Deedee’s Comments (group member since Aug 04, 2010)

Deedee’s comments from the Reading with Style group.

Joyland by Stephen King satisfies 10.5

Posted "my" 15.1 book: The Time of the Buffalo

just started a 10.8 book but it is a long one (almost 600 pages) so it will take a week or more likely two weeks for me to finish

Also I am starting "my" 15.2 book, also a long one

Here are few authors to add to Elizabeth(Alaska)'s list in message 2:

Elizabeth von Arnim
Jeannie Gunn
Sara Douglass

I'll keep looking for more additions!

Task 15.1

Spur Award for Best Nonfiction (1972)
(note: I'm going to be doing all Spur Award, sequentially, starting with this one in 1972)

The Time of the Buffalo (1972) by Tom McHugh (Paperback, 383 pages) [599.735]

+15 Task
+5 Not-a-Novel
+5 Oldies (published before 1992)

Task Total: 15 + 05 + 05 = 25

Grand Total: 55 + 25 = 80

Task 10.3 English Language
Read a book by an author born in one of these English Language Countries: UK, South Africa or New Zealand.

Tanith Lee was born in London, England

The Winter Players (1976) by Tanith Lee (Hardcover, 104 pages)
Review: This is one of the first fiction published by the late, great Tanith Lee. It’s at an awkward length, at 104 pages, too long to be included in an anthology, too short to be part of a reprint series. That’s a shame, because it is a story that is just the right length to tell the tale the author wishes to tell. It’s a high fantasy tale, starring a young, moral, determined priestess and ….. hmmm, spoiler-free version ….. those protagonists that wish bad things for our heroine priestess and those she protects. I greatly enjoyed this story. It’s a good mixture of fantasy tropes and sheer originality.

Tanith Lee’s stories get darker as she got older. I, therefore, prefer the earlier stories, like this one, that flirts with darkness but never commits to being a “dark fantasy”. Recommended for those who enjoy “high” fantasy stories that are told without the “padding” present in so many fantasy stories.

+10 Task
+05 Comb (#10.2)
+10 Review

Task Total: 10 + 05 + 10 = 25

Grand Total: 30 + 25 = 55

Finally wrote my review & I posted my 20.3 book Without You, There Is No Us: My Time with the Sons of North Korea's Elite. Still reading 15.1 and also The Imjin War. I've been reading so much non-fiction that now I'm wanting some fiction to get away from it all :)

Task 20.3 Evicted
Read a book shelved as Current Events at least 8 times.

Without You, There Is No Us: My Time with the Sons of North Korea's Elite (2014) by Suki Kim
Review: Suki Kim was born and raised in South Korea. She moved to America as a teenager and became an American citizen. She joined 30 or so missionaries to teach English as a Second Language at a state-run college near Pyongyang, North Korea. She did this even though she, herself, is an atheist, because she wanted to visit North Korea and report on it and this was the only way she could get into the country to do so. In the Author’s Note she states that “the identifying details of missionaries, minders, and students have been changed…..I have altered the chronology of events….." and she’s made other alterations in the text so that the North Koreans she came in contact with would not suffer reprisals from the North Korean government. So, the memoir is true in general but not so much true in details. Suki Kim focuses on the constrained life of the students there. She also relates how little about the outside world that the students there know about. There’s a lot of repetition of events and attitudes. Maybe a lengthy magazine article would have been the right length? Overall, recommended for those who want to know more about North Korea, and those who want to read about how life under repressive regimes feels like.

+20 Task
+10 Review

Task Total: 20 + 10 = 30

also for Jane Austen team

Jane Austen http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WM...

Elmer Kelton http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WM...

Sinclair Lewis http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WM...

Larry McMurtry http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WM...

and, entertainingly, when I entered my zipcode the waymarks site came up with the local Starbucks:
http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WM...

So we have Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, George Eliot and ..... Starbucks!!!

Just finished 20.3 -- Without You, There Is No Us: My Time with the Sons of North Korea's Elite. I'm waiting to post it until 20.7 is posted (in case there are combos). I'll also write a review to go with my posting.

Still reading 15.1 (about halfway through)

and

Reading The Imjin War: Japan's Sixteenth-Century Invasion of Korea and Attempt to Conquer China -- thanks Elizabeth (Alaska) for 10.6 suggestion, I have it listed for there.

Deedee wrote: "20.3 for me definitely in-progress :) I tried to up date the Google Sheets Document to show it

I've tossed the book I was reading for 10.1 at 100 pages in -- plot took a turn that I didn't want t..."

Which book did you toss? I've always been horrible at giving up books that I don't like. I tend to read on to the (sometimes very) bitter end, so I admire anyone who is able to actively give up on a book.

