false 24 8 2 true 5848650 read 6 true 1404796 currently-reading 0 true 1404795 to-read http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/51125338 Dreams from My Father (Paperback) by Barack Obama
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I am so impressed by Obama's engaging writing style. He is so open and honest and alive to the world. How lucky we are! ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/51125226 The Women (Hardcover) by T.C. Boyle
I am a big FLW an and T.C. Boyle reader, so I have long awaited this book. I loved it! ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/15881198 to: Annette Vallon: A Novel of the French Revolution (Hardcover) by James Tipton
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This historical fiction is about the relationship of William Wordsworth and Annette Vallon, the French woman he met on a stay there during the French Revolution and had a child with. I had always known her as a romantic footnote to this august poet's life. I am a big Wordsworth fan and enjoy reading the young Wordsworth. It was slow going at first, but I am now absorbed and eager to return to its pages tonight. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/15880760 to: The Uncommon Reader: A Novella (Hardcover) by Alan Bennett
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What a concept: the Queen reads and writes! This book touches me with its evocation of the miracles of words on the page: ours and others. After discovering the power of literature, she turns to writing, observing that reading tames you and writing toughens you. Wow! ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/14378050 The Sportswriter (Paperback) by Richard Ford
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My daughter Emily has recommended this book to me and gave it to my hnusband for xmas. I just started it and am full of great expectations. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/14363815 The Friendship: Wordsworth and Coleridge (Hardcover) by Adam Sisman
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I have had a lifelong interest in Wordsworth and romanticism. I am drawn to literary biographies and find this one compelling in its focus on the two great geniuses of poetry (and politics). ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/14360007 American Transcendentalism: A History (Hardcover) by Philip F. Gura
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I am very interested in the New England Transcendentalists and feel a certain kinship to their weave of spirituality and nature. Their views were progressive and applied in important ways in the culture we know today. There aren't many books on the subject, and I am pleased to have a composite history to begin. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/14347700 to: Songs of Ourselves: The Uses of Poetry in America (Hardcover) by Joan Shelley Rubin
The author uses the reader response approach which I like: we as readers make meaning from a text. The book is about the uses of poetry and doesn't include any poetry itself. It's more scholarly than inspirational. The author seems restrained in letting poetry's power come through - at least for me. ]]>