to me lying in his well-drawn characters and ear for dialogue. But there's nothing really wrong with any of these, other than they leave me wanting more.

>82 rosalita: Great review of The Dry, Julia. It was really good and I should look for the second book as well as some Rex Stout books like the one you reviewed in>85 rosalita:.

I’ve had The Dry languishing on my Kindle for a while now. I’ve heard a lot of good things about it and I’m glad to see you liked it. I need to get on it. I saw that she had a new book out but I didn’t realize it was connected to the first one. Another series for us to follow!

>86 Familyhistorian: So glad you were a fan of The Dry as well, Meg. I've been eyeing Book Two on the library website but I haven't pulled the trigger yet. If you get to it before me, I'll be interested in your thoughts.

>87 Copperskye: Believe it or not, Joanne, I had no idea it was the first of a series when I picked it up. The last thing I need is another series, but I have to admit it was really good. Oh, well, what's one more series? :-)

Glad to see The Dry was a good one after all! It's on my list for "eventually", whenever that may be.

Hi Julia!

The Dry sounds like something right up my alley. BB!

And like you said, Oh, well, what's one more series? :-)

>90 karenmarie: I just can't seem to stop adding series, Karen! But I guess when they are as good as this one, I don't mind quite as much. I hope you enjoy it.

Love the topper, Julia. We are having a rainy afternoon here. I should be reading, but thought I would pay some visits around the threads. Molly's preschool graduation is tonight. I hope the rain stops before then because I washed my car yesterday. Also, I don't want the new grad to get wet!

I really liked The Dry and my SIL tells me the second one is just as good. The title eludes me now. "What's one more series"? More fun books to read...

>92 Donna828: Hi there, Donna! I hope you get clear skies for Molly's graduation. You do realize it's your fault it's raining since you washed your car? :-)

I'm excited to hear the second book after The Dry is also good. I am resisting looking for it at the library ... my willpower is being sorely tested!

>92 Donna828:, >93 rosalita: I have actually tried washing my car in order to get some rain. Sadly, it did not work. Forecast today is for possible rain. Maybe I'll run out and get my car washed just to give it a little extra nudge.

>94 Storeetllr: I hope it works for you, Mary! After reading The Dry I find myself especially sensitive to thoughts of living in drought country. Maybe you can help stem the tide!

Today's Quote

I haven't been posting many Clickbait articles lately, not because I haven't been reading them but because I haven't had as much time to spend on LT. Waaaaah! But this afternoon I was reading Ta-Nehisi Coates' article in The Atlantic about Kanye West, and these two paragraphs took my breath away:

But this was 1982, and Michael Jackson was God, but not just God in scope and power, though there was certainly that, but God in his great mystery; God in how a child would hear tell of him, God in how he lived among the legend and lore; God because the Walkman was still uncommon, and I was young and could not count on the car radio, because my parents lived between NPR and WTOP. So the legends were all I had—tales of remarkable feats and fantastic deeds: Michael Jackson mediated gang wars; Michael Jackson was the zombie king; Michael Jackson tapped his foot and stones turned to light. Even his accouterments felt beyond me—the studded jacket, the sparkling glove, the leather pants—raiment of the divine, untouchable by me, a mortal child who squinted to see past Saturday, who would not even see Motown 25 until it was past 30, who would not even own a copy of Thriller until I was a grown man, who no longer believed in miracles, and knew in my heart that if the black man’s God was not dead, he surely was dying.

And he had always been dying—dying to be white. That was what my mother said, that you could see the dying all over his face, the decaying, the thinning, that he was disappearing into something white, desiccating into something white, erasing himself, so that we would forget that he had once been Africa beautiful and Africa brown, and we would forget his pharaoh’s nose, forget his vast eyes, his dazzling smile, and Michael Jackson was but the extreme of what felt in those post-disco years to be a trend. Because when I think of that time, I think of black men on album covers smiling back at me in Jheri curls and blue contacts and I think of black women who seemed, by some mystic edict, to all be the color of manila folders. Michael Jackson might have been dying to be white, but he was not dying alone. There were the rest us out there, born, as he was, in the muck of this country, born in The Bottom. We knew that we were tied to him, that his physical destruction was our physical destruction, because if the black God, who made the zombies dance, who brokered great wars, who transformed stone to light, if he could not be beautiful in his own eyes, then what hope did we have—mortals, children—of ever escaping what they had taught us, of ever escaping what they said about our mouths, about our hair and our skin, what hope did we ever have of escaping the muck? And he was destroyed. It happened right before us. God was destroyed, and we could not stop him, though we did love him, we could not stop him, because who can really stop a black god dying to be white?

My goodness, that man can write!

Thanks, Julia. Yes, it's not fun to be in a drought area. Every day I'm grateful for the humidifier else I'd be in dry skin and nosebleed city. I did get the car washed, and it does look like a big storm coming this way. Maybe I should try to do a rain dance.

>96 rosalita: Wow.

>96 rosalita: Wow, can Coates write!

>97 Storeetllr: I've got my fingers crossed for you to get wet, Mary!

>98 quondame: Isn't he, though?

>96 rosalita: Wow, thanks for posting that quote, Julia. Amazing writing. MJ was such a good-looking young guy, too, before he started messing around with his features.

Thanks for that, Joe. It was baffling and strange to watch him go to such lengths to destroy his appearance. I never thought about the message that was sending to other African-Americans who had to live inside the bodies the white world thought (and made sure to tell them) was so ugly.

>97 Storeetllr: It worked! It worked! That, plus I went out this morning in a short-sleeved tee and didn't bring my umbrella or a sweater. Of course it started to pour when I was in the grocery store, and I got soaked when I shlepped my groceries to the car. Cold and wet, I was smiling!

Yay!

>96 rosalita: that is a cool excerpt.
We were looking at picture on the interne of MJ, and W couldn't believe he was the same person (pre- and post-plastic surgery). It was interesting to hear a 9 year old say that he looked way better before, as he had "cool" hair and a "normal" nose!

>104 LovingLit: It's a shame that Wilbur and the rest of us can all see that but MJ couldn't, isn't it? What a tragedy.

Monday Clickbait



Laurie by Stephen King — Stephen King recently tweeted a link to a free short story he wrote recently. It's tailor made for dog lovers — no supernatural horror here, I promise! (Maybe just a smidge of non-supernatural horror.) I thought it was really sweet. (The pic is of a Border Collie-Mudi puppy, the same mixed breed that stars in the story. Just look at that face!)

Woot for Border Collies!

>107 scaifea: Indeed! All puppies are cute but my goodness, border collies are just the cutest. And they stay cute even when they're grown up, as the lovely Tuppence shows.

>106 rosalita:

Laurie was a welcome read - thank you!

And, how I miss the rescue Border Collies of my life -
Curly when I was young, Michael after college,
and Duke, then
Khayman and Elise in the country...

>96 rosalita: Hi Julia--Stunning writing and insight by Coates. I never did understand why Michael Jackson worked so hard to change his appearance--he was so cute when he was younger. It made me so sad. Still does.

The Dry sounds great--like I need another series! Dang you. : )

>109 m.belljackson: I'm glad you enjoyed it, Marianne! We never forget the dogs we shared our lives with. Each one stays with us forever.

>110 Berly: Hi Kim! Coates really made me look at Michael Jackson in a new light. The whole article, tying Jackson's "dying to be white" with Kanye's embrace of Trump in search of essentially the same thing, is really thought-provoking.

Hey, I didn't need another series, either! The least I can do is share the pain. :-)

Julia, glad to hear that you liked The Dry. It was a Kindle Daily Deal here yesterday so I snagged it for 99p :-)

>112 susanj67: Ooh, perfect! I'll look forward to seeing what you think.

>50 rosalita: 'I'm pretty sure I'll want to continue on to Family Britain but perhaps not right away, since they are such enormous chunksters. That's probably how you felt when you finished Austerity, too!'

Yep, that was pretty much what happened to me! Of course, now it's been so long I'm worried I won't remember enough of the stuff covered in Austerity Britain for Family Britain to make sense.

>96 rosalita: Oh, wow. That's powerful stuff. I still haven't read any of Coates' essays and I was just saying on Kim's thread that I really need to.

