( My Fictional List )

Happy New Year, everyone!
(A bit belated, but pre-dated.)

May 2015 bring you peace, joy, love, and blessings.

Today is the Winter Solstice, the longest night, the shortest day. Marking it with verse is one of my rituals. (With best wishes to friends in the Southern hemisphere for your midsummer celebrations.) At 6:03pm (EST), the moment of the solstice, I will be opening a bottle of bubbly to continue and honor a ritual my father and I had for many years ( Read more... )

Buffy: "With Mom at Aunt Darlene's this year, I'm not getting a Thanksgiving. I guess maybe it's just as well."

Anya: "Well I think that's a shame. I love a ritual sacrifice."

Buffy: "Not really a one of those."

Anya: "To commemorate a past event, you kill and eat an animal. It's a ritual sacrifice, with pie."
from "Pangs ( Read more... )

The complete list of fiction I read in 2013 can be found here. It's an absurdly long list, so I want to post reviews of some titles that stood out for me. In alphabetical order (by author):

I read the 3rd & 4th books in Alan Bradley's series about Flavia de Luce (A Red Herring without Mustard and I Am Half-Sick of Shadows). I continue to love ( Read more... )

In 2013 I read a great many books, mostly fiction. This happens when I am underemployed and stressed. I read 66 works of fiction for the first time, some of those from favorite authors, others brand new to me.

I also read 6 works of non-fiction. Here are short reviews:

The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Businessby Charles ( Read more... )

1. Strayed, Cheryl: Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar, 304p
2. Patchett, Ann: This is the Story of a Happy Marriage, 320p
3. Frank, Thomas: What's the Matter with Kansas: How Conservatives Won the Heart of America, 332p
4. Wall, Maryjean: How Kentucky Became Southern: A Tale of Outlaws, Horse Thieves, Gamblers, and Breeders, 291p ( ( Read more... )

( My Fictional List )

I've started 3 entries and not finished any of them, so let's just go with this:

2013 was a profoundly difficult year for me, and for many people I know. I'm not sure where most of it went, and I am so amazingly grateful it is gone.

I pray this new year brings peace, prosperity, and joy to all of you.

Happy New Year, everyone.

I have news for you; the stag bell, winter snows, summer
Has gone.
Wind high and cold, the sun low, short its course, the sea
Runs high.
Deep red the bracken, its shape is lost; the wild goose has
Raised its accustomed cry.
Cold has seized the birds' wings; season of ice.
This is my news.

9th century Irish/Celtic poem
author unknown

At the ( Read more... )