Welcome to Litsy!

With some distance now I have an even greater appreciation for this behemoth. With so many themes I can‘t even begin to relay them all here. But one I especially appreciated was that of the invisible & everlasting connections between people, places, events, ideas, beliefs, etc. They are the “sparks” Olga gathers in this book.

The Prologue & final scene doubles down on this theme in a most delightful way I can‘t spoil!

Were all the flags and annotations necessary? Yes! Was it worth the 10 weeks of effort. Absolutely yes!

Can I even begin to coherently articulate why yet? No!

This is one of those books I will have to sit with to settle the swirling thoughts.

Page by page! 😅 Definitely can get bogged down in this giant middle section, but there are spectacular nuggets here & there. OT has ratcheted up the tension at the end of book 5 so we‘re definitely headed somewhere. 😬

Halfway mark! 😅 If you want to build your vocabulary, look no further than this monument to words.

“In the beginning was The Word” - no joke. It‘s all about letters, words, and language and communication and perception, or lack thereof.

Okay, the “torturous” initiation rites of the Bogomil sect wherein they are subjected to pagan plays made me laugh. (All things earthly and pleasurable are sinful.) Such as those featuring Lady Baubo, who is the ancient goddess of mirth & obscenity & laughter.

Oh the evils of hedonism! 😂 Google to get the full pic!

I‘ll be living with Olga for awhile. (10 weeks as a read along) Slow going because I have to make a note or look up a word every other minute.

What a ride! Halfway thru Book 2 and I‘m a bit nonplussed by the mysticism of Kabbalists. “The air is full of eyes…” 👀👀👀👀

Beverages & books are an escape from reality.

Loved the first book of Jacob! It couldn‘t be denser with ideas & threads. I am delighted & tickled with the humor. 😄

Feeling Asher‘s misanthropy today.

What a fantastic title page!

A highly praised book I just didn‘t take to on audio. Jacob Frank, a false Jewish messiah, is nonfictional. Tracing his life gives Tokarczuk a chance to look at Poland in the late 1700‘s (when it was dissolved) from a nationally disinterested perspective. And a chance to look on how many different characters change over time. I somehow found them all a little too evasive.

New audiobook, merely 35 hours of it. I was told this was an especially well done audio production and so far (30 minutes in) that seems true.

I plunged into this fascinating book 4w ago + was absorbed in the world of an E European Jewish messiah who creates a cultist group who convert to Catholicism. The themes of anti semitism, charismatic abusive leaders, nation states, + the power of religion echo across the centuries with the final pages bringing us to the 20th century.Jacob Frank is unlikeable as we view him through multiple viewers eyes. Daunting, dense, but worth the effort

https://youtu.be/CUtRyiruvPk?si=ysqRM9Y4pCk5fjIs

Liked it

#MarchMagic Day 8: bought these beauties roughly a year ago which makes them technically #OnTBRListFor1Year

Wow😳I was determined to get to this soon , but when it arrived ….#chunkster

I put together my annual reading stats, which are available on my blog: https://lindypratch.blogspot.com/2022/12/annual-reading-stats-2022.html?m=1
Or, if you prefer, on YouTube in my latest video: Looking back on 2022, my first year on booktube … plus pie charts!
https://youtu.be/8CzLzgIxYlE

March. March is International Booker month. Along with some brilliant books, I read some serious 🐴💩. Including some questionable🦞🍆 choices

The standout, though, was Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk, translated by Jennifer Croft - not my favourite book, but easily my reading experience of the year. Epic, unexpected & brilliant. Did I mention it was 900 PAGES?

Polish first ed pictured, cos Fitzcarraldo don‘t make graphics easy!

#12booksof2022

I have three of these on my shelf looking longingly at me to rise up the TBR with great speed! But the tagged looks good - so I‘ve shown restraint and stacked it until my TBR subsides a little! 😅

https://bookmarks.reviews/the-best-reviewed-books-of-2022-fiction/

“There are four types of readers…The sponge absorbs everything it comes into contact with... But he is not able to filter out what is most important. The funnel takes in what he reads at one end while at the other, everything he reads pour out of him. The strainer let‘s through the wine and keeps the sediment…The sieve, on the other hand, separates out the chaff to give a result of only the finest grain.”

What kind of reader are you?

This was a 1000 page beast. It took awhile to get started and I contemplated giving up…but then something interesting occurred that sucked me back in. The book chronicles a religious sect in Eastern Europe in the 1700s through a lot of characters and points of view. Slow motion train wreck but well written, just crazy long.

I haven't read any of the books on the MBI short list, but judging from other people whose tastes are similar, this is an excellent selection.

Look what you made me do @rockpools - bad influence! 😄

It's soooo long.

