It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

Sorted by book date

I keep improving after battling COVID in early January. My cough has improved a lot in the past week, and although my energy and stamina have not returned to normal, I have had a great week with no big "crash" days. I need more sleep than usual and I struggle to get out of bed before 9 (a battle I lost yesterday), but I'm starting to go out into the world. I had a quick visit with Kohli and Michael last week - great releases. I might as well do the shopping this week. This morning I got up in time to go to the doctor's appointment and now I'm exhausted, so no baby.

We had snow on Saturday. In Northern Delaware we only have 3-4 inches, but that's a big deal here. It's crazy that the beaches 2 hours south and the Jersey Shore were destroyed by this storm. my friends have 14 inches at the beach.

As my son and husband walked our way, I did something truly extraordinary. I emptied the closet. Our home has been a terrible mess in the past year, my health is worse than usual, our son is on his way home, and a lot of my stepfather's things are stored here. It was what we called a "craft box" filled with art material, craft material and science material that our kids had left behind when they were children. They're in their 20s now, so it's been a long time. This is just the first step in a series of junk projects planned for this year. I needed the space here to be able to clear other areas. I'm so proud that I've finally made some progress, so I'll be sharing my before and after photos.

Before

after

Last week I posted the weekly Friday lesson on my YouTube channel (and another video on my chronic Illness channel ). Check it out if you want to know more about the books I read last week:

Friday read 1-28-22

This is what we all read last week.

After finishing this terrible nonfiction book on generic drugs and the pharmaceutical industry (and my husband and I are doing research online to try and find out where our drugs are made), I needed a dose of fun fiction. I also wanted to start my classic 2022 challenge ( I missed my target last year ). So I chose Ray Bradbury 's The Illustrated Man . I'm a huge fan of his and read all of his books in our public library when I was a teenager. This is a collection of unrelated stories. Each one is the title tattoo of a man who comes alive at night and tells a story. As always, his stories are brilliant, so clever and provocative. I loved this book and almost finished it.

I also finished listening to Jennifer Hay's Mercy Street on audio. Hay is another favorite author and this novel was great. They were several people, each of whom was connected in one way or another to the famous women's clinic in Boston. The author alternates characters whose paths cross in different ways and you get to know them very closely. If you haven't tried Haigh yet, I highly recommend this (tomorrow) and his entire list. To find out more about this novel and Ray Bradbury's book, check out my Friday reading video .

My husband, Ken, is still reading Stephen Erickson's Gardens of the Moon , the first book by Malazanian Fallen , a fantasy novel recommended by our son. It's a long, dense book, but she liked it a lot and it's almost over. (When I said last week that there were only 60 pages left, I misunderstood: it was 160 pages.)

 

Our 27-year-old son has already read Evan Winter's Fury of Dragons , the first book in the Burning series, as a gift from his girlfriend . He says it was great and that he will definitely read more about the program. Then he read Victoria Yard 's The Destroyer of Kingdoms, the start of a new series, and loved it too.

Then our son read the book I gave him for his birthday last year, Wild Kings by Nicholas Eames . I heard about it in Daniel Green's 10 Best Fantasy Series video . many of his top 10 are my son's too, so I knew he'd like this one, which incorporates humor into a great ball swing. And now (he's been reading a lot lately) he's reading Glenn Cooke's The Chronicles of Black Society , the first book in the series of the same name. He says this is a series he has wanted to read for years and saw it in our local thrift store last year.

Last week's blog posts:

Cinema Monday. Parasite : This Oscar winner was full of surprises and fun.

Reading Challenges 2022 - Finally! Now I'm ready to start the new year.

Non-fiction review. Amy Goldstein's Janesville is a haunting and fascinating look at what happened to the city and its inhabitants when the large GM plant closed.

What you read on Monday was brought to you by Catherine on the Book Date , so head over to her blog and join on Monday! You can also join the Kids / Teens / YA version provided by Unleashing Readers .

You can follow me on Twitter at @SueBookByBook or on Facebook on my blog page.

What are you and your family reading this week?