Coffeespoons

Why I'm going to like this book

2013-05-03T12:02:00.002+08:00

Because I've avoided John Green for a long time...

since everybody seems to be talking about him...

and the thing with authors or books that everyone's talking about...

is that sometimes you want to avoid them...

after all, if a LOT of people like them...

that means they appeal to the masses...

which means that it appeals to a pedestrian taste...

but you don't want to be associated with anything pedestrian...

because you're different, damn it, and you're smart...

you think...

smarter than the hoi polloi...

so you avoid the book/author...

until you can't because...

you're actually curious...

and you end up buying the book...

but at the back of your mind, you think, "There must be something wrong with this book...

and I'm going to find it. And call it out for everyone to see...

or agree with a really smart detractor...

because we smart folk need to stick together...

and distinguish ourselves from the hoi polloi who like this book/author"...

and then it hits you...

you're being an ass again...

and you realize that you've already pre-judged a book...

not based on its merits nor the author's merits...

but because you want a certain status...

which might be entirely in your head...

and that sucks...

because whether you like it or not...

it takes a lot out of the enjoyment in reading...

and maybe you're not as smart as you think you are...

otherwise why would you let other people's voices in your head...

while you're reading a book?...

and maybe to many people, YOU are the hoi polloi...

and what the fuck does it matter anyway...

because when you start to read...

you want it to be just between you and the book...

which doesn't really care about your idea of self-worth.

Yes, I read these

2013-04-09T15:01:00.000+08:00

Five new adult-ish titles

Because everyone needs a little popcorn/potato chip lit once in a while. They might not be the healthiest alternative, but they're damn good in your mouth and on the way down. And sometimes, popcorn's just what you need.

Case in point: before I started reading the top bestsellers on Amazon, I had not read a book for an entire month. I blame work. Loaded with it. The first book I had read after a month was J. Lynn's Wait For You. Not something I'd usually pick up, but I had two good reasons: 1) I know that New Adult is a trend in publishing, especially self-publishing, right now, so I figure I should sample at least one book; and 2) I just really needed a fast-paced, easy, and potentially exciting read. Because even though my days and nights are filled with work, family, or Candy Crush, not being able to finish a book in that long is like not being able to buy crack for a crack addict.

It's nice when you can merge work and bingeing. So, last weekend, I wrote that I'd up the ante in my "research" by reading as much as I could of these bestsellers. This is my report (not review) and my takeaways after reading five books from the bestseller list.

Wait For You by J. Lynn

My summary: Something awful happened to Avery five years ago, so much so that she goes to a college a thousand miles away from home. As a result, she just wants to be left alone. But, of course, she meets a guy who will challenge all her well-laid plans for her peaceful, eventless future. Cameron, said guy, is extremely hot and uncommonly attracted to Avery. He wants to figure her out, get into her secrets, protect her. Then, Avery starts getting threatening emails and phone calls that remind her of what happened five years ago. Will she be able to deal with the past and move on, and will Cam be there to help her when he finds out what really happened?

Observations: Avery's in college; Cam's her classmate. They each rent a unit in one of the off-campus apartment buildings. (Prime opportunities there.) Each doesn't have to worry about money, but each has deep, dark secrets that they're afraid the other will find out. Or, they do want to tell each other, but aren't exactly sure how. There's a comparison of families, because Cam's family is the kind that Avery wishes her family were, though both of them live away from their families. And, of course, there's the steamy build-up to sex, and the actual sex, vanilla, but in different variations.

One thing I'll also say--this Cam's an unreal dude, because the title--Wait for You? My god, he does. To the point that I think is unrealistic for a hormonal twenty-something dude.

Falling Into You by Jasinda Wilder

Amazon book description: I wasn't always in love with Colton Calloway; I was in love with his younger brother, Kyle, first. Kyle was my first one true love, my first in every way.Then, one stormy August night, he died, and the person I was died with him.

Colton didn't teach me how to live. He didn't heal the pain. He didn't make it okay. He taught me how to hurt, how to not be okay, and, eventually, how to let go.

Observations: Nell and Kyle both come from privileged families who are neighbors. As the description says, Kyle dies. Nell turns self-destructive, even two years later when she's studying college in New York, where Colton also is, eking out a living after renouncing family support. Colton has his own deep, dark secrets, too (see a trend here?), and has seen the end-point of the self-destructive route that Nell is taking. So, they set out to save each other. The sex? Steamier, in my opinion, than the four others I've read because, you know, they're already into hurting themselves, so what's a little hurt in the bedroom?

However, I think the story adds a little more dimension to the usual tale towards the end because a new issue is introduced, and there's no clean, bow-tied ending. There's an acknowledgement that they still have their own damage to work through, though, of course, they end up together. At least, by the last page of this book.

The Sea of Tranquility by Katja Millay

Amazon book description: Former piano prodigy Nastya Kashnikov wants two things: to get through high school without anyone learning about her past and to make the boy who took everything from her—her identity, her spirit, her will to live—pay.

Josh Bennett’s story is no secret: every person he loves has been taken from his life until, at seventeen years old, there is no one left. Now all he wants is be left alone and people allow it because when your name is synonymous with death, everyone tends to give you your space.

Everyone except Nastya, the mysterious new girl at school who starts showing up and won’t go away until she’s insinuated herself into every aspect of his life. But the more he gets to know her, the more of an enigma she becomes. As their relationship intensifies and the unanswered questions begin to pile up, he starts to wonder if he will ever learn the secrets she’s been hiding—or if he even wants to.

Observations: Again, deep, dark secrets that the girl, Nastya, wants to keep from everyone, even Josh, whom she finds compelling. Again, both are kinda-sorta privileged. Again, both don't have much in the way of parental supervision. Circumstances even lead to "platonic" cohabitation, though you can guess it doesn't stay platonic.

This actually isn't in the Top 100 of Kindle bestsellers. In fact, I downloaded the book because it was number one in the Top-rated Kindle romance books list, which is interesting because the top-rated Kindle romance is a new adult title without as much sex as the others. Also, to be honest, this is the one I liked the best of all five. Writing's better than the others, characters are more interesting, the build-up (not to the sex, but to the relationship and the reveal) seems more realistic. And the sex isn't even as vivid as the others. Time is actually spent tackling how Nastya deals with all the pain of what happened to her. Finally, it's pretty sweet.

Just One Night, Part 1: The Stranger by Kyra Davis

Amazon book description: You should sleep with a stranger, her best friend whispers in her ear as they take to Vegas for one last pre-wedding fling. Despite her best intentions, when Kasie Fitzgerald enters the casino and sees him, a man whose tailored clothes belied a powerful, even dangerous, presence, she loses herself to the moment.

It was supposed to be just one night. But right as she's thinking she wants more, he shows up in her office with an agenda. As the billionaire CEO of a company that's engaged her PR firm, his demands just became her reality...and he desires so much more than just some attention in the boardroom.

Observations: This isn't new adult anymore. At least, I think it isn't. Of course, some stretch the description of New Adult to extend to Fifty Shades of Gray, so maybe it is. And this book is obviously patterned after the Fifty Shades phenomenon: cover, trilogy, billionaire guy, young woman discovering her own nascent sexuality. No BDSM yet, but maybe it's there in Parts 2 & 3, which I will not bother to read because I didn't care much for how this was written. Too many overused metaphors. Still, I totally get why all three in the series are in the Top 100 bestseller list.

Just For Now by Abbi Glines

Amazon description: Preston is one bad boy. And Amanda has harbored a crush on him for forever. When she finally makes her move on him, it does not end well. But still, she can’t resist him. Especially now that he seems to be pursuing her, too.

No one wants wants them to be together. Not Amanda’s brother and definitely not any of Preston’s buddies. They know way too much about Preston’s dark side. Even Preston realizes he’s not good enough for someone like her.

But Amanda believes there is more to Preston than his bad boy persona, and she is determined to unearth what he’s hiding behind his seductive blue eyes—secrets that could explain his actions. Secrets Amanda might not be able to forgive.

Observations: This is my first Abbi Glines of Vincent Boys fame. Girl is a college freshman, guy is a few years older in college. The guy is from the wrong side of the tracks, but is friends with girl's family. Again, guy has a deep, dark secret, but girl is obsessed with him. Eventually, they see each other's good sides, including the fact that they're both spectacularly hot. Also, the book opens with a seduction, and perhaps every time the guy and the girl are alone together, things get hot and heavy. Guy is over-protective that, if it were me, I would've knocked him down. But the girl apparently enjoys it so, whatever.

Take-aways:

Obviously, feminism doesn't sell.
Usual elements: protagonists range from 18 to early 20s, both really attractive; the guy is usually a girl/woman/cougar magnet; the girl may know she's pretty, but not realize how beautiful/sexually attractive she is; absence of a parental figure for an extended period of time; either or both protagonists have heavy issues to deal with (sexual abuse, death, poverty in one instance); girl may or may not be a virgin at the start of the book, but she definitely won't be by the end; sex is not hinted at but is explicit; language is easily accessible; guys calling girls "Baby" is expected, but not required.
The books obviously cater to both older teens and the adult market, and the authors that tend to do better are the ones with several books under their belt.

Did I like the books? Sure. Except one or two. Point is, I understand why they would sell. When I was thirteen, my classmates and I would pass around those Sweet Dreams books. And then, in less than a year, we graduated to Mills and Boon. The following year, the more daring of us--myself included--got our hands on Johanna Lindsay, Judith McNaught, Judith Krantz, Sidney Sheldon, etc. That's from the young adult point of view.

Then of course, when I was a thirty-something mom with two kids, I sucked up (excuse the pun) the Twilight series and the Mortal Instruments trilogy. I "read down" because I never really read a lot of YA when I was a YA. So I made up for it when I was an adult. And I'm sure all the Twi-moms and the Mundie moms out there, if Twitter is anything to go by, get a thrill when the young 'uns get a bit frisky. Now you can judge us/them all you want, but there it is. And it sells books.

That would be bookseller/publisher me talking. Reading advocate me would probably say, "It's great that these books get more people reading, so we should celebrate them. I still hope that readers explore other kinds of books, too, but in the end, even if I don't like a certain kind of book, I'm still glad that they have their readers." Former English teacher me would say, "My, why do kids and adults read more trash these days?"

Maybe that's why I'm a former English teacher.

So now we've established that I'm conflicted, I'm going to go get a bowl of ice cream and download that new adult novel written by the 17-year-old who got a million dollar book deal.

Tackling the Bestsellers: This Weekend's Reading Plan

2013-04-05T22:01:00.002+08:00

Before leaving work today, I spent some time looking at Amazon's current bestsellers on the Kindle store. This was prompted by this article that my boss posted on Facebook.

