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ParentDish Feature: What are you reading?
Filed under: Media, Day Care & Education
(June 1, 2007) What are you reading this week? I have had a busy week of reading around here. I am not quite sure why, but I have sort of run out of patience with my romance novels, though I am still working my way through one. I am pretty sure that my impatience is temporary. However, in the meantime, I am looking for other things to read. I have been enjoying a very lovely email conversation with commenter Mandy this week. At her recommendation, I decided to go ahead and overcome my fear of The Lovely Bones. I started it last Friday, and read it all before I went to bed that night. It was a beautiful, compelling book. But I am not going to discuss it quite yet, here, because I promised I would give everyone time to read it first. So, readers, start your engines! Can you at least post in the comments and let me know when you have started reading it? Then we will all kind of be able to keep track of how far you are in the book, and we'll know when we can discuss it here.
I think you will have a hard time putting it down. Mandy also wrote that she had gotten Twilight, and she took her three-year-old son to a new playground so she could try reading it. However, she had to follow him around, which distracted the reading. But I remember doing the same thing when my kids were that age. I love hearing how other moms try to find time to read.
In addition to finishing The Lovely Bones, I started reading Widow for One Year by John Irving. I'll let you know how I like it. I am maybe a quarter of the way finished with it now. John Irving books take some time, but I love him as an author. I also have A Prayer for Owen Meany on my shelf. Shopping my shelves has proved to be pretty lucrative, actually. I was thinking about John Irving's books, which are full of sex, versus romance novels, which really don't even parallel Irving for sexual content. So, what makes Irving's books different? Well, in Irving's books, we don't get the complete narrative (or, dare I say, blow by blow) of the sex and how everybody feels about it, inch by inch, lick by lick. Irving's books are much more about the relationships that are forged (or destroyed) by the sex, and the consequences of the sex, than telling you about the sex itself. The orgasms his characters have are temporary, fleeting, but the consequences are long and difficult (you thought I was going to say 'hard,' didn't you?).
In addition to the Irving novel, I am still plugging my way through Tall, Dark, and Cajun. I suppose it's growing on me. Especially one part: In Tall, Dark, and Cajun, one of the characters is an interior decorator. She is explaining feng shui to one of her clients (her potential lover) and she waves her hands at his houseboat and says, "We have to get rid of this clutter."
"Clutter?" He asks her, offended.
"Yes. It's bad feng shui. Clutter is nothing more than a series of postponed decisions."
I'm paraphrasing, but I really love that last bit: a series of postponed decisions. The stacks of books and papers in my living room and dining room? Nothing more than a series of postponed decisions. Far from making me feel bad in any way, this makes me feel that my house is brimming with the potential. The potential to make all of those decisions. At any moment, I could a) read one of those books b) do work with one of those folders or c) put them away, indicating that I am done with them. But while the clutter is present, my work is unfinished. And while my work is unfinished, I am still alive.
A series of postponed decisions. That sounds like gone fishing, gone for a walk, or doing something more interesting.
What are you reading? And do you ever journal or blog about it? I put the above bit about postponed decisions on my personal blog too, because I liked it so much. Have a great week, and let me know about The Lovely Bones!
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ReaderComments (Page 1 of 1)
6-01-2007 @ 6:51PM
Trisha said...I read the lovely bones and loved it! I too was a little worried that it would be too weird. But like you said, it was beautiful.
I'm currently reading something far from my usual book type; The American Presidents by David C. Shitney. Allready I'm facinated, and it's historical! I'll be checking back for more readers comments so I can add some books to my summer reading list.
btw- I read when my 1 year old is napping or in bed. Which makes me skip cleaning but that's fine with me:)
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6-01-2007 @ 6:52PM
Trisha said...OMG! I meant to type David C Whitney, not SHITney! ah ha, sorry!
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6-01-2007 @ 7:19PM
Ann Adams said...I have Widow for One Year around here someplace.
Think I'll dig it out and read it again. I like John Irving.
Right now, I'm working my way back through Sue Grafton but I have my eye on a new Jodi Picoult book called "My Sister's Keeper". I read the first couple of chapters at the book store and got hooked.
I'll probably talk myself into it.
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6-02-2007 @ 1:35AM
Cheryl said...Ann, fair warning. I thought the end of My Sister's Keeper was terrible! I am currently reading Into the Forest by Jean Hegland. It is a story of two teenage sisters who live in a house in the forest and have to cope when society suddenly breaks down (it's a post-apocalypse book but very much a literary/feminist take on the genre). It's really interesting.
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6-02-2007 @ 12:04PM
Molly said...LOL, Trisha.. tell us what you really think of that author! :)
I finished the Lovely Bones this week, and the second time was a different experience than the first especially since I became a parent in between readings. I'm looking forward to the discussion.
I'm trying to catch up with the Rachel Morgan books by Kim Harrison, so I read 'A Fistful of Charms' this week. It's another in the vampires, werewolves and all things weird genre. I really liked the first few books in this series, but this one wasn't as great. HBO is supposed to be making this series into a show, and I think it will make for great T.V.
I keep track of the books I read by creating a simple table in a Word document. I have columns for title, author and a grade based on what I thought of the book. I really should add a space for comments since I have absolutely no memory for plots. The list keeps me from buying a book I've already read, and I like to go back and the end of the year and pick my favorites.
Like Trisha, I usually read when my daughter is napping, but she hasn't napped all week! Ugh, she's not even two yet! Isn't too early to drop napping? The stack of books I have waiting will never get read at this rate!
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6-02-2007 @ 1:35PM
Spring said...Hey, I got in a good 2 hours of reading at the park, despite having to move around to keep within sight of him. I will be doing that again next time I have a book I can't wait to return to... probably when I get the sequel to Twilight.
I am reading Paradise right now by Toni Morrison. It's about a small town that is entirely a black population and the book starts off with the men from the town going up to an old Convent and shooting all the women. Then it moves into the different stories of the women and what led them to the house. It's interesting and emotional.
I agree about the clutter.
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6-02-2007 @ 5:18PM
Leian said...I read The Lovely Bones but like you, Jen, it took me a long time to do it - I avoided it because of the subject matter, because I was just afraid that the book would be too good and make me feel so sad. And it did do that, obviously, but I'm glad I finally got around to it.
Another book I had for a long time before reading it was The Kite Runner. I just had so many other books I wanted to read that it took a while to get to it - I had no idea the book would affect me so powerfully. What a book... It stayed with me for quite a long time afterwards.
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6-09-2007 @ 2:31PM
Jacqui from the Bay Area said...Hi Jen, It's been a week or two since I read your book posts here again and I was eagerly looking forward to it. Read Hosseini's second book "A Thousand Splendid Suns" the other night and like his first book, this one once again gripped me from the first page to the last. And once again, tears ran down copiously. Unlike the first one, however, where the story revolved on the friendship of two men and a young Afghan boy, "A Thousand..." showed the triumph of an Afghan woman and the many hardships she had to endure along the way, with another equally brave older Afghan woman. I hope you read it soon - this is another book that will stay with you long after you've read the last page.
I'm recovering now by reading one of James Patterson's mysteries (while Lee Child's latest Jack Reacher saga awaits) but hope to get my hands soon on Irving's "Widow..." that has also been sitting in our shelves for quiet a while.
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