Books read in January

[ciroccoj]

Somehow I haven't posted here in over a week. ::squinting at screen:: I don't see how that's possible.

Not much in the way of news, other than yesterday I learned how to give a cat insulin shots (not my own cat) and we went skating on Friday but had to give up after only an hour because I couldn't feel my toes at all. Oh, and the kids started swimming lessons again.

And Family Law is depressing, yo.

Books read:

• Me:
  • Whiteout, by Ken Follett. The plot was about terrorists and a virus. The story took place during a storm. The storm was over Christmas in Scotland. There were many characters. Some were good and some were bad. I wanted to find out the ending. The ending was good. It just wasn't worth the boredom of the stilted prose. ::yawn::
    
    
  • Aztec, finally, again, and I loved it the second time around. I'll probably read it again some day, and, in the meantime, will be on the lookout for other books on that period in history.
    
    
  • Gave up on Poland, by James Michener. It's good, I'm just not that interested in Poland, I guess. No offence to any Poles reading this. I also wasn't thrilled that, for the first few chapters anyway, it was written very much in the manner of The Source, his book on Israel, where, instead of just telling one chapter per period, it's one chapter per tragic ending of an episode of the country in question. The Jews get driven out of Israel. The Crusaders finally lose. The Arabs are driven out of Palestine. Death and mayhem and rape and pillage and utter destruction of the same bloody village, over and over and over again. Cheerful reading. Really. I was able to push through for The Source; not for Poland.
    
    
  • Tesseracts⁷, a bunch of short sci-fi stories by Canadian authors. Some good, some bad, one that had me actually laughing out loud with the following lines:
    
    Jerry 1 definitely looks a little flustered. He keeps blurting things about Posse Comitatus, anal sex, Roundup and Atlantic City.
    
    Yeah, Jerry's jerking and twitching, trying to do a meringue and crunchies and recite the Bhagavad Gita at the same time.
  
  
  
• Daniel: Finished the Half-Blood Prince, and is now doing some wrap-up on it for English. Laughed like an idiot at a picture by seviet entitled Santa's Dilemma, Christmas 2006. He'd like to read some fanfic, but, um... yeah, I'll have to hop over to SugarQuill and find something suitable. The answer to the question "Couldn't I read one of the fanfics you read, Mama?" was a decided Um, no ;)
  
  
• In the meantime, he's started on a bunch of Jackie Chan books. ::shrug:: Fluff, but enjoyable fluff. We'll have to find another series for him to read for English. I may take out my Black Cauldron books; he's definitely old enough to read them, and I think he'd really like them. I have some grammar and stuff for him to do for English, but I kinda don't want English to turn from the one subject that I hold out as a treat to the one he needs prompting to do. Math became that when he finished the Grade 4 curriculum and got into multiplication and division practice.
  
  
• Chris and the Boys: finally finished reading Chamber of Secrets to the boys at night, and they are now fairly far along in Prisoner of Azkaban. I've got two night classes a week and choir Wednesday night this month, plus a few choir concerts, so he puts them to bed far more frequently. And Justin's a bit older, so he's able to stay awake for more of the story. They're going at a pretty good clip right now.
  
  
• Justin: hasn't been reading much, but seeing as how he may be home schooling in the fairly close future, this may be changing soon.

I'm freezing. All the time. I may actually go to my family doc about this, because it's getting ridiculous.

Comments

[bandgeek.livejournal.com]

Heh, you may have figured out by now that saying in my vicinity that you need to find suitable books for your child to read is like waving a red flag in front of a bull. ;)

My absolute favorite of all time is Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials; I suppose I shouldn't assume, however, that you haven't heard of it. They're a lot more theologically/mythologically cerebral than HP, IMO (take this with a grain of salt, as I actually don't much like HP), and I understand some of the subtleties better as an adult, but I think if Daniel's finished HP, he can probably handle the series, especially the first book, which isn't quite as heavy in terms of blasphemous/heretical themes (Pullman is a Biblical scholar). The publisher says 12 and up. Maybe you should wait, I don't know, but I always have to get out there and pimp my favorite series.

Another suggestion would be The Chronicles of Narnia, if he hasn't read them yet. I was a bit younger when I hit those, and I did fine. You'd find plenty of educational materials for those, too. (But again, these are pretty religious, and I don't know how you feel about that. The allegory in the books is more subtle than it was in that awful film they made recently, and in general C.S. Lewis isn't much of a loud-scary-evangelical type.)

