The Renfroe Scoop: 2025 Books

2025 Totals (so far):

Number of Books: 46

Pages: 11,514

Audiobooks: 81 hours, 12 minutes

New Favorites: The Ogress and the Orphans, A Marriage at Sea, The Complete Brambly Hedge, Isola, We Solve Murders 🎧, The Impossible Fortune 🎧

Old Favorites: A Gentleman in Moscow, The Silence of the North

Favorite Vocab Words: To sit below the salt: comes from old European dining customs, especially during medieval times. It means to be of lower social status or less important in a group. In medieval dining halls, salt was a valuable commodity, and a large salt cellar was placed in the middle of the table. Important guests sat above the salt (closer to the host and the best seats), while less important guests sat below the salt, farther from the host and with less prestige. So, if someone says today that you “sit below the salt,” it’s a figurative way of saying you have lower rank or influence in a particular situation.

46. Born This Happy Morning (re-read, 2025.12.22)

By: John Bytheway

Pages: 112

Published: 2014

Genre: Religious nonfiction / Christian devotional / Christmas

Bex Rating: 9

I read this book two Christmases ago and it was such a great devotional to get me in the Christmas frame of mind. It was just as good the second time. I love the idea of having a "Level Three Christmas. Level One is Santa Claus, Level Two is Silent Night, but Level Three is Christ the Risen Lord.

45. Hamnet (2025.12.18)

By: Maggie O’Farrell
Pages: 320
Published: 2020
Genre: Historical Fiction / Shakespeare / loss / love / plague
Bex Rating: 10

Oh my, this book was so good. Trigger warning: it is about losing a child, and it was heart-wrenching. But beautiful, and real, and relatable. I was so moved.

People would say these words, to each other, Did you ever hear about the girl who lived at the edge of a forest? as they sat around the fire at night, as they kneaded dough, as they carded wool for spinning. Such stories, of course, make the night pass more quickly; soothe a fractious child, distract others from their cares. At the edge of a forest, a girl.
There is a promise, from teller to listener, concealed in that opening, like a note tucked into a pocket, a hint that something is about to happen. Anyone in the vicinity would turn their head and prick their ears, their mind already forming a picture of the girl, perhaps picking her way through trees, or standing beside the green wall of a forest. (39)
She grows up feeling wrong, out of place, too dark, too tall, two unruly, two opinionated, two silent, too strange. She grows up with the awareness that she has merely tolerated, and irritant, useless, that she does not deserve love, that she will need to change herself substantially, crush herself down if she has to be married. She grows up, too, with the memory of what it meant to be properly loved, for what you are, not what you ought to be. (49)
Her brother does not appreciate being pressed or rushed. He is someone who must be approached sideways, with caution, as with a rest of horse. She must gently probe him and, and that way, she will likely find out more. (65)
How frail, to Agnes, is the veil between their world and hers. For her, the worlds are distinct from each other, rubbing up against each other, allowing passage between them. She will not let Judith cross over. (109)
Whatever differences Agnes and Mary have, and there are many, of course, living at such close quarters, with so much to do, so many children, so many mouths, the meals to cook and the clothes to wash and mend, the men to watch and assess, soothe and guide dissolve in the face of tasks. The two of them can gripe and prickle and rub each other up the wrong way; they can argue and bicker and sigh; they can throw into the pig-pen food the other has cooked because it is too salted or not milled finely enough or too spiced; they can raise an eyebrow at each other's darning or stitching or embroidery. In a time such as this, however, they can operate like two hands of the same person. (109)
There is so much to do in a family of this size, so much to see too, so many people needing so many different things. How easy is it, Agnes thinks, as she lifts the plates, to miss the pain and anguish of one person, if that person keeps quiet, if he keeps it all in, like a bottle stopper too tightly, the pressure inside building and building, until – what? (159)
He needs to find his mother: amazing how strong this instinct is, even now, as a great lad of 11. He recalls the sensation, this urge – just – from when he was much younger: the driving need to be with his mother, to be under her gaze, to be by her side, close enough to be able to reach out and touch her, because no one else would do.(167)
She now knows that it's possible, more than possible, that one of her children will die, because children do, all the time. But she will not have it. She will not. She will fill this child, these children, with life. She will place herself between them and the door leading out, and she will stand there, teeth bared, blocking the way. She will defend her three babes against all that lies beyond this world. She will not rest, not sleep, until she knows they are safe. She will push back, fight against, undo the foresight she has always had, about having two children. She will. She knows she can. (202)
She, like all mothers, constantly casts out her thoughts, like fishing lines, towards her children, reminding herself of where they are, what they are doing, how they fare. From habit, while she sits there near the fireplace, some part of her mind is tabulating them and their whereabouts. (220)
fossick: to rummage, to search

44. The Book of a Thousand Days (2025.12.10)

By: Shannon Hale

Pages: 320

Published: 2007

Genre: YA fantasy / fairy tale retelling / adventure

Bex rating: 9

I got his book at our annual Christmas book club book exchange, and it was so great! I haven't read any Shannon Hale for a while and this book was so well done--kind of a Rapunzel story with a twist, set in Mongolia.

Why can’t my lady dip her hands into the wash water and give the clothes a good scrubbing or mend a rip or make a pot of something worth eating? I’d be pleased as anything if I never had to haul a bucket of water up the cellar ladder again, but some work isn’t so bad, not when you have naught else to do but star at a candle flame or into the shivering dark. (84)
I’m a stubborn mare sometimes and must dangle my own carrot. (119)
That boy Osol who winked at me, I saw him today winking at one of the cutter girls. I guess he’s just a boy who winks. It doesn’t matter, not in the least. And I’m not goin to think about him anymore. (152)
A bit of my mama awakened in me, a bit of the stubborn mucker soul, the stuff that keeps you alive when all the world is frozen and the food sacks empty. (168)

43. The Ogress and the Orphans (2025.12.07)

By: Kelly Barnhill

Pages: 400

Published: 2022

Genre: fantasy / middle grade / community / kindness / social commentary

Bex rating: 10

What a lovely story. I got this book at the DI in May because I recognized the author from The Girl Who Drank the Moon, a Newbery winner a few years back. In my opinion, this book is much better! I loved the characters, the narration style, and the beautiful, timely story. It was just a pleasure to read.

In those days, townspeople lounged in the promenades and the public square, discussing literature or politics or philosophy or art. All roads in town then led to the Library, which had wide windows, tall shelves, and deep cushions on the sofas, and which welcomed everyone. There were hand-bound books and modern books and ancient scrolls, and even texts carved into stones. The librarians bustled this way and that, sorting, preserving, shelving, and shushing. Even their shushes were lovely. (6)
There is a power in a book that suppresses even that of a dragon. (67)
The reason for the kindness is never as important as the fact of the kindness. Someone was kind. We need that kindness. Therefore, we are grateful. We can choose to be filled with suspicions, or we can choose to accept grace, and then continue to extend kindness to others. Which do you choose?(91)
It was the game of it, the trick, his paw tingled at the very thought. For to trick another creature – to give them a version of the world that was upside down inside out and too then let it all come crashing down with delightful chaos – well, that was power indeed. Delicious power. And the dragon was hungry for it. (167)
They remembered that a story, in the mind of the reader, it’s like music. And discussing stories among other minds and other hearts feels like a symphony. They remembered how Adidas make their own light, and how words have their own mass and weight and being.(327)

42. If We Were Villains (2025.11.28)

By: M.L. Rio
Pages: 400
Published: 2017
Genre: fiction / thriller / mystery / campus life / drama / tragedy
Bex rating: 8.5

I couldn't put it down, but it's not one I will be freely recommending. Lots of F-words and drinking and drugs and promiscuity. Definitely in the vein of The Secret History by Donna Tartt, which I read waaaaay back in 2004 or 2005.

But the SHAKESPEARE. I was sucked in. And it doesn't hurt that Allen and I have tickets to see Julius Caesar next week!

There is a tide in the affairs of men/which, taken out the flood, leads onto fortune/on such a full seat are we now afloat/and we must take the current where it serves
Per aspera ad astra: through the thorns to the stars

41. A Marriage at Sea (2025.11.19)
By: Sophie Elmhirst
Pages: 256
Published: 2025
Genre: nonfiction / survival / true story / adventure / love / resilience / psychological study
Bex rating: 10

Loved it from beginning to end. This is a true story of a husband and wife who survived 118 days at sea in a life raft after their sailboat was struck by a whale and sunk.

