Tag: Bruce Springsteen

Nonfiction November: A Look Back at My Year in Nonfiction

This coming month, starting early today, I’m participating in Nonfiction November (for more information on the event and hosts, click on the image at right). Week 1: (Oct. 28 to Nov. 1) – Your Year in Nonfiction : Take a look back at your year of nonfiction and reflect on the following questions – What was your favorite nonfiction read of the year? Do you have a particular topic you’ve been attracted to more this year? What nonfiction book have you recommended the most? What are you hoping to get out of participating in Nonfiction November?

I will be honest that I wasn’t sure I was going to participate in this, but earlier this month, I did see former host Kim of the blog Sophisticated Dorkiness mention the event on her Instagram feed and it got me thinking about it. Then a few other bloggers I follow mentioned it too, and now I’m feeling the blogger pressure. PLUS more importantly, I want to participate because this year I’ve read more nonfiction than in other years. I’m also hoping to read at least one nonfiction book a week in November, although I’ll be happy if I read only a few.

Altogether this year, out of the 28 books I’ve read total, 11 of them are nonfiction or 39 percent. Here are the 11, in order of when I read them:

  1. The Library Book by Susan Orlean
  2. Shale Play: Poems and Photographs from the Fracking Fields by Julia Kasdorf and Steven Rubin
  3. Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah
  4. All Things Bright and Beautiful by James Herriot
  5. Calypso by David Sedaris
  6. Leaving Church: A Memoir of Faith by Barbara Taylor Brown
  7. All Things Wise and Wonderful by James Herriot
  8. Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World by Cal Newport
  9. Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body by Roxane Gay
  10. Travels with Charley: In Search of America by John Steinbeck
  11. Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen

The Library Book was my first read of the year and was a great way to begin the year. I’ve been reading the Herriot series over the last couple of years and have the next two, The Lord God Made Them All and Every Living Thing, to read in the next couple of months, maybe into next year. Travels with Charley was a reread. Almost all were excellent, with four in particular standing out among the rest: The Library Book, Born a Crime, Hunger, and Born to Run. The best, by a slight margin, was Born to Run, perhaps because I had been gifted the book as part of a book blogger gift exchange a couple of years ago and never gotten to read it.

As you can tell, I don’t have one single topic to which I’m attracted. However, among my “to-be-reads” are more than a dozen books on race in America. I have collected them, mostly from Kindle deals, over the last year, year and a half. I have yet to get to them, because I’ll be honest (again) that I’m having a hard time reading political nonfiction right now with our current political climate. Unfortunately, like many Americans, it makes me frustrated to the point of disengagement. I know I will get to these books, but I think it’s going to be slowly, rather than all at once, in one large binge-read.

I’m also reading one nonfiction book right now: Everybody Behaves Badly: The True Story Behind Hemingway’s Masterpiece The Sun Also Rises by Lesley M.M. Blume. I started it during this past Saturday’s Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon during which I also re-read The Sun Also Rises. I’m not sure what else I’ll be reading for nonfiction during November with my next several planned books being fiction, but that always could change, depending on my mood.

Whether or not you’re participating or not in Nonfiction November, I’ll leave you with the same questions as this first week of the event: What was your favorite nonfiction read of the year? Do you have a particular topic you’ve been attracted to more this year? What nonfiction book have you recommended the most?

Pushing Forward Back September/October 2019

September started well as I had four days off for the Labor Day Weekend. To start the weekend, I read Bruce Springsteen’s autobiography, Born to Run, which continues my year of reading mostly great books. On the fourth day, Tuesday, my wife and I went on a day trip to Three Brothers Wineries & Estates, which includes three wineries and a brewery, and it was a beautiful day for it.

After tagging Three Brothers on Instagram before my birthday in June, they gave me two free tasting passports for five flights of wine, beer, and cider at each of the wineries and the brewery. The only thing we paid for was the gas to get there, our lunch at their restaurant on site and some wine that we got (but of course).

The following week, I had a follow up for my left knee after getting three gel injections at the end of July and start of August. As a result, I am having arthroscopic surgery on October 22 on my knee to check, and repair, if needed, my meniscus which was diagnosed earlier this summer as “degenerative” from osteoarthritis. This surgery is in addition to another medical procedure, a colonoscopy since I just turned 50 in June, that I am having on October 14 and a PSA (prostate-specific antigen) blood test I am having on October 15.

