Books Read in 2021

I know, I know... I'm extremely late getting this out.  It's been a very harsh winter both weather-wise and personally.  We Moved to North Dakota in the spring and started to unpack half the house. The house we bought needed months long construction during the summer to finish the basement where my son's room and my studio would be. In the autumn I received a rather bad burn when jars of squash in my canner exploded onto my face and arms. Then in the winter I lost my mother, my 2 year old great nephew, and my beloved cat, Midnight in the span of just two months.  I'll do a post on all that's happened later.  

During the first part of the year after we moved and while the basement was being finished, the only books I had to read were on my Kindle or on Audible or the few I bought along the way. All my books were still packed in moving boxes and stored in the garage... for so many months. I didn't realize how attached to my books I am.  I have to admit though that I think I may have read less this past year simply because I was unpacking, managing a remodel, unpacking again, and then towards the end of the year I became addicted to TikTok and Facebook Reels.  I know that it's just a symptom of the depression that I've been under but it's cutting my productivity.  It'll need to be brought under control.  Without further ado, here is what I read in 2021.

Books

Mexican Gothic - Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Untold Stories of American Indians: Encounters with Star People - Ardy Six Killer Clark

Vines (The Killer Book 1) - Brynne Asher (read 2x)

Midnight Sun - Stephanie Meyer

Paths (The Killers Book 2) - Brynne Asher (read 2x)

An Elder Lady Is Up To No Good - Helen Tursten

Devolution - Max Brooks

Gifts (The Killers Book 3) - Brynne Asher

Murder At Archly Manor - Sara Rosette

Viels (The Killers Book 4) - Brynne Asher

Trowel and Terror - H. Y. Hanna

Fronds and Enemies - H. Y. Hanna

Chronicles Of The Unexplained - Gary Gillespie (bought at iMagicon 2021)

Bridge of Souls - Victoria Schwab

Fifty Shades Of Grey - E. L. James (re-read)

Fifty Shades Darker - E. L. James (re-read)

Dark Stranger: The Dream - I. T. Lucas

Bottle Demon - Stephen Blackmoore

The Box In The Woods - Maureen Johnson

Spooky Creepy North Dakota - Lori L. Orser

Until The Tequila - Brynne Asher

Scars (The Killers Book 5) - Brynne Asher

Later - Stephen King

Troubled Blood - Robert Galbraith

Your Guide To Not Getting Murdered In A Quaint English Village - Maureen Johnson & Jay Cooper

Audio Books

A Keeper - Graham Norton

The Only Woman In The Room - Marie Benedict

The Mountain and The Sea - Kwame Dawes

Fight or Flight - Stephen King, editor

The Life We Bury - Allen Eskens

Interview With A Robot - Lee Bacon

Where The Forest Meets The Stars - Gwendy Vanderah

Short Stories

"I Own A Motel. I've Been Renting Out A Room To A Family Of Vampires" - Strange Dangerous

We Have Moved Again

 We are now in very sunny North Dakota. The sun is too bright here. It fades everything so quickly.  We've been here since mid-March.  We bought a house that needed the basement to be finished.  There were 3 months of construction and most of our stuff was still packed in boxes in the garage while the construction was ongoing.  This included all of my book.  I had no idea how much my bookshelves full of books were like a security blanket for me until this.  After 5 months of living here, the construction was finished in time for my birthday in July.  Then there was all the unpacking that then had to be done in the basement rooms.  We are only just now hanging photos and artwork.  Hopefully by Christmas it will feel more like home and be cooler outside.

Books Read in 2020

 Despite the upheaval that my family went through in 2020, I was able to get some books read although it was far less than I usually read.  I'd just come home so exhausted from my job I wouldn't even have the energy to read let alone be creative.  This year I have a more to look forward to and the adventures that come with it but I plan to make plenty of  time for reading in as many forms as possible.

