Mean girls have been around in fiction for, well, I imagine as long as there has been women's fiction. Miss Bingley and Mrs Hurst in Pride and Prejudice. Austen's title character Emma is a queen bee and who her mean girl moments (though she does repent and try to rise above them). Josie Pye in Anne of Green Gables. There's a reason why Judy Blume's Blubber resonated so well with so many of us. We all knew a mean girl.
Maybe Winona Ryder Got This One Right. Colleen asked the following questions:
Does teen literature exaggerate the mean girl phenomena too much? If aliens landed on earth and read teen lit (oh my) would they expect to find mini Cordelias wreaking havoc on every high school across America? Are they so prevalent because it just easier to write about mean girls then nice ones? Is teen lit reflecting what is real in this instance or propagating an unfair female stereotype?
The responses that she got were thoughtful and insightful. I'm going to sit on my hands while you go and read them all because I cannot reasonably quote all the wonderful thoughts they had.
It has you thinking and rethinking about mean girls doesn't it? When it comes to fiction are mean girls just an archetype? Yes...and also no. They can be two-dimensional cutouts, just like the dumb jock and the nerdy brainiac. As Zetta Elliott points out in Colleen's post, we rarely see a true mean girl. More often than not there's simply not enough time for a mean girl to truly develop in a story. Sometimes we get to see it in a series but it's hard in a stand alone book, unless they are the main character.
Imagine reading a book set in a high school where everyone was wonderful and got along and no one hated the main character or her friends. Everyone gets along. Does that sound realistic to you? Heck, even Pollyanna has a few tough nuts that she has to crack. Of course she does and by the end everyone loves her, which let's be honest makes us hate her a little (or a lot).
Mean girls in real life give us a chance to grow and learn things about ourselves. Mean girls in fiction can make us feel less like we're the only ones dealing with it. I'm frequently reminded by posts like this one by Uppercase Woman, whose three-year-old daughter came home chanting "I'm not your friend" because others had said it to her at school, why we need to see these relationships in books. Or this post on the teen girl ranking system by Elizabeth Donovan:
A tween recently confided that the ‘popular girls’ in her Middle School ‘rank’ the girls in their grade according to beauty, skinniness, and how many boys like them. Until a few weeks ago they’d been using social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook to rank seventh and eight grade girls, but decided to pull the files for fear of discovery by a school official. This group of ‘mean girls’ now posts the rankings in the schools bathroom along with a year book photo of each girl and a ‘numerical’ rank beside her picture. The ranking lists are periodically taken down to avoid detection by school personnel, but reappear in the girl’s bathrooms often.
Our hearts ache a little for those girls because we've been there or our friends or our daughters have been there and we desperately want them to know that they are not alone.
Colleen's questions inspired Courtney Summers to write about why her book is about mean girls.
I think mean girl lit is booming not because it’s easier to write about mean girls (it’s so not easier to write about mean girls, in my experience!), but because girl aggression and bullying has and, unfortunately, may always be pretty prevalent in our society (while I was writing Some Girls Are, my friends would often forward me horrifying news stories about girl-bullying). I think mean girls are so very much a part of popular culture now because we’re very eager to see our reality reflected in fiction, to find some understanding in our experiences and to feel less alone.
I don't think we need to glorify mean girls, nor do we need to make them sensational. They exist and to pretend they don't would be inauthentic. It's true that mean girls in fiction aren't always given the opportunity to have layers. Sometimes they are just mean and they stay mean. And you know what? I'm ok with that too. I can't say I gave a whole lot of thought to what was making the mean girls in my life tick when I was in junior high or high school. I was too busy just trying to get out in one piece. I can't fault the characters in books for doing the same thing.
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>The red Olympic mittens are a fundraisers for the Canadian Olympic Foundation's Own The Podium campaign. The initiative strives to help Canadian athletes to be the best they can be, if I may steal a phrase from our southerly neighbours. A noble ambition if I do say so, but one that needs funds to get it there.
There is perhaps no easier time to get public attention toward sports funding than during an Olympic year, except maybe when it's an Olympic year and you are playing host. This particular campaign appears to be quite the success. Everywhere I turn people are talking about these mittens. They love them! They want them! They are cheap! They can't find them!
Oops. Yes, it seems that maybe they are suffering from a bit too much popularity. They are the season's must-have winter accessory - even the royals have them. (Though I suspect will not be wearing them much now that they are home.) The mittens are available in stores from coast to coast...if you can find them. They keep flying off the shelves, in part because people are not just buying a pair for themselves but they are buying them for all their family too. I have a hunch they are going to show up in many a Christmas stocking this year.
Jaime at Embracing Balance missed seeing the Olympic relay because of a conference call (is that a bummer or what?) but to add insult to injury she still can't find any mittens.
Sue not only has the mittens but a whole outfit...because she's a torch bearer. Go Sue! Actually I've heard that the official torch bearer mittens are slightly different. Supposedly the maple leaf on them is grippy, which makes sense. I mean, you wouldn't want someone to drop the torch because the mitten made it slippery.
