Average Girl Reads

I was checking out a review at The Last Book I Read in which the author linked to a NY Times article about losing our reading innocence. The author, Michelle Slatalla, posits that it is more difficult to abandon ourselves to a book once we become adults because we have become more sophisticated and know where the plot is going before the author takes us there.

I'm not sure that is the case with me. As regular readers know, I've been working my way through Lori Wick's catalog of Christian romances. You can see where those books are going before you even crack the cover, yet they have come closer to can't-put-it-down status than anything else I've read in the past six months. Her books are so accessible that I couldn't help being drawn in, and reading them made me almost feel like I was back in my reading heyday.

My problem is closer to the other excuse Slatalla mentioned in her article: the pressure of being an adult. Unless a book is an absolute page-turner, I always have that little voice in my head that tells me I should be doing housework. As a teenager, I could block out the world and give myself over to a book, no matter how predictable the plot was. Nowadays I either think I should be handling other responsibilities or at least reading more "important" literary works.

This loss of reading innocence is part of the reason why I am so up in arms about the Accelerated Reader program at my kids' schools. There is so much pressure to earn points that they don't have time for fun reading, and now is the time to do it. By the time they get to my age, they will have even less time for fun reading. I want my kids to enjoy the magic of getting lost in a book before the chance slips away.

This week I am reading Atonement, the book by Ian McEwan that was the basis of the 2007 film starring Keira Knightley. An acquaintance of mine is working on the 1001 Books list and this is the book she is starting with, so I decided to read it with her. It is not going well. I'm less than 100 pages in and I've already gone into skimming mode.

My biggest problem is the length of the paragraphs. Right now I am looking at a paragraph that starts at the top of page 82 and ends on page 84! I'm reading the large-print edition and I know that affects the formatting, but that would be a seriously long paragraph even in regular print. Faced with a large unbroken blocks of type like that, my mind starts to wander and I lose interest in the story. If McEwan is imparting some profound wisdom in those passages, I am likely to miss them.

Another thing I've noticed is the shortage of dialogue or action. Perhaps that is the difference between literature and popular fiction. Since embarking on this reading adventure, I've noticed that the more literary novels have pages and pages of the characters' inner thoughts and feelings while genre novels (chick lit, mystery, sci-fi, etc) get down to business more quickly. When I was younger, I stuck my nose up in the air whenever I saw my friends reading what I considered trashy romance and throwaway fantasy novels. It is difficult for me to admit, but I think I prefer those sorts of books now.

With so many other things on my mind, I want a story that immediately grabs me and pulls me along. Atonement isn't doing that for me, but I am going to at least continue skimming through it to get the gist of the plot. Hopefully I will have better luck with my next book.

I started this blog to get more out of my reading, but I'm feeling aimless. I either pick books that don't merit discusssion or I pick meaty books but don't know how to pull the choice bits out of them. My reviews end up saying little more than, "I hated this book" or "It was a good book". I'll be attacking the 1001 Books list soon and I think those book deserve more than that.

To help me with my review writing, I've thought about using reading guides. I've seen guides for many books on author and publisher sites. A set of questions specific to a book may be what I need to start the flow of ideas for a review. I don't have trouble discussing a book with someone else who has read it and asks me about it; it is more difficult to start the discussion with myself, which is basically what a blog post is.

QUESTION: Do any of you using reading guides for your blog posts or with your book clubs?

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My graphic novel week was long overdue, so I needed to do it before the books were overdue, as well. I finished off four last week:

Jellaby by Kean Soo
Robots Gone Wild! by Trina Robbins
Good as Lily by Derek Kirk Kim
Janes in Love by Cecil Castellucci

I also read Seedfolks (a YA book about a community garden) and listened to two audiobooks: The Beach House by Jane Green and Crazy Gone Love by Cate Brody.

I'm at loose ends as far as reading for this week because I'm not sure what I'm in the mood to read. Atonement, one of the 1001 Books, is on my library request list but I'm not sure if it will be available when we do the pickup on Monday. Perhaps this would be a good week to start whittling down my TBR list.

The Beach House by Jane Green

My review

rating: 2 of 5 stars
This audiobook follows a group of people who become friends when they all rent a room in a historic house on the island of Nantucket. The reader, Cassandra Campbell, is excellent. She helps you distinguish between the characters without doing obvious voices and she read the children's parts without any annoying baby talk.

For a story about a beach house, it seemed to take the characters forever to get to the beach! Green chose to give the reader a lengthy look at the circumstances that led up to each character needing a getaway. There were long passages about what was going on in each person's mind. While many of the observations were fascinating, I sometimes wished there was more dialogue.


View all my reviews.

Seedfolks by Paul Fleischman

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
This is a story about an empty lot in Cleveland that is transformed from a junk heap to a community garden. Each of the 13 chapters is told from the perspective of a different participant. The community members are a regular Rainbow Coalition: black, white, Latino, Indian, Korean, etc.



The first two chapters explain how the garden gets started. The line about the young Asian girl trying to get her dead father to see her by planting seeds made me cry! I was also touched by the old lady who didn't even know why the girl planted the seeds but wanted to help her, anyway.



