Monthly Archives: January 2012

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Teaser Tuesday (24 Jan)

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:
Grab your current read – Open to a random page – Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page

BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS!
(make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Today’s Teaser taken from:
 I’d Know You Anywhere by Laura Lippman

“I’m sure this is a shock, although that’s not my intention, to shock you.  Up until a few weeks ago, I never thought I would have any communication with you at all and accepted that as fair. That’s how it’s been for more than twenty years now.  But it’s hard to ignore signs when they are right there in front of your face, and there was your photo in Washingtonian magazine, not the usual thing I read, but you’d be surprised by my choice of reading material these days.  Of course, you are older, a woman now.  You’ve been a woman for a while, obviously.  Still, I’d know you anywhere.”

Bonus Teaser taken from:
Family History by Dani Shapiro

“I start to move toward Kate, but she shakes her head, her eyes narrow in warning, and I stop.  She turns her back, squaring her little shoulders resolutely away from me.  The movie ends there.  I turned off the camera and stood alone in a crowd of parents, my arms dangling uselessly by my sides.”

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The Chili-Cookoff by W. Bruce Cameron

The Chili-Cookoff
By W. Bruce Cameron
Apr 25, 2008, 09:23 PST

For those of you who have lived in Texas, you know how true this scenario can be. There is actually a Chili Cook Off in Texas about the time Halloween comes around. It takes up a major portion of a parking lot at the San Antonio City Park. In this little story, Judge #3 was an inexperienced Chili Taster named Frank, who was visiting from Springfield, IL.

Frank: “Recently, I was honored to be selected as a judge at a chili cook-off. The original person called in sick at the last moment and I happened to be standing there at the judge’s table asking for directions to the Coors

Light truck, when the call came in. I was assured by the other two judges (Native Texans) that the chili wouldn’t be all that spicy and, besides, they told me I could have free beer during the tasting, so I accepted.”

Here are the scorecard notes from the event:

CHILI # 1 – MIKE’S MANIAC MONSTER CHILI…

Judge # 1 — A little too heavy on the tomato. Amusing kick.

Judge # 2 – Nice, smooth tomato flavor. Very mild.

Judge # 3 (Frank) – Holy smokes, what is this stuff? You could remove dried paint from your driveway with it. Took me two beers to put the flames out. Hope that’s the worst one. These people are crazy.

continue reading… The Chili-Cookoff.

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You Don’t Like Short Stories? Let Me Recommend…

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created at The Broke and the Bookish.

Everyone is welcome to join.

Just link back to The Broke and the Bookish on your own Top Ten Tuesday post AND add your name to the Linky widget so that everyone can check out your list! If you don’t have a blog, just post your answers as a comment. Have fun with it! It’s a fun way to get to know your fellow bloggers.

Today’s Top Ten Tuesday Topic:
You Don’t Like Short Stories?  Let Me Recommend…

1.  Why I Live at the P. O. by Eudora Welty
This is perhaps one of the funniest short stories I have ever read, and each & every time I reread it, I’m amused all over again.  It is a classic southern short story, full of family dysfunction, righteous indignation, ridiculous misunderstandings, and competitive one-upmanship.  Though easy enough to relate to if you hail from The South, it is truly a universal story of crazy family relations.

2.  A Good Man is Hard to Find by Flannery O’Connor
Flannery O’Connor was an astute observer of human nature and a harsh critic of hypocrisy, particularly that of overtly & publicly pious “Christians” who continually cast judgment on others, but could not see the deceitfulness of their own hearts.   O’Connor’s short stories are beautifully crafted & exquisitely worded expositions on society…nearly perfect in their construction, and with themes as applicable today as the time she wrote them.

3.  Rita Hayworth & the Shawshank Redemption by Stephen King
In my humble opinion, this is perhaps the best of King’s short stories.  He is a master craftsman, especially of matters dark and horrific, and while this story departs to some degree from his typical fair, it is tightly crafted as his best novels.  And though the movie on which it was based is excellent, the story is (as is almost always the case) better, and therefore worth the read.

