Tuesday, January 25, 2011

What I've been reading..... on my iPad(:

As you can see, my fascination with the novelty of my iPad has not worn off(: And get reading ready for a deluge of books, this time ebooks(:

I've been really biased towards my iBooks app, such that I read practically only on that one, and neglect my Kobo and other apps (although the Wattpad app gets quite a lot of use). So, the following books will all be from the iBooks app..... *tadada...attemptedbutfaileddrumroll*

The first "set" of books (since I want to use classifications), are all related to Jane Austen, and they're either her works or works that she read; and yes, Jane Austen is one of my favourite authors, and I don't care what Mark Twain thinks. In particular, her works, are Lady Susan and Love and Freindship (typo intended). Love and Freindship is her "Juvenilia" and even though she wrote it at a young age, is really surprisingly good. (Although, with the advent of so many good writers from fanfiction.net and Wattpad, it should be expected). Her writing style is a bit different, but in no way inferior and there's lots of humor in it. Lady Susan, is her first work (if I remember correctly), and it's basically about a sociopath (at least, that's the consensus from people), and I have to admit, she (Lady Susan), is really feeling-less.

The works that Jane Austen (and now I) read, are Pamela, Pamela II, Shamela (anyone see a pattern?). In cause you're wondering, I did read somewhere that it's normal for the books to be named after the titular character. But while Pamela and Pamela II are a series, Shamela is a parody of the series (does that make it the ancestor of fanfiction?). The two Pamela works are about a servant protecting her Virtue from her Master, whom she eventually marries, and the second volume is about their life after marriage. While Pamela can seem like a Mary Sue at times, she's surprisingly likeable. But be warned, both works are very long, while Shamela is much shorter.

What's interesting about all these works is that they are Epistolary Works, which basically mean that they are all written in the form of letters from different characters to other characters. It's actually really hard to do, since you need to be able to "write" the voice of each character, and it's also a part of characterisation. (:

The next "set" of works are by G.K Chesterton. I think I've mentioned them before, so I'll be brief. The two works are Heretics and Orthodoxy and they are meant to be 'companions' to one another. And again, I can't stress enough what a wonderful writer he is, and urge people to read his works.

The third "set" are related to making the most out of life, and the two books (that I recall reading) are How to Study and How to live on 24 hours a day. Even though those two books were written really really long ago, they are still, surprisingly applicable, and readable (since they're both short). I actually recommend everyone to read them both, since the How To Study guide is general enough for any subject, but the methodology is specific, and the one about 24 hours (sorry! Lazy!) is quite good on helping managing time. They provide the methodology, but they don't give a schedule (see the difference?)

The last "set" is the random set, and consists of all sorts of books, mostly related to school. The first one (which is also the first book I finished) is called Farmers of Forty Centuries, and is about organic farming. But I really like the descriptions of life in past Japan, China and Korea, so it's a decent 'history/travel' guide (And it's link to school is that it was recommended during an enrichment programme). The next book is Plays by Anton Chekhov and basically, I just read/annotated Three Sisters, which is one of the books I'm doing for my World Literature Essay 1. (:

Whew! You've just survived this very long winded and TMI account. Hurray for you!

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