A soft pick for me. Brilliant in its structure with the story of a tycoon and his wife told from 4 different perspectives. Just so…much…..finance.
My messily written Boobspin list. #Bookspin @TheAromaofBooks
Hmmm….I need to think about this one more. Soft pick but might grow on me more. Very ambiguous ending. About grief, anger, feeling on the outside because of economic background, cultural background, temperment, and evil evil Alexa-like devices. I did take several Mexican-Indigenous/American authors with me on vacation, and enjoying the overlaps. Vampires of El Norte and tagged both feature cucuys, the Spanish/Mexican boogeyman.
Thanks for the tag @AnnR ! Gardening and watching Star Trek with my Dad. Baking with my mom. And traveling with both of the . I hope I‘m remembered for contributing to river and fisheries restoration efforts. Just started tagged yesterday….is it a take on the Sackler family? Intrigued. @Eggs #wondrouswednesday
I suspect this won‘t be everyone‘s cup of tea as a slow-paced novel. I have a serious book hangover though. Beautiful writing. 5 stars for me. A servant girl flees the colony Jamestown in the 1600s and makes her way through the land. A contemplation on survival and death, and strangely uplifting.
Loving this pyschological horror book. Beware of Alexa! And how lovely to read a horror book with the daily vulture who comes to the pool at our Mexican rental house. We‘ve had black vultures, turkey vultures, tropical king birds and a snake all come for a drink.
I love Roz Chast and her off-the-wall humorous New Yorker cartoons. This collection was just okay for me, mostly because I‘m not particularly fond of listening to descriptions of dreams. But some funny ones for sure.
I loved the setting: 1840s northern Mexico (current south Texas), Rancheros defending their land, cattle and lives from the Yanquis working to take over. And vampires! And insight into the class hierarchies and treatment of women. And deep love between a working vaquero and a daughter of a Patron. But I don‘t read romances and these veered too much that way for me. So me, not the book.
I loved the setting: 1840s northern Mexico (current south Texas), Rancheros defending their land, cattle and lives from the Yanquis working to take over. And vampires! And insight into the class hierarchies and treatment of women. And deep love between a working vaquero and a daughter of a Patron. But I don‘t read romances and this veered too much that way for me. So me, not the book.
I‘m on vacation for #joyousjanuary. It‘s minus 7 degrees in my town. Happy to be reading and hanging out with the resident black vultures that visit our pool at our house in Mexico we are sharing with friends. Plan to finish the tagged book, a Joy Harjo poetry collection, Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse and The Thing Between Us by Gus Moreno. @Andrew65
Sharing a house with friends in Mexico. I‘m leaving this collection out on the communal table so all can enjoy if they so choose.
All the stars. I was not expecting to love this book so much. I‘m not into gaming. At all. And yet this novel spoke to me in so many ways. Really, it is about how we deal with grief and loss in life, about friendship. I got a bit teary towards the end.
Definitely doing #readaway2024. Here are the print books I brought on vacation as a start. I also want to get through some lingering chunksters including Anna Karina, Ninth Street Women, Ducks Newburyport. Also Brothers Karamazov! So glad @BarkingMadRead is leading us on a group read! @DieAReader @Andrew65 @GHABI4ROSES
Seems an appropriate book for where I‘m sitting. The minuses of over-developed tourism. Loved reading Hiaasen on my trip to Florida last year! So funny although some of his writing hasn‘t aged well. But happy to have escaped the cold weather to Mexico! Also, any good recommendations for Mexican history books?
Many thanks to the organizers of Scarathlon! I was away from internet as much as possible—we had a beautiful October fall in the Inland NW USA! So I didn‘t participate much here but I did have a good reading month. Word count 1600, bucket list 30,spooky reads and regular reads 110, 2 readathons 2600 points. 3740 combined with first half month: 32,220 points. Thank you @Bookwormjillk ! #teambookloverrs
Love the history & themes SMG uses. Set in 80s Mexico City in the movie industry. Sound editor getting squeezed out of jobs by sexist boss & an actor w/waning career due to old scandal, childhood friends, meet film director who years ago worked on films with Nazi occultists. Spooky evil magic story ensues when they agree to help director dub an old film. Next up: Bad Cree. #scarathlon #TeamBookLovers
Had it not been for the #scarathlon word count stats for this book, I would have few points to offer #teambooklovers halfway through the month. But this gory novel offered an embarrassment of riches. So despite few posts, not having my bingo points together except for the 24 hour and quick sprints, I managed 27,328 points, 27,120 from this book alone!. @Bookwormjillk
Love SGJ but I‘m not into slasher movies and this is an homage to slashers as was the first in this trilogy. Loved his dark humor as always and themes of gentrification, stolen land. One chapter about the ghost girl Stacey Grqves haunting the drowned town under Indian Lake was especially beautifully written. So a so-so read for me.
Looking forward to #OutstandingOctober readathon! The weather has been fabulous the past 2 weeks in the Inland NW of USA so little time spent reading and little time w/ decent cell or internet. Need to catch up on #Scarathlon for #TeamBOOklovers! Need to read tagged—I‘m sucked in just 10 pages in! Want to finish Don‘t Fear the Reaper, Silver Nitrate and Beware the Woman. Weather is changing, time@for some cozy reading. @Andrew65
I‘m only now posting my #bookspinbingo card! #bookspin is Silver Nitrate—already a bit into that one. And looking forward to Beware the Woman. Filled the board with monsters, murders and mysteries! #scarathlon #TeamBOOklovers
Late posting due to little cell/internet access (which I love). Did more than 20 chapters and read 12-plus hours! Made great progress on Silver Nitrate, Silvia Morena-Garcia's newest, Merlin Sheldrake's Entangled Life, and SGJ's Fear the Reaper, which was the perfect creepy book to be reading on an Idaho lake, since it takes place on such a lake, and I know the country and setting well. Thanks @Andrew65 for hosting another #20in4 #readathon!
#scarathlon Without thinking, brought SGJs sequel to My Heart is a Chainsaw up to our boat. First book featured a murderous rampage on an Idaho lake w/ themes of colonialism, gentrification, slasher films. Where am I reading it? At night in a deserted marina on an Idaho lake, a place also feeling the squeeze of wealthy people from elsewhere taking over. End of season, all lights are turned off too.. which I like. But…ooh. #BOOklovers 😳😳🔪🔪
Only about 70 pages in so will be finishing this wonderful book in October. I‘m lovin‘ the lichens! And (mostly) black cover! Yay first day of #scarathlon! Black. #photochallenge #BOOklovers
#Scarathlon bucket list ready to go! #TeamBOOklovers @AllDebooks Need to think about a Halloween costume!
It's not too late to sign up for #scarathlon, my favorite Litsy community event of the year. Fun challenges and a great opportunity to dive into those monster stories and spooky thrillers. My most anticipated read of the month is tagged! Sign up here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdnawYo1IDsBAr2s_LlqzBQlxM8KGwIqDxE1Dm4... @staycurious @clwojick @bookwormjillk #BOOkLovers
1. Spending a spring or fall day out in nature with my border collie Jackson, hiking, birdwatching and reading, solo. 2. My love of cheese and a cocktail at night. I eat healthy but I need to ratchet it up so that I stay in remission from cancer. 3. I haven‘t really gotten back to the gym since Covid. I need to do that. And—I want to make a habit of sending a card, making a small unexpected gesture to a friend once a week.
Terrible photo and messy handwriting, but my dark and spooky #Bookspingbingo list for October. Indigenous and Mexican authors and some well known writers I‘ve not yet read. Early bird points for #scarathlon @Bookwormjillk @TheAromaofBooks #TeamBOOklovers
1. I‘ve had a bit of a bad reading month…too many books going at once. But I think it will be the tagged! I love fungi. I‘m loving the beautiful poetic writing and the information. 2. Reading some spooky books and getting some solo fall fishing/camping in and reading in front of the camp fire! #TwoForTuesday @TheSpineView
1. Fish feeder at salmon farm 17 yr. Don‘t eat farmed salmon to this day. Became a life long wild salmon advocate. Salmon farms do great harm to estuaries and spread disease to imperiled wild salmon. 2. Not ones I‘ve been paid for, other than the occasional stint as an assistant in commercial river trips. 3. Burned out spectacularly in an advocacy career. Climbing out of the ashes and balance is my main priority! @Eggs #wonderouswednesday
A soft pick for me. Beautiful prose. Loved the structure. Love her poems. Just so much focus on bitter divorce and mothering and that‘s not my favorite cup of tea.
My boat book for the weekend. I‘ve been waiting for DJD‘s next novel for more than 20 years. Brothers K is one of my favorite all time novels. The River Why was the first literary fiction set in the landscape where I grew up and made a big impression on me at 22. Twenty years later is was hell of a lot of fun to end up working with David on efforts to remove 4 large dams to restore Columbia-Snake salmon & steelhead runs. Yay! He finished it!!