The Dry was a Kindle deal here, too, the other day, and I snapped it up :)

>114 souloftherose: Coates is a really powerful writer, Heather. I hope you're able to get to him someday.

>115 katiekrug: That's great, Katie! I hope you like it.

33. Austerity Britain: 1945-51 by David Kynaston.

Whew! Six weeks and 692 pages after cracking it open, I finally turned the last page in this history of Britain in the years immediately following World War II. The first word that comes to mind is NOT "exhausting" — rather it's "fascinating". As long as it took to read, I was sorry to see it end, and you can't say that about every 600-page book you read!

I was completely absorbed in Kynaston's meticulously detailed and annotated social history. He draws on public records, contemporaneous media reports, and most of all the personal diaries of scads of ordinary and not-so-ordinary Britons to lay bare not only the facts of what happened, when, and by whom, but how people from all walks of life felt and coped with it. Now and then I spotted the name of a Brit who was unknown then and has since become famous, but I suspect I missed a number that would have been recognizable to their fellow countrymen. One that I didn't miss sent a bit of a chill up my spine, as Kynaston scatters without fanfare a few informational nuggets about an unsuccessful young Tory politician named Margaret Roberts, who had yet to marry her eventual husband, Denis Thatcher. We've all seen how that movie ends.

The beauty of Kynaston's approach of mining personal diaries for information is the sheer depth and breadth of his depiction of the era's impact on the people of Great Britain. Even though I consider myself a history junkie I confess I had no idea how seriously difficult the country's economic situation was once VE- and VJ-Day had come and gone. Anecdotes about massive housing shortages, the continuing rationing of just about every household good you can imagine, and mandatory electrical blackouts for hours every day to conserve energy took a tremendous toll on the quality of people's physical and emotional lives. Despite the landslide victory by the Labour Party in 1945, the government struggled to implement democratic socialist policies that were meant to ease the post-war pain and jump-start the economy. Kynaston does a good job of laying out the reasons for their only sporadic success. (The one program that was popular from the start was the National Health Service, which this American read about with wistful envy.)

The only blemish keeping this from being a 5-star book for me might not be a factor for others: The book is clearly written for a British audience, and Kynaston tosses out names of sports teams and players, radio and television programmes and actors with little or no context. More than once he related an anecdote about a big crowd at some sporting event or other without specifying what sport he was talking about. I'm sure to Britons it's all perfectly clear, but I felt a bit at sea with these pop-culture and other insular references.

There are two further books (so far) in this historical series, Family Britain: 1951-57 and Modernity Britain 1957-62. I believe Kynaston intends to take the series up to Thatcher's ascension to prime minister in 1979. I'm already on the lookout for a reasonably priced ebook of the next, as I can't imagine not continuing to learn more about this utterly fascinating topic.

34. The Murderer Is a Fox by Ellery Queen.

Davy Fox has returned as a decorated war hero to his hometown of Wrightsville, that bucolic village in upstate New York that so enraptured Ellery Queen on his first visit to Calamity Town. What the town doesn't know is that Davy is not the same young man he was when he left. He gets the shakes, has flashbacks to some of his most brutal air battles against the Japanese enemy, and involuntarily fantasizes about killing his beloved wife, Linda. It's a classic case of what we would now call post-traumatic stress disorder, though in 1944 it was simply "a case of nerves."

Exacerbating Davy's condition are the traumatic events of his childhood, when he abruptly (for reasons that are withheld from the reader until much later in the book) went to live with his Uncle Talbot Fox and Aunt Emily, adoptive parents of young Linda. Whatever it was that happened to his family when he was 10 years old, it's been eating at him ever since, and the trauma of war has only deepened his distress. He's determined to leave Linda and Wrightsville far behind, since he can't trust himself not to do her harm. But before he can make his escape, Lindy gets him to agree to talk to Ellery Queen, to see if that eminent detective can help him sort out his issues and save their marriage.

Many of the characters from Calamity Town are present here, too, though some of them have lamentably brief cameos. The author doesn't spare the town busybodies and ne'er-do-wells from censure, even as he waxes rhapsodic about the gentle pace of small-town life. As Ellery sets about trying to solve the mystery, it seems hopeless, and typically of a Queen case, there's more than one version of the truth ...

>117 rosalita: Excellent review, Julia! And I'm glad you liked it :-) I am also a bit in the dark about some of the sports anecdotes in British social history, as they are well before my time *and* I don't follow sports, so I haven't caught up in the same way that I have with, say, radio and TV references that pre-date me :-)

Thanks, Susan! I just loved it — the level of insight into ordinary people's lives was unsurpassed in my opinion. And the pop-culture references I did get were fun — Bill Wyman talking about having qualified for grammar school and feeling completely out of place with his working-class background was quite poignant. I must confess that I was rather appalled at the idea of thinking you can tell by age 11 whether a child is worthy of a decent academic education, and thereby determine their lifelong prospects. I'm glad we didn't bring that system to this particular former colony!

I never thought about the signals that MJ was sending to young black people as he changed his appearance to look more white until I read that article by Coates. Powerful stuff.

>117 rosalita: Great review of Austerity Britain. I have Family Britain on the shelf but it looks like it would be good to read the first book before that one. It would be interesting to know what my family lived through at that time.

Hi, Meg! Thank you for sharing your thoughts about the Coates article. It was fascinating to read how he sees the root cause of MJ's tragedy as the same catalyst for Kanye's support of Trump. I know nothing, really, about Kanye's music but it was powerful to see it all put in context.

And I believe I am contractually obligated by Susan to say that yes, you should start with Austerity Britain. :-) My understanding is that Kynaston continued using the diaries and personal writings of the same set of Britons throughout the series, at least the ones written so far, so in that sense there is a continuity. Having family ties in Britain during that time period would make it especially interesting! When did your family emigrate to Canada? Do you still have family in the UK?

Currently Reading

  

Dr. Thorne is the third of Trollope's Barsetshire Chronicles. The Card Catalog is just what it says on the tin: A history of the library card catalog or more broadly how the concept of cataloging and categorizing books developed. I'm reading it on my iPad so I can pinch-and-zoom the scads of pictures, and also see them in color. I don't like reading for long stretches on a backlit screen, so this is a book that I am dipping in and out of.

35. Law Man: My Story of Robbing Banks, Winning Supreme Court Cases and Finding Redemption by Shon Hopwood.

This month's selection in my real-life book club. The author, Shon Hopwood, grew up in a conventional family in small-town Nebraska. He was a high-school basketball star, went to college and flunked out, spent a couple of years in the military, got out and started robbing banks. As one does.

Before long, Shon gets caught, goes to prison, offers to help a fellow inmate craft an appeal petition, gets hooked on the legal minutia of such endeavors, helps more inmates and eventually sees a couple of his petitions actually argued before the Supreme Court of the United Status. As one does.

He's released from prison, marries his high-school crush, finds Jesus and enters law school. As one does.

It's an inspiring if fairly routine prison redemption story. Hopwood is more convincing when he's talking about what his time in the sneezer taught him about the need for criminal justice reform and the unfairness of the same crime triggering varying amounts of prison time based on location and the personal whims of judges and prosecutors. The presence of a co-author doesn't keep the writing from being pedestrian except when it's a bit melodramatic — the book opens with Hopwood and an airplane full of fellow inmates getting caught mid-air in a thunderstorm that is spawning tornadoes all around them. If you don't think this event is used as a metaphor for the prison experience, this must be your first book.

I'm sincerely glad Hopwood has turned his life around. It's not lost on me (or on him, to his credit) that the chance he's afforded to do so is almost certainly a function of white privilege, but equality doesn't mean forcing everyone to endure injustice but rather ensuring justice for everyone. It's refreshing to read an account where prison actually fulfilled its rehabilitation function (even accidentally) along with its punishment function. I might have wished for a more compelling narrative style but that would be quibbling. So instead I'll just wish him all the best. As one does.

>122 rosalita: Ha, Julia I think we are safe Susan-wise because I was rearranging my nonfiction shelves and found Austerity Britain. It had been catalogued under a different heading than Family Britain. It is also about half of Family Britain's length now that I see them side by side.

