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1richardderus
It seems to me that having six threads is wasteful and arrogantly snobbish. So how could I resist?
Reviews for books one through twenty-five are over here.
Reviews for books twenty-six through thirty-seven are over here.
Reviews for books thirty-eight through fifty-three are over here.
Reviews for books fifty-four through sixty-eight are over here.
Reviews for books sixty-nine through seventy-three are over here.
Cool ticker thingie:
Reviews are in post:
(note that touchstones are in the reviews to save me endless touchstone corrections)
74. 1066, The Story of a Year...#4
75. Six Geese A-Slaying...#9
76. The Songbird in My Heart...#60
77. Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand...#61
78. Ivy: The Life of I. Compton-Burnett...#66
79. White Nights...#101
80. Cockatiels at Seven...#133
81. Red Bones...#167
82. The Penguin Who Knew Too Much...#184
83. Swan for the Money...#197
84. The Norman Kings...#200
85. Damsels in Distress...#239
86. Mummy Dearest...#245
Reviews for books one through twenty-five are over here.
Reviews for books twenty-six through thirty-seven are over here.
Reviews for books thirty-eight through fifty-three are over here.
Reviews for books fifty-four through sixty-eight are over here.
Reviews for books sixty-nine through seventy-three are over here.
Cool ticker thingie:
Reviews are in post:
(note that touchstones are in the reviews to save me endless touchstone corrections)
74. 1066, The Story of a Year...#4
75. Six Geese A-Slaying...#9
76. The Songbird in My Heart...#60
77. Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand...#61
78. Ivy: The Life of I. Compton-Burnett...#66
79. White Nights...#101
80. Cockatiels at Seven...#133
81. Red Bones...#167
82. The Penguin Who Knew Too Much...#184
83. Swan for the Money...#197
84. The Norman Kings...#200
85. Damsels in Distress...#239
86. Mummy Dearest...#245
2alcottacre
I have 9 threads. I hate to think what that makes me!
3kidzdoc
Queen of LT. Or at least Queen of the 75ers.
*kidzdoc again bows reverently in the direction of Texas
*kidzdoc again bows reverently in the direction of Texas
4richardderus
Seventy-four of seventy-five:
1066, The Story of a Year by Denis Butler was published as part of the general increase of interest in the Norman Conquest as its 900th anniversary approached. It's not a scholarly book, though, it's a popular history, a book meant to appeal to the mass audience, though based on the soundest scholarship available at that time.
It's a successful attempt to make distant events and people come to life, in that Butler gives not simply dates and events and a list of the players on the stage. He makes it his business to extrapolate, from the scanty source materials that survive, the likeliest feelings of the actors on the stage of history, and sifts through the detritus that inevitably accretes around the great and good after their deaths to get at the most probable motives and processes of thought behind their recorded actions.
Butler himself was a television and short story writer, this being his first major prose work. It shows in certain craft areas. He tends to shift his focus from place to place in his narrative without offering much sense of *why* he is doing so. He chose a chronological approach to telling the story of the year, which makes perfect sense; but his leaps of PoV among the many active parties aren't tied as well as they could be to that chronological structure. Given that there is little known with certainty about the timing of events at this late remove, it could not have hurt his credibility to acknowledge that his timings are not specific but probable more often than he does.
All that said, I can but pine wistfully for the times when history books such as this were popular reading. The modern trend in non-ficiton towards the narrow subject and the biography and the relevance of a specific event instead of an overview at book length of a pivotal time is, in my opinion, a loss. Books like 1831, dedicated to as broad an assemblage of facts and theories about a single year and its consequences for modern times, are all too rare; I can think of few others, 1759 being one, 1688 being another. Both, by the bye, are excellent books. They failed to set the sales charts on fire, sadly. Decent sales, enough to make their publishers issue paper editions; but not world-beaters, the way this book was in its day.
Interests have changed, it's true, and the specific subject as opposed to the general one is ever more evidently the winner of the consumer dollar sweepstakes. It's not a bad thing, really, but a worrisome one if it betokens further and accelerating fragmentation of knowledge. It's good to know all there is to know about The Texas City Disaster but mostly because its knock-on effects on corporate power are still being felt. It's not good that no one is writing about the underlying causes of these disasters...perhaps if someone had, it could have prevented Bhopal from happening for most of the same causes as Texas City did.
Ah well, such are the cranks and crotchets of an aging liberal with an autodidact's inability to see why education should prove so stultifying to human curiosity. I recommend this book to those with an interest in history, those who like to feel they have a better broad understanding of it, and those whose non-professional interest in the past is naggingly unfilfilled by current works of historical scholarship.
1066, The Story of a Year by Denis Butler was published as part of the general increase of interest in the Norman Conquest as its 900th anniversary approached. It's not a scholarly book, though, it's a popular history, a book meant to appeal to the mass audience, though based on the soundest scholarship available at that time.
It's a successful attempt to make distant events and people come to life, in that Butler gives not simply dates and events and a list of the players on the stage. He makes it his business to extrapolate, from the scanty source materials that survive, the likeliest feelings of the actors on the stage of history, and sifts through the detritus that inevitably accretes around the great and good after their deaths to get at the most probable motives and processes of thought behind their recorded actions.
Butler himself was a television and short story writer, this being his first major prose work. It shows in certain craft areas. He tends to shift his focus from place to place in his narrative without offering much sense of *why* he is doing so. He chose a chronological approach to telling the story of the year, which makes perfect sense; but his leaps of PoV among the many active parties aren't tied as well as they could be to that chronological structure. Given that there is little known with certainty about the timing of events at this late remove, it could not have hurt his credibility to acknowledge that his timings are not specific but probable more often than he does.
All that said, I can but pine wistfully for the times when history books such as this were popular reading. The modern trend in non-ficiton towards the narrow subject and the biography and the relevance of a specific event instead of an overview at book length of a pivotal time is, in my opinion, a loss. Books like 1831, dedicated to as broad an assemblage of facts and theories about a single year and its consequences for modern times, are all too rare; I can think of few others, 1759 being one, 1688 being another. Both, by the bye, are excellent books. They failed to set the sales charts on fire, sadly. Decent sales, enough to make their publishers issue paper editions; but not world-beaters, the way this book was in its day.
Interests have changed, it's true, and the specific subject as opposed to the general one is ever more evidently the winner of the consumer dollar sweepstakes. It's not a bad thing, really, but a worrisome one if it betokens further and accelerating fragmentation of knowledge. It's good to know all there is to know about The Texas City Disaster but mostly because its knock-on effects on corporate power are still being felt. It's not good that no one is writing about the underlying causes of these disasters...perhaps if someone had, it could have prevented Bhopal from happening for most of the same causes as Texas City did.
Ah well, such are the cranks and crotchets of an aging liberal with an autodidact's inability to see why education should prove so stultifying to human curiosity. I recommend this book to those with an interest in history, those who like to feel they have a better broad understanding of it, and those whose non-professional interest in the past is naggingly unfilfilled by current works of historical scholarship.
5girlunderglass
I'm back and I'm here to star you! Lots of catching up to do!
6kidzdoc
Nice review, Richard. I've added 1066 The Story of a Year to my Amazon wish list.
7alcottacre
I am looking for it as well, Richard. Thanks for another cogent review.
8richardderus
>5 girlunderglass: Hi Eliza! how was the Euro-peregrination? LOVED the pics from Romania, BTW.
>6 kidzdoc: I don't think you'll be disappointed, Darryl.
>7 alcottacre: Stasia daaahliiingk! (Best Natasha Fatale voice) You'll appreciate the book's immediacy when you can fit it into your Singularity TBR.
>6 kidzdoc: I don't think you'll be disappointed, Darryl.
>7 alcottacre: Stasia daaahliiingk! (Best Natasha Fatale voice) You'll appreciate the book's immediacy when you can fit it into your Singularity TBR.
9richardderus
Seventy-five of seventy-five:
Six Geese ASlaying by Donna Andrews is part of a daffy mystery series featuring the Rubenesque Meg Langslow, daughter of a chic, slim, stylish and scary Virginia aristocrat mother and a simple, single-minded doctor father who never grew up (thank goodness). She's married to an ex-soap hunk and cult TV fantasy villain actor-turned-drama-professor at a small, exclusive liberal arts college located a few miles from her hometown of Yorktown, Virginia. Her extensive extended family includes a cousin who lives his life as a forensic technician from inside a gorillla suit; a cousin whose wool-headed New Age philosophical maunderings cause most of the family acute embarrassment; a younger brother who, like her father, never grew up but managed to make himself rich by starting a MMO-RPG company.
Getting the picture? It's a screwball comedy-cum-mystery, with a couple of befuddled normals at its whirling center. Think "Bringing Up Baby"--you know, the Cary Grant-Katharine Hepburn movie with the leopard and the madcap heiress?--and you've got the gist. And it's working for Andrews! This is the ninth of ten, to date, books in the series.
I commented once, on an LT thread now long buried, that I read mysteries to satisfy my orderly side. (The Divine Miss contends I *have* no orderly side, usually with a wrinkled nose and a wince as she looks into my bedroom.) This series of mysteries, despite the winsome chaos of the plot, scratches that bump with just the right touch. I love the characters, I willingly believe that (fictional) Caerphilly County, Virginia, is run by the lunatics instead of the asylum attendants, because *things go right* there. The right people are rewarded and punished. The right solutions are found to problems, and are implemented with a nudge and a wink at the law.
It's the way I wish Nassau County, New York, was run. It ain't, for the record, even close.
So when the chance came to join the Holiday (not Christmas!) parade and festivities in Caerphilly, Virginia, it would have taken a stronger man than I am to resist the siren call. I read the book in about four hours of snorting, giggling, howling fun. And that's the downside of Andrews's simple, direct prose: It flows like water over the eyeballs, nothing to impede the story being told, no snaggle in the current, just fast-flowing water from the Holy Well of Humor.
The humorless need not even bother looking at the book. The po-faced classics snobs should pass by the shelf, wincing disdainfully. The pseudo-erudite high-culture vultures stand warned off. The rest of us will be over here, in the corner, laughing fit to bust.
Six Geese ASlaying by Donna Andrews is part of a daffy mystery series featuring the Rubenesque Meg Langslow, daughter of a chic, slim, stylish and scary Virginia aristocrat mother and a simple, single-minded doctor father who never grew up (thank goodness). She's married to an ex-soap hunk and cult TV fantasy villain actor-turned-drama-professor at a small, exclusive liberal arts college located a few miles from her hometown of Yorktown, Virginia. Her extensive extended family includes a cousin who lives his life as a forensic technician from inside a gorillla suit; a cousin whose wool-headed New Age philosophical maunderings cause most of the family acute embarrassment; a younger brother who, like her father, never grew up but managed to make himself rich by starting a MMO-RPG company.
Getting the picture? It's a screwball comedy-cum-mystery, with a couple of befuddled normals at its whirling center. Think "Bringing Up Baby"--you know, the Cary Grant-Katharine Hepburn movie with the leopard and the madcap heiress?--and you've got the gist. And it's working for Andrews! This is the ninth of ten, to date, books in the series.
I commented once, on an LT thread now long buried, that I read mysteries to satisfy my orderly side. (The Divine Miss contends I *have* no orderly side, usually with a wrinkled nose and a wince as she looks into my bedroom.) This series of mysteries, despite the winsome chaos of the plot, scratches that bump with just the right touch. I love the characters, I willingly believe that (fictional) Caerphilly County, Virginia, is run by the lunatics instead of the asylum attendants, because *things go right* there. The right people are rewarded and punished. The right solutions are found to problems, and are implemented with a nudge and a wink at the law.
It's the way I wish Nassau County, New York, was run. It ain't, for the record, even close.
So when the chance came to join the Holiday (not Christmas!) parade and festivities in Caerphilly, Virginia, it would have taken a stronger man than I am to resist the siren call. I read the book in about four hours of snorting, giggling, howling fun. And that's the downside of Andrews's simple, direct prose: It flows like water over the eyeballs, nothing to impede the story being told, no snaggle in the current, just fast-flowing water from the Holy Well of Humor.
The humorless need not even bother looking at the book. The po-faced classics snobs should pass by the shelf, wincing disdainfully. The pseudo-erudite high-culture vultures stand warned off. The rest of us will be over here, in the corner, laughing fit to bust.
11richardderus
Thanks, jasmyn! (I hope we're on a first-name basis, or I'll have to call you Ms. 9....)
13cameling
Whew! I've already read Six Geese and 1066 so nothing to add from your reviews for a change. Oh my... this is a first ..... oh dear ...how extraordinary...... feeling woozy ......*grabs a potato chip for stability*
I love Meg Langslow and her family. Can you imagine someone living with someone like her dad? How about this... Meg's family in Saskatoon and neighbors with Russell Quant?
to continue with your corn dialogue - how about corn kernels in cornbread? I love good cornbread but not the mealy dry blocks handed out by some restaurants. I've a good recipe for a moist cornbread that calls for corn kernels (canned so you don't have to deal with corn pubes), grated cheese (uh huh) and crushed pineapple.
I love Meg Langslow and her family. Can you imagine someone living with someone like her dad? How about this... Meg's family in Saskatoon and neighbors with Russell Quant?
to continue with your corn dialogue - how about corn kernels in cornbread? I love good cornbread but not the mealy dry blocks handed out by some restaurants. I've a good recipe for a moist cornbread that calls for corn kernels (canned so you don't have to deal with corn pubes), grated cheese (uh huh) and crushed pineapple.
15alcottacre
Richard, Donna Andrews had a new one come out in June in that series called Swan for the Money. You might want to check it out.
18momom248
And to think on your 1st thread of the year you said let's see how far you get into the 75--wow you reached it w/ 4 months to spare. So will you go for the 100 books thread next year or the 50 x 2 thread? I wish I could reach 50 but alas I am a very very very slow reader! Congrats.
19cameling
#17 : *whimpers*....but i have a sickness ... i eavesdrop on conversations..... i need help... ;-p
I also want to know where you find all your animated gifs. They're awesome!
I also want to know where you find all your animated gifs. They're awesome!
20alcottacre
#19: Since I share the same sickness, I can commiserate.
As for the gifs, I get them on www.glitter-graphics.com. Love the place!
As for the gifs, I get them on www.glitter-graphics.com. Love the place!
21TheTortoise
> 9 Rich, loved your review of Six Geese Aslaying. If the book is as entertaining as your review, it must be a goody!
~ TT
~ TT
22cameling
*toodles off to glitter-graphics*
TT : If you love a good chortle, you'll really enjoy Six Geese as well as other Donna Andrews books such as Murder with Peacocks, Crouching Buzzard Leaping Loon (how could you not love a book with this title?!), No Nest for the Wicked among others. It's addictive .. you've been warned.
TT : If you love a good chortle, you'll really enjoy Six Geese as well as other Donna Andrews books such as Murder with Peacocks, Crouching Buzzard Leaping Loon (how could you not love a book with this title?!), No Nest for the Wicked among others. It's addictive .. you've been warned.
23cameling
Richard : Congratulations on meeting your challenge .... I can't believe I'm going to say what I'm going to say next ...but.... I hope you don't stop posting your reviews of books for this year since I know you're not going to stop just because you've completed your challenge.
of course, if you wanted to spare a kind thought for your little friend (me! incase you had to think), you could read and review lots of books for the rest of the year that you know i won't like and therefore won't be tempted to add to my tottering TBR piles!
of course, if you wanted to spare a kind thought for your little friend (me! incase you had to think), you could read and review lots of books for the rest of the year that you know i won't like and therefore won't be tempted to add to my tottering TBR piles!
24kidzdoc
Congratulations, Richard!
I think a weekend long celebratory party at his place is in order. I'll bring Philly cheese steaks and Junior's cheesecake...and sneak in some corn on the cob.
I think a weekend long celebratory party at his place is in order. I'll bring Philly cheese steaks and Junior's cheesecake...and sneak in some corn on the cob.
25calm
Congatulations Richard!
Please keep finding (and reviewing) all these great (and not so great) books :)
Please keep finding (and reviewing) all these great (and not so great) books :)
27jasmyn9
>11 richardderus: Well since I don't much like the sound of Ms. 9 ... you hereby have my permission to use my first name. :)
28jasmyn9
>26 alcottacre: Oh my......I think I still have soda coming out of my nose from laughing so hard at the kitten and the corn...two of my favorite things!
29alcottacre
#28: Not 2 of Richard's though :)
31alcottacre
I could not resist!
32kiwidoc
OMG - am getting a migraine on this thread.
Well done on reaching 75, Richard. I am intrigued by your wonderful review of 1066. It is a MBR now.
Well done on reaching 75, Richard. I am intrigued by your wonderful review of 1066. It is a MBR now.
33richardderus
*choo*urp*choo*urp
Stasia. No More Glitter Graphics. None. Zippo. Das ist Verboten!
cameling, imagine you pleading for mercy! Ha! When it's all down to YOU AND YOUR EVIL INFLUENCE that I did the "75-Books Challenge" in the first place and found all these wonderful books I can't afford to buy and *must* have and and and it's my birthday in a week and I can't even buy myself a book or fifty and and and even mean old Stasia feels sorry for me!
*snivel*
Stasia. No More Glitter Graphics. None. Zippo. Das ist Verboten!
cameling, imagine you pleading for mercy! Ha! When it's all down to YOU AND YOUR EVIL INFLUENCE that I did the "75-Books Challenge" in the first place and found all these wonderful books I can't afford to buy and *must* have and and and it's my birthday in a week and I can't even buy myself a book or fifty and and and even mean old Stasia feels sorry for me!
*snivel*
34alcottacre
I have only done 3! I know you had more than that on your previous thread.
Mean old Stasia is going to track down the mailman and get the book back, birthday or no, just because you called me mean and old. Mean I can live with, old NEVER!
Mean old Stasia is going to track down the mailman and get the book back, birthday or no, just because you called me mean and old. Mean I can live with, old NEVER!
