Back to Blogging! I'm just as Surprised as you!

  Back at it!

Hard to believe it’s May!  But it is indeed welcome!!

One more month closer to summer and SCHOOL OUT FOR SUMMER!

At the beginning of the year, I promised on Instagram I would post the books I read each month.  I had a banner January with close to 20 books.  I was faithful to my posting again in February but totally and completely forgot to post my March and April books.  So I posted a two-for-one over on Instagram and just didn't have the space to post it all.  SO... I got this idea to post to the blog again!

The last time I posted a blog was in June 2019!  That's crazy.  It's almost as crazy that I blogged for 7 straight years before that!  As I looked back at some of my posts, I laughed a lot, cringed some, and itched to get back to it...if even for a little bit.  I was reminded of the community I was a part of, the friends I made, and the travels I took to meet those friends IRL.

Even before COVID entered the picture, blogs were dismantled, Insta was more of a thing and snippets of my life in pictures seemed more than enough!  With a blog titled The Mishaps and Mayhem of a Solitary Life, blogging in COVID seemed like a good idea, and I even had a few drafts in here that I wrote during that time but I never dared to hit publish.  

Now over four years later, I am not even sure what’s compelling me to do this again. But here we are!

I’m still teaching. Year 22 is quickly coming to a close. I still spend plenty of time solo, but my life is a ‘lil less solitary these days.  Even though he is not staple on my social media and we rarely take photos together, I’ve been pretty happily dating for almost 3 years.  While my circle of friends has gotten smaller since COVID, the friends I have now are really the only ones I need.  

There is a lot to be said about friendships in your 40s…no drama, lots of laughs, talk about how our bodies are changing, wine, board games, book clubs, and more wine! LOL  Some you don’t see all the time, but when you do, it’s always as if no time has passed!

This brings me back to the main reason I am posting… BOOKS!  You can find my January and February books on Insta!

But I wanted to share more of my March and April round-up here!

If you read only one book this month, make it The Women by Kristen Hannah.  I listened to the author read it on audio and could not stop reading/ listening for three days straight.  It was such a different perspective and I’ll be honest in saying, I had no idea about a lot of it!  I listened to the audio but think I need to buy book because I just loved it so much I thought I should have it!  To go right next to my favorite book of all time, The Nightingale.

Another book I listened to {when the author reads it I feel compelled to do so}, was Nineteen Steps by Millie Bobby Brown.  Yes, that Millie Bobby Brown, the actress from Stanger Things fame!  I was impressed.  It was inspired by her Grandmother’s own story and painted quite a picture of WWII in London.  So, another different perspective.  It was both heartbreaking and hopeful.  Highly recommend!!

I  finally finished The Frozen River by Ariel Lawhon!  I started reading it on the plane to Iceland {Maybe I’ll blog about THAT soon!}  and finally got around to finishing it.  I think because it was one I bought on my Kindle and it was always there, so when my library holds come through, I feel like I have to read those first.  I enjoyed it!  Another piece of history I knew very little about!

Last year my sisters and I started a book club to make it a point to see one another each month.  If you are familiar with me on Instagram you know that in February we read Beloved by Toni Morrison and it was ROUGH!  So we needed a light-hearted easy read for March!  And Nora Goes of Script was just the ticket!!  We loved it.  Why did we read Beloved you ask?  Well, in January, our book club selection was The Reading List…a new FAVE!  And as you probably guessed, it revolved around a reading list!  HA!  Beloved was on that list, so our thought was to work our way through the list! Needless to say, we have now taken a break from that idea.

Our April {but kinda March, too because we got together for book club on April 5th!} book was Just the Nicest Couple by Mary Kubica.  It was a good book for discussion but was not a fave.  I enjoyed her Local Woman Missing more!  The best thing about the book was our book club meeting at a local brewery and Distillery! Didn't end up taking a photo with the book but the drinks were good!

As I look the list of my March List of books, I realize  I read several books with strong female leads!  Go ME as March is Women’s History Month!  LOL

More in March:

The Fifth Avenue Apartment and Gilded Girl, both by Pamela Kelley.  Kelly is a new-to-me author I discovered this year and I am enjoying her storytelling and easy writing.

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue. Another good story.  I read this for another book club I am part of in town.  I enjoy this book club because we read many different books, that honestly, I would never pick up on my own.  This was more in the fantasy realm, but I really liked it and was about to get engrossed in the story easily.  Another good book club pick…great discussions.  Was sad when I ended up having to miss the meeting when I threw out my back!

If He Had Been with Me by Laura Nowlin. Crazy, twisty good.  Part of a two-book series…the same story told from the other perspective.  I am not yet sure I want to pick that up! I liked this one too much!

The Lost Book Shop was the April book club selection for The Better Man Book Club in town one of the very few books I finished in April.  Another different story, and very much something in the fantasy vein, again but I did like it and had lots to say at the book club.  I also highlighted a lot of great quotes from the story on my Kindle!

Last month, I read/listened to a new series by Samantha Chase.  I tend to listen to her books when I am awake at two in the morning and can’t get back to sleep…and then I get invested and am up all night!! LOL

I like all her series…they are light, fun and have a bit of sass & spice. For anyone familiar with her series, the two that I read from her were part of a new spinoff of The Donovans Series: SweetBriar Ridge. The First Two Books in the series were Wanting You and Teasing You.

I’m already on track for a great May reading-wise…so stay tuned!