Baby it's cold outside

It's only gone and started snowing! Even though we have had a fair bit of the white stuff in recent years, I still find it deliciously exciting to open up my curtains and see so much snow everywhere. Basically, I am a child.

I've just spent ages outside with the pooch and she absolutely loves it. She's only a puppy so this is her first snowy experience. Here she is, just chilling:

Griffin (our old dog, who we still miss very much), on the other hand, just did not know what to make of it. Though he did later join us in some sledging adventures.

I do have to go to work later, which should be interesting, but for the time being I am going to enjoy the fact that I am inside in the warm whilst outside there is a bit of a blizzard going on (yes, I am exaggerating, just go with it). So I've got my book, my moleskine, a large cup of tea and leftover Christmas snacks. Perfect.

(I'm reading The Light Between Oceans by ML Stedman. And loving it, I should add)

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Paper vs Digital: My two cents...

Every blogger and their dog has an opinion on the dreaded ebook/ereader vs real books question. I have a very simple opinion: I love books. I love words. I love sentences. In whatever form they may take.

I have been known to unashamedly peruse the yellow pages or a take-away menu just for something to read.  If I get particularly desperate I will read trashy magazines like closer or heat (bear in mind, I pretty much have to be weeping out of sheer desperation to turn to these. But, still, I will and do.) I would find it difficult to call myself a lover of the written word if I did distinguish between acceptable and unacceptable reading apparatus. I mean, that's pretty much the definition of hypocritical is it not? Some of my fellow MA-ians at uni scoffed at my kindle when I whipped it out of bag during breaks. That hurt, my kindle is amazing and I love it. I just don't understand the snobbery. We all love books so why should it matter whether it is a paper book or an ebook?

I travel a lot. I commuted to uni. I like to carry books around but I read a lot of chunky hardbacks which are not very shoulder friendly (though they are brain friendly). I think the kindle gives you the best of both worlds: portable reading. What on earth could be wrong with that? I know I wish I had one when I went travelling.

Having a kindle has not stopped me from buying books. Take a quick browse through this blog and that will quickly become apparent. Perhaps I'm just greedy but I want books and ebooks. I find this to be a nice compromise. And I like to think that buying both means I don't have a destructive effect on the book industry.

Have I stressed that I'll read anything? Leaflets, fire extinguishers, car registration plates (anyone else like to make words out of them? No? Just me?)...

Anyway, meandering rant over. What have you learnt?
1. I like books
2. I love books
3. I talk too much about rubbish

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Review: The Elegance of the Hedgehog

The Elegance of the Hedgehog
Muriel Barbery
2006
Original Language: French

'Madame Michel has the elegance of the hedgehog: on the outside, she's covered in quills, a real fortress, but my gut feeling is that on the inside, she has the same simple refinement as the hedgehog: a deceptively indolent little creature, fiercely solitary and terribly elegant.'

Can I just say 'wow'?! Is that an appropriate review? Perhaps not, but don't fret, I could go on and on about this book.

So, to business. I read this book as part of Curiosity Killed the Bookworm's 2013 Translation Challenge. I decided on this one to start off the challenge because I'd had it on my shelves for far too long. That, and it coincided nicely with my New Year's trip to Paris. I would like to thank Ellie for setting up this challenge and forcing me to pick up this amazing book from the unread and unloved pile. How dare I leave it there for so long?!

Seriously though, the quote from a Guardian review on the back cover swung the purchase and consequent reading of the novel for me: 'Resistance is futile...' That's pretty much the Trekkie vote right there*.

The novel is a snapshot of the lives of a group of people living at the apartments of 7, rue de Grenelle, seen from the point of view of Renee Michel (the concierge) and twelve-year-old Paloma Josse. Putting it simply, the owners of the apartments are shockingly upper class and are completely unaware of the intelligence of their concierge. The book kind of floats along in a contemplative fashion until one of the apartment owners dies and his apartment is purchased by Japanese businessman Kakuro Ozu. Together, Kakuro and Paloma slowly draw out Renee's character and allow her to accept her own intelligence regardless of her place in the social ladder.

I did find the novel hard going at times. It is very deep and philosophical and my brain tends to go to mush when I think too much about the whys and the hows of the world. But having said that, some bits were just truly lovely to read. Like this bit:

'It's as if those strains of music created a sort of interlude in time, something suspended, an elsewhere that had come to us, an always within a never.'

I love the language (I can only imagine how beautiful it'd be in French) and the dual narration. I love Renee's passion and Paloma's intelligence. I love how uplifting and hopeful it is. Most of all I love how the whole novel destroys the boundaries of age, sex, class and intelligence and proves how they are completely unnecessary in the world. That is pretty much my view of the world and it makes me feel quite hopeful seeing it at work in a novel.

