The Yarnarian wants to do the Flashback Challenge!

Look at this: Wendy of it's just me, Wendy fame, mentioned this on her blog, and I am going to do this. Flashback Challenge! Maybe, it's just possible, that I will like Ethan Frome! And all the kiddie lit; yes, that's for me. Which books to reread as an adult? Jane Austen of course. I've already read Anna Karenina a few times and it's now out of my system. Besides, I don't have the patience right now for those massive Russian tomes. Nope, it will be Jane. I'll have to think about what else.

I generally don't like people suggesting books for me. I like what I like and I read what I want, but this is so cool. This is a challenge I want to do.

If you were going to reread a book from your childhood, what would it be? I loved the Betsy Tacy series by Maud Hart Lovelace, and I think I will start there.

The only authors from high school that I liked were Shakespeare and George Bernard Shaw. I disliked Ethan Frome, but I suspect it would be good to read as an adult. I do remember hating Thomas Hardy. We read Return of the Native, and it was pure torture for me to read. Maybe that bears re-reading. I was a voracious reader, but I rarely liked what we had to read for English class. Now if we had read Jane Austen, but we didn't. Too bad. Come to think of it, we never read books that had a female appeal. I groaned through Moby Dick, Heart of Darkness, and others of that ilk. We did read Dickens in 9th grade, but I had read David Copperfield on my own a couple of years before and liked it. Reading it in class changed my enjoyment of it.

In retrospect, I always disliked taking a book apart and studying it. To me, great literature should be read and enjoyed, not dissected, but then I didn't major in English, and I never liked delving into the obscurities of a novel. Maybe that's why I rarely enjoyed any required reading. I am grateful that I was forced to read Dubliners by James Joyce. Didn't like it, but it was probably good for me. Shakespeare, on the other hand, I loved. And Chaucer. Oh I loved Chaucer. I loved all of the medieval lit. I'm not sure what that says about me, but that's the way it is.

Now I read mysteries, but only well-written ones. I don't particularly like knitting, or embroidery mysteries, although if I'm desperate enough, I will read them, mostly to enjoy the craft references. I used to read a lot of science fiction, but rarely do it any more. Now I read fantasy. I read Tolkien long before he became so popular.

My current mystery delight is the Gregor Demarkian mysteries by Jane Haddam. I love them so much that I spread out the reading so that the enjoyment can go on forever.

Romance? Only as summer vacation reading. Horror? Only when written by a master such as Stephen King or Dean Koontz. I don't do much reading in "regular" fiction any more. I can't tell you why, but at this point it doesn't appeal to me. Non-fiction? Nope. Cookbooks, knitting and crochet books, yes. Otherwise no non-fiction.

When I was a kid, I went through my classics phase all on my own and loved them, but now don't really have the patience to read them. So I'm hoping that the Flashback Challenge will light a fire under me and get me out of my nice reading rut. Truthfully, I like my reading rut. I read for pleasure so why should I apologize for what I like? I dunno; it's silly to do so. So I won't!

Knitting news: Fan Dance is off to be test knitted. My poor test knitters will have to decipher this shawl and help me make it understandable. I knit intuitively, and I assume others do too, but that is not the case, so I need clear directions. Go forth, ye test knitters, and be stalwart and brave!

Flower Fairies Sock Club is filling nicely. There's still room for more members, but I will close off sign-ups around the middle of January to give me time to get things together. Want more information? Click on the link and then sign up on Etsy.

itsJUSTme-wendy - It's a great idea and maybe it'll get me out of my rut, although I do like my rut. Now to decide which category to do. Are you doing the second one? That is the one I'm going to do.

sockmadmary - Pepys would give me a headache. I believe I read Fielding somewhere, but have no desire to reread. I've done Thackery a couple of times. That was enough. I just thought of LIttle Women; that is due for a re-reading. In high school we did a lot of English lit, almost no American lit. That I had to do on my own or in college. I think this is going to be a delightful challenge. I should really go through a list of the "classics" and see what I'd like to do again.

Aarti - This should be a treat to do! thanks so much for coming up with the idea.

Holly - I went through my vampire stage years ago with the Ann Rice books, and the Chelsea Quinn Yarbro books, and now I'm done. Adolescent vampires don't talk to me.