a stressful summer and getting back into blogging

This year has been a challenging one for a number of reasons. I started January with a restructuring at work and every time things seem to be settling down a new stressor gets thrown my way. Also, summer is my least favorite season as I melt in the face of heat plus high humidity. With everything that's been going on the past two months I haven't been really been tracking what I've read, hence the lack of an August recap post and no regular updates to the "currently reading" and "books read in 2013" sidebar lists. I have been reading though and I will attempt to get my "books read in 2013" list updated to the best of my ability.

In the meantime, here's a little report on my current reading -

I'm listening to the audio version of Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell (public library), which was recommended to me by my friend Nancy, and I adore it. I crave it when I'm not listening to it even though I'm worried that something bad may be in store for one of the main characters.

On my Nook I'm reading Escaping Reality: The Secret Life of Amy Bensen by Lisa Renee Jones (Netgalley), a romantic suspense novel.

I also have Lark Rise to Candleford by Flora Thompson (borrowed from a friend) and One Thousand and One Nights: A Retelling by Hanan al-Shaykh (public library) in progress (though One Thousand and One Nights is going to have to go back to the library this weekend as I've just realized that it's overdue and I've reached my renew limit for it). Both of these are best in small installments so they fall into the actively-but-slowly-reading category.

Some of you may remember that my birthday is at the end of September. Russell has a particularly virulent case of the flu so celebrations have been quite subdued. I will have a bookish birthday gifts post up either at some point this weekend.

dust jackets, binge reading, and counting chickens

My blog-related resolution for 2013 was to post at least something about every book that I read this year, preferably immediately or shortly after I either finish or officially give up on it. I failed pretty miserably at it during the first six months of the year, but I was on quite a roll this month (even sneaking in an on-topic review of a book read earlier in the year). I felt so good about the groove I'd gotten in that I started counting my chickens before they'd hatched.

Last week was one of those crazy weeks where all different sorts of problems pile up on you all at once. It was made even more unbearable by the heatwave our region has been under. Even if I hadn't begun floundering, I would have dropped the ball on my review posting last week. At a certain point all I wanted was some comfort reading. Specifically, I wanted to reread The Hunger Games trilogy. Thursday night when I went to pull The Hunger Games off the shelf though, I found lined up on the shelf Mockingjay, Catching Fire, and an empty The Hunger Games dust jacket. Now it isn't too uncommon for there to be empty dust jackets on my shelves because I prefer to read hardcover books naked¹ when possible. I'm also quite lax about putting my books away. Of course I couldn't find the book in any of the logical places. As I was looking for it I grew so irritated with myself that I actually started reuniting some of my other naked hardcovers with their dust jackets.

Luckily Russell managed to find my naked copy of The Hunger Games on Friday because the high temperatures have left me indoors and growing increasingly stir crazy this weekend. I haven't wanted to knit or do much of anything else so I've just been binge reading the entire series. I just finished Mockingjay and I'm at a bit of a loss again. But by writing this post, I've made progress toward getting back on track with my resolution. I've now posted about 7 out of the 9 books I've read so far this month. Somehow that sounds much better than 4 out of 6.

1. I mean, without their dust jackets.

for what it's worth

My blog-related resolution for 2013 is to post at least something about every book that I read this year, preferably immediately or shortly after I either finish or officially give up on it.

miss me?

I've been neglecting the blog again.

While I've thought about posting a number of times over this break, the fact that I didn't is evidence of my ambivalence about the blog.  I definitely have a love/hate relationship with this blog (with more hate than love).  I cycle between wanting to give up on it entirely and desiring to be "a better blogger" and post more regularly.  When you make something you enjoy (in this case reading and talking about books) into work, it tends to become a lot less enjoyable.

