Tag: readers

Five hodge-podge mini-book reviews

On By Lisa R. HowelerIn book reviews, books and reading9 Comments

I haven’t had much time to sit and write up full book reviews lately so I thought I’d share five mini-book reviews today.

Death Comes to Marlow by Robert Thorogood

Description:

Judith (our favorite skinny-dipping, whiskey-sipping, crossword puzzle author), along with Becks the vicar’s wife, and Susie the dogwalker find themselves in a head-scratching, utterly clever country house, locked-room murder mystery. 

Holiday festivities are now January doldrums when Judith gets a call―Sir Peter Bailey, a prominent Marlovian is inviting notable citizens to his house the day before his wedding to celebrate. 

Judith decides to go―after all, it’s a few houses up the Thames and free champagne, for sure. During the party, a loud crash inside stops the festivities. The groom-to-be has been crushed to death in his study. The door was locked from the inside so the police say suicide, obviously. 

My Review:

This was the second book in the Marlow Murder Club series. I did not enjoy it as much as the first book. This one was all over the place and very repetitive. I rolled my eyes way too often. I still love the characters but why the suspects were suspects was repeated and twisted around so many times it simply became obnoxious. We really needed another story to sort of break up the monotony of them running around in circles in this one. There was one side story related to the vicar’s wife Becks, but it came in way too late in the book and didn’t break up the way he kept saying, “We don’t know who killed him! Here is all our evidence….again.”

The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Description:

The Hound of the Baskervilles is the third of the four crime novels by British writer Arthur Conan Doyle featuring the detective Sherlock Holmes. Originally serialised in The Strand Magazine from August 1901 to April 1902, it is set in 1889 largely on Dartmoor in Devon in England’s West Country and tells the story of an attempted murder inspired by the legend of a fearsome, diabolical hound of supernatural origin. Holmes and Watson investigate the case. This was the first appearance of Holmes since his apparent death in “The Final Problem”, and the success of The Hound of the Baskervilles led to the character’s eventual revival.

One of the most famous stories ever written, in 2003, the book was listed as number 128 of 200 on the BBC’s The Big Read poll of the UK’s “best-loved novel”. In 1999, a poll of “Sherlockians” ranked it as the best of the four Holmes novels.

My review:

I really expected to like this a lot more than I did. Conan Doyle is a classic crime writer – the father of the detective/crime novel so it has to be great, right?

Sadly, this book really dragged for me and my son who read it with  me for his British Literature class. Maybe it was because Sherlock wasn’t even in half of it. During that half it was Watson writing letters to Sherlock to tell him what had happened. There were way too many conversations about what might have happened and very little action for me. I also couldn’t stand the “lord of the manor”, Henry Baskerville. I would guess Conan Doyle was making him obnoxious because he was an American and the British like to  make sure Americans know what they think about us. So maybe I wasn’t supposed to like him, which worked well because I didn’t.

I didn’t hate the book, but it was not one I would necessarily rush to read again anytime soon. I’d really like to read the short stories and the other three novels instead and then go back to this one later on to see if I like it any better.

Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes

Description:

Fourteen-year-old Johnny Tremain, an apprentice silversmith with a bright future ahead of him, injures his hand in a tragic accident, forcing him to look for other work. In his new job as a horse-boy, riding for the patriotic newspaper, the Boston Observer, and as a messenger for the Sons of Liberty, he encounters John Hancock, Samuel Adams, and Dr. Joseph Warren. Soon Johnny is involved in the pivotal events shaping the American Revolution from the Boston Tea Party to the first shots fired at Lexington. Powerful illustrations by American artist Michael McCurdy, bring to life Esther Forbes’ quintessential novel of the American Revolution.

My review:

I read this one with Little Miss for English/History. The book is broken into sections with six chapters in each section, so we read a couple of the chapters each day for a few months.

I ended up really like this one even though the older writing style and the subject was a little difficult at times. There were some chapters where I skipped some of the more descriptive paragraphs to get to the point and move forward, but overall, this book was very well done, very educational, and had me crying more than once with the real life lessons within its pages.

Tooth and Claw by Craig Johnson

Description:

Tooth and Claw follows Walt and Henry up to Alaska as they look for work after they both returned from serving in Vietnam. While working for an oil company in the bitter cold of winter, they soon encounter a ferocious polar bear who seems hell-bent on their destruction. But it’s not too long until they realize the danger does not lurk outside in the frozen Alaskan tundra, but with their co-workers who are after priceless treasure and will stop at nothing to get it.

