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Reading Out Loud: 55 Favorite Read-Aloud Books from the Semicolon Homeschool

Jul23

I’m not saying these are THE BEST read-alouds, just some of our favorites.

1. Adams, Richard. Watership Down. Violence and mythology and rabbits. This novel of rabbit communities is long, but worth persevering through.
2. Aiken, Joan. The Wolves of Willoughby Chase. Deliciously Victorian, and dangerous, and odd, this one is a sort of October-ish book.
3. Alcott, Louisa May. Little Women or Eight Cousins. I prefer Eight Cousins, but of course, Little Women is a classic. Little Women is #47 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
4. Alexander, Lloyd. The Book of Three and all the sequels. Taran, the Assistant Pig-Keeper, Eilonwy the annoyingly intelligent and plain-spoken princess, Gurgi, and Fflewddur Fflam, the truth-stretching harpist are favorite character in our fictional pantheon. #18 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
5. Balliett, Blue. The Wright 3. All of these detective adventures centred on famous works of art are favorites of my youngest two girls. They have listened to Chasing Vermeer, The Calder Game, and The Wright 3 many times in audiobook form.
6. Barrie, J.M. Peter Pan. I like James Barrie’s imaginative story very much, and think the movies Peter Pan (Walt Disney), Hook by Steven Spielberg with Robin williams as grown up Peter), and Finding Neverland (more for adults) are all good follow-up viewing for after you read the book aloud. #86 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
7. Benary-Isbert, Margot. The Ark. Not many people are familiar with this story set in Germany just after World War II. It’s about children surviving the aftermath of war, about animals and animal-lovers, and about family. A good read-aloud for older children.
8. Birdsall, Jeanne. The Penderwicks:A Summer Tale of Four Sisters, Two Rabbits, and a Very Interesting Boy. My children and I love the Penderwick family. In fact, when I started reading this one aloud to some of the younger children, my then-15 year old was entrapped in the story, and picked it up to finish it on her own. #29 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list. Z-baby and I discuss The Penderwicks.
9. Bond, Michael. A Bear Called Paddington. Paddington has been a favorite around here since Eldest Daughter (age 26) was a preschooler.
10. Burnett, Frances Hodgson. The Little Princess. From riches to rags and back again, the story of the orphaned Sara Crewe is delightful and richly Victorian. #56 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
11. Carroll, Lewis. Alice in Wonderland. I think Alice is a love-it or ate-it proposition. I love all the word play and sly wit. #31 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
12. Cleary, Beverly. Ramona the Pest. We’ve had to read all of the Ramona books to my youngest, Z-baby,and she’s listened to them on CD. Several times. #24 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
13. DeAngeli, Marguerite. The Door in the Wall. A crippled boy learns to be a strong, courageous man during the Middle Ages. We’ll probably be reading this book this year since Betsy-Bee is studying that time period.
14. DeJong, Meindert. The Wheel on the School. A group of children work together to bring the storks back to Shora in Holland.
15. DiCamillo, Kate. The Tale of Despereaux. A mouse who loves a princess and save her from the rats. Z-baby recommends this one. #51 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
16. Enright, Elizabeth. The Saturdays. If you like The Penderwicks, you should enjoy Enright’s stories about the Melendy famly, or vice-versa. #75 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
17. Estes, Eleanor. The Hundred Dresses. Short, poignant story of a group of girls who find out too late that people who are different and perhaps misunderstood should still be treated with care and gentleness.
18. Forbes, Esther. Johnny Tremain. Good accompaniment to a study of American history.
19. Gilbreth, Frank and Ernestine Gilbreth Carey. Cheaper by the Dozen. Z-baby says this story about a family with an even dozen children is funny and good to read aloud.
20. Gipson, Fred. Old Yeller. One of those dog stories where the dog, of course, dies, but it’s still a good read aloud for frontier studies or Texas history.
21. Grahame, Kenneth. The Wind in the Willows. Read aloud slowly and carefully and savour the descriptions and the setting and the antics of Mole, Rat, Badger, and especially Toad and his motorcar. Brian Sibley on the 100th anniversary of the publication of The Wind in the Willows (2008).
22. Juster, Norton. The Phantom Tollbooth. Milo is bored until he goes through the tollbooth into a world of word play and numerical delights. #21 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
23. Karr, Kathleen. The Great Turkey Walk. In 1860, big, brawny Simon Green, who’s just completed third grade (for the fourth time), sets out to herd a huge flock of bronze turkeys all the way from his home in eastern Missouri to the boomtown of Denver, where they’ll fetch a big price.
/>24. Kipling, Rudyard. Just So Stories. These stories are good to listen to because Kipling used words in a very poetic, vocabulary-enriching way, even in his prose. The book includes stories such as How the Leopard Got His Spots and How the Camel Got His Hump and others.
