Book a Week 2018 - BW50: Bookish Birthdays and News

[Kareni]

Do you agree or disagree with this piece?

Don’t Buy Me Books!  by Katherine Marciniak

Regards,
Kareni

[Penguin]

22 minutes ago, Kareni said:

Do you agree or disagree with this piece?

Don’t Buy Me Books!  by Katherine Marciniak

Regards,
Kareni

Disagree.  But I don’t feel compelled to read or keep a book just because it was a gift. And really, a book-gift does not take up as much space as some other unwanted gift possibilities.

[Lady Florida.]

33 minutes ago, Kareni said:

Do you agree or disagree with this piece?

Don’t Buy Me Books!  by Katherine Marciniak

Regards,
Kareni

Agree but I mostly prefer ebooks and I use the library extensively. I'm not one who wants to own books. Even before switching to ebooks and even when I used to buy books, very few stayed on my shelves unless I really loved them or intended to read them repeatedly. My belief has always been that books are meant to be read and I'd rather pass a book along or donate it than have it sit on my shelves looking nice. I didn't even mind loaning out a book only to have it never come back. I wouldn't loan books I wasn't willing to lose anyway. 

Edited December 11, 2018 by Lady Florida.

[Robin M]

@Lady Florida.  Hugs and good vibes winging your way.  

36 minutes ago, Kareni said:

Do you agree or disagree with this piece?

Don’t Buy Me Books!  by Katherine Marciniak

Disagree. Some of the books I have been received have been really good and wouldn't have bought them for myself.  Others, well I may change my mind eventually and enjoy them. I don't feel any pressure to read them and other book readers will entirely understand that some books require a certain mind frame to read them.  

[Robin M]

I recently watched Disturbed's rendition of Simon and Garfunkel's The Sound of Silence which is awesome and powerful has stuck with me the past few days. My husband calls it an ear worm which he tried to replace with Slim Whitman's When I'm calling You because we just watched Mars Attack. 😄    Didn't work.   The song was replaying in my head last night while trying to sleep which prompted ideas for a one of my 10 x 10 categories from the video and lyrics. An of course, I had to share.  Dystopia, nature, music, characters who live in silence, all sorts of things popped in my brain. It'll be a work in progress.  What pops in yours once you've watched the video.   

 

 

[Kareni]

A limited time offer from Tor.com ~

Download a Free Ebook of Luna: New Moon by Ian McDonald Before December 15, 2018!

"In Ian McDonald’s Luna: New Moon, the scions of a falling house must navigate a world of corporate warfare to maintain their family’s status in the Moon’s vicious political atmosphere.

 

The Moon wants to kill you.

Maybe it will kill you when the per diem for your allotted food, water, and air runs out, just before you hit paydirt. Maybe it will kill you when you are trapped between the reigning corporations-the Five Dragons-in a foolish gamble against a futuristic feudal society. On the Moon, you must fight for every inch you want to gain. And that is just what Adriana Corta did.

As the leader of the Moon’s newest “dragon,” Adriana has wrested control of the Moon’s Helium-3 industry from the Mackenzie Metal corporation and fought to earn her family’s new status. Now, in the twilight of her life, Adriana finds her corporation-Corta Helio-confronted by the many enemies she made during her meteoric rise. If the Corta family is to survive, Adriana’s five children must defend their mother’s empire from her many enemies… and each other."

Regards,
Kareni

[Violet Crown]

8 hours ago, Lady Florida. said:

I spoke too soon about Emma yesterday. Last I talked to ddil she was taking Emma to her pre-op appointment and expected her to pass, so that's what I told you all. 

She's showing cold symptoms and the doctors don't want to risk any complications, so her surgery has been rescheduled for Jan. 17th. While we want her in tip-top shape it's still a blow for everyone since we were all expecting it to happen this week. Now she has another month of the feeding tube, meds, and carefully supervising her contact (which obviously didn't help and anyway she has a brother in school and one in preschool). 

The one positive is that we won't have to balance a baby either in the hospital or recovering at home with the Christmas excitement of 6 and 4 yo boys. 

Dang. Sorry; best hopes for after Christmas.

[Violet Crown]

Some Scottish writers dh and I have enjoyed reading (and who are neither Robert Louis Stevenson nor Sir Walter Scott) with some of their books:

John Buchan
Catherine Carswell, The Life of Robert Burns
Elspeth Davie
Arthur Conan Doyle
Elizabeth Grant, Memoirs of a Highland Lady
Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song
Alasdair Gray, Lanark
James Hogg, The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner
Robin Jenkins, The Cone Gatherers
David Lindsay, Voyage to Arcturus
Eric Linklater, Magnus Merriman
J. MacDougall Hay, Gillespie
Nancy Morrison, The Gowk Storm
Margaret Oliphant
John Prebble, The Highland Clearances
Muriel Spark
Orkneyinga Saga

Of these, my favorite obscure Scottish fiction books were Margaret Oliphant's very strange Calvinist ghost stories, the gothic Gillespie, and Hogg's lesser-known novel The Three Perils of Man. The Cone Gatherers and Sunset Song are the books most people seem to like best.