BOOKS

The Air Raid Killer - Frank Goldamm

A Longer Fall - Charlaine Harris

The Hand on the Wall - Maureen Johnson

The Master Quilter - Jennifer Chiaverini

Gwendy's Magic Feather - Richard Chizmar

7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle - Stuart Turton

The Tea Master and the Detective - Alietle DeBodand

A Walk in the Woods - Bill Bryson

Every Heart a Doorway - Seanan McGuire

In The Shadow of Spinthrift House - Seanan McGuire

Ghost Money - Stephen Blackmoore

The Perfume Collector - Kathleen Tessaro

If It Bleeds - Stephen King

The Last Curtain Call - Juliet Blackwell

One Hell of a Ride - Seanan McGuire

No Place Like Home - Seanan McGuire

Married in Green - Seanan McGuire

Wave of Terror - Jon Jefferson

The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires - Grady Hendrix

The Neighbors - Ania Ahlborn

This House is Haunted - John Boyne

The Mystery Girl - David Gordon

A Tale from Paleface Creek - Robert F. Morneau

Granddaddy Gift - Margee King Mitchell

Duke Ellington - Andrea Davis Pinkney

Watch The Stars Come Out - Riki Levinson

Boom Town - Sonia Levitin

STORIES

The Fifth Step - Stephen King - Harper's Magazine Feb 2020

Batman and Robin Have an Altercation - Stephen King - Harper's Magazine Sept 2012

Everything But The Squeal - John Scalzi

AUDIBLE

Becoming - Michelle Obama

The Burnout Generation - Anne Helen Peterson

The Mystery of Alice -  Lee Bacon

The Last Emperox - John Scalzi

Camilla - Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

Educated - Tara Westover

2020

 2020 was a terrible year for most people.  For us it was incredibly stressful even before the pandemic hit.  In October of 2019 my husband lost his job when his position was eliminated.  We thought he would have a new job by the first part of 2020.   In the meantime, and this is going to sound crazy, we followed through with a trip we had planned to visit our daughter in Japan.  We spent Christmas and New Years with her (two and a half weeks total) and it was awesome.  But the job my husband had interviewed for, that we thought was a done deal, fell through.  

In November of 2020 my husband's father died unexpectedly.  He was then dealing with his grief, trying to manage his father's estate, and trying to find a new job.  I've never seen him so lost as I did in the months to come.  

By March 2020, just as the pandemic was getting a foothold, I had found a job.  I worked as a scheduler for a local hospital chain.  In the months that followed I learned to book mammograms, CT scans, ultrasounds, MRI's, and much more.  It was a difficult job keeping all the information for the 8 different hospital locations straight - each location had different rules for the different tests.  It was all draining for me as an introvert to talk to people all day long and my empathy continually got the better of me.  Everyone calling in had something serious going wrong in their life.  I'd come home absolutely exhausted.  But it was a job and it provided insurance and income for my family - that's what mattered.  

At home my husband at first had trouble with this role reversal (there was also this deep depression as well).  He had never filed for unemployment before.  Luckily he filed before the crush from the pandemic and lock downs.  He began keeping house and making dinner.  If I'm honest, he did a much better job of keeping the house clean and he's a better cook than I am.  He also had to keep track of the appointments and services for our son.  He began to see what it was like for me while he worked.  It was eye opening for both of us.  We were doing everything we had to do to stay afloat until better days come.

In January of 2021, after applying for over 200 positions across 63 different companies, my husband was offered a position as a Research Agronomist in Minot, North Dakota.  He's been there since the end of January.  We will be moving there as a family in a few days.  I look forward to this new adventure in an area of the United States of America that I've never been to.  Hopefully, I can get back to this blog and more creativity in the coming year!

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Books and Stories Read in 2019

 2019 was a blue-ribbon year of reading for me.  I somehow found time to read 6 stories and 45 books and listen to 32 audio stories/books!  I am especially fond of using audible to help me be more productive.  I can only listen to audio books when I am working - filing, cleaning, laundry, cooking, canning, etc. It has really boosted my productivity! Besides reading, it's been a busy year with so many ups and downs.  I hope that 2020 will be good for me and my family... and my "to be read" pile!


