2025 Pop Sugar Reading Challenge Results

I have been plugging away at the Pop Sugar Reading Challenge all year. Here are the results. It was not as successful as it has been in previous years, but at least I read some interesting books. 

Results from previous years:

2018
2019
2020
2021

2022 

2023

2024

1. A book about a POC experience joy and not trauma

What You Are Looking For Is in the Library by Michiko Aoyama (translated by Alison Watts) - Cozy slightly magical book about a librarian who knows just how to help people with their biggest challenges. It read like a series of interconnected short stories. It was a bit too self-help-y for me, but it was a gentle, kind read. 4/5 stars

2. A book you want to read based on the last sentence

The Wishing Game by Meg Shaffer - Sort of a problematic book, but it's very readable. 3/5 stars

3. A book about space tourism

Floating Hotel by Grace Curtis - Not exactly what I suspected. It was a fun cozy book and then suddenly there was a dead body? 3/5 stars

4. A book with two or more books on the cover or "book" in the title

The Bookish Life of Nina Hill by Abbi Waxman - I stand by my review. #ninaisaterribleperson 2/5 stars

5. A book with a snake on the cover or in the title

The Last Magician (The Last Magician #1) by Lisa Maxwell - So much promise. The most meh of books. 3/5 stars

6. A book that fills your favorite prompts from the 2015 PSRC - 2015 was before my time, so I had to look these up!

I think I'll probably do a book with more than 500 pages:

Here Be Dragons (Welsh Princes #1) by Sharon Kay Penman - Historical soap operas are my catnip. 4.5/5 stars

7. A book about a cult 

The Girls by Emma Cline - DNF in January

I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman  - Beautiful little book. 4.5/5 stars

8. A book under 250 pages

Dear Fahrenheit 541 by Annie Spence - I enjoyed spending time with Annie as she talked to her books. 4/5 stars

The City in Glass by Nghi Vo - DNF May

9. A book that features a character going through menopause

Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe by Fannie Flagg - DNF July

How to Age Disgracefully by Clare Pooley - DNF

The New Moon's Arms by Nalo Hopkinson - DNF May

The Correspondent by Virginia Evans - Basically a perfect book if you ask me. 5/5 stars

10. A book you got for free

The Bee Sting by Paul Murphy (recommended by Maya, J, and Nance) - Slow start, but then I was really invested. J gave me an audiobook copy, so I got it for free! 4/5 stars

11. A book mentioned in another book

Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters - Mentioned in How to Read a Book. It was worth a read! 4/5 stars

12. A book about a road trip

Planes, Trains, and All the Feels by Livy Hart - Unremarkable romance, but this couple is never going to make it. 3/5 stars

13. A book rated less than three stars on Goodreads

14. A book about a nontraditional education

Truly, Devious (Truly Devious #1) by Maureen Johnson - This was legitimately a terrible book. 2/5 stars

The Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip Williams - DNF January

15. A book that an AI chatbot recommends based on your favorite book

When I asked ChatGPT to recommend books based on my love of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, it recommended:

The Chosen by Chaim Potok - Nothing happened in this book. 3/5 stars

16. A book set in or around a body of water

The Most by Jessica Anthony - Marriage in peril and the wife won't get out of the pool. The ending ruined what could have been a promising novel. 3/5 stars

The Wedding People by Alison Espach - DNF

17. A book about a running club

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami - Oddly enough, I could have used less talk about running or being thin. 3/5 stars

18. A book containing magical creatures that aren't dragons

I read Alberich's Tale in the Valdemar saga - lots of Companions in that series. 

Exile's Valor - 3.5/5 stars

19. A highly anticipated read of 2025

Sunrise on the Reaping (Hunger Games #0.5) by Suzanne Collins - Nice bit of fan service if you're interested in Haymitch's story. 4/5 stars

Everything is Tuberculosis by John Green - Super interesting topic. I wish another author had written it. 3/5 stars

Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry - I did not care for the subplot of the old lady recounting her life, but the romance was pretty fun. 3.5/5 stars

Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid - DNF September

20. A book that fills a 2024 prompts you'd like to do over (or try again)

I'd like to do a book by a blind or visually impaired author over again - I didn't get a great book last time

Feed by Mira Grant - The main character has issues with her eyes because of the zombie virus. Also, I loved this book. Bloggers! Zombies! 5/5 stars

21. A book where the main character is a politician - Well, you can't say I didn't try with this one. 

Infomocracy (The Centenal Cycle #1) by Malka Ann Older - DNF July

Never by Ken Follett - DNF in April

The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin - DNF November

22. A book about soccer

The Long Game (Green Oak #1) by Elena Armas - Slow burn romance. Fine if you like that sort of thing. 3/5 stars

23. A book that is considered healing fiction

How to Read a Book by Monica Wood - I really liked this one. 5/5 stars

24. A book with a happily single woman protagonist

Girl, Woman, Other by Bernadine Evaristo - Too many POVs for me. 3/5 stars

25. A book where the main characters is an immigrant or refugee

Real Americans by Rachel Khong - Long, but good. I did not find it memorable, though, because as I went to write this blurb a couple of months later, I couldn't remember much about this book. 4/5 stars

Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng - For Pete's sake, this book was a snooze. 2.5/5 stars

The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christy Lefteri - DNF May

26. A book when an adult character changes careers

Assistant to the Villain by Hannah Nicole Maehrer - Girl stumbles into a job with the bad guy. Fine read. 3/5 stars

