#BookReport 47/21

I had a good week! Loved the tagged one and also Intimacies. Doha and the Winman were okay reads for me.

My choices for December. The month of finishing challenges, starting new ones, do some buddyreading and read thrillers by the Christmas tree 🎄

Sarah, I‘m in for #bookspin, #doublespin and #bookspinbingo. Thanks 😘

I enjoyed this quiet novel quite a lot. The narrator has moved temporarily to the Netherlands to work as an interpreter for the International Court of Justice. She has met a few very different people and the story tells about her connection to them and the ethical implications of her job. She wants to belong, to the Court and The Hague, the city she now lives in, but can she? #ToBLonglist

What a surprise! Dear Liz, I‘m ridiculously happy with this book! It‘s longlisted for the ToB, it‘s about Colombia and it‘s a beautiful edition! Thank you so much for your friendship and kindness! Please tell me when is your birthday 🙏 (I don‘t think you‘re on the Litsy calendar)!
PS how clever to order it via a Dutch bookstore!
😘😘

#UnpopularOpinion Unfortunately I did not enjoy this book as much as I expected to. While I mostly enjoy character-driven novels, I do want some sort of plot too. Considering how many decades this story spans, I was expecting a bit more of that. Instead I was sidetracked by keeping track of all characters and all dialogues - without quotation marks. So I am afraid I didn‘t get as much out of the book as I had hoped, based on all reviews I read.

I think I received your gift Jessie and I am SO happy with it! I love Sarah Waters and I‘ve heard the best things about this specific one. Thank you so much!! ❤️❤️

The author and her Arab Muslim husband move to #Qatar. She came from the Philippines, raised Catholic, and met him in the US where they both attended med school. It is fascinating how she found her way in this conservative country, staying true to her beliefs. She even works as a cardiologist while raising 5 kids. I just wish she would be a bit more critical about what definitely is not the most correct country on earth.

#ReadingAsia2021 🇶🇦

#weeklyforecast 47/21

I started Still Life and the beginning is gooood! I am also starting My Life in Doha for #ReadingAsia2021 and will be trying to read a book from the #ToB22 longlist each week until the shortlist is announced. Looking forward to all of these!

Why do people hurt eachother so much? And themselves? Why being so hard on yourself and one another? This book is real life. Not mine, but it feels so real. Wallace does and my heart goes out to him. The loneliness of the black gay boy trying to fit in the the white Midwest. Hiding in science. All that anger and the feeling of not being worthy of love. All the misunderstandings but also the tenderness. The book touched me deeply. #bookspin #pop21

#BookReport 46/21

Tagged is my favorite book of the week. Both others were okay. I am so glad I‘m reading again and enjoying it!

This book pulled me right in. I loved My Lovely Wife and had high expectations. Three siblings go on a road trip through the US to bury their grandfather‘s ashes by which they will earn their inheritance. I soon discovered they are all unreliability and have their secrets. The tension builds up fine but in the end I felt let down. Between a pick and a so-so.

#Booked2022 My #Autumn choices:

19 dark academia: In the Freud archives
20 a coming out story: At swim, two boys
21 hopepunk: The Anthropocene reviewed
22 mythology retelling: A thousand ships
23 adapted for small screen: Vanity Fair
24 MC living with aids: Splendor

#Booked2022 My #Summer choices:

13 includes a recipe: Green fried tomatoes at the…
14 set in Canada: The tenderness of wolves
15 involves an exploration: An African in Greenland
16 about sisters: The Makioka sisters
17 new in 2022: The trees
18 set in a hotel: The diver‘s clothes lie empty

#Booked2022 My #Spring choices:

7 about a royal: She would be king
8 written by a journalist: Blood river
9 author born in Africa: We need new names
10 own prompt (Dutch): Dit is mijn hof
11 nautical: And the sea will tell
12 murder mystery: The Aosawa murders

I‘ve finally come up with my plans for #Booked2022. They will no doubt change completely but I think it‘s fair to assume a lot of them will be used for #ReadingAfrica2022 as well.

Here are my #Winter choices:

1 about religion: Matrix
2 title repeats itself: What is the What
3 set in China: Land of Big Numbers
4 weather term in title: Empire of the Sun
5 black-owned publisher: Baho!
6 eco-feminist: Wij zijn licht (Dutch)

#NYRBBookClub

During the closing stages of WWII recently orphaned young Felix arrives in Jerusalem at the boarding house of a sort-of-relative, the hilarious Miss Bohun.
She is taking as much money as she can from her houseguests, while also pretending to be self-sacrificing and motivated entirely by kindness.
At first the reader picks up on much more of this drama than Felix does but then a new boarder arrives, the young widow Mrs. Ellis. ⬇️

Our #DecemberChill #buddyread is nearing and while #DrZ turns out to be a bit of a challenge, let‘s take a cue from our theme & chill 😉

Dec 3: 🎧what music do you relax to during these chilly days? Is it jazz, acoustic or blues? Holiday music? Let‘s hear it 🎶

Dec 4: 📸 Share some chill photos! A beach stroll with your dog, having coffee with a friend, sitting on your couch?! Anything goes!

