Book Review: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

I'm such a dork.

Here I am challenging all of you to read books and then POST YOUR REVIEWS. I finished The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society a week ago and totally forgot to write a review. Sheesh...

I'll chalk it up to PMS (or, as I like to call it, Period Head, because let's face it, you just don't think normally when the hormones are rampaging through your body).

Moving on...

This book is actually written as a series of letters. I didn't know this going into it and it kind of threw me at first. I wasn't so sure how much I'd like it. But after about the first 20 pages or so, I was hooked! The characters are so charming and really funny and I loved reading about a little known history of the German occupation of small British islands during WWII. If I ever have a chance to visit Guernsey, I will certainly do so after reading this book! I just wish all the characters were real so I could visit them, especially the main character, Juliet Ashton. She and I would get along very nicely, I think.

I gave this book 5 stars on Goodreads.com. I highly recommend it.

2009 Busy Bookworm Challenge!

Friends! Book lovers! Bloggies! Come one, come all and join me in the 2009 Busy Bookworm Challenge!

What is the Busy Bookworm Challenge, you ask? That's an excellent question! I've just made it up! Here's the gist:

I am a very busy lady, as I'm sure many, if not most, of you are as well (unless you're a guy and then you're a very busy lad...obviously). Nevertheless, I LOVE to read as you may have gathered by now. I know many of you also love to read. I also know that many of you also love to blog/chat/gossip/bitch/moan/list/review/discuss about the books you have read, are reading, and have yet to read. I ALSO know that if you're anything like me, you love a good challenge if for no other reason than succeeding in that challenge.

Enter the 2009 Busy Bookworm Challenge! It goes like this: make a list of all the books you want to read before the end of the year. Go ahead. Make the list. I'll wait...

You back? Okay, so there is your goal. You are to read those books by the end of the year. Once you've finished one of the books on your list, write a blog post about it telling everyone that you've (a) read it, (b) how you liked it (or didn't as the case may be), and (c) if you'd recommend it. As you read others' blog posts/discussions about the books they've read and you want to read their book just add it to your ongoing list of books that you will use for the 2010 Busy Bookworm Challenge. After the new year, we'll start the new challenge. Easy peasy, right?

Hopefully, this will encourage and inspire all of us Busy Bookworms to spend more time reading wonderful stories and nourishing our inner nerd instead of watching t.v. or otherwise wasting our creative energies. Of course, your personal list can be edited to be longer or shorter depending on what you have going on in your life because, honestly, the whole point of the Challenge is to remind ourselves on a regular basis of the joy of picking up a great book and getting lost in another world if only for 10 minutes a day. It's a way to refresh and renew and have a little bit of "me time" before jumping back into the fray of jobs, kids, husbands, pets, and chores.

What do you get out of the Challenge, you ask? Besides nourishing your inner nerd...I don't know yet. But I'm going to try to think of some nice little trinket (a blog award? a small gift?) to present to those who succeed in reading all the books on their list by the end of the year. Honor system, people. And besides, I'll know if you don't review the books as you read them. Because I'm smart like that.

So, grab a glass of wine (Cabernet is my favorite, what's yours?) have a seat in a comfy spot and make your lists. Then grab your current to-read and get started! Happy reading!

So...who's in???

My lists:

Books Read in 2009 (to the best of my recollection)

1. Twilight by Stephanie Meyer
2. New Moon by Stephanie Meyer
3. Eclipse by Stephanie Meyer
4. Breaking Dawn by Stephanie Meyer
   
5. Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden
   
6. In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan
   
7. Broken For You by Stephanie Kallos
8. The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
   

Challenge List (to be read by December 31, 2009)

1. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer (currently reading)
   
2. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
3. People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks
4. Neverwhere: A Novel by Neil Gaiman
5. The Sugar Queen by Sarah Addison Allen
6. Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen
7. The Ghost Orchid by Carol Goodman
8. The Rose Labyrinth by Tatiana Hardie
9. The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown
10. The Book of Air and Shadows by Michael Gruber
11. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
12. I Know This Much Is True by Wally Lamb
    
    

Book Review: The Time Traveler's Wife

I finished The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger this weekend. When I saw that the movie adaptation of this book was coming out soon I knew I had to hurry up and read this one so the movie didn't ruin it for me like Memoirs of a Geisha. So, I started reading it...and I couldn't put it down.

I really loved this book. It wasn't particularly beautifully written or anything, but the story was just wonderful. It's a love story. One that conquers time and space. And while I did not necessarily enjoy the random let's-list-the-popular-punk-bands-of-the-'90's renditions that the author seemed to think was necessary, such renditions didn't really detract from the story.

At first, the time jumping is a bit confusing but you soon get the rhythm of it. There were a few sex scenes that used crass language that I could have lived without but it didn't bother me enough to detract from the story.

Overall, I thought it was a great book and I'm glad I read it. I am very much looking forward to the movie!

Up next: I think I'm going to re-read a children's classic, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll, and see how the adventure changes when read from an adult perspective.

Bibliophiles Anonymous

Confession: I am a bibliophile.

A big one. Like, I would rather buy books than food.

I know. It's a little sad. I can't help it. I LOVE books!

I love the sight of books. The smell of books. The texture of the pages, the perfect spacing of the words on the page. I love the stories they tell. I love everything about books.

So...


Naturally, I must have a library. Wouldn't it be loverly to live in one of these rooms?









Don't you just love them? Me too. This weekend one of my goals is to assemble the two 6 foot tall bookcases I bought on the cheap at Target. They will go on either side of the Murphy bed in my spare room (go ahead, google "Murphy bed." I had to, too, before I rented my place because whether I liked it or not, it was coming with the house. Ah, the joys of renting...).

Of course, because I am getting more shelf space to store all my beautiful books, what did I do at lunch today? I bought more books, of course! I went to the Salvation Army Family Store and bought five, count them FIVE, books for $5. I could have bought more but I'm trying to show a little restraint. Very little.

I did a little happy dance at the check out counter. Woo!

You know what's even better? Lobster loves books too. When we started getting to know each other and confessing each of our nerdy life dreams we were shocked to discover that each of us has always dreamed of having a home library! I found the perfect nerd soul mate for my nerd self!

Is there anything you love like I love books? Spill it...