Laytonwoman Will Finish the Year Here (Thread 4 for 2017)

(My Dad, about 1960.)

Hi! I'm Linda, a retired paralegal living in Northeastern Pennsylvania with my husband flamingrabbit (a retired broadcast engineer), and our sweet kitty, Molly O'Del, who we rescued from The Barn. Our daughter, lycomayflower, hangs around this group as well. In my first year of retirement (2016), I read 112 books, which is, as it should be, more than I read in any of the previous 10 years in which I was keeping track here on LT. My goal is always to read more of the books I already own, and to acquire fewer books than I remove from the house. As you will see from subsequent posts where I keep track of that kind of thing, I'm rubbish at it. I've been getting a fair number out of the house, but they do keep coming in. In June of 2016 I became a board member of the Scranton Public Library, so now I'm duty bound to attend ALL their book sales and bring stuff home, eh?

I've been keeping track of my reading here on LT since 2007.
Here is a link to my last 2016 thread, from which you can navigate to all my previous reading threads back to the beginning, if you are that crazy.

**Here I will keep track of my numbers for reading, RMOS, and culling.

Total Books Read:

100 of 75

Reading My Own Stuff:

29 of 50

Books Culled from the House:

112 of 100

** I have removed my pretty little tickers, as my McAfee webadvisor tells me the site is not safe, all of a sudden. I'll be keeping track in the above boring fashion from now on.

I'll keep track of my last quarter reads in this post. The first 3/4 of the year is documented in >3 laytonwoman3rd: below.

Some code I use: ROOT identifies a book that I have owned for at least a year at the time I read it. These are the ones I'm keeping track of with the camel on the 2nd ticker in >1 laytonwoman3rd: laytonwoman3rd: above. CULL means I put the book in my donation box for the library book sale after finishing it. DNF means I didn't finish the book, for one reason or another, usually explained in the related post. ER means I received the book from LT's Early Reviewer program. GN refers to a graphic novel (don't expect to see a lot of that one!) An asterisk indicates a library book; LOA means I read a Library of America edition; SF means the book was a Slightly Foxed edition; FOLIO, of course, indicates a Folio Society edition. AUDIO and e-Book are self-explanatory, and probably won't appear very often. AAC, BAC and CAC refer to the American, British and Canadian Author Challenges. (See more on those below) NF indicates a non-fiction read, not necessarily in one of the NF challenge categories.

DECEMBER

DNF True at First Light by Ernest Hemingway and Patrick Hemingway CULL
100. Benediction by Kent Haruf ROOT
*99. The Rabbi's Cat by Joann Sfar GN
98. Baby Doll Games by Margaret Maron
*97 Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward NF
96. Eudora Welty on William Faulkner by Eudora Welty NF
*95. The September Society by Charles Finch
94. The Whistler by John Grisham CULL
93. The Elected Member by Bernice Rubens ROOT
92. The Great New Orleans Kidnapping Case by Michael A. Ross NF, ROOT, CULL

NOVEMBER

*91. If the Creek Don't Rise by Rita Williams NF
90. The Last Ballad by Wiley Cash ARC
89. The Loyal Son by David Mark Epstein ER, NF
DNF * Graveyard Dust by Barbara Hambly
88. *A Fugitive in Walden Woods by Norman Lock NF

OCTOBER

87. The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving ROOT
86. Y is for Yesterday by Sue Grafton
85. The Puttermesser Papers by Cynthia Ozick ROOT, CULL
*84. This is the Story of a Happy Marriage by Ann Patchett NF
83. Another Brooklyn by Jacqueline Woodson
82. Slightly Foxed but Still Desirable by Ronald Searle
*81. The Gods of Gotham by Lyndsay Faye

Completed reads for the first three quarters of 2017, latest on top. The links take you to the post where I commented on the book, not to its book page. (See >2 laytonwoman3rd: above for an explanation of my letter and symbol codes.)

SEPTEMBER

80. The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien AAC, ROOT
79. On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder NF
78. The Kingdom of Auschwitz by Otto Friedrich NF, ROOT
77. The Paper Moon by Andrea Camilleri ROOT
*76. Likely to Die by Linda Fairstein
75. A Nickel's Worth of Skim Milk by Robert J. Hastings NF
74. One By One in the Darkness by Deirdre Madden ROOT, CULL

AUGUST

73. Morningstar: Growing Up With Books by Ann Hood NF
72. The Blunderer by Patricia Highsmith ROOT, AAC, LOA
*70. Charlotte's Web by E. B. White AUDIO read by E. B. White and George Plimpton (afterword)
*69. Last Night at the Lobster by Stewart O'Nan
68. Call the Nurse by Mary J. MacLeod ROOT, CULL, NF
67. South Riding by Winifred Holtby ROOT, Virago
66. The Birchbark House by Louise Erdrich
65. When a Wolf is Hungry by Christine Naumann-Villemin, Illustrated by Kris DiGiacomo

JULY

*64. Small Ceremonies by Carol Shields CAC
*63. Final Jeopardy by Linda Fairstein
*62. The Kennedy Half Century by Larry Sabato NF
61. Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson, illustrated by N. C. Wyeth ROOT, BAC
*60. The Right Jack by Margaret Maron
*59. Little White Lies A Spenser novel by Ace Atkins
58. Albert Nobbs by George Moore
*57. The Jade Peony by Wayson Choy
56. I'm the King of the Castle by Susan Hill ROOT
55. The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett ROOT, LOA
*54 Designated Daughters by Margaret Maron

JUNE

*53. Hide & Seek by Ian Rankin
52. Belzoni Dreams of Egypt by Jon Clinch ROOT
51. The Patch Boys by Jay Parini ROOT
*50. The Bellini Card by Jason Goodwin audio and print
49. Last Lessons of Summer by Margaret Maron
48. The Paris Wife by Paula McLain ROOT
*47. Debt to Pay by Reed Farrell Coleman

MAY

*46. The Blackwater Lightship by Colm Toibin
45. Writer, Sailor, Soldier, Spy by Nicholas Reynolds NF
44. The Cool Cottontail by John Dudley Ball
*43. The Snake Stone by Jason Goodwin
42. The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon ROOT
DNF The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George
*41. Death in Blue Folders by Margaret Maron
40. The Madwoman Upstairs by Catherine Lowell

APRIL

39. The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter by Sharyn McCrumb
38. If Ever I Return, Pretty Peggy-O by Sharyn McCrumb
37. Scriptorium by Melissa Range AAC
36. Hag-Seed by Margaret Atwood CAC
35. Cluny Brown by Margery Sharp ROOT
34. The Inextinguishable Symphony by Martin Goldsmith NF, ROOT

MARCH

33. Death of a Butterfly by Margaret Maron
32. One Coffee With by Margaret Maron
31. Journal of a Solitude by May Sarton
*30. The Buzzard Table by Margaret Maron
29. Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys BAC, CULL
*28. Bloody Kin by Margaret Maron
27. Hellhound on His Trail by Hampton Sides NF
*26. Search the Dark by Charles Todd
25. A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry ROOT, CAC
*24. The Devil Wins by Reed Farrel Coleman

FEBRUARY

*23. Three-Day Town by Margaret Maron
22. Christmas Mourning by Margaret Maron ROOT, CULL
21. The Round House by Louise Erdrich ROOT
# A Christmas in Slovakia by Wesley Elllis (No number---too short and insubstantial to count)
20. Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad ROOT
19. The Moon-Spinners by Mary Stewart ROOT, BAC
*18. The Night Country by Stewart O'Nan AAC
17. The Stranger in the Woods by Michael Finkel ARC, NF

January

16. Make Way for Ducklings by Robert McCloskey
*15. In the Heat of the Night by John Ball
14. What Color is My World? bu Kareem Abdul Jabbar and Raymond Obstfeld CULL
13. The Night Gardener by The Fan Brothers
*12. Slow Burn by Ace Atkins
*11. The Eyes of the Buddha by John Ball
*DNF An Irish Country Village by Patrick Taylor Audio
10. A Story for Bear by Dennis Haseley and Jim LaMarche
9. The Gentle Lion and the Little Owlet by Alice Shirley
8. The Wish Tree by Kyo Maclear and Chris Turnham
7. Kindred by Octavia Butler AAC, ROOT, CULL
6. The Cat Who Rode Cows by Frances and Richard Lockridge
*5. Murder by Proxy by Anne Morice
4. Murther and Walking Spirits by Robertson Davies CAC, ROOT
3. This Boy's Life by Tobias Wolff NF, ROOT
DNF. Maine by J. Courtney Sullivan CULL
2. The New Great American Authors Cookbook edited by Dean Faulkner Wells NF
1. The Bill the Cat Story: A Bloom County Epic by Berkeley Breathed

I was trying to keep up with the Non-Fiction Challenge, but I don't do well trying to fit my reading into categories this way. I pretty much gave up trying half way through the year. I do read a fair amount of non-fiction, though.

January: Prizewinners {Non-fiction books that have won, or been short-listed for, any kind of literary prize.} Finished reading This Boy's Life by Tobias Wolff

February: Voyages of Exploration
I began In Patagonia, but set it aside and have not gone back to it. I hope to finish it eventually.

March: Heroes and Villains--People you admire or people you hate. Or people others admire or hate, and that you're just curious about.
Finished Hellhound on His Trail by Hampton Sides

April: Hobbies, Pastimes and Passions
Dipped into The Smithsonian's Lords of the Air, but it isn't a straight-through sort of read. It remains on my coffee table, to be picked up from time to time.
Finished The Inextinguishable Symphony by Martin Goldsmith

May: History
Finished Writer, Sailor, Soldier, Spy by Nicholas Reynolds

June: The Natural World

July: Creators and Creativity

August: I’ve Always Been Curious About….
A catch-all category. If the topic of the book can complete the sentence, you can add it to the challenge.

September: Gods, Demons and Spirits
Religion, spirituality of all kinds; read about the Salem witch trials or animism in West Africa if you want.

October: The World We Live In: Current Affairs

November: Science and Technology

December: Out of Your Comfort Zone
A nonfiction book that isn't something that you would normally gravitate to, about a subject you'd never normally read about, or that is a "book bullet" you'd never previously heard about from another LT reader.

All the challenges have "challenged" me this year; I've decided I just won't sweat it. When an author appeals to me during the assigned month, I'll try to read something, hopefully something that's been lingering on my own shelves for a while. I have "met" a couple new authors through these challenges, and it's always enlightening to follow along with others as they sample and review. I just don't need to be a completist about it. I'm reading for myself, after all. Here's my participation in the American, Canadian and British author challenges in 2017.

American Author Challenge General Thread

January-Octavia Butler Finished Kindred
February- Stewart O'Nan Finished The Night Country
March- William Styron gave Lie Down in Darkness a try; main character annoyed me in the first 50 pages (much as with Serena, I couldn't get past disliking the character to see where the story might be going). DNF
April- Poetry Month Scriptorium by Melissa Range; and A Private Mythology by May Sarton
May- Zora Neale Hurston
June- Sherman Alexie Read several selections from Ten Little Indians
July- James McBride Pearl-ruled The Miracle at St. Anna
August- Patricia Highsmith Finished The Blunderer
September- Short Story Month Finished The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien
October- Ann Patchett This is the Story of a Happy Marriage
November- Russell Banks
December- Ernest Hemingway Tried True at First Light and couldn't take it.

British Authors Challenge General Thread for 2017

JANUARY : IRISH BRITONS - Elizabeth Bowen and Brian Moore I will be skipping the Irish Britons this month.
FEBRUARY : SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY -
Mary Stewart and Terry Pratchett Finished The Moon-Spinners I love Mary Stewart, but this book isn't either sci-fi or fantasy, just for the record.

MARCH : A DECADE OF BRITISH NOVELS The 1960s -
With 10 Novels by Men and 10 Novels by Women to choose from I read the only title in my current library: Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys

APRIL: SOUTH YORKSHIRE AUTHORS :
A. S. Byatt and Bruce Chatwin Read a bit of In Patagonia, and will get back to it eventually.

MAY : BEFORE QUEEN VICTORIA
10 Novels written prior to 1837 Probably skipping this category

JUNE : THE HISTORIANS (Historical Fiction / Historians)
Georgette Heyer & Simon Schama Skipped these too.

JULY : SCOTTISH AUTHORS
D. E. Stevenson and R. L. Stevenson Finished Kidnapped

AUGUST : BRITAIN BETWEEN THE WARS (Writers active 1918-1939)
Winifred Holtby & Robert Graves Finished South Riding

SEPTEMBER : THE NEW MILLENNIUM (Great Books Since 2000)
Started Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell but will probably not even finish it in October.

OCTOBER : WELSH AUTHORS
Jo Walton & Roald Dahl Neither of these authors appeal to me, so I will skip this one.
NOVEMBER : POET LAUREATES : British laureates, children's laureate, National Poets

DECEMBER : WILDCARD
Elizabeth Gaskell and Neil Gaiman Time ran out; I had thought I might get to Gaskell, but I won't.

