(I’m here! A day late, but that’s okay.)

Happy New Year! Here we are in 2024 and I hope not a single one of you has said, “This is going to be my year!!!” We need to sneak in sideways to this one in the hopes that it doesn’t punch us too hard in the face, I think, because that’s about the only kinds of years we get these days…

I hope you all had a lovely month, whether you celebrated holidays during this time or just cozied up with a large stack of books and read, or merely just survived through tough times. I’ve been reading a little less, since I’ve been getting some other long-ignored projects done, but they’re projects that are making me happy, so I’m good with it, and I hope you’re also happy with whatever progress you’ve been making this month. Survival is progress, too. : )

Let’s get this recap started, shall we?

Books I Read in December 2023

1. Tehran Children by Mikhal Dekel

2. The Gypsy Game by Zilpha Keatley Snyder

3. Relax, It’s Just God by Wendy Thomas Russell

4. American Rule by Jared Yates Sexton

5. American Shtetl by Nomi M. Stolzenberg and David N. Myers

6. The Productive Writer by Sage Cohen

7. Sorry for Your Loss by Joanne Levy

8. The Jake Show by Joshua S. Levy

9. Personal Effects by Robert A. Jensen

10. Distant Sisters by Yehudit Rotem

11. Surviving the Americans by Robert L. Hilliard

12. There’s An Owl in the Shower by Jean Craighead George

13. Dear Miss Breed by Joanne Oppenheim

14. The Feast Nearby by Robin Mather

15. How NOT to Write a Novel by Howard Mittelmark and Sandra Newman

16. There’s No Cream in Cream Soda by Kim Zachman

Not as much reading as I could’ve done, but again, other projects, so that’s fine! A lot of these (at least the ones that aren’t middle grade)  were really, really heavy reading, too, so that probably accounts for my need to chill out a little. American Shtetl was just almost 400 pages of legal battles; I made it through, but I can’t say I enjoyed it all that much. American Rule was good, but took a bit for it to pick up. Personal Effects, a memoir written by a man who heads a company that helps sort out human remains and belongings after disasters both natural and man-made, was excellent, but again, a bit exhausting to read. Same for Surviving the Americans, a memoir by an American soldier who saw how terribly Holocaust survivors were treated by the American soldiers who were supposed to be their liberators (there was a quote in there from a survivor of the camps that just chilled me, and that survivor asked something like, “Other than the gas chambers, what’s the difference between the Nazis and the Americans?” That’s how bad the suffering still was. I had to sit and stare into space for a bit after reading that one). So yeah, it’s been a month of really heavy nonfiction, and my brain definitely needs to chill a bit. 

Four fiction, twelve nonfiction. Ten of these books came from my TBR. Speaking of which…

State of the Goodreads TBR

Still working my way down to zero! We started off last month at 43, and now we’re down to…

30! I removed two books that I wasn’t into anymore (one I tried and it wasn’t the book for me). I’ll finish this up in the next few months, though which month depends on how much my focus is on reading, and how much my focus is elsewhere. : )

Books I Acquired in December 2023

Hmm…you know, I don’t know that I actually got any new books this month! We’re not big on gift-giving around here (which is 10000000% fine by me; I’m trying to be more minimalist!), and no one in my family would dare to gift me a book anyway, because they’re never sure what I’ve read and what I haven’t, which is a good move on their parts. : )

Bookish Things I Did in December 2023

I did sign up for a virtual book talk with an author for Januaryqt; does that count? I just need to read her book before January 11th, which shouldn’t be a problem.

Current Podcast Love

Still listening to Leaving Eden as I do my volunteer work, and occasionally while I cook. I’ve also had on Casefile, a true crime podcast, to help me fall back asleep in the mornings, and it’s both helpful in that way and also interesting.  

Stephanie’s Read Harder Challenge

So, I’m not doing my normal Read Harder Challenge of getting a tougher book or a classic novel read in short chunks, but I guess some of what I’ve been doing can go here, since it involves reading that’s a little harder than what I normally do.

I gave up on the French grammar book I’ve been working through; it’s so crappily made and put together that if I hadn’t known exactly when I bought it (back in the mid-2000’s), I would’ve thought it was AI-created. There are mistakes all over the book; some are grammar mistakes, others are mistakes like, the answer key will have three answers for an exercise that has six questions, stuff like that. Plus it was boring, and I was dreading doing even a chapter per day. That’s NOT the way to study something, so I ditched the book, and I’ll pick up another one of my French books in the future.

