1. According to GR, A Charlotte Mason Education by Catherine Levison (104 pp), but I don't completely trust GR page counts.
2. The Lord of the Rings (1,216 pp as one volume). See note on GR page counts above.
3. Meditations of the Heart by Howard Thurman (printed 1953). Epic of Gilgamesh is older (c2100 BCE) but I don't have an original printing (inscription?) of that one.
4. Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo (Oct 2019)

@ljuliel #bookquestion

1. Pilgrims, right?
2. Accompanying my children to Junior Scientist Day at my spouse's workplace. I suspect it was primarily an excuse for the grown-up scientists to play, which helped make it super awesome!
3. Leftovers and an early bedtime.
4. Nine living, two deceased.
5. On it!

#friyayintro @howjessreads

I met my reading goal for this year! I hope this doesn't mean I have to stop reading until 2020. Or maybe I just can't *finish* any books until January 1. I can probably swing that.

So, is Marjorie possessed or is she suffering from mental illness? It doesn't seem like the author ever really decided, which makes the story a little wishy-washy, but overall I liked this one. It's spooky and captures well the vulnerability of childhood, especially the precarious period on the cusp of adulthood when adults are afraid of us.

Pic: While listening to this book, I spotted this SoCal tree trying out "autumn in New England" cosplay.

1. So many! Perspicacity, façade, tenacious, apocryphal, teleological, hegemony...
2. Should stop one book before it gets formulaic. Fave: the Ramona Quimby books.
3. Used to. Personal narrative, bad fiction, and I had an academic piece published in a collection this year. Now it's just letters and the occasional book review.
4. Not sure what "new followers" means. People who've recently followed me?
#wondrouswednesday @Eggs

This is actually yesterday's prompt. I missed it, but I liked it enough I wanted to respond anyway.

In order of importance:
1. Reviews
2. Author
3. A tie between Title, Cover, and Length
4. Price (price is no object when you get books from the library 😉)

Most important, though, is whether it's on my TBR. I mood-read more than I'd like, but I try to prioritize my TBR.

@ljuliel #KeepLitsyActive

Prompt from @ljuliel for #KeepLitsyActive:

Name an author that's an immediate purchase when they release a new book, plus you've read every other book they've written.

I don't buy a lot of books, but a few authors whose new releases I scoop up ASAP from the library: Marilynne Robinson, Otessa Moshfegh, and Margaret Atwood.

John Irving used to be my clear favorite, but I've not been as into his stuff since The Fourth Hand.

A young woman is charged with murder, but the pieces aren't lining up. Everyone has a reason to prevaricate so it's not clear who---if anyone---can be trusted.

Told in three voices, this novel addresses the messiness and malleability of "truth." Engaging at first, the courtroom stuff lost me, as did the anachronistic Axe body spray. The novel left me coveting the bikeability of Swedish roadways.

"To reiterate, incubus that it can be, anxiety is not an affliction but the manifestation of our spiritual nature..."

I don't know... I think it can be both.

Well, my timer messed up, but I added up the little bits and got in a solid 17 1/2 hours this weekend. Pictured is my breakfast (cocoa banana hazelnut smoothie...not very photogenic) and the dishcloth I worked on while listening to the tagged book today. It's been a fun #readathon! Now to bed to try and get enough sleep to be a productive member of society.

#MrBook1inaMillion. #24B4Monday #LitsyPartyofOne
@Andrew65 @MrBook

A circus appears without warning and seems to make concrete our most fantastic dreams. But there is a larger purpose behind the show, a bigger story into which it fits.

Whimsical and magical and deadly serious, this novel was a pleasure to read. The ending is a little precious, but endings are tough, so no points docked for that.

2nd book down for #MrBook1inaMillion. #24B4Monday #LitsyPartyofOne
@MrBook @Andrew65

Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark, hosts of the wildly popular My Favorite Murder podcast, share personal stories about what led up to the podcast and how it's affected their lives.

Part laugh-out-loud funny, part fist-pumping "heck yeah!", but mostly just two people talking about their experiences in therapy. I enjoyed their perspectives on victim-blaming and Georgia's love of Ray Bradbury, but it wasn't very engaging to me overall.