4.  The Body by Stephen King
Again, an exceptionally good story by the master of the horror genre.  If you remember the movie Stand By Me, then you know the plot, as this was the story on which the movie was based.  And again, as mentioned above, the movie is wonderful, but the story is better.

5.  The Dead by James Joyce
It is a psychological study if ever there was one, set in the familiar setting of the annual dinner and dance party hosted by some friends.  Throughout the evening, the socially awkward and uncomfortable protagonist undergoes an epiphany as he struggles through the evening, learning along the way how little he knows of his own spouse.  For those with a taste for heavier fair, this is Joyce at his best, but without the overwhelming difficulty (and length) of his more daunting works.

6.  The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry
A truly beautiful story of love, and how true love puts the needs and desires of others before the needs and desires of oneself.  It is the Christmas spirit at it’s best, and while not an annual tradition at Christmas, it should be because of its flawless illustration of what Christmas spirit really is, and as such what (and who) the season is really about.

7.  The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County by Mark Twain
A well known and favorite short story by Mark Twain, an author known for both his humor and his harsh social commentary, this story does indeed deliver on both counts.  It’s a humorous tale of a man given to betting on anything, and a short commentary on cheating.  It is not didactic or boring, and will leave you with a chuckle, but it is also a reminder to watch the eggs in your basket (to borrow another Twainism).

8.  The Night the Bed Fell by James Thurber
When a humorist writes a story of calamity and a hysterical woman, this is the story that results.  It is hilarious, truly hilarious!

9.  The Beard by Fred Chappell
Fred Chappell is known for his short stories, and the collect in which “The Beard” is published (I Am One of You Forever) is good as a whole.  The Beard, however, is my favorite of this collection.  It is riotously funny, metaphorical in its construction, and has perhaps one of the most perfectly worded and memorable lines in all of reading:  “I have had an elegant sufficiency.  Any more would be a superfluity.”  It is memorable not only because it is hilariously poetic, but also because it is the only utterance of the otherwise silent Uncle Gurton.

10.  The Shawl by Cynthia Ozick
An easy read linguistically, but a tough subject.  This story is set toward the end of WWII, and it is the story of a woman and her baby living in one of the Nazi concentrations camps.  It is brutal, but no more brutal than its subject matter.  Having read a number of books & stories set during the Holocaust, I can say that this is as good a place to start as any, due to its brevity.  It also provides a great lead-in to Ozick’s novella Rosa, which I ultimately liked better.

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Teaser Tuesday (17 Jan)

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:
Grab your current read – Open to a random page – Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page

BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS!
(make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Today’s Tease taken from:
 The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

“He became my confidante, someone with whom I could share thoughts I could never voice…In exchange, he trusted me with his.”

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Eudora Welty: Why I Live at the P.O.

Eudora Welty: Why I Live at the P.O.

I WAS GETTING ALONG FINE with Mama, Papa-Daddy and Uncle Rondo until my sister Stella-Rondo just separated from her husband and came back home again. Mr. Whitaker! Of course I went with Mr. Whitaker first, when he first appeared here in China Grove, taking “Pose Yourself” photos, and Stella-Rondo broke us up. Told him I was one-sided. Bigger on one side than the other, which is a deliberate, calculated falsehood: I’m the same. Stella-Rondo is exactly twelve months to the day younger than I am and for that reason she’s spoiled.

She’s always had anything in the world she wanted and then she’d throw it away. Papa-Daddy gave her this gorgeous Add-a-Pearl necklace when she was eight years old and she threw it away playing baseball when she was nine, with only two pearls.

So as soon as she got married and moved away from home the first thing she did was separate! From Mr. Whitaker! This photographer with the popeyes she said she trusted. Came home from one of those towns up in Illinois and to our complete surprise brought this child of two.

