weekly wrap up

Sunday Bookends: Changing leaves, Hadley Beckett is not a boy, and Matthew Macfayden is no Colin Firth

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 14 Comments

Sunday Bookends is my week in review, so to speak. It’s where I share what I’ve been up to, what I’ve been reading, what I’ve been watching, what I’ve been listening to, and what I’ve been writing. Feel free to share a link or comment about your week in the comments.

What I’m Reading

How awkward it was when I ordered a book for my birthday and thought that the main character was a man because I was too clueless to know that the name Hadley is a girl’s name. Ha! But truthfully, I didn’t care what sex of the main character was because so far I have enjoyed both of Bethany W. Turner’s other books and knew I would enjoy this one too. I enjoyed Hadley Beckett’s Next Dish as much as Wooing Caddie McCaffery and more than The Secret Life of Sarah Hollenback (though that was a fun one too).

This book followed the same “formula” so to speak as Wooing Caddie McCaffery, with one chapter written in the first person and focusing on Hadley Beckett, the sweet Southern belle chef, and cooking show host, and the next being written in the third person and focusing on the unlikely love interest of chef world cad Max Cavenaugh. I am not usually a fan of books that switch point of view once you get into it but Bethany does it in such a creative way I don’t mind it with her books. It’s her style and it works for her. I probably wouldn’t try it with another author.

For those who might be interested in the book, here is the Goodreads description:

Celebrity chef Maxwell Cavanaugh is known for many things: his multiple Michelin stars, his top-rated Culinary Channel show To the Max, and most of all his horrible temper. Hadley Beckett, host of the Culinary Channel’s other top-rated show, At Home with Hadley, is beloved for her Southern charm and for making her viewers feel like family.

When Max experiences a very public temper tantrum, he’s sent packing to get his life in order. When he returns, his career in shambles, his only chance to get back on TV and in the public’s good graces is to work alongside Hadley.

As these polar-opposite celeb chefs begin to peel away the layers of public persona and reputation, they will not only discover the key ingredients for getting along but also learn the secret recipe for unexpected forgiveness . . . and maybe even love. In the meantime, hide the knives.

Fan-favorite Bethany Turner serves up a heaping helping of humor and romance with this thoroughly modern story centered on cooking, enemies, and second chances. 

Next week I’ll offer my own review of the book in a separate post.

I’ve been trying to find another book to enjoy reading as much as I did Hadley’s story. So far I’m trying different books, looking for the happier reads, and rejecting anything that starts out with tragedy or death. Or if not rejecting, taking my time to read them so I have only small slices of depressing subjects to read. Two books that so far deal with some sad topics but that I’m still trying are Down Where My Love Lives by Charles Martin, which is two novels in one (The Dead Don’t Dance and Maggie.) and Just Like Home by Courtney Walsh. Walsh writes mainly romances so I’m gathering this one is a romance.

For some reason, I am also still pushing through The Cat Who Said Cheese by Lillian Jackson Braun, even though it is terribly boring and isn’t featuring Qwilleran’s cats Koko and Yum-Yum enough.

What I’m Watching

I watched the 2005 version of Pride and Prejudice with a group of sweet romance authors and readers Friday night. We were commenting back and forth about the characters, plot, but mainly the actors or how the movie was directed and that’s when Facebook started blocking us from commenting. Facebook is like a lot of people in this day and age — they ruin everything and take the fun out of life.

Luckily we were all still able to post status updates within the discussion and converse back and forth. Bethany Turner, the author I mentioned earlier in this post, was on with us and hilariously argued that the 2005 version was not as good at the 1995 BBC mini-series, which starred Colin Firth.

I had to agree with Bethany Turner, who is a massive Colin Firth fan, that Matthew Macfayden is no Colin Firth and that I much preferred Colin’s Darcy. All this to say that I’m not necessarily a huge fan of Jane Austen or her movies, but it was fun watching it with a group of women so we could all make fun of the movie, or swoon in some parts, at the same time.

As per our usual pattern of being behind the trend, we finally saw Hamilton on Disney Plus this week as well. We enjoyed it and it is brilliant, but I didn’t like the last half-hour as much as the first two hours. Yes, it was 2 hours and 40 minutes. This was my favorite song, but sadly, I can never listen to it again because it was stuck on a loop in my head all week after watching it. (Sorry ahead of time for the cheesy graphics on this one. It was the only clip of the song I could find.)

What’s Been Occurring

Nothing much has been happening this week. It’s been pretty routine. Homeschool, errands, cooking meals, working on my novella and novel. Blah, blah, blah.

Little Miss has a new friend who she’s been seeing a few times a week. The little girl’s great-grandmother, who lives at the end of our short street, watches her during the week and sometimes on the weekends. I’m glad to have a little friend for my daughter because she hasn’t had any real friends her age for most of her life. I had actually prayed the week before that God would send her some children her age for her to play with. I’m regretting that prayer a little bit because it means walking her back and forth between my house and my neighbors a few times a day, but I’m still glad to see her learning how to play well with others.

It has been nice to watch our trees change from green to brilliant orange, red, and yellow almost overnight. The trees in our backyard were a dull orange at the beginning of the week and by Saturday morning they were on fire with colors.

Sunday Bookends is my week in review, so to speak. It’s where I share what I’ve been up to, what I’ve been reading, what I’ve been watching, what I’ve been listening to, and what I’ve been writing. Feel free to share a link or comment about your week in the comments.

What I’m Reading

How awkward it was when I ordered a book for my birthday and thought that the main character was a man because I was too clueless to know that the name Hadley is a girl’s name. Ha! But truthfully, I didn’t care what sex of the main character was because so far I have enjoyed both of Bethany W. Turner’s other books and knew I would enjoy this one too. I enjoyed Hadley Beckett’s Next Dish as much as Wooing Caddie McCaffery and more than The Secret Life of Sarah Hollenback (though that was a fun one too).

This book followed the same “formula” so to speak as Wooing Caddie McCaffery, with one chapter written in the first person and focusing on Hadley Beckett, the sweet Southern belle chef, and cooking show host, and the next being written in the third person and focusing on the unlikely love interest of chef world cad Max Cavenaugh. I am not usually a fan of books that switch point of view once you get into it but Bethany does it in such a creative way I don’t mind it with her books. It’s her style and it works for her. I probably wouldn’t try it with another author.

For those who might be interested in the book, here is the Goodreads description:

Celebrity chef Maxwell Cavanaugh is known for many things: his multiple Michelin stars, his top-rated Culinary Channel show To the Max, and most of all his horrible temper. Hadley Beckett, host of the Culinary Channel’s other top-rated show, At Home with Hadley, is beloved for her Southern charm and for making her viewers feel like family.

