Last week’s walking is brought to you by the great state of Michigan where we spent some time exploring the coast line. Turns out the shore of Lake Superior are nicely socially distant when it’s 59 degrees and windy.
Here’s what I’ve been listening to and seeing this week.
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Shamelessly stolen from Litsy
August wasn’t a stellar reading month for me. The best part has been reading a chapter a day from Pride and Prejudice with the #PemberLittens group on Litsy. But, we won’t finish that until this month.
Until then know that my reviews below may sound grumpy and halfhearted and it is all me, not them.
PS I’m hosting a giveaway in honor of the National Parks if you’re interested.
Such A Fun Age by Kiley Reid — This short book covers so much territory about race and class in America. I’m still thinking about it. The part that struck me the most was how everyone was talking, but no one accurately heard what the other person was trying to say. Really, I think about that once a day at least. Despite my August mood this will probably be one of my top books from 2020.
Beach Read by Emily Henry - This would normally be right up my alley, but because of my August mood all I could think was, “You two better learn to communicate soon because when you’re in quarantine together you’re gonna have some real problems.”
Big Summer by Jennifer Weiner - This was a ridiculous yet fun look at the world of influencers, and when the twist happens it gets even more entertaining. Just if something sounds familiar in this book don’t google it because you will get spoiled.
The Redhead by the Side of the Road by Anne Tyler - This was my favorite of the three. A solitary man who lives by his rigid routines gets his life tossed around when a teenager shows up claiming to be his son. I’m not sure how I’ve never read a book by Anne Tyler before, and I’m excited for all that I have to catch up on.
Universe of Two by Stephen P. Kiernan- I enjoyed this WWII novel, and how he tied organ music in to the making of the atomic bomb. (It works; you’ll see.) A little bit repetitive at certain points, but worth the read. (ARC from LibraryThing.)
A Torch Against The Night by Sabaa Tahir - Sometimes the second book in a series suffers a bit, but not so with this one. Tahir kept up the pace, and I can’t wait to read more.
The Aunt Who Wouldn’t Die by Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay - An extended Bengali family and all of the politics and ghosts that come into that sort of thing. I enjoyed the audiobook.
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Not much walking for me this week unless you count to the fridge and back :(
Here’s what I’ve been listening to and seeing this week.
Note: Links to amazon.com are affiliate links. Thanks for your support.
Another great week of walking when the air doesn’t want to melt my face off! Plus more rainbows and weird looking flowers.
Here’s what I’ve been listening to and seeing this week.
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My kids have been at summer camp this week, so I actually got to walk alone a few times. (Don’t judge it’s a fully outdoors, socially distanced camp.)
Subtle signs of fall are starting to creep in on my walks, and there are mushrooms everywhere.
Here’s what I’ve been listening to and seeing this week.
Note: Links to amazon.com are affiliate links. Thanks for your support.
Ugh, is anything going to be left for us when this is over? I just read that June bookstore sales fell 35%. I guess it’s time to order more books! Any recommendations? I already have the new Louise Penny on pre-order.
July was a slow reading month for me, but between the adoption of two kittens and the new Baby-Sitters Club Netflix release who can blame me?
Blue Highways by William Least Heat-Moon - This is a travel diary from the late 1970’s, and like in Travels With Charley I was struck by how many problems in America then are still problems now. I usually am a fast reader, but took my time with this one so I could savor Least Heat-Moon’s observations. He had a really observant yet non-judgemental way of looking at the people he met on his travels.
“I’d traveled ten thousand miles and had not encountered a single hoodlum. But I’d been taken for one several times. ”
In The Woods by Tana French - I FINALLY got around to reading a Tana French book. I really liked this mystery that was really more about the detectives than it was about the actual mystery. The detectives in this book were very different than my favorite series by Louise Penny, but the feel was similar.
The Secrets We Kept by Lara Prescot - I love me a good Cold War spy novel, especially when the spy is a woman. The background of how Dr. Zhivago came to be published, and the race to release it as anti-Russia propaganda was also interesting. This was also the first library book I read post quarantine, so it holds a spot in my heart for that alone!
Iron Lake by William Kent Krueger - This was another new to me mystery series that I’m excited to catch up on. The former sheriff of Aurora, Minnesota is at a bit of a loose end when this book starts. A mysterious death and a missing Boy Scout pull him back to his old job.
