books read
Jun. 29th, 2005 11:36 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fleaDiane Ackerman, Cultivating Delight (HarperCollins 2001).
I wanted this to be like Verlyn Klinkenborg - it's short snippets moving through the year in her garden - but I stopped reading a few scenes into summer and I'm not going to finish it. I'd read her Natural History of the Senses years ago, and similarly just couldn't care about it. Her writing style is quite lush, and I do prefer the spareness of someone like White or Klinkenborg. But more than that, it's that I don't get anything from her books - she describes things, but there isn't any thoughtful moment there, no point to the anecdote that resonates with me. It's just pillowy pages of prose, signifyin' nothin'. Note to self: don't bother trying again.
Loretta Chase, Miss Wonderful.
Susan W. has excellent taste in romance authors with a past in traditional regencies (naturally I define excellent as "I agree with her"). Thanks, Susan! This books wasn't perfect, of course, but it was worth reading, and I have very high standards of worth reading. She's a highly competent estate manager (dad's an absent-minded botanist) and heiress who broke off a former engagement because she was so devoted to the land. He's a ladies' man turned reluctant Waterloo hero who can't remember the battle, and due to a paternal injunction must make his way in business or marry an heiress. They fight each other over whether or not a canal is a good thing, and have lots of wildly anachronistic sex.
Dr. Seuss, The Lorax (1971).
I don't include all the children's books I read, but I read this for the first time since my childhood this week and was struck by its simple message about limited resources on the earth, and how we shouldn't destroy something beautiful (the Truffula Tree environment) just to make something nobody needs (Thneeds), as well as money. Compared to now, of course, 1971 looks positively restrained in its consumerism (okay, I wasn't born yet, so I don't exactly remember, but I am sure there were no Humvees and Viking stoves were not standard kitchen upgrades.) Sigh.
I wanted this to be like Verlyn Klinkenborg - it's short snippets moving through the year in her garden - but I stopped reading a few scenes into summer and I'm not going to finish it. I'd read her Natural History of the Senses years ago, and similarly just couldn't care about it. Her writing style is quite lush, and I do prefer the spareness of someone like White or Klinkenborg. But more than that, it's that I don't get anything from her books - she describes things, but there isn't any thoughtful moment there, no point to the anecdote that resonates with me. It's just pillowy pages of prose, signifyin' nothin'. Note to self: don't bother trying again.
Loretta Chase, Miss Wonderful.
Susan W. has excellent taste in romance authors with a past in traditional regencies (naturally I define excellent as "I agree with her"). Thanks, Susan! This books wasn't perfect, of course, but it was worth reading, and I have very high standards of worth reading. She's a highly competent estate manager (dad's an absent-minded botanist) and heiress who broke off a former engagement because she was so devoted to the land. He's a ladies' man turned reluctant Waterloo hero who can't remember the battle, and due to a paternal injunction must make his way in business or marry an heiress. They fight each other over whether or not a canal is a good thing, and have lots of wildly anachronistic sex.
Dr. Seuss, The Lorax (1971).
I don't include all the children's books I read, but I read this for the first time since my childhood this week and was struck by its simple message about limited resources on the earth, and how we shouldn't destroy something beautiful (the Truffula Tree environment) just to make something nobody needs (Thneeds), as well as money. Compared to now, of course, 1971 looks positively restrained in its consumerism (okay, I wasn't born yet, so I don't exactly remember, but I am sure there were no Humvees and Viking stoves were not standard kitchen upgrades.) Sigh.
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Date: 2005-06-29 06:27 pm (UTC)