*****************************

Canadian Authors Challenge General Thread for 2017

This is the challenge that challenges me the most, as it includes more authors I haven't previously heard of than the others. (Although I'm doing much better with the Canadians than with the Brits this year!) I didn't set the world on fire with it last year, and probably won't in 2017, but I am sure I will discover a few new authors thanks to Ilana's suggestions from this list:

January : Anne Michaels & Robertson Davies Finished Murther and Walking Spirits

February : Madeleine Thien & Rohinton Mistry Finished A Fine Balance

March : Anne Hebert & Alistair McLeod tried In the Shadow of the Wind, but did not care for it.

April : Margaret Atwood & Guy Vanderhaeghe
Finished Atwood's contribution to the Hogarth Shakespeare series, Hag-Seed

May :Louise Penny & Leonard Cohen Tried another of the Three Pines series, and decided not to go forward with it.

June : Heather O'Neill & Dan Vyleta Sampled Vyleta's The Quiet Twin, and it seemed to be going somewhere I had no desire to follow.

July : Carol Shields & Wayson Choy Finished The Jade Peony
Finished Small Ceremonies
FIRST TIME I'VE READ BOTH AUTHORS in a given month!

August : Ruth Ozeki & Douglas Coupland Skipped

September : Lori Lansens & Steven Galloway

October : Alice Munro & Arthur Slade

This Challenge is sort of an orphan...no threads were set up for September or October (so far), and participation has been slight. I have to say I really enjoy Canadian fiction as I'm becoming more acquainted with it.

November : Gil Adamson & Guy Gavriel Kay

December : Donna Morrisey & Wayne Johnston

Books acquired in 2017 (Trying to keep myself honest, here.)



January
1. Yashim Cooks Istanbul by Jason Goodwin
2. Jane Bowles: Collected Writings (LOA)
3. The Cat Who Rode Cows by Frances & Richard Lockridge
4. Darling of Misfortune by Richard Lockridge
5. The Weather in Africa by Martha Gellhorn
6. The Stranger in the Woods by Michael Finkel
7. World War I and America Told by the Americans Who Lived It (LOA)
8. Death on the Aisle by Frances and Richard Lockridge
9. The Wish Tree by Kyo Maclear and Chris Turnham
10. The Gentle Lion and the Little Owlet by Alice Shirley
11. A Story for Bear by Dennis Haseley and Jim LaMarche
12. Joseph Banks: A Life by Patrick O'Brian (Folio)
13. Winnie the Pooh by A. A. Milne (Folio)
14. What Color is My World by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Raymond Obstfeld
15. On the Shoulders of Giants by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Raymond Obstfeld
16. The Night Gardener by The Fan Brothers
17. Make Way for Ducklings by Robert McCloskey
18. The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo
19. Mycroft Holmes by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Anna Waterhouse
20. The Blind Watchmaker by Richard Dawkins

February

1. The House in Paris by Elizabeth Bowen
2. The Cool Cottontail by John Ball
3. Stoner by John Williams
4. Butcher's Crossing by John Williams
5. The Tennis Partner by Abraham Verghese
6. Mary McCarthy Novels & Stories 1942-1963 LOA
7. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad (Everyman edition)
8. The Girls of Atomic City by Denise Kiernan

March

1. Author and Agent by Michael Kreyling
2. Embattled Freedom by Jim Remsen
3. New Boy by Tracy Chevalier
4. The Home-Maker by Dorothy Canfield Fisher
5. If Ever I Return, Pretty Peggy-O by Sharyn McCrumb
6. Novels 1963-1979 by Mary McCarthy
7. One Coffee With by Margaret Maron
8. Death of A Butterfly by Margaret Maron
9. Scriptorium by Melissa Range
10. The Norths Meet Murder by Frances and Richard Lockridge (new PB edition)
11. The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter by Sharyn McCrumb
12. The Gastronomical Me by M. F. K. Fisher (Folio Society edition)
13. Last Lessons of Summer by Margaret Maron
14. Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King

April *big breath, and a "Hoooooboy!"*

1. Collected Poems by Philip Larkin
2. The Piano Maker by Kurt Palka
3. The Whistler by John Grisham
4. True at First Light by Ernest Hemingway
5. LaRose by Louise Erdrich
6. The Big Seven by Jim Harrison
7. Prayers the Devil Answers by Sharyn McCrumb
8. House of Earth by Woody Guthrie
9. Huck Out West by Robert Coover
10. Writer, Sailor, Soldier, Spy by Nicholas Reynolds
11. The Stonewall Brigade by James Robertson
12. The Passage by Justin Cronin
13. West Virginia: A History
14. Some Lie and Some Die by Ruth Rendell
15. A Sleeping Life by Ruth Rendell
16. Wild Swans by Jung Chang
17. The Tongues of Angels by Reynolds Price
18. Delta of Venus by Anais Nin
19. Writers' Reflections Upon First Reading Welty
20. The Odyssey by Homer (Word Cloud edition) Samuel Butler trans.
21. Death on the Aisle by Frances and Richard Lockridge.

May

1. Walt Kelly's Pogo; the Complete Dell Comics Vol. 4)
2. Our Land Before We Die by Jeff Guinn
3. A Wolf's Tale by Eva Montanari

June

1. The Loyal Son; The War in Ben Franklin's House by Daniel Mark Epstein
2. The March by E. L. Doctorow
3. Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
4. Human Croquet by Kate Atkinson
5. The Secret Chord by Geraldine Brooks
6. Shadow Tag by Louise Erdrich
7. Susan Sontag: The Later Essays (LOA)
8. Tennessee Williams, Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh by John Lahr
9. The Unquiet Grave by Sharyn McCrumb
10. The Great Swindle by Pierre LeMaitre
11. The Dry by Jane Harper
12. Hassan by James Elroy Flecker (Folio)
13. A Kestrel for a Knave by Barry Hines (Folio)
14. Take Out by Margaret Maron
15. Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann

July

1. Baby Doll Games by Margaret Maron
2. Corpus Christmas by Margaret Maron
3. Past Imperfect by Margaret maron
4. Fugitive Colors by Margaret Maron
5. Native Guard by Natasha Trethewey
6. Olio by Tyehimba Jess
7. Thomas and Beulah by Rita Dove

August

1. When a Wolf is Hungry by Christine Naumann-Villemin
2. Fierce by Barbara Robinette Moss
3. The Birchbark House by Louise Erdrich
4. Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell
5. The First Time Ever by Peggy Seeger (No touchstone yet)
6. A Nickel's Worth of Skim Milk by Robert J. Hastings
7. Y is for Yesterday by Sue Grafton
8. Peter Taylor: Complete Stories 1938-1959
9. The Tangled Web by Michael J. Cain
10. On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder

SEPTEMBER

1. A Dash of Dragon by Heidi Lang & Kati Bartkowski
2. Peter Taylor: Complete Stories 1960-1992

OCTOBER

1. Preserving Your Family Photographs by Maureen A. Taylor
2. Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively
3. Family Matters by Rohinton Mistry
4. Walkin' the Dog by Walter Mosley
5. The Right Mistake by Walter Mosley
6. Long Upon the Land by Margaret Maron
7. At the Owl Woman Saloon by Tess Gallagher
8. The Dressmaker by Beryl Bainbrige
9. Nightingale Wood by Stella Gibbons
10. Animals in Translation by Temple Grandin
11. The Rape of Nanking by Iris Chang
12. In the Springtime of the Year by Susan Hill
12. The Same Sea by Amos Oz
13. Slightly Foxed But Still Desirable by Ronald Searle
14. The Best American Short Stories 2006 edited by Ann Patchett
15. The Collected Stories of Grace Paley

NOVEMBER

1. Dvorak in Love by Josef Skvorecky
2. The Mournful Demeanor of Lieutenant Boruvka by Skvorecky
3. An Island Garden by Celia Thaxter
4. Collected Poems by Czeslaw Milosz
5. The Woodlanders by Thomas Hardy
6. A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains by Isabella Bird

DECEMBER

1. Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry
2. A Burial at Sea by Charles Finch
3. A Death in the Small Hours by Charles Finch
4. An Old Betrayal by Charles Finch
5. Eudora Welty on William Faulkner
6. Maine: A Legacy in Painting by Bruce Chambers
7. Uncommon Type by Tom Hanks
8. Collected Short Stories by Saki
9. Giving Up the Ghost by Hilary Mantel
10. The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton
11. The Invention of Nature bu Andrea Wulf
12. Period Piece: A Cambridge Childhood by Gwen Raverat
13. Then Everything Changed by Jeff Greenfield
14. Salt Fat Acid Heat by Samin Nosrat
15. Zeke and Ned by Larry McMurtry
16. The Gardner Heist by Ulrich Boser
17. On the Art of Reading by Quiller Couch
18. The Good German by Joseph Kanon
19. The Lion in the Living Room by Abigail Tucker
20. The Second World Wars by Victor Davis Hanson
21. Port William Novels and Stories by Wendell Berry (LOA)

And the biggest challenge of all....books culled from the house so the people have a little room to move around. (As of July 4th, I'm really quite pleased with my progress in this department! My husband has been helping---he's much more likely to let a book go after reading it.)

Books culled in 2017



January:

1. Maine by J. Courtney Sullivan
2. My Dog Skip by Willie Morris
3. Life Goes to the Movies
4. Kindred by Octavia Butler

February:

1. Daughter of the Queen of Sheba by Jacki Lyden
2. Until I Find You by John Irving
3. What Color is My World by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
4. No Deals, Mr. Bond by John Gardner
5. The Guns of August by Barbara W. Tuchman (old PB, replaced by LOA volume)
6. In Country by Bobbie Ann Mason
7. The Youngest Doll by Rosario Ferre
8. Classic Slave Narratives ed. by Henry Louis Gates (PB replaced by LOA volume)
9. We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver
10. Christmas Mourning by Margaret Maron
11. The Cellist of Sarajevo by Steven Galloway
12.-26. Fifteen Dick Francis paperbacks
27. Trace by Patricia Cornwell
28. The Body Farm by Patricia Cornwell
29.-32. Four Jeffrey Deaver paperbacks
33.-36 Four Faye Kellerman paperbacks
37.-41. Five Jonathan Kellerman paperbacks

March:

1. Not Without Laughter by Langston Hughes (PB copy replaced by LOA Harlem Renaissance volume)
2. Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys
3. The Quants (JCK)
4. Lightless by C. A. Higgins (JCK)
5. Roadside Picnic by Arkady Strugatsky (JCK)
6. Clapton by Eric Clapton (JCK)
7. The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce (replaced by LOA volume)

I've done fairly well with this in the first quarter. I see that I actually did remove more books than I acquired. I don't expect that to continue throughout the year, but I'll take a good start!

April:

1. To A Blossoming Pear Tree by James Wright
2. There Goes My Everything by Jason Sokol

May:

1. Best Evidence by David Lifton
2. The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon
3. Sophia: Living and Loving by A. E. Hotchner
4. Townie: A Memoir by Andre Dubus III
5. Cataloochee by Wayne Caldwell

June:

1. Ian Fleming's Commandos by Nicholas Rankin
2.-5. Miscellaneous old math textbooks from attic clean-out
6. Possession and Exorcism
7. Hypnosis, Fact and Fiction by F. L. Marcuse
8. Romola by George Eliot
9. Last Lessons of Summer by Margaret Maron
10. Silicon Snake Oil by Clifford stoll
11. Supernature by Lyall Watson
12. Basic television Revised Second Edition Vol. 1-6
13. The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene
14. Understanding Physics by Isaac Asimov
15. The Skeptic by Terry Teachout

JULY

1. The Novels of Dashiell Hammett duplicate copy
2. More Laughing Out Loud by Myron Cohen
3. Self-Hypnotism by Leslie M. LeCron
4. The Seven Pillars of Wisdom by T. E. Lawrence shabby pb copy
5. Music for Chameleons by Truman Capote duplicate copy
6. Hypnosis by Raphael H. Rhodes
7. The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan
8. The Passage by Justin Cronin

AUGUST

1. Hit List by Richard Belzer and David Wayne
2. Call the Nurse by Mary J. MacLeod (to LEK)
3. The Pleasures of Reading in an Age of Distraction by Alan Jacobs
4. Used and Rare by Lawrence and Nancy Goldstone

SEPTEMBER

1. One by One in the Darkness by Deirdre Madden

OCTOBER

1. A Trick of Light by Karen Blomain
2. The Season of Lost Children by Karen Blomain
3. Edenville Owls by Robert B. Parker
4. The Puttermesser Papers by Cynthia Ozick

NOVEMBER

1. I Will Bear Witness by Victor Klemperer
2. The Peddler's Grandson by Edward Cohen
3. The Book of Legal Anecdotes by Peter Hay
4. The Fall by Simon Mawrer
5. Mermaids Singing by Lisa Carey
6. Feast Day of Fools by James Lee Burke
7. Two for Texas by James Lee Burke
8. Rain Gods by James Lee Burke
9. In the Moon of Red Ponies by James Lee Burke
10. Heartwood by James Lee Burke
11. Cimarron Rose by James Lee Burke
12. The Museum of Dr. Moses by Joyce Carol Oates
13. Bitterroot by James Lee Burke

DECEMBER

1. Moon Tiger (duplicate) by Penelope Lively
2. The Great New Orleans Kidnapping Case
3. The Whistler by John Grisham
4. Bailey's Cafe by Gloria Naylor
5. When the Mob Ran Vegas
6. Tabloid City by Peter Hamill
7. National Public Radio: The Cast of Characters
8. True at First Light by Ernest Hemingway

Here, at long last, is my list of favorite books published in each of the years since I was born. Some years were tough, others yielded two or three titles I just couldn't leave off, and of course, William Faulkner published most of his best stuff before I was born. But anyway...

