What I'm Reading This Week

 Because I'm usually reading several books more or less at the same time - and concentrating now more on a slower, more absorbent reading pace - I'm not completing books nearly as quickly as I have in recent years. I'm avoiding short deadlines,  both review-imposed ones and self-imposed ones (can't do much about the library-imposed ones), as much as I can, also, but did want to highlight the books that have most recently caught my attention. 

Having an unread Louise Penny novel is akin to having money stashed in the bank in case of urgent need; it's just a great feeling. But I was in such need of a Gamache palate cleanser after watching the horribly-presented Amazon Prime series, that I can't hold off any longer. It helps that I do keep Penny's 2013 Gamache novel, How the Light Gets In around as my final unread Gamache at any moment. I'm a little over 100 pages in, and I'm enjoying this one a lot but still not sure where it is ultimately headed.

I'm not familiar with Ellen Marie Wiseman but the cover of this one reminded me so much of Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen, a novel I really enjoyed, that I decided to give it a shot. ( I'm sure that resemblance is not just a happy coincidence.) And about 85 pages in, I'm happy to say that I'm feeling pretty positive about it. It has two separate plots that are explored in alternating chapters (I like that style) and are set about 20-25 years apart (one - I think - set in the 1930s and the another in the 1950s. 

This is actually a re-read of a book that I first read and reviewed back in 2007. This was an "unauthorized" history of both the product that made the McIlhennys a generational family of millionaires and the family itself. The original review was vehemently attacked and ridiculed by what I still suspect was an anonymous member of the family. To this day, I don't find the book to be insulting to the family at all because what is recounted, especially taken in context of the times, should not surprise anyone. I"m enjoying it even more this second time around.

I was first exposed to rugby (and almost instantly became a fanatic probably because cricket and soccer don't much appeal to me) in the nineties when living in London. But I left the country still pretty much a self-taught fan, and still get a bit confused by some of what I see on the pitch. I'm finding that Rugby for Dummies has all of the answers to those nagging little questions I still have, and I'm slowly working my way through the manual. It's proving to be a well written book that is not at all boring, and that's seldom the way with "rules books" like this one.

This is the only one I'm reading at the moment for the specific purpose of writing a review, and it is not scheduled to be published until November 2023. I decided to take it on because I'm always open to exploring a new series centered upon one anchor character, and "Rick Cahill" is certainly an interesting guy. This is actually the tenth novel in the series, though, and I'm catching a pretty beat-up guy here. I'm just a few pages into it because I struggle to read pdf files on my Kindle, but I already feel like I need to read the first series book next. 

I'm looking forward to dipping back into each of these, a very good sign for what is to come in the days just ahead. Today will be spent on a little bit of cleanup outside to gather up the debris that accumulated in the yard as a result of yet another massive thunderstorm that moved through the area last night with 60-70 mph wind gusts. We lost power for about five hours, but regained it about two a.m. Luckily we had all the backup chargers ready to go, including some light bulbs that automatically use battery power to light up things just as always when the power goes out for just a few hours. Happy reading, guys.