Category Archives: General Books

Book Review: Of Mice and Fairies by A.R. Geiger

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Some of you may remember that a while back I posted a mini-review of A.R. Geiger’s Birdwoman, a collection of short stories. Well, Of Mice and Fairies is a second collection–very different from the first!–of short stories put out by Geiger, and it doesn’t disappoint.

Of Mice and Fairies is a collection of inter-connected stories in which a very endearing and old-fashioned kind of narrator tells us of the adventures of her woodland friends — mice, fairies, gnomes, and the like. It’s a short, delightful read – really! I sort of laugh at myself for typing “delightful” but it’s the best word for it. The stories are fanciful and fun and contain little, not-overbearing moral lessons. It’s very light reading and was perfect for my grouchy, I’m-mad-about-being-on-bedrest mood that pervaded the last couple of days (yesterday especially). Its style is old-fashioned and charming, and I’m thinking about reading it aloud to my kids (my oldest LOVES fairies – we just had a fairy-themed 7th birthday party for her). I love that peppered in through the stories are also profound truths such as, “Lumpkin is an adventurer at heart. And an adventurer is never quite happy at home for too long (Kindle Location 479).”

I read the whole thing with a smile on my face — both for the adventures of Lumpkin, Belinda, and associates and for the beautiful way Geiger describes the scenery, giving life to such things as shadows as they dance and hide among the grasses. I should also note that I loved the illustrations! There are beautiful, black-and-white drawings throughout the stories done by Geiger’s sister, E. Noel. I couldn’t help but think that they’d make a really fun adult coloring book!

Geiger’s biography at the end says she’s working on her debut novel – I’m eagerly looking forward to it, because through these two very different collections of stories I can clearly see her talent for writing and I’m eager to read what she comes out with next!

Four stars!

Book Review: St. George, Rusty Knight and Monster Tamer by John Powell

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When I requested John Powell’s Saint George: Rusty Knight and Monster Tamer from NetGalley sometime last year, I confess I totally thought it was going to be a story of the legend of St. George, who is often portrayed as a slayer of dragons. That, of course, wasn’t the case at all (ha, oops!), but it was a really enjoyable read. Part of the novelty for my daughter was reading together on my Kindle (ooohhh! exciting!), but she really did enjoy the book and so did I.

The Goodreads synopsis is super short:

Humorous tales about an impoverished knight in old England who discovers a way to tame the great variety of monsters that roam the land in the days of Good King Freddie the Umteenth and his prime minister Merlin the Whirlin.

“Humorous” is the perfect word to describe the story. If I remember correctly, Powell says in the beginning of the book that he originally came up with these stories as bedtime stories for his kids – and you can tell! They’re just funny and perfectly geared toward little kids. They follow a predictable structure (all of them start with “Now it was in the days of Good King Freddie…”) and in each story Saint George has to take on some ridiculous monster problem or another – which usually can be solved by providing the monsters with the magical, monster-taming marmorguglehupf cake (my daughter thought that word was hilarious).

The stories are full of all sorts of absurdities with names just as outlandish as marmorguglehupf cake, ideas like George’s “armor-on week” and “armor-off week” (during which he sleeps – for the whole week!), and other silly, non-sensical things (like a king who can’t read!). The crazy names and nonsense action reminded me a good deal of Roald Dahl, and prompted the same kind of laughter from my daughter as did The BFG. There were only two drawbacks for me with the books: 1) each story was a little too long to be a bedtime read-aloud but it didn’t work to break them up so we just pushed through a whole story in each sitting; and 2) there was one entire story that REALLY is not suited for American kids – or their parents! We just couldn’t follow the thread on playing cricket (our loss, though – I’m sure to a British kid the story would’ve been as hilarious as the rest).

All in all, I’d give it 4 stars and definitely recommend it! I think it’ll be another year or two before my next daughter is ready for it, but I’ll look forward to rereading the silliness with her when she’s ready!

Attention: Awesome Book-themed goodies!

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Before I started blogging I was always amazed at how bloggers had these cool posts with giveaways and promocodes and the like, and I was like…. eh I’ll never get there but that would be SO COOL. Well, just this past week I was contacted by Melissa of Literary Book Gifts and asked if I’d be willing to share a review of her products or a promocode with my readers. You guys, I’m SO EXCITED.

I checked out Melissa’s website and, as I told her in our email exchange, these are the kinds of things I ogle and hope someone buys me but I can never justify purchasing for myself… especially right now, being super pregnant and couch-bound! What I decided to do in the meantime is highlight some of the products and designs–most exclusive to Literary Book Gifts and done by Melissa herself–that I find most appealing to give you an example of what her shop has to offer.

First, a “Bookend t-shirt” – I put a picture here of my favorite color but there is an impressive variety of colors available.

Next, because I love a nice comfy sweatshirt, this Moby Dick Hoodie is one of my favorite designs. I couldn’t wear it, though, because I’ve never actually finished the book (I tried – in seventh grade – and kids stole the book, wrote ” ‘s ” after “Moby” and passed it around the room laughing… sigh. The life of a book nerd in middle school.)

Finally, because I’m Mom and these are beautiful, this Peter Rabbit Tote Bag. It could replace the silly Frozen bag I (or my husband, more accurately at the moment) use for our library runs with the kids.

The shop includes women’s, men’s, and unisex t-shirts, tanks, and hoodies, as well as backpacks and totes. The designs are all based off classics — think Moby Dick, Jane Austen, Plato, Homer, Les Miserables — and would be SUCH fun to wear!

Melissa has generously offered 20% off for readers of The Edifying Word if you use the promocode THEEDIFYINGWORD20. The code is good for anything in the store, no minimum purchase, and can be used unlimited times. So, thank you, Melissa, and happy shopping to my readers!