Sullivan, Margaret C. "The Jane Austen Handbook"

Sullivan, Margaret C. "The Jane Austen Handbook. A Sensible Yet Elegant Guide to Her World" - 2007

Part of my #Reading Austen project is to read a book by the author in the uneven months and a book about the author and/or her books in the even ones. This month, it was a book about her time with a lot of background information to why some characters acted the way they did. There were a lot of lovely illustrations and even more funny allusions to the novels.

I can heartily recommend this little book to any Jane Austen fan. Whether you have read her books or watched them on TV or in the cinemas (hopefully both), you will be delighted by this. And if time travelling was a thing, you could even learn how to behave in Regency times without anyone noticing you're from the future.

From the back cover:

"Jane Austen published her first novel in 1811, but today she's more popular than ever. Film adaptations of her books are nominated for Academy Awards. Chick lit bestsellers are based on her plots. And a new biopic of Austen herself Becoming Jane arrives in theaters this spring.

For all those readers who dream about living in Regency England, The Jane Austen Handbook offers step-by-step instructions for proper comportment in the early nineteenth century. You'll discover:

How to Become an Accomplished Lady
How to Run a Great House
How to Indicate Interest in a Gentleman Without Seeming Forward
How to Throw a Dinner Party
How to Choose and Buy Clothing

Full of practical directions for navigating the travails of Regency life, this charming illustrated book also serves as a companion for present-day readers, explaining the English class system, currency, dress, and the nuances of graceful living."

Campbell, Jen "Weird Things Customers say in Bookshops"

Campbell, Jen "Weird Things Customers say in Bookshops" - 2012 

What is weird? I can think of weird-funny, weird-strange, weird-stupid, weird-crazy, weird-peculiar, ...

There are 182 synonyms and antonyms to the word weird in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary (I did not count them, it says so on their website: They divide it into weird as in bizarre, eerie, magical, unusual.

Well, this book has remarks by customers that fit them all. There is the joke at the back of the cover: "Do you have this children's book I've heard about? It's supposed to be very good. It's callled 'Lionel Richie and the Wardrobe'."

But there are lots more, many of the really stupid. It starts with the customer who read a book in the sixties that made them laugh. They don't remember the title, only that it was green.

And other customers who know nothing about the book they are looking for but expect the bookseller to find it. Or the customer who doesn't want to start with the first book in the series and then complains that they can't understand the fourth or fifth …

And then there are the people who come with their children and think they have every right to misbehave, destroy books or parts of the equipment. Honestly, I don't know how the sellers keep their calm.

Honestly, I could go on and on. But I leave it at this: Read the book!

From the back cover:

"A John Cleese Twitter question ('What is your pet peeve?'), first sparked the 'Weird Things Customers Say in Bookshops' blog, which grew over three years into one bookseller's collection of ridiculous conversations on the shop floor.

From 'Did Beatrix Potter ever write a book about dinosaurs?' to the hunt for a paperback which could forecast the next year's weather; and from 'I've forgotten my glasses, please read me the first chapter' to 'Excuse me... is this book edible?', here is a book for heroic booksellers and booklovers everywhere.

This full-length collection illustrated by the Brothers McLeod also includes top 'Weird Things' from bookshops around the world."

Haig, Matt "The Midnight Library"

Haig, Matt "The Midnight Library" - 2020

We read this in our international online book club in December 2024. And before I begin, let me tell you, this was my favourite of our selection this year, besides "Morning and Evening". And I did not think I would like it at all because this is so not my genre.

Have you ever wondered what your life might have been if something had or hadn't happened? If you hadn't visited that school you went to, if you had decided to get another profession, if you had met another partner in life? Well, here you can find how it might be if you could explore your life in different circumstances.

Imagine a library on the way between life and death. Nora, our protagonist, finds herself just there and tries quite a few different alternatives.

It's so wonderful to see what choices she could have made and where they would have led. Brilliant story.

From the back cover:

"Between life and death there is a library.

When Nora Seed finds herself in the Midnight Library, she has a chance to make things right. Up until now, her life has been full of misery and regret. She feels she has let everyone down, including herself. But things are about to change.

The books in the Midnight Library enable Nora to live as if she had done things differently. With the help of an old friend, she can now undo every one of her regrets as she tries to work out her perfect life. But things aren't always what she imagined they'd be, and soon her choices place the library and herself in extreme danger.

Before time runs out, she must answer the ultimate question: what is the best way to live?"

Bythell, Shaun "Remainders of the Day"

Bythell, Shaun "Remainders of the Day: More Diaries from The Bookshop, Wigtown" - 2022

I absolutely love Shaun Bythell's books about his shop and his customers, his clients and his friends. I had already read his former ones and this is just as great.

