The Longest Walk

As per my new reading list I am currently making my way through The Lord of the Rings (here-after known as LOTR) which I have begun jokingly referring to as the longest walk ever. It is after all a very long journey, two thousand eight hundred and fifty-one pages in my edition, never mind the multiple appendixes tacked onto the end.

I first began calling it the longest walk ever while part way through The Fellowship of the Ring and I think the moniker is quite apt.  The first book is in particular a little slow moving and while the pace does pick up sections here and there continue to make me think “just get on with it already”.

Although LOTR is separated into three books it is one story not a trilogy and I think this is likely the reason why it does at times seem to be almost endless.  It really does go on, and on, and on.  Its saving grace however is that while the pages and story may be long it does continue to hold my attention and I am anxious to complete the story.  It truly is an engaging and wonderful tale of adventure and a well deserved ruler of the fantasy Genre.

I have not previously read the story although I have read The Hobbit and do have a dim recollection of attempting to read LOTR in my early teens giving up on it amidst the slower moving sections of the first book.  With the recent release of “The Hobbit” and my growing affection for the fantasy genre I felt it was time to give it another shot.

“The Hobbit” is really what prompted my interest in the full series and like many other films which have a written counterpart from which it was adapted I often find the written story to be my medium of choice.  I enjoy exploring my own interpretation of a story although it does not dim my interest in seeing another’s interpretation of it as well.   

As I draw ever nearer to the end of this tale even knowing what is to come having seen the film version I’m no less anxious and have come to love the characters within. 

My favorites by far are Merry and Pippin while my least favorite would be Éowyn.  I find that Tolkien tends to give readers fairly basic character development leaving much of who each character is to the readers own devices. While I think this works quite well for most I’m unable to get a grasp on Éowyn.  To be honest I think it may be a fault with Tolkien’s female characters in general.      

The descriptions of middle-earth are where Tolkien really shines however giving a fantasy land a life that can be imagined easily and brings to mind settings which are well suited for the story and to each of the fellowships journeys.  You can almost imagine that middle-earth must exist in reality somewhere yet to be found.

All in all I think Tolkien really did create a masterpiece of his genre here and I understand why this story has become so enduring and treasured by so many.  It is a world onto itself that exists in the minds of people across the world, now in my own as well.

I am now off to continue the journey to the land of shadow and mount doom with Frodo and Sam.     

Out Loud (and in silly voices)

Reading aloud to children is something I enjoy doing whether it is to my own children or not.  I tend to really get into it using multiple voices, big loud booming ones and quiet timid squeaky ones. I use my hands and act out a knock on the door or stomp my feet and encourage the listeners to cheer along with the characters and get as into the story as I do.

As it tends to happen however, as my own children have gotten older I’ve read to them less and less.  With my youngest now being an independent and as enthusiastic reader as I am the importance of reading aloud to them seems to have faded.

That was until Harry Potter as over the last year we read the entire series together and I began to really see the value of reading aloud to both of them again. My oldest listened because she was too impatient for me to finish reading them to my youngest before reading them on her own, which she then did anyways.

What I’ve noticed since then as I’ve read other stories to my youngest is how my oldest surreptitiously listens to the story I’m telling rather than reading the one in her own book open on her lap.  Her eyes seem to lose focus and pages no longer turn.

So seeing as I have set my own goals to read some “better literature” I’ve decided in the next few months to do the same with my girls, reading aloud the classic children’s tales and whether they both admit to listening or not I think it will be well enjoyed.

