Welcome to Litsy!

#TLT

1. Snowman ⛄️
2. Homemade marshmallows!
3. Gloves, but mittens really do keep my hands warmer
4. Fuzzy socks
5. White lights on the Christmas tree - strict on this 😆
6. The Holiday
7. Neither really, but if soup it must be creamy 😄
8. Shop online
9. Traffic - with an audiobook!
10. Both 😊

What do you think @Gissy @Chili ?

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Repost for @PuddleJumper

Another December reading challenge with a bingo board! #wintercleardown is all about clearing down that TBR to make space for all the new books in 2024

Challenge is on Storygraph: https://app.thestorygraph.com/reading_challenges/79ed1701-bf5c-4b3d-97e5-1eeebab...

I have always loved gymnastics and this was a heartbreaking story based on the real life USSR gymnastics… while a slow start for me, it picked up the pace in the middle and then I couldn‘t put it down! Overall, a great historical fiction book!

A motherless young Soviet gymnast shoots her shot. Right up my alley.

This was a powerful, beautiful and heartbreaking story based on real-life gymnasts from the USSR. I also loved that the queer element of the story was the most beautiful and hopeful part of the whole thing and was not at all the focus of Anya‘s challenges and struggles.

Anya lives in a Soviet factory town that spends much of the year in polar night until she gets her big break to train as a gymnast to bring glory to the motherland. Anya, her family, and friends are all compelling characters and this book exposes the dirty underbelly of state run sport that chews up athletes and spits them out, not to mention the perils of sacrificing everything for political ideals. Great read! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Ok I‘m adding another read to my top 5 of the year so far. Anya was an amazing character and reading about what a gymnast went through during the USSR years was mind boggling. Easily a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ read!

I won this advanced read book on Goodreads. I can‘t put to words how much I loved it. Learning about what the Russian gymnasts went through was almost unbelievable. I loved the main character, Anya. I love that she‘s based on a real gymnast. The atrocities that they put their bodies through for “the state” was insane. I highly recommend this book, and would love to hear what others think of it.

Y‘all! This is a must read!

https://reecaspieces.com/2022/12/16/winterland-by-rae-meadows-booktwitter-audiob...

Full Review: https://southernersreadtoo.com/2022/11/14/the-cold-taste-of-victory/

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Winterland explores the brutality of competitive gymnastics against the backdrop of the USSR in the 1970s. Not everything that glitters is gold.