#IMWAYR March 1, 2021

Hello out there. It's #IMWAYR time again, when readers share what they have been reading and find out what others have been up to in the past week. Kathryn hosts the adult version of this meme at Book Date. Jen at Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee and Ricki at Unleashing Readers host the kidlit rendition. Whatever you are looking forward to in your next great read, these are fabulous places to start your search.

I am still walking at least six days a week. I'm now up to 8.5 kilometers. I plot out routes to see different parts of the community and country around our small town. I plug an audiobook into my ears and head out. I feel disgustingly healthy, but mostly I am full of joy. In rediscovering the landscape of my youth I'm connected to the planet in a way I never was living in the city. I might even learn to love the prickly pear cactus. 

Titles with a 🍁 indicate this is a Canadian Author and or Illustrator. 

Clicking on the title will take you to the Goodreads page of the book. 

BLOG POSTS LAST WEEK

Last week I had hoped to read and review a Netgalley title, The Incredible Nellie Bly a graphic novel by Luciana Cimino. It was downloaded onto my device and I was looking forward to it. Unfortunately, the text was painfully blurry at best, and mostly impossible to read.

PICTURE BOOKS

4 stars

Find Fergus by Mike Boldt 🍁

This was lots of fun. I really wish my grandkids were here for me to read it with them. Fergus is a bear who at first is not very good at playing hide and seek. With a little help from the author and reader he gradually improves. Eventually Fergus ends up challenging us to find a list of things hidden in the pages of the book.

3.5 stars

Under the Love Umbrella by Davina Bell & Allison Colpoys

Picture books in rhyme are difficult to pull off. This one works - mostly. The structure of the first part is different from the rest and it threw me off a bit. The second time round went better. I do love the idea that when we are loved, that love is with us all the time no matter what we do and where we go. The neon bright illustrations show happy children in diverse families.

NON FICTION PICTURE BOOKS

5 stars

Exquisite: The Poetry and Life of Gwendolyn Brooks by Suzanne Slade & Cozbi A. Cabrera (Illustrator)

To everyone who wrote about this book, I thank you. Gwendolyn Brooks' biography is told in poetry and prose. Suzanne Slade's words are interspersed with Brooks'. Not only are they a joy to read, Cozbi A. Cabrera's illustrations are just stunning.
Reading this makes me want to read more of Brooks' poetry.

GRAPHIC NOVELS

4 stars

Twins by Varian Johnson & Shannon Wright (Illustrator)

This is delightful. When Francine and Maureen start grade six, they end up being in separate classes for the first time in their lives. As the two of them become interested in different things, tension between the two of them arises. It gets even worse when both of them end up running for class president.
I like a lot about this. I like the diverse group of friends. While the twins are Black, it's their twinness that drives the story here. I appreciate that a large component of what drives the problems between the two girls has to do with secrets the family was keeping from each other. Hopefully they all learn to be more honest with each other. This would make a great series. 

4 stars

Measuring Up by Lily La Motte & Ann Xu (Illustrations)

Cici, young girl from Taiwan, has just moved with her parents to Seattle, Washington. While Cici makes new friends, she also has to deal with all kinds of microaggressions. She misses her A-má (grandmother) terribly and comes up with a plan to win a cooking contest so she can afford to bring her to be with them on her 70th birthday. She makes a new friend through the contest and learns a lot from her. I love that she goes to the library for help with cooking potatoes and the librarian sends her home with Julia Child. (We have that book here. Potato pancakes will be on the menu this week I think.) If like me you want to try out Cici's oily rice, you can find the recipe here: https://lilylamotte.com/

NOVELS

5 stars

When You Trap A Tiger by Tae Keller

Stories are powerful. Terry Pratchett wrote, "People think that stories are shaped by people. In fact, it's the other way around." This book is about the stories that make us who we are. It's about the stories that don't get told and the stories that do. It's how the stories of our ancestors and countries are integrated into our modern lives.
Two half Korean girls and their Mother return to the small town in Washington State where their Halmoni lives. One one of the daughters, Lily, negotiates with a giant tiger that only she can see. She bargains with it to heal Halmoni, who is dying, but tigers are tricksters who rarely give you what you think you want. In the end, they get what they need.

