Pinkerton’s Sister by Peter Rushforth is sitting on my nightstand, the bookmark indicating that I’m about 70 pages in. I think I lost interest in this one because it references the Bronte sisters and several other female authors I’ve either never read or don’t remember reading because it’s been ten years since I have. In high school we didn’t learn much about the personal lives of authors, and I’m definitely not getting the allusions to their literature, so Pinkerton’s Sister is likely on the bottom of my stack because I know I’ll probably never get around to it. It’s poetic, though, and I wouldn’t say badly written or hard to get into.

I started Dr. Eckener’s Dream Machine by Douglas Botting sometime last fall while I was keen on learning everything I could about dirigibles. It’s quite interesting. It was one of the last books I purchased from the used bookstore where I previously worked and I think there’s some kind of weird emotional connection there that’s making it difficult for me to finish this book. I pick it up every once in a while, but the topic isn’t holding my attention like it used to. Perhaps another day I’ll get through it. Botting, however, successfully (so far) takes the reader through the history of the Graf Zeppelin, without boring or putting her to sleep, if you’ve any interest in that.

Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard by Chip Heath & Dan Heath came to us at the store as an advanced reader’s copy a week before the book came out. I find it hard to resist business/marketing books if they’re free, especially if they focus on people. I don’t know how unedited of a proof it is, but my difficulty in reading this is mainly because it seems thin, like the skeleton of a draft that the editor still hasn’t worked through to create a full, complex piece of business book that, instead of shooting from one idea to the next, finds some way to connect them and bring it all together. Maybe I should stick to full books.

When David Foster Wallace died, everyone wanted to buy his books. People STILL come in asking for “that author who died sometime last year who writes big books.” (As a bookseller you learn quickly what they mean when they’re vague. Like that book about the dog who has the man’s name that isn’t Marley & Me or Merle’s Door… well I couldn’t answer that one, but once I do I’ll be able to answer every other question that comes in about that book. Anyway, at the used bookstore we didn’t have a computer system when David Foster Wallace died, but we also didn’t have any of his books. I still had to learn what they meant.) I don’t kill myself finding books of authors who have just died simply because they’ve died, but when Although of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself by David Lipsky came in as another advanced reader’s copy I sat down with it, read the first few pages, and decided to hang out with it for a while. Lipsky apparently goes on a road trip to interview DFW and this book is the result.

High in demand in the kids’ section has been Where the Mountain Meets the Moon by Grace Lin. It’s so high in demand that the computer has said we’ve had two but no one has been able to find any of them, and our warehouses are completely out of stock. A few days ago, I found one of them sitting pretty in the back room on the return shelves (no sign of the other). In a selfish move, taking money away from the store and enjoyment away from a parent who thinks her kid should read it, I bought it. I figure it’s right up my alley, as illustrated above, and maybe once I’m done I’ll be more in the mood to start reading in kids’ books again. Who knows. It’s beautifully illustrated, though, and I find that encouraging.

From last August, I’m still reading Mein Kampf, I stopped once my airplane landed after my trip to Disney World after the kind military person next to me offered to confiscate and burn the book if I continued reading it in his presence. I’d started another book that was in my possession at the time (dude could totally take me, it wasn’t worth the fight, though we argued about it) and just never got back to it. Everyone has thus far told me that the writing is dry and difficult and the subject matter is even worse, but I actually found it quite easy to read, at least what I’d read so far.

The only other item on my nightstand worth noting in this post is my new nook, which I’ve named Loki (I name my electronics after mythological figures or Roman emperors, usually). Loki’s sharing The Descent of Man by Charles Darwin, though since I just got it yesterday and spent the better part of the evening learning how to hack the device, I haven’t gotten past the introduction. I’m sure when I’m more familiar with the thing I’ll dedicate an entire post to the awesomeness of Barnes & Noble for bringing Loki into my life. (I’ll be making nook covers soon for any of my readers who have one and are interested in keeping it safe in style for less than $125.)

At the meeting, everyone looked at me and someone said, “Michelle, you haven’t read this yet? The Lightning Thief is one of the Top 5 selling books at our store AND YOU HAVEN’T READ IT YET? Get out of the kids section!” They were jesting, of course, but I think after I finish this stack I’ll get back into it. The last kids book I read was A Whole Nother Story by Dr. Cuthbert Soup, which I’ve been hand-selling like crazy (it’s funny, cute, and has tips for life; an inventor carts his kids across country, escaping from various international government agencies who want to get their hands on his time machine, you should check it out) but I finished that last year.

