2014

3 Non-Fiction

2014, Books in Bed, cookbooks, Favorites, Non-Fiction /

Sassymonkey talked about One Skillet, Two Plates so I checked it out. It’s a nice cookbook. A lot of good recipes, nothing super hard or weird. I wish there were more photos. I like photos.

Make Your Place: Affordable, Sustainable, Nesting Skills was mentioned on a blog I read so I thought I’d grab it. Totally loved it. Very zine-like. I can see a few of my kids really liking this book, (She recommends looking for help/info at Punk Houses, hahaha.) There wasn’t anything new or unusual about the ideas (tinctures, teas, infusions, cleaning, beauty products, first aid) I just liked the voice of the writer.

I reserved Hoosier Mama Book of Pie months ago (like September of last year). And I do mean MONTHS ago. It finally arrived at which point I decided I must have all the pie. Immediately. I don’t even really like pie all that much (except pumpkin) because I don’t really like pie crust. I also finally realized that when RJ talks about the pie shop her father has been going to, she’s been talking about the Hoosier Mama pie shop. (For some reason she says “Who’s Your Mama” not “Hoosier Mama”. lol) Must have all the pie. Seriously. Also… mmmm, Chess Pie. I don’t, however, want to make pie — no matter how interesting or good the recipes sounded.

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The Signature of All Things

2014, Audiobooks, Books in Bed, Fiction, Women /

We finished an audio book right before Easter and none from my reserve list were available at the library so I grabbed the first thing that looked somewhat interesting, via my library’s online system and that just happened to be Elizabeth Gilbert’s The Signature of All Things.

Amusing because I’d just sat through the video she made of her house in Jersey, the one that she’s trying to sell, and complained mightily about her and her video. (It made me queasy and she was kind of weird in it, IMO.)

I’ve also never read Eat, Pray, Love… so there you go.

It took forever to listen to this book, even though we made two trips to Wisconsin while listening to it. It took so long, the darn license expired on me and I had to re-check it out. Frustrating but that should tell you that we found it interesting enough to go through the pain of doing that, while sitting in the parking lot of our library (even though by then I had another audio book in the car just waiting for us to listen to it.)

It was interesting. Alma was interesting. (So was her father.) So were all of the characters, really. The sex scenes were… a little strong in places, (moss will forever remind me of binding closets and oral sex… just saying…) – I think particularly so because we were listening to it rather than reading it. You can’t skim really descriptive passages very easily in audio, even if they make you cringe… So. Consider that before you read this book.

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Beautiful Redemption

2014, Books in Bed, Favorites, Sci Fi and Fantasy, Young Adult /

I’m so glad I stuck through this series. After a couple of lackluster books that had me saying “I hope this series ends soon because I’m getting tired of this…” the last book in the series, Beautiful Redemption paid off. This is my favorite book in the series. By far.

I’m still angsty over the “outside of Summerville” and “Summerville water tower” setting but all was forgiven once everything was sorted out and all of the creatures functioning as they should. The Far Keep scene at the end was fabulous and Sarafina did exactly what she should have done. Perfect.

I’m glad it’s over and I’m glad it ended this way.

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Three Just For Fun Non-fiction

2014, Books in Bed, Non-Fiction /

I wasn’t feeling in the mood to start anything on my shelves, last night — not even the new Christopher Moore book — so I decided to flip through all of the non-fiction books I’ve picked up over the last few weeks. That was a good choice. I had some nice light reading and thoroughly enjoyed my reading time (even though I didn’t love all of the books I read.)

First, Jay Shafer’s DIY Book of Backyard Sheds and Tiny Houses. Ho hum. It was mostly a sales pitch for his line of tiny houses. The back section of the book was filled with things like “how to fell a tree” and “how to raise a wall”, which was nice enough. Ho hum.

Creative Ideas to Organize Your Home was not so much about organizing your home as it was about making things with the “junk” you have lying around and pretending like those things will help you organize more junk. I wasn’t interested in anything in the book and I like that sort of thing. Blah.

Remodelista reminded me why I like the Remodelista website. I read every word. I loved all of the houses. No, not much of it would ever apply to my life but I did find myself with a new appreciation for subway tile, (TW does not agree. She does want pretty cloth-covered extension cords, though. And, I really want a 70s gaming table.)

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The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry

2014, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction /

TW read The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry really quickly and when she finished she said “THIS WAS A HORRIBLE BAD BOOK.” which confused me because I’ve only heard good things about it. Comparisons to the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society and The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry led me to believe it should be a very good book.

I almost didn’t read it because she seemed very serious about hating the book.

Turns out she hated it because it is a heart-breaker, emotion-pulling book and not because it is bad.

At page 64 I said, I should really just put this book down before it breaks my heart… but I didn’t. I read it straight through and loved it.

Read it — but at page 64 you still have time to change your mind.

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Reading In April

2014, Books in Bed, Reading /

Thank goodness for #readathon, without it my totals would have been less than great which doesn’t bode well for my goal for the year. Oops.

I read a total of 21 books this month. (I’ve got four still in progress, including an unpublished draft of a friend’s book that I started today and an audio book. That’s a lot of in progress books for me — I’ve usually only got two going at once, one audio and one not!)

Eight were from the Cybils shortlist.
Two were audio.
One was non-fiction.
Four were graphic novels.
One was from my stack.
Six were children’s/middle grade and six were YA.

Must do better in MAY! Seriously.

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Winter: Cricket and Grey

1 Comment / 2014, Books in Bed, Fiction /

I had hoped to finish Winter: Cricket and Grey during #readathon but I was just way too tired — particularly since Cricket’s dead mother started talking to her and I was all Huh? Good thing I put it down and picked it up fresh the next day. Things made so much more sense once I’d had a few hours of sleep.

I’m a post-apocalyptic fiction fan, and I especially liked this one. The world was different but not so different that it was unrecognizable (or unbelievable.) Health care… you think it’s a mess now, just wait til we run out of oil…

I’m not sure Hesse was quite creepy enough, when it all came down to it in the end. I expected to be a lot more creeped out than I was. I’m looking forward to the next book (so get busy, Angelina!)

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6 from the Cybils Shortlist

1 Comment / 2014, Books in Bed, Children's Literature, Comics & Graphic Novels, Cybil Challenge, Favorites, Poetry, Young Adult /

3 Graphic Novels:

– Monster on the Hill — This is a middle grade book and I chuckled my way through the whole thing. VERY cute.
– Bad Machinery — I don’t know if I was tired or if I just plain didn’t like this one. It bored me.
– Delilah Dirk and the Turkish Lieutenant — I love Delilah!

3 Poetry:

Follow Follow — Cute reverso poems. Very cute. I don’t think these are as good as those in Mirror Mirror, though. And unless you just love reverso poems you should skip this in favor of Mirror Mirror.
Forest Has a Song — Ho hum poems. Great illustrations.
Poems to Learn By Heart — Great compilation of poems. Really excellent. Nice intros to sections. Nice diversity of poetry. I’d buy this one for JMP.

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