more about books ~

[lookingland]

Orthopaedic Injuries of the Civil War: An Atlas of Orthopaedic Injuries and Treatments During the Civil War is down to $44.48.

i know, you were dying to know.

last night i finally started reading geraldine brooks' March (you know, that pulitzer-prize winning novel that prolly no one on my flist has read). i had only meant to read the first ten pages or chapter or so ~ but found it rather engrossing and breezed through 50 pages. the first chapter is stunning: horrific and fresh. the death of silas stone is astonishingly well written (hang up your pens, people, it's all over!).

but what follows begins to trouble me. the writing loosens up a bit and we go from the intensity of battle to flashbacks of the life of Mr. March and his encounter with a plantation owner and his slave, Grace. here i feel the stereotypes begin to creep in (after holding well through the introductions). Mr. Clement (who is anything but) crumbles into the old south slave-whipping paradigm and all the slaves are earnest, good-willing dignified people of heroic spirit, etc. etc. i think it's impossible for people to write anything else these days. the clichés have started getting heavy in a book that otherwise opened with one of the most original battlefield descriptions i have ever seen.

i'm not too disappointed ~ the writing is good and i'm willing to believe the romance part, though i'd rather just get back to the fight (i know, i am bad). i'm just afraid that the book is going to be about this love affair instead of the war. beh.

i'm not against romance, mind you. i like a mooshy love story as much as the next person. but i'll feel cheated if Mr. March spends the next 250 pages whining about the woman for whom he had a forbidden love. this is the part where i go on a tirade about truth in advertising since nowhere on the book is it labeled a "mooshy romance".

anyway, it's still at 4 stars right now. we'll see what happens.

~ * ~

i've started putting my books on LibraryThing. if you click that link you can see how far i have gotten (not very ~ hahahahaha). i may quit since half the books i have are too old and don't have catalog information or pictures (and i'm too lazy to scan and stuff). anyway, it's a fun diversion.

: D

gonna take the dogs to the park today ~ they have missed it! happy saturday all!

Comments

[lastremnant.livejournal.com]

that's an interesting site. :) So it's basicall trying to catalog all your books and then it connects you with people based on the books you read as well? Like forum style chats?

[lookingland.livejournal.com]

i haven't really explored the rest of it ~ i've just been looking for books. it seems pretty cool, though!

: D

[gwyn-hwyfar.livejournal.com]

Oh! I've been meaning to read that book! Thanks for reminding me.

[lookingland.livejournal.com]

i'm very impressed with the first part so far ~ definitely worth a gander.

i prolly won't finish reading it until next week, but i'll let you know how it goes.

: D

[geckobird.livejournal.com]

Yes, yes I was dying to know! ^_^

And so I looked through your online library. And now I want to create my own online library. :D

I definitely remember reading The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle by Avi and Where the Wild Things Are as a child. I loved both of those books.

There's a lot of books I am dying to get my hands upon, yet due to my financial situation, they are merely a hope for the future. In the meantime, I have acquired a lovely book collection from what others have given me, and what I couldn't resist buying (I love book sales!). One book in particular that I have checked out from the library, The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, is turning out to be an amazing book. I'm not quite finished with it, but it is incredibly lovely and the prose spectacular. I simply adore how Death, itself, tells the story, and I must say, Death has an interesting fixation on colors. This is definitely something I wish to buy... someday. Although the main character, the Book Thief who is a young girl named Liesel, seems to be influencing my thoughts for I had a thought about stealing it. Naughty Amber! No following in the footsteps of book thieves.

I need a book user pic.

[lookingland.livejournal.com]

it's at $44.41 now. hahahahahaha ~

~ *~

while it's great to own a huge pile of books, it's nice to choose your "keepers" carefully. i like to check things out at the library ~ and then if i really really love them or think they will be perpetually useful in some fashion, i will buy them.

except old books (pre-1900). then i lose all common sense.

: D

[bachsoprano.livejournal.com]

I was wondering what you thought of The March. Donald Maass used it as an example of good pace and tension in one of his workshops, and the particular section he used was all the more remarkable because plot-wise, nothing happened. It was all about psychological mood, so I've been meaning to buy it...guess I will now!

Hope you had a nice walk with the pooches :)

[lookingland.livejournal.com]

noooooo ~ not doctorow's novel!

this is March (no the). i hope Maas wasn't talking about doctorow, because if he was, i'd be very disappointed. i tried (with every fibre of my being) to like doctorow's mess of a book. i thought it was awful ~ simply atrocious. not only does a whole bunch of nothing happen, but it's written as if all editors were sent on a permanent holiday.

please tell me you're talking about the brooks book and not doctorow.

: o p

[bachsoprano.livejournal.com]

Oops! I'm pretty sure it was March because he mentioned something about it winning the Pulitzer....I certainly hope that's the one he meant! I'll have to go dig out my notes and see....

[lookingland.livejournal.com]

whew ~ !

; D

[bachsoprano.livejournal.com]

:D

Oh, and I love Library Thing...I haven't been there in a while, but I've been meaning to catalogue my library for a while. I'm going to have fun snooping around your reading material! :)

[lookingland.livejournal.com]

nothing too surprising in there ~ i'm amazed at how predictable my books are ~ hahahahaha

: D

[smurfb1ue.livejournal.com]

I read March after hearing Tracy Chevalier mention it at a conference, but I prefer her novel Year of Wonders. I think I had a hard time reading a book loosely based on one of my favorite books. It was kind of like reading one of those spin-offs of Pride and Prejudice...a mere imitation.

[lookingland.livejournal.com]

much as i love alcott, i don't find myself making the connection much ~ and brooks doesn't seem to be trying to imitate anything, really ~ if anything there's a very deliberate attempt to divorce her story from alcott's ~ to the point that i get a bit distracted when he mentions beth or amy (theyre sorta immaterial to all this in a way).

normally, i don't like the spin off thing, but i kinda feel like since the father is absent in the alcott book, this isn't really taking too many liberties (or at least doesn't seem to be 112 pages in).

i'd have a harder time with it if it were a book about Jo or Marmee more directly.

: D