Twenty Questions

Found this on Leeswammes' Blog the other night, and thought it sounded interesting.

1. Which book has been on your shelf the longest?

I think the one I've owned the longest but have not read has been Sophie's World by Jostien Gaarder. I got it sometime in the 1990s, and I'm not really sure what possessed me to get it.

2. What is your current read, your last read and the book you'll read next?
Last read: A Kingdom's Cost by JR Tomlin
Current reads: Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell; Flash and Bones by Kathy Reichs; Beneath a Marble Sky by John Shors
Next read: The Greatest Knight by Elizabeth Chadwick perhaps

3. What book did everyone like and you hated?
I have three that come to mind. Love in a Time of Cholera, The Help, and The Kite Runner. The first I read because it kept showing up on people's "Must Read" lists. Really didn't like it, and I hate the stalker story lines (realized reading this). The second was getting rave reviews by it seemed by everyone who read it when it was book of the month in one of the Shelfari groups. Story was fine, but I was underwhelmed by the writing. The last my neighbor handed to me in a stack of books I should read. Not something I'd have picked up on my own. The setting was an unusual one, but that's about all I can say in favor for it.

4. Which book do you keep telling yourself you'll read, but you probably won't?
I really can't say. I usually read books based on mood. Odds would be one of those classics that are on the 'books to read before you die' type lists.

5. Which book are you saving for "retirement"?
I am too young to consider "retirement" and I don't plan that far in advance. Maybe some of those big brick of a status reads, like War and Peace?

6. Last page: read it first or wait till the end?
Sacrilege, reading the end first. Books aren't timey-wimey, they get read from front cover, to back cover.

7. Acknowledgments: waste of ink and paper or interesting aside?
Interesting within reason, especially if it was a piece that required a great deal of research. But 5-8 pages on a young adult chick lit novel less than 200 pages with very wide spacing and margins...that's a waste of ink.

8. Which book character would you switch places with?
Hmm, probably Arya Stark from A Game of Thrones- she's pretty badass, gets to wallop Joffrey and hang out with Jon Snow. Close would Eowyn from Lord of the Rings.

9. Do you have a book that reminds you of something specific in your life (a person, a place, a time)?
Not really. Unless we wanted to talk about books I got for a class or term paper in college.

10. Name a book you acquired in some interesting way.
I don't have any acquired in an interesting way. I have some I got on vacations, then some I got a wicked deal on (like Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell in hardcover with dust jacket, a framed drawing/print of Boggart's Rick character from Casablanca as a mouse and some other stuff for $5 at a yard sale). But none seem terribly interesting.

11. Have you ever given away a book for a special reason to a special person?
Given away one of mine? No. I do give books as gifts. And I did pass along some romance novels I was given for Christmas to people who actually read romance novels.

12. Which book has been with you to the most places?
My anthology of Jane Austen's novels has gone with me from California to Georgia and back again. And I've had several that have gone on cross country trips. I guess one of the most miles has been one of the lesser known books in the Three Musketeer saga. Purchased in Savannah, went to ohio and back to Savannah, then to California.

13. Any "required reading" you hated in high school that wasn't so bad ten years later?
I'm only a few years past this 10 years later phase, and I've not gotten to re-reading my required readings yet. I've only just started thinking about which I'd want to try again.

14. What is the strangest item you've ever found in a book?
An old plane ticket, from the pre-computer printed tickets era.

15. Used or brand new?
Either. When I was younger, I bought used without thought from yard and estate sales, but many of those were those 50s-60s paperback printing with the very acidic paper and dying glue in the bindings. But now I am more discerning. There's nothing better than going through a library sale or yard sale and finding a hard cover copy of something that looks like it was never read.

16. Stephen King: Literary genius or opiate of the masses?
I've not read much by him yet, but I'd lean towards literary genius. Not many authors have the balls enough to write in multiple genres. He does it and is very successful at it. And look a the vast quantity of his works optioned, and those produced into tv shows or films.

17. Have you ever seen a movie you liked better than the book?
Bridget Jones' Diary. I don't like Chick Lit, and didn't much care for the book (I think her non Bridget Jones books are better). But I'm a bit more tolerant of the genre when its done on film. Not much more, but some.

18. Conversely, which book should NEVER have been introduce to celluloid?
Eragon. I really liked the book, but holy hell, the screen writers did a horrible adaptation of it for the movie. They spoil the beginning of Eldest in the first five minutes of the movie

19. Have you ever read a book that's made you hungry, cookbooks being excluded from this question?
Not that I recall.

20. Who is the person whose book advice you'll always take?
I would probably listen to Melissa of Confessions of an Avid Reader and Bookworm Erin on Shelfari the most since our tastes and opinions of books coincide more often than not. Then my neighbor, since I've gotten some good recommendations from her, but, it tends to be more hit and miss due to our varied tastes.