lunabee34

1. Hi, kids. Don't be me.

Josh is all the way better. I am so relieved. However, while he was sick, I basically did nothing but keep the house and kids afloat and catch up on the grading I didn't do while I was at my parents'. I was recovering physically from the trip, so it was basically sleep, grade, sleep, chores, sleep, cook, sleep, grade, sleep--you get the picture. The kids helped so much; I am so glad they are old enough that lots of these tasks can be delegated to them and that I don't have to play with them when I really can't. However, what this means is that I did not write the conference paper I was supposed to be writing this summer. The paper I am presenting this Friday. Aahhahhahahhahahah.

So, I started working on that this weekend. I already had all the research compiled, and with the exception of one book (review below), I'd already read it all before; I just need to go back through it looking for this different purpose. So I did all that over the weekend and Monday, wrote half the paper yesterday, and will finish the second half today when the first day of the conference is over (the joy of an international conference is that it's over at noon! the despair is that the first session this morning started at 4:30!). I'm not worried about finishing it or about the quality; the writing is going fine, and I'm pleased with it.

However . . .

2. This summer was supposed to be about me resting and recharging and rejuvenating and getting to a place where I'm not procrastinating all the time. And it's actually getting WORSE!

I am not a procrastinator. This is not me. I am a do-aheader. I am a 15 minutes early is on time kinda gal. I hate this.

I thought about going back to work a few days ago and nearly burst into tears. *sigh*

3. Here's some good stuff to read.

The Novels of Mrs. Oliphant: A Subversive View of Traditional Themes (Writing About Women)

The Novels of Mrs. Oliphant: A Subversive View of Traditional Themes by Margarete Rubik

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is a good argument that Oliphant has been unjustly left out of the canon and a robust defense of the merits of many of her novels (she was of the Trollope school of writing and extremely prolific).

Oliphant is typically seen as rather conservative, but Rubik argues that she had more subversive ideas about gender roles than is traditionally allowed. Rubik is writing during that period when it's very important to feminist scholars to prove that 19th-century women writers are subverting the norms of the time, but I find parts of her argument compelling, particularly Oliphant's late-in-life admission that her earlier, conservative statements in essays were made because she felt she had to make them in order to sell books.

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Scattered All Over the Earth by Yōko Tawada

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is such a wonderfully weird, little book. It's set during some future dystopia, and the nature of that dystopia is never very clearly spelled out. Information is parceled out randomly during the course of the narrative and as it would naturally come up; lots is left very ambiguous, but it's clear that climate change is the major factor fueling this dystopia. Most of the characters are physically displaced from their home countries. I think the search for home and identity comprises the core theme of the book. Despite what seems like such a heavy setting and heavy theme, this is such a kind book, uplifting and hopeful. I didn't like one character very much; I thought he wasn't very nice to his mother, for example. And then the end of the book made me reevaluate my opinion, which was very nicely done by the author.

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Women against cruelty: Protection of animals in nineteenth-century Britain by Diana Donald

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is very well-written and impeccably researched. Highly recommend if you are interested in attitudes about animals and animal rights during this time period, attitudes toward women's advocacy for animals, and attitudes toward animal cruelty during this time period in Britain.

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The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Can I give this twelve stars? LOL

I can't remember the last time I stayed up way past my bedtime reading a book. I literally couldn't put this down even though I knew I was going to pay for it the next day.

This book is just sweet. It's sweet and kind and wonderful. Reading it made me happy. I knew from the beginning it was going to end well if not the exact shape that happy ending would take; that's telegraphed pretty hard and not a secret from a reader who is at all familiar with this genre. But I enjoyed every single page that took me to that happy ending. I started tearing up when I had about a fourth of the novel left and cried some happy tears from then until the ending.

I can't recommend this novel highly enough.

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