But like all utopian visions, there’s had its contradictions. They sold all their belongings to build a boat. They were abandoning everyone they knew to live afloat. Alone, unshackled from obligation and community . . . After all, what is more self-interested than running away? (28)
What about that fishing boat they passed when they swapped over the Watch? Perhaps it had been a wailing ship. Perhaps those little boats and the search light have been looking for a whale they’d harpooned but failed to catch. Perhaps the whale had escaped, injured and angry, followed them for the rest of the night, and collided with them in some sort of anguish revenge attack. It was only a theory, but somehow it was more comforting than the idea that it was all pure coincidence, pure misfortune. That their boat had sunk for no reason at all. (59)
Maurice was amazed. How much she seemed to assume: that they’d be rescued, that they’d lived to turn an encounter with a whale into an anecdote, as if this ordeal were a minor interruption to the progress of their lives. No part of Marilyn appeared to question their survival. (85)
This was their chosen existence, not a hobby or an experiment. It was more a manifesto than a lifestyle. You don’t walk away from a choice like that after one mishaps; it would be like abandoning of faith because you weren’t blessed with a miracle. (104)
And yet, even in the moment of rescue, Maurice felt that weightless sensation of something passing; something precious and unrepeatable, something you could recognize as such only once it was safely over. There had been a strange kind of peace of drift on the ocean, even if it was a piece close to annihilation.(149)
It felt wonderful, for a moment, to step away. Maurice realized that this was the first time in his life he sat still on the beach. “I have landed on them, walked on them, swam from them, even had snacks on them,“ he wrote, but he had never just sat on one and done nothing until now, sunbathing had been one of many human behaviors he found perplexing. Relaxation, to Maurice, was close to moral degradation. But here, now, alone for the first time in months, he simply sat. He didn’t have to say nice things about what he was seeing. He didn’t have to pose for a photograph. He didn’t have to try to make himself understood. (176)
After the wedding, after the honeymoon – well, then it’s just days. Ordinary days. The insurmountable, self renewing chores. The bins, the laundry, the procession of meals. And those are the golden days, it turns out. The blissful, boring days that you long for when things go wrong. It’s not as if we were warned. The old vowels knew what they were doing: for better, for worse; For Rich, for poor; in sickness and Health. The storms are right there in the words.. Misfortune can’t seem abstract in the midst of celebration. At the beginning, we imagine the bad weather might pass us by. It’s only natural, part of the Long business of self preservation, because how impossible it would be to go through life in full awareness of all that will be follow us. Somewhere, deep within, unspoken, we must know, we do know, that we’ll all have our time adrift. For what else is a marriage, really, if not being stuck on a small life raft with someone and trying to survive? (202)
We talk about the dead to keep them alive. The conversation tends to work better with people who knew them too. To anyone else the debt are fictitious. A name, a picture, an anecdote about something they once did or said, but nothing close to flesh and warms and movement. It’s hard, in the middle of grief, to clearly describe the person you miss. Sometimes you can’t even see them, or remember what they sounded like. If you look too hard at a memory, it dissolves.(224)

40. The Dark Maestro 🎧 (2025.11.06)
By: Brendan Slocumb
Narrator: Ronald Peet
Length: 13 hrs 37 min
Published: 2025
Genre: Thriller / Fiction / Coming of Age / cello / comic books / revenge fantasy
Bex Rating: 9

Curtis Wilson is a cello prodigy from Southeast D.C. whose life is transformed by his talent and the support of his father’s girlfriend. Just as he’s rising to international acclaim, his father’s criminal ties pull their family into danger — forcing them into witness protection and away from the music Curtis loves most. They must decide whether to confront the threat themselves to survive.

It was fun, but got a little over-the-top at the end. I think Slocumb's best book is "Symphony of Secrets" and I loved the audiobook version.

39. We Won’t All Survive (2025.11.15)
By: Alex Segura
Pages: 352
Published: 2025
Genre: fiction / thriller / crime / mystery / contemporary
Bex rating: 9

This was fun--not nearly as good as her first book, I Am Still Alive, which is one of my all-time faves.

It’s less about what he does or says and more that he possesses an intense and unshakable belief that he is hot SH**. A lot of people, I find, consider confidence and quality to be the same thing. (33)

38. The One Hundred Years of Lenni and Margot (Book Club, 2025.11.05)
By: Marianne Cronin
Pages: 368
Published: 2020
Genre: fiction / contemporary / friendship / grief / healing / family
Bex rating: 8.5

We read this for book club and it was very sweet. Great discussion, too.

“It’s OK,” I said. “I spent a whole day doing that seven stages of grief thing, and I got over it all in one go.” (42)
I'd seen grandmothers at work and I knew them to be warm a sweet and kindly. Christabel's grandmother made her nice dresses. My mother's mother, who had died when I was five, had knitted a cardigan for me and another identical one for my doll so we could match.The woman who stood scowling at us from the doorstep wasn't like that. (66)
She picked up the pot and successfully communicated some tea into her best china teacups. They were the ones she put out when she wanted to impress someone. I was wary of the cups, associating them as I did with doctors' visits, with unpleasant and nonbiologically related "aunts" and my least favorite grandmother (90)
He held out a yellow handkerchief for me. I’ve never seen anyone use a handkerchief in real life, only in films. It hung in the air between us like a springtime ghost. I took it and opened it up into a perfect square, and then I buried my face in it. It was absorbent and smelled of church. It was like crying onto the hymn of the Popes best dress. (139)
When I’ve passed people in wheelchairs in the hospital before, I have never really considered that they are low down. Very low down. I never realized how small it could make you feel to be half the height of everyone and not even strong enough to generate your own motion. Everything looks bigger from the chair, like it was a child again. (188)
“ our father, who are in heaven, hallowed be by name… “There are some words in the Lord‘s prayer that I don’t know. But I do know the word art. It’s a necessary inclusion, I think. We should all be artists. Especially if God is doing art in heaven; we should follow his example. (248)
“Jesus’ love is not jam”. “Why not? He can be bread and grapes and a sheep and a lion and a ghost, but he can’t be jam? (259)
I took Humphrey’s love for granted sometimes, which is something you can only do when you’re really secure in someone’s affection. (297)
My mother had two words she always used when she was running out of patience, or when she was tired, or when she was scared. She would turn to me and say something like, "I don't know, Margot, but there's precious little time left in the day," or "There's precious little we can do," or "There's precious little left in the cupboard." little we can do,
I used to imagine what a Precious Little might look like. A glass trinket perhaps, blue and shining in the light. Something you had to be careful with when you held it in the palm of your hand. It would need wrapping in tissue if you wanted to take it somewhere, but I always wanted to slip it into my pocket. I imagined my mother and my six-year-old self, sitting on either side of the kitchen table with the Precious Little between us, deliberating how we ought to split it to make a meal. (306)

37. The Silence of the North (re-read 2025.11.03)
By: Olive Fredrickson
Pages: 256
Published: 1932
Genre: fiction / Canadian literature / nature / survival / family / resilience
Bex rating: 10

Father was a good man when it came to honesty. He was hard-working neighborly and well respected in the places where he lived. But he was never a kind man to his wife and children. In the latter years of his life he quit drinking altogether which made things better, but we still had to live with that quick, fiendish temper. (Five)
In all the years I lived on our Homestead on the Stewart, I could never make up my mind which of the four seasons I loved best. Spring brought it’s relief from winter and it’s miracle of renewal. In summer, when the fragrance of clover drifted across the fields and cattle grazed contentedly in the deep grass, the woods were like green cathedrals. Autumn said the Earth ablaze with color, and it’s bright beauty with something no human could resist. then came winter, when Birch and Aspen and Cottonwood cast long shadows across the new snow, spruce and pine were like dark green blocks in a patchwork quilt, and the stillness pressed down until you could feel it. (109)
I have eaten elaborate meals and some of the best restaurants in Vancouver and the other cities of Western Canada, and I’ll stack against the greatest of them trout from a cold Mountain River, so fresh cut that they curl up when you drop them into the hot grease, served up with hot bread from a rusty little oven. Of course, the setting has to be right. There must be the smells of wood smoke and Pine needles and sun warmed earth Adrift Ing in through the open door of a low roof cabin as you eat, and snow peaks in the far distance are a help. (180)
I was almost as eager now to get out of the bush as I had been eager to lose ourselves in it back in May. I was beginning to be haunted by visions of mashed potatoes and brown gravy and big slabs of apple pie with ice cream on the side. (201)

36. The Lost Bookshop (2025.10.26)
By: Evie Woods
Pages: 448
Published: 2023
Genre: fiction / magical realism / historical fiction / fantasy / romance / bibliophilia
Bex rating: 9

“That’s the trouble with your generation. Entirely unwilling to do an honest day’s work. It’s all “tikkety-tok” these days, expecting money for nothing.” (13)
No coward soul is mine
No trembler in the world's storm-troubled sphere
I see Heaven's glories shine
And Faith shines equal arming me from Fear
O God within my breast
Almighty ever-present Deity
Life, that in me hast rest,
As I Undying Life, have power in Thee
A new person had joined our family and, without saying as much, we all seemed to be united in the conviction that her experience would be better than our own. We would become better people for her. The process had already started. Perhaps this was why people referred to new life as a miracle, because it had the power to change everything. (203)
'No alcoholic enjoys drinking,' he said, as though reading my thoughts. 'It's all you think about from the moment you open your eyes, but it's like swallowing poison.' For the first time I could see that he was struggling too. He had become a monster in my eyes, but here he was, all human, and it took everything I had not to weep for everything we'd lost; beat his chest and tell him how much it hurt to lose him. (226)
'Your brother has brought you here because he is concerned for your welfare, Opaline. You seem to be suffering from what we term puerperal insanity - a type of psychosis that can develop in pregnant women causing them to become violent to themselves and others' (270)
There is an old saying before you sit out on a journey of revenge you must dig two graves’ -Confucius (373)
St Brigid’s Day- a traditional holiday celebrated on February 1st, marking the beginning of spring in Ireland according to the old Celtic calendar. It honors St. Brigid of Kildare, one of Ireland’s patron saints, known for her generosity, compassion, and miraculous deeds. Welcoming spring—the day is linked to fertility, growth, and the warming of the earth after winter. Religious observances in the Catholic Church and Anglican traditions, where St. Brigid is celebrated for her piety and charitable works. In Irish folklore, St. Brigid is sometimes associated with a goddess of fertility and agriculture, blending pagan and Christian traditions.

