Books I've Read Of Late

So, I used to post after each book. Apparently that's become too complicated. So here are my thoughts on the last several books I've read.



I picked this up at my sister-in-law's house and took it home with me. I forget how much I enjoy children's literature. And I like how quickly I can read it. I enjoy intense novels that require me to give something of myself, but then after, I enjoy a book I can finish in three feedings. (Because that's how I measure a book's length now--in how many times it takes me to nurse Asher while reading it.)

One thing I thought about while reading Hoot was how comic bad guys are in children's literature. And how comic adults are. But it seems to work, because it seems like that's what adults seem to be when you are younger; big nosed silly versions of people.



When I was in elementary school I remember learning about the price of bread in 1930. It cost about a nickel. And even more exciting? Candy cost a penny. A PENNY. And in my little girl brain, I hatched a genius plan. What if I took a wallet full of money from 1988 back to 1930? I could buy anything I wanted. Even Teddy Ruxpin, that creepy animatronic bear that was all the 80s rage.

Little did I realize that I had come up with the plot for several 80s movie, only with more plot holes. Like how was I going to buy Teddy Ruxpin if I lived in 1930? But ever since then I've wondered how I would react at different times in history. A common question, but one that's unanswerable largely because time travel doesn't exist, and also because I'm a product of the current time and I would be a totally different person if I lived at another time.

That's what I thought was most interesting about Kindred. The (black) main character lives in the 1970s and is taken back in time to the antebellum South. The world she creates for herself in the past is frightening because she is aware of how wrong it is. And even more frightening is how she starts to feel at home in a world that is so wrong.



Want to do something kind of risky? Do a google image search on "Straight Man."

Richard Russo is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors. This book was hilarious.

This has nothing to do with the book, but I've realized that my favorite characters in books are men. I don't really know why this is. If I try to identify the female character I've liked the most in novels I've recently read, I think I'd have to point to Sarah Agnes Prine from the These Is My Words books, but even as I do that, I have to admit that I like Sarah, but I LOVE Jack. And Udell for that matter.

Okay, that's all I've got for you.