Weird_O Bill Futile Frolics in 2025, II

The Eyes of Weirdness
                  

Stack o' Reads—1-1-2025 through 7-7-2025
                  

First quarter reads

January
1. So Long, See You Tomorrow, William Maxwell. Finished 1/4/25. 
2. Literary Feuds, Anthony Arthur. Finished 1/5/25. 
3. The Toughest Indian in the World, Sherman Alexie (AAC). Finished 1/9/25. 
4. Oh Skin-Nay: The Days of Real Sport, verse by Wilbur Nesbit, drawings by Clare Briggs. Finished 1/12/25. 
5. The Late Monsieur Gallet, Georges Simenon. Finished 1/15/25. 
6. Hotel Splendide, Ludwig Bemelmans. Finished 1/16/25. 
7. Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls, David Sedaris. Finished 1/23/25. 
8. Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City, Matthew Desmond (Nonfiction Challenge). Finished 1/24/25. 
9. The Violent Bear It Away, Flannery O'Connor. Finished 1/28/25. 
10. Dorothea Lange: Seeing People, Philip Brookman. Finished 1/31/25 (at 11:59 p.m.). 

Pick o' the Month: 

February
11. The Rock Snob*s Dictionary: An Essential Lexicon of Rockological Knowledge, David Kamp and Steven Daly. Finished 2/1/25. 
12. Glorious Exploits, Ferdia Lennon. Finished 2/3/25. 
13. The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse, Charlie Mackesy. Finished 2/4/25. 
14. Annie Leibovitz, Photographs, 1970-1990 : Including a Conversation with Ingrid Siscny, Annie Leibovitz. Finish 2/4/25. 
15. Necessary Trouble: Growing Up at Midcentury, Drew Gilpin Faust. Finished 2/7/25. 
16. Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth, Reza Aslan (for February AAC). Finished 2/17/25. 
17. The Map Thief, Michael Blanding (for February Non-Fiction challenge) Finished 2/22/25. 
18. My Lobotomy, Howard Dully. Finished 2/26/25. 
19. The White Album: A Collection of Images Inspired by the Songs of the Beatles, compiled and introduced by Russell Walks. Finished 2/26/25. 
20. Missing Person, Patrick Modiano. Finished 2/27/25. 
21. Stop Project 2025: A Comics Guide to the Republican Plan to End Democracy, an e-book. Finished 2/28/25. 

Picks o' the Month:  &

March
22. Paved Paradise: How Parking Explains the World, Henry Grabar. Finished 3/6/25. 
23. Horrorstör, Grady Hendrix. Finished 3/9/25. 
24. In Praise of Idleness, Bertrand Russell and Bradley Trevor Greive. Finished 3/15/25. 
25. Everyday People, Stewart O'Nan (March AAC). Finished 3/16/25. 
26. Fink on Warhol: New York Photographs of the 1960s, Larry Fink. Finished 3/17/25. 
27. The Spy in Moscow Station, Eric Haseltine. Finished 3/21/25. 
28. How About Never--Is Never Good for You, Bob Mankoff. Finished 3/24/25. 

Pick o' the Month: 

Second quarter reads

April
29. Careless People, Sarah Wynn-Williams. Finished 4/4/25. 
30. All the Beauty in the World, Patrick Bringley. Finished 4/8/25. 
31. When the Moon Hits Your Eye, John Scalzi. Finished 4/13/25. 
32. How to Read a Book, Monica Wood. Finished 4/18/25. 
33. Grandma Gatewood's Walk, Ben Montgomery. Finished 4/26/25. 

Pick o' the Month: 

May
34. Warlight, Michael Ondaatje. Finished 5/2/25. 
35. A Clockwork Orange, Anthony Burgess. Finished 5/31/25. 

Pick o' the Month: 

June
36. The Public Library: A Photographic Essay, Robert Dawson. Finished 6/2/25. Interesting.
37. Crumb: A Cartoonist's Life, Dan Nadel. Finished 6/7/25. Most Excellent.
38. The Carter of La Providence, Georges Simenon. Finished 6/11/25. 
39. The Night at the Crossroads, Georges Simenon. Finished 6/18/25. 
40. Lies My Teacher Told Me: A Graphic Adaptation, James Loewen and Nate Powell. Finished 6/20/25. 
41. Humans, Mike Dowdall & Pat Welch. Finished 6/21/25.
42. The New Shoe, Jeff MacNelly. Finished 6/23/25.
43. The Machine Stops, E. M. Forster. Finished 6/27/25.
44. The Twilight Man: Rod Serling and the Birth of Television, Koren Shadmi. Finished 6/29/25.
45. Reduced Shakespeare: The Complete Guide for the Attention-Impaired (abridged), Reed Martin and Austin Tichenor. Finished 6/30/25.

Pick o' the Month: 

Third quarter reads

July
46. The Sellout, Paul Beatty. Finished 7/1/25. 
47. Drive Your Plow over the Bones of the Dead, Olga Tokarczuk. Finished 7/6/25. 
48. The Yellow Dog, Georges Simenon. Finished 7/6/25. 
49. Sealskin, Jeff Dworsky. Finished 7/10/25. 
50. Art & Beauty Magazine, Robert Crumb. Finished 7/12/25. 
51. Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism, Amanda Montell. Finished 7/14/25. 
52. The Rape of Nanking, Iris Chang. Finished 7/18/25.  
53. I Will Judge You by Your Bookshelf, Grant Snider. Finished 7/23/25.  

Pick o' the Month 

August
54. Wild Thing: A Life of Paul Gauguin, Sue Prideaux. Finished 8/3/25.  
55. Picture, Lillian Ross. Finished 8/5/25. 
56. Maigret Gets Angry, Georges Simenon. Finished 8/6/25. 
57. Thank God for the Atom Bomb and other essays, Paul Fussell. Finished 8/8/25. 
58. American Heiress, Jeffrey Toobin. True crime for AAC. Finished 8/12/25. 
59. Trent's Last Case, E. C. Bentley. Finished 8/15/25. 
60. Preston Sturges by Preston Sturges. Finished 8/20/25. Movies for NF Challenge. 
61. The Black Mask Boys: Masters in the Hard-Boiled School of Detective Fiction, William Nolan. Finished 8/28/25. 

