I re-read Fahrenheit 451 and was surprised at how relevant it still is after 70+ years. Killers of the Flower Moon came in second. The last 25% of the book was not included in the film version - and what happened after the conviction was more criminal than the first three deaths!!
I have three books from January, I couldn't choose between those. And they are:
Lucy by the Sea by Elizabeth Strout (it made me long for a lockdown, but then without a horrible disease)
Shrines of Gaiety by Kate Atkinson (she amazes me every time, I don't know how she does it, but there never are loose threads in her stories and the characters are just perfectly crafted)
Went to London, Took the Dog by Nina Stibbe (the humor, the observations, the daily life stuff, it's like reading messages from a good friend)
I would say it was “Shakespeare, the Man Who Pays the Rent” by Judi Dench, based on a series of interviews she did with Brendan O’Hea. Discusses almost every significant part she played in Shakespeare plays, in a very warm, entertaining fashion. I really enjoyed it. The next best was also a non-fiction work, “Exactly” by Simon Winchester, about the development of precision engineering from pre-steam-engine times to today.
Had a few I’m afraid the first 3 Iin Brandon Sanderson Storm light Archive series. The Way of Kings, Words of Radiance and Edge Dancer. Honourable mention to Chimera’s Star, book 14 of Glynn Stewart Starships mage series.
Both of my favorites from this month are rereads. First, Fairy Tale by Stephen King. It was our book club read last month and I was gifted it and read it when it first came out. I liked it even better the second time. Second, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. I reread an Austen every January, it’s one of my favorite reading habits.
Travels with Charley by Steinbeck was so good! I haven’t cried like that reading a book in quite a while. Ken Follett’s The Armor of Light was really good too.
January was a great month of reading! While I read 7 books, the 2 that I’ll continue to think about constantly are The Covenant of Water and The Frozen River.
I tend to read two, sometimes three types of books at any given time:
My "traveling book" this is a book I bought myself with my own money so if I lose it I'm the only one who's out.
My "home book" which tends to be a library book and only travels from the library to my home & back again.
And the eReader book. In my case that eReader is libby, though I recently downloaded the Kindle app for my phone.
My books for January were mostly library books relating to cultivating irises & their symbolic meanings. A regional community interest magazine here in Tennessee sponsored a poetry contest where the entries had to be about something relating to the state. I chose to focus on the state flower, the iris.
My traveling book was me finishing Humphrey Carpenter's "A Great Silly Grin," which inspired further reading goals of P.G. Wodehouse, the script for "Beyond the Fringe" if I can find it, & my copy of Spike Milligan's "Adolf Hitler: My Part in His Downfall." And Lenny Bruce's "How to Talk Dirty & Influence People."
My library selections last month both had ties to my local library's DVD selection, as I read Washington Irving's "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" on libby & Roald Dahl's "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" as a physical library book checkout to prepare to check out the Tim Burton films based on each one weekend.
This month's main reads will be the Christian leadership book "Power in the Pulpit" & miscellaneous books on leading small group discussions as I have been tapped to lead a Bible study at my church one Wednesday night this month.
My favorite January read was actually a reread—The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway. But if I had to pick a “new to me” favorite, I think I have to say The Book of the Dun Cow, by Walter Wangerin, Jr., though three weeks later, I’m still not sure I completely understand all of it. (I’m going to have to let this one marinate a while and then pick it back up and read it again.) If pressed for a still living author, I suppose I would have to say Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, by Gabrielle Zevin.
I really enjoyed ‘The Upside-Down World: Meetings with the Dutch Maters’ by Benjamin Moser, who I wasn’t familiar with, but he won a Pulitzer Prize for the biography Sontag: Her Life and Work.
The book was a pleasure to read partly due to the physical beauty of the book itself. Moser writes beautifully; his connection with the Netherlands brings a personal element to his experience of the paintings.
I re-read Fahrenheit 451 and was surprised at how relevant it still is after 70+ years. Killers of the Flower Moon came in second. The last 25% of the book was not included in the film version - and what happened after the conviction was more criminal than the first three deaths!!