35. The Impossible Fortune 🎧 (2025.10.17)
By: Richard Osman
Narrated by: Fiona Shaw
Audiobook length: 10 hours, 29 minutes
Published: 2025
Genre: fiction / mystery / cozy mystery / thriller / crime / humor
Bex rating: 10

There are many things she should probably tell her mom one day but how many things can one really tell their mom? Too much static builds up.

34. The Country of Pointed Firs (2025.10.16)
By: Sarah Orne Jewett
Pages: 144
Published: 1896
Genre: fiction / New England life / short stories / community / nature / women’s experience
Bex rating: 8.5

The old poets little knew what comfort they could be to a man. I was well acquainted with the works of Milton, but up there I did seem to me as if Shakespeare was the King; he has his sea terms very accurate, and some beautiful passages were calming to the mind. I could say them over until I shed tears; there was nothing beautiful to me in that place but the stars above in those passages of verse. (22)
“ how do you suppose she knows it’s me?” Said Mrs. Todd, with a tender smile on her broad face. “There, you never get over being a child as long as you have a mother to go to.“ (35)
Her hospitality was something exquisite; she had the gift which so many women lack, of being able to make themselves and their houses belong entirely to a guest's pleasure… Besides, she had that final, that highest gift of heaven, a perfect self-forgetfulness. (46)
There’s more women likes to be loved than there is of those that loves. (49)
“There’s some herb that’s good for everybody, except for them that thinks they’re sick when they ain’t.” (52)
“There was good singers there; yes, there was excellent singers, but I chance to drift alongside Miss Peter Bowden of great Bay and I couldn’t help thinking if she was far out of town as she was out of tune, she wouldn’t get back in a day.” (113)
At last it was the time of late summer, when the house was cool and damp in the morning, and all the light seemed to come through green leaves; but at the first step out of doors the sunshine always laid a warm hand on my shoulder, and the clear, high sky seemed to lift quickly as I looked at it. There was something shining in the air, and a kind of Leicester on the water and the pasture grass had a northern look that, except at this moment of the year, one must go far to seek. The sunshine of a northern summer was coming to its lovely end.(127)
If there is one way above another of getting so close to nature that one simply is a piece of nature, following a prime evil instinct with perfect self forgetfulness and forgetting everything except the dreamy consciousness of pleasant freedom, it is to take the course of a shady trout Brooke. The dark pools on the sunny shallows back in one on; The wedge of sky between the trees on either bank, the speaking, companioning of noise of the water, the amazing importance of what one is doing, and the constant sense of life and beauty make a strange transformation of the quick hours. (139)
It was mortifying to find how strong the habit of idle speech may become in one’s self. One need not always be saying something in this noisy world. (145)
To sit below the salt: comes from old European dining customs, especially during medieval times. It means to be of lower social status or less important in a group. In medieval dining halls, salt was a valuable commodity, and a large salt cellar was placed in the middle of the table. Important guests sat above the salt (closer to the host and the best seats), while less important guests sat below the salt, farther from the host and with less prestige. So, if someone says today that you “sit below the salt,” it’s a figurative way of saying you have lower rank or influence in a particular situation.

33. A Gentleman in Moscow 🎧 (2025.09.29)
By: Amor Towles
Narrated by: Nicholas Guy Smith
Audiobook length: 18 hours, 12 minutes
Published: 2016
Genre: fiction / historical fiction / character study / Russian history / resilience / isolation
Bex rating: 10

I read this nine years ago and the audiobook was a sweet new experience. It's one the of the best books of the century.

32. The Martian (Classroom Edition) (2025.09.28)

By: Andy Weir
Pages: 285
Published: 2014 (Classroom Edition)
Genre: fiction / science fiction / survival / space / engineering / problem-solving
Bex rating: 9.5

Haha, I had a couple of instense conversations with friends where I INSISTED that there was no swearing in The Martian. It was about a month after I finished it that I looked at the picture I took and saw the "Classroom Edition" distinction.

I loved every single page.

Turns out the L in LCD stand for liquid. I guess it either froze or boiled off. Maybe I’ll post a consumer review. “Brought product to surface of Mars. It stopped working. 0/10.” (127)
fait accompli: a thing that has already happened or been decided before those affected hear about it, leaving them with no option but to accept it.

31. Willa of the Wood (2025.09.06)
By: Robert Beatty
Pages: 384
Published: 2018
Genre: fiction / fantasy / middle grade / environmentalism / adventure / coming-of-age
Bex rating: 9.5

What a great read! And Mollie read it right after me and loved it, too.

Was it possible that she could be more Faeran in her heart than the God of the Faeran clan? (127)
“Wherever you’re going, Mamaw, May you walk among trees.“ (144)
With her mamaw gone from the world, did her own power still work? Could she still speak to the trees? Would they still listen? Could she still learn and grow without her teacher? Or had all the magic of the world disappeared? (152)
As she lay on the bank, the sun gave her its warmth, the Earth gave her its stillness, and the living trees held sway over the world once more. (181)
Her grandmother had given her the knowledge and skills to survive in the forest, but where was she going to find a place for her heart to live? (185)
Mamaw was imploring her to hold onto what was in her heart: her love, her compassion, her sense of soul; not just her instinct to blended, but sometimes her willingness to stand up and make herself known, to throw the spirit, to bring the trap, to set things in motion that cannot be undone.(347)
She had always thought of love as the rarest and most delicate of things, and that there must be a limit to the amount of love that a human or Faeran could give or feel, a limit to how much love there could be in the world…But love wasn’t the stone. It was the river. Love was like the glistening stars and the midnight sky, like the sun that always rises, and the water that always flows.(375)
holt: A holt is typically a burrow or hidden shelter where otters live, sleep, and raise their young. Otters usually make holts along riverbanks, lakes, or coastal areas, often using tree roots, hollow logs, rock crevices, or abandoned burrows made by other animals.

30. Happy the Land (2025.09.01)

By: Louise Dickinson Rich

Pages: 245

Published: 1943

Genre: fiction / rural life / homesteading / New England / marriage / self-discovery / resilience

The first book I have read all the way through in the past three months! I am dead serious when I tell you that the last time I went this long without reading an entire book was in 1984, when I was five years old. This book is a sequel to one of my favorite memoirs, We Took To The Woods, by Louise Dickinson Rich. I love her signature blend of humor and beautiful prose to describe her life in the Maine wilderness. She penned this memoir after her husband unexpectedly died, and there is an ache through the whole book—but I love her continued joy for life and her children and her friends and reading and canoeing and growing.

Hopefully the slump is over! We moved across town and it has been so wonderful and so much work, but I can feel myself slowing down and getting to a more stable place.

Here is a link to my favorite passages.

29. Noah's Compass (2025.05.31)

By: Anne Tyler

Pages: 277

Published: 2009

Genre: fiction / self-discovery / aging / retirement / reconciliation / memory

Bex rating: 8.5

Anne Tyler might be the best at writing about ordinary people coming to important realizations. And her dialogue is so real.

28C. Firefly Lane (DNF 2025.05.25)

By: Kristin Hannah

Pages: 116 of 479

Published: 2008

Genre: fiction / friendship / betrayal /

Bex rating: 6

I think the reason I haven’t liked her books is when the characters are not relatable or believable. I don’t have to LIKE a character to like a book–I mean, Scarlett O’Hara is kind of deplorable, but I am rooting for her the entire time. But there’s something missing in a lot of her character development–even in the three books I liked, there are parts that just. don’t. flow. They throw the rhythm off and I can’t suspend my disbelief.

28b. The Wayward Traveler (DNF 2025.05.19)

By: Robert Louis DeMayo

Pages: 200 of 729

Published: 2013

Genre: memoir / travel / the 80s / drugs

Bex rating: 5

I thought I was reading a memoir of someone's self-discovery as they traveled around the world. Not a memoir of someone’s sexual exploits and drug experimentation as they traveled around the world.