And Scottish poets other than Burns:

Robert Fergusson
Iain Crichton Smith
David Lindsay
George Mackay Brown
Edwin Muir
Hugh MacDiarmid
William Soutar
Norman MacCaig

ETA: Dh would like all to know that Lanark is a cult classic, and that he also liked James Kelman's How Late It Was, How Late, which won the 1994 Booker Prize. So now you know.

 

Edited December 12, 2018 by Violet Crown

[mumto2]

45 minutes ago, Violet Crown said:

Some Scottish writers dh and I have enjoyed reading (and who are neither Robert Louis Stevenson nor Sir Walter Scott) with some of their books:

John Buchan
Catherine Carswell, The Life of Robert Burns
Elspeth Davie
Arthur Conan Doyle
Elizabeth Grant, Memoirs of a Highland Lady
Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song
Alasdair Gray, Lanark
James Hogg, The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner
Robin Jenkins, The Cone Gatherers
David Lindsay, Voyage to Arcturus
Eric Linklater, Magnus Merriman
J. MacDougall Hay, Gillespie
Nancy Morrison, The Gowk Storm
Margaret Oliphant
John Prebble, The Highland Clearances
Muriel Spark
Orkneyinga Saga

Of these, my favorite obscure Scottish fiction books were Margaret Oliphant's very strange Calvinist ghost stories, the gothic Gillespie, and Hogg's lesser-known novel The Three Perils of Man. The Cone Gatherers and Sunset Song are the books most people seem to like best.

And Scottish poets other than Burns:

Robert Fergusson
Iain Crichton Smith
David Lindsay
George Mackay Brown
Edwin Muir
Hugh MacDiarmid
William Soutar
Norman MacCaig

ETA: Dh would like all to know that Lanark is a cult classic, and that he also liked James Kelman's How Late It Was, How Late, which won the 1994 Booker Prize. So now you know.

 

Wow,  you are really trying to up my game.  I had been thinking Ian Rankin!  When I have a chance I will go through your list ........ If you want to make a recommendation suited to my reading habits beyond Doyle.......

 

[Violet Crown]

34 minutes ago, mumto2 said:

Wow,  you are really trying to up my game.  I had been thinking Ian Rankin!  When I have a chance I will go through your list ........ If you want to make a recommendation suited to my reading habits beyond Doyle.......

Everyone likes Grassic Gibbon. Though his books aren't mysteries, it's true.

[mumto2]

19 minutes ago, Violet Crown said:

Everyone likes Grassic Gibbon. Though his books aren't mysteries, it's true.

These look interesting.  I will have to read paper but my library has them!  Actually they do have Cd's for one 😀 but I think they might be more work then paper as we no longer own a CD player.  They are also available in the kindle store but I will try the paper first as they are 't huge.

[Robin M]

More books set in Scotland or contemporary scottish authors

Diana Galbaldon's Outlander Series

Alexander Mc Call Smith's 44 Scotland Street series 

Iain Banks - The Crow Road (Bildungsroman)

Alistair Maclean - wrote Ice Station Zebra 

Val McDermid - Crime Writer for Dr Tony Hill series

Cozy Mysteries with Scottish theme

 

 

 

[Matryoshka]

1 minute ago, Robin M said:

More books set in Scotland or contemporary scottish authors

Diana Galbaldon's Outlander Series

Alexander Mc Call Smith's 44 Scotland Street series 

Iain Banks - The Crow Road (Bildungsroman)

Alistair Maclean - wrote Ice Station Zebra 

Val McDermid - Crime Writer for Dr Tony Hill series

Cozy Mysteries with Scottish theme

I likely won't be joining you all on the Scotland jag except for maybe a book or so, but thought I'd mention that last year's Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine is set in Scotland.  I listened to it; there are Scottish accents.

[Robin M]

I think I've figured out my 10 x 10 of which there probably will be overlap. Hoping to complete most from my stacks rather than buying new. 

1 Book Chain
2 Chunky
3 First in series
4 Historical
5 New to Me Authors
6 Non fiction
7 Revisiting old friends
8 Speculative fiction  (Which encompasses science fiction/fantasy/paranormal, etc.  Throwing them all into the big pot)
9  Whodunits
10 The Sound of Silence

[Robin M]

Good evening!  I posted The Sound of Silence mini challenge on the 52 books blog.  Please check it out and if you have any ideas that I didn’t think of, let me know.  Thank you!

http://www.read52booksin52weeks.com/p/the-sound-of-silence.html

 

[mumto2]

7 hours ago, Robin M said:

I think I've figured out my 10 x 10 of which there probably will be overlap. Hoping to complete most from my stacks rather than buying new. 

1 Book Chain
2 Chunky
3 First in series
4 Historical
5 New to Me Authors
6 Non fiction
7 Revisiting old friends
8 Speculative fiction  (Which encompasses science fiction/fantasy/paranormal, etc.  Throwing them all into the big pot)
9  Whodunits
10 The Sound of Silence

I like these categories.  I also like how you used the book chain and The new Sound of Silence theme as their own categories.  The Sound of Silence is great btw.  More planning to be done!

