Marci Rae Johnson's Blog, page 4

It's Monday, What Are You Reading?

[image error] [image error]Between getting married, honeymooning, going on several vacations with my kids, and now buying a new house, I've neglected this weekly meme! And now I'm a day late, but here's what I'm reading this week:

An Abbreviated Life, Riel Leve (memoir)
Multiple Listings, Tracy McMillan (novel)
Boy Erased, Garrard Conley (memoir)

Since I'm closing on the house and moving in Thursday, I probably won't get a lot of reading done this week after tonight, though I do tend to read pretty much every night before bed, in order to relax. Anyone else do this? Even when I don't have a huge amount of time to read, with the act of reading a bit each night, it adds up. When people ask me how I can read so many books every year (I'm trying for 82 this year), that's what I say! Just do it a bit each day and it adds up. Of course, taking a full day to do nothing but read every once in awhile helps as well.

If you'd like to participate in It's Monday, What Are You Reading? Click here. 

Outdo Yourself Reading Challenge

[image error] [image error]I just updated the page where I keep track of all the books I'm reading this year for the 2016 Outdo Yourself Reading Challenge. I'm at 45 books so far, which means I'm three books ahead of schedule! I usually have more time to read in the summer, so I'll get ahead now, to make up for a leaner fall.

Are you doing a reading challenge this year? If so, which one? Leave a comment and let me know.

Outdo Youself Reading Challenge

[image error] [image error]I just updated the page where I keep track of all the books I'm reading this year for the 2016 Outdo Yourself Reading Challenge. I'm at 45 books so far, which means I'm three books ahead of schedule! I usually have more time to read in the summer, so I'll get ahead now, to make up for a leaner fall.

Are you doing a reading challenge this year? If so, which one? Leave a comment and let me know.

Summer Reading

Even though the list is bound to change as I go along, I always enjoy putting together a list of books I'd like to read over the summer, so here's my list. What's on your list?
Summers with Juliet, Bill RoorbachLeave Me Alone, I'm Reading, Maureen CorriganThe Three Martini Lunch, Suzanne RindellGrit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance, Angela DuckworthThe Magicians, Lev GrossmanThe Square Root of Summer, Harriet Reuter HapgoodDetroit Hustle: A Memoir of Life, Love, and Home, Amy HaimerlThe Guest Room, Chris BohjalianAt the Edge of the Orchard, Tracy ChevalierHarriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders, Julianna BaggottMy Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry, Frederik BackmanEligible, Curtis SittenfeldThe Slow Professor: Challenging the Culture of Speed in the Academy, Maggie Berg, Barbara SeeberHow to Survive the Apocalypse: Zombies, Cylons, Faith, and Politics at the End of the World, Robert Joustra, Alissa WilkinsonBrowsings: A Year of Reading, Collecting, and Living with Books, Michael DirdaCharmed Particles, Chrissy KolayaMy Brilliant Friend, Elena FerrantePurity, Jonathan FranzenBlackout: Remember the Things I Drank to Forget, Sarah HepolaA God In Ruin, Kate AtkinsonHow Literature Saved My Life, David ShieldsThe Wild Truth, Carine McCandless

It's Monday, What Are You Reading?

Grades for the semester have been turned in, and I just got a stack of books from inter-library loan! Looking forward to diving into these.

Last week I finished reading Vintage, by David Baker, and The Two Family House, by Lynda Cohen Loigman. I loved The Two Family House, and while I enjoyed Vintage, the main character got on my nerves. The character seemed like a bit of wishful thinking on the part of the author: he was a middle aged man, a washed up, overweight, jobless writer who still somehow magically managed to get every woman he came across to want him. A bit unrealistic, perhaps?

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It's Monday, What Are You Reading?

It's the end of the semester, so I'm mostly reading student papers! But I still have to have my nightly read-to-relax time, so I've started two books, a memoir called The Sound of Gravel by Ruth Wariner, which is about a woman who grew up in Mexico in a polygamous community, and Vintage by David Baker, whose main character is a novelist, food writer, and wine connoisseur (three of my favorite things!). I'm also almost finished with Big Little Lies, by Liane Moriarity, which I've been listening to on audio as I commute to and from work. The book has some interesting characters and an appealing setting (Australia), and also a great twist that I couldn't have predicted, but I'm having trouble finishing the book because it's going on for a long time after the plot's climax, wrapping up every little detail in a way that seems unnecessary. Still the characters are appealing enough that I do want to find out what happens to them.

