The wife sent me this meem and I so enjoyed it I thought I'd share...

 

1. One book that changed your life?

....hmm...

Not surprisingly I’m running through the list in my head trying to decide which to single out. And settling on this one has brought so many things home, so, I choose you! Gogmagog: The Buried Gods by T. C. Lethbridge.

I can honestly say that this book opened thousands of doors for me, literally. It made me understand things about myself that I never knew and inspired years of research and discovery. And (warm fuzzies...) I can still see Karen running for the library to find it for me.

I have to add a caveat to this, however; I never made it to the end. It is, possibly, the most boring book I’ve ever tried to wade through. I’ve tried, time and again, and like trying to read Dune, I finally had to concede defeat. (The wife, bless her, read Dune aloud to me so I could cross it off the list. If you feel a desire to read Gogmagog aloud to me please email me at: sebastian122@gmail.com)

2. One book you have read more than once?

I’m actually not going to answer this, but change the wording a bit and answer: One book that I will only read once. Foundation by Asimov. I thought this book was SO stunning that I closed it with a glow like after sex and swore off any more Asimov lest no other book should live up to this pinnacle of prose. What an amazing book.

3. One book you would want on a desert island?

I’m thinking it’s the only way I’ll ever get through Gogmagog...

Northanger Abbey by J Austen. If Fahrenheit 451 were the rule, this would be the book I’d be memorizing (or having tattooed on my body. I think there’s enough room...)

All my horsey adolescence I swore it would be Black Beauty by A Sewell, and I could, for years, recite a very large portion of that classic of social injustice, yaddi yaddi, but tastes change, mature and see the error of their ways...Ask me in 15 years and doubtless I’ll have a different answer for you.

4. One book that made you laugh?

National Lampoo’s Doon by E Weiner. If this book doesn’t leave you breathless, lay down, you’re dead.

5. One book that made you cry.

My knee-jerk reaction was The Doomsday Book by C. Willis, but then I thought of Sylvie and Bruno by L. Carroll. This is the first book I can remember blubbering over. In fact, I’m getting choked up thinking about it. It’s truly a shame that Carroll’s other works are so unknown. He was indeed the first Surrealist, but if he had giving his writing career a second’s consideration he could have challenged Dickens...which leads me to the next question.

5a. (Lee added this one for aspiring authors) One book by someone else you wish you had written.

A Tale of Two Cities by C Dickens. The world should come to its senses, dig this man up and have him bronzed! This book is brilliant enough to read inside a dog. The wife will be thrashing in defiance when she reads this, I can see her even as I type, but I can call upon millions of people, from every walk of life, to back me up. How I wish I could write like this!!

6. One Two books you wish had been written?

The main reason I’m struggling through this list of questions is because I read so little fiction. I’m a non-fiction girl and the list of books I wish had been written would fill a library. To single one out would send me to the 900s. My greatest delight is Egyptology and my home away from home is England. The history of both places is my comfort zone and to have a truly comprehensive book on pre-dynastic to Old Kingdom, and a readable one on late Bronze/early Iron Age Britain would leave me the happiest of Patties.

7. One book you wish had never been written?

The Lord of the Flies by some fuck up who hated kids and thought that they ought to be taught a lesson.

Or, to quote a master: The covers of this book are too far apart.        Ambrose Bierce

8. One book you are currently reading?

Myths and Legends of China by E. T. C. Werner. It is surprising/alarming the lack of current material on China. <sigh> But I keep looking.....

9. One book you have been meaning to read?

The Crying of Lot 49 by T Pynchon. Or anything by Pynchon! Mason and Dixon taunts me nightly...lying on the shelf in the bedroom saying, ‘Come on, Pattie...what’re you waiting for?’

 

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