Yay for Thanksgiving! This year was fairly relaxed -- my brother provided an enormous turkey, which tasted really good and still provided me with enough leftovers for my post-Thanksgiving dishes, and we had four pies. We had a friend and a extra brother in town (my brother-in-law's brother) so the table felt decently extended.

I was happy to share the holiday with my sons, although one guy had to work for part of the day. He's the vegetarian though, so he was happy to show up just in time for pie.

Then it was back to frantically reading more Cybils books.

Started

This still includes things that I really started ages ago but for various reasons am still working on.

Animal Allies: 15 Amazing Women in Wildlife Research

Absurd Words: A kids’ fun and hilarious vocabulary builder for future word nerds

I Will Protect You: A True Story of Twins Who Survived Auschwitz

Picturing a Nation: The Great Depression's Finest Photographers Introduce America to Itself

Bernice Sandler and the Fight for Title IX

I Could Not Do Otherwise: The Remarkable Life of Dr. Mary Edwards Walker

Animal Allies: 15 Amazing Women in Wildlife Research, Elizabeth Pagel-Hogan. Cybils nominee.

Absurd Words: A Kids' Fun and Hilarious Vocabulary Builder For Future Word Nerds, Tara Lazar. Cybils nominee.

I Will Protect You: A True Story of Twins Who Survived Auschwitz, Eva Mozes Kor. Cybils nominee.

Six Wakes, Mur Lafferty. Foolscap & Sword and Laser pick. Nice of them to match up like that!

Serpent in Heaven, Charlaine Harris. I'm enjoying this series.

Picturing a Nation: The Great Depression's Finest Photographers Introduce America to Itself, Martin W. Sandler. Cybils nominee.

Bernice Sandler and the Fight for Title IX, Jen Barton. Cybils nominee.

Concrete Rose, Angie Thomas. 2021 Cybils finalist.

Hattie Big Sky, Kirby Larson. Previous Cybils finalist.

Why We Fly, Kimberly Jones. 2021 Cybils finalist.

I Could Not Do Otherwise: The Remarkable Life of Dr. Mary Edwards Walker, Sara Latta. Cybils nominee.

Cobra, Timothy Zahn. Oh -- I forgot about the serial Baen is giving me as part of their weekly podcast. I had fallen behind but now I'm catching up.

Stormsong, C.L. Polk. So, I was reading this when a bookclub read Witchmark, which I had already read and enjoyed. So I decided to read the next in the series instead. And then I got buried under a pile of other books, but now I've picked it up again.

Ship Without Sails, Sherwood Smith. I lost this and now I've found it again. Really continued reading but covered under my COMPLETE AMNESTY (see last week).

Completed

What's the T? The Guide to All Things Trans and/or Nonbinary

Be The Change: Making a Difference in a Messed-Up World

Fridays with the Wizards (Castle Glower, #4)

Funky Fungi: 30 Activities for Exploring Molds, Mushrooms, Lichens, and More

What's the T: The Guide to All Things Trans And/Or Nonbinary, Juno Dawson. Cybils nominee. Don't get me wrong -- this is the kind of book we need. Books that discuss topics actually impacting kids today and give them information they need to handle it. But in this case, it felt like a guide to the things that Juno herself had to deal with, and things that weren't as big a deal for her weren't seen as important. She wanted to be writing a more general book, but to me it didn't feel like she really succeeded. I consider myself only moderately informed on trans issues, and this didn't really give me more information either on the steps to take if you think you are trans or if you want to understand more about (other) trans people and the stuff that they are facing. There isn't much documentation in the back, which was a bit disappointing. I think this would have worked better if it had embraced itself as a memoir rather than as a guide to all things Trans.

I Will Protect You: A True Story of Twins Who Survived Auschwitz, Eva Mozes Kor. Cybils nominee. Ever since I was a kid, WWII books have been my jam, so this one was very up my alley. I liked the solid relationship of the twins, and how Eva was a fighter from the very beginning. The Holocaust parts were expectedly horrific, but written at a kids level. And the post stuff was also good; I was interested in the discussion of forgiveness and how to live with the burden of the trauma and I think kids would be as well.

