Reading Update: July 31, 2010

WitchI have been reading Georgette Heyer’s Regency romance Charity Girl for the Celebration of Georgette Heyer at Austenprose. I am about 1/3 the way through. I also picked up Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms because I need to have it read before school starts: it’s summer reading for my 10th grade students, and I haven’t read it before. I know, shocking! I like it so far, but I can’t deny that I have truly been wanting to read something set in Salem ever since my trip. I tried to tell myself I was going to finish these two books first and then I could indulge, but you know what? It’s summer, and I’m going to read it now if I want to. So I have started Brunonia Barry’s The Map of True Places. I will probably move on to something else set in Salem for as long as the mood lasts. I had a wonderful time there, and I so enjoyed seeing everything I had read about.

Plus, how cool is it that the first few results in my Photodropper plugin that helps me find Flickr images I can use on my blog returned my own photographs?

photo credit: danahuff

Salem Trip

I originally hadn’t planned to post this video of our trip to Salem, MA., but I will share it for a short time. I created it in iMovie using photographs and video taken with our iPhones and Flip camera. It’s a little distorted to fit here, but not substantially so. It clocks in at about 11 minutes.

Trip to Salem, MA., July 2010

Map of True Places Sweepstakes

On Friday, I received a package full of goodies. You might remember I won the Map of True Places Sweepstakes for Brunonia Barry’s newest book, The Map of True Places. It’s hard to tell what all is in the picture above, but the prizes included

We will probably go in July. Dylan and Maggie will most likely come with us. It’s weird. You see these contests online and enter for the hell of it, not thinking you could win, but definitely thinking why not? It takes a minute. You know ultimately someone wins these things, but you never think it will be you. This time it was, and I am so excited. I actually don’t know how to put how I feel into words. I still don’t believe I won.

A Really Good Day

GateFirst, I received an e-mail from HarperCollins informing me that I won The Map of True Places Sweepstakes. I enter contests like this all the time, but I never have any expectation of winning. My prize is a weekend in Salem, Massachusetts, a place I have always wanted to visit (especially as an English teacher). I am so incredibly excited. I hardly know how it happened. Like I said, I enter these contests whenever one strikes my fancy, but how exciting!

Second, I am slowly catching up with my Instructional Technology coursework. I read and took quizzes on three chapters of Educational Research yesterday. I didn’t too badly on the quizzes either, especially considering the difficulty of the quizzes. Today I wrote a short paper critiquing a journal article for the same course. I am virtually caught up in this course based on the schedule I set for myself. What I would like to do this week is get a little ahead in both this course and Multimedia Authoring so that I can be sure to finish both courses by the end of the semester. Once again, I find myself wishing we didn’t use grades to evaluate. I would much rather receive the feedback and a pass/fail. Grades stress me out. I hate giving them to my students, and as a student I hate worrying about them.

Finally, I noticed a small crack in the back case of my iPhone about half an inch long originating at the center of the docking port. I have scheduled Genius Bar appointments twice, but canceled them so I could continue working or not feel pressed for time completing other activities. Finally, I decided it bothered me enough to bring in and see what would happen. The Genius at the Apple Store examined the phone, determined somehow that I didn’t cause the damage by dropping it (not sure how he figured it out; I didn’t cause the damage that way, but I admit to having dropped it, although not hard—maybe it was the location of the crack), checked on my warranty (glad I got AppleCare), and replaced the phone. I’ve had it since December 2008, so it wasn’t new. It was in good shape, though the corners were chipped (I didn’t used to have a case for it; now I do), and a tiny scratch marred the otherwise perfect screen. I bought some crystal film protectors to prevent damage to the new phone’s screen and immediately put it in the case. I hope I can keep this one in pristine shape with some extra care.

So all in all, a really, really good day. Plus it’s spring break! Bonus!

In book news, I’m still reading The Annotated Pride and Prejudice and keeping up with Crime and Punishment as best as my schedule and interest will allow (I’ll be glad to finish that one and begin Gulliver’s Travels). I am thoroughly enjoying the audio version of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. I am planning to read about the Once Upon a Time Challenge to see if I can participate.

photo credit: Svenstorm

New York Times Review of The Lace Reader

The New York Times posted a review of Brunonia Barry’s novel, The Lace Reader.  I thought the review was very fair and quite accurate, particularly about Towner’s creative writing stopping the forward motion of the plot, which was something I couldn’t articulate when I wrote my own review.  Still, I think the book is well worth a read.  Check it out!

When I have an opportunity, I’ll post my review of Bill Bryson’s Mother Tongue, which I finished reading last night.  I am embarking on a re-read of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows before I turn back to new literature.

