February 2021

More isolation, more (mostly good) reading, and a reaction to second covid shot. Such an exciting life!

 

Activities:

2/4    Gas; Neil's Donuts; Ace Hardware

2/11  Library (curbside pickup); Lyman Orchards (breakfast fruit & other essentials)

2/17  Library (curbside)

2/21  CVS

2/25  Nissan (key battery replacement); West Side Market (Rocky Hill); traffic check E.Berlin Rt 372

2/26  covid vaccine dose 2 (followed by two days of nothing but sleeping, mild aches, and light eating)

 

The reading was, as usual, all over the map both geographically and thematically.  The Passenger, set in Nazi Germany, and Pigeons on the Grass, set in Post War Munich, went nicely with Endpapers a family memoir that covers both periods and more.

 

Fiction: 

The Adventures and Misadventures of the Extraordinary and Admirable Joan Orpí, Conquistador   

 and Founder of New Catalonia by Besora, Max  (a fun romp)

The Passenger by Boschwitz, Ulrich Alexander
Pigeons on the Grass by Koeppen, Wolfgang

The Theory of Flight by Ndlovu, Siphiwe Gloria (Zimbabwe?)
The Cat and The City by Bradley, Nick (the city here is Tokyo)
The Mission House by Davies, Carys (India)
The Last Moon Before Home (Moon Trilogy, #2) by Dzikowski, Barbara J. (USA; nice, but not necessary, to have read the first of the trilogy)

At the Edge of the Haight by Seligman, Katherine (Post hippie Golden Gate Park, these are not flower children)

The Ancestry of Objects by Ryckman, Tatiana (meh)
White Ivy by Yang, Susie (My least favorite of the month)

Nonfiction:
Uprooted: A Gardener Reflects on Beginning Again by Dickey, Page (This was a nice read. In the past the garden (in northwestern Connecticut) has been open occasionally for tours. I hope they can do it again. It would make a good day trip)
Endpapers: A Family Story of Books, War, Escape, and Home by Wolff, Alexander   
The Doctors Blackwell: How Two Pioneering Sisters Brought Medicine to Women and Women to Medicine by Nimura, Janice P.
 

Online:

I won't be trying this at home. I never even got past a simple paper airplane...

These impossibly detailed origami figures are made of a single piece of paper Thousands of folds. By Lilly Smith "Several months. One sheet of paper. Juho Könkkölä’s origami characters have to be seen to be believed."

 

Speaking of Neil's donuts...

Food & Wine magazine names Neil's Donuts as Connecticut's best

 

And still on the calorie laden treats theme...

I am impressed with once having a First Lady who behaves as a human (as opposed to a clueless mannequin) that I have been following Dr. Jill on Twitter. Sooo...when Dr. Jill visited a DC bakery. The Sweet Lobby I couldn't resist checking out their site. I was quite taken with their boozy Cocktail Cupcake Menu. I shared this find with my housemate and she countered with a local source of treats -- Nora Cupcake Company -- which offers several cupcakes featuring boozy additives. So we spent a pleasant few minutes at our laptops in a sort of Cupcake War, reading delicious descriptions to each other.

Best Places to Visit in Europe (according to USNews)

I love lists like this one. They open up memories of places I've been to and dreams of places I'd like to go. It's a good list of 25 places, 16 of which I've visited.

August 2020

Lousy weather, great reading. 

8/4 - Tropical Storm Isaias - 12 hour power outage; several limbs from maple tree down in driveway fortunately not to large for us to drag aside.
8/5 - Internet/phone out - about 36 hours
8/7 - PO to mail primary ballot
8/13 - library curbside pickup; JC Farm; Lyman Orchards

Fiction:

Echo on the Bay by Masatsugu Ono: translated from the Japanese by Angus Turvill

At Least We Can Apologize by Ki-ho Lee; translated from the Korean by Christopher Joseph Dykas

Garden by the Sea by Mercè Rodoreda; translated from the Catalan by Martha Tennent and Maruxa Relaño

The House with a Sunken Courtyard by Won-Il Kim; translated from the Korean by Ji-Moon Suh )

Stingray by Kim Joo-Young; translated from the Korean by Inrae You Vinciguerra and Louis Vinciguerra

