Happy Friday Links

10-22-21

Hey readers,

My weekend began yesterday with the afternoon off work. I’m also off work today, so I have a 3 1/2 day weekend, and I’m so excited. I have car stuff I need to get accomplished today, so I can spend the weekend doing other things that I want to do. I’m back to having several books started and almost finished; It would be nice to get a couple of them moved to my completed list before the weekend is over.

I’m trying something new with the Happy Friday Links; I’ll tell you about it towards the bottom of this newsletter. For now, let get going with this week’s links; enjoy!

• My reading nibbles are pretty simple and rather plain compared to this. Beautiful spreads, yummy looking food, this looks more like what I would put out for a party.

• I love reminiscing, and the nostalgia that reminiscing makes you feel. It turns out that being nostalgic is good for you.

• I don’t like spooky or scary books, and I especially don’t like horror books. You will most likely not find me giving you a book list of those types of reads, but you can find a scary list here and a spooky list here.

• I read very few paper books, and yet, I love bookmarks. In fact, I collect bookmarks. My daughter knows that a great stocking stuffer for me is a unique bookmark. It is probably a good bet that I’ve already ordered a few of these for myself.

• I just discovered Elle magazine’s “shelf life”; short Q & A’s with authors, and the best part is they tell you about some of their favorite books. Here is a couple I enjoyed; one with Jasmine Guillory and the other with Jonathan Franzen.

• I can’t believe that I just discovered the Best American Travel Writing book series. One book is released annually, and it includes short stories by different authors about all things travel and traveling. The 2021 book shows Padma Lakshmi as the guest editor, and notable prior guest editors have been Bill Bryson, Cheryl Strayed, Robert Macfarlane, and others. There are also series on Best American Food Writing, Best American Mystery and Suspense, and Best American Short Stories.

Read a few of these for short reading escapes and just plain fun.

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I’m adding a new feature this week; a look at a few books publishing next Tuesday. Tuesday seems to be the day that publishers like to release their new books. When I tried to find out why, there seemed to be various reasons for this, none of which made much sense to me; I still don’t have clarity, so I guess this will remain a mystery.

Here are a few that I’ve read and think you might enjoy also:

• The Secret of Snow, Viola Shipman - I wrote about author Wade Rouse writing under the pseudonym Viola Shipman to honor his grandmother in this newsletter. His books not only honor his grandmother, but they are also about family, trust, love, longing, and his love for his home state of Michigan. His books remind me of some of the Southern fiction books that I enjoy reading so much.

• The Wicked Widow, Beatriz Williams - This is the third book in the Wicked City series, and if you haven’t read the first two books, go back and read them first as each has the same characters and builds on the book before. These are dual timeline books set in NY City and Florida in the 1920s, and the more current storyline is set in 1998. I have read the first two books in the series, and I’m about halfway through this one and enjoying it so far.

• The Electricity of Every Living Thing, Katherine May - If you enjoyed her previous book Wintering, you would probably enjoy this book. Katherine tells of her journey walking the South West Coast Path (in England) to understand why she stopped coping with life, why motherhood had been so overwhelming, and why she felt like she couldn’t meet anyone’s expectations of what she thought they wanted her to be.

• Baggage: Tales from a Fully Packed Life, Alan Cumming - I’m a little late to singing this actors’ praises. I had never seen him in anything (that I was aware of) until I binged The Good Wife, and I loved the character he played in it. When I look at his IMDb, I see just how impressive his career has been. This book follows his memoir Not My Father’s Son. It picks up after his nervous breakdown at the age of 28. Having read both of these, I suggest reading his earlier book first as it sets up the basis for this one.

• As the Wicked Watch, Tamron Hall - The ABC and NBC news and documentary host, and talk show personality’s first book begins the Jordan Manning series of TV reporter crime mystery novels. A small-town Texas reporter heads to Chicago taking a job as a TV reporter, and encounters a crime that affects her to her core. Her real-life experience as a reporter lends so much credibility to her writing and the job a reporter does; a worthy first effort.

So many new books are releasing Tuesday, it was hard to narrow it down to just these few. Maybe one of these interests you, I enjoyed all of them.

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Well, this is it for the Happy Friday Links this week. I’m looking forward to my three days off work and the books I want to finish reading. How are you spending your weekend? Tell me in the comments below. If you’ve read any good books, I’d love to hear about those too. Happy reading!