Literary Friday: Purchased Books - I couldn't do it!

 OK, so I couldn't do it! I found some books at the thrift that I couldn't pass by because they sparked my interest. I've been trying to learn yoga at home. I have video's watched YouTube, purchased how to video's but I still feel lost. So I turned to reading, with a book I can reference it to things I quite don't understand. I like the stick drawings and its set up with tabs for a weekly schedule that you follow.
(Goodreads excerpt) Too busy to attend yoga class but can't be bothered to read the endless instructions in the latest yoga book? In OM Yoga: A Daily Practice, celebrated yoga instructor Cyndi Lee brings the rigors and reqards of yoga class to the home with a totally unique method of teaching. Instead of wordy directiosn and minimal pictures, each series of asanas is communicated entirely through easy-to-follow illustrations and tips. Designed in a practical, concealed Wire-O format that lays flat on the floor while being used, OM Yoga is organized in tabbed sections for each day of the week. Monday is devoted to the Sun Salutation to welcome the week's start. Thursday's practice focusses on sitting poses, when the week's energy is dwindling. When joined together, each day's recipe cultivates a yoga practice that is challenging, energizing, and restorative. Including sections on meditation, breathing, and do-it-yourself yoga "recipes" for all levels, OM Yoga: A Guide to Daily Practice creates the possibility for a meaningful yoga practice in the privacy of the home.

The second book is about publishing your own artwork and design. If you have not attended higher learning for art and producing your work it is an insight of how trained artist do it themselves.

(Goodreads excerpt) Not satisfied with the new T-shirts on sale at the local mall? Maybe you'd like a wedding invitation that expresses your own vision, not your party planner's? How about some personalized stationery? An upgrade to your website? A business card? A poster for your political campaign? A CD package for your band? Sound good? Then get up off your couch and Design It Yourself! Avoid graphic identity theft: build your own. Ellen Lupton, bestselling author of Thinking with Type, will show you how. DIY: Design It Yourself, provides you with all the tools you'll need to create your own projects, from conception through production. Here you will find:

- simple ideas on how you can "think like a designer"

- clear and coherent explanations of design technologies, from silk-screening to web development

- what materials you'll need to get your job done

- where to find and buy them

- how much time and experience your project demands

- diagrams that show how to handle complex tasks

- basic typographic dos and don'ts

- the history and theory of the DIY design movement

- hundreds of innovative and beautiful projects for inspiration

No more excuses. With this book, virtually any design task is within your grasp. Just do it (yourself)!

Literary Friday: The Magicians

Literary Friday: The book that I have been reading this week is "The Magicians" by Lev Grossman. I chose this book because NPR touted it as Harry Potter for grown-ups. It could have been a wonderful fantasy, however the only thing that makes it grown-up are the intimate scenes and obscene language, which I don't think any deceit adult would use. I wish they would put a rating on books so I would know that it is something I don't want to read.
The author seem to take things from Harry Potter and Chronicles of Narnia and married them into his story. This is actually a series but I think I'm going to stop at book one.

Literary Friday: Doubled Booked

It's Literary Friday and I am doubled-booked for this week of reading I chose Mr. and Mrs. Prince the true story of a remarkable pre-Civil War African-American family, as well as the challenges that faced African-Americans who lived in the North versus the slaves who lived in the South. Mr. and Mrs. Prince moved out of slavery to owning their own land. Lucy Prince was the first African-American Poet. Abijah Prince served in the French and Indian War. They own land when people of their race in the south and north were still slaves.

Reading about slavery is always hard, so I chose a mystery to go along with it, called Niceville by Carsten  Stroud. Something is wrong in Niceville, evil lurks. It begins with the disappearance of a young boy.  who literary vanishes in front of surveillance camera while looking through a mirror.

Literary Friday: Currently Reading

 Literary Friday -The book I chose to read this week is called Amped by Daniel H. Wilson. I read his Sci-fi book Robopocalypse which I chose because of the title.
In Amped people are implanted with devices to help cure medical deficiencies, but as a result they become the strongest and smartest people. Pure humans become afraid of them and began to make laws against anyone who has a device.The plot is good but the profanity drops it down two stars for me.

Literary Friday

I am currently reading How I Came to Sparkle Again by Kaya McLaren. The title may fool you, Sparkle is a ski town in Colorado. I am on page 94, so far its okay but the writer likes to use profanity. I just never understand why an educated person cannot use more of their word knowledge to convey a point other than profanity. I would like this book a lot more if she could of use wit instead of cursing.
I am currently on a no book buying challenge for 2016. Currently I have not purchased any books, but I am keeping a list of books I would like to purchase:
1. Square Foot Gardening Cookbook by Mel Batholomew
2. Learning to Live in the Now
3. The Power of Discipline by Brian Tracey

My Reads: A Growing Gardener

I've had this book on my shelf for a while. Although I would glance at the wonderful illustrations by the author I've just recently picked it up to read. Abbie makes you want to see her garden, and look up people like the plant-man. I really enjoyed this gardening book. And I did look up the people she mentioned. It shows that life moves on and you cannot know the future.
However take a look inside, she has these little mini book pages inside. She is a wonderful artist.

Oh! So Many Books

Whenever I go into a store, library, or any place where the are a collection of books I want to read them all, look in them all. Reading has taken me to so many different places, era's, and worlds how can you not love reading.

Anthropology display

I buy books from everywhere and gladly have no problem looking in the free bins. My latest read came from the Dollar Store. I have collected several great reads for only a $1. The title was "A Cup of Friendship" by Deborah Rodriguez,   the story of a remarkable coffee shop in the heart of Afghanistan, and the men and women who meet there — thrown together by circumstance, bonded by secrets, and united in an extraordinary friendship.  I am so glad to be a woman in America, that's what this book made me feel the most. It's about friendship but it also deals with the harshness that the women of that country must live through.

I am a Runner!

 I am a runner. I'm no professional but, I love to wake up at 5 a.m. put on my running gear and go. My neighborhood is great for short runs and we live close to a trail for long runs. I am happy with my short run pace, if only I could keep it when I run longer.

I've met a lot of older women in their 70's who are my role models. They still get out there and do it. That's the way I want to be.

Although I am not consistent with my art, I can say I am at running and reading. I don't feel like I'm in my fifties.

Literary Friday

So I've been MIA for a while, but still reading.  I am currently reading The Scavenger's Manifesto. It's about being more eco-minded, how to create a lifestyle out of recycling, reusing, and repurposing rather than buying new. I must admit that I have not been faithful to it. I started reading on April 30, but picked up four other books and completed them Broken Harbor (2 stars); 2030 -The Real Story of What Happens to America (2 stars); Into Thin Air - A Personal Account of the Mount Everest Disaster (4 stars); The Hunter - A Chinese Folktale (4 stars).
Hopefully this week I'll finish The Scavengers Manifesto.
I also wanted to share this great book find at Thrift store. Leather bound books for $4 a piece published 1979. I really don't care about date but I love leather bound books. These look like new, they were never opened.

Literary Friday - Double Book

I'm doubled booked once again. Sometimes you just can't make up your mind. I initially picked up Wicked Ways by Donna Hill about murder and revenge. To my great joy while searching the library catalog I found out that Alan Bradley wrote another Flavia de Luce mystery, Speaking From Among the Bones. I have read all of his other books in this series and I have never been disappointed. Flavia is a 12 year old mystery sleuth that also dabbles in chemistry. Flavia stumbles across another dead body, thus begins the mystery. Whenever I read one of his books it as though I am there. I love his detail in describing everything. Check out the cute little video below of one of his previous books. The illustration is mine of Flavia.



Flavia de Luce

Literary Friday

I am currently reading The End of Your Life Book Club by Will Schwalbe.“What are you reading?”
That’s the question Will Schwalbe asks his mother, Mary Anne, as they sit in the waiting room of the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.
Will and Mary Anne share their hopes and concerns with each other—and rediscover their lives—through their favorite books. When they read, they aren’t a sick person and a well person, but a mother and a son taking a journey together. The result is a profoundly moving tale of loss that is also a joyful, and often humorous, celebration of life: Will’s love letter to his mother, and theirs to the printed page. ( Excerpt from Goodreads review)
I love reading books with books included. Joy fills my heart when I have a shared read with others. Here is my list of shared books with the author and his mother:
Little Woman by Louisa May Alcott
Jane Austens Books
The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Mureil Barbery
The Holy Bible
People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks
Alice Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
Charlie & Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
Howard's End by E.M. Foster
Anne Frank: The Dairy of a Young Girl
Loed of the Flies by William Golding
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Steig Larsson
The Story of Ferdinand by Munro Leaf
The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis
On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan
Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
Toni Morrisons Books
The Railway Children by Edith Nesbit
The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch
Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak
William Shakespeare
The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien

Literary Friday

I am currently reading The Sandcastle Girls by Chris Bohjalian. He is an excellent fiction storyteller. Hopefully I will enjoy this story too.

     

I just finished reading Shift by Charolette Agell about a fifteen year-old Adrian Havoc's world. . The end of the world as we know it, or is there some plot by the Homestate a.k.a. government to manipulate us. Homestate rules every aspect of society: identity cards need to be carried at all times, evolution is a forbidden topic of discussion, and religious education is enforced in daily "rapture" doses. A rumor is being spread about a Shift in the universe. Can it really be the end of the world.

I enjoyed the story for this young adult book. What I did not enjoy was the use of profanity. I did not expect such language to be appropiate in a book directed at the young. My children said that I would be shocked if I worked at a high school.
The plot was good. This was a easy read if you are looking for light. A book that draws you in as you read and makes you want to know what happens next.

Book #58

So we are almost at years end and I'm attempting my goal of 60 books read for 2010. This morning I at 5am I could not get my husband out of the bed to go running so I finished reading a novel called Christmas Letters by Lee Smith. I meant to read it before Christmas. It's a collection of Christmas letters spanning three generations.

I'm sure that you've probably received one of those end-of-the-year summaries. I tend not to like these letters because everything sounds so perfect and I don't know about your life but mine can get pretty messy and I feel like a hypocrite if I only report the good stuff, especially when there's so many other things are pressing on my heart. I know that everyone will say but who wants to hear about your child struggling in school and the expensive tutors and all the parent involvement is not helping and how your child's self esteem is lowering because they are trying. No one wants to hear that.

I actually liked the book and all of the letters were not "my family is perfect and yours is not." It was a little corny but I'm okay with corny. I have 1 more book to go and I will finish reading Revelations on the 31. I always read through the entire Bible every year and I count it as 1 book which will give me a total of 60. I haven't decided what my goal for 2011. I usually try to do an increase but I don't know if I can make it to 65.

Reading

I just finished reading The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson, finally a book that really should be on the best seller list. It was a little racey for me in some area but it had a good story line. I don't know how some books are chosen for the best seller list, because The Emperor's Children made the list and it was horrible, to me it was just paragraph's with a lot of unknown words. Steig Larsson is continuing the story with tThe Girl Who Played with Fire I think I'll read that. I like series.

Inkdeath a real page turner.

I love to read a book that is so well written that you can't wait until the end to find out what happens but at the same time you don't want it to be over. I couldn't put this book down and when I did have to I couldn't stop thinking about it. This book is the conclusion to the Inkheart trilogy. Which was also an excellent book. However don't be fooled by that disastrous thing they called a movie Inkheart. Every time I see the trailer I am filled with disgust. They have ruin a really good book. My children look at me every time they preview it on tv and I start complaining. I don't want to see how they butcher such a wonderful story. Well if you have never read Inkheart I highly recommend it. The second book called Inkspell took me a little while to get into but it was very satisfying also. After I finished Inkdeath I wanted to read it over again. I was in the Ink world. It is not a short read, 663 pages but oh so good. Put it on your reading list after you have finished the 1st two books.Inkdeath by Cornelia Funke