4 stars

Binti by Nnedi Okorafor & Robin Miles (Narrator)

The only problem with this book is that it's a novela and too short. I feel like I barely got to know Binti and it was over.
Binti, a gifted mathematician, leaves her desert home and people to go to Oomza University on another planet. On the way the ship is attacked by the Meduse, an alien race at war with these people. Everyone except Binti is killed, but she is saved by her edan, a piece of ancient technology she had brought with her from Earth. It enables her to communicate with her captors and she ends up brokering a tentative peace between the two groups. In the process, she is transformed. If the next one had only been available I would have started it right away. I immediately put it on hold. 

DISCWORLD NOVELS

5 stars

Night Watch by Terry Pratchett 

This is my second time reading this. I liked it even more than the first time round. I find this is true with all of Pratchett's novels. The first time I focus on the story arc. The second time I revel in the details and humour.
On the eve of his first child's birth, Sir Samuel Vimes, commander of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch, gets caught up in a magical storm and ends up travelling back in time. He brings with him Carcer Dun, a psychopathic serial killer. Ankh-Morpork is in the middle of a revolution and both men get caught up in it. While Vimes is trying to maintain peace, Carcer Dun joins forces with the revolutionaries.
There is a saying by Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr, "The More Things Change, The More They Remain The Same." That's the big idea behind this book, except that through it all, Pratchett manages to make us care about all the individuals caught up in the foibles of history, however flawed they are. (Except for Carcer Dun) The more I read about Sam Vimes, the more I come to adore him - not quite, but almost as much as Tiffany Aching.

5 stars

The Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett

I very nearly started this all over again as soon as I finished it. I think it's the fourth time I've read it. The Tiffany Aching series spurred me into reading more of Pratchett's Discworld collection. This one is appropriate for readers from grade 4 up.
While a Feegle is introduced in one of the earlier novels, in this one, we get to really know the 'Wee Free Men.' They are Pictsies, a kind of Gaelic fairy folk. Don't get them confused with pixies or other fairies if you want to keep your teeth. This boisterous bunch of six inch, blue skinned, kilted little people love to steal, drink, fight, and tell lies. This group, the Nac Mac Feegles, make their home in a mound on the Chalk and consider Tiffany to be the witch of the land and their big wee hag.
Tiffany, only nine, manages to rescue Wentworth, her little brother, and Roland, the Baron’s son, from the Queen of the Elves. It is a gripping adventure wherein a talking toad, the Nac Mac Feegles and an iron frying pan play important roles in the rescue.

 

5 stars

A Hat Full of Sky by Terry Pratchett

Three years after The Wee Free Men, Tiffany sets off to be an apprentice to the older witch, Miss Level. In this coming of age tale she starts to come to grips with who she will become. She struggles to fit in with the coven of younger witches led by the bossy, bullying, leadership of Annagramma Hawkin, and ends being laughed at. Tiffany's secret trick of stepping out of her body has attracted the attention of a hiver. It manages to take control of her body and abuses her power.
With the help of the Nac Mac Feegles and Miss Level, they manage to drive the Hiver off. Then Tiffany and Granny Weatherwax work together to put an end to it. The ending is not at all what you might expect.
When the hiver has control of Tiffany, she does the kinds of things that she might think of doing, but would never actually do. When she's finally dealt with it, she takes responsibility for what happened under its control.

As an older reader reading these books, it's like watching a grandchild grow up. It took great restraint not to just start the next one in the miniseries. 

CURRENTLY 

I'm reading a netgalley title, Call Me Indian: From the Trauma of Residential School to Becoming the NHL's First Treaty Indigenous Player by Fred Sasakamoose. I've started Aggie Morton, Mystery Queen: Peril at Owl Park by Marthe Jocelyn. The Pratchett novel I'm listening to is Going Postal. I'm also listening to Hench by Natalie Zina Walschots.

UP NEXT

My partner took my copy of The Sixth Extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert to read last week so I'll start it when he's done with it. I hope to get to Beetle & the Hollowbones by Aliza Layne and finish up the picture books from the library. I now have a lot of audiobooks ready to listen to. The Project by Courtney Summers is next in the queue. 

PROGRESS ON MY READING GOALS 

#MustReadIn2021 5/25 

#MustReadNFIn2021 2/12 

#MustReadPBIn2021 14/100

Books by Canadian Indigenous Authors: 7/25 one in progress

Books by Canadian Authors: 19/100

Canada Reads 2021 1/5 one in progress

Discworld Series 31/41 

Goodreads Reading Challenge: 80/333