BOOKS

Threads of Deceit (A Vineyard Quilt Mystery) - Mae Fox and Jan Fields
Good Omens - Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
The Vanishing Stair - Maureen Johnson
Nobody's Secret - Michaela MacColl
Blood Communion - Anne Rice
Deadhead and Buried (English Cottage Garden Mysteries) - H. Y. Hanna
Silent Bud Deadly (English Cottage Garden Mysteries) - H. Y. Hanna
Myth Breakers (Gods and Monsters - Stephen Blackmoore
Greenglass House - Kate Milford
Fire Season - Stephen Blackmoore
The Secret Daughter of the Tsar - Jennifer Laam
Hunting Annabelle - Wendy Heard
Meddling Kids - Edgar Cantero
The Vanishing - Wendy Webb
Next Girl to Die- Dea Poirier
Wishful Drinking - Carrie Fisher
The Loneliest Girl In the Universe - Lauren James
Small Kingdoms and Other Stories - Charlaine Harris
A Certain Age - Beatriz Williams
House Rules - Jodi Picoult
Farewell, Dorothy Parker - Ellen Meister (signed)
The Cuckoo's Calling - Robert Galbraith/J. K. Rowling
Dorothy Parker Drank Here - Ellen Meister
The Silk Worm - Robert Galbraith/J. K. Rowling
Career of Evil - Robert Galbraith/J. K. Rowling
Lethal White - Robert Galbraith/J. K. Rowling
The Night Gardner - Jonathan Auxier
The Cat Who Saw Red - Lilian Jackson Braun
The Car Who Talked To Ghosts - Lilian Jackson Braun
Unnatural Creatures - edited by Neil Gaiman
Life As We Knew It - Susan Beth Pfeffer
The Dead and the Gone - Susan Beth Pfeffer
Tunnel of Bones - Victoria Schwab
I'll Be Gone In The Dark - Michelle McNamara
Finders Keepers  Stephen King
This World We Live In - Susan Beth Pfeffer
End of Watch - Stephen King
Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore - Matthew Sullivan
The Outsider - Stephen King
That Old Black Magic - Mary Jane Clark
Beneath the Ashes - Dea Poirier
The Trap - Melanie Raabe
Doom and Bloom - H. Y. Hanna


STORIES

"Mr. Fox" - Theodora Goss - Enchanted Living Spring 2019
"The House Wins In the End" - L. Chan - thedarkmagazine.com
"What Cannot Follow" - Eugenia Triatafyllou - Oct 2019 FiresideMagazine.com
"O Have You Seen the Devle With His Mikerscope And Scalpul?" - Jonathan L. Howard - Apex-Magazine.com Issue 118 March 2019
"Twas the Night Before Yuletide" - Emma Tuzzio themuseinthemirror.com Dec 2014
"STET" - Sarah Gailey - firesidefiction.com Oct. 2018


