Showing posts with label Food. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Food. Show all posts

#IMWAYR August 29, 2022

Welcome readers! It's #IMWAYR time again, when bloggers share what they have been reading and find out what others have been up to. 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. These are fabulous places to start your search for what to read next.

It has been a very hectic couple of weeks. I gave up on blogging last weekend and contemplated leaving it for this one too. I decided against that because our son, his wife, and their two girls will be arriving Monday and will be here for a week. I fully expect to be exhausted next Sunday and will be desperate to do nothing. 

Because we expected to be away for a couple of weeks early September, we had to get a lot of food preservation accomplished in August. So, on the 16th I purchased 120 pounds of Roma tomatoes. They had to sit and finish ripening for a few days. Since they became ripe enough, I have canned 14 quarts of tomatoes, made 50 odd jars of salsa, 25 pints of tomato sauce and 14 jars of ratatouille. I also made a couple of quarts of dill pickles and a double batch of zucchini fritters to freeze. After all, the garden doesn't stop producing just because we are busy with other things. On Saturday, the 20th, a crew of us juiced another 320 pounds of tomatoes. We ended up with about 110 quarts of tomato juice. Only half of it is ours. 
It is very satisfying going to the cool room in the basement and looking at all the food on the shelves. 

This is our portion of juice cooling. My uncle reminded me of the good old days when we used to go and pick our own tomatoes and juice up to 1000 pounds.
We are a family that loves our red juice. 

In the middle of all that we got the message that we no longer have to be away. 

In addition to all the food processing, we have been trying to get the suite in our basement under control so my cousin can move in. Our last tenant left a huge mess that has taken a lot of work to clean and a lot of stuff to fix. I've painted the kitchen cupboards and my husband made new doors for them. I've done just about all the rest of the cleaning except the linoleum floor that I am leaving for him to look after. I am quite proud because I fixed the toilet all by myself and, after much scrubbing and half a bottle of bleach, got the bowl cleaned out. 

Needless to say, I did not get much reading with my eyes accomplished, but I made up for it listening to some brilliant audiobooks. 

I will do my best to respond to everyone's posts this week, but I'm not guaranteeing it will happen for the first few days. 

Hope you are all enjoying the end of summer. The weather the last couple of days has been a bit cooler. This hint of autumn has been much appreciated. 

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

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

MG NOVELS


Me Three by Susan Juby & Justin Miller (Narrator) March 22, 2022  🍁

Rodney, his sister, and their mother have moved to a new town in a new state to start a new life. The two children start school using their mother's maiden name because of sexual abuse allegations made against their father. 
This epistolatory novel introduces us to Rodney and his family and they struggle to come to terms with what has happened and make new friends. At first Rodney thinks that the allegations must be false, but over time he comes to understand that they are true and that his father is not the man Rodney thought he was. 
I liked Rodney even if he seemed a bit young for his age. I appreciate that we see the ramifications on children when their parents are held accountable for their unscrupulous actions. I liked the complexity in Rodney's new friends even if some of their adventures terrified the bejeezus out of me. 
All the other Susan Juby books I've read have been set in Canada, so I was a bit disconcerted, and wondered why this one is set in the USA. I appreciated that one of Rodney's friends has a mother living here in BC Canada. 


The Fort by Gordon Korman June 28, 2022  🍁

I am really enjoying Korman's work these days. The Fort is the story of a group of boys who discover an underground bunker. It was built in the 1980's by a now deceased, local capitalist. They end up selling the pure silver cutlery to purchase food and fix one of their group's phone.
A couple of older bullies figure they have money and end up harassing them to get them to let them in on what is going on.
The tale unfolds through each of their voices. I appreciate how the character of each of these boys has been developed. They all have important stories that reveal the kinds of challenges that real boys today are liable to connect to. Ultimately, the important thing is how they are there for each other.


Playing the Cards You're Dealt by Varian Johnson & Dion Graham (Narrator) October 5, 2021

Anthony, (Ant) idolizes his father and want desperately to impress him. Now that he is ten and in grade five, he plans to do this by winning the next spades tournament. His older brother, his father and his grandfather have been winners of this card game year after year. Unfortunately, a lot of things get in the way of this. He and his best friend and spades partner, Jamal, end up estranged. Ant pairs up with Shirley, a new girl in school and still hopes to win. But his father's behaviour becomes increasingly erratic and strange until Ant's mother makes him leave. 
Varian Johnson has created another endearing character in Ant. My heart aches for him as he struggles to figure out how to become his own man in the middle of his father's failures. 


