what i read in january

I didn't read too much during the holidays, but I got back on track in January.  January is long and cold and I think we had maybe four days of sun here, so I decided to go with a beach theme.

First up was The Girls of August by Anne Rivers Siddons. 

What's the bigger question, how many books can be written about a bunch of old friends with significant baggage who reunite at the beach and uncover secrets about each other, or how many of those books will I read?  

The answer is likely all of them.

So, this book was about a bunch of old friends with significant baggage who reunite at the beach and uncover secrets about each other.  It wasn't brilliant literature, but it kept my attention and made me feel like I was spending a summer week on a barrier island off the South Carolina coast.  I would give it 3.5 stars.

Next up was another Anne Rivers Siddons, called Sweetwater Creek.  

I loved this one.  It's about a young girl whose mother has been missing for years.  She lives with her father and brothers in the South Carolina lowcountry and they breed and raise hunting spaniels.  There are a lot of quirky characters and unexpected turns and difficult relationships in the book, and overall it had a melancholy feel to it, but it was beautifully written.  I'd give it 5 stars.

I shifted authors after that one, and read Body Surfing by Anita Shreve.  

I started another book of her's this month, A Wedding in December, and I couldn't get into it.  It never picked up.  Body Surfing was good though.  The main character is 29 is has already been divorced and widowed.  She takes a summer job as a nanny for a girl whose family spends summers in their oceanfront cottage in New Hampshire, so you know I was all in.  Even though she's trying to avoid love for the summer, it finds her anyway.  This was a good one, 4 stars.

My final read was a non-fiction, called the 5 AM Miracle: Dominate Your Day Before Breakfast by Jeff Sanders.  

The title contains two things I don't really enjoy, 5 AM, and breakfast.  I am historically not a morning person.  My husband and family are nodding their heads.  I don't like to wake up super early, and even when I'm awake, I'm not really happy until about 9:00 or so.  I'd heard about this book on podcasts so I picked it up at the library with the hopes that perhaps I could transform myself into a morning person.  The book had some good tips for time management, but I think I need one called the 7:15 Miracle.  

Linking up with Steph and Jana today!  Did you read anything great this month?

the epilogue is my favorite part

I've been reading a lot lately, and tonight I realized all the books I've been reading have a theme.

Give me all the beach reads. 

Last night I was reading the last few pages of Sweetwater Creek, and as I turned the page, Matt looked over and said, “Hmm.  You actually read that part of the book?"

“The epilogue?”  I said, “Of course I read it!”  

“Oh,” he said, “I don’t read any of the optional extra parts."

Matt isn’t a huge reader, but he reads here and there and evidently, sticks to the meat of the book.  No time for a prologue or epilogue.

Please tell me I'm not the only one who reads the extra parts.

When he said that, it reminded me of a few years ago when I was driving my coworker, Jen, and we were on the Pennsylvania Turnpike.  The turnpike has billboards with lights and a message that says "Urgent message when flashing - tune radio to 1640 a.m."

We passed a sign with the lights flashing, so I immediately tuned my radio to 1640 a.m., as directed.

And Jen looked over at me and said, "Wow, I've never been in the car with anyone who actually did that."

Well, I'm a rule follower on the roadway.  And on the couch when I'm reading a book.

Speaking of work, the heat in my office has been broken for the last ten days or so.  My desk is right beneath the vent, and it’s been continuously blowing a stream of freezing air.  I haven’t taken my coat off in days and even had to work with my gloves on occasion.  Yesterday a maintenance man popped his head in the office and said, “Hey, look out, we’re conducting a wind tunnel test!”  

Because "wind tunnel test" sounded ridiculous to me, I assumed he was joking around.  So I laughed and said, “Well, I sure feel like I’m in a wind tunnel!” and continued on with my work.

And three minutes later, black soot came falling like snow out of the aforementioned vent, located directly above my head.  I had my gloves on, but I wished I had been wearing a hat.

But, what stopped coming out was cold air, so I guess the end justified the means.

If only his warning had come with flashing lights and a pre-recorded message alerting me to the impending conditions.