Thoughts on Books

If there is anything that characterizes this blog, even up to the title, it is BOOKS.   

Books ....

....read aloud to children, 

.... shared with friends, 

..... discussed.   

A recent phone call with Chari may have been the first time we ever DIDN'T talk about what we were reading!   Or did we?    Well, if Bible in a Year and Catechism in a Year count, and I think they do, we actually did talk about books this time too.      

Books...

.... listened to!

Here in Oklahoma I only have a tiny shelf of books.   Most of them are still back in California, where my three oldest sons are managing the house in our absence.    The lack of books gives me pangs sometimes, but not nearly so much as it would have before e-reading.   After all, I basically have a whole library on a small device.    And then, of course, easy access to audiobooks, as well.   It is something I never even visualized as a child carrying around as many books as the local library would let me check out, or rereading my home supply of books for the thirtieth time.  

Of course, digital reading is not quite the same.   My granddaughter tells me that a large part of what she loves about reading is holding the book, turning the pages, remembering where she was when she read that last chapter, which cat was sitting in her lap, and so on.      I have a whole collection of similar memories from when I was her age, sometimes with the very same book.    

A few books I have read recently:

The Long Loneliness by Dorothy Day.   This is an autobiography, written when she was in her 50's; she lived to be over 80.    I had been wanting to learn more about this Servant of God.   Interesting to find she was in San Francisco during the Great Earthquake, as a child of eight; close to the same age as my husband's grandmother who was also a child in San Francisco during the earthquake.  

Cry, the Beloved Country by Alan Paton.   This one I read because I joined Well Read Moms this year.    I thought I had read it before, but it didn't seem familiar.    I know my Dad read it, so maybe I just saw it around the house as a teenager.     Very beautiful; basically about fathers and sons, and forgiveness, and a country broken and wounded by injustice.  

Diary of a Country Priest by Georges Bernanos.    Another sad one -- I guess it is Lent!   A small parish priest in 1930's France who lives out St Therese's maxim "To love is to give everything and to give oneself."

Practice of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence.  After I read Dorothy Day's book, I found a copy of Practice of the Presence of God with an introduction by her.    This book is a reread, but I thought it would be a good one to take me the rest of the way through Lent.    I'm reading it in bits and pieces during the day.  

 

Willa Cather.......Finally

After all of these years, I have finally started reading a book authored by Willa Cather.

Buuuuuuut fiiiiiiirst:

Yaaaaaawwwwnnnnnn. 

😴😴😴😴😴

 Streeeeeeeetch.

🙋🙋🙋🙋🙋

Okay, that was the sound of this blog waking up.

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As I was saying........

I am reading MY ANTONIA.  I already had it on my shelf and a handful of my friends also have it at hand.......so we are reading this one.  Or, rereading in one case.

Supposedly Willa Cather referred to My Antonia as "the best thing I've ever done."

That has me a little worried.......If I read her best work now, will I not enjoy her other works as much?  What's your favorite title?

I am also confused why it's her book. She says that her friend brought his notes to her and she created the book, without changing much. And he even titled it.

I have been distracted by so many other books........that's why I am late to this party.  I am really looking forward to reading it.  I like it so far.......about 14 pages in.

I looooove this quote:

Jim was a 10 year old, visiting his grandmother's garden for the first time, at the end of Chapter I, Part II:

I kept as still as I could.  Nothing happened.  I did not expect anything to happen.  I was something that lay under the sun and felt it, like the pumpkins, and I did not want to be anything more.  I was entirely happy. Perhaps we feel like this when we die and become part of something entire, whether it is sun and air, or goodness and knowledge.  At any rate, that is happiness: to be dissolved into something complete and great. When it comes to one, it comes as naturally as sleep.

 This resonates so much with me.......I KNOW this.  I FEEL this. So frequently.

It's a special gift that God has deigned to give me.  Its one reason why I love the sun and summer and warmth so much.  Pure happiness drug.

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On the subject of this blog:

Willa and I both want to write here.....and we make plans every year to do so......but it keeps not happening.  I write blog posts in my head daily, still.  

I love writing. I want to write daily, several times. But with my grown kids (minus one....still 16), and life being so short and all, I have been focusing on my relationships with my people.

