Category Archives: Books

Here Comes the Sun!

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pool photo with fountain and fake alligator
My backyard pool view complete with fake gator.

After a cold few months — I guess that’s why it’s called Winter — a bit of warmth from the sun has returned.

It’s the first time I’ve been able to sit in the backyard by the pool in months. We were having highs in the 40s but now it’s in the 70s. It’s still cold at night, but what a treat to take a break in the sun.

I’m having a time with an upcoming fundraiser where I’m contacting magazines, newspaper, radio and TV to drum up coverage with the hope to sell tickets. I’ve started the dreaded tax prep. I have an HOA newsletter due. I have a board meeting to review our progress on the fundraiser…

Then there’s my photography class. Each Monday morning the professor posts a new module which includes reading what he’s posted, plus the textbook, and learning the basics of how my camera works. Then there are quizzes. We haven’t gotten into the fun stuff yet. But to be fair, it’s only week two.

I’m worried I won’t make my deadlines or be able to finish my tasks. Then I woke up in the middle of the night and stayed awake. I turned on Audible with “Travels with Charley” by John Steinbeck. It was somewhat calming, but the story and writing is so beautiful I wanted to listen rather than fall asleep! I’m not finished with this book, but I highly recommend it. Steinbeck travels across the country to discover America with his poodle Charley. His observations about different areas are intriguing.

I’m also reading the “Daughter’s of Shandong” that I heard about from one of my blogger friends. In any case, taking a few minutes to be warmed in the sun, reading, is saving me!

What is your go to to control stress when life gets too busy?

Who was your favorite Beatle? Hint: Mine wrote this song.

Don’t you love a good book?

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Thanks to fellow blogger and friend LA from Waking Up on the Wrong Side of 50 — for recommending Demon Copperhead. It’s one of the better books I’ve read lately.

I finished it in time to share it with my lunch bunch yesterday. My lunch bunch are two friends I worked with in PR and Advertising 30 years ago. We ended up moving to Arizona a few miles apart. We reconnected after years of not seeing each other. Now we go to lunch once a month together. We share books and talk about TV shows we like.

Here’s what Amazon has to say about Demon Copperhead:

Set in the mountains of southern Appalachia, Demon Copperhead is the story of a boy born to a teenaged single mother in a single-wide trailer, with no assets beyond his dead father’s good looks and copper-colored hair, a caustic wit, and a fierce talent for survival. Relayed in his own unsparing voice, Demon braves the modern perils of foster care, child labor, derelict schools, athletic success, addiction, disastrous loves, and crushing losses. Through all of it, he reckons with his own invisibility in a popular culture where even the superheroes have abandoned rural people in favor of cities.

Many generations ago, Charles Dickens wrote David Copperfield from his experience as a survivor of institutional poverty and its damages to children in his society. Those problems have yet to be solved in ours. Dickens is not a prerequisite for readers of this novel, but he provided its inspiration. In transposing a Victorian epic novel to the contemporary American South, Barbara Kingsolver enlists Dickens’ anger and compassion, and above all, his faith in the transformative powers of a good story. Demon Copperhead speaks for a new generation of lost boys, and all those born into beautiful, cursed places they can’t imagine leaving behind.

What books have you read lately that you really liked?

Please share, because I’m putting together a list of books to read this year.

Germinating New Year’s Ideas

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I took this photo the other morning as the sun began peaking over the horizon in our backyard. I don’t know why it took a blueish tint, but I kind of like it.

I’m not doing New Year’s Resolution this year. I have some ideas of what I’d like to do. They are closer to goals than resolutions, but more in the germination stage of seedlings.

I went for a walk the other morning with a neighbor. She said she and her husband are focusing on health for 2025. I told her that’s something my husband and I are doing, too. I’m sure it’s a reflection of what I wrote in What Would You Do? last Monday. (If you missed this post, please take a look.)

Another idea I thought of the other night, after waking up every two hours for some unknown reason, was putting together a list of classics. When I can’t sleep, I turn on podcasts. (I have headphones that rest around my neck. Connecting them to my laptop via bluetooth, I don’t wake up my husband.)

