Linking to: It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? at BookDate; Sunday Post @ Caffeinated Reviewer; and the Sunday Salon @ ReaderBuzz
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Life…
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It seems I spoke too soon.
Part of the reason for my absence has been a result of chauffeuring my kids around. I’ve been taking my youngest to work at 3.30am 6 days a week, thanks to overtime, for the past 2 and a half months, while taking my daughter to her part time job at 11am M-F, then picking up my son up at 3pm and then my daughter at 4pm. It’s been exhausting and disruptive, but the overtime is finished for now thankfully.
I’ve also had a bunch of family things going on, mostly good, like my daughter’s graduation ceremony which necessitated an overnight in Sydney to be able to attend, and my eldest son has been home for his mid semester break for the last few weeks, (he went back to Uni yesterday) which has kept me busy, but we’ve had some bad news too which has been challenging to reconcile.
I have every intention of getting back on schedule this week. I have to figure out how to post all the catch up reviews I need to do.
It’s the last Monday of the month, so here’s my challenge update. I’m woefully behind which is not unexpected, but disappointing.
2024 Nonfiction Reader Challenge: 6/12
2024 Linz The Bookworm/ Logophile Reading Challenge: 28/60
The Crossing Continents Reading Challenge 2024: 4/12
2024 Fantasy/SciFi Reading Challenge: 5/12
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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…
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Love From Scratch by Amy Hutton ★★★1/2
Sing Like a Fish by Amorina Kingdon ★★★1/2
Sandwich by Catherine Newman ★★★★★
Mrs Hopkins by Shirley Barrett ★★★★
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New Posts…
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2024 Nonfiction Reader Challenge Monthly Spotlight #5
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What I’m Reading This Week…
A forbidden, secret affair proves that all’s fair in love and science.
Rue Siebert might not have it all, but she has enough: a few friends she can always count on, the financial stability she yearned for as a kid, and a successful career as a biotech engineer at Kline, one of the most promising start-ups in the field of food science. Her world is stable, pleasant, and hard-fought. Until a hostile takeover and its offensively attractive front man threatens to bring it all crumbling down.
Eli Killgore and his business partners want Kline, period. Eli has his own reasons for pushing this deal through – and he’s a man who gets what he wants. With one burning exception: Rue. The woman he can’t stop thinking about. The woman who’s off-limits to him.
Torn between loyalty and an undeniable attraction, Rue and Eli throw caution out the lab and the boardroom windows. Their affair is secret, no-strings-attached, and has a built-in deadline: the day one of their companies will prevail. But the heart is risky business – one that plays for keeps.
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Beverly Underwood and her arch enemy, Lula Dean, live in the tiny town of Troy, Georgia, where they were born and raised. Now Beverly is on the school board, and Lula has become a local celebrity by embarking on mission to rid the public libraries of all inappropriate books—none of which she’s actually read. To replace the “pornographic” books she’s challenged at the local public library, Lula starts her own lending library in front of her home: a cute wooden hutch with glass doors and neat rows of the worthy literature that she’s sure the town’s readers need.
But Beverly’s daughter Lindsay sneaks in by night and secretly fills Lula Dean’s little free library with banned books wrapped in “wholesome” dust jackets. The Girl’s Guide to the Revolution is wrapped in the cover of The Southern Belle’s Guide to Etiquette. A jacket that belongs to Our Confederate Heroes ends up on Beloved. One by one, neighbors who borrow books from Lula Dean’s library find their lives changed in unexpected ways. Finally, one of Lula Dean’s enemies discovers the library and decides to turn the tables on her, just as Lula and Beverly are running against each other to replace the town’s disgraced mayor.
That’s when all the townspeople who’ve been borrowing from Lula’s library begin to reveal themselves. It’s a diverse and surprising bunch—including the local postman, the prom queen, housewives, a farmer, and the former DA—all of whom have been changed by what they’ve read. When Lindsay is forced to own up to what she’s done, the showdown that’s been brewing between Beverly and Lula will roil the whole town…and change it forever.
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If she wasn’t dead already, Delphie would be dying of embarrassment. She’s entered the afterlife wearing the sort of pyjamas you don’t want anyone to see and finds herself face-to-face with the most handsome man she’s ever encountered. And he’s smiling at her.
As they start to chat, everything else becomes background noise – until someone comes running out of a door, yelling something about a huge mistake, and sends the dreamy stranger back down to earth.
In a twist of fate, Delphie is offered a deal in which she can return to her previous life and reconnect with the mysterious man she’s sure is her soulmate.
The challenge? She only has ten days to find him.
Ten days to make him fall for her.
Oh, and he has no recollection of them ever having met…
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It is said there is a price that every passenger must pay. A price beyond the cost of a ticket.
It is the end of the 19th Century and the world is awash with marvels. But there is nothing so marvellous as the Wastelands: a terrain of terrible miracles that lies between Beijing and Moscow.
