Cat Thursday - Authors and Cats (56)

Welcome to the weekly meme that celebrates the wonders and sometime hilarity of cats! Join us by posting a favorite LOL cat pic you may have come across, famous cat art or even share with us pics of your own beloved cat(s). It's all for the love of cats! (share your post in the Mr. Linky below)

The second Cat Thursday of each month is Authors and Cats Thursday. Each time I will feature an author with their cat(s), or pictured with a cat(s).

I missed Authors and Cats last week! I have been so forgetful lately. So, I'm just going to go ahead and do it this week!

A very happy birthday this month to one of my favorite authors, Stephen King! (September 21)
King is known to be more of a dog lover, but it seems they do always have cats in their household. I would think they do at least inspire him, as they have figured prominently in at least two of his works, Pet Sematary and Cat's Eye. 

Here are a couple of shots of SK with some kitties. I couldn't corroborate for sure, but according to these images, one or both of these cats may be the cat from the Cat's Eye film. King was still relatively young in these shots. He looks like he's having fun. 

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A Reading Life (45) - #TopTenTuesday #RIPXI #Bloggiesta

Scroll down for Bloggiesta wrap-up.

Seems I'm in a blogging rut of a sort. I post reviews and Cat Thursday, but nothing much else. Trying to get back into the swing of things. I have Banned Books Week at the end of the month so want to be in a better frame for (almost) daily posts that week.

I decided to participate in Top Ten Tuesday this week. It has been a while. I actually like making lists so not sure why I don't do this every week. Here are my top ten favorite literary fiction novels (these may also fall into other categories):

In no particular order...

1. The Time Traveler's Wife, Audrey Niffenegger - I loved, loved, loved this book. Even after seven years, it still stays with me. It was actually one of my first reviews on this blog (HERE).

2. The Keep, Jennifer Egan - This book blew me away. It was utterly what I was not expecting and that made it all the better. If you haven't read this...well, you really should.

3. The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold - This was another of my first reviews on this blog (HERE). I liked this because of it being a cautionary tale, but also the story was incredibly poignant.

4. The Color Purple, Alice Walker - Not much explanation needed here. The movie is actually one of my favorites. I read the book years later and loved it even more. Brilliant story. (Review here)

5. The Remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro - Ishiguro is a brilliant writer. He knows how to get to the meat of what makes people tick, and it's not always pretty, or ideal. He is one of my favorite authors which is why he makes the list twice...

6. Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro - This is a book not to read if you don't want to sob uncontrollably. Also, don't go watch the end of the film after reading the book. More uncontrolled sobbing. The movie was good. The book is better. The book makes you think...really think...which is my favorite kind of book. (Review here)

7. The Invention of Wings, Sue Monk Kidd - A wonderful book, based in fact, about the strength of the human spirit and bonds that can't be broken.

8. The Mountain Story, Lori Lansens - I actually just finished reading this a couple of weeks ago and haven't even had time to review it yet. It is not just about being stranded on a mountain, but about people...what they do to each other and how they love each other in spite of it all.

9. The Gift, Cecelia Ahern - I know Ahern is categorized as a "chick lit" author, but this book is not chick lit. It was a great book to read at Christmas because it has a message, but would be good to read any time of year. Another "will have you sobbing" book.

10. The Book Thief, Markus Zusak - I think everyone has read this so it will be apparent why it's on the list. A book about human bonds, love, tragedy, and how books can bring people together. (Review Here)

R.eaders I.mbibing P.eril XI

11th year! So glad to have Carl at Stainless Steel Droppings back hosting again. I'm a bit late with this sign-up, but I have a ton of spooky reading going on this Sept-Oct. Yay!

My levels of participation:

Read four books, of any length, from the very broad categories earlier defined as perilous. They could all be by the same author, a series of books, a random mix of classic and contemporary or whatever you like.

Here's what I have on my plate:

• The Night Parade, Ronald Malfi (currently reading)
• The History Major, Michael Phillip Cash (currently reading)
• Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, Ransom Riggs (currently reading, hosting read-along at Castle Macabre)
• Salem's Lot, Stephen King (read-along in Oct. for TuesBookTalk & the Stephen King Challenge)
• The Kept Woman, Karin Slaughter
• various other horror novels

Short story read-alongs at Castle Macabre for Season of the Witch:

Edgar Allan Poe:

The Mask of the Red Death 
The Pit and the Pendulum

H.P. Lovecraft
The Dunwich Horror
The Dreams in the Witch-House

I've already seen Ghostbusters and The Disappointments Room and I have to finish watching the last few episodes of Stranger Things. American Horror Story's new season starts tomorrow!

Movies I'm also planning to see:

Morgan
The Blair Witch
Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children
The Girl on the Train
Ouija: Origin of Evil
Rob Zombie's 31
Rings

and tons of scary movies and paranormal/horror TV shows on television!

BLOGGIESTA!

Goals:

• finish working on the new community reading site I've been promising since August :(
  completed site url: http://www.gathertogetherread.com/
• finishing touches on new perpetual reading challenge accompanying the intro of new site
• sign-up post for FrightFall Read-a-Thon
• create button for new reading challenge to start January 1, 2017
• visit other participants
• work on book catalog and my home library site (A Library, Collected), if I have time
• ...if I think of anything else
• mini-challenge at Guiltless Reading - create a book map Done. Here: http://www.truebookaddict.com/p/my-book-map.html

I accomplished a bit...not a ton, but I'm satisfied. :-)

Recent book acquisitions...

from Goodwill:

Treasured Stories of Christmas (from Norman Vincent Peale, Helen Steiner Rice, Pearl S. Buck, and more)
The Curious Cast of Benjamin Button, F. Scott Fitzgerald
The American Senator, Anthony Trollope
Thomas Jefferson: An Intimate History, Fawn M. Brodie
Redcoats & Rebels, Christopher Hibbert
The Light in the Ruins, Chris Bohjalian

What's going on in your Reading life?

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Cat Thursday: Cats in Art (21)

Welcome to the weekly meme that celebrates the wonders and sometime hilarity of cats! Join us by posting a favorite LOL cat pic you may have come across, famous cat art or even share with us pics of your own beloved cat(s). It's all for the love of cats! (share your post in the Mr. Linky below)

I'm behind on my visits again. Bear with me. I promise I will catch up!

The Favorite Cat - 

Currier and Ives 1838-1846

Albert Anker - 

Girl with Cat watercolor 1903

Albert Anker - 1862

Julius Adam II-

GERMAN 1852-1913

Cat with Kittens at Play

private collection

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George HS Singer's #Ergon - Review

Ergon is a book of poems about a man looking back on, and going through, life. There are some very deep, meaningful poems in this collection. I found myself getting lost among the words and imagery as I read. There are so many wonderful poems here, but I found this one to be my favorite, as it speaks of the sacrifices parents make, and the great love and protectiveness they feel, for their children. As a mom, I can relate.

World Without End

While she lingered at the handsome
neighbor's house, mother did what people do
when battered or bored or simply afraid. 
And father did what young men do after
their wheelless bomber skids down
on desert tarmac while the crewmen
cry out their mothers' names.

They did what the dead have always
done--shouldered bricks on steep
ramps, obeyed the boss, cleaned 
the children's ears with painted 
fingernails, made do with hardened 
bread and onions fried in chicken fat.

They did what animals do--hunger on their
young's account. Mother dished up nubbly
cow's tongue and father
a Motorola TV and blue Rambler.
And so that I too might do what humans do,
they locked the front door to keep love in
where it nuzzled and shielded, spasmed and flailed.

In this slim volume, through his insightful words, Singer demonstrates Ergon: The core function or purpose of something or someone. Virtue arises when the ergon is realized fully. Aristotle (Nichomachean Ethics, 1,7, 12)

This is a must read for all lovers of poetry.

About the Book

George Singer’s Ergon is precise, delicate and fierce in its engagement with the world.

George HS Singer, a former Buddhist monk, has written a debut collection of poems about his life as a monk and in the monastery and about his life when he left to marry and have a family. As he tries to balance his spiritual principles with every day life as a husband and father, these poems utilize nature as a backdrop for his quest.

About the Author

George HS Singer, a former Zen Buddhist monk and student of Rev. Master Jiyu Kennett, lives with his wife of forty-two years in Santa Barbara, Calif., where he works as a professor at University of California, Santa Barbara. He was educated at Yale, Southern Oregon University, and the University of Oregon. He wrote poetry in college but took a twenty-year break before taking it up as a regular discipline. He has been a long term student of Molly Peacock and has had the opportunity to work with other marvelous poets through the Frost Place in Franconia, N.H. He writes about life in and out of a Zen monastery, trying to live mindfully in a busy and troubled world, his love of nature and of his wife. The arts have become more central to his life. Singer’s poems were published in the Massachusetts Review, Prairie Schooner, and Tar River Poetry.

