Welcome to Litsy!

Another really good book by Erdrich. I love the banter of her characters.

It‘s a really strange story- read the blurb. If you like this author I think you‘ll enjoy this one.

“When you don‘t have a mother, as I never did, you have to make one. Get yourself a piece of clay and shape in your fingers and the shape you always make will be a mother. Or press her together of mud and sticks. Sometimes a tree would do, gnarled around me. Bundles of reeds. I used a blanket rolled and bunched in the shape of her. Rags. Sometimes there was a little extra stew in the pot and I stole it and said to myself she gave it to me.”

It‘s now teetering on the edge of being too hot (for both of us!) to stay on the porch much longer, but if there is anything more delicious than Sunday morning outdoor time with a dog and a book, I don‘t know what it is. ♥️🐕📚

“Arguments were best indulged in and dispensed with while the sun shone. Things were quieter at night. Hurtful words hurt more, and doubts cut more deeply.”

A grand story, with grand lessons and symbolism all in 145 pages.

Forward by Ann Patchett, who brought this book back into print.

While visiting Nashville, I toured Cheekwood Estate. This is a dumbwaiter in a nook off the library. They used it to easily get books up to and down from the second floor for reading in the bedrooms. Genius.
(I started the tagged book while on this trip.)

First entry in the Chicago Mystery, and it promises to be a great series. The primary character, Cass Raines used to be a cop. She left after being involved in a shooting caused by an incompetent cop who escalated what should have been the arrest of a teenager. Now she‘s a PI, and in this story she‘s seeking the killer of a priest who cared for her when she lost her mother. Good story, great characters. Well worth reading.

Not many people can tell a tale like the Irish ☘️ 5 Stars

The All of It by Jeannette Haien revolves around Father Declan, an Irish priest, who learns a disturbing secret about two of his parishioners, Kevin and Enda, who were siblings living as husband and wife. The story unfolds through Enda's confessions, exploring themes of sin, love, and morality. ⬇️

This one goes a little off the rails in the last 25%, and a couple of the relationship details don't always make emotional sense to me, but I did enjoy Golden's take on the "offer too good to be true" haunted house trope. The audiobook narrators each did an excellent job, but the switch between the two voices could have been a little more seamless with different engineering, I think.

I finished my first #aardvarkbookclub pick and my first book here in Virginia. It was okay; not great but not terrible. Thankfully my new home is not haunted or possessed.😁
June #Bookspin Selection
@thearomaofbooks