After yesterday’s post…
A kind Book Barmy reader sent this to me after yesterday’s post…
Excuse me, but I think I’ll go fondle my books…
Odd, Very Odd
2016 was a very odd year on many levels, and now we’re into 2017, which promises to be even odder.
While sipping New Years Eve champagne with friends, I realized 2016, for most everyone, was rubbish – absolute rubbish (I love the British term — rubbish — so much nicer than — garbage)
For me, odd 2016 was a year of being distracted and worried about so many things over which I had no control or influence and yet it affected everything in my life – especially my reading .
Even that normally quiet week between Christmas and New Years was a conga line of interruptions and mad activity. I finished only one (only one!) of my Christmas books. 2016 was very odd:
I lost my reading mojo.
I didn’t do as much reading as I’d planned or even hoped.
I have a toppling stack of books abandoned after reading a few chapters
I had the attention span of a gnat.
So, as I slowly put away the Christmas decorations for another year, it suddenly hit me. For most of the past year I’ve been freaking tired – not sleep deprived tired — but bone weary, beat with sticks, sick of it all tired…
My New Years resolution is to give myself permission to restore.
Restore my focus
Restore just being still
Restore also getting out and being more active
Restore my connection with things that fill me with quiet, simple happiness – a daily walk on the beach, my garden, going out with friends, trying new recipes, my new bicycle, writing a letter or two ~~ and yes reading, but not just reading – but focusing and falling into a book — hard.
A friend just posted this on their Facebook page (see, no attention span, I bounced over to Facebook, even as I write this blog post…)
Hello 2017, as odd as you may be, I’ll be ready for you — after I’ve had a rest.
Hygge days
It’s my favorite part of the holiday season – that lovely week between Christmas and New Years. When I put on my music and snuggle up in my reading nook.
But I’ll take a short break to tell you about an article a friend mentioned from the Sunday New York Times.
It’s all about wintering the Danish way and the concept of Hygge (pronounced HOO-gah) ~~ the Danish word for cozy.
Hygee
(don’t you love saying it? Come on everyone, all together now, ~~ HOO-gah)
is the constant pursuit of homey pleasures involving candlelight, fires, fuzzy knitted socks, porridge, coffee, cake and other people. Yes, I mummered to myself that’s exactly what this week is all about, Hygge. (Except for the porridge bit, shudder.)
You can read the article HERE
I promise to report back soon with my reading adventures.
Happy Hygee everyone.
And to all a good night…
A favorite post from last Christmas Eve.
In Iceland, it is a Christmas Eve tradition to give a book as a gift.
This is called Jólabókaflóð, or the Christmas Book Flood.
At Christmas the sun doesn’t rise until 11 am and it’s dark by 3 PM.
So after a brisk (and chilly!) afternoon walk around town with the rest of their neighbors, the whole family snuggles into their homes with a hot drink and to read their new books.
Wishing all my fellow book lovers a traditional Jólabókaflóð ~~
and to all a good night ~~
Soon — Very Soon
I’m on the home stretch of Christmas preparations. Knitting projects whittled down to a final few. Presents wrapped, boxed and shipped – mostly. Christmas cards mailed (yes I still send some real cards). Cookies are made and boxed to distribute. The tree is up and decorated. Just a few last minute decorations and gifts to sort out.
So it’s beginning to look like ~~~ Ho Ho Ho ~~~ holiday reading time Soon — very soon I keep telling myself.
Here’s my pile of carefully chosen Christmas books, standing at the ready next to my reading chair.
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Every December an envelope bearing a stamp from the North Pole would arrive for J.R.R. Tolkien’s children. Inside would be a letter in a strange, spidery handwriting and a hand-colored drawing. This book contains all the letters J.R.R. Tolkien wrote to his children in the guise of Father Christmas from the first to his eldest son in 1920 right through to the last one he wrote to his only daughter in 1943. Each letter purports to be an account of various adventures that happen to Father Christmas and elves. I’ve briefly dipped into this lovely book. It’s filled with reproductions of the actual hand calligraphy and drawings Tolkien created –and I couldn’t resist — this beautiful book had to belong in my Christmas book collection. Here’s just a sample.
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This is the first in a mystery series featuring the Armenian dective Gregor Demarkian. I’ve never read any of these so grabbed this for $2 at the big book sale. Here’s the summary:
The Hannaford who made the family fortune called himself a tycoon. The newspapers called him a robber baron. Since the days of Robert Hannaford I, the family has infested Philadelphia society like a disease. The current Hannafords are a clan of embezzlers, gamblers, and fantasy novelists. This Christmas, they have money in their bank accounts, crime in their blood, and murder on their minds.