Tokyo Ueno Station by Miri Yū; translated from the Japanese by Morgan Giles
  
Girls Lost by Jessica Schiefauer; translated from the Swedish by Saskia Vogel

Lake Like a Mirror by Ho Sok Fong; translated from the Chinese by Natascha Bruce

A Hundred Million Years and a Day by Jean-Baptiste Andrea: translated from the French by Sam Taylor (review copy, LibraryThing giveaway)

Book of the Little Axe by Lauren Francis-Sharma (review copy, Goodreads giveaway) 

Fiction/Poetry:

The Love Story of the Century by Märta Tikkanen; translated from the Swedish Stina Katchadourian

A Grave is Given Supper by Mike Soto 

Nonfiction:

Why We Swim by Bonnie Tsui

Cape Town: A Place Between by Henry Trotter 

Online:
The Easiest Eight Thousand Words Ever Put Together: the story behind the story of David Dodge's To Catch A Thief. by J. Kingston Pierce

Why is Malaysia’s Chinese Population Leaving in Droves? by Wing Wong 
 found this because I needed some background for one of the stories in Lake like a Mirror

July 2019 Reading

All good reading for July, with one exception.   

Fiction (in no particular order within the star ratings)

5 stars: 
If Beale Street Could Talk by Baldwin, James (public library)
War, So Much War by Rodoreda, Mercè; translated from the Catalan by Maruxa Relaño and MarthaTennent (my collection)
Hollow Kingdom by Buxton, Kira Jane (Advance Review Copy, Shelf Awareness)
Eight Stories: Tales of War and Loss by Remarque, Erich Maria (translators unidentified) (my collection)
The Most Fun We Ever Had by Lombardo, Claire (public library)
The Imagined Land by Berti, Eduardo; translated from the Spanish by Charlotte Coombe (my collection)
Solovyov and Larionov by Vodolazkin, Eugene; translated from the Russian by Evgenij Vodolazkin and Lisa Hayden (advance review copy, LibraryThing

4 stars:
L'Amour by Duras, Marguerite; translated from the French by Kazim Ali and Libby Murphy (my collection)
The City Where We Once Lived by Barnes, Eric (public library)
The Vagrants by Li, Yiyun (my collection)
San Diego Noir edited by Hart, Maryelizabeth (my collection)

3 stars:
The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Lefteri, Christy (Advance Review Copy, Shelf Awareness)
The Quest by Baroja, Pío; translated from the Spanish by Isaac Goldberg (my collection - Amazon freebie)
Smoking Kills by Laurain, Antoine; translated from the French by Louise Lalaurie Rogers(blog win)
The Evenings: A Winter's Tale by Reve, Gerard; translated from the Dutch by Sam Garrett (public library)

1 star
The Skin Is the Elastic Covering That Encases the Entire Body by Rasmussen, Bjørn; translated from the Danish by Martin Aiken
I did actually finish this but did not like it. Yes it was poetic, well written, etc. Best I can say about it is that it is short. (from my collection but I'm not keeping it!)

Nonfiction
 
5 stars:
The Man Between: The Life and Legacy of Michael Henry Heim by Heim, Michael Henry (and others) (my collection)

3 stars:
Memoirs of Gluckel of Hameln by Glückel von Hameln; translated from the German by Marvin Lowenthal (my collection)
On the Clock: What Low-Wage Work Did to Me and How It Drives America Insane by Guendelsberger, Emily (public library)
Fire and Ice by Mingle, Jonathan (Advance Review Copy--from ages ago)
Rough Magic: Riding the World's Loneliest Horse Race by Prior-Palmer, Lara (public library)
 

These Caught My Attention Because...

Because this is the land where I was grown...
The Land Where Birds Are Grown.  A visit to the engineered wetlands of California’s intensively cultivated Central Valley by Cynthia Hooper

Because procrastination is a thing with me...
I've Been Meaning to Talk to You About Procrastination by David Abrams

   and on the same note...

When you're writing, it's good to give yourself little rewards along the way.
For example, once I've typed a word, I allow myself to look at the internet for 4 hours.

