Wednesday, May 16, 2007

Wars and elections are both too big and too small to matter in the long run. The daily work - that goes on, it adds up. - Barbara Kingsolver

I swiped this from Naked without Books, who swiped it from Bookfool, and she told two friends, and so on,and so on...

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A book that made you cry: Bridge to Terabithia – Katherine Paterson; The Book Thief – Markus Zuzak; A Thread of Grace - Mary Doria Russell

A book that scared you: Salem’s Lot - Stephen King. I slept with a crucifix next to my bed for months, and to this day I hate to look out the bathroom window at night.

A book that made you laugh: Virgins – Caryl Rivers (possibly the funniest book I have ever read); The Egg and I – Betty MacDonald; Bright Lights, Big Ass – Jen Lancaster; The Gashlycrumb Tinies - Edward Gorey

A book that disgusted you: Chuck Palahniuk’s Haunted; I can deal with violence if it’s well-written and relevant, but I was NOT impressed by this book or its gratuitous yet lovingly detailed violence.

A book you loved in elementary school: Understood Betsy; Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm; Trumpet of the Swan; The Little Princess; the list could go on and on.

A book you loved in junior high: The Cat Ate My Gymsuit by Paula Danziger. Very funny, painfully honest, what a terrific book for a shy, awkward teenager to find, read, and empathize with. I can’t remember who gave it to me, but God bless ‘em.
I also read every Trixie Belden - stil have 'em, too.

A book you loved in high school: I don’t really remember anything I read in high school; I spent a lot of time plowing through my mom’s random mysteries. That’s when I read all the Brother Cadfael books, so I would have to pick those. Although I remember reading Thomas Costain’s Silver Chalice, and Frances Parkinson Keyes’ Came a Cavalier, and liking both very much (and not that I can remember a damn thing about either, now).

A book you hated in high school: The House of Seven Fucking Gables. Which I read again, later, in college, and thought was just fine. I resented that we were not permitted to read Scarlet Letter, I think.

A book you loved in college: Pride and Prejudice, which I read for the first time when I was sick with the flu in my junior year, on the night of one of the biggest parties of the year, and my boyfriend, instead of coming to spend a very little bit of time with me, stayed at the fraternity house and partied, hanging out with several women by whom I felt very threatened.

A book that challenged your identity: Book of Common Prayer (Anglican Church)

A series that you love: Laurie R King’s Mary Russell series

Comfort books: Hens Dancing; any of Laurie Colwin’s novels; Shell Seekers.

Your favorite horror book: I don’t read horror; my sole attempt (successful) was HP Lovecraft’s In the Mountains of Madness.

Your favorite science fiction book: The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell

Your favorite fantasy book: Madeleine L’Engle’s books for teenagers – An Acceptable Time, Young Unicorns, Arm of the Starfish. Or apparently, Time Traveler’s Wife counts...

Your favorite mystery book: Brat Farrar, but honestly, anything by Josephine Tey

Your favorite graphic novel: Easy! The Sandman series, probably Brief Lives if I had to pick, but otherwise, the whole kit and caboodle.

Your favorite biography: Laurie Colwin’s food books, Ruth Reichl, MFK Fisher. Hmmm, another theme...I did enjoy very much Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat Love Pray.

Your favorite “coming-of-age” book: Roller Skates – Ruth Sawyer

Your favorite classic: Gone with the Wind, which is totally a soap opera and I find it hilarious that it’s considered this big, intimidating classic.

Your favorite romance book: Jane Eyre, although I admit to a weird fondness for this fluffy little novel called Just Desserts, by Patti Massman ; or Judith Krantz’s Mistral’s Daughter.

Favorite kids’ book: I am partial to The Big Orange Splot; but I also like I Love You, Stinky Face and Yellow Submarine, which is just FUN to read out loud. “I’m a born lever-puller, me.”

Favorite cookbook: To use – Real Simple Real Food; How to Be a Domestic Goddess – Nigella Lawson (these can change depending on mood, what’s in season, what’s new, etc.); for reading: John Thorne or Laurie Colwin. For both: Consuming Passions - Michael Lee West

Your favorite book not on this list: Satanic Verses – Salman Rushdie; Possession – AS Byatt; Stones from the River – Ursula Hegi.

5 comments:

Stomper Girl said...

Ditto Brat Farrar and Josephine Tey

jenny said...

I think I made it through the first gross story in Haunted and thought...why, again, am I bothering??

Velma said...

Ditto Laurie R King and I Love You, Stinky Face!. Mo Willem's "Don't Let the Pigeon..." books also never get old around here.

Jess said...

I should not have read your list before attempting my own - you've put all sorts of ideas into my head.

Major Bedhead said...

Whoa, Thomas Chastain's Silver Chalice. That's one of those books, like Laura, by Vera Caspery, as books I never expect anyone else to have heard of, let alone read.

The Shell Seekers is one of my go-to selections when I'm needing to fall into a featherbed of a book. Anything by Pilcher, really, or Maeve Binchy.