28. Lost Letters (2025.05.06)

By: Tom Hapgood

Pages: 314

Published: 2025

Genre: fiction / Cold War Germany / coming-of-age / the 80s / DNA testing / graphic design / lost love

Bex rating: 8

27. To the Bright Edge of the World (2025.04.27)

By: Eowyn Ivey

Pages: 413

Published: 2016

Genre: fiction / magical realism / Alaska / exploration / photography / love story / myth

Bex rating: 9

Now that I have been brought home by carriage and climbed into bed, my fury has burned out, and I am left cold and tired. Why do we insist on inflicting more suffering on the world that is already fraught with it? It is here that I must part ways with father‘s romantic spirit, for I suspect that it is a curse of nature, some original instinct that we have failed to shed. And I am no better than others, for in the face of it, I would keep quiet and retreat. (89)
There is a mythical element to our childhood, it seems, that stays with us always. When we are young, we consume the world in great gulps, and it consumes us, and everything is mysterious and alive and fills us with desire and wonder, fear, and guilt. With the passing of the years, however, those memories become distant and malleable, and we shape them into the stories of who we are. We are brave, or we are cowardly. We are loving, or we are cruel. (138)
I despise my own propriety. It keeps me to this bed, docile and quiet, hair brushed and pinned, bed clothes smoothed neatly over my lap. I mark the days. I eat. I breathe. I say thank you and please and feign sleep. Yet it is all a lie. In my heart I am something else altogether. I am burning with grief. I should be out in the rain, barefooted and wild. I should roar and claw at the sky. I should rip open my gown and bare my breasts and bare my pain and plead and rage. (169)
“One time when my brothers got to fighting and the littlest was screaming like a banshee and I by accident burnt up my good shoes by the woodstove, Mam threw her apron down and walked right out of the house, left the door wide open, and she got nearly to town before Da picked her up in the wagon. He put her in a room at the hotel for the night, saying she could have it all to herself, with a hot bath and a new dress, if only she would come home the next day. She came back, and I'm glad she did, but I don't think I would have, if I was her. I'm decided — I'm only having dogs and goats, but no babies” (201)
Song for My Mother, 1952
You say go to the river, it is time for the salmon And I go to the mountains to bunt for nothing.
You say to never let anger chisel me And I sharpen my words on a whetstone.
You say come home at night but I sleep where I fall.
So what is this Mother's love
but a steady hold against the bore tide of a young man?
You say "I did not give birth to you, but you belong to my heart."
I say, what is birth but death in reverse And what is love
but the beat of a mother's heart against her son's ear?

26. West With Giraffes (2025.04.16)

By: Lynda Rutledge

Pages: 356

Published: 2021

Genre: historical fiction / coming-of-age / Depression / Dust Bowl / giraffes / zoos / adventure / old age

Bex rating: 9

25. The House on the Point: a Tribute to Franklin W. Dixon and the Hardy Boys (2025.04.03)

By: Benjamin Hoff

Pages: 262

Published: 2002

Genre: fiction / adventure / mystery / nostalgia

Bex rating: 7

"And remember what he says about people who're mentally lazy, 'conservative-minded.' They want a life of easy, predictable patterns. They aren't intrigued by disturbances to those patterns, they're bothered by them. So when something they don't understand comes along-something that disturbs the pattern of what they know, or think they know—they immediately try to reassure themselves and other people by explaining it away. And once they've made a habit of doing that, they're no longer able to see clearly." (38)

24. Take Less, Do More: Surprising Life Lesson in Generosity, Gratitude, and Curiosity from an Ultralight Backpacker (2025.04.12)

By: John Michael Morgan

Pages: 208

Published: 2014

Genre: self-help / productivity / leadership

Bex rating: 8

In his intriguing book Subtract, Leidy Klotz lays out his arguments that we are all, as humans, wired to add rather than subtract, in essence to "take more" instead of "take less." His fascinating experiments, which started with Lego blocks and moved to editing music and writing, and finally more abstract grids, revealed a deep human bias to solve problems by adding as opposed to taking away. At biological, societal, and cultural levels, we have a tendency to overlook subtracting in favor of addition. Because of that bias, as humans it takes extra effort on our parts to be able to see options that solve problems by subtracting rather than by requires effort to see how "take less" (108)
When my life is encumbered with things, tasks, burdens, and anything else that weighs me down, I accomplish less. I become too busy to get to the "more" of life. The more unencumbered I am, the more freedom I have to do what I want to do. Because of this philosophy, I have tried to scrutinize my life in the same way I scrutinize my backpack: to make sure I am not carrying too much or figure out how I can lighten the load of the things I need to carry. (137)
Just like it takes forethought and planning to make a successful backpacking trip, personal growth and relationships with others don't just happen by accident. They're something you invest in. When you have space in your life to "do more," then you are free to do the things that add depth, joy, and meaning to your life. For me, depth, joy, and meaning are almost always connected with people. I've found that I need to invest time and energy into those relationships to reap the rewards and to make the lives of those I care about rewarding for them. (149)
I realize that people believe all kinds of different things and may not change those beliefs based on my testimony. But I will say this: when life hits you hard, as it did to me with Derek's illness and eventual death, a tragedy in which I also feared I might lose my wife because her grief was so very deep, it's essential to believe in something greater, stronger, and more powerful than yourself. Being out on the trail, dwarfed by towering cliffs or enormous trees, standing in awe at wildlife or a stunning sunset, I marvel that the Creator of this infinitely incredible world knows and cares for me, providing me a spiritual compass to live by. Being in the majesty of the wilderness reminds me of how small I am. (163)
…at every juncture, I'd been invested in giving freely to the community that had long enriched me. I wasn't out to make a buck or to corner a market. What I've found is that, when I give freely of my resources, my talent, and my time, I am always rewarded. Sometimes that reward comes in beautiful sunsets over the ocean shared with friends, or sunrises at a campsite in the middle of the desert. Sometimes it's financial, and other times it's to be found in the precious richness of relationships and experiences. But when I give without restraint, I am more than compensated in one way or another. (175)
Even a small cushion can help. If we learn to live below our means, even a little below, there's some hope of surviving crushing defeats. When I live below my means—take less! —I'm more agile in responding to the inevitable hiccups that can seriously derail a life. This is true in the backcountry too. If I'm carrying a light load, my strength is available to help someone else who may be struggling. (178)
…an amazing thing happens when I admit I don't know. Suddenly, I find people who genuinely want to help me get smarter. This is the opposite of what my ego would like to do — to pretend I'm an expert and look down on others. (178)
I gain when I fail because I come to understand better my own strengths and weaknesses. People who don't shy away from the failures but use them to better understand their strengths and weaknesses experience increased self-awareness and personal growth. (182)
I'm not a fan of using someone elses disability as a form of inspiration. While highlighting the achievements of someone who's disabled can be empowering, it can also turn people from actual humans into patronized and dehumanized objects. Doing so often perpetuates the myth that a person with a disability needs to triumph over adversity to be a valued member of society. As the father of Derek, who'd been so profoundly disabled his entire life, it is important to me to recognize the inherent value and worth of all people, regardless of one's abilities or disabilities. (194)
Type II Fun, which may not be enjoyable as it’s happening but you feel great about it after the fact, like doing an ultramarathon or parenting teenagers (195)
When I have approached life from this perspective of abun-dance, it has always been easier to see the goodness in the people I meet and to not feel the need to one-up them or assert myself in any way. When I see intrinsic value in others, first as a unique creation loved by God, then I can more easily pay attention to what that person brings to the table. Granted, with some folks, I have to work harder to see it than with others, but anytime I look hard enough, I can always find it. (209)

23. Night (2025.04.10)

By: Elie Wiesel

Narrated by: George Guidall

Audiobook Length: 4 hrs 19 mins

Published: 1956

Genre: memoir / Holocaust / nonfiction

Bex rating: 7.5

I'm glad I finally read this book (listened to it for free on YouTube) but it needs to be read in conjunction with another holocaust memoir when the survivor finds meaning. Because Elie Wiesel DOES NOT find meaning or hope--his memoir is all about the fragility of faith and the horror of the "night" that is the holocaust.

22. Huckleberry Finn (refresher--Great Illustrated Classics edition)

By: Mark Twain

Pages: 120

Genre: picaresque novel / coming‑of‑age / American classic / social criticism / satire

Bex rating: 10

I loved the Great Illustrated Classics as a kid and I still do! They are such a great introduction to some of the best literature. The pictures in this book I remember as well as anything from my childhood.

21. James (2025.03.28)

By: Percival Everett

Narrated by: Dominic Hoffman

Audiobook Length: 🎧 7 hrs 49 mins

Published: 2024

Genre: historical fiction / literary fiction / reimagining of a classic / slavery / Black studies / humanity / freedom / Pulitzer Prize

Bex rating: 10

Wow. this book absolutely blew me away. I had to re-read Huck Finn when I was done. The narration was flawless and beautiful. It absolutely deserves the Pulitzer and I recommend to everyone.