— Chris Kelly (@imchriskelly) March 6, 2019

Because I went to the eye doctor yesterday and something he told me led to my googling and finding this...
Mayo Clinic Q and A: Fish oil supplements and dry eyes By Liza Torborg 
I've been taking this stuff for other reasons for years and didn't know I was helping my eyes.

Because he was Connecticut based... 

“Form-Generating is Similar to Music – You Try to Compose Music and Suddenly the Melody Comes”: In Conversation with Kevin Roche  by Vladimir Belogolovsky

Because lit in translation...Yes
The Catalan Paradox: Writers, Editors, and Translators on the Literature of a Stateless Language
Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi interviews Quim Monzó


Between worlds: in praise of the literary translator by Miranda France

Gendered “Revenge” in Emma Ramadan’s Reworking of Brice Matthieussent’s Meta-Novel
By Arshy Azizi

It's rare that I read a review or interview concerning a book I'm currently reading but I couldn't resist this one. I was about 2/3 of the way through the book when I succumbed to the temptation to google to find out if the translator (Emma Ramadan, that is--everyone in this book is a translator of sorts) had given any interviews on this work. I found this review and decided to read it. It goes beyond where I had read so there was a chance of spoilers. But I didn't think anything could spoil the marvelous book. I was right. There are some revelations but, for me, no spoilers though other readers might not agree.

August (fifth week) 2018 Reads

I had planned to be away from home most of the week, but the place had no air conditioning.  Monday night was quite pleasant, Tuesday night was miserable so we gave up and came home on Wednesday morning. It was too hot to do anything but read so I made a dent in the owned-but-unread stack.

This week the "Deal Me In" card is the Seven of Hearts; the selection is The Provincials by Daniel Alarcón (in The best American short stories, 2013, Kindle ed.)

Online...
The Illegal Ramen Vendors of Postwar Tokyo: Black markets and American wheat imports popularized ramen. By Hunter Lu
Two of my favorite topics - Postwar Japan and Food.

from my shelves...

When Adam Opens His Eyes by Jung-Il Jang; translated from the Korean by Sun-Ae Hwang and Horace Jeffery Hodges
 Coming of age...

Lost Cities Found Objects, linked stories by Robert Fagan
 OK, but it was my least favorite of this week's reading

The Animal Gazer by Edgardo Franzosini; translated from the Italian by Michael F. Moore 
 bio-fic inspired by the life of sculptor Rembrandt Bugatti

Brother in Ice by Alicia Kopf; translated from the Catalan by Mara Faye Lethem    
 A young woman muses on her family relationships (including a disabled older brother) whilst engaging in research on the polar regions and other icy things. Excellent!


Sight by Jessie Greengrass
 Advance Review Copy. As in Brother in Ice, a young woman muses on her life and family (especially pregnancy and mother/daughter/grandaughter relationships) whilst researching. This time the research involves Freud, Rontgen, and William and John Hunter. Also Excellent!
Allmen and the Dragonflies by Martin Suter; translated from the German by Steph Morris
  Underhanded shenanigans in the world of art collectors and thieves. In this case the art is five missing Art Nouveau glass bowls created by renowned French artist Émile Gallé. Fictional account of what might have happened the the bowls.

The Baklava Club (Yashim the Eunuch #5) by Jason Goodwin 
 A pleasant mystery--not nearly as much fun as Allemen (above)--but OK.  I haven't read the others in the series, I might pick one up at the library when I want a not too demanding diversion.

The Endless Summer by Madame Nielsen; translated from the Danish by Gaye Kynoch
  Had trouble getting into this but it turned out to be a favorite. It just took a while to click. 

August (first week) 2018 Reads

This week the "Deal Me In" card is the Queen of Hearts; the story The Taxidermist by David Abrams (in Watchlist: 32 Stories by Persons of Interest)
A taxidermist with a unique, unsettling paranormal gift. One of my favorite stories from this anthology.  Here are some links to a few of Abrams' works online. He also has a great blog: The Quivering Pen

elsewhere online...
Treepedia: Exploring the Green Canopy in cities around the world 
from MIT Senseable City Lab - a source worth further exploration.

and from the library...

