I have said before how much I adore Temeraire and the series by Naomi Novik. I have now read them all and listened to them read on audiobook. I had the unique experience of reading “Tongues of Serpents” on my iPhone/Kindle app. I think that might be my favorite part of my new phone. Having a book everywhere I go.
A family favorite for National Poetry Month.
“Spring In The Bronx”
by Anonymous.
Spring is sprung, the grass is ris.
I wonders where the birdies is.
They say the birds is on the wing.
Ain’t that absurd?
I always thought the wing was on the bird.
April is National Poetry Month. I didn’t know that. (Thanks Donna) This is the first poem I ever had to memorize. We learned it in Kindergarten and I still remember it. It was the first “grown up” poem I learned about (not Mary had a Little Lamb or something just for kids) and I remember being very impressed by that.
Who Has Seen the Wind?
Who has seen the wind?
Neither I nor you.
But when the leaves hang trembling,
The wind is passing through.
Who has seen the wind?
Neither you nor I.
But when the trees bow down their heads,
The wind is passing by.
by Christina Georgina Rossetti (1830-1894)
One of my very favorite authors passed away today. I have read every one of Dick Francis’ mysteries at least once and several of them many many times. In fact, just randomly, I have spent the last month re-reading all of them that I have on bookshelves scattered around the house, probably 8 books in the last 2 weeks. (It’s winter in MN!) He wrote interesting and believable characters and scenes that draw you in. Reading the BBC’s obituary, I had to laugh at their description of his “crime novels for gentlefolk.” One of the things I love about his books is that they are suspenseful without being creepy or gory. I lift my cup of tea in your honor, Mr. Francis.
You can read more about Dick Francis here.
Time to finish up the year with a book report. In no particular order…
Six Geese A-Slaying by Donna Andrews
A Christmas themed mystery, which would ordinarily be too cheesy for me. However I bought this book about 8 hours before the winter “snowmageddon” hit us here. (How do you plan for a blizzard? I bought groceries and books.) Funny, light. I like this series, although I miss some of the elements from the very beginning. The whole reason I picked up the first book was because the main character was a blacksmith and selling things at a craft fair. The further we go in the series the less we hear about her art, which drew me to her in the first place.
A re-read. I couldn’t sleep one night. Any of the Mccaffrey family are comfort reading for me. Long live Pern.
The Foundling by Georgette Heyer
I really enjoyed this one. Our main character is a lordling who is sheltered, pampered and fussed over, much to his chagrin. In short, he runs away to have an adventure, acquires some companions somewhat more naive than himself and faces a thoroughly enjoyable villain. This one was more of an adventure story than some of Heyer’s novels, although there’s a romance as well.
Read about this one somewhere and so picked it up on that recommendation. This is one I think my youngest sister would enjoy. It’s a little dark and spooky, otherworldly romance. Unlike some other uberpopular paranormal-romantic-fiction, this one has some female characters with some brain cells and a backbone.
A detective mystery told from the perspective of the faithful hound. Very funny if you are a dog person.
Cockatiels at Seven by Donna Andrews
Pretty much what I said earlier about this author/series. Enjoyable, but I would like more Meg and a little less of the wacky family.
The Darcy Connection by Elizabeth Aston
I am of mixed feelings about books inspired by Jane Austen. I have read several by Elizabeth Aston and I appreciate the way she goes about it. Although they center around the Darcy family, Elizabeth and Darcy are almost always traveling and they interact with the story through letters or telegrams. I think trying to write a scene and make Elizabeth believable would be hard, but I am ok with her writing letters. These are amusing and I enjoy the setting and flavor for sure.
Mixed feelings about this one. I have enjoyed other books by Melanie Rawn and read several of them multiple times (Dragon Prince series). This one was good but occasionally felt a little political/preachy to me. The story and characters were somewhat engaging, but I kept getting distracted by the rest. I am glad I checked it out from the library and I think I will pass on the first book in the series.
