Well, it's finally summer. The season of no school, of hot weather, of vacations and swimming and having lots of time to myself to just read. It's also the season of street fairs and used book sales and me ordering books online to use for tutoring and treating myself to a few as well. This year, summer brought a late spring cleaning, which led to me inheriting some books that my sister got from the woman whose children we used to babysit after her book club was done with them. Needless to say, I am even more surrounded by reading material now, have no space, and am not sure what to read next!
So, I have unintentionally embarked on a journey of reading several books at once. It started with my trip to used book sale #1, where I picked up (for fifty cents each) The Secret Life of Bees, Catch Me If You Can (the book), and Bridget Jones's Diary (already read but hilarious). My sister then gave me The Tales of Beetle the Bard, The Memory Keeper's Daughter, The Time Traveler's Wife, and Water for Elephants (which I have already read and enjoyed but not as much as the movie). I then attended used book sale #2, where I purchased Vanity Fair (#79) for another fifty cents. So, that's 8 books for a whopping $2.00. I then decided to purchase some books online as a gift to myself, which ended up being Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (in preparation for next year, since I have been buying myself one book per year until the set is complete), To Kill A Mockingbird, and Bossypants by Tina Fey (which I have listened to on audiobook and loved and definitely had to own it, especially since the new version is an orange-y peach color).
I then got a very strong urge to read To Kill A Mockingbird, and was a little ashamed that I did not own the book. I went on an excursion to several book stores and could not find a version that I liked (the hard cover with the correct cover had ragged pages, the hard cover with nice page edges had the wrong cover and was expensive, the paperback versions was too small, etc.) so after hemming and hawing for a couple of days, I decided to just get the small paperback with the wrong cover (I was never a big fan of the strange looking tree anyways) because it was cheaper, and now that I have it, I like it and enjoy the fact that it looks unique. I'm just a little ways in right now and Jem has just rescued his pants from the Radley's fence. I remember reading this freshman year of high school and enjoying it (and rereading it in a day because I had, as most high schoolers do, run out of time to read for homework (ie procrastinated and found better things to do) and sparknoted most of the book) and did want to reread it for this challenge.
While school is in session, I like to have a book in my bag that is an easy read that can be easily taken out and put away and read in small sections, so I started Secret Life of Bees for that purpose and got a little ways into that one as well. I'll have to finish that one up to decrease the number of books I'm reading at once. My plan is to possibly get an audiobook of it, as I am going to be driving 7 hours to visit a friend this weekend and may enjoy hearing the story on the way.
The third book I'm reading is Vanity Fair since it ended up at my boyfriend's house after the sale we went to, and although I am about 5 pages in right now, it seems enjoyable and a little easier to read than I had anticipated.
So, once at least two of those are done, I'll head into Lord of the Rings. (but I've said that so many times that I hardly believe myself and definitely wouldn't bet money on it!) Happy Summer!
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
Saturday, May 25, 2013
Cloud Atlas: Check!
I finished Cloud Atlas. Mind blown. Definitely was an experience through time and through characters that left me questioning what actually happened in the book and which characters may have been reincarnates of each other. It made me realize that humans are not so different from each other, our ancestors, and those yet to come. Good job, David Mitchell.
My life amounts to no more than one drop in a limitless ocean. Yet what is any ocean, but a multitude of drops? (pg. 509)
Next up: Lord of the Rings Return of the King, I promise!! I want this series over and done with. Then what? No idea. Hopefully I'll be done with that book by November, haha.
My life amounts to no more than one drop in a limitless ocean. Yet what is any ocean, but a multitude of drops? (pg. 509)
Next up: Lord of the Rings Return of the King, I promise!! I want this series over and done with. Then what? No idea. Hopefully I'll be done with that book by November, haha.
