Great Books » Bookworm Broadcast

I’m so excited! Do you remember the other day when I was telling you how I had too many books to read and not enough time to read them? Well – guess what! I had a long wait in a doctor’s office waiting room and I was actually happy about it! What a nutjob I am, eh? Who me? No way! I just knew that meant I could READ! It is so often hard for grownups – with lots of icky obligations to take DEAR time. You know Drop Everything And Read? So I love when I am forced – I don’t have to sit there reading and have guilt in the back of my head over things that I really ‘should’ be getting done, you know?

Anyway, I had started The Giver back when school started, but, then my son had to take it back to school. It was his summer reading book and they were working on it in class. Then he finally brought it home, and I have been reading it little bits and pieces at a time – until yesterday! When I had two glorious hours sitting in the waiting room. I was in Heaven!

I really, really, really liked this book! Wikipedia calls it soft science fiction. Well, I guess ‘soft science fiction’ is my thing, then, because, I love stories like this.

I came home from the doctor’s office all excited and said to my fourteen-year old, who was home sick, “Patrick! I finished the book and it was great – I really loved it! And I realized there is another book that follows it – isn’t that great???”

To which he moaned.

Too funny! He had been entirely nonplussed with the book when he had to read it in seventh grade. He was even more nonplussed with the book he had to read for eighth grade! And it is even more of the type of story that his seventh grade brother and I love! I can’t remember the name of that one. I had begun reading it, when he rudely and crudely snatched it back from me to turn into his teacher. She told them that if they gave her their books, she would give them extra credit. So back it went! Poor Mama Bookworm!

I will have to check out the used book store in the town square and see if I can find it! And I will, of course, have to look for the two follow-up books to The Giver. (I just read on Wikipedia this morning that there are actually two of them!)
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Do you remember last night when I talked about my boys warming their mama’s heart and earned themselves some bookworm points? I hope you do! It was only two posts ago!

Well, I promised that I would tell you about the books that they ordered. I was actually pretty surprised, because, they are dragon books. Shawn is very into dragons, and Patrick hasn’t expressed that much interest in dragons, or even fantasy books, beyond Harry Potter, that is. The series is called The Dragon Lance Chronicles Trilogy and the authors are Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman. The books were published in 2001. I always have to know publish dates, it might just be an obsession of mine, but, that is one of the first things that I look at when looking at books that are new to me. Maybe you have that obsession, too? (Oh, actually – it seems that the set was put together in 2001 and the individual books were published earlier than that.)

(I’m so bummed that the picture came out so small, it is a nice looking set! But Amazon’s link-making is not cooperating with me today. Click through to Amazon and you can see it better.)

Anyway, I’m rather impressed with this series, as per the reader reviews. They have an overwhelming majority of good reviews. Several of the reviewers think that the series is better than The Lord of the Rings. Hm, that’s interesting, as that seems to be so popular right now.

Well, I can’t wait until they get here and the boys dig in to the books and tell me their opinions on the series!
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Just what is wrong with me?! I’m so silly! Do you remember when I told you how excited I was, because, I was going to be oiling my brain with intellectual literature? Well, I had bought these two great new books – and the other night as I was reading The Intellectual Devotional, I thought to myself, ‘Self, why aren’t I reading this to the children?’ We could all enjoy this – as a family!

The knowledge just comes in small bits, quick to read and easy to absorb. And quite often, what I read spurs me on to research more on the topic! I seriously am just loving this book! And I’m not sharing it with the family! What kind of ‘Mama Bookworm’ am I?

It could be a nice time for the family to sit together for a few minutes, enjoy each other’s company, and learn something all at the same time!

Well, I’m the only one home right now, so I guess this won’t start tonight. Mark and the kids are at Mark’s cousin’s house and I’m home blogging my little heart out. I suppose if they don’t get home too late tonight – we could go ahead and read it.

They are off of school for a week for fall break! Woohoo!

Ya’ll just don’t tell any of my bookworm friends what a knowledge-hoarder I’ve been, ok?

Oh crud – ya’ll are my bookworm friends! Eeps!

Ah heck, just….
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Ok, it’s a small festival – it’s just me and a few books and a movie, but, it is a festival, nonetheless! I just found myself in the middle of Alice Hoffman-land, sort of unexpectedly. It just sort of happened! And I am quite enjoying it!

It started when I remembered that I hadn’t yet read my copy of Here on Earth…

It was really good, and I was disappointed when I finished it – because it was over!

Then I decided that I would watch Practical Magic…

…again! I’ve only watched it like a hundred million times! But I LOVE THIS MOVIE! When it first came out on video, and I rented it, I did the funniest thing! I had never done this before. I immediately rewound it and started it over! I literally sat through two back-to-back showings of it! As a grown-up! (Ok, I use that term loosely.)

However, at the viewing recently, I fell asleep before the ending.

Moving on, though, I recently purchased The Probable Future:

…so I decided to start reading it. I am really enjoying it so far, as well. But I’m not getting very far, because, I keep falling asleep.

I have since watched Practical Magic again two more times, from the beginning – falling asleep before the ending – two more times.

Why do I keep starting it over from the beginning? Well, because, it is just more enjoyable that way! Except for the falling asleep part, that is.

I think I have just been working too hard and going to bed too late, lately. I am enjoying my Alice Hoffman Festival, though. And I guess doing it this way is just making it last longer, so it can’t be all that bad, right?

Have you read Alice Hoffman lately?

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That is what my friend, Loretta, said she had just received from Amazon. She had told me that her Amazon order had come in, and I excitedly asked her what all she ordered. And one thing she mentioned that was in her ‘oh-so-fun-I-love-to-get-books-in-the-mail’ package, was a few Needlecraft Mysteries.

“Needlecraft Mysteries?!” I asked, “What the heck are those?”

And that is when she sent me to this Amazon page to check it out: A Murderous Yarn (Needlecraft Mysteries)

Now that’s pretty cool! (Of course, I had to ask her, “Oh, does the person get stabbed with a needle?” Ha!) Really, though, it is neat to have a whole series of books that caters to people who love to work with needles. And does Loretta ever like to work with needles! She is a ‘stitching queen’ – she even runs a very active stitching website, complete with message board. You can keep up with what craftiness she’s up to by reading her Craft Blog. She talks about all things crafty there, with a heavy focus on needlecraft, and she even has free cross stitch patterns.

Getting back to the books, though – it is a whole series and I can’t even tell how many of them there are. It looks like a lot! And there is a big crowd of fans, as you can tell from the reviews. Loretta was told, though, that you don’t have to read them in order. So I will be interested to hear back from her how well she liked them.

I just love to learn about new books and the people who love them! It’s all so interesting! I wouldn’t call it new genres, necessarily, because these books would be in the mystery genre. But it divides up further than that, even – I wonder if you could say ‘subculture’ in reference to such? You know, like the ‘Harry Potter subculture’.

This could be a whole new post, itself, I suppose – but, just wonder with me for a moment. What would we call the groups of people that like different types of books within one genre? I’m sure there are fantasy book lovers who don’t get into Harry Potter, for example. And I’m sure there are mystery book lovers that don’t like the Needlecraft Mystery books. So you have these sub-groups, and they are almost like a community, sometimes. I know with Harry Potter, it is like that – we went to a celebration of his birthday at a bookstore and it was very much like a community. And I’m sure when people are hanging out at the store until midnight, in full HP gear, they are feeling pretty much a part of the HP crowd!

Anyway, we could philosophize a lot about the different groups I’m sure, but, this post is really about my finding these Needlecraft Mysteries in the first place. And I just think they’re pretty neat!

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