Here it is. I finally have time to show it off! I want to take you on a virtual tour of the parts of the book I contributed to. How did I get involved? The editors are friends. Crafty Planet (which Trish & Matt own) is so close I can walk there from home. I knew as soon as I heard about the book that I had to submit some designs. Thanks to Trish, Matt & Rebecca for the encouragement. I am thrilled to pieces with the result.
Let’s start with the Laptop Sleeve. I have one just like this that I carry my laptop around in all the time. I love it. I don’t need another bag to carry, I already lug around a tote bag with my lunch and knitting, so this sleeve just slips right in my tote bag. I also made myself a little coordinating zipper bag that I carry around my power cord, LCD adaptor, thumb drive and all those other little gizmos in. This pattern starts with your laptop’s measurements so you can make it to fit almost anything. I am pretty sure you could even make a baby one for your iPhone.
That’s on page 100.
Then if you flip to page 238, you see my Cuddly Bear Cushion.
This one is totally designed for my sister Beth. She is a collector of fetish bears and I had that shape in mind rather than a “teddy bear”. I think this would be great for long car trips. Use it as a pillow, use it as a lap desk, pretend to snuffle your brother with it. Perfect! Mine is made from corduroy, which is one of my favorite fabrics. I also made up a prototype with some sunflower print upholstery fabric that is pretty cute too. That one sits on the shelf in my sewing room and supervises.
My bio is on page 284. They are organized alphabetically by first name.
Finally, you can look me up in the index if you want to. I am right before ribbons.
And when you close the book, you might see something familiar on the back cover.
I promise to blog more about some other projects in the book – I do have some favorites and I will post pictures as I try them out. What’s my favorite part of the book? I love that it is all the basics in one place. Although I am perfectly capable of doing it, I don’t want to invent a pattern for a bib or an oven mitt or a cute organizer when I just want to sit down and sew. I love that I can pull out some fabric and just pick something to make. As a beginning sewing teacher, I love that it is a whole book of practical projects made with affordable materials.
I think it’s time for another book report.
Evan’s Above by Rhys Bowen. I have enjoyed some other books by this author. This one was on the light side for me. Not much mystery, characters a little thin. Enjoyable, but I read it in about 1/2 an afternoon and just kind of felt like “meh”. There are more in this series and I think I will pass.
The Unknown Ajax by Georgette Heyer. Georgette is one of my favorite all time authors. I am so happy they are currently re-releasing her books. It is annoying that they are $13 a pop, but I do love an oversize paperback and I know I will read them again and again. What is an ajax? According to the prologue, the “unknown ajax” refers to a character from Shakespeare’s Troillus & Cressida, “a dumb horse of a man who could be duped”. Meet our hero. A delight as always.
Dead until Dark by Charlaine Harris. I have heard a lot of buzz about this series. Sometimes I ignore buzz; sometimes I wait until the second Harry Potter book comes out until I see what all the fuss is about and am pleasantly surprised. I wish I had passed this by. It is ridiculously similar to the Twilight books. I announced very loudly at one point that if “this character turns out to be a werewolf, I am throwing this book in the trash!” I didn’t have to throw the book in the trash but it was a near thing. It was a big yawn for me. I am done with vampires, thank you.
The September Society by Charles Finch. And just because we are on a roll with things-that-make-you-go-bleh, this one was also a dud. I think I counted the use of the word beautiful or beautifully about 6 times on one page. The language is what killed me. The word choices were odd, the vocabulary was limited. The way that our hero describes his lady love made me yell at the book. The story was somewhat interesting, but I kept getting pulled out of that reality by the word choices.
Queen’s Own Fool by Jane Yolen and Robert Harris. This one was pretty good. It follows Queen Mary of Scotland, with the story as told by her “fool”. Amazon calls this one a YA novel for ages 9-12. I think that is probably a good category. I kept thinking I had read the same series of events, just more sophisticated storytelling (I think it was a Jean Plaidy novel). I enjoyed it, but I recommend the Plaidy even more.
