April Book Update

I liked the way I kept track of my book reading last year, so I'm going to do something similar this year - just monitor books in and out, without any pressure to declutter or read things in order, etc. I'm once again setting a goal to read 100 book in the year - I read 102 in 2018. Otherwise, my only goal is to keep reading and keep enjoying books!

In January: books read: 9; books out: 2; books in: 5; books on windowsill: 59
In February: books read: 10; books out: 0; books in: 0; books on windowsill: 54
In March: books read: 4; books out: 0; books in: 0; books on windowsill: 52
In April: books read: 6; books out: 4; books in: 2; books on windowsill: 48

And here's the breakdown for this month:

• I read a few books on the airplane and in airports on my trip to the US (Sheltering Rain, Jojo Moyes; The Terracotta Dog, Andrea Camilleri; The Girl on the Train, Paula Hawkins)
• I read one book (re-read) while at my mother's house (Ever After, Elswyth Thane)
• And a couple of books after I got back (The Venetian Game, Phillip Gwynne Jones; The End of Summer, Rosamund Pilcher)
• I got rid of a few books from my bookshelf that I am not inspired by and probably won't ever read
• I picked up a couple of books in a charity shop and at the book sale charity table in a motorway service station (And the Mountains Echo, Khaled Hossseini; The Drowned Detective, Neil Jordan; a Rosamund Pilcher title which I read straight away, so it never made it to the list)

Here's the updated list of Books to Read in 2019. These are the books hanging out on my windowsill upstairs, waiting to be read. Or discarded. But hopefully, read. I started the year with 60 books on this list - you can see how long the books have been knocking around by the dates in brackets.

1. Ford Maddox Ford, Parade's End (Nov 2012 - birthday present - bought after the BBC adaptation - but I knew I wouldn't read it straight away as I wanted to let time pass from the adaptation.  Enough time has probably passed now...)
2. Elizabeth Gaskell, North and South (2014)
3. Gabriel Garcia Marquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude (would be a re-read, bought shortly after his death - spring 2014 - as I was reminded how much I enjoyed it and I didn't seem to own a copy - think my old one fell apart, probably...) 
4. Daphne du Maurier, Frenchman's Creek (Waterstones Piccadilly - 2016? bought in principle for the girls, but thought I might read it again as it's been ages)
5. Daphne du Maurier, Jamaica Inn (Waterstones Piccadilly - 2016? bought in principle for the girls, but thought I might read it again as it's been ages)
6. Susan Barker, The Incarnations (charity shop, July 2016)
7. Orhan Pamuk. A Strangeness in Mind (Christmas present 2016)
8. Andrew Taylor, The Ashes of London (passed to me by Geoff after he read it, April 2017)
9. Mark Haddon (Introduction), States of Mind: Experiences at the Edge of Consciousness (Waterstones Piccadilly, April 2017)
10. John Irving, Avenue of Mysteries  (Waterstones Piccadilly, April 2017)
11. Mikhail Bulgokov, The Master and Margarita (charity shop, April 2017)
12. Jane Smiley, Early Warning (Abe Books, May 2017, after finishing the first in the series)
13. Siri Hustvedt, A Woman Looking at Men Looking at Women (Waterstones Wimbledon, July 2017)
14. Lucy Worsley, A Very British Murder (Waterstones Oxford, August 2017)
15. Sebastian Barry, Days without End (Abe Books, January 2018)
16. Arundhati Roy, The Ministry of Utmost Happiness (passed to me by Geoff, Feb 2018)
17. Bella Pollen, Hunting Unicorns (Kingston Hospital Charity Bookshelf, March 2018)
18. Sebastian Faulkes, A Week in December (Charity Shops, March 2018)
19. Jose Saramago, Blindness (Lisbon, April 2018)
20. Margaret Atwood, Oryx and Crake (passed on by Geoff, April 2018)
21. Spark, Alice Broadway (Waterstones Wimbledon, April 2018)
22. The Mime Order, Samantha Shannon (Abe Books, May 2018)
23. March, Geraldine Brooks (Abe Books, June 2018)
24. Anything is Possible, Elizabeth Strout (Waterstones Wimbledon, July 2018)
25. The Disappearances, Emily Bain Murphy (Waterstones Picadilly, July 2018)
26. Salt to the Sea, Ruta Sepetys  (Waterstones Picadilly, July 2018)
27. Selected Stories, Alice Munro (charity shop, July 2018)
28. The Murderer's Ape, Jakob Wegelius (Waterstones Wimbledon, August 2018)
29. The Snack Thief, Andrea Camelleri (passed to me by Geoff, Sept 2018)
30. Even the Dogs, Jon McGregor (Abebooks, Sept 2018)
31. Islands in the Stream, Ernest Hemingway (Abebooks, Sept 2018)
32. Scythe, Neil Schusterman (Waterstones Piccadilly, Sept 2018)
33. Alice, Christina Henry (Waterstone Piccadilly, Sept 2018)
34. Throne of Glass, Sarah J Maas (Waterstones Wimbledon, October 2018)
35. Winter, Ali Smith (Waterstones Wimbledon, October 2018)
36. The Mistletoe Bride, Kate Mosse (charity shop, November 2018)
37. Milkman, Anna Burns (Waterstones online, December 2018)
38. Hillbilly Elegy, J D Vance (Waterstones Piccadilly, December 2018)
39. The Dry, Jane Harper (Christmas present, 2018)
40. Homegoing, Yaa Gyasi (Christmas present, 2018)
41. History of Wolves, Emily Fridlund  (Christmas present, 2018)
42. Theft, Peter Carey (charity shop, January 2019)
43. The Crossing, Cormac McCarthy (charity shop, January 2019)
44. The Music Shop, Rachel Joyce (Waterstones Wimbledon, January 2019)
45. Elinor Oliphant is Completely Fine, Gail Honeyman (Waterstones Wimbledon, January 2019)
46. Little Fires Everywhere, Celeste Ng (Waterstones Wimbledon, January 2019)
47. And the Mountains Echo, Khaled Hosseini (charity shop, Harborne, April 2019)
48. The Drowned Detective, Neil Jordan (charity shop, Harborne, April 2019)

