[femmecreole]

Originally Posted by beachgal

I'm so intrigued by what you're reading! I absolutely love the song, Marie Laveau, but I never thought she really existed! Wow! What years did her life span?

Oh, yeah, she really existed! She lived across the street from my GGGgrandmother. She was born in 1794 and died when she was about 79.
There has been much garbage written about her...made up hollywood, biting the heads off of chickens stuff..all a bunch of hooey. The book I'm reading (written by a friend of mine) uses actually documentation to tell the story of her life. Very interesting reading backed up by wonderful extensive research.

[browneyedgirl77]

Cat- That book sounds pretty interesting is it a limited release or is the book widely available?

My DH is away at school all the way until Feb., so, I began reading again. It makes the nights shorter. I just finished the Dark Elf trilogy (big fantasy fan) and Milton's Paradise Lost.

[femmecreole]

Originally Posted by browneyedgirl77

Cat- That book sounds pretty interesting is it a limited release or is the book widely available?

My DH is away at school all the way until Feb., so, I began reading again. It makes the nights shorter. I just finished the Dark Elf trilogy (big fantasy fan) and Milton's Paradise Lost.

Widely available. I think I got mine from Amazon.
Just do a search at google with the title and tons of links should pop up for ordering if you can't get it locally. I really enjoyed it. My favorite books are history books about New Orleans, so it really fit the bill for me.

[browneyedgirl77]

Thanks Cat, I found it at buy.com for a fairly reasonable price.

[RocknRoll]

I am going to the library today to get a copy of Lance Armstrong's book. He has been a big motivation in my life and I wear my LIVESTRONG bracelet every single day. I am surprised I have not read the book by now!

[beachgal]

Originally Posted by JessieW

Laurie, girl, you told me you loved Birth of Venus! It was 1/2 the reason I read it! LOL. ...Books fade fast when I keep trying to cram them into my head.

Yeah...me too! (obviously ) Oy!

Good to hear I liked it...I definitely need to start keeping a book journal. I haven't done it before because it seems like one more thing to do...but it would sure help my poor brain to remember.

Cat, that book looks terrific! She sounds like one heck of an amazing lady. So your family has been in New Orleans (or the environ) for generations, eh? That's so cool!

kmac and RocknRoll!

kmac, of course you can join in! Sounds like you're reading all the books that are really popular of late. What's Keeper of the Light about?

RocknRoll, Lance is truly an inspiration, isn't he? Hope the book is great!

[beachgal]

Whew! I finally finished Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. It really was a good read, but it took a long flight to get me going on it again--I think I just am not as motivated by non fiction sometimes...

I'm now reading a fast little suspense/mystery/romance called Sleight of Hand. I like the writing but am having a bit of trouble keeping sight of what era we're in and I wasn't a fan of a somewhat violent scene in the first chapter. I'm such a wuss when it comes to grusome deaths.

What's everyone else reading?

[JessieW]

Sorry I have been MIA! I had a bad car wreck on Tuesday night and have pretty much been attached to the couch since then. Didn't read too much, though, as my mom came to take care of me and mostly I talked to her and watched TV. I did finish Girl Meets God, which is a great memoir about an Orthodox Jew who becomes a Christian. She's a doctoral student, or was when she wrote the book, and it's very high-brow intellectual, so it took me a while to finish!

[beachgal]

Jessie, I'm so sorry about the car wreck!!! Are you feeling better now? Was anyone else involved? How's the car? So glad your mom was there to help! The book sounds really intriguing, though my recent procrastination with nonfiction might mean I should save it for later!

Take care of yourself, hon!

[CyndiM]

Originally Posted by beachgal

Whew! I finally finished Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. It really was a good read,

I loved that book! I bought 4 copies for friends while reading it myself.

I seem to split my reading between birding/nature books, fantasy novels when I need variety, and birding magazines. Can you tell I'm a bit obsessed

[Ruthxxx]

Just finished Our Lady of the Lost and Found my book club selection. It was amusing in some parts but read like three different books - the week's events, the history and the narrator's internal thoughts. Strange but I will read some of the authors other books.

The next books are The Kite Runner(Afghanistan) and sweetness in the belly (Ethiopia) which should be interesting. We'll be discussing and comparing these at the January meeting.