1951 My Cousin Rachel
1952 Charlotte's Web
1953 Go Tell it on the Mountain
1954 The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers
The Dollmaker
1955 The Return of the King
1956 Giovanni's Room
1957 Anatomy of Criticism
1958 The Civil War: A Narrative Vol. 1
1959 The Mansion (not ALL of Faulkner's books were published before I was born!)
1960 To Kill a Mockingbird
1961 The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
1962 The Reivers (His last)
1963 The Yoknapatawpha Country by Cleanth Brooks
1964 Sometimes a Great Notion
1965 Up the Down Staircase (read when I still wanted to be a schoolteacher)
1966 The Magus
1967 The Chosen
1968 A Kestrel for a Knave
1969 The Godfather
1970 84, Charing Cross Road
1971 The Other
1972 Watership Down
1973 The Godwulf Manuscript Not the best of Robert B. Parker's novels, but this is where
it all began
1974 Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
1975 Ragtime
1976 Roots and
A River Runs Through It
1977 The Thornbirds
1978 On Moral Fiction by John Gardner
1979 Sophie's Choice
1980 The Clan of the Cave Bear and
Cosmos
1981 Early Autumn which may BE the best of Robert B. Parker's novels
and The Mismeasure of Man
1982 The Color Purple
1983 A Gathering of Old Men
1984 Love Medicine
1985 The Cider House Rules and
Lonesome Dove
1986 Prince of Tides
1987 Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe
1988 The Bean Trees
1989 The Temple of My Familiar
1990 The Things They Carried
1991 Bully For Brontosaurus
1992
1993 Paddy Clarke, Ha Ha Ha
1994 Death of a River Guide
1995 A Fine Balance
1996 Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil
1997 Cold Mountain
1998 The Poisonwood Bible
1999 Plainsong
2000
2001 At Swim, Two Boys and
Dirt Music
2002 Middlesex and
If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things
2003 Eats, Shoots and Leaves
2004 Gilead
2005 The Book Thief
2006 The View From Castle Rock
2007 Finn
2008 Home
2009 Homer and Langley
2010 Ru
2011 The Tiger's Wife
Salvage the Bones
2012 A Land More Kind Than Home and
Absolution
Sutton
2013 Sweet Thunder
2014 H is for Hawk
2015 Between the World and Me
2016 Vinegar Girl
2017 The Stranger in the Woods

There are a couple years in there for which I haven't found a favorite. I'll update if something comes to me.

Hi Linda3rd! I'm late to the party but here.

Happy new thread, Linda

>9 richardderus: Well, howdy, stranger! I'd say you're early...the caterers aren't all set up yet.

>10 jessibud2: Thanks, Shelley.

Happy new thread, Linda.

Happy new thread!

>11 laytonwoman3rd:, >12 FAMeulstee: Yay, more visitors!

Everybody help themselves to dim sum...

*snarfles spring rolls and meat dumplings* are those moon cakes?! OOO

I’ve pulled up a chair to see where you go next. You have done so much great reading so far.

Happy new thread, Linda.

Good to track your progress with the BAC, CAC and AAC challenges. You have done better than I have, I think.

Have a glorious weekend.

Happy New Thread, Linda. Love the Dad topper. Perfect.

Excellent review of The Things They Carried. Big Thumb.

Great job on the AAC, BTW.

>8 laytonwoman3rd: I'm kind of shocked I found I had read only 12 books on your list and one more of those was a maybe - a strong maybe - The Magus - but even tho I had it a long time I can't remember now when I read it. There are a couple on your list tho that I should probably add to my own such as The Godfather which completely entranced me when I read it long ago - in those days my mom was something of a strong influence on my reading - when she really sunk her teeth into something and talked about it I generally followed. I still need to add more to my list and work on some of my holes. I think I need to squeeze a Michener in here or there. I'm glad you got yours finished. It is a lot of work I know!

Nice new thread, Linda, and thanks for the eats. I haven't done that book a year thing as it seems rather daunting. But your list is inspiring!

>16 NanaCC: Make yourself cozy, Colleen. I'm curious to see what I'll read for the rest of the year myself!
>17 PaulCranswick: Thanks, Paul. I have certainly made some new authorial acquaintances by following the challenges, even if it has been in a rather spotty fashion this year.
>18 msf59: Thanks, Mark. As you know, I love the AAC.
>19 RBeffa: I have to revisit your list, Ron. I didn't tally up how many of your titles I've read.
>20 lauralkeet: Glad you could find some leftovers, Laura. I was afraid Richard might have picked out all the good stuff. It took me about two weeks to do that list...I got a little cross-eyed in the process.

>8 laytonwoman3rd: You’ve done half of the work for me Linda, thanks :-). Great list.

Love the photo of your dad at the top.

Beautiful new thread, Linda.

Looking through your Books of My Life list I saw many, many titles that brought back happy memories; also quite a few that would be on my list as well. I haven't been able to get enough energy to pursue this, but I may soon.

>22 Caroline_McElwee: Feel free to borrow, Caroline!
>23 Matke: It does take physical energy, as well as mental effort, Gail. All that scanning of publication dates! I only did 5 or 6 years at a time.

I keep adding to the list in >8 laytonwoman3rd: above, as I think of books that I read, but that don't turn up on the publication lists in Wikipedia or Goodreads. Just now I remembered The Dollmaker, which I picked up at a used book sale in Louisiana back in the early '70's. It was published in 1954, I see, so onto the list for that year it goes. It was one of my first forays into Appalachian fiction, and I highly recommend it.

Well, I may or may not have filled a sack at the Abington Community Library's fall book sale...

Happy New Thread, Linda!

>25 laytonwoman3rd: Great haul. I'm a Walter Mosley fan, and the others look intriguing, too.

Hi, Joe! I was lucky to find the next two Mosleys I need to read in the Socrates Fortlow series. But when I got home I realized I had passed up a nice copy of my next read in the Easy Rawlin's series---Cinnamon Kiss. I thought I already had that one. It's tough to fill in titles in series fiction at book sales---I usually end up with some but not in the proper order.

Hi, Linda. Haven't been around much. Lost in my own fog, I think.

>3 laytonwoman3rd: What does the asterisk mean?

>8 laytonwoman3rd: Glad to see another Life List. So decisive in selecting (usually) just one book per year. I can't do that; I didn't do that.

>25 laytonwoman3rd: Abington Library? In the Abington near Philly? Good assortment you got.

>28 weird_O: Hi, Bill. We all get blinded by the fog from time to time.
Ah, it seems I did not transfer my little code explanations---an * means it was a library book I read. I'll go back and edit that.
No, not the Abington near Philly, the Abingtons outside of Scranton, consisting of North Abington and South Abington Townships, the Borough of Clarks Summit, the Village of Clarks Green, Newton Township, Ransom Township, Glenburn Township, Dalton, Waverly and Chinchilla.

>25 laytonwoman3rd: scrummy haul!

Great haul Linda. I really liked the stories in that Tess Gallagher collection.

>31 Caroline_McElwee: Oh, good to know, Caroline. I haven't read Tess Gallagher before.

I love the photo of your dad up top, Linda.
And that's a great library sale book haul. Moon Tiger was a five-star read for me.

>33 EBT1002: My dad was a handsome devil, and although he wasn't a big reader himself, I think he completely approved of my "habit", which started pretty early. He also told me more than once that he expected me to write a book someday. That doesn't look likely, but it feels right to have him oversee one of my threads.

I know I had a copy of Moon Tiger around once upon a time, but I looked for it for the BAC challenge in 2015, and it never turned up. I think I'll try to read it soon, in case this one disappears too!

>25 laytonwoman3rd: Happy Saturday, Linda. Nice book haul. I love the sound of At the Owl Woman Saloon.

Wow, what a great book haul! I enjoyed At the Owl Woman Saloon, Linda — I suspect I read it on Caro’s recommendation. And Moon Tiger was my introduction to Penelope Lively; I read it as part of my tour through the Booker Prize winners. But now I’ve read 6 of her books and she’s one of my favorite authors.

>35 msf59: Thanks, Mark. A successful trip to a library book sale = guaranteed Happy Saturday!

>36 lauralkeet: You are the source of the first copy of Moon Tiger, Laura. So maybe YOU know where I stowed it?

>37 laytonwoman3rd: lycomayflower's bookshelves, possibly?

>38 lauralkeet: A distinct possibility...although I usually make note of that.

81. The Gods of Gotham by Lyndsay Faye This is the first of three (so far) novels with Timothy Wilde, one of NYC's first "copper stars", as its protagonist. The setting is mid-19th century Manhattan, which makes it irresistible to me. The city has just established its first official police force, which faces a lot of resistance from the rough underworld types as well as more respectable citizens who see it as a "standing army" and do not approve of its existence. Timothy has an analytical mind, but an impulsive nature and a tender heart; he's a grand creation. His boss is the historical personage, George Washington Matsell, who organized this force and eventually became New York's first police commissioner. Matsell also compiled and published Vocabulum: A Rogue's Lexicon, a dictionary of thieves' slang, which the author uses extensively in this book. The story line concerns murdered "kinchin mabs", or child prostitutes, of both sexes. When a burial ground containing the remains of 19 of these unfortunates is discovered, and anonymous letters accuse the Irish Catholics of atrocities in the practice of their religion, Matsell insists the crime must be solved without triggering riots between Nativists and immigrants. The middle parts dragged a bit, as most of the fledgling detective's (that word is never used) theories turned out to be wrong, but the setting and the characters carried me along anyway. It's a fascinating world and one I intend to revisit.

82. Slightly Foxed -- but still desirable by Ronald Searle This has been on my wishlist for a long time, and yesterday I found a "lovely mellow copy" of it at our local library's fall book sale. It is a rollicking illustrated guide to terms used in the antiquarian book-selling world. The cover gives you a hint as to the far-out nature of the author's "cracked but holding" sense of humour.



The Glossary at the end is no less snort-worthy. A couple examples:

"Foxed --- Some pages discoloured with brown damp spots.
Foxed, somewhat --- Simply smothered in brown damp spots
Russia --- Smooth, dyed calfskin treated with birch-bark oil by a vodka-soaked serf.
Shaved --- The binder's guillotine has converted 'y' to 'v' on every bottom line of text."

That topper pic of Grandpa is among my favorites of him. Even though it is years and years before I ever knew him and he's doing a thing I rarely saw him do, it is so very *him* somehow.

Your years list makes me jealous of some of the ones you get to include. *pets Tolkien*

>40 laytonwoman3rd: Hmm. That sounds good.

>41 laytonwoman3rd: *gimme hands. sad eyes*

Happy new thread!

>42 lycomayflower: Agreed...that's a priceless photo. I must remember to share it with his other grands, who probably haven't seen it. It was one of Mom's slides that we digitized.

>40 laytonwoman3rd: Mmmm...it was good enough that I snagged No. 2 in the series as I was returning that one to the library.

The Searle is often naughty and funny as can be. I'll allow you to look at it sometime, under strict supervision, of course!

>43 drneutron: Thanks, Jim.

Slightly Foxed -- but still desirable looks like a hoot.

Admiring your book purging -- I've had to do more of that than I would like as I don't have the shelving in this house, but we still have too many.

Also I love your list of best reads starting with your birth year. I think I've read all but ten of them!

>46 EBT1002: It definitely is, Ellen. It's made me want to find more books by Searle. His take on cats is hysterical.

>47 sibylline: Thanks, Lucy. I do feel I've done a good job of getting rid of some books we're never going to read again, or that have been duplicated by my Library of America collection. But I don't seem to have any more shelf space than ever, because I can't compliment the purging with a moratorium on the buying!

>5 laytonwoman3rd: I've pretty much given up on challenges & group themes, except for the Tony Hillerman group thread. I'm a moody reader, and adding in my schedule, challenges just don't work for me.

>8 laytonwoman3rd: I love your year-by-year list of favorites!

>51 tymfos: I've pretty much given up the "challenge" part for myself, Terri. I follow along, though, because I am discovering some very interesting authors this way, and using the opportunity to visit others I've been "meaning to get to". But I won't pressure myself to read something just for a challenge.

83. Another Brooklyn by Jacqueline Woodson Another beautiful, brilliant, and heart-touching book from Woodson, bringing the friendship of young women on the brink of emerging into the larger world right up off the page and into the light. Even though my growing-up situation was so different from that of a motherless black girl in 1970's Brooklyn, there are moments in this book that I remember... I don't want to call it a coming of age story. It's about being an age...8, 11, 14... just being and seeing from that spot on your life line. "This is memory" August says over and over, but it feels like now, as if there has been no fading or embellishment or nostalgic softening of the edges as she tells her story.

>53 laytonwoman3rd: - Just last night, I started another book by Jacqueline Woodson, called Brown Girl Dreaming. She is a new-to-me author and so far, I am entranced. I have heard a lot of warbling about the one you are reading and will probably look for it at the library sooner rather than later. I am also leaning toward what I want to read now, rather than challenges.

>53 laytonwoman3rd: I really enjoyed Another Brooklyn. My daughter now lives near places referenced in the book, so in addition to everything you wrote I can make those connections and think about how the area has changed.

>54 jessibud2: and I loooooved Brown Girl Dreaming. So beautiful.

Chiming in to say that Woodson is amazing. Her picture books are wonderful, too.

>54 jessibud2: I loved Brown Girl Dreaming too, Shelley. That one is blank verse. This one is more lyrical prose, I guess I'd say. But her handling of language is simply gorgeous in both.

>55 lauralkeet: Ah, Laura...that's interesting. I love any story that shows the "neighborhood-ness" of parts of NYC at any time. The one and only time I visited Brooklyn (it was work-related and involved meeting a doctor who had treated one of our clients) I was amazed at the coziness of the part we were driving through.

>56 scaifea: I need to get my hands on some of her books for younger readers, Amber.

>52 laytonwoman3rd: I've pretty much gone the same way with challenges Linda. I dip in when I see something I might try or that has been waiting on the shelf. I too discovered several authors in the various challenges but I am better off reading to my whims and the book ideas constantly being discovered and discussed on people's threads. More than anything though I have wanted to heavily focus on books at hand. I've been doing very good at that this year. The recent best by year posts have also given me some mental nudges to pull some out to read sooner rather than later.

Happy new-to-me thread, Linda!

I loved your comments on Another Brooklyn and fully agree. It was one of my favorites last year.

Hi Linda!

I can’t believe that it’s taken me this long to visit your threads. My loss for sure, but I’m here now and happy to follow along the rest of the year.

>8 laytonwoman3rd: I love your list! We have 5 in common.

A general comment on challenges: I have one year-long one going right now (Bible as Literature – I’ve never read the Bible cover to cover, and when my sister asked why I was reading it, knowing I wasn’t Christian, I got snarky and told her it was to have ammunition. Not the real reason at all, but she sounded so hopeful…. It’s a great project and I’m pretty sure I won’t do another year-long challenge ever again.) Every time I sign up for a challenge I immediately stress out, so am very careful with them, although it looks like I will set up a group read for Nicholas Nickelby early next year. I'm currently in the Rules of Civility group read and fortunately am enjoying the book enough to not feel stressed about it.

Ain’t retirement grand?

>58 RBeffa: I'd like to see the challenges re-named for next year, Ron. Something that suggests less pressure (although naturally there isn't any pressure from other participants now...it's all individual, but still) to "complete" something. I really like the suggestions, though, and would hate for that part of it to go away.

>59 katiekrug: Hey, Katie! Good to see you.

>60 karenmarie: Welcome, Karen. I'm glad you found me. I starred that Bible as Literature challenge early in the year, but didn't do any more about it. My grandmother used to read the Bible from cover to cover in about a year's time, a little every night. She stayed with us most of the winter for several years, and slept in my room, so sometimes she would read to me. My recollection is that she picked the lovely bits to read aloud. I took a course in the Old Testament in college (to satisfy a requirement), and was amazed at how little a well-brought-up Methodist girl like myself knew about it. Of course, I remember next to nothing that I learned now, and the rest of my college education (at what was, at the time, a Methodist-affiliated liberal arts school) pretty much erased any inclination I may still have had to practice any religion.

84. This is the Story of a Happy Marriage by Ann Patchett A collection of essays (and a speech) that is Fine from beginning to end. I had only read Ann Patchett's second novel, Taft, before. Most of her fiction has not called to me, based on descriptions, and even enthusiastic reviews by readers I respect. HOWEVER, having read all these pieces, many of which spoke directly to my heart and soul, I know I have to trust Ann Patchett to tell me a good story, even if it isn't one that seems to be "my kind of thing" on the face of it. When she described her 7th grade self's brief but lovely encounter with Eudora Welty at a book signing, I found myself hugging the book, and there might have been a tear in my eye over her final observation about that: "For the sheer force of its heart-stopping, life-changing wonder, I will put this experience up against anyone who ever saw the Beatles." Also, she has forced --forced, I tell you--me to buy two books, a collection of Grace Paley's short stories, and the 2006 edition of Best American Short Stories, which Patchett edited and for which she wrote a wonderful introduction (included in This is the Story...)

>62 laytonwoman3rd: Isn't it wonderful when a book grabs you like this one did? It doesn't happen often but this one just clicked for me, too.

Ooof. Must get round to Patchett soon...

>6 laytonwoman3rd: I am a little late to the party, but hurray!! I see you are listing the books you purchase and start over at #1 each month! LOL. I like your method. : )

>8 laytonwoman3rd: I think I have read 26 of your favorites. I knew I liked you! ; )

>25 laytonwoman3rd: Nice book haul!!

>62 laytonwoman3rd: Glad you enjoyed the Patchett so much.

I am going to continue best I can with the challenges and goals I have set up for this year. I was feeling a little pressured to keep up with them at times, so I may vote for more spontaneity next year. We'll see...but I am up for Donna's new murder/mystery thread!!

Happy Sunday.

Happy Sunday, Linda. You have been doing some fine reading. I am so glad you enjoyed The Gods of Gotham. I loved it as well. I am also glad you enjoyed the Patchett collection, (which I also adored), along with Woodson's latest.

I am just about done with Commonwealth. Man, I love this woman's writing.

>65 Berly: Thanks for all the kudos, Kim...and it's really nice to see you here!
>66 msf59: Thanks, Mark. We're off in a little bit to go to an Old Time Fiddlers' performance. I might have mentioned this local group before; we try to see them at least once a year. They are fantastic.

>62 laytonwoman3rd: I dip into and pull out of this collection. Too much Patchett doesn't digest well for me. An entire novel is not something I'll ever do again after Bel Canto.

Hope the Old Time Fiddlers gave you a good show.

Hope you had a good time with the Old Time Fiddlers, Linda.

We enjoyed the show, as always. There is a lot of talent in that group. We didn't stay for the full 4 hours (yes! for $8 per person), because we took my Mom and MIL; Mom gets antsy after an hour, but we managed to keep her there for 2 1/2 before relenting and going home. It is a bit disconcerting, though, because as you can see from that photo (which is a couple years old), the crowd is nearly all gray or bald, and I worry that they won't be able to sustain themselves. They seem to attract some younger performers from time to time, but the audience just gets older and more decrepit. Naturally, none of these musicians are making a living at it. They are teachers, bus drivers, mailmen, farmers, etc.
Here's a video of the core players of the group having a little fun along the river in my home town. These four perform separately as "Fiddlin' Around".

Liked the clip Linda. Glad it was fun.

85. The Puttermesser Papers by Cynthia Ozick Meh. I think this book is smarter than I am. And it may have taught me a vocabulary word or two. But I didn't enjoy it at all, and last night, finally reaching the last section (Puttermesser in Paradise), I read a few pages and did the unthinkable---I put it down with less than 20 pages left, and with no intention of reading to the end. This "novel" consists of five sections, each of which seems to stand alone, and to have nothing much to do with the others beyond the common character of Ruth Puttermesser. When we meet Ruth, she is a middle aged lawyer stuck in a dull bureaucratic job in the City of New York. After some political shuffling she ends up buried even deeper in the dusty files, on the clear path to termination. Her married lover walks out on her because she would rather read Socrates than frolic in bed when she knows their time together is limited. One night she unconsciously creates a golem from the dirt in her many potted plants. This section was a bit of fun of the magical realism variety, and although I couldn't warm up to Ruth, I thought the book might be going somewhere interesting as her fortunes rose and fell (possibly only in her imagination) with the machinations of her supernatural creation. But the next section took Ruth into a peculiar relationship with a much younger man, a relationship she attempted to mold into a recreation of that between George Eliot and George Lewes. The results were as predictably disastrous as releasing a golem in New York City had been. And this is where I really should have cut my losses and moved on. I continued to dislike Ruth, in the sense that there is nothing likeable about her, not that she is offensive or wicked or stupid; she's just an unfocused, over-educated bore. I also disliked that the author refers to her primarily as "Puttermesser", although it does describe her rather well---a butter knife, utilitarian, but unnecessary really. The separate parts, which I believe were all first published individually (each section a "paper"), fail to coalesce into a whole for me. Granted there are many allusions I'm missing the point of, my grasp of ancient history and mythology being slight, and naturally I cannot blame the author for that. But what was she getting at? The book is meant to be "comic in tone", apparently. While a couple bits of the golem story were amusing, overall I didn't see much humor in it, particularly in the final section as Ruth faces a distinctly unfunny end to her life on earth.

The book was a National Book Award finalist; it's on a list of 101 Great Jewish novels and the New York Times Best Books of the Year list. It didn't work for me. Your mileage may vary significantly.

Hi Linda!

Yikes. I'll pass on that one, for sure. A whole book about an unlikable character would be more than wearing, especially if surrounded by mythological and historical references that you know are there but don't get. I've put down books with just a few pages to go, and it always feels like the right thing to do, even if a bit frustrating. I recently read Olive Kitteridge and am thankful for the second and last stories, because otherwise Olive is as unlikeable as Ruth.

>72 laytonwoman3rd: Oh dear, not a success at all. I found Puttermesser a familiar character, a nebbishy dull soul with delusions of adequacy...permaybehaps a little too familiar...but loved Ozick's fearless choice of making a dull soul a) female and b) magical at the same time.

>74 richardderus: "a nebbishly dull soul with delusions of adequacy"---oh how I wish I had said that!

>73 karenmarie: Olive was indeed unlikeable, but somehow a bit more interesting. Which is odd, considering some the outlandish things that transpired in The Puttermesser Papers.

>72 laytonwoman3rd: I don’t think I’d ever heard of that novel Linda, but it won’t be added to the wish list me thinks. Gold stars for sticking with it.

86 Y is for Yesterday by Sue Grafton It's 1989, and a group of old high school friends are still dealing with the long term consequences of a pool party gone terribly wrong ten years earlier. One girl dead, two boys sent to prison, another losing his battle against the bottle, their svengali gone like the wind, an unsavory video tape being used to blackmail a fractured family...and that's where Kinsey Millhone comes in. She is hired to find out who is behind the blackmail attempt, but none of it is simple, and the threads that bound these people together a decade ago have only become more tangled and knotted with the passage of time. To complicate matters further, the psychopath who tried to kill Kinsey in X is still on the loose, and it looks like he's back in town with her in his sights once more. This is one of the best entries in the series, I think. Lots of character insight, lots of interesting action, Kinsey smarter than ever, and Henry's cinnamon rolls still making us both drool.

And so I have just one more Kinsey Millhone novel to look forward to...at least I assume that to be true. Maybe Grafton will decide she wants to go on after "Z" and will figure out a clever way to do that. Or maybe she will "retire" Kinsey one way or another at the end of the alphabet. Whatever she does, I hope she has made stringent provisions that will prevent anyone else from taking over the character when she's gone. Of course, Kinsey is too young to retire, and much too wonderful to kill off. I have a feeling Grafton has known for a while now how she wants to wrap up this series, and I don't expect to be disappointed by how she does it. Just bereft.

Henry's cinnamon rolls! OMG Dr. Pavlov I'm drooling.

Maybe I should read more of these. I can't remember where I left off, somewhere around N I think.

>77 laytonwoman3rd: - I am not much of a mystery fan but I did enjoy Grafton's books for awhile. I think I made it to *H* or *I*, then kind of lost interest. Maybe she will move on to numbers, after the alphabet...

Aa, Ab, Ac ....

Maybe each will take some thread from its earlier letter to run with.

I do have one somewhere, but I’ve not read it yet.

>78 richardderus:, >79 jessibud2:, >80 Caroline_McElwee: Well, by all means, everyone....read more Grafton. She is 77 years old, believe it or not, so who knows....maybe SHE will retire, even if Kinsey isn't ready to.

87. In honor of Hallowe'en, I read (re-read?) The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving, and what a treat it was. Naturally, I sorta kinda knew the story, but if I had actually read it before, it must have been when I was in 7th grade, or thereabouts, and under orders. It is very well done, full of wicked humor and my copy (OK, my daughter's copy) marvelously illustrated. Irving's descriptions are outstanding, and no more flowery than befits the 19th century. "...the sky was clear and serene, and nature wore that rich and golden livery which we always associate with the idea of abundance...some trees of the tenderer kind had been nipped by the frosts into brilliant dyes of orange, purple, and scarlet. Streaming files of wild ducks began to make their appearance high in the air; the bark of the squirrel might be heard from the groves of beech and hickory, and the pensive whistle of the quail at intervals from the neighboring stubble- field." Picture the lank and bony Ichabod Crane, a terror to young scholars in the classroom, ingratiating himself with their parents (who lodged and boarded him, turn-about, a week at a time) by helping with farm chores and minding the younger children--"he would sit with a child on one knee, and rock a cradle with his foot for whole hours together." And then, of course, he put himself crosswise of the formidable Brom Bones, when they each set their caps for Katrina Van Tassel, the "blooming lass of fresh eighteen; plump as a partridge; ripe and melting and rosy-cheeked as one of her father's peaches" (I say, Wash, take a cool dip in the stream!). Well, we know how Brom decided to eliminate the competition, now don't we? Fine stuff.

Happy Halloween!!

Hi Linda!

I recently finished Y is for Yesterday, too, and your review is excellent. I loved it, too, and Henry's food, all of it, is always mouth-watering. I did think that knowing that the psychopath was after her should have made her even more cautious than she was, and the death of said psychopath by compressive suffocation a bit far fetched.

Apparently "Z" is for Zero is due out in 2019 and Grafton has stated that it will be the final novel. We'll see, but I definitely agree that the series should end with Grafton writing it, not anybody else taking over.

>83 Berly: Pick your poison, Kim!


>84 karenmarie: Thanks, Karen. I'm always skeptical about people going about their business knowing someone is out to get them. I'd be cowering behind double-locked doors with security cameras and big dogs everywhere! And I'd sure as heck be "packing" when I did leave the house if I had a license to carry and the firearms training Kinsey has. I actually looked up compressive asphyxia, and apparently it happens with some frequency as the result of people being crushed in a panicked crowd, and during physical restraint while taking suspects into police custody. Maybe a little stretch in this instance, but not impossible, I guess.

>85 laytonwoman3rd: All the ones without nuts!! Yum, yum, yum. : )

I saw you over on the Kitchen thread. Much healthier diet there. ; )

Happy Wednesday.

>86 Berly: We leave the house and go to a big neighborhood (not ours) Halloween party thrown every year by my husband's former boss and good friend, so we aren't tempted by a lot of left-over candy. We do eat a lot of stuff we shouldn't, though, because they have all the good grown-up junk food.

Hope you had a good Halloween party Linda.

Crunch and Peanut Buttercups stand out for me. I have stopped buying candy at Halloween as the last few years we had no one ring the bell and then I had to eat everything myself. It was much easier when I was working, then I could take everything to work and leave them on the counter in the office.

So, my retirement should be making me healthier and skinnier, right? .......

"So, my retirement should be making me healthier and skinnier, right? ......." YEAH....why isn't that working??? No coffee breaks, no high-calorie quickie lunches at the desk, no boxes of fund-raiser candy bars from everybody's kids, grandkids etc., no "menu testing" of potential new items from the office manager's husband's restaurant... why why why aren't I wasting away?

>90 laytonwoman3rd: - and all the steps in my house! I go up and down more times a day now that I am home!

So, when you find the answer, let me know, ok? ;-)

>41 laytonwoman3rd: and >48 laytonwoman3rd: My library doesn't seem to have a copy. How is this possible?

>92 EBT1002: Maybe they sold it, like mine did...that's how I got my hands on this copy!

^Ha! :-)

Merry Monday, Linda3rd! I'm being the Donut Fairy today, sprinkling apple cider donuts with gay abandon:

88. A Fugitive in Walden Woods by Norman Lock Well, this is what you get for browsing the new acquisitions shelf at the library. Apparently Norman Lock has written 3 previous novels in what's called the "American Novels Series", which look at American history through the eyes of characters and real people we think we know. The first of these, which sounds the most ambitious, is The Boy in His Winter, a "re-imagining" of Huck and Jim's journey, which takes them not down the river, but through time from the Civil War to Hurricane Katrina. I must get my hands on a copy of that.

The premise of A Fugitive is that an escaped slave, Samuel Long, having made his way via the Underground Railroad to Concord, comes under the protection of Emerson, who engages his services to live in Walden Woods and "keep an eye" on Henry Thoreau. The tale is told by Long some 15 years after the fact, when his freedom has been purchased by Emerson and others, he has received a college education at Middlebury College in Vermont, and has worked under William Lloyd Garrison at The Liberator. Long is often bemused by these privileged white men, who both preach and practice their views on the evils of slavery and the equality of all men, but who do not always see the realities of life clearly while they are busy thinking on a high plane. As far as I can determine, no real person forms the basis of Lock's creation, but the author has relied heavily on the writings of Thoreau and Emerson to build his story, and has included recognizable events, such as Thoreau's disastrous campfire which burned over 200 acres of woodland and threatened the town of Concord itself. Lock's (or Long's) prose is lovely, reminiscent of Thoreau at his best, but skewed differently. If you love Walden, you'll enjoy this fictional memoir for its perspective on Thoreau's experiment in simple living, but if you find Thoreau annoying and slightly simple-minded in his outlook, you'll LOVE Samuel Long's wry and pithy observations about him. A very fine find, indeed.

>95 richardderus: Oh, oh...oh! And is there coffee to go with??

Press or carafe?

Whichever is hotter, thank you.

>96 laytonwoman3rd: - I read American Meteor last year, Linda, and didn't love it (didn't hate it, either, though!), but made note of the author, as I thought I'd like to try something else by him. Thanks for the nudge :)

My Norman Lock reviews:
The Boy in His Winter

American Meteor

The Port-Wine Stain

>99 laytonwoman3rd: Going by its description, Katie, I'd say American Meteor appeals to me the least of the four titles.

>96 laytonwoman3rd: RD, I see by my explorations that you reviewed The Boy in His Winter favorably, with some reservations. I was brought up short a couple times by Samuel Long's turn of phrase in context of 1846, or so, when the action takes place. But then he would remind the reader that his words come from the 1862 version of himself, and that he could not have spoken so at the time. Maybe Lock got the hint that his "older, wiser" narrators need a little more propping up.
ETA: Ah....thanks for the other links. I was typing while you were typing.

>1 laytonwoman3rd: So, all of a sudden my anti-virus, web-advisor tells me the TickerFactory site is DANGEROUS, and won't let me into it to update my numbers. Anybody else having this issue?

Nope, my antivi ignores the site per usual.

I just went to look at tickerfactory from your ticker up above and the first page was fine but when I clicked on create McAfee threw up a big Whoa you don't wanna go there

>103 laytonwoman3rd: - Linda, I updated my ticker just this morning, without any problems. Try to shut down your computer altogether and reboot. When in doubt, reboot. That's my extremely non-techy advice! :-)

>105 RBeffa: Yup, exactly. I can get to the site, but if I try to access my ticker to edit it, McAfee shrieks at me, and the "Accept Risk" button seems to be greyed out, so there's nothing I can do. If you find a solution, Ron, please let me know.

>106 jessibud2:, Well, yes, as a former IT person (albeit one without any training whatsoever except LIVING with one and not being afraid of the technology), I would very often recommend a reboot. It's always worth a try.

Hi, Linda. I was not a fan of The Boy in His Winter - author showoffery and some weird choices turned me off. But you may well like it better than I did.

>108 jnwelch: Eww..."author showoffery"...that's not good.

Tickerfactory is still at Whoa. I think I would avoid it. Either they have been hacked somewhere or they have some malware type thing linked into pages. I've depended on McAfee for quite a while now and between them and malwarebytes I've stayed safe.

>110 RBeffa: Sadly, I must agree with you, Ron. It isn't worth the risk. I love my pretty little tickers, but I'll be removing them from my threads now.

Sorry to see the tickers go but perhaps the site will become safe(r) again sometime soon.

Odd, but I have not had any ticker issues. I updated just the other day and transferred them to my newest thread yesterday. No pop-up warnings for me. Maybe it's something else?

>113 jessibud2: Are you using McAfee antivirus, Shelley, or something else? I think it's a little more stringent than some, but I've never had it actually prevent me from doing anything before.

Hmmmm. I think my ticker is working well....? Good luck figuring it out.

>114 laytonwoman3rd: - Hmmm, I can't remember. I want to say I have AVG but that might have been what I had on my old computer. I am not at home now so can't check but I will let you know once I get home on Monday. I don't think it is McAfee, though

>115 Berly:, >116 jessibud2: I have a second computer (old) that I mostly use to run Word (old version) and to store photos, but it is connected to the internet, with Kaspersky anti-virus. That one lets me use TickerFactory. I'm pretty sure I don't trust Kaspersky much these days---not so much its effectiveness against viruses, but its integrity in other ways---so I'm still going to shun the site.

McAfee seems to have relaxed a bit on ticker factory. The go ahead button wasn't greyed out. I didn't click thru but did a google search for tickerfactory - it shows six sub pages and gives two of the six pages a red X - Event and weight loss. clicking on the main page still gives the whoa however - so I clicked on view site report and it shows the risk as minimal but says the site is cited for online affiliations and how aggressively it tries to get you to go there.

So, the ticker is probably OK but something is still funny there.

DNF Graveyard Dust by Barbara Hambly This is No. 3 in Hambly's Benjamin January series. Unfortunately, the shortcomings I noted in the first two books continue here, and I just couldn't keep going this time. The setting really appeals to me, and January is an interesting character. But I find Hambly's style monotonous; secondary characters don't come to life and I lose track of who's who because they mostly get talked about, not seen in action; again I was finding her emphasis on the obvious heavy-handed and repetitive. Free people of color in 19th century New Orleans had as much reason to fear for their safety as slaves, or former slaves, yeah I get it---even when she shows the reader that this is true, she finds it necessary for her characters to tell us what we just saw. I couldn't make myself care who killed Isaak (if he's even dead, which I doubt) and I was fairly sure that somehow January would get his sister cleared of the charge, but I wasn't too curious about how....so I quit about 150 pages in. This series should be much better than it is, and it makes me sad. Despite my interest in the multi-leveled milieu of the time and place, which carried me through A Free Man of Color, I barely made it to the end of Fever Season, and could not finish Graveyard Dust. It just isn't enough of a factor to keep me reading these rather tedious books.

>119 laytonwoman3rd: I reached the same conclusion re Hambly's style vis a vis my remaining eyeblinks. Just not the way I want to spend 'em.

I have switched to a non-fiction account of a kidnapping that took place in New Orleans during Reconstruction...a white baby apparently taken away by two women of color. So far, much better reading.

That sounds so much more The Thing, indeed. And if you haven't, I'd recommend reading The Lost German Slave Girl: The Extraordinary True Story of Sally Miller and Her Fight for Freedom in Old New Orleans at some point. I was very taken by it.

>122 richardderus: Duly noted...thank you sir!

>122 richardderus: Ooh, yes, seconding that. I found the legal process of that whole story fascinating.

Hope your current read is hitting the spot, Linda!

Yesterday was the monthly meeting of the Board of Trustees of the Scranton Public Library, of which I am a member. We met at Library Express, the combination indie bookstore/used bookstore/library branch in the Marketplace at Steamtown (formerly known as the Steamtown Mall). Accordingly, I was more or less obligated to purchase a few items in support of our worthy endeavors. I came home with 2 bars of Gertrude Hawk chocolate, and the following secondhand treasures:

Czeslaw Milosz The Collected Poems
The Woodlanders by Thomas Hardy (Folio Society edition)
A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains by Isabella Bird (Folio Society edition)
An Island Garden by Celia Thaxter, illuminated (not just illustrated, if you please) by Childe Hassam.

The latter is so gorgeous I have to share one of the paintings that grace its pages.

>125 laytonwoman3rd: Wow, and not just the painting!

>125 laytonwoman3rd: lovely haul Linda. The Thaxter is a beauty.

Folio editions - nice! It's such a treat to find those in used bookstores, isn't it?

Small but mighty, this haul. I had one other that came closer to knocking my socks off---when I found several Folio editions (at $2.00 each) in the flea market booth at a county fair a few years ago.

Two dollars?! That's crazy!

>130 scaifea: I know, right? The good people at Library Express have a better idea of the worth of such things, but still offer a good many of them for $5.00 a piece. After all, it's clear profit as the used stuff is all donated. I dropped off a rather hefty box of donations myself yesterday, but there were no Folios in it! Mostly what you see listed as culled in October and November in >7 laytonwoman3rd: above.

The marvelous mahsdad is hosting the 75'ers Christmas Swap again this year, in case you missed it. If you'd like to participate, take yourself over here: https://www.librarything.com/topic/274870

Is there a prettier sight on a November afternoon?



