It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

 

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It's a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and Jen Vincent, of Teach Mentor Texts decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

If you want to know more about what I've been reading, visit my Goodreads shelf.

Last Week on the Blog:

Poetry Reviews at Rich in Color

Last Week in Books:

Thousand Star Hotel is a book of poetry by the author of the picture book A Different Pond. In one of the poems, you can find reference to the times when Bao Phi and his father went fishing as he described in the picture book. Most of the poems are about his experiences growing up in Minnesota. His family came to Minnesota as a result of the war in Vietnam and there are some pretty raw revelations of the racism and hostility directed at Bao Phi and his family as he grew up in the cities. It's written with an adult audience in mind or maybe older teens. I was eager to read some of his adult work and am looking forward to hearing him in October at the CCBC Charlotte Zolotow Symposium in Madison. 

I am Life is one that I found out about from another IMWAYR blogger. It's one that could lead to great discussions about what life is and what meaning it has. As a side note, there is an illustration with a character who has many tattoos. I did a blog post about tattoos in children's books once and am always interested to find more of them.

Around the World in a Bathtub has interesting information about bathing in different places around the world. Milky Way is a sweet story of a child who loves the moon. It takes place in Ladakh, India and provides a glossary and some background information.

You Go First is a nice middle grade story of friendship and family issues. It takes place over a week and addresses some very common middle grade situations. It had tension, but it felt soothing too.

South Korea wasn't an extremely outstanding book, but it did give me the basics about the country and that's what I need. I'm super excited to be heading to both Korea and Japan in June, but I want to know a it more about both countries before getting there.

Hillbilly Elegy was certainly interesting. My family of origin is not geographically similar, but there were many things I could relate to. It's a bit of a controversial book and our book club had lively discussion around how he offered his story. We agreed that the personal stories (especially around Mamaw) were the strength and some of the social/political commentary wasn't as strong. 

The Coming Week: 

I'm reading Tokyo: A Biography in preparation for my trip. I will also be reading Mary's Monster for next month's book club. Happy reading to you! If I get it from ILL, I will also read Thi Bui's graphic novel memoir The Best We Could Do.

Reading Challenge Updates: 
Goodreads Challenge 2018 - 95/800
Diversity on the Shelf 2018 - 58/300
#MustReadin2018 - 11/30

It's Monday! What are you reading?

 

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It's a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and Jen Vincent, of Teach Mentor Texts decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

If you want to know more about what I've been reading, visit my Goodreads shelf.

Last Week on the Blog:

Poetry Month at Rich in Color

Last Week in Books:

It was a great week for books. The picture books were great for the most part. I love Alma, Black Girl Magic and What If for sure. Marlon Bundo was humorous & cute. Breaking News is all to necessary & does a good job showing children what to do in the face of difficult news.

I tore through all of the chapter books: Dread Nation, Sunny, Picture Us in the Light & Far From the Tree.

I especially enjoyed reading Sunny after driving with a friend to St. Paul to hear Jason Reynolds speak. He always inspires me to be a better teacher and human being.

When we went to St. Paul, we visited Red Balloon Bookshop. There I read some books and bought some books.

The Coming Week: 

I'm still reading Hillbilly Elegy. Happy reading to you!

Reading Challenge Updates: 
Goodreads Challenge 2018 - 88/800
Diversity on the Shelf 2018 - 53/300
#MustReadin2018 - 11/30

It's Monday! What are you reading?

 

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It's a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and Jen Vincent, of Teach Mentor Texts decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

If you want to know more about what I've been reading, visit my Goodreads shelf.

Last Week in Books:

I had a great week of reading even though I didn't read a ton. I read For Every One by Jason Reynolds ahead of seeing him later this week. It's a great inspirational book that will have you wanting to jump up and go chasing some dreams. Jabber-Walking is by Juan Felipe Herrera & is a seriously quirky poetry book that encourages readers to get out on a walk and create poetry while out there. Of course, I had to get my jabberwalking boots on and get out there in spite of the somewhat ridiculous but beautiful snow we got this weekend. *rolls eyes at snow again*

 

Mommy's Khimar is a gorgeous book that I won through the #muslimshelfspace giveaway from earlier this year.

