It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? #SundayPost #SundaySalon

The It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? meme is hosted at BookDate

I’m also linking to The Sunday Post @ Caffeinated Reviewer

And the Sunday Salon @ ReaderBuzz

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Life…

Monday is Labour Day, so It’s a long weekend here in NSW. Apparently Labour Day commemorates the implementation of the eight-hour working day, which was adopted in Australia in 1948.

Which means hubby is home today, stretched out on the lounge watching DashCam compilations on YouTube. it’s not a public holiday for retail or hospitality casuals though so both the oldest and youngest have shifts, and Aleah is busy studying.

She’s still deciding between two University options, the one she’s already been accepted to (UWS) where she’ll do a Bachelor of Science (Forensic Science), and a second (UNE) which offers a dual Science/Arts degree in Forensic Science/Criminology, but doesn’t make early entry offers til November. Nevertheless we’ve just submitted her expressions of interest for university campus accomodation at both. it’s all getting very real.

Hubby and I watched Lincoln Rhyme: Hunt for the Bone Collector this week, we also watched the movie Midway which we both liked. I also binged Away on Netflix, which I enjoyed. I’m not sure what I’m going to watch next.

We don’t have any specific plans for the coming week, just more of the usual I think, our time is pretty constrained by the kids work and study schedules these days.

And it seems my luck has run out, the iOS WordPress editor has changed, and I’m not sure how formatting this post is going to go, so please excuse any weirdness.

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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…

The Left-Handed Booksellers of London by Garth Nix

Song of the Crocodile by Nardi Simpson

A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik

Honeybee by Craig Silvey

The Godmothers by Monica McIerney

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New Posts…

Review: The Left-Handed Booksellers of London by Garth Nix ⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2

Review: Song of the Crocodile by Nardi Simpson ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2

Review: A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

2020 Nonfiction Reader Challenge: Monthly Spotlight #8

Review: Honeybee by Craig Silvey ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

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What I’m Reading This Week…

It is 1987 and a small Irish community is preparing for the wedding of two of its young inhabitants. They’re barely adults, not so long out of school and still part of the same set of friends they’ve grown up with. As the friends head home from the beach that last night before the wedding, there is a car accident. Three survive the crash but three are killed. And the reverberations are felt throughout the small town.

Connor, the young driver of the car, lives. But staying among the angry and the mourning is almost as hard as living with the shame, and so he leaves the only place he knows for another life. Travelling first to Liverpool, then London, by the noughties he has made a home – of sorts – for himself in New York. The city provides shelter and possibility for the displaced, somewhere Connor can forget his past and forge a new life.

But the secrets, the unspoken longings and regrets that have come to haunt those left behind will not be silenced. And before long, Connor will have to meet his past.

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For five years, Australian doctor Sofia Raso has lived in Kabul’s vibrant Shaahir Square, working with Dr Jabril Aziz to support the local women. She knows that living peacefully in Kabul requires following two simple rules: keep a low profile; and keep out of local affairs.

Yet when threatening night letters from the Taliban taunt the town, and young boys disappear from Jamal Mina, Kabul’s largest slum, Sofia can no longer remain silent. While the square is encased by fear, an elegant former warlord proves an unlikely ally, and a former lover re-emerges with a warning. As the search for the boys intensifies, and Sofia feels herself being drawn back into a love affair she thought had ended, it soon becomes clear that answers will bring a heavy price.

Gripping and evocative, The Night Letters takes you to the heart of Kabul in a story of secrets, friendship and love in all its imperfect guises.

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The English language is changing constantly. We invent new words and phrases, we mash up idioms, we mispronounce, misuse, misappropriate. Sue Butler has heard it all and is ready to defend and disagree with common usage. Veering from tolerance to outrage, she examines how the word sheila took a nose-dive after World War II, considers whether we should hunker or bunker down, and bemoans the emptiness of rhetoric. She shouts ‘down with closure’ as it leaps from the psychoanalyst’s couch, explains why we’ve lost the plot on deceptively, untangles the manuka honey stoush, fathoms why the treatment of famous is infamous, and ponders whether you would, could or should …

Rebel without a Clause is a fascinatingly idiosyncratic romp through the world of words by lexicographer and former Macquarie Dictionary Editor, Sue Butler.

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It’s no secret that love has plagued the Owens family for centuries. But when did the curse begin, and why? It all began with Maria Owens, who arrived in America in 1680, with a baby in tow…

Born with pitch-black hair and pale green eyes, Maria was abandoned in the English countryside by her birth mother and raised by Hannah Owens who warned her, “Always love someone who will love you back.” She inherits Hannah’s Grimoire—a magical book of enchantments that include instructions to heal illnesses, ingredients for soaps that restore youth, and spells that make a person burn with love for another. When Hannah dies in an attack, Maria leaves for Curacao, where she meets John Hathorne, a magistrate from Salem living freely for the first time in his life as he falls in love with Maria. But Hathorne soon abandons her, before Maria realizes she’s pregnant. When she gives birth to a red-headed baby girl, Faith, who possesses immense magical talent, Maria embarks on a voyage to Salem to face her destiny, with or without magic.

But aboard the ship bringing her to America, fate intervenes and she meets a man who will change her life, if she’ll only let him. Her journey, laced with secrets and truths, devastation and joy, magic and curses, will show her that love is the only answer, always.

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Thanks for stopping by!