CanadianContent discussion

Good morning fellow readers! It is hard to believe that tomorrow we celebrated Canada's 150th birthday!! What are you reading to celebrate???

Happy Birthday, Canada! It's going to be a rainy one here in Halifax tomorrow.

This week I finished a giveaway book, Court of Lions by Jane Johnson which was pretty good, and Gone Astray, a Netgalley ARC, by Michelle Davies which I quite liked.

Currently reading The Way Back to Florence by Glenn Haybittle, Twenty-One Cardinals by Jocelyne Saucier, Alone in the Classroom by Elizabeth Hay, and will soon crack open The Only Café by Linden MacIntyre.

Happy Canada 150!

I'm still listening to Dragonfly in Amber. I got a new phone last night and wasn't about to download those 39 hours of audio with no wifi before driving home. I was lost without my audiobook! Thankfully, I have everything back in order this morning.

I didn't finish anything this week. I'm currently reading Random Passage and Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend: A Novel. I also started reading Phoebe and Her Unicorn with my six-year-old. This looks like a cute series.

Happy Canada Day!

I finished up Juliet's Answer: One Man's Search for Love and the Elusive Cure for Heartbreak this week, which was a simple and easy book about one man's experience as one of Juliet's Secretaries in Verona, Italy. It's also about his love experience, which is at times painful but has a happy ending (*spoiler alert*). I learned last night that this author is coming to the Kingston Writer's Fest in September, so I'm planning to go to that session for sure.

I still have Minds of Winter on the go (saw the author last night at the launch of the Kingston Writer's Fest) and also The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane, which I am really, really enjoying. I haven't read any other Lisa See books; I really love her style.

Summer is a really hard time for me to find time to read, with all these kids around all the time, and a full-time job from home. (I have been interrupted at least five times while I've been writing this!!) So I'm afraid I'm going to have little to add each week to these Spine Crackers. Only eight weeks til school starts again!! hahahaha... I'm kidding... kinda... no, I am... I am...

Looking forward to a fantastic Canada Day long weekend, I took an extra day off, so am heading out for four days at the family cottage, where I hope to sit on the dock, sip a cool one, and read, read, read.

I just finished up listening to Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis which I really enjoyed, hearing about a part of the U>S>A> I did not have much familiarity with (Appalachian). Although I don't agree with Mr. Vance's point of view on everything, I certainly enjoyed his insight into his own family history,

Happy Canada Day weekend, everyone!

This week I finished The Hate U Give, which I thought was very well done but also a sad read (no punches were pulled for the YA crowd - the plot was unfortunately true to life). I also finished Ghosts of Mississippi: The Murder of Medgar Evers, the Trials of Byron De LA Beckwith, and the Haunting of the New South. I'm planning to visit Evers's house on my road trip in August, even though I think that might be a lot to handle emotionally.

After a couple of dark reads in a row, I decided to get back to bingo and the cross-Canada challenge and read something completely different: Cool Water. This is a quiet book and I'd avoided it (for years!) mostly because I feared it would be a bit dull, but I'm really enjoying it. It has an unusual structure, as it doesn't have a through-story but flits among a handful of characters in a small town in SK, but the narrative strands somehow create a satisfying whole. I'm splitting my reading time on this one between a paper copy and audiobook. The audiobook is very good (in the U.S., this novel is called Juliet in August and that's the title of the audiobook I have from Hoopla).

Happy Canada Day weekend! We're getting together for a big family weekended at the lake, I hope the weather stays nice for us.

I finished reading Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture and When Dimple Met Rishi this week for my Bingo squares (past Canada Reads and YA respectively).

I read Clutterfree with Kids the last couple days. What a big disappointment this book was. If you are already familiar with the minimalism philosophy just skip this book. It really offered no concrete solutions to kid clutter. I will say that it gave some good ideas for kid's artwork. I do have an urge to purge my house again, so it wasn't all bad.

Now I've started How to Make Love to a Negro. This is a sassy book! I find myself wanting to laugh out loud and blush at the same time. It's making for an interesting read on the bus.

Next up is Kit's Law for our July read.

I'm STILL waiting for Ragged Company and The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane from the library.

@Diane, let me know how you like The Only Café. It's high on my TBR list. :)

Happy reading everyone!

Happy Birthday Canada 150!!
With the end of school for the boys and one of them graduating high school yesterday, reading suffers, but I wouldn't have traded it for anything :)
This week I finished Homegoing for my in-person book club! It was a very ambitious debut and the family tree was crucial, but I highly recommend it. I also finished Nobody Cries at Bingo, a coming of age story of an indigenous girl. I grew to love Dawn for her strength and resiliency.
I am currently reading Kiss Carlo by Adriana Trigiani. I have never read the authors' previous books, but am enjoying this one so far.
@Allison ༻hikes the bookwoods༺ , love the pic of the books on the dock!!

Happy Canada Day everyone!

I picked up Company Town unsure of what kind of book it would be like - and it was a lot of fun. Good blend of weighty questions, strong female and coming of age.

The Comforters - was just ok. I'm enjoying A Stone, a Leaf, a Door: Poems. It was fun to re-read The Little Country - so much so that I'm re-reading other books by this author. I had forgotten enough of the details to enjoy reading the books again.

Happy Canada Day weekend!!

@Allison, I really enjoy Lisa See's books. I've read quite a few of them. I'm glad to see your enjoying your first one.

I was visiting with family last week on Vancouver Island. I took along 2 books, one of which had the title I wanted but turned out to be the wrong book (LOL) and a romance; it went back to the library unread and the right book is now requested.
That left me with Proust. Turns out, Proust is a perfect travel companion. Very entertaining.

Last week, I finished News of the World. I quite enjoyed it but didn't love it like so many have. I really liked the 2 main characters.

This week I am, as promised, making my way through The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane and enjoying it. Really looking forward to participating in the Buddy Read.

@Allison - if you are enjoying Lisa See, I'd recommend Snowflower and the Secret Fan. It is my favourite Lisa See thus far. The book takes place during a time when foot binding was popular. It was quite interesting and drove me to learn more about that practice.

Hello and happy weekend!

I'm back out of a slump and am reading The Queue by Basma Abdel Aziz, a dystopian novel inspired by the events of Arab Spring in Egypt.

The days simultaneously feel incredibly fast but that also nothing happens in them. I've been reading lots of different books but not actually finishing them and am hoping to change that around this weekend.

@Susan, looks like Juliet in August (or Cool Water) isn't available in Canadian Hoopla. Bummer!

Sounds like Lisa See gets a lot of love from this group! How have I missed her to dates? The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane is the first I've come across her! Thanks for the recommendations, guys! I'll look into them...

I also really loved Snow Flower and the Secret Fan and Shanghai Girls.

I am going to finish up The Shadow of the Wind and the graphic novel How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less which I am enjoying. I think my next book will be a giveaway win, one of my Canadian ones, If This Is Home by Kristine Scarrow. She has less than 50 reviews so it will be good to read it and add another review to her tally. I have heard it helps? Have to root for new Canadian talent right? I am sticking around Calgary for Canada Day. We are going to a BBQ at a friend's and will hopefully catch the fireworks if the weather behaves. Hope you all have a great long weekend!

Has anyone read any other books by Lisa See? I enjoyed Snow Flower And The Secret Fan but it's not the typical genre I read so I like to wait until someone recommends the others first. I just added her most recent one to my TBR - thanks.

Talie wrote: "Has anyone read any other books by Lisa See? I enjoyed Snow Flower And The Secret Fan but it's not the typical genre I read so I like to wait until someone recommends th..."

@Talie, I loved Shanghai Girls

All this talk of Lisa See.... I've never read her but came across copies of Snow Flower and the Secret Fan and Dreams of Joy (the sequel to Shanghai Girls) at the Dollarama a couple of years ago for like $3 (yes, I said years). I also won The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane in a giveaway. Needless to say, I have plenty of her work to read and it's nice to hear you all speak so positively of her writing.

