Amy, Happy Birthday!!!!!! ðŸŽðŸŽ‚🎈🎉🎆

This looks great! :). I am still trying to pick which keywords I want to use. I may use the topics..... I finished Chloe Neill's Biting Cold https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11746102-biting-cold. It is the sixth book in her paranormal series. I stopped reading these last year when she killed off my favorite character. I needed an author whose name stared with an N and this was available. It was actually pretty good since my favorite character was magically brought back to life. For real. ;). Maybe I will read more as needed. This is the type of books that I normally use for the spelling challenges. I have moved on to my very last Bingo book, A Tan and Sandy Silence. It's a Travis McGee thriller by John Macdonald. There are many in this series and I have never made it beyond the first few pages of any. I am proud to say I have made it to 11% and finishing won't be painful. I still like Lee Child's Reacher far more. Reacher was modelled on the McGee character. BTW, I recently discovered there is a Reacher movie starring Tom Cruise on Amazon Prime. I watched a few minutes of it but decided Cruise as Reacher did not work for me, especially since I want to keep reading the books! Here is the trailer

Congratulations!!!

Just downloaded the red shoe book because options are good. :) That category is now solved for sure. I had been thinking of rereading The Scarlet Slipper Mystery fro the Nancy Drew series http://nancydrew.wikia.com/wiki/The_Scarlet_Slipper_Mystery as a tribute to my favorite girl detective. I really loved that one!

You have probably figured out that I don't read much sci fi\ fantasy that involves outer space but one of the challenges last year made me pick up The Long Way to a Small, Angry, Planet https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22733729-the-long-way-to-a-small-angry-planet?ac=1&from_search=true which I really enjoyed. It probably would be considered total fluff by your nephew but I think you would like it! ;) :lol:

:grouphug:

I read Jar City over a year ago at the start of a Scandinavian mystery binge. I remember liking it and I know I gave it 4 stars but not much else. So I can't really compare. I will say one of the reasons I really liked Reykjavik Nights is because the main character is a young police officer. He goes out of his way to solve a crime evolving a homeless man who Erlendur considered a friend when no one else even considers to be a crime. There is also a bit of personal back story that evolves how Erlendur came to be living in Reykjavik that didn't ring any bells which I suspect will be helpful when I go back to reading the series.....or it might not because the book was written after the rest. :lol: There is nothing wrong with not starting with Reykjavik Nights especially since he is so much younger in it but I did like the book.

They must be independent because if they aren't, I am in trouble! Robin would never do that to us. It's supposed to be fun. :). I need to find time to sit down and start trying to match books that I have on lists to the categories. I am going to second Loesje with dropping the page count to 150. I normally have a hard time in one category finding a book that is long enough. It would be nice not to feel guilt because many of my books for Bingo are chunky. Loesje, I hope someone can answer your vocabulary question. I showed it to dd who is my in house expert and she can't think of any similar words in her languages. I am too stressed with finishing my challenges to read an artic book but my author A to Z did take me to Iceland for I, Indridason. Reykjavik Nights https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18803656-reykjav-k-nights has been on my list all year so I was glad to have a good excuse to read it. ;) I really enjoyed it and hadn't expected to. I was advised to start with Jar City which I liked. Reykjavik Nights came close to 5stars for me which might just be because it was the first in the series.

I have no idea how this would work for you but there is an IGCSE for Portuguese http://www.cambridgeinternational.org/programmes-and-qualifications/cambridge-igcse-portuguese-foreign-language-0540/.

This looks like a really good book and it would mark Spain (Spanish author) off my list for next years plans. My overdrive has it which is even better! ;) ErinE I hope you are feeling much better today! I have found a Q for Turquoise thanks to Erin. Her recommendation of The Quant's for my DC will work for me too. It's already reserved so bonus points! In the distant past I really loved the quantitative analysis course I took so I suspect this book will be really interesting. I finished listening to Runemarks by Joanne Harris for my local author Bingo square. It was interesting but I can't say I loved it. I thought I would really enjoy the mythology element and didn't. When I was recording it in Goodreads I discovered she also wrote The Gospel of Loki which I abandoned a few years ago after reading a significant portion of. I would have read her other series if I had known that! https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1877314.Runemarks

We are contemplating a move but external factors are motivating us because of our current home's physical location within our village. We want a new neighbor....it's a building making us unhappy not a person BTW. The house we are in was our only choice at the time we bought it and while it isn't the smallest house we have lived in it does receive an award for smallest kitchen. I used to enjoy cooking. ;) I will be honest and say the current house would be difficult for me with littles around but fictional grandchildren aren't motivating me! Our graduated dc's also have every intention of calling our house home for the next few years and we have discovered that 4 adults living in a house is a bit different than the adult\child mix we are used to. Both dh and I want spots for our hobbies of our own. More counter space in the kitchen would make me happy. We are waiting for a house to come on the market better suited to our needs.

Robin, I hope the cats were inside last night! I finished Sarum this morning! I feel like I should throw a party because it was long. Really, really, long. The characters kept changing. I became so grateful that the author kept using the last name as well as the first. If I was still teaching I would probably be happily dividing this books into sections to use with a good text for a British history course. It wasn’t perfect by any means but it was accurate for the character of the moment in that part of England. It was interesting to see the decedents of a very small group of original people against the backdrop of centuries of history. Someone was burned as a witch, another was convicted of a crime and sent to Australia, emigration to America. It all happened. I have 2hours of The Runemarks left to listen to and then one more book to a Bingo blackout! I also have my Author A to Z to finish....5 books I think. I have to moan for a minute, Turquoise is a long one with lots of vowels. I have saved vowel books to read in December but still need a Q and an E.

