A Work in Progress

The World of Books at Your Fingertips

I've been busy . . . (requesting), can you tell?  Maybe I am in an alternate universe?  While I keep walking into 'most anticipated books of 2020' lists, everything catching my eye of late has been books that are older or out of print.  One of the perks of working in a library has been being able to just walk up to the stacks and pull a book off the shelf.  And the books I want but we don't own?  Have a little patience and then request them from another library.  

I seem to be in an ILL request phase.  On the agenda (and bookcart) at the moment:

Francesca Woodman Photographs, 1975-1980.  This is an exhibit catalog.  The name caught my eye via Buried in Print's GoodReads.  I was intrigued by the name (a woman) and the subject of photography.  Francesca Woodman's photographs are amazing and you may well be familiar with them without realizing it, as more than a few have been book jacket illustrations (notably one for a book by Elena Ferrante).  Sadly she committed suicide at the very young age of 22 in 1981.  

The following books are from an article I read somewhere about books that are 'now forgotten' but much loved or admired by contemporary authors.  Sorry I have lost the link that spurred me to request these.

The Winter of Enchantment by Victoria Walker is a young adult/juvenile title (I have several on the go right now--I guess this might be my year of more than normal YA reading).  The author was a mere 21 when she wrote this.  "Through a magic mirror Sebastian travels from his Victorian world of winter snow and Mrs. Parkin to a magic world of Melissa, Mantari the cat, a wicked Enchanter, and many other exciting people. Melissa, a pretty young girl, has been imprisoned in a large house by the wicked Enchanter. Sebastian first meets Melissa through the magic mirror and resolves to do everything in his power, and with the help of a little magic, to free her."

Translated from French Assia Djebar's The Mischief has been compared to (found the link for this book!) Francoise Sagan's Bonjour Tristesse (maybe I will read that as well this year).  And from the article noting this wonderful book: "It was written and first published in French in the mid-50’s, and is set over the course of a single summer. Its heroine is one of the jeunesse dorée, dissatisfied and bored despite her wealth and privilege. She drives a fast sports car, and idles away her days sunbathing on Mediterranean beaches and flirting with her boyfriend. She’s a capricious enfant terrible, and she’s stricken with jealousy at the happiness of a couple close to her, so she amuses herself by sabotaging their relationship, with unexpectedly tragic consequences."

We Always Wore Sailor Suits by Susanna Agnelli -- "A brief, charming, and somewhat puzzling autobiography by a woman who is currently Mayor of Porto Santo Stefano. The period of the author's girlhood and youth, which her book describes, coincided exactly with Mussolini's rule in Italy, yet this is a record not of Mussolini's Italy, but of Ms. Agnelli's, in which Mussolini was a distant and symbolic participant. The author was born into the comfortable upper reaches of the Italian bourgeoisie--her grandfather had founded Fiat and grown immensely rich--yet the family had little claim to the ultimate privilege of nobility."--1975 Kirkus Review.

And I am reading right now Richard Peck's Don't Look and It Won't Hurt, another YA novel that was made into a very good movie called Gas Food Lodging, which I recently watched again.  The novel differs somewhat from the movie, but I like it just as well nonetheless.  I read some of Richard Peck's work when I was a teenager, so it is fun revisiting his writing now.

I love these unexpected treats.  Sometimes the best reads are the ones that no one (or not many people) are talking about anymore.  I want to balance my reading of contemporary fiction with older and unknown (hopefully not completely forgotten) books.  What hidden gems are you reading now?

Winter Blues Retail Therapy! (& kitties)

I find the winter months really challenging.  So many gloomy, grey days and often bitter cold.  The sun shines infrequently and I just want to close the blinds, turn on all my lamps and get under a blanker until spring.  This year is especially difficult and it is hard to see glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel.  I was happy to turn the calendar over to a new year/decade, and now I am ready to turn that calendar over to a new month as well.  Not that February will be any better.  Winter has settled in and with it a pattern of snow and ice.  