Audiocooking. I now will forever associate the voice of Karen Kilgariff with the smell of fresh ginger. Homemade curry paste in the works to make some yellow curry soup with black rice once I acquire some black rice. Also featured: my squash stash.

#24B4Monday #LitsyPartyofOne #MrBook1inaMillion
@MrBook @Andrew65 @Alisnazzy @Rachel.Rencher @Lucas.Rencher @TheReadingMermaid

Well, I got in about ten minutes of listening before my ten-year-old said, "Sorry for interrupting you, Mom. I just love talking to you." And suddenly I couldn't enjoy my audiobook. But I did manage to get a photo of the beautiful persimmons I plan to devour during my reading time this weekend.

#readathon #24B4Monday #MrBook1inaMillion #LitsyPartyofOne
@MrBook @Alisnazzy @Andrew65 @Rachel.Rencher @Lucas.Rencher @TheReadingMermaid

A few minutes before Friday on the West Coast, but close enough:

1. Catan
2. National Park road trip across the US (as many times as necessary)
3. 97/100 for my Goodreads goal
4. The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro
5. You have to wear a shirt with only one word on it every day for one year. What word do you choose? (credit: the first result when I Googled “ice breaker questions“) Bonus: Include punctuation.

#friyayintro @howjessreads

In response to @ljuliel 's query about historical book preferences, I don't seek out historical fiction/NF history in particular (I like to read books written during the time period rather than modern books looking back), but I do have some individual books that I love. The tagged book, Michael Shaara's The Killer Angels about Gettysburg, and Nathaniel Philbrick's Mayflower are a few favorites.

#KeepLitsyActive #historybooks

Pepper doesn't belong in the psych ward, yet here he is, forced to face his assumptions about mental illness and a literal monster that roams the halls at night.

This is a solid so-so. It's amusing enough, but it feels loose, unpolished. I fear that Lavalle is using "but they're crazy" to excuse some inconsistencies in the characters. The novel does a good job, though, of capturing the Catch-22 that is mental healthcare in the US.

Here are the books at which I hope to chip away during the #MrBook1inaMillion extravaganza. The tagged book is my audio choice for this #Readathon. My kids/schedule/way of life have me reading in little bits here and there rather than in big chunks so I usually just estimate my reading time, but I might play with keeping a timer this time, just for kicks. 😉

#24B4Monday #LitsyPartyofOne

At the suggestion of @ljuliel , here are two books that had a strong emotional effect on me. I very rarely cry at books, but I made the mistake of reading The Yearling aloud to my daughter and sobbing my way through a whole section of it. Fierce Kingdom didn't bother me (except for the adrenaline rush) until I finished reading. I closed the back cover and lost it, snot, zubzubs, and all. Very unlike me.

And there you are!

#keeplitsyactive

1. Not a big fan of meeting authors, but wouldn't mind having dinner with Ottessa Moshfegh, Shirley Jackson, Gary Shteyngart, George Eliot, Audre Lorde
2. Just want to chat about human nature, life's absurdities/challenges, relationships
3. LT says 68, but I haven't updated my “owned“ tag in a while. Maybe as much as twice that by now.
4. Ugh, I never know whom to tag! I'm still new here and don't want to be presumptuous.
#wondrouswednesday @Eggs

#keeplitsyactive #litsyquestionnaire @ljuliel

1. Nice people who share my passion for reading, feeling comfortable posting comments on anyone's posts, even if I don't know them (not sure if they like it, but I feel like having read the same book is connection enough for me to comment).
2. (see below; can't find arrow emoji on the desktop version)

My youngest has a weekly band rehearsal next door to one of the city library branches. It's too far to head home in between drop-off and pick-up, so I'm forced to hang out at the library for two hours. The sacrifices I make for my children.

I quite enjoyed following Alex's convoluted route through Yale's campus trailed by her past and the pasts of others, seeking truth and belonging among the wealthy and self-important. It's helped me remember why I always read the first book in a series only after the whole series is out. Darn you, Bardugo.

Why do authors always have their characters use the term "bled out" instead of "bled to death"? Is it the influence of crime dramas?

Dear Book,

Please keep being as awesome as your first 200 pages have been.

Love and kisses,
Charity

(Cashing in on the extra hour from the end of daylight saving to scare myself right before bedtime.)

Apologies in advance to all of you who are about to receive the #litsylove notes I wrote after having too much coffee. ☕

Well, this was different than I expected.

Some bits were gratuitous, like a clunky couple of paragraphs about Red's attractions, and some were a little off, like some of the ways the youngest characters acted, and some were just kind of bizarre, like some spoilery things I won't mention.

Overall it was a quick, fun read that I'm certain to forget almost immediately.

1. Popcorn with vegan butter, a sprinkle of brewer's yeast, and a veritable storm of nutritional yeast.
2. Yes!
3. Lower tides (tidepooling!), rain (decreased fire risk!), and food (teaching the kids to cook for me!).
4. Zero! (Except for some dark chocolate, but I eat that every day.)
5. Depends on what the item is. I like all of them, really.

#friYAYintro @howjessreads

Please share your favorite books about journaling.

I've kept a journal (often more than one) since I was ten years old, but over the past year or so, I've lost my journaling mojo. I feel bored of my own writing voice. I'm looking for a book that addresses the challenges of journaling long-term rather than a book that's just prompts or tips for beginners. If such a book exists, I figured the Litsy crowd would know about it. :-)

I didn't manage to visit any bookshops on my recent trip to the desert, but I did visit the World Famous Crochet Museum. And I finished the tagged book. The museum was quirky and fun and perfectly desert-like, but the book was pretty meh. Too many gratuitous twists and turns, characters acting inconsistently/out of character, and a couple of scenes that just made me roll my eyes. Disappointing follow-up to Six of Crows.

I brought two books with me on our jaunt to the desert, but I'm being tempted by the books in our rental. Not Infinite Jest, though.

Hooray! I finished one whole book during this #deweysreadathon!

I was hesitant when I saw this one had been made into a TV series (apparently set not in Australia as the book is but in Monterey, CA, where I lived for a few years as a child, although probably in a less-tony part of town than the show), but I really enjoyed it. The mystery unfolds in a compelling way, and the characters are messy, complex, and (mostly) believable.

#deweysoct

This is what I love about reading multiple books at once: Finding little coincidences like these two similar passages about nurturing grudges, one from Leigh Bardugo's Crooked Kingdom and the other from Liane Moriarty's Big Little Lies. I find it kind of comforting, like maybe there's order in the universe after all. Or maybe grudges are just part of the Zeitgeist.

#deweysoct #deweysreadathon

Dewey's Hour 9: After summer squash and eggs, coffee and chocolate, LaCroix and popcorn, with a warm breeze blowing in through the window, I stretched out to read on the couch...and crashed. I didn't even realize I'd fallen asleep until I found myself struggling into wakefulness through the streets of Ketterdam. Probably time to turn on the ceiling fan and take an intentional nap.

#deweys24hourreadathon #deweysoct #readathon

Dewey's Readathon Opening Survey:

1) I'm in San Diego, California
2) Most looking forward to: All of them? :-)
3) I don't really have any snacks lined up, but the UPS driver dropped off a big box of chocolate the other day, so that will probably make an appearance.
4) About myself: I'm 3+ inches shorter than my 14yo daughter.
5) This is my first Dewey's since I joined Litsy. I'm excited!

#deweys24hourreadathon #readathon @DeweysReadathon

Getting ready for Dewey's #readathon by setting up my stack and following a bunch of other Litsy readathoners. I will not finish all of these---or probably any of these---but I'll make a dent, I hope. Thank goodness for audiobooks so I can read while cleaning house! Now for some shut-eye so I can be up for the 5am Pacific start time...

1. Not only is it a great parenting book, the playdough recipe is invaluable.
2. Yes, before I even leave the bedroom.
3. No, that's what microwaves are for. That and reheating my coffee over and over because I keep forgetting about it.
4. 38/7.5-ish in regular shoes, 39/8.5-ish in running shoes.
5. On it!

