Welcome to Litsy!

These were all so amazing. Thank you @Suet624 for Fresh Water, I adored it and meeting you 🩷, #hastagbrigade for the enjoyable hashtags and chats with Vanity Fair, and #RereadingtheClassics for the Madding Crowd. A big shoutout for Mayflies 💔and if anyone reads As Meat loves Salt pleas tag me as I want to know what another Litten thinks.

What more does one need than a good book and a judgmental look from a spoiled dog?

4✨ I read this earlier this week as a suggestion for my 12 book recommendations at the beginning of the year. @CBee Thank you for the recommendation it was fabulous. Violette is a caretaker of a cemetery. When Julien a Police Chief comes to bury his mother on a strangers grave we go into a back story of how his mother and Violette are connected from their pasts. It made me laugh, but it also pulled at my heartstrings. ⬇️

This book was sooooo beautiful! I didn‘t want it to end.
Not sure if this makes sense and feels odd for me to say but reading this made me want to live and love and lose and do it all over again. Oh, and also unlocked my newfound goal of being a cemetery keeper.
I‘ll definitely look into for more from this author.

🪦❤️

Wonderful translation! It follows the life of a cemetery keeper with a little mystery thrown in.

1. Without a doubt: 💕 💕

2. Without a doubt: Fresh Water for Flowers

#Two4Tuesday @TheSpineView

Thanks for the tag @The_Penniless_Author

A book about the life of a cemetery keeper in France. I was touched by the way she tended the graves and by the way she often performed tasks that were not in her job description. All the while, she was dealing with her own grief and hardships. It‘s a sad and mysterious story, but also wonderfully moving and hopeful. I loved it! 💐

I had errands to do, places to go, people to meet, stuff to accomplish but no I sat and finished this gracefully told, and beautifully rendered story. I can see why it‘s a favorite of many. Thank you so much @Suet624 for this absolutely delightful read. I loved it and will be recommending to everyone I meet. ♥️

Front porch reading in the hazy dawn.

I‘m so glad I read Fresh Water for Flowers, it was my best fiction read in June, and easily since March… but I can‘t decide yet if it beats out Black Sun. I‘m going to let it sink in more before I decide the first half of the year‘s winning book. #readingbracket #bestfiction

What a beautiful book. I read it slowly and soaked it in. Such emotional power and gorgeous prose, I‘m very impressed by the translation. I don‘t think I‘ve ever connected with a translated book like this before. My heart feels heavy and full with it.

I go up to my bedroom and open the winter wardrobe to put on a dressing gown. I have two wardrobes. One I call “winter,” the other “summer.” It has nothing to do with the seasons, but rather the circumstances. The winter wardrobe contains only classic, somber clothes, for the eyes of others. The summer wardrobe contains only light, colorful clothes meant only for me. I wear summer under winter, and I take off winter when I‘m alone.

I've decided to try to read an author in every country - partly inspired by picking up this lovely work in translation from France.

Well-plotted, this story unveils the life of a woman we meet as a cemetery keeper - there's one main timeline and a few different past timelines you're following. Briefly confusing timeline switching on audio, masterfully plotted in when details were revealed. Beautiful, sweet, sad story that I really enjoyed.

💚💚💚💚💚 This is a story of love, of many different loves, and not all are beautiful. This is life itself.

Wow, loving the writing, setting, characters, the whole works!

What a fantastic line quoted above! MYOB

Spent some leisure time this afternoon at my local bookshop. 😊

#MayMontage #22ndOnYourTBR Is it really 22nd ?Honestly, I shuffle my TBR like poker players shuffle cards so 😁🤷‍♀️

Just in case folks want to know, there will be a live chat online with Valerie Perrin. Go to Tombolo Books to sign up.

I loved this - it starts slowly, and the layers of the story build and build so skilfully that before you know it you have such a deep and nuanced view of each character. It‘s sad, involves lots things that might be triggers ( the main character looks after a cemetery) but its joyful too! There‘s hope and reminders about how we live our lives, how we love and care for those closest to us and how we want to leave this life. I love this author!

Turning out to be a perfect bookmark / book pairing! 👍🏼

First few chapters in …. I like this writers style - you go in thinking it‘s a story about one thing and then it‘s about something co pkwy welsh different. Enjoying being gently tugged into the story‘s orbit.

One of the best books I‘ve read in quite some time. There are very few books I ever want to read again, but this is one. I love the way this story unfolds. I‘m glad I listened to the audiobook because of the French pronunciations.

@AmyG I legit squealed when I opened this package!! Everything is perfect. And I love both of these book choices!! 💕 can‘t wait to read both of them!
Thanks for the extra chocolate goodies! I‘m sure my boys will find the stash soon enough 😆
Also, this mug is awesome! I love it so much 🌱
Thanks to @Cinfhen and @TheKidUpstairs for organizing #muglove23 #muglove2023 — my first swap and it was so fun!

Wow. This book. Epic. Completely enthralling. I went into it knowing nothing about it. I suggest reading it that way. Excellent in every way. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ #bookspin

These words resonate.

Reading + golf = relaxing Saturday 😎

"My closest neighbors don't quake in their boots."
#firstlinefridays
@ShyBookOwl

I finally read this book and understand all the love for it! It started out slowly and then suddenly in one page it was as if the story was lit with a match. I so loved the way Perrin slowly built the rest of the story from different perspectives, building up to an incredible ending. I will miss Violette. ♥️

January isn‘t over yet but it‘s close enough I know this is my favorite finished in January 23. I want to tag the person who made and offered the bracket graphic but can‘t find the name as it appears I accidentally cropped it on the version I saved. If you know, please comment/tag. This was on my #auldlangspine list as one of @CBee s favs of 22. #readingbracket2023

This is a love story. Or a story of how love always has loss too. Love of family, life, self, friendship. It‘s heartwarming and heartbreaking. Beautifully written. I collect Europa Editions and am so happy to add this to my collection even though I chose audio for this from my #auldlangspine list from @CBee so I could also read another on the list in print. The alternating POV actually adds to the pathos. The plot twist made me gasp out loud.

I wondered if I was disguised. Or if it was myself I had found.

Because I‘m always late to book parties, I‘m grateful to @Deblovestoread for putting this in her #ALSpine list and to @CBee for sending it to me to make sure I would read it. 😀 It‘s a poignant read with a slow burn that veers into a thriller and then ends kind of abruptly. The chapter-header epigraphs were my favorite parts. A lovely book (but I‘d still give the nod to “A Constellation of Vital Phenomenon,” Cyd. 🤷🏻‍♀️)

#AuldLangSpine

Oh @Cbee I'll be thinking about this a long long time.

Thank you so much friend.

I‘ve read SO many amazing books this year, but (and I knew this months ago) Fresh Water For Flowers captured my heart and held on tight ♥️ #readingbracket #thatsawrap #goodbye2022 @chasjjlee

#12Booksof2022 #3

@Andrew65

@CBee OMG I‘m only at Chapter 10

♥️ thank you so much for this gift

Also nothing is getting done today 🤣

And this is why I never decide my favorite books of they year until January. I absolutely loved this complex & character driven story. I went in expecting it to be about a woman in a cemetery and her cheating ex, which it is but it is so much more too. Filled with grief, a bit of mystery, and a few love stories I was enamored with Violette from the jump and could have spent many hundreds more pages with her.
This will be 1 of my top 2022 books

We did Christmas gifts today since the kids are here. Hubby came through with a good chunk of my #auldlangspine wish list. I am very excited for a reading Christmas and a wonderful start to January 2023

This is me, thrilled to receive @CBee ‘s gift of “Fresh Water for Flowers” because it‘s on my #AuldLangSpine list from @Deblovestoread !

Littens are totally awesome. 😍

📚 Tagged
🖋 Jasper Fforde
🎞 Fiddler on the Roof, Four Weddings & a Funeral
📺 Friends
🎤 Fleetwood Mac, Foreigner
🎼 Fear - Blue October, Father and Son - Cat Stevens, Funhouse - Pink, Fairytale of New York - The Pogues

#MANICMONDAY #LETTERF

#ManicMonday @CBee
📕 Tagged above 👆🏽
✍🏻 Claire Fuller
🍿Fast Times at Ridgemont High
🎤 Frank Ocean
🎵 Fly Away https://youtu.be/cJMeTmdfNWk

What you got @Allylu @KarenUK @Megabooks

^^Grief of parent losing seven-year-old child, person suspended in time, imagining lost possibility, listing places mother can continue to find her daughter: in the world‘s whispers, in the sea, in the garden, in candlelight, in the sunrise, in another young girl in the street. This book does investigate healing from grief rather well, though with a tip towards suppression & sentimentality rather than rage/bargaining.

Domestic novel / romance / epistolary / whodunnit mashup. Two generations of romance/obsession intertwined. Violette is frustratingly passive, but forges her path by the end. Something withheld—characters indirect. Evocative, atmospheric. Largely set in a cemetery in Bourgogne, lush gardens & graves. Grief, guilt, forgiveness, finding family. Change of person/POV inconsistent. LONG—one edit more? Cheesy but lovely. Prose lulls, hypnotizing. 2018

There is a particular cemetery in Burlington, edged by Lake Champlain, that I love to walk in. These photos don‘t do justice to the beauty, serenity and peace found there. This morning I suddenly realized how much it reminded me of the home of my favorite character, Violette, from my favorite book, Fresh Water for Flowers. 💕

I can see why this has been a litsy hit! #HeapsMorePraise This tender story about a French cemetery keeper is a triumph of found family and healing.

Violette grew up an orphan and married a no-good man in her teens. They work at a railroad crossing, and V is raising their daughter, the joy of her life. When a terrible tragedy strikes, he looks for answers while she turns inward. Later, she meets a man whose dead mother had an unusual request.

#AlphabetGame Letter F

I was planning to only choose books that I read a long time ago so I wouldn‘t be digging the books again that you‘ve already heard me rambling about!

But I can‘t ignore this one, last year‘s favorite 🤷🏻‍♀️🥰

One of the #womenintranslation books I am hoping to get to this month

Have you read this? What did you think? I am currently enamoured with French writing.
#alphabetgame #letterf @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

#sundayfunday

1. I don‘t think it matters if your thumb is green,I think it matters whether or not you enjoy it and what it gives to you,I started this about 30 yrs ago when it was just dirt I have had many failures in some plants dying but other successes with so many taking root and thriving.
2 Fresh Water for Flowers in this story used gardening to inspire friendship&healing ❤️‍🩹
3. My library sale I picked up Gardening Hints and Tips