I’m usually not one to willingly read lectures, even if they are about poetry, but Madness, Rack, and Honey is so much more than that. Mary Ruefle takes poetry out of the classroom and into the world with her profound insights about the written word.

Madness, Rack, and Honeyis a compilation of Mary Ruefle’s graduate school lectures on poetry and the writing life. She discusses beginnings and endings, the moon, fear and writing, and the power of secrets.

“The poem is the consequence of its origins. Give me the fruit and I will take from it a seed and plant it and watch grow the tree from which it fell.”

Mary Ruefle, originally from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is concise in her prose and poetry. It is so easy to read. I highly recommend that you leave it for your Sunday afternoon. Something pleasant and insightful to peruse.

Bavaria

The mountain skies were clear

except for the umlaut of a cloud

over the village.

The little girl wore yellow gloves.

She looked in the peephole and saw

a stack of unused marionettes.

Yet, she wondered.

So, lately I’ve been reading a lot. And yet, my TBR (to-be-read) shelf is still way out of hand and growing larger and wilier by the day, and so, the necessity of reading a lot of books has become, well, a necessity. What I would like to do here is share some of the books I’ve read, am reading, and will be reading. Maybe this will help me, and you, in some strange subpsychic and or metaphysicomental way. And so a list of sorts:

Recently read:

Neuromancer _ William Gibson

All the Pretty Horses _ Cormac McCarthy

The Moviegoer _ Walker Percy

Snow Country _ Yasunari Kawabata

*Tenth of December: Stories _ George Saunders (see below for asterisked items)

Infinite Jest _ David Foster Wallace

Red Country _ Joe Abercrombie

Currently reading:

Fevre Dream _ George R.R. Martin

Murphy _ Samuel Beckett

A bacon sized slice of the hog that is The TBR shelf:

The Virgin Suicides _ Jeffrey Eugenides

*The Miniature Wife: and Other Stories _ Manuel Gonzales

May We Be Forgiven _ A.M. Homes

Geek Love: Katherine Dunn

The Broom of the System _ David Foster Wallace

Storm Front _ Jim Butcher

Ghost Written _ David Mitchell

Gravity’s Rainbow _ Thomas Pynchon

So about those starred titles.

The Tenth of December is our first editions club pick of the month, which also happens to be one of the best collections of short stories I’ve read in a long time – a long time. These stories are set in the near future (my favorite type of future) and are very satirical (satirical is my favorite type of satire). George Saunders will be here THIS MONTH <January 23> @ 5 o’clock. He will read and sign and it will be very fun. And 1dolla beers.

The Miniature Wife is a collection of short stories by new author Manuel Gonzales. I don’t know much about this book other than I want to read it. But it is new, came out this month, and I’m always looking for a great new author to follow.

And, don’t forget <January 23> @5!

A couple of years ago, as I turned 60-years-old, I wrote a blog about Chris Crowley’s Younger Next Year. I expressed how much I was affected by Chris’s lifestyle suggestions.

At 55, I had been jogging for 25 years, and my legs were nearing a running end. I didn’t want to give up that lifestyle, but that’s what I was facing. Chris’s younger book inspired me to find other exercise pleasures. I started more stretching and explored strength building. My biggest change was switching to stationary bike riding and not minding its boredom. I don’t watch television so getting into this exercise was a mental challenge. With enough diligence and practice, I’m now enjoying my jogging replacement. This pleasure has led to outside biking, enhanced by the convenience of the Ridgeland bike trails. My back and knees told me biking was my new path.

I’ve never met Chris or just been able to say thanks for sharing his helpful book about increasing your lifestyle pleasures. However, on February 6th, I will be able to thank him. After many requests to his publisher, Chris Crowley and Dr. Jen Sacheck will visit Jackson to discuss his new book Thinner This Year: A Diet and Exercise Program for Living Strong, Fit, and Sexy.

I can’t share my excitement about Chris and Jen’s visit enough. If you haven’t found your Younger Next Year for men or Younger Next Year for Women, check them out. They might be good guides for your own lifestyle change.

Also, if your body is carrying a few extra pounds, consider Chris’s new book, Thinner This Year. Thinner is not really a diet book but a book for changing your lifestyle permanently. It will give you ideas on new ways to live happier and be more content with yourself as you age.

Chris Crowley and nutritionist Dr. Jen Sacheck will be signing and speaking at Lemuria at 5:00 & 5:30 on Wednesday, February 6th. Grab a friend or two and get ready for some no nonsense inspiration for better living! More details here.

I love that The Painted Girls by Cathy Marie Buchanan is my first book blog of 2013.  I absolutely loved this story and cannot wait to get it into your hands.  While The Painted Girls is a novel, it is based on the true story of the three Van Goethem sisters’ lives.  Marie and Charlotte were both ballet dancers in the Paris Opera dance school. Antoinette, the oldest, works as an extra, having been dismissed from the dance school.

The dance school at the Paris Opera was a place where young girls had a chance to be lifted out of poverty.  The young girls would work their way up through the ranks and if they were “lucky”, catch the eye of an abonee, a rich older man.  These alliances were very common place, and the girls were very hopeful that an abonee would come along and to pay their rent and give them gifts.  It was survival.

We follow the stories of the sisters  in The Painted Girls as they try to survive and keep their family together.  Their father has recently passed away and their mother, who works as a laundress, seems to be found in the bottom of an absinthe bottle more often than not.  Antoinette is desperately looking for love, Marie for security, and Charlotte for success. We follow all three girls on very bumpy but interesting road.  Along the way, Marie is noticed by the artist, Edgar Degas, who frequents the Paris Opera looking for girls to model for him.  She is very excited to be able to earn extra money, and even more so when she finds out about the sculpture he is creating.  Marie is the model for Little Dancer, 14 Years.

I do not want to give to many of the details away but I will say that I really loved this book.  I feel like the author did a fantastic job in describing Paris during this time and the struggles people faced just to survive everyday living, especially young girls.  This quote seems to sum it all up:

No social being is less protected than the young Parisian girl–by laws, regulations, and social customs.

–Le Figaro, 1880

To see other works of art by Degas referenced in The Painted Girls please click here.

Recently I’ve taken up baking as a my new after work hobby (I’ve run out of Lego sets to put together).  It started because I needed something really cheap to give as Christmas presents and figured who doesn’t love baked goods during the holidays.

From there it’s become a monster and I can’t stop baking.  The first baking book I picked up was The Back in the Day Bakery Cookbook by Cheryl & Griffith Day.  I adore this cookbook.  After I made several items from this book I then picked up Vintage Cakes by Julie Richardson which is also quite wonderful.

Having following all the directions to the tee I decided I was going to mix and match and come up with my own baked delights borrowing recipes from both cookbooks.  I’ve truly enjoyed my new hobby and have forced my co-workers to partake in my new love for baking.  Thanks guys for being my guinea pigs.

by Zita