BW5: February Author of the Month: Agatha Christie

 

Happy Sunday! February is upon us which begs the questions -  will Punxsutawney Phil see his shadow and we'll have six more weeks of Winter?  Most likely.   But did you know, before the ground hog, there was a hedgehog. Poor guy was usurped by the ground hog in 1887 in America.

Ireland folklorist Kevin Danaher says that "To see a hedgehog was a good weather sign, for the hedgehog comes out of the hole in which he has spent the winter, looks about to judge the weather, and returns to his burrow if bad weather is going to continue. If he stays out, it means that he knows that mild weather is coming.”  The Year in Ireland: Irish Calendar Customs.

February is also Black History Month, Creative Romance Month, and An Affair to Remember Month.   

AND our Bookish Bookology Author of the month is Agatha Christie.  

Dame Agatha Christie was born September 15, 1890 in Torquay, Devon. She began writing poems when she was a child and short stories by the age of 18. During the first world war, she started writing detective stories.  In 1919, her first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles was published and she went on to publish 66 detective novels, 14 short story collections as well as plays, plus 6 romances under the pseudonym of Mary Westmacott.   She created numerous characters including Hercule Poirot, Miss Marple, Tommy and Tuppence as well as Ariadne Oliver, Harley Quin and Parkey Pyne. 

She loved archaeology and traveling. She traveled on the Orient Express in 1928, then in 1930 went on to an archaeological site in UR, Nineveh in the Middle East  where she met Max who become her second husband. She accompanied him on many digs and her stories were inspired by all her true life experiences.  In 1955, She was the first to receive the Grand Master Award, the highest honor by the Mystery Writers of America's.  In 1971, she was granted female knighthood as Dame Commander of the British Empire for her literary work.  She passed away at the age of 85 on January 12, 1976.

Agatha Christie is also one of our 52 Books bingo categories as well as the subject of one of our Perpetual Reading challenges. I've been bouncing around the list, instead of reading chronologically, and currently have Why didn't they ask Evans?, Mystery of the Blue Train, and Sad Cypress in my reading stacks. 

 If you've been following the Read Agatha Christie 2023 Motive and Methods readalong challenge, February's read is Partners in Crime, from one of her Tommy and Tuppence short story collections.   

And the Royal Reading Room recently covered Agatha Christie during their Christmas Interlude which including a video discussion between Vaseem Khan, Dreda Say Mitchell, Robert Thorogood, and James Prichard on the Legacy and Life of Agatha Christie.  

Enjoy exploring through the creative mind of Agatha Christie.

Our post is sponsored by the letter E. Big E, little e, what begins with E.  Earl and Edward, everyman and everywhere, earnestly earning enlightenment and erudition. 

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Please share your thoughts and reviews. Link to your website, blog, Goodreads, Google+, Tumblers, or Instagram page. If you do not have a social media account, please leave a comment to let us know what you are reading. The link widget closes at the end of each book week. 

 In the Your Name field, type in your name and the name of the book in parenthesis. In the Your URL field paste a link to your post, then check the privacy box and click enter.

BW4: 2023 Chinese Lunar New Year: Year of the Rabbit

 

Happy Sunday! Today is the beginning of the Chinese Lunar New Year which is the Year of the Rabbit.  

"Rabbits are known to be incredibly witty, outgoing, well-spoken, creative, empathetic, thoughtful and meditative; the water element of 2023 means this year will bring even more introspection, peace and hope... It’s a season to hone into your imagination, intuition and instincts. With artistic inspiration as a focal point, the rabbit encourages you to fill your heart and soul with hobbies and crafts. Poetry, painting, making music—any activity that instills inner harmony will reign supreme."  Stylecaster - Cam Zhang

Good thing I'm in a creative mood this year.   

I love following rabbit trails and have been following a lot of rabbit trails lately on Instagram, posts about books and bullet journaling and writing and books, books, and more books, with a little bit of self help thrown in, along with a smattering of celebrities. Which brings me to the point of this post - we're going to dive down a rabbit hole this week and read something with or about or symbolizes rabbits this week.  No, it doesn't have to be an actual rabbit. 

While reading Julia Cameron's Write for Life this week,  I was reminded of the story, The Tortoise and the Hare when Cameron reminds writers to take it slow and easy and not race ahead. "Slow and steady wins the race." 

