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The Bibliofile


No, that title's not a misprint. I'm not a bibliophile. Dictionary.com describes a bibliophile as: a person who loves or collects books, especially as examples of fine or unusual printing, binding, or the like. For someone who downloads the majority of their books to read on their iPad,  I kind of miss out on the print and binding and so on.

No, "bibliofile" is something new for me. I intend to share with you, on a monthly basis, the books I've been reading. So it's my biblio file. Get it?

Last month, February, saw me zip through 7 books. Not a bad feat when at the same time I was writing a daily post to keep up with the writing challenge hosted by Nicky and Mike at We Work For Cheese. Here they are in the order in which I read them:

Mr. Penumbra's 24 Hour Bookstore - Robin Sloan
Raylan Givens 3-Book Collection - Elmore Leonard
The Moving Target - Ross MacDonald
Live By Night - Denis Lehane
True North - A Life in the Music Business - Bernie Finklestein
The Drowning Pool - Ross MacDonald
Grendal - John Gardner

My favourites of the month were the Elmore Leonard, Dennis Lehane and Ross MacDonald novels.  Leonard and MacDonald write about Private Detectives, a genre I find myself revisiting and enjoying immensely. MacDonald's protagonist is Lew Archer and the two books I read of his were the first in this series published in 1949 and 1950 respectively.

The loser of the month was Grendel, a retelling of the epic Beowulf poem form the antagonist, or monster's, point of view. This was strange. Written in 1971, it is described as "dealing with finding meaning in the world, the power of literature and myth and the nature of good an evil" the book made me wonder what the author had been smoking when he wrote it. Either that or he wanted the reader to think he or she had been under the influence.

If you want more information about these books click on my Books page up top there. Clicking on the title under each book picture will take you to a review.

So that's what I was up to in February. I'll try to keep this up on a monthly basis but when golf season swings around (see what I did there?) I'm not making any promises.

How about you? Any of you read any of these books? Just what are you reading? Let me know. I'm always on the look out for recommendations.

Comments

Nicky said…
I was just thinking last night that I need to pick up some new books to read now that the madness has come to an end. And I am truly impressed that you managed to read 7 books while the challenge was happening. Even reading one was too much for me to deal with!
P.J. said…
I have so much to read, it's not even funny. I'm a Kindle guy and every day I get several e-mails loaded with free books. I download many.

I go through spurts, though. I'll get into a roll where I read a ton. Then I'll go a month or two where I don't read anything. The last book I read (Round Ireland with a Fridge -- well worth the read) was one I actually got at the *gasp* library! I learned quickly that I don't read "regular" books as fast as I do ones on the Kindle. I used to love regular books. Now I find it hard to worry about them when I can just grab the Kindle.
P.J. said…
Start handing out blue ribbons and you'll see how much better society becomes, including book reading! Just sayin'! :-P
Shawn Ohara said…
I wish I had a little more time to read.
Leonard is a wonderful writer. But I don't know if I can forgive him for writing High Noon II.
nonamedufus said…
I have a lot of time on my hands...and love to read. My tastes in literature are a lot like my tastes in music: eclectic. So I'll switch back and forth among fiction, non-fiction, biographies and so on.
nonamedufus said…
Blue ribbons, eh?
nonamedufus said…
I'm kind of like that too, P.J. Lately, though, I've been on quite a reading jag, having read 18 books since January 1st. While I love the simplicity of reading on the iPad I do miss the feel of real books. And with real books the battery doesn't run out!
nonamedufus said…
I quite enjoy Leonard, too. His Raylan Givens character is great. I've never read or seen High Noon II. Based on your recommendation, I'll probably avoid it.
Laughing Mom said…
I'm impressed at the amount of reading you did, although if I had the amount of snow you have, I wouldn't leave the house and might get to read some! Currently I'm working on Skippy Dies by Paul Murray. Can't give it a review yet though. I go back and forth between print books and ebooks. If you haven't read Christopher Moore books, I think you would get a kick out of them. His humor got me back to reading after our fire at a time when I couldn't read anything at all.
P.J. said…
Yeah, I'm not sure how I would be with an iPad. Too many other things to do on that thing. I have one of the older Kindles. No color or anything. Kind of "feels" more like a book. I do, at times, miss the true feel of a book, but I really like what a Kindle can do and it makes reading so much faster!
nonamedufus said…
I'll look into the Moore books. Thanks for the recommendation.
nonamedufus said…
Downloading books is here to stay. Same with music. I download a lot, although for some of those special CDs I'll buy the real thing to add to my collection.
meleahrebeccah said…
Wow. I am really impressed you managed to read all of that and while participating in the writing challenge. I honestly don't remember the last time I read a book.
nonamedufus said…
Meleah, really? I'd go out of my skull if I didn't read. It takes me to so many other places.
meleahrebeccah said…
That's wonderful for you. That's what TV does for me.
KZ said…
I really need to make more time to read. My bookshelf looks impressive, but only until you realize that I still haven't read half of them.
nonamedufus said…
My bookshelf's run out of space with books I've read. Now I've moved over to e-books on my iPad.

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