Fans of Longmire will thrill to this pulse-pounding and bone-chilling novel of extreme adventure that adds another indelible chapter to the great story of Walt Longmire.

My review:

I really enjoyed this novella. I’m a fan of the Walt Longmire Mystery books, with the exception of Hell is Empty, which I hated. I haven’t read one of the books since that one, which was early in 2024. I love Johnson’s writing, though, so I knew I couldn’t stay away for long. When I needed a short book to finish out the year, I remembered my husband had just won this one in a Goodreads giveaway. It is a story separate from the other books so I knew there wouldn’t be any spoilers.

I read it around Christmas, which is usually reserved for cozy books, not books where a man-eating, monster Polar Bear is terrorizing scientists in the arctic, but I could not put this book down. It was constant action, and I enjoyed it. I might even read another one of the full-length novels soon.

The Christmas Swap by Melody Carlson

Description:

All Emma Daley wants this holiday season is a white Christmas. But the young teacher and struggling musician sure can’t find that in sunny Arizona. Luckily, there’s someone living in a perfect mountain home in the Colorado Rockies looking to make a vacation trade this year.

West Prescott is an in-demand songwriter and talented musician who put his own singing career on hold to write songs for celebrity acts to perform. When his mother convinces him to do a vacation trade for Christmas, he never imagined one of the houseguests would be so sweet–or so strikingly pretty. Naturally, he decides to stick around, and, to get better acquainted, he poses as the house’s caretaker. But when Emma’s friend Gillian discovers his true identity and sets her sights on him, things get . . . messy.

My review:

 I really liked Carlson’s book, A Quilt for Christmas, and thought this would be similarly heartwarming and well-written. It was not. This book was a very cheesy romance that would not end. I feel so bad saying this but it was such a short book I had no time to connect to the characters and in the end I really didn’t care if I did or didn’t. These ridiculous romances where people meet and three days later are in love and changing their lives around for each other drive me nuts. I had no idea that was what was going to happen in this book. It’s like the two books were written by two different people. Every author has hit or miss books, though, and every reader is different in their likes and dislikes so while this book was not for me it might be the perfect light read for someone else. I won’t give up on trying Carlson’s books, but I will be a bit more careful and read the descriptions better from now on.

Have you read any of these books? What did you think of them if you did?

Top Ten Tuesday: My Top Reads of 2024

On By Lisa R. HowelerIn books and reading, everyday musings, top-ten-tuesday20 Comments

|| Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. ||

Today’s prompt is “Best Books I Read in 2024”

I have a list of 16 books I enjoyed from my 2024 list, but I whittled them down to ten for today. I’m going to leave my favorite read from the year at number 10.

  1. The Cat Who Talked to Ghosts by Lilian Jackson Braun

I have read most of the books in The Cat Who series and this one was definitely my favorite. Honestly, it almost felt like it was written by a different author in some ways. I enjoyed most of the books in the series even though this one felt different.

2. Miracles on Maple Hill by Virginia Sorenson

I really enjoyed this middle grade book that takes place in my home state of Pennsylvania. There were some tough topics here — such as PTSD after war —— but they were handled gingerly.

3. Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers by Jesse Q. Sutanto

This one was different than many of my other reads and not “clean” by some standards because of language, but I fell in love with the main character and the side characters. I can’t wait for the sequel!

4. Murder in an Irish Village by Carlene O’Connor

This one also featured some language but otherwise was clean and a lot of fun. I loved this cozy mystery that took place in a small Irish village and I can’t wait to read more in the series. I hope they are as good as the first book.

5. Move Your Blooming Corpse by D.E. Ireland

This was the second book in a series based on the characters of My Fair Lady – Eliza Doolittle and Professor Henry Higgins. The book was a ton of fun from start to finish.

6. The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

I had seen the movie based on this book but had never read the book. I read it and then read it again to my daughter shortly after so I guess I read it twice in 2024. The ending was a bit too abrupt to me, but I still enjoyed it.

7. Around the World in 80 Days by Jules Verne

Yep, this was another classic I had never read and I ended up really enjoying it.

8. The Clue of The Whistling Bagpipes by Carolyn Keene

This was a Nancy Drew Mystery and while they can be a bit cheesy at times, I really enjoyed this one because it was full of Scottish history and culture.

9. Return to Gone Away Lake by Elizabeth Enright

This was another middle-grade book that I read with Little Miss and really enjoyed. We had read Gone Away Lake, the first book in the series in 2023.

10. The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery

This was by far my favorite read of the year and my favorite read from the past several years. This book was so much different than the Anne of Green Gables books and I sometimes wonder how they are so different in their language and style. I don’t usually write in or mark up my paperback books but I underlined and marked so many passages in this book. If you haven’t read it, I would definitely encourage you to move it up your TBR list.

Honorable mentions:

Other books I enjoyed this year include:

The Sentence is Death by Anthony Horowitz (A Hawthorne/Horowtiz Mystery)

Clueless at the Coffee Station by Bee Littlefield

The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie

Murder Always Barks Twice by Jennifer Hawkins

A Quilt for Christmas by Melody Carlson

The Middle Moffat by Eleanor Estes

Have you read any of these books? What did you think of them? And what books were among your favorite reads in 2024?

Book Review/Recommendation: Trouble Shooter by Louis L’Amour

On By Lisa R. HowelerIn book reviews, books and reading, everyday musings3 Comments

Book Title: Trouble Shooter (A Hopalong Cassidy book)

Author: Louis L’Amour

Genre: Western

Description:

Hopalong Cassidy is one of the most enduring and popular heroes in frontier fiction. His legendary exploits in books, movies, and on television have blazed a mythic and unforgettable trail across the American West. Now, in the last of four Hopalong Cassidy novels written by Louis L’Amour, the immortal saddleman rides again—this time into a lonely valley of danger and death.

Hopalong Cassidy has received an urgent message from the dead. Answering an urgent appeal for help from fellow cowpuncher Pete Melford, he rides in only to discover that his old friends has been murdered and the ranch Pete left to his niece, Cindy Blair, had vanished without a trace. Hopalong may have arrived too late to save Pete, but his sense of loyalty and honor demands that he find that cold-blooded killers and return to Cindy what is rightfully hers.

Colonel Justin Tradwar, criminal kingpin of the town of Kachina, is the owner of the sprawling Box T ranch, and he has built his empire with a shrewd and ruthless determination. In search of Pete’s killers and Cindy’s ranch, Hopalong signs on at the Box T, promising to help get Tradway’s wild cattle out of the rattler-infested brush. But in the land of mesquite and black chaparral, Cassidy confronts a mystery as hellish as it is haunting—a bloody trail that leads to the strange and forbidding Babylon plateau, to $60,000 in stolen gold, and to a showdown with an outlaw who has already cheated death once… and is determined to do it again.

My Thoughts:

Trouble Shooter by Louis L’Amour was not listed under L’Amour’s name when it first came out in 1951. Instead, it was released under the name Clarence E. Mulford, the original creator of Hopalong Cassidy, the main character of the book. When Mulford retired, he asked L’Amour to carry on Hopalong’s tradition in four novels, which included Trouble Shooter, The Rustlers of West Fork, The Trail to Seven Pines, and the Riders of High Rock.

The books were published on L’Amour’s name in the 1990s when they were re-released.

I ended up liking Trouble Shooter a lot more than I thought I would when I first started it. Once I realized that the book was written in the style of another writer and that it was written in the 1950s, I began to adjust to the style of writing and storytelling. I found myself pulled into the story a bit more as it went along, despite the old style of writing, which included what writers call “head hopping.” This is where the thoughts of each character involved in a scene are shared instead of the point of view being from just the one character. This can get a little bit confusing but L’Amour didn’t over do it.

The way the sentences were structured threw me off at times but I thought the prose really was well-written. I wasn’t as interested in the lengthy description of Hopalong Cassidy climbing a mountain or riding long distances in the middle of nowhere and would have loved for the female characters to have been flushed out a bit more, but I still liked the overall story.

I didn’t expect the ending to take such a dark turn since most of the book was mild when it came to the discussions of violence. There was very little to no descriptions of violence at all and any descriptions offered were very surface level. There were no obscenities in the book and no sex at all – not even hinted at.

This was definitely a stripped back Western. There were some descriptions but none of them went on for pages. There were some slow parts for me but I wanted to know the  answer to the mystery introduced in the beginning so I kept reading.

A couple of lines I enjoyed and thought were well-written:

“Hopalong Cassidy had drawn his gun as he always drew, with flashing, incredible speed. Once his hand was empty, then filled, and the gun blasting death.”