The Lace Reader

Brunonia Barry’s novel The Lace Reader is an intricate and fascinating read.  Barry’s description evokes a setting that is easy for the reader to picture and her characters are memorable.  Towner Whitney narrates most of the novel, and readers would do well to pay particular to the first two sentences in which she introduces herself.  I make a habit of checking a book to see how many chapters, parts, and pages it has, and I inadvertently saw something on a page near the end that gave away the ending, but I enjoyed seeing it unravel nonetheless.  Do yourself a favor if you read it, and don’t peek.  The surprise is better.

Towner returns to Salem after 15 years when she discovers Eva, whom Towner refers to as her aunt, is missing.  As the novel progresses, the reader learns that Towner has stayed away to escape some horrible memories from her past, when her twin Lyndley committed suicide at the age of 17 and Towner herself confessed to a murder that had not taken place.  She meets and becomes close to Rafferty, the detective assigned to look into Eva’s death and also into subsequent events.

My favorite character was Ann Chase, whom Barry describes as the second most famous witch in Salem after Laurie Cabot.  She was no-nonsense, funny, and strong.  I also liked Eva, who has died by the time the narrative begins, but whose personality is revealed through other characters’ memories of her.

The title comes from a fictional means of divination called lace reading, which is practiced by Eva, May, and occasionally Towner, though Towner blames her sister’s death on lace reading and refuses to practice it afterward.

More than anything else, this novel is about abuse and its toll on the human psyche.  I found the book to be really interesting, and it wouldn’t surprise me if lace reading becomes a popular means of fortune telling as a result of the novel.  Barry says that she wrote the novel as a “heroine’s journey,” influenced by the ideas of Joseph Campbell.  She wondered how the woman’s journey as a hero would be different from that of the man.  I’m not sure, after reading it, that I see Joseph Campbell’s monomyth in the novel.  However, I do see a sort of journey in it, and I’m glad I went on that trip.

The Lace Reader Received

I received an advance reading copy of Brunonia Bryant’s The Lace Reader.  I’m looking forward to being one of the first bloggers to be able to review this novel, so I will begin it as soon as I finish The Plague of Doves (which is really, really good so far).

Brunonia Barry’s The Lace Reader

I heard about Brunonia Barry’s novel The Lace Reader yesterday via Book Club Girl’s blog.  Book Club Girl has an interview with Barry that really intrigued me, and you ought to give it a listen if my description of the novel intrigues you.  I was lucky to be one of the first ten commenters, which means Book Club Girl will be sending me a free advance reader edition of The Lace Reader.

Perhaps one of the most intriguing aspects of the novel is how it came to be published.  Trying to get a book published is hard, trying, and often disheartening work.  Rather than spend years trying to find a publisher, Barry published her book herself.  The book became popular with readers and book clubs, and it attracted the attention of publishers who then had to bid for her book.  I love that part of the story.  Barry was able to score a $2 million book deal; the novel will be published by William Morrow and has already generated film industry buzz.

The novel is the story of Towner Whitney, a native of Salem, MA who can read the future in patterns of Ipswich lace.  She returns to her hometown after the murder of two women.  Barry says that her inspiration for the story was Joseph Campbell’s theory of the monomyth, around which I built a senior English elective at my school.  Needless to say, a new book deliberately written with the Hero’s Journey in mind intrigued me.  Barry explains that “Most stories that follow this pattern have a decidedly male orientation: a lone individual acts heroically and saves the day. I wondered if there might be an alternate form, a feminine Hero’s Journey.”  Barry is right.  Of the books I chose, all of them had a male protagonist, and it wasn’t that I didn’t want to find a book that had a female protagonist — I couldn’t.  I chose books like The Iliad, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Le Morte D’Arthur, The Ramayana, The Hobbit, Star Wars, and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (which was nixed by my principal), among a few other selected texts.  In part I am intrigued by this book for possible inclusion in my course.

I am about one-quarter into Northanger Abbey, and it’s been a delight.  I love the “heroine” Catherine, and I am looking forward to discovering what the Editrix of Austen Blog loves about Mr. Tilney (I’ve only seen him twice so far).  Austen, as always, has a pitch-perfect ear for conversation, and I was completely charmed by chapter six, in which she recounts a dialogue between Catherine and Isabella Thorpe (whom I also adore).  I should be finishing Emma this weekend, so please look for a review some time on Sunday.  I have decided I will read Charles Dickens next on DailyLit, but I am having trouble choosing a book.  I have narrowed down the list to three selections, and if you have thoughts about which one I should choose, please leave me a comment.

David Copperfield would take me more than a year in 447 daily installments, but A Tale of Two Cities and Great Expectations are broken into 170 and 231 parts respectively.  When selecting novels for DailyLit, I try to choose books that I think I would otherwise not read, and all three books fit that description, so if you don’t help me, I’m afraid I’ll have to rely on eenie, meenie, miney, and moe for assistance.  Here’s incentive for you: if you successfully convince me to read the book of your choice, I will send you a DailyLit subscription to the book of your choice (so long as it’s free), and you can enjoy a bit of DailyLit in your own inbox.  What do you say?