I'm suddenly reminded of The Runaway Bunny by Margaret Wise Brown which we used to read way back when James was a toddler. And of course, Goodnight Moon, both which hold a special place in our hearts. 

Read a books with rabbits or bunnies or other animals on the cover, such as The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter. 

Read a book with an animal protagonist, maybe rabbit detective's like Mr. and Mrs. Bunny — Detectives Extraordinaire!

Read about an Anthromorphic animal, like Watership Down by Richard Adams, or Winnie the Pooh by A.A. Milne. 

Read a book about a character with the nickname rabbit like John Updike's Rabbit, Run. 

Read about the joys of rabbits, the care and feeding, the raising of rabbits.

Who is your favorite rabbit character?  

Have fun! 

This post was brought to you by the letter D! Big D, little d, what begins with D. Dutch rabbits, deer, dingo or dragonflies. Donuts, dragon fruits, drumsticks or dandelions.  Dickens, Dumas, Dorothy or Daniel. Whether they are dangerous, dandy, or down right dastardly, don't deny you like to read about stories with a begin or end with a D.

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Please share your thoughts and reviews. Link to your website, blog, Goodreads, Google+, Tumblers, or Instagram page. If you do not have a social media account, please leave a comment to let us know what you are reading. The link widget closes at the end of each book week. 

 In the Your Name field, type in your name and the name of the book in parenthesis. In the Your URL field paste a link to your post, then check the privacy box and click enter.

BW3: Blue

 

Happy Sunday!  I follow different publishers and different book bloggers, and I keep seeing all these bookshelves that are categorized by books of the same color.  Some of the pictures are kind of pretty and others, truth be told, look garish and unsightly. There are even companies,  like Juniper Books, who curates books by color.  

Is it the color that matters, or the content of the book that matters?  To me, it's more the content. The color coding would drive me crazy, because I like to categorize, then alphabetize my books. All my Nora Roberts books take up one whole bookcase, while Robert Jordan's may take up a shelf as well as Faith Hunter and few others.  And some of the authors do make some kind of attempt to color coordinate their covers. Take for example, James Rollin's Sigma Force series or J.D. Robb's In Death series.  Yes, they are double parked, at least until our new shelves come in. And that's another story. 

Hmm? Robb's name seems to have gotten larger over the years.  

But,  I do have some bookshelves which I'll arrange the books by height:

Yes, I'll admit it's a thing, probably as much as someone else arranging their shelves by color is a thing. Everyone has their own ways of shelving books, whether it's pleasing to the eye, organized by category or alphabetical or chronologically, artfully or willy nilly.   How do you like to arrange your bookshelves?  

And you're probably wondering why I named this week's post Blue.  That's because I'm reading The Blue by Nancy Bilyeau which is a historical novel about finding the secrets of porcelain and the color blue and it gave me the idea for the post.  

Your mission this week is the read a book with a blue cover or with blue in the title or about the subject blue, whatever that may be. 

Our post is sponsored by the letter C this week.  Big C, little c, what begins with C.  Color, coins, capital or class. Clarke or Cruickshank's, Cooper or Cox,  Conrad or Child, what a conundrum. Find a  character that's canny or cagey or cunning. 

Happy Reading! 

 

Please share your thoughts and reviews. Link to your website, blog, Goodreads, Google+, Tumblers, or Instagram page. If you do not have a social media account, please leave a comment to let us know what you are reading. The link widget closes at the end of each book week. 

 In the Your Name field, type in your name and the name of the book in parenthesis. In the Your URL field paste a link to your post, then check the privacy box and click enter.

BW2: 52 Books Bingo - Eastern

"East of the sun and west of the moon.' As unfathomable as the words were, I realized I must figure them out, reason it through. For I would go to this impossible land that lay east of the sun and west of the moon. From the moment the sleigh had vanished from sight and I could no longer hear the silver bells I knew that I would go after the stranger that had been the white bear to make right the terrible wrong I had done him.... All that mattered was to make things right. And I would do whatever it took, journey to wherever I must, to reach that goal.” ~ Edith Pattou, East

Happy Sunday!  Our first 52 Books Bingo category is Eastern which means our reading journey is taking us east.  But where in the east? We could go to the Far East, the Middle East, Eastern Europe, East of the Mississippi, or maybe the East coast.  Turn towards the east and read a book from whichever town, city, state, or country is in that direction.  Find a a book with East in the title or a character, or even a dog named East. Ask a family member to blindly pick a point on the map located in the east and read a book by an author closest to that point. How you interpret it is up to you.

