A Work in Progress

A Year of Bookish Prompts

I fudged a little this year on my prompts and I am finishing up December's book, but of any plans I made at the start of the year, this is the one I actually stuck with.  I am working on my new list of prompts and am thinking about January's book, but more about those later.  Just a quick look back over the books I read for each month's prompts.

January: Crime and Punishment
Maigret's Mistake by Georges Simenon

February: Something Old
A Curious Beginning by Deanna Raybourn

March: Upstairs Downstairs
The Land of My Dreams by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

April: Rain or Shine
Lock 14 by Georges Simenon

May: Something New
The Sunday Philosophy Club by Alexander McCall Smith

June: I Could Have Danced All Night
All the Beautiful Girls by Elizabeth J.Church

July: A Day at the Beach
As Close to Us as Breathing by Elizabeth Poliner

August: Something Borrowed
The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side by Agatha Christie

September: Swinging Sixties
Durable Goods by Elizabeth Berg

October: Call of the Wild
Dear Mrs. Bird by AJ Pearce

November: Something Blue
The Deep blue Good-by by John D. MacDonald

December: Cold War December
Berlin Game by Len Deighton--I'll be carrying this one over into 2020.

I'm looking forward to another year of prompts/themes to inspire my reading in 2020.

Cleaning House-Books by the Number 2019

I don't think I want to reflect too long on 2019 and am more than ready to turn the calendar over to 2020, clear off my night table and start fresh once again.  But I do want to put a few things in order.  I won't be able to write about the many books I read and enjoyed this year, though I do still want to come up with a favorites list in the next couple of days.

I didn't do a very good job logging my books, but I think I might have enough information to at least tally a few things up.  I might just include those things I did rather than those I didn't.  So a peek at this year's reading by the numbers.

• Books read: 80 ( I accomplished my GR reading challenge!)
• 20th century: 40
• 21st century: 40
• Books published in 2019: 11
• Fiction: 32
• Historical fiction: 4
• Romance: 1
• Nonfiction: 8
• Creative nonfiction (autofiction?): 2
• Nature: 1
• Classics: 4 (modern fiction)
• Mysteries/Crime/Suspense: 30
• Graphic novel: 4
• Books written by women: 61
• Books written by men: 19
• American authors: 26
• British authors: 35
• Canadian authors: 1
• Australian/Irish authors: 2
• Authors from other countries: 17
• Subscription Books: 1
• Books in translation: 15 (Danish, French, Japanese)
• Virago Modern Classics: 3
• Persephone Books: 1
• Books read that were checked out from the library: 14
• ARCs/Review Copies: 2
• Books read from my own shelves: 64
• Rereads: 2
• Multiple books by the same author: 4 by Georges Simenon, 3 by Mary Hocking, 9 by Sue Grafton

It is always interesting to see where my reading led me over the  course of the year.  I think it helped setting a Good Reads goal, which I have managed to meet, so I will do the same for 2020 (and maybe up the ante just a bit).  It helps logging each book there and then seeing the book jackets-it helps me visualize where I am going.  Last year's numbers are here.  My reading tends to be very predictable it seems!

Christmas at Stillmeadow

Stillmeadow has been a delightful place to spend time each month over the course of this year.  Gladys Tabor is a charming storyteller, and despite the decades that have passed since the original publication of Stillmeadow Calendar, it is amazing how fresh and relevant her observations are.  It seems only fitting that she and Stillmeadow should get center stage this holiday.  The beauty of reading is being transported to another time and place and moments of happier circumstances!

"Christmas Eve is an important occasion for me.  We sit around the fireplace talking about the past and the future.  The tree glows softly in the light of the candles on the trestle table.  Our voices join in the singing of carols, and in this uneasy world I find faith anew.  Music, I think, is the basic art.  It speaks to all in a language of its own.  Nobody has to translate it; it requires only listening to.  The words of the carols are beautiful, but even without them the message is clear.  The power of love, the true significance of good will, shine forth with greater meaning at this holy time."

******

"When everybody has gone to bed, I sit a few moments in the now-quiet house, watching the embers fade into ash, thinking how fortunate Stillmeadow is to have small feet still pattering around on the old oak floors."  (Maybe I can count the patter of kitty paws, right?).

******

"Holiday breakfasts at Stillmeadow are traditionally festive.  I abandon my usual soft-boiled egg for pancakes with golden maple syrup and crisp, tiny sausages.  Or creamed finnan haddie, which was Jill's favorite dish and which her son fixes for us now.  Ot corned beef hash, for a change." (I think I will be having tamales with my housemates).

******

"On a moonlit night in December, as the earth turns toward another year, I sit quietly and begin to make a new set of resolutions.  My first is to be better organized."

"What the new year may bring, we cannot know, but I pray God's blessing may fall on us as softly as apple blossoms fall in spring.  And then I put out the guttering candles on the trestle table and go to bed, feeling that tomorrow will be another adventure in living!"

Two New Roomies (of the feline variety)

I've been absent for a while here, haven't I?  I think I may have mentioned, or perhaps not (?) that a family member had been dealing with health issues and I had been spending weekends cat/house sitting.  Rather unexpectedly my mom passed away very recently.  We had believed she was on the mend and would be returning home in time for the holidays.  Unfortunately that did not come to pass.  It has been a very difficult last couple of months and devastating to lose your mother--at any time, but particularly sad at holidaytime.

