I have books all over my room. On my bookshelves (of course), on my desk, and on the floor. Unlike the other locations however, my bedside has a constantly rotating set of titles that I like to focus my attentions on. My current bedside book roster is part books I’ve picked up from the Festival of Books and part rereads of fantasy stories.
Here are the four books on my bedside that I’ve been chipping away for the past few weeks:
Taiwan Travelogue
Picked this up before the awards and reading halfway through, it was clear why this book was nominated in the first place. This is a translation of a “recently recovered” travelogue of Taiwan during Japanese occupation of the island from the point of view of a young Japanese woman. If you aren’t intrigued by the premise, the footnotes add a whole other layer of world building that really just enhance the reading experience. While reading, I wished that I could read the original text and really get the most out of the story—anyone who speaks more than one language can tell you that certain phrases just hit differently in other languages, and I wonder what quirks the translator had to work with in translating the piece.
Jane Austen’s Bookshelf
Browsing the books on display in the booth for the Jane Austen Society of North America (JASNA Southwest), the title intrigued me. As a firm believer that the books we love reflect us in a certain way, what does the books that Austen loved reading say about her and how have they impacted her writing? Sounds like a good premise. Each chapter looks into the popular authors of her time whose works haven’t reached the same notoriety in the modern age. Some of the books mentioned were titles I had seen in passing during trips to the used bookstore, but was never really interested enough to pick up.
Wings of Starlight
Currently rereading this in preparation for Periwinkle’s book (Wings of Reverie) release in August. If you were a fan of the Disney fairy books or the movie series (we should’ve gotten more!), this is the book to pick up. It’s a prequel featuring Queen Clarion that expands her backstory and on the love story between the queen and Lord Milori as seen in the movie Secret of the Wings. If I’m going to be frank, it’s a bit slow and bittersweet. But it is a must read if Pixie Hollow was an important part of your childhood.
The Hobbit
Another reread that I’m slowly chipping away and in no rush to finish. The prequel of the ever-famous high fantasy series, Lord of the Rings, featuring a young Bilbo Baggins on his great adventure to Erabor and back. You really can’t bring up fantasy, much less high fantasy, without mentioning J. R. R. Tolkien’s works and The Hobbit does such a great job establishing a vibrant environment typical of the genre.
& babbling 