This is a book aimed at young adults, but I don't think you have to be a teenager to enjoy it. I think it is the perfect little story to read in February as you are preparing to resurrect your own garden.


View all my reviews.

Good as Lily by Derek Kirk Kim

My review

rating: 3 of 5 stars
This book is proof that you can't always trust that books from the same line are equal. I read Plain Janes before this one, and it was safe to hand to my youngest son. This one is not. None of the art is graphic, but it contains a few sexual references that are OK for my 16-year-old, but not for my 12- and 10-year-olds.



The story itself is pretty good. A girl finds three other versions of herself, two from the future and one from the past. She spends the bulk of the book trying to figure out what to do with them. The reader doesn't find out what the title means until 2/3 of the way through the book and the emotional impact of this is not played up as much I thought it should be. However, that is a minor gripe.



Unlike Plain Janes, this is a stand-alone story. If you are looking for a quick read with a happy ending, then pick up Good as Lily.


View all my reviews.

Robots Gone Wild by Trina Robbins

My review

rating: 2 of 5 stars
This comic book compilation is about a teenage female superhero, Go Girl!, who takes over from her mother who was a superhero called Go-Go Girl! in the 1970s. It is the type of comic that reminds of the kind I read when I was a kid. The stories are simple and nothing really scary happens. It makes me think of something like The Archies. It is too simplistic to appeal to adults, but you could definitely hand it to an 8-year-old without worrying about troublesome content.


View all my reviews.

Jellaby Vol. 1 by Kean Soo

My review

rating: 3 of 5 stars
This is a graphic novel about a girl named Portia who moves to a new town. Portia doesn't fit in with any of the kids at school and her mom works so much that she barely pays attention. When she finds a purple monster in the woods who seems lonely, taking care of him gives Portia a purpose.

The art work is all done in shades of purple. It is clean and uncluttered, which makes it easy to follow the action. The story isn't overly wordy, but there is enough text to make the story clear. I'm not a fan of wordless books, but I don't mind if they are on the minimalist side.

Other elements of the story include a classmate that Portia saves from a bully and a mystery about where Portia's father has gone. I found the story melancholy, but my 12-year-old C1 is anxiously awaiting the next book.


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Last week, I mentioned several ideas about giving my 2009 reading and blogging some direction. I'm not very good with goals, but I keeping trying! Here are a few more thoughts on the subject.

1. I opened the 1001 Books spreadsheet and found that I've only read 22 of the books! That means that I would have to read about 25 books a year until I die to finish the list. Between the books that aren't available at my library and the books that don't appeal to me, I figure that I can chop the list in half. An acquaintance of mine is also pulling books from the list so maybe I will be more motivated if I have someone with whom I can discuss the books.

2. As of today, I have 112 books on my Goodread TBR list. It was less than that at the beginning of 2009, but I keep adding more books. I use my TBR list to keep track of any books I hear about on TV or radio, so I will probably keep adding books. I just want to see if I can have it below 112 books by the end of the year.

Here is the Musing Monday prompt from the Just One More Page blog:

Today’s MUSING MONDAYS post is about book stores…

How do you choose what do buy from your local bookstore? Do you have a list, or just browse? What is the selection in your book store like? Do you find what you're looking for? Do you feel pressured to buy the kind of books the store makes prominent? (question courtesy of MizB)

Since I don't drive, I don't go browse at the local bookstores often. The closest shop to me is part of a chain -- Books-A-Million. I only make there about three times a year, and that is usually to buy coffee and a specialty magazine like Vogue Knitting. Since that is all I ever go to the shop for, I guess I always find what I'm looking for!

If you have read any of my three blogs, you know that I have trouble parting with money. I'm not necessarily cheap, but I'm always worried that I will make the wrong decision when spending money. In the case of books, there is also the notion that I will be wasting money because I generally read books only once. Because of all this, I am not tempted by the books that have the big displays at the front of the shop. The books that I usually feel the need to own are manuals that I can use again like cookbooks or knitting books, and that is only after I've checked them out from the library.

At the beginning of the year, a scant 30 days ago, I said that I wasn't going to join any challenges or set any goals for my 2009 reading. To read for fun was my only aim. However, after finding out that someone in my Bible study group is trying to work her way through the "1001 Books To Read Before You Die" list, I thought I might want to get back to that as well. Then that got me to thinking about other things I might want to accomplish and document on this blog. Here's my short list:

1. I want to see how many books I can finish from the 1001 Books list. I'm not setting a certain number because I chafe against goals and restrictions. I want to chart my progress on the Arikuyomi spreadsheet -- if I can find a free program that will open the blasted thing!

2. I want to see how low I can get the total number of titles on my TBR list at Goodreads. Lately I've been reading a lot of books that aren't on my list. This year I will attempt to be less random and construct and pull my library requests from the TBR list.

3. I will work on writing better book reviews for this blog. Previously, I've been cutting myself some slack and using the excuse that this blog is more about impressions of the books rather than proper reviews. However, I haven't been pleased with my posts as of late, so I plan to learn more about the elements of informative book reviews.

It will take me a couple weeks to request books from my list, so this week is all about the graphic novels. I am currently reading American Born Chinese, and I have five others waiting in my stack. I bet you guys are glad that I've moved beyond the romances for the moment!