25. Konigsburg, E.L. From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. Z-baby likes it because the children are independent, resourceful, and funny and they visit a real museum in New York City, the Metropolitan Museum of Art. #7 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list. Z-baby and I discuss the Mixed-Up Files.
26. L’Engle, Madeleine. A Wrinkle in Time. Meg, and Calvin, and Charles Wallace rescue Father from IT. #2 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list. More about Madeleine L’Engle and her wonderful books.
27. Lamb, Charles and Mary. Tales from Shakespeare.
28. Lang, Andrew. The Violet Fairy Book. And all the other multi-colored fairy books.
29. Lewis, C.S. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. What can I say about the Narnia books that hasn’t already been said. Get all seven of them , read them aloud, listen to them, read them again. #5 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
30. Lindgren, Astrid. Pippi Longstocking. I like the edition that came out a coupe of years ago with illustrations by Lauren Child for reading aloud because the pictures are delightful and because it’s large and easy to hold. #91 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
31. Lovelace, Maud Hart. Betsy-Tacy. Eldest Daughter was a huge fan of the books of Maud Hart Lovelace, and in fact they took her from childhood into her late teen years along with Betsy and her friends. #52 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
32. Macdonald, Betty. Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle. If only I had Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle living near-by in her upside-down house to solve all my parenting problems.
33. MacDonald, George. The Princess and the Goblin. Princess Irene and her stout friend Curdie, the miner’s son, must outwit the goblins who live inside the mountain. “I write, not for children, but for the child-like, whether they be of five, or fifty, or seventy-five.” ~George Macdonald
34. Milne, A.A. Winnie-the Pooh. Every child should read or hear read this classic story of Christopher Robin and his Bear of Very Little Brain, Pooh. #26 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
35. Montgomery, L.M. Anne of Green Gables. Read aloud or listen to the Focus on the Family radio dramatized version. #8 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
36. Nesbit, Edith. Five Children and It. Predecessor to the stories by Edward Eager and other magical tales.
37. Norton, Mary. The Borrowers. Little people live inside the walls and nooks of an English house and only come out at night to “borrow” things that the people don’t use or need anymore. The story in the book(s) is much better than the movie version.
38. O’Dell, Scott. Island of the Blue Dolphins. Karana, a native American girl, is accidentally left alone on an island off the coast of California, and she must use all her wits and ingenuity to survive. #45 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
39. Paterson, Katherine. Bridge to Terebithia. Jess Aarons and Leslie Burke become friends and imagine together a land called Terabithia, a magical kingdom in the woods where the two of them reign as king and queen. #10 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
40. Pyle, Howard. Otto of the Silver Hand. Another tale of the Middle Ages about courage and dealing with suffering and cruelty.
41. Pyle, Howard. The Adventures of Robin Hood.
42. Pyle, Howard. The Story of King Arthur and His Knights.
43. Rawls, Wilson. Where the Red Fern Grows. Another good dog story. #34 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
44. Salten, Felix. Bambi. Bambi. A little fawn grows into a handsome stag. You can a Kindle edition of this translated classic for free.
45. Serrailer, Ian. The Silver Sword, or Escape from Warsaw.Best World War II story for children ever. Pair it with The Ark for a study of refugees during and after the war in Europe.
46. Sewell, Anna. Black Beauty. A horse story told from the point of view of a Victorian working horse.
47. Sidney, Margaret. Five Little Peppers and How They Grew. A bit cloyingly sweet for some adult readers, but children love the story of the five little Pepper children and their cheerfulness in the midst of poverty.
48. Speare, Elizabeth. The Bronze Bow. Adventure story that takes place during the time of Jesus’s incarnation. Daniel barJamin and his friends Joel and his twin sister Malthace must choose between rebellion and hatred for the Roman conquerors and the way of following this man Jesus, who preaches love and forgiveness.
49. Streatfeild, Noel. Ballet Shoes. Three sisters—Pauline, Petrova, and Posie— are orphans who must learn to dance to support themselves when their guardian disappears. #78 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
50. Sutcliff, Rosemary. Black Ships before Troy. The story of the Iliad (Trojan War) retold for children with beautiful illustrations by Alan Lee.
51. Tolkien, JRR. The Hobbit. Our read aloud experiences with The Hobbit are chronicled here and here and here and here and here and here and here. #14 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
52. Travers, P.L. Mary Poppins. Mary Poppins, the book,isn’t the same as the movie, and you may or may not like both. I do, but in different ways.
53. Twain, Mark. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Every boy, at east, should read or listen to Tom Sawyer.
54. White, E.B. Charlotte’s Web. #1 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.
55. Wilder, Laura Ingalls. Little House in the Big Woods. #19 on Fuse #8’s Top 100 Children’s Novels list.

