Tagged With: Reading
the little rift
What flaw is there in my essential makeup which causes me, when purging my shelves, to get rid of Virginia Woolf’s classic novel Orlando but retain Betty Ren Wright’s underwhelming YA mystery The Dollhouse Murders? Am I basing my entire library on which books I read in third grade?
Finer Things: Arabian Nights
We read Arabian Nights for the penultimate Finer Things; it was a not-so-subtle joke as one of our members prepares to move to Morocco. Well, you won’t get far with my leash around your neck, Duckface. I don’t know what I’m going to do when FT collapses. I may have to join a real book … Continue reading
Save this paper?
The day I don’t see a Chronicle headline about child abuse or child murder will be the day I know the paper has finally gone under. I have an idea for how to save our fast-dying daily: give it a new tagline. Some suggestions: The San Francisco Chronicle: ferreting out every grisly story about bad … Continue reading
Adventure Island
Captain Redscarf: “How d’ye like me tattoo, salty wench?” Island Princess: “It’s peeling.” Captain Redscarf: “Aye. Me tattoo artist be a poxy drunken knave.” Island Princess, politely: “Oh, be he?” Finer Things attempted to read Robinson Crusoe this month, but failed, because it’s hard to spend three hundred pages with an utter douchebag. No one … Continue reading
Rumi at the Palace
Last night Katy and I went to hear Coleman Barks read some of his Rumi translations at the Palace of Fine Arts. I acquired one of Barks’ Rumi books the last time I was in Europe and it stabbed me in the heart a few times, as books occasionally do. Rumi was a thirteenth century … Continue reading
It starts with socks
On Christine’s recommendation, I bought and read The One Hundred: A Guide to the Pieces Every Stylish Woman Must Own. Christine posted a really helpful and entertaining distillation of this and a few other how-to-dress books here, and I’m not going to repeat that. This post is for women like me, who really despise the … Continue reading
Reporting Back
Looking down at the table of books for sale. Why did I not look at the one called FAERY!, I wonder? And, hey, BESTIARY! The author sure seems excited about these. Looks like another glance on Sunday is called for. Post-sale with my backpack loaded, ready to get my swag home on the bus. This … Continue reading
Prepping for the sale
Well, books, the gigantor San Francisco Library Book Sale is tomorrow. You’re about to get some new friends. Won’t that be nice? But we don’t want any friends! We are overcrowded as it is! STOP BRINGING US MORE FRIENDS! Well, I guess I could always sell some of you… No, no! We are fine! Plenty … Continue reading
Help!
Now that I’m trying to write short stories, I think I need to read more of them as well. I’ve read Nabokov, Wodehouse, McKillip, Thurber, Gaiman, Saki and Salinger: who else should I read? Your help will be highly prized.
He also wrote No Country for Old Men
The Road This book, about a man and a boy traveling through a post-apocalyptic wasteland, scared the pants off me. Cormac McCarthy never makes the mistake of addressing why everything fell down, so you never get the chance to think “Well, that’s unlikely. The world won’t end. I’ll be fine.” You’re stuck thinking “This could … Continue reading