April is the time of Literary Orange which is presented by the Orange County Library System. It is usually a lovely one-day event held at a big hotel in Newport Beach, CA, and features several keynote speakers, authors all, and "breakout" rooms with panels of writers who cover different genre. There is usually a mystery panel, a food panel, a humor panel, etc., a total of about thirty, I think. The registration fee usually includes a couple books by the presenting authors, but this year we received all four of the keynote speakers books, picking them up at the closest Orange County Library, in my case in Brea, CA. In past years lunch was served, not bad for a hotel meal, and there was lots of visiting and even a book sales room. I especially enjoyed seeing the ladies (and a few guys) dressed in their going-to-lunch clothing. Nice outfits and jewelry and even some behatted ladies, besides me! Of course, Covid has changed all that. This year's Literary Orange in via ZOOM and features interviews with four keynote speakers on consecutive Wednesday evenings. No "break out rooms". Last week I watched Harlan Coben talking about his book "Win". I enjoyed the interview, and I had read the book. Mr. Coben's books are a little too smart aleck for my taste. The title character "Win" is a minor person in a long series of Coben's previous books.
This week the book will be "Cilka's Journey" by Heather Morris, author of the best selling "The Tattooist of Auschwitz". I will watch the interview, but I cannot read the book. With all the turmoil of the past year it seems I cannot read anything about human's inhumanity to other humans or animals. In the past I could, but no longer.
However, I managed to read "The Book of Lost Friends" by Lisa Wingate. It also deals with inhumanity, this one is about freed slaves in the 1870s trying to connect with their lost families from whom they were separated by their owners before the Civil War and emancipation. It is a well written book, but hard to read. I also find I struggle with books that move back in forth in time, chapter by chapter. Here the odd numbered chapters occur in 1875 and the even numbered chapters occur in 1987-88. I did my usual modification by reading all the odd numbered chapters first and then leafed back to the beginning and read the even number chapters that take place in 1987-88. Something I have done with this odd format in past books. In this particular book I don't understand why the author used this format.
The remaining book from the keynote speakers Is "Interior Chinatown" by Charles Yu, which is a National Book Award winner. I will start reading it tomorrow!
I have not been very creative during this past year. I have three completed quilt tops, none larger than baby size, and none quilted. And I have done half a dozen small projects - mug mats, fiber post cards, 12X12s and mending. But I have read a ton of books and spent hundreds of hours on Facebook. I regret that I have essentially "wasted" a whole year, but I just lost my "mojo" and could not be very creative. No concentration, so even reading a book took maybe twice as long as normal. Of course, the question is now "What is normal anyway?"
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2 comments:
Thank you Del for the literary information! I too have read more this year and have found I wiggle and get up and down more often than necessary, but I never figured out why....to much mental thinking! We all were put through quite an incredible year perhaps the past four or so and that some of that time has been lost to my creative juices! I find this is true of so many of my friends. We stayed in touch through Zoom...thank goodness for Zoom. For me it saved my mental self! I was able to stay in touch with family and grandsons and my quilting and art friends through free lessons and not very expensive series of art. Our artist and quilting friends were most generous with their talents and information. We are now almost free to come and go as we need to and our governmental stress has been diminished substantially...thank goodness. Now, back to finishing the binding on my quilt and working in my garden! Take care, stay well and continue your wonderful kindnesses. Pats to KoKo!
Del, I enjoyed this entry very much. I think you are too hard on yourself. This year has not been what any of us would have wanted, and we each coped in our own way. You coped with unpleasant and painful health issues on top of all the isolation, and still have your great sense of humor. And you managed to take wonderful care of KoKo, which is a daily accomplishment. XO
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