books, Family, Kids, Travel, Uncategorized

Read!

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My daughter has been quite concerned about me because I have not been reading very much for the past several years.  She thinks  I have been depressed since my parents died. She is probably correct.

Daughter insisted that I buy at least one book on our trip to Washington. We stopped at a lovely independent bookstore in Kirkland, WA, where I purchased a murder mystery set in southwest France. Daughter chose David Sedaris’ most recent book of essays, along with four other books that I am sure she has finished by now. She insisted I take the Sedaris book home with me to read. It was very funny and poignant. He is one of her favorite authors.  (Her Grade 5 teacher was rather concerned why we allowed her to read such material after she took one of his books to school to have for free reading time.)  I like the murder mystery.  Husband is reading VS Pritchett.

It is a long weekend and I feel like reading this weekend. I wonder what the Baboons are reading now.  What will be next on your “To Read” list?

43 thoughts on “Read!”

  2. As usual, I’m in the middle of several books right now:
    A House Among the Trees by Julia Glass, A Mile in Her Boots: Women Who Work in the Wild edited by Jennifer Bove, Spoonbenders by Daryl Gregory and The Merry Spinster by Mallory Ortberg.

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  3. Rise and Shine Baboons,

    I have mentioned many times that audiobooks allow me to read as much as I want to these days. RIght now I am listening to New York by Edward Rutherford, an American Marriage by Trayvan, and an old Maeve Bunche book. David Sedaris, reading in his own voice, is really quite wonderful.

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  4. Currently reading “Story Genius” by Lisa Cron (a writing craft book), “Guerilla Publishing” by Derek Murphy (a self-publishing how-to book). Next up will be … not sure yet.

    I read about 80 books per year mainly because I’m addicted to the stupid Goodreads.com Reading Challenge 😉 Mostly because I love to read but also to see what fellow writers are writing (know the competition) and to constantly try to learn how to write better, faster, and smarter as well as how to be a small business owner (author-publisher) in the 21st Century–NOT easy. 😦

    Chris in O-town

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  5. I’m just finishing (for a local book club) a Dean Zoontz book, The City, which is a departure from his usual horror stories, and it is really quite good. On my bedside table is Cat’s Table by Michael Ondaatje. I’ve requested from the library The Music Shop by Rachel Joyce, on recommendation from s-I-l. Next up for other book club is Riverwalking by Kathleen Deane Moore, which I need to pick up at the paperback store here.

    I want to read an Ann Patchett soon, and I’ve started thinking about Armand Gamache again, so I need to get the next Louise Penny in the series.

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  6. I started reading Maureen Dowds ‘The Year of Voting Dangerously’, but it got pre-empted by my history class and the history textbook I’m reading.
    Right under the Dowd book is ‘Victoria and Abdul’.
    Just got new copies of ‘Smithsonian’ and ‘Air and Space’ magazines too.

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  7. Summer is my time to read lighter fare – usually murder mysteries. I really like the Maggie Hope series by Susan Elia MacNeal (Mr. Churchill’s Secretary”, Princess Elizabeth’s Spy”). I read the first three last summer and tackled the next two this summer. Still have two more to go. Right now I have a couple of books by Brian Freeman (murders that take place in Duluth). But I am also transitioning back to a mix of nonfiction and more “serious” fiction. I just finished “MacArthur’s Spies” by Peter Eisner, about a spy network in the Phillippines during WW2. Also in my stack of books to read is “The Thirst” by Jo Nesbo.

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  8. I don’t usually plan my next read but rather wander among my bookshelves to see what strikes my fancy. I’m just finishing American Dreams by Vernon Parrington Jr., a survey of American literary utopias with Edward Bellamy’s <Looking Backward as a particular point of reference.

    For my next book, I’m considering Half Horse Half Alligator bu Walter Blair and Franklin Meine, an exploration of the growth of the Mike Fink legend (remember Mike Fink from the old Disney Davy Crockett? He was a real person and mythologized as Crockett was).

    Also among the contenders is Bernd Heinrich’s Mind of the Raven and Irish/ Charles G. Halpine in Civil War America By William Hanchett. Halpine was an Irish immigrant who hung around with a group of “bohemian” journalists, artists, actors, and writers, including Walt Whitman, in mid-nineteenth century Manhattan. He owned and edited several newspapers, was a voice politically and socially for Irish immigrants, wrote poetry and, as a Union soldier, humorous dispatches using the pseudonym Private Miles O’Reilly.

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        3. Not too worried. Lively isn’t how I would describe a lot of my reading. Just finished a biography of John Quincy Adams and I’m pretty sure the author doesn’t know the meaning of the word!

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  9. My life has many limitations now, but something I have in abundance is time to read. I’m currently reading a book about Ada Blackjack, an Inuit woman who was the only survivor of a disastrous Arctic exploration in 1921. Three books I’ve read recently were particularly good. Sally Mann, a fascinating photographer, wrote a thoughtful book about family history called Hold Still. I enjoyed a sad but well written book about guitar wizard John Fahey. The best book I’ve read in several years was Prairie Fires, the autobiography of Laura Ingalls Wilder. I am not actually a fan of her books about pioneer life, but the story of her life is fascinating.

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    3. I had a different reaction to Prairie Fires. Found it difficult to get through (in fact, I didn’t finish it). But that probably says more about me than it does about the book.

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  11. I don’t read much fiction. The 3 books I bought a couple months ago that I’m reading are “The Longevity Diet” by Dr. Valter Longo, “Vibe” by Robyn Openshaw and “The Oxygen Advantage” by Patrick McKeown. All books on the healthiest ways to live, think, eat, breathe, etc. Amazing information that I slowly incorporate into my lifestyle as they are very highly evidence-based.

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  13. I’m reading lighter fare than most baboons. I’ve got the newest in the 44 Scotland Street series on hold at the library, and to refresh my memory, I’m reading the one before that, The Bertie Project.

    I’ve got a couple other “fluff” books checked out, and one old children’s book, The Sea ia All Around, by Elizabeth Enright.

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    1. Alexander McCall Smith is wonderful fluff.

      Today Lou was stung in the upper lip by a yellow jacket while mowing. Tues he had eyelid surgery whicjh left his face bruised. Today with the sting I took hom to the ER. He looked frightful. They gave him an epipen and prednisone. Mow he is home and I am at the orthapedist for arthritis. It has been a day.

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  15. OT: Update on me.

    A few baboons have emailed me wanting to know HOW AM I and what was wrong with me that I had to be in the hospital for a few days.So I’ll put this out here for anyone else who is wondering but haven’t gotten around to emailing.

    I don’t want to get into specifics here, but here’s the general info:

    1. I am home from the hospital and I feel better than when I was admitted.
    2. They have an educated guess as to what is wrong – but it has to be confirmed. It may be several more days before diagnosis is confirmed.
    3. Once I get a diagnosis and (hopefully) some idea of the treatment plan, I will send out a group email to you all. Until the diagnosis is confirmed, I just don’t want to speculate on what it might be.

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  16. i’m reading a good one by janette walls who wrote an acclaimed one we read in book club

    young sisters in a disfunctionsl family
    funny, heart tugging well written
    and we cummings had a collection of his non poetry stuff republished in july

    looks great

    vonnegut and conroy are my fallbacks

    vs who was the wizard tree woman story and author

    that was a treat

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  17. I enjoyed the recent Blevins selections. Sourdough and The Philosopher’s Flight. Picked up Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore at a garage sale recently, but haven’t gotten far. I keep falling asleep. Not the book’s fault, I’m just tired.

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