Simona's 50-Book Challenge
Yeah, you heard right: one year, 50 books
N.B. clicking on the name lets you buy the book on Amazon
May 10
Book #18 is Don't Make a Black Woman Take Off Her Earrings: Madea's Uninhibited Commentaries on Love and Life
by Tyler Perry.
Now, you know how much I love Tyler Perry! Apart from the fact that I think he's warm and refreshing and funny and sincere and genuinely cares about making people's lives better, he's got the hottest pair of lips I've ever seen on a black man.
This book made me laugh out loud from time to time, and considering the depression I've been in these past few weeks, that's saying something. Occasionally he slipped from the voice of Madea to the voice of Tyler, and wasn't always consistent with Madea's misspellings and levels of technical knowledge, etc., (one chapter she's spelling a word hilariously wrong and the other she's got it right), I forgive that. It was natural and relaxed and a great read. Go Tyler!
Book #17 is Les Gosses volumes 1 and 3 by Cabaral
Well, technically, this is cheating. I sorta said I wouldn't include anything I'd read before, but I read these so long ago that I can't remember a single strip. It's a collection of comics in French that I bought before I had kids, i.e. when the shenanigans of these little bastids was actually funny.
But it's a delightful book, and it was good to catch up on my French. Nice to take a break from the serious stuff for a change!
April 26
Book #16 is
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
Ah, if only I could describe to you how much I loved this book! It's very rare that a book brings tears to my eyes, but this one did. It's about a young girl who accidentally killed her mother as a toddler, and who spent the next 10 years of her life yearning for a sign of love from her, and for forgiveness, proof that she's worthy. It's also set against the backdrop of the Civil Rights chaos of the 1960's.
Oddly, ironically, coincidentally, it's the book I was reading at the time my father was killed, and I remember lying in bed a day or two after, worn out from the emotional turmoil and the chaos of the wake, and finishing it off...just around the part where a main character dies and the family was thrown into the same turmoil. It brought me solace.
I loved this beautiful, poetic book. I'll read just about anything Ms. Kidd writes!
April 18
Book #15 (and I'm really falling behind here) is
Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott
I'm not too sure how to react to this book. I bought it about 9 years ago, began reading it, and threw it down in despair when I got to the bit about "You have the right to write a shitty first draft".
I was quite the newbie then, and certainly had NO INTENTION WHATSOEVER of writing a shitty first draft, or a shitty ANYTHING. Now of course, with more experience and perhaps longer teeth, I understand what she was trying to say; write, then edit. And I'm cool with my shitty first drafts.
So I got into the book again, cautiously. Somewhere in the middle I became really engrossed in it, highlighting Anne's words of wisdom and all that. Near the last quarter, though, she started waxing philosophical, and maybe a little loopy, and my eyes glazed over. I guess we all have out philosophies about writing, it's just that mine don't sound as drug-induced.
Glad I read it, though.
Book #14 is Tales from Toddler Hell: My life as a mom
Occasionally funny enough to make me laugh out loud, and a slim, quick read, but I guess my timing was off on this one. I read this over a 4-day weekend stuck at home with two sick kids who were alternately whiny, limp, and manic, depending on how much kiddie drugs they had in their system.
Suffice it to say that this book was a little too close to home.
And guess what; I'm feeling too damn lazy this morning to find a cover photo. Yawn. Maybe I'll do it tomorrow.
Book #13 is Do Ants Have Arseholes? by Jon Butler and Bruno Vincent
I know I promised to read the silliest thing I could get my hands on after that last round of heavy-duty reading, but this is ridiculous. This book is a scream.
It's a collection of faux letters to the editor of Old Git magazine, written by a bunch of lunatics who have nothing else to do with all the time on their hands. Beautiful. I notice it isn't available on the US version of Amazon. Wonder why.
Book #12 is
Copyediting and Proofreading for Dummies
by Suzanne Gilad
Wow. Carefully explained, concise, and knowledgable. A good book for seeing in print stuff I do all the time, and for learning something new. Well worth the MONTH I spent reading it.
After such an intense cerebral workout, I need to read the silliest book I can get my hands on.
March 12
Book #11 is
Writing Dialogue by Tom Chiarella
Oh, man, was this book helpful. I pretty much read it through, albeit slowly, without having much truck with the exercises, but I am definitely going to re-read it with the intensity of a student preparing for a term paper.
It's well-written, funny, and dead on. And his description of stilted, unreal dialogue as "Bradyised Dialogue" just cracked me up.
If you're a novelist and you know your dialogue is wooden enough to be used for kindling, get it!
