Rainy Day Reads

I'm combining these into one blog post, because it's already February {Edit: Now it's March? when did this happen?}  and I think that these 2017 year-in-review posts are dragging on. So here's a quick wrap up of my favourite nonfiction and series from 2017. If I was a put together person I would have finished these way back in January, but clearly I'm not on it, so here we are. In March. Still reviewing 2017 books. But in my defense I found out that I've apparently been battling the flu for a month or so. So motivation for blogging and life in general has been at 0%. So here's a quick last 2017 Wrap Up post, and then we're back to our normal schedule (of sporadic posts/no posts at all. Depending on how fast I can kick the last vestiges of the flu out of my system). First up is my favourite non-fiction reads of the year: Nonfiction: Sacred Mundane by Kari Patterson This book is a celebration of the mundane. Sometimes, when...

So I did end up catching that flu bug that’s going around. My immune system held up for over 2 weeks though, so that’s rad. What’s not rad is how this flu is STILL going around even after more than two weeks. Anyway, I’m holed up in bed, because I’m too sick to get up and do anything remotely productive in between naps, and that's driving me nuts. So what better thing to do than to discuss all of the artsy books from 2017? {NOTE: And then I waited a FULL week to edit. Write when sick and delirious, edit when lucid and well is my personal version of that Ernest Hemingway quote, apparently} These are the books that are hard to describe under any other category, and are works of art. Or just the ones that are really, really, pretty. You know, artsy . And as usual, this isn't in any particular order. Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady My biology teacher from a couple years ago recommended this to me. It's absolutely beautiful. The author, Edith...

I'm writing this holed up in my room with tea and shortbread. There's a weird cold/flu thing going around, and it's taken out my whole family, so I'm doing my best not to catch it. My avoiding sickness techniques include holing myself away with tea and shortbread, so what better time to write my end of year reading wrap up? Yes, I'm battling sickness by pretending to be sick. But maybe if I put my sick time in, and stay in bed the flu spirits will pass over me. I'm optimistic. Anyway, I thought that now would be a good time to do a sort of reading wrap up for 2017. I read 92 books, so there's definitely a surplus of books to talk about. I've got my 'Year In Books' (Courtesy of Goodreads) open, so that I can have a shot at remembering what exactly I read this year. I've decided to do a top five(ish. Picking favourite books is hard, ok?) in several categories. I'm not doing them in any particular order, just in what orde...

This is my very large and very beautiful volume of Irish Fairy and Folk Tales. It's seven hundred pages, with embossed, intricate Celtic designs, gold edged pages, and the size of an old church bible. I purchased it shortly after Christmas last year, and have been chipping away at reading it for the last five months (according to my Goodreads activity). I got it because I love me some Irish folklore; I find it fascinating. You can't go wrong with folk tales that tell the legends of a giant named 'Finn MacCool'. There's a fantastical 'magic-is-always-around-the-corner' feel that permeates these tales, and they have a very 'telling stories passed down from generations past around the family hearth' vibe. I find short story compilations slightly discombobulating. I have no problem with a 700 page book when it's all one linear plot, but to have roughly 70 10(ish) page stories makes it hard to stay focused, because you're always ...

~terrariums, thievery, tea. what's not to love?~ Back in July, my mother and I took a terrarium planting class at Roosevelt's Terrariums . In the introduction to the class, the owner told an interesting story about how terrariums (thanks to their enclosed, miniature ecosystem in a bottle capabilities) made transport of plants on old sailing ships possible; allowing a man to sneak deep into China, learn all about tea farming, smuggle a large number of tea plants out of the country, and start a tea farm in Darjeeling, effectively breaking China's tea monopoly. I thought that it was a fascinating story, but sort of tucked it away in my head, and went on with my life. Fast forward two months later at a gift shop, and what do I spy but For All the Tea in China , an entire book written about that tea-stealing trip? What are the odds of hearing about a historical tidbit, only to see a book about it for sale mere months later? So because it looked fasc...