AUDIBLE

Stephen Fry's Victorian Secrets - John Woolf and Nick Baker - read by Stephen Fry
Christmas Eve 1914 - Charles Oliver
Suspect Zero - Richard Kadrey - read by Wil Wheaton
If Ever They Happened Upon My Lair - R.A. Salvatore - read by Wil Wheaton
Red Shirts - John Scalzi - read by Wil Wheaton
The Vampire Lestat - Anne Rice - read by Simon Vance
Harry Clark / Lillian - Dave Cale
The Audacity of Hope - Barack Obama
Zero G - Dan Wells - ready by Emily Woo Zeller
The Collapsing Empire - John Scalzi - read by Wil Wheaton
The Consuming Fire - John Scalzi - read by Wil Wheaton
The Seventh Bride - T. Kingfisher - read by Kaylin Heath
A Mind of Her Own - Paula McLain - read by Hillary Huber
Out of My Mind - Alan Arkin
Junk - Les Bohem - read by John Waters
Elizabeth II: Life of a Monarch - Ruth Cowen - read by Jennie Bond, Tim Piggot-Smith, Lindsay Duncan
The B-Team: Human Division - John Scalzi - read by William Dufris
Walk the Plank: Human Division - John Scalzi - read by William Dufris
The Ghost Brigades - John Scalzi - read by William Dufris
The Human Division - John Scalzi - read by William Dufris
Old Man's War - John Scalzi - read by William Dufris
The Last Colony - John Scalzi - read by William Dufris
Zoe's Tale - John Scalzi - read by Tavia Gilbert
The End of All Things - John Scalzi - read by William Dufris, John Scalzi, Tavia Gilbert
Rivals! Frenemies Who Changed theWorld - Scott McCormick - read by Josh Hurley
The adventures of Tom Stranger: Interdimensional Insurance Agent - Larry Correia - read by Adam Baldwin
Even Tree Nymphs Get the Blues - Molly Harper - read by Amanda Ronconi
Sovereign -Jeff Hirsh - read by Jesse Einstein
Mr. Mercedes - Stephen King - read by Will Patton
Skeleton Crew - Stephen King
Killer By Nature - Jan Smith
The Girl Who Drank the Moon - Kelly Barnhill
The Christmas Pact - Vi Keeland and Penelope Ward

Stumbling Blocks

When I was 21 years old I was working towards a Bachelor Degree in Accounting. Part of the curriculum for the Accounting degree included upper level accounting management and corporate accounting classes.  I sucked at these classes.  Math is actually not my strong suit.  One of the professors of an upper level accounting class would sometimes go off topic.  Sometimes he'd talk about personal things that bothered him.  On one occasion he spoke about how sincerely happy he was with his second wife whom he's recently married.  He followed this statement by saying that his first wife was nuts; that she'd been abused as a child (both physically and sexually) and that it had made her crazy.  He felt like it had been a bait and switch between dating and marrying her.  She'd seemed so nice before they'd married but then she just started having all these problems.  She was crazy and broken and damaged he explained, and so he'd left her.  He was miserable trying to deal with her but he was happy now.  He finished his long rant admonishing the young men in class that if they're dating a girl and they find out she's been abused that it would be best for them if they just left - as quickly as possible.  If she's damaged, then she'll just make you miserable.

 I sat listening to all this.  I could feel my face and neck turning splotchy crimson.  It felt like a personal attack even though the professor didn't mean it that way.  It made me question everything.  I was married and pregnant and trying to finish a degree.  It made me wonder if I should give it all up.  Just walk away and life alone on whatever job I could get with the Associates Degree I already had.  Just walk away now before my damage, my baggage could hurt anyone I loved.  Maybe it'd be best to just die before I hurt anyone at all.

I didn't walk away.  I went into counseling at the university I was attending.  His response was basically that if I wanted a happy marriage that I needed to 'put all this in the past' (meaning the abuse and all its after effects) and do whatever it took to make my husband happy (this included sexual situations as well).  This wasn't helpful at all.  I didn't finish my Bachelor Degree in accounting.  By the time my baby came I knew I wasn't cut out for anything other than basic accounting.  I also knew that if I wanted to be a good mother for my daughter I'd  need to find a different therapist.  This was in 1990-91.

A couple of years later we tried some marriage counseling, mainly because my husband said that if it helped ,e then it would help the marriage.  After two sessions it became one on one counseling.  My husband  just thought he didn't need any help but I did.  That counselor was through another university where my husband was working on his Masters Degree.  That therapist tried to diagnose me as Dis-associative Identity Disorder (DID) or Multiple Personality Disorder.  But then in the mid-90's that was all the craze with psychologists.  No other counselor/therapist/psychologist I've seen over the years has given me that label.  Still, it definitely wasn't helpful.