#friyayintro @howjessreads

Recommended to me by my teenager, this was a fun, fanciful story with a vision of what it might look like to confront hatred with compassion. There were a couple of steamy scenes that made me second-guess abandoning pre-screening all of my daughter's reading, but then I realized that I rarely feel a pull to censor a book for her because of violence, and I got caught up wondering why I'd be okay with her reading about bloodshed but not smooching.🤔

Emily Wilson's translation of Homer's Odyssey is awesome. Odysseus is such an arrogant jerk. He caused so many of his own problems yet Homer seems to love him all the more for it. My daughter said at one point, "This is a really Odysseus-centered book, isn't it?"

My children and I laughed at so many parts of this book, but naked Odysseus jumping on the threshold to announce his killing spree really cracked us up. Playtime is over, indeed.

Still thinking about this book...

"If the gods created everything, was truth not just another creation?"

?May 2019
? I heard about Litsy through readathons (Dewey's, 24in48), but didn't join until I saw through LibraryThing that it was newly available on the web.
? About the same, I think.
?Goodness, I couldn't say. I read all over the place. I really like strong, literary horror and fantasy, but it's difficult to find.
?"know" in the online sense is tough for me to define.

#WondrousWednesday @Eggs

95°F, 10% relative humidity...perfect fall weather to curl up with a book.

I wasn't sure that this book would be my thing, but I found it hilarious and poignant and cringe-inducing. The ending is ho-hum, but overall I found it to be a pleasant audiobook accompaniment to household chores. I alternated this one with Black Leopard, Red Wolf, which was a strange juxtaposition, and The Odyssey, which was apt.

Tracker is telling to his Inquisitor the tale of his search for a boy, which ends up interwoven with the story of Tracker's life and love, his childhood and his coming of age and his compromises with loss. It's a bizarre story and so, so violent, but I'm glad I read to the end. I have no idea whom I'd feel comfortable recommending it to, though.

Birthday greetings ready to head out, some late, some early, maybe one on time. 🥳

I love that #litsylove gives me an excuse to buy stationery!

❤️ San Diego, CA
🧡 Old enough to know better. (42)
💛 Libraries, libraries, libraries! (And book sales.)
💚 Married
💙 No particular preference, but I'm accustomed to she/her/hers.
💜 It's a combo of the name of my blog and my childhood nickname. It's also my name on LibraryThing.

@JoScho #gettingtoknowyou

When the text description doesn't match the map. I suspect someone just didn't catch that one "Southwest" should have been a "Southeast." This kind of thing bugs me, but I wonder if it were my job to edit books if I would actually catch these mistakes or if I only see them because I have the luxury of reading at my own pace.

On a positive note, I think I'm finally getting my bearings in this novel. Only took 250+ pages...

1. Circe seems appropriate here.
2. Bare feet (unless I'm somewhere with scorpions, in which case, hard-soled slippers).
3. Not counting airplane travel, probably ~10,000 feet while hiking near Salt Lake City.
4. American cheese. *shudder*
5. Not likely.

#friyayintro @howjessreads

“But let me tell you what I see instead. The neediness of it. The begging to be applauded. As if the praise of a thousand strangers would ever make up for the fact that you didn‘t feel loved enough as a child. Oh, you poor thing. You were begging to be devoured.“

A quick read exploring the role of myths and fairy tales in our lives and culture. The story is clunky at times and there are enough inconsistencies and inaccuracies to keep me from being drawn in completely, but it was spooky enough to make me hesitant to walk to the bathroom through the dark house so there's that going for it. Are people really as knee-jerk violent as so many of the books I'm reading now suggest?

The first section was annoying, the second and third were promising (if gory), the fourth was just ridiculous, and the coda was unnecessary. I'm perhaps a little sensitive about people dumping on Ohio (it's like how no one's allowed to pick on your siblings except you), but if you're going to do it, at least make the story believable (or so fanciful it becomes magical realism, which could still be emotionally believable).