Welcome to Litsy!

Love, love, loved this one, for its style and voice and dark humor, as Bina covers some very difficult topics. Bina has a lot to warn you about, as her life is falling apart and she‘s taken to her bed while the Guarda, the press, and a group of “Crusties” (volunteer protesters/protesters who are aiding her AND camping on her land) wait outside.

I really enjoyed this book and developed deep affection and respect for the narrator. It deals with an interesting combination of topics through a narrative style that reflects the way our minds circle around things that are hard for us to face or that cause stress or grief. A great read.

#HappyCanadaDay! So many favourites! Bina is by a Vancouver author. 2. Mona Awad is a fantastic writer - I could read Bunny all day long 3. Hawkins Cheesies

Favourite fiction of the decade, audiobook format. Note that volume 1 in Martha Wells‘ Murderbot Diaries is standing in for all four; they are short, so enjoy them all! Also note that I have trouble counting to ten... #top10ofthedecade #audiobookedition

“Recording my own audiobook was the hardest thing I‘ve ever done. No. Childbirth was harder. I actually don‘t recommend either one.” —Anakana Schofield at #VWF2019

Reinventing the Novel at #VWF2019
Anakana Schofield: The novel is the place to posit philosophical questions. It‘s the place to subvert & disrupt. We‘ll never know what the novel can be; that‘s the nature of art making.
Bindu Suresh: There‘s a lot of unpopulated space to explore between established forms like between poetry & short fiction.
Sara Peters: Interested in how the novel can become more fluid. Sound & sense are inextricable when writing.

Listen to the author-narrated audiobook if you can! Schofield is a gifted reader and really does her own highly quotable prose justice. Highly recommended.

So far I am VERY along for the ride #audiowine

Sorry I‘ve been MIA lately! I haven‘t really been reading much at all and reading slumps are rare for me. This audiobook might be just the thing to hoist me out of it #sunset #audiowalk

Out of 30 books in July, eight were 5-star reads. See which ones they were in my reading round up blog post: https://lindypratch.blogspot.com/2019/07/july-2019-reading-round-up.html?m=1
#readingstats #booknerd

If you like the voices of feisty old women in your fiction, Bina is for you. She warns her readers: “Know this much—know it firm, know it tall, know it wide: I will not shut up.” Her trials include being unable to rid herself of a younger man who started living in her west Ireland home after he crashed into her stone fence, having a crowd of activists camped in her yard, and facing criminal charges for things she didn‘t do. It is seriously funny.

Sacrifice is a stupid thing that women do. Don‘t do it. The men don‘t notice and all the women around you spend their lives mopping you up, so you‘re only making more and more work for the women who‘ll have to repair you.

Why was it we weren‘t rewarded with children? And did I think it was timing, or was it God‘s decision? And, were some chosen and some not? I said no. I said it was nothing to do with timing, but rather some of us had more sense, and could avoid a bucket of trouble being sloshed into our laps.

(Author photo from internet)

He‘d hit me in sly ways and only in the kitchen, where if I‘d cause to hand him a cup, I kept forgetting this. “Give me that cup,” he‘d say, and I‘d reach for the cup and he‘d strike me every time. He would slam the bottom of his hand into the cup and if there was hot liquid in it, up to scald me it would.
(Internet photo)

Eddie was an eruption, a natural disaster. The first human one. Won‘t be the last. Plus, he‘s still going, erupting & disrupting. Like today. He might be gone, but look at what he left in his wake. A wake is an absolutely cheery goodbye. There will be no wake with Eddie except an earthquake. It‘d take an earthquake, maybe, to really be shut of him. Pity you can‘t order them over the phone, underneath specific people.

I started thinking about Canada and what kind of people might be there. I didn‘t like their prime minister. He was flighty. He looked like he‘d take off if he went rolling up an escalator too fast.
(Internet photo)