#the shell collector

[cinemaronin]

[whilereadingandwalking]

@shadowtearling​’s August Selfie Challenge - Day 16 - TOP 3 - Top 3 Books that Shaped Me as a Person

I’m skipping Neil Gaiman, as I’ve used him so much in this challenge thus far, and with that omission, here are my top three:

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy - This brilliant classic provided me with a discussion about the meaning of happiness and true love that will never leave me, and that has become an integral part of who I am.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling - The Harry Potter series has made me who I am in any number of ways, but the ending in particular was poignant for me: the boy who lived, who wants only normalcy, rather than more adventure, and the happy ending not being a wedding, or a battle, or a victory, but simply, “All was well,” which is, by the way, tattooed onto my back.

The Shell Collector by Anthony Doerr - Both Doerr and Bradbury have, in recent years, changed the way I thought about writing, but the changes that Doerr wrought in my thoughts are more recent, and so I decided to include this incredible collection of magical realist short stories. 

[amidstthedark]

Ai Hashimoto ( January 12, 1996 )

2017 Birthday Countdown [ 9 / 12 ] - Ai x IFFR 2017 ( The Shell Collector )

"There is a part where I want to selfishly enjoy (the film festival), but because I am allowed to come here and shoulder Japan's work, there was a feeling that…I want to leave an impact even if it's just a bit." 

Source & Credits: RiverPaperPeace

[whilereadingandwalking]

July 25: “The Hunter’s Wife” by Anthony Doerr

I’m participating in #oneshortmonth, hosted by @armormadeofbooks!

Thoughts before reading: This is one of my all-time favorite short stories. 

Favorite Quote:(s)

“You probably know...that wolves are hurdlers. Sometimes the people who track them will come to a snag and the prints will disappear. As if the entire pack just leaped into a tree and vanished. Eventually they'll find the tracks again, thirty or forty feet away. People used to think it was magic—flying wolves. But all they did was jump. One great coordinated leap.”

“He showed her a thousand ladybugs hibernating in an orange ball hung in a riverbank hollow; a pair of dormant frogs buried in frozen mud, their blood crystallized until spring. He pried a globe of honeybees from its hive, slow-buzzing, stunned from the sudden exposure, tightly packed around the queen, each bee shimmying for warmth. When he placed the globe in her hands, she fainted, her eyes rolled back. Lying there, she saw all their dreams at once, the winter reveries of scores of worker bees, each one fiercely vivid: bright trails through thorns to a clutch of wild roses, honey tidily brimming a hundred combs.“

Rating: 5/5

What did you like: I love the use of “the hunter” to describe him as he is. He is what he does, it’s a huge part of his identity, and so it is how he’s described. I love that this story is magical and fantastic, and yet it’s actually a story about a husband who wants to understand his wife but doesn’t entirely, and who is reaching out to her, trying to get there as best he can. I love the magical realist, wintry feel to the story, and the incredible tone and mood-setting of the tale. Doerr’s writing is incredible—I discovered this story before I discovered All the Light We Cannot See was also by him, and it changed the way I look at my own writing.

What did you dislike: Although it shifts, the beginning of the story has a tinge of stalking-as-flirting as well as manic-pixie-dream-girl. It goes away, and the story definitely makes up for it, but it is there.

Would you read more by this author: Yes. If you want to read more of his short stories, check out The Shell Collector. They’re almost all as good as this one.

[thereadingcafe]

REVIEW - TO LIGHT THE WAY FORWARD (The Shell Collector) by Nancy Naigle "sweet,heartwarming & delightful"

[bookcoversonly]

Title: The Shell Collector | Author: Anthony Doerr | Publisher: Penguin (2003)

[sandythereadingcafe]

REVIEW:

THE SHELL COLLECTOR by Nancy Naigle at The Reading Cafe:

'a wonderful, heart warming story'

http://www.thereadingcafe.com/the-shell-collector-by-nancy-naigle-a-review/

[thereadingcafe]

REVIEW - THE SHELL COLLECTOR by Nancy Naigle "wonderful heartwarming story"