Yikes, I left off some really good read aloud books, but I was limited to 55. So check out the Fuse #8 list (not technically a read-aloud list, but still a good place to look), and this list from Jim Trelease, this list of favorites at Hope Is the Word, and this list that I made a few years ago. Whatever, you do, though, read some books out loud as a family. It will change your life (as my next-door neighbor used to say about some discovery or activity about once a week.)

Sunday Salon: Links and Thinks

Jul8

How Silence Works: Emailed Conversations With Four Trappist Monks by Jeremy Mesiano-Crookston. “Is silence beneficial for all people? I would say the cultivation of silence is indispensable to being human.”
I have considered taking a weekend retreat where I simply observe silence and spend the time in prayer and meditation, no internet, no phone, no television, and no books. It’s the “no books” that frightens me. I’m not sure I have the inner resources or the connection with God that would sustain me in such silence for an entire weekend. Sad, but true.

Why You Should Consider Cancelling Your Short Term Missions Trip by Darren Carlson.
And yet my daughter leaves for Slovakia in a week to teach in Bible (day) camps and to share the gospel working alongside the Slovak church. Mistakes have been made, and unintended consequences are rampant. However, we can be called and used of God in other countries and cultures.

A British offering from Arts Council England: “Brought to life using audio performance and archive footage, 60 Years in 60 Poems travels through time to unpack our shared history, celebrating individual moments alongside national events.”
There’s a poem for every year of the Queen’s Jubilee, starting in 1954. I listened to the one for 1957, the year of my birth, and I thought it was poignant: On Not Dying Young by Elaine Feinstein.

Why Are American Kids So Spoiled? by Elizabeth Kolbert. Yikes, just yikes!

How Reading Disturbing Novels can make you a Better Reader of the Bible by Alan Jacobs

“If we are people of the Book, people whose Faith is built upon the Word of God as it is given to us in the Bible, then we need to be a reading people. And by reading I do not mean merely that we are literate, but that we are able to read carefully, that we are comfortable reading slowly, and allow passages to challenge our preconceptions and to change us.”

The Flying Inn (great blog) gives us a list of 5 things from YouTube that are actually worth watching. He’s called his post Reasons TV is Obsolete.

55 Favorite First Lines from Favorite Books

Jul5

I have put the references for these famous and not-so-famous first lines in white font, so that if you move your cursor to highlight the spaces immediately after the quote, you should be able to read the reference. How many can you guess without looking?

1. It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife. ~Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

2. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only. ~Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

3. Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again. ~Daphne DuMaurier, Rebecca

4. There once was a boy named Eustace Clarence Scrubb and he almost deserved it. ~C.S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

5. Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show. ~Charles Dickens, David Copperfield

6. Now, Bix Rivers has disappeared, and who do you think is going to tell his story but me? Maybe his stepfather? Man, that dude does not know Bix deep and now he never will, will he? ~Bruce Brooks, The Moves Make the Man

7. “Christmas won’t be Christmas without any presents,” grumbled Jo, lying on the rug. “It’s so dreadful to be poor!”
~Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

8. Dr. Strauss says I shud rite down what I think and evrey thing that happins to me from now on. Daniel Keyes, Flowers for Algernon

9. It was a bright cold day in April and the clocks were striking thirteen. ~George Orwell, 1984

10. All children, except one, grow up. ~J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

11. In the history of the world there have been lots of onces and lots of times, and every time has had a once upon it. ¨~N.D. Wilson, Leepike Ridge

12. Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. ~Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

13. In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind ever since. ~F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

14. I write this sitting in the kitchen sink. ~Dodie Smith, I Capture the Castle

15. In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. ~JRR Tolkien, The Hobbit

16. Once on a dark winter’s day, when the yellow fog hung so thick and heavy in the streets of London that the lamps were lighted and the shop windows blazed with gas as they do at night, an odd-looking little girl sat in a cab with her father and was driven rather slowly through the big thoroughfares. ~Frances Hodgson Burnett, A Little Princess

17. In an old house in Paris that was covered with vines lived twelve little girls in two straight lines. ~Ludwig Bemelmans, Madeleine

18. Mr. and Mrs. Mallard were looking for a place to live. ~Robert McCloskey, Make Way for Ducklings

19. Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, “and what is the use of a book,” thought Alice, “without pictures or conversations?” ~Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

20. Scarlett O’Hara was not beautiful, but men seldom realized it when caught by her charm as the Tarleton twins were. ~Margaret Mitchell, Gone With the Wind

21. As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams, he found himself transformed into a giant insect. ~Franz Kafka, Metamorphosis

22. It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents. except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness. ~Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Paul Clifford

23. Mother died today. Or maybe yesterday, I don’t know. Albert Camus, The Stranger

24. Taran wanted to make a sword; but Coll, charged with the practical side of his education, decided on horseshoes. ~Lloyd Alexander, The Book of Three

