Required Reading List

So, a friend asked what I was reading lately, and i couldn't really think of anything that blew me away.

So, what are you reading right now? What have you read lately that blew you away?

Yanked from a Time Warp Into the Blessed Present

I have written before about my love for the song This Must Be the Place, by Talking Heads, and about how cool it was that Arcade Fire covered the song live. So, last night, we came in from dinner out, and I had to do the dishes from lunch (Domestic Diva, don't'cha know?) and so i turned on the radio. I usually listen to 88.5 or 92.9 FM or a CD while in the kitchen, but for some reason, i didn't like what was on, and I flipped over to WREK. Well, they were playing the Arcade Fire cover of This Must Be the Place, and so i stood there and listened for the whole song.

It is amazing the way a song, particular songs, can completely transport you to a different time in your life, so much so that you can almost taste and smell and feel it, and it looms over you, and you are just transfixed by it. I could not have changed the channel if I had wanted.

Also, I did not want to do the dishes, or finish the dishes and have to go wrangle children into PJs. Much more enjoyable to daydream about being eighteen and in love and with that peculiar sense of possibility that i had when I fell in love with the song the first time.

So, the song ended and I came roughly out of my reverie to the sound of the college girl on the radio, saying the name and band and the name of the radio show. And then she said, "And now i have some tickets to give away. If you'd like to see Broken Social Scene at the Variety, be the first caller through."

My cel was right there on the counter, I dialed the number and she answered. I won.

Just like that, I was yanked from 1990 to 2008, like a shot. And now I am going to a free show tonight. I love it when stuff like that happens. And I still love that song.

Obviously, based on this with my combined win of the book from Goodreads, I will be buying a lottery ticket this Friday.

!Outlander Graphic Novel!

So anyone who knows me or reads Dogwood Girl knows that I seriously heart Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series of books. You know the Twilight series? I was pretty addicted. I am ten times more addicted to Outlander than Twilight, and these are actually smart and well-written!

Well, it seems that Gabaldon is doing an Outlander graphic novel, loosely following events in the first book, Outlander, but from Murtagh's point of view. Love me some Murtagh! First of all, holy crap. Second of all, this guy is doing the illustrations, and he looks like a great artist. It comes out next year, and so does the next Outlander series book, An Echo In The Bone. Not only that, but Echo won't be the last. Praise sweet Jesus on a pogo stick!

I just can't wait to see what his interpretation of Jamie will be. Or Black Jack for that matter. It's like a train wreck. I want so badly for it to be good, but I'm scared to look, but I can't not look. You can see some early Claire illustrations here.

Nerd Dirge

I am bummed about illustrator, Pauline Baynes passing. You will be, too, if you were like me and you absolutely lost yourself in Narnia and Middle Earth and the warrens of Watership Down. I never even knew her name. Her name. Very proud that those beautiful maps and covers that drew me into the stories were drawn by a female.

Disaster

Kind of. . .

My IBook just doesn't seem to want to turn on. I am posting from Todd's today. Not sure when I will be back online, but I have an appointment at the Apple store later to check out the problem.

Me: "Can we afford that?"
Todd: "It's cheaper than therapy for you."

Good point.

In case you're wondering, I'd rather chop off my own hand that spend an hour with MacGeeks who call themselves "Genius." The whole Mac persona really annoys me. So hoity toity.

I am sure this is bad karma and my laptop will never be fixed now, but i am really not in a good mood. On the positive side, while I am there, i am finally going to pick up Breaking Dawn, and i will have plenty of reading time, with no pesky internets to divert me. Oh, yeah, i never went to get the book Friday night.

I wanted to finish the other one I was reading, On Agate Hill. I loved it, and would highly recommend it to others. A great story that reminded me a little bit of Toni Morrison's Beloved or Alice Walker's The Color Purple in style, with an imperfect heroine, a bittersweet love story, a smidge of magical realism, a cast of memorable characters, a great display of late 19th century southern culture, and a soaring ending, the kind that makes you feel kind of high as you are reading it.

Who Knew This Golden Girl Fan Had a Heart of Such Darkness?

Looking for something good to read? My dear friend Vanessa wrote a really cool short story and it has been published in a modern horror anthology called Read by Dawn, Volume III. Go ahead and click on that link and buy a copy. (I edited the story for Vanessa, so I can tell you, it's really, really good!) You'll get a great bunch of stories by authors you haven't read before, and you'll be supporting a girl who is following her dream.

Will You Go to Prom with Me?

1987_Homecoming10th.jpg
Originally uploaded by Dogwood Girl.

Like, OMG, who wants to go to Prom with me? I know Amanda would go if she was in town. Pierce, would Fowler like to fly in and date me for an evening of Twilight fun?

