Books Read, 2008

My friend Charles Gramlich of Razored Zen for many years has kept a list of books he's read. I wish I'd done the same thing, but better late than never. I managed to keep a list of all the books I read in 2008. Encouraged by the reading lists posted by Lisa Kenney of Eudaimonia and Tim Hallinan of The Blog Cabin, I decided to post mine here.

I averaged a little more than one per week, fewer than in any year since I can remember. I find it harder to concentrate on books nowadays--I start far more than I finish. Often they just don't pull me into the story; I set them down, meaning to continue, but end up starting another book instead.

When I put a book on the side, I usually plan to return to it eventually. Only rarely do I start one and know I'll never finish it. When that happens I give the book to a friend or donate it to charity--even if I don't like it, someone else may. (Maybe I should start keeping a list of books I've started but haven't yet finished.)

I have several books on the list that were re-reads--books by some of my favorite authors, "comfort reads." Many of the re-reads last year were novels by Georgette Heyer, one of my all-time favorite authors, who died in 1972. Most of her books have long been out of print in the U.S., but are now being reprinted by Sourcebooks in beautiful trade paperbook editions. I purchase them as they're released, and enjoy the pleasure of rereading her wonderful stories.

My favorite of the new reads last year was The Brass Verdict by Michael Connolly, second in his new Mickey Haller series. Excellent, excellent. He's become one of my favorite writers.

Sphinx Ink’s List of Books Read in 2008
Legend: F = fiction; NF = nonfiction; R = re-read; A = audio book

TITLE, AUTHOR, DATE READ (NOTES)
1. My Sweet Folly, Laura Kinsale, 1/19/08 (F; R)
2. White Night, Jim Butcher, 2/18/08 (F)
3. Psychic Eye, Victoria Laurie, 2/24/08 (F)
4. Glass Houses, Rachel Caine, 2/24/08 (F)
5. The Overlook, Michael Connelly, 3/1/08 (F)
6. Seize the Fire, Laura Kinsale, 3/8/08 (F; R)
7. On the Prowl, Anthology (Briggs, Wilks, Chance, Sunny), 3/21/08 (F)
8. High Profile, Robert B. Parker, 3/23/08 (F)
9. What the Dead Know, Laura Lippman, 3/29/08 (F)
10. Blink, Malcolm Gladwell, 3/31/08 (NF; A)
11. Wildfire, Nelson DeMille, 4/2/08 (NF; A)
12. Irresistible, Mary Balogh, 4/17/08 (F; R)
13. Never Lie to a Lady, Liz Carlyle, 4/14/08 (F)
14. A Lady’s Secret, Jo Beverley, 4/19/08 (F)
16. Mystic Horseman, Kathleen Eagle, 4/23/08 (F)
17. Staying Dead, Laurie Ann Gilman, 4/28/08 (F)
18. Jumper, Steven Gould, 4/28/08 (F)
19. The Novice’s Tale, Margaret Frazer, 5/9/08 (F)
20. From Dead to Worse, Charlaine Harris, 5/11/08 (F)
21. Bones, Jan Burke, 5/13/08 (F)
22. Dagger-Star, Elizabeth Vaughan, 5/15/08 (F)
23. Hour Game, David Baldacci, 6/7/08 (F)
24. The Tomb, F. Paul Wilson, 5/18/08 (F)
25. Dead to Me, Anton Strout, 6/15/08 (F)
26. False Colours, Georgette Heyer, 6/15/08 (F; R)
27. Spare Change, Robert B. Parker, 6/16/08 (F)
28. Goodnight, Irene, Jan Burke, 6/19/08 (F)
29. Your Scandalous Ways, Loretta Chase, 6/21/08 (F)
30. The Cotton Queen, Pamela Morsi, 6/22/08 (F)
31. Forty Words for Sorrow, Giles Blunt, 7/1/08 (F)
32. The Ideal Wife, Mary Balogh, 7/3/08 (F; R)
33. Winter Fire, Jo Beverley, 7/5/08 (F)
34. Death of a Stranger, Anne Perry, 7/7/08 (NF; A)
35. Sweet Dreams, Irene, Jan Burke, 7/10/08 (F)
36. A Nail Through the Heart, Timothy Hallinan, 7/13/08 (F)
37. Lady of Quality, Georgette Heyer, 7/15/08 (F; R)
38. Black Sheep, Georgette Heyer, 7/20/08 (F; R)
39. These Old Shades, Georgette Heyer, 7/23/08 (F; R)
40. The Sleeping Doll, Jeffery Deaver, 7/29/08 (F)
41. The Black Moth, Georgette Heyer, 8/1/08 (F; R)
42. Cry Wolf, Patricia Briggs, 8/6/08 (F)
43. Death in Bloodhound Red, Virginia Lanier, 8/14/08 (F)
44. Alone, Lisa Gardner, 8/18/08 (F)
45. Red Square, Martin Cruz Smith, 8/21/08 (F; R)
46. Stalin’s Ghost, Martin Cruz Smith, 8/22/08 (F)
47. Polar Star, Martin Cruz Smith, 8/26/08 (F)
48. All Mortal Flesh, Julia Spencer-Fleming, 8/29/08 (F)
49. The Man with the Golden Torc, Simon R. Green, 9/19/08 (F)
50. The Gallows Thief, Bernard Cornwell, 9/27/08 (F)
51. The Ruby in the Smoke, Philip Pullman, 10/2/08 (F)
52. Regency Buck, Georgette Heyer, 10/20/08 (F; R)
53. The Archangel Project, C.S. Harris, 10/20/08 (F)
54. The Butcher’s Boy, Thomas Perry, 10/23/08 (F)
55. Last Dance at Jitterbug Lounge, Pamela Morsi, 11/2/08 (F)
56. Faro’s Daughter, Georgette Heyer, 11/8/08 (F; R)
57. Once Upon a Christmas, Diane Farr, 11/11/08 (F)
58. From Dead to Worse, Charlaine Harris, 11/16/08 (F; R)
59. The Brass Verdict, Michael Connolly, 11/21/08 (F)
60. The First Quarry, Max Alan Collins, 12/1/08 (F)
61. The Outlaw Demon Wails, Kim Harrison, 12/6/08 (F)
62. The Shadow in the North, Philip Pullman, 12/7/08 (F)