So, this is certainly one of the best books I read this year. Shaun Bythell's humour is one of the greatest. I hope he will write a new book soon.

Here are some examples:

"Some people (so we're told) don't read. What unfulfilling lives they lead."
I couldn't agree more.

And his favourite from the book "Nil Desperandum, a Dictionary of Latin Tags and Phrases":
"Timeo hominem unius libri." - "I fear the man of one book!"
We definitely should!

A sixteenth century Spanish curse:
"For him that stealeth this book, let it change into a serpent in his hand and rend him."

Book description:

"After twenty years running The Bookshop in Wigtown, Scotland, Shaun Bythell's life has settled into a mostly comfortable routine; days spent roaming between the shelves, poetry nights by the fire, frequent drop-ins from friends with gossip.

But while customers come and go - whether or not they’ve paid - there’s never a quiet moment in The Bookshop. Apart from the usual stream of die-hard trainspotters, antiquarian porn collectors and toddlers looking for somewhere cosy to urinate, Shaun still must contend with his employees’ increasingly eccentric habits, the mayhem of the Wigtown Book Festival and the shock of the town’s pub changing hands.

Warm and witty, with Shaun’s iconic mix of deadpan humour and grouchy charm, Remainders of the Day is the latest in his bestselling diary series."

Garfield, Simon "To the Letter: A Curious History of Correspondence - A Celebration of the Lost Art of Letter Writing"

Garfield, Simon "To the Letter: A Curious History of Correspondence - A Celebration of the Lost Art of Letter Writing" - 2013

I read a book by Simon Garfield a couple of years ago: "On the Map. Why the World Looks the Way it Does".

I really loved it. And since I love letters just as much as I love maps, I just had to get this one.

It is an interesting book about the development of letters, how they came into existence in the first place, how they changed over the centuries, what they mean today in a world of e-mails and phone messages.

I used to be a keen letter writer and was really looking forward to this book. And though it is a good survey into the habit of letter writing and contained some nice anecdotes, I found it a little boring at times. I don't mind jumping around in a story but this was all a little too haphazardly.

That might have been one of the reasons why I didn't read this in one go, I just couldn't get my head around his structure.

Also, he mentions a lot of authors and books in his work, a table of contents would have been nice.

I still like writing letters.

A nice quote:

"Today is the tomorrow we worried about yesterday."

He also mentions a letter subscripion where you receive an actual letter by one of your favourite authors twice a month. It still exists and you can find all about it here at "The Rumpus". I couldn't find out whether they also send something abroad but there are quite a few US readers here, so maybe something for them.

From the back cover:

"To the Letter tells the story of our remarkable journey through the mail. From Roman wood chips discovered near Hadrian's Wall to the wonders and terrors of email, Simon Garfield explores how we have written to each other over the centuries and what our letters reveal about our lives.

Along the way he delves into the great correspondences of our time, from Cicero and Petrarch to Jane Austen and Ted Hughes (and John Keats, Virginia Woolf, Jack Kerouac, Anaïs Nin and Charles Schulz), and traces the very particular advice offered by bestselling letter-writing manuals. He uncovers a host of engaging stories, including the tricky history of the opening greeting, the ideal ingredients for invisible ink, and the sad saga of the dead letter office. As the book unfolds, so does the story of a moving wartime correspondence that shows how letters can change the course of life.

To the Letter is a wonderful celebration of letters in every form, and a passionate rallying cry to keep writing."

Tomalin, Claire "Jane Austen - A Life"

Tomalin, Claire "Jane Austen - A Life" - 1997

Jane Austen is one of my favourite authors. I have read all her novels, even the ones she didn't finish, some letters and short stories, so: a lot about her.

Claire Tomalin is a British journalist and biographer. She has a good reputation, especially for her biographies.

After reading this book, I understand why. I think she put together whatever is known about Jane Austen and her life, her family, her works, her illness, her death, anything. And she also tells us a lot about the era the author lived in, how female authors were regarded, how women were regarded, how people lived. You just have the feeling you lived with them.

We also get to see many of her writings, not all the letters as a whole but many excerpts that give us a glimpse of the author's life.

It's a shame Jane Austen was not able to write more books but this is a good supplement to her literature.

From the back cover:

"At her death in 1817, Jane Austen left the world six of the most beloved novels written in English - but her shortsighted family destroyed the bulk of her letters; and if she kept any diaries, they did not survive her.  Now acclaimed biographer Claire Tomalin has filled the gaps in the record, creating a remarkably fresh and convincing portrait of the woman and the writer.