So my weekend spot of sunshine was a visit to the bookstore with holiday gift cards in hand.  I browsed the many aisles, even those I tend to ignore and managed to create a hefty pile of books and magazines to peruse in the cafe.  Hot coffee in hand I shifted books from one pile to another and then back and then once again whittled down, but I still came away with a larger purchase than usual.  I try to leave with just one book and one magazine to add to my at home (teetering) piles.  Part of the blame falls on those stickers that have popped up on books 'buy one get one 50% off'.  I mean if I am going to buy  one, surely I can find another ( I avoid those two for the price of three tables--I can never manage a combination of three books I don't already own, have not read and actually really want to read).  But two is doable.

I hope I made good selections.  Top to bottom:

My Husband's Wife by Jane Corry -- I hope this truly is a "grabber from the first page".  "When young lawyer Lily marries Ed, she’s determined to make a fresh start and leave the secrets of the past behind. But then she takes on her first murder case and meets Joe, a convicted murderer to whom Lily is strangely drawn—and for whom she will soon be willing to risk almost anything.  But Lily is not the only one with secrets. Her next-door neighbor Carla may be only nine, but she has already learned that secrets are powerful things. That they can get her whatever she wants.  When Lily finds Carla on her doorstep twelve years later, a chain of events is set in motion that can end only one way."

The Order of Time by Carlo Rovelli -- I am interested in books about science and nature, but often the science books seem a little more intimidating to me.  This one seems accessible and the bonus is it is a work in translation (really want to read more translated books this year).  "Why do we remember the past and not the future? What does it mean for time to "flow"? Do we exist in time or does time exist in us? In lyric, accessible prose, Carlo Rovelli invites us to consider questions about the nature of time that continue to puzzle physicists and philosophers alike."

To Shake the Sleeping Self: A Journey from Oregon to Patagonia, and a Quest for a Life with No Regret by Jedidiah Jenkins -- That's a tall order, isn't it?  I am very interested in that "quest for a life of no regret" part.  I think I would have passed this one by had not one of the booksellers enthused over this (apparently he must have a very popular Instagram account, too).  She placed it in my hands to look at, but it was the first line of the book that really sold me: "I have learned this for certain: if discontent is your disease, travel is medicine.  It opens you up to see outside the patterns you follow."  One of my goals, once I get through the next six months or so of family obligations is to finally plan a proper vacation with new sights and sounds and experiences.  It is far over the horizon, but I am hoping it is there and continues to get closer.  Maybe this book will help inspire me!

Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel -- I want to read at least twelve graphic novels this year.  The idea was to just read one a month, but already I am nearly finished reading my second and now have the third one lined up.  I think this must be a classic of the genre and it has garnered all sorts of awards and is being adapted to film, so it seems a perfect choice for this year's lineup.  "A fresh and brilliantly told memoir from a cult favorite comic artist, marked by gothic twists, a family funeral home, sexual angst, and great books."

And my magazine of choice is the most recent issue of World Literature Today (another nod towards literature in translation!).  To be honest, this is just a taste of my recent acquisitions . . . you know how all those library requests come in at the same time, right?  And then there have been a few online purchases, too.  So maybe there will be a part two sometime this week.  Until then, I have to share a cozy photo:

A Weekend Mishmash: Reading Notes, etc.

I am very ready for the long weekend, only I am not looking forward to the messy weather that will be accompanying it.  Friday snow brings not just snow but maybe ice and frigid temperatures with a smattering of very strong winds.  I guess winter has finally arrived.  A good reason to stay tucked inside with hot chocolate, my two adopted cats and a stack of books, right?

According to GoodReads I am falling behind (already?) in my reading challange.  I am doing too much grazing and not spending quite enough time with one book at a time to finish them in an orderly manner.  I am hoping, however, there will be several finishes all at once and it will send me into being ahead of schedule.  

This weekend I will be finishing the novelization of Sanditon  as well as watching it on PBS (I wonder if Jane Austen would approve . .  . maybe not actually).  There have been some rather blush-worthy moments in the book and no doubt will be in the film, too; and it feels a little too heavily borrowed from Pride and Prejudice in particular, but Austen tropes in general.  I guess the fact that the book comes in relation to the making of the TV adaptation (or after it) rather than the movie coming from the book (since Sanditon is only a rough fragment to begin with).  Read into that what you like!

