“Business!” Cried the Ghost, wringing its hands again. “Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were all my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!”

I‘ve read this every December for the last 5-6. The above quote especially struck me this year as something we should all remember.

@wideeyedreader and I read this for our December mother-daughter murder mystery book club. It was a lot of fun and I did NOT suspect the correct person 😂

It‘s been more than 30 years since I read Huck Finn in high school and I remember almost none of it. I loved this retelling from Jim‘s perspective though. I read it for #sharonsaysso book club and can‘t wait for the author meeting 😁

Also, now I feel like I need to read Huck Finn again lol

I enjoyed this one. I had never heard of the Mitford family before this and I had to Google all the things while reading 😂

This was okay. It had enough twists and mystery to keep me reading but wasn‘t a favorite.

I gave this one 50 pages and can‘t convince myself to pick it back up so it‘s a bail for me. I wanted to and should have liked it, based on the summary. But I just couldn‘t do the writing style 😢

@wideeyedreader and I read this one for our November Mother Daughter Murder Mystery Book Club choice. We both flew through it in 2 days 😂 I enjoyed it-it kept me guessing.

It took me awhile to get through this one because I‘ve been recovering from surgery. I did enjoy it though. I thought I knew who did it and it looked like I was actually right this time! Until I wasn‘t 😂 She got me again. Eventually I‘ll get one of these right. lol

I read this one at the recommendation of my 15 year old niece. I don‘t read a lot of YA but I really liked this one.

I liked the set up of this one-4 possible murderers and 4 detectives to figure out who did it. As usual, I didn‘t have a clue 😂

Tim Alberta, the son of a pastor, has a lifetime of experience in the evangelical church. He takes us through the recent history of the church, explaining how they went from loving God and preaching the Bible to exalting political leaders and grabbing for power. It was sad and disturbing and eye opening-especially since I have family members who fall into this group. I appreciated his use of scripture to explain what the Bible actually says ⬇️

I absolutely love The Thursday Murder Club series so I had very high expectations for this and Osman did not disappoint.

@wideeyedreader and I flew through it for October‘s Mother-Daughter Murder Mystery Book Club. Can‘t wait to read the next one!

“The best Americans are not the critics, they are the doers. They are the people who went for broke when everyone else yelled to turn back. They are those who know that one becomes great because of who they lift up, not who they put down.”

Sharon tell us the stories of 12 ordinary Americans, who are not in the history books but should be, who did the next needed thing. And we are all better for it ❤️

@wideeyedreader and I read this for our September Mother-Daughter Murder Mystery book club. I really enjoyed it-it kept me guessing right up until the end.

While there was plenty of murder, there wasn‘t a lot of mystery for this month‘s Mother Daughter Murder Mystery Book Club with @wideeyedreader It was still a lot of fun though!

I have loved everything I‘ve read by Kate Quinn and this is no exception. She‘s one of my favorites for a reason 😁

This month‘s mother daughter murder mystery book club book was full of twists & turns and shocking revelations. Loved it! @wideeyedreader

I‘ve only read 11. I have a few more that I want to read but a lot I‘ve never even heard of 🤷🏼‍♀️

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/books/best-books-21st-century.html?smid...

I went into this knowing very little about the Alamo, except that we are supposed to remember it. It was well researched and told the history of Texas leading up to the battle and the aftermath, up to present day (Phil Collins?? Really?)

It was disheartening to see how the myth of the Alamo has been used to oppress people of Mexican descent since the battle in 1836.

Fifteen year old Mercy Wong just wants to get a good education so she can help get her family out of poverty. After she gets herself admitted to an exclusive girls school, though, she finds it difficult to be accepted. Then the 1906 San Francisco earthquake hits and through tragedy she learns she has friends who love her.

@wideeyedreader and I read this for our June mother daughter murder mystery book club. I liked it and actually figured out part of what was going on. 😂

Emily Henry is pretty much the only romance author i will read. It‘s not usually my thing. I love her characters and the banter between them. And that there is always much more to the story than the romance aspect.

Daphne + Miles= ❤️

I got this ARC from work.

Two women separated by decades but connected through a beautiful, unique bracelet that‘s been passed down from mother to daughter.

I did think some parts of the kidney donation part of the plot were unrealistic but I did really enjoy the story overall.

Erik Larson is one of my favorite nonfiction authors-I have loved every book I‘ve read by him. He used letters, diaries and other documents to show both sides leading up to the start of the Civil War. I learned a lot and now want to make another trip to Fort Sumter. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

#bookmail is the best mail 😁 I took advantage of the Amazon book sale to get a few more books I definitely don‘t have room for right now 😂 📚

I really enjoyed this one. I was kinda close to guessing who did it this time 😂

“Within National Parks is room-glorious room-room in which to find ourselves, in which to think and hope, to dream and plan, to rest and resolve.” ~Enos Mills

I‘ve been following Amber Share on Instagram for quite awhile so I was especially excited to get this from @wideeyedreader for Mother‘s Day. I loved it ❤️

This read more like YA but it was still fun and sweet.

