Other Books I've Read

Thursday, July 15, 2010 , terribly early in the morning

I love the library

I admit it… I haven’t been blogging, I’ve been reading.  Ever since we got a brand new library branch in our neighbourhood, I’ve turned back into the voracious reader I’ve been most of my life, and I’m back to averaging a book a day.  I don’t really watch TV so that’s where I find my free time.  I’ve had such a fabulous time reading wonderful historical fiction, biographies of Roman emperors, books about gardening and farming, and (new for me), most of the Philip K. Dick science fiction library.  I’ve been meaning to transfer the book reviews I write for Goodreads over to my blog, but until I get around to that, here’s my book list.  If a book has a starred rating it means I’ve read it, and if it’s listed without a rating, it’s still on my “to read” list.  Today I get a dozen new books from the library (I’m working through Steven Saylor’s “Roma Sub Rosa” series), so if you need me, I’ll be immersed in the fictional world of crime in 34 BC, wondering how I’d look in a stola and glad I don’t need to eat garum.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 07/15 at 06:07 AM
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Sunday, November 04, 2007 , early morning

Neil Gaiman

I wouldn’t say that I’m a huge fan of the “fantasy” literary genre, yet I loved the entire Harry Potter series, the “His Dark Materials” trilogy, anything by Christopher Moore, and “Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell”.  Amazon.com offers book recommendations based on the titles you’ve previously purchased, and I must have purchased enough fantasy titles to prompt a recommendation of the book “Good Omens” by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett.  I read it, and I mostly enjoyed it, but it was very light and a bit silly (in a bad way).  It didn’t help that it was the first book I read after finishing “Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell”, so anything would seem simplistic in comparison.  I felt the authors had some potential, however, so I took a chance and purchased two more books by Neil Gaiman, “American Gods” and “Anansi Boys”.

It must have been Terry Pratchett who kept “Good Omens” from being deep and complex, because Neil Gaiman, by himself, writes pretty heavy books.  “American Gods” was an enjoyable story about the old, traditional gods of the world (like Odin, Ganesha, Zeus, Anansi, etc.) having a battle with the “new gods”—media, the Internet, etc.  The main character was a human named Shadow, who was hired to be Odin’s bodyguard.  I don’t think I’d recommend the book to anyone else, as I didn’t love it, but I enjoyed it.  “Anansi Boys” was a sort of sequel to “American Gods”, and I enjoyed it much more.  I could recommend it to someone looking for an unusual read.  The spider god Anansi dies, and leaves two adult sons, one human, and one god.  The twist is that they’d never met prior to their father’s death.  Being a bit of a trickster, the god starts to take over the life of his human brother, and lots of things go awry.  It was amusing and I enjoyed the small number of characters.  “American Gods” had so many characters that few of them were developed.

The one main observation I can make about Neil Gaiman’s writing is that his female characters are poorly developed and rather cliched.  That sort of bugged me, but I was able to overlook it through two novels.  I don’t think I will be reading any more of them, though.

The next book on my nightstand is also of the fantasy genre, and is also an Amazon.com recommendation:  “The Good Fairies of New York” by Martin Millar.  The description of the book sounded fabulous, and I really hope it lives up to my expectations.  If it doesn’t, I’m going to have to start reading a book which arrived today, “All the Math You’ll Ever Need: A Self-Teaching Guide”.  I really hope I don’t have to do that.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 11/04 at 07:49 AM
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Thursday, May 31, 2007 , terribly early in the morning

The Family That Couldn’t Sleep

There’s nothing I love more than sleeping, so I was particularly horrified to recently find out about a rare, genetic disease called Fatal Familial Insomnia.  It’s sufferers will live normal lives until they hit middle-age, and then suddenly, they’ll develop insomnia.  A number of other nasty symptoms manifest themselves, and the infected person will eventually die, their brain filled with holes caused by an invasion of prions.  FFI is just one of many diseases caused by prions, and it’s the basis for a book I just finished, The Family That Couldn’t Sleep.  The book is a history of prions (aka, “misfolded proteins”), and it traces a pretty fascinating path as it meanders through discussions of “scrapie” in sheep, “mad cow” disease, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, a disease called “Kuru” which only occurs on one South Pacific Island, and FFI.  The author ties all the different aspects of the book together by putting a human face on prion disorders with an Italian family who can trace instances of FFI in their family tree back to the 1700s.  The family had always known that there was some sort of medical issue in their family tree, and each generation lived in fear of developing it, yet the disorder was never diagnosed or truly identified until about twenty-five years ago.

