June 2021

I wasn't planning on listing my non-reading, used to be routine, activities but getting my hair professionally cut for the first time in sixteen months was a really Big Deal! I cut it myself three times (with in between trims on the bangs) during quarantine: the first time I did a really good job but who could see it? the second time was so-so but it looked OK for a medical visit; the third time was a real mess and by the time I was fully vaccinated it looked terrible! 

Another biggie! I resumed my water exercise class. Ahh, did it feel good to be back in the pool! 

As for the reading...some surprises, a couple of disappointments, but mostly good reading.

Fiction:

 Abide with Me by Strout, Elizabeth
  Always reliable Ms Strout

The Lost Book of Adana Moreau by Zapata, Michael

 I loved this!

Summer : a novel by Wharton, Edith 

  One of my "Twenty Books of Summer 2021"

  Unusual Wharton - it's not about the gilded privileged set.

Checkmate to Murder: A Second World War Mystery by Lorac, E.C.R.
 So enjoyable to read the classic mysteries from the British Library/Poisoned Pen Press. Ah the world without smartphones!

Maids by Skelly, Katie
  A graphic interpretation of a real crime (murder) that took place in France in 1933. Grisly but good. 

They Were Found Wanting - They Were Divided (The Writing on the Wall: The Transylvania Trilogy #2-3) by Bánffy, Miklós; translated from the Hungarian by Thursfield, Patrick and Bánffy-Jelen, Kathy
   The Trilogy has been on my to-read list for ages, I'm glad I finally got to it.

 

Turbulence by Szalay, David 

 Linked short stories. One of my favorite reads this month.

A Passage North  by Arudpragasam, Anuk
  I really liked the author's The Story of a Brief Marriage so I was looking forward to this. I received an electronic review copy from the publisher and it was a real struggle to read in that formatI think I need to get a print copy and read it again.

The Charmed Wife by Grushin, Olga  

 I enjoyed this modern day look at the aftermath of the Cinderella story, but I liked Grushin's Forty Rooms more.

Migrations by McConaghy, Charlotte  

 An Irish/Australian woman breaks her parole to follow the migration of arctic terns from Greenland to Antarctica. 

How Beautiful We Were by Mbue, Imbolo 

 An African village vs American Oil interests. This one fell flat for me.

Christmas at The Mysterious Bookshop edited by Penzler, Otto

 Seventeen short mystery stories, each by a different author, set in and around Penzler's Manhattan bookshop.  A fun "summer" read.

 Authors:  Charles Ardai, Lisa Atkinson, George Baxt, Lawrence Block, Mary Higgins Clark, Thomas H. Cook, Ron Goulart, Jeremiah Healy, Edward D. Hoch, Rupert Holmes, Andrew Klavan, Michael Malone, Ed McBain, Anne Perry, S. J. Rozan, Jonathan Santlofer, Donald E. Westlake.

 

Juvenile fiction:

A Tale of the Summer Holidays by Mockler, Geraldine

  One of my "Twenty Books of Summer 2021"

  I was surprised. This was written in the 1890s. I expected tame and sedate. I got a contest the resembled the grass-bomb wars we had defending our "forts" in 1940s rural California.  Good fun.

 

Poetry:

Mortal Summer by Van Doren, Mark

 One of my "Twenty Books of Summer 2021"

 What a mishmash! Greek deities and Christian archangels journey to America and mess with rural (hillbilly?) society. Why? Not Van Doren's best effort.  It made little sense.

Nonfiction:
Footnotes: The Black Artists Who Rewrote the Rules of the Great White Way by Gaines, Caseen

 A learning experience.

 

The Battle of Versailles: The Night American Fashion Stumbled into the Spotlight and Made History by Givhan, Robin 

  High fashion never made much sense to me. Still doesn't.

 

Letters to Camondo by Waal, Edmund de 

  Well worth the read..

 

Free the Beaches: The Story of Ned Coll and the Battle for America’s Most Exclusive Shoreline by Kahrl, Andrew W.

 Some Connecticut history. Wish it had been better organized because it's an important story.

 

Bounty from the Box: The CSA Farm Cookbook by Lipe, Mi Ae 

 Great book but its 4.1 pound weight overwhelmed me even more then the overabundance of collards, chard, lettuce & other greens in our very own CSA box!