Gregor Demarkian is their reluctant guest. A former FBI agent who quit the agency after his wife’s death, he is invited by the Hannaford patriarch to come for dinner at the family mansion. Demarkain arrives just in time to find his host bludgeoned to death in his study and his investigation will lead him to the Hannafords, a family of cold-blooded killers.
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This book came into our young adult section at the bookstore. It’s part of a series called “Dear America” which tell historical events through fictional characters.
In April of 1917, Simone Spencer’s world changes. Her beloved brother Will goes off to war, and Simone seeks a way to help. The passionate daughter of a feisty French mother and a rebellious upper-class father, Simone is not cut out for the society life she is meant to lead.
So, when General Pershing calls for French-speaking American girls to operate the switchboards on the Western Front, Simone becomes one of the first to sign up and keeps a diary of her life as a brave “Hello Girl” whose courage helped lead the Allies to victory.
I borrowed this little book and after reading it will determine if it’s worthy of purchase for my collection.
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This looks like fun. From the back: It’s three days until Christmas and Junior Bender, Hollywood’s fast-talking fixer for the felonious, is up to his ears in shopping mall Santas, Russian mobsters, desperate holiday shoppers, and (’tis the season) murder.
Junior Bender, divorced father of one and burglar extraordinaire, finds himself stuck inside the Edgerton Mall, and not just as a last-minute shopper (though he is that too). Edgerton isn’t exactly the epicenter of holiday cheer, despite its two Santas, canned Christmas music, chintzy bows, and festive lights. The mall is a fossil of an industry in decline; many of its stores are closed, and to make matters worse, there is a rampant shoplifting problem.
The murderous Russian mobster who owns the place has decided it takes a thief to catch a thief and hires Junior—under threat—to solve the shoplifting problem for him. But Junior’s surveillance operation doesn’t go well: as Christmas Eve approaches, two people are dead and it’s obvious that shoplifting is the least of the mall’s problems. To prevent further deaths, possibly including his own, Junior must confront his dread of Christmas—both present and past.
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I’m on the looooong library wait list for this treat from the late P.D. James. Trust me, I can hardly wait, and will drop all the others when my turn comes.
Here’s the blurb from the library catalog:
Four previously unpublished stories from one of the great mystery writers of our time—swift, cunning murder mysteries (two of which feature a young Adam Dalgliesh) that together, to borrow the author’s own word, add up to a delightful “entertainment.”
The newly appointed Sgt. Dalgliesh is drawn into a case that is “pure Agatha Christie.” . . . A “pedantic, respectable, censorious” clerk’s secret taste for pornography is only the first reason he finds for not coming forward as a witness to a murder . . . A best-selling crime novelist describes the crime she herself was involved in fifty years earlier . . . Dalgliesh’s godfather implores him to reinvestigate a notorious murder that might ease the godfather’s mind about an inheritance, but which will reveal a truth that even the supremely upstanding Adam Dalgliesh will keep to himself. Each of these stories is as playful as it is ingeniously plotted, the author’s sly humor as evident as her hallmark narrative elegance and shrewd understanding of some of the most complex—not to say the most damning—aspects of human nature. A treat for P. D. James’s legions of fans and anyone who enjoys the pleasures of a masterfully wrought whodunit.
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For now I have a few more Christmas preparations, there are some fun events to attend, and not forgetting our annual dinner downtown combined with visiting the holiday window light displays.
But soon I’ll be in my happy place, Christmas tea mug in hand, carols softly playing and reading ~~ there’s even more rain predicted in a few days. We need more rain and, as I’m sure you’ll agree — it’s the perfect reading weather.
Take me away…
I’m guessing you may be in the mood to escape and, as it just so happens, I have some reading recommendations to take you away for a bit (you’re quite welcome).
Taking you away to one of my favorite guilty reading pleasures – Time Travel.
Now don’t scoff, this genre is tricky – one false move and the novel is relegated to those dusty bookstore shelves of either fantasy or science fiction.
Accomplished authors convince the reader that time travel is not only credible, but enticingly possible. Like watching a magician perform or a classic Disney movie — the reader is happily ensconced between reality and make believe. Bring it on, I say — bring it on.
And so, without further ado, my favorite time travel tales…
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, by Mark Twain (Samuel L. Clemens)
Near, and dear to my heart, this was my introduction to time travel, aged 12, sitting on the floor of my grandfather’s library, this book spread open in front of me.
