(no subject)
A couple of weeks ago LJ had a community spotlighted, whatwasthatbook. The name is pretty self-explanatory. It's a place where people can go and say, "I read this book years ago and it was about.........and I don't remember the title but it was great".
I was a voracious reader as a kid but I'm not remembering too many of the books that people are asking about. Probably because most of the people want to know about books they read in middle or high school and most of the LJ crowd is, oh I don't know, 25-30 years younger than me. Why yes, I am old. How nice of you to notice. :)
The other reason is that I pretty much gave up reading for years. It's really sad that I've let real life take away something that I enjoyed so much. Here follows random musings about reading and books. I will spare you.
I'm not kidding about being a big reader when I was a kid. When I was in 6th grade we had to keep track of all the books we read and by the end of the year my count was 207 and those aren't 15 page kids books either. I think I read The Andromeda Strain for the first time that year.
It's not like I haven't read anything at all in the last 20 years or so but I would be hard pressed to give you titles of anything other than Harry Potter. Reading the posts to whatwasthatbook made me realize that I can remember in vivid detail books that I read many years ago. This lead to several days of on-line searching to get titles and author names for a bunch of books that I remember and that in turn lead to several days of a nostalgic funk.
Anyway, I've been trying to build some reading time into my life for about six months now. Not succeeding as well as I would have liked but it's a vast improvement. I even found a really neat used book store where I could spend hours. I've also taken to going to Barnes & Noble with the express purpose of buying something, anything, even if it's off the bargain table. You can find some really odd stuff there and it appears I have a liking for non-fiction history, go figure!
So, what have I read lately?
A book about Galileo and his daughter who was a nun, built around the letters they wrote to each other that survived all these years.
A book about the architects who designed and built the World's Fair in Chicago in the 1890's and a mass murderer who took advantage of the crowds that the fair drew.
A book about some Mississippi sheriffs who were immortalized (in a bad way) in a photograph from the Civil Rights movement.
A book about the differences between the Amish and Mennonites.
A novel about a taxidermist who gets involved in and solves mysteries (don't look at me like that it was quite funny......)
A book about the flu pandemic of 1917-1918
The last one I finished is called "Tyrannosaur Canyon". Speaking of that one, who writes the advertising blurbs for book covers? I know it's always something like The Topeka Tribune and they rave about the book but this one was just too much. I bought it because the synopsis on the back sounded interesting and one of the quotes said, "Michael Crichton wishes he could write this well". As a Crichton fan from way back (see above re: The Andromeda Strain) I couldn't wait to get started on this one. All I can say is "The Andromeda Strain" - finished in one sitting, "Jurassic Park" - finished in one sitting, "Airframe" - finished in one sitting, "Timeline" - finished in one sitting, all Crichton, all page turners. "Tyrannosaur Canyon" - I put it down for two weeks and didn't even think about it. I'm not saying it was bad at all. It was quite interesting and I enjoyed it but, better than Crichton? Ermm......no. I liked it well enough that I will read some of this guys other work but I was disappointed in a way.
Ah well, enough rambling for tonight.
I was a voracious reader as a kid but I'm not remembering too many of the books that people are asking about. Probably because most of the people want to know about books they read in middle or high school and most of the LJ crowd is, oh I don't know, 25-30 years younger than me. Why yes, I am old. How nice of you to notice. :)
The other reason is that I pretty much gave up reading for years. It's really sad that I've let real life take away something that I enjoyed so much. Here follows random musings about reading and books. I will spare you.
I'm not kidding about being a big reader when I was a kid. When I was in 6th grade we had to keep track of all the books we read and by the end of the year my count was 207 and those aren't 15 page kids books either. I think I read The Andromeda Strain for the first time that year.
It's not like I haven't read anything at all in the last 20 years or so but I would be hard pressed to give you titles of anything other than Harry Potter. Reading the posts to whatwasthatbook made me realize that I can remember in vivid detail books that I read many years ago. This lead to several days of on-line searching to get titles and author names for a bunch of books that I remember and that in turn lead to several days of a nostalgic funk.
Anyway, I've been trying to build some reading time into my life for about six months now. Not succeeding as well as I would have liked but it's a vast improvement. I even found a really neat used book store where I could spend hours. I've also taken to going to Barnes & Noble with the express purpose of buying something, anything, even if it's off the bargain table. You can find some really odd stuff there and it appears I have a liking for non-fiction history, go figure!
So, what have I read lately?
A book about Galileo and his daughter who was a nun, built around the letters they wrote to each other that survived all these years.
A book about the architects who designed and built the World's Fair in Chicago in the 1890's and a mass murderer who took advantage of the crowds that the fair drew.
A book about some Mississippi sheriffs who were immortalized (in a bad way) in a photograph from the Civil Rights movement.
A book about the differences between the Amish and Mennonites.
A novel about a taxidermist who gets involved in and solves mysteries (don't look at me like that it was quite funny......)
A book about the flu pandemic of 1917-1918
The last one I finished is called "Tyrannosaur Canyon". Speaking of that one, who writes the advertising blurbs for book covers? I know it's always something like The Topeka Tribune and they rave about the book but this one was just too much. I bought it because the synopsis on the back sounded interesting and one of the quotes said, "Michael Crichton wishes he could write this well". As a Crichton fan from way back (see above re: The Andromeda Strain) I couldn't wait to get started on this one. All I can say is "The Andromeda Strain" - finished in one sitting, "Jurassic Park" - finished in one sitting, "Airframe" - finished in one sitting, "Timeline" - finished in one sitting, all Crichton, all page turners. "Tyrannosaur Canyon" - I put it down for two weeks and didn't even think about it. I'm not saying it was bad at all. It was quite interesting and I enjoyed it but, better than Crichton? Ermm......no. I liked it well enough that I will read some of this guys other work but I was disappointed in a way.
Ah well, enough rambling for tonight.