I was really glued to the book, and the author did a great job of making it informative yet a bit “gossipy”.  The politics and ego of the scientific research community will horrify you, as will an in-depth look at how the “mad cow” problem has been bungled in both the UK and the US, mainly by greedy bureaucrats.  There’s a fair amount of information about chemistry and genetics included, but it’s all very well-explained and easy to understand.

The book should leave you a little bit scared, and rightly so.  Prions can just spontaneously start reproducing themselves to infect you, as in cases of spontaneous Creutzfeldt-Jakob.  You can be infected by prions by ingesting them, which leads to a great anthropological discussion of how our ancestors were probably all cannibals until a prion disease wiped out entire populations and made cannibalism a taboo.  Prions can jump species, which is how sheep with scrapie led to cows with bovine spongiform encephalopathy, which led to people with infected with “mad cow”.  Sheep with scrapie are also believed to have been the cause of Chronic Wasting Disease, which affects so many elk and deer herds in North America.

I finished the book just as beef producer Creekstone Farms was making the news headlines again.  They’re the fairly small ranch which announced a few years ago that they were going to test every one of their cows for BSE.  The USDA stepped in and put a stop to it, complaining that if Creekstone Farms tested every cow, the USDA would be expected to test every cow, and it would be too expensive (boo hoo!).  The case went to court, Creekstone won the right to test their cows, and they were going to start doing that as of June 1st until the USDA stepped in and got an injunction to stop them.  The arguments the USDA is using are ridiculous, and I can’t imagine any citizen thinking it’s acceptable for a government agency to prevent a private business from ensuring their products are safe.  It’s also ridiculous that YOUR TAX DOLLARS are paying the USDA’s legal bills, to help them do something which isn’t in your best interests!  It’s extremely likely that BSE exists in some cows in the US, and if they aren’t ending up on your plate, they’re ending up in your pet’s food dish, so we all need to speak up and tell the government to put safety before profits.  I’ve been trying to eat less meat lately, yet I’m willing to buy from Creekstone just to make a point. Here’s a little news story about the issue:  Legal fight over BSE testing drags on

Getting back to the whole point of this entry, The Family That Couldn’t Sleep was a great read, and I highly recommend it.  I’m not sure what I’ll tackle next in my book pile… I’ve gotten so far behind in my reading since I started to work for a living.  Working is for suckers, man.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 05/31 at 06:49 AM
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Friday, October 20, 2006 , late at night

No One Cares What You Had for Lunch: 100 Ideas for Your Blog

As mentioned in the NaBloPoMo entry, Flippy and I are going to attempt to write one blog entry each day in November.  I’m considering it an opportunity to catch up on all my uncompleted book reviews, but just in case I run out of things to say, we ordered a copy of, No One Cares What You Had for Lunch: 100 Ideas for Your Blog.  It arrived today and I give it two very amused thumbs up!  It’s a small book and a quick read, but it really does contain good ideas, and great examples to inspire the uninspired blogger.  It kind of reads like a good blog, too—short, snappy, and entertaining— so it’s a fun investment for the NaBloPoMo participant, or just the person who wants to hone their blogging skills.  I hope to write a sequel to the book, and I’ll call it, “No One Cares What Cute Thing Your Cat Did Today” (which I’m sure it what lots of people say about my blog.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 10/20 at 11:09 PM
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Monday, December 05, 2005 , evening

Truth & Beauty

I owe a thank you to Christine of “The Rabbit Lived” blog, for making me aware of the existence of the book, Truth & Beauty, by Ann Patchett.  I’d never read any of Patchett’s fiction, and I’ve actually been feeling quite impatient with fiction lately, but as soon as Christine mentioned that I’d like Truth & Beauty if I liked Autobiography of a Face (by Lucy Grealy), I was sold.

