Happy Holidays to you all!

Regular posting will resume in a week or two!

Such A Pretty Face

From Goodreads:
In this warm, funny, thoroughly candid novel, acclaimed author Cathy Lamb introduces an unforgettable heroine who's half the woman she used to be, and about to find herself for the first time-Two years and 170 pounds ago, Stevie Barrett was wheeled into an operating room for surgery that most likely saved her life. Since that day, a new Stevie has emerged, one who walks without wheezing, plants a garden for self-therapy, and builds and paints fantastical wooden chairs. At thirty-five, Stevie is the one thing she never thought she'd be: thin. But for everything that's changed, some things remain the same. Stevie's shyness refuses to melt away. She still can't look her neighbors' gorgeous great-nephew in the eye. The Portland law office where she works remains utterly dysfunctional, as does her family-the aunt, uncle, and cousins who took her in when she was a child. To top it off, her once supportive best friend clearly resents her weight loss. By far the biggest challenge in Stevie's new life lies in figuring out how to define her new self. Collaborating with her cousins to plan her aunt and uncle's problematic fortieth anniversary party, Stevie starts to find some surprising answers-about who she is, who she wants to be, and how the old Stevie evolved in the first place. And with each revelation, she realizes the most important part of her transformation may not be what she's lost, but the courage and confidence she's gathering, day by day. As achingly honest as it is witty, Such A Pretty Face is a richly insightful novel of one woman's search for love, family, and acceptance, of the pain we all carry-and the wonders that can happen when we let it go at last.

My take:

OMG, this book made me cry. Stevie's journey, from her traumatic childhood  to the life she's rebuilding as the book progresses, is amazing. Her childhood is cut short by the deaths of her schizophrenic mother, baby sister, and beloved grandparents. She's taken in by her aunt and her control-freak husband, Herbert. Her cousins Polly & Lance try to help her feel normal, but they wind up battling their own issues. As her life spirals out of control, Stevie eats for comfort and eventually reaches 350 lbs. (Polly becomes an anorexic and Lance is just zany & neurotic)  After a heart attack at 32, she undergoes gastric bypass surgery and starts her life over again. At half her former weight, she's amazed at how different that life is.

In her quest for a new beginning, Stevie is forced to confront the demons of her past. She also finds a new love, loses an old friend who turns out not to be such a good one, helps a family cope with the loss of a child, joins a roller derby term (!!!), and watches as her family turns on the man who has made them all miserable for so many years in a quest to earn their own happy endings too. I was rooting for Stevie and all of her friends/family and cheered as those who needed it got their comeuppance.

Ophelia Joined the Group Maidens Who Don't Float- Classic Lit Signs On To Facebook

from Goodreads:
This hilarious book is the first to bring more than fifty authors and stories from classic literature back to life and online. Schmelling uses the conventions of social networking- profile pages, status updates, news feeds, and applications-to retell everything from The Odyssey to The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn to Lolita. At last, your favorite characters and authors from classic literature have caved to the pressure and joined a social network. William Shakespeare, with a little help from author Sarah Schmelling, recruits everyone from Jane Austen to Oedipus Rex to James Joyce to his online booke club group. Of course, mayhem soon ensues: -Mark Twain infiltrates Oscar Wilde's profile page and challenges him to a "quip off." -Jane Eyre listens to "Hard Knock Life" on repeat. -Hamlet becomes a fan of Daggers. -Dracula wonders why this "Edward" and "Bella" are people he may know. A loving spoof of the most-trafficked social networking website in the world and a playful game of literary who's who, Ophelia Joined the Group Maidens Who Don't Float will have book lovers and Facebook addicts alike twittering with joy.

My 2 cents:
I got this from a bargain bin at Jospeh-Beth Booksellers in Lexington KY and it may be the best $2 I spent this year! This was a hoot! Classic literature as if seen on Facebook- much better than a similar type book I read that was based on Twitter. I think the Hamlet may have been my favorite.

Half-Assed: A Weight Loss Memoir

from Goodreads:
After undergoing gall bladder surgery at age twenty-three, Jennette Fulda decided it was time to lose some weight. Actually, more like half her weight. At the time, Jennette weighed 372 pounds.




Jennette was not born fat. But, by fifth grade, her response to a school questionnaire asking “what would you change about your appearance” was “I would be thinner.” Sound familiar?



Half-Assed is the captivating and incredibly honest story of Jennette’s journey to get in shape, lose weight, and change her life. From the beginning—dusting off her never-used treadmill and steering clear of the donut shop—to the end with her goal weight in sight, Jennette wows readers with her determined persistence to shed pounds and the ability to maintain her ever-present sense of self.
 
My 2 cents:
This wasn't a touchy-feely "oh it's so easy to lose weight" book. The author is very honest about her struggle and makes it clear that it took modifying her eating habits and exercising to accomplish her goal. Now I just need to follow in her footsteps!

The Special Blankie

This was a cute little story. Little Hedgehog agrees to take care of Baby Hedgehog. His friends aren't so thrilled about having Baby and his blankie tag along, but when one of them gets into trouble, it's Baby & the blankie who save the day! Not only is this a good book to teach little ones that EVERYONE is important, it has a fuzzy blankie that they can pat on the pages.

