Benny's afoot

Benny is quite the travel boy with his adventures in the Big foot land, Egypt, Pirates, own room fighting monsters and the treasure island. He is never alone on his trips, either going with his father or uncle or making friends when he starts alone. He is very resourceful in carrying stuff with him that might be helpful in getting out of the troubles he is always landing in.
The simple line illustrations and silhouettes pulsate with the adrenaline of the adventures.
I hadnt heard of Wedgie and Wet Willy.

Willa Cather

I have never read Willa Cather's work before. Her poem on Columbus inspires you to explore without fear.

China is so beautiful in Ah Lie me dead in the sunrise land.

Then Back to the ancient France again. Anjou like Anjou pears.

In Broncho Bills valedictory, the narrator is a male.

grandmither
Kirkland and kirkyard

Endless Mythology. Antinous in Antinous

Observe

I had read The Hidden life of Deer by Elizabeth Marshall Thomas.
So I was interested in reading this book.
The authorsays waterbear : radio :: Humans: universe.

waterbears in The Animal Wife

Jack Londons To build a fire  

Emperor

Why are Emperor Penguins called so? For their height? Looking at the penguin skeleton, I cannot imagine underneath the sea world toy, there is the ivory. An author called cancer

In the body of the world

I didnt know that Chemotherapy is different from radiation. Now I also understand why the hair is damaged after chemo.

Motion driven pictures

I came to know of baton twirlers from the Miss congeniality movie. The front and the back cover of the book with its triptych of Jazmin in action with her baton set you in the mood. We look forward to rain, but what about the plans that they might ruin. Jazmin faced one such situation, but the 'walla walla BOOM' couldnt faze her. Read this book while the laundry is on for the special sound effects.
Join the neighborhood having fun in the rain. The illustrations capture the gymnastic moves very well in spirit.

That fun hour

Like the cover zoomed in on the ball, the scale of the pictures is captivating. The baseball bat looks like the chase of a cannon. The pictures have a bright black and white illustration feel. They almost make everyday play like a cosmic activity.
'In the cage, bat every ball
until the coach has thrown them all'
Theres all the motivation right there to play till the end for any activity the kids take up. The attitude that makes practice fun and develops skills.

Mothers love

I might have heard of Siberian tiger, but even if I did, I hadnt thought that life in Siberia would mean snow.
For the young, predator are always a problem, even if your mom is a Tigress.
This book not only informs readers but entertains them with poetry and paintings of a rare environment.

How Sarah met Mercedes

If you have read Eating Enchiladas, then you know Mercedes. This book back fills how they met. This is my third book in the series. The font type and size, illustrations are nostalgia inducing. The story line of learning big lessons in your backyard, catching the fine moments of spotting bird eggs, baby chicks as they happen, all in such a thin book is a marvel.
Not only do the kids watch nature, they even write a poem in the end for an exquisite corpse(pun intended)

Words Spirit and You

Called from within and outside

The author has a trail name. Even Cheryl Strayed had one in Wild. Wait, I have one too. Energizer Bunny.

To put in extra, we need to bulldoze into a wall. Jennifer Davis hadn’t reached that wall on her Appalachian trail hiking with her husband supporting her. To test her limits, the author took to breaking the record on the AT hike.

Two days of hiking can make you loath the smell of trail mix. Three days of traveling in a train can make you think you are still on it even when you are off it. So it is no wonder that the author went into a delirium about the paths she already hiked.

The book gives you the sense of teamwork and commitment required for such a hike to succeed.

Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much – Helen Keller.

Mumford and sons I will hold on hope

Cathole

Hotel

July 2011, I thought this New Yorker building belonged to the magazine.

Going back in time

Dana Reinhardt

Odessa is a likeable character with her sibling rivalry. Into the mix is the big divorce and remarriage of her dad. Faced with huge situations like this, Odessa needs powerful magic. Just what her attic can store, but like an hour glass the magic ticks away. Like Cinderella on clock.
Melding reality with fantasy as in this Time-travel is a tight rope walking, which the author finished with the pole of good writing. I couldnt buy the magic of fixing things over, too huge a leap of faith. That said, the book deals with an important transformation of accepting rocky boat situations having tried all recourses. The illustrations are no fuss and unpredictable.

I was a Latchkey kid too but me and my sister stayed at a boarding school as kids.
Gumshoe

Butter Brickle icecream

River Hope

Author: Melanie Crowder

Summer is perfect time for movies like Rango and Road Movie (Hindi) where water is power. In Melanie Crowder's Parched the sought after are the ones who can hear underground water or those with a lesser secret, the knowledge of looking around and see where the plants want to park their roots.
I have had a couple of childhood summers where we had to pull and push the water pump for muddy water until the rib hurt or push people to get the water from the municipality tanker. And once the drum is filled, the warmth of the bounty of water makes bath that much fun.
In a burnt place, Sarel uses survival skills learnt from her mother to tide not just herself but her pack of dogs. On the other end is another kid Musa who is captivated like the oracle Phaedra in the Titans story. His gift - he can hear invisible water. Everyone is after one thing in the desert. Water.
Adventurous and brave kids in search of their future. Oh how kids love to run the show. 
The story alternates between the point of views of Sarel and Musa. Bonus, Nandi the dog too gets his share of wordscape in the language of scents. The language in the book gets poetic sometimes.
'A thread of song scraped past his throat..'. This syle of sparse, distinct words leave vivid images in the mind of the reader.
When the author uses Ongola bird and other tree names, references or pictures would have helped.

Sounds like Wasabi

Wabi-sabi

Beheaded

Mannequin in love
I feel my upper body
my stomach until the
knees meld

Lawyers are contextualists, incrementalists

Since they charge in 6 minute increments, an hour could end up having way more than 60 min.
Lawyers rode circuit on horse back.

Pygmalion and the bulimic

There is an Ellen West in a poem. Who is Ellen West? And there's Frank Bidart's poem on her wiki page.

In Modern love, I wonder how some people can wait those many years and still be sane. And when you lose the opportunity of waiting, do you lose the 'hunger for the absolute?'.

Other people that I have been putting of from knowing: Henry Brulard.

review

To read

Compare and contrast tragedy

Compare and contrast loss of hearing

Katherine Bouton

For the last couple of weeks, the phone on the left seems to ring from the right.

I know a couple of friends who lost hearing in a ear - one due to wrong medication as a child. Looper technology.
In Facing the wave, the author write 'Because he could hear, he knew he was alive, no dreaming'. In the 'Shouting Wont Help' the author talks of an elderly British woman kidnapped in Africa and without her hearing aid. Blindfolded and no way to hear, she was kept away from that privilege of knowing she was alive.

As a child, when our school was getting ready for a meet, the convent sister asked me to get a plate or so I thought. I also reasoned why would she need a blade and got her a plate from cafeteria. Some one else’s. It was close to lunch time.

A word filled up might lead to funny incident or a mixup but what if you had a whole day’s notes in gobbledy gook.

‘Song without words’ is the unusual story of a person who spent most of his life deciphering the world through many layers with what he call lyricals – the stages of guessing the right word.

The stages are poetic but if every piece of info you receive is to be through this process then it can be harrowing than the impossible finger writing the letters.

Glasses with built in hearing aids

Reading was a Pascalian diversion - Stephanie lacava

'The more I know about the inner lives, the more I might understand about the world' 
When I read about the inner lives of deers and snail, it is a wonder that so much happens and exists unknown to us.

When I started reading the book, I assumed the author to be a male. But when the author talks about her naivete of trusting everyone, even the childhood phase didnt mask out her gender.
Poison dart frog from their poison's use in a dart.