Teaser Tuesday is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of 
He had just begun to doze off, when he heard the sound of feet trampling on the buckwheat stalks, making a terrific crunching noise, and suspected that it might be a thief. But when he looked up, he saw a huge monster bearing down upon him, with red hair and a big bushy beard.Bookmark Monday – Big Bang Theory (August 15)
Bookmark Monday is a weekly meme hosted by Aloi from guiltless reading. Take a picture of one of your favourite bookmarks, post it on your blog, and head over to guiltless reading to share a to your post.
We’ve been binge watching The Big Bang Theory lately, so I thought I’d share pictures of some bookmarks related with the series that I found online:
Booking Through Thursday – Database (August 11)
I haven’t done one of these for a while, but this week Booking Through Thursday asks the following question:
Do you keep a database of your book collection anywhere? An online website? An excel spreadsheet? A handwritten paper journal?
This is an easy one. I use LibraryThing as a catalog for my books. It’s free up to a certain amount of books, but I’m way beyond that and took out a life membership for $25.00, which is really good value. The rest of my family use it for their books as well. My profile is HERE, so check it out if you’re interested. LibraryThing also has a mobile app, which is handy when I’m in a bookstore and am not sure whether I have a certain book or not.
I don’t use LibraryThing to track my reading. For this I use GoodReads (my profile) and 50 Book Pledge (my profile), plus I keep a list of them on this site as well. I like to keep track of my books and reading, but I sometimes have to stop myself rom getting a little obsessive!
Bookmark Monday – Ten Thousand Villages (August 8)
Bookmark Monday is a weekly meme hosted by Aloi from guiltless reading. Take a picture of one of your favourite bookmarks, post it on your blog, and head over to guiltless reading to share a to your post.
Ten Thousand Villages is the oldest and largest Fair Trade organization in North America, selling artisan-crafted personal accessories, home decor and gift items from around the globe. They have a store in Stratford, which is only 20 minutes from where we live, that we like to visit from time to time. I like the uniqueness of their products and the fact that we are supporting artisans around the world when we shop there. The following cat bookmark is one I picked up there recently. It probably won’t be the last one I buy from them!
Book Beginnings and Friday 56 – Brooklyn (August 5)
For this week’s Friday meme combo I have chosen Colm Toibin’s Brooklyn. I have seen the movie a couple of times and enjoyed it, but I really wanted to read the book as well. I bought it a couple of months ago, so it’s time to get it read. GoodReads has the following description:
Eilis Lacey has come of age in small-town Ireland in the hard years following World War Two. When an Irish priest from Brooklyn offers to sponsor Eilis in America, she decides she must go, leaving her fragile mother and her charismatic sister behind.
Eilis finds work in a department store on Fulton Street, and when she least expects it, finds love. Tony, who loves the Dodgers and his big Italian family, slowly wins her over with patient charm. But just as Eilis begins to fall in love, devastating news from Ireland threatens the promise of her future.
Now for this week’s excerpts:
Book Beginnings is hosted by Gilion at Rose City Reader, who invites anyone to join in, saying: ‘Please join me every Friday to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. Please remember to include the title of the book and the author. Leave a link to your post. If you don’t have a blog, but want to participate, please leave a comment with your Book Beginning.’
The beginning of Brooklyn:
Eilis Lacey, sitting at the window of the upstairs living room in the house on Friary Street noticed her sister walking briskly from work. She watched Rose crossing the street from sunlight into shade, carrying the new leather handbag that she had bought in Clerys in Dublin in the sale.
There’s not much happening here yet, but I guess it’s just setting the scene for what will follow.
The Friday 56 is a book meme hosted by Freda’s Voice and the rules are as follows:
*Grab a book, any book.
*Turn to page 56.
*Find any sentence, (or few, just don’t spoil it) that grabs you.
*Post it.
*Add your (url) post below in Linky. Add the post url, not your blog url.
