What's with today, today?

I wanted to write this post ages ago, in responses to the post over on Stuck-in-a-book   post , but blogger has been playing up and uni assignments have been calling... so some of these books are out of date, and some have been changed, but here we go... The book I'm currently reading... I loved Patricia C. Wrede's Enchanted Forest Chronicles  SO MUCH when I was younger, but I haven't read anything else by her (or even the whole set of the Chronicles, for that matter). This is living up to my expectations, it's a regency/fantasy book and it's so much fun! The main character is a street urchin in London who dresses as a boy to stay out of trouble and takes a job breaking into Mairelon the magician's caravan and is then taken on as an assistant. Adventures ensue. The last book I finished... I am reading quite a bit of fantasy at the moment I feel, and this is also set in a quasi-regency period, but with the added complication of an alternate hist...

Well it is certainly a woeful year for blogging for me. But it is a hectic year for uni, work and apparently everything else. Heading into panic mode. So at the moment not much is getting done, and all my books are comfort reads. Books to read when your brain is all worn out at the end of the day. If I look at my current reading list, I think it pretty much sums up all my comfort-read categories: 1. Agatha Christie Maybe that should be 'murder mysteries', but there are few things as comforting as Agatha Christie. I'm currently reading 'Lord Edgeware Dies', which has Poirot, dead actresses and suspects galore. Agatha Christie has written so many books I don't think I've read them all, the only problem is that it can be hard to sort out the ones I have read from the ones I haven't. Pretty sure this is a new one though. 2. Anything with a really strong plot Fast-paced books, preferably full of action, wake you up at the end of those 10 hour days. I ...

I know I have been doing very poorly at keeping up my goal of blogging more frequently this year, and am only now putting up pictures from my birthday earlier this month, while it is still the same month. Hope you enjoy them anyway! This year I turned 25, and for my birthday Andrew made me a spectacular chocolate mud cake type cake. It was very secretive and time-consuming, but I think he did an amazing job. The view from above. It looks so cozy, I would like to sit in that armchair by that fire and read those books. As it is, I nibbled on the armchair and ate those books (they are made of white chocolate + food dye + flavouring). There's me, turning 25 with cake, candles, bookshelf and friends (not pictured, but I swear they were there). After this we headed to the Berkelouw Books wine bar for some food and wine and book-browsing. For my birthday I got a lot of book vouchers (appropriately enough) among other things, so I spent Sunday book sho...

The Pillow Book by Sei Shonagon is a collection of thoughts, like a diary, written by a court gentlewoman in Japan in the tenth century. This absolutely blew me away when I started, because it was impossible not to make comparisons to Old English literature, and there is just nothing like this in Old English (sidenote: though many works I studied in Old English are dated pre-10th C., technically the period ends in 1066, so this book is roughly contemporaneous with the late Anglo-Saxon period). This book seems so personal, in a way that Anglo-Saxon literature is not, and it's so concerned with the affairs of women (it's written by a woman) and everyday life, and aesthetics, it's like an entirely different world. There is something really incredible about reading something that seems so personal and yet was written 1,000 years ago. Besides, this book is a great introduction to the world of the Japanese court in the 10th century, with its descriptiveness and anecdotes. There...

The first word I can remember reading was in a fairy tale, and folk and fairy tales have long had a fascination for me. When I was growing up (or when I was a teenager even) we had a collection of books at home by Ruth Manning Sanders ( A Book of Dragons , A Book of Sorcerers and Spells  etc.) which rekindled that interest after fairy tales had become overly familiar and a little bit boring. These books had a selection of fairy tales from around the world on a specific theme (dragons or sorcerers for instance), which meant that it had a wider range of stories than I was used to and made me aware of the universality of fairy tales. Tales from all over the world were familiar, there are so many variations on Cinderella. And yet, they were not the same stories that I had read. There are dragons from all over the world, but Chinese dragons are very different from European dragons. I am not the first person to be fascinated by fairy tales, of course, or to notice that there...

As January draws to a close, it's really my last chance to blog about New Year's resolutions, so here they are before the time runs out. 1) Blog more. This is one of those things like 'exercise more' or 'eat healthily' that crop up over and over again but rarely eventuate. But all the same I'd like to blog more regularly this year. And leave comments on other blogs, rather than lurking as usual. 2) Read at least one book from every continent (apart from Antarctica). My reading tends to be very dominated by, roughly in order, England, the US and Australia. So in order to mix things up a bit I've set this target, I think it's pretty easily achievable but I don't really have a plan of attack. Any recommendations (particularly for books from Africa and Asia, which I don't come across often) greatly appreciated! It can be difficult to define a book's 'nationality', so I'm using these guidelines- author's nationality + set...

Sam's companion review of Gilead  is here Coming to Home straight after reading Housekeeping I was struck by the differences. Home feels earthier, more dialogue, less light and water, less dreamy. But then the similarities- the interest in family, the presence of loneliness as a force that seems intrinsic to some people. The outsider, the drifter, and home. As you might expect, home is a major theme in this novel. Home begins with Glory, the youngest of eight children, returning home to the Iowa town of Gilead to look after her aging father, the Rev. Robert Boughton, after her own dreams have been shattered. Shortly after her return her brother, Jack, comes home too. Unlike Glory, he hasn't been home for 20 years, and his return fills the house with a mixture of anger, joy, love and anxiety. Home in this book is a place of happy childhood memories, but also painful ones. It provides sanctuary but also a sense of failure. Both children have returned less than voluntarily, ...

Author discovery of the year: Marilynne Robinson! I would be happy to go out and just read anything by her. Other notable authors I read for the first time this year were Kate Griffin and Anais Nin. Top 10 books read last year (not in order): Wolf Hall - Hilary Mantel Scott Pilgrim series - Bryan Lee O'Malley Mrs Dalloway - Virginia Woolf The Changeover - Margeret Mahy The City and the City - China Mieville The Summer Book - Tove Jansson The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie - Alan Bradley The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet- David Mitchell A Madness of Angels - Kate Griffin Home- Marilynne Robinson I feel like it's cheating to pick 10, since that makes up such a large proportion of books read. But it was still hard to pick. Honourable mentions to The Piper's Son-  Melina Marchetta,  Housekeeping - Marilynne Robinson, Under a Glass Bell - Anais Nin, The House of Mirth - Edith Wharton,   The Knife of Never Letting Go and The Hunger Games... I could go ...

I did this a couple of years ago- it's a meme taken from Ronni- and I liked it so I'm doing it again. Pretend that it's NYE rather than New Years Day.... 1. What did you do in 2010 that you'd never done before? Studied by distance, ran a bible study. 2. Did you keep your new year's resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I'm a bit wishy washy with new year's resolutions. I guess the same as most people- eat better, exercise more. 3. Did anyone close to you give birth? Two school friends of mine did- to Amelia and Matthew. Both in October. Also my cousin, in June, to Oscar. 4. Did anyone close to you die? My Gran. It was somewhat unexpected. We remembered her chocolate cakes and love of books. I remembered the time she defended us from a charging bull (it may have been a cow) armed with a pitchfork. Love you Gran. 5. What countries did you visit? Didn't leave Australia. 6. What would you like to have in 2011 that you lacked in 2010...

As always, books I finished reading for the first time this year. This year with links to where I've talked about them before, for added convenience. [edited to add link to Home  review] Wolf Hall- Hilary Mantel Don't know how Hilary Mantel managed to make the intricacies of Tudor politics so clear and readable, but she did. Reviewed here Bella Tuscany- Frances Mayes Self-indulgent travelogue Angel Puss- Colleen McCullough AA Gill is Away- AA Gill  The Graveyard Book- Neil Gaiman Perhaps my favourite Neil Gaiman to date. A Madness of Angels- Kate Griffin Fast paced and lots of fun, urban fantasy. More here Under a Glass Bell- Anais Nin Gorgeous little short stories that made me want to read more. The Hunger Games- Suzanne Collins One of the most talked about books of the year, reviewed here The Slap- Christos Tsiolkas One of the most talked about books of last year. I was in two minds about it though, see here and here . On the whole, not a fan. Unseen Academic...

Happy Christmas all! Hope you had a great day. I was away from my computer at the time (actually spent about half the day on the road), so sorry that the Christmas greetings are belated. I am currently in the process of writing up my list of New Books Read This Year, but for now- what I got for Christmas (aka Christmas books):                - Truth, Peter Temple (Australian Crime)               - The Little Prince and Other Stories (Collected Children's stories, including The Little Prince and                The Railway Children)               - The City and the City, China Mieville (Fantasy/Crime)               - Freedom, Jonathan Franzen (American Literature)               - The Grimm Reader, trans. Maria Tatar, foreword by AS Byatt. (Fai...

In my wanderings around the blogosphere I have come across two(!) memes that involve filling in the blanks with books you've read this year. I couldn't decide which one to do, so naturally I have done both. The downside is that you start to run out of good titles, but it was fun nonetheless. First, from Regular Ruminations ( here ): In high school I was:   Under a Glass Bell  (Anais Nin) People might be surprised I’m:   The Fire in the Blood   (Irene Nemirovsky) I will never be:   Jude the Obscure   (Thomas Hardy) My fantasy job is:   Unseen Academicals  (Terry Pratchett) At the end of a long day I need:   Love in a Cold Climate  (Nancy Mitford) I hate it when:   Housekeeping  (Marilynne Robinson)  Wish I had:   A Study in Scarlet  (Arthur Conan Doyle) My family reunions are:   Exploits of Moominpappa  (Tove Jansson) At a party you’d find me:   Looking for Alibrandi  (Melina Marchetta) ...

Points for identifying the lyrics in the title! This is a train of thought that has been brewing in my head for quite a long time, so I'm not sure if it's coherent anymore. It's also based heavily on my own personal experiences/feelings, so I'm sure not everyone will agree with me, and I would love to hear your thoughts! Basically I have been reading YA (young adult) fiction for many many years, and throughout my teenage years (and before and after) and for a while I stopped because some stuff about it annoyed me. Here is my rant: I remember when I was around 15 a friend recommended Sonya Hartnett's 'All My Dangerous Friends', about a girl starting university who goes out with a bad boy, falls in with the wrong crowd, steals, takes drugs and then leaves because she sees the dark side of it (in the form of the 'crowd's' violent retribution against a man who abuses one of their own). The basic plotline there feels a little familiar. It did to me ...

Here's an update on a future thing appearing on this blog, I know you will all be on tenterhooks to hear what I will write next. After reading Housekeeping I wanted to go out and read everything else Marilynne Robinson has ever written. But where to start? The obvious place is Gilead , perhaps her most famous book. But should I read that or Home , written later than Gilead but set parallel to it? Musing on Twitter my friend Sam commented that he was keen to read Gilead and, long story short, we decided to do a parallel read- he read Gilead and I read Home . Next step: we both review them, swap and repeat. So I'm sorry if this blog starts to give you Marilynne Robinson fatigue, but I have a lot more coming up!

Last weekend two of my friends had babies! Two! One boy and one girl. I haven't met them yet but I have seen photos and I can report that they are both extremely cute. Also from all accounts both friends + their babies are healthy, which is even more important. So very exciting times.  During this week another friend managed to get in a car accident- rolling her car right over on a wet road. But she emerged unscathed through the back window. And most importantly, her gelato was safe. Which is good to hear. This weekend another friend is moving house. So much news, and thankfully all good. What a week! My life seems unexciting by comparison. Though I did get a haircut (it's very short!), get my marks back from my last assignments (passed with pretty good marks) and manage to buy a bunch of new books. That is eventful enough for me! Edited to add picture of new haircut (coincidentally I am also dressed as a flapper for Halloween in this photo)

Another rave from me here, I loved Housekeeping , by Marilynne Robinson, and have to read the rest of her books now. Marilynne Robinson is best known (I think) as the author of Gilead , as well as Home (winner of the 2009 Orange Prize). From what I have gleaned, her major themes are religion and domesticity. While I have heard about Gilead quite a bit I have not been tempted to read it, and only came to read Housekeeping after reading a review that described it as good-but-not-as-good-as- Gilead (as well as an encounter with it in a bookshop in a moment of weakness).  But I am so glad that I did, because this was such a gorgeous novel, beautifully written. It's a novel of liminality, with recurring imagery of water and light and the sense of memory and dream. All these things seem to infuse the writing style itself, as well as informing the plot, characters and settings. And what are they? Two sisters are left by their mother on their Grandmother's doorstep, and cared for b...