11 Fantastic Books set in Asia

15 Must Read Books by Middle Eastern Authors

50 Must Reads of Slavic Literature 

53 Books Directly Related to Mississippi

Books with East in the Title 

Authors with East in their name

Our post is brought to you this week by the letter B.  Big b, little b, what begins with B?   Read a book by Babbage or Baker or Bruce.  Read a book about a Beatrice or Betty or a Ben. Read a book about a Bee or a Bat or a Badger. Read a book set in Baton Rouge, Bangladesh, or Bangor, or Botswana. Read a book about Badminton, or baseball, or barrel racing. Whether they are beguiling or baffling, beautiful or bossy, every book begins with a b. *wink*

What book did you read this week that was better than a bag of chips? 

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Please share your thoughts and reviews. Link to your website, blog, Goodreads, Google+, Tumblers, or Instagram page. If you do not have a social media account, please leave a comment to let us know what you are reading. The link widget closes at the end of each book week. 

In the Your Name field, type in your name and the name of the book in parenthesis. In the Your URL field paste a link to your post, then check the privacy box and click enter.

BW1: Welcome to another bookish adventure around the world

 

"A book, too, can be a star, a living fire to lighten the darkness, 

leading out into  the expanding universe" ~ Madeleine L'Engle

Happy New Year and welcome to our 15th year of Read 52 Books in 52 Weeks. If you are new to our reading quest, the official goal is 52 books. How you get there is up to you.  But I'll tell you a secret. Shh, I'll whisper, but don't tell anyone.  For those who hate setting goals, we have an unofficial goal which is to set your own goal.  Read what you want, explore and dive into those longer books, engage your mind and soul and don't worry.  Have fun. Follow as many rabbit trails as you like and see where they lead. 

To help us have fun, there are a number of mini, monthly, annual, and perpetual challenges to choose from.  For 2023 we have an updated Bookish Bookology which is our author of the month. There are a number of ways to complete the challenge, including but not limited to:  

• Spell out the author's name - one book per letter from the title on the cover.
• Read one or more books written by the author. 
• Read a book written in the country or time period of the author.

We traditionally start our year with Haruki Murakami, our January author the month, so we are going to dive right in and head to East Asia. Which coincidently fills our Eastern Bingo category.  Nudge nudge wink wink!!

I couldn't wait so I already started After Dark which is all about the magical hours between midnight to dawn. Standing by to reread almost immediately is 1Q84 which I think is one of Murakami's best stories ever.  According to Murakami it is a mind bending ode to George Orwell's 1984.  Also on my shelves are Novelist as a Vocation and his short story collection Men Without Women.  And if you like comparing books to film, Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Drive My Car was adapted from the short story Drive My Car in Men Without Women.  

We also have an updated Bingo which is taking us around the world, from the north to the south, from the east to the west as well as taking us through the libraries of Agatha Christie, Neal Peart, Jorge Luis Borges and Mind Voyages Science Fiction / Fantasy adventure.  And if you're working your way through Well Educated Mind, the list is available in the menu bar.   

We'll be working our way through the alphabet again with A to Z and Back Again. There are a variety of ways to complete the project and you don't have to stick with authors or titles only.  Check out the link on the menu bar for more information. 

Our A to Z and Back Again letter of the week is A.

Are you ready? Great! It's time to put on your hat and walking shoes, strap on your backpack, grab that walking stick and start our reading adventure. 

Happy reading and cheers to a wonderful, enlightening, fun reading new year! 

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Please share your year end wrap up, book thoughts reviews and link to your website, blog, Goodreads, Google+, Tumblers, or Instagram page. If you do not have a social media account, please leave a comment to let us know what you are reading. The link widget closes at the end of each book week. 

In the Your Name field, type in your name and the name of the book in parenthesis. In the Your URL field paste a link to your post, then check the privacy box and click enter.