You are currently browsing the tag archive for the ‘suzanna jansen’ tag.
The Sunday Salon is a virtual gathering of booklovers on the web, where they blog about bookish things of the past week, visit each others weblogs, oh — and read ;)
Let’s start this Salon post with a confession: I have been a bad grrl and bought 3 more books for myself!
- I Am a Cat (Natsume Soseki)
- The Old Capital (Yasunari Kawabata)
- The Housekeeper and the Professor (Yoko Ogawa)
I’ve got a great excuse though: I joined the new online Japanese Literature Book Group and Read-along at In Spring It Is The Dawn — and these are the first books on the agenda. I am really looking forward to it!
Another fun thing to do over there is this months Hello Japan! mini mission:
Read or watch something scary, spooky, or suspenseful, and Japanese of course!
Since I have enough to read already I decided to rent a movie that has been on my wishlist for a long time now: Dark Water (Honogurai mizu no soko kara), by Hideo Nakata. You might have heard of the American remake with Jodie Foster, but I prefered to see the original. I’ll tell you why in my upcoming review post! It was a nice Friday night activity to surprise Mr Gnoe with, especially with the stormy autumn weather that has set in :)
But back to bookish things. For the last three months of 2009 I am also participating in the Set It Yourself Challenge (SIY) #10. Just to keep the pressure on my challenges: I have listed all 5 books I need to read before the end of this year:
- The Chosen (Chaim Potok)
- The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
- The Pillowbook (Sei Shonagon)
- The Sea, the Sea (Iris Murdoch)
- The Old Capital (Yasunari Kawabata)
I have joined this Bookcrossing challenge before in 2008 and 2009; succeeding twice, failing once…
Speaking of Bookcrossing: I made a first attempt at the Bookcrossing monthly readathon. 
But instead of 24 I read for 15 hours and 8 in the last week of September. So technically I failed but I am actually quite proud of the result because it was an awfully busy week. You can read about my thoughts concerning the readathon in Friday’s post. Now I am really looking forward to the autumnal 24 hour read-a-thon of October 24th! I am already making a list of books and snacks to lock myself in with :)
Partly thanks to the readathon I finished more books in September than I usually read in a month:
- Vlinder in de wind (Butterfly in the Wind) by Rei Kimura (reviewed)
- To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (review pending), #4 on the list of Banned and Challenged Classics
- Het pauperparadijs (Pauper Paradise) by Suzanna Jansen (no review planned)
- Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates (review pending)
Current book: The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck. Wednesday’s update post will tell you why I picked this book. I am ‘buddy reading’ with two Boekgrrls: MaaikeB and Manon, so one of these days I should mail them my thoughts so far!
Another exciting thing going on this week is BAFAB! 
Buy A Friend A Book. One of my favourite reads of the past years is on its way to a long time friend that is on a busy schedule at the moment. I’ll give the book a chance to arrive for a few days longer, so I can’t say more! ;)
Do you BAFAB?
Challenges / Bookgroups etc.
Progress update on my challenges that I have not yet mentioned above:
- Japanese Challenge (Aug 2009-Mar 2010): read and reviewed 1/1
(✔ finished, but intent on reading more) - Classics Challenge (2009, entree level): read 3/6, reviewed 0/6
- What’s In A Name Challenge (2009): read 6/6, reviewed 3/6
- Personal 2008-2009 Challenge: read 8/12
- SIY Challenge #10 (Oct-Dec 2009): read 0/5
Current Bookgroup reads:
- Boekgrrls September book: Away, by Amy Bloom (read and reviewed in Dutch on the mailing list)
- Boekgrrls October book: Revolutionary Road, by Richard Yates (read, to be reviewed)
- Japanese Literature Book Group for November 30th: The Old Capital, by Yasunari Kawabata (TBR)
- Japanese Literature Read-along for November 15th: I Am A Cat (part I), by Natsume Soseki (TBR)
That’s it for now. I need to get up my review of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird a.s.a.p. so that I can send this Bookcrossing book along to the next reader. Better get on with it!
The Sunday Salon is a virtual gathering of booklovers on the web, where they blog about bookish things of the past week, visit each others weblogs, oh — and read ;)
I am mentally preparing myself for the 24 hour read-a-thon that will take place in the weekend of 24-25 October. 
Not only am I contemplating my pile of books and what snacks to hoard, but last Friday I also joined this month’s Bookcrossing read-a-thon for which I need to read 24 hours in one week. I am having quite a busy schedule so I’m not at all sure if I will make it, but a grrl can try. I’ll write a seperate post of my progress in Richard Yates‘ Revolutionary Road! I had finished Het pauperparadijs the day before the challenge started.
Another bookish thing that happened to me this week is that I received a review copy The Book of Dahlia by Elisa Albert, in Dutch translation. I have never before received a review copy and did not request it… It was sent to me as a prize in a little spring quiz. Now what do I do? I guess I shouldn’t feel obliged to review the book. But I am not even sure if I would like to read it :-o The blurb suggests some kind of chicklit — which I am no fan of. Anyone out there who knows if that’s true? Even better: can anyone convince me to read, or not to read this book?
Last but not least I am very excited that BAFAB week is coming up! “BAFAB?” Yes! Buy A Friend A Book in the first week of October :) Because of my huge Mt. TBR and overcrowded reading programm for the rest of 2009 I am not allowed to get myself any new books. But I can surprise someone else, can’t I? :)) Now how am I going to tackle this: choose a book first and then a beneficiary, or the other way round?
Oh my, and I almost forgot: I also started another round of the 2009 History Challenge at Bookcrossing! I’ll have to release 12 books at historic sites before the end of this year; that makes 3 a month. Having done 4 already I’m ahead of schedule. Read all about my releases in my forum post. I did a first round of 12 from January until May.
Well, you will probably understand that I am keeping my salon post short this week — I need to read! Actually I should be writing a review of To Kill a Mockingbird (that I finished two weeks ago), but that’ll have to wait just a bit longer…
Unfortunately I don’t have much time to play on the internet in this Book Blogger Appreciation Week. But I try to keep up with the fun, so.. here’s a picture in answer to Tuesday’s reading meme!
Looking at this picture you’ll know the answers to three of the questions asked:
- What are you currently reading?
- Do you tend to mark your books as you read, or does the idea of writing in books horrify you?
- How do you keep your place while reading a book? Bookmark? Dog-ears? Laying the book flat open?
Right now I am reading some Dutch non-fiction about an 19th century colony for poor people, and its significance for several generations of the author’s family: Het pauperparadijs (Pauper Paradise), by Suzanna Jansen. I chose to read this book now because in a few weeks we’ll be having a ‘pauper arrangement‘ as a company outing in the Gevangenismuseum (Jail Museum), located in the last remaining building of the former colony. I hope our visit won’t turn out too beggarly…
This copy is signed and I borrowed it from my mother-in-law so I’ll admit to being extra careful with it, but that doesn’t make any difference for the following answers. Although I can understand people making notes in their books, I never do so. I drag along a notebook almost anytime I leave the house; not just to write down thoughts about my book but also for taking notes relating to work, blog ideas etc. This week I filled the last page of my orange moleskine so the notebook in the photograph is nice and fresh! I love starting in a brand new booklet :))
As you can see I also use post-its to mark pages, especially when I don’t want to stop reading only to scribble down quotes. I keep some of these markers at hand on the backside of my bookmark — which brings me to the last question: I really need those to help me remember at what page I am. I own several bookmarks and I always choose one that ‘fits’ the theme of my book. You’ll find some on my Flickr page! Can you find out what’s on the front of the bookmark shown here?
So now you know some of my reading habits! What are yours?
Graasland 