And also, by a wild coincidence? The birthday of Lord Alfred Douglas, Oscar Wilde’s erstwhile lover, creepy anti-Semitic xenophobe in his middle-ish years, and slightly more subdued jerk after that. LORD ALFRED DOUGLAS WAS NOT A VERY NICE PERSON. He had an extremely difficult life BUT NOT EVERYBODY WHO HAS A BAD CHILDHOOD TURNS OUT TO BE AN ASS. This one time, Lord Alfred Douglas decided he hated all the gays everywhere and was renouncing any such tendencies on his own part, and as part of his new resolution, he SUED EVERYONE and then embarked on a MEAN CAMPAIGN OF…
18 CommentsCategory: Misc.
We’re moving in a couple weeks (the first time since I was 9 years old), and I’ve been going through my library of 3000+ books, choosing the books that I could bear to part with and NOT have to pack to move. Which made me wonder… When’s the last time you weeded out your library? Do you regularly keep it pared down to your reading essentials? Or does it blossom into something out of control the minute you turn your back, like a garden after a Spring rain? Or do you simply not get rid of books? At all? (This…
28 CommentsThis is a longstanding complaint really, but I’ve been reminded of it today by Paperback Reader‘s lovely shelf of beige books. See those Salman Rushdie books? This is the source of my displeasure. Because I like Salman Rushdie quite a lot. In fact I am thinking it is probably time to read Shalimar the Clown, one of two of Rushdie’s books that I’ve been saving. I like Salman Rushdie a lot, and I like these editions of his books (link is to The Moor’s Last Sigh, the other of Rushdie’s books I’m saving for myself). But they don’t have my…
21 CommentsI realized yesterday that I hadn’t read any of my other books for the RIP IV Challenge, and they all came due today, and I had to renew them by an unnecessarily complicated process because the library is also being fail lately. Anyway so I grabbed Let The Right One In (why is it called Let Me In on my copy?) to read it and I came to a realization. I am just tired of vampires. I have had enough. There are vampires everywhere and it is too many vampires, and I need a break from them. But there is…
30 CommentsAnd today, in light of its being the massive book blog love-fest week, and today being the day where we all say thanks for particular books, here are some that I’d never have read if it weren’t for various people (see below): Thanks to an adventure in reading for Douglas Coupland – particularly Eleanor Rigby. And to Nymeth for Patrick Ness and Bayou. I know went on and on about how scary Bayou was (and I was not exaggerating, that book was scary as hell), but it was also gorgeous and amazing. And oh, also, A Life in Books –…
11 CommentsSo I’ve never had an eReader, but they sound fantastic. I mean you can put dozens of books up on those things and stick ’em in your purse, and there you go, you have a whole bunch of books. That would make packing for long trips GLORIOUSLY EASY. Instead of hurling me into an agony of indecision. I bring this up because the lovely people at Irex have partnered with Bongs & Noodles (Bongs & Noodles! hurrah!) so that they have access to loads and loads of titles in the B&N database. Wait, no, that’s not why I brought it…
6 CommentsAck, I am so behind on reviews. I am working on a project that requires a lot of attention (fortunately I can work on it while still watching classic Doctor Who), which is the excuse I’m using for my negligence. Feel free to be distracted from this by a picture of my beautiful hat: Gerald Morris’s The Squire’s Tale and The Quest of the Fair Unknown Essentially, Gerald Morris writes very sweet retellings of King Arthur legends from various sources, making fun of impractical chivalry rules and having Gawain be the coolest knight of all the knights. Instead of Lancelot,…
10 CommentsMy own personal game for the DogEar Reading Challenge is to read only books recommended to me by Jeane. Ya heard. Thus: 1. Adult fantasy/sci-fi 2. A book featuring an animal 3. A YA or juvenile fiction book 4. A nonfiction book on an obscure topic/a topic you don’t usually read about 5. A book about gardening, plants, or food So these are mine: 1. Chalice, Robin McKinley 2. The Coachman Rat, David Henry Wilson 3. Daughters of the Sunstone, Sydney Van Scyoc 4. West with the Night, Beryl Markham 5. In Defense of Food, Michael Pollan I totally meant…
9 CommentsMagic. I should have done this, like, much sooner. Except that I didn’t believe (despite ample evidence all through my blogroll to the contrary) that it was possibly possible that you could really truly genuinely say, “Excuse me, may I have a copy of that book, which I desperately desperately want, before it is released?” and then receive an actual copy of the book in the post. BEFORE IT IS OUT. And yet: Good, eh? I like this cover best – the American cover is a little too bluey and generic for me (generic but not spare like my copy…
13 CommentsI cannot hold out any longer! I know I was going to do the rereading thing, and not get any new books out of the library, but I cannot maintain in the face of everyone on my blogroll going on and on about the thousands of amazing spooky books they are thinking of reading, and having the pretty picture of the girl, and putting up covers of beautiful books all the time. I AM ONLY HUMAN. Eee, I’m excited. I can totally read four spooky books by the end of October! (she said optimistically) Definitely I am going to read…
23 Comments