better than the zoo

We toured the pet stores in lethbridge with our kids yesterday. It made us too late for a wedding dinner and we missed out on the food and comradie, but we were having so much fun. One of our daughters was literally shaking with excitement at the mice scurrying in their cages. It's better than the zoo in some ways because it's free and you can cuddle the rabbits and let the birds hang out on your arm. Too bad Rus exudes something that makes animals aggressive. He was bit by a furious little albino hedgehog!

The Dorking Gap Affair!

I came across this book and just loved the title, in my head I had some good ole poking fun at the Gap kind of fun:
"The Dorking Gap Affair"

Turns out that it's actually some kind of "Mycroft Holmes Adventure" novel. Mycroft Holmes is Sherlock Holmes' brilliant older brother, apparently. Who knew?
So say the title with an English accent and maybe it will make sense.

pride and prejudice chick

i saw the new pride & prejudice. i liked it (even kierra knightly). the book (and the movie) is one of those impossible love stories that guys might find cheesy, but every woman secretly wishes for. who wouldnt want a loving family with a pile of sisters to support you. who wouldnt want to spend their days perfecting their artistic talents, in a mansion with servants to do the dirty work. who wouldnt want a lonley troubled millionaire to fall desperately in love you. especially one with the phattest side burns ever.

Rooftop Gardens

I have always loved this concept. What a great use of space. Just imagine a world where every flat-roofed building had a garden on top.

griffin and sabine

I finished the rest of the 6-logy... hexlogy... hexology... whatever. The trilogy in six parts (see post below titled "the end"). I think my brow was furrowed in agitated concentration the whole time. It took a lot of effort to stay focused on the story. The interaction between Griffin and Sabine became more intense,complicated, and mystical as another couple, Matthew and Isabella was added to the correspondence. I can't say that the story itself would stand on its own, as it was fairly ambiguous and confusing at times. It was the illustrations and the presentation that brought it to life. My imagination was exercised to the limit, which was agitating at times (hence the agitated confusion), but ultimately good for that part of my brain that has become lazy. phew! I'm reading something a little more obvious next.

The Concert

I´m still at loss for words over the Depeche Mode concert last weekend in Copenhagen. I admit that I have not been to many big concerts so I don´t have a lot of comparison but this one was just fabulous.

I did not take these pictures I got them of http://depechemode.com but they are from this tour. The stage was fantastic and Dave Gahan is just a maniac. The crowd just responds beautifully to him. I was not close to the stage but I could see it very clearly from the side and I saw the screens well and I had a wonderfull time watching the crowd interact with the band.

They started with songs from Playing the Angel
which I´ve come to like very much, and then
moved on to older songs, I got chills all over my body when they started "Walking in my shoes" which has not even been one of my favorite songs. The crowd (including me) went wild during predictable songs like "Personal Jesus" "Never let me down again" and "Behind the wheel"and "enjoy the silence" and ofcourse they where amazing.

The high point for me though was after the first encore when Martin Gore performed "Shake the disese" acommpanied only by keyboard.

He was so incredable, it was like he put his heart and soul into it. I´ve never seen or heard anything like it. He is just an incredable preformer.

Music just is not the same when played live, I had epiphany about the meaning of some lyrics at this concert and before you ask, I have not been taking any drugs.

They closed with a beautiful rendering of "Goodnight lovers" after 3 encours

The bottom line, best concert I´ve ever been to
magnificent band I might quit my job and follow them around. It´s all your fault Rus if you hadn´t given me that "Construction time again" tape I would still be sane.

I think this might be close to the order of the songs

> Intro> A Pain That I'm Used To> John The Revelator> A Question Of Time> Policy Of Truth> Precious> Walking In My Shoes> Suffer Well> Damaged People> Home> I Want It All> The Sinner In Me> I Feel You> World In My Eyes> Personal Jesus> Enjoy The Silence
encore> Shake The Disease> Just Can't Get Enough> Everything Counts
encore #2 Behind The Wheel> Never Let Me Down Again>
encore #3 Goodnight Lovers

gone to Copenhagen

I like penguins, tourists look for them all the time in Iceland which is really funny.
Anyway I´m gone to Copenhagen to see Depeche Mode in consert tell you all about it when I get back on Monday.

