Oh rainy June, where did you go? I liked you much better than tropical July. Yesterday was a record-breaking one in terms of weather. The temperature reached 100F (38C) and the humidity was tropical making it feel more like 115 (46C). Our Independence Day celebrations did not involve much. We didn’t go outside until around 8:30 in the evening to water the vegetable garden and even then it was still 90 (32C). We spent our day indoors and celebrated by partaking of Bookman’s homemade vegan hot dogs. I told him I wanted ice cream too and he delivered. He made vegan Neapolitan ice cream (strawberry, chocolate, vanilla) using strawberries from our own garden for the strawberry layer. If the weather stays tropical we’ll be able to grow our own coconuts (we use coconut milk for the ice cream) and chocolate too.
A large part of the day was spent reading. I read a whole book! Granted it was a short book but I haven’t read a book in a day in ages. The book in question was The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes. I will be writing about that soon. I have a couple other recent finishes I have to post about too, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte and Orestes by Euripides in a fantastic Anne Carson translation.
The year is halfway over and I am heading towards reading a record breaking number of books. I usually average 54 books a year and this year I am on track to read over 60. I believe the most books I have ever read in a year is 62. Not having library school cutting into my time and reading short books really pumps up the numbers. But at the end of the day, reading is not about numbers it is about the pleasure that reading has given me. So far, it’s been great with only one abandoned book. Not bad.
My eyes were bigger than my stomach as the saying goes, and I had hoped to read far more than I managed in June. But no matter. I’ve got lots of books in progress so July doesn’t have a big line-up of hope-to-reads, more like a big pile of hope-to-finish. When I do finish books I hope to get to some of the books I planned to read in previous months and didn’t manage. And who, knows, maybe this will be the month I finally start that science books by women project I made a whole long list for. Natalie Angier’s The Canon is still sitting on the shelf above my desk scolding me for my neglect. I’ll get to it, I’ll get to, but you see I have these other books I need to read too.
Ah that previous paragraph has lots of hope in it. Is it just me or do readers tend to be an optimistic bunch?
One book I have not yet begun that I will read in July is A.S. Byatt’s Ragnarok. I will be receiving it in the mail shortly from Barnes & Noble since the store I went to didn’t have it in stock and I didn’t want to drive to another one across town in the heat. Better to have my good and wonderful postal carrier deliver it to my doorstep. Ragnarok is the next Slaves group discussion book. The conversation begins on July 31st and all are welcome to join.
I will be going to visit my family in San Diego for several days on the 19th. Bookman will be staying home and holding down the fort. I will be in need of airplane reading. I just began reading George R.R. Martin’s Clash of Kings last week (off to an awesome start btw) and it is such a chunky book if I am still reading it come the 19th it will go with me. There will also be my Kindle filled with other books because one can never be sure what one will want to read while traveling and visiting family.
My turn just came up for Jonah Lehrer’s Imagine. I read the introduction last night. It has possibility but it didn’t grab me right off which worried me a bit. I’m concerned it might turn out to be a cross between popular nonfiction and a self-help business management book. If I am not connecting with it by page 50 it goes back to the library. Which might be why I got the book so fast to begin with because when I put a hold on it at the beginning of June there were 80 people in line for it before me and I figured I wouldn’t be seeing it until September. Has anyone read this?
Still slowly and happily making my way through Marilynne Robinson’s When I Was a Child I Read Books. I could probably write a post for each of her essays that’s how yummy and substantial they are.
I have read the first essay in To Write Like a Woman by Joanna Russ. It is about critiquing science fiction. I found her argument somewhat bothersome and will very likely get around to posting about that essay after I read it again to make sure she is saying what I think she is.
And of course I am reading entries from Emerson’s diaries now and then. They make good bedtime reading when I am tired and only want to read for 10 minutes or so. Still, they are not breezy so I can’t be too tired when I read them.
Oh, and I borrowed Native Guard by Natasha Trethewey from the library. Trethewey was recently announced as the next Poet Laureate of the U.S. and I had never heard of her. I’ve read the first few poems and so far like her very much. Not only is she a woman but she is biracial and in her forties – young with some really interesting things to say. Very exciting to have her as Poet Laureate.
That’s all my active reading at the moment. That’s enough, isn’t it? Lots of variety, exactly what I like. Plus, it will help me get through this terrible hot summer. I am so very much looking forward to winter. Snow? Yes please.
That seems like a quintessential Independence Day dinner (speaking as a Canadian observing from afar). Does Bookman use seitan to make the vegan dogs? Is there a recipe you would recommend, or have you just gotten used to making them by now? Your combination of reads does seem delightfully varied; the poetry collection is now on its way to me from my local library too…thanks for bringing her to my attention! Good luck with your finishing-up July.
Buriedinprint, we would have had potato salad too except we were out of potatoes. Still pretty darn good. Bookman created his hot dogs by experimenting with a vegan sausage recipe from Vegan Brunch. The hot dogs are made of pinto beans and other ingredients. I will get him to write down the recipe and I will email it to you. I hope you enjoy Trethewey’s poetry!
Reblogged this on This beautiful life.
Well here it is still raining. Today steadily pouring down, and parts of the country are on flood alert yet again, poor people. Clearly what the drought-affected parts of the world need is a hose pipe ban. There’s no rain dance quite like it.
My reading seems to have hit a sticky patch at the moment where nothing quite hits the spot and several books have been disappointments. I hate when this happens! Very glad you are happily deep in lots of good books, though. And I had better get a move on with Ragnarok – the end of July does not look that far away!
You’ve got the authentic pioneer spirit, Stefanie, with the reading plans for what is clearly a truly awful summer! Ours is not that hot so far but very, very wet and today/tomorrow we are to have rain of such intensity as to give a month’s worth of water in a few hours. Last time we had a year as bad was 2007…at least at the end of it we had a beautiful Autumn. Anyway, hope you enjoy what looks like a wide range of good stuff to read.
Ian, heh, it’s easy to be pioneering indoors when there is air conditioning, you should see how weedy my garden is getting though. Going and coming to work I turn my eyes away so as not to notice the weeds are almost as tall as the flowers and beans. According to climatologist, Minnesota weather is being affected more by global warming at the moment than other parts of the country and we are to expect this kind of summer to become normal. If that’s the case, I might have to move further north! I hope you get a break in your rain soon and get some warmth and sunshine out of the summer in addition to a beautiful autumn
Hopefully all those rainy days have been conducive to reading!
And you still get a lot of people who think global warming has nothing to do with what we are doing to the environment – one of them is a bonkers libertarian mine owner who wants to take over what’s left of the Australian press not owned by Rupert Murdoch!
We had a couple of quite cold winters in Europe 2009/10 and 2010 and the last two summers were cool and dry but I suspect that these drenching summers will become much more commonplace. Conducive to reading? Sometimes! Hope you get some break in the heat and that you avoid severe thunderstorms (I hope Waldo and Dickens can cope with those!).
Ian, I’m glad it’s not only the US that has crackpots who don’t believe in global warming. Your cold winters made it into the news here so I know they must have been pretty bad! We got some rain but no severe weather and the weekend was was hot but not like it has been. Oddly, Waldo and Dickens are not scared of thunderstorms. The doorbell, however is another matter.
Litlove, rain would be really nice about now. We have out fingers crossed for some tonight and also hoping that should we get some it doesn’t come as a severe thunderstorm. Sorry to hear your reading has reached a sticky patch. If it doesn’t come unstuck soon, hopefully Ragnarok will do the trick. I have high hopes for it.
I can tell you exactly where all your rain went, it came over to the UK to make July even wetter than June. I live on top of a hill and last week was completely marooned. I’m interested in what you say about the Robinson essays as I’ve seen very mixed reviews. I normally love her work but have been holding off from these, maybe I should reconsider.
Alex, the news this weekend was talking about how the Olympics might end up being rather wet. Hopefully there will be a dry spell for a bit and everyone there can enjoy some sunshine. Robinson is not an easy essayist to read, hers are not casual and chatty but very idea-rich. Also they are not about books which probably surprises a lot of people who expect one thing and get something very different.
It’s been hot here, too, but also quite rainy. We are usually a bit cooler on the island…probably breeze off Wassaw Sound. Despite the heat, I made it to the grill and threw on a (close your eyes) London Broil for dinner. For lunch we had Hebrew National all-beef hot dogs…so not so vegan, but Bookman’s hot dogs and ice cream would have been fine with me too. I ditto staying inside to read when the weather is not cooperating. Although I usually don’t read more than one book at a time, on the 4th I started a re-read of Joy In The Morning taken off my shelf after a 50 year hiatus. I think I enjoyed it more when I was 14 as I’ve remembered it fondly all this time, but it doesn’t quite compare with A Tree Grows In Brooklyn. Good nevertheless. I also started The Outermost House by Henry Beston (perfect summer read) and am finishing up Half Broke Horses. After work I’m hitting the library where The Night Circus is waiting for me. Which means I can hang on to my gift card…and dream of what it will bring.
Grad, apparently it is hot all over. Glad you were able to make it outside and grill even if I had to avert my eyes to what you were grilling
Sounds like you have some good reading going. I hope The Night Circus ends up being good too!
My eyes are always bigger than my stomach, too, so I sympathize. And I can also relate to your weather woes as they are pretty much the same as mine. I hope it is true and we get ‘cooler’ weather this weekend. Even 85F sounds divine!
My reading is as usual all over the place. I have picked up a few books that got relegated to the bedside pile (‘finish laters’) and discovered all of a sudden that that was the one book I really wanted to read and then quite enjoyed it….so timing really does count (since those books tend to get abandoned completely more often than not), I think! Maybe I’ll just plow through that pile this month (or at least finish a few more). Of course now that it’s midway through the year I was thinking, too, how I need to reassess my ‘reading plans’ and do another night table shuffle (sounds like a dance, doesn’t it? 
). So that means more books relegated to the bedside pile….ah, such a vicious cycle in my house when it comes to reading.
Danielle, Timing does count for a lot, doesn’t it? The night table shuffle does sound like a dance. I do the reading chair shuffle regularly. They must be related!
I just purchased Jessica Beck’s “Killer Crullers” and Erica Spindler’s, “Watch Me Die.” via Amazon.com. When will I get to them? I’m not sure. Erica is one of my must read authors so she might get to the front of the line. Still reading “The Gun Seller.” I still have Southern Fried in the “reading but not really reading pile.” *sigh* why am I such an avid reader? I have an addition. Help!
Also Stephanie, I would like a second opinion about a book that I have read. I am an african american woman who rarely reads african american books. I purchased a book from a self-published author her name is Terri D. and the book is titled, “Yesterday’s Lies” I was wondering if you could throw it on your pile and see what you make of it. I purchased it to support the author. However, I just need to know if my opinion of the book was harsh. I do have a review posted of the book on my blog.
Regina, oh don’t get me started on books I bought that I had to have but have sat on my shelf unread for years! Thank you for the compliment of wanting my opinion on Yesterday’s Lives. After reading your review of it however, I don’t think I would like it any better than you did. I trust that you have a valid opinion
Sounds like you have some great reading and travel on the horizon. I hope the weather will calm down a bit for you. One thing that really saps me of my energy is that kind of humidity. I suppose that is why I stay living in California even though the rents and home prices are so astronomical.
boarding, I actually don’t mind a bit of humidity as long as it isn’t also blazing hot. The temps have come down a bit thank goodness! And it is always nice to have something to look forward to, isn’t it?
Wow Stefanie, you are having a terrific year of magical reading. I myself am on a track of reading LESS books than in previous years, having read only about 20 thus far. But I’ve read, and tend to read, sort of obese books!
Last September I read Tenant of Wildfell Hall and I really liked it, so I look forward to your thoughts on it. So many times I have picked up that Julian Barnes one you mention [it seems so slight] at the store and wondered about buying it. Again, I look forward to your words on it.
I saw Jonah Lehrer on The Colbert Report and thought, “Hey, this guy is so fascinating” but when I later leafed through Imagine in a store and read a bit of it, nothing leaped out at me and said “I am crucial” so I never did buy the thing.
By the way, about the general HEAT and all — I am quickly becoming a believer in global warming, in Al Gorian proportion! I work all day in a non air-conditoned place and seriously, it is like a sauna in there. So even here in Canada — we are BAKING, it seems.
Cip, I like that, a year of magical reading!
It matters not if you read fewer books this year than last, what matters most is how much you enjoy the books you do read and I believe you have read some really good ones! Tenant of Wildfell Hall will be written about sometime this week I hope. I have decided to send Lehrer’s book back to the library. While the book seemed interesting as I read it wasn’t revealing anything new that I hadn’t already read elsewhere, so you made the right decision putting it back on the shelf at the bookstore. Even hot in Canada? You’ve been my go-to place for when it gets too hot here. You’ve just crushed my escape route!
Glad to hear you’re enjoying Game of Thrones! Just wait until you get to Book 3.
Duckthief, oh it’s lots of fun. You mean book 3 gets even better? Can’t wait!