When Max experiences a very public temper tantrum, he’s sent packing to get his life in order. When he returns, his career in shambles, his only chance to get back on TV and in the public’s good graces is to work alongside Hadley.

As these polar-opposite celeb chefs begin to peel away the layers of public persona and reputation, they will not only discover the key ingredients for getting along but also learn the secret recipe for unexpected forgiveness . . . and maybe even love. In the meantime, hide the knives.

Fan-favorite Bethany Turner serves up a heaping helping of humor and romance with this thoroughly modern story centered on cooking, enemies, and second chances. 

Next week I’ll offer my own review of the book in a separate post.

I’ve been trying to find another book to enjoy reading as much as I did Hadley’s story. So far I’m trying different books, looking for the happier reads, and rejecting anything that starts out with tragedy or death. Or if not rejecting, taking my time to read them so I have only small slices of depressing subjects to read. Two books that so far deal with some sad topics but that I’m still trying are Down Where My Love Lives by Charles Martin, which is two novels in one (The Dead Don’t Dance and Maggie.) and Just Like Home by Courtney Walsh. Walsh writes mainly romances so I’m gathering this one is a romance.

For some reason, I am also still pushing through The Cat Who Said Cheese by Lillian Jackson Braun, even though it is terribly boring and isn’t featuring Qwilleran’s cats Koko and Yum-Yum enough.

What I’m Watching

I watched the 2005 version of Pride and Prejudice with a group of sweet romance authors and readers Friday night. We were commenting back and forth about the characters, plot, but mainly the actors or how the movie was directed and that’s when Facebook started blocking us from commenting. Facebook is like a lot of people in this day and age — they ruin everything and take the fun out of life.

Luckily we were all still able to post status updates within the discussion and converse back and forth. Bethany Turner, the author I mentioned earlier in this post, was on with us and hilariously argued that the 2005 version was not as good at the 1995 BBC mini-series, which starred Colin Firth.

I had to agree with Bethany Turner, who is a massive Colin Firth fan, that Matthew Macfayden is no Colin Firth and that I much preferred Colin’s Darcy. All this to say that I’m not necessarily a huge fan of Jane Austen or her movies, but it was fun watching it with a group of women so we could all make fun of the movie, or swoon in some parts, at the same time.

As per our usual pattern of being behind the trend, we finally saw Hamilton on Disney Plus this week as well. We enjoyed it and it is brilliant, but I didn’t like the last half-hour as much as the first two hours. Yes, it was 2 hours and 40 minutes.

What’s Been Occurring

Nothing much has been happening this week. It’s been pretty routine. Homeschool, errands, cooking meals, working on my novella and novel. Blah, blah, blah.

Little Miss has a new friend who she’s been seeing a few times a week. The little girl’s great-grandmother, who lives at the end of our short street, watches her during the week and sometimes on the weekends. I’m glad to have a little friend for my daughter because she hasn’t had any real friends her age for most of her life. I had actually prayed the week before that God would send her some children her age for her to play with. I’m regretting that prayer a little bit because it means walking her back and forth between my house and my neighbors a few times a day, but I’m still glad to see her learning how to play well with others.

It has been nice to watch our trees change from green to brilliant orange, red, and yellow almost overnight. The trees in our backyard were a dull orange at the beginning of the week and by Saturday morning they were on fire with colors.

What I’ve Been Writing

I finished Quarantined here on the blog last week and shared a hodge podge of chapters from The Farmer’s Daughter. I’m now in the middle of rewrites and editing of Quarantined with a hopeful publication date of Oct. 10 on Kindle. My husband is both content and line editing it for me and I hope he can do the same after I rewrite and edit The Farmer’s Daughter this winter.

Photos of the Week

Sunday Bookends: Holy drama and bad Southern accents, blooming flowers, and cozy mysteries

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 6 Comments

What’s Been Going On

Since moving to our new house we’ve watched various plants around the property bloom and it has been fun waiting to see what shows up. Last week, I mentioned being excited because peonies were blooming next to our house. I was excited because we had peonies outside our house when I was growing up and I haven’t really seen them since. Last week I counted four of the bushes, two on the side of the house, one on each front corner, but then I discovered there is a fifth near the neighbor’s property and Friday I discovered a sixth on the other side of our garage.

My mom told me that the blooms usually open by my brother’s birthday so I waited and the first blooms did indeed open on my brother’s birthday. He came to the house for a visit that day (he lives 90 minutes away) and had to leave before we went to see if the blooms had opened (he had work the next day) but later I checked and there they were – opened, or at least part of them.




Now we are waiting for the purple/pink ones to open fully.

The white ones were slightly damaged during heavy rains one night. Either that or the resident bear laid in the middle of them. I did mention our neighbor saw the resident bear in the backyard two weeks ago right? If I didn’t, then I’m telling all of my readers now. The bear is real and he/she was about 50 yards from our house at 5 a.m. one morning.

We missed him/her but have seen a lot of other wildlife, including rabbits, blue herons and our neighbor let us know her daughter saw a rattlesnake. My husband says if he sees the snake it will be dead within seconds. He’s not a fan of snakes. At all.

Anyhow, I digress; back to the blooming flowers. After discovering the peonies I also woke up one morning to find pink roses blooming outside behind our garage, near the lilac bush (which barely bloomed this year). I knew my daughter, who loves flowers, would be excited so we walked up the hill to see them together. We then discovered another rose bush next to the peonies bush near the neighbor’s fence.

There are also these purple/blue flowers, but I have no idea what they are. I really am ignorant about plants and flowers.

I’ve stayed away from social media, for the most part, but did jump on quick this past week. That was a huge mistake. The atmosphere there was even more toxic than it was about a week or so ago when I decided to step away. Everyone is angry, offended, and calling each other racists if they ask a question. Quite frankly, I don’t have the energy for it all so I’m back off social media. I can’t live my life offended 24/7 like the rest of the world. It’s just not healthy.

It seems like a lot of the pastors are out there trying to tell people they need to feel offended 24/7 too so I’m not even listening to well-known pastors right now. Honestly, I need to get back into the Bible and stop listening to pastors anyhow. They seem to be led by the world lately and when I listen to them I feel further away from God and my faith than ever.

What I’m Reading

I am finishing up two books, A Light in the Window by Jan Karon and The Knife Slipped by Earl Stanley Gardner and I am also hoping to dive into a couple of cozy mysteries this week, including By Book or By Crook (A Lighthouse Mystery No. 1) by Eva Gates. I’ve peaked into this book and after reading the first page, I’m not sure this is going to be my type of book, but I’m going to try anyhow because I may be totally wrong!