Ever since I started working in trade publishing and ebook selling a year and a half ago, it's become difficult for me to separate what I do for fun (reading) from what I do for a living (publishing and selling books). And so when I read books now, even if I just want to lose myself in the story (which I sometimes accomplish if it's a writer I love or trust), I often find my mind drifting to things like, "I wonder what went into the acquisition decision." or "Man, this sucks, but they had a good marketing plan for this." or "I wonder what the publishing history of this book is." and so on.

This also works vice-versa: my reading is increasingly influenced by my job. And not in the sense that I read marketing and psychology books (which I do, actually), but in the sense that I read books I wouldn't normally pick up, simply to find out why a lot of people love them.

So, I've been exposed to the wonderful world of every shade of erotica (BDSM, gay, paranormal, rubenesque, erotic non-consent, etc.), to find out what's in it that makes it sell like it does. (My most simplistic answer: sex and fantasy-fulfillment.) And though I probably wouldn't have been adventurous enough to pick up a BDSM erotica book or two prior to this job, I can't say that I didn't enjoy the ride when I sampled the genre and its subgenres.

Now, I've looked at the Amazon bestsellers before, because yes, you have to do your research if you're in ebook publishing. Admittedly, though, I never actually read many of the top 20 Kindle bestsellers (unless you're talking about The Hunger Games trilogy and Gone Girl), preferring to take note of the popular genres and reading other books of that genre.

But after reading that article, I thought--why not? And the part about reading the reviews--that's good advice. I can't say I've done a systematic comparison of reviews of these bestsellers. And if there's something that catches my imagination, it's research.

So, before I spend too long on this post and lose valuable reading time, I've decided that my reading plan for this weekend is to read as much as I can from the Amazon list of Kindle bestsellers, to have better context for reading the reviews. I'm calling it market research. Though, really, I'm merging with it my need to actually finish a book, and I find that the only book I've been able to finish in a span of four weeks is a new adult title called Wait for You by Jennifer Armentrout, writing as J. Lynn. (I gotta say, that's a kickass name--Armentrout.)

If I'm lucky, I'll finish 2-3 books by Sunday evening. If I'm luckier, I'll even get to post about it here. Barring that, I can always update my Shelfari bookshelf.

So, any of these Amazon Kindle bestsellers you're willing to try out?

Why I like what this bookstore is doing

2013-03-23T17:59:00.000+08:00

One of the videos in Fully Booked's What's My Story? campaign. I gush about John Williams' Stoner.:)

In the country I live in, there are two major bookstore chains. One has been around for more than 50 years, devotes a large part of its business to selling school and office supplies, and definitely has wider penetration. The other is less than 20 years old, has a more diverse selection of titles, but caters to clientele with larger disposable incomes.

I'd say both do their part in pushing a reading culture in my country. Whereas one has ventured into publishing popular local titles and selling a lot of other titles for cheap, the other provides its customers titles not usually found in the other store and actively engages its reading community.

Now, I'm very big on engaging the reading community. As a reader, I like to watch what companies in the book industry do to engage their readers. As a heavy user of social media, I also like to watch these companies' social media accounts and see whether the "voice" they have and the content they put up are attractive to me and other readers.

Personally, I'd have to give it to Fully Booked for engaging their community. No, not because I'm in the videos posted here, but because they actually used their customers and reading community in their campaign.

A few years ago, I remember some book blogger friends lamenting the fact that bookstores often used celebrities (actors, models, etc.) to promote their wares. Their beef was not that celebrities don't read (though I'm betting only a few of them do), but that book bloggers couldn't really relate to these celebrities. And though I can understand the use of a popular face to sell one's product, I also wished that bookstores saw the growing community of Filipino readers. We got our recommendations from friends, trusted bloggers, and book websites we frequented. We did not get them from celebrities.

The What's your Story? billboard in front of the Fully Booked main branch.

The itty-bitty picture of me, with some of the other readers interviewed.

Here's an experiment: tell me who got you interested in reading. Chances are, very few to nil of you will say, "Oh, I saw holding/reading/talking about a book, and from then on, I fell in love with reading."

(Related thought: You know, though I'm not likely to take a book recommendation from a celebrity, I would definitely take it from a character, e.g. Lisa Simpson, Rory Gilmore, folks at Mad Men, etc.)

Anyway, apparently Fully Booked, in a series of focus group discussions, did ask their customers where they got their recommendations from. And the answer was from other readers. And so, this year, they launched a campaign with a host of regular customers who just talk about their favorite books, favorite characters, their reading journey, etc. And they're inviting other customers to share their favorite books and their own reading stories, too.

Finally, someone who got it.

The campaign is called What's Your Story? I got invited to be one of the customers to share the our reading stories in the videos. I think there are about ten videos so far, which you can check out on Youtube. There are also a few videos of people sharing their bookshelves. And whenever they release one of these videos, they use their Facebook and Twitter accounts to ask their other customers to share their own favorite books, characters, etc. Here are a couple more of the videos where I make the cut.:)

Whoever's in charge of their Facebook and Twitter accounts, by the way, gets a hat tip from me. Quick responses, chipper and friendly tone, and always a response. They ask these interesting questions on Twitter that get a lot of retweets and replies. And I will honestly say that, among all the companies that have something to do with books (i.e., publishers and bookstores), I think they're doing the best job with customer engagement on social media.

Now, I have no idea how successful this campaign is going to be. But for the sheer bravery of deciding to focus on their readers, instead of their merchandise or their company, I'm hoping that Fully Booked does really well with it.

To the Fully Booked Marketing team: thanks so much for including me, for always responding to your customers on Twitter, and, in general, for deciding to ask your readers what they want. In the end, I guess we readers just want the same thing--to be acknowledged and to find others like us.

The FFP 2013 Diversity Challenge

2013-01-05T17:53:00.001+08:00

I think part of the growth of a reader is to start trying out books or genres which one doesn't usually read. The trial might result in a long-term love affair with the genre, temporary preference, mild tolerance, or outright rejection. Even if it's the last case, one can at least say, "I don't like ." and know whereof one speaks.

Enter the Flips Flipping Pages (FFP) 2013 Diversity Reading Challenge. As I mentioned, we resurrected the challenge this year with new categories. Three years, after all, is enough time for new book trends to gain prominence. And given the changes in technology, I believe it's high time for us to explore the new ways that content is packaged.

This Diversity Challenge is open to members of our book club, Flips Flipping Pages, an online/offline book club for Filipinos all over the world. If you're interested, you can head on over to Shelfari to join the club, with the click of a button.

If you don't want to or can't join the club but want to participate, that's cool, too. You can do what I do when there's a challenge and I want to do it, but I'm not inclined to formally state my participation. You can just take note of the categories here and complete them on your own.

Of course, part of the fun is comparing notes with or getting book recommendations from other people, so I do hope you show up in the threads or, at the very least, mention the origin of the category list. Speaking of the list, here it is:

FFP 2013 Diversity Challenge Line-Up

1 Common Book--published in 2013 (To be announced before June 2013)
1 for The Umberto Eco Challenge (fiction or non-fiction)
1 for the Partner's Challenge (mechanics to follow)
3 titles for Alternative Media Challenge (at least one of them an audiobook. Children's book apps excluded.)
1 Foreign Award Winner
1 Self-published/Indie book - Foreign
1 Self-published/Indie book - Local. This is also 1 out 4 local titles
1 Local Title - Non-fiction
1 Local Title - Award-winning
1 Local Title - Filipino language or other local languages and dialects
1 Foreign Book 1 - Asia, except the Philippines (author or publisher)
1 Foreign Book 2 - Australia (author or publisher)
1 Foreign Book 3 - North America, except USA (author or publisher)
1 Foreign Book 4 - South America (author or publisher)
1 Foreign Book 5 - Europe, except England (author or publisher)
1 Foreign Book 6 - Africa (author or publisher)
1 Read-Along (Read-alongs are voluntary and may be scheduled by anyone in the club at any time. The first one is in January, on Murakami's IQ84.)
1 Poetry
2 Non-Fiction books (bios, business, art, essays, travel, philosophy, psychology, etc.)
2 books from any edition of 1001 Books to Read Before You Die
1 Graphic Novel

Total: 25 books/titles

If you prefer the chart version, you can also download the excel file made by FFP founder, Gege. It summarizes the list very nicely.

The excel file

And there are additional guidelines, also written by Gege:

Guidelines:

For most categories, the book will be decided on by the reader. Exceptions: Common book, Read-along book, Partner's Challenge
All the books must be read within 2013.
Rereads are allowed.
Deadline of completion: the eve of the FFP Christmas party (to be announced)
Overlaps with FFP's 2013 line-up allowed.
Internal overlaps not allowed. Different titles for each of the 25 books. For example, Gaiman's Sandman cannot be listed twice for graphic novel and award winner. You have to choose in which category to put it.
Each book must be completed from first to last pages. (Forewords, prefaces, indexes, etc. excluded.)

I'm very excited about this list because it works in a lot of my own interests and advocacies. For instance, really happy about the indie/self-published categories. I think more people should give indie authors and publishers a chance. Though some of them are a pain to read, there are quite a few that are impressive.

Also happy about the alternative media category. Obviously, I've no problem with ebooks, but I've never actually listened to an audiobook in full. I'm curious about how I'll take to it. And about the apps, I do have The Silent History on my iPad, but I haven't really read a lot from it. Still, I know there are other enhanced/multi-touch ebooks and book apps out there, so I'm going to have fun exploring them.

Of course, happy that the Filipino category still there, with ever more variety. I happen to think that some of the best Philippine writers today are independently published authors. Mainly, they're the ones pushing the envelope on Philippine writing, opting to come up with new forms instead of the hackneyed old styles and themes.

The 2 books from the 1001 Book List are in line with one of my goals of reading as many books as I like from that list. I also love the poetry and graphic novel part. Oh, and the challenge to read one book from every continent (except Antarctica. We weren't sure we could find a lot of writers from Antarctica. Are there? Do tell.) is also a personal goal I'm glad has been explicitly stated through this challenge.

After a 2-day reading slump, I've finally started on a book for the challenge. It's a Spanish zombie novel, translated into English and republished by AmazonCrossing. I'm reading the ebook, so this goes either in the Europe or Alternative Media cateogory--haven't decided yet. In any case, it's one of those.

And now the question: how much of a challenge is this list? Well, if we're talking about finding titles that fit the categories, I think most of us can say that that won't be much of a challenge. One of the advantages afforded to us these days is the ease by which we can find books. Not available in a bookstore? There are always ebooks. And I'm fortunate enough to be familiar with a few indie authors, so I know where their books can be found.

But the funner part of the challenge is to fill the list with books that are, at the very least, interesting. Preferably awesome. Diversity, if you pardon my saying so, should be very easy these days when you can Google almost everything. Provided that the individual is willing, that is.

