February in Review

February in Review

I'll give you a winter prediction. It's gonna be cold, it's gonna be grey, and it's gonna last you for the rest of your life. #groundhogday

— Charleen Lynette (@charleenlynette) February 2, 2015

Life

Still pregnant… for one more month! (Or, you know, whatever Snickerdoodle decides.) In a whirlwind two weeks earlier this month, we attended all the classes offered through our hospital, some of which were more helpful than others. Here at home, we’re not quite as ready as we wanted to be a month out, but I think we’re in pretty good shape for a surprise early appearance, should the situation arise.

Meanwhile, we had our last Valentine’s Day with just the two of us. We didn’t do much, just went out for dinner the night before… and while a part of me feels like it deserved a little more fanfare, a bigger part of me knows I wouldn’t have been up for anything else.

Movies & TV

So, Parks & Rec… I loved the finale. I really did. But, and here’s a weird little thing… I didn’t cry. Not once. This show has made me cry more than any half-hour comedy has a right to, on top of that I’m crying at any stupid little thing right now. (Did everyone hear about how I literally cried over spilled milk?) So… yeah. I feel like that alone means I must be disappointed in some way with the way things ended, but I’m really not.

One thing that did make me cry last week – the death of Leonard Nimoy. I used to never understand why people could get so upset at celebrity deaths, but there’ve been a few in recent years that hit me harder than most. (Though I’m pretty sure this is the first time I’ve actually cried; whether that would have been the case minus pregnancy hormones or the fact that I was already having a tough day, who knows?)

I think the older you get, and the more entertainment you experience, the greater the likelihood that the next celebrity death won’t be just a recognizable name and face, but someone who’s actually made you feel something through their work… and even though it’s not a loss that will affect you daily, it’s still a loss.

Anyway… a while back I was watching through Star Trek: The Next Generation (after having already watched The Original Series and all of its movies), and it turns out that I stopped just before the two-part episode where Spock makes an appearance. Maybe it’s time I pick that up again.

Music

We went to see the Dubuque Symphony, like I mentioned last time. Unfortunately, we had to leave at intermission because I just didn’t have it in me to sit through the second half. It was a tough weekend, and my back wasn’t happy unless I was lounging in a sea of pillows.

Thanks to my library and Freegal, I’ve been slowly building up a collection of Rockabye Baby! – lullabye renditions of baby’s favorite rock bands. These songs are so much fun. Honestly, I think I might enjoy them more than Snickerdoodle will.

Books

Here’s what I read this month:

The Rendezvous, by Evelyn Anthony (4 stars)
The Manchurian Candidate, by Richard Condon (2 stars)
The Golem and the Jinni, by Helene Wecker (4 stars)
Watchers, by Dean Koontz (4 stars)
The Kraken Project, by Douglas Preston (3 stars)
Congo, by Michael Crichton (3 stars)
Captive Queen, by Alison Weir (2 stars)
Avatar: The Last Airbender – The Rift, by Gurihiru & Gene Lueng Yang (4 stars)

I’ve now read almost everything I wanted to get to pre-baby. There are actually a full ten books from my various goal lists I haven’t gotten to – the Mistborn trilogy and a re-read of the Death Gate Cycle – which seems like a lot, but it’s nothing to do with not having time and everything to do with not feeling like epic fantasy right now. Oh, well. Just more to look forward to once I can settle back into a reading groove.

How was your February?

ITW Must-Reads: Point of Impact

 

My goal is to eventually make my way through all of these must-read titles. These books have been around for so long and read by so many that another generic review from your average reader seems unnecessary. Instead, I thought it would be fun to take a look at what some of the experts have to say about the stories that paved the way for their own success… and how their perspective compares to my own reading experience. Today, I’m looking at Stephen Hunter’s Point of Impact.

 

He was one the best Marine snipers in Vietnam. Today, twenty years later, disgruntled hero of an unheroic war, all Bob Lee Swagger wants is to be left alone and to leave the killing behind. But with consummate psychological skill, a shadowy military organization seduces Bob into leaving his beloved Arkansas hills for one last mission for his country, unaware until too late that the game is rigged…

 
Christopher Rice praises Point of Impact for one point above all others: its ability to populate an action story with real characters. “Hunter treats his human characters as seriously as he treats his guns, and the passion with which he does so distinguishes Point of Impact from countless other thrillers in which the author displays a cold, mechanical allegiance to the weapons and cutting-edge technology his characters interact with like mindless robots.”