My family emigrated in 1954 but my grandparents stayed in England. I still have cousins there.

I noticed you were asking around about Framley Parsonage and Tooth and Claw. I’ve read both, but read Tooth and Claw first, and it was fine that way around. I did get a little sense of ‘this is like Tooth and Claw’ when I eventually came to read Framley Parsonage, but it wasn’t a problem.

>125 Familyhistorian: Hooray for finding Austerity Britain lurking on the shelves, Meg! Although I uttered an involuntary "oh heavens!" at reading that Family Britain is twice as long!

>126 SandDune: Thank you for chiming in, Rhian! Since I own Tooth and Claw I'm inclined to wait and read Framley first. If it had been a library book I'd probably just forge ahead but I have the luxury of waiting in this case. As long as I don't run out of other books to read in the meantime ... :-)

36. Doctor Thorne by Anthony Trollope.

The third in Trollope's "Barsetshire Chronicles" series of six books, set in a fictional county in mid-19th century England. This one tackles the tension between marrying to further bloodlines vs marrying for money. Frank Gresham, only son of the current squire of Greshamsbury (described as the highest-ranking commoner in the region) has the bloodlines, but his father has squandered a great deal of the fortune that should come Frank's way by vainly pursuing political office and supporting his wife, Lady Arabella, who is a sister of the current Earl deCourcy and will thank you not to forget it. Thus, even though Lady Arabella is the biggest snob you can imagine, she pressures Frank to pursue an heiress, bloodlines be damned. Similarly, she is prepared to accept into the family as husband to her eldest daughter an upstart tailor who has thousands of pounds of assets offsetting his vulgar background and occupation.

Frank's a good chap, and he'd like to do what his mama wants, but there's a problem. He's in love with Mary Thorne, niece and more-or-less adopted daughter of our titular character, who has neither money nor bloodlines to recommend her, only a sterling character. Lest we think snobbery is a luxury afforded only to the well-born, Trollope shows how Dr. Thorne and the lovely Mary are carrying around their own burden of family pride. In the doctor's case, it's his knowledge of Mary's sordid birth story, which he has carefully hidden from her all these years. His example has taught her that despite her lack of bloodlines she has no need to bow down to anyone. You can imagine how well that goes over with the odious Lady Arabella.

Trollope's conversational style goes down very easily, making him one of the most accessible 19th century authors I've read. While earlier books in the series (The Warden and Barchester Towers depended on the readers' knowledge of church and government politics of the day, Dr. Thorne is much more straightforward and easy to understand without a lot of background knowledge. And if you're tackling those first two and in need of the background knowledge as I was, you could do much worse than follow along with the tutored read threads hosted by Liz: The Warden and Barchester Towers, respectively.

I need to get back to Trollope. He was a favorite of my mother's - she had a complete set of Barsetshire and Palliser novels. My idiot father got rid of them... grrrrr.

LL starts soon! Hurrah!

>129 katiekrug: Hi Katie! I've been enjoying the Trollope very much. I'm always surprised when some of these old classics turn out to be so readable — Middlemarch was the same way for me. What a shame that your father got rid of your mother's Trollope books. It's nice that they are so readily available in the public domain as ebooks, though the formatting on some of the free versions leaves much to be desired.

It seems like it's been forever since LL76! Hopefully all the site issues are ironed out and everything is ready to go.

>128 rosalita: I love the Barsetshire novels, particularly The Warden, Barchester Towers, Framley Parsonage and The Last Chronicle of Barset. Didn’t love Doctor Thorne quite as much, but still found it very readable

>131 SandDune: Perhaps you felt, as I did, that there was a bit too much romance in Doctor Thorne? The lack of intricate 19th century church politics made it more readable but at the expense of some of the biting commentary of the first two, I thought. So I just pretended I was reading a Georgette Heyer and then I didn't mind so much. :-)

>132 rosalita: I liked the church politics in the earlier novels, although I won’t pretend to follow all of it. I loved the Archdeacon as a character, and all his machinations to get the better of Mrs Proudie, and I think there’s less of that in Doctor Thorne from what I remember. As you say, it’s more of a straightforward love story.

>133 SandDune: I could never have gotten through either The Warden or Barchester Towers without your tutored reads with Liz! They explained so much of the background and context that it was like reading a completely different book — or reading it with someone else's brain. :-)

The Archdeacon was such a good character! And so many of Trollope's character names are deliciously punny (Doc Thorne's bitter rival, Dr. Fillgrave, and the law firm of Slow and Bideawhile were favorites) but I'm not sure any can top the Quiverful family with their umpteen children (and he was vicar of Puddingdale!). That one made me giggle-snort when I first encountered it in BT.

37. Sting-Ray Afternoons by Steve Rushin.

Steven Rushin, who grew up to be the only thing he ever wanted, a sportswriter at Sports Illustrated magazine, recounts his childhood in 1970s Minnesota. With sharp wit and a knack for telling a ridiculous story (especially if it makes himself the object of ridicule), Rushin recounts growing up as the middle child of five (when his baby sister, Amy, is born after three boys, the obstetrician tells his father in the hospital waiting room, "Congratulations, you finally got one with indoor plumbing.")

The memoir is replete with so many of the touchstones of a '70s childhood in middle America, and as someone just a couple of years older than he, growing up a few hundred miles south, I found myself being walloped with nostalgia on every page. Someone who grew up in a different (that is to say, later) era might not have the same reaction to the specific pop-culture mentions, but much of the humor is universal, I think, and the ways that pre-pubescent boys think and act and play probably is, too. Probably the closest comparison I can make is to Bill Bryson's memoir, The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid, with its recollections of a 1950s kid. Rushin's humor isn't quite as mean-spirited as Bryson's can sometimes be, though.

One of the hallmarks of Rushin's sportswriting (and Twitter posts) is his love of wordplay and puns (just as I rate Bryson's writing by the number of giggle-snorts it induces, I gauge Rushin's by the number of involuntary groans), and I loved learning that his infatuation with the rhythms of words and language began early, a child in love with alliteration long before he ever learned the word itself.

This is not a harrowing tale of abuse and dysfunction, which I found refreshing but does leave the narrative feeling a bit slight. No one overcomes tragedy or addiction or anything like that and yet the tone is far from saccharine. It's the kind of childhood that often gets labeled "idyllic" even taking into account the never-ending casual violence that brothers perpetually inflict on each other, down the line from oldest to youngest. For myself, this is a solid 4-star read, but I downgraded it slightly because I'm not sure a reader who isn't familiar with Rushin's writing or who didn't grow up in the 1970s American Midwest would feel the same appreciation and connection that I did.

Currently Reading

    

Three books in three different reading formats:

The Card Catalog is on my iPad, and so is being read in small doses because the last thing I want to do at night is look at a computer screen after staring at one all day.

Word by Word is a paperback that doesn't leave the house.

The Horse and His Boy is the ebook I carry with me everywhere and read on my e-ink Kobo. It's the third entry (if you're using chronological order of the stories rather than publication order) in the Chronicles of Narnia, none of which I had ever read (I know!) before starting this project.

>128 rosalita:

Well done, Julia! :)

I'm glad you're still finding the old group / tutored read threads useful.

>137 lyzard: The old threads are wonderful resources! The Dr. Thorne thread, being a group read rather than a tutored one, rather fizzled about halfway through but as you said in the thread, this particular Trollope didn't really require the detailed explanations that the first two did for me.

>117 rosalita: oooh! I'd been waiting for your review. nice :)

>139 LovingLit: It's a good one, Megan. Have you read it? It seems right up your street.

I haven't read it, and the 600 pages freak me out a little. I just got a book from the uni library today called Thought and Language (I think). It is heavily theoretical...Im not sure I can cope with that!

>136 rosalita: Oooh, I keep seeing the card catalog book on the library's New Books shelves, and I keep wanting to check it out, but I've got so many challenge books right now to get through...

>122 rosalita: Ha! Contractual obligations...I like that! You've had lots of good finishes, Julia.

>141 LovingLit: Yeah, it's a beast but a really interesting beast. I found it helpful to trade off reading sessions between it and shorter, lighter fare.

>142 scaifea: I need to get back to it, Amber. It's been somewhat neglected here lately, but what I've read has been interesting.