What I'm more interested in, however, is curation. So, I'd like to fulfill this challenge with a curated list of titles that I would not be ashamed of recommending. If I happen to read a book that I don't like, I'm going to try my darnedest to read another book in that category. If I still end up not liking the second book, I'm going to stop there. I only have a year, you know. Which is why if push comes to shove, it's also likely I'll forego the second book. I'm wishy-washy that way.

Anyway, I'm 68% into Apocalypse Z. It's so-so. Nothing astounding. We'll see what the last 30% bring.

Any other books you'd like to recommend for any of our Diversity Challenge categories? Would be happy to pass the word along.

The Ride: 2013 Reading Plan

2013-01-03T01:06:00.002+08:00

The Princess and the Goblin, McSweeney's Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales,
My Mother She Killed Me, My Father He Ate Me, Kikomachine #1, Hark! A Vagrant, Building Stories

See these books (not my messy desk behind them)? I dipped into these lovelies last year, but I never got to finish them. For a few of them, such as My Mother She Killed Me, My Father He Ate Me, McSweeney's Mammoth Book of Thrilling Tales, and Hark! A Vagrant, I did more than dip; I was halfway in. Was reading each of those a little at a time, until I was either distracted by work or by other books.

A big part of this year's reading plan, then, is to ensure that I finish these books. Based on what I've read, these are all books worth my time. Besides, I'd like to get them off my messy desk.

What else constitutes my reading plan this year?

Well, because I purposely did not join any reading challenges last year, explicitly stated or otherwise, I'm going to swing the opposite direction and join a few this year.

FFP's 2013 Diversity Challenge - This year, my book club, Flips Flipping Pages, has revived its Diversity Challenge. The last one was held in 2009 and had been relegated to the dark abyss of buried discussion threads. But we've now dug up the challenge and come up with new categories to explore the wide range of content nowadays. The challenge even comes complete with an excel file.
Goodreads 2013 Reading Challenge - This is more a quantity challenge than anything else. But I thought I'd use this Goodreads function just to formalize it. My number is 52. It's lower than the number of books I read this year, yes, but it's really more of a placeholder number. When I targeted to read 100 books or more, I didn't like the reading choices I made just to fulfill the number. So now it's a completely doable number.

My other goals are the following:

Read more books by African woman writers (a carry-over from last year)
Read at least 2 books in the Time 100 List (I don't think I made any headway on this list last year.)
Read under-the-radar books (No specific number. But I'm going to keep my eyes out for them. I think there are many great books and writers out there that don't get the audience they deserve. Would like to give a few of them one more reader: me.)

What isn't on my list of goals for this year is any kind of book-buying or book acquisition resolution. I completely give up on those. I give up! I tried limiting my book buying to 12 a year. I tried limiting it to $23/month. I tried reading my TBR books and not acquiring anything until I had read a book in my TBR. Nada. Nothing worked.

To be fair to myself, all of those things did limit my book buying somewhat. Only, I was never completely successful. And so, no such goal for me this year. I will trust on my discretion about book buying and see where that leads.

The rest of my reading? As usual, I'm going to try to keep it loose. I did try to program my reading before (like in 2010), but I realized that didn't work for me either. It's kind of hard to program one's reading, what with the constant flow of book recommendations you can get from your favorite blogs, book clubs, friends, and news sites. Would you like to hear another funny thing? Those books in that 2010 link? To date, I've still only read a total of 6 of them. Out of 41 in my 2010 TBR. You see how useful historical perspective is? Makes you realize what a joke all of this personal goal-setting can be.

The only defense? To be cool about it. That sounds so very Fonzie, but what I mean is that even if I don't get there, I sure as hell am going to enjoy the ride.

10 Best Reads of 2012

2012-12-31T23:43:00.002+08:00

Forty-five minutes before the clock strikes 12 here, and 2013 steps in. So, I've enough time to finally post my ten favorite reads from 2012. I actually read a lot of good books this year, but it's been a custom on this blog to post 10 of my favorite books for the year. My main criteria for choosing these books: I ponder on them until now and still have warm feelings when I see them.

The Family Fang by Kevin Wilson - I found this story of a family of performance artists hilarious and moving, especially with the kids having to deal with their crazy parents.
The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides - I loved Middlesex, but this one, my God. It is beautiful. The language, the characters, the description of the house and community.
House of Mirth by Edith Wharton - I still feel bad about Lily Bart. She was a rebel, but things just didn't work out her way.
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot - This is the book that made me want to read more scientific journalism. Fantastic research by Ms. Skloot and great portraits of Henrietta Lacks's family.
American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis - More than grossing me out, this book made me laugh in a good way. There's something hilarious and pitiful in Patrick Bateman's efforts to make others see him for what he is.
Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas - I read the abridged version when I was younger and didn't like it. Glad I got the Penguin unabridged edition this time. If you're looking for a classic and a page-turner, this is it.
North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell - Two words: Richard Armitage. Warm, warm feelings all around.
Alif the Unseen by G. Willow Wilson - This was a surprising book for me. Loved the Eastern mythology and theology. I'm distraught that it's not widely available in my neck of the woods, and hence, not read much. But as a technothriller, page-turner, fantasy book, and means to understand Islamic culture, this is perfect.
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn - What to say about this book that hasn't been said by everyone else? Suffice to say, I loved the excitement.
The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to our Brains by Nicholas Carr - Read this as the first book in our Non-fiction Reading Challenge. I just checked my Kindle. I have over 200 highlights and notes combined. It is fascinating, and such rich fodder for discussion.

Unfortunately, I don't have reviews of the books, what with my awful blogging year. But I do hope my posting them here urges some of you to pick them up. They're all worth your time.

Fifteen minutes to midnight at the end of this post. Happy New Year!

2012 Reading Round-up

2012-12-31T22:20:00.001+08:00

Some of the books I read this year

And in the photo finish of photo finishes, here's my year in reading, 2012 edition. At the beginning of the year, I jokingly said in one of our book club threads that I'm targeting to read 10 books this year. I didn't want to pressure myself to reach a certain number of books read at the expense of relishing reading or choosing books that I actually want to read. That happened when I used to set my reading target to 100 books for the year.

Now, according to my Shelfari bookshelf, I read a total of 55 books this year, give or take. I say "give or take" because I really wasn't sure how to count the comic book issues and graphic novels. Also, there are a few indie comics and books that I haven't been able to add to my bookshelf. In any case, I'm happy to say I exceeded the 10 book goal.:-P

So, the books I read in 2012:

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
The Sisters Brothers by Patrick DeWitt
Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs
The Family Fang by Kevin Wilson
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmidt
The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides
The Help by Kathryn Stockett
Room by Emma Donoghue
The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton
Sweet Tooth: Book 26 by Jeff Lemire
Sweet Tooth: Book 27 by Jeff Lemire
Sweet Tooth: Book 28 by Jeff Lemire
Sweet Tooth: Book 29 by Jeff Lemire
The Road by Cormac McCarthy
Graceling by Kristin Cashore
Habibi by Craig Thompson
Hollowland (The Hollows, Book 1) by Amanda Hocking
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
The Magicians by Lev Grossman
The Silent Land by Graham Joyce
The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell
Luna by Julie Anne Peters
The Secret History by Donna Tartt
The Gingerbread House by Carin Gerhardsen
Seed by Ania Ahlborn
A Curse Dark as Gold by Elizabeth C. Bunce
Voices in the Theater by A.S. Santos
The Confessions of Max Tivoli by Andrew Sean Greer
Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (or, These Foolish Things) by Deborah Moggach
Seducing Cinderella by Gina Maxwell
Intimate Strangers by Laura Taylor
The Religion by Tim Willocks
In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
Porcupirate Plans the Day by Robert Magnuson
Married by Mistake by Abby Gaines
Lady Audley's Secret by Mary Elizabeth Braddon
The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
A Town Like Alice by Nevil Shute
Maid for the Billionaire by Ruth Cardello
Every Day by David Levithan
Alif the Unseen by G. Willow Wilson
The Twelve by Justin Cronin
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
Goodbye for Now by Laurie Frankel
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
Little Bee by Chris Cleave
No One Writes to the Colones and Other Stories by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloane
Graceland by Chris Abani
Days of Blood and Starlight by Laini Taylor
The Song of Achilles by Madeleine Miller
The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to our Brains by Nicholas Carr

And these are some of the books not included in Shelfari, because I've frankly been too lazy to create the book page yet:

Trese 5: Midnight Tribunal by Budjette Tan and Kajo Baldisimo
Texticles by Adam David
School Run and a few other indie-published local comics
A slew of indie published erotica. Seriously.

I could say I read many of the erotica books for work reasons, but that's not entirely true. I read them because I wanted to read them.

Aside from that, I'd say I met half of the rest of my 2012 reading goals, according to this post. Specifically:

relinquish my little semblance of control and be entirely honest with myself. Ergo, I opt not to formally join any reading challenge this year. - OK
let my reading develop organically, while trying to read more of the following:

African women writers - NOT OK
Filipino literature (for fun, not just for work. Though work is fun.) - OK
Graphic novels - OK

try to limit my book buying to P1000 (around $23) per month. - NOT OK
try blog more regularly? - SO NOT OK
participate in or organize more read-alongs, either with fellow book club members or fellow bloggers. - KINDA OK
definitely have a Ulysses read-along with Jaclyn of a book diary. It will last a year and we'll be checking in with each other every 16th of the month. - NOPE. NOT EVEN CLOSE.

Forgot about these reading goals, really. But it seems that I've had a lot of them at the back of my mind, hence the OKs. Next year, I'm going to keep on trying with the African women writers, and will consolidate all my reading goals for next year in a later post.

I honestly don't know how this reading year compares with my other reading years, unless we consider quantity. But I think measures should be more than quantity. Suffice to say, I either enjoyed what I read this year or I enjoyed reading the books, regardless of whether I liked them or not.

Reading is so complex these days, what with all the social networks, status messages, internal and external ebook links, reviews, etc., etc. I think it's better for me to simplify and just enjoy losing myself in a book.

By the way, a happy end of 2012 and Happy New Year to all of you!

Time is a tyrant

2012-12-12T02:02:00.000+08:00

(img src)

Earlier today, I was thinking of all the things I've been planning to do. It started with me wondering why I'm not a full-time mom, because I occasionally find myself wishing that I were. Of course, aside from the fact that I have to earn a living, I also enjoy my job tremendously. So, the desire to be a full-time mom is really a function of time. I would love to have enough time to do all the activities I'd like to do with my kids and do my job well.

But it's not as if my family and my job are the only things I want to do. I'm not even talking about bucket list things here, although I do hope to spend a few weeks in each major European city one day. I'm talking about simple, doable things like my hobbies (reading) and my advocacies (reading) which I haven't gotten around to because there are only so many hours in a day.

