4-21-24: My 10th finished book of 2024! This is a very slow book written in 1972, about a rabbi named David and his wife Miriam. When David decides he needs a break, he takes a 3 month leave of absence from his synagogue to travel to Israel with his wife and son. He becomes involved in a recent set of bombings while in Israel and befriends a foreign correspondent visiting his son. Back home, the congregation is wondering if David will return.

4-14-24: My 9th finished book of 2024! A story told in three time lines. Back in the 90s, an unlikely friendship that came at a time when both girls really needed one another. In present day (2016), after many years of estrangement, a scavenger hunt created by someone close to them will bring them together for one more weekend. Will that weekend fix years of confusion and sadness? ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣9️⃣

4-7-24: My 8th finished book of 2024! Wow, every trigger warning is in this novel. Drug abuse-especially heroin use, molestation, rape, murder, suicidal ideation, the list goes on and on. It was a really rough read but overall very good. Young Callie and Leigh, have done something horrific for good reasons. Years later, as adults, their secret begins to resurface and they must try to deal with the fall out. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣8️⃣

3-31-24: Happy Easter from the newest little bunny in my world! My granddaughter, Ava Rosemarie💖📖😍

3-30-24: My 7th book of 2024! I picked this book up at a book swap because I loved the cover. I wound up loving the story too. Sam and Sadie are childhood friends who bond in a hospital over a video game. Through a series of events they reconnect as young adults in colleges in the same city, far from where they grew up, and they bond again over a video game, this time making one instead of playing one. I loved following these characters.

3-20-24: My 6th finished book of 2024! This one was hard for me. Michelle wrote a beautiful memoir in honor of her mother full of lovely memories and connections to food from her Korean upbringing. Reading about what she went through with her mom when she became ill was difficult because it was so reminiscent of what I went through with my mom from 2016-2018. Losing a parent is devastating, especially a mother. The author wrote a love letter 💖

3-8-24: My 5th book of 2024! Told in present day with one timeline from 25 years earlier, this is a story about neighbors lives intertwining when tragedy strikes. In a Georgian home in a suburb of London live 3 families. The Harlows on the top two floors, Emma and Zeb on the main floor and Vicky and Chris in the basement. When one of them goes missing they all somehow get involved. Told in many different voices this one caught me by surprise.

2-27-24: My 4th book of 2024! I really didn‘t care for this. The writing felt juvenile for some reason. Charlie hates his life and is given a chance to change it in a very drastic way. Then along comes Aude who helps to make his life better than he could have imagined. They must jump over some hurdles to make it work but in the end they find the right balance. It was very predictable and a little boring because of the predictability.⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣4️⃣

My almost 3 week old granddaughter on her first trip to our local library 💖📖😘📚

2-20-24: My 3rd book of 2024! 970 pages of Barbra? Yes please!! I‘ve waited my whole life for this book and I‘m so thankful she took the time to tell us the truth about her life and career. To say it has been remarkable is an understatement. I took a long time to read this but really I was savoring each page and didn‘t want it to end. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ stars for sure! And yes, I would read this one again which is why I bought my own copy to have forever.

It all got cut off but basically I‘m looking for postcards from every state for my coworker‘s 3rd grade class project. If you‘re interested please send to Jaime Fumo 2600 South Broad Street Philadelphia, Pa 19145. Thanks in advance!!!

2-3-24: Well, it looks like I‘m about half way through this 970 page book! And I‘m loving every second of it. 💖📖 #barbrastreisand

1-26-24: I finally got to see Who‘s Afraid of Virginia Woolf on the stage! I‘ve watched the movie many times and loved it but seeing it live was amazing. Hearing all the caustic quips and the audience laughing changed the whole first half of the show for me. Everyone‘s personalities change over the course of the show but it is more evident in the play. I highly recommend seeing both the movie and the play. 📖💖

1-19-24: My 2nd finished book of 2024! Book 1 in a series about Rachel Krall, the host of Guilty or Not Guilty, a podcast. Rachel has just touched down in Neapolis to cover the rape trial of Scott Blair, golden boy swimmer, accused of raping Kelly Moore. While, covering this, she is contacted by Hannah, who is trying to uncover the secrets of her sister‘s death from 25 years earlier. The two storylines combine and I didn‘t see the end coming.

