Selection for March, Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

This month I decided to reach down to more of a "classic" from 1953 and picked Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451.

Amazon.com Review:
In Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury's classic, frightening vision of the future, firemen don't put out fires--they start them in order to burn books. Bradbury's vividly painted society holds up the appearance of happiness as the highest goal--a place where trivial information is good, and knowledge and ideas are bad. Fire Captain Beatty explains it this way, "Give the people contests they win by remembering the words to more popular songs.... Don't give them slippery stuff like philosophy or sociology to tie things up with. That way lies melancholy."

Guy Montag is a book-burning fireman undergoing a crisis of faith. His wife spends all day with her television "family," imploring Montag to work harder so that they can afford a fourth TV wall. Their dull, empty life sharply contrasts with that of his next-door neighbor Clarisse, a young girl thrilled by the ideas in books, and more interested in what she can see in the world around her than in the mindless chatter of the tube. When Clarisse disappears mysteriously, Montag is moved to make some changes, and starts hiding books in his home. Eventually, his wife turns him in, and he must answer the call to burn his secret cache of books. After fleeing to avoid arrest, Montag winds up joining an outlaw band of scholars who keep the contents of books in their heads, waiting for the time society will once again need the wisdom of literature.--Neil Roseman --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

I hope everyone enjoys a little scifi this month! Happy reading! :)

Short Review of Special Topics in Calamity Physics

Special Topics In Calamity Physics.. hum.. what can I say about this book? My advise to those of you reading and getting annoyed (I was getting annoyed)? Hang in there! The ending is really good, and worth trudging through the wordy beginning and annoying citations. The citations were cute at first, but got a little distracting. I admit this one went slow for me.. the other books we have chosen I finished very quickly. It's slow because of the writers style.. which is quirky and sometimes overdone in my opinion. The plot is really very interesting, and the story kept me moving, even if I was reading at a snails pace. The last hundred pages were much better, the ending is pretty thrilling, and the plot really takes off at the end. Let me know what you all think.. I am dying to hear some reviews of this one! Were you annoyed like me or did any of you LOVE the writers style?

Autobiography

Okay, so I've only started reading this month's book but it got me thinking about autobiographies for some reason. I guess it's because she mentions them in the first page or 2, but I was thinking maybe it would be a good idea to write one. Just to keep, not to publish, of course. The content will not be interesting enough for the average Joe, but maybe my future children or grandchildren will find it somewhat interesting how we lived back here in the "stone age."

I would start now, and lay it out in parts. Part 1 would be as far back as I can remember through graduating collage. Then Part 2 could be life after collage through my childrens' graduations from whatever, then Part 3 could be life again without kids and retirement. :) See, I figure I can remember more about my past if I start now, then, add to it as my life progresses, so it's more like me at that time and not an old kook looking back at life. So, I guess it would be a diary of sorts, but no daily entries. It would have stages-of-life entries, the 3 parts.

I don't know, is this dumb? Would my future family even care? I do wish I knew more about my family, so I'm hoping my opinion passes through my bloodline. :)

I am actually going to read this one! I need to take my lunch break and pick it up at the Library!

Special Topics In Calamity Physics by Marisha Pessl - February Selection

This month's selection is Special Topics In Calamity Physics, by Marisha Pessl.
From back cover: "Calamity Physics: The resulting explosion of energy, light, heartbreak, and wonder as Blue Van Meer enters a small, elite school in a sleepy mountain town. Blue's highly unusual past draws her to a charismatic group of friends at St. Gallway (see page 2, "wild, wayward youths," Everyman Parenting) and their captivating teacher, Hannah Schneider. A sudden drowning, a series of inexplicable events, and finally the shocking death of Hannah herself lead to a confluence of mysteries. And Blue is left to make sense of it all with only her gimlet-eyed instinct and cultural lexicon to guide her."

Review:
From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Pessl's stunning debut is an elaborate construction modeled after the syllabus of a college literature course—36 chapters are named after everything from Othello to Paradise Lost to The Big Sleep—that culminates with a final exam. It comes as no surprise, then, that teen narrator Blue Van Meer, the daughter of an itinerant academic, has an impressive vocabulary and a knack for esoteric citation that makes Salinger's Seymour Glass look like a dunce. Following the mysterious death of her butterfly-obsessed mother, Blue and her father, Gareth, embark, in another nod to Nabokov, on a tour of picturesque college towns, never staying anyplace longer than a semester. This doesn't bode well for Blue's social life, but when the Van Meers settle in Stockton, N.C., for the entirety of Blue's senior year, she befriends—sort of—a group of eccentric geniuses (referred to by their classmates as the Bluebloods) and their ringleader, film studies teacher Hannah Schneider. As Blue becomes enmeshed with Hannah and the Bluebloods, the novel becomes a murder mystery so intricately plotted that, after absorbing the late-chapter revelations, readers will be tempted to start again at the beginning in order to watch the tiny clues fall into place. Like its intriguing main characters, this novel is many things at once—it's a campy, knowing take on the themes that made The Secret History and Prep such massive bestsellers, a wry sendup of most of the Western canon and, most importantly, a sincere and uniquely twisted look at love, coming of age and identity. (Aug.)
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http://www.amazon.com/Special-Topics-Calamity-Physics-Marisha/dp/B001OMHTZM/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1233380785&sr=8-1

Cheap and Fun Way to Trade Books Online!

While I have not tested this site out myself, it looks like a really fun way to get books on the cheap! And by cheap I mean for the price of postage only! Check out http://www.paperbackswap.com/index.php and let me know what you think. If you test it out, please blog about your experience so our members will know what to expect!

Once you register for free, you then post books you no longer want...and trade them for books you do want. You pay only shipping, the site provides the packaging. This works perfectly with our eco theme!

The Story of Junk by Linda Yablonsky-January Selection

This month's selecton will be The Story of Junk by Linda Yablonsky.

Synopsis from the back cover:
New York City, 1986. The world is made of junk: junk bonds, junk food, junk powder. Anyone can be a junkie. Or a cop. At least that's how it seems to a young woman who is cooking up heroin deals for some of the cultural heroes of the moment: her friends. One of whom may not be entirely friendly.
The odyssey that has brought her here - from a Philadelphia suburb to a SoHo walkup, from the Golden Triangle to the darkest recesses of her soul- is The Story of Junk.

I am especially excited about this book as it gives an insider's look at being a junkie in the 80's pop era! Sure to be a fast paced, good read!

Happy Reading!