booking through thursday - auntie meme

I hate that "meme" has replaced the perfectly serviceable, though non-trendy, word "questionnaire." I ADORE filling out surveys and questionnaires and quizzes. I always have. I used to get very excited when we'd get comment cards from hotels or restaurants, and my mom would let me fill them out.
Booking Through Thursday has a reading/book questionnaire for today's Question, and I just cannot pass that up.

So, without further ado, here be my answers:
1. Favorite childhood book?
Race Against Death (the story of the dogsled relay that brought diphtheria serum to Nome, Alaska, and was the origins of the Iditerod).
2. What are you reading right now?
just finished Saving Francesca by Melina Marchetta

3. What books do you have on request at the library?
currently, none (I picked them all up this week)
4. Bad book habit?
leaving them open face-down, rather than using a bookmark.
5. What do you currently have checked out at the library?
ha. ha. ha. 75 dissertation related books. and about 15 titles from the public library, mainly YA fiction, Wodehouse and a couple of nonfiction titles that I probably won't read.
6. Do you have an e-reader?
no.
7. Do you prefer to read one book at a time, or several at once?
it varies. i usually get caught up in whatever i'm reading and just crank through it, but sometimes i have a couple going at once.
8. Have your reading habits changed since starting a blog?
nope
9. Least favorite book you read this year (so far?)
hmmm. The A-List by Zoey Dean.

10. Favorite book you’ve read this year?
Peter Cameron's SOMEDAY THIS PAIN WILL BE USEFUL TO YOU.
11. How often do you read out of your comfort zone?
semi-regularly
12. What is your reading comfort zone?
it's pretty broad. children and YA, especially fantasy; 19th century novels; nonfiction (usually, but not always, history or evolutionary biology); really good contemporary fiction (not so much bestsellers); Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers; literary criticism/theory/history; cultural studies kinds of stuff.

13. Can you read on the bus?
Yes
14. Favorite place to read?
my bed
15. What is your policy on book lending?
I loan freely but to trusted acquaintances.
16. Do you ever dog-ear books?
rarely
17. Do you ever write in the margins of your books?
very, very grudgingly rarely, and only in books that i have as teaching editions (and thus multiple copies) or a very few purpose-bought critical texts.
18.  Not even with text books?
nope
19. What is your favorite language to read in?
english
20. What makes you love a book?
its style, its form, its content. do i learn anything, do i think about anything new, am i transported, do i recognize myself or the world, is it imaginative in interesting ways.....it's SO hard to pin this down!
21. What will inspire you to recommend a book?
usually a combination of "I think the book is good" plus "your taste leads me to think that YOU would think this book is good"
22. Favorite genre?
fiction. probably classic children's fantasy fiction.
23. Genre you rarely read (but wish you did?)
science
Favorite biography?
i'm totally cheating on this - Caroline Moorhead's DUNANT'S DREAM: history of the international red cross.
25. Have you ever read a self-help book?
not all the way through
26. Favorite cookbook?
don't really have one, though I use The Joy of Cooking fairly regularly.

27. Most inspirational book you’ve read this year (fiction or non-fiction)?
inspirational? i don't use that word lightly....SOMEDAY THIS PAIN WILL BE USEFUL TO YOU.

28. Favorite reading snack?
cheese & crackers
29. Name a case in which hype ruined your reading experience.
nothing comes immediately to mind, though i KNOW this has happened.

30. How often do you agree with critics about a book?
I don't usually read critics. i usually disagree on some level.
31. How do you feel about giving bad/negative reviews?
not a problem. it isn't personal.
32. If you could read in a foreign language, which language would you chose?
RUSSIAN.
33. Most intimidating book you’ve ever read?
hmmmm. Moby Dick, because I only had a week to read it; Andrei Bely's Petersburg, because it's insane and wonderful and complicated.
34. Most intimidating book you’re too nervous to begin?
Ulysses
35. Favorite Poet?
T.S. Eliot. ee cummings.
36. How many books do you usually have checked out of the library at any given time?
anywhere from 8-20, not counting dissertation/teaching related ones.
37. How often have you returned book to the library unread?
it happens semi-frequently, but not all that often.
38. Favorite fictional character?
too many to name, but I am extremely fond of Will Parry from His Dark Materials.
39. Favorite fictional villain?
the Smog in China Mieville's UN LUN DUN.

40. Books I’m most likely to bring on vacation?
something lengthy to last me.
41. The longest I’ve gone without reading.
maybe a couple of days? i really couldn't say.
42. Name a book that you could/would not finish.
i couldn't bring myself to read the final 25 pages or so of Twilight. I skimmed the final two or three pages then threw it across the room.

43. What distracts you easily when you’re reading?
people talking to me, or talking very near me.
44. Favorite film adaptation of a novel?
oh gosh. I really like Fantastic Mister Fox and The Series of Unfortunate Events
45. Most disappointing film adaptation?
The Lightning Thief; Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland
46. The most money I’ve ever spent in the bookstore at one time?
$80-$100.
47. How often do you skim a book before reading it?
almost never
48. What would cause you to stop reading a book half-way through?
It's terrible OR depressing OR I get distracted by another, more compelling book
49. Do you like to keep your books organized?
yep
50. Do you prefer to keep books or give them away once you’ve read them?
KEEP THEM FOREVER.
51. Are there any books you’ve been avoiding?
Ulysses. Dickens' Hard Times, because then I'll have read all the big novels. Tolkien. Inexplicably, Susan Cooper's Dark Is Rising series.
52. Name a book that made you angry.
Twilight
53. A book you didn’t expect to like but did?
Same Difference by Siobhan Vivian (more like was afraid I wouldn't like)
54. A book that you expected to like but didn’t?
Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart
55. Favorite guilt-free, pleasure reading?
all of it. i don't read anything that induces guilt.


and that's my list. i'm sticking to it.