And I am nearly finished with the most excellent, though nail biting Code Name Lise.  I am going to try and finish these two books before starting any new reads (in theory anyway--good intentions usually thrown out the window in the end).  So will just pull from the night table stack after Sanditon winds down but I am in the hunt for a new nonfiction. 

So many choices.  I almost feel compelled, despite the slightly heartwrenching stories of spies captured by the Germans in WWII Paris (and true story which makes it harder going) to read more about this era, but then again . . .  It is winter and cold and gloomy and something a little more cheery would be most welcome.  I have a stack of nonfiction books I can choose from--maybe a memoir would be good.  Have you read any really engaging nonfiction books of late (of any subject)?

I will be reading more of the Louisa Luna novel I just wrote about and it is time to pick up Anita Abriel's The Light After the War, which is a review copy that I could not resist.  As it is coming out early in February it is time to dive into the story.  And I have to say how much I am enjoying Andrew Taylor's The Ashes of London.  I am not a big fan of Restoration era England, but I am really engaged in this story of the Great Fire of 1666 and find the characters, Richard Marwood and Cat Lovette really likable and interesting.  Did I already mention that I bought the next book in the series in anticipation?  I have been jaded on historical fiction to some extent (like most thrillers these days) as so much of it seems like it is only set in WWI or WWII era and as much as I like reading about that period, variety is nice, too.

As much as I am trying to keep my focus on in progress books I am still feeling the urge for some literary fiction.  It is all those new book lists--the most anticipated reads of 2020--that I am bombarded with.  I have a new BOMC book on my pile, which happens to be one of those books as a matter of fact.  I will try and make some progress on my other books this weekend first and then pick it up next week perhaps.

And just a few miscellaneous items.  I decided to become an Opera subscriber again and have ordered my tickets for the next season.  I have always wanted to see Sweeney Todd-though it is literally more than a year off!  There will be Mozart and Tchaikovsky to look forward to as well.  

I just found out that Frank Tallis's turn-of-the-century Viennese mystery novels have been adapted for TV and are going to air in the US sometime in the coming year.  You can see the trailer here.  Maybe it is time to pick up those books again!  And I can see I am going to have to get the newsletter for Willow and Thatch to keep up on all the period drama news.  It looks like there are some good dramas in the works and I am always looking for something good to watch.  I suspect there will be some movie watching this weekend as well.

Louisa Luna's Two Girls Down: A Teaser

Off already on my first unplanned reading path.  Sooner or later it always happens.  My reading is off to a very slow start this year, but all things considered, I am not surprised.  And I am not sure which reading list or newsletter that prompted me to pick up Luisa Luna's Two Girls Down, but the review or recommendation was so persuasive that I was immediately sold.  And to be honest I am very much in a mystery/suspense/thriller mood, too.  So it came in the mail and I started reading and was hooked.

And then came an offer for a review copy for her forthcoming novel, The Janes, featuring the same main characters, so I had to say yes, of course.  You know how all the planets will line up just right as a sign this is the book/author you need to read now?  For a while now I have been a little jaded when it comes to thrillers as they seem far too much in the same vein.  Or maybe I just needed a break and palate cleanser period, but I have to agree with the blurbs on the book--Nancy Pearl and Lee Child both gave the book thumbs up--"sensational", "spectacular" and "gripping" just to name a few words of praise the book has earned.

And then today in CrimeReads there was this list!  Hear hear--I am totally on board with that--in praise of difficult women!  The list is by Louisa Luna and now I want to pick up some of the books she recommends!  Onwards, I think.  But first maybe I should mention why Two Girls Down is resonating with me at the moment.  Maybe resonating is not exactly the right description, but I am finding myself engaged with the storytelling and the characters.

The mystery at the heart of the novel is the disappearance of two young girls from the parking lot of a Kmart in a small Pennsylvania town. Their mother ran in just for a few minutes to pick up a birthday gift, but when she returned to the car they were missing.  There is the sense that maybe the mother has some issues.  No husband/father in the picture.  Maybe not the very best family situation, but they are utterly devastated.  With little progress forthcoming from the local police the family hires a bounty hunter from California to help find the girls.  And this is where it really gets interesting.