Before I forget, I have a question about  Scavenger Hunt “the tenth page, every tenth word” challenge.  Thanks to the ease of highlighting on the Kindle I have tried a few books and every time I seem to get about four what I will term as little words....dd pointed out that they  are not just conjunctions, true 😉 .....anyway should we discard the “a, to, the, am, did , etc” and move on to what I consider interesting words. I am happy to use the common words ( and they may be a relief considering the potential for obscure words)  but wanted to clarify.  I just finished Treacherous is the Night by Anna Lee Huber (good book,  btw) and my notes show these are the scavenger hunt words ( my most interesting experiment so far)......

ring, cab, shall, entry, our, newspaper, to, legs, was, white

I just want to say we seem to be generating an incredible number of great reading ideas!  My trusty notebook needs to come out and start taking notes so that I can find ways to combine books (maybe overlap is a better term) because this year’s challenges all look so fun.  I have been following links this morning and had a bit of a chuckle when Sharyn McCrumb’s Elizabeth McPhearson Cozy series popped up on the list....the books set in Scotland in this series are some of my favorite cozies ever.......but the one set in England, Missing Susan https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/471516.Missing_Susan,  probably inspired my part in the creation of Brit Tripping.  I have no idea how many times I have read that book over the years, but  somehow I haven’t read it this year, the year of Brit tripping.   I might need to rectify that! 😉 

[Robin M]

8 hours ago, mumto2 said:

I like these categories.  I also like how you used the book chain and The new Sound of Silence theme as their own categories.  The Sound of Silence is great btw.  More planning to be done!

Before I forget, I have a question about  Scavenger Hunt “the tenth page, every tenth word” challenge.  Thanks to the ease of highlighting on the Kindle I have tried a few books and every time I seem to get about four what I will term as little words....dd pointed out that they  are not just conjunctions, true 😉 .....anyway should we discard the “a, to, the, am, did , etc” and move on to what I consider interesting words. I am happy to use the common words ( and they may be a relief considering the potential for obscure words)  but wanted to clarify.  I just finished Treacherous is the Night by Anna Lee Huber (good book,  btw) and my notes show these are the scavenger hunt words ( my most interesting experiment so far)......

ring, cab, shall, entry, our, newspaper, to, legs, was, white

I just want to say we seem to be generating an incredible number of great reading ideas!  My trusty notebook needs to come out and start taking notes so that I can find ways to combine books (maybe overlap is a better term) because this year’s challenges all look so fun.  I have been following links this morning and had a bit of a chuckle when Sharyn McCrumb’s Elizabeth McPhearson Cozy series popped up on the list....the books set in Scotland in this series are some of my favorite cozies ever.......but the one set in England, Missing Susan https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/471516.Missing_Susan,  probably inspired my part in the creation of Brit Tripping.  I have no idea how many times I have read that book over the years, but  somehow I haven’t read it this year, the year of Brit tripping.   I might need to rectify that! 😉 

Yes, go for the more interesting words for the scavenger hunt.   I had planned to skip the connecting words such as a, an, The, was, were, for, etc.  and choose either the word before or after the articles and prepositions. Totally up to you all if you want to use the pronouns. 

Glad the side challenges are prompting lots of ideas.  As for Scotland, I may join in for for one or two books, most likely contemporary cozies. 

😘

Edited December 12, 2018 by Robin M

[Kareni]

Today I finished Beginnings: Worlds of Honor 6 (Honor Harrington- Anthologies)  by David Weber, Charles E. Gannon, and more.  This is an off-shoot of the Honor Harrington series I've been reading.  Those books have been getting longer (the current one is upwards of 800 pages!), so I  haven't had much to post in terms of finished books.  Like most anthologies, I liked some stories better than others.

I previously finished Keira Andrews' male/male romance In Case of Emergency.  It was an okay read, but I could wish have wished for more story.  (Adult content)

Regards,
Kareni

[Kareni]

Two books that are currently free to Kindle readers ~

How to Save an Undead Life (The Beginner's Guide to Necromancy Book 1)  by Hailey Edwards

Mooseletoe  by Tiffinie Helmer

Regards,
Kareni

[Violet Crown]

After much angst, I've got my 10x10 categories for 2019 determined:

The Brexit Special: 10 European countries, not including the UK
Scots Wha' Hae: Scottish books
Don't Mess With Texas: Texas, cowboys, or both
Plucked From the Air: chosen via the atmospheric noise Truly Random generator
Little Oval on the Spine: published by New York Review of Books
A is for Amy who...: cover art by Edward Gorey
Bad Catholic: the sort of books they read at that parish you don't go to
Dramatic: plays or books of plays, whichever
Lyric & Epic: poetry
The Shame List: "Really? You've never read that?"

