Time continues to fly by in the time of COVID. I, like most of the world, have been working from home for almost six months. There are days it feels routine and days it absolutely doesn’t. Thankfully, we got out of town to visit NH for the first week of September. We were originally supposed to be in Alaska for the roommates 40th birthday, but for obvious reasons that didn’t happen.
I’ve finally started knitting again after a long break (late-April) which has been nice and rewarding, it’s basically fall to me. Check out a detail shot of what I completed at the very end! And I’ve continued to really move through books, all while somehow working full time remotely and not being as distracted as I thought I would.
Books and Bookish Things
I got through nine books in August: two young adult, three galleys (*), one nonfiction, four MM romances, and one literary fiction that just gave me all the feels.
On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous takes the cake for me this month, which is a little surprising as there isn’t much of a story line. It’s more a series of snapshots of the protagonists’s life written in letter form to his mother, but the language and how Vuong plays with it was incredibly beautiful. I was most disappointed in Solitaire and Camino Island. Solitaire is on me, I had built it up so much even though I knew Nick and Charlie were minor characters, but the style just didn’t work for me. And Camino Island was about a book heist and set for the most part with author characters and in and around a bookstore, but overall it was just one big meh, I know Grisham does better.
- Solitaire – Alice Oseman
- To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before (To All the Boys #1) – Jenny Han
- On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous – Ocean Vuong
- Crime Dot Com – Geoff White*
- Double Full (Nice Guys #1) – Kindle Alexander
- Better Than People (Garnet Run #1) – Roan Parrish*
- Full Disclosure (Nice Guys #2) – Kindle Alexander
- Best Laid Plaids (Kilty Pleasures #1) – Ella Stainton*
- Camino Island – John Grisham
I did grab a copy of Hanya Yanagihara’s A Little Life as it was on Kindle super sale ($1.99) and I do have plans to read it so I figured why not. Now it’s just going to loom over me until I do, like many others. I also picked up quite a few review copies (I need to STOP), but I am super excited for the David Chang memoir and Ijeoma Oluo’s next work!
- Eat a Peach – David Chang w/ Gabe Ulla*
- Mediocre: The Dangerous Legacy of White Male America – Ijeoma Oluo
- A Little Life – Hanya Yanagihara
I am LOVING the bookish memes around physical distancing. I basically have an entire Jane Austen story highlight on Instagram which just makes me happy. This one really stood out to me this month.
Culture Corner
We’ve been trying to spend time outside before fall sets in and so have been going on quite a few trail walks. We went out to the Blue Hills Reservation just outside Boston a few weeks ago and enjoyed that immensely. And while in NH we’ve already done the Pudding Pound Trail Loop and will actually be spending the 3rd on a boat just enjoying the last of the summer weather.
What’s Next?
I’m finishing the final book in Kindle Alexander’s Nice Guys trilogy, Full Domain, and then I’m hoping to make a dent on my ARC/galley list that is slowly getting out of control. We’re up in New Hampshire for a few more days and I’m hoping to get some more reading and knitting done. School has started up again and I’m taking a course on Behavioral Science: Understanding Organizational and Consumer Behavior where we’ll be reading Nudge by Thaler and Sunstein, Predictably Irrational by Ariely, and Thinking Fast and Slow by Kahneman (and a ton of articles).
I can’t wait to sit in front of the fire and read a book or knit. Is anyone else looking forward to the cooler weather of fall?Â
I love A LITTLE LIFE so much. I need to reread it.
It’s been on my list since Simon raved about it right after it first came out.
Yes! That’s what made me read it!
Sounds like August was a great month for you, and while I have enjoyed my summer, I totally ready for autumn: my favourite season. Bring on those darker nights, golden leaves, woolly tights, boots and staying inside to snuggle up with a book! 😊
Bring on fall!!!!! It was definitely on it it’s way. We were a few hours north and it got chilly at night.