Books in Bed

Glass Books of the Dream Eaters

1 Comment / 2006, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction /

The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters was one of the oddest books I have ever read. It was also one of the most interesting books I have ever read. It was also one of the LONG-WINDEDEST books I have ever read (Long-windedest is a great word, I know! It should totally be in the dictionary!).

I finished the book last night and I have absolutely no idea how to describe it to you. Or what it all meant. In that way, it reminds me of House of Leaves which holds a special place in our lives, even though we have no idea what it was about, or what it meant. I believe Glass Books/Dream Eaters is going to be that kind of book for us.

I wandered over to Amazon and read the reviews, to see if those would help. They don’t. The one I agree with most can be para-phrased like this “Somewhere in this 750 page, over-written, novel was an amazing 400 page novel.” That is very, very truet. The writing, was dense. The story-telling, just a little convoluted.

The three heroes, wonderful. The bad guys, ummm there were so many. Too many, I think. The premise, the glass books – excellent idea! Really fabulous. The sex, wonderful! The alchemy and religion, very good too.

Sigh. Someone speak to the author please. Don’t let him do this again. Really, a great story is in there and that’s why I’ve plopped it into my “favorites” category. It’s just too bad it was such a struggle, such a painful struggle. If I could have looked into the blue glass, it might have helped clear the fog a bit. But since I couldn’t, sigh… reading should just not be that painful.

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What Kind of Reader Are You?

Meme /

There’s a problem with this meme – the question where you have to choose the “set” that you’ve read all of (or the most of)… I could have chosen all three…I’m sure that means something, doesn’t it?

What Kind of Reader Are You?

Your Result: Dedicated Reader

You are always trying to find the time to get back to your book. You are convinced that the world would be a much better place if only everyone read more.
Literate Good Citizen
Obsessive-Compulsive Bookworm
Book Snob
Fad Reader
Non-Reader
What Kind of Reader Are You?
Create Your Own Quiz

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Killer Dreams

2006, Books in Bed, Fiction /

Is Killer Dreams a sequel or something? It felt like it and that bugged me because I hate reading a sequel before I’ve read the original.

Anyway, as with the odd book or two I’ve read by Iris Johansen, Killer Dreams is nothing to write home about. If you want a drama that doesn’t make you think and you don’t mind some silly dialogue sprinkled throughout the story, then you won’t mind Killer Dreams a bit. If you like to read dramatic thrillers at the beach or on some other vacation, then this will do the job.

If you prefer something substantial – something really GOOD, this isn’t it. Try Dexter instead.

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The Rules of Survival

2006, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction, Young Adult /

TW was pretty troubled by the idea of her kids reading The Rules of Survival. Not that they’ve read this, they haven’t. It’s just the idea that this book is a young adult book – something RJ might pick up off of the shelf – that idea troubled her. It didn’t trouble me at all.

Some kids do live this way and I think all kids should know this. Life isn’t all peaches and cream and sometimes people who say “I love you” are the ones who are doing their damnedest to hurt you. That. Is. Life. For some kids.

Nicely written book. Good ending, which is often not the case with “problem books”. Possibly triggering for kids who’ve lived with abuse or adults who have survived it.

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Chuck Palahniuk?

2006, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction /

Until reading Diary yesterday, I’d never read a book by Chuck Palahniuk. I know, you’re shocked. As much as I read, you’d think… well yea, you would wouldn’t you? I’m not sure why I haven’t read one before. I’ve certainly SEEN Fight Club and I’ve certainly meant to read his books before. I think I went so far as to get Lullaby from the library over the summer but I never managed to read it. (Neither did Michelle, and she’s the one who asked me to get it in the first place!)

Anyway, about Diary. I liked it a lot. Very non-horror Stephen King-like in some ways. Very “Fight Club-like” in other ways. I really liked the art lessons sprinkled into the coma diary. I hope Michelle finds time to read this before it has to go back to the library – or maybe she can borrow it from Jared who is a huge Palahniuk fan. I’d hate for her to miss it – and I think this might make a better movie than Fight Club did.

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Kate Delafield

2006, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction, GLBT, Mystery /

Sigh. Detective Delafield, you were not at your best in Hancock Park. Are you showing your age? Or is it Katherine Forrest who is showing hers? I can’t decide. All I know is that I don’t like it and I hope we see improvements with the next Kate Delafield mystery.

The good detective is a drinker and should definitely get that under control. I’m all for that. She’s also the kind of dyke who doesn’t wander around the sisterhood with a rainbow bumper sticker attending empowerment seminars and that should not change at all. Leave the woman alone. Let her do her job and go home to a nice g/f at the end of a hard day. Or let her do her job and go home with a screwed up lesbian relationship at the end of the day. But quit beating her up about not being an active participant in the community. That’s BS and Katherine Forrest should really know better, shouldn’t she?

Yes, she should.

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100 Notable Books of 2006 Meme

1 Comment / Meme, Reading Lists /

Here’s a link to the NY Times list so you can find authors and brief descriptions if you need them.  Play the normal way – bold the ones you’ve read, italicize the ones you want to read, cross out the ones you are sure you will never read (I rarely cross any out).  (my italicized books are either already on my reserve list or have been on my reserve list and returned to the library unread – because I ran out of time.) 

FICTION & POETRY

ABSURDISTAN

AFTER THIS

AGAINST THE DAY

ALENTEJO BLUE

ALL AUNT HAGAR’S CHILDREN

APEX HIDES THE HURT.

