10,008 in 2008 - July Update

After reading a lot even by my own standards in June, my pace in July has slowed a bit. I have been crazy busy but that is the topic of other post(s). Here's the play by play for July:

# 25. Lost on Planet China by J Maarten Troost - 400 pages

I first discovered J. Marteen Troost a couple of years ago when his then newly written book Getting Stoned With Savages was given to me as an Advance Reading Copy (ARC). It was a great book! He tells the story of his wife getting transferred to Vanuatu and their subsequent adventures while living there. The book was so interesting and fun to read - I devoured it. I figured it was the closest I would ever get to seeing that part of the world - and I did feel like I had gone there after reading the book. After that, I sought out Sex Lives of Cannibals which was actually his first book about that part of the world. Again, I loved it.

So imagine my excitement one night a couple of weeks ago when I got to work at the bookstore only to find the ARC of Troost's newest offering in my mailbox! I started reading it immediately and have been talking about it to anyone who will listen ever since. My 22 year old son read it in one day and also really liked it. I have passed this title along (the physical book as well as in suggestion) to many other readers I know. Troost is a really entertaining writer writing about the biggest and most mysterious country in the world - I am ashamed to admit I know very little about it.

Timed to hit bookstores just in time for the summer Olympics in Beijing it is available now. Give it try - I guarantee you'll enjoy it and you'll learn a lot too.

#26. The History of Love by Nicole Krauss - 252 pages
This book was a case where I should have trusted my first impression. I started it once a while ago and quickly got lost (not in a good way) in the stories that I knew would eventually intersect. I couldn't keep the characters straight, I got discouraged and I put it down. Eventually I went back to it determined to finish. Since I had been through the first third of the book previously I was able to follow it along a little better this time so I kept at it. At one point I even mentioned to one of my reading friends that I thought it was a pretty good story. But, in the long run, it wasn't. I got to the end and thought - well that was a week of my life I will never get back.

My advice - don't bother.

#27. Antartica on a Plate by Alexa Thomson - 320 pages
This book is another example of my newest reading fixation - reading about places I will never see. Not in a fictionalized account but in a true travel narrative. In this particular case, I have no interest in ever visiting Antartica, but I am still fascinated by the idea of it.

Alexa Thomson was a well paid web designer in Sydney, Australia when she began feeling as if her life had no meaning. She heard about a job cooking for an "international air base" and since she had previous cooking experience she decided to apply. She got the job and the story is about her summer season spent at "Blue 1" in Antarctica called Blue 1 because it was the first blue ice runway in Antarctica. ("Blue ice" runways are areas with no net annual snow accumulation, so that the ice surface is capable of supporting aircraft landings using wheels instead of skis.)

The story is really mundane except for the exotic locale. Blue 1 is a base laid out around the cook tent. There is no electricity, no running water and the walls are nylon tents - yes - nylon tents. They slept in sleeping bags and wore lots of gore-tex and polartec. To get water they melted ice in a pot on the stove. The bathroom was called the "Orange Palace" which I envisioned as a kind of basic porta-pot. They had to empty it on a regular schedule and ship the contents to South Africa to be disposed of. Imagine camping for three months in sub zero temperature - kind of what it sounded like. Every few weeks expeditions of 20 or more would fly in, eat, rest and then ski/sled/skidoo out to parts beyond for scientific measurements and other purposes. It is actually kind of amazing that this goes on at the bottom of the world as we go about our daily lives.

I enjoyed this book and would say that if you are at all interested in reading something out of the ordinary to give this one a try.

#28. The Wednesday Sisters by Meg Clayton Waite - 304 pages This book tried way too hard to be the definitive collection of everything that happened in the 60s and how it affected the five women at the heart of the story. I felt it was pandering to women of my age group. I don't need to read about this stuff - I lived it for the most part. The story seemed to be woven around the historical events much like the play/movie Mamma Mia is woven around the songs of Abba. Mamma Mia works - this book doesn't.

My total for the month was 1,276 pages bringing my year to date total to 9,445 pages. Just between you and me, I think I am going to reach my goal of 10,008 pages in 2008!