Full disclosure: I did not cook this bird, but I did partake of it, a few years ago. Our celebration will be on the weekend this year, but I couldn't let the day pass without wishing my carnivorous American friends a HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

This is a time of year when I as a non-American ponder over what I am thankful for.

I am thankful for this group and its ability to keep me sane during topsy-turvy times.

I am thankful that you are part of this group.

I am thankful for this opportunity to say thank you.

>134 PaulCranswick: Thank YOU, Paul, for all you contribute to the LT community that has become so essential to my life.

>133 laytonwoman3rd: That is a good looking turkey!! Happy Thanksgiving, in advance!

Just a little something for the two of us....



Not shown: the crustless chocolate pie (i.e. pudding).

Hope you had a lovey Thanksgiving, Linda. You set a beautiful table!

>133 laytonwoman3rd: LIKE!

Hi, Linda. I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving with the family. And I hope those books are treating you just fine.

What a lovely table for two, Linda. And the food looks pretty scrumptious too!

Hi Linda!

>137 laytonwoman3rd: Nice table and food. Especially the gravy.....

>138 jessibud2: Thank you, Shelley. I like to get a little fancy once in a while.
>139 msf59: Thanks, Mark. The family part will happen on Sunday, weather permitting. Over the river and through the woods, and everything.
>140 lauralkeet: Thanks, Laura...gotta say it was pretty tasty.
>141 karenmarie: Thanks, Karen. I'm a fan of good gravy myself!

PaulCranswick 's list for the 2018 Irish Authors Challenge (am I NUTS?) Just putting it here where I can find it. I have books on hand by many of these authors and have enjoyed some others already, so I'm hoping to do better with this one than I have with some other challenges this year.

IRISH AUTHOR CHALLENGE 2018

January : EDNA O'BRIEN
February : WILLIAM TREVOR
March : DEIRDRE MADDEN
April : Samuel Beckett
May : IRISH CRIME WRITERS
June : ANNE ENRIGHT
July : COLM TOIBIN
August : MOLLY KEANE
September : RODDY DOYLE
October : POETS & PLAYWRIGHTS
November : EMMA DONOGHUE, JENNIFER JOHNSTON, MAGGIE O'FARRELL
December : JOHN BANVILLE, SEBASTIAN BARRY, COLUM MCCANN

I have been reading in November, honest. Just haven't had much time to collect thoughts and write reviews. Hopefully next week... I have finished The Loyal Son and The Last Ballad, both excellent reading.

Off in an hour or so to pick up my mom and head for "the farm" where our official family Thanksgiving feast will take place this afternoon.

89. The Loyal Son by Daniel Mark Epstein This biography of William Franklin is subtitled "The War in Benjamin Franklin's House", which is very apt, as it refers to both The War (for American Independence) and how it affected the Franklin family, and the war between Ben and his son William, a Royal Governor of New Jersey who never wavered from his staunch Loyalist views, despite the hardships and tragedies that descended on him and his family as a result. It is much more than William's life story; the insights into our country's origins revealed here are eye-opening, and often unsettling. You think you know your American History when you've gone over the high points from sixth grade on, but The Loyal Son is full of real-life drama, nitty-gritty politics and detail we never learned in school. The existence of Dr. Franklin's illegitimate son by a woman whose identity we can't be sure of was something I only became aware of in the last 20 years or so. The terror in which Tory families found themselves living once the Sons of Liberty and other patriots began to get the upper hand; the utter bloody stupidity of the Crown; the difficulty of communicating and traveling between Europe and North America; the incredible fortitude of Ben Franklin; it's all so thoroughly illuminated here. Epstein is not quite in the same class as an author of narrative non-fiction as David McCullough or Tony Horwitz, but this in-depth look, from opposite perspectives, at the wheeling-dealing, scheming and personal sacrifice of participants in the events leading up to and following in the American Revolution is one of the most fascinating historical accounts I've read in some time. This would make grand mini-series fodder, if done along the lines of PBS's John Adams, for instance.

90. The Last Ballad by Wiley Cash Wiley Cash has the story-telling gift. This novel is based on historical incidents in the early 20th century, as union organizers attempted to bring better wages and working conditions to the textile mills of Appalachia. Varying points of view add perspective and tension to the tale; although we learn early on that the first character we meet, Ella Mae Wiggins, will risk everything to try to improve her family's lot by joining the union, and that she will be murdered eventually because of her actions, that foreknowledge takes nothing away from her story, bits of which we learn through the eyes of other unforgettable characters. A page-turner; highly recommended.

91. If the Creek Don't Rise by Rita Williams I'm on a roll of great reading, as this memoir got a grip on me and wouldn't let go. I'm surprised not to have heard of it here, to find only two very minimal reviews posted, and to be virtually unable to find any updated biographical information on the author other than one sentence on the book jacket -- "She has been an actor, musician, professor, recovery counselor and radio announcer as well as a writer."

Rita Mae Williams was the youngest child of a sweet, pretty woman of Cherokee and African heritage, and a light-skinned ambitious black man who together ran a sort of dude ranch near Steamboat Springs, Colorado, leading hunting and fishing expeditions, and raising strawberries and raspberries, all with the help of Aunt Daisy, one of the state's first licensed female hunting guides. For a time, they "had the world by the tail on a downhill pull". But when Rita was 2 years old, her father abandoned the family to live with a white woman. The family business fell on hard times, and after moving to Denver to find work, Rita's mother died in a boarding house fire. Rita and her sisters came under the care of their mother's sister Daisy, the widow of ex-slave, Buffalo soldier and rancher Robert Ball Anderson. Daisy had married Mr. Anderson in 1922 when she was 21 and he was 79; his death left her with a lot of land in South Dakota, and not much else, so she had moved to Colorado to help out with her sister and brother-in-law's enterprise. From the age of 4 until she went off to college, Rita lived under the watchful eye of Aunt Daisy; finances were very tight, and Daisy made ends meet by cleaning houses, schools and businesses, often pressing Rita into service as her assistant. Daisy was tough, resourceful, and determined that Rita would "make something of herself", although her encouragement took strange forms, and often when Rita would show aptitude or talent in a certain area, Aunt Daisy would start throwing stumbling blocks in her path. She provided for education, music lessons, dance instruction and more, but she was impatient, hard to please, impossible to love, and sometimes downright cruel. For much of Rita's childhood and adolescence, she was the only African-American student in her classes, and she rarely met anyone other than white people. Her aunt's attitude toward her neighbors, employers and the nuns at the Catholic schools she sent Daisy to was inconsistent, a mixture of respect and contempt that often left Rita confused about just what her aunt--and the world--expected of her. This is a fascinating story, told without nostalgia or self-pity. Its only failing, in my opinion, is that it leaves us with so little information about the adult Rita became. I wish she had written another book (this one was published in 2006).

>145 laytonwoman3rd: that's his new book, right? I read a review in NYT which tempted me and now you're nudging me so I'm sure I will succumb at some point.

>145 laytonwoman3rd: - I won this as an ER in August but it still hasn't arrived :(

Mark and Joe are reading it next week.

>145 laytonwoman3rd: A page-turner and highly recommended - good to hear, Linda. Now I just have to find the darn book - we picked it up at ALA a good while ago.

Hi Linda. It is wonderful to visit here. I am tempted to add many of the books you read. For now, I'm going to seed if my local library has a copy of The Last Ballad by Wiley Cash , I tremendously enjoy his books.

>147 lauralkeet:, >148 katiekrug:, >149 jnwelch:, >150 Whisper1: The Last Ballad is Cash's latest novel; it was just published in October, I think. It may not be on the library shelves just yet. I got my ARC from a wonderful friend who knows what I love. I think you are all going to enjoy it too.

We were at an annual holiday party last night where we usually see another couple for the only time during the year, and the conversation always turns to books. This year I got a recommendation for a non-fiction book called The Faith Club, in which 3 women, a Christian, a Muslim and a Jew, explore their respective faiths in an effort to help their children understand the differences and similarities among them. So that's something I'll be looking out for.

Oops, another hit Linda, the faith club sounds interesting.

>144 laytonwoman3rd: Oh All RIGHT I give UP I'll go get the darn thing! *sheesh*

Sending hugs

>152 Caroline_McElwee: I think so too, Caro.

>153 richardderus: Hugs back atcha. I love when I wield my power for Good!

92. The Great New Orleans Kidnapping Case by Michael A. Ross Meh. This is the story of the kidnapping of a white baby, allegedly by a couple women of color--or more correctly the story of the investigation into that kidnapping and the trial of the Afro-Creole sisters accused of it. It all took place during the period of Reconstruction, when government in Louisiana was integrated, and operating fairly well. The detective on the case was a Creole named John Baptiste Jourdain. In the beginning, the abduction was linked to Voodoo ritual, and it was feared the child had been taken for a human sacrifice. When the baby was found and returned unharmed, the investigation turned in a totally different direction, and frankly the rest of the story just wasn't that interesting. Despite a few intriguing elements, I think there is way too much book here for the amount of subject matter, even though it only runs to 234 pages. The story suffers from a lack of suspense; I simply didn't care a lot how the trial came out because it never seemed clear whether there were any innocent parties or bad guys to root for or against. It was significant, however, in that the women of color accused of the crime were acquitted by a biracial jury, suggesting that the hardline racists had not yet totally tangled the reins of justice in the late 19th century. It's sad and ironic to contemplate in light of how other trials turned out in the Deep South in the first half of the 20th century.

I've finally done a review of If the Creek Don't Rise at >146 laytonwoman3rd: above. This book definitely needs more exposure. See if you can find a copy--it's unlike anything else I've ever read.

>156 laytonwoman3rd: ...not...gonna...look...nope nope nope...

Ah hell.

*trudges off to Ammy*

>157 richardderus: So that's TWO TWO TWO vunderful books I've hit you with, eh, R? (I'm hevving SUCH a VUNderfull time!)

93. The Elected Member by Bernice Rubens Several years ago, an LT friend read this early Booker Prize winner, and was impressed. She sent it to me, and it got buried in the masses of wanna-reads around here. Then in 2016 (I think) Rubens was one of the selections for the British Authors Challenge, and I thought to myself--I HAVE one of her books, I'll read it now! Could I find it?? Nope. Well, I came across it recently in a totally forgotten box of unread books (how can that even happen?) so I thought I'd dispense with it one way or another. Much like lauralkeet, who sent it to me in the first place, I didn't have high hopes, and thought I'd probably Pearl rule it and cull it from the house. Wrong. So wrong.

Rubens begins by introducing the reader to the surreal world of Norman Zweck, a tormented man who "sees" creatures swarming around his room, over his bed and his body. We come to understand that his mind is deranged, that he has a substance abuse problem, that he has thrown away a promising legal career, and that his family is clueless as to how to help. His elderly father, Rabbi Zweck, buries himself in optimism, clinging to the forlorn hope that if only he could "find out who he gets them from" he could cut off Norman's supply of pills, and all would soon be well. The unmarried daughter, Bella, who stopped growing into her own self at around age 15, partly because of her brother and his favored status in the household, can do nothing but care for the two men she loves most in the world. When Rabbi Zweck, with extreme reluctance, commits Norman to a mental hospital for treatment, his greatest fear is that Norman will actually "settle in" and get better there, never wanting to come home. Yet home is so much more peaceful without the son's unpredictable presence. As the novel proceeds, we learn details of life with the Zwecks over the past two decades, and the tragedy merely deepens with each new revelation. Dysfunction is a mild word for the way this family has destroyed each other on the pretense of love and loyalty. Despite the essential hopelessness of the story, there is humor in it---the wicked, so-awful-I-have-to-laugh-or-I'll-cry sort, to be sure. One could reduce the novel to stereotypes and cliches--the suffocating Jewish mother, the long-suffering devoted daughter, the pampered over-indulged son, the daughter who married out and has been dead to her parents ever since, the simple good-hearted Rabbi who has spent so much of his life learning that he knows nothing of living-- but it would be quite wrong to do so. Rubens takes us deep enough into the characters to rise above that. I thought, while reading, that I did not like any of them very much, although I found them all quite interesting to know. But then, like one of Norman's male nurses, I found myself nearly overcome by Rabbi Zweck's inevitable, dignified, poignant farewell to his son.

Interesting. Most interesting.

>160 laytonwoman3rd: What a fabulous review, Linda. It makes me happy that you enjoyed this book so much. I guess it's a kind of forgotten treasure.

>160 laytonwoman3rd: it is years since I read any Bernice Rubens Linda, and I’ve certainly not read this one. Another BB I think.

Hmmm, heading for 100 I see...

Hi Linda!

>146 laytonwoman3rd: Ya got me! Like >157 richardderus: our own dear RD, I just trudged off to Amazon and bought it. Not even adding it to my wishlist, mind, but actually buying it. As if I need a single book right now, knowing I'll get 3 books for sure, at Christmas, and having over 1700 books tagged 'tbr' on my shelves. However, it sounds fantastic and I can't wait to get it!

>161 richardderus:, >163 Caroline_McElwee:, >164 karenmarie: *dusts hands* My work here is done.

>162 lauralkeet: You and me, kid. Discerning readers extraordinaire!

94. The Whistler by John Grisham Grisham's usual complex but not bewildering plotting, this time involving a sort of sting operation to bring down a corrupt judge, and with her a whole organized crime outfit not even on the Fed's radar until Lacy Stoltz of the Florida Board on Judicial Conduct brought it to their attention. A bit of a slow set-up, and a death that felt unnecessary had me skeptical about this one for 100 pages or so, but I should have trusted Grisham to know what he was up to. Solid entertainment and a satisfying outcome, as always.

>166 laytonwoman3rd: Solid entertainment and a satisfying outcome, as always.

And there, in a nutshell, is the career of one John Grisham. The best summing-up possible. I always enjoy reading his books but have nothing interesting to say about them. Now I don't even have to try! *smooch*

>160 laytonwoman3rd: I must read that book next year Linda.

Have a great remainder of your Sunday.

I hope you found other treasures in that forgotten box of unread books, Linda. The one that you reviewed, The Elected Member sounds interesting.

>168 PaulCranswick:, >169 Familyhistorian: I'm glad to be stirring up interest in Bernice Rubens. I'm going to be looking out for more of her work.

There were a couple of Penelope Lively books in that box, too, Meg. Actually, I'm going to try to revisit it today and make a list of what's in it. I try not to just box books up blind like that, but I must have done this several years ago when I wasn't being so organized about it.

>170 laytonwoman3rd: Looks like you left a box of treasures for yourself, Linda.

Happy birthday Linda, hope you are tucking in to some naughty sweet treats.

>171 Familyhistorian: Yep, that's what I did. Probably even meant to do it at the time, and then forgot all about it!

>172 Caroline_McElwee: Thank you, Caroline. Haven't been too naughty so far, but dinner will be an indulgence!

95. The September Society by Charles Finch This is the second in the series of Victorian detective novels featuring Charles Lenox, a 40ish man who had always thought to follow his grandfather, father and brother into Parliament, but somehow hasn't got 'round to standing for a seat so far. He's come to accept that sleuthing suits him, and that perhaps he should really consider proposing to his dearest and oldest friend, Lady Jane Grey. In the midst of an increasingly alarming missing persons case, however, the moment never feels quite right and he may have left it too long... I remember reading the first Lenox outing, A Beautiful Blue Death, and thinking this is a series with great promise, love the characters and the setting, and here's a gentleman doing what Sherlock Holmes claimed to have invented, some 30 years earlier and without the benefit of that 7% solution. But then it sort of fell off my radar. I found No's 5, 6 and 7 in the series at that last book sale I went to, and my interest was rekindled. So I fetched No. 2 from the library. It's even better than I expected. Set mainly among the colleges of Oxford, this is not just a grand mystery, but also a fine bit of historical fiction. I'm well and truly hooked now.

I have the first of that series sitting on my shelf... *sigh*

Mentally moving it up in the queue!

>175 katiekrug: *grins*

96. Eudora Welty on William Faulkner This is a collection of Welty's public writings about Faulkner, including a review of Intruder in the Dust; a deliciously wrathy letter to Edmund Wilson, who had critiqued the same novel with blinkers on, in her view ("there's such a thing as a literary frame of reference that isn't industrial New York City in 1948" she points out); a memorial tribute written for the Associated Press news service when Faulkner died; and some lectures and speeches. Lordy, I love this lady. She is right up there at the top of my list of people I wish I could sit down and talk to. And I'm pretty sure if she lived down the road, I could sit down and talk to her. She comes across as warm, witty, gracious, possessed of an intelligence I could learn from, totally lacking in Attitude but not about to take a lot of nonsense either. And, of course, she loves Faulkner the way I do...not academically, but like a slightly surly uncle who nevertheless tells terrific stories and sees things the rest of us would miss if not for him. She also reviewed a collection of Faulkner's Selected Letters. After pointing out that Faulkner would have hated the idea, but accepted the inevitability, of their publication, Welty dealt a bit with the content and the chronological presentation of the letters Joseph Blotner included in the chunky volume (there it sits, right on the shelf at the top of my desk). But then she wrote a paragraph that exemplifies why I do love her so. She said:
"No man ever put more of his heart and soul into the written word than did William Faulkner. If you want to know all you can about that heart and soul, the fiction where he put it is still right there. The writer offered it to us from the start, and when we didn't even want it or know how to take it and understand it; it's been there all along and is more than likely to remain. Read that."

>174 laytonwoman3rd: I loved the first book in this series, and never got around to the second. You’ve made me want to get to the second soon.

Oooo, you are going to break the 100 mark this year I suspect Linda.

>177 laytonwoman3rd: Must get back to The Hamlet trilogy next year.

Happy weekend, Linda3rd. Hope it's warmer there than here...40° but really windy isn't much better than upper 20s.

Hope you had a better weekend that I did, Linda. Shortly after unpacking the box of presents you sent, I decided that Faulkner's name is on all three. And I was surmising that the thin, square package might be Eudora Welty's writing about Faulkner. Then I read your report on just that book >177 laytonwoman3rd:, and now I'm really pumped. An-ti-ci-pa-tion...Oh man, hope I'm right.

My less-good weekend began with a tumble and a fractured right ankle, leading to three dispiriting days in the hospital...waiting. Gahh. Home now. Reunited with my favorite wife and our doggie, a good environment for reading, and some books I really want to read.

>181 weird_O: Just left a consoling message over on your thread, Bill. I hate mishaps this time of year...it seems they are doubly troubling because they often upset lots of plans, in addition to being painful and just generally inconvenient. But...books. So, there's that. And as for your surmising, you are partly right. And that's all I have to say about that. Under the circumstances, though, if you just can't wait to open that square package, no one here will say a word against it.

>180 richardderus: Thanks, Richard. The weekend was pretty good. And the warm-up is welcome, up to a point, of course.

>179 Caroline_McElwee: It will be close, Caroline, but I hope to hit that 100 mark.

>178 NanaCC: I really think the second book was even more engaging than the first, Colleen.

97. Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward Jesmyn Ward just amazes me. Her language is exquisite, and I think I could read anything she might write on any subject whatsoever. This memoir is powerful, disturbing and extremely important. And beyond that I just don't know what to say about it. Her world, which she loves despite its brutality, is so foreign to me, and yet she has somehow made it possible in a way no other author has matched for me to grasp a bit of how growing up in that world shapes your understanding of life and your place in it, and how unbelievably hard it is to see across the dividing lines, from either side, let alone to move from one world to the other. The primary focus of the book is the lives and untimely deaths of five young men who were close to the author, beginning with her brother. Ward tells their stories backward, starting with the most recent death and ending with the most important, that of her younger brother Joshua, who was killed by a drunk driver in 2000. Interspersed with the sections on each lost life are chapters about Jesmyn's growing up in a working class Black family in Mississippi, where generations of women found themselves struggling to raise children with absent fathers, and generations of men strove to fill the role of protector and provider, with all the cards stacked against them. I feel better informed after reading this book, but I also feel at a loss to know what to do with this information.

It was over 50° yesterday and will be in the mid-40s today! What a crock. It's December. Supposably cold. Now, not so much.

Have a happy and productive Tuesday!

>183 laytonwoman3rd: - Wonderful comments, Linda. I am planning to read MWR next year.

>184 richardderus: It was a heller, as my father used to say, RD. A list of errands as long as my arm, but with a lovely holiday lunch with an old friend thrown in the middle. Soon, I'm off to throw a round missile at 10 white objects that are way more stable than they look. Liz Johnson I'm not, but it should be fun.

(Oh, for you all who don't know -most of you, I imagine- Liz Johnson is a world class bowler, who just became the 2nd woman to win a PBA national tour title (on what used to be called the "Men's Tour"), competing against some of the best men in the sport.)

>185 katiekrug: It's a toughie, Katie, but you'll have no regrets.

>183 laytonwoman3rd: wasn't that a powerful book? I share your feelings about being more informed but also unsure what to do about it. Still, awareness is a start.

>183 laytonwoman3rd: "Jesmyn Ward just amazes me." Amen to that, Linda. Good review. I loved this memoir too. Strong stuff.

>183 laytonwoman3rd: What a great review!

>183 laytonwoman3rd: very fine review Linda. I have just ‘Clicked’ on a copy of that. I have Sing, Unburied Sing near the top of the pile too.

I’d be interested to hear if you do do anything with the information. Of course, you’ve already encouraged others to read the book....

>183 laytonwoman3rd: Ooof. Adding that one to the list.

>183 laytonwoman3rd: As I think you know, Linda, I have Men We Reaped on my TBR shelves and I plan to read it in January. I may start it next week and let it roll into the new year so I can count it for one of my not-challenges in 2018.

And I'm adding A Beautiful Blue Death to the wish list. If only I can remember my user name for FictFact....

>192 EBT1002: Ha! I already have A Beautiful Blue Death on the wish list and it says "rec by Linda" in the comments field!

Memory.

>193 EBT1002: LOL! >192 EBT1002: I must go see if I noted it as "read" in FictFact. I sometimes forget to keep track there, and it's really a useful site.
>187 lauralkeet:, >188 msf59: Probably one or both of you prompted me to take this one out of the library. Although I was already keen on Ward after reading Salvage the Bones.
>189 Whisper1: Thank you, Linda! And how lovely to see you dropping by.
>190 Caroline_McElwee: Mmm...well, I guess passing the word counts as doing something, Caroline. Thank you. Sing, Unburied, Sing is on my wishlist as well.
>191 scaifea: Good, Amber!

Happy Yule Book Flood!

>195 richardderus: Ha!

98. Baby Doll Games by Margaret Maron Sigrid Harald investigates the brutal murder of a popular dancer, which took place on stage, in full view of an audience including many of the children taking dance lessons from the victim. Everyone with opportunity seemed to have loved her, motive is hard to come by, and despite the number of witnesses, no one can identify the killer. Tricky business, complicated by possible connections to a previous murder, with an interesting secondary plot that gives the book its title. Good stuff. A couple quibbles -- too many "colorful" references to the skin of a Chinese man and a Latino man, and to the hair of various female characters; these added nothing to the plot and struck me as completely unnecessary; the murder "weapon" also seemed to present an unwarranted hazard, even without evil intent, and I found it an unlikely component of an amateur stage production. Still, a good puzzle, with clues for the careful reader. The Harald series is so much darker than Maron's Judge Knott books.

Mark's 2018 American Author Challenge (which I can never resist) looks like this:

2018 AAC

January- Joan Didion
February- Colson Whitehead
March- Tobias Wolff
April- Alice Walker
May- Peter Hamill
June- Walter Mosley
July- Amy Tan
August- Louis L'Amour
September- Pat Conroy
October- Stephen King
November- Narrative Nonfiction
December- F. Scott Fitzgerald

And I like it.

99. The Rabbi's Cat by Joann Sfar My daughter campaigns to convert me to an enthusiastic reader of graphic novels. This was her most recent recommendation. She can't claim success just yet. I found the story a bit choppy and muddled, the religious explication a bit heavy-handed, and the art unappealing. There was, however, a fair amount of "my kind" of humor in it. Maybe I'm just not ever going to take to this format. *pats lycomayflower on the head* But I am still open to an occasional suggestion.

I'll probably be a part-time participant in the AAC in 2018.

Meanwhile....



Happy Holiday season to you and yours, Linda!

>199 laytonwoman3rd: *splutters* There's no accounting for taste, I guess.

>200 EBT1002: Ohhhh.....almost as cute as my own Christmas kitty. Thank you, Ellen. I hope you do participate in the AAC next year. I know you're trying to swear off the challenges, and I certainly understand that.



>201 lycomayflower: THAT's what you call burning my ears off? I suppose you're going easy on me in the spirit of the season. ("In keeping wif the situAYtion" that is.)

>198 laytonwoman3rd: LOVE!!

Merry Christmas, Linda. Have a great holiday and I look forward to another year of shared reading and enjoying the final year of hosting the AAC.

>202 laytonwoman3rd: Hello Mollie.

Hi Linda!



Stopping by to wish you and yours all good things this holiday season.

It is that time of year again, between Solstice and Christmas, just after Hanukkah, when our thoughts turn to wishing each other well in whatever language or image is meaningful to the recipient. So, whether I wish you Happy Solstice or Merry Christmas, know that what I really wish you, and for you, is this:

>205 karenmarie:, >206 rretzler:, >207 ronincats: Thank you! Merry Christmas to you all.



I've been around to as many threads as I could tonight. But if I missed yours, and you visit here, please know I wish everyone a lovely holiday, and a peaceful New Year.

Wishing you all the best for the holiday and the new year, Linda!

Wishing you all good things this holiday season and beyond.

Merry Christmas to you and your family, Linda!

Thank you Shelley, and Paul, and Darryl. It didn't snow here quite as much as predicted, and the grass is still visible in spots, so "White Christmas" is a bit of a stretch, but we're making it work!