What I’m Watching


Sweet Magnolias


I binged watched the first season of Sweet Magnolias on Netflix this week (we have a trial month of Netflix because I’m not a big fan of them, for various reasons) and I have a lot of opinions on it, but will try to keep my “review” short.

First of all, for the writers of the show: thanks for the parenting lessons on how NOT to be a parent. None of these parents actually talk to their children or ask them what’s really wrong. They just assume and then act on what they assume and then the kids get upset and the parents get upset because the kids get upset. It’s a really strange cycle to watch and I suppose it is slightly realistic but a little overblown.

Then there is the little girl the husband hooked up with and got pregnant and the fact she’s an idiot and doesn’t understand she is only a few years older than her new boyfriend’s oldest child so she shouldn’t be acting like she’s going to be the new mom of these children.

Then there is the whole “lifetime friends” baloney. Three women who always remained friends. What is that even like? You know it’s fiction when there is a story line like that — with friends who actually talk to each other after high school.

They meet once a week or so for margaritas and seem pretty wound up in their own lives and not their kids’, but the show is primarily about them so they can’t pause it every five seconds for a heart-to-heart with the kids.

The show is supposed to take place in a tiny town named Serenity in South Carolina. The one problem is that only half the members of the town have Southern accents and the actors who do try the accents (especially Chris Kline who plays Bill) are pretty bad at it. They are some of the oddest southern accents I’ve ever heard.


I did binge-watch the show in two days but that’s partially because I fast forwarded a good portion of the last three or four episodes because the drama had gotten to be a bit too much and I really wanted to run over Bill. If you watch the show you will realize very quickly why I want to run over Bill and then back over him again. Then later I wanted to run over Maddie, but again, you’ll have to watch the show to figure out why.

I talked to the screen a lot with this one. I said things like “Hey, maybe you should have been paying attention to your kids and that wouldn’t have happened.” Then I looked up and my 5-year old was missing. Luckily she’d just gone to get a piece of bread and was still in the house, but still . . . I learned to be less judgmental of these fictional parents in that moment.


Virgin River

After fast forwarding through part of the last episodes of Sweet Magnolias, I started Virgin River, which is a fairly feel-good show that has a very similar storyline to Hart of Dixie, (which I watched a couple of episodes of this week as well.) in that a woman comes to a small town to work with a much older doctor. Oddly, the actor (Tim Matheson) playing the doctor in Virgin River also played the doctor on Hart of Dixie. Typecast much?

The difference is that in Hart of Dixie, the woman is a doctor who needs to earn more experience before she can become a heart surgeon and in Virgin River the woman is a nurse practitioner who is looking to escape her past. On Virgin River we learn about the main character’s (Mel’s) past through flashbacks throughout each show. Trigger warning: so far the show does deal with the topic of infant loss. By the way, Virgin River is the name of the town.

I much prefer Virgin River and it’s acting and story line to Hart of Dixie and Sweet Magnolias (so far anyhow). I’d have to say my favorite character in Virgin River is the mayor, Helen. She’s a pistol and I used to know a small town mayor just like her. The mayor I knew dragged an oxygen tank behind her while also smoking a cigarette, just to give a sneak peek into her personality.

What I’m Listening To

I haven’t been listening to a lot and that may be why I’ve felt off some days. I have still been listening to some of the Dead South and this week I listened to Unchained Melody by Marc Martel because his voice soothes me. I haven’t been listening to some of the worship music I used to listen to because it just seems like a big money-making machine at times since every big church sings the same songs over and over again. When I do listen to it, I listen to Michael W. Smith’s Awaken album.


I enjoy Unchained Melody by Marc Martel because the beauty of his voice makes the world seem less ugly.


What I’m Writing

I’m still in the middle of The Farmer’s Daughter and I’m also plugging away on my novella Fully Alive. I haven’t had much time to finish the short story I started — Rekindle —- which is the sequel to Quarantined.

My first two books A Story to Tell and A New Beginning are both on Kindle Unlimited, at least for the next months.

So, what have you all been up to this past week? Reading? Watching? Doing? Listening to? Let me know in the comments.

I’ll leave you with a few photos from our week:

Sunday Bookends: What the family is reading, cold weather moves in and a self-imposed media break

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 18 Comments

It finally happened. My brain snapped this week and I had to impose an overall media break on myself.

Social media.

News media.

Gone for three to four days at least, if not longer. After snapping at people, shaking from anxiety every time I logged off, and having crying fits based in depression and anxiety I knew it was time.

Luckily, after starting the break I felt so much better with less bouts of anxiety. Until I went back on and got in a completely unnecessary word exchange with an acquaintance

I broke it a couple of times for brief updates then went right back into my clueless hole and blocked the sites on my phone and Facebook.

If anyone else wants to join me on my break, you’re welcome to. Just make a list of things you would rather be doing and then commit to staying away from news and social media and at the end of the time you set for your break write about you felt during the break and after.

So far, I have filled my time with some reading (not as much as I would have liked), blog reading, working on formatting novel two and writing novel three, researching gardening and compositing (Lord Jesus, help me. I’m not sure I’ll be able to figure all that out), and watching The Chosen.

I also spent two days avoiding looking out the window since it snowed. Yes. Snowed. In May. I did not take any photos of it because it was insanely depressing.

I thought I’d share what the family is reading this week, since I’m reading pretty much the same books that I’ve been reading for a while.

What I’m reading: A Light in the Window by Jan Karon and Sweet on You by Becky Wade and About Your Father by Peggy Rowe (I read one story a night from this and talked about the book first HERE).

Planning to read soon:
Death of A Gossip (A Hamish Macbeth Book) by M.C. Beaton

Husband: The Poet by Michael Connelly

Description: An electrifying standalone thriller that breaks all the rules! With an introduction by Stephen King.

Death is reporter Jack McEvoy’s beat: his calling, his obsession. But this time, death brings McEvoy the story he never wanted to write–and the mystery he desperately needs to solve. A serial killer of unprecedented savagery and cunning is at large. His targets: homicide cops, each haunted by a murder case he couldn’t crack. The killer’s calling card: a quotation from the works of Edgar Allan Poe. His latest victim is McEvoy’s own brother. And his last…may be McEvoy himself.

Son: Harry Potter and the Half-Bred Prince


Daughter (with me) Ree Drummond’s book Charlie and The New Baby and Ramona The Pest.

