My Brain on Books XXX

 

 

 

I am reading for The Office of Letters and Lights the folks who bring us NaNoWriMo today as I love what they are doing for literacy with their Young Writer's Programs and because I've participated in NaNo every year since 2004.  I have been blessed to have it in my life and would like to give something back if only kudos and link love.  I'm putting this plug at the top in hopes some who stop by will check out their site and see all the great things they do to foster love of reading and writing and story in kids. 

This post will be organized like a blog inside a blog with recent updates stacked atop previous ones. I may be posting some updates on Twitter @Joystory and the Joystory fb fanpage. But this is where I do anything more than a line or two.  Including mini-challenges that don't require a separate post..   

Be sure and see my tribute poem to Dewey and the Thon she birthed at the bottom of this post

My Read-a-Thon Nest

The Inheritance of Orquidea Divina
by Zoraida Cordova

12:22 AM (Sunday) - Coming up for air.  WOW.  I've spent this whole time with the same book.  Tho I must admit that eyestrain caused me to need to rest my eyes frequently and several times closing my eyes to rest them resulted in mini naps.  Most lasting minutes but one or two over an hour.  But the Libby ap says I spent a total of 11 hours 33 minutes on The Inheritance of Orquidea Divina by Zoraida Cordova  between 5AM and 12:11 AM.  It's a book I could have read in under six hours once upon a time but those times are gone forever.  But in spite of how long it took I am suffused with a sense of triumph for having read a whole novel in what is still in essence one sitting.

It was magical.  Not only the flashback to days of yore when reading a novel in one sitting was nearly a daily happening but the story itself.  Magical.  I feel like I've been dreaming and I don't want to wake up. How do I move on to another story now with only four hours and a bit left in the thon?

And it wasn't even the book I listed in the opening meme that was the one I was most looking forward to.  I started it in the first hour because I expected it to be an easier read than Matrix like a fantasy or a YA.  I thought I'd be done before noon and could move on to the literary Matrix with a tankard or two of coffee in me.

But this story turned out to be as complex as any Lauren Groff story I've yet encountered and contained themes as serious as any literary novel I ever read.  To top that off many of those theme are the very ones I'm currently obsessed with.  Loss.  Grief.  Dysfunctional family dynamics.  Family secrets.  The untrustworthiness of memory.  The power of creativity and imagination.  The importance of truth telling.  The primal need for connectivity.  The daily necessity for repentance and forgiveness.  The evil of misused power.  The need to just say NO to bullies of all stripes.  The arrogance of that sense of purity and piety that calls itself righteousness giving itself the right to judge others 'less than' which is the source of most of the pain we humans inflict on each other in the name of good.

4:44 AM - Intro Meme I'm setting this to go live at 4:44 AM but it may be well into hour 1 or even hour 2 before I check in again.  I'll be reading my first pick sitting in my beanbag chair nursing my first thermos of coffee.

1) What fine part of the world are you reading from today?

Kelso Washington USA.  Across the Cowlitz river from Longview where I grew up and had been living with my elderly mother since 2013.  I moved into my 400 square foot efficiency unit in late July.  Yesterday's post was a photo essay updating the current status of the settling in phase.

2) Which book in your stack are you most looking forward to?

Non-Fiction: Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism by Amanda Montell

Fiction: Matrix by Lauren Groff

3) Which snack are you most looking forward to?

Chips and guacamole.

4) Tell us a little something about yourself!

Widowed September 2020 

Living alone for the first time ever.

Legally blind with RP aka tunnel vision

Diagnosed with high functioning autism six years ago

Have a caregiver who comes in twice a week to help with chores and errands I can't do alone.

I proved during this move that I have more volume in fiber art supplies than in clothes by at least thee times.

5) If you participated in the last read-a-thon, what’s one thing you’ll do different today? If this is your first read-a-thon, what are you most looking forward to?

I'm hoping to interact with the community more this time than in the last several thons.

Ode to Dewey

by Joy Renee

vote, fav and share for Dewey

We Miss You Dewey