Berry’s Monday Memetastical Challenging Thingamajigger

Since I haven’t done one in a while, I thought I’d do Berry’s ‘Monday Meme’ this week, as the topic is one near to my heart.

Books.

1. Are you a bookworm? – I actually joke with friends RL that I’m not a bibliophile, I’m a bibliovore.  As often as not, if I’m not at a computer I’m reading something.  Anything.  Everything.  There’s all sorts of things I like about books, but probably most especially the way that squiggles of dark against light can transport you to another world: a world that someone else made up.  Perhaps even someone who’s long departed from this world, yet her (or his) writing is just as gripping today as it was a hundred years ago.
2. Which do you prefer: hardcover, paperback or electronic? – It truly depends, as far as paperback and hardcover goes.  Some paperbacks I have loved into small bits and pieces, while others simply refused to work for me even when the hardcover turned out to be a book I loved like mad.
3. Which book is your favorite? – I couldn’t pick one favorite, but a book I come back to regularly is John Crowley’s Little, Big.  I love the pseudo-Victoriana of it, I love the way that he mimics the fantasies of a bygone era so well.  I also have a fascination with orreries, so there’s that.
4. Which children’s book is your favorite? – Well I’m rather fond of the Harry Potter books – however, the Narnia books were ones that opened my eyes, as a kid, to the idea of wider horizons (even if I found the Christian subtext in them a bit hamhanded at best).
5. What’s the last book you’ve read? – Last one I read was P. D. James’ Cover Her Face.  I’m about two-thirds of the way through Haruki Murakami’s 1Q84 at present, and am hating the idea it will end soon!
6. Name your top five favorite writers: – Jonathan Carroll, Iain Banks, Evelyn Waugh, Robin Hobb, Haruki Murakami.
7. Name a book that had a strong impact on you: – In Cold Blood, Truman Capote
8. Favorite & least favorite book genres? – When I was younger I really went in for Science Fiction, but not as much anymore.  I’m far more interested in Fantasy; something about that genre really echoes for me with the stuff of dreams, while Science Fiction is far more about the visceral and down to earth.  I like Mystery as well, and simply cannot stand the sorts of things that have Tom Clancy’s name on the cover.
9. Favorite & least favorite book-to-movie adaptions? – I wanted to hate it, but the adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s A Scanner Darkly amazed me.  Much as I liked everyone involved in it, I have to say I thought that The Prestige (a fine book!) was unfilmable when I read it, and the movie only halfway managed to convince me otherwise.
10. Have you ever bought a book based on the cover alone? –  Definitely. There have even been occasions where I haven’t regretted it.
11. Where do you usually buy your books? – I haven’t been buying books much at all in the past seven years or so: when I do, they’re used.
12. Do you go to the library? – Quite often: it’s on my way from home to many other places (one might say anywhere else I’d want to go), so it’s far too easy to swing in on my way.
13. How many books do you own? – 9′ tall, 30′ wide, shelves as close together as possible, and only mostly double-shelved.  That’s what, 3000?
14. If you were to write a book about Second Life, which topic would you focus on? I’ve thought for some time that Second Life would be a very interesting setting to bring into a mundane story of a murder: it’d make a nice distraction for the reader’s attention while the very cold-blooded evil of murder passes by almost undetected.

Stylecard:
Jacket: Fatewear “Coat – Derrick – Void”
Slacks: Fatewear “Pants – Eddie”
Sweater: Addon for jacket (see above)
Book I’m standing on: Schadenfreude ‘Curious Flora’
Hair: Argrace ‘Itsuki’
Skin: Logo “Eternal Tristan – Pale – Bald’
Hands: SlInk AvEnhance Male Hands – Relaxed
Pose: 3M “wall2_m_02”