Just finished Julie & Julia by Julie Powell. They have made a movie based on it, which usually makes me want to avoid the book, but I picked this up at Walgreens on my lunch hour, where there wasn’t much by way of options. I enjoyed it a lot, although I don’t like to read modern chick-lit. I like my books to be set at least 40 years in the past, preferably 100 or more. I don’t read just to read, I read to escape, so the more different it is, the better I like it. By contrast, I have a lot of little things in common with Julie, the author of this book. She married her highschool sweetheart when she was (gasp) less than 30 – I actually had to read that section out loud to my highschool sweetheart as we were cooking dinner. It was fun and charming and totally yucky (lobster murder) and very genuine. A nice read. I have made Julia’s crepes myself many times and there are none better.
A Royal Pain by Rhys Bowen was, like the 1st book in the series, a lovely little light mystery. These ones are an afternoon read at most, fast and fun. Set in the 1930′s, England. The narrator is great – an impoverished cousin of the Queen’s. Georgie is expected to act like a royal and obey summons to tea with her royal cousin, but has no income, no maid and has only just learned to boil an egg for herself. She is funny and awkward and I love all of the nicknames like only the British do (Funghi, Tubby, Fig, Binky).
Summer Camp has sapped my brain, so I picked up and re-read for the eleventy-seventh times DragonSinger and Dragonheart by the redoubtable McCaffreys. I love pretty much everything she/they have ever written.
A Fatal Waltz by Tasha Alexander. Number 3 in a series. Enjoyed the first two and this one as well. There are many similarities to this series by Deanna Rayborne and I can’t decide if I like these more or less. That being said, this was not my favorite in this series, but it was certainly enjoyable. This one is set in Vienna and I felt as thought I didn’t ever get a very good sense of where they were and the atmosphere of Vienna at this time. There was a lot of plot and a lot less character than I would like. It has also been long enough since I read the last one that I had forgotten much about the “bad guy” and he just seemed sort of lame and flat. This is part of why I re-read things so happily, I do often forget details.
The Private Diary of Mr Darcy by Maya Slater. Picked this up with much skepticism. I love anything having to do with Jane Austen as much as the next girl, but much like my loathing of “modernizing Shakespeare”, I am always certain that I am going to dislike anyone messing about with my Austen. This is written as though it is the private journal of Mr. Darcy, with entries that follow the story from P&P. A few moments made me go “Umm, no.” but for the most part, it was entertaining. The male perspective on some of the moments from the story were quite amusing and a few bits of back story had me thinking. Not for purists, but put it on your beach reads list.
This weekend I spend an afternoon at the Shepherd’s Harvest Festival in Lake Elmo MN. It’s a haven for fiber geeks. Several buildings packed with yarn, fleece, spinning wheels, spinners, weavers, knitters and more. Then walk across the fairgrounds a little way and it is barns full of sheep, goats, llamas and more. I taught two mini versions of my “technology for artists” classes in a 4H barn with no internet connection, but despite that, I think they went really well! (Hello class!) I didn’t take a camera with me, so no photos of the sheep!
We also had a couple of cute visitors over the weekend. My nephew, who just turned 6 months old, and his mommy came up for his first trip to the big city. We went to a couple of greenhouses and hung around the house with Lucy. Evidently, when you are 6 months old, Lucy is the funniest thing ever. Every time she would look his way, he would burst out giggling.
This week should be a little quieter. I finished my Pioneer sweater and it is drying from blocking right now. Pictures soon. It turned out great, although I did a couple of modifications.
It’s also time for another book report! Recently finished:
Dissolution, Dark Fire and Sovereign by C.J. Sansom.
Mysteries set in the time of King Henry VIII, just after he had beheaded Anne Boleyn. Having watched The Tudors recently, I was instantly familiar with all kinds of characters from these books. Matthew Shardlake, the main character, is a lawyer who gets noticed by “those with power” far too often for his piece of mind. Great mysteries with lots of interesting incidental characters. The King and the Court are really minor characters, which I like. Often these kinds of mysteries have a talented commoner interacting with the King or Queen and this was a nice change. Matthew deals with underlings who are grasping to stay powerful and often they do not care how that might cause problems for those they order around. I look forward to reading more.