I have just gotten through the physical torture of not having any Twilight to read, delving into a new, not-at-all-teen-horror-romance-genre-ey (it's a word, because i just made it a word) novel, On Agate Hill, which, by the way, is really well-written and quite the page-turner at the same time.

But, really, it's just a case of me biding my time until the new book comes out. Kind of like when you really like that one guy, but he moved, or he isn't into you, so you date that other, really nice guy in the meantime, but you know that you were never really that into him. Hypothetically. Not that I ever really did that for, like . . . years. The funny part is that if I wasn't so Twilight-obsessed, I would be really, really jazzed [stef] about this other book.

I so wish I could fit into my old dalmation prom dress. . . that would be perfect. (Okay, haven't found the dalmation dress, so shiny 10th Grade Homecoming number will have to do for our purposes.)

Bereft

I haven't been this depressed about finishing a book since I read the last page of A Breath of Snow and Ashes.

Now, what am I going to do with myself for the next five days, thirteen hours, seventeen minutes, and eight seconds until I see Bella, Jacob, and the Cullens again? Ugh.

Maybe my family will be glad to have me back for a few days.

I Think I Need An Intervention

So, if you read Dogwood Girl much, you are probably wondering what happened to me. Well, I left for Hilton Head on Thursday of last week. That was the day I started my 544-page "beach read," Twilight.

I didn't know much about it, except that over the course of the summer, I kept on seeing high school girls at the pool reading this thick-ass dark book. Lots of girls reading them. Female lifeguards taking it on the stand with them, blowing the whistle for adult swim with one hand and cracking the book open with another. Anyone who knows me knows I love a big-ass thick book. Everybody had copies of the first book, and then I started seeing a second and third one, all with these slick dark-looking covers, and I thought to myself, that looks like something I would read, and then i thought, it also looks like a V.C. Andrews-type thing, which, let's be honest, is just plain crack addiction reading. Knowing I'd be hanging out on the beach, and not wanting to read anything too heady while I'm drinking beer, I picked it up before we left. (By the way, South Carolina, no alcohol on the beach? $1,000 fine? Dumbest law on the books EVER, totally would kill tourism to enforce, plus, I'm pretty sure that telling people they can't drink on the beach is un-American and considered a terrorist threat on American society. Also? Girls with "Cocks" on their shorts should just be shot.)

I proceeded to read that thing all the way down 16, only pausing to look up at that Christmas tree in the median, and then put on a bathing suit, and took it to the beach with me. I didn't put it down again until dark, when i was forced to go to dinner. I read it when I came in drunk at 1 a.m. after drinking with my old friends. (Had to read that little section over the next morning, I admit.) Took it with me to the breakfast buffet, but didn't crack it, only because Todd stared me down disapprovingly when I reached for it. Started reading it back on the beach that morning. Read it after everyone (finally!) left me at the pool that afternoon. Read it after getting dressed for the wedding until time to leave. Read it after the reception in the 30 minutes we took to get changed. Thought how wonderful it would be to read it at the reception, but resigned myself to an evening of drinking with my favorite high school friends and their wives. Sigh.

Read it like a fiend all the way home on Sunday, up until about bedtime, where I flipped through the remaining pages. Only about 50 pages left, i thought. Like a nicotine addict worrying about the pack of cigarettes being there in the morning, I debated putting back on clothes and finding the nearest bookstore before bedtime, so that I would have Book II there when I woke up and drove to the lake.

Finished Sunday night. Drove to the Lake on Monday morning and promptly used new nephew as an excuse to get out of the house. Hauled baby all over middle Georgia on a mission to find a bookstore. Found one. Bought second and third books in the saga. Noted with relief that there is a fourth one coming out August 2nd. Shed an inner tear that the saga would end. Drove to best coffee shop in my universe (apologies to Joe's!) and prayed for baby to sleep while I started reading 2nd book.

Reluctantly went home when needy three-week old nephew got hungry. Committed crime of lying by omission when asked by husband if I bought another of "those books." Silently fumed while husband and sister made fun of my high school vampire obsession. Later loaned first book to sister, as her interest was piqued, and who doesn't like a good vampire story when a newborn is sucking you dry every two hours?

That was Monday at noon. I just finished 600-page book 2 about 30 minutes ago, and I am just blogging about it so that I can draw out starting number three. I mean, I only have eleven days until the fourth one comes out.

Are they good? Well, they are young adult fiction. They are definitely in the romance genre. About on par with a Harry Potter, as far as suspense goes. I would be lying if I didn't say that they could use more sex, violence, and strong language. I would be lying if I said I didn't cringe when I watched a teaser trailer for the movie and then listen as my husband derided it as Goth Gossip Girl in the Cascades.

