Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Book Meme

Bobbie of Great Grannie Blog tagged me for this meme. It's a fun one.

Here are the rules:

1. Pick up the nearest book of 123 pages or more.
2. Find Page 123.
3. Find the first five sentences.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people.

Robert E. Lee, (Roy Blount, Jr., Penguin Books, 2003)

But it was Lee's way to give his officers leeway. Maybe he should have been stricter with Stuart: Jeb had started signing letters "Knight of the Golden Spurs," or "K.G.S." He was a major general now, and although a Minie ball had carried off half his mustache, people were writing songs about him.

I tag anyone who lives outside the United States who reads this blog!

P.S. If you want to read a really good book about Robert E. Lee's years after the Civil War, get a copy of Lee: The Last Years by Charles Bracelen Flood. Excellent book! Blount's book, so far, only so-so. Although Blount is hilarious on NPR's weekly news quiz show, Wait! Wait! Don't Tell Me!

6 comments:

Fénix - Bostonscapes said...

I don't do memes, but I stopped by to wish you a happy Valentine's Day. :)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ♥ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Lucky Dip Lisa said...

'It was lees way to give leeway' Someone got paid to write that?
Oh and I tagged you too but see I wasn't fast enough on delivery...bummer!

Janet Kincaid said...

Fenix: I rarely do them either (at least, not on this blog, anyway), but this one was about books and I can't resist a good book! Happy Valentine's Day to you, too!


Lisa: Grannie was faster! ;-) And yes, can you believe that sentence?! All I can think is, because Roy Blount, Jr., is so famous in the literary world over here, the editor was afraid to truly edit out stuff like this. I, OTOH, wouldn't have been. I would have rewritten it "It was Lee's way to give quarter..." or "It was Lee's way to be flexible..." or something. Anything but what Blount was allowed to write. (Can you tell I'm not 100% enamored of this book?)

Bobbie said...

Boy that Jeb was proud of himself wasn't he? Goes to show that ego was alive and well back then. Thanks for joining the meme-notameme book review :)

Bev said...

This is what I would have kinda expected you to be reading, as yoou seem to know a lot about American history lol

Janet Kincaid said...

Bobbie: Jeb Stuarts seems to have been quite a character. Earlier in the book, Blount describes his uniform and his love of parades, which was the opposite of Lee who never wore insignia on his gray uniform, except when he surrendered to Grant at Appomattox, and didn't make his soldiers form up and parade. Anyway--it was a fun meme. Thanks for asking me to play along.


Bev: I hadn't thought about it, but I do read a bit of history and biography, though not as much as I'd like! If it's any comfort, I recently read and would recommend the following:

The Great Santini, Pat Conroy
Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters, Mark Dunn
The Red Tent, Anita Diamant
Uncommon Carriers, John McPhee
Pillars of the Earth, Ken Follett (which is what I'm reading right now, along with The Idiot's Guide to Freemasonry.)

For non-history stuff, I read C.J. Box's Joe Pickett Mystery series.

Wow. I've done more reading lately than I thought I had. Hm. (I have a friend who can read three books a week while it takes me three weeks to read a book.)