Firebird by Mercedes Lackey. A retelling of a classic fairy tale, another favorite genre. This one was a very easy read. Our main character, Ilya, is clever, the ending has a nice twist, the story had a very classic feel. I am not familiar with the Firebird story, but it had that traditional kind of feeling. I usually like Mercedes Lackey’s writing and this was no exception.
Silent on the Moor by Deanna Raybourn. I loved the first two. The third was equally compelling. I read it nearly in one sitting. Lady Julia epitomizes “curiosity killed the cat” as she herself acknowledges in this book. I would call these a romantic mystery. Once again, great twists to the plot, witty writing that make me laugh out loud. The covers to these books in paperback are ridiculous -don’t let that turn you off. They are smarter than they look.
The Snow Queen by Mercedes Lackey. Part of her “Tales of the 500 Kingdoms series”, which is truly delightful. The series follows fairy godmothers and the kingdoms they oversee. Not true fairies, but clever magically talented girls who find themselves doing an unusual job. The “Tradition” is a magical force that tries to recognize bits of traditional fairy tales happening to regular people and then it jumps in and tries to force their story fit the fairy tale. A girl with a grumpy stepmother can find herself reliving the Cinderella story. Light, funny and packed with snippets and characters of fairy tales, which makes it fun.
1. What author do you own the most books by?
Anne McCaffrey. One of my favorite authors since I was about 10 years old.
2. What book do you own the most copies of?
I try not to have multiples of the same title. I have too many books already. I know we have 2 copies of the last Harry Potter book because Andy and I wanted to read it at the same time.
3. What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Justin de Quincy from Sharon Kay Penman’s mysteries, Remus Lupin
4. What book have you read more than any other?
Moreta by Anne McCaffrey
5. What was your favorite book when you were 10 years old?
The Talking Parcel by Gerald Durrell
6. What is the worst book you’ve read in the past year?
I don’t know about worst. Most disappointing was The Mysterious Benedict Society. Lost Interest: The Big Over Easy by Jasper Fforde. Usually if it’s bad, I stop reading.
7. What is the best book you’ve read in the past year?
One best? The Sanctuary books by Deanna Rayborn, several by Georgette Heyer, Jean Plaidy
8. If you could tell everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Ack. Hard to choose. Anything I have mentioned that you haven’t read.
9. What is the most difficult book you’ve ever read?
Les Miserables
10. Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
French
11. Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Shakespeare.
12. Austen or Eliot?
Austen 100%.
13. What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
The Great Gatsby. Seems like everyone has to read this and I managed to get by without it being required anywhere.
14. What is your favorite novel?
I don’t have 1 favorite. The things I re-read the most are Harry Potter, Anne McCaffrey, Jane Austen, Georgette Heyer, Guy Gavriel Kay, Robin McKinley.
15. What is your favorite play?
Midsummer Night’s Dream.
16. What is your favorite poem?
Favorite poet: ee cummings. I think my favorite of his is
“somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond”
17. What is your favorite essay?
I am not sure I have a favorite.
18. What is your favorite short story?
I don’t read a lot of short stories either. A Sherlock Holmes, maybe.
19. What is your favorite non-fiction?
I love field guides. I don’t read a lot of non-fiction.
20. What is your favorite graphic novel?
Those Left Behind (Firefly)
21. What is your favorite science fiction?
The Hawk’s Grey Feather by Patricia Kennealy, The Summer Tree Trilogy by Guy Gavriel Kay (sci-fi/fantasy mix). Strictly science fiction I like Jack McDevitt.
22. Who is your favorite writer?
Just One?? I have mentioned quite a few.
23. Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
Stephanie Meyer.
24. What are you reading right now?
Dissolution by C.J. Sansom
25. Best memoir?
All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot
26. Best history?
I prefer historical fiction. Anything by Sharon Kay Penman.
27. Best mystery or noir?
And Only to Deceive by Tasha Alexander, Joliffe Mysteries by Margaret Frazer, Brother Cadfael Mysteries by Ellis Peters
And what about you?
