Melissa's comments (member since Oct 08, 2007)

Melissa's comments from the 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die group.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time has a child narrator (and is a short light read). The narrator in Vernon God Little is a teenager. And there's always Through the Looking-Glass.

You can get email or phone notification on holds with NYPL if you ask for it at a library in person; it doesn't seem to be an option that you can get online, but I set it up a long time ago.

"Where in these books is there spousal abuse?"

One of Edward's first acts as a married man is to take his wife to an extremely secluded and inaccessible location and, in the process of having sex with her, essentially throttles her until her entire body is covered in bruises. Now, the sex happens in the space between passages, and we know Bella had previously "begged for it," so I suppose you could argue that we don't know enough about the event to judge it and that they could be in a consenting sadomasochistic relationship.

Or, one could read, this is an act of spousal abuse. That seems far more clear-cut and supported by the text to me.

Just read White Noise by Don DeLillo and Choke by Chuck Palahniuk in the same week. Now I need something a little less postmodern...

December: If Not Now, When
January: At the Mountains of Madness
February: On the Black Hill OR The Ogre

Although Middlesex will probably win for February, I'd like to make a plug for the two other choices! Look either up on Amazon for some good reviews and descriptions. I've already read Middlesex, as I'm guessing many others have, and I'd rather use this book group as an impetus to dig into some of the more obscure titles on the list.

Unfortunately, the formula that calculates how many books you have to go and your percentage read didn't work when I exported it. Any idea how to fix this?

Yelena, would you be willing to link to that updated spreadsheet here? I've been really curious about the edits, but I don't own either book!

I'm at 11%, but I'm not really actively trying to read through this list... yet. Reading all the Pulitzer fiction winners this year (and probably going for work by Nobel laureates next year) may inadvertently boost my percentage, though.

I'm a pretty quick reader too, if I'm reading fiction, teen books, or light nonfiction. I finish two or three books a week with a fair number of graphic novels thrown in. Basically, I try to set aside at least 20 minutes in the morning before work and at least an hour in the evening to read my main book and then I'll have some poetry or another book working on the side. I tend to read in big blocks on the weekends too, and that's when I'll read most graphic novels--in one swoop. It helps that I'm a middle school librarian, so if I'm seen reading at work for 10-15 minutes at a time it's not the end of the world. (And I like being a good reading role model when I have classes reading silently in the library!)

I read quickly but lightly... not quite skimming, definitely immersed but not attempting to memorize anything. I finish just about every book that I start. I watch a decent amount of TV and DVDs, but not as much as the average person, probably, and I definitely spend too much time on the internet.

Again, being a school librarian means that I tear through books on vacations and slow down during the weekday school year, but it's that steady daily reading that really gets me through a lot of books consistently.

Great questions! I love thinking about this stuff...