Archive for the ‘Ramblings’ Category
Rich’n’Meaty language
Posted on: March 21, 2011
- In: Bibliophilia | Book Links | Poetry | Ramblings | Speculative Fiction | Top Lists
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This fabulous video-fied talk of Stephen Fry‘s reminded me this morning of what I find fabulous about language:
I may get itchy Sharpie fingers when I see signs with inappropriately-placed apostrophes, and I still geek-out to things like my friend’s t-shirt that reads “Does anal retentive have a hyphen?” [Answer: depends on your style sheet?], but give me rich, frenzied writing any day over the terse and uptight.
Give me the verbal lushness and inconsistency of spelling and punctuation of Keri Hulme’s The Bone People (which I’ve already blogged about here)….
…. or the crazy richness of image that is The Gone-Away World by Nick Harkaway (again, previously blogged here)….
…. or the rich neologisms of Earle Birney (see AngloSaxon Street in this post).
Your favourites?
Lori
Annotations & Resolutions
Posted on: January 2, 2011
So the other day, I was alone in a little restaurant near my work, having a late lunch…and I was bookless! And notebook-less, and newspaper-less…I’m sure you get the picture.
The guy sitting a couple of tables over was also eating alone…[DIGRESSION: I was told once that the friendly Philippine people will go out of their way to ensure that a friend/co-worker/what-have-you does not eat alone. Then there are cultures where people turn away when they’re eating or drinking, for privacy. What a lovely odd world we live in.]
So, this guy was eating alone…no, I did not join him. He was completely en-booked. He didn’t need anyone. But he was not just reading, he was reading, margin-note-taking, notebook-note-taking…rather frantically.
And there was me, so bereft of reading material that I frantically tried to see the cover of the paperback he was perusing so thoroughly, just to read something!
Do I want to read like that? No. I may take the odd note, and if I were to get an ereader, I’d want one with note-taking capability, but I have no need to be obsessive about it. What I resolve to do is to ensure that I’ve got a book (or something!) with me at all times. I can’t believe I’ve come to this point, where I have to remind myself to carry reading material!
Plus, I want to blog more — about books and reading, obviously. Perhaps not the Post-A-Day challenge, but at least the Post-A-Week. We’ll see how that goes.
Read on!
New-to-me
Posted on: September 13, 2010
- In: Bibliophilia | Drama of Life | Memoir | Poetry | Quotes | Ramblings | Used Bookstores
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My #1 pleasure in life? Browsing in a bookstore, esp. a second-hand bookstore, or one with piles of discount, ‘remaindered’ books…I love the never knowing of rummaging these piles.
Anyone else with me? (If you’re ever in Victoria, check out Munro’s Books, for those sale tables and extensive selection of new books)
Today’s treasures:
The Book of Martyrdom & Artifice: First Journals and Poems 1937-1952, Allen Ginsberg.
Random excerpt (p168 in my copy):
“January 13 [1947]
Tried tea and junk tonite for second time.
Hip conversation:
“You bug me.”
“I bug you?”
“Yeah, you bug me.”
“I bug you.”
“You bet you bug me.”
“Well, you bug me.”
“So, I bug you.”
Hmm. Art?
I also picked up Rita Mae Brown‘s memoir, Rita Will: Memoir of a Literary Rabble-Rouser. First couple of chapters are fun…but then her writing is always fun.
Well, I seem to have been in a gay mood, now that I look at it. Must have been the discussion this morning over breakfast about the local baker who discriminates against those of alternate sexual persuasion. Guess where I don’t buy cupcakes?
Lori
O Cringeworthy List!
Posted on: March 15, 2010
- In: Bibliophilia | Essays | Ramblings | Reviews
- 5 Comments
I’ve reviewed books, many times. I don’t consider what I do on this blog to be really reviewing though. I think I’m more commenting on how this book or that book moved me or messed with me, or sometimes, just how it connected with another book in my mind.
Here is the top 10 of the 20 most annoying book review clichés:
1. Gripping
2. Poignant: if anything at all sad happens in the book, it will be described as poignant
3. Compelling
4. Nuanced: in reviewerspeak, this means, “The writing in the book is really great. I just can’t come up with the specific words to explain why.”