Alice Vega.  I am still forming my impression of her.  She is called "Vega" in the story, which is sort of telling.  She is no-nonsense and fairly unemotional.  She can take care of herself it goes without saying.  I think to say she has moxie is even too tame to really.  Vega is a no-holds-barred sort of woman.  She is independent and confident and I would feel pretty safe in her company.  When she arrives, she knows she is going to need a little local help and she convinces Max Caplan, a disgraced former policeman, to help her obtain the witnesses interviews and aid her in her investigation.  I like Max--I like his teenage daughter Nell.  And I am very curious how they will all work together--especially as there is now a second book in the series and this disparate set of investigators live on opposite coasts!

So, a little teaser and peek into Alice Vega's character.

"In a room in a house in Central California, a girl stood on her hands.  She was too old to be called a girl anymore, thirty-three, but she still felt like one.  Not in a good way of having her whole life in front of her.  In the bad way of being able to see only the edges of things, to peek around the corners when what you wanted was a city planner's blueprints of the whole block seen from above." 

Vega is 33 and Cap is 41 with a teenage daughter and an ex-wife.  I am very curious about the characters and how they will interact and want to know more about their personalities and back stories.  All in all a good start to a new series with a few very fresh and interesting characters.

Public Library 2020 Reading Challenge

So, I said I was going to keep things simple and lowkey this year and just let my reading flow, but I can't resist joining my public library's reading challenge.  

Especially since they had these really nifty little reading logs printed.  I mean, how perfect for a simple challenge of a mere dozen themed reads over the course of the year.  Having this booklet to guide me makes it all the more appealing (and it was already appealing before).

Each theme has a two page spread in the booklet to note down the book read and a few other little details.  And the themes are really pretty accessible--most likely I will manage to read them as a matter of course anyway.  

Read a Book in One Sitting
Read a Book Made into a Movie or TV Show
Read a Book by a Nebraska Author
Read a Book from OPL's 2019 Top Shelf
Read an "Own Voices" Book
Listen to a Book
Read a Fantasy, Myth or Fairy Tale
Read a Book in Translation
Read the 2020 Omaha Reads Book (to be voted on and announced later this year)
Read a Book by a Nonbinary or LGBTQ+ Author
Read a Classic That is New to You
Read a Nonfiction Graphic Novel

My first read of the year is actually a graphic nonfiction title, so I take that as a sign this is going to work.  I hope to share Nora Krug's Belonging, which I have wanted to read since it was first released.  A perfect first book of the year, especially as my one small challenge to myself is to read one graphic novel (or nonfiction) each month, but at least ten, this year.

One of my first book checkouts by the way, is The Library of the Unwritten by A.J. Hackwith, which sounds most intriguing and would fit nicely in that fantasy theme.  I have not yet started it (I am trying to persevere with the books I selected to start the new year off and "finish" them before adding new books to the pile--I know it won't last, but I will try).

My posts may continue to be irregular but I want to try and write three times a week here about my reading adventures.  I hope everyone else's reading year is off to a good start as well.

2019 Favorites & a Few Mentions

A little late, but still worth noting--a dozen favorites from last year and a few extra mentions.  Every year I think maybe this is the year where it will be slim pickings in terms of really stand out reads, but then every  year I manage to make a list of more than ten titles that, for me anyway, stood out just a little bit (or maybe a lot) above the rest.

Ten favorite books.  Eight novels and then two nonfiction in the order that I read them. 

Spring of Love by Celia Dale -- She is one of my good new finds.  Not only a Virago Modern Classic, but an author who should not have been relegated to the forgotten.  Domestic suspense of the best kind and a book worth rereading (and I have two or three of her other books in my shelves, too).

Pale View of Hills by Kazuo Ishiguro -- A different kind of war story, one about history and memory and mothers and daughters.  This is a story where not much happens, but if you read between the lines it is about so much more than what is visible at the surface.  I have loved the books I have read by him and this is a reminder to pick up more of his work.