There are all those books I've been wanting to read. Books in my physical TBR, books in my Kindle's TBR, books in people's best of 2012 book lists, books that my friends are pimping to me, books that very few people read but promise to be awesome, etc., etc.

Like, did you know that Kirkus Reviews came out with a list of the 100 Best Teen Books of 2012? I'm not a big teen book reader, though I do dabble now and then. But 100! They actually narrowed down the list to 100 teen titles published in 2012. And that's just for teen books. There's a different list for fiction, non-fiction, children's. One hundred books each. My point is, how can a reader compete? We might not like all of the books in Kirkus's list, but I think it's safe to say that there are just so many good books being published these days that there is no chance to read everything we might want to read.

So we limit, we set standards, we prioritize. Because time is something we can never bargain with, no matter how much we want to or wish for a TARDIS (Doctor Who's time machine, for the non-fans). And like some of my mentors always said, you focus on the things you can control.

I can control my reading goals, which have always been personal. Whether I meet my goals or not won't have a big impact on you or anyone else. But then there are my reading advocacy plans, which might have a bigger impact. Or, at least, I hope they have a bigger impact, otherwise what's the use of that advocacy?

I really could use one of these. (img src)

These, then, are the things I've always wanted to do and have been planning on doing, with the help of many friends:

Work on the incorporation of the Filipino ReaderCon. Why? Because it will have a greater potential for sustainability.
Conduct an online survey that mirrors the 2012 Readership Survey conducted by the National Book Development Board and the Social Weather Station. Why? Because I think it would be useful for publishers and authors to get answers to the questions from a population with a potentially higher reading index. And I'm hoping it would give the reading community vindication.
Help set up a Filipino Book Bloggers' (FBB) directory. Like, set up a Google form in the FBB website that will save the info in a public and free excel file that publishers and authors can use for marketing purposes and book bloggers can use to find fellow book bloggers.
Start planning for next year's ReaderCon. Already have a couple of new segments and talks in mind and the tentative theme is "What Other People Are Reading." I admit I am stealing this idea from something the people at Fully Booked said: that readers just want to know what other readers are reading. And that makes perfect sense. Case in point: book bloggers. Also, I'd like to have more regional representation in next year's ReaderCon.:)
Help the Readers' Choice Awards get more exposure and more traction.
Talk more with Paolo about what we can do for the Young Adult Reader Carnival (YARC) and high school book clubs.

And then the other things that I haven't fully thought out yet but would love to make happen:

Book clubs "adopting" a public school or a district and helping said "adoptee" through book donations and book discussions or tips for setting up their own clubs. Why? Because book clubs I know have a wealth of books, have enormous experience with fun book discussions, and are truly passionate about the things they read. It would be nice to show these things to schools with struggling reading programs and get them excited about reading, too.
Help make World Book Night happen in the Philippines.

Why am I posting all of this here? Partly to force myself into action, thereby exercising some control over the tyranny of time; partly so that people can steal my ideas, if they so want to. I am not averse to someone else doing any of these things, as long as someone does them. (well, that is, except the program for the ReaderCon. I love coming up with the program.) But I would think that everything else is fair game.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think these things are glaring gaps in the local scene. And the gaps need to be filled. However, if there are already existing projects like these, then point me their way and I will gladly join or support them. Yeah, I have time.

So, uh, any of these things you want to help out with?

Non-fiction Read-along Project

2012-12-06T00:43:00.000+08:00

The books for our non-fic read-along

Over at our Shelfari book club, Flips Flipping Pages, a friend, Shani, and I have announced our new non-fiction read-along project.

The project was born out of our combined geek minds, minds that like talking about pop psychology, technology, marketing, maybe a little philosophy, and other such nonsense.

Seriously, we just wanted to read more non-fiction and talk about it.

So, we've lined up the following books for our non-fiction read-along. One book per month:

December - The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains by Nicholas Carr
January - Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything by Joshua Foer
February - You are Not So Smart: Why You Have Too Many Friends on Facebook, Why Your Memory Is Mostly Fiction, and 46 Other Ways You're Deluding Yourself by David McRaney

What was intended as a two-woman read-along became something we opened up to our other book club members, though people don't have to join for all the months. We're keeping it loose and unofficial (our official discussions fill up pretty quickly). We also said that even if it were just the two of us, we'd go for it.

Nevertheless, I'm posting this here because there might be someone reading this who'd like to join the read-along. I find that discussions are more interesting if there's plurality of ideas. So, you can head on over to our thread on Shelfari. Or, come to think of it, you can just comment here. I'm thinking of putting up a post after each read-along anyway. We can talk about the books there, too.

And, while we're at it, any other non-fic reads you'd like to suggest for us?

Five Filipino books more people should read

2012-12-02T23:59:00.001+08:00

Top Row L-R: Smaller and Smaller Circles, It's a Mens World, The El Bimbo Variations
Bottom Row L-R: Texticles, Joaquinesquerie, sample of Pop Stories for Groovy Kids cover

This is a post I've been promising to write for a few months now. So, it's a day after my birthday--new year, new life and all that jazz-- and I'm finally getting off my bum to finish it. Let's call this the year that I do the things I've been planning to do for a long time.

Caveat # 1: This list is based only on the books I've read and really loved. Unfortunately, I haven't read as many Filipino books as I'd like.

Caveat # 2: I suppose some of you know I work with a publishing company. And so, though I do love many of the books we published, I've decided on not including them in this list for now. Would like to reserve them for another post (if I do finally get around to that). So, these books are not published by us.

Caveat # 3: Though I may know the writers of some of these books, I'd like to think I put their books here not because I know them, but because I really enjoy what they've written.

Smaller and Smaller Circles by F.H. Batacan - It's a forensic mystery involving a serial killer, though, as the book often says, there are no serial killers in the Philippines. I don't know how true that statement is, but this book is one of the few Filipino books I've read that is quite a page-turner. The detectives are two Jesuit priests, Father Brown style, from an unnamed but thoroughly recognizable (at least to us Filipinos) university. They're trying to solve a series of gruesome murders of children in one of the slum districts of Manila. I was happy to hear that the author, Ichi Batacan, is out to write a sequel to this book. In my opinion, it's about time.
It's a Mens World by Beverly Siy - The title may be a bit misleading, since it's in English, and the book is written mostly in Taglish (Tagalog-English). But Bebang Siy's essays are by turns moving and laugh-out-loud funny. Or both. (I'm serious about the laugh-out-loud part, as I had to try an contain my laughter since I was reading it beside my husband who was already asleep.) The magnificent thing about her essays: though they are about her coming of age and her family, Bebang's life mirrors experiences that many of us Filipinos go through and her insights are not platitudes. She seems to offer us her life with humor and joy, regardless of what she went through. And if you meet Bebang, you'll know that that's exactly how she is--always offering people joy.
The El Bimbo Variations by Adam David - I reviewed this a couple of years ago. It's an independent book written and published by a guy who, full disclosure, now works with me. This book isn't on this list because he works with me. Rather, he works with me because I had read this book and I think Adam is one of the most creative and smartest people I've met. And his intellect does not get in the way of his writing something delightful, so what you have is something funny, irreverent, smart, and riffing off something beloved in Philippine pop culture. And to think it's poetry! I often wish I had enough money to help him print enough copies and distribute these copies to every bookstore in the land so that more people read them. Because I think if teachers use the book as a way to show students poetry, be it English or Filipino, then we'll have more lovers of poetry in the Philippines. If you'd like to see the earliest version of the book, you can also download it from the Goodreads link.
Texticles by Adam David - Obviously, I really like Adam's work. This one is a fiction collection, though of a more experimental nature. The narratives are a series of exercises, written with different constraints that, again, would be FANTASTIC if used in a classroom showing students the really fun ways you can write or the amazing things you can do with words. Or, if you're not a teacher, then you can always marvel at how beautifully Adam writes these short pieces and vignettes. And fun. They are seriously fun. Oh, did I mention he designs his own covers, too? You'll see them above. They're the ones without any text on the front cover.
Joaquinesquerie: Myth a la Mod by Nick Joaquin - This is actually a collection of what were originally children's stories entitled Pop Stories for Groovy Kids from a Filipino writing legend, Nick Joaquin. I first read the stories in this collection in my mid-20s. Hence, I did not read them with children's eyes and looked at them as one of those modern fairy tale collections, because that is what they are. When I found out later that they were originally issued as story books, I thought that the stories were doubly fantastic because they held an appeal for both kids and adults. The stories are intelligent, magical mash-ups of Philippine legends and Western fairy tales, yet the mash-ups remain faithful to the spirit of both the stories and their characters. You know how some mash-ups in Glee sound like they're murdering both songs? (Sorry, Glee fans.) Well, this is the opposite of that. Unfortunately, this copy is hard to find. And so are the original stories. They are all out of print. I sincerely hope the Joaquin estate is making plans of republishing these stories for a new generation of readers. These stories shouldn't lie dormant. And I think it really doesn't matter which publisher publishes them or whether the Joaquins independently publish them, just as long as the stories are out there again. Here I speak as a fan and as someone who is always wishing there are more great texts that will make readers out of non-readers. Please. Bring them back.

I hope those who read this do try at least one of these titles, if you haven't already. You may not like them as much as I do. Then again, you may. I'll settle for you giving them a chance. And for those books that aren't widely available, then I dearly hope their publishers read this and do something to make them accessible. It would be lovely to see them widely read.

Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloane

2012-11-25T19:51:00.000+08:00

img src

These books about books are difficult for book-lovers to ignore, I think. You put the word "bookstore" in the title, with a quirky name and, bam! Next bibliophile that comes across it is going to pick it up for sure.

Well, in my case, I checked the Amazon page. I'd been seeing the hype around the novel. So, bookshop + quirky name + interesting book description + hype = Yes, I will get you.

My initial question, though, was whether I'd get the print book or the ebook. I'd also read this interview of Robin Sloane implying that, in the age of ebooks, you have to find reasons for buyers to invest in the print book. I thought that was a pretty smart idea. There has to be added value to the print book, otherwise people like me, who try not to overburden our currently overburdened book shelves, are just going to get the ebook.

So I checked out what added value the print book had. I usually get the print book if: 1) I know the book's going to be a keeper; 2) There are illustrations that I know will suck on an ereader; 3) There's a particular book design on the print book that is going to be impossible to replicate on an ebook (think Tree of Codes or Mark Danielewski's House of Leaves). Apparently, the only added value in the print book is the glow-in-the-dark cover. Seriously? And it's not like it's an astounding dust jacket design. Disappointment #1.

Of course, I got the ebook. Not going to spring for a more expensive print book just for a glow-in-the-dark book jacket.

Then I started reading it. Now, I've been reading a couple of techno-mystery/thrillers/romance that ALWAYS have a computer programmer as the main character (Alif the Unseen, Goodbye For Now). They're written in very accessible prose. I guess if you're a book blogger, you know that "accessible" is a euphemism for "easy enough for an average 15-year-old kid to read." Alif, I loved, for reasons that I might yet write about in this blog. Goodbye for Now was too raw for me, but I liked all this discussion about how technology and the internet is changing how we view things, absorb knowledge, and experience the world.

Thus, I had high hopes for Mr. Penumbra.

I'm sorry to say, I'm kind of let down. And yes, I know I'm in the minority.

Let me say first that it is a fun read. You can breeze through it in perhaps 4-6 hours, less if you're a speed reader. The prose is reminiscent of Ready Player One, really, including some of the snark. There's an old bookstore, old books (of course!), a fusty but charming proprietor, computer geeks, design geeks, book geeks, typography, mention of bestsellers, tech start-ups, a secret society (a very tame version of the Illuminati, if you ask me), a fake fantasy series reminiscent of Dungeons and Dragons, and Google. Sounds fun, doesn't it? Definitely, for a certain type of audience.

But early into it, it laid on the Google love pretty thick, as though Google is the awesomest place and company on Earth. Now, I don't doubt it would be cool to work for Google, but I take it against my fiction if it shows an obvious bias towards a corporation. Disappointment #2.

And then there were the characters who, I guess, would be great if they were cardboard stereotypes of a fast-paced Hollywood tv series. Everyone is just so convenient. Disappointment #3. Yes, they're cute, but I like my characters more dynamic, especialy if we're going to talk about books and technology, which I feel strongly about.

I guess this is really why I was disappointed with the book: because I love books, and I work in ebooks, and I'm familiar with the technology. For instance, I know that the Harry Potter ebooks are not really "unhackable," like the book claims. I know there's no cloth-bound ereader yet developed by Google, and I seriously doubt Google would even go into developing a dedicated e-reading device. I can't believe that all the computing power of Google with all of the brain power of its engineers fail to see the solution that the character eventually finds in the end.

But let's say we take all of this in stride. After all, it's a work of fiction. In which case, I was hoping for a more nuanced take into the transformation of Old Knowledge, OK for short, found in books to the more ubiquitous digital kind. Every kind of information container was thrown into the story: print books, ebooks, audio books, computers, old printing machines, stubs for types, even museum warehouses--repositories of forgotten human knowledge. But it felt like it was just all thrown in there, without really giving a satisfying perspective on how we now consume our information.

And then there's this cop-out at the end: an homage to friendship. Really? Can it get cornier than that? Oh wait, there's the epilogue. Yes, yes it could.

Ok, reading this you might think I hate the book. In all honesty, I didn't. I was just disappointed, because I expected much, especially from a former Twitter manager. I grant that this might not entirely be the book's fault. I'm not sure, then, if I should blame the marketing department, or all those people who gave it 5 stars in their Amazon reviews.

My recommendation: go read it. Seriously, it's not entirely a bad way to spend a Sunday afternoon. You can geek out just thinking about the book shop or the books they're selling. And you are not me, so you don't have my immediate biases towards the book. I'd even recommend it for a high school reading list, though if you are a teacher and include it in your reading list, I'd also suggest you process all the Google love with your students.

Now, though, I'm hankering for a book that really means something.

P.S., If you're so inclined, here's a really smart, albeit long, discussion about books, from printed to ebooks, content vs. container.

Impressed with Bel Kaufman and Open Road Media

2012-09-19T23:01:00.000+08:00

Bel Kaufman, author of one of my all-time favorite books. (img src)

I got an email yesterday from a Ms. De Silva of Open Road Media. It was a marketing email telling me about the release of Bel Kaufman's cult classic, Up the Down Staircase, in ebook format. It gave the usual short background about the author and a link to new content, specifically a video of Bel Kaufmann.

Now, I usually do not do anything about emails like this. Not that I don't appreciate them--trust me, I do. I am shallow and, once in a while, I like feeling important enough for a marketer's email. But I have a lot of things on my plate--as might be obvious from the sporadic posts on this blog--so I really don't have the time to take books for review or even post announcements and such.

But I'm making an exception for this. Because I am truly impressed.

First, I am impressed by Bel Kaufman. My God, the woman is 101 years old! And lucid as ever. I fell in love with Up the Down Staircase because of the honest, inspiring, and hilarious view of the teaching profession. It resonated deeply, hence I wrote about it way back in 2009. To this day, I still have mushy feelings towards it, hence this post.

But the other reason I am impressed is due to the tenacity and the research by the people in Open Road Media. Ms. De Silva's email started with the following:

Hi there,

I'm writing because of your honest and thoughtful review of Bel Kaufman's Up the Down Staircase a few years ago. I recently came across your post, and I absolutely appreciated your take on Kaufman's work.

I don't know how sincere this is. I'd like to believe it is. But either way, I'm flattered. The email's very targeted and personal. Ms. De Silva did her research and reached out. And I know this is sort of a basic thing that book bloggers will say to and expect of publishers' online marketing teams but believe me, not everyone does their research. Not everyone will even take the time to Google their book's title, see who wrote about it, and approach them.

And I love that they created a page specifically for the upcoming ebook editions of Ms. Kaufman's works. And that they added a new interview with Bel Kaufman. Fantastic marketing.

Granted, Open Road Media might have more resources than other smaller players. Still. It's a joy to see things done right.

Within the same email, Ms. De Silva says "If [the video] moves you, I hope you'll consider sharing it with your friends and readers."

So Ms. De Silva, yes, the video did move me. I got chills when I saw the text from the book again. Makes me think it's time for a reread. What also moved me is the attention you guys put in reaching out to readers. Thank you and more power to you.

And to everyone else: my recommendation from three years ago still stands. Go lose yourself in the book. I doubt many of you will regret it.

A more meaningful MIBF

2012-09-16T17:25:00.000+08:00

Maybe because I was thinking of Christmas? And maybe because, for the first time in ever, I only bought Filipino-published books.

For the uninitiate, the MIBF stands for the Manila International Book Fair, the country's biggest and most prominent book fair. Unlike other book fairs around the globe, the MIBF is really more of consumers' market, with hordes of readers descending upon the happily waiting publishers and distributors, setting out to find the long sought for book or the cheapest bargain. And, lately, hoping to catch a favorite author during one of the book launches or author-signing events during the MIBF.

The show runs for 5 days. It started on a Weds., Sept. 12 and will run till Sept. 16. My first visit was on a Friday, where I bought these four books for my kids:

Three are from Hiyas Publishing (OMF Lit) and one from Adarna House, Inc.

The Great Duck and Crocodile Race by Robert Magnuson - which I love. Love the art, love the text, love the message. It was also named as one of the Best Reads of 2012 in the last Philippine National Children's Book Awards.
Porcupirate Plans the Day by Robert Magnuson - another wonderful book from Mr. Magnuson which made me go, "Awwwww." We actually helped convert this print book into an ebook. That opportunity made me admire Robert's work ethic even more, considering that he really took the time to immerse himself in the entire process and even redrew a lot of the pages to make sure that the ebook edition looks good given the format. His publisher, the wonderful people from OMF Lit, have already made the ebook version of this available on Amazon.
Boom Bang Clang by Malou Malibiran-Salumbides (text) and Robert Magnuson (art) - Yes, I've become a fan. But this book is another charming story in the Filipino language.
But That Won't Wake Me Up! by Annie and Anelka Lumbao - a lovely story by mother-and-daughter team Annie and Anelka, and published by Adarna House. The book won in this year's first Filipino Readers' Choice Awards, Children's Book category. This children's book also has an ebook version available on our store, Flipreads.

And that's all I bought on the first day of my visit.

Went back on the second day, toting my kids this time. I got them a few other activity books. And then I got these, too...

Local books so worth spending time and money on

Multiple copies of:

The Great Duck and Crocodile Race, Porcupirate, But That Won't Wake Me Up!
Just Add Dirt by Becky Bravo (text) and Jason Moss (art) - because if you have an eight-year-old boy or if you are an eight-year-old boy, then you will understand this story very well.
some puzzle booklets
It's a Mens World by Bebang Siy - utterly hilarious memoir, written in Filipino. (Yup, it's really "Mens" not "Men's.") The book also won in the Essay category in the Readers' Choice Awards and is published by Anvil Publishing.

No, I don't intend to sell any of these, which might be what the cashiers were thinking when they were asking why I was buying multiple copies. I just decided to do some of my Christmas shopping in the book fair. And if you're familiar with Christmas in the Philippines, then you know why some of us shop months ahead.

I also figure that this is a fantastic way to keep on promoting local literature: to give these gifts to people I think might like them. Short of ramming it down their throats. (No, I don't do that anymore.)

Though I would like to because these are books I believe in.

Anyway, the only things I got for me, sort of, are these:

Filipino editions! Plus one new comic series, Animen.

These are Filipino translations of Twilight and the first two books of Vampire Diaries! And who is responsible for this? Local romance books publisher Precious Hearts Romances. I think it's awesome. I really do. Because this publisher and their books, which may be looked down upon by many in the literary establishment, prove that many Filipinos read. And the fact that they worked to have local translations of these popular franchises available shows me that they keep their readers' preferences in mind and leads me to hope that reading will become more of a habit among Filipinos. They even have Tagalog translations of The Hunger Games and Fifty Shades of Grey in the pipeline. And though I may not read some of these books, as a reader I completely respect and admire what they're doing.

And that's all I bought. I didn't really get anything for me, since I plan to give away Takipsilim (Twilight) and the two Vampire Diaries books eventually. But I think I ended up spending more than I ever did. And I really just bought from local publishers.

That's why this MIBF strikes me as something more meaningful, from a personal perspective: support for the local publishers and authors, many of whom I've come to know and whose works I've come to read and love. It's not something that I feel was forced upon me, given that I'm already a part of the industry. I really just like these books, and I wish others would read them. In other words, I'm a fan.

Oh, another thing that made me happy about this MIBF? People. Saw the usual crowd of book bloggers, book club members, writers, and publishing professionals. Whenever there are books, you see these people.:) But I also got to meet one book blogger, Gilbert of Bookworm of GenSan, who flew all the way to Metro Manila from Mindanao just to come to the book fair and to meet a few fellow book bloggers. He came bearing gifts.

My blog! On a t-shirt! And cute earring and a Manny Pacquiao pen.:)

Gilbert gave us all personalized t-shirts, with our blogs in front and...

The back of the shirt!

the Filipino Book Bloggers banner at the back.:) I feel bad that I couldn't hang out too long with him and Tarie and couple of other book bloggers, due to family duties. Nevertheless, thank you so much for the generous gifts, Gilbert!