Well, I am actually home all alone today.......and I have a lot of stuff to do......so I will close this short post.



I am excited that I finally sat still long enough to write and publish.  Please, if you see this post, please say hello!!

Want to read My Antonia with us?

Blessings on a beautiful spring day,

                                                          Chari

P.S.  This is officially our 526th blog post!!!  I guess there was a time that we were more prolific!  Now I have to figure out how to get photos from my phone onto here.....things are more complicated than before.....

My Newest Friend: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

Originally written last December......completed today......

"As she read, at peace with the world and happy as only a little girl could be with a fine book and a little bowl of candy, and all alone in the house, the leaf shadows shifted and the afternoon passed."

It was time to figure out what to read next........age-old bibliophilic problem.


My dilemma was quickly and easily solved!


Earlier this year, a young friend of my son's was visiting our home.  I asked the usual question when getting to know someone......."What is your favorite book?".........(who else does this???)


She responded with:  A TREE GROWS IN BROOKLYN


      I replied:  I always wanted to read that....but I never got around to it........


I was very pleased to receive a copy in the mail last week from her. And I immediately set aside a little reading time to get started........and it was these passages below.......that got me. 

I love this story already.  I love Francie already.

Let me share my favorite passages from the first few chapters........I want to put them here so that later, when I want to relive my "falling-in-love" with this story, it will be easy access to the memories.....

Francie is a 12-year-old girl in the early 1900's Brooklyn.........from a poor Irish family.....


"Francie loved the smell of coffee and the way it was hot. As she ate her bread and meat, she kept one hand curved about the cup enjoying its warmth. From time to time, she'd smell the bitter sweetness of it. That was better than drinking it. At the end of the meal, it went down the sink.

 Mama had two sisters, Sissy and Evy, who came to the flat often. Every time they saw the coffee thrown away, they gave mama a lecture about wasting things.

Mama explained: "Francie is entitled to one cup each meal like the rest. If it makes her feel better to throw it way rather than to drink it, all right. I think it's good that people like us can waste something once in a while and get the feeling of how it would be to have lots of money and not have to worry about scrounging."

This queer point of view satisfied mama and pleased Francie. It was one of the links between the ground-down poor and the wasteful rich. The girl felt that even if she had less than anybody in Williamsburg, somehow she had more. She was richer because she had something to waste. She ate her sugar bun slowly, reluctant to have done with its sweet taste, while the coffee got ice-cold. Regally, she poured it down the sink drain feeling casually extravagant."

Francie's mother sent her to buy stale bread.....while she wited for the bread truck to dump its load......

"Francie stared at the oldest man. She played her favorite game, figuring out about people. His thin tangled hair was the same dirty gray as the stubble standing on his sunken cheeks. Dried spittle caked the corners of his mouth. He yawned. He had no teeth. She watched, fascinated and revolted, as he closed his mouth, drew his lips inward until there was no mouth, and made his chin come up to almost meet his nose. She studied his old coat with the padding hanging out of the torn sleeve seam. His legs were sprawled wide in helpless relaxation and one of the buttons was missing from his grease-caked pants opening. She saw that his shoes were battered and broken open at the toes. One shoe was laced with a much-knotted shoe string, and the other with a bit of dirty twine. She saw two thick dirty toes with creased gray toenails. Her thoughts ran. ...

"He is old. He must be past seventy. He was born about the time Abraham Lincoln was living and getting himself ready to be president. Williamsburg must have been a little country place then and maybe Indians were still living in Flatbush. That was so long ago." She kept staring at his feet. "He was a baby once. He must have been sweet and clean and his mother kissed his little pink toes. Maybe when it thundered at night she came to his crib and fixed his blanket better and whispered that he mustn't be afraid, that mother was there. Then she picked him up and put her cheek on his head and said that he was her own sweet baby. He might have been a boy like my brother, running in and out of the house and slamming the door. And while his mother scolded him she was thinking that maybe he'll be president some day. Then he was a young man, strong and happy. When he walked down the street, the girls smiled and turned to watch him. He smiled back and maybe he winked at the prettiest one. I guess he must have married and had children and they thought he was the most wonderful papa in the world the way he worked hard and bought them toys for Christmas. Now his children are getting old too, like him, and they have children and nobody wants the old man any more and they are waiting for him to die. But he don't want to die. He wants to keep on living even though he's so old and there's nothing to be happy about anymore."