“The heat was a living thing, and he touched his lips only a little with the water in his canteen, then pushed on. Dust devils danced across a vast, empty distance marked by nothing but the trail of two riders. And then out of the north came another trail, a trail of several riders that moved in and obliterated the trail they followed.”

“Through the storm clouds the afternoon sun sent streaks of cathedral light across the sky and first spattering of drops fell, dappling the ground and making the dust jump.”

“Even if he isn’t dead, he might have reformed, and if a man has reformed, I’d have to judge him according to what he is now, but I’d advise him to keep his name to himself.”

If you would like to read more about Louis L’Amour, you can do so here:

https://louislamour.com/aboutlouis/biography.htm

Book Recommendation/Review: The Secret of Shadow Ranch

On By Lisa R. HowelerIn everyday musings6 Comments

The Secret of Shadow Ranch is the fifth book in the original Nancy Drew series. This was, so far, one of my favorites that I have read. I felt like it was more of a cohesive story than past books.

Nancy travels to Shadow Ranch in Phoenix, Arizona to meet up with her friends Bess Marvin and George Fayne for what is supposed to be a relaxation vacation. When she arrives, though, she finds out there have been some weird things going on at the ranch, mainly the appearance of a ghost horse, and now Bess’s aunt and uncle, the new owners of the ranch, don’t think any of the girls should stay for a visit.

Nancy, though, likes a mystery and she is even more intrigued when she finds out that locals think that Dick Valentine, an outlaw who was killed at the ranch years ago, is haunting the ranch. Dick Valentine was in love with the previous owner’s daughter and it was the previous owner who killed him.

Now Nancy is being pulled into a mystery that involves romance, danger, and treasure.

I enjoyed the way this one was written with it feeling much more well-rounded than previous books. I know some readers didn’t like that Nancy’s previous friend Helen Corning disappears in this book and rarely returns in future books before totally disappearing, but, in my opinion, Bess and George are absolutely an upgrade.

Bess is funny, bubbly, and boy-crazy (she can’t wait to tell Nancy abut the handsome cowboys she’s met at the ranch) and George is described as “tomboyish with short brown hair.”

I listened to a podcast recently where the podcaster didn’t like that Bess is described as slightly plump in this book and others and felt that the writer (Mildred Wert Benson — later rewritten by Harriet Adams) was fat-shaming her or saying she was inferior because of her larger size. I respect the podcaster’s opinion and do see where she was coming from, but I respectfully (sincerely respect) disagree.

I felt that the author was simply describing Bess to show that not all their characters were skinny minnies. I’m overweight and I’d prefer to be called pleasantly plump like Bess was, to be honest. I think the fact that she was included at all was a sign of progress in books because characters were fairly cookie-cutter thin back then from what I’ve seen.

The mystery in this one was interesting, Nancy was flirted with by a handsome cowboy, Nancy’s boyfriend Ned was mentioned for the first time, Bess and George were introduced and added a fun element to the story, and there seemed to be more thought put into the story overall.

Some readers could see the introduction as a Native American in the story as problematic but I did not because she was not stereotypically portrayed. The fact she was simply owning a store and being part of the community and not seen at a Pow-Wow or something similarly stereotypical was actually very nice. I didn’t really have a problem with Nancy and her friends wearing traditional Native American garb, but like the podcaster I listened to, I didn’t like that they called it “squaw dresses,” because the term squaw sounds derogatory to me.

After a search online I learned that these dresses were made popular in Arizona and developed by Dolores Gonzales (a Mexican-American designer) and Cele Peterson,

The dresses incorporated Native American designs to pay homage to Native Americans, not to steal their designs or to mock Native Americans, and Native Americans from a variety of tribes designed and wore them, but I can see how some would see them as a negative representation of the Native American community. The name of the dresses were later changed to patio or fiesta dresses to be more culturally sensitive.

Anyhow, back to the book — as always, these books are a product of their time but they are a fun distraction in this chaotic world.

Have you read this book? What did you think?

Top Ten Books on my shelves (real and virtual) that I want to read soon.

On By Lisa R. HowelerIn everyday musings19 Comments

Today I am hoping on to Top Ten Tuesday hosted by The Artsy Reader Girl. Today’s topic is top ten books on your shelf you want to read soon.  Some of these books are on my physical shelf and some are in digital form on my Kindle, or if they aren’t, they will be.

