Books - Past Bestseller Challenge

Captain James Tiberius Kirk once said (a Star Trek episode or movie, I don't recall) that Jaqueline Sussan's novel, Valley of the Dolls was one of the great classics of the 20th Century.

This book was a bestseller, but I have never read it.

So, I am starting a challenge.

Books - any type, a bestseller in your country or another.
If you are a bit lazy, you can watch the movie.

Author - must be dead

Publication - the original date must be from 1955 to 1995. If you have a
reprint, that's ok. You don't need to get a book from the stacks of a library, if you are going to die from the dust.

Goal - When you write your book review, you must say whether it can become a classic or whether it is a product of its time and that it will be forgotten 50 years from now.

Double-Dipping - Ok by me. If you are reading the book for another challenge, it's fine with me. Kill two birds with one stone.

Reward - I will link to your blog with your book/movie selection. When you write a review, I will add that link.

I will have two drawings. Book reviewers can get a big book. Movie reviewers get a little book.


Deadline - Now until October 31, 2007.

Suggestions (but if you find something else, go for it)
Fiction(General) - James Clavell, Ian Fleming, Arthur Hailey, Alex Haley, Louis L'Amour, C. S. Lewis, James Michener, Jacqueline Susann, Dr. Seuss, J.R.R. Tolkien
Cooking - Julia Child
History - Stephen Ambrose, Barbara Tuchman
Mystery - Agatha Christie
Non-fiction (general) Betty Friedan
Poetry - T. S. Eliot, Sylvia Plath, Ezra Pound
Science - Stephen Jay Gould, Carl Sagan
Self-Help - Dale Carnegie, Dr. Benjamin Spock
Science Fiction - Issac Asimov, Rod Serling

Movies - Airport, Hawaii, Roots, etc.
Must be the version made closest to the original publication date

ENJOY!

Bloggers and their book/movie:
Isabel - Caravans by James Michener

Books - Kiriyama Prize

One of my fav authors, Haruki Murakami, won the 2007 Kiriyama Fiction Prize!

This competion also encompasses non-fiction, which I am also reading a lot these days. This book won that prize: Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Promote Peace... One School at a Time by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin.

I like their expanded definition of Pacific Rim! I looked at the lists to check out the Latin American books that have been nominated. I am hoping recommend some writers from this region for the International Fiction Bookgroup of New Orleans.

Stuff - Projects and Reading Started!

I have been doing a lot of projects this week. When Spring approaches, my concentration decreases, so I just do little things.

Knitting - My friend, A, in California saw me wear my mobius shawl, and so I am making one for her. She said no yellows or oranges, so I chose the fabrics in the swatch that you see on the left. She loved my selection.

I am starting a red scarf for the Orphan Foundation of America. This organization gives young people, who were in foster homes most of their lives, a scarf when they are not in the foster care system.

The length needs to be 60 inches, so I have a long way to go!

I attended my book group last night. We had a great discussion on The Year of Wonders.

I have finished reading a very well written novel, Kabbalah - A Love Story by Rabbi Lawrence Kushner. It's short enough that I might reread it this weekend. I want to capture what I missed in the first reading.

I am now reading another non-fiction book, The Secret Life of Numbers - 50 Easy Pieces of How Mathematicians Work and Think by George E. Spriro. It's a book of essays about different math geniuses. It's written for the general audience, so you don't have to know about calculus to appreciate it.

Of course, I will write book reviews next week.

I also finished my free issue of World Literature Today. I can't wait for my next issue from my one-year subscription.

Enjoy your weekend!

Books - Book Review - Flower Confidential - Amy Stewart

Amy Stewart went behind the scenes to find out what it takes to get cut flowers from the field to your vase. And it’s a lot of work, on the part of the growers, a lot of coordination among the auctioneers and distributors, and then survival skills for both the flowers and the florists.

Buying cut flowers is a growing business. So much coordination has to happen. Everyone has to be prepared for special events, like Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day. Diseases can still ruin flowers.