And, just because my beloved Dodgers are mentioned:


"They played furiously, cursing, sweating and punching each other. Every time a stumble bum passed and loitered for a moment, they clowned and showed off. There was a rumor that the Brooklyn's had a hundred scouts roaming the streets of a Saturday afternoon watching lot games and spotting promising players. And there wasn't a Brooklyn boy who wouldn't rather play on the Brooklyn's team than be president of the United States."


And I loved this scene in the library........so glad that the librarians who befriended my young self were not as this one.....


"After awhile, Francie got tired of watching them. She knew that they would play and fight and show off until it was time to drift home for supper. It was two o'clock. The librarian should be back from lunch by now. With pleasant anticipation, Francie walked back towards the library.  
 

"The library was a little old shabby place. Francie thought it was beautiful. The feeling she had about it was as good as the feeling she had about church. She pushed open the door and went in. She liked the combined smell of worn leather bindings, library paste and freshly-inked stamping pads better than she liked the smell of burning incense at high mass.

"Francie thought that all the books in the world were in that library and she had a plan about reading all the books in the world. She was reading a book a day in alphabetical order and not skipping the dry ones. She remembered that the first author had been Abbott. She had been reading a book a day for a long time now and she was still in the B's. Already she had read about bees and buffaloes, Bermuda vacations and Byzantine architecture. For all of her enthusiasm, she had to admit that some of the B's had been hard going. But Francie was a reader. She read everything she could find: trash, classics, time tables and the grocer's price list. Some of the reading had been wonderful; the Louisa Alcott books for example. She planned to read all the books over again when she had finished with the Z's.

Saturdays were different. She treated herself by reading a book not in the alphabetical sequence. On that day she asked the librarian to recommend a book.

After Francie had come in and closed the door quietly behind her-the way you were supposed to do in the library-she looked quickly at the little golden-brown pottery jug which stood at the end of the librarian's desk. It was a season indicator. In the fall it held a few sprigs of bittersweet and at Christmas time it held holly. She knew spring was coming, even if there was snow on the ground, when she saw pussy willow in the bowl. And today, on this summer Saturday of 1912, what was the bowl holding? She moved her eyes slowly up the jug past the thin green stems and little round leaves and saw ... nasturtiums! Red, yellow, gold and ivory-white. A head pain caught her between the eyes at the taking in of such a wonderful sight. It was something to be remembered all her life.
"When I get big," she thought, "I will have such a brown bowl and in hot August there will be nasturtiums in it."

She put her hand on the edge of the polished desk liking the way it felt. She looked at the neat row of freshly-sharpened pencils, the clean green square of blotter, the fat white jar of creamy paste, the precise stack of cards and the returned books waiting to be put back on the shelves. The remarkable pencil with the date slug above its point was by itself near the blotter's edge.

"Yes, when I get big and have my own home, no plush chairs and lace curtains for me. And no rubber plants. I'll have a desk like this in my parlor and white walls and a clean green blotter every Saturday night and a row of shining yellow pencils always sharpened for writing and a golden-brown bowl with a flower or some leaves or berries always in it and books ... books ... books. ...

She chose her book for Sunday; something by an author named Brown. Francie figured she had been reading on the Brown's for months. When she thought she was nearly finished, she noticed that the next shelf started up again with Browne. After that came Browning. She groaned, anxious to get into the C's where there was a book by Marie Corelli that she had peeped into and found thrilling. Would she ever get to that? Maybe she ought to read two books a day. Maybe. ...

She stood at the desk a long time before the librarian deigned to attend to her. "Yes?" inquired that lady pettishly.

"This book. I want it:" Francie pushed the book forward opened at the back with the little card pushed out of the envelope. The librarians had trained the children to present the books that way. It saved them the trouble of opening several hundred books a day and pulling several hundred cards from as many envelopes.

She took the card, stamped it, pushed it down a slot in the desk. She stamped Francie's card and pushed it at her. Francie picked it up but she did not go away.

"Yes?" The librarian did not bother to look up. "Could you recommend a good book for a girl?" "How old?"

"She is eleven."

Each week Francie made the same request and each week the librarian asked the same question. A name on a card meant nothing to her and since she never looked up into a child's face, she never did get to know the little girl who took a book out every day and two on Saturday. A smile would have meant a lot to Francie and a friendly comment would have made her so happy. She loved the library and was anxious to worship the lady in charge. But the librarian had other things on her mind. She hated children anyhow.

Francie trembled in anticipation as the woman reached under the desk. She saw the title as the book came up: If I Were King by McCarthy. Wonderful! Last week it had been Beverly of Graustark and the same two weeks before that. She had had the McCarthy book only twice. The librarian recommended these two books over and over again. Maybe they were the only ones she herself had read; maybe they were on a recommended list; maybe she had discovered that they were sure fire as far as eleven-year-old girls were concerned.

Francie held the books close and hurried home, resisting the temptation to sit on the first stoop she came to, to start reading.

Home at last and now it was the time she had been looking forward to all week: fire-escape-sitting time. She put a small rug on the fire-escape and got the pillow from her bed and propped it against the bars. Luckily there was ice in the icebox. She chipped off a small piece and put it in a glass of water. The pink-and-white peppermint wafers bought that morning were arrange in a little bowl, cracked, but of a pretty blue color. She arranged glass, bowl and book on the window sill and climbed out on the fire-escape. Once out there, she was living in a tree. No one upstairs, downstairs or across the way could see her. But she could look out through the leaves and see everything.
 

It was a sunny afternoon. A lazy warm wind carried a warm sea smell. The leaves of the tree made fugitive patterns on the white pillow-case. Nobody was in the yard and that was nice. Usually it was pre-empted by the boy whose father rented the store on the ground floor. The boy played an interminable game of graveyard. He dug miniature graves, put live captured caterpillars into little match boxes, buried them with informal ceremony and erected little pebble headstones over the tiny earth mounds. The whole game was accompanied by fake sobbings and heavings of his chest. But today the dismal boy was away visiting an aunt in Bensonhurst. To know that he was away was almost as good as getting a birthday present.
 

Francie breathed the warm air, watched the dancing leaf shadows, ate the candy and took sips of the cooled water in-between reading the book.

 

If I were King, Love, Ah, if I were King. ...

 

The story of François Villon was more wonderful each time she read it. Sometimes she worried for fear the book would be lost in the library and she'd never be able to read it again. She had once started copying the book in a two-cent notebook. She wanted to own a book so badly and she had thought the copying would do it. But the penciled sheets did not seem like nor smell like the library book so she had given it up, consoling herself with the vow that when she grew up, she would work hard, save money and buy every single book that she liked.

 

As she read, at peace with the world and happy as only a little girl could be with a fine book and a little bowl of candy, and all alone in the house, the leaf shadows shifted and the afternoon passed. 

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Even a few months later, the wonderful afterthoughts of this little gem of a book still linger.  I am so happy to have my own copy.......because I am sure that I will be rereading this book again within the next decade.

 

Thank you so very much for this beautiful and thoughtful gift, Julia!

 

 

Spring & Reading Blessings to all!

 

 

   God bless,

 

                 Chari

 

 

 

PS.......Interestingly enough, after reading this book above, the next book that I picked up was very similar in so many ways.......but instead of taking place in the early 1900's........it takes place in the 1950's and is an actual biography:  The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls.  It was an excellent follow-up book immediately after reading A Tree Grow in Brooklyn. Funny thing:  The Glass Castle "found me".........a few months before, I had been taking my daily walk for exercise from home, and strangely, laying there on a country road, was this book.  It insisted that I pick it up and take it home to read. When I finished reading the book, I slipped it to Julia so she could follow-up her reading with the book.......and it turns out it was on her MUST READ list.  I love when books talk to us........



Journaling! My New Hobby!

Good day, my friends!

I am so excited!  (Forgive me.....I am so easily pleased.) I think I am going to take up journaling as a new hobby. Not the blog-posting kind that I have done in the recent past (not too recent obviously) ......but real journaling with pen and notebooks.

Writing itself, is a longtime hobby.......but journaling, specifically, is my new concentration.