25. Once upon a time there were four little Rabbits, and their names were Flopsy, Mopsy, Cotton-tail, and Peter. ~Beatrix Potter, The Tale of Peter Rabbit

26. As I walked through the wilderness of this world, I lighted on a certain place where was a den, and laid me down in that place to sleep and as I slept, I dreamed a dream. ~John Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress

27. Midway upon the journey of our life, I found myself within a forest dark, for the straightforward pathway had been lost. ~Dante Alighieri, Inferno

28. The year that Buttercup was born, the most beautiful woman in the world was a French scullery maid named Annette. ~William Goldman, The Princess Bride

29. True! –nervous—very, very nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad? ~Edgar Allan Poe, The Tell-Tale Heart

30. As I sat in the bath-tub, soaping a meditative foot and singing, if I remember correctly, “Pale Hands I Loved Beside the Shalimar,” it would be deceiving my public to say I was feeling boomps-a-daisy. ~P.G. Wodehouse, Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit

31. “Where’s Papa going with that axe?” said Fern to her mother as they were setting the table for breakfast. ~E.B. White, Charlotte’s Web

32. My name is India Opal Buloni, and last summer my daddy, the preacher, sent me to the store for a box of macaroni-and-cheese, some white rice, and two tomatoes and I came back with a dog. ~Kate DiCamillo, Because of Winn-Dixie

33. We went to the moon to have fun, but the moon turned out to completely suck. M.T. Anderson, Feed

34. On the morning of the best day of her life, Maud Flynn was locked in the outhouse singing “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” ~Laura Amy Schlitz, A Drowned Maiden’s Hair

35. The Mole had been working very hard all the morning, spring-cleaning his little home. ~Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows

36. There are dragons in the twins’ vegetable garden. ~Madeleine L’Engle, A Wind in the Door

37. I have had not so good of a week. ~Sara Pennypacker, Clementine

38. To start with, look at all the books. ~Jeffrey Eugenides, The Marriage Plot

39. I saw Byzantium in a dream, and knew that I would die there. ~Stephen R Lawhead, Byzantium

40. The first week of August hangs at the very top of summer, the top of the live-long year, like the highest seat of a Ferris wheel when it pauses in its turning. ~Natalie Babbit, Tuck Everlasting

41. Rose sat all alone in the big best parlor, with her little handkerchief laid ready to catch the first tear, for she was thinking of her troubles, and a shower was expected. ~Louisa May Alcott, Eight Cousins

42. On Friday noon, July the twentieth, 1714, the finest bridge in all Peru broke and precipitated five travelers into the gulf below. ~Thornton Wilder, The Bridge of San Luis Rey

43. While the present century was in its teens, and on one sunshiny morning in June, there drove up to the great iron gate of Miss Pinkerton’s Academy for young ladies, on Chiswick Mall, a large family coach, with two fat horses in blazing harness, driven by a fat coachman in a three-cornered hat and wig, at the rate of four miles an hour. ~William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair

44. Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this sun of York. ~William Shakespeare, Richard III

45. What can you say about a twenty-five year old girl who died? ~Erich Segal, Love Story

46. One dollar and eighty-seven cents. That was all. And sixty cents of it was in pennies. O’Henry, The Gift of the Magi

47. Bowing down in blind credulity, as is my custom, before mere authority and the tradition of the elders, superstitiously swallowing a story I could not test at the time by experiment or private judgment, I am firmly of the opinion that I was born on the 29th of May, 1874, on Campden Hill, Kensington; and baptised according to the formularies of the Church of England in the little church of St. George opposite the large Waterworks Tower that dominated that ridge. G.K. Chesterton, Autobiography

48. This is the forest primeval. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Evangeline

49. The great fish moved silently through the night water, propelled by short sweeps of its crescent tail. Peter Benchley, Jaws

50. On the morning of the eleventh of November, 1937, precisely at eleven o’clock, some well-meaning busy-body consulted his watch and loudly announced the hour, with the result that all of us in the dining car felt constrained to put aside drinks and newspapers and spend the two minutes’ silence in rather embarrassed stares at one another or out of the window. James Hilton, Random Harvest

51. Under certain circumstances there are few hours in life more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as afternoon tea. Henry James, The Portrait of a Lady

52. This is the story of what a Woman’s patience can endure, and what a Man’s resolution can achieve. Wilkie Collins, The Woman in White

53. Mark was eleven and had been smoking off and on for two years, never trying to quit but being careful not to get hooked. John Grisham, The Client

54. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The Bible, Genesis

55. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The Bible, The Gospel of John

How many did you guess right? What are your favorite opening lines from your favorite books?

55 Free Kindle Books Worth Reading

Jul3

It seems to me that if one were to purchase a Kindle as a gift for a young adult or an older child and load it with all of the following books, the recipient would be happily fixed for reading material for several years. Older adults should enjoy most of these, too.