Freya by Anthony Quinn -- Quinn is a favorite author--another somewhat new discovery.  Freya appears in an earlier novel but here she is center stage.  A remarkable woman of the twentieth century--this chunky novel is one I loved losing myself in.  She never failed to surprise me--human, flawed, but still entirely admirable.  She shows up in another later book, which I am curious about and hope to read this year.

All She Was Worth by Miyuke Miyabe -- The premise of this mystery/thriller sounds like it might be on the boring side--the crime of identity theft, but it was actually, curiously, really good.  Aside from the fact that the characters were really interesting (the detective and his family and another man who aided him in the solving of the crime), the bits that made this really intriguing were how credit and banking and identity are handled in Japanese society.

Manhattan Beach by Jennifer Egan -- This story of a female diver in WWII NYC was already really interesting, but hearing Egan speak and share the inspiration and how she researched and wrote the book made the reading experience even richer.  I had read Egan years ago and I plan on returning to her work again.

The Old Capital by Yasunari Kawabata -- Kawabata won the Nobel Prize and this book specifically was named in relation to the award.  It felt to me, a very Japanese novel, as it is set in Kyoto and is about cultural traditions of a time and place known mostly in memory.

The Dutch House by Ann Patchett --This was a great reading experience--one that matched the hype that preceded it.  I forgot what a great storyteller Patchett is.  The story of a family and the turmoil and turbulence no family is immune from.  It is woven together quite seamlessly moving across time and space and that has remained with me months later.

Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie -- My first book by Adichie but definitely not my last.  She is another superlative storyteller.  I love books like this.  It was at times painful to read, yet I could never turn away.  A mark of a good storyteller--even with those characters that I railed against, I could never entirely condemn them.  But those I loved I felt were truly remarkable.

*****

Just So Happens by Fumio Obata -- I love graphic novels like this.  As a matter of fact it is thanks to this that I plan on reading one each month this year.  The storytelling was quite spare, but it is real talent to tell a rich story in the way Obata does and the illustrations were perfection.

Nisei Daughter by Monica Stone -- A biography of about a Japanese-American family at a time when they were not welcomed very warmly in this country.  It read like a novel.  It was totally engrossing and I learned so much about a bit of history I should really know more about.  Highly recommended (as are all my favorites of this year).

*****

A few honorable mentions.

Kinsey Millhone!  I read nine Sue Grafton mysteries last year, from G through O!  I plan on finishing the series this year.  I can't stay away too long from Kinsey's adventures!

I enjoyed finally meeting Inspector Wexford and want to go back and read more, and maybe even start a reread of my favorite Ruth Rendell/Barbara Vine books.

I finished the Maisie Dobbs series last year and so have read all (save the one WWI novels she wrote) of Jaqueline Winspear's books.  I have heard she sis taking a break this year so nothing more until 2021--so  long to wait--I wonder how things will progress?!

There were a few books which I was quite underwhelmed by to be honest, most notably (and I feel like I should not even mention this) Normal People by Sally Rooney.  Maybe I will just put that down to being the wrong audience at the wrong time.

The good reads, happily, far outweighed the not so good.

It is interesting that so many books that ended up being particularly memorable are those that I read as part of my big reading project--Reading Japan.  I still have a stack of books I will keep reading from (what theme will I pick this year?).  Japanese Literature/Japanese-American Literature really resonated for me. 

Now to lots of new discoveries in 2020!

January: I've Been Meaning to Read This

What better prompt to kick off the new year than to choose a book "I have been meaning to read".  I mean to read all my books, but there are always a few that are more "in mind" than others.  A few sit right next to my bed, or I have heard especially tantalizing things about others.  I have a sheet of paper I cart around with me, tucked into whatever I happen to be reading at the moment which has reading notes and a list of my in progress books, but on it I also jot down books that come to mind that I feel like reading next.  Here is a sampling of those books.  Tonight I will tuck into bed with the stack near at hand and peruse until one simply won't be set aside any longer.