While most Austen biographers have accepted the assertion of Jane's brother Henry that 'My dear Sister's life was not a life of events,' Tomalin shows that, on the contrary, Austen's brief life was fraught with upheaval.  Tomalin provides detailed and absorbing accounts of Austen's ill-fated love for a young Irishman, her frequent travels and extended visits to London, her close friendship with a worldly cousin whose French husband met his death on the guillotine, her brothers' naval service in the Napoleonic wars and in the colonies, and thus shatters the myth of Jane Austen as a sheltered and homebound spinster whose knowledge of the world was limited to the view from a Hampshire village."

Moggach, Deborah "The Carer"

Moggach, Deborah "The Carer" - 2019

I have read "Tulip Fever" by the same author and thought it was very good. So, when a friend offered to lend me this one, I took the opportunity.

This was not the same at all. Not just because it was a different topic. It just read more like chick-lit disguised as a serious novel.

While this could be a great novel about old age and how the care of a senile father can take up everyone's resources, the story turned more and more into a soap opera with family secrets everywhere. I could have done without all that and it might have been a brilliant novel. This is just very unreal. The only thing missing is a murder and the landing of an alien ship, then all genres would have been covered.

According to Goodreads, the novel is humourous. I couldn't detect that.

From the back cover:

"From the bestselling author of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and Tulip Fever, a deliciously funny, poignant and wry novel, full of surprising twists and turns.

James is getting on a bit and needs full-time help. So Phoebe and Robert, his middle-aged offspring, employ Mandy, who seems willing to take him off their hands. But as James regales his family with tales of Mandy's virtues, their shopping trips, and the shared pleasure of their journeys to garden centres, Phoebe and Robert sense something is amiss. Is this really their father, the distant figure who never once turned up for a sports day, now happily chortling over cuckoo clocks and television soaps?

Then something happens that throws everything into new relief, and Phoebe and Robert discover that life most definitely does not stop for the elderly. It just moves onto a very different plane - changing all the stories they thought they knew so well."

Rowlinson, Derek "What's the best you can do?"

Rowlinson, Derek "What's the best you can do?: First-hand Recollections of a Second-hand Bookseller" - 2009

After reading Shaun Bythell's books about his life as a second hand bookseller, this one was recommended to me on one of the sites. Since I still wait for Shaun's next book to be published in paperback, I thought I might read this one in between.

This is another book about customers of a book shop where one can only shake your head. I'm surprised people still do this because the way they get treated is unbelievable.

Derek Rowlinson's book is not as funny as that of his Scottish counterpart but also highly entertaining. His description of some of his nice customers and their little quirks is great. But the others! My goodness. How can you treat books and booksellers that way?! He sorts the different characters into plenty self-explaining categories: time-wasters, thieves, meanness, asking silly questions, … I hope no bookseller has ever added me to one of their negative lists, second or first hand sellers.

And the beauty about any book like this: you feel the whole time as if you are in a bookshop. And that's paradise!

The illustrations by Graham Kennedy add to the pleasure of reading the book.

From the back cover:

"An autobiographical glimpse into the world of second-hand bookselling, where teh funny and the sad coexist like a microcosm of life itself. Here is a book that starts with a smile and ends with a wink."

The author has also written "Truelove's Journal: A Bookshop Novella" (Goodreads) under the pseudonym Ralph St. John Featherstonehaugh. That book deserves to be read for the funny and inventive name alone.

Canetti, Elias "Auto-da-Fé"

Canetti, Elias "Auto-da-Fé" (German: Die Blendung) - 1935

For the The Classics Spin #34, we were given #13, and this was my novel.

What a book! Did I like it? Hm, hard to tell. It is described as grotesk, obscure, weird, … And weird it is.

The book tells the story of Peter Kien, a sinologist and philologist who lives very reclusively in his apartment with his books. He marries his housekeeper but he slides more and more into madness.

Peter's brother Georg is a famous psychologist in Paris. Alerted by one of Peter's acquaintances, he comes to Vienna in order to help but, alas, is not successful.

This is a very complex book that cannot possibly be explained in a few words. Its a book of obsession and criticism, of society at the time but also a warning about what was to come. After all, this was two years after the nazis gained power in Germany and many people, like the author, feared for the future. And they were right, as it turned out.

The meaning of the English title is explained in Wikipedia:
An auto-da-fé (/ˌɔːtoʊdəˈfeɪ, ˌaʊt-/ AW-toh-də-FAY, OW-; from Portuguese auto da fé [ˈawtu ðɐ ˈfɛ], meaning 'act of faith'; Spanish: auto de fe [ˈawto ðe ˈfe]) was the ritual of public penance carried out between the 15th and 19th centuries of condemned heretics and apostates imposed by the Spanish, Portuguese, or Mexican Inquisition as punishment and enforced by civil authorities. Its most extreme form was death by burning.