>143 susanj67: Thanks, Susan! I could feel you looking over my shoulder when I answered Meg's question. :-)

Hi Julia!

>135 rosalita: My brother and sister had sting-rays and I was always envious. Sounds like a wonderful read.

>136 rosalita: I got The Chronicles of Narnia as a college graduation gift in 1975 from a Christian friend who was hopeful for me..... I've read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe but never finished the series. I keep saying I'll do it, but have never gotten back to it.

>145 karenmarie: Howdy, Karen! Sting-Ray Afternoons was a fun read. So many memories of growing up during that time period!

I've enjoyed the first two Narnia books but I'm feeling a little dubious about this one. Knowing that Lewis wrote these as Christian allegories, I'm feeling uncomfortable about the bad guys here being dark-skinned people who wear turbans and shoes with turned-up toes. I'm fearful we're about to recreate the Crusades and I am not down for that, especially in our current political climate.

>146 rosalita: - I had similar feelings about that entry in the series, Julia. And really the whole series was not a favorite. I'd read TLTWATW as a kid and liked it, and maybe if I had first encountered the rest of the books as a child, I would have liked them better. As it was, they started to grate on me. And the last one was just over the top and ruined whatever lukewarm feelings I had.

What a good review of Austerity Britain, Julia. Thumbed. Good for you for reading "outside the box". I'd never heard of this one. I'm familiar with Britain's war years from different angles, but not right after.

>147 katiekrug: So I've got that to look forward to, which is nice. Ha! Seriously, though, I suspect I may end up feeling the same but we'll see how it goes. This one is just making me all kinds of uncomfortable, though.

>148 jnwelch: It was absolutely fascinating, the level of details, Joe. I had no idea just how grim things continued to be in Britain for years after WWII was over. I really admire their resilience.

>146 rosalita: and >147 katiekrug: Hmm. Looks like I'll get rid of a hardcover set I acquired a while back and just keep the paperback box set I got as the gift in 1975 for sentimental reasons. I've read a few others - The Space Trilogy and Four Loves.

>150 karenmarie: The Narnia series is beloved by many people, Karen, so don't take my hesitation as gospel (no pun intended). I don't think I've read any other C.S. Lewis, though I do have a copy of The Screwtape Letters banging around somewhere.

Hi ho, Julia. How are things there in the American Heartland? I'm intending to read a few Irish writers/Irish stories in advance of visiting there at the end of the month (all right, it isn't quite June, but I'm always a few hours ahead of others. Except when I'm behind them). Read TransAtlantic by Colum McCann (Irish-born now living in the USA).

Finishing...ehhh, the end is in sight...The Ginger Man by J.P. Donleavey (American-born, attended Trinity in Dublin, lived much of his life in Ireland). That latter is a read stretched over a half-century; started in a 20th century European lit course in 1966, didn't like it. After a several decades long hiatus, restarted from the beginning and bailed at the same point as I did the first time. I've read 3/4 of it, still dislike it, but I'm going to get 'er done. Sad!

I've got an unread Roddy Doyle and a couple of unread Colm Toibins. Also plan to read a Mosley (I, ah, don't think he's Irish).

Well, hello there, Bill. Have you read any J.G. Farrell? I've got his Troubles on my shelf but haven't cracked it open yet. I've heard it's very good, though. And Roddy Doyle is terrific — very funny stuff. I read but didn't love Transatlantic and have some Colm Tóibín but have yet to get to them. So many books ...

Enjoy your trip! I've been to Ireland just once but I absolutely loved it and did not want to come home.

38. The Horse and His Boy by C.S. Lewis.

The third tale (chronologically) in the Chronicles of Narnia series, and not a favorite. I found myself extremely uncomfortable reading about a place where the bad guys are dark-skinned Muslim stand-ins, and the good guys are blonde, blue-eyed Aryans Narnians. It's probably not something I would have bumped on if I had read these when I was a child, but now, in the increasingly partisan, paranoid, intolerant, hate-filled world we have made for ourselves, it sat badly indeed.

The story itself, subtracting the distasteful ethno-religious elements, was slight but fine. A slave boy runs away from his master, aided and abetted by a talking horse who was himself captured from Narnia and wants to return home. Along the way, horse and boy team up with a young girl fleeing a forced marriage and her own talking horse. Hwin the lady horse was my favorite character by far. I can only imagine how completely over the moon I would have been to read this in fifth grade, when I was at the height of my "horse crazy" phase!

I should have deducted another half-star for the truly ridiculous cover of my edition, as you can see above. I'm no book designer, but it seems to me that a children's book with the words "horse" and "boy" in its title should probably contain at least one of those elements in the cover illustration.

What, ya got something against bridges, lady!?

(Hmm... Or is it an aqueduct?)

>152 weird_O:

Mosley Irish? You never know until DNA surprises are unleashed!

>117 rosalita: Austerity Britain is definitely going on the wishlist pile. Sounds terrific.

>155 lyzard: I am as bridge- or aqueduct-positive as the next person, but I'm pretty sure neither feature in this book in any way!

>157 lindapanzo: Thanks for reading, Linda. I hope you like it as much as I did when you read it.

Hey Julia - I am really behind. Great comments on the Kynaston book - sounds like something I would love as well. Onto the list it goes. Not sure when I'll get to it, but oh well.

I do want to read the Coates essay soon; I'm finishing the We Were Eight Years in Power and am so impressed with his writing. He keeps getting better.

Happy Monday. Is it quieter at work?

>159Thanks, Beth —it's great to have you back! I'm glad Ireland put her best face forward for your trip. She did the same for me back in the mid 1990s.

>154 rosalita: distasteful ethno-religious elements
Sounds about the oder of the day from him! These ones don't age well, do they. I love the Famous Five spin-offs though, they really take the mickey out of the way those particular novels have dated!

>161 LovingLit: Hi, Megan! I'm not at all familiar with the Narnia spinoffs you mention. I'll have to see if I can run them down at the library.

Where did you visit in Ireland, Julia?

I traveled around the south of Ireland, from County Clare in the West down along the coast and up the eastern side to Dublin. I was on my own, just rented a car and stayed at B&Bs along the way. I made a rule that I would stay at least two nights at each stop because I didn't want to just be living out of a suitcase, and it worked out well though it meant I didn't cover as much territory as I could have if I had just kept moving. At the time, I assumed I'd go back someday soon and see the rest. Ah, well.

>117 rosalita: A thumb for your review of the Kynaston Julia! In terms of insights into ordinary people's lives during and after the war the Mass Observation diaries are excellent. Simon Garfield has edited some good collections of these - I started with Our Hidden Lives: The Everyday Diaries of a Forgotten Britain 1945-1948 which is a post war collection and gives a fascinating insight into the shortages post-war and people's views. I then went on to read two wartime collections, We are at War and Private Battles. I think they were published in the order I read them but in if you wanted to read in chronological order you should start with We are at War.

>165 souloftherose:, Thanks for the thumb and for the tip about the MO collections. I had never heard of the Mass Observation organization and was impressed with the volume and quality of the information that Kynaston used from their data. I will definitely look at especially the two wartime collections, since Austerity Britain didn't really cover that time period.

You are incredibly brave to have driven around Ireland, Julia. I don't know if I would do it. Do you have a favorite spot. The area around Galway and Kilkenny is lovely, and I wished I would have had more time to explore Dublin. I did get to the Writer's Museum, which is a lovely little museum.

Driving in Ireland wasn't that bad, Beth. Of course, I was not mad enough to attempt to drive in Dublin proper! I stayed at a B&B in Dun Laoghaire and took the light rail into the city each day. Of course that was back when I could walk without pain. My favorite things I did in Dublin was a literary pub crawl one night, and the second night I saw a play at The Abbey Theatre. It was Philadelphia Here I Come by Brian Friel, and it was incredible. If I ever do go back, I would definitely plan to take in more theatre. And more pubs. :-)

But maybe my favorite thing I did was something completely unplanned. I did a tour of Killarney National Park that started with a horse-drawn jaunting car tour through the Gap of Dunloe and ended with a boat ride through the Lakes of Killarney. The scenery and the weather was gorgeous and it was great to see it from a viewpoint where motorized vehicles weren't allowed.

