Voracious Reader

I am a voracious reader and the book problem is getting out of hand. For a long time I have had the policy that I only bought books that I seriously wanted to own as part of my library, which meant that I usually had already read them. This helped keep the piles down, but lately I have begun to buy books just for the sake of buying them again. This is part of author good karma and I am happy to do it.

I am also an avid library supporter and so I go to the library on a weekly basis and usually come away with an armload of books. I don't always read each one, but, I read until I am bored or it loses my interest. Often, I am reading four or five books at once, and the one or two I keep reading until the end, wins the competition. (I imagine that is what it is like with agents and manuscript submissions).

Also, I have been going to used bookstores. We have some great ones. The Montague Bookmill being one of the best. "Books you don't need in a place you can't find." When I go to these places, I pick up books I have been wanting to add to my collection and books that are just for general interest, especially to visitors.

I love it when I walk into a house and there are piles of books. So, I have started to let that happen in my own home. I am not a clutterbug and I have had people come in to my house and say where is all your stuff. Well, I am letting the books and magazines clutter things. It is worth it. Although I really do just need another bookshelf.

Another spring feeding our Voracious Reading is my husband and I like to support our local book store and even if we aren't buying books, occasionally we go and select a few magazines from their varied collection. I am not talking about Cosmo or Better Homes and Gardens (although I do like that one), I am talking about Writer's magazines, or Beer Brewing magazines, or Farming magazines, or Art magazines. Supporting small publications, small book stores and our interests all at once. It is great. And then I keep them around for others to enjoy when they come to our house.

   
What do you read? Do you have piles around your house? What is in your bookshelf? I love seeing other people's bookshelves. (Lostinsidethecovers - that is a shout out to you!)

C is for Comparative Titles

When a writer queries an agent, he or she should identify a work or two that an agent can think of as comparative to your work. The work of Alice Hoffman long ago inspired my own writing, though my book is different than her style for sure. I actually began to write a book when I struggled to find more books to read that were in the genre of what I call supernatural women’s fiction. So I wrote the book I wanted to read. In the time since, as I was writing my book, lots of stories have been published that share some element with DISTILLATION. But it seems nothing is really like it. Maybe that is good, maybe that is bad. But here are some books I can recommend or am looking to read that fit somewhere in the genre:

                         

Have you read any of these books? Can you recommend a good
ghost story, a story of past lives, or story with literary witchy magic?

Happy New Year! #1 Reading and Writing

Happy New Year. Resolution # 1 - to start blogging more often about what I am reading and finding out what you all are reading.

I am reading right now "Outside the Ordinary World" by local author Dori Ostermiller.
So far this book is pretty good. It is about Sylvia Sandon who swore she wouldn't become like her mother (imagine that - it seems to be a common theme) but finds that she is retracing some of her steps as Sylvia tries to create a better life in small town New England (also very common in these parts) as her marriage is failing. The beginning at least is set in California in the 1970s amidst ambient brush fires that give the sense that the world is going up in flames.

I was a little familiar with Ms. Ostermiller before because she runs the Writers in Progress Workshops in Florence, MA. I have considered attending them numerous times and still plan on it at some point. I did try to contact her a few times because she did offer manuscript critiques (for a fee which I couldn't really afford) - but I was going to see if there was a partial critique we could do. But alas, she didn't return my calls or emails. But when I saw her book in the library the other day I figured, she must have been busy with this.

and "At Home: A Short History of Private Life" by Bill Bryson
This book is non-fiction and is one I heard about on NPR - I ordered it from the library and had to wait. It is really interesting - taking the reader through all the rooms and passageways in a home - and in doing so going off on a million tangents about the things found in them - or in ideas (somewhat) related to that room. I started reading it because I love old houses and I wanted to know the history of the rooms. Unfortunately though, Mr. Bryson does not stick to that formula. For example, he spends the entire chapter on the Cellar (which I was very interested to learn about) talking about the history of bricks and cement. Right now - we are in the study - and he is talking about the lives and habits of rats and mice. These are interesting subjects, though I do not share his particular interest in eccentric architects, and I have kept reading - but it is not solely about the house. It should have been a clue that one of Mr. Bryson's earlier works was "A Short History of Nearly Everything."

So What are You Reading? Please do tell.

Books and Summer Reads

I just finished Margaret Atwood’s The Year of the Flood, which is a follow up to Oryx and Crake. If you have read and loved, as most do, her Handmaid’s Tale, you might like this dovetailed pair. As with Handmaid’s, these take place in a dystopian, not too distant future world where animals have been gene spliced to create new species and the social ills of civilization are taking their toll on everything. It is a fast forward look at where our consumerism, vanity, corporeal and corporate corruption might take us.

As with Handmaid’s Tale, Atwood’s imagination brings to life women who patiently navigate their way through dangerous situations that threaten their individuality, bodies, and mental states with hushed tones and secret conveyances while planning a way to escape and/or to survive. Oryx and Crake begins with a man isolated in a world recently wiped out by plague, in which the boots of guards dead outside biological engineering companies still bake in the sun, and where compound animal species (such as rakunks) roam the forest that is taking over what was once civilization. He tells the story of the man who was responsible for the destruction of everything and in the end finds others who are still alive. The Year of the Flood tells a parallel story of a group of subversive “greenies” who are called God’s Gardeners and who seek to live an anti-consumerist, ecologically friendly life and to spread the word before the “waterless flood” destroys the world. This story ends at the same place the other one does, except from the other side of the camp fire, so to speak. I really liked the way the two books were not a series in the traditional sense, where one story follows another. Instead, they are concurrent stories that converge in the same spot.

Other books I can recommend: If you have not already read The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe, it is a great summer read. It is a modern day Salem witch story that oscillates back and forth between a young woman discovering her heritage in Salem today and the story of a real witch from the Salem Witch Trials. I actually just added it to a list of choice books in my upcoming American Literature class. In an attempt to actually get kids to like reading, we try to assign enjoyable, contemporary novels that pick up on themes or subjects from the canon, as outside, independent reading and I thought the kids would really like in connection to the early New England works we read in class.




In relation to Howe’s book, I can also recommend if you like witchy women and historical fiction: Daughter’s of the Witching Hill by Mary Sharratt. This is an excellent piece of historical fiction that takes place in the early 17th century in England – centering on a “cunning woman” trying to make ends meet with folk magic mixed with the then forbidden Catholic faith. It takes place during the reign of James I, and his Daemonologie, which was the basis for interrogations and examinations precluding the various witch trials across Europe and New England.

I also recently read Joe Hill's Horns. This was a very interesting new type of "horror" story - I guess, written by none other than the son of Stephen King. For some bizarre reason, the agent I met with at the conference I went to recently suggested I compare myself to Joe Hill. By this comment, I am not sure if she even read my pages. But - this book - about a guy who wakes up one morning with devil horns on his head - is a unique and good read.

I am interested to hear in books others have to recommend. As school is getting out soon, I will be reading probably two books a week, so bring it on. I just returned from the library and, as always, came away with an armload of books. One I just picked up that seems interesting is a nonfiction book on the history of poison and chemistry. The chemical revolution is something I researched for DISTILLATION - from alchemy to modern day pharmaceuticals and my brain is ticking away at some ideas for the new story I am writing.

I also plan on reading some classics this summer – which I always plan – but do not always actually get to. Currently, I have Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway, Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead (just coming off Hamlet at school and this is a must) and Scott Fitzgerald’s The Beautiful and the Damned on my list.