While I'm not clamoring for a pair of the mittens (though I do think the leaf right where you'd give a high five is cute) I think I understand their vast popularity. You see, our official Olympic wear? It's well, fugly. We've come a long way from the famous poor boy caps our Olympians wore in 1998. We were really hoping the Beijing Olympic gear was an anomaly and that we'd redeem ourselves. Instead we have a look that has been (rather politely) described as "hoser meets heritage". Yes hoser like Bob and Doug MacKenzie on SCTV. Oh I know, I know. Everyone should want stag heads right over their boobs but for those that don't, the mittens are a good choice. Inexpensive, small, functional and they fit inside our uncle's Christmas stocking. What more could we ask for?
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>Personally I have two big pet peeves and surprisingly neither actually has much to do with the content inside the book. The first is actually more with other readers. Have you ever noticed that whenever you say (or whenever anyone says really) that you don't like a book there's always someone who chimes in and says, "How can you not like that book? It's wonderful! You're crazy." That statement drives. me. crazy. Let's be honest - if everyone all loved the exact same books then every book would be a success and a book would never be stuck out on a clearance bin, show up at a thrift store or in a secondhand bookstore, etc. The simple truth is that different books work for different people. There is no one-size fits all. The end.
Ahem. Moving on.
My second pet peeve is one that will not be a shock to some people as I've been rather vocal about it. I loathe headless women and girls on the covers of books. I'd love to say that I refuse to read them, and I've actually considered it, but for quite awhile it would have meant not reading much of anything. Everything from literary fiction to chick-lit to romance to young adult was sporting the latest and greatest of female decapitation. (Some of the people in the publishing art departments would have done great during the French Revolution.) Now there's some variety among the headless covers - some are full body shots from the neck down, some are mostly legs and feet (lots of feet dangling in water) and others are just torsos (I call these the T&A covers). Thankfully this trend seems to be waning, though I doubt it will ever go away completely.
So there you have them, my top two reading pet peeves. But that doesn't even being the scrape the surface of things that get under people's skin. Casee at reading pet peeves is flashbacks.
I freaking hate them w/ a passion. I rarely hate anything b/c hating takes up too much energy. But I hate flashbacks. I hate when I'm all into a story and then all of a sudden it flashes back to 34 months prior. Wtf?
I've seen flashbacks work, I've seen them really not work. When they don't work they really don't work. Ditto flash-forwards.
Author are not above reading pet peeves (though presumably they do not appear in their own work...). Young adult author (and the woman who brought us killer unicorns) Diane Peterfreund says that her pet peeves are a bit general.
Boring openings, plot points that come out of nowhere (and not in the cool, “I totally didn’t see that coming, but wow it fits” way), motivations and characterizations that are far too on the nose. Everyone feels exactly what they say they feel, which is also, conveniently, exactly as they are supposed to feel.
Allison Boyer hits another one of my fiction pet peeves on her list of her top ten fiction pet peeves. (Actually she hit a couple but this one stands out for me.)
When I see the same word within a few paragraphs or even pages, I want to tear out my hair. I don’t mean common words, and you don’t necessarily want to use your thesaurus to find crazy words that sound unnatural to your writing style.
If I say the word "dazzle" I know the Twilight fans will know exactly what I'm talking about won't they?
What's your reading pet peeve? 'Fess up!
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>I think Amanda said it best at the Blog Jar when she said, "THE END OF THE YEAR IS FAST APPROACHING?!" Indeed it is. I know. You are simultaneously saying that you don't want to hear that we're that close to the end of the year, meanwhile you are convincing yourself that you have plenty of time to finish all those 2009 goals. You are right on both points.
There's seven weeks left in the year. You can read a lot in seven weeks, even with all the holiday hubbub. Some people will do up a detailed plan of attack of what they want to read. Others will just take stock and keep plugging away. But before you can figure out your plan of action, the first thing you need to do in order to meet your goals is revisit them so that you remember what they are.
Now I'll admit it, I get off easy here. You see, in 2009 I resolved not to make any reading resolutions. I wanted to have nothing but joyful reading this year. I've mostly succeeded. I've had reading ups and downs this year and the downs seemed so very down and the ups were not as gloriously high as I had hoped. But I'm satisfied with what I've read and how much I've read.
Pinkflipflops, who blogs at The Many Thoughts of a reader is not going meet her 2009 reading goals. She's really kind of hoping that some of you aren't either.
Every year is a learning experience. Our goals can get more or less specific depending on how the previous year went. Adrienne at CYA: Children & Young Adults Reading Blog set her goals, but she didn't set up how to track them.
had a goal this year to try and read 100 books. However, my goal did not take in account how to keep track of what I read. It is easy for me to finish a book and pick up another one without pause. And, what constituted “finishing” a book?
Word Lily faced facts earlier this month - there are just some goals she's not going to meet this year.
I have known for awhile now that I will not end up meeting some of my personal reading goals for 2009. And while this saddens me, what am I to do? For now, I’m simply laying it out there, acknowledging in public where I stand.
It's not all unsuccessful. Kailana has completed almost all of her reading challenges - something I never really could do. (I cannot read happily from a list of books. It brings out my hidden rebellious streak.Oh hush, it is too hidden.)
I love what Lezlie at Books 'n Border Collies had to say about learning from reading challenges. The important thing isn't that we complete them, it's that we open ourselves up to new things and learn and enjoy them along the way.
