influental books

I haven't done a follow-friday post in a while, but I liked this week's question.

Talk about the book that most changed or influenced your life (was it a book that turned you from an average to avid reader, did it help you deal with a particularly difficult situation, does it bring you comfort every time you read it?).

I can't say that this book changed my life, but it is one that helped me through a tough time. I feel a bit silly posting about this particular book in this particular context because the author's work falls solidly in the chick-lit category. I really have nothing against chick lit, but it does have a justifiable reputation for being frivolous.

PS, I love you by Cecilia Ahern is a wonderful, uplifting, and fun story about love and loss and grief and learning to cope. I bought it after the unexpected death of my cousin died planning to send it to his wife. Of course I decided to read it before sending it along and I have to say that it brought me great comfort. After reading it, I felt the desire to buy another copy to send to her so I could keep the original copy for myself. Since then I decided that it should be shared rather than hoarded. I've passed along my copy and bought a few others (from the discount bookstore) to share via BookCrossing.

~

If you are visiting this blog for the first time, welcome!
And be sure to check out my giveaway (see this post or the sidebar to the right).

This is Karen. I'm a librarian and archivist and I've been writing this blog since 2006. Some of my favorite books are All We Know of Love (schneider), The Book of Laughter and Forgetting (kundera), The God of Small Things (roy), The Handmaid's Tale (atwood), Pride and Prejudice (austen), The Storyteller (vargas llosa), and Zahrah the Windseeker (okorafor-mbachu).

bad books?

First of all - Book bloggers, I'm looking for some book suggestions. Please see item 3 on this post.

Now on to our regularly-scheduled follow-friday question post.

What is the worst book that you've ever read and actually finished?

The single worst book? I really have no idea. I've gotten so much better at giving myself permission to stop reading books that I'm not enjoying at all. So far I've had two did-not-finish books (see this post). My most punishing read-all-the-way-through book of recent memory was probably The Passage by Justin Cronin (see post) just because it was horribly long and slowly paced and not nearly as intriguing as I'd hoped it'd be.
I know that doesn't strictly answer the question, but that's all I've got this morning.

If you are visiting this blog for the first time, welcome! This is Karen. I'm a librarian and archivist and I've been writing this blog since 2006. Some of my favorite books are All We Know of Love (schneider), The Book of Laughter and Forgetting (kundera), The God of Small Things (roy), The Handmaid's Tale (atwood), Pride and Prejudice (austen), The Storyteller (vargas llosa), and Zahrah the Windseeker (okorafor-mbachu).

Here are my posts since my last follow-friday post (I skipped last week):

• Sync: Where the Streets Had a Name + Passage to India
• The Dream of Perpetual Motion by Dexter Palmer (review)
• Domestic Violets by Matthew Norman (review)
• first half of 2011
• Literary Blog Directory
• The Book of Lies by Mary Horlock (review)
• Take a Chance Reading Challenge update
• Sync: Little Brother + The Trial
• word: concinnitous
• The Maid by Kimberly Cutter (review)
• The Parasol Protectorate series by Gail Carriger (review)

of fairies and fairy tales

In light of the Summer Solstice. Also known as Midsummer...let's talk about fairies. What is your favorite fairy tale or story that revolves around the fae?

I don't know that I have a favorite fairy tale. What I like most about fairy tales are how they are part of our collective memory and imagination. To that end I love stories that are inspired by fairy tales. I like retellings as well, but not nearly as much as stories that take ideas from or aspects of fairy tales are run with them. A couple good examples of this are Castle Waiting by Linda Medley (see post) and The Witch's Boy by Michael Gruber.

As for books featuring fairies, two sets of books come to mind. First, Shanna Swendson's Katie Chandler series and, second, Charles de Lint's books. Of course I recommend both.

If you are visiting this blog for the first time, welcome! This is Karen. I'm a librarian and archivist and I've been writing this blog since 2006. Some of my favorite books are All We Know of Love (schneider), The Book of Laughter and Forgetting (kundera), The God of Small Things (roy), The Handmaid's Tale (atwood), Pride and Prejudice (austen), The Storyteller (vargas llosa), and Zahrah the Windseeker (okorafor-mbachu).

