subdee

How much do I love editing for scratchmist, let me count the ways. XD Mellish always edits carefully before she sends anything on and her sentences are always carefully worked out and her grammar is always correct, even when she is writing in something weird like second-person past-perfect tense.

***

Sign-ups for the next round of bibliophages have begun! The theme this time is school stories. I ended up posting a pretty frivolous list to the comm but I did also consider a more torturous literary list of books: Nobokov's PNIN, Muriel Spark's The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, Louisa May Alcott's Little Men, and Azar Nafisi's Reading Lolita in Tehran. (But I couldn't think of a fifth book...well, there was Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure, but I would never inflict that on someone else ever.) You know, books that are about education as much as about Hijinx. But then I remembered that I never finished some of these. XD; Others are encouraged to join in and recommend serious literature! We loves us some srs books too.

It occurs to me that someone better read in this field could probably also come up with a list that was entirely comprised of suggestive boys' boarding school titles. Such a list might hypothetically include:

Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
A Separate Peace by John Knowles
Maurice by E. M. Forster

And maybe also some thrillers, like The Secret History or The Night Climbers?

(Sign up here.)

Today I was overtaken by an irresistable urge to reread the classic SF I am sending to petronia, followed by an equally irresistible urge to compile themed booklists for reading_mix.

SUGGESTIONS WELCOME!!! These lists are from memory -- like last time, I'm at college, with no access to my bookshelves.

The Psychology of Science
Books with nuanced depictions of the personalities of research scientists.

1. Intuition, Allegra Goodman
2. Timescape, Gregory Benford
3. Eternal Sabbath, Fuyumi Soryo??
biggersandwich
3. Bellwether, Connie Willis
( descriptions )


Looping Stories
Short stories that reference each other in ways that make you go "Aha! I remember that!"

1. Dreams of Terror and Death, H.P. Lovecraft
2. Sideways Stories from Wayside School, Louis Sachar
3. Love Mode, Shimizu Yuki
apintrix:
4. Love Medicine, Louise Erdrich
5. Come to Me, Amy Bloom
6. J.D. Salinger's "Glass family" short stories and novel (list)
milchstrasse
7. Not the End of the World, Kate Atkinson
8. Pixel Juice, Jeff Noon??
( descriptions )


YA Building Books
YA books about building your environment, preferably including lots of cool contraptions. These are books that make you want to run away and live in the wilderness.

1. The Swiss Family Robinson, Johann David Wyss
2. Island of the Blue Dolphin, Scott O'Dell
3. Boxcar Children, Gertrude Chandler Warner*
4. Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of MIMH, Robert C. O'Brien
angrybabble
5. Hatchet, Gary Paulsen?? may be too realistic.
6. My Side of the Mountain, Jean Craighead Craighead George
meril
7. The Mad Scientists' Club, Bertrand R. Brinley?? lots of contraptions but may not include environmental engineering.

HONORABLE MENTION!!! The chapters in Jojo's Bizarre Adventure (part four) about the stand-user who lives in an abandonned electric tower and never sets foot on the ground. Remind me to upload this later when the list's finalized.

*The sequels are mysteries but the first one is about four siblings who make a home out of an abandoned boxcart. See also: From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler?? About a brother and sister who make a home out of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I dunno, should Boxcar Children count? I count a distinct absence of cool contraptions.


Oh god, it's nearly 2:00am and I still have three essays to write. *sob*

ONCE AGAIN: SUGGESTIONS WELCOME!

EDIT:

YA Puzzle-Narratives with Answers in the Back
1. Sideways Arithmetic from Wayside School, Louis Sachar
2. Clue Series - Who Killed Mr. Boddy?, Eric Weiner
3. Encyclopedia Brown, Boy Detective, Donald J. Sobol
murinae
4. The Westing Game, Ellen Raskin
meril
5. Hawkeye Collins & Amy Adams series by M. Masters

It's obvious where my mind is tonight, -_-;

Added another list to the last post: Being Normal/Being Weird. Nonfantasy YA with fantastical elements, acid trips optional, may not be suitable for assigned age group.

Some more lists here. These're more generic than the other ones. (Did I make the dealine? Please say I made the deadline.)

WITH lacewood: ( Alternate Europe Historical Fantasy )
( British YA fantasy VS The Arabian Nights )
( You're in the Army Now -- In the Future )
( Poetic and Heartbreaking )
( Identity and Memory in Manga )

YES DONE FINALLY. Suggestions welcome!

From the userinfo of dracula1897:

Dracula is an epistolary novel (meaning that it's written as a series of documents; usually letters, here everything from letters to diary entries to newspaper clippings). On this community, they'll be appearing on the day they're dated, starting with Jonathan Harker's first journal entry on the 3rd of May. The novel finishes in November, so we've got about six months.

Dracula is more picturesque than I expected it to be. I mean, I knew it was mostly journal entries and letters, but I thought it would be Gothic all the way through. You know? But instead it's a turn-of-the-century travelougue complete with colorful local history and gastronomical asides -- and it's scenic, I can imagine the blossoming fruit trees behind peasants in quaint clothing as the sun sets on the mountain as a postcard or something. Anyway, I'm looking forward to the rest of the novel.

From obakesan (again): Reading Mix Challenge. I have a couple in mind, but I'm having trouble filling them in from memory (all of my books are at home). Some help? Suggestions? Comments or questions?

( In-Progress Mixes Under Here )

There are also some mixes that I want someone else to do, since I haven't read widely enough to do them myself.

UP FOR ADOPTION, with 2-3 books given for each as suggestions/examples:

( I am a Cut )

Right. So. SUGGESTIONS PLZ THANK YOU.

Or if you know someone else who you think could suggest something, please point them toward this post! I am also willing to maybe adopt someone else's list, as long as it's in a genre I'm reasonably familiar with.