Currently Reading

    

I'm feeling spoiled for choice, reading three excellent books right now.

Hi Julia. I seem to have fallen behind on LT once again and I am scrambling to catch up. I have a question regarding The Barsetshire Chronicles - do they have to be read in order or are they separate novels?

>170 DeltaQueen50: Hi, Judy! At least in the three Barsetshire novels I've read so far, there isn't much overlap in plot lines or characters. Some characters from Barchester Towers are briefly mentioned in Doctor Thorne, but I don't think not knowing the references would hamper enjoyment of the book overall.

Of course, Liz probably has a different idea and I'm sure she'll chime in ... :-)

I see you will read The Dark Angel before I get to it. I have to stop reserving library books!

>171 rosalita:

I'm sure I don't know WHY you'd say THAT...

I think these novels are a richer experience for being read in order, both because of the way the characters are used, and because of the way Trollope's writing developed. The cameo appearances by previously established characters also adds to the fun.

While you can read some of the novels as standalones, if you are planning to go on from the Barchester series to the Palliser series, it is important to know that the ending of the former overlaps with the beginning of the latter, and at this point the novels should be read in publication order (instead of finishing the Barchester books first)---that is, Can You Forgive Her? should be read in between The Small House At Allington and The Last Chronicle Of Barset. With these novels, there is significant overlapping of characters and events.

This is also true of The Warden and Barchester Towers; while The Last Chronicle Of Barset *must* be read last of the Barchester novels, as its title suggests, or it will lose a great deal of its impact.

>173 lyzard: Oh boy, I didn't know that (about needing to interweave the last Barsetshire books with the first Palliser ones). You are trying to make me read them all, aren't you? Sneaky Liz!

Currently Watching



This four-part documentary series on Netflix is especially timely, this week being the 50th anniversary of RFK's assassination. I read a lot of stuff about the Kennedy family when I was much younger, so there wasn't a tremendous amount that was new to me here. But the vintage film clips and the current-day remembrances of people who worked with (and against) him at the time is really powerful. I was a blubbering mess by the end of Episode 4, as the train carrying RKF's body traveled from New York City to D.C. for his burial in Arlington National Cenetery. Millions of people lined the train tracks to say goodbye, and it was an emotional gut-punch after the building hope and optimism of the previous episodes. The final episode drags a bit, as it focuses a bit too much (in my opinion) on various conspiracy theories surrounding the killing, but the whole thing is worth the time of anyone who either remembers or wants to learn more about this tumultuous episode in American history.

May in Review


Austerity Britain


The Dry
The Murderer Is a Fox
Doctor Thorne
Sting-Ray Afternoons


And Four to Go


Law Man
The Horse and His Boy

Author genders
Male: 7
Female: 1

Genre
Fiction: 5
Nonfiction: 3

Source:
Library: 2
Bookshelves: 6

Continuing series
The Dry (Aaron Falk, 1/2)
Austerity Britain (Tales of a New Jerusalem, 1/3)
And Four to Go (Nero Wolfe, 30/48)
The Murderer Is a Fox (Ellery Queen, 19/37)
Doctor Thorne (Barsetshire Chronicles, 3/6)
The Horse and His Boy (Chronicles of Narnia, 3/7)

>174 rosalita:

That's why I'm here... :)

>171 rosalita: & >173 lyzard: Thanks, Julia and Liz. I am usually a stickler for reading things in their proper order, but I wondered why only The Last Chronicle of Barset and Phineas Finn - one from each series made the 1,001 Books List.

>177 lyzard: I'm going to have to keep my eye on you!

>178 DeltaQueen50: I always think including series books in lists like that is odd, Judy. The last book in the series might be the best one BECAUSE of the character development and other things that have been built up in the earlier books. Reading the listed book with no knowledge of the other books might be a very different experience.

>179 rosalita:

It's similar to giving The Return Of The Kings a Best Picture Oscar: you're really acknowledging the entire achievement, not the single work.

It's interesting they chose Phineas Finn out of the Palliser books, perhaps because it's the most political?

>180 lyzard: Good point, Liz.

39. Now May You Weep by Deborah Crombie.

The ninth in a series featuring DS Duncan Kincaid and (newly minted) DI Gemma James. This time around, Gemma travels to Scotland with her friend Hazel for a cookery weekend, only to find herself enmeshed in a murder at the B&B where their course is being held. The mystery unfolds in two parts, one set in the late 1800s and featuring ancestral characters of the current lot. Duncan eventually makes his way north to lend a hand, leaving mounting personal troubles behind in Notting Hill. Beyond the character development, which is very good as usual, there are enough descriptions of fantastic food and various whiskeys (distilleries being a key part of the mysteries, both old and new) to make one want to book the next flight to the Highlands.

40. The Dark Angel by Elly Griffiths.

The latest entry in Griffiths' superb series featuring forensic archaeologist Ruth Galloway. Normally we encounter Ruth in Norfolk, digging up bones and helping DI Harry Nelson and his crew solve crimes. But this outing finds Ruth in Italy, soaking up the sun while assisting a fellow archaeologist with his Italian television program on Roman ruins.

Ruth has her own personal reasons (revealed at the end of the last book) for wanting to get out of Norfolk just now, and so with daughter Katie and friend Shona and her son Louis in tow, they settle into an apartment in the hill town of Castelli d'Angeli. Old secrets come unburied along with some bones, and result in a fresh murder for Ruth to puzzle at. When Harry and Cathbad show up for reasons that are best discovered as you read, we've got ourselves a real whodunit.

I thoroughly enjoy this series, so much so that even though I knew a paper copy was coming my way from Beth (via Mamie by way of Katie who I think got it from Suzanne) I still leapt at the chance to borrow the ebook from the library when it came available. Patience has never been one of my virtues.

If you're tempted to dig into this series, it's best to start at the beginning with The Crossing Places to fully savor the complicated entanglements the characters find themselves in as the series goes on. And if you're caught up, be aware that this one ends in a tiny cliffhanger that will have you waiting impatiently for the next installment.

>183 rosalita: Sounds like a series I should check out.

I really enjoy it, Susan!

A cliffhanger? I might have to wait to read this one then. I don't like cliffhangers. Sorry I didn't get to this one fast enough...

Just dropping by to say hi, Julia!

I ended up giving my hardcover Narnia books to a dear friend who was over the moon to get them. Now I'm down to my sentimental boxed set.

>186 BLBera: Cliffhanger might not be the right word, Beth. It's more along the lines of the character development that happened at the end of the last book, where you're left wondering where things will go next given the new situation.

>187 karenmarie: Hi, Karen! I'm happy that the Narnia books went to someone who really wants them. That's the best way to get rid of books.

Did someone mentioned getting rid of book? I don't want to hear that again, do you hear?

Me? I just added a couple of books. Coincidental with Anthony Bourdain's suicide last week, I found a copy of Kitchen Confidential at Goodwill. Stopped in and scanned the book shelves. Nuttin. Worse selection since I've been going there. Ah, but there was Anthony Bourdain. And an E.B. White, The Trumpet of the Swan.

I've never read Bourdain nor seen any of his programs. Too late to board his train. And yet, not too late to see what I've missed.

The White replaces a copy we lent to a granddaughter. I just hope she's read it.

>189 weird_O: Some good pickups there, Bill. I also have never read Bourdain or seen any of his programs, and it is only now that he has died that I realize I was eternally confusing him in my mind with Gordon Ramsay and thinking "Why would I want to read or watch that jackwagon?" So consider this a posthumous apology to Mr. Bourdain, whose work I may sample one of these days.

Bill and Julia - I am a big fan of Bourdain. He was a very good writer, and his shows - first, No Reservations, and then Parts Unknown - are fascinating and so well done. He had a great gift for story-telling on both the page and the screen.

>191 katiekrug: So I gather. I feel kind of bad for thinking he was a jerk all this time, but so it goes.

Heh. I think it's kind of funny. He was sort of a jerk in his own way, but more endearingly so than Ramsay.

Currently Reading

    

Dorothy Must Die is this month's selection in my work book club. I could only access the audio, and so far I am kind of hating the narrator's style/ It's early yet so hopefully it gets better.