20.5 Great Expectations: Classics Illustrated edition

20. Great Expectations (2025.03.26)

By: Charles Dickens

Pages: 544

Published: 1861 (first book form; originally serialized Dec 1860–Aug 1861)

Genre: classic fiction / Victorian literature / bildungsroman (coming‑of‑age) / social criticism

Bex rating: 10

This was my first time reading Great Expectations and I absolutely loved it. And when I was done, the icing on the cake was to re-watch the 2011 BBC miniseries adaptation with Gillian Anderson playing Miss Havisham--it's sooooooo good.

My sister, Mrs. Joe, with  black hair and eyes, had such a prevailing redness of skin that I sometimes used to wonder whether it was possible she washed herself with a nutmeg greater instead of soap. (8)

Mrs. Joe was a very clean housekeeper, but had an exquisite art of making her cleanliness more uncomfortable and unacceptable than dirt itself. Cleanliness is next to godliness, and some people do the same by their religion. (23)

Lookee here, Pip at what is said to you by a true friend. Which this to you the true friend say. If you can’t get to be uncommon through going straight, you’ll never get to do it through going crooked. So don’t tell no more (lies), Pip, and live well and die happy. (72)

I must remark my sister, what is equally true of all the violent women I have ever seen, that passion was no excuse for her, because it is undeniable that instead of lapsing into passion, she consciously and deliberately took extraordinary pains to force herself into it, and became blindly furious by regular stages (114)

How could I, a poor dazed village lad, avoid that wonderful inconsistency into which the best and wisest of men fall every day? (129)

“Bear in mind then, that brag is a good dog, but hold fast is a better.” (138)

Joe laid his hand upon my shoulder with the touch of a woman. I have often thought him since, like the steam hammer, that could crush a man or Pat an eggshell, in his combination of strength with gentleness. (141)

Heaven knows we need to never be ashamed of our tears, for they are rain upon the blinding dust of earth, overlaying our hard hearts. I was better after I had cried, then before – more sorry, more aware of my own and gratitude, more gentle.(160)

Herbert Pocket had a frank and easy way with him that was very taking. I had never seen anyone then, and I have never seen anyone since, who more strongly expressed to me, and every look and tone, a natural in capacity to do anything secret and mean. There’s something wonderfully hopeful about his general air, and something that at the same time whispered to me he would never be very successful or rich. (177)

So, throughout life, our worst weaknesses and meannesses are usually committed for the sake of the people whom we most despise. (218)

All other swindlers upon earth are nothing to the self swindler, and was such pretentious did I cheat myself. (225)

Whatever he put on, became him less (it dismally seemed to me) than what he had worn before. To my thinking, there was something in him that made it hopeless to attempt to disguise him. The more I dressed him and the better I dressed him, the more he looked like the slouching fugitive on the marshes. This effect on my anxious fancy was partly referable, no doubt, to his old face and manner growing more familiar to me; but I believe too that he dragged one of his legs as if there were still a weight of iron on it, and that from head to foot there was Convict in the very grain of the man. (337)

“I’ve been locked up as much as a silver tea kettle.” (346)

I set off by the early morning coach before it was yet late, I was out on the open country road when the day came creeping on, halting and whimpering and shivering, and wrapped in patches of cloud and rags of mist, like a beggar. (354)

I dined at what Herbert and I used to call a Geographical chophouse - where there were maps of the world in porter-pot rims on every half-yard of the tablecloths, and charts of gravy on every one of the knives - to this day there is scarcely a single chop-house within the Lord Mayor's dominions which is not Geographical (382)

in shutting out the light of day, she had shut out infinitely more; that, in seclusion, she had secluded herself from a thousand natural and healing influences; that, her mind, brooding solitary, had grown diseased, as all minds do and must and will that reverse the appointed order of their Maker. (399)

It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold: when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade. (434)

“And a cool four thousand, Pip!" I never discovered from whom Joe derived the conventional temperature of the four thousand pounds, but it appeared to make the sum of money more to him, and he had a manifest relish in insisting on its being cool. (465)

over-the-broomstick:

prolix

19. Mercies in Disguise: A Story of Hope, a Family's Genetic Destiny, and the Science that Rescued Them (book club, 2025.03.04)

By: Gina Kolata

Pages: 244

Published: 2017

Genre: nonfiction / medical / neurological disease / faith / research / GSS

Bex rating: 9

Gerstmann-Sträussler-Scheinker (GSS) disease is a rare, inherited, and fatal neurodegenerative brain disorder characterized by progressive loss of coordination, dementia, and other neurological symptoms, caused by a misfolded prion protein

PGD stands for Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis.

It refers to a technique used in assisted reproductive technologies (ART), such as in vitro fertilization (IVF), where embryos are screened for genetic abnormalities before implantation in the uterus. This allows couples who are at risk of passing on genetic disorders to select embryos that are free of these abnormalities.

The project posed an impossible ethical dilemma. As much as Mike wanted to know—needed to know—what had happened to his father and what might happen to any of them, he didn't feel it was his right to force that knowledge upon others. His extreme desire to know butted right up against these strangers' right to remain ignorant—it was a matter of life and death for many of them, whether they realized it or not. (65)
The Baxleys always felt they were special, but it you’d asked any of them to tell you why, none would have named a medical anomaly as the thing that set them apart. Strength, maybe. Spirituality. Hard work or those bulletproof family values. But never a rare genetic disorder. As mystifying as the disease remained-as directionless as each of them still felt, sitting before a map and having no idea where it would take them— they derived a certain comfort in knowing it existed. In knowing they were not wrong. And they had a feeling that that family tree might be the start of their salvation. (68)
“if you inhale a piece of food it will give you pneumonia." He nodded. "Why don't I try processing this steak and see what it tastes like?" Buddy looked at her, his eyes welling, and nodded again. He looked down at his alphabet board and spelled out "please." From that day on, Buddy ate nothing that was not pureed. His brother Billy, on the other hand, refused to give in on this front. Proud and defiant, he continued to cough and choke on his food until the day he died of pneumonia, most likely from inhaling food. (WTH? 122)
And when GSS did enter her mind, it was in a different way now. There are many sorrows in life, especially Zambian life, but you can still be happy. A disease–even one as terrible as GSS–does not have to destroy your inner self. (168)
gamine: (of a young woman) attractively boyish.1. a young woman with a mischievous, boyish charm. 2.dated, a female street urchin.
Oxblood flannel shirt: Oxblood is a dark shade of red with the hex code #4A0404, created solely from red in the RGB color system. The term comes from the literal blood of an ox, which was used as a leather and fabric dye, and the shade is sometimes mistaken for cordovan.
boilerplate: boilerplate clauses are standard provisions commonly found in commercial contracts. They're often placed towards the end of an agreement and are characterized by their repetitive nature

18a. Fire Keeper's Daughter (DNF 2025.03.06)

By: Angeline Boulley

Pages: 285 out of 494

Published: 2021

Genre: young adult fiction / Native American culture / Tribal culture / mystery / drugs / love story /

Bex Rating: 7

The story and characters were compelling, but the pacing was a little rushed a difficult to follow, and there was too much casual mention of teenage sex. But the main reason I put it down was because of a self-pleasuring scene. No thanks.

18. Letters of a Woman Homesteader (2025.03.03)

By: Eleanor Pruitt Stewart

Pages: 320

Published: 1909

Genre: memoir / nonfiction / homesteading / Wyoming / humor

Bex Rating: 9

17. Isola (2025.02.27)

By: Allegra Goodman

Pages: 243

Published: 2025! (I read it only three weeks after it came out--so gooooooooood)

Genre: fiction / inspired by true events / historical fiction / 16th century colonization / France / women / / love story / survival / Canada / escape / freedom

Bex Rating: 10!

My favorite book of the year, and I have read a couple of 10's.

This is the story of a real French woman named Marguerite. She is heir to a fortune when her parents die, but her guardian, a distant cousin, is a cruel and controlling man who squanders her inheritance on speculative ventures at the same time he controls and manipulates his young ward. When she displeases him by falling in love with his servant, he leaves them both on a stony island in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The real Marguerite really did survive on that stony outcropping for two years, and this is the imagined account of what may have happened.

The writing was exquisite, the story was compelling, and the characters were so believable and relatable. I loved every second and read it in three big gulps.