The Stone Child by David Alexander Robertson & Brefny Caribou (Narrator) August 2, 2022  🍁

There are two individual, but linked adventures in this novel. It begins as Morgan wakes to finds Eli near death at the base of the great tree. His soul has been stolen. To save him she has to call on everyone she trusts. She brings her best friend, Emily, from the everyday world to Misewa. Together with Arik, they travel into the dangerous North Woods, to search for Eli's soul. They are helped by an unexpected saviour. On their return home Eli realizes that another soul has been trapped inside the tree. In order to set it free, they have to destroy their portal to Misewa. 
The second part of the story involves their search for a new portal and Morgan connecting to her grandmother and deceased mother. 
I liked this a lot. My adrenalin ratcheted up while reading of their terrifying experiences in the North Woods. (At least there were no spiders.) I liked the romance that is blossoming between Emily and Morgan. I liked that the children are appreciating their foster parents more and in turn, the foster parents are doing their best for the children.  
I can hardly wait to find out what will happen to them all when they visit Misewa in the next book. 


Wings (Bromeliad Trilogy #3) by Terry Pratchett & Stephen Briggs (Narrator) January 1, 1990

I love this series so much that I've listened to each book twice. 
This quote from a wiki page explains the series much better than I can: "The main theme in the trilogy is the struggle of challenging society's accepted beliefs in the face of new information. This theme recurs through the books and includes changes in the scientific establishment, political establishment, religious beliefs, accepted history and family values of the nomes."
Wings is a companion book to Diggers in that it takes place at the same time. While the main group of Nomes are trying to deal with humans invading the quarry, this small group sneaks aboard an airplane and flies to NASA. With the help of 'the thing,' they end up contacting their spaceship, and returning to the quarry just in time to save the rest of the Nomes. 

Like the other novels in the series, this book is chock full of humour and rich commentary by the Nomes that ends up showing us ourselves. 
Some of the humour comes from how the Nomes think about the world: 

'What was that thing, Thing?’ said Masklin.
The Thing extended one of its sensors.
‘A long-necked turtle.’
‘Oh.’
The turtle swam peacefully away.
‘Lucky, really,’ said Gurder.
‘What?’ said Angalo.
‘It having a long neck like that and being called a long-necked turtle. It’d be really awkward having a name like that if it had a short neck.'

Some of it comes from how they see us:
 
'I don't think humans want to know things that disturb them.'

Nomes live ten times faster than humans. They're harder to see than a high- speed mouse. That's one reason why most humans hardly ever see them. The other is that humans are very good at not seeing things they know aren't there. And, since sensible humans know that there are no such things as people four inches high, a nome who doesn't want to be seen probably won't be seen.
  
"The other humans around it are trying to explain to it what a planet is."
"Doesn't it know?"
"Many humans don't. Mistervicepresident is one of them."

This series is deeply subversive. Don't let the book banners know anything about it. 

YA & ADULT FICTION


Huntress by Malinda Lo & Emily Woo Zeller (Narrator) April 5, 2011

I was wowed by this fantasy novel. It's jam packed full of action and romance. "Kaede and Taisin, two seventeen-year-old girls, are picked to go on a dangerous and unheard-of journey to Tanlili, the city of the Fairy Queen. Taisin is a sage, thrumming with magic, and Kaede is of the earth, without a speck of the otherworldly." They travel with the Prince and a small group of guards. 
If the sequel, Ash, had been available, I would have started it right away. 


Homicide and Halo-Halo by Mia P. Manansala & Danice Cabanela (Narrator) February 8, 2022

I kind of fell in love with Lila Macapagal and her aunties in Arsenic and Adobo, the first in Manansala's Tita Rosie's Kitchen Mystery series. They are cosy mysteries steeped in Filipino culture. Also, the food descriptions have me salivating nearly all the way through it.  
In this one, Lila, a former beauty queen herself, is roped into being one of the judges for this year's pageant. Then someone murders one of them and Lila's cousin, Bernadette becomes the prime suspect. Lila and the Filipino aunties (AKA the gossip brigade) get to work to clear her name.


Yolk by Mary H.K. Choi March 2, 2021

So many people have praised this book that I think I went into it with unreasonable expectations. I enjoyed it well enough, but it was loaded with too much relationship angst for me. It's the story of two Korean American sisters who grew up in Texas but now live in New York. June, the older, successful sister has cancer. Jayne, the younger one is a student struggling to deal with an eating disorder and feelings of inadequacy. While the relationship between the two siblings is fraught with all kinds of tension and squabbling, it isn't the angst that arises from this that bothered me.
It's the angst that is embedded in Jayne's relationships with men that was hard for me to deal with. I expect that this is because I am more of an age to these girl's parents and after 46 years of marriage have figured out that you just have to try and be as honest and upfront as you can. Also, if someone is a jerk, you either leave or kick them out. 

CURRENTLY

The Vanishing Half by Britt Bennett June 2, 2020

Stories of Métis Women: Tales My Kookum Told Me by Bailey Oster et al August 6, 2021  🍁

UP NEXT

I've had these books on my up next list for a number of weeks now.  I do mean to get to them but have to admit that they are merely suggestions.

Barry Squires, Full Tilt by Heather Smith  🍁
Cub by Cynthia L. Copeland, 

READING GOALS

#MustReadFiction 19/24

#MustReadNonFiction 13/18 one in progress

Canadian Authors 52/100 

Canada Reads shortlist 5/5 

Indigenous Authors 13/25 one in progress

2022 Big Book Summer Challenge 7

Goodreads Reading Challenge: 201/250

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#IMWAYR August 9, 2021

 Hello everyone. 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.

In the last couple of weeks my sister and I have managed to get two baby quilts almost completed. Here's the one that's ready to give away. 

Then last weekend my four year old granddaughter was visiting. She kept us busy. Ada adored the quilt I had just finished and wanted one just like it for her doll. While she was here Grandpa helped her make a set of bunk beds for them. Ada chose the colours for the quilts and even sat on my lap while I sewed them. The rest of the time when I was sewing, she played around with scraps of fabric. We ended up making mattresses and pillows to go with them. 

We also built a huge duplo house and played a lot of 'visiting with grandma and grampa.' We went swimming, canoeing, and collected flat rocks that we painted. She was here for six sleeps and wasn't ready to go home. Her little sister, mother, and father insisted it was time because they missed her so much. We were heartbroken (and exhausted) when she left. 

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

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


PICTURE BOOKS

5 stars

Fred Gets Dressed by Peter Brown May 4, 2021

My granddaughter and I enjoyed this lovely book about a boy who ends up dressing up in his mother's clothes. She is starting to think that there are boy things and girl things. This is a delightful book for eliminating those kinds of budding stereotypes.

5 stars

Bodies Are Cool by Tyler Feder June 1, 2021

The rollicking rhyme and rhythm in this book begs to be read out loud. It showcases the beautiful diversity in bodies. No matter what age, colour, shape or size, bodies are indeed cool! 


A young girl comes upon her great uncle waiting by an abandoned train station. He tells her of boarding a train from there when he was young. He and his siblings were taken to a residential school. He was there for six years before he came home.
The book doesn’t deal with the horrors of that place, but it does highlight the loss of language, culture and relationships.
Georgia Lesley’s gorgeous illustrations enhance the emotional impact of this story.

3 stars

Spirit Bear: Fishing for Knowledge, Catching Dreams by Cindy Blackstock & Amanda Strong (Illustrator) January 1, 2018  🍁

Essentially this book addresses the underfunding of Indigenous education in Canada. In 2016 funding on reserves was only up to half of what their provincial counterparts received. This book focuses on the reality of the community of Attawapiskat. A school was built in 1976, but three years later, 30,000 gallons of diesel fuel leaked into the ground under the school. Even though children and staff got sick from attending the school, it wasn’t until 2000 that the government set up portables on the playground area. By 2005 the trailers were breaking down and infested with mice and black mold. In 2007, Shannen Koostachin, a grade eight student, began advocating for a new school. Unfortunately she died in a car accident attending high school away from her community. In 2012 the community finally got a new school. Shannen's dream continues through shannensdream.ca, a group working to build schools and ensure equal funding for education for all Indigenous children in Canada.
This book contains an important message. Unfortunately, the fictional component didn’t work for me.


Like this duo's first book, A Family is a Family is a Family, this one showcases a diverse group of characters. It addresses micro aggressions couched as questions. Adults can learn a lot from this book. You can read my full review with images here.

CHILDREN'S NON FICTION


This looks at food across time and space. The content is rich, but the presentation of it leaves much to be desired. You can read my full review here. 