My Summer in a Garden, and Calvin: A Study of Character by Warner, Charles Dudley 

  One of my "Twenty Books of Summer 2021"

  Warner was a neighbor of Stowe and Twain in the Nook Farm area of Hartford. Similar writing style to Twain. Fun to read. Gardening is not easy in these parts which is why I don't do it.

Online:

Enough with Copenhagen! It is Time for U.S. Cities to Learn From Models Closer to Home by Juan Miró 

Six Degrees of Wikipedia: Find the shortest path between any two Wikipedia pages

 

Several short pieces at New World Writing (published on June 11):

 

   Mary Grimm ~ Her Sketchbook, Found Among Her Things
   Maria Robinson ~ The Requirement
   Mike Itaya ~ Rasthole Flats
   Laurie Blauner ~ Four Pieces
   Daniel Adler ~ The Lion Tamer

 

The Filing Cabinet by Craig Robertson "The filing cabinet was critical to the information infrastructure of the 20th-century. Like most infrastructure, it was usually overlooked."

 

20 Best Zucchini Recipes We signed up for a CSA subscription and expect the zucchini will soon be filling the box. I do know lots of zucchini dishes but more is more. In addition to the recipes, this site has tips for handling (including freezing) the squash.

Mary Grimm ~ Her Sketchbook, Found Among Her Things

Maria Robinson ~ The Requirement 

Mike Itaya ~ Rasthole Flats

Laurie Blauner ~ Four Pieces

Daniel Adler ~ The Lion Tamer

High Voltage

Mary Grimm ~ Her Sketchbook, Found Among Her Things

Maria Robinson ~ The Requirement 

Mike Itaya ~ Rasthole Flats

Laurie Blauner ~ Four Pieces

Daniel Adler ~ The Lion Tamer

January 2021

Another month of quarantine but maybe there's a little light coming--I got my first (of two) jab of the Pfizer  Covid vaccine. So here is the total of my outside contacts. Not impressive. 

Errands  etc.

1/2 Library to pick up holds.

1/8 Library returns; Lyman Orchards for produce & bread. 

1/12 ditto of 1/8

1/21 cvs

1/21-??? phone problem

1/25 covid vaccine dose 1

1/26 land phone repair (a stranger had to enter our house!)

Most of the  reading this month was good. A mixed bunch. Five from my shelves (first group), two Advance review copies (second group), and eleven from public libraries (third group plus the nonfiction). Of the fiction, Polar Vortex was the only one I didn't like at all. The Smiley, Moore, and Osman books were fun light reading. I needed that!

 

In nonfiction, The Dan Rather book was the weakest. I just didn't learn anything from it at all, certainly not what the title suggests.

 

Finally, I spent a lot more of my online time reading stuff other than the news. Still, it was such a pleasure to see competence that I became addicted to White House Press Briefings on CSPN.

 

Fiction
The Regal Lemon Tree by Saer, Juan José
That We May Live by Si'an, Chen and others, various translators (Short Chinese speculative fiction.)
Joseph Walser's Machine by Tavares, Gonçalo M.
Harmada by Noll, João Gilberto
Life Went On Anyway: Stories by Sentsov, Oleg

 

Here Lies a Father by Cassidy, Mckenzie (ARC via LibraryThing. Coming of age--surprised I liked it.)

Polar Vortex by Mootoo, Shani (ARC via LibraryThing. I didn't like it at all.)

Perestroika in Paris by Smiley, Jane
Facing the Bridge by Tawada, Yōko
Igifu by Mukasonga, Scholastique
Missing Person by Modiano, Patrick
The Gift of Rain by Tan Twan Eng
Hamnet by O'Farrell, Maggie
Shakespeare for Squirrels by Moore, Christopher
The Thursday Murder Club by Osman, Richard

Nonfiction

Fifth Sun: A New History of the Aztecs by Townsend, Camilla
City Squares: Eighteen Writers on the Spirit and Significance of Squares Around the World edited by Marron, Catie
What Unites Us: Reflections on Patriotism by Rather, Dan
      

Online

Gamey Meat: Here’s the Deal by Hank Shaw

Shaw's blog -- Hunter-Angler-Gardner-Cook -- is always a good read even if one isn't into game meat, foraging, etc. 

 

The History of Esculent Fish By Roger North. 