Alcott, Louisa May. Eight Cousins. My favorite LMA novel, this book tells the story of Rose and her many, many boy cousins who all live on Aunt Hill and grow up together as one big happy family.

Alcott, Louisa May. Little Women.

Allen, James Lane. The Choir Invisible. Set in Kentucky in the late 1700’s, this romance follows the fortunes of a schoolteacher, John Gray, and his romantic entanglements.

Austen, Jane. Emma. Emaa, like me, rushes in where angels fear to tread and gets herself into all sorts of trouble as a result. Emma is a book about the dangers of trying to run other people’s lives.

Austen, Jane. Pride and Prejudice. Don’t we all have a little pride and a little prejudice to overcome in our relationships?

Barrie, J.M. The Little Minister. The novel was the third of the three “Thrums” novels set in rural Scotland, which first brought Barrie to fame. The other two novels with the same setting were Auld Licht Idylls and A Window in Thrums.

Bronte, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. Semicolon thoughts on Jane Eyre.

Bronte, Emily. Wuthering Heights. Emily’s classic romance about Cathy and Heathcliff takes some work to get into, but t is worth the effort. The problem is that neither Cathy nor Heathcliff is particularly likeable, but they did deserve each other. And such passionate, drama-driven creatures do exist.

Burnett, Frances Hodgson. A Little Princess, being the whole story of Sara Crewe now told for the first time. Burnett’s 1888 serialized novel entitled Sara Crewe: or, What Happened at Miss Minchin’s Boarding School, was originally published in St. Nicholas Magazine. If you’ve only seen a movie version of this story, I don’t think you can really get the flavor and feel of Victorian poverty and rags-to-riches.

Burnett, Frances Hodgson. The Secret Garden. I always wanted a secret garden after reading this book.

Carroll, Lewis. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. From Alice and from Lewis Carroll in general I learned: odd things happen in this world. You just have to go with it, and see what will happen in the end.

Chesterton,G.K. The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare. Another odd duck of a book. Semicolon thoughts on The Man Who Was Thursday.

Christie, Agatha. The Mysterious Affair at Styles.

Dickens, Charles. David Copperfield. My favorite Dickens novel.

Dickens, Charles. Great Expectations. We read Great Expectations out loud when my older children were probably 12, 10, 8, and 6 years of age, so it holds a special place in my heart.

Dickens, Charles. A Tale of Two Cities. Paris and London are the cities; historical romance and intrigue is the genre.

Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. A collection of twelve Sherlock Holmes stories including A Scandal in Bohemia, The Adventure of the Red-Headed League, The Adventure of the Speckled Band, and The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle.

Dreiser, Theodore. Sister Carrie. Classic tale of a fallen woman who actually ends up with nothing worse than a feeling of vague discomfort with her pointless life. Semicolon review here.

Dumas, Alexandre. The Three Musketeers. A celebration of Alexandre Dumas and his books.

Eliot, Geoge. Adam Bede. Semicolon thoughts on Adam Bede.

Gaskell, Elizabeth. Cranford. Note that the “serialized novel” aspect of this book make it quite episodic, not very plot-driven. I liked it anyway. Semicolon thoughts on Cranford.

Grahame, Kenneth. The Wind in the Willows. Kenneth Grahame and The Wind in the Willows.

Hardy, Thomas. Far From the Madding Crowd. This novel, a “tragedy of errors”, was Hardy’s fourth published novel, and its success enabled him to give up architecture, get married, and become a full time novelist.

Hudson, W.H. Green Mansions. Semicolon thoughts on Green Mansions.

Hughes, Thomas. Tom Brown’s Schooldays. This one is the grandaddy of all boarding school books; the setting is Thomas Arnold’s Rugby School in Victorian England. Tom Brown is a typical English boy who grows up to epitomize the virtues of a British public school education and the essence of British manhood.

Hugo, Victor. Les Miserables. My. favorite. novel. ever. Read it all, even the parts about the history of the sewers of Paris and the Napoleonic wars.

Lang, Andrew. The Blue Fairy Book. The others in this series of fairy tale collections—red, green, orange, olive, yellow, violet, crimson— are also available in free Kindle editions or in low-cost illustrated editions.

MacDonald, George. The Light Princess and Other Fairy Stories. A princess is cursed with a complete lack of gravity, both physical and emotional.

MacDonald, George. The Princess and Curdie.

MacDonald, George. The Princess and the Goblin. More about author George Macdonald.

MacLaren, Ian. Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush. A collection of stories of church life in a glen called Drumtochty in Scotland in the 1800’s.

Malory, Thomas. L’Morte d’Arthur. “IT befell in the days of Uther Pendragon, when he was king of all England, and so reigned, that there was a mighty duke in Cornwall that held war against him long time. And the duke was called the Duke of Tintagil. And so by means King Uther sent for this duke, charging him to bring his wife with him, for she was called a fair lady, and a passing wise, and her name was called Igraine.”

