Friday, November 18, 2005

evening

Book Meme & Teasing Secrets from the Dead

From Leigh-Ann, from VetMommy from...yadda, yadda, yadda:

1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the sentence in your blog with these instructions.
5. Don’t search around for the “coolest” book you can find. Do what’s actually closest.

I’m so disappointed in the fifth sentence from Teasing Secrets from the Dead: My Investigations at America’s Most Infamous Crime Scenes by Emily Craig, that I wanted to cheat.  I’ll tell you why.  The fifth sentence is, “The second-hand smoke covered the smell for me, too.” However, the fifth line is(if I back up a few words to get the beginning of the sentence), “The maggots gorge themselves on the liver, then bury themselves in the dirt to pupate.” Cool, huh?

Oh, and while I’m here, I may as well write my brief book review for that book, since it’s sitting in my stack of “hurry up and review(s).” It’s written by Emily Craig Ph.D., a forensic anthropologist, who started out as a medical illustrator.  She got bored with that and went back to school to learn to analyze bones, charred remains, skulls...and other bits of bodies that you and I don’t ever want to see.  While I found the book interesting, the constant Emily Craig self-backpatting got tedious.  Yes, it was wonderful how you solved the crime that no one could solve in a million years.  Yes, it was fabulous how you made a sculpture of a face only going by the skull, so that it was recognized and the body identified.  Yes, YOU ARE WONDERFUL AND THE BESTEST FORENSIC ANTHROPOLOGIST EVAH.  THE BESTEST.  But, really, when you ignore the against the odds, this woman identified those who no one else could identify, even in their wildest dreams, it’s an interesting book about forensic anthropology.  While Kathy Reichs (who writes her own books and on whom the new show “Bones” is based) writes the foreward, I’d honestly rather just read any Kathy Reichs book.  At least there, the character is fictional, so if I’m getting annoyed by her, I can look at it as fictional writing that makes me feel something about a character.  Not that Temperance Brennan annoys me usually.

Friday, September 30, 2005

evening

Like Romance or Nice Daughters or Funny People?

I found this ad on Dooce’s blog and thought it was sweet - “My mom is an award-winning romance author and a cool lady. Come see.” I confess to not being a romance novel reader, but I’m a sucker for a nice story.  So, if you know anyone who reads romance novels and loves animals, this snippet from her bio should be enough to seal the book buyin’ deal: Edith Layton lives on Long Island where she devotes time as a volunteer for the North Shore Animal League , the world’s largest no-kill pet rescue and adoption organization. Her dog Daisy --adopted herself from a shelter-- is just one member of Layton’s household menagerie.

If you live in New York and want to see her daughter, Susie Felber, perform - http://felberfrolics.blogspot.com/ I, myself, live in Las Vegas.  So, Susie, if you’re ever here, lemme know.  NY is a bit too far to go to support a nice daughter.

Monday, September 19, 2005

early evening

You’ll Laugh, You’ll Cry, You’ll Cheer & You’ll Thank My Brother

My brother recommended that I read Last Days of Summer by Steve Kluger, and while I generally like the same books as my brother, I honestly didn’t expect to LOVE this book so much.  It’s the most amazing coming-of-age novel I’ve ever read.  Since Publisher’s Weekly can describe it better than I can, here goes: From Publishers Weekly—Mixing nostalgia, baseball and a boy’s mostly epistolary friendship with a 1940s baseball star, this inventive but sentimental novel consists entirely of letters, fictional newspaper clippings, telegrams, war dispatches, report cards and other documentary fragments. Growing up Jewish in a tough, Italian Brooklyn neighborhood, Joey Margolis is troubled by anti-Semitic neighbors, by Hitler’s rising power, by his parents’ divorce and by his absent cad of a father. Craving a surrogate dad, Joey strikes up a correspondence with Wisconsin-born New York Giants slugger Charlie Banks. The boy’s outrageous fibs, tough-guy posturing and desperate pleas grab the reluctant attention of the superstar, whose racy vernacular guy-talk (peppered with amusing misspellings and misusages) hints at his deepening affection for Joey. Charlie is a politically enlightened proletarian ballplayer with a heart of gold. His liberal views find an echo in Joey, whose best friend, Japanese-American Craig Nakamura, gets shipped off with his family to a wartime internment camp. In a plot that swerves from Joey’s Bar Mitzvah to a White House meeting with President Roosevelt to a tearjerking climax, Kluger keeps changing the pace and piles on a slew of period references with a heavy hand. Despite these flaws, this debut novel is at its best a poignant, golden evocation of one boy’s lost innocence.

The “heavy hand” that Publisher’s Weekly talks about didn’t affect my enjoyment of the book at all.  It’s right up there at the top of my favorite books of all time.  Just the right amount of baseball, history, politics, sarcasm and heartbreaking love stories.  Normally, I just tell you how much I loved a book and don’t tell you to read it, so I can talk about it with you.  But...read it.  If you don’t like it, you can yell at me or something.

late morning

Ruining It For Everybody

On Saturday I received a lovely gift from a friend.  It’s a book ironically (or not so, ha!) titled Ruining It For Everybody by Jim Knipfel.  I only started it last night and am so far enjoying it.  The author is, let’s face it, a total mess - physically and psychologically.  But I love to read the warped views of people I wouldn’t meet under normal circumstances.  Plus, I really like the cover.  I’m fairly easy to please.

The irony in receiving this book is that it was sent before there was any message board drama in my life.  Perhaps I’ll ask my friend to do a reading for the rest of my life, based on books she thinks I’d like.  Prophetic titles amuse me terribly.  And certainly, my presence or lack of presence shouldn’t really affect a whole message board.  I’m just one person and no offense to the people who are mad at me, but I implicitly trust my gut instincts about people.  Plus, that million dollar bribe was kind of welcome too.  Oh, but that makes me laugh.  Anyway, I have immediate feelings about people I meet and rarely do those opinions change.  I think I can count on one hand where I completely misjudged someone and a couple of those were from childhood.

I think I’ll decide to make this a public thank you to person who sent me the book.  You shouldn’t have, but I’m so very glad you did.  It’s an author I’d never heard of, but I think I may enjoy reading all of his books eventually.  Plus, I can’t wait to read the book sent to Leigh-Ann too.  So, thanks again.  You rock!

Wednesday, August 24, 2005

late evening

Book Reviews - Yes, They Have Stacked Up Again

So far, good, good, good and quite entertaining.  I will be back more, when my brain starts to function, at least on the fifth grade level.