What I Read in April

      It seems that these monthly wrap up posts keep being written later and later. Hard to believe the first week of May is over already. I'm not really sure what happened to April. I was editing for Camp NaNoWriMo in April which took up a lot of my reading time. My goal had been to finish editing my novel and have it be 90,000 words. By the end of April I had edited 16 chapters (about halfway) and the word count was just shy of 77,000 words. I added almost 8,000 words, probably closer to 10,000 as several paragraphs were deleted and rewritten. So, I'm still working on it.

Here is what I read in April:

Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert

      I really resisted reading this one but decided to read it after I heard so many good reviews of the book. I enjoyed reading it, even if I didn't agree with everything in it. I liked it as a writer, to hear about the struggles of getting published and how many of her books came to be. I think anyone would like this but creative people might get more out of it. I wish I had wrote down my initial thoughts of this book after I read it because I'm struggling to remember what I really thought of it. I know there is a podcast that goes along with the book, but I haven't listened to an episode yet.

Fables: Happily Ever After

And April marked the end of reading Fables, for me. They set up two sides to have a major battle, where one would have to die but of course that isn't how it ended. I don't want to give too much away so I'll leave it at that. I enjoyed this series and thought of starting over once I was done. It's always neat to go back and see the little clues you might have missed the first time. Not thrilled but okay with how it ended. I guess I kind of wanted the big battle.

Fables: Farewell

A History of European Art with Professor William Kloss. 48 lectures, 30 minutes each

     I watched this series with my daughter, mainly after school. We enjoyed the professor but the beginning of the series was heavy in religious art. This made sense as the Catholic church sponsored a lot of the artists but I don't think all the altarpieces that were shown were necessary. It would have been nice to have more lectures on art created in the past 300 years than 500-600 years ago. There was also not one female artist mentioned. This kind of pissed us off. 

From Monet to Van Gogh: A History of Impression with Professor Richard Brettell, 24 lectures, 30 minutes each.

      My daughter and I both enjoy Impressionism, so we enjoyed the paintings shown in this series. However, the professor was a little boring sometimes. At the end of some lectures my daughter and I would both be lying down and almost asleep - the art kept us awake.  This series did include two female artists; Mary Cassatt and Berthe Morisot. The Van Gogh episode lacked since the lecture was about Gauguin's visit with him in Arles for a couple months. I know Van Gogh isn't really thought of as being an Impressionist but if his name is in the title of the series you expect more. Of course, I might be a little biased since I adore him.

     My April bookmark. I've already finished reading two novels this month. I think I might start a draft of my What I Read in May post so I can get my thoughts about them written before I forget.

Have you read anything good lately?