The third week brought a visit from Joe, a college roommate, mid-week during which we binge-watched the first season of Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, available on Hulu. I had started watched it earlier in the week but when Joe told me he had seen part of it, but never got to see all of it, I stopped watching so we could watch together. However, once we started it, he realized it was another version, just called Dirk Gently, that he had seen, not this particular one. We enjoyed it, though I had never read the book, but it was, and is, very weird. I usually don’t “go” for that kind of weird science fiction “thing,” but I went with it and surprisingly liked it.

The fourth week, my wife and I celebrated Bruce Springsteen’s 70th birthday on Monday by watching his New York City concert from 2001. Then on Friday, I had the day off from work before working my Saturday for the month. On Friday, I listened to Sturgill Simpson’s new album Sound and Fury, which is very unlike his previous two albums, A Sailor’s Guide to Earth and Metamodern Sounds in Country Music. Sound and Fury definitely is that, full of the sound and fury of rock and roll, whereas the first two were country and, dare I say it, pop music.

Tomorrow, I plan on rounding out the month by going to a birthday party for my soon-to-be 5-year-old niece Grace. Her birthday is in the middle of the week so the party is tomorrow.

Also Read

  • The Curse of the Pharaohs, the second Amelia Peabody mystery, by Elizabeth Peters, which was good, but not as good as Born To Run.

Also Watched

  • Friday Night Dinner (3 seasons), with my wife – hilarious
  • Rocketman (movie), with my wife – very good
  • Booksmart (movie), with my wife – surprisingly good (a Superbad but with girls and funnier)

Also Listened To

  • Norman F***ing Rockwell by Lana Del Rey, out at the beginning of the month.

October is…well, I already told you about my surgery…event-filled. And while the main event, the surgery, isn’t necessarily fun, I believe it is necessary and hopefully will help alleviate the pain in my knee. The other event in the month to which I’m more looking forward to is Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon, which is Saturday, Oct. 26. It also happens to occur during my two week convalescence after the surgery.

Topping the list are two books apropos for a weekend so close to Halloween:

  • The Unforeseen by Dorothy McCardle
  • The Night of the Hunter by Davis Grubb.

The first is a recommendation from a friend, who also recommended to me I read McCardle’s The Uninvited, her first novel, which I did and enjoyed. Now I’m going to give her second novel a go. The second is the basis for one of my wife’s favorite movies of the same name, starring Robert Mitchum…which I probably will find somewhere online and watch with my wife during my downtime.

Besides reading, and medical appointments and procedures, that covers most of my October, I think.

Also To Read

  • Less by Andrew Sean Greer, which I started earlier in the month.
  • The Lost for Words Bookshop by Stephanie Butland, which I picked up while “shelf-reading” at the library.

To Watch

  • Mindhunter, Season 2, on Netflix now
  • Good Omens, Season 1, on Amazon Prime now
  • Schitt’s Creek, Season 5, on Netflix Oct. 10
  • Letterkenny, Season 7, on Hulu Oct. 14

To Listen To

  • All Mirrors by Angel Olsen, due out Oct. 4
  • Ode To Joy by Wilco, also due out Oct. 4
  • Magdalene by FKA Twigs, due out Oct. 25

I also would be remiss if I didn’t mention one other book I plan on reading this coming month: A Story To Tell by my sister, Lisa Howeler. She self-published it and as of September 19, her birthday, it is available for purchase on Amazon. Oh, happy belated birthday, Lisa, if I didn’t mention it. 😉

How was your month of September? Read any good books, seen any good movies and/or TV shows, listened to any good music? What was the highlight of your month? What are you most looking forward to in October? Share in the comments.

Bruce, Elton, Four Tet & 3 Brothers

This past week, this is what I have…

Read

I received this in a book blogger gift exchange a few years ago, because my wife is a HUGE Bruce Springsteen fan. Then it went on a shelf on our bookcase and finally to a shelf on my computer desk, where finally I picked it up a couple of weeks ago after writing about how I need to read books that have been sitting on my shelves for too long. I read it over a week and a half, and I’m glad I finally read it as it probably will be up among the top books I’ve read this year, if not the top book at year’s end.

