This & That

This & That

Nightstand April 2, 2007

Despite having read a good number of books last month, I’ve fallen behind on some of the reading I wanted to get done. I still haven’t read Lady Susan for the Slaves discussion.

I know some of you are already reading your first book for the Once Upon a Time Challenge and some of you have even finished one book. Let me just say that I haven’t even started my Chunkster Challenge. Yikes.

Tuesday I have a book group meeting and I’m not done yet with The Dancing Girls of Lahore. What a sad book, perhaps that’s why it’s taking me a while to get through it. I will finish it but maybe not in time for the meeting.

In the meantime there are things around the web that are keeping me occupied. The latest Estella’s Revenge is out and it’s another great edition. Thank you again to Andi for the advance reader’s copy of the Barbara Seranella book and for posting my review.

My friend Isabel has decided to start a new reading challenge. It’s quite interesting so check it out, and best of all, it’s not as demanding as some of the others in the blogosphere.

Okay, I’m feeling slightly overwhelmed by all the books demanding my attention. Anyone else? I think I am in need of some brain candy. I’m off to stare at my bookshelves and find some light reading.

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March Statistics

March Statistics

Nightstand April 1, 2007

March was a good reading month as I read nine books. Again, I seem to be doing better about reading from my stacks as only one was a library copy so I say that’s a bit of progress. Here’s a look at what I read:

Mortal Causes by Ian Rankin
The Yacoubian Building by Alaa Al Aswany (my review)
Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie
The Seven Sisters by Margaret Drabble (my review)
Come Closer by Sara Gran (my review)
Under the Dragon’s Tail by Maureen Jennings (my review)
Immoral by Brian Freeman (my review)
Queen of the Underworld by Gail Godwin (my review)
Deadman’s Switch by Barbara Seranella (my review)

It seems that March was my mostly mysteries month and I’m definitely continuing with the Maureen Jennings and Ian Rankin series. And, two new authors to me who I hope to read more of are Gail Godwin and Margaret Drabble.

I’m in the middle of a couple of other books which I’ll tell you about later. For now, I’m looking forward to more good reads in April and I definitely plan on reading a poetry book. Happy National Poetry Month everyone!

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Book Lines

Book Lines

Nightstand March 29, 2007

I recently purchased Wide Open, an awesome set of inspiration cards for journaling, and today I’ve been looking through the journal that comes with the set. It also has prompts and tips. If you’ve been reading my blog for a while you know I love journaling and crafting but it’s been some time since I’ve felt the urge to create, mainly due to just not finding enough time. Anyway, I know my creativity spark will come back and in the meantime I’ll play with these cards and be inspired.

One exercise in the creativity notebook that did catch my attention was on collecting movie lines. The author encourages you to think about your favorite movie lines and use those in your art. Well, I have a terrible memory when it comes to movie lines (same thing for remembering a joke’s punch line) so that’s not useful to me but I do have a collection of book excerpts that I’ve liked.

I used to write these down in a book journal and I realize I don’t do this as much anymore. Well, I do write lines that I’ll use for a blog post/review but once that’s done I don’t keep a record of them outside the blog. I think I need to start doing that again. Want to see what some of the jottings in my journals are? Here are a couple:

  • “Insensibly he formed the most delightful habit in the world, the habit of reading: he did not know that thus he was providing himself with a refuge from all the distress of life, he did not know either that he was creating for himself an unreal world which would make the real world of every day a source of bitter disappointment” ~ from Of Human Bondage
  • “What really knocks me out is a book, that when you’re all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it.” ~ from The Catcher in the Rye

Do you keep a collection of favorite lines from books too?

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