One Crazy Summer and PS Be Eleven by Rita Williams-Garcia - The three sisters in these books were some of my favorite characters that I’ve read in a long time. These books touch on so many topics I want my kids to think about at a level they can understand. Great, great historical fictions for middle graders, and excellent on audio. I can’t wait to listen to the third one when we have a reason to be in the car again.
The Titan’s Curse by Rick Riordan - I can’t really get into these books, but my kids love them for road trips.
Back in June there was a chain letter going around town where kids tell other kids to buy books and send them and somehow they were supposed to get 36 books each in the mail. My daughter got three of these chain letters, and while I only let her send out one set of extortion letters in return we did end up buying books for four different kids because I felt bad thinking about them waiting for books in the mail that never came. So that’s why when I went to buy some books for myself the address of a member of my daughter’s girl scout troop was in the ship to field instead of mine. And my brain has been kind of mush this year, so I didn’t notice. And because the bookseller was swamped at the time I couldn’t cancel. And the girl in question had just moved a state away. But, happy ending to a long story I ordered myself a second set of books, and the original books made their way back to me last week. So now I have a set to give away! Just enter your email below, and I’ll pick on person to ship the books to! (US only, sorry.)
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We went from 100 degree days without a drop of rain to tropical storms and floods. Gotta love 2020.
Here’s what I’ve been listening to and seeing this week.
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We’re hunkered down here waiting for Isaias to pass. It would be a perfect day to read all day if it weren’t for this job thing they want me to do.
Bad weather is excellent for good reading. One of my favorite bookish memories is staying up all night in a shaky little cottage on Cape Cod listening to the wind howl and reading Bird Box. I’m not sure I would have liked that book at all if it weren’t for the weather.
Are you in the path of the storm? What are you reading today?
One of my favorite new walking hobbies is to read all of the signs sprouting up in my neighbors’ yards. I guess since we can’t really get together and talk right now we turned to messages in our lawns.
Here’s what I’ve been listening to and seeing this week.
Note: Links to amazon.com are affiliate links. Thanks for your support.
Last week I was was in Wolfeboro, NH visiting my family. We were playing it pretty safe cooking our own meals, taking long walks, and swimming at an isolated section of lake, but at one point I did sneak away to visit a bookstore I heard was open. (Shout out to The Country Bookstore.)
It was great to be back. You know that feeling of being in a bookstore and finding books you didn’t even know you were interested in? Man, I had missed that.
The bookstore itself was great for browsing. I was the only one in there at the time (the bookseller told me they had been doing insane amounts of mail order.) The books were laid out nicely so that I didn’t have to touch everything just to see the titles. They had a great big kids’ section, and a wide variety of adult topics as well. In short, bookworm heaven.
I have mixed feelings about entering any kind of building at this point, and spend most of my time outside or in my very own house. My garden is producing so even my trips to the grocery store are getting rarer. But, for one brief 20 minute period of time, I felt normal and happy again. Thank you The Country Bookstore.
Meet Daisy. Brother Oliver is too fast to get a good picture yet.
Two good things happened since we last met up. One, my library opened for curbside pick up! Two, we adopted two kittens who are adorable and love to lay around with me while I read. We also took a very socially distant trip out of town to go hiking, and that meant audiobooks in the car. So, a good month for reading.
(Note, I was worried to leave my city which is filled with pretty serious social distancing mask wearers to go someplace that didn’t have as good of a reputation, but it was fine. No confrontations I’m happy to say.)
And how is it mid-July already?
The Color Purple by Alice Walker - I read this a long time ago, and picked it back up again early last month. So much good stuff here. You need to read it if you haven’t.
“I think it pisses God off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don’t notice it.”
A $500 House in Detroit - I thought I was getting a HGTV style makeover book, but what I got was a really interesting look at race and class in Detroit around 2008.
Parable of the Sower - I read this for a reading challenge not knowing that a dystopian novel set in the year 2025 would seem so believable based on the year 2020. This is the second book I’ve read by Octavia Butler, and I will be reading more. (The other book, Kindred, was also really good.)
Ten Days In A Mad House - In 1887 journalist Nellie Bly had herself committed to a “mad house” so that she could report on the conditions. Once you read about the conditions and the ease of commitment in those days you will be amazed by how brave she was.
I weirdly ended up reading three books set in Chicago last month.
Rodham - A book about what might have happened to Hillary if she hadn’t married Bill. I thought this book was super clever, and have recommended it to a bunch of people (including you!)
Becoming - I loved the behind the scenes looks at the White House, and the very real struggles the Obamas had raising two kids with two working parents. This might have been bad timing though, because to me a lot of the things we worried about in 2008-2016 just seem so quaint.