4 stars

The Disability Experience: Working Toward Belonging by Hannalora Leavitt & Belle Wuthrich (Illustrations) Apr 13, 2021  🍁

This book explores what it means to be disabled. While I have a few quibbles with it, I would definitely purchase it for my school library and encourage teachers to read it. You can read my full review here. 

CHAPTER BOOKS


When my granddaughter was here we started out reading a collection of books every evening. After a few nights we transitioned into just reading one of the Princess in Black titles. Each night we read a new one. Ada loves them. Hopefully these will shake up her notion of what it means to be a princess.

NOVELS


Nancy Wake was a fascinating character. This was one of those books that I had a hard time stopping listening to once I started. I was so enthralled I would interrupt my partner's reading to tell him about her. At one point I went to read more about her and discovered something that gave away an important part of the story. It didn't change my enjoyment of it.
This is both an historical romance and a thrilling war story. It's written in alternate time frames. One part tells of her courtship and marriage. The other tells of her work in France as one of Britain's Special Operations Executives.

5 + stars

Firekeeper's Daughter by Angeline Boulley & Isabella Star LaBlanc (Narrator) March 16, 2021

This book is brilliant. It’s a nerve wracking thriller steeped in Anishinaabe culture.
These characters are beautifully written. They are rich, complex and loaded with nuance. I adored all the strong women. Of all the supporting characters, the elders are some of the finest I’ve read. The unraveling of the mystery was fraught with surprises and betrayal. The romance was satisfying and realistic. I loved this ending.
This is one of the best books I’ve read so far this year.


This is a highly satisfying feminist fantasy. I'm looking forward to the sequel coming out in 2022.

4 stars

Arsenic and Adobo by Mia P. Manansala & Danice Cabanela (Narrator) May 4, 2021

This is a delightful cosy mystery. It's chock full of diverse characters making their way in a culinary world. I listened to this, but figure I'm going to have to find a hard copy just to get the recipes at the end of the book.  


Although I finished the print version of this book recently, when the audiobook became available, I had to experience it in this format as well. Kevin R. Free didn't let me down. 

CURRENTLY

The Fabulous Zed Watson! by Kevin Sylvester & Basil Sylvester
Marcus Vega Doesn't Speak Spanish by Pablo Cartaya (audiobook)
Compulsory by Martha Wells (A Short Story) 
 
UP NEXT

Elvis, Me, and the Lemonade Stand Summer by Leslie Gentile
Maybe Maybe Marisol Rainey by Erin Entrada Kelly
My Name Is Seepeetza by Shirley Sterling
Made in Korea by Sarah Suk
I'll try to work at getting the picture book pile under control.

BLOG POSTS PLANNED FOR NEXT WEEK

The Deepest Dig by Mark David Smith

PROGRESS ON MY READING GOALS

#MustReadIn2021 20/25 one in progress

#MustReadNFIn2021 8/12

#MustReadPBIn2021 48/100 

Big Book Summer Challenge 8 

Books by Canadian Indigenous Authors 27/25

Books by Canadian Authors: 78/100 one in progress

Canada Reads 2021 4/5 

Discworld Series 41/41

Goodreads Reading Challenge: 291 /333 

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History Is Delicious Josh Lurie & Laura Foy (Illustrations)


Thanks to NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book. It will be released August 10, 2021 by Honest History.

I really wanted to love this book. I was excited by the premise and the table of contents. It promises fascinating information about food and eating behaviour from around the world. As it turns out, the information is indeed there. I appreciate the thorough and thoughtful details about global cuisine. I liked the inclusion of history. I appreciated the recipes.

It's the layout of the book leaves much to be desired. I like the colour coded pages. I like the inserted information boxes. The problem is that essentially, this book is way too text heavy. In addition, the sentence structure is complex for most elementary aged readers. The format of the book lacks the kinds of text features that would compliment the content and make it easier to grasp. For example, this is a book about food from around the world, yet it doesn't include one map.

Food is sensory. It's at least an experiential combination of visual, olfactory, and flavour. Capturing this in a book was never going to be easy. In this case it seems like the publishers didn't make much of an attempt. There are many text features that would have improved this title. The small coloured illustrations that are included helped a bit, but are not nearly enough. Photographs (and lots of them) would have been a huge improvement!

If you are just looking for bits of data then this book might be ok. The problem in using it as a research resource is that it doesn't include an index or a bibliography.