This is the inspiration for my new project:

Going through my mom's genealogy stuff, that she passed specifically to me before she passed away in December of 2014, gave me an inkling of what I am finding enjoyable to discover.....the handwritten letters from my grandparents, mother and great-aunt. All of those dates and names of people are only so interesting. The stories and handwritten accounts are much more meaningful.   It is one of my motivators for blogging......though it hasn't been enough of a motivator lately. Obviously. I think I am just not in the mood for sitting in front of a computer anymore......

I always feel like writing.....but now the desire is overwhelming. I don't mean to be full of myself, like what I have to say is important.....but I wish my relatives had left more writing behind for me. So I intend to leave some writing behind for my progeny. I am a storyteller. Not one of fiction, but of family stories and memories. With almost all of my kids grown-up (5 of 6 are 19 years and up!), I definitely should have more time to fit some writing in.....I think it will naturally improve my blogging as well......as is already evident in my two posts in one week. And as I reread this post for editing,  am reminded that my scrapbooking does the same......so I need to get all of this decluttering done at home so that I may get back to the scrapbooking. 

 

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I am all set to go!  I have purchased two books to use as a guide....and have picked up an old journal that I have used an average of once a year for about fourteen years. 

Last week, I got stuck with seven days off from work and nowhere to go. So, I took myself on an overnight solo shopping spree up to Medford, Oregon, a three-hour roundtrip. I made a list of stops and items needed;  I did so well!  I got almost everything I needed.....and most of it with good discounts. 

I spent my evening visiting Barnes & Nobles to see if they had any Five-Year Journals I could touch and possibly purchase. I liked the inside of a few, but not the outside. I had hoped to find the Book of Kells one offered on their webpage. But alas, no. 

There was one with awesome quotes inside.....but not a comforting cover. So I decided to just buy the one on Amazon that I had already picked as a back-up plan.   

And Hannah, my Maddelyn's college roommate, inspired me to put my own quotes in my Five Year Journal......

I think that is a great idea and I have already downloaded the Brainy Quote app to use. 

In the meantime, I was so awed with the amazing selection of journals in just one place!!  So many lovely choices!!  I wanted them all!  

I actually took photos to show my sister......

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So beautiful, right??!!  And so many choices and styles to choose from!!! Extensive!

In the end, I resisted the temptation of purchasing a new journal......knowing that I had a few nice choices at home still. I soooo know where I am going to get the next journal that I need to purchase!!

I did allow myself to chose this specialized journal: LIST YOURSELF:  Listmaking as the Way to Self-discovery.....A Provocative, Probing, and Personal Expedition into Yoir Mind, Heart, and Soul by Iline Segalove and Paul Bob Velick

 

I don't feel I need much self-discovery through this book.... 

I just thought it would be a fun thing to leave behind so my grandkids and great-grandkids would know what I was thinking "back in the day". It would have been fun to have done this at age twenty and again now at age 52 (later this month). I think it will be good for those days when a prompt will be useful. Here are sample pages from this book, including the "how to use this book"............
 

  

      

 

 

  

 

    

 

 

    

 

 

     

 

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Now about this Five Year Journal.......

My daughter Maddelyn and her roommate Hannah were home for Spring break a few weeks ago. They are sophomores at the University of San Francisco. I saw them writing in their journals and was intrigued by the titles. Maddelyn let me read some of her entries..... She was 18 months into writing in hers. She started with her first week at college. This will be such a gift to herself and her progeny....to see what the young college student was thinking and doing. Even looking back just one year ago was fun.  It was sweet to see where I showed up in her story......  :)

I was about to say:  I wish that I had journaled more at that age......but I did!  Inadvertently!! Apparently I wrote a lot of handwritten letters to friends.....and one of them just sent me all of my letters. It is truly a treasure of my thoughts at that age.....and as a newly married girl. ❤️❤️❤️❤️
 

Anyway......as soon as I saw those books, I knew I wanted one of those journals!!  I could commit to a few lines a day. For five years. 😊

So, you write a few lines on each date of the year, for five years......so you will come back around to each page four more times after the first round through......clever.
 

Maddelyn received hers as a gift from her BFF from birth.....a beautiful Jane Austen book. I wanted it......but I will wait for next time. Here is the one that I picked up......a thought a day via Amazon

 

and the inside:

 

I have started on April 1st.......the month of my birth.......52 years on the 25th!
 

So I challenge all of you......encourage you..... to at least get one of those Five Year Journals. They look like fun!  And your kids will love them later. And maybe their kids' kids.

Let me know if you do!!

And finally, here is the regular journal, purchased and started when my 14 year old was an infant, 14 years ago......

 

 

 

 

 

 

Spring & journaling blessings to all!

 

 

 

 

God bless,

 

                Chari

 

 

 



Chari's 2013 Book List

Maybe I will just accept that I will always be late in getting my yearly book lists posted.....

2013 Book List

       So, this was a bit of a rough year for me, with regards to reading.  This may well be the least amount of books I have read or heard in a year.......EVER in my entire life.  And I did not even finish everything on this list.....yet. I am only including those books because they are so long.....they will be on both 2013 and 2014......poor me.  Got a full-time job........and everything else added up to little ability to focus.  To read a whole book, that is.  I am still reading lots.  It just happens to be online articles, mostly.

      I am doing things to resolve this problem, or at least to improve the quantity, while keeping my preferred quality.  I listen to books while walking.  I have been taking a tub instead of a shower......and taking a book with me.......getting a bit more reading done in this way......and I think I need to let go of reading heavy books or classics for awhile.  I think I might make a focus on getting more classics read through my walks (listening) and spend time reading books more recently written (think lighter fare).  I am hoping this will help.

      Did I say I think this was probably the shortest list EVER in my life?  Yeah.  That bad.

 Here we go..........

 

The Weird Sisters

 by

Elaine Brown

 

 

     I chose this book to read because my dear cousin-in-law Deborah came for a visit......and she brought it along.  It looked like it would be worth the effort. It is the story of three sisters, and their parents.......one of which, their father, is a college professor whose expertise lies in Shakespeare.  In fact, all three of the daughters are named for Shakespeare characters. It basically follows a time in their lives when the three sisters come home at the same time, as adults........just as their mom begins treatment for breast cancer.  It was not a great book, just okay.  It was enjoyable enough because of the Shakespeare references and the fact that it was three sisters, as I am the oldest of three sisters......but otherwise, spend your time reading better books. Though, it is good enough for a quickie fluff book for the tub time.

 

The Power of Habit:

Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business

by 

Charles Duhigg

 

 

       Sooooo........I loved reading this book.  I loved learning about the brain science behind habits.  I read in the Amazon reviews that some people were disappointed that the author did not then provide advice on how to improve your habits, but really, I think understanding the science is helpful enough to get started.  Besides, I am not sure it was even the author's intention to tell you specifically how to improve your life by changing your habits, but I think there is plenty of indirect help available in the book.  All of that being said, it was all the science of the brain in the book that was the best part. I found it all so fascinating.  It provided plenty of conversational points for Willa and I.  There is a part that gets less fascinating when the author focuses on businesses and peoples' habits, but it was still quite interesting, to me. So, if you want a good non-fiction to read, I do highly recommend this book. 

 

 

The Great Gatsby

by

F. Scott Fitzgerald 

 

 



 

      My motivation for reading this book for the second time in my life.......was to pre-read it before I saw the movie.  I am so glad that I did.  I read many of the classics as a teen......and I always wonder what my adult-self will think of them.  I have re-read many of them......even though I do not prefer the re-reading of books in general.  Anyway.......I actually did not find my reaction to the story had changed much over the years.  It was pretty much as I remembered it all these years.  It is a well-written story.  I disagree with those that say the main point of the story is about how a life of opulence brings unhappiness and often ruin.  I really think the crux of the story is really just about the mental health of Gatsby.  That other stuff about opulence is just a slight side story, in my opinion. It is fine story-telling, unhappy conclusion.  It shows that dumb decisions that you make early in life can really ruin your overall life happiness. As for viewing the movie after reading the book......I found that they did a better-than-expected rendition of the book.  Of course I did not like the subtle changes from the story......but overall, it was a good enough movie.

 

Mary Marston

 by

George MacDonald
via Librivox

 

 

 

I found this on Librivox.  It is only the second George MacDonald work I have heard, the Princess and the Goblin being the first.  I very much enjoyed this story.....though it went in way more directions than I ever could have imagined.  Mary Marston is a wonderful and noble character.  I very much enjoyed that.  Highly recommend for reading or listening.