Stewart covers the path that the flowers take by examining companies and talking to people involved in all the cycle of breeding, growing, distribution, and selling.

These are some interesting facts that I found out about cut flowers:

• Breeders are working hard to create a blue rose. Geneticists have already produced a green rose.
• 75% of the flowers sold in the U.S. come from Latin America
• Flowers in Europe come with different certifications, to denote organic growing methods and high quality. Some of the bouquets sold in U.S. supermarkets wouldn’t even sold AT ALL in any flower market in Europe.
• Placing bouquets next to cheese or fruits shortens the life of flowers. Ethylene is the culprit.
• Organic certification programs can actually result in cost savings. Growers use fewer pesticides and better worker benefits mean higher levels of retention.
• Some florists dye flowers in strange colors. The dye is absorbed in the stems. Japan is a big market for this. Glitter can also be applied to flowers.
• Viagra can extend the life of a flower.

Stewart made witty observations in her travels. On her way to Cayambe, Columbia, to visit a grower, she notes: “Once or twice the road swerved across the equator; each time the (tour bus) driver would point it out to me, and I’d imagine a bright orange dotted line draped over the landscape, like the one on my globe at home…that I was traveling on a tight thin line that held all the emerging flower growers together…”

Stewart really loves cut flowers, but seeing the distribution process in Miami and thinking about the organic certification process makes her realize that “…once flowers begin their final leg of their journey to the consumer, they lose their identity. They blur together in a sea of petals and leaves…all massed together, that flowers seemed to me for the first time to be utterly faceless, anonymous. If it seems like flowers have lost their souls in this process, well, they have. There’s nothing romantic or sentimental about toxic pesticides and underpaid workers. “Green label” flower certification programs, which establish standards for the reduction of pesticides and other chemical, conservation of natural resources, worker safety, and labor rights, represent the best hope flowers have of winning back their souls, their purity.”

Stewart also provided address and websites of the places that she visited, so you can do your own research. She prepared charts and an extensive Notes section.

I learned a lot of interesting things about this industry. I had no idea how immense it was. I prefer flowers from the garden. However, I have the luxury of being able to have a garden. When I lived in a small apartment in Connecticut, I didn’t have the space, so I would buy flowers to brighten up my tiny home.

I did test out one of her facts. Breeders told Stewart that most cut flowers have no scent. I suppose that this trait is not a strong, so it’s one of the first flower traits to be discarded. I went to a supermarket last night and sniffed. It’s really true.

Stuff - Difficult Music

The good thing about being an indie bookstore is that you can decide what to do and not be restricted by corporate policies.

Maggie McKeown enjoys hearing Difficult Music. This can be electronic or not, partly improvised or not, original, modern … well, you have to be there to understand it.

You need to be quiet. You won’t catch all the nuances in the first listening. The next time that you listen to the songs, it might be different.

An experience that really uses all your brain cells.

On Saturday, March 10, 2007, I attended Difficult Music No. 7 at McKeown's Books

The first set was played by Kevin Gipson. He played some synthesizers. I heard some bird sounds. It was great. He also has some music that you can hear in these two sites: No. 1 and No. 2 .

I stayed for the second set and listened acoustic cello music (natural but very modern) by Helen Gillet .

I didn’t stay for the last set by Chef Menteur's Bryan Killingsworth and native Trey Smith

I enjoyed this evening for the alternative thinking.

This was also the night that I used some of my store credit to get Geisha, A Life!

Books - Book Review - Geisha a Life - Mineko Iwasaki

This memoir continues (timewise) where Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden) ends. Mineko Iwasaki was born after WWII, and retired in the 1970s.

Iwasaki first explains that geisha means artist. She considered herself a geiko (female artist) and also a maiko (a woman of dance). She was also an atori, the head of household and business for other geikos who worked in the Iwasaki lodging house and the support staff.

She does acknowledge that some women do work as prostitutes, but geikos are artists. But, love can happen when men and women come together.

Iwaski was one of 11 children. Some older siblings became geikos, but she was chosen by the Iwasaka atori to be the next atori. She lived in the Gion section of Kyoto.

