sallylou61's reading of backlog

I am just beginning in this group, but am counting the books from my TBR collection which I have read this year. Many of them were for specific challenges.

Welcome and happy ROOTing! :)

Reading in January:

Votes for Women by Diane Atkinson (read January 6th for Alpha CAT V) -- purchased prior to Nov. 2007
Toward a Better Life: Americas New Immigrants in Their Own Words by Peter Morton Coan (finished reading Jan. 11th for GeoCAT -- U.S. emphasis on immigration) -- recd as gift, Jan. 2012
Doorways to Significance: Finding Peace, Power, and Passion by Pat Holland Connor (finishing reading Jan. 17th for Random CAT -- emphasis on doorways or gates -- purchased Mar. 2012

Welcome and happy reading!

Read in April:

Nadirs by Herta Muller (finished April 19th for GeoCAT -- Eastern Europe, focus on occupation) -- purchased summer 2012
Selections from the Religious Poems of John Greenleaf Whittier (finished Apr. 30th for RandomCAT -- poetry) -- had prior to Nov. 2007
A Child's Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson (reread after many years, finished Apr. 26th for RandomCAT -- poetry) -- purchased in England prior to Nov. 2007

Reading in May:

Ice Cream U: The Story of the Nation's Most Successful Collegiate Creamery by Lee Stout (history of Penn State creamery finished May 22nd for unofficial GastroCAT) -- purchased Jan. 2012
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini (finished May 27th for GeoCAT -- South Asia) -- recd. as prize, July 2013 -- I'm counting backlog beginning Jan 2014 so this title qualifies even though I had it less than a year prior to reading it.

Read in June:
The Quiet Rebels: The Story of the Quakers in America by Margaret Hope Bacon (finished June 29th for unofficial Alpha CAT -- Q) -- purchased prior to Nov. 2007

So far, all of my reading has fallen into some challenge. I also plan to do some reading just for pleasure.

Yeah! Already, I have added The Quiet Rebels to my list to read, as I was raised a Quaker.

Welcome! Nice to see you here :)

Read in July:
Wanamaker's: Meet Me at the Eagle by Michael J. Lisicky (read July 16th)

Welcome to the ROOTers!

Today I read Wanamaker's: Meet Me at the Eagle by Michael J. Lisicky. Although it was a short book, it would have been better as a article. Instead of concentrating on the main Philadelphia store which was noted for its giant eagle which became a place for individuals to meet and its well-known tea room and organ music, the author gave a history of department stores in the Philadelphia region with many openings and closings of branch stores. He tells why some of the once prominent large city department stores went out of business. The info on the back of the book jacket made it sound more as if the book would be a nostalgic visit to a store of the past, and thus the book was disappointing.

I have just finished reading On Rereading by Patricia Meyer Spacks, a book which I purchased at the Virginia Book Festival in March 2012 after hearing her speak. I enjoyed her talk more than reading the book, which I found to be heavy going -- probably because it is basically literary criticism which I am not familiar with.

You are making great progress! Keep up the good work!

Re 14: Thanks. I thought of upping the challenge to 25 instead of 20 books, but decided to keep it to what I initially set it as when I joined last week. A few of the books on my shelves which I'm planning to read later this year are longer than many I've read so far. At times I've bought books for various challenges or borrowed books from a local library instead of reading what I already have.

Read in August: Growing up with Dick and Jane by Carole Kismaric and Marvin Heiferman discusses the impact of the Dick and Jane reading books on learning to read, especially in the 1950s. It shows how these readers reflected life during that decade.

Interesting!

I've seen that book in a bargain bin before.....should've bought it!

I have finished reading Quakers and Nazis: Inner Light in Outer Darkness by Hans A. Schmitt, which has been on my TBR shelf since before I joined LibraryThing in 2007. This is a very detailed scholarly account of Quaker activity in Germany and to a lesser extent Austria, Lithuania, Holland etc., from the end of World War I through the end of World War II with emphasis on the World War II period. Quakers (Friends) in these areas received varying levels of support from British Friends and from American Friends, especially through the auspices of the American Friends Service Committee. Although British and American Friends came to Germany to help with relief efforts in the period prior to World War II, during that war itself German Friends were the only ones there. Initially Friends were given more free reign than other religious groups in relief efforts, possibly because they fed many Germans during the post World War I era who later became Nazis, including some Nazi leaders. I'm not very well versed in German history and found the account at times difficult to follow, especially since some of the same efforts by Friends were described several times in relation to Germany and then to Austria and elsewhere.

I just finished reading Angels in My Heart which I bought in the fall of 2013 from an acquaintance. It tells her story of having four miscarriages (and three living sons). The last sections of the book talk about the grief process and give suggestions of what one could say (and should not say) to persons who have experienced miscarriages. The angels in the title refer to the miscarriages; the author felt comfort in naming them.

#19- I'm interested in Quakers and Nazis: Inner Light in Outer Darkness. I was raised as a Quaker and I'm a professor of the Holocaust. Had never heard of the book before. I will be seeking that book out shortly! Thanks!

I just finished reading my first ROOT for September: The Whistling Season by Ivan Doig, which I read for a book club meeting later this month. The book had been on my shelves since mid 2008.

Keep it up Sallylou.

I have finished reading my second ROOT for September (which is my 16th ROOT for the year). It is Twelve Years a Slave by Solomon Northup. I've updated my ticker.

Getting closer to that goal!

You're making good progress!

I just finished reading After the Fire which discusses the problems of the Amish in Lancaster County, PA -- a rich farming area, which is becoming more and more developed to the detriment of the Amish. Mr. Testa, a Catholic who became disenchanted with teaching elementary school children of the wealthy in a private school in Colorado, lived for several months among the Amish and actively participated in their life on a farm; moreover, he went back every month while writing about the Amish. He did this study as part of a doctorate program at Harvard; however, the book does not read as a thesis. Much of it is vignettes of experiences he had and stories he heard although the last section deals with the politics of trying to help the Amish retain their way of life by opposing the selling of a farm for a large development.

I just finished reading The Children's Blizzard by David Laskin about the January 12, 1888 Midwest blizzard which took the lives of numerous children, many of whom were returning from school. The book focuses on the stories of several families and young teachers. Unfortunately, too much of the book is devoted to scientific explanations -- both of weather conditions and how they occur, and the process of people being frozen to death. The politics concerning late 19th century weather forecasting is also discussed.

This is my second November ROOT. Still have two more to read in December, which should not be difficult.

Just keep it up! You can do it!

Almost there! Your last 2 books sound like good reads!

I have just read Tea Time for the Traditionally Built by Alexander McCall Smith which had been on my TBR shelf for more than a year (and which I had started several times before); this time I started it at the beginning again. It is an interesting book, but more a description of the roles of men and women in Botswana than a true mystery novel. The mystery, why a particular football team was suddenly losing games, was rather mild.

Today I read A Wreath of Snow, a Christmas story by Liz Curtis Higgs. This is the first book which I have read by her, and I enjoyed it. I bought it two Christmases ago.

With this book, I have reached my goal. I probably will not read another ROOT this year although I definitely plan to participate next year.

Congrats!

Congrats again!

Hurray, congratulations! See you next year! :)

Congrats!!

A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!