tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-60299352024-03-13T22:07:50.122-07:00Knitting it all togetherknitting, books and movies, etc.Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.comBlogger106125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-53087870889377748332014-12-04T16:42:00.000-08:002014-12-04T16:42:01.536-08:00Reading, Writing and ArithmeticNovember by the numbers:
* I finished book 52 of my book-a-week-in-2014 reading challenge. I'm still reading and will probably count at least three more before the new year. The last was Me Before You by JoJo Moyes, a tear-jerker of a novel. It was one of 15 books to get a five-star rating from me this year. Of those, my favorite was a classic, Wilkie Collins' The Woman in White, which in my Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-37974503883166641812014-11-02T17:06:00.002-08:002014-11-02T17:06:48.083-08:00The Casual VacancyI wanted to love J.K. Rowling's first post-Harry Potter novel, The Casual Vacancy, and I was certain I would, not because of any fangirl loyalty to Ms. Rowling. Rather, I was annoyed by the negative reviews from disappointed Harry Potter fans. I wanted to affirm with my praise Ms. Rowling's right to write whatever she wants. I was also intrigued by the notion that this book was somewhat personal Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-51875832610543999512014-10-31T11:51:00.001-07:002014-10-31T11:51:53.628-07:00Clearing the stashI recently joined an online book group, and last week I participated in the bimonthly "toppler" activity. The purpose of the toppler is to set aside as many other activities as possible to embark on an intense readathon to clear your shelves of malingering titles. Most members, however, report that their "to be read" list tends to grow rather than shrink during the toppler activity as they add Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-87147973704344462442014-10-17T11:38:00.000-07:002014-10-17T11:39:42.546-07:00Good poetry, bad proseNotice: knitting content will be returning to this knitting/books/film blog.
After 8.5 years, I have completed the knitting project that has been my albatross. This sweater is why I haven't been in a yarn shop in, well, probably 8.5 years, until yesterday when I purchased the buttons to finish it off.
And here it is:
The pattern is from a gorgeous, now out-of-print book, Poetry in StitchesSharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-69580869946426083622014-10-13T14:09:00.001-07:002014-10-13T14:09:28.172-07:00The Woman in WhiteMy favorite category of literature is British novels of the 19th century. (I'm also extraordinarily fond of the music and poetry of the 19th century; perhaps I had a previous life in that time). Having just finished another novel of the era, I've been pondering the common characteristics that link Austen, Dickens, Elliot, et al, in my mind, and so far I'm at a loss to account for it.
CouldSharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-88429537215144403192014-10-06T09:11:00.002-07:002014-10-06T09:11:59.252-07:00The Name of the RoseI've been an admirer of Umberto Eco since reading his marvelous novel Foucault's Pendulum in my mid-20s. For many years, I counted it among my top-five favorite books, although I was less enchanted when I re-read it a few years ago. I read 3 of Eco's subsequent 4 novels and a collection of essays, but none have matched the delight of my first experience of Foucault.
The glaring omission in my Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-52919096032838476422014-10-04T07:13:00.001-07:002014-10-04T07:13:49.869-07:00Shadow of NightThis month I'll be reading 8 books, I hope! This ambitious undertaking is necessitated by next month's even more ambitious undertaking: to write 50,000 words of a novel as part of National Novel Writing Month. To stay on plan for the book-a-week challenge, I'll need to bump November's books into October, so that I may devote all of November to writing a novel for which, at this point, I have Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-9796744357665113322014-09-16T11:25:00.003-07:002014-09-16T11:25:53.776-07:00An Echo in the BoneI'm grateful I didn't read An Echo in the Bone in 2009 when it was published. Five years would've been an excruciating wait for the next book in the Outlander series; the cliffhangers and loose ends are unmatched since Dragonfly in Amber. As it is, I merely have to give myself a little time to decompress before picking up Written in My Own Heart's Blood, which waits on my bookshelves.
Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-68288209167596412932014-09-12T08:08:00.001-07:002014-09-12T08:08:23.563-07:00The Joy of ConversationA few months ago, a friend in my neighborhood book group inquired if any of us would like to meet occasionally to discuss other topics, perhaps issues of local interest, in a semi-facilitated manner. Hmmm, I'm aware of that concept, I thought, and I mentioned it to another friend who has facilitated conversation salons, and she loaned me a book on the subject. Published nearly 20 years ago by Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-56307394965140972542014-09-08T10:13:00.001-07:002014-09-08T10:13:26.367-07:00Shades of GreyNo, not THAT book! This is Jasper Fforde's Shades of Grey of unspecified quantity. I joined an online book group, and this dystopian-type novel was the September read.