@May, I really enjoyed both Homegoing and Nobody Cries at Bingo. If you haven't read Rose's Run, it is also fun.

@Barbara, How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less is interesting, isn't it? I also recently read her Rolling Blackouts: Dispatches from Turkey, Syria and Iraq.

I finished Son of a Trickster this week. It was pretty good, but YA is not my genre. I'm now almost done Willful Blindness: Why We Ignore the Obvious at Our Peril, which is quite interesting, and will then move on to The Wonder, I think.

Talie wrote: "Has anyone read any other books by Lisa See? .."

Talie, besides Snowflower, I can recommend:
- Shanghai Girls and Dreams of Joy (these two are really wonderful)
- China Dolls
- Peony in Love (this one is a bit different; very well written)

ETA: I'd also highly recommend The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane.

OOh -- Thank you Petra. :) This is exactly the heads up I was looking for. Too many to choose from but I'll start with Shanghai Girls :)

@Emmkay, thanks for your recommendation!!

I'm happy Lisa See is getting a lot of love! I really enjoyed Shanghai Girls and her very first book On Gold Mountain: The One-Hundred-Year Odyssey of My Chinese-American Family which was about her family history from China to America, as her great-grandfather was Chinese.
I'm so happy her new book is getting positive reviews and can't wait to start reading it!

Greetings. Although I personally can easily envision other priorities until such time as they are resolved indicate that such a celebration is premature, may you all have a fun and safe weekend.
@Diane The Way Back to Florence is alas not in our library system. It looks good.

@Allison in the backwoods, Hoping that your great photo is indicative that you are healed and back at it. What are the titles on either side of Handmaids Tale? This is your long weekend tbr, eh? And how did you get that photo to post?

This report is being posted in sections, as my first attempt got taken....and I am on library computer, 10 mminutes! Maybe they will allow me to book on another session.
@original Allison and Shannon, I'm so glad that that you are enjoying Tea-girl, and am am guessing that the ones who are still waiting for it are in for a treat, its a delicious read. Lisa See seems to have a knack for being sympathetic without being sticky, and of being able to relate things that are impossible to relate to. She
assigns such dignity to her characters, making them easy to love and thus gain entry to a wholly foreign world.

I am feeling much better @Magdelanye, thank you, but I did not take that photo myself. It was stolen from the Chapters-Indigo website! The books above and below THE HANDMAID'S TALE are ANNE OF GREEN GABLES and THE ENGLISH PATIENT, I think.

Imagine my surprise when I found out that the obscure poet I have been falling in love with,Mark Strand ,New Selected Poems is actually a big prizewinner, as in Pulitzer.

I am also reading Dahanu Road by Anosh Irani a grim read but not one I can turn away from
@ Allison
Read most of those anyway

@Allison ༻hikes the bookwoods༺ - great graphic!

With a grade 8 graduation and the busy days leading up to the end of school, my reading has suffered this week.

I did finish listening to Commonwealth by Ann Patchett which was an easy read which started off with an uninvited guest at a christening party, a bottle of gin and illicit kisses which led to the blending of two families and dealing with the fallout for decades later.

After this finished, I have started the podcast of One Brother Shy by Terry Fallis. While it is entertaining, I can't help critiquing some of the content (the main character's mother is receiving a palliative approach to care and his description of the care received and after death experience is not accurate in relation to services "provided by the province" which has been hard to ignore).

I have started Keeper'n Me by the late Richard Wagamese for my book club in which we are all tasked to choose a book by him to discuss with the group and am still slowly reading Rilla of Ingleside which I am enjoying but is my bedtime book and I have been so tired, that i only read a couple of pages before going to sleep.

We have a quiet weekend planned so I am hoping to enjoy some nice weather, some reading and time with the family.

@Susan, I had to grimace in recognition at your comment on the Fallis book. When I read a book that's about something I know, especially professionally, I find it so hard to just enjoy it once I start noticing mistakes like that. It just rips you right out of that suspension of disbelief, doesn't it?

@Emmakay - it makes me feel a bit nitpicky but I also like readers to get the right information.