(right) Wow. Really great. Can't say much more than that. It was just really really fascinating and well-written and I enjoyed it very much -- way more than I expected I could ever enjoy a novel about a woman living through the Plague.
(right) I've always been utterly and completely fascinated by Princess Diana. I
In reading the pre-publication talk about Tina Brown's book, it seemed like a lot of people wanted to imagine that this is just a bunch of made-up sensationist stuff. I don't think it is; I think it's probably some of the most accurate and on-target assessments of Diana as a person in print. I devoured this book. I hated that it ended, partly because it was so fascinating and partly because of course we know how it ended in that Paris tunnel.
It's really a shame that we didn't get to see more of Diana's "second act" (life as an ex-Princess of Wales), she was coming into her own. I don't know how she would've found that perfect balance of someone to love her as much as she needed to be loved and yet stay safe and non-threatening to the Royal Family, but eventually she would have found him. I expected to detest Camilla, and I still don't think very much of her, honestly, but I do feel bad that it seems like she's being frozen out by the Family just as Diana was. All that fighting for "her side" they did for her and they can't be nice to her even now. Mostly, I feel sorry for everyone involved...yet at the same time, I am struck by how, well, human the Royal family seems (Sense of Duty aside).
and, it's funny, I once read a novel called The Queen and I, in which there is a political revolution in England that obsoletes the monarchy overnight and the Queen, Philip, Queen Mother, Diana and Charles (still together at the writing of the novel), all of them are thrown into life in the suburbs. In the novel's version of the suburban Queen, Elizabeth is practical, calm, and level-headed In a lot of ways, I think the Queen of this novel had a lot in common with the Queen in Tina Brown's book.
(left) then, because why change topics?, I read another historical novel, this one about Margaret Tudor (Henry VIII's older sister), who was the Queen of Scotland. Poor woman was just as star-crossed in love as her brother.
Got derailed a few times, by bustin' out HP7 for a while, by re-reading half of The Cider House Rules for a while, and the excerpt of Eric Clapton's autobiography in the new issue of Vanity Fair (btw, I'm super sad all over again about poor little Conor), but I did finish one book.
(left) Found this book at the flippin' dollar store and couldn't have been more excited, what with being cuckoo crazy for John Irving books. It was mostly about getting the movie of The Cider House Rules made (he wrote countless versions of screenplays before the final one), but I particularly enjoyed the parts about his grandfather, and (odd as it sounds) the mini history of abortion in America, too. HOWEVER, don't read this if you haven't already read TCHR. I'm kind of disappointed that it didn't include Irving winning the Oscar for the screenplay, though.
And, funny thing, I realized that the
authors of my three favorite books have all won (indirectlly or
directly) an Oscar for screenwriting: John Irving, Larry McMurtry, and
Jane Austen (through Emma Thompson).
(right) Y'all, I think I'm just about ready to call it. Stephen King post-car accident is not as good as Stephen King pre-car accident. There's something missing. You can see a few little hints of his brilliance now and then but overall, it's muddled and confusing and maddening. I lost interest in this book over and over and kept hoping that it would get better but it never did. Sad.
(left) Fun enough read, but I hope readers new to Larry McMurtry won't pick this up and assume this is the best he can write. This wasn't bad, but it felt like a writing exercise in some ways -- like he set out to write in the first person as a woman, and tried to fit in every possible famous Old West character ever. Quick read, though.
(right) Another quick read. Not what I was expecting, but interesting. Too short to have really warranted a full-out book, though, IMO.
(left) Does the cover photo look at all familiar? Take a closer look. It's a detail shot of the very edge of the World Trade Center as it was burning, prior to collapsing. This novel takes place over one 24-hour time period, from early morning on September 11, 2001, to early morning on September 12. I think I would've enjoyed this more if I had liked the characters more. There was both too much and too little information about them all at once. The thought that the husband of the couple was on the phone with his lawyer while his lawyer ate breakfast at Windows on the World was both disturbing and fascinating; the husband's call to the lawyer's home later in the day meant that he, essentially, was telling the lawyer's wife that he had died in the WTC. However, the surfer's story felt like too much of a reach. He would drive an hour in the wrong direction to play hooky and go surfing at a private stretch of beach in East Hampton, then spend half the day surfing, totally ignorant of the terrorist attack? It felt wrong. But the bit about a fully-saturated Pull-Up being a horrible mess was dead-on.
(left) Started this thinking it would be like every other Oscars history book I've read, kinda unexciting and dry. But actually, I really enjoyed it. Rather than be nothing but a History of the Oscars, it was actually more a detailed recounting of the Oscars as a show, as a Hollywood production. It covered I forget how many Oscars, but it basically started with the year that Rob Lowe sang with Snow White (and the book's explanation of what the original vision and meaning of that particular spectacle was ended up being fascinating) and stretched to the year that Lord of the Rings won best picture. In that time, there were four different producers of the show (one producer repeated several times and may still, in fact, be the producer, I think) and three different hosts: Billy Crystal, Whoopi Goldberg, and David Letterman. the backstory on all of these broadcasts was so fascinating! It really was the best demonstration I've ever read of David Letterman's off-camera personality: not so much stand-offish as incredibly seriously very neurotic and lacking in self-confidence. Actually, it sounds almost as if Letterman is more like Woody Allen's movie characters than Woody Allen himself. Anyhow, the author (a writer for Premiere magazine) recounted the planning and politics that went into each year's show, plus a semi behind-the-scenes recap of that show. Also loved it because it spurred me to search out clips of the Billy Crystal opening numbers on youtube. hee. (ooh this too)
(Right) Read this because I saw it when I was looking for the first Harry Potter at the library for Sissy (electronic card catalog said it was on the shelf but it MOST DEFINITELY WAS NOT. Anyhoo, I found my own copy under a pile of towels, because that is apparently just where it belongs), and also because they've started showing a TV version of it on the CW or whatever, which I have set TiVo to record simply on the basis of needing more trash in my TV life now that Big Brother is over. Okay. May I just say that while I am well-aware of the fact that NYC teenagers are far and away more mature than most of their peers who don't live in the City (i base this on knowledge of friends and relatives who went/go to those private day schools there), it was still quite a huge shock to read about these acting-way-too-old-when-they-can't-even-vote-yet kids. I seriously felt like an old lady reading this, exclaiming "good Lord!" and "oh my Heavens!" and "oh my sainted Aunt!" before I was even three pages into it. But of course I finished it, because I have no powers to withstand a good trashy story.
(left) My sister M recommended this author a few weeks (months?) ago and my paperbackswap stuff of hers just started arriving, and YEAH, I like her! I really really like her! Did you say, M, that she's like a not-Irish Marian Keyes? Or was that just me? In any case, it was a very fun story and of course I adored every speck of the Harvard Square/Cambridge/Boston stuff, even though the Red Sox only made an appearance on some bedsheets.
(left) Written by the woman at the GTE Air Fone call center who took the call of a guy on Flight 93...the one who said "Let's Roll." I don't know how they got it as thick as they did. It really didn't have much more than an article in Vanity Fair. Anyhow, Mrs. Jefferson has come to believe that God meant for her to answer that particular phone call, and if it gives her (and the man's widow) comfort, then I have no problem with that whatsoever. This woman gave a little bit of comfort and peace and courage to a man on the plane and right there, she deserves all the happiness in the world, IMO.
(right) I enjoyed this, but, damn, sometimes this guy is hard for a chemo-brain such as myself to follow! It definitely had its heartbreaking moments, but he really is quite amused by himself, isn't he?
(left) This is part of a series of old skool-ish pulp fiction stories. It's a mystery. not even 200 pages. And the ending seriously made me HULK ANGRY.
(right) Oh man, this was SO much fun. I really enjoyed this.
Am just finally figuring out now, by the way that chick lit is pretty much modern-day fairytales for grown-ups. Yeah, late to the show much?
Anyhow, it's a collection of short stories, some of which are linked to another story, others that aren't. We already know a few of the characters, and others are new, but really not because they're all about a woman reporter in Philadelphia in some way or another.
I enjoyed them, although many of them were pretty depressing. One of my favorites was the title story, "The Guy Not Taken," which was sort of a combination of a Stephen King story, the movie Sliding Doors, and every woman who has ever sat down at the computer and "happened" to type their ex-boyfriend's name(s) into an online wedding registry...for hours. :p
I was pleasantly surprised by one story, where I loathed the character's decisions and actions but it was so nice that, by story's end, those poor decisions (in my view, anyway) turned out to be instrumental in an even happier outcome. You could say it was an illustration of that old saying, "when one door is closed, another one opens." and it wasn't done in a cheesy manner, either. It was very realistic-feeling. Sometimes it takes years to find that opened door, after all.
I would have finished one other book but I put it down in favor of the stack of library books I got. You know, 'cause overdue fines suck.