I thought it would be better for me to listen to classic literature, rather than current podcasts. I’m not giving up podcasts, just when I’m trying to sleep. The podcasts obviously aren’t working.

I looked online for lists of classics and discovered that I have read a lot of them through school and life. Ones like “To Kill a Mockingbird,” “East of Eden,” “Secret Garden,” “Pride and Prejudice” and “The Great Gatsby.” Also, “Jane Eyre,” “Brave New World,” “Nineteen Eighty-Four” and “The Iliad.” And the list goes on.

I discovered two that sparked my interest that I have never read. Well, more than two, but I decided to start with:

“In Cold Blood” by Truman Capote.

I’ve always wanted to read this because Dill in “To Kill a Mockingbird” is based on Capote.

The other book I chose is John Steinbeck’s “Travels with Charley in Search of America.”

Here’s the description from Amazon: “With Charley, his French poodle, Steinbeck drives the interstates and the country roads, dines with truckers, encounters bears at Yellowstone and old friends in San Francisco. Along the way he reflects on the American character, racial hostility, the particular form of American loneliness he finds almost everywhere, and the unexpected kindness of strangers.”

Who wouldn’t want to join Steinbeck and Charley on a road trip across America?

What are your favorite classic books?

What classics would you like to read that you haven’t yet?

An entertaining read

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I bought this book in Salt Lake City at a used book store for 75 cents. I was almost done with the book I was reading and wanted something fun to read on the plane. I ended up saving “Once Is Not Enough” for the beach. It was a perfect beach read.

After reading LA’s post Anatomy of a Story on Waking Up on the Wrong Side of 50, I instantly thought of my beach vacation book. In her post, she discussed four different categories of books and what makes some books good all the way to a classic.

Of course I read “Valley of the Dolls.” But that was the only Susann book I’ve read. I found this one a blast to the past with nostalgia from the late 60s and early 70s.

The characters were good, the story was faced paced. It was an entertaining read, and not a heavy book. Perfect beach book. The book was published in 1973 and I would have been in the sixth or seventh grade. Definitely not a book my parents would have allowed me to read at that age with all the drugs and sex.

It’s definitely dated, but I enjoyed looking back at the era in time. This book was Susann’s third best selling novel. I just discovered there was a movie made from the book. I’ll have to see if it’s available online or to stream on our TV.

What books do you remember from the 60s and 70s?

What Jacqueline Susann books have you read?

I’m so glad I joined!

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The Desert Foothills Library.

After living in Arizona for three years and buying books on Amazon, a few weeks ago I discovered our library in the foothills of Cave Creek. Hence the name — Desert Foothills Library.

I joined but didn’t check out any books until this week. I was reading a three-book series by Lisa See called the Red Princess Mysteries — that I bought from Amazon. The day I finished the third book, I packed them up and headed to the library. The library has a section called “Second Chapter” where you can buy books for 50 cents to a dollar. I donated the three Lisa See books, plus, went through my bookshelves to find a dozen other books I liked, but didn’t necessarily want to keep.

In Palm Springs, the local library was part of my weekly routine. We checked out VHS movies when the kids were little. I did research for my writing there. I got the kids’ library cards when they turned four years old. Every week we went to check out books. It was as essential to our daily lives as the grocery store.

I’ll never forget after watching a number of movies with my son including “Sound of Music,” “An American in Paris,” “Singing in the Rain,” and Meet Me in St. Louis.” One day he asked, “Mom, do they make any movies where they don’t sing and dance?”

At least he got a good dose of 1950s and ’60s culture.

It felt really good to walk inside the library. After donating my books, I walked up and down the aisles and read a variety of jacket covers and blurbs. I felt like I should celebrate after checking out my first book!

Do you belong to a library near you? What’s your favorite thing about libraries?

Inside the Desert Foothills Library.

Metamorphosis from sick to health

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Harris hawks hanging out on an Agave behind the tree in our backyard on New Year’s Eve.

