I'm still excited about being accepted as a Round One CYBILS JUDGE for nonfiction! This year we'll look at books from elementary (K-5), middle school (6-8 grade), and high school (9-12). I'm super excited and ready to roll. I'm been warming up by ordering a few dozen old Cybils books to read, and accidentally starting a few zillion random books.
Oops. I should probably deal with those twenty random book by Thursday, when nominations officially open.If you've read any good kids books (picture books to YA, fiction, nonfiction or graphic novels) that were written in the past year (Oct 16 2019 - Oct 15 2020), then get ready to nominate them at Cybils.com when nominations open on Oct 1st. I'm counting on people to nominate really good nonfiction books for me to read!
The rest of the week rolled along. We got some delightful rain, which has made me forget all about the fires that are probably still raging in other places but aren't making it hard for me to breathe. Since I haven't fixed my sprinkler system after an unfortunate incident involving the corner spigot and my car's tires, I need enough rain to keep my lawn happy. But not so much that I need to mow that lawn. So I guess I don't want my lawn to be happy so much as not abjectly miserable. It's a delicate balance.
I cooked a good inner of pasta with chicken, spinach and a tomato cream sauce. And mozzarella. I think cream means happiness to my taste buds. I was going to make Mexican lasagna for Friday's dinner, but must as I was starting my nephew came over and whispered the name of my favorite Mexican restaurant in my ear, and that sounded even better, so CASA DURANGO it was.
My Tuesday book/game club got to playtest the online version of Steve Jackson's Tribes game, which was a lot of fun and my brother did a good job of coding it. Also, I won. We're going to try to break it again tomorrow so that when they try it out on real people at a real virtual convention everyone will look good. Then my Foolscap convention tried out a virtual game night that was also fun, although technically I did not win.
Oh, I managed to drag myself out running again on Sunday. I went about as slowly as it is possible to go while still technically running (my pace is again lower than my BIL's walks on Runkeeper), but I was in motion for about 30 minutes and that was a good proof on concept. Maybe I'll still manage a 5K in two days. Yikes!
My currently reading has lurched back up to 29 with all the books left over from false starts on the Bingo card, plus some other poor choices. Oh well, sometimes life is like that.
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. Most of the books I actually finished are kidlit!
Started
We'll Always Have Parrots, Donna Andrews. A five star from my summer book team. Also, I like these.
Welcome to Your Period, Yumi Stynes & Melissa Kang. ARC from LibraryThing.
Your Own, Sylvia, Stephanie Hemphill. Cybils finalist.
The Bone Witch, Rin Chupeco. For KCLS 10 to Try -- recommended by staff.
The Bourne Supremacy, Robert Ludlum. Another top pick from last summer's book team.
This Promise of Change, Jo Ann Allen Boyce. Cybils finalist.
By Immortal Honor Bound, Danielle Ancona. An ARC from the author!
Deadly Sexy, Beverly Jenkins. For my Cloudy book club.
Completed
Cities in Layers, Philip Steele. Although personally I found it a bit stressful to find all the marked points of interest (I'm like a vampire -- if you scatter a list in front of me I cannot go on until I check them off) I think this would be a big hit with kids. Since I got the book for free I gave it an actual review; I would have handed this to my kids on long trips with great joy. The page cut outs were deeply satisfying and a great way to show that bits of a city's past are still here in the present.
Welcome to Your Period, Yumi Stynes & Melissa Kang. ARC from LibraryThing. This is a great gift for people wondering about periods, which includes probably all people who have or will have them and some of their friends. I liked the tone, the format, and the information. I think it's from Australia, which matters because they aren't afraid of sex. I thought the tone and information were spot on, from cramping to being caught somewhere without supplies to whether skipping a period means you are pregnant. Five stars.
Reaching For the Moon, Katherine G. Johnson. 2019 elementary nonfiction Cybils finalist. Johnson is of course one of the famous computers from Hidden Figures, and she does discuss the movie, but even more she shows her whole life, where yes her mathematical skill was important but also being Black and a woman and a Christian mattered a lot. I liked her matter-of-fact tone; this is how it was and it was awful and wrong, but we made a life there. I liked the whole book, from her childhood where she worried about her poor dull brother (he was only good at math, not spectacular) to her decision to leave grad school to have children, to the gossip about which bits of the movie were real (she just used white bathrooms instead of walking a mile, but the breaking into meetings really happened). Johnson is a hero and it's fun to read the autobiography to see her achievements, but she also takes care to show what the world as a whole was like with segregation and discrimination and civil rights and sexism, both in the past and currently.
The Sorcerer of the Wildeeps, Kai Ashante Wilson. Be the Serpent pick. I really liked the worldbuilding and the setting of this one, with the caravan moving through the magical forest and the mysterious captain being everywhere at once while the sorcerer earns both the faith and the uneasiness of the other workers. But there was also sorta a love story between the captain and the sorcerer that I completely didn't buy and it felt like the story fell over and lay lifeless on the floor whenever that came forward. Then the captain would disappear and things would be fascinating. Repeat. Even during the final boss fight this pattern held -- the fight scene was gripping and vivid (is smell imagery an African book thing? It's noticeable in both this and Black Leopard Red Wolf, so there are two back-to-back data points. Could be a gay thing, or just a thing thing. I clearly must read more books) but then attention shifts back to the captain and I yawned and things went according to trope. Now I have to watch Old Guard and then I'm ready for podcast #68.
Bookmarks Moved (Or Languished) In:
Tender Morsels, Margo Lanagan. 10/12 discs. Hmm. There are 12 discs, not 10. That explains why it isn't hurrying to a conclusion.
Uncompromising Honor 32/??, David Weber. Baen Free Radio Hour's serial. The battle continues.
Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling. I'm listening to celebrities read this to me. Harry goes shopping!
Black Leopard, Red Wolf, Marlon James. Sword and Laser pick. I meant to finish this in September since I had already read this months pick. Oops.
A Long Time Until Now, Michael Z Williamson. There is little competence to be had. But they make up for it with dehumanizing women! Wait, that doesn't make up for anything...
Children of Time, Adrian Tchaikovsky. The intersection of humanity and spiders is not going well.
Slippery Creatures, K J Charles. Who should our protagonist trust? I hope it's the hot stranger.
Jubilee, Margaret Walker. Early pick for debut over 50 in SPL Summer bingo. OK, I read the tough chapter, so things should get better. What am I saying? Things will stay hard.
A Thousand Beginnings and Endings, Ellen Oh (editor). Early pick for retellings in SPL Summer bingo. Enjoyed a few more stories.
The Pleasant Profession of Robert A Heinlein, Farah Mendelson. Hugo finalist. Overview of his career is going well.
Skylark and Wallpaper, Anne O'Brien Carelli. Cybils finalist. This started with a character dealing with the flooding of Hurricane Sandy in New York, which is cool, but also has another story of her grandmother's work as a child in the French Resistance in World War II. So two interesting times!
The Luminaries, Eleanor Catton. I suspect that by reading it among so many other books I have doomed any hope I had of noticing clues to the mystery. But I'll enjoy the characters and setting anyway.
Clap When You Land, Elizabeth Acevedo. The poems don't feel like poems, but the story is real.
Someplace To Be Flying, Charles de Lint. One of the books I've been claiming to read, and here I am, reading it!
Picture Books / Short Stories:
Αλφαβητάρι με γλωσσοδέτες, Eugene Trivizas. So close to done.
Animal Poems, Valerie Worth. 2007 Cybils poetry finalist. This was fine -- the poems were interesting and the pictures fun, but I know I would have struck out trying to share this with my poetry-allergic offspring. I don't know who to share this with, but it you have friends who like animals and poems, maybe you know!
Palate Cleansers
These books I'm barely reading; I use them as palate cleansers between books I'm actually reading.
The Educated Child, William Bennett. Science in junior high.
Give All to Love, Patricia Veryan.
Wool, Hugh Howey. Where will she go?
The Wind Gourd of La'amaomao, Moses Nakuima. Sweet sweet revenge.
Sorcerer to the Crown, Zen Cho. Shenanigans at the girl school.
Reading and Learning to Read, Jo Anne Vaca. Wrap up nonfiction books, and onto diverse classrooms!
Reading Challenges
- Cybils 2017. None. I just need 3 YA books to be done. But I'm reading all the short books from all the years.
- Cybils 2018. Nothing.
- Cybils 2019. Finished Reaching For the Moon. Started This Promise of Change.
- Early Cybils: Read some poetry.
- Reading My Library. Haven't started the next one yet.
- Ten to Try. At 9/10. Haven't read it yet, but I've started #10.
- Where Am I Reading: 24/51 states. 24 Countries. Katherine Johnson is from West Virginia.
- Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge. I'm technically done.
I'm putting this at the end because I suspect it's complete fiction, but seeing as I've just grown my currently-reading pile by a LOT and I'm days away from diving into Cybils reading, I feel I should attempt some structure.
I am reading:
- Book I own: Officially none. Up Next: Trash
- Library Book: Clap When You Land. Up Next: Your Own, Sylvia
- Ebook I own: Slippery Creatures. Up Next: One Man
- Library Ebook: Skylark and Wallcreeper. Up Next: an extra. Maybe We'll Always Have Parrots
- Book Club Book: Deadly Sexy. Up Next: Merry Wrath
- Tuesday Book Club Book: from the archives: Somewhere to Be Flying. Next: ??
- Review Book: By Immortal Honor Bound. Up Next: I think this category will switch to 2020 Cybils.
- Hugo Book: The Pleasant Profession of Robert A Heinlein. Next: Joanna Russ.
1 comment:
I completely missed the fact that it was already time for CYBILS. Last year and this year have sorta blended together. Congratulations on being a judge. I hope you enjoy the reading, this year. I keep thinking one of these years I'll put my name in the hat, but this is definitely not the year for that. LOL I still have so many plates spinning. Have a great week, Beth!
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