My favorite spot to chill (which is reading for me 🙃) is in the corner of this couch with a lot of cushions and my tbr shelves nearby calling out to me! #DecemberChill

Day 2 of #DecemberChill!

📸 let‘s see some chill photos!!! Do you live in a snowy climate? Maybe you ski? Perhaps, chillin is a beach stroll with your 4 legged friends? Browsing a bookshop or sipping a beverage in a cozy spot? Feel free to share your snaps and let us enjoy the moments with you😍

I know what I‘ll be doing for the upcoming months! Hunting the rooster! I‘ve read five so far and have Matrix on my shelves. I voted for The Trees as my zombie. I love the Tournament of Books! #tob22

https://themorningnews.org/article/the-2022-tournament-of-books-shortlist-and-ju...

Yay! My #jolabokaflodswap parcel arrived already. I can‘t see who to thank for it without opening it, which I won‘t do until Christmas Eve, but know that it arrived safely! Thank you so much ❤️❤️

Where I live there is a so called ‘Top 2000‘ on the radio from December 26-31. It‘s always something to look forward to. Everyone can vote for up to 35 favorite songs and for me it‘s the ultimate #DecemberChill. We‘re listening day and night and it brings back so many memories. Pictured are the songs I voted for, last year‘s Top 2000 you find here:

https://open.spotify.com/user/spotify/playlist/37i9dQZF1DWTmvXBN4DgpA?si=CdmARxQ...

The fun is about to begin! #DecemberChill has started 💃🕺💃🕺

🎼what music do you relax to during these chilly days? Is it jazz, acoustic or coffeehouse blues? Maybe colder days means Holiday music? Whatever you prefer, we want to hear it! Share your playlist with us! 🎧🎶♥️

My December plans. Lots of books I‘ve been excited about. Some #ToBlonglist books, a couple of buddyreading books, the last one for Asia and the first ones for Africa. For example Out of Africa, which is my #bookspin as well. The #Doublespin is The Dead Girls‘ Class Trip.

My favorite-author-of-2021 posted on Instagram about her nomination on Goodreads and when I commented on that, she LIKED it! Haha, it‘s silly I know, but it feels cool to see her name appear on my feed!

Yes!! It‘s here! #pop22

Who‘s in?! https://www.popsugar.com/entertainment/reading-challenge-2022-48569820/amp

Our #DecemberChill #buddyread is this weekend and it‘s time to prepare!

Friday Dec 3: 🎧what music do you relax to during these chilly days? Is it jazz, acoustic or blues? Holiday music? Let‘s hear it 🎶

Saturday Dec 4: 📸 Share some chill photos! A beach stroll with your dog, having coffee with a friend, building a snowman?? Anything goes!

Sunday Dec 5: 📚 #DrZ. Discussion starts here at 2 PM EST, 7 PM GMT, 8 PM CET

#Novemberstats #Novemberwrapup #bookspin #doublespin

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Een goede moeder (Dutch)

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️✨
Real Life

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Pillars of Salt
School for Love
Intimacies
The Trees

⭐️⭐️⭐️✨
At Night‘s End

⭐️⭐️⭐️
No Exit
An Untouched House
On the Road
He Started It
My Life in Doha

⭐️⭐️✨
Wittgenstein‘s Mistress

This is a book about retribution for all the black people that have been lynched in the US. White men are being killed and mutilated. First in Mississippi, but soon all over the country.

Special agents come investigating what is happening. Everett‘s dialogues are sharp and funny, as always. The plot is extremely violent. A challenging and brutal pageturner. #ToBLonglist

(Pic: First snow of the year!)

With #Jordan (Pillars of Salt) and #Qatar (My Life in Doha) finished in November, I have now just the Philippines left to finish #ReadingAsia2021. I saved this one for December to combine my read with #FoodAndLit.

I hope to start and finish my chosen book (America is not the Heart) soon, so I can maybe make an early start with #ReadingAfrica2022!

#WeeklyForecast 48/21

Two more books from the #ToBLonglist and one to finish #Booked2021, #ReadingAsia2021 and #FoodAndLit. Let‘s do this!

You absolutely didn‘t need to do this Vansa but I‘m thrilled with these early Christmas 🎄 presents! I love your choices! The Tokyo noir seems right up my alley but I also am curious of the Indian book you chose for me. Thank you so much 💚💚

#BookReport 47/21

I had a good week! Loved the tagged one and also Intimacies. Doha and the Winman were okay reads for me.

