I love Paperback Swap!

As you've probably already guessed, I'm a bookworm (I'm also a coffee nut, but that's a little irrelevant...), so you can imagine how excited I was when I discovered www.paperbackswap.com. Books! For free! And I can get rid of all the books that I don't really like and make room for more books!
So yesterday, I got All the King's Men in the mail and Alias Grace is on the way. And since I just sent out three more books, once those are received, I get to choose three more that I want! (I'm reading this and realizing how idiotic I sound, but really, I do get this excited.)
If you're stuck with a bookshelf full of books you never read, it's worth checking paperback swap out.

I'm sorry :(

I know I haven't been good about writing and hopefully once I get back to school and back into a regular routine, I'll be able to keep you updated.

Well, while I've been gone, a couple things have happened. I decided to stop reading Absalom, Absalom! because I needed to finish one of these books for school and I knew I wouldn't be able to finish that. So, I read both The Awakening and The Age of Innocence. It's odd how two books that I picked randomly could be oddly similar and yet incredibly different. Both have feminist undertones (though they are much more evident in The Awakening), but the characters in The Age of Innocence never seem to be able to break as free as Edna. And Wharton is much more detail-oriented in her description of the intricacies of New York society, while Chopin, though she does take time to illustrate the forces working against Edna, never goes into as much detail. But the one thing they both have in common is that I hate the endings.

Let me explain: I am a sucker for Jane Austen-type happy endings where all the loose ends get tied up and every character gets what they deserve, whether it be good or bad. With both these novels, that is certainly not the case. In The Awakening, Edna gets what she wants, but she pays a huge price for it, which immediately negates the happy-ending possibility. And then in The Age of Innocence, Newland is too much of a wimp to go and get his own happy ending; he's happy to content himself with his own imagination. The both made me want to throw the book at the wall when I finished them.

Yes, yes, I know they are great works of fiction and that they have much more value than just the plot, but how hard is it to give your characters a happy ending every once in awhile?

Oh and on a side note, I've finished seventeen of the 223 books. Only six more to go to get the total under 200 by New Years. This should be a piece of cake!

:(

I've been a horrible, horrible person.
I haven't read.
for a whole week.
Yeah, I don't know what got into me, but I just couldn't get myself to read. Of course, I realized that needed to change when I remembered that I needed to finish one of these novels for class, which starts on September 3, besides having a ton of stuff to do. Guess I'll have to really dive in now.

Currently Reading: Absalom, Absalom! and The Awakening

Fifteen books down, 208 to go.

It's official, I've finally finished The Grapes of Wrath. It might have taken a little poking and prodding, but I got it done. And as much as I loved Steinbeck's writing, I have to admit, I just didn't "get it". Yes, the novel has plot, but there is no real defining climax or resolution; things just happen; people come and go. And because of that, the whole novel almost seemed pointless. Yeah, times are tough. Yeah, big business sucks. Yeah, oppressed masses are going to get pissed. The point is? (I feel so bad bashing a piece of classic literature!)
But the writing is still amazing and Steinbeck's mastery of dialect is unparallelled, so I'll still give it a rating of four stars.

Currently Reading

Since only one person voted in my poll and that vote was for Absalom, Absalom!, that's what I started reading today. I got my copy from Paperbackswap.com (the best value on earth for anyone who reads at al) and took it along with me to the dentist. And as I was sitting in the waiting room, I noticed something quite odd. Here I was, the teenager who can barely get herself up and out the door on time in the morning, let alone keep my room clean for a week, and I'm reading Faulkner, while my mother is reading Sloppy Firsts, chick lit at its best (or worst?). Rather ironic, hmmm?
And while you're out and about on the web, be sure to check out To Write Love on Her Arms. They're a great charity that works to reach out to teens who are struggling with depression, eating disorders and drug addiction and connect them with the help they need. But what makes them unique is the means by which they do it: the web. Today's teens are more active online than anywhere else, so it only makes sense to reach them where they are.

Currently Reading: The Grapes of Wrath

Here ends the first week of my challenge and the verdict is in: I'm crazy.
Everyone whom I've told about my challenge has given me that same boggle-eyed, open-mouthed stare and I know that the first words out of their mouth will be something along the lines of "Are you out of your mind?". There are times when I'm slogging through the slow parts of The Grapes of Wrath and I think to myself, "What on earth am I doing?". I know it certainly won't be the last time I say that, but slogging through books has become oddly satisfying. Even if I only sit down and read five pages or two pages or one, slowly but surely, I'm moving through.
As far as the book itself goes, it is certainly not a suspenseful novel, but I keep reading on because I have become so invested in the Joads' well-being, whether they will find work or starve, basically if it's going to have a sad or happy ending. But my favorite parts are the two-, three-page chapters where Steinbeck leaves the plotline and explores the historical and physical setting of the story, providing background and depth to the plot. Absolutely gorgeous prose in its own way.

