I'm still reading the C.S. Lewis essay book, just started an essay entitled 'On Criticism'. I also started a book called 'The Last Unicorn', by Peter S. Beagle. Its fairly good so far.

I have picked up The Last Unicorn so many times while I'm at Barnes and Noble. Everything about the book appeals to me; the cover, the style, the genre, the story line, etc. . . Everything that is, except the price

I've heard a TON of good things about that book, and it remains on my "To Read" list. Unfortunately, now that I'm back at university, most of my "To Read" list is going to contain works such as "Organic Chemistry" "Animal Physiology" and "Genetics: A Molecular Approach." Sounds thrilling doesn't it

Ah, so that's how you know all of the amu stuff and element stuff for your smoke, DiGs!

I just finished A Conspiracy of Kings as well. I'm still ruminating about it, but I think I liked it alot! Sophos was really interesting. I forgot about him in The Thief. I should re-read that, hey? I liked his character.

I've heard people say that they didn't like the book because Sophos wasn't Gen, but I think that's not fair. You can't expect one person to be just like another, or just write books about one character. It's not fair to dislike Sophos simply because he isn't Gen. You should give him a chance! He has good traits.

DiGoRyKiRkE's WoRd Of ThE wEeK: Grimalkin: Noun: An old female cat

So I read that, and thought, "But I've only ever heard that applied to a male cat!" Of course, I'd only ever read the word in context of Marguerite Henry's Benjamin West and His Cat Grimalkin... turns out I had conveniently forgotten the line, "But that's a girl cat's name!"

It certainly made for a nice afternoon going through my collection of Marguerite Henry books. Once I finished Benjamin West I went on to Born to Trot to see how the mama cat was mentioned in there. (Not Grimalkin. Possibly the wrong part of the country?)

I may also need to re-read King of the Wind because I don't remember what that cat was named... I'm guessing it's not Grimalkin because it too is a male.

Orious: I LOVE City Of Ember!

I just read the second book in "The Tomorrow Series" by John Marsden called "The Dead Of Night"! it was so awesome! I sobbed when

Spoiler

they found Chris dead. I honestly didn't see that happening!

Actually, the cat in King of the Wind is named Grimalken.
I like all of Marguerite Henry's books, but that one is probably my favorite. Best horse story ever.

Really? My memory is not as faulty as I thought it was! *will probably read King of the Wind tomorrow* I'm looking forward to the illustrations.

(I think my favourite horse story ever is Mountain Pony by Henry V. Larom. It is the absolute perfect mix of wilderness adventure, horse story, and cowboy. )

So, since I have a fellow Marguerite Henry fan here, you wouldn't happen to have read a dog story by her called Always Reddy would you? I've read what I think is an excerpt from it a couple times, but it's always the same excerpt so I'm not sure if there's more or not...

Fantastic intro, Kate! I'd love to be in a place like that right now.

The university I'm attending for grad school has lots of libraries, many of them beautiful. I think I'm at the right place.

*Agrees with everything jo said about Harry Potter* I'm about halfway done with Deathly Hallows now. Eeep!

I did love The Hobbit. But I find the TTT and ROTK kinda hard to slog through. I'm not sure if it's the lengthy descriptions or just the writing style...I have a hard time focusing on the story. I am definetly a LOTR fan though.

Same here. I did love the books, but the last two especially were almost like I was slogging through them. This made me feel guilty, but there you are. Yay, we agree on so much! Truly we are ~kindred spirits~.

EWWWWWW on the new Forest Born cover, although I think I prefer it to the smirking modern moddle-girls. Yes, actually, I do. Why not green, for pete's sake? I mean, come on. FOREST Born? And you make it pink? Anyway, I very much liked Princess Academy and found Book of a Thousand Days to be very good. I've only read the first two Bayern books, and while I also found them very good, I'd need to read them again (since I forget about characters all the time) in order to form a solid opinion.

ForeverFan, would you (or anyone else) recommend Daniel Deronda? I've had a friend (the HP-lending one) recommend it, but I'm a little wary. My strict sadness-to-good ending ratio, you know.

I enjoyed reading LOTR and love the films too, but I've never been completely in love with them. Same goes for Jane Austen actually, I enjoy reading her books but I wouldn't call them favourites.

This is exactly how I feel, too.
Stardust was good. There are a couple adult scenes, and it felt like there was much the author hinted at but didn't delve into, which was a bit aggravating for me, but I'd recommend it if you don't mind that. That's all I've read by him, although I keep meaning to read more. I think I liked the movie more than the book, although both have their faults (and of course the movie is more Hollywood-y).

Right now I'm reading a fascinating nonfiction book by Maria Tatar, called Off With Their Heads! It's about fairy tales and the culture of childhood, analyzing folktales and all that. I also have one by the same author called Secrets Behind the Door, about Bluebeard, and I'm super excited to start that one as Fitcher's Bird (a variation of Bluebeard) is one of my favorite fairy tales.

Ooh, that sounds so interesting! I shall have to find them.

I got a 1941 compillation of the sonnets of Edna St. Vincent Millay for 50¢

Oh, I love her poetry. I have her Collected Poems and enjoyed it very much. Excellent price, too!