I started this blog in 2006 because I was encouraged to do so. At first I found the writing of it both novel and fun, later I became more serious about posting what I thought of as "proper" reviews. For ages, though, it seems that I've been in this place of profound ambivalence about the blog. I don't get many comments, but I don't feel like I have the right to complain about it because as a blog reader I comment infrequently (but in the absence of comments its impossible to know whether anyone is actually reading what one writes). I don't have many followers, but the market for book blogs is over-saturated and I really haven't made a concerted effort to gain followers (my explorations into regular weekly follow memes yielded a reader overcrowded with blogs I didn't particularly want to read and few new followers). During one of my periodic blog-subscription weedings (when I was actually posting regularly), I was shocked to see that someone who hadn't posted in over a year still had easily ten times more followers that I did.

The point of this post is just to communicate a bit of what I'm feeling about this project and to see whether it engenders any response. I'm not giving up on the blog entirely yet and I do intend to get back into a regular posting cycle, but I'd appreciate hearing from those of you who read the blog (when I do post) even if it's just an acknowledgment that you do read my posts every once in a while.

Now I'm off to read Boneshaker by Cherie Priest, which Russell picked up for me at the library today. I'm looking forward to it.

on weeding our book collection (post 1 of ?)

We've just moved. We're still in the process of unpacking. Moving is really not my favorite thing to do.

Russell and I both freely admit that we have a bit of a book-collecting problem.¹ Our books were here there and everywhere in our old place. Many were packed away in boxes and we had bookcases packed in most cases two books-deep nevertheless we had freestanding piles. I refuse to let things continue that way in the new place.

I want books to be on bookcases and organized in such a way that we can actually find something when we want to read it. And, I'm willing to weed mercilessly in order to make that happen.

I did get rid of around 300 books (mostly to a book drive) before we left, but I still have far too many. I'm trying to weed as we unpack book boxes. I've come up with some general rules for myself and I'm trying (though not always succeeding) to be ruthless.

If I've already read a book, I'll only keep it if I genuinely think I'll reread it or if I need to have it around for reference.
When I encounter a to-be-read book, it will only be kept if it meets one of the following conditions:

• It's a classic that I really do need to get around to reading.
• I remember its premise and am still interested.
• Its synopsis appeals to me right now.
• It came highly recommended from someone whose opinion in books I trust implicitly.

Of course I've kept some books because I liked their titles (Geographies of Home by Loida Maritza Perez) or they were written by an author whose work I've enjoyed in the past (Surfacing by Margaret Atwood) or because it's related to my job (a bunch of the books from oral history class I took in grad school) or any number of other (il)logical reasons. Regardless, I am making progress.

1. I have to say that at least on my part BookCrossing is partly to blame. When I decided to participate I thought it'd be a good way to get rid of books. It was in fact a catalyst for book acquisition. I started picking up free or unbearably cheap books to bookcross, there are affiliated sites that aid in the trading of bookcrossing books, and once people knew that bookcrossing was something I did they gave me books they no longer wanted so that I could bookcross them. The problem was that often these books never left the apartment, even those acquired expressly for bookcrossing.

why you really don't wish you were a character in a historical romance

When you read historical fiction (or some classics like Jane Austen's novels), you can't help but feel a wave of nostalgia. You imagine what your life would be like if you were born in whatever time period you happen to be reading about. During those moments you dwell on the idealized version of the past. You are always that lady of the manor rather than a housemaid or a tenant farmer. You contemplate the beautiful clothes, the refined manners, but never the logistics of really living during that time.

My mother has been reading The Women of the House by Jean Zimmerman (a book from our library, by the bye) and she just had to share the following passage with me:

[In the 1690s, no] woman, though, not even Catherine [van Cortlandt Philipse], would dream of shielding her nether regions by pulling on a pair of underpants, even when she menstruated. Women simply bled into their clothing--we're talking about roughly thirty years of monthly "accidents," except for the months a woman spent pregnant. [...] Perhaps the practice of ignoring the issue had its advantages: One historian surmised that far from finding menstrual blood a turnoff, men of the era perceived the aroma of a woman's monthly flow as intensely seductive. And that is fortunate, since bathing with soap and water still was actively frowned upon, with the inevitable gaminess ameliorated mainly by sachets sewn into clothes linings. (178)

As a nurse and proponent of personal cleanliness, this passage made her shudder. I believe the not-bathing part, but I'm skeptical about the bleeding-out. Either way, though, it served as a reminder (see post title).

being a librarian

A book is a fragile creature, it suffers the wear of time, it fears rodents, the elements and clumsy hands. So the librarian protects the books not only against mankind but also against nature and devotes his life to this war with the forces of oblivion.
- Umberto Eco¹

In my old job I was a Librarian. Yes, librarian with an capital L. I was an archivist, but I was also a Librarian (Senior Assistant Librarian for most of my tenure). Librarian is some academic libraries have faculty status so Librarian is a formal title indicating rank just like Professor. In this academic world not all librarians are Librarians and, yes, I freely admit that I occasionally caused a bit of uproar by using the term librarian (little L) unintentionally excluding people when others assumed I meant Librarian-with-a-capital-L.

While I served on library committees, worked with librarians on various projects, presented at library conferences, and occasionally prodded subject specialists to add certain titles to the circulating collections, I wasn't really a librarian. Or, at least I didn't feel like one despite by ALA-accredited degree and Nancy Pearl action figure.²

Now in this new position I really am a librarian. While I'm mostly a department head, an archivist, and a records manager, I oversee a library. There's a circulating collection and rare books and satellite libraries, oh my! And I'll be helping with many of the library functions as well as working on implementing an electronic catalog (yes, we still have a card catalog). It's quite exciting to be a librarian. In addition to learning about the collections under my care and about my new employer as a whole, I'm accustoming myself to thinking like a librarian more of the time.³

Since I'm not going to be doing book-of-the-month posts for the student services blog anymore, I thought I might occasionally feature a book from my new library's collections. These will likely be different types of books than I've usually featured on the blog since our collection doesn't include much fiction and is pretty geographically and historically specialized. It should be interesting and I think it'll help me get a better handle on the types of books we collect (our collection development policy circa 2000 is detailed, but it needs some updating).

1. The Name of the Rose (48). The quote doesn't really have anything to do with what else I wrote in the post (and is equally relevant to the archival profession), but I decided to include it anyway.
2. I have both the original and deluxe.
3. People often think that archivists view the world the same way as librarians. I'm as guilty as the rest as my simple explanation of what I do occasionally goes something like this:
   - What do you do?
   - I'm an archivist
   [silence accompanied by blank stare]
   - a special kind of librarian
   (though usually I've just said that I work in the special collections area of the library). However libraries and archives have different roles leaving librarians and archivists with very distinct points of view (some simplistic differences: secondary vs. primary sources, item- vs collection-level description, access vs. preservation). Thinking as an archivist I'm liable to want to throw out much of what I as a librarian should want to keep to ensure we have a robust collection.

thoughts on The Economist's best books of 2010

Russell subscribes to The Economist. I don't read it regularly, but will flip through an issue from time to time. Yesterday Russell pointed me to the "Books and arts" section of volume 397, issue 8711 (December 4, 2010) thinking that I'd like to see which titles the magazine had decided to include in their listing of the best books of 2010.

As expected I jumped straight to their picks for fiction where I noticed something quite strange. Seven books (Freedom by Jonathan Franzen, To the End of the Land by David Grossman, Parrot and Olivier in America by Peter Carey, The Unnamed by Joshua Ferris, Mr Peanut by Adam Ross, The Imperfectionists by Tom Rachman, and Selected Stories by William Trevor), all written by men.
Now, I don't always keep on top of all the new releases, but I know that there were were at least a few outstanding offerings from female authors this year. After all, five of the fourteen books on the Man Booker Prize longlist were written by women.

My perusal of the rest of the lists yielded only three titles obviously written by women. There were quite a few authors with ambiguous names, though, so I did a little digging today. Here's how it played out:

Politics and current affairs: 10 books, 1 female author
Biography and memoir: 4 books, 1 female author
History: 8 books, 2 female authors
Economics and business: 3 books, 0 female authors
Science and technology: 6 books, 0 female authors
Culture, society and travel: 4 books, 0 female authors
Fiction: 7 books, 0 female authors
Poetry, 2 books, 0 female authors

That's 44 books: 40 written by men and 4 written by women. Really? really?!

Well, congratulations to Rachel Polonsky (Molotov's Magic Lantern), Lyndall Gordon (Lives Like Loaded Guns), Amanda Foreman (A World on Fire), and Isabel Wilkerson (The Warmth of Other Suns) for beating the odds to get onto The Economist's decidedly gender-biased best-books-of-2010 list.

word: hubris

hubris
- Presumption, originally towards the gods; pride, excessive self-confidence. (per the OED)

I've been reading The Passage by Justin Cronin, but I decided to take a break from it last night because I haven't been sleeping all that well lately (because of the book? who knows). The Passage is described as "postapocalyptic vampire fantasy," but I think that's false advertising. I'm around page 200 now (it's a monster of a book, edging 800 pages). I wouldn't describe it as fantasy (more like near-future scifi). I'd say "dystopian future" rather than "postapocalyptic," but maybe the Apocalypse is forthcoming? In any case it is very dark and as the story progresses it keeps revealing all these horrible things that have happened to the characters. I'm persevering because the novel is supposed to be really good and I want to see where it's going, but I needed a bit of a break from it.

In any case, I decided to read the second Percy Jackson and the Olympians book, The Sea of Monsters (see my post on book 1). In it, Annabeth (one of the secondary characters) learns that hubris is her fatal flaw. In explaining hubris to Percy (who confused hubris with hummus), she says: "Don't you ever feel that way? Like you could do a better job if you ran the world?" (200). While I don't see myself in the dictionary definition of hubris, I can definitely relate to Annabeth.

my life is cold and dark and dreary

"The Rainy" Day by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
from Ballads and Other Poems

The day is cold, and dark, and dreary;
It rains,and the wind is never weary;
The vine still clings to the mouldering wall,
But at every gust the dead leaves fall,
And the day is dark and dreary.

My life is cold, and dark, and dreary;
It rains,and the wind is never weary;
My thoughts still cling to the mouldering past,
But the hopes of youth fall thick in the blast,
And the days are dark and dreary.

Be still, sad heart, and cease repining;
Behind the clouds is the sun still shining;
Thy fate is the common fate of all,
Into each life some rain must fall,
Some days must be dark and dreary.

1 december

I think a Nook would be a great gift. In fact it is one of the items on my wishlist this year.

The Nook is Barnes and Noble's ebook reader. From my perspective it's better than Amazon's Kindle because it's library ebook-friendly. The Nook is compatible with various ebook formats including EPUB, PDB, and PDF. Being able to get library ebooks is important to me because I'm resistant to buying ebooks. At this point in my life, I'm only buying books (for myself) that I know that I'll want to read again. Because I'm an archivist I'm especially sensitive to concerns about the lifespan of electronic files (will the Nook or any of the other readers be around 20 years from now? will these file formats be supported on whatever new technology we have at that point? etc).

I have to admit that I hadn't seriously considered getting an ebook reader until this year. I like reading books. I like the experience of reading books, the feel of the paper, the weight and heft of the monograph. When reading PDFs, I prefer to print them out so I can underline the text and make notes in the margins. I have, however, slowly come around to the idea of an ebook reader. I see the benefits--great for travel, easier to read when cats are harassing you, etc--and I've gotten to see a few different readers in person.

The Nook also has this wonderful Alice in Wonderland case.

advent

For some reason this year I am really feeling the lack of a fancy chocolate advent calendar (Moonstruck did one one year, I didn't get it, but I wanted it pretty badly) or some other way to focus on the fun, happy, and joyous aspects of the holiday season rather than the stressful ones.

Inspired by this post at Mila's Daydreams, I decided I should try to do some kind of advent series on my blog. Because this blog is focused on books and reading, I think I'll feature books and reading-related items that I think would make great holiday gifts (an extra excuse to window shop). This feature may morph a bit as the month progresses, but that's the plan right now.

The first post is coming up shortly...

comfort reading

We all have a few books that we hold dear to our hearts. Books that we make sure to keep close at hand, but are careful not to reread too often. Books that we want to share with others, but do so almost reluctantly because we'd be devastated if we learned that others hated them.

All We Know of Love by Katie Schneider is one of my books. For some reason it just speaks to me. I happened across it at a big box book store in 2003. It's cover design is calm and beautiful, the back-cover blurb made the story sound promising so I picked it up. I loved it. I gave away my paperback and when our discount book store had them briefly, I bought out all the copies they had so I'd have more copies to share. I procured a hardcover for myself.

The image I've included in the post is Giotto's Ognissanti Madonna, which is part of the Uffizi's collection and features prominently in the novel, which I've just reread because I wanted some comfort reading.

inspired to read Agatha

I have to admit that I haven't read much of Agatha Christie's work. I know I've read Murder on the Orient Express and that I've listened to a few others on audio, but I really haven't made a dent. She was quite prolific after all.

While driving today I heard an interview with actor David Suchet on Talk of the Nation (NPR). Suchet has played Agatha Christie's most famous sleuth, the eccentric Hercule Poirot, in the aptly named British television series Agatha Christie's Poirot since 1989. Hearing Suchet talk about Poirot and the challenges inherent in bringing the character to life made me want to read more of Christie's work.

an update

I haven't been posting much lately. I've been busy and overwhelmed. I have been reading and I do have quite a few half-written posts here, there, and everywhere. I need to get back into the habit of posting regularly (even if my posts are short and imperfect) and that's my short-term goal.

To that end, I thought that I'd share a quote from Esther Cohen's The Book Doctor, which I'm reading right now:

She closed her eyes, and tried to imagine the glass contained an actual potion that could, in minutes, transform her into a chain-smoking Czechoslovakian novelist whose novels revealed a faith in love, in county, and in human kindness in the face of ever-increasing political disillusionment. Black and engaging. (127)

Love that.

back in the saddle again

The summer has been hectic for me. I've been busy and struggling to meet two big deadlines and haven't had a lot of time for leisurely reading. Because I've been overwhelmed I've also found myself losing patience with books more easily than usual.

I didn't manage to finish the book club book for either my normal book club or my online book club the past two months:

• The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz (July selection, regular book club) I liked, but I didn't start it early enough and couldn't rush through it to finish in time for the discussion. I haven't picked it up again
• One Fifth Avenue by Candace Bushnell (August selection, regular book club) wasn't what I expected. I didn't like it at all. I couldn't relate to any of the characters. I gave up on the book because I never wanted to pick it up to read more.
• Wings of the Dove by Henry James (August selection, online book club) - I never got around to starting the book
• You Are Not a Gadget by Jaron Lanier (July selection, online book club) - ditto

I read about 160 pages of The Book of Shadows by James Reese (synopsis sounded good, but the actual story had far too much emphasis on sex). I also gave up on Tathea by Anne Perry (I found it boring).

I did manage to finish some books. I read Druids by Morgan Llywelyn and Everyone Worth Knowing by Lauren Weisberger. I loved the first two books in Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games trilogy, Hunger Games and Catching Fire (I'm saving the third book, Mockingjay as a birthday treat). I also read a number of romance novels by Susan Johnson. (I'm sure I've forgotten some others)

Additionally, according to Bookcrossing, I've wild-released 36 books in the past 4 weeks (see stats on my profile page).

Margaret Atwood

Margaret Atwood was on campus on Wednesday as part of the University's Distinguished Speakers Series.

I went to hear her speak and I have to say that it really wasn't what I expected. Atwood herself was funnier than I imagined. Her talk was on the short side and its topic was "questions people have asked me and their answers" so the whole program ended up being like one huge question-and-answer session.

What she chose to include in her talk was interesting, particularly her discussion of how the questions she's usually asked have changed over the years. She touched on her hair, feminism, speculative fiction, and hope. Her answer to the question of which of her characters is most like her is Zenia from The Robber Bride because she's a pathological liar who's able to spin tales appropriate to her audience.

The audience questions covered a variety of topics. Atwood was asked about her arctic vacations and whether she had any advice for graduate students. Individuals requested that she comment about one character or another and share her feelings about the film adaptation of The Handmaid's Tale (she wishes they'd release an original cut because the voice-over bits were cut out and, while she understood that they had to change the ending, she didn't think what they decided to do was logical).

When Atwood was asked which genre she prefers to write she answered that if she really and truly enjoyed one more than the others that'd be the only genre in which she'd write. She continued that the bit of writing that she finds most difficult is the book review. As a result she reviews infrequently and only books that she likes. She mentioned reviewing E.O. Wilson's first novel Anthill.

She was also asked which authors she always snaps up: Alice Munro and Hilary Mantel. She also threw in a plug for Yann Martel's new book, Beatrice and Virgil (forthcoming in April).

When asked about the impending death of the book (in the wake of e-readers), Atwood mentioned that she'd written a post on her blog detailing three reasons to keep paper books: solar storms, energy shortages, and internet overload.

Books that were mentioned in the program (ordered, more or less, from most-mentioned to least) were The Handmaid's Tale, The Year of the Flood (which we'd expected her to talk more about than she did), Oryx and Crake, The Robber Bride, and Alias Grace. Atwood mentioned her poetry, but generally.

Of course I can't mention everything here, but that was a taste of it.

Booking Through Thursday - Electronic vs. Paper

In response to "Books Gone Wild: The Digital Age Reshapes Literature" (Time Magazine article),
Do you have an ebook reader? Do you read ebooks on your computer? Do you hate the very thought? How do you feel about the fact that book publishing is changing and facing much the same existential dilemma as the music industry upon the creation of MP3s?

I do not have an ebook reader. I read books (and articles) on the computer when I have to. I don't hate the thought of reading from the screen, but I do greatly prefer a printed copy. For me reading is at least in part a tactile experience. I like the heft of the book, the feel of its cover, the act of turning its pages.

I understand the direction that publishing is heading right now. But, I really don't think it'll change our buying habits. Russell and I don't buy mp3s. We buy CDs because, at least in part, if our hard drive crashes we'll still have the music on disc.

I like the fact that self-publishing is becoming for viable. Part of that is because I'm friends with an author who has been struggling with the traditional publishing process and, through her, I've really gotten to see just how difficult it is to get published even when you are a good writer with an innovative product.

Then again, because of self-publishing's increased popularity the market will become flooded, possibly making it harder for consumers to find what they want.

There are pros and cons to these new developments, but as Lev Grossman says in "Books Gone Wild," changes are happening and they're neither good nor bad, they just are. And, for better or worse, we readers are along for the ride.

Belated Booking Through Thursday - Inspired

I started trying to answer this question Thursday, but I was feeling decidedly uninspired so I gave up pretty quickly.

Since "Inspiration" is (or should) the theme this week... what is your reading inspired by?

This isn't a particularly simple question to answer because I honestly don't spend much time thinking about what inspires me to read. Reading is simply something that I have always done. I was raised by readers and one of my most vivid early memories has to do with visiting the public library.

That being said, the kind of books that are most appealing to me at this moment are upbeat, light-hearted books, those with happy endings, YA novels, and those set far, far away (either in fantastical worlds or just further afield). I assume that this is because during these dark, dreary winter months, I find comfort in escapism and stories that lift my spirits. So I guess that right now my reading is inspired by a quest for comfort.

the right book

Lately I've found myself starting books and then quickly putting them down (a sampling listed below) and struggling when trying to select books from our shelves to start reading. This seems to have more to do with my mood that with the books themselves. Any dark, depressing, or heavy books are out as is much serious, literary fiction, but I've also found myself losing patience with YA fantasy.

Is it the stress of the season (or my life in general)? Is it the dark, dreariness of the weather and winter's short days? Am I just too impatient these days? I don't know, maybe I just need a vacation.

Recently abandoned books:
- The Dead Fathers Club - punctuation (no quotation marks) makes reading difficult, feel horrible for the protagonist
- Nadia's Song - starts with funeral
- Norwegian Wood - slow, hopeless love
- The Passion - begins with character committing suicide
- Search of the Moon King's Daughter - opium addiction, industrial revolution, not going to be a cheery read