  1. Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis

2. The Two Towers by J.R.R. Tolkien (my son and I read The Fellowship of the Rings last year and The Hobbit a few years ago for school so now I want to read this one)

3. The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery

4. The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas

5. Crooked House by Agatha Christie

6.  James Herriott: A Memoir of My Father by Jim Wight.

7. Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry by Mildred D. Taylor (this would actually be a reread for me since I read it when I was like 10 but don’t remember a lot of it.)

8. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle

9. The House of Silk by Anthony Horowitz

10. The Complete Father Brown Collection by G.K. Chesterton.

It was hard to find ten books at first and then it was hard to narrow it down as I thought of a few others as I got toward the end.

Have you read some of these or are they on your list?

Why I leave book reviews

On By Lisa R. HowelerIn books and reading15 Comments
Photo by Min An on Pexels.com

A lot of readers don’t leave book reviews.

They don’t want to take the time to do so.

I am an independent author without a traditional publishing contract so reviews are important for me to sell books, which may be why I think about reviews more now than I used to.

I don’t leave reviews so people will leave reviews for my books, just to clarify.

But the fact that I need reviews makes me think of how reviews can benefit the reader and the author.

A review can help a reader decide if a book is for them, based on the good, bad, and all-in-between reviews.

The book may have a ton of great reviews but by reading them a reader may realize, “This book still isn’t a book I’d like.”

Or the bad reviews might tell a reader the book is for them.

For example, someone may give a negative review saying the book has too much romance, which makes a reader who likes romance say, “Oh! This book is for me!” Or maybe the reviewer said they didn’t like the fantasy element and the reader says, “Oooh. I love fantasy. I’m going to read it because this person didn’t like it.”

While I’m leaving a review for a reader, I am also leaving a review for the author. Some of us may think that an author doesn’t need a review or to read their reviews. In fact, I’ve heard many authors tell each other to not read their reviews because the reviews aren’t for them.

I don’t agree with that advice.

A review is for an author as much as a reader.

Yes, it can be hard to read bad reviews, but sometimes those bad reviews improve our writing or they make us realize that our books aren’t going to be everyone’s cup of tea.

Even if an author doesn’t read a review, though, it can make them feel good to see the number of reviews and know that people are reading their books which makes all that work feel worth it. It feels good as an author to know that people are reading your books. We work a long time on those stories and just writing them can be satisfying enough in many ways, but it can still be nice and fulfilling to see that others have read it and enjoyed it.

So I write reviews for the readers and the authors. I don’t always want to stop and write a review, to be honest. Writing one only takes about five minutes, though, because I know reviews are not book reports. Reviews are a simple few sentences to say I liked a book and why. It doesn’t have to be extensive. In fact, most people who look at reviews don’t want to read a super long review anyhow. They just want the gist – did you like it or didn’t you?

I won’t always do well at leaving reviews but I hope to keep doing them for the benefit of both the reader and the author.

Sunday Bookends: arctic temps, still reading the same books (sigh), and binging Northern Exposure

On By Lisa R. HowelerIn Sunday Bookends, Sunday Salon17 Comments

It’s time for our Sunday morning chat. On Sundays, I ramble about what’s been going on, what the rest of the family and I have been reading and watching, and what I’ve been writing. Some weeks I share what I am listening to.

This week I’m joining up with Kimba at Caffeinated Reviewer, Deb at Readerbuzz, and Kathyrn at The Book Date.


What’s Been Occurring

I talked a little bit about what’s been occurring yesterday in my Saturday Afternoon Chat. Mainly we’ve been dealing with weird weather of snow and rain and ice and high winds. Today our temps dropped very fast so we will be dealing with arctic temperatures for the whole week.  I will be inside the whole week, other than picking our son up at the bus stop (which is our local convenience store) because I don’t want him to have to walk up the hills to our house in the frigid temps.

I also woke up this morning to find out we have a wind advisory again so now it feels like 16 instead of 28. I was on my way to my parents this afternoon (they’re about eight minutes from our house) but when we saw a tree being removed from the bottom of our street and then another one hanging on a line, across the road and almost to the height of our car, I decided we would pick up my son and head back home to wait for the wind advisory to expire before we try again tomorrow.

We might have been fine but looking around seeing trees smashed along the road, limbs broken in the road and evidence of trees having been chainsawed to clear the roadway, we decided to err on the side of caution.

The Husband dropped some homemade soup I was taking off at my parents so they could at least have lunch.

Tomorrow’s temperatures will be frigid but at least we won’t have to be concerned about trees falling on us while battling the cold.