Mama said she like to made her drop dead for a second. “Here you had this marvelous blonde child and never so much as wrote your mother a word about it,” says Mama. “I’m thoroughly ashamed of you.” But of course she wasn’t.

to continue reading…   Eudora Welty: Why I Live at the P.O..

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Philippians 2:1-11 ESV – Christs Example of Humility

1 So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy,
2 complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.
3 Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.
4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.
5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,[a]
6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,
7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant,[b] being born in the likeness of men.
8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name,
10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

via Philippians 2:1-11 ESV – Christs Example of Humility So if there – Bible Gateway.

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The Pages of 2011

Year Roundup (a post I ran across at Book Memes & Quizzes)

What’s the best book you read this year?
It’s a tossup between Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood, Pat Conroy’s My Reading Life, and Stieg Larsson’s The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.  I loved them all, but because they’re so different, it’s hard to say which stands out the most for me.

Any other standouts?
Anne Frank’s Diary of a Young Girl, Flannery O’Connor’s Complete Stories, Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca.  All were excellent, compelling reads.

What’s the most challenging book you read this year?
Feodor Dostoyevsky’s The Gambler.  It was a very difficult book to get into (took about 1/3 of the book to really sink into the story), and it was a setting that I just don’t relate to at all.  I enjoyed the story, but it was definitely outside of my frame of reference.

What’s the worst book you read this year?
Dear Author: Letters of Hope  – a great idea, but very poorly executed in my opinion.  Way too long, and some of the author responses were preachy & ridiculous.

Which authors featured most prominently for you in 2011?
Pat Conroy (2), Lisa See (2)

Were you part of a reading challenge? Did you meet it?
I was part of several reading challenges.  My standard challenge is to read 100 books during the calendar year, which is a big challenge for me and not conquered as of yet.  I did an audiobook challenge, ending the year with 26.  I tried a TBR challenge for the second time, and for the second time I flaked on it, mostly because I don’t like planning my reading in advance because my taste meanders around so much.  I worked on about four other challenges sporadically, one “unofficially” (I didn’t sign up), and one that didn’t have an ending date (so I’m still “technically” working on it).

Are you signed up for any in 2012?
150+ Challenge for 2012, What’s in a Name 5, Southern Lit Challenge 2012, Adoption Reading Challenge, Mount TBR Reading Challenge 2012 (aka Howards End is On the Landing), Back to the Classics 2012, Les Miserables Read-Along.  There may be others – I’m contemplating another audiobook challenge as well as continuing the 50-State Reading challenge I started last year.

What books are you hoping to get for Christmas (or buy next, if you don’t do the holiday gifting season thing)?
None – I like to buy my own, so I’d rather a gift card.

Which books are you most looking forward to reading in 2012?
A Personal Odyssey by Thomas Sowell, more of Pat Conroy, The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson, The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, more Asian & Indian authors, Les Miserables by Victor Hugo

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Do You Supplement Your Reading With Outside Sources…

…like Sparknotes, academic articles, or other bloggers’ reviews?  If so, why?  If not, why not?

This is the January 2012 question for the Literary Blog Hop hosted by The Blue Bookcase.  It’s my first time to join this blog hop, but it is perfect timing, being not only the beginning of the year, but also the commencement point for several new reading challenges that I hope to complete during 2012.  Read on for my answer.

Do I supplement my reading?

When I was in college school, there was no question about the fact that I would have to supplement everything I read in order to (ultimately) write a research paper, answer classroom questions, or respond to an essay question on a test that required more than a rudimentary knowledge of the text.  At any rate, I got very familiar with ferreting out expert opinions, but (not necessarily) familiar with coming to my own opinions & conclusions as I read.  I don’t know if this was due in part to being young and less experienced as a reader of classics and other meritorious literature, or if was simply due to laziness.

