{"id":650,"date":"2012-05-19T16:40:28","date_gmt":"2012-05-19T21:40:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/?p=650"},"modified":"2012-05-19T16:40:28","modified_gmt":"2012-05-19T21:40:28","slug":"reading-round-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/2012\/05\/19\/reading-round-up\/","title":{"rendered":"Reading Round Up"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>My reading hiatus ended! \u00a0It seems I’ve had a book in my hand every free minute since my last post, usually in the evening or early in the morning before the day really swings into action. \u00a0Living with only an antenna for television means no 24 hours news or reruns of movies on the weekends. \u00a0It takes about 2 minutes to surf through the channels, several of which are repeats. \u00a0And “new” porch furniture (see the picture) that was a birthday gift from my parents has been enticing me to take afternoon breaks as well.<\/p>\n

It’s all been fiction and somewhat fluffy fiction at that: I finished up the Camel Club series with Hell’s Corner<\/a><\/em>, the best of the series in my opinion. And I found several of the Elm Creek Quilters books in my cupboard: The Aloha Quilt<\/a><\/em>, A Quilter’s Holiday<\/em> <\/a>and The Lost Quilter<\/a><\/em>. \u00a0The first two came from my mother so I read through them in order to return them when she visited. \u00a0They were good stories with easy to like characters. \u00a0But, I was surprised at the intensity of The Lost Quilter<\/em>. \u00a0It was a companion to The Union Quilters<\/em> that I read earlier this year, set during the Civil War and featuring ancestors of the contemporary Elm Creek characters. \u00a0The book presented a powerful portrait of slavery told from the slave’s point of view. \u00a0Chiaverini does not hold back with her descriptions of the violence visited on the slaves. \u00a0But even more compelling was the way she described the capriciousness of the owners in their treatment of these human beings.<\/p>\n

Today, I finished The Owl & Moon Cafe<\/a><\/em> by Jo-Ann Mapson. \u00a0It is a family story: four generations of women working together at a small restaurant near Monterey. \u00a0It was somewhat typical but the character of the youngest Moon woman, twelve-year-old Lindsay, gave it a fresh voice. \u00a0I’ll look for more Mapson at the library.<\/p>\n

My mother even commented on the “fluffiness” of my reading of late. I guess I do have a reputation for reading pretty serious stuff. \u00a0And, I suppose I will get back to it: all that Ivan Doig and Wendell Berry I wrote about is still there. \u00a0But for now, I’m happy to sink into a good story. \u00a0I was considering Carl Sagan’s The Dragons of Eden<\/em>. \u00a0Lindsay from The Owl & Moon Cafe<\/em> has something of a crush on Carl Sagan and is always reading this book. \u00a0I have a copy and considered it as potential reading material earlier this year. \u00a0Perhaps it is a sign that now is the time.<\/p>\n

I also need to dig into Reality is Broken<\/em> by Jane McGonigal since I’ll be leading a book study this summer. \u00a0It’s on the Kindle. \u00a0Everything in the above list has been analog and I know there’s lots of interesting stuff on the Kindle and the Nook. \u00a0I get the Kindle and Nook Daily Deals as well as several emails with free Kindle books. \u00a0It’s so easy to buy them that I have really lost track of what’s there. \u00a0I also had the opportunity to hear Diane Ravitch speak at a conference at the end of April and several of her books are sitting on the shelf as well.<\/p>\n

But, I just pulled Any Human Heart<\/em> by William Boyd off the shelf as the next candidate. \u00a0And I bought several of Bernard Cornwell’s Arthur books at the book exchange when I turned in my Diane Gabaldon books and they are calling to me. \u00a0I really didn’t like The Outlanders<\/em> so decided to turn in the whole series for credit to get some books that I knew I would like.<\/p>\n

Aah…the life of a reader…always seemingly infinite possibilities!<\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My reading hiatus ended! \u00a0It seems I’ve had a book in my hand every free minute since my last post, usually in the evening or early in the morning before the day really swings into action. \u00a0Living with only an antenna for television means no 24 hours news or reruns \u2026 Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"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":[81,11],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p31UVs-au","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650"}],"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\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=650"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":653,"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650\/revisions\/653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/simplykaren.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}