Author Archives: katielx

The October Country

Posted on by
Reply

img_2499Book: The October Country by Ray Bradbury

Date Read: October 19 to December 1, 2019

Rating: 5 (of 5) stars

I read The October Country a few months back as a sort of reward for myself— if you have been following along, you may recall that in October I was challenged to read a book that scares me, and chose the lowest rated book on my to read shelf, which I had been putting off for quite some time. (I wrote about that here, if you’re interested.) I planned on reading this one next, as a sort of carrot for myself: finish the book I was less excited about so that I could move on to one that I was excited to read. Coincidentally, this was also a good fit for the November Unread Shelf challenge, a book from your favorite genre. I have a tough time defining a favorite genre, but I think this was a good fit for that.

This collection of short stories by Ray Bradbury turned out to be that perfect reward. Although it took me longer than I had hoped to finish, it was well worth the time spent. The October Country is introduced as a sort propensity for darkness that exists within us. A place that is not inherently evil, but perhaps a little creepy with the potential for wickedness. Despite an overwhelming sense of spookiness, I would not classify anything in this book as outright horror.

Rather than go for an upfront scare, these stories leave one with a feeling of uneasiness. Many of the endings are at least a tad ambiguous, leaving the level of horror up to the imagination of the reader. Some ease in with some creepiness, but end with a sense of sadness—a man left with a shattered self, an average person born into a family of immortals, a glimmer of hope with a grave consequence.

One story that particularly stood out to me was The Next in Line, which I am positive relates to the fact that I have visited the location of the story in the recent past. I have very clear memories of walking through the cemetery, and looking down the spiral staircase into the crypt. The Museo de las Momias de Guanajuato looks very different now than the room described in the story, but having seen them for myself, the thought of being haunted by the faces encountered there is by no means a stretch of the imagination.

Boris’s thoughts: “It’s always all about the spooky with you, isn’t it? 3 paws.”

Book: The October Country by Ray Bradbury

A Friend for Dragon

Posted on by
Reply

img_3067Book: A Friend for Dragon by Dav Pilkey

As a kick off to the third year of Books On My Cat, I present to you A Friend for Dragon by Dav Pilkey. This is the first book in the Dragon series of book, which I have written about several times before. Dragon is one of my favorite children’s characters. He is always getting into some sort of misadventure—in this case, Dragon falls for a prank and mistakenly assumes that an apple that has fallen on his head is actually looking to become his friend. Despite the misunderstanding, Dragon finds the apple to be a delightful friend, who is a good listener, has common interests, and shares with his friends.

I admit that this is not my favorite addition to the Dragon collection, but I think it sets a nice tone to the series. We get a good glimpse of his personality, which is then built upon in the later books. Dragon is a little naïve, but is also willing to make the most of any situation with his positive attitude. If everyone else is too busy, why not spend your time hanging out with an apple? Of course, apples do not last forever (especially when you are tricked into thinking you have a special speaking apple, and the culprit of the trick is no longer around to fake an appley voice). Although Dragon is quite distraught at the loss of his friend, he receives a pleasant surprise the summer after laying his friend to rest in the backyard.

Of course, as you may have noticed in the photo, today is also the debut of a friend of Boris: introducing Minka, a sassy little girl that joined our family at the end of December. She was found near where my dad works as a kitten in July; she was alone despite seeming too young to have left her mother. My dad began to care for her, and she moved into the office building. After living there for a few months, and with the weather starting to turn cold, he decided that it was time for her to have a more proper home and asked if Boris needed a friend. I was reluctant, as Boris has always struck me as a lone cat personality, but we decided to give it a try. The two are still getting used to having another cat around, but are starting to warm up to each other a bit. While Boris is still my number one guy, you will start to see a bit more of Minka around here!

Book: A Friend for Dragon by Dav Pilkey

Biggest Apologies

Posted on by
Reply

I was so excited about my new plans for Books On My Cat that I got ahead of myself– I started to write content to schedule but just kept writing and never scheduled it!! I had a post ready to go for this week, but alas, it is saved on my laptop at home while I am out of town. My sincerest apologies to readers. I am so disappointed in myself.