The Unfinished Odyssey of Robert Kennedy came out of all the coverage of the 50th anniversary of RKF's assassination. I found this ebook lurking on my virtual shelves, and it's Halberstam so I'm sure it's great.

The Card Catalog continues to get read in short sessions on my iPad. Still interesting.

I have to say, I am more drawn to your "currently readings" from >169 rosalita:, than your "current currently readings" from above.
Really, I just wanted to use words in a funny way, I am sure they are all super ;)

>195 LovingLit: So you're saying you like my former Currently Readings better than my current Currently Readings, eh? I'll make a note of it ... :-)

But seriously (on an unserious topic) wordplay is always welcome on this thread, Megan! I reviewed one of those Currently Reading books in >169 rosalita: (see >183 rosalita:) and I'm still working on another one of them, but the Word by Word review is coming soon, so stay tuned for that!

41. Word by Word: The Secret Life of Dictionaries by Kory Stamper.

Every last syllable of this book is utterly delightful. You should seek it out and read it immediately. The End.

OK, that's not much of a review. Let's try again.

Kory Stamper is a lexicographer for Merriam-Webster, which means, essentially, that she and her colleagues write the dictionary. She's long been one of my favorite word-nerd Twitter follows, because she is smart and profanely witty and even more in love with language than I am. More than once, as she has shared some wry observation about the lexicographical life, I've thought, "Man, that would be my dream job." And now, she's written a book for all of us who have ever thought, "How on earth do you write a dictionary, exactly?"

Stamper has cleverly constructed the book as a series of chapters, each focused on one particular dictionary word. But she uses a word's story to tell her own, in the process highlighting all the aspects of lexicography that go far beyond writing definitions. The word "but" is the jumping-off point to discuss how grammar figures into dictionary writing, and the tremendous difficulty sometimes of pinning down just what part of speech a particular usage of a particular word actually is — and how none of that is what most people mean when they talk about grammar: To them, "grammar" is a loose conglomeration of stylistic word choices that get codified into right and wrong, misspellings that every English speaker has made at some point in their life and yet are branded as "bad grammar," half-remembered "rules" about usage shamed into them by their middle-school English teachers, and personal, sometimes irrational dislikes. This is the grammar that shows up on Internet memes about "your" and "you're," the sort of grammar people are referring to when they claim you can't end a sentence with a preposition, the grammar that is invoked when people claim that the "10 items or less" sign at the grocery store is "bad grammar."

That excerpt probably gives you a clue that Stamper — indeed all lexicographers and the dictionaries they create — are descriptionist rather than prescriptionist. Despite years of claims to the contrary (including the marketing materials of those self-same dictionaries!) the purpose of a dictionary is to describe and define language as it is being used by ordinary people right now, not to settle bets or teach anyone the One True Way. A similar message is conveyed in the chapter about "it's," wherein I learned that in fact the possessive and plural forms of that word were pretty much interchangeable for hundreds of years, including in the King James Bible and much of Shakespeare.

Other chapters use a specific word as the basis for illuminating the myriad different tasks that a lexicographer performs every day: searching written materials to find new citations for new words as well as new ways of using old words; the tricky considerations that go into defining the word "surfboard," which seems deceptively obvious until you try to pin it down; how small, ordinary words like "take" and "set" are the hardest to pin down because they have so many senses and subtleties of meaning (Stamper refers to them as "semantically oozy").

A chapter on revising the entry for "bitch" expands into a discussion of how dictionaries treat words that are considered vulgar or derogatory, and the problems that arise when not everyone agrees that certain words or sub-senses of words deserve to be labeled as such (including the problem that the majority of the people making those calls are still older white men of relative privilege who have not experienced having those words hurled at them in very personal ways).

There are chapters on the challenges of nailing down a word's etymology, and how a good anecdote ("posh" is shorthand for "port out, starboard home") is no substitute for actual documentation; the never-ending search to find the earliest known written use of each word; and the tricky business of conveying pronunciation that can accommodate dialect differences (this is why dictionaries use phonemic alphabets so that \i\ is pronounced like the vowel in \pin\,whatever that may sound like in your dialect). Again Stamper makes the point that the dictionary's focus is on describing usage, not judging right and wrong.

The final chapter details how all hell broke loose in 2009, when some evangelicals noticed that the dictionary had added a sub-sense to the word "marriage" that described relationships between people of the same sex. (That the definition had changed six years earlier with no fanfare did not stem the outrage.) It's a thoughtful intro to discussion of how people often get very angry about specific dictionary entries because they feel the dictionary is instigating societal changes that make them uncomfortable instead of simply describing how society has already changed.

I no longer have any illusions that being a lexicographer is like getting to have ice cream for breakfast every day. It's a difficult, demanding, and rewarding endeavor that requires skills that go beyond just "loving words". Loving words is definitely a prerequisite, though, and this book will give you an even greater appreciation of the nutty ways that English has developed and evolved over the centuries. If I had my life to live over, I could think of much worse ways to spend it than writing a dictionary.

And as a reward for reading that epic saga of a review, I have an extra copy of Word By Word (trade paperback) that I would be happy to pass along to someone who has been bitten by the lexicography bug. I'm hanging on to the signed hardcover that I got when I went to see and listen to Kory Stamper in Iowa City last year, though. PM me if you're interested; I'm happy to ship internationally.

Hi, Julia! Adding Word by Word to the list!

Hi Julia!

>197 rosalita: Excellent review! I just finished listening to The Story of Human Language, a 36-lecture series by linguist John McWhorter. He discusses the world's languages past and present. It is all fascinating.

>197 rosalita: This sounds fascinating, Julia. I would love a copy if no one else has claimed it. No need to mail, though. I can make the exchange when I see you in July.

>199 scaifea: It's SO good, Amber!

>200 karenmarie: Thanks, Karen! I've listened to McWhorter on the Lexicon Valley podcast.

>201 BLBera: It's all yours, Beth! I'll put it aside for safekeeping until July.

Thanks Julia!

>203 BLBera: You're very welcome!

It's all starting to get very real now. I just booked my hotel for my trip to New York City in August. I'm going to be staying at the Library Hotel! It all sounds fantastic, especially the nightly wine-and-cheese reception. :-)

I've stayed there - it's lovely :) It's a block down from The Wayne's office, but he is probably changing jobs soon so you won't have any random sightings....

The rooftop lounge is really nice, too, and has fun literary-themed cocktails.

Yes, Katie has warbled about the Library Hotel and so we are all now totally envious of you, Julia!

Did you enjoy Bruce at the Toni awards last Sunday? Bit of a stone face, wasn't he now?

>183 rosalita: I've got The Dark Angel waiting for me at the library, and I can't wait to get into it! I've read the series in order to this point, and have enjoyed them all.

Karen O.

>207 ronincats: Bruce on the Tonys was fun, but he did look like he was auditioning for Mount Rushmore, didn't he? :-)

>208 klobrien2: I don't think you'll be disappointed, Karen! I thought it was a very good entry all around.

>205 rosalita: That is so cool, Julia. You can warble about it when we see each other in July. And I can be jealous.

I'd rather talk about your travel adventures, Beth — Ireland and Portland. I can't wait to hear about all of it!

>182 rosalita: I'm planning to read the next Crombie (for me) for MysteryCAT next month since it fits the police procedural category. I'm going to read the lead-up short story either this month (if I get to it) or at the beginning of next month before reading No Mark Upon Her. The short story is Nocturne.

>212 thornton37814: Oh, I liked that one, Lori. I haven't read the short story since my library doesn't have it in Overdrive. I'm sure it's good, though.

>213 rosalita: The short story was available at ours, and it is downloaded.

We can talk about all those things, Julia. The summer is flying by.

>214 thornton37814: Lucky you! Our local library is part of an online consortium of small library systems across Iowa, and they don't go in much for the standalone short stories that so many series writers are producing between full-length books these days. That's fine; I'd rather have access to a more diverse collection given their limitations.

>215 BLBera: Where is the time going, Beth? I can't believe it's the middle of June already.

>205 rosalita: I want to go to there!!