36cameling
LOL ... Stasia .. that's the best I've seen yet.
hmph... i will not feel sorry for richard, i will not feel sorry for richard, i will not feel sorry for richard.... oh heck, ok i feel a little bit sorry for you only because i know how you feel.
let us weep together, let our tears fall in ever growing pools and may the rivers that form wash away this shitty economy so that all may once more be gainfully employed that bookstores will flourish with happy customers and not teary-eyed browsers.
btw, *going off tangent*, have you read All the King's Men by Robert Warren?
hmph... i will not feel sorry for richard, i will not feel sorry for richard, i will not feel sorry for richard.... oh heck, ok i feel a little bit sorry for you only because i know how you feel.
let us weep together, let our tears fall in ever growing pools and may the rivers that form wash away this shitty economy so that all may once more be gainfully employed that bookstores will flourish with happy customers and not teary-eyed browsers.
btw, *going off tangent*, have you read All the King's Men by Robert Warren?
37richardderus
>34 alcottacre: *eep* I meant, of course, mean young and errrmmm svelte and stylish Stasia! Slip of the keyboard, I swear this thing is haunted, don't know how that could have happened, really!
*offers fearful prayer that he's sucked up enough*
>35 drneutron: Thanks, Dr. N, it really does feel like an accomplishment to have written 75 reviews in a little over eight months. Reading 75 books in and of itself doesn't present a challenge to me, but reading 75 books closely enough to write reviews that I can consider worthwhile indicators of a book's merits is a different and more difficult thing.
Oh and the ban on glitter graphics is sweeping and all-encompassing. Enough already. No more. *cats and angels ewww and those weird emoticons blech*stews off in a huff*
*offers fearful prayer that he's sucked up enough*
>35 drneutron: Thanks, Dr. N, it really does feel like an accomplishment to have written 75 reviews in a little over eight months. Reading 75 books in and of itself doesn't present a challenge to me, but reading 75 books closely enough to write reviews that I can consider worthwhile indicators of a book's merits is a different and more difficult thing.
Oh and the ban on glitter graphics is sweeping and all-encompassing. Enough already. No more. *cats and angels ewww and those weird emoticons blech*stews off in a huff*
38richardderus
>36 cameling: Robert Penn Warren makes my spirits rise. I want to grow up to be able to write like him. His deft hand and surgeon's eye...! What glorious prose expended on such broken, bad people. Steinbeck got nothin' on Warren!
Oh wait...what was the question again...ah! Yeup, read it.
Oh wait...what was the question again...ah! Yeup, read it.
39alcottacre
#37: Svelte - decidely not. Stylish - I absolutely refuse to be. Young - is a state of mind and I am there.
Good thing for you that the mailman is gone . . .
Good thing for you that the mailman is gone . . .
40MusicMom41
Congratulation of reaching 75--how did you ever doubt that you would?
You've introduced me to a new author and series--but that is okay as long as my library has it. (I'm trying to desist from buying mysteries to help keep my library shelves from exploding.) I'm going to start with Murder with Peacocks which is the first in the Meg Langslow series. I love to laugh and it will make a good camouflage for a "closet book snob!" :-)
You've introduced me to a new author and series--but that is okay as long as my library has it. (I'm trying to desist from buying mysteries to help keep my library shelves from exploding.) I'm going to start with Murder with Peacocks which is the first in the Meg Langslow series. I love to laugh and it will make a good camouflage for a "closet book snob!" :-)
41richardderus
Thank you, Carolyn! And Murder with Peacocks, while a good and fun book, is only the beginning. It was Revenge of the Wrought-Iron Flamingos that brought the series to its full stride.
Waaay up in #13, cameling, you mentioned the use of canned corn...I use frozen in preference to canned, but kernels are okay. I love cornbread, but all bready substances **must** be drenched in butter (not margarine ickshudder), or dipped in olive oil, or postively oozing cheese before I will consent to eat them. Dry bread is prison food.
Waaay up in #13, cameling, you mentioned the use of canned corn...I use frozen in preference to canned, but kernels are okay. I love cornbread, but all bready substances **must** be drenched in butter (not margarine ickshudder), or dipped in olive oil, or postively oozing cheese before I will consent to eat them. Dry bread is prison food.
42msf59
Congrats Richard! You are an amazing guy!... as I shuffle back to my minuscule challenge threads.
One of your biggest fans
Little Markie
One of your biggest fans
Little Markie
43Cait86
Congrats on 75 books!
Your last thread lasted less than a month. That might be a record!
Oh, and I am totally with you on the corn thing. Most disgusting vegetable ever. So many foods - salsa, vegetable soup, quesadillas - are ruined because people insist on adding corn :(
Your last thread lasted less than a month. That might be a record!
Oh, and I am totally with you on the corn thing. Most disgusting vegetable ever. So many foods - salsa, vegetable soup, quesadillas - are ruined because people insist on adding corn :(
44Catreona
Belva, so sorry about your kitty. *hug*
Congratulations, Richard!
13: Cornbread with crushed pineapple? Scrumptious!
Richarrd again, I couldn't agree more about butter. Margerine is thoroughly vile stuff. Olive oil OTOH is quite lovely, but butter is best. Butter melting on a piece of fresh-out-of-the-oven yellow cornbread... heavenly.
Congratulations, Richard!
13: Cornbread with crushed pineapple? Scrumptious!
Richarrd again, I couldn't agree more about butter. Margerine is thoroughly vile stuff. Olive oil OTOH is quite lovely, but butter is best. Butter melting on a piece of fresh-out-of-the-oven yellow cornbread... heavenly.
45thomasandmary
>26 alcottacre: Stasia, that was priceless!
As someone who grows corn, I feel the need to weigh in on this controversy-corn is heaven sent. While others wait all year for Christmas to come round, or school to end, or even school to begin, we wait for the cob to become perfectly plump, pull away from the stalk, the silks to turn brown and then it is time to rejoice and eat, eat, eat, with butter melting through all the cracks and crevices. Corn is the ultimate food, but why take my word for it, here is what the author James Stevenson wrote:
Why Am I Happy
That I Was Born?
Just One Reason
(In Season):
SWEET CORN!
P.S. Sorry, Richard, I forgot to congratulate you on 75 books. Kudos to you and all of your excellent reviews.
As someone who grows corn, I feel the need to weigh in on this controversy-corn is heaven sent. While others wait all year for Christmas to come round, or school to end, or even school to begin, we wait for the cob to become perfectly plump, pull away from the stalk, the silks to turn brown and then it is time to rejoice and eat, eat, eat, with butter melting through all the cracks and crevices. Corn is the ultimate food, but why take my word for it, here is what the author James Stevenson wrote:
Why Am I Happy
That I Was Born?
Just One Reason
(In Season):
SWEET CORN!
P.S. Sorry, Richard, I forgot to congratulate you on 75 books. Kudos to you and all of your excellent reviews.
46richardderus
>42 msf59: Little Markie, next year it's YOU in this hot seat! I might join in again, dunno how I feel about it yet...maybe even do the hundred, though that is a LOT of reviews! Might not be up to it.
>43 Cait86: Soul Sister/New Best Friend, aaaaaa-men! *Ulch* Corn is ickptui stuff.
>44 Catreona: Cat, oh my goodness yes! Nummers and slurpsome!
>45 thomasandmary: Thomas and/or Mary, perpetrator/perpetratrix of corn growing, it isn't enough that you perform this horrid injustice on society, but you must openly boast of it! Fie, sir and/or madam, and pshaw!
>43 Cait86: Soul Sister/New Best Friend, aaaaaa-men! *Ulch* Corn is ickptui stuff.
>44 Catreona: Cat, oh my goodness yes! Nummers and slurpsome!
>45 thomasandmary: Thomas and/or Mary, perpetrator/perpetratrix of corn growing, it isn't enough that you perform this horrid injustice on society, but you must openly boast of it! Fie, sir and/or madam, and pshaw!
47richardderus
I've decided that I will write my memoirs one day. The first volume I shall title, Uncommon Fruits Worthy of Attention, which is a gardening book whose title is just *me* all over; that will take us up to about age 39. The second volume I shall call, Craze: Gin and Debauchery in an Age of Reason, which title I just saw here and added to my wishlist. It shall be 40 onwards. Perfect description of my life, between the two of them.
48Catreona
LOL Richard.
BTW forgot to mention earlier, the author of Shop Class as Soul Craft was on The News Hour tonight. I was excited, having heard of the book here on LT. The author wasn't terribly impressive though IMO
Anyway, LT sure does broaden my horizons...
Edited to try and fix touchstone, blast it!
BTW forgot to mention earlier, the author of Shop Class as Soul Craft was on The News Hour tonight. I was excited, having heard of the book here on LT. The author wasn't terribly impressive though IMO
Anyway, LT sure does broaden my horizons...
Edited to try and fix touchstone, blast it!
49alcottacre
#45: Thanks, I thought so too!
51richardderus
I do? I'd best go check the home page and see why...there's been a clerical error someplace, I don't have two new reviews, do I?
ETA: Oh, the second one's the Donna Andrews! It's only got two thumbs, so it'll be gone soon. But thanks for letting me know, Darryl.
ETA: Oh, the second one's the Donna Andrews! It's only got two thumbs, so it'll be gone soon. But thanks for letting me know, Darryl.
53richardderus
Why thank you, kiwidoc! I'm honing the craft of the short reader-response review. It's hard for me to be concise and impossible to be brief. The discipline is good for my soul.
54rainpebble
I don't know why I didn't suspect him before!~!
Richard, you came all the way up here just to do my little kitty in, didn't you?
Stasia; gooders on the kitty/cob gif (missed the pubes tho, *giggle, giggle*
cameling;
must, must have your cornbread recipe, please.
St. Richard
Way to go!~! Congrats on hitting and busting your 75 challenge!~! Good on you!~!
And may I just say Congratulations for your Hot Review on 1066, The Story of a Year!~! You de man!~!
love n hugs to all (since it seems that all are
hanging here),
belva
Richard, you came all the way up here just to do my little kitty in, didn't you?
Stasia; gooders on the kitty/cob gif (missed the pubes tho, *giggle, giggle*
cameling;
must, must have your cornbread recipe, please.
St. Richard
Way to go!~! Congrats on hitting and busting your 75 challenge!~! Good on you!~!
And may I just say Congratulations for your Hot Review on 1066, The Story of a Year!~! You de man!~!
love n hugs to all (since it seems that all are
hanging here),
belva
55richardderus
Thanks, Belva! I'm amazed that anyone's paying attention to a review of a 44-year-old book about history. It's a good'un, though, and it's so rare to find a writer whose prose is up to the challenge of making the past full of real people with feelings and families and frustrations just like us'n's today got.
56cameling
margarine has never stepped an icky foot across my threshhold! yuck, ptui .... butter all the way. My favorite ... hot toast, dripping with butter and a sprinkling of sugar (not cinnamon) on the top ...great snack for any time of day.
belva : look in your mailbox
belva : look in your mailbox
57wookiebender
Congratulations on reaching 75, Richard! And now I'm adding Donna Andrews to my wishlist. Dagnabbit. Her books were also recommended to me by a friend whose taste I have ignored in the past, and now I'm finally reading books she recommended ages ago, and wondering why I didn't run out to the bookshop, waving my credit card, on each recommendation!
58girlunderglass
another one to congratulate you, you've done it! I think the way it looks right now (I'm tracking my reading progress on an Excel spreadsheet) I will get to 75 just before the deadline - well, hopefully just before and not right after. But it's gonna be tight. I might have to do a little chea... *ahem* I mean reading of slightly smaller books towards the end.
Happy reading!
Happy reading!
59karenmarie
I'm going to hijack your thread, Richard, to promote a group CharlesBoyd and I set up. We each agreed to read a book we thought we'd hate and its been lots of fun. Based on level of interest, we've created a group to promote this type of challenge.
I'll Read Yours if You'll Read Mine
I'll Read Yours if You'll Read Mine
60richardderus
Seventy-six of seventy-five:
The Songbird in My Heart by Mark Steven Rhoads was a Member Giveaway that I got last week. It's a poetry/prose/photographic meditation on the nature of life and the appreciation of the manifold pleasures of nature. It's beautifully produced and charmingly designed.
The author sums up his message on page 141:
"Let me summarize this simple message of grace:
-You were born perfect and present in your original mind.
-You acquired an egoic personality leading to a life subject to false reality, pain and suffering.
-Allow your original mind to be ever present, coexistent with, and observant of your egoic mind.
-This is the purpose of your life, to live in the pure consciousness of your original mind.
-There is nothing else that you need to do, study, remember, memorize or otherwise know."
So if these statements ring your mind and heart like a huge brass gong, you will **love** this book. It's not for Bible-thumpin' Christians. It's not for agnostics or those questioning the need for concepts of spirit. It's a celebratory ode.
Oh, and poetry students should give it a WIDE berth.
The Songbird in My Heart by Mark Steven Rhoads was a Member Giveaway that I got last week. It's a poetry/prose/photographic meditation on the nature of life and the appreciation of the manifold pleasures of nature. It's beautifully produced and charmingly designed.
The author sums up his message on page 141:
"Let me summarize this simple message of grace:
-You were born perfect and present in your original mind.
-You acquired an egoic personality leading to a life subject to false reality, pain and suffering.
-Allow your original mind to be ever present, coexistent with, and observant of your egoic mind.
-This is the purpose of your life, to live in the pure consciousness of your original mind.
-There is nothing else that you need to do, study, remember, memorize or otherwise know."
So if these statements ring your mind and heart like a huge brass gong, you will **love** this book. It's not for Bible-thumpin' Christians. It's not for agnostics or those questioning the need for concepts of spirit. It's a celebratory ode.
Oh, and poetry students should give it a WIDE berth.
61richardderus
Seventy-seven of seventy-five:
Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand by Samuel R. Delany was a favorite read of mine back in my twenties. I used it as proof that SF wasn't a literary wasteland, that innovative stuff was being done in the field and there were voices that the most exacting style-snob couldn't scruple to include in hifalutin' conversations.
Boy, was I wrong.
It's turgid, it's obfuscatory, and it's mutton dressed up as lamb. "Cut through the galaxy's glitter; slice away all night. What thoughts did I dole out to that world (out of the six thousand, which, according to a rumor that had crept worlds and worlds away, corroborrated only by a certain certified psychotic, may have been) destroyed by the XIv?
Certainly I thought about it.
Yet after a week, after a handful of weeks, now at home, now away, somehow the rational part of my mind had accorded it much the weight one gives to the most insubstantial notion."
What the...? Six thousand worlds, or one, destroyed and the thought is insubstantial. I am reminded of the moment I stopped reading Susan Cheever's work, when she described a moment in a character's life as "soft as loss." Loss, soft? Funny, that isn't how I've experienced it. And this farrago, what is the insubstantial notion that the author gives to the possible destruction of a large number of planets? Too big to understand, too hard to grasp entirely, what? But insubstantial?
That's the beginning of chapter four. It's one example of a repeating problem that I see at fifty that I didn't at twenty-five: write lots of words, no one will notice that you're not saying much.
I haven't re-read Dhalgren, Delany's claim-to-fame book, and now I don't think I will. This re-read wasn't a success at all. It's a book I think is second rate, about ideas I think are unoriginal and pretty uninteresting. And that makes me sad.
Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand by Samuel R. Delany was a favorite read of mine back in my twenties. I used it as proof that SF wasn't a literary wasteland, that innovative stuff was being done in the field and there were voices that the most exacting style-snob couldn't scruple to include in hifalutin' conversations.
Boy, was I wrong.
It's turgid, it's obfuscatory, and it's mutton dressed up as lamb. "Cut through the galaxy's glitter; slice away all night. What thoughts did I dole out to that world (out of the six thousand, which, according to a rumor that had crept worlds and worlds away, corroborrated only by a certain certified psychotic, may have been) destroyed by the XIv?
Certainly I thought about it.
Yet after a week, after a handful of weeks, now at home, now away, somehow the rational part of my mind had accorded it much the weight one gives to the most insubstantial notion."
What the...? Six thousand worlds, or one, destroyed and the thought is insubstantial. I am reminded of the moment I stopped reading Susan Cheever's work, when she described a moment in a character's life as "soft as loss." Loss, soft? Funny, that isn't how I've experienced it. And this farrago, what is the insubstantial notion that the author gives to the possible destruction of a large number of planets? Too big to understand, too hard to grasp entirely, what? But insubstantial?
That's the beginning of chapter four. It's one example of a repeating problem that I see at fifty that I didn't at twenty-five: write lots of words, no one will notice that you're not saying much.
I haven't re-read Dhalgren, Delany's claim-to-fame book, and now I don't think I will. This re-read wasn't a success at all. It's a book I think is second rate, about ideas I think are unoriginal and pretty uninteresting. And that makes me sad.
62rainpebble
St.;
Though you didn't care for the book, your review was succinct and evocative, honest and revealing. I think I will give the book a pass but I enjoyed your review.
belva
Though you didn't care for the book, your review was succinct and evocative, honest and revealing. I think I will give the book a pass but I enjoyed your review.
belva
63tloeffler
I think I missed saying congratulations on hitting 75 books, so Congratulations on Hitting 75 Books! And if I said it before, well, then Congratulations Again on Hitting 75 Books.
64womansheart
Dear Richard -
I salute you with great respect for completing your 75/2009 Challenge in advance of the deadline by many, many days!
One of the things that I admire each time I read your Challenge thread is reading the reviews that you have given each one of the books that you have read. I sift through them panning for gold and I find nuggets quite often.
You are the Man ... thank you for your insights and musings. Eagerly awaiting your *extra* Challenge books as they are presented.
womansheart/Woofie
I salute you with great respect for completing your 75/2009 Challenge in advance of the deadline by many, many days!
One of the things that I admire each time I read your Challenge thread is reading the reviews that you have given each one of the books that you have read. I sift through them panning for gold and I find nuggets quite often.
You are the Man ... thank you for your insights and musings. Eagerly awaiting your *extra* Challenge books as they are presented.
womansheart/Woofie
65London_StJ
Like everyone else has said, congrats on 75. And on your large number of healthy reviews. Good work!
I actually enjoyed your (albeit negative) review of Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand. I've had the same experience with books I once thought were amazing and turned out not to be. I'm sorry the reread was a dud, but I'm glad you got the chance to re-experience it and find that out for yourself - sometimes that's worth the reading itself.
I hope you enjoy your next one!
I actually enjoyed your (albeit negative) review of Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand. I've had the same experience with books I once thought were amazing and turned out not to be. I'm sorry the reread was a dud, but I'm glad you got the chance to re-experience it and find that out for yourself - sometimes that's worth the reading itself.
I hope you enjoy your next one!
66richardderus
Seventy-eight of seventy-five:
Ivy, the Life of I. Compton-Burnett by Hilary Spurling
Why would I, a charter member of the “Eradicate Ivy Compton-Burnett” Society, have and read this book? It all started as a joke.
I saw this elephantine tome in the liberry and was inspired. The Divine Miss, the only person on planet Earth who hates the labored simplistic flatness of Icky Crumpet-Burnoose's prose more than I, was due home for her weekendly visit. What better way to cause her pain than to cause her to see Icky's malevolent mug on her nightstand, with a note attached: “For relief of insomnia”?
Gratifying shrieks of outrage and stomps of fury from her bedroom assured me of the success of my evil plot. Subsequent hurling of this massive artifact at me (no mean feat! Must weigh 5lbs!) let me know that my humor was properly received and appreciated.
So why not just return the damned thing to the liberry and call it good, a prank well done? I got curious. So many bad things happen when I get curious (two marriages, two children, oh-so-many disastrous car trips) that you'd think I'd've learned not to scratch that bump. Ha.
Turns out that Icky had a more interesting life than her fiction! (Not that this is a difficult feat.) The oldest child of a Victorian homeopath's second family, she was a bossy, albeit cheerful and fun older sister to her family, gradually losing all semblance of humor and kindness as her extremely weird mother made ever-increasing demands on her to run the family. Her eventual position as head of household was a disaster for her personally, resulting in the suicides of her two youngest sisters and her (far too) belovèd brother's alienation from her by marriage to a woman she didn't seem to like a whole lot. He then dies in WWI, and she drifts personally and professionally for a good long time. She has no money worries, so it's only on the emotional side that this matters.
So then she meets an older woman, more established than she as an independent professional writer and historian of furniture, called Margaret Jourdain. Their love affair lasted some 35 years, spent living together and traveling together and going to parties together. And, according to Spurling, not having sex. They said they didn't, protests Spurling! And yet, in other instances, the mere saying of something is determined by Spurling to be simple misdirection, Icky saying something to deflect or distract someone from learning details she didn't want to give. Other people said they weren't, corroborates Spurling! And yet, in other instances, eyewitness reports are discounted because the people involved were prejudiced or insufficiently informed or what-have-you.
Now, I don't belong to the school of readers who want salacious details of characters's lives, even subjects of biographies. I don't need to know what others do in their bedrooms, any others, unless in some way it expands my knowledge and appreciation of a character. And I am actively revolted by the idea of lesbian sex, unlike most males; I outgrew my juvenile need for female genitalia a long time ago and would prefer not to be reminded of them at all, thank you. I am also not one of those gay people who seeks spurious validation in claiming people from earlier times as members of the gay community before such an identity, let alone community, existed.
But if Ivy and Margaret weren't big ol' dykes, who on this earth is? And why should we for a moment believe that they never so much as kissed? Women, contrary to what most men and their female converts seem to think, have intense erotic urges that (in my experience, at least) they very very very badly want to satisfy. Most men are inept at doing so, sadly, so the myth goes on that these urges are nonexistent. Spurling does these women, raised in a homophobic and reticent culture, a disservice by denying them (posthumously) even a suggestion of a sex life. I think it's bosh, and I think it's dishonest, and Spurling and her ilk should be ashamed that their minds can't encompass the idea that two women in love could find satisfaction and pleasure in each others's bodies without wanting to make it a public display or even discuss it with others. There are anecdotes of Icky saying she'd never made love, and then going on to have quite thoroughly informed and detailed conversations with married women about sex and desire. This, says Icky's biographer, is a testament to the authoress's imaginitve powers.
Oh for God's sweet sake! Grow up, woman, and realize she wasn't that imaginitive!! NO ONE IS. You can't, even in today's world of instant and astoundingly diverse gratification, know what desire and its satisfactions are about until you've been there! Really now.
But oddly enough, I was interested enough in this life to keep reading about this writer whose tiny talents I disparage with vim and vigor at every opportunity. I wouldn't recommend it to any but her most ardent dupes, I mean fans, because it's simply too long to be useful to anyone only mildly curious. Spurling's style is clear, I suppose, though I can't say much more for it than that. It was no great pleasure to read, but it was a life lived on her own terms in a time and place where that was a very, very novel (!) and difficult achievement.
Ivy, the Life of I. Compton-Burnett by Hilary Spurling
Why would I, a charter member of the “Eradicate Ivy Compton-Burnett” Society, have and read this book? It all started as a joke.
I saw this elephantine tome in the liberry and was inspired. The Divine Miss, the only person on planet Earth who hates the labored simplistic flatness of Icky Crumpet-Burnoose's prose more than I, was due home for her weekendly visit. What better way to cause her pain than to cause her to see Icky's malevolent mug on her nightstand, with a note attached: “For relief of insomnia”?
Gratifying shrieks of outrage and stomps of fury from her bedroom assured me of the success of my evil plot. Subsequent hurling of this massive artifact at me (no mean feat! Must weigh 5lbs!) let me know that my humor was properly received and appreciated.
So why not just return the damned thing to the liberry and call it good, a prank well done? I got curious. So many bad things happen when I get curious (two marriages, two children, oh-so-many disastrous car trips) that you'd think I'd've learned not to scratch that bump. Ha.
Turns out that Icky had a more interesting life than her fiction! (Not that this is a difficult feat.) The oldest child of a Victorian homeopath's second family, she was a bossy, albeit cheerful and fun older sister to her family, gradually losing all semblance of humor and kindness as her extremely weird mother made ever-increasing demands on her to run the family. Her eventual position as head of household was a disaster for her personally, resulting in the suicides of her two youngest sisters and her (far too) belovèd brother's alienation from her by marriage to a woman she didn't seem to like a whole lot. He then dies in WWI, and she drifts personally and professionally for a good long time. She has no money worries, so it's only on the emotional side that this matters.
So then she meets an older woman, more established than she as an independent professional writer and historian of furniture, called Margaret Jourdain. Their love affair lasted some 35 years, spent living together and traveling together and going to parties together. And, according to Spurling, not having sex. They said they didn't, protests Spurling! And yet, in other instances, the mere saying of something is determined by Spurling to be simple misdirection, Icky saying something to deflect or distract someone from learning details she didn't want to give. Other people said they weren't, corroborates Spurling! And yet, in other instances, eyewitness reports are discounted because the people involved were prejudiced or insufficiently informed or what-have-you.
Now, I don't belong to the school of readers who want salacious details of characters's lives, even subjects of biographies. I don't need to know what others do in their bedrooms, any others, unless in some way it expands my knowledge and appreciation of a character. And I am actively revolted by the idea of lesbian sex, unlike most males; I outgrew my juvenile need for female genitalia a long time ago and would prefer not to be reminded of them at all, thank you. I am also not one of those gay people who seeks spurious validation in claiming people from earlier times as members of the gay community before such an identity, let alone community, existed.
But if Ivy and Margaret weren't big ol' dykes, who on this earth is? And why should we for a moment believe that they never so much as kissed? Women, contrary to what most men and their female converts seem to think, have intense erotic urges that (in my experience, at least) they very very very badly want to satisfy. Most men are inept at doing so, sadly, so the myth goes on that these urges are nonexistent. Spurling does these women, raised in a homophobic and reticent culture, a disservice by denying them (posthumously) even a suggestion of a sex life. I think it's bosh, and I think it's dishonest, and Spurling and her ilk should be ashamed that their minds can't encompass the idea that two women in love could find satisfaction and pleasure in each others's bodies without wanting to make it a public display or even discuss it with others. There are anecdotes of Icky saying she'd never made love, and then going on to have quite thoroughly informed and detailed conversations with married women about sex and desire. This, says Icky's biographer, is a testament to the authoress's imaginitve powers.
Oh for God's sweet sake! Grow up, woman, and realize she wasn't that imaginitive!! NO ONE IS. You can't, even in today's world of instant and astoundingly diverse gratification, know what desire and its satisfactions are about until you've been there! Really now.
But oddly enough, I was interested enough in this life to keep reading about this writer whose tiny talents I disparage with vim and vigor at every opportunity. I wouldn't recommend it to any but her most ardent dupes, I mean fans, because it's simply too long to be useful to anyone only mildly curious. Spurling's style is clear, I suppose, though I can't say much more for it than that. It was no great pleasure to read, but it was a life lived on her own terms in a time and place where that was a very, very novel (!) and difficult achievement.
67richardderus
Labor Day weekend was laborious and unpleasant. I am glad it's over. Thanks to all who posted congratulations and who said kind things about my testy review of Delany's bad book. It's odd how I hit a patch of books I disliked at a time when I was in a good mood, and then got to review them when I was mired in a bad one.
Bibliotherapy, I guess. Letting me express negative thoughts and feelings in a socially acceptable way.
Fall is here, and I hope to be chilly very soon. Until then, at least it's not hot anymore. Here, that is.
Bibliotherapy, I guess. Letting me express negative thoughts and feelings in a socially acceptable way.
Fall is here, and I hope to be chilly very soon. Until then, at least it's not hot anymore. Here, that is.
68alcottacre
Be assured Richard, that whenever you come down to Texas it will still be hot!
69richardderus
Don't I just know it, and thanks for rubbing it in. Oh joy, oh goody, in a mere two weeks I get to roast my toasties off. Rapture. Giddily tossed confetti.
70kidzdoc
Love your comments about the biography! I first thought that you'd been kidnapped by Compton-Burnett worshipping gypsies and forced to read the book over the weekend.
71richardderus
Thanks, Darryl! High praise indeed coming from a Hot Review geneeratin' machine such as your good self.
72girlunderglass
you are a joy to read as always, Richard!
73rainpebble
St Richard;
I just slapped you with your 5th, count 'em, 5 thumbs up!~! I think you are gonna have another hot one and I saw another one there this morning and yet another the other morning. What in the hell is this world coming to when a St. is also a STAR!~!
Whoo Hoo!~! Richard, you rock!~!
And I laughed my whole way through your review. (which, I am certain was your intention)
Have I told you lately that I love you?
love,
xoxo
belva
I just slapped you with your 5th, count 'em, 5 thumbs up!~! I think you are gonna have another hot one and I saw another one there this morning and yet another the other morning. What in the hell is this world coming to when a St. is also a STAR!~!
Whoo Hoo!~! Richard, you rock!~!
And I laughed my whole way through your review. (which, I am certain was your intention)
Have I told you lately that I love you?
love,
xoxo
belva
74richardderus
Fifth thumbs up? For which review, Belva? I didn't know I had two until I read my profile messages. xoxo back at'cha
That Icky Crumpet-Burnoose read was more interesting than I like to let on. It amazed and saddened me to think she possessed such a life as material and honed her innate gift down to a 000-gauge needle's fineness, then did nothing to speak of with it.
ETA: Eliza! So glad you're here!! I wonder where you go when I don't see you for a few days...not like you have your own thread or nothin'.
That Icky Crumpet-Burnoose read was more interesting than I like to let on. It amazed and saddened me to think she possessed such a life as material and honed her innate gift down to a 000-gauge needle's fineness, then did nothing to speak of with it.
ETA: Eliza! So glad you're here!! I wonder where you go when I don't see you for a few days...not like you have your own thread or nothin'.
75jasmyn9
>60 richardderus: I received The Songbird in My Heart also. I've only managed to flip through the pages so far and I like the pictures. The *plan* is to read it this weekend when I have the house to yself for a few hours....with the Billy kitten snuggling in my lap.
76alcottacre
#69: You are quite welcome for the rub :)
77QuentinTom
wow what a thread! (Hi Doc, why didn't you tell me about this place?)
It's gonna take me some time to read through everything, but I'll get there.
It's gonna take me some time to read through everything, but I'll get there.
78richardderus
>75 jasmyn9: Jasmyn, it's so pretty! Enjoy that, and take the rest as the author likely intended...a sip at a time.
>76 alcottacre: *ngurmph*
>77 QuentinTom: Murr! You came! Welcome.
>76 alcottacre: *ngurmph*
>77 QuentinTom: Murr! You came! Welcome.
79QuentinTom
yes, thank you, and I am applauding wildly your review of ICB, and the magnificent trashing of La Spurling's daftness over the whole sex thang.
80ChocolateMuse
Hi Richard, I have just found your thread and am lamenting that it's taken me this long. One long winter evening I shall read your old ones... or at least some of them...
With regard to your review of 1066, have you heard of The year 1000 by Robert Lacey? I read it once and enjoyed it in a restrained sort of way. You might be interested.
With regard to your review of 1066, have you heard of The year 1000 by Robert Lacey? I read it once and enjoyed it in a restrained sort of way. You might be interested.
82kidzdoc
Okay, so I was impressed by Richard's two Hot Reviews from a couple of days ago. Today he has three Hot Reviews! I officially anoint Richard King of the Hot Reviews, and I am turning my prayer mat away from Texas (sorry, Stasia) toward Long Island. Ommm...
Hi, Murr! I didn't tell you about Richard's thread because he is allergic to cats, and has threatened even innocent kittens with extreme violence. I feared for your safety.
Hi, Murr! I didn't tell you about Richard's thread because he is allergic to cats, and has threatened even innocent kittens with extreme violence. I feared for your safety.
83QuentinTom
extreme violence, eh? well, let him try!!!!!!!!
* hollow laughter from the attic*
* hollow laughter from the attic*
84womansheart
> tomcatMurr -
All I gotta add to what Darryl said is ... thank G_d that Cyberspace exists and that it is deep and wide to protect you, Dear tomcat, from the uber cat disliker!
Welcome to the groupies of one of the Fairest of the Fair and Most Accomplished of Reviewers. I do believe you two ( you & Richard) have met elsewhere on LT.
Believe me it is worth the trip over here to follow this thread. Some days, most days, it is better that a great cuppa or even a quick fierce hug from a beloved. Let's just say, I like this man!
Welcome, bring with you your special thoughts and ways of being here.
womansheart/Ruth
All I gotta add to what Darryl said is ... thank G_d that Cyberspace exists and that it is deep and wide to protect you, Dear tomcat, from the uber cat disliker!
Welcome to the groupies of one of the Fairest of the Fair and Most Accomplished of Reviewers. I do believe you two ( you & Richard) have met elsewhere on LT.
Believe me it is worth the trip over here to follow this thread. Some days, most days, it is better that a great cuppa or even a quick fierce hug from a beloved. Let's just say, I like this man!
Welcome, bring with you your special thoughts and ways of being here.
womansheart/Ruth
85womansheart
Richard Dear -
I'm going to my local Liberry (sic) today to pick up and chew, snort and guffaw my way through my first Donna Andrews, book Murder, with peacocks.
If a grumpy guy like you gets a laugh outta her books, that's good enough for me ... and just what I need right now. So declared this day!
You are da bomb.
Woofie
eba - to remove duplication(s)
I'm going to my local Liberry (sic) today to pick up and chew, snort and guffaw my way through my first Donna Andrews, book Murder, with peacocks.
If a grumpy guy like you gets a laugh outta her books, that's good enough for me ... and just what I need right now. So declared this day!
You are da bomb.
Woofie
eba - to remove duplication(s)
86richardderus
>84 womansheart:, 85 the uber cat disliker
Oh Woofie, so restrained and mild-mannered...I am the Ur Cat Destroyer. Cats=hyenas=wrongbadevil. The Turkish Delight wanted to leave his wife for me last weekend, and I vetoed the plan (on any number of grounds) but for him, the deal breaker was "your cat stays with the wife." I've told him from the start...you'll always prefer...oh, that's indelicate, isn't it? Well, I expect y'all know what I mean.
And smoochings back at'cha, honey bunches of oats.
>83 QuentinTom: Murr, I eat scarier things for you for breakfast...try it, c'mon.
>82 kidzdoc: Darryl, We accept your most humble homage and, subject to your acceptance of the Creed of the Anti-Dickensians, and recitation daily of the Meditation of St. Berly of the Bookstacks, grant you full access to and permission to enter the Great Bookstore in the Sky. (Belva's still in the Vestibule of the GBiS, owing to her continued veneration of Dickens...all those wet, drippy anoraks and wellington boots, and the stacks of complimentary lamingtons and Berliners out of reach...never to taste the perfectly brewed teas whose vapours waft temptingly out the Revolving Door of the Elect....)
Oh, and from http://www.librarything.com/topic/61978#1318700 comes the Meditation of St. Berly of the Bookstacks:
"Hail Richard, erudite proselytizer,
The bibliophiles are with thee.
Blessed art thou of all felicitous curmudgeons,
And blessed is the fruit of your mighty pen.
Holey Richard, sire of this thread,
Pray for us lay readers, Dickensians, and Hemingwayites,
Now and at the time when surely our TBR pile shall falleth.
Amen"
I still laugh when I read that! What a goofball! Thank goodness she's fer me, not agin me!
>81 msf59: Mark, thanks! I don't know exactly why this review seems to offer so much to so many people, but I sure struck a chord. I'm very glad you liked it.
>80 ChocolateMuse: ChocolateMuse, welcome and more welcome! You're here now, that's what counts...although the thread linked above is pretty darned funny reading. I recommend it.
