BlogFest 2011

BlogFest 2011 is coming up! [Blogging events on your calendar are closer than they appear!] This year it will be July 15-17. It's hosted by Cinnamon @ A Journey of Books. BlogFest is a blog hop or blog run. Each participating blog links to another and every blog will host their own giveaway.

This will be my first year to participate so I'm anxious to see what it's all about and how I'll do. If you'd like to join me and a whole bunch of other terrific bloggers in the BlogFest, then use the link above and check out the rules at A Journey of Books.

Quote It! Saturday

Freda's Voice has an awesome Saturday meme for quote lovers called Quote It! and I have another blog, Quote Mistress, which is entirely devoted to the quotes I have collected over my lifetime. So my Quote It! may be found on my quote site. I'd love for you to visit...and be sure and visit Freda's Voice too!

Saturday Snapshot: May 21

Saturday Snapshot is a meme hosted by Alyce at At Home with Books. All you have to do is "post a photo that you (or a friend or family member) have taken and then leave a direct link to your post in the Mr. Linky on [her] blog. Photos can be old or new, and be of anything as long as they are clean and appropriate for all eyes to see. How much detail you give is up to you." All she asks is that you don't just post random photos that you find online.


I generally fill my blog with my own obsession....books, books, and more books. [Did I mention books?] So, I thought today I would show you all my husband's latest obsession. Mustangs. No, not horses. The kind that runs on horsepower though. To be specific, this 1966 model (same year as Hubby)....

[pictures taken by my son--using his Nintendo 3DS]

Library Loot: May 18-24

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted by Claire (The Captive Reader) and Marg (The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader) that encourages bloggers to share the books they've checked out of the library. If you'd like to participate, just write up your post, feel free to steal button, and link up using the Mr. Linky on Claire's site this week. And, of course, check out what other participants are getting from their libraries.

Here's my haul for this week:
Howards End is on the Landing by Susan Hill: One day British novelist Susan Hill went to the bookshelves in her home looking for a copy of Howards End. She didn’t find it (at least not at first), but she did come upon several other books she had never read. That started her thinking: Why not devote a year’s reading time just to the books on her own shelves? This delightful bibliophile’s memoir records her experience, both the browsing and the reading. Along the way, she developed a kind of second project: If she could only keep 40 books, which ones would they be? The list of 40 appears at the end, and it’s a charmingly eccentric batch of books, but the real fascination in reading Hill’s ruminations isn’t about the list but, rather, about how she reads and how living with books enriches her life. Those who collect books in any fashion will be lost in their own memories as Hill muses on “things that fall out of books,” or defends writing in books, or, best of all, argues against overorganizing the books on her shelves (no more wonderful surprises). Just try to read this book without nosing around your own shelves. --Bill Ott

The Religious Body by Catherine Aird: "Sister Anne," said the Mother Superior unperturbed, "died on Wednesday evening sometime after supper, probably in the corridor leading from the Great Hall to the kitchens. Her body was put into the broom cupboard and later thrown down the cellar steps. "Who would want to kill a cloistered num? But, astonishingly, someone had. It was as much of a surprise to the sisters of the Convent of St. Anselm as it was to Inspector C. D. Sloan, Criminal Investigation Department. But now it was up to the Inspector to find the motive and the murderer.

The Highly Effective Detective by Richard Yancey: Following the death of his mother, Theodore "Teddy" Ruzak fulfills a long-held dream of setting up a private detective agency in his hometown, Knoxville, Tenn. He soon gets his first case—who drove the mysterious black SUV that mowed down a row of baby geese crossing the street? As Ruzak sets out in his own remarkably indirect way to uncover the culprit, he slowly discovers he may have landed way over his head. Ruzak, reminiscent at first of both A Confederacy of Dunces's Ignatius J. Reilly and of Columbo, fast becomes his own uniquely realized character. After starting as an especially well-drawn out shaggy dog story, the narrative takes unforeseen, utterly believable twists that wind to an extremely satisfying close. By turns touching, suspenseful and hilarious... [Publishers Weekly]

And a couple of finds in the Library Book Store:
Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
A Stranger in My Grave by Margaret Millar

Leftover Loot:
The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein
The Bloody Wood by Michael Innes
The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield

Friday 56

The Friday 56 is a bookish meme sponsored by Freda's Voice. It is really easy to participate.

