Booking Through Thursday

This week's topic~~~

When’s the last time you weeded out your library? Do you regularly keep it pared down to your reading essentials? Or does it blossom into something out of control the minute you turn your back, like a garden after a Spring rain?  Or do you simply not get rid of books?

If, and when you DO weed out books from your collection (assuming that you do) …what do you do with them? Throw them away (gasp)? Donate them to a charity or used bookstore?  SELL them to a used bookstore? Trade them on Paperback Book Swap or some other exchange program?

I guess you could say I fall into the " weed my books regularly category".  I cringe at too much disorganization, and try to contain my 600 books to (4) bookcases. (2) are 6 feet tall and (2) and 3 feet tall. I almost never keep a book once I've read it, I usually will swap it on Paperback Swap, or if it's a really common title, I most likely will donate it to the library on going book sale, if no one has the book on their PBS wish list.

I recently listed about 10 titles on PBS and donated about 30 titles.  My problem is that I keep accumulating more books whether it be through arcs or new acquisitions brought to my attention by all of your amazing reviews :)  So I am constantly, trying to decide which books I will probably never read,  and then donate them to make room for books I'd want to read more......an endless cycle it seems.

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BUDDY UPDATE:  Buddy spent his 3rd night at the Vets yesterday as he keeps finding a way to take out his cath. They said they've never had a cat do this more than once.  Since they are running out of options, they are giving him some steroids today as he is inflamed from even pulling it out when it was stitched in place with the cone collar on.  So no more cath inserts for him, He appears to be peeing a little on his own, so we are waiting for another call this afternoon to see if he can come home or not :(

Booking Through Thursday - The Saddest Reads

Today’s Booking Through Thursday carries on with the ‘recent theme’ and asks us “What’s the saddest book you’ve read recently?”

I tend to read a lot of books with sad themes for some reason.  I think some people, me included,  are naturally drawn to things that evoke an emotional response like sadness. I guess there is nothing written in the book of life that says we as human beings must be happy all the time.  I can think of several sad stories I read and loved:

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  The Bluest Eye; Toni Morrison
  
  
  
  
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  The Things They Carried; Tim O'Brien
  
  
  
  
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  Tuesdays With Morrie; Mitch Albom
  
  
  
  
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  The Kite Runner; Khaled Hosseini
  
  
  
  
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  Death Be Not Proud; John Gunther
  
  
  
  
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  My Sister's Keeper; Jodi Picoult
  
  
  
  

Two more recent titles that I read in the last several months were:

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  The Blue Notebook; James Levine MD
  
  
  
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  Christian the Lion; Bourke and Rendall
  
  
  

 
I so loved these books, even though they brought tears to my eyes (something that does not happen very often). Both are HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

What are your saddest reads recently? Why do you read sad books? Have you read the books I mentioned, and, if so, did they move you?

You can read more Booking Through Thursday answers here.

Booking Through Thursday - Recent Best

What’s the best book you’ve read recently?

I enjoyed Richard Russo's new book : That Old Cape Magic so much, that I just ordered (4) more of Russo's books:

• Risk Pool
• Mohawk
• Nobody's Fool
• Straight Man
  

• Bridge of Sighs (I have this one to read already)
• Empire Falls (Loved the book and the movie)

One thing that really appeals to me about Russo's writing is his ability to vividly capture his characters and show parallels between them. Between parent and child and one generation to the next. That Old Cape Magic and Empire Falls are both good examples of this. You can read my review here of That Old Cape Magic.

Booking Through Thursday - Unread

“So here today I present to you an Unread Books Challenge. Give me the list or take a picture of all the books you have stacked on your bedside table, hidden under the bed or standing in your shelf – the books you have not read, but keep meaning to. The books that begin to weigh on your mind. The books that make you cover your ears in conversation and say, ‘No! Don’t give me another book to read! I can’t finish the ones I have!’"

I'm pathetic really, but how could I take a picture of over 200 books, so I narrowed it down to (7) that I really want to read, but have been avoiding for some unknown reason??

1. Sylvanus Now; Donna Morrissey - Morrissey's third novel set in mid-twentieth-century Newfoundland examines the interpersonal dynamics that link the inhabitants of an insular fishing village. This time the pressures on the fishermen and their wives come from both within (insularity suffocates even as it nurtures) and without, as modern fishing methods threaten the livelihood of the locals. Sylvanus Now is determined to fish the way his ancestors did, but his wife, Adelaide, yearns for escape: from a stultifying future of tending babies and working "on the flakes," where women salt-dry the freshly caught fish. Morrissey meticulously documents the bitterness that grows in both husband and wife as their very different dreams are slowly crushed. And yet, in the midst of seething emotions and steadily building disappointment, a sustaining love begins to grow between the beleaguered pair. Morrissey generates a remarkable intensity of emotion here, and if the novel often seems oppressively sad, it is buoyed by the crispness of detail and the author's ability to vivify the slow process through which an inner life is transformed.
2. East of the Sun; Julia Gregson - British author Gregson bows in America with her fast-paced second novel, an absorbing international period drama concerning three young Englishwomen and a troubled boy journeying to India in the late 1920s. The eldest at 25, Viva Holloway is an orphan hoping to retrieve her lost parents' personal effects; she's paying her way by chaperoning three younger travelers. Rose Wetherby is going to India to be married; Victoria Tor Sowerby is Rose's bridesmaid; and 16-year-old Guy Glover is returning home after getting expelled from school for stealing. Throughout, narrative shifts reveal the travelers' perspectives and fears: Viva is haunted by a childhood and family she barely remembers; Rose is growing increasingly nervous about how little she knows of her fiancé; and Tor is eager, after a disappointing deb season in London, to find a husband of her own and avoid returning to England. Guy's strange behavior makes it clear he's unstable, and before long, he's assaulted a member of a powerful Indian family, setting off a frightening chain of events for both himself and Viva. Gregson's rich imagery, strong characters and gripping plot make this a resonant page-turner.
3. Snow; Orhan Pamuk - A Turkish poet who spent 12 years as a political exile in Germany witnesses firsthand the clash between radical Islam and Western ideals in this enigmatically beautiful novel. Ka's reasons for visiting the small Turkish town of Kars are twofold: curiosity about the rash of suicides by young girls in the town and a hope to reconnect with "the beautiful Ipek," whom he knew as a youth. But Kars is a tangle of poverty-stricken families, Kurdish separatists, political Islamists (including Ipek's spirited sister Kadife) and Ka finds himself making compromises with all in a desperate play for his own happiness. Ka encounters government officials, idealistic students, leftist theater groups and the charismatic and perhaps terroristic Blue while trying to convince Ipek to return to Germany with him; each conversation pits warring ideologies against each other and against Ka's own weary melancholy. Pamuk himself becomes an important character, as he describes his attempts to piece together "what really happened" in the few days his friend Ka spent in Kars, during which snow cuts off the town from the rest of the world and a bloody coup from an unexpected source hurtles toward a startling climax. Pamuk's sometimes exhaustive conversations and descriptions create a stark picture of a too-little-known part of the world, where politics, religion and even happiness can seem alternately all-consuming and irrelevant. A detached tone and some dogmatic abstractions make for tough reading, but Ka's rediscovery of God and poetry in a desolate place makes the novel's sadness profound and moving.
4. The Walking People; Mary Beth Keane - Debut author Keane offers an extended meditation on leaving, finding and making home in a novel focused on the new Irish immigrant experience. Awkward, dreamy Greta Cahill was always in the shadow of her vivacious older sister, Johanna, as the two grew up on the far west coast of Ireland. Surrounded by houses left vacant by neighbors who emigrated, adventurous Johanna dreams of America, especially when, in the aftermath of a family tragedy, she befriends Michael Ward, the son of itinerant tinkers who wants nothing more than to stay in one place. When teenaged Johanna's dream comes true, Michael and Greta are dragged along to America in Johanna's impetuous wake. In New York City, however, Greta and Michael create their own home, happiness and success. The narrative, which extends from 1956 to the present, has the dusty feel of 19th-century literature, though Greta is an appealing character lacking in nostalgia. Her romance is also authentic and unsentimental, and despite the stodgy storytelling, her coming-of-age reflects a fresh take on the lives recent immigrants can create.
5. The Mosquito Coast; Paul Theroux; In a breathtaking adventure story, the paranoid and brilliant inventor Allie Fox takes his family to live in the Honduran jungle, determined to build a civilization better than the one they've left. Fleeing from an America he sees as mired in materialism and conformity, he hopes to rediscover a purer life. But his utopian experiment takes a dark turn when his obsessions lead the family toward unimaginable danger.
6. The Post Office Girl; Stefan Zeweig - The post-office girl is Christine, who looks after her ailing mother and toils in a provincial Austrian post office in the years just after the Great War. One afternoon, as she is dozing among the official forms and stamps, a telegraph arrives addressed to her. It is from her rich aunt, who lives in America and writes requesting that Christine join her and her husband in a Swiss Alpine resort. After a dizzying train ride, Christine finds herself at the top of the world, enjoying a life of privilege that she had never imagined.
   
   But Christine’s aunt drops her as abruptly as she picked her up, and soon the young woman is back at the provincial post office, consumed with disappointment and bitterness. Then she meets Ferdinand, a wounded but eloquent war veteran who is able to give voice to the disaffection of his generation. Christine’s and Ferdinand’s lives spiral downward, before Ferdinand comes up with a plan which will be either their salvation or their doom.
   
   Never before published in English, this extraordinary book is an unexpected and haunting foray into noir fiction by one of the masters of the psychological novel.
7. The Samurai's Garden; Gail Tsukiyama - Seventeen-year-old Stephen leaves his home in Hong Kong just as the Japanese are poised to invade China. He is sent to Tarumi, a small village in Japan, to recuperate from tuberculosis. His developing friendship with three adults and a young woman his own age brings him to the beginnings of wisdom about love, honor, and loss. Given the potentially interesting subplot (the story of a love triangle doomed by the outbreak of leprosy in the village) and the fascinating period in which the book is set.

Don’t forget to leave a link to your actual response (so people don’t have to go searching for it) in the comments—or if you prefer, leave your answers in the comments themselves!

Booking Through Thursday - Book Gluttony!

Mariel suggested this week’s question Book Gluttony! Are your eyes bigger than your book belly? Do you have a habit of buying up books far quicker than you could possibly read them? Have you had to curb your book buying habits until you can catch up with yourself? Or are you a controlled buyer, only purchasing books when you have run out of things to read?



Last count I had close to 570 books (and that is after donating quite a bit prior to our move). Keep in mind, I never save books after I read them, so all but maybe 5 of these are sadly UNREAD. I call this my "retirement stash", just in case I am really poor and homebound one day :)



Honestly, I cannot recall paying full price for a book in years. Most of my books are obtained from: Library book sales, Paperback Swap, ARCS, and often through gift card purchases as well. Books bring me comfort, and although, I tend to read the inside or back covers often, my reading since our move has slowed down a bit.



I am also, and have been for a number of years "hooked" on the library, so that complicates things a bit and keeps my unread stacks mounting.

What say you? >> sad huh? or, the more I think about it -- happy really!












Audio book collection (unread)