Thursday, March 14, 2013
Life of Pi: the Movie
I never intended this to be a movie blog, but last night I watched Life of Pi. Originally, when it came out, I wasn't interested in watching it because it took me long enough to get through the book and was not too willing to watch 2 hours of a seasick man and tiger on a boat in the middle of the ocean. However, after it won so many Oscars, I reconsidered and wanted to see what all the buzz was about. I enjoyed the story but after a while it became more and more tedious. However, the movie kept me captivated the entire time. I loved (as in the book) the beginning with all the Indian culture and bright colors. And I had forgotten all the religious aspects of the book, so it was a good chance for me to rediscover the main theme of the book. (And it definitely cleared up my question about how they did not know the tiger was in the boat.)
Some quotes I liked:
"You only need to convert to three more religions Piscine, and you'll spend your life on holiday."
"Above all, don't lose hope"
Adult Pi Patel: Can I ask you something? I've told you two stories about what happened out on the ocean. Neither explains what caused the sinking of the ship, and no one can prove which story is true and which is not. In both stories, the ship sinks, my family dies, and I suffer.
Writer: True.
Adult Pi Patel: So which story do you prefer?
Writer: The one with the tiger. That's the better story.
Adult Pi Patel: Thank you. And so it goes with God.
Some quotes I liked:
"You only need to convert to three more religions Piscine, and you'll spend your life on holiday."
"Above all, don't lose hope"
Adult Pi Patel: Can I ask you something? I've told you two stories about what happened out on the ocean. Neither explains what caused the sinking of the ship, and no one can prove which story is true and which is not. In both stories, the ship sinks, my family dies, and I suffer.
Writer: True.
Adult Pi Patel: So which story do you prefer?
Writer: The one with the tiger. That's the better story.
Adult Pi Patel: Thank you. And so it goes with God.
Monday, February 25, 2013
Cloud Atlas: 28% and 3/11 sections down
At my last update, I recapped the first section (Pacific Journal of Adam Ewing) and most of the second (Letters from Zedelghem). I have just finished section 3 (Half Lives: The First Louisa Rey Mystery)
Toward the end of Letters from Zedelghem, Frobisher continues to get visits from Jocasta. One night, while Jocasta is "visiting," Ayres comes in needing Frobisher's services because he has woken up during the night with a song in his head that he needs to write down immediately. He then warns Frobisher that his wife can be a flirt, and asks Frobisher if his wife has made any advances. Frobisher lies and says no. He then gets an offer from Ayres to stay for another year, which he is contemplating as the section ends.
The sections are getting better and better. While I did not enjoy the first section, I liked the second and was sad to see it end. However, the third section, which takes place in California in the 70's, was even better, and now I'm sad to see that one end as well.
Louisa Rey is the daughter of a now deceased famous reporter, who is now a reporter herself. She has recently been dumped, and lives in an apartment in a town near Los Angeles. She is friends with her 11 year old neighbor who has a rough home life, and who crosses the balconies of the complex to visit Louisa. One day, Louisa and Rufus Sixsmith (the recipient of Frobisher's letters), now in his 60's, become trapped in an elevator due to a brownout. Sixsmith is one of 12 scientists working on a nuclear power plant(?) or some kind of nuclear project called HYDRA. Sixsmith's research has led him to the conclusion that the reactor (or whatever it is) is not safe due to the possibility that it will fail and melt down, and he prints his findings in a report. However, the company he works for tries to cover this up, and tells the scientists to keep their mouths shut. Sixsmith is the only scientist of the 12 who is having a hard time with this, and he lets something slip to Louisa about his conflicted thoughts. Louisa then attends the opening of the reactor in an attempt to get a good story out of it for her magazine, and finds herself wandering the halls of the building looking for Sixsmith's office and report. When she finds it, she finds Isaac Sachs looking through Sixsmith's work as well, but then gets escorted back to the party by the PR rep, Fay Li.