worst hairdo ever

Here's proof that this handsome young man does not wear a toupee, it's just a really bad combover.

the end

I know that sometimes a mysterious and unresolved ending for a story can be part of the writer's "artistic vision" but I get so frustrated when the end is left open for me to figure out for myself. I can't decide whether or not I should accuse the writer of getting out easy or whether I should respect their "vision" for the story. I just read the Griffin and Sabine trilogy by Nick Bantock. The presentation was entertaining (a collection of postcards and letters between Griffin, a postcard artist, and Sabine, a stamp designer who has visions of Griffins art). I hope this doesn't spoil it for anyone who has yet to read these but at least there were only two main options for the outcome. Either Griffin was insane the whole time or they finally got together. I haven't decided yet which one I have chosen.
Update: Lucky for me I just discovered that the trilogy actually continues for three more volumes...what kind of a trilogy includes 6 volumes??? So at least I haven't spoiled these for anyone...
(click on the picture for a larger view of one of the postcards)

challenges

I read the second book in a graphic novel series by Michel Rabagliati about a young guy named Paul, living in Quebec in the 70's. (I couldn't find the first one, Paul in the Country, and the third one, Paul Moves Out, is on its way)
Paul's job is as a camp counsellor for underprivileged and dilinquent kids. He starts out being scared of the woods, impatient with kids; pretty much defeated. He ends up falling in love with the kids, learns to rock climb and canoe and generally creates great memories for himself.
This just got me thinking about some of the times that I have felt defeated and overwhelmed (a prime example being when I start a new job). Because I didn't give up, I learned great things, made friends, improved my life. It makes me really regret the times that I have given up and potentially missed out on some amazing experiences.

my favorite author

recently i've found some time to read again and my first choice is Pearl S. Buck. here you can read a small essay she wrote on something dear to my heart. i like her for more than her books, but also for her life. she adopted over seas which is a dream of mine, but more than that, she recognized the need for foreign adoptions and she started her own adoption agency, all the while writing fabulous books about china and it's unique culture. her books are historically and culturally accurate given that she spent most of her childhood in china. i also love her because she presents the feminine role so compasionately and sympatheticaly. my favorite book is "pavilion of women". as one of my heroines, i named my van after her; the pearl.

Audrey Niffenegger

I remember the thing I really loved about The Time Traveller's Wife was how she would describe one of the characters making art. It was just so lively. Now that I have read The Three Incestuous Sisters, it makes sense that she can so vividly describe the visually creative process. This picture is from one of my favorite scenes in the book, when Clothilde gives her nephew (who is still just a fetus in her sister's womb) flying lessons.

piano man

I went to see Jon Schmidt last night with my piano teacher. He is a pianist and composer, started composing at age 11. It may seem strange that I would voluntarily pay to go see a pianist, but this guy is good. He's young and entertaining and not at all what I expected. He didn't wear a suit, he wore a t-shirt and pants. He did a Dana Carvey song about broccoli. He plays a mean piano, making good use of every key. He can get so many different sounds out of a single key. There has probably been plenty of people throughout history that have been able to do that but I think this guy has a little more fun with it.

I´ve been reading some very good things about The Three Incestuous Sisters. Lis have you read it yet? I remember you talking about it some time ago. It´s really interesting to know that it took the author 14 years to finish it. I was reading in Locus http://www.locusmag.com/ that she actually started The Time traveler´s Wife as a way to procrastinate on finishing The Three Incestuous Sisters.

opening a can of worms?