We have a lot of dead ash trees around us so those are ripe for falling down and causing issues. In the summer my daughter and I were at my parents’ swimming in the pool and one fell down behind my parents’ house in the woods. It wasn’t even windy that day. It just fell over. If it can happen without wind then it can definitely happen in 25 to 45 mph wind gusts.

What I’m/We’re Reading

I’m still reading Little Women and Dysfunction Junction.  I am enjoying both and like to switch off between them. I will probably finish Dysfunction Junction (by Robin W. Pearson) this week.

After that, I’ll be reading The Cat Who Went Into A Closet and The Bungalow Mystery – a Nancy Drew Mystery.

I am also reading Do The New You By Steven Furtick as a Netgalley read which was perfect timing since our online Bible study is going to be reading it in February.

At night Little Miss and I are reading The Borrowers.

What We watched/are Watching

I watched Northern Exposure over 20 years ago (probably) and started watching it again this week. I don’t remember much of anything about it so it’s like watching it for the first time.

It really was well written and holds up pretty well actually.

I also watched Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice for the Jane Austen January feature I’m doing with Erin from Still Life, With Cracker Crumbs. If you want to join in our link-up to discuss all things Jane (including the books) you can find the link up above.

I watched Miss Scarlet and the Duke last week and will probably watch more today and this week since I will be hiding in the house until the weather gets better.

The Husband and I watched the 1978 version of Death on the Nile. It held up pretty well despite Bette Davis looking like she’d come out of a crypt.


What I’m Writing

I am working on Cassie, which releases in August. I hope to have it finished by February. If you are curious what the book will be about, here is a very loose description:

It’s 1995 and 32-year-old Cassie Mason is an actress who made it big on a sitcom in the mid-1980s but hasn’t been able to find a job since the show ended five years ago.

After being fired by her talent agency, Cassie takes her sister Bridget up on her offer for Cassie to come back to their hometown for an extended visit to unwind and regroup.

While there Cassie finds out her younger sister – the one with the handsome husband and three kids and running a farm – is going to open a café and farm store in the small town they grew up near. Cassie decides to stay long enough to help with the grand opening, though she isn’t sure what she can do since she doesn’t know a thing about cooking like her mom and sister and isn’t great at organizing either.

In fact, Cassie isn’t sure what’s she is good at other than acting. Bridget hasn’t been able to help out at the Berrysville Community center like she’d like to with all that has to be done to open the business so she asks Cassie to fill in for a couple of volunteer opportunities. That’s when Cassie finds out that her sister’s neighbor, Alec, isn’t only a small farmer – he’s also someone who knows how to cook and showcases those talents in a weekly cooking class at the community center.

During her visit home, Cassie struggles to figure out not only where she fits in and feels most at home but also to figure out if acting is all she is meant to do with her life or if there is another way God wants to use her talents.

And God? There’s someone else she needs to learn more about on this break from the career she thought she’d always have.

I’ve also been writing blog posts:

What I’m Listening To

This week I have been listening to James Herriot’s Treasury for Children but this upcoming week I will be back to listening to A Tale of Two Cities.

Next week I hope to return to sharing blog posts from other bloggers that I enjoyed from the week. I haven’t been reading as many blogs as I would like to and I’m really looking forward to getting back to that this year.

Now it’s your turn. What have you been doing, watching, reading, listening to or writing? Let me know in the comments or leave a blog post link if you also write a weekly update like this.

Sunday Bookends: Christmas movies, Christmas books, Christmas, Christmas, and more … yes, Christmas

On By Lisa R. HowelerIn Sunday Bookends10 Comments

It’s time for our Sunday morning chat. On Sundays, I ramble about what’s been going on, what the rest of the family and I have been reading and watching, and what I’ve been writing. Some weeks I share what I am listening to.

This week I’m joining up with Kimba at Caffeinated Reviewer, Deb at Readerbuzz, and Kathyrn at The Book Date.



What’s Been Occurring

I wrote yesterday that I tested positive for Covid on Friday. I must have been at the tail end of it because yesterday morning I woke up with my nose clear and able to taste and smell again. I pretty much felt like I hadn’t had anything at all. I had written yesterday’s blog post on Friday evening when I was at my worst – congested and swollen in my nose, no smell or taste, and this horrible burning up my nose and through my sinuses that kept coming in waves and making my eyes water so bad I couldn’t see.

I literally cried when I could taste peanut butter and smell my essential oils in the morning. I know it seems dramatic and if you don’t know my back story with Covid-induced smell and taste loss then it does seem that way.

