It’s all about the books: **This post contains affiliate links, supporting local bookshops and my coffee habit at Bookshop.org*** Since I was a little girl I have loved to read books. Read anything really! My dad likes to tell of me sitting on the floor sounding out the words in the newspaper before I even attended school. If there was a cereal box on the table I would read that while I ate, the funnies on Sunday morning was always a good way to practice reading. I just loved to read. It’s funny, some people can really express why they love to read, waxing poetic over adventures in their minds and other equally lovely images. But I have to tell you, I cannot really say exactly why I love to read. I just do! (Though I am sure my love of reading is what prompted my love of writing, well, that and talking… I do love to talk!)
The people in my immediate family were not big readers. My dad liked to read, but I didn’t live with him most of growing up. But my grandmother? Grandma was a purely focused reader. The family loves to recount the many times chaos was breaking gout in her household of nine people, two dogs, and three cats, but she was sit-in non the couch so engrossed in her book, she didn’t even notice! I know I can get like that too. Sitting in a busy airport, nose in a book, riding a bus, nose in a book… all kinds of real drama has to be happening near me for me to notice once I am in that book zone.
I was the kid that got sent to bed and then put a flashlight under the covers to read, or snuck into the bathroom and sat in the tub to read. Every trip or family vacation required carefully selecting just the right books to take with me. I was so grateful when I discovered ebooks because I no longer had to manage space for 3-4 paperbacks on work trips. More room for shoes!
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When people ask me about my favorite books, I never know what to say because I read so many. I just checked my Goodreads Book Challenge page and last year I read 35 books. (I watched a lot more TV than I usually do last year- Pandemic Brain and all…) But I almost always give these two:
Middlesex is a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Jeffrey Eugenides published in 2002. A sweeping family saga about the effect of a mutated gene on three generations of a Greek family.
Ahab’s Wife: Or, The Star-Gazer: A novel by Sena Jeter Naslund published in 2009 imagines the woman Ahab left behind when he went off chasing Moby Dick. The language is great and the story is compelling.
In 2020- my favorite pandemic reading was the Fever Series by Karen Marie Moning. Totally fun light reading! Powerful women main characters, hot Irish and Scottish men, paranormal activities, the fae… There are 11 books in the series and fans everywhere are waiting for the 12th book to drop! I know I can’t wait!! These books were a full 1/3 of my reading in 2020!
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Finally- I wrote a post not too long ago about the books that helped me move my thought process from monogamy to understanding Polyamory and sex-positivity. The post is here: 6 Books That Changed My View on Relationships and Sex and the list is here.
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Another past post you might be interested in: My Sexual Liberation Doesn’t Belong to You
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Today’s photo is one of my favorites from Cuenca, Ecuador. It is actually the mountains outside the city. I did an amazing tour where I got to see ancient Inca ruins and huge cathedrals built into mountainsides and got to stand at the top of this mountain and stand in awe of this incredible view!
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I liked your list of books. I also read some of them.
It’s a good list! Always looking for new ones too!