My choices for December. The month of finishing challenges, starting new ones, do some buddyreading and read thrillers by the Christmas tree 🎄

Sarah, I‘m in for #bookspin, #doublespin and #bookspinbingo. Thanks 😘

I enjoyed this quiet novel quite a lot. The narrator has moved temporarily to the Netherlands to work as an interpreter for the International Court of Justice. She has met a few very different people and the story tells about her connection to them and the ethical implications of her job. She wants to belong, to the Court and The Hague, the city she now lives in, but can she? #ToBLonglist

What a surprise! Dear Liz, I‘m ridiculously happy with this book! It‘s longlisted for the ToB, it‘s about Colombia and it‘s a beautiful edition! Thank you so much for your friendship and kindness! Please tell me when is your birthday 🙏 (I don‘t think you‘re on the Litsy calendar)!
PS how clever to order it via a Dutch bookstore!
😘😘

#UnpopularOpinion Unfortunately I did not enjoy this book as much as I expected to. While I mostly enjoy character-driven novels, I do want some sort of plot too. Considering how many decades this story spans, I was expecting a bit more of that. Instead I was sidetracked by keeping track of all characters and all dialogues - without quotation marks. So I am afraid I didn‘t get as much out of the book as I had hoped, based on all reviews I read.

I think I received your gift Jessie and I am SO happy with it! I love Sarah Waters and I‘ve heard the best things about this specific one. Thank you so much!! ❤️❤️

The author and her Arab Muslim husband move to #Qatar. She came from the Philippines, raised Catholic, and met him in the US where they both attended med school. It is fascinating how she found her way in this conservative country, staying true to her beliefs. She even works as a cardiologist while raising 5 kids. I just wish she would be a bit more critical about what definitely is not the most correct country on earth.

#ReadingAsia2021 🇶🇦

#weeklyforecast 47/21

I started Still Life and the beginning is gooood! I am also starting My Life in Doha for #ReadingAsia2021 and will be trying to read a book from the #ToB22 longlist each week until the shortlist is announced. Looking forward to all of these!

Why do people hurt eachother so much? And themselves? Why being so hard on yourself and one another? This book is real life. Not mine, but it feels so real. Wallace does and my heart goes out to him. The loneliness of the black gay boy trying to fit in the the white Midwest. Hiding in science. All that anger and the feeling of not being worthy of love. All the misunderstandings but also the tenderness. The book touched me deeply. #bookspin #pop21

#BookReport 46/21

Tagged is my favorite book of the week. Both others were okay. I am so glad I‘m reading again and enjoying it!

This book pulled me right in. I loved My Lovely Wife and had high expectations. Three siblings go on a road trip through the US to bury their grandfather‘s ashes by which they will earn their inheritance. I soon discovered they are all unreliability and have their secrets. The tension builds up fine but in the end I felt let down. Between a pick and a so-so.

#Booked2022 My #Autumn choices:

19 dark academia: In the Freud archives
20 a coming out story: At swim, two boys
21 hopepunk: The Anthropocene reviewed
22 mythology retelling: A thousand ships
23 adapted for small screen: Vanity Fair
24 MC living with aids: Splendor

#Booked2022 My #Summer choices:

13 includes a recipe: Green fried tomatoes at the…
14 set in Canada: The tenderness of wolves
15 involves an exploration: An African in Greenland
16 about sisters: The Makioka sisters
17 new in 2022: The trees
18 set in a hotel: The diver‘s clothes lie empty

#Booked2022 My #Spring choices:

7 about a royal: She would be king
8 written by a journalist: Blood river
9 author born in Africa: We need new names
10 own prompt (Dutch): Dit is mijn hof
11 nautical: And the sea will tell
12 murder mystery: The Aosawa murders

I‘ve finally come up with my plans for #Booked2022. They will no doubt change completely but I think it‘s fair to assume a lot of them will be used for #ReadingAfrica2022 as well.

Here are my #Winter choices:

1 about religion: Matrix
2 title repeats itself: What is the What
3 set in China: Land of Big Numbers
4 weather term in title: Empire of the Sun
5 black-owned publisher: Baho!
6 eco-feminist: Wij zijn licht (Dutch)

#NYRBBookClub

During the closing stages of WWII recently orphaned young Felix arrives in Jerusalem at the boarding house of a sort-of-relative, the hilarious Miss Bohun.
She is taking as much money as she can from her houseguests, while also pretending to be self-sacrificing and motivated entirely by kindness.
At first the reader picks up on much more of this drama than Felix does but then a new boarder arrives, the young widow Mrs. Ellis. ⬇️

In this very experimental book Kate muses about life and art. She seems to have travelled the world, even lived in museums. But I can‘t be sure, her thoughts are so chaotic it was hard to follow. Some wonderful insights though, like this one: “One of the things people generally admired about Van Gogh, even though they were not always aware of it, was the way he could make even a chair seem to have anxiety in it. Or a pair of boots”. #1001books

#WeeklyForecast 46/21 (more of a #restoftheyearforecast actually!)

Okay, here‘s the plan. On the left are the books I need to read to finish #Booked2021, #ReadingAsia2021, #pop21, #52booksin21 and keep up with the #NYRBbookclub.
On the right are the books I want to read (longlist #ToB22), birthday presents etc.

It seems doable I think. Now I just have to start them. Oh and the tagged book is the one I am currently reading 🤦🏻‍♀️🤣

#BookReport 45/21

I haven‘t read any book of my forecast, not one book for the challenges or the buddyreads. Just these 200 pages 🤦🏻‍♀️

Look at this! Thank you lovely friends for your wonderful birthday gifts and thoughts! I haven‘t read any of them 💃 and feel spoiled!! ❤️❤️❤️

Thanks @Ruthiella for spreading the longlist of the #ToB22. I ❤️ this tournament!
I read 10 of them and I‘d like to read some more before the shortlist will be announced in a few weeks. So I could do with some recommendations by you guys!

Here‘s the longlist: https://themorningnews.org/article/the-year-in-fiction-2021

I liked this book more than I expected. I had been dreading it for years but I actually had a good time on the road with Sal and his crazy friends! The book is a tribute to America. The country, the scenery and the people. A bit cliché at times but still enjoyable. #1001books

Look at this oldie. I got this old edition from my grandfather and read it in 1990. For 31 years it has been sitting on my shelves and now I‘m picking it up again for #DecemberChill. Let‘s see….

#WeeklyForecast 45/21

Today I finished the 2 books I was reading and now I‘m unsure what to pick up. I‘m thinking of the tagged one but I also have to start The Diviners for the #manawakans buddyread as well as School for Love for the #NYRBbookClub. And now that I‘m writing this I realize I forgot to add #DrZ for #DecemberChill, which I really must start too. So much required reading makes me unmotivated and escaping in a podcast 🤫😇

In the last months of WWII a partisan enters an abandoned villa in a luxury seaside resort, somewhere in Central Europe. Initially it is a peaceful place to stay. When a German regiment arrives for quartering, he pretends he is the owner of the house and leaves the ground floor to the Germans. Then the real owner returns unexpectedly.

This is a novella of a deceptive simplicity, behind which lies a particularly complex constructed story.

And then this happened today! Yay! My next goal is to reach the same amount of books (186!!) I read last year, the year of staying at home 🦠

This book is written by a Dutch author whose kids went to school with mine. ‘A Good Mother‘ is the story of his ex, the mother of their kids. Set in our neighborhood, I recognize almost everything and anyone but I never knew that living has been so hard for the mother.⬇️⬇️

(Pic: Isle of Skye, Scotland)

#BookReport 44/21

Three completely different books. All good, but my favorite was Pillars of Salt.

Two woman confined in a mental hospital in #Jordan share their life stories. One is a Bedouin, one a woman from the city. At first glance they seem different, but soon they discover that they have so much in common: life was hard for women no matter what.

#ReadingAsia2021 🇯🇴 #pop21 #bookwitmineralintitle

And here‘s the winner of the #Booker prize. I am not really surprised, I can understand why it won. Congratulations to Galgut 🎈
I enjoyed reading this book but I rooted for either Bewilderment or No One is Talking About This!

Jonatan wakes up in a messy hotel room in Mexico to discover that he has told everyone that his best friend Joël is dead. However, Joël is still alive. We follow Jonatan‘s chaotic thoughts and jumps in time to learn about their friendship growing up in Jerusalem, and their current, troubled relationship.⬇️⬇️

This fast moving thriller reads like a movie. A woman gets stuck in a highway rest stop during a blizzard in the Rocky Mountains. She discovers one of the people she is stuck with, has abducted a child and is determined to save that child. Entertaining yet forgettable! Between a so-so and a pick.

#OctoberStats #OctoberWrapUp #bookspinbingo #bookspin

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
The Woman in the Purple Skirt
Bewilderment
Summerwater
The Secret Lives of Church Ladies
The Nothing Man

⭐️⭐️⭐️✨
Beautiful World Where Are You
Sovietistan
The Promise

⭐️⭐️⭐️
The Leavers
A Bird in the House
Never Fall Down
The Woman Upstairs

DNF
Beloved

We are delighted to announce #ReadingAfrica2022! Join @Librarybelle and me on a year long challenge to read books set in each African country or by an African author. Track your reading by signing up for the challenge using the link below. Post throughout the year with #ReadingAfrica2022 and tag us! Tagged are people who have been involved or interested in #ReadingAsia2021 but the challenge is open to anyone!

https://forms.gle/tKdCCsxttXxcex6p9

#WeeklyForecast 44/21

In progress: the tagged one, which is entertaining, and At Night‘s End. Next will be one for #ReadingAsia2021, and a Dutch one, written by a successful Dutch author who I happen to know.