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2024 Bookish Books Reading Challenge (Hosted by Yours Truly)

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My Progress:


9 / 30 books. 30% done!

2024 Literary Escapes Challenge

- Alabama
- Alaska
- Arizona
- Arkansas
- California (3)
- Colorado (1)
- Connecticut
- Delaware
- Florida
- Georgia
- Hawaii
- Idaho (2)
- Illinois
- Indiana
- Iowa
- Kansas
- Kentucky
- Louisiana (1)
- Maine (1)
- Maryland
- Massachusetts (1)
- Michigan
- Minnesota
- Mississippi
- Missouri
- Montana
- Nebraska
- Nevada
- New Hampshire
- New Jersey
- New Mexico
- New York (1)
- North Carolina (1)
- North Dakota
- Ohio
- Oklahoma
- Oregon (2)
- Pennsylvania
- Rhode Island
- South Carolina
- South Dakota
- Tennessee (1)
- Texas (1)
- Utah
- Vermont
- Virginia (1)
- Washington
- West Virginia
- Wisconsin
- Wyoming
- Washington, D.C.*

International:
- Australia (1)
- Canada (1)
- England (5)
- France (1)
- Ireland (1)
- Scotland (1)
- The Netherlands (1)

My Progress:


12 / 51 states. 24% done!

2024 Historical Fiction Reading Challenge

My Progress:


10 / 50 words. 20% done!

2024 POPSUGAR Reading Challenge


15 / 50 books. 30% done!

Booklist Queen's 2024 Reading Challenge

My Progress:


32 / 50 books. 64% done!

2024 52 Club Reading Challenge

My Progress:


27 / 52 books. 52% done!

2024 Build Your Library Reading Challenge

My Progress:


21 / 40 books. 53% done!

2024 Pioneer Book Reading Challenge


13 / 40 books. 33% done!

2024 Craving for Cozies Reading Challenge

My Progress:


5 / 25 books. 20% done!

2024 Medical Examiner's Mystery Reading Challenge

2024 Mystery Marathon Reading Challenge

My Progress


17 / 26.2 miles. 65% done!

Mount TBR Reading Challenge

My Progress


15 / 100 books. 15% done!

2024 Pick Your Poison Reading Challenge

My Progress:


34 / 104 books. 33% done!

Around the Year in 52 Books Reading Challenge

My Progress


31 / 52 books. 60% done!

Disney Animated Movies Reading Challenge

My Progress


32 / 165 books. 19% done!
Friday, August 17, 2012

TGIF—Time to Hop!

It's Friday and you know what that means here in book bloggerland—it's time to hop!  This is my favorite weekly event because it's just a good ole time.  I love finding new book blogs to follow.  It's always fun to see what's going on on other blogs and to see what books everyone's recommending.  If you want to join up (and you really should), click on over to Crazy For Books to get all the details.

This week's question is:

What is the one genre you will NEVER read?

- Easy—I'll never read erotica.  Ever.  There are other genres I shy away from (poetry, comic books, textbook-ish non-fiction, etc.), but, if a book in those genres sounded intriguing enough, I would still pick it up.  Not so with erotica.  When I say never, I mean never.  

What about you? 

If this is your first time visiting BBB, welcome!  I'm so excited you're here.  Please take a look around, make a comment (or two or three or ten) and, most of all, enjoy yourself.  I'll definitely return the favor.  If you're an old follower, a thousand thanks for your support of my blog.  I love writing it and it makes me happy to know that other people enjoy it, too.

Have a great weekend, everybody.  Happy reading!  

Old-Fashioned Animal Tale A Little Dull For My (Always Discerning) Tastes

(Image from Barnes & Noble)   

Although she lives inside a grand plantation house, Celeste longs for a real home. The tiny, timid mouse yearns for a place where she can nestle, safe from rat bullies and the threat of the housecat's claws.  A cage isn't exactly what she has in mind, but that's where she ends up after she's forced from her nest under the dining room floorboards.  Captivity, it turns out, isn't so bad.  Not when your captor is a nice boy like Joseph Mason.  Joseph's staying at the plantation while he and his teacher, John James Audubon, study the local wildlife.  Curled up inside Joseph's pocket, Celeste gets to experience things she never even imagined, things like the great outdoors, the perplexing behavior of humans, the excitement of flying like an osprey and, most of all, true friendship.  But when Joseph finishes his work in Louisiana and returns to Ohio, what will happen to Celeste?

Although I expected A Nest for Celeste by Henry Cole to be a sweet, simple tale, it actually delves into a fairly dark subject.  Not only does it discuss animal cruelty, but it paints a famous naturalist in a rather unflattering light (Audubon, according to Cole's Author's Note, killed almost all of the birds he painted so lovingly).  At its heart, though, the tale is exactly what it purports to be:  "A Story About Art, Inspiration, and the Meaning of Home."  Readers will sympathize with the book's kind heroine, although they may find that her story drags a bit.  Although A Nest for Celeste is a quick read with lots of illustrations, I yawned through a good portion of it.  I'm not sure how appealing this one will be for children, if even I found it a little dull.  Or maybe I'm full of prunes and they'll totally love it.  At any rate, I wasn't all that impressed.  

(Readalikes:  Um, I can't really think of anything.  Can you?)

Grade:  C+

If this were a movie, it would be rated:  PG for scenes of peril and scenes involving animal cruelty (not horribly graphic, but still might be disturbing for young children)

To the FTC, with love:  I borrowed A Nest for Celeste from the library at my kids' elementary school as part of my volunteer work with the school's reading program.   
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Reading

<i>Reading</i>
End of Story by A.J. Finn

Listening

<i>Listening</i>
My Contrary Mary by Brodi Ashton, Cynthia Hand, and Jodi Meadows



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2024 Reading Challenge

2024 Reading Challenge
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