Book Love

A question from BTT:

Are you a spine breaker? Or a dog-earer? Do you expect to keep your books in pristine condition even after you have read them? Does watching other readers bend the cover all the way round make you flinch or squeal in pain?

Oh, I'm a spine breaker AND a dog earer. And a soup-spiller on pages. Except when I buy a book as a gift and decide to read it first - then I read it just barely cracked open.

Maybe because books are so readily available these days (compared to, say, the Middle Ages), I just don't give too much thought to preserving them. In fact, I hate when people give me special editions of books - like I'm supposed to appreciate how it is bound, rather than appreciate the BOOK - the words and the concepts behind the words.

My books are READ. They don't just sit on shelves. And since I carry them around with me they tend to get pretty beat up.

You?

Literary couples?

Booking through Thursday asks the following this week:

“Name a favorite literary couple and tell me why they are a favorite. If you cannot choose just one, that is okay too. Name as many as you like–sometimes narrowing down a list can be extremely difficult and painful. Or maybe that’s just me.”

hmmm.

Elizabeth Bennett and Mr. Darcy from Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. Austen showed how first impressions can so often be wrong, or at least not be the entire story.

Daphne Manners and Hari Kumar from Paul Scott's The Jewel in the Crown. Scott says a lot about the western justice system through the tragedy of their relationship. Love cannot conquer political reality.

Maud and Roland from A.S. Byatt's Possession (no not Ash and Lamotte like everyone else picks). I love how they can't bring themselves to be "romantic" because romance has been lost in this post-modern age.

You?

Q & A

Over at Novel Readings is a Q&A about books that I thought I'd try.

What was the last book you bought?

Well, that's easy. Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead, which kinda sorta started this whole blog thing. Before that I bought Anna Karenina, which I'm still slowly reading. Both in paperback.

Hardback? hmmm.

I think it was The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox by Maggie O'Farrell.

Name a book you have read MORE than once.

Just one? To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. Possession by A.S. Byatt. Every Dorothy Dunnett novel. Dream of Scipio by Iain Pears.

Has a book ever fundamentally changed the way you see life? If yes, what was it?

I'm not sure any book has changed me fundamentally. Books have made me think long and hard about things. For instance, Dream of Scipio made me think long and hard about the meaning of 'civilization'.

How do you choose a book? e.g. by cover design and summary, recommendations or reviews?

Recommendations are important. But I admit that cover design will make me pick up a book I've never hear of to read the first paragraph. The best cover design won't make me read the book if the first paragraph doesn't grab me - not from a plot point-of-view but from an author's style point-of-view.

Do you prefer fiction or non-fiction?

Fiction. But I still read a lot of non-fiction.

What's more important in a novel - beautiful writing or a gripping plot?

Writing. Plot without beautiful writing bores me. But a combination of beautiful writing and gripping plot - heaven.

Most loved/memorable character?

Dorothy Dunnett's Francis Crawford.

Which book or books can be found on your nightstand at the moment?


The Fountainhead by Any Rand
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

but then there's the "pile" on top of the bookcase:

Inez of my Soul by Isabel Allende
The Titan's Curse by Rick Riordan (yes it's a kid's book ... so?)
The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
Martin Dressler by Steven Millhauser
The Story of Forgetting by Stefan Merrill Block
The Red Scarf by Kate Furnivall
Mudbound by Hillary Jordan
A Thread of Grace by Mary Doria Russell

What was the last book you read?

The Amber Room by Steve Berry. I blogged about it here.

Have you ever given up on a book halfway in?

More and more as I get older. But I don't remember most of them. The most 'famous' book I've given up on (twice) is DH Lawrence's Women in Love. I think I've read everything else by Lawrence except that and for the life of me I can't get past page 100.

An "Honest-to-God Literary Salon"

Last week, a friend of mine used a quote in one of her blog posts that contained the phrase: poetry readings, literary salons, theatres.

I commented that I'd always wanted to meet someone who had been to an honest-to-god literary salon. She, with her inimitable wit, shot back, "what would qualify as a "sham" literary salon, I am wondering."

I'm still thinking about that. What qualifies as a literary salon? What is the difference between an author event and a literary salon? What is the difference between a book discussion group and a literary salon? Is it the location? The people who attend? The topics discussed? The general ambience?

And, really, what would qualify as a "sham" literary salon? I am wondering too.