Update – The Book Diva's Reads

Yesterday was Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day (TYCBD). My plan was to take my twin 6 y.o. nieces to my favorite local indie bookstore and buy them books. The plan was kind of, sort of, almost successful. We did make it to the bookstore, Taylor Books. We did purchase books. This is where the kind of, sort of, almost comes into play…my darling nieces decided that they needed “big kid” books as opposed to more age appropriate books. Rather than have a meltdown in the store over this issue (mine not theirs), I decided to let them choose their own books. Here’s where things became even more interesting.

First a little background information on the girls might be helpful. My youngest nieces are fraternal twins. A. likes the color pink, adores all things glittery and glam, and is into gymnastics. J. likes the color purple, loves all things related to dinosaurs, dreams of getting a bearded dragon lizard, and is taking dance class. They are both cheerleaders for a local basketball league, and they love to wrestle with one another. I expected that J. would want to get a book on lizards, dinosaurs, or dragons. She insisted she wanted a book on horses, no problem. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from A. since she likes to keep us guessing. A. wasn’t quite sure what book she wanted but wound up choosing a book on bizarre sea creatures. Again, not a problem but definitely not what I expected.

Here are my diva nieces (I had to obtain their permission to post this picture and they were quite adamant that it was only allowed if I didn’t show their faces) perusing their books. Actually they’re just hiding behind the books for the picture.

Miss A. chose a National Geographic Kids book, Weird Sea Creatures by Laura Marsh. The photographs are bright, colorful and awesome (my favorite is the blob fish) and the text is filled with fascinating facts about these creatures.

Miss. J. chose Misty of Chincoteague by Marguerite Henry. Told you it wasn’t age appropriate but J. carried this book around and browsed through it for the remainder of the day. She told me she was going to read it “in her head” and she might, someday, tell me about it.

After choosing our books, Miss A. wanted a hot cocoa, which I purchased for her at the bookstore’s cafe, and yes I got a Chai Latte. Miss J. wanted candy so we left the bookstore for our local candy and nut store (conveniently located a block away from the bookstore and directly across the street from the library).

The remainder of the afternoon and evening was spent browsing through their books, glancing at a few movies (we never really watched a movie in its entirety), and enjoying their new game called “Let’s torture Auntie Vee.” This was the most fun I’ve had in quite some time. My only regret is that I can’t afford to buy them books every week. Maybe I’ll have to institute a recurring “Take My Nieces to the Library” weekend event. We can spend our Saturday afternoons browsing through library books and then read “in our heads” for the rest of the day.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Saturday. Did you participate in TYCBD? If so, where did you go and what books did you buy? Please share.

Happy reading!

I know it’s been awhile since I posted a review. Let’s chalk this up to ongoing problems due to chronic, severe migraine headaches AND writer’s block (or should that be reviewer’s block?). Strange as it may seem, I’ve been able to keep up with my reading as long as I read in electronic format. I can handle low-light and ebooks but low-light and print books just doesn’t seem to work. I have no idea why.

So what have I been up to other than reading and more reading? Well I was fortunate enough to attend the BookMarks Book Festival in Winston-Salem, North Carolina last month. I was accompanied on this day trip by my youngest brother and his lovely six-year-old twin daughters, as well as my sixteen-year-old niece. The twins were excited about the idea of receiving a free book after participating in the childrens’ activities. My older niece accompanied me as I attended lectures by Deborah Harkness (A Discovery of Witches and Shadow of Night), Jason Mott (The Returned – review coming soon with a giveaway offer), Ann B. Ross (author of the Miss Julia series), and Jill McCorkle (Life After Life). The best thing about this trip was spending the day with family and listening to some wonderful authors discuss their work. The second best thing about this day-trip was I didn’t have to drive so I got to read going and coming, yay! BTW, Ms. Harkness revealed the title for the third book in her All Souls Trilogy, The Tree of Life.

Here’s a picture of Ms. Harkness at the festival:

And here’s one of Mr. Mott:

I also attended a lecture at a local university by author Wil Haygood (The Butler, A Witness to History). Mr. Haygood actually worked for a local Charleston WV newspaper quite a few years ago before heading to Washington DC and the Washington Post. Mr. Haygood spent quite some time here in Charleston and met with local college students as well as Upward Bound students. If you ever get the opportunity to hear him speak, go! To read more about his visit to Charleston, please click here.

It was fascinating to hear about Mr. Haygood’s discovery of Eugene Allen that was followed by a newspaper article. That article in turn inspired the blockbuster movie “The Butler” and ultimately led to the writing of the book, The Butler A Witness to History. Mr. Haygood shared anecdotes of his time spent with Mr. and Mrs. Allen, as well as his time on the movie set.

What’s next? Well, I’m going to do my best to write all the reviews that should have been written and posted over the past few weeks (okay months, don’t nitpick). I hope it won’t be too confusing but I’ll be posting reviews of recently read books mixed with previously read books. Please bear with me as I attempt to catch up. Thanks and Happy Reading!