The book was first published in English with the title "The Tower of Babel".
The translation of the original titel "Die Blendung" would be translated into "Blinding as a punishment", "Glare", "Deception", or even in the sense of "Verblendung" as "Infatuation". All these words could be used as the title of the book. In the German book description, it is said that "like Joyce's 'Ulysses', 'The Blinding' is a powerful metaphor for the lonely reflective mind's confrontation with reality." Sounds correct to me.

Book Description:

"'Auto-da-Fé' is the story of Peter Kien, a distinguished, reclusive sinologist living in Vienna between the wars. With masterly precision, Canetti reveals Kien's character, displaying the flawed personal relationships which ultimately lead to his destruction.

Manipulated by his illiterate and grasping housekeeper, Therese, who has tricked him into marriage, and Benedikt Pfaff, a brutish concierge, Kien is forced out of his apartment - which houses his great library and one true passion - and into the underworld of the city. In this purgatory he is guided by a chess-playing dwarf of evil propensities, until he is eventually restored to his home. But on his return he is visited by his brother, an eminent psychiatrist who, by an error of diagnosis, precipitates the final crisis...

'Auto-da-Fé' was first published in Germany in 1935 as 'Die Blendung' ('The Blinding' or 'Bedazzlement') and later in Britain in 1947, where the publisher noted Canetti as a 'writer of strongly individual genius, which may prove influential', an observation borne out when the author was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1981. 'Auto-da-Fé' still towers as one of the greatest novels of the twentieth century, and Canetti's incisive vision of an insular man battling agianst the outside world is as fresh and rewarding today as when first it appeared in print."

Elias Canetti received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1981 "for writings marked by a broad outlook, a wealth of ideas and artistic power".

I contribute to this page: Read the Nobels and you can find all my blogs about Nobel Prize winning authors and their books here.

Since this book takes partly place in Paris, it can also go with the project #parisinjuly2023.

Bythell, Shaun "Seven Kinds of People you Find in Bookshops"

Bythell, Shaun "Seven Kinds of People you Find in Bookshops" - 2020

This is the third book I read by Shaun Bythell. In "The Diary of a Bookseller", he introduces us to his second-hand bookshop in Wigtown, Scotland and his quirky customers. In "Confessions of a Bookseller", he gives us an overview of a whole year and carries on in his sarcastic way to describe everyone he comes across.

I love the title. So, apparently, you can find seven kinds of people in bookshops. I kept wondering the whole time where I might fit in. Only to find out to wards the end, that I seem to belong to the "normal people". How boring. Mind you, I wouldn't have wanted to be considered a loiterer, my family is definitely not young anymore, I don't have a beard, I'm also not an expert on anything and hope I don't annoy people with telling them about the books I read or the subjects in them - well, I have a blog for that and can discuss those issues with other readers who are interested in the same stuff. But still … normal???

Well, to me, like to most of the other bloggers, I suppose, a bookshop is there to explore. Of course, sometimes I am looking for a certain book and will enquire accordingly. But most often, I just like to browse - and I will always find something. So, I am glad, booksellers appreciate customers like me.

Shaun Bythell is one of the most hilarious people I have come to know through my reading and I was happy to find out that he has married in the meantime and they started their young family.

As in my reviews of the first book, I am happy to lead you to his blog website The Bookshop and his blog. If you don't decide to buy his books after that, I can't help you.

The author is just as funny, witty and sarcastic as in his other books. Can't wait for his next one, "Remainders of the Day: More Diaries from The Bookshop, Wigtown" to come out in paperback.

From the back cover:

"Between its covers, a book can contain a whole world. And, at one time or another, the whole world comes to a bookshop - so step inside to find:

The Conspiracy Theorist
The Exhausted Parents
The Whistler
The Dark Artist
The Loiterer without Intent
The Craft Enthusiast
The Bore
And many more …

In twenty years behind the till in The Bookshop, Wigtown, Shaun Bythell has met pretty much every kind of customer there is - from the charming, erudite and deep-pocketed to the eccentric, flatulent and possibly larcenous.

In Seven Kinds of People You Find in Bookshops he distils the essence of his experience into a warm, witty and quirky taxonomy of the book-loving public. So, step inside to meet the crafty Antiquarian, the shy and retiring Erotica Browser and gormless yet strangely likeable shop assistant Student Hugo - along with much loved bookseller favourites like the passionate Sci-Fi Fan, the voracious Railway Collector and the ever-elusive Perfect Customer."

