Nonfiction November is an annual celebration of Nonfiction. This year it is hosted by Julie (JulzReads), Sarah (Sarah’s Book Shelves), Katie (Doing Dewey), Rennie (What’s Nonfiction), and Kim (Sophisticated Dorkiness). The first prompt is today, and is hosted by Kim.

Week 1: (Oct. 29 to Nov. 2) – Your Year in Nonfiction (Kim @ Sophisticated Dorkiness):Take a look back at your year of nonfiction and reflect on the following questions – What was your favorite nonfiction read of the year? Do you have a particular topic you’ve been attracted to more this year? What nonfiction book have you recommended the most? What are you hoping to get out of participating in Nonfiction November?

Here’s an overview of the Nonfiction books I’ve read thus far this year. I usually get more read, but I’m a little behind this year!

My Favorite Nonfiction This Year – I’d say the best nonfiction book I read this year was Killers of the Flower Moon, by David Grann. It was an account of the Osage murders in Oklahoma in the 1920s. Tragic and fascinating. I would suggest it to anyone who reads general nonfiction or recent history.

Particular Topic that I Read More Of – Well, I read two each of these three subjects: Mental Health (American Psychosis and No One Cares About Crazy People), Incarceration (Incarceration Nations and Beyond These Walls – not pictured), and Scientology (Beyond Belief and Going Clear).

Nonfiction Book Recommended the Most – Lol. Sorry, I have no idea whether there’s any one book I suggest more often. I tend to suggest books based on people’s interest subjects.

What Do I Hope to Accomplish by Participating in Nonfiction November – I hope to find more bloggers to interact with

Summary: Castella Cresswell lives in a world that is different from those she goes to school with – her father is abusive to her and her 5 siblings, and they are encouraged to believe that he is a prophet of God. When she meets a boy that talks to her as if she’s a “normal” person, Castella becomes confused about what she should believe about herself, God, and her family.

My Thoughts: I’ve seen plenty of mediocre reviews for this book, and I’m not sure why. The writing was engaging, and I cared (and worried) for the characters. There was enough suspense to keep me interested all the way through. And the plot was, on the whole, believable. I believe that families like this are rare, but they exist. And what’s more believable is the way the rest of the town ignored the obvious abuse that was going on in the Cresswell household. Overall, I thought this was a good book, and I would suggest it to people who like teen realism.

I am considering having a year of Shakespeare next year. Potentially with theme-based trimesters:

Jan – Apr Comedies

May – Aug Histories

Sep – Dec Tragedies

Would anyone be interested in joining? It would be very informal, with trimesterly linkups to post links to your reviews.

Summary: Senator Sasse’s book describes how the breakdown of community due to advancing technology, changes in the way we consume news, and general changes in how we interact with each other has led to heated tribalism.

My Thoughts: I totally agree with Sasse about several subjects – especially how we consume news. Instead of reading accurate, important, and informative news, our media outlets and social media feeds are focusing on stupid, distracting tribalism. For instance, why are we focusing on whether Melania Trump slapped Donald’s hand away (or what she’s wearing) instead of focusing on major issues like healthcare and border security? Focusing on things like this is hateful, useless, and silly. Because we are inundated with this information, it is more difficult to find the important news. I also agree with Sasse about addiction to screens, and how it is causing a breakdown in family and friend communication. However, despite agreeing with his main points about technology, I found his chapter on technology too long for the point he was trying to make. He’s not an expert on technology, he doesn’t need to write pages and pages of descriptions of upcoming technologies.

I did not relate to Sasse’s argument on a number of points. For instance, he grew up in a small town and describes the breakdown of that small town culture over his lifetime. Despite growing up in the same decade as Sasse, I can’t relate to this loss at all. I’m sure it’s great that everyone was able to sit around every Friday night at a small town football game and chat about politics amicably. But that’s not the life I grew up in. How does Sasse’s argument about the breakdown of culture apply to great number of people who, like myself, did not grow up in that situation? Or am I not his target audience? I can see Sasse’s point that loneliness and lack of occupation leads to depression-like symptoms, which can then lead to hateful speech and focusing on the negatives of life. However, I have not been lonely or lacked occupation. Though I mainly avoid hateful speech (I like to think), I do lean heavily to the left politically. (In other words, I have my tribe.) So there’s more to tribalism than the loss of small town dynamics, loneliness, and lack of occupation.

I thought Sasse did an excellent job of remaining as unpartisaned as he could, considering his strong right leanings. Of course, he had to include some partisan points because he needed to talk about subjects he was familiar with (which is why he focused so much on the breakdown of small-town life when many of his readers will not be able to relate to that subject). But he did a good job of keeping it down to a minimum and not saying anything strongly controversial for the sake of his more liberal-leaning readers. I really admired his restraint on staying as unpartisaned as he could.

In fact, the only objection I had to what was in the book was one comment in which he used the word “schizophrenic” in an inappropriate sense, using it as an adjective to describe people who move from job to job in an erratic way. Misuse of words like “bipolar” and “schizophrenic” is one of my pet peeves. Mental illness is real, Mr. Sasse, and it’s painful. Misusing these words minimizes the pain people with mental illnesses (like myself) go through. I would say that this is not a partisan thing, but I guess sensitivity to others’ feelings (a.k.a. political correctness) IS actually a partisan thing sometimes.

Anyway, enough of my rant. I want to give the book 3.5 stars because I felt that it made some very good points, but had some rather boring sections (like the overly-long chapter on technology). I’d like to give him an extra half of a star for remaining as unpartisaned as possible, however, so I’m settling on 4 stars.

And it’s that time of year again! I’m participating in Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon starting 7am Minneapolis time. My goal is 12 hours of reading, though I usually pull off closer to 8.

Hour 0: I’m sitting here in front of my happy lamp, ready to start.

Overall Progress

Them, by Ben Sasse: 54% – complete

The Passage, by Justin Cronin: 29.5hr – 32.5hr

The Witch of Willow Hall, by Hester Fox: 42% – 52%

The Wasp Factory, by Iain Banks: 60% – 80%

Not much to report in my personal life over the past couple of weeks. It snowed last Sunday, which was a surprise to myself. I caught this picture well before it stopped snowing – so there was more accumulation by the end of it.

This being MEA weekend, I am spending Thursday and Friday with the kids. So far, we haven’t done much interesting, though today we plan on going to the library. This weekend, I will participate in Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon. My goal is to read 12 hours – which would be more than I am usually able to pull off for a readathon. