Tag Archives: mince pie

From April into May 2022

May 2, 2022Audio, Challenge, Childrens, Graphic Novel, Historical Lit, Library, Life, Lists, Pie, Quotes, What's in a Name 2022"Asking no further questions is the song of my people.", apple pie with cheese!, Cream pie, cutie-pie, fanouropita - a kind of pie/cake, hashtag #CaresPieShow, Huckleberry Pie, I hate wordpress blocks, LItsy Bingo, Manage to read both the Litsy Book SPIN and the DOUBLE spin, mince pie, monthly stats, on a path to 100 books for the year!, pie pie pie and more pie, Pie-faced, pumpkin pie, spicy apple pie, Things Are Against Us wins for most pie mentions, three-chicken pie, tracking my books this year, where did I travelCare

Monthly Recap Time! and plans for current merry month of May:

10 books; 42 for the year
2881 pages, ~21.8 hours | 11478 total pages, 114.3 hours for the year so far
- By Type:
  Hardcover – 2
  Tradeback 2
  eBooks 4
  Audiobooks 2

My favorite was … The City of Girls by Elizabeth Gilbert, followed very VERY closely by The Slow March of Light by Heather B Morris. Chouette was the most artsy (and musical) and creative and just wild! If you like unsettling books, I recommend.

“My tiny important job of the day is to crimp pie crusts.”
-Chouette

Locations and travels:

A few of these were based in the US or England and then traveled around the world
Slow March was set in cold war Berlin
The Last Thing He Told Me started and ended in Sausalito CA with much of the action in Austin TX
City of Girls was NYC
Chouette was CA but also forest fantasyland somewhat.

She was a bright, energetic, pie-faced fourteen-year-old, who always dressed in the most outlandish costumes.
-City of Girls

For challenges, I added one more category for the What’s in a Name 2022 “Speed” with the SLOW in the title, The Slow March of Light by Heather B. Moore – and still hope to add a single post review of this soon. It was a scary book with a hopeful “Wow, good humans DO exist” ending that really touched me.

I’m excited to have completed the personal to me challenge of reading Truth & Beauty with The Autobiography of a Face. Interesting story of friendship, of writing, of memoir and who owns the telling.

As a refrain offered in Chouette, “It’s time to tell.” Ellman’s essays would certainly agree with that.

Pie was mentioned in five of this month’s reads: Things Are Against Us had many pie mentions! Which is not at all surprising if you had read Ellman’s prior book Ducks, Newburyport about a pie baker. And of course, the only reason I have a kids book read was because PIE is in the title. Chouette, City of Girls, and The Last Thing He Told Me round out the pie offerings.

I made a bunch of pie in April – for Easter. Go search #CaresPieShow hashtag in IG or Litsy to see a picture. (or my post prior)

Now it is May and I’m doing a buddy read with Laila of Big Reading Life of The View of the Harbour by Elizabeth Taylor. It is going to be GOOD, I just know. Looking forward to it! This was also a SPIN book for Litsy in May – yay me for having more reasons to read it (besides it being a classic for my Club 50.)

What was YOUR favorite book of April?

May 3 is Raspberry Tart Day, May 8 is Coconut Cream Pie Day, May 13 is Apple Pie Day, and May 20 is Quiche Lorraine Day – which is in a pie crust, so I call it pie.

“Just go sit inside and get yourself a piece of pie, okay?”
“I literally couldn’t want a piece of pie less,” she says.
LOL! -The last thing he told me

“… make mock apple pie out of green pumpkins”
Things are against us (many many pies in this!)

Copyright © 2007-2022. Care’s Books and Pie also known as and originally created as Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care. It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

The Soul of Kindness

October 27, 2021Author Recommendation, Classics, Classics Club, Pie, Wordscottage pie, cover links to goodreads, gooseberry pie, meat pie, mince pie, steak pie, subtlety, such pretty covers for the latest editionsCare

Thoughts by Elizabeth Taylor, Hachette Digital 2010 (orig 1964), 223 pages

Challenge: Classics Club second list of 50

Genre/Theme: Six Degrees of Separation?

Type/Source: eBook / Kindle sale

What It’s About: This is about connections and people who influence by those connections though some never meet. It’s about how ‘nice’ isn’t really nice, after all. There is SO MUCH going on and yet, there is little plot. My jam, for sure.

She always brought Alice from her pram or cradle when Ba and Meg called, behaving, with self-conscious generosity, like a nice child with a special toy to share.

Flora is so nice and she just wants everyone to be happy. She, of course, knows what is the best for everyone and believes the best for everyone and just knows, that if this-then-that, then all would be happy. Yet, she also believes that she is the sun and all should revolve around her in her magnificence happy-attention sunshine. Life doesn’t work that way, however, and some planets orbit a different rotational path.

…the book by Henry Miller Patrick Barlow had lent her, which she was reading with such mild surprise. (‘What does this word mean, Richard?’ ‘Truly? Well I suppose it had to be called something.’ How had she lived so long without knowing? he wondered.)

Wow. I must read everything now.

Rating: Five slices of gooseberry pie. LOTS of pie mentions!

Today would be the longest time she had ever spent with him, and her happiness brimmed over. It was bliss to have this lying ahead of her – the train journey, his company all the time, the Vivaldi records perhaps, and Mrs Clarke’s cold game pie.

Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit

October 11, 2021Family, Life, Pie, Young Adultbook cover links to goodreads, evangelical Protestants, have had this on my tbr for a long time, King Arthur, lil orange dragon demons, mince pie, my copy has typos, set in EnglandCare

Thoughts by Jeanette Winterson, Grove Press 1985, 176 pages

Fruit salad, fruit pie, fruit for fools, fruited punch.”

Challenge: n/a

Genre/Theme: LGBTQIA+ coming of age

Type/Source: Tradeback / Used Book Store Purchase

It is not the one thing nor the other that leads to madness, but the space in between them.

What It’s About: Jeanette is a young girl being groomed to be a missionary. She’s the adopted daughter of a very headstrong woman and an inconsequential father. Jeanette loves the Lord and loves the church and is OK with being considered odd because she has a purpose.

If the demons lie within they travel with you.

Eventually, however, she begins to have doubts. Especially when her friendship with Melanie blossoms into a special love. The church disapproves.

People do go back, but they don’t survive, because two realities are claiming them at the same time. Such things are too much. You can salt your heart, or kill your heart, or you can choose between the two realities. There is much pain here. Some people think you can have your cake and eat it. The cake goes mouldy and they choke on what’s left. Going back after a long time will make you mad, because the people you left behind do not like to think of you changed, will treat you as they always did, accuse you of being indifferent, when you are only different.

Winterson weaves parables and fantasy stories of wizards and King Arthur into this semi-autobiographical tale and I enjoyed the heck out of her voice, her turn of phrase, her interesting thoughts on how the world works.

“She asked if it was the woman who served pie and peas in the pub; Doreen didn’t know, but now that she thought of it that would explain why he always smelled of gravy when he came home late.”

Thoughts: It all worked for me. Enjoyed this very much.

“Best thing to come out of France,” the woman declared, biting her Bourbon.
“What about quiche?“ I reminded her.
“Right, that’s right,” she nodded.

Rating: Five slices of pie. Mince pie! and quiche.

“I have a theory that every time you make an important choice, the part of you left behind continues the other life you could have had.”

Jane Eyre

May 2, 2018Audio, Author Recommendation, Classics, PieCharlotte Bronte, did I catch an error that JE didn't know German from Greek but then has a German book to read?, gooseberry pie, gothic romance, how come the Rivers cousins didn't know the Reed cousins? why don't they all have the same last name?, I now know the gypsy scene!, I resisted reading these books in HS because they were always suggested or read by girls, I tackled Les Miserables instead, I think this was my first-read, I wish this was my bookclub read, I'm such a booksnob, Jane Eyre, mince pie, no I don't think I've seen any of the films, why didn't JE think to look for Uncle?Care

Thoughts by Charlotte Bronte, 2016 (orig 1847), 19 hours 10 minutes

Narrated by Thandie Newton.

Challenge: Personal

Genre: Classics, Feminism, Gothic Romance?

Type/Source: Audiobook / Audible

Why I read this now: #shrug

MOTIVATION for READING: Oh Jane. Jane, I feel like I know you. I have ‘known’ your story for what feels like forever. But, my memory fails me! I’m not really positive that I have met you face-to-face and heard your story from you directly. Perhaps I have only heard talk from other acquaintances, about your Mr. Rochester and his mad wife in the attic. I can’t remember if I was lying when I say I have read your book. Did I? or does it just seem that way because I know of the tale? (I have the same issue/question re: Wuthering Heights.)

I had to be sure. I decided that experiencing Jane Eyre via audiobook was the way to go (a first-read or reread – who cares? I suspected I would enjoy it – I love long classics on audio.) Lucky for me, I was able to select THIS edition.

WHAT’s it ABOUT: Hmmmm, dare I spoil it? Have I already?! EVERYONE KNOWS WHAT JANE EYRE IS ABOUT, right?

Actually, no. One of my best friends asked me yesterday, what is about? Crazy, huh? She’s such a good egg but is she plugged into the world of literature-mania like me? She is NOT.

And I had hard time telling her. How much to tell? I shrugged and told her she wouldn’t like it and would probably DNF it. I know her well enough.

WHAT’s GOOD: Thandie Newton is a dream. She is PERFECTION. She made every line beautiful and dreamy; she delivered the exact amount of emotion to every sentence. Fraught or loving, scary or forcefully independent.

Listen to Thandie’s voice and her thoughts on doing the narration:

What’s NOT so good: Bronte can go on and on with descriptions but I enjoyed it. (I suspect my friend would roll her eyes in weariness. I also suspect she wouldn’t like the old language.)

FINAL THOUGHTS: If you want to audiobook a classic, choose this one.

RATING: Five slices of gooseberry pie.

“I have kept myself; and, I trust, shall keep myself again. What are you going to do with these gooseberries?” I inquired, as she brought out a basket of the fruit.

“Mak’ ’em into pies.”

“Give them to me and I’ll pick them.”

“Nay; I dunnut want ye to do nought.”

“But I must do something. Let me have them.”

She consented; and she even brought me a clean towel to spread over my dress, “lest,” as she said, “I should mucky it.”

pierating

Copyright © 2007-2018. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club. It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Care's Books and Pie

"I like my literature with a slice of pie."