island reads: Faraday's discovery of light, Büscher's journey around Germany + Teá Obreth's Orange Prize novel

in Septemer, the Goodread's question "What Kind of Books Do You Like to Read?" made me go and explore my home bookshelf, and put together a book collage and a clip (here).

now, on the second to last day on the island, looking at the books i am reading here made me put together a mini-collage. interesting to see how each books actually relates to a previous book i read on another journey. it's one journey leading to another, one book leading to another.

there's Ralf Bönt's novel "Die Entdeckung des Lichts": it's the life story of chemist and phyisician Michael Faraday, who discovered electromagnetisicm, written in novel form, with many small notes on the time of Faraday's life, from Napoleon's Battle in Leipzig (which i visited in March), to the Cholera in London, and to Darwin's journey around the world. i hadn't thought of that when picking the book, and didn't even know about the Darwin connection - but the last time i've been here, i read a non-fiction book about Darwin's journey, written by a science writer who followed the itienary of said journey himself: Wolfgang Neffe, that was.


the second one, "Deutschland - Eine Reise", "Germany - a journey": that's the account of Wolfgang Büscher on his roundabouttrip along the border of Germany in 3 months, taking trains, buses and ships, and walking. in his previous book, Büscher walked from Berlin to Moscow. i just looked, i didn't blog about it, but i think i read it in France.

and the third: is a surprise that waited in the supermarket shelf here at the bay, between the usual packs of romance and crime: this year's Orange Prize winner: Teá Obreth "The Tiger's Wife". i read several of the previous winner books, the last one was "Bel Canto" by Ann Patchett, which i read in Mallorca (link), and which indirectly brought me to this quote on life and journeys:

The goal is to experience it [life] and see how it changes. I certainly have resolved some things with myself, but it's important that it's a journey, and that you keep yourself open to how things change and grow as you go through life. - Julie Powell.

right now, i am still reading the Germany journey book. but i googled the Tiger's Wife already, and arrived at the blog of a book blogger who read almost all books on the Orange longlist, here's his note on it: SavidgeReads/Orange Prize. and here i was, thinking i read quite a lot of books. oh well :)