Random book from our home library:

📖 Six Middle English Romances edited by Maldwyn Mills

On Oct 30, 2024, I accidentally left this book in Los Angeles. It was easily replaceable but the Stonehenge bookmark from our first trip to England was not. Thanks to my cousin Summer, both book and bookmark arrived back at my house in Utah on Apr 26, 2025!

★★★★☆

Nice review of Francis's first couple years of public events.

Random book from our home library:

📖 Life in the Castle in Medieval England by John Burke

Recent acquisition:

📖 Green Arrow: A Celebration of 75 Years

Random book from our home library:

📖 Wild Hares & Hummingbirds: The Natural History of an English Village by Stephen Moss

My parents are college dropouts. I'm a high school dropout (who later earned a master's degree thanks to my privilege, the inspiration and support of my wife, federal Pell grants, and a new start at our local community college).

All that is context to joyfully share that our oldest child graduated this week from our Alma Mater, Utah State University, with bachelor's degrees in early childhood education and elementary education! #EducationForAll

Random book from our home library:

📖 The Best of Coldplay (Easy Piano) Second Edition

Recent acquisition:

📖 The Eagle and the Hart: The Tragedy of Richard II and Henry IV by Helen Castor

Started

📖: Pope Francis: A Photographic Portrait of the People's Pope by Michael Collins, featuring photography by Rodolfo Felici

Random book from our home library:

📖 Henry V (Pelican Shakespeare) by William Shakespeare, edited by Claire McEachern

Random book from our personal library:

📖 Robert's Rules of Order Newly Revised In Brief: The Rules You Need in a Meeting Made Simple and Easy (Fully Updated 3rd Edition) by Robert, Honemann, Balch, Seabold, and Gerber

Recent acquisition:

📖 The Vikings (National Geographic) by Howard La Fay

Random fiction book from our home library:

📖 The Last English King by Julian Rathbone

Random book from our home library:

📖 Panoramas of English Gardens by David Wheeler and Nick Meers

Recent acquisition:

📖 Wales: The First Place by Jan Morris & Paul Wakefield

p. 5: '[Francis of Assisi] shows us just how inseparable the bond is between concern for nature, justice for the poor, commitment to society, and interior peace.'

Random book from our home library:

📖 The Quest for Merlin by Nikolai Tolstoy

Random book from our home library:

📖 The Mormon Book of Lists by Jay A. Parry & Larry E. Morris

Started

📖 Laudato Si' : On Care For Our Common Home by Pope Francis

Recent acquisition:

📖 Robin Hood by the Walt Disney Company

I collect RH books and this is my 72nd.

Random book from our home library:

📖 The Gonne-Yeats Letters 1893-1938 edited with introductions by Anna MacBride White and A. Norman Jeffares

Random book from our home library:

📖 The Big Fellow: Michael Collins and the Irish Revolution by Frank O'Connor

2010 review: ★★★★★

Last Friday, I watched Christopher Nolan's The Prestige for the first time in more than 15 years. ★★★★☆ #FridayFilms

Started

📖 Tyrant: Shakespeare on Politics by Stephen Greenblatt

'Why would anyone, [Shakespeare] asked himself, be drawn to a leader manifestly unsuited to govern, someone dangerously impulsive or viciously conniving or indifferent to the truth?'

Random book from our home library:

📖 Eleanor of Aquitaine by Alison Weir

Recent acquisition:

📖 Simply Christian: Why Christianity Makes Sense by N. T. Wright

Random book from our home library:

📖 Thomas Hardy: The Complete Novels in One Sitting

I bought this little book in the British Museum in 2016. Though it seems from the title that it might contain the complete Hardy canon, in reality, it just has synopses of all his novels. Unfortunately, they're not all accurate and I was highly disappointed. It now serves as my business card holder on my desk at the library where I work.

It was inspiring to hear from Senator Bernie Sanders, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and local candidates and activists in-person a few hours ago in Salt Lake City, along with 20,000 others. It's been 10 years since he first ran for President of the US and opened my eyes to the possibilities of democratic socialism. We're not surrendering to billionaire bullies! #FightOligarchy

Photo taken by our daughter.

Random book from our home library:

📖 Songs of Innocence and of Experience (Illustrated Throughout in Full Colour) by William Blake

Recent fiction acquisition:

📖 The Serpent's Tale by Ariana Franklin

Random book from our home library:

📖 Warwick Castle [souvenir guide - not in Litsy]

I have lots of souvenir guides to places in the UK that I've never visited. I believe I even have two different editions of this one. Have I mentioned that I'm an Anglophile bibliophile?

The last film I saw was Hitchcock's North by Northwest with my daughter at a local theatre that plays old films. It was great except that the DVD had problems halfway through and they had to stop the playback to fix it. #FridayFilms

Random book from our home library:

📖 This is Shakespeare: How to Read the World's Greatest Playwright by Emma Smith

p. 271: 'It was better to award a light penance that would one day put someone into purgatory to endure further punishment there, than to assign a heavy one that would not be done and might send the defaulter to hell.'

That's not what I expected from medieval confessors. Unfortunately, Orme doesn't cite his source for this attitude.

On to the section about Holy Week, which is obviously timely.

Random book from our home library:

📖 Richard the Third by Paul Murray Kendall

We originally had a paperback reprint but I later found this beautiful 1950s hardback - first edition? - at a local charity shop.

Random book from our home library:

📖 Collected Poems of Edward Thomas

When I was thinking of what song to play as I traveled to my local Hands Off protest last Saturday, I remembered Sea Power's great track, Who's In Control?

'Sometimes I wish protesting was sexy on a Saturday night!'

Links below. #TuesdayTunes

Recent acquisition:

📖 Twelfth Night (Pelican Shakespeare) by William Shakespeare, edited by Jonathan Crewe

Random book from our home library:

📖 Britain (LIFE World Library) by John Osborne

Random book from our home library:

📖 The Story of the Champions of the Round Table Written and Illustrated by Howard Pyle

Recent acquisition:

📖 In the Company of Crows and Ravens by John M. Marzluff and Tony Angell

Random book from our home library:

📖 Great Tales from English History, Vol. 1: The Truth About King Arthur, Lady Godiva, Richard the Lionheart, and More by Robert Lacey, illustrated by Fred van Deelen ★★★★★

Random book from our home library:

📖 The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement by David Brooks

Recent acquisition:

📖 Sun Dancing: A Vision of Medieval Ireland by Geoffrey Moorhouse

Random book from our home library:

📖 Fabulae Mirabiles: Fairy Tales in Latin (Hippocrene Foreign Language Studies) by Victor Barocas

★★★☆☆
I have a problem with the fact that the Irish were barely mentioned before page 70, that the author's main point didn't emerge until page 183 (this in a book of only 250 pages), and that the final 50 pages of core subject matter felt rushed. Also, the Irish didn't save civilisation in general as the title seems to say - they played a critical role in preserving Greek and Roman writings.

Recent acquisition:

📖 Bosworth 1485: Psychology of a Battle by Michael Jones

Cahill finally getting to his thesis on page 183:

'While Rome and its ancient empire faded from memory and a new, illiterate Europe rose on its ruins, a vibrant, literary culture was blooming in secret along its Celtic fringe.'

Random book from our home library:

📖 Strange Planet by Nathan Pyle