My previous smell and taste loss lasted a couple of weeks or more and when it returned my smell and taste were distorted for months afterward.

You can read more about that on the blog by searching Covid in the search bar to the right, though I’d just skip it because it’s depressing. Ha! It’s depressing but also gets hopeful later and taught me about trusting God.

Today when I made myself some deli ham on lettuce with Italian dressing (I’m trying to cut bread all the way out for health reasons) and I could taste the Italian dressing I felt weepy. I really did.

Every time I can smell something or taste something I feel immediate gratitude.

While I didn’t like the fear that came with getting Covid again since my last bout sent me to the hospital for five days (hooked up to a very low dose of oxygen for a day and a half of those days), I do like the reminder God gave me with this that he got me through that first bout and he is going to get me through whatever struggles I am facing now.

Much like a rainbow is a reminder of God’s promise to never flood the earth again, being able to smell and taste is like a reminder to me that God hasn’t failed me and doesn’t intend to let me fall now.

This illness was like a short head cold but I was very concerned part of the time it would be longer, like Covid was for me and my family before. I remained calm most of the time with a few breakdowns of crying, but trying to remember the verses about Jesus giving us peace that passes all understanding.

Most of the time I felt very peaceful. I did not feel dragged out like I did when I’ve been sick in the past.

Still, I prayed to God on Friday and asked him to please give me a sign that I was going to be okay. I prayed again very, very early Saturday morning when I couldn’t breathe through my nose. I asked God to forgive me for me being annoyed because I had just been thankful for being able to smell and taste a few days before and now it was being taken away again. I asked God to forgive me for not being thankful that I was breathing okay.

At 6:45 a.m. I still couldn’t smell anything.

At 9:30 a.m. I could both smell and taste.

Little Miss and my fever were gone (mine had been gone even when I tested positive for Covid the day before) and we both felt almost like we’d never been sick in the first place.

Talk about an answer to prayer.

We are in quarantine another day and then I can finally see my parents in person for the first time in two weeks.


What I/we’ve been Reading

Because my eyes were watering a lot this week, I didn’t read as much as I wanted to. I did continue some of my Christmas Regency romance book, which is a collection of novellas in one book. I am in the second novella now.

I also read a little of Southern Snow by B.R. Goodwin. I hope to have at least Southern Snow finished this week, but I also hope to finish Christmas in Absaroka by Craig Johnson.

Since it is the week before Christmas, I will probably continue to read A Vintage Christmas: A Collection of Classic Stories and Poems, which is a collection of Christmas stories by a variety of authors, including L.M. Montgomery, Louise May Alcott, Charles Dickens, and Mark Twain as well.

Oh, and I will definitely be finishing up my audiobook of Shepherd’s Abiding by Jan Karon which I have been listening to each night before bed. I mentioned before on here that I didn’t know if I liked the narrator but I absolutely love him as I continue to listen so I wanted to correct that. From what I understand he also narrates the other audiobooks of the Mitford series so I hope to collect them over time.

Little Miss and I are listening to The Greatest Christmas Pageant Ever again.

What We watched/are Watching

Since we couldn’t leave the house last week, I watched more than I do other weeks.

I watched We’re Not Angels as a buddy watch with Erin from Still Life, With Cracker Crumbs, and blogged about it.

I also watched Going My Way, the prequel to The Bells of St. Mary’s. I’ll blog about it later this week but really enjoyed it. I might have liked The Bells of St. Mary’s better, though. I don’t know. They were both very good and watching them close together was a good idea.

I then watched the 1938 version of A Christmas Carol and while I am about done with watching any more movies based on this book, I loved this one. This is probably my favorite version so far.

My aunt used to look for this version every year and I didn’t know why until I watched it this week. I wish I had taken the time to watch it with her when she was still alive.

I will blog about it later this week but for now, I will say I loved the acting in the movie. I also loved how I really feel this movie gave us more time with each character and gave us a more well-rounded impression of them. That well-rounded impression connected me to the characters more than any other movie I’ve seen and maybe even more than the book itself, which made the emotional impact of what unfolded even more powerful for me.

I highly recommend this version if you’re going to watch a movie adaptation of this story.

Last night I watched a Christmas episode of All Creatures Great and Small (the latest version).

This week I plan to load myself up on Christmas movies including The Man Who Invented Christmas, The Man Who Came To Dinner, White Christmas, A Charlie Brown Christmas, and maybe Arthur Christmas.