27. A book set at a luxury resort

And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie - The writing is subpar, the characterizations nonexistent, and the ending was exasperating. 2/5 stars

28. A book that features an unlikely friendship

News of the World by Paulette Jiles - A perfect book for this prompt. I loved Captain and Johanna together. I actually bought this book for my 16-year-old nephew as a present for Christmas. 4/5 stars

29. A book about a food truck

The Rest of the Story by Sarah Dessen  - I read this. It's not about a food truck. The Truth About Forever is the one that features a food truck. Grr. 3/5 stars

The Truth About Forever by Sarah Dessen - This one isn't about a food truck, either! The main character works for a catering company and there's a catering truck, but it's not really the same thing. It's better than the other Dessen book, though. 4/5 stars

30. A book that reminds you of your childhood

Charlotte's Web by E.B. White - This audiobook is read by E.B. White himself and is sheer perfection. What a fantastic book. 5/5 stars

The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett (on hold at library) - Still a lovely story of self-discovery and found family. 4/5 stars

31. A book where music plays an integral part of the storyline

A Visit from the Goon Squad (Goon Squad #1) by Jennifer Egan - DNF July

August Lane by Regina Black - If you like your romances with a bit of a deeper message, this might be for you. It was not for me. 3/5 stars

32. A book about an overlooked woman in history

Mr. President, How Long Must We Wait?: Alice Paul, Woodrow Wilson, and the Fight for the Right to Vote by Tina Cassidy - YES!! This book. Maybe I wouldn't want to be friends with Alice Paul, but I was so happy to read all about her fight for women's suffrage. I liked how it was framed with Paul and Wilson as big players. This made me feel better about our current political landscape. 5/5 stars

33. A book featuring an activity on your bucket list - My bucket list item is to eventually have more than half my wardrobe be clothing I have made with my own two hands, so I looked at books with seamstresses in them. I just didn't get around to reading any of them. 

34. A book written by an author who is neurodivergent

Mislaid in Parts Half-Known (Wayward Children #9) by Seanan McGuire (also could be for a book under 250 pages) - Not the best in the series, but I read it! 3/5 stars

35. A book centering LGBTQ+ characters that isn't about coming out

Space Opera (Space Opera #1) by Catherynne M. Valente - On my reading spreadsheet (borrowed from Stephany), I put a no in column labeled LGBTQ+. I mean, I guess maybe? The thing is that both of the main male characters were in relationships with women. Maybe they were bi? Who knows? I'm counting it. 

Somewhere Beyond the Sea (Cerulean Sea #2) by TJ Klune - This fits the prompt much more directly. 3/5 stars

36. A book with silver on the cover or in the title

The Silver Star by Jeannette Walls - I wanted more. 3/5 stars

37 & 38. Two books with the same title 

This just didn't happen this year. 

39. A classic you've never read

Moby-Dick by Herman Melville - I DID IT!!! 4/5 stars

40. A book about chosen family

Clean Sweep (Innkeeper Chronicles #1) by Ilona Andrews - So much fun! 4/5 stars

41. A book by the oldest author in your TBR pile

I don't even know how I would go about finding this out. A bunch of authors I read are dead - does that count?

42. A book with a left-handed character

Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah - Hmm...is there a left-handed character here? I don't know. I read it, though. I think I missed the point of this book. 2/5 stars

43.  A book where nature is the antagonist

The Vaster Wilds by Lauren Groff - Servant girl runs into the woods during the "starving time" in the Jamestown colony. Despair and loneliness follow. 3.5/5 stars

44. A book that features a married couple who don't live together

Twelve Years a Slave by Solomon Northrup - This is an interesting slave narrative, but I sort of wanted it to be more? 3.5/5 stars

45. A book with a title that starts with the letter Y

Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks - The writing was great, but maybe I'll never really be ready for a book about the plague. 3/5 stars

46. A book that includes a nonverbal character

Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson (reread for me) - I think Just Listen handles these themes better, but both books have their place in YA books about rape. 3.5/5 stars

47. A book you have always avoided reading

Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell - Easily my most favorite book I read in 2025. 5/5 stars

48.  A dystopian book with a happy ending

I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself by Marisa Crane - Look, was this really a happy ending? I don't know about that. 3/5 stars

49. A book that features a character with chronic pain

False Witness by Karin Slaughter - This was a good thriller, fast-paced. But I think it was a bit too much for the likes of me. 4/5 stars

50. A book of interconnected short stories

Blackout by Dhonielle Clayton, Tiffany D. Jackson, Nic Stone, Angie Thomas, Ashley Woodfolk, and Nicola Yoon - I listened to this one and it got me really pumped up for summer. 4.5/5 stars

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Completed prompts: 44/50

Average star rating: 3.53/5 stars

One thing I really like about this challenge is that I do read outside of my normal tendency. Look at me reading contemporary fiction, poetry, and mystery! Sure, much of it is romance and fantasy/sci-fi, but I like that I branch out a bit, too. 

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Did you do a reading challenge this year? How did it go? If not, would you ever take on something like this?

What We Can Know by Ian McEwan

I heard about What We Can Know by Ian McEwan on a recent episode of Sarah's Bookshelves. 

We have two timelines here. In 2014, poet Francis Blundy gifts his wife Vivien a poem for her birthday, a poem he read aloud at a dinner party. In 2119, we learn that most of the world has been submerged under water after a nuclear weapon occurrence (see my post on Nuclear War by Annie Jacobsen for more on that!). Museums and libraries that still exist are on high land, are hard to get to, and travel is difficult in the best of times. A scholar of Francis Blundy is attempting to learn more about that poem from 2014 because it seems as if no copies remain. 