Oh Woofie, so restrained and mild-mannered...I am the Ur Cat Destroyer. Cats=hyenas=wrongbadevil. The Turkish Delight wanted to leave his wife for me last weekend, and I vetoed the plan (on any number of grounds) but for him, the deal breaker was "your cat stays with the wife." I've told him from the start...you'll always prefer...oh, that's indelicate, isn't it? Well, I expect y'all know what I mean.
And smoochings back at'cha, honey bunches of oats.
>83 QuentinTom: Murr, I eat scarier things for you for breakfast...try it, c'mon.
>82 kidzdoc: Darryl, We accept your most humble homage and, subject to your acceptance of the Creed of the Anti-Dickensians, and recitation daily of the Meditation of St. Berly of the Bookstacks, grant you full access to and permission to enter the Great Bookstore in the Sky. (Belva's still in the Vestibule of the GBiS, owing to her continued veneration of Dickens...all those wet, drippy anoraks and wellington boots, and the stacks of complimentary lamingtons and Berliners out of reach...never to taste the perfectly brewed teas whose vapours waft temptingly out the Revolving Door of the Elect....)
Oh, and from http://www.librarything.com/topic/61978#1318700 comes the Meditation of St. Berly of the Bookstacks:
"Hail Richard, erudite proselytizer,
The bibliophiles are with thee.
Blessed art thou of all felicitous curmudgeons,
And blessed is the fruit of your mighty pen.
Holey Richard, sire of this thread,
Pray for us lay readers, Dickensians, and Hemingwayites,
Now and at the time when surely our TBR pile shall falleth.
Amen"
I still laugh when I read that! What a goofball! Thank goodness she's fer me, not agin me!
>81 msf59: Mark, thanks! I don't know exactly why this review seems to offer so much to so many people, but I sure struck a chord. I'm very glad you liked it.
>80 ChocolateMuse: ChocolateMuse, welcome and more welcome! You're here now, that's what counts...although the thread linked above is pretty darned funny reading. I recommend it.
87womansheart
My current belief is that you are a big ol' goofball MAGNET.
Takes one to recognize one. Don't know about the Turkish one ... but we, here, are prolly weirder than he is. There is NO CONTEST between you and a feline, buddy. Silly boy/man!
Preferences ... (nice one , Richard). Gut buster, that one. I'm telling ya' ... better than Prozac.
W*
the short, smart version of the single capital letter as an identity ...
*Woofie
Takes one to recognize one. Don't know about the Turkish one ... but we, here, are prolly weirder than he is. There is NO CONTEST between you and a feline, buddy. Silly boy/man!
Preferences ... (nice one , Richard). Gut buster, that one. I'm telling ya' ... better than Prozac.
W*
the short, smart version of the single capital letter as an identity ...
*Woofie
88cameling
Only you, richard dear, could inspire one to meditate upon your generous and kind gifts to one and all on LT..... I haven't stopped laughing yet. Berly is a genius for coming up with that. Someone should put that in needlepoint for you.
89kidzdoc
I accept the Creed, milord, and promise to recite the daily Meditation.
Is this a monotheistic religion, or can I still turn my prayer mat to Texas after Queen Stasia posts her Sunday proclamations?
Is this a monotheistic religion, or can I still turn my prayer mat to Texas after Queen Stasia posts her Sunday proclamations?
90alcottacre
#82: Since I never thought I deserved the prayer mat anyway, I have no problems to you switching directions with it, Darryl :) Besides, I do not do reviews and I have the utmost respect for those who do!
91richardderus
The Venerable Stasia is part of the Pantheon of the Elect, as soon as she renounces apostasiacal fondness for Dickens. Until then, the Vestibule for her!
92QuentinTom
thank you womansheart for your kind words and promise of protection. I remind Richard that I have a machine gun and that I am a crack shot with an automatic pistol.
And I also adore Dickens. Dickens is the greatest! Dickens rules! Dickens lives! Let's hear it for Dickens!!
Seriously, though, I'm surprised that you don't like Dickens, Richard. There is something very Dickensian about your online persona: large, gregarious, warm- hearted and intoxicated with language, witty and whimsical. What is it about CD that you object to? when did you last read a Dickens novel?
And remember, I am armed.
And I also adore Dickens. Dickens is the greatest! Dickens rules! Dickens lives! Let's hear it for Dickens!!
Seriously, though, I'm surprised that you don't like Dickens, Richard. There is something very Dickensian about your online persona: large, gregarious, warm- hearted and intoxicated with language, witty and whimsical. What is it about CD that you object to? when did you last read a Dickens novel?
And remember, I am armed.
93girlunderglass
Seriously, though, I'm surprised that you don't like Dickens, Richard. There is something very Dickensian about your online persona: large, gregarious, warm- hearted and intoxicated with language, witty and whimsical.
ha! I have to agree with that. Although I think I remember you listing the reasons why you don't like him on another thread. And I don't disappear from your thread it's just that your thread moves too fast! I'm pretty sure it's the busiest one on here except Stasia's.
ha! I have to agree with that. Although I think I remember you listing the reasons why you don't like him on another thread. And I don't disappear from your thread it's just that your thread moves too fast! I'm pretty sure it's the busiest one on here except Stasia's.
94womansheart
>86 richardderus: - Holey Richard!
I really like that one from the Lady Berly's sharp brain and pen. That Portland area of our country seems to nurture and support exceptional human beings. I had read that piece several threads ago and admired it very much. Delightful. Thank you, Berly.
And thank you, Richard Dear, for re-posting such an elegant and amusing bit of the Creed of St. Richard.
W
I really like that one from the Lady Berly's sharp brain and pen. That Portland area of our country seems to nurture and support exceptional human beings. I had read that piece several threads ago and admired it very much. Delightful. Thank you, Berly.
And thank you, Richard Dear, for re-posting such an elegant and amusing bit of the Creed of St. Richard.
W
95Berly
#86 OH! The Meditation of St Richard is in its second printing! How exciting. (I'll have to get the touchstone fixed though...)
Seriously. Richard, I am tickled it still gives you so much pleasure: if it is one tenth the joy your witty ruminations give me, then I am very satisfied.
(Thanks Woofie and Cameling for your kind comments. :) It's ever so nice to be considered elegant, amusing and a genius!! What a great start to my day.)
St. Berly of the Bookstacks
Seriously. Richard, I am tickled it still gives you so much pleasure: if it is one tenth the joy your witty ruminations give me, then I am very satisfied.
(Thanks Woofie and Cameling for your kind comments. :) It's ever so nice to be considered elegant, amusing and a genius!! What a great start to my day.)
St. Berly of the Bookstacks
96richardderus
>92 QuentinTom: My dear Murr, What is it about CD that you object to? Repetitious, tedious, tendentious twaddle. when did you last read a Dickens novel? 2001. Great Expectorations. Oh dear, oh my, I meant Great Expectations, of course. AWFUL. The penny-a-word prolixity never more evident. There is something very Dickensian about your online persona Oh hell! I was going for Falstaffian. *grumble*
>93 girlunderglass: Although I think I remember you listing the reasons why you don't like him on another thread. No fair telling tales out of school, Eliza, unless you tell the WHOLE tale, and provide a handy link. C'mon, c'mon, I just need an excuse...maybe I should fire up the microwave....
>94 womansheart: Woofie, ain't that a hoot?! That St. Berly of the Bookstacks...a laugh a minute!
>95 Berly: We are not at all sure that We like being compared to a ruminant....
>93 girlunderglass: Although I think I remember you listing the reasons why you don't like him on another thread. No fair telling tales out of school, Eliza, unless you tell the WHOLE tale, and provide a handy link. C'mon, c'mon, I just need an excuse...maybe I should fire up the microwave....
>94 womansheart: Woofie, ain't that a hoot?! That St. Berly of the Bookstacks...a laugh a minute!
>95 Berly: We are not at all sure that We like being compared to a ruminant....
97womansheart
> Holey Richard -
Let's make an assumption that is NOT what Lady Berly meant, huh? Funny, tho'. Reading the definition makes it even funnier, IMHO.
See Wiki link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruminant
And yes, I do know what ruminate means Dear Sir.
See Merriam-Webster link:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ruminate
Your are SO adorable. I'm totally and happily in crush!
W
Let's make an assumption that is NOT what Lady Berly meant, huh? Funny, tho'. Reading the definition makes it even funnier, IMHO.
See Wiki link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruminant
And yes, I do know what ruminate means Dear Sir.
See Merriam-Webster link:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ruminate
Your are SO adorable. I'm totally and happily in crush!
W
98Berly
# 96 "Laugh A Minute?" Hhhmmmmm. Please don't laugh too hard or you might lose sight of the love intended in that little homily to St Richard. And BTW, cows are considered holy in Hinduism.
99womansheart
>Berly -
The loves shines through. 'Nuff said.
Cows rock, wholly.
WH
The loves shines through. 'Nuff said.
Cows rock, wholly.
WH
100tiffin
Ricardo, about your review of the Ivy Crumpet-Hairnet book...as soon as she took over the headship (is that a word?) of her family, her two sisters committed suicide? Her eventual position as head of household was a disaster for her personally, resulting in the suicides of her two youngest sisters Am I reading this the right way, as in her leadership basically caused the suicides?
101richardderus
Seventy-nine of seventy-five:
White Nights by Ann Cleeves is the second Sheetland Islands Quartet thriller, which marketing decision was a good one...calling these thrillers instead of mysteries sets up the expectation of a whacking good read though not necessarily the play-fair-with-the-reader puzzle-solver that modern mysteries are.
Cleeves writes wonderfully clearly and carefully about flawed, real, lovable characters in bad emotional states because of violent, evil acts disrupting their very ordinary lives.
The stories she tells in this series, to date, are proof to me that she's looked deeply into human nature and seen what its outlines show to the astute...there but for the grace of God go I. Everyone in this book flees from their hurts. Their flight is, inevitably, unsuccessful. Jimmy Perez can't run from his flaming co-dependence. Fran Hunter can't run from her seething ambition. Bella Sinclair can't run from her self-created persona, an Iron Maiden as effective as any Inquistor's torture device. Inspector Taylor, back up from Inverness, can't escape his fear-driven energy. No one, not any one, escapes.
The white nights of the title are a phenomenon of the far north. The sun never *quite* sets enough for true, dark night to fall. It's unsettling to some, it's a biorhythm disturber of tremendous power to have the body's million-year-old clock disrupted by absence of night. It's used by vile people the world over as a form of torture to deprive a human of good rest. And yet, there are thousands whose entire lives are lived with this condition as backdrop, and they seem not to feel its downside too strongly.
But let's face it...this fact of nature is a thriller-writer's best birthday present. What better metaphor, and even a pretty subtle one, for bringing to light old wrongs, shining the pitiless lamp of the torturer on the concsciences of those guilty of undiscovered crimes, than a sun that won't go down?
That's a very nice backdrop you've chosen, Mme Cleeves, and it works very, very well for your chosen story, right up to and including the resolution of the multiple crimes. It does not make up for the sense I got, throughout the book, that your focus wasn't on me, your reader.
I recommend the book, yes. I even think there are some things about it that are outstanding, including the character developments of Perez and Taylor. But as I careened from incident to incident, I didn't sense that you were laying out this tale for my delectation, but rather leading me like a museum docent from exhibit to exhibit, trying in a haphazard way to lead my somewhat dim brain to a conclusion you'd already reached and were now impatiently awaiting my "aha!" moment. I am already in possession of Red Bones, and I am very much looking forward to seeing what you have planned for me next, but I am a little bit put out by this sense of magisterial disdain that I got from the resolution to White Nights. I wish you'd let me get there with you, instead of running ahead and pointing and waving your arms.
White Nights by Ann Cleeves is the second Sheetland Islands Quartet thriller, which marketing decision was a good one...calling these thrillers instead of mysteries sets up the expectation of a whacking good read though not necessarily the play-fair-with-the-reader puzzle-solver that modern mysteries are.
Cleeves writes wonderfully clearly and carefully about flawed, real, lovable characters in bad emotional states because of violent, evil acts disrupting their very ordinary lives.
The stories she tells in this series, to date, are proof to me that she's looked deeply into human nature and seen what its outlines show to the astute...there but for the grace of God go I. Everyone in this book flees from their hurts. Their flight is, inevitably, unsuccessful. Jimmy Perez can't run from his flaming co-dependence. Fran Hunter can't run from her seething ambition. Bella Sinclair can't run from her self-created persona, an Iron Maiden as effective as any Inquistor's torture device. Inspector Taylor, back up from Inverness, can't escape his fear-driven energy. No one, not any one, escapes.
The white nights of the title are a phenomenon of the far north. The sun never *quite* sets enough for true, dark night to fall. It's unsettling to some, it's a biorhythm disturber of tremendous power to have the body's million-year-old clock disrupted by absence of night. It's used by vile people the world over as a form of torture to deprive a human of good rest. And yet, there are thousands whose entire lives are lived with this condition as backdrop, and they seem not to feel its downside too strongly.
But let's face it...this fact of nature is a thriller-writer's best birthday present. What better metaphor, and even a pretty subtle one, for bringing to light old wrongs, shining the pitiless lamp of the torturer on the concsciences of those guilty of undiscovered crimes, than a sun that won't go down?
That's a very nice backdrop you've chosen, Mme Cleeves, and it works very, very well for your chosen story, right up to and including the resolution of the multiple crimes. It does not make up for the sense I got, throughout the book, that your focus wasn't on me, your reader.
I recommend the book, yes. I even think there are some things about it that are outstanding, including the character developments of Perez and Taylor. But as I careened from incident to incident, I didn't sense that you were laying out this tale for my delectation, but rather leading me like a museum docent from exhibit to exhibit, trying in a haphazard way to lead my somewhat dim brain to a conclusion you'd already reached and were now impatiently awaiting my "aha!" moment. I am already in possession of Red Bones, and I am very much looking forward to seeing what you have planned for me next, but I am a little bit put out by this sense of magisterial disdain that I got from the resolution to White Nights. I wish you'd let me get there with you, instead of running ahead and pointing and waving your arms.
102richardderus
>100 tiffin: Tui, pretty much. It's clear that her imperious and managing style caused these two young fools to act on impulses that, in a less controlling and intimidating situation, probably would have been the subject of late-night tearfests and door-slamming scenes. Ol' Icky never wrote a book after those events that had no domestic tyrant causing grievous emotional harm to her/is subjects. Expiation, anyone?
>98 Berly: Berly-boo, what Woofie said...except the bit about the cows rockin', which they don't until you tip' em. Uh oh...the Texas is comin' out....
>98 Berly: Berly-boo, what Woofie said...except the bit about the cows rockin', which they don't until you tip' em. Uh oh...the Texas is comin' out....
103Berly
I remember going on a cow-tipping quest one inebriated night in my college days at Amherst. We walked and walked and never did find a damn cow. And I never could figure out whether this was a worthwhile goal in the first place. Why would you want to tip a cow? It seems like the cow might not like it, nor would I for that matter.
104richardderus
Cows, dear Berlyner, are too stupid to like or dislike anything. Their dimwitted buggy-outy eyes are prone to rolling like Groucho Marx's when they go over, which sight is a hoot and a holler when you're 16 and drunk. Which I was. Didn't have to go that far to find cows, either...the 70s in north Austin, maybe a 10-minute trip.
NOTE TO MCKAIT...DO NOT READ POSTS 102-104!!
NOTE TO MCKAIT...DO NOT READ POSTS 102-104!!
105rainpebble
Y'all are crackin' me up as I sit here lurking and having my coffee. Just 9:40 here.
>#98 & #103:
My dear Berly boo boo boo;
I recall gettin' drunk on my ass and going cow tippin' with my son one time. There were 6 of us and we knew exactly where the cows were. Their owner was my Sunday school teacher. It took 4 of us to tip just one and we all four went with it.
Now regarding cows being holy somewhere in this world; there is also (I am thinking India for both) somewhere that when an elephant in the street begins to piss; people run from the shops (even shop owners) to stand under the "fountain" because that brings them luck and blessings.
So happy I live in the good old U.S. of A. The only place I would rather be is U.K., Ireland, Wales, Scotland, and on & on & on.
luv and hugs to all
And oh by the way Ruthie/Woofie/W/H;
You can't have him so just get rid of the "in-crush" thingee. Have you forgotten that the St. is my betrothed???????????????/
belva
glitter-graphics.com
>#98 & #103:
My dear Berly boo boo boo;
I recall gettin' drunk on my ass and going cow tippin' with my son one time. There were 6 of us and we knew exactly where the cows were. Their owner was my Sunday school teacher. It took 4 of us to tip just one and we all four went with it.
Now regarding cows being holy somewhere in this world; there is also (I am thinking India for both) somewhere that when an elephant in the street begins to piss; people run from the shops (even shop owners) to stand under the "fountain" because that brings them luck and blessings.
So happy I live in the good old U.S. of A. The only place I would rather be is U.K., Ireland, Wales, Scotland, and on & on & on.
luv and hugs to all
And oh by the way Ruthie/Woofie/W/H;
You can't have him so just get rid of the "in-crush" thingee. Have you forgotten that the St. is my betrothed???????????????/
belva
glitter-graphics.com
106richardderus
Both my present wifey and my boyfriend need to be prevented from seeing this thread...not to mention the boyfriend's wife....
107alcottacre
I am happily not any of those people. I am content just being a friend, despite residing in the Vestibule :)
108MusicMom41
Since I mostly lurk, I'll keep Stasia company in the vestibule. :-)
Loved the review of White Nights--you really have a knack of capturing the essence of a book without giving too much away. And I love the last sentence summation--brilliant way of showing your problem with her delivery of the story! I predict this will be another "Hot Review"--deservedly.
