The Myth & The Majesty

A year ago, I gave a not-quite-a-review for a book. I read Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore in a Denver hotel room while preparing for a life that ... as it turned out, never quite happened. It was a weird place and time in my universe and on some level, I wondered if my deep, abiding love for that book was inextricably linked to that almost-life. Six months later, I read it again. Turns out this was a book that had nothing to do with where I was. I still loved it. Then, something crossed my radar in September. Robin Sloan , the hilarious and brilliant author of Penumbra , had a newly released novel. ... About bread. Kind of. I finally acquired it last week, and then this week I opened it up. And the next day, I was done. Here's my review: Go read it . The thing that gets me about Sloan's books as a whole is that they are rather hard to describe. They're not directly mysteries or love stories or anything quite that easily classified (well, not yet...

This. Once again, I'm late to the game. This book came out four years ago and I didn't trip over it until this past week, when I found it on the staff recommendation shelf at a favorite bookstore. It's absolute magic and I highly recommend it. Part mystery, part heist, part character study, part lesson in networking, and altogether incredibly entertaining. (I also recommend it in audiobook form. I hear there's a bonus, which makes sense when you get to the end of the printed form...) "At first I thought I had a crush on her, but then I realized she's an android." (Description of Ashley Adams)

I've made a few too many acquisitions in the last month and a half, due in large part because of the book fair in Virginia . Then, just for fun, I paged through  Voices From Chernobyl while I was killing a little time at Mitzi's  ... and had to go back the very next day and get it because I couldn't stop thinking about it. Fascinating, sad, and absolutely jarring. Don't read it in public if you have a hard time controlling your reactions to things. Anyway! It seems I have my work cut out for me this summer. During all of that free time I have. Hm.

As it turns out, I'm not great at holding still. Mr. Rogers got an early start on his first day of riding (Monday morning) and I headed back to the motel to pack up, reorganize, and make my way northeast. We had covered a lot of miles in three days ... but now I had a mission that required a couple hundred extra. The evening before, I had perused the brochure stand in the lobby and tripped over something of particular interest. The Green Valley Book Fair  is just south of Harrisonburg, Virginia, and is only open five times a year for a few weeks each time. It is essentially an enormous overstock sale, and ... well. As some of you may remember, I have a book store ... thing. It was the original purpose behind my trip to Portland and I try to work at least one interesting store into each trip. I was in luck: the book fair had opened just a couple days earlier and was within shooting distance of Mr. Rogers' take-off spot. This time, I had to set both a spen...

So ... I've been thinking a lot about space lately. It started (realistically) in January when I visited the Kennedy Space Center. What that mostly managed to do was reawaken a quiet fascination I'd had as a kid. Nothing earth-shattering [... there may be a terrible stealth pun there] but a reminder that yes, space is intriguing and the people that have gone are some of the most interesting that have existed. Then one of my very favorite bloggers was approached by Elon Musk and his new adventure became my new obsession. And it's been ... well. For those who aren't familiar (or who ignore my usual re-post posts), Elon Musk is the man that will get us to Mars. Er, Elon Musk is the man who has created an electric car that I would willingly buy. Er ... Elon Musk is most likely insane. And a genius. And possibly very, very hard to like. But fascinating. Okay, fine. Elon Musk is the man behind Tesla Motors and SpaceX. Not the only man, mind you, but he's c...

I read awful things. When I say "awful," I'm not actually talking about the news (even though that might qualify). And I'll also say I don't make it far into awful books. In this case, I generally mean "about topics that are considered awful." I read a lot of books about cults and diseases and murders and wars because these are things that interest me and that I want to attempt to understand, to a degree. Which means a lot of my reading time is spent on topics that are ... less than cheerful. What really gets me in trouble, though, is the fact that I insist on reading these books in public places where people will ask about them. Oh well. That being said, here are a few of the awful things I've been reading this year. And one wonderful thing. The Emperor of All Maladies   This book is all about cancer.   What?   Okay, okay. This book is described as a "biography of cancer." It goes into the known history, the develop...

2013 marks the 200th anniversary of the release of Pride & Prejudice , and rather coincidentally, I've been on a bit of an Austen-athon. Compared to a lot of people, I'm a fairly recent convert. Mia Sorella first introduced me right before I took a selected authors course at Mines where we covered P&P and Persuasion (which happens to be my personal favorite of hers). In the last seven years (holy cow, it's been longer than I thought) I've read, watched, listened (I love audio books) and even visited. In 2009, I got to roam Bath during my venture to England and have tea at the Jane Austen Centre. I wandered the gravel walk, saw the Roman baths, and pondered the dreary weather.  This and other stills were Facelifted from the Jane Austen Facebook fan page.  They're all from the 1995 BBC production of Pride & Prejudice . And tonight, when I needed to get some work done around the house, I popped the 1995 BBC version of P&P into the DVD pla...