1-10-24: My 1st finished book of 2024! I adore Alexandra Billings! I follow all her social media and she is funny and insightful on many topics but especially old Hollywood. Her memoir is difficult at times, she had a rough start as Scott before she transitioned into Alexandra. Some of it was hard to read however it was also moving and uplifting. I‘ve wanted to read this since it came out and when I received it for Christmas I was thrilled!

12-31-23: Well, here is my Goodreads challenge completed for 2023! My original goal was 128 which is what I read last year, but since I started working I‘ve had less time to read. Still 105 isn‘t too shabby. Happy New Year everyone!! See you in 2024🎉📖💖🎊

12-31-23: My 105th finished book of 2023 and my final book of 2023 pictured here with my new glass mug from my youngest daughter which is full of wine on this New Years Eve night! What a twisty one this was. Julia Day is a DCI in Portishead who is investigating yet another missing girl. Between that and helping keep her daughter safe from a serious allegation, DCI Day is trying to keep it all together. Happy New Year! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣1️⃣0️⃣5️⃣

12-27-23: Well, my goal to read this whole series during my Christmas break was fulfilled! Loved it! Thanks to my dear friend Dana, who sent me this for my birthday in September. 🎄💖📖⭐️

12-27-23: My 104th finished book of 2023! Book 4 in the Winter Street series. It was supposed to be a trilogy but the author decided to revisit the Quinn‘s one more time and I‘m glad she did. All was resolved very nice but it definitely ended on a difficult note. Life will go on for the Quinn‘s in the best ways possible. Marriage, retirement, a new TV show…so much to look forward to but saying goodbye was hard, lots of tears.⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣1️⃣0️⃣4️⃣

12-25-23: Gifts from my family. The tagged book has been on my list since it came out! So happy to have it. The wooden piece is for my book, glasses and coffee! 📖 👓 ☕️🎄💖

12-25-23: The tagged book is another one that was found under our tree this year. This is my family. My husband and two daughters. And the one in black is carrying my first grandchild. Her name is Ava Rosemarie. I love them and really enjoyed our holiday today. More to come….

12-25-23: Merry Christmas from my darling daughter. One of those presents is the tagged book! 📖🎄💖

12-25-23: My 103rd finished book of 2023! Book 3 of the series. It was written as if it were the last one so there was a lot of resolutions for the main characters be it in love, marriage, family, war, addiction. This one got me a little bit. I definitely shed a tear towards the end but was pleasantly surprised to see the author decided to write one more book. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣1️⃣0️⃣3️⃣

12-22-23: My 102nd finished book of 2023! Winter Stroll is book 2 in the Winter Street series. It takes place in early December in Nantucket during the Winter Stroll weekend. We are with the Quinn family once more. There is a new addition, and everyone is getting ready for her baptism. There are a lot of real life situations occurring in this novel. It is more dramatic than book 1 and leaves us on a cliffhanger. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣1️⃣0️⃣2️⃣

12-19-23: My 101st finished book of 2023! Book 1 in a series my good friend Dana bought be for my birthday back in September. 3 days during Christmas in Nantucket with the Quinn family. Kelley, the dad and owner of the Winter Street Inn gets a major shock, Margaret, his famous ex-wife shows up to help. And their children all go through it but it feels very relatable and funny for the most part. I‘m looking forward for book 2.

12-17-23: My 100th finished book of 2023! I thought this was beautifully written. The story of a young woman, who is about to lose her freedom, who runs away only to find herself in a cult like community with no freedom, who eventually has a daughter who learns how to grasp for that freedom because of reading books. One book in particular saves her. One author becomes the love of her life. It‘s true that books can save us and open doors for us💖

12-16-23: My 99th finished book of 2023! Flor and her 3 sisters, Matilde, Pastora and Camila, have gifts. Flor can predict when someone will die. When she decides to hold a living wake for herself, her sisters, niece and daughter, pitch in to make it a memorable affair but have many questions. The story goes back and forth in time, telling how the 4 sisters upbringing took them from rural Dominican Republic to the capital and finally to NYC.

12-7-23: My 98th finished book of 2023! Holly Gibney has been around for many books now. She shows up in the Mr. Mercedes trilogy and in the short story If It Bleeds as well as The Outsider. She is a great King character. Flawed in many ways but a great detective who faces a lot of scary stuff. In this novel, Holly is dealing with a crazy old couple, several disappearances and her own personal issues related to covid.King always keeps my interest.

12-6-23: My November Book Wrap Up! How sad only 4 books. Now that I am working a full time job here in Philadelphia I don‘t have nearly enough time to read! These were fine with the exception of The Wishing Game being 5 stars. It was a lovely story. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️📖💗

11-26-23: My 97th finished book of 2023! This was just eh for me. Book 5 in the series. This one centers on brother Heath, just back to England from LA. He gets called for jury duty as does the fictional Sherlock Holmes. The majority of the story takes place in the courtroom with the jurors. Many mishaps occur here to bring them to an island to search for proof of an alibi. It could have been better. ⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣9️⃣7️⃣

11-24-23: I‘m catching up on my reading while my husband is cooking a feast for our daughters. We are doing Thanksgiving a day late so we could have everyone together. 🍽📖💖

11-23-23: Happy Thanksgiving!!🍁🍽 My daughter and I went out on Thanksgiving Eve to make pumpkin centerpieces for the holiday. Hope everyone enjoyed their days with family and friends and books! 💖📖💐

11-23-23: My 96th finished book of 2023! I wanted to like this one more than I did. It was fine for the most part but I found the women to be a bit whiny. 4 college acquaintances meet at a reunion and decide to start a yoga class together. One is the yoga instructor, one is a editor at a publishing house, one is a web designer and one is a journalist. They forge friendships that will last while dealing with the perils of being a woman in NYC.

11-13-23: My 95th finished book of 2023! Lucy, a kindergarten teacher‘s aide, is a fan of the Clock Island book series. Jack Masterson is the author who actually lives on Clock Island in Maine. Remember Willy Wonka? Well, Jack hosts a game for fans of his series and 4 lucky contestants are brought to the island in the hopes that they will win his newest book, the only copy! This was a heart warming story. I loved it! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣9️⃣5️⃣

11-9-23: Very excited to start this one! 🎫

11-8-23: My 94th finished book of 2023! Book 3 in the series about Queen Elizabeth II being a secret sleuth. I‘m this story, the Queen is spending Christmas at Sandringham, her rural retreat, when an old acquaintance and family friend goes missing. With the help of her assistant personal secretary, Rozie, the Queen gets down to the bottom of things when the police don‘t. This series is a nice reminder of the Queen. ⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣9️⃣4️⃣

11-1-23: My October Book Wrap Up!! Another month with a low reading count but I definitely enjoyed everything. Here‘s hoping I pick up the pace in November! ⭐️📖⭐️

10-31-23: My 93rd finished book of 2023! I have to be honest, not one of these characters, especially the 3 main Donnelly women, are likable. Mindy and Ginger are the daughters of Carol, a woman who would rather surf then raise her girls. Spanning from the 50s through the 60s, from the sunny Beach Boy vibes to the turbulent Vietnam war, Mindy, Ginger and Carol go their separate ways but always have the surf as their common denominator.

