New year new thread. What do you like to read

jmorth said: I finished it before the new year so I was able to use it in my 2019 Reading Challenge on/in Goodreads. Reader sets a goal of how many books to read that year. My goal was 75 but I exceeded that by 123% ending witn 92 books read with an average length of 391 pages! My goal for 2020 will be 80 books.

Wow I'm very impressed! I only joined Goodreads last March so never really kept track of how many books I was reading before. I set my goal for this year at 40 books, then see a couple of my friends setting theirs for 100!
Finished War and Peace this morning. I loved it but must say I'm glad to be moving on to something else. It was a looong read! Almost done with The Maine Woods, and starting on Tall Trees Tough Men and Spiked Boots: Tales of the North Country, both by Robert E. Pike. Also Kate Furbish and the Flora of Maine, a book I've been wanting to read for over a year and just realized that our library has it! For poetry I'm starting on a complete collection of Robert Burns. I was going to check out Silas Marner by George Eliot, but must have set it down somewhere in the library because I didn't check it out! Oh well, I think I have enough to keep me busy anyhow.

Wow! Y'all deserve trophies, blue ribbons, and A+ for great goals!

I came to 2020 thread to tell you what I read in 2019! Christmas present to myself was to finish reading book I started in the fall, "The First Phone Call from Heaven" by Mitch Albom. Says it is a #1 NY Times bestseller. It's probably in category of Christian fiction, though not preachy. It's about relationships
so not much action. Since it was about phone calls, it includes info about Alexander Graham Bell and invention of telephone. In the
modern book, the phone calls from Heaven came to people's cellphone.
So even in fictional story, it's interesting about communication!

One thing I liked was the time of year I read the book. I didn't think I
will read book in fall since it is busy with holidays. Since y'all are reading, I started book about phone calls from Heaven on Halloween, like ghosts! I only read couple pages at night. Right around
Thanksgiving, I read chapter that started It was the week of Thanksgiving! Then the end of the story occurred at Christmas, when I
finished the book.!
It ended with a plot twist!

Now I have to think about what I will read in 2020.Thanks for great goals!

TT, if your just finished book ended with a plot twist it could be setting the stage for a sequel.

Finished 'Kate Furbish and the Flora of Maine'. She was quite a remarkable lady. Despite poor health, she made it her mission to explore each region of Maine and document the wildflowers she found. Often she travelled alone, through bogs and swamps and up steep mountainsides. She was also an artist and her portrayals of flowers are both botanically accurate and ascetically pleasing, and her work gained the respect of the eminent botanist Asa Gray.



I stopped short after reading 30 pages of 'Spiked Boots'. It wasn't what I was expecting at all. There seemed to be more drunken fights and swearing going on than anything else. I realize the rivermen were rough tough men. They had to be to do the kind of work they did, (like standing chest deep in icy water all day picking a log jam), but I've read other stories about them and I don't think they were all like that.

Now I'm reading 'The Vicar of Wakefield', by Oliver Goldsmith. It's a delightful story, simple but highly entertaining...a welcome break after War and Peace!

I read 'The Vicar of Wakefield' in High School, quite a while ago...
Finished the Repairman Jack book (good as expected) and am presently reading 'The Compendium of Srem' . It's about Torquemada, 15th century leader of the Spanish Inquisition, reading a tome of eldritch lore both evil and powerful. He (so far) cannot seem to destroy it.
Book by same author (F Paul Wilson) as Repairman Jack books of which the 'Compendium of Shem' is occasionally referenced to...

I just finished Stephen King's "The Institute" it was fabulous If you're a King fan this one is a must read!

Just finished a book I checked out at the library 2 days ago. It was 351 pages long, so that means I REALLY liked it! The Penobscot Man, by Fannie Hardy Eckstorm. It was first published in 1904. This was my review on Goodreads...

I loved this book! The stories in it are true and are about real men. It was more than interesting to read about Joe Attien, Thoreau's guide on his second trip to the Maine woods, who drowned trying to run impossible rapids, just for the challenge of it. He could have saved himself, but chose to stay with those of his men who could not swim. "Oh, the folly of all self-sacrifice, the vanity of all things beautiful, the lying promise of spiritual ends which the cynic preaches! 'This might have been sold for much and given to the poor!' Verily. Yet when the poor had eaten and drunken it, what then? But the precious wastefulness, preserved within a book, — how many are fed from the ambrosia of such a fair and noble deed!"
And then there is the pretty story of "The Posies", where eleven pure white Ladies Slippers are plucked and saved by the rivermen, because they overheard a woman telling her companion that they were beautiful! Those rough men, who would dare each other to do deeds that often cost them their lives, yet took such care not to crush a little bird's nest that had been built close to the river where they worked! I doubt there will be men like them ever again.

@JHeirloomSeeds, You speed read through the book, and enjoyed and remembered the stories! I'm impressed!

That's the magic of books. They bring enlightenment to daily life!

I've been at odds with some men in my life lately. Fortunately, the men I know would be like the men in your book, I think. My grandsons will grow up to be like them too, I hope.

We don't need challenges that cost precious lives. Though this world needs to celebrate people who are both tough and tender!

I also enjoyed your sharing info and photo of Kate Furbish and the Flora of Maine. Interesting how she studied and documented, even with art, the local wildflowers. I'm sure she could have lived a more comfortable life without wading through bogs. It sounds like she lived her best life!