So as not to leave you completely without content this week, I will share my current situation, and what I imagine Boris to be doing in my absence:

Welcome Back

Posted on by
Reply

As January wraps up, I would like to welcome you back to the new (and hopefully improved) Books On My Cat blog! During my time off, I took the opportunity to organize my thoughts around this blog and what I would like it to be. While my priority will be on sharing the books that I am reading, I hope to be more intentional with how I use the blog and want to give myself some room to breath as well.

Part of my revamp will be a slightly modified post format. Looking back to my previous posts, I realized that I have not always been good about including the full titles and author names for each book. I will correct that with the new format, and am planning to slowly work on ensuring that this information is included in all previous posts as well.

Currently, I have a bit of a backlog of books from the end of last year, which is a perfect place to start. I have looked ahead at the year to plan out some posts, and built in some breaks where I think I will need them. Moving forward, I plan to catch up on reviews, participate in The Unread Shelf Project 2020, and mix in a few extras along the way. My regular posts will still be on Wednesdays, and I will continue to feature a picture book at the beginning of each month. My last post each month to be the book I chose for the Unread Shelf, with a few pre-planned exceptions.

I am working on a few ideas for “bonus” posts— bookish content, but not necessarily book reviews. Even when planning some weeks for picture books and taking time off, there are simply more weeks remaining than books I will realistically read. At a minimum, I have these planned for months when there will be five Wednesdays. However, I would love to plan out something special to share every month.

My regular posts will resume next week, February 5, 2020, which is also the second anniversary of Books On My Cat. This post will be in the form of a book review, but will also include a surprise announcement! I am looking forward to a wonderful year of books and cats, and I hope you are too!

Under Construction

Posted on by
Reply

img_3117A few weeks ago, I posted that Boris and I were taking a break. This has extended a little longer than I had originally planned, but I am now hoping that it will be with good results.

While taking a break from writing, I took some time to think about my reasons for starting this blog. I love to read, and I love to share the things that I have read (although I am not sure of how many people out there are really reading). I felt like channeling this into a blog would make it feel a little more productive—and it did, at first. Over time, something that I truly loved to do in the beginning was starting to feel like a chore. I would fall behind on reading or writing reviews, which would make me feel guilty for being unprepared, and eventually lead to me feeling overwhelmed by the idea of writing. I have tried a few “tricks” along the way to help me catch up, whether that be posting about previous reads, adding in children’s books, or sharing other bookish things. Unfortunately, these were only temporary fixes. I want to change that.

So here I am with an update: Books On My Cat is still temporarily under construction. I am working on establishing some better habits, starting with making writing a regular routine. Rather than trying to force myself to write a review because of a deadline, I want to spend just a little time each day with my writing—thinking about the things that I have read recently, or perhaps with some other bookish musings.

Over the next couple weeks, I plan to take some time to lay out my vision for the future of Books On My Cat. I would like to continue to post here weekly, but I do not go through books quickly enough to make that feasible without expanding a bit from book reviews. I have a few ideas to fill in the gaps, but need some time to fully flesh them out. I plan to be back to the regular schedule at the beginning of February (if not sooner).

Until then, thank you to those who are reading! If there is anyone out there who has made it this far, I would love to hear from you. Please leave me a comment with something you like about this blog, or something you think could be improved. Or maybe just say hello!

Notes on the photo above: Boris is pictured with My Purrfect Friend by Charles Wysocki. This is a cute little book that was gifted to me. It is full of cat pictures and artwork, along with many quotes and poems related to friendship.

How to Talk to Your Cat

Posted on by
2

img_2724How to Talk to Your Cat by Jean Craighead George

This fun little non-fiction children’s book was brought to my attention by my school librarian—she noticed that the cat on the cover looks a bit like Boris, and thought he might be interested in reading! How to Talk to Your Cat provides a good introduction to cat behavior and some general information in interpreting what your cat is trying to say. Of course, as a book intended for children, it’s not a definitive guide. There are a few items of cat behavior included that I would consider a bit questionable, plus a few items that contradict things I have read recently. I suppose some of this is inevitable in a book that was published nearly 20 years ago.

The book starts with the history of domestic cats, referring to something I have heard a few times from other sources: humans did not domesticate cats; cats domesticated themselves. From there, it moves on to cat greetings, and communication via scent, sound, and body posture. The book wraps up with some more behavioral information—typical habits for indoor and outdoor cats. Along the way there is some advice in communicating and living with cats. I believe it is said a few times that cats tend to have the attitude that we belong to them, rather than the other way around. I’m not quite sold on this, but I think there is some truth to it. Boris knows that there are some limits to his running of the household. I am the keeper of the treats, after all.

