I had an ambitious summer reading list (to say nothing of the teetering stacks and bowing shelves of books -yet-to-read here at home) that I wanted to finish during summer, when I actually have time to read. During the school year, my reading-for-pleasure consists of rereading the same paragraphs night after night as I barely finish a page before falling asleep.
So, my (hedonistic-scale - I loved it! I hated it!) reviews:
The Namesake, Jhumpa Lahiri
I liked it - plain and simple. I like books that plop you down in the middle of another culture and just let you experience it through the text. This was one.
Wonderland, Michael Bamberger
A quick read about a year in the life of an American high school. Interesting, but nothing terribly fascinating. Best lines:
The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
This was a re-read for book club. I hadn't picked it up since high school, and was antsy to read it now that I'm (almost) a grown-up. A lot of ladies did not love it. I thought it was great, still. I'm sure I had more profound things to say about it two months ago.
A Separate Peace, John Knowles
Also a reread for book club. This and Catcher were my favorite books that I was ever assigned to read. I wound up reading A Separate Peace twice during high school. And so I was looking forward to re-reading, particularly since I teach at a boarding school now. I still like it, but I was expecting much more from it. It has given me a wonderful quotation, something I want to devote an entire blog entry to someday:
Notes on a Scandal, Zoe Heller
I loved this. It was such an easy read, and really fascinating. A total bait-and-switch. It's billed as a story about a teacher who has an affair with a student, but it's really about the predatory friendship that the teacher suffers at the hands of another teacher. Which is a far more captivating story. There were some passages that made my commonplace book.(1) Maybe I'll get up and grab it. Maybe later.
Okay, it's later.
All Loves Excelling, Josiah Bunting III
Exceptionally predictable. A decent beach-read, which is exactly where I read this. One portion made the commonplace. Again, later. Maybe. It's not as good as the other quoted text here.
The English Teacher, Lily King
A used-book-sale find. A pleasant read, interesting characters. A bit slow in parts, but enough character development to keep my interest.
Only Child, Siegel and Ulviller
I've already described my thoughts at length. Enjoy them.
Uncertainty: Einstein, Heisenberg, Bohr, and the Struggle for the Soul of Science, David Lindley
I'm so enjoying this book, but I've made it my bedstand book for six weeks now (thank you, OCPL online renewals...), which means that I collapse, exhausted, into bed and reread the same paragraph or half-page three nights in a row, like I reference up there^. Not a great way to read a book; I don't recommend it. I'd like to make it a point to finish this one, in one swoop. Maybe tomorrow, but that's highly unlikely.
There were many I didn't so much as even think about. Actually, that's not true. There are a few books that I at least obtained, even if I didn't read them:
- The Headmaster, John McPhee (2)
- Brave New World, Aldous Huxley (A re-read; my husband and I had BNW inside jokes at the beginning of our relationship. Maybe that's too geeky for public release...)
- Through Painted Deserts: Light, God, and Beauty on the Open Road, Donald Miller (A treasured birthday gift, it was to be the first thing I read this summer, but I put it off. I don't know why. I should crack it open.)
There were several others I didn't so much as investigate the availability at the library. Still, I think I did some serious work on a pretty lengthy list. What with traveling and whatever else it was that I did this summer. It feels like ages ago already.
(1) I have sucked at writing in my commonplace book. It needs a more prominent home, and I might actually remember to write in it.
(2) I strongly encourage the reading of any John McPhee. Florida readers will enjoy Oranges, though it is somewhat dated, having been published in the late 60s, if I recall correctly. Rock-heads (geology, not death-metal) will enjoy his Annals of the Former World. The Control of Nature is worthwhile. Or if you want a sampling, The John McPhee Reader. On my McPhee short list are The Curve of Binding Energy, the aforementioned Headmaster, and Common Carriers, his latest.
So, my (hedonistic-scale - I loved it! I hated it!) reviews:
The Namesake, Jhumpa Lahiri
I liked it - plain and simple. I like books that plop you down in the middle of another culture and just let you experience it through the text. This was one.
Wonderland, Michael Bamberger
A quick read about a year in the life of an American high school. Interesting, but nothing terribly fascinating. Best lines:
"His career had spanned eras. When he began teaching, the role of the teacher, as Mr. Cunningham saw it, was to get inside the lives of the students and shape them. Now the job was all about, he said, 'covering your ass.'"
The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
This was a re-read for book club. I hadn't picked it up since high school, and was antsy to read it now that I'm (almost) a grown-up. A lot of ladies did not love it. I thought it was great, still. I'm sure I had more profound things to say about it two months ago.
