Today’s Top Ten Tuesday topic from That Artsy Reader Girl is “Reasons I Love Reading.” It reminded me of my grandmother who once (during an 11-day power outage) shared with me that she felt sorry for people who don’t read. “What do they do with all their time?” What indeed?

1. Language excites me. A well-turned phrase needs to be shared with whoever is nearby (whether they’re interested or not. Sorry, Rudi.) New words are like candy. And I love how manipulating the way words are put together conveys so much.
2. Waiting with a book is an opportunity to get a few pages in, rather than an opportunity for tedium or irritation.
3. I love being transported to a different time and place.
4. I am not wealthy enough or endowed with enough vacation time to go to all the places I want to visit … except with my library card.
5. A shared love of a story is a shortcut. My college roommate said she knew the first night we’d be friends because I put a copy of Anne of Green Gables on my desk. And seeing people reading the Harry Potter books in the first days after release helped me know there were lots of people who shared something important with me.
6. I can juggle different worlds. At a tense point in the fantasy story? Dive into that romance novel until you’re feeling ready to go on. Someone once remarked they didn’t understand how I could read multiple books at once. “Don’t you get them mixed up?” I replied that I was perfectly capable of not confusing the details of multiple friends and this wasn’t especially different.
7. Books can fill in for friends (for a little while) when you’re feeling lonely and out of your element. When we moved to D.C., we brought a carload of stuff with us at a time. I had a box of books I insisted had to come with me first off.
8. Your books tell me about you. The first thing I do on going to someone’s home for the first time is to look at their bookshelves.
9. It’s the best way to learn things! I mean, sure YouTube is absolutely faster if I want to learn how to knit an i-cord. But if I want to learn the history of knitting or why microaggressions are so virulent? I’m turning to a book.
10. Sometimes, a magical book will make you feel seen in a way that nothing else does.

Why do you love to read?

Oh, and while I have you bookish people here: Are there spoilers to Six of Crows if I start reading it before I finish watching season one of Shadow and Bone on Netflix? I started listening to it last year and quickly realized it would be a book I’d enjoy more in print.

My shawl is … still small. I’m through the first three set-up sections, but there are eight sections of mosaic ahead.

I just tonight wrapped up listening to Act Your Age, Eve Brown, the final book in Talia Hibbert’s Brown sisters romance novels.

I still have about 100 pages left in Arsenic and Adobo. The main character and her family have grown on me, but I am neither impressed by the murder mystery aspect of the book nor especially worried that the whodunit is going to surprise me.

I’m thinking when I’m done I’ll start A Lady’s Formula for Love, about a Victorian scientist and the Scottish body guard/police officer who must protect her against threats.

Head over to As Kat Knits to see what others are reading and crafting!

This week’s Top Ten Tuesday from That Artsy Reader Girl invites us to share the new releases we’re most looking forward to in the next six months:

1. Miss Moriarty, I Presume?, by Sherry Thomas (November)
2. Any Way the Wind Blows, by Rainbow Rowell (July)
3. Incense and Sensibility, by Sonali Dev (July)
4. Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World, by Benjamin Alire Sáenz (October)
5. Under the Whispering Door, by TJ Klune (September)
6. Fast Pitch, by Nic Stone
7. If the Shoe Fits, by Julie Murphy (August)
8. Enola Holmes and the Black Barouche, by Nancy Springer (August)
9. The Lincoln Highway, by Amir Towles (October)
10. Your Guide to Not Getting Murdered in a Quaint English Village, by Maureen Johnson (September)

How about you? Are there any books coming out before the end of the year you’re particularly excited about?

My rainbow socks will not likely be done by the end of the month, particularly with Tour knitting starting on Saturday. But I do have a finished sock, so that’s not nothing.

I am about halfway through both Arsenic and Adobo and Act Your Age, Eve Brown. The former has started irritating me less, so although I am relatively certain I know the who of the murder, I’m happy to read through to see if there’s some depth to the why. And the latter series of books is always enjoyable. Both Chloe and Dani have now made (phone) appearances in the story, so I’m even happier.

Head over to As Kat Knits to see what others are crafting and reading.

I’m feeling very meh about the book I started in print last week. There are some pretty major stressors in my life right now, so I can’t tell if it’s just that, if I need to give myself another 25 pages to let the story get going, or if, despite several other people telling me it’s good, it’s just not the right book for me.

And with all those other stressors, it feels very irksome to have the thing I like best as a stress reliever to be demanding additional brain power and attention.

Just be easy, reading, at least for the rest of this month!

I haven’t been especially good about reading this year, which is due in large part to working too much and being depressed and then working some more. But summer is a time of lounging by the pool and soaking up rays at the beach and staying out late at the park. I bet if I made dates with some of my friends to just go read at a cafe, they’d be down for that. So I will do that.

To help with that plan come That Artsy Reader Girl and this week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic, a perennial seasonal favorite — the top ten books I plan to read this summer:

1. Incense and Sensibility by Sonali Dev — The latest in one of my favorite series — retellings of Jane Austen’s novels — drops the first week in July.
2. Beth & Amy by Virginia Kantra — The sequel to Meg & Jo, a modern reimagining of the four March sisters as 20-somethings who grew up on a farm in the Carolinas.
3. Pride & Premeditation by Tirzah Price — Yup, another Austen spin, but this time with a murder subplot.
4. The Road Trip by Beth O’Leary — I loved The Flatshare and road trips just scream summertime.
5. A Lady’s Formula for Love by Elizabeth Everett — A Victorian romance, but set between a fiercely independent scientist who heads a women’s intellectual circle and the bodyguard assigned to protect her. I’m hoping for a readalike to the Veronica Speedwell series.
6. Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo — A heist novel, this is part of the Grishaverse and features some of the characters from the recent Shadows and Bone series on Netflix. I’d started it on audio months ago and then decided it would work better on paper and have been waiting for it on the holds list ever since.
7. The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World by Laura Imai Messina — Based on a true story, this novel tells about a telephone booth in a Japanese garden — and the unique purpose strangers put it to.
8. The Personal Librarian by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray — Historical fiction aboutBelle de Costa Greene, J.P. Morgan’s personal librarian and a Black woman passing as white.
9. You’ll Never Believe What Happened to Lacey: Crazy Stories about Racism by Amber Ruffin and Lacey Lamar — Real-life anecdotes from about Living While Black from Amber Ruffin and her sister.

How about you? What’s on your summer TBR list?

Category: books. There is/are 2 Comments.