Dec 5: 📚 A very basic bookish discussion of DrZ 🤓

If I had all the time and money I needed, this would be my TBR based on the #ToB22 longlist.
I have not, however, and I have three others on my shelves that I am looking forward to and will read first. By then the shortlist will probably be announced and my TBR will be set!

Thanks for the inspiration @Well-ReadNeck

In this very experimental book Kate muses about life and art. She seems to have travelled the world, even lived in museums. But I can‘t be sure, her thoughts are so chaotic it was hard to follow. Some wonderful insights though, like this one: “One of the things people generally admired about Van Gogh, even though they were not always aware of it, was the way he could make even a chair seem to have anxiety in it. Or a pair of boots”. #1001books

#WeeklyForecast 46/21 (more of a #restoftheyearforecast actually!)

Okay, here‘s the plan. On the left are the books I need to read to finish #Booked2021, #ReadingAsia2021, #pop21, #52booksin21 and keep up with the #NYRBbookclub.
On the right are the books I want to read (longlist #ToB22), birthday presents etc.

It seems doable I think. Now I just have to start them. Oh and the tagged book is the one I am currently reading 🤦🏻‍♀️🤣

#BookReport 45/21

I haven‘t read any book of my forecast, not one book for the challenges or the buddyreads. Just these 200 pages 🤦🏻‍♀️

Look at this! Thank you lovely friends for your wonderful birthday gifts and thoughts! I haven‘t read any of them 💃 and feel spoiled!! ❤️❤️❤️

Thanks @Ruthiella for spreading the longlist of the #ToB22. I ❤️ this tournament!
I read 10 of them and I‘d like to read some more before the shortlist will be announced in a few weeks. So I could do with some recommendations by you guys!

Here‘s the longlist: https://themorningnews.org/article/the-year-in-fiction-2021

I liked this book more than I expected. I had been dreading it for years but I actually had a good time on the road with Sal and his crazy friends! The book is a tribute to America. The country, the scenery and the people. A bit cliché at times but still enjoyable. #1001books

Look at this oldie. I got this old edition from my grandfather and read it in 1990. For 31 years it has been sitting on my shelves and now I‘m picking it up again for #DecemberChill. Let‘s see….

#WeeklyForecast 45/21

Today I finished the 2 books I was reading and now I‘m unsure what to pick up. I‘m thinking of the tagged one but I also have to start The Diviners for the #manawakans buddyread as well as School for Love for the #NYRBbookClub. And now that I‘m writing this I realize I forgot to add #DrZ for #DecemberChill, which I really must start too. So much required reading makes me unmotivated and escaping in a podcast 🤫😇

In the last months of WWII a partisan enters an abandoned villa in a luxury seaside resort, somewhere in Central Europe. Initially it is a peaceful place to stay. When a German regiment arrives for quartering, he pretends he is the owner of the house and leaves the ground floor to the Germans. Then the real owner returns unexpectedly.

This is a novella of a deceptive simplicity, behind which lies a particularly complex constructed story.

And then this happened today! Yay! My next goal is to reach the same amount of books (186!!) I read last year, the year of staying at home 🦠

This book is written by a Dutch author whose kids went to school with mine. ‘A Good Mother‘ is the story of his ex, the mother of their kids. Set in our neighborhood, I recognize almost everything and anyone but I never knew that living has been so hard for the mother.⬇️⬇️

(Pic: Isle of Skye, Scotland)

#BookReport 44/21

Three completely different books. All good, but my favorite was Pillars of Salt.

Two woman confined in a mental hospital in #Jordan share their life stories. One is a Bedouin, one a woman from the city. At first glance they seem different, but soon they discover that they have so much in common: life was hard for women no matter what.

#ReadingAsia2021 🇯🇴 #pop21 #bookwitmineralintitle

And here‘s the winner of the #Booker prize. I am not really surprised, I can understand why it won. Congratulations to Galgut 🎈
I enjoyed reading this book but I rooted for either Bewilderment or No One is Talking About This!

