Reading Anxiety

Besides constantly nagging my poor mother to buy me must haves like Nancy Drew Mysteries, poetry books, and two sets of encyclopedias... there was the Scholastic Book Club order form.



The Scholastic Book Club gave me much anxiety as a child. We'd get the book descriptions and order form and I'd start to feel dizzy. I'd want many of the books listed. My mother would only allow me to order one or (rarely) two. Bargaining with her was like going in to ask the boss for a raise every few weeks, and the boss just dreads seeing you, sometimes feels sorry for you, but no way in hell are you getting that raise.

Try to explain to a hardworking mom just why you can't live without Silly & Annoying Jokes & Riddles or yet another book about teenager who discovers she's adopted and has a meltdown. There were some kids at school who never ordered a book, but I only noticed the kids who flaunted the fact that they had ordered six books. (Six books!) I never ever ordered more than two books, and I agonized over the order form for days ~ like a true readaholic drama queen. Nevermind the fact that there were better books at the library. The Scholastic Book Club was like a cult and I was a fully hooked follower.

It's summertime and Holly is going away to college in the fall. She stops going steady with Bernie, meets Tony, and then uncovers a secret that threatens to shatter her life !

Reading & Food #1

One of the most interesting cookbooks I've come across is this one by Henry Hill (watch the film Goodfellas to see Henry as played by Ray Liotta.) Henry loves to cook, and while in the government's witness protection program, there were times when he was limited to buying groceries at the 7/11. As he moves around the USA he adapts his favorite recipes, and still manages to have wonderful Italian meals.

The main thing here is that the recipes all work and are crowd pleasers. When he can, Henry prefers to use the best ingredients and he certainly knows what he's talking about when it comes to food.

Also Cooking for Blokes by Duncan Anderson and Marian Walls is fun and useful. A great gift for any bloke.

Craig Claiborne's Kitchen Primer is a must for someone just starting out, but also useful for the more experienced as well.



When you move to the suburbs, whaddya get as gifts? books on cooking and books on gardening. After a few years, you start clearing some of them out. At one time we had hundreds of cookbooks, and I sold an ancient copy of "The Joy of Cooking" at a yard sale. My significant otter noticed the lack and purchased a new copy. Why? Because it tells you how to cook a squirrel.


(Index from The All-Purpose Cookbook Joy of Cooking by Irma S. Rombauer and Marion Rombauer Becker.)


As well as instructions on how to skin said squirrel.

(Illustrations in The... Joy of Cooking were done by Ginnie Hofmann and Beverly Warner.)

note: Gray squirrels are best, those little red ones are gamey and not very plump.

From The Library

I grabbed the Judi Dench biography quickly and left the Library. Later I realized it was about her career as an actress rather than a typical bio. It was still interesting, covering her career from it's beginnings until sometime before she did the movie *Chocolat with Juliette Binoche and Alfred Molina (and Johnny Depp. )


John Miller wrote the book (The proper title is: Judi Dench with a crack in her voice) and he also co-wrote John Gielgud's memoir An Actor and his Time. (which I plan to check out in the future.)

The Christian Science Monitor got it right when they said this book was "Compelling reading for anyone intrigued by actors and acting..." I am interested, but not intrigued, and so...








*When I was at Waterstones Bookshop in Belfast they had a huge sale going, and I got Chocolat and several other books by the same author (Joanne Harris) at a price I couldn't pass up. Her books are great for foodies to read. I spent a quiet afternoon in a hotel reading her novel Coastliners while a storm raged outside.

Kindle Reading

Currently reading Bird by Bird (Anne Lamott) Saw it on another blogger's desk , and 2 minutes later I was reading it thanks to the Kindle. I'm just dipping into this one every few days, and already have learned a lot from Lamott.
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just finished reading:

Captain Burle , The Death of Olivier Becaille , and Fécondité (all by Emile Zola)

Zola is a favorite of mine, and I liked finding things I hadn't read yet. Kindle has good collections of classics at bargain prices, so I'm enjoying a lot of essays and short fiction as well as some novels I'd never heard of before. The short work "The Death of Olivier Becaille" was a good read, and very chilling ~ it leaves the reader with many questions and would be excellent for a book group to discuss.

Captain Burle is a cautionary tale, and Fécondité (translated as Fruitfulness) shows the sweetest side of Zola, the man who loved children and mother earth, the man who had hope. Of course historical facts, politics and social commentary are all mixed in -- it was eye opening as all his works are.

Magazine Reading

I'll take a quick look at any magazine that comes my way now, but in my youth I was crazy for magazines just as I was for encyclopedias, dictionaries, manuals, handbooks, catalogs and maps. I'd collect an alarming number of magazines, getting bundles of old ones at The Salvation Army Store for a dime apiece. Sometimes the clerk just wanted to get rid of the bundles and would ask me to take as many as I could carry for free. I had a long list of favorites that included Scientific American, Redbook, Life, Psychology Today, Ms., Cosmopolitan, Time, Business Week, Popular Mechanics, and many others. I'd read the short fiction in Redbook, the formulaic tales of woe in True Story, look at all the advertising in the old magazines from the 1950's, and read about shipwrecks and polar bears in National Geographic. If I was stuck on a slow subway train an essay on cutworms became fascinating.

October-November

Good old Ed Koch ! Koch was our mayor for many years and never a dull moment. (Click to enlarge newspaper image)

The Election was much on my mind and I couldn't concentrate on blogging. I was sick of reading that our next president would be McCain. I honestly did not believe McCain could possibly win, but I hated hearing he might. I thought Obama would just squeak by and win it (by just enough that no one could take it away from him.) What was I reading? Mostly magazines and newspapers and Cherie Blair's memoir, Speaking For Myself on Kindle.

August - September Book List

I was very busy in August and just re-read a few Jane Austen novels besides some mass market crap not worth mentioning.
In September I slogged through some biographies ... (Stalin, Mussolini) Read a few spy novels ( enjoyed The Charm School by Nelson de Mille.) In August I received a gift - an Amazon Kindle, which I was unsure of at first. I ordered some free samples, a load of classics, and a few bestsellers and began to use the Kindle.