See you next year!

I have all these great ideas for blog posts, but no time or wherewithal to get them done. So it's time to admit that, with the holidays and a big road trip fast approaching, I probably won't be around until next year.

I'll be over here, as always, continuing to post about my family and our travels.

When I return I plan to review/discuss the following books:

Northanger Abbey (with a comparison to the movie)
A Daughter of the Seine: The Life of Madame Roland (most recent Newbery book)
The Chrestomanci Series (6 separate books)
The Hunger Games Series (3 separate books)
Anne of Avonlea and Anne of the Island (as part of my continuing LMM project)
The Hobbit (planning to listen to it on the road trip)

Happy Holidays!

Living With Books around the Holidays

We're not decorating much for Christmas this year. We're leaving for Colorado on the 17th of December and not returning until the 2nd of January so it seems like a lot of hassle for little pay off. And yet I still made my husband drag down ALL the boxes from the attic because I every year I anticipate diving into my constantly growing Christmas/Holiday/Winter picture book collection. The only book from my own childhood is the book at the very bottom - A Christmas Treasury - and it is a very much beloved book as my father read stories out of to me through many many Christmas seasons. The rest I've been collecting since Izzy was born and I add about 2 to 5 every year. A few are actually missing from this pile as they're spending time in Izzy's room because they are constantly requested. And of course, some didn't made the cut and have been sent to live better lives with other family's who will appreciate their merits.

English Book Shopping - Part 2

As per usual I didn't get in nearly as much book shopping as I would have liked, but I did manage to make it to the famous Foyles on Charing Cross Road.

Foyles was founded in 1903 by two brothers looking to get rid of their old textbooks after they'd flunked the civil servant exam. They ran the bookshop successfully for many years and it was once listed as the largest bookshop in the world.

Then in 1945 the shop passed on to a daughter who made the shop infamous for her bizarre business practices. Books were shelved according to publisher (vs. author), staff were paid a pittance and were regularly hired and fired indiscriminately, and the process of paying/checking out was a maddening and time consuming three-step affair. In spite of (or perhaps because of) all this the shop became an attraction -for locals and tourists alike. It was known as a place where one could get lost in the stacks and where perseverance was justly rewarded.

Fortunately (or unfortunately) this has all changed and it's a perfectly organized and respectable bookshop these days which, for me, meant it didn't really blow me away. It reminded me of our very own Book People - but truth be told not even quite as impressive. And, of course, we have six-plus handy locations of the unparalleled Half Price Books here so perhaps it's not so easy to blow me away. I suppose it's time to admit that Austin is a good book buying town! Even so, I'm glad to have gone to Foyles and the book prices were surprisingly not horrible and so I bought the following....

This was a gift for my Nerdy Girl pal and fellow recent Gaskell devotee, Meghan (who graciously took us to and picked us up from the airport) and will hopefully make the 2011 reading list!

And I've actually decided that I want to talk about my other purchase in more detail, so I'm wrapping up here!

Traveling with the Kindle

I thought that travel would completely win me over to the dark side of e-readers, but I'm really not so sure now....

The pros are obvious. I loved just having one 'book' in my luggage. This allowed me a lot of freedom in many ways:

** I loaded the sucker up with tons of (completely free) books and therefore had a lot of choices on the airplane and through out the trip. I was able to read Northanger Abbey while in Bath and various Charles Dickens stories while in London. Very cool!

** I felt more free to shop for books while on vacation.

** An unexpected bonus was being able to read my daughter bedtime stories. I had downloaded all the Andrew Lang fairy books right when I got the device along with some Beatrix Potter stories. I used the device with her at night more than I expected.

The not so good:

** I don't like that I can't read during take off and landing! How annoying! Especially in these days when it seems like those are often the longest and most tedious parts of the trip! Arrgh!

** The travel guide issue. I mentioned before I left that I was going to try to travel sans physical guide books. What a joke! I buckled at the last minute and snuck in 2 books and I'm SO GLAD I did! The two e-guides I downloaded weren't particularly helpful and it's just not practical or desirable for me to carry the kindle around with me while site-seeing. It wouldn't make me feel carefree to have a $150 device in my purse! Also, it's not as easy to power up the kindle and find the right page as it is to grab a book an go to the marked page.

So, while I still really do like the kindle I'm more convinced than ever that e-readers can never completely replace physical books. On one hand I'm excited to take the kindle on my upcoming Christmas holiday to Colorado, but I'm not so sure I'll take it on our summer vacation to Hawaii. I certainly wouldn't feel comfortable with it on the beach - although it would be a good way to conceal the trashy romance novels that I'm planning on reading ;-)