First November Hop

It's Friday and that means it's time for another Book Blogger Hop. As always, thank you to Jennifer at Crazy-For-Books for hosting this amazing meme.

I started my week off on a great note with Mike Birbiglia's new book - Sleepwalk with Me. Since then I've been trudging through Persian Letters for class, and the library finally got in a copy of The Unbearable Lightness of Being, which I am really excited to reread.

This week Jennifer poses us with an interesting challenge, to find a new blog we generally enjoy and comment on  at least five of their posts. As always, I look forward to finding more awesome blogs.

Lastly, instead of answering Jennifer's question this week I'd like to pose one of my own. During my first year at College I created a quote wall out of post it notes in my dorm room. Since then I've moved twice and have lost a majority of the interesting quotes I came across. My room right now is pretty plain so I'm in the process of remaking my wall. So what I want to know is what is your favorite quote?

Hope everyone has a great weekend

Sleepwalk With Me - Mike Birbiglia

Sleepwalk With Me - and Other Painfully True Stories

Mike Birbiglia 

Sometimes it's good to laugh at yourself, and that's exactly what Mike Birbiglia does in this memoir. Mike created a perfect balance between personal, funny and serious - meaning almost all of his stories are very personal, laugh at loud funny and rarely heavy enough that it'll bring down your mood. If you're a fan of his stand-up you'll find a lot of overlap, but in a good way. Things like Birbiglia's Like Fun jokes develop into something more. It's more like he has decided to acknowledge his stand up, but take it on a different journey for his first book -which I really appreciated.

At 191 pages, Sleepwalk With Me is a quick read. I tore through the pages like a house on fire. I spent all of yesterday on a less then pleasant train ride, and usually during these rides I turn to Mike's comedy albums to give me a few laughs and keep my spirit up but this time I decided reading would be a better use of my time. There were still parts where I laughing out loud and having the time of my life, and I didn't have to worry about those silly ear-buds falling out ever five seconds!

There is a lot of honest in Sleepwalk With Me. At 32 Birbiglia admits he's a bit young for a memoir, not wanting anyone to think he's 'wrapping it up'. I particularly liked his brief section on Mitch Hedberg, which, along with his sleepwalking stories are the most serious of the entire book. This is one of the better comedic memoir's I've read this year, and it really exceeded my expectations. If you're in need of a pick me up you should totally pick this one up.

Top Ten Tuesdays - Books That Made Me Cry

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created by The Broke and the Bookish. This meme was created because they are particularly fond of lists over at The Broke and the Bookish. they'd love to share our lists with other bookish folks and would LOVE to see your top ten lists


This week's Top Ten is:

Top Ten Books That Made You Cry

(These all contain little spoilers. Just a heads up.)

1. The Book Thief - Zusak -  i can't think of a better place to start that here. The Book Thief was a really emotional journey for me. I read it this past winter and remember crying through the last thirty pages. It was just so hard to see Liesel lose everything and everyone.  

2.Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince - Rowling - Here's a little secret. When I first read Half Blood Prince when it came out I didn't cry. I didn't even really think twice to what Dumbledore's death would mean. Since then I've read Half Blood Prince at least five times, and twice since i started this blog. It's my favorite book of the series and I've noticed, especially in these past two reads, that I can't finish it without bawling like a baby. When I reread the series this summer I had to wait a few days to start Deathly Hallows. I felt like I needed to finally mourn Dumbledore properly, because I hadn't all those years ago. 

3. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Rowling - I've talked a lot about Harry Potter on this Blog, but I find it hard to do lists like this without adding both HBP and DH. I have cried every single time I've read Deathly Hallows, sometimes more then others, but the tears are always there. Really, in addition to losing so many characters I'd grown to love, Deathly Hallows represents the end of my childhood. 

I even cried all the way through the epilogue. 

All was well. 

4. The Proud Breed - Blasis - A good friend lent me The Proud Breed years ago. I must have been just starting high school. It was a long novel, an epic really. I don't remember a lot of the details, or really much of anything about it, but I remember turning the final few pages and sobbing. There's something about taking a complete journey with a person, for me, means I need to mourn them in some way. I sobbed my way through those final pages, and I was proud of myself.