10-27-23: Saw the movie, Five Nights At Freddie‘s, that is based on these books and the video game last night. My daughter is a huge fan of all of it so we had to see it on the big screen. Very strange story….😳

10-26-23: My 92nd finished book of 2023! Cassie is a little odd. Pushy and opinionated, kind of cold, very candid, and she has a huge love of Greek Mythology. After a series of truly unfortunate events occur, Cassie realizes she can turn back time. She can erase her big mistakes and go back and fix them. Will it work? She has a relationship to fix and a job to save! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣9️⃣2️⃣

10-19-23: My 91st finished book of 2023! Catherine and her mother Ruth are close until one day Catherine starts to suspect her mom is not being 100% truthful. With some flashbacks to when Ruth was younger, this book takes some dark turns telling the story of Ruth‘s past and her and Catherine‘s present situation. And then there is James. Ruth‘s high school boyfriend. We learn a lot about him in flashback. ⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣9️⃣1️⃣

10-9-23: My 90th finished book of 2024! Back in 1995, about to graduate from Berkeley, Jordan, Naomi, Alec, Jordy, Craig and Marielle are inseparable. When one of their own passes suddenly the remaining friends create a pact which can be triggered whenever someone is in need. They have living funerals for one another so they all know how much they are loved. Very heartfelt and loving. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣9️⃣0️⃣

10-1-23: My 89th finished book of 2023! I started this book before my move and had to give it back to the library only 1 chapter in. Happy to say I finished it just now. The AMC show Lucky Hank starring Bob Odenkirk is based on this book and was a great show. I equally enjoyed this story. William Henry Devereux, Jr. is the chair of the English department at Railton University in Pennsylvania. Mid-life crisis ensues. Colorful cast or characters.

9-30-23: My September Book Wrap Up! Not a lot of time to read since I started a new job two weeks ago and my days of laying out in the Florida sun and reading are now behind me. I enjoyed the ones I got to especially The Meryl Streep Movie Club which I gave 5⭐️. Let‘s see what October brings! 📖💖📚⭐️

9-30-23: My 88th finished book of 2023! Lauren and Ryan, met at 19 in college, and never left each others sides. Now, 9 years in their marriage, they have hit a wall. They just don‘t seem to like one another anymore. So they decide to take a year off. A year to figure out if they still love one another or if they should call it quits. That year is a busy one full of self discovery and family bonding. Marriage is hard.⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣8️⃣8️⃣💖

9-18-23: My youngest daughter had this wooden bookmark made for me. It‘s cut off at the top so you can‘t see The Bell Jar and at the bottom Practical Magic. These are some of my favorite books that I will read over and over. 📚💖📖

9-18-23: Look at these lovely pieces my best friend and my daughter gave me for my birthday! I‘ll wear all the book jewelry!!🎊⭐️💖

9-15-23: My 87th finished book of 2023! Lolly, her daughter Kat and her nieces, Isabel and June, are thrust together one fateful night many years ago when the girls were young. Since then, they‘ve gone their separate ways until Lolly makes a big announcement and the girls come home. Interspersed with 10 Meryl Streep movies, the 4 women create new bonds, friendships, and long lasting love. I cried. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣8️⃣7️⃣

9-13-23: My 86th finished book of 2023! Set in 1950s San Francisco, Lily Hu is 17 year old senior living with her family in Chinatown. While she has her main friends including Shirley, she becomes close with Kath and a whole new world is opened up to her when she visits the Telegraph Club a lesbian bar in North Beach, right next to Chinatown. This was a sad but lovely story of a young girl coming of age during a time when who she was wasn‘t seen.

9-7-23: My 85th finished book of 2023! Former child stars reunite to uncover the tragedy that ended their show. Think Barney but sinister. Who is Mister Magic and how does he keep the children from being bad? Enter Val, having lived on a farm for the last 30 years, Val only knows that life. Then Isaac, Marcus and Javi reunite them and Val learns she has a whole other past. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️📖#️⃣8️⃣5️⃣