[Kareni]

More books that are currently free to Kindle readers ~

I Hate Reading: A funny book for 6-9 year old…  by Beth Bacon

Jingle Stars (Shamans & Shifters Space Opera Book 4)  by Jenny Schwartz

Old School Magic  by Jenny Schwartz

The Governess (Sisters of Woodside Mysteries…  by Mary Kingswood

 

Dark Day Dreams: Stories by  James Hawthorne
 

LGBT:  Borrowing Blue: Made Marian Series Book 1  byLucy Lennox

 

Regards,
Kareni

[Granny_Weatherwax]

I just finished wrapping and packaging my mom's Christmas present.

I created a Mother-Daughter Book Club membership kit for each of us. I wrote a note about the MDBC and explained what the MDBC is and a little bit about the Kit.

In the Basic Kit, I included the Reading log and the first book to be read. I wrote an inscription in the Reading Log and filled in the information for the first book. I bought the Basic Kit for myself as well.☺️

I also sent her the Upgraded MDBC kit. In this kit I included a mug imprinted with "Just one more chapter", a spoon etched with "Drink Tea, Read Books, Enjoy Life", a box of Literary Teas (tea bags with tags printed with famous literary quotes), and some special book marks.

My plan is to send a book every other month and include a small reading themed trinket. I'm pretty excited about the idea. I hope she enjoys it.

[Kareni]

18 minutes ago, The Accidental Coach said:

My plan is to send a book every other month and include a small reading themed trinket. I'm pretty excited about the idea. I hope she enjoys it.

This sounds like such a wonderful gift!  I hope she'll enjoy it, too.

Regards,
Kareni

[Kareni]

Last night I finished David Weber's War of Honor (Honor Harrington Book 10).  This particular book was well over 800 pages, so it took me quite some time to finish it.  I've missed reading a greater selection of books, so I think I'll take a break from at least the full length books in this series of nineteen.  I may read a few more Honorverse anthologies to keep my hand in until returning to the series.

Regards,
Kareni

[Violet Crown]

1 hour ago, The Accidental Coach said:

I just finished wrapping and packaging my mom's Christmas present.

I created a Mother-Daughter Book Club membership kit for each of us. I wrote a note about the MDBC and explained what the MDBC is and a little bit about the Kit.

In the Basic Kit, I included the Reading log and the first book to be read. I wrote an inscription in the Reading Log and filled in the information for the first book. I bought the Basic Kit for myself as well.☺️

I also sent her the Upgraded MDBC kit. In this kit I included a mug imprinted with "Just one more chapter", a spoon etched with "Drink Tea, Read Books, Enjoy Life", a box of Literary Teas (tea bags with tags printed with famous literary quotes), and some special book marks.

My plan is to send a book every other month and include a small reading themed trinket. I'm pretty excited about the idea. I hope she enjoys it.

I love this gift idea!

[Robin M]

On 12/11/2018 at 6:45 PM, Violet Crown said:

Some Scottish writers dh and I have enjoyed reading (and who are neither Robert Louis Stevenson nor Sir Walter Scott) with some of their books:

John Buchan
Catherine Carswell, The Life of Robert Burns
Elspeth Davie
Arthur Conan Doyle
Elizabeth Grant, Memoirs of a Highland Lady
Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song
Alasdair Gray, Lanark
James Hogg, The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner
Robin Jenkins, The Cone Gatherers
David Lindsay, Voyage to Arcturus
Eric Linklater, Magnus Merriman
J. MacDougall Hay, Gillespie
Nancy Morrison, The Gowk Storm
Margaret Oliphant
John Prebble, The Highland Clearances
Muriel Spark
Orkneyinga Saga

Of these, my favorite obscure Scottish fiction books were Margaret Oliphant's very strange Calvinist ghost stories, the gothic Gillespie, and Hogg's lesser-known novel The Three Perils of Man. The Cone Gatherers and Sunset Song are the books most people seem to like best.

And Scottish poets other than Burns:

Robert Fergusson
Iain Crichton Smith
David Lindsay
George Mackay Brown
Edwin Muir
Hugh MacDiarmid
William Soutar
Norman MacCaig

ETA: Dh would like all to know that Lanark is a cult classic, and that he also liked James Kelman's How Late It Was, How Late, which won the 1994 Booker Prize. So now you know.

 

Thank you for the great list. I've added Lanark and Voyage to Arcturus  and The Cone Gatherers to my stacks. 

14 hours ago, Violet Crown said:

After much angst, I've got my 10x10 categories for 2019 determined:

The Brexit Special: 10 European countries, not including the UK
Scots Wha' Hae: Scottish books
Don't Mess With Texas: Texas, cowboys, or both
Plucked From the Air: chosen via the atmospheric noise Truly Random generator
Little Oval on the Spine: published by New York Review of Books
A is for Amy who...: cover art by Edward Gorey
Bad Catholic: the sort of books they read at that parish you don't go to
Dramatic: plays or books of plays, whichever
Lyric & Epic: poetry
The Shame List: "Really? You've never read that?"

Love your creativity with the titles of each category and choices! 

Edited December 13, 2018 by Robin M

[Robin M]

2 hours ago, The Accidental Coach said:

I just finished wrapping and packaging my mom's Christmas present.

I created a Mother-Daughter Book Club membership kit for each of us. I wrote a note about the MDBC and explained what the MDBC is and a little bit about the Kit.