When I returned to school to try again to finish a Bachelors Degree I changed my major from Business/Accounting to English because I still had dreams of being a writer.  I did well in my classes while also juggling to be a good wife and mother.  I had a known/published author for a short story class.  As part of the class we would writer a story and after the professor graded them he would pick 2-3 stories that he would read anonymously in class.  He would use the stories as examples - either good or bad.  I wanted him to read my story.  I wanted the praise.  One day my dream came true.  He read my story and did say that it was well constructed.  After these few short words he, along with his class pet, proceeded to rip the topic to shreds (a woman recovering memories of abuse - a type of PTSD).  My face turned such a bright red.  I felt so humiliated.  I couldn't get out of the class fast enough.  I never tried as hard again in that class.  Not after having those two carry on about how the subject of abuse was overdone.  That there was an overflow of these types of stories.  Yes, the story was emotional and well written, but, oh, to have to hear one more story about a woman who was abused.  Who would want to hear THAT?!

I kept trying and through personal and group therapy I did get some help dealing with my personal demons (my damage, my brokenness).  I found therapists who encouraged journaling, writing, and art as ways to help work through issues.  I was once told that the journey to healing is a spiral that you move along on an upward path. Periodically you turn a corner and find yourself needing help dealing with an issue that still hasn't been dealt with. I've found this to be true at least for me.  Over the years when I find myself struggling and I know that I need help, I search out a therapist to help me.  I've learned that if the therapist isn't helping it just means that it's not a good fit.  It's not on me.  However, the words spoken to me early on in my life have been a stumbling block at times, coming back to me in deafening volume.  Indeed, our marriage has been difficult but the difficulties have never been one sided.  I am not the only 'broken' one here.  I've tried to be the best mother I can but I know I've failed on occasion.  I travel through life doing my best with what I have wherever I am on the spiral and basically that's all anyone can do.

First Book Attempt

I have been making up stories to entertain myself for as long as I can remember.  I wrote my first story around age 11.  However, my first attempt at a book had nothing to do with telling a story.  It was more of a hygiene and beauty guide that I hobbled together for myself.

I was an unpopular kid.  I was scorned by my peers for my red hair, freckles, doing well in class (teacher's pet), and my socioeconomic situation.  I never fit in because I never really understood how to fit in.  So around the time I was 12 I decided that if I just did the research on how to be poised and beautiful then everything would change. Of course, this was no My Fair Lady silver screen dream.

I checked out books from the school library about how to "do" the beauty thing (these books were from the 19050's - 60's as our library wasn't well funded).  I started with basic hygiene, grooming, and poise (posture, walking in heels, manners) and compiled the information from all the sources into a few paragraphs and a daily, weekly, monthly schedule that I felt was workable for me or the average person.

From there I moved to the basics of makeup and fragrance.  Unfortunately makeup was not allowed for me at that time.  I wanted to know the basics when the time came that I could.  I had a very sweet perfume (honeysuckle I think?) that my grandmother had given me at Christmas. The books said a lady would dab it on the wrists and on the neck behind the ears.

I wrote this self-help hygiene and beauty guide not only to try to level up to fit in, to try to make my peers forget the things they held against me, but to have something that I had control over.  I had no control of the abusive home I lived in  I had no control over rather my peers at school attacked me.  I could gather and coalesce information and ideas to improve myself.  I could try to improve myself despite all that was against me.



While the general plan to make myself palatable to my peers failed, I learned from the experience. First, I learned that you can learning amazing things through research - libraries are awesome for that.  I also learned that by gathering ideas and bits of information together, I created something new.  Put enough ideas, thoughts, imaginings, daydreams together and fiction is born.  Something new.  Something entertaining and amusing.  It was something that I could absolutely control.  It was exactly what I needed to survive through the darkest times.  Even today while I'm in much better conditions, I still need this - the act of creation - that is wholly in my control.