Off The Shelf

Hello! So..long time no see. But I have returned (Hurray!) and here is what I have recently been reading, interested in, and working on. Here we go! Currently Reading I am currently reading Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel. This novel was included on several "Best of 2014" lists last year, so I figured I would give it a try. I really, really love it so far. Mandel's sentences are so elegant and beautiful, and she switches perspectives with such ease. I very rarely comment on a book's s cover, but the cover of Station Eleven is just so pretty - the lighted tents, the starry sky, the simple bold font. Here is a brief look as to what it's about: On a snowy night, Arthur Leander, a famous actor, drops dead of a heart attack while portraying King Lear on stage. On the same night, a terrible flu begins to spread, engulfing the city of Toronto and its residents in sickness and death. Fifteen years later, Kirsten Raymonde is an actress with the Travelin...

  { “Eating and reading are two pleasures that combine admirably." -C.S Lewis}   Hello! It's been a little while, but I am here this week to share what I am currently reading, interested in, and working on this August.   Currently Reading I am currently reading Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell as part of my AP English summer reading requirement for the upcoming year. The nonfiction story of success has spent 166 weeks so far on the NY Times Best Sellers List.   In Outliers , Gladwell argues that it has become no longer enough to look at what a successful person is like , but rather, in order to understand their rise to the top fully, we must look at where these people are from : their culture, their family, their generation, and the idiosyncratic experiences of their upbringing. Throughout the book, the author reveals why no star hockey players are born in the fall, why Asians are good at math, and that Bill Gates and the Beatles are more alike tha...

     {An odd mix of classic literature and blockbuster contemporary}   Currently Reading I am currently reading The Chaperone by Laura Moriarty. I went to the bookstore (in fact,  I drove to the bookstore :)) a few weeks ago hoping to buy something in particular, but ended up coming out with something entirely different. I bought The Chaperone  because of it's beautiful cover and of course because of the ever-deciding factor: the blurb on the back, which in a brief summary states:   Cora Carlisle, a traditional woman from Kansas, has volunteered to chaperone the beautiful, yet arrogant 15 year old, Louise Brooks to New York City. Louise is on her way to becoming the silent-film star of a generation, with her famous black bob with blunt bangs and lack of respect for convention. Cora has her own reasons for making the trip, but the five weeks the two spend together promise to change their lives forever. Set in the 1920s an...

{Books and Homework} I've decided to start a new series of posts entitled On My Nightstand , and hopefully I can get around to posting them once a month. The posts will focus on what I am currently reading, working on, and interested in. Currently Reading I had to pick a memoir or autobiography for English class, to read for this semester's independent reading project. I did a lot of research before making a selection, reading excerpts from, and reviews about, a number of memoirs including: A House in the Sky , Eat Pray Love,  and Half Broken Horses . And although each of the aforementioned titles have received high critical acclaim, I choose  Wave for the emotional power I presumed it would express. Wave is the story of Sonali Deraniyagala, who was vacationing with her family in Sri Lanka during Christmas week of 2004. On December 26th, a devastating tsunami and earthquake occurred in the Indian Ocean and her hotel in Yala was consumed by waves. Deraniyagala los...