At some point, Sixsmith gets a call from an anonymous source (Sachs?) that he is no longer safe in California and should return to England, his home country, immediately. Sixsmith is skeptical, but complies. He is unable to get a flight until the next day, and stays in a hotel in the meantime. During his stay, he is murdered by Bill Smoke, an employee of the reactor company that is sent to forever silence employees who speak out against the company. However, the press and police rule that his death was a suicide, something that Louisa refuses to believe. She then tries even harder to get a copy of the report and go public with it. Eventually, she runs into Isaac Sachs again, who gets drunk at another event at the plant and agrees to help Louisa find the report. He does, and leaves it in her car. However, the top executives, including Smoke, get wind of this and follow Louisa to the plant. When she gets there, Smoke hits her car and it ends up in the water.
End of section (DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNN!!!!!)
That was definitely my favorite section so far, although it's really difficult to compare them since they are all so different. I hope the next section will be just as good. While this one was clearly a thriller (I haven't read a lot of thrillers, so I'm not sure if they are all like this, but I found it very similar to Stieg Larsson's The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (side note: I just rented the Swedish version of the movie and have yet to see the American one) in the speed, the way the narrative jumped around between characters to show the actions of everyone, and how the main character is a journalist looking to expose information and solve a murder) the next is apparently more comedic in nature. And it looks like the one after that is completely written in interview form.
Here are the connections I've found so far:
-Louisa and Frobisher both have comet tattoos on their shoulderblades
-Frobisher finds the first half of Ewing's journal at Zedelghem
-Louisa orders Frobisher's "Cloud Atlas" sextet (gasp! I knew the title would reveal itself eventually)
-Frobisher and Sixsmith were friends
I'm sure there will be more, and I'm predicting it will really come together as we go backward through time in the second half of the book. But for now I'm more than halfway to the half, which is pretty good for only a couple of days (even if they were vacation days).
Toward the end of Letters from Zedelghem, Frobisher continues to get visits from Jocasta. One night, while Jocasta is "visiting," Ayres comes in needing Frobisher's services because he has woken up during the night with a song in his head that he needs to write down immediately. He then warns Frobisher that his wife can be a flirt, and asks Frobisher if his wife has made any advances. Frobisher lies and says no. He then gets an offer from Ayres to stay for another year, which he is contemplating as the section ends.
The sections are getting better and better. While I did not enjoy the first section, I liked the second and was sad to see it end. However, the third section, which takes place in California in the 70's, was even better, and now I'm sad to see that one end as well.
Louisa Rey is the daughter of a now deceased famous reporter, who is now a reporter herself. She has recently been dumped, and lives in an apartment in a town near Los Angeles. She is friends with her 11 year old neighbor who has a rough home life, and who crosses the balconies of the complex to visit Louisa. One day, Louisa and Rufus Sixsmith (the recipient of Frobisher's letters), now in his 60's, become trapped in an elevator due to a brownout. Sixsmith is one of 12 scientists working on a nuclear power plant(?) or some kind of nuclear project called HYDRA. Sixsmith's research has led him to the conclusion that the reactor (or whatever it is) is not safe due to the possibility that it will fail and melt down, and he prints his findings in a report. However, the company he works for tries to cover this up, and tells the scientists to keep their mouths shut. Sixsmith is the only scientist of the 12 who is having a hard time with this, and he lets something slip to Louisa about his conflicted thoughts. Louisa then attends the opening of the reactor in an attempt to get a good story out of it for her magazine, and finds herself wandering the halls of the building looking for Sixsmith's office and report. When she finds it, she finds Isaac Sachs looking through Sixsmith's work as well, but then gets escorted back to the party by the PR rep, Fay Li.
At some point, Sixsmith gets a call from an anonymous source (Sachs?) that he is no longer safe in California and should return to England, his home country, immediately. Sixsmith is skeptical, but complies. He is unable to get a flight until the next day, and stays in a hotel in the meantime. During his stay, he is murdered by Bill Smoke, an employee of the reactor company that is sent to forever silence employees who speak out against the company. However, the press and police rule that his death was a suicide, something that Louisa refuses to believe. She then tries even harder to get a copy of the report and go public with it. Eventually, she runs into Isaac Sachs again, who gets drunk at another event at the plant and agrees to help Louisa find the report. He does, and leaves it in her car. However, the top executives, including Smoke, get wind of this and follow Louisa to the plant. When she gets there, Smoke hits her car and it ends up in the water.
