Sunday 6 April 2008

Another bookish meme...


Stolen from Karen. I'm not tagging anyone; help yourself if you like - or not.

1. Hardcover or paperback, and why?

Hardback. They just have that solid feel. I wish all my keepers were hardback, but alas...

2. If I were to own a book shop I would call it…

Wordtryst, of course.

3. My favourite quote from a book (mention the title) is…

I have so many faves it's hard to single one out, but I really like this one from Edward Abbey's Desert Solitaire: "There is no mystery. There is only paradox - the incontrovertible union of contradictory truths."

4. The author (alive or deceased) I would love to have lunch with would be ….

Gerald Durrell

5. If I was going to a deserted island and could only bring one book, except the SAS survival guide, it would be…

The Bible. It pretty much covers everything. The Greek myths would be nice too, but they did specify one.

6. I would love someone to invent a bookish gadget that….

...would hold my book for me in bed and in the shower.

7. The smell of an old book reminds me of….

...my great grandmother's house. She had lots of ancient books with beautiful paintings and illustrations. And lots of cats, and chickens and ducks. And great sticky-sweet things to eat.

8. If I could be the lead character in a book (mention the title), it would be….

Hmm. This is a hard one. Maybe Isadora Wing in those Erica Jong books, for sheer hedonism and lack of inhibition.

9. The most overestimated book of all time is….

Don't kill me for this. I read Catch-22 and after all the hype I was somewhat let down.

10. I hate it when a book…

...is filled with stupid spelling, grammar and other errors. If it's really bad I can't finish the book. Happily, this happens rarely.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

This is a great meme - glad you stole it :-) Loved your answers!

Anonymous said...

...so now I stole from you :)

Karen said...

Great answers! I agree with you about Catch-22, by the way :o)

Matt said...

Poor Joseph Heller. His book became ingrained as a classic when he's only a really good writer. He does have some great quotes:

"Every writer I know has trouble writing."

"When I read something saying I've not done anything as good as Catch-22 I'm tempted to reply, 'Who has?' "

And one of my favorite, humblest lines:

"But this latest gambit ... was simple, hackneyed satire ... of a kind that swarms of gifted newspaper and magazine writers could do in half a day with eight hundred words, while he would need three or four years for his novel and fill four hundred pages."

I feel like most of my ventures are the type described above and so it gives me something to aspire to overcome.

Liane Spicer said...

Thank you, Liz.

akalol, you know I'd do the same for you... or from you.

Karen, I'm glad there's at least one person who won't want to stone me for not loving Catch-22!

Matt, I do love those quotes. This is the first time I'm seeing the third one, though. And you know how I feel about your ventures...