Although I would still consider this a picture book, it is quite heavy on text. Most of the pictures included are for demonstration, with a few additional illustrations to fill in along the way. The drawings are fairly simple and cartoonish, which I think feels appropriate with the style of the book. There are a few photos of the author (Jean Craighead George) included, intermingled with the cartoonish cats. It feels a little silly—especially the picture of her on hands and knees rubbing heads with a cat. I suppose this is one way of keeping interest for kids who might otherwise be off put by the lengthy text passages on each page. I can see this as a good book for older kids who have an interest in cats or pets, or perhaps animals in general, but would not necessarily make a general recommendation for this one.

Boris’s thoughts: “A well read cat like me clearly has much more to say than this book would suggest. 2 paws.”

Balance and Book Collections

Posted on by
Reply

img_2593I have been struggling some with balance lately– particularly the balance between life, work, and leisure. I suppose it is the season where everyone feels like there is not enough time in the day to get everything done. I have definitely been feeling that, but I also partially blame the two large trees in my yard… who knew raking could take so much time from the day??

While I am not beating myself up for it, the need to focus on other things has cut into my reading time. I have still been trying to read a bit every day, but I have not been finishing books at my normal pace. I am definitely behind on my goal for books read this year, and am not quite finished with the book that I was planning to post about today! I had hoped the collection of Halloween themed books I had shared throughout October would help me to catch up, but alas here I am, behind again. Rather than skip this week, I thought I would share something a little different.

Last spring when I was traveling, I posted about a small collection of books I’ve collected from the different countries I’ve visited. (You can read about that here, if you’d like.) Similar to that collection, I have also slowly been accumulating books from the US states that I have been to. I cannot quite pinpoint when this collection truly began. The first book I remember seeking out was The Art Forger, when I was in Boston in June of 2018. However, I had at least 2 of these books prior to that, although not exactly intentionally. My intention with this collection is to gather books from each state that also related to that state, whether that is because of a local author or setting/content of the book itself.

Since this is a fairly recent collection that I have started, it does not reflect the number of states that I have actually visited; that number is between 24 and 30, depending on how you count (24 truly visited, 4 borders crossed but not explored, 2 only in airports). I have been making an effort to add on books as I have revisited the states around me, and hope that I can start to catch up to reflect the places that I have been! Anyone else reading a collector of books? How do you differentiate a collection versus other books you have accumulated?

For anyone interested, here is the list of those I have so far:

  • Alaska: Travels in Alaska by John Muir
  • Indiana: God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater by Kurt Vonnegut
  • Kentucky: The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek by Kim Michele Richardson
  • Louisiana: Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice
  • Massachusetts: The Art Forger by Barbara Shapiro
  • Michigan: Middlesex by Jeffery Eugenides
  • Wisconsin: A Prayer for the Dying by Stewart O’Nan

Hillsdale: Greek Tragedy in America’s Heartland

Posted on by
1

img_2352Hillsdale: Greek Tragedy in America’s Heartland by Roger Rapoport

Date Read: October 2 to 19, 2019

Rating: 2 (of 5) stars

This was my choice for a somewhat loose interpretation for the October prompt from The Unread Shelf Project: a book that scares you. I do not have a ton of true horror options on my shelves, and even then I would not quite say that horror themed books really scare me. This one was the scariest I could think of, the true bottom of my to read list pile. It’s outside my normal realm, and I bought it on a whim because it was on a display of local interest books at one of my favorite bookstores. This was about 10 years ago; since then I discovered that it has the lowest average Goodreads rating of all my books. Now that’s terrifying.

I tried really hard to go into this with an open mind, but it did not take me long to figure out why the book had been poorly received. The story itself is intriguing: the president of a prestigious, historically conservative college finds himself in the midst of a scandal after the death of his daughter-in-law, shortly after she has claimed that the two had been involved in a nearly 20 year affair. To add to the drama, there are some unusual circumstances surrounding her death, which is ruled a suicide although never fully investigated. While I do not mean to advocate for the exploitation of an obviously tragic situation, I feel like this could have been made very interesting. However, the flaws heavily outweigh any intrigue in the content. This book is not well written. It reads very much like a textbook—a poorly edited textbook.

