Yep.  Heading for the beach this morning, armed and ready with lots of literature.

Here’s my short list, sorry no links, no time….

The Girl who Loved Tom Gordon - Stephen King, and thanks to Les at  A Life in Books for turning me on to it.

The Blind Assassin  - Margaret Atwood

Stone Creek - Victoria Lustbador

Three Junes - Julia Glass

The Heart is a Lonely Hunter - Carson McCullers

The Tea Rose - Jennifer Donnelly

I’m pretty happy with it.  See ya on the flip side!

It’s books like this one that remind me why I love reading so much. Books, that from page one, open a door and welcome you into their world, with details so rich and vivid you can not only see it and hear it, but you can smell it too. Books that introduce you to wonderful new places, and let you see things you might never have seen or even heard of before. I love books like this because when your done you actually feel like you’ve changed a little.

The Highest Tide, is about Miles O’Malley, a thirteen year old boy who lives on the tidal flats of the Puget Sound, his obsession for marine biology, and his coming of age. Right from the start we can tell Miles is not your ordinary thirteen year old boy, instead of text messaging and playing video games he is out on his kayak looking for clams to sell to local restaurants or collecting other interesting sea life for his aquarium, all the while pondering the meaning of our place along with nature in this world, “…the water was so clear I could see coon-stripe shrimp … and the bottomless bed of white clam shells … Those shells, as unique and timeless as bones, helped me realize that we all die young, that in the life of the earth, we are houseflies, here for one flash of light.” One night out exploring he finds a rare deep sea creature that does not belong in or anywhere near the shallow flats of the Puget Sound. This discovery puts the spotlight on Miles and his amazing talents and the events of his remarkable summer begin to slide into motion.

One of the special things about The Highest Tide are the vivid details in which you are able to explore the world of marine biology, for example when Miles happens upon a beautiful sea creature called a nudibranch, he reflects “In all my time on the flats I’d never seen one before. I’d read about them, sure. I’d handled them at aquariums but never in the wild, and I’d never even seen a photo of one this stunning. Nudibranches are often called the butterflies of the sea, but even that understates their dazzle. Almost everything else in the Northern-Pacific is dressed to blend with pale surroundings. Nudibrances don’t bother, in part because they taste so lousy they don’t need camouflage to survive. But also, I decided right then, because their beauty is so startling it earns them a free pass, the same way everyday life brakes for peacocks, parade floats, and supermodels.”

While Miles’s marine life discoveries are fascinating stuff, his personal life is equally as rich and interesting. He’s in love with his eighteen year old rocker/bi-poler babysitter, he has a clam digging pal named Phelps who is sex obsessed, and his best friend is an elderly woman named Florence with Parkinson’s disease. To top it all off, his parents are getting divorced and he can’t seem to grow any taller than 4′8. Toss in an earthquake, a cult, a few near death experiences and top it off with making out with a chocolate Labrador retriever and you’ll begin to see why Mile’s life is just as crazy and fascinating as the sea creatures he collects.

While the plot delivers, the heart of the book was the beauty of the ocean and the Puget Sound. At one point in the story Miles quotes his favorite marine biologist Rachel Carson and her words with regards to writing about sea life, ‘if there is poetry in my book about the sea it is not because I deliberately put it there but because no one could write truthfully about the sea and leave out poetry.’” This veneration for the beauty of sea life makes this book not only a good solid read but a lovely hybrid of science textbook meets poetry and prose. Within it is also the lovely message that there is amazing beauty everywhere for us to see, but in order to see it you have to be willing to open your eyes and look.

I highly recommend this, and I think it would make an amazing beach read. In fact my only regret when reading this was that I hadn’t waited a week or so to read this while I will be at the beach in Coastal South Carolina.

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More Stuff about The Highest Tide.

Jim Lynch has a super cool website about The Highest Tide, check it out after you read the book.

Bookslut has a very good review of The Highest Tide by Colleen Mondor who actually lives in the Pacific Northwest herself.

Click here to read the first chapter of The Highest Tide.

Rachel Carson, Miles’s hero in the novel was a real person and a “genius” in the world of Marine Biology. Go here to learn more about her.

A Nudibranch

A Giant Squid

The Puget Sound, Washington State

Pitching Horseshoes

Claudia Emerson

Some of your buddies might come around
for a couple of beers and a game,
but most evenings, you pitched horseshoes

alone. I washed up the dishes
or watered the garden to the thudding
sound of the horseshoe in the pit,

or the practiced ring of metal
against metal, after the silent
arc - end over end. That last

summer, you played a seamless, unscored
game against yourself. Or night
falling. Or coming in the house.

You were good at it. From the porch
I watched you become shadowless,
then featureless, until I knew

you couldn’t see either, and still
the dusk rang out, your aim that easy;
between the iron stakes you had driven

into the hard earth yourself, you paced
back and forth as if there were a decision
to make, and you were the one to make it.

Taken from Late Wife, a collection of poems for which Emerson won the Pulitzer Prize in poetry in 2007.

My creation

Originally uploaded by bookie_sherid

Check out this cool photo meme I found at Bookpusher.

The concept:

a. Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search.
b. Using only the first page, pick an image.
c. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd’s mosaic maker.

The Questions:
1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What high school did you go to?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. Favorite drink?
7. Dream vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What you want to be when you grow up?
10. What do you love most in life?
11. One Word to describe you.
12. Your flickr name - Or online handle.

