A bibliophile's obsession

Following my earlier post about my love of books and a short discussion with some students and ex-students about certain books, I thought it is high time I include here some sites which I visit obsessively.

To students who don't read often and hence are not sure what books to read, you can always refer to lists of recommended books compiled by bibliophiles, respectable publications or book publishers.

One list which I refer to quite often in the last year is flamboyantly called "1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die". It is not merely a list of 1001 titles, the suggested book list is actually compiled into an impressively heady tome, complete with reviews and pictures and interesting snippets about the book's and its author's history. The book has now taken pride of place on my bookshelf.

Then I discovered, to my delight, that someone has actually prepared an Excel spreadsheet which lets you tick the books (out of the 1001 titles) which you have read, and then calculates the number of books you must read in a year if you were to complete the 1001 target before you see your Maker. Call me crazy but I take a perverse delight in actually wanting to know what that insane number is. Filling in the spreadsheet transports me instantly to giddy exhilaration. I encourage all book lovers to visit Arukiyomi's site, download the spreadsheet and then see how many of the 1001 you have consumed and discover your reading target for the rest of your life. You can take comfort that I have so far achieved a mere 3.5% of the target and would need to read 24 books per year from the list if I were to complete this massive mission.

Something less intimidating which any compulsive or casual reader can do is to visit the Amazon website and check out ratings and reviews of popular books you have seen or heard people talk about. I like to do what I call a book chain search. Say I have finished reading a James Patterson novel and like it a lot, I then search for titles similar to James Patterson's book in Amazon. I'm then  led from one book to another to another until I'm utterly intoxicated by the sheer number of great books waiting for me to read! Hence, I'm never short of ideas on what to read next. I always have a list of at least 10 books I can read after the current one and I often visit bookstores or the library deliberately or randomly to check up on books I can buy or borrow. 

I am also thrilled that our local library does stock many of the bestsellers. To find out which branch of the library has the book you want, simply search for it and you can reserve the book or visit the branch that carries the title. (Xiao Wei: The Handmaid's Tale is available in the public library. Just do a search and visit the branch that has the title.)

Perhaps I'm boring some of you who can't fathom my love of books. It'll be a real pity if you can't enjoy the world of reading. Reading nourishes your mind, enlarges your vista and enriches your life experience. It'll also make you a more interesting person to talk to. It's never too late to start reading.  The rewards are too numerous. So what are you waiting for? 

First time stuck in lift

What an odd way to finish the school term.

I got stuck in the school lift for about 35 minutes today. Right when I was heading to my class for the class party. The lift heaved a little more heavily than usual on the 3rd floor and then stopped dead. Cassie, the IT trainer who was in the lift in me, stared round-eyed at me and started hitting all the buttons on the lift panel frantically. Me, I tried to act cool. It was a surreal moment for me.

I told Cassie to calm down. Just wait for help to come. I saw lots of students walking outside the the lift. We waved, shouted, banged on the door, rang the alarm bell. But no one heard us. Now what? Thankfully Cassie had her phone with her. She called the office. Then we waited.

Meanwhile, I pondered about the absurdity of the situation. Here I am, armed with a box of brownies for my class, but I'm trapped in this metallic hellhole. The students outside couldn't hear us. The air in the lift was getting stale. But I had food with me!! Let's eat here! I told Cassie. Let's take a picture too!

Finally some boys from F34 saw us. They pressed their faces to the glass panel. They laughed, pointed fingers, whipped out their handphones (not to take pictures I hope!) and got more of their friends to come and look at Exhibit A. Oh no, not when my make-up was melting!

Miss Johnson came. I put on my best woebegone face to gain some sympathy. Then the repairman came, pried open the door, and we stepped out.

I patted my hair, checked my make-up, and tried, as suavely as I could, to make my way up to my class. Last day of school, and I had to experience such a malu moment. But thank God it's the last day of school. I wouldn't want to start the year being known as The Teacher Who Got Stuck In The Lift. Like that where to hide my face?

What do you read?

To my dear students (especially the more vociferous ones from F31) who have been lamenting on the near-demise of my blog, I shall attemp to breathe a bit of life back to my blog. This is particularly important to me since I discovered several ex-students who still check my blog for any signs of life and use this blog as a means to stay in touch.

Of course, my lack of activity here is not entirely forgiveable. Busyness is a pathetic excuse I know, because I always frown on students who use their busyness as an excuse for not picking up a book to read. You will always make time for things that are important to you and for that matter, I will always have time to read, and you will always see me with a book wherever I go. I will readily succumb to any spot check by any student to see if I practise what I preach. If you promise not to laugh at the songs I have in my ipod, you can always spot-check my bag and see if I have a book tucked inside.

Talking about reading, this year has been a very very productive year for me as far as reading goes. As early as December 2007, I began my frantic foray into Chinese books (very humbled by my lack of Chinese fluency after my visit to Beijing) and devoured close to 20 Chinese novels in the space of 3 months. That is a personal record for me as I have never read more than 10 Chinese novels in the last 30+ years since I learnt to read Chinese! Since this personal Olympic feat, I have been able to maintain a constant reading diet of about a Chinese novel every 6 weeks.

Interspersed with my Oriental diet is a steady stream of English books - my first love naturally - and I went through a surfeit of thrillers (David Baldacci, Lee Child, Harlan Coben, Tess Gerritsen, Kathy Reichs, Tami Hoag to even the quaint but equally titillating Qiu XiaoLong) before I exhausted myself and have now retreated to more sedate but more satisfying authors like Barbara Kingsolver and Peter Carey. The thrillers have served their purpose of getting me reading voraciously (1 book every 2-3 days) through the year-end holidays last year and up till the first quarter of this year. Then the formulaic serving begins to wear me out and I started to seek a more eclectic cuisine.

I have also bought tons of books in the meantime and they are all sitting nicely on my shelves, waiting for me to explore their riches. I must give special thanks to F31 for giving me a most precious gift for Teachers' Day - you are evidently a class after my own heart! :) I shall savour the delights of Jeffrey Eugenides' Middlesex with great joy once the December break starts. (I need to clear the backlog of books from the National Library first!)

This year also marks the year I start exploring some authors that I see my students reading. The girls in F31 seem very fond of Jodi Picoult so I took the liberty to order some of her books for the school library, although I must confess I had no idea at that time if her books are 'wholesome' enough for the school library. I discovered, after trying one of her books, that the 'risk' was worth it. After the Jodi Picoult fever, I saw Stephanie Meyer making her rounds in the school. I mentioned it to some of the English teachers and one of them promptly bought one to read and pronounced it a page-turner (the vampire content notwithstanding). So I've 'choped' the book as it is making its round amongst the English teachers and I can't wait to read for myself this page-turner. I can't guarantee that Stephanie Meyer will take residence in our school library next year seeing as the school is not that open to vampire stories but I'm optimistic that if a sufficient number of teachers give the thumbs-up, we may be able to see our library stocked with books you want to read.

Which brings me to the title of this post. I'm curious to know what authors you like to read and why. Since I have quite a big say in what books will appear in our library (in fact I get to choose the books!), you will do many students in GM a big favour by telling me authors and books that you want to see in our library. So please respond in the comments section and I'll see what I can do next year.

Ex-students who read this post, you can also let me know what you read. I've always believed in recommending good books to people. A good book is one of the best gifts you can give to anyone and if you think teachers are clueless about what teenagers like (there is an element of truth in that!), then pray, englighten us. I look forward to hearing from all the hungry readers out there.