Mom: Somebody’s Daughter by Rochelle B. Weinstein

Description:

Emma and Bobby Ross enjoy a charmed life on the shores of Miami Beach. They are a model family with a successful business, an uncomplicated marriage, and two blessedly typical twin daughters, Zoe and Lily. They are established members of a tight-knit community.

Then, on the night of the girls’ fifteenth birthday party, they learn of Zoe’s heartbreaking mistake—a private and humiliating indiscretion that goes viral and thrusts her and her family into the center of a shocking public scandal.

As the family’s core is shattered by disgrace, judgment, and retribution, the fallout takes its toll. But for Emma, the shame runs deeper. Her daughter’s reckless behavior has stirred memories of her own secrets that could break a marriage and family forever.

and before that Angel Killer by Andrew Mayne (My mom reads much faster than me so I have trouble keeping up with what she is on).

Description:

In this self-published bestselling e-book by a real illusionist—the first thriller in a sensational series—now available in paperback, FBI agent Jessica Blackwood believes she has successfully left her complicated life as a gifted magician behind her . . . until a killer with seemingly supernatural powers puts her talents to the ultimate test.

A mysterious hacker, who identifies himself only as “Warlock,” brings down the FBI’s website and posts a code in its place. It hides the GPS coordinates of a Michigan cemetery, where a dead girl is discovered rising from the ground . . . as if she tried to crawl out of her own grave.

Born into a dynasty of illusionists, Jessica Blackwood is destined to become its next star—until she turns her back on her troubled family, and her legacy, to begin a new life in law enforcement. But FBI consultant Dr. Jeffrey Ailes’s discovery of an old copy of Magician Magazine will turn Jessica’s carefully constructed world upside down. Faced with a crime that appears beyond explanation, Ailes has nothing to lose—and everything to gain—by taking a chance on an agent raised in a world devoted to seemingly achieving the impossible.

The body in the cemetery is only the first in the Warlock’s series of dark miracles. Thrust into the media spotlight, with time ticking away until the next crime, can Jessica confront her past to embrace her gifts and stop a depraved killer?

If she can’t, she may become his next victim.



I tried to distract myself this week with movies, but mostly failed on that front. I had considered the newest version of Emma, which you could have rented on Amazon for $20 and now can buy for $14.99. I knew I didn’t want to buy it and after reading some reviews, I’m not sure I even want to rent it. This was my favorite review on Amazon:

“I am sitting here alone, in the midst of quarantine, because the rest of my family couldn’t handle this movie any longer and fled. I have not left my house in five days, but death by coronavirus would be more merciful than continuing to watch this movie. Everyone in this movie is so unlikable, which is not Jane Austen’s fault. The other versions were good. The only saving grace is Chummy from “Call the Midwife.””

Ouch.

So then I tried Little Women. My brother and sister-in-law loved it and telling them I didn’t was hard, but I didn’t. I just didn’t. I guess it was supposed to be artistic but I had to agree with what a reviewer on Amazon said: “The film felt like a very long trailer.”

Saoirse Ronan and Timothée Chalamet in Greta Gerwig’ LITTLE WOMEN.

All the flipping back and forth between the past and present was extremely confusing at times and the orange glow on all the outdoor scenes made me want to adjust the lighting on my computer. If the story had been told in a more linear way I might have been able to actually like the characters, but since it was a movie of five minute clips here and there, I never really had a chance to get to know them unfortunately. Of course, I know them from other movies. I should say I know them from the book, but I never finished the book. I know. I’m awful, but it’s true.

The actors were very good, however, so I really wanted to give the movie a shot again after stopping it only half an hour in the first time. The guy playing Laurie looked 14 whether he was actually supposed to be 14 or in his 20s and he looked slightly stoned the entire time so I really had little interest when he came on the screen. I won’t lie and say there weren’t parts I didn’t cry through, because there were, but I’m not lying when I say I barely had time to cry for Beth because they had flipped to another scene before I knew what happened.

Instead, I watched a more traditional version I found on Amazon that was split into four episodes and featured actresses who seemed to fit the parts more for me than the other actresses did.

I also distracted myself from the news of the world by blogging last week:

Faithfully Thinking: He will lift it soon

A small family greenhouse in the middle of nowhere (this was my most popular in months. I think because it was shared on Facebook and a lot of local people saw it.)

“Did you go outside today?” Yes, Mom, in fact we did.

Fiction Friday: The Farmer’s Daughter Chapter 7

So how about all of you? What are you reading, watching, writing and doing these days? Let me know in the comments.

Sunday Bookends: Peggy Rowe, The Chosen, rocking out the stress and country living

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 19 Comments

It has definitely been a crazy week with moving in, trying to get settled in to our new house and having the sudden realization we now live in the country. Sure, we have other houses around us and technically live ‘in town’ but our backyard (beyond the neighbor’s garden that is) is a forest. Not only that but the other day our neighbor suggested we move our trash cans inside the garage until pick up day because one time the previous owner didn’t and a bear got into it.

Yes, a bear.

Into the garbage.

That may be the moment I actually realized we live in the country. That and when he told me about the six or seven deer who visit their yard from time to time. I have this bad feeling we might put a crimp in that with the arrival of our dog. I’ve noticed neither of the neighbors on either side have pets, or at least dogs. How sad for them. (*wink*)

I’m still waiting for the weather to warm up so we can start getting our garden ready. We had more cold and rainy days this week but hopefully we will finally have spring in the next couple of weeks. The previous owners were nice enough to leave garden supplies in the small shed out back, including fencing to keep the deer out.

They also left several rakes, hoes and shovels. We’re not a drinking family but they left us wine glasses and a bottle of wine as well, which was nice. I might need that when I start trying to plant a garden since I’ve only done it once before and it didn’t go so well. I have a tendency to kill plants, which I think I’ve mentioned before.

My daughter and I cleaned out some old leaves from the flower beds Saturday using rakes we found in the garage, including a small one for my daughter. Even though I kill plants I’m going to try to plant some around the house when the local greenhouse opens up in the beginning of May. I also discovered several perennials that I am hoping will come up soon. After that we tried a bike ride on the street in front of our house, hoping the cars that zoom by when they use it for a short cut didn’t run us down at any point. We took the dog with us and she found a cat to bark at and watch closesly.

