2 DNFs - both temporary - and a book I'm loving

I'm sure you guys are going to think I'm off my rocker when you see the second of these DNFs, but I have my reasons for both.

Mike White Presents Impossibly Funky: A Cashiers Du Cinemart Collection is a collection of writings about film that I'm pretty sure I received from the publisher or author-slash-editor (not positive about that). It looks really good and I enjoyed it, at first, but let me tell you how it starts and why I set it aside.

The first article is about how Mike White observed some very striking similarities between Quentin Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs and an older, lesser known film, City on Fire, directed by Ringo Lam. White claims that Reservoir Dogs is based on City on Fire and made a now-notorious film called Who Do You Think You're Fooling that showed parallel bits from the two movies to show that Tarantino had gone so far as to steal entire scenes.

Because Reservoir Dogs was a huge break-out hit for Tarantino and a money-making, award-winning movie . . . well, he ticked off a lot of people. A lot. The intro and first several articles are about White's attempt to get Tarantino and Miramax to fess up. This involved a lot of phone calls, interviews, acceptance of White's film into the New York Underground Film Festival and a whole lot of denial from the Tarantino/Miramax camp.

The articles are very interesting but there were several in a row and by the time I hit the 4th, I was ready to move on to reading just about anything else but more of the same. I didn't bother to even look to see how much more there was about the whole controversy, White's follow-up film, etc. (oops -- just a whopping 2 pages). I don't like skipping portions of a book, though, so I set it aside thinking, "I'll get back to this one, soon." Well, if you've been watching my sidebar you know Impossibly Funky has been lurking there for quite a while.

There are times that I'll get a mental block about returning to a book and the only way I'll ever get back to it is to set it aside, leaving the bookmark in place (I often don't have any trouble remembering what I've already read), remove it from my sidebar and come back to it in a few months. That's what I plan to do. Now that I've been sitting here flipping through the book, I almost feel like changing my mind and going ahead with the reading. Almost. Not quite. But, I can already say I think it's fun reading if you're a film buff.

I watch movies almost exclusively because I prefer seeing an entire story rather than the bits you see in weekly television (although I make exceptions -- I'm a Michael Westin freak, a Hugh Laurie afficianado, a Chuck obsessive, and I am still waiting for someone to bring Firefly back). But I don't watch obscure films and really don't think you need to in order to enjoy Impossibly Funky.

This is the one that'll make you think I'm crazy. I set aside The

Pioneer Woman's new bio (which I just purchased about a week ago), Black Heels to Tractor Wheels: A Love Story -- at page 225! That is totally unheard of for me! Usually, if I abandon a book, I stop around the 50-100 page range. And, I really enjoyed a lot of what I read. If you've read her blog, you know Ree Drummond is an excellent storyteller with a great sense of humor; she's utterly charming, really.

What I wasn't expecting was that this book would dredge up so many emotions about my home state and how much I still miss home and family (both of my parents and my last living grandmother have died since we moved to Mississippi). Around page 225, Ree and Marlboro Man's wedding was ending and I was in pieces, absolutely sobbing my eyes out. It wasn't just that the romance was touching and lovely and she and her man had these wonderful extended families (which I totally envy) but that it took me back to some very important plans I left behind when we moved out of Oklahoma -- things I haven't figured out how to get back to, in spite of years of trying.

So, do not avoid Black Heels to Tractor Wheels based on the fact that I set it aside. It really is a sweet story of an oddball true romance. I'll probably still manage to finish it, but not this moment. I have to give it some space and time and come back when when I'm good and ready. In case you haven't peeked inside the book, it does include a few recipes. In fact, I considered not returning to the book and put it in my get-rid-of bag. It was Huzzybuns who retrieved it to seek out some new recipes and that was enough to make me rethink getting rid of the book without finishing.

On to other topics . . .

Why Bookfool Deserves a Time-Out:

When I met up with the lovely Amy of Amy Reads on Friday, I had an armful of books because Borders was having one of those terrific $1 clearance sales and there were so many appealing titles -- some of which I've had on my wish list for quite some time -- that my friend Donna (who works at Borders) fetched me a little hand basket and took the books out of my arms so I wouldn't have to haul them around while Amy and I chatted. That turned out to be a mixed blessing. When Borders announced that they were preparing to close, I decided to just go ahead and buy everything in the basket. They were only $1 each, after all. I came home with one heck of a pile and you know I do not need more books. I'm trying to purge, not add to my shelves. But, I came home and looked through them; and, only one book turned out to be a reject. I can always haul that to the homeless shelter store or donate it to the library. No biggie.

