I never imagined I could write 26 posts in 30 days. (Ok, for me it was 24 posts in 30 days, but more on that later!) I read about the A-Z Blogging Challenge on a Facebook group I joined after I started Jeff Goins’ Intentional Blogging Challenge. Disclaimer: note that I said I started Goins’ Challenge. …
The A-Z of You and Me (NetGalley) James Hannah Sourcebooks I read James Hannah’s new novel The A-Z of You and Me in two sittings. How could I not? The story might be a little familiar to some readers with shades of The Love Story of Miss Queenie Hennessey, My Name is Lucy Barton, and even If …
Today is day 19 of the Blogging from A to Z Challenge. The challenge began with A on April 1 and continues the alphabet throughout the month, except on Sundays. My theme for the month will be this blog’s tagline: life, books, and all things bookish, so you can expect a little bit of this …
Spill Simmer Falter Wither (Edelweiss) Sara Baume Houghton Mifflin release date: March 8, 2016 I realise that you were not born with a predetermined capacity for wonder, as I’d believed. I realise that you fed it up yourself from tiny pieces of the world. I realise it’s up to me to follow your example and …
The Canterbury Sisters Kim Wright Simon & Schuster Chick lit for women of a certain age–it’s difficult to come by. Most of the chick lit I’ve read falls into the twenty-something-my-boyfriend-left-me or the twenty-something-I’ll-never-find-Mr.-Right category. And if you’ve read my last post (link) you understand that I’ve been there and done that. But every once …
My Name is Lucy Barton (NetGalley) Elizabeth Strout Random House This thing we call ‘family’–those little rag tag bands of humans who make their way through life bumping into each other and bouncing off again, sometimes laughing, but often in tears–becomes more mysterious to me the older I get. Whenever I think I have family …
Readers of the Broken Wheel (NetGalley) Katarina Bivald Sourcebooks Landmark Katarina Bivald’s Readers of the Broken Wheel is a love letter to books I could have written myself. The reviews of this wonderful little nugget are plentiful, so I thought another wasn’t really necessary. There’s Sara, let go from her job in a book shop, …
Dear Committee Members Julie Schumacher Anchor Books Jason Fitger has been an English professor for twenty-something years at a small university in the Midwest. He’s under pressure, overworked, and hardly appreciated. Writer Julie Schumacher tells the prof’s story through the letters he writes: a department head and dean here, fellowship and job recommendations there. The …
Little Pretty Things Lori Rader-Day Seventh Street Books I don’t read mysteries. Never liked ’em. Except when I like them as here or here or even here. And of course there’s my beloved Flavia. So maybe I’d better rethink this mystery thing, right?! Lori Rader-Day’s Pretty Little Things is a pretty straightforward murder mystery from about page 40. …
The Brontë Plot (NetGalley) Katherine Reay Thomas Nelson Lucy Alling is Sid McKenna’s Girl Friday at Sid McKenna Antiques and Design–most days she straightens, dusts, rearranges, and parcel-posts for one of Chicago’s premier interior designers. But Wednesday was Book Day, a day Lucy could lose herself in the rare and sometimes just plain quirky books she …
This is my symphony 