Tuesday, January 8, 2019

Happy 2019!
and as you can see from my sad posts in all the other categories besides the reading Journal, not much has happened in terms of the projects I had determined to accomplish in 2018. 
I did read a lot of books though and that is something, even with all the bike commuting, I still managed to read loads.

So I begin another reading year and in December we went to the independent bookstore, Book Culture owned by a childhood school buddy of Harley's.  Lora was in town, and for my big birthday she bought me a few things. Here's what was purchased in the past few months:

December:
  • Infinite Jest- David Foster Wallace
  • What to Read and Why- Francine Prose
  • These Truths: History of the United States- Jill Lepore
  • Life of Pi- Yann Martel (for Hiro)
  • A Confederacy of Dunces- John Kennedy Toole 
  • Poisonwood Bible- Barbara Kingsolver (for Moxie)
  • Outliers: The Story of Success- Malcolm Gladwell (for Hiro)
  • Asimov's Guide to the Bible- Isaac Asimov
  • Year of Wonder: Classical Music For Every Day- Clemency Burton-Hill 
  • The Vanderbeekers and the Hidden Garden- Karina Yan Glaser (Hiro, author event)
  •  How To Sell Your Family to the Aliens- Paul Noth (Hiro, author event)
  • Gertie Milk and the Keeper of Lost Things-Simon Van Booy (Hiro author event)
  • Gertie Milk and the Greak Keeper Rescue- Simon Van Booy (author event)
  • See You in the Cosmos- Cheng, Jack (Hiro)
November:
  • Inconspicuous Consumption: An Obsessive Look at the Stuff We Take for Granted, from the Everyday to the Obscure-Lukas, Paul
  • To Kill a Mockingbird- Harper Lee (for Hiro)
October:
  • Waiting For Godot- Samuel Beckett 
  • 80 Things to Do When You Turn 80-Mark Evan, Chimsky (editor)



My Infinite Jest diary of 2019.

Week 1: cut the book in half, to make volume 1 & 2, copied the cover on card stock and taped it on to the second half, so I don't have to carry the whole damn book around.

Week 2: Skipped Tom Bissell's intro and find the first chapter to be manageable, thinking, what's the big deal? This is good!

Week 3: Feeling like I'm intellectually in the loop, when I hear Daniel Radcliffe's character mention Infinite Jest in "The Lifespan of a Fact"

Week 4: on page 21, in the middle of a 5 page paragraph. All I can think every few seconds is...wait that sentence could have started a new paragraph, why didn't he? Stop already! There's another place he could have hit return, indent! Oh God this paragraph goes on for another page! To be followed by another 3 page paragraph! Really? WTF...
Reading Journal
December 5, 2018


Just started two books.
The Labyrinth of the Spirits by Carlos Ruiz Zafon- a sequel to the other two, which I had read a few years ago and I was excited to read this new novel to continue the story which I had loved….however after the first chapter, I abandoned it.  Maybe I’m in a different place in my reading life than before so the story of the Sempere family no longer interests me.  Or maybe it’s the translation with many cliches that I cant get into.

Example: “….I must declare, and I do declare that you, Daniel Sempere Gispert, tender youngster on the verge of maturity, despite the thin faith you feel at this moment in yourself and in your feasibility as a paterfamilias, are and will be an exemplary father, even if , generally speaking, sometimes you seem born the day before yesterday and wetter behind the ears than a babe in the woods.” 

Uggg, and this is just half of the sentence.

The other one, which I am purposefully reading slowly to savor it as long as possible is the new novel by Barbara Kingsolver, the author of The Poisonwood bible.  (also fabulous!)...
but then the slow savouring tactic backfires when the due date comes and goes, I begin accruing fines and  the library won't let me renew it since it's a new book.  So sadly I had to relinquish it on page 27.  Now it's back in my queue for requested books.