Here are my posts since my last Friday:

• Sync: Shiver + Romeo and Juliet
• why I hate moving
• Tiny Sunbirds, Far Away by Christie Watson (review)
• The Iron Duke by Meljean Brook (review)
• steampunk defined

follow friday and Russell's birthday

Genre Wars!
What's your favorite genre and which book in that genre made it your favorite?

I actually don't have a favorite genre. There are some genres that I read more than others (and I do read a lot of non-genre fiction) and some genres that I rarely, if ever, read (horror and sick-shit mysteries come to mind).

I guess if I can to settle on one genre, it'd be historical fiction. There's not one book that sold me on the genre, but I'll happily share some of my recommendations with you.

Good historical fiction titles that leap to mind:

• The Birth of Venus by Sarah Dunant
• The Blood of Flowers by Anita Amirrezvani (the audio is fantastic)
• Fever 1793 by Laurie Halse Anderson (YA)
• Jacqueline Winspear's Maisie Dobbs books (which are also mysteries)

Also, today is Russell's birthday and so far he hasn't received any books. This is a seriously big deal. I always get him at least one book (we're trying to cull our book collections now so no books from me this year) and he often gets books from others. We think this is the first time in at least 15 years that he hasn't gotten a book for his birthday.

If you are visiting this blog for the first time, welcome! This is Karen. I'm a librarian and archivist and I've been writing this blog since 2006. [The Russell mentioned above is my husband who (very) occasionally reviews nonfiction on the blog]. Some of my favorite books are All We Know of Love (schneider), The Book of Laughter and Forgetting (kundera), The God of Small Things (roy), The Handmaid's Tale (atwood), Pride and Prejudice (austen), The Storyteller (vargas llosa), and Zahrah the Windseeker (okorafor-mbachu).

Here are my posts since my last Follow Friday (I skipped last week):

• The Poisoned House (review)
• Sync is back! free audiobooks this summer
• Steampunk! An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories (review)
• i've been reading
• vivid figures of speech
• on weeding our book collection (post 4 of ?)
• Mercy (review)

follow friday question

What are you doing to prepare for an upcoming zombie apocalypse and/or the return of Mel Gibson to the silver screen? (Both of which could be terrifying.)

Ah... I don't know what to write in response to this question. I could mention the Center for Disease Control's recently posted zombie apocalypse emergency response guidelines, but that's all I've got. Also, a little unsolicited zombie-book-related advice: do not read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.

I think instead that I will just share a reference for something that Parajunkee mentions in her post this week, the concept of the rational anarchist.

Professor Bernardo de La Paz: "A rational anarchist believes that concepts such as 'state' and 'society' and 'government' have no existence save as physically exemplified in the acts of self-responsible individuals. He believes that it is impossible to shift blame, share blame, distribute blame... as blame, guilt, responsibility are matters taking place inside human beings singly and nowhere else. But being rational, he knows that not all individuals hold his evaluations, so he tries to live perfectly in an imperfect world... aware that his efforts will be less than perfect yet undismayed by self-knowledge of self-failure." (The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Robert Heinlein, p. 83-84)

If you are visiting this blog for the first time, welcome! This is Karen. I'm a librarian and archivist and I've been writing this blog since 2006. Some of my favorite books are All We Know of Love (schneider), The Book of Laughter and Forgetting (kundera), The God of Small Things (roy), The Handmaid's Tale (atwood), Pride and Prejudice (austen), The Storyteller (vargas llosa), and Zahrah the Windseeker (okorafor-mbachu).

Here are my posts since last Follow Friday last week:

• Stranger by Zoe Archer
• more book buying
• book buying
• Mothers and Daughters
• on weeding our book collection (post 3 of ?)
• adaptation: No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency

follow friday question

My second week for this meme.

How many books do you read in a week? And in what format do you read them, or listen to them?

I don't have a hard and fast answer to the number of books I typically read in a week. I can read a book a day, but there are times when I might only finish one book during the course of a week.

At the moment it seems like I'm doing most of my reading on my Nook, though the majority of the books (the ones I'm reading just a little bit at a time) I have in progress are physical books. While I do listen to audiobooks, I don't have one going right now.

If you are visiting this blog for the first time, welcome! This is Karen. I'm a librarian and archivist and I've been writing this blog since 2006. Some of my favorite books are All We Know of Love (schneider), The Book of Laughter and Forgetting (kundera), The God of Small Things (roy), The Handmaid's Tale (atwood), Pride and Prejudice (austen), The Storyteller (vargas llosa), and Zahrah the Windseeker (okorafor-mbachu).

Here are my posts since last Follow Friday last week:

• The Goddess Test
• word: mellifluous
• Siri Hustvedt
• The White Woman on the Green Bicycle
• on weeding our book collection (post 2 of ?)
• Steamed
• a juicy find

Any questions? Feel free to ask.

follow friday question

My second week for this meme.

It's circle time. Time for us to open up and share. Can you tell us FIVE quirky habits or things about you? We all have them...

1. When I was younger I used to dye my hair all kinds of crazy colors (and I mean bleaching my hair white first to get really bright color). People who've met me as an adult have a hard time believing this. My very conservative father quite liked the purple and took to calling me Princess Grape when I had purple hair.
2. I own a typewriter. I rarely use it, but I was horrified when Russell wondered if maybe me shouldn't get rid of it during our pre-move purge. I actually learned to type on a typewriter, though I'm don't know how soon after the school switched over to using computers for keyboard training.
3. A blogging-related quirk is that I'm much more of a lurker than a commenter and I'm trying to rectify that. I have tons of blogs in my reader, but there are quite a few that I've probably never interacted with in such a way that the author actually knows that I'm an active reader.
4. My husband has five sisters (five!) and they all have names that begin with the letter K. None of them is named Karen so I fit right in.
5. I'm ichthyophobic (I won't give you the definition; if you want to know, go look it up).

If you are visiting this blog for the first time, welcome! This is Karen. I'm a librarian and archivist and I've been writing this blog since 2006. Some of my favorite books are All We Know of Love (schneider), The Book of Laughter and Forgetting (kundera), The God of Small Things (roy), The Handmaid's Tale (atwood), Pride and Prejudice (austen), The Storyteller (vargas llosa), and Zahrah the Windseeker (okorafor-mbachu).

Here are my five most recent posts:

• Philip Roth
• reading habits survey
• Washington Irving Book Awards
• Skylark Farm
• on weeding our book collection (post 1 of ?)

I usually write posts that focus on an individual title, but this past week was a bit abnormal. Any questions? Feel free to ask.

follow friday question

My second week for this meme.

What is the most emotional scene in a book that you have read lately?

Probably the death of George in White Woman on the Green Bicycle by Monique Roffey (review forthcoming). Many of the scenes with Abram in The Unthinkable Thoughts of Jacob Green by Joshua Braff (post) were pretty difficult in a different way (Abram is verbally and emotionally abusive).

follow friday question

Because I haven't participated in a meme for quite some time (and because my feed reader needs some fresh blood), I thought it might give this blog-hop, hosted by Parajunkee, a try.

Circle time! Time to share. What character in a book would you most like to be, what character in a book would you most like to date?

Ok, well now I remember why I stepped away from memes like booking through thursday: I have such a hard time answering the majority of the questions! Oh, well, here goes nothing...

I think it'd be fun to the Thursday Next from Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next series. She lives in such an interesting world and how much would I like to have a pet dodo and a footnoterphone.¹

As for the second question, if I continue to see myself as Anne Elliot (see post), then the logical answer is Captain Wentworth. I think I'll stick to that answer for now as I think I could waste an inordinate amount of time thinking about other possibilities.

1. Jurisfiction glossary entry. I love footnotes!