 

Pride and Prejudice

by Jane Austen via Librivox

 

 

 Not sure how many times I have read or listened to P&P, but it was time again!  All I am going to say is that it is great fun to read/hear very single time.  If YOU have not yet read this book.....please get on it!  (I am well aware that not every book that is pleasing to most is pleasing to all.....I get that.  You would then be off the hook.....if you tried the first 100 pages and it just did not do it for you.  :) )

I believe that Willa just re-read it again.  I posted about a Jane Austen Book Club happening this year. Should be fun to follow from the perspectives of mothering!
P&P is the first book up in the Club.

 

 

Whose Body?

By Dorothy L. Sayers

via Librivox

 

 Again, just looking for something stimulating to listen to while I walked for exercise, and at the same time to enrich my life with classic literature.  This was the first Sayers work for me.  It was great fun to follow the mystery.  I will probably look for more to listen to.......though I may not be as interested in sitting down and reading a hard copy, at this time.

 

 

The Girl on the Boat

by

PG Wodehouse

via Librivox 

 I say it repetitiously.........you cannot go wrong with Wodehouse.  This novel was just as fun as all the others I have read or listened to......excellent company for exercise.  Highly recommend.

 

Nights in Rodanthe

by

Nicholas Sparks

 

So......every once in awhile I read a Nicholas Sparks novel......not even sure why.  He is not a very good writer, in general.  Just fair, in my not so humble opinion. His stories rarely have the happy ending that we all like.......that is so very annoying!  Anyway......my brain has not been up to the higher quality literature that I usually prefer. So, when I was at the library, looking for a DVD to watch, I saw this movie on the shelf.  When I realized it was Sparks, I decided to read the book first, then watch the movie. I still have not watched the movie, but it looks like they take some of the details out of the movie.  Why.must.they.do.this????  Anyway......the story was okay, the writing okay, no happy ending.  But, it was decent enough for a quick bath read. Only worth a read if it is the only thing you have on hand.  Even his other books are better than this one.....

 

The Language of Flowers: A Novel

by

Vanessa Diffenbaugh

 

I first saw this novel in the hands of one of my patient's visitors.  She was telling my patient why she should read it.  I was intrigued.....and many months later I ordered it from the library.  It was definitely enjoyable.  It follows the story of a young woman who was raised in the California foster care system.....both her childhood story and her present young adulthood story, each story weaving back and forth: first the present, then the past, and back to the present again....and so on.  The transitions between the past and the present work well. Your heart will break and you will cheer her on...and then it will break again.....and you will be mad at her for some of her decisions.  But in the end.....it was a read worth having.  I definitely enjoyed it. This was a debut novel from a woman who has raised foster kids......I think she does a fine job of recognizing the emotions that a real-life young adult might be going through. Oh!  And I almost forgot......the story also focuses on what the meanings of flowers are....and that is just fun, too!  It adds a nice dimension.

 

*********

 

Below, you find the books that I read 30-50% or more of in 2013......I am still working on them now......some of these books are tomes (think Dickens), and the reason behind some of my inability to finish much this year.......

 

 

 

You're Wearing That?:

Understanding Mothers and Daughters in Conversation

by

Deborah Tannen

 

 Worth a read........about adult daughters and their moms. 
Probably a good time to read this would be when your girls are teens.......help to identify those less than positive communication habits we can fall into......
and also help to improve your communication skills with your own mom.

 

 

 

 

Our Mutual Friend

by

Charles Dickens

 

 

In my desire to read more Dickens so I could be more well-read, I somehow found myself reading/listening to two of the really long ones at one time. What was I thinking?

 

 

 

 

 

David Copperfield

by Charles Dickens

via Audible.com

 

 Yep......my first time through.  Excited, though!

 

 

 

Swallows and Amazons

 by 

Arthur Ransome

 

 

 Reading aloud to Malachy.  Yeah, its my first time through.

 

 

The Hobbit

 by

JRR Tolkien

 

Speaks for itself.  A read aloud to my youngest.
My umpteenth time through it....

 

A Simple Act of Gratitude:

How learning How to Say Thank You Saved My Life

by

John Kralik

 

A good & quick read for a new year.

 

 

 

Autumnal Blessings,

 

                             Chari