Monthly Intent | February 2022

February 3, 2022January 30, 2022 bookishluna6 Comments

Welcome to my very ambitious post about my February plans. I don’t know why, but I always end up making a ton of plans and lofty goals for the shortest month of the year. With that aside, I do have a few things I want to try and accomplish over the next 28 days.

Reading Plans

This month I would like to finish reading The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires by Grady Hendrix, which I am buddy reading with @jkimexploring. I am about 30% into it as of right now and I am really enjoying it. Outside of that I don’t want to have any set reading because mood reading and not setting to many specific reading goals for myself last month really paid off since I ended up reading 9 books.

Crochet and Knitting Plans

This month is all about starting a few projects that will take me some time. The first one is the Saraya Shawl by Saysha Greene. I love how beautiful and playful this shawl looks, I first saw it in my copy of Worsted and I loved it right away. I ended up ordering the same color as the sample. Since a lot of the techniques used in this pattern are new to me I know it is going to take quite a while, but I love a challenge!

The second project I plan to start and I know I will not finish for months if not years is the Scrappy Granny Stripe Blanket by Lucy of Attic24. I have quite a few scraps left over from projects and the like so I was looking all over for fun things to make with them. I came across this pattern and knew I wanted to start it ASAP. So, every time I finish a projects with fingering weight yarn I am going to add to this. I can’t wait to see how all the colors play together as time goes on. In February I am planning on getting all the stripes for the scraps I already have crocheted up. I am going to try to keep up with this by doing scrappy Sunday, which is a thing I found through Crazy Sock Lady on youtube.

Random Goals

I really want to try learning a new craft this month, I am learning towards cross stitch. I also really want to get back into language learning. I was doing really well for a bit, then life got a bit chaotic and I had to let some things go. But, I really want to jump into it again. Outside of those two things, I just want to have some quality time with my loved ones. January was good in quite a few ways, but sadly I was not able to see my significant other the entire month so I really would like to spend as much time as possible with him.

Sign Off 2020 — Sign off, thanks for reading!

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Someone Picks My Books | Cousin Edition | Men Without Women by Haruki Murakami

July 25, 2021 bookishluna2 Comments

Hello and welcome to the July edition of Someone Picks My Books! This month I reached out to my cousin to pick a book for me. She ended up picking Men Without Women by Haruki Murakami, but you probably figured that out from the title. I have read a few of Murakami’s books so I was thrilled when she brought this one up so I get to read it. I was able to get it right from the library on my ereader so I got right to reading!

Description

A dazzling new collection of short stories—the first major new work of fiction from the beloved, internationally acclaimed, Haruki Murakami since his #1 best-selling Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage.

Across seven tales, Haruki Murakami brings his powers of observation to bear on the lives of men who, in their own ways, find themselves alone. Here are vanishing cats and smoky bars, lonely hearts and mysterious women, baseball and the Beatles, woven together to tell stories that speak to us all.

Marked by the same wry humor that has defined his entire body of work, in this collection Murakami has crafted another contemporary classic. –goodreads.com

What I Liked

I really enjoyed the bite sized looks into the lives of those within the stories. I felt like the stories were well paced and the length of each one was perfect. I didn’t feel like I missed out on anything, but I also never felt like a story went on too long. A very difficult balance to maintain as a writer. I felt that while we got a snippet of each of these men, each was unique and I didn’t feel like a plot was recycled in any way.

Another thing I really enjoyed was the fact that these short stories has the same feel that I have previously loved in works I have read by the author. This is personally a worry for me when I am used to reading novels by an author, changing the type of fiction an author writes can at times ruin an author for me because they can loose a sense of what I enjoy about them. Happily that was not the case at all here.

What I Didn’t Like

As with short story collections there are some winners and some not great ones. I normally have this experience with collections, but I have to say I felt overall very positive about the collection and I didn’t outright hate or fully dislike one in particular.

Overall

This is a great collection of short stories and I am very glad that my cousin picked this for me to read. I was lucky enough to bring this with my on vacation and it was honestly perfect for that setting. It was bite sized chunks of great works by a very talented writer. The stories didn’t go to fast or drag on in any way. If you love Murakami or have been wanting to give his works a try, but 1Q84 is overwhelming I think you should look into this collection.

Up Next

Next month I am reading a book picked by the lovely Minna, where you can find them on twitter as @bookishminna and on their blog bookishminna. I really love their combination of book content and life where their personality shines through as well as their passions.

Have you read this book before or is it on your TBR?

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Hauls & Unboxings

Book Haul | April 2021

May 9, 2021December 22, 2022 bookishluna3 Comments

Hello and welcome to a bit of a haul from the month of April. I went on my first day trip this past month after getting fully vaccinated. It was my first time doing so in over a year and it felt so great! On this trip I went to a really awesome bookstore that was new to me and found some gems to bring home with me and picked up a few books from my local bookstore and sent one by a friend. Anyway, here are the books!

The Books

Record of A Night Too Brief by Hiromi Kawakami and Ms. Ice Sandwich by Mieko Kawakami I picked up on a day trip to a Japanese market. They have a really awesome bookstore there and I always find gems like this I would not have found otherwise. Record of A Night Too Brief caught my attention because it seemed to have so much packed into such a small package. Ms. Ice Sandwich caught my attention because of its talk of starting something new and possible love.

The Orphan of Cemetery Hill by Hester Fox, was a gift from the amazing Adrianna. I am really excited to get to this historical fiction novel with a possible paranormal twist to it.

Junji Ito’s Cat Diary: Yon & Mu, I also picked up from the Japanese market. But, I have read this authors work quite a bit. He is a known horror manga writer. This book tells tales of his own life experiences as a dog person then owning two cats. It is quite funny and it was fun to read.

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee, this book has been on my radar for quite sometimes and I finally picked it up. I am really excited to get to it this month as well.

Ghosts of Harvard by Francesca Serritella, I will be honest the cover of this book really pulled me in. The cover alone has such a great atmosphere for a thriller and sets the tone so clearly. Then, when I read the description I added it to my pile before checking out from the store. This books talks about a girl going to Harvard to try and figure out what led her brother to suicide. There also seems to be ghosts possibly present in this story as well.

What book have you recently added to your shelves from the library or the store?

What book have you recently read?

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