It All Changed In An Instant- More Six Word Memoirs

From Goodreads:
Thousands of people around the world responded to SMITH Magazine's call for six-word memoirs. Following up on the smashing success of the New York Times bestseller Not Quite What I Was Planning, here are more memoirs from Sarah Silverman, Junot Diaz, Neil Patrick Harris, Suze Orman, Gay Talese, Tony Hawk, Amy Tan—and hundreds of never-before-published writers. Funny and bittersweet, witty and wild, or downright tragic, these addictive life stories are both monumental and miniscule. Six-word memoirs have become a globalphenomenon, offering anyone and everyone a telling peek at humanity and a chance to find the writer within. "Father: ‘Anything but journalism.' I rebelled." —Malcolm Gladwell"Live man's life in woman's body!" —Diane von Furstenberg"Met wife at her bachelorette party." —Eddie Matz"The miserable childhood leads to royalties." —Frank McCourt"I never checked my lottery ticket." —Casey Burra"Shiny head. Hippie hair. Shiny head." —Wally Lamb"Bipolar, no two ways about it." —Jason Owen"So would you believe me anyway?" —James Frey"Can't look at heart donor's picture." —Tonia Hall"Healed with steel, then got real." —Dr. Mehmet Oz"I still practice my Oscar speech." —Jennifer Labbienti"I've done it all except hear." —Marlee Matlin

My 2 cents:
LOVE LOVE LOVE this series! They give you a website where you can submit your own. (SMITHMag.net) I, of course, had to try my hand at it and have finally narrowed mine down to 4 choices:




1. My life: cats, caffeine, books, job


2. Confused, bitter Amazon seeks similar male


3. Sometimes too much, yet never enough


4. Can’t forget, won’t forgive, HATE him.

Is It Just Me? Or Is It Nuts Out There?

Given how much I've enjoyed Whoopi's humor over the years, I thought that this would be a laugh riot. More like a genteel snicker or two. I think Ms Goldberg has been drinking the Kool-aid at the View and has both dumbed down and tamed her sense of humor for the masses. Worth reading, but I wouldn't recommend paying hardback prices for it. Get it from your library or wait for the paperback.

The Pioneer Woman Cooks

I love Ree's website and this book has the same familiar feel. The way she includes step-by-step photographs with the instructions for the recipes makes it very easy to follow along if you're a novice cook. The stories she tells and the gorgeous photgraphs of her family, friends, and scenery around her ranch make you feel like you're there.

Ransom My Heart

From the book:

He's a tall, handsome knight with a secret. She's an adventurous beauty with more than a few secrets of her own. Finnula needs money for her sister's dowry, and fast. Hugo Fitzstephen, returning home to England from the Crusades with saddlebags of jewels, has money, and lots of it. What could be simpler than to kidnap him and hold him for ransom?


Well, for starters, Finnula could make the terrible mistake of falling in love with her hostage.

My review:

I was afraid that this was going to be horrible- it's a one off from the Princess Mia books. The premise is that Mia has written this historical romance. But despite a few moments that DO come across as written by a clueless teen, this is actually an entertaining story! I would honestly recommend it to some die-hard romance reading friends of mine or anyone who wants a light-but-fun read.

Living Oprah

From Goodreads:
What happens when a thirty-five-year-old average American woman spends one year following every piece of Oprah Winfrey's advice on how to "live your best life"? Robyn Okrant devoted 2008 to adhering to all of Oprah's suggestions and guidance delivered via her television show, her Web site, and her magazine. LIVING OPRAH is a month-by-month account of that year.



Some of the challenges included enrollment in Oprah's Best Life Challenge for physical fitness and weight control, living vegan, and participating in Oprah's Book Club. After 365 days of LIVING OPRAH, Okrant reflects on the rewards won and lessons learned as well as the tolls exacted by the experiment.

My Opinion:
My biggest gripe with this book is that while the author kept mentioning her money issues, she continued to buy the books that Oprah featured. I understand that she was performing an experiment and why she bought the other stuff mentioned throughout the book (even if I disagree with the idea), but she could have saved herself some money by obtaining books from her local public library. In most cases, from what I understood, Oprah said READ these books, not necessarily buy them. (and this is coming from a compulsive book buyer!)

Very Best of British

From Amazon:
A fun look at the differences between British and American English. Written by the British bloke who moved to Tossa Lane, Austin, Texas. This humourous and informative book is a must for anyone who wants to speak British!! Illustrated throughout with 22 original cartoons, this book contains over 1000 words and expressions you thought meant the same on both sides of the Atlantic!

My view:

The cartoons are cute, and some of the definitions are amusing. However, I own so many other books like this that were done better, that this was a bit of a let down. Books like Brit-Think, Ameri-Think: A Transatlantic Survival Guide, Revised Edition by Jane Walmsley are more my type. Not bad though if you just want a very basic dictionary of British terms.

Silly Sunday: 5-10-15 Meme

I love memes! I find them on other blogs and sometimes steal them for my own. I thought I'd take a stab at creating one and see how it turns out. Feel free to play along- Really! The base premise for this one is easy: 3 lists- 1 of 5 items, 1 of 10, etc. Ready?

