Merry Little Christmas! Down With the Decorations

I hope everyone had a Happy New Year! I stayed in. I planned to go to bed early so stayed up until I could text my mom (several time zones over) a Happy New Year but then I ended up reading late anyway. So a typical celebration for me! My sons come to me for Christmas so they go off to their dad for New Year; it's a bigger holiday for Greeks anyway.

My triple book club night was Saturday, and I only skipped half of one book, which isn't bad seeing as I didn't start reading them until New Years Day. It's a fun crowd, although not everyone stays for all three books -- first Sword and Laser, then Torches and Pitchforks, and finally Vaginal Fantasy. I'm not sure how they came up with that order, but I do all of them and it makes it worth the extra drive.

I ordered some Nabisco Famous chocolate wafers and my kids came back home to make our traditional Icebox cake Little Christmas. I'm not sure how I fobbed off this tradition on them but it was completely worthwhile. We brought it over to share at family dinner on Sunday, so my sister's family and my brother could partake. Hmm, I wonder if there is any leftovers in the fridge -- that might make a good blogging snack...

In general it's been a very low energy year so far. It's hard to get motivated. But we did manage to take down Christmas. Except as I write this I realize I forgot about the door wreath. Excuse me a moment...

My currently reading shelf has slowly moved down to 23, although some of those I'm just kidding myself about. My New Years resolution is to only check out two library books a week, so that should help there.

The Book Date does a weekly roundup of what people are reading, want to read, or have read each week called It's Monday! What Are You Reading so I'll sign up there. Ditto for the children's lit version at either Teach Mentor Texts or Unleashing Readers. 

Started: 




Capsized! The Forgotten Story of the SS Eastland Disaster, Patricia Sutton. Cybils 2018 nonfiction book.

Caleb and Kit, Beth Vrabel. Cybils 2017 middle grade fiction.

Hogfather, Terry Pratchett. The December Sword and Laser pick.

Delilah Dirk and the Turkish Lieutenant, Tony Cliff. The local Vaginal Fantasy pick for December.  

Cantoras, Carolina de Robertis. The Torches and Pitchforks book club pick for December.

Finding Baba Yaga, Jane Yolen. The other December pick for our Vaginal Fantasy book club.

Sweep With Me, Ilona Andrews. They are posting another story live! I will catch up and then sulk.


Completed:




Brave Face, Shaun Hutchinson. Cybils nonfiction longlist. I didn't really complete this, but I've skipped around to read most of it. When my kids are older I'll be more willing to sink into a book about a depressed teen. I was impressed with the honesty of this memoir -- the author had to really go back to his memories of being an unhappy teen who was often stupid with his unhappiness. Unhappy people tend to be unlikable, but it's hard to realize when one is driving people away with actions rather than with the parts of oneself (in this case, his discomfort with acknowledging his gayness) that is causing some of the unhappiness. It makes for a vicious circle that can lead to despair.

Capsized! The Forgotten Story of the SS Eastland Disaster, Patricia Sutton. Cybils 2018 nonfiction book. Strong book that features many (although by no means most!) of the casualties and survivors of the horrific event where a shipful of picnic goers (families, young people, workers) fell into the frigid river and many died. Written for junior high kids, it clearly traces how it happened, who was involved, and even the aftershocks for the victims, families, and companies. A worthy finalist.

Caleb and Kit, Beth Vrabel. Cybils 2018 middle grade fiction. A solid book about a boy maturing, going from a rather self-centered kid to a more compassionate and responsible youth who is able to both extend and accept love and friendship. Caleb and his family are struggling to deal with his growing need for independence, complicated by the extra demands of his medical condition which is is starting to feel defines him to an unacceptable degree. But his efforts to separate himself both puts him in danger and alienates him from the people who care about him until he learns to balance different desires better. An emotionally realistic book with lots of details that kids appreciate, from the annoyance of being an over-age day camper to the guilty pleasure of imaginative play after being "too old" for it.

Lord Darcy Investigates, Randall Garrett. Very genre book, but a fun set of stories. It's mysteries set in an alternate history, where the existence of magic made recent events go a bit differently, so everyone is very Regency (? my historicals are fuzzy) with lots of British Empire classism and titles thrown about and the monarchy is very much in power. Science is less advanced because magic does a lot of that, and I had no intention of solving the puzzles because maybe magic did it, so it was relaxing and I still felt clever when I figured stuff out (Garrett obviously intended them to be solvable, but he's not the boss of me). I particularly liked the homage to Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express which was really grumpy about it.

Hogfather, Terry Pratchett. A fun and seasonal read, with Pratchett's humor and heart in strong evidence. Susan and Death are the prizes, but there are also fun bits with the Unseen University and their Hex computer, an appearance of a few Guards, and a tasty restaurant scene. Probably not the best introduction to Discworld for some of our members, but as they read on audio book they could just enjoy the accents when things seemed a bit unwieldy (the professors especially seemed a bit jammed in).

Delilah Dirk and the Turkish Lieutenant, Tony Cliff. A fun and fast reread, although I admit I was usually completely lost in the action scenes and I managed to confuse the two main characters several times. I'm terrible at graphic novels! But the art was lovely and painterly and both heroes charming in very different ways and I do mean to read the next two in the series.

Finding Baba Yaga, Jane Yolen. I enjoyed this as a vivid and lush story -- it's a novel in verse and although the individual poems never really struck a chord with me the story as a whole was powerful and evocative. It felt like enhanced prose, not just artificially short lines on a page. The discussion was interesting as well -- the other people thought it was a more literal story which I hadn't considered, while my mutterings about liminal spaces and the mythic nature of the forest made some people also revisit their conceptions. That's part of what I go to book clubs for -- to trade missed interpretations.

Bookmarks Moved (Or Languished) In:






Son of the Black Sword, Larry Correia. 77/? Baen's podcast serial. I haven't listened to this part yet since they switched off to a short story and I spent my time digging up the old one because I could have sworn that wasn't an ending. It wasn't an ending. Now I can go enjoy the short story.

Tender Morsels, Margo Lanagan. 4/10 discs. I am reading this one track at a time. Sadly the tracks are about 45 seconds long, which seems a bit excessively short. When it's the annoying dwarf that's fine but I like hearing about the girls.

Book Lust, Nancy Pearl. I am being very stern and not letting myself put books on my TBR list just because they sound good. I have to actually want to read them in the next five years.

One Good Dragon Deserves Another, Rachel Aaron. Ha! Take that, mean people who want to hurt Justin. And his friends.

The Poppy War, R.F. Kuang. Last month's Sword and Laser pick. Waiting to recover it.

Tropic of Serpents, Marie Brennan. The library called this home.

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, Susanna Clarke. I am finally ready to start the audio and it will be due in a few days. Sigh.

ConCom: Conflict Communication, Rory Miller. Oops, forgot to finish this. Moved it back to my bedside table so I don't forget again.

Once a Spy, Mary Jo Putney. If this were fanfiction, I would describe it as crack. She has mad harem skillz, but fears sex. He is endless patient although he appreciates those skills. Also, they get all the aristo titles.

Bloodshot, Cherie Priest. The library wanted the paperback back (I had just started!) so I got the ebook and I'm enjoying it a lot.

Masques, Patricia Briggs. It will be fun rereading it knowing how young the guy is this time. I won't spend so much time being shocked.



Picture Books / Short Stories:

None.


Palate Cleansers

These books I'm barely reading; I use them as palate cleansers between books I'm actually reading. Of course, since I was off having Christmas in Utah, they were untouched.



A Traitor to Memory, Elizabeth George. Gideon was raised to be an unpleasant musician, and is only now finding out how far that went. He is regretful but still unpleasant. As are everyone else in this book.

The Educated Child, William Bennett.

Cookie, Jacqueline Wilson.

Give All to Love, Patricia Veryan.

Tell the Wolves I'm Home, Carol Rifka Brunt.

Reading and Learning to Read, Jo Anne Vaca. Oh of course -- Basal readers are those story collections that are designed to boost up your reading! I liked reading about the ones from long ago.

Reading Challenges

1. Cybils 2017. I read a middle grade fiction!
2. Cybils 2018.  I read a middle grade nonfiction!
3. Cybils 2019. OK, I needed a break. Then I'll start. Finished junior and senior high nonfiction.
4. Reading My Library. Nothing. I rechecked out my next book.
5. Ten to Try. Of course I'm doing this again.