As for the sailors, they lay where they could an open air and slept in shifts so that they could keep Watch day and night. Summer boys on summer men, but all were bold. (110)
But I had to come to fear approval as much as anger. Gentle or berating, kind or cruel, in all his moods he exercised his power over me. (112)
Filling these packets and wood boxes, I felt a joy I had not known before. It was not love, and it was not comfort, nor was it mastery or beauty, but it was usefulness. (193)
She close his eyes and wrapped him in his sheet, while I sat bewildered. I kept saying no, not yet. He had been well a week ago and strong. He had spoken to me just an hour before. How could he lie so stiff and white? He who had whispered in my ear and kissed my lips. He had touched my wrists under the edges of my sleeves. (214)
Even in the dark, my nurse found signs of grace, but I saw none. (223)
Her resignation awed me. Her courage, in the face of disappointment. Strangely, as her life became more difficult, she complained less. She did not rail against injustice, although her fate was unjust. She did not question God‘s will. I looked at her and thought, why do I sit self-pitying? Why don’t I think of her? Damienne was blameless, and I had brought her to the island. This I knew, and for this I must atone.(238)
I began to see the wisdom of Damienne’s busy hands. Working, I had a little time to mourn – but in my dreams, I grieved. (240)
I bowed my head because the world was stranger and more terrible than ever I’d imagined. The sea more mysterious – and I am more blessed. How could I think otherwise? That I was blessed to witness such a thing. I did not deserve to see such beauty, and yet this wonder spread itself before me. And I felt God‘s presence as I had never done in grief and anger; I knew it in my insignificance. I had given up, and yet God came to me in winter and in ice, in the hard world and in the night. (254)
“Forgive me,“ I called out, and I meant forgive my lack of faith, my anger, and my willfulness – but most of all, I begged forgiveness for hiding in my cave. Silently, I pleaded, Raise me. Bring me back. Gather me as the tide gathers shards of ice. This was my prayer. Not for rescue or escape, but for my soul, which had been sick. I gazed at waves rising and shattering, and this was my resolve – to remember myself as God remembered me. (255)
Wild thoughts, but I was wild. Idea is unbecoming – but what had I become? I, myself, was now an island, solitary. Brambles and five petal flowers for my garden. Rocks my furniture. Ocean waves my lessons. Sadness overwhelmed me and sank back. Then, like the tide, joy crept in on me again. (258)
allee: an alley in a formal garden or park, bordered by trees or bushes.

16. We Solve Murders (2025.02.26)

By: Richard Osman

Narrated by: Nicola Walker

Audiobook length: 10 hours, 33 minutes

Published: 2024

Genre: contemporary fiction / murder / mystery / amateur sleuth / crime / humour / British

Bex Rating: 10!

Richard Osman, you've done it again. I can't tell you how many time I was laughing out loud as I walked down the frozen country roads around my town, listening to the escapades of his delightful new characters. It was just as witty, charming, hilarious. and touching as his "Thursday Murder Club" books and I highly recommend the audio, because the British narration is so great (and I laughed a few times at the "American" accent).

15. Good Energy: The Surprising Connection Between Glucose, Metabolism, and Limitless Health (RE-LISTENED TO WITH ALLEN 2025.02.23)

By: Casey Means, MD

Narrated by: Casey Means

Audiobook length: 11 hours, 53 minutes

Published: 2024

Genre: nonfiction / health / science / biology / exposé / medical field / self-help

Bex Rating: 9.5

Even better the second time, because I didn't feel like I was drinking from a fire hose as much, and I could focus better on the parts I wanted to remember better. And then GUESS WHAT? We bought a hard copy of the book, too!

I'm so glad Allen liked it--I was hoping he would, because this book gets you excited about taking charge of your health. It is so empowering and motivating. We listened to it on our anniversary trip (a fabulous 5-day excursion to the St. George area) and, (gasp!), we stopped at Winco and bought blueberries and nuts and cheese to snack on instead of our usual fare of baked goods and chocolate in any form (but don't worry, we still ordered pizza and went out for frozen custard during our trip).

It's such a great book and I recommend it to everyone!

The next revolution in health will come from understanding how the root of almost EVERY disease relates to energy and how LESS specialization [in medicine], rather than more, is the answer.

14. The Outlaw Noble Salt (2025.02.18, book club)

By: Amy Harmon

Pages: 367

Published: 2024

Genre: fiction / romance / alternate history

Bex Rating: 7

I read this entire book while I substituted at the high school. It started out pretty promising, but quickly fizzled. I do like a good love story, but this one just felt too forced and slightly ridiculous. There were some good quotes, though:

"I'm telling you what will happen. I'm giving it to you as straight as I can. I'm a lawyer, but I try not to be a liar."
Butch Cassidy smiled at that, surprising Powers again. "And I'm an outlaw, but I try not to be a crook." (11)
He had the flavor of places she couldn't even imagine in his voice. A land of long stretches, tall mountains, and blazing suns, but she had no time now to bask in its warmth. (77)
…he often found himself in charge, even though he'd rather not be. It was the role he'd always played. Big brother to twelve siblings will do that to a fella. He'd tried to shake that off too, his tendency to lead, but it was like shaking off your skin, or your eye color, or the way you walked. Some things you couldn't escape. (89)
Her hurt had given way to grief, and grief was so much kinder, so much softer. (336)

13. One Man's Wilderness: an Alaskan Odyssey (2025.02.17)

By: Richard Proenneke

Pages: 224

Published: 1973

Genre: nonfiction / memoir / homesteading / Alaska / nature / DIY / building a cabin / survival / philosophy

Bex Rating: 9.5

This is my favorite book find at a thrift store since "We Took to the Woods" by Louise Dickinson Rich (2015, review #15). I mean, I have found a lot of good books over the years at thrift stores, but this is absolutely my favorite genre (living and surviving in the woods)--it's like it was written just for me.

I new about Dick Proenneke from the PBS documentary--he filmed himself building his cabin with only hand tools back in the SIXTIES, long before the Internet or Instagram or DIY videos. I have never seen the full documentary, just snippets of it, but my favorite librarian just ORDERED IT FOR ME, so I will be seeing it soon.

This book was written from his journal entries during the first year of building a cabin at Twin Lakes in Alaska, and there are great color photos of the process and the gorgeous setting. Much like "The Way of the Hermit" below (review #5), it includes a few of his observations and ethics, and the deep satisfaction that comes from doing things with your hands. I loved it.

Brown, thin, and light – nothing quite like a stack of sourdough hotcakes cooked over a wood fire in the early morning. (30)
Chores are easier if forethought is given to them and they are looked upon as a little pleasures to perform instead of inconveniences that steal time and try patience. (30)
There’s no sleeping pill like a good day's work (39)
This evening I sat on my driftwood pile admiring my cabin. Pale blue wood smoke rose up through the dark boughs of the spruce, and beyond, looming huge and majestic, the jagged peak of Crag Mountain. The cabin was complete now except for the fireplace and, maybe later on, a cache up on poles. It was a good feeling just sitting and reflecting, a proud inner feeling of something I had created with my own hands. I don't think I have ever accomplished anything as satisfying in my entire life. (98)
The wind is the villain when the thermometer is low. Nature’s invisible knife. (124)
Somehow I never seem to tire of just standing and looking down the lake or up at the mountains in the evening even if it is cold. If this is the way folks feel inside a church, I can understand why they go. (141)
This country makes a man younger than his birthdays. (159)
I enjoy working for my heat. I don't just press a button or twist a thermostat dial. I use the big crosscut saw and the axe, and while I'm getting my heat supply I'm working up an appetite that makes simple food just as appealing as anything a French chef could create. I've never found anything I like better to drink than Hope Creek water. The good feeling I get out of lungfuls of mountain air and draughts of sweet water from the snows is probably as good as any "high" I would get out of a bottle or a pill. But of course not many have a chance to live in unspoiled country. (210)
News never changes much. Its just the same things happening to different people. I would rather experience things happening to me than read about them happening to others. I am my own newspaper and my own radio. I honestly don't believe that man was meant to know everything going on in the world, all at the same time. A man turns on the TV and all those commentators bombard him with the local, the national and the international news. The newspapers do the same thing, and the poor guy with all the immediate problems of his own life is burdened with those of the whole world. (212)
I have found that some of the simplest things have given me the most pleasure. They didn't cost me a lot of money either. They just worked on my senses. Did you ever pick very large blueberries after a summer rain? Walk through a grove of cottonwoods, open like a park, and see the blue sky beyond the shimmering gold of the leaves? Pull on dry woolen socks after you've peeled off the wet ones? Come in out of the subzero and shiver yourself warm in front of a wood fire? The world is full of such things. (213)

12. Ephemera: a memoir (2025.02.07)

By: Briana Loewinsohn

Pages: 194

Published: 2023

Genre: young adult fiction / graphic novel / memoir / mental illness / grief / forgiveness / catharsis / gardening / plants /

Bex Rating: 8.5

This was less a story and more a visual journey. The author paints a beautiful, heartbreaking picture of trying to understand her mother's mental illness by returning to her childhood home and bringing her mother's bushes and flowers and herbs back to life, and planting new ones. It was pretty darn sad.

There are hardly any words--sometimes I hesitate to put the word count when I read graphic novels and children's books and comics . . . but then I remember the five or six magazines I read each month that I don't count, and it all evens out.

11. Young Hag and the Witches' Quest (2025.02.06)

By: Isabel Greenberg

Pages: 272

Published: 2024

Genre: young adult fiction / graphic novel / fantasy / quest / Arthurian tales / coming of age / witches

Bex Rating: 8.5

I really enjoyed this graphic novel--Allen curates the very best ones for me as Christmas presents every year and I've been saving them. The story was fantastic, and the pacing/placement of panels was done so perfectly. But I can't deny that I wish the art had been (cough) more appealing. What I mean to say is . . . not ugly. I know it is an intentional style--it's just not my style. That's why I gave it an 8.5 and not a 9 or 9.5--because the best graphic novels, IMHO, are the ones with amazing story telling AND fantastic art.