Anyway. Feel free to ignore any and all of this; I wouldn't be surprised if I'd told you all this before. ;)

[cabenson.livejournal.com]

I started Whiteout but didn't get past the first chapter. If the ending is good like you say, I may be willing to give it another shot.

If you are freezing all the time, go get your thyroid checked.

Unfortunately I can't suggest ant fanfic for the little man, unless he likes girl with girls. Nah, not yet.

[ciroccoj.livejournal.com]

I started Whiteout but didn't get past the first chapter. If the ending is good like you say, I may be willing to give it another shot.
Oh, I really wouldn't if I were you. The ending isn't bad, but you have to slog through so much really boring prose that it's really, really not worth it.

It's so weird; I was totally spellbound for all 1000+ pages of Follet's Pillars of the Earth, but this reads like it was written by a completely different person. It's just so flat. Character A did X. Character B did Y. Character A thought Character B was wrong. Character B didn't care. Character C... ugh. It's like reading a recipe. And almost no humour at all.

If you are freezing all the time, go get your thyroid checked.
Yeah, I did and I'm on a low dose of stuff, but I'm wondering if maybe the dose is too low or something.

Unfortunately I can't suggest ant fanfic for the little man, unless he likes girl with girls. Nah, not yet.
::snicker:: Yeah, no, not yet :D :D

[ciroccoj.livejournal.com]

Heh, you may have figured out by now that saying in my vicinity that you need to find suitable books for your child to read is like waving a red flag in front of a bull. ;)
::waves some more::

My absolute favorite of all time is Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials; I suppose I shouldn't assume, however, that you haven't heard of it.
Hm, yeah I have heard of them, though I haven't heard much. Both of the other people who mentioned them also generally have really good taste in books, so I'll have to check them out.

but I think if Daniel's finished HP, he can probably handle the series, especially the first book, which isn't quite as heavy in terms of blasphemous/heretical themes (Pullman is a Biblical scholar).
Well, there's no harm trying :)

Another suggestion would be The Chronicles of Narnia, if he hasn't read them yet.
Yeah, I was thinking of those too. He's had them read to him twice; it might be kind of neat to see what he gets out of them when he's the one doing the reading.

(But again, these are pretty religious, and I don't know how you feel about that. The allegory in the books is more subtle than it was in that awful film they made recently, and in general C.S. Lewis isn't much of a loud-scary-evangelical type.)
Oh, religion is good in my house. Especially since we don't go to church/temple/whatever ourselves. I see stuff that mentions religion as filling in a bit of a gap in their education/social development. Not that I want to indoctrinate them into anything, but they should know at least a little bit about what other people believe in.

This was very cool! Thanks for the suggestions!

[snarkhunter.livejournal.com]

I *love* that picture!!

Has Daniel read The Dark Is Rising books? He's just about the right age--I think Will is 11 in TDIR, and the kids in the first book, Over Sea, Under Stone, are assorted ages. I think he'd like them--kids discovering magic, and they're all Arthurian, too.

[snarkhunter.livejournal.com]

Pullman is directly responding to both Narnia and Paradise Lost. If Daniel's had Narnia read to him, he has the necessary foundation for His Dark Materials.

They're intense, but as said above, if he can handle HBP, I think he can handle HDM. And they are truly, truly brilliant. (And I love them even though I'm a Christian, so the heresy isn't something you'd need to worry about.)

[bandgeek.livejournal.com]

HDM is just ... amazing. Seriously, even if Daniel doesn't read them, you should. I think the series's adult following might be bigger than the kiddos. Also, there's a movie of the first book in production right now, which might make a nice motivation for reading it before, say, a trip to the movies and some popcorn as a reward? :)

I think your family's attitude toward religion is very cool. I wish I had the broad perspective as a child that your children are developing. I was raised evangelical Christian, so any theologically-related texts I'd read were pretty much of just the one flavor.

Speaking of the religious stuff in HDM, it's pretty dern liberal. The first book plays around a lot with the idea of Original Sin (but not in a way that's inappropriate for kids, I think), so a little explanation of that might help Daniel with the text.

I'll be sure to let you know if I think of anything else. I was an absolutely ravenous reader at Daniel's age, which is why I get so passionate about recommending books. :) There was a time when I worked my way through the backlog of Newberry Award winners. Lois Lowry's The Giver stands out in my mind as probably the best one there, and there are actually two companion books to that one now, Messenger and Finding Blue. Again, a little bit philosophically complicated, but I'm sure Daniel could handle it with a little guidance.

Hee! There I go again. *g*