Pick o' the Month 

September
62. James, Percival Everett. Finished 9/1/25. 
63. Dirtbag, Massachusetts: A Confessional, Isaac Fitzgerald. Finished 9/5/25. 
64. Unfinished Business: Notes of a Chronic Re-reader, Vivian Gornick. Finished 9/9/25. 
65. Jesus' Son: Stories, Denis Johnson. Finished 9/9/25. 
66. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain (re-read). Finished 9/17/25. 
67. The Little Book of Famous Insults, Betty Jo Ramsey, ed. Finished 9/18/25. 
68. The Man in My Basement, Walter Mosley (re-read). Finished 9/20/25. 
69. The AI Con: How to Fight Big Tech's Hype and Create the Future We Want, Emily Bender and Alex Hanna. Finished 9/28/25. 
70. Practical Magic, Alice Hoffman. Finish 9/30/25. 

Picks o' the Month  

Fourth quarter reads

October
71. Death's Acre: Inside the Legendary Forensic Lab, the Body Farm, Where the Dead Do Tell Tales, Dr. Bill Bass and Jon Jefferson. Finished 10/2/25.
72. Art Work: On the Creative Life, Sally Mann. Finished 10/8/25.
73. My Friend Dahmer, Derf Backderf. Finished 10/10/25.
74. Autocracy, Inc.: The Dictators Who Want to Run the World, Anne Applebaum. Finished 10/18/25.
75. In Patagonia, Bruce Chatwin. Finished 10/30/25.
76. I Feel Bad About My Neck, Nora Ephron. Finished 10/31/25.

Pick o' the Month 

November
77. An Artist of the Floating World, Kazuo Ishiguro. Finished 11/8/25.
78. I, Robot, Isaac Asimov. Finished 11/10/25.
79. Make a Chair from Bullsh%$t, Christopher Schwartz. Finished 11/13/25.
80. Georgia O'Keeffe at Ghost Ranch, John Leongard. Finished 11/17/25. SnackBook.
81. Everything Is Tuberculosis, John Green. Finished 11/29/25.
82. The Essential Andy Warhol, Ingrid Schaffner. Finished 11/30/25. SnackBook.

December
83. Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, Gabrielle Zevin. Finished 12/10/25. Excellent, as in super-duper.
84. Fallout: The Hiroshima Cover-up and the Reporter Who Revealed It to the World, Lesley M. M. Blume. Finished 12/18/25
85. Hiroshima, John Hersey. Finished 12/25/25.

Currently Reading as of 12/6/25
The 6:41 to Paris, Jean-Philippe Blondel.
The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark, Carl Sagan.
William Faulkner, N. Thomas Inge. SnackBook.
Wit, Des McHale.
Into the Night, Cornell Woolrich and Lawrence Bloch.

I'll blather on in this developing post.

You should feel free to blather on hereafter.

Oh! And please do.

Happy new thread, Bill!

To be co-operative, blather, blather.

Happy new thread!

Happy new thread, Bill!

Happy Friday, Bill. Happy New Thread. Those eyes!! Glad to see you are back into the books. I still NEED to get to The Rape of Nanking. Come on, Marky!

Happy new thread, and happy Friday, Bill. Those eyes, that stack! Happy reading.

Love the stack of books! Happy new thread!

Blatheringly,

Karen O

Happy new one!!!

Happy new thread, Bill

Headed into rehab this afternoon. Here's hoping it will do me some good.

Thanks to all you well-wishers: Susan, Anita, Irene, Mark, Kristel, Karen, Shelley, and Paul.

By-the-bye, I'm funning about "rehab". It's Cardio-Pulmonary Rehab. Three days a week, one hour per session. Organized and supervised by the cardiac specialists in the hospital where I got the stents.

Still reading Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism. Past the halfway point. While Trumpf's name comes up, the author's focus is the language of Jim Jones, L. Ron Hubbard, and other cult leaders. Scary, sad case studies.

Good luck with your rehab, Bill!

Hi Bill! Happy new thread, happy Saturday.

Mostly a line in the sand moving forward, sorry I missed your cath procedure. I’m glad things are under control. Ugh to dryer woes and 4-day internet outage. Yay to lots of books bought, all read. Did I miss anything major? If so, I apologize.

>1 weird_O: Well, hello there.

>2 weird_O: I love your stack o’ books read each year.

>16 weird_O: Good luck with the cardio rehab.

Happy new thread, Bill!

>4 weird_O: I've read a couple of books about Rod Serling's life - The Twilight Man is news for me I will have to find it.

I'm a big fan of Serling - was exciting to see a writer step out into the spotlight like that.

Return with us now to the thrilling days of yesteryear, when television was a place for serious drama and no apologies. Seems a thousands years away.

Did you post about The Rape of Nanking That was a hard read. Brilliant and difficult and necessary though

>20 magicians_nephew: I have The Rape of Nanking cuing up itself for reading to begin tonight, Jim. I have three other books on deck, and I have been waffling. But you've applied the push I've needed. Most everyone who knows of the book has warned me it is grim.

>20 magicians_nephew:, >21 weird_O: The Rape of Nanking and The Chinese in America, also by Iris Chang, are brilliant, eye-opening, necessary, and grim IMO as well. Each book easily won 5 stars from me. It's an incredible tragedy that Ms Chang committed suicide at a very young age (early 30s?) while researching, IIRC, a third book about the horrors inflicted on the Chinese people in the 20th century.

Happy new thread, Bill!

           

Today feels like a day off. No appointments, medical or other. No rehab. Still have one-half a vat of Mac 'n' Cheese 'n' hot sausage in the frig for lunch and/or supper. Drinking my breakfast joe for lunch. I observed during my morning surfing binge that GOP senators Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins voted against defunding public broadcasting. Why is it, among the GOP Senate cabal, only two ladies "have-a-pair"? Tillis? Paul? I guess Lisa and Sue could go against the mob, if only because their contrary votes wouldn't derail the bill. Bah!

I am engrossed in The Rape of Nanking and have about 100 pages to read. It is so ghastly. I was struck that Hirohito intervened in the planning to put his uncle, Prince Asaka Yasuhiko, in charge. "...Hirohito had singled out Asaka as the one member of the royal family who possessed an attitude that was 'not good' and apparently gave his uncle the appointment at Nanking as an opportunity to redeem himself." I'm ashamed to admit that I've always believed that Hirohito was somehow sidelined by the Japanese generals from the war's planning and execution, and thus was absolved of any blame.

Oh ye gods!!! A TRIPLE post. Maybe I need to bolt a shot or two of top-quality moonshine, shake off whatever it is that besets me.

Today feels like a day off. No appointments, medical or other. No rehab. Still have one-half a vat of Mac 'n' Cheese 'n' hot sausage in the frig for lunch and/or supper. Drinking my breakfast joe for lunch...