I feel like I’m emerging from 11 days of cocooning. I’m not quite a butterfly yet, but I can breathe and stretch my wings after a nasty bug that kept me in bed.

The day is bright and sunny. Absolutely stunning. The past few days have been cloudy and my weather app said air quality wasn’t good.

Here’s a clear view of the perch the hawks enjoyed on New Year’s Eve. Look at that sky!

At one point, there were five Harris hawks hanging out together.

During my cocoon phase, I listened to an outstanding book. Ann Patchett’s “Tom Lake.” It was published August 2023. I enjoy reading books the old fashioned way with paper pages and spines. However, because I was laying in bed with my eyes closed, propped up on pillows for my deep cough, I chose listening to an audiobook.

Meryl Streep was the reader! I could distinguish characters, not by a big change in her voice, but by subtle rhythms and intonations. I believe her reading added to the book so the experience was better than it would have been if I had held the book in my hands and used my eyes.

Here’s a summary from Amazon:

In this beautiful and moving novel about family, love, and growing up, Ann Patchett once again proves herself one of America’s finest writers.

“Patchett leads us to a truth that feels like life rather than literature.” —The Guardian

In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family’s orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew.

Tom Lake is a meditation on youthful love, married love, and the lives parents have led before their children were born. Both hopeful and elegiac, it explores what it means to be happy even when the world is falling apart. As in all of her novels, Ann Patchett combines compelling narrative artistry with piercing insights into family dynamics. The result is a rich and luminous story, told with profound intelligence and emotional subtlety, that demonstrates once again why she is one of the most revered and acclaimed literary talents working today.

amazon.com

I have one major question in the story that wasn’t resolved after going to back to re-listen to certain chapters. I won’t ask that question here, because it’s a spoiler. I’m waiting for someone else to read the book so we can discuss. I wonder if Patchett left this question unanswered on purpose?

Here’s a 10-second video of the hawks leaving my yard:

Hawks.

Do you like listening to audiobooks, using a reader or old-fashioned books?

Have you read “Tom Lake?” If so, what are your thoughts?

Struggling with a book

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Books I’ve read or am reading during my spree with Lisa See.

I’m struggling to finish “Peony in Love.” I zipped through the other books pictured above as well as “Dreams of Joy,” “Shanghai Girls” and “Flower Net.” I wonder if my problem with “Peony” is due to the power of suggestion. One of my close friends listens to audio books while she works. She sews for interior designers and creates duvets, curtains, throw pillows, sailboat sail covers and furniture slipcovers.

She gets through quite a lot of books during her working hours. She recommended “China Dolls” and “The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane.” But she did add she couldn’t get into “Peony in Love.”

Is that little nugget of info tucked away in my brain? Or is it the story I don’t like? (It’s about a girl who is lovesick and quits eating until she dies. Then she hovers around her family trying to figure out how to come back to life.)

I read an article in the Wall Street Journal by Jason Gay this week called:

Is Watching a Movie the New Reading a Book?

In a zero attention span world, spending two hours locked in on a film feels like a trip to the spa

Here’s an excerpt:

My chest puffed with pride. I watched a whole movie, in one night, all by myself. No interruptions, no pauses, no iPhone diversions, no flipping channels, not even 30 minutes of falling asleep on the couch, drooling into a pillow and dreaming that I was an astronaut pizza maker who played point guard for the Oklahoma City Thunder. 

It was a revelation. You know what watching a movie felt like to my easily-distracted hamster brain? It felt like an accomplishment. It felt smart. It felt like a spa day for my skull. It felt like…finishing a book. 

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-cost-of-biden-family-advice-700d12cf?mod=hp_opin_pos_5#cxrecs_s

I agree with the WSJ writer that our attention spans have shortened. I can find myself flipping through texts, X messages and assorted other distractions online. It’s much easier than reading an entire book – or sitting through an entire movie. I prefer reading to watching TV, though. I also like listening to podcasts.

Have you read “Peony in Love?” Did you like it?

Do you think your attention span has changed through the past years?

Do you like to watch entire movies or do find yourself distracted like me?