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| Hosted by The Book Date |
Life
My husband continues to recover from his cancer surgery and is doing very well, getting stronger every day. My aunt came to stay with us for the week, and she was an enormous help! Because of my own chronic illness, my husband usually does a lot around the house, including all the grocery shopping and a lot of the dishes. If I'd had to do all that on my own last week, I would have been in bad shape, so we greatly appreciated her help ... and enjoyed her company!
Tuesday, we celebrated our son's 28th birthday, and my aunt was a big help with that, too. She baked his favorite cake (banana cake), which I never would have had the energy to do! We celebrated with a surf and turf dinner at home, gifts, and cake.
My book group was meeting at the beach (about two hours away) this week, as a special treat. One of our members recently moved there, so she hosted both book group and a sleepover! I knew from the beginning I would need a quiet place to retreat to by myself, so in early December, I rented a little Airbnb apartment near my friend's house. A week later, after getting the news of my husband's diagnosis, I canceled my reservation, but last week, my aunt and my husband encouraged me to go, so I rebooked! I thoroughly enjoyed my little 24-hour getaway after a very exhausting, stressful past month. We had lunch and discussed the book, I went back to my apartment for a nap (during the Verizon outage, so it was tricky getting into my Airbnb), and I almost slept through dinner! But I made it to the restaurant to meet the rest of my group in time to order. I enjoyed the book group, the company, and a bit of much-needed quiet solitude. Before heading home the next day, I took a walk on the beach. It was cold and windy, but being near the ocean in the sunshine filled me with joy!
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| My little Airbnb - home away from home! |
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| My happy place! |
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| Sunshine waves, salt air ... ahhh! |
It snowed here both Saturday and Sunday, and our son was out of town (for a birthday weekend with his brother and cousins!). So, for the first time in many years, I attempted to clear the driveway myself. Luckily, Delaware doesn't get much snow, but it was a LOT for me (with my disease, even mild exertion worsens all symptoms and can cause a flu-like crash). I was wiped out by last night and am pretty worn out today, too ... and the driveway is covered again! Fortunately, our son comes back today.
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| Shoveling yesterday |
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| Driveway all clear! |
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| And ... covered again by morning! |
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Top 5 Nonfiction Books Read in 2025 - My top picks in nonfiction last year including memoir, science, nature, adventure, and more!
Top 10 Novels Read in 2025 - It was an outstanding year of fiction for me! It's hard to choose favorites, but these 10 rose to the top.
Weekly Reading Update, on location! - A quick update from the beach
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We love this time of year when many of our favorite TV shows come back, for a new season or to continue the fall season, and one of those is The Rookie, now in its 8th season. Yes, 8! That's hard to believe, until you look at the photo of its star, Nathan Fillion, in the original season 1 cover. We loved this show right from the beginning, with its fun mix of suspense, drama, and humor, and the in-depth character development over the years makes the characters feel like old friends now. Action-packed and funny, this is still one of our favorite shows. My review and a trailer from season 1 at the link.
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I finished reading Cat's Paw by Heather Blackwood, book 2 in The Time Corps series. I read book 1, The Clockwork Cathedral, last month when I needed some fun escapism. I enjoyed that fast-paced, creative time travel novel (my kind of comfort read) so much that I decided to try book 2. In book 1, a young woman who is a Tulane medical student in present-day New Orleans suddenly finds herself pulled through a rip in time back to 1857. The sequel features the same characters, starting in New Orleans in 1863, six years after the first book ended. This series features time travel and parallel universes, both tropes that I love, and in this second book, there are multiple characters traveling through time and to different worlds, which makes it gripping and intriguing. It also mixes in some fantasy, which I'm not always a fan of, but I enjoyed this second book very much. Just ignore the ridiculous cover! I hate when book covers don't match the content of the book; there are no female characters in these books that would ever dress that way!
Today, I plan to start A Ghost of Caribou by Alice Henderson, book 3 in her Alex Carter series. Alex is a wildlife biologist who studies endangered animals, and for some reason, there are always murderous bad guys in the area! So far, all of these outdoor thrillers have been set in cold, snowy places, so I thought this would be a perfect January read.
On audio, I am still listening to The Frozen River by Ariel Lawhon, and it's making so much more sense now that the chapters are in their proper order, instead of alphabetical order, as Apple Music helpfully rearranged them for me! I was SO incredibly confused, and with everything going on, it took me a week to realize what had happened. It's the story of a midwife in Maine in the late 1700's, after the American Revolution, with the mysterious murder of a man in their town and two men accused of rape. It combines fascinating historical detail (based on the diaries of a real midwife at that time), in-depth character development, and gripping suspense. I'm near the end now, and I have thoroughly enjoyed it. My book group all loved it, we had a great discussion, and our average rating was a very high 8 out of 10.
My husband, Ken, finished the latest book from his favorite author: Exit Strategy by Lee Child and Andrew Child, #30 in the Jack Reacher series. He said he was sorry when it ended. He is now reading two books. During the day, he's reading Wings: The Story of a Band on the Run by Paul McCartney, edited by Ted Widmer, a Christmas gift from me.
And at night, he's reading a novel, Beartooth by Callan Wink, an outdoor thriller that was recommended at Booktopia this year that many of my Booktopia friends have enjoyed.
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What are you and your family reading this week?
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