'Moving' is such a cop-out word but my goodness, I was certainly moved. And the ending, oh the ending. Be warned: there were tears. A heartbreaking but totally necessary ending which pretty much answers the 'what is the meaning of life' question that seems to fizzle below the surface. I'm welling up again. Don't judge me, just read the book.

*If you were guessing why this blog is called Lit Nerd, there's your answer. I am a geek.

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Bookaholics Anonymous?

If there is such a thing as bookaholics anonymous, sign me up. Right now. The atmosphere in my house is growing increasingly tense as my book buying habits are threatening to take over every available bookshelf. I've doubled up and piled high on all mine and now I'm starting to encroach on any space whatsoever. Kitchen table, windowsills, the floor...Needless to say my parents are unimpressed. And yet, I am still unable to exercise any self-restraint. However (and this is a big however), I am able to provide my reasoning behind every purchase (sounding desperate now, I can tell).

Quiet by Susan Cain (unofficially aka 'all hail introverts')
Red, the Waterstones Anthology
The Land of Decoration by Grace McCleen
The Great Gatsby notebook

Now, my sister's kindle broke as we were sitting down in the eurostar departure lounge just before new year. There were tears and there was shouting (all from me, she was fine). I gave her a tenner and sent her off to Smiths to get something to read. To fill in the back story: my sister is not a reader, the only one in my family who is not a reader and I have been desperately trying to get her to read for years. I bought her the kindle last Christmas and since then she has not looked back. She lives in London so it is ideal for all her tube journeys. Especially when you compare our reading material in this picture:

Liv with her kindle and me with Pat Barker's Regeneration series (all 3 books in 1)

Anyway, she is home at the moment and looking for something else to read. Unfortunately she didn't fancy any of books; if she had this whole debacle could have been avoided. So we took a trip into Waterstones. Rookie Mistake. There were buy-one-get-one-half-price signs everywhere, sale signs and so so many pretty books. I literally felt I had fallen into some sort of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas drug induced book-mad state. I walked out of the shop to find I had unwittingly purchased three books and one notebook and several cards with pictures of books on (why?!). I was a quivering wreck for the rest of the day.

Onto the actual reasons why I chose these specific books: Quiet and The Land of Decoration have just come out in paperback. I have wanted them since they came out in hardback but held off so I just could not refuse (surely?). Quiet I am very excited to read because I am most definitely an introvert and would like more of an insight into introvertedness. The notebook I got because it was cheaper than my usual moleskine (how I love thee), although I am wishing I stuck with the moleskine just because they are so pretty. I have been intrigued by the Red anthology since it was released because it seems to be an interesting concept and there are lots of interesting contributors like Emma Donoghue, Max Hastings and David Almond. Yet again I just couldn't resist when I saw it in the flesh: hardback, red, gold lettering. I am shallow when it comes to buying books. Shallow and somewhat promiscuous. 

Wow. All of that to explain why I've bought some books. Had enough of hearing my excuses? I think that's called denial, isn't it? I'm clearly well on my way to becoming a fully-fledged bookaholic*.



* unfortunately I am slightly proud of this fact so I'm thinking I will not be changing my ways any time soon. No matter how many bans I put myself on. Oh dear. 

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Translation Challenge Update

So, with January and the first book currently underway, I have started planning the translated reads I will be notching up for the rest of the year. Is it weird that I am super excited about this?! I still have books on my shelf that have been waiting to be read since I was at college (basically 5 years ago) so the prospect of some structured reading is really quite appealing to me right now. Although those five year old unread purchases do not fit the criteria for this challenge, some other books on my TBR do so at least I'll be making a slight dent. Only slight, but enough to lessen the guilt momentarily.

Next month I'm planning on a double whammy and will aim to read Primo Levi's The Periodic Table and Elie Wiesel's Night as they go together well. I have quite the collection of books by Primo Levi, my favourite being If this is a Man which is a ridiculously powerful book that I would highly recommend if you are interested in a truthful, unsentimental portrait of life in a concentration camp. Night is, as far as I can tell, along the same lines as If this is a Man so it will be interesting to compare the two.

It is my aim to read twelve (thirteen, possibly, if February goes to plan) books from different countries and I so far have quite a few options:

1. The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery (French)
2. Night by Elie Wiesel (Romanian - Originally written in Yiddish)
3. The Periodic Table by Primo Levi (Italian)
4. The Bookseller of Kabul by Åsne Seierstad (Norwegian) This is a piece of journalism/non fiction but is written in the style of a novel.
5. Down the Rabbit Hole by Juan Pablo Villalobos (Spanish)
6. Chasing the King of Hearts by Hanna Krall (Polish)
7. Portrait of the Mother as a Young Woman by Friedrich Christian Delius (German)
8. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy (Russian)

Any recommendations are more than welcome to fill up my 13!

I look forward to reading all of these books and to reading everyone else's translation challenge reviews so let me know if you are doing it too.

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Reading Update

I thought I'd do a little update on what I've read recently, what I'm reading now and what I'm hoping to read in the next few weeks.

I haven't had too much time for reading recently as work is really quite manic with the Christmas production but, happily, I have still managed to get through a few books. I think that fact they have all been good has helped the situation enormously. The week before Christmas I finally got around to reading The Daylight Gate by Jeanette Winterson which has been hanging out on my shelf since it was released. I don't usually mind leaving books on the TBR pile for years but if I feel the urge to buy a hardback I like to read it fairly sharpish, at least before the paperback is out. After this chilling but immensely atmospheric read I picked up the sequel to Jane Gardam's Old Filth, The Man with the Wooden Hat. I love Gardam's writing style as it is so darkly humorous but also very revealing of the human condition. The character of Filth is wonderful and this is a very cleverly written sequel which retells the same story from a different point of view.

Over Christmas I decided to opt for something new rather than reread an old favourite. In the end I went for Mrs Dalloway as it is my intention to eventually make my way through Woolf's writing. Considering I used to think Virginia Woolf was the epitome of pretentious literature, I am quickly coming around the beauty of her writing. If only my college Lit teacher could hear me say that now...Anyway, I thought Mrs Dalloway was brilliant and I think it is quite remarkable how she gets inside the shell shocked mind of Septimus.

Over New Year I read The Greatcoat by Helen Dunmore and then began Parade's End by Ford Madox Ford. Unusually it is the TV series that has encouraged me to read the novel, usually it is the other way round, I watch a series because I've read the novel. I was slightly worried I'd find Ford's writing style a pain because I wasn't blown away by The Good Soldier but I find I am actually rather enjoying it. I am reading it on the kindle though because it is a bit of a chunker! Also, cracking on with the 2013 translation challenge, I am about half way through The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery. It is pretty deep but very interesting and I'll be posting a review when I've finished it.

I am hoping to read the books I have recently purchased (see previous post) by the end of the month but as I am such an unpredictable reader, who knows what I'll actually get around to!

 Reading Challenge for 2013: Read as many books as possible from the ever-growing TBR pile.

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Bonne Annee!

So Christmas is over, it's a new year and I have a few cheeky purchases to share with you. I have just come back from my new year break in Paris which was absolutely brilliant. I have eaten an unbelievable amount of food (moules and crepes) and walked an unbelievable amount of miles to counteract said excessive eating. In between meals I have been exploring, reading and buying books.

I devoted an entire morning, as any bibliophile would, to the Shakespeare and Company bookshop near the Notre Dame. There are no words to describe how phenomenally amazing this bookshop is. I mean it's pricey and annoyingly cult which means it's very busy but, seriously, I adore crammed bookshelves and books piled on every surface. I wasn't going to leave without buying something and getting it stamped with their legendary mark.

I treated myself to a second hand Contemporary Poems (yellow cover) which has got all my faves in and a lovely cover design (winner all around). Next up is the Lost Books of the Odyssey by Zachary Mason. I adore Greek myth and the whole Odyssey/Illiad genre and according to the blurb this is a series of re-tellings of sections of the Odyssey. I am intrigued! Moving into non-fiction I picked up Charles Dickens Pictures from Italy which, as far as I can tell, is a piece of travel writing. Italy is my favourite country in the world and I can imagine Dickens would uncover some interesting sights so I think this may make for some interesting reading. Plus it has some beautiful illustrations. Finally, I picked up the shops own literary magazine, The Paris Magazine.

I have made a couple of purchases from Foyles and the Book Depository (my new favourite website). Foyles had a bit of a sale and Oliver Sack's Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain caught my eye with 50% off.

On boxing day I sat down with my laptop and browsed the sales. I didn't really find anything I liked and was in the mood for spending money so swiftly clicked on to the book depository. I was, however, very well behaved. I knew what books I wanted and without stalling I added them to my basket. It's fair to say, I was very proud of myself.

I don't know why I have held off for so long with buying The Light Between Oceans. I have been drawn to it since it came out but never actually found the impetus to buy it. I opted for the US version with the lighthouse  on the cover because I pretty much have a thing for lighthouses (personal fact: I have a small lighthouse tattooed on my back). I used to really dislike hardbacks because I carry my books around but I have recently got into the habit of having more than one book on the go: one for portable reading and one by my bed. I have seen so many good reviews of this novel and it has cropped up in a few end of year favourites lists so I just could not refuse.

Another obsession of mine which has popped up in a few of my posts is war writing. The Yellow Birds is war writing from a modern war whereas I have tended to stick with the First and occasionally Second World Wars. It has been compared to All Quiet on the Western Front and I am very interested to see how they do compare. Very excited to read this one.

Well, that's that. A few not so guilty purchases. A Christmas treat, if you will. I would love to know what any of you made of the Shakespeare and Co. bookshop or if you have any thoughts on the books I've bought recently.

Happy New Year!