My Month in Books
Even though I didn't read anything at all during the last week of June, I still read 17 books and most of them were 4 or 5 star reads. The books I read are mostly romance, which is typical for my summer reading, and I also knocked out a couple of longer, more demanding titles. Here is the full list.
40 Re-Reads Before 40
I didn't read as many books for this project in June as I had hoped, partly because a lot of the books I want to re-read aren't available on audio, and that's been my preferred reading method. But I did listen to two re-reads: Life Among the Savages by Shirley Jackson (5 stars), which was every bit as funny the second time around and On Writing by Stephen King (5 stars), which I hadn't realized was a source of a lot of the "rules" I give myself when I write fiction.
Challenges and Book Clubs
For my personal #EbookSummer challenge I fulfilled 4 squares on the Bingo board. Love and Other Great Expectations by Becky Dean (5 stars) counted is an ARC, Jill Came Tumbling by Julie Christianson (4 stars) is a novella, The Love Connection by Denise Williams (4 stars) has "love" in the title, and All in Good Time by Carolyn Astfalk (5 stars) is by a favorite author. Love and Other Great Expectations is a YA romance involving a literary-themed scavenger hunt in the UK. It was delightful. Jill Came Tumbling was well-written but I've already forgotten the details of the story. I enjoyed The Love Connection a lot, but I heard the second book in the series had some content that I prefer to avoid and I won't be reading it. All in Good Time was great. It was an emotional rollercoaster at times, but very believable and very relatable for Catholic moms.
With my husband and our friend, I read Mohawk Valley by Ronald Welch (4 stars), which deviated a bit from the formula of the other titles in the series in a way that I enjoyed.
With Close Reads, I finally finished Tess of the D'urbervilles by Thomas Hardy (4 stars). I'm glad I read it and I like the way Hardy writes, even though it was a depressing tragedy.
For #WorldFullofBooks, the theme was popular books. I read Part of Your World by Abby Jimenez (5 stars) and Book Lovers by Emily Henry (3 stars). Part of Your World was great; Book Lovers was kind
of a let-down.
The Goldberry reading challenge prompt was a book your husband or father loves. My husband asked me to read Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco (4 stars). It's a strange book with many passages I didn't understand, but it also made me laugh and it made me think. It was worth picking up.
The prompt for the Buzzword Reading Challenge was a book with "all" in the title, so I counted All in Good Time by Carolyn Astfalk.
For the Read Your Bookshelf challenge, the prompt was a book with a book on the cover. I listened to Meet Me in the Margins by Melissa Ferguson (3 stars). It was a good story, but not very memorable.
Mood Reading
The other books I picked up this month were all chosen at random, and all were audiobooks. I listened to Dear Reader by Cathy Rentzenbrink (5 stars) after seeing it recommended on Instagram. It was a nice look at the reading life, and at re-reading, which seemed appropriate given my own re-reading project. Word by Word by Anne Lamott (5 stars) is a short lecture based on her book, Bird by Bird, which I read and enjoyed in 2021. The lecture had different enough content that it was worth listening to even after reading the book. The Cartographers by Peng Shepherd (5 stars) was recommended in the Modern Mrs. Darcy Summer Reading Guide, and it was a surprise big hit with me. It's a mystery involving maps and it's a little bit fantastical, and I loved it. Love, Lists, and Fancy Ships by Sarah Grunder Ruiz (5 stars) is another one I saw on Instagram, recommended by a writer friend, and it was really good. I loved the details of working for a charter boat company. Finally, I listened to Joyland by Stephen King (4 stars), which was recommended on What Should I Read Next when the guests were the hosts from A Strong Sense of Place. It was not scary.
As for the rest of the family's reading...
A (girl, 2 years 3 months)
- The Big Scream by by Kirsti Call and Denis Angelov
- I Am a Baby by Bob Shea
R (boy, 2 years 3 months)
- I Am a Baby by Bob Shea
- Truckery Rhymes by Jon Scieszka
- I Am a Backhoe by Anna Grossnickle Hines
E (girl, 4 years 8 months)
- Elmer and the Dragon by Ruth Stiles Gannett
- The Dragons of Blueland by Ruth Stiles Gannett
- B is for Betsy by Carolyn Haywood
C (girl, 6 years 9 months)
- Ramona and her Father by Beverly Cleary
- Mr. Popper's Penguins by Florence and Richard Atwater
M (girl, 8 years 7 months)
- The King's Beard by Leonard Wibberley
My husband
- Mohawk Valley by Ronald Welch
- Eusebius the Phoenician by Christopher Webb
- Hittite Warrior by Joanne Williamson
Up Next For Me
I came home from visiting my family in New York with over 50 new-to-me used books. I hope to read a couple of those in July, along with A Month in the Country by J.L. Carr for Close Reads, The Scarlet Letter and Franny and Zooey as two of my re-reads, and possibly The Italian Teacher by Tom Rachman to go along with the #WorldFullofBooks theme, Italy.
I'm adding this post to the link-up for An Open Book at CatholicMom.com.
No comments:
Post a Comment