by Audrey Niffinegger
by Donald McCaig 
by Zora Neale Hurston
by Warren St. John
by Kathryn Stockett
by Jamie Ford
by E.L. Doctorow
by Frances Mayes
by Jeannette Walls
by Tracy Cevalier 
by Terrence Frisby. I plowed right through this book on Christmas Eve (it's only about 200 pages in length). For what was a very scary time for the English (and much of the rest of the world) was an adventurous time for the seven year-old narrator who published this book in the form I read it in 2009. Frisby, a playwright, has worked with the Criterion Theatre (where I saw a play that I'll talk about in a later post). A musical theatre version of his story of the three years he spent in Cornwall was produced in 2004 at Queen's Theatre in London.
, but with a much more positive and adventurous spin. It was almost as if Frisby didn't know the danger his parents were in and thought of his time with Auntie Rose and Uncle Jack as just a fun new chapter in his life. This is a really wonderful tidbit of history told from the perspective of a real person, and better yet, a child. I won't give the book away, but the ending is very satisfying and very sweet.
, and listening to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
on my iPod before going to London, I had a particular itch to visit 221B Baker Street, where today there is a Sherlock Holmes Museum. This fit in well with visiting the British Library and the Charles Dickens Museum, as there were pretty close to each other in the Bloomsbury and Marylebone sections of London. 
. He was nice enough to give me a review copy of his book, which I've read. A review is forthcoming in the next few days. 
, while sitting at the bar, came up with the idea for Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson. In recent years, Batman: The Dark Knight
(seen it) was filmed in part here, and Russell Crowe's A Good Year
was also filmed here (haven't seen it yet).
at Shakepeare's Globe Theatre
. At first we were thinking of spending five pounds on a groundling ticket to get the effect of that; we changed our minds after all the walking we did that day. We paid 20 pounds instead for a front row seat and rented a cushion for the show. I recommend that route.
, and it's by Steve Slaunwhite, Pete Savage and Ed Gandia. Some of the information given is just good business practice, and things I'm already doing. Much more of the book is great ideas of things I haven't yet thought of, and hints on handling all the snags that will eventually come the way of a freelance writer. My list of action items I created for myself from reading this book will take me a while to complete, but promises to be helpful. I'd even recommend that book for most any self-employed entrepreneur, writer or not, because there are plenty of helpful tips on cultivating client relationships, marketing yourself and getting the most bang for your buck out of a host of things., which has turned out to be one of my favorite reads of the year, and one of the best book club discussions I've participated in. 
and An Ideal Husband
. In both cases, these plays were read by a variety of voices, which made them much more entertaining and easier to listen to rather than read. I followed this up last week by watching movie versions of both of these productions, which further helped these plays come to life for me. The casts on both versions I watched were great. The Importance of Being Earnest
featured Colin Firth (one of my favorites - Mr. Darcy, anyone?), Rupert Everett, Reese Witherspoon and Judi Dench. An Ideal Husband
starred Rupert Everett again, Julianne Moore, Cate Blanchett and Minnie Driver. They were both fun to listen to and watch.
, published in 1856. I know enough from my research to know that my relative owned it near the end of his life, as he died from injuries sustained in a Civil War battle in 1864 in either Alabama or Georgia.
by Robert Louis Stevenson. Most of us had never read it before, though we were familiar with the idea of the book. It made for pretty interesting discussion. If you haven't read it, it's short enough to be considered a novella, so it won't take you long to read. Luckily one of our book clubbers had her laptop with her, so we did a few YouTube searches to see what was out there on the book. John Barrymore's movie version from 1920 is available in its entirety. We discovered that a few years ago, David Hasselhoff acted in a Broadway musical based on the book. You can see a clip of him here.
by Joanna Moody. I picked it up in the gift shop at one of my favorite London places: the Churchill War Rooms.
on CDs in the car. I've read a handful of his novels before and only really, really liked A Time to Kill
and A Painted House
, but found myself really enjoying this collection of stories. I think what I liked about them is that I felt like even though they were short stories, Grisham did a great job of making me feel strongly about each character right from the get-go. The characters are both Southern and believable. This doesn't happen as often as it should.
and it's really a pleasure to read. If you like this kind of thing, I think you should read it. Time well spent.
. It's a fun read each month, telling me all the places in Atlanta I should be eating and all the other great things the city has to offer that I should take advantage of. . There is even more good news associated with this bestseller: filming for the movie has begun in Mississippi, Stockett is considering writing a short story prequel to her novel, and she's at the beginning stages of writing a second novel. Hooray!
has been published! For my birthday last week, my sister bought me Literary Trails of the North Carolina Piedmont: A Guidebook
by Georgann Eubanks. I've skimmed most of the book so far, but just can't wait to start checking things off as I have done in the past year or so in Asheville and Hendersonville, NC. At first glance, there are a lot of fun things to check out: the residences of Betty Smith (author of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
), all the authors living in Hillsborough (Lee Smith, Hal Crowther, Allan Gurganus, Jill McCorkle and sometimes Annie Dillard) and NC Central University where Zora Neale Hurston taught briefly, to name a few.