I’ve been able to get back into some reading this week. I am really enjoying Peggy Rowe’s new book, as I’ve mentioned the last couple of weeks. It’s made up of short stories about her life with her husband and son’s so it’s easy to read one or two stories a night before bed. This week her son, Mike Rowe (from Dirty Jobs, The Way I Heard it podcast, MikeRoweWORKS Foundation, and Return the Favor on Facebook.), shared a video telling her that for the second time in a couple of years she has a book on the New York Times Bestseller list. For those who are Christians on my page, don’t let the screenshot below dissuade you from watching this clip or reading the book. It’s less offensive than it looks!


I’m also finishing up True to You by Becky Wade this week (as I’ve been saying I would do for awhile now).

As for what I’ve been watching I’ve started The Chosen, an online dramatic series based on the life of Christ. It weaves a lot of Biblical fiction within the story of Jesus, so don’t look for this to be a word for word interpretation of the Bible, but it still keeps very inline with the message of the Bible and of Christ. The acting is excellent and the imagery is compelling. I’ve only watched the first episode and part of the second and I’ve already cried twice (in a good way.) I ordered a DVD set of the show to help support the production costs for Season 2. You can learn more about this project and how to watch it on their site.

I thought I would share a little about what I am listening to this week, as well. I started my Friday morning with a playlist of Skillet on Youtube and I highly recommend it since it woke me up and got my day started off right. (I know. I don’t seem the Skillet type, but I am, just without the leather jackets and dyed hair and nose ring.)

My day would have been better if I had done what I had originally planned to do and turn the phone off and never looked at social media, but live and learn.

I’ve also been listening to this new song by Elevation Worship since I loved watching them perform it live on Easter morning. That service was such a breath of fresh air and a move of the Holy Spirit I couldn’t stop watching it and am thrilled I can listen to the song on my phone or anywhere else now.

So how about all of you? What have you been reading, watching, listening to or up to this week? I’d love to read about it in the comments. Let me know!

Sunday Bookends: Books? What are those?

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 6 Comments

I miss reading to enjoy a story instead of reading only to try to escape life. I’m sure I’m not alone in that. This last week I wanted to escape life a lot — not only because of the stress everyone else in the country is facing but because of the fact our mortgage lender dropped us three days before we were supposed to close on the house we were purchasing. This meant we could not purchase our new house. However, we still had to move out of our current house because it was being purchased.

So we kept packing (we’d already rented the truck) and packed up the house by ourselves in four days (still not done, actually). We headed to my parents, who we were trying to stay away from because of You Know What and had planned only to spend one night with. Now it looks like it could be two weeks or more living at my parents (pray for them) and we aren’t even guaranteed the new loan program we are in will pan out and we will still be able to buy the house we wanted to.

While we would have liked to have delayed everything until the country’s leaders decide if they can tell their butt from a hole in the ground (they can’t, by the way and before someone says I’m a this or that person hater, I’m talking about all of them of all parties. Not picking sides on this one.) we were told we could get sued for not moving out for our buyers so we did. And we moved in the original deadline we were given, not the extended deadline we were told AFTER we rented the truck and started moving. It turns out we could have had almost another week to move because the buyers weren’t even ready to sign (not their fault, but it would have been nice if their rep had told our rep about the delays. Just a little communication would be nice these days.)

To say things are stressful in my life is an understatement right now. I have a teenager who feels lost, displaced and panicked because the home that was once his source of feeling grounded is gone and the new house we thought we were going to make our own is also gone (hopefully not permanently.). My son is separated from friends at the same time all of this is going on and he’s still trying to recover from some hurts inflicted on him by past friends. In two days, I have dealt with four or five panic attacks, two of them being my own. Writing all this almost triggered another one.

Our TV is packed up and my parents have some of the most awful WiFi on the planet so we can’t stream anything. I’m having trouble focusing enough to read, but when I do get a chance to read, I’ll be reading A Light in the Window with Jan Karon and maybe I’ll actually finish True to You by Becky Wade. With everything going on, I had stopped reading it and my mom returned it on Kindle Unlimited again. Mooooom. (Wink).

I started two new stories this week on the blog. I’m not sure I’ll share from both stories each week or not. I had one criticism that the chapter of the second story was too long. I deleted the comment because I keep getting rude comments from this same person. Just a reminder: I’m not forcing anyone to read the fiction I share on my blog or anything on my blog. If you think a chapter is too long, or a story is boring, don’t read it. It’s fairly simple. As simple as scrolling by on Facebook if you don’t like what someone has written.

I shared the first chapter of Fully Alive on Thursday and the first chapter of The Farmer’s Daughter on Friday.

Last week I also shared some photos I’ve taken over the years at our house and some laughs with Alice, the fictional advice columnist from our local weekly hometown newspaper. I also shared some advice I needed for myself about where to find our longterm peace.

I’m very behind on my blog reading, mainly because of the move and all the drama that went with it, partially because of my parents’ WiFi. When their WiFi is working, I’ll be certain to get caught up on some my favorite bloggers (you know who you are).

I hope most of your lives are much calmer and delightful compared to mine this past week, despite all that is going on in the world.

Give me some ideas for books, something to watch (if the WiFi is having a good day here, or if you have something I can watch on cable, which my parents have at least), or let me know what is up with you (even if it is depressing. It’s okay. You don’t have to cheer me up. I’ll figure that out on my own eventually!)

 

 

 

Sunday Bookends: house selling drama, Sweet Land and small town libraries

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 24 Comments

The house selling process plods forward and as it does I seem to be having more breakdowns than normal. The roller-coaster of emotions as we worry about something falling through with either the sale of this house or the purchase of the other is getting to me I guess. I find myself sitting down and having a good cry a couple times a week.

After an unexpected removal from the house when the inspector came and wanted to bring the buyers, I cried as we toured our small town, not so much because I will miss the place, but because of all the bad memories made while here.

“That,” I said as I pointed at the hospital, the largest in our region, tears rolling down my face. “is the last place I saw my grandmother alive.”

This was after we drove past the house where some family members live but who no longer speak to us, though they never spoke to us much before either. That situation has broken my heart for a long time and resulted in a lot of confusion and hurt feelings on all sides. In some ways, it’s as if we think if we pack up the house and get out of this place we can leave all the emotional baggage behind, but of course, we really can’t.

We can drive away but we will still carry the scars we’ve gotten here. From the broken family relationships to the loss of my husband’s grandparents to driving by the last place I saw Grandma alive so many times in the last 16 years to the knives in our backs from former places of employment and former friends, living in this town hasn’t always been easy. I know only God can heal those scars so I have to lean on him now more than ever.

