New Year Haiku

Five, seven and five
Is the meter of haiku.
Shouldn’t be so hard.

Of course, haiku is not so strict.
Point is, first and third get the same count, yes?
and then the middle row has more.

Happiness Project,
The. By a Gretchen Rubin.
Start now or wait til _____?

She has done research
on just what is this ‘Happy?’
Many quotes to share.

Court Justice Stewart
said, “I know it when I see it.”
(on what is obscene?*)
* He meant to define obscenity, but Rubin applies to happiness.

Am not really read-
ing this book. Yet. Cuz want to
start Miss Pettigrew first!
(in trend to start new year fresh with a new book…)

Happiness and feeling good;
Just what is a very cool life?
I aim to discover.

Goal is 50 books
(with a secret conniving:
will read many more.)

One goal is to move.
Move often and stretch first.
Drink lots of water.

I want to crave poetry.
I do not yet but want to.
Neon Vernac’lar.

New authors to try:
Krakauer and Mary Roach,
Perotta, O’Nan.

Susan Jane Gilman
Elliot, Miéville, Rowling,
and Mitchell and Yates.

Authors to repeat:
Atwood, Kidder, McEwan,
and DuMaurier.

1Q84
Maree and I and maybe
Vasilly; Will tweet!

Haiku is not so
Difficult once you start it.
Happy, happy, joy.

Wishing my readers
a healthy happy Twenty
Twelve.  Joyful, book-filled
FUN!

Thanks for helping me to make 2011 another wonderful book-blogging adventure. Looking forward to more in 2012.

HIdeinWhitetoSkipLine

Copyright © 2007-2011. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

The Screwtape Letters

Thoughts    The Screwtape Letters by C.S.Lewis, New York THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 1944, 160 pages

Wow. INTERESTING book.

A series of letters from Screwtape, perhaps he is an executive of Hell, to his nephew Wormwood who has been assigned with preventing a British gentleman from converting to Christianity.

We do not get to read Wormwood’s side of the story but I’ll go ahead and spoil it for you by saying he fails. Each piece of correspondence brings up a philosophical idea rather than a religious one. Truly a wonderful thought-provoking look at spirituality and good versus evil.  Ageless in message. The humor is my favorite kind:  sly, intelligent and clever.

“Your man may be untroubled about the Future, not because he is concerned with the Present, but because he has persuaded himself that the Future is going to be agreeable. As long as that is the real course of his tranquillity, his tranquillity will do us good, because it is only piling up more disappointment, and therefore more impatience, for him when his false hopes are dashed.”  p.79

The sections that really captured my attention were the ones the attempt to ‘explain’ the human concept of TIME, CHANGE versus the Same Old Thing, and sense of ownership. I also enjoyed the confusion and frustration on what possibly this LOVE thing really is all about.

“All His talk about Love must be a disguise for something else – He must have some real motive for creating them and taking so much trouble about them. The reason one comes to talk as if He really had this impossible Love is our utter failure to find out that real motive.”  p.97

“The use of Fashions in thought is to distract the attention of men from their real dangers. We direct the fashionable outcry of each generation against those vices of which it is least in danger and fix its approval on the virtue nearest to that vice which we are trying to make endemic. The game is to have them all running about with fire extinguishers whenever there is a flood, and all crowding to that side of the boat which is already nearly gunwale under.”   p.128

I really wish I had read this as a teenager.  Well done.

“The creatures are always accusing one another of wanting ‘to eat the cake and have it’; but thanks to our labours they are more often in the predicament of paying for the cake and not eating it.”  p.155
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RATING:  Four slices of pie. 

Copyright © 2007-2011. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Last Wordless Wednesday of 2011

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Copyright © 2007-2011. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Before Ever After

Thoughts   Before Ever After by Samantha Sotto, Crown Publisher New York 2011, an eBook so… not sure how many pages – goodreads says 260 which means I had the font a bit bigger because mine shows 312.

Book Club “The Bookies” Choice for December 29 Meeting

FIRST SENTENCE:  ”Jasmine. It was not Max Gallus’s top choice for his last thought, but it would have to do.”

 

WHAT’s it ABOUT:  In this chicklit romance story about immortality but NOT vampires, Shelley is our hapless-but-adorable heroine who runs away from her life to take an offbeat tour of Europe, ultimately falling in love with Max, the tour guide. But that doesn’t necessarily mean they figure it out easy-peasy.

WHAT’s GOOD:  The travel pieces from the non-typical spots of Europe entwined with story bits of ancestors who lived through little-known historical events were entertaining, descriptive and informative.   Seeing how well this book is being received, I bet Sotto has a promising career ahead.  I hope her writing gets tighter and less embellished.  Pacing was good; I can say that.  The book does a lot of back and forth between NOW and THEN and it works well.

And since I have an interest in mosaics, I was pleased to see this mentioned in the story.

(from mosaicartnow.blogspot.com)

WHAT’s NOT so good:  OOoo boy. I didn’t fall into this like I hoped. I wanted to, but truthfully found it difficult to root for our poor Shelley and sympathize with her apprehensions about love. I never did get much sense of Max. Or his chickens. HOWEVER, if you want a light and sappy tale of resisting love and then saying ‘what the heck – go for it’, you might enjoy the humor and the silliness and get your heartstrings tugged despite the over-abundance of amber-colored eyes. And chickens.