I would think long and hard, and explore other options before investing in this book for my school library.
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#IMWAYR May 3, 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.

#CCBCBookWeek2021 began on Sunday. Canadian Children’s Book Week is a celebration of Canadian authors of children's literature. 
"From May 2 to May 8, Canadian children’s authors, illustrators and storytellers will embark on our first-ever virtual tour, reaching 17,205 kids and teens across the country. Hosted on digital platforms, our goal is the same as it has always been: to share stories and captivate the imaginations of children and teens. Throughout the week, 45 authors, illustrators and storytellers will visit hundreds of schools, public libraries, bookstores and community centres across Canada to read from their books and share with children the magic of reading, writing, illustrating and storytelling. Touring participants will be visiting students all across Canada, including remote communities like BC’s Salt Spring Island, Fort Simpson in the Northwest Territories, and Lennox Island First Nation, PEI."
I've tried to focus on sharing books by Canadian authors this week and will try to read #CanKidLit books this week.

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

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

BLOG POSTS FROM LAST WEEK



PICTURE BOOKS

5 stars

My Family, Your Family! by Kathryn Cole & Cornelia Li (Illustrations) September 8, 2020  🍁

I love that this features so much diversity in families. I've ordered copies of this board book for my youngest grandbabies.

4 stars

Blue Rider by Geraldo Valério March 1, 2018  🍁

In this wordless story, A young girl finds a picture book on a busy street and brings it home. When she opens it, she is taken from her drab city existence into a world of nature. Pages explode with colour as she reads it. When she finished the book, her bedroom has been transformed.

5 stars

At the Pond by Geraldo Valério March 1, 2020  🍁

A boy visits a pond with his dog and ends up discovering a new way to be in relationship with the animals, plants, and world around him. 


This wordless book is stunningly gorgeous. 

5 stars

Cora Cooks Pancit by Dorina K. Lazo Gilmore & Kristi Valiant (Illustrator) May 1, 2014

I connected with this book right from the first page. I remember being a child watching my slightly older aunts and uncles cooking with my grandparents. Just like Cora, I longed to be a part of that crowd. When her older siblings go out to the mall, Cora and her mother cook pancit together for the rest of her family.
I appreciate that there is a glossary and recipe for pancit at the end of the book. I had to adapt it for only the two of us, but it was delicious.

There is so much to love about this book. I ordered two copies - one for each of my almost four year old grandkids to help prepare them for kindergarten. The 'Richard Scary' format will keep them entertained and ensure they go to the book back again and again. You can read my full review here. 

3 stars

Skunk on a String by Thao Lam March 15, 2016  🍁

Somehow a skunk has been tied to a helium balloon and, unable to untie himself, is floating across a city sky.
The art in this is gorgeous, but at times I had a bit of difficulty making sense of the story.
 
CHAPTER BOOKS

This graphic novel style picture book packs an overload of sweetness and humour. Read my whole review here. 

NOVELS

5 stars


This book is for everyone who has had that defining moment, that episode of utter humiliation that changes their lives for at least part of their life. I've got at least one of my own and bet you do too. This is about how, with a little humour and help from friends, you can rise above it.
This is about the power of friendship. It’s about being friends across ages and cultures. It’s a little bit about finding romance when you least expect it. Ultimately it's about becoming the best kind of person you can be. You can read more about this book here. 


Hiram Walker was born a slave. His father was the plantation owner. He was much smarter and more responsible than his white half brother. It doesn't matter. He will always be a slave. It turns out that Hiram has the special power of conductivity. Eventually he is freed from slavery from an unexpected person and ends up joining the Underground Railway. This is an odd book to review because it's a mixture of magical realism, fantasy, and historical fiction. While there were places where the narrative got a bit bogged down, I was compelled to finish listening to Hiram's story. 

NON FICTION

This memoir reminds me that Indigenous people on Turtle Island lived here long before it was separated into different countries. The history of Gansworth's family showed me a history similar to those I've read of Indigenous people here in Canada. 
I was struck by the many references to Canadian place names and pop culture. I was reminded that the Sylix here where I live have close family on both sides of the border. There is one particular section when he writes about sharing a Tragically Hip tune with his niece that says it all. "The Canadian side of her DNA wakes up, and since we don’t consider it another country, the Canadian side of my DNA wakes up as well, as we listen to Gordon Downie singing of poets and hockey and ice storms and hockey and Toronto and hockey and penguins and hockey and fireworks and the power of phantoms, or fleeting, phantom power, and in return she walks into the house and returns, offering me slices of cornbread, buttered and salted, on a paper towel." 
That's big picture stuff.
In the minutia of one family, this is a story of tragedy, determination, resilience, and love. It's a story of redemption, reconciliation, and rejuvenation.
Some of these poems made me weep. Others made me laugh. I was always in awe.


