Friday, February 19, 2010

Giant Catch-up Post

The Library death march I've been on means I haven't been posting much about what I'm reading, because time spent writing could be time spent gazing in despair at my towering pile of library books on top of the book crate that is supposed to contain them all.

I guess I could also spend that time reading, but that would be productive. I'm not down with productive lately. Nor am I up with it. We aren't really talking much, really. Spatially, I mean.

Anyway, here are the books that I keep meaning to post about:
  • Does My Head Look Big in This? Shallow, appearance-obsessed Australian teen-ager decides to start wearing a Muslim headdress as her religion dictates.
  • The Lacuna. Kingsolver writes an interesting novel about a boy working for Trotsky during his Mexican exile, and a more predictable bit that teaches how insane the red-scare of the fifties became.
  • Rampant. Unicorns aren't extinct, but they are also carnivorous and only killed by those from the ancient hunter families. Is it better to stay chaste and try to save the world, or find a willing guy so you can go back to school?
  • Chalice of Roses: Four romance stories about women finding the holy grail and a man. Not necessarily in that order.
  • Academy 7. Elite futuristic prep school challenges two kids from opposing families.
  • Sunshine. Best vampire book ever. No, I don't mean evah. Reread.
  • Caught By the Sea: My Life on Boats. Gary Paulsen makes me wish I were athletic and adventurous, whether describing sailing or dog-sledding or wilderness crashing.
  • Ender's Game. Think sweet but carry a big punch. A reread for my book club.
  • Someday My Prince Will Come: True Adventures of a Wannabe Princess. Interesting story of a girl who travels so far to rebel against her parents that she meets up with them again on the other side.
  • Nocturnes: Five Stories of Music and Nightfall. Delicate gems of stories that are placed a little too close together.
  • Life Without Friends. This book should have been in Shelf Discovery.
  • Mormon Convert, Mormon Defector: A Scottish Immigrant in the American West, 1848-1861. Interesting description of the passage from Scottish hardship through conversion, immigration, and disillusionment. I learned a lot about Utah history.
  • Scandal. Fun regency romance.
  • Beat the Turtle Drum. For Shelf Discovery.
  • Son of the Mob. Life is tough when your dad is the godfather.
  • Isabel and Miracle Baby. Big sisterhood complicated by mom's cancer.
  • Picture This. Boy accidentally takes picture of the wrong man.
  • Prisoner Within. I finished it! Hosannah!
  • Captain Alatriste. Spanish derring-do and drinking.
  • Fire: Tales of Elemental Spirits. McKinley and Dickinson go very well together.
  • Lighting Their Fires: Raising Extraordinary Children in a Mixed-Up, Muddled-up, Shook-up World. OK, so my kids are just ordinary. I can live with that.
  • Deep and Dark and Dangerous. What your mother did that summer...
  • Lawn Boy. Economics and lawn mowers.
  • Shredderman: Secret Identity. Boy blogger defeats bully.
  • Scepter of the Ancients. Skeletons as secret agents -- nifty.
  • Kindred in Death. Uh, Dallas solved it?
  • Fire (Graceling). Lovely and rich.
  • Sea Glass (Glass 2) Still whining, still has the author on her side.
  • The Kids Are All Right. Four kids manage to pull their family together after their parent die. A bit too much drugs for me; I'm glad I don't live on the East Coast.
  • Dragon, Actually. The kinky bondage sex in the second part bothered me; I have this "consent" fetish.
  • Supreme Courtship. Crazy politics but no concept of law, which bugged me while I giggled.
  • Countdown to Summer: A Poem for Every Day of the School Year. Nifty concept, often lazily executed.
  • Stanford Wong Flunks Big-Time. Asian parents who don't appreciate their kids breaking the Asian-kids-are-smart stereotype.
  • Millicent Min, Girl Genius. Forced to tutor Stanford, she also finds a friend (no, I don't mean Stanford).
  • The Tarantula in My Purse. Memoir of wild pets through two generations.
  • Flint. The doctor told him he had a brain cloud, so he went west to die.
  • Lord Caldwell and the Cat. Lame regency series book.
  • How to Ditch Your Fairy. Book club book, cute story, annoying protagonist.
  • Vanished. I couldn't ever really engage with this fourth Greywalker book.

1 comment:

Kristen said...

The short blips are cracking me up. And thanks to you, I now have the Gary Paulsen on my list. With luck W. will sneak it from my pile and read it too since he loves sailing and boats. Oh, and how come you keep recommending The Kids Are All Right to me based on your short take here? You goon! You just want to read another one of my snarkfests, don't you? ;-)