Follow the directions. aww…look how cute the beer and the bookstore look next to Josh. *sigh*

1. Who’s your all-time favorite author, and why?

I think I would have to say Jeanette Winterson, even though a few of her more recent works have been a bit too abstract for my liking, her earlier novels such as The Passion, Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit, Sexing The Cherry, and particularly Written On The Body, are all in my top ten favorite books of all time and they reinforced a life long love of literature in a way that will never be undone. The purity and passion in her words produce the most beautiful and effective prose of anyone I have ever read. WInterson is like Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Haruki Murakami meets Toni Morrison and Neil Gaiman.

Bibliography

• Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit (1985)
• Boating for Beginners (1985)
• Fit For The Future: The Guide for Women Who Want to Live Well (1986)
• The Passion (1987)
• Sexing the Cherry (1989)
• Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit: the script (1990)
• Written on the Body (1992)
• Art & Lies: A Piece for Three Voices and a Bawd (1994)
• Great Moments in Aviation: the script (1995)
• Art Objects (1995)
• Gut Symmetries (1997)
• The World and Other Places (199
• The Powerbook (2000)
• The King of Capri (2003)
• Lighthousekeeping (2004)
• Weight (2005)
• Tanglewreck (2006)
• The Stone Gods (2007)

“They say that every snowflake is different. If that were true, how could the world go on? How could we ever get up off our knees? How could we ever recover from the wonder of it?”

When I say “I will be true to you” I must mean it in spite of the formalities, instead of the formalities. If I commit adultery in my heart then I have lost you a little. The bright vision of your face will blur. I may not notice this once or twice, I may pride myself on having enjoyed those fleshy excursions in the most cerebral way. Yet I wil have blunted that sharp flint that sparks between us, our desire for another above all else. (p. 79). Written on the Body.

The Buddhists say there are 149 ways to God. I’m not looking for God, only for myself, and that is far more complicated. God has had a great deal written about Him; nothing has been written about me. God is bigger, like my mother, easier to find, even in the dark. I could be anywhere, and since I can’t describe myself I can’t ask for help. (p. 115) Sexing the Cherry.

“Book collecting is an obsession, an occupation, a disease, an addiction, a fascination, an absurdity, a fate. It is not a hobby. Those who do it must do it. Those who do not do it, think of it as a cousin of stamp collecting, a sister of the trophy cabinet, bastard of a sound bank account and a weak mind.”

I have to be honest and say she lost me with Art and Lies and Gut Symmetries which just went WAY over my head, but I have heard wonderful things about Tanglewreck and most recently The Stone Gods and I am looking forward to rediscovering her work.

2. Who was your first favorite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favorites?

My favorite first author was Judy Blume. She’s a true genius of young adult fiction. Blume answered every question that needed answering and spared me many an awkward conversation with my mom.  She also gave me a little preview into the complexities of adolescent social behaviors and I think because I read her books I was more prepared than others for the war zone that was adolescent society.

3. Who’s the most recent addition to your list of favorite authors, and why?

Well, I just recently discovered Neil Gaiman and even though I have never been a big fan of sci-fi, I have been pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoy his stories. Also, I love David Sedaris and I wanna be his best friend.

4. If someone asked you who your favorite authors were right now, which authors would first pop out of your mouth? Are there any you’d add on a moment of further reflection?

Umm…Haruki Murakami, Geraldine Brooks, Gaiman, Sedaris, John Green, Marcus Zuzak, Emily Giffin, and MORE!

5. Tagged:

Everyone. GO!

More stuff from Jeannette Winterson

Ed and Bella looking hip and happy at the MTV movie awards where a full scene from the movie Twilight was shown. To see it go to the MTV Twilight movie page, where you can see that and everything else related to the movie. Wanna see the trailer? OK. Check it out below. YAY!

Can you believe, in the midst of my personal crisis, that Chic-fil-A has the nerve to go and do something like “re-invent” their formerly perfect version of the chicken salad sandwich and then CHARGE me like a buck fifty MORE for the revised version of my once favorite sandwich????   *sigh*

Whats next, Guinness Light?

Hey guys.  I’m still around although I am going through some pretty big personal drama (will Bookie be single again?), and I’m also taking 2 online courses, History of WWII and Early American Lit.  Both classes consist of 15 lessons and each lesson requires at least 2 essays, so I am FUCKED.  Well, not really, just busy.  I’m enjoying the diversion actually.  I can’t believe my brain still works in an academic way I was sure my brain had passed out of me right along with Jackson’s placenta.  Anyways, I did manage to read The Kite Runner the other day.  Depressing as shit, but good.  Well, I’ll be around to your places sometimes soon to say hello.  Fix me a drink will ya??!!

I can’t decide what I want to read next, but I think I may be leaning towards some chick lit.  It’s Spring and I’m really sick of being all depressing and boring.  I think I might need some shameless flirting, and casual sex to cheer me up.  The book I’m eyeing is Savannah Blues by Mary Kay Andrews.  She’s really quite funny and I’m a sucker for her Southern accent.  Yea….I think today night be a “order pizza and read chick lit on the sofa all day” kind of Saturday.  Screw the laundry, I think laundry is kind of like Gremlins, it just grows, multiplies and becomes more dreadful looking every time it touches water.

That’s me.

I’ve been reading but not blogging. So far I owe blogs on Eat Pray Love, The Stone Diaries, Season of the Snake, and now The Sisters, an ARC from B&N. I thought they were all very good and would recommend them btw, but will I ever get around to writing about them? Who knows…I mean, the sun is in Pisces people and that always has such a crappy effect on sunny bright Leo folk such as myself.

As of right now all I have to say is if I were to write a book like Eat, Pray, Love I would have to call it Starve, Pray, Divorce.

Good day.