In the Basic Kit, I included the Reading log and the first book to be read. I wrote an inscription in the Reading Log and filled in the information for the first book. I bought the Basic Kit for myself as well.☺️

I also sent her the Upgraded MDBC kit. In this kit I included a mug imprinted with "Just one more chapter", a spoon etched with "Drink Tea, Read Books, Enjoy Life", a box of Literary Teas (tea bags with tags printed with famous literary quotes), and some special book marks.

My plan is to send a book every other month and include a small reading themed trinket. I'm pretty excited about the idea. I hope she enjoys it.

Oh my gosh, what a great idea.  Your mother will love this.  

[Robin M]

I finished Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.  Have you ever read a book that you enjoyed, but found hard to read at the same time? Very well written and I was drawn into the lives of the characters, sometimes pondering why they made the choices they did.  Prompted many a rabbit trail, looking up the history of the conflict and culture of the Biafra's. 

"Half of a Yellow Sun re-creates a seminal moment in modern African history: Biafra’s impassioned struggle to establish an independent republic in Nigeria in the 1960s, and the chilling violence that followed.  With astonishing empathy and the effortless grace of a natural storyteller, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie weaves together the lives of three characters swept up in the turbulence of the decade. Thirteen-year-old Ugwu is employed as a houseboy for a university professor full of revolutionary zeal. Olanna is the professor’s beautiful mistress, who has abandoned her life of privilege in Lagos for a dusty university town and the charisma of her new lover. And Richard is a shy young Englishman in thrall to Olanna’s twin sister, an enigmatic figure who refuses to belong to anyone. As Nigerian troops advance and the three must run for their lives, their ideals are severely tested, as are their loyalties to one another. Epic, ambitious, and triumphantly realized, Half of a Yellow Sun is a remarkable novel about moral responsibility, about the end of colonialism, about ethnic allegiances, about class and race—and the ways in which love can complicate them all. Adichie brilliantly evokes the promise and the devastating disappointments that marked this time and place, bringing us one of the most powerful, dramatic, and intensely emotional pictures of modern Africa that we have ever had."

 

 

Edited December 13, 2018 by Robin M

[Lady Florida.]

I took a bunch of books off of my Currently Reading list and moved them to a shelf I created called Finish Another Time. I knew I wasn't actually reading them but seeing them on my Goodreads home page made me feel like I should be lol. Now I can relax and just read the ones I've actually been reading. 

[Penguin]

18 hours ago, Violet Crown said:

After much angst, I've got my 10x10 categories for 2019 determined:

The Brexit Special: 10 European countries, not including the UK
Scots Wha' Hae: Scottish books
Don't Mess With Texas: Texas, cowboys, or both
Plucked From the Air: chosen via the atmospheric noise Truly Random generator
Little Oval on the Spine: published by New York Review of Books
A is for Amy who...: cover art by Edward Gorey
Bad Catholic: the sort of books they read at that parish you don't go to
Dramatic: plays or books of plays, whichever
Lyric & Epic: poetry
The Shame List: "Really? You've never read that?"

I love your categories, VC. I might join you with the Bad Catholic. Do you have any titles in mind yet? 

 

[JennW in SoCal]

Just stopping by for a quick hello. No reading to report as I'm buried in holiday music gigs, sewing projects for gifts and other holiday festivities. Looking forward to collapsing on the couch and just reading after Christmas!

I will likely re-ask in another month for a repeat of that list of Scottish titles -- I'm going there (and Ireland) with my church choir next summer!  

[Violet Crown]

1 hour ago, Penguin said:

I love your categories, VC. I might join you with the Bad Catholic. Do you have any titles in mind yet? 

Phil Lawler's new book was just amazoned to me, and it takes a lot to get me to buy a book new. I'll be starting it as soon as I'm done with BritTripping. And I want to re-read Brian Moore's cult classic Catholics next year.

[Violet Crown]

45 minutes ago, JennW in SoCal said:

I will likely re-ask in another month for a repeat of that list of Scottish titles -- I'm going there (and Ireland) with my church choir next summer!  

Excellent! Do you know where in Scotland?

[tuesdayschild]

On 12/12/2018 at 5:02 AM, Lady Florida. said:

Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI - The author did a decent job of balancing both of the title topics, the murders and the early days of Hoover and the FBI. This is a part of U.S. history that isn't taught but that everyone should know about imo. It's not for lack of trying. The author isn't the first one to write about these killings - even some of the original people involved tried as have others have over the years - but his seems to be the first book getting attention. I gave the book 5 stars more for the subject matter than for the writing, though the writing was well done.

So good to see you appreciated this book too.  I went on and on about it so much, before, during and after reading it - it has became one of my top picks for this year - that my Dh caved in and asked for me to download the audio for him.  We had no idea this was a portion of U.S history.  

Delayed surgery, and the wait for you all  😞  Hoping the Jan 17th gifts you with Emma well and ready for surgery.  (& really hope your Gndsns end of year 'thing' went well!!)

