Monday Malarkey

Recent arrivals (top to bottom):

• I is for Illuminati by Chris Vola - from HarperCollins for review
• The Wreck by Meg Keneally,
• Toby's Room by Pat Barker,
• Clever Girl by Tessa Hadley,
• Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon, and 
• Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs - all purchased
• The Museum of Forgotten Memories by Anstey Harris - from Gallery Books for review
• Earthlings by Sayaka Murata - purchased
• Matrimony, Inc. by Francesca Beauman - from Pegasus Books for review

Not pictured:

• Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia - purchased as e-book

Quite a stack. I have one more book I want to buy for a challenge I'm going to participate in, next year (and I'll buy one each month for that, since I own none of them) but I think it's about time to put myself back on a book-buying ban, otherwise. 

I generally don't buy e-books, anymore, since I'm not a fan of reading electronically and have way too many books already languishing in my Kindle app, but I made an exception for Mexican Gothic when it went on sale for $2.99, yesterday. I've been intrigued by the storyline since the first time I read about it (probably on Instagram) and I've read numerous reviews, in the past month or two. It's pretty polarizing, which I like. Will I love it? Will I be bored? It'll be fun to find out. 

Books finished since last Malarkey:

• Song of the Court by Katy Farina
• Cat Knit by Jacob Grant
• Writers and Lovers by Lily King
• The Witch of Willow Hall by Hester Fox
• Slade House by David Mitchell
• The Wreck by Meg Keneally

Cat Knit is a children's book that I bought on a whim because cat. It takes about 2 minutes to read but it's super cute. Slade House is a horror/paranormal novel I've had sitting around for years and it caught my eye when I was looking for something creepy to read. It was my second book for fall spooky reading after The Witch of Willow Hall, which a friend sent and I absolutely loved. The Wreck started off slowly but once I got into it I simply could not bear to put it down until I was no longer able to keep my eyes open (and then I woke up way too early so I finished it off). This was a great couple of weeks of reading.

Currently reading:

• The Great Influenza by John M. Barry

I finished The Wreck early this morning, so I haven't yet chosen my next fiction read. The Great Influenza is excellent but I didn't read more than a handful of pages, this week, so it's going to take a while. No biggie. It's one from my personal library and has no attached obligation to be read by any particular date so I'm going to add another nonfiction title to the current reads, as well, but I haven't decided which one, Matrimony, Inc. or I is for Illuminati. I want to finish both before the end of the month so the order doesn't really matter. 

Posts since last Malarkey:

• Song of the Court by Katy Farina (book review)
• Girl in the Blue Coat by Monica Hesse (book review)
• Running Out of Time by Margaret Peterson Haddix (book review)
• Fiona Friday - Awww (cat photo)
• Becoming by Michelle Obama (book review)
• I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter by Erika L. Sánchez (book review)
• Fiona Friday - Anyone want a fish taco? (cat photo)

In other news:

I'm still watching COBRA on Sunday evenings but that's the only regularly scheduled program on my watch list, right now. Otherwise, there's not much TV viewing going on. Streaming-wise, I started watching Schitt's Creek. So far, so good. I don't find it laugh-out-loud funny but I'm enjoying it. 

I chose Knives Out to watch, on Friday evening, and we both loved it. And, last night we watched Ferris Bueller's Day Off when it came on after . . . maybe the news? I don't remember. We just happened to have the TV on and Ferris Bueller is an old family favorite so we stuck around for it. 

It's occasionally chilly out there and we're loving the porch-reading weather. I spent a couple hours outside reading The Wreck, yesterday. In the end, it got a little muggy and the biting things began to emerge but the cool air was fabulous while it lasted. 

I haven't done any painting at all for a couple weeks because I decided I need to get a grip on my supplies and painting area, which lately has been just a stretch of the kitchen counter. In order to do that, I started emptying dresser drawers of Kiddo's clothing. He left quite a bit behind. I've got a drawer for sketchbooks, painting pads, and other paper. I have one for vintage ephemera and another with shoeboxes into which I've sorted various paintbrushes and doodads. It turned out to be a much bigger job than I intended and in the process I realized that I need to clean off the table I bought specifically for painting, which is currently buried in canvases, paintbrushes, notebooks of ideas (photographs, for example, of things I might like to try painting), etc. It's a mess. 

I'm missing the painting and the counter has since been buried in actual kitchen implements, so I may clear off that stretch of counter and do a little painting in between days spent working on cleaning up the paint table, since it's it's going to take a while. 

What's up in your world? Will you open your door to trick-or-treaters, this year? 

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