At the time of this posting, there are still 3 hours left until the end of the MIBF. Will it be more successful this year than the last? For the event's sake, I hope so. But in terms of whether my visit was a success or not, I'd say yes. I'm happy with what I got and didn't get. I'm happy that I met friends. And I'm happy at the prospect of introducing more people to great stories that come from local authors.

Letting go of books

2012-08-27T01:13:00.000+08:00

If I were a guy, this would be my wet dream. (img src)

I believe there is such a thing as too many books. In my youth, I never thought so. I wanted to own a library as huge as Belle's in Beauty and the Beast. I thought a library like that was better than love.

But it's not love that convinced me otherwise about books. It was a lingering sense of guilt (thank you, Catholic education) and two floods. The first flood happened 3 years ago. I wrote about it here. And though my books were all saved, I thought that it was about time I trimmed down my library. So I had shelves made that were 4 1/2 feet off the floor, and I challenged myself to own only enough books that would fit in them.

Of course, that didn't happen. Once again, books claimed their dominion over my work desk, my dresser, on top of my bedroom drawer, and even the bedroom floor.

Then, a few weeks ago, another flood. It came into our house again and though it didn't reach as high as it did 3 years ago, it still managed to rise to 6 feet inside my house.

We had time to take a pic, yes. Am I smiling? Yes. At the absurdity of it all.

My books, as usual, were safe. Obviously my priority, after my children, the rest of my family, and our food, is my book collection. Four of us helped transport my books from the first floor to my house's second floor. Four people. Took us like 15 minutes. Which, come to think of it, isn't that long. But when water's coming inside your home, 15 minutes is plenty long.

And so, in the middle of piling my books on top of my bed, I suddenly thought, "I have too many books." I wasn't even sure I could read all of them. At least, not in the next year or so, if I'm being realistic about my current rate of book acquisition vis-a-vis the time I actually have to read. And in the face of disasters like the one we were experiencing, how much did I REALLY need all those books? I didn't even like some of them.

Therefore, my resolution--actually my entire family's resolution when we started rebuilding again--is to trim things down to what we actually need. Screw consumerism. Screw attitudes that lead to wastage which leads to garbage piling up which leads to waterways clogging up which leads to floods.

In our case, it's not a simple matter of upping and leaving our area. Our home has been in our family for more than 50 years. Which, I think, gives us a pretty good gauge of global warming/rising water levels/congestion in our Metro, considering we've never been flooded like this before. Anyway.

The only things I really have in excess are my books. So, I've been ruthlessly sorting through my books, picking out the ones that I 1) didn't love; 2) loved but know will never read again; 3) liked but feel that it's time for the book to move on; 4) have not read yet and know that I'm not inclined to read in the foreseeable future; 5) think have just been with me for too long.

Ok, I should be honest. I don't think it would have been easy for me to do this had I not owned an ereader. Or two. And though this post is not going to become an ode to e-readers and ebooks, I can't deny that the convenience of the device and the ease with which I can get ebooks allowed me to finally let go of print books I held on to for no good reason at all. Of course, when the apocalypse comes and the turbines stop spinning leaving the world in eternal blackness, I and other ebook advocates will probably kick ourselves for disposing of so many of our print books. But until then, I'm enjoying the fact that I have options with which to consume my reading material.

Ah, consumerism wins still.

To date, I've weeded out around 150 of my books. A third of that I chose to donate. The rest I was planning to sell or give away to friends, but events during the Filipino ReaderCon convinced me otherwise. I met a couple of public school teachers who are running a reading program with limited resources and support from the school administration. Yet, against all odds, they're trying to make it work. And the students themselves have owned the reading program.

The panel on "Reading Programs that Work" during the 2nd Filipino ReaderCon. Admirable women, all.

Which leads me to another conclusion when it comes to giving away books: if I'm to donate books, I'd really rather give them to a school or a library that has a fantastic reading program run by passionate reading advocates. Because they would know what to do with the books, and essentially, I'm giving my books away so that they'll be read by someone else. I don't want my books to be shunted off to some shelf in the library, never to be borrowed, only to be displayed. I can display them on my shelf, thank you very much. But I'd like for them to be used.

Hence, I've been asking around about places that run great reading programs for disadvantaged populations. Which brings me to another question or, perhaps, the birth of an idea: who collects information like this? Who has a list of public schools, public libraries, foundations, and institutions in the Philippines with great reading programs but who need help in terms of book donations? I'd really like to know.

Anyway, I'm giving away most of the books I weeded out. I'm also selling a few, but mostly to contacts on Facebook. I figure I might as well try and make back a teeny percentage of what I invested in them in the first place. Gives me a great opportunity to try out e-commerce, too, though I don't think I'm going to get into that for myself. It's already my job.

Currently, I have something like 300 books left on my shelves, not counting all the reference books, cook books, and education-related books. Half of those 300 are TBR books, so I'm prioritizing print right now. I might be able to cut down that number, most likely to make space for others.

Suddenly, I imagine that growing a library is like growing a garden. You cut and you prune to make it grow or become more beautiful. Or perhaps growing bonsai is a better analogy. Then again, this whole library-garden analogy is hardly original. But you get my point.

So farewell, books I'm going to let go. You have served me well, either by giving me a few hours or days of distraction or by adorning my shelves, making me feel so much more accomplished or fortunate for having you. Our journey is done now. Go and find a new owner--someone who, hopefully, will cherish you more than I did. And because you were mine for a few years or months, I'd like to think you carry some of my soul with you, as I carry your story with me (well, at least for those I've read)...

That's a nice goodbye, isn't it?

ReaderCon Filipino Fridays #2: School of Reading

2012-08-02T23:08:00.003+08:00

I have one hour to catch up on last week's Filipino Friday before the linky disappears, so here goes...

This week's prompt:

School of Reading. We all started reading somewhere, and more often than not, we were influenced by someone. Who got you into reading? Your parents? A friend? A librarian? One teacher who always lends out his/her books? How helpful was your school in helping your reading habit / fueling your book addiction?

Who got me into reading? My mom. Read to me every night when I was 3 to 5 years old. At least, every night she was at home from the hospital. So, reading time was also bonding time with my mom. And then my brother, who also took over reading to me when mom was on duty at the hospital. Dad was never a big reader, but that's ok 'cause he's big with the 'rithmetic.

Was my school helpful in fueling my book addiction? That depends on which school we're talking about. To be fair, my book addiction grew with every school I went to. Perhaps not necessarily because of the school's reading programs, but because of fellow book lovers. When I was in grade school, I read my first novel for adults, which was lent to me by an older schoolmate. When I was in high school, a bunch of us got hooked on Sidney Sheldon, Judith Krantz, and Mills & Boon, among other things. And then an ex gave me my first sci-fi series, Piers Anthony's Apprentice Adept. I don't think he realized what he started.

By the time I got to college, I was already too immersed in books. Which is why I ended up as an English teacher, trying to convince my students that reading is the bomb. And so my "school of reading" comes full circle.

*Filipino Fridays is a weekly meme leading up to the celebration of the 2nd Filipino ReaderCon: United We Read, to be held on August 18, at the Filipinas Heritage Library.

ReaderCon 2012 Filipino Friday #1: Introductions

2012-07-21T00:21:00.001+08:00

It's Filipino ReaderCon time again. And that means the return of ReaderCon Filipino Fridays! Once more, the great and varied Filipino reading community is preparing to come together for the ReaderCon. In preparation for that, we have the Filipino Friday meme where a few of us can get to know each other.

Which is the topic for this year's first ReaderCon Filipino Friday.

Introductions. As with every start of a weekly meme, we need to know a bit about you! Talk about your top 3-5 (or more!) favorite books of all time, the genres you read and would never read, the books that surprised you this year. You can also talk about how you became a reader and why you love it so much! And finally, if you were in the ReaderCon last year, talk about your experience too! If you weren’t there, but you’re planning to go this year, then what do you expect for the upcoming ReaderCon?

All right, then...

Favorite books:

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee - all-time favorite, even if Flannery O'Connor calls it "a children's book," in not quite a flattering manner. I used to read it every year and fought to include it in the junior curriculum when I used to teach in high school.
The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood - because I love how she made the story-within-a-story-within-a-story work by keeping all the narratives interesting. And I loved how her prose sounded more like poetry.
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen - I'm a sucker for the classic marriage plot. And of love stories that begin at cross-purposes. And, basically, I love Jane Austen.

Genres I read: Generally everything. I do have a preference, though, for classics, literary fiction, fantasy, mystery, and occasionally young adult.

Genres I don't read: Nothing much. I used to avoid non-fiction, but ever since I started blogging nearly four years ago, I've taken a liking to it. I don't like self-help, but I have read a few. I prefer to try a book first before I diss it.

Books that surprised me this year:

American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis - because for its topic, I did not expect to find it funny. But I did.
The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides - It was just damned beautiful.
The Magicians by Lev Grossman - I was surprised that I took an active dislike towards it.

How I became a reader: My mother. She read to me every night she could when I was 3-4 years old.

Why do I love reading so much? I could give a million different reasons that better people have already elaborated on. But can one ever satisfactorily explain why one loves someone? Or something? One loves because one loves. And reading is already too much a part of me that it's difficult for me to separate it from myself and analyze why I love it.

Last year's ReaderCon...

My. How do I talk about last year's experience? Only that it was a dream that many of us cherished for a long while. And then it happened. Or we made it happen.

Granted, it was small. Granted, it wasn't perfect. But many of us worked together, on the strength of a common passion.

More than anything, it made me feel that we could do what we had always wanted to do: give Filipino readers the acknowledgement that they deserve. Call out to other Filipino readers. Foster reading in the country. I thought it was beautiful, and it made me happy. But then I'm obviously biased.

I don't expect this coming ReaderCon to be perfect, though the organizers will do their best to approach perfection. What I do hope, because I'm too close to the matter to expect anything, is that this ReaderCon will yet be another step--a bigger step--towards creating the perception and the reality that the Philippines is nation of readers.

So, if you're reading this, I hope you join Filipino Fridays. And I hope to see you, in one way or another, in this year's Filipino ReaderCon.

Speculative Fiction from the Philippines

2012-06-21T07:56:00.000+08:00

Aren't the covers pretty? There, I've been wanting to put these covers side by side and post them online for the past few weeks.

These are the covers for the ebook editions of Philippine Speculative Fiction (PSF), Vols. 1-4. And yes, we published them. The ebook editions, I mean, as the print ones were independently published by Dean Alfar and company since 2005.

