I can’t wait for Lily! My review of Seed Savers: Treasure can also be found here with the original cover art.
I am happy to announce that Seed Savers, book 2, Lilyis on its way! It will be available soon both in paperback and kindle versions. In Lily, we find out what really happened to Ana and what Lily does after she discovers Clare and Dante have left town. GRIM becomes more personal, and Lily learns a family secret that changes her life.
I will be running special sales prices for both Treasure and Lily at different times during the holiday season, as well as a book giveaway at Goodreads and some free ebook days. Since I haven’t yet determined the dates, please sign up at the tab on the right to receive the newsletter (Newsletter Signup Form). This will not be an email clogging situation; I will simply use the newsletter to let folks know when new books are available and when there are special deals (and…
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Flatland Falls Flat
Title: Flatland
Author: Edwin A. Abbott
So here goes one of my less than going reviews. I hate writing these because I truly enjoy enjoying books, so when I don’t enjoy one I am so thoroughly disappointed with everything. It is a sad state of affairs for me when I don’t like a book.
Flatland is a much raved about little piece of allegory refered to in the subtitle as “a Romance of Many Dimensions.” In 1884, when it was published, it had a bit of a cult following and is often described as an “underground favorite.” A bit of sci-fi, a bit of possible dystopian society… it was one of the rare times I read the back jacket and it sounded right up my alley. It was recommended by so many friends. Yet, at only 147 pages long, I was bored to tears by page 36.
I understand what Abbott was trying to do and say, but it is truly exhausting keeping up with circles, pentagons, straight lines, and triangles and all their interpersonal relationships. It was overdone. Everything you need to know to grasp Abbott’s idea could have been handed over in a ten page short story.
In the future I think I’ll stick to his theological work.
When We’re Not Reading – Pow Wow Adventures!
Today we went to Trader’s Village where we attended the 23rd Annual Texas Championship Native American Pow Wow. Singing, dancing, bright colors, people, and corn in a cup… what more could a girl want?
So many people were gathered to honor Native American Indian culture today, and to dance for a $15,000 prize. The young man featured above picture was dressed to the nines and dancing his heart out when the drums were going. The entire competition was pretty awesome.
There were a few times Kiddo was moving and grooving and clapping to the beat. And every time we took a break from sitting in the stands, we were able to get pictures with some of the friendly competitors.
Books are wonderful sources for information, but when it comes down to it I want Kiddo to go out into the world and experience first hand what she reads about in books. In honor of our adventure today, we’re reading Pocahontas: Princess of the River Tribes
I definitely plan to take her to this event every year, as it is only $3 to park and free to attend.
When We’re Not Reading – It’s Texas, It’s Friday, What do you think?
Growing up in Texas, one thing is supposed to be as gold as the Gospel, and that’s what’s happening on Friday Night at high schools all over the state. I was surrounded by this my whole life, but managed to only attend one game, and pretty much missed the whole extravaganza. I never participated in the Homecoming business, never went to a dance, got one of those mums the south is famous for from a friend, but was just never into it. Several times I showed up for a game, sang the national anthem with the choir, and then high tailed it out of there. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to stay – I was just so damn busy.
I don’t want the kiddo to miss it. Well, she can miss it if she wants, but I want her to at least have a chance to choose to not miss it. But I also plan to home school. So where does home school and good old fashion Texas High School Football have a chance to collide? In Andi-land, that’s where. Also in many school districts where they allow home school students to try out for teams and be a part of the school’s organizations.
So… There’s a high school right down the road from our house, it’s Friday Night, my husband was out for the evening, and I found out there was a home game. What do you think I decided to do?
General Admission Ticket: $7.00
Chili Cheese Nachos: $3.50
Watching Your 2 Yr. Old at Her First Football Game Ever: Priceless
(Actually, she stood in awe of the cheerleaders and then opted to color princesses while I tried to watch the game.)
St. Denis
Click to visit Kate’s Library
My thoughts on Part Four of Les Miserables
Maybe it is a bit shallow and unliterary of me to come away from St. Denis and only have the story of my own marriage on my mind, but that’s the truth of it. How can you read what has become a nearly epic love story and not think of your own? Call it what Hugo does, The Stupefaction of Complete Happiness, and then maybe you can forgive me for getting wrapped up in the romance of it all and not caring for the extensive history, the depth of the literature, and all the rest of it.