Ok, first of all I consider myself a Christian.
I was looking at the "Church of the flying spagetti monster" website and I thought it was hillarious. To me it is a joke, I was not offended. http://www.venganza.org/ I´m curious, are you guys offended? I read some of the hatemail the site has gotten and I just can´t belive that some of those people call themselfs Christians.
I was thinking that maybe I was not offended because the ID theory stuff has not been an issue here in Iceland.
The seperation of Church and State is not a fact here. When I was little just about everyone I knew belonged to the national church. Still today when you are born you automatically belong to it unless your mother belongs to a diffrent religion. When I met Rus in 1990 I had never met a person that I knew to belong to a diffrent church then me, although in theory I knew they existed. (and I guess I had already met alot of people that did not, seeing that I was in Canada at the time, I had just never discussed it with anyone)
When I was in elementary school we had Christianity as one of the subjects and I don´t remember ever having been educated in any other religion in school although I´m sure we must have talked about them at some point. (Now Icelandic schools don´t have christianity but sociology and teach about all the major religions, someone must have complained)
When I was prepering for my confirmation when I was 14, I remember my priest getting very upset when we asked him about darwin and creation. We where studying evoluton in biology at the same time and my biology teacher told us his belive which I realize today was very simular to intelligent design theory. I remember being facinated and I think we all where at the time because we (my whole class) was prepering for confirmation at church. My priest could not handle those questions and banned them from our studies. I think it probably did more damage to our faith than not.
So what am I missing here? Should I be offended and am I just a bad Christian.

we got the cronicles of narnia for christmas and i've strted reading them to the children. i'm surprised that they will sit through a whole chapter at a time, but they were written with a compadable perspective. i just wish i would have bought the books before the major motion picture came out.

the kite runner

My current reading material is The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. It starts out in Kabul, Afghanistan in the early 1970's. The main character, Amir, is the son of a wealthy businessman and has a servant his age named Hassan who will do anything for Amir. The funnest time in their lives is the winter when they have huge kite competitions. The whole neighbourhood sits outside to watch as hundreds of kites are flown in the sky. Participants must cut each others kites so that they fall, and then they chase down and catch ("run") the fallen kites. The winner is the last one flying and he/she must run the last kite that was cut to bring home as a sort of trophy. The copy I'm reading has the green cover but as I was googling for an image of the book, I came across this other tan one. It really caught my attention because it suggests the main incident of the story, the turning point in Amir and Hassan's life. It kind of gave me the shivers because it's not a pleasant incident at all.

taggarama

So, I have been "tagged" by Aisy (right of way). I am supposed to share five weird things about myself. I have to say that my first thought was "I hate these things". But then I felt an obligation to follow through with it and then it became a challenge and then I started enjoying it. However, I am going to rebel a little and not tag anyone else.
#1: I can't swim. Well, I can swim in the shallow end of a pool but I have never ventured into the deep end or jumped off a diving board. When I tell people this they are either shocked, amused or disgusted. Where's the sympathy!?
#2: I am a mutant. When I was born, my two smaller toes on my right foot had not yet separated. There was bone, they were just stuck together by the skin. For reactions, see #1, although my husband thinks it's pretty cool. They are separated now.
#3: I'm not a Canadian citizen. I guess that's not really weird but it does set me apart sometimes because I can't vote and do certain other things that require citizenship. I have never wanted to be a politician anyway. I would like to be able to vote but I would have to lose my Danish citizenship for that and that is something that I don't want to give up, because I am able to work anywhere in the EU, if the desire and opportunity to do so should arise.
#4: I can spin wool and weave tapestries. Although I am not very good at it (it has been at least ten years since I have last tried) and I don't have the patience to pursue it, my mother taught me to spin and weave. For some weird stuff on spinning doghair and such, see Ninjutation's post in Popscoff.
#5: I sincerely enjoy living in a small town in southern Alberta. This might not seem weird to those who don't know me well but to those that have known for a long time, they would never have thought this would happen. Although I spent my childhood equally in rural and urban communities, I thought the city was where I belonged. Turned out I just needed to find what I was looking for before leaving for something more peaceful. I didn't know it at the time but what I was looking for was the truth about life. It came to me in the best form possible: a husband in the church, followed by a twin pregnancy.

Ok so I know that I said I wouldn't tag anyone but I think I wanna tag Phyllis Sweetwater(the epitome) after all, mostly out of curiosity and because I know she has some weirdness up her sleeve and this is the sort of thing that would suit her personal blog.

love books can´t read them

I love books, stories and storytelling of all kind. I tend to like music with lyrics that tell a story even if they just hint a story behind the song. My favorite song when I was 13 was Love is a battlefield with Pat Benatar. I would spend hours listening to it and wondering about the story behind the song or what happened to the people in the song. Strangely as much as I love storys I can´t seem to read anything at the moment I pick up books and start reading them and put them down again. So I am posting pictures by one of my favorite bookcover illustrator Jody Lee. You might recognice her work you can´t go into a bookstore that sells fantasy without seeing one of her covers. I like the detail and the promise of a story that her work hints.
http://www.jodylee.org/