Includes descriptions of several edible fish and an essay on the breeding of fish and construction of fishponds. There are notes on what the fish eat, where to find them and how to catch them, but nothing about preparation and cooking. The plates, drawn and engraved by Eleazar Albin are what made me want to keep going back to this. Here is his Haddock:

The Smoky Valley  by Birger Sandzén

 I found this on Gutenberg and it was a nice introduction to an artist I'd never heard of. However the works are all in black and white so it was nice to find a resource that has them in color.

Birger Sandzén Memorial Gallery 

December 2020

Activities - only one out of the house trip: 12/1 lab for blood work & on the way home stopped by Mazzicota's for pastry treat.

No real duds on the reading but Piranesi really stands out as the best of the fiction. Of the nonfiction, I was surprised at how much I liked the one on E. E. Cummings.

Fiction:

Piranesi by Clarke, Susanna
Pew by Lacey, Catherine
Miss Benson's Beetle by Joyce, Rachel
Down the Rabbit Hole by Villalobos, Juan Pablo
Butter Honey Pig Bread by Ekwuyasi, Francesca
Tyll by Kehlmann, Daniel
All the Truth That's in Me by Berry, Julie
The Secret of Lost Things by Hay, Sheridan
The Garden of Evening Mists by Tan Twan Eng
The Hour of the Star by Lispector, Clarice
The Wonder Garden by Acampora, Lauren

Poetry:
Every Day We Get More Illegal by Herrera, Juan Felipe
    
Nonfiction: 

The Beauty of Living: E. E. Cummings in the Great War by Rosenblitt, J. Alison

The Hidden White House: Harry Truman and the Reconstruction of America’s Most Famous Residence by Klara, Robert 

The Path to Power by Caro, Robert A.
Metropolis: A History of the City, Humankind's Greatest Invention by Wilson, Ben
Women in the Kitchen: Twelve Essential Cookbook Writers Who Defined the Way We Eat, from 1661 to Today by Willan, Anne 

Paper Bullets: Two Artists Who Risked Their Lives to Defy the Nazis by Jackson, Jeffrey H.
The 99% Invisible City: A Field Guide to the Hidden World of Everyday Design by Mars, Roman

 

Online:

Two with great illustrations from Gutenberg:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Christmas tales of Flanders Author: André de Ridder; Illustrator: M. C. O. Morris; Illustrator: Jean de Bosschere

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Paris pair; Their day's doings by Beatrice Bradshaw Brown 

 

 

 

 

 

Some local history:

Dams of Middletown, Connecticut: Past and Present

The day the Crystal Lake dam breached by Joraen Fenster

  This was before I lived in the affected area.

Some bookish things:

A Conversation with Patrick Modiano

  A brief interview focusing on the novel Invisable Ink (Yale; 2020) 

Mining the Dalkey Archive 

This is a new project of Chad W. Post whose states this purpose: "As a friend, former employee, and current editorial curator, I’m going to use this newsletter to explore Dalkey Archive Press: its history as a nonprofit press, its role in upending ideas about literature and the marketplace, and its ongoing impact on literary culture. Interviews, excerpts, investigations, anecdotes, analysis—this newsletter will go in a number of different directions, with each “episode” organized around a specific idea or set of books."

November 2020

Activities:

 

Not much outside the house.

11/5 doctor 

11/16 lab; gassed car

11/24 pickup at libraries (2); jc farms for pie!

Books:

 Some good novels and lots of non-fiction this month.

Fiction:
Lovely War by Berry, Julie
Jean-Luc persécuté by Ramuz, Charles-Ferdinand; translated from the French by Baes, Olivia
How to Stop Time by Haig, Matt
Autopsy of a Father by Kramer, Pascale; translated from the French by Bononno, Robert
The Midnight Library by Haig, Matt
Forty Rooms by Grushin, Olga 

Poetry:

The Golden Goblet: Selected Poems of Goethe by Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von; translated from the German by Ozsváth, Zsuzsanna and Turner, Frederick  

Nonfiction: 
The Last Million: Europe's Displaced Persons from World War to Cold War by Nasaw, David
For the Love of Music: The Art of Listening by Mauceri, John
The Simpsons: A Cultural History by Fink, Moritz
A Promised Land by Obama, Barack 

Owls of the Eastern Ice: A Quest to Find and Save the World's Largest Owl by Slaght, Jonathan C.
Music to Eat Cake By: Essays on Birds, Words and Everything in Between by Parikian, Lev

The Truths We Hold: An American Journey by Harris, Kamala

Online:

Sabine Meyer

 While reading For the Love of Music and Music to Eat Cake By I wondered why I was reading about music but not listening to music?  So I put the books aside and went searching for music, specifically Mozart's Clarinet Concerto. As a result I've spent a least an hour a day on YouTube listening to Sabine Meyer play. Mozart, Schubert, Beethoven, Brahms,....

