If you could start your own business, do anything you wanted to earn a living, what would it be? That’s the question that lingered as I read this book. Kate MacDougall did this, in a way. She left her job at Sotheby’s and decided to start a dog walking agency. She’d grown up with READ MORE
WEDNESDAY BLOGGING CHALLENGE | THREE FUN FACTS ABOUT ME
This is the kind of prompt that makes me want to hide under the covers for a week. Fun stories? About me? I mean. Like what? I don’t have a fascinating job or a bunch of travel tales. I don’t have any special skills. So this is not an easy one for me. Let’s READ MORE
TOP TEN TUESDAY | GENRE FREEBIE – BOOKS ABOUT MENTAL ILLNESS/NEURODIVERGENCE
This is a topic I’ve been reading a lot about over the last few years – longer, even. It’s one that’s close to my own experiences and the experiences of people in my life, and one I find very fascinating. I started reading about depression, then anxiety, and various other issues like bipolar disorder READ MORE
LINK-UP | IT’S MONDAY! WHAT ARE YOU READING?
This one is a two-week edition because I didn’t have time to write it last week. Not that it matters much! I’m making good progress despite being busy in the garden and with my kid, who I’m loving having extra summer time with. We had a wonderful time yesterday repotting three varieties of mint READ MORE
THE SUNDAY REVIEW | WILL YOU READ THIS, PLEASE? – JOANNA CANNON
It’s difficult, sometimes, to find good first person accounts of what it is like to experience a mental illness. Some of those who have been there don’t want to talk about it; some can’t. Others simply can’t find the right words. Joanna Cannon (author of The Trouble with Goats and Sheep) came up with READ MORE
WEDNESDAY BLOGGING CHALLENGE | A DOCUMENTARY I LIKED
This is a tough one because there have been several. I go through phases of niche interests and I try to go on a deep dive for each one. So over the years I’ve had several favourites on different topics. But when I look back there have been a couple that have stuck with READ MORE
TOP TEN TUESDAY | CHARACTERS FROM DIFFERENT BOOKS I’D LIKE TO INTRODUCE
This, potentially, is a fun one. If I can get my memory to work properly, which is always a bit of a crapshoot if I’m being honest. But here we go, let’s see what I come up with *cracks knuckles.* Hermione Granger (The Harry Potter series) and Matilda Wormwood (Matilda) Anne Shirley (Anne READ MORE
THE SUNDAY REVIEW | GARDEN VARIETY – CHRISTY WILHELMI
I’m very into gardening at the moment, thanks to having just moved to a house that has a garden – the first time I’ve had proper earth space to plant in nearly two decades, and the first time I’ve had any sun to grow in. I’ve been looking for good books that centre gardening, READ MORE
WEDNESDAY BLOGGING CHALLENGE | THE STRANGEST DREAM I’VE HAD LATELY
Oh man. Dreams are such a trip. I guess the first thing I should mention is that one of the medications I’m on can… well, it can make vivid and intense dreamscapes, and boy does it ever. I’ve had crazy Jason Bourne-style epics where I had to jump from a cruise ship to a READ MORE
TOP TEN TUESDAY | BOOKS I’VE READ OR WANT TO READ BECAUSE OF YOU GUYS
I get most of my book recommendations online. Wether it’s from a BookTube channel, another blog, or indeed from someone who has left a nugget of literary gold in a comment, the online book community is a rich repository of great books I’ve yet to discover. It’s hard to remember exactly where I heard READ MORE
LINK-UP | IT’S MONDAY! WHAT ARE YOU READING?
It’s been what felt like a long week, but a decent one. I’ve spent a lot of time out in the garden, and it’s finally starting to look like, well, a garden – instead of an overgrown thicket of weeds on the rampage. They really were poised to take over the neighbourhood! I have READ MORE
THE SUNDAY REVIEW | UNRAVELING – PEGGY ORENSTEIN
I’ve always been around knitting. My mum knitted – she made me a sweater when I was a toddler that I still have to this day. And, as Peggy Orenstein says over and over in this book, SLFHM – she learned from her mum. My maternal grandmother was a wizard with the knitting needles. READ MORE
WEDNESDAY BLOGGING CHALLENGE | A JOB I WOULD NOT BE GOOD AT
Ha, so this one is much easier than last week’s prompt about jobs I’d be good at. I have had several jobs, and while I did a fine job at most of them, I also hated some of them. I have a few things in particular I’m not good at. Multi-tasking is one of READ MORE
TOP TEN TUESDAY | FORGOTTEN BACKLIST TITLES
I’ve tried to delve into the recesses of my mind to think of some great books I’ve read that I don’t hear discussed that much, and that I really enjoyed. I’ve started with some I read and loved as a child – so definitely qualify as backlist – then progressed to more recent but READ MORE
LINK-UP | IT’S MONDAY! WHAT ARE YOU READING?
Not a terrible reading week, though I didn’t finish as many this week as last. I did finish one that’s been on my reading list for a while though, and made a good discovery. I’m also slowly continuing with a couple of books I’ve started, and I’m really enjoying them. Just Shelved READ MORE
THE SUNDAY REVIEW | IN FIVE YEARS – REBECCA SERLE
This was a bit of an odd one. I didn’t know anything going in, which can be either a really good thing at times, and I’ve discovered some great surprises that way. This one, though… it just managed to not be at all what I expected while also having had no expectations at all. READ MORE
WEDNESDAY BLOGGING CHALLENGE | A JOB I’D BE GOOD AT
It’s hard for me to know what I’d be good at. I’ve always struggled to see my own strengths, and never really managed to actually form a career for myself, despite lots of schooling and many jobs. I don’t know about what I’d be good at, but I do know I’d like a job READ MORE
TOP TEN TUESDAY | MOST RECENT DNFS
I constantly DNF books, but then I also constantly return to partially-read and often mostly forgotten books and pick them up again. So this is a hard one for me, because DNFing a book isn’t a big dramatic decision for me as it can sometimes be for the more committed readers among you. I’ll READ MORE