Be the Change: Making a Difference in a Messed-Up World, Rob Greenfield. Cybils nominee. So, Rob Greenfield is a guy who makes a living doing extreme things to showcase environmental things and then being on social media about it (I'd never heard of him). This is a fun book with lots of photos that show the things he does (wear all his garbage for a month, bike across the country eating out of dumpsters, etc), WHY he did them -- what was he trying to draw attention to? What are the implications of this in terms of the planet? And how kids could also address this issue in their own lives. It's fun and might give kids some ideas for the lives, either for projects or because they are budding greenies.

Bernice Sandler and the Fight for Title IX, Jen Barton. Cybils nominee. A biography that is also full of ideas of doing your own activism and how to affect changes on your own. The details of the 1970's fights for women's rights must seem like ancient history, but the more current details should help concentrate the reader's attention.

Picturing a Nation: The Great Depression's Finest Photographers Introduce America to Itself, Martin W. Sandler. Cybils nominee. Amazing photographs. The coffee table type explanations mostly describe how the feds set up a photography project and give details about the photographers. But we are all here for the photos.

Fridays With the Wizards, Jessica Day George. READING MY LIBRARY QUEST: RENTON HIGHLANDS: CHILDREN'S AUDIO. Fun car book, although the prospective brother-in-law's accent was an annoying kind of Italian thing, and I kept wanting to propose democracy to the kingdom. I read the Tuesday one and then fell behind, so it was good to see what the royal family was up to.

Funky Fungi: 30 Activities For Exploring Molds, Mushrooms, Lichens and More, Alisha Gabriel. Cybils nominee.Maybe there were 30 activities? But mostly this is a book about what fungi are, what the diversity is, where to find them, what to use them for, and all sorts of facts. Lots of pictures and call outs make it interesting.

Serpent in Heaven, Charlaine Harris. I'm enjoying this series.This barely mentions my friend Gunnie Rose and instead follows her half sister as she reveals her magical abilities and struggles with growing up (which she is doing at an accelerated rate, thanks to her father having paused her maturity), friendship, and negotiating power. It was catnip to me; I really like Harris's blend of common sense and magic.

Bookmarks Moved (Or Languished) In:

Primary Inversion (Saga of the Skolian Empire, #1)

Four Streets and a Square: A History of Manhattan and the New York Idea

White Fragility (Adapted for Young Adults): Why Understanding Racism Can Be So Hard for White People (Adapted for Young Adults)

You Are More Than Magic: The Black and Brown Girls' Guide to Finding Your Voice

Detector Dogs, Dynamite Dolphins, and More Animals with Super Sensory Powers

Still Stace: My Gay Christian Coming-of-Age Story

Primary Inversion, Catherine Asaro. My kitchen cleaning book. I'm going to have to double down -- I still have some Thanksgiving cleaning to do.

Four Streets and a Square: A History of Manhattan and the New York Idea, Marc Aronson. Cybils nominee.

White Fragility (Adapted For Young Adults): Why Understanding Racism Can Be So Hard For White People, Toni Graves Williamson. Cybils nominee.

You Are More Than Magic: The Black and Brown Girls' Guide to Finding Your Voice, Minda Harts. Cybils nominee.

Detector Dogs, Dynamite Dolphins, and More Animals With Super Sensory Powers, Cara Giaimo. Cybils nominee.

Still Stace: My Gay Christian Coming-of-Age Story, Stacy Chomiak. Cybils nominee.

(You can tell we are in the gotta-read-them-all stage of Cybils judging, because I keep switching to the ones that my library has that others don't.)

Picture Books / Short Stories:

I'm just going to put some covers up here. OK, that was an unhelpful wall of images. I'm going to make a post of my November picture books, maybe for Friday.

Palate Cleansers

These books I'm barely reading; lately I use them as bribes to get me to deal with the mail. I've been ignoring my mail.