Dec 28, 2011 |
Yesterday, I posted My New Reading List for 2012. To make sure I keep up with my List, I already started “The Magician’s Nephew” by C.S. Lewis. By the time you read this post, I should have finished that book and moved on to “The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe”. I’m highly excited. I love writings that are so well done, you forget to breathe while writing. That’s how I aspire to write.
I know my List is not nearly exhaustive, but of all the books I have at my house, those are the ones I want to read. Of all the books I have…
So you know where this is going. This post’s title and that one half-sentence say all you need to know. This post is a list of books I will someday have in my Library.
Louis L’Amour. Any and all. Except for the one short story collection I already have and treasure. The one that inspires me again and again to keep writing. He is so magical, so descriptive with his words. He is someone I would have loved to have met. 89 novels, 2 nonfiction works and 14 short-story collections. 105 books! Now there’s a writer!
The Oz series. Recently I watched “The Origins of Oz” on the Smithsonian Channel. All I can say is, “WOW.” I’ve always loved The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and can’t ever remember not having a copy (or two!) on my bookshelves. But after watching this show and realizing what I’ve missed, I’m more interested than ever in reading all the books, not just the first. Yes, indeed. All 16.
Charles Dickens. I humbly admit I had never read A Christmas Carol until this year. December 21st, as a matter of fact. And I read it all in one day. It was stunning, and much better than any movie portrayed. Now I’m anxious to read all his works. In addition to 27 novels and novellas, his was also the author of many shorter stories and essays.
My teen daughter tells me I still need to read her Twilight and Harry Potter series of books. She also received the Hunger Games trilogy for Christmas. There’s 13 right there.
Claudia has reminded me that Ray Bradbury is always a good read. He wrote a plethora of short stories and novellas that would be hard to put down. I’ve tried googling his bibliography but can’t come up with a number because all articles point out that most of his creative writings were either magazine articles and/or adapted for stage and screen, like Something Wicked This Way Comes, which I wrote about in my post, Why I Don’t Go To Carnivals in October. As best as I can figure, there’s a good 20 books at least.
At the proposed rate of one book every two days, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be able to read all these books in one year, even if I had them in my Library. But it gives me something to look forward to for 2013. I guess I better get reading …
And Frankly, My Dear… that’s all she wrote!
Dec 27, 2011 |
I come from a long line of readers and writers. I know, I know: big shocker, there.
So it’s also not a shocker that I was gifted three wonderful books for Christmas.
In my family, books are more than paper and binding. Books are entire worlds. Explanations to this one, doors to others. They hold the past, present and future; they hold wishes and dreams and everything real and imagined. Where some people say a picture is worth a thousand words, I’d rather have the words thankyouverymuch. Books are manna in my family.
The first book is my Pastor’s “Route 66 Journal”. One of our main roads out here is the old Route 66. There are 66 books in the Bible. My Pastor’s great at making connections like that, things people will remember. In 2012, Pastor Tom is going to lead us to read the entire Bible from cover to cover. He designed a very simple reading plan to do so, and the journal has a daily entry with simple parts for each daily reading: 1. What does it say? 2. What does it mean? 3. How does it apply? I figure if I want God to continue to bless me and my family the least I can do is give Him half an hour of each day to read and write just for Him. I’m excited about what we’ll learn and how it will change my life. I fully expect it to. Maybe not dramatically; maybe not overnight. But I do expect a good change, and that excites me.
The second book I received is Stephen J. Cannell’s “Vigilante”. It’s the last in his Shane Scully series, finished shortly before he died. If you’ve been around me or my blog, you’ll know that I’m a huge fan of SJC. In 2007 I sent him an email and over the course of three-plus years he became a great mentor and encouraged me to keep writing. I finally had the chance to meet him in person six months before he passed. When he died, I thought it was a joke. I kept waiting for someone to say his Facebook page had been hacked or something. But then the news sites reported it. And later that day came the email. I have the first six books in the Shane Scully series, and now I have the last. I’ll quickly collect the three I’m missing, and those ten books are on my reading list for 2012.