“From time to time Marius’ knee touched Cossette’s knee, which gave them both a thrill.” – Book Fifth
Do you remember that? That feeling like a shock, but so much gentler, when the object of your affection makes contact; the feeling incredibly enhanced when that person loves you back… Do you remember?
I met my husband when I was fourteen, my freshman year of high school. He was old for our grade and already fifteen. By the time I was fifteen too, I was sitting next to him at lunch our sophomore year, just friends but wondering desperately if he would ever want more. In those days, I thought a knee knock or a hand graze was everything. Come to find out, it was nothing compared to him taking my hand to walk me down the hall later that year. Or even much later – years later – when he would hold just my pinky finger under a blanket in college because we were under orders from my then boyfriend not to hold hands. We were best friends by then and the idea of not holding hands with my best friends was excruciating. That same evening he leaned in and whispered in my ear, “I’ll always love you,” and then some blithering nonsense about my boyfriend and the direction of our lives.
Things changed then. Obviously that (very awesome and dear to me) boyfriend didn’t last as a boyfriend, and I finally knew what I had wanted to know all along: my best friend was my truest love.
Our first year as a couple at my 3rd degree black belt test.
The innocent but thrilling touches didn’t end there, we spent an entire summer trying to ease my parents into the idea that he was around. I neither confirmed nor denied that he was my boyfriend – at twenty I didn’t think it was any of their business – but during the school term we were in different cities so we wanted to take advantage of the time we did have. It was like a Jane Austen novel in my head, something like Jane Fairfax and Frank Churchill: catching glances across the room, brushing knuckles and fingertips in the hall. Sneaking a whisper and a kiss when no one was in the room.
“What passed between these two beings? Nothing. They were adoring each other.” – Book Eighth
Apparently, I have thing for secrets, because that was nearly the entirety of all my relationships, relishing in the act of not letting anyone know. The difference this time is I was dying to scream it from the roof tops: One day I will be Mrs. Jonathan Klemm!
As for complete happiness, it is still had. We fight and argue – after all, we are married- but at the end of the day, at the end of it all, I can snuggle up in the crook of my love’s arm and hold his hand. He will rub his thumb against mine, lean down and kiss my forehead, and all is well again. The thrill of the small and innocent touches still there – after all, we are married.
Skip to my next Les Miserables post.
Weekly Low Down on Kids Books – Ella
Titles: Ella the Elegant Elephant
Author/Illustrator: Carmela & Steve D’amico
Publisher: Scholastic Inc.
Genre: Kids Picture Book
How cute are these!? We picked them up at the library this morning and already kiddo is hooked. They follow the adventures of a little elephant named Ella, who is shy but always finds a creative and sweet solution to her problems. The result? This tiny, unsure elephant always does something outstanding for her friends, family, and ultimately learns beautiful life lessons for herself and her readers.
The pictures are bright and lovely, they capture the eye of the kiddo and remind her heavily of Babar
A Rich Anthology
Rich Fabric lying on a piece of my own rich fabric, a quilt made by a family friend’s grandmother.
Title: Rich Fabric
Editor: Melinda McGuire
Length: 165 pages
When I first booked Melinda McGuire to do a signing at Half Price Books in Humble, I didn’t know I was about to meet one of the sweetest and down to earth people ever. A successful indie author of southern fiction and fellow Texan, she has been to the store for two events now, and hopefully more. Her most recent project, Rich Fabric, is an anthology about quilting, “the tradition, culture & symbolism.” With a dozen contributors, memoirs, short stories, tidbits, tricks of the trade, and all sorts of cozy anecdotes, Rich Fabric truly shows off the exciting and colorful heritage of quilting.
During the book signing on November 3rd, Melinda was kind enough to give me a copy of this little anthology, and yesterday I finally sat down to read it by my fireside, hot cocoa in hand. I knew it would be interesting and precious, but I didn’t expect such a lovely and diverse group of writers. Not all were from the south, not all were over thirty; in fact, there were contributors from all over and of all ages. The entire work is dedicated to a woman whose work is included within the pages, but died before Rich Fabric’s publication, an avid quilter named Crystal Vining. All the profits go to the Twilight Wish Foundation, a non-profit organization that grants wishes to senior citizens living at or below the poverty level, but the work itself leaves you with a strong sense that quilting is not just something of interest to senior citizens, but the young and the very young as well.