Watched


We rented this Friday night, and while we didn’t know it was a musical (think Moulin Rouge), we still loved it (we also loved Moulin Rouge). Worth it for Taron Egerton’s performance alone.

& Listened To

My wife and I also went to Three Brothers Wineries & Estates on Seneca Lake in upstate New York on Tuesday as they gave me two tasting passports for me and my wife to each of their three wineries and their brewery for my 50th birthday back in June. I can’t figure out how or if I can embed “Instagram Stories” to the blog, so I’ll just leave you with this link where you can see the highlights of our day trip: https://www.instagram.com/stories/highlights/18098165917054923/.

So what did you read, watch or listen to this past week? Any other highlights from this past week?

#fakereadathon for the second weekend in a row but getting real this time

In one way, this past week went as expected: busy. In another, it didn’t: not with things we wanted to do or things we didn’t want to deal with, namely doctor appointments, one for my wife and another for me. We also didn’t get away as we had planned for a one-day wine trip on Thursday, but we did get accomplished on Thursday at home, with some much needed housekeeping. In light of the busyness again this past week, this weekend Sunday, I’m planning on doing another weekend a Sunday readathon, or a #fakereadathon as one of my book blogger friends called it on Instagram, like I did last weekend.

This time though I’m getting real with my reading. I’m not feeling the series I started, Bruno, Chief of Police, or the book I had on hold from the library, Turn of the Key by Ruth Ware. I’m only three books into the Bruno series, but I’m already beginning to wonder why he never seems to be prepared for large protests in his small town and while I read – and really enjoyed – The Death of Mrs. Westaway by Ware last weekend, I’m just not feeling like reading another one of her books this weekend.

Plus I’ve been reflecting on this post from Karen of the blog Booker Talk: “Read It Now – Tomorrow May be Too Late”, which she talks about reading “rainy day” books, the ones we keep saving for a better day…but then that day never comes…or might never come if we don’t actually get to reading them. So I have three in particular (listed in order of publication) I’ve been saving for a rainy day:

  • Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen
  • We Were Eight Years In Power: An American Tragedy by Ta-Nehisi Coates
  • Becoming by Michelle Obama

Born to Run: I actually got for my wife, because she is a big Bruce Springsteen fan a few years ago from a book blogger gift exchange, but I still wanted to read, but then never did – I think in great part due to the size of the book. For the record, my wife still hasn’t read it either. We Were Eight Years in Power was another I received from a book blogger gift exchange and to be honest, I just was – and still am – burnt out from the 2016 election, but I really liked (not enjoyed necessarily, because it wasn’t – and still isn’t – easy) Between The World and Me also by Coates. Becoming: I had on hold for a long time on ebook at the Free Library of Philadelphia, then finally bought a copy when it came in as a donation for our library book sale, thinking I wouldn’t have to wait for months to read it. Now months later, Mrs. Obama’s book sits, along with Mr. Springsteen’s and Mrs. Coates’ books, atop my computer desk unread.

I’m going to begin with Born to Run tomorrow and might take a break by reading a little of Coates’ book in between. Then next weekend, since I have a three-day weekend, I will read more from one, two or all three of the books. Most likely I’ll still be reading Bruce’s autobiography and Coates’ essays, but we’ll see.

Postscript

  • Neither my wife nor I is in the best shape, health-wise; she, after being diagnosed with atrial fibrillation two years ago this month and I, after somehow twisting my left knee in late March. We both are on the road to recovery. But it’s a slow journey, due to a combination of factors including doctors, insurance companies, physical therapists and quite frankly our not understanding the “process” since we really haven’t been “through it” before. That doesn’t mean, though, that we won’t stop attempting to better ourselves.
  • I planned on reading today (Saturday, as I write this), but I distracted myself all morning with trying (unsuccessfully) to get tree sap off the hood of our car. And now at almost 3:30 p.m. as I get ready to hit “publish,” I don’t really believe that reading is going to happen. Oh, well, there’s always tomorrow.

How was your past week? Reading anything good or getting ready to read anything good? Share in the comments.