But the best book of all, the one I never expected, the one that I am almost afraid of opening for fear of creasing the pages or smudging the cover… a hardcover collection of the Chronicles of Narnia. It’s beautiful. It’s inspirational. It’s magical. The spare room in my house is called the Narnia Room. It’s designed around a painting of a path into a forest. The walls are painted Mountain Sage Green. I have a brown park bench inside, a fake tree, and flowers, and just walking into the room evokes the magic of stepping through the Wardrobe. The book will have a special, prominent, secure place in the room. At the top of the bookshelf. There’s seven more books for the reading list.
I also need to finish my Louis L’Amour. I want to read “Little Women”, the “Left Behind” series. I only have the first 12 of these, as the last four were added after the series was supposedly finished. So I’m only planning to read the first 12 (at least for now). At some point I’ll get the remaining four and read those as well.
I have Anne Rice’s Songs of the Seraphim series, two books so far. I picked them up when I stayed at the Mission Inn in Riverside last spring. She wrote the books while staying there, and it figures greatly into the plot.
I’m also very intent on reading my Sherlock Holmes collection (the complete collection in two volumes). My favorite Uncle sent me the collection nearly 18 years ago. He was also a writer, and had the most amazing handwriting. I still love reading the letters he sent me before he died. When I was not quite two years old, he wrote a book for our families, a Christmas story that we read every year. So when in passing I mentioned to him that I wanted to read all the Sherlock Holmes stories, four weeks later I was stunned to receive a package containing just that. He was a most amazing man, friend, Uncle and supporter. Reading Sherlock Holmes seems like such a small way to keep him around. I miss our weekly donut dates and only hope he’s looking down with pride at my writing.
That’s 36 books. Now, if I read as fast as my mom does, I’d have them done by the end of February. Unfortunately, I don’t read that fast. So I’m giving myself the entire year. That’s three books a month. And if I add any more to my shelves (which I’m fairly certain I will)… well, for me, that’s a whole lotta reading. But as my Mom keeps reminding me, to be a good writer, I also need to be a good reader.
I think I’ll get a headstart and pick up a book tonight.
Now I just need to figure out where to begin…
Dec 26, 2011 |
I had an awesome Christmas. There were some great surprises, some crowded hello’s, and some wonderful family moments.
First, I have to say, you haven’t seen Capra’s “It’s a Wonderful Life” until you’ve seen it on the Big Screen. I have two seasonal movie themes that get me every time. The first is any variation of “Miracle on 34th Street” and the other, of course, is “Wonderful Life”. There are so many movies that try, but none come close. So it was with tears of joy (yes, I’m a crier, especially this time of year!) that I lost myself in the story. And I thought I had it bad this year? I’m counting my blessings, let me tell you…!
And Christmas morning… what can I say? Three generations together, orange danishes, fresh coffee, and a few gifts.
You know how each year there’s that one gift that gets you? You know what I mean: that gift that you’re not expecting, but are just tickled with? The gift that keeps getting your attention throughout the day? Yeah. That one. Well, what do you say to two such gifts? I say, THANK YOU!
The first was a great set of mixing bowls that I’ve wanted for over a year. They’re from the Food Network and completely attractive and functional! I can’t wait to use them. In the meantime, they’ll just look pretty sitting on my cook’s shelf. I hadn’t actually asked for them, and only mentioned it in passing once several months ago… I do so love people who pay attention!
The second gift that stole my attention was this great little cookbook. About eggs. Angry Bird eggs, to be exact. It’s “The Angry Birds Bad Piggies’ Egg Recipes” and it is hilarious! Because it’s a real cookbook. I mean, these recipes are awesome and I can’t wait to whip them up with my new mixing bowls.
The first recipe I want to try is the Hollandaise Sauce. I’ve mentioned recently that it’s a recipe I’ve not yet made and definitely want to (a POUND of butter?! Hello?!) and there it is, in my Angry Bird cookbook. I wonder how Julia Child would feel about that.
Just in case you were concerned, there’s a disclaimer that no Angry Bird Eggs were harmed in the making of the book. Pretty decent of them, don’t you think? I do.
Well, I’m off to whisk and crack and boil and eat.
What’s your One Gift this year?