Yes, yes. I wrote that. It doesn't bear repeating

YES yes. This too will be gone shortly.

Today feels like a day off. No appointments, medical or other. No rehab. Still have one-half a vat of Mac 'n' Cheese 'n' hot sausage in the frig for lunch and/or supper. Drinking my breakfast joe for lunch. I observed during my morning surfing binge that GOP senators Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins voted against defunding public broadcasting. Why is it, among the GOP Senate cabal, only two ladies "have-a-pair"? Tillis? Paul? I guess Lisa and Sue could go against the mob, if only because their contrary votes wouldn't derail the bill. Bah!

I am engrossed in The Rape of Nanking and have about 100 pages to read. It is so ghastly. I was struck that Hirohito intervened in the planning to put his uncle, Prince Asaka Yasuhiko, in charge. "...Hirohito had singled out Asaka as the one member of the royal family who possessed an attitude that was 'not good' and apparently gave his uncle the appointment at Nanking as an opportunity to redeem himself." I'm ashamed to admit that I've always believed that Hirohito was somehow sidelined by the Japanese generals from the war's planning and execution, and thus was absolved of any blame.

>27 weird_O: Bill, thought I would drop by and point you to Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan if you have a continued interest in that period of Japanese history. Bix makes a pretty compelling argument that the emperor was a lot more involved than people thought. I especially was interested in how directly he was involved in surrender negotiations and that it is fairly clear that he was more concerned with preserving the imperial throne than the damage being wrought by the two atomic bombs.

>27 weird_O:
I just added a title to my gargantuan TBR list that deals with this very topic. In the Realm of a Dying Emperor. It was published in 1993 and deals with Hirohito and his role. Here is the Amazon blurb about the book.

When the Emperor Hirohito died in 1989, Japanese newspapers had to use a special, exalted word to refer to his death, and had to depict his life uncritically, as one beginning in turbulence but ending in magnificent accomplishment. To do otherwise would have exposed them to terrorism from the vigilant right wing. Yet this insightful book by a Japanese-American scholar who grew up in both cultures reveals the hidden fault lines in the realm of the dying emperor by telling the stories of three unlikely dissenters: a supermarket owner who burned the national flag; an aging widow who challenged the state's "deification" of fallen soldiers; and the mayor of Nagasaki, who risked his career and his life by suggesting that Hirohito bore some responsibility for World War II.

I can't remember where I saw the reference to this book, but it caught my eye and when I read the blurb I added it to my TBR list.

I have finished The Rape of Nanking by Iris Chang. It is . But it is also grim. Grim grim grim. In 1937, the Japanese invaded China, assaulting Shanghai, then advancing along the Yangtze River to Nanking, a walled city with a population near 700,000. The author reports:

[T]he imperial government endorsed policies that would wipe out everyone in certain regions in China. One of the deadliest was the "Three-all" policy ("Loot all, kill all, burn all")...In his diary, a frustrated Japanese colonel reveals the cruel simplicity of this policy: "I have received orders from my superior officer that every person in this place must be killed."

Did I mention that I finished reading The Rape of Nanking by Iris Chang? I sampled some ancillary stuff, and jotted down the titles of books recommended by Darryl, Erik, and Benita.

The Chinese in America, Iris Chang.
Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan, Herbert Bix
In the Realm of a Dying Emperor, Norma Field

And of course I'm interested in Chang's other books.

The local angle: I read in The Guardian, that British newspaper, that my neighbor Luis Leon was snatched by ICE from an immigration office and subsequently deported to Guatemala. Mr. Leon, 82, hails from Chile. He was granted asylum in the US in 1987, when Pinochet was in power in Chile. He settled in Allentown, spent decades working, paying taxes, raising a family. Then he lost his wallet, and with it his Green Card, a little scrap of paper entitling him to reside legally in the US. Do you have your Social Security card? Voter registration card? It's easy to lose/misplace these things, right?

The family can't locate him. They get a couple of phone calls from a woman claiming to be an immigration lawyer, who tells them that he's died. But no, he's in a hospital in Guatemala. WTF?

Hits home.

>32 weird_O: - Eek. How awful, for him and his family. And all Americans who despise what trump and his goons are capable of. :-(

>32 weird_O: I read that story too Bill. It's awful, and I can only imagine how much greater the emotional impact is when you know the person.

Just a morning gloat, if you all don't mind. I turned off the light last night with the BR ceiling fan on low. Climate controlled house, i.e. no AC. Come sunrise and I was C O L D. Set the water for coffee to boil and checked the outside thermometer. 69°. Glory be!

>34 lauralkeet: Gloriosky! I don't know Mr. Leon. He's my neighbor in the sense that all 370,000 folks in Lehigh County are my neighbors. I knew I should clarify that...as I poked the "Post message". Sorry.

>35 weird_O: ohhh, I get it. No problem Bill!

IMO it doesn't matter whether we know the person involved or not. It is simply wrong. This morning on NPR there was a report of an Afghan interpreter who has been detained when he showed up for a regularly scheduled report-in to the Immigration Court. This is following the law. Why is this person being retained? They are following the law, therefore, they are a legal immigrant. It doesn't seem to me to take a great brain to figure that out. But then, if you don't believe in birthright citizenship, I guess anyone of us can be deported.

Checking in on the new thread, Bill! I agree that The Rape of Nanking is great, but it is one that I will never read again as it is just that overwhelming to me.

Have a wonderful Wednesday!

>38 alcottacre: The Rape of Nanking is still flitting through my thoughts, Stasia. I don't think I'd want to re-read it anytime soon, but it presents so many avenues for further reading. I've already re-read a Paul Fussell essay called "Thank God for the Atom Bomb." A veteran of combat in Europe, Fussell (and many other soldiers) was returned to the US and groomed for the assault of the Japanese home islands. In the face of Japanese intransigence, the use of The Bomb was a life-saver for him and his fellow foot-soldiers.

>37 benitastrnad: Of course I am with you, Benita. I fret about the vast number of willing foot-soldiers in ICE. How will they be repatriated into a civil society? We bungled the task at the end of our Civil War.

-----------------

I've run into trouble with current reading. Too many forks. I took 'em, and now I'm kinda lost. To compound that problem, I've picked up close to a dozen new-to-me books that want to be sampled "right NOW!"

This too will pass. Ain't.

