How I choose books to read

I read a lot of books in winter.  When I get my hands on a good one, I might read through it in two days’s time; this was the case with John Grisham’s “The Litigators”, which I recommended to Cliff.  I don’t always love Grisham’s books, but every once in awhile there is one that resonates with me.  I was happy to see that Netflix made a six-part series of Grisham’s “The Innocent Man”, which I believe is the only book the guy has written that is a true story.  

To get ideas for my next books, I pay attention to what some of my friends are reading, then see what Amazon has to say about them.  If nothing else strikes my fancy, I head for the New York Times best-seller lists.  Of course, the best sellers of the current year usually require my putting a hold on them:  That’s why they are best-sellers; everybody wants to read them!  But if I go back to the previous year’s list, many of those are available immediately.  I probably got carried away this morning, but every single book I put on hold intrigued me:  “Little Fires Everywhere”; “Killers of the Flower Moon”; “Educated.  A Memoir”; “The One”; “We Were the Lucky Ones; and “Heavy”.  A book I put on hold two months ago is almost ready for me to get checked out:  John Sandford’s “Holy Ghost”.  Sandford is my favorite.  He can do no wrong.  

I believe a couple of the books I put on hold are non-fiction.

Last week I noticed a Stephen King book that was highly rated and decided to give it a try:  “The Outsider”.  I would have had to put a long hold on the print copy, but the audio version was available.  Now here’s the thing:  I don’t like ghostly, imaginary, scary, books as a general rule.  But every once in awhile King comes up with something I love:  Christine, Green Mile, The Shining, the movie “Stand By Me”... so every five years or so I give him another chance.  I’ve listened to about two-thirds of “The Outsider”, and am about ready to give it up.  I just don’t like the premise.  It started out like a who-done-it and held my interest, but when things started getting ghostly, I began losing interest.  

Granddaughter Monica and Amara, her niece (who was our youngest great-grandchild until yesterday), spent most of the day with us.  Amara has won me over completely, since she seems to prefer my company no matter who else is in the room.  Oh, she keeps one eye on her mother if she’s with her, but she still crawls over to where I’m sitting.  It makes me feel special.  We did get a new great-granddaughter yesterday, but we won’t be seeing her much, if at all.  Georgia is a long way off.  I’m glad Amara is, for the present, close at hand.  

Cora, the little girl we used to babysit, needed a pinch-hitter babysitter Thursday, so we got to enjoy her for awhile too.  Now that she isn’t here all the time, I can really see how fast she’s growing up in size, actions,  and temperament.  Where did that tiny baby go?  

Gabe may have a new buddy we haven’t met.  The grandson and his wife got a Great Dane puppy!  We went out to eat with Cliff’s sister and her husband who are here from St. Louis, and when we got home, the kids had a lot of company.  Somehow that didn’t seem like a good time to introduce Gabe to Apollo.  We’ll see what happens today.  

And that’s about it, except to tell you that I somehow got a week ahead on the calendar and thought Christmas was this coming Tuesday.  Good grief, time goes fast enough without my trying to hurry it along.  We intend to visit my sister in Kansas for Christmas if the weather doesn’t turn bad.  

Cliff’s family could use prayers:  His beloved aunt has been moved from the hospital to a nursing home, and is still very weak and not particularly happy to be there.  She’s in her 90’s.  Also, his brother’s wife has been in and out of the hospital; we were terribly concerned about her, but she seems to be getting better now.  It seems as though there’s always someone ailing during the holidays, which takes a lot of the “merry” out of Christmas.  

I believe that’s it for now.  I’ll try to have something more exciting next time.

Yours till the ocean wears rubber pants to keep its bottom dry,

                                   

Donna