Bright Eyes strikes again

This is good. Except for the expression on the girl's face when the plane starts to crash. That's an adult movie expression. Also, for those of you who didn't see his Leno performance, here's that one.

foreign food

One of the best things about traveling to another country is the food; the way it's presented, eaten, etc. I flipped through this book called Mangoes and Curry Leaves. It is written by a couple that travels frequently to other continents and this is one of their books that they have compiled full of recipes, pictures and facts centered around food from Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. I didn't read very much of it, but it made me think of all the good food that I have had on my travels. My husband always raves about the extensive selection of ice cream flavours in Taiwan. We find some of the same good stuff in Asian supermarkets. Perhaps in search of the perfect ice cream, we have been making it a point to try ice cream whenever we leave Canada. I think the grossest ice cream we have ever had was a popsicle in Denmark that was lemon and licorice flavoured, but not the North American kind of licorice. It was the salty European kind. Blech. Here's a fun fact about ice cream in Denmark: They slice their ice cream, they don't scoop it.

smart

One of the arguments people use for driving huge vehicles such as the hummer is "i feel safer in a bigger vehicle." Manufacturers of these large vehicles don't have to prove that they are especially safe because consumers already have this false notion that just because they're big, they're safe. Here is more proof that smaller is safer. I believe there was a post on popscoff about this once.

Depeche Mode

I´m taking my Visa creditcard to the bank tomorrow and turning it in. So the last thing I did was to buy tickets to Depeche Mode´s concert in Copenhagen on Febuary 25th. I´m already so deep in dept that a ticket to a concert won´t change anything. So now I just have to figure out how to get there.
It´s a good thing I have another creditcard...

http://www.depechemode.com/

Book purist

I´m a book purist.
It´s silly but I dislike it immensly when I´m unpacking books at work and the distributor has packed brand name books like Warhammer or Dragonlance with my precius children books by "respectable" authors. Maybe that´s more snob than anything else.
Oh my, I´m a snob.
The lego thing Rus, that´s also snob.
Noooo, my friends and I can´t be snobs maybe it´s some form of a mental illness, that would be much better. At least we would be a respectable minority.

list-o-rama

All those lists out there has made us want to compile my own. My husband and I have collaborated to bring you our own best/worst of lists for 2005. Tell us your best/ worst-of's.

Best Music:
Hurra Torpedo (specifically The Only Egil Band)
Regina Spektor
Smoosh

Best Books:
The Alchemist (not published this year but I finally read it this year and it deserves it)

Best Graphic Novels:
"Pyongyang" by Guy Delisle
"War's End" by Joe Sacco
"Carnet De Voyage" by Craig Thompson
"Jeffrey Brown's Girlfriend Trilogy": "AEIOU" was published this year and it hasn't come to a library near us yet, but we've read "Clumsy" and "Unlikely" so it makes the list on their merits.
"Embroderies" by Marjane Satrapi

Best TV:
My Name is Earl
Bright Eyes on Leno
Arrested Development

Best Other Stuff:
2 Legged Dogs

Worst Radio Show:
Freestyle

Worst Music:
K-Fed

Worst Other Stuff:
yellow (ribbons, bracelets)
more bottled water
more antibacterial soap
under-reported news stories
bigger monstrosities driving the roads

barf

Here's a book that I do not recommend unless you're 12 years old and are into the Babysitter's Club series. I was curious to know what all the hype was about but I couldn't get past the third page without barfing.

Craig Thompson

I have two more graphic novels to recommend (it's a long drive from lethbridge to edmonton). Both are by Craig Thompson: Blankets and Carnet de Voyage. Blankets is about his first love, reminds me a little of Unlikely and Clumsy, only not as sad (see November 9 and 27 posts). Carnet de Voyage is a sort of travel journal of his time in France, Spain and Northern Africa.
You can view his art and see panels from his books on his site.