*Grab a book, any book.
*Turn to page 56.
*Find any sentence that grabs you.
*Post it.
*Link up at Freda's site.

Here's mine from Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne:

One would have though that the whole force of the misfortune would have spent and wasted itself in the family at first,--as is generally the case:--But nothing ever wrought with our family after the ordinary way.

Book Beginnings on Friday

Book Beginnings on Friday is a bookish meme sponsored by Katy at A Few More Pages. Here's what you do: Share the first line (or two) of the book you are currently reading on your blog or in the comments section. Include the title and author so we know what you're reading. Then, if you are so moved, let us know what your first impressions were based on that first line and if you did or did not like that sentence. Link up each week at Katy's place.
Here's mine from Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne:

I wish either my father or my mother, or indeed both of them, as they were in duty both equally bound to it, had minded what they were about when they begot me; had they duly considered how much depended on what they were then doing;--that not only the production of a rational Being was concerned in it, but that possibly the happy formation and temperature of his body, perhaps his genius and the very cast of his mind;--and, for aught they knew to the contrary, even the fortunes of his whole house might take their turn from the humours and dispositions which were then uppermost:--Had they duly weighed and considered all this, and proceeded accordingly,--I am verily persuaded I should have made a quite different figure in the world from that in which the reader is likely to see me.

My thoughts: OMG, not another stream of consciousness writer (yes, indeed--and the great-grand-daddy of them all, seeing as this was written in 1768)! And: Is he ever going to put a period on this sentence?!!

If I hadn't signed this book up for so many challenges and determined that this time (the third try) I really was going to finish the darn thing, I think I would have thrown it out the window by now. I'm on page 134 so far.

Booking Through Thursday: Age Inappropriate

This week Booking Through Thursday wants to know: (in contrast to last week's theme) What do you think about censoring books BECAUSE of their intended age? Say, books too old for your kids to read?

I'm not a fan of censorship. I would never have told my son that he couldn't read something--based on age or content. Of course, I didn't have much to worry about with him...getting him interested in reading was a battle in and of itself. Once he got hooked (thanks to Harry Potter and Vampyrates (I think I spelled that right), I was just pleased that he was reading. And then I just made sure I was aware of what he was reading and made sure he knew he could talk to me about anything he didn't understand. Was I thrilled about the vampire pirates and the horror tendencies of his reading? Not particularly. But I remember freaking my mom out with all those spine-tingling Alfred Hitchcock collections (and she thought those were scary....).

Theme Thursday: Male Person

Hosted by Reading Between the Pages

Rules

*A theme will be posted each week on Thursday

*Select a conversation/snippet/sentence from your current book that features the theme

*Post it and don't forget to mention the author and title of the book

*Event is open for the whole week

*Link back to Reading Between thePage

This week's theme is Male Person: a description of a man or boy.

Here's mine about a parson/pastor from Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne (p. 20):

--he chose rather to join in the laugh against himself; and as he never carried one single ounce of flesh upon his own bones, being altogether as spare a figure as his beast, --he would sometimes insist upon it that the horse was as good as the rider deserved;--that they were centaur-like,--both of a piece.

WWW: Wednesdays

WWW: Wednesdays which is hosted by MizB ofver at Should Be Reading. This is a weekly meme that I have been participating in for over a year now.

To play along just answer the following three questions....

*What are you currently reading?

*What did you just recently finish reading?

*What do you think you'll read next?

Current:
Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne: is narrated by the title character in a series of digressions and interruptions that purportedly show the "life and opinions" — part of the novel's full title — of Tristram. Composed of nine "Books" originally published between 1759-1767, the novel has more to do with Shandy family members and their foibles and history than it seemingly does with Tristram himself. However, it is through Tristram's relating the actions, beliefs, and opinions of his family members — primarily his father, Walter Shandy, and his paternal Uncle Toby — that the reader gets a clearer picture of Tristram's character.

Read Since the Last WWW: Wednesday (click titles for reviews):
Dancers in Mourning by Margery Allingham
A Piece of Justice by Jill Paton Walsh
Tom Brown's Schooldays by Thomas Hughes
Killer Dolphin by Ngaio Marsh
What Alice Knew by Paula Marantz Cohen
Past Tense by Catherine Aird

Up Next:
The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein
The Bloody Wood by Michael Innes
The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
[I had The Castle of Llyr by Lloyd Alexander on my list, but I actually started it and have found that fantasy just isn't to my taste at the moment. Maybe another time.]

