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I have just inadvertently deleted the 25 most recent comments to this blog. Including my own.
*facepalm*
I didn't even know batch deletion was possible.
This brief (and apparently inept) foray back into blogging has been fun on some levels, but it's also reminded me just how much time a blog slurps out of my day. You wouldn't believe me if I told you how many minutes I spent posting the quiz answers. I don't even believe it.
So. Once again I am forsaking the blog and fleeing back to my WIP. However, I'm not disappearing entirely -- if you'd like to keep up with my mini-updates on reviews, interviews, contests, and Romanov-y things in general, please bookmark my Facebook page:
Mucho bonus points if you can name either of the two famous tushes who've also occupied this uber-ugly seat:
(Closeup of the vehicle in question
here.)
I rang the bell and everything. Twice.
Thanks to Barbara O'Connor for making a movie-dweeb's whole morning.
I am about to embark on a small adventure that's almost certain to involve authorial shenanigans and will likely disrupt my usual blogging schedule but not necessarily generate a full 10-day hiatus. Updates to follow as blog-worthy events (and time to chronicle them) arise...
All the books that have in one way or another found there way into my collection in 2009. And in order of acquisition, because I've been adding to this post for the last 365 days:
In the morning, I wake up, grab the book I'm reading from my nightstand/pillow, and carry it into the other room. While I catch up on email and so forth, it sits on the footstool beside me. When I go downstairs to shower, the book comes with me - to be parked on the bathroom counter. Next I go upstairs to get dressed and make my bed, book still in tow. (It sits on the hamper.) Then it accompanies me back down to the bathroom counter while I play 'beauty shop' with eyeliner and hairspray. After all that's done, it's back to the computer for me, and back to the footstool for the book of the day.
In all this time, I haven't read a word -- just carried the book from place to place.
Same thing happens at lunch time. I put my computer aside, carry the book downstairs and set it on the kitchen table while I eat and watch an episode of Jeopardy. Then, back to the footstool it goes while I tinker with the WIP for the afternoon.
Generally, I don't get around to actually reading until after 4:00 or 5:00.
How strange is this?
Last week the superdrive in my MacBook died. No more playing of CDs, watching of DVDs, loading of software, or adding of audiobooks to my iPod. Kaput. The bugger costs $280 to replace, which was way more money than I cared to spend.
So...I, um...
...I bought one of those shiny new MacBook Pros instead. Because they're so much cheaper and all...
In the last week, I have dusted and/or washed every accessible inch of my personal living space. Which means that I've handled every one of my 751 books. Consequently, I've gotten the itch to revisit some stories that have strayed dangerously close to the edges of my radar. The list, more or less in order of shelf-position:
The Moorchild, by Eloise McGraw
Spitting Image, by Shutta Crum
Wise Child, by Monica Furlong
Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH, by Robert C. O'Brien
East, by Edith Pattou
Beauty, by Robin McKinley
Elske, by Cynthia Voigt
A Curse Dark As Gold, by Elizabeth C. Bunce
Larger-Than-Life Lara, by Dandi Daley Mackall
Aurora County All-Stars, by Deborah Wiles
Dandelion Wine, by Ray Bradbury
Heavy on the fantasy, for whatever reason.
And you? Any old favorites you'd like to cozy up with this fall?
******************
Currently reading:
Wise Child
by Monica Furlong
Behold, Long Awaited Russian Book #2 -- a full 5 weeks ahead of schedule!
Not only is it rare as heck (original 1927 print run: 1,000 copies) but it's also the cutest little dang thing. Just the right size to cradle half-open in one reverent palm - so as not to break the binding, of course.
Long-awaited Russian book #1 has finally arrived. According to my Austro-Russian online buddy, in spite of the annoyingly reverential tone of the biography, it's supplemented with "many precious documents" which you will find "only after a very big search." Well I've been searching for at least four years, and now it's mine-all-mine.
In the upstairs front room of the house where I'm dog-sitting:
Sadly, this wardrobe harbors no fur coats, nor Turkish delight. Instead, there is a rather large flatscreen TV which has taken me on a few vicarious journeys to France (Ratatouille, Beauty & the Beast) while my hosts are off enjoying the real thing.