Us Little People

I just got this book out of the library and it's really cute. I think it almost has my husband wanting to convert. Carl Hiebert spent seven years befriending some Mennonite colonies in Ontario, after a hang-gliding accident left him paralyzed. They ended up trusting him enough to tell them some personal stories and let him photograph them sometimes, although it is frowned upon to have your picture taken. They say it promotes honoring a person instead of God. Here's a story from a 12 year-old girl that I thought was especially cute:
"The funniest thing that I ever heard is about a horse that bit off a Mennonite girl's braid. I imagine that she was just walking past a horse, and the horse decided that the braid looked delicious. Then, for awhile, she had just one braid. But now she is a grandmother with no braids. She still has the braid that the horse bit off. I sure hope that a horse will never bite my braid off!"

Dancing around the Christmas tree

Check this out, learn to dance disco and count to four in finnish at the same time. Lots of fun.

http://folk.uio.no/tsandvik/fun/learn_disco.mpg

mags

I've been poisoning my mind this year with a lot of gossip magazines. My husband gets them free from his work sometimes, so in my defence, I'm not actually purchasing them. I know way too much about Brad and Angelina's courtship and about Nick and Jessica's break-up. It's disgusting, especially since I could have been spending that time flipping through one of the really great magazines that he gets, like Mother Earth News.

flakey

A snowflake under a microscope.

Here is a chance to make your own snowflake. Hours of fun for the whole family.

The Alchemist

I finally started reading this last night. Paulo Coelho is so digestable. Maybe it is because it has been translated, but the writing isn't pretentious, it doesn't use unnecessarily complicated language. It's simple, yet it conveys a lively picture in your mind of what you are reading. The Alchemist is about a young man who has become a shepherd because he wants to travel. A series of omens leads him on a path to discover his "Personal Legend". Another book of his, Veronica Decides to Die, is one of my favorite. Anyone that I have recommended it to who has read it, agress that it is a wonderful book. His website: http://www.paulocoelho.com.br/engl/

Stuart McLean

My husband and I had the opportunity to see Stuart McLean last night (of the Vinyl Cafe on CBC Radio). He is a storyteller/comedian. He likes to showcase young up-and-coming musical talents on these shows and one of these guys in particular was very good. His name is Owen Pallett aka Final Fantasy. He also sometimes plays with The Arcade Fire. He plays the violin and he uses a loop pedal to create several background tracks live, so it gets pretty intricate, and then he starts singing and his voice is beautiful. Here is another track of his. And a video. It was an engaging act, the best thing i have seen live in a while. The rest of the show was pretty entertaining as well, with an artist, Holly Carr, rapidly painting some back-lit silk panels as either Stuart McLean was talking or someone was playing. Stuart McLean makes me laugh. It was neat to see his eccentric physical mannerisms after only hearing his voice for so long.

PYONGYANG: A Journey in North Korea

This graphic novel is an account of the author, Guy Delisle's two months spent in North Korea, supervising an animation project. It gives a Westerner's perspective on a country devoid of all common sense, the result of totalitarian Communism and too much one-sided propaganda. I actually laughed out loud at one point, when a large group of children were throwing buckets of water on a lawn, watering it...just for "fun". There were "volunteers" sweeping the freeways, cutting the grass with scissors, among other mysterious acts, made to keep citizens out of trouble i suppose. The photograph above is probably the most ridiculous modern structure to my knowledge, the Ryugyong hotel. It was built in Pyongyang to host part of the Olympic trials in 1988 and they stopped working on it in 1989. It is over 1,000 feet tall and has 105 floors, and it is completely empty, just a concrete shell with no windows and there it will stand for who knows how long. Millions of dollars were spent building it while many of the local people were starving. The mysteries of humanity...

full circle

my parents used to make me listen to neil diamond when i was young and i went through a few stages with him including; ignorant acceptance, annoyance, hatred, curiosity, nostalgia and now, with the release of his new album, acceptance once again. in fact i bought it and i like it and not because it reminds me of the good old days of my childhood, but also because its catchy, real and raw. it would make a great christmas present for my parents... but i'm keeping it.