People who bake with me always say that the tale of a good baker is someone who makes what they’ve set out to make and never has any extra batter. Well, I always have extra batter. When I’m cookie-cutting there are always leftover corners, bits that can mold together into a very small round cookie but not much else (I usually just feed the tapeworm). When I’m in the mood for cheesecake I always make the rookie mistake of getting ingredients for only one pie crust, so I’m left with a lot of extra batter.

What do you do with that batter, Michelle? you might ask. (Actually, someone did ask, which is why I’m telling you about it here.) Some people just eat it. Having a tablespoon of cookie dough left is no problem, but I personally can’t wrap my head around eating the extra five cups of cream cheese and sugar. Maybe that’s just me.

I wanted to find some use for the leftover candy canes from Christmas so I decided to make a peppermint cheesecake following cheesecake directions but adding peppermint extract and some candy cane pieces. Here’s what I used:

· 3 packages (8 oz each) cream cheese
· 3/4 cup sugar
· 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
· 4 eggs
· 1 cup (8 oz) sour cream
· 3/4 teaspoon peppermint extract
· 4-5 crushed candy canes (depending on how many you want inside) + 2 crushed (for top)
· Oreo crust (ready-made, or make one yourself)

1. Beat cream cheese and sugar until smooth, then add flour. Mix well. Add eggs one at a time. Add sour cream. Beat all ingredients until smooth.
2. Mix in peppermint extract and crushed candy canes.
3. Pour to fill the pie crust.
4. Bake at 325° for 35 minutes or until the center is almost set. Cool for one hour.
5. Refrigerate over night. Garnish with crushed candy; refrigerate leftovers.

If you haven’t purchased two pie crusts, half the batter will remain. I simply took out a muffin pan, filled the muffin cups, and poured the leftover batter 3/4 full in each of those. You can also smash graham crackers or a vanilla wafer on the bottom for makeshift crust, but I didn’t have either of those on hand. The cheesecake cupcakes are just as good without the makeshift crust. Bake at the same temperature, shorter time (325° for 30 minutes). Follow the same instructions for cooling and refrigeration as well, or eat them warm. Garnish with remaining crushed candy canes. Makes about 12, depending on how much batter you have leftover.

There you have it! A full-sized cheesecake and some little ones to boot. These ideas only get rid of about six of your candy canes unless you want crunchy cheesecake; in that case, by all means, crush more and mix ‘em in!

I recommend all writers find a book like this, one that doesn’t so much tell them why they write, but reminds them in a way they can’t quite explain. One that helps them learn how to embrace the skills they possess and utilize them positively. This book is not just a writer’s prompt book, but it’s not just a writer’s memoir. Goldberg is not mouthing off everything she does to write and telling you to do the exact same; she’s encouraging you to find your own way as she had to, showing you how she found her way and which experiences influenced her, and teaching you to find those guides in your life.

There are prompts every now and again, and you could open the book and go straight to those prompts (they’re in the table of contents), write them, close the book until you need another. But I don’t think you’d quite get the meaning of it; you’d be writing because someone told you to write, not because you needed to for yourself. Goldberg explains the prompt and then has you do it, and it was while reading that explanation that I found I yearned to write on it. I have writer’s prompts books that have words, pictures, sentences, ideas on pages, but I open them and I stare at the prompt for an hour trying to think of anything that could possibly become a story or blog post from it. Maybe my brain doesn’t accept prompts. I wrote on several of the prompts from Wild Mind, however, and I think it’s because they came with writing.

It was so difficult to get through it, so hard to keep picking it up. It was hard to come to terms with my own writing life, but when I finally did, I understood that Wild Mind helped me get there. Now what are my plans? To review a book on this blog at least once a month and find my “reviewing style.” To write a serial adventure novel on my personal domain. To build puzzles in my free time, allowing me to work through ideas that aren’t quite getting out on paper. The biggest speed bump I hope to cross over this year is allowing other people to read my unedited writing.

Perhaps Wild Mind won’t change your life, but if you’re a creative type struggling with the why and the how of your art, I recommend picking it up. Just give it a try.

This year, I am going to take on more review copies, not out of the excitement of an ARC, but because I want to help the publicity of a new author. I won’t be taking on more than I can handle. :)

This year, I am going to interact with book bloggers.

This year, I might take on a sometime reviewer (a friend who works at the bookstore with me) to post about her musings on books/what she’s reading.

I wouldn’t call them resolutions, but I do have plans for this blog to grow back into what it once was. It’s sad as empty space with a review every once in a while. Let’s get on a consistent schedule. :)

Happy Reading, everyone!

Despite the general appeal of all his other books (which I’ve been thinking of perusing anyway), Airman was the first that really grabbed my attention and had me thirsting for more. Conor Broekhart was born in a hot air balloon while it was being shot down by unseen enemies. It would seem that the child was born for flight and adventure, and the novel delivers both well and equally. Under the supervision of a Frenchman who is friend to his father and king, Conor learns to fight and invent with the freedom of science at a very young age. It would seem that life is too good to be true: He has his mother, the scientist, his father, the fighter, and his Princess Isabella, who never really comes into her own character, but is nevertheless necessary as a part of Conor’s life. But, as with most stories set in these worlds, there is also the king’s Marshall, Bonvilain, who is plotting to take the throne and won’t let anyone, not even a young inventor, get in his way.

Upon discovering Bonvilain’s plot, the Marshall sends the young man to Little Saltee, the kingdom’s prison, where he perseveres under terrible conditions for two years. What keeps Conor Broekhart alive? Is it his determination to reveal the truth of Bonvilain’s schemes, or is it a greedy desire to live selfishly, now that he has been separated from his family forever? There is much to learn about Conor in these pages, and his obsession with flying machines makes it all the more interesting to get through.

Though all the elements are there, this is not a fantasy story of “save the princess, get the girl;” however, towards the beginning it almost seemed it would turn in that direction. Airman is a little darker than some other books for younger kids; the main character does spend quite a bit of time under harsh conditions in a prison, and though he’s quick to learn how to get through it, friends are few and far between. That said, despite all he goes through in this book, Conor is never tempted to actually make the kill, and so becomes a moral character to hold onto without the fear of his becoming villainous.

There are a few weaknesses in the book, but the strengths so outshine them that it’s still certainly worth the read. Secondary character development definitely wasn’t a focus in the writing process, and towards the end some things seem a little too convenient, but it is clear that Conor’s flying inventions were very well researched and Conor himself leaves little to the imagination. He’s strong, intelligent, and quite wonderful with the sword, and where he resides so does action. And the best part (well, one of them)? This book is full of quirky and witty comments. Adults will smile as they come across them, and kids will wish they had such quick responses.

For anyone (adult or child — it is written well enough to hold an older reader’s attention, and content-wise does not cross lines for the kids) who enjoys high adventure, deception/scheming, exciting inventions, and a character’s will to survive under any circumstances, Airman would make a perfect treat. At just over 400 pages, it’s a quick read, but an absolutely engaging one that will leave you wishing for Colfer to come up with another adventure for Conor Broekhart. Knowing Conor, though, it doesn’t seem that far-fetched.

Working in used books with a strict trade-in policy, I don’t get much exposure to general fiction that comes out in hardcover. We generally only take the already popular authors, the ones that are sworn to sell (Patterson, Hooper, Balogh, whatever), so when I saw this on the shelf I thought it would be a nice change of pace. Me? Read a new hardback book? It’s usually unheard of. Lately I’ve been into magical tales of wonder and adventure, but primarily kids’ magical tales of wonder and adventure; The Magicians appeared to jump out at me as something that might get me back into adult reading. (Not that there’s anything wrong with kids reading, and I plan to do a lot of it presently, but every so often you do miss seeing the word ‘fuck’ in print, I’m not going to lie.)

A socially awkward but extremely intelligent high schooler named Quentin finds himself being examined for magical prowess and gets admitted into a super secret magic institute that is not Hogwarts because it’s in New York and only has an English “feel” to it. All the while, he pines over the world of one of his favorite childhood books, The Chronicles of Fillory, or something like that, and wishes desperately that he’ll one day be able to visit and go on adventures and quests and beat up mean people, and all.

Long (long) story short, he’s sorted–er, grouped with some older kids (being so advanced, as he is), they play a sport that doesn’t seem to have any purpose to the book at all except perhaps to insert a skill into Quentin or one of the other characters that they otherwise couldn’t believably have which helps them defeat some evil later in the book, and, oh, they find a way into Fillory.

I kept reading, thinking, “okay, something interesting is bound to happen next, right?” and I was rewarded with plot elements that are never tied up, characters that are never seen again or were otherwise unnecessary, and a total repeat of the entire Harry Potter and Chronicles of Narnia except with different names, lots of cursing, and a bit of Tolkien thrown in.

I don’t read much fantasy, and this is why: There is a moment when most of the loose ends are brought back together, the bigger more demanding questions are answered, and characters are more or less safe or sound. This is not the end of the book. I know why books don’t end here, there’s always one or two other questions, or a character’s unwillingness to just stay put. Personally, if I ever write a fantasy/adventure novel, it’s just going to end there. No quest back home. There won’t be fifty more pages dedicated to healing and displaying how the hero can utilize all the fantastic things he learned on his quest. To me, those parts are the most boring to read (with the exception of Lord of the Rings, where I think it was written quite well, though I admit that sometimes I don’t even watch the end of the movie).

It’s at this point when I think: “When will this adventure end? I’m already done reading it.” I always want to close the book and start something else, and by rights I probably should… but I figure it’s so rare that I read a book like this that I might as well read it to the end.

Was The Magicians a bad book? No, it really wasn’t. Aside from the obvious copycat elements, the main characters were strongly developed, the description was beautifully executed, and I didn’t put it down after the first chapter, thinking: “This book is going to suck, I shouldn’t waste my time.” I wanted to keep reading not out of loyalty to something I’d started, but because it was well-composed. I want to read another of his books just for the writing style.

Do I otherwise recommend it? Probably not, unless you’re into this sort of thing and don’t care that it’s just like those other books… It’s opened for a sequel at the end, and that worries me; either I’ll have to read it, if I remember, or it’s just done open-ended and he did that out of spite for people like me who complain about things that aren’t quite sewn together well enough.

My life has been one weird, big, understandably discomforting ball of stress the past few months. I moved out of my apartment and lost all my independence by moving in with my parents. I told everyone and convinced myself it was “just temporary,” only for “a few months;” I needed to “gather myself financially” and “figure things out.” It was all true, and still more or less is, except I didn’t count on my time at my parents’ house being so incredibly stressful. Among other reasons, I have no privacy, which makes it very difficult to read (they have the TV going almost 24/7, and as someone who spent the last year or more without television to even blare on in the background, it’s become a particularly irritating noise). Reading is my escape. Failing that, I like to write. However, I can’t write when I’m stressed, because there’s to much of the “else” on my mind to concentrate on anything specific.

This is also why I haven’t been able to write reviews (not that I’ve been reading much anyway). Or posts in my personal blog. (Plus my Internet has gone above and beyond all expectations in unreliability. It’s quite impressive.)

In any case, it seems to be picking up, maybe because of some things I can’t yet mention (they’re not set in stone), maybe because I’ve realized I need to take more time for me… I’ve been more creative lately, and might even have a redesign for this site soon. Most importantly, though, I’ve been reading. I finished some books I started before the summer began, and others I started and finished within a week. I’m happy it’s coming back to me, and I hope that means I can start writing here again.

Wild Mind by Natalie Goldberg has been a big help. I haven’t written on every prompt, but I’ve written on enough to make this book one of my Top 5 for any aspiring writers, and I quickly told all my writer friends about it as soon as I’d read just the first few chapters. (Annie Dillard’s The Writing Life is also on that list, as well as [your favorite book here], because it might always be the kind of inspiration you need to get something going.) Even if one of the prompts don’t get me, one of her tales does; I rarely pick up this book, even just to reread, and don’t find something pop into my head, some idea I can hash out. It’s all about sitting down and writing and ignoring that nagging itch that you’re not good at it, or it’s not worth it, or your ideas stink. In the end, they never do. You always feel a little proud, even if you’re afraid to show anyone. Wild Mind helps you conquer those fears and get your words out.

Also: the graphic novel adaptation of Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. I can always count on him to respark some kind of hope that I’ll be able to sit through a whole book again, because I can never put his down. In the past month, my reading bug has come back (thankfully), and I’ve been reading some of those books about books I’ve collected in my many years of spending money on things I don’t necessarily need. Blind Submission by Debra Ginsberg was an unexpected semi-thriller; I didn’t read further on the dust jacket than “Angel was a bookseller.” I do like the ones set in bookstores, despite this book’s claim that literary novels don’t sell. I couldn’t put this down, though the ending seemed quick. I thought a bit about that; the endings seem quick in a lot of the books I’ve been reading lately, and I wonder if that’s because I care about the characters and don’t want it to end, or because I’m actually recognizing a change in pace, a “rush” to get things done in time for the publication date or whatever else may have caused the book to end so abruptly. It seems like most of the books I’ve read have done that (though certainly not all of them). Do you find that most of what you read tends to feel rushed/abruptly end?