Loved the review of White Nights--you really have a knack of capturing the essence of a book without giving too much away. And I love the last sentence summation--brilliant way of showing your problem with her delivery of the story! I predict this will be another "Hot Review"--deservedly.
109Catreona
Hi Tom Cat *wave* I don't, myself, have any use for anti-Dickensians, much less cat haters. But, there's something about Richard...
110calm
This always make me think of one of the greatest closing lines in film history "Nobody's Perfect".
A sense of humour means I can forgive most things:)
Also Richard is on the opposite side of the ocean to me and my cats!
signed a lurker
(damn doctor stopped my meds for a few days -relurk needed!)
A sense of humour means I can forgive most things:)
Also Richard is on the opposite side of the ocean to me and my cats!
signed a lurker
(damn doctor stopped my meds for a few days -relurk needed!)
111richardderus
Just to be perfectly clear...no individual lurker's cats are in danger from me! I will do them no harm.
It says here.
Gee, Linda, I'm glad you think my little musings could earn some heat. It's evident that I like this series, since I am already on p56 of Red Bones.
It says here.
Gee, Linda, I'm glad you think my little musings could earn some heat. It's evident that I like this series, since I am already on p56 of Red Bones.
112MusicMom41
Hmmm--I think you think I'm schizophrenic. Sometimes you call me Linda and sometimes you call me Carolyn. Do you think I have both a naughty and nice side? And, if so, which one is which? Just so I know where I stand. :-)
113cameling
nyah nyah.... I already had White Nights on my TBR so nothing to add from you for a much welcome change! *fist pump*
i just know richard is coming back in his next life as a beautiful calico, living with a delightful gent who reads Dickens out aloud to himself in the evenings by the fire.
i just know richard is coming back in his next life as a beautiful calico, living with a delightful gent who reads Dickens out aloud to himself in the evenings by the fire.
114richardderus
>112 MusicMom41: Whosits, it's not schizophrenia...it's plumbing. The plumber is still here fixing the 72-year-old toliet that the 90-year-old aunt needs *badly* and that chose last night at 2am to flood the upstairs.
CAROLINDA. I am henceforth calling all women everywhere "Carolinda" and I will *never* be right, so no one will notice!
;->
>113 cameling: Carolinda, if I come back as a CAT in that situation, I will know that the Christians are right and there is a hell.
CAROLINDA. I am henceforth calling all women everywhere "Carolinda" and I will *never* be right, so no one will notice!
;->
>113 cameling: Carolinda, if I come back as a CAT in that situation, I will know that the Christians are right and there is a hell.
115calm
BUT-but-Cats are GOD's - they know it and we are their faithful servants! They do not listen to our words but bask in the comforts we provide!
Don't you want to come back as a god!
Don't you want to come back as a god!
116rainpebble
But we do not believe in reincarnation, my beloved!~!
117tiffin
You know in Moonstruck where the grandfather looks around the room at everyone and says "I'm confused"? I often feel like that chez Richard. Schizophrenia, plumbing, theology, the servants of Bastet....
118jasmyn9
> 111 I don't think I could survive without me three little furry beasts so I'm glad to hear that you will not be hunting any of the resident LT'er's cats down. Besides...I think Billy would give you a run for you money...he's ferocious. And Pumpkin run you to death with lots of lovins. Squeegie...well she would just ignore you until you went away.
>115 calm: Cats are not gods, they are god's messengers. If we aren't nice just think of all the stories they could tell to whatever powers may be.
>115 calm: Cats are not gods, they are god's messengers. If we aren't nice just think of all the stories they could tell to whatever powers may be.
119cameling
I know my cats were all treated as demigods ... milk and egg for breakfast, cream once a week, boiled or grilled fish or chicken for dinner everyday and occasionally some cake crumbs as a treat. A bath once a week after which they had their fur blowdried. .... are you sure you wouldn't enjoy being a pampered feline, richard?
120Catreona
Ah! Good to know I'm not the only one who gets confused as soon as the browser loads Richard's thread.
121richardderus
>115 calm: Carolinda, good heavens NO! All that responsibility, and the whole licking yourself clean thing is just too uggs for words.
>116 rainpebble: Carolinda, I ain't quite all the way on that....
>117 tiffin: Carolinda, it's really very, very simple. Ummm. Yes, really simple. *views thread* Oh hell, I'm confused too.
>118 jasmyn9: Carolinda, they'd have to dander me into submission first!
>119 cameling: Carolinda, you make it sound semi-appealing, except for that whole "licking yourself clean" dodge. Ew.
>120 Catreona: Carolinda, confused?! What? It's really very, very simple. Ummm...wait...didn't I do this one already?
>116 rainpebble: Carolinda, I ain't quite all the way on that....
>117 tiffin: Carolinda, it's really very, very simple. Ummm. Yes, really simple. *views thread* Oh hell, I'm confused too.
>118 jasmyn9: Carolinda, they'd have to dander me into submission first!
>119 cameling: Carolinda, you make it sound semi-appealing, except for that whole "licking yourself clean" dodge. Ew.
>120 Catreona: Carolinda, confused?! What? It's really very, very simple. Ummm...wait...didn't I do this one already?
123alcottacre
#121: If you call me Carolinda I am never talking to you again.
125rainpebble
You can call me "Flower" if ya want to.
(better St.?)
Sorry about the no, no. Didn't "no". hee hee
big hugs,
belva
(better St.?)
Sorry about the no, no. Didn't "no". hee hee
big hugs,
belva
126MusicMom41
I told you White Nights would make the "Hot Review" list! I may not be able to write them, but I sure can recognize them. :-)
CAROLYN
CAROLYN
128rainpebble
I have got to read The Shetland Island series and that Pine something series. Got to do it. They just sound too good.
Hey Berly;
I forget whose thread I am on but I just told St. Richard to "Man up and stop being a woose and read The Shack!~!
belva
Hey Berly;
I forget whose thread I am on but I just told St. Richard to "Man up and stop being a woose and read The Shack!~!
belva
129rainpebble
oh, oh, I just saw whose thread I was on. hee hee
130girlunderglass
Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
rrrrrggggggggggghhhhh
hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!
Ahem.
Oops.
Sorry about that. I get these panic attacks on this thread sometimes.
rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
rrrrrggggggggggghhhhh
hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!
Ahem.
Oops.
Sorry about that. I get these panic attacks on this thread sometimes.
131richardderus
>123 alcottacre: Eunoreenette, I promise I won't.
>124 kidzdoc: Hi Carolin...oh Darryl, thank GOD someone whose name and gender I can remember.
>125 rainpebble: Beelzeva!! NO MORE GIFs!!!! (Though that one is pretty cute.)
>126 MusicMom41: CAROLYN(da?), you were right! And no one could be more surprised than I am. I didn't think that review was any better or any worse than several that have simply sunk without a trace. It's a curious thing, this Hot Review doomaflotchie.
>127 Berly: Berlyner, it is, one hopes, a temporary aberration. I don't want to have more toilet troubles. The wax seal around the base broke during the tank fixing, and the resulting second emergency visit has used up my patience with plumbing issues. The bathtub draintrap can just damned well STAY broken, no one here takes baths anyway (they're so icky, like the idea of being buried, ewww).
>128 rainpebble: Belva dearest...RUN and get the Shetland Islands books. Red Bones will be up for review very shortly. I'm done with it. You will looove them!
>129 rainpebble: Eliza, there there pat pat...take a xanax, you'll be fine in a minute.
>124 kidzdoc: Hi Carolin...oh Darryl, thank GOD someone whose name and gender I can remember.
>125 rainpebble: Beelzeva!! NO MORE GIFs!!!! (Though that one is pretty cute.)
>126 MusicMom41: CAROLYN(da?), you were right! And no one could be more surprised than I am. I didn't think that review was any better or any worse than several that have simply sunk without a trace. It's a curious thing, this Hot Review doomaflotchie.
>127 Berly: Berlyner, it is, one hopes, a temporary aberration. I don't want to have more toilet troubles. The wax seal around the base broke during the tank fixing, and the resulting second emergency visit has used up my patience with plumbing issues. The bathtub draintrap can just damned well STAY broken, no one here takes baths anyway (they're so icky, like the idea of being buried, ewww).
>128 rainpebble: Belva dearest...RUN and get the Shetland Islands books. Red Bones will be up for review very shortly. I'm done with it. You will looove them!
>129 rainpebble: Eliza, there there pat pat...take a xanax, you'll be fine in a minute.
132rainpebble
have addressed the issue St.
have also ordered the 1st 2 of the Shetland series. Red Bones is only out in hardback at this time, isn't it? I can't find it anywhere in paperback. Not that I don't like the hardback, but I didn't like the price.
And goody, goody; because right now....I need something to loooooooove!~!
Would ya, could ya, will ya, won'tcha, said ya wanna, Hmmmmmmmmmmm????????????//
belva
have also ordered the 1st 2 of the Shetland series. Red Bones is only out in hardback at this time, isn't it? I can't find it anywhere in paperback. Not that I don't like the hardback, but I didn't like the price.
And goody, goody; because right now....I need something to loooooooove!~!
Would ya, could ya, will ya, won'tcha, said ya wanna, Hmmmmmmmmmmm????????????//
belva
133richardderus
Eighty of seventy-five:
Cockatiels at Seven by Donna Andrews is the seventh cocktail peanut book in Andrews's hilarious and delightful Meg Langslow series of cozy Caerphilly County mysteries.
These really are cocktail peanut books, in the best sense of the word. They're compulsively readable. They have a pleasant taste and satisfying texture. They will make you fat if you consume too many of them because you'll never rear up off your sitzfleisch long enough to do more than walk the dog. And you'll chuckle while you're doing it.
Meg's insane family has nothing on the insanity of her friends, such as the mother who drops her toddler on Meg and her newly minted husband Michael because she's fleeing the criminals and lawmen who are after her not-quite-ex-husband; the neighboring sheep farmer whose obsessive belief that everyone is out to steal his sheep leads him to hide in his own shrubbery to keep watch on them, forgetting that he's completely visible from the main road; and her new bestest buddy, the absentee mom's co-worker at Caerphilly College's financial aid department, whose eagerness to latch onto Meg shows she's a rare good judge of where the action is.
Of course, all the usual suspects are making Meg crazy as well: Her daft father and newly discovered grandfather are hiding six-foot snakes in her new hot tub (there goes the sexy evening of soaking cares away with the aforementioned new husband), her brother the millionaire has abandoned his furnished apartment for her third-floor bedrooms (but failed to mention it to her), her mother and her loopy New Age cousin are shopping shopping shopping for new decor for her house, and so just *can't* babysit the toddler; and he's proven to be such a handful that Meg's seriously questioning her never-very-strong desire to be a mother. Someday. Maybe never. Especially now.
It's not urgently necessary to read these books in order. I'd suggest starting out with Murder with Peacocks to get some of the background, and certainly would not have a newbie skip past Revenge of the Wrought-Iron Flamingos before tackling the rest of the series. But...and here's the big point...there is too much fun to be had for me to go all OCD and strenuously urge you to follow the chronology. You're big people now, you can figure it out, and Andrews gives very good fill-ins for all crucial relationships.
Read. Enjoy.
Cockatiels at Seven by Donna Andrews is the seventh cocktail peanut book in Andrews's hilarious and delightful Meg Langslow series of cozy Caerphilly County mysteries.
These really are cocktail peanut books, in the best sense of the word. They're compulsively readable. They have a pleasant taste and satisfying texture. They will make you fat if you consume too many of them because you'll never rear up off your sitzfleisch long enough to do more than walk the dog. And you'll chuckle while you're doing it.
Meg's insane family has nothing on the insanity of her friends, such as the mother who drops her toddler on Meg and her newly minted husband Michael because she's fleeing the criminals and lawmen who are after her not-quite-ex-husband; the neighboring sheep farmer whose obsessive belief that everyone is out to steal his sheep leads him to hide in his own shrubbery to keep watch on them, forgetting that he's completely visible from the main road; and her new bestest buddy, the absentee mom's co-worker at Caerphilly College's financial aid department, whose eagerness to latch onto Meg shows she's a rare good judge of where the action is.
Of course, all the usual suspects are making Meg crazy as well: Her daft father and newly discovered grandfather are hiding six-foot snakes in her new hot tub (there goes the sexy evening of soaking cares away with the aforementioned new husband), her brother the millionaire has abandoned his furnished apartment for her third-floor bedrooms (but failed to mention it to her), her mother and her loopy New Age cousin are shopping shopping shopping for new decor for her house, and so just *can't* babysit the toddler; and he's proven to be such a handful that Meg's seriously questioning her never-very-strong desire to be a mother. Someday. Maybe never. Especially now.
It's not urgently necessary to read these books in order. I'd suggest starting out with Murder with Peacocks to get some of the background, and certainly would not have a newbie skip past Revenge of the Wrought-Iron Flamingos before tackling the rest of the series. But...and here's the big point...there is too much fun to be had for me to go all OCD and strenuously urge you to follow the chronology. You're big people now, you can figure it out, and Andrews gives very good fill-ins for all crucial relationships.
Read. Enjoy.
134richardderus
>132 rainpebble: Belva dear cuddle bunny, Red Bones was just published this month, so no paper edition until 2012 or something. It's a liberry borrow, I guess.
wrong touchstone, I won't wait forever for the damned loading to finish.
wrong touchstone, I won't wait forever for the damned loading to finish.
135womansheart
>134 richardderus: - Richard Dear -
I'll stick my neck out here (hope it's not intrusive, but helpful) and post the link to Red Bones.
http://www.librarything.com/work/7114526
Blasted servers get overloaded and d__n slow around here sometimes. Hard to hang in there when everything seems "hung up." Hard for me, too. I like slow food, slow reading, slow dancing and lightening fast computers/servers, by golly.
WH/Ruth/ruthie/Woofie ... you pick.
I'll stick my neck out here (hope it's not intrusive, but helpful) and post the link to Red Bones.
http://www.librarything.com/work/7114526
Blasted servers get overloaded and d__n slow around here sometimes. Hard to hang in there when everything seems "hung up." Hard for me, too. I like slow food, slow reading, slow dancing and lightening fast computers/servers, by golly.
WH/Ruth/ruthie/Woofie ... you pick.
136alcottacre
#133: Thanks to you I now have 5 of the Donna Andrews books. One of these days, I may actually read them! lol
BTW, #131: I want my book back (until you can remember my name)
BTW, #131: I want my book back (until you can remember my name)
137London_StJ
Thanks for the Meg Langslow suggestion! I'm always on the lookout for cozy mystery series.
138richardderus
>135 womansheart: Woofie, you have more patience than I do, thanks for putting that in there.
>136 alcottacre: Hyapatia...?...LeBronzine...?...Myrtle...? Ummm. Errrmmm. STASIA! (You can see I really want to keep that book!)
>137 London_StJ: It's a real keeper! You'll enjoy themm, I feel morally certain.
>136 alcottacre: Hyapatia...?...LeBronzine...?...Myrtle...? Ummm. Errrmmm. STASIA! (You can see I really want to keep that book!)
>137 London_StJ: It's a real keeper! You'll enjoy themm, I feel morally certain.
139alcottacre
#138: LeBronzine? Oh my goodness!
140tymfos
While lurking on your thread, I caught the comments about the Meg Larson mysteries by Donna Andrews. Sounded fun . . .
SOOOO, before starting work tending our Public Library's book sale table at the local Community Yard Sale today, I stepped inside and grabbed the only one in the series that our library had on the shelves, Owls Well That Ends Well, just to see what it was like. It wasn't one of the early ones, but you said that didn't really matter that much. Since it begins with Meg's mega yard sale, it seemed especially appropriate to look at during the lulls in business.
Problem is, I think I scared customers away laughing so hard . . . :D
And now I have 5 -- count them, FIVE -- books going at once (if you count the audio book I'm trying from Net Library).
SOOOO, before starting work tending our Public Library's book sale table at the local Community Yard Sale today, I stepped inside and grabbed the only one in the series that our library had on the shelves, Owls Well That Ends Well, just to see what it was like. It wasn't one of the early ones, but you said that didn't really matter that much. Since it begins with Meg's mega yard sale, it seemed especially appropriate to look at during the lulls in business.
Problem is, I think I scared customers away laughing so hard . . . :D
And now I have 5 -- count them, FIVE -- books going at once (if you count the audio book I'm trying from Net Library).
141rainpebble
>#135:
Woofie;
"I like slow food, slow reading, slow dancing and lightening fast computers/servers, by golly."
just brought to mind:
"I want a man with a slow hand
I want a lover with an easy touch
I want somebody who will spend some time
Not come and go in a heated rush
I want somebody who will understand
When it comes to love, I want a slow hand."
Woofie;
"I like slow food, slow reading, slow dancing and lightening fast computers/servers, by golly."
just brought to mind:
"I want a man with a slow hand
I want a lover with an easy touch
I want somebody who will spend some time
Not come and go in a heated rush
I want somebody who will understand
When it comes to love, I want a slow hand."
143rainpebble
*********giggles as she wanders through the St.'s thread*************
144womansheart
>141 rainpebble:- Belva -
Chuckles and totally agrees with #143 - TT
or, dare I say it ? A new, discrete electrical/or battery operated ahem "personal friend."
Absolutely, NOMB, but ... you're the one that put it out there, girl.
womanheart, your buddy
Chuckles and totally agrees with #143 - TT
or, dare I say it ? A new, discrete electrical/or battery operated ahem "personal friend."
Absolutely, NOMB, but ... you're the one that put it out there, girl.
womanheart, your buddy
146rainpebble
**********still giggling and whistling her way through thread************
147Berly
You guys are a bad influence! I just read TT's thread where he very innocently shares the "69 rule" for deciding if you want to buy a book and all I can think of is the sexual connotation of 69 and how can that possibly help you decide what to buy in a bookstore?! LOL.
148womansheart
>147 Berly: - Berly -
Now, now. Did you go to Catholic school, too?
Bad influence. Hah. 'Bet that you could top us in insinuating/innuendo of the s*xual variety any day, woman. I say, celebrate being alive in appropriate ways!
Love it when you blush
WH
Now, now. Did you go to Catholic school, too?
Bad influence. Hah. 'Bet that you could top us in insinuating/innuendo of the s*xual variety any day, woman. I say, celebrate being alive in appropriate ways!
Love it when you blush
WH
149mckait
Too late rd
I love butter
I also love cows with their sweet deep eyes
tsk to the tippers :P
I love you Stasia, stick to your guns.. Carolinda indeed!
Carolinda my A$$ rdear.. I do have a name and you do know it! harumph!
I feel like I wandered through the looking glass.
Think I will go and snuggle my cat.
I love butter
I also love cows with their sweet deep eyes
tsk to the tippers :P
I love you Stasia, stick to your guns.. Carolinda indeed!
Carolinda my A$$ rdear.. I do have a name and you do know it! harumph!
I feel like I wandered through the looking glass.
Think I will go and snuggle my cat.
150msf59
What's going on over here, while Richard is away? "personal friend" & "69 rules" "hot lovers?? I better skip a long and get back to my book!
151Berly
I should clarify that the "69 rule" as applied to books, means skip to page 69 of the book and use that as your litmus test for whether or not to buy. Innocent. Totally innocent!
152cameling
i go away for the weekend sans internet access and come back to.... LTers on a smutty cruise... LOL
154cameling
my grandmother would not be pleased with the company i am keeping these days ... she had such high hopes that I would join the noviate. ;-)
155wookiebender
>133 richardderus: Quoth richardderus Read. Enjoy.
Yes, I did. And, yes, I did.
I ran out, bought, and read Murder, With Peacocks and now have Murder With Puffins near the top of the pile. Good fun!
Yes, I did. And, yes, I did.
I ran out, bought, and read Murder, With Peacocks and now have Murder With Puffins near the top of the pile. Good fun!
157calm
Tut tut, I come along to wish Richard a happy birthday and what do I find!
Happy Birthday Richard,, wishing you good books; good food and good friends - today and for the rest of the year.
Happy Birthday Richard,, wishing you good books; good food and good friends - today and for the rest of the year.
158msf59
Richard- Happy Birthday, sir! Hope you had a great time at the party Saturday! Didn't see you around much yesterday, so I think I might know the answer to that one!
160richardderus
I am back...sort of...to normal. The cold, the party, and the weather (icky until today) conspired to keep me from being sociable. Today, the actual day, is so beautiful I can't imagine a better gift! It's cool, breezy, sunshiney, and DRY! Stella the Jindo is in obnoxiously high spirits. The Divine Miss was chirpy all the way to the station this morning. Chirpy! She is the archetypal insomniac, which makes mornings so cheery normally, that her chirps set me to searching for the pod....
And now I really must catch up on my thread-reading and also review Red Bones.
And now I really must catch up on my thread-reading and also review Red Bones.
163richardderus
The idea of it being sung well conjures images of Marilyn in a spangled body-glove at Madison Square Garden....
Wow. It's amazing how indifferent I am to the age I've just turned. Given life expectancies in my family, I have about 35 years left. Probably more, since I don't smoke and have fully functional organs. Somehow that doesn't seem so bad...I guess my parents' angst about turning 50 was about something else that I just don't have...regrets, maybe? The regrets I have are pretty few, lucky man that I am. Whatever it is, I'm grateful for it! I didn't want to turn into a sourpuss the way my father did, or into a lump of religiosity the way my mother did. So far, so good.
ETA: 162, large print ROFL
Wow. It's amazing how indifferent I am to the age I've just turned. Given life expectancies in my family, I have about 35 years left. Probably more, since I don't smoke and have fully functional organs. Somehow that doesn't seem so bad...I guess my parents' angst about turning 50 was about something else that I just don't have...regrets, maybe? The regrets I have are pretty few, lucky man that I am. Whatever it is, I'm grateful for it! I didn't want to turn into a sourpuss the way my father did, or into a lump of religiosity the way my mother did. So far, so good.
ETA: 162, large print ROFL
164tloeffler
You may imagine Marilyn in her spangled body-glove and pretend it is me. However, for your own safety, DO NOT imagine me in a spangled body-glove.
165richardderus
>164 tloeffler: LOL
If I am going to imagine someone in a spangled body-glove, it's going to be Ewan McGregor*sigh*singing Happy Birthday in that lovely Scottish accent...*moon*
If I am going to imagine someone in a spangled body-glove, it's going to be Ewan McGregor*sigh*singing Happy Birthday in that lovely Scottish accent...*moon*
166rainpebble
A very happy birthday to you St. Richard.
May you enjoy many more to come.
your wish is my command:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3IzpazVl-I
big birthday hug
xoxo
belva
May you enjoy many more to come.
your wish is my command:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3IzpazVl-I
big birthday hug
xoxo
belva
167richardderus
Eighty-one of seventy-five:
Red Bones by Ann Cleeves
This is the third in what the publishers call The Shetland Islands Quartet in some places, A Shetland Islands Thriller in others. I hope that this betokens a realization on the part of Cleeves and her publishers that the series has the essential ingredient for longevity: Terrific characters entwined in believeable relationships.
We see Jimmy Perez, our sleuth, living without gal-pal Fran Hunter while she's down south in London to visit family and friends. His every waking thought seems to return to her, to her daughter Cassie, and to the natural fears of a man in love whose lover is far away: Is she safe, is she having too good a time to want to come back, is this the end of my dream of happiness, all the stuff men think but never admit they're thinking.
Sandy, Perez's Detective Sergeant, is also away, though closer to home...he's on Whalsay, a short ferry ride from Lerwick where Jimmy is based. While visiting home, Sandy's beloved grandmother is shot. It looks like a horrible, horrible accident. Sandy is first cop on the scene, naturally, and has to make hard calls about how to pursue the matter before Jimmy shows up to take over. Sandy's family will never be the same again, of course, but more importantly for the story, Sandy won't either. Jimmy helps Sandy grow into his manhood during this investigation, and this makes the book far richer than we'd have any right to expect from a simple thriller. When a second horrible death occurs, Sandy and Jimmy both conclude there are connections here that the two of them aren't making, and whether or not the deaths were intentional, the connections need to be investigated and explored. This takes each of them farther from his comfort zone than either expected.
Cleeves's plot snake-twines around each character, squeezing the past and the present tightly together, and finally forcing the characters into one inevitable crushing future. It looks nothing like the present. It looks nothing like the future the characters saw coming. And that's why I recommend this book, and this series, with such a strong voice.
Red Bones by Ann Cleeves
This is the third in what the publishers call The Shetland Islands Quartet in some places, A Shetland Islands Thriller in others. I hope that this betokens a realization on the part of Cleeves and her publishers that the series has the essential ingredient for longevity: Terrific characters entwined in believeable relationships.
We see Jimmy Perez, our sleuth, living without gal-pal Fran Hunter while she's down south in London to visit family and friends. His every waking thought seems to return to her, to her daughter Cassie, and to the natural fears of a man in love whose lover is far away: Is she safe, is she having too good a time to want to come back, is this the end of my dream of happiness, all the stuff men think but never admit they're thinking.
Sandy, Perez's Detective Sergeant, is also away, though closer to home...he's on Whalsay, a short ferry ride from Lerwick where Jimmy is based. While visiting home, Sandy's beloved grandmother is shot. It looks like a horrible, horrible accident. Sandy is first cop on the scene, naturally, and has to make hard calls about how to pursue the matter before Jimmy shows up to take over. Sandy's family will never be the same again, of course, but more importantly for the story, Sandy won't either. Jimmy helps Sandy grow into his manhood during this investigation, and this makes the book far richer than we'd have any right to expect from a simple thriller. When a second horrible death occurs, Sandy and Jimmy both conclude there are connections here that the two of them aren't making, and whether or not the deaths were intentional, the connections need to be investigated and explored. This takes each of them farther from his comfort zone than either expected.
Cleeves's plot snake-twines around each character, squeezing the past and the present tightly together, and finally forcing the characters into one inevitable crushing future. It looks nothing like the present. It looks nothing like the future the characters saw coming. And that's why I recommend this book, and this series, with such a strong voice.
168richardderus
Thanks, Belva! I hope for many, many more.
169girlunderglass
It looks nothing like the present. It looks nothing like the future the characters saw coming. And that's why I recommend this book, and this series, with such a strong voice.
Richard you sly dog, you knew that powerful sentence at the end of your review would get me didn't you?
Richard you sly dog, you knew that powerful sentence at the end of your review would get me didn't you?
170TheTortoise
>167 richardderus: Rich you are only fifty! I thought you were at least 83. And that Anne of Cleeves must be all of 500! So clever that not only did she avoid the chopping block but lived on into the 21st Century and writes detective novels! Amazing.
Happy birthday from The Tortoise.
Happy birthday from The Tortoise.
171alcottacre
Chiming in with my birthday wishes as well!
172jmaloney17
Happy Birthday! Mine is Wednesday. It is my favorite holiday. I hope you have a one worthy of holiday status too.
173richardderus
>169 girlunderglass: Eliza, *mwaahaahaa* it's worked, it's worked!!
>170 TheTortoise: Milord, a mere stripling of fifty, that's me. And isn't it remarkable that Lady Anne has kept up with the times so well? One is awestruck, isn't one?
>171 alcottacre: Thanks, Stasia! What a beautiful day for it!
>172 jmaloney17: Thank you muchly, fellow Virgo! Enjoy yours on Wednesday.
>170 TheTortoise: Milord, a mere stripling of fifty, that's me. And isn't it remarkable that Lady Anne has kept up with the times so well? One is awestruck, isn't one?
>171 alcottacre: Thanks, Stasia! What a beautiful day for it!
>172 jmaloney17: Thank you muchly, fellow Virgo! Enjoy yours on Wednesday.
176cameling
LOL .. perfect, Kath!
yet again i am powerless in the face of your review and have no choice but to add (with great resignation), Red Bones to my wishlist. And since this is such a beautiful day and I've got a half day off to come home and watch the Men's tennis finals, I'm not even grumbling at my pitiful lack of will power against your spells
yet again i am powerless in the face of your review and have no choice but to add (with great resignation), Red Bones to my wishlist. And since this is such a beautiful day and I've got a half day off to come home and watch the Men's tennis finals, I'm not even grumbling at my pitiful lack of will power against your spells
177msf59
Richard- I turned the big 50 in July but I still feel like a fledgling student under your amazing tutelage! I think I called you avuncular at one time but I can't recall if you appreciated it or not! Take care, old man!
178richardderus
General Announcement to All Who Visit This Thread:
The A-word, used in post 177 above, is Verboten for use in reference to the thread's founder. I am not a spherical, pipe-smoking, Santa-Claus-like old fuffertut, perched by a smoky fireplace breaking wind and ho-ho-ho-ing his way into dementia.
That Is All.
The A-word, used in post 177 above, is Verboten for use in reference to the thread's founder. I am not a spherical, pipe-smoking, Santa-Claus-like old fuffertut, perched by a smoky fireplace breaking wind and ho-ho-ho-ing his way into dementia.
That Is All.
179ChocolateMuse
Richard, I should warn you, there's someone logging in under your name and denying all your best attributes. See post 178 above.
180rainpebble
ROLF / LMBFAO!~!
~~T;
didn't know you had it in you!~! hee hee
"The A-word, used in post 177 above, is Verboten for use in reference to the thread's founder. I am not a spherical, pipe-smoking, Santa-Claus-like old fuffertut, perched by a smoky fireplace breaking wind and ho-ho-ho-ing his way into dementia."
The images that are going through my mind right now. And it's bed time. Can you imagine the dreams/nightmares we shall have tonight?
~~T;
didn't know you had it in you!~! hee hee
"The A-word, used in post 177 above, is Verboten for use in reference to the thread's founder. I am not a spherical, pipe-smoking, Santa-Claus-like old fuffertut, perched by a smoky fireplace breaking wind and ho-ho-ho-ing his way into dementia."
The images that are going through my mind right now. And it's bed time. Can you imagine the dreams/nightmares we shall have tonight?
181alcottacre
#180: Don't sleep, Belva. It is dangerous - especially tonight!
182rainpebble
Amen to that Stasia!~!
184richardderus
Eighty-two of seventy-five:
The Penguin Who Knew Too Much by Donna Andrews is a Meg Langslow mystery set in fictional Caerphilly County, Virginia, and populated by the usual cast of nuts, weirdos, and goofballs that surround Meg, her husband Michael, and the one or two other normals that Andrews heaves into the chaos of her plots to provide anchors for the action.
This entry in the series takes on a lot of expository responsibility. It requires the characters to navigate Meg and Michael's moving into their huge new home, the party that *must* ensue from that in Southern culture, the discovery of a long-lost relative, the actual wedding of Meg and Michael, and the ordinary nuttiness of an Andrews mystery.
It succeeds, but barely. This is a breathless hurtle from giddy-up to whoa. Andrews's trademark bellow-with-laughter lines are fewer and farther between because of the pace at which events progress (though I will be stealing shamelessly the gut-busting, "Oh good, the hyenas are here" for the next family do). The need for speed trumps the need to make a person hoot.
That said, this is still a very funny book. The reactions of all characters to the madhouse environment of Meg and Michael's world is pitch-perfect and just the right degree of puzzled acceptance of the most wacked events as normal.
Recommended for those already in the know. Anyone not acquainted with the series should really start with the first one, Murder With Peacocks, in order to acclimatize to the madness. From there, I think there are few rules...though it's wise to remember that chronology makes life easier....
The Penguin Who Knew Too Much by Donna Andrews is a Meg Langslow mystery set in fictional Caerphilly County, Virginia, and populated by the usual cast of nuts, weirdos, and goofballs that surround Meg, her husband Michael, and the one or two other normals that Andrews heaves into the chaos of her plots to provide anchors for the action.
This entry in the series takes on a lot of expository responsibility. It requires the characters to navigate Meg and Michael's moving into their huge new home, the party that *must* ensue from that in Southern culture, the discovery of a long-lost relative, the actual wedding of Meg and Michael, and the ordinary nuttiness of an Andrews mystery.
It succeeds, but barely. This is a breathless hurtle from giddy-up to whoa. Andrews's trademark bellow-with-laughter lines are fewer and farther between because of the pace at which events progress (though I will be stealing shamelessly the gut-busting, "Oh good, the hyenas are here" for the next family do). The need for speed trumps the need to make a person hoot.
That said, this is still a very funny book. The reactions of all characters to the madhouse environment of Meg and Michael's world is pitch-perfect and just the right degree of puzzled acceptance of the most wacked events as normal.
Recommended for those already in the know. Anyone not acquainted with the series should really start with the first one, Murder With Peacocks, in order to acclimatize to the madness. From there, I think there are few rules...though it's wise to remember that chronology makes life easier....
186wookiebender
I have no idea what a "fuffertut" is, but I like the word. I may have to drop it into conversation from time to time...
187karenmarie
I actually googled fuffertut after reading Richard's message, but no dice.
Richard, did you make that word up?
Richard, did you make that word up?
188richardderus
I, personally, didn't make it up. My father, a nonsense generator par excellence, used it a lot to describe those older or younger than himself who were performing acts he didn't wish them to perform.
Seriously...I wish I had a tape recording of my father's stories and silliness. He was the dream daddy of every five-year-old. The magic moment of what, seven?, when your parents become intensely embarrassing was the end of his reign. I still find the stories and nonsense running through my head. It was like having my very own Rocky-and-Bullwinkle writer scripting my life. The Treadmill of Tedium (yardwork), the Oblivion Oxpress (a huge, wooden schoolbus drawn by a very old, grumpy, flatulent ox), Goosegrease Grange (our house)...no wonder I didn't flinch at "Wossamatta U" or "Frostbite Falls."
Seriously...I wish I had a tape recording of my father's stories and silliness. He was the dream daddy of every five-year-old. The magic moment of what, seven?, when your parents become intensely embarrassing was the end of his reign. I still find the stories and nonsense running through my head. It was like having my very own Rocky-and-Bullwinkle writer scripting my life. The Treadmill of Tedium (yardwork), the Oblivion Oxpress (a huge, wooden schoolbus drawn by a very old, grumpy, flatulent ox), Goosegrease Grange (our house)...no wonder I didn't flinch at "Wossamatta U" or "Frostbite Falls."
189Catreona
Belated Happy Birthday, Richard dearest.
*grovil* Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa! How can I exponge and expiate the sin of forgetting your saintliness's birthday?
*grovil* Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa! How can I exponge and expiate the sin of forgetting your saintliness's birthday?
190richardderus
Oh, no worries, Cat...you're in for a looong spell in the Vestibule of the Great Bookstore in the Sky, wiping snowy footprints of the Elect from the marble floors, is all.
191rainpebble
St. Richard;
Just what do you have against body functions?
They were designed for a purpose.
Did you not know?
xoxo
belva
Just what do you have against body functions?
They were designed for a purpose.
Did you not know?
xoxo
belva
192cameling
Thankfully The Penguin Who Knew Too Much was already on my wishlist .. so I'm safe thus far .... but I really can't wait to read it. I miss Meg and gang.
I'm bummed.. I thought I had brought Stain of the Berry with me on this trip, but having rummaged through my luggage, I can't find it, so must have left it at home.. boo hooo
I'm bummed.. I thought I had brought Stain of the Berry with me on this trip, but having rummaged through my luggage, I can't find it, so must have left it at home.. boo hooo
193womansheart
>188 richardderus: - Richard Dear -
Thanks for the remarks about your father, his stories and silliness. It would be great to hear a tape recording (mp3, maybe?) of his wily, witty clever nonsense words and goofie re-namings of everyday items.
Does the apple fall far from the tree?
BTW, I'm older than seven and you are holding steady as quite a lustrous human in my inner child's eyes. The caveat ... You are not my parent ... I am not your child. Shine on, Sir Richard.
How goes the crusade to Texas? Dare I ask?
Woofie
Thanks for the remarks about your father, his stories and silliness. It would be great to hear a tape recording (mp3, maybe?) of his wily, witty clever nonsense words and goofie re-namings of everyday items.
Does the apple fall far from the tree?
BTW, I'm older than seven and you are holding steady as quite a lustrous human in my inner child's eyes. The caveat ... You are not my parent ... I am not your child. Shine on, Sir Richard.
How goes the crusade to Texas? Dare I ask?
Woofie
194richardderus
I hate traveling. I hate the entire process of planning, coordinating, and scheduling it. I hate packing, boarding the plane, sitting in the seatlets, breathing the stale air, listening to the voluble old person or desperate young mother with bratty toddler I am inevitably seated next to, and paying for the drink the %(!* airline should *give* me for sedation.
If I had time, I'd drive again. It's much more enjoyable. I don't particularly want to drive alone, so it's not happening, plus the whole limited time limitation, but it's the only way I really *enjoy* traveling.
If I had time, I'd drive again. It's much more enjoyable. I don't particularly want to drive alone, so it's not happening, plus the whole limited time limitation, but it's the only way I really *enjoy* traveling.
195Catreona
190: Phew! At least that's something I am capable of doing. Thank you for your leaniancy, m'lawd. It shall not be forgotten.
I'm very grateful that it's no longer necessary for me to travel. You couldn't pay me to get on an airplane nowadays! I can see where a driver might enjoy driving. As one condemned to be a perpetual passenger, I don't really enjoy motor trips either. Anxiously awaiting the commercial production of that car designed to be driven by a blind driver...
I'm very grateful that it's no longer necessary for me to travel. You couldn't pay me to get on an airplane nowadays! I can see where a driver might enjoy driving. As one condemned to be a perpetual passenger, I don't really enjoy motor trips either. Anxiously awaiting the commercial production of that car designed to be driven by a blind driver...
196kidzdoc
What's going on? Richard has no Hot Reviews, two books by Dan Brown are Hot Reviews, and Eliza's lovely review of My Name Is Asher Lev is falling like a rock. Time to get busy, 75ers!
197richardderus
Eighty-three of seventy-five:
Swan for the Money by Donna Andrews is the most recent entry in the Meg Langslow mystery series, set in fictional Caerphilly County, Virginia, and featuring the indefatigable Meg and her motley crew of relatives and neighbors in crime-solving antics reminiscent of the glory days of Harold Lloyd.
What fun, of course, and as expected, the action doesn't stop for a minute around Meg. But this time, her case is set amid the bizarre and highly competitive world of rose-show trophy hounding. How completely weird, I thought as I looked at the book...rose shows? Who cares?
Well, I still don't care about rose shows, but I'll never look at a rose the same way again. I had no idea (admittedly, even less interest) that there were literally hundreds of categories a rose could fit into for showing purposes, and the virulence of the passions of rose-growers came as a surprise as well.
Meg's mysterious task this time is determining who, among the hundred or so people exhibiting and competing in this bloom-binge murdered a sweet, kindly old lady who just happened to bear a strong resemblance to the world's nastiest battle-ax, whose huge color-themed estate is the site of the show. Her usual good temper is sorely tried at every turn by the battle-ax, a complete nutball whose fetish is making everything in her world black or white. She has black swans. Black and white Belted Gloucester cattle. Black fainting goats, including a very aggressive one named Algie whose passion for butting humans is completely understandable...wouldn't YOU need to take a swing at a creature who meddled with your DNA to make sure you fainted dead away at danger, making you a perfect victim for predators?
But since she's been drafted to run this beano (one guess by whom...oh good, all who said "her mama" win!), she's coping. That is, barely coping since husband Michael is in New York attending a former student's play (a musical about Millard Fillmore and the Compromise of 1850, with a catchy little ditty about the Wilmot Proviso...Wikipedia has the whole story, never fear) in its death throes. Every time Meg tries to talk to Michael, asking him to bring back a pregnancy test, she's interrupted...so she asks him to bring back 1) bagels, lox, and cream cheese 2) cheesecake 3) real New York pastrami and rye sandwiches...you get the picture.
So add that to the list of problems Meg has, trying to figure out how to ascertain if she's pregnant in a place crawling with people who know her, her mama, her grandparents and cousins and aunties and all, each and every one, glad to gossip their lungs out.
Well, the murder is solved, the wicked are punished, the unappealing are redeemed (somewhat) and the pregnancy test arrives via the hopeful Michael, who interpreted all the food requests as wicked-bad cravings and arrived at the main question: A new little Waterston-Langslow?
Stay tuned. I certainly plan to.
Swan for the Money by Donna Andrews is the most recent entry in the Meg Langslow mystery series, set in fictional Caerphilly County, Virginia, and featuring the indefatigable Meg and her motley crew of relatives and neighbors in crime-solving antics reminiscent of the glory days of Harold Lloyd.
What fun, of course, and as expected, the action doesn't stop for a minute around Meg. But this time, her case is set amid the bizarre and highly competitive world of rose-show trophy hounding. How completely weird, I thought as I looked at the book...rose shows? Who cares?
Well, I still don't care about rose shows, but I'll never look at a rose the same way again. I had no idea (admittedly, even less interest) that there were literally hundreds of categories a rose could fit into for showing purposes, and the virulence of the passions of rose-growers came as a surprise as well.
Meg's mysterious task this time is determining who, among the hundred or so people exhibiting and competing in this bloom-binge murdered a sweet, kindly old lady who just happened to bear a strong resemblance to the world's nastiest battle-ax, whose huge color-themed estate is the site of the show. Her usual good temper is sorely tried at every turn by the battle-ax, a complete nutball whose fetish is making everything in her world black or white. She has black swans. Black and white Belted Gloucester cattle. Black fainting goats, including a very aggressive one named Algie whose passion for butting humans is completely understandable...wouldn't YOU need to take a swing at a creature who meddled with your DNA to make sure you fainted dead away at danger, making you a perfect victim for predators?
But since she's been drafted to run this beano (one guess by whom...oh good, all who said "her mama" win!), she's coping. That is, barely coping since husband Michael is in New York attending a former student's play (a musical about Millard Fillmore and the Compromise of 1850, with a catchy little ditty about the Wilmot Proviso...Wikipedia has the whole story, never fear) in its death throes. Every time Meg tries to talk to Michael, asking him to bring back a pregnancy test, she's interrupted...so she asks him to bring back 1) bagels, lox, and cream cheese 2) cheesecake 3) real New York pastrami and rye sandwiches...you get the picture.
So add that to the list of problems Meg has, trying to figure out how to ascertain if she's pregnant in a place crawling with people who know her, her mama, her grandparents and cousins and aunties and all, each and every one, glad to gossip their lungs out.
Well, the murder is solved, the wicked are punished, the unappealing are redeemed (somewhat) and the pregnancy test arrives via the hopeful Michael, who interpreted all the food requests as wicked-bad cravings and arrived at the main question: A new little Waterston-Langslow?
Stay tuned. I certainly plan to.
198girlunderglass
I am definitely finding this series it sounds really great. And I'm off to give you a thumb-up so as to rectify the situation that kidzdoc has brought to our attention!
199MusicMom41
Just got Murder with Peacocks from the library (had to request it because my loccal branch doesn't have it) so I'll be joining the party soon!
200richardderus
Eighty-four of seventy-five:
The Norman Kings by James Chambers is an attractively illustrated overview of the Norman kings of England, from Willie the Conq to Stephen the Inept.
It's part of a series published by Weidenfeld and Nicolson in the 70s and 80s, edited by the redoubtable Antonia Fraser, authoress par excellance. The *popular* kings and queens got their *own* books, but W&N decided that the Saxon and Norman kings should get piddly little compendia of rumor and innuendo and downright condescension. Oh, excuse me...William the Conqueror has his own book, and the largely legendary Alfred the Great does too. Must be fair in my dismissivness.
Here's my problem with these sorts of books. They're all working from the same source material as each other, so there's really very little difference in the stories they can tell. What is different is the animus or slant each writer brings to the fete...I mean party. Opinion is all, really, and so the question becomes: "How well supported is the author's opinion? And do you, o reader, agree with it?"
Chambers and I do not see eye to eye.
His vituperation of William Rufus follows in the footsteps of the "great" nineteenth century Rufus biographer E.A. Freeman, whose Reign of William Rufus has always been the Gold Standard of the homophobes who inveigh against Rufus for his supposed sodomiticalness. So Chambers, writing in the "enlightened" 70s and 80s, offers a *better* idea...Rufus was impotent, not perverted! His sentences exactly:
"So he may have been homosexual...William's ostentatiously virile behavior...could as easily be used to deduce that he was impotent. On such evidence as there is, the atmosphere in William's household appears to have been more like a degenerate officer's mess than a perverted brothel."
Where do I begin...oh hell, two sentences and it's SUCH a target-rich environment!
1) Men of whom we have records in this era are prolific fornicators. They, married or not, left heaving seas of bastard children behind. (Willie the Conq a notable exception...all six feet of him seems to have loved his 4'2" queen to the exclusion of all others.) None of them merits the condemnatory word "degenerate" in decribing their courts full of fellow woman-screwing and bastard-leaving men.
2) Impotence, the *inability* to achieve erection, is preferable to homosexuality in this construction...it's offered as a *step up* from it. Dunno about y'all, gents, but I'd rather have been queer than limp back in the days when there was no hope for the impotent (and thank GOD those days are gone!). So it wasn't his fault that he ever married, left no children...it was nature's cruelty, not perversion! How insulting to the man!
To be completely fair, the author says he's relying on the chronicles of the churchmen for his information, and these witnesses had good, solid reasons to be anti-Rufus, but I note that the author is still glad to be judgmental....
3) "Ostentatiouslyy virile behavior," is it? Rufus was a passionate hunter, and a good one. So was his father, so were his brothers, none of whom (producers of bastards and babies at a prodigious rate) merit the condescension of "ostentatiously virile."
I'm on record elsewhere as opposing the unhealthy sense of self-congratulation inherent in "outing" people in history as gay before such an identity was conceptualized. It's a entirely different thing to look at the evidence, assess a person's probable sexual nature, and judge them harshly for it as part of a complex of other "undesirable" characteristics as Chambers does. It's still outing, I suppose, but with minatory intent. "He was a rotten king, he hated the Church (go Rufus!), AND he was a shirt-lifter! EWWW!"
So...the other kings...well, honestly, I stopped trusting the author after Rufus and pretty much read the text as it broke up the illustrations. Not recommended for text, but the pictures are nice.
The Norman Kings by James Chambers is an attractively illustrated overview of the Norman kings of England, from Willie the Conq to Stephen the Inept.
It's part of a series published by Weidenfeld and Nicolson in the 70s and 80s, edited by the redoubtable Antonia Fraser, authoress par excellance. The *popular* kings and queens got their *own* books, but W&N decided that the Saxon and Norman kings should get piddly little compendia of rumor and innuendo and downright condescension. Oh, excuse me...William the Conqueror has his own book, and the largely legendary Alfred the Great does too. Must be fair in my dismissivness.
Here's my problem with these sorts of books. They're all working from the same source material as each other, so there's really very little difference in the stories they can tell. What is different is the animus or slant each writer brings to the fete...I mean party. Opinion is all, really, and so the question becomes: "How well supported is the author's opinion? And do you, o reader, agree with it?"
Chambers and I do not see eye to eye.
His vituperation of William Rufus follows in the footsteps of the "great" nineteenth century Rufus biographer E.A. Freeman, whose Reign of William Rufus has always been the Gold Standard of the homophobes who inveigh against Rufus for his supposed sodomiticalness. So Chambers, writing in the "enlightened" 70s and 80s, offers a *better* idea...Rufus was impotent, not perverted! His sentences exactly:
"So he may have been homosexual...William's ostentatiously virile behavior...could as easily be used to deduce that he was impotent. On such evidence as there is, the atmosphere in William's household appears to have been more like a degenerate officer's mess than a perverted brothel."
Where do I begin...oh hell, two sentences and it's SUCH a target-rich environment!
1) Men of whom we have records in this era are prolific fornicators. They, married or not, left heaving seas of bastard children behind. (Willie the Conq a notable exception...all six feet of him seems to have loved his 4'2" queen to the exclusion of all others.) None of them merits the condemnatory word "degenerate" in decribing their courts full of fellow woman-screwing and bastard-leaving men.
2) Impotence, the *inability* to achieve erection, is preferable to homosexuality in this construction...it's offered as a *step up* from it. Dunno about y'all, gents, but I'd rather have been queer than limp back in the days when there was no hope for the impotent (and thank GOD those days are gone!). So it wasn't his fault that he ever married, left no children...it was nature's cruelty, not perversion! How insulting to the man!
To be completely fair, the author says he's relying on the chronicles of the churchmen for his information, and these witnesses had good, solid reasons to be anti-Rufus, but I note that the author is still glad to be judgmental....
3) "Ostentatiouslyy virile behavior," is it? Rufus was a passionate hunter, and a good one. So was his father, so were his brothers, none of whom (producers of bastards and babies at a prodigious rate) merit the condescension of "ostentatiously virile."
I'm on record elsewhere as opposing the unhealthy sense of self-congratulation inherent in "outing" people in history as gay before such an identity was conceptualized. It's a entirely different thing to look at the evidence, assess a person's probable sexual nature, and judge them harshly for it as part of a complex of other "undesirable" characteristics as Chambers does. It's still outing, I suppose, but with minatory intent. "He was a rotten king, he hated the Church (go Rufus!), AND he was a shirt-lifter! EWWW!"
So...the other kings...well, honestly, I stopped trusting the author after Rufus and pretty much read the text as it broke up the illustrations. Not recommended for text, but the pictures are nice.
201richardderus
Eliza, I note your review has climbed back up the charts with great pleasure! Thanks for thumbs-upping my Donna Andrews review. It's really a piffling little thing. Go give "The Norman Kings" (touchstone is right in the review) a thumbs-up as a birthday present, okay?
;(0)= (The Winking Walrus)
Linda, HAPPY BIRTHDAY!! I sang to you over on your profile.
;(0)= (The Winking Walrus)
Linda, HAPPY BIRTHDAY!! I sang to you over on your profile.
202rainpebble
Dear St. Richard;
Congratulations on your very (whew!~!) HOT REVIEW!~! And they just keep on acoming! Just like the injuns at the Battle of Big Horn!~!
hugs,
belva
Congratulations on your very (whew!~!) HOT REVIEW!~! And they just keep on acoming! Just like the injuns at the Battle of Big Horn!~!
hugs,
belva
203thomasandmary
What the H E double hockey sticks is this????? I can't get this stupid pirate gibberish off my screen!!!! Is it national pirate day or something? oh yeah, Richard, gave a thumbs up for your The Saxon and Norman Kings review. The "but the pictures are nice" alone was worth the thumbs up. Classic.
205womansheart
Richard Dear -
Thanks for the latest reviews ... sterling and GOLD thumbs up in that order.
I came by LT for a quick check-in and have been smiling and laughing non-stop since signing in. Between you, Tim and conceptDawg I've had a complete attitude adjustment since sitting down to my wireless key board and mouse with my big fat super-sized iMac screen mere inches in front of me eyes.
I see by your reviews that your chosen books have brought out the best in you, mister.
Darryl, thanks for the heads up. I don't think I will be speaking much pirate tomorrow as I will be having Rosh Hashana dinner with very dear friends, whom I prefer to keep as very dear friends.
I also love the non-recommendation caveat at the end of the review of The Norman Kings. Splendid, man in his prime, that's you, RD.
WH
Thanks for the latest reviews ... sterling and GOLD thumbs up in that order.
I came by LT for a quick check-in and have been smiling and laughing non-stop since signing in. Between you, Tim and conceptDawg I've had a complete attitude adjustment since sitting down to my wireless key board and mouse with my big fat super-sized iMac screen mere inches in front of me eyes.
I see by your reviews that your chosen books have brought out the best in you, mister.
Darryl, thanks for the heads up. I don't think I will be speaking much pirate tomorrow as I will be having Rosh Hashana dinner with very dear friends, whom I prefer to keep as very dear friends.
I also love the non-recommendation caveat at the end of the review of The Norman Kings. Splendid, man in his prime, that's you, RD.
WH
207richardderus
What? Talk Like A Pirate Day?!
*whatever*
>202 rainpebble: Thanks, Belva!
>203 thomasandmary: Regina, it's weird and annoying, but the turn it off button works, so...
>204 kidzdoc: Darryl, one hesitates to ask, but how did you know that little piece of trivia?
>205 womansheart: Thanks, Woofie! That's a nice compliment.
>206 mckait: Arrr, wench! Whar be the grog?
*whatever*
>202 rainpebble: Thanks, Belva!
>203 thomasandmary: Regina, it's weird and annoying, but the turn it off button works, so...
>204 kidzdoc: Darryl, one hesitates to ask, but how did you know that little piece of trivia?
>205 womansheart: Thanks, Woofie! That's a nice compliment.
>206 mckait: Arrr, wench! Whar be the grog?
208kidzdoc
I had never heard of Talk Like a Pirate Day before today. I looked at the home page after LT made the switch, Googled "Talk Like a Pirate", and found out about it.
209Catreona
I think Talk Like A Pirate Day is great fun. I too have been laughing and giggling ever since logging in, having found it a delightful surprise. But, as Richard says, the button at the top of the screen to turn it off works just fine.
grog all round, me harties, to toast our gallant cap'in's triumph!
grog all round, me harties, to toast our gallant cap'in's triumph!
210Catreona
I don't know how long Talk Like A Pirate Day has existed, but I have known of its existence for several years. There's a Pirate Name Generator:
http://gangstaname.com/pirate_name.php
http://gangstaname.com/pirate_name.php
212tloeffler
I LOVE International Talk Like A Pirate Day! I have the cutest little rubber pirate duck that I bring out every year. My sons hate me.