For some reason Blogger isn't letting me imbed the links in the text, so here are the links to my friends' blogs:
Razored Zen -- http://charlesgramlich.blogspot.com/; Charles' booklist reference -- http://charlesgramlich.blogspot.com/2007/10/reading-and-referral.html
Eudaimonia -- http://eudaemoniaforall.blogspot.com/ (Lisa's past and current booklists are on her blog's sidebar)
The Blog Cabin -- http://www.timothyhallinan.com/blog/?cat=2

On Crusie's "The Double-Edged Blog"

(Yikes, two posts back-to-back! Is the world ending?)

I just read Jenny Crusie's latest entry on Argh Ink, "The Double-Edged Blog." Jenny's a best-selling author of women's fiction, known for her great sense of humor. She blogs about her works-in-progress, the businesses of writing and publishing, and life in general. She's found that while her blog gives her a chance to express herself freely on topics beyond her writing, it also results in the occasional flame-war from readers who don't like her opinions. She analogizes blogging to a double-edged sword:

I found out that blogs were a chance to say anything I wanted and I was hooked. For awhile, everything was lovely, and then I posted something a lot of people didn’t like. I can’t remember what it was now, but it was the first time somebody said to me, “You know, you should stop blogging, it’s going to hurt your career.” I said, “How is that possible?” and she said, “If they don’t like what you say on your blog, they’ll stop buying your books.” That was incomprehensible to me then, and it’s still puzzling to me now. ...

Then I tripped again, this time because I was thoughtless (this happens a lot). One of my friends got a ludicrous letter from a reader and I posted it with her first name on it. That was flat out wrong of me, and I did apologize and take the name off the blog but basically, I screwed up. First lesson: Never blog when you’re really angry but not admitting it to yourself. Practical application: Wait twenty-four hours before you post something you’ve written.

Then while I was being careful on Argh–well, careful for me–I lost my temper on somebody else’s blog and became The Author Who Is Pro-Plagiarism (because that was more fun for people to get upset about than The Author Who Thinks This Is Being Handled Badly and People Should Stop Author-Bashing Until They Know the Facts). This annoyed some people so much that they’re still mad at me; some of them cornered Bob [Mayer, Crusie's co-author on a couple of books] at Thrillerfest to tell him just how awful I am, as if he didn’t know the black depths of my heart already. And of course, they’re never going to read me again. (Actually my fave comment about the whole mess was on another blog: a reader said she was never going to read me again and then followed it up by saying she’d never read me before either. I kept thinking of the old “Doctor, will I be able to play the piano after my broken arm heals?”/”Of course”/”Funny, I couldn’t play it before” joke, but that’s probably just more evidence of how depraved I am.)

I always enjoy Jenny's blog entries, whether or not I share her point-of-view on certain issues. I'm baffled by the people who incite flame-wars because someone has an opinion that differs from theirs. Or, even worse, those who begin online campaigns against a particular writer because they don't like his/her point of view.

Jennie's blog entry is well worth reading, especially for anyone who's had a similar blog-experience. Several of the comments following it are thought-provoking, too.

As Jenny says:

I feel strongly that anybody who evaluates the rest of the people in the world by how closely their attitudes and statements agree with her worldview is in danger of structuring a life much like the Alberto Gonzales Justice Department. We don’t learn from the people who agree with us, we learn from the people who make us say, “Wait a minute,” and that learning goes both ways. I learn a lot from the critics who intelligently analyze my books and find them wanting; I’ve also learned a lot from the people who have thoughfully and calmly disagreed with me on this blog. Haven’t learned a thing from the shriekers and condemners, though.

Diggin' Poetry with the Rest of You

Lately several of my favorite bloggers have posted about poetry. I generally tell people I don't like poetry--I got burned out on it in my long-ago years as an English major in college. I don't read it as a leisure activity. Yet at times of high emotion or tragedy, I've found myself writing poetry. Poetry is the highest expression of the art of language, and good poets are the most skillful users of language. Perhaps at times that have intense meaning for us, we need to express ourselves within the discipline of poetry.

I recall several poems from my college years. My all-time favorite is "Dover Beach" by Matthew Arnold, which I reproduce here. (It's long out of copyright because Arnold died 120 years ago.) It's easy to find on the Internet; I got it from http://www.bartleby.com/42/705.html.


Dover Beach
by Matthew Arnold (1822–1888)


The sea is calm to-night,
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits;—on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanch’d land,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand.
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.


Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Ægæan, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.


The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth’s shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furl’d.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.
Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.

Yipes...

Yipes, January 2008 is already past, and I posted only one blog entry in the entire month. Somehow time got away from me. I hope to make up for it in February.

Rather than focusing on a single topic today, I have a miscellany of comments.

It's now Carnival Time in New Orleans. Mardi Gras is extremely early this year--Tuesday, February 5. Because it's right in mid-winter, there's been a lot of rain and cold weather (well, cold for New Orleans--to us, anything under 60 degrees is cold). Already a number of parades were rained out. (Most of them were rescheduled to other days and nights, sometimes resulting in as many as four parades rolling one after the other.) Tonight (Friday, February 1) starts the really intense weekend that leads up to Fat Tuesday itself. Hotels are 90% full and will be 100% by Tuesday. Our favorite saying here is Laissez les bons temps rouler, that is, "Let the good times roll!"--not grammatically correct French, but idiomatic Cajun French.