Sometime at the beginning of the summer I picked up The Glamorous (Double) Life of Isabella Bookbinder by Holly McQueen which was good to start, interesting as it went along, but annoying in the end. I don’t mean plotwise; it wasn’t like anything I’d read before, had the necessary twist. But I didn’t like the main character. I found her so annoying that I kept hoping that she’d fail in the end. Yes, that’s right; I wanted the heroine of the novel to fall. I wanted the villians to win! They did their job; they were written correctly. I wanted them to suffer as much as they deserved, but they were still plainly less irritating than Isabella Bookbinder, who lied to everyone in her life constantly, cared only about her appearance, and was actually incredibly stupid. All the same, I’ve always thought a book that gets a reaction out of someone must have been pretty well written (unless it was the bad writing which caused the reaction–not so in this case, unless you consider writing a disliked main character ‘bad writing’), so on my end it’s one of those “pick it up and see how you like it, though I didn’t really” recommendations.

Otherwise I’ve been getting rude comments about my reading of Mein Kampf (not a book to read on an airplane, apparently), I started Peter Rushforth’s Pinkerton’s Sister and quickly realized that since I’ve never read Jane Eyre I probably won’t understand it very well, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Adventures of Sherlock Holmes has finally made an appearance in my house and will likely be devoured soon. All in all, it’s been a terrible summer for my reading habits, but I hope this fall they’ll pick up and I can get back into reviewing again. I finally have a bedside lamp, and I plan to make very good use of it!

Fiction

Jackie from Literary Escapism shares her thoughts on the book What Would Jane Austen Do? by Laurie Brown, which, “had a very simple story that not only worked well, but completely sucked me in.”

Christina from Jackets and Covers “flew through the 324 pages” of The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde, as did Amanda from The Zen Leaf, as she shares in her review of the same book. Amanda also shares her thoughts on Lost in a Good Book by the same author, and she can’t wait to read the next in the series!

Heather from Age 30+ listened to People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks and called it “best recorded book that [she has] listened to in quite some time.”

Cynthia from Catching Days writes a bit about Stories from Shakespeare and The Shadow of the Wind as she shares the path of an old book newly acquired.

Sarah from Puss Reboots shares her thoughts on the book The Secret of Lost Things by Sheridan Hay and points out that though there are flaws, the “connection [she] felt with the book was so strong [she didn't] care about any of them.”

I’d also like to share my thoughts on Inkheart by Cornelia Funke. “One moment I felt my heart constrict, the next my mouth was watering for some apricots, then I found myself feeling extremely triumphant as one of the characters defeated her demons and shone brightly.”

Nonfiction/Essays

Rebecca from Lost in Books read and reviewed Good Books Lately by Ellen Moore and Kira Stevens, which “gives greedy readers and book club members a lot to chew on.”

Rebecca from Rebecca Reads “loved the short insights into other’s lives” as she read The Book That Changed My Life, edited by Roxanne J. Coady and Joy Johannesson. Heather from Age 30+ calls this the “the perfect ‘go to’ book” in her review of the same book. She also shares her thoughts on Outwitting History: The Amazing Adventures of a Man Who Rescued a Million Yiddish Books by Aaron Lansky, which she LOVED enough for all-caps, and Being Written by William Conesc, which was “unlike anything [she'd] read before, and in a good way.”

Ana from Things Mean A Lot enjoyed the book Feeling Like a Kid by Jerry Griswold, and the “deep respect the author clearly has for children and the way they experience the world.”

Florinda from The 3 R’s Blog shares her thoughts on the book So Many Books, So Little Time by Sara Nelson, a “relatively fast, and very enjoyable, reading experience.”

Nicole from Linus’s Blanket was prepared to throw How to Read and Why by Harold Bloom “across the room a few times, but that’s what made this book so much fun for me. It was like having a spirited conversation with someone who’s really knowledgeable about the topic at hand.”

Ali from Worducopia shares some delicious looking cook books, including Read It and Eat It: A month-by-month guide to scintillating book club selections and mouthwatering menus by Sarah Gardner.

I’d also like to share my thoughts (however old :P) about Lynne Sharon Schwartz’s Ruined By Reading and How To Talk About Books You Haven’t Read by Pierre Bayard.

Next Edition

The next edition of the carnival is on Paranormal Fiction, which I’m also looking forward to. I don’t review a lot of it, but I do read some of it (in fact, I’m updating my books read list with J.R. Ward’s recent hardback, Lover Avenged, as I type this post :P). The deadline for submission is June 12, and is hosted by the Bookworms Carnival website. If you have anything to submit, the contact email is bookwormscarnival[@]gmail.com.