Brooks, Geraldine "People of the Book"

Brooks, Geraldine "People of the Book" - 2008

This is going to be one of my favourite books this year. Such a wonderful story about a book and its history. I have once read a similar story, well, not a similar story, just a book that tries to follow a piece of art, a painting from today into past until it was created. That was by Susan Vreeland and it was called "Girl in Hyacinth Blue". I loved that one and this was just as interesting.

The main "character" is the Sarajevo Haggada, a Jewish religious book that really exists (see here on Wikipedia or here on The National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina website) The word "haggada" is Hebrew for telling, story or account, the book "Haggadah" is a text that describes the order of the Passover Seder.

There are books, even ancient ones, where you know exactly where they come from and who made them. This is not one. The author has put down some ideas and made a wonderful story about it that travels around the whole world. From the Australian conservationist who tries to find some clues that sound just like a crime story we travel back from Bosnia-Herzegovina to Italy, Austria, Spain and to the shores of Ifriqiya (modern day Tunisia, parts of Algeria and Libya). In between, we visit the Untied States and the United Kingdom where the protagonist does not only find out more about the book but also about her family.

I absolutely loved the whole story, how we get to know the different kinds of people who contributed first to the creation of the book and then to the saving of it. Some of the ideas might even be true. Well, we can always dream.

Remarks from the book club:
I partly felt the book was really interesting and wanted to know more about the old stories from history.
The parts about WWII always feel a little too close for comfort anyway.
The author's experience as a journalist shone through the story. But the present day frame-story felt slightly "puff-piece" kind of full with story gaps.
Overall still give it 4/5 or maybe even 4,5/5.

We read this in our international online book club in October 2023.

From the back cover:

"During World War II a Bosnian Muslim risks his life to save the book from the Nazis; it gets caught up in the intrigues of hedonistic 19th-century Vienna; a Catholic priest saves it from burning in the fires of Inquisition. These stories and more make up the secret history of the priceless Sarajevo Haggadah - a medieval Jewish prayer book recovered from the smouldering ruins of the war-torn city.
Now it is in the skilled hands of rare-book restorer Hanna Heath. And while the content of the book interests her, it is the hidden history which captures her imagination. Because to her the tiny clues - salt crystals, a hair, wine stains - that she discovers in the pages and bindings are keys to unlock its mysteries."

Ruiz Zafón, Carlos "The City of Mist"

Ruiz Zafón, Carlos "The City of Mist" (Spanish: La Ciudad de Vapor) - 2020
(El cementerio de los libros olvidados #5)

Yes, we return to Barcelona, one last journey with a wonderful author who left a big hole in the literary world with his death. His fans can look forward to a last greeting. All stories that fit somewhere in his Cemetery of Forgotten Books. How it came about and what it has contributed to. One or the other story has already been read beforehand, e.g. "Gaudí in Manhattan" or "The Prince of Parnassus" (El Príncipe de Parnaso), but that doesn't detract from the joy of this book.

And if you haven't read the wonderful series yet, you should do so as soon as possible. These short stories are also good for getting in the mood. You can read all of his books in any order, they complement each other well.

From the back cover:

"Return to the mythical Barcelona library known as the Cemetery of Forgotten Books in this posthumous collection of stories from the New York Times bestselling author of The Shadow of the Wind and The Labyrinth of the Spirits.

Bestselling author Carlos Ruiz Zafón conceived of this collection of stories as an appreciation to the countless readers who joined him on the extraordinary journey that began with The Shadow of the Wind. Comprising eleven stories, most of them never before published in English, The City of Mist offers the reader compelling characters, unique situations, and a gothic atmosphere reminiscent of his beloved Cemetery of Forgotten Books quartet.

The stories are mysterious, imbued with a sense of menace, and told with the warmth, wit, and humor of Zafón's inimitable voice. A boy decides to become a writer when he discovers that his creative gifts capture the attentions of an aloof young beauty who has stolen his heart. A labyrinth maker flees Constantinople to a plague-ridden Barcelona, with plans for building a library impervious to the destruction of time. A strange gentleman tempts Cervantes to write a book like no other, each page of which could prolong the life of the woman he loves. And a brilliant Catalan architect named Antoni Gaudí reluctantly agrees to cross the ocean to New York, a voyage that will determine the fate of an unfinished masterpiece.

Imaginative and beguiling, these and other stories in The City of Mist summon up the mesmerizing magic of their brilliant creator and invite us to come dream along with him.

