Y’all, I don’t know what happened but my reading slowed to a craaaawl in November. It started out with my abandonment of Long Division by Kiese Laymon.
I truly wanted to love this book. It’s by an author of color, which is a demographic woefully under-represented in my repertoire. On top of that, he’s from my hometown of Jackson, Mississippi! But I just couldn’t get into it. I returned it to the library when it came due even though I was only about 1/3 of the way through it.
Bread and Wine by Shauna Niequist, though, was a different story. I wanted to underline just about this entire book. Though we differ on what we believe about church and Jesus, Shauna and I are totes on the same page about food & fellowship. This was a book club read, and we each cooked a recipe from the book for our gathering (or contributed the obviously important bread and wine). It was wonderful. You should read it, and you should talk about it with some friends around a table.
OKAY I READ A NORA ROBERTS NOVEL. It was enjoyable in the way that a rom com you go to see with your girlfriends can be enjoyable. At the risk of sharing just a bit TMI, I’m trying to get more in touch with my sensual side, and obviously books are a natural place to start. I thought Nora Roberts would be tame enough as to be accessible to my somewhat prudish self. And it was. It was pretty vanilla, but it fit the bill for now.
I’ve been a passive Mitford fan, so I was intrigued when I saw Karon had a new installment coming out. I borrowed it as a library e-book, and I’m glad–it wasn’t that good. The writing style, jumping around from character to character, didn’t resonate with me, and it also just lacked some of the charm of the other Mitford novels. I found the entire premise to be pretty unbelievable. (I also have probably missed a few in the series along the way, so that could be part of why.) If you love Mitford you should check it out, but otherwise, skip it.
That’s all, folks. Three measly books. I’m back on a roll now in December, thankfully, and I also have a week and a half off of work, which bodes well! I still have one book left on my Read Harder challenge, which is currently checked out from the library and waiting patiently on my kitchen table. I’ll report back on the challenge once it’s completed!
