Five Tuesdays in Winter

Thoughts by Lily King, Blackstone 2021, 6 hours 10 minutes

Narrated by: Bronson Pinchot, Mark Bramhall, Stacey Glemboski, Cassandra Campbell, Christa Lewis

Challenge: What’s in a Name: Season category

Genre/Theme: Short Story, Adult Lit

Type/Source: Audiobook / Audible

What It’s About: If you have Audible, this is an included special gift. I don’t even recall who alerted me, but I ran to my account and sure enough, I was able to download without losing a credit. SCORE!

Ten short stories, some longer than others, all marvelous. I enjoyed the entire collection. Looking at the list now, some come back to me with a force of characterization and suspense, some I don’t even remember what they were about or am hazy about how they ended already but that’s just me. Many are about wistful misunderstandings or memories of relationships now unfixable. Perhaps some get fixed. All are delightful! Heartily recommended.

Thoughts: I think my favorites are the title story, “Five Tuesdays in Winter” – a shy widower bookseller with a teenage daughter has a crush on one of his staff, “When in the Dordogne” – two college kids get to house sit for a wealthy couple traveling abroad and they also get to watch their 14 yo boy, and “The Man at the Door” – a young mother desperate for time alone so she can write her novel struggles with her realities, her past and her present. All of the stories shine, all are provoking, just real good. Audio is well done.

“She was the type who could not take a compliment. If he told her she looked nice, she’d give the reason instead of saying thank you. But he was the type who could not give a compliment, so he just said hello and let her in.”

“Five tuesdays in Winter”

 

Rating: Five slices of blueberry pie.

Grant had heated up a Sara Lee pie, blueberry.

When he pulled it out, he started to cut into it and Ed said, “I know how you’re going to do this: miserly wedges, one at a time. When you know for a fact we’re going to eat the whole thing. Give me that.”

Ed took the knife from him and cut the pie into thirds, and put a mound of ice cream on each of the enormous pieces. We ate on the porch. It was a warm humid night, the hot pie and the cold ice cream were perfect together.

“When in the dordogne”

 

 

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The Dud Avocado

A review and a clarification…

First, the response to the comments on the prior post: I did not mean to imply that WordPress is hard and difficult to figure out. I really REALLY do think it much more preferable than Blogger – especially when I do hear that platform has not been updated ever. Yikes. WP is better at spam filtering, if nothing else.

It was only that I didn’t want to deal with any changes. I want my OLD way I’m used to. If I do take the time to relax into it and deal, I’m sure it will be lovely. I just couldn’t do quick because I couldn’t FIND my tags and categories. Not a big deal. I could have taken the time to ask customer service where they are hiding this feature in the latest upgrade, but I was in a hurry.

That said,

I’m right now typing this on the WRITE-NOW button that is available to me and I’m rolling with it.

READY for my REVIEW?

Cool. Here goes.

by Elaine Dundy, 1958, 260 pages, Kindle Edition

I loved the Introduction to The Dud Avocado.
I actually read it first, too, and I don’t remember why. (I never read the Intro to a classic if I’ve yet to read the story!! What has happened to me?!)

Unfortunately, I couldn’t finish The Dud Avocado. I did enjoy the breezy style in the beginning and I chuckled in amusement with her observations and challenges of living in Paris as a young lady in the 50s.

But then I put it down and left it a few days and when I did come back to it, I couldn’t figure out where it was going. I put it down again and then, then,

oops. The book expired and I wasn’t able to read on. It was a library eBook and Too-Much-Time-Passed… POOF! It was gone.

DNF and I’m not that sorry. I can always check it out again.

I’m still going to count it for the What’s in a Name Challenge

Fruit or Vegetable Category 

 

And it is on my Classics Club 50 list so WOO HOO!

 

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.

What’s in a Name 2018 Kick Off Post

My favorite challenge! This button     will take you to the host blog, The Worm Hole.

Here are the categories (with hyperlinks back to host blog) and my possible choices:

The word ‘the’ used twice – From my Classics Club 50: The House of the Seven Gables by Nat Hawthorne.

A fruit or vegetable – I’m committing to Elaine Dundy‘s The Dud Avocado, also on my Classics Club 50.

A shape – SO EXCITED to announce another Classics Club 50 will fit this one:  The Ox-Bow Incident by Walter Van Tilberg Clark. An ox-bow is defined as 

1. a U-shaped bend in the course of a river.

   • short for oxbow lake.
2. a U-shaped collar of an ox yoke.

A title that begins with Z – Darn that I read Z last year (book about Zelda Fitzgerald) so I’m going to try The Zero by Jess Walter – I absolutely loved his Beautiful Ruins.

