Divine Mistakes

As mentioned in my previous post, I decided to reread some of my favourite books from my adolescence (despite the fact that my ABR library things book arrived today). Thus, today I’m reviewing two of my all-time favourite picker-upper reads: Calico Captive and The Witch of Blackbird Pond, both by Elizabeth George Speare.

I was first introduced to The Witch of Blackbird Pond when my fifth grade teacher read it aloud to us. I was hooked to the story of Katherine ‘Kit’ Tyler, born and raised in Barbados in the mid-17th century, who is forced (upon her grandfather’s death) to leave her tropical home and travel to live with her aunt and her family in Connecticut Colony (1687). Aside from being interested in the historical aspect of it, Nathaniel ‘Nat’ Eaton, son of the captain of the ship on which Kit made her voyage, was the first fictional character I ever fell in love with. I know for most girls my age that honour usually goes to Gilbert Blythe, and while I will always have a fondness for Gil, my first was definitely Nat.

It was my love of TWOBP that led me to Calico Captive in my middle school library, on the prowl for a new book to read. The title intrigued me, though I wouldn’t have been able to differentiate calico from any other type of fabric, and as I knew I enjoyed the author I decided to give it a try. Based on the real narrative account of Susanna Johnson, it follows the story of Susanna’s younger sister, Miriam Willard, and her family. At the beginning of the story, the family lives just outside the fort at Charlestown, New Hampshire in 1754. The morning after giving a party, the family is kidnapped by Indians (using the book’s terminology for reasons of pure laziness), and so the story follows them through their capture by the Indians, who sell them to various families in Montreal. Continue Reading »

If you’ve been keeping track of how often I post reviews (and therefore how many books I’ve read this year), you’ll realize that the number is abysmally small. Not that I have any excuse for it (being unemployed would be the ideal time to get a lot of reading done, one would think)… that’s just how the chips have fallen. So, as I’ve been feeling rather nostalgic lately, I think I’m going to do a re-read of some of my favourite young adult/children’s literature, and may do a mass review post on those. Plus, it will get my numbers up, &c.

In other news, I’ve also been selected for my first LibraryThing Early Reviewer book: Dream Lucky: When FDR was in the White House, Count Basie was on the radio, and everyone wore a hat by Roxane Orgill. I’ve always been a bit fond of the 1940’s, as far as 20th century history goes, so I’m really looking forward to this book. Also, it would appear to fit my nostalgic mood quite perfectly, wouldn’t it?

Also, I AM intending eventually to make my own wordpress theme. I’m tired of looking at this one right now, but my e-muse is not being very helpful at the moment. So, it’ll happen when it happens, I suppose. Hmph.

One last thing: a question of internet/blog etiquette, I suppose. When someone comments on your blog and you want to respond to them, do you reply on your own blog, or on theirs? People have left comments here that I’d like to answer, but I want to do it where they’ll be sure to see it, and it’s been entirely too long since I’ve blogged with anything other than Livejournal (which has spoiled me with its threaded comment structure). So, if anyone could enlighten me, that would be fabulous.

This title has caught my eye more than once, and while I finally got around to purchasing it last fall, I didn’t read it until last week. Once I started, however, it was nearly impossible to put it down. Fingersmith, by Sarah Waters, tells the tale of two girls: Susan Trinder and Maud Lilly. One was raised in London by thieves, and the other in a madhouse until her uncle came to fetch her and then raised her to copy risque books by hand and read them aloud to visiting ’scholars’/booksellers/etc. (though she didn’t comprehend what she was reading). A man known as Gentleman tells Susan he wants to marry Maud, thus securing her fortune, and send her off to a madhouse, keeping the money for himself and offering a small share to Susan for her help, if she acts as Maud’s maid and sings his praises to her, etc. I won’t go into much more detail above the cut because it would spoil the story, but let me say that every time I thought I had the story worked out, I was wrong. Plot twists abound in this female version (perhaps not completely, it’s been ages since I’ve read it) of Oliver Twist.

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When I worked at Borders, we had the option of picking out ARCs (and sometimes CDs) as a reward for excellent customer service (or when we stayed late, or what have you). I have had several on my TBR shelf for quite a long time now, and Alphabet Weekends by Elizabeth Noble was among them. I chose it because it seemed like it would be some nice fluff reading, ‘chick lit’ as it were, but the peripheral relationships ended up making it much richer than I anticipated.

The book centers around Natalie and Tom, best friends from early childhood who are still single in their mid thirties. Natalie was dumped by her long-term boyfriend right before Christmas, and Tom, who has long been under the impression that their relationship had the potential for more than friendship, suggests spending 26 days/weekends together, doing a different activity according to each letter of the alphabet. By the end of which, he claims, she will be in love with him. However, the book also explores the relationships between Patrick, Tom’s brother, and his wife Lucy, who are both going through different personal struggles, as well as Nicholas and Anna, Natalie’s parents. Continue Reading »

Just when I got my Now Reading plugin to look the way I want, I had to go and break it. :-/ I wanted to change over to Pretty Permalinks, which I’ve done for the rest of my WP entries/pages. Now, the sidebar looks the way I want, and has links to the books, which the plugin has obviously added. However, the library page and individual pages don’t work. UGH. I’m pretty sure wordpress is deliberately trying to break my head. I’ve read through all the old comments and found two people who had the same issue, but no-one ever responded to it. So I brought it up again on the bug tracking forum, so we’ll see how that goes.

Anyway, I got approved for some new fanlistings, so perhaps I’ll just concentrate on those until I can figure out what the heck is going on with this thing.

This book has caught my eye many times since it was originally published (it happens when you work in a bookstore), but I didn’t buy it until this past summer, and haven’t had the chance to sit down with it until now. As a history major, one of my areas of interest has always been the Napoleonic Era, although most of my reading material till now has been focused on the British navy of the period (hello, Hornblower and Aubrey). So, a story that combines one of my favourite historical periods with a modern heroine seeking a graduate degree in History… how could I refuse?

(also, this is my first entry in the What’s In A Name challenge)
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The original plan was to combine my fanlistings collective with my blog, and therefore create one unholy mess of a conglomeration. Unfortunately, my brain is not up to coordinating Enthusiast and Wordpress at the moment, so I’ve taken the lazy way out and created a separate fanlistings collective. My joined listings are there, as well as owned.

So, if you’re a TFL staffer here in search of my coding abilities, I’ll direct you here instead. Someday I’ll get around to making my own layout here. For now, I’ll settle for finally having the Now Reading plugin looking (more or less) the way I want it.

I’ve decided to try to read 50 books this year, and this is the post in which I will keep a list of the books I’ve read. Wish me luck!

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I’ve never done a book challenge before, but I decided that as one of my goals for this year is to read at least 50 books, it might help to have at least a few guidelines to help me start out. If you’re interested in joining, too, you can find more information here. Good times! And now, here are a few of the books I’m considering from what I have in my library at the moment.

1. A book with a color in its title.
The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman

2. A book with an animal in its title.
The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett

3. A book with a first name in its title.
Michelangelo and the Pope’s Ceiling by Ross King
Tess of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy

4. A book with a place in its title.
The Madonnas of Leningrad (ARC) by Debra Dean
The African Dream by Ernesto “Che” Guevara
(I’m also planning on rereading The Poisonwood Bible after reading Guevara, both to compare the two and because I love the latter)

5. A book with a weather event in its title.
The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley
There Is A Tide by Agatha Christie
(I wanted to include only books I hadn’t read, but I don’t own any books in this category that I haven’t read, so I picked two I’ve been meaning to reread)

6. A book with a plant in its title.
The Secret History of the Pink Carnation by Laura Willig
The Virgin in the Garden by A.S. Byatt

One of my many new year’s resolutions is to familiarize myself with Wordpress and, in doing so, jump back into web design. I had quite a bit of fun when I first started out designing silly things many years ago (the one involving the greatest expansion of my design skills being a Newsies fan site). My old personal site, patronus.org, has long since disappeared (and I regret not renewing at least the domain name), so I’m starting afresh with a new playground. We shall see how things turn out, I suppose.

Eventually I’ll try to make my own Wordpress theme, but ’til then, I’ll stick with this. I intend to use this blog mostly to keep track of the books I’m reading (another of my resolutions being to read more), the knitting projects I’m working on, and so forth. I’m sure I’ll add more on, eventually.