Well, here it is. My very first post.
The idea for starting a reading blog came to me after I returned from holiday a few days ago. The town where I had been staying was in close proximity to a number of excellent second-hand bookshops, so I was able to buy lots of new (so to speak) books for a bargain price.
I don’t know why, but as I was packing my bag to go home, I felt a weird urge to make a note of the books I’d bought and to give some context as to why I’d decided to buy them. This post probably won’t be of interest to anyone apart from me, but I decided that it was as good a place to start as any.
So, without further ado, here is an arbitrarily-ranked list of my recent book purchases and my reasons for buying them:
Meridian by Alice Walker
I read Alice Walker’s The Color Purple earlier this year and I really loved it. I was not immediately aware of any other books which Walker had written, so it was a pleasant surprise to find Meridian whilst I was browsing the bookshop shelves. I had a read of the first few pages whilst still in the shop and I was intrigued to note that Meridian seems to be written in a much more conventional format than The Color Purple. Whilst The Color Purple was written in the character Celie’s unique vernacular, Meridian does not adopt a similar style, from what I can tell. Either way, Meridian sounds like a really inspiring story and I’m looking forward to reading it.
Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer
This book seemed to be everywhere for a while in the early 2000s and yet I never got round to reading it. To this day, I continue to see Artemis Fowl cropping up on lists of best books for young adults, so I’ve decided that I’m finally going to give it a go. That cover kind of creeps me out though!
Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate DiCamillo
I actually only heard about this book for the first time earlier this year. As of writing it’s been less than 20 years since the book’s publication, but it already seems to be something of a modern children’s classic. A member of my family works in a high school library and she approached me to ask for book recommendations for one of her students who loves animals. Whilst I was able to offer a number of suggestions off the top of my head, I thought I should do some wider research to assist her. I came across this title and sort of stored the book away at the back of my mind for future reference. I then happened across Because of Winn-Dixie whilst browsing in a charity shop (I’ve since finished reading this book and will upload a review in due course).
Stuart Little by E.B. White
I got this book from the same charity shop as Because of Winn-Dixie. I’ve wanted to read Stuart Little for years and years but, much like Artemis Fowl, I just never seemed to get round to it. I used to watch the first Stuart Little movie a lot as a child and I remember enjoying it, so I’m interested to see how the book differs.
Captain Corelli’s Mandolin by Louis de Bernières
Technically, I shouldn’t have bought this book, as my parents have said previously that I can borrow their copy. However, despite my love of books, I’m notorious for judging them by their covers. My parents’ copy of Captain Corelli’s Mandolin has the poster for the 2001 movie adaptation as the front cover. Every time I tried to read it in the past, the mere sight of Nicolas Cage’s face was enough to make me smirk. I love Nicolas Cage, but not in Captain Corelli’s Mandolin. If I’m going to read this book, I need a copy which doesn’t remind me of the movie.
Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie
Full disclosure: I have no idea what Midnight’s Children is about and the only thing that I really know about Salman Rushdie is that he had a cameo appearance in the first Bridget Jones movie. Still, there’s something enormously exciting about starting to read a book which you’ve only heard of in passing.
Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson
I first heard of Jacqueline Woodson earlier this year. I was reading about the author Daniel Handler (a.k.a. Lemony Snicket) and how he appears to have frequently belittled his female literary peers, including Jacqueline Woodson. In 2014, Woodson won the prestigious National Book Award for Young People’s Literature for her novel Brown Girl Dreaming. Woodson was the first black woman to ever win this award. During the ceremony, Daniel Handler made a racially insensitive joke about Woodson, which caused quite a bit of controversy. It frustrates me that I discovered Woodson as a result of Handler’s casual racism, rather than via a more positive route. However, hopefully I’ll really enjoy this book and the whole Handler situation will be pushed to the side as a result.
Mort by Terry Pratchett
As a self-confessed bookworm, it pains me to say that I’ve never read a Terry Pratchett book in my life. I started trying to read The Colour of Magic several years ago and it didn’t really do anything for me. I’ve been told by a couple of fans of Pratchett’s work that The Colour of Magic isn’t one of the stronger books in the Discworld series, so hopefully I’ll like the others better. I absolutely adore the concept for Mort – that of a young man who becomes Death’s apprentice – so I’m going in to this book with a healthy dose of cautious optimism.
Jennie Gerhardt by Theodore Dreiser
Full disclosure once again: I’ve never heard of this book or its author. I just kind of plucked it from a bookshelf and thought it sounded interesting. It’s about a pregnant woman at the end of the 19th century who’s cast out by both her family and her baby’s father. Although she is a member of an economically oppressed underclass, she resolves to fight to make a decent life for herself. I usually love stories of this sort, so fingers crossed it will be good!
Cross Stitch (a.k.a. Outlander #1) by Diana Gabaldon
Whilst I’d previously had a vague awareness of the book and TV adaptation, I didn’t really have much interest in reading Cross Stitch until a few weeks ago. PBS recently concluded its TV series entitled The Great American Read, which sought to find America’s favourite book. Americans voted in droves for their favourite works of literature and Cross Stitch finished an astonishing second, beaten only by Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. This was incredible to me and it really piqued my curiosity. As you can probably tell by the over-sized bookmark in the photo, I’ve already started reading it!
Ben Hur by Lew Wallace
Even though elements of it are very dated, I adore the 1959 movie Ben Hur. I actually already own a different copy of this book (which I had also purchased second-hand) and started reading it earlier this year. I had just reached the part where Judah is falsely imprisoned and I started to reflect on how quickly the narrative seemed to be rushing along. Only then did I think to check the copyright page and I saw that my version of the story was heavily abridged. To me, it always feels a little bit like cheating when I read an abridged novel, so I stopped reading it there and then. Needless to say, when I came across my new copy and saw the words ‘Complete and Unabridged’ proudly displayed on the cover, I decided to invest.
So there you have it. My first post done and dusted.
Thank you if you’ve stuck with me to the end of this post. More than anything, it was just something to get me started. I have lots of ideas for further posts which will hopefully have a wider appeal than this one, but thank you again in the meantime.
Realm of the Bookworm 