Christmas stories

Hi, I´m not reading a lot these days but I thought I should tell you about this book the Angel doll. My mom was reading it and told me the story, I picked it up and read the ending for myself. It´s not overly sentimental but I got tears in my eyes anyway. I´m not going to tell you what it is about its short so I recommend you read it if you can find it. It´s a really sweet Christmas story and brings a real feeling of hope for mankind to my heart. I generally think mankind as a whole is pretty hopeless but some individuals can make me forget that.
This author usually writes true crime.
Please tell me about some good Christmas stories that you know about, I´m a Christmas idiot and like everything Christmas.

harry potter six

so i read harry potter and the half blood prince, thinking that i was going to be captured with all of the suspence the other books brought me. I was disappointed. there was too much silly dating and crushes on girls etc. i think i personally am beyond that so it meant to interest 16 yr old girls (go figure).it wasnt scary enough (i heard jk had to rewrite the scary parts out) and the plot which is supposed to be a cliffhanger turns out to be a collapsed bridge. poor harry. if book seven doesnt seriously redeem him im afraid his reputation might be shot.

El español

I have decided to learn Spanish. It's either that or take over the world. So I've decided to learn Spanish.

"without change..."

"...something within us sleeps. Awaken the sleeper." -Frank Herbert
Well I have become completely bored and constricted by the purpose of this blog so I am changing it to include, well...everything. So, fellow contributers, feel free to post whatever you please.

book of mormon

i hope nobody minds that my first post is about a religious book. i dont want this to be used as a missionary oppurtunity, i just want to tell you what i am reading now. The Book of Mormon is a true account, written and compiled by christian prophets in the americas and their dealings with their families, governments and other waring tribes. i find the wars and other physical strife very metaphorical to my own spiritual wars and strife. there are some people or warriors whose bravery and integrity motivate me to take courage and be stronger. anyways, alot of people don't believe that this book is historcally accurate and it's difficult to read it as a fictional novel. however, if you do believe it, it is very hard to read only once because of the vast ammount of symbolism and personal revelation you can find.

Unlikely

Unlikely is another graphic novel(sometimes very graphic indeed), by Jeffrey Brown. It's the prequel to Clumsy. Like Clumsy, it is autobiographical, about a young relationship; a bit awkward, often pathetic. I felt a little uncomfortable and sorry for the guy. My husband read this right before I did and when he saw me reading it, shook his head and said "poor guy." But there was still something charming and cute about him. I think it was partly the honesty it was written with and also the style of his drawings. The expressions on their faces were very simple but the feelings they conveyed were quite strong. It left me wanting more again. The third and last book in the girlfriend series is called AEIOU. Jeffrey Brown has also done a parody of Clumsy called Be A Man, "full of typical male antics".

Pnin

Well, I tried reading this book because someone's review of it intrigued me(see Nov.8 post). I got as far as page 36 and realized I was just torturing myself. Not everyone has the same taste in books.

LMNOP

I finished Ella Minnow Pea last night. It took a page or two for me to get used to the language of the Nollopians because they use so many words that I have never heard before. I had to kind of train myself to know the definition of words by the context they were used in. Then letters disappeared from the story altogether. My favorite was when the letter D was outlawed and they had to change the names of the week like satto-gatto for saturday or sunshine for sunday. It gave me a new awareness of words in the past few days. I noticed myself eliminating certain letters when thinking to myself for awhile after finishing the book. The political message of the book reminded me a lot of Animal Farm (by George Orwell); that too much power or control causes greed and corruption. What a satisfying read. Thanks Dagga, for the recommendation!

Publishing in Iceland

The Icelandic book catalog has made it´s way to all homes in Iceland, it is a yearly ritual to sit down with the catalog and decide whitch books you would like to read and mark the one you would like for Christmas in a way that members of your family can´t possibly miss.
Oh, the joy of the annual book catalog. This year it has over 600 titles, every book published in Icelandic this year.
40 original children books,
121 translated children books,
67 original fiction for adults,
70 translated fiction for adults,
36 poetry books (1 translated)
then there are the art and photagraphy books, biography - autobiography, interview books (always popular) history, geography, inspirational books, cookbooks and other misc. non-fiction.
A bit over the top for a population of 260.000.
My favorite Icelandic author Gyrðir Elíasson has 1 new collection of short stories, a book of poetry and a translation. It is actually one of the most interesting translation this year, Tuck Everlasting by Natalie Babbitt, I have not read it in yet but I´m told that it is a wonderful story for both children and adults.
So many books so little time.

finished!