One small hint of light-two of her much loved cats will be finding a new home with me (and her other pair will be living with one of  my sisters).  During her illness my mom was always concerned that her animals were being cared for.  There will always be a gaping hole in my heart for the loss of my mom, but at least I will have a continuing connection with her via my two new roommates.

They will be making their transition later this week--something to keep us all busy during the coming dark, cold months of winter, which are always so hard anyway.  Let me introduce you to Snowball and Toby.  Snowball is a sweet, very furry little girl who is 4-1/2 years old.  Toby is the elder gentleman of the quartet--a spry 18 year old boy.  He likes to butt heads and has a bent tail, behind which there is surely an interesting story (he's not telling however).

I think they are going to offer a nice distraction for me, which I am going to need.  I have missed my virtual bookish chats and sharing my reading with everyone.  I hope to still share a few last minute catch up posts.  I think I might still manage to reach my Good Reads reading goal for this year.  I am dearly going to love turning that calendar over to 2020 in the hopes for a much better year.  I have a few reading plans in mind, if only to have something nice to look forward to and keep me busy, though they will be decidedly pared down from my usual enthusiasms.  It may take me a bit to catch up, but I would love to hear about your reading--what have been your favorite books and what you are looking forward to in the new year.  Don't be surprised if you see more cat pictures interspersed with books!

Last Prompt: Cold War December!

Last prompt of the year!  I have decided to stray a bit from my list as I was not all that excited about the theme I had chosen, but tweaking is always allowable as this is meant to be fun and just a way for me to explore my shelves a bit.  Besides I still have last month's prompt to finish and one from earlier in the year (which I may also fudge on, too).

Since we have just celebrated the thirty year anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, it seems like a timely prompt to read about those Cold War days that created the wall.  The world is a better place without walls, but I do find that era intriguing--best only to read about in fiction and not live through or with.  So I pulled a few books that have a Cold War backdrop to them and will choose one to finish out the reading year.

Stasi Child: A Karin Muller Thriller, David Young -- "East Berlin, 1975.  When Oberleutnant Karin Müller is called to investigate a teenage girl's body at the foot of the Wall, she imagines she's seen it all before. But when she arrives she realises this is a death like no other. It seems the girl was trying to escape - but from the West."

Stasiland: Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall, Anna Funder -- "In 1989, the Berlin Wall fell; shortly afterward the two Germanys reunited, and East Germany ceased to exist. Anna Funder’s bestselling Stasiland brings us extraordinary tales of real lives in the former East Germany. She meets Miriam, who tried to escape to West Berlin as a sixteen-year-old; hears the heartbreaking story of Frau Paul, who was separated from her baby by the Berlin Wall; and gets drunk with the legendary 'Mik Jegger of the East', once declared by the authorities—to his face—“no longer to exist.” And she meets the Stasi men themselves, still proud of their surveillance methods. Funder’s powerful account of that brutal world has become a contemporary classic."

Berlin Game, Len Deighton -- "East is East and West is West – and they meet in Berlin…  He was the best source the Department ever had, but now he desperately wanted to come over the Wall. 'Brahms Four' was certain a high-ranking mole was set to betray him. There was only one Englishman he trusted any more: someone from the old days.  So they decided to put Bernard Samson back into the field after five sedentary years of flying a desk."

Casino Royale, Ian Fleming -- "In the novel that introduced James Bond to the world, Ian Fleming’s agent 007 is dispatched to a French casino in Royale-les-Eaux. His mission? Bankrupt a ruthless Russian agent who’s been on a bad luck streak at the baccarat table." 

Then We Take Berlin: A Joel Wilderness Novel -- "Joe Wilderness is a World War II orphan, a condition that he thinks excuses him from common morality. Cat burglar, card sharp, and Cockney wide boy, the last thing he wants is to get drafted. But in 1946 he finds himself in the Royal Air Force, facing a stretch in military prison . . . when along comes Lt Colonel Burne-Jones to tell him MI6 has better use for his talents."

I think I have plenty to choose from with this little pile, but just out of curiosity--do you have any favorites with a setting of this era and part of the world?  I seem to be rather light on stories driven by or written by women, which is something I always look for normally.  

It is getting unbelievably close to the end of the year and I know I will not be able to write about the many books I have finished that have gone unnoticed or unmentioned.  I hope I might squeeze in a few chatty posts about them, but it might not happen.

I have some serious clean up to do--I am reading the last two months/chapters in my Gladys Tabor book and will write about them soon.

For such a long time I was ahead of the game with my Good Reads book challenge, but I am now a book behind.  Still, I think I can finish eight books still this month to meet my goal.  I am within the last 100 pages of at least three novels at the moment and I would love to clear off another book or two that has been languishing.  If not, perhaps I will simply clear them away and start afresh whatever happens.  

My blogging will likely continue to be erratic unfortunately.  Life is a little crazy and there are family things that are mostly my focus right now.  But this, too, shall pass, right?  I am sure life will get back to some semblance of normalcy eventually even if it is a new kind of normal.

I would love to hear what you have been up to?  What are you reading?  What has been your favorite book?  A favorite new find for 2019?  Or maybe a spectacularly good or absorbing movie or TV show.  I feel cut off from my virtual friends and I do miss you!  But whatever you are up to, I hope you have a good book next to you!