And once again the shame I feel for not having read a lot of classics falls upon me. There are three books in particular I feel I ought to read: Charles Dickens' Great Expectations, Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre and Bret Easton Ellis' American Psycho.
I feel I ought to read Great Expectations because I keep getting it mixed up with Jane Eyre. As I understand it, they are totally different stories but both feature a mad old lady (Miss Havisham and doodlesquat's wife... Mrs Rochester).
Jane Eyre I know I've wanted to read for a long time because I wanted to be one of very few people who have read Jean Rhys' Wide Sargasso Sea (its prequel) before Jane Eyre itself. I read Wide Sargasso Sea about a decade ago (so long ago I've forgotten what happens), but for reasons I can't remember I never got around to reading Jane Eyre. Another reason I want to read Jane Eyre (and more classics in general) is to understand the jokes in Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next books.
And American Psycho—I started reading this and got about three chapters in (liked it, wanted to keep going), then my sister, who owned the book, lent it to a friend of hers. Before she got it back she had moved to Canberra and I have never had enough motivation to borrow it from the library (is it banned?) or buy it since.
There you have it, the shame.
Day 24 – A book that you wish more people would’ve read
Day 25 – A character who you can relate to the most
Day 26 – A book that changed your opinion about something
Day 27 – The most surprising plot twist or ending
Day 28 – Favourite title
Day 29 – A book everyone hated but you liked
Day 30 – Your favourite book of all time
I'd like to thank Sarah Jansen for her tweet about this, as well as The Literary Gothamite and Confessions of a Book Lush for the good idea.
03 May, 2011
02 May, 2011
#22: Favourite book you own
Well, this is sort of a stupid meme topic. Who wouldn't own their favourite book? I have to agree with The Literary Gothamite and Confessions of a Book Lush that today's meme topic is conspiring with #17 to make me reveal my favourite book before day #30.Instead, I'm going to tell you that of the books that I own, my favourite book title is I have a Bed Made of Buttermilk Pancakes by Jaclyn Moriarty, which is close to having the best book cover as well.
However, the best book cover... actually, I don't have a lot of books with awesome covers as I tend to find out about books through word-of-mouth or read a review so the cover usually doesn't do anything for me.
But below are a few that I like. They are all slightly sinister.
Carter Beats the Devil by Glen David Gold
Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger
... and anything by Josh Kirby for Terry Pratchett's Discworld series.
I once bought a calendar featuring Kirby's Discword art and ended up liking every picture so much I preserved them all by wrapping them around exercise books. Most of these ended up with my boyfriend because I don't actually use exercise books, but what the hey.
Day 23 – A book you've wanted to read for a long time but still haven’t
Day 24 – A book that you wish more people would’ve read
Day 25 – A character who you can relate to the most
Day 26 – A book that changed your opinion about something
Day 27 – The most surprising plot twist or ending
Day 28 – Favourite title
Day 29 – A book everyone hated but you liked
Day 30 – Your favourite book of all time
I'd like to thank Sarah Jansen for her tweet about this, as well as The Literary Gothamite and Confessions of a Book Lush for the good idea.
01 May, 2011
#21: Favourite book from your childhood
Wow, childhood is really very broad.
I'll start with early childhood. My favourite book when I was three would have been Dr Seuss' Hop on Pop. I have not seen this book for more than 25 years and I still remember the pictures and some of the content ("We like to hop on top of pop / STOP", "Pup up, Brown down" > this has to be a cricket-related headline one day).
When I was able to read novels I was heavily into Enid Blyton. My word that woman was prolific. I read quite a lot of Wishing Chair and Faraway Tree books as well as most of the Famous Five series, but my favourite was the Adventure series. I had a three-book omnibus of The Island of Adventure, The Castle of Adventure, and The Valley of Adventure. I can count an omnibus as my favourite book, can't I?
(Oh my! They have all eight books in the series for the Kindle. My omnibus was so careworn I think my mum made me throw it away. I'm so tempted to buy them... UPDATE: Blytons bought)
In my early adolescence I read Babysitters Club books, Nancy Drew novels and those schlocky horror stories by people like RL Stine, DE Athkins and Christopher Pike. The one I re-read several times, because it had such a beautiful ending, was Carolyn Keene's The Clue in the Crumbling Wall, #22 in the Nancy Drew series. And you know what? I only just discovered via Wikipedia that Carolyn Keene was a collective pseudonym.
Sorry to disappoint you, I was not some kind of freak wunderkind who read classics at the age of 10. For some reason people still see me like that.
Day 22 – Favourite book you own
Day 23 – A book you've wanted to read for a long time but still haven’t
Day 24 – A book that you wish more people would’ve read
Day 25 – A character who you can relate to the most
Day 26 – A book that changed your opinion about something
Day 27 – The most surprising plot twist or ending
Day 28 – Favourite title
Day 29 – A book everyone hated but you liked
Day 30 – Your favourite book of all time
I'd like to thank Sarah Jansen for her tweet about this, as well as The Literary Gothamite and Confessions of a Book Lush for the good idea.
I'll start with early childhood. My favourite book when I was three would have been Dr Seuss' Hop on Pop. I have not seen this book for more than 25 years and I still remember the pictures and some of the content ("We like to hop on top of pop / STOP", "Pup up, Brown down" > this has to be a cricket-related headline one day).
When I was able to read novels I was heavily into Enid Blyton. My word that woman was prolific. I read quite a lot of Wishing Chair and Faraway Tree books as well as most of the Famous Five series, but my favourite was the Adventure series. I had a three-book omnibus of The Island of Adventure, The Castle of Adventure, and The Valley of Adventure. I can count an omnibus as my favourite book, can't I?
(Oh my! They have all eight books in the series for the Kindle. My omnibus was so careworn I think my mum made me throw it away. I'm so tempted to buy them... UPDATE: Blytons bought)
In my early adolescence I read Babysitters Club books, Nancy Drew novels and those schlocky horror stories by people like RL Stine, DE Athkins and Christopher Pike. The one I re-read several times, because it had such a beautiful ending, was Carolyn Keene's The Clue in the Crumbling Wall, #22 in the Nancy Drew series. And you know what? I only just discovered via Wikipedia that Carolyn Keene was a collective pseudonym.
Sorry to disappoint you, I was not some kind of freak wunderkind who read classics at the age of 10. For some reason people still see me like that.
Day 22 – Favourite book you own
Day 23 – A book you've wanted to read for a long time but still haven’t
Day 24 – A book that you wish more people would’ve read
Day 25 – A character who you can relate to the most
Day 26 – A book that changed your opinion about something
Day 27 – The most surprising plot twist or ending
Day 28 – Favourite title
Day 29 – A book everyone hated but you liked
Day 30 – Your favourite book of all time
I'd like to thank Sarah Jansen for her tweet about this, as well as The Literary Gothamite and Confessions of a Book Lush for the good idea.
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