Fourth, I learned that not reaching my reading goals is in no way a failure. Sometimes I'm not learning what I meant to learn, but I'm finding new and fascinating topics that I didn't know I was interested in. Or I'm discovering that a big project I had mapped out isn't nearly as easy to conduct as it sounded when I started. As long as I'm reading and learning, I'm bettering myself which helps me to better the world around me.
How are you doing with your 2009 reading goals?
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>I think I've been reading on and studying Canada's involvement in the two world wars ever since that first Remembrance Day ceremony. It was more than natural for me to study in university. My grandfather was a merchant marine. He wanted to be in the Navy but he was colour blind and at the time that could keep you out of action. He found his way to serve. Storyteller that he was (and I could listen to him tell stories for hours, many of which were probably not entirely appropriate for my young ears), I never heard him say a single word about the war. I have his service records, I did research. I know what he did. It wasn't glamorous. It was kitchen duty mostly. But it was his way of "doing his bit."
Sweet Salty tells the story of her grandfather in quotations and with the words of those that loved him in parenthesis. You really must read it.
Caught in searchlights on the way to raid Dusseldorf, minutes become eternities. Riddled with flak, their navigator hit in the abdomen, knee, and leg, and one finger on his left hand shot off, they made a desperate push to make it back across the Channel on fumes.
One up on his mates, Grampa opted out of a routine mission the following day, staying on the ground. On that flight, the plane was shot down. All but two of his best friends were killed.
The memories of those that didn't return never left those that stayed at home. At Another Day, Another Story Marlene tells how her mother-in-law got a shock one Remembrance Day.
As she was expecting me, I knocked and then opened the door and walked in. As she came towards the door, she cried out and grabbed a chair to sit down. When she caught her breath, she said that she thought her brother had just walked in the door.
It was November 11th and my son had just finished participating in a parade. As a member of the Reserves, he was in full military uniform. This was the mid 1990's. Her brother had died in the First World War.
Uphilldowndale is British but Canadians fought side by side, often commanded, by the British. In many ways, though not all, we share a common memory. And for those that fought in WWII, the memories of war never really leave them.
The very last thing my brother heard my dad say, in his drug induced confusion and as they wheeled him in to resus, at the hospital, at the age of 82 and just hours before he died? ‘Get down, get down it’s a sniper’
Lest we forget.
Ten years ago singer/songwriter Terry Kelly was in a store when the clock struck 11am. The store observed a moment of silence and contemplation. Someone decided that it didn't apply to them and out of his anger he wrote this song, A Pittance of Time. It's seen been developed into a play.
object width="425" height="344">
I'll be getting dressed soon and getting ready to head to the National War Memorial here in Ottawa. No, I don't get the day off work. I've never had a job that gives me that. I either take the day off or head out for a few hours and work through a few lunch hours to make up for it. I'll stand with others and do a very simple act, I'll remember. I'll keep faith. Even if you can't make it to a ceremony today, you can take a moment at 11am to remember. It is, after all, only two minutes - a pittance of time.
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>One of the things about reading a lot is that people expect you to be able to recommend books blindly. When people ask me to recommend a book for them/their mother/their husband/etc I have the instinct to hide. When I try to talk my way out of it, because I don't know the person and don't know what they'd like, people get suspicious. Maybe I don't read as much as they think I do. Maybe I read really bad books. Maybe I'm hoarding the good books and keeping them all to myself.
There are books that I'm rather "unqualified" to recommend. I don't read enough books in the sci-fi or mystery genre to be very good at recommending those (though I can probably send you to some bloggers who can). My non-fiction reading is very specific to my own personal interests. My reading of literary fiction goes through peaks and valleys. I go through very earnest genre phases (some lasting longer than others).
Even when I'm familiar with the genre or style of book that is requested I still find it hard to recommend books. I've always felt that recommending books is very a personal thing. I quite like how Brenda at Inhaler Of Books describes how she feels about recommending books.
I get anxious recommending books that I really love because it almost feels like sharing a little bit of my soul.
If I can take that one step further, when you recommend a book to another person, it's sometimes as if you are slapping a label on their soul. When you think about it, is it any wonder that Eliza feels this way sometimes when people recommend her books:
I have a good friend who like recommending books to me. Usually her suggestions are great (The Other Boleyn Girl, The Poisonwood Bible, Fame - the novel...) and received with great glee. However, sometimes books are handed over with the words: "I read this and it reminded me of you" and I get rather concerned.
Recommending books to a friend can make or sometimes break a friendship. Refashionista wrote a post on why she doesn't like book recommendations and well, based on the way she's been recommended some books I rather understand why she feels that way.
I no longer read books recommended to me by friends unless I happen to have discovered the book myself already. I have a few exceptions to this — people whose tastes are so closely aligned with my own that they’ve never yet thrown me a bad suggestion — but for the most part I nod, murmer a “I’ll have to add that to my list”, and move along
Do you know who rocks at giving book recommendations? Librarians. Librarians give the best book recommendations of anyone I know and I love this older post on how to recommend books at Caroline's Charming Adventures. She offers up many suggestions for how to suggest a book (along with a few for how not to).
