Jumping the Shark?

This week BTT asks: If you read series, do you ever find a series “jumping the shark?” How do you feel about that? And, do you keep reading anyway? I have never heard of the phrase “jumping the shark” so I had to look up the idiom’s meaning first. Wikipedia says the idiom is used [...]

[313] Ghostwritten – David Mitchell

” I experience memories like a network of tunnels. Some are serviced and brightly lit, others are catacombs . . . But access to memories does not guarantee access to truth. Many minds redirect memories along revised maps ” [168] Ghostwritten is David Mitchell’s debut novel but he is not playing safe with a conventional [...]

Book Group Recommendations

This week’s musing asks: If your book group asked you to bring two (2) suggestions for group reads to your next meeting, what two books would you suggest? Why? In keeping the sentiment of banned book week, and that I just read about Handmaid Tale‘s being banned in Texas, I would like to suggest this [...]

Big Book Sale

If I read correctly, over 4 million volumes were available at this year’s big book sale. Books are organized in categories designated by a number. Fiction was sub-divided into genres but books were in random order. You have to grab what catches your eyes and decides later because you will never see the book again. [...]

A Pier Full of Books

Annual big book sale, Friends of the San Francisco Public Library

Memories and Tunnels

Picking up from yesterday’s post. I know this book is like nothing I have read. It’s not the same as the linked narratives in Oliver Kitteridge. I don’t expect any one of the narrators will physically overlap—but the way these people are connected is just so surreal and intriguing. As my infancy progressed, I became [...]

Current Readings

This week BTT asks: What are you reading right now? What made you choose it? Are you enjoying it? Would you recommend it? (And, by all means, discuss everything, if you’re reading more than one thing!) The one book that I’m focusing on is Ghostwritten by David Mitchell. I chose the book because I have [...]

Into Fall Reading

Picture encore of City Lights Bookstore. Have a seat and read a book! I have finished the review of Boris Pasternak’s Doctor Zhivago, of which a new translation by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky will be available next month. I have an agreement with Shelf Awareness that the review will appear first on their blog [...]

Reconciliation with City Lights

Chiropractor appointment brought me to the proximity of Chinatown. The landmark of the Beat Movement, City Lights Bookstore, is just right around the corner. I haven’t been there for years because of an absurd incident that made me boycott it. Some girl up at the front desk asked no one but me to check my [...]

All the World is a Stage

This week’s musing asks: What makes you love / hate a character in a book? The paradox that fictitious characters often reflect the truth of real people in life never fails to amaze me. Authenticity is what makes me love a character. As long as the characters feel real and dynamic, they don’t have to [...]