 

Edited December 14, 2018 by tuesdayschild
Needed to (-:

[tuesdayschild]

On 12/12/2018 at 8:02 AM, Kareni said:

Do you agree or disagree with this piece?

Don’t Buy Me Books!  by Katherine Marciniak

Agreeing,  if it's someone who doesn't know me that well purchasing me a random, not on my wishlist, book.    

 

On 12/12/2018 at 5:47 PM, Robin M said:

Cozy Mysteries with Scottish theme

Fun selection.

(I've run out of time ... link hopping: hope to catch up with the rest of the thread tomorrow)

[JennW in SoCal]

1 hour ago, Violet Crown said:

Excellent! Do you know where in Scotland?

 

We'll be performing in the royal chapel at Stirling castle and Canongate Kirk in Edinburgh. I know we will visit Isle of Skye and Glasgow, and can't remember now where else we're performing (Iona maybe?) I'll be playing fiddle -- American fiddle, that is, and otherwise singing. Since we are from a Presbyterian church, we'll be visiting Haddington where John Knox was born and raised.

So any reading recommendations will be welcome -- but not yet! Let me get through this holiday season first....

[-M-]

#129 Hazards of Time Travel (Joyce Carol Oates; 2018. Fiction.)
#130 Rome Sweet Home: Our Journey to Catholicism (Scott and Kimberly Hahn Carreyrou; 1993. Non-fiction.)
#131 Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup (John Carreyrou; 2018. Non-fiction.)
#132 On Living (Kerry Egan; 2016. Non-fiction.)

Lily King’s Euphoria will be #133, and, wow, is my reading year closing strong! Bad Blood and Euphoria are unputdownable; and On Living is beautiful:

p. 180
When someone tells you the story of their suffering, they are probably still suffering in some way. No one else gets to decide what that suffering means, or if it has any meaning at all. And we sure as hell don’t get to tell someone that God never gives anybody more than they can handle or that God has a plan. We do not get to cut off someone’s suffering at the pass by telling them it has some greater purpose. Only they get to decide if that’s true. All we can do is sit and listen to them tell their stories, if they want to tell them. And if they don’t, we can sit with them in silence.

[-M-]

On 12/11/2018 at 1:02 PM, Kareni said:

Do you agree or disagree with this piece?

Don’t Buy Me Books!  by Katherine Marciniak

Regards,
Kareni

A relative was always pressing this book or that on me and then asking how I liked it. She got it right once, when she bought me a book I already owned. Heh, heh, heh. Some of the choices were just so odd, too: An autobiography of one of the Marx brothers? A maudlin chick lit book? A book of parenting aphorisms... when all of my children are over eighteen? Insert head shaking. Oh, I forgot! She got it right one other time! Sort of. I had received a number of books as a prize from a publisher. After reading those that I appealed to me, I gathered all of the selections, as well as several novels weeded from my personal library. I asked if she’d like any; she took them all. A couple of years later, we met for lunch.

Oh, I have a bag of books for you!

Great, I thought.

She hands me two grocery bags of battered books, all of which had been in the box I gave her years before. Oh, you didn’t have to return these, I said (especially in such bad condition, I thought). 

What do you mean?

These are the books I gave you, from the publisher and my collection.

I don’t think so, she said with a huff.

Sigh.

I make a wishlist for my husband and daughters, and when others ask, I suggest a bookstore gift card or Amazon.

Edited December 14, 2018 by Melissa M

[Violet Crown]

1 hour ago, JennW in SoCal said:

 

We'll be performing in the royal chapel at Stirling castle and Canongate Kirk in Edinburgh. I know we will visit Isle of Skye and Glasgow, and can't remember now where else we're performing (Iona maybe?) I'll be playing fiddle -- American fiddle, that is, and otherwise singing. Since we are from a Presbyterian church, we'll be visiting Haddington where John Knox was born and raised.

So any reading recommendations will be welcome -- but not yet! Let me get through this holiday season first....

Canongate Kirk is where the poet Robert Fergusson is buried; there's a bronze statue of him on the pavement in front. 

ETA: That totally didn't count as a recommendation, right?

Edited December 14, 2018 by Violet Crown

[Kareni]

Earlier today I read with pleasure the graphic novel/comic book Fence Vol. 1  by C.S. Pacat and Johanna the Mad.

"Novelist C.S. Pacat (Captive Prince) and fan-favorite artist Johanna the Mad team up for a new series perfect for fans of Check, Please! and Yuri!!! on Ice. Nicholas Cox is determined to prove himself in the world of competitive fencing, and earn his place alongside fencing legends like the dad he never knew, but things get more complicated when he’s up against his golden-boy half-brother, as well as the sullen fencing prodigy, Seiji Katayama. Collects issues #1-4."
**

I also finished the anthology More Than Honor (Honor Harrington- Anthologies Book 1) by David Weber,  David Drake, and S. M. Stirling.  As with most anthologies, I found it uneven and did not finish one story.  There was one story (by Weber) which I quite enjoyed.

Regards,
Kareni

[tuesdayschild]

Flat out enjoying all the planning 10x10 , and Scotland selections.

Gorgeous gift idea @The Accidental Coach

[Penguin]

@Robin M Overlapping is allowed for the 10 x 10 challenge? I plan to overlap, and I thought that placed me outside of the challenge rules but now I think I misunderstood. Thanks for any clarification 🙂

--

I have been playing with my 10 categories. I am not going to declare them DONE until I see what the rest of y'all come up with! I do promise not to post my revised list more than once per week between now and January!

At the moment, here are my thoughts:

1) 1960s

2) In Danish

3) Non-tropical Islands: Greenland, Faroes, Scottish Islands, etc.

4) Good Catholic / Bad Catholic: some current authors similar to VC's idea for the Bad Catholic category, but also books/authors that were prohibited by the Church (Index Librorum Prohibitorum). Also Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton, Sigrid Undset.

5) Fantasy/Folktales/Fairy Tales

6) Nordic

7) Poetry

#8)  50 states (an ongoing challenge for me) *

9) Round-the-world (another ongoing challenge)

10) Politics: Political theory, political philosophy, exiled poets

*Huh. An 8 followed by a ) turns into a smiley emoji. Didn’t know that.

Edited December 14, 2018 by Penguin

[mumto2]

22 hours ago, The Accidental Coach said:

I just finished wrapping and packaging my mom's Christmas present.

I created a Mother-Daughter Book Club membership kit for each of us. I wrote a note about the MDBC and explained what the MDBC is and a little bit about the Kit.

In the Basic Kit, I included the Reading log and the first book to be read. I wrote an inscription in the Reading Log and filled in the information for the first book. I bought the Basic Kit for myself as well.☺️

I also sent her the Upgraded MDBC kit. In this kit I included a mug imprinted with "Just one more chapter", a spoon etched with "Drink Tea, Read Books, Enjoy Life", a box of Literary Teas (tea bags with tags printed with famous literary quotes), and some special book marks.

My plan is to send a book every other month and include a small reading themed trinket. I'm pretty excited about the idea. I hope she enjoys it.

I love this idea.......I may adapt it as a best friend book club and as a birthday gift as her Christmas gifts are already on the way to her!

19 hours ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

I finished Turbo Twenty-Three by Janet Evanovich at 4am this morning when two scared little kids woke up and jumped in our bed because ofa lightning storm! I went ahead and moved onto Twenty-Four because, well why not? 🙂 I do feel like every Evanovich novel now is a game of roulette though........like when are the wheels going to fall off and am I going to hate this series?!? 

I'm so impressed with all of y'all's planning and categories for 2019. So many cool ideas! 

I am wondering this too.  But I still like these books every single time and don’t care that she has such a formula going on......Stephanie borrows Ranger’s car because something hilarious happened to her’s......waiting for what goes wrong while driving Ranger’s so he can save her.  I flip those pages every single time!  I am rather hit and miss with all those other series she is writing with others but enjoy her fluffy romances from the 80’s and 90’s.

19 hours ago, Lady Florida. said:

I took a bunch of books off of my Currently Reading list and moved them to a shelf I created called Finish Another Time. I knew I wasn't actually reading them but seeing them on my Goodreads home page made me feel like I should be lol. Now I can relax and just read the ones I've actually been reading. 

I have a bad habit of forgetting to put books on Goodreads if they aren’t listed in my currently reading section partly because many of my books are being finished with WiFi off.  They disappear and get forgotten in terms of Goodreads. 😉.  I have started listing my stack as my currently reading every few weeks then putting the unfinished ones into abandoned and want to read for permanent shelves.  I like the read another time shelf and think I will add that as a sub shelf for my abandoned books.  Currently Abandoned is mix of books I doubt I would ever wish to read and ones that I don’t want to read now.  

Since we have been talking about gifts of books I have to say I have no room.  I buy myself crafting books in hard copy because they are easier to work with but try to limit the other hardcopy books that are for me.  Love my Kindle and libraries.  I try to donate or pass on as many purchases as possible because I am the one who has saved many home ed books which is our household book problem.

 One of my new year’s tasks is to take another look at my boxes for elementary and hopefully gift quite a few textbook type things to a young family we are just getting to know.  I want to get myself down to sort of a best of smaller box. That will work for text books but not my fiction saves which I do not wish to give away and loaning beloved books generally does not turn out well for me.

Wish lists,  my wish lists are disaster’s, especially my “want to read” on Goodreads.  I have noticed that duplicates seem to be happening frequently so I have read some of the wish list.  Duplicates can be hard to clean up because of the Brit Trip list which I am not complaining about, I just can’t delete without effecting my reads or Brit tripping want to reads.  Good tv watching activity!

1 hour ago, Penguin said:

@Robin M Overlapping is allowed for the 10 x 10 challenge? I plan to overlap, and I thought that placed me outside of the challenge rules but now I think I misunderstood. Thanks for any clarification 🙂

--

I have been playing with my 10 categories. I am not going to declare them DONE until I see what the rest of y'all come up with! I do promise not to post my revised list more than once per week between now and January!

