March Check In

My goal had been to have read 25 books by the end of March – March being 1/4 of the way through the year I figured if I was 1/4 of the way to 100 I’d be on track.   I’m pleased to say that I made it!  Not only did I make it, but I have read 27 books!  So I’m 2 books ahead of schedule! :-)

Here’s what I read in March:

1.  Someday My Prince Will Come: True Adventures of a Wannabe Princess – Jerramy Fine 
2. Murder on the Iditarod Trail – Sue Henry 
3.  The Friday Night Knitting Club – Kate Jacobs 
4.  The Moving Finger – Agatha Christie 
5.  Dishwasher: One Man’s Quest to Wash Dishes in All Fifty States – Pete Jordan 
6.  Stealing Buddha’s Dinner – Bich Minh Nugyen 
7.  Green Witch – Alice Hoffman 
8.   Flush – Carl Hiaasen 
9.  How Reading Changed My Life – Anna Quindlen 
10.   Death on the Nile – Agatha Christie

This is also a good time to check in on my progress on the other challenges I’m working on (click on the pictures to go to that challenges page on my blog!)

  I have read 3 out 6 books for this one, so half way there!  I have the last three books I need to read in my possession, so the big goal for April is to finish this challenge!

I have read 14 out of the 20 books for this one so more than halfway there!  Just like the What’s in a Name challenge, I have the remaining 6 books to read in my possession so after I finish off What’s in a Name I plan to finish this one off too!

I have read 17 out of 50 towards this challenge.   Not quite halfway yet, but more than a 1/4 and so I’m making the same progress with this one as I’m making with the 100+ challenge, so I feel confident I’ll make it!

I have read 1 out 0f 6, so this challenge is clearly lacking.  Maybe after I get the other 2 finished I’ll have more of an interest in completing this one!

Death on the Nile

Death on the Nile – Agatha Christie

When I decide to read some Agatha Christie I thought I’d check out one featuring each of her famous detectives – Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot.  

This one more fit my notion of what a mystery was, although it took over half the book to “warm up” before someone was killed.  After the 1st murder there were several more in quick succession. 

I liked how Christie continually recapped the events, clues, etc because I have a hard time keeping track of all the details and who was when, where and whatnot. 

I am definitely enjoying reading mysteries, however I still have a bit of a love/hate relationship with them.  I love the suspense, but I hate it too.   I want to read as fast as I can to figure out what happens, but at the same time I need to slow down and read all the details! 

Reading about Reading

How Reading Changed My Life – Anna Quindlen

One of the 1st challenges I signed up for this year was the one Lesley created, The Bibliophilic Book Challenge.  I thought it would be interesting to read about reading AND Lesley oked my plan to read some professional books about teaching reading that have been on my TBR  list for years. 

In reality though, this is the last challenge have tackled.  The other challenges are all at least 1/4 completed, some more than 1/2, but I hadn’t touched the Bibliophilic challenge. 

I have many of the books that I’d planned to read for this challenge, they just seem uninteresting.  I’m not as interested in reading essays or non-fiction, unless it’s written like a story.  Also, I’m just coming off a graduate program where I had piles of, interesting mostly, professional reading to do so now that I’m done I’m not as interested in reading books for school.  When I was at the library last time I checked out How Reading Changed My Life – Susan had recently read this book and wrote a rave review (ok, so Just searched through Susan’s blog to find what I thought was her review of this book, but it wasn’t this one that she’d read – it was Ruined by Reading – oh well.)  – so I decided I needed to read it. 

I was pleasantly surprised to see that it was a thin book.  Only 97 pages. And the last 20 or so were book lists, so only 70 pages of actual reading.  Ok, I could do that.  Even if it was boring, which it was not.  

Monday morning I picked up the book, thinking it would be perfect to “pad” my monthly total since I could finish it quickly. I ended up reading it in one sitting!   It was neat reading about Anna’s reading habits and her explanations about why we read.  It was a bit highbrow – quoting classics and waning philosophical in places, which is exactly what I hate about essays' so I was glad it was a quick read and I could skim for the good stuff.  I enjoyed the view into Anna’s life and plan to read more of her fiction soon!

Flush

Flush – Carl Hiaasen

A few years ago my cousin, who was 8 or 10 at the time, was raving about the book Hoot by Carl Hiaasen.  She was such a fan that I had to read it to see what the hubbub was about.   It was a story about some teenagers who did some somewhat illegal things to save the habitats of burrowing owls from a big corporation.  I totally enjoyed it!  I can’t remember if it had won the Newbery Honor yet or not, when I read it, but it definitely deserves a Newbery!

What I didn’t know when I read Hoot was that Carl Hiassen was a prolific novelist!  I started reading some of his adult books.  I totally enjoyed Nature Girl, Skinny Dip and Lucky You.   Because I’m anal and once I start reading an author I feel the need to read read everything they wrote, so even though some of his other books aren’t as good as the 1st few I have stuck with him.  All of his books are set in Florida and all have an environmental spin.  He is also the master of bizarre characters and bizarre events which leave me laughing every time, even if the book isn’t very good!   His book are very “adult'” – most of them are R rated for violence, sex, and language. 