Dinner, 30/4/19: Homity Pie (Leeks, Potatoes, Spinach)

Book 29: End of Summer, Rosamunde Pilcher (re-read)

A quick, pleasant read which I picked up at a charity table at the motorway service station on the way back from Birmingham. I've read it before - read most of hers, both short and long. 

Dinner, 28/4/19: Roast Pork, Yorkshire Puddings, Cabbage

I sometimes feel like the minute Olivia goes back to uni, we grab an enormous chunk of meat, like we've been deprived somehow.  It's really not like that (at least for me), but as Sarah is still home, and she really likes a roast dinner, it seemed like a good choice for today.

Year Long Declutter, week 17 (238 items total)

A wide variety of junk today, from various places. Some stamps and craft things I don't use; three pairs of earring I don't wear (studs - I have more, which will probably appear before long). A cookbook which I've not been inspired by; a tape dispenser which is really cute, but the way it's made, you can't lift the tape up to cut it with the serrated edge. And some books which I won't read again. 

Books in

A couple of books from the charity shops near where Liv's flat is, and where we ate lunch (in Harborne).  And one from a table at the motorway services, a charity table. I'll read the Rosamunde Pilcher probably straight away or tomorrow, so I won't even add it to my list. I've read it before, years ago. 

Book 28: The Venetian Game, Philip Gwynne Jones

This is actually the first in this series; I read the second after I picked it up in the RA bookshop (it has an art theme, as well as the Venice theme).  I love books about Venice, set in Venice, etc so I went back to find the start of this series, and enjoyed it. It also had an art theme - and it didn't ome out at all how I expected (some aspects, yes, but the main solution was a good twist).  I'll look forward to the third.

Dinner, 26/4/19: Courgette & Butter Bean Curry

This is an adaptation of a curry we've made before with courgettes & prawns, to allow for one vegetarian daughter and one who doesn't like prawns anyway. It was very nice with butter beans in.

Dinner, 25/4/19: Leek, Asparagus and Potato Soup

Someone, somewhere is good at taking photos of soup.  It's not me.

Dinner, 24/4/19: Spiced Sweet Potato Shepherd's Pie, Kale

This recipe was from a vegan cookbook, though I just used regular milk in the sweet potato mash, as we are ok with cow's milk in this house. It was a nice lentil pie - I liked the sweet potato topping - contrasted well with the Indian spices in the lentils. The kale was in my veggie box this week and was really young and tender - possibly the best kale I've ever eaten. 

