Remind me not to blog when I’m pessimistic and/or cynical. I shall take my own advice and refrain from commentary, merely noting that here is a somewhat delayed cross-posting of a book review that I did at Read All Over. Click to see the original post.

As a recent college graduate living in Seattle having studied (though not majoring in it) French, it’s fairly safe to say I could relate to the main character of this novel, Lexi Stuart who lives in Seattle with her parents and finds herself working in a French bakery. As no exception to the “Christian chick-lit” genre, this book leans heavily upon the tried-and-true model of an initially single character who has fallen away from her relationship with God and is at some sort of crossroads. Lexi struggles with her parents’ upcoming move and the necessity of finding a place of her own (that she can afford), finding meaningful work that uses the degree she slaved over, and the frustration that is everyone else in her life finding their perfect someone.

Somewhat needless to say the book is predictable. This is the first in a series and pretty sure I can even predict what happens in the next book just based on a few lines of conversation that were slipped in toward the end. I enjoyed relating to the character, and it was a nice fluffy read. As an English  graduate, I invariably look to more than just the number of times I laughed or rolled my eyes, I look to the writing. I’ll admit I wasn’t expecting Pulitzer quality going into it, and my expectations were met. This type of novel has a pretty standard style, and Byrd doesn’t deviate from it. She (or her editor) throws in some “illustrations” that try to be original but come off cutesy and young.

Overall, I was entertained. I wouldn’t say I wasted my time, and I did finish the book. But if you’re looking at it on the shelf, consider carefully what you’re looking to find from the book. If it’s quality literature or surprises, maybe try the classics shelf. If you just want something to accompany your mug of hot cocoa and that won’t take too much of your time, this isn’t a bad choice.

As mentioned earlier, I received my holiday swap/book blogger Secret Santa gift!

My Secret Santa did not reveal his/her identity, but thanks for Katrina Carlson’s “Untucked” and Robert Ward’s The King of Cards, neither of which I was previously familiar with – so yay for branching out!

ETA: (see part two!)

As you’ll know if you’ve read my blog for any length of time (or just browse the archives), I’m not one for posting memes (or rather, I do it elsewhere). But in light of the fact that I should be writing a novel or vacuuming or doing any number of other things on my to-do list. I thought I would snag this nifty, consolidated list of 100 books. If you follow blogs or just like lists, you’ve probably seen the 100 best novels of all time or whatever. Apparently this list consolidates all those different ones. I have no idea (or care really) as to its accuracy, but it’s different than some of the others I’ve seen, so why not

Read/Want to Read/Don’t Care/Never Heard of It

41/29/9/21

1. Nineteen Eighty-Four George Orwell
2. The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald
3. The Grapes Of Wrath John Steinbeck
4. The Catcher in the Rye J.D. Salinger
5. Catch-22 Joseph Heller
6. One Hundred Years Of Solitude Gabriel García Márquez
7. Gone with the Wind Margaret Mitchell
8. Ulysses James Joyce
9. On The Road Jack Kerouac
10. The Lord of the Rings J.R.R. Tolkien
11. To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee
12. Pride and Prejudice Jane Austen
13. Wuthering Heights Emily Brontë
14. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe C.S. Lewis
15. Great Expectations Charles Dickens
16. War and Peace Leo Tolstoy
17. Lolita Vladimir Nabokov
18. Animal Farm George Orwell
19. Crime And Punishment Fyodor Dostoyevsky
20. Anna Karenina Leo Tolstoy
21. Lord Of The Flies William Golding
22. Brideshead Revisited Evelyn Waugh
23. Midnight’s Children Salman Rushdie
24. Love In The Time Of Cholera Gabriel García Márquez
25. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Douglas Adams
26. Jane Eyre Charlotte Brontë
27. The Hobbit J.R.R. Tolkien
28. To the Lighthouse Virginia Woolf
29. Middlemarch George Eliot
30. Rebecca Daphne du Maurier
31. Dune Frank Herbert
32. Brave New World Aldous Huxley
33. A Prayer For Owen Meany John Irving
34. Watership Down Richard Adams
35. The Sound and the Fury William Faulkner
36. Little Women Louisa May Alcott
37. Invisible Man Ralph Ellison
38. Anne Of Green Gables LM Montgomery
39. Emma Jane Austen
40. Memoirs Of A Geisha Arthur Golden
41. Beloved Toni Morrison
42. Of Mice And Men John Steinbeck
43. The Heart of Darkness Joseph Conrad
44. Les Miserables Victor Hugo
45. The Wind in the Willows Kenneth Grahame
46. The Da Vinci Code Dan Brown
47. Tess Of The D’Urbervilles Thomas Hardy
48. Winnie the Pooh A.A. Milne
49. Birdsong Sebastian Faulks
50. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin Louis de Bernieres
51. Slaughterhouse Five Kurt Vonnegut
52. Life of Pi Yann Martel
53. A Clockwork Orange Anthony Burgess
54. The Count Of Monte Cristo Alexandre Dumas
55. A Passage to India E.M. Forster
56. Moby Dick Herman Melville
57. A Suitable Boy Vikram Seth
58. The Stand Stephen King
59. Possession A.S. Byatt
60. Madame Bovary Gustave Flaubert
61. A Tale Of Two Cities Charles Dickens
62. The Trial Franz Kafka
63. I, Claudius Robert Graves
64. The Handmaid’s Tale Margaret Atwood
65. The Secret History Donna Tartt
66. His Dark Materials Philip Pullman
67. The Harry Potter Series J.K. Rowling
68. The Brothers Karamazov Fyodor Dostoyevsky
69. Don Quixote Miguel de Cervantes
70. Sons and Lovers D.H. Lawrence
71. The Pillars Of The Earth Ken Follett
72. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man James Joyce
73. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Mark Twain
74. The Kite Runner Khaled Hosseini
75. An American Tragedy Theodore Dreiser
76. Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland Lewis Carroll
77. Bleak House Charles Dickens
78. The Time Traveller’s Wife Audrey Niffenegger
79. A Fine Balance Rohinton Mistry
80. The Sun Also Rises Ernest Hemmingway
81. Nostromo Joseph Conrad
82. Under the Volcano Malcolm Lowry
83. The Golden Notebook Doris Lessing
84. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter Carson McCullers
85. The Stranger Albert Camus
86. Native Son Richard Wright
87. Gravity’s Rainbow Thomas Pynchon
88. The Poisonwood Bible Barbara Kingsolver
89. Perfume Patrick Süskind
90. Things Fall Apart Chinua Achebe
91. David Copperfield Charles Dickens
92. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory Roald Dahl
93. Pale Fire Vladimir Nabokov
94. Persuasion Jane Austen
95. Atlas Shrugged Ayn Rand
96. The Tin Drum Gunter Grass
97. Vanity Fair William Makepeace Thackeray
98. Atonement Ian McEwan
99. Light in August William Faulkner
100. The Secret Garden Frances Hodgson Burnett

Outrage is met with disgust, quickly followed by a vehement proclamation that I will most certainly not endorse this travesty.

What, you ask, has evoked this strong protestation?

reuters

Not so much the (authorized) sequel – but the inclusion of a certain new character named Lottie the Otter.

I suppose the rational side of my brain is kicking in and acknowledging that these types of sequels usually do have new characters – in fact they often need them. But still – the naming of this character? It just seems so cheesy and smarmy. I’m thinking of the original characters, and okay, so they don’t often deviate very far from the animal’s name…but it worked. Now they work because they have the benefit of being positively embedded in our collective psyche.

At this point as I continue to mull over this turn of events, I have concluded that I will borrow this book from the library to evaluate whether to consider it an addition to my Winnie-the-Pooh canon. But. Lottie the Otter? I remain resolutely unimpressed with this naming.

It is not to be wondered that men have worshiped the ocean, for in his depths they have seen mirrored the image of Eternity — of Infinity. Here they have seen the symbol of God’s great plan of oneness with His creatures, for the sea is the union of all infinite particles, and it takes the whole to make the one.

(“The Sea” in The Philosophy of Elbert Hubbard, via wikiquote)

I need more poetry in my life, so perhaps you do too (for those of you who do not find poetry so essential – apologies for two posts in a row, prose shall return next time).  Here’s one from Edward Hirsch as published in 180 More.


“I Am Going to Start Living Like a Mystic”


Today I am pulling on a green wool sweater
and walking across the park in a dusky snowfall.

The trees stand like twenty-seven prophets in a field,
each a station in a pilgrimage–silent, pondering.

Blue flakes of light falling across their bodies
are the ciphers of a secret, an occultation.

I will examine their leaves as pages in a text
and consider the bookish pigeons, students of winter.

I will kneel on the track of a vanquished squirrel
and stare into a blank pond for the figure of Sophia.

I shall begin scouring the sky for signs
as if my whole future were constellated upon it.

I will walk home alone with the deep alone,
a disciple of shadows, in praise of the mysteries.