"Sun books" 2005

It's nearly that time of year again! Time for sitting outdoors among the roses and indulging in the reading of books that gloriously evoke a richer, more sensuous, more pungent world than I know in everyday life. Specifically, these books should be set in the Mediterranean, Central Asia, and India, with occasional tastes of Africa or the American Southwest for variety. I wait all winter and spring for this time of year. Here's what I've been saving up for summer:

Simeti's On Persephone's Island, about Sicily

Pagan Holiday, which I got nearly halfway through last year; it's about a man and his pregnant girlfriend who recently followed the ancient Roman tourist routes

The First Fossil Hunters: Paleontology in Greek and Roman Times by Adrienne Mayor

The God Who Comes: Dionysian Mysteries Revisited by Rosemarie Taylor-Perry (EPL 292.36)

The Harlot by the Side of the Road: Forbidden Tales from the Bible

Gardens of Light by Amin Maalouf, a novel about the prophet Mani (PQ3979.2.M28J3713 1996)

The Shah Nameh by Firdawsi, which is the Persian national epic (PK6456)

David Macauley's Mosque

Wise Lord of the Sky: Persian Myth

Kim by Rudyard Kipling

Gulbadan: Portrait of a Rose Princess at the Mughal Court by Rumer Godden, which B. found for me for Christmas (I'd read it about 10 years ago)

The Travels of Marco Polo

The Tortilla Curtain by T.C Boyle, which SR lent me

Refuge by Terry Tempest Williams, a book combining nature writing (Utah) with her mother's cancer experience

Two just for fun: Under the Tuscan Sun and A Year in Provence - I can hardly wait!

Maybe nonfiction or fiction about ancient Greek explorers; maybe I could reread Forgotten Queens of Islam too, which is pretty exotic!

Meanwhile, I'm determined to soon finish The Earth Path by Starhawk and to read Postmodernism and the Environmental Crisis by Arran Gare. I had also better hurry up and finish other UO library books if I want to be checking new ones out.

It's a big one!

Thanks to fractal9091, I now have a new entry in the Fauna of Chapel Hill series, the first in months. This big, fat snake was about five feet long! It travelled from their front lawn down into the street, which it slithered across then headed into the neighbors' yard.

With that white underbelly, we're guessing it's a black rat snake or a black racer. Does anyone know for sure?