Reading - and readers

I think I've become a horrible reader. I didn't use to be, in fact - one of my favourite authors once signed his book for me by saying "I wish I was as good at reading as you are" (this wasn't the first time he signed a book for me)!

When I was in school, especially up till I turned lazy teenager, I would read a book a day. At least. At 11 I was let out to the town library once a week when my classmates went to the school library - I had read all the books there.. (No, not the encyclopaedias from A-Z (or A-Å as it were!), but you get my drift!)

I consumed books. (Not having five children did mean more sparetime...) Some I found enchanting, some horrible, some funny, some unbearably sad - but it was always about the book, the story, the characters, somehow.

Now, I don't know. Lately it seems my liking for the characters completely decide whether I like the book or not. Example - I really didn't like The Kiterunner. At all. "Everyone" says it's fantastic and amazing and possibly the best book ever written and so on and so forth. But I ... Well, firstly, when I'm told by masses of people to read a book, I rarely do. (Except when recommended by favourite authors, in person, of course!) But this one I did. And for 2 reasons I decided I didn't like it - I didn't like the main character, he was a coward and a liar; and secondly, after a while I could guess the entire rest of the book, give or take a detail or two, but on the whole - no surprises. At. All...

But does that have to mean it's a bad book (no pun intended)? I mean - the language was flowing, I obviously felt the characters were extremely true to life, as I disliked one of them so much? So perhaps it was actually a brilliant book?

I don't know anymore... What makes a book a good read? That you want to read more of the same author / about the same characters? That you can't put it down once you've started reading? That it'd be worthwhile reading again?

I'll just keep reading until I find out - and beyond.

The Aging Meme

From EllasDevil
Rules: All you have to do is either finish the sentence or fill in the blanks...

At a certain age women should: stop trying to look 17.
At a certain age men should: start shaving their ears!
When I was a kid I thought I: would be world famous by now...
Now that I am older I wish: that I'll stay un-famous!
You know you are too old to party when: there's football on TV and it's a lot more tempting.
You know you are too young to retire when: your mortgage is still larger than your house.
When I was in high school I listened to the music of: U2, Sting and de Lillos.
Nowadays I find I like the music of: Rufus Wainwright - U2, Sting and de Lillos  :)
On my last birthday I: probably had too much cake and a sugar rush, 'cause I can't remember anything...
On my next birthday I want to: be surrounded by friends and family! (Wait, I think I was last year too..?)
The best birthday present I ever got was: one of many - which one to choose!
The first time I felt grown up was: when I could admit to my own flaws without flinching.
The last time I felt like a kid was: today, around lunch. And yesterday. And ...
When I read "Roots" by Alex Haley (at 12) it changed my life.
Last year was: surprising!
Next year I hope: the world hasn't changed too much.

Media meme

My week in media - tagged by Sam, who does it so eloquently you should really go over and read his instead. But in case you're still here...

What I read

Hmm. Off to a difficult start, I fear... Well, I did read a few chapters more in Wintersmith - a book I really enjoy, but still haven't got enough time to... And I browse the local paper every day to see if there's anyone I know there. (There usually is. It's that local.) Other? Yes, I've read about half of a book about hiking in Crete (it's in Norwegian - what did you expect of the link? ...) - preparing for the summer! I have serious plans of making the kids walk with me at least to the bay of paradise...

What I watched

TV. Oh, you mean more specifically? Well, I'm sure there were a few football games, but this last week I've actually been watching handball a lot. Really! And I've learnt that it's χάντμπολ in Greek, which is just the same word only with a Greek accent... (The Greeks I asked couldn't remember if there was an actual Greek word for it!)

What I listened to

No, no - I have listened to other music than Rufus too, honest! But yes, quite a lot of Rufus... And quite a lot of de Lillos too - as well as Verdi, Sting, Jamie Cullum -- and some others that just randomly appear when I shuffle - I love it!

What I surfed

The usual - which isn't that much lately, but I stop by the odd blog every now and then. That is - I stop by my friend Børge's blog every day. And Josh & Josh every week... The rest of you? Whenever I can... And I stop by Rufus' message board quite a lot, it's the most friendly place to be! (He's been nominated to the Brit Awards, best male singer, it's not just me...) And how could I forget - Slap Upside The Head - it's priceless! Love the cartoons...

What I’ve played

Playstation! The kids got PS2 for Christmas from granddad and we've been playing FIFA '08 ever since... Filip's the most eager one - the others still well into their nintendos - so I sometimes play with him. He beats me to a pulp every time, of course... And just to keep him on the right track we've decided that if he wants to be Arsenal (he was doing that too much...) he can play for 10 minutes, but if he's Liverpool he can play for a full 40 minutes. Kids need guidance, right?