My #BookspinBingo list for September! Trying to finish some buddy reads that are half or two-thirds done! I will commit to finishing or officially DNFing Villette and Middlemarch! I have some chunksters on this board so not expecting a Bingo but who knows! @TheAromaofBooks
Oh I think I judge my mysteries too harshly. But again this #Doublespin was a so-so soft pick. I really enjoyed the plot and Sweden setting. A cop and his son who follows in his footsteps are wrapped into story of unsolved rapes/murders. But oh, so overwritten. This is debut novel. The author was just trying to be too….deep? Literary? There are many hilarious sentences . Get over yourself. Focus on the story!
My #Doublespin. I appreciated the read after spending a week in Iceland this month. But a so-so-so. I liked the MC, a female detective. I didn‘t like how many mistakes the author had her make. And I sure as hell didn‘t like the “twist” at the end. Think I‘m donr with Nordic noir for awhile and will pick up some Tana French again.
Looking forward to diving into this one! Sitting on the boat watching ospreys fish and woodpeckers peck.
A really great overview of Le Guin and her novels and other writings. I need to read more of her! https://www.nytimes.com/article/ursula-k-leguin-best-books.html?smid=url-share
Had a grand day in Dublin. Started an appropriate book AND did the Dublin Literary Pub Crawl tour hosted by actors Kevin and Frank. All the love. Afterwards visiting over whisky I told them I might cajole some fellow literary lovers into a Joyce readalong. Ulysses, anyone?
Thanks for the tag @The_Penniless_Author ! I don‘t have kids so I don‘t pay close,attention but I think first week of,September? Hmmm….Normal People by Sally Rooney. @TheSpineView
Traveling for an extended period and different situations so no room to pick up books. But I thoroughly enjoyed my hour in this lovely Galway Ireland bookshop. One takeaway: I am obsessed with American writer Percival Everett. He gets so little attention in my American city, and so few book lovers I know are familiar with him (although that is changing). Two of his novels were predominately displayed here: The Trees and Dr. No. WTF America?
My Icelandic read! Gorgeous waterfall in the West Fjords. This mystery is set on a nearby Island, Flatey in the 1960s. Two deaths occur associated with a book of Icelandic sagas connected to the island and a riddle based on the book—the Flatey Enigma. Read this not for the mystery, but for the window into the isolated, Iceland island living circa 1960. Loved the descriptions, the characters. They survived on potatoes, seal, fish and puffins.
I‘m traveling a month in a different part of the world, so not participating in #foodandlit but wanted to give a shout out to Lizano sauce, which I filled my suitcase with. Required ingredient for the national Costa Rica dish Gallo Pinto. Here is one of my Gallo Pinto breakfasts at a small motel in the Cloud Forest. He took me into the kitchen to show me how to make it. The manager https://www.fusioncraftiness.com/lizano-sauce-from-costa-rica/
Traveling Ireland. Appreciating tagged history. Chatted a long time w/ fellow book lover Glen (in the middle) over Irish whiskey at the Hole in The Wall in Kilkenny. We talked about our love of Steinbeck, Kesey, tagged book and Richard Powers‘ The Overstory. He forgave me for not liking Kerouac. An Irish forester who‘d lived in Montana, we talked long on forest conservation. And why Americans voted for a fascist like Trump. #bookscanuniteus
1. It‘s a rare day I don‘t read or listen to a book. 2. I read to explore and understand the world and also to escape it when I need to. People who read, grow up reading have larger brain centers supporting empathy studies show. Thanks @Eggs #wondrouswednesday
It‘s only appropriate that my #Bookspin would be the tagged Icelandic noir while I‘m traveling Iceland. Photo is of the farthest western point in Europe in the West Fjords that also hosts the largest bird colony in Europe. Puffins are damn cute! #doublespin is a Swedish noir Blaze Me a Sun. @TheAromaofBooks
A bar/bookstore with live music across from our Airbnb in Reykjavik. Love it! And enjoying the tagged noir mystery set in the islands off the West Fjords where we are headed next. Set in the 1960s, a cryptographer studying one of the original saga books is found dead. Another dead body is found with a Viking symbol carved in its back. A young lawyer from Reykjavík is sent up to help solve the crimes. Moody, slow-paced, descriptive story.
I would probably not have gotten around to reading this had it not been for #camplitsy. While I enjoyed Rodham, I thought there would be other novels I‘d rather be reading. I enjoyed this so much more than I expected. Fun, funny great audiobook to listen to while doing chores and running errands in preparation for a long vacation. I laughed out loud so many times. Main character writes for SNL show connects with musician guest starring.