In happier news, I watched a movie called Sweet Land this week, which was actually pretty “sweet”, so it lived up to its name. It starred Elizabeth Reaser, Tim Guinee, Alan Cumming, and Alex Kingston.  I kept writing in circles when I tried to explain the plot (that’s how muddled my brain is this week), so I pulled it off Wikipedia:

In the aftermath of World War I, Inge Altenberg (Elizabeth Reaser), an orphan from Snåsa, Norway, arrives in America to a very cold reception. The parents of immigrant farmer Olaf Torvik (Tim Guinee) remain in Norway, where they met her. Dialogue reveals that the four of them have worked out an agreement that allowed her to emigrate to America for the purpose of marrying Olaf. The Minnesota farming village of Audubon, in which her intended husband lives, is horrified to learn that she is a German immigrant with no papers. To make matters worse, she has accidentally obtained membership papers for the American Socialist Party. Scandalized, both the town’s Lutheran minister and the county clerk refuse to marry them.

When events lead them to openly cohabit with each other, they find themselves ostracized by the entire town. They are then forced to harvest their crop completely by hand and alone. This particular harvest season brings not only work, but love as well.

I streamed the movie on Amazon, but I’m sure it is available on other services as well.

On the book front, I am still reading Love Begins at Willow Tree Hill and still enjoying it. I haven’t had as much time for reading with all the “drama” (so to speak) in our life, but this week I hope to escape that drama a bit with reading and working on my two novels. (If you haven’t been following my novel, you can find a link to the chapters at the top of the page or HERE. I post new chapters on Thursdays and Fridays and will post it to Kindle when I’m finished, possibly with changes, but definitely edited and revised.)

I visited what was once my local library and will hopefully be our new local library when we move. My son and I had headed to the new house to pick up a radon test we’d ordered ahead of the inspection. After we left the house we mailed the test and then I asked my son if he wanted to see the little library in town. It was the library my mom and I always went to when I was a kid.

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“You don’t understand,” I told my son. “I didn’t have video games and social media when I was growing up so books were my only way to escape and experience life.”

When I walked into the library, the smell of books overwhelmed me just like it did when I was a kid. That smell was a sign to me that entire worlds were opening up to me and my mom and I would spend probably an hour choosing the books we wanted. We’d drag them home in a big bag and my dad would say “More books?” Sometimes we would bring home books we bought from the book sale and Dad would say, again, “More books? We don’t even have room for the books we have!”

But he let us have them anyhow and Mom and I would delve into them and float away from our small house in the country to worlds far away that were much more exciting than cleaning houses and cooking dinners and washing clothes and doing homework.  And we met new people, learned new ideas, developed new vocabulary, and for me, dreamt dreams of sharing stories as compelling as the ones I was reading.

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Before we left town, I decided to let the little old library ladies sitting at the front desk know how important the library was to me when I was growing up. They appreciated me letting them know, they said, and hope it works out for the library to be our home library by spring.

As for what I’m writing this week:

A flash fiction piece about a “sugar report” (letter to a soldier from a romantic interest);

Did you drink your water?

Faithfully Thinking: God’s Kingdom is in Your Own Backyard

Fiction Thursday, A New Beginning Chapter 22

Fiction Friday: A New Beginning Chapter 23
I’ve also joined *eyeroll* Wattpad…the place that teens apparently share all their bizarre pubescent sex fantasies. My story, however, is nothing like that so it will not, most likely, get traction on Wattpad. But, why not try? Life is short and we need to go for it, right? If you want to follow The Farmer’s Daughteron there (though this version probably won’t be what I finally publish on Kindle), you can find it HERE.

As for what I’m listening to this week (something new I’m adding):

Oldies to get me in the mood for revisions on A New Beginning (which takes place in the mid 60s):

Marc Martel:

and sermons like this one:

So, how about you? What are you up to this week? Reading? Watching? Learning? Listening to? Share with me in the comments!

Sunday Bookends: big house news, books finished, books to start

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 28 Comments

 

I finished two books this week. One was a middle school-aged book and the other was an adult book (not that kind of adult book!). The adult book was a library book, the first I’ve actually read in probably 10 years, if not more. Normally I borrow books or read them on Kindle.

The middle school book, The Misadventured Summer of Tumbleweed Thompson by Glenn McCarty was one my son and I read together for his homeschool English. It was a fun book, full of adventure and perfect for every age, but especially 5th to 7th-grade boys.

Tumbleweed Thompson

I helped my son write a book report about it and realized it really is not easy to write a book without giving away the entire plot. Of course, I realize this when I mention books on the blog, as well. I decided I’d share part of my son’s book report to let my readers know what it was all about and why he said he felt sad when he realized he had reached the end of it.

The Misadventured Summer of Tumbleweed Thompson (or M.S.T.T.), a book made for kids about the Wild West, was written by Glenn McCarty and is his second book. This book follows Eugene Appleton and the son of a shady businessman Tumbleweed Thompson. They go adventuring, doing kooky stuff like being tricked into looking for a fake treasure to getting kidnapped.

The story starts when Eugene Appleton was walking in Rattlesnake Junction when he saw Tumbleweed and his dad “performing. After a scandal involving a misunderstanding about what was actually in Mr. Thompson’s tonic, they became friends, despite the fact the tonic worked as a laxative. Eugene, Tumbleweed, and Charlotte (the love interest) go on crazy adventures, but it gets serious. While they are looking in a widow’s old house, they found out robbers were living there with plans to rob a train. The rest of the book is them trying to stop the robbers.

Eugene, Charlotte and Tumbleweed are the main characters of this story. Eugene is smart, brave, and trusts people too much. Tumbleweed is dumb, brave and lies a lot. Charlotte is smart, brave, and a love interest of Eugene and Tumbleweed, who sometimes compete for her attention. Together they try to stop a band of robbers named the No Shave Gang. It’s probably important to say everything is told through the eyes of Eugene.

Well, in conclusion, this book has everything a children’s book should have. It has adventure, interesting characters, and slapstick comedy. I love how three dimensional some of the characters are, take for instance Widow Springfield the local widow whose husband got in trouble with a local gang. The plots and the great description of the locations are on point and make you feel like your really there. If you like stories that make you think this is the book for you. Even if you don’t like thinking, there’s a lot of action.

I also finished Falling Home by Karen White.

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The book was well written but was fairly melodramatic and cliche. Since I like books that are melodramatic and cliche, that didn’t make me hate the book but I did find myself rolling my eyes a few times. (Let me clarify that the books I write are also melodramatic and cliche and sometimes I even roll my eyes at my own writing, so this isn’t a negative review 😉 ). I ended up skimming through some of the chapters toward the end because the subject dealt with a very real fear of mine and I couldn’t handle reading about it. White did such a good job of bringing out the emotion of the situation I could immediately see myself in a similar situation. She’s a wonderful writer, but during those chapters, I almost wish she hadn’t been and I could have had an excuse to abandon the novel. I read all the way to the end, even though I had figured out both plot twists well toward the beginning of the novel and I was squirming reading the one plot twist because of the aforementioned personal trigger.