I used to not toss books, but I've decided that there are so many good ones out there that I need not stay with one that isn't good just because I've started reading it.

I like fantasy & science fiction. I've had good success with books from the Angry Robot publisher. The book I tossed was vN, which I though was going to be about androids. I tossed it because it morphed into a zombie apocalypse book, albeit with robot zombies instead of human ones.

I also like to read "literary" fiction books. Sometimes, though, the author gets experimental with the style in such a way that I can't make heads or tails out of what the author is trying to communicate. Those get tossed also.

Thanks for all your responses -- I have a better feel now for what qualifies and what doesn't

My 2 Romeo & Juliet inspired stories:

Romeo's Ex: Rosaline's Story (YA) is about what Rosaline is up to while the whole Romeo & Juliet drama is going on -- I'm thinking yes -- or -- is it too much of a retelling?

Saving Juliet (YA) is about a contemporary teen girl who travels in time and attempts to force a happy ever after ending for Romeo & Juliet -- I'm thinking no because it is more of a retelling (albeit with 21st century teenager)

20.3 for me definitely in-progress :) I tried to up date the Google Sheets Document to show it

I've tossed the book I was reading for 10.1 at 100 pages in -- plot took a turn that I didn't want to follow

Getting ready to start my 15.1 book

And also getting ready to do my buddy-read with my son:
The Imjin War: Japan's Sixteenth-Century Invasion of Korea and Attempt to Conquer China
I'll find a place for it somewhere, I'm sure

Yes, go team Jane Austen! :)

I've started my 20.3 book and a Square Peg book (which might not be Square Peg in the end, depending on what the as-yet-unposted tasks say).

And -- last post for now --

Books reusing characters from Shakespeare
from The Tempest
Ilium by Dan Simmons
Miranda and Caliban by Jacqueline Carey
Prospero Lost by L. Jagi Lamplighter

and there's a bunch of YA books taking off on Romeo and Juliet

Plus there are all the modern Sherlock Holmes stories:

Sherlock Holmes Adventures
Moriarty by Anthony Horowitz
Sherlock Holmes in Orbit by Mike Resnick
The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

and many other collections of "new" Sherlock Holmes stories

Karen Michele wrote: "There are always some characters out of literature in the Jasper Fforde series. Miss Haversham is in most of the books if I recall correctly. I think the series would qualify because the main chara..."

Jasper Fforde series would be amazing if it worked! :)

Would books in this series work? The Austen Project

I'm fairly sure these Austen-related novels work:
Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters by Ben H. Winters
The Pursuit of Mary Bennet: A Pride & Prejudice Novel by Pamela Mingle
The Independence of Miss Mary Bennet by Colleen McCullough
The Other Mr. Darcy by Monica Fairview
The Pemberley Chronicles by Rebecca Ann Collins
Old Friends and New Fancies: An Imaginary Sequel to the Novels of Jane Austen by Sybil G. Brinton
The Third Sister: A Continuation of Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility by Julia Barrett
The Darcys & the Bingleys: A Tale of Two Gentlemen's Marriages to Two Most Devoted Sisters by Marsha Altman
Mansfield Park Revisited by Joan Aiken

Jane Odiwe's Austen novels, including
Searching for Captain Wentworth
Mr. Darcy's Secret

Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Deedee wrote: "Would Suki Kim count as non-western? The dust jacket of her book Without You, There Is No Us: My Time with the Sons of North Korea's Elite states: "Born..."

Thanks for checking.

There are a lot of authors who move around like that -- Isabel Allende (Peru? USA? I seem to remember she counts for USA), Alexander McCall Smith (Zimbabwe? Scotland? I think he's Scotland), J.M. Coetzee (South Africa? Australia? I think he's Australia), and so on. It seems that a lot of successful non-western authors promptly move to a western nation to live out their lives :)

Would Suki Kim count as non-western? The dust jacket of her book Without You, There Is No Us: My Time with the Sons of North Korea's Elite states: "Born and raised in Seoul, she lives in New York." No comment about whether or not she has become an American citizen, although she has lived in America for enough years to be able to apply for citizenship if she wanted to.

And then there is Silvia Moreno-Garcia. Her bio says: Mexican by birth, Canadian by inclination..

Thanks!

Task 20.7 Retellings
Read a book that has been shelved as "retelling" by at least 20 users.

Golden: A Retelling of "Rapunzel" (Once Upon a Time #9) (2006) by Cameron Dokey (Paperback, 179 pages)
Lexile 760L

+20 Task

Task Total: 20

Grand Total: 820 + 20 = 840