Um, yeah, they're pretty damn good. Look out, Jamie Fraser; We might have a new hero in town.

My Little Engine

Lately, we've been reading The Little Engine That Could. Not the short dumb versions, but an old complete edition that was mine as a little girl, with brilliant illustrations and lots of repetition of the phrase, "I think I can."

So, the other day, a neighbor brought by two small girls' bikes that her daughters had grown out of, to see if Tiller might be interested in them. Um, yeah, she's interested!

I planned to go back in and finish some work, but the kids saw the new bikes and any idea of working was out the window on two wheels. "NEW BIKES!!! BIKES FOR ME? MOM, NEW BIKES!! MAMA, DID YOU SEE THE NEW BIKES!? WHY DID THAT LADY LEAVE TWO NEW BIKES? WHY SHE NOT WANT BIKES?"

Indeed, why would someone not want a bike? Certainly not because of the complete chaos-inducing nature of bikes upon those under five.

We spent the remainder of the afternoon in the driveway, Tiller practicing a loop that involved arcing through the back of the garage, down the slight incline of the drive and into the sharp right turn of the sidewalk leading to the front door. (I am not sure what they do once they are at the front steps, but it usually is imagined as Grandma's house, or the bakery, or the MACDonald's drive-through. Frighteningly, Rollie can do an exact impersonation of me at the drive-thru, down to all of our exact orders.) Then Tiller would come whipping back around the corner, with a big grin under her Hello Kitty helmet, ready to fly back into the garage for another loop.

Except that when she came off that sidewalk onto the drive, she would slow down, her little legs struggling to crank up the incline into the garage, and, i realized after a few loops, whispering to herself, "I think I can, I think I can, I think I can . . . " and "I did it!" (Dora the Explorer-style, of course) when she made it to the peak and into the garage.

Tiller: My Little Engine The Could

Book Recommendations

So, I've been slack about updating my "What I'm Reading" section. I finished The Lies of Locke Lamora a while ago, and then went out and bought the sequel, because it was such an enjoyable read. They are pretty light fantasy. Not groundbreaking, but have a pretty interesting fantasy world that is similar enough to our world to be believable, but with some cool imaginings that stretch over into the fantastic. (Bondsmagi are way cool! And kind of mean!) I loved the main characters - They are lovable, incorrigible thieves and con artists, with wonderful self-deprecating senses of humor. The demises of some characters are downright nasty and gory, but i love that kind of stuff. I love that Lynch isn't scared to kill off some major characters either. I cried a couple of times. (Yep, i cry over books.)

The characters do have love interests, but there's not a lot of mushy crap, and in the first two books, one character is alluded to as a love interest and we never even see her, although I was constantly thinking she would show up sooner or later. Speaking of women, they are strong and cool and complete badasses in the books. The world Lynch imagines is one where men and women work and fight next to one another every day. The setting is a strange Mediterranean-style water world, with sharks, and gladiator-like sporting events, and enough magic and ancient history to make it fantasy, without spilling over into the annoying side of fantasy. The second book, Red Seas Under Red Skies hits the high seas, the landlubber characters learning the ropes (and the crimes) from the pirate world.

Anyway, I loved the books for the fact that they were the fun reading that reminds you why you first loved to read in the first place: You find a world that captures your imagination and stays with you long after you finish the read.

Highly recommended for reading right after finishing some pretentious or difficult read, when you just want to remind yourself that reading doesn't have to be a struggle to be good.

I'm sad they are over and I can't wait for the third.

p.s. Thanks again to Kat and Mike for sending it!

The Meaning of 8

I am totally digging the new Cloud Cult album The Meaning of 8. It's kind of quirky like Flaming Lips. Kind of atmospheric. Seems like it would be a good album to trip to, but I am way too old for that now. Todd thinks it sounds like Tortoise, but I think Tortoise is a total snooze, so I don't see that. The album title makes me think of this book that I loved called The Eight. (Not great literature, but just one of those entertaining quest reads, kind of like The DaVinci Code. A great beach read kind of book.) And I love the 8s scattered throughout the lyrics, like clues to a puzzle that I am supposed to solve.

Favorite tracks: Chain Reaction, Chemicals Collide, Dance for the Dead.

Of course, I've only been listening for a couple of days. So those favorite tracks could change. I am pretty confident, though, that going into September as we are, this is a likely top ten of the year for me.

Please Do Not Break My Heart, Filmmaker

A while ago, I read an article in Oprah's magazine, O, about an actress' favorite novels. It is a recurring article in the magazine, and my favorite part of a magazine that I actually think is really great. They ask famous people about their ten favorite books, and the people list them, and also tell what was so inspiring about them. For example, here's what Laura Linney told O about her favorite books.