End of section (DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNN!!!!!)
That was definitely my favorite section so far, although it's really difficult to compare them since they are all so different. I hope the next section will be just as good. While this one was clearly a thriller (I haven't read a lot of thrillers, so I'm not sure if they are all like this, but I found it very similar to Stieg Larsson's The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (side note: I just rented the Swedish version of the movie and have yet to see the American one) in the speed, the way the narrative jumped around between characters to show the actions of everyone, and how the main character is a journalist looking to expose information and solve a murder) the next is apparently more comedic in nature. And it looks like the one after that is completely written in interview form.
Here are the connections I've found so far:
-Louisa and Frobisher both have comet tattoos on their shoulderblades
-Frobisher finds the first half of Ewing's journal at Zedelghem
-Louisa orders Frobisher's "Cloud Atlas" sextet (gasp! I knew the title would reveal itself eventually)
-Frobisher and Sixsmith were friends
I'm sure there will be more, and I'm predicting it will really come together as we go backward through time in the second half of the book. But for now I'm more than halfway to the half, which is pretty good for only a couple of days (even if they were vacation days).
Thursday, February 21, 2013
Finally Started Cloud Atlas
I have finally started reading again. This time I am working my way (slowly) through Cloud Atlas, which I received as a gift this fall and had a hard time getting into. The format of the book is very interesting, and it has been compared to nesting dolls. It's as if Mitchell laid six stories on top of each other and then folded them into a book. Basically, the book is comprised of six stories, and all but five are interrupted about halfway through and finished later in the book in reverse order. The only uninterrupted story is the sixth story, which is in the middle of the book. It is sandwiched by the two halves of the fifth story, and so on, so that the story begins and ends with the first story.
The first story is called The Pacific Journal of Adam Ewing. Adam is on a journey on a boat headed toward California and at some point he discovers someone on the boat who is not supposed to be there (I think). To be honest, I found this section kind of dry and uninteresting, and I had a hard time following the action since there was not much of it at first. By the time anything happened, I was so lost that I was unsure of what was going on, but not lost enough to want to reread. I figured if I moved on maybe it would become clear later. (I advise my students against this, and I would tell them that not knowing what is going on is a red flag and to go back and reread or choose an easier book....I guess this is an instance of "do as I say not as I do"). Actually, I thought something was wrong with my book at first, as this section cuts off mid-sentence, only to resume over 400 pages later. I had to look it up online to see if that was indeed correct or if somehow there was a printing error. Luckily, that section only lasted about 40 pages, but nevertheless it took me months to get through.
The next section, Letters From Zedelghem, which I am in the middle of now, is much less dry. It's written in epistolary form, from Robert Frobisher, a broke and disowned musician, to his friend Sixsmith. So far, Frobisher has run out of money and jumped out of a hotel window to avoid paying his bill. He took a train to the Netherlands and borrowed a bike from a police officer to ride to the chateau of a famous composer, Vyvyan Ayres. Ayres is going blind and slowly dying of syphilis, so Frobisher convinces him he needs someone to help him write down his musical compositions. So far they have written a short piece that is the talk of the town. Vyvyan and his wife Jocasta have a bitchy daughter named Eva who is amusing to read about. She is skeptical of Frobisher, and often brings up his family and money, and wonders aloud to all present why he never receives letters or things from home. Frobisher has Sixsmith write him a few letters just to cover up the fact that he has been disowned by his family. Recently, Frobisher and Jocasta have started an affair, which Eva is starting to pick up on, but no one has figured out yet. (It was mentioned that Jocasta has not slept with Ayres since he contracted syphilis, just to clear that up since I was wondering about it as well). I have about 15 more pages of this section to go until reaching section 3, which is entitled Half-Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery. Hopefully that section will be good as well, but I am going to miss Frobisher.