It’s that simple.
From page 56 of Brooklyn:
On Sundays, Mrs. Kehoe had a rule that she did not appear and it was up to the girls to cook, making sure to leave no mess behind them. Mrs. Kehoe went to early mass on Sundays, she told Eilis, and then had friends around in the evening for an old-fashioned and serious poker game. She made the poker game, Eilis noted in a letter home, sound as though it was another form of Sunday duty that she performed only because it was in the rules.
I’d like to think that I can get into this book over the weekend, but time will tell. I am looking forward to reading it, though, because I want to see how the movie measured up to it.
Bookmark Monday – The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (August 1)
Bookmark Monday is a weekly meme hosted by Aloi from guiltless reading. Take a picture of one of your favourite bookmarks, post it on your blog, and head over to guiltless reading to share a to your post.
It’s been a while since I participated in this, but I’m going to try to get back on schedule again! I thought I’d quickly share the following bookmark of The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, from this summer’s Stratford Festival presentation. We have tickets to see it tomorrow, so I’m quickly reading the book again as a refresher. It’s one of my favourite books from long ago anyway and I’ve lost count of the times I’ve read it.
Saturday Snapshot – St Marys (July 30)
Saturday Snapshot is hosted by West Metro Mommy. Go there to see how you can participate.
I’ve been concerned lately with my lack of exercise, so to remedy this I’ve been trying to get out for a walk each morning for the past week. My daily walk takes me by the banks of the Thames River, so I took the following snapshots by the river during the week:
Book Beginnings and Friday 56 – The Maze Runner (July 29)
It has been forever since I did one of these Friday posts. In fact, it has been over two months since I posted anything here at all. The past few months have been quite busy with lots of people coming and going, but as things have slowed down a bit I figured it was time to get back to this again.
My choice of book this week is The Maze Runner by James Dasher. The reason I am reading this now is that the movie of this book is one of the ones on Netflix that the rest of the family want to watch. I said i’d watch it once I had read the book, so that is what I am doing now. GoodReads shares the following description:
If you ain’t scared, you ain’t human.
When Thomas wakes up in the lift, the only thing he can remember is his name. He’s surrounded by strangers—boys whose memories are also gone.
Nice to meet ya, shank. Welcome to the Glade.
Outside the towering stone walls that surround the Glade is a limitless, ever-changing maze. It’s the only way out—and no one’s ever made it through alive.
Everything is going to change.
Then a girl arrives. The first girl ever. And the message she delivers is terrifying.
Remember. Survive. Run.
Now for this week’s excerpts:
Book Beginnings is hosted by Gilion at Rose City Reader, who invites anyone to join in, saying: ‘Please join me every Friday to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. Please remember to include the title of the book and the author. Leave a link to your post. If you don’t have a blog, but want to participate, please leave a comment with your Book Beginning.’
The beginning of The Maze Runner:
He began his new life standing up, surrounded by cold darkness and stale, dusty air.
I don’t know very much about this book and this beginning isn’t giving away much either. Hopefully things will soon become clearer.
The Friday 56 is a book meme hosted by Freda’s Voice and the rules are as follows:
*Grab a book, any book.
*Turn to page 56.
*Find any sentence, (or few, just don’t spoil it) that grabs you.
*Post it.
*Add your (url) post below in Linky. Add the post url, not your blog url.
It’s that simple.
From page 56 of The Maze Runner:
The boys lining the path to Newt and the girl glared at him as he walked past, as if he were responsible for the entire mess of the Maze and the Glade and the Grievers. Thomas refused to make eye contact with any of them, afraid of looking guilty.
I haven’t reached this part yet, so I have no idea what is going on here or even if Thomas has anything to feel guilty about. Hopefully I’ll get the book read soon so that we can watch the movie in the near future.
“We don’t need to get into the details, but they interrupted me, pulled me down from the pulpit, and showed me the exit. Although I already knew where it was, of course.”