Lucy Grealy and Ann Patchett became best friends during college, eventually becoming roommates, and sharing many years of friendship through letters when Grealy lived in Scotland and New York.  They went through the process of becoming writers together, and I was fascinated by the process of writing professionally.  Patchett talks of a year spent working at Friday’s restaurant, during which she developed characters in her head and fleshed out plot ideas, essentially writing her first novel in her head while waiting tables.  It was very non-glamourous, and I think it’s the first book I’ve read about writing where the author is a real person with a real, regular life.  Granted, both Patchett and Grealy participate in some great writing workshops, teach writing at university, go on writing retreats, etc., but for the most part, Patchett lives a very normal existence.  It’s Grealy who lives life on the edge, wanting to experience everything to the fullest as she deals with years of facial recontruction surgery (and surgery failures), after a childhood bout with cancer leaves her with only a partial lower jaw.  I was afraid I wouldn’t like Lucy Grealy, would find her too demanding and narcissistic, but she comes across as very “normal” in her wants and desires, if a bit more extroverted than the average person.  Grealy eventually dies, perhaps due to some excesses of living, or perhaps because her body just gives out after repeated surgeries, and I was certainly left with a sense of loss.  Patchett did a wonderful job of capturing a very normal friendship with a rather extraordinary person, and I think Lucy Grealy would have been proud to read about herself through Ann Patchett’s eyes.  I subsequently picked up Lucy Grealy’s only other book, a collection of essays called, As Seen on TV: Provocations, and it just served to reinforce what a wonderful and adventurous thinker Grealy was.  I really am sorry she won’t be writing any more books.  As for Ann Patchett, I think I’ll say away from her fiction just because of my anti-fiction mood, but if she wants to write more non-fiction, I’m there.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 12/05 at 09:47 PM
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The Spam Letters

When you get a particularly annoying piece of spam, do you wish you could give the sender a piece of your mind?  Jonathan Land did just that, and the result is, The Spam Letters.  The book is based on Land’s website, TheSpamLetters.com, so I think the material was “previously published” on his site.  I’m not the type to sit and read long passages on my monitor, though, so having the letters in book form was exactly what I needed.  Land is a very good writer, and a very creative thinker, and he has some fabulous retorts to spam pitches.  Unfortunately, 99% of Land’s replies are never seen by a real person (as almost all spam comes from fake email addresses), and it’s a shame that his long letters usually are just being sent into a blackhole.  The letters which do elicit replies (the Nigerian banking scam emails) aren’t all that interesting, and after you’ve read one, the rest are pretty much the same.  So, if you’ve wanted to reply to your spam mail, you might find this book cathartic.  If you’re just intrigued by the idea, check out Land’s website, where you can download some sample chapters so you’ll know what you’re getting.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 12/05 at 09:39 PM
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An Idiot Girl’s Christmas

From the title, you’d think this was a book about me.  Instead, An Idiot Girl’s Christmas is a book about Laurie Notaro, and her “misadventures”.  It’s classic Notaro, i.e., it’s really funny, and all the (true) stories have a holiday theme.  Each of the 13 chapters is a stand-alone essay, although 4 of the chapters were featured in Notaro’s earlier books.  They’re worth reading again, though… Laurie Notaro’s story of her relationship with the two little girls who live down the street (in the house with the old sofa and washing machine on the lawn), is one of the funniest things I’ve read in years, and I was happy to have the chance to read it again.  It’s not a long or overly complicated book, but would be a great gift for the busy person who needs a good chuckle.  Buy a copy today and ensure that both you and Laurie Notaro have a merry Christmas!

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 12/05 at 09:31 PM
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Friday, November 18, 2005 , early evening

Book meme from Vet Mommy Jen

This meme comes courtesy of VetMommy.  As I’ve always got a book nearby, I couldn’t resist.

1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the sentence in your blog with these instructions.
5. Don’t search around for the “coolest” book you can find. Do what’s actually closest.

My nearest book is Secrets of the Widow’s Son by David Shugarts.  It’s on my desk because I’m supposed to be writing a review of it for our Cult of Dan Brown message board, but I haven’t done it yet (because I’m horrible).  The fifth complete sentence on the page reads thusly:

Pike is the only Confederate general to get a full outdoor statue in the nation’s capital, but it was his prominence as a scholar and leader of the Freemasons that earned him a spot for his statue.

It’s a good book, seriously.  Lots of great trivia and historical intrigue!