She started her training at age five but she was not adopted by the Iwasaki family until she was about 10. Until this point, she occasionally visited her parents. After the adoption, she did not.

Iwasaki was amazed that she even became a geiko, much less an atori.

“A first-class geiko is constantly in the glare of spotlights while I spent much of my childhood hiding in a darkened closet. A first-class geiko uses all the skills at her command to please her audience.. while I prefer solitary pursuits A first-class geiko is an exquisite willow tree who bends to the service of others while I have always been stubborn and contrary by nature, and very, very proud.”

Iwasaki was happy at home, but fate had another path planned for her. She started dance lessons at age 6, attending school, and did some minor household tasks. At age 15, she stopped attending regular school, went to dance school in the mornings, paid respectful visits to others in the geiko community, rehearsed for dance performances, studied national and international events, and biographies of clients and patrons, and performed the geiko duties in the evenings. Iwasaka worked almost non-stop, seven days a week, for several years. She did have to stop once when her kidneys failed; she usually slept about 4 or 5 hours a night. She did have servants, so she didn’t have to do household tasks or run errands, like other young women in Japan.

Iwasaki chafed under the restrictions. Although the system allowed her to earn a great deal of money, she could not dance what she felt like; she had to follow the rules of the dance mistress. She wanted to continue her formal education, but that was frowned upon.

She has no idea how to handle money, or how much things costs. She falls in love with a married man, who promises to leave his wife. She has to ask the permission from a go-between to make arrangements.

Despite the restrictions, Iwasaka was determined to continue expanding her mind. She tried learning new ideas from talking to clients. She kept petitioning the governing board of the geikos for modernizations, despite their refusal. She lived in her own apartment for a bit and learned how to cook and clean and deal with her budget. She took better care of herself and went on vacations.

I learned many things about the geikos: how much a kimino costs and why it is so precious, how envious other women can be (I worked in mostly male offices, so this was eye opening for me), how difficult is it to dress and get ready for an evening of work, how strict the dancing was. Also, entire families get to know their favorite geiko and even invite her to visit them in their vacation home.

Iwasaki decides to retire at a rather young age and marry an artist. She learns another career. She still goes to Gion to see the geikos.

I enjoyed reading this autobiography and recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn more about this world.

Stuff - Little Joys, Smirks,Grrs and Yikes

Little joys

I have visitors this week, so my reading is slow. I managed to finish Year of Wonders and am still working on my other two books.

I went to my knitting group for only 1 1/2 hours. Last week, it was noisy there; a not-very-good band was having rehersals there. I was afraid it would continue this week also, because the rehersal spaces are not as readily available as before, but they weren't here this week. Yippeee. We will keep on meeting at Urban Cup for now.

Little smirks

New outdoor sculptures are being installed in various parts of the city. It's a fleur de lis (the New Orleans symbol). Each artist is given a blank sculpture, and they can paint it as they wish.

There is a rather strange one at the local electrical utility headquarters. The company deserves it. They are making the customers pay for the 'Kane damage, instead of the stockholders.

Little grrs

A national Wholey Foods company refused to allow the Girl Scouts to sell their cookies in front of their store, because they said that the cookies contain trans fats. Bad Wholey Foods; if you abuse any of the foods in their store, it's not good for you. And, they use a lot of plastics to package their foods, so they are not totally holy.

The mother went to another national food chain to sell the cookies with her daughter.

The next day, I saw another Girl Scout and her mom selling cookies, diagonally across the street from Wholey Foods, but next to a bar. One of my friends commented, "a totally New Orleans scene." She is so right.

Little Yikes

I also attended a friend's funeral. I hadn't been to that part of town, since it's rather close to the 17th St Canal levee breaches. Well, the funeral home was standing but water-damaged. The company made a makeshift home using a double-wide trailer. Yikes. What improvisation.

The inside was beautiful, and my friend looked peaceful.