Up on the reading block this week is a book recommended by Erin at Still Life, With Cracker Crumbs: Love Begins at Willow Tree Hall by Alison Sherlock. I’ve started it and so far I’m really enjoying it. It’s a nice light read, which I need right now. The description, according to Goodreads:

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A feel-good love story in a gorgeous country village, perfect for fans of Milly Johnson and Heidi Swain.
Previously published as A House To Mend a Broken Heart.

Willow Tree Hall has been the proud ancestral home of the Cranley family for centuries. But now the house is falling apart, and the elderly Earl is growing too frail to manage it himself.

Annie Rogers is looking for a job that will allow her to disappear. The role of live-in housekeeper to Arthur, Earl of Cranley, and his reluctant heir, Sam Harris, is just perfect. How hard can it be to run a household? But with no qualifications, and Sam criticising her at every turn, Annie suddenly finds herself completely out of her depth.

But it turns out that Sam and Annie have more in common than they think. Both of them are running from their past. And both of them have fallen under the spell of Sam’s beautiful, once-grand home. Maybe, just maybe, together they can save Willow Tree Hall … and bring each other back to life at the same time.

As for what I watched recently, not a lot. I’ve been reading and writing more than watching. I did watch a movie by myself on the recommendation of my brother: About Time, starring Domnhall Gleeson (what a name) and Rachel McAdams. If you don’t recognize Domnhall’s name you might recognize him from the newer Star Wars movies as General Hux:

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And if you have children, you might recognize him as Thomas McGregor from the latest adaption of Peter Rabbit:

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Or from the Harry Potter as Ron Weasley’s brother Bill (which I added here after my brother reminded me.):

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After I saw him in Peter Rabbit, I recognized him in Star Wars I said “Hey! It’s that guy!” Since I don’t know how to pronounce the man’s name, I will most likely say “Hey! It’s that guy!” And honestly, I’ve been saying that a lot lately since he’s been in a lot of movies we have watched recently. When my brother mentioned About Time, I looked it up and said “Hey! It’s that guy!”

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Anyhow, the movie was very good (rated R for language, just an FYI if you sit down to watch with the family). The R rating surprised me in some ways because the movie really was pretty clean. I think a couple uses of the f-word were what gave it the R rating. The basic premise is that the main character learns that the male members of his family can go back in time to certain points in their lives to change what happened without changing the timeline drastically, as long as they don’t go back before a child or person is born, which can pretty much mess everything up.

The theme was love in all forms – between couples and family, but especially love between a son and father. Yes, I cried. I cried a lot. I think I damaged a muscle in my cheek from crying toward the end because for the rest of the day a muscle along my cheek and temple jumped.

I will probably be burying myself in books the next few weeks while we deal with the stress of selling and buying a house and moving. Last week someone made an offer on the house and we accepted and hope to have it sold by the beginning of April. We also hope to be able to move into our new house around the same time, if all goes as planned.

Last week on the blog, I shared photos from our winter; wrote about my need to trust in God even when I don’t feel he’s near; and I shared Chapter 20 and Chapter 21of my novel in progress, A New Beginning.

Up on the blog this week will be a post sharing some of my favorite blog posts from the last month and two more chapters of A New Beginning and a post about nightmares in children and adults.

How about you? What are you reading or watching or simply doing this week? Feel free to share in the comments.

This post is part of Readerbuzz’s Sunday Salon and Caffeinated Reviewer’s Sunday Post. 

Sunday Bookends: Christmas romance movies off the agenda, Christmas prep with Michael Buble, British cleavage, and social media detox failure

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 14 Comments

I wrote last week that I was on a Christmas movie binge, but, no. I’m over it.

Oh. My. Word.

Seriously?

How many more movies can I watch where one parent of the main character is already dead at such a young age? Or where the husband has died and now she’s looking for new romance?

Duuuuudes. Stop the tropes already. I just can’t take it.

I just want one Christmas movie where Mom and Dad are still alive and their death isn’t the reason someone hates Christmas.

So, bah-humbug. No more of those cheesy Christmas romance movies.

Back to reality.

(Oops. There goes gravity…sorry that line immediately made me think of Eminem’s Lose Yourself. And I don’t even really listen to Eminem.)

And part of that reality was watching a 1934  film from England called The Scarlet Pimpernel (yes, there have been a few remakes) where there was plenty of harsh reality and cringeworthy brutality. The movie, starling Leslie Howard (no idea, but I think he’s a famous British actor)  opens with the beheadings of French citizens during the 1792 French Revolution’s Reign of Terror by the guillotine. Movie makers from the 30s made in England didn’t bat an eye at disturbing visuals or sounds, let me tell you that.

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According to the trivia link on Amazon (yes, Amazon! And no, I’m still not trying to sell Amazon Prime to you and have not been paid for this reference. Ha! But I should be.), movie makers of the 30s also weren’t afraid to show a little skin. However, the folks in the United States weren’t pleased with that skin, based on what the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America said about the movie: “There is cleavage in Reel 1. There is cleavage in Reel 4. There is gross cleavage in Reel 8,” adding that it was the last film it would pass containing ‘scenes of offensive cleavage.'”

(My husband interjects here “That was during the time of the Hayes Code which was basically the movie industry censoring itself because parents were complaining.” Thank you movie and history trivia Rain Man. And actually, I like his little interjections of history, so don’t take this teasing too seriously).

I read this bit of trivia before I watched the movie so I immediately turned it back on to find out where the cleavage was, not because I enjoy cleavage of women (I don’t swing that way) but because I wanted to see if it was truly “offensive.”

My verdict? There was definitely- gasp!!!– dare I say it? Clear and fairly offensive cleavage from Miss Merle Oberon who leaned over quite seductively more than once! By the way, be sure to say cleavage in a very pompous or posh British tone or it doesn’t work at all for this conversation.

I actually kept watching the movie as a joke because of the cleavage trivia but then I got engrossed in the story and couldn’t stop watching it. The story is basically that aristocrats in France were being marched to the guillotine on a daily basis but some were being saved by an English man called the Scarlet Pimpernel, which had the ones doing the beheadings on high alert and on the lookout for him.

Cleavage or not I highly recommend the movie (on Amazon or wherever you choose to watch it.). The movie was well written and acted.