Melville, Herman. Moby Dick, or The White Whale. Semicolon thoughts on Moby Dick.

Meredith, George. Diana of the Crossways. Semicolon thoughts on Diana of the Crossways.

Mulock Craik, Dinah Maria. John Halifax, Gentleman. More about Dinah Maria Mulock Craik and her novel.

Orczy, Baroness Emmuska. The Scarlet Pimpernel. Several sequels are also available for free.

Pyle, Howard. Otto of the Silver Hand.

Scott, Sir Walter. Ivanhoe. Brown Bear Daughter started reading this one aloud to us, but I guess it will have to wait for us to finish after her return from a month long mission trip to Slovakia.

Sewell, Anna. Black Beauty. Best horse story ever.

Sidney, Margaret. Five Little Peppers and How They Grew. Five children–Ben, Polly, Joel, Davie, and Phronsie— live with their widowed Mamsie in poverty in a little brown house.

Sienkiewicz, Henryk. Quo Vadis: a narrative of the time of Nero.

Spyri, Johana. Heidi. Read Heidi. It’s a wonderful story about a feisty little girl, Heidi, and her friend Peter and how they are tempted to do wrong, confused about spiritual things, and finally loved and forgiven. The themes of the story—-broken relationships, reconciliation, forgiveness, sin and temptation–-are woven into the story in a way that teaches and entertains at the same time. Modern writers of “Christian fiction” could learn a few things from reading and emulating Johanna Spyri’s classic book.

Stevenson, Robert Louis. A Child’s Garden of Verses. First poems for children and lovely memories of childhood for adults.

Stowe, Harriet Beecher. Uncle Tom’s Cabin. More about Harriet Beecher Stowe.

Swift, Jonathan. Gulliver’s Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World, in Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of Several Ships. The first and second books of this four-part satire are the best. Parts three and four are extremely odd, and Lemuel Gulliver ends up preferring the company of horses to men.

Tarkington, Booth. Penrod. Just as funny and insightful as Tom Sawyer about a boy’s life and thoughts.

Thackeray, William Makepeace. Vanity Fair.

Trollope, Anthony. Barchester Towers. Thackeray isn’t quite as hopeful about life and human nature as Dickens, and Trollope is gently cynical, but all three Victorian novelists knew how to create memorable characters.

Twain, Mark. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

“But I reckon I got to light out for the Territory ahead of the rest, because Aunt Sally she’s going to adopt me and sivilize me and I can’t stand it. I been there before.”

Twain, Mark. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.

Wallace, Lew. Ben-Hur, a Tale of the Christ. Judah Ben-Hur = Charlton Heston, however, the book is worth reading.

Wharton, Edith. House of Mirth. Edith Wharton and House of Mirth.

Wiggin, Kate Douglas. Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm. I know I’m in a minority, but I enjoyed Rebecca just as much as I did Anne of Green Gables. And I couldn’t find a free Kindle version of Anne of Green Gables, even though several of the sequels were available for free.

Wilde, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Gray. Wilde certainly knew how to show that the “wages of sin is death.”

Wodehouse, P.G. Right Ho, Jeeves!

“It is impossible to be unhappy while reading the adventures of Jeeves and Wooster. And I’ve tried.” ~Christopher Buckley.

Sunday Salon: Books Read in June, 2012

Jul1

Young Adult Fiction:
Bumped by Megan McCafferty. One word review: BLECH.
Sabotaged by Margaret Peterson Haddix.
Torn by Margaret Peterson Haddix. Good entries in this time travel series for middle grade readers.
Code Name: Verity by Elizabeth Wein. Semicolon review here.
War Horse by Michael Morpurgo. Semicolon review here.

Adult Fiction:
Palace Walk by Naguib Mahfouz. Semicolon review here.
The Summer of Katya by Trevanian. Semicolon review here.
Bridge of Scarlet Leaves by Kristina McMorris. O.K. but not a favorite.
Dorchester Terrace by Anne Perry. Typical Anne Perry. I think I’ve outgrown or just become tired of this particular series of Victorian-setting mysteries. Or Ms. Perry is becoming repetitious and boring.

Nonfiction:
Crockett Johnson and Ruth Krauss: How an Unlikely Couple Found Love, Dodged the FBI, and Transformed Children’s Literature by Philip Nel.
The Big House: A Century in the Life of an American Summer Home by George Howe Colt.

Sunday Salon: Books Read in May, 2012

Jun10

Children’s and Young Adult Fiction:
Life: An Exploded Diagram by Mal Peet. Semicolon review here.
The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater. Semicolon review here.
Someone Else’s Life by Katie Dale. Semicolon review here.
Robbie Forester and the Outlaws of Sherwood St. by Peter Abrahams. Semicolon review here.
The Always War by Margaret Peterson Haddix.
Where I Belong by Gillian Cross. Semicolon review here.

