This week’s read – The lovely bones

The Lovely Bone by Alice Sebold is one of those books that the English department love to recommend to the Int2 girls.  ”It’s really sad”, they say, “you’ll love it”.

They are right is is sad, though not in as depressing a way as might be expected given the narrator is a murdered 14 year old girl – Susie Salmon.

I can see why the english teachers like it – lots of character development and relationships to discuss plus the narration perspective. I did like it, it was easy to read and I wanted to know what happened. Despite the fact that ultimately not much did happen – life just carried on.

I was slightly disappointed with the ending – Sebold tried to wrap everything up at the end but I didn’t like the way she closed the Ruth and Ray characters relationship with Susie.

Light and easy to read but I’d recommend a box of tissues on hand.

Shrink Plastic fun

For a Senior Section craft I was making a charm bracelet using Shrink Plastic.

I had some spare so I decided to make myself a pair of jigsaw earrings to wear at Capital Jig in October.

I used 2mm link chain. I picture makes them look much darker than they really are – I used crayola metalic pens to colour in the jigsaw peices.

Kateri Tekahkwitha

There was exciting news recently that Kateri Tekahkwitha could be on the verge of becoming a Saint. See here for news report

In the meantime I treated my namesake, Goddaughter and self to a felt version of her from Saintly Silver on etsy. Genius!

Holiday Reading

A week off work so I set myself a book a day challenge – and I nearly managed.

Monday and Tuesday – Oscar Wilde and the Ring of Death by Giles Brandreth

I rather liked this. I’ve no idea if it is historically accurate but it was fun and used lot’s of Wilde quotes in the text (apparently Wilde did ‘try out’ phrases with friends prior to their appearing in his work). Wilde has Sherlock Holmes-esque observational skills and uses these to the full to solve the murder and like all good crimes I got to the end amazed by the solution but sure that if I read it again all the clues would be staring me in the face.

Wednesday – Library Confidential : Oddballs, Geeks and Gangstas in the public library by Don Borchert

It claims to put the Shh! in shocking. I’d say it is a pretty accurate of life in the public library and in my own experience with toy gun fights before 8:30am, stolen pot plants and massive arguments over a 15p fine I’ve experienced a very similar range of adventures during my library career so far. Though I dare say for those who think the library is a quiet place it probably is a shocker. Worth reading since it was quite amusing but mainly assured me that my experience is only to be expected.

Thursday – The Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor.

This was excellent! Very much a teen book so easy to read but brilliant. It’s a reworking of Alice in Wonderland – less full of drug induced weirdness but much darker and bloody. I loved the way the various characters are re-worked I loved the Mad Hatter and the Cheshire Cat! The sequel ‘Seeing Redd’ has just been moved to my must read book pile.

Friday – The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

This has been moved on and off the read pile for a while but it’s one of seven books I’m challenging myself to read by February. I really liked it. I dare say I’m missing the deeper meanings but I loved the description of the opulence and glamor of Gatsby.  I really liked the tragedy of it all and the idea that time is always moving forward, never letting you return to the past. I loved the line Meyer Wolfshiem says near the end;

“Let us learn to show our friendship for a man when he is alive and not after he is dead.”

Oscar Wilde

I love Oscar Wilde and I’m on a bit of a Wilde streak. I can’t wait to see the new ‘Dorian Gray‘ movie with Ben Barnes as Gray himself. I’ve added ‘The Importance of Being Ernest’ and ‘The Ideal Husband’ to my Love Film wish list and I’ve just read ‘Nothing…except my genius’ a collection of Wilde’s quotes from Penguin.  Now this wasn’t life changing, I’ve read or heard most of the material included but it was nice to refresh the memories and Stephen Fry’s introduction is great. He played Wilde in a movie of the same name and talks about becoming Wilde or at least the comment of others about him becoming Wilde.

It was missing my favourite quote though -

“We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.”

Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry

My Aunt Teri gave me a copy of ‘Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry’ by Mildred D. Taylor years ago. I trusted her that it was an excellent book and worth reading but it never made it into the read pile. Well that changed this week and I read it – she was right it was excellent.

The story is told over a year through the eyes of Cassie (a 9 year old black girl in 1933 Mississippi). During the year her world changes as she discovers what her position in society is, or at least what the white folks who live nearby think it is, and why their opinion counts for so much. The warmth and love within her family gives an excellent grounding and allows for some truly horrific things to happen but because of Cassie’s faith in her family you always felt they would work out. Cassie’s protected perspective means the story came in bits of over-heard conversation or playground gossip so it takes a while for the whole picture to emerge and the consequences of actions to be revealed.

I think ‘I know why the cadge bird sings’ by Maya Angelou or ‘To Kill a Mocking Bird’ by Harper Lee would be logical progressions. Another teen read might be ‘Yankee Girl’ by Mary Ann Rodman is about a slightly older black girl, in 1960s Mississippi where race is a still an issue.

On a closer to home front I went to see the play ‘The Bondagers’ by Sue Glover recently. Set on Scottish Borders Farms in the 19th Century the women bondagers were little better off than slaves. Hired at a market each year to work on the farms, they were dependent on the farmers. It has similar themes of powerlessness for main characters and their desire to protect each other is limited by the confines of their positions in society.

Books with Bite

First display of the year is books beyond Twilight. Vampire theme they include Dracula and The Historian. There are some of the recent reprints of past girly vampire books but there is also ‘Parliament of blood’ by Justin Richards , Vampirates Series by Justin Somper, Piggies by Nick Gifford (this one is all about what if Vampires were the norm and humans kept for food) and Vampire Kisses by Ellen Schreiber (Manga version)

The poster is the official ALA one I got it through Gresswell, the table cloth a Halloween one from the supermarket bats and lettering are my own The apple poster is promoting my new book group – I got the image from Office clip art.

Project Idea

Now I love myths and legends, especially mythic creatures. I think this might be my new favourite.

It’s a Grave Guardian Beast (Zhenmu Shou) from China (480-221BC) and is made of wood with polychrome pigments and lacquer horns.

As you’d expect with any archaeological item such as this they don’t really know what they were for. They have found a number of these antlered figures with long tongues in tombs of this time. Best guess is that since they are found at the head of the coffin they might be to protect the dead from evil. Apparently they can also come with a double head.

I was also very fond of this fat dog from Mexico.

As seen at the Art Institute of Chicago

I spy with my little eye…

…a Matschie’s Tree Kangaroo! We saw them at Milwaukee zoo. I love these. I think they may be my new favourite animal.

They come from the rain forests in New Guinea and they are marsupials.

Guiding History

I just read “The Story of The Girl Guides in Scotland: 1908 -2000″ by Elizabeth Robertson.

It’s easy to read, interesting and informative though a tad erratic in it’s inclusion policy.  My favourite facts were:

The girl pictured here is Allison Cargill who was the first girl in Scotland to attempt Girl Scouting. She joined in with a local Scout troop and her and her friends called themselves the Cuckoo Patrol.

Senior Section first appeared in 1916 in Scotland (known as Senior Guides).

Lones in Scotland first appeared in 1919 (though apart from a couple of camp references and a couple of Queen’s Guides little mention is made).

The original cooks badge required you to either skin and cook a rabbit or pluck, truss and cook a chicken.

The first Scottish Commissioner (known at the time as Deputy Chief Commissioner) was Loelia Buchan-Hepburn – she was 19 when she took on the role.