It's sort of an academic detective mystery with a hint of dystopia in it. 

Things I liked: The dystopian future setting was very interesting. I wanted to know more about how people lived in the future. I also liked that academic setting - it's interesting to think about how higher education would evolve in a world like that.

Things I didn't like: The plot? Small spoilers, but this book was mostly about people cheating on one another in both time periods. I am not into that, to be honest. Also, the font was somewhat hard to read at times. 

Overall take: I don't know. I mostly wanted a different story in the future setting. 3/5 stars

Lines of note:

The humanities are always in crisis. I no longer believe this is an institutional matter - it's in the nature of intellectual life, or of thought itself. Thinking is always in crisis. (page 58)

Lolololz. *sob* *sigh* I am very concerned about AI. Out students have no critical thinking skills at all.

Most of our history and literature students care nothing for the past and are indifferent to the accretions of poetry and fiction that are our beautiful inheritance. They sign up to the humanities because they lack mathematical or technical talent. We are poor cousins and we don't get the smartest bunch. Our office are dilapidated. Many of them leak. (page 73)

This literally made me laugh because have we talked about how the building where I work has leaked from the roof for a decade. They actually redid the roof last year, BUT IT STILL LEAKS. Right into the political science department's offices. 

I felt, though I could never say, that I had made a sacrifice by marrying a man who had no taste for reading, who would rather fix the plumbing than talk about literature...(page 203)

I asked my husband if he wished he had married someone who read more than dragon books. He looked surprised and reminded me that I read Gone With the Wind and Moby-Dick this year. It's not just dragons. 

He seemed to disapprove of me on principle, but what that principle was, I never dared to ask. (page 279)

Doesn't everyone have someone like this in their life? 

Things I looked up:

Weil's disease (page 62) - Also known as Weil syndrome, a bacterial infection that is characterized by disfunction of the kidneys and liver. Most commonly caused by a bite from an infected animal, including rats, mice, cows, pigs, and dogs. (This seemed familiar to me, but it turns out that I looked it up when I read The Thorn Birds.) 

The Wanderer by Hans Thomas (page 78) - Hans Thoma (1839 – 1924) was a German painter. An alumnus and later professor of Karlsruhe Academy, he is known for his landscapes, portraits, and symbolic works rooted in German regional life and tradition.

secateurs (page 170) - a pair of pruning clippers for use with one hand

poitín (page 176) - rish moonshine, deeply rooted in the country's history and lore, is traditionally among the most potent alcoholic drinks on the planet

Hat mentions (why hats?): 

A gentleman with shoulder bag, straw hat and walking stick is strolling along...(page 78)

He removed his hat...(page 79)

I couldn't find a hat or gloves and I was in a hurry. (page 149)

I was given a yellow jacket and hard hat to wear and heavy boots...(page 243)

He was wearing globes and a black wide-brimmed hat I had never seen before. (page 260)

the wide-brimmed hat (page 263)

black hat (page 278)

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Have you read any good dystopian books recently? 

Happy Christmas!

 From our house to yours!

Wordless Wednesday: Scenes of Celebrations

 

Moby-Dick, or the Whale by Herman Melville (Part 2 of 2)

Part 1 here. 

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Note: All page numbers come from the Kindle ebook I used. 

Lines of note:

You cannot hide the soul. Through all his unearthly tattooings, I thought I saw the traces of a simple honest heart; and in his large, deep eyes, fiery black and bold, there seemed tokens of a spirit that would dare a thousand devils. (page 69)

...certain it was his head was phrenologically an excellent one. (page 70)

The above two quotes are Ishmael's descriptions of Queequeg and now I'm going around examining everyone's head phrenologically. 

For what are the comprehensible terrors of man compared with the interlinked terrors and wonders of God! (page 133)

Right? You tell us, Melville. 

For the most part, in this tropic whaling life, a sublime uneventfulness invests you; you hear no news; read no gazettes; extras with startling accounts of commonplaces never delude you into unnecessary excitements; you hear of no domestic afflictions; bankrupt securities; fall of stocks; are never troubled with the thought of what you shall have for dinner— for all your meals for three years and more are snugly stowed in casks, and your bill of fare is immutable. (page 182)

When I read this, I took a few seconds to stare in the middle distance and wonder about what it would be like to just be away from the news for the next three years. I sort of understand why Ishmael wanted to take to the sea. 

Let me make a clean breast of it here, and frankly admit that I kept but sorry guard. With the problem of the universe revolving in me, how could I—being left completely to myself at such a thought-engendering altitude—how could I but lightly hold my obligations to observe all whaleships’ standing orders, “Keep your weather eye open, and sing out every time.” (page 184)

Look, I think this book should be labelled a comedy. Ishmael is hysterical. 

Ah, God! what trances of torments does that man endure who is consumed with one unachieved revengeful desire. (page 230)

REVENGE!!

But where this superiority in the English whaleman does really consist, it would be hard to say, seeing that the Yankees in one day, collectively, kill more whales than all the English, collectively, in ten years. (page 271)

Fuck off, English. LOLz. 

The French are the lads for painting action. (page 301)

Draw me like one of your French girls!!! (Seriously, I have now laughed out loud half a dozen times at this line. The lads.)