Here, I took a photo of the cleavage for you in case you’re curious….

I’m kidding. You can find the cleavage yourself and be appropriately horrified, even though it’s tame compared to what we see in today’s movies. The censors of the 30s would have a stroke if they saw what was on today’s movie screens.

Anyhooo….

Enough about the cleavage of the French, er, British pretending to be French. Also, I’m not writing the word cleavage ever again because I feel like a weirdo now. Plus, I’ve written the word how many times now in this post? Let’s not count.

We got more snow this past week but it looks like we will not have a white Christmas this year since the predicted temps are set at the mid-40s.  I’m okay with that since snow on Christmas could mean we can’t get to my parents to spend the day with them. We went to their house Friday so we could help decorate their Christmas tree.

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I’ll probably ramble on about Christmas decorations later in the week.

I’m not doing great with my social media detox lately but it’s better than it could be. Last year my detox involved not logging on to any sites at all but this year I find myself logging on to check certain groups only. The issue with that is that I sometimes trail off of those groups and get stuck into the ridiculousness that is our world today.

(A beautiful painting of a newborn baby as Jesus and then a thread moaning over how white the baby is? Come on already! It was the sentiment behind the photo that mattered, not the perceived race of the baby! Social media makes us horrible, bitter, nasty, self-serving morons. I mean, how many more things we once enjoyed can everyone piss all over so we are all a bunch of depressed, uptight, self-righteous, finger-pointing, miserable people like most of Hollywood?)

I actually had to pull up the post I wrote last year where I made a list of suggestions of activities a person can engage in other than social media to remind me of activities I’ve been remiss on participating in because I have been distracted by the stupidity that is social media.

To try to take my mind off of everything with house selling and buying this weekend, I put on Michael Buble’s Christmas album this week (and did NOT look up to see what anyone’s opinion of it was), pulled out a book about Advent (also did NOT look up what anyone’s opinion of THAT was), kept working on my novel, watched more Dick VanDyke and read more light mysteries (The Cat Who) and romances.

For your enjoyment, because I was so excited to find it! Michael Buble’s Christmas Album and the Yuletide Log at the same time! Enjoy (or run away screaming if you aren’t a fan of either.)

So what were you reading, watching or doing this past week? Let me know in the comments.

Lisa R. Howeler is a writer and photographer from the “boondocks” who writes a little bit about a lot of things on her blog Boondock Ramblings. She’s published a fiction novel ‘A Story to Tell’ on Kindle and also provides stock images for bloggers and others at Alamy.com and Lightstock.com.

A little chaos in my weekly review

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 15 Comments

A little chaos reigned for me a few weeks when I watched the movie “A Little Chaos” on Netflix. The basic plot is that Kate Winselt is a designer or a builder or a large breasted woman they needed to look forlorn and longingly at the guy who was also a gardener or a designer or whatever for the king. She is hired to design a fancy concert hall/garden for King Louise VIII (Alan Rickman) and few seemed phased she’s a woman building for the king in 1800 whatever. She’s a woman with tragedy in her past and it takes the entire movie to figure out what her tragedy is.

I believe all the characters are supposed to be French but only the gardener and a couple other characters have actual French accents. The rest have British accents. Not sure what that was about. It sort of reminded me of Robin Hood when Kevin Costner kept losing his British accent and slipping back into Brooklyn or something.

I spent most of the movie trying to figure out why Kate seemed the only woman who wore a dress that pushed her breasts up and almost out completely.

I guess the French were (and are?) an open group but I was really getting confused over who was sleeping with whom as well.

And is it bad that every time I saw Alan Rickman all I could think was “why does the king look like Captain Hook?”

All in all, there was still something charming about the movie. The scenery and sets were beautiful, the costumes were breathtaking, the plot fairly predictable.

Would I watch it again? Not unless I needed another good giggle.

Also in the movie department, I found myself completely delighted with Tea with the Dames on Amazon. This was one my brother mentioned to me when we were talking about another movie. The Dames are Maggie Smith, Judi Dench, Joan Plowright and Eileen Atkins. Once a year they meet in the country and chat and “talk shop” so to speak. The movie is a documentary and features the women chatting about their careers, what it meant to become a “dame” and their time as actresses on the stage.

In case your curious, here is a trailer to give you an idea what it’s about:

In the book realm, I am finishing up All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriott and A New Song by Jan Karon.

It was nice of my brother to ruin Herriott’s books for me a bit when he told me that wasn’t his real name. After looking up the reason why James Alfred Wight used a pen name, I understood better and accepted that it wasn’t appropriate for veterinarians at the time to promote themselves so he felt it was better not to use his real name. He also changed the names of those in the books, to protect the innocent and not-so-innocent. The fact James Herriott isn’t his real name doesn’t take away from the witty and touching stories in the book for me like I thought it might. I have learned not to talk to my brother about books I’m reading if he has already read them. Who knows what else he will feel compelled to tell me – maybe the endings of one or two.

I’ve been reading All Creatures Great and Small on my Kindle, which is connected to the Kindle my mom uses. She’s on my account and we share Kinde Unlimited. Normally we are reading different books at different times but Mom started All Creatures Great and Small after me and blew through it before I was done. I almost attempted a competition when my Kindle would notify me that another device registered in my name had made it to a page further than I had, but then I remembered my mom is retired I am a mom with two young children, a needy dog, a pushy cat and a newspaper editor husband who asks me to proof his weekly columns. I finally gave it up and let her blow right past me and finish the book before me, even though I had been reading it for a month longer than her. That’s how slow of a reader I am.

A New Song is a slight departure from Karon’s other books in the series because the story takes place outside of Mitford, N.C., which is where most of Karon’s other books about Father Tim Kavanaugh take place. In case you’ve never read the books, the main character is Father Tim, an Episcopalian priest who lives in the small town of Mitford. The books are about his adventures and how they relate to the quirky, fun, and sweet characters in the town. If you’re looking for something light and not very deep then Karon’s books are for you.

Next up on my book list to read or finish is The Cuckoo’s Calling by Robert Galbraith, All Things Bright and  Beautiful (after I finish All Creatures Great and Small) by James Herriott and On Writing by Stephen King.

As for what I’ve been writing on my blog lately: here are some links to my recent posts:

When You Finally Stop Waiting for the Calls to Come

A New Beginning For A Small Pennsylvania Farm

And the fifth part in my fiction story “A Story to Tell”

So what are all of you reading or watching or even writing ? Feel free to share here or find out what others are reading by visiting Readerbuzz’s weekly wrap up and Sunday Salon feature on her blog.