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2025 Bookish Books Reading Challenge (hosted by Yours Truly)

My Progress:


30 / 30 bookish books. 100% done!

2025 Cover Lovers Reading Challenge (hosted by Yours Truly)

2025 Cover Lovers Reading Challenge (hosted by Yours Truly)

My Progress:


46 / 50 books. 92% done!

2025 Literary Escapes Challenge

- Alabama (1)
- Alaska (2)
- Arizona (2)
- Arkansas (1)
- California (9)
- Colorado (3)
- Connecticut (1)
- Delaware (1)
- Florida (2)
- Georgia (1)
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- Iowa (3)
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- Washington, D.C.* (1)

International:
- Australia (5)
- Canada (3)
- England (16)
- France (2)
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- Italy (1)
- Japan (1)
- Norway (1)
- Puerto Rico (1)
- Scotland (2)
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My Progress:


51 / 51 states. 100% done!

2025 Historical Fiction Reading Challenge

My Progress:


31 / 50 books. 62% done!

2025 POPSUGAR Reading Challenge

2025 POPSUGAR Reading Challenge

My Progress:


37 / 50 books. 74% done!

Booklist Queen's 2025 Reading Challenge

My Progress:


40 / 52 books. 77% done!

2025 52 Club Reading Challenge

My Progress:


43 / 52 books. 83% done!

2025 Build Your Library Reading Challenge

My Progress:


29 / 40 books. 73% done!

2025 Craving for Cozies Reading Challenge

My Progress:


38 / 51 cozies. 75% done!

2025 Medical Examiner Mystery Reading Challenge

2025 Mystery Marathon Reading Challenge

My Progress


26 / 26.2 miles. 99% done!

2025 Mount TBR Reading Challenge

My Progress


33 / 100 books. 33% done!

2025 Pick Your Poison Reading Challenge

My Progress:


70 / 109 books. 64% done!

2025 Around the Year in 52 Books Reading Challenge

My Progress


57 / 62 books. 92% done!

Phase Out Your Seriesathon - My Progress


23 / 55 books. 42% done!

The 100 Most Common Last Names in the U.S. Reading Challenge

My Progress:


97 / 100 names. 97% done!

The Life Skills Reading Challenge

My Progress:


75 / 80 skills. 94% done!
Showing posts with label Robin MacArthur. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Robin MacArthur. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 14, 2023

Top Ten Tuesday: "Heart" Books On My TBR List


Freebies always stump me and today's is no exception. I wracked my brain to come up with a creative topic for the Valentine's/Love Freebie, but nothing came to mind. In the end, I just decided to go with books on my TBR with "heart" in the title. I'm not much for romance reading, so I was pleasantly surprised to discover I had ten (but not many more) on my want-to-read list.

If you want to join in the TTT fun, head on over to That Artsy Reader Girl for all the details.

Top Ten Books On My TBR List With "Heart" in the Title 
- in no particular order - 



1. Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country in the World by Sarah Smarsh—The product of generations of Kansas wheat farmers on her paternal side and generations of teenaged mothers on her maternal side, Smarsh is well-acquainted with the effects of intergenerational poverty. This close, intimate look at what it means to be part of America's working class poor sounds fascinating.


2. The Secret of a Heart Note by Stacey Lee—I'm a big fan of Lee's YA historical novels. This book is the only one the author has written that I haven't read yet. It's a contemporary story about a 16-year-old girl who uses her ability as an aroma expert to help others find true love. As much as she longs to be a normal high school kid, she knows that if she falls in love, her gift will disappear. When she finds herself falling for the perfect guy, her whole life begins to change...Sounds like a cute love story! 


3. The Metal Heart: A Novel of Love and Valor in World War II by Caroline Lea—Following the Allies' win in North Africa, a large group of Italian soldiers are shipped to a remote island off the Scottish coast until the end of the war. When Dorothy and Constance—sisters who have been orphaned—volunteer to tend to the sick and injured men, Dorothy finds herself drawn to one of the prisoners. Their forbidden friendship causes strain between Dorothy and her sister as well as Dorothy and her community. When she is faced with an impossible choice, Dorothy must decide where her true loyalties lie.


4. Heart of Fire: An Immigrant Daughter's Story by Mazie K. Hirono—As a genealogist and the descendant of Europeans who immigrated to America in the 1800s, I'm endlessly fascinated by immigration stories. This one is written by a woman who was born in Japan, immigrated to Hawaii as a young child, and is now a U.S. Senator. 


5. Our Crooked Hearts by Melissa Albert—This YA novel sounds odd, but intriguing. It concerns a teenaged girl who is experiencing strange occurrences that seem to be linked to her mother's mysterious past. With the help of the boy next door, she starts digging into the secrets her enigmatic parent is clearly hiding.


6. Jar of Hearts by Jennifer Hillier—When the remains of a woman missing for fourteen years are discovered, it leads to the reopening of a cold case that stirs up the lives of three best friends, forcing them to reckon with dark secrets and terrifying truths.