Last week I finished All the Birds in the Sky, by Charlie Jane Anders. I'll be writing a book review of this one for Books & Culture, so I'm not going to say anything about it yet.

If you'd like to participate in It's Monday, What Are You Reading? Click here.

It's Monday, What Are you Reading?

Well actually, it's Tuesday. I'm a day behind, still recovering from an amazing writing conference I attended last weekend, the Festival of Faith and Writing. Highlights from the conference include: seeing tons of close friends, giving a reading, and selling out of my book. Also, I managed to buy only one book, which was a real accomplishment considering how many books tempted me at the book fair. The book I did buy was The Confessions of X, by Suzanne Wolfe. Suzanne's husband, Greg Wolfe, editor of the wonderful Image journal, had a stack of her books on his table, and I couldn't resist.

And now,  a bit of quiet reading is just what I need after all the time interacting with people at the conference. Luckily, Dewey's 24 hour read-a-thon is coming up this Saturday. Anybody else participating in that?

Last week, since I was so busy, I only finished one book: A Man Called Ove, by Frederik Backman. I LOVE this book. I won't give much away, but let's just say that I'm not at all a cat lover, but I had become one by the end of the book. This week I'm reading Truth and Beauty, by Ann Patchett. I'm sure I'll add more to my reading list as the read-a-thon approaches. I'll post later this week with the list of books I plan to work on for that.

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It's Monday, What Are you Reading?

I've been traveling a lot for writing conferences lately, including the AWP Writers Conference a week and a half ago, and later this week, the Festival of Faith and Writing. I've managed to finish a few books in the last few weeks despite the busyness. Reading is always my best way to unwind, so sometimes I even read more when I'm busier and more stressed! Over the last 2 weeks I've finished the following books:

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Jean-Dominique BuabyThe Astronauts Wives Club, Lily Koppel (audiobook)Raising Ryland: Our Story of Parenting a Transgender Child with No Strings Attached, Hillary WhittingtonA Spool of Blue Thread, Anne TylerWhile these were all interesting, none of them stood out to me as especially great. I love Anne Tyler, so I was somewhat disappointed in this recent book that seemed disjointed and not really all that interesting.

This week I'm working on two books: A Man Called Ove, by Frederik Backman and The House of Twenty Thousand Books, by Sasha Ambramsky. So far both of these books are more intriguing than the books I read over the last two weeks, so that's a good sign!

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It's Monday, What Are You Reading?

Over the last two weeks, I finished a lot of books!
Good on Paper, Rachel CantorAfter You, Jo Jo Meyes (audiobook)Tolstoy and the Purple Chair, Nina SankovitchEarly One Morning, Virginia BailyPortrait of an Addict as a Young Man, Bill CleggPiano in the Vineyard: Poems, Jean JanzenAll these books were wonderful -- it was a good two weeks! My favorite, though, was Good on Paper by Rachel Cantor. It's one of those novels I think I will need to read again -- I feel like I missed a lot the first time through. Do you have any books you feel that way about?

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It's Monday, What Are You Reading?

Last week I finished a lot of books because I was on spring break from my college teaching job. I finished The Girl on the Train, by Paula Hawkins; The Storied Life of A.J. Firky, by Gabrielle Zevin; The Blue Zones Solution, by Dan Buettner; Paper Dreams, edited by Travis Kurowski; and Metallica, by David Masciotra. My favorite of this bunch was The Storied Life of A.J. Firky. It's another book in one of my new favorite genres: novels about books. A.J. Firky owns a bookstore in a small town. His depression lifts after the death of his wife after an orphan girl is left at his bookstore and he decides to raise her. The book is a quick read, and something of a feel-good book, but also well written with engaging characters.

This week I'm in the middle of four books that I started during my break: Piano in the Vineyard, poems by Jean Janzen; Good on Paper, by Rachel Cantor; Early One Morning, by Virginia Baily, and Tolstoy and the Purple Chair, by Nina Sankovitch.

If you'd like to participate in It's Monday, What Are You Reading? Click here.