@wideeyedreader picked this one for our mother-daughter murder mystery book club this month. I loved it. It was just as good, if not better, than the first and as always with these things I was surprised by the ending. I would not make a good detective 😂😂

I am not usually a fan of short stories but I have loved everything I‘ve read by Amor Towles so I decided to give this a try. While I am still not a fan of short stories, these are the best I‘ve read. Definitely recommend.

@wideeyedreader and I picked this one for this month‘s mother-daughter murder mystery book club. I loved it and did not see the end coming. We‘re reading the 2nd one next month 😁

This was so much fun. And ridiculous in all the right ways 😂 Just what I needed after my last book, which was very heavy.

“Hate, we confirmed, is the same all over the world. Warped notions of supremacy. Of fearing, then dehumanizing, the Other.”

Well. I got an education with this one. Browning was a detective in AZ who spent 20+ years undercover in White supremacy & militia groups, learning the methods & plans so he and his fellow officers could try to stop the violence and hate. It took a toll on his personal life & mental health-I can‘t imagine what it‘s like ⬇️

This is the last book in the Schuyler Sisters trilogy and I have enjoyed every one of them. I loved Pepper and Annabelle‘s feisty independence, though Annabelle‘s story broke my heart.

“Thank God for girlfriends. In this crazy, chaotic, divided world that was run by men, you could always count on the women.”

Frankie McGrath is young, sheltered, and idealistic when she decides to follow her brother to Vietnam as a combat nurse. This is a raw, vivid portrayal of the horrors of war-and the bonds of friends-& the deplorable way vets were treated when they returned home.
I loved Frankie, Ethel & Barb. Everyone should have friends⬇️

This was a fun, fast paced murder mystery that gave off Gilmore Girls and Thursday Murder Club vibes. But it‘s more about the relationships between 3 generations of strong women and I was happy to see the growth in those relationships throughout the book.

Definitely read the author‘s note at the end and be prepared for 😭

“Most of them care nothing whatever about race. They want only their proper place in the sun and the right to be left alone, like any other citizen of the republic.” -James Baldwin

I read this for #sharonsayso‘s book club and loved it. It‘s a well researched history of the Great Migration (1915-1970), when Black people escaped the injustice, degradation, and racism of the Jim Crow south by going north and west. Often to be faced with more ⬇️

“I‘ve taken many losses in my life. But my voice is undefeated.”

The bookstore I work at hosted a book signing/talk with Q&A/photo op with A‘ja Wilson last week. I don‘t follow basketball and am not the target audience but I really enjoyed this. She had a lot of good things to say and I loved her sense of humor and openness.

A coworker wanted to recommend my next book and this is what he chose. He and I don‘t typically read the same genres but I agreed I would give it a try. It is definitely not something I would have picked on my own. I didn‘t hate it and it did keep me interested to the end. So overall not a bad suggestion 😊

“The real story is the universal one of men who destroy the souls and bodies of other men for reasons neither really understands.”

I first read this over 30 years ago as a teenager and while the basic idea stuck with me none of the details did.

Griffin decided, in 1959, to find out the truth for himself about the South‘s racial situation by becoming a black man. What struck me was how naive he was going into it and how quickly he learned just⬇️

Born into slavery and still young when granted freedom, Booker T Washington was determined to get an education & help others in his position to do the same. While I enjoyed the first few chapters about his early life and experiences after slavery, the rest of the book-about establishing the Tuskegee Institute-was rather dry and unemotional. Low pick.

“‘Sisters: Women bonded by a shared desire for change.‘ I was not alone, I realized, in wanting something I was not born to have.”

Set in England during the Great War, this focuses on twin sisters Peggy and Maude, who work as Bindery Girls at Oxford University Press. While Maude is happy where she is, Peggy dreams of joining the students at the college across the street.

I really enjoyed this and have already bought her other book 😁

Gotta love a good #bookmail day. Both my #botm selections and Pango order came today 😁

Finally! I was hoping #BOTM would have Kristin Hannah‘s new one this month. I‘ve skipped at least 4 months in a row and will be canceling now.

This is a collection of short stories of different cases investigated by Poirot and Hastings, narrated by Hastings. I had read 2 of them before and enjoyed all of them well enough, though short stories aren‘t really my favorite thing.

“I don‘t believe that we can fully lay claim to a tradition if we are not willing to recognize what we have taken from other cultures over time, for better or worse.”

This is a story about family, tradition, identity, loyalty, secrets and what a person is willing to do.

This was a book club pick for this month. If not for that, I probably wouldn‘t have picked it up. 5⭐️

God has no children whose rights may be safely trampled on. - Frederick Douglas

“In his experience, you didn‘t have to lead a man to hate, just show him the way and he‘d do it on his own.”

This was shocking. Disturbing. The story of the rise of the KKK in Indiana in the 1920‘s, lead by a charismatic charlatan who got rich off hate.

I found it sad that some of the things the Klan said/believed are echoed in current politics. #bookclub #governerd

Reading the tagged tonight while the MI game is on in the background. I‘m 9 chapters in and so far 🤯🤯😡

#goblue #IDontCareAboutFootball

This was a Christmas gift and I had to jump right into it for the first book of the year. I enjoyed it and as usual didn‘t guess entirely right. 😂

I love Storygraph‘s reading wrap up. 😁