Blanca and the Departure
Nameless
A Young Lady from Barcelona
Rose of Fire
The Prince of Parnassus
A Christmas Tale
Alicia, at Dawn
Men in Grey
Kiss
Gaudí in Manhattan
Two-Minute Apocalypse"

Sankovitch, Nina "Tolstoy and the Purple Chair"

Sankovitch, Nina "Tolstoy and the Purple Chair: My Year of Magical Reading" - 2010

I've had this book on my TBR pile for quite a while. I love books about books, I love lists, especially of books but somehow, this never made it to the top of my pile.

Until now.

What did I like about the book? The fact, that books are there for us, that they can help us in difficult circumstances. I knew that already and I have lived through it myself. Books have helped me a lot.

Mind you, I didn't buy the book for that, I bought it because it was about reading.

Nina Sankovitch read 365 books in one year. I wouldn't have liked to have to finish any book in a given day and not read any of my beloved chunksters but she didn't seem to mind that.

I did like that she mentioned other books, books she didn't read in that year but which meant something to her.

I would recommend reading to anyone who is in a ditch and can't get out by themselves. Those authors help you a lot. And I'm not talking those self-help books, they often make me even more depressive, I'm talking about books you enjoy, whether they are non-fiction or fiction, a romance book, science fiction, fantasy (the last ones all genres that I don't enjoy), historical novels or anything you feel like at the time. They do help, believe me.

There are quite a few passages that made me think. The author tells us about a ghost in a Dickens story that will take away your memory and the answer "Memory is my curse, and if I could forget my sorrow and my wrong, I would." I doubt I would take that offer because with all the bad memories, also many of the good ones will be gone. Like in Nina's case, the loss of her sister is terrible but the memories she shares with her are wonderful, and would she want to lose them, as well? Probably not.

And this one, an old Arab proverb: "He who lends a book is an idiot. He who returns the book is more of an idiot." Okay, call me an idiot, I have lent books to others all my life, I think we should share our richness. I agree more with Henry Miller's advice (also mentioned in the book): "Like money, books must be kept in constant circulation, Lend and borrow to the maximum - of both books and money! But especially books, for books represent infinitely more than money. A book is not only a friend, it makes friends for you. When you have possessed a book with mind and spirit, you are enriched. But when you pass it on you are enriched threefold". Definitely.

From Cornelia Funke's "Inkheart" (GE: Tintenherz): "Books loved anyone who opened them, they gave you security and friendship and didn't ask anything in return; they never went away, never, not even when you treated them badly. Love, truth, beauty, wisdom and consolation against death. Who had said that? Someone else who loved books." Yes, books always love us, they will send us on a new path, they will entertain us, they will teach us something, they are there for us.

Elizabeth Maguire asks, "Have you ever been heartbroken to finish a book? Has a writer kept whispering in your ear long after the last page has turned?" How can anyone say no to those questions?

Something that has nothing to do with reading but needs to be said again and again, a quote from Kurt Vonnegut: "War is Murder". There is nothing that anyone can say against that.

"Read a book to find out why we go to war, to experience what it is that drives us to violence", is a good answer, that the author only thought about after a discussion, as happens so often to all of us, I guess. But it's the best way to learn about it and to try to convince others that it is stupid to kill someone, no matter for what reason.

"Books are the weapon against someone's lament that 'everything is forgotten in the end'." Yes, books, make us remember, books teach us everything,w e don't have to experience it first ourselves, we can truly feel for someone through a book.

And finally, a quote by one of the greates authors that ever lived, Leonid Tolstoy: "The sole meaning of life is to serve humanity." There is nothing to be added.

Nina Sankovitch has a website.
And here she has some recommendations on how to read all day.

I will not repeat all the books she read in this review, you can find that list here.

I will, however, list all the books I read from her list so you can go and check out what I have to say to them.

The same with the books she mentions, there is a list at the end of the books I read.

From the back cover:

"Caught up in grief after the death of her sister, Nina Sankovitch decided to stop running and start reading. For once in her life she would put all other obligations on hold and devote herself to reading a book a day: one year of magical reading in which she found joy, healing, and wisdom.

With grace and deep insight, Sankovitch weaves together poignant family memories with the unforgettable lives of the characters she reads about. She finds a lesson in each book, ultimately realizing the ability of a good story to console, inspire, and open our lives to new places and experiences. A moving story of recovery, Tolstoy and the Purple Chair is also a resonant reminder of the all-encompassing power and delight of reading."

Books read:
Achebe, Chinua "Things Fall Apart" (The African Trilogy #1) - 1958
Adams, Richard "Watership Down" - 1972
Adiga, Aravind "The White Tiger" - 2008
Barbery, Muriel "The Elegance of the Hedgehog" (F: L’Elégance du hérisson) - 2006
Berry, Wendell "Hannah Coulter" - 2004
Butler, Octavia E. "Kindred" - 1979
Chevalier, Tracy "Falling Angels" - 2001
Cleave, Chris "The Other Hand" (US: Little Bee) - 2008
Coetzee, J.M. "The Master of Petersburg" - 1994
Danticat, Edwidge "Breath, Eyes, Memory" - 1994
Douglass, Frederick "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave" - 1845
Ephron, Nora "I Feel Bad About My Neck And Other Thoughts on Being a Woman" - 2006
Funke, Cornelia "Inkheart" (GE: Tintenherz) - 2003
Morrison, Toni "A Mercy" - 2008
Shaffer, Mary Ann & Barrows, Annie "The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Society" - 2008
Tóibín, Colm "Brooklyn" - 2009
Walls, Jeannette "The Glass Castle" - 2005

Not many from the 365 books she read but then again, she hasn't mentioned many of my books, either. ;)

Books mentioned:
Christie, Agatha "And then there were none"  - 1939 (called "Ten Little Indians" in this book)
Dickens, Charles "A Christmas Carol" - 1843
- "A Tale of Two Cities" - 1859
Fitzgerald, F. Scott "The Great Gatsby" - 1925
Gilbreth, Frank + Gilbreth Carey, Elizabeth "Cheaper by the Dozen" - 1948
Gordimer, Nadine "Burger's Daughter" - 1979
Greene, Graham "The End of the Affair" - 1951
Kingsolver, Barbara
McEwan, Ian "Atonement" - 2001
Schlink, Bernhard "The Reader" (GE: Der Vorleser) - 1994
Trollope, Anthony "Barchester Chronicles" - 1855-67

Greywoode, Josephine "Why We Read"

Greywoode, Josephine (ed.) "Why We Read. 70 Writers on Non-Fiction" - 2022

It's Non-fiction November and if you haven't had a chance to participate, here is a short book that tells us a lot about non-fiction books and might instigate us to read some.

70 authors have written about the reason why we read, especially why we read non-fiction. A brilliant collection of thoughts by some great minds. I could repeat the whole book here - but I recommend you get it yourself and read what they have to say. You won't regret it.

And here are just some snippets that might entice you starting the read yourself:

"Poetry in translation is, like Guinness outside Dublin, just a shadow of the real thing." Ananyo Bhattacharya

"And whatever kind of book you are reading, you get to rest for a while in the author's mind and share their unique way of looking at things and putting them together. In a few hours you will learn, without effort, everything this other person has laboured for years to know and understand." Clare Carlisle

"The pictures are better. No fancy computer-enhanced video can compete with reading, and re-reading, the actual text. Imagination is the key to enjoying good literature." Paul Davies

"And sometimes I read as a way of keeping a grip on the world, a grip on myself in the world, a tiny speck, in the rushing darkness that I am. Hold fast. Reading for my life, I guess." Nicci Gerrard

"Education: This is not just the obvious help that reading gives to the formal process of learning at school or university. Reading is a wonderful gift for life-long learning. I read to learn more about more, to educate myself further, to extend my knowledge. That is something that never ends." Ian Kershaw

"Consider this: reading is a strange, modern behaviour that we never evolved to do. Of the 300,000 or so years in which our species has existed, humans started reading only about 5,000 years ago. That's barely 1 per cent of our existence. What is more, until the Industrial Revolution, just a handful of humans had to privilege of reading. From an evolutionary perspective, reading is nearly as novel and strange as driving cars or using credit cards." Daniel Lieberman

"Governments want to tell you that "science, technology, engineering, maths" (STEM) are the most important subjects. But reading is the real stem. Understanding what a fact means understanding how to read. A fact is an interpretation of date: a reading." Timothy Morton

"Studies of the effects of education confirm that educated people really are more enlightened. They are less racist, sexist, xenophobic, homophobic and authoritarian. They place a higher value on imagination, independence and free speech. They are more likely to vote, volunteer, express political views and belong to civic associations such as unions, political parties and religious and community organizations. They are also likelier to trust their fellow citizens - a prime ingredient of the precious elixir called social capital, which gives people the confidence to contract, invest, and obey the law without fearing that they are chumps who will be shafted by everyone else.
For all these reasons, literacy is an engine of human progress, material, moral, spiritual." Steven Pinker

"Non-fiction books matter because we are what we read." Daniel Susskind

And some book recommendations by Emma Jane Kirby:
Hamel, Christopher de "Meetings with Remarkable Manuscripts"
MacGregor, Neil "A History of the World in 100 Objects" (I read "Germany. Memories of a Nation")
MacDonald, Helen "H is for Hawk"
Nicholson, Christopher "Amon the Summer Snow"
Winterson, Jeanette "Oranges are Not the Only Fruit"
Winterson, Jeanette "Why be Happy When You Can be Normal"
Wynn, Raynor "The Salt Path"

From the back cover:

"Why read non-fiction? Is it just to find things out? Or is it for pleasure, challenge, adventure, meaning? Here, in seventy new pieces, some of the most original writers and thinkers of our time give their answers.