5. Lyrical: see definition of nuanced, above.
6. Tour de force
7. Readable
8. Haunting
9. Deceptively simple: as in, “deceptively simple prose”
10. Rollicking: a favorite for reviewers when writing about comedy/adventure books
Thank the gods, I’m only batting 2 for 10 here. I’m so totally guilty of ‘readable’ and ‘compelling’…’cause books often are those things!
Looking at the whole list, I believe I’m still only 20% clichéd. I hope.
My favourite example?
“17. That said: as in, “Stephenie Meyer couldn’t identify quality writing with a compass and a trained guide; that said, Twilight is a harmless read.””
Check out the whole article…oh, and the newly created Bingo cards!
Another box o’ books…
Posted on: June 22, 2009
- In: Book Links | Fantasy | Memoir | Poetry | Ramblings | Reviews | Short Stories
- 5 Comments
Well, it’s happened again…I’ve received another box of books to review (here’s a list of the previous batch, and the one before).
This time they look like a lovely mix: 4 books of short stories, 1 memoir, 1 poetry/novel, 2 novels.
Short Stories
Cobalt Blue
Silent Girl
I’m absolutely flumoxed. Tricia, me girl, that was inspired. I’m now terribly eager to read the book. (Book publishers/authors, take note: this woman knows how to market a book on the Internet!).
Out of Cleveland
I must admit, this post is turning into a “Who wins on the Internet marketing front?” — and here’s one that has almost no presence. To get anywhere, you have to put the title in quotes. Publisher — pay attention! I had to search for your site separately! (Hopeless, as web-un-savvy as this group is, they will likely not see this post. Unlike Tricia, above, who will be visiting me shortly, I’m sure!)
Red Rooms
Memoir
The Way It Was: Vignettes from My One-Room Schools
Poetry/Novel
The Given
Novels
The End of East
Living with the Dead
I will try to post something other than my first impressions as I read the books. Please feel free to ask me directly for feedback.
And Tricia? Stop and say hi! 😀
The Reviewer’s Plight
Posted on: April 27, 2009
- In: Ramblings | Reviews
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My faithful readers (all 3 of you!) will have noticed the lack of new posts recently. My apologies for that. It’s part laziness, part the pile of books I received for review a while ago.
Now, I’m an amateur reviewer…’amateur’ in the classic sense in that I don’t do it for money, but enjoy composing my little reviews for CBRA. Up until this last batch of books, all of the reviews I wrote sat in a hardbound annual in libraries across the country…likely very few people actually read them. Now, however, these reviews are going online, where they will (theoretically) be searchable by anyone looking for information on a given book.
And now I’m hesitant. When I blogged the list of books I received, I realized something I’d not thought about seriously before — the author may read my review of her/his book. Oh, I’m sure they did before, in the hardcover annual, but now, they truly will.
And they might respond.
In this day’n’age of tracking mentions of yourself/your book/your cause célébre online, I’m sure every single person attached to the books I received hit my blog.
Two responded.
This is exciting if you’re offering up praise. How every cool to be in touch with someone whose work you admire.
But what if the work is awful? What if it makes you cringe at the state of the book publishing industry in this country?
I will have to decide…to post my opinion, for good or for bad, as it is my opinion. Honest and true-as-I-see-it. It’s all I can do.
And I won’t ignore my blog anymore.
Thanks for listening.
“Literary Soup” Literature
Posted on: October 27, 2008
- In: Bibliophilia | Book Links | Classics | Cultural History | Mystery | Quotes | Ramblings | Reviews
- 2 Comments
I’m in the middle of two books, and suddenly I feel like I’m reading one of those artsy-fartsy double features at your local, non-mainstream movie house. You know the ones, where there is a connection between the films, and it is your job as the audience to find it.
The most obscure one I ever came across was where the only link was an ice cream cone in each film. The most delightful was Robert LePage’s Le Confessional (1995) shown with Hitchcock’s I Confess (1953).
So, back to books.
I’m reading two books right now:
- the always erudite, sometimes terribly obscure Umberto Eco’s The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana (2005), and
- a first book by a young woman in the USA, Marisha Pessl’s Specialty Topics in Calamity Physics (Astute BookNook followers will recall that I blogged about the book’s amazing website here!)
While both books are utterly different in plot, character, setting, and genre they have in common a wonderful bookyness to them…they are both a literary soup of references that verge on the border of being overwhelming, but instead are almost inspiring in their bibliophilia.