The covers were made by our production editor, Adam David, and our artist, Lester Banzuelo (better known to others as the drummer of Fuseboxx. Yeah, we cool like that. Or, at least, he is.). I remember passing by Adam and Lester's workstations as I was walking to our office pantry when I had to stop because I saw the covers on their screens. I think they were working on the Vol. 4 cover by then. When I saw the sinister Christmas-y cover, I believe I felt what can only be described as "kilig" (rough English translation: "to be tickled pink"). I would've giggled, but I was trying hard not to show what a ditz I am.

Beyond the covers, I wanted to mention these books here because I'm really happy that more and more Philippine sci-fi, fantasy, horror, retold myth, and alternate history stories can now be read by more people from different countries. I don't mean only the PSF series. I mean all the Philippine speculative fiction works that are out as ebooks, whether we published them or not. Why? Because of all the stories from these shores, the ones I remember the most are the ones that involve our local myths and legends. These are the stuff of the speculative fiction stories.

So, if you're interested in reading more

sci-fi & fantasy, horror, etc. that's not Western
Filipino authors
stories based on Filipino myths and legends...

I hope you consider trying one of these books out (And here's the part where I plug our titles and some others that aren't ours.):

Philippine Speculative Fiction Vol. 1 - Amazon | Apple | Flipreads | Kobo
Philippine Speculative Fiction Vol. 2 - Amazon | Apple | Flipreads
Philippine Speculative Fiction Vol. 3 - Amazon | Apple | Flipreads
Philippine Speculative Fiction Vol. 4 - Amazon | Flipreads
Alternative Alamat - Amazon | Apple | BN | Flipreads | Kobo
Lower Myths - Amazon | Apple | Flipreads

And these are some of the speculative fiction comics:

Tabi Po

Book 1 - Amazon | Apple | BN | Flipreads
Book 2 - Flipreads

The Lam-ang Experiment

By the way, Adam and Lester are working on the covers of Vols. 5 & 6 of the PSF series. They'll be coming out by the end of the month. Will keep you posted.

Do you know of any other Philippine speculative fiction (sci-fi, fantasy, horror, alternate history, myth retellings, etc.) works available as ebooks? Would love to see this list grow.

If we had a ReaderCon 2012 and a readers' choice book awards...

2012-04-22T22:26:00.002+08:00

One of the badges from last year's ReaderCon

...would you support it?

Last year, we held the first Filipino Readers' Conference or ReaderCon, entitled "Filipino Readers Make it Social." Back then, what we wanted to do was spread awareness about the vibrant reading communities of the country. We had two panels: one on book clubs and another on book blogging. We held it in a small room, good for 70 people, during the Manila International Book Fair. Surprisingly, the room was filled, the panelists enthusiastic, and the crowd friendly and participative. Generally, people said the event was a success, with a few comments that there could have been more time for socializing. I tend to agree. And so before that first ReaderCon ended, I, with bravado, said that there would be another one next year, because I felt we had barely scratched the surface of what we can do as a reading community, for the reading community.

This is next year. I am still intent on making Readercon 2012 happen. Based on conversations with many of the people who helped last year, so are they. So, we are going to do our darndest to make it happen and be bigger than last year. But to do that, we need all the help we can get.

For starters, I'd like to know what else you guys might expect from a Readers' Conference. You can take a look at last year's program to give you an idea of what we did. Take note, this is not an event organized by publishers (even if I work in publishing), nor something organized by a formal organization. From its inception, the ReaderCon was meant as a readers' event, organized for readers, by readers. So, as readers, what would you like to happen? What talks, what discussions, who do you want to see, etc?

We do have a few things in mind already:

for book bloggers, a panel on the ethics of book blogging
for teachers, a panel on reading programs that actually work
for book clubs/reading groups, sponsored book discussions/debates on popular titles/series
for everyone, writer meet-ups (hopefully they come)

But do feel free to suggest more things. Since this is an event meant for readers, we'd like everyone's input, as much as possible. But since it's a grass-roots event, we most likely can't shoot for the moon. We'll try as best as we can, though.

Another new thing that might happen this year is the establishment of a readers' choice book awards. I don't know about you, but I think it's high time that those Filipino books that we readers really enjoy get recognition from us.

We'd like the awarding ceremony to happen during the ReaderCon, but the book awards core committee will still confirm that. I won't be part of that core committee, for obvious reasons (like I said, I work in publishing, so conflict of interest), but I know for a fact that they also need all the help and support they can get. The core committee will give more details when they're ready, but rest assured they're already planning things. So, basically, I'd like to know if you think this readers' choice book awards is something you can get behind.

For these two things, I'm appealing to all book clubs, reading groups, book bloggers, reading advocates, and any and all Filipinos who love reading regardless of the reading material, for help and support. Please help us spread the word about the dynamic communities of readers in the Philippines.

Farewell, my favorite indie bookstore

2012-03-27T23:28:00.000+08:00

Libreria last day party. (photo courtesy of Rhett)

Libreria. Where we ate, danced, slept, wrote, scavenged, hobnobbed with writers, spilled drinks, raised hell, got drunk, and oh yes, read, for a year and a half, closed its doors last Saturday. The closing of indie bookstores isn't as alarming in this country, but the closing of this particular indie bookstore is. Because it was our haven, refuge, our treehouse, our clubhouse.

And I don't just mean for my book club. It was home, too, to the Filipino Book Bloggers. It was a place we could go to geek out about books and feel like we belonged. So though it was around only for a little while, it has inspired a loyalty in us.

Owner and proprietor, Triccie, finally decided to close shop because her work necessitated that she be in a different province for several days in the week and because the bookstore stopped earning money. And I keep thinking that I wish I had enough money to keep the place as it is--a venue for book lovers to get together.

The 2011 Best & Worst Book discussion. Copy is the Phil. tourism tagline. (img src)

To be honest, I didn't get to buy many books at Libreria. I brought many friends there, though, to make up for that. But the value in the place is the home that we found in it. Admittedly, making book lovers feel at home may not necessarily be a very profitable business model, but I think this kind of cultural good karma will eventually result in good profit margins.

I think if we did have the time and money, a few of us would pool our resources together and set up a reading room/bookshop. Preferably something as homey as Libreria, where there was always freshly brewed coffee from freshly ground beans, where we could hold book events, and where someone could just come to sit on a couch or rocking chair and read.

For what it's worth at this point, I'd like to thank Triccie for putting up this second incarnation of Libreria. We're hoping that Libreria will open again, sometime, somewhere. She's not closed to the possibility.

In the meantime, I think our book club, many of the local book bloggers, and readers who hung out inside Libreria's bright and cool confines are going to look for a similar place that we can also call home.

Suggestions?

Things I didn't get to say in The House of Mirth discussion

2012-03-26T00:41:00.001+08:00

I didn't finish House of Mirth in time for our book discussion last Saturday. When I stepped into the venue, I had only read up to 72% of my ebook. So I was thinking of keeping quiet as I hadn't finished the book (though I did know the ending), but then I'm not the kind who keeps quiet in any kind of discussion.

It was interesting that many people from the club identified Lily Bart as a gambler. I didn't see that at all. I mean, sure, she had gambling debts. But you don't really see her engage in gambling in the novel. Being the romantic kind, I pegged her as a rebel. The poor girl seemed to want to get away from the kind of life she was weaned into. Though at the same time, she knows that she'll always value money and beauty highly.

Nevertheless, though she had a great number of opportunities to finally marry someone to secure her future, she never saw any plan through. And though she could've fought dirty like many of the people in her set, she never did. Lily, the poor girl, wanted to "go beyond" the life and practices of her set, as Lawrence Selden tantalizingly offered her on a couple of occasions. So she opted not to do what people expected of her, or even what she expected of herself, because of her own set of principles. And of course, there was the thorny issue of her actually falling in love with Selden.

I seem to have used the phrase "poor girl" to refer to Lily twice in this post. That's because I finally did finish the book today. And yes, poor girl. A few people in the club said they hated Lily Bart (the kinder ones said they were extremely annoyed by her). I admit, I did find her annoying at the start. She reminded me a lot of Rebecca Bloomwood from Confessions of a Shopaholic, what with all her shopping and getting into debt. But what turned me around is the realization that Lily Bart is incredibly self-aware. She knows what kind of creature she is. She is capable of analyzing what she feels, what she thinks, and why she does things. And she isn't dismissive about her motivations. The girl really tried to become better. And in the end, I think she did.

So I disagree that this is a cautionary tale about the folly of trying to live a superficial life devoted to being decorative. I think The House of Mirth is a tale about a product of the society that pursues wealth and glamor--Lily Bart--who nevertheless tries to escape said society but is hindered by upbringing and the values of that same society. And in all the misfortune brought about by her failure to escape, Lily Bart finds that, at her core, she values honor. Not a bad girl at all, I'd say. Tragic figure, yes, but the Hamlet kind, not the Macbeth kind. (Read: the kind you fall in love with, not the kind you want to behead.)

I'd like to thank Peter, the discussion moderator, for pushing this book to our book club, Flips Flipping Pages. It's a great read. Yesterday, at 72%, I rated the book at 4 stars. But after having finished it, I'm changing that rating to a 5. Well-deserved, I'd say. And all because of Lily Bart.

This is my first Wharton, by the way. I've had The Age of Innocence for years and even watched the movie, but I've never read it. I was telling book club mate Iya about that and the fact that I've never read Anna Karenina nor Madame Bovary, though I've had both books for years, too. I was trying to figure out why, and I think it's because I'm prejudiced against these books for having eponymous female characters who "fall."

Whoops. And just now I figured out why I'm prejudiced...

Wonderful how thinking (and writing) about books makes you realize a lot of things about yourself, isn't it?

I shall stop there. Good night!

On The House of Mirth and webinars

2012-03-22T23:57:00.000+08:00

Gillian Anderson as Lily Bart. I did not know about this. (img src)

So I'm cramming my reading of The House of Mirth. In time for my book club's discussion this Saturday. I'm at 10% so far in my ebook. And so far, I'm thinking this girl Lily Bart is sassy and perhaps an early version of the gals in Sex and the City. With the City but minus the sex. Unless I'm proven wrong, that is.

On the work front, I'm pretty proud of the two webinars we held a couple of weeks ago. The first one was on the basics of ebook publishing. That was me. But the second one was more of the technical stuff in making ebooks. Our three production experts did that. Proud of the webinars because, well, I used to be a teacher. So I'm into educating and stuff. And because I think we had fun. So, hooray, am no longer a webinar virgin!

Speaking of which, if any of you guys want to try webinars (both holding and attending them), I highly recommend the guys from Mayer Virtual Consulting. And this isn't a paid ad or anything. I just really like what they did for us.

Now, back to Lily Bart. Damn me for reading Wikipedia's House of Mirth entry. I now know how it's going to end.

