From the category archives:

Read

reading: interactive communication ne plus ultra

May 2, 2012

It’s been too long, my darlings. Working like a fiend at my day job and finishing a draft of a novel in the wee hours filled my winter as the snow we didn’t have might have filled in the cracks and crevices in the landscape, quieting the noise of the world and making it difficult [...]

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lovely bookstore, lovely story

January 20, 2012

Geez, I was getting weepy over this. Have you ever seen such a beautiful location for a bookstore?

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The Joy of Books

January 12, 2012

Found the above on this delightful site with the silly name sent to me by my sister-in-law (thank you!). The photos on the site make me want to pound the table and say, with Sally, “Yes! Yes! Yes!” (I heart bookshelves.)

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Reading is Not Optional

January 10, 2012

Walter Dean Myers is being sworn in today as the new Ambassador for Young People’s Literature, an ungainly title, but a great job. His stated theme for his time in the post is, “Reading is not optional.” On NPR this morning he talks about his life, reading, and some of the initiatives he hopes to [...]

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BOOKS

January 4, 2012

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happy holidays

December 31, 2011

are spent like this:

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Spies of the Balkans; Alan Furst, 2011

December 20, 2011

I have a terrible weakness for buying books in airports. A foolish habit, because I’m always carrying too much weight as it is, but the truth is, I don’t spend much time in new bookstores. I live deep in the boonies and I don’t enjoy shopping as a hobby; unless I need something specific, or [...]

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The Weirdstone of Brisingamen; Alan Garner, 1960

December 17, 2011

Christopher Middleton, in The Telegraph, tells you anything you might need to know about The Weirdstone of Brisingamen, and talks with Alan Garner and other writers about the effect it’s had on over 50 years of readers and writers. I will add this, though Middleton mentions it: most claustrophobic scene in all of fiction! Well, [...]

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Letters from Father Christmas; J. R. R. Tolkien (1920-1943; first published 1976)

December 12, 2011

Another holiday favorite in this house are the extraordinary letters and drawings Father Christmas sent the Tolkien children between 1920 and 1943. Take a moment to remember the world created by Tolkien in The Hobbit and the Ring Trilogy, remember the maps, drawings and paintings with which he illustrated them, and then imagine being the [...]

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Joan Bauer Girl Power

December 11, 2011

Recently I read in quick succession three books by Joan Bauer handed to me by my daughter as she finished them—Hope Was Here, Rules of the Road and Best Foot Forward. While these books are not of the era of books I like to promote, being of this century, they are worthy of note.
When I [...]

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