Two excellent short story collections:
A Thousand Morons by Quim Monzó; translated from the Catalan by Peter Bush
Awayland by Ramona Ausubel

...and an ok collection:
Tell Tale: Short Stories by Jeffrey Archer

a good novel;
A Boy in Winter by Rachel Seiffert

...and two novels that I found disappointing (because I've liked everything else I read from these authors):
The Neighborhood by Mario Vargas Llosa; translated from the Spanish by Edith Grossman
The End of a Family Story by Péter Nádas; trhanslated from the Hungarian by Imre Goldstein

a non-fiction that I enjoyed:
The Ninth: Beethoven and the World in 1824 by Harvey Sachs

as for my shelves...I didn't touch them except to add some things that came in the mail.

December (fourth week) 2017 Reads

Once again my reading was all over the map: Libya/Italy, Sudan, New York's Chinatown, Chile, and a creepy unnamed fantasy village from a Catalan author.

Deal Me In

This week's story: The Past by Ellen Glasgow: In The Best Short Stories of 1921 originally published in Good Housekeeping, October 20, 1920. (The anthology covers the period from October 1920 through September 1921).
This is a gentle ghost story set in a Fifth Avenue mansion.





Card: Queen of Diamonds from a  promotional deck printed by B. Dondorf for Saks & Company, New York, late 1920s. Found at The World of Playing Cards.








A picture book from from Project Gutenberg...
My Book of Ten Fishes by Rosalie G. Mendel

from my shelves...

 
Morning Sea by Margaret Mazzantini; translated from the Italian by Ann Gagliardi
The stories of two mothers and their son are told in this short novel of migration between Italy and Libya. One pair are boat refugees-a mother and her young son traveling from Libya to Sicily. The other story line involves a nineteen year-old son of a woman who was born in Libya of Italian immigrant workers.


 
Death in Spring  by Mercè Rodoreda; translated from the Catalan by Martha Tennent
Weird and compelling world building. This is part of Open Letter Books Two Month Review Project.
Rodoreda is a fine writer. Actually the guided read has another week to go but I couldn't stop myself from finishing ahead of time.





  
Navidad & Matanza by Carlos Labbé; translated from the Spanish by Will Vanderhyden 
Another weird one from Open Letter, this one from Chile. Teenage brother and sister go missing, there is an odd research lab, a group writing of a story. It's all mixed up but worth figuring it out. 


 


 
Mambo in Chinatown by Jean Kwok  
Two American born Chinese sisters live with their immigrant father (a noodle maker in New York's Chinatown). The father and his brother (an herb doctor) are traditionalists. The girls must deal with living an "American" life while trying to respect the views of their elders. 

The Book of Khartoum: A City in Short Fiction by Raph Cormack (Editor), Max Shmookler (Editor); translated from the Arabic
Contents:
 The tank / Ahmed al-Malik ; translated by Adam Talib --
 In the city / Ali al-Makk ; translated by Sarah Irving --
 A boy playing with dolls / Isa al-Hilu ; translated by Marilyn Booth --
 It's not important, you're from there / Arthur Gabriel Yak ; translated by Andrew Leber --
 Next Eid / Bawadir Bashir ; Translated by Thoraya El-Rayyes --
 Passing / Rania Mamoun ; translated by Elisabeth Jaquette --
 The story of the girl whose birds flew away / Bushra al-Fadil ; translated by Max Shmookler --
 The passage / Mamoun Eltlib ; translated by Mohamed Ghalaeiny --
 The butcher's daughter / Abdel Aziz Baraka Sakin ; translated by Ralph Cormack --
 The void / Hammour Ziada ; translated by Kareem James Abu-Zeid. 
 
 

December (first week) 2017 Reads

Calling it December since it will be posted on Dec 2. A dreadful Deal Me In short story this week. But the other short stories I read were great and/or pretty good. The novels I read were fine.

Still having browser problems. My Firefox wasn't broke until they "improved" it. This entry looks blah without images but I just don't want to mess with it.

Story:  Razor Blades by Lina Meruane (in The Future is Not Ours), translated from the Spanish by Janet Hendrickson
Yuck! Gross mean girls.

Card: King of Spades - not bothering with looking for a card this week.


from my shelves...

I'd Like by Amanda Michalopoulou; translated from the Greek by  Karen Emmerich
Excellent collection of related stories. meta.

