This is an extremely important and historic election, which should be enough impetus for each and every one of you who is registered to get out and vote tomorrow. If you need a little extra persuasion, or if you think you’ll be exhausted at work from those long lines early tomorrow,
Just remember,
Well, in October I read about half as many books as I have in any other month since I started this blog. Part of the issue is that two books were quite long, also I got stuck in one book and just couldn’t move out of it (I never finished that book and it does not appear on this list). Not least of all, my reading funk and the flu affected my reading in very negative ways for a little more than a week. I am still on track to read 150 books this year, but only just barely.
Here they are:
Historical Fiction:
Thriller:
Fiction:
Young Adult Fiction:
Memoir:
Nonfiction:
My Favorite Book in October:
It isn’t often that the third book in a trilogy can both stand alone and make you want to go back and read the first two books, but Penman accomplishes that. Penman really brings the 12th century alive in an accessible yet not-dumbed-down way.
noneThe following are some of the books I have read so far this year that might make for good Halloween reading tonight. Click on the titles to see my reviews.
General Halloween Night Reads:
Alive in Necropolis not only has a great storyline, but part of the story includes unruly ghosts harassing one another in a graveyard. How can you go wrong for Halloween?
The Gargoyle isn’t a Halloween story, but the beginning is absolutely horrific. Besides, the whole plot is a bit eerie: were they or were they not actually lovers 500 years ago? Has the narrator really been horribly burned in multiple lives?
Again, The Lace Reader isn’t precisely a Halloween story, but I think it fits as well. In addition to the mystery of the woman who has disappeared, the whole thing takes place in Salem, Massachusetts and the characters include at least one self-described witch.
Vampire-Related Books:
Bram Stoker’s Dracula, the mother of all vampire stories. What else is there to say about this book, other than I was very surprised how much I enjoyed it.
Okay, so technically The Dracula Dossier is not actually a vampire book, it is really a novel of Jack the Ripper. However, the main character is Bram Stoker and The Dracula Dossier purports to explain how Stoker got some of his ideas for his famous Dracula. Like Dracula, this novel is written in an epistolary style and Reese does a fantastic job writing in Stoker’s voice. There were times I forgot that I wasn’t actually reading Stoker’s correspondence.
In some ways, The Historian is a take-off of Stoker’s Dracula. Kostova uses a primarily epistolary style like Stoker and the plot involves travel and trying to find and stop Dracula before he finds you. This book seems to be somewhat polarizing, perhaps partly because some people dislike or are not used to the epistolary style. If you do read it, do not expect something extremely fast-paced, it reads much more like its predecessor, Dracula.
What discussion of vampire books could be complete these days without Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series? Twilight is a bit of a break from the books I have previously listed. For one thing, the vampire and the human fall deeply in ‘love’. In addition, this is just a plain-old normal first person narrative, no letters in sight. Finally, this book is written more for the high school market. Adults may find it either engaging or vomit-inducing, or some mix of the two.
Halloween for Younger Readers
Madeleine L’Engle’s classic A Wrinkle in Time is perhaps the only book I’ve ever read that actually starts with the sentence “It was a dark and stormy night.” What’s more, L’Engle makes it WORK. I’m recommending this as a Halloween read mostly for the huge fall storm in the beginning of the book, as well as the fantastical beings Meg, Charles, and Calvin meet, some of whom are fairly scary.
Ghosts and a non-graphic murder mystery make The Hunt for the Seventh a great Halloween read for upper-elementary school kids. I thought it was a very enjoyable read, spooky without really being scary.
Creepers is a very tame ghost story. Although the ivy can be a little scary, there are really no malevolent beings in the story, making it a great read for the child who scares easily but wants to be part of the Halloween fun.
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Are you a spine breaker? Or a dog-earer? Do you expect to keep your books in pristine condition even after you have read them? Does watching other readers bend the cover all the way round make you flinch or squeal in pain?
I used to be a HUGE dog-earer and occasional spine breaker. I’m much better about these things now, but I definitely do not keep my books in pristine condition. I throw them into purses and backpacks; use whatever I can find to hold them open so I can read while eating or knitting; take them into the bathtub. When I do all these things, I attempt to keep from harming the book. However, if some water gets on it, water gets on it and if the cover gets bent in my purse, so be it. For me it is not the book itself that is sacred, but the act of reading; my book is simply a tool to help me be able to read. Of course, I do want to preserve the book as well as possible so it can be my reading tool more than once, whether through re-reads or by swapping it for another book.
How do you read your books? Are you gentle, or do you just want to get down to the words, whatever that takes? Did you cringe in horror at any of my descriptions of what I do to my books?
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Capote in Kansas: A Ghost Story by Kim Powers
Truman Capote and Harper Lee were childhood friends. Truman inspired Harper’s character Dill in “To Kill A Mockingbird” and Harper, called Nelle by friends and family, went with Truman to Kansas to help him research the Clutter murders for his book “In Cold Blood.”