Geez, I've been buying books. Just a couple at a time, but they are piling up. I'm going to need rehab. Acquired in the last few days:

Hidden Libraries: The World's Most Unusual Book Depositories, D C Helmuth
Algospeak: How Social Media is Transforming the Future of Language, Adam Aleksic
The AI Con: How to Fight Big Tech's Hype and Create the Future We Want, Emily M. Bender & Alex Hanna
The State of the Art, Iain M. Banks

I picked these titles for...ah...well, reasons. Algospeak crept into my head as I surfed the LT threads. I think Dr. Derus is to blame. The AI Con was brought to my attention by James Gleick who reviewed it in The New York Review of Books. The Banks book is the only one of his 64 books that B&N had on offer. I read a conversation between Paul Krugman and a follow economist Henry Farrell, which included comments about how influential sci-fi books have been amongst The Tech Bros. Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson was cited as particularly influential...and I have read it. Banks also was cited. Krugman explained:

Okay, a word for listeners Iain M. Banks, the late Iain Banks is a science fiction writer and has an incredible series of novels, the culture novels, which do portray a kind of utopian culture based partially on artificial intelligence. What's funny about that is that Banks was pretty clearly a socialist himself.

So a taste of of Banks.

Now I must read. Continuing with Wild Thing: A Life of Paul Gauguin. And then....

ICE repatriation is a great question, Bill. How will we absorb these licensed terrorists back into a civil society? Or will we need to watch out for them forever?

I almost always begin the day with HCR and Prof. Krugman, and my day thus gets off to a woeful start. I'm one of those people who keeping doing the same thing and being surprised when the result is the same.

Well, I'm still young and I can change. If I have to. I think.

Mr. Natural stopped by and delivered marching orders. 

>25 weird_O: Your take on 'The Rape of Nanking is muchly similar to mine. The whole story will probably never be told, but Hirohito was lucky not be hanged after the war. He was proactive in many of the nastier parts of the war and complicit in all of it. The shy bookish disengaged Emperor (“Who? Me?”) is largely a post war myth.

MacArthur thought that stripping the Chrysanthemum Throne of its divinity was enough and he wanted Hirohito kept around to bring stability to the country. Or maybe Mac just recognized a kindred soul in the Emperor. Who knows.

Yes I did. Finished Wild Thing: A Life of Paul Gauguin by Sue Prideaux. Most excellent. But it's late.

I've got several books that I sampled, and tomorrow later today I'll narrow my focus to one.

You have been reading lots of art books this year. There is lots to learn about art and artists and the books are often quite pretty. Does a person need anything more to make them read an art book?

Howdy, Bill. I have the audio of The Rape of Nanking lined up. I have been meaning to get to this one for years. I appreciate the nudge. The Gauguin bio sounds really good too.

>41 ffortsa: We must incorporate this "reconstruction" into our thinking, Judy. We worked with Germany, less so with Japan. The confederate states undermined federal efforts to, shall we say, "rehabilitate" the racists and their ilk. Mao spent a decade "re-educating" the Chinese individuals who simply would not embrace his communist society. "Reconstruction", "rehabilitation", and/or "re-education" will make or break our society.

>44 magicians_nephew: The Rape of Nanking jarred my admittedly shallow view of the Japanese policies and strategies, Jim. Aware of the Bataan Death March, the way the Burma-Siam Railway was built, and other atrocities, I just didn't make the obvious connection between what Japanese forces did and what the government's overall plan was. So we botched post-war Asian policy just as we did Reconstruction.

>46 benitastrnad: Art books tend to be pricey. The Paper generally is costlier, more of it is used. Full color images require extra steps to prepare for printing and color correcting. Retail pricing is a deterrent to distribution and sales. So a reader has to be interested...really really interested...to seek art books out.

>47 msf59: Go for it, Mark.

            

I find it interesting that the Israeli's have recreated the Warsaw Ghetto in 1943. I think that the Gaza Strip today is a simulacrum of Warsaw circa 1943. Seems to me that the Golden Rule (Do Unto Others as you would have them do unto you) has been shortened to Do unto others what has been done to you.

Or perhaps the Israeli's had good teachers?

This just in!!! Patricia Hearst has been captured/arrested/rescued. I was able thus to click off the bedside light at approximately 1 a.m. today and get a full night's sleep. I haven't begun chapter 22, so I don't know what happens next. Just 100 pages more in American Heiress: The Wild Saga of the Kidnapping, Crimes, and Trial of Patty Hearst by Jeffrey Toobin.

Finished American Heiress by Jeffrey Toobin very early this morning. Number 58 for the year.

Having completed American Heiress, I looked at the stack of books I've started and dip into from time to time, I plucked a venerable murder mystery that I got maybe a month ago at Goodwill. I've seen the title on lists of "Best thrillers/mysteries/crime/detectives". Trent's Last Case by E. C. Bentley. First published in England in 1913. It's slow-moving and quirky, but I'm enjoying it. And I'll be done by the weekend.

I am reading Preston Sturges by Preston Sturges and I'm quite astonished by what I've read of his life so far. I have known him as the creator of a half-dozen marvelous movies in the 1940s—Sullivan's Travels, The Palm Beach Story, The Great McGinty (which won Sturges the screenwriting Oscar® in 1940), The Miracle of Morgan's Creek, Hail the Conquering Hero, and others. He started as a screenwriter in the thirties, adding directing in the forties. Holy Smokes, he had him a LIFE. He spent most of his youth in Europe, bouncing around France and Switzerland as his mother pursued one whim or another, one lover or another. I've read about a third of it, and he hasn't yet written a stage play or a movie script. I think I getting more enthusiastic as I read.

I've been reading Preston Sturges by Preston Sturges, an autobiography/memoir by an often high-flying inventor, businessman, scriptwriter for stage and film. And four-times married groom. On page 254, I read this:

...[O]n a train south to Palm Beach, I fell in love with a beautiful blonde.
  The beautiful blonde was Eleanor Hutton, the twenty-year-old daughter of Margerie Merriweather Post and the stepdaughter of her then husband, E. F. Hutton. She was on her way to Mar-a-Lago, a little seventy-bedroom cottage on the sea her mother had built several years before.

Fun trivia. Incidentally, this was 1930, and Eleanor did become the second Mrs. Preston Sturges.

>56 weird_O:
Amazing isn't it? About Mar-a-Lago. I believe at one time it was owned by the US government and was intended to be a winter White House or some such thing.

Last night I finished the book I was reading—Preston Sturges by Preston Sturges. "That was fun," I said to myself. "I should read another book." So I am—Unfinished Business: Notes of a Chronic Re-Reader.

My "unfinished business" in another realm (rehab) will be finished tomorrow. One last cycle through the machines. Then I'll be shown the door.