Long exile from Christendom and civilization inevitably restores a man to that condition in which God placed him, i.e. what is called savagery. Your true whale-hunter is as much a savage as an Iroquois. I myself am a savage, owning no allegiance but to the King of the Cannibals; and ready at any moment to rebel against him. (page 305)

No loyalty for Ishmael, you see. 

this seems so outlandish a thing that one must needs go a little into the history and philosophy of it. (page 334)

A LITTLE!! This is foreshadowing that you're about to go three chapters deep into a tangent before you wind back to the main thought.

Now some Nantucketers rather distrust this historical story of Jonah and the whale. But then there were some sceptical Greeks and Romans, who, standing out from the orthodox pagans of their times, equally doubted the story of Hercules and the whale, and Arion and the dolphin; and yet their doubting those traditions did not make those traditions one whit the less facts, for all that. (page 408)

LOLz once again.

Oh! happy that the world is such an excellent listener! (page 416)

Yeah, I guess if you're just gabbing about to the ocean, the world is a good listener.

It smells like the left wing of the day of judgment (page 471)

You know exactly what this smells like, don't you? Such great imagery. 

All sorts of men in one kind of world, you see. (page 483)

Preach it, Melville.

Would to God these blessed calms would last. But the mingled, mingling threads of life are woven by warp and woof: calms crossed by storms, a storm for every calm. (page 544)

There are seasons in life. A good reminder that it doesn't matter where we are - the good and the bad take turns. 

Things I looked up: (much help due to Power Moby-Dick, an online annotated version of the book)

...particularly if you come of an old established family in the land, the Van Rensselaers, or Randolphs, or Hardicanutes. (page 20)

• Van Rensselaer family - a family of Dutch descent that was prominent during the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries in the area now known as the state of New York. Members of this family played a critical role in the formation of the United States and served as leaders in business, politics and society
• Randolph family -  a prominent political family, whose members contributed to the politics of Colonial Virginia and Virginia after it established statehood in June 1788, following the American Revolutionary War. The Randolph family was the wealthiest and most powerful family in 18th-century Virginia.
• Hardicanutes - variant spelling of Harthacnut (Hardicanute), a 11th‑century Danish king of England

Black Parliament sitting in Tophet (page 24) - Black Parliament refers to a meeting of Scottish King Robert's parliament in 1320 or to a meeting of English King Henry VIII's Parliament in 1524. Tophet is a biblical city where the inhabitants sacrificed children by burning them alive. Also, hell itself. 

pea coffee (page 25) - a beverage made by boiling roasted peas or chickpeas; a substitute for coffee

Javan seas (page 28) - seas near the island of Java (I thought this was some biblical allusion or something)

Cape of Blanco (page 28) - a fishing village in northern Peru

catarrhs (page 31) -  a buildup of mucous in the nose or throat

arrantest topers (page 31) - most utter drinkers? I HAVE NO IDEA.

farrago (page 34) - a confused mixture

Mt. Hecla (page 34) - a volcanic mountain in Iceland that had erupted in 1845, six years before the publication of Moby-Dick

grego (page 38) - a hooded jacket

sledge drawn by dogs as Ledyard did (page 48) -  John Ledyard (1751-1789), an American explorer who traveled with Captain James Cook on the expedition during which Hawaii was discovered

Feegeeans, Tongatobooarrs, Erromanggoans, Pannangians, and Brighggians (page 50) - Natives of Fiji, the Tongataboo Island of Tonga, the Erromango Island in Vanuatu in the South Pacific, Penang on the northwest coast of Malaysia for the first four terms. Scholars do not know what Brighggians refers to. 

Moluccas (page 52) - Collectively known as the Moluccas, the Maluku Islands are an east Indonesian archipelago comprising 2 provinces, Maluku and North Maluku. They're known for their volcanoes and palm-lined beaches.

Isle of Desolation, off Patagonia (page 53) - part of the Tierra Del Fuego archipelago

cenotaphs (page 58) - a monument to someone buried elsewhere

Joppa (page 61) - Jaffa, Israel, near Tel Aviv

Tarshish (page 62) - in the Bible, this can mean "sailing ships" or "ships going far away," rather than a particular location

kelson (page 68) -  keelson, a structure running the length of a ship just above the keel

Kokovoko (page 75) - the fictional South Pacific island home of Queequeg 

Czar Peter content to toil in the shipyards (page 76) -  Peter the Great of Russia (1672-1725) dreamed of creating a Navy. To prepare, he worked incognito in shipyards of the Dutch East India Company and the British Royal Navy. Later, he conquered the port that became St. Petersburg

more lonely than the Eddystone lighthouse. (page 83) - A lighthouse on the dangerous Eddystone Rocks, off the coast of England - I did a bit of a deep dive on this (read the Wikipedia article) and there have been four structures at the site of the Eddystone lighthouse. The second of these structures would have been standing when Melville wrote Moby-Dick.

ancient Medes (page 91) - an Iranian people in the eighth to the sixth centuries B.C.