Sublime Swimming: 14 examples of custom pools by María Francisca González

  I sure do miss my swims ... sigh...

Wagenhallen Stuttgart Cultural Center ArchDaily article

Wagenhallen official site

 a part of Stuttgart I've never seen (because it was something else when I lived in Germany)

October 2020

 Another exciting (ha) month of quarantine....but some really good reading

Activities:

10/1 Library curbside drop off/pick up; JC farms for produce.

10/3 Furnace guy

10/5 Doctor 

10/6 Furnace guy

10/9 Library curbside drop off/pick up; JC farms for produce; Durham Market for cold cuts; mailed ballot

10/15/ local foliage drive; short walk at Miller's Pond 

10/23 Library curbside drop off/pickup; JC farms

10/27 Drive to Old Saybrook

10/29 JC Farms Closed!; Lyman Orchads

Reading:

Fiction:

 A Million Aunties by McKenzie, Alecia

   A novel told from several points of view making it read like very closely linked short stories

 How to Pronounce Knife by Thammavongsa, Souvankham 

   short stories

 That Time of Year by NDiaye, Marie; translated from the French by Stump, Jordan

 The End of the Day by Clegg, Bill
 Here We Are by Swift, Graham

 Verena in the Midst by Lucas, E.V. (on Project Gutenberg) 

 The Gathering by Enright, Anne

 The Perfect Nine: The Epic of Gĩkũyũ and Mũmbi by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o; translated from the Gĩkũyũ by the author 

 The Silence by DeLillo, Don

Poetry:

 Home: New Arabic Poems by Hawwash, Samer Abu and others; various translators

Nonfiction:
 This Tilting World by Fellous, Colette; translated from the French by Lewis, Sophie
 James Monroe: A Life by McGrath, Tim

 Wandering in Strange Lands: A Daughter of the Great Migration Reclaims Her Roots by Jerkins, Morgan

 Having and Being Had by Biss, Eula

Online:

Marmalade: A Very British Obsession by Olivia Potts

October 2019 Reading

A nice mix this month. Yesterday I hurt my hand carrying an especially heavy bag (of books, of course,  what else is there?). So I couldn't do anything but read, hence I read One Day in one day.

 

Fiction:

The Women’s Courtyard by Khadija Mastoor; translated from the Urdu by Rockwell, Daisy (5 stars) The Shadow King by Mengiste, Maaza  (5 stars)

Frontier by Xue, Can; translated from the Chinese by Gernant and Chen Zeping  (5 stars)

Girl, Woman, Other by Evaristo, Bernardine  (5 stars) 

We, the Survivors by Aw, Tash  (4+ stars)

The Memory Police by Ogawa, Yōko; translated from the Japanese by Snyder, Stephen  (4+ stars) Hollywood North: A Novel in Six Reels by Libling, Michael (3+ stars) 

Grand Union: Stories by Smith, Zadie (2 stars--so disappointing because I liked Swing Time so much)

Women Within by Parrish, Anne Leigh (2- stars--the rather abrupt ending really bothered me)

Nonfiction:
Read My Pins: Stories from a Diplomat's Jewel Box by Albright, Madeleine K. (4+ stars)
Saving Jemima: Life and Love with a Hard-Luck Jay by Zickefoose, Julie (4 stars)
One Day: The Extraordinary Story of an Ordinary 24 Hours in America by Weingarten, Gene 4 stars)
Year of the Monkey by Patti Smith (4 stars)
Plagued by Fire: The Dreams and Furies of Frank Lloyd Wright by Hendrickson, Paul  (3+ stars)
Scholars of Mayhem: My Father's Secret War in Nazi-Occupied France by Guiet, Daniel C. and Smith, Timothy K (3+ stars)
To Feel the Music: A Songwriter's Mission to Save High-Quality Audio by Young, Neil  (3 stars)

Reading notes:   

I love it when stuff like this happens.