>57 benitastrnad: Indeed it is amazing about Mar-A-Lago, Benita. But kitsch is everywhere, right?

Hi Bill!

Congrats on almost being done with rehab. Is there a way for you to continue cardio-ing either at home or at a gym or senior center?

Books, Mar-a-Lago, Gaza. Yay, boo hiss, heartbroken.

Congrats on completing rehab and continue to work on recovery and reading.

>56 weird_O: Huge fan of Preston Sturges and his films. Will have to look for the autobiography.

>59 karenmarie: >60 Kristelh: I have a meetup with someone from cardio tomorrow morning. Never met her, but this appointment was put on my calendar even before "the procedure", so it's part of the routine. Then Wednesday I get another echo-cardiogram. I bet they have more surprises for me. (I think they know I have a lot of openings on my calendar.)

I do have to take action this week to keep up exercising.

>61 magicians_nephew: The Sturges autobiography is very readable. He was a raconteur, and his life was full of entertainment.

OK, so it is Labor Day. Last day of rest. As August passed on overnight, I blinked my eyes over the pages of James. As everyone knows, it is excellent. It's on my list as the first book read in September.

Happy Labor Day, Bill, enjoy James and get back to the exercises. Happy September Reading.

>62 weird_O: I've got James coming up in November for my book club. I'm hoping to fit in a reread of Huckleberry Finn before then. I'll be interested to see what you think of it.

For the first time since Memorial Day, my television is turned on (but muted). Iggles and Cowboys. May the Iggles win. Of course.

I'm rollicking with the Cardio biz. Tuesday I met with a new-to-me doc that I'll be seeing a couple times a year, alternating with Nurse Alma. For now, they're tinkering with drugs and dosages. Wednesday, I had another echo cardiogram, and got an e-mail from Nurse Alma that the result was good, that my heart is strengthening. Went out to Walmart, forgive me, for a pair of light dumbbells (and already I have used them). Gotta walk. Tomorrow.

Field hockey has begun for The Grand Gracie. She scored two of the team's 7 goals in the first game.

I finished James on the weekend. Just a marvelous story. I think I should re-read Huckleberry Finn because there were sequences that I couldn't recall. My reading log only goes back to 2010, so it's been a while since last I read it. Phooey.

I picked up Dirtbag, Massachusetts: A Confessional by Isaac Fitzgerald, and I'm about two-thirds of the way through it. Not sensational, but reasonably entertaining. To keep the reading advancing, I dropped into B&N and came out much enriched:

Jesus's Son, short stories by Denis Johnson
Revenge of the Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell
Autocracy, Inc.: The Dictators Who Want to Run the World by Anne Applebaum
...and...
Glorious Exploits by Ferdia Lennon (which I read but want to own and re-read)

And oddly enough, I have a number of unread books laying about the manse.

Rain (mit donner und blitz) delays the game...

Happy September, Bill. Happy Friday! Go Iggles! Nice win, but what's up with Jalen Carter? Pretty nasty and unprofessional.

I loved Jesus' Son. Enjoy!

>65 weird_O: I've been beating the drum to tell everybody who reads James to go back and read Huckleberry Finn too, just to get the whole picture.

I think it will add to the experience.

As an aside I will never forgive the author of James for making Jim Huck's father - does unnecessary violence to the structure of the tale -- and makes no sense. It's the biggest reason why it ultimately didn't work for me

but there is a lot to like in James.

But as Twain said
"There is the lightning and there is the lightning bug"

>68 magicians_nephew: I agree with what you wrote, Jim. The last time I re-read Huck Finn was before 2010, as I said. I've got that book out now, and it just need to crack the cover and begin reading. I especially agree with your comment behind the spoiler-guard.

In other news, my south Jersey group visited me for a few hours last weekend. The three girls are all readers. Olivia, 15, didn't keep track but estimated her summer's talley at 20 books, and possibly more. Lia, 11, arrived toting an 850+ page doorstop she's reading. Annie, 7, is not quite ready to tackle her older sisters' regimens. Their Mom and Dad are homeschooling them.

I completed Dirtbag, Massachusetts: A Confessional by Isaac Fitzgerald. His opening lines?

My parents were married when they had me, just to different people.
   That's the way I open every story when I'm asked about my childhood. I was a child of passion! A happy little accident. Or, put another way, I was born of sin: a mistake in human form, a bomb aimed perfectly to blow up both my parents' lives.

And his own life, too.

I did get out The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and put it right out in the open where I can see it. Right now, I'm switching between Vivian Gornick's Unfinished Business: Notes of a Chronic Re-Reader and Jesus' Son, short stories by Denis Johnson. Gornick's slender book is a collection of re-reviews of books she re-read recently, books she now understands in new ways. I do that re-reading occasionally (but not often enough). Two books from college days that I didn't much like (and probably failed to read to the end) were The Ginger Man by J. P. Donleavy and Under the Volcano by Malcolm Lowry. Forty or more years later, I figured them out.

>65 weird_O:
I saw Anne Applebaum on Washington Week a few weeks ago and forgot to put this book (Autocracy, Inc.) on my gargatuan TBR list. Thanks for reminding me.

>24 weird_O: This!

>25 weird_O: We all need a day off day! Today I am sick in bed, and technically I *could* be up. But I need some down time (plus, I did make a chicken soup from scratch and drop my son off at work...so...).

>30 weird_O: I have actively avoided reading The Rape of Nanking as I am just not sure I can handle the level of violence and deprivation it surely describes.

>59 karenmarie: I have to agree! ...Books, Mar-a-Lago, Gaza. Yay, boo hiss, heartbroken

Has there been any notice of a film version of The Man in My Basement? The book's author, Walter Mosley, wrote the script. Willem Dafoe portrays "the man". The Guardian has given it 4 of 5 stars. I know the book had a lot of readers here (amongst the 75ers). Just asking if anyone knows about it being filmed.

Also. Sally Mann, the noted (and controversial) photographer, has a follow-up to Hold Still: A Memoir with Photographs being released next week. I'm ordering it now. Loved Hold Still.

        

Oh, except Wednesday I bailed on a Book Sale. And finished my re-read of Mark Twain's Huck Finn.

Hi Bill! Congrats on your good results/efforts in getting your heart healthy again.

I'm glad/not glad that you bailed on the book sale, and I will take up the slack as I buy books and work in the children's room for the next 3 days at our sale here in central NC.

>75 karenmarie: I made up for bailing on the Library sale by buying a trio of books at Firefly Books.