FINAL THOUGHTS:  Overall, I enjoyed it but at times I had to squash my picky inner booksnob critic.  The author has charmed me –  she likely has a fun sense of humor.  Three slices of pie: QUICHE, of course!

“Yes. The good news is that we woke up,” Max said. “Today is a new day, and I, for one, have decided to live it. I strongly urge you to do the same.”

other REVIEWS:  S.Krishna, Amused, Fyrefly, and the entire list of results of Fyrefly’s Book Blog Search

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Copyright © 2007-2011. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Merry Everything 2011

Grand Finale

Happy Shortest Day of the Year / Winter Solstice!!

                      

Merry Christmas! Have a Holly Jolly Rockin’ Lobster Holiday!!  Which ornament is YOUR favorite?

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Copyright © 2007-2011. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Christmas Lobster #14

Christmas Lobster #14

Oh no, dear readers, I’m out of order. and I think I missed sharing a Lobster #4. Let’s all laugh anyway and be very merry…

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Copyright © 2007-2011. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Cat in a Diamond Dazzle

Thoughts  Cat in a Diamond Dazzle by Carole Nelson Douglas, Forge: A Tom Doherty Associates Book 1996, 414 pages, GENRE: Chicklit Mystery?

Christmas Lobster #13

Yep, it’s a bottle opener.

This book was not my kind of book.  I only read it because it had DIAMOND in the title and I wanted to fulfill the JEWEL category of What’s in a Name 4 Challenge.

As far as I can tell, there is nothing WRONG with this book – just aint for me.  I never had to roll my eyes or question any facts or critique any sentence structure or wonder where it was going.

If you are already a fan of Carole Nelson Douglas, I’m sure this is fine. If you like cats that solve mysteries, you might like this. The premise was fun, I actually liked the cat but this book – for me – was TOOOOOO LOOOOOOONNNNG. I was bored; wanted much more action, less dialogue.  Dialogue propels this entire narrative, it seemed. I liked the cat’s part but that was a tiny portion. I’m not even a cat person! I’m sadly allergic. I do respect cats, however.

Apparently, CND has written quite a few of these Midnight Louie Mysteries and you all know I’m not a series-reader. I am discovering that I’m not much of a mystery reader anymore either. I also thought this book’s cultural references made it seem dated.

It’s about a girl who seems to get herself into situations involving murder and always ends up as a suspect. This time, a male model for a romance writer convention is killed and sure enough, our girl is involved.  Her cat (Midnight Louie) ends up figuring out the whodunnit and has to place the clues just so in order for the humans to have the AHA! moment.  There are other storylines and characters and drama, of course, but.   Sort of reminds me of the Stephanie Plum books by Janet Evanovich.

I started this in January.  Read a bit here and there (back and forth from Ulysess) and then misplaced the book for most of the year.  I recently dug it out of stacks of crap on the floor of my miscellaneous room and thought I better have a go at finishing.  I skimmed to the last quarter and didn’t feel like I missed anything. Then I read the cat’s overview of the the wrapup on the crime and now I feel very satisfied to check this as a DONE-READ and no longer a DNF.

I finished the What’s in a Name 4!  YIPPEE!!    CHECK.

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Segunda-feira é um dia da semana

Translation from Portuguese:   Monday is a day of the week.   Just trying to get a friend’s attention…

Christmas Lobster #11

BOOKS in the HOUSE since last Monday:   Mrs. MISS! Pettigrew Lives for a Day by Winifred Watson, a Persephone Classics I received in the Holiday Exchange from my friend Karen.  I’m saving this for 2012 and the What’s in a Name 5 Challenge in the CALENDAR category.

1Q84 by Haruki Murakami.  For my read-along with Maree. I just told my friend Holly that we were buying this book for each other for Christmas and I was to have it first.  She owes me $15.

Maman’s Homesick Pie by Donia Bijan, thanks for a giveaway over at Love Laughter and Insanity. Thanks Trish!

The Secret Life of Lobsters    by Trevor Corson, thanks to a very dear blogger bud who amazes me with her total enthusiasm for throwing herself into the goodness that is life and being so generous to share and think of others she’s never even met who value her place here in the interwebs for always warming hearts with simple cherished acts of giving, Debi.  She is still very much important.  Thank you.

NOW – those of you who are signed up or are thinking about the What’s in a Name Challenge 5 (I have somehow become obsessed with everyone signing up for this one…), I here by tell you if you have NOT read The Secret Life of Lobsters, you should and it will totally count for the CREEPY-CRAWLY category since they often call lobsters ‘bugs’. So there. And the fact that it is utterly fascinating is a plus, too, yes?  I just might have to write a review of this since I read it pre-blog and then I can count it for Trisha’s meme for highlighting An Old Favorite.

I also bought the Artisan Bread cookbook for my hub the chef and I look forward to baking some yummy goodness.

Finally, I got the coolest email from my friend Ana who you may have instantly thought of yourself when you saw the title to this post.  Here’s what she sent me:  Thanks Nymeth!  #luvana

Christmas Lobster #12

Thanks for thinking of me!  Obrigado!

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Copyright © 2007-2011. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Love Actually

Did you know that lobsters are featured in what has become one of my favorite Holiday movies?   And on that note, let me share another of my lobster Christmas Tree ornaments…

Christmas Lobster #10

Have a Very Merry Lobster Christmas!

(thank you to http://classycat.tumblr.com/post/1498424024/best-line-ever)

Apparently, there were THREE lobsters present, according to the movie…

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Copyright © 2007-2011. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.