A nationality – Not sure here. Had American War for this spot when it was on the TOB long list but since it didn’t make the short. I have a lot of great nonfiction options about women that history forgot and I might go that route. Or perhaps American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang which would be a graphic novel and I want more of these. Any other suggestions?

A season – Cruel Winter by Sheila Connelly. I purchased this book for a friend’s birthday because it sounded like something she would enjoy and she promised to let me read it after (and then I’ll give it back so she can loan to her mom.)

I have created a goodreads list of done-reads and possibles for my 2018 tracking here…

Happy Reading Challenges!  What is the challenge you are MOST looking forward to this year?

 

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.

What’s in a Name is my Favorite (Challenge)

I completed a reading challenge. I’m quite happy about this. 

I was quite happy… until I realized I didn’t read any – none, nada, not a ONE, of the classics on my Classics 50 Challenge in the entire 12 months of 2017.

What?  HUH?!

Oh well. I don’t know why this really saddens me. But it does. It makes me sad. Not one?  REALLY?

Well. I already know I’m failing miserably at the Tournament of Books Long List. We know my book review posting has been pathetic since May. Yep, Ok. WE KNOW.

I know – or think I just MUST have – read one or two books this year that were published over 50 years (ok, maybe 25  years ago – let’s try that?) But I’m afraid to look.

SO, let’s be happy with KINDNESS. Let’s be happy with making a tremendous effort to not get bogged down by ‘the news’ – fake or otherwise (see? I’m already losing it) and let’s think positive fighting RIGHT humanity-minded equality-grounded love-centered thoughts and be kind to every person, every puppy. Cats, too. Why not.

And PIE. Let’s promote PIE because the World can use a PEACE. 

Here are the books I read for the 2017 What’s in a Name Challenge:

Title with number (not spelled out): 

Building: 

Title with an X: 

Compass Direction: 

Cutlery: 

Alliteration: 

I love this time of year in blog world. Stats! Pie charts! Picking THE book to be the First of the Year! Going through my books to find ones that fit the next What’s in a Name Challenge!  Cheers

Copyright © 2007-2017. 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.

 

What’s in a Name 7 and soon 8

My favorite reading challenge is What’s in a Name.

For 2014, year 7 of this challenge, I read multiple books for one category but missed one category, the weather one. If I can make it happen, I will finish Wind, Sand and Stars by 12/31. I heartily HEARTILY recommend Wind, Sand and Stars by Antoine de Saint Exupéry to anyone for any reason, by the way. This will be a reread for me. I own two copies.

By category:

• Time – The Yearling / Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
• Number – Slaughterhouse-Five/Vonnegut (or Three Men in a Boat, or The Sign of Four…)
• Name – My Antonia / Cather
• Weather –
• Royalty – The Count of Monte Cristo / Dumas
• School – 101 Things I Learned in Film School / Landau

hey – FOUR of these are CLASSICS! I was on a classics role in ’14…

I had multiple choices for the Time and Royalty categories, too but didn’t read all the Queen books that I seem to be accumulating. Maybe 2015 should tackle this theme – I have books on most of the famous queens of history and am ready to read more nonfiction.

Now, announcing NEXT year’s WiaN8!

Categories – books on my shelves that might fit:  

• Words ending with ING – First You Try Everything by Jane McCaffery, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay – Chabon, or Music for a Torching by AMHomes
• Color – Color by Victoria Finlay or Vreeland’s Girl in Hyacinth Blue
• Familial Relationship – My choice is Sister Carrie (been wanting to read this forever; it has been on too many upcoming “gonna read” lists!) but I also have The Family Orchard by Nomi Eve which would work or The Kingmaker’s Daughter by Philippa Gregory
• Body of Water – I think I am going to vote that a flood IS sort of a body of water and choose Margaret Atwood’s Year of the Flood. But Two Rivers by T.Greenwood is an option.
• City – Hard City by Clark Howard
• Animal – Ape House – Sara Gruen or The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery
  HIdeinWhitetoSkipLine

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What’s In a Name Challenge UPDATE

Hello! I just found out that my favorite challenge has added an additional category!

The What’s In a Name Challenge for 2014 now has a BONUS category of reading a book with a title that has something to do with SCHOOL.

I have quite a few nonfiction choices in my tbr. The one fiction I have wanted to read is The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Bauermeister. Have you read this? I also have a book poetry, God Went to Beauty School by Cynthia Rylant. How about this one?

I found out this news when I was double-checking on the number category. Sure enough, I can count Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five for this challenge. The number is spelled out in letters and not as ‘5’, so it works. Expect my thoughts on this reread soon.
Have you read this one?

Copyright © 2007-2014. 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.