It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? a place to meet up and share what you have been, and are about to be reading over the week. It’s a great post to organise yourself. It’s an opportunity to visit and comment and er… add to your groaning TBR pile! So welcome in everyone. This meme started on J Kaye’s blog and then was hosted by Sheila from Book Journey. Sheila then passed it on to Kathryn here at The Book Date.

Hope everyone is reading and staying busy, as well as sane.  I'm trying to!  Our governor just extended the stay-at-home order to May30th and school has been cancelled for the rest of the school year or in actuality, it will be e-learning, which I have doubts  about how effective it is. especially for elementary or middle school students.

 

What I read last week:

Wannabe Farms is for upper primary graders or lower middle graders. It is really a cute book written in prose.  I was listening to a Map of Days, the fourth book in the Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children.  Now that they are in the U.S., I am enjoying the series again.

What I am reading now:

Another middle grade book.  This one take place in Russia and is about the Chernobyl disaster in April 1986

I started listening to An Author's Odyssey by Chris Colfer, which is the 5th book in The Land of Stories series.  It is narrated by the author and I decided I'd rather read it in the near future.

Up next:

Tomorrow, I think I will start listening to Roll of Thunder. Hear My Cry.  I never read this as a kid, not sure why

Book Beginnings/The Friday 56 4/24/20

Friday 56 is hoste
d at Freda's Voice and Book Beginnings is hosted by Rose City Reader. The idea is to share a sentence or so from the first page and the 56th page of the book you are currently reading!  Also, I will now also include a brief synopsis.




Like Ruta Sepetys for middle grade, Anne Blankman pens a poignant and timeless story of friendship that twines together moments in underexplored history.

On a spring morning, neighbors Valentina Kaplan and Oksana Savchenko wake up to an angry red sky. A reactor at the nuclear power plant where their fathers work--Chernobyl--has exploded. Before they know it, the two girls, who've always been enemies, find themselves on a train bound for Leningrad to stay with Valentina's estranged grandmother, Rita Grigorievna. In their new lives in Leningrad, they begin to learn what it means to trust another person. Oksana must face the lies her parents told her all her life. Valentina must keep her grandmother's secret, one that could put all their lives in danger. And both of them discover something they've wished for: a best friend. But how far would you go to save your best friend's life? Would you risk your own?

Told in alternating perspectives among three girls--Valentina and Oksana in 1986 and Rifka in 1941--this story shows that hatred, intolerance, and oppression are no match for the power of true friendship.

Book Beginnings

share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. Please remember to include the title of the book and the author’s name.

Pripyat, Ukraine, Soviet Union
April 1986

Valentina

Valentina wondered where the birds went. They weren't waiting on the sill when she went to the sitting room window that morning.

A pretty good first line for a book that takes place after the disaster that we know as Chernobyl happened.  But as the book begins, it is an ordinary morning, or so the citizens of the area believe.  It has me wanting to read on.


THE FRIDAY 56

RULES:

*Grab a book, any book.

*Turn to Page 56 or 56% on your ereader.
If you have to improvise, that is okay.

*Find a snippet, short and sweet.

Page 56

Chapter 9

Oksana

After breakfast Oksana's mother turned on the radio to listen to the news.  

The explosion of the nuclear reactor has already occurred, so will this be main topic of discussion as we Americans would expect it would have here in the U.S,  Remember this is the U.S.S.R during the years of the Cold War.

Book Beginning/The Friday 56 4/17/20

Friday 56 is hoste
d at Freda's Voice and Book Beginnings is hosted by Rose City Reader. The idea is to share a sentence or so from the first page and the 56th page of the book you are currently reading!  Also, I will now also include a brief synopsis.



When Lila Moore inherits her grandfather's house, she finds herself in a small Midwestern town where margarine is never an acceptable substitution for butter, a coveted family recipe can serve as currency, and the friend who will take your darkest secrets to the grave will still never give you the secret to her prize-winning begonias.

Lila is charmed by the people of Auburn, from the blue-eyed lawyer with the southern drawl to the little old lady who unceasingly tries to set Lila up with her grandson. But when strange things begin to happen, Lila realizes some of her new friends are guarding a secret like it's a precious family heirloom. It's a dangerous secret, and it has come back to haunt them. Lila is caught in the middle, and her life may depend on uncovering it. But even if she can, can she stay in Auburn when not everyone is what they seem, and even the house wants her gone?

Book Beginnings

share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. Please remember to include the title of the book and the author’s name.

Chapter 1

Lila watched them standing alongside the casket, five women in their Sunday best, forming a wall you couldn't drive a Dodge Ram through.

THE FRIDAY 56

RULES:

*Grab a book, any book.

*Turn to Page 56 or 56% on your ereader.
If you have to improvise, that is okay.

*Find a snippet, short and sweet.

56% 

Thr humor drained from his face and he sounded more genuine than he had all weekend

March Reading Update

Number of Books Read:  7 - 






@AnnieRainsBooks #StartingOverAtBlueberryCreek @rjpalacio @jeaninecummins

What I Am or May Be Reading In April

Sine this stay t home order due to the Coronavirus is my best opportunity for reviving this blog,  I'll start with this post.

Currently, I am reading Sunrise at Half Moon Bay by Robyn Carr



I am also listening to My Name is Mahtob by Mahtob Mahmoody, which I hope to finish this weekend.



Usually. I do not have  set reading plan.  But I do have several books that I have planned.  Next I'll be reading Not Like My Mother, which has been on my Kindle for nearly 7 years.





My next audiobook will be The Library of Lost and Found



Other books that I'm hoping to get to this month include:





Since we are on a stay at home order, I would hope I can get to these.

Www Wednesday

WWW Wednesday is run by Taking on a World of Words.

The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

Trying to restart my blog after some rime off mainly to having started a new job and recovering from a stroke that occurred 2 weeks after starting the job.  I'm home still recovering and reading as much as I can, so reviving   this blog is actually good therapy

I'm currently reading The Good Luck Sister by Jill Shalvis book 1.5 in the Wildstone series.  It's a short novella, which I think I will finish by the end of the month.


Next, I will be probably reading. The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan.  Surprisingly, I never read it back when ir came out, I was in college and wasn't interested in it.



I finished several books that I need to review and since the book I'm currently reading is a short one, I better get to it. Cowboy Tough is an romance that I really need to review, since I got it as an ARC on NetGalley and it's by one of my favorite authors.  It comes out next week on the 4th.  The Fierce 44 was an audiobook that I listened to, It is more for middle graders to introduce them to the many important Black -Americans

   
Have you read any of these books?

My Least Favorite Books of 2019

Although I gave this 2 stars way back when I read it, I should have given it only 1 star.  It is way too long and boring as can be..  A good part of the story is about Laura's daughter, Rose Wilder Lane, who is a very unlikeable person.  If you liked the Little House book when you were young,  I wouldn't recommend this book in the least.  I wish I DNF'd it.




Another very unlikable book.  Unpleasant characters, undeveloped plot, and not the least bit romantic, unless you just want the characters to have sex like rabbits with no real story.



I'e read quite a few books about Mormon Fundamentalists, but this one was just so boring.



Now here I seem to waiver from popular opinion, but then there were quite a few people whose reviews mirrored mine. this ws so unenjoysble and unbelievable.. Totally overhyped. This was the last book that I finished this year in 2019 and like the book, the year I say good riddabce to!