Powers picks up the story of Truman and Nelle late in their life, as Truman begins to imagine that he is haunted by the ghost of Nancy Clutter, the murdered teenager. In his fear he calls Nelle in the middle of the night. He decides he must find a way to make amends both with the Clutters and with the friend he fell away from so many years before.
There was something very different about the style of this book, but I couldn’t put my finger on exactly what it was. Perhaps it was a mix of Truman Capote and the fear and desperation Nelle felt as strange things began to happen to her after Truman’s midnight call. Whatever it was, it worked for me. I definitely prefered Nelle’s periods of narration to the narration of Truman’s housekeeper, but it was all well done. My very favorite parts of the story were Nelle’s rememberings of her youth, including the time in Kansas with Truman and the writing of The Book (”To Kill A Mockingbird”). Perhaps the most interesting aspect was the slight exploration of the rumor that Capote was the real author of “To Kill A Mockingbird.”
I really enjoyed this book. Powers writes in a way that those who have never read “In Cold Blood” or even “To Kill A Mockingbird” can still understand what is going on, but I would recommend reading both before reading “Capote in Kansas,” as I think it will help with appreciation of this interesting novel.
This book tour is nearly over, but you can still read one more review tomorrow, or go back and look up reviews at one of these great blogs:
Wednesday, Oct. 1st: Bookgirl’s Nightstand
Friday, Oct. 3rd: Book Room Reviews
Monday, Oct. 6th: A Guy’s Moleskin Notebook
Wednesday, Oct. 8th: Tripping Toward Lucidity
Friday, Oct. 10th: book-a-rama
Monday, Oct. 13th: Ready When You Are, C.B. (review)
Tuesday, Oct. 14th: Ready When You Are, C.B. (author interview)
Wednesday, Oct. 15th: Bibliolatry
Friday, Oct. 17th: Books and Movies
Monday, Oct. 20th: Booking Mama
Wednesday, Oct. 22nd: Diary of an Eccentric
Thursday, Oct. 23rd: Maw Books
Friday, Oct. 24th: Book Club Classics
Monday, Oct. 27th: Books and Cooks
Tuesday, Oct. 28th: Devourer of Books
Wednesday, Oct. 29th: Literate Housewife
noneWe have selected the two winners for the “Alive in Necropolis” contest. Ti of Book Chatter and Other Stuff was the winner chosen by random.org and Doug chose Riva’s epitaph as his favorite. The winning epitaph read:
Jane Doe
1956 - 2050There was always
Just One More Book
Ladies, I’ll be getting your addresses and Doug will be sending you your books.
As for my book funk, this last week was a nice little vacation. Boomshine was a huge favorite at the beginning of the week (thanks Nicki!). Later in the week, though, I took to watching things on my laptop instead of on the tv. I had to ditch boomshine at that point because there didn’t seem to be a way to turn the sound off. At that point I began to play a lot of Mah Jong, as well as some of the Popcap.com games. Since I was sick Friday, I haven’t read since Thursday at lunch time, so I’m looking forward to getting back to it today, even though I’m not crazy about the book I’m reading right now. My first review back will be tomorrow as I am part of the book tour for “Capote in Kansas,” so check back then!
noneI think that I should post about the reading funk and the book-ban, but I don’t feel like it. So there. =P
noneOn Saturday during the read-athon, I finished two books, Stephenie Meyers’s “Breaking Dawn” and Jane Yolen’s “Briar Rose.” I was within 25 pages of hitting 1,000 pages that day, but I just couldn’t do more. Since then I’ve read maybe 80 pages of “Capote in Kansas” by Kim Powers. Although I’m enjoying “Capote in Kansas,” I’m feeling a bit of a reading funk. In order to try to remedy this, I’m imposing a reading semi-ban through Friday.
I will allow myself to work through “Capote in Kansas” during lunch time or if I get cold enough to take a hot bath at night, but that’s it. Any time I’m at home, if I want entertainment, it will be television and popcap.com games, all the way. I may not be as good at getting on LibraryThing or my Google Reader either, so if there’s something I really should see, feel free to email me.
Oh, and don’t expect any reviews this week. They’ll be back next week. I may update how this challenge is going, and I’ll likely post for the Tuesday Thingers and Booking Through Thursday memes, but this will be a quiet week here.
Why am I doing this? Simple. I figure after a week of TV I’ll be so glad to get back to my books that I’ll forget this funk ever existed.
P.S.
Neither ‘funk’ nor ‘reading funk’ turned up anything interesting in google image search. =(
I took a fairly long break after finishing “Breaking Dawn” around 2 and have only now finally finished my much shorter book, “Briar Rose” by Jane Yolen, another 224 pages.
I really should read another 25 pages of something at least, so I can get to a full 1,000. I don’t think I’m going to make it much longer, however, even though it isn’t all that late here. I knew I wouldn’t be able to make it all night, but I didn’t think I’d crash by 9! We’ll see, hopefully I can at least get to my 1,000.
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