ARTHUR AND GEORGE

AVERNO

BEASTS OF NO NATION

BLACK SWAN GREEN

BROOKLAND

COLLECTED POEMS, 1947-1997. By Allen Ginsberg

THE COLLECTED STORIES OF AMY HEMPEL

THE DEAD FISH MUSEUM

DIGGING TO AMERICA

THE DISSIDENT

THE DREAM LIFE OF SUKHANOV

EAT THE DOCUMENT

THE ECHO MAKER

THE EMPEROR’S CHILDREN

EVERYMAN

FORGETFULNESS

GALLATIN CANYON: Stories. By Thomas McGuane

GATE OF THE SUN

GOLDEN COUNTRY

HALF OF A YELLOW SUN

HIGH LONESOME: New & Selected Stories, 1966-2006. By Joyce Carol Oates

THE INHABITED WORLD

THE INHERITANCE OF LOSS

INTUITION

THE KEEP

LAST EVENINGS ON EARTH

THE LAY OF THE LAND

LISEY’S STORY

NEW AND COLLECTED POEMS, 1964-2006. By Ishmael Reed

OLD FILTH

ONE GOOD TURN

ONLY REVOLUTIONS

THE POSSIBILITY OF AN ISLAND

THE ROAD

SKINNER’S DRIFT

SPECIAL TOPICS IN CALAMITY PHYSICS

THE STORIES OF MARY GORDON

STRONG IS YOUR HOLD

SUITE FRANÇAISE

TERRORIST

THE TRANSLATOR

TWILIGHT OF THE SUPERHEROES.

THE USES OF ENCHANTMENT

A WOMAN IN JERUSALEM

NONFICTION

THE AFTERLIFE

AMERICA AT THE CROSSROADS: Democracy, Power, and the Neoconservative Legacy

ANDREW CARNEGIE

AT CANAAN’S EDGE: America in the King Years, 1965-68

AVA GARDNER: "Love Is Nothing."

THE BLIND SIDE: Evolution of a Game

BLOOD AND THUNDER: An Epic of the American West

BLUE ARABESQUE: A Search for the Sublime

CLEMENTE: The Passion and Grace of Baseball’s Last Hero

CONSIDER THE LOBSTER: And Other Essays

THE COURTIER AND THE HERETIC: Leibniz, Spinoza, and the Fate of God in the Modern World

THE DISCOMFORT ZONE: A Personal History

EAT, PRAY, LOVE: One Woman’s Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia

FALLING THROUGH THE EARTH: A Memoir

FIASCO: The American Military Adventure in Iraq

FIELD NOTES FROM A CATASTROPHE: Man, Nature, and Climate Change

FLAUBERT: A Biography

FUN HOME: A Family Tragicomic

THE GHOST MAP: The Story of London’s Most Terrifying Epidemic — and How It Changed Science, Cities, and the Modern World

THE GREAT DELUGE: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast

THE GREATEST STORY EVER SOLD: The Decline and Fall of Truth From 9/11 to Katrina

HAPPINESS: A History

HEAT: An Amateur’s Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany

IRAN AWAKENING: A Memoir of Revolution and Hope

JAMES TIPTREE, JR.: The Double Life of Alice B. Sheldon

JANE GOODALL: The Woman Who Redefined Man

KATE: The Woman Who Was Hepburn

LEE MILLER: A Life

THE LOOMING TOWER: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11

THE LOST: A Search for Six of Six Million

MAYFLOWER: A Story of Courage, Community, and War

THE MOST FAMOUS MAN IN AMERICA: The Biography of Henry Ward Beecher

THE OMNIVORE’S DILEMMA: A Natural History of Four Meals

ORACLE BONES: A Journey Between China’s Past and Present

THE PLACES IN BETWEEN

PRISONERS: A Muslim and a Jew Across the Middle East Divide

PROGRAMMING THE UNIVERSE: A Quantum Computer Scientist Takes On the Cosmos

QUEEN OF FASHION: What Marie Antoinette Wore to the Revolution

READING LIKE A WRITER: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them

REDEMPTION: The Last Battle of the Civil War

SELF-MADE MAN: One Woman’s Journey Into Manhood and Back Again

STATE OF DENIAL

STRANGE PIECE OF PARADISE

SWEET AND LOW: A Family Story

TEMPTATIONS OF THE WEST: How to be Modern in India, Pakistan, Tibet, and Beyond

THINGS I DIDN’T KNOW: A Memoir

UNCOMMON CARRIERS

THE UNITED STATES OF ARUGULA: How We Became a Gourmet Nation

THE WAR OF THE WORLD: Twentieth-Century Conflict and the Descent of the West

THE WORST HARD TIME: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl

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The Fourth Bear

2 Comments / 2006, Books in Bed, Fiction, Sci Fi and Fantasy /

Thank goodness! I actually enjoyed The Fourth Bear! OK not as much as I have enjoyed all of the Thursday Next books but I did enjoy it a lot. Tons more than the first Nursery Crimes book.

In the Humpty Dumpty book I didn’t much care for Mary Mary and I found Ashley a ridiculous character entirely. This time around, I liked them both. I also loved Punch & Judy. I’m still not thrilled about Prometheus and that whole storyline but I can overlook that now.

So what do you think – is The Gingerbread Man a cookie or is he cake? It’s important that you know for sure which he is…

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Goodnight Nobody

1 Comment / 2006, Books in Bed, Chick Lit /

I should have known – I lost my entire post about Goodnight Nobody. That’s a sign that I either shouldn’t speak badly about Jennifer Weiner and nobody cares about my half-hearted boycott of her work or that my boycott should be more than half-hearted.

Goodnight Nobody was no Good in Bed, nor was it any In Her Shoes. It wasn’t even a Little Earthquakes. It was ok. Nothing to write home about or to convince others to read. It isn’t making me regret my decision to drop Jennifer Weiner as my favorite chick lit author or my decision not to rush out and get her books as soon as they hit bookstores. No, I’m not going to change my mind about her book of short stories either.

Goodnight Nobody was ok. Not great, but ok.

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