Writing meme

I'm supposed to mention the qualities of a good writer or good writing, Devil Mood said when she tagged me. (I have avoided reading how she answered the meme, so as not to ruin all my chances of writing something original. Here goes...)

Firstly, I don't know how to separate the two! To me, good writing is what makes a writer great, so I guess it all comes down to the writing. I'll be real subjective here! And short. So I'll stick to books rather than poetry, or plays, even though I enjoy that too. Rufus' lyrics included...

The stories I enjoy reading ... are usually very wordy. And more often than not, quite non-sensical. When we 'had to' do the neoclassical period during my English studies, I was thrilled. Jonathan Swift, Daniel Defoe, Henry Fielding - and not to forget, Addison & Steele's Spectator Essays (sic!) - were all such fun to read! Shakespeare, just the same - Chaucer I adored. Naturalism moved me not one bit, however sad the stories...

Yes, yes, I've read more modern stuff too... I've even read a few classics in my time, I'm sure. But if a writer knows his way with words, he can have his way with me! (It's a metaphor!! No reason to alarm hubby.) I'm the kind of gal who stays up late to fill my fun quota some way or other; busy day at work, quarrelling kids and lots of chores? Well, when everybody (and I do mean everybody else has gone to sleep I stay up, watch fun youtube videos, chat with friends & bluddies, play online scrabble... Until I'm full up.

Few of my current favourite authors are "up there" with the Nobel prize winners (come to think of it, I do read Shakespeare - he would have had one, surely, had he not died before Nobel was born), I love people like Terry Pratchett, P.G. Wodehouse and Douglas Adams. And Lars Saabye Christensen, a Norwegian - but worth reading still. - There are only about 70,000 words in Norwegian, compared with 400,000 in English -- but he seems to know his way around them all!

I've described before I had once had a proper goosebump moment reading a book. I didn't even think the book was all that good after finishing - but that particular chapter had me enthralled. Recently, I had another of those moments, two, in fact. Reading ... Steven Gerrard's autobiography! I know, much as I love his football skills I had never thought he'd stir up such emotion through his writing... I love the guy, loved the book, the language (ok, maybe he had a little help writing? still...) -- but my chills came when he described, in much detail, a couple of games that changed completely when they least expected it. So was it really the writing that did it? Hard to tell...

So, to me good writing is stuff that makes me

a) chuckle

b) laugh out loudc) run for a dictionary (or a number of them)

d) get the chills

e) all of the above

For more objective views on writing, try our book blog - The bluddy list of great novels. (You can even contribute.) Or go read something yourself!

Bits and pieces

Now in their 2nd year the kids are supposed to get "individualised" homework. Mathias' reading homework goes something like this:

[drawing of pig] How old can a pig be? A pig can be .. years. (no, it does state the number of years, I just can't remember..) Next page. [drawing of goose] How old can a goose be? A goose can be .. years. Next page. And so on and so forth.

Then, homework done, he continues to read The Hobbit...
*sigh*

Two days ago (16th) my blog was 2 years old! Poor thing, and already neglected...

And two days from now I'll be off to Edinburgh, which hopefully will lead to new updates - at least a few photo posts...

This is just not on!

I don't know if anyone else cares, but really - here I am, peacefully, browsing Amazon. I stop by (natural choice) the world's greatest footballer, and they team him up with that?!!

It really is unheard of. "Perfect partners"? Pah. Glad I got that off my chest...

- By the way, don't mention this to my hubby. His birthday's coming up... And no, he doesn't read my blog :)

Book Meme

Riannan tagged me for this one, and I haven't done that many meme's lately, have I? Besides, I'm quite fond of books :)

Hardback or paperback: It doesn't really matter. I'm quite fond of paperbacks, really, but if you want to give me a hardback, go ahead...

Amazon or brick and mortar: Brick and mortar! I don't think I've bought a book online yet. (Yes, I've bought other stuff, cd's and dvd's - I'm not a complete internet illiterate...) I just love book stores, walking through, browsing...

Barnes and Noble or Border's: I haven't got a clue... From what internet can tell me, I think I'd quite like Barnes and Noble --- but I can't find out if Border's is anything special, so I really can't tell.

Bookmark or dog-ear: Bookmark! Anything goes... Or if it's got a dust jacket I'll fold it in where I stopped reading. If I haven't got either I'll jot down the page number somewhere. Never dog-ears. Incidentally, dog-ears are "donkey-ears" in Norwegian. Only we say it in Norwegian, of course ;)

Alphabetize by author, alphabetize by subject, or random: By author, and chronologically within same author (as I do with my cd's). Although books of other kind - artsy books, reference books etc. go by classification, and a few non-definable books are *blushing* sorted by height...

