Thursday, July 1, 2010

is it weird that i love the smell of books?

so if you know me then chances are you know i love to read. i always have. in first grade i was reading at a third grade level. so it makes me very sad that i havent had much time to read lately. ive been working so much, and im also ashamed to say that i have an internet addiction. between facebook, MIL, and StumbleUpon, i stay on my laptop for hours, usually doing nothing very important. its gotten to the point where ill refresh facebook and MIL obsessively, waiting for someone to say something interesting. and the whole time im thinking of all the books i could be reading, but i just cant tear myself away from the damn interwebz. i have a problem, and i must work to overcome it. especially since its just getting too nice outside for me to justify being "plugged in" for so long. i love to just sit outside and read. im becoming lazy and sedentary and it must change.

aaaaaaaaanyway, back to topic...

i have gotten a little more reading done lately, and i thought id pass along a few of my recommendations :)

the red tent by anita diamant
if you havent read this yet, you absolutely must. it is an absolutely amazing work of historical/biblical fiction. it brings to life the story of dinah, whose life was barely hinted at in the bible. it is a beautiful story of coming of age and the struggles of womanhood. i highly highly recommend this book.

the lace reader by brunonia barry

all the women in the whitney family have the ability to read a persons future in a piece of lace. when towner whitney is nearly driven to insanity from reading the lace, she leaves her hometown of salem MA and doesnt come back until many years later, after receiving news of her great aunts suspicious death. this is barrys debut novel, and i am excited to see what else she will come up with. from page one, the characters just drew me in. i lost myself so completely int his book; the characters were complex and intriguing, the storytelling was beautiful, this was just an all-around good book. not to mention it actually made me feel as if i were back in new england (a place i miss dearly and cannot wait to visit again), the detail and the skill of barrys storytelling were so great.

the time travelers wife by audrey niffenegger
if you liked the movie, you will LOVE the book. if you havent seen the movie yet, watch it before you read the book. while i appreciate the movie for what it was, it doesnt even approach the level of amazingness that is this book. if you read the book before seeing the movie, youll just be disappointed by all the things they left out.
this book is about a girl named clare, who meets her husband henry when she is six and he is 36. henry is a time traveler (duh), and the book revolves around their lives together and all the complications that naturally come with it. and i think a part of the reason i loved it so much was because it resonated on a level with me that many people cant understand. i was an army wife, and while my husband never deployed, we still had our separations, and they were long. as a military wife, sometimes you dont know when your husband will be home, when youll see him again. so while it wasnt exactly the same situation, i could relate to clare on that level to a certain extent; when henry disappeared she was never sure when he would be back. i highly recommend this book; you will laugh, you will cry, and you will absolutely fall in love.

and of course i have to give a shout out to a few of my all-time favorites. no description or summary here, youll just have to trust me and get to your local library as fast as possible :)
the sword of truth series by terry goodkind (okay so i know the summary on the site sounds totally cheesy but i promise you, if you like fantasy this is one of the best series you will ever read. my love for this series rivals my love for harry potter, and if you know how much i love harry potter then you know that thats saying something lol)
harry potter series by j k rowling (of course - i am a HUGE HP nerd ^_^ )
the lake of dead languages by carol goodman
dracula by bram stoker (im not usually one for classics, but this is just amazing. if youre into the whole vampire craze, you definitely need to read this one. and burn your copy of twilight while youre at it...real vampires have fangs and dont sparkle :p lol)
the fire rose by mercedes lackey
when we were gods by colin falconer
memoirs of a geisha by arthur golden (again, a million times better than the movie)

1 comments:

Christine said...

Excellent list! I'm determined to finish The Lake of Dead Languages at some point, but I need to get back into the habit of reading more often again.

I really love the smell of books too. Even library books, which is a little sketch.