I will leave you with some quotes that I enjoyed. A few made me laugh out loud as I was reading. Good thing I was home.
"A half-read book is a half-finished love affair." (p. 64) (If that is true I have many love affairs to finish)
[Eva is mad that her father likes Frobisher so well and has offered him a better room, and sarcastically exclaims that he should be added to the will and given part of the estate. Ayres exclaims that it's the first good idea she's had in her entire life and tells her that at least he earns his keep]
"My hosts wouldn't hear my apologies, they said Eva should be apologizing to me, that she has to lose her pre-Copernican view of a universe revolving around herself. Music to my ears. Also re: Eva, she and twenty classmates are bound for Switzerland v. soon to study at a sister school for a couple of months. More music! It'll be like having a rotten tooth fall out." (p. 66)
"The meadow is turning yellow, the gardener is anxious about fires, farmers are worried about the harvest, but show me a placid farmer and I'll show you a sane conductor." (p. 71)
The first story is called The Pacific Journal of Adam Ewing. Adam is on a journey on a boat headed toward California and at some point he discovers someone on the boat who is not supposed to be there (I think). To be honest, I found this section kind of dry and uninteresting, and I had a hard time following the action since there was not much of it at first. By the time anything happened, I was so lost that I was unsure of what was going on, but not lost enough to want to reread. I figured if I moved on maybe it would become clear later. (I advise my students against this, and I would tell them that not knowing what is going on is a red flag and to go back and reread or choose an easier book....I guess this is an instance of "do as I say not as I do"). Actually, I thought something was wrong with my book at first, as this section cuts off mid-sentence, only to resume over 400 pages later. I had to look it up online to see if that was indeed correct or if somehow there was a printing error. Luckily, that section only lasted about 40 pages, but nevertheless it took me months to get through.
The next section, Letters From Zedelghem, which I am in the middle of now, is much less dry. It's written in epistolary form, from Robert Frobisher, a broke and disowned musician, to his friend Sixsmith. So far, Frobisher has run out of money and jumped out of a hotel window to avoid paying his bill. He took a train to the Netherlands and borrowed a bike from a police officer to ride to the chateau of a famous composer, Vyvyan Ayres. Ayres is going blind and slowly dying of syphilis, so Frobisher convinces him he needs someone to help him write down his musical compositions. So far they have written a short piece that is the talk of the town. Vyvyan and his wife Jocasta have a bitchy daughter named Eva who is amusing to read about. She is skeptical of Frobisher, and often brings up his family and money, and wonders aloud to all present why he never receives letters or things from home. Frobisher has Sixsmith write him a few letters just to cover up the fact that he has been disowned by his family. Recently, Frobisher and Jocasta have started an affair, which Eva is starting to pick up on, but no one has figured out yet. (It was mentioned that Jocasta has not slept with Ayres since he contracted syphilis, just to clear that up since I was wondering about it as well). I have about 15 more pages of this section to go until reaching section 3, which is entitled Half-Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery. Hopefully that section will be good as well, but I am going to miss Frobisher.
I will leave you with some quotes that I enjoyed. A few made me laugh out loud as I was reading. Good thing I was home.
"A half-read book is a half-finished love affair." (p. 64) (If that is true I have many love affairs to finish)
[Eva is mad that her father likes Frobisher so well and has offered him a better room, and sarcastically exclaims that he should be added to the will and given part of the estate. Ayres exclaims that it's the first good idea she's had in her entire life and tells her that at least he earns his keep]
"My hosts wouldn't hear my apologies, they said Eva should be apologizing to me, that she has to lose her pre-Copernican view of a universe revolving around herself. Music to my ears. Also re: Eva, she and twenty classmates are bound for Switzerland v. soon to study at a sister school for a couple of months. More music! It'll be like having a rotten tooth fall out." (p. 66)
"The meadow is turning yellow, the gardener is anxious about fires, farmers are worried about the harvest, but show me a placid farmer and I'll show you a sane conductor." (p. 71)
Saturday, October 20, 2012
Anna Karenina: check! (again)
I finished Anna Karenina for the third time, and am now ready for the movie to come out next month. I've already written papers and journal entries on this book for school twice, so I don't want to rehash it here, but I will leave you with a couple of my favorite quotes from the book before I move onto Sherlock Holmes.
