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March's Reading
Apr. 2nd, 2010 09:42 amBad month, reading-wise. My cat, spring, etc, etc. Plus, I started A Clash Of King partway through the month, and that beast is +700 pages, so I finished it yesterday, April 1.
-Bobbed Hair and Bathtub Gin: writers running wild in the 20's. Marion Meade. Biography of Zelda Fitzerald, Dorothy Parker, Edna Ferber, and Edna St. Vincent Millay. Okay, I never heard of Edna Ferber, and apparently she's written everything well-known. Oklahoma! is based off of one her books.
Edna St. Vicent Millay was the reason I picked up the book. I like her poetry. Her, not so much after reading this. She came off as an utter boor. Self-serving, shady, and as the 20's passed, behind-the-times. Sad because she was sorta-kinda edgy (for the times).
I highly reccommend this book. Its one flaw is that some passages felt like she took a detail from a diary or letter and repeated it-- Dorothy Parker and her then-husband moved into "an apartment the size of a teacup". Otherwise, the book is fun. The 20's are far enough past (and technologically unadvanced) to feel historical, yet modern enough that the people feel relatable. I want an algonquin round table.
-Green Grass, Running Water. Thomas King. Book club selection. Hard read for the first 100 or so pages. Lots of POV characters, seemingly unconnected at first. Anvil-ious rants on colonialism. Lots of randomness. Though the randomness continued through the book, the characters and plot eventually came together and felt meaningful. I'm not super well-read in First Nations fiction, but this was the first story that took the "do I live in the Indian culture or the white one?" question and answered "both".
-Dinner Is Served-- an English butler's guide to the art of the table. Arthur Inch & Arlene Hirsh. BECAUSE I AM JUST TEXT ON A SCREEN. How to set a table, serve a meal, show good manners, and disgress into rants about Winston Churchill. Lots of period costumes (boner!) and how-to on menial tasks done the old-fashioned way (boner!boner!)
-Bobbed Hair and Bathtub Gin: writers running wild in the 20's. Marion Meade. Biography of Zelda Fitzerald, Dorothy Parker, Edna Ferber, and Edna St. Vincent Millay. Okay, I never heard of Edna Ferber, and apparently she's written everything well-known. Oklahoma! is based off of one her books.
Edna St. Vicent Millay was the reason I picked up the book. I like her poetry. Her, not so much after reading this. She came off as an utter boor. Self-serving, shady, and as the 20's passed, behind-the-times. Sad because she was sorta-kinda edgy (for the times).
I highly reccommend this book. Its one flaw is that some passages felt like she took a detail from a diary or letter and repeated it-- Dorothy Parker and her then-husband moved into "an apartment the size of a teacup". Otherwise, the book is fun. The 20's are far enough past (and technologically unadvanced) to feel historical, yet modern enough that the people feel relatable. I want an algonquin round table.
-Green Grass, Running Water. Thomas King. Book club selection. Hard read for the first 100 or so pages. Lots of POV characters, seemingly unconnected at first. Anvil-ious rants on colonialism. Lots of randomness. Though the randomness continued through the book, the characters and plot eventually came together and felt meaningful. I'm not super well-read in First Nations fiction, but this was the first story that took the "do I live in the Indian culture or the white one?" question and answered "both".
-Dinner Is Served-- an English butler's guide to the art of the table. Arthur Inch & Arlene Hirsh. BECAUSE I AM JUST TEXT ON A SCREEN. How to set a table, serve a meal, show good manners, and disgress into rants about Winston Churchill. Lots of period costumes (boner!) and how-to on menial tasks done the old-fashioned way (boner!boner!)