Thorkill-Hake’s carved buckler or bedstead. (page 91) - Thorkill-Hake was an 11th-century Icelandic Viking hero whose adventures were illustrated with carvings in his furniture

Pottowotamie Sachem’s head. (page 92) - the head of a Native American tribe is called a Sachem

young Hittite (page 111) - a member of an ancient people who lived in Asia Minor and Syria from 1700 to 1200 B.C.

psalmody (page 126) - the singing of psalms or sacred canticles

Krusenstern (page 134) -  Adam Johann von Krusenstern, (1770-1846), a Russian admiral who led the first Russian voyage around the earth

Ahasuerus (page 145) -  a biblical king of Persia, sometimes thought to be Xerxes I

taffrail (page 152) -  the rail around the stern (rear) of a ship

binnacle lamp (page 154) - binnacle is a built-in housing for the compass on a ship

hustings (page 173) - political campaigns

expatiate (page 180) - write about at length

Saint Stylites (page 181) -  Simeon Stylites (c. 390-459 A.D.), a Syrian Christian ascetic, who achieved notability by living 36 years on a small platform on top of a pillar near Aleppo (in modern Syria) - Seriously, friends, how did I never hear about this?

binnacle magnets (page 184) - magnets affixed to the ship's main compass to counteract the magnetic effect of iron in the ship

who offers to ship with the Phaedon instead of Bowditch in his head (page 185) 

•  Plato's Phaedo, a philosophical dialog in which Socrates discusses the afterlife
• the contents of The New American Practical Navigator by Nathaniel Bowditch, first published in 1802 and still used today as a main guide for ocean navigation on U.S. ships

Crammer's sprinkled Pantheistic ashes (page 186) - English religious reformer John Wycliffe (mid-1320s-1384), a critic of the Catholic Church. After he died of stroke, the pope had his body exhumed and burned, and the ashes thrown into a river. (The first American edition of Moby-Dick named Thomas Cranmer rather than Wycliffe. My edition, and apparently many others, further confuse matters by using Crammer instead of Cranmer.)

Leyden jar (page 193)  - a special glass jar that could store static electricity - SCIENCE EXPERIMENT TIME.

ye deaf Burkes and blinded Bendigoes! (page 196)

• James "Deaf" Burkey - one of England's early boxing champions (1809-1845)
• William Abednego Thompson  - the (not blinded) English boxing champ who beat Deaf Burke in an 1839 fight (1811-1880)

Ophites (page 212) - a religious sect from about 100 A.D. who believed that the serpent who tempted Adam and Eve was the story's hero, and God its villain

Pegu (page 216) - Bago, a city in Burma (Myanmar)

Froissart (page 220) - Jean Froissart, a chronicler of medieval history

Saul of Tarsus (page 237) - the apostle Paul, who became a follower of Christ after seeing a blinding flash of light while on the road to Damascus

marline (page 245) - a light rope made of loosely twisted strands

Crozetts (page 268) - The Crozet Islands are a sub-Antarctic archipelago of small islands in the southern Indian Ocean

archiepiscopacy (page 294) -  following the Anglican or Episcopal church, rather than the Catholic church

famous cavern-pagoda of Elephants, in India. (page 295) - The Elephanta Caves form a collection of cave temples predominantly dedicated to the Hindu god Shiva; UNESCO has designated them as a World Heritage Site

Leuwenhoeck (page 302) - Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, commonly known as the Father of Microbiology, one of the first miscroscopists and microbiologists who discovered bacteria, protists, sperm cells, blood cells, and much more (1632-1723)

Mendanna (page 306) - Álvaro de Mendaña de Neira (1542-1595), a Spanish navigator who discovered the Solomon Islands

Figuera (page 306) - Spanish writer Cristóbal Suárez de Figueroa (1571-after 1644) wrote about Mendaña's voyage

made a Mazeppa of (page 316) - tied to the back of a wild horse. In the 1819 poem Mazeppa by Lord Byron, this is the fate of the title character, who was loosely based on the life of a Ukrainian kossack by that name

Dunfermline (page 334) -  an abbey in the Scottish town of the same name

Neskyeuna Shakers (page 351) - members of a communal, celibate, emotional Protestant denomination whose first U.S. settlement was founded in 1776 in Niskayuna, New York - they're mostly known for the furniture they created today, but some of the stories about the Shakers are wild

freshet (page 352) -  a sudden overflow of a stream, for example after a spring thaw

calomel (page 360) - a chemical compound used as a treatment to purge the bowels

jalap (page 360) - a Mexican vine whose dried roots are used as a treatment to purge the bowels

gamboge (page 364) - a strong red-yellow color

Isthmus of Darien (page 379) - the narrow strip of land through which the Panama Canal would eventually be built

Lavater (page 387) -  Johann Kaspar Lavater (1741-1801), a Swiss physiognomist

Gall (page 387) -  Franz Joseph Gall (1758-1828), the founder of phrenology

Spurzheim (page 387) -  Johann Spurzheim (1776-1832), who worked as an assistant to Gall but later split from him

Phidias’s marble Jove (page 387) -  a massive, seated sculpture of Zeus in Olympia, Greece, considered one of the seven wonders of the ancient world

Then I had to look up the seven wonders of the ancient world because there are only seven. Shouldn't I know them?

Melancthon (page 388) - Philipp Melanchthon (1497-1560), a German theologian with receding hairline

Champollion (page 389) -  Jean-François Champollion (1790-1832), a French scholar who deciphered the Rosetta Stone

Bartholomew Diaz (page 409) - Bartholomew Dias (c. 1450-1500), a Portuguese explorer who in 1488 became the first European known to have sailed around the western tip of Africa

Cleopatra’s barges from Actium (page 411) -  Actium was a Roman colony in Greece, in 31 B.C. the site of the decisive naval battle in the war between the Roman emperor Octavian and the combined forces of Mark Antony and Cleopatra, queen of Egypt

Darmonodes’ elephant (page 421) - scholars don't know the source of this name, but the story recalls one in Plutarch's Moralia in which an elephant falls in love with a flower-girl and caresses her breasts with its trunk

As Ptolemy Philopater testified of the African elephant (page 422) -  a pharaoh of Egypt who reigned from 221-205 B.C.