We the People: A History of the U. S. Constitution by Jill Lepore
The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality by Amanda Montell
and a graphic novel, My Friend Dahmer by Derf Backderf

So I'm happy.

Of course, the glow is somewhat diminished by having been told at a local thrift store that they didn't want a hidabed loveseat (because they don't take furniture) and that clothing on hangers isn't welcome (because the clothing must be on their hangers). There's always Goodwill.

I also bailed on a library book sale. The local public library has been having a used book sale yesterday and today. They will still be there tomorrow and I might go and see what is left. But really - I am drowning in books that I still haven't put on shelves and have about 30 boxes of books still in the carport, so I don't need more books. It is best I stay away.

>77 benitastrnad: Your situation is so much like mine, Benita. Many unshelved books in boxes, and still I'm acquiring more. But, you know, the additions to the collection are GOOD! Too, reading challenges—like Alice Hoffman for the AAC—demands a search of the boxes to locate just the right answer. Good luck to you in your shelving and reading and reading and shelving.

I just want to say that I'm now reading Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman. For this month's AAC. I have 6 other tales by Hoffman on my book shelves. Which of my 7 books should I read for this challenge? I was going to poll my visitors... But "my visitors" are few and far between. Then I remembered Judi reading Practical Magic way back in the day and when she was finished with it, consigning to one or another of her local friends. Knowing it was be passed around and probably never to return.

But then, I happened upon a nice hardcover copy at a library sale in Manheim. The Manheim in Lancaster County. In Pennsylvania.

So, without benefit of counsel, I settled on PM as my Hoffman read. Perhaps there was magic involved...somehow?

I have 17 cataloged titles of Alice Hoffman's in my collection. So far I have read three of them. All three are part of the Practical Magic series, but I haven't read Practical Magic. Maybeperhaps (as Richard says), I should dig it out and read it. But I think it is one of the boxes that is still in the carport so, it will stay there a bit longer.

~delurking~ I read your thread regularly although I don't post very often. All I know of the topic in question was enjoying the movie Practical Magic, presumably based on the book. I hope the book is great!

A lovely downpour outside right now. Don't stop. Don't stop.

Uh oh.

So much for that.

            

            Yes indeedy!

>83 weird_O: A lovely sentiment.

Just stopping by to say thanks for stopping by my new thread and to tell you that I posted a picture just for you. :)

New month. Dust off the routine. Tweak it as experience and imagination suggest. Get to 75 soon.

>79 weird_O: Our Book group took a look recently at Hoffman's Seventh Heaven there is magic in it but sort of sneakily around the edges. But we liked it

>76 weird_O: A new one from Jill LaPore is always welcome. Have heard good things about We The People

Some countries amend their Constitutions about as often as they change their socks, it seems sometimes. American has barely two dozen amendments and if you don't count the original Bill or Rights, fewer than that..

LaPore is among those who think our Constitution is too hard to amend and that the work of "Amending" and interpreting goes to the Courts and not to the Legislature. It's a point of view I'm not totally sure I agree with. But she is a very eloquent and articulate advocate

If you're not Constitution'ed out after that you might have a look at America's Constitution: A Biography for an other-the-other-hand view.

I'll be curious to know what you make of it, Bill. It is a bit of a doorstop - don't drop it on your foot.

Happy Friday, Bill. After a very busy September, I am looking forward to things slowing down a bit. I hope those books are treating you fine. Mine sure are. 😎

Figuring out where I am. A good way to start the new week. The weekend was a mix of happiness and despair. Gracie's field hockey team had a match Saturday and played well, gaining a 4-1 victory. Their games are usually streamed, but lately the service sucks. Lots of buffering and related glitches. For example, the game's tied 1-1 with about 5 minutes left in the half. Screen goes black for 15 seconds or so; when the video returns, it's halftime and the score is 2-1. What?! Same sort of glitch deprived me of seeing Smith's two scores in the second half. Bah!

Reading is less spotty; I've got a good run going.

Say. Would today be Hump Day? I'm pretty sure it is.

This morning I read the last 15 pages or so of Sally Mann's new book, Art Work: On the Creative Life. Excellent. I was predisposed to like it, and I wasn't disappointed. Although the aim is to provide inspiration and advice to young artists, Mann reveals a great deal about her life and work.

Yesterday (Thursday) was brutal for Philadelphia's sports fans. The Phillies were eliminated from the baseball playoffs. The Flyers lost their season opener. And the Eagles were rocked by the New York Giants.

On my home front, the overnight temperature was down in the low 40s. I closed all the windows; don't know if I'll open them any more this year.

Finished a GNF (graphic non-fiction—is that a thing? Maybe not; the subtitle is "A Graphic Novel") titled My Friend Dahmer. The author/illustrator, Derf Backderf, was a high school classmate of Jeffrey Dahmer. Dahmer, you may recall, kidnapped, murdered, mutilated, and occasionally ate, more than a dozen men in Wisconsin. The book is confined to his high school days. Not for all tastes. Natch.

           

Last Sunday, The Guardian published a lengthy excerpt from Cory Doctorow's forthcoming book Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About I. Here's a link: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/oct/05/way-past-its-prime-how-did-am... You should take a look. Even better, you should read the entire piece. In it, Doctorow describes the natural history of enshittification:

1 First, platforms are good to their users.
2 Then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers.
3 Next, they abuse those [business] customers to claw back all the value for themselves…

"This pattern is everywhere," Doctorow continues.

Once you learn about it, you’ll start seeing it, too. Take Amazon, a company that started out by making it possible to have any book shipped to your door and then became the only game in town for everything else, even as it dodged taxes and filled up with self-immolating crapgadgets and other junk.

The book will be released on October 14, just a few days from now. (I see there's no Touchstone for the book yet.)

>92 weird_O: - Excellent post. The article is very good but more than anything (and what does that say about me), I love that word *enshittification*. Such a perfect word. Applies perfectly to amazon, of course, but I personally see it being more than appropriate for certain governments and what they and their *agendas* have done to the lives of millions (if you know who I mean)...

>91 weird_O: >92 weird_O: Boom, BB head shots. Already downloaded Dahmer on my iPad, and I'll put the Doctorow on the WL. Always like reading his stuff.

I heard Cory Doctorow talk on an NPR program about this problem and it was a great fun time while I listened to it. He is certainly not a lover of most of the tech gurus.

>91 weird_O: I would probably read that. Having watched the dramatisation of those events a few years back, nothing could top the *eye-opening* scenes there.... I do like a graphic non-fiction novel though!?

I thought My Friend Dahmer was a terrific GNF! Very creepy and unsettling.

