The Bookshelf
I'm an avid book reader, and love browsing through people's bookshelves to see what books and ideas they've found interesting. The books here are some that I've read recently and some that I think are especially interesting. If you've got some on your bookshelf to share, please drop me an e-mail note or add a comment below.There are bookstore links if you want to buy or find related books. If you just want to read, check out your local library.
allconsuming.net reading list |
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Doctor Zhivago
This is a book-on-tape, and I'm not sure who did the translation, but it's masterful.
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One Hundred Years of Solitude
I've wanted to read this for years, and the combination of the forced pseudo-vacation of our summer transition between houses, finding a copy of it on the bookshelf where we're housesitting, and the need for something more filling while plowing through "The DaVinci Code" made this the right moment to dive in.
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allconsuming.net completed books list |
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The Da Vinci Code
Feels like fast food after I've been eating good home cooking: simple and easy to take in, but it's not going to help you grow. Plus, it reads like it's meant to be made into a movie full of glamorous movie stars.
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The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother
The story of some amazing lives, harsh, loving and very full. Along with it, a unique view on race as it affected both white and black members of the family.
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The Perfect Mile: Three Athletes, One Goal, and Less Than Four Minutes to Achieve It
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The Cloister Walk
A beautiful book of reflections on a style of life that few of us know about. She looks at the Benedictine vows that are taken and the structure of life on a monestary, and reflects on how that shapes the way you look at and interact with the world. Unfortunately, it's harder to extract spiritual lessons for my own life right now that's so filled with the craziness of young children, work and family. Sure, living the Liturgy of the Hours is probably very moving, but that's on another planet for me right now.
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Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life
An autobiography with a strong thread of his "conversion" to Christianity, the writing is so beautiful in some places I regretted having it as a book-on-tape, since I wanted to re-read and savor the parts. His conversion is really a long process of internal growth, and it's the inner and outer journeys that he chronicles so well.
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Life of Pi
My sister told me that this needed to be the next book that I read, and that it was one of the best books she had ever read. Quite a demand and statement from someone who has read as widely as my sister. Yet now that I'm in to and hooked, I see her point. It's been a while since I've had such pure enjoyment from reading - Barbara Kingsolver's books usually do it, as did "Peace Like A River". This is another one that I don't want to end.
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Right Ho, Jeeves
I grabbed this as a book-on-tape at the library on a whim, knowing that I should read a P.G. Wodehause sometime. It's something like tasting some Godiva chocolate after being used to Hershey's; even if you're not an afficienado of chocolate, you can tell that you've got something special on your hands.
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Montana 1948 : Montana 1948
An interesting short novel. I suppose that being in Montana has something to do with the story (a family tragedy as remembered through the mind of a 12-year old) but it seems secondary at best. It's more about coming of age and learning about some of the ragged edges of the world in a harsh way, no matter where you might happen to grow up. I hope it wasn't just trying to cash in on Montana chic.
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Seabiscuit: An American Legend
This was a pulse accelerator. A marvelous telling of a story that had slipped somehow into obscurity. Listening to it on disc was perhaps a good way to keep me from racing ahead or reading it too fast. <br />
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Mountains Beyond Mountains: Healing the World: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer
I wish I had the time to immerse myself in this one, because the story draws me in whenever I start reading just a couple of pages. I need sleep, though, so I guess I'll take it slowly. <br /> <br />It's a unique book for Kidder in that he allows himself to be part of the story rather than the omnipresent narrator. Paul Farmer challenges him in many ways and at many levels, and Kidder lets us in on his own reactions. <br /> <br />Beyond being a story about one man, it's a story of how anyone can make a difference.
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The Weblog Handbook: Practical Advice on Creating and Maintaining Your Blog
I've just picked this up, and it looks like a nice companion to "We Blog"; that one is heavier on the practical advice of construction and machinery, while this one focuses on the why, what for, and how of writing within a community.
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Home Town
Classic Kidder, fly on the wall listening to everyone, and crafting a non-fiction piece like a novel. The range of people make for a fine mesh of characters that draws out an image of the town that's surprisingly rich.
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The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference
This was the abridged book-on-tape version, and I wish I could have found the full length version. It seems a bit too pop science, and yet it carries a very interesting message that rings true. The whole weblog movement is probably a good case in point: personal websites aren't anything that new, but once a couple of good tools arrived to lower the barrier to publishing, the floodgates were opened.
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We Blog: Publishing Online with Weblogs
This is a great book for historical and technical background on the blogging world. It seems to be trying to straddle two worlds - the technie and non-techie bloggers - and I'm not sure it does too well there, but being in the techie camp I could understand the tech talk (and learn from it) and enjoy the non-techie angle. For me, it was a way of broadening my horizon of blogging beyond the software minds I had followed when just getting into blogs.
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For the Love of Books: 115 Celebrated Writers on the Books They Love Most
We know books can affect us, so why not ask what books affected the writers of the books that affect us? And don't just for any old "good" books they liked, but the ones that MOST affected them. It's good to hear that such choices aren't any easier for them than they might be for us, and the results are great reading.
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A Passage to India
This one had to grow on me, as I started out listening to it in a distracted state of mind, but it's finally hooked me. The story itself is interesting - the interplay of people and cultures in British colonial India of the 1920's - but the storytelling is masterful. In fact, this is one where listening to the book was hard, because the arrogant, snooty British attitude came across so strongly in the narrator that I almost gave up. Now I'm glad I didn't.
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Soul of a Citizen : Living With Conviction in a Cynical Time
This is a wonderful tonic for the malaise of being overwhelmed with the things in the world that require change. He gives you encouragement to believe that you can, should, and will take action. Without, your soul begins to fade, and most people don't like it when that happens to them.
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Young Men & Fire
A tremendous story of a tragedy that shaped fire fighting as practiced today. Stories of forest fires from my brother-in-law put the events it describes into even starker and sadder relief.
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DAUGHTER OF TIME
I had never heard of Josephine Tey before, but she is apparently famous in the field. I can see why.
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Small Wonder : Essays
Beautiful essays, lovingly crafted, full of the usual passion and personality. As an added bonus, I listened to this as a book-on-tape with the author reading it. Not all writers are good readers, but she is an exception.
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The Control of Nature
Controlling the Mississippi, directing a volcano's flows, stopping mountain erosion; it's not just about human hubrus that thinks it can "win" against nature, but about how we cope in settings where our scope of time and effort are so short. All told in the inimitable style of a master writing craftsman.
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Who Got Einstein's Office?: Eccentricity and Genius at the Institute for Advanced Study
Life in egghead heaven isn't exactly what everyone thinks it is cracked up to be, but then again it doesn't sound all that bad either. The casual tone and clear descriptions of complicated pieces of high science make this a great read.
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I'd Rather Teach Peace
This was suggested by a teacher who had it as required summer reading for staff. I'm not sure how to thank him yet, because this is one with ideas that you don't come across often. The timing was right, too, with a slightly to radically different way of viewing (depending on how you think of it) the current Iraqi and Afgan war.
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Crossing Open Ground
I usually don't like abridged books on tape, and authors don't necessarily make good readers, but this one is a jewel. I'm sure that the full length version of this book has plenty of more nuggets, but the distillation done here is masterful.
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Guatemala books |
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Secrets of the Talking Jaguar
A beautifully told story of a man's journey from the United States to his soul's home in Santiago Atitlan, where he becomes a village shaman. His stories and insights into the indigenous belief system from his sacred place within their lives is a marked departure from outsider's interpretation of the Guatemalan people described by simple observation.
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Guatemala Rainbow
A coffee-table format photo collection of the breathtaking array of colors and patterns that appear in Guatemalan dress, both the everyday and the ceremonial.
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Love in a Fearful Land
Another story of life in Santiago Atitlan, this one about a pair of United States priests who go there to serve, and become targets of the repressive forces of the government.
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Bridge of Courage
A collection of stories of campesinos, or ordinary people involved in the struggle for justice and fairneess. The stories are told in their own words, of life in the villages, hiding in the mountains, or organizing in the city.
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Guatemala : Eternal Spring, Eternal Tyranny
Both a photo journal and a book trying to describe the plight of the people during the war. Excellent pictures, lots of good references, unabashedly on the side of the people.
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Out Of The Dump
A book that grew out of a project to let children living in the poorest of poor districts in Guatemala City tell their story in pictures and words. They were given cameras and told to take pictures. Along with stories and poems that they wrote, this is a powerful book.
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Guatemala Journey
A travelogue written while the author was teaching in Guatemala on a Fulbright Scholarship, but with lots of history and well-written analyses of the situations.
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False Tongues and Sunday Bread
An authentic Guatemalan cookbook, now out of print. If you can find it in a used book store, get it.
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Sweet Waist of America
This has more of the tenor of a P.J. O'Rourke account of Guatemala, written by a self-avowed conservative who wants to give a more balanced view than the bleeding-heart liberals usually tell. Unfortunately he spends too much time grinding his ax rather than just telling the stories of people he encounters, which are fascinating in and of themselves.
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Other Media
AlterNet
Common Dreams
The Guardian
Other Bookstores
HamiltonBook.com
abebooks.com
Powell's Books
Near By
Badgerball
The Daily Page
Wisconsin.gov Portal
Far Away
Resource Center of the Americas
La Ruta Maya
Important
Common Hope Project
Heifer Project
Nat'l Adoption Info Clearinghouse
Common Cause
Silly
Dave Barry's Blog
The Onion
This Modern World
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