Books - Cookbook and Eating

A week ago, I ate for a good book cause. The Culinary History group held a GUMBO tasting at the Savvy Gourment

Gumbo is hard to cook. If you burn or overcook the roux (flour mixed with oil) or don't prepare the okra correctly (cut in small pieces, most of the juice must be out before it's put in the soup pot, and other things that I don't know about), the soup will have the wrong color and/or consistency.

So, the group prepared four different soups from different cookbooks. I didn't try two of them; they were too red. Gumbo should be muddy brown to grey.

The other two were ok. One had the right consistency but was too yellow. The other had the right color, but too much okra juice leaking out.

It was a nice mini-meal to warm me up, but I hope that they modify the recipies to get the color and consitency correct before the publication.

Stuff - Priority In Box

I made this box to prioritize my tasks at work. I needed something visual to punch up my desk. Plus, I found out that I am multitasking so much, that I forget to do things.

This project took several days. I painted parts of a cigar box (that had already been "desmelled") with acrylic paint.

I stamped some images. To make the images pop some more, I put embossing powders. Then I pasted some machine embroidered flowers; they were part of fine fabric samples that I got at a fabric store.


One eye dripped after the second layer of embossing powder, so I glued part of an flower to cover up the goop.

I then used some yarn samples to form the first letters of my three priority lists: Soon, Later, and When I Can. I wrote the rest of words in markers.

It's working out well, so far.

Books - Spring Fever moments

I can jump from one creative crafting activity to another and volunteering in one organization to another.

I can watch two TV shows at a time, changing to secondary interest show when there are commercials on the primary interest show.

I can drive and listen to the radio.

But I usually read one book at a time, except for now.

I think it's spring fever; my concentration is scattered. Or, maybe, I have done so much advance planning for my vacation, that my mind can't take it anymore.

Current reads:

• Geisha-A Life by Mineko Iwasaki (Autobiography)
• Flower Confidential by Amy Steward (from my advanced reading stash)
• Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks (for bookgroup)

It's a bit disconcerting for me to be fliting from one book to the other, but I am doing it.

Books - How much are they worth?

If you had a dire situation and needed some money quickly, could you, would you, sell some of your books?

To check out what your book might be worth to others, see Abe Books.

In the advanced search feature, you can enter "first edition" , "signed" "hard" cover and see what other people would pay for your books.

I did a fun search: Fiction books that cost more than $10, 000.

Some of the most interesting results are:

Casino Royale FLEMING, Ian
Price: US$ 20000.00

In the Days of the Comet Wells, H.G.
Price: US$ 22500.00

A Christmas Carol in Prose Being a Ghost Story of Christmas Dickens, Charles
Price: US$ 12000.00

Pride and Prejudice: A Novel. AUSTEN, Jane]
Price: US$ 129319.50

GONE WITH THE WIND Mitchell, Margaret
Price: US$ 12000.00

Whenever I buy an old book, I check the price first. If it's not worth too much, and I like the illustrations, I take the book apart for my altered art. I haven't found the hidden treasure yet!

Books - Book Review - The Inheritance of Loss - Kiran Desai

I was looking forward to reading this book. It’s about the inhabitants of Kalimpong, India near the Himalayas in the late 1980s. This part of India is close to other countries and is compact. Peoples of many nationalities and religions coexist in this small area.

The characters are living a life that won’t stay stable for long; there are national and local events happening that will affect them.

One of the characters, Biju, leaves for New York City and works there as an illegal alien. He suffers a lot and does not enjoy life in the U.S. Everyone takes advantage of him, including his own countrymen. However, he is the only one who tried to shake free the lethargy of the Kalimpong.

I cared for some of the characters and couldn’t believe how callous others were. It’s just the same as I feel for people in real life.

The stories of the various characters are told in flashback form and not linear in time.You have to work a little bit to keep the stories and timelines straight.

The language in certain passages was beautiful. When the judge goes to England to study, he doesn’t feel comfortable there, so “He retreated into a solitude that grew in weight day by day. The solitude became a habit, the habit became the man, and it crushed him into a shadow.” The cook revered aluminum foil; “..washing, drying, using, and reusing them until they crumbled into the tinselly scraps that he couldn’t bear to throw away.” Gyan found that love was “…wasn’t a scripture; it was a wobbliness that lent itself to betrayal, taking the mold of whatever he poured it into.”

Yet, despite the characters and the language, I didn’t feel moved or interested by the novel. I wanted to learn more about this area of India, but I felt that the novel only touched the visible level. After awhile, the characters seems whiny to me also.

Another book club member felt the same way about the character, and she had the feeling that she had read this novel before. She said the The Inheritance of Loss reminded her of Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things, which won the 1997 Booker Prize.

The only character that we both admired was Biju, who dared to travel elsewhere.

I give this book a tepid recommendation. I loved the language, but the novel felt superficial to me, even though it won the 2006 Booker Prize. I know that Desai can reach deeper, but she didn’t do it in this work.

Books – Exhibition of World’s Largest Fold Out Book

I walked quickly on a nice spring day from my office to the New Orleans Glassworks and Printing Studio to see the largest fold out book in the world. It’s The History of the Brave Czech Nation by Lucy Seifert. 7 feet high by 230 feet long!

It started in a narrow room (probably where the carriages were kept in this 19th century building) and extended all the way to the kiln room.

Since I was on my lunch break, I couldn’t spend as much time as I wanted but I was enchanted by the exhibit.

The illustrations are lovely, and the history is clearly explained.

I saw the book size version, and there were pop-out castles and other figurines.

I appreciate that the Czech nation sponsored this exhibit to cheer up the people of this recovering city.

Stuff - Spring Scarves

It's too hot to wear wool but cool enough for something. I finished making these two skinny scraves with Noro Yarn.

One is knit on one side, purl on the other. I made it with three stiches/row with a No. 3 circular needle. The yarn curled into itselves. People from my knitting group thought I used the I needle method!
(I have no idea what that is). The yarn just curled into itself as I knitted.

My second scarf is made with knit stiches for three rows and then a dropped stich. I wrapped a braided section around the rectangular portion. The braid is longer than the scarf. I am still thinking of what to do with the long braid.

Stuff- My winter shawl

I made this shawl a few months ago and have been wearing it, receiving lots of compliments, but I have not had a chance to blog about it.

The entire project is an accident. I made a couple of single crochet rows correctly, but on the third or fourth row, I started crocheting on the opposite side of the foundation chain row. I didn't notice it, until I realized that I had to really move the novelty yarn around a lot when I did a row. I decided to continue, and the result is beautiful

The project is a like a modified mobius strip. I used my leftover novelty yarns from other scarf projects to make it.

I am submitting this project to Craft Zine .

Stuff - On-Line Poetry Magazine

I received an email, about the Poet's Letter Magazine. It's very nice. I haven't finished reading it.

Too bad, I don't live in London and can't work there. It sounds like a creative place.

Enjoy.

Books - LPO finds

I made two trips to the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra Book Fair. On the first trip, I didn't find anything. On the second day, I bought three books.

One is really beat-up, but it has nice illustrations, so that will be for altered books projects.

I have read other books by the late James Michener. He reseached his topics well and even lived in the area for awhile to have the feel of the place.

Mr. Michener spent the last years of his life in Austin, TX, where a graduate level, creative writing program is named in his honor!

The last one of his that I read was Poland. It followed two families through various centuries in Poland's history. Every section ended with the serf, Jan, going back to his miserable existence after going off to war or some sort of adventure with the lord of the manor.

Caravan involves looking for a lost U.S. citizen in 1946 Afganistan, before the Partition of India. The inside-cover map shows places where the U.S. & U.K. troops are stationed today, like Kabul and Jalalabad.

The LPO volunteers also slipped a bookmark, advertising the next sale. Bad temptation.

I also bought a book about kissing, originally published in 1932 and republished in 1988. I wanted my young co-worker to have a good laugh about the advice. Well, she showed it to a friend, who took it from her. Now, my co-worker has to go fight for MY book. The content is now campy today.

When I get it back, I will share some of the insights!