While I was reading The Shadow King by Maaza Mengiste, a novel set during Mussolini’s 1935 invasion of Ethiopia:
   Abiy Ahmed Ali, the current prime minister of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, won the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize.
   and A new Ethiopian restaurant opened in my town

Then, while I was reading the Frank Lloyd Wright bio, I serendipitously stumbled on this cool map from Home Advisor: A map of Frank Lloyd Wright homes in (nearly) every state.

September 2019 Reading

Another good reading month, mostly from public libraries. (Ma Bole's Second Life is from my collection.) No review copies in this bunch.

Fiction:
5 stars 
Quichotte by Rushdie, Salman
Ma Bole's Second Life by Hong, Xiao; Goldblatt, Howard (Translator)
The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Harrow, Alix E. 
The Song of Everlasting Sorrow: A Novel of Shanghai by Anyi, Wang; Berry, Michael and Egan, Susan Chan (Translators)

4 stars
Darius the Great Is Not Okay by Khorram, Adib 
The Body in Question by Ciment, Jill

3 stars
This Tender Land by Krueger, William Kent
Sing to It: New Stories by Hempel, Amy

A Single Thread by Chevalier, Tracy

Nonfiction: 
London in Fragments: A Mudlark's Treasures by Sandling, Ted
Bagehot: The Life and Times of the Greatest Victorian by Grant, James 
Island of the Lost: Shipwrecked at the Edge of the World  by Druett, Joan 
Five Days Gone: The Mystery of My Mother's Disappearance as a Child by Cumming, Laura Freestyle Embroidered Mandalas: More than 60 Stitches and Techniques in Inspiring  Combinations by Blomkamp, Hazel

Online:

Community Plumbing: How the hardware store orders things, neighborhoods, and material worlds by Shannon Mattern

The Hooker Family of Kew by Judith M Taylor 

From Project Gutenberg:
The Sisters Rondoli and Other Stories by Maupassant, Guy de; Boyd, Ernest (Translator)



Oregon the Picturesque: A Book of Rambles in the Oregon Country and in the Wilds of Northern California; Descriptive Sketches and Pictures of Crater and Klamath Lakes, the Deschutes River Canyon, the New Columbia Highway, the Willamette and Rogue River Valleys and the Cities and Towns of Oregon; also of the little-known Lakes, Rivers, Mountains, and Vast Forests of Northern California, to which is added a trip to the Yosemite and to the Roosevelt Dam and the Petrified Forest of Arizona, by Motor Car. by Thomas D. Murphy; illustrated with paintings, photographs, and maps;  Page Company, 1917.

A LACK OF BALANCE.

A Wheel Within a Wheel:  How I learned to ride the bicycle, With some reflections by the way
By Frances E. Willard;  Illustrated with photographs; Fleming H. Revell company, 1895.

Frances Willard  (1839-1898) was an educator, temperance reformer, and suffragist.

Read in April

No real duds for April and some excellent:

Fiction (in most liked to least liked order):

These two got 5 stars:

Everything Under by Johnson, Dais

Murmur by Eaves, Will

Four stars for these:
Waiting for Bojangles by Bourdeaut, Olivier; translated from the French by Kramer, Regan
Arturo's Island: A Novel by Morante, Elsa; translated from the Italian by Goldstein, Ann
Little Faith by Butler, Nickolas
Virgil Wander by Enger, Leif

Three+ stars for these:
The Winter Soldier by Mason, Daniel
The Shape of the Ruins by Vásquez, Juan Gabriel; translated from the Spanish by McLean, Anne

Three stars for this:
The Betel Nut Tree Mystery (Crown Colony #2)by Yu, Ovidia
 OK, but not a series I want to follow

Nonfiction so diverse that they can't be listed by preference. I am glad I read them:
Zora and Langston: A Story of Friendship and Betrayal by Taylor, Yuval   
Nature's Mutiny: How the Little Ice Age of the Long Seventeenth Century Transformed the West and Shaped the Present by Blom, Philipp
Save Me the Plums: My Gourmet Memoir by Reichl, Ruth


And from my online reading:

A gender fight over an Italian dish by Stefania D'Ignoti

September (Third week) 2018 Reads (and day trips)

Sunday drive: Weston to pick up picnic stuff at Peter's Market and then to Putnam Memorial State Park to eat.