Nothing touches this abandoned wilderness except the Great Trans-Siberian Express: an impenetrable train built to carry cargo across continents, but which now transports anyone who dares to cross the shadowy Wastelands.
On to the platform steps a curious cast of characters: a grieving woman with a borrowed name, a famous child born on the train and a disgraced naturalist, all heading for the Great Exhibition in Moscow.
But the old rules are changing, and there are whispers that the train isn’t safe. As secrets and stories begin to unravel the passengers and crew must survive their journey through the Wastelands together, even as something uncontrollable seems to be breaking in . . .
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Thanks for stopping by!
It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? #IMWAYR @thebookdate #SundayPost @Kimbacaffeinate #SundaySalon @debnance #NotInLove #LulaDeansLittleLibraryofBooks #TheLoveofMyAfterlife #TheCautiousTravellersGuidetotheWastelands
The Guide to the Wastelands is for me! I am glad the chauffering is done and you can get rest. Even though I don’t kow what the bad news is I hope you can resolve it and everyone is well, in good health. When you don’t post, I know you are super busy.
It’s awfully hot here and you have winter – I would love to be i your neck of the woods! As things are I am readig a lot, staying inside, trying to crochet 🙂
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Good luck with all your family problems!
best, mae at maefood.blogspot.com
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Providing transportation for everyone can be an exhausting job. And I’m glad that at least part of the reason you’ve been a bit absent is that you’ve been busy with good things. Sending good thoughts and prayers that the rough stuff can be dealt with.
I have Lula Dean’s Little Library of Banned Books here. I will probably give it a go as soon as I finish the latest Katherine Center.
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It’s hard to get everything done when life is crazy busy, I am sure you will be able to get back on track with you reading once things settle down. Have a great week!
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Great to see you here again. wow that is some serious ferrying around of your son and daughter. Congrats on the graduation, must be so pleasing. Keep those reviews simple and be kind to yourself.
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That is a lot of time in the car! Glad the overtime is over for now at least. Enjoy your books!
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Congrats on your daughter’s graduation!
Everything Rabbitearsblog: https://rabbitearsblog80.wordpress.com/2024/06/23/social-updates-5-long-time-no-see/
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That’s an exhausting schedule! I hope things improve, now.
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I am so sorry to hear about bad news and hope you are all doing ok.
Driving around one’s children is so time consuming and exhausting. Here’s to motherhood!
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You have been quite busy ferrying your kids around. Glad for the overtime for them, but that’s a lot of driving. So sorry about your bad news, but prayers that things will improve. Take care of yourself!
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Take care, Shelleyrae. I’m delighted to read your good news, thinking of you in relation to the bad news.
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Don’t beat yourself up, Shelleyrae. Life has a habit of throwing us curveballs. Be kind to yourself and take time to just be. 💕🤗
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This time of year seems to mean running around for a lot of people. Hope you get some time to relax soon. Congratulations to your daughter. I pray there is reconciliation for that bad news.
https://thebookconnectionccm.blogspot.com/2024/06/its-monday-what-are-you-reading-june-24.html
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Whoa you are busy. You deserve a break from all that driving around. I think it’s okay to be behind – life comes first. Don’t stress. I’m sorry about the bad news whatever it is. Hope things get better and easier ahead.
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Congrats to your daughter! Enjoy having more time now wit h less overtime at work.
Your books look so good!
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Acting as chauffeur at that time in the morning is definitely above and beyond the call of duty and must have been exhausting.
Hope that you enjoy A Cautious Traveller’s Guide. I loved it but I know that it’s not to everyone’s taste.
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Sounds like life is keeping you busy. Your books do look good though. Come see my week <a href=”https://inside-dog.blogspot.com/2024/06/its-monday-what-are-you-reading-june-24.html”>here</a>. Happy reading!
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I enjoyed Lula Dean’s Little Library of Banned Books, I hope you do too, Sheleyrae. I am keeping you in my thoughts and prayers. I pray things get better for you soon.
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Congrats to your daughter! Your driving schedule sounds exhausting — I hope you get a little more time to yourself soon. Looking forward to hearing more about all these books!
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I get behind sometimes and I don’ t like it. I’m trying now to stay a bit ahead. But things like a failing HVAC or clogged sink or dead computer really upend my schedule in addition to all my daughter’s med appts.
I just try to do a bit extra until I catchup rather than try to do it all at once. I hope your schedule gets easier.
Anne – Books of My Heart This is my Sunday Post
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Congrats to your daughter! I hope everything settles down soon.
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This last book sounds super intriguing. Enjoy!
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Hope everything works out four you and your family.
Have a great week.
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If you post the reviews you do, if you don’t you don’t! In other words, be kind to yourself!
Hopefully things calm down for you a bit more.
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Congrats on your daughter’s graduation! And good luck/condolences/whatever’s appropriate re: the bad news. I hope you get some time to catch your breath!
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