I finished #InternationalBookerPrize2022 longlist and here is my shortlist selection/prediction. It is interesting, thematically diverse longlist, with surprisingly number of short stories collections. Reading longlist was exhausting, but at the same time - it is rewarding experience.

In my latest Friday Reads, I talk about picture books, graphic novels, middle grade fiction AND a novel about a bisexual Palestinian woman with a love addition. https://youtu.be/fULro9HR9zM

March stats... I doubt I will ever have another month with this many books! Granted, many of them were picture books and graphic novels. I've tagged my favourite book of this month, and it's a chunskster.
#chunksterchallenge2022 #readingstats

This will take some time but I cannot NOT give it a try. @Simona convinced me to read it, it is nominated for the #InternationalBookerPrize2022 and I loved Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead so… I can do this! I just finished the first of the seven books. In between each of the books I‘ll read another, “lighter” book 🤞🏽

I‘ve enjoyed previous books from Tokarczuk, but I‘m a quarter of the way through this beast and not at all invested in it. So, I‘m out. It‘s not worth 24 more hours of audio booking to me.

A completely immersive novel, like stepping into mid-18th century Europe, the start of the Enlightenment… & the dark shadows it created. It‘s based on a real historical figure who lead a strange Jewish-Christian cult; we see Jacob Frank from many viewpoints but never within his own. Just as well, since I would have shuddered to be inside his head. It‘s a very feminist tale and the writing is stupendous, beautifully translated by Jennifer Croft.

Another weekly roundup of what I‘ve been reading is on my channel, plus my new puppy: https://youtu.be/ROTDablv1ZU

But it isn‘t Frank‘s looks that give him his power. Asher knows such people. Many magnates have it, the nobly born: that inexplicable self confidence, founded in nothing, or perhaps in the existence of some internal centre of gravity, that makes a person feel like a king in any situation.
(Internet image of Jacob Frank)

The Bogamils didn‘t eat meat, just plant foods, occasionally cheese when someone had given them some. They were disgusted by eggs, just the same as they were by meat. Of the vegetables, they did not eat broad beans since they believed that souls might reside there before being born, in those little grains laid out there like in some coffer. ⬇️

The plaintive rumble of the sea is a lament, and all of nature is taking part in this process, of mourning those gods of whom the world has been in such desperate need. There is no one here. God created the world and the effort of doing so killed him.

Graves are in fact altogether pointless, since the dead ignore them and roam.

This is my second chunkster so far this year. 36 hours in audio. Finished this morning; review to come; I gave it 5 stars and I‘m still formulating further thoughts. #chunksterchallenge2022

There is a particular kind of science that exists on these sorts of estates: the science of coaxing out blood stains. For centuries, it has been taught to future wives and mothers. If a university for women ever came about, it would be the most important subject.

There are four types of money that never bring happiness: writer‘s fees; translator‘s fees; orphan‘s benefits; and money coming from countries overseas.

… they play the greatest tribute to this virgin with her child
… we, too, ought to get under her wings.

They say everyone is going to stay 30 forever. This cheers the old and scares the young. But supposedly this is the best age, where health, wisdom and experience are entwined harmoniously.
(Photo: me, age 39)

The coming-to-be of the world is somehow too poetic, he thinks. For us, it‘s snip, snip, in six days God created the world, like a boss who knows how to get something done, instead of thinking about doing it.

People who write books, he thinks, don‘t want to have their own stories. What would be the point? In comparison with what is written, life will always be boring and bland.

In my latest booktube video, I talk about all the readathons in which I plan to participate in March.
https://youtu.be/034aUmIlbNY

Litsy‘s #chunksterchallenge gets a mention too. @Amiable

Oh, it‘s going to be *that* kind of weekend!

This rave review has convinced me.

"Storytelling, The Books of Jacob seems to suggest, is not altogether unlike virtuoso tricksterism or alchemy. Reaching the end of this dazzling book, I also felt like a devoted disciple, of Olga Tokarczuk, impatient for her to return and lead me to new imaginary realms."
https://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/books-of-jacob-olga-tokarczuk-book-review-ada...

I went to the bookstore today fully intending to buy this 900+ page behemoth, but when I opened it up, the PAGE NUMBERS WENT BACKWARDS.

I was not mentally prepared to read a book that was counting down, so I made an alternate selection.

Took a lunch trip to Park Road Books to pick up a couple of recent releases. I had no idea The Books of Jacob was such a door stopper. 😱 Super excited about all of these, though. New books make me happy.

#bookmail A tad intimidated by this beast (nearly 1000 pages!), but mostly just excited.

“The usefulness of Latin is debated, gout is suffered, colds are caught, large breasts are fetishized, fresh-squeezed pomegranate juice quaffed. At a key moment, a character might wander off and weed the oregano. It‘s that kind of book.” Quote from review in the NYT. I‘m excited to dive into this book! Thanks @vivastory for the tip!