Weekly Mewsings: My February Wrap Up and Kicking Off March (Please Vote in my TBR Poll!)

I am linking up to the Sunday Post hosted by Kim of Caffeinated Book Reviewer and The Sunday Salon (TSS) hosted by Deb Nance of Readerbuzz  where participants recap our week, talk about what we are reading, share any new books that have come our way, and whatever else we want to talk about. I am also linking It's Monday! What Are you Reading? hosted by Kathryn of Book Date where readers talk about what they have been, are and will be reading.

I am linking up Stacking the Shelves hosted by Marlene of Reading Reality a meme in which participants share what new books came their way recently.  

Are you ready for March? It is here already! I feel a bit out of sorts--so much to do! But first some highlights since my last Sunday post a couple weeks ago. There was the usual work and then some. I got good news at a doctor's visit. There were Girl Scout cookie booths galore. But the best part was going to see The Wiz performed live at the Hollywood Pantages Theatre with my family. It was such a fun show and we had a great time.

Now it's March, which is always a full month for us. A certain someone in our house will officially become a teenager, and there will be lots of celebrating all month long. Cookie Season is coming to an end (thank  goodness--am I allowed to say that?). Mouse didn't meet her personal goal this year, but she is okay with that. Her troop's joint booth sales were good, so it balances out. This month we also have band performances, Girl Scout meetings, doctor's appointments, another couple musical outings, work, school, and spring break (for Mouse, at least). I feel out of breath already. 

I am afraid I have not had time to sit down and polish my final February bookish thoughts for you on my recent reads. They are coming though! Just not this weekend. February was a good reading month for me overall. My plan was to read Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson after finishing Women of the Post, but I was so taken with the women of the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, that I jumped right into Charity Adams Earley's memoir, One Woman's Army. An unexpected fiction/nonfiction pairing! Another goal completed. Then when my daughter recommended I read Misfit Mansion after she finished it, I could not say no. It sounded just like the kind of graphic novel I would like--and I did!

Books Read in February

• The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years by Shubnum Khan
• Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi
• The Roanoke Girls by Amy Engel
• A Good Cry: What We Learn from Tears and Laughter by Nikki Giovanni
• Women of the Post by Joshunda Sanders
• One Woman's Army: A Black Officer Remembers the WAC by Charity Adams Earley
• Misfit Mansion by Kay Davault
• Emily Wilde's Map of the Otherlands (#2) by Heather Fawcett

Emily Wilde's Map of the Otherlands was my favorite February read. I love everything about the world building and characters Heather Fawcett has created in the series. The Roanoke Girls by Amy Engel was my least favorite. It was more a case of the book not being the best fit for me, but there were things I liked about it, and I think others might too. 

What was your favorite book read in February? Did you have a good reading month?

I will soon be starting Gone with the Witch, the fifth in the Witch Way Librarian Mysteries series by Angela M. Sanders. It's one of my favorite cozy mystery series and I am looking forward to reading the latest installment! 

I am continuing to read Shannon Reed's  Why We Read: On Bookworms, Libraries, and Just One More Page Before Lights Out, which I am slowly making my way through, reading an essay here and there. I have been highlighting passages that I find particularly relatable. Shannon Reed is both a teacher and a reader, and offers her perspective on both experiences as it relates to reading.

I enjoy Ilona Andrews' books and am re-visiting Clean Sweep, the first in the Innkeeper Series, this time in graphic audio format. This is my first graphic audio book--the occasional background music and sound effects took a little getting used to (I found myself looking around to see where that beeping or crash came from), but it certainly adds to the entertainment factor. 

I decided it was time to start a Big Book (one of my reading goals for the year), especially if I want to make my way through it by the end of the year. I hadn't even been thinking about reading David Copperfield by Charles Dickens, but as I looked over my bookshelves, eyeing Barbara Kingsolver's Demon Copperhead, I remembered Kingsolver's novel is inspired by the Dickens' classic. I found myself on Goodreads, reading some of my friends' reviews of David Copperfield. Thanks to Deb, Margaret, and Linda, I decided to give it a try. My plan is to take it slow. Like with many classics I have liked over the years, including other works by Dickens, they aren't the sort of books I find myself able to get through quickly. 

What are you reading right now?

My TBR List is hosted by Michelle at Because Reading. The 1st Saturday of every month, I will list 3 books from my TBR pile I am considering reading and let you vote for my next read during that month. My review will follow (unfortunately, not likely in the same month, but eventually--that's all I can promise). 