Monday drive: Lunch at Panera Bread in Lisbon, CT; then a swim at Hopeville Pond State Park (most likely our last outdoor swim of the season); followed by ice cream at Buttonwood Farms.

Saturday drive: Explored Mashamoquet Brook State Park in Pomfret, CT. On the way home we stopped for lunch at Hank's Restaurant  in Brooklyn, CT.

Reading this week:

The "Deal Me In" card is the Two of Clubs; the selection is Muqtatafat: Part two: Arabic language (translated into English). Slop / by Magdy el Shafee -- Where our stories collide / by Jana Traboulsi -- Gauche droite & estamba / by Mohamed el Shennawy -- Nap before noon / by Barrack Rima -- The bike / by Mohamed Tawfik.

from the library...

The Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker


from my shelves...

Our Woman in Havana: Reporting Castro's Cuba by Sarah Rainsford
Advance review copy through LibraryThing giveaway 

September (second week) 2018 Reads

This week the "Deal Me In" card is the Seven of Spades; the selection is The Wife Killer (in Singer Collected Stories I)

from the library...

White Houses by Amy Bloom


Peculiar Ground by Lucy Hughes-Hallett

The Age of Eisenhower : America and the World in the 1950s by William I. Hitchcock


from my shelves...  

The Queen of Palmyra by Minrose Gwin

June (24-30) 2018 Reads & Little Trips

Not many trips this week--too hot.

Monday - picnic Wickham Park,  Manchester/East Hartford. Not a state or city park. It's a private foundation. $5 a car entrance fee. Lovely gardens, nice picnic areas. 

Wednesday - picnic (with wading) Wadsworth Falls State Park, Middlefield/Middletown

This week the "Deal Me In" card  is the Two of Spades; the story is On the Beautiful Blue Danube by Georgi Tenev; translated from the Bulgarian by Angela Rodel (in Bat City Review, Issue 10, 2014)
The Danube is not anything near beautiful in this story of hazmat disposal.

online...

The Two Most Beautiful Words in Doughnut Language  

 from my shelves... 

The Dinner List by Rebecca Serle
A pleasant read to fill in between more serious stuff. Actually this covered some serious stuff, but with a light touch. Not too dense.
Advance review copy from publisher.

Fashion Climbing. A Memoir with Photographs by Bill Cunningham; Preface by Hilton Als
It's fun to read a memoir by someone who had a passion for his work. This covers Cunningham early life and his struggle to make a living designing hats. Some inside stuff, some gossip, some goofy parties, and what it's like in the salons when designers parade their new lines. Fun to read. I was a bit disappointed that this didn't cover the latter portion of his life when he was a street photographer.
Advance review copy from the publisher.

Bat City Review, Issue 10/2014 (see here for contents)
Literary journal from the University of Texas at Austin. Poetry, Fiction, and Art. 

from the library...

In the Land of Eternal Spring by Alan Howard
Young Americans get tangled up in the 1960s political situation in Guatemala.

Crimes of the Father by Thomas Keneally
Difficult subject matter--child abuse.

Revolution!: Writings from Russia: 1917 by Pete Ayrton (Editor)

Three that I checked out for home improvement ideas:
Dream Porches and Sunrooms: Designing the Perfect Retreat by Michael Snow
Pretty pictures and none of it fits my budget or daily life style. Nice places to visit.

Ultimate Guide: Porches by Steve Cory   
A couple of these might actually be something I would want to add to my house.

Ideas for Great Patios & Decks by Sunset Magazines & Books
Maybe, if I still lived in California...

April (third week) 2018 Reads

Slow reading week...juggling several books...

This week the "Deal Me In" card is the Five of Hearts; the story is Malaria by Michael Byers (in The Best American Short Stories, 2013)
So so story..

Gutenberg finds... 