I don't know what it is about that feature that always draws me in: I do have a terrible habit of always trying to see what complete strangers are reading. If I am in a coffee shop, I will look around at every person in there to see if one of them is reading something that I have never heard of before, or something i love already. I love the voyeuristic nature of looking over someone's shoulder, much like checking out a person's bookshelf at home, or their CD collection. I guess it is that peep into someone's reading choices that I like about it, and even better, the people tell you why they liked them. As if by seeing a person's reading choices, I could know what makes them tick. God, if Oprah could only get Christian Bale to reveal his favorites and why.

Anyway, I think the actress being interviewed this particular month was the love interest from the movie Pearl Harbor. (Can't remember her name, but she is so beautiful that I was sure her choices would be dumb as hell. Yes, as a matter of fact, I do hate beautiful people.) I can't remember any of the other books she listed, but in particular, the way she discussed Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials series really struck me as the way I talked about some of my favorite books. I made a note to myself to check them out next time I was at a bookstore and then promptly forgot about them until a couple months later when I happened to run across them while looking for something completely different. I picked them up and then devoured all three in less than two weeks.

They are children's books, supposedly, or maybe young adult, although the last book gets a little out of what I would consider the realm of children's fiction. They are set in present-day Oxford, but with so many layers of parallel universes in the books, they sometimes have an almost Victorian sensibility that then throws you for a fantastic loop. Like other beloved children's novels by Rowling, Lewis, and even Tolkien (yes, i am throwing the comparison out there!), these books create their own world, similar enough to our own to be believable and so completely different as to capture the imagination completely. I loved everything about them - from the not so elementary emotional subjects tackled, to Lyra, the smart little cookie of a protagonist. The antagonist is as love-to-hate as Cruella DeVille, and the other characters, (including humans, animals, and witches) are all so real you could reach out and touch them. The books are three of my favorites, and the thing that most impresses me about them is that I could have read them at ten and enjoyed them just as much as I did in my early 30s. They have that quality that I adore in a novel - the ability to work on as many levels as the universes contained within.

After finishing them, about the same time as the last of The Lord of the Rings trilogy films arrived in theaters, I thought to myself,

"Dear God, please make a movie of these books. Wait. No, God, please don't. There is no way that I can bear another of my favorite books distorted and watered down and ruined for me on the big screen. I don't think the success of the LOTR film adaptation can be repeated."

I go through this all the time at the thought of favorite novels adapted for the big screen. At times, though my desire to see the film is there, I will just pretend it was never made, knowing that some director's vision will never match what I have created in my own mind of what a book looks, feels, and sounds like.

I experienced both sadness and excitement when Todd told me they were making The Golden Compass into a film. For the last year or so, I have loosely followed the casting for the film. (Nicole Kidman as Mrs. Coulter - Brilliant choice! Sam Elliott as Lee Scoresby? Perfection. Some newcomer with the god-awful name Dakota Blue Richards as my beloved Lyra? I shudder to think what the result will be.)

And then today, Todd sent me the following link to the director's teaser trailer on YouTube. I debated watching it. To watch it is to change the image I have in my head of Lyra and the rest forever.



I totally watched it. It looks really great. Even Dakota Blue, although she looks nothing like I imagined. Gollum looked different than I imagined, too, though, and I really like him now.

If you have read and loved the novels, you might want to check out the Daemon Name Generator and How to Read the Alethiometer.

Cool stuff, but I am kind of glad there was no internet when I was reading other childhood favorites. I may never have learned to drink, or lost my virginity, or gone off to college. I think I would still be sitting up in my room reading some WikiNerdOPedia.

Disclaimer

After receiving an email from a male friend, asking if he should really read the Outlander series, I feel it is my duty to explain more fully about the genre of the book: Outlander has tons of fans in the romance category.

I am not one to sit around reading romance novels, so I didn't mention this. I guess I didn't want anyone to think I was a romance reader. That being said, the reasons that I like the book have little to do with romance (although I would admittedly leave my husband for him if the hero showed up at my doorstep) and everything to do with genre-bending characters, strong females, adventure, what it might be like to live in the past, and a touch of time travel and witchcraft, mixed in with a healthy dose of biology and horticulture.

I don't read them because of the love story, but all of these other things I mention do add up to make this one of my favorite love stories (with apologies to Mr. Darcy.)

So, male-friend-who-shall-remain-nameless, I think since you went ahead and bought the book, you should go out on a limb and read the damn thing. If for no other reason than that you can share a discussion over a bottle of wine with your girl, and she (and I) will be highly impressed with the level of security you feel in your manhood.

My friend Mike, at the urging of his wife, did so. He liked it and ended up reading more of the series.