King Juba (page 422) - probably Juba I (85-46 B.C.) of Numidia, an area encompassing modern-day Algeria and part of Tunisia

proas (page 425) - various types of multi-hull outrigger sailboats of the Austronesian peoples

rowels (page 427) - small, rotating, spiked wheels on the end of a horse's spur, used to give subtle cues to the horse, with designs varying from blunt (gentle) to sharp (strong)

King Porus’ elephants in the Indian battle with Alexander (page 428) - King Porus was a ruler of Paurava, in the modern-day state of Punjab, India, in the fourth century B.C. In the battle of the Hydaspes between Porus and Alexander the Great in 326 B.C., Alexander won

Gulfweed (page 432) - sargassum, a free-floating seaweed

en bon point (page 437) - embonpoint, plumpness

Bashaw (page 438) - pasha, a military or civil official in Turkey

Vidocq (page 439) -  Eugène François Vidocq (1775-1857), a French private investigator who started life as a criminal and wrote about the young women he'd seduced

You might have heard of the Vidocq Society -  a voluntary brain trust of retired and working criminologists that meet the third Thursday of every month to assist in the investigation of cold-case murders from all over the country. Meetings take place in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Justinian’s Pandects (page 441) - a 50-book digest of Roman laws compiled for Emperor Justinian I in the 6th century

Coke-upon-Littleton (page 442) -  an important commentary on British property law written by Sir Edward Coke (1552-1634)

Brandreth’s pills (page 456) - Pills heavily advertised by Dr. Benjamin Brandreth and known as a laxative

poltroon (page 461) - coward

squilgee (page 466) - a swab made of untwisted yarn

Hydriote (page 471) - a person from Hydra, an island in Greece 

Canaris (page 471) -  Constantine Kanaris (c. 1793-1877), a naval officer during the Greek war for independence from Turkey. In 1822 he began using fire ships against the Turks by stealthily attaching a small ship to a Turkish flagship and setting it on fire

Rabelais (page 474)  - Francois Rabelais (1494-1553), a French satirist

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego (page 476) - three men who, in a story in the Old Testament book of Daniel (3:12-30), refuse a king's order to worship a golden idol. They are punished by being thrown into a furnace, but they survive without harm. The king then orders his people to worship their God

metempsychosis (page 478) - the reincarnation of a soul after death into a new body

Pactolus (page 479) - a river in Turkey that once contained gold sands linked to the myth of King Midas washing away his golden touch in its waters, and a source of wealth for Lydian kings like Croesus

Popayan (page 481) - a city in Colombia, South America, that had a famous mint

Golconda (page 481) -  a ruined city in India, once famous for its wealth

Daboll's arithmetic (page 481) - a textbook used widely in schools in the United States

seignories (page 500) - (or seigniories/seigniories) were feudal land grants, essentially lordships or domains, in places like France, New France (Quebec), and British North America, where a seigneur (lord) held rights and obligations over the land and its inhabitants, involving rents, fealty, and jurisdiction, existing until abolished in the 19th century but leaving legacies in place names and historical land tenure systems

Pompey's Pillar (page 504) - an ancient, freestanding column in Alexandria, Egypt, built not by Pompey (a leader of the Roman Republic in the first century B.C.) but in honor of the Emperor Diocletian, who ruled Rome in the third century A.D.

temple of Denderah (page 508) -  the Dendera Temple complex in Egypt

multum in parvo (page 519)  -Latin for "much in little"

"...We must up Burtons and break out." (page 525) - 

• Up Burtons - raise the burtons - a kind of light tackle used for hoisting
• Break out - lift all the barrels of oil out of the cargo hold

Zoroaster (page 529) -  the chief prophet of the Zoroastrian religion was said to have been assassinated

corpusants (page 557) - another name for St. Elmo's Fire, a spooky, glowing electrical phenomenon seen on ships during storms, named from Portuguese for "holy body" (corpo-santo) because sailors thought it was a saint's manifestation

“Mene, Mene, Tekel Upharsin” (page 558) - the writing on the wall in the biblical book of Daniel

here now’s a patched professor in Queen Nature’s granite-founded College (page 574) - I've no clue. I assume he's suggesting the person he's talking to is a weak man - "patched professor" - but I've no idea about the rest. 

Antiochus’s elephants in the book of Maccabees (page 608) -  in 1 Maccabees, a book of scripture included in the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox bibles, the Greek King Antiochus V shows his elephants grape and mulberry juice before battle, to incite them to fight

Note: There are a surprising number of elephant references in Moby-Dick. 

Fata Morgana (page 632) - an optical illusion that makes objects on the horizon appear longer and higher up than they are

Ixion (page 634) - a figure in Greek mythology punished for various sins by being bound to a winged wheel of fire

Hat mentions (why hats?):

(There's the line about knocking people's hats off - I talked about it in the previous post.)