I think that the number one thing that people get wrong when they recommend books is that they think more about what they like than what they know about the person they are recommending to. For example, I don't push non-fiction, even really good non-fiction, onto my friend that doesn't read non-fiction. Even if I think it was a book that they'd like because I know for them that it's just a non-starter. (I can't say I quite follow the same way with fiction that I'm positive that they'd like...and I'm generally right.) I can recommend books to people I know well. Of course, that doesn't mean they take my recommendations, or that they don't try to tell me I'm wrong when they've only read one chapter in the book. There are also "reverse recommendations." I may like a book a lot and may freely say so, but there will be friends that I may turn to and tell that it's not a good book for them. It's easy, or easier at least, because I know them.
But that book recommendation you want for your brother's sister's mother's friend? Um, yeah. Sure, I'll give you that...just right after I go hide behind the couch for a few weeks and give you enough time to track down a librarian or bookseller and get a recommendation from them. M'kay?
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>I'm not sure why but it feels like my generation of readers have all gone nostalgic at the same time. Maybe it's the Twilight mania that is making us remember our own crackliture. It seems everywhere I turn these days I'm seeing remembrances and rereadings of Christopher Pike.
]]>I'm not sure why but it feels like my generation of readers have all gone nostalgic at the same time. Maybe it's the Twilight mania that is making us remember our own crackliture. It seems everywhere I turn these days I'm seeing remembrances and rereadings of Christopher Pike.
Oh we read his contemporaries as well. There were plenty of R.L. Stine's that got passed under desks as well. But Chrisopher Pikes books were a bit longer and meatier. Christopher Pike introduced our tweenage selves to the murder, mayhem and supernatural episodes as can only happen among upper-middle class Americans. Drugs, murder, coming back from the dead, abortions, sex - yes he had it all.
Sadly, Like Pike hasn't been updated since May but just looking at the list of books in the sidebar sets me back at my sixth grade cafeteria table. Nothing is held back in those reviews so if you want to reread (or read any of those books for the first time) maybe save it for later. Oh but how well I do remember Remember Me. Yes indeed, Shari was cool.
I don't think I ever read Monster but it was the first Pike book that Cait at Escape Through the Pages read.
Monster was not only the first Christopher Pike book I read (starting a love of his books that continues today), but it was also my first thriller book. I have a fear of horror/thriller movies, but that fear somehow doesn’t continue over to literature (thankfully), which I discovered when I picked this book up in my grade seven classroom to read for independent reading.
Dannie took a look at one of the books I remember the most clearly - Die Softly. I love her take on Pike's writing style. http://readingwatchingliving.blogspot.com/2009/11/book-review-die-softly...
Die Softly is a strange kind of mystery. It's kind of like you saw it coming, but you didn't see how is came. Possibly one of the strongest characteristic of Pike's writing, he's able to let you think you won, but then flips it on it's head and makes you feel like a moron. In a good way.
Jenn at Young Adult Revisited remembers Whisper Of Death vividly - it got her in trouble in sixth grade.
http://yarevisited.blogspot.com/2009/10/whisper-of-death-christopher-pik...
Whisper of Death holds a fairly special place in my heart because it once got me in trouble. My little group of sixth grade friends and I chose the book for our reading group and made the mistake of discussing it in the classroom. A classmate (damn you Luke!) ran and told our teacher that we were reading a book about abortion, cussing and sex. The teacher took one look at the book and banned all Christopher Pike books from our classroom for the rest of the year. It’s kind of sad when you think about it…
For Halloween YA authors Diana Peterfreund and Carrie Ryan paid hommage to Christopher Pike on the Book Smugglers blog. I loved how Peterfruend mentioned doing an bit of an internal squee when she saw her book on a shelf at a bookstore right beside Pike's books. And I loved the point that Ryan made about what she learned about writing from Pike.
Carrie: I think reading Pike then expanded my understanding of how far authors could go. It’s exactly what you said – no one’s safe, which I think added to the thriller aspect. I mean, there’s a comfort in reading a romance where you know things are going to work out, you just don’t know how. They’re still page turners because it’s the figuring out how that’s fascinating, but with Pike… all bets were off.
No one was safe and even when you thought that you knew what was going to happen, you never really could be sure. His explanations were always plausible...well plausible enough in Pike's world. And that was good enough for us.
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey was very disappointed she couldn't find any recent posts about "Witch." She also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>It doesn't seem like this trip will be complete smooth sailing for the royal couple. PETA is up in arms after Camilla wore a fur stole to a public event. It must be said that her hat was fake fur. (And I was highly amused by the "since no one who is anyone wears real fur any more" comment in the article. PETA, she got her Prince. Do you think she really cares if anyone thinks she is anyone?)
Right before the couple arrived a poll revealed that Canadians aren't crazy for Charles, though we're fond enough of Queen Elizabeth II. Yes, the Prince of Wales has an image problem. Personally, I think it largely stems from knowing too darn much about his affairs. Thanks to the very public dissolving of his marriage with Princess Diana I know things about Charles that I really wish I didn't know.
The biography of his grandmother Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother came out recently (I've been reading it, it's huge). I had heard through the years that she did not approve of the public nature of the divorce and did not wish for anyone from the family to speak to the public about it. What I didn't realize until this week is that the Queen Mother only ever gave one interview in her entire life. One interview that happened after she got engaged to Prince Albert. No wonder she didn't approve of the royal family speaking publicly about the marriage. Coincidentally the Queen Mother did not have an image problem in Canada. The royal visit in 1939 was enormously successful.
Marilyn has decided that the coverage of the royals isn't great. She also says that Charles isn't such a draw, really.
With the exception of the Queen, Charles on tour works better as a double-act. Bring someone attactive or higher ranking with him and he can't lose. Arrive by himself and, well who really cares, right? The minor royals suffer this indignity all of the time.
There is hope for the royals though. I found a thread in the Toronto Livejournal Community where people were wondering if it was possible to get in a line to meet them. I wasn't planning on attempting to see them. I saw Prince Charles when I was a kid. As part of the first leg of their cross-Canada Royal Couple tour in 1983 they visited my hometown. I have some pictures in my photo album. Of course you wouldn't be able to tell it was Princess Diana if I didn't tell you but I have an undeniably recognizable photo of the Prince of Wales. I'm going to end up seeing Charles and his new wife purely by accident. It turns out we're all attending the Remembrance Day ceremony in Ottawa next week. Of course, I suspect they'll have much better seats.
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>For the last few years there's been a "Chunkster Challenge" where bloggers committ to reading some of these big books. I find it comforting, even though I don't join (I suck at challenges), because it means that I'm not the only one that buys or borrows these books with the intent of reading them and then let them gather dust.
]]>For the last few years there's been a "Chunkster Challenge" where bloggers committ to reading some of these big books. I find it comforting, even though I don't join (I suck at challenges), because it means that I'm not the only one that buys or borrows these books with the intent of reading them and then let them gather dust.
The 2009 Chunkster Challenge was hosted at Feelin' Chunky. (A Novel Challenge will be hosting it in 2010, in case you are interested.) A "Chunkster" is defined as a book that is 450 pages or more and that is ADULT literature (fiction or nonfiction). Yes, that's right. Twilight and Harry Potter don't count. Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell does count...it also happens to be one of the books languishing on my shelves. Gone With the Wind is a Chunkster. I remember reading it in junior high. Everyone thought I was nuts, and was unimpressed when I informed them, "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn."
I always have a lot of fun reading through people's reading lists but when I look at the lists people have for the Chunkster Challenge I'm often surprised by how few of the books I recognize. Southern Sassy Things finished six chunksters in the past years and I've hardly heard of half of them. I didn't do much better with Teddy Rose's book list either.
I've been thinking about big books a lot since I bought Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother: Official Biography last week. It's a book that I think qualifies as a tome. It has more than thousand pages, though I must say it's surprisingly light. I don't know how they managed it but I think it weighs less than my copy of Harry Potter And The Order of the Phoenix
. I bought in part because I think that she must have lived an interesting life. She didn't just live to be more than 100 years old, she lived an entire century. She was born in 1900 and died in 2002 and I find that kind of fascinating. But another part of me was just blown away by the size of the book. It is thicker than the phone book for the province I grew up in. That's rather impressive.And scary. It is a big book. I didn't buy it the first night I saw it but it picked away at me. I kept asking myself who would read a thousand page biography of the Queen Mother aside from the die-hard royal family fans. The more I thought about it the more I wanted to read it. It would be a challenge. So I bought it. I've set myself a goal of reading ten pages a night. I've missed the last three nights because I went away for the weekend and the book just does not scream "packable". I had read more than fifty pages the first couple of nights so I'm still mostly on track. If I continue at the rate of ten pages per night it will still take me more than three months to read. It's a tactic I've used with other books, though with fiction to try to stick with chapters.
Do you read big books? Do you have a special strategy for reading them. Or are they no big deal?
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>A Hippie In a Minivan spent a day in Montreal at the Redpath Museum. Confession: I've sat on the steps at the Redpath Museum (many, many times) and had a class or two in the lecture hall while I was a student at McGill but I never actually toured the museum.
The theme was Mummies. A little tour and talk about mummies and then an activity for the kids…The talk was perfect, geared towards kids and just the perfect amount of time for the kids. Little did I know that as small as the Redpath museum is, they have the second largest ancient Egyptian mummy collection in Canada…3 mummies, a sarcophagus, mummified animals, a set of Coptic Jars along with many other artifacts.
The Drowsey Monkey is wondering if meditating is causing her to lose her blogging edge.
I've been wondering if all my meditation classes have taken away my edge. Made me too balanced to blog. I'm not all tense and angry ... well, yeah okay I'm still a bit of those but not enough to blog about it. Perhaps I need to rethink this self awareness journey.
Ecochick is now an eco-mom. Her post introducing her new eco-chick brings a smile to my face.
I got kind of lost looking at the wonderful photographs on Isle Dance. I'm sure we all know a bunch of reasons why the chicken crossed the road, but do we know why the rooster crossed the road?
I found some sage advice at Join Me On The Path. The next time you are feeling overwhelmed maybe you need to h.a.l.t..
A wise friend advised me to h.a.l.t. when I’m overwhelmed, conflicted or unsure, and to ask myself these questions:
Am I hungry?
Am I angry?
Am I lonely?
Am I tired?If I answer yes to even one of those questions, it’s best to remedy that issue before even trying to figure out what to do about what’s overwhelming me or what might have me conflicted or unsure.
I really need to remember that one. When I get hungry I also get tired and well, I'm sure there are tropical storms that cause less of a disturbance than I do when I'm like that.
What Canadian blogs have you been reading?
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>Let's look at the Nook first. (Yeah, it's a bad name, but then Kindle isn't so great either.) This new offering from BN offers a lot of what the Kindle does, including wireless downloads. It's good to see the Kindle have some competition on that front (rumor is that Sony is coming out with something similar soon and one assumes that when Apple unleashes their version it will have that as well). When the Nook was announced one of the big (in fact HUGE) advantages that readers saw was the "Lend Me" feature which would allow the Nook owner to "loan" the e-book to a friend for a period of fourteen days. During that time they would not be able to read the book on their own device. In a world where "loaning e-books" tends to result in "dirty rotten pirate" this was major news.
Until someone did a little bit more digging. As it turns out that you can only loan a book out once. There was a collective sigh around the blogosphere and well, some people who already ordered it before that tidbit came to light might be in for a bit of a surprise.
Geeky Mom asked if the Nook will be a Kindle killer and I honestly don't think so, especially in light of the loaning a book only once policy. And because Barnes and Noble is coming to the game late their e-books stocks aren't quite as extensive as other e-book sellers.
Now let's move on to the Kindle. There was a story in the New York Times about e-books that caused a kerfuffle (I believe that is the polite term for what happened). This is the part in particular that caused the uproar:
Exploiting a loophole in Amazon’s system, Ms. Englin has linked her Kindle to the Amazon account of some nearby friends, allowing all of them to read books like “The Lost Symbol” at the same time — while paying for them only once.
The article then goes on to report that Ms. Englin says she and her friends do not know if what they do is within Amazon's terms of service. It's how the article ends and the big takeaway from the whole article as written is that this woman is cheating the system. It set off numerous groups, but perhaps most unfortunately it set off some authors. The woman was called a thief on Twitter. Worse yet, others were encouraged to retweet the accusation.
The problem was, as so elegantly laid out by Dear Author's Jane, the Ms. Englin and her friends weren't doing anything wrong. Not by Kindle's Terms of Service, which allows six devices to be connected to a single account. And no, they do not have to live in the same household. Now you're not going to let use anyone use your Kindle account. Why? Because they also have access to your credit card (which is stored so that you can download wirelessly to the Kindle) and can make purchases on it. You have to be pretty good friends with someone to allow that. She wasn't breaking any copyright or digital rights management laws or agreements either. You see, we readers? We have some rights too.
The problem here is that the very same law that gives authors a property right to their creative work gives consumers the right of first sale and fair use privileges. Let me state that again. The VERY SAME LAW that creates intellectual property for authors gives readers rights too.
A lot of this comes down to digital rights management and pirating. Now, this is going to be the hard part as I try really hard not to rant. This is the thing, I support authors. They provide me with hours and hours of entertainment each week, let alone over the course of a year. I'm happy to pay for their books when I can afford and borrow from the library when I can't. I don't want their work to be pirated anymore than they do and I certainly won't be the one pirating it. But I hate digital rights management and the DRM files that are attached the the e-books that I legally purchase. With a passion.
I remember the first time I tried to move an e-book that I legally borrowed from the library onto my e-book reader. It ended in tears and swearing. Ditto the same time I legally bought a book from an e-book store that wasn't the same store as the brand associated with my e-book reader. The file type was compatible but well...I darn near threw both the reader and my computer at the wall. I wasn't trying to do anything with the books that I wasn't supposed to do. I was only trying to move it from my computer to my reader so that I could read it, a radical action don't you think? I still hate that process, though I'm happy to say it has gotten a bit easier...most of the time.
I honestly felt like I was being punished for been a good law-abiding citizen of the world. If ever there was a moment I was tempted to look for pirated books it was those first two attempts to move legal books to my e-book reader. If I wasn't I could have gone online, found a pirated version easily enough and it would have been far easier to move onto my device. It really makes no sense to me. Ok, fine. It does. I understand why the DRM files on these books exist, but I do not understand why they need to be so difficult to use.
Courtney Milan in her post "Readers Have Rights Too made a point that I really agree with.
But keep in mind that the value a book has is not just in the act of reading it. It’s also–hugely so–in the act of sharing it. In giving a book to a friend and waiting breathlessly to see if she loves it as much as you do. In reading a book someone else has recommended, and figuring out why it does (or doesn’t) work for you. Books are about building community, and if we undercut that community as authors, we take value away from our books.
I love sharing and recommending books to my friends. I have many books I'd love to share with my friends but the problem is that we're not exactly geographically conveniently located for that. Many of my friends live in other cities. Heck, I'm Canadian and many of my reading-inclined friends live in the US. We sometimes try to read a book together (or even within the same month as each other) but coordinating which person can buy one, which has to wait for a library copy, etc can make it pretty difficult. And don't even think about trying to all get a book form the library at the same time unless its several years old and not very popular and even better if it's a classic (heh! Moonstone!). It would be fantastic if there was a way we could share e-books. The same way it would be fantastic if I could loan them physical books. I'm not breaking any laws when I purchase a book and loan it to a friend, so the assumption of some people who think if I want to loan an e-book to a friend I'm a pirate/thief/no-good-awful-human-being really bothers me.
Authors, the people who are having this discussion? We're not talking about sending it to 500 of our social networking friends who will turn around and do the same. We're not talking about putting your e-book up for sale on e-Bay or Craigslist. We're talking about sharing your book with our mothers, sisters, close friends. We're not trying to pirate your books or steal from you. The world of e-books is a whole new world for everyone. We've got your back. Just make sure you have ours too.
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>The challenge happens two times a year and book lovers all over sit themselves down and try to read for 24 hours straight. It's really fun. As the 24 HourRead-A-Thon FAQs point out even if you aren't a reader (or just can't dedicate yourself to reading on the allotted day) there are still other ways people participate. You can cheerlead or host a mini-challenge. You can tweets and urge people on.
I know what some of you are thinking. A whole 24 hours of reading sounds like bliss doesn't it? I took part in back in April and let me tell you, it's surprisingly hard. I'm someone who will happily sit and read for hours at a time but reading for a whole day, on purpose? It's hard. Surprisingly hard. Of course you don't have to read for the full 24 hours. I don't. I try to read as much as I can but when it comes right down to it, I'm not not a night owl and will fall asleep reading if I try to stay up all night. (Or stay awake and be a grumpy, grumpy bear the next day and since we have plans with my in-laws tomorrow morning that I probably bet avoided...)
So exactly how many people are participating? Well, the sign-up post shows that 362 readers are joining and 92 cheerleaders. Yes, we are reading force not to be reckoned with.
Who are these readers? They are people like Bonjour Cass. She is much smarter than I am today and remembered to to bed early and set her alarm to wake up and start reading. And it's her birthday weekend! Stop by and say happy birthday!
Alyce from At Home With Books is also smarter than me. She tackled her laundry pile last night.
Melanie from Melanie's Musings is cheerleading today. You can get to know her with the read-a-thon meme.
I love how BrownGirl BookSpeak kicked off her read-a-thon post. She simply stated that she. reads. hardcore.
One of my favourite things to do with the read-a-thon is check out people's bookstacks. This one at The Stacks My Destination is quite lovely. (I wish I had Little House On The Prairie in mine.)
I'm starting late today and I feel very much like the White Rabbit in Alice in Wonderland. I'm late! I'm late! For a very important date! (Hmm I do have a copy of Alice around here somewhere...) So I'd best stop writing this post and get myself reading. If you want to follow the fun on Twitter look for the #readathon hash tag.
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>Many people I know, myself included, read as a form of escape. When it's a stressful week at work or something is going on in my life that I can't do much about reading gives me a way to forget about it for a few minutes or hours. Through a book I can go on a trip to Italy, become someone else, sometime even leave the galaxy. In the not so great moments reading helps me see the possibilities that exist. In the good moments it reminds that there is still more that is possible.
For Elizabeth at Take a Whisk, reading got her through rough times in her childhood.
Reading saved me. I got lost in the words and escaped a stressful childhood and school experiences that were less than joyful. The words helped heal my first broken heart and they helped me to see that the world was a much bigger place than I could possibly imagine.
Sometimes books saved us from the monsters in the closet. For write J.L. Powers books got her through the night.
I would creep out of bed and get a book, a safe book, a children’s book, one that wouldn’t contain demons or violence or anything unsafe. I would huddle in the very back of my closet, bathed in the harsh light of the light bulb. Or, better yet (because it made me feel less sequestered from the people I needed to be near me in order to feel safe), I would gently ease open my bedroom door and sit on the cold cement floor of the entryway just outside my bedroom.
For others the fears and monsters weren't easy to get rid of. Dear Author set aside their usual "first sale" series this Monday to post, as they said, a very, very special essay from Chloe on why she reads. It saved her.
I am alive today because of books. Over 5 years ago, my abuse flashbacks were coming to a head and I was getting maybe 30 minutes of sleep each night after I’d wake up screaming from what I call the “five rape marathon flashback”. Nora Roberts/JD Robb’s “In Death” series saved my life. I had started counseling the same year Naked in Death was published and tried to read the book when it came out based on the recommendation of a friend. But as soon as I realized that Eve had been abused as a child, I put the book down and didn’t pick it up again until 3 years later.
The Dear Author blog is right. It is a very, very special essay. Stories can provide an escape when we need it. They can make a sick boy laugh. They can help an abused child survive. They can help a woman heal.
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>I've tried downsizing. I really did. When I moved from Montreal to Toronto I could only afford to move a certain number of boxes and I since I was moving into an apartment that was already furnished by my new roommates (who are a completely different kind of post themselves) books had to pared down. Then when I moved out of the apartment I was sharing with my roommate (it was a joyous day) I was moving into a teeny-tiny apartment. I only had room for one bookcase and the one I had was even too big. Out it went, along with some books, and in came a new smaller bookcase. I eventually decided I had room, not mention the need, for a second bookcase.
Because at no point did I stop buying books.
When I left that small apartment in Toronto it was to move into an apartment more than twice the size in Montreal. I had space! Lots of space! Add into that the fact that I didn't have access to a library for a long time it meant even more books. Another bookcase was added. I was now up to three. By the time I moved to Ottawa a year later I was in desperate need of a fourth. I currently stand at 6 full-sized bookcases and one half-size.
There are days when I look around and wonder where on earth these books came from. (I do not allow myself to consider how many times I've moved certain books.) But when I stop and really look at each individual book I can tell you where I got it. That hardcover copy of Death Du Jour by Kathy Reichs? I bought when I was still in university. It's personalized and signed by Reichs. The 1930s hardcover edition of Pollyanna? It's from my grandparents house and I brought it back on one of my last trips home. Frommer's San Francisco Day by Day? I bought it at Costco in preparation for BlogHer Food.
There are books I bought on vacation, books from my childhood, books that replace books that have gone missing from my childhood. Some were presents. Many, many of the books on my shelves are unread. Most of those that have been read will someday be reread.
Patti at Oops...Wrong Cookie has one of those lovely jobs, the kind that comes not only with books, but books you want to read. But she also hits on something else, the other place I get books...the ones I don't keep. I'm speaking, of course, of the library.
I'm not a big buyer of books. Strange and unusual, I know, since most library people tend to be book collectors. I'll usually only buy books after I've read them and like them enough to think I'll read them again.
Most of the books I read I do not own, but I can't switch to 100% library or borrowed books. The thought of it makes my heart a bit sad. I guess I'm a bit like KH Chronicles.
I get asked why I buy books and magazines rather than loaning them from the library and saving myself a small fortune and the answer is because one day, like dinosaurs and hypercolour t-shirts, books will no longer exist.
And I want to hold on to them, in my own two hands, for as long as possible.
I don't know that I can envision a time when there are no physical books. I just can't. I don't believe it, or maybe I just refuse to believe it. I've considered doing one of those "no buying books" challenges. I've purposely set out to do it for a month or two but I find it's kind of like yo-yo dieting - the more I try to restrict myself the more I resist and eventually binge. A couple of years ago Kelly Watson wrote on Romancing the Blog about how she tried to give up buying books. They were her "latte factor" of sorts.
When I returned home with my newly acquired booty I felt no remorse. I had books! Lots of books! Shiny, new books! And like a proud new mom I couldn’t help but brag about them to everyone, including my Latte Factor friend. While my friend was happy for me, she couldn’t help but ask “Why did you buy those books? Couldn’t you get them books from the library?”
I could give you many excuses for why I buy books (I want to support authors! I want to support local store owners!), but mostly it's because I just liked books. I figure as long as I can remember where I got the books on my shelves I'm doing ok. It's only when I start forgetting that I'll need to stop...right?
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>While The Cutting Edge was very much a work of fiction Battle of the Blades is anything but. We have taken honest to goodness female figure skaters, including Olympians, and paired them with hockey players. Yes. Tie Domi. In tights. Though unlike the movie, I don't think anyone expects the winners of this show to go on to win the Olympics.
I honestly can't decide if this is insane or brilliant so it pretty much follows that it is insanely brilliant. But it leads to one question, which Lose that Girl also wonders - why on earth did it take Canada, aka The Great White North, so long to do this?
Before this series took to the ice, I don't think anyone with any sports knowledge could picture tough guys, Tie Domi or Bob Probert on figure skates gracefully lifting *anything*, spare the Stanley Cup, high into the air. Now these hockey stars are orchestrating death spirals and overhead lifts with (almost) the greatest of ease. The resulting program is downright addictive!
I know you want to be skeptical. I do too. I haven't seen it yet though I'm hoping I can catch up online. (I'm bad at watching pretty much anything on tv. I suck at tv.) Auntie Fashion doesn't normally watch the CBC and well, she just made me laugh.
Although I normally swear off the CBC like I swear off white leather pants and home perms, I think I’ll watch this show.
Oh, come on. Whether you are a fan of CBC or not (and really, I am) you have to find that funny, especially since it's not completely out of the realm of possibility that you'll find both white leather pants and home perms if you happen to watch CBC on the right day.
One of the kind of fun things about this show is that the people competing are fairly familiar figures. Lori Beth at The Road Less Travelled had her favourites picked out before the show started.
I'll admit I have a soft spot for Barb Underhill and Ron Duguay -- if only because they're probably the ones closest to my age (46 & 52 -- the other skaters have been referring to them as "Grandma & Grandpa"). When I heard Duguay was on, I thought, "Good Lord, he was playing hockey when I was in high school!" -- I checked, and he was!! But they are also proving to be a great pair to watch. Duguay still has some Studio 54 moves in his repetoire ;
And bad/awesome 90s movie connection aside, many of the participants really are reminiscent of 80s and 90s culture so it's perfect blog material for Tammy 80s and 90s nostalgia blog.
Try as I might I can only think of one thing to sum up how I feel about Battle of the Blades. All together now - TOE PICK!
Contributing Editor Sassymonkey also blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.
]]>