Here begins a series, published all in a row, of 35 years of reading, 1982-2016.
Oh my, how very much my reading habits have changed over the years. In those happy and seemingly uncomplicated days, I read almost all fiction. (In the mid 70s, I had read oodles of non fiction on feminist topics.) In the years before I was blogging, I’ve added more photos and details of life as I knew it then.
reading and life in 2016
In January of 1982, I fell in love with someone I had known casually, Bryan. He had managed a punk rock club (the Gorilla Room) in downtown Seattle where I had attended many shows the year before. In early January, I was waiting for a bus to go to work and he hopped off and said hello and that he liked the pink colour of my hair. I hopped on the bus and departed but that night, I called a mutual friend and asked her to arrange a meeting, which she did. From that night on, Bryan and I were inseparable for the next five years.
Bryan loved to read, and for a punk rocker he had some gentle reading habits. One of his favourite authors was Regency Romance writer Georgette Heyer. I started with his favourite, The Grand Sophy, and plunged into a Georgette Heyer binge that went on for months. Bryan also loved Jane Austen, who I had avoided because I thought she would be so stuffy. I read Pride and Prejudice and changed my mind. (If you click on the screen shots to biggify them, you will be able to read the titles.) I also read Sense and Sensibility and all the other Jane Austens this year but for some reason failed to write them down.
I read a great deal of science fiction and fantasy back then. I rarely read it at all now. House Between the Worlds by Marion Zimmer Bradley was memorably good. I own it and might re-read it. I regularly kept up with her Darkover fantasy series. I did not think the writing so great but loved her plots and ideas. I wept over The Silver Metal Lover by Tanith Lee and have recently learned there is a sequel, so I must re-read it (easy, because I own it!) Below, with the sunflower, is the great gardening memoir, Onward and Upward in the Garden by Katharine S White, one of two non fiction books I read that year (and I had read it before, in the mid 70s).
I read so much science fiction…often by writers whose writing style was blah but who had such great ideas. I think John Brunner was in that category.
For years, I had been trying to remember a book I had read in high school and finally found it again: The Still Small Voice of Trumpets. (Must re-read again; I own it!) It reminded me of this verse of the Holly Near song, It Could Have Been Me:
The junta broke the fingers on Victor Jara's hands They said to the gentle poet "play your guitar now if you can" Victor started singing but they brought his body down You can kill that man but not his song When it's sung the whole world round
A friend of Bryan’s, Marc Szeftel, was reading Philip K Dick. I borrowed Eye in the Sky and thus began my PKD binge, which partially coincided with my Georgette Heyer binge (quite a contrast).
I also reread the great Dark is Rising fantasy series, which I know would make a good read today (and I own it): Over Sea Under Stone, The Dark Is Rising, Greenwitch, Silver on the Tree, The Grey King.
A science fiction duo by Tanith Lee, Don’t Bite the Sun and Drinking Sapphire Wine, became favourites that I re-read in 1982 and in the early 2000s. I own them, of course, and would like to re-read them again.
John Wyndham is another SF favourite of mine.
I discovered and read through all that were available at the time of the Dave Brandstetter mystery series by Joseph Hansen. I own all his books and I still think about Dave Brandstetter and his unusual house. So, of course, I want to re-read them.
Walter Tevis’ Mockingbird is about reading, and is a science fiction book I read for the second time in 1982. For several years it has been high on my list of books to re-read. I just need time.
I was slow at reading all of Jane Austen, but I did add Persuasion to my list.
The PKD trilogy of The Divine Invasion, Valis, and The Transmogrification of Timothy Archer gives intense insight into the working of his mind.
At the time, I was a housecleaner (for 18 years) so I enjoyed the housecleaner character in What Mrs. McGillicuddy Saw (Agatha Christie). I re-read A Different Light, a progressive-politcs SF book by Elizabeth Lynn (and I want to read it again, and I own it). For my second non fiction book of the year, I read Kim Chernin’s The Obsession: The Tyranny of Slenderness, and I continue to recommend it. Ecotopia became the vision of Cascadia (a liberal left coast paradise).
I re-read The Diviners, part of a beloved Canadian series by Margaret Laurence. (Also part of the theme of I own them and want to re-read them.)
I look back with amazement because I had truly forgotten how much science fiction I once read, and love the idea that for a year I mixed Georgette Heyer and Philip K Dick. I read 115 books in 1982; due to some flaws in my screen shot process, they are not all in this post.
Here I am in 1982 with Montana Mary, another avid reader:
I loved that kind of reading too, at that time period and later, all kinds of scifi/fantasy. These days I am into the Regencies and just finished A Civil Contract by Heyer which I have mixed feelings about, since I liked the male hero but didn’t really love either of the main women protagonists–I felt one was dumpy and shlumpy and steady and nice, which is good but dull, and the other a complete dramaqueen of selfishness. I could see the lesson, but didn’t *feel* the romance ending at all. Maybe I’ll feel differently next time.
I was into New Wave and punk starting at the end of 1982 and would have thought Bryan was a babe–how great that you have these photos and lists of what you read.
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He was a total babe all right. We were thick into the Seattle punk scene.
I rated all the Heyers highly in retrospect because I can’t remember them individually. I do remember Bryan wanted to be like some of the heroes–I think especially Sylvester (as I recall).
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You are knocking it out of the park with these excellent retrospectives.
My early reading binges began in grade school when I discovered Zane Grey and Agatha Christie. ( I know, what a combination eh. )
And when I discovered I wanted to own the paperbacks, even though it meant my fifty cent allowance went on second hand books rather than candy.
I bought every book I could afford by those authors and devoured them all.
And then my kid brother bought me The Hobbit. I quickly read, and reread, LOTR and I was full speed ahead buying the pulp Analogs and SF/Fantasy magazines.
I spent my summers picking berries for a dollar a flat to feed my
book hoarding….er, appreciative collecting!
University broadened my reading habits, and I fell in love with both Margarets, Atwood and Lawrence…and every moody poet I could find, ancient, romantic, or contemporary.
And of course I wrote plenty of bad poetry.
Sadly a move overseas meant losing much of my book collection.
And echoing Donnalee, Bryan sure had the babe looks of the era.
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Oh my gosh, I used to say I loved the three Margarets: Atwood, Drabble, and Laurence. I still have almost all their books.
I too spent my chore money on paperbacks. I remember the first time I bought some: Ray Bradbury. The first SF novel I read was called Have Spacesuit Will Travel. The children’s librarian suggested it to me.
I liked poet Elinor Wylie.
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I was reading all the Marion Zimmer Bradley Darkover novels around this time too, I loved them. I was very much into science fiction when I was younger too, but not so much now. I gave them up for mysteries and non-fiction, although I have been sucked back into a few unusual ones recently (Ann Leckie’s Imperial Radch trilogy). I’m going to be interested to see what future years hold for you. How amazing that you kept records.
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Fascinating!! I loved MZB. I made the same transition to mysteries and then memoirs and non fiction. With non genre novels always mixed in.
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That is the cutest picture of you with the three kitties! The one of you and Montana Mary is cute, too. You certainly did read a lot, and kept great records.
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