At the moment, here are my thoughts:

1) 1960s

2) In Danish

3) Non-tropical Islands: Greenland, Faroes, Scottish Islands, etc.

4) Good Catholic / Bad Catholic: some current authors similar to VC's idea for the Bad Catholic category, but also books/authors that were prohibited by the Church (Index Librorum Prohibitorum). Also Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton, Sigrid Undset.

5) Fantasy/Folktales/Fairy Tales

6) Nordic

7) Poetry

#8)  50 states (an ongoing challenge for me) *

9) Round-the-world (another ongoing challenge)

10) Politics: Political theory, political philosophy, exiled poets

*Huh. An 8 followed by a ) turns into a smiley emoji. Didn’t know that.

Great categories!  Like you I feel the urge to revise my list every time someone else adds a list.  You are all so creative.  I will wait for next week to refine mine!

[Violet Crown]

I like those categories. For 1960s, are you thinking broadly anything written in the '60s, or books characteristic of the era?

[Penguin]

2 minutes ago, Violet Crown said:

I like those categories. For 1960s, are you thinking broadly anything written in the '60s, or books characteristic of the era?

VC, I don't have it quite figured out yet, and am open to suggestions. I'm really thinking about civil rights, pop culture, second wave feminism, and music. Off the top of my head, I am interested in Joan Didion, The Outsiders, Valley of The Dolls, Autobiography of Malcolm X, and The Feminine Mystique. I think I am looking for the zeitgeist.

But I'm not settled on anything, yet. At first I would have said that I wouldn't pick The Agony and The Ecstasy (1961), but hmm, that would also fit my Good Catholic/Bad Catholic category - so I think I will just see how it unfolds.

[Violet Crown]

Looking up a few possibilities for your category, I was surprised how many important books from the 1960s were from the 1950s. 

[Kareni]

5 hours ago, Penguin said:

*Huh. An 8 followed by a ) turns into a smiley emoji. Didn’t know that.

I spotted an emoji in a recent post of mine and thought it odd since I don't generally use them.  I had posted about reading the 8th book in the Honor Harrington series and made the same discovery as you.

Regards,
Kareni

[Robin M]

19 hours ago, JennW in SoCal said:

 

We'll be performing in the royal chapel at Stirling castle and Canongate Kirk in Edinburgh. I know we will visit Isle of Skye and Glasgow, and can't remember now where else we're performing (Iona maybe?) I'll be playing fiddle -- American fiddle, that is, and otherwise singing. Since we are from a Presbyterian church, we'll be visiting Haddington where John Knox was born and raised.

So any reading recommendations will be welcome -- but not yet! Let me get through this holiday season first....

Wow, that sounds like so much fun.  Green with envy, in a good way!  

6 hours ago, Penguin said:

@Robin M Overlapping is allowed for the 10 x 10 challenge? I plan to overlap, and I thought that placed me outside of the challenge rules but now I think I misunderstood. Thanks for any clarification 🙂

--

I have been playing with my 10 categories. I am not going to declare them DONE until I see what the rest of y'all come up with! I do promise not to post my revised list more than once per week between now and January!

At the moment, here are my thoughts:

1) 1960s

2) In Danish

3) Non-tropical Islands: Greenland, Faroes, Scottish Islands, etc.

4) Good Catholic / Bad Catholic: some current authors similar to VC's idea for the Bad Catholic category, but also books/authors that were prohibited by the Church (Index Librorum Prohibitorum). Also Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton, Sigrid Undset.

5) Fantasy/Folktales/Fairy Tales

6) Nordic

7) Poetry

#8)  50 states (an ongoing challenge for me) *

9) Round-the-world (another ongoing challenge)

10) Politics: Political theory, political philosophy, exiled poets

*Huh. An 8 followed by a ) turns into a smiley emoji. Didn’t know that.

Yes, overlapping is allowed.  If the next question is how much overlapping, I haven't given it much thought so I'll leave that up to you guys to decide how much you want to overlap.    Really like your categories and I'm sure you'll have fun with it.   I totally enjoyed Thomas Merton's Seven Storey Mountain and have a few of his other books.  I just picked up his Praying the Psalms and have The Way of Chuang Tzu among others in my virtual stacks.  It's the 50th anniversary of his death this week and came across this article a couple days ago.

Edited December 14, 2018 by Robin M

[Kareni]

I finished a couple of romance novellas today by Indra Vaughn.  They were pleasant reads but not likely stories I'll be re-reading.  (Adult content)

Dust of Snow

and The Winter Spirit

Regards,
Kareni

[Matryoshka]

On 12/13/2018 at 9:24 PM, Melissa M said:

Lily King’s Euphoria will be #133, and, wow, is my reading year closing strong! Bad Blood and Euphoria are unputdownable;

Hmmm...  I'm going to need a new audiobook starting tomorrow (car ride much longer than what's left on current one).  I am #1 on the waitlist for Song of Achilles, but that might not be soon enough.  I've been iffy about Euphoria, but I see it's available on Overdrive, and that is a strong recommendation!  Or I could try The Monk of Mokha...

Edited December 15, 2018 by Matryoshka