It’s true that interchangeable stock characters abound in the thriller genre, and Hunter does a better job than many in making his stand out and feel like real people. However, one thing that really stood out to me was that it’s only the male characters that get this treatment. There are only two women in the entire book with any significance to the plot, and neither one feels as alive as the two leading men.

And even though I did enjoy the book overall, this is clearly a guys’ novel. I read a lot of books that are mainly marketed toward men, but this one felt more loaded with testosterone than most.

Still, despite the fact that I don’t much care about war and guns, the plot and the characters grew on me, and the writing style kept me interested even before I got invested in the story. And the payoff at the end was brilliant (though I could have done without the extended denouement… it didn’t quite fit the rest of the book).

“Published in 1993, Point of Impact contained all the essential elements of a post-Cold War thriller in which monolithic villains are replaced by ferocious, covert splinter groups with origins that are unnervingly close to home.” I don’t know if I’d call it a must-read, but it was definitely a good one.

Twenty-seven down, seventy-three to go…

Next month I’ll be discussing Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.

January in Review

January in Review

I’m adopting a new format for my monthly updates. Instead of just recapping for you everything I’ve read, it’ll be more general, sort of taking the place of my old “bookish and not-so-bookish” weekly updates… because, come on, I’m not going to have time for that anymore. I’m also throwing in some random pictures from throughout the month; maybe it’ll inspire me to actually take more interesting pictures.

So, let’s get to it…

Life

Still pregnant. My due date is two months from today. I had my baby shower a couple weeks ago, which was also my last visit home pre-baby. In a couple weeks I won’t be able to travel anymore. They don’t want me going more than 50 miles away, and while I take that as more of a guideline than a rule – it’s not the travel that’s the issue, it’s the not being nearby if something unexpected happens – it is kind of nice to have a doctor’s note excusing me from any six-hour round-trips in the near future.

Movies & TV

The biggest news, of course, is that Parks and Recreation is back! And by this time next month, it will be over already… which is sad, but also exciting that we don’t have long to wait to see how it all ends.

The final season of Psych is on Netflix now. I re-watched the finale a few weeks ago. Endings, with all their expectations and baggage, can so often lead to mixed feelings about the result, but I really thought they nailed this one.

I watched the first episode of Sherlock. I thought this episode was better than the other one I’ve seen (“The Hounds of Baskerville”), but as for the books they were based on, I liked The Hound of the Baskervilles more than A Study in Scarlet.

Finally, I had a girls’ night last weekend and we watched Pitch Perfect, which I somehow hadn’t seen yet. It’s just as much fun as everyone says.

Music

Remember last fall when I was so excited about going to see the Dubuque Symphony? Well, we’re going again this weekend! The feature piece of the evening is Beethoven’s third symphony, but what I’m most looking forward to is the Brahms double concerto with violin and cello. (I have a weak spot when it comes to the cello.)

I’ve also been listening to more classical music in general lately… which I could pretend is for Snickerdoodle’s benefit, but really it’s for mine. It’s just nice to have an excuse to make it a priority again.

Books

This is what you really came for, right? Thanks in part to Bout of Books, I read a ton in the first half of the month – 10 books by the 15th! – but then the classics slowed me way down at the end. Here’s what I read this month:

Koko, by Peter Straub (1 star)
Fortune’s Pawn, by Rachel Bach (4 stars)
Honor’s Knight, by Rachel Bach (4 stars)
Heaven’s Queen, by Rachel Bach (4 stars)
The Virgin Queen’s Daughter, by Ella March Chase (3 stars)
Reversion, by Amy Rogers (3 stars)
Reconstructing Amelia, by Kimberly McCreight (3 stars)
The Bell Jar, by Sylvia Plath (2 stars)
A Study in Scarlet, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (4 stars)
Master of the Game, by Sidney Sheldon (3 stars)
Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley (3 stars)
Dracula, by Bram Stoker (3 stars)

The highlight of the month was the Rachel Bach trilogy. Devi is a great heroine, and the rest of the characters are interesting as well. The world is complex, but not to the point of being overwhelming. The second book doesn’t feel stale the way that middle books sometimes can. And the final book is (almost) everything I wanted it to be. The whole story was just really fun.

The disappointment of the month was The Bell Jar. I’d wanted to read this for a long time, but it gave me a similar feeling as The Catcher in the Rye… like I should have gotten more out of it, but I just didn’t quite see the point. I couldn’t get invested in the story. I couldn’t muster up much empathy for the character. And especially having experience with depression myself, I was really surprised it didn’t make me feel more.

Hiatus

My original plan was to start my hiatus in a month, but if you’ve read some of my posts so far this year, you know I’m already struggling. So I’m not going to fight it anymore. I’m stepping back now, and I’ll be gone for five months instead of the four I’d planned… which seems like an eternity in internet time. Don’t forget me while I’m gone.