If I have a little money I buy books; and if any is left, I buy food and clothes. -Erasmus My spending habits have changed drastically in the last year. Of course, that's to be expected -- after all, I lost my job and went from having disposable income out of proportion to my age to having a lack of disposable income out of proportion to my age. I abruptly stopped buying things and my "social money" was carefully budgeted for an occasional dinner or birthday outing. Those habits haven't yet changed, even though I've been allowed to relax a little. However, all along, I've managed to find money if there's a book I really want. I've written from time to time about my ongoing love affair with the written word. While I don't really do book reviews here because, well, I just don't, there is another aspect of this love that is easy for me to convey. This booklust has led to me finding bookstores in most cities I've visited, regardless of ...

It's been a long time coming ... but the final Harry Potter movie has been released. Yes, I know I'm a couple weeks late on that one, but as I've finally made it to the theater to see it, now's my chance to talk about my Hogwarts view. Let me summarize: I love this series, both the books and the movies. If you don't want to read any further, you now know the general idea of it. Also, there will be spoilers. While just about everybody knows and understands most of them, I might let details slip that could be ... well, spoilers. * It took awhile before I was willing to join the Harry Potter Club. It was a kid thing, and I -- at the ripe old age of 13 (just two years older than the characters, actually) -- didn't feel like joining in with the kid thing. In fact, I resisted until after the first movie came out on video something like five years later. It was the summer of 2002 when we watched it at the day care ... and I was almost instantly hooked. It was sho...

Let me tell you a story. Some time back -- I estimate between 18 and 24 months ago, although I'm not totally sure -- I took Sophie in for an oil change. As usual, I kicked back in the customer waiting area with my mp3 player and a book, paying very little attention to the things going on around me. I glanced up as someone else walked in -- and caught sight of the television over my head, tuned in to some cable news station. The host was talking via webcam to someone I didn't recognize, and here and there still photos flashed up -- photos of cattle staring at the camera, photos of kids doing random things, and occasionally photos of men in chaps. The chaps. The chaps were what ultimately made me take out my ear buds. It turned out that the woman's name was Ree, and she ran a website that was quickly growing in popularity. I caught that last part as they went to commercial and the segment ended, and I quickly jotted down on a piece of paper the only reference I caught -- ...

Well, here we are. T-minus 3 days and counting. I can't convince myself to keep working; denial has ended, but avoidance has kicked in full force. I will likely finish packing after work on Friday. (Whoop. Great way to spend a Friday night, eh?) I owe my distraction to a lot of different things. Like this book, The Madonnas of Leningrad. This is one of those diamond-in-the-rough kinds of books. A book that, four years ago, I wouldn't have even noticed on the shelf. It was an impulse B&N buy, an experiment, and I'm hooked. Not just the subject matter (workers at the Hermitage in St. Petersburg [Leningrad] during the German siege on the city in World War II), but the story itself. It's part romance, part drama, part historical fiction, and it is something I would have never caught before. I also have "Hey Jude" stuck in my head and I don't know why. I haven't listened to the song in probably two years. Right, so those two thoughts don't really go...

I love winter. Love it. I know I've expressed my feelings about certain seasons and holidays, but for my newer readers who haven't had the boredom to peruse my archives, let me get you caught up: I am overly enthusiastic about most holidays. I don't like summer heat. I am just as likely to be found sledding as the city's 10-year-old population. The first snow will have me outside playing, regardless of what my feet are wearing. Winter tends to align with so many other of my favorite things: tea, coffee, hot chocolate, cozy blankets, nighttime, warm woolen mittens ... The second it got cold enough for frost, I started thinking about Christmas (which worked out well this year -- so did ShopKo) ... Blame it on the fact that I have very little else to do with my time, or the fact that for the first time ever I have an apartment of my own to decorate (that I will actually be IN directly before and after Christmas). This means I've actually been Christmas shopping -- or ...

My computer just spontaneously restarted, and my heart broke. I was mid-post, but I think I can reproduce it with decent accuracy. So here we go ... Here's what's going on in my head right now. InterVarsity snagged me the first hour I was at Tech. I remember it rather clearly. I was sitting on my bed, looking around this glorified closet I was going to live in, wondering when my roommate (whom I had never met) would appear. These two girls poke their heads in, obviously going door-to-door, and invite me to hike Harney Peak with them and their friends the following Saturday. I asked what organization they were with and almost had a heart attack. You see, I wanted to find two groups: a Christian one, and a hiking one. It just so happened that I found both with one group. Within an hour of showing up at Tech, I was sold. There was a small group that met in the (now nonexistent) March-Dake lobby, and I got invited to that, too. The people were interesting, largely not what I expect...