Dinner, 23/4/19: Broccoli Pesto Pasta

A quick dinner, as the girls and I are going up to town to see Waitress - my birthday present from them.  (It's been a while since the birthday, admittedly, but theatre tickets work that way sometimes...)

Dinner, 22/4/19: Potato & Carrot Tart; Crunchy Bean Salad with Seeds

This is a great tart - we all love it - it uses thinly sliced potato as the base of the tart instead of pastry. Yum!

Dinner/Lunch/Whatever 21/4/19: Picnic

Various picnic fare, both bought and homemade. Large selection of cheese, as usual. I made spinach and potato pastries, cheese & pesto scones and a salad of mixed leaves with lentils, artichokes and goat cheese.

Year Long Declutter, week 16 (224 items total)

Cleared out my craft book shelf - these are books I've accumulated (mostly) for using in crafts. A few of them are very few pages left, so they went. And a few of them aren't things I'll ever use. Plus a few bits and pieces that ended up on that bookcase.  Also, a couple of cake tins which aren't useful sizes and some napkins we don't use much.

Dinner, 20/4/19: Potato & Cardoon Gratin, Spring Greens, Sausages

It's rare that I come up against a vegetable that I've never eaten, but our veggie box this week had cardoons in it. And that was new to me.   We used one of the suggestions in the box and made a gratin with potatoes - it was delicious. The cardoons look a bit like celery and taste a bit like artichoke. Might try fritters next time I get cardoons in my box!

Dinner, 18/4/19: Cheesy Leek Pithivier, Salad

Leeks, potatoes, cheese inside a puff pastry crust. With a mixed green and other veg salad. Yum.

Dinner, 17/4/19: Roasted Aloo Gobi

This is a cauliflower and potato curry, done in the oven. I also cooked the cauliflower stems and greens, which we really like, and added them on top.  With flatbread from our local shop. Yum.

Book 27: The Girl on the Train, Paula Hawkins

Another airplane read, and perfect for it. I had some trepidations about this as it was so hyped, but actually, it was a nice, solid thriller. And although I guessed aspects of how it would come out quite early on, there were other things I didn't expect at all - and the characters were good. It's interesting to have unreliable narrators. I don't want to say more in case there's anyone in the universe who hasn't read it yet, but it was very compelling.

Boook 26: Ever After by Elswyth Thane (Re-read)

Most of the time I spent in the US at my mother's house, I didn't read much. We were either doing things or socialising with people.  But I did pick up this favourite novel in a historical series and re-read it in the evenings before going to bed...

Year Long Declutter, week 15 (210 items total)

Again, I'm not sure of the precise count of this - it's probably more than 14. I went through my ribbon box and got rid of some I won't ever use, and then went through my box of textured paper and cleared out some of that. Some has gone to Sarah and some has gone in the recycling. One nice side-effect of going through the boxes is that I'm reminded of things I had forgotten I had...

Book 25: The Terracotta Dog by Andrea Camilleri

The second in this series (Montalbano) - I find these fun to read - I don't think I enjoy them quite as much as Geoff (they are a bit bloke-ish), but they are a nice gap-filler. This one I read largely in airports and on planes, which is perfect.

Book 24: Sheltering Rain, Jojo Moyes

A good airplane read - a well drawn story of a family with various family issues and secrets - not too challenging, but entertaining. Didn't last the whole flight from London to Toronto, but that's ok - I watched a film too... (And of course, I had another book with me.)

Dinner, 7/4/19: Roast Vegetables & Chickpeas with Harissa, Couscous

Year Long Declutter, week 14 (196 items total)

Again, I think these are slightly more than 14 things, but close enough. I went through all my sets of letters, and passed all of the larger ones on to Sarah, who might make some personalised birthday cards, etc - the really big ones are just too big for me to use, generally, as the sort of things I do are pretty small.  Gradually working my way through all my craft boxes, so expect to see craft stuff for the next few weeks!

Dinner, 5/4/19: Homemade Pizzas

Dinner, 3/4/19: Cheesy Bean & Chipotle Quesadillas

Dinner, 2/4/19: Courgette & Lemon Linguine

Dinner, 1/4/19: Potato & Rocket Soup