May/June Book Report

I held off on May's book report because it felt so small. However, now I have a lot of books to report on. I read seven books in May and June. The Seattle Public Library put out their 2016 Summer Book Bingo cards which means my reading has really ramped up. I was slow to realize that my love for long books was bringing down my Bingo Square accomplishments but I've fixed that problem in July. #shortbooksforthewin. My yearly total for books is at 29 at the end of June.

I decided to read Raising the Barre by Lauren Kessler after it was recommended on the barre3 blog. You know, I love barre3 and I also happen to love the Nutcracker ballet. I thought it would be a great book to meander along with. The premise is that the writer, who is obsessed with the Nutcracker ballet, decides that she will dance in the Eugene Ballet Nutcracker performance. She goes on an almost year long journey to accomplish this goal and begins taking barre3 classes to strengthen her body. I thought the book was hard to get into but about halfway through I started flying through it. My two friends who read this had the same experience. I'm not sure I'd recommend the book but if one were to start reading it, I'd encourage you to keep going! 

The next book I read was The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler. This fit into my "Novel" bingo slot for the  2016 Summer Book Bingo. This is a book for true Jane Austen lovers. I don't think you'd get much out of it if you haven't read her books. I've read most of them and was honestly a bit lost on the chapters that included novels that I haven't yet read. Maybe a Jane Austen novel will fulfill my "Written More than 100 Years Ago" slot.

My parenting book club read The Importance of Being Little by Erika Christans. I've been meaning to read this book since I heard about it on NPR. It was a very academic book which thrilled Molly's preschool teacher and was only ok for me. I did enjoy reading this book though and found a lot of it fascinating. This also filled my "Nonfiction" bingo slot. 

After such a heavy book, I decided to read something a bit lighter. Catastrophic Happiness by Catherine Newman was excellent! I read Newman's previous book and laughed all the way through it. I was in hysterics with this book about raising children and the toll it takes on life. This was a hilarious view of parenthood and filled my "You've Been Meaning to Read" bingo slot. 

We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler was the 2016 Seattle Reads selection. I was intrigued by this tale of a family raising a chimp as one of their children and the effect it has on their actual adult children. I took much too long to read this book though and accumulated so many library fines. This fulfilled my "Prize-Winner" bingo slot. 

I have no idea how I discovered this next book but the story was so beautifully told that I am glad I did. I decided to listen to the audio version of The Forgetting Time by Sharon Guskin and the narrators voices were perfect. The story is about a child who suffers from some unknown trauma and his mother's struggles to get him help. Along the way she meets a psychologist who is beginning to battle a type of dementia that presents with significant aphasia. Along the way, they learn about her son's previous life. I filled in my "Read Out Loud" bingo slot with this book. 

For my "Collection of Poetry" bingo slot, I decided to read What Loves Comes To by Ruth Stone because Elizabeth Gilbert talks about her in Big Magic. I can't say that I loved this poetry but I did find it intriguing. 

I filled out 6 bingo slots in June out of 25 but have already been barreling through books in July. 

This post contains affiliate links which means if you buy something from a link, I receive a very small percentage back.