Wondrous Words Wednesday

Kathy over at Bermudaonion's Weblog hosts Wondrous Words Wednesday. If you come across a word (or two) while reading that is new to you and would like to share your new knowledge, then hop over to Kathy's place and link up!

Here's what I've got this week from Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne:

Crasis: (archaic) Composition; constitution; blending; makeup

Context:

This is all that ever staggered my faith in regard to Yorick's extraction, who by what I can remember of him, and by all accounts I could ever get of him, seemed not to have had a single drop of Danish blood in his whole crasis....

Mercurial: characterized by rapid and unpredictable changeableness of mood
Heteroclite: a person or thing that deviates from the ordinary rule or form
Declensions: everything I can find on this seems to refer to the "inflection of words that serves to indicate number and gender"; I'm not sure how that applies hereGaieté de Cœur: Light-heartedness

--he was on the contrary, as mercurial and sublimated a composition,--as heteroclite a creature in all his declensions,--with as much life and whim and gaieté de cœur about him, as the kindliest climate could have engendered and put together.

Teaser Tuesdays

MizB of Should Be Reading hosts Teaser Tuesdays. Anyone can play along. Just do the following:

*Grab your current read.
*Open to a random page.
*Share two "teaser" sentences from somewhere on that page.
*BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! You don't want to spoil the book for others.
*Share the title and author too, so other TT participants can add it to their TBR lists if they like your teaser!

Here's mine from Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne (p. 17):

I know there are readers in the world, as well as many other good people in it, who are no readers at all,--who find themselves ill at ease, unless they are let into the whole secret from first to last of everything which concerns you.

Crime Fiction Alphabet: Letter R

Kerrie over at Mysteries in Paradise sponsors The Aphabet in Crime Fiction community meme. your post MUST be related to the first letter of the book's title, the first letter of the author's first name or the first letter of the author's surname. You can write a book review or a bio of an author so long as it fits the rules somehow.

This week we are featuring the Letter R. R is for Ronald (aka Father Knox). Father Knox was an influential theologian, classical scholar and critic. He is well-known in the mystery field as one of the founders of Holmesian scholarship as well as the author of the celebrated "ten commandments" for writing detective fiction. These commandments are as follows:

1. The criminal must be mentioned in the early part of the story, but must not be anyone whose thoughts the reader has been allowed to know.
2. All supernatural or preternatural agencies are ruled out as a matter of course.
3. Not more than one secret room or passage is allowed.
4. No hitherto undiscovered poisons may be used, nor any appliance which will need a long scientific explanation at the end.
5. No Chinaman may figure in the story.
6. No accident may help the detective, nor must he have any unaccountable intuition which proves to be right.
7. The detective himself must not commit the crime.
8. The detective is bound to declare any clues which he may discover.
9. The stupid friend of the detective, the Watson, must not conceal from the reader any thoughts which pass through his mind: his intelligence must be slightly, but very slightly below that of the average reader.
10. Twin brothers, and doubles generally, must not appear unless we have been duly prepared for them.

And most writers of the Golden Age followed these rules scrupulously. The Footsteps at the Lock (the only one of his six mysteries which I have read) shows Father Knox to be not only a scholar and critic of the genre but one who could practice what he preached.

A bibliography of his detective works (from Wikipedia):

Novels

• The Viaduct Murder (1925)
• The Three Taps (1927). Features Miles Bredon.
• The Footsteps at the Lock (1928). Features Miles Bredon. (click title for my review)
  
• The Body in the Silo (1933). Features Miles Bredon.
• Still Dead (1934). Features Miles Bredon.
• Double Cross Purposes (1937). Features Miles Bredon.

Short stories

• Saved by Inspection (1931). Features Miles Bredon.
• The Motive (1937)
• The Adventure of the First Class Carriage (1947)

Collaborative works by the Detection Club

• Behind the Screen (1930) (six contributors including Knox)
• The Floating Admiral (1931) (fourteen contributors including Knox)
• Six Against the Yard (1936) (six contributors including Knox)

Booking Through Thursday: Age Appropriate

This week Booking Through Thursday wants to know: Do you read books "meant for other age groups"? Did you read adult books as a child? Young Adult books or picture books now that you're an adult? Or do you pretty much stick to books written for people your age?