Here, the story gets worse. After blubbering about how much I miss home and, gosh, real estate is so freaking cheap in my hometown that maybe I should just buy a house there, my husband decided I clearly needed to spend some time out of the house. Our little cluttered house does drive me nuts. Guess where he took me? Among other places . . . Borders.

Darned if they didn't still have about a million fantastic titles. This time, I sat in the cafe and narrowed down, but not by much. I was getting set to walk back to the shelves when the spouse hustled me to the cash register and out of the store. I'm reading one of those purchases, High Points and Lows: Life, Faith and Figuring It All Out by Austin Carty. I love his down-to-earth thoughts about faith versus religion and since it's a fairly short book I'm pretty sure I'll whip through this one and review it some time soon. Here's my favorite quote, so far:

The one remarkable truth about Christianity is that it's all a matter of heart. You can avoid curse words your whole life, bake brownies every day for bake sales, lead prayer meetings at your house, never touch alcohol, never have premarital sex, and still, if it isn't because you really believe that Jesus is still alive and you love him for it, you're wasting your time. That is the beauty of the Christian religion, and also the rub. Only each individual can determine whether he's committed, abstaining, practicing, etc. for the real reason.

--from p. 3 of High Points and Lows by Austin Carty

Cool. I love that paragraph so much that I handed the book to my husband and asked if he agreed and wasn't that a great way of putting the whole Jesus thing? Nod, nod.

Okay, off to bed with me. All that bawling, last night, has caught up with me. I'm frazzled. I must go bury myself in a book to recover. Nighty-night!

©2011 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery and Babble or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Live Big! by Katie Brazelton

Live Big! 10 Life Coaching Tips for Living Large, Passionate Dreams
by Katie Brazelton
Copyright 2001
Howard Books - Personal Growth/Christian
141 pages - DNF

Unfortunately, this is another Did Not Finish, but I will tell you right up front that there's absolutely nothing about Live Big! that I disliked or that turned me off. I simply have been very moody about my reading, lately, and it was another case of wrong book for the moment.

The title basically says it all. Live Big! is about pursuing your dreams. In general, I love positive-thinking books, but it's possible that I'm getting a little too old for this kind of book. I'm more at the "squeeze in what you can of the old dreams before it's too late" stage. Mid-life crisis, maybe. Anyway, I read 18 pages and actually enjoyed those 18 pages but just couldn't seem to go on and I think it's just me. If you're looking for encouragement and particularly if you like to be encouraged from a biblical perspective (i.e., "God is on your side," encouragement), this may be the book for you and it's a quick bite of a book at a mere 141 pages. I'm pretty disappointed with myself for not managing to get very far, but I will definitely give it another go when the time is right.

I'm typing this at 12:39 a.m. on Friday morning, unfortunately, because Thursday was One of Those Days. Earth Day is technically over and I had plans to post about some books that I thought particularly fitting for Earth Day, so . . . wait, it's Earth Month, right? Every April is Earth Month, isn't it? If it's not, I just made it so. I will plan to get around to commenting about my Earthy books before the end of April. If I don't, you can strip me of Official Tree Hugger status, which would actually save me from the poison ivy but let's just keep that bit hush-hush, okay?

I didn't say that. Seriously. One of Those Days. In the end, it was Craig Ferguson (the late-night talk-show host, not that other guy you went to school with who used to pull your pigtails and tie your shoe strings together . . . although it seems likely that the famous Craig did that) who saved me from using an entire box of Kleenex for no other reason than I just felt like sobbing because it was One of Those Days. Thank you, Mr. Ferguson, sir. The only trouble is that Mr. Ferguson had me laughing till tears streamed down my face. I'm going to have really dry eyes, tomorrow.

Finished today, in spite of all the snuffling: Will Grayson, Will Grayson by Green & Levithan

Live Big! is a tour book (my thanks to Howard Books for the review copy), so Fiona Friday has been delayed till evening but I do plan on posting a photo. Not to worry. Happy Friday!