The rest of the books were those that I read at the CCBC Choices presentation I attended this week. The CCBC is based at UW-Madison, but they travel around the state to share books. You may have heard of them as they compile some excellent statistics about diversity in childrens and YA publishing industry each year.

My last bookish item was while watching my most recent Korean drama My Love From a Star, I caught sight of The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane.

The Coming Week: 

I'm still reading Dread Nation (really loving it) and have a whole pile of books from the library. I still need to read Hillbilly Elegy and Far From the Tree for two different book clubs that meet next week. Happy reading to you!

Reading Challenge Updates: 
Goodreads Challenge 2018 - 78/800
Diversity on the Shelf 2018 - 47/300
#MustReadin2018 - 10/30

It's Monday! What are you reading?

 

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It's a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and Jen Vincent, of Teach Mentor Texts decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

If you want to know more about what I've been reading, visit my Goodreads shelf.

Last Week on the Blog:

Celebrating Airline Tickets

 

#MustReadin2018 Spring Update

Last Week in Books:

The Coming Week: 

I am in the middle of Dread Nation (loving it) and have a whole pile of books from the library. I'm not sure which ones I'll get to, but likely will read Hillbilly Elegy and Far From the Tree. Happy reading to you!

Reading Challenge Updates: 
Goodreads Challenge 2018 - 68/800
Diversity on the Shelf 2018 - 44/300
#MustReadin2018 - 9/30

Celebrate!

Ruth Ayres has a link-up on weekends where people link to posts that are celebrations about their week. I love this reminder to celebrate every week and I appreciate the community we have through this link-up.

Food our Korean student brought when he stayed with us

The airport we will fly to when we go to Japan (my youngest has already been there)

Another picture from when my youngest child went to Japan

This week I'm celebrating the purchase of tickets. I didn't feel like I could get super excited about my trip to Asia until we actually had tickets. A month ago we started talking about the possibility of a trip and this week we finally made the purchase. We are getting into the more serious planning now and I started up my app to practice Korean. My mother-in-law and I will be flying to Korea. We'll stay with the family of a former exchange student for part of the trip and then go out on our own. Then, we will fly to Japan and meet up with a former exchange student to visit and then we will do some sight seeing on our own there too. It's not a super long trip, but it should be a lot of fun. Part of the fun of trips like this is doing the research ahead of time and looking forward to the trip. If any of you have suggestions, we'll be in the areas of Seoul and Tokyo. Have a great week!

Spring Update #MustReadin2018

At the beginning of 2014, I started participating in Carrie Gelson's #MustRead challenge. I love it because while I generally do several challenges a year, often they are number goals or a specific type of book, but with the #MustRead, we commit to specific books. This is a way to encourage myself to read books I have wanted to read, but never quite get to. It's also a way to keep certain books on my radar that haven't been released yet. Carrie does a great job encouraging us and reminding us to post about our progress. 

Here are the 30 books I chose for 2018: 

I've read almost a third of them so far:

 

Now that I have them here, I notice that almost half of these first books are non-fiction. I really enjoyed the three memoirs. When They Call You a Terrorist is a look at what it has been like for Patrisse Khan-Cullors to grow up in the U.S. as a Black woman and what led up to her part in the Black Lives Matter movement. It was not an easy book to read, but is a valuable perspective. I have enjoyed Roxane Gay's writing in the past so I put Hunger on my list. She shares her relationship to her body. She shares some very painful times so again, it wasn't a lighthearted, easy book. The Princess Diarist was less intense than the other memoirs. Much of the book is about the relationship Carrie and Harrison Ford had during the filming of the first Star Wars movie. She has a humorous way of telling stories so it's a fairly quick read. 