Keep, throw away or sell: Unless I really hate them (which is rare), I keep them. I just love books, the feel and touch and look of them :) I've given a few away that I'd never read and wasn't going to. Quite a few books still in the attic, though, waiting for a bigger house with more bookshelves... Now that all the kids have learnt to read as well, we'll have to find somewhere for all those children's books too!

Keep the dust jacket or toss it: I always keep it. Like I'd never throw away an album sleeve. I need all the information I can get! I wouldn't buy those see-through dust-jackets, though, I'm not really worried about the dust.

Short story or novel: I usually read novels, but I'm quite fond of short stories too. It goes in cycles, sometimes I'll read only short stories.

Collection (same author) or anthology (different authors): I don't think I've really tried the latter, unless you count all the books written "by Enid Blyton" I read when I was little. I though he/she (I didn't know which) had an amazing capacity and was a little put off when I heard it was different authors... I'd definitely say "collection", though, as I'm loving my way through Terry Pratchetts discworld novels...

Harry Potter or Lemony Snicket: Definitely Lemony Snicket. I have no idea what it is, but I don't like Harry Potter... I know, I think I should, I enjoy fantasy and magicians and all that, but Harry and I got off on a wrong note - I read the first book in Norwegian. I hear people saying it's an excellent translation, so I figured - it's got to be the author's fault, then... Read the 4th in English (only two I've read) and although I was quite captured by it while reading it I'm afraid it didn't leave me wanting to find out what happens. It was too plain evil. Now, I'll just find out about Lemony Snicket. I must say it looks promising :)Stop reading when tired or at chapter breaks: Chapter breaks. Tiredness doesn't enter into it - breaks have got to fit in with the plot.

"It was a dark and storm night" or "once upon a time?": First one, probably, I'm not too keen on fairytales. Though fairy's tales I seem to be quite partial to :) Which reminds me of Martin Millar's Fairies in New York, haven't read that in too long...!

Buy or borrow: Either. Though I like to own books, reading them are more important. When I was in primary school I'd read all the books in our school library, saving the encyclopaedias, so they let me go into town to borrow books there. Nowadays I borrow mainly from friends, or I just read the stuff I've already got, but haven't had time to read...

New or used: That's irrelevant. I love old books - especially the look of them - but I also love brand new books, especially if they're by any of my favourite authors.

Buying choice: Very much haphazard. Sometimes recommendations from friends - although I tend to not want to read a book if too many people tell me I'll love it... Well, one author & tv personality over here sometimes recommends books to me (we're email buddies :) - and I always go for them. He showed me David Sedaris, for which I'm eternally grateful!

Tidy endings or cliffhangers: I must admit I prefer endings that are, well, endings. Although I can take a cliffhanger if I know there's another book coming up.

Morning reading, afternoon reading, or nighttime reading: If I had any spare time at all, time of day wouldn't matter much. Well, morning would be out of the question, of course, as I can't think straight until lunchtime... Nighttime, definitely a good time!

Stand-alone or series: [I'll just copy Riannan's answer to this one, it matches mine.] Both. I can get caught up in a good series, and can't wait for the next book, but I read many books that aren't part of a series.

Favourite series: Discworld Books by Terry Pratchett. The 5 books in "The increasingly inaccurately named trilogy" A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. Well, to be truthful, I didn't really like the 5th book all that much. Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien. (Yes, I read it all long time before the films came out. And I think I've seen half a film so far.) Anything by PG Wodehouse - especially the Jeeves stories. The no. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series by Alexander McCall Smith.

- Oh my, I seem to be rather fond of series after all... And I'm very fond of reading, it just doesn't fit into the time table right now...

And, if you like, TAG, you're it. And thanks, Riannan, this was quite good fun :o)

Reading habits

Our polar bears seem to do a lot of reading when we're not home... Here, Anna's 'Lille Mille' caught reading a Pooh story, you can tell she didn't expect the camera!And here - a collection of the books Mathias has read since Christmas... He taught himself how to read in the summer, just before starting school, and since Christmas he hasn't done much else! Just like his mum did, he prefers the company of books to quite a few other things...

We've started making a list, he's on 84 now, and counting (the shortest ones have only a few words in them, the biggest one had 320 pages. The highest stack is 60+ pages books.)

But even though he is, I can't really say he reads better than his oldest brother, can I? I know Jakob wouldn't appreciate it...

Matt meme

It's from Matt, alright? It's not about him. It's about ME. Naturally... I'd just like to add, hastily, that these days I get most reading done on the boat. 23 minutes to and from work. Takes a while to finish a brick like that..

1. One book you have read more than once

Not all that many, or, well, just a few...
From age six, I read "The Secret Garden" and "Little Lord Fauntleroy" once a month. At least. Up until the age of about 15. That makes, erh, quite a few readings.. I've re-read them a few times as an adult too, I still like the feeling of change. In those characters, of course, I'm not changing...

More recently, Good Omens (by Terry Pratchett) and Amatøren (by Lars Saabye Christensen) are my most frequent repeats. I laugh my head off at both each time.

2. One book you would want on a desert island

I was going to say one of the above, for entertainment - but reading how Matt would bring a heavy novel to kill major time I figured that made sense. In which case I'd bring Ulysses and Don Quijote. I'd really like to read both but never seem to find the time for it.

3. One book that made you laugh

Most by Terry Pratchett, Discworld series. Good Omens, Amatøren (am I repeating myself?), several books by Are Kalvø - those actually had someone coming up to me on the boat, asking if I was choking. I'd been trying not to laugh out loud... Oh, and "Families, and how to survive them" by John Cleese and Robin Skynner.

I'm really not very good at choosing just one, am I..?

4. One book that made you cry

Cry, as in weep, not cry with laughter? I honestly can't say, I tend to opt for the lighter variety...
Well, there may be at least one. I've read a lot of books of and / or about native Americans. I'd been very interested in their culture, language and history since I was about 9 or 10, and wrote a major thesis about them in my senior year in high school. If memory serves correctly, Dee Brown's Bury my heart at Wounded Knee had me shed a few tears. Whereas the biography of Geronimo just made me really ashamed to be white. One of many times. (So I was happy to find a t-shirt with "Don't judge my colour, judge my mind"...)

5. One book you wish you had written

I may have to say - any one by Douglas Adams, at least the first four of the (increasingly inaccurately named) trilogy Hitchhiker's guide to the Universe. Not least for all the fun he must have had while writing!
I'd also like to have written a ridiculous number of traveller's guides - to Greece, mainly - and do all the research for them myself!

6. One book you wish had never been written

The fifth book of the (increasingly inaccurately named) trilogy Hitchhikers' guide to the Universe. It's not such a horrible book in itself. It just breaks down the others. I feel.

There. I chose just one. Happy?

7. One book you are currently reading

Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. Don't look at me, I've only just started it, can't expect me to finish it. I've even had holidays, right, and no boating!

8. One book you have been meaning to read

The Da Vinci code. NOT because I want to read the Da Vinci code. At all. But because I'd very much like to read my favourite author Knut Nærum's book Madonnagåten (aka The Madonna riddle) - a parody that is best read after the original... I'd even throw in The Asti Spumante Code for good measure, Rarity recommended it ages ago. If I could only bring myself to read the first one...

9. One Book That Changed Your Life

Huh? Nah, sorry, haven't found that one yet.

10. Now tag five people

Do I want to do this? Do you?

Reading and goosebumps

Yesterday I finished The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho. I'd been meaning to read it since forever, and finally got 'round to it.

I read the last part on the boat going to work in the morning. There was a passage towards the end - when reading it, I got goosebumps all over! I've never experienced that when reading before. (Listening to music, that's another story, I do it all the time. I can put on a certain song or musical piece, and I know exactly when to watch the little hairs on my arms starting to lift..)

In case some of you haven't read it yet I won't say anything about the plot.. I'll just mention that I didn't think it was quite as awesome or unique as it has been made out to be.
But for the feeling it gave me for a little while - totally worth the read!

Clifftop by the sea

Your soft
sensual body
folds
and curves
in the lazy silence

It is midday
And your hunger
turns to the afternoon.
A slow heartbeat
of whitewash hands,
Tender swells that roll in,
Trapped on an endless tide.

Nature is so graceful,
Your rippled shoulder
stretched so distant before me,
sleeping in the lazy sun.

No blemishes
does your blue skin show,
'cept the acne of one fishing boat,
A white spot 'pon perfect fabric.

You hide the scars
of yesterday.
The edges of your stormy wounds
left unhealed.

Whitewash fingers rub
against the rocks,
Tapping an endless tune,
A soft heartbeat
that pulsates from far below.

Death is so near me,
yet you are so warm.

19/7/92

Ben Fleming is (was?) a friend of mine from Australia. We've lost touch - literally, I've lost his address - but I've still got his poems. This one's my favourite. The photo I stole from someone's homepage, I think. But I have been there too, it's from Doolin, Ireland.