BooksBooksBooks

HP7

Thu, 16 Jun 2011 11:42:59 -0700

To start off my summer reading, I just finished Harry Potter 7. I haven’t read any of the HP books since reading this one the day it came out almost four years ago (wow!), and I am so glad that I did. There were definitely things that had not stuck with me from the first reading, but I definitely enjoyed this time through just as much, if not more than before.

With this reading, I realized that Neville is probably my favorite character. A favorite character not being something I had really considered before. Also, I actually enjoyed the epilogue with this read through. Which is weird, because I was adamantly against it the first time. Still don’t like the whole Albus Severus thing …

“Shelf-Pod is a private residence and study building,...

Tue, 14 Jun 2011 11:52:20 -0700

“Shelf-Pod is a private residence and study building, located in Osaka prefecture, Japan. The client owns an extensive collection of books on the subject of Islamic history, so he requested that we create this building with the maximum capacity for its storage and exhibition.”

*Click-through link to more pictures.

Summer Reading List

Sun, 29 May 2011 16:23:00 -0700

Last day of the school year for me is Thursday, June 9th. The weekend will consist of cleaning, packing, and moving back home for the summer. A summer for which I have almost no plans whatsoever. For the first time in years, I will not be taking summer classes nor will I be working. I am ecstatic, for this of course means that I will have all the time in the world (well, three months of it at least) to spend reading. So here, without further ado, I write down my summer reading list:

American Gods — Neil Gaiman

Atonement — Ian McEwan

Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress — Dai Sijie

The Blind Assassin — Margaret Atwood

A Clockwork Orange — Anthony Burgess

Crime and Punishment — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

The Corrections — Jonathan Franzen

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime — Mark Haddon

Death Comes for the Archbishop — Willa Cather

Dracula — Bram Stoker

Empire Falls — Richard Russo

Far From the Maddening Crowd — Thomas Hardy

Freedom — Jonathan Franzen

Game of Thrones — George R. R. Martin

Great Expectations — Charles Dickens

The Finkler Question — Howard Jacobson

The Imperfectionists — Tom Rachman

Infinite Jest — David Foster Wallace

Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell — Susanna Clarke

Jude the Obscure — Thomas Hardy

Madame Bovary — Gustave Flaubert

Middlesex — Jeffrey Eugenides

Mrs. Dalloway — Virginia Woolf

The Name of the Rose — Umberto Eco

The Namesake — Jhumpa Lahiri

Never Let Me Go — Kazuo Ishiguro

Neverwhere — Neil Gaiman

On the Road — Jack Keroua

Oryx and Crake — Margaret Atwood

Persuasion — Jane Austen

The Road — Cormac McCarthy

Tinkers — Paul Harding

A Visit From the Goon Squad — Jennifer Egan

White Teeth — Zadie Smith

The White Tiger — Aravind Adiga

Wolf Hall — Hilary Mantel

Wuthering Heights — Emily Brontë

"‎You want weapons? We’re in a library! Books! The best weapons in the world! This room’s..."

Sun, 15 May 2011 21:44:17 -0700

“‎You want weapons? We’re in a library! Books! The best weapons in the world! This room’s the greatest arsenal we could have—arm yourselves!”

- The Doctor; Dr. Who, episode “Tooth and Claw”

"Did you wear through your sandals that are on your feet, and did you tear your garments that are on..."

Fri, 22 Apr 2011 09:47:00 -0700

“Did you wear through your sandals that are on your feet, and did you tear your garments that are on you while you were transiting heaven and earth?”

- Ancient Egyptian pick-up lines for the win!

I found this on page 110 of The Literature of Ancient Egypt, a text used for my Ancient Egyptian Religion course. It might not have exactly been a pick-up line in context, but I can’t help but be amused by how similar this line is to today’s “Did it hurt when you fell from heaven?”

I haven't read very much for "fun" . . .

Fri, 22 Apr 2011 09:24:27 -0700

… over this past year and a half. At least, not much outside of what’s been required of me for school. Then again, I also have a terrible memory, thanks to which I have trouble recalling what activities I took part in even the day before, so I could just be confused.

In the past eight months, I’ve probably read over 50 books for school. Some required by a class/teacher, some simply necessary to meet source requirements for a paper. Last quarter, I must have read a good 15 books alone about the biblical book of Jonah for a single paper. Granted, I’m pretty sure I now know everything there is to know about those two pages of the Bible. =|

That’s another book I’ve been reading a lot from lately. The Bible. A lot of it for classes (religious studies major), but on occasion I find myself reading it just for funsies. I would most definitely recommend it. The Hebrew Bible (Old Testament—sort of) in particular is beyond fascinating.

So yeah, that’s where I’m at so far as reading goes. It hasn’t been for pure pleasure in quite sometime, but at least it’s never been exactly painful.

Read any good books lately?

Fri, 22 Apr 2011 00:52:56 -0700

It’s been a while and I’m not sure if I’m actually returning to start-up this tumblr again, but I’m thinking a post here, right now, might motivate me to return tomorrow or the next day (when it’s not one in the morning) and post something more worthwhile. In the meantime, if any of you still follow this blog, read any good books lately?

