Whatcha Readin'?

by Sunday Dutro

Our family was struck by the plague last month, which generally allows for more reading hours and is thus not to be feared. Unfortunately, it was the type of cold that makes your head too foggy to concentrate and we all spent way more hours in front of screens than books. Luckily for us it only lasted about four days and the kids were back to screaming “coming in hot!” while racing through the house and our evenings returned to calm and quiet reading time.

In February I read 17 books (thanks to some of them being very short and others being poetry), of which ten were four stars or better. Here they are, in no particular order:

When Women Were Dragons by Kelly Barnhill is a medium-paced emotional, hopeful and reflective historical/fantasy book about injustice and what would happen if people suddenly turned into dragons when their rage became more than they could bear. I absolutely loved her book The Girl Who Drank the Moon, and while most of her books are YA, When Women Were Dragons is considered an adult novel although I’d think teens might enjoy it too.

The Winners by Fredrik Backman is the medium-paced, emotional and reflective third book in the Beartown series. If you read and enjoyed the first two you will not be disappointed by the third. It is a much longer book than the previous two, but worth the read.

Farm City by Novella Carpenter is a medium-paced memoir about farming in an extremely urban environment. The idea of raising chickens, turkeys, and even pigs in an Oakland, California,slum bordering the highway was almost too far-fetched to believe. I found it funny and fascinating, definitely reinforcing that cities are not for me.

Odd Pets by Lilo Hess is a nonfiction book about keeping things like mud puppies and snails and anoles. A very old book that’s really rather out-dated now, I read it because it was referenced in The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating by Elisabeth Nova Bailey which I read in January and loved. I liked that the author encourages trapping and re-releasing.

Breath by James Nestor is a fast-paced, informative, nonfiction book about the science of our health and breathing in particular. If you’ve ever been interested in meditation, yoga, or Wim Hof this is a fantastic read. My husband and I have wildly different tastes in literature and he loved this as well.

Body Work by Melissa Febos is a medium-paced, nonfiction memoir/inspiration/how-to book about the power of personal writing. It’s specifically for writers, but I think anyone who enjoys memoir would like it. I also enjoyed her other memoirs, Girlhood and Whip Smart, although they require much more backbone.

How to Keep House While Drowning by KC Davis is a medium-paced, informative nonfiction/self-help book that’s extremely helpful for anyone who’s trying to do it all and failing. She has wonderful work-arounds as well as the most important part of understanding yourself in relation to your house work and learning to weed out the biases we have towards certain chores and the shame we associate with not doing them. Fascinating.

The Editor by Steven Rowley is a medium-paced, lighthearted and emotional book about a contemporary writer and his editor who just happens to be Jackie Kennedy/Onassis. A fabulous “summer read.”

Dog Songs by Mary Oliver is a slow-paced, emotional, and reflective book of poems that will be adored by the dog lovers out there. Oliver’s poetry is always wonderfully poignant, insightful, and fascinatingly detailed and to have a collection of only dog-related poems is lovely.

In the Next Galaxy by Ruth Stone is a fast-paced and reflective book of poetry that won the National Book Award in the early 2000’s. Lovely imagery and insights into women and aging.

Among other books, I’m currently in various stages of reading:

- What Are You Hungry For? by Francois Comunetti (local writer)

- The Moonlight Child by Karen McQuestion (for Elks Book Club)

- A Scatter of Light by Malinda Lo

- The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski

- The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis (with my kiddos)

- I Never Promised You a Rose Garden by Joanne Greenberg

I hope you’re all healthy, avoiding the various plagues going around, and finding all the time in our extremely cold and snowy world to enjoy the copious good books available to us. Just a reminder that many of these books are available at the Thompson Falls library and through Libby.

Sunday Dutro is an avid reader and eBook convert living in Thompson Falls with her beautiful family and an enormous “to be read” pile. Reach her at [email protected].