When I was growing up, I was always reading out of my age group. I was reading at high school and college level when I was in elementary. And once I discovered the adult section of the library, I pretty much read whatever I wanted no matter what age group it was meant for. Now that I'm an adult, I stick more to "age appropriate" literature. I'm not much into the teenage angst of young adult literature--but I have read some recently and have also read a few children's books for a reading challenge here and there.

And one side note: I did enjoy reading children's books with my son when he was younger. I really loved discovering Tin Tin, Waldo, and Captain Pugwash with him.


Well...Looky what just showed up in my draft file....My missing post. Now if the missing comments would show up as well.

Top Ten Tuesday: Minor Characters

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme created over at The Broke and the Bookish. This week we are asked to give our Top Ten Minor Characters. Even though the major characters are where the focus is--sometimes there are minor characters that stick with us and maybe even steal the show. Here's my list:

1. Mr. Thipp's mother in Whose Body? by Dorothy L Sayers. She is such a minor character that she doesn't even have a name. She's just the mother of the man in whose bath a naked corpse has been found. But she absolutely steals the scenes in the courtroom.

2. The Dowager Duchess of Denver in various Lord Peter Wimsey stories by Sayers. I love her round-about way of talking that somehow always gets right to the point. One of those "fluffy" women who always see and understand more than anyone thinks.

3. Mr. Butler in the Phryne Fisher series by Kerry Greenwood. Anyone who can continue to run Phryne's household when one never knows what will be needed next--a nice cocktail, a fast car, a small firearm, something to kosh a criminal over the head with, or a nice intimate dinner for the latest conquest--gets special kudos. Unflappable and ever ready whatever Phryne may need.

4. Magersfontaine Lugg: Albert Campion's man in the Margery Allingham series. Not quite a butler and not very polished, but always there when you need him. He as the charm of the diamond in the rough.

5. Captain Hastings: Ever faithful companion to Hercule Poirot. Tends to have his mind on the pretty girl in the case rather than the clues, but definitely ready to aid Poirot whenever necessary.

6. Galahad Threepwood: Brother to Lord Emsworth in P. G. Wodehouse's Blandings Castle stories. Author of a scandalous manuscript of memoirs and quite a lively story-teller.

7. Sergeant Mullins in the Frances & Richard Lockridge series starring Pam & Jerry North. Mullins knows that the crime is going to be a "screwy" one whenever the Norths are involved.

8. Marion Halcombe in The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins. In my opinion the best character in the book. She's got spirit and is very independent.

9. Miss Habersham in Intruder in the Dust by William Faulkner. Not intended to be a main character, but without her the crime wouldn't be solved and an innocent man would hang or be lynched.

10. Spider, the dog, in The Woman in Black by Susan Hill. I love Spider--she's got a lot of character for a little dog and is quite brave in some of the spookier scenes.

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

It's Monday! What Are You Reading? is a bookish meme hosted by Book Journey. It's where we gather to share what we have read this past week and what we plan to read this week. It's a great way to network with other bloggers, see some wonderful blogs, and put new titles on your reading list. So hop on over via the link above and join in...and leave a comment here so I can check out what you are reading.


Books Read Last Week (click on titles for review):
Queen of the Flowers by Kerry Greenwood
The Man on the Balcony by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö
Dancers in Mourning by Margery Allingham
A Piece of Justice by Jill Paton Walsh
Tom Brown's Schooldays by Thomas Hughes
Killer Dolphin by Ngaio Marsh
What Alice Knew by Paula Marantz Cohen
Past Tense by Catherine Aird

Currently Reading:
Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne: is narrated by the title character in a series of digressions and interruptions that purportedly show the "life and opinions" — part of the novel's full title — of Tristram. Composed of nine "Books" originally published between 1759-1767, the novel has more to do with Shandy family members and their foibles and history than it seemingly does with Tristram himself. However, it is through Tristram's relating the actions, beliefs, and opinions of his family members — primarily his father, Walter Shandy, and his paternal Uncle Toby — that the reader gets a clearer picture of Tristram's character

Books that spark my interest:
The Castle of Llyr by Lloyd Alexander
The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein
The Bloody Wood by Michael Innes
The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield