BOOK STACK WRITING PROMPT

Books I’ve Read That Spell My Name

Books That I Can Identify With

Ellie Jacobson has been having fun with her books and spelling her name with 5 titles in her possession. What a great idea Ellie, and I thought I’d give it a go. See the link below about Ellie’s prompt.

I am surrounded by books in my house. I sometimes have to move a pile of them off the settee in the lounge to enable me to sit down. I actually knew a family who lived near me in the 1960s called the Clutterbuck’s — well that’s our house, Clutter-books.

Only last week my wife and I attended a Sci-fi and Fantasy event and came away with two bought books and three we won in a raffle. Where to put them is the problem.

Anyway, it didn’t take too long to find five books I love which spell my name. Oddly enough, they were located in bookcases around the house, easy to find, and not lying on the floor, stairs or on comfy chairs.

D. Daughters Of The Earth by Carolyn Niethammer Published 1995 Prentice Hall

An absorbing book that tells about the lives and legends of Native American Women. She was the guardian of the hearth, a mother, lover, and sometimes a ruler and warrior.

She was also emancipated and had property rights long before women of European descent. She built earth lodges and tipis, owning their contents. She farmed and ground corn, wove blankets and painted pottery. She played field hockey and raced horses.

Through the pages of this book, I learned how central to the family and tribe a woman was, the strange taboos about menstruation, and how a son-in-law couldn’t speak directly to his mother-in-law.

During menstruation, women would sleep away from their family and refrain from even touching them. They would also not prepare food or take part in ceremonies.

Divorce was simple. He left, she kept everything.

A. Ancient English Houses by Christopher Simon Sykes Published 1988 Chatto & Windus Limited

This book is richly illustrated with some of England’s most beautiful houses built between 1240–1612AD, and deserves to be on anyone’s coffee table.

The author visited each of the 23 houses in this book, taking hundreds of photographs, and describing the history of each location. Three in particular I visited recently — Ightham Mote, Markenfield Hall, and Burton Agnes Hall — and yes they are truly amazing places.

Christopher should know a thing or two about amazing places, as his pad, Sledmere House, is not to be sniffed at either.

Most of the houses in this book are open for part of the year to the public. It’s one of the delights of the summer to visit such places and have tea and scones in the tearoom, or out on the terrace.

V. Vikings: Odinn’s Child by Tim Severin Published 2005 MacMillan

I live in an area that was once dominated by the Vikings, an era that came to an end in 1066 when they were defeated at the battle of Stamford Bridge by the English King Harold. Up north, we’re still trying to get over this catastrophe and come to terms with it!

Where I live in East Yorkshire most villages still bear the origins of the names the Vikings gave them over a thousand years ago.

This book, the first in a trilogy based on Norse Sagas and mythology, is set in the year 999AD. It tells of epic adventures from Ireland to Greenland and Iceland, ferocious battles, and the struggle between emerging Christianity and dwindling Paganism.

The trilogy follows the life of Thorgils Leiffson from the shores of Greenland as a young boy, growing up learning of the old religion. By the time he’s reached manhood, he’s travelled to England where King Knut ruled as one of the most powerful men of the Viking empire, and where he encounters this new religion, Christianity.

Eventually Thorgils travels to Byzantium where he joins the Varangian Guard in Constantinople, before he joins up with Harald Hardrada and the fateful battle at Stamford Bridge.

It is a very good read.

I. Indian Life On The Upper Missouri by John C. Ewers Published 1968 University of Oklahoma Press

John C. Ewers was an American ethnologist and museum curator, and well known for his studies on the art and history of the American Plains “Indians”.

He was instrumental in establishing the National Museum of American History, and the New York Times called him one of the foremost interpreters of American Indian culture.

His book describes in detail the life, customs, warfare and societies of the people who lived in the upper Missouri region before the expansion of white settlers forced them onto reservations — the Mandan, Hidatsa, Arikara, Sioux, Assiniboines, Crows and Crees.

Anyone contemplating writing a novel featuring Native Americans would be best advised to read this book first.

D. Dreaming Of Steam — 23 tales of Wolds and rails Published 2017 Fantastic Books Publishing

I love trains. This little book goes into painstaking detail about life on the railway in the Yorkshire Wolds from the 1850s to the present day. The Wolds is an idyllic landscape, a hilly chalk upland area of rolling countryside, and this book is packed with stories both fact and fiction.

One such story, ‘A Solicitous Wife’, is written by fellow Medium writer Madeleine McDonald.

Can you spell your name with the books you own? I would be interested to see what you come up with, and what you have been reading. So here’s paging ….

L Burton Randy Runtsch Vidya Sury, Collecting Smiles pockett dessert Madeleine McDonald Nicole Anders Mary Chang Story Writer and Thief