In 1889, a practical Yankee is hit on the head and wakes up in England — in the year 528. He fools the inhabitants of the time into thinking that he is a magician and becomes Sir Boss of the Round Table. The Yankee believes that he is the saving grace for the people of Camelot, using capitalism as his means to set them free. The societal commentary and satire was above my head during that first reading. But upon adult re-reading, the lampooning of social class institutions and of inherited rank is pure Twain — witty (but sobering) sarcasm.
Here’s my cherished original copy from my grandfather’s library.
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A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
I also read this as a young girl and have re-read it several times since. A Wrinkle in Time is written for young adults but can be enjoyed at any age. Winner of the 1963 Newbery award, it spins a captivating tale, which opens (wait for it) on a dark and stormy night. Meg Murray, her little brother Charles Wallace, and their mother are having a midnight snack when an unearthly stranger appears at their door. He claims to have been blown off course, and goes on to tell them that there is such a thing as a ‘tesseract’, or a wrinkle in time. Meg’s father had been experimenting with time-travel when he suddenly disappeared. Meg, Charles Wallace, and their friend Calvin venture to outwit the forces of evil as they search through space for their father. Pure fantasy, pure delight.
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Time and Again by Jack Finney
When asked about my all time favorite books — Time and Again has a permanent place on that list. I have bought and given away many copies of this book over the years.
In 1970, Simon Morley, an advertising sketch artist, is approached by U.S. Army to participate in a secret government project, which involves — in case you haven’t been paying attention here — yes, time travel.
Simon or ‘Si’, as he’s called, jumps at the chance to leave his twentieth-century existence and step into 1882 New York City. Aside from his thirst for experience, he has good reason to return to the past—his girlfriend Kate has a curious, half-burned letter dated from that year, which holds a mystery about her lineage. But when Si begins to fall in love with a woman he meets in the past, he will be forced to choose between two worlds—forever.
What sets this classic time travel novel apart from any other is the detail, the exquisite illustrations and curated photographs. Mr. Finney’s highly detailed descriptions bring the period to life – from the interior of the Dakota residence to the often pock-marked faces of the people, unprotected (as they were then) from small pox.
Warning, these descriptions may slow you down, but that’s fine, as this is a book to be read slowly and richly savored.
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Kindred by Octavia E. Butler
Equal parts time travel and slave narrative, this novel is still as popular as it was when it was first published in 1979.
Often studied as high school required reading, Kindred is the first-person account of a young African-American writer, Dana, who finds herself shuttled between her California home in 1976 and a pre-Civil War Maryland plantation. There she meets her ancestors: a spoiled, self-destructive white slave owner and the proud black freewoman he has forced into slavery and concubinage (I checked, yes, that’s a word…). As her journeys into the past become longer, Dana becomes intimately entangled with the plantation community, making difficult compromises to survive slavery and to ensure her existence in her own time.
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The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
A highly imaginative novel in which the author has combined time travel with the intricacies of love, marriage, children, sickness, loss, joy and sorrow.
Henry is a time traveler, although not by choice. A genetic mutation causes him to spontaneously travel through time without warning and he finds himself in the past or future, usually at a time or place of importance in his life. Clare, his wife has been with him through most all his time travels, and his various life stages. She waits for each of his visits throughout the years until they can meet in real time. Together they hold fast to their love and attempt to have some semblance of a normal life.
This is a complex story, and even with Henry shuttling back and forth in every chapter, the author deftly keeps the plot clear, compelling and, at times heartbreaking. But, as the Washington Post said, this is
“ a love that works despite all travails and impediments.”
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A Murder in Time by Julie McElwain
I just finished my most recent time travel read the other night. Kendra is a tough FBI agent who goes rouge in order to assassinate the killer who brought down half her FBI team mates. She pursues the killer to Aldrich Castle in England and hides in a stair well only to emerge still in the same castle — but in regency-era 1815.
Mistaken for a lady’s maid hired to help with weekend guests, Kendra is forced to quickly adapt to the time period until she can figure out how she got there; and, more importantly, how to get back home. However, after the body of a young girl is found on the grounds of the county estate, she starts to feel there’s some purpose to her bizarre circumstances. Stripped of her twenty-first century FBI tools, Kendra must use her wits alone in order to unmask a cunning serial killer.
Pure entertainment with enough action and adventure to keep the reader entertained. Kendra, and her bad-ass self, turn the 19th century on its ear.
A digital review copy was provided by Pegasus Books via NetGalley
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So, dear Book Barmy readers, choose any of these books to take you away — away from your worries to these wonderful tales of other times — and other places.
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