From Hilton Als on reading as writing's dearest companion to Nicci Gerrard on reading for her life; from Malcolm Gladwell on entering the minds of others to Michael Lewis on books as secret discoveries; and from Lea Ypi on the search for freedom to Slavoj Žižek on violent readings, each offers their own surprising perspective on the simple act of turning a page. The result is a celebration of seeing the world in new ways - and of having our minds changed."

Top Ten Tuesday - Books with the Word Book in the Title

 

"Top Ten Tuesday" is an original feature/weekly meme created on the blog "The Broke and the Bookish". This feature was created because they are particularly fond of lists at "The Broke and the Bookish". It is now hosted by Jana from That Artsy Reader Girl.

Since I am just as fond of them as they are, I jump at the chance to share my lists with them! Have a look at their page, there are lots of other bloggers who share their lists here.

This week, our topic is Bookish Wishes

Jana's birthday is today, so she's celebrating it and asked us to list the top 10 books we’d love to own. But, as so often, I've done this kind of list a couple of times lately:

Books I Hope Santa Brings/Bookish Wishes

Most Anticipated Books of the Second Half of 2021

Top Ten Books I Hope Santa Brings 

Top Ten Things On My Reading Wishlist

Top Twelve Books I Loved that Made Me Want More Books Like Them

Therefore, I decided to go back to a good old favourite of mine, books with a certain word in the title, in this case, since we talk about bookish wishes: Book. I had no idea I had read so many books with word book in the title, let alone notebook. Totally interesting.

Abdolah, Kader "My Father’s Notebook" (NL: Spijkerschrift) - 2000
Almost an autobiography. Ishmael, the protagonist in this story, has a deaf-mute father who works as a carpet restaurateur in Iran.

Allende, Isabel "Maya's Notebook" (E: El Cuaderno de Maya) - 2011
Maya is a girl with a tremendous story. She has a Chilean father and a Danish mother and is brought up by her Chilean grandmother and her second husband who is African American. Can it get any more international?

Campbell, Jen "The Bookshop Book" - 2014
Another approach to discovering bookshops. The author has more or less travelled around the world for us, interviewed bookshop owners, employees, authors, readers, anyone who has anything to do with producing and consuming books.

Fforde, Jasper "Lost in a Good Book" - 2002
Thursday Next works for SpecOps 27, the Literary Deceives (LiteraTecs) in Special Operations, a fictional division of the British government. With the help of special gadgets and skills, she can enter books and move from one to the next, this is called "bookjumping". This time, she spends a lot of time in "Great Expectations" by Charles Dickens.

Lessing, Doris "The Golden Notebook" - 1962
One of those books that I still remember after many many years. I thought it was very good and very sensitive, approached the subject of women's liberation in a very unique but helpful way.

Lundberg, Sofia "The Red Address Book" (SW: Den röda adressboken) - 2015
A lovely story about an elderly lady who reflects on her life with the help of modern technology and her old address book.

Oates, Joyce Carol "A Book of American Martyrs" - 2017
One of my favourite authors. As usual, her characters are so alive, so real, incredible. Of course, I don't understand people who condone one sort of killing and then go on to do another one. A fascinating book about a subject that should be discussed much more than "I'm against abortion". (Please, read my whole review.)

Pamuk, Orhan "The Black Book" (TR: Kara Kitap) - 1990
Another one of my absolute favourite authors. A man is looking for his wife who disappeared. He is roaming the streets of Istanbul in order to look back at their past. But there is so much behind the plot, so many "meetings", present meets past, East meets West, religion meets secularism. You will definitely want to visit Istanbul after reading this.

Sparks, Nicholas "The Notebook" - 2004
An alright story, a love story, poor boy loves rich girl and all the obstacles that there are in these kinds of novels which you know they will overcome. Most probably the only book I will ever read by Nicholas Sparks.

Taylor, Andrew James "Books That Changed the World" - 2008
Definitely one of the best list of books to read I have seen! A list of important books that made a major impact on our present view of the world. I haven't read all of them but I am sure most people have heard the titles and the authors at some point in their life.

I hope you enjoyed my little trip around the books and bookshelves of the world. And maybe I find more wishes on your lists.

📚 Happy Reading! 📚