Patroon Van Volkenberg : A Tale of Old Manhattan in the Year Sixteen Hundred & Ninety-nine. by Henry Thew Stephenson; Illustrated by C. M. Reylea

"I turned on my heel to look at the town in which I intended to lodge for the night. It was now late and fully dark, and one or two dim lights were all that I could see in Gravesoon by way of welcome. At that moment a feeling of loneliness took such 2strong hold of me that I cast my eyes once more upon the open sea for the meagre companionship of the pirate crew that was gliding away into the dark. But the ship was already so far from shore that the sounds that always accompany getting under way could no longer reach me, though I strained hard to hear them. In ten minutes even the vague outline of the vessel against the sky had completely blended with the darkness. Then I realized for the first time that I was all alone in a strange land. My only companions were the heavy sorrow in my heart and a strong hope that this sorrow would soon be turned to joy by virtue of the errand that was now bringing me to New York.'

Don't know if I'll finish this...am on Chapter three...

The Book of the Feet :  A History Of Boots And  Shoes, With Illustrations Of The Fashions Of The Egyptians, Hebrews, Persians, Greeks, And Romans, And The Prevailing Style Throughout Europe, During The Middle Ages, Down To The Present Period; Also, Hints To Last-Makers, And Remedies For Corns, Etc.
B y   J.   S p a r k e s   H a l l, Patent-Elastic-Boot Maker To Her Majesty The Queen, The Queen Dowager, And The Queen Of The Belgians. From The Second London Edition, With A History Of Boots And Shoes In The United States, Biographical Sketches Of Eminent Shoemakers, And Crispin Anecdotes (American Edition, 1847)

Didn't read the entire text, but loved the illustrations.

from my shelves...

Angelica's Smile (Commissario Montalbano #17) by Andrea Camilleri; translated from the Italian bt Stephen Sartarelli
It was OK, but I think I've now read one too many in the series (and I haven't read all 17). Put in the donation pile.

April (second week) 2018 Reads

Didn't read a lot this week--we finally had some decent weather and went for a couple of outings including delicious ice cream at the UCONN Dairy Bar.

This week the "Deal Me In" card is the Six of Spades; the story is Afternoon of a Faun by Jung Young Moon (in A most ambiguous Sunday, and other stories); translated from the Korean by Krys Lee and the author.
A quiet dream-like story of three friends spending an afternoon on a lake shore. Nothing much happens as they retell personal stories they've all heard before. A boring afternoon but the writing is lovely and not boring in its creation of an atmosphere of ennui.


Gutenberg finds...


Making Tin Can Toys by Edward Thatcher, c. 1919
Not that I read the whole text--it's quite detailed and I'm not actually going to try to make these. But I loved the pictures and the whole idea. If I had the tools, maybe I'd give it a try.





Suffrage Songs and Verses by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Published in 1911
25 poems, here is a sample (I feel frustrated when I read this) :      
             
                     COMING

Because the time is ripe, the age is ready,
Because the world her woman’s help demands,
Out of the long subjection and seclusion
Come to our field of warfare and confusion
The mother’s heart and hands.

Long has she stood aside, endured and waited,
While man swung forward, toiling on alone;
Now, for the weary man, so long ill-mated,
Now, for the world for which she was created,
Comes woman to her own.

Not for herself! though sweet the air of freedom;
Not for herself, though dear the new-born power;
But for the child, who needs a nobler mother,
For the whole people, needing one another,
Comes woman to her hour.

from the library...

The Last Castle: The Epic Story of Love, Loss, and American Royalty in the Nation’s Largest Home by Denise Kiernan
An interesting account, but it has much padding that hasn't anything to do with do with the Baltimore.

from my shelves...

Mourning by Eduardo Halfon; translated from the Spanish by Lisa Dillman and Daniel Hahn
Loved it! Halfon is always wonderful to read.

March (fifth week) 2018 Reads

This week I juggled several short story collections and only finished one book (a biography, not short stories).

The "Deal Me In" card this week is the Five of Diamonds; the story is The Last Asset (on Project Gutenberg in The Hermit and the Wild Woman and Other Stories, by Edith Wharton)
Americans in Paris. Love this sentence "He was presumably a bachelor—a man of family ties, however relaxed, though he might have been as often absent from home would not have been as regularly present in the same place—and there was about him a boundless desultoriness which renewed Garnett's conviction that there is no one on earth as idle as an American who is not busy."

from the library...

Empress of the East; How a Slave Girl Became Queen of the Ottoman empire by Leslie Peirce
A biography of Roxelana, wife of Sultan Suleyman the Magnificent. 

also from the library....a film

 

The French minister / directed by Bertrand Tavernier. New York, NY : IFC Films, [2014]

A spoof on french involvement in international diplomacy.