Wasn’t The Dark Angel fun!? I love the little cliffhangers and look forward to each book as it comes out. And I’d love to hang out with Ruth.

>217 Copperskye: I would love to hang out with Ruth! I would even be willing to face up to her mean old cat Flint if I could spend some time at her house on the Salt Flats of North Norfolk. :-)

Sunday Clickbait



What a Father Learns by Reading With His Special-Needs Son — This essay, about a father's experience reading aloud to his son with cerebral palsy, is lovely.

42. Dark Threat (aka Pilgrim's Rest) by Patricia Wentworth.

Miss Silver is back, and for a wonder she did not get hired for her current case on a train! No, instead she gets an indirect referral from Detective Sergeant Frank Abbott. It seems Abbott's friend Roger Pilgrim is convinced someone is trying to kill him, perhaps to keep him from selling the family manor, Pilgrim's Rest. Miss Silver gives him some advice which he refuses to take, so who's to blame when he turns up dead? Well, the murderer of course, but our Maudie will have to bring in the big guns in the persons of DS Abbott and his boss, Chief Inspector Lamb, to catch the culprit.

I enjoyed this 10th entry in the series. The whodunit was decent. Although I had the killer pegged very early on it didn't seriously hamper my enjoyment of seeing how it all played out, and there were other characters who could plausibly have done the deed. The inevitable romance angle was fairly muted, and included some coy misdirection in terms of guessing which two characters were going to end up in a clinch at the end. I was worried at the outset about the presence of an overly precocious child but thankfully she was shunted offstage fairly quickly, leaving the field clear for the less precocious grownups to do the acting out.

Click on photo to embiggen.

Check out this baby. I tell, she's sooo mellow. She even put up with ME holding her. Not a peep or a bellow.

>197 rosalita: Every last syllable of this book is utterly delightful. You should seek it out and read it immediately. The End.
ha!

Hi, Julia! Awesome books and reviews here lately. I really need to read another Ruth Galloway book...soon! Your Ireland trip sounds awesome and NY on the docket! I have travel envy. : )

>221 weird_O: Aw, she's a real cutie, Bill! You must be over the moon with pride.

>222 LovingLit: That really says it all, Megan, but you'll notice I managed to drone on for ages anyway!

>223 Berly: Hi, Kim. I hope you're able to visit Ruth Galloway again soon. It's one of my favorite series.

>197 rosalita:

Thank you for that enlightening review!

As a longtime James Murray (The Oxford English Dictionaryof which I own two copies from the 1890s)
and Simon Winchester(The MEANING of EVERYTHING and The PROFESSOR and THE MADMAN) fan,
I'll be searching for this one.

>225 m.belljackson: I hope you enjoy it, Marianne!

>226 rosalita:

Kory Stamper's website is also fun and inspiring -
I posted a request for her to come to Madison, Wisconsin, based on your review.

>227 m.belljackson: Yes, it is! That's Harmless Drudgery if any of you are interested in checking it out.

43. Dorothy Must Die by Danielle Paige.

This was ... not good. It's a classic example of a really interesting idea married to mediocre plotting and pedestrian writing. Other than that, it's great!

No, but seriously: Amy Gumm is a teenage girl living in Kansas (remind you of anyone else in literary history)? She's got the usual angsty teenage girl troubles — a dysfunctional mother, an absent father, mean girls at school — but all of that pales in comparison to what awaits her when a tornado blows her trailer home off its foundations and brings it down in Oz. Yep, that Oz.

Despite the author's fondness for refusing to share information with either her protagonist or her readers, we and Amy eventually learn that something or someone has brought her to Oz because it needs saving. It seems Dorothy, having first decided there was no place like home, took one look around the flatlands of Kansas and decided she was better off in Munchkinland. So she returned to Oz, where through some convoluted shenanigans that I still don't understand managed to overthrow the reigning princess and take control. Now she rules with an iron fist, in the form of a tyrannical Tin Woodman, along with a no-longer-cowardly Lion and a mad-scientist Scarecrow. Oh, and Glinda the Good Witch is now a bitch. The Revolutionary Order of the Wicked (as in Witches, among others) trains Amy to infiltrate the Emerald City and snuff out her fellow Kansan so that Oz can return to the magical wonderland it was always meant to be.

So the concept is intriguing but the execution is a mess. Amy is a whiny teenage girl (to be honest, not my favorite category of human being, and I say that as someone who was one) who is forever haring off and getting herself into trouble. The witches who are grooming her to be an assassin are more cryptic than a British crossword, and there's a painfully strained attempt at a love triangle that is just stupid. And if all that was not enough, the book ends on a damned cliffhanger and it turns out there are four or five more books in the series.

A few caveats to my negativity: I am assuredly not the target audience for a YA novel, though I have read and enjoyed many. Also, having never read L. Frank Baum's original Wizard of Oz books nor ever having seen the movie, I suspect some references may have gone over my head. And finally, I listened to the audiobook, narrated by Devon Sorvari, and I thought it was pretty terrible. It got better once the action moved to Oz but she still had that snotty teenager voice going that sets my teeth on edge.

One-tenth of a star upgrade for the name of the main character; the birth name of Judy Garland, who played Dorothy in the classic movie, was Frances Gumm.

>197 rosalita: Julia, that's an excellent review of Word by Word :-) I have tried to seek it out, but the library catalogue isn't playing the game. However, I see it's new, so I will persist. Or keep an eye on the Kindle price :-) Meanwhile, I'll seek out Kory Stamper on Twitter. Not actually being on Twitter, I mean I'll bookmark her Twitter page in my internet bookmarks. I only have my pretend-boyfriend Elon so far, so she will be my second tweeter.

>230 susanj67: I hope you're able to find Word by Word, Susan. I think you'd enjoy it. And if you want to read more of Kory Stamper in the meantime, check out that link to her blog that >228 rosalita:.

>183 rosalita: I need to get back to the Ruth Galloway series - glad to hear you enjoyed the latest one!

>197 rosalita: Word by Word sounds really good Julia - added to the list

Thanks, Heather. I hope you enjoy both of those when you get to them.

44. Chopping Spree by Diane Mott Davidson.

I read the start of this series but dropped it somewhere along the way, as the plotting got more outlandish and Goldy's sweet young geeky son turned into a surly teenager. The recipes were always appealing, though, so when I saw this one on esale, I grabbed it.

Goldilocks' Catering is booming, and Goldy is frazzled by all the work she's getting. She's set to cater a party for rich shoppers at a local mall, and a few days later cater another party for the owner of one of the stores at the mall. Someone ends up dead, and Goldy's beloved one-time assistant Julian is jailed for murder. (At this point, I thought surely I had already read this one, but no.) Oh, and son Arch is about to turn 15, and has the sort of ridiculous demands for a gift that would have gotten me locked in my room until I was 25, rather than being indulged. Sigh.

I really, really, really wish the author could control her cartoonish impulses to put Goldy into ridiculous situations that don't just strain credulity, they snap it off at the root. And while I know many teenage boys are jerks, could we just see and hear a little less of this one? Again, the recipes are the real stars here. The rest of it's pretty bad.

>234 rosalita: I read (or listened to) the first few in that series, up through The Grilling Season, but I think I was more or less hate reading when I finally gave up. I liked the Colorado locale, but the plots, I agree, were really ridiculous.

>235 Copperskye: Hi, Joanne! It's a shame when a good series goes bad, isn't it? I think Grilling Season was about where I checked out of the series originally as well. "Hate reading" is a good description; I keep hoping she'll do some kind of reset and get back to what made the early books appealing, but that seems increasingly unlikely.

Cozy mysteries are not my forte, so I have never read any of her stuff and didn't know about the Colorado locale. Last cozy mystery author I've read was Agatha Christie.

>237 Storeetllr: Well, I wouldn't recommend starting your cozy mystery explorations with this series, as you could probably tell, Mary!

Not planning any cozy mystery exploration, Julia. Not my cuppa.