Jonatan wakes up in a messy hotel room in Mexico to discover that he has told everyone that his best friend Joël is dead. However, Joël is still alive. We follow Jonatan‘s chaotic thoughts and jumps in time to learn about their friendship growing up in Jerusalem, and their current, troubled relationship.⬇️⬇️

This fast moving thriller reads like a movie. A woman gets stuck in a highway rest stop during a blizzard in the Rocky Mountains. She discovers one of the people she is stuck with, has abducted a child and is determined to save that child. Entertaining yet forgettable! Between a so-so and a pick.

#OctoberStats #OctoberWrapUp #bookspinbingo #bookspin

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
The Woman in the Purple Skirt
Bewilderment
Summerwater
The Secret Lives of Church Ladies
The Nothing Man

⭐️⭐️⭐️✨
Beautiful World Where Are You
Sovietistan
The Promise

⭐️⭐️⭐️
The Leavers
A Bird in the House
Never Fall Down
The Woman Upstairs

DNF
Beloved

We are delighted to announce #ReadingAfrica2022! Join @Librarybelle and me on a year long challenge to read books set in each African country or by an African author. Track your reading by signing up for the challenge using the link below. Post throughout the year with #ReadingAfrica2022 and tag us! Tagged are people who have been involved or interested in #ReadingAsia2021 but the challenge is open to anyone!

https://forms.gle/tKdCCsxttXxcex6p9

#WeeklyForecast 44/21

In progress: the tagged one, which is entertaining, and At Night‘s End. Next will be one for #ReadingAsia2021, and a Dutch one, written by a successful Dutch author who I happen to know.

#BookReport 43/21

It‘s been a pretty good week. I enjoyed The Promise and The Nothing Man, two completely different books, but bailed on Beloved. Too confusing 🤷🏻‍♀️

I had a great time with this book about a serial killer who is addressed by the one girl who survived and has written a book about it twenty years later. I will find you, she promises. Quite the pageturner!

Slowly but surely the end is approaching. I read two more books for #ReadingAsia2021 and have two more months to read the final three!

October‘s choices were:
🍀 Tajikistan: Sovietistan
🍀 Cambodia: Never Fall Down

Hi Sarah, I‘m in for another round of #bookspin, #doublespin and #bookspinbingo!

Many books to finish my challenges and fortunately some books I‘d actually want to read too 😅😉

Now that everyone is thinking about November and their bookspin for that month: it may be time to add Dr. Zhivago! We‘re having our #DecemberChill weekend first weekend of December including the #Buddyread of this chunkster. So here‘s a reminder for all who expressed interest and everyone else who wants to join @Cinfhen and me in a weekend filled with music, pictures, memories and fun! If you‘re not tagged yet and want to join, let us know below!

Me and Toni Morrison, we‘ve never been a good match. I know it‘s an unpopular opinion but this was the fourth of her books I tried and again it didn‘t work. Beloved asks too much from me. I can‘t seem to follow along and all time jumping and magical realism feels forced to me. Maybe some other time… #1001books

I did enjoy this story of a white family in South Africa. I liked the style, the many points of view. The atmosphere felt raw at times, magical at other times. A book well worth the #BookerPrize but somehow it didn‘t touch me as much as I expected.

#WeeklyForecast 43/21

In progress are The Promise (which I am enjoying a lot) and Beloved. Toni Morrison and I are not a good match - again. But I‘ll stick with it a bit longer.
I still have The Nothing Man lined up and am adding a translation of At Night‘s End, an Israelian book quite popular here at the moment.

#BookReport 42/21

I managed to finish a few books that had taken me wat too long. This weeks absolute favorite is the tagged one!

There's so much more than the church in the lives of the women in the nine stories that form this little gem of a book. I enjoyed all nine of them and felt strangely proud of these women, their strength, their choices, their fears and their passion. A great read!

“The Stans are at a crossroads. Should they forge closer links with Russia or China, or look to the West? Which interpretation of their own history should they trust?”

#Turkmenistan #Kazakhstan #Tajikistan #Kyrgyzstan #Uzbekistan

Squid Game keeps distracting me but I did finally finish this book 🦑

Lack of democracy, struggling economies, suppressed ethnic conflicts: there are similarities between the Central Asian ‘Stan‘ countries but many differences too. Fatland shares her experiences while traveling through them along with historical information. I will definitely read it again if I ever go there myself.

I use this book for #Tajikistan in #ReadingAsia2021 🇹🇯

Nora is 37, single, a teacher who wanted to be an artist. She often feels unworthy. ‘The woman upstairs‘, for all to see and judge. But she mostly judges herself. Until the Shahid‘s enter her life. Father, mother, 8 year old son. They make her feel like a friend, an artist, a woman and a mother. Before long she depends on them for her happiness and self esteem.

The book began and ended with a bang, but dragged a bit in the middle.