It's been a few weeks since my last post here and in that time I've polished off four more books. Granted, they weren't difficult or even very big books, but I enjoyed most of them.
I picked up
the Great Typo Hunt: Two Friends Changing the World One Correction at a Time by Jeff Deck and Benjamin D. Herson. Being the sort of person who enjoys proof reading (though rarely on my own work) I thought this would be right up my alley. The story is based on Jeff and Benjamin's road trip around the US searching for and correcting typos and grammatical errors. For the most part it was cute and kind of funny. The verbose language and writing style seemed a tad on the pretentious side at times. My newsroom background made this slightly more irritating than it would have been otherwise. I'm a fan of saying things concisely. Don't get me wrong, I love a beautiful description, but I found the tone of the story was written in such a way that they were using words for the sake of it. It got on my nerves. Regardless, it was an interesting story and I giggled at just about every typo and error they encountered on the road trip. Plus, the end had some interesting reference material explaining why certain grammar rules apply.
After this one, I picked up
Sh*t My Dad Says by Justin Halpern. The book is just a series of chapters each starting with a quote from his dad followed by the story that lead up to that quote. After each chapter there are a number of other random quotes. I was laughing out loud multiple times during the two days it took me to polish this one off. In reading some of the brief quotes to Brad we were both in tears. I would absolutely recommend this one to anyone who needs a good laugh. I'll also be watching the show starting this fall with William Shatner.
Mare and I started reading
Emma by Jane Austen after this, but as we're having a bit of trouble getting through it, I swapped quickly and briefly to
the Big Love by Sarah Dunn. The story is about a girl whose boyfriend goes out for mustard and calls to say he's not coming back. I don't have much to say about this chick lit book other than Meh. Pass.
Next, on my Mum's recommendation I swapped to something non-fiction and read
Outliers: the Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell. The book examines what makes people successful. It was a really interesting read and somewhat satisfying to discover that successful people have an awful lot of factors contributing to their success beyond the typical "rags to riches" story. I particularly liked the explanation that for anyone to become a professional or expert at something they have to commit 10,000 hours to practicing. That tells me that if I put 10,000 hours into scrapbooking (I'm about halfway there) I'll be a pro. Not that that will get me anywhere, but it'll be fact. Ha! Definitely an interesting read though.
I picked up the Great Typo Hunt: Two Friends Changing the World One Correction at a Time by Jeff Deck and Benjamin D. Herson. Being the sort of person who enjoys proof reading (though rarely on my own work) I thought this would be right up my alley. The story is based on Jeff and Benjamin's road trip around the US searching for and correcting typos and grammatical errors. For the most part it was cute and kind of funny. The verbose language and writing style seemed a tad on the pretentious side at times. My newsroom background made this slightly more irritating than it would have been otherwise. I'm a fan of saying things concisely. Don't get me wrong, I love a beautiful description, but I found the tone of the story was written in such a way that they were using words for the sake of it. It got on my nerves. Regardless, it was an interesting story and I giggled at just about every typo and error they encountered on the road trip. Plus, the end had some interesting reference material explaining why certain grammar rules apply.
After this one, I picked up Sh*t My Dad Says by Justin Halpern. The book is just a series of chapters each starting with a quote from his dad followed by the story that lead up to that quote. After each chapter there are a number of other random quotes. I was laughing out loud multiple times during the two days it took me to polish this one off. In reading some of the brief quotes to Brad we were both in tears. I would absolutely recommend this one to anyone who needs a good laugh. I'll also be watching the show starting this fall with William Shatner.
Mare and I started reading Emma by Jane Austen after this, but as we're having a bit of trouble getting through it, I swapped quickly and briefly to the Big Love by Sarah Dunn. The story is about a girl whose boyfriend goes out for mustard and calls to say he's not coming back. I don't have much to say about this chick lit book other than Meh. Pass.
Next, on my Mum's recommendation I swapped to something non-fiction and read Outliers: the Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell. The book examines what makes people successful. It was a really interesting read and somewhat satisfying to discover that successful people have an awful lot of factors contributing to their success beyond the typical "rags to riches" story. I particularly liked the explanation that for anyone to become a professional or expert at something they have to commit 10,000 hours to practicing. That tells me that if I put 10,000 hours into scrapbooking (I'm about halfway there) I'll be a pro. Not that that will get me anywhere, but it'll be fact. Ha! Definitely an interesting read though. 