Vaseline Buddha by Young-moon Jung; translated from the Korean by Jung Yewon
Surreal stream of consciousness which is, at times, hypnotic. An excellent read.

Flames of Quiet Light: Thirteen Tiny Tales of Love and Loss by Angel Zapata (Kindle)
Quick reads. Nice for those odd reading moments snatched whilst waiting for something or someone.

After Rain by William Trevor (Kindle)
Great collection of stories.

Now and at the Hour of our Death by Susana Moreira Marques; translated from the Porteguese by Julia Sanches
Non-fiction. Observations by an observer of a palliative care unit in rural Portugal.
from the library...

Uncertain Glory by Joan Sales; translated from the Catalan by Peter Bush
I really liked this novel of the Spanish Civil War. The politics of that war always confuse me and this shows that the participants were pretty confused too. Sales was involved in the war.

The Secret Diary of Hendrik Groen, 83¼ Years Old by Hendrik Groen; translated from the Dutch by Hester Velmans
An old geezer in a old folks home--reminded me of the Brit-com Waiting for God.

October (fourth week) 2017 Reads

Story: East of the Web's story of the day on the day I draw this card. Phase in Space by Paul O'Neill
This turned out to be very short, jokey, and fun.




card: 4 (or any other) club: by Carlson Choo





from my shelves...




Tristana  by Benito Pérez Galdós; translated from the Spanish by Margaret Jull Costa; Introduction by Jeremy Treglown 
Wonderful classic about a confined woman who breaks free--or does she? Most of the story puts forth ideas of gender equality which is interesting in a novel written and set in Spain in the 1890s. But in the end reality sets in.
 





Guadalajara  by Quim Monzó; translated from the Catalan by Peter Bush
Superb short stories. Can't pick a favorite because I liked them all.
Contents:  Family life -- Outside the gates of Troy -- Helvetian freedoms -- Gregor -- A hunger and thirst for justice -- A day like any other -- Life is so short -- The power of words -- Literature -- Centripetal force --  Strategies --The lives of prophets -- During the war -- Books.


  


from the library...



Havana: A Subtropical Delirium by Mark Kurlansky
An honest, realistic appreciation of a city that is often over-romanticized in both fiction and non-fiction. 

August (fourth week) 2017 Reads

This is brief because it is Bout of Books 20  week I have posted every day.

“Deal Me In 2017!”

Story: California by Sean Bernard (in Watchlist : 32 stories by persons of interest)
A group of friends in a California suburb periodically receive very short film clips featuring a popular TV host. They are puzzled, yet fascinated, by the brief clips. Some appear to be outtakes from the show's filming, others seem to have been shot for the sole purpose of preparing mysterious clips to be sent to the group.

Card: 3  of Hearts

This week I chose to showcase this gold leaf deck, rather than isolate a specific card. Why gold? Well the TV personality in the story is identified only as "The Host" but most Californians will recognize him as Huell Howser the host of the series "California's Gold" which ran on KCET from 1991-2012.
Deck is for sale on several online shops.



online...

Old Hong Kong Mahjong  by Vicky Wong.
Article about the only female carver of Mahjong tiles in Hong Kong. Nicely illustrated with photos by the author. (I spend Tuesday mornings playing Mahjong)

 For Centuries, Readers Annotated Books With Tiny Drawings of Hands by Anika Burgess
"They were the medieval version of a highlighter." 

Yesterday (Friday) was an online only reading day which I reported in my Bout Update (5) posted earlier today. 

from the library... 

The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate – Discoveries from a Secret World  by Peter Wohlleben, Tim Flannery (Foreword), Jane Billinghurst (Translator), Susanne Simard (Afterword) (Kindle edition)

The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry (Kindle edition)
Too many notes. Is this a character study? A novel of place? of time? It tries too hard to be Victorian, tries to hard to be Essex. There are so many characters with conflicts within themselves and between one another that everything seems contrived and under developed.

Buenos Aires: The Biography of a City by James Gardner

from my shelves...

The Boys by Toni Sala,  translated from the Catalan by Mara Faye Lethem
Excellent story of how the tragic death of two brothers in a village affects those left behind.