Wab Kinew is a well educated, former CBC reporter who is now the leader of the NDP party in Manitoba. This memoir was written by him as his father neared the end of his life. It's the story of his father's experiences and how these in turn influenced his own. Kinew's father was a residential school survivor who became an accomplished academic and politician. He was often away from home and emotionally distant from his family. Kinew's mother is a white woman. He is comfortable in both worlds. 
This book is full of what reconciliation means. The official apology for residential schools was just the beginning, not as many people might think, the end. 
It was fascinating to be listening to this book at the same time as I was reading Gansworth's memoir with my eyes. There are many similarities in their family's experiences. Just as Gansworth's family stretches into Canada, Kinew's stretches into the United States. Unfortunately, The Reason You Walk lacks the emotional intimacy of Apple: Skin to the Core

DISCWORLD NOVELS


I finished listening to this more than a week ago, and then started it all over again. I have so much love for this book and this mini series inside the Discworld collection. In this, the second to last book, Tiffany is now the fully-fledged witch of the chalk. The baron dies and Roland, his son, takes over. Roland has gotten himself engaged to a weepy, but beautiful, princess with a tartar for a mother. Tiffany's conflicted feelings about his engagement are compounded by his no longer seeming to be her friend. On top of this, a powerful demonic spirit, the Cunning Man, is stalking her. The Cunning Man despises all witches and uses his powers to fill minds with suspicion and hate towards them. Tiffany must defeat him, because if she doesn’t, and he manages to take over her body, the other witches will have to destroy her. Thankfully Tiffany has many allies, including new witches, a promising young man, and the fearless Nac Mac Feegles to help her.

CURRENTLY 

This is what I have on the go:

Not On My Watch by Alexandra Morton
Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel 
Raising Steam by Terry Pratchett
A Place to Hang the Moon by Kate Albus

UP NEXT

The Electric War: Edison, Tesla, Westinghouse and the Race to Light the World by Mike Winchell
Love Is A Revolution by Renee Watson

BLOG POSTS NEXT WEEK

This Is Ruby by Sara O'Leary

Out into the Big Wide Lake by Paul Harbridge

PROGRESS ON MY READING GOALS

#MustReadIn2021 11/25 one in progress

#MustReadNFIn2021 4/12 

#MustReadPBIn2021 29/100 

Books by Canadian Indigenous Authors 16/25

Books by Canadian Authors: 44/100

Canada Reads 2021 4/5 

Discworld Series 39/41 

Goodreads Reading Challenge: 168/333

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#IMWAYR November 29, 2020

 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.

Hurrah! I am nearly finished the reversible Piet Mondrian quilt. I still have to finish cleaning off the threads and remove any markings, but essentially it is complete. Here is a picture of it hanging on the line. I was hoping the breeze might clean off some of the threads but I'm not that lucky. 



Next I'll be working on the two Gossie and Friends quilts for my newest grandkids. I have a plan for how I want them to look, but now I have to figure out how to get there. 

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. 

PICTURE BOOKS

5 stars

Fry Bread: A Native American Family Story by Kevin Noble Maillard & Juana Martinez-Neal (Illustrator) 

Living across from the school my siblings and I came home for lunch everyday. The best days were those when Mom was making bread. Piles of what we called 'dough gobs' would be waiting for us. I smothered mine with peanut butter and syrup or jam. Some of my siblings liked cheese whiz. No matter the topping, it was delicious. 
This book is a comprehensive look at fry bread. It's really in two parts. The first part contains headings accompanied by illustrations and phrases. The second section at the back revisits these headings with additional detail and explanation about many of the images. 
Ultimately it is about community and the rich history of indigenous people here in North America. 
My mother learned to make bread from her mother-in-law. After reading this I wondered if the idea of frying bread dough originated with my maternal Grandmother's Menomonie heritage or from my German Grandma. Perhaps it's both since my Uncle Cliff recalls coming home after school to fresh dough gobs on those days when his mother made bread. 
Between the two sections in this book is a recipe for fry bread. I appreciate that it has yeast in it like ours does. I contemplated giving it a try, but think I will stay with our own tradition. After all, Mom's fried bread was the best.

