{"id":6765,"date":"2007-07-02T11:30:00","date_gmt":"2007-07-02T15:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=6765"},"modified":"2024-10-27T17:04:09","modified_gmt":"2024-10-27T21:04:09","slug":"5-books","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=6765","title":{"rendered":"5 Books"},"content":{"rendered":"

Got a cool mee-mee from 50 Books<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Five most recent books you’ve bought for yourself:<\/b><\/p>\n

Grover Cleveland (The American Presidents Series)<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – by Henry Graff<\/p>\n

Then She Found Me<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – by Elinor Lipman – I used to have this book – no idea what happened to it. I love it, so I just bought it again<\/p>\n

The Inmost Heart: 800 Years of Women’s Letters<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – edited by Olga Kenyon (thanks to Letters of the Day<\/a> for this one)<\/p>\n

Triangle: A Novel<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – by Katherine Weber<\/p>\n

Travels with Herodotus (Vintage International)<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – by Ryszard Kapuscinski (at last.)<\/p>\n

Five books you’ve most recently given other people:<\/b><\/p>\n

Baseball: A Literary Anthology<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – sent to Dad, and also to David and Maria<\/p>\n

We Need to Talk About Kevin tie-in: A Novel<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – by Lionel Shriver – sent to Beth<\/p>\n

Spielberg, Truffaut & Me: An Actor’s Diary<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – by Bob Balaban- sent to Emily<\/p>\n

Five most recent books you’ve loaned other people, and their status:<\/b><\/p>\n

I rarely lend people books. I very rarely borrow books either – I like to own, and be able to dip in and out of it at my own time. But more than that: I’m not a lender. Buy your own.<\/p>\n

Last five kids’ books you bought:<\/b><\/p>\n

I just went on a binge this morning! I am always in the process of acquiring books I loved as a kid! Here is what I bought a mere 2 hours ago (before I even read these mee-mee!):<\/p>\n

Ella Of All-Of-A-Kind Family<\/a>\"\"<\/i> by Sidney Taylor. Words cannot express how much I love that whole series – but I love Ella, in particular. A WWI story. And I have a vivid recollection of the illustrations in the book … I’ll have to see if they are what I remember.<\/p>\n

The Trumpet of the Swan <\/a>\"\"<\/i> by EB White. I LOVE Louis, I LOVE the father swan – I love the boy … and I remember the last paragraph almost word for word.<\/p>\n

Midnight is a Place<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – by Joan Aiken – This book was read to us in the 5th grade – by my worst teacher ever (ROT IN HELL, BITCH.) But I sure remember this book. It takes place in the early dirty days of the industrial revolution in London – at least I think it does – and I know it involves a mystery, and a big gloomy house, and orphans, and a terrifying old man and little kids who have to work in factories for long hours – and sometimes die, because they get squished by the dyeing machine or whatever (the details are lost in my mind). But I know we, as a class, really looked forward to reading hour every day – we wanted to know what would happen!<\/p>\n

James and the Giant Peach<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – by Roald Dahl Hooray!<\/p>\n

Seventeenth Summer<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – by Maureen Daly Okay, there is a long story behind this book and myself. I must have checked it out of the library in high school – I don’t know. It was written by a girl who was actually 17 years old – she had won a story contest or something. It takes place in the 1950s – and it was written in the 50s too, I think – so it’s not nostalgic 1950s, it’s not kitsch 1950s – it’s actual 1950s. And it’s a teenage romance in a small town – and I remember it being WONDERFUL. I’ll have to re-read it someday and see if it holds up.<\/p>\n

Last five books you looked at on Amazon\/Chapters\/Powell’s\/etc.:<\/b><\/p>\n

God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – by Christopher Hitchens<\/p>\n

The Post-Birthday World: A Novel (P.S.)<\/a>\"\" <\/i>by Lionel Shriver<\/p>\n

The Yiddish Policemen’s Union: A Novel (P.S.)<\/a>\"\": A Novel <\/i>by Michael Chabon<\/p>\n

Uncommon Arrangements: Seven Portraits of Married Life in London Literary Circles 1910-1939<\/a>\"\" <\/i> – by Katie Roiphe<\/p>\n

Ava Gardner: “Love Is Nothing”<\/a>\"\"<\/i> by Lee Server<\/p>\n

Top five books on your “to read” pile:<\/b><\/p>\n

Bleak House <\/a>\"\"<\/i> by Charles Dickens<\/p>\n

The End of the Affair<\/a>\"\"<\/i> by Graham Greene<\/p>\n

Orson Welles: Volume 2: Hello Americans<\/a>\"\"<\/i> by Simon Callow<\/p>\n

By the Lake<\/a>\"\"<\/i> by John McGahern – they re-named the book when it was re-issued in the states. But the actual title? The Irish title? They May Face the Setting Sun<\/i>. God DAMnit that’s a far superior title. By the Lake<\/i>? What the heck is that? A Sandra Bullock movie? At any rate, John McGahern is one of the all-time greats, his Amongst Women<\/i> is a great novel – so By the Lake<\/i> is definitely on the list.<\/p>\n

The Yiddish Policemen’s Union: A Novel (P.S.)<\/a>\"\": A Novel <\/i> by Michael Chabon. I’d read a grocery list if it was written by Chabon.<\/p>\n

Bottom five books on your “to read” pile <\/b><\/p>\n

These are books I’ve had around forever, and don’t see myself throwing them out – but I feel no urgency to read them immediately.<\/p>\n

America’s Constitution: A Biography<\/a>\"\"<\/i> by Akhil Reed Amar – I have it, it looks great – I’ll read it eventually!<\/p>\n

Elia Kazan: A Biography<\/a>\"\"<\/i> by Richard Schickel (Schickel, of course, is the dude who wrote an entire book about the development of Cary Grant’s acting style, going from film to film to film meticulously – not focusing on biography, but on talent, and development. I LOVE that book – and wrote about Schickel here<\/a>). So I will definitely be reading his biography of Kazan – and very much look forward to it – just not any time soon.<\/p>\n

Only Revolutions: A Novel<\/a>\"\"<\/i> by Mark Danielewski – I wrote just a tiny bit about his freak-out book House of Leaves<\/i> here <\/a>– I’ll cover it more when I get to it in the Dailiy Book Excerpt thing, but I don’t even know what to say – hooly shit, and I’ve heard this new one is a bit of a let-down, but whatever, I will certainly read it. Eventually.<\/p>\n

Grover Cleveland (The American Presidents Series)<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – by Henry Graff. I’m basically collecting the entire series (they haven’t published all the books yet) – but I can’t imagine I’ll get to Grover Cleveland any time soon. However: when I am ready for him, he will be there!! Thank goodness.<\/p>\n

Saturday<\/a>\"\"<\/i> – by Ian McEwan. Eventually I will read it, I’ve had it since it came out – just not in the mood for McEwan these days. Since he tore my heart out with Atonement<\/i>, uhm – 4 years ago?? I’ve stayed far away from him! But I will eventually read it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Got a cool mee-mee from 50 Books: Five most recent books you’ve bought for yourself: Grover Cleveland (The American Presidents Series) – by Henry Graff Then She Found Me – by Elinor Lipman – I used to have this book … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15],"tags":[931,587,240,94,247,107,155,718],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6765"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6765"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6765\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":103278,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6765\/revisions\/103278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6765"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6765"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6765"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}