Life: It Goes On - December 11

That cold I was whining about last week? Yeah, it knocked me out for several more days this week as well. I don't know about you but I sure can't afford to get nothing done for an entire week. Finally back on my feet and working hard to make up ground. Lots of online shopping is helping tremendously but I hate not to be giving my local businesses the dollars.

The great light fiasco yesterday didn't help - pulled out the lights for the tree and the longest strand wasn't working. The Big Guy headed off for all new lights while I took off what was already on. Got the new lights all up, plugged them in and...a good part of one of the strands wasn't working! Poor BG had to make yet another trip out for yet more lights. I finally got the tree decorated but not with the new ornaments I spent part of Thursday trying to find. Can't you just buy packages with one color of ornaments that are all the same any more, for Pete's sake? Isn't this supposed to be more fun?!

This Week I'm:

Listening To: Book-wise, I started Meg Wolitzer's The Interestings Friday and I'm enjoying it early on. Music-wise, I'm full on Christmas music. I've listened to most of our Christmas CD's this weekend as well as quite a lot of Spotify Christmas music. It's definitely helping me keep in the spirit even when things aren't working quite as planned.

Watching: Volleyball (our Nebraska Huskers are in the Final Four and local Creighton made it to the Elite Eight), football, and The Voice, of course. Also, Christmas movies - White Christmas, Love Actually, The Family Stone, and Elf.

Reading: Ugh, this is going so slowly lately and I have so much I need to get read for this week! I don't even want to talk about it!

Making: Sugar cookie dough to roll out later this week, dipped pretzels, grilled cheese sandwiches and Rueben sandwiches, homemade mac and cheese, chili mac, lobster and pasta. Damn! I didn't realize how much pasta we'd had this week until I wrote that!

Planning: On getting Christmas cards out in the next couple of days, finishing shopping this week, and getting presents under the tree. In my dreams, I'd have most of the "things that must be done" done by the time I write to you next week. We'll see.

Thinking About: Making a kilt for Mini-me for his wedding. For Christmas he'll get a muslin "first draft" to check fit and then I'm taking the plunge into the real deal. Have I mentioned that I don't really sew? I may have completely lost my mind.

Enjoying: Watching our great-nephew play high school hoops. He transferred high schools this year so can't play with the varsity until January. Can't wait to see what he can do then!

Feeling: There's a bit of melancholy underlying everything this season as it's the first year we've gone into the holidays without one of our kids with us. No Mini-me to drop in for a Sunday today with the rest of us, no Mini-me to dip pretzels as a family, getting presents together to get in the mail instead of having the kids here with us. Missing those two Wisconsinites every day!

Looking forward to: Book club this week. I need a girls night!

Question of the week: If you could only carry on one of your holiday traditions, what is the one thing you absolutely have to have/do to make the holidays complete?

A Month of Faves: This Is How We Read

Join hosts Girlxoxo, Traveling with T and Estella’s Revenge for the 3rd annual #AMonthofFaves blog event – a fun way to recap the year that was. They have everyday planned out, so we can join in anytime. There will also be a link-up on all of their blogs – put a link to your post so that they can stop by each and every post to leave comments, high fives, good vibes and well wishes.

Yesterday the hosts are asking us to share "how" we read - number of books read, fave genre, genre we wish we read more of, fave book of the year, where we read...that type of thing. I'm still playing catch up (and since I don't have a whole lot to say about today's topic), here's yesterday's topic today.

Books Read In 2016: By year's end, I will likely have finished 75 books and 3 plays. Of those, 12 will have been nonfiction (made my goal, although I'd still like to be reading more nonfiction), 11 were about or written by persons of color (again, I'd like to up this number next year), and more than half were written by women (for this years Women In Fiction challenge, I stopped recording at 25 but that was months ago).

Favorite Place To Read: Curled up in a corner of the sofa in my family room. It's not the easiest place to read but it's the most comfortable and I'm still surrounded by my family.

Most Read Author: Most years, if I'd read two books by the same author, that would be unusual. This year, I read two books each by three different authors: Fredrik Backman (Britt Marie Was Here and A Man Called Ove), two by Melanie Benjamin (The Aviator's Wife and The Swans of Fifth Avenue) and two  by Greg Iles (Natchez Burning and The Bone Tree).

Favorite Book of the Year: I'm only supposed to give you a hint. If I'd figured out the answer, I would. But I've read so many books this year that really impressed me, I'm torn as to which was my very favorite.

Favorite Genre: Literary fiction remains my favorite genre but I've done a better job this year, I think, of mixing things up, if only just a little. Although, I must admit to having read no sci-fi at all. I would really like to up my game on this genre but I seriously need recommendations of books that aren't too "out there."