‘The Postcard’ by Anne Berest
I have three books from January, I couldn't choose between those. And they are:
Lucy by the Sea by Elizabeth Strout (it made me long for a lockdown, but then without a horrible disease)
Shrines of Gaiety by Kate Atkinson (she amazes me every time, I don't know how she does it, but there never are loose threads in her stories and the characters are just perfectly crafted)
Went to London, Took the Dog by Nina Stibbe (the humor, the observations, the daily life stuff, it's like reading messages from a good friend)
I would say it was “Shakespeare, the Man Who Pays the Rent” by Judi Dench, based on a series of interviews she did with Brendan O’Hea. Discusses almost every significant part she played in Shakespeare plays, in a very warm, entertaining fashion. I really enjoyed it. The next best was also a non-fiction work, “Exactly” by Simon Winchester, about the development of precision engineering from pre-steam-engine times to today.
Had a few I’m afraid the first 3 Iin Brandon Sanderson Storm light Archive series. The Way of Kings, Words of Radiance and Edge Dancer. Honourable mention to Chimera’s Star, book 14 of Glynn Stewart Starships mage series.
Both of my favorites from this month are rereads. First, Fairy Tale by Stephen King. It was our book club read last month and I was gifted it and read it when it first came out. I liked it even better the second time. Second, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. I reread an Austen every January, it’s one of my favorite reading habits.
Travels with Charley by Steinbeck was so good! I haven’t cried like that reading a book in quite a while. Ken Follett’s The Armor of Light was really good too.
these precious days by ann patchett!!
I had to choose two: The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte and Shakespeare's Julius Caesar
January was a great month of reading! While I read 7 books, the 2 that I’ll continue to think about constantly are The Covenant of Water and The Frozen River.
Joan Didion’s Where I Was From. I read several of her books in January. They were all great, but that one stands out for me.
I tend to read two, sometimes three types of books at any given time:
My "traveling book" this is a book I bought myself with my own money so if I lose it I'm the only one who's out.
My "home book" which tends to be a library book and only travels from the library to my home & back again.
And the eReader book. In my case that eReader is libby, though I recently downloaded the Kindle app for my phone.
My books for January were mostly library books relating to cultivating irises & their symbolic meanings. A regional community interest magazine here in Tennessee sponsored a poetry contest where the entries had to be about something relating to the state. I chose to focus on the state flower, the iris.
My traveling book was me finishing Humphrey Carpenter's "A Great Silly Grin," which inspired further reading goals of P.G. Wodehouse, the script for "Beyond the Fringe" if I can find it, & my copy of Spike Milligan's "Adolf Hitler: My Part in His Downfall." And Lenny Bruce's "How to Talk Dirty & Influence People."
My library selections last month both had ties to my local library's DVD selection, as I read Washington Irving's "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" on libby & Roald Dahl's "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" as a physical library book checkout to prepare to check out the Tim Burton films based on each one weekend.
This month's main reads will be the Christian leadership book "Power in the Pulpit" & miscellaneous books on leading small group discussions as I have been tapped to lead a Bible study at my church one Wednesday night this month.
My favorite January read was actually a reread—The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway. But if I had to pick a “new to me” favorite, I think I have to say The Book of the Dun Cow, by Walter Wangerin, Jr., though three weeks later, I’m still not sure I completely understand all of it. (I’m going to have to let this one marinate a while and then pick it back up and read it again.) If pressed for a still living author, I suppose I would have to say Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, by Gabrielle Zevin.
I really enjoyed ‘The Upside-Down World: Meetings with the Dutch Maters’ by Benjamin Moser, who I wasn’t familiar with, but he won a Pulitzer Prize for the biography Sontag: Her Life and Work.
The book was a pleasure to read partly due to the physical beauty of the book itself. Moser writes beautifully; his connection with the Netherlands brings a personal element to his experience of the paintings.
A Fever In The Heartland
Covenant of Water.