A beautiful inscription.
I have truly enjoyed the stories and pictures in Rich Fabric. I have enjoyed the feeling of getting to know families I have never met while being inspired to hunker down and complete my own unfinished quilt, as I have been working on one for years but all the quilts in my house were made by others. Many of the anecdotes were so intimate and involved, I began to feel a little sad for my quilts not having such an involved history. Each of mine were made by friends of the family and their families, they are items I received used, merely by accident; though they are well-loved here in my home, I do not personally know their crafters or the circumstances in which they were brought into existence. Then, I read Claire Burson’s piece about her quilt, passed down through the family and cherished but the intimate details being lost. She explains the treat and delight in the mystery of the quilt itself, how there is beauty in the known facts but beauty in the lost details as well because then she can imagine all the possibilities. In that moment, the sadness for my hand-me-down quilts was gone and I realized she was right, it is kind of nice to be able to imagine.
I hope there will be more Rich Fabric volumes. It truly is a little treasure to have on the shelf, and with all the lovely stories within its pages it is only so glaringly obvious that there must be so many more out there in the world. I’d like to read those too some day.
So Many Books
Title: So Many Books, So Little Time
Author: Sara Nelson
Publisher: Putnam
Length: 242 pages
Ironically, when I find myself so overwhelmed by my mountainous TBR pile I become crippled and damn near illiterate, I find that the perfect cure is a book about books. More specifically, a book with lots of lists and descriptions and lengthy lamenting of how many books there are in the world that are begging my attention. So my latest reading slump (if anyone but me were keeping tabs, they’d see I only read two books – other than children’s books – in the whole of October) I picked up a copy of Sara Nelson’s quasi-memoir detailing a year in the life of a professional book reviewer.
It’s short and sweet, and has a lovely methodical layout. Each chapter is dated, and dedicated to a week of time (I am assuming, as the whole purpose of the project was to read a book a week and write a bit on her life as she read said book, but I didn’t count the chapters and they are un-numbered). It was a pleasant read, I enjoyed the simplicity and quickness of it. But it also made me think, I found myself journaling after I finished every chapter.
She has a little segment on Then & Now, discussing the great reads of her adolescence and what she thought the first time she read it versus how she feels as a grown up and I found myself solidifying my plan to have my kiddo journal and document her own reading experiences throughout childhood to remember the titles and authors as well as her true feelings on the subject matter. Of course, we’ll keep it age appropriate, at first she will only be able to summarize briefly, but then she’ll have proof of the process of change and growth as a literary being. I’ve journaled my whole life, but not always with purpose. Purpose is a delightful thing to have. The ability to later compare your thoughts and feelings about literary ventures with such clarity would be such a treasure.
The chapter reminded me of my re-reading of The Great Gatsby earlier this year, and how much I truly enjoyed it. It reminded me of a need to re-read Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea, which I always hated, but feel I was just too immature and boisterous to care about a man fishing. Typically, my Then & Nows are quite vague, but with all this recent documentation of my reading life, I’ll have a better view of my lit-brain when I’m 80.
But above all, the chapter reminded me that there is value in my re-reading. Often, my TBR pile is so high, I feel guilty when compelled to read something I have already read. Should I really be doing this? I wonder. I know Persuasion nearly by heart, shouldn’t I be tackling Bauer’s Ancient History, a book I’ve been slowly pecking through, and loving it, for almost a year and a half now. Shouldn’t I be immersed in George MacDonald’s Lilith, a book I’ve had for ages, but keep only relishing in the first chapter and never moving on – over and over again? The list goes on. And yes, there is a physical list in my own writing, with not nearly enough checked off titles because I continually pick up others.
Then Sara Nelson says, “If you want to make the book god laugh, show him your reading list.” I nearly died. YES! However, every so many weeks, I find myself sitting down to write a new one anyway. I find them therapeutic, refreshing, even mysterious as I tend to write them haphazardly allowing my subconscious to take over and just see what spilled out of the ink pen next. What has been hiding in the recesses of my bookshelf that my brain remembers is calling my name? I think that’s why book lovers revel in their lifestyle so much. Whether they care a lick about the mystery genre, every book lover enjoys a good mystery.
