shelbel
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About shelbel
- Birthday 10/04/1966
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Sorry for the long delay in my reply! Your first post was fine - you didn't need to go to all the trouble of redoing it! I have so little time for reading lately - I've read about 20 pages of my Jane Austen novel in a week.
And I'm barely keeping up with the forum as well.It's great that your daughters are so motivated in sport. I'm usually so lazy but have been turning that around a bit lately. It makes the world of difference when you exercise for pleasure and not because you feel obligated to.
I'm glad you're enjoying Janis Ian again. I'm listening to Dido at the moment. I find I can never go wrong with her music.
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Sounds like an interesting book Paul! I've always been interested in reading prize winning literature and enjoy discovering the qualities that make a particular book so special that it deserves notable recocognition - I would love to hear your thoughts on this in regards to American Pastoral by Phillip Roth.
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Moby Dick is proving to be a real challenge for me Kylie, I am enjoying the writing and it's a wonderful adventure story, but I have found myself at times incredibly bogged down in Melville's extremely detailed background information about whale anatomy and whaling. I'm hoping to finish this book sometime this week, so that I can move onto something a little lighter!
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I can completely relate to how your feeling at the moment Echo, I felt the exact same way late last year when Australia held it's election, we had had a very conservative and narrow minded prime minister for almost ten years and our country was crying out for change - even though it always looked imminent that the Australian Labor Party was going to win; I still felt incredibly anxious right up until Kevin Rudd made his victory speech.
I know the American election is so much bigger than the Australian, there is so much more at stake, not just on the home front but also on a world wide scale - I am keeping my fingers crossed Echo; that America gets the change and new direction it so desperately needs.
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Sorry about the mistakes Kylie, I'm just learning how to cut and paste, I will retype my message so that it makes sense - this seem to be my week for embarrassing moment!
I'm so glad you like the colours! I was avoiding reading Moby Dick the other day, so I decided to play around with my profile page.
Falling off your bike, sunburn and a flat tyre all in one week Kylie! You have just reminded me why I never ride myself, preferring to encourage rather than participate.
My twin daughters are absolute sport junkies, they love to set themselves goals and train incredibly hard to attain them; they are nothing like me, they get it entirely from their father - I'm not the competitive type at all and I only like to play sport for the enjoyment, I often look at the girls and think they're completely mad!
I've been in such a rut lately with my music choices, gravitating only to the old faithfuls - thanks for the suggestion of CW Stoneking, I will definitely check him out through the week and a big thanks for reminding me of Janis Ian, I haven't listened to her music in the longest time (maybe even years); I pulled her cd out yesterday and played it, I had forgotten how fantastic she is!
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I’m so glad you like the colours! I was avoiding reading Moby Dick the other day, so I decided to play around with my profile page.
Falling off your bike, sunburn and flat tyre all in one week Kylie! You have just reminded me why I never ride myself, preferring to encourage rather than participate.
My twin daughters are absolute sport junkies, they love to set themselves goals and train incredibly hard to attain them; they are nothing like me, they get it entirely from their father - I’m not the competitive type at all and I only like to play sport for the enjoyment, I often look at the girls and think their completely mad!
I’ve been in such a rut lately with my music choices, gravitating only to the old faithfuls - thanks for the suggestion of ……., I will definitely check them out through the week and a big thanks for reminding me of Janis Ian, I haven’t listened to her music in the longest time; I pulled her cd out yesterday and played it, I had forgotten how fantastic she is!
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Wow……thanks Paul! There are some wonderful suggestions there, a real eclectic mix of books from this period. Some of your suggestions I have already read; but I have to admit they were many years ago and I should probably reread them at some stage - I don’t know when, as I’m having so much fun exploring new books. There are quite a few authors you’ve listed, like; George Elliot, Jane Austen, Robert Lewis Stevenson, Alexander Dumas and Charles Dickens that I was already considering including in my challenge. But Paul! There are many interesting books you’ve mentioned that I would never have considered and now think would be worth taking a look at. Particularly some of the lesser known authors to me like: Wilkie Collins, James Fenmore Cooper, Rider Haggard, Joseph Conrad and Lew Wallace. Mm……So much to think about, the choices seem endless! I’ve had a busy weekend so I haven’t had a great deal of time to think about this challenge; I’m hoping to devote some energy to it this week. I’ve been trying to think of a few recommendation of my own for you Paul, but I must admit I’m a little stumped, as I have a feeling that you’ve already read quite a broad cross section of books, and know exactly what you like and want to read - so I’ve decided to list a few of the more stand out books that I’ve read in the past twelve months and some of the books in my TBR pile that I anticipate will be exceptional reads. Stand out reads in the past twelve months: French Lieutenant’s Woman by John Fowles The Color Purple by Alice Walker A Farwell to Arms by Hemingway - reread The Hours by Michael Cunningham Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf To Kill a Mocking-Bird by Harper Lee - reread Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez Call of the Wild by Jack London Breakfast at Tiffany’s Truman Capote Son of the Circus by John Irving Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov The English Patients by Michael Ondaajte Another Country by James Baldwin Orlando by Virginia Woolf Books currently sitting in the TBR pile that may be of interest to you: The Waves by Virginia Woolf Cold Blood by Truman Capote One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey Rabbit, Run by John Updike The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe The Sea by John Banville The name of the Rose by Umberto Eco The Wind-up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell Timbuktu by Paul Auster I don’t know if you’ve read much Australian fiction, but I thought I would mention a few of my most favourite Australian writers: Peter Carey – Oscar and Lucinda - True History of the Kelly Gang Tim Winton – Cloudstreet Randolph Stow – Tourmaline This has been great fun! Thanks so much and good luck with your reading challenge - I hope you keep us posted with regular updates of your reading as you work your way through your challenge. Kind regards Shelbel. :
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Thanks Paul for being so understanding! Like I said in my original post, you have inspired me to put together my own reading through the decades challenge - I think I would like to make mine a 19th century literature challenge, which fits with my resolution at the start of the year to explore more authors and influential books from this era, particularly books that have contributed to the shaping of modern day writing - already this year I have read Anna Karenina, Crime and Punishment, Modame Bovary and I'm currently reading Moby Dick. If you have any suggestions, I would greatly appreciate It!
Just wanted to wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Here's to good books in '09!
