July and August Titles // 2020

 

late summer beach time with long-time friends

Well, we are already down another month in 2020. It is September. The year where time is so bizarre it's equally surprising that we're rotating into Fall and wishfully hoping we'd fast-forward into a new year with better realities. My attention and focus has taken such a hit in the last 6 months that I barely have any books to share, so I have to double up months for my list to look normal. 

The pandemic (et al.) has affected everyone differently, but my lack of ability to read deeply, or well during this time has been an interesting shift in my normal life. I expected things to look differently.  Now, each book feels like a small victory! Over the last month, I've felt a shift in my ability to consume literature; it's creeping back. I'm starting a lot of books but trying to really push through the sleepiness, distractions, and restlessness that have marked my reading year. 

*Edit in December* The inability to complete books or read deeply has been ebbing and flowing. As you can see, I haven't made progress (until now! Blessed Christmas break!) and October and November's reading was just as pitiful. December, thankfully, has been really lovely to complete so many books and feel that satisfactory accomplishment. 

Here is my July and August list of finished titles:

The Little Book of Lykke by Meik Wiking - I'm not entirely sure why I'm somewhat drawn to these little books, but I do really enjoy learning about Scandanavian culture, and when I saw the main word on this book (Lykke) it looked so much like my son's name, I just sort of wanted to read it and see if there was a derivative language-wise. Lukka, the spelling of which I created from the Italian word/name Luca, means "light", and Lykke means "happiness" in Danish. 
This little book was enjoyable to read with short chapters, separated by topic and helped me learn a little bit more about Denmark's culture.  

I'm Still Here by Austin Channing Brown - This book is about how 'white, middle-class Evangelicals have participated in apathy and rising racial hostility' in the last number of decades, and frankly, what can be done about it. I found this book to be short and to the point, with a lot of good "one liners" that helped me understand Brown's opinion in a really accessible way. I wish I would have written this review sooner so I could have listed a few of them here, but now, all I can really remember was that I thought it was worth the read, and a lot of Christians would benefit from engaging. 

Rethinking School by Susan Wise Bauer - I'm not entirely sure why I picked this book up, as the primary audience for this book is someone who is considering pulling a child out of a typical brick and mortar school, not a philosophical homeschooler. The books Susan Wise Bauer writes, however, usually are gold so perhaps I just went on her merit and checked it out at the library anyway. 

I found a lot of encouragement in this book, because it really hones in on what makes sense (overall) that schools do well, and what really doesn't make sense long-term. 

The Vanderbeekers to the Rescue by Karina Yan Glaser - This was the brand-new Vanderbeeker book out, and I just wanted a fun, middle-grade novel to get lost in. Middle grade fiction is like my beach-read genre, and Yan Glaser put out another cute (but not saccharine) book with this one. 

Read Aloud to the Kids

The Underneath by Kathi Appelt - This was probably my favorite book of the year read aloud to the kids. Wow! What a book. 

What I wrote on Instagram will suffice, " Whoever said ‘don’t judge a book by its cover’ clearly wasn’t around when the #newberryaward and #nationalbookaward labels were smacked on covers. This book was a finalist in both categorizes and I had never heard of it nor it’s author when I found it, lonely at a thrift store, for $1.

This is hands-down one of the most INCREDIBLE middle grade books I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading to my children. I literally can’t stop telling people about it.
It has everything: Indigenous and ancient myth, a lovable and adoptive family of cats + hound dog, lush swampland flora and fauna imagery, breathing trees, a 100-ft alligator, a mean old cuss of a man, and two creatures whose hatred and shame has eaten them alive.
These three seemingly-random plot lines mix into something mysterious and electrifying and the words roll out like poetry. THIS is children’s literature at its best, writing at its strongest, story of love so symphonic..please please read yourself and/or this to your kids (10+). I will now read everything #kathiappelt has ever written."