5. One Day - Nicholls - This may be silly, but I felt for Emma. This was one of those situations where I needed there to be a complete happy ending, kids, a dog, a white picket fence's. I needed that for this story, and I understand why the ending was what it was, but I just couldn't get over finality of everything. I just wanted there to be a story where everyone wasn't perfect, but where there could still be some kind of lasting happiness.


6. A Walk to Remember - Sparks - I don't think I need to say much about this, despite my hatred of new Sparks novels, i did read a good few in my early teens and Jamie and Landon have the kind of romance that's made for a box of tissues. 


7. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Album - Journey's through death are sad. There really isn't much  more to say about this. 


8. Everything is Illuminated - Foer - I may have shed a few tears over Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, but Everything is Illuminated left me sad for days. I think it's something with World War II stories that get me. It was a combination of all of the stories that just had me shedding tears here. I have been siting this as one of my favorite books for over five years now and haven't been able to bring myself to reread it.

9. Falling Angels - Chevalier - This is my favorite book of all time. Honestly, my copy is falling to pieces, and I can find my favorite passages just by opening up to the creases. Now this list has me realizing one thing. I like sad things. Falling Angel's isn't really different. There is a lot of sadness here, and some death, and for a book that is centered around mourning it seems like It would have been a little wrong if I didn't shed a few tears as well.


I can't really think of any more, so I'll leave this list at 9.

October in Review

As always I borrowed the month in review post from Lily's Bookshelf, because she's awesome. 

Books Read:

Touching From a Distance - Curtis (review)

How Did You Get This Number - Crosley (review)

Moonlight in Odessa - Charles (review)

A Streetcar Named Desire - Williams (not reviewed)

The Lake of Dead Languages - Goodman (review)

Total Number of Books Read This Month: 
5 

Total Number of Books Read This Year: 51 

Books Unfinished:

As I Lay Dying

Great House 

Most Anticipated:
How Did You Get This Number

Biggest Let Down:
How Did You Get This Number

Favorite Read:

The Lake of Dead Languages 

Overall Reflection:

October was a month of ups and downs for me. I'm really lucky to have gotten five books in this month. Three of them are curtsy of the Read-a-Thon earlier this month. After that I kind of fell into a funk. I was supposed to read Faulkner's As I Lay Dying for class but got about 3/4 of the way through and couldn't finish it. I was also having a hard time getting into Nicole Krauss's new novel, Great House. This was really discouraging because I'd been looking forward to it for a while. I was in a reading slump for most of the month, but rediscovered crocheting and made several hats and my dad a blanket for his birthday.  

So really out of the entire month I was only actively reading for about 10 days of it. I'm finally out of my slump. I read Carol Goodman's The Lake of Dead Languages over Halloween weekend, and got a few books at Barnes and Noble with a gift card I had laying around. I'm ready and excited to start November off on a strong note.

What about you, read any good books this month?

The Lake of Dead Languages

The Lake of Dead Languages

Carol Goodman

Jane Hudson left Heart Lake School for Girls twenty years ago, after the suicide of her two best friends and the boy of her dreams. Now she is back teaching the subject they all loved. When signs from her past start to pop up she starts to worry that the real story of what happened her senior year will come to light. When these events start to repeat herself Jane realizes that she may be in more danger than she ever thought possible, and that the lies she told twenty years ago were the reason for tragedy's beyond her wildest nightmares. 

This isn't the first Carol Goodman novel I've read this year, and I partially blame reading The Lake of Dead Languages after Arcadia Falls for the mixed feelings I have about it. I really like boarding schools in literature, and  for some reason Heart Lake didn't live up to what I thought it was going to be. Other than that I really liked the story, I enjoyed the deep connections that run throughout, leaving the reader the ability to look back and see all the connections. That being said, I wasn't overly surprised by anything in this book. Not just because her style and story are replicated in Arcadia Falls, but just because as a reader, you know.

I didn't really enjoy Jane Hudson as a main character. She was so caught up in the past that she had a hard time seeing her present, and while that's what moves the story forward, it gets pretty irritating after a while. Plus she's a little immature. There are several times when I stopped and thought "yeah, teachers shouldn't do this". Even though I didn't particularly like her, I was able to relate to her in a bit.  That really did help. 

Even with it's predictable nature I really did enjoy The Lade of Dead Languages. I liked all of the minor characters. Goodman's has a knack for descriptions. Her characters are unique and I really do love that. She's also good at finding that 'can't put it down' quality. The one thing I've found with all of her books is at about the 30 page mark I get serious. I want to finish the novel immediately and speed through it like no tomorrow. 

All in all, I really did enjoy The Lake of Dead Languages. It's the kind of story that will stay with me for a while and I'm happy I finally got around to reading this. 

In case you're interested, I reviewed both Arcadia Falls and The Seduction of the Water earlier this year. 

Halloween Hop

Boo!
It's Friday, and that means it's another Book Blog Hop day. Again a huge thanks to Jennifer at Crazy-For-Books for hosting this weekly event which we all love so much!

Now with Halloween being this Sunday, I found that a lot of the meme's I participate in went for the spook factor this week and I sadly didn't have anything to say on the matter. To be honest, Halloween isn't my favorite holiday. No before you send the mob over, I'm just much more of a winter person. I like fall, but all of the weather changes and ends and starts and everything usually leave me pretty depressed by the end of October, so by the time Halloween gets here I am in no mood to be social. Perhaps the more important fact here is that I can't tolerate scary things. Really. Horror movies are not my friend. Even the more terrible of horror movies will keep me up for at least a night (example: the faculty. I didn't actually think the water alien was coming for be but still). Scary books are worse. Most of the time suspenseful books are enough to keep me on edge, and if you introduce anything remotely scary and I'll just put it down. The scariest thing I've read is House of Leaves, and I was one of the few people who didn't find it as scary as the internet would have would-be  readers expecting.
So I'll be happy when this weekend is over, all the kids are at home with their candy and I'm able to start listening to Christmas music and planning Thanksgiving dinner.

Alright, I promise to never go on a Holiday rant again. Back to book related things -

The question Jennifer chose for us this week is:
"What is the one bookish thing you would love to have, no matter the cost?"


I've always dreamed of having a library in my home, with a few overstuffed chairs and lots and lots of windows. Really big windows. Failing that I'd settle for a Kindle right now. I just spent 7 hours on a train, for what was supposed to be a 5 hour trip and would have loved to have more books with me then I was able to carry.

I'd also like to thank my readers for sticking around for the past few weeks, I know I haven't been updating and reviewing as much as a good blogger should. I think I've finally pulled myself out of my slump and should have a new review up tomorrow.


For everyone that's over from the Hop, thanks for stopping by and have a great weekend!

Tweeting while Fictional

"The threat 'over my dead body' would be more effective if phrased 'over the dead body of the last idiot who didn't do what I wanted'."

One of my favorite things on twitter are the fake accounts for fictional characters. My favorite of which are God_Damn_Batman and Lord_Voldmort7. So while I was watching Voldy tweet about his ever growing hate of  Justin Beiber this evening I started thinking - who else would be remarkably funny on twitter? Now I haven't actually gone looking for any of these people, but here is what I would like to see:

Mrs Bennett - She'd be absolutely hilarious - ranting about Mr. Bennett, trying to marry off Kitty and Mary and generally ranting about celebrities and silly things.

Dumbledore -  I'm picturing the opposite of Voldmorts account, with whimsical musings and confusing advise. Oh, and some angry, butt kicking moments.

Holden Caulfield -  "Everyone on twitter is a bunch of phonys." I'd be amazing.

Bridgett Jones - I'd love to see her babbling about her life. "alcohol units consumed - 5  - must do wash."

Robert Langdon - How much better would everything be if instead of having to read The Lost Symbol we just had someone behind a Tom Hanks picture offering up false, but interesting facts?

Dorian Gray's Portrait - "Hey D - please stop ruining everyones lives, you left the mirror on the other side of the room uncovered and I'm making myself sick."

Are there any character's you'd like to see on twitter?