Happy New Week, Bill.

>93 jessibud2:, >94 mahsdad:, >95 benitastrnad: Pass the word along. I heard about "enshittification" couple of months ago, and then I heard about book. Wasn't too taken with reading it until reading the excerpt. There's just so going on with these greedy bros.

Chuggin' along. I think I have my working list of 2025 reads up to date. Without comparing with previous years, I am rather surprised to see the number of newly purchased books I've read: 46 of 73. The other 27 books are ROOTs. Per my personal "definitions" list, a ROOT is any book on the shelves at the stroke of midnight on New Year's Eve. Yes, yes. That means the books given to me for Christmas transmogrify, as the ball drops, from new to old (read ROOT). Yeah, it's a scam. But what a sight to see!

I like your definition...I say a book has to have been on my shelves for a year to qualify as a ROOT, but I cheat a little...a week or two, here or there...who's to know, right?

>92 weird_O: That looks quite interesting. I will have to read the article. Thanks for posting it!

I haven't made the rounds since I-don't-know-when, so I don't know if reports on the No-Kings-Palooza abound. We had a bunch of sites across eastern PA. Below is the scene in Kutztown. I'd like to point out, this being a book-orientated site, that the store with the mushroom art in one store window and the "No Kings" placard in the other, is Firefly Bookstore, my primary bricks-and-mortar source for used and new books.

Looks like this was a good turnout. I was glad to see so many people come out for these rallies. However, it would probably be better if they had all written and signed postcards or made phone calls to their various representatives that they don't like what is going on and those representatives need to change their votes.

"it would probably be better if they had all written and signed postcards or made phone calls to their various representatives " Many people I know did both.

‘Morning, Bill! Sweet Thursday to you.

>76 weird_O: Yay for books, sorry about the thrift shop.

>78 weird_O: Acquiring books is necessary, although I’ve been tempering it lately by getting rid of a few.

>83 weird_O: You may be a weirdo, but your OUR weirdo.

>91 weird_O: I have 8 graphic novels, 4 of which are nonfiction.

Going on the rutch today. Through Sunday actually. Riding with Son the Elder and his wife to Boston for a partial family meetup at MIT's field-hockey field. Smith vs. MIT. Jeremy and Tara's three daughters will be in attendance, as will my daughter Becky. Surely all will enjoy a festive supper. Return home Sunday.

The meetup is partial because Son the Elder, (bah) Younger, his wife Sam, and their three daughters won't be there.

Still reading In Patagonia. Accumulating candidates for the read-after-that. That Chatwin book will be Number 75.

Have a nice weekend all!

>106 weird_O: We have good friends in Boston we go up there pretty often.

Remembering in Patagonia maybe its time for a re-read

Howdy, Bill. How is life treating you? How was the family Meet Up? Are you still with them? Yep, lots of questions from the Warbler.

>107 magicians_nephew: Two of my children went to college in Boston, beginning in the early '90s. Our daughter stayed in Boston after graduating. So we have been getting there several times a year since 1990.

>108 msf59: The meetup was swell, Mark. Gracie was pleased that her sisters were there, plus quite a number of field hockey alums who turned out to root for their friends. They didn't win. Didn't score a single goal. (Boo) But the team stuck around and mingled with friends. We took a walk across the MIT campus, including an amble down the infinite corridor. Eventually, we converged at a restaurant for supper. I bunked at Becky's apartment in Quincy. Sunday morning, we delivered Gracie back to Smith, and I was given a tour of the campus.

As for life, it's a mixed bag. My DiL's parents got notice that their insurance provider was dropping the Medicare Advantage plan because of changes in the federal fees and reimbursements. They have to find a new provider by 12/7. I've got an Advantage plan, but I'd had no communication from my provider. No reason for optimism.

This afternoon, after a dental appt, I'll drive to my son's to help him dole out candy to trick-or-treaters.

A follow-up to >109 weird_O:: I found a letter from my health insurance provider in the mailbox Friday. It listed the costs and copays for 2026. But that evening, my son told me that his in-laws got the same type of letter, followed a week later by the announcement that the program had been axed. So I'm not really sure I'll have coverage after all.

Nevertheless, I did complete both In Patagonia and Nora Ephron's collection I Feel Bad About My Neck by/on Friday. Picked up Kazuo Ishiguro's An Artist of the Floating World and read about 25 pages. After that, I think I'm going to read Jill Lepore's We the People: A History of the U.S. Constitution. I may direct some attention to the chapters in George Packer's The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New America that focus on Peter Thiel, a German-born tech oligarch who recently gave several lectures revealing his thoughts about "the antichrist".

>109 weird_O:, >110 weird_O: Hi Bill! My husband becomes eligible for Medicare next year, and I'll be eligible in 2027, so I'm paying more attention to this type of news these days. I read an article in yesterday's NYT about changes to Medicare for 2026. It sounds like your situation is not uncommon.

>111 lauralkeet:. Congratulations on your aging, Linda. The late night reports on the bashing the GOP got electorially is happy-making, and one hopes that will push the GOP to be less cruel, that SocSec (and all the other "socialistic" programs) will survive and thrive.

>110 weird_O:, second 'graph: A lot of that reading planning and scheduling blew up real good, as the Fishin' Musician used to say on SCTV. I had an appointment in Reading yesterday and as my trip unrolled it unravelled. Construction surprises on nearly every leg of the drive made me late. To cool down, I hit a B&N. And naturally emerged with four new books:

A Grief Observed by C. S. Lewis; the only title of the four that was on The WANT!! List™ (a BB fired by Klobrien.)
I, Robot by Isaac Asimov; I've never read it. (!?!)
The State of the Art by Iain M. Banks
Everything Is Tuberculosis by John Green; highly recommended by by most LT readers of it.

So I'm in a sampling stint. Three days ago I was reading Ishiguro, with Lepore on deck. Now I'm reading Ishiguro with Green and Asimov and Lewis on deck, and Lepore back on the bench (seething).

I think I might walk out and check the mail.

^Howdy, Bill. Thinking of you...

>106 weird_O: I have never read In Patagonia. Probably need to rectify that fact.

>110 weird_O: Congratulations on hitting 75, Bill!

Sorry football Giants fans, but what's the team future to be with Kafka...yes, Kafka...at the helm?

Hello Weirdo!! Love your topper, of course. And your books. Good luck with health coverage and I hope I see more of you now that I am not MIA. Happy Thanksgiving!!

