{"id":279,"date":"2009-12-16T22:34:49","date_gmt":"2009-12-17T03:34:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/?p=279"},"modified":"2009-12-16T22:37:33","modified_gmt":"2009-12-17T03:37:33","slug":"mid-december-reading-listening-update","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/2009\/12\/16\/mid-december-reading-listening-update\/","title":{"rendered":"Mid-December Reading & Listening Update"},"content":{"rendered":"

For the first time in a very long time, I went on a road trip and came home with fewer books. I visited my parents and read and then returned two books to my mother: The Zookeeper’s Wife<\/em><\/a> by Diane Ackerman and Knit Two<\/em><\/a> by Kate Jacobs. The former was a sometimes heart-wrenching, yet somehow amazingly light-hearted, portrait of the family that lived at and ran the Warsaw Zoo at the time of the Blitzkrieg. Very sad…many animals were killed in the initial attack, but the zoo became a hiding place for Jews.<\/p>\n

The latter–the sequel to Friday Night Knitting Club<\/em><\/a>, which I also borrowed from my mother–was a good, if quick, read. It seems like there are just one or two too many characters to really keep track of and get to know them all very well. I’m not sorry I read it, and I may borrow the threquel when my Mom’s done with it.<\/p>\n

I only came home with one book but it’s a doozy: Inwood’s three-inch History of London<\/em><\/a>. I added it to the pile in the bedroom, not sure when I’ll read it.\"Beaumaris<\/a><\/p>\n

One random note: I’m reading a National Geographic Society book called The Age of Chival<\/em><\/a>ry<\/em><\/a>. It is a lively overview that includes a pull out of the Bayeaux Tapestry<\/a>. The end pages are a schematic of Beaumaris Castle, which is on the Isle of Angelsey in Northern Wales, one of the castles I visited during my trip last year. I got the classic castle picture there…the swan in the mote that you see here. You can view some more pictures, too. And, for fun, you can Create Your Own Tapestry.<\/a><\/p>\n

I also got plenty of time to listen to audio books since it’s a five or six hour road trip to see my folks. On the way north, I listened to Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict<\/a><\/em> by Laurie Viera Rigler. Excellent and perfect for the audio format because you can clearly hear the difference between the narrator’s voice and the voice of Jane Mansfield. The same is true for Rude Awakenings of a Jane Austen Addict that I listened to on the way home.\u00a0 Not quite finished so I’ll have to take a walk or ride the bike! Well-narrated books are a combination of a audio-friendly prose accompanied by a pleasing voice.<\/p>\n

I started my book group book: Why We Believe What We Believe<\/a>, thinking I had until after Christmas.\u00a0 But it turns out the meeting is Sunday afternoon.\u00a0 Guess I’ll have to step up the reading schedule but I’m confident I’ll finish.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For the first time in a very long time, I went on a road trip and came home with fewer books. I visited my parents and read and then returned two books to my mother: The Zookeeper’s Wife by Diane Ackerman and Knit Two by Kate Jacobs. The former was \u2026 Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_options":[]},"categories":[50],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p31UVs-4v","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":284,"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279\/revisions\/284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}