Travel Reading (Part 2)

With all the exciting travel I've been doing (not to mention the time wasted updating my facebook status), I'm surprised at the amount of time I've had to read. It has been really wonderful. Since I last updated this list in February (when I was still in southeast Asia), I've made quite a dent in the Kindle downloads (I still prefer physical books, but this trip was made possible in part by Kindle, so credit where credit is due). Here we go:

Animal's People (read this in India, and despite the amazing reviews, hated every minute of it)

His Majesty's Dragon, Throne of Jade and Black Powder War, by Naomi Novik (who knew fiction set during the Napeolonic wars featuring aerial squads comprised of dragons, their captains and their crews could be so ridiculously good?)

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (so good, I have no idea why it took me so long to get to this one)

Count of Monte Cristo (which I saved for France and loved every second of, despite -- or perhaps because of -- its length)

Earth Logic, Water Logic and Fire Logic (from the elemental logic series): I'm not normally a sci-fi/fantasy kind of girl, but these were incredibly well-written and awfully good reading

An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination (very sad memoir by author Elizabeth McCracken about her pregnancy with first child, who died in her womb days before she was scheduled to deliver)

Fellow Travelers (why do all of the books I buy have a tendency to make me cry at least once while reading? maybe I should switch to a diet of history and David Sedaris)

Getting Stoned with Savages (saved this for Tonga, although I avoided the kava - this guy is very funny)

Gods Behaving Badly (silly, entertaining enough but not particularly well-written)

Heart Like Water (about New Orleans immediately before Katrina and in the weeks after. This is a subject I care about, written in a way that at times made me not care at all, for which I lay blame at the feet of the author)

In Defense of Food (which has convinced me to join a food co-op, start getting all my vegetables through a CSA, plant a window herb garden, and avoid nearly all packaged foods -- I look forward to getting back to the US and putting these things into practice)

Innocent Traitor (who doesn't love Lady Jane Grey?)

Mistress of the Sun (also a book for France; not great, but historical fiction has its place)

Olive Kitteridge (fine, but nothing special)

Say You're One of Them (more reading for Africa, not one of my favorites)

Shattered Dreams: My Life as a Polygamist's Wife (I don't know if fun is the right word for this, but I learned quite a bit and will never watch Big Love in quite the same way again. Did you know that fundamentalist mormons get to be gods when they die -- provided they get at least 7 wives and 50 kids -- and they each get a planet to populate. Wild stuff.)

Solitaire (sci-fi set in a not too distant future with a weird corporate twist. Interesting.)

Space Between Us (reading for India which definitely helped me understand better what was going on around me, class-wise)

The Sparrow (wow, I really, really loved this book. It's a weird mix of Jesuit politics and sci-fi. The writing was amazing. The story was amazing. Maybe I won't feel this way in a month, but at the moment, I think the book is brilliant.)

Teach Like Your Hair's On Fire (I wish this guy would come teach at the school I'll be starting...)

They Poured Fire on Us from the Sky/What is the What: both about the Sudanese Lost Boys, the first is entirely non-fiction, while the second is called a novel largely because Dave Eggers did the writing and the narrator would have been to young to recall/reconstruct many of the earlier events in the book. The two books are very consistent and totally depressing.

I am currently rereading all of Jane Austen, a fitting way to spend my time in England (especially my visit to Bath, which has forced me to reread Northanger Abbey, something I would not do in other circumstances). I started with Persuasion, went on to Mansfield Park (and was reminded again that Fanny Price is perhaps my least favorite of Jane Austen's heroines), and am now suffering through Northanger Abbey (whose frequent references to Mysteries of Udolpho make me long to be reading that instead).