In graduate school it was largely the same, with the big change being that I was now thinking more independently and more critically about what I was reading.  My opinions were important, and professors were interested in hearing all of us flesh out our thoughts and put some meat on our critical thinking bones.  Academic articles and supplemental information were meant less for coming to an understanding of the work than for supporting our  theories, and giving us some solid intellectual ground as we ground out some (hopefully) fresh and original ideas.  Whether or not those ideas actually gained any traction, the process of reading, discussing, studying critically, and applying our own perspectives to our literary pursuits made us…me…a much more confident reader.

Fast forward to now…

I almost never supplement my reading now, unless there is something about the book or the author that so captures my attention that I feel a need for some additional insight.  Those incidents are not cases of lacking understanding so much as a desire to broaden my appreciation of what I read by getting some backstory.  Sometimes reading a few blogger reviews fills that need, but there are times when I’m voratiously reading whatever information I can find.  I never do (and never did) any supplemental reading ahead of time, and though this was not a necessarily conscious decision, I do believe that it is important to read and appreciate the text on my own before seeking out anything else.  Most of the time that’s sufficient.  When it’s not, I read & research until I satisfy the questions in my head.

Then I write my review, and I may or may not reference any supplemental sources.  I want my reviews to reflect my opinions, my assessments, my critique of the writing and the story.  In the end, I hope that they do.

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This Year, I Am Going to Read…

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created at The Broke and the Bookish.

Everyone is welcome to join.

Just link back to The Broke and the Bookish on your own Top Ten Tuesday post AND add your name to the Linky widget so that everyone can check out your list! If you don’t have a blog, just post your answers as a comment. Have fun with it! It’s a fun way to get to know your fellow bloggers.

Today’s Top Ten Tuesday Topic:
This Year, I Am Going to Read…

1.  The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (currently reading) – To my knowledge, this is my first of “dystopian” fiction.  It’s not a category that I naturally gravitate toward, but since this trilogy is so highly recommended, I am giving it a shot.

2.  The Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom – It has been on my TBR list for a while, and I’m determined to get to it this year.

3.  Great Expectations by Charles Dickens (audio) – Another one that has been on my TBR list (or perhaps on my “to-listen-to” list) for years.  I thought I’d get to it in 2011, but I did not.  I have great expectations for this year (pun intended). :-)

4.  Gazelle by Rikki Ducornet – I started this book a few years ago and then lost it.  When we moved to Arizona in 2010, I found it again, and it’s now on my nightstand, where it will stay until I finish it this year.

5.  Moby Dick by Herman Melville (audio) – The other colossal classic that I have meant to read…er…listen to for years, planned to listen to in 2011, failed, and now hope to get to this year.  It’s a mood thing for sure, and you’d think in a 12 month period, I’d swerve into that mood at some point.  This is going to be the year.

6.  A Personal Odyssey by Thomas Sowell – I gave this book to my father for his birthday in October, and both he & my mother raved about it.  I have it on my bookshelf now, and will read it this year…soon!

7.  The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson (audio) – My husband & I listened to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo on our last road trip, and we both loved it.  Putting this on my 2012 TBR list means we must make the point to road trip & listen together again, and that’s definitely something to look forward to.

8.  Les Miserables by Victor Hugo – My preference is to listen to this book, as I tend to enjoy the chunkster classics much more in an audio format.  However, I want to get at least some of it under my belt, as it looks like a movie is coming out either this year or next, and I’d like to have read the book before I see it.  We shall see…

9.  Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God by J. I. Packer – A small book with a huge idea, and one that I’ve been wanting to read for about a year and a half.  Since I have a nephew & niece who are heading into the mission field sometime this year, I have a renewed eagerness to read it – then perhaps pass it along to them.

10.  Complete Stories by Flannery O’Connor – I read several of these in 2011, and I want to complete them this year.  I haven’t decided if I want to read them in order or not, but I am determined to read them all by the end of the year.  She was a powerful writer, and the short story was definitely her forte.