Month I Read The Most/Month I Read The Least: Surprisingly, May was the month I read the most, at least the month I reviewed the most books and generally I'm reviewing in the same month I'm reading a book. I read 9 books in May which was also the month I was the busiest. Go figure. There were several months I only read five books; these must have been the months I felt like I was in a reading slump although, compared to average Americans, this is still quite a lot of books in a month so I don't feel as bad.

Favorite Format: I read more books in paperback than any other format with ebooks coming in second (most of those on the iPad, thanks to Netgalley but I've now - finally - figured out that I can get them on my Nook now that it's a Samsung device. Duh). Next is audiobook, which I almost exclusively listen to in my car. I do love the idea and look of hardcover books but for toting around or reading in bed, they just aren't as practical so only about a half dozen or so of those got read.

A Month of Faves - These Are A Few Of My Favorite Things

A Month of Faves is once again hosted by GirlXOXO and I am, once again, playing catchup. The month was meant to kick off last Thursday with a few of my favorite things. As I'm going to have to pick and choose topics to get caught up, I'm picking this one because it should be easy, right?

1. Dolce and Gabana's Light Blue - it's my year-round scent. It's light enough for everyday but nice enough for special occasions.

2. Bailey's Irish Creme - as soon as the temps start to fall, I start thinking that a small glass of Bailey's is just the perfect way to end a day.

3. Simply Cheetos Puffs White Cheddar - they cost more than the other Cheetos but since I can only find them at Target, I always buy two bags at a time. And they don't turn your fingers orange!

4. The U. S. Swim Trials were my favorite sports event this year. The races were exciting to watch and it was great to be part of all of the fun.

5. Favorite proud mama moment - watching Mini-me graduate from college. He made the most of every opportunity he had while he was there and graduated with honors.

6. Milwaukee might be my new favorite city. It has a river that runs right through town, it has all of the cheeses, it has art and beer and parks, it has Lake Michigan. Best of all, it has two of my favorite people.

7. My new favorite cream for my feet (a never ending search for the thing that will finally make putting panty hose of my heels not quite so dangerous) is Gold Bond Ultimate Softening Foot Cream. Miss H included some in a pampering jar she gave me for my birthday. I hope Santa puts some more in my stocking!

8. My favorite new television show this year is This Is Us. It's giving me everything I missed when Parenthood ended with some really great themes.

9.  Favorite friend moments are a two-way tie. This summer I reconnected with a woman who was my best friend for nearly all of my teen years. We spent four hours over lunch catching up. It's one of the few things I thank Facebook for. The fall I got to meet a fellow blogger I've "known" for six (?) years. We met for lunch and it was immediately easy conversation. Love this blogging community!

10. My favorite squee moment this year? Mini-me's engagement, of course! We adore Miss S, she is perfect for him, and her mother will be a lovely mother-in-law. Next year's favorite squee moment is a foregone conclusion!

Life: It Goes On - December 4

What a waste this week has been! I caught a cold Wednesday and have hardly left the house except to go to work since then. I haven't even really felt like reading (insert sad face emoji here). Thank heavens for online shopping - at least I'm getting some Christmas shopping done. With gifts to ship to Milwaukee this year, I need to get their shopping off in the next week. I may, or may not have, ordered a jacket for their dog for his walks. Online shopping may be a little too easy!

This Week I'm:

Listening To: One more week of The Flamethrowers - the jury's still out on this one but now that it's taking fewer side trips, I'm enjoying it more. I'm also dipping my toes into Christmas music but the radio stations who play it this time of year tend to play the same things over and over so it gets old. Also, they tend to forget the reason for the season and I want my religious Christmas music.

Watching: Volleyball, football, The Voice...the usual. But I'm also watching Christmas shows - Rudolph and It's A Wonderful Life. Today I'm finally bringing up the Christmas decorations so I'll likely put on a Christmas movie while I'm decorating.

Sookie's been getting more
reading done than I have

Reading: See above. Which is bad because I've got a lot of commitments, reading-wise, in the coming weeks. I did finish the three plays I was reading and will review those this week. I'm thoroughly enjoying Hidden Figures and when I'm done with that I'll jump into Boys In The Boat for book club. Love that I'm finishing the year strong on nonfiction.

Making: Again, see above. I've largely relied on The Big Guy to feed me this week. I did make some chicken noodle soup last night (and even froze a container) last night and this morning I made cinnamon rolls. If I'm cookin', I must be getting better.

Planning: It's all about Christmas this week. Lots of shopping to get done, Christmas cards to get ready to mail, decorating to do and I need to start baking so I can ship some of that to Milwaukee as well.

Thinking About: How much I miss Mini-me's Sunday visits. I just finished off a pot of coffee. If he were here, we'd be firing up another pot. I know he's very happy where he's at, with Miss S, which helps. But still...

Which brings up something else I've been thinking about: it's now less than seven months until they are married. I can't believe it! And then what do I call her? Mrs. S? Mrs. Mini-me?

Enjoying: Watching the first snow fall of the year. Although it did ruin plans for the day. Now it just needs to hurry up and melt today, as forecast.

Feeling: Frustrated. I don't know about you, but this time of year, I can't afford to not feel up to accomplishing anything for four or five days.

Looking forward to: Hopefully getting to go shopping for my mom with my dad and my sister this week. That's what we were supposed to be doing yesterday but my folks didn't get to come to Omaha thanks to the snow. My dad used to need help shopping for my mom; he doesn't really need the help any more but none of us is ready to do away with that tradition.

Question of the week: Do you still send Christmas cards? A lot of our friends have stopped sending them, now that we are all so in touch with each other throughout the year. I miss them, though!

I'll Take You There by Wally Lamb

I'll Take You There by Wally Lamb
Published November 2016 by Harper
Source: my copy courtesy of the publisher and TLC Book Tours in exchange for an honest review

Publisher's Summary:
I’ll Take You There centers on Felix, a film scholar who runs a Monday night movie club in what was once a vaudeville theater. One evening, while setting up a film in the projectionist booth, he’s confronted by the ghost of Lois Weber, a trailblazing motion picture director from Hollywood’s silent film era. Lois invites Felix to revisit—and in some cases relive—scenes from his past as they are projected onto the cinema’s big screen.

In these magical movies, the medium of film becomes the lens for Felix to reflect on the women who profoundly impacted his life. There’s his daughter Aliza, a Gen Y writer for New York Magazine who is trying to align her post-modern feminist beliefs with her lofty career ambitions; his sister, Frances, with whom he once shared a complicated bond of kindness and cruelty; and Verna, a fiery would-be contender for the 1951 Miss Rheingold competition, a beauty contest sponsored by a Brooklyn-based beer manufacturer that became a marketing phenomenon for two decades. At first unnerved by these ethereal apparitions, Felix comes to look forward to his encounters with Lois, who is later joined by the spirits of other celluloid muses.

My Thoughts:
I'm not sure I know where to start. I'm actually not sure exactly how I feel about this book. I agreed to read and review it solely based on Lamb's name with no idea what it was about.

For twenty-seven pages, Lamb had me. And then ghosts. Hmmm. Okay, I decided, give it a chance. At that point, I decided this was going to be a book where we looked back on Felix's life as Lois walked him through films of his life. That worked for me; I could imagine it all leading to a revelation about Felix's life, a lesson he needed to learn.

I was wrong. And I was really confused about what Lamb was trying to say for most of the rest of the book. Here's one case where I would have been better served to have read the publisher's summary before reading the book. Had I known going in that Lamb's purpose was to focus on the women, I might better have understood when things seemed to become disjointed.

So here we have a book about women, written by a man, with a man as the central figure. It's not that Lamb didn't do a respectable job telling the women's stories. Verna's story, in particular, was well told. Maybe Lamb's purpose of using Felix to tell the story was to show the effect of these women on a man, but that wasn't clear to me. Perhaps I'm touchy right now; my feminist core is a little tender. But if we're going to tell women's stories, why can't they be centered around a woman?

In the end, my initial concern about the ghosts as a device turned out to be valid. For me, it was a gimmick that didn't really work and one that cause the book to feel more disjointed than to tie the pieces together.

But Lamb is a formidable writer, no doubt about it. The relationships between Felix and Aliza and Felix and Frances were wonderfully written and Lamb managed to tell a lot of women's stories in one book. The Miss Rheingold competition was an actual competition, one Lamb used throughout many of the stories and I wondered if might have been able to use that as the device to spin everything out from rather than the ghosts/films. I liked a lot about I'll Take You There but I came away feeling like I could have liked it more.

But that's just me. For more opinions about this book, check out the full TLC Book tour here. Thanks to the ladies at TLC for including me on the tour; no matter how I end up feeling about a book, they always make sure I'm pushing myself and that's a good thing.

Wally Lamb is the author of four previous novels, including the New York Times and national bestseller The Hour I First Believed and Wishin’ and Hopin’, a bestselling novella. His first two works of fiction, She’s Come Undone and I Know This Much Is True, were both number-one New York Times bestsellers and Oprah’s Book Club selections. He lives in Connecticut with his wife, Christine. The Lambs are the parents of three sons.

Find out more about Wally at his website, and connect with him on Facebook.