The Ashes of London by Andrew Taylor -- "London, September 1666. The Great Fire rages through the city, consuming everything in its path. Even the impregnable cathedral of St. Paul's is engulfed in flames and reduced to ruins. Among the crowds watching its destruction is Richard Marwood, son of a disgraced printer, and reluctant government informer. In the aftermath of the fire, a semi-mummified body is discovered in the ashes of St. Paul's, in a tomb that should have been empty. The man's body has been mutilated and his thumbs have been tied behind his back - the sign of a Regicide, one of those who signed Charles I's death warrant. Under orders from the government, Marwood is tasked with hunting down the killer across the devastated city. But at a time of dangerous internal dissent and the threat of foreign invasion, Marwood finds his investigation leads him into treacherous waters - and across the path of a determined, beautiful and vengeful young woman."

Gallows Court by Martin Edwards -- "A heroine called Rachel Savernake had better live up to that dangerous-sounding name, and in Martin Edwards's Gallows Court, she does...Is Rachel a female Moriarty? A lucky dilettante? An avenging angel? Edwards keeps the reader guessing deep into the lively narrative...a clever pastiche of the golden-age mystery." - Air Mail

House of Glass by Susan Fletcher -- "June 1914 and a young woman - Clara Waterfield - is summoned to a large stone house in Gloucestershire. Her task: to fill a greenhouse with exotic plants from Kew Gardens, to create a private paradise for the owner of Shadowbrook. Yet, on arrival, Clara hears rumours: something is wrong with this quiet, wisteria-covered house. Its gardens are filled with foxgloves, hydrangea and roses; it has lily-ponds, a croquet lawn - and the marvellous new glasshouse awaits her. But the house itself feels unloved. Its rooms are shuttered, or empty. The owner is mostly absent; the housekeeper and maids seem afraid. And soon, Clara understands their fear: for something - or someone - is walking through the house at night. In the height of summer, she finds herself drawn deeper into Shadowbrook's dark interior - and into the secrets that violently haunt this house. Nothing - not even the men who claim they wish to help her - is quite what it seems."

The Last List of Miss Judith Kratt by Andrea Bobotis -- "Judith Kratt inherited all the Kratt family had to offer--the pie safe, the copper clock, the murder no one talks about. She knows it's high time to make an inventory of her household and its valuables, but she finds that cataloging the family belongings--as well as their misfortunes--won't contain her family's secrets, not when her wayward sister suddenly returns, determined to expose skeletons the Kratts had hoped to take to their graves.  Interweaving the present with chilling flashbacks from one fateful evening in 1929, Judith pieces together the influence of her family on their small South Carolina cotton town, learning that the devastating effects of dark family secrets can last a lifetime and beyond.

Outline by Rachel Cusk -- " . . .a novel in ten conversations. Spare and lucid, it follows a novelist teaching a course in creative writing over an oppressively hot summer in Athens. She leads her students in storytelling exercises. She meets other visiting writers for dinner. She goes swimming in the Ionian Sea with her neighbor from the plane. The people she encounters speak volubly about themselves: their fantasies, anxieties, pet theories, regrets, and longings. And through these disclosures, a portrait of the narrator is drawn by contrast, a portrait of a woman learning to face a great loss."

There There by Tommy Orange -- "Tommy Orange’s wondrous and shattering novel follows twelve characters from Native communities: all traveling to the Big Oakland Powwow, all connected to one another in ways they may not yet realize. Among them is Jacquie Red Feather, newly sober and trying to make it back to the family she left behind. Dene Oxendene, pulling his life together after his uncle’s death and working at the powwow to honor his memory. Fourteen-year-old Orvil, coming to perform traditional dance for the very first time. Together, this chorus of voices tells of the plight of the urban Native American—grappling with a complex and painful history, with an inheritance of beauty and spirituality, with communion and sacrifice and heroism." 

You'll Never See Me Again by Lesley Pearse -- "Heart-pounding, exhilarating and ever suspenseful, Lesley Pearse's You'll Never See Me Again is a tale of one woman's fight to find her destiny."

Out of curiosity--have you read any of these or heard good things about one or another or are there any that sit on your TBR as well?

A New Year and a New Pile of Books!

