Space Station Mir

I'm swamped with work, and not much relief in sight till May. Honestly, I'm surprised I got as much reading done as I did. Plus, it looks like one of my doggos is going to need surgery and I'm pretty upset, and between making appointments for her, me, and my husband...phew. Good news is I'm now half-vaccinated, as a teacher, and so is my husband, who also works in education. I get my second vaccine next week!   Books I Read This Month Winterkeep by Kristin Cashore The Last Watchman of Old Cairo by Michael David Lukas My Life on the Road by Gloria Steinem (reread) Thoughts I'm so, so grateful that I got to read  Winterkeep,  the latest in the Graceling series that I've been following since 2012. I definitely tried to read slowly and savor as much as I could! I know I'll read it again too. I love Kristin Cashore so much and will read anything she writes for the rest of my life.  Reading  Winterkeep was  even more of a treat than I dared to dream.  Bitterblue 

 Happy Top Ten Tuesday over at That Artsy Reader Girl! This week's topic is a Spring Cleaning freebie, so I decided to go with cleaning-themed books I'm either interested in or have enjoyed. I'm not going to do any spring cleaning anytime soon since this is a busy time of year for me (as a teacher, I'm more likely to attempt big cleaning projects in January or June), but it's sometimes fun to read about it. Also to watch on Netflix re: Kondo and The Home Edit. Laundry Love: Finding Joy in a Common Chore by Patric Richardson Home Comforts: The Art and Science of Keeping House by Cheryl Mendelson Chasing Dirt: The American Pursuit of Cleanliness by Suellen Hoy The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo (still sparks joy!) The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning by Margareta Magnusson Outer Order, Inner Calm: Declutter and Organize to Make More Room for Happiness by Gretchen Rubin The Home Edit: A Guide to Organizing and Realizing Your House Goals by Clea Sh

 Happy Top Ten Tuesday over at That Artsy Reader Girl ! Honestly, it's easier for me to think of characters whose jobs I don't wish I had. I don't want to be a defense lawyer. I don't want to travel through Mordor to throw the Ring into Mount Doom. I might want to be a librarian or a bookseller (assuming I could make a living), a writer or what I already am, a teacher. I want more of the jobs from cozy, safe types of books--although I threw a few nonfiction in too.  1. The Bookish Life of Nina Hill by Abbi Waxman Job: Bookseller 2. The Bookshop on the Corner by Jenny Colgan Job: Owner of a book van/traveling bookshop 3. Playing with Matches by Hannah Orenstein Job: Matchmaker I wouldn't have picked this before I read the book, but the way she spends most of her time just looking at online profiles and then setting people up kind of sounded fun. 4. The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet by Becky Chambers Job: Anything on a spaceship. I (almost) don't care! I could

A lot of speculative fiction this month, and I needed it. Also, rereading two of my favorite fantasy novels, Graceling and Bitterblue , in preparation for the next in the series, Winterkeep , which I am eagerly awaiting---5 of 34 on the library waitlist! It was my first reread of Graceling since I first read it in 2012 (!) but I own Bitterblue and have read it many times. I'm glad she's going to be a character in Winterkeep . A Traveler in Time is a book I picked up at a Chicago library sale, and have had for a while, but I finally read it. It's such a cozy story about time travel into the 1600s, but it was written pre-1930s, so for me, it's like time-traveling twice. The two Kevin Emerson books are the second and third in the middle-grade science fiction Dark Star trilogy which offers alternatively irreverent and profound interpretations of the space/time continuum, plus a meditation on personal and collective responsibility.   Books Read This Month A Traveler in Ti

Happy Top Ten Tuesday over at That Artsy Reader Girl! I know I've done similar topics before, so while David Lebovitz or Jen Lancaster can always get me to laugh, I'm focusing on books I've read in the past couple of years. Happy reading! A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking by T. Kingfisher Black Widow by Leslie Gray Streeter My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry by Fredrik Backman The 100 Most Jewish Foods: A Highly Debatable List ed. Alana Newhouse Embrace Your Weird by Felicia Day Howl's Moving Castle by Dianne Wynne Jones The Boy Who Steals Houses by C.G. Drews Dear Mrs. Bird by A.J. Pearce Born a Crime by Trevor Noah To All the Boys I've Loved Before by Jenny Han

Today's Top Ten Tuesday is a Valentine's Day freebie, so I thought I'd have a little fun and share with you some of the most un romantic stories I've ever read. Definitely DO NOT RECOMMEND if you're trying to impress your valentine. Some of them should be obvious--and some of them should be obvious. And I have a little more to say on the last one, which is one of my favorite books of all time, and in some ways one of the most romantic books of all time, but also the key to explaining why some books are not as romantic as some may think. Keep reading if you're curious: Top Ten Books You Shouldn't Read for Valentine's Day Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier Pamela by Samuel Richardson My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier  Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov 1984 by George Orwell Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy The Tragedy of Mariam by Elizabeth Carey Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte Persuasion by Jane Austen Jane Austen on Why Roma

I read a lot more this month than I have in a while. Part of it is being off work for most of the month. Part of it is distracting myself from the winter, particularly the winter of this pandemic. The rates, the restriction, the closing in, the cold. I felt better after the 20th was over. I feel confident that I will get the vaccine sometime this year. But I still just want to escape. I'm lucky. I have a lovely cozy place to huddle up with my beloved spouse and dogs. I'm safe. I have everything I need. I just have to find it.   Books Read This Month The Secret Commonwealth by Philip Pullman Mrs. Everything by Jennifer Weiner Tell Me More by Kelly Corrigan Paper Brigade 2020-21 One Fine Day the Rabbi Bought a Cross by Harry Kemelman Romancing Mr. Bridgerton by Julia Quinn Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel Last Day on Mars by Kevin Emerson Favorite Book This Month 1. The Secret Commonwealth by Philip Pullman It helps to start off the mo