I could use your help deciding which book to read next! These are more recent additions to my TBR which caught my attention as I was looking over my books. I love the covers on all of these (I admit The Book of Doors cover is from the UK version--I like it better than the American one). Mostly, I just really like the sound of them. 

The Book of Doors by Gareth Brown

If you could open a door to anywhere, where would you go?

In New York City, bookseller Cassie Andrews is living an unassuming life when she is given a gift by a favorite customer. It's a book - an unusual book, full of strange writing and mysterious drawings. And at the very front there is a handwritten message to Cassie, telling her that this is the Book of Doors, and that any door is every door.

What Cassie is about to discover is that the Book of Doors is a special book that bestows an extraordinary powers on whoever possesses it, and soon she and her best friend Izzy are exploring all that the Book of Doors can do, swept away from their quiet lives by the possibilities of travelling to anywhere they want.

But the Book of Doors is not the only magical book in the world. There are other books that can do wondrous and dreadful things when wielded by dangerous and ruthless individuals - individuals who crave what Cassie now possesses.

Suddenly Cassie and Izzy are confronted by violence and danger, and the only person who can help them is, it seems, Drummond Fox. He is a man fleeing his own demons - a man with his own secret library of magical books that he has hidden away in the shadows for safekeeping. Because there is a nameless evil out there that is hunting them all . . .

Because some doors should never be opened. [Goodreads Summary]

The Summer Book Club by Susan Mallery

The rules of summer book club are simple:
• No sad books
• No pressure
• Yessssss, wine!

Besties Laurel and Paris are excited to welcome Cassie to the group. This year, the book club is all about fill-your-heart reads, an escape from the chaos of the everyday—running a business, raising a family, juggling a hundred to-dos. Even the dog is demanding (but the bestest boy).

Since Laurel’s divorce, she feels like the Worst Mom Ever. Her skepticism of men may have scarred her vulnerable daughters. Cassie has an unfortunate habit of falling for ridiculous man-boys who dump her once she fixes them. Paris knows good men exist. She’s still reeling after chasing off the only one brave enough—and foolish enough—to marry her.

Inspired by the heroines who risk everything for fulfillment, Laurel, Paris and Cassie begin to take chances—big chances—in life, in love. Facing an unwritten chapter can be terrifying. But it can be exhilarating, too, if only they can find the courage to change. [Goodreads Summary]

The Heiress by Rachel Hawkins

When Ruby McTavish Callahan Woodward Miller Kenmore dies, she’s not only North Carolina’s richest woman, she’s also its most notorious. The victim of a famous kidnapping as a child and a widow four times over, Ruby ruled the tiny town of Tavistock from Ashby House, her family’s estate high in the Blue Ridge mountains. In the aftermath of her death, that estate—along with a nine-figure fortune and the complicated legacy of being a McTavish—pass to her adopted son, Camden.

But to everyone’s surprise, Cam wants little to do with the house or the money—and even less to do with the surviving McTavishes. Instead, he rejects his inheritance, settling into a normal life as an English teacher in Colorado and marrying Jules, a woman just as eager to escape her own messy past.

Ten years later, Camden is a McTavish in name only, but a summons in the wake of his uncle’s death brings him and Jules back into the family fold at Ashby House. Its views are just as stunning as ever, its rooms just as elegant, but coming home reminds Cam why he was so quick to leave in the first place.

Jules, however, has other ideas, and the more she learns about Cam’s estranged family—and the twisted secrets they keep—the more determined she is for her husband to claim everything Ruby once intended for him to have.

But Ruby’s plans were always more complicated than they appeared. As Ashby House tightens its grip on Jules and Camden, questions about the infamous heiress come to light. Was there any truth to the persistent rumors following her disappearance as a girl? What really happened to those four husbands, who all died under mysterious circumstances? And why did she adopt Cam in the first place? Soon, Jules and Cam realize that an inheritance can entail far more than what’s written in a will—and that the bonds of family stretch far beyond the grave. [Goodreads Summary]

Thank you for voting!

New to my shelves:

The Fox Wife by Yangsze Choo 

Maame by Jessica George 

Bride by Ali Hazelwood

Foolproof by Sander van der Linden

Stone Blind by Natalie Haynes

I Done Clicked My Heels Three Times: Poetry by Taylor Byas

The Spear Cuts Through Water by Simon Jimenez

One Woman's Army: A Black Officer Remembers the WAC by Charity Adams Earley

The Space Between Worlds (#1) by Micaiah Johnson

David Copperfield by Charles Dickens

Have you read any of these books? If so, what did you think? 

I hope you have a great week! Let me know what you have been reading!

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