Bout of Books Read-a-Thon No. 20

In getting a feel for where I'd like this blog to go, and because I happened to catch an online read-a-thon at the cusp of a new go-around, I decided to participate in the Bout of Books Read-a-Thon (it's #20!). Or... Maybe because I'm a first-timer to any kind of organized blogging event, I'll say "participate loosely" because I'm not sure how it will work for me one way or another.

I plan to update this post daily with page counts, links to anything relevant, favorite quotes, likely some read-a-thon participation stuff, and maybe some other things I come up with as I go. This will be a little experiment in seeing how much I can get myself to read and to see how I like joining in on blog events like this.

Unrelated to Bout-of-Books but popping this here anyway:

Consider checking out PaperbackSwap.

I'm not affiliated, but I do think it's potentially a great way to unload

books that others are looking for and you collect swap points

in return to request any available book you want.

(Hardcovers available too!)

And away we go... Well, away we go starting 8/21 @ 12:01a.

❦ Monday - August 21

Reading Material
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

Pages Read
19—feel a tad sheepish about this, but I did spend the day multitasking like crazy.

Favorite Quote(s)

• "Is it because we're having so much fun at home we've forgotten the world?" — How close to home does this hit?

• I liked the line describing an upset Mildred as "sitting there like a wax doll melting in its own heat" merely because that's a very accurate description of me throughout most of the summer.

• "Faber sniffed the book. 'Do you know that books smell like nutmeg or some spice from a foreign land? I loved to smell them when I was a boy."

• "The good writers touch life often. The mediocre ones run a quick hand over her. The bad ones rape her and leave her for the flies."

• "... somehow we think we can grow, feeding on flowers and fireworks, without completing the cycle back to reality."

• "After all, when we had all the books we needed, we still insisted on finding the highest cliff to jump off... We do need knowledge. And perhaps in a thousand years we might pick smaller cliffs to jump off."

Notes (Possible Spoilage)

• The introduction of Faber was a warm and welcomed relief! It felt like meeting an old, close friend after a long, long period of loneliness. And he offered a voice of intelligence and reason. This coming from one character that actually isn't a cold, hollow shell of a person.

• A book I'd meant to read (and had owned) for at least 10 years, I'd never even read a snippet of this classic. And I didn't expect this novel to describe the current state of things so accurately. But the dumbing down, the lack of attention spanning any period longer than three minutes, a society's choice to read less and less... To name a few of the similarities. When reading 1984, another novel that reveals a strange, unfamiliar kind of world... It felt like a looming possibility of danger in the far future—too far to take serious or instill any immediate fear. But Fahrenheit is different because it feels unfamiliar in ways, sure, but the portrayal of the general masses is very on the money in a very scary way. If 1984 seemed like a far distant possibility, Fahrenheit in many aspects seems like a hop, skip, and a jump away.