@jmorth, I appreciate your comments about my book, "The First Phone Call from Heaven" and how the plot twist can lead to sequel.
I haven't taken the time to write a reply. So tonight I turned off the tv and returned to our posts about great books. Now, reading sounds so much more entertaining than TV!

Often a plot twist leads to a sequel. Though I doubt it will here.
Mitch Albom wove the threads of the story tightly together so all intertwining characters and plots all came together at the end.
He brings the book to a great conclusion, yet leaves room for the reader to personally interpret the story,

I may have mentioned previously that the book contains two stories, the fictional story involving the characters and the historical story about the invention of the telephone. I don't want to give away too much about the book. The plot twist involves manipulation of the technology. Reminds of the Ring doorbell.
It was first invented for security, to see who came to your door.
Then people twisted technology, so they could spy in your door!

Summarizing the last 2 paragraphs -

Sound was transmitted over a wire, leading to the invention of the phone. "But it was not a new idea. We call out, we are answered.
It has been that way from the beginning of belief, and it continues ....a young boy hears a noise, opens his eyes, lifts a toy phone to his ear, and smiles, proving heaven is always and forever around us, and no soul remembered is every really gone."

When I read those last 2 paragraphs early Christmas morning, it was magical!

(Another plot twist is that in the story, the young boy's father did not want his son to be fooled thinking he could hear his deceased mother talking on the toy phone. Yet at story's end, it is OK!)

My father and stepfather both passed away on December 20, yet 30 years apart. I think many of us think of loved ones during the holidays. The time of year I happened to read the book and the world created in the book's pages enlightened the holidays!

Now when I picked up the book 2-3 weeks later, it seems like words on paper. Then when I read them again and write and remember, I can begin to be transported back to the magic!

I finished The Night Fire by Michael Connelly. It was pretty good, if you like Harry Bosch and Rene Ballard.

I just started Things You Save in a Fire by Katherine Center. I'm not far enough to have much of an opinion yet.

Karen

Finished The Vicar of Wakefield. It was a good story but I can't say it'll be one of my favorites. Now reading The Scarlet Pimpernel, by Emmuska Orczy. So far I'm really enjoying it!

I finished reading The Girl Who Stayed by Tanya Anne Crosby. I really liked it. A sort of local woman comes back to where she grew up to get her parents house ready for sale after a bad break-up with the wrong guy, then can't avoid all the sad memories of her younger years. Especially about her sister, who mysteriously disappeared as a young girl and was never seen again. So there was a "who-did-it" in more recent disappearances of women in the town, as well as that earlier one, where they never found the body of the sister. Also it seems to comment on how parents fail their daughters...in lots of ways. Girls who get bad vibes from parents who made their own mistakes can be natural victims...for taking reckless chances, for abusive relationships, for just not believing they're worthwhile. Zoe had all that and then naturally chose someone abusive. Whether her sister made bad choices that led to her death is never quite clear. But Zoe seemed to be blamed for everything that went wrong all those years ago. Funny...or not..the title says "the girl who stayed", yet she did leave once she finally had a choice, even though it wasn't a good one. So she has to face the past while trying not to be a victim again. I guessed who the town killer would be, so I wondered why she didn't...until it was almost too late.

Finished Joyland one of 2 books King wrote for the publisher Hard Case Crimes. The other was The Colorado Kid. I would say if you missed this one it is worth finding. Started Under the Dome. A tough one to read in bed , the book is just so big over 1000 pages.

@LindaTX8, thanks for the intriguing book review, Did the town killer also kill the sister?

@jheirloomseeds, I saw on news about snow in Maine, good reading weather! Hope you are warm & well!

I haven't decided what book I will read next, Previewing self-help books I have at home since new year.

They haven't taken effect yet!

The fate of the sister, hiyall, never was really answered for sure. I would've liked to know what happened, but at least they answered about all the rest.

hiyall said:

@jheirloomseeds, I saw on news about snow in Maine, good reading weather! Hope you are warm & well!

Wow! Snow is such a regular event here, I'm surprised it was in the news! Yes, this time of year is a good time to snuggle up next to the woodstove and read a good book.

Finished 'The Scarlet Pimpernel'. It has to be one of my all-time favorites! Now starting on 'The Poets' New England', by Helen A. Clarke. I own a first edition from 1911, as well as a matching edition of 'Longfellow's Country', by the same author. I'm also eagerly awaiting a couple of books which I ordered through interlibrary loan...hoping they arrive tomorrow!

The requested library books did come, so now I'm also reading 'Agnes Grey' by Anne Bronte. This is the first book I've read by Anne. I've read one by Charlotte (Jane Eyre) and one by Emily (Wuthering Heights) but so far Anne's book is very different in character from those of her sisters. Which is probably a good thing! I loved Jane Eyre but was a little uncomfortable with Wuthering Heights.

Reading 'The Light Brigade' by Kameron Hurley. Future war when combatants can be instantly translated to battles on Mars (human colonials in revolt) at the speed of light. However, they may come back altered...like with one of their arms spouting out of their stomach...DOA. Still, an interesting concept.
Also reading 'Rapture of the Deep' by Cody Goodfield who is presently one of the better 'neo-Lovecraftian' fiction writers today. Short stories, some good, some not so good.
Finished 'The Ravener' by Donald Tyson, about 16th century alchemist and counselor to Queen Elizabeth I, John Dee.
Also finished 'Tales of the Al-Azif - A Cthulhu Mythos Anthology'.