So instead of dreading that every day, I grabbed my copy of Norsk, Nordmenn, og Norge by Kathleen Stokker and Haddal Odd, a Norwegian grammar book that’s almost entirely in Norwegian. My Norwegian is already decent enough that I can handle this (I wouldn’t recommend it for someone who’s just starting out *unless* you’re using it in conjunction with a class!), and as I’d already gone through a chunk of the book before, it only took me three days before I’d finished reviewing up to where I’d left off (about chapter 8, I think), and now I’m several chapters beyond that. I’ve been supplementing this with rewatching Season Two and watching for the first time Season Four of SKAM, the Norwegian teen drama series that was super popular a few years ago. I’d finished Season 3 a few years back, then never got around to Season 4, so I’m enjoying that now. (Unfortunately this time, I have to watch it on YouTube, as it’s no longer accessible to foreigners on the NRK site – which I VASTLY preferred, because there I could watch it with Norwegian subtitles, which really, really improves my listening abilities. But it’s still enjoyable with English subtitles on YouTube.) I’ve also been watching Karl Johan, a comedy show that’s all in Norwegian. Subtitles get better as the series goes on, but this show is hilarious, and it makes language learning a load of fun!   

It’s fun to connect with my ancestry on my Dad’s side by learning Norwegian and enjoying Norwegian content because I can understand the language, so this has been bringing me a lot of joy lately!

Real Life Stuff

Busy, busy, busy! Lots of language learning going on here during this winter break; I’ve really been enjoying this. Before my daughter’s school break, I was doing a ton of writing as well; my manuscript is up to almost 48,000 words, so yay, me! Who knows if it’ll ever go anywhere; I’m not hugely concerned with that at the moment. I’m mostly just trying to focus on the process and the joy that it brings me to actually be writing, and trying to make this a zero-pressure exercise. This isn’t an assignment, so there shouldn’t be any stress. It’s all about bettering myself as a writer at this point and writing the best story I can. : )

2023 hasn’t been the *worst* year. I finished 209 books, which is a pretty big number. I’ve improved my French, I’m improving my Norwegian (and enjoying it mightily!), I’ve picked up my writing again and have written over 11,000 words this past month. I’ve deepened my knowledge of and love for Judaism, I’ve attended a bunch of in-person services (still masked; we’re still extremely careful out there!), which has been wonderful. I taught myself how to embroider and how to darn socks. I’ve grown in knowledge, strength, and confidence in so many ways. And I’ve started volunteering with a local gardening group dedicated to sustainability and permaculture; I’m there two hours a week in the winter, and five in the spring/summer months, and lemme tell you, these people are some of the best people I’ve ever met. They’re friendly, caring, smart, dedicated, and utterly fascinating. I learn *so* much every time I’m there, and they make getting disgustingly sweaty, absolutely filthy, and covered in burrs one of the most enjoyable activities of my life. Truly an amazing group, and I’m so lucky to call these people my friends. : )

I’ve got a list of goals for 2024, including going through all of Norsk, Nordmenn og Norge; when I finish that, I’ll start the second volume, the Antologi, which I’m seriously excited about. I want to finish the first draft of my novel and start on edits (current word goal, for when we’re NOT on winter break, is 350 words per day, 5 days a week. And I was exceeding that most days, so yay for me!). I’d like to seriously start on learning to play my mandolin (with the help of lessons from YouTube, of course), and, obviously, there’s my regular yearly goal of reading at least 100 books. 

Reading will look a little different for me this year. Once I finish with the books on my TBR, I’m going to go back and forth with reading books from my own shelf and reading books that I stumble upon at the library – a little bit of mood reading, if you will. I haven’t been able to do that in years, and I’m looking forward to lightening up my reading a bit. I think 2024 definitely calls for that, and I’ll need the escapism that’ll bring, so I’m very much excited about all these changes!  (And no reading challenges for me this year; I want to focus on finishing the TBR and then seeing what comes after that.) Are you making any changes to your reading life this year, or are you staying the course? 

I wish you all a happy, peaceful 2024 filled with love, light, good health, safety, and stacks upon stacks of excellent reads. Be well, my friends. : )