Chapter Adventure Reading Challenges discussion

The Motif (theme) for September is ... “Birds, Bugs, & Botanicals”

Read a book with birds, bugs, or botanicals that are on the cover, in the title, or part of the story.

Share with us! Which book did you read and what did you think of it

Challenge complete, in the absolut broadest sense!

I chose to read , which was garnered with botanicals on the cover.

“All stories are good stories if you find the right listener”. And I, in all honesty, probably wasn't the right target audience for a literary read such as this.

The concept was super intriguing and the prose throughout was absolutely lovely, but - I just didn't get it. The overall story arc had a certain ebb and flow, but I often felt stranded on an island, trying to get with said flow. Plenty of characters were sort of hard to keep track of, nevermind relate to. I had troubles keeping all their story lines straight and constantly felt like I missed a turn somewhere, ending up entirely elsewhere than the characters.

It is by no means a bad book - it's just me that wasn't the right reader.

September Motif: “Birds, Bugs, & Botanicals”
Read a book with birds, bugs, or botanicals that are on the cover, in the title, or part of the story.

Challenge Complete: What a Bee Knows: Exploring the Thoughts, Memories, and Personalities of Bees by Stephen Buchmann

Filled with insightful and intriguing information, the book is nevertheless easy to read. Chapters lead the reader from the bee’s short but remarkable life to its awareness, so different from ours.

I thought I knew something about bees, but it turned out that there was so much I didn’t know. I didn’t know that the majority of bees are solitary, ground nesters who do not live in hives. They are the rule, not the exception. I didn’t know that their color vision, being shifted to the ultra violet of the spectrum, bees don’t see reds. I didn’t know that bees (and flies,) easily avoid being swatted because motion doesn’t become motion for them until the rate of 200-250 frames per seconds. For humans it’s 20 fps, which is why motion pictures are run at 24 fps. I didn’t know that there are cuckoo bees that, just like the cuckoo bird, lays its eggs in another bee’s nest, where it will hatch first and cannibalize the host’s young.

I could go on, but best to allow interested readers to find out for themselves.

Once again, seriously behind in posting!

Challenge complete!

I reread Charlotte's Web by E.B. White. I've had this paperback since I was a child, and I'm pretty sure I bought it at the book fair at school. Finally going to part with this one and pass it on to a young person for them to enjoy!