We actually had quite a bit of snow over the last 24 hours so much of my city is digging out this morning. It's blowing around a lot too, so I am grateful not to have to be out driving in it! But it sure is pretty from this side of the window! :-)

Popping by because I need to tell you about the dream I had last night:

You and your lovely daughter biked to my parents' house to deliver chickens to us so that we could donate them to our friends, who apparently lost all of theirs in some sort of unspecified yet tragic chicken farm disaster. I'm not sure how you two a) peddled all the way from your respective homes several states away from Indiana or, b) carried a chicken in one arm while doing so (you clearly didn't use cages in the dream), but the strange but grand gesture was very much appreciated.

Anyhoo, thought you'd like to know. Also Happy Christmas and New Year!

>214 scaifea: Hmmm...probably my niece was with us, but you don't know her so maybe you didn't see her in the dream. She actually has chickens, and I imagine that's where we got them. Of course, it's a well-known fact that chickens love a nice bike ride. (You've heard of biker chicks, right?)

100. Benediction by Kent Haruf If there is such a thing as beautiful sadness, that's the feeling this book left in my heart. The story of a man in his final days, dying of lung cancer, facing this challenge with the same grace and practicality he has applied to his life. It's just a simple picture of good people up against trouble; some of them deal with it well, and others aren't particularly equipped to deal with it at all. It's a story that I feel I have lived in myself, and I saw an awful lot of that man in >1 laytonwoman3rd: above in Dad Lewis. It also reminded me quite a lot of Marilynne Robinson's Home, although in this case, the prodigal son never does return.

Gotta thank you sincerely, Linda, for your gifts. I want to read Miss Welty before the end of the year. I loved your card and the tale of your choices.

Did you look at the collection called "My Own Books" by any chance?

>215 laytonwoman3rd: what a hoot! or should I say cluck?

>216 laytonwoman3rd: * happy sigh* beautiful sadness, indeed. That was a 5-star read for me. And I am so grateful to you, Linda, for introducing me to Haruf's work!

>217 weird_O: *headslap* I did not look specifically at that collection, Bill, and I wasn't looking at authors while perusing the wood-related books in your catalog. I just saw that huge "woodworking" collection and had a brainstorm. I'm usually sharper than that!

>218 lauralkeet: Yes, Laura, I have to give it five stars too. What I find incredible is that he wrote this story, which could be his own, before he knew he was dying of an incurable lung disease. According to everything I read, he learned his own diagnosis sometime in 2014, and Benediction was published in 2013.

>220 laytonwoman3rd: wow. I didn't connect those dots when I read it.

For my own reference, and yours if you like, Electric Lit's list of 46 Books By Women of Color to Read in 2018 As the list's compiler says "It’s late in 2017, and the situation’s desperate. If we can’t imagine one another, how will we get through these next few years?"

DNF True at First Light by Ernest and Patrick Hemingway OK, I tried. This "fictional memoir" was left behind in manuscript form, untouched for nearly a decade when Ernest Hemingway died. Thirty-five years later, his son Patrick, who was with his father and stepmother in Africa for the real-life events portrayed here, edited it for publication. His introduction intrigued me, and I love the title. The book's epigram is this quote from Papa himself: "In Africa, a thing is true at first light, a lie by noon, and you have no more respect for it than for the lovely, perfect wood-fringed lake you see across the sun-baked salt plain. You have walked across that plain in the morning and you know that no such lake is there. But now it is there absolutely true, beautiful and believable." With writing like that, he almost had me. But I couldn't bear more than 60 pages or so of his paternalism; Mary's fawning for his approval; the casual acceptance of his relationship with the village woman, Debba (another "child-wife"); and finally the whole insider attitude of the narrator cryptically referring to native tribes, uprisings, and secret doings without enough background or explanation. Granted, Patrick does cover some of the latter in his fine introduction, but the text itself seems to have been written for readers "in the know". Reportedly there is some very fine writing in here, and I am willing to believe that. I'm just not willing to wade through so much muck to get to it.

Happy Holidays, Linda!

I loved Benediction. I'm glad it worked for you.

I'm with your daughter on The Rabbi's Cat, but I can tell you're tough to convince. Did she suggest Shaun Tan's The Arrival to you? That one seems to have universal appeal.

>223 laytonwoman3rd: Well that's disappointing.

Congrats on hitting 100 and with a Haruf to boot. I think Haruf's Eventide will be my first or second book in 2018. I've been itching to read it since Plainsong and the time is now.

>216 laytonwoman3rd: Brava!

Salut! on getting 100 books read this year. I'm switching between Eudora Welty and Agatha Christie. I believe I'll clock out at 94.

I don't want to get too far into the new year before reading Becoming Faulkner. But I've committed to read Nick Nickleby in January, and that one IS a doorstop.

>219 laytonwoman3rd: * B A G * :-)

Have not even heard of Wood: Craft, Culture, History by Harvey Green. New to me, and it looks interesting.

>224 jnwelch: Thank you, Joe! Yes, I read Arrival some time ago...I did enjoy that. Lynd Ward's wordless novels from the 1930's are compelling. But I'm a Word person. I cannot assemble furniture using diagrams, and many symbols used on electronic devices (and car dashboards, etc.) strike me as illogical, not at all "universal" in their suggested meanings. So I simply am not a good candidate for graphic novel enthusiasm. I can appreciate lovely art work such as in Tan's book, as well as the powerful images in Ward's, and some of my favorite children's books are strong on illustration but weak in story. I am willing to take further recommendations under consideration, but I don't expect ever to get excited about a graphic novel.

>225 RBeffa: Well, YMMV, as they say, Ron. Again, I'm not a big admirer of Hemingway, although some of his work lands better on me than others. This one just pushed all the wrong buttons.

>226 richardderus: Lovely! Thank you.

>227 weird_O: Well, with my new-found understanding of your expertise, Mr. Hylton, I am very pleased (i.e. relieved) to have sent you a book about wood that you aren't familiar with!

Congrats on reaching the magic 100!! Nicely done.

Oooo, has missed the passing of 100 reads, congratulations Linda. Here’s to next year’s literary nosh.

>229 Berly:, >230 Caroline_McElwee: Thank you, thank you.

I am bereft. The Universe has no sense of justice whatsoever. RIP, Sue Grafton.

>232 laytonwoman3rd: So sad. So much of my life was lived with Kinsey!

>233 richardderus: I know...and it never occurred to me that Grafton wouldn't finish the series. I had no idea she had been ill. After finishing Y is for Yesterday, I assumed she knew how she was going to wrap up, and that she probably had a good bit of "Z" in the tank already. See >77 laytonwoman3rd: ff above.

>232 laytonwoman3rd: Very sad Linda, too young. I will put her first book on my list to read this year, as I’d not got to her yet.

Time for a bit of year-end summing up. I have read a total of 100 books this year, which is a good solid number for me. I believe I exceeded it once before. I generally end up somewhere between 85 and 100. Of that total, 19 were non-fiction, again a number I am satisfied, but not overjoyed by. I usually find my non-fiction reads some of the best of any given year. This one was no exception. My top six (41/2 or 5 stars) were:

Men We Reaped
If the Creek Don't Rise
The Loyal Son
The Kennedy Half Century
Hellhound on His Trail
Stranger in the Woods

I came close to a 50/50 split between male and female authors; 55 to 49. (You'll notice that comes to more books than I actually read; that's due to my counting DNF's when sorting the authors, but not counting them in my read total. A couple more books aren't in the gender tally at all because they were written by a man/woman team.) I haven't sorted by LGBTQ criteria, because it's something I don't know about all the authors on my list, and therefore can't be accurate about.

Top five fiction reads of 2017:

A Fine Balance
The Things They Carried
Belzoni Dreams of Egypt
The Last Ballad
Benediction

Another category I'd like to make mention of are the illustrated children's books I've been sampling this year. Stand-outs among them were The Night Gardener, The Wish Tree, The Gentle Lion and the Little Owlet, A Story for Bear and Make Way for Ducklings (an old favorite revisited). Some of the stories didn't quite do it for me, but the illustrations---oh, my. The audio version of Charlotte's Web, read by the author, takes high honors also.

I did not shine in the challenges this year, completing exactly none of them. Yet some of my best reads --A Fine Balance, Hellhound on His Trail, The Things They Carried were selected to slot into those challenges. I read or sampled 8 of the 16 suggested authors in the Canadian Authors Challenge, which was rather an orphan in the last quarter. Participation was very slight, and there was not even a thread in December, as far as I am aware. Nevertheless, Canadian authors often hit my sweet spot, so I'm going to try to keep track of the recommendations for future reading.

In the Non-Fiction Challenge, I read 4 selections in months where they fit the suggested categories. Some of my other NF reads might slot in somewhere, but I haven't bothered to correlate them. I think this is one challenge I will totally abandon in future, except possibly to follow it casually for suggestions of books that might not otherwise cross my radar.

I finished novels by 5 of the American Authors, as well as collections from 2 poets in April; I Pearl-ruled 4 more novels, and skipped Zora Neale Hurston and Russell Banks, both of whom I have read in the past and intend to visit with again someday. This challenge is near and dear to me, and I intend to be much more conscientious about it in the coming year, especially as I have fairly well committed myself to hosting it in 2019.

I read 4 novels for the BAC, 3 of which were certainly or probably re-reads. (I can't remember reading Kidnapped before, but at the very least I was well familiar with the story.) I was quite pleased to finally get around to South Riding, though, and enjoyed it immensely. This is another challenge that brings new authors to my attention, so I will follow it in 2018 (along with the Irish Authors Challenge), but may not try very hard to keep up.

I didn't do very well on sticking to reading from my own shelves...only 29 of the books I finished were volumes that had been around for a year or more. I did cull 112 books from the house, but at least 142 came in. I do think that's a bit better ratio than in some years past.

And so...that's a wrap. I will be reading today and tomorrow, but am unlikely to finish anything. I'll be thinking about the set-up of my 2018 thread, and will post a link here when it's open for business.

Thank you, one and all, who visit and comment (OK, even if you don't comment, your presence is welcome). We've nearly survived a year that brought a lot of unpleasant surprises with it. At least the reading was good.

>236 laytonwoman3rd: - Well done, Linda!! I also have a real soft spot for illustrated children's books.

A good summing up, Linda. It's a good nudge, too.

I'm going to close the year reading Eudora Welty On William Faulkner. Thanks much for it.

Buh-bye 2017...

Hi Linda!

Belated congratulations on reaching 100. Interesting statistics.

>237 jessibud2: Thanks, Shelley. Any recommendations for children's books I should check out?

>238 weird_O: Oooh...I like that graphic!

>239 karenmarie: Thanks, Karen!

>236 laytonwoman3rd: A wonderful summing up Linda.

>240 laytonwoman3rd: - Oh, Linda. You may be sorry you asked. I have a ton of recommendations!

- The Imagine a Day series, illustrated by Rob Gonsalves. There are 4 in the series: Day, Night, Place, World

- all books by Ruth Heller. She used bold exquisitely detailed illustrations in all her books and wrote in lovely rhyme. Her book series were about nature (the How To Hide A ____ books), language (the grammar series) and I could go on and on.

- I have also always loved the gorgeous art work of Schim Schimmel. His use of light is amazing.

- Creative illustration is also something I am attracted to. There are 2 Canadian illustrators that I especially love. Barbara Reid has illustrated both her own books as well as books of other authors. All her illustrations are done in plasticene. Truly stunning. Have you Seen Birds, is just one example. And Ron Broda does all his art work using torn paper sculpture. Until you see his work, you can't even begin to imagine it. In My Backyard and Have You Seen Bugs are just 2 examples.

- Another book I have in my collection that I loved is called An Egg is Quiet by Dianna Aston, illustrated by Sylvia Long.

I must have been an artist in a previous life, that I am so mesmerized by beautiful artwork :-)

Hi Linda!



Peace, Health, and Happiness in 2018

>242 jessibud2: Not sorry a bit! I love learning about what's new and worthy. It's been a loooong time since I was paying close attention to this class of books, and now I have two adorable grand nieces to give me an excuse to get back into them.

>243 karenmarie: May we all be showered with such blessings!

>244 laytonwoman3rd: - Just an fyi, Linda. None of the books I mentioned are *new* but all are certainly worthwhile having a look at if you can find them

>245 jessibud2: When I say "new', I mean published since the mid-90's or so...all of yours qualify, I think. And they all should be a hit with the little girls, who live among animals (horses, dogs, chickens and goats) and are fascinated by bugs.

>246 rretzler: Thanks, Robin.

>244 laytonwoman3rd: Ein Minuten, bitte. *How* long has it been since you had a reason to pay attention to picture books?

>249 lycomayflower: Didn't say, did I? What are you challenging, exactly? I didn't stop looking at them when you were still a non-reader, nor did I keep looking at them much past your pre-teen years. Soooo....

...so...new thread...?

>251 richardderus: Still in the works, But here it is.