Welcome to my weekly Sunday Bookends post where I rambling about what I’ve been reading, watching, listening to, writing and doing.
What I’ve Been Reading
I finished Sunny: The Weather Girls Book One this week. It was an okay book. Very simple and sweet with a totally out of place “conversion” scene tossed in at the end, as some Christian fiction books do. I will have a review up for it Tuesday, since it is part of a book tour.
I am in the middle of The Rhise of Light by Max Sternberg and enjoying it.
Last week I neglected to share the description for it and thought I would do so this week. It is a Christian fantasy novel.
The entirety of living civilization stands on the very brink of death. Undead hordes have rampaged across the world. Determined to do his part, Leon Rhise left his wealthy father’s estate and chose to defend the last living kingdom by joining the military. It had seemed to be a good idea at the time.
After his career in the airship navy came to an abrupt end Leon arrived home, hoping for a warm reception. Instead, he was abruptly tossed out. Disowned, unemployed, and friendless. All hope seems lost. Then Leon discovers a mysterious relic, which opens up the possibility of him becoming a Judge: a hero of legend. One that has not been seen for centuries.
As Leon travels the road less taken his destiny converges with newfound companions, each one surrounded by mystery. Advised by strange beings in dreams and visions, Leon learns that the undead onslaught the world has suffered is part of a much larger problem. A solution can be found by learning about the forgotten being known as Adonai. But the world is ending, and time is running out.
Delve into a world that brings a unique twist and interpretation to faith-based high fantasy. With emotional highs and lows, certain peril, dysfunction, and humor; tough questions are asked, and answers will come to light.
I am really enjoying the fourth book in the Craig Johnson Longmire series, despite having started it two or three months ago. I haven’t taken on any other books for the rest of the month, into November, so I should have plenty of time to finally finish it this week. Yes, the Longmire books are much different than what I write or usually read.
Little Miss and I are reading Little Town on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder at night and Toliver’s Secret by Esther Wood Brady for her school during the day. Now that we are on book seven of the Little House series, it is interesting to see how Wilder’s writing progressed from her first book. There is much more description in the later books, as well as a lot more introspection on the part of Laura.
I do have to wonder though, if the story about Laura’s future sister-in-law Eliza Jane being so mean to her when Eliza Jane was her teacher was true or not. After looking up some information about Eliza Jane, I found it interesting that she passed away before Laura finished her series. Maybe that was why Laura felt comfortable writing about how mean Eliza Jane was too her. Of course, a lot of Laura’s books were only based on fact, not completely factual, so maybe she elaborated that story for the sake of the fictional Laura’s story.
If the story was true and Laura had to see Eliza Jane at family gatherings, I would imagine that was a bit awkward, to say the least.
The Boy is reading Blood Brothers by Elias Chacour, which is a book about Palestine around the time that the nation of Israel was established, for school.
What We’ve Been Watching
I’ve been watching The Elliot Sisters, which is chocked full of drama every episode. I can’t seem to look away, even though the drama is a bit silly at times. The one sister seems always to fall for a man who is at risk of dying and the other sister is often overly, and illogically, dramatic and uptight about the simplest of things. But the acting is good, it is very clean, and it is a nice distraction from the craziness of the world.
Another nice distraction is the show Lovejoy, a British show about an antique dealer who seems to always get himself mixed up in some kind of trouble. I usually watch that with the Hubs.
The Boy and I finished up Paul, Apostle of Christ, a movie I encourage all Christians to watch. I assigned it to The Boy for his Bible lesson this past week. It stars Jim Caviezel as Luke from the Bible as he tries to record the words of Paul before he is executed in Rome.
The movie includes an underlying story of Christians being persecuted by Nero as well as the story of the jail keepers daughter dying from an illness. This a complex movie that is not your traditional “Christian” movie in other words.
The Boy and I were watching a scene when a woman comes in to the Christians in hiding, covered in blood. They ask her where she is hurt and she says, “This is not my blood. It is the blood of my baby.” The Romans had killed her husband and baby and only she was able to escape. My son looked at me and said, “Daaang. They aren’t pulling any punches in this one.”
