May Reading Report

Last day of May. Sneaking in with a reading report in the last hour here before the month gets away from me. May was a good reading month - I'm predicting that a couple of the books I got to this month will make my best of 2016 reading list by the end of the year ... and that's with six months of the year left to go!

This month I finished:

• Stella by Starlight by Sharon M. Draper. The story of a small black community in North Carolina during the depression and how they band together when the KKK starts to make its presence known. Stella is the unlikely heroine in this story and she is a small voice that helps her community fight back. This is one that I checked out from the library and immediately turned around and ordered a copy for our personal library. So good. 
• The Enchanted Castle by E. Nesbit. A magical story about four children who discover a magic ring and what happens when the wearer makes a wish while wearing it. It was not our favorite Nesbit story (try The 5 Children and It or The Railway Children for one of our favorites), but we still enjoyed it. I think we just had a rough start to this book with a very poorly formatted Kindle book that made it quite difficult to read, as well as very long chapter. I think it would have been more enjoyable if we hadn't read it aloud, and I don't say that about many books.
• The Fellowship of the Ring by JRR Tolkien. The first time reading this classic. I found parts of the book a little dry to read through, probably because I've seen the movies so much, and felt like I was slogging through parts of it. I did like it enough to move on to The Two Towers, which I must say is progressing much quicker!
• Leepike Ridge by N.D. Wilson. Another N.D. Wilson book that we had on our shelf that I hadn't read yet. This is a modern story (unlike all his fantasy which I have read lately) and it was full of mystery, murder and escape from great peril. I loved it, and if you have a young reader (I'd say ten and up) that likes adventure and thrilling danger, this is a great pick.
• Own Your Life by Sally Clarkson. I have stopped and started this book a half dozen times. I was a little worried it was going to be a "name it and claim it" type of book, but having read as much Sally Clarkson as I have, I shouldn't have been worried. A wonderful (WONDERFUL) book about applying Scripture to your life and redeeming areas where you to see the Lord grow you and where you want to move out and serve him with confidence. I can't wait to read it again.
• Taran Wanderer, book 4, Chronicles of Prydian by Lloyd Alexander. We are determined to finish this series this summer! Book 4 of the series finds our hero, Taran, on a quest to figure out his parentage. This one doesn't have as many colorful characters as the first three books, and it misses the character of the spirited Princess Eilonwey and the noble Sir Gwydion, but none-the-less, we wrapped this one up just today and are headed into book 5 to find out if our assistant pig keeper does get the girl in the end.

Short and sweet this month. I posted at the end of last week my optimistic list for the summer so we'll see where I end up on those books by the end of June! Book lists and goals are one of my favorite things ... almost as much fun as actually reading the books. :)

Big Summer Plans of the Bookish Sort

School's out!

We finished our year as of last week (though one girl still has a little math to do, but we won't mention any names). We are assembling summer bucket lists, seeing how many days in a row we can get to the pool, and young people are enjoying staying up past a sensible person's bedtime. Not me. I'm enjoying going to bed at the same time, and everyone else sleeping in a little longer in the morning. : )



One of my resolutions this year was to read more of the stuff sitting around on my shelf. With that in mind, I've put together a summer reading list of several that I've been wanting to read for just forever, several that I've been wanting to re-read, and ... let's be honest ... there are a few new goodies in there as well.

Re-reads include:

• The Mission of Motherhood by Sally Clarkson.
• The Core by Leigh A. Bortins

From the shelves that I've put off for way to long include:

• The Question by Leigh A. Bortins. N1 starts Challenge A this fall and I should have probably read this last summer!
• For the Children's Sake by Susan Schaffer Macaulay. 
• Prayer by Richard Foster.
• Understood Betsy by Dorothy Canfield Fisher. Because this is a classic and because I have a Betsy.
• C.S. Lewis' Miracles. Because I keep saying that I want to read more C.S.L. and this is what my husband said I should read next. So far, I've only read Screwtape Letters, twice, and Mere Christianity, once. I should probably reread that one as well.
• The Two Towers (which I'm about half-way through) and The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien. I read The Fellowship of the Ring in May as part of a Facebook book club I am in and I'm continuing the series. The Fellowship dragged quite a bit for me, but thankfully The Two Towers has picked up the pace a bit!

From the shiny, bright, and new pile:

• The Wild Robot by Peter Brown. I admit, I checked this out from the library based on a description on Amazon and because I liked the cover. : )
• None Like Him by Jen Wilkin. Her Women of the Word is excellent, and I'm working my way through her 1st Peter study right now, so buying her new book was a no-brainer.
• Missional Motherhood by Gloria Furman. Everything I've read by Gloria I've also enjoyed, but strangely enough, I've never actually finished one of her books. Hoping to rectify that this summer.
• Sophie Hudson's newest which comes out next week - Giddy Up, Eunice. I have read Boomama's first two books multiple times and laugh out loud and am moved with every reading and so I have great hopes for this one as well. She gets me.

If you are reading anything fun in your neck of the woods, I'm all ears! Happy summer!