What I Read: February

I had an extra day to read in February, thanks to the leap year, and finished a book and an audiobook on February 29th which I thought was a funny coincidence! It has been pretty busy lately and Elise has been wanting to get out of her car seat and play with me in car line instead of having her tablet, which I'm all about, so that is a chunk of reading time that is now gone.

Books:

• Bel Canto by Ann Patchett- Since I liked Commonwealth, when I saw this book also by Patchett at Goodwill, I decided to pick it up. It was okay. Toward the end I felt like the hostage situation was drawn out for so long, I didn't really care about the resolution. I think that was kind of the point though.
  

• You Can Never Find a Rickshaw When It Monsoons: The World on One Cartoon a Day by Mo Willems- Since Willems is my favorite children's book author, my parents got me this book for Christmas one year. It's a book for adults. I wasn't too interested in it when I first got it because it was all cartoons with little stories to go with them. Going through my stack of books I decided to give it a go and I really liked it. It was a neat way to experience someone's travel around the world, through random snapshots in the form of cartoons he drew each day. I really enjoyed it, although it made me really want to travel!

• Throw Like a Girl by Jean Thompson- When I saw the spine of this book at Goodwill, I was drawn in. It was so pretty. Then I read the title and pulled it off the shelf. When I saw it was a book of short stories, I was a bit hesitant because I tend to not like short stories that much. For whatever reason I was really excited to read the book anyway so I bought it. I enjoyed it quite a bit.

  

  The spine that caught my attention!

• Nine Perfect Strangers by Liane Moriarty- I was super excited to read more of Moriarty's books after reading Big Little Lies which was amazing. I found 3 during my last visit to Goodwill and grabbed them all. We picked this one as our April book club pick so I decided to read it first. I may have expected too much out of this book due to how much I loved Big Little Lies because I was disappointed with it. I never got super into it to where I couldn't put it down and I wasn't as invested in the characters as I was with her other book. It was still good but not really anything special, in my opinion.

• Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker by Jennifer Chiaverini- This was another one I picked up at Goodwill. I love historical fiction so, of course, loved this one. It was so interesting to read about Elizabeth Keckley and now that I know she wrote an autobiography, I am excited to read it to find out more about her life before she became Mrs. Lincoln's dressmaker.  

eBooks:

• Born a Crime: Stories From a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah- This was our March book club pick. It was funny in some sections and terribly sad in others. There was so much about apartheid that I didn't know. I feel like I've heard about apartheid but never actually understood how terrible it really was. There were some ways Noah said things that really resonated with me and helped me understand circumstances I otherwise would have no way of understanding. 
  

Audiobooks:

• Wonder by R.J. Palacio- I wanted to listen to this one as an audiobook because I saw it listed as a great audiobook. It was such a good book. There were a couple times where I was struggling to breath as I ran because I was crying a little as I listened to this book. It was just beautiful. I got the movie from the library and the kids wanted to watch it with me. They both liked it. I think Carter would like the book as well.
  

• Lafayette in the Somewhat United States by Sarah Vowell- I love Vowell's books. I enjoy learning more about history with her fun little side bars and funny takes on things. The audiobook versions of her books are golden because she narrates them and gets comedians to fill in other voices. On this one she had different people voice famous figures in history. I loved that Lafayette had a French accent and Patton Oswalt did a great job with the voices he did. Nick Offerman voiced George Washingston which didn't feel right to me. I felt like Washington's voice would have been more dignified. This book made me even more excited to go to Boston and sight see!

• Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know about the People We Don't Know by Malcolm Gladwell- This was really interesting. I had it on my to-read list for a while and then a friend recommended it as an audiobook so I put it on hold and it took a while because it's pretty popular right now. I would definitely recommend it as an audiobook. I found myself wondering how it would translate to a regular book because there were quite a few audio excerpts from actual interviews, speeches, and podcasts. I found the content very interesting and it re-framed my thinking in some ways.

• Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie- This is one I will admit I picked because the cover was so pretty. I had no idea what it was about. I've read books about the rise of Isis and terrorism in the Middle East so this was an interesting perspective for me. I've never read a book that went into detail on how someone was brain washed into joining a terrorist organization. It was so terribly sad and the ending left me feeling depressed for a while after I finished it. On one hand I feel like it is a great book to give empathy for the poor young boys and men who desperately want to get out of a terrorist organization once they join, but on the other hand the ending was so sad, I don't know that I would actually recommend it to others. I am glad that I read it though.
  
• The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris- This book was so incredibly good. It was the first book I've read (or in this case listened to) about World War II that took place in a concentration camp. At different parts of the story when the main character survived an incident where it seemed obvious he would be killed, I found myself wondering if stuff like that ever really happened. Then during the afterward I found out the book was based on an actual person and the events in the story were told to the author by the man who lived them. It made me realize that surviving a concentration camp had a lot to do with luck but it also came down to making connections with other people so they helped you in difficult situations. The main character in this story was so amazing and had a charisma where even some of the German officers wanted to help him. One of my favorite parts of the book was the afterward written by his son which gave a small idea of the long term impact living for years in a concentration camp had on his parents.