Adult Fiction:
The Bookshop by Penelope Lively. Semicolon review here.
The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides. Semicolon review here.
The Return of the Soldier by Rebecca West. Semicolon review here.
Memento Mori by Muriel Spark.

Nonfiction:
Kisses from Katie by Katie Davis, with Beth Clark. Semicolon review here.

Advanced Reading Survey: Eugenie Grandet by Honore de Balzac

May14

I’ve decided that on Mondays I’m going to revisit the books I read for a course in college called Advanced Reading Survey, taught by the eminent scholar and lovable professor, Dr. Huff. I’m not going to re-read all the books and poems I read for that course, probably more than fifty, but I am going to post to Semicolon the entries in the reading journal that I was required to keep for that class because I think that my entries on these works of literature may be of interest to readers here and because I’m afraid that the thirty year old spiral notebook in which I wrote these entries may fall apart ere long. I may offer my more mature perspective on the books, too, if I remember enough about them to do so.

Author Note:
Honore de Balzac, son of an officer in Napoleon’s army, was greatly influenced and impressed by the great emperor’s career. He once wrote, under a picture of Napoleon, “What Napoleon could not do with the sword, I will accomplish with the pen.”
Balzac wrote at an incredible pace throughout his life, and although much of his work was of negligible value, stuff written solely to support himself and pay his creditors, he did manage to turn out a few masterpieces, including Eugenie Grandet and Le Pere Goriot. Balzac died in Paris in 1850 at the age of 51, possibly weakened by his intense writing schedule and his incessant coffee drinking.

Gustave Flaubert on Balzac: “What a man he would have been had he known how to write!”
Victor Hugo: “Balzac was one of the first among the greatest, one of the highest among the best.”
Henry James: “Large as Balzac is, he is all of one piece and he hangs perfectly together.”
Marxist Freidrich Engels: “I have learned more [from Balzac] than from all the professional historians, economists and statisticians put together.”

Plot Summary:
Eugenie Grandet falls in love with her cousin, Charles, but her father is a miser who refuses to allow her to marry a penniless man. Eventually, Eugenie becomes wealthy and miserly herself, following in her father’s footsteps.

Characters:
Monsieur Felix Grandet: an old miser
Madame Grandet: His wife
Eugenie Grandet: the daughter
Nanon: the family’s only servant
Charles Grandet: Eugenie’s cousin

Quotations:
“Innocence alone can dare to be so bold. Once enlightened, virtue makes her calculations as well as vice.”

“Flattery never emanates from noble souls; it is the gift of little minds who thus still further belittle themselves to worm their way into the vital being of persons around whom they crawl. Flattery means self-interest.”

Other reviews:
Beyond Assumptions: “As it turns out Balzac has penchant for good story-telling and a fine eye for writing interesting and humorous characters.”

Wuthering Expectations: “Eugénie Grandet has some of Balzac’s best descriptive passages, and three or four really fine characters, and a snappy story. But it’s the combination of the characters, and the structure, and the details of the house and town that amaze me.”

Constance Reader: “every character in this novel is fully fleshed out and fully-realized, including secondary characters like the family housemaid and even tertiary characters like the village butcher, whom we only see once. The result is that you get a perfect idea of what life in a little town was like, at that time, from the top to the very bottom.”

The Music Man:
Maud: I shouldn’t tell you this but she advocates dirty books.
Harold: Dirty books?!
Alma: Chaucer
Ethel: Rabelais
Eulalie: Balzac!

Sunday Salon: Books Read in April, 2012

May6

The Sunday Salon.com

Children’s and Young Adult Fiction:
Unbreak My Heart by Melissa Walker. I read an ARC of this YA romance novel. It’s due out from Bloomsbury on May 22, 2012.
Dead End in Norvelt by Jack Gantos. Newbery Award winner for 2011. Semicolon review here.
On the Blue Comet by Rosemary Wells. Time travel via Lionel model train. Semicolon review here.
Eyes Like Willy’s by Juanita Havill. World War I fiction.
A Time of Angels by Karen Hesse. World War I fiction.
Private Peaceful by Michael Morpurgo. More World War I fiction. Semicolon reviews of all three WW I novels here.

Adult Fiction:
Nanjing Requiem by Ha Jin. Fiction based on the life and work of school principal Minnie Vautrin during the Rape of Nanjing. Semicolon review here.
Scoop by Evelyn Waugh. The first read from my Classics Club list. Semicolon review here.
In the Country of Men by Hisham Matar. North Africa Reading Project.

Nonfiction:
Fortunate Sons by Liel Leibovitz and Matthew Miller. “The 120 Chinese Boys Who Came to America, Went to School, and Revolutionized an Ancient Civilization.” Semicolon review here.
Why Jesus? Rediscovering His Truth in an Age of Mass-Marketed Spirituality by Ravi Zacharias.

