Blogiversary
I'm celebrating 15 years of blogging today, so there are 15 balloons up there. (Yeah, count 'em!) My first post on this blog was on January 30, 2007, which means I have now been blogging for a decade and a half. I'm still having fun!
Two books I finished recently
Delia Sweeney has always been unlike her older sister — fair and delicate compared to tall, statuesque Nora, whose hair is as dark as Donegal turf. In other ways too, the sisters are leagues apart. Nora is her mother’s darling, favored at every turn, and expected to marry into wealth. Delia, constantly slighted, finds a measure of happiness helping her da on the farm. The rest of the time, she reads about far-off places that seem sure to remain a fantasy — until the day a letter arrives from America. A distant relative has provided the means for Delia and Nora to go to New York. Delia will be a lowly maid in a modest household, while Nora will be governess for a well-to-do family.
In Queenstown, Cork, they board the Titanic, a majestic new ocean liner making its maiden voyage. Any hope Delia carried that she and her sister might become closer during the trip soon vanishes. For there are far greater perils to contend with as the ship makes its way across the Atlantic. In the wake of that fateful journey, Delia makes an impulsive choice to take Nora’s place as governess. Her decision sparks an adventure that leads her from Fifth Avenue to Dallas, Texas, where oilfields bring unimagined riches to some, despair to others. Delia grows close to her vulnerable young charge, and to the girl’s father. But her deception will have repercussions impossible to foresee, even as it brings happiness within reach for the first time.
This book counts for my Historical Fiction Reading Challenge 2022 and also for my TBR 22 in '22 Challenge, since I bought it last year. For the record, I kept reading to see what would happen, but it was confusing to read about two different sisters in the alternating chapters, but with one pretending to be the other. Yeah, confusing and sometimes very frustrating. I'm not likely to read other books by this author.
I won't read anything else by this author, either. He used some version of the 4-letter F-word on what felt like every other page, trying to make everyone sound tough, I guess. The main character, a woman in a man's job, is "so tough" that she's also a felon (though that wasn't really HER fault, ya know). But the author's main reason for writing the book seems to have been to show how stupid a President of the United States was — an overweight president whose winter White House was in Florida. It has a tiresome number of 4-letter words, along with the POTUS Pussies, a group of high society women who called themselves "Potussies" to sound less crude. It's a waste of time.
What I'm reading
It’s time to get serious about playfulness. When was the last time you felt really, truly happy? If you’ve ever longed to leave your exhausting days and fretful nights behind, look no further. Courtney Ellis is a whimsical storyteller who combines witty humor and engaging research with unfettered honesty. You’ll discover there is almost nothing that playfulness cannot make a little bit better, a little bit easier, and a lot more fun. Lift your mood, lighten your load, let go of your most serious self, and renew your spirit with the power of playfulness.
Word of the Day
Y'all'd've = triple contraction of "you all would have." It's colloquial, used mostly in the South and in neighboring regions. Example: "We could've met y'all there, if y'all'd've just told us!" (For those who wonder — no, I've never seen this "word" in print.)
a place for us to link up and share what
we have read and done during this week.
4 comments:
I just noticed the Carl Hiaasen book on my dad's stack so it will be interesting to see what he thinks.
Congratulations on 15 years of blogging! I think your blog was one of the first I discovered when I started blogging in 2009
I hate authors who use gratuitous foul language or explicit sex. I can't stand it. My Sunday Salon
Bonnie, your blog was one of the first blogs I ever visited when I started blogging in June of 2008. Congratulations on fifteen years of blogging!
I love the idea of living lightly. I've had "play" as my word for the year for several years. I'm not sure that I really took things any lighter. I feel like I've had more success with "love" as my word this year. It redirects my behavior instantly when I think of it.
You have blogged a few more years than me. 15 years seems quite long and yet when you think about it in terms of blogging, it seems even longer, at least to me. Congrats and I hope you'll blog as happily as before.
Have a lovely day.
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