Reading update...still blaming Nick Hornby...

I originally posted a blog about reading after I finished Nick Hornby's fun book, The Polysyllabic Spree.  Then, I posted an updated reading list, that I never came back to, and sort of abandoned...oops!  You should just blame Mr. Hornby for any reading blog posts I put up, 'k? You all good with that?  Allrighty then...


Sooooo....back in the last week of December, and the first week of January, I managed to read (or finish):

• Mary Karr - Lit  (fantastic, but a few turns of phrase sprinkled throughout that were utterly annoying)
• Barbara Kingsolver - The Lacuna  (I wanted to love this book, but some portions were far too choppy, and I would have preferred a straight novel without the interjections of one of the characters)
• Suzanne Collins - Mockingjay (Whoa! Can't wait for the movies!)
• Stieg Larsson - The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest (Uh-may-zing!) 
• J.K. Rowling - the first Harry Potter book (I actually started reading this more than a year ago!)

What now???  Well, my last term of graduate school started a few weeks ago (OMG...my last term???), and much of my reading is poetry and creative writing based, as well as reading to help my tutoring students.  As a result, my current reading list is:

• Homer - The Odyssey (Penguin Classics edition - one student is reading this edition;  Robert Fagles translation - the other student is reading this one!  My son will read the Penguin Classics edition in a few weeks as part of his Ancient Greece studies)
• Shakespeare - Macbeth (not exactly one of Shakespeare's easier plays...sigh...  This is the only book for which I have ever told a student that I will accept him using Cliff/Spark/E-notes)
• Dean Young - Recklessness (about writing poetry); Fall Higher (poetry)
• Jorie Graham - Erosion finished 2/13 (poetry)
• Major Jackson - Holding Company (poetry)
• Louise Gluck - The Wild Iris (poetry); Vita Nova As of 2/19, halfway through both and enjoying neither, but will probably finish anyhow (poetry; Am I the only person in my grad program that hasn't read Vita Nova yet????)
• Lynn Emanuel - Hotel Fiesta finished 2/21 (poetry); The Dig finished 2/21 (poetry) Loved both!
• Sharon Olds - Strike Sparks As of 2/19, a quarter of the way through and loving it (poetry)
• Margaret Randall - Hunger's Table finished 2/15 (poetry, and OMG, so good!)
• Deborah Digges - Rough Music finished 2/22, and loved about half of it.  Couldn't sand the other half! (poetry)
• John Green - The Fault in Our Stars finished 2/16 (fiction; one of my tutoring students - the one reading Macbeth - insisted I read this...he was right.  The book is fantastic!)

Amended to add these books which I forgot I had taken out from the library: 

• Matt Cook in the small of my backyard  started and finished 2/19 (poetry; so good! If Holden Caulfield had been a poet, he might have written these poems.) 
• Jack Crimmins Kit Fox Blues As of 2/19, quarter of the way through and can't decide if I like it or not (poetry)
• Abigail Child Mob As of 2/19 abandoned (poetry)
• Reginald Shepherd Otherhood As of 2/19, three or four poems in, and not sure yet... (poetry)
• Nancy Mitchell The Near Surround finished 2/22 - the best of the poetry books on this list so far! (poetry)
• Willie Perdomo Where a Nickel Costs a Dime finished 2/22 - excellent! (poetry)
• Raymond McDaniel Saltwater Empire As of 2/22 abandoned (poetry)

And, adding one that a tutoring student is reading for a creative project in her English class:

• Markus Zusak I am the Messenger Wow! Finished 2/26, and loved it! So interesting! (fiction) 

My goal is to finish all of these books by March 1st, with exception of books read for tutoring students as I read along with them, according to their class reading schedule.

And, I leave with this for your amusement, and feel free to make fun of me...

This is what happens when you drop an already damaged cell phone on a cement walkway...oops!