Being a patron of libraries and used bookstores, I often find myself in the middle of a mystery. Whether it be a random scribble in the margins: Secret meeting in the place at 8, password candles, or some such nonsense, highlighting or dog-eared pages, when a book shares owners all sorts of questions arise. Most specifically, for me, I often find stashed bookmarks in the books I read. Sometimes at the start of a chapter, or in the middle of randomness where someone either wanted to savor a line or simply gave up reading the book; sometimes it’s a receipt or a thank you note, birthday cards, and even checks… things people stashed and forgot about, or possibly the item just slid into the pages when the book was stashed into a purse or bag. I often wonder which of these is the story for whatever scrap I find.
SMB,SLT had a small post-it stuck between pages 54 and 55, the beginning of February 27th, chapter: The Clean Plate Book Club. Did they run out of time and have to turn a nearly over due book back into the library? Did they give up because they hated it? Or give up out of principle, because the chapter is about seasoned readers having the power to give up on a book if they aren’t interested in it, wanting to prove something to themselves? Did they simply mark the chapter because the ideas within its pages spoke to them? We may never know. It keeps the mind reeling, though.
I couldn’t stop thinking about the idea that mature readers, seasoned readers, are the only ones who can give up on a book part way. Nelson describes it as a reader’s rite of passage.
“Allowing yourself to stop reading a book – at page 25, 50, or even less frequently, a few chapters from the end – is […] the literary equivalent of a bar mitzvah or a communion, the moment at which you look at yourself and announce: Today I am an adult. I can make my own decisions.”
Funny, I always thought of it as something slackers do in high school. Post motherhood, I thought it was something I did because I killed brain cells while being pregnant and having a baby. Quitting kills me every time, but there are times that I feel compelled to do it, mostly because I either plan to finish it when I’m in a different mood, or I discover the author is what Paul Collins would describe as someone who writes ‘unequivocal crap.’
It seems, then, I am a late bloomer in, yes, even reading. I thought at least I had escaped that title in one thing in life, having been a very early reader. But apparently not.
The most interesting chapter for me, though, where I might leave a small post-it myself, is March 15th: Eating Crows. It’s all about recommending books to friends and how it can possibly damage the friendship. What if one likes it and the other doesn’t? What does this say about each person? How does this new information you have gathered about your so-called friend change the friend dynamic.
This is where I found myself saying, ‘Oh, hell.’ I’ve been around book nerds, book people, bookstore staff, customers, friends, family, the whole shebang, and this is the first I’ve heard about this dilemma. I recommend books to people all day, every day. It’s my favorite thing to do. If I recommend a book it is because I either liked it, or I truly think you may like it. May is a big word in this sentence. If you don’t like it, that’s your own business, but I’d love to discuss why and learn more about the world around me. It isn’t going to make me not want to be friends with you, that’s just shallow and dumb… even though I may secretly think that what you read is shallow and dumb, I know that somewhere someone is thinking the same thing about what I read – so why should it matter?
The next chapter about borrowing or loaning books is also silly to me. I don’t loan it if I’m not ok with not getting it back – usually. If that’s not the case, then I’ll tell you PLEASE PLEASE GET THIS BACK TO ME one day, and that only happens with someone who has already established a good track record. If I don’t say that, you may bring it back, or just consider it a gift if you fall in love with it. I don’t care. I have plenty of books, and multiple copies of some of my favorites. A book will not ruin our friendship unless you write one about me that is awful, spilling the beans that you’ve actually hated me all these years but haven’t said so because… Then, we might have issues. That hasn’t happened to me, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it did. And no, I don’t have anyone in mind, I’m just used to being surprised by what people think of me.
All in all, Nelson you served your purpose. I have a new list of titles to tackle, nothing you mentioned in your book because we have entirely different reading tastes. That’s not true. They are similar in the way a Venn diagram is similar. Not a Venn diagram, more like if there are four quadrants of reading (I, II, III, and IV), and I & II are two different kinds of book snobs and III & IV are polar opposites of I & II who read varying kinds of ‘unequivocal crap’, we are readers I & II. Still, we may not have the same, identical tastes, and in real life you would probably never want to be my friend, but I enjoyed your book and it has made me voracious for the piles and piles on my own shelves again.