A Raisin In The Sun - I love this play, and read it often. This was the first “grown up” book I read when my mom took me to see it in Boston as a high schooler. The struggles in this play just poke my heart.
Mary Anne Saves The Day - Yup, I’m 42 years old and read a Baby-Sitters Club graphic novel in preparation for watching the Netflix series. So sue me.
Anne of Windy Poplars - Still reading through Anne’s books. I enjoy them, but they’re feeling more and more like filler that LMM’s publisher talked her into writing.
Twisted Twenty-Six - These books are always the same, and I always enjoy them. This was the first one I’ve ever done as an audiobook, and I liked the narrator.
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My step count is way down this week because of the heat. I need to come up with a better schedule, but is there any good schedule in the time of COVID-19? I’m already getting up at 4:30 so I can get work in before my kids get up. Whatever, I’ll figure it out, because my brain doesn’t function without walks.
Here’s what I’ve been listening to and seeing this week.
Note: Links to amazon.com are affiliate links. Thanks for your support.
I was looking for an image of five stars and this picture of cookies came up.
I use LibraryThing.com to track what I’ve read, tags, and star ratings. Any book I read starts with three stars. Three stars to me is a good, average book. The good thing about LibraryThing is that you can give half star ratings. So from three stars I either go up or down a half star at a time. When I get to about two stars I usually won’t finish. Four stars is a really good book. Five stars is an amazing book that I will read again.
My favorite book of 2020 so far
I’ve read some great books in 2020 so far, but the one that I liked the best, the one that reminded me why Iove/need to read was Matterhorn by Karl Marlantes. This book is truly unforgettable.
Best Re-read of 2020
I started The Stand on the beach last July, and finished it in February of this year, just before everything fell apart. It was a pretty weird experience to feel like I was living the Stephen King book I just read.
My favorite audiobook so far
This is another book from early this year. I really hope that after this mess is over we consider how our low wage workers are being treated, and how much we need them.
A great 2020 non-fiction read
This spring and summer it’s been all the books from and about the 60’s and 70’s that have appealed to me. Travels With Charley is one of those. I’s amazing to me how many battles we’re still fighting now that our parents were fighting then.
I’m nervous to see what the rest of this year brings, but I’m interested to see what turns my reading life will take. I wonder if any of these will be on my best of 2020 lists?
Last week featured a quick trip to the mountains. I got used to the lower temperatures there, and now walking at home feels like walking through soup. Still going though!
Here’s what I’ve been listening to and seeing this week.
Note: Links to amazon.com are affiliate links. Thanks for your support.
We’re halfway through the year
We’re halfway there guys. While I gave up on my 2020 reading goals long, long ago I didn’t stop tracking and I’m surprised to say I’m not actually doing too bad.
This year I set three goals:
Read 200 books (around 16 or 17 books a month) - So far I’ve read 102 books this year
Read books that take place in 20 different countries - I’m at lucky 13 right now
Read 20 new to me cookbooks and cook at least one recipe from each one - This has been the hardest one considering my lack of access to specialty ingredients, but I’m up to 6.
Of my 102 books 16 have been re-reads, 33 have been audiobooks, and 26 have been non-fiction. (Some of these categories overlap.)
I must admit that there are a lot of books I read in March and April that I barely remember. But around May I started loving books again. I never buy books, but this month I have been, probably more than I’ve been reading. Buying books from independent stores, books by BIPOC authors, and buying books that will give my kids something to do feels like a positive step I can take to help the world. So I’ve been going with it, and dropping them in local Little Free Libraries when I’m done. It’s part of my COVID-19 routine now. And this week my library opened again for curbside pickup. I got some of the books I put on hold in March, and while those books don’t appeal to me much now I was happy to see my library again. I hope they feel okay about working again, and that they feel protected.
On Friday I’ll tell you my favorite books of the year so far.
A few weeks ago I wasn’t in a mood for summer reading, but then I bought one book. And then I bought about 15 more. And now I’m in a summer reading mood again. This one is next up, but I’m also looking forward to all sorts of back list reading, the books I bought as part of #BlackoutBestSellerList, and some classics I’m reading as part of a buddy read. Bring on the backyard reading!
After a long cold spring, it seems like summer is finally here. This is when my best walking starts!
Here’s what I’ve been listening to and seeing this week.
Note: Links to amazon.com are affiliate links. Thanks for your support.
I’m back on the walking bandwagon, and feeling better for it.
Here’s what I’ve been listening to and seeing this week.
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