I won’t be completely gone though. At least until the baby is born, I’ll still be reading blogs on a mostly regular basis, and even commenting now and then, when I actually have the brain power to put words together. I also have two scheduled posts each month, and after the baby comes, I’ll still do my best to check in and reply to comments as I can. And you can always find me on Twitter.

Of course, all these plans may end up going out the window; I’ve heard that babies tend to have that effect. We’ll just have to show up and see what happens.

ITW Must-Reads: The Hunt for Red October

 

My goal is to eventually make my way through all of these must-read titles. These books have been around for so long and read by so many that another generic review from your average reader seems unnecessary. Instead, I thought it would be fun to take a look at what some of the experts have to say about the stories that paved the way for their own success… and how their perspective compares to my own reading experience. Today, I’m looking at Tom Clancy’s The Hunt for Red October.

 

A military thriller so gripping in its action and so convincing in its accuracy it’s rumored that the White House debriefed the author. The theme: the greatest espionage coup in history. The story: the chase for a top secret Russian missile sub. The Hunt for Red October remains a masterpiece of military fiction by one of the world’s most popular authors.

 
Chris Kuzneski is one of the many fans of Tom Clancy’s debut. I, on the other hand, am not. Kuzneski starts off talking about a moment during Reagan’s presidency when he was seen reading the book, which helped to spark its popularity. Clancy himself admits he got lucky; who knows if his career would have taken off like it did without a presidential endorsement?

“Clancy’s debut novel ushered in a brand-new, extremely popular genre: the modern techno-thriller, books that included a massive amount of technical details and cutting-edge technology while maintaining action and suspense.” A few words from that sentence stick out to me. Massive, for one… which in this novel feels like an understatement. But also action and suspense. Those are the most important parts of a thriller, and while they weren’t absent from The Hunt for Red October, they were definitely overshadowed; I felt like the book was 75% “techno” and only 25% “thriller.”

Maybe it’s because I didn’t live through the Cold War (or at least wasn’t old enough to understand the little that I did), but I just have a hard time relating to the main conflict here. The story – after you strip away all of the technical details – is interesting, and I wanted to know how it all turned out. But I didn’t feel any urgency.

On the plus side, it made for a pretty good movie adaptation. I could tell while I was reading that I’d probably like it better as a movie, and my suspicions were proven correct a couple weeks later when I finally watched it. The intricacies of politics and intelligence and submarines and naval warfare were all stripped away, leaving only those details that moved the plot forward.

The Hunt for Red October launched a career, and it introduced a hero of several books and movies. If Kuzneski is to be believed, it also helped to define a subgenre (though Crichton was already writing at this point, so I think techno-thrillers were on their way up anyway). But I just can’t call it a must-read.

Twenty-six down, seventy-four to go…

Next month I’ll be discussing Stephen Hunter’s Point of Impact.

Am I Still a Blogger?

When I say, “I’m a blogger,” what am I really saying? That I have a blog? That I have X number of followers? That I post Y times a week? That I make money from it?

There are all sorts of definitions you could attach to the label, but to me, being a blogger means being a part of a community. That’s the biggest thing. It means that I spend time reading blogs, commenting on blogs, replying to comments on my own blog, sharing links I’ve enjoyed, joining in blogging events… it means engaging with other people. Writing and publishing my own posts is honestly the least important part of it.

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Yes, I like writing. I like hashing out my thoughts and feelings and then putting it all out there. But I like the community more.

Which is why I’m really struggling with my place as a blogger now. In a couple months, I’m not going to be able to engage with other bloggers the way I have in the past. I’ve already been pulling back.

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When I first found out I was pregnant, one of the first things I started doing was stepping down from various online responsibilities. It was a relief at first (and it still is) not to have people counting on me when I know I don’t have that extra effort to give… but it also means that I’m not interacting in the community as much. Because as much as it’s something I want to do on my own, it’s nice to have that extra push to make sure I make the time. Now I don’t have that push.

So the past couple months, I’ve been slacking. It’s been harder and harder for me to engage; even when I enjoy a post, I struggle to comment. And I used to be really good about sharing other bloggers’ posts, which is a great way to show support even if I don’t leave a comment myself… and then I fell out of the habit of doing even that.

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I know that I don’t have an obligation to anyone to do anything, especially when I’m in the middle of a huge life-altering event. But if I’m not a part of the community… then why am I even here?

Why are you here? What is it that you get out of the blogosphere, whether it’s as a writer or a reader or both?