The other non-fiction book is So You Want to Talk About Race.  This book is for anyone, but seems to be aimed for White readers who want to learn more about issue surrounding race in the U.S., but don't know where to start or who don't want to ask questions that may make them look ignorant or worse - racist. She provides a lot of background and answers many questions that may be rolling around in the minds of White people. This is book would be a great place for someone to start if they are interested in dismantling racism.

After a few serious and intense books, I was super excited to pick up American Panda. The main character is Taiwanese American and is dealing with some family and identity issues so there are some serious moments. Overall though, it was a story that made me smile and laugh a lot. I appreciated the many opportunities to laugh.

Everything I Never Told You is a book to make you think. We never completely know what perceptions people have about us. At the beginning of the book, readers learn that Lydia's body has been found in the local lake. She's a Chinese American teen in a small town in Ohio. They don't know if it was suicide, foul play or an accident. As everyone works through their grief, they are also trying to figure out how this could have happened.

Rebel Seoul was awesome. This is what I wrote on Goodreads, "This was a fast-paced adventure in a future Seoul. I enjoyed the characters and the machines too. The friendships were awesome. I appreciated the romance, but the friendships were actually more of a highlight for me." 

I had a hard time starting Shadowhouse Fall. I think it works better to have read the first book without a couple year break in between. A couple of chapters in I was back into the setting and connected to the characters again. It's a fabulous urban fantasy.

Symptoms of Being Human is about a gender fluid teen who is not out yet. Riley's father is also congressman up for re-election so their family is sometimes in the spotlight. Riley begins writing a blog and feels a bit empowered there. The book was compelling and may also be informative for readers who are unfamiliar with gender fluidity. 

I'm happy to have this update because it got me to look at my list again. I'm really looking forward to some of these titles. Maureen Goo's book will be out soon and I may be able to go see her in St. Paul in May. I have really enjoyed her books in the past. They always make me smile. I'm currently reading Dread Nation so I'll have ten finished soon. Have a great time reading!! 

It's Monday! What are you reading?

 

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It's a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and Jen Vincent, of Teach Mentor Texts decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

If you want to know more about what I've been reading, visit my Goodreads shelf.

Last Week on the Blog:

Celebrating Time with My Sister

Review of The Astonishing Color of After

on Rich in Color

Last Week in Books: 

Because my sister was here for much of the week, I didn't read much. We were running around Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota and having a lot of fun though. Americanized: Rebel Without a Green Card is the memoir of Sara Saedi. Her family moved to the U.S. from Iran. She shares about her life and specifically about the difficulties of fleeing their home country and navigating the intricacies of the immigration system here. The Belles is a unique fantasy. It took me a while to get into it, but once I was there, I couldn't put it down. I basically read it all in one day. The Wedding Portrait is another picture book from the activist who wrote A is for Activist. It's a great look at what activism is and some of the forms it can take.

The Coming Week: 

I'm really not sure what I will be reading this week. I have Shadow Girl checked out, but otherwise, I'll need to locate a few more books to read.

Reading Challenge Updates: 
Goodreads Challenge 2018 - 62/800
Diversity on the Shelf 2018 - 38/300
#MustReadin2018 - 9/30

Celebrate!

Ruth Ayres has a link-up on weekends where people link to posts that are celebrations about their week. I love this reminder to celebrate every week and I appreciate the community we have through this link-up.

Today I'm celebrating time with my sister. She drove up to visit from Texas. That's love - driving 14 hours to see someone. We spent a lot of time together in the few days she was here. We drove along the Mississippi and watched eagles soaring by us.

One of my sister's pictures.

We also went to the National Eagle Center and the Mall of America. On our way to the cities we stopped at Lake Pepin. The ice on the edge of the lake was moving a lot and was super noisy. I loved hearing the creaking, cracking, and popping. 

We finished off our day trip at Minnehaha Falls in Minneapolis before coming back to our house. I wish we lived closer to each other so we could spend more time together, but I'm thankful for the chance to visit with each other this week. A lot of our time is spent in laughter.