June: What are you reading?

[Trillian]

I just started reading Stephen King's "It."

[Spudd]

You're prompt, Trillian!

I'm reading a Canadian novel called "Nikolski". It was originally written in French but I'm reading the translation. So far, really good.

On audiobook I'm listening to "Water for Elephants" which is also amazing. I'd recommend it to anyone.

[Blush]

I finished "Roxanna Slade" by Reynolds Price a couple of days ago; I really liked it. It wasn't a quick read but it was good. It was meaty enough without being marooned in details. I feel like I learned something about history.

I just read Michael Pollan's "Food Rules" while my boss was on the phone. 20 minutes start to finish. It was everything you've ever read about smart eating condensed. I felt myself saying, "Yeah, I know that" but of course, putting it into practice is another story.

[Sílvia]

I'm still reading Dragonfly in Amber and I'm finding it painfully slow. Beverly, when does it pick up? I'm on page 357 and I feel like they've been in Paris doing basically nothing since the beginning of times!

[mellenhead]

Spudd I LOVED "Water for Elephants" - fantastic book.

I'm reading "Matterhorn" by Karl Marlantes. It's about the Vietnam War. I read fantastic reviews on this book and I HATE IT. I just cannot get in to it. I've been forcing myself to read it for the past few nights but I think I'm giving up. It's almost 600 pages and I just can't do it.

[Anna]

I read "My Life At Grey Gardens" which is an autobiography about a woman who lived with the eccentric aunt and cousin of jackie O at Grey GArdens, I'm kind of obsessed with them so I loved it.

[Anna]

I'm about to finish "Mennonite in a Little Black Dress" by Rhoda Janzen and then onto "The Missing Girls" a true crime book

[mellenhead]

Anna did you like "Mennonite in a Little Black Dress"? It's on my list of books I want to read.

Ok, I hung on and kept reading "Matterhorn". OMG - FANTASTIC....once I got about 5 chapters in. I couldn't put it down. There is another book about Vietnam called "The Things They Carried" I want to check out now.

I just started "Then We Came to the End" by Joshua Ferris. I'm only about 20 pages in but I'm enjoying it so far.

[Spudd]

I finished "Nikolski". I didn't really like the ending, but I enjoyed the book overall.

Now I'm reading "Happenstance" by Carol Shields. So far I'm not loving it, hopefully it will pick up. It's an interesting idea... it's two novels about a married couple, one from the wife's point of view and one from the husband's. I'm reading the wife's first and I'm only a little ways in.

[Beverly]

Mellen, I LOVED Then We Came to the End! Joshua Ferris is such an amazing writer ... I just finished his second book The Unnamed, and it's just as fabulous as TWCTTE.

Earlier this week I read The Romance Reader by Pearl Abraham. It's about a rebellious Hasidic girl growing up in NYC in the 70s. Pretty good.

Now I'm reading Words the Dog Knows by J.R. Carpenter. I think it was Blush who mentioned it a few weeks ago, and I couldn't resist the title ... I'm not far into it, but so far I'm liking it a lot.

[Blush]

I hope you like it, Beverly!

I'm currently reading a non-fiction book: "Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard" by Chip Heath and Dan Heath. It is FASCINATING. I told my brother, Dad and R to try to find it on audio book (not sure if that exists yet).

Why is change so difficult and frightening? How do you create change when you have few resources and no title or authority to back you up? Chip and Dan Heath, the best-selling authors of Made to Stick, are back with a ground-breaking book that addresses one of the greatest challenges of our personal and professional lives — how to change things when change is hard.

In their follow-up book to the critically acclaimed international bestseller Made to Stick, Chip and Dan Heath talk about how difficult change is in our companies, our careers, and our lives, why change is so hard, and how we can overcome our resistance and make change happen. The Heaths liken the human mind to two distinct entities — the animal mind, or what psychologist Jonathan Haidt calls the elephant, and the logical brain, which Haidt describes as the rider. The elephant is instinctive; it acts on emotion. It likes gorging on Oreos and sleeping in. And it loves routines — doing things the same old way, every day.

The rider is the planner and thinker. The rider obsesses about the future. He or she wants to stop eating junk food and stop hitting the snooze button. But it’s hard, because when the rider and elephant disagree on where to go, the rider usually loses. And that describes the essential tension between our primitive emotional brain and our high intellect, and helps to explain why changing how we behave is so difficult. The secret to making a switch is understanding this odd couple relationship. Direct the Rider. Motivate the Elephant. Shape the Path.

Throughout Switch, Chip and Dan Heath illustrate and explain situations in which sweeping change was adopted, from a university researcher who ended the cycle of child abuse in a group of families, to an entrepreneur who turned his skeptical employees into customer service zealots and saved his company.

In the tradition of Made to Stick, Blink, and Outliers, Switch is filled with engaging and entertaining stories of how companies and individuals have brought about and sustained significant change. An indispensable guide to making change happen, it is certain to become a classic.

[Anna]

Mellen I really liked the Mennonite book, I love memoirs so that helped but it was great either way.

I am semi obssessed with the Grey Gardens stuff and so far it's all been fantastic.

[Bugsy]

I'm almost finished with my rereading of "Memoirs of a Geisha" by Arthur Golden. After Trillian mentioned it recently, it made me want to go back and read it again. Last time was in high school!

And today I picked up "The Monkey Wars" by Deborah Blum (nonfiction). She's a local author, and this one is about animal experimentation. I have a few of hers on my list, and since one of my goals for this year was to read more nonfiction books, this is the first one of hers that I chose.

[mellenhead]

I absolutely loved "Then We Came to the End" by Joshua Farris. I loved the writing and as an office drone I so related to all the characters and the set up in this book. I was so sad to finish it. I'm definitely going to check out his second book.

Right now I'm reading "Medium Raw" by Anthony Bourdain. I adored "Kitchen Confidential" and "A Cooks Tour" but all of his other books have kind of run together for me. "Medium Raw" is decent and he has some interesting stuff in there about other chefs and popular restaurants like French Laundry, Per Se, Alinea, etc but I find myself skimming a lot.

[Blush]

I finished Switch and I highly recommend it.

Now I'm reading Chelsea Chelsea Bang Bang by Chelsea Handler. It's ok. It has some funny moments.