A Separate Peace, John Knowles
Also a reread for book club. This and Catcher were my favorite books that I was ever assigned to read. I wound up reading A Separate Peace twice during high school. And so I was looking forward to re-reading, particularly since I teach at a boarding school now. I still like it, but I was expecting much more from it. It has given me a wonderful quotation, something I want to devote an entire blog entry to someday:
"...when you really love something, then it loves you back, in whatever way it has to love."Actually, I want to do an entire series of posts on the nature of love. I have a lot of scattered writings to condense into some posts. Maybe it will make a good school-break task.
Notes on a Scandal, Zoe Heller
I loved this. It was such an easy read, and really fascinating. A total bait-and-switch. It's billed as a story about a teacher who has an affair with a student, but it's really about the predatory friendship that the teacher suffers at the hands of another teacher. Which is a far more captivating story. There were some passages that made my commonplace book.(1) Maybe I'll get up and grab it. Maybe later.
Okay, it's later.
"I keep staring at things, willing myself to remember them. [snipped]Of course, memory is not really as obedient a faculty as that. You can't consciously decide what is going to adhere. Certain things may strike you at the time as memorable, but memory only laughs at your presumption. 'Oh, I'm never going to forget this,' you say to yourself when you visit the Sacre-Coeur at sunset. And years later, when you try to summon up an image of the Sacre-Coeur, it's as cold and abstract as if you'd only ever seen it on a postcard. If anything unlocks the memory of this house for me, years from now, it will be something - some tiny, atmospheric fragment - of which I'm not even aware at the moment. I know this, and yet I still persist in making my little inventory, trying to nail down my recollections."
"What is romance, but a mutual pact of delusion? When the pact ends, there's nothing left. That's the thing about people who believe in God, isn't it? The love they have for Him never ends. He never lets them down. I read some writer once who said that love - he was talking about romantic love - love is a mystery and, when the solution is found, it evaporates."
"Talking to him is rather like attempting to converse with a school play."
"Any break in my routine - any small variation in the sequence of work and grocery shopping and telly and so on - tends to take on a disproportionate significance. I'm a child in that respect: able to live, psychically speaking, on a crumb of anticipation for weeks at a time, but always in danger of crushing the waited-for event with the freight of my excessive hope."
All Loves Excelling, Josiah Bunting III
Exceptionally predictable. A decent beach-read, which is exactly where I read this. One portion made the commonplace. Again, later. Maybe. It's not as good as the other quoted text here.
The English Teacher, Lily King
A used-book-sale find. A pleasant read, interesting characters. A bit slow in parts, but enough character development to keep my interest.
Only Child, Siegel and Ulviller
I've already described my thoughts at length. Enjoy them.
Uncertainty: Einstein, Heisenberg, Bohr, and the Struggle for the Soul of Science, David Lindley
I'm so enjoying this book, but I've made it my bedstand book for six weeks now (thank you, OCPL online renewals...), which means that I collapse, exhausted, into bed and reread the same paragraph or half-page three nights in a row, like I reference up there^. Not a great way to read a book; I don't recommend it. I'd like to make it a point to finish this one, in one swoop. Maybe tomorrow, but that's highly unlikely.
There were many I didn't so much as even think about. Actually, that's not true. There are a few books that I at least obtained, even if I didn't read them:
- The Headmaster, John McPhee (2)
- Brave New World, Aldous Huxley (A re-read; my husband and I had BNW inside jokes at the beginning of our relationship. Maybe that's too geeky for public release...)
- Through Painted Deserts: Light, God, and Beauty on the Open Road, Donald Miller (A treasured birthday gift, it was to be the first thing I read this summer, but I put it off. I don't know why. I should crack it open.)
There were several others I didn't so much as investigate the availability at the library. Still, I think I did some serious work on a pretty lengthy list. What with traveling and whatever else it was that I did this summer. It feels like ages ago already.
(1) I have sucked at writing in my commonplace book. It needs a more prominent home, and I might actually remember to write in it.
(2) I strongly encourage the reading of any John McPhee. Florida readers will enjoy Oranges, though it is somewhat dated, having been published in the late 60s, if I recall correctly. Rock-heads (geology, not death-metal) will enjoy his Annals of the Former World. The Control of Nature is worthwhile. Or if you want a sampling, The John McPhee Reader. On my McPhee short list are The Curve of Binding Energy, the aforementioned Headmaster, and Common Carriers, his latest.
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