The first comes early on in the book, where Anna is surrounded by society people who are talking about someone who had recently had an affair.
"What I think is," said Anna, toying with the glove she had pulled off, "that there are as many minds as there are heads, so there are as many kinds of love as there are hearts." (p. 163 )
The next one comes from a visit between Dolly and Anna after she has been shunned from society.
"No, no, tell me what you really think of my position. What is your opinion of it?" she (Anna) asked.
...
"I don't think anything," she (Dolly) said. "I've always loved you, and when you love someone, you love the whole person, just as he or she is, and not as you would like them to be." (p. 709)
The third comes from Dolly's visit to Anna's house toward the end of the book, when she feels uncomfortable with the company and wishes to go home.
"Dolly did not feel particularly cheerful while they were playing. She did not like the flirting Veslovsky carried on with Anna and the general unnaturalness of grown-up people carrying on a children's game in the absence of children. But not to disconcert the others and to while away the time in some way or other, she joined the players and pretended to be enjoying herself. All that day she had the strange feeling that she was taking part in a theatrical performance with better actors than herself and that her own bad performance was spoiling the whole show" (p. 733)
I could definitely relate to the third one especially. Next time I update it will probably be about Sherlock Holmes (or Cloud Atlas, which I recently received as a random gift). Ciao!
The first comes early on in the book, where Anna is surrounded by society people who are talking about someone who had recently had an affair.
"What I think is," said Anna, toying with the glove she had pulled off, "that there are as many minds as there are heads, so there are as many kinds of love as there are hearts." (p. 163 )
The next one comes from a visit between Dolly and Anna after she has been shunned from society.
"No, no, tell me what you really think of my position. What is your opinion of it?" she (Anna) asked.
...
"I don't think anything," she (Dolly) said. "I've always loved you, and when you love someone, you love the whole person, just as he or she is, and not as you would like them to be." (p. 709)
The third comes from Dolly's visit to Anna's house toward the end of the book, when she feels uncomfortable with the company and wishes to go home.
"Dolly did not feel particularly cheerful while they were playing. She did not like the flirting Veslovsky carried on with Anna and the general unnaturalness of grown-up people carrying on a children's game in the absence of children. But not to disconcert the others and to while away the time in some way or other, she joined the players and pretended to be enjoying herself. All that day she had the strange feeling that she was taking part in a theatrical performance with better actors than herself and that her own bad performance was spoiling the whole show" (p. 733)
I could definitely relate to the third one especially. Next time I update it will probably be about Sherlock Holmes (or Cloud Atlas, which I recently received as a random gift). Ciao!
Saturday, September 1, 2012
Anna Karenina
So rather than read another book off the list, why not read one I've already completed...twice? Apparently Anna Karenina is coming out on film (again) this November, and since it's one of my favorites (besides Gone With The Wind, Because of Winn Dixie, and Charlotte's Web) I decided to reread it and prepare for its upcoming film (re)debut. (There were a lot of parentheses in that paragraph, my apologies).
Currently I'm about halfway through, and I just realized that I hadn't updated since what was technically still spring. That means I spent the summer doing.......ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! My plan was to finish LOTR (success rate over the past 2 years for that plan, 0%, or maybe even negative. It's a pretty poor plan since it never works), but like all past attempts, it failed. Then a friend alerted me to the new Anna Karenina movie, and here I am. On page 450 of 940, so almost half. Yes, I am that person who not only reads a Russian novel on summer vacation, but REreads a Russian novel on summer vacation.