Reading List

As I was going about my day, I realized that the list from which I'm reading is not widely published and that some of you might be curious as to its contents. So here it is. (Bolded titles have been read previously; italicized titles are currently being read)

Absalom, Absalom!
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Age of Innocence
Agnes of God
Alias Grace
All the King's Men
All My Sons
All the Pretty Horses
American Tragedy
Anna Karenina
Another Country
Antigone
Antony and Cleopatra
The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz
As I Lay Dying
As You Like It
Awakening
The Bear
Beloved
Benito Cereno
Billy Budd
Birthday Party
Bleak House
Bless Me, Ultima
The Bluest Eye
Brave New World
Brighton Rock
Brothers Karamazov
Candide
Caretaker
Catch-22
Catcher in the Rye
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
Cat's Eye
Centaur
Ceremony
Cherry Orchard
Civil Disobedience
Color Purple
Crime and Punishment
Crucible
Cry, the Beloved Country
Daisy Miller
Dancing At Lughnasa
David Copperfield
The Dead
Death of a Salesman
Death of Ivan Ilyich
Delta Wedding
Desire Under the Elms
Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant
The Diviners
Doctor Faustus
Doll's House
Dollmaker
Don Quixote
Emma
Enemy of the People
Equus
Ethan From
Eumenides
Fall
Farewell to Arms
The Father
Fathers and Suns
Federalist
Fifth business
Frankenstein
Gathering of Old Men
Ghosts
Glass Menagerie
Go Tell It On the Mountain
Going After Cacciato
Good Soldier
Grapes of Wrath
Great Expectations
Great Gatsby
Gulliver's Travels
Hairy Ape
Hamlet
Hard Times
Heart of Darkness
Hedda Gabler
Henry IV
Homecoming
House Made of Dawn
House of the Seven Gables
Iliad
In the Lake of the Woods
Invisible Man
J.B.
Jane Eyre
Jasmine
Joe Turner's Come and Gone
Joseph Andrews
Joy Luck Club
Jude the Obscure
Julius Caesar
Jungle
King Lear
A Lesson Before Dying
Letters from an American Farmer
Light In August
Little Foxes
Long Day's Journey
Lord Jim
Lord of the Flies
Love Medicine
Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
Lysistrata
Macbeth
Madam Bovary
Main Street
Major Barbara
Man and Superman
Mansfield Park
Mayor of Casterbridge
Medea
Member of the Wedding
Merchant of Venice
Metamorphosis
Middlemarch
Midsummer's Night's ream
Mill on the Floss
Misanthrope
Miss Lonelyhearts
Moby Dick
Moll Flanders
Monkey Bridge
Mother Courage
Mrs. Dalloway
Mrs. Warren's Profession
Much Ado About Nothing
Murder in the Cathedral
My Last Duchess
Native Son
Native Speaker
Nineteen Eighty-Four
No-No Boy
No Exit
Notes from the Underground
Obasan
Odyssey
Oedipus Rex
Of Mice and Men
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
One Hundred Years of Solitude
Optimist's Daughter
Oresteia
Othello
Our Town
Pale Fire
Pamela
Paradise Lost
Passage to India
Persuasion
Phedre
Piano Lesson
Pnin
Portrait of a Lady
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
The Power and the Glory
Praisesong for the Widow
Pride and Prejudice
Pygmalion
Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
Raisin in the Sun
Rape of the Lock
Redburn
Remains of the Day
Richard III
Romeo and Juliet
Room of One's Own
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
Saint Joan
Sandbox
Scarlet Letter
Separate Peace
Shipping News
Sister Carrie
Slaughterhouse Five
Snow Falling on Cedars
Song of Solomon
Sons and Lovers
Sound and the Fury
The Stone Angel
Stranger
Streetcar Named Desire
Sula
Sun Also Rises
Tale of Two Cities
Tartuffe
Tempest
Tess of the D'Urbervilles
Their Eyes Were Watching God
Things Fall Apart
To the Lighthouse
Tom Jones
Trial
Trifles
Tristram Shandy
Turn of the Screw
Twelfth Night
Uncle Tom's Cabin
Victory
Volpone
Waiting for Godot
The Warden
Washington Square
Waste Land
Watch on the Rhine
Watch that Ends the Night
Way of the World
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf
Wide Sargasso Sea
Wild Duck
Winter's Tale
Winter in the Blood
Wise Blood
Woman Warrior
Wuthering Heights
Zoo Story
Zoot Suit

Already Read, cont.

• Macbeth: Now don't get me wrong, Shakespeare is one of the greatest writers of all time, but I found this play a bit too violent and depressing for my tastes. Yes, I do know it was meant to be a tragedy, but it doesn't mean I have to like it. Macbeth as a character was frighteningly intriguing, as well as Lady Macbeth. Rating: three stars.
• Mansfield Park: I absolutely love Jane Austen to death. This is a little bit more reserved than Pride and Prejudice, but it definitely pulled me in, keeping me reading to make sure Elinor got a happy ending. I found the character of Marianne very similar to Lydia, except for their final situations. Rating: four stars.
• Merchant of Venice: I found this play horribly confusing and had a hard time getting all the allusions and humor. But again, it's by Shakespeare, so I feel bad rating it poorly. I'm sure it has literary merit; it's just lost on me. Rating: two stars.
• Persuasion: Again, I love Jane Austen. This is my second-favorite novel of hers, besides Pride and Prejudice. The character of Anne is so easy to identify with and you find yourself rooting for her with every new misfortune. Rating: five stars.
• Pride and Prejudice: This is quite possibly my favorite book of all time. I can't even begin to count all the times I've read it, plus having watched every single movie version I could get my hands on multiple times. Austen's wit absolutely sparkles in this novel and there is never a dull moment. This will certainly be a classic for centuries to come because, besides being entertaining, it contains some of the most biting social commentary a woman could express in that time. Rating: five stars.
• Romeo and Juliet: Forgive me, but I haven't read this book for three years and when I did, it was the first time I had ever read Shakespeare and I was very poorly taught. So, I think I enjoyed the play, but I know for certain, I did not comprehend Shakespeare's humor or allusions, which is what truly makes his work great. Rating: three stars.
• The Scarlet Letter: I did like this novel, but Hawthorne's style is so tangled and dense that I found it hard to read for much more than plot. Wonderfully suspenseful, but the cultural difference left me feeling a little disconnected. The character of Pearl is quite odd, which only contributes to this dark little novel. Rating: three stars.
• A Separate Peace: I really loved this novel. The suspense of what was eating at Gene was skillfully created as well as the mood of the era. Warning: not a "feel-good" book. It's definitely not a book to read when you're depressed. Rating: five stars.
• Tale of Two Cities: Harking back to the way it was published, this book is a very suspenseful read. The ending is a bit of a cop-out, yet satisfying. Very rich in accurate historical detail. Rating: four stars.
• Wuthering Heights: Another novel from one of the Bronte sisters, yet I did not care for this one very much. A very dark and confusing novel, I just couldn't get into it. But I know there are people who absolutely love it, so meh. Rating: two stars.
  

Here Goes!

Last night, as I was trying to decide what book to read for my AP Lit Summer Independent Reading, I had a pretty crazy idea. What if, instead of trying to decide what book to read, I just read the whole reading list. Keep in mind, this is a two-columned, double-sided list in size ten font, which adds up to 223 books.
I knew I'd never make it through the whole list without some sort of external motivation, so that's why I'm here, blogging. I invite you along for the ride as I plow my way through the classics and rate them from one to five stars. I'll try to update you weekly or whenever I finish a book, whichever comes first.
Going through the list, I've already read a few of the books, so I might as well get them out of the way.

• Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: I had to read this last summer and let me tell you, I hated it. There is nothing I hate more than testosterone-fueled coming-of-age stories. Okay, so maybe it's not testosterone-crazy, but it's certainly no feminist novel. Rating: two stars.
  
• Civil Disobedience: I read Walden and Civil Disobedience in APLANG for independent reading and it was one of my worst decisions ever. Thoreau needed a lesson in conciseness. No, Mr. Thoreau, I do not want to spend thirty pages reading about how you built your house. And he's so frigging pompous too. "I'm so awesome and if everyone was just like me, life would be sooooo perfect." After three hundred pages of that, I was ready to vomit. He was very observant, though; I'll give him that. Rating: one star.
• The Great Gatsby: Now this was one book I actually enjoyed. Fitzgerald's writing flows beautifully and his ability to create characters, emotion and mood is astounding. Although, this "flowiness" does make his books a little confusing. I kept getting characters and plot events confused (I B.S.'d my essay test over this one). Rating: four stars
  
• Jane Eyre: This is one of my favorite books of all times. Slightly unbelievable storyline, but altogether stunning. Rating: five stars.

Warped Tour

For those of you who can make it to Warped Tour, be sure to stop by To Write Love on Her Arms's tent/booth/thingy.

Purpose for the Pain

by Renee Yohe. Check it out - endorsed by TWLOHA.

Join the Team