45. The Card Catalog: Books, Cards, and Literary Treasures by Library of Congress.

This is a delightful book that combines a history of book cataloguing with some great historical images. The timeline ranges from the Great Library of Alexandria, when the notion of somehow classifying and cataloguing all those scrolls first began, to modern-day electronic catalogs. But the bulk of the story, as the title suggests, is about the classic card catalog — individual 3- by 5-inch cards that contain the vital bibliographic information needed to help library staff and patrons find books on the shelves. With encouragement from the fledgling American Library Association, the Library of Congress was perhaps the key player in standardizing the card catalog by creating and selling printed cards to libraries across the country to build their own catalogs without each having to re-create the wheel, so to speak. The description and images of the room where this took place gives a hint at the immense scale of the project, which sometimes threatened to overwhelm the actual cataloguing of books.

As informative as I found the text to be, the illustrations are the real star of the show. Along with the historical images, there are many sets of images showing classic book covers, frontispieces or title pages, paired with that volume's corresponding catalog card. Some of the cards are handwritten, some are printed, but it's fascinating to explore each one and remember just how much information could be squeezed onto a small index card. If you're of an age (as I am) to remember actually using card catalogs, I'm sure you will feel the same sense of nostalgia that I did. I spent many a happy hour in a library, letting the cross-references on cards lead me on a merry chase across the catalog and through the author, subject, and title cards it contained. It reminds me of using a dictionary, where looking up one word inevitably leads me on a happy browse through related and unrelated terms.

Because the images are such an important element, I would recommend reading this book either in paper format or as an ebook on a color screen. I used my iPad and was happy to be able to enlarge the images to see details. I didn't even try to read it on my e-ink reader, though, as I can't imagine that small black-and-white format would provide any joy for this book.

Hi Julia - remind me what days you are in New York in August...? No, I won't stalk you - just want to try to keep them open should you wish to meet-up!

46. Proof by Dick Francis.

Over the years, I've read every one of Dick Francis' mysteries set in the world of English horse-racing. I remember how much fun I had scouring used bookstores looking for the ones that were missing from my collection, and how exciting it was to find a new one I hadn't read yet. But in my ongoing efforts to downsize my possessions, I've donated all those print copies to my library's fund-raising book sales, so I haven't actually picked up and read one of these old favorites for a long time.

I found Proof available in an ebook sale and didn't think twice about grabbing it, as it had always been one of my favorites. The story is narrated by Tony Beach, wine merchant in a small English town (village? I'm not sure how such designations work in the UK) smack dab in the middle of horse-racing country. Many of his customers are in the racing biz, so when he sets off one Sunday afternoon to cater an end-of-season party at a local trainer's stables, he expects just another routine business event. A terrible accident sweeps away all that's familiar in an instant and begins the slow unraveling of a tale of business fraud and murder that finds Beach having to call on reserves of courage that he isn't sure he has.

>241 katiekrug: Hi Katie. I arrive on Aug. 8 in the evening and leave the afternoon of Aug. 10.

>242 rosalita: Dick Francis is one of my go to authors for re-reads. I love the writing, and the characters who are always so positively evolved in their livelihoods. Overwhelmingly his protagonists are skilled working people who like what they do and are open to new experiences. Also, most of the women who serve as love interests come across as real people. I am much less happy with his son's work and didn't finish the last one I picked up some years ago.

>244 quondame: I agree about Dick Francis, Susan. They are very re-readable. And I am impressed that he didn't just use people directly involved with horse racing as his protagonists, but instead spotlights other professions that have some sort of connection to horses, and gives great details on the ins and outs. I always come away from them thinking, "That's an interesting job; I should have done that as a career." I haven't read any of his son's books, but I just have an aversion in general to those sorts of continuations. I'd rather just re-read the originals.

>242 rosalita: I was an avid reader of those Dick Francis mysteries, too. I remember Proof as a particularly good one.

>243 rosalita: Oh, that does not surprise me at all, Joe! They do seem like they would be right up your alley. Now that I've re-read this one, I'm remembering all my other favorites: Reflex with its photography puzzles, Shattered about glassblowing, Longshot with the survivalist writer. So many good ones! I hope more are put on e-sale soon.

>245 rosalita: >247 rosalita: For Kicks is still my favorite, though it pretty much goes against all but the 'good writing' qualifiers of >244 quondame:.

I remember Odds Against and Forfeit as among my favorites. As you say, so many good ones! We should think about a Dick Francis group read in '19?

>248 quondame: Oh yeah, that was a good one, Susan. Although I hated the horse torture aspect of it. There's another one, Blood Sport that I have tagged as "too sad to re-read" on LT.

>249 jnwelch: The Sid Halsey trio of books (a rare continuing character for Francis) were good but that first one is the best of them, for sure. I think a Dick Francis group read next year would be fantastic! Maybe one book a month? Or is that too much? Since it's not a series they don't have to be read in order but it might make sense to use publication date so we know what's coming up. Or we could go alphabetical, or whatever other scheme appeals.

Who else would be interested in a Dick Francis group read next year? Susan?

>250 rosalita: Next year sounds good - it seems I haven't read them for a few years already, but a few more months is fine.

I used to read Dick Francis, too, but it’s been years/decades (back in my horsey days) since I’ve picked one up. Those titles listed above sound very familiar and I know some are favorites of mine, as well. I know I’ve read Proof but I don’t remember the details.

Wasn’t there some controversy (I’m going way back here) about his wife having done some of the writing and not getting credited? I have some vague recollections of that but I don’t know if they’re true at all.

I might be interested in a group read. It’d be fun to reread some of those old favorites!

eta: I just checked my shelves and have hardcovers of Break-In, The Edge, and Bolt. I was hoping I had Proof but, like you, I may have given some away.

>251 quondame: Yay! Now that I've read this one, after years of not having ready any, I am definitely feeling the urge to read more.

>252 Copperskye: I do remember those stories about his wife, but as far as I know no one ever really proved she had done any of the writing. I know he freely acknowledged that she did a great deal of research to help him make the various occupations realistic. If I'm remembering correctly, she even took flying lessons and got a pilot's license to help him with a couple of books featuring pilots!

Oh, The Edge! That one put the notion of a trans-Canadian train trip on my radar for the first time. I still say I'm going to do it one of these days! In the meantime, I'll settle for another trip from Iowa to New York City on Amtrak in August, sleeper car and all.

>253 rosalita: Nothing wrong with that! Sounds like a pretty good gig, actually.

I’d love to take the train to California. Some day!

>253 rosalita: Another "mystery" with a trans-Canadian train trip is The Nanny Bird by Dorothy Dunnett. I prefer her historical novels though.

>240 rosalita: Julia, The Card Catalog sounds like a great read. I am also old enough to remember actual cards :-) And I loved the dictionary game when I was younger too :-)

I've never read any Dick Francis, but looking at this thread I'm now keen to! I was just about to ask about reading order, but I see that most of them are stand-alones. I'd be up for a group read in 2019. I checked the elibrary, which has 48 of his books (how many are there?!!) including Proof, so I borrowed it :-)

>254 Copperskye: I hope you get to ride the rails to Cali, Joanne!

>255 quondame: Oh, thanks for that tip, Susan. I'll look for that one.

>256 susanj67: Francis really churned them out, Susan! I hope you like Proof enough to join us on the group read adventure.

I thought of another possible way to organize the read: We could take turns choosing each month's books, either our favorites or ones we haven't read yet, or whatever. The only exceptions I would make are for the three books that feature Sid Halley, and the two that feature Kit Fielding. Each of those mini-series might be better read in order.

This is sounding good, Julia!

>258 jnwelch: I'm getting really excited about it, Joe! Let's not forget it was all your brilliant idea. :-)

>243 rosalita: - Let me know if you want to try to squeeze in an early dinner on your one full day. I'm sure Jim and Judy would be up for it, but since you have so little time, totally understandable if you'd rather use it experiencing the city!

>260 katiekrug: I will definitely let you know once I've figured things out a bit more. I do know that doors open at 7:30 for the show. I'm not sure how that figures into planning for dinner, in terms of when and where.

No worries - I'll just make a note that's when you'll be in town :)

I love Dick Francis books! I am in for some sort of group thingy. : )

Hi Julia! I hope summer is going well. :) I can't keep up, and I've quit trying, but a quick perusal of your thread reminds me that I have more Ruth Galloways to read. I am on #6.

Hi, Jenn! It's a good series, one of my favorites right now.