Alcohol Today: Abstinence in an Age of Indulgence by Peter Lumpkins (thoughts)

Alcohol Today by Peter Lumpkins
Copyright 2009
Hannibal Books - Christian (nonfiction)
176 pages

I'm just halfway into this book and not sure if I'll continue to read, so I'm going to go ahead and post my thoughts. The author advocates total abstinence from alcohol as opposed to drinking in moderation and the book is about why he thinks abstinence is the Biblically correct choice.

A few days ago, I mentioned that I think the language makes this book self-limiting because it's written in what I would call "preacher-speak", the language of someone who has been to seminary and knows some theological terminology that isn't naturally known to a wider audience. Last night, I took the time to check for a glossary and there is one, but the word I was looking for, hermaneutics, was not in the glossary.

I looked it up online because I'm a curious chick:

Biblical hermaneutics - refers to the study of the interpretation of written texts, especially texts in the areas of literature, religion and law. (Wikipedia)

Actually, the word itself gives you an idea of what kind of territory the book covers. While at this point (page 76), the author hasn't directly referred to any scriptures that pertain to abstinence from alcohol, his opinion/interpretation is that the Bible is a completely and wholly accurate expression of God's wishes for His people. I'm probably saying that wrong, but the author is a Bible purist, as opposed to someone who believes that some scripture -- like the story of Adam and Eve -- is not strictly historical but more along the lines of mythology to explain early events. The author believes that scripture can answer all questions, even about topics that are not directly described because of the time period in which it was written.

Abortion and cloning are some examples of current topics the author mentions that are not specifically discussed in the Bible because of the time period, but to which he believes the answers of whether or not they're morally acceptable can be inferred from Biblical scripture based on what we know of right and wrong. This is tricky territory. I don't typically share my opinion of what I believe about such things outside my family because they're such hot-button topics and, in my opinion, rather private to the individual.

So . . . back to the book. Because the language is a bit tiresome, the book is a slow read. I do think there are some very interesting sections although, in general, I'm not finding the book as illuminating as I'd hoped. I enjoyed reading about America's Prohibition Period, in particular. The author reminds us that Prohibition is commonly thought of as a total failure. That was certainly my understanding, but he has dredged up some statistics showing that it was actually a success in that fewer people drank alcohol and the troubles that go with alcohol consumption (abuse, fights, accidents) also dropped.

But why abstinence rather than moderation? Well, I haven't gotten to a point at which he actually describes how he's inferred that abstinence is preferable. If you're interested in a glimpse of the author's writing style, check out the sneak peek chapter in my previous post. The author has shared his own story, which obviously informs his own opinion. He grew up in a large, impoverished family and his father always had a beer in his hand. The author started sneaking sips of his father's beer as a very young child and, eventually, drank himself into a drunken state on a daily basis -- while he was still quite young.

Why was I interested in this book? Because I don't drink and I guess I was looking for a better reason than, "Alcohol tastes disgusting." Although, to be honest, I have several reasons. By the time I went off to college, I knew I would never drink heavily because of my migraines. If you've lived with intense headaches for many years, it makes sense not to do anything that will give you a bad headache and everyone's heard of hangovers by the time they get through high school. I wasn't interested in taking myself any further into headache territory. My family was also friends with a man whose alcoholism literally ruined his life and then killed him.

However, the author hasn't convinced me that there's anything wrong with moderation -- yet. In fact, I think this passage reflects an irrational assumption:

. . . to limit the biblical record's application to simply "wine" or even alcoholic beverages for that matter neglects the much larger and desperately needed application to an endless parade of intoxicants whose primary purpose is identical to "wine" -- stimulating pleasure. Incidentally, once again we must remind ourselves, unlike the ancients who necessarily consumed grape products specifically for survival, those lobbying for moderately consuming intoxicants today in the form of drinking distilled wines, beers, and other alcoholic beverages are lobbying for consumption distinctively driven by pleasure alone.

My father would have disagreed with that statement. He had a collection of pretty little crystal wine glasses about 2" deep and each night he sipped about an inch-and-a-half of wine, merely because he read that it was good for his heart. Not everyone drinks for pleasure alone, although I'm certain my father also found his evening wine relaxing.

If you're interested in this topic, I definitely suggest that you read the sneak peek chapter before purchasing this book, simply because I found the writing so heavy that I'd recommend checking it out before buying. I can't rate it, not having reached the end, but I do wish the author had referred to some scripture by this point.