I no longer go out to the parades myself; my physical problems preclude walking distances or standing for any length of time, both of which are necessary if you want to watch parades. Now I stay at home and watch it on TV. I'll spend Mardi Gras day at a friend's home, playing Trivial Pursuit and eating junk food. Maybe I'll wear a mask and wig to stay in the spirit of the day.

I posted in early December about my fractured wrist. The cast was removed three weeks ago and the fracture's healing nicely. I'm astonished by how much range of motion I lost simply by having it immobilized for five weeks. Unfortunately, it's my dominant hand, too. I'm taking occupational therapy sessions to regain full use of the wrist. I sit in my recliner chair at night, doing wrist exercises while reading and watching TV.

And here a segue: For most of my life I have spent little time watching TV, a residual of my childhood--when I became a bookworm to escape the constant battles between my brother and sister over which channel to watch on the family TV. I've gone through life oblivious to television programs that were cultural icons for others. Ever since Hurricane Katrina, however, I've found myself watching TV more and more, especially news programs and sitcoms. My TV time increased so much during the past year that I began scheduling my activities around my favorite programs.

I assume the TV addiction was a reaction to some extreme stress I underwent in 2007. Perhaps my brain needed rest.

As a result of the Hollywood writers' strike, however, my favorite shows went into rerun mode early, due to lack of scripts. After going months with having read very few books, a couple of months ago I started reading again. Since November I've averaged about a book a week--a low rate compared to my former reading pace, but an improvement over the preceding months. I've decided to start keeping a list of what I read this year, encouraged by the lists of my blog buddies Charles Gramlich, Tim Hallinan, and Lisa Kenney. I wish now I'd kept a list all my life--it would be cool to look back over the years and remember my past by what I was reading.

It would be hard to match the books-read list of Art Garfunkel, however, at least for sheer duration. He's been keeping his list for almost 40 years, beginning in June 1968. In that time he's read 1023 books, as The New Yorker recently reported in "Lists: The King of Reading," by Nick Paumgarten, January 28, 2008. The article says this works out to an average of 2.16 books per month. The article mentions some of the books on the list--most of them classics or "serious" literature (e.g., Foucault, Balzac, Heidegger, Spinoza, Hazlitt, Milton, Proust), with the occasional foray into popular literature or humor (e.g., Chesterton, Dan Brown). In general, however, Garfunkel says he doesn't read "fluff":

The list contains just—just—enough low- or middle-brow work to suggest sincerity. In the spring of 1996, between “Flaubert in Egypt” and “I, Claudius,” he took on “You’ll Never Make Love in This Town Again,” by Robin, Liza, Linda, and Tiffany. In February, 2004, he gave Dan Brown a go before returning to Flaubert and Aristophanes. He has read several books by the actress Carrie Fisher, one of Simon’s ex-wives, as well as “Simon and Garfunkel: The Definitive Biography” (in May, 1998, two years after it was published, and just before moving on to Plato and Locke).

“I avoid fluff,” Garfunkel explained last week, on the phone from a Marriott in Florida. “The stuff that men are always reading on planes: I don’t read that.” He also doesn’t read postmodern fiction—the Garfunkel Library contains no Pynchon or Barthelme. “I tried ‘Gravity’s Rainbow,’ and I thought it was fraudulent,” he said.

“I read for the reading pleasure, not for the gold star,” he went on.

IMO, Garfunkel shouldn't be called the King of Reading--2.16 books per month isn't much. Many people I know read more than that every week; I know of some people who read a book or more per day. Garfunkel may be King of Books-Read-List Keeping, however, to have faithfully maintained his list for four decades. If you'd like to see the entire list, it's on his website.

Ave atque Vale, Annus MMVII

"We will open the book. Its pages are blank. We are going to put words on them ourselves. The book is called Opportunity and its first chapter is New Year's Day." -- Edith Lovejoy Pierce (b. 1904), poet

I thank my friend Shauna Roberts for the quotation, which is perfect to start off the New Year.

I believe in new beginnings, and I like them. I always make New Year's resolutions, although I rarely stick to them for long. I am an optimist. I always try again.

2007 was not a good year for me. I suffered through a variety of worries: extreme anxiety for a beloved family member dealing with addiction, as well as my own health problems, financial worries, caretaking responsibilities, job issues, and free-floating anxiety.

Today marks the end of 2007, however, and tomorrow is a new year. I mentally erase the blackboard of 2007, washing it clean for the new self-history I will write in 2008.

Things for which I was especially thankful in 2007:

• My Family: I love them and they love me, even when we are in conflict.
• My Friends--especially Brenda, Carolyn, Cheryl and Joanne: their love and support have rescued me from despair.
• My Writer's Group, Wordsmiths (Laura, Candice, Charles, Steve, and Emily): They are not only professional colleagues, but also good friends; their opinions, tastes and judgment in literary and other matters are significant to me; their concern during my dark times over the past year has helped enormously.
• My Pets--the dogs (Dozia, Galadriel, Squeaky) and the cats (Katy, Harmony, Precious): their unconditional love and eagerness to please have comforted me through dark times.
• My Job: Even when there is chaos at home, at the office things are orderly, logical, peaceful and predictable.
• My Books: Reading them lets me escape into other minds, other lives, and other worlds; possessing them makes me feel rich, replete, rapturous and reverent. When I am anxious I sort out piles of books and I am calmed.

I will post my New Year's Resolutions for 2008 tomorrow.

Happy New Year to all my blog-friends. I'm grateful to have "met" you over the past year, through our exchanges of posts and comments.

Boo-Hoos for Newspaper Book Sections

Over the past couple of years several newspapers around the country have canceled their book review sections. Book lovers have greeted this development with sorrow, fearing it reflects a decline of reading in the population overall.

Yesterday Kassia Krozser commented on the phenomenon in her Booksquare blog. In "Stop Your Sobbing," she makes some acerbic points I hadn't considered, and her excellent essay gave me a new point of view on the situation. She points out:

[Steve] Wasserman [former editor of the Los Angeles Times Book Review] seems to put the failure of newspaper books reviews on the shoulders of some sort of anti-intellectual movement. Perhaps instead of blaming the public for a lack intellectual rigor, Wasserman and others should consider their failure to communicate. It isn’t the failure of the citizens of Los Angeles or any other community to read; it is a failure of book review editors to connect with those readers.

Instead of valuing the whole audience, they cherished only a small percentage. This, more than anything, is why book reviews are being cut. Book critics often point to the sports sections of newspapers as low revenue generators. Why isn’t sports coverage being cut?

The obvious answer is that people don’t subscribe to newspapers for book reviews; they do subscribe for sports coverage. Possibly a less examined reason — but one that is often valid when it comes to the Los Angeles Times — is that sportswriting is often more compelling and emotionally engaging than literary criticism. Oops, did I really say that? I think the fact that the section of the paper devoted to good writing is drier than toast is proof positive of every student’s nightmares are about reading.

Where is the passion, the enthusiasm, the joy that comes from reading something wonderful and wanting to share it with the world? Is it completely impossible to be analytical, thoughtful, and interesting? Writing about books should not inspire boredom, it should inspire someone to buy and read books.

* * *

To the book critics of America, I say it’s time to stop your sobbing. If you are as important and relevant as you say you are, prove it.

Food for thought. Certainly, all of us who love genre fiction know that standard book review sources tend to ignore our favorite types of books. As a result, many genre book review sites have sprung up across the Web over the years, some becoming very popular. And of course, we now have the ubiquitous Amazon review, straight from the keyboards of actual readers. (Oh, okay, we have to allow for the sandbagging by authors and their friends and/or enemies....)

The book review is not dying. It's just appearing in other places, and from other sources, than before.

Martin Cruz Smith

I return to blogging after yet another prolonged absence. This time it was partly due to loss of my Internet connection. It was days before I could find enough time to stay on the phone with tech support to recover the connection. (My ISP tries to weed out the weak-willed by making the customers first fight their way through a jungle of computer-voice links, then slog through the prolonged "you're-on-hold-but-we-really-value-your-call" waiting period, before reaching someone who can actually help.) Once I got finally got hold of a live human technician, we spent half an hour tracing various software paths to figure out what the problem was. It appears I screwed up some settings while trying to uninstall a piece of hardware a couple of weeks ago. I'm glad to be back online now, after going through days and days of Internet Withdrawal.

The topic on my mind right now is Martin Cruz Smith, whose latest novel (Stalin's Ghost) was just released. He rates a lot of respect in my weekly writers' group. Three of us had read his work and recommended him repeatedly to the others for several years. Two of them finally got around to reading some of his work in the last few months and both have raved about him--see comments on the C.S. Harris blog. (I thought Charles Gramlich had a Martin Cruz Smith entry on his blog, too, but after skimming several months of his entries I can't find it. I guess I was confusing his comments during our meetings with blog commentary.)

Anyway, if you haven't yet read Martin Cruz Smith, try one of his books. I recommend you start with Gorky Park. I've decided to re-read some of his books myself, starting with Gorky Park. I love the character of Arkady Renko; I'm a sucker for a noble hero who fights against overwhelming odds. C.S. Harris' one-sentence analysis of his character in her blog entry (see link above) is spot-on:

[O]ne of the most fascinating aspects of Arkady’s character is that as much as he hates totalitarianism and bureaucracy and coercion, he genuinely believes in all that is good and noble about the pure communist philosophy.

I Googled Martin Cruz Smith and came up with some items of interest. Apparently he's not a cyber-wise author--the only "official website" for him is an amateurish and out-of-date page on Literati.net. However, I found other pieces of interest:

• Wikipedia's article on him shows he's written under five names, including his best-known one, and had at least 16 books published before GORKY PARK: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Cruz_Smith.
• His newest book was just released--Stalin's Ghost, #6 in the Arkady Renko series. You can read an excerpt here: http://www.bookreporter.com/reviews2/0743276728-excerpt.asp.
• For a discussion of his writing process, you might enjoy reading this interview of him, done a decade ago when his novel Rose was being released: http://www.salon.com/weekly/interview960520.html.

Here are other interviews of him:

• http://www.bookpage.com/0411bp/martin_cruz_smith.html (in conjunction with release of Wolves Eat Dogs);
• http://wiredforbooks.org/martincruzsmith/ (written commentary interspersed with links to three audio interviews, done in connection with releases of Stallion Gate, Polar Star, and Red Square);
• http://www.bookreporter.com/authors/au-smith-martin-cruz.asp (regarding December 6--an interesting discussion of why he decided to set a book in pre-WWII Japan, and his difficulties writing about a culture that was difficult for him to get into).

He's one of America's best living writers, in my opinion.

What I've Been Reading

It's curious how different books can be when you read them than what you expected from the back-cover blurb.

I recently discovered the work of Julia Spencer-Fleming, a really excellent mystery author. On recommendation of members of my writers' group, I read her first book, In the Bleak Midwinter. Had it not been praised by people whose judgment I trust, I would never have tried it--I would have shunned the book based on the back-cover blurb. The heroine is an Anglican priest--a woman priest--and I'd expect a book featuring a priest or minister to be preachy, to force-feed religious dogma to the reader. How wrong I was!

In the Bleak Midwinter (2002) is the only debut novel to have won six major mystery awards--according to the author's website, it "made debut history when it won the St.Martin's/Malice Domestic contest, the Dilys Award from the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association, and the Agatha, Anthony, Macavity, and Barry awards for Best First Novel." After reading it, I can say it deserved those awards.

No sooner had I finished the book than I purchased and read the second in the series, A Fountain Filled with Blood (2003), which was as good as the first book. I have the third in hand now, Out of the Deep I Cry (2004), and I'm eager to start on it. There are two more in the series after this, To Darkness and to Death (2005) and All Mortal Flesh (2006). All Mortal Flesh has been nominated for the Agatha award and also for Mystery Ink's Gumshoe award. It also made several "best of 2006" lists, including Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, and Library Journal.

I love to discover a good author who's already completed several books in a series, because I don't have to wait for each book. Of course, once I reach the latest book, I'm on the wait-a-year-for-the-next-one list. But at least while reading the backlist I can immerse myself in the bliss of wonderful writing.

In a few days I hope to post an entry on Spencer-Fleming's books. I want to analyze what makes her books riveting.

Bibliomania

My blolleague Charles Gramlich had an entry in February on Biblioholism. This is a disease I share with him. I believe my case is more severe, however, moving from -ism into mania.

I have loved books for as long as I can remember. Starting with Little Golden Books (my earliest reading), progressing through our family's set of The Book House for Children (which I still have), through the Children's Classics. (I still recall that set fondly, with its great novels such as Black Beauty, Little Women, The Black Arrow, Rose in Bloom, Treasure Island--and I still brood because my mother gave the set away to another family when I was in high school.)

We had little extra money, so it was rare to get books of my own. I was a heavy library user until I first began earning my own money during college. I promptly joined a mail-order book club--Literary Guild, I think it was--and began building a personal library. I didn't have a theme to the library; I just bought books I thought I'd like. It grew and grew.

Within a few years I discovered what has now become a lifelong frustration: never enough bookcases. Because, you see, after I read a book, I keep it; I am a re-reader. If I like a book, chances are that one day I'll go back and reread it. Although I have an excellent memory for associating book titles with their authors, I don't have a good memory for plot details. I'll remember generally what the book was about--e.g., genre, setting, basic story--but not enough to keep me from enjoying the book again when I re-read it.

As time went on, I continued buying books, and my library grew. When I occasionally had to move to a different house, packing and moving the books was the biggest and most back-breaking issue. Still I held on to them, however. Having lots of books made me feel rich, replete, and blessed.

In the early 90s, my love of buying books expanded into mania. I was dealing with various difficulties in my life and buying books became an outlet for me. In 1993 I joined a local chapter of Romance Writers of America, decided I wanted to write romance novels, and began buying and reading them at an unprecedented pace. (I had always enjoyed reading the romance genre, but had never read as much of it as I did after I joined RWA.) Most romance novels were published only in paperback, and a substantial number were in the "category" lines of Harlequin and Silhouette which generally are only on store shelves for a month or so. As a result many of them, even those that were really well-written books, went out of print quickly.

My local library does buy paperback romance, but the librarians have so little respect for the genre they don't even bother to alphabetize the books, so finding a particular book can be difficult or even impossible. Further, the library doesn't buy every paperback romance that comes out, so I couldn't be sure of finding what I wanted at the library.

Hence, I realized I had to buy the books when they came out to be sure of having them. And, as I discovered more and more romance writers whose work I liked, I began looking for their backlists, and buying their older books whenever I could. I hit the bookstores whenever I could, obsessively scouring the shelves for books I wanted. For books that were out of print, I went to used bookstores.

I spent money on books the way some women spend money on clothes or shoes or makeup or jewelry. Or the way gamblers spend money at a casino.

And I didn't buy only romance. I bought other types of novels--mysteries here and there, thrillers from time to time, mainstream fiction, and lots of nonfiction, too. I couldn't resist those Sale shelves at Barnes & Nobel, where I found wonderful nonfiction books for such low prices. I figured I needed to build up a good research library for the historical romances I was planning to write. More recently, I've been buying a lot in the Dark Urban Fantasy genre.

Now I own thousands and thousands of books. No, I haven't read them all--I bought a such a pace over the years that I couldn't keep up with the influx. I now have so many books that even if I never buy another book, I probably will never finish reading the ones I already own.

I purchased a program to catalog my library several years ago, which partly automates the process by allowing me to scan in the ISBN bar code on books. The program then downloads information on the book from various websites such as Amazon or the Library of Congress. I have nearly 5,500 entries in the program now, and that's only the books that are actually in my house. I rent a climate-controlled ministorage unit where there are dozens of boxes of other books--I have no idea how many, because I haven't cataloged those yet.

Obsession. Yes, I admit it. But I love my books. I need my books.

To quote Arnold Lobel:

Books to the ceiling,
Books to the sky,
My pile of books is a mile high.
How I love them! How I need them!
I'll have a long beard by the time I read them.

Recommended Romance Writers

Stewart Sternberg has asked for advice on romance novels. He bought one to get an idea of what young women (ages 20-30) like to read nowadays, and couldn't finish it. Not wanting to believe that all romances are like the one he tried, he asked his blog audience for suggestions. I was eager to contribute. Although my age is years past his target range, I've read so many romances I figured surely I could suggest some he'd be able to enjoy. The comment became so long I realized it would be better to post it on my own blog rather than in Stewart's, so here it is:

I've been reading romance novels for a long time, but can't speak authoritatively on what women in the 20-30 age range like now. I can, however, list some romance novels I've liked that were popular, and thus I presume some of their audience is in your target range.

First, in defense of Janet Evanovich, the novel you tried to read is one of her early works, which has been out of print for years, perhaps deservedly. Because Evanovich is a Very Big Seller now, it was brought back into print along with several others of her early books. They are disappointing, and I agree with your evaluation. What has earned Evanovich her fame, fortune, and guaranteed spot in the NYT bestsellers list is the Stephanie Plum romantic mystery series, which are light, very funny, and fast-paced. These started with ONE FOR THE MONEY in 1994, followed by TWO FOR THE DOUGH (1996), and one every year since, with the most recent releases being TWELVE SHARP and PLUM LOVIN' (2006). I've read them all except PLUM LOVIN'.

I like the Stephanie Plum series for its humor and action; Stephanie is a lovable, sometimes loopy, heroine who is followed by disasters she barely manages to escape. She works for her cousin Vinnie as a bond enforcement agent, which creates a lot of the hilarity of the books by constantly putting her into weird situations. Evanovich has a talent for creating memorable comic characters, not just Stephanie but many of the secondary characters, such as Stephanie's sidekick Lula, a former ho' who nows works as a clerk in Vinnie's office; Stephanie's crazy grandmother, Grandma Mazur, who's a hoot; and many of the people Stephanie has to try to capture in her job. She also has two hunky men in her life, Morelli, a cop, and Ranger, another bond enforcement agent. Both are sexy but tough guys (no Fabios there!). I think you'd enjoy the Plum books a lot more than Evanovich's early romances. Also, the romance part of the novels is fairly minimal, because they are classed in the mystery genre rather than the romance genre. Try ONE FOR THE MONEY and see how you like it. Or, start later in the series--I recall being impressed that No. 9, TO THE NINES, was as funny as the first. (The scene with Lula and the pork chops slays me.)

I agree with Kate S on Jude Devereaux's A KNIGHT IN SHINING ARMOR--it was a favorite of mine for years. It's flawed as a novel in many ways, but has a central core fantasy that I think appeals to a lot of women. I must admit, however, that I haven't been able to finish any other Devereaux books I've started. (And, incidentally, despite Devereaux's having been one of the biggest-selling romance authors for years, she apparently doesn't have a website; I Googled her and got lots of references to her on other sites, but no site directly by/for her. Perhaps she's one of those cyber-phobic authors; I know a few who hate all things related to computers.)

Diana Gabaldon's OUTLANDER is one of my favorites. It's really more a historical novel/adventure story than a romance, although there is a strong romance at its core. I read the other books in the series, up through No. 4, but haven't tackled 5 & 6 yet (Gabaldon's books tend to be lo-o-o-ng). Although I liked the other books, OUTLANDER was the most satisfying to me. I consider Gabaldon a fine writer: excellent at character development, historical settings, and swashbuckling plots, as well as at describing realistic romantic relationships between men and women.

These are other historical romance writers whose work I love:

• Loretta Chase (LORD OF SCOUNDRELS is one of my all-time favorites);
• Laura Kinsale (FLOWERS FROM THE STORM is one of the finest historical romances ever written);
  
• Jo Beverley (the ones I like best are from her Malloren series--MY LADY NOTORIOUS, TEMPTING FORTUNE, SOMETHING WICKED, SECRETS OF THE NIGHT, DEVILISH);
• Mary Balogh (she had dozens of Regency romances published before she became a NYT bestseller with her Bedwyn series--the books whose titles start with SLIGHTLY...e.g., SLIGHTLY SCANDALOUS);
  
• Mary Jo Putney (THUNDER AND ROSES of her Company of Rogues series is probably my favorite; it was reprinted in 2003 and may still be available);
  
• Candice Proctor, who wrote wonderful atmospheric, character-driven historical romances (e.g., SEPTEMBER MOON) before switching to mysteries and a new pseudonym, C.S. Harris.
  

Of contemporary romance novelists, these are some I recommend:

• Jennifer Crusie--light, rollicking, fast-paced (caution--like Evanovich, Crusie is so popular that her early work has been put back into print and, although well-written for their type, those books are not as satisfying or well-developed as her later, longer books, such as TELL ME LIES, CRAZY FOR YOU, WELCOME TO TEMPTATION, and subsequent work);
  
• Susan Elizabeth Phillips--she's good at character development, many of her novels feature pro athletes as heroes (e.g., IT HAD TO BE YOU and HEAVEN, TEXAS are probably my favorites), and her books also have strong notes of humor;
• Suzanne Brockmann--her Navy SEAL "Troubleshooters" series has put her on the bestseller lists, with exciting plots, strong characters, and headlong pacing (that series begins with THE UNSUNG HERO; the most recent title is INTO THE STORM, 10th in the series);
  
• J.D. Robb, a pseudonym used by Nora Roberts for her IN DEATH series featuring police lieutenant Eve Dallas. Those novels are edgy, urban, futuristic, and fun. I also like a lot of Roberts' more traditional romance novels (e.g., MONTANA SKY, which has been made into a TV movie that will air on the Lifetime channel on Monday, February 5. It remains to be seen how well the book-to-film transition is, but the picture features John Corbett as the hero, and he's a hottie).

Of course, gotta put in that final caveat--I can't guarantee that women in the 20-30 age range like these books, but since all the above authors are bestsellers, it's a good bet that many of their fans are in that age range. There are a lot of hugely popular romance novelists whose work I've never read or that I've tried to read but didn't like.

I've reveled in the work of the authors listed above, however, and enjoyed most if not all they've written.

Book Reviews

My weekly writing group has pondered the effect of negative book reviews on potential readers. The members who are published novelists have been concerned about a couple of negative reviews of their work appearing on Amazon.com, amidst bunches of other reviews glowing with praise. Some of the negative reviews sound as if the reviewer hadn't actually read the book; one is shrilly derisive and picks on miniscule points as a basis to condemn an entire book.

I myself have never yet posted an Amazon review, but I've determined in future to post reviews of books I like, so as to support the authors. I will not post reviews of books I don't like, unless they are so abysmally bad others should be warned against them as a public service. Despite having encountered many ill-written books in my life, I have seldom found books so bad they shouldn't have been written. There is almost always a redeeming feature or two that makes them appeal to some readers.

Since I am a novice at book-reviewing, I'm looking for articles on writing reviews. Booksquare's January 19 post tipped me to this highly entertaining "class" on writing book reviews: Miles Kington -- Masterclass: How to write a book review

Sample quote:

Book review writing is very much the same [as the art of fiction], except that instead of telling people about characters, the idea is to tell the reader all about YOU.

In addition, I found a link proffered by the Smart Bitches, on a Swedish reviewer who wrote a "terrible review for [a] terrible book -- that doesn't even exist yet." (Is that what happens when book reviewers allow their personal animosity toward an author to take over?)

I am still searching for a good article on how to review a book. If you know of one, please let me know.

I am also interested in knowing what you think of some of the negative reviews on Amazon. Do you believe the reviews word-for-word, or are you skeptical? Do it depend on how well the review itself is written? How much do the Amazon reviews affect your book-buying decisions?

Comfort Reads

At Christmas this year, I was melancholy. I missed the family holiday gatherings that used to take place every year. Such get-togethers are precluded now by the post-Katrina dispersal of my extended family from the New Orleans area. Before Katrina five families of my cousins lived in Chalmette, and another set of cousins lived in New Orleans' Mid-City neighborhood. The Chalmette families lost everything, with flooding anywhere from eight to sixteen feet in their homes. The Mid-City family lost everything in the downstairs of their home, although their upstairs was untouched. Five of the families now live outside the New Orleans area, some in another state. Only two of the families plan to return and rebuild. Since it will be near-impossible in future for all my cousins to coordinate their schedules of work, children's school, and traveling to return for the annual gathering of yore, I was feeling sad and weepy.

It was time for some comfort reading.

When I need comforting, I turn to some old favorites that never fail to soothe me:

• Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice and Persuasion
• Georgette Heyer's Regency and Georgian novels, especially Venetia, Devil's Cub, Regency Buck, Lady of Quality, The Unknown Ajax, Bath Tangle
• Loretta Chase's The Lord of Scoundrels
• Laura Kinsale's Flowers from the Storm
• Diana Gabaldon's Outlander

There are other books on the comfort-read list, but these are at the top. I've read each of these books numerous times. This time I re-read Flowers from the Storm and Lord of Scoundrels. And I felt better.

On a happy ending note for my melancholy, two families of my out-of-town cousins turned up on surprise visits in the week between Christmas and New Year. I was very happy indeed to see them.

What are some of your comfort reads?

Favorite Fictional Characters

My blolleague Charles Gramlich listed his Favorite Fictional Characters on his Razored Zen blog the other day and blolleague C.S. Harris followed with a similar listing. I, believing in the mystical symmetry of the triad, herewith list my own selections. Like C.S. Harris and blogfly Basil S. Ratbane, however, I noted that the previous lists I read were weighted heavily with males. Hence, I have made two lists--my favorites of each sex:

Females:

1. Elizabeth Bennett (Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen)
2. Jane Eyre (Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte)
3. Jo March (Little Women by Louisa May Alcott)
4. Claire Fraser (Outlander by Diana Gabaldon)
5. Scout Finch (To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee)
6. Venetia Lanyon (Venetia by Georgette Heyer)
7. Archimedea "Maddie" Timms (Flowers from the Storm by Laura Kinsale)
8. Jessica Trent (Lord of Scoundrels by Loretta Chase)
9. Stephanie Plum (Plum series by Janet Evanovich)
10. Anna Pigeon (Pigeon series by Nevada Barr)
    

Males:

1. Atticus Finch (To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee)
2. Jamie Fraser (Outlander by Diana Gabaldon)
3. Spenser (Spenser series by Robert B. Parker)
4. Fitzwilliam Darcy (Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen)
5. Dave Robicheaux (Robicheaux series by James Lee Burke)
6. Joe Pike & Elvis Cole (Elvis Cole series by Robert Crais)
7. John Corey (John Corey books by Nelson DeMille)
8. Christian Langland, Duke of Jervaulx (Flowers from the Storm by Laura Kinsale)
9. Arkady Renko (Gorky Park, etc., by Martin Cruz Smith)
10. Beowulf Malloren, Marquess of Rothgar (Malloren series by Jo Beverley)

Both Gramlich and Harris also listed their ten favorite characters from movies/TV, but my brain is tired. I will meditate on choices for that list and post it tomorrow. After all, tomorrow is another day. . . .

(Question: The preceding sentence is a quotation from what, said by whom? Your prize is simply the mention of your name on the Sphinx Ink blog.)

The Dresden Files

I discovered The Dresden Files books by Jim Butcher earlier this year, and quickly zipped through the entire series except for the most recent (still waiting for Proven Guilty to come out in paperback). The setting is a combination of alternate reality and the near-future, in which there are wizards, vampires, and other supernatural beings living among ordinary humans. Harry Dresden, a wizard who earns his living as an investigator, is a rebel who's often in trouble with both human authorities and paranormal powers-that-be. His ad in the phone book reads,

HARRY DRESDEN — WIZARD
Lost items found. Paranormal Investigations.
Consulting. Advice. Reasonable Rates.
No Love Potions, Endless Purses, or Other Entertainment.

Dresden's a man of honor and principle struggling to make a living in a world that doesn't value his talents. Remind you of anything?

Yep, the classic P.I. . . . and, like classic detective novels, the Dresden Files books are in first person p.o.v. Butcher gives Harry a wry voice and dry wit that make him memorable, funny, and real, while maintaining the overall noir-with-humor feel of the series. Butcher's talent as a writer shows not only in how well he develops Harry, but also in the excellence of the secondary characters who appear throughout the series, chief among them Bob (an intelligent spirit embodied in a skull, Bob is a wizard's version of a computer). Bob is a marvelous creation, funny, scatological, and perpetually horny (alas, since he's a spirit, all he can do is watch). Also important are Murphy, a tough cop who's Harry's contact on the police department (and, incidentally, female), and his best friend, Michael, a real "knight in shining armor." Many other characters reappear during the series and, with every book, Butcher has developed Dresdenworld into a place you want to visit (though maybe not to live--it's scary a lot of the time).

Well, heck, can't blurb the series any better than Butcher himself does on his website:

The Dresden Files are set in a 'alternate' Chicago where magic is real, but only a few actually believe in it; it's a first-person tale told by an irascible wizard named Harry Dresden, who regularly gives the magical establishment indigestion — and the police, the same. Take Sam Spade, your Average Joe Underdog Action Star, and toss in some spellcraft, and you get Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden. Heck of a guy.

The latest news is that the Dresden Files is being made into a TV series for the SciFi channel that will debut on January 21. There's a brief video promo that looks intriguing. I have marked January 21 on my calendar and plans to catch the first episode.

And, oh yeah, the actor playing Harry (Paul Blackthorne) is Hot.

Gollancz Romancz

Interesting news: British publisher Gollancz wants to get in on the surge of interest in romance-fantasy novels and, in January 2007 , will launch its own line of same (punnily named Gollancz Romancz).

Three of the first four titles are reprints of already-released work by American authors Charlaine Harris and Elizabeth Vaughan. The fourth is by Australian author Kim Wilkins. Sphinx Ink has read Harris and Vaughan and likes their work enormously--both are on her "must buy" list. I haven't read Wilkins, but apparently she's popular.

In addition--as you can see from the thumbnail--Gollancz Romancz has a really cool logo!

Blog Harvest

I am at home semi-sick (feels like flu coming on), but had to check out my favorite blogs, plus some I haven't read before, and the links on each lead to more articles, with more links...well, you know how it goes. Here are some tidbits I found.

Booksquare takes on one of my favorite rants, the lack of adequate proofreading in books now being published. In Castration by Drapery, or, The Importance of Good Editing Booksquare focuses on a recent J.D. Robb novel full of mistakes that should have been corrected in the editing process. J.D. Robb, author of a best-selling futuristic/paranormal romantic suspense series, is a pseudonym of fabulously successful romance author Nora Roberts. I was impressed that The Nora herself responded to Booksquare's post, with apologies for the errors and a promise to have her publishing team work harder on catching all those nagging little nasties before publication.

The Renegade Writer talks about she writes her freelance magazine articles so quickly in Channeling Your Inner Squirrel.

Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind takes a look at the types of readers who like mysteries in Oh, so that explains it--which actually is a comment with a link to an article on that subject, but you're being sent to Confessions first because it's an excellent blog for readers and writers.

And for some juicy/bitchy gossip-speculation, read Gawker on Stalk of the Town: Maury Povich's Current Affair. Alas, poor Connie Chung....

Info Junkie

I am an information junkie. It started many years ago, back in grade school. I love reading my text books--except for math--and learning all kinds of oddball facts that were never on the tests. I developed into "the scholar" in my family, and praise for my academic achievements spurred me on.

I was a voracious reader from an early age, and read everything I could find. Both of my parents were readers, my father especially, and there was plenty of material lying around the house, from encyclopedias to novels to magazines and newspapers. I remember reading novels by Frank Yerby and Frank G. Slaughter (my father's books) when I was no more than 10. The covers were racy--pulp fiction indeed--and very titillating to a 1950s-era child. I don't know how much of the content I truly understood--I caught few of the sexual implications in the scenes--but I did learn about the geographical settings of the books and other such background information. My mother subscribed to Reader's Digest Condensed Books and I read them all. It introduced me to a variety of mid-20th century fiction, and some nonfiction. Nowadays, as a writer I deplore abridgements of books and would never read such any more, but at the time it was a good way to be introduced to all kinds of fiction, and writers, I never otherwise would have encountered.

As I got older I started reading Time magazine--again, via a parental subscription. (I probably skipped most of the political stuff, since I didn't develop an interest in politics until my late teens.) What a great education a newsmagazine is, because it covers a broad spectrum of topics, albeit in a very limited way. I was a faithful reader of Time all the way through college and beyond.

I also started reading the daily newspaper when I was in high school and I have been a newspaper addict ever since. That's really the greatest way to pick up information and trivia. The best parts of the newspaper are not the hard news pages, but the other sections--so many factoids, treasures to an info junkie.

When I got to law school, however, I was forced to forego much of my pleasure-reading. I was working full-time while going to law school and, given how heavy the reading load is for law students, there simply wasn't time to read much except textbooks. Still, we info-junkies can't help reading wherever we are--from cereal boxes at the breakfast table, to advertisements and posters while walking down the street, to the free weekly newspapers in coffee shops, to anything we find when we're idle somewhere. Most of us carry paperback books around with us to read in otherwise idle moments during the day. Whether fiction or nonfiction, we're always learning something when we read.

The advent of the Internet and the World Wide Web has been a bonanza for info junkies. What a wonderful thing, to be able to get information about so many things, so quickly, and whenever we want it. Those factors, however, also make people like me become Internet addicts, because clicking on one hyperlink leads to another, and another, and another...Bet you can't click just one!

I still love the newspaper best, however, and try to read as much of it as I can every day. It is an info junkie's feast.