Congratulations on 52!!! I just went and put a hold on What Made Mandy Run. Thank you for making the discovery of this book. It definitely sounds like one I need to read.

I love the rain concept because that has been one of my roles in my children's lives so far. Because we home educated someone had to point out things weren't perfect and that person was me. They had to be prepared for the future beyond my school. Life does not always tell you that you are wonderful and bad things happen. I am going to be honest and say I really want to stop being the rain. I don't want to be the rain for life. It's actually the part of home ed that I regret. I would love to just cheer (how easy) but suspect I will always sprinkle a bit. ;)

I am another fan of the older versions but from my experience with dd and Nancy Drew from libraries I wouldn’t t buy beyond number 50 for sure. The newer ones were not nearly as good and she did quit reading the series pretty quickly when those were all she had left. She was spoiled because I had around thirty that I had collected from used bookstores when I was reading them. With the pre 50 ones at least they updated a good story. The Trixie Belden series was also really good. Lots of involvement with the brothers in the storiylines which your boys might like.

I am so impressed that you were able to fix a Beta. Dh will be so jealous he loved his Beta....he bought it when he was a very broke student and it moved with us for almost 20 years before it didn’t work anymore. Our current worry are our vhs home movies of trips, kids, etc. Hubby just got a device to put them onto dvd. That’s so sweet that your dad has all your mom’s 8 tracks still. I am still reading along in Sarum. The Tudor portion took forever. Currently on Cromwell. I am now using it as my carry along book thanks to Kindle. I WILL finish it before Sunday. I have been reading it on and off for months now! Cannot wait to be done.

I am allergic to mussels and I know this from bad experiences not an allergy test. I really liked mussels. 😞 I seem to be OK with everything else so I am just very careful when I am someplace where mussels are seriously on the menu. Food wise a trip to Belgium is hard, mussels are everywhere! I never eat things like Paella just in case. Hubby is allergic to a whole long list of foods including msg. Some things like cucumbers he can just pick out of his salad if he really wants to eat it and is normally fine but msg is hard. At home I keep track of my ingredients and we do fine generally. It’s eating out where things can go bad unexpectedly. For him it’s quantity in terms of how sick he feels but I think he always knows when he has been exposed because of the headache. If he has a whole Chinese meal with msg he is miserable, diarrhea etc.

My dream vacation is a cruise around Australia and New Zealand with a stop over in Singapore. So that's my three all in one go! My choices probably aren't the most exotic but I don't enjoy beach holidays where you just stay at a beach resort much and all the super exotic places could think of are beaches.

By Pathway I am assuming you mean the Amish series. Dd loved them because they were so different from her life. I would definitely give the books a try and see if they click with your child since you already own them! Ds didn’t like them but he did know the stories already because his sister had read them to him! I really don’t remember the workbooks beyond the phonics where we had quite a struggle keeping the names of the different buggies straight! Dd is 19 and those readers are one of the “ Do you remember when we......†from home ed. We recently saw a horse and cart and looked at each other and said “So which cart is that?†😂She doesn’t even remember MCP phonics which we also did.

I recommend Premier Inn as the first choice also. If that doesn’t work out you might want to check Travelodge. We stayed in one ten years ago and vowed never again but friends we travel with on occasion (so we know their expectations) recently had a good experience with a Travelodge that had recently been updated.

My Overdrive has it so I have put it on hold, both print and audio. Both dc’s will br on break for much of December so they should have a chance to read it. It’s perfect because it is mathy so even ds might like it. My ds did not like Hardy Boys either. I think it is a guy thing because I liked Hardy Boys (Dd didn’t). You will enjoy War Games again. We watched it a couple of years ago and it occasionally still makes it into conversation because of the bad tech. It’s also not a bad cautionary tale which is why we pulled it out.....bought a new one. At one time dh had it on Beta.......it’s that old. Kathy, I thought I had you in the multi quote but I guess not. Pretty sure you will enjoy Gone to Dust. It’s definitely in the area where our reading overlap. I think I have read the first couple of the John Sanford Prey books. I can’t really remember them really but I think my not reading the more recent ones probably had more to do with availability and my move than a conscious decision. I think they might be pretty intense in places but that’s it for the memory.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31702740-gone-to-dust I just finished one of the best mysteries I have read in quite awhile. Gone to Dust by Matt Goldman is hopefully the first in a new suspense series with a good main character for the private detective. Definitely professional so not sleuth worthy. ;). This book was unique because the entire scene is covered in dust from hundreds of vacuum bags. How does one sift through that? I will tell you the starting point just because it came up really early in the book............I will leave a blank for people who don’t want to look......... You only look at suspects in the DNA system. Clever right?

Loesje, This article might be helpful. http://www.nancydrewsleuth.com/sleuthing101.html Many here were huge Nancy Drew fans. My mother loved them, I collected them as a 10 yo and still own my early copies. I passed my love on to Dd. When I hear the word sleuth I instantly associate it with Nancy Drew.

I have been trying to figure out how to EASILY share a list of my Asia plans for next year. I think this might be the easiest way for everyone. Think of it as my Dream List ;) ..some I have already read but plan to read more by the author. If I manage six of these I will be pleased. https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/51042385?shelf=asia

Congratulations 🎉🎊