I will also be watching Christmas-themed YouTube videos and a couple of Christmas specials from the creators of The Chosen.


What I’m Writing

This past week I shared a lot of Christmas-themed blog posts including:

What I’m Listening To

I am listening to audiobooks such as Shepherd’s Abiding and The Greatest Christmas Pageant Ever and also Christmas music about the reason for the season (at least in my family) – Jesus’ birth.

Now it’s your turn. What have you been doing, watching, reading, listening to, or writing? Let me know in the comments or leave a blog post link if you also write a weekly update like this.

Sunday Bookends: Recovering from a busy week, not my favorite cozy mystery book, and hopefully a slower week next week

On By Lisa R. HowelerIn everyday musings, Sunday Bookends10 Comments

Sunday Bookends July 30

It’s time for our Sunday morning chat. On Sundays, I ramble about what’s been going on, what the rest of the family and I have been reading and watching, and what I’ve been writing. Some weeks I share what I am listening to.

This week I’m joining up with Kimba at Caffeinated Reviewer and Kathyrn at The Book Date.


What I/we’ve been Reading

I will be finishing up Elementary She Read by Vicki Delany tonight and I have to be honest that I did not enjoy the second half as much as the first half. The second hash seemed like a rehashing of the first half. I don’t know how to explain that other than the author repeating themselves a lot about the characters and points of the story like she herself forgot some of those points and wanted to be sure the reader didn’t as well. I will probably try another Delany book but maybe not in this series. The main character of this series sort of grates on my nerves but maybe she will grow on me if I try book two.

The only reason I kept reading the book was because it was due back on Libby yesterday. As soon as it was returned for me, however, before I finished it mind you, I asked to have it put on hold again. At first it said there were two people ahead of me. Then it said that I could have the book back again. So I took it back to finish it.

This week I plan to focus on The Word Is Murder by Anthony Horowitz.

I also plan to read a chapter or two of Anne of Ingleside, which I believe is the last book in the series that focuses on Anne, Gilbert, and her family exclusively.

Next week I hope to finish Nicole Deese’s book All That Really Matters which I started at the beginning of the summer and got distracted from. It was a pretty good book, even though I can tell it’s going to be a typical romance of he doesn’t like her but he’s going to fall for her, blah, blah. Oh, wait. I write that stuff too sometimes. Ha.

The Husband is reading a Joe Pickett novel.

Little Miss and I read a stack of picture books yesterday and she started a book called Saving Winslow that she picked out on the last day of summer reading.

The Boy isn’t really reading right now as he tries to enjoy the last bits of summer before school starts the 24th.

What’s Been Occurring

I talked about what has been occurring in yesterday’s post. After our crazy busy week, Little Miss had some sort of allergy attack or brief illness (which would be the second in two weeks) and had a runny nose and dry cough all day yesterday. She slept hard last night and into this afternoon and now she’s a little bit better. Because of her not feeling good yesterday we are staying home today instead of visiting my parents but will probably see my parents later in the week. We will definitely see them on Thursday, which is my mom’s birthday. Also, she’s going to be 79, not 80. I aged her a year (again) in a post last week.

This next week we do not have a ton to do, luckily. I might ride with my dad to his physical therapy 45 minutes south on Tuesday and Thursday, but otherwise, it should be a relaxed week. You know how it goes when I say that in my posts, though. The week usually doesn’t end up being relaxed at all.

I will start my job as a sales representative for The Old Schoolhouse Magazine as an independent contractor around August 7.

Photos from Last Week

What We watched/are Watching

Last week The Husband and I watched a lot of Newhart and it was nice and relaxing.

I watched half of Monkey Business with Cary Grant and Marilyn Monroe and will watch the rest today. I also hope to watch some All Creatures Great and Small, even though I’ve seen all the episodes.

I also have had to watch a ton of Snake Discovery, which is a YouTube channel about snakes that Little Miss loves.

What I’m Writing

I worked on Gladwynn Grant Takes Center Stage this week and I am having a lot of fun writing it. I also wrote at least one blog post I’ll be sharing tomorrow and started a couple more.
On the blog, I shared:

What I’m Listening To

This week I will be listening to Elevation Worship. When I drive anywhere I will be listening to Death Beside the Seaside by T.E. Kinsey as an audiobook.


Now it’s your turn

Now it’s your turn. What have you been doing, watching, reading, listening to or writing? Let me know in the comments or leave a blog post link if you also write a weekly update like this.