#IMWAYR November 23, 202

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.

We almost completely gutted our main bathroom this week (the bathtub/shower part was refinished a couple of years ago.) Still, it's not really functional with everything else awry. We discovered that the wiring is anything but straightforward, so we are waiting for an electrician to help us figure it out. In the meantime my partner is mudding and sanding the gyprock that was behind the wallboard. I usually help him at this stage, but it's just not big enough in there. 

Otherwise in my project life, my fabric arrived on Thursday so I am back at work on the monstrous Piet Mondrian quilt. I've finished one knitting project that I can't share here now because it is a gift for a friend who reads my blog. I've got socks on the go for my partner that I knit on while we are watching TV. These days we are rewatching Deadwood. 

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

4 stars

The Thundermaker by Alan Syliboy 🍁

This is the story of a young boy, Little Thunder, growing up and learning to become The Thundermaker. Readers learn the role thunder and lightning play in rejuvenating the earth along along with him. As the boy grows up he learns how recognize the seasons through the movement of animals, and how to catch fish, and hunt. Storytelling is most important aspect of this life. It's how he learns to be Mi'kmaw.

"Giju [his mother] explains how one cycle rolls into the next. She says that characters always reappear with a new teaching or a new way of telling an old one.

His mother talks in pictures, and these pictures transport him back in time. There he can find his place as part of this cycle.

When Little Thunder's mother finishes a story, his father picks it up, telling of great hunting trips and how to think like a rabbit or a fox. He tells Little thunder how to know where the animals will be and how to have real respect for these creatures."

Alan Syliboy is a Mi’kmaw artist, filmmaker, musician and social justice advocate. His art is inspired by Mi'kmaw petroglyph and quill weaving traditions. He works in acrylic and mixed media.

5 stars

I Lost My Talk by Rita Joe & Pauline Young (Illustrator) 🍁

Rita Joe was an indigenous poet and songwriter of the Whycocomagh First Nation in Nova Scotia. This poem tells of how she lost her language, her culture, and ways of knowing the world while in residential school.

The back matter includes two pages of information about residential schools and another page with information about Rita Joe.

Pauline Young, a Mi'kmaw artist from Nova Scotia, spent a year creating the paintings for this and the companion book by Rebecca Thomas, I’m finding My Talk. Her art captures the pain and anguish from her own life to portray the darkness and hope in this book. You can read more about her here. 

GRAPHIC NOVELS

5 stars

Class Act (New Kid #2) by Jerry Craft 

This is as good as Jerry Craft's first book, New Kid. It focuses more on Drew, Jordan's friend. Through the characters in the book readers become more aware of the many microaggressions BIPOC people have to deal with on a regular basis.

NOVELS

5 stars

Bloom by Kenneth Oppel 🍁

I read a couple of pages and then got distracted by other things.

When I finally sat down in peace and quiet, I devoured this book. Creepy plants taking over my part of the world - Yikes! Teens who don't just seem like they are part alien, but really are! Thankfully they have lots of courage to deal with this evil flora.

The best thing about starting this sci fi series this late is that I can now start the next one right away without all that waiting. 

After reading this I'm never going to complain about the weeds in my garden again. 

SHORT STORIES

4.5 stars

How to Pronounce Knife by Souvankham Thammavongsa & James Tang & Kulap Vilaysack (Narrators) 🍁

This collection of short stories won this year’s Giller Prize. The tales portray Laos immigrants negotiating their way in a strange new country. They tell of poverty, heartache and hardship. Souvankham Thammavongsa’s characters are so matter of fact real, it’s like you could run into them on the street. If not them, then people very much like them.

The intimacy of these stories reminds me that everyone, no matter who they are, has an important story to tell.

DISCWORLD NOVELS

4 stars

Sourcery by Terry Pratchett

In the discworld an eighth son of an eighth son automatically becomes a wizard. When that wizard ends up getting married and becoming a father to  eight sons, the eighth child is so loaded with magic he becomes a sorcerer. On the Discworld, sorcerer's have far more power than wizards. When said father has a grudge to settle with the wizards at Unseen University, nasty things are bound to happen. When Coin (under the control of his spiteful father) arrives at the university, the wizards are duly impressed by his power. It turns out he is also a source of powerful magic. In a short time they use it to battle each other for supremacy. Last time this happened they nearly destroyed the discworld. It's up to Rincewind, a wizard renowned for his lack of magic, and the Archchancellor's hat to save the day. The satire in this is brilliant. I laughed out loud numerous times.

3.5 stars

Pyramids by Terry Pratchett

This won the British Science Fiction Association in 1989, but is my least favourite book in the series so far. That said, once I got into it I was certainly engaged. It's set in a desert kingdom, Djelibeybi. which is the Discworld's version of Egypt. Teppic, the hero, went away to Ankh-Morpork to train to be an assassin, but upon his graduation, his father dies. He has to return to and take his place as king. In theory he is the supreme ruler, but he soon learns that in reality he is nothing more than a figurehead. In attempting to appease the high priest, he orders the largest and most elaborate pyramid ever built for his father. In order to create this spectacle, the pyramid makers call upon quantum magic. It ends up spinning Djelibeybi into some kind of time warp where the dead come alive and gods walk the earth.

Teppic misses all this because he has fled the Kingdom with one of his father's handmaidens who did not want to 'volunteer' to die and be interred in the pyramid with him. Upon learning that Djelibeybi has disappeared, he has to figure out how to find it and save them all.

This book, like others  in the series is fully loaded with play on words and parodies of life in our round world. This site here outlines most, if not all of them. 

CURRENTLY 

I'm listening to The Constant Rabbit by Jasper Fforde. With my eyes I'm reading Wish in the Dark by Christina Soontornvat. The Discworld book I've got on the go right now is Eric. 

UP NEXT 

I'm hoping my next audiobook will be Hollowpox: The Hunt for Morrigan Crow by Jessica Townsend, but if it doesn't arrive from the library in time, I've just downloaded the ebook. I'm hoping to read (with my eyes) From You to Me by K. A. Holt. both of these are on my #MustReadIn2020 lists. I fear I may not reach all my goals this year, but I'm going to do my best in the next while. I've paused all my library holds except those on the lists. 

PROGRESS ON MY READING GOALS 

#MustReadIn2020: 22/25 

#MustReadNFIn2020: 11/12 

Books by Canadian Indigenous Authors: 24/25 

Books by Canadian Authors: 125/100 

Goodreads Reading Challenge: 304/333