Welcome 2020!  It is nice to see you! 

I seem to be having laptop issues.  I am going to take the fact that I have been able to connect to a local indie coffeeshop's wifi (what better place to start thew New Year anyway!) as a good sign (rather than take the glass half empty view of what a way to start the new year!). 

So things are a bit mixed up.  I had planned to share my 2019 favorites and then my list of new prompts, but I will go in reverse order this year.  I suspect this year is going to be full of all sorts of new starts, new habits and new traditions.  I will try to take that in the spirit of a fresh start after a very unhappy end to last year.

By the way, thank you so very much for the kind words and cards about my mom.  It was rough going last year and it will still be uphill for a while, but your thoughtfulness is so very appreciated.  As soon as I can get back to a normal connection at home I will reply to all the comments, but please be assured they have been read and I thank you!

I have decided to clear the decks so to speak with my reading.  I have a pile of books from last year that I will sort through and decide which I will try and finish this year and which can quietly go back to their places in book piles or shelves for a later attempt.  This is my tentative pile of new starts with a couple of books started last year.

I am ready to get back to Kinsey Millhone's adventures.  Next up is P is for Peril.

I have gotten away from the classics (save for what I would call modern classics, which are good, too).  An easy start and maybe a little bit of a cheat.  Did you see the forthcoming TV adaptation by Andrew Davies of Jane Austen's last novel, Sanditon?  She never finished it.  I think a mere 60 page fragment is all that exists.  I found Sanditon by Jane Austen and Kate Riordan (who I have read before) at the bookstore recently.  I will look for the Jane Austen fragment and read it alongside the reworked work.  A nice way to ease back into the classics--reading Jane Austen and then watching the movie later this month.

I didn't finish Decembers prompt, Len Deighton's Berlin Game, so I will continue to enjoy it this month.  I think there are three sets of three books and I already have the second one on hand.

I am not really setting out any goals this year (save my Good Reads Challenge), but there are a few things I would like to try to do more of this year.  Classics reading is one.  Another is to get back to chunky reads.  I have a whole stack (are you surprised) to pull from.  Dorothy Whipple's The Priory (coming in at 536 pages) is tentatively my first choice for the year.  I have wanted to read it for ages.

I started Signe Pike's The Lost Queen last year.  I listened to a podcast about it last year and was quickly sold.  It is the first of three planned books.  Everyone who has read it seems to have raved about it.  It is a story in the vein of The Mists of Avalon.

My nonfiction choice is not completely firm, but I keep eyeing Code Name Lise by Larry Loftis, so it has been added to the pile.  You know I am always up for a good spy story--even better that this is based on an actual person.

I could not pass up a review copy of Anita Abriel's The Light after the War about two Jewish women who survive the Holocaust, which is based on a true story.

And there at the bottom of the pile is a graphic novel (nonfiction in this case)-Nora Krug's Belonging, which I have wanted to read ever since I first heard about it.  I would like to try and read ten graphic novels over the course of the year.

We'll see how it goes.  I am not making any plans really other than the few I mention here and only by way of starting out the new reading year.  I fully expect that I will veer off the paths I set now, and that is okay.

My Good Reads 'challenge' is to read 83 books this year.  I managed to read 80 in 2019, which is what I set out to do, so I thought it fitting to try and better that by just a few books.  It really helped to log books last year and watch the covers add up--see what I had read and where my reading was taking me.

******

So that leaves my dozen prompts to help me choose a new book from my shelves in the coming months.  As always, each is open to interpretation, and I may make a change if something really doesn't appeal.  Randomly:

January: I've Been Meaning to Read This

February: It's a Woman's World

March: Any Book from an Old new Books List!

April: Read, Enjoy.  Repeat

May: Any Green Spine

June: Exit Stage Left

July: In Sickness and in Health

August: La Dolce Vita

September: Ready for New Beginnings

October: A Month in the Country

November: Wishing Myself Somewhere New

December: Dear Diary, Dear Friend

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It's good to start fresh!  Not just a new year, but a new decade, and for me a new start to a life that went topsy turvy.  What are your hopes for 2020?