Meme, Me.

I was tagged by tangognat, so here it is. My five books change by the hour, so that list shouldn't be taken too seriously.

1. How many books do I own?

Oh, wow, too many. Less than I did at the beginning of the year, but still, several small boxes full of them. Enough so that counting them would be a hassle.

2. Last Book I Bought:

I bought Douglas Adams' The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide. I bought it at the thrift store today for $1.50; I had read the first book while I was in junior high, and am curious about the rest. Plus, the price was right.

3. Last Book I Read:

H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds. I was curious about it after watching the movie, so I whipped out my copy. I was surprised to find (and I don't know why) that the most haunting images in the movie were directly from the book, and that some of the most annoying parts of the movie were nowhere to be found. If anything, Wells did a much better job of depicting the misery and squalor and pain, and actually addressed the fact that, at the end of the story, the narrator was still displaying symptoms that we would now recognize as post-traumatic stress disorder. And while the ending was a (relatively) happy one, there was not the sense of the happy ending being almost insulting. Plus, the Edward Gorey drawings were just gravy!

4. Five Books That Mean A Lot To Me:

James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl. My second grade teacher read this to the class right before summer vacation, and I became absolutely enthralled by it. It has the randomness of a fairy tale, and was free of the wearisome moralizing children's books are prone to. The book that made me a reader.

D'Aulaires Book of Greek Myths by Ingri D'Aulaire, Edgar Parin D'Aulaire. The book that turned me into a researcher. In third grade I borrowed this from the library, and became obsessed with learning about mythology -- not only Greek & Roman, but Norse and Egyptian as well. It taught me the pleasure of learning on my own. It also paved the way for my fascination with comic book superheroes.

The Years by Virginia Woolf. A gorgeous book, a family history where virtually all of the history happens outside the narrative. Just snapshots of people, and when I first read it, I thought it was the perfect book. I should probably reread this book, to see if this assessment stands.

Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison. I have always been a sucker for metaphor; the entire book is a metaphor. This book haunted me for several years, in a good way.

Time Out of Joint by Philip K. Dick. I could list any number of Dick's novels. I'm fond of this one because for a good chunk of it, it is nothing all that extraordinary. It just really stuck with me.

5. Tag Five More:
I'm not going to tag anyone; if you feel like posting the meme, be my guest.