 He now took off his hat — a new beaver hat — when I came nigh singing out with fresh surprise. (page 38)

He commenced dressing at top by donning his beaver hat...(page 44)

What under the heavens he did it for, I cannot tell, but his next movement was to crush himself — boots in hand, and hat on — under the bed...(page 44)

At last, he emerged with his hat very much dented and crushed down over his eyes and began creaking and limping about the room...(page 45)

...staving about with little else but his hat and boots on...(page 45)

 ...smoking with his inseparable hat on... (page 49)

He wears a heaver hat and swallow-tailed coat, girdled with a sailor-belt and sheath-knife. (page 50)

Shaking off the sleet from my ice-glazed hat and jacket, I seated myself near the door...(find page)

...for his tarpaulin hat ran down with melting sleet, and his great pilot cloth jacket seemed almost to drag him to the floor with the weight of the water it had absorbed. However, hat and coat and overshoes were one by one removed...(page 57)

...with slouched hat and guilty eye...(page 62)

broad-brimmed hat (page 97)

Drive down your hat in presence of the Czar, and take it off to Queequeg! (page 136)

With slouched hat, Ahab lurchingly paced the planks. (page 154)

With bent head and half-slouched hat he continued to pace, unmindful of the wondering whispering among the men (page 188)

he pulled his hat from his head, and stamped up and down on it (page 254)

still slowly dripping from the unremoved hat and coat. (page 267)

his slouched and gaily-ribboned hat betoken his grand features (page 283)

Let me remove my hat. (page 294)

snatching off his hat, dashed the sea-water into it. (page 320)

the men tossed their hats off to it (page 322)

Hold your hat in one hand, and clap t’other a’top of your heart, when I’m giving my orders, cook. What! (page 332)

This lucky salvation was cheaply purchased by the loss of Queequeg’s hat, who, while standing in the bows to prick the fugitive whales, had his hat taken clean from his head by the air-eddy made by the sudden tossing of a pair of broad flukes close by. (page 435)

I say, pass round a hat, some one, and let’s make him a present of a little oil for dear charity’s sake. (page 450)

removing his hat, and brushing aside his hair (page 489)

wore long streamers of narrow red bunting at their hats (page 545)

Same with cocked hats; the cocks form gable-end eave-troughs, Flask. (page 564)

The Hat (page 591) - THIS IS A CHAPTER TITLE!!!

slouching hat (page 592)

stone-carved coat and hat (page 592)

“Your hat, your hat, sir!” suddenly cried the Sicilian seaman (page 595)

Ahab’s hat was never restored (page 595)

From beneath his slouched hat Ahab dropped a tear into the sea (page 599)

slouching his hat (page 612)

Your hat, however, is the most convenient. (page 635 - this is in a footnote)

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Anyone have a favorite Moby-Dick meme I haven't shared yet? I spent too much a lot of time laughing at memes, which, frankly, seems okay for this time of the year. 

Moby-Dick, or the Whale by Herman Melville (Part 1 of 2)

People who pay attention to my reading stats (lololol) might notice that I have not completed an ebook on my Kindle since September. This is because I have been reading Moby-Dick by Herman Melville. This is a classic I've been meaning to read forever and since this was the year of Big Books, I dove in. 

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I think I'm going to do this review in two parts. Today I'll talk about Melville and do a review and then tomorrow I'll do my lines of note, things I looked up (SO MUCH), and hat mentions. Strap in. I've been reading this book for literal months. 

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Does anyone actually know the plot of Moby-Dick? (I sure didn't.)

It starts with the sentence "Call me Ishmael" and immediately you're on guard. Okay, fine, but is that your actual name, Ishmael? Are you an unreliable narrator? You sound unreliable from the first three words!

Note: All page numbers come from the Kindle ebook I used. 

So we're calling the narrator Ishmael and we're basically introduced to him through this very, very hilarious description of his state of mind:

Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people’s hats off — then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. (page 17)

(My husband and I used to tell each other not to murder anyone when we go into a crowded situation - usually the grocery store - but now we've taken to reminding the other not to knock people's hats off. We are amused if no one else is.)

So Ishmael goes to sea with a ragtag assortment of folks on the Pequod. This includes Queequeg, a harpooner who just happens to be a cannibal; Starbuck, the Quaker mate from Nantucket; and Captain Ahab, an absolute batshit crazy guy who is obsessed with finding a white whale - the one and only Moby Dick - who had bit his leg off and forced him to use a fake leg. 

“Aye, Starbuck; aye, my hearties all round; it was Moby Dick that dismasted me; Moby Dick that brought me to this dead stump I stand on now. Aye, aye.” (page 190)

A handful of adventures ensue, but it's mostly Ishmael's deep dives into whales, whaling, and life on a ship, Ahab's insane rants, and some incredibly repulsive descriptions of killing sea creatures. 

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Who is Herman Melville? 

Melville was born into a financially stable family in New York City in 1819. His father died, however, and his family was broke as a joke, so he signed up to be a common sailor on the merchant ship St. Lawrence and then to a whaler named Acushset. He wrote a couple of books based on his travel adventures, Typee (1846) and Omoo (1847), and that set him up financially for a time.

Moby-Dick came out in 1851. Trivia alert. Moby-Dick the title of the book has a hyphen, but no where in the book itself does Melville use a hyphen. So if I'm writing about the whale, I'll use Moby Dick (no hyphen), but if I'm writing about the book, I'm going to be pedantic and use a hyphen. 

The book was first published (in three volumes) as The Whale in London in October 1851, and under its definitive title, Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, in a single-volume edition in New York in November. Melville drew on his experience as a common sailor and on wide reading in whaling literature for his vivid and sometimes disgusting descriptions of sailing, whale hunting and of extracting whale oil, as well as life aboard ship among a culturally diverse crew. The white whale is modeled on a notoriously hard-to-catch albino whale Mocha Dick, and the book's ending is based on the sinking of the whaleship Essex in 1820. 