You know how every so often I run across a rare batch of Romanov family photos I've never seen and go berserk? It's just as good when it happens in my own family. Behold, from the back of Grandma's closet:
Grandparents, great-grandparents and great-great grandparents galore. There's even a triple-great in there -- can you find her? That dashing doughboy in the center? That's my great-grandpa Thompson, in probably the sixth (and certainly youngest) photo I've ever seen of him. Or how about that itsy-bitsy photo of my grandma right beside it, sporting a pose that immediately brought to mind the cover of
Anne Frank: Beyond the Diary.* In the upper right corner, a photo of the family farm before it was in the family. An 8x10 hand-colored portrait of my great-aunt, Alice, in her twenties.
A whole pile of history, there.
Oh, and just the other day someone gave my grandpa a photo of his mother's 1914 high school basketball team. (Don't have a copy of my own yet, though.) Did you even know girls played basketball in 1914? In skirts, yet.
*speaking of Anne Frank, today is August 4th** the 65th anniversary of the Gestapo's raid on the Secret Annex and the arrest of the Franks and their four companions.
**speaking of August 4th, today is also the birthday of bookstore buddy Linda Brick, which I once overlooked in a rather extravagant manner and vowed never to forget again.
A tsar:
(Imported from St. Petersburg, courtesy of Romanov-buddy Laura Mabee)
(Courtesy of my mother, who bought herself a new recliner. This one's dangerously nap-alicious)
In celebration of Cecil Castellucci & Jim Rugg's
The Plain Janes, Little Willow invited me to take part in the Readergirlz
Art Saves! project -- to create or display an image of how art affects us. Here's my booksy-artsy story...
Once upon a time, I shelved books five nights a week at the little library down the street. Down in the children's room where I spent most of my time, there was a book called
Jon O.: A Special Boy. I'm not sure why its spine ever caught my eye, except that it was so euphemistic and dated. And also, so rarely checked out that it was something of a landmark on the shelves -- to the extent that I remember my co-worker, Alisha, making a Vanna White-style presentation of shelving it one day.
But the cover had this irresistible picture of Jon O. himself flashing a look-at-me grin. The book's since been discarded and I can't find an image of the cover online, which is a shame, because if you could see that, you'd understand why this face, smiling down at me from the art showcase stopped me dead in the middle of the hallway one day at school:
"You painted Jon O!" I gushed to Alisha the next time I saw her at work.
"You saw him!"
You bet I did. And somehow I hinted and wheedled so effectively that before Alisha left for college the next year, she
gave me Jon O. He grins from just inside my bedroom doorway to this day.
Look at me, Jon O's face says. And how can I resist?
(Oh, and Alisha? Nowadays,
Alisha's designing her own line of clothing in New York.)
Today is:
- Miss Spitfire's second anniversary
- my godson's third birthday
- the day my grandpa gets released from the hospital
In the immortal words of Ron White's bulldog, Sluggo, "It's gonna be a good day, Tater."
Until my Canadian Romanov-buddy comes visiting, this uber-rare little honey is in my care:Les Dernieres Annees de la Cour De Tzarskoie-Selo[Last Days of the Court at Tsarskoye Selo]by Alexandre SpiridovitchIt's volume one of a memoir by Nicholas II's personal chief of security, and it looks, feels, and smells exactly the way an 81-year-old book should. I can't read French, but who cares -- it's
With the spectacularful Sara Pennypacker:
She let me fawn all over her while she signed my ARC, hardcover, and bookmark of Clementine with a BRIGHT ORANGE sharpie.
Also, my copy of A Story for Bear now sports this bit of snurp-worthy original art, courtesy of Jim LaMarche:
Meanwhile, I took the better part of an hour to decide which type of disaster book I wanted Jim Murphy to sign: blizzard, plague, or fire. Finally settled on
The Great Fire. That silver Newbery sticker looked so nice alongside the bright orange flames...
Pros:
1. The kidlitosphere keeps me in the loop and aware of what new books are buzzing.
2. Blogging provides me with a legitimate reason to wheedle with sales reps for ARCs and review copies of fresh novels.
3. An active blog helps readers remember I exist, even though I've puttered around so much that it'll be about four years between my first novel and my second.
4. Blogging about books I love makes me feel like I've still got my bookseller mojo.
5. Reading blogs and exchanging comments with other readers and writers is just plain fun, and keeps me in touch with cool people.
Cons:
1. It's work, and though it tends to be a whole lot more fun than laundry, blogging is one of those never-ending tasks. Scheduling posts in advance sacrifices spontaneity, while blogging on the fly leaves me panting.
2. I'm the sort of person who wants to silence all the bitsy little chores from my to-do list before tackling the big ones. Which means that keeping up with my blog and reading journal often gets put before keeping up with my actual book-writing. Not ideal.
3. Maybe this is only a reflection of my own frame of mind, but it seems like the kidlitosphere isn't as dynamic as it used to be. Lately I find myself dropping some blog feeds entirely, and skimming the vast majority of the keepers. Something's got to be amiss when an author I love posts a new blog and my first reaction is to feel put upon at the thought of taking the time to read it. Seriously? Do blogs and/or blog reading have a shelf life?
4. It's not a tremendous time commitment in the grand scheme of things, but keeping up with blogs, Facebook, Goodreads, and my reading journal is fragmenting my attention far more than it ought to, and I do not like that feeling. Not one bit. I want my focus back. (I suspect this also has something to do with writing a book from four points of view, but there's no turning back on that front.)
And yet I refuse to quit. I don't want to lose touch with my virtual buddies, or stop yammering about good books. A break might be in good order, though.
So I'm taking the week off. Maybe the one after that, too. Ok fine, "off" doesn't really mean radio silence. More like maybe-I-might-if-I-feel-like-it. (Because I do predict a blog-worthy day in the very near future.) No obligations, though, except the Sunday TBR updates. But that's it. Sort of.
Wednesday night I got this bright idea: As long as I'm indulging in audio-egotism, maybe I could practice my Braille skills by following along in my bumpy edition of Miss Spitfire while I lie in bed listening to the CDs.
Bah-hahahahahahaha....
You know how long it took before I got completely overwhelmed? Exactly ONE sentence. (Shut up -- it was a long sentence.)
Tell me how high this rates on the vanity scale...
A couple nights in a row this last week, I woke up in the wee hours for what felt like at least half an hour -- that annoying kind of awake where it's too much trouble to reach for the lamp and a book, so you end up just lying there, bored and semi-groggy.
By night #3, I decided an audiobook playing low on my iPod dock might lull me (or at least occupy me) better than my view of the ceiling. This is a tricker proposition than meets the eye -- you need something in a soothing, level tone. Something familiar enough to doze off into, yet not so familiar as to send you drifting back toward boredom. Also, something that doesn't have harmonica riffs in between each chapter, like the Grapes of Wrath, which made my eyes flap open every 10 minutes or so.
Now, I have always been the sort of author who doesn't dare open her own book. Not because I can't stand it, though. Quite the contrary -- if I open it, there's a 96% chance I'll sit right down and read it like I've never read it before. So on night #4 I kind of smirked and glanced over my shoulder to see if anyone was watching as I dialed through the Authors listing on my old pal the iPod and caught myself pausing over the M section. Not M for "Miller," mind you -- M for...wait for it... "Me."
Because much as I like what Recorded Books has done with Miss Spitfire, actually listening to the audio edition myself has always made me a tad self-conscious in a way that reading the print version never does. Could I really use my own former ruminations to hush my brain back to sleep, I wondered?
As it turns out, HECK YES. I dunno if it's good news or bad that I've spent the last two nights snoozing through the bulk of my very own book, but I sure am taken with the drifting off and waking up parts. You'd think I'd know this story well enough by now that I could lie there and recite it along with Terry Donnelly; instead I find myself just plain enjoying a good story on a topic I like a whole lot. This may become a permanent habit.
Alligator pears. Did anyone else know that avocados are also called alligator pears? Why on earth should I ever say "avocado" again when I can say ALLIGATOR PEARS instead?
The centerpiece of my bulletin board is a miniature quilt, handmade for me about 20 years ago by a good friend who used to live across the street. (The same neighbor lady, incidentally, who introduced me to
Magic Elizabeth.) I think this was my first birthday or Christmas gift after they moved to Florida. Honestly, at age 10 I don't think I really realized what I was getting -- even though Mrs. Smith's teensy masterpiece had already won first prize at a quilt show before shipping it up to grace my doll bed -- but now I look at that piece of work and think, Oh my
God! Can you imagine doing all that work and giving it away?
...and this is what I got:
Clearly I am not the only smartypants in this house.
*****************
Currently reading:
100 Days and 99 Nights
by Alan Madison
Doesn't it seem like a fully grown person with the help of Turbo Tax should be able to do her very own taxes without yelling "Dad!"
Sadly, such is not the case...
My get-up for the local pre-Oscar night costume party:
*In my world, three or four requests qualifies as "popular demand."
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2 Comments on A year of book-gathering, last added: 1/3/2010
Oooh... another WIP! I already read that you're not telling anyone what you're working on next, but I was just wondering if it takes place in history and or what century?