   

1.       Chalotte’s Web – E.B. White

2.       The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson

3.       3. The Velveteen Rabbit - Margery Williams

4.       4. The wonderful Wizard of Oz - L. Frank Baum

5.       5. Anne Of Green Gables - L.M. Montgomery

6.       6. James and the Giant Peach - Roald Dahl

7.       7. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl

8.       8. Pinocchio - Carlo Collodi

9.       The Wind in The Willows – Kenneth Grahame

10.   Through the looking-glass – Lewis Carol

11.   Black Beauty – Anna Wewell

12.   The Tale of Despereaux – Kate DeCamillo

13.   The Chronicles of Narnia – C.S. Lewis – full set

14.   The Black Stallion – Walter Farley

15.   The Neverending Story – Michael Ende

Exploring The Written Word

I’ve begun a new project or perhaps I’ve continued an old one depending on which way you look at it. I have been creating a list of books that I would like to read.  In recent years I seem to lean towards popular fiction reading the latest works of my favorite authors or picking up random best sellers. I haven’t read a piece of classic literature in years and I’ve recently realized that I miss reading those books that challenge my intellect rather than simply my imagination.

It’s quite the list I’ve created and while I have read many of these books previously it’s been a long time.  The first book on my list is in fact one of my favorite reads - Utopia by Thomas Moore.  I had read it many times over until one day I discovered that my dog-eared and well read paperback copy was missing. I never did find it and with slight astonishment I now realize I first discovered it missing nearly a decade ago.

I’m a rather voracious reader and I can and do read several books a week fairly regularly and so this is not really a daunting task at all but something I’m looking forward to.  Here is the first 25 I plan on reading.

1.       Utopia – Thomas Moore

2.       The Hobbit – J.R.R. Tolkien (Just purchased the box set which is why these are so high on the list)

3.       The Fellowship of the Ring – J.R.R. Tolkien

4.       The Two Towers – J.R.R. Tolkien

5.       The Return of the King – J.R.R. Tolkien

6.       The Time Machine H.G. Wells

7.       The Iliad -  Homer

8.       The Odyssey – Homer

9.       Gulliver’s Travels – Jonathon Swift

10.   Dracula – Bram Stroker

11.   20,000 Leagues under the Sea – Jules Verne

12.   Frankenstein – Mary Shelley

13.   Around The World in Eighty Days – Jules Verne

14.   The Call of the Wild – Jack London

15.   Brave new World – Aldous Huxley

16.   Les Miserable – victor Hugo

17.   The Phantom o the Opera – Gaston Leroux

18.   Nineteen Eighty-Four – George Orwell

19.   To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee

20.   Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy – John Le Carre

21.   Black Beauty – Anna Sewell

22.   Midnight’s children – Salman Rushdie

23.   A Passage to India – E.M. Forster

24.   Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy

25.   Lord of the Flies -  William Golding

In a Book

It has been quite some time since I’ve perused the books at the Winnipeg public library. The past few months any books I’ve read from the library were requested online.  What that means is all I have to do is step into the library wander the kids section for a few minutes while my youngest picks out a few books and check out. 

I’ve also been reading less than usual I think in part because I haven’t been perusing the shelves and finding new authors and new books to read.  So while I love the convenience of a simple pick up and drop off I’m missing out on something more.

There are of course a few other reasons I’ve been reading less, primarily a lack of time but also because I am still in the process of reading the Harry Potter series to both girls.  While I read at a rather quick pace alone reading aloud takes much more time. 

When we first became interested in this series I read all 7 books in a two week period.  Aloud I’ve been reading a chapter every day I’m able to and it’s been about 9 months now.  We are now only half way through book 6.

Hrmm got a little off track there….where was I ..…ahh the library and lack of time spent. 

I realized how much I enjoy wandering the shelves this past weekend as the millennium library opened a new park area and we as a family decided to go take a look.  It was a gorgeous weekend with a short respite from the cool fall days we’ve been having and it was quite nice to walk through.  

After checking out the new park area we spent a fairly good chunk of time wandering the library itself and as I walked down aisles a book jacket catching my eye here and there.  I began to realize that I rather missed the time lovingly spent picking books.

I love everything about the library, the smell of books the general air of calm and quiet. It seems to me that libraries represent the very best of humankind.  They represent our quest for knowledge, our love of imagination and even a bit of magic.  

Libraries have held a special place in my heart since I first began reading and I think I’d forgotten a bit of that.  They are a place in which I feel a sense of peaceful solitude and a reverence in the world at large, you can after all you can go anywhere in a book.   

Reading Woes

I’m reading a book I don’t particularly like.  Seems an odd thing to say let alone do but I find myself doing this more often than I would like to admit.  I get given books by my mother, by other family and friends and the stack of books to read can occasionally get out of hand and hard to choose from.

They seem to come in waves, I will receive no books for what seems like ages then suddenly everyone all at once has a book to lend or give and I end up with a huge stack.  All but the ones which need to be returned when I’m done get put in the basement storage room for me to slowly make my way through.

I stack them up based on a quick perusal of the blurb on each book and my first impression. They get stacked with those I’m most likely to enjoy on top down to the ones I’m not really interested in but will probably read anyways on the bottom. 

I feel like I have to give them all a chance.  I have been pleasantly surprised before and found a few good ones even a favorite or two at the bottom of a stack. Admittedly most of the time I am right and my first impression was accurate but just in case I’ll still read them all.

These basement dwelling books are usually books of last resort anyways and are for when I’m looking for something to read but haven’t got anything new, haven’t been to the library, and my e-reader has a dead battery.  This particular set of circumstances doesn’t happen all too often so basement books can linger sometimes for ages without a second glance.

My latest choice from the pile, (and let me tell you I’m really scraping the bottom of the proverbial barrel at this point), was accurately judged at first glance. It just isn’t grabbing my attention, well except for the multiple spelling errors which a previous reader has circled in bright red ink. 

I hate when people do that, the spelling errors are glaringly obvious to begin with and highlighting them accomplishes nothing except ticking off the books next reader.    

In fact I may just toss this book without finishing it. It takes a lot for me to just stop reading a book once I’ve started but this one is quickly reaching the level of dislike to qualify for early tossing.  I usually end up giving the story one more chapter or one more page to see if maybe, hopefully it gets a little bit better and before I know it have finished the whole book.  

Ah well better luck next time.

Something New

I am very excitedly awaiting my KOBO e-reader which is being tracked as “out for delivery”.  I’ve already got a head start on a good collection of e-books ready to transfer over and have an e-books account for the public library.  I have used e-books a few times on either my phone or the ipad but both devices have their problems for reading on. 

My phone is fine for reading in even quite bright sunlight but the text is small and it’s not at all like reading a book, it involves a lot of scrolling which for me seems to interrupt the flow.  The ipad works great as long as you are indoors away from light so the glare doesn’t blind you. I’m hoping my new e-reader will solve both these problems.

I’ve wanted to get one for some time now so I’m a bit excited about getting it.  I have always been a big reader from the time I learnt to read and I tend to read pretty fast. On average I’ll read 3 books for every 2 weeks.  Not long ago my daughter and I both started to read the harry potter series and I finished all 7 in a 2 week period; I thought they were great books.

I can really get into a good story and I love to disappear behind the pages of a good book and become a part of another person’s story while leaving my own behind for awhile.  I have a vivid imagination and am able to see a story in my mind’s eye with amazingly clarity.

For me it’s as good as watching a movie and in many cases better then.  I’ve seen plenty of movies that have left my own idea of a book in the dust and been entirely dissimilar. Ones that have deviated from the theme or feeling of a novel entirely.

One of the most recent to drive me nuts was The Mist I absolutely hated the movie but loved the original story.  The movie ended on such a sour and unforgiving note, whereas I always find Steven Kings books including The Mist always leave me with a feeling of hope that despite terrible events the human spirit prevails.

Reading makes me think, feel a wide range of emotions and allows me to experience things I might not do in my own life.  They are a gateway to another person’s mind fictional or not and I look forward to having something that hopefully extends my reading experience to another level.