A Tidbit from Miss Golightly
A Book Lover has the uncanny ability to leave a book lying around just about everywhere… even the roof.
I use a book to prop my window open, and today it fell onto the roof below…whoopsie daisy! – Jennifer Joy Golightly
A Book Club Possessed…
… by the power of the words of A.S. Byatt.
I already shared with you my thoughts on A.S. Byatt’s Possession, how the novel leaves me overwhelmed with inadequacy. But tonight, at the Half Price Books Humble monthly Book Club meeting, I got to discuss with others how it made them feel.
Over a strawberry cream cheese coffee cake, we talked a lot about French mythology, feminism, the Victorian era, the roaring twenties (a discussion that branched out of our feminism discussion), human nature, and more.
There is so much to talk about in this book, so much material, so many memorable quotes, I found it exhilarating that the things I wanted to discuss were things someone else wanted to discuss too. When I asked about favorite quotes from the book, a typical book clubbish question, it was exciting to see that Henry had underlined the same quote on page 39 that I had. What are the odds?
“It’s an odd affair – tragedy and romance and symbolism rampant all over it […]”
The quote is about the fabricated poet Christabel LaMotte and her poem about Melusina, and in hindsight it doesn’t necessarily stand out that much from the other wonderful quotes to be found in the book. However, it is so close to the beginning that you wouldn’t know that so many amazing bits of prose are to come. I think I had initially underlined it, supposing (correctly) that it would equally describe Christabel’s poem and Byatt’s work as a whole. There is tragedy. There is romance. And the symbolism is rampant all over it.
The idea of cleanliness, purity, and the color white intermingle with Victorian era ideology while also contrasting against the deviance of feminism in bold greens, crimsons, plums, and blues.
What is so interesting about all this symbolism with color, is that like it’s themes, that the white and the color overlap so effortlessly, so surprisingly, when the final work is complete it is hard to decide where you would want to end up – with the pure white? or the passionate color? It seems as though to be complete, there would need to be both.
There’s an essay floating about in cyberspace written by a Stephen Dondershine titled Color and Identity in A.S. Byatt’s Possession. In it, he talks of the book being just like a Pre-Raphaelite painting and quotes Raymond Watkinson”s Pre-Raphaelite Art and Design:
One of the marks of the finest Pre-Raphaelite work was, and still is, the exciting and disturbing power of its colour — very much the least naturalistic aspect of the new painting. The painters of the Brotherhood, and their associates, went beyond the frank record of the green trees and grasses, the bright pure hues of flowers, and reintroduced into painting ranges and relations of colour unused in European art since the Middle Ages — an alarming array of blues, greens, violets, purples, used not simply because they were there to be painted, but chosen for their powerful emotional effect. It was not of course simply the colours, but their combination, that compelled and provoked these effects.
Dondershine stresses the word combination with good reason. Would any of these paintings speak to us visually and emotionally even half as well if the lights and darks were not so opposite and vibrant? If the color was not so colorful and rich, if the white was not so stark?
Would Maude be so fascinating if she wasn’t so broken by Fergus? Would Christabel’s story be quite so passionately romantic if she hadn’t been a virgin before Ash? Would the story have meant so much if their love hadn’t been somewhat forbidden? At the same time, doesn’t her fate make you think twice about her rash haste to be independent? Doesn’t the idea of freedom being found within the safety and confines of a marriage, a partnership become solidified when viewed in the severe contrast of Christabel’s dependency on her cousin later in life… when seen how famously Roland and Maude get along?
Then there is Melusina. Melusina, the story actually being described in that oh so telling page 39 quote. I had never heard of Melusina until this book. I am now completely captivated by the French version of the Scots selkies, the Ondines/Undines of the world; except instead of being a beautiful and gentle seal-woman, Melusina is a serpent of the water-sprite variety. Now, of course, I am dying to get my hands on a compilation of French myths, equipped with illustrations throughout history, of course!
All in all, it was an exciting meeting, and left me much to ponder. I cannot wait until next month’s gathering when we will discuss Charles Dickens’ The Old Curiosity Shoppe.
Anakalian Whims 