So far we have rejected Levin, in-debt Oblonsky, oblivious on purpose Dolly, cheating Anna, wimpy Karenin, and annoying Vronsky. Also frail Kitty, almost forgot about her. They are all at a dinner party (except Anna and Vronsky) and Levin is about to propose to Kitty again. Hopefully everything works out this time.
I don't often reread books, mostly because there are so many I want to read for the first time, but I do love picking up a book I've enjoyed in the past. It's like visiting old friends and reminiscing about old times. I had a kid tell me once, when I asked if she wouldn't mind rereading a book for class that she had read on her own, "a favorite book is like an old friend." How true she was! Other books I've reread include Harry Potter and.....I'm not sure what else. Any of my favorites I guess. I plan to reread Gone with the Wind at some point. Maybe next summer.
Reading Anna Karenina has made me very curious about War and Peace. I love Tolstoy's writing style, and as long as I keep a character list, I should find it just as enjoyable (except for it's obvious length, which in my copy is 1256 with a 102 page epilogue....so 1358). That will be quite a project!
After I finish AK, I have a couple books in mind to tackle next. I normally would say Return of the King, and if I get in a mood where I just want to get it over with, I may just go for it. Another option is Les Miserables, since the movie for that is coming out in December, although that's another long one that I'll definitely have to commit to. I also still have Middlemarch sitting here, as well as Midnight's Children, and a couple others that are not on the list. Other options include finishing up the Narnia series. We'll see what happens with them. But anyway, here it is September 1st, and I've still only read 2 books from the list. This one doesn't count either since I've already read it. So I'm pretty confident that I won't be meeting my goal, but if all goes well I'll maybe get to 5.
Currently I'm about halfway through, and I just realized that I hadn't updated since what was technically still spring. That means I spent the summer doing.......ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! My plan was to finish LOTR (success rate over the past 2 years for that plan, 0%, or maybe even negative. It's a pretty poor plan since it never works), but like all past attempts, it failed. Then a friend alerted me to the new Anna Karenina movie, and here I am. On page 450 of 940, so almost half. Yes, I am that person who not only reads a Russian novel on summer vacation, but REreads a Russian novel on summer vacation.
So far we have rejected Levin, in-debt Oblonsky, oblivious on purpose Dolly, cheating Anna, wimpy Karenin, and annoying Vronsky. Also frail Kitty, almost forgot about her. They are all at a dinner party (except Anna and Vronsky) and Levin is about to propose to Kitty again. Hopefully everything works out this time.
I don't often reread books, mostly because there are so many I want to read for the first time, but I do love picking up a book I've enjoyed in the past. It's like visiting old friends and reminiscing about old times. I had a kid tell me once, when I asked if she wouldn't mind rereading a book for class that she had read on her own, "a favorite book is like an old friend." How true she was! Other books I've reread include Harry Potter and.....I'm not sure what else. Any of my favorites I guess. I plan to reread Gone with the Wind at some point. Maybe next summer.
Reading Anna Karenina has made me very curious about War and Peace. I love Tolstoy's writing style, and as long as I keep a character list, I should find it just as enjoyable (except for it's obvious length, which in my copy is 1256 with a 102 page epilogue....so 1358). That will be quite a project!
After I finish AK, I have a couple books in mind to tackle next. I normally would say Return of the King, and if I get in a mood where I just want to get it over with, I may just go for it. Another option is Les Miserables, since the movie for that is coming out in December, although that's another long one that I'll definitely have to commit to. I also still have Middlemarch sitting here, as well as Midnight's Children, and a couple others that are not on the list. Other options include finishing up the Narnia series. We'll see what happens with them. But anyway, here it is September 1st, and I've still only read 2 books from the list. This one doesn't count either since I've already read it. So I'm pretty confident that I won't be meeting my goal, but if all goes well I'll maybe get to 5.
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