Scoop by Evelyn Waugh

Apr24

I don’t know if it was just me or my mood or what, but Evelyn Waugh’s comic novel that the NYT Book Review called “thoroughly enjoyable, uproariously funny” just felt like a P.G. Wodehouse wannabe, except more pretentious and not nearly as accessible or humorous. Scoop is a parody of the world of sensational journalism, and as such it’s neither dated nor inaccurate. If anything, Big Journalism has become more unreliable and farcical in the twenty-first century than it seems to have been in 1937-38 when this book was first published. But I did keep thinking, as I read the story of the accidental foreign correspondent for the Daily Beast, William Boot, that I’d rather be reading about Bertie Wooster and Jeeves.

In a case of mistaken identity, Boot is sent to the country of Ishmalia to cover an incipient rebellion. Although set in a fictional country in North or East Africa (near Soudan?, Waugh’s spelling), the novel doesn’t really have much to say about Africa either. The Africans in the novel are simply foils for the oh-so-comical exploits of the European press corps and the politicians who seek to exploit the Africans. The N-word makes frequent appearances, and although the mere appearance of such a term doesn’t offend me as much as it does some people, the attitude of condescension and superiority that all the Europeans in the novel have toward “the natives” does make for reader discomfort and weariness after a while.

“The novel is partly based on Waugh’s own experience working for the Daily Mail, when he was sent to cover Benito Mussolini’s expected invasion of Abyssinia – what was later known as the Second Italo-Abyssinian War. When he got his own scoop on the invasion he telegraphed the story back in Latin for secrecy, but they discarded it.” Wikipedia

Now that’s funny.

One main idea in the novel is that the news reporters create the news. Even if nothing of importance is happening, where there are reporters, news must happen. So the reporters make it happen or make it up. Nowadays with CNN and the internet and the 24 hour news cycle, news must be created even faster and in greater quantity. Maybe that insight is worth wading through some of the obscure slang and bewildering politics of Scoop, but I’m not sure.

classicsclubI did like the way Waugh ends some of his chapters, with purposefully purple-ish prose that satirizes the journalists and yet communicates a sort of melancholy feel to the story:

“And the granite sky wept.”

“So the rain fell and the afternoon and the evening were succeeded by another night and another morning.”

“William once more turned to the Pension Dressler; the dark clouds opened above him; the gutters and wet leaves sparkled in sunlight and a vast, iridescent fan of colour, arc beyond arc of splendor, spread across the heavens. The journalists had gone, and a great peace reigned in the city.”

Scoop is the first book I’ve read from my Classics Club list. I’m hoping it only gets better from here.

Poem #53: The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 1861

Apr18

“To feel most beautifully alive means to be reading something beautiful, ready always to apprehend in the flow of language the sudden flash of poetry. “~Gaston Bachelard

I love Longfellow! Accessible, rhythmic, and pure fun!

Listen my children and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five;
Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.

So through the night rode Paul Revere;
And so through the night went his cry of alarm
To every Middlesex village and farm,—
A cry of defiance, and not of fear,
A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door,
And a word that shall echo for evermore!
For, borne on the night-wind of the Past,
Through all our history, to the last,
In the hour of darkness and peril and need,
The people will waken and listen to hear
The hurrying hoof-beats of that steed,
And the midnight message of Paul Revere.

Read the entire poem.

And, by the way, on April 18, 1775, 237 years ago today, American revolutionaries Paul Revere, William Dawes and Samuel Prescott rode though the towns of Massachusetts giving the warning that “the British are coming.”

Here are links to a few resources for teaching and enjoying the poetry of Mr. Longfellow:

In episode #197 of Adventures in Odyssey, entitled The Midnight Ride, Whit tells the real story of Paul Revere’s ride, pointing out a few inaccuracies in Longfellow’s poem. I would use this radio program in class if I were teaching this event in American history or if I were teaching the poem.

I’ve done several posts on Longfellow and his poetry here at Semicolon:
Poetry Friday: Poem #43, The Village Blacksmith by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 1841

Poetry Friday: The Childrens Hour by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Longfellow, Hurricanes and The Wreck of the Hesperus.

A Celebration of Longfellow

Longfellow’s Birthday

This is the forest primeval . . .

If you’re interested in the inception of the American Revolution and Paul Revere, I would suggest two books, one fiction and one nonfiction, by Esther Forbes. Ms. Forbes received a Pulitzer Prize in 1943 for her historical work, Paul Revere and the World He Lived In, and in 1944 her young adult historical fiction book, Johnny Tremain, was awarded the Newbery Medal for distinguished contribution to American literature for children. Paul Revere is a character in the novel Johnny Tremain, and the entire story is a wonderful introduction to the American Revolution and to the ethos and culture of the mid to late 1700’s in Boston.