My Summer Bookshelf – July/August
Welcome to Round 2 of My Summer Bookshelf! Some fellow bloggers and I are sharing what we’ve read over the past month and what we plan to read THIS month. Welcome!
Here’s how I fared on my “Books I Plan to Read in July” list.
The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah: I read it but had to make myself finish it. I know a lot of people LOVE this book, but I didn’t. I think if I’m going to read something this incredibly sad, I need it to be especially beautifully written. Like All the Light We Cannot See and The Book Thief.
Home Comforts: The Art and Science of Keeping House by Cheryl Mendel: I’m reading it now. It’s a HUGE book, and I’m reading it a little at a time. It explains not only HOW to keep house (I haven’t even gotten to the part yet), but it explains the more important WHY it’s important to keep house. Here are a couple of my many favorite quotes from it:
“Above all, housekeeping must be intelligent so that it can be empathetic, for empathy is the form of intelligence that creates the feeling of home. Good housekeepers know intuitively what needs to be done in their homes because they know how their homes make people feel.”
“Good meals at home satisfy emotional hungers as real as hunger in the belly, and nothing else does so in the same way.”
You Learn by Living by Eleanor Roosevelt: I haven’t even started it yet.
What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty: I’m next in the queue for it at the library!
Hannah Coulter by Wendell Berry: I read some of it, and I appreciate that fact that it has some beautifully written lines in it. I abandoned it because I struggle with memoirs anyway, and to read a fictional memoir is something I’m just not willing to do right now!
This Day: Sabbath Poems by Wendell Berry: I skipped around in the book and read multiple poems in it. Some of them I thought were good; others I didn’t feel strongly about one way or the other. If somebody gave it to me as a gift I would probably read from it from time to time, but I don’t think it’s one I would buy for myself. But then there aren’t many poetry books I would buy for myself, so there’s that. Mr. Berry is a gifted writer; I can tell that! I think his stuff just isn’t right for me right now.
Other books I read in July:
Come Rain or Come Shine (audiobook) by Jan Karon. Took me a while to get into it, but I enjoyed it overall.
Gray Mountain (audio book) by John Grisham. A legal thriller about coal mining in Appalachia.
White Fire (audio book) by Preston & Child. A thriller with a Sherlock Holmes twist!
The Ladies Room by Carolyn Brown. Felt vindictive at the beginning but ended up being a sweet love story. Some funny lines!
Doubt by C. E. Tobisman. A legal thriller about a GMO biotech case.
Son by Lois Lowry. A beautiful finish to the series. Not what I expected, but good.
Cinder by Marissa Meyer. A fun story! I’m looking forward to reading the rest of this series.
To Be Read in August
The Things We Wish Were True by Marybeth Mayhew Whalen.
Greater Than Gold: From Olympic Heartbreak to Ultimate Redemption by Olympic diver (as in will be competing THIS year) David Boudia.
Miss Julia Speaks Her Mind by Ann B. Ross. Revisiting an old favorite series.
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier.
The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield.
Stormbreaker by Anthony Horowitz.
What books are on YOUR TBR list?!? Leave a comment below and let me know! (If you don’t see the comments section, please scroll back up and click on the title of this post. I’d love to hear from you!)
Be sure to check out these blogs to get even more ideas for what to read this summer!
Once Upon a Time & Happily Ever After
The Mishaps & Mayhem of a Solitary Life
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6 thoughts on “My Summer Bookshelf – July/August”
I love Jan Karon but I don’t think I know that one! Have you read her other Mitford books? I’m pretty behind on the series, apparently! Adding it to my TBR list! I abandoned some this go round too. Too many good books to waste time on an okay book. Me Before You finally came in but I have to finish my current book first. Must focus! I should be reading Core 400 books but I just can’t bring myself to them yet.
I read the other Mitford books (several of hem anyway) years ago. I didn’t love it now like it loved it then. I’m still trying to figure out why. I just dragged myself kicking and screaming all the way through Rebecca. (Spoiler alert there! I did NOT love it! More on that in next month’s recap!)
I am ashamed to call myself a librarian after seeing how few books I read compared to everyone else. I am a disgrace to my profession! I need to get back to listening to audio books in order to “read” at least three books a month! Ha! Loved The Giver, and I am thinking Son is part of that series. Is that right? I need to read What Alice Forgot. And Cinder sounds like something I would like…a twist on a fairy tale, huh? Thank you for joining up with us, Michael Ann. You and Sheila have inspired me to get an audio book ASAP.
No shame allowed! I’m just blessed to be able to have a good bit of down time right now! Yes, Son is the last of the four Giver Series books. I didn’t know there was a whole series until the last year or so! They’re VERY interesting! They’re good ones to listen to. Cinder is a cyborg story based loosely on Cinderella! I heard about it on Modern Mrs. Darcy. It’s not my usual genre, and it’s not the best written thing I’ve ever read, but the story IS fascinating! I was upset when the book ended! I have the next book on hold at the library.