While awaiting Thanksgiving dinner to be served (I've contributed the sweet potatoes and dried corn for the multitude), I trimmed down my Christmas WANT!! List and put it in DRIVE. Here's a link to it: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1JVREZF_23zvv0cVRbqMHdIkSdzjQeFvIwvHjhu4B...
I'm not a listener. I don't like ebooks. I prefer hardcovers and trade paperbacks. No mass market paperbacks. Love used books. Hope you'll enjoy shopping.

>106 weird_O: looks like I read In Patagonia in 2022...as a reread. From recollection, it didn't wow me, but did have some cool stories.

Happy 75th!

Stepping out of the shadows to report that I finished reading a book. About a year ago, a primary reading influencer of mine was agitating for me to read it. She pointed to our mutual granddaughter, stretched out on the sofa, her nose stuffed in the book. "It's good," said granddaughter said. And she was the fourth in the family to read that copy. So I read it.

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin. I agree with Claire, and Gig, and Tara, and Helen, and Jeremy... It's good. It's really good. How could Ms. Zevin put all this goodness in less than 400 pages?!?

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow was one of my top reads last year. I really liked it.

>120 elorin: Three cheers for Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow everyone i know seemed to be reading it and i picked up a copy and was carried away.

Despite non-appearances, I'm still here, still reading (just more slowly). Befuddled? Sure. Just sipping the day's coffee, nibbling at a breakfast cake. Trying to get fuddled. Oh, and of course, wrapping merch that loved ones desire. Becky's coming to town to spend too few days. And now there's snow. Not a lot, from what I can see from my perch atop the Schochary Ridge, but something to be both aware and wary of.

Hiroshima by John Hersey is what I'm currently reading. I read and finished Fallout about a week ago. That one's billed as a report about "the Hiroshima Cover-up" and about Hersey's report on the bombing and the aftermath. (It's a report on a report, don't you see.) Seemed appropriate to re-read Hiroshima, and as I passed the halfway point, I have to admit it is like reading something for the first time. Over the years, I've always tagged Hiroshima as something I read...but it's all new to me. Cognitive decline.

What will be 2025's reading finale, I don't know. Sooo many books are arrayed atop bookcases, yammering for my attention.

So. Happy Holidays, Young'ins.

>122 weird_O: The description of your "perch" echoes Donald Hall in his very mellow On Eagle Pond.

>122 weird_O: Richard Rhodes The Making of the Atomic Bomb has a very good section about Hiroshima.

Fair warning it's a bit of a chunkster.

Remember the first time I read Hersey's Hiroshima Much the same reaction as when I read Iris Chang's book about The Rape of Nanking

Bill as you celebrate, keep in mind:

>125 richardderus: How about blood sugar readings on Christmas?

>123 m.belljackson: Not familiar with Donald Hall, Marianne. Is the book you cited poetry?

>124 magicians_nephew: I've actually read The Making of the Atomic Bomb, Jim. It deservedly won the Pulitzer. And yeah, it is a doorstop.

>126 weird_O: Your pancreas is in on the gag...All will be well. Otherwise Baby Jesus gets it.

On Eagle Pond features essays, starting with some inspiring ones on Seasons, with WINTER a favorite.

The only one of his Poetry books I've read is: I AM A DOG I AM A CAT which is pretty cool!
(a zero for touchstones)

Merry Christmas, Bill. We sure miss seeing you around but glad to hear you are doing okay. I thought Hiroshima was an excellent, eye-opening read.

Merry Christmas, Bill. Hope it's spectacularly un-befuddled.

Donald Hall is a favorite of mine, although not so much for his poetry as for his lovely short prose works and a couple children's books.

Merry Christmas Bill,

Thanks so much for my Christmas books

Breaking thru on the Other Side. Far as can tell, no body parts were displaced or left behind. Yay!!!

Got books, a handcrafted book marker, a hat, slippers. Did I mention books? We had a North African meal, organized by The Grand Helen, who vacationed in Morocco last April. Didn't get to bed until Boxing Day. Slept late and after an afternoon breakfast, took a nap. In the evening, my daughter and I talked to Son the Younger and his family via Facetime and watched that family's three girls open the gifts we had sent. What a hoot!

Awaiting the arrival of Son the Elder's mob. When they leave, they'll take Becky with them to their home. Sunday the crew will drive to NYC to meet some folks from New Hampshire, dropping Becky off at the train station for her return to Boston.

Happy to report that the Wicked Big Shawm forecast for today into tomorrow fizzled.

>132 weird_O: I was looking for inches and inches of snow, and saw a heavy dusting when I got up. It's been slobbering rain/snow/ice (I think the po-faced National Weather Service calls it "wintry mix" but I'm still callin' it "Snowman Slobber").

The North African meal sounds glorious! Were there preserved lemons involved? I love those things.

I wanted to embellish my Santa Swap reveal with a photo, but the tech bros out in Silicon Valley were retarding the transfer of images captured on an iPhone through Apple photos to Google Photos. Thus...



Pictured are:

The Book Censor's Library, Bothayna Al-Essa. (pbk)
The 6:41 to Paris, Jean-Philippe Blondel (pbk)
Cutting for Stone, Abraham Verghese (pbk)
Half a Life, V. S. Naipaul (pbk)
Enduring Love, Ian McEwan (pbk)

Good choices all. Thank you, thank you. (I've started The 6:41 to Paris).

I'm guessing my Santa was amanda4242. Return address name "Amanda", and I think her Library name is amanda4242. Correct me if I'm wrong, please.

I did get a few books from family:

The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny: A Novel, Kiran Desai (hc)
Books As a Way of Life: Essays, Gordon N. Ray (hc)
Pennsylvania Germans: An Interpretive Encyclopedia (Young Center Books in Anabaptist and Pietist Studies), Simon J. Bronner (hc)
James Turrell and Nicholas Mosse : Lapsed Quaker Ware, Jonathan Rickard (hc)

And a handcrafted bookmark by Lia, for her favorite grandfather.

Cutting for stone is a terrific book. Our book club had a look at it a few years back. Definitely a winner

>134 weird_O: Enduring Love is terrific.

Thanks for the endorsements of what my Secret Santa gave me. Cutting for Stone has been recommended to me—with considerable urgency in at least one case—but it's such a doorstop. It might trap me in my bedroom...or out of my bedroom. As for the McEwan, hmmm. I've read one—Amsterdam— with pleasure, and I have six others (now seven) on the TBR. Lot to look forward to as a new year looms

Hello Bill! Belated Merry Christmas. Early Happy New Year. Sounds like things have been wonderful so far, but here's a pretty graphic: