We got a new member of the family in June. Meet Pixels! I would‘ve liked a bookish name, but he‘s technically my son‘s cat who‘s really into computers and gaming. Still, I can tell Pixels is going to be my reading buddy! 🥰

I haven‘t read as much this year, but this is the best novel I‘ve read so far. The story mostly follows Thomas Hart, who inadvertently, becomes enmeshed in astronomy with the passing of Hale-Bopp and the history of a mysterious woman from the past. Like Essex Serpent that this has ties to, it combines science & religion to talk about life‘s greatest mysteries and relationships with each other. Beautiful novel.

When a scullion in a home is discovered to have magical abilities, the family pushes her to use her magic to rise higher in society. Set during the time of Elizabeth I & the Spanish inquisition, Luzia must decide who she can trust, if anyone. The king‘s former secretary has heard of Luzia‘s little miracles and wants to use her to regain favor, but he already has his own secrets in Santángel. This was entertaining, but not a love for me 3 1/2⭐️

Halfway through this little book and enjoying blueberry hibiscus rooibos.

I made a Halloween book display.

It‘s Book Lovers Day today! Here is just a small selection of some of my favorite books!

This is the best book of modern poetry I‘ve ever read. The humanness and the love that I felt entangled with left me shattered in the best way possible. Seriously so so good.❤️💔♥️

I absolutely loved this book. Perhaps it was the right moment for it. Perhaps because the Met is the number one place I‘d go in NYC. The author talks about his personal experiences with art and people as a guard at the Met for ten years. It is beautifully written and heartfelt. My favorite book I‘ve read this year. ♥️

All three of my library holds came in this week! Currently reading Weyward.

I enjoyed this book about a woman named Ann who is hired to work at The Cloisters. I really love medieval history as well as tarot so I was pulled into the detail that the author included about the various items as well as the plants from the gardens.

I just thought this was funny. Happy Valentine‘s Day!

So…I've crossed the wine-dark sea and came to
the Lotus-eaters, escaped Cyclops, but not Poseidon's
wrath, received a bag of wind that sent me back again,
stayed on Circe's island in the throes of her magic,
voyaged to the House of Death, heard the sirens sing,
passed Charybdis and Scylla and felt the blows of Helios
and laid in the arms of Calypso, but never gave heart and
back to Ithaca where the deathless gods finally made amends.

While this is a coming of age story about a young girl I couldn‘t help but feel that Janet would have been my soul friend as she doesn‘t fit in with the norm, but is instead a romantic dreamer, poetry and language lover especially Latin & Greek and familiar with mythology, a lover of animals and nature, is moved emotionally by her surroundings and sorely misunderstood. Exquisite writing in this modern gothic novella. Loved it!

I‘m not sure why I waited so long to read this book, but wow did I love it! I don‘t want to write a synopsis because I went into it not really knowing what it was about and was happy to be surprised, but the characters are charming, the story feels classic, and it was just a delicious read and one that I will read again! Highly recommend!

Started off loving this slow burn of a novel with secrets of a small town‘s past and its woods, Mockbegger, and the guardians that keep the nearby village safe with their quirky ways, but it became a bit long and repetitive for me in the end. I liked Lucia, she sort of reminded me of a more lucid Merricat, & I like the author‘s nod to Little Women and Wind in the Willows. Atmospheric and some beautiful descriptions, but longer isn‘t always better

Finished this today as I‘ve been reading each section that correlated with each book as I didn‘t want to spoil anything in In Search of Lost Time. I loved having the visuals paired with Proust‘s text which just added layers to the novel for me. Plus, this is printed on beautiful paper.

So I finished Time Regained at 1:00 o‘clock in the morning after reading this for over a year because I read other books in between. All I can say is wow. So much of Proust‘s writing in this volume is euphoric and how he decided to finish the ending makes me actually want to start writing instead of just making notes and thinking about my stories in my head. I loved this so much! ❤️

I read this book in April and should have reviewed it then. Yes, this book is a bit dry, especially two of the chapters in the middle, but it‘s also the most comprehensive book on western libraries that I‘ve ever read. If you can get through the pedagogical feel of it, it holds a wealth of information. If you like something a bit more relatable choose Stuart Kells or Matthew Battles books on libraries. This is still a pick for me.

Keats was the first poet I really loved and his poems have retained their place in my heart. I enjoyed learning more about his background, where he lived, his friendships, and love for Fanny.

This is between a pick and so-so for me. I enjoyed the idea of a lost manuscript found in the drawer of a hotel room & finding out what hands it had passed through in the last thirty years & the people who were immensely affected by it in a positive way. I generally like epistolary novels, but the letters, although written by several different voices, did somewhat sound the same; that extra flowery romantic style of writing which I usually ❤️

I enjoyed this book which is in part a biography of Bernini and his working with various popes, mostly Alexander VII, to beautify Rome. It‘s a physically heavy book without chapter breaks that made it flow quickly. I especially liked the info about Egyptian obelisks and the gritty details of Bernini‘s love for Constanza. It‘s interesting that we think of an artist as one man for his concepts, but so many artists contributed to these works.

Hi friends! I‘ve been horrible about writing reviews or blurbs lately and need to make a point of doing so, but for now I‘m sharing a shelfie because I just was tidying it up a bit.

I went into the library for my two holds, (the top two books) and walked out with four. I think I‘m the first person to get The Evening Hero as I was listed as 1 of 18 for people in my library system that want to read it, so I‘ll start with that one and hopefully finish it quickly. I‘m going on vacation next week and don‘t know if I should take one with me or leave it home? I‘m flying and torn about taking property that isn‘t mine. Opinions?

A woman with a secretive past moves from London to a remote village in Scotland to start a new life for herself, but the Henderson family that she rents from and others on the premises seem to hold secrets themselves. This book isn‘t scary, but is atmospheric & strange. The narrator isn‘t necessarily unreliable, but at times she seems unaware of what was just said wrapped up in her own thoughts which adds to the mystery of the characters & place.

I watched the first installment of The Essex Serpent and while it differs from book I absolutely love it! Highly recommend!

I really enjoyed this book about manuscripts. Some of the books she talks about in detail are the Cuthbert Gospel, Malory‘s Morte Darther, Beowulf, and Henry VIII private prayer book. The author also talks about known and more likely unknown artists of illuminated manuscripts such as The Master of the Leaping Figures, written letters of the time period, female authors, discoveries of texts, and disasters. I enjoyed the history surrounding these 📚

Overall a pick for me as I was really interested in Augusta‘s job in collections at a historical house where she starts to feel a bit more connected to Harlowe House than she bargained for and I was also interested in her investigating the family, especially Margaret the supposed town witch, that had once lived there. I was disturbed that Augusta seems to have an eating disorder which I couldn‘t tell if she was normalizing or didn‘t realize she

Okay okay. So I might have complained a bit in my review of this book a few years ago that I thought the book took on too many different ideas because I liked the religion and science part, but it became more of a social novel towards the end, but I still overall thought it was great. Anyway, the trailer has been released for Apple TV and it looks good! Too bad I don‘t have Apple TV, ha! https://youtu.be/A5GqOeELRFU

I finished this a couple of weeks ago, but forgot to post about it. I enjoyed this story as an audiobook; Margaret moving from a quaint town in the South to trying to adjust to an industrial town where a strike takes place. I read that this book was initially serialized and Gaskell had wanted the book to be longer, but had to cut it short by two episodes. I would like to see what she intended as I feel that the romance portion was cut short.

Hey! It‘s my 6th Litsyversary! Thanks to this awesome community of readers who continue to inspire me, broaden my reading interests, and share in my love of reading with me! This is my favorite social media place and I‘m so glad to be a part of it. 📚♥️

This book is so beautifully written and I completely understand why it won the Newberry award. This is a story about Lily and her family and their Korean heritage, it is about stories and how they can change us and also how it‘s okay to change our own stories we tell about ourselves as we grow and change, at any age. This book is excellent. Five stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

A fun middle grade ghost mystery that I listened to on audio. Zee and her best friend Elijah notice that a lot of weird things start happening around their town after a storm rolls through town that coincides with the disappearance of a few people and the appearance of some creepy “wolves”. Meanwhile, Zee has her bully, Nelly, to contend with, but they may have to look at what connects them rather than divides them to save the town from evil.

I love Schwab‘s middle grade books so much and that goes for this one. This book had elements of both Addie Larue (death) and The Shades of Magic trilogy (spoilers ) mixed in with the mystery of an old mansion, her mother‘s diary, ghouls, and secrets. I read it so quickly and it helped get me out of the reading slump I was in and the fact that I‘ve been juggling reading multiple books at a time. I really loved this one!

Because of the title, like a wheel, Roger Bacon and the Voynich manuscript should be at the center of this book while other subjects should radiate like spokes; a compilation of events and people mainly focused from the Middle Ages through the Renaissance with info relating to early universities, power changes with rulers and popes, and how that affected whose scholarship was credited as the truth where science meets religion. 👇

Some of the best reading is that which opens up questions for us to think about and this book does just that by examining how we look at the female body in art and in previous years. McCormack chose the Venus, Mothers, Maidens &Dead Damsels and Monstrous Women to talk about things like who were these paintings originally created for? How are different bodies portrayed such as being smooth and hairless, and who is allowed to look and who isn‘t? 👇

I enjoyed this historical fiction novel about how Sylvia Beach came to open Shakespeare and Company. Its focus is on Beach‘s endeavor to publish James Joyce‘s Ulysses, (her own Odyssey), and the friendship/ tumult she had with Joyce. The book also features other famous authors that frequented her place and what an influence she and her shop had on everyone in Paris, as well as her longtime romance with Adrienne Monnier.

I loved this little volume of poetry set in sections such as The Love of Books, Because of Libraries, Marginalia, to Rethinking Books and Reading from poets from Wordsworth, to Borges, to Larkin and Dove. My favorite microhistory books to read are about books and libraries and I also love poetry, so this was the perfect book to add to my collection. I loved it!

I loved this book about the history of Christmas traditions. Flanders covered why there has been a war on Christmas for centuries because of revelry, how Washington Irving helped inspire Christmas cheer, as well as how Santa‘s look changed through the years. Of course she discusses the date of Christmas in its alignment with the winter solstice and other holidays, twelfth night, Dickens, and the start of the use of Christmas trees. ♥️🎄

As with any short story collection certain stories are going to appeal more to some than others. I wasn‘t that into this collection at first, but I enjoyed the 2nd half with Candle & Crib, Men and Women by Claire Keegan was great, as well as The Dead by Joyce. Soft pick as there were a couple stories I didn‘t like at all, but a few I enjoyed immensely.

Hi friends! I haven‘t posted any reviews because I haven‘t been able to read as much lately. I‘ve been struggling with more frequent bouts of migraines and my son keeps getting sick. Anyway, these are the books I‘m currently reading. Braiding Sweetgrass is an audible book which is great. I‘ve just missed sharing with this community, but am still frequently checking out everyone‘s posts and I‘m still stacking more books to read!

Whew, this book made me feel a bit emotional. I got really attached to Franny and Jet and it‘s a bit sad to see this series come to a close. I‘m glad I recently read The Rules of Magic and Magic Lessons last year as this book wouldn‘t make much sense otherwise. There is just a wonderful homecoming about these books with family, doing no harm, love, and the magic we may not be born to, but that we make for ourselves.

I loved this anthology of Japanese poetry ranging from the 7th to 13th centuries. The tanka use wordplay and are about nature, seasons, and the time of day. Each poem includes an English translation, original Japanese, pronunciation, and literal translation and notes for each of the 100 poems. It also includes a woodblock print on each page, but there isn‘t any info about the prints which I would have liked too. I really enjoyed this!

This was one of my most anticipated books of the year as it was described as being like Crimson Peak, but it was the most disappointing book I‘ve read this year instead. I would have bailed if I hadn‘t bought it. It didn‘t need to be speculative or set in an “other” place IMO. That made no sense to me. I couldn‘t understand the main character‘s motive it wasn‘t strong enough to endure what she had to. The “magic” involved felt more like occult 👇

I read this a few weeks ago and am behind with Litsy reviews, so I also don‘t remember exactly what I was going to say about it as it was a library book I‘ve taken back. The sections the author wrote about being in nature and animals resonated with me a bit more than the more memoir ish sections, but I did like confirming that it‘s okay not to be okay all of the time as we all have highs and lows with physical and mental health.

This is a book I would like to own as the illustrations are gorgeous and it is something I would like to keep as a reference book as a could not remember pairing of flowers for every occasion. The flower arrangements with a more sinister meaning were laid against a black background, which I preferred and would have liked the entire book rather than some arrangements against cream. Lovely book for someone interested in the Victorian period/ flowers

I read books written for all ages because a story can be fantastic whether it‘s a picture book or a classic tome. I usually like MG scary books because adult horror is usually too scary for me, but I think love this one like I did the author‘s other book, Scritch Scratch. Again, a title should set the tone of a poem or book and this really wasn‘t about anything in the woods, but rather what was haunting a mansion built in the 1930s👇

I loved this story about Frances, Jet, and Vincent growing up in N.Y.C. on the cusp of the 1960s and spending time in Massachusetts with an aunt whose presence would help to alter their lives and become who they were really meant to be. This book made me feel a bit melancholic and thoughtful, but in a good way knowing that life is short and how even small decisions can change lives. A really beautiful story that I can tell will linger for awhile.

I adore everything Victorian so this book was great for me set in 1893. The story begins with a seamstress and mysterious death. Gideon Bliss arrives in London at his uncle‘s request only to get involved with acerbic Sgt. Cutter as he investigates missing working class girls. Octavia H. is reporter who is investigating Spiriters. There are fantastical elements. I really enjoyed this mystery, but I did find fault with a few things:the title, as👇

Ollie, Coco, and Brian are on their third adventure trying to escape the smiling man and his schemes. This time they go sailing with Ollie‘s dad and Coco‘s mom as well as another friend where they end up on a maybe? deserted island beyond the mist where they are hunted by a sea creature as well. This was not as riveting as the first two IMO. It was fun, but it just didn‘t have the same gripping elements and so I was a little bit disappointed.

📕 I stacked this book thanks to @LeahBergen 😊
🍊 Clementines
🤩 The Death of Jane Lawrence
💞I‘m thankful my son recovered quickly from being sick and the lovely walk I got to take with my husband today.
Thank you so much @Eggs for the tag! #wondrouswednesday Would you like to share? @JacqMac
@Blueberry and anyone else who would like to join in.