The setting is a world in which one's ability to see certain colors determines social status, as well as nearly every aspect of life. This world appears to be on our planet several centuries from now, but no specific places from Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-13480607005812395132014-09-05T09:30:00.001-07:002014-09-05T09:30:10.528-07:00Bring Up the BodiesThe intrigues of the court of England's King Henry VIII have long been rich source material for novelists and screenwriters. Centuries later, Henry remains one of England's most famous monarchs, noted for his break with the Roman Catholic Church and his six wives. Henry's reign provides ample excitement to fuel the plots of a modern soap opera, but in Hilary Mantel's novels, the sexual politics Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-71284839250938488382014-09-02T17:18:00.002-07:002014-09-02T17:18:24.109-07:00A Discovery of WitchesThe last of my pleasant summer reads was surprisingly diverting, the surprise because I continued to read it after discovering it was a vampire romance novel. The entire genre has previously caused me to snort with contempt. In my 50 years, I've read only one book involving vampires, a well-reviewed Anne Rice novel, and that was so long ago I can't recall the title. I've fastidiously avoided evenSharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-63221164745055922452014-08-30T05:43:00.001-07:002014-08-30T05:45:45.356-07:00A Breath of Snow and AshesI'll remember the summer of 2014 as my summer of Outlander. In three months, I read the first six books in the series, spent an enjoyable evening listening to author Diana Gabaldon at the Traverse City Opera House during her National Writers Series appearance, and got hooked on the television adaptation on Starz. I could've finished all eight books by this Labor Day weekend if I had not decided Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-48557066440621456912014-08-23T08:36:00.000-07:002014-08-23T08:36:00.525-07:00The MagiciansAs the last novel in Lev Grossman's trilogy has been released to rave reviews, I decided to read the first in the series, The Magicians. Some describe this novel as "Harry Potter in college," and that's not a bad tagline for the plot. Imagine more cynical versions of Harry, Ron, Hermione and friends at college with the concerns of that age group: drugs, alcohol and sex, with only magical studies Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-11291361189814674892014-08-18T16:21:00.002-07:002014-08-18T16:21:29.436-07:00Rebuilding the FoodshedThe selection for this quarter's community resiliency read, Rebuilding the Foodshed by college professor Philip Ackerman-Leist combined optimism with a reality check. My friend Diane's review of it is much better than any I could write, so all I need to do is decide what to cook for the potluck.Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-78761615669656701282014-08-05T12:56:00.002-07:002014-08-05T12:56:57.443-07:00The Fiery Cross
The fifth installment in the Outlander series, The Fiery Cross is definitely slower-paced than the preceding four, and perhaps if I had begun reading the novels as they were released, I would have been disappointed to wait three or four years for more breathless Jamie-Claire adventures only to be find them nearly collapsing into the rocking chairs on the porch of their 1770s Appalachian Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-86629284908417298322014-07-24T10:55:00.000-07:002014-07-24T10:55:13.462-07:00The Third PlateThis week, my newsfeed had a trailer for a documentary that apparently blasts some of the leading environmental organizations for failure to rail against hamburgers. Several other headlines informed me that eating beef results in more greenhouse emissions than driving a car, apparently extrapolating from a study recently published in the journal Climatic Change. And Elizabeth Kolbert writes in Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-75611119869799478072014-07-21T15:35:00.000-07:002014-07-21T15:35:20.584-07:00The CircleI suspect Dave Eggers does not like the internet, and after reading The Circle, I'm reassessing my online habits to ensure I'm not under the spell of a cyber Pied Piper. While this novel isn't quite successful as a novel, it will provoke some thoughts on privacy in the digital age, the power we've ceded to giant tech companies, and the danger of embracing new technologies without scrutiny orSharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-51633030652213478522014-07-17T11:13:00.001-07:002014-07-17T11:13:16.505-07:00Drums of AutumnNotice: knitting content ahead!
I don't know what else to say about Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series, so I'll just note that I've finished the fourth book, Drums of Autumn. I'm sure to read the next one after I catch up on some non-fiction titles due back at the library soon.
All of this reading about Scotland has made me desperately want to visit that country and has put me in the mind of Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-65143406072603159222014-07-08T19:32:00.001-07:002014-07-08T19:32:54.657-07:00Happy CityI'm now in the second half of my 2014 challenge to read a book a week and I'm slightly ahead of pace, which is fortuitous as the next three books in my queue range from 450 to 900 pages.
Of this year's (so far) 28 completed books, the tome I just finished is the only one I wish I could force all of my fellow citizens to read. Those of us interested in urbanism have been schooled in the benefits Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-20360150168113653592014-07-03T08:58:00.003-07:002014-07-03T08:58:40.973-07:00Dragonfly in AmberI fear I'm on the path to insanity.
Last month in my review of Outlander, the first in a series of eight (so far) extremely lengthy time-travel romance novels by Diana Gabaldon, I confessed to having the second book on hold at the library already. I went through the nearly 800 pages of Dragonfly in Amber like it was a box of See's dark California brittle and I'm already half-way through the Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-49371016093102184702014-06-19T19:22:00.001-07:002014-06-19T19:22:08.972-07:00A History of the World in 10 1/2 ChaptersI'm going to be lazy and not write about this strange "novel" by Julian Barnes, mostly because I don't feel competent to review it. I liked it very much, and it's undoubtedly clever. That's all I have to say!Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-84993093103518870302014-06-15T11:41:00.003-07:002014-06-15T11:41:50.572-07:00OutlanderIn my teen years, the bulk of my pleasure reading was romance novels, but with the notable exception of Jane Austen, I abandoned those after discovering the joys of literary fiction in college. If I had an inkling that Outlander was a bodice ripper, I doubt I would have checked it out. It only came to my attention because I have tickets to see the author at her upcoming and sold-out appearance inSharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-36987548645250613042014-06-04T12:56:00.000-07:002014-06-04T12:56:10.232-07:00Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour BookstoreOf the 23 books I've read so far this year, Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore was the most entertaining. It was exactly the diverting and fun tale I needed after so much heavy lifting from the other pages I've turned recently.
I don't know if author Robin Sloan grew up playing video games and reading fantasy novels, but I suspect he did as his narrator and main character, Clay Jannon, is attuned Sharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6029935.post-42716335663847337582014-06-02T11:04:00.000-07:002014-06-02T11:06:34.541-07:00My Life in MiddlemarchWhen I added My Life in Middlemarch to my list after reading glowing reviews, I expected to encounter something similar to Julie and Julia for the bookish set. Since I've only seen the film version of the latter, I can't adequately judge if this is a valid comparison, but the first parallel I noted was that each author's famous muse steals the show.
Rebecca Mead, a writer for The New YorkerSharonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10807410992690160954noreply@blogger.com0