And they do not. From Christians used as torches to light the streets of Rome to Paul being brutally beaten and whipped, this is real life at it’s most raw and horrific. Yet in the end you will find hope. A hope that does not come without trials, just as Paul told us in his letters.
What’s Been Occurring
Last week Little Miss had two days to celebrate her birthday. We took her to a fall event at a local camp on her actual birthday and then she had a party at our house on Sunday.
After that we had a very regular, routine week of school and life. We watched the majority of leaves around us turn brown and fall off, which was rather depressing. We did take one day to seek out some pretty leaves and found a few laying in our yard and a few on a couple of maple trees around us.
The large maple tree in front of our house that usually showcases lovely red leaves instead turned brown and looks awful. It’s a bit depressing, actually.
Our one adventure this week was when the kitten escaped and was gone for several hours. We had just decided that she had been eaten by a wild animal when she sauntered up the driveway toward me, running at first, then slowing down and flopping on her side to let me know she didn’t give a fig that she’d completely freaked us all out.
She’s now grounded.
We try to keep her inside anyhow, but she’s a quick little stinker and darts out our back door before we can stop her. She isn’t like our other cat who sneaks out and then wanders around close to the house. I have a feeling Scout, as we named our crazy kitten, tours the entire town before returning home, which is the main reason we aren’t letting her outside for a long while.
Saturday, we took Little Miss to a roller rink to try out the skates we and her grandparents gave her for her birthday. We met a friend there and she had a blast.
Later this week we have a science camp for her at a local Christian camp for homeschool.
What I’ve Been Writing/What’s Been on The Blog
I’ve been working on The Next Chapter in between writing book reviews and blog posts about homeschooling.
This week on the blog:
Creative Fusion: Book Review with Celebrate Lit
Ten pieces of advice to make your homeschooling experience easier
Blood From a Stone Book Review with Just Read Blog Tours
Fiction Friday: The Next Chapter Chapter 6
Fiction Friday: The Next Chapter Chapter 6
On Hopes, Hearts and Heroes, a blog I contribute to, I shared a blog post from 2017 about planting a garden, taking a step away from rambling about writing and fiction.
What I’ve Been Listening To
I’m including this section because sadly I have not been listening to anything and I should be. I’m much more relaxed when I listen to music or podcasts and I have been failing on that lately. I hope to find some good podcasts to delve into this week. I started listening to Livin’ La Vida Gokey with singer Danny Gokey and his wife and enjoyed it so I hope to get back to it. I have also enjoyed Matthew West’s podcast and hope to get back to that as well. I seem to only find time for podcasts at the end of the day, so when I lay down to listen to them, I fall asleep.
So that is my week in review. How about yours? What are you reading, watching, writing, listening to or doing these days? Let me know in the comments or link up your own blog post if you want to take part.
Boondock Ramblings 
I always get so stressed when the cats get out because here in the city cats are disappearing like crazy. All over Nextdoor neighbor I am always reading about pet cats disappearing. Now everyone is trying to keep all cats inside. Up north, there are wild animals, in the city there are wild people. Sounds so scary, but I think you get what I mean.
When the pandemic and lock downs started our neighbor was upset across the street because all the pigeons he used to feed in his backyard were gone…all of them. They used to fly down every morning. I told him the same thing happened to me. All the little sparrows and doves I used to feed were about 90% gone. It was very unsettling.
At the feed/pet store there was a young man buying up all doves, birds and chickens. All the grocery stores were also out of poultry. That was over a year ago, now we have birds again but not as many as we used to. We are at 60% now.
Happy belated birthday to your little girl, she is a little doll. I love those photos of the leaves, so sad about the tree being brown this year…even that is strange to me. Did it get too hot or cold too fast. I live in a desert most of the time, so I am terrible at how that cycle works with the leaves changing one year red and the next brown. We don’t have a Fall season here in the city. When we head up north I will look for Fall leaves and let you know if ours are brown too.
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