7. A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America and the Woman Who Stopped Them by Timothy Egan—I've never heard of Madge Oberholtzer, but her story sounds intriguing. Her deathbed testimony outed KKK leader D.C. Stephenson, which brought the organization to its knees. 


8. The Key to My Heart by Lia Louis—Louis' books sound like romances I would actually like to read. This one revolves around a grieving widow who finds solace in playing music in a London Tube station. When someone begins leaving the sheet music for her dead husband's favorite songs on the station's piano, the widow is incredulous, curious, and, for the first time in a long time, hopeful. Could this—whatever it is—be her second chance at life and love?


9. Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng—I still haven't read Ng's newest, which is about a boy who embarks on a quest to find the mother he has never had a chance to know except through her banned poetry.


10. Heart Spring Mountain by Robin MacArthur—When Vale, a bartender in New Orleans, is informed that her estranged mother is missing after a violent tropical storm ravaged her Vermont town, she feels compelled to go home. As she looks for her mom, she digs deep into her family's roots and history, revealing shocking secrets that change everything.

There you go, ten "heart" books on my TBR list. Have you read any of them? What did you think? What did you do for today's Valentine's/Love freebie? I'd truly love to know. Leave me a comment on this post and I will gladly return the favor on your blog.

Happy TTT! 

Wednesday, December 27, 2017

Top Ten Tuesday (on a Wednesday): Books I Can't Wait to Read in 2018


I'm a day late with my favorite weekly meme, but that's because I forgot yesterday was Tuesday.  This Christmas-on-a-Monday thing has been throwing me off for weeks! I honestly didn't realize yesterday was Tuesday until about 5:15 p.m. when my phone reminded me of my daughter's gymnastics class, which takes place every week on—you guessed it—Tuesday.  I'm back on track now, but I didn't want to miss Top Ten Tuesday altogether, so I'm doing it anyway, even if it is a Wednesday.  It is Wednesday, right??

In case you don't know, Top Ten Tuesday is brought to us by the ladies over at The Broke and the Bookish.  After January 16, the meme will be coming at us from That Artsy Reader Girl instead.  In the meantime, you can participate by clicking over to The Broke and the Bookish, reading a few TTT rules, making your own list, and hopping around to other blogs to check out theirs.  It's a great way to find new blogs, new books, and new friends.

Predictably, this week's prompt is:  Top Ten Books I'm Looking Forward to in 2018.  Here we go:


1.  The Wolves of Winter by Tyrell JohnsonAvailable January 2.  Jamie from The Perpetual Page Turner just published a fabulous list of 2018 adult fiction titles she's looking forward to reading.  This dystopian novel was among them and I agree, it sounds compelling.  Billed as The Hunger Games meets Station Eleven, it's sure to be a book I'll love.


2.  The Craftsman by Sharon BoltonAvailable (in the U.S.) October 18.  I enjoy Sharon Bolton's crime novels, so I'm excited for her newest.  It's about a woman whose career is made when she apprehends a coffin-maker accused of burying people alive.  After the man's death, much to her horror, events of the past start repeating themselves.  Did she convict the wrong killer?


3.  The Belles by Dhonielle ClaytonAvailable February 20.  I've been looking forward to this one ever since I first heard about it.  It takes place in an alternate (futuristic?) New Orleans where everyone is born grey and needs the help of a Belle to be made beautiful.  Camellia wants to be the queen's favorite Belle, but fulfilling her dream will not come without a price ...


4.  Heart Spring Mountain by Robin MacArthurAvailable January 8.  This novel concerns a woman whose estranged mother goes missing after a tropical storm wreaks havoc in Vermont.  It's about her search for her mother and is supposed to be an atmospheric story about coming home.  I'm in!


5.  The Job of the Wasp by Colin WinnetteAvailable January 9.  I love me a good Gothic ghost story, so this one sounds right up my alley.  It's about a child who arrives at an isolated school for orphaned boys only to find that there's something very strange about his new home ...  


6.  The Woman in the Window by A.J. FinnAvailable January 2.  This Hitchcockian thriller about an agoraphobic woman who thinks she's witnessed a murder sounds very intriguing.


7.  Force of Nature by Jane HarperAvailable February 6.  I enjoyed reading The Dry, an Australian murder mystery, earlier this year.  This is the next book in the series, which I'm definitely looking forward to reading.


8.  Dread Nation by Justina IrelandAvailable April 3.  I'm not huge into zombie novels, but I don't mind them if they're done well.  This one, about a zombie invasion that derails the Civil War and changes American history forever, sounds interesting.


9.  The Lost Girls of Camp Forevermore by Kim FuAvailable February 13.  This novel revolves around a group of women who come together again years after suffering through a traumatic event while at summer camp together.  Sounds good!


10.  Grist Mill Road by Christopher J. YatesAvailable January 9.  Similarly, this novel is about three people whose lives are forever changed by a violent BB attack during childhood who come together as adults because the past, of course, can never stay in the past. 

So, what do you think?  Do we have any books in common this week?  What are you looking forward to reading in 2018?  I'd truly like to know.  If you leave a comment on this post, I'll gladly return the favor.

Happy TTT!     
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