5 Christmas Songs That I Can Still Stand:



Blue Christmas- Seymour Swine


10 Pains of Christmas- Bob Rivers


Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)- U2 version only


Do They Know It’s Christmas?- Band Aid (original only please)


Last Christmas- Wham






10 Movies That I Have Watched Way Too Many Times


Princess Bride


Rocky Horror Picture Show


Disney’s Robin Hood


The Birdcage


16 Candles


The Breakfast Club


Stardust


Star Trek IV- The Voyage Home (all of them really)


Star Wars- New Hope


Raiders of the Lost Ark






15 Books That I Have Almost Memorized


The Eight- Katherine Neville


Moonheart- Charles De Lint


Gone With the Wind- Margaret Mitchell


Coffee Tea or Me- Trudy Baker & Rachel Jones


Never Hit a Jellyfish With a Spade- Guy Browning


Madeline- Ludwig Bemelmans


Green Eggs & Ham- Dr Seuss


Where the Sidewalk Ends- Shel Silverstein


If Life Is a Bowl of Cherries, What Am I Doing in the Pits?- Erma Bombeck


Once & Future King- T H White


The Woods Were Full of Men- Irma Lee Emerson


Get Away From Me With Those Christmas Gifts- Sylvia Wright


Little House in The Big Woods- Laura Ingalls Wilder


Bless Your Heart, Tramp- Celia Rivenbark


Murder At The Cat Show- Marian Babson

The English Rose Resturant Cookbook

From Goodreads:
From basics such as Shepherd's Pie to artfully created recipes like Glazed Carrots and Parsnips, this homey cookbook captures the rich flavors of the British countryside. Recipes from the menu of the popular Bay Area restaurant feature entrees, soups, salads, light lunches, breads and scones, and desserts.



 
 
My opinion:
Well, being something of an avowed Anglophile and loving to eat, I had high hopes for this cookbook. My friends and I are planning an all day bash for Kate & William's wedding next spring and I was hoping to find a useful tidbit or two. No such luck. While I am not such a food snob that I refuse to use ready made foods in recipes, I do find it disheartening to find them in a cookbook of recipes allegedly served in a restaurant. I counted at least 6 in this volume including an apple pie that called for a defrosted 12 oz package of escalloped apples.
 
At least I bought it used for a low price and won't feel bad about giving it away!

Marrying Anita

From Goodreads:
You are a single woman in your thirties, fed up with the singles scene. You are tired of singles dinner parties, and exhausted by phone calls, e-profiles, and forced dinner conversation. You fear you will never marry. What do you do? Anita Jain, a New York-based Indian-American journalist, is just such a woman. Even her parents despair of her and have logged her details on to an Indian dating internet site. For years she has trusted the Western way of finding a husband, but maybe there's something in arranged marriages after all. It certainly can't get any worse. So she's travelling to India in search of a perfect husband. Marrying Anita is a refreshingly honest look at the modern search for a mate set against the backdrop of a rapidly modernising New India. Will she find a suitable man? If so, will he please her nosy parents, aunts, uncles and cousins? Is the new urban Indian culture all that different from New York? And is any of this dating worth the effort?

My opinion:
Anita got fed up with the dating scene in NYC and decided to move to India in order to give a more traditional Indian approach to relationships a try. That didn't work too well either, but her journey is an interesting read. Despite our cultural differences, I was able to identify with a great deal of Anita's life. I, however, will NEVER consider letting my parents pick a husband for me! (my mother's idea of the perfect man for me is Howdy-Doody and my father is trying to marry me off to Shaft.)

The Big Read list and how I rank on it

I confess freely that I have cribbed this from Nancy at Bookfoolery & Babble. (http://bookfoolery.blogspot.com/) I did change the color coding to suit my taste. I hope she won't mind too terribly as I am a very big fan of her blog.

The Big Read list has been passed around quite a bit, this past week or two, so I thought I'd join in. It's a list of 100 books; the BBC believes most people will have read only 6 or so off this list. They probably have a point. I doubt you'll see anyone outside the book blogging community getting all excited about the list. The average Joe probably has only read what's required or the most popular tripe, right? Anyway, I'm going to alter mine a little.

Black = I have read it



Green = I read part of it but did not finish


Purple = I have read it AND I own a copy
** = A personal favorite from this list


Red =  Not familiar with this one or don't want to read it
Blue = Will eventually read this one

Orange = hated it


And without further ado, here's the list!


1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2. The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte


4. Harry Potter Series - J. K. Rowling ** (in hardback, no less)
5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6. The Bible


7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte


8. 1984 - George Orwell


9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman


10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11. Little Women - Louisa May Alcott ** (must confess that I liked Little Men better)


12. Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy


13. Catch-22 - Joseph Heller


14. Complete Works of Shakespeare ** (I've read a LOT of Shakespeare, but not EVERYTHING)


15. Rebecca - Daphne DuMaurier
16. The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien


17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk


18. Catcher in the Rye - J. D. Salinger
19. The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger


20. Middlemarch - George Elliot


21. Gone With the Wind - Margaret Mitchell**


22. The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald


23. Bleak House - Charles Dickens


24. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy


25. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams**

26. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky


28. The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck


29. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll**


30. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame


31. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy


32. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens


33. Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis**


34. Emma - Jane Austen
35. Persuasion - Jane Austen


36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - C. S. Lewis**


37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini


38. Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis de Bernieres


39. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden (own an autographed copy and still haven't read it)


40. Winnie the Pooh - A. A. Milne**


41. Animal Farm - George Orwell


42. The DaVinci Code - Dan Brown


43. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez


44. A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving


45. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins


46. Anne of Green Gables - L. M. Montgomery


47. Far from the Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy


48. The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood


49. Lord of the Flies - William Golding


50. Atonement - Ian McEwan


51. Life of Pi - Yann Martel


52. Dune - Frank Herbert


53. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons (I don't suppose watching the movie counts?)


54. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen


55. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth


56. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon


57. A Tale of Two Cities - Charles Dickens (you may be noting a trend in my attitude toward Dickens)


58. Brave New World - Alduous Huxley


59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime- Mark Haddon


60. Love in the Time of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez


61. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck


62. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov


63. The Secret History - Donna Tartt


64. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold


65. The Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas


66. On the Road - Jack Kerouac


67. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy


68. Bridget Jones' Diary - Helen Fielding


69. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie


70. Moby Dick - Herman Melville (an entire chapter on the color white?!? GAH)


71. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens


72. Dracula - Bram Stoker


73. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett


74. Notes from a Small Island - Bill Bryson**


75. Ulysses - James Joyce


76. The Inferno - Dante**


77. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome


78. Germinal - Emile Zola


79. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackery


80. Possession - A. S. Byatt**


81. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens (the only Dickens I can halfway stand)


82. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell


83. The Color Purple - Alice Walker


84. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert


86. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry


87. Charlotte's Web - E. B. White**


88. The Five People You Meet in Heaven - Mitch Albom (are you freaking kidding me?!?)


89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle**


90. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton

91. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad


92. The Little Prince - Antoine de Saint-Exupery


93. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks


94. Watership Down - Richard Adams


95. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy O'Toole


96. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute


97. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98. Hamlet - William Shakespeare** (not sure why this isn't included w/Complete Works above, but whatever)


99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl**


100. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

Well, if you take out the 33 that I haven't read and the 6 that I haven't finished, I don't think i finished too shabbily. 61 out of 100. Anyone else want to weigh in?

The Remarkable Miss Frankenstein

I love Minda Webber! I almost skipped this book but something made me go back and pick it up. What a hoot! If you like punnish humor, finding old friends in the oddest places, and a goofy romanctic entanglement or two, you'll like this book. I nearly fell out of bed laughing when the heorine and her erstwhile self-appointed protector fell out of a closet at an inopportune moment. Most of the classic horror stereotypes are here- vampires, werewolves, the Frankenstein monster (his name is Frederick and the family has adopted him)as well as a twist on some well known characters. Light reading, but worth it!

What the Mouse Found

This is a darling collection of stories that Charles wrote for assorted children in his life, based loosley on dolls & stuffed animals made by his wife. They're all delightful, but the last story nearly made me cry. The end was bittersweet, but over all it's a terrific collection that would be a wonderful way to get your little bookworm hooked on the Magic that is Charles's deLint's work.

And One Last Thing

From the book: "If Singletree’s only florist didn’t deliver her posies half-drunk, I might still be married to that floor-licking, scum-sucking, receptionist-nailing hack-accountant, Mike Terwilliger."

Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned! Lacey's soon-to-be-ex husband finds this out the hard way as she informs everyone they know (and then some)of his affair via the company newsletter he asks her to write for him. The story goes viral and now Lacey has to hide out while her lawyer tries to get things settled down. As she swears she never wants to look at a man again, she finds herself being intrigued by her new neighbor......you have to read the book to see what happens next!

Cats In The Belfry

I loved this book. I've had several friends with Siamese cats and it's hard to believe that this book was written so long ago, because it totally describes them. For that matter, it describes my 3 non-siamese owners. (let's not kid anyone- they own me, not the other way round!)Especially the way the cats voiced their opinions In Capitalized Exclamations and the general behavior when taken anywhere in the car. I can't tell you how many times I've had someone squawk at me. "You're Going To Kill Us All!" or "Why Isn't There Food In My Bowl?!?"

Clubbing

This was a cute light-hearted mystery. A shopping & club addicted London girl gets in trouble and gets sent to her grandparents in the country. There she finds natives both friendly and unfriendly, a possible boyfriend, and more mayhem than she ever expected!

Zen and the Art of Herding Cats

No book review this time, just a view into my world. This particular incident happened back in August:

So, my three cats have a way of demanding attention at inopportune moments. Their favorite time to want petting is when I’m in the bathroom, ensconced on the throne, and not in the mood to be disturbed. I mean, heck, I don’t try to pet them when they’re in the litter box!

Anyway, there I am and of course all 3 come bounding in. (For those who ask why I don’t just close the door, they are good at zipping in before I can get it shut) Nightshade, the little black cat, is going through this phase where she will only drink water from the bathroom sink. She won’t drink from the bowl in the kitchen- I have to fill the sink a couple of times a day for her highness. Since I was in a position to do it, I went ahead and filled it for her.  She perched on the sink on the side by the wall and Felicity jumped up on the bathtub side to get a drink too. Malkin was on the floor between my feet demanding attention.

Well, Liss decided that she should be on the side of the sink by the wall and started trying to push Shady out of the way to get there. She managed to lose her balance and fall, sideways, into the sink, thoroughly drenching herself in the process. As soon as she started to slip, Shady leapt up and over her, landing in the tub. Liss shot straight up from the water and burrowed herself into my chest, screeching “What IS This?!? You KNOW I Don’t Get Wet!!! Why Did You Do This To Me?!?” (like I had anything to do with it) Malkin went into panic mode as soon as Liss started screeching and tried to flee the bathroom. He ran headlong into the door- TWICE- before finding his way out. “I swear, I didn’t do any of it, Mom! Really!” Felicity, in the meantime was still screaming “WHY ME, WHY ME?!?” and was climbing over my shoulder, smacking me in the face repeatedly with her wet tail, and avoiding my attempts to wrap her in a towel to get her dried off.  She finally jumped down and ran, still shrieking,  through the house. Nightshade got back up on the sink and gave me a plaintive meow “you KNOW I can’t drink this after SHE took a bath in it!”

I hurriedly finished my business and left Shady still wailing about her water while I hunted Felicity down with a towel. Of course, she had her dripping wet butt on top of one of my bookcases. (no books damaged, thankfully) She saw me coming with the towel, assumed I was going to Do It To Her Again, and took off…for the bathroom. Nightshade saw her coming and literally threw a hissy fit. Malkin had emerged from wherever he had gone to hide and got bowled over by Liss on her way back to the bathroom. (no mean feat there- he’s twice her size) Then I stumbled over him while chasing HER. I finally cornered Liss with the towel and got her dry, refilled the sink to shut Shady up, and picked Malk up for a cuddle to soothe his hurt feelings since we were all Being Mean To Him.

It seemed like forever, but I think the whole episode lasted about 5 minutes. All I can say is, if the cats make me this crazy, I am NEVER having kids.

Native Star

I really enojyed this book. Set in roughly the same time period as Gail Carriger's Parasol Protectorate series, only in the United States, Native Star is the tale of hedge-witch Emily Edwards and the deliciously named wizard Dreadnought Stanton. Emily accidentally winds up with a magic stone embedded in her hand and the story follows her as Stanton tries to take her to the wizard he thinks will best be able to get it out. Along the way they encounter Indians, killer raccoons, evil wizards, flying machines, and many other obstacles. Oh, and there's even a bit of a love triangle. Lots of fun!

Playing With Books

The semi-puritanical me is HORRIFIED at the idea of desecrating a book. I whimper when I see a book- any book- dropped, mangled, or mutilated. However, if a book MUST be altered from it's normal form, the ideas presented here are fairly good ones! The projects are doable if you have a bit more time and patience than I do, and the art gallery presented at the end is nothing less than amazing.

A Killer Plot

This was a fun little mystery. Olivia Limoges is a woman with a tragic past who has returned to her hometown after making her fortune. She keeps to herself, with her best friend being her loyal dog, until a restuaranteur friend convinces her to join a local writer's group. As she finds herself making friends, Olivia begins to feel more comfortable in her old home...until one of her new friends is brutally murdered. Now she & the survivng members of the group are trying to help the local law enforcement solve the case and prevent anyone else from dying.


Ellery Adams manages to introduce quite a few characters in this first book of a new series, but manages to make you feel a connection to most of them. You find out what happened to Olivia as a child, but there is still some mystery as to what went on in her life after she was taken away from the town and raised elsewhere. I'm sure it will be addressed in later book, and can't wait to find out.

Hopeless Romantic

More Brit-lit! Girl constantly falls for wrong guy, girl totally screws up her life in the process, girl winds up falling for another guy and tries not to becasue she's learned to fear the consequences. However, love wins out in the end and it's presumed that they live happily ever after.


That's prety much a nutshell description, and may not sound like I enjoyed the book, but I actually did. The heroine's relationships with her friends and family reminded me a bit of my own life (including the horror of traveling on vacation with her parents)although I do hope that I'm not quite THAT silly about men. Reading this book was a nice way to spend an evening, especially accompanied by a cup of tea and a few hobnobs.

The Sleeping Beauty

I've always loved Mercedes Lackey. The Tales of the 500 Kingdoms series has been a fun romp through the realm of fairy tales. This volume, to paraphrase a line from Lackey's intro, is a Snow White tale that gets hijacked by Sleeping Beuaty before crashing into the Ring saga. Add 100 princes vying for the hand of the princess, a lisping unicorn, and a magic mirror in love with a fairy godmother, and the results are pure bliss. Princess Rosamund is no shrinking violet, Prince Siegfried is surprisngly gentle and kind, Prince Leopold is a hoot (his reaction to the curse challenge had me in tears, I was laughing so hard), and some of the challenges the princes have to undertake are diabolical. This may be my favorite volume in the series so far.

Chicks Dig TimeLords

This is a fun look at fandom from a female persepctive. Like several of the essayists in this collection, I was a late convert to the bliss that is Doctor Who. (MANY thanks to my friend Kim who INSISTED that I watch it and then Torchwood) My two favorite essays are by Elizabeth Bear and Carole Barrowman. (big sister of John Barrowman- aka- Captain Jack Yumminess, er, Harkness) The various aspects of fandom (watching, writing, costuming, etc) are well represented in this slim volume and I would recommend it to anyone, male or female, who loves Doctor Who or someone who does.

Dewey's Nine Lives: The Legacy of the Small-Town Library Cat Who Inspired Millions

Well, this one made me cry. I'm not usually that big a sentimental fool, but reading these stories about beloved cats and their owners really got to me. It didn't help that my three brats were lounging on or near me as I read the book. Although it's suitable for just about anyone, I would NOT recommend this book to someone who just doesn't understand the joy and love and bond that pet lovers have. 

In that vein, here are three stories about my silly kitties, plus a story about one who is no longer with me:

Felicity is my first and oldest cat. She is a stubborn little tortoise-shell and is the delight of my life when she's not trying to be the bane of my existance. There are a million and one stories I could share, but I'll start with this one. I had invited a couple of friends over for dinner. Marcy had met my cats before, but Shawn had not, so I warned him that the princess was a VERY friendly little cat who demanded her due attention from everyone who walked through my door. Even so, NONE of us were prepared for her to fall utterly in love with him. Felicity did everything but hump his leg, she wanted his attention so badly. We were sitting down to eat and she threw herself onto her back with a dramatic yowl. Shawn looked down and she was shimmying on her back, trying to entice him into rubbing her belly. "But, but, but we JUST MET!!!" he sputtered. Marcy and I died laughing.


Greymalkin is my big fat gray lump cat. He has a white spot on his chin, a patch on his belly, and 4 white socks. Malkin is also an attention hound (pardon the phrase) and is very sweet and placid in nature. However, he was a VERY hyper kitten. WE first met when Marcy (the same one from before) came to pick me up for a reading we were attending at the main library. (Donna Jo Napoli- great YA author if you haven't read her, you should) As we went to walk out the door of my apartment, this little gray & white cat tried to walk in. "No, sweetie" I said, scooping him up. "You don't live here." He had a collar, but no tags. I suspected that he belonged to the neighbors 2 apartments down. A few days later, I was lugging a basket of laundry to the car and was stopped by another neighbor. "Is that your cat?" she asked, pointing. I looked and there my little friend was, rolling on his back in a patch of sunshine on the sidewalk, right under a tree where a trapped squirrel was having a fit. "No," I said. "but he thinks he is. He tried to come in the other night." I noticed his collar was gone. My neighbor said that he'd tried to get into her place too and her dog nearly killed him. We talked a few minutes more and decided that he must have belonged to the people I had first assumed, but they'd done a midnight moveout and it looked like they'd left him behind. (GRRR) "We can't leave him out here" said my neighbor. "He'll be killed." (At the time, I was living in a building right off I-65 with my street being a connector for the on/off ramps in either direction and a lot more traffic than I expected when I moved in) I explained that I already had 2 cats (Felicity and her brother Donohue) and it wasn't safe to just take him in without having a vet check him over. She asked how much it would cost to do that- I didn't know, so I went back in and called my regular vet to ask. When I went back out and told her that they'd said it would be $40, she handed me $20 and said "I'll pay half if you'll take him in." Well, I didn't get my laundry done that day, but I did get a 3rd cat!


Nightshade is my sweet little rescue kitty. A little black & white thing- her coloring is almost the exact same placement as Malkin's. One of the police officers I work with found her huddled down on the side of a busy street. She'd been abused and abandoned. Since they already had several pets, his wife wouldn't let him keep her. He sent out a department wide email with a photo asking if anyone was interested in taking her in. I called him at once and said "I want her." The first few weeks were traumatic for all of us. Malkin wanted to play, Liss was furious that I'd brought another cat into HER home, Shady was terrified of everything, and I was off work with a knee injury and in a lot of pain. We've all since recovered/adjusted. Shady & Malk sleep together a lot, play together, and generally enjoy each other. Liss has come to accept her and every now and then the girls team up to terrorize Malkin after he's been mean to one or both of them. She's still very skittish and leery of new people, but has accepted me as HER human and loves to cuddle up and purr to me. One of my favorite moments with her occurred a few weeks after she came to live with us. She was tearing around the house, like cats do for no reason, and as I was walking through the door way from the kitchen to the living room, leapt up and clung to the door frame. Nightshade is a strong little kitty and she'd managed to leap high enough to put her on eye level with me. I stopped, startled, and said "well, hello!" Shady cheerfully chirruped at me and leaned forward to lick my nose before springing down and rampaging through the house again.




Last story: my beloved, late, Donohue kitty. He and Felicity were litter mates and the first cats I'd ever owned. He was solid coal black with dark amber eyes. Donohue was named after my favorite chef-instructor at the culinary school I was attending when I acquired my kittens. Felicity's name came easily, but it took a couple of weeks to name him. Nothing seemed right. One night after I'd come home from work & school, I was in the kitchen making a snack. I realized that my little boy was following everything I did with his eyes, just like the chef had. "Well, aren't you just a little Donohue?" That got his attention. MEOW. I looked at him again. "Should that be your name? Are you Donohue?" MEOW! "Donohue?" MEOW! And that was it.


However, that's not the story I was referring to earlier. This is. 2 days before Christmas 2001, I came home to find that Felicity had been violently ill. When she threw up several more times in the span of 30 minutes, I knew something was wrong. I called my then-boyfriend (hereafter referred to as the Schmuck) and raced out the door to an all-night vet's office. They weren't sure what she'd gotten into (no room for a tree in my small place, so she hadn't swallowed tinsel), but she was dehydrated and listless, so they decided to keep her overnight. The schmuck had arrived and calmed me down enough to drive back to my apartment. (MY BABY! She's so small- what if I never see her again?!?) Well, we walked in without her and Donohue was just crazy. It suddenly hit me- this was the first time since birth that he and Felicity had EVER been separated. They'd even gone to their vet appointments together. He was so freaked out that I broke my rule and let him sleep with us. (Felicity doesn't sleep- she bats my ears, pries my eyes open, sticks her head in my mouth, and makes a general nuisance of herself, so just to keep it fair NONE of the cats sleep with me) He was a little happier about that development. Now, I have to explain that D had never really cared for the schmuck. Liss tolerated him, but D loathed him. (and that's how I learned to trust my cats when it came to boyfriends) Anyway, we crawled into bed, me on the inside against the wall, Schmucko on the outside. Donahue started at out feet, but crawled up and was balanced on my back-at first. I was dimly aware of him burrowing down between us as I drifted off. Then I was rudely awakened by a THUD and a yelp of "WHAT THE HELL?!?" I looked to the other side of the bed and saw the Schmuck sprawled on the floor.  Donahue was lying beside me, snug against my back, with all 4 paws out in front of him and a VERY satisfied look on his furry face. He had apparently managed to PUSH my boyfriend OUT of the bed. The Schmuck got mad when I started laughing hysterically (Donohue was purring quite contentedly) and stormed off to spend the rest of the night asleep in the living room.


So there you have the first of many kitty stories you will encounter on this blog. I hope you enjoyed reading them as much I enjoyed the memories they brought back while typing them!

 

Hungry For Happiness

This wasn't bad but it could have been better. The heroine is a deep-fried Southern former fat girl and the story picks up after she's had lap-band surgery. She suffers through some strange, bizarre, and sad relationship issues, has countless arguments with her overweight family members who think she's 'putting on airs' now that she's lost weight, yet succeeds with carrying on her life despite all of the obstacles thrown in her path. My biggest gripes are the highly exaggerated Southern accent the author manages to write with, and the fact that he makes Loretta seem like a victim despite her successes.

Instructions

This little gem of a volume contains three of my favorite things- fairy tales, Neil Gaiman's writing, and the art of Charles Vess. I was lucky enough to score a deeply discounted copy from Amazon, but it's well worth purchasing at full price! The illustrations are gorgeous, making you feel like you're there with every step....er, turn of the page. The simple instructions for a successful journey through the Otherworld make you feel like you're on the adventure.

Steampunk-Style Jewelry: A Maker's Collection of Victorian, Fantasy, and Mechanical Designs

This was a neat little book, but most of the projects require more patience and creativity than I possess. I may have to try a few ideas it inspired though! Craft store, here I come....

Eating Well- on a Budget

I love cookbooks. I especially love cookbooks that promise me good food that I can afford and/or have the time to make. This one, while nicely laid out, did not live up to the expectations I had. The chapters were typical for an all-purpose cookbook, but the copy I had contained pages that I think may have been inserted out of order. if not, then someone fell down on the job doing layout because it was a bit disconcerting to flip through the poultry chapter and find 3 vegetarian recipes in the middle. Or to read the beef section and find a shrimp dish.



Most of the recipes in this volume were somewhat basic and I have other (sometimes better) verisons in my collection already. I did find 3 that were worth adding to my list: Salmon Rosti,Almond Crusted Pork, and a Cream of Turkey & Wild Rice Soup.


Oh, and the misplaced shrimp dish? I can't make it myself, due to food allergies, but I may pass it on to my mother. I think my Dad would enjoy it.

We Are In A Book

This may be my favorite of the Elephant & Piggie books so far! When they realize that they are in a book and readers are following what they do, Elephant and Piggie begin to have some fun with their followers. Their outright glee is contagious, and reading this makes me wish I could be in a book too!

Three Scoops and a Fig

Sweet little book about an Italian girl who wants to help her family get ready for a big dinner. But her attempts to help end in disaster and the various family members telling her that she's too little to help. She finally goes outside to huddle under a fig tree with a bowl of gelato and her beloved kitty, where she gets the inspiration for a dish that everyone in her family ultimately agrees is just right!

Gordon Ramsay's Family Fare

I love to watch Gordon Ramsay on TV and I could listen to him talk for hours, but I've just never been that fond of his recipes. I appreciate his apparent passion for food, and quality food at that, and his desire to see people use more fresh ingredients in their cooking. (something I have been trying to do better with, myself) However, I just can't see the average American family making some of these meals. There is just no way most children are going to eat Baby Squid in Tomato Sauce with Chard, for example. That's an appetizer.

For that matter, most families that I'm familiar with don't have time or inclination to sit down to meals that include appetizers, main course/sides, and dessert. Those are special occasion type meals and are usually eaten in restaurants...like Hell's Kitchen. (yes, I crack myself up- it's my review, I'm allowed to)

To be fair, both American & British measurements are included for the ingredients. But that's where reality ends with a lot of these recipes. The timelines for prep work are a nice inclusion, but show his lack of knowledge to what resources many of us have...for example, the time line for meal 7, A Classic Sunday Lunch, starts with this :

A FEW DAYS AHEAD...
Order the pigeon (you need 8-12 breasts from large wood pigeons ?!? oh sorry, you can substitute squab for the pigeon if it isn't available where you shop...riiiiight....) from your butcher or poulterer and get him to carve out the breasts. Reserve the rib of beef too.

The timelines for most of the fish dishes contain this advice:

Order the fish from the fish supplier. (get him to fillet it for you) Arrange to collect it on the day if possible, or the day before.

Um, Gordon? We're cooking AT HOME. Most of us don't have a butcher/poulterer/fish supplier. We're lucky if we have anything resembling a fresh meat counter at the grocery since most stores have switched to vacuum sealed pre-packaged meats from THEIR suppliers.

Anyway, I can tell you that while most of the meals didn't appeal to me, the instructions ARE clearly written out and the food pornographers did a wonderful job of photographing some of the dishes. Instead of assuming that everyone knows how to make various stocks or keeps them onhand, Ramsay includes simple directions for how to make & store them. The timelines are concise and helpful, if you overlook the kind of thing I mentioned above. There are also a few bonus tips & tricks listed here and there throughout the book.

Oh, and among the handful of recipes that I intend to try? Gordon's Apple Pudding, Prosciutto Sage & Parmesan Puffs, Gordon's Beef Wellington, and a variation on Salmon En Croute. Most of these looked delicious, have ingredients that I can easily get, and won't keep me in the kitchen for an eternity! 

Great bookstores

Another post from the BBC:


http://www.bbc.com/travel/feature/20101118-the-worlds-greatest-bookshops


As I mention in my library post earlier, I love bookstores as much as I love libraries. I have literally planned vacations around book shopping. My first trip to Toronto was a giant book buying binge. I found Bakka Science Fiction Books and thought I'd died and gone to heaven. Then there was the cookbook store, whose name I've forgotten. And so many more....


London? Mom had to drag me away from Charing Cross Road. It's not the bookstore Mecca it once was, but I still had a lot of fun plundering the stores we found. I bought a ton of books that I began to resent as I had to lug them around for the rest of the day, having planned badly.


I even love online bookstores as my denuded bank account, Amazon, and Better World Books will all tell you. And nothing is more fun for me than spending an hour (or 3) digging through the stacks in a good used bookstore.


So, among my other life goals now, is the challenge of getting to as many of the bookstores on the BBC list as possible.


Tell me, what are some of YOUR favorite bookstores?

Love Letter to the Library

I read this article on BBC.co.uk : http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/willgompertz/2010/11/are_libraries_out_of_date.html

Go ahead and read it, I'll wait. 

Ok. Are libraries passe? I don't think so. Nor should they be phased out. My mom was a career librarian and gave me my love for reading. Even before she went back to work, we took weekly trips to the library to stock up on books. Back in those days, books were a luxury we couldn't afford to buy on our own and the library was always there for us. Once she started working there? I was like a kid in a candy store. Dad & I would go to pick her up (he worked nights, so he was free to keep an eye on me after school while Mom was at work) and I would frantically grab books to take home. If I was a good girl, I was allowed in the back where I could plunder through the newly returned books for treasures. If the librarians were busy back there, I'd browse through the stacks and carry a pile up to take home. 

I watched my first videotape at the library. Back then, our library had 3 viewing stations so that people who didn't have VCR's at home could still see movies, and I think they were one of the first libraries in the state to offer that. Anyway, the first one I watched was Star Wars. There were also a few listening stations for LP's and audiotapes. I learned about old radio serials from the AV department and checked out all of the Amos & Andy tapes, as well as other programs. I picked out albums based solely on the cover art (hey, I was a kid) and discovered jazz and blues and a handful of comedians. (mom didn't censor my book choices much, but she kept an eagle on on the audio selections- not that the library had too much of anything hardcore. public funding and all that) Oh, and the magazines! I didn't know that there were that many magazines available. I quickly figured out that most of them didn't appeal to me, but just knowing that they were there was enough.

When I got older, I was hired as a library page. This is basically a glorified term for shelver. I felt all grown up- I had to get my social security card for payroll, the librarians who had always seen me as "Marie's kid" now treated me like one of them, and I still got to take home as many books as I could carry, plus I got PAID! Shelving allowed me to find books I might not have seen otherwise. When I went off to college and was given a choice of jobs for my work-study financial aid, I immediately chose to work in one of the college libraries. My bosses were amazed by my shelving prowess and amused by the stacks of books I constantly took back to the dorm.

Post college, I eventually wound up working in bookstores. I'd still be there if A: they paid more, and B: I hadn't thoroughly come to loathe working retail. I like books, people I'm not so crazy about. With the employee discount, I bought books out the wazoo. I stopped using the library as much because it wasn't as convenient and I hated waiting for them to buy the new books that I wanted to read. (still do. I realize that they have to spend their money on books that will appeal to the largest number of people and can't buy EVERYTHING, but it makes me crazy when they don't get a new title in for months, if at all)

Although I no longer work retail, I still buy a fair amount of books. But I also use the library a lot more. It took a few years for me to find a branch that I liked- the main library here is mostly staffed by some of the most lazy, obnoxious people I've ever met. (alas, they're in a union, so they can't be easily fired) There are a handful of VERY nice people there, who I miss talking to, but I got tired of dealing with the others and eventually quit going there. The branch closest to my house had a rotating staff when I started using it and I had numerous problems there at first, but now they have a permanent staff who are some of the most delightful people I know. They know me by name (and I know their names) , are amused by my omnivorous reading & music habits, and we share family stories and book recommendations all the time. I use the computers there a few times a week (no printer at home, and can't print some things at work, so I go to the library for that too) and attend a few of the programs when they fall in hours I'm not working. We even held a book club meeting there once. (the club disbanding shortly after that was a coincidence- My friend Laura and I keep trying, but can't get one off the ground.)

It makes me crazy when I hear people say that they don't know what good libraries do. Let's see- free access to books/magazines/music/videos, free access to computers (limited time, but they're free!), free classes in computer skills/creating resumes/job searching online, a safer place for kids to go after school, school tutoring/homework assistance, storytimes and other programs for small children...the list goes on. Anyone who doesn't want to go through formal education can still learn about almost anything under the sun by reading library books.

Two years ago here in Louisville, one of the most hotly contested issues was a proposed library tax. It was an occupational tax that would have cost most people about $5 a year, if that. The money it would have raised could have increased the collection, built new branches, remodeled some of the older branches, and been a real asset to the community. It got voted down. I partially understand why- our mayor was known for taking money earmarked for projects and throwing into his own pet issues, but a lot of people said they voted against it "because I don't use the library, so why should I pay for it?" Well, going by that logic, I don't have kids and am not going to, so why should I pay taxes for schools? Some people don't drive- why should they pay taxes for roads? What if you need to use it some day and it's not there? For $5 a year, it would have been a bargain.

Anyway, now that I've rambled on forever, the point that I was trying to make is that I love libraries. Friends and family members laugh at mom & me when we go on vacation and one of the first things we want to do is go check out the local library and the bookstores. On my first trip to Toronto, one of the first things I did was pick up a handful of fliers from a library and mail them to Mom in NC. When we went to London, we didn't get to a library, but by gad we went to as many bookstores as I could drag Mom into. (And I learned the valuable lesson of go to the British Museum first, hit the Charing Cross Road bookstores last or you will spend the entire time you're in the museum waiting for your arm to fall off under the weight of all the books you foolishly bought and have to lug around until you go back to your hotel!) We went to Washington DC and toured the Library of Congress (beautiful building- if you've never been, GO) and got official library cards from it. (one of my most prized possessions) And if anyone ever succeeds in dragging me to NYC, you can best believe that I will be going to the NY Public Library and getting my picture taken with the lions!