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Take Back Your Shelves Read-a-Thon #TBYSreadathon

I can never resist a read-a-thon, and since I'll be reading this weekend anyway...why not? This read-a-thon is hosted by JMill Wanders.

What I'll be reading (from):

13 Ways of Looking at the Novel, Jane Smiley
Thousand Acres, Jane Smiley
Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, Ransom Riggs
The Life and Death of a Druid Prince, Anne Ross and Don Robins

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Cat Thursday - Large and in charge! #CatThursday #cats

Welcome to the weekly meme that celebrates the wonders and sometime hilarity of cats! Join us by posting a favorite LOL cat pic you may have come across, famous cat art or even share with us pics of your own beloved cat(s). It's all for the love of cats! (share your post in the Mr. Linky below)

Hope everyone is having a great week. A safe and happy holiday weekend to all the U.S. peeps!

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Sweta Srivastava Vikram's #SarisAndASingleMalt - Review

My thoughts
For someone who has a mother who is so very dear to me, and who is also my best friend, this slim volume of poetry was a difficult read. I can't imagine suddenly hearing that my mother had fallen critically ill and not being able to get to her in time. It is unfathomable.

Sweta Vikram has beautifully expressed her time as she rushed to get to her mother before she passed, and the unfortunate time after her passing. She poignantly gives glimpses of what her mother meant to her. Each poem gives us insight into how she is coping with, and working through, her grief.

As you can probably imagine, I had tears in my eyes while reading these poems. There were a couple that really hit home.

This....

Why Didn't You Wait For Me?

Such un-clarity on such a bright day,
such darkness in my verses.

I ask for a sign;
something, anything.

Can you hear me?

Did you know I needed
to give you a hug,
cook some Persian Kalam Pulao
when I saw you next?

A detour in your journey,
did you know fate?
Before leaving for Kashmir
did you gather
memories for me?

Why didn't you wait for me?
I ask the same question, over and over again, Ma.

I ask for a sign;
something, anything.
Can you hear me?

I wonder, as I stare at your body wrapped
in blue in the morgue. You look peaceful.
But I want to hear your hot, teasing words:

Chota kapdaa pehnee phir se?

I ask for a sign;
something, anything.
I weep silently,
thanking the thunder
for expressing my pain through the noise.

Why didn't you wait for me, Ma?

and this...

Time Changes Us

I hear you hum, "Time changes us all."
You always complained that I didn't write about you, Ma.
In thirty-six hours, I bled
a book of poems about you.

Writing is what helps me
keep you alive.
Writing is what tells me
don't lose faith.

I stand inside the sound of my words,
like a stranger lost in a dark forest.
I hear you hum, "Time changes us all."

*******

Vikram shares this cathartic experience with us and it is very powerful. It also shows us that losing someone changes us forever and we must move on, incorporating this change into our new life. I leave you with this quote from the beginning of the book which I will remember well in years to come. I find comfort in it.

"The reality is that you will grieve forever. You will not 'get over' the loss of a loved one; you will learn to live with it. You will heal and you will rebuild yourself around the loss you have suffered. You will be whole again but you will never be the same. Nor should you be the same nor would you want to." ~Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

About the Book

Saris and A Single Malt

Published by Modern History Press in August 2016

Kindle and Paperback; 46 pages

ISBN: 9781615992942

Saris and a Single Malt is a moving collection of poems written by a daughter for and about her mother. The book spans the time from when the poet receives a phone call in New York City that her mother is in a hospital in New Delhi, to the time she carries out her mother’s last rites. The poems chronicle the author’s physical and emotional journey as she flies to India, tries to fight the inevitable, and succumbs to the grief of living in a motherless world. Divided into three sections, (Flight, Fire, and Grief), this collection will move you, astound you, and make you hug your loved ones.

Goodreads

Amazon

About the Poet

Sweta Srivastava Vikram, featured by Asian Fusion as “one of the most influential Asians of our time,” is an award-winning writer, five-time Pushcart Prize nominee, Amazon bestselling author of 11 books, writing coach, columnist, marketing consultant, and wellness practitioner who currently lives in New York City. A graduate of Columbia University, she also teaches the power of yoga, Ayurveda, & mindful living to female trauma survivors, creative types, entrepreneurs, and business professionals. Sweta is also the CEO-Founder of NimmiLife, which helps you attain your goals by elevating your creativity & productivity while paying attention to your wellness.

Follow her on Twitter: https://twitter.com/swetavikram
On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sweta.vikram

Visit her website: http://swetavikram.com/

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