10. The Persian Pickle Club (book club, 2025.02.05)

By: Sandra Dallas

Pages: 196

Published: 1995

Genre: fiction / women / The Great Depression / Kansas / Dust Bowl / friendship / clubs / quilting / mystery / murder

Bex Rating: 9.5

What a great story! I can't believe it was written 30 years ago and still hasn't been made into a movie--because it's got it all: friendship, mystery, hard times, secrets, loyalty . . . and murder. But it's not a murder mystery. It's really a story about why women need women. And quilting. I loved it.

President Roosevelt could get out of his wheelchair and ask her to dance, and she’d act like she was too stepping with the hired man. (Two)
Agnes T. Ritter had always thought she was better than the rest of us, even though home economics wasn't something important like teaching. I thought it was stupid to spend all that money going to college to learn the very thing you learned growing up on a farm. (9)
It was marrying that made women appreciate other women. (13)
“Reading is right, I suppose, but with quilting, when you’re done, you have a quilt. When you finish with the book, you don’t have anything.” (44)
"Queenie, I'd be obliged to you for a scrap of that nice red you have with the white stars—that is, if it wouldn't rob you. I'm making me a Dresden Plate, and the red'll look awful good in it."
I'd been holding my breath ever since Mrs. Judd called my name, and I was so relieved that I let it out in a rush. Asking for a piece of yard goods was Mrs. Judd's way of telling me she didn't blame me for Rita's prying, that everything between us was normal. "I'd be proud to see it in your quilt," I said. "'ll drop it off the next time I come this way." (108)
He had a face ugly enough to clabber milk (115)
Women can’t quilt when they’re angry. It shows up in the stitches. (169)
“Sawbuck" is also a slang term for a U.S. $10 bill, thought to be derived from the similarity between the shape of a sawbuck device and the Roman numeral X (10), which formerly appeared on $10 bills

9. As Bright as Heaven (2025.02.03)

By: Susan Meissner

Pages: 387

Published: 2018! (Crazy, 2 years before the pandemic)

Genre: historical fiction / WWI / Spanish Influenza / pandemic / funerary arts / death / family / sisters / lies / coming-of-age / loss

Bex Rating: 9.5

I almost never buy a book at a thrift store if it is over $2. But when I saw the name Susan Meissner, I knew $3 was a steal! We have read two of her books in book club, and I have absolutely loved them both. (A Fall of Marigolds, 2019 Book Reviews, #13 and The Nature of Fragile Things, 2024 Book Reviews #40)

After the awful nightmare of losing her four-month old baby boy, a grieving Pauline Bright tells her husband that he should accept his uncle's offer to move their family to Philadelphia, where her husband will become his uncle's partner as a undertaker, eventually inheriting Bright Funeral Home.

The story is told from the perspectives of Pauline and her three daughters: 15-year old Evelyn, 13-year-old Maggie, and 7-year old Willa. The Great War has affected their lives, but when the Spanish Flu comes to Philadelphia, it will take a far greater toll.

Below is one of my favorite quotes, and here is a link to all my favorite quotes.

…it's not the first time I think that grief is such a strange guest, making its home in a person like it's a new thing that no one has ever experienced before. It is different for every person. (70)

8. Good Energy: The Surprising Connection Between Glucose, Metabolism, and Limitless Health (2025.02.02)

By: Casey Means, MD

Narrated by: Casey Means

Audiobook length: 11 hours, 53 minutes

Published: 2024

Genre: nonfiction / health / science / biology / exposé / medical field / self-help

Bex Rating: 9.5

Wow. My friend Cori recommended this book and it was just what I needed to read! The perfect book to motivate me to care for my physical, mental, and spiritual health.

Casey Means is a brilliant ENT surgeon who wondered how her dream of becoming a doctor to help and empower and heal people was being derailed by a system whose guiding mission is to prevent death, but not to CREATE HEALTH. She gives the reader a detailed overview of cell biology and mitochondrial function, and addresses thoroughly how cellular health is the key to better sleep, more energy, greater happiness, less stress, a stronger sense of peace and purpose, and the very best ways to prevent so many of the diseases, pains, and fatigue that plague the majority of Americans.

I loved it. If I'm being fully transparent, this book feels like an answer to my personal prayers about how to get my energy back and feel motivated to be more healthy. There are a LOT of uncomfortable topics, but the scientific findings she presents about diet, sleep, exercise, and mental health are pretty rock-solid. I am probably going to get an actual physical hard copy so I can take notes and share--I absolutely recommend it.

The excerpts below are ones I hand wrote as I listened because they were so good.

You can feel limitless, positive, sharp, powerful, and free.
The brain is exquisitely sensitive to oxidative stress and is one of the most energy hungry organs of the body. It counts for 20% of the consumption of your body energy, even though it is only 2% of the body's weight.
The world kids live in is metabolically disastrous unless parents go against the tide of a normal American culture. The irony is that so many parents wish that parenting were easier: fewer infections, less colic, easier behavioral patterns . . . without thinking through the lens of energy production in their children’s bodies. We can do so much for our children and our lives by controlling the controllable.
We are made from sunlight. This is not a metaphor. Almost all energy from food come directly from the sun. for most of us, photosynthesis is a word we learned Middle School and forgot. But remember this miraculous fact: the energy from the sun traveling 92 million miles through space, is stored in the glucose molecules plants.

7. The Complete Brambly Hedge (2025.01.29)

By: Jill Barklem

Pages: 248

Published: 2021

Genre: children's fiction / picture books / mice / nature / fairy tales / cozy books / gorgeous illustrations / British /

Bex Rating: 10!

I never knew these books existed. They were first published int he early eighties, and then Barklem added a few more stories to her canon (ultimately eight volumes), all about the mice of Brambly Hedge. (I was made aware of them by an Instagrammer who built an incredible Brambly Hedge treehouse for her daughter).

They are so reminiscent of Beatrix Potter, with the most delicious details in both word and picture. This is what I will be reading my grandkids, people.

6. The Comfort Crisis: Embrace Discomfort to Reclaim Your Wild, Happy, Healthy Self (2025.01.27)

By: Michael Easter

Pages: 281

Published: 2021

Genre: nonfiction / health / mental health / physical health / self-help / memoir / science / civilization /

Bex Rating: 9

My favorite kind of "journalistic nonfiction"--a dive into a fascinating subject, told within a narrative arc. The author starts out with his five-week long Caribou hunt in the Arctic, completely cut off from any outside support, but weaves the topic of discomfort into every chapter--and how it's actually really good for you.

I knew I would love this book as soon as my friend Erica Goode told me about it (while we were NOT being uncomfortable, soaking in Lava Hot Springs' world famous hot pools with a bunch of friends on a frigid January week night--picture below).

top: Hailey Mazza, Hope Hansen, Barby Toone,
Susy Hunsaker, Afton Marowelli, Rachelle Haymore,
Paige Messerly, Becca, Tash McClatchy, Brenda Nielsen
left: Becca, Erica, Brenda, & Susy
right: me and Hope

My three-plus pages of favorite excerpts were too many to share, so below is my favorite one, and here is a link to the rest. Thanks for loaning it to me, Erica!

Somewhere between denial, anger, and bargaining, on day one [of a multi-day backcountry trip], Hopman would have strapped complicated brain-wave measuring devices onto the skulls of the students. Three days later, once the students had hit acceptance, she'd retest them.
The students' day-one brain waves were beta waves. These are frenetic, type-A, go-go-go waves. But by day three they'd be riding what are called alpha and theta waves. These are the same waves found in experienced meditators and people who have lapsed into an effortless flow state. These rare waves reset your thinking, revive your brain, tame burnout, and just make you feel better.
"You don't really see the good alpha and theta waves appear in the short excursions outside," said Hopman. "That's why taking a backcountry trip each year is so important." We in the modern world are riding high, violent beta brain waves more often than any humans in history, and the message is clear: Time in nature is a hell of a way to calm the turbulent sea inside our minds. (124)

5. The Way of the Hermit (2025.01.22)

By: Ken Smith

Pages: 237

Published: 2023

Genre: nonfiction / memoir / off-grid / homestead /

Bex Rating: 9

I loved this memoir of a kind, reclusive British man who asked a Scottish landowner if he could build a primitive cabin near an isolated lake . . . and that landowner said YES. Ken Smith still lives on the shores of Loch Treig, and shares his observations, wit, and wisdom, after living over forty years off-grid.

I got this book in the hands of my dad at the first opportunity, because I know he will love it too!