Two different books, two utterly different characters, but both texts are littered with pop culture:
Eco, being a semiologist, does not really surprise us in this. His other books have been thick with historical references, illuminating his amazing well-readness. This time however, it is a plot point, as our protagonist is an older man suffering from amnesia who uses the books of his lifetime to rebuild his lifeline. The references this time are both classical and current, albeit the focus of the current is on Italian modern history and corresponding pop culture.
Pessl, a young woman writing her first novel, holds her own in general bookyness in comparison to the towering Eco. The character, Blue van der Meer, is not quite 18 but is an astoundingly well-read genius, being the daughter of a rather eccentric, nomadic, genius professor father. As she navigates the teen hell of a yet another new school, her every thought is a literary or pop culture reference, at times against her will. Despite how ponderous that sounds, it is a delightful read, and un-put-down-able once you really get rolling.
I need more books of this genre (is it a meta- or sub-genre?). Any suggestions?
Reader’s Bill of Rights
Posted on: February 10, 2008
- In: Bibliophilia | Discussion | Philosophy | Quotes | Ramblings
- 4 Comments
Ripped directly from Mattheous, who’s just started hanging around here at the Nook, who found it here.
Daniel Pennac’s
The Reader’s Bill of Rights
1. The right to not read
2. The right to skip pages
3. The right to not finish
4. The right to reread
5. The right to read anything
6. The right to escapism
7. The right to read anywhere
8. The right to browse
9. The right to read out loud
10. The right to not defend your tastes
Surplus books — is it possible?
Posted on: December 28, 2007
- In: Bibliophilia | Discussion | Ramblings | Used Bookstores | Wishlist
- 5 Comments
As the New Year approaches, some people like to think of ways to better their lives, and to some, that means reducing clutter.
But to declutter books — is that really something a book lover wants to do? No, I don’t think so…but the reality is that sometimes we may have to do it.
Over at 43Folders is a post about this very topic, with a link to the original source, a question and long series of rather good answers at Ask Metafilter on “Advice for clearing literary clutter” — although, for me, the asker loses some credibility for even thinking of the phrase “literary clutter”!
What do you think, O Loyal Reader? Is there such a thing as ‘literary clutter’? What does it look like to you? What do you do about it?
Or, as is the point, what are you planning on doing in the New Year to clear some space on your bookshelves (to make room for new books in 2008)?
4 Books
Posted on: November 17, 2007
- In: Poetry | Ramblings | Reviews | Science Fiction | Speculative Fiction | Top Lists | Wishlist
- 3 Comments
Stolen from casa az, who plundered it from alejna
Four childhood books
- Freddy the Pig — don’t really remember much about the books, but that I used to love them. (Animal Farm always sort of freaked me out, with my Freddy background.)
- The Donkey Rustlers by Gerald Durrell. Again, I don’t remember much about the story, but I do remember taking it out of the library again and again.
- Paddington Bear — of course. I think he is the root of my love of the absurd…how can you resist a world where people don’t think twice about talking to a bear in a coat carrying a suitcase full of marmalade sandwiches, with bacon hanging out of it and dogs following him?
- No fourth comes to mind…the Hobbit, the Narnia books — all begun in my childhood, and continued to be read and re-read in my teens, my young adulthood, my middle ages, my dotage…
Four authors I will read again and again
- Robertson Davies (I’m with az here)
- Lois McMaster Bujold
- JRR Tolkien
- Jasper Fforde
- [This is all really quite random…there are 100s (10s?) of authors I would re-read again and again, I could continue this list on to the next page…]
Four authors I will never read again
I blank out the unpleasant in my life. I’ve not much interest in ever reading Dan Brown, Terry Pratchett (sorry az for putting those two in the same sentence), or Stephen King. Authors I don’t like, I just don’t remember. 😦
The first four books on my to-be-read list
- Ulysses by James Joyce (az, alejna and I are threatening to read this together)
- Dante’s Inferno
- Plus a cast of 100s! Too many to list. (Wow. I’m being rather lazy with this one.)
The four books I would take to a desert island
- LOTR
- The complete Shakespeare
- Norton Anthology of Poetry
- a big blank book, with some pens
The last lines of one of my favourite books
- I don’t have any. Sorry to disappoint. Although I may think on this one, and change this some random morning at 4 a.m. when a line pops into my head and won’t let me sleep until I’ve added it here.
Anyway — tag yourselves on this one!
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