I finished The Time Traveler's Wife. What an amazing story. The reviews I have read all seem to dwell on it as being a love story. But it's so much more than that. It's anything but Hollywood romance. It is actually a little bit sad, but I think that made it realistic. Obviously someone who travels through time and ends up naked in public places will have bad things happen to them. It was disturbing sometimes but not so much that I would cringe; pretty mild disturbances. I think my favorite parts were when the author described the wife, Clare, making her sculptures and other art. She described it as though the art was making itself. It was so graphic. I want to talk about it some more but I don't want to ruin it for anyone who has yet to read it. Audrey Niffenegger is also an artist. She does some pretty cool stuff. Her website: www.audreyniffenegger.com
She has a new book that was published this year, a "visual novel in eighty aquatints", The Three Incestuous Sisters. I am going to convince the head librarian here to order it.

for the love of graphic novels

I just read Clumsy tonight. It's by Jeffrey Brown. It's really cute and entertaining, and it only took about an hour to read. Aaah...the graphic novel. So satisfying, in so little time. It's like a cross between a movie and a book. It's not as lazy as a movie and you still get to use your imagination. Jeffrey Brown's site: www.theholyconsumption.com

a novel without letters

I read the most wonderful book last night, it is called Ella Minnow Pea and is a true adventure of letters and words. It is short, only took me a few hours to read so you English speaking people should be even quicker to read it.
It´s told in letters between people on a fictionary island nation of the shores of South Carolina. It´s almost an utopian society where technology is used sparely and arts and language held in the highest regard. Then one day for reasons I won´t go into (so as not to spoil the fun for you) the high council decide to outlaw the letter "Z" from the language. As you can see it leads to certain caos. Then one by one they outlaw more and more letters from the language. It is a true joy to read the letters between the people as they try to follow this new law and the book is a treasure for everyone that loves words and language. It is also a fable on how power can corrupte and really makes you think about how goverments in general hold power over theire people and how easy it is to abuse.
So, put it on your reading list.

Pnin

I'm not yet done The Time Traveler's Wife but I have decided that the next book I want to read is called Pnin. The author is Vladimir Nabokov. It's a novella (meaning short novel...good news for those of us who have little time to read). I don't know a lot about it but a review that I read intrigued me.
Here's the review (by Zadie Smith):
"This novella is explicitly a book about ridicule and caricature-Professor Pnin is a joke of a man on a college campus. He's an awkward Russian emigre with bad English, false teeth, a clumsy sense of humour, a tendency to burst into tears or take offence at small slights. Everybody on campus can do an impression of him. He's a clown. But at the core of the book is the idea that there is a Pnin who is as real as the people who ridicule him. You are invited to laugh at him, and then you are humbled and shamed by your own laughter. It's a gorgeous, hilarious, humane book that uncovers the reality of a man's life in sly, piecemeal fashion. I think it's my favorite novel."

If anyone wants to read this book with me and give your thoughts on it, please do! I love it when other people are reading the same book as me. It makes it feel like more of an event. I will probably start reading it when I get it in a week or two. So join me if you like. Your local library either has a copy or can probably bring it in for you.

Corine wants me to read another Paulo Coelho book with her sometime...maybe The Alchemist?

Kitty and the midnight hour

Hi, I just finished reading Kitty and the midnight hour, I liked it. It will never be confused with the great world literature but who cares. I like to call this sub-genre in fantasy/horror, vampire chick lit. they are always set in an alternate reality that is almost like ours but not quite. Kitty is a werewolf in the closet that hosts a late night radio show and starts to get phone calls from vampires and werewolves in need of advise. The plot is not terrible complicated but its enough to hold your interest through out the whole story and the characters could use a little bit more developing. But hey its fluff it´s not supposed to be complicated. I still like it, although for people starting out in this genre I would recommend Dead witch walking by Kim Harrison and Dead until dark by Charlaine Harris and the hilarious Undead and Unwed by MaryJanice Davidson.

the present

(re: The Time Traveler's Wife)
This novel is written in the present tense. It is really well done because I didn't actually notice the fact until last night! Writing in the present tense is a little more challenging. I remember trying to write a short story in junior high using present tense and it turned out sounding like I was trying too hard to be edgy or something. Anyway, it sucked. It was too obvious.