I think I look at books from the library like this: title, cover, blurb. The title grabs my attention first, and if the blurb makes it sound interesting I'm more likely to read it (meaning I put it back if it doesn't sound like my thing; I often put back interesting-sounding books because the time isn't right or I'm not feeling up to it). I usually use covers to avoid books that I wouldn't want to read (i.e., romance-novel or gruesome kinds of books).

Warrior4Jesus: I think that's the best cover for That Hideous Strength that I've ever seen. I like the new Ransom trilogy covers a lot, but the THS's is confusing since the people that live on the moon are mentioned only once, and briefly. I have the original hideous, nonsensical covers. I say that fondly, since I feel towards them about the same way I feel towards the neon '70s CON covers.

I WANT THAT COVER OF THE PRINCESS BRIDE (the black & white one AJAiken showed). The Barnes & Noble I go to only has the drippy movie-esque one, which will not do. I am the most picky about the covers of the books I buy, unless they're second-hand and cheap.

"Too political" seems like a really stupid reason to ban a book (and for Animal Farm and Uncle Tom's Cabin that is the POINT). Too risqué/sexual I can see, because Oh Noes Think of the Children (although I also find that stupid). Books should not be banned. If parents don't want their kids reading a certain book, they should go with them to the library and make sure they don't. That's not the library's job.

I've been reading... just Harry Potter, mainly. I've been buying a lot of books since it was my birthday last month and I got some spending money/B&N giftcards. From the library I bought: Gift From the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh and The Wizard of Oz from like the '40s, with a charming cover. From the $1 Bookstore at the mall I bought a beautiful Everyman's Library book of Love Poems (red hard cloth cover, red ribbon bookmark), a book of daily readings from the works of George Macdonald edited by C.S. Lewis, and At the Back of the North Wind by George Macdonald as well. I think there was another book but I can't remember what it was (I left them all at home to avoid temptation while at school ). One of my birthday gifts was a Barnes & Noble membership, which came with some great coupons. I bought The Scarlet Pimpernel and Mansfield Park (Buy 1 Classic, Get 1 Free), Possession by A.S. Byatt (talk about lovely covers!), and a 3-in-1 volume of CSL's works (God in the Dock, Christian Reflections, and The Pilgrim's Regress, I think). I was happy.

I think my Literary Links theme will be Covers.
Jules Verne Gorgeous! Here's another picture.
Abebooks:
-When Authors and Artists Unite
-Lovely Lithographs--The Magic of Currier and Ives
-75 Years of Penguin (well, they do have some interesting covers in there.)
-Undercover: Judging People By Their Books
Book Jackets: An Endangered Art
Some examples of Kinuko Y. Craft's illustrations She's the one who did the beautiful Wildwood Dancing cover. Gahhhh, just so gorgeous. Anyway, that's her website so you can probably click around and find new things.
86 Beautiful Book Covers I don't find all of them beautiful, but most of them are rather interesting.
Penguin book covers (probably sadly not real) So cute!
The Making of a Book Cover: BLAMELESS by Gail Carriger Interesting.
Well, this was long enough, wasn't it?

I am now in the BOOK II of LOTR: Fellowship of the Ring, yeeeey! I am starting to love the book more and more! .

um sandyentersnarnia, I'm guessing you're talking about the second lotr book, The Two Towers? The Fellowship of the Ring is the first book.

Ahh so I can't find who mentioned The Princess Academy, but I love that book. I love any book that Shannon Hale wrote. I love Shannon Hale for that. Haha my favorite book of hers is Burning Enna and to whoever has read that book Finn is still one of my original book crushes.

My favorite book cover of all time would be of Avielle of Rhia by Dia Calhoun. There's just something about it that stands out to me and that I still remember it clearly even though I haven't seen the cover upclose in 2 years. I just love the snow white hair and the mystical look to her but yet there's something human about her.

Actually, sillygoose, The Lord of the Rings is made up of six books: two in each volume. The six books are Tolkien's making; the three volumes are the publisher's.

Book 1: "A Long-Expected Party" - "Flight to the Ford"
Book 2: "Many Meetings" - "The Breaking of the Fellowship"
(which comprise The Fellowship of the Ring)

Book 3: "The Departure of Boromir" - "The Palantír"
Book 4: "The Taming of Sméagol" - "The Choices of Master Samwise"
(which comprise The Two Towers)

Book 5: "Minas Tirith" - "The Black Gate Opens"
Book 6: "The Tower of Cirith Ungol" - "The Grey Havens"
(which comprise The Return of the King)

sillygoose: No, there's a BOOK II in a LOTR: Feelowship of the Ring. I just don't remember the title of the chapters in it.

Oh cool, I didn't know that. For some reason whenever I read a book I always skip over the chapter names and anything that isn't exactly part of the text. So I guess I missed "Book I Book II" thing. My bad..

^Don't worry, no big deal about it.

I can't choose which book to buy! The one suitable for my age, but a little bit daring for a 15-year old girl. Any suggestions?

oh wow, I am already reading book 3 in The Tomorrow series by John Marsden called "A Killing Frost"

it's amazing! this series is addicting!

EDIT: oh my word I just found out about the new 39 Clues series! it's called "Cahills vs. Vespers" www.the39clues.com