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 11/18 at 06:42 PM
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Thursday, November 17, 2005 , the wee hours

Hyperventilation Syndrome

This is going to be one of my “public service” entries—those things I write with the hopes that they’ll be scooped up by a search engine and will be of help to others down the road.  My entire life, I’ve suffered from periodic “shortness of breath”.  It’s hard to describe except to say that I feel the constant need to yawn, and that I can’t take a really deep breath.  It’s been intermittent since I was a teenager, and I’ve never been able to put my finger on what causes it (except that it often seems to happen when I haven’t had enough sleep).  I also suffer from occasional bouts of tachycardia, where my heart starts to beat so strongly that you can literally see my chest pounding.  Now, probably 25 years since I first started to be bothered by these things, I have a name for what my problem is, “Hyperventilation Syndrome”.  It’s so simple, really—I’m a mouth-breather.  I don’t know how I started out that way, but I know I do it now out of habit because I breathe through my mouth when I’m cleaning the litterboxes (no smell), breathe through my mouth when I’m cleaning bird cages (no dust to set off my allergies), breathe through my mouth when I’m picking up dog poop (again, I want to avoid the smell), etc.  I guess it’s something I’ve done off and on my entire life, but having so many pets to clean up after, combined with the stress of being self-employed and Flippy’s recent health problems have REALLY turned me into a mouth-breather.  My poor breathing technique causes me to over-breathe, and that results in a number of symptoms which are self-perpetuating.  It predominantly causes a sensation of not having enough air, and of needing more oxygen, so you can imagine how that can cause anxiety and make the symptoms worse.  I’m lucky in that I’ve had a second-sense about the anxiety part all along, and always try to relax and take slow breaths so I never end up with a full-fledged panic attacks.  Other people with the problem aren’t as lucky, because the endless sensation of not being able to breathe, combined with anxiety, can make some people feel like they’re headed for certain death.  Many over-breathers end up in the emergency room, and many have to take anti-anxiety medication as part of treatment for their problem.

The good news is that the problem has an easy fix—I just need to train myself to breathe properly.  It involves some conscious-thinking, some posture correction, etc., and it also means I need to cut down on things like caffeine, as I notice it makes the problem worse.  I’m sure I have a mild case, so don’t hesitate to see a doctor if you think you might have this problem and that it might be “bigger than you”.  In the interim, I’ve read a great book on the subject:  Self-Help for Hyperventilation Syndrome by Dinah Bradley.  I’m even going to send a copy to my mother, as I know she’s got the same problem.  There are a lot of medical issues which can involve shortness of breath, so of course, see a doctor before you self-diagnose.  But if you’ve had tests and examinations and no one can figure out why you have panic attacks and have trouble breathing, you might want to check out this book.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 11/17 at 12:10 AM
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Monday, October 03, 2005 , evening

The Secret Life of Dust

I’ve had the book, The Secret Life of Dust, listed in my “Now Reading” section for the past six months or more.  I don’t know if anyone noticed it there, but if you did, you probably figured I hadn’t started it yet, or had forgotten about it.  The truth is, I have been reading it, and it’s just taken me six months to finish it.  Don’t take this as a slam against the book, because the book is incredible.  Instead, consider it a slam against my brain, which just could not digest all the information in the book in large doses.

The Secret Life of Dust will tell you everything you ever wanted to know about every kind of dust.  The dust on your window sills, the dust in raindrops, the dust which makes smog, the dust which kills coal miners, the dust in the solar system, etc.  All the teeny-tiny specks of matter, some practically invisible, which float around in the atmosphere are considered “dust”, and the stuff they do is pretty incredible.  For example, I didn’t know you needed dust to make rain—the water vapor in the sky needs a solid to cling to, and as more droplets cling to a dust speck, it finally becomes heavy enough to rain down.  No dust means no rain.  Did you know that the dust on your bookshelf may contain particles of dinosaurs, blown up from huge sandstorms in central Asia?  Did you know that you should be worried about smog from Beijing, because you could be breathing it in when you’re outside working in your yard?  Did you know there are people in Turkey who still live in caves, and that most of them die of lung cancer because of naturally-occuring silica?  There’s just so much information in this book, I think the best thing I could do was to read it slowly and carefully and really take it all in.  Not that I’m smart enough to understand most of it, but hey, I’ve got a new appreciation for rain.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 10/03 at 09:52 PM
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