(For those of you playing along in NGS reading lore, the sinking of the Essex is the basis of my beloved In the Heart of the Sea and is responsible, in large part, for my decision to read Moby-Dick.)

Moby-Dick was published to mixed reviews, was a commercial failure, and was out of print at the time of the author's death in 1891. Whomp. Whomp. 

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So what did you think?

Um. Hm. That's a good question. 

Ishmael is hilarious. As a narrator, I found his voice to be entrancing. I found his enthusiasm for all things whales to be contagious. 

So I was on board, truly, for his in-depth discussions of everything whale - a biological classification, fictional stories, a breakdown of the skeleton, detailed anatomical structures, how to catch one, flensing whales (NOT FOR THE FAINTHEARTED), ambergris, barrels of whale oil, and everything else. I was mostly on board for his in-depth musings on things that came to mind when he thought about whales, including the symbolism of particular animals and colors (whales and white, mostly), man as the top predator, fate, free will, and obsession. 

What I was not here for, it turns out, was Ahab's monomaniacal obsession. As soon as Ahab started talking, I'd find myself zoning out. I also found myself zoning out about religion, but that's par for the course with me. 

While this book is nominally about whaling, it's obviously really about man versus nature and who is top dog. Nature isn't just the white whale, but taking to the sea to collect oil so that people on the shore can light their way at night. It's about loyalty, revenge, and problem solving. It's about life and death, light and dark, and, of course, killing that fucking whale. 

It also took a lot of time before the real "action" started. It wasn't until almost 100 pages in that we actually saw the Pequod:

...were three ships up for three-years’ voyages—The Devil-Dam, the Tit-bit, and the Pequod. (page 91 - first mention!)

Description of the Pequod:

A noble craft, but somehow a most melancholy! All noble things are touched with that. (page 92)

Then it was still more time before we actually set sail:

At length, towards noon, upon the final dismissal of the ship’s riggers, and after the Pequod had been hauled out from the wharf, (page 125 - we set sail!)

Ship and boat diverged; the cold, damp night breeze blew between; a screaming gull flew overhead; the two hulls wildly rolled; we gave three heavy-hearted cheers, and blindly plunged like fate into the lone Atlantic. (page 129)

So, the first part of the book was really not that exciting unless you like sermons about Jonah and reading about how cold it is in New England during winter. 

But, just wait until tomorrow when I post all the things I had to look up. Melville had a much more classical and Biblical training than I did and I did not understand a lot of his references and allusions. However, the Internet is an amazing thing and have you heard of Power Moby-Dick? It's a FREE online annotated copy of Moby-Dick. I used the heck out of it. 

I'm glad I read it, but I will not be reading it again. 3.5/5 stars (I guess - this was hard to rate!)

Have you read Moby-Dick? Are you going to?

Five for Friday, Edition #35

Five Hard Things

1. I recruited a friend to be my co-worker. Did I ever tell this story? I had a friend in book club who was looking for a job and I told her to apply to my office and she did and now her office is across the hall from mine. She's sick. And things are not going well for her. On Wednesday she was admitted to the ICU and I feel like it was stuff with my mom all over again. Anyway, she's probably going to be fine, right?

2. I used to listen to a podcast called Let's Go To Court. It was two women who had been friends since they were in elementary school discussing true crime cases. But the podcast ended and so did the friendship. One of the hosts has a new podcast with her husband called An Old Timey Podcast and at the end of an episode they discussed how hard it was to lose that friendship. She said that in many ways ending that friendship was harder than if she had ended her marriage and I think that's right. When you get divorced, people around you rally around. When a friendship ends, no one really knows. Anyway, I've been thinking about this because I recently took someone off my holiday card list because I hadn't heard from them in a long time and it was clear they have broken up with me, but I don't know why. 

3. Yesterday when I walked Hannah in the morning, it was rainy and about 44 degrees (about 7 degrees Celsius). Not ideal, but it was fine. By the time I left work, it was 34 degrees and the temperatures were falling fast. By the time I walked her before bed, it was 19 degrees (about -7 Celsius). A winter weather advisory was issued for something called flash freeze, which is not a term I was familiar with, but some jackass on Reddit wrote "this is completely normal for living in the Midwest" and I'm over here going ???? in my brain. How have I ever never heard this term before?

4. Grades were posted Wednesday, so yesterday I spent the day following up with my students of concern to see how things were going. Most of the news was good and I was able to say congratulations and I'm proud of you. But the students who didn't do well. Ugh. I hate having those conversations. 

5. I'm reading a book that has a lot of buzz and has been well-reviewed and I just don't like it. How long do I have to keep reading it? 

Five Fun Things

1. Tonight we're going to the holiday light show at the local botanical garden with our friends. We do this every year and I'm excited about taking a little bit of fun time.

2. Sunday is the Winter Solstice! We have friends who have a Solstice Party every year where we go to their backyard and hang out around a campfire. It is a lovely time to see people we don't always see regularly and to remind myself that the days are going to get longer.

3. In January, I have blocked out days for me and Bestest Friend to hang out together. We haven't exactly planned what we're going to do yet, but it's on the calendar.

4.Speaking of Bestest Friend, I sent her a holiday card with some of my high school senior photos in it and she put those photos on the fridge. This made me laugh.

5. Did you all know Christmas is next week? And New Year's the week after? I'm super excited for time off and to get to hang out with my in-laws on Christmas Day.

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Are you familiar with flash freeze? Did you take anyone off the holiday card list this year? What holiday celebration are you most looking forward to in the next couple of weeks?