Lucybird

Tom and Pippo at the Beach arrived in the post, a first birthday present for my niece.

Middlesex- Jeffrey Eugenides Synopsis (from Amazon) 'I was born twice: first, as a baby girl, on a remarkably smogless Detroit day of January 1960; and then again, as a teenage boy, in an emergency room near Petoskey, Michigan, in August of l974. My birth certificate lists my name as Calliope Helen Stephanides. My most recent driver's license records my first name simply as Cal.' So begins the breathtaking story of Calliope Stephanides, and three generations of the Greek-American Stephanides family who travel from a tiny village overlooking Mount Olympus in Asia Minor to Prohibition era Detroit, witnessing its glory days as the Motor City, and the race riots of l967, before they move out to the tree-lined streets of suburban Grosse Point, Michigan. To understand why Calliope is not like other girls, she has to uncover a guilty family secret, and the astonishing genetic history that turns Callie into Cal, one of the most audacious and wondrous narrators in contemporary fiction. Lyrical and thrilling, "Middlesex" is an exhilarating reinvention of the American epic. Review This really wasn't what I expected but I loved it all the same, possibly more that I would have thought. I was expecting it would be about being a hermaphrodite but it was more about family- a family which was, despite some skeletons, pretty normal. Most of the time it could have been about pretty much any teenage girl and the worries she has, and I think that was written very well. In fact I found it more interesting before Cal knew his/her true nature or that she/he wasn't 'normal' than after and reading about him after that point. I really thought Eugenides built up a great sense of character and of family and I really felt I knew the characters, especially Cal and Desdemona, plus I really liked them. However (maybe because of the autobiographical style) I felt it ended quite abruptly- I suppose that makes it more realistic because Cal's story wouldn't end until he/she was dead in the very least. 4.5/5

QI on Dave

Have started I fought the law- Dan Kieran now.

Neighbours

Finished Middlesex I remember I found this slow to start too but I really enjoyed it by the end.

Just finished a bowl of Ben and Jerry's Half-baked. Now having a lemon and ginger tea.

Coq au Vin yummy

The film is really good, and the book is really good, but they are both so different they're pretty much incomparable, I can't say I prefered either.

Wow some good bargins there! Have about 50 pages of Middlesex left so may well finish today.

hmm I think so, at least the first one. It seemed to me it was something you had to see. I guess it depends on what you call hype.

I could see it being read as a stand alone too when I read it. Which story was your favourite? I liked the fountain of fair fortune.

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned the Harry Potter films. Unless you've read the books they don't make sense half the time and Daniel Radcliff can't act!

Roast beef dinner yumm yumm

I was going to join in with this but reading the questions and everybody's answers I realise I don't actually remember much of it (I did read it last year). If I manage to read it again before the end of the month though I'll come back.

Dr Who too

Total Wipeout. Waiting for Dr Who.

So they've rewarded our complaining about the Graham Norton graphic by changing the time again then?

Hobnobs and tea

Dr Who for me. And isn't Have I got News for You on tonight?

On average I read about a book a week but easy books I can read in a couple of days and harder books take me longer, the length doesn't seem to matter so much. Like you I do most off my reading travelling (spend about 2 hours on the bus a day), and I read in my lunch break at work too.

I agree about Pearl Harbor. But Romeo + Juliet is one of my favourite films.

You're right about Titanic, awful.

Am now on Book 3 of Middlesex and really into it

I almost bought that one the other week...maybe I should have after all.