Hiaasen, like many other authors, also writes newspaper columns and had published some of his columns into a book, 2 books actually.  I started reading one of them Paradise Screwed, in my Kindle.   It wasn’t what I was hoping it would be.  It was very political.  Most of the politics were stuff I could get into, like saving the Keys or protecting the Everglades, but it still wasn’t very interesting to me so I gave up on it. 

Since writing Hoot, Hiaasen has written 2 other young adult books – Flush and Scat.  I knew I wanted to read them both, but the library had Flush the last time I was there!

Now that I have read so many of Hiaasen’s adult novels I was curious to see how he pulled off YA.  Interestingly it was just like his adult works, only cleaned up.  There was less humor and the bizarre factor was greatly reduced, but it was good solid read.  It had adventure, saving the plant, suspense, surprises, and great family dynamics!

Green Witch

Green Witch – Alice Hoffman

Alice Hoffman is one of my favorite authors.  She writes about magic, but it’s not fantasy magic, it’s magic that is present in everyday life. 

I enjoyed her older adult novels more than I have enjoyed her newer stuff, and recently I have discovered that her Young Adult novels are some of her best work!  I’m wondering if maybe the younger audience is more easily drawn into Alice’s magical world?  We adults aren’t willing to be as pulled in?

This latest young adult novel is actually a sequel to The Green Angel, I don’t think Alice has ever written a sequel to one of her books so this was a rare treat to visit again with one of Alice’s characters. 

Green Angel tells the story of Green, left alone in the world after her family travels to the city one fateful fall day and are killed when an evil group out to destroy the civilization burn down the city.    It was a creative expression of the tragic events of September 11, 2001. 

Green Witch takes place a year later as Green and other other villagers who survived the attack are re-building their lives.  Green uses her talents, listening to and telling the stories of the villagers, to help everyone heal! 

Stealing Buddha's Dinner

Stealing Buddha’s Dinner – Bich Minh Nguyen

I found this book through my fellow book blogging buddy Lesley, once again she found a winner!

I wish I’d know Bich during the 80s.  We could have been good friends!  Like me Bich arrived in the US as an infant in 1975.  Unlike me, she arrived here by way of Vietnam when she and her family fled just before the fall of Saigon. 

So many things about this book appealed to me.  One was reading about how Bich learned English and how she attempted to assimilate herself with American children in Grand Rapids Michigan in the 80s when there was no real diversity. 

It made me think of a student I have in my class who just moved here from China and doesn’t speak or understand any English! Made me wonder if her experience is anything like Bich’s? 

I also enjoyed the trip back through the 80s! Bich had me singing along to songs from the 80s and reminiscing about TV shows, foods and toys that were all apart of pop culture at the time! 

My favorite part of the book had to have been when she was telling us about her love of Beverly Cleary’s Ramona books and Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie books.   Both of those series were my absolute favorites when I was a kid.  I’d read them all multiple times.  Laura and Ramona were my two childhood heroes.  They were also Bich’s heroes. 

  

Wash, Rinse, Repeat

Dishwasher: One Man’s Quest to Wash Dishes in All Fifty States – Pete Jordan

This is another book I found out about through Susan, I think her book club read it a few years ago.  It looked to me like a quirky, offbeat, Americana-type book.  I was not disappointed!

Pete made me think of several of my students, a true underachiever! He was capable of working hard, but the motivation wasn’t there.  He always continually managed to get himself in little scuffles that always managed to land him in trouble, but he never felt that the trouble was justified, he always had a good reason behind his actions.  He managed to find his niche early on – dishwashing.  It was perfect for him!  He could work in peace and quiet, he could quit when he wanted to, and he could slack off as much as he wanted! 

I really enjoyed reading this book!  Pete’s style & humor reminded me of Bill Bryson.  He traveled across the USA several times and had experiences I can only dream of.  Some of the stories were laugh out loud funny!

This book was a perfect book for my Kindle App on my iPhone!  I have taken to reading a book in my Kindle App while stuck in traffic. I know it sounds dangerous, but really it’s safer than a lot of things I could be doing!  I only read when the car is stopped at a stop light, or in a traffic backup.  When the car is rolling I point the phone away from eyes, or click it closed until the next time I’m stopped.  With the horrible traffic around here I get a surprisingly large amount of reading time on my way home from school!  The one challenge is finding books that are conducive to reading in small spurts – books that are entertaining, yet easy to read.  Dishwasher, fit the bill perfectly!  I found myself cheering when I saw a long line of traffic, because I knew it meant I could read!

I am counting this book toward the Twenty-Ten challenge under the category of “Shiny and New”.  The category is for books purchased in 2010.  I think using a Kindle book for the category is a bit of a stretch, however, I don’t buy very many adult books and this is one that the library didn’t have so I was going to have to purchase it somewhere, the Kindle version was cheaper than the paper one. 

Where There’s Smoke, There’s Fire

The Moving Finger – Agatha Christie

My very first Agatha Christie!  Well, not really, I read Murder on the Orient Express in High School and HATED it.  Swore of the whole mystery genre because of my bad experience with that one book.   I have since developed an enjoyment  of mysteries so decided to try another Agatha Christie, she is after all the queen of mystery! 

Also recently I discovered that Agatha Christie was British!  That makes her more interesting to me now, however, after reading the 1st few pages of The Moving Finger, I realized why my high school self had a hard time with the Orient Express.  There were a lot of British phrases and language structure and words that I’m sure I didn’t understand then.   Also, the book was written in the 1940s, I’m sure that played a part in my lack of understanding back then. 

The Moving Finger was a quick read – only 200 pages!  And I enjoyed it immensely!  I can’t wait to read more!  I loved the glimpse of British country life!  I loved how Miss Marple swooped in at the end and solved the whole thing!  It was billed as a “Miss Marple Mystery” however Miss Marple doesn’t appear until the last 40 pages and not even as a major character then.  

The story is about some nasty  anonymous letters being sent to various people in the village – the letters were written in “classic mystery” style – letters cut from the pages of a book and glued together.  What I’m wondering is, was that as much of convention then or was this the 1st time that technique had appeared in literature?

Knit One, Purl Two

The Friday Night Knitting Club by Kate Jacobs

I’d seen this book all over and only half wanted to read it, I’m kind of a wannabe knitter and didn’t think I’d enjoy reading about knitting because it’s something I want to do, but can’t seem to make it work.   I saw it at Riverby’s in Dec and decided to buy it. 

After I bought it I saw the quote on the cover: USA Today said it was “Like Steel Magnolias set in Manhattan” hmmm…..now I for sure wanted to read it and I decided to save it for after my trip to NYC at the beginning of March. 

When I started the book I thought it was going to be my kind of book – all the women were single, many by their own choosing, I was feeling good that this would be a book about women single by choice living their lives. 

Then around the middle things began to change.  It started heading in the direction of most chick lit – male/female relationships.  ugh.  I almost put it down, just because it was so much like so many other books.  But I continued on.

By the end I realized it was nothing like all the other chick lit books and was surprised by how attached I’d gotten to all the characters and how they all deep relationships with each other.  I agreed 100% with USA Today’s quote from the front cover! 

I discovered that there was a sequel: Knit Two and yesterday I checked at the library and it was sitting right there on the shelf, just begging to be checked out!

    

Hike! Gee! Haw! Easy!

Murder on the Iditarod Trail by Sue Henry

Despite not really liking the other Sue Henry books I read I was pulled in by the fact that the rest of her books are set in Alaska.  I decided that I owed it to myself to at least try one of her Alaska novels to see if it was different from her Maxine and Stretch series.  

At the library I had a hard time picking one to start with.  I finally settled on Murder on the Iditarod Trail for no other reason except that it was her 1st.   Sometimes an authors first novel is a bit clunky (in terms of the writing), and it was the writing style that I didn’t care for in the Maxine & Stretch novels, so I was a bit worried that this one would disappoint me, but I also always like to start a series at the beginning when possible. 

The book sat on my TBR shelf in my bedroom until last weekend when I threw it in my bag to take it to NYC with me.  It also just so happened that last weekend was the start of the real Iditarod in Alaska. 

Reading this book during the real race helped the book come alive for me.  On the other hand, the book made the real Iditarod came alive too!  This was a very well timed fun read!

Even though it was a fictional account Sue Henry added lots of details about the race history, what life is like on the race, and lots of Alaska color! The mystery added excitement to the book, but it was not the main draw of the book for me.   

In this book Sue Henry introduced us all to Jessie Arnold, her heroine of most of her Alaska mysteries.  In many ways Jessie reminds me of Nevada Barr’s Anna Pigeon.  Since I have already read every Anna Pigeon book published to date, I’m looking forwarding to diving into some Jessie Arnold novels while I wait for more Anna Pigeon novels!

Check out the real Iditarod online here.

Wishing, Hoping, & Praying

Someday My Prince Will Come: True Adventures of a Wannabe Princess –Jerramy Fine

My friend Lesley, also a fellow book addict, has a great blog called A Life in Books.  I am avid reader of her blog, she rarely reads anything that I have ever heard of before and I have gleaned many books to add to my “to be read” list.  Most of the time I read Lesley’s blog and head over to GoodReads, mark the books as “To-read” and then that’s it.  Until now, I had never read a Lesley pick!  Lesley has a great review here.

I was really looking foward to reading this one, until my friend Susan (who is also friends with Lesley, in fact Lesley is her friend and I only met Lesley very recently) read it and LOVED it.  You would think that was a good thing, except that books that Susan falls in love with typically don’t elicit the same response from me.  I usually enjoy them, but I don’t love them like Susan did.  I was disappointed because I really wanted to LOVE Someday My Prince Will Come.   (You can read Susan’s review here)

Well, the good news is, I DID love this book!  :-)  This is a book for anyone who has ever felt that they were in the wrong place.  Anyone who has ever wanted something different than what they had.  Anyone who doesn’t feel like they belong in their place in the world.   If you want to know more about the book you’ll have to visit Susan or Lesley’s blog.