Of course, I'm also doing fun reading - mainly quilting and painting books at the moment plus New Yorker, Macleans and Canadian Living!

[missingmyerica]

I'm working my way through the classics. I just finished Rebecca and now I'm reading Charles Dicken's Bleak house. It's a little hard to get into but I'm determined to finish.

Does anyone else love Jane Austen? I can read her books over and over.

[favepairobluejeans]

I recently finished the Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns..both by Kahlid Hosseini and both AMAZING books. They are fiction, but I suppose they could be considered historical fiction ( even though the settings are quite modern) since the characters are deeply effected by true events.
You have to be prepared to read some pretty graphic depictions of violent acts ( some against children) but if you can read them with appreciation for what the Afghani people have gone through, you will really learn something from these books.

[beachgal]

Wow, lots of amazing reading going on in here! I love that!

Cyndi, I'm so glad you liked A, V, M as much as I did! Have you read any of her other books? They're not Fantasy, but I have a feeling, if you like nature, that you'll really enjoy her book Prodigal Summer. It's one of my favorites! Interestingly, even though it was written quite a while ago, it's very akin to A, V, M! There are several characters in the book and two are neighboring farmers, one of whom uses all the newfangled chemicals and pesticides and one who is trying to run an organic farm. The older farmer, who's using all the chemicals, is irritated at his neighbor for her weeds and all the pests that float over to his farm while his neighbor is irritated at all of his chemicals coming over to her farm and possibly endangering her organic license or killing the beneficial pests who help her farm run. It sounds very serious, but she actually writes it in an extremely humorous way that has you laughing out loud! Anyways, you might enjoy it if you are looking for a fiction read. It's cool that you're so into birding! Do you participate in the big yearly backyard count?

Ruth, you are always reading neat things! Let me know what you think of Kite Runner. I really don't like reading about that part of the world...all the talk of violence and war just hurts my heart. But everyone keeps saying it's a great read. *sigh* I'm starting to think (have I said this before?) that the current trend is incredibly well written books about intolerable subjects.

Wow, MissingMyErica, you have a fantastic avatar, and great taste in books! I adore Jane!!! When we went to England for 3 days, I made sure one of them was spent in Bath, partly for the history and partly for Jane! I even dragged DH on a Jane-oriented tour of Bath! He then went to a pub while I did a tour of the Jane Austin Centre, but he joined me at the end for a description of Christmas celebrations during Jane's time which included a glass of mulled wine that was so tasty! Can you tell that I just loooooove Jane? Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility are my two favorites...I could read them or watch movie versions of them over and over. I also adore the Jane Austen mystery series...it's a lot of fun! Have you read The Jane Austen Book Club? If you're an Austin fan, you'll just love it...and now there's a movie version of the book, too! I love Dickens but there are several of his books that I haven't read...Bleak House is one of them. Let us know what you think! Did you ever read the "sequel" to Rebecca? I think I did...now I can't remember!

Fave, thanks for letting us know about the two books. The violence is just extremely hard for me to handle. I get so upset, but there is literally nothing I can do on my own to fix the problems or heal them. We're reading Water for Elephants for our next book club, but the one after is 1,000 Splendid Suns. I appreciate the warning about the violence--hopefully I can figure out when it's about to happen and skip ahead or something. Oddly enough, the only book I've been able to read that had that kind of violence in it was Persepolis I & II, which was written in a graphic novel format. For some reason, that format made it palatable for me. It's become a movie, which intrigues me, because it looks like it might have been done as a cartoon. Has anyone read it? It's a lot like Maus I & II in the sense that it's about a terrible period of history but told in a graphic novel format.

I'm still working on Sleight of Hand, but it's SO good that I'm excited to know it's the beginning of a series! I have to make myself go to bed instead of reading all night!

Happy reading everyone...I look forward to hearing about your next adventures! :

[beachgal]

Well, finished Sleight of Hand but am reading a magazine until I get a copy of the next book club book, Water for Elephants. I may have to take my friend up on her offer of borrowing her book since it's taking forever for the library to get my copy in. I really don't want to buy it...I'm not excited about reading it in the first place!

What are you up to?