Howling Frog Books

I found a lot of good covers!  I like this one. The Trial, by Franz Kafka I've read some Kafka before, but never this famous novel. Joseph K. has a good position at the bank and is doing well, until the morning that they come to arrest him.  Officers of the Court take over his landlady's house and inform him that he is free to go about his ordinary life, but he is under arrest and must come to Court when required.  He may not know what he is charged with, who accused him, or anything else.  K. is confident he can prove his innocence, but he finds that the Court is in the attic of a crowded apartment building.   He gets a lawyer, who never seems to get out of bed.  People who claim to have influence give him contradictory instructions. Everyone seems to know about this Court, but it is secret and labyrinthine.  K's case requires all his energy, but is completely unknowable.  Detailed paperwork is mandatory, but goes nowhere.  Kafka ...

The Forgotten Man: a New History of the Great Depression , by Amity Shlaes Amity Shlaes is a well-established journalist and historian in the field of economics.  Her new look at the economics of the Great Depression made quite a splash in 2008, and I've been meaning to read it ever since.  Score one for the TBR pile!  Shlaes offers analysis of how Presidents Hoover and Roosevelt responded to the 1929 crash and subsequent depression, chronicling the actions of the movers and shakers of the times.  It's a big-picture history; we see New Deal policies in action, the decisions in Washington, and the rise of large unions, not portraits of individual farmers and workers. We start in 1927, getting some background and the political climate of the time.  The economy is roaring and many people are getting modern conveniences such as electricity or even a car for the first time.  Leftists have their eye on the new Soviet Union and think it is just great, so a del...

Dancers in Mourning , by Margery Allingham I don't think I've said anything about Margery Allingham here, but I love her books.  She wrote a lot of them, very fun mysteries (and plenty of other stuff too; she wrote for magazines a lot) usually starring Albert Campion as the detective.  Campion is your eccentric kind of detective, who hides a clever mind behind a vacuous and foolish exterior.  He has something of a secret identity, and there are references to his real name being Rudolph and a wealthy background.  If he reminds you of Lord Peter Wimsey, there is a reason for that, since he was reputedly created as a sendup of Lord Peter.  I haven't had a lot of luck getting many Allingham stories, so I'm happy now because I just got a pile of them. In this story, Campion is called in to deal with a theatrical problem.  The famous Jimmy Sutane is starring in a popular show, but he's being quietly persecuted with nasty practical jokes.  Sutane is hig...

I didn't mean to stay silent for a week!  The only books I've finished have been re-reads of mysteries by favorite British authors.  I have some serious reading going on too, but let's face it--it's really hot, there's a lot going on, and I'm trying to get ready for the start of school, and my brain has not been quite up to facing the Great Depression or Kafka.  Even though they are really interesting.  I haven't even touched the EBB/RB love letters since Monday!  Oh no! What I have been doing is prepping for the start of school in a few weeks, and in case you care, I'll tell you about it.  This is your cue to skip this post if you don't care!   We are due to start in about 3 weeks, and I have done very little over the summer, because by June I always need at least a month where I do not have to think about homeschooling at all.  I do have most of my materials, because I do the bulk of my purchasing in the spring before the old school year ends...

The Letters of RB and EBB This time I read letters from November 1845--March 1846.  When last we checked in, Robert and Elizabeth had just begun their romantic relationship; Elizabeth had finally admitted her feelings to Robert and they were on the same page, though Robert had to keep assuring her that she was perfectly fine the way she was and that he hadn't planned to marry anyway (which, maybe he hadn't, but he sure wanted to marry Elizabeth--he was just too smart to tell her that just yet). From November through March, they really solidify their relationship.  Elizabeth becomes more demonstrative and manages to say more of how she feels about Robert, until she is quite eloquent on the matter.  She tells him her family nickname -- Ba -- and allows him to use it, which he does quite a lot.  Her given name of Elizabeth has disappeared by now. The sheer volume of letters has increased enormously.  They are now writing long letters to each other almost ...

Oops, this post got a bit lost.  For the Dewey Readathon I thought I'd try to spend some time on a couple of essays.  I wound up choosing a giant book of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s writings and speeches, and read several.  They were excellent, but now it is far too long since I read them!  This is just a note for the Essay Challenge.

Norms & Nobility: a Treatise on Education , by David V. Hicks I've wanted to read this book for years.  It's one of the foundational texts on classical education.  So it's been on my wishlist forever, but it's also pretty expensive and not that easy to find in a library.  I finally got around to ILLing it, and have been working on it for a few weeks. This is a difficult and heavy text, with a whole lot to think about--even though it's less than 200 pages long.*    Hicks lays out why a classical education is worth pursuing and how to do it (there is a whole syllabus for grades 7-12).  He has a lot to say.  I read it quite slowly, and it would be good to own the book so I can read it again...and then again. I think it's also rather advanced in the world of classical education.  This is not a book for a beginner to read; if I'd tried to read it 10 years ago it would not have made much sense to me.  At that time, The Well-Trained M...