I was going to try to post images with the vast amount of books that fell down around (into?) my birthday like leaves, but my friends and family members are too generous, so there are too many of them (one of my favorite problems)! So, in place of a highly decorated post, you're going to have to settle for more of a list!
The Great 2018 Birthday Book Pile (aka proof that I am loved) ;)
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| This is an Amur Leopard, the rarest big cat in the world. To learn more about Amur leopards, go here! |
My big cat collection is now larger thanks to the addition of: Relentless Enemies, a book about the lions of the Okavango Delta, A Cheetah's Tale (Princess Michael of Kent), Path of the Puma (Jim Williams), Living with Leopards (Nils Kure), Sundarbans Tiger (John Brooks), In the Shadows (Vince Gibbons), Shadows of a mountain lion (Mikki Terzian), American Lion (R. Timothy Rush), Living with Tigers (Valmik Thapar), Old Three Toes (John Joseph Mathews), Sariska: the tiger reserve roars again (Sunayan Sharma), Scent of a Game (Raghav Chandra), Wild Cats of the World (Luke Hunter).
2. Bill Hodges: 3 new titles!
The whole reason that I started to write is that I fell in love with characters. Today, I don't read much fiction, so that experience of finding a character to obsess over is rarer than it was. But once in awhile it happens - though I never expected it to happen with a Stephen King novel! I picked up The Outsider because it kept showing up in various you-must-read-this. I preferred the police procedural part (the first 400 pages) to the supernatural, but what I really loved was the characters. When I found out that some of them appeared in other books, I went on to get those, too. I still need one more to finish the series, but now I have: The Outsider, Mr. Mercedes, and Finders Keepers.
3. History: 3 new titles
This is a bit of a random assortment! I've been interested in Tecumseh since I saw the outdoor drama with my parents and grandparents as a kid, so $3 seemed like a steal for Glenn Tucker's Tecumseh: vision of glory. Since I'm gearing up to teach animal studies, Sharon B. Smith's Stonewall Jackson's Little Sorrel was already on my radar. It's silly to say so, but I was introduced to Shaka Zulu through an epic rap battle (facepalm) so I thought I'd better get the full story!
4. Hard Sciences: 3 new titles!
One of the best ways I have found for dealing with difficult and painful situations is to learn more about them, so when I had to go through surgery last month I added some books about the process to my reading list: Aldersley-William's Anatomies: a cultural history of the human body and Gawande's Complications. Because the surgery then led to hormonal issues (so many hormonal issues...) I also picked up the newly published Aroused: a history of hormones by Epstein.
5. Fiction: 6 new titles!
My recent fiction reading falls into two categories: books about Rome and war fiction. I don't have a good reason for this recent and arbitrary divide except to say that I don't know almost anything about Rome... and war fiction books keep getting recommended to me!
The Roman titles are: Longward's The Oath Breaker, Iggulden's Emperor: the gates of Rome, and Quinn's Mistress of Rome.
The war titles are: Doerr's All the light we cannot see, Mason's In Country, and Mason's The Winter Soldier.
6. Some random titles that don't fit anywhere: 5 new titles!
As a Victorianist, I ought to know more about Gerard Manley Hopkins than I do, so I added Martin's Gerard Manley Hopkins: a very private life to my pile. I also added Hopkins because I know that he struggled with why God allows terrible things to happen - and I struggle with this, too! Alongside Hopkins, I will also be reading Thiessen's Shadow of a Galilean because of its promise to come at Jesus from an angle rather than directly (like Dickinson's "tell the truth/ But tell it slant) and The M*A*S*H* FAQ because my husband and I just watched the entire series! Szablowski's Dancing bears: true stories of people nostalgic for life under tyranny was recommended by the husband of a colleague, and Cheshire's Where the animals go came up because we have been watching Blue Planet II and Planet Earth II.
7. The Vietnam War: 3 new titles!
Because M*A*S*H* criticized Vietnam and because I've been working my way through the Ken Burns documentary on the war, I also added some reading in that vein: Marlantes' Matterhorn, VanDemark's Road to Disaster, and Musgrave's (who was featured in the Ken Burns documentary) Notes to the Man Who Shot Me.
Eco-fiction is a new field for me, so I'm always finding new (sometimes quite old) gems! This birthday saw the additions of: Harkaway's Gone-away World, Kavan's Ice, and Faruqi's The Oyster Thief.
9. Genre Fiction: science fiction and fantasy: 3 new titles!
I don't read as much science fiction and fantasy as I used to (though I'm still vainly trying to write it...) but once in awhile something catches my eye. This birthday season introduced: Powell's Embers of War, Edwards' The Last Sun, and an audiobook of the long loved Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin.
I read more romance than I ever thought I would... and I'm not sure what to make of that myself. I blame those early fantasy authors (looking at you, J.R.R.) who wove romantic tendrils into their masterworks and left me to imagine how they played out... This year's crop of romance includes: Dare's The Governess Game, Charles' The Magpie Lord and Think of England and not exactly a romance but certainly about romance in popular culture: I'll have what she's having: how Nora Ephron's three iconic films saved the romantic comedy.
11. Genre Fiction: reads for the season: 6 new titles!
I love October. I love the good, good smell of leaves that gets up into your nose and makes you regret that winter should ever be allowed to sweep it away or freeze it out. I love pumpkins and pumpkin muffins and bread and pie. And I love reading books with an October atmosphere tucked between their covers. These ones fit the bill: Tucholke's The Boneless Mercies, Perdy's The Legend of Decimus Croome, Patrick's They Mostly Come Out at Night, Ankrum's The Wicker King, Polk's Witchmark and Cleaves' Rise Headless and Ride.
I'm honestly a bit frightened of the ocean, but frightening and fascinating are practically next door neighbors. New works for this shelf include: Fenolio's Life in the Dark, Robertson-Brown's Deadly Oceans (which is very handsomely made, I might add) and Riedman's The Pinnipeds.
13. Natural history: predators: 2 new titles
I love big, dangerous animals and I sincerely hope they survive all the terrible things we're doing to our world... Additions to this collection are: Sparks' Dreaming of wolves and Fallon's Vulture.
Most of the reading I do, currently, is to prepare for teaching. These are some of the titles I'll be reading for the spring and summer semester: Kemmerer;s Animals and world religions, Alexander's Crossover, Carson's The Autobiography of Red, Brun's Cloak and Jaguar, Samaha's Never ran, never will, and Nuwer's Poached.
Final Count: it was a very literary birthday, indeed, with 63 (!!!) new titles coming into my life. Thank you very much to everyone who helped me gather this latest collection of books!
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