Get Ready...

Banned Books week starts tomorrow. Just a quick refresher on why it's important to "celebrate":

The First Amendment

Sidetracked

The Mister and I finally checked out the library in our new neighborhood and it is AWESOME! Came home with a large-ish stack of reading material and immediately dug into a book by one of my favorite authors, Dick Francis. My WWI stage has been temporarily diverted over to the former-English-jockeys-who-write-mysteries stage.

What I'm Reading

Father-in-Law gave me books he was done with a few weeks ago. He was a modern European history professor for 30+ years, so his collection is heavy on World War I and II. Started Back to the Front last night and was immediately intrigued by the term "accidental historian". I think I've seen it somewhere else, but I can't be sure. Certainly most of what I do could be deemed "accidental"; many of the topics I'm currently interested in came about as I was reading/researching something else. There was the Civil War phase, then the Florence Nightingale phase, then the Abraham Lincoln phase, then a random jump to World War II, Winston Churchill, the Russian Front, then the Romanovs...many other phases...now World War I!

Another Item To Add To The List...

...of reasons I don't read: unpacking boxes from the move.

Didn't make it to the library this weekend. Found a book on the shelf that I hadn't read yet, so I'm giving it a try.

What To Read Next

Have started two books in two days and put them both down in disgust. Many times I will just power through until the end, but my heart wasn't in it. I am stuck. Finally going to check out our new library this weekend so maybe I'll find something appealing there. If not, there's always my beloved Tattered Cover!

Any suggestions?

Business Plan

Step 1: Buy cool old building.
Step 2: Break up into tiny rooms. Decorate with rugged wooden desks and comfy chairs. Excellent lighting a must. Install pencil sharpener.
Step 3: Rent out space to writers! Apparently writers are so desperate to have a quiet space to work that they actually rent space. As far as I know this service is not being offered in Denver yet. I wonder if our basement would work?

Brilliant!

What I've Read

Found (and finished) Freakonomics! In a word: fascinating.

I love that the authors didn't back off from controversial topics of race and gender. Certainly it would have been a more "comfortable" read if they'd reached different conclusions, but overall it was an eye-opening and interesting book. Definitely a book you can loan to your friends.