Author Archives: maedez

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About maedez

Writer, biographer, poet. History nerd, silent movie maven. Punk rocker, amateur baker, bookworm. Cricket fan, Scotch drinker, craft beer snob.

A Year in Books/Day 50: Free Love

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  • Title: Free Love
  • Author: Annette Meyers
  • Year Published: 1999 (Mysterious Press)
  • Year Purchased: 2002-2004
  • Source: Edward R. Hamilton Bookseller Company
  • About: This period murder mystery (the best kind, in my opinion) features an Edna St. Vincent Millay-esque heroine. She composes poetry, acts for the (Provincetown) Playhouse, is shockingly frank and solves a crime. Sounds familiar, except for that last bit. After reading this book, I could pretty well be convinced that the flesh-and-blood inspiration was a bad-ass detective, too.
  • Motivation: Although I’m rather picky when it comes to mystery novels (I don’t like them except when I love them), the blurb on this one sucked me in: The era. The main character. The atmosphere. Sold, sold and sold.
  • Times Read: 1
  • Random Excerpt/Page 2: “It was a mistake; the water was cold and sloshy. Still, there was no way I was going to impart this and have him say “I told you so,” so I took my time sloshing through it. Oh, prig or not, he probably wouldn’t have gloated because he’s a better person than I am.”
  • Happiness Scale: 8

 

A Year in Books/Day 49: Hollywood Dressed & Undressed

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  • Title: Hollywood Dressed & Undressed A Century of Cinema Style
  • Author: Sandy Schreier
  • Year Published: 1998 (Rizzoli International Publications, Inc.)
  • Year Purchased: 2002-2004
  • Source: Unknown
  • About: With the attention to detail of an insider and the adoration of the most giddy fan, designer Schreier takes us on a 100 year tour of film-land’s most famous and enduring costumes.
  • Motivation: I’m an ex-actress (stage) and write extensively about early cinema. I’m just one ridiculous movie nerd. I also love fashion in all of its iterations, from the silly to the avant-garde to the iconic.
  • Times Read: Countless
  • Random Excerpt/Page 2: “Costume designer Edith Head, Hollywood’s most prolific designer, reflected on the Golden Age of costuming: ‘Then the designer was as important as the star-when you said Garbo, you thought Adrian; when you said Dietrich, you thought Banton. Their magic was part of selling a picture.'”
  • Happiness Scale: 10

    Garbo with Ricardo Cortez in Torrent (1926)

    Image via Wikipedia: 10

Wanted: One Resourceful Book Lover

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  • Wanted: One resourceful book lover
  • Your Mission: To invent an easily removable price sticker that does not require any of the following: a razor, solvent or 20 minutes spent digging with a fingernail.
  • Requirements: Patience and excellent sales ability, as you will need every book shop in the world to use your product.
  • Your Reward: Eternal glory and the genuine thanks of millions of readers everywhere. Oh, and lots of cash, as you will doubtless become filthy rich in the
    Paradise Ruined by Another Cheap Label

    Paradise Ruined by Another Cheap Label

    process.

  • Signed: Maedez

A Year in Books/Day 48: Seeing Europe with Famous Authors

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  • Title: Seeing Europe with Famous Authors Vol. II Great Britain and Ireland Part Two
  • Editor: Francis W. Halsey
  • Year Published: 1914 (Funk & Wagnalls Company)
  • Year Purchased: September, 2010
  • Source: Springfield (OH) Antique Show & Flea Market
  • About: This tiny book was one of a ten-volume compilation series culled from previously published travel essays by famous authors. On hand are pieces by Nathaniel Hawthorne, James Boswell, William Makepeace Thackeray, Sir Walter Scott, Robert Louis Stevenson and others. Even in 1914, some of the essays were decades old. Now, they all read like history as well as travel-they remain fascinating word-gems of a time long ago surpassed by the frantic rhythms of our modern world.
  • Motivation: I bought this perfectly preserved first-edition copy while shopping for vintage lovelies for my December 2010 nuptials. It was too adorable and cheap ($3.00) to pass up. History and literature is a heady mix for this girl.
  • Times Read: 1
  • Random Excerpt/Page 54: “It is doubtful whether the name of any lighthouse is so familiar throughout the English-speaking world as the “Eddystone.” Certainly no other “pillar of fire by night, of cloud by day,” can offer so romantic a story of dogged engineering perseverance, of heartrending disappointments, disaster, blasted hopes, and brilliant success.”
  • Happiness Scale: 7 1/2
    English: photograph of Robert Louis Stevenson

    Image via Wikipedia

     

A Year in Books/Day 47: The Girl from the Fiction Department

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  • Title: The Girl from the Fiction Department A Portrait of Sonia Orwell
  • Author: Hilary Spurling
  • Year Published: 2002/This Edition: 2003 (Counterpoint)
  • Year Purchased: 2010
  • Source: My Mom
  • About: A thoughtful, even-handed biography of George Orwell’s controversial second wife (and widow). Although it was written by a later-in-life friend of Sonia’s with the stated goal of setting the record straight, it’s the real deal: well-researched, compassionate and honest.
  • Motivation: My Mother knows me well! Biography + complex woman + literary theme= winner!
  • Times Read: 1
  • Random Excerpt/Page 87: “This was the Sonia who bewitched others all her life, and whose abrupt disappearance invariably came as a shock. Maurice didn’t care for the second self who replaced the first, the wary, reticent Sonia whose uncertainty made her overbearing, the Sonia who could never trust herself or anyone else, especially not someone who seemed in retrospect to have surprised her into an intimacy she feared and could not sustain.”
  • Happiness Scale: 8

A Year in Books/Day 46: Scotch Whisky

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  • Title: Scotch Whisky A Liquid History
  • Author: Charles MacLean
  • Year Published: 2005 (Cassell Illustrated)
  • Year Purchased: 2009
  • Source: A dear friend.
  • About: The history of Scotch, covering the years 1494-1994.
  • Motivation: This book was a thank you gift from a close friend. My (now) husband and I love Scotch. In fact, my appreciation of and knowledge about the beverage helped him fall in love with me. Although this is the stuff of another story or ten, our mutual love of the drink has been a pretty constant thread in our relationship. Aw, romance!
  • Times Read: 1
  • Random Excerpt/Page 37: “In 1707 Scotland was one of the poorest and most backward countries in Europe. Agriculture was at the stage it had reached centuries before; manufacturing, as we understand the term, did not exist. Even the gentry lived in relatively straitened circumstances-an average gentlewoman would possess no more than three or four fine dresses throughout her lifetime.”
  • Happiness Scale: 9 1/2

 

A Year in Books/Day 45: Haunted London

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English: Exterior of The Langham, London

Image via Wikipedia

  • Title: Haunted London
  • Author: Richard Jones
  • Year Published: 2004 (Barnes & Noble Books)
  • Year Purchased: 2005
  • Source: Barnes & Noble clearance rack
  • About: A photograph-rich travel book that blends traditional history with paranormal research.
  • Motivation: I’m a history-mad Anglophile with a penchant for off-the-beaten-path adventure.
  • Times Read: 1
  • Random Excerpt/Page 23: “A forerunner of London’s grand hotels, the Langham Hotel was built in 1864. Its Victorian splendor was host to such famous names as Mark Twain, Arnold Bennett, Napoleon III of France, and the composer Dvorak -who managed to offend the sensibilities of the management when, in an attempt to save money, he requested a double room for himself and his adult daughter.”
  • Happiness Scale: 9