Captain Bess Bonney
Even though there's no legal rank on a pirate ship, everyone recognizes you're the one in charge. You can be a little bit unpredictable, but a pirate's life is far from full of certainties, so that fits in pretty well. Arr!
Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network
(another option!)
Captain Bess Bonney
Even though there's no legal rank on a pirate ship, everyone recognizes you're the one in charge. You can be a little bit unpredictable, but a pirate's life is far from full of certainties, so that fits in pretty well. Arr!
Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network
(another option!)
213thomasandmary
>2007 No, that was the problem; it turned off on my home page, but I couldn't get it off reading your thread. I guess you are the only one that can do it for your thread.
215Whisper1
Richard Dear!
Thanks for your birthday wishes and the note of my wonderful, young, wrinkle free senior class photo posted on my home page. I've already surpassed the age of Catherine Howard. I've kept my head, insane as my addled brain appears at times!
Hugs to you,
Linda
Thanks for your birthday wishes and the note of my wonderful, young, wrinkle free senior class photo posted on my home page. I've already surpassed the age of Catherine Howard. I've kept my head, insane as my addled brain appears at times!
Hugs to you,
Linda
217Whisper1
Can it be that you have FOUR hot reviews listed tonight on the LT home page! This has to be a record! Congratulations to you! That is a near impossible feat to beat!
219rainpebble
Congratulations!~!
Wow!~!~!
You are the Saint!~!~!
You Rock St. Richard!~!~!
You are sooooo good you can eat crackers in bed!~!~!
We bow down to you!~!
We are your peons!~!
We are soooooooo unworthy of your presence!~!
xoxo
belva
Wow!~!~!
You are the Saint!~!~!
You Rock St. Richard!~!~!
You are sooooo good you can eat crackers in bed!~!~!
We bow down to you!~!
We are your peons!~!
We are soooooooo unworthy of your presence!~!
xoxo
belva
220tiffin
Pirate Tad the Staggering Drunk here to yell YARRRR at Ricardo for his four hot reviews. Ye be peg legging up the ladder of fame there, me 'eartie, hookin' 'em in right over the yard arm.
221richardderus
FOUR hot reviews?! This is just plain weird. How can that be possible?
I expect the LT cops to come knockin' on me bunk afore long, talkin' 'bout gangplanks and keel-haulin'....
I expect the LT cops to come knockin' on me bunk afore long, talkin' 'bout gangplanks and keel-haulin'....
222womansheart
>221 richardderus: -
Some people can write a thumbs-up, worthy review AND some people have LOTS OF PEOPLE/FRIENDS who read 'em and vote!
You sly dog. What a smarmy smarty you are. I am very pleased and proud to know ye, matey.
Keep your quill sharpened for more hotties to be penned. Har har har.
W
Some people can write a thumbs-up, worthy review AND some people have LOTS OF PEOPLE/FRIENDS who read 'em and vote!
You sly dog. What a smarmy smarty you are. I am very pleased and proud to know ye, matey.
Keep your quill sharpened for more hotties to be penned. Har har har.
W
223rainpebble
I am sa proud an honored ta be blest enuff ta say thit ye are me friend (when ye wish 2 B). The brilliant things that come from your brain to your pen to your computer and then to us are far beyond our comprehension. Ye R definitely 4 the sainthood me hearty!~!
224richardderus
No, seriously...two of those reviews were more than a few days old, and I thought the algorithm sorted them out after x days. I guess not...but thanks for thumbs-upping them, all who did.
225rainpebble
We are patiently awaiting the checks in the post.
226womansheart
> What are we doing up this time 'o the marnin'???
I was readin' Amuse Bouche and next thing I knew it was almost 1:30 AM on Saturday and I'm hunting down the dog who tol' me about the villain, Russell the Quant.
I'm gonna hit the hammock.
W
I was readin' Amuse Bouche and next thing I knew it was almost 1:30 AM on Saturday and I'm hunting down the dog who tol' me about the villain, Russell the Quant.
I'm gonna hit the hammock.
W
227richardderus
Checks...!
ROFL
LMAO
Checks*chuckle*
Woofie, oh don't I know your pain...that %^(!^&^^%$!!)&^_) CAMELING turned me into Russell's panting sycophant! SHE told me about Amuse Bouche and, well, you can see what has happened to me. HA! It begins to happen to you, too!!
Night, all *smooch*
ROFL
LMAO
Checks*chuckle*
Woofie, oh don't I know your pain...that %^(!^&^^%$!!)&^_) CAMELING turned me into Russell's panting sycophant! SHE told me about Amuse Bouche and, well, you can see what has happened to me. HA! It begins to happen to you, too!!
Night, all *smooch*
228womansheart
G' Night.
229rainpebble
G'nite. God love you.
belva
belva
232richardderus
Darryl...I couldn't believe my eyes when I read your post, so I went and looked.
OMG
What is wrong with their algorithm? NO ONE should be able to monopolize the Hot Reviews this way! And while my teensy little ego-ette is gibbering with pleasure, my conscience is squirming. This isn't fair. I'll have to alert the PTB to this.
OMG
What is wrong with their algorithm? NO ONE should be able to monopolize the Hot Reviews this way! And while my teensy little ego-ette is gibbering with pleasure, my conscience is squirming. This isn't fair. I'll have to alert the PTB to this.
233jdthloue
thanks for the heads-up regarding Touchstones on reviews...i imported the reviews on my "75" page from my blog..now that i have seen how you post reviews "here" ...i know how "tis done...a tip of the Fedora..
and i would not call you Avuncular...as msf59 did do...you're still younger than me and are in no way a Fogey.......nor "old"....
anywho..thanks Friend
and i would not call you Avuncular...as msf59 did do...you're still younger than me and are in no way a Fogey.......nor "old"....
anywho..thanks Friend
236cameling
richard, YOU dare out me about Russell Quant? After all the books you've turned me on to?
That's it, matey.....you can swab the deck all day, 'm confiscating your share of the grog for a week, and you can bed down in the pickle barrel.
That's it, matey.....you can swab the deck all day, 'm confiscating your share of the grog for a week, and you can bed down in the pickle barrel.
237richardderus
Whose pickle am I barrelling into? Makes a difference....
238cameling
the pickle barrel owned by Donna Cross, author of your favorite tome, Pope Joan.... *evil laugh*
239richardderus
Eighty-five of seventy-five:
Damsels in Distress by Joan Hess
Claire Malloy, bookselling sleuth of the Farberville Book Depot, returns for her umpty-zillionth murder investigation (well, okay, only the sixteenth) but this time at a *shudder* Renaissance Faire!
Now seriously. Have any of y'all been to a Renaissance Faire? Have you not wished intensely for a lethal weapon and civil and criminal immunity? Milady Larchblossom and the Baron Quonsethut, oof! So as Claire snooped about, I found myself squirming in discomfort at the faux olde-tyme speak the cultists used (though not consistently, to the editor's lasting shame) and the instant sense memory of being at one of these events in Texas in heat just like Hess describes.
I can't think how anyone could *want* to don Northern European clothing from the era before central heating in the American South. My daughter, who belongs to one of these organizations and is quite renowned for her fighting prowess, will end up being Lanya (one of the characters) but hopefully with better-behaved children.
The mystery here is a murder; well, two; and the resolution was neat and tidy and strained credulity to the absolute minimum possible in a series where the sleuth is engaged to a police officer who does not chain her to her doorhandle to prevent her from messing around with crime.
I recommend this book without a blush. Newbies, start with Strangled Prose and move forward as haphazardly as you wish.
Damsels in Distress by Joan Hess
Claire Malloy, bookselling sleuth of the Farberville Book Depot, returns for her umpty-zillionth murder investigation (well, okay, only the sixteenth) but this time at a *shudder* Renaissance Faire!
Now seriously. Have any of y'all been to a Renaissance Faire? Have you not wished intensely for a lethal weapon and civil and criminal immunity? Milady Larchblossom and the Baron Quonsethut, oof! So as Claire snooped about, I found myself squirming in discomfort at the faux olde-tyme speak the cultists used (though not consistently, to the editor's lasting shame) and the instant sense memory of being at one of these events in Texas in heat just like Hess describes.
I can't think how anyone could *want* to don Northern European clothing from the era before central heating in the American South. My daughter, who belongs to one of these organizations and is quite renowned for her fighting prowess, will end up being Lanya (one of the characters) but hopefully with better-behaved children.
The mystery here is a murder; well, two; and the resolution was neat and tidy and strained credulity to the absolute minimum possible in a series where the sleuth is engaged to a police officer who does not chain her to her doorhandle to prevent her from messing around with crime.
I recommend this book without a blush. Newbies, start with Strangled Prose and move forward as haphazardly as you wish.
240cameling
I've put Joan Hess in the same category as I've now put Sue Grafton stories ... I just can't get into the Claire Mallory or Kinsey Millhone. Everything's too neat and tidy and not enough humor at least for fluffy reads.
hmm..now the Grafton touchstone isn't working... oh well, you know who I mean.
hmm..now the Grafton touchstone isn't working... oh well, you know who I mean.
241richardderus
I feel that way about Arly Hanks of Hess's Maggody series. Funny enough, but not quite enough for me to keep going. I'll take Donna Andrews over them all, but as she must eat and sleep at some point during each diurnal cycle, I can't rely on her for all my chuckles-with-crimes.
242MusicMom41
Finally read Murder with Peacocks yesterday--my first Donna Andrews. Thanks for introducing me. I'll write my review later today--giving credit where credit is due! :-)
243cameling
Joanna Fluke makes me laugh too but her books make me hungry because of all the great desserts mentioned by her baker sleuth, Hannah Swensen.
244TheTortoise
>232 richardderus: Rich, you can't blame me, I didn't vote for you!
Stop all this voting nonsense immediately. You will turn the Saint's curmudgeonly head.
- TT
Stop all this voting nonsense immediately. You will turn the Saint's curmudgeonly head.
- TT
245richardderus
Eighty-six of seventy-five:
Mummy Dearest by Joan Hess
Series mysteries are either the breath of readerly life or the kiss of death, depending on the temperament of the lector. I love them, I read them, I look for clues to new ones all the time, and on rare occasions, I drop the ones I've been following. Most often I do so because some shift in me or the author has occurred and the initial spell that lured me to the table is broken, leaving moldy dishes in an unscrubbed sink in place of the banquet I first saw.
Claire Malloy and Peter Rosen are married at last. I don't think Ms. Hess quite knows what to do about that yet. Caron and Inez are finally growing up some, and that's a problem too. This series is reaching middle age, and some middle-aged lumps are to be expected. But the problem here is, I read these books to laugh while thinking through the puzzle. I didn't laugh much in this case, and the puzzle didn't satisfy me much either. Just not up there to my eyes.
So, I ask myself, is Claire destined for the scrap heap of readerhood? No, not quite yet. I liked the setting of the book, and I enjoyed the murders since the "right" people were murdered. I'll assume that the likelihood of a sub-par outing in any seventeen-book series is high, and I will move on.
But more cautiously than before. Read only if already a series fan.
Mummy Dearest by Joan Hess
Series mysteries are either the breath of readerly life or the kiss of death, depending on the temperament of the lector. I love them, I read them, I look for clues to new ones all the time, and on rare occasions, I drop the ones I've been following. Most often I do so because some shift in me or the author has occurred and the initial spell that lured me to the table is broken, leaving moldy dishes in an unscrubbed sink in place of the banquet I first saw.
Claire Malloy and Peter Rosen are married at last. I don't think Ms. Hess quite knows what to do about that yet. Caron and Inez are finally growing up some, and that's a problem too. This series is reaching middle age, and some middle-aged lumps are to be expected. But the problem here is, I read these books to laugh while thinking through the puzzle. I didn't laugh much in this case, and the puzzle didn't satisfy me much either. Just not up there to my eyes.
So, I ask myself, is Claire destined for the scrap heap of readerhood? No, not quite yet. I liked the setting of the book, and I enjoyed the murders since the "right" people were murdered. I'll assume that the likelihood of a sub-par outing in any seventeen-book series is high, and I will move on.
But more cautiously than before. Read only if already a series fan.
246womansheart
A very quick drive-by to say Hello and let you know I'm still breathing down here in the Big Bend of Florida.
May all things get in line properly and then fall into place in support of YOUR goals and activities, as well as bring you joy and satisfaction while you are in the midst of them and satisfaction as you complete them. Go, Richard, go.
Woofie
May all things get in line properly and then fall into place in support of YOUR goals and activities, as well as bring you joy and satisfaction while you are in the midst of them and satisfaction as you complete them. Go, Richard, go.
Woofie
247richardderus
Eighty-seven of seventy-five:
Dead and Gone by Charlaine Harris
The ninth Sookie Stackhouse mystery is a very much better book than I was expecting, given the trend in my series-mystery reading towards increasing disappointment. I was hoping at best not to feel acute disappointment, and ended up feeling quite satisfied.
Sookie's world took ours by storm at the beginning of this century. It somehow made the US we live in able to look into the mirror these books hold up to us, and acccept what Harris shows us. In the Murrika that Bush and the right wing were creating, I saw and see that as a huge plus. I don't belong to the group of optimists who see that nightmare conservative Hell as in retreat, so much as crouching for the next blow to goodness, kindness and tolerance...those enemies of conservative hate-based fascistic dreamers.
"True Blood" on HBO is a huge pop-culture success. It's a hopeful thing to me that these stories of the hideous consequences of prejudice and intolerance are so popular. It's a hopeful sign to my eyes that stories told from the point of view of a victim of social intolerance and the hates of the religious are so well tolerated and so eagerly consumed. It's puzzling to me how Harris does all this without earning the ire of the Good and Just (as they see themselves) heaped on JK Rowling. I know a lot of Harris's readers HAVE to be teens; what's holding the baying hellhounds of Coulter and Limbaugh back?
Whatever. Don't care that much. I encourage people, even ones who dislike supernatural stuff, to go and buy some books in this series. If you don't want to read them, put them on BookCrossing or BookMooch...just buy them, get them into the hands of those who want to read them, and strike a blow against the shadows of hate that darken our noble experiment.
Dead and Gone by Charlaine Harris
The ninth Sookie Stackhouse mystery is a very much better book than I was expecting, given the trend in my series-mystery reading towards increasing disappointment. I was hoping at best not to feel acute disappointment, and ended up feeling quite satisfied.
Sookie's world took ours by storm at the beginning of this century. It somehow made the US we live in able to look into the mirror these books hold up to us, and acccept what Harris shows us. In the Murrika that Bush and the right wing were creating, I saw and see that as a huge plus. I don't belong to the group of optimists who see that nightmare conservative Hell as in retreat, so much as crouching for the next blow to goodness, kindness and tolerance...those enemies of conservative hate-based fascistic dreamers.
"True Blood" on HBO is a huge pop-culture success. It's a hopeful thing to me that these stories of the hideous consequences of prejudice and intolerance are so popular. It's a hopeful sign to my eyes that stories told from the point of view of a victim of social intolerance and the hates of the religious are so well tolerated and so eagerly consumed. It's puzzling to me how Harris does all this without earning the ire of the Good and Just (as they see themselves) heaped on JK Rowling. I know a lot of Harris's readers HAVE to be teens; what's holding the baying hellhounds of Coulter and Limbaugh back?
Whatever. Don't care that much. I encourage people, even ones who dislike supernatural stuff, to go and buy some books in this series. If you don't want to read them, put them on BookCrossing or BookMooch...just buy them, get them into the hands of those who want to read them, and strike a blow against the shadows of hate that darken our noble experiment.
248msf59
RD- Exceptionally well-said, sir! I have not read the Sookie books and probably won't but your thoughts on the Dark Right, I cannot agree with you more! I may not be with the optimists, you mentioned, but the dissolution of that repugnant group would be a glorious day. They may be loud and boisterous but that stand for NOTHING! I saw a clip the other day of Glen Beck, praising Joe McCarthy as a misunderstood but true American. And Beck is a major voice of that party? Simply grotesque!
249alcottacre
#247: (Sheepishly) - I like the Harris books, too. I consider myself to be religious . . . just saying. Do not put us all in one basket, heh?
250Whisper1
Dear King of the Hot Review!
Tonight's home page shows yet another hot review for you! Get out the sticker books and paste bunches of them on your forehead, hands and feet. Make believe you are back in first grade and do some cart wheels -- hey, you should even stick out your tongue and put your hands to your ears and wave them madly.
Congratulations!
Tonight's home page shows yet another hot review for you! Get out the sticker books and paste bunches of them on your forehead, hands and feet. Make believe you are back in first grade and do some cart wheels -- hey, you should even stick out your tongue and put your hands to your ears and wave them madly.
Congratulations!
251richardderus
>250 Whisper1: Linda, you do paint a picture...it sorta scares me, but it's a picture.
>249 alcottacre: Stasia my friend, you're not religious as I see it, you're a person with faith. Very, very different things.
>248 msf59: Mark...oh my God. That's a sight I don't ever want to see, and I'm sorry that you did.
>249 alcottacre: Stasia my friend, you're not religious as I see it, you're a person with faith. Very, very different things.
>248 msf59: Mark...oh my God. That's a sight I don't ever want to see, and I'm sorry that you did.
252wookiebender
How funny, I read the first Sookie Stackhouse novel, and was pretty meh about it. I obviously missed something in the reading! (Maybe it's being in a country far, far away from Bush et al, that helps.)
Love the idea of buying copies just to mooch unto others!
Love the idea of buying copies just to mooch unto others!
254London_StJ
>252 wookiebender: - I wasn't thrilled with the first few Sookie books, but I stuck with them out of boredom and they got much better!
My thought when I was reading them was that I'm not "Southern enough" to really get it.
My thought when I was reading them was that I'm not "Southern enough" to really get it.