Many of the chapters feel disjointed, with tangential information that does not add anything to the story. Some of this I understand, in sharing the history of the college and the family of the college president. However, there were areas where it not only did not add to the story, but also simply did not make sense. When we learn that Lissa wanted to move the family to Colorado, do we really need several pages detailing the history of the city where she wanted to move? There were other sections that seemed to have been rearranged during editing, but never fully reviewed. For example, there were specific individuals with names included, but no explanation of who they were or how they were related to the story. In most cases, this explanation came later; sometimes several pages later. In at least one case, pointed out to me by a friend who attended the college, there is a person who is misidentified as connected to the university during that time.

Even disregarding these errors, which could have easily been resolved with a strong editor, there were pieces of this book that did not sit well with me. In some ways, there is a sense of injustice here: a woman is dead, there are questionable circumstances surrounding this, and it is never fully investigated. Rapoport seems to feel this, as he details the shortcomings of the investigation. There are even hints that perhaps Lissa’s husband, George IV, had something to do with her death, including possible motive and opportunity. However, this is quickly brushed over in favor of more details on how the scandal associated with Lissa’s death lead to the downfall of George III as the college president.

Lissa’s claim of the affair was used as evidence against George III, although it could not be substantiated. Perhaps this is unfair, but is that really the most important point of this story? What is the “Greek tragedy” referred to in the title: the death of Lissa, or the loss of George III’s job? The chapter that talks of Lissa’s death and the shortcomings of the investigation ends with a quip about George III and his new wife’s experiencing the “airline industry’s equivalent of a near-death experience” by being forced to watch the same poor movie on four long flights they took in the two days after Lissa’s death. This is not only tangential; it is disrespectful.

Unfortunately, this book did live up to the poor reviews that influenced me to continually push it down in my list of books to be read. It is also unfortunate, I suppose, that there is always more to say about books that are disliked than those that are enjoyed. I still will not quite claim that I wish I had not taken the time to read this. I do think that it is a story worth telling; I wish it had been handled better than this.

Boris’s thoughts: “Can we finally put this one away now? 1 paw.”

Outliers

Posted on by
Reply

img_2215Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell

Date Read: September 2 to 30, 2019

Rating: 4 (of 5) stars

With my focus on some spooky children’s books in September, I am a bit behind with my normal posting. This book was actually my September pick for The Unread Shelf Project—a book that you can buddy read. Surprisingly, I do not have a big group of friends that read. One of my friends has been trying to read more, so we decided it would be fun to pick a book that was on both of our “want to read” lists. We ended up deciding on this one, as the one that we thought could lead to the best discussion.

While we did not actually get in as much discussion on the book as we had expected, I am glad that we decided upon this one. This is the third of Malcolm Gladwell’s books that I have read, and I really do find much of his work fascinating. However, I feel like I have to say that I find it a bit limited. There is a ton of great research referenced here, and so many great thoughts, but in the end, this really is a work of “pop psychology.” Is there something to it? Yes, probably. But I’m also not quite prepared to take all of Gladwell’s conclusions as fact. Despite this, I think it’s a great starting place for thinking and learning. I just think that the case of “Outliers” is more complicated that laid out here.

It may seem like a strange jump, but this book made me think about my brother’s speech at his friend’s wedding this summer. My brother was the Best Man at the wedding of two amazing friends of our family, and I was lucky enough to be present at the wedding as well. In his speech, my brother referenced some incredible accomplishments shared by the couple—a self renovated home, a successful business, and the wedding itself, which was very much planned and decorated “from scratch.” My brother shared an important belief he feels is connected to all this: if there is something you want to do and you don’t do it, you didn’t want it enough.

Perhaps this is a simplification as well, but I think it speaks to one of the missing pieces from Gladwell’s conclusion. Genetic potential, opportunities to practice, and being born at the right time in the right place can put you ahead of the game—but there is still a drive to that accomplishment that is unaccounted for. It may be true that 10,000 hours of practice is a “magic number” to become an expert or a master in a field; but it is also true that it takes a certain amount of personal drive and dedication to be willing to put in that time. So you did not become a master at the task you wanted? There’s nothing wrong with that, of course; but remember: you did not want it enough to dedicate the amount of time needed to do it.

Boris’s thoughts: “The only thing I want to be a master at is napping. I think I’ve got a pretty good start on my 10,000 hours or practice. 4 paws.”