The Book Cover Archive

Fri, 18 Sep 2009 07:50:45 -0700

The Book Cover Archive:

(via booklover)

(via architectureblog) Hi, can Bilbo come out to play today?

Wed, 16 Sep 2009 11:05:44 -0700

(via architectureblog)

Hi, can Bilbo come out to play today?

So I started reading The Poisonwood Bible a few days ago

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 08:07:00 -0700

but I have had to stop since heymikewaskom threw a fit on twitter about me reading ahead of the book club and so I will be putting that adventure on hold. Now I have to get ahold of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer, which is our first book club read. I’m excited!

libraryland: (via cavesoflilith) Personally, it’s always...

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 07:45:23 -0700

libraryland:

(via cavesoflilith)

Personally, it’s always been a goal of mine to get both in the library.

World's Greatest Libraries: Past and Present

Sat, 12 Sep 2009 09:29:52 -0700

World's Greatest Libraries: Past and Present

"Dark and stormy, the night is!"

Sat, 12 Sep 2009 07:58:01 -0700

libraryland:

inothernews:

From the book When Yoda Does Literary Cliches.

Haha. That took me a second longer than it should have, but quite funny.

What YA Lit is and isn’t

Fri, 11 Sep 2009 13:54:22 -0700

What YA Lit is and isn’t:

(via librarianpirate)

"As for you, my galvanized friend, you want a heart. You don’t know how lucky you are to not have..."

Fri, 11 Sep 2009 13:34:10 -0700

“As for you, my galvanized friend, you want a heart. You don’t know how lucky you are to not have one. Hearts will never be practical until they are made unbreakable.”

- The Wizard of Oz (via hopelesslymg) (via feelinganddreaming)

Bwahahahahaha What to Expect When You’re Expected: A...

Fri, 11 Sep 2009 10:56:00 -0700

Bwahahahahaha

What to Expect When You’re Expected: A Fetus’ Guide to the First Three Trimesters by David Javerbaum available October 13, 2009.

Some responses to your responses

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 15:11:57 -0700

mustardseedtrees: Several people who are planning to participate in the online book club I’m trying to put together recommended Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close as one of our reads. It looks like that will actually be our first one, too! How did you like it?

bitchpleeze: Hahaha, I’ve been meaning to pick up a copy of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. What did you think? Would Austen be pleased?

commentaire: I love the film adaptation of Stardust, but wasn’t too thrilled with the actual book. Though that may be because I had already fallen in love with the movie by the time I read it and so was biased toward the changes made for the film. Have you read anything else by Neil Gaiman?—I’m embarrassed to say that Stardust is the only one I’ve read.

kaylee: Did you read Lord of the Flies for school or for fun? Did you like it? It’s absolutely one of my favorite books. Also, best essay I’ve ever written was an analysis of LotF, so it holds a special place in my heart for that reason as well.

yellow-walls: I’m sorry you didn’t like The Iliad. I’ve only read parts of it, but I very much enjoyed The Odyssey. What didn’t you like about it? Or was it the having to read it for school that ruined it?

Everyone else who answered my last post: How did you like what you read? Would you recommend it? I’m always looking for books to add to my “to read” list.

What's the most recent book you've read?

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 13:47:32 -0700

The History of Love by Nicole Krauss

I'm about to throw a fit

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 13:33:27 -0700

girloffscript:

booksbooksbooks:

lemonadediary:

booksbooksbooks:

This morning my brother asks me to look over something he’s written for his English class (he just started college). So I read it, make a few adjustments, then inquire as to if it should be in MLA format. He says yes, so I put the paper into MLA format, which required rewriting his source citation and adjusting the heading and title.

A few minutes later, my brother returns to the computer and changes it all back. I ask him what he’s doing and he says he’s following the format his teacher used.

I WANT TO SHOOT HIS TEACHER IN THE FACE!

And all other English teachers that choose to have their students format their papers any which way they choose. I’m sorry, but it’s MLA or APA and that’s it. I don’t care what you want.

There’s also Chicago Manual, actually, in the social sciences especially. Don’t forget Chicago! Especially if it’s an entry-level writing class and he’s not an English major. Though I agree with you on the “different styles for different classes” thing. It’s annoying and confusing.

Fair enough. There are several options for acceptable formatting, but this teacher’s version was not one of them. My brother is also attending the same school I went to for the last two years, and I haven’t had any teachers or met any students who used anything but MLA—unless it was one of the crazies that make their own thing up because it’s a convenience for them to do so.

Mmmmmm….the new MLA 7 came out in the Spring, though most of those changes had to do with citations. What the prof could be doing is using a WAY outdated form of MLA, which I know some adjuncts at the local community college do. (Who really only cites once per paragraph? Lies! I say!)

Must have been a really outdated version if that’s the case. Speaking of which, I absolutely love the changes made for MLA 7.

Can I just say that I lovelovelove HBO Family programming?

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 08:04:43 -0700

Crashbox? Happily Ever After? Storybook Musicals? Animated Tales of the World? Goodnight Moon and Other Sleepytime Tales?

I’m almost twenty years old and I LOVE these shows. This stuff better still be around when I have kids. None of that Wow Wow Wubzy or Yo Gabba Gabba shenanigans for my progeny.