On Coffeespoons' 3rd Anniversary

2012-01-21T21:26:00.000+08:00

It's Coffeespoons' 3rd birthday! Three years ago, on this date, I made the first post of this blog live. I always have a certain fondness for that post whenever I read it. It's not one of those things I write that I cringe at (I have a lot of those), mostly because it was honest and I like the sense of history. I started this blog because I was bored and because I love reading.

Now, I am no longer bored. Haven't been for a long time. And I still love reading.

In my last 2 blogiversaries, it was my custom to outline my advocacies for the year, whether I realized it or not. If you care to check back on my first and second year anniversary posts, you'll see that it was always about reading and the Filipino reader. That hasn't changed yet. So, this year, I hope I can do more to help push reading and readers in this group of islands where I'm from.

This blog, which was meant only to allow me to share my love for reading, has been good to me. I know I often haven't shown it the love that it deserves, but I want to say that, since I started this blog, many things have happened in my life that led me to where I really wanted to go.

Because of this blog, I've met people from the book blogging community, both local and international. I worked up the courage to shift careers so that I could do what I enjoyed and prioritize what I wanted to prioritize. Eventually, this blog allowed me to express what I thought about the way readers are perceived (or not perceived) in my country. I was able to meet the other Filipino book bloggers and count many of them as friends. This blog helped me realize that a readers' conference is an idea that other people could get behind, too, hence the first Filipino ReaderCon. And I do believe this blog has been instrumental in helping me get the job I currently have.

But most of all, this blog allowed me to just geek out as a reader, to be unabashed about my love for or my dislike of certain books. And periodically, it provided me sanity. Come to think of it, I started it to preserve my sanity.

And so, dear blog, thank you for everything you have done for me. I don't know where life and you will lead me as I go into the 4th year of book blogging, but wherever it is, please know that I will forever be grateful for what you've already brought me.

The Ulysses Read-along

2012-01-16T23:56:00.000+08:00

Ulysses wordle (img src)

Early this year, during a conversation on Twitter, Jaclyn of a book diary and I decided that we'd have a read-along. I'd never done one before and I thought it might be fun. Besides, I figure that, sometime during the year, I'd need this push in my reading. And so, Jaclyn suggested Ulysses. Perfect, really, since I only went as far as the second page long in my previous readings of the work.

We decided we'd check in on each other every 16th of the month, since Bloomsday, the day in celebration of Joyce and Ulysses, happens on June 16. I do not take credit for this idea. To be honest, I stole it from dovegreyreader who ran a Ulysses read-along almost 3 years ago.

So, this is the first check-in.

Frankly, I'm 6 pages into the text.

However, I did read the introduction and the publication history. Around 3 or 4 years ago, I took a course called History of the Book. One of the most fascinating examples of a book with an intricate publication history was Ulysses. Sadly, I've since lost the reference materials I had showing how involved Joyce was in publishing Ulysses, how he dipped his hand even into the composition and the layouting of the text. Even more sadly, I can't recall which version we talked about. And so, I hedged my bets with the original 1922 version and got myself the OWC edition. And because I am now incapable of going through a book's text without reading all, and I mean all, of the front matters--yes, including the copyright page--I went through the first two sections before I dove into the text.

I will not attempt to go into a discourse about the intro and the composition and publication history. In the first place, I don't think I'm capable. In the second, I have 20 mins. before this day ends and I would really like to post this while it's Jan. 16 in my part of the world. Suffice it to say, however, that my eyes did not glaze over as I read Jeri Johnson's introduction. I often like entering into a book cold, but I don't think anyone who was born in the 20th century onward can enter into Ulysses cold. And so I appreciated the context that Johnson provides, from the initial to the latter readers of Ulysses. Not having read the text completely yet, I like can't say if I'd agree with Ms. Johnson, but I can agree with her when she says,

While every new reader faced with this book addresses it new, this newness is modified by the generations of readers who have come before and whose disseminations of it have seeped into virtually every aspect of high and popular culture.

Like I said, who hasn't heard of Ulysses?

And so, though I shunned this novel before, by virtue of rumors about it being too dense and incomprehensible, I think what consistently brings me back to it is the idea of history--both it's publication history and the history of all the readers who have ever tried to make sense out of it. It is exactly a book like this that keeps reading alive--because people can't agree about it, because it is hard to fully understand, because no matter how long it's been around, people still discover/rediscover things about it and it still has something new to say. I don't know if I will end up liking it, but if only for its history, it earns my great respect.

That said, 6 pages into the text itself, and I wonder why I dropped it at page 2 years ago. Sure, I have no idea yet what exactly Buck Mulligan and Stephen Dedalus are talking about, but I have to say I'm enjoying reading the prose. Reminds me a great deal of T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land. And therein lies the reason. Except that this is prose, not poetry. I wonder how that will turn out eventually.

Thus goes my first month check-in for our Ulysses read-along. Jaclyn, I hope you're doing much better than I am.:)

The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides

2012-01-08T22:39:00.002+08:00

Summary

"Madeleine Hanna breaks out of her straight-and-narrow mold when she falls in love with charismatic loner Leonard Bankhead, while an old friend resurfaces, obsessed with the idea that Madeleine is his destiny." - from NPR.org

The good stuff

It started with the books. And it went on and on with books. The Marriage Plot is replete with references to books. We catch the three main characters, Madeleine, Leonard, and Mitchell, in college and the first year out of it, and much mention is made of their reading material. In fact, two of the characters fall in love precisely because of books, and the other one in the triangle uses his readings and scholarship as a crutch for his unrequited love. However, it is Madeleine's reading list that speaks the most to me, since she loves the narrative and considers herself a "Victorianist," a specialization I would also love to have. (Just to show how much I enjoyed the books, see the list compiled below.)
I only planned to browse through the book's first few pages. But Eugenides writes so smoothly that I found I'd already gone through 25% of the book before I looked up.
I liked that Eugenides gave characters values that seem very archaic today, such as taking the marriage plot (in literature and in life) head-on and searching for faith even in organized religion.
I enjoyed Mitchell's honesty and Leonard's fight to cope with his condition.

The not-so-good

Even though I loved her reading list, I did not care for Madeleine at all. She was blind, oftentimes on purpose, to the course her life was taking or the consequences of her choices. She also got progressively whinier through the book. I did not like that she became childish whenever she was with her family, nor that it was the men in her life who made choices that would benefit her, such that she, not them, ends up with a promising life, through little effort of her own.
This may be because I'm nearly 15 years out of college, but at certain points, I did not see what their fuss was all about. All the pretension from knowledge gained in college, the search for love, the quest for one's self--not that I've got the last of these down pat myself--but really, I was close to losing patience with them. And that's how I realized that I must really be getting old. These are not the issues I would worry about knowing what I know and being where I am now.

Quotes from the book that I highlighted and why

She'd become an English major for the purest and dullest of reasons: because she loved to read.

...because the line is counterintuitive.

Madeleine was perfectly happy with the idea of genius. She wanted a book to take her places she couldn't get herself. She thought a writer should work harder writing a book than she did reading it. When it came to letters and literature, Madeleine championed a virtue that had fallen out of esteem: namely, clarity.

...because we share this belief.

Religious feeling didn't arise from going to church or reading the Bible but from the most private interior experiences, either of great joy or of staggering pain.

...because it makes sense to me.

There were some books that reached through the noise of life to grab you by the collar and speak only of the truest things.

...because it reads like a line that'll be in a "best quotes about books" website and will be quoted ad infinitum by book lovers.

It took courage to let things fall apart so beautifully.

...because the line is beautiful and true.

The ending

I still haven't decided whether I like it more than I didn't like it. I liked it because it was witty and right, given everything that happened. I didn't like it because it felt like the whole book was written just to get to that ending...

Over-all

(Errata: The initial version of this paragraph assumed that this book won the Pulitzer. I thought I was that behind on Pulitzer news that I didn't even know the award was given. Apparently, I was misled by the cover. So, it hasn't won the Pulitzer yet and I don't think it will. Thanks for pointing it out, Aldrin!)
In spite of the indulgence in semiotic theory, feminism in Victorian lit, and a deconstruction of the marriage plot itself, all set in the recession of 80's America (or maybe because of it) I wasn't all sold to the book. Though I flipped through the novel quickly and enjoyed reading it to some extent, I still think Middlesex was a stronger and more relevant novel. The female character in The Marriage Plot didn't speak to me and that disappoints me because I like well-drawn female characters, if not strong ones. In the end, I felt that, no matter how much I enjoyed reading the book, it didn't mean much of anything in the face of real life. Which, I think, is highly reflective of most literary theories.

And yet, the books...

The Marriage Plot started with the books, so I'll also end with the books. It may either be geekiness or even pretension on my part, but I did write down the books mentioned in it, along with who was reading them. Not that I intend to read all of them, but I am grateful that it reminded me of other books I still plan to read.

So, whose reading list do you prefer?

Mitchell

Imitation of Christ by Thomas Kempis
Confessions by St. Augustine
Interior Castle by St. Theresa of Avila
A Confession by Leo Tolstoy
Franny and Zooey by J.D. Salinger
The Orthodox Church by Timothy Ware
A Dance to the Music of Time by Anthony Powell
Ulysses by James Joyce
The Varieties of Religious Experience by William James
The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism by Max Weber
Auguste Comte and Positivism by John Stuart Mill
The Courage to Be by Paul Tillich
Being and Time by Martin Heidegger
The Drama of Atheist Humanism by Henri de Lubac
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
The Cloud of Unknowing
The Dark Night of the Soul by St. John of the Cross
V by Thomas Pynchon
A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway
Moby Dick by Herman Melville

Madeleine

Modern Library Set of Henry James
Love Story by Erich Segal
Myra Breckinridge by Gore Vidal
H.M. Pulham, Esquire by John Marquand
Emma by Jane Austen
Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton
Barchester Towers by Anthony Trollope
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
Persuasion by Jane Austen
Middlemarch by George Eliot
Portrait of a Lady by Henry James
Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser
Of Grammatology by Jacques Derrida (also read by Leonard)
The Role of the Reader by Umberto Eco (also read by Leonard)
Writing and Difference by Jacques Derrida (also read by Leonard)
On Deconstruction by Jonathan Culler (also read by Leonard)
The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton
Daniel Deronda by George Eliot
A Lover's Discourse by Roland Barthes (also read by Leonard)
Paradise Lost by John Milton
The Madwoman in the Attic by Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar
The Oxford Book of English Verse

Leonard

Writings in General Linguistics by Jacques Derrida
The Sorrows of Young Werther by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Ontogeny and Phylogeny by Stephen Jay Gould

Other books mentioned

Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino
Sarrasine by Honore de Balzac
The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon
New French Feminisms: An Anthology

By the way, this list is by no means exhaustive. And if you find mistakes or things I missed out, feel free to point them out.