GRAPHIC NOVELS


This is a solid nonfiction, coming of age memoir. Robin (Chuna) Ha was born to a single mother in Korea. Her father left them when she was one year old. As a child she experienced much prejudice at school because of this. Still the two of them had a good life as her mother became owner of her own hairdressing salon. They were well enough off to take holidays around the world.
Then her mother took her on a 'holiday' to Alabama where she married a divorced Korean man. Shades of American Born Chinese show up in her relationship with Ha's stepfamily, especially the children, who seem embarrassed by her. At school not only is she is isolated because of her lack of English, she is bullied and shunned. Ha's loneliness is heartbreaking. Eventually her mother separates from her stepfather.
Ha's life begins to change when her mother takes her to a comic shop and enrolls her in a comic creating class. She makes friends there and her confidence returns so that she is able to make friends with other students at school.
Then the two of them move to a city in Virginia with an established Korean population. Her mother found a job in a salon. The multicultural school is much better. Robin ends up in an ESL class with students from around the world. This group becomes her new network of friends. Eventually she connects with a group of Korean girls.
At the end of the book Ha returns to Korea with these friends. She meets up with her school friends there. What she comes to realize is that for many reasons, she is an outsider in both worlds.
While I suspect that Ha’s experience as an immigrant to America has much in common with immigrants from other places, it is also unique because of her particular background as an only child of a single mother. I appreciated how much I learned about Korean culture and gender roles from reading this book. I especially appreciated Ha’s acknowledgements at the end of the book where she talks more fully about her mother’s story.

NOVELS


This is powerful satire. It's weird and wonderful and profound. When six foot tall anthropomorphized rabbits move into an English village, it's inhabitants fret that their property values will be reduced. This family has moved in next door to Peter Knox and his daughter Pippa. It turns out that Constance Rabbit and Peter were friends at university. His place of work, (an anti-rabbit arm of the government) asks Peter to make friends with the Rabbit family and keep his eye on them. Eventually Peter has to decide whose side he is on. 


This is the story of three children growing up in a country where fire is prohibited. Two of them were born to women in prison. Because of this they are 'tattooed' and branded as criminals. The other is from a higher caste family. 
The city is ruled by a maleficent governor who brought light into the city after it was decimated by a fire. He has rigid ideas about who is worthy and who is not. 
I liked the story and came to care for the characters a lot. Unfortunately it just never grabbed me enough to make me sit down and read to find out what was going to happen. When I finally made myself finish it, I ended up skimming much of it. I wish had been more tightly edited. 

DISCWORLD NOVELS


This is going to be one of my favourite Discworld novels. (There are so many I'm going to have to come up with favourites of favourites) It is a feminist look at war, religion, and gender roles.
When Polly Perks dresses up as a boy and signs up to go to war to search of her brother, she soon discovers that the rest of the recruits in her regiment are also women disguised as men. They end up rescuing the rest of the army by disguising themselves as women.


I wondered how Pratchett was going to bring Rincewind back from wherever he ended up in the last book.
I did not anticipate him returning as a demon summoned by Eric, a teenage boy. And yet, here it is. Eric wants three wishes: to be master of all kingdoms, to meet the most beautiful woman who ever existed, and to live forever.
Rincewind, the least powerful magician in all of the Discworld, discovers he does indeed have power.
Parody after parody parade through this tale as Eric achieves his wishes, albeit with a nasty twist. 

CURRENTLY 

I'm listening to Hollowpox: The Hunt for Morrigan Crow by Jessica Townsend. With my eyes I'm reading Turtle Island by Eldon Yellowhorn and Kathey Lowinger and From Me to You by K. A. Holt. The Discworld book I've got on the go right now is Guards! Guards! by Terry Pratchett.

UP NEXT 

My next audiobook will be whatever becomes available. I'm hoping to read (with my eyes) Flamer by Mike Curato and On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous Ocean Vuong. Alas, neither are on my #MustReadIn2020 lists, but three I'm currently reading are so I still think I might actually reach all my goals!

PROGRESS ON MY READING GOALS 

#MustReadIn2020: 22/25 - two in progress

#MustReadNFIn2020: 11/12 

Books by Canadian Indigenous Authors: 24/25 - one in progress

Books by Canadian Authors: 125/100 

Discworld Series 13/41 - one in progress

Goodreads Reading Challenge: 311/333 

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