Put your faith in chopping wood. Build up the pile and the calluses on your palms, and always remember: from the moment you first swing your axe in early spring, you’re already racing to get your pile in sound order before Winter throttles the daylight back out of these moors . (12)
Quite honestly, though, if you cared less about what people thought then you would be a lot happier – regardless of whether you live as a hermit or not. (27)
Count yer blessings, Ken. Then count yer bleedin’ toes. (126)
I was given the job of ghillie. The work of the ghillie is woven as tight as tartan into the ancient traditions of Scotland. "Ghillie" derives from an ancient Gaelic word whose rough translation rests somewhere between "manservant" or "attendant," specifically within the hunting, riding and fishing disciplines. In the past, the ghillie acted more like countryside helps to the upper classes in their outdoor pursuits. (150)
There are plenty of people out there who are struggling with real sickness and injury who would give everything they have just to be in your shoes (providing your shoes haven't been stolen or burnt to cinders!). Do not waste the opportunity offered by your good health; especially if the bad times have already come to pass and can't be changed now anyway. Get right on with proving to yourself that no matter what happens you will always find a way back from real adversity. Do that, and I'll tell you now, as I sit here as an old man, that is what you will look back on with the greatest feelings of pride. That is the way of this hermit. (163). [this is the authors Takeaway after watching his log home burned to the ground in 1991, and then have everything burglarized in 1997]
When you keep a diary, you find yourself actively looking for a story to tell, and soon enough, your life will fill with far more vibrant scenes than it would if you were just sitting in your chair, passively letting the world slip by before you. You want to impress your reader, and if that reader is only ever going to be you, what could be more important than creating a life story that is full of color and resonance? (173)
You shouldn't feel self-conscious about saying a few kind words to the things that grow in your garden. You shouldn't feel self-conscious about saying kind words to anything. (207)
Every few weeks, I'll venture out to town for my shopping and mail. In spite of my lifestyle, I don't hugely mind going to the shops and seeing people. I hear that everyone is doing much of their shopping on the internet with computers. I have never been on the internet, or on a computer, in my life; and it all sounds very strange to me. So there are all those people living near to shops, but instead choose to do it all without leaving home? Is that really how we are supposed to live these days? Without seeing a soul, having a conversation, or experiencing life outside? I'll go down to the shops, hitch a ride, have a chat, get a backslap off old mates, sample a pint, maybe; and yet I'm the one who's supposed to be the antisocial old hermit. Odd, in't it? (228)
Dumfries: a market town and former royal burgh in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland
Jaffa cake: (British snack food) Light Sponge Cakes with Dark Crackly Chocolate and a Smashing Orangey Centre [grossssssssssss]
demijohn: a bulbous narrow-necked bottle holding from 3 to 10 gallons of liquid, typically enclosed in a wicker cover.

4. The Kitchen Front (2025.01.18)

By: Jennifer Ryan

Pages: 406

Published: 2021

Genre: historical fiction / WWII / British front / cooking / sisters / forgiveness /

Bex Rating: 8.5

This was a great WWII book with a twist: four British women are competing on a local radio show to see who can cook the best dinners made only with War Rations. Each chapter is from the point of view of each of the four women, who find themselves coming together despite their rivalry.

Exhaustion, disillusionment, and that panicky feeling that everything was running out of control had set up home in her heart. For the sake of the children, she worked hard to keep her anguish at bay, hugging them through their grief while thrusting her own down into her belly until the middle of the night. It was deemed bad spirit to show tears-Mr. Churchill had drummed that into them: Collective despair could bring the nation to its knees. (6)
"The poor boy's a bag of nerves, Audrey. They can't be terrified every time a plane goes over. You can't wrap them in cotton wool all their lives." Zelda's tone was one of impatience. "Arm them with the facts, tell them when they should be worried, and leave the rest to them."
Audrey crossed her arms angrily. "It's all right for you. You haven't already lost a husband in this ruddy war, have you? If you had, I'm sure you wouldn't be so cavalier about the remainder of your family."
Zelda shrugged. "I'm sure it's hard for you, Audrey, but you can't lose your head. Let them get through it by themselves—they're not going to break." (120)
"My grief is only equal to what I had that was lost, and if my sorrow is immeasurable, it is because the depth of our love, our world, and the joy we created, was so immense on the other side of the balance. I would not be without it for all the world." (175)
It was a heavenly morning, the bees buzzing lazily as they lapped up the last vestiges of summer. The lingering smell of smoke from burning the fields brought an unconscious reminder of the beginning of autumn, the forthcoming march through harvest and Halloween to Christmas. The reliability of the seasons— the formidable character that shaped months, years, lives it gave Audrey a comfort that surged through her. (300)
“I found that contentment—happiness even—comes in all kinds of ways. Sometimes you shouldn't wait for things to be perfect. You just need to enjoy the small things, every little moment that makes you smile." (313)
Baedeker Raids: Baedeker raids were the name given to German air attacks on the English cathedral cities of Exeter, Bath, York, Canterbury and Norwich, carried out mainly during spring and summer 1942. They took this name from the travel guides prepared by Karl Baedeker - these were apparently used to decide which cities deserved revenge bombing following the allied bombing of Lűbeck and Cologne.
Hay-box: a device to transport hot food from kitchens to troops. It got its name from the straw or hay used to form the insulation.

3. Ride On (2025.01.13)

By: Faith Erin Hicks

Pages: 220

Published: 2022

Genre: graphic novel / middle grade fiction / YA fiction / horses / friendship

Bex Rating: 8.5

This was a super quick read, and a really sweet, low-stakes story. I snatched it up at a thrift store, because I LOVE Faith Erin Hicks' trilogy, The Nameless City. I was surprised to find out in the author's note that the central conflict of the story (a girl named Victoria is shunned by her best friend because she "doesn't take riding horses seriously enough") actually happened to the author when she was young. Definitely a must-read for your horse-loving kids, and a great middle-grade introduction to graphic novels.

2. Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (2025.01.11)

By: Annie Dillard

Pages: 290

Published: 1974

Genre: memoir / philosophy / prose poetry / nature writing / Pulitzer Prize

Bex Rating: 9

This was a Christmas present from Allen and one of the densest books I have ever read. I love it, but it required ALL of my concentration to understand and visualize Dillard's prose. It's apparent she is a genius--both in her writing and in her understanding of the world around her. She wrote this book when she was TWENTY-SEVEN, which is almost unbelievable.

I can't think of a better place to read than
in my very own cozy house with cats and
dogs and children strewn about, wintering all.

In essence, this is a modern iteration of Thoreau's Walden--Annie Dillard spends a year chronicling her ramblings around Tinker Creek near her home in Virginia. She goes through the seasons, beginning with Winter and ending with Fall, but delves into so many subjects it is dizzying. But dazzling. Beautiful. It's kind of like a dream where you only understand it if you don't look directly at it. I am a lover of creeks and woods and animals and words, so it was the perfect book with which to begin the year.

Fish gotta swim and bird gotta fly; insects, it seems, gotta do one horrible thing after another. I never ask why of a vulture or shark, but I ask why of almost every insect I see. (64)
The great hurrah about wild animals is that they exist at all, and the greater hurrah is the actual moment of seeing them. Because they have a nice dignity, and prefer to have nothing to do with me, not even as the simple objects of my vision. They show me by their very wariness what a prize it is simply to open my eyes and behold. (195)

My favorite excerpts in totality are too lengthy for this annual blogpost, so here is a link to a google doc of all the lines that struck a chord with me.

sonant: having sound or sounding. It can also be used as a noun to describe a speech sound that is voiced
surd: phonetics (of a speech sound) uttered with the breath and not the voice
eutrophic: ecology (of a lake or other body of water) rich in nutrients and so supporting a dense plant population, the decomposition of which kills animal life by depriving it of oxygen.
Ultima Thule: a distant unknown region; the extreme limit of travel and discovery. "the Orkney Islands seemed to be ultima Thule to the English." Thule is a Latin (and earlier Greek) name for an island north of Britain

1. The Frozen River (book club, 2025.01.10)

By: Ariel Lawhon

Narrated by: Jane Oppenheimer

Audiobook length: 15 hours, 5 minutes

Published: 2023

Genre: historical fiction / mystery / American history / midwifery / law / diary / thriller / romance / revenge / love story / women's rights

Bex Rating: 9.5

This book covers all the genres: part historical fiction, part mystery, part thriller, part love story, part REVENGE FANTASY. I loved it. And had no idea until the end that Martha Ballard was a real midwife who delivered well over a thousand babies in the days of early America in Maine.

I didn't think this would be my first book of the year--I started it at the end of 2024, but had less time than I anticipated to listen. But once I was halfway through, it was all I wanted to do. ***Trigger warning*** like To Kill A Mockingbird, the plot of the story centers around a rape, but unlike TKAM, the actual rape is described, and is unfortunately pretty graphic.

The Frozen River the story of a midwife named Martha Ballard who gets tangled up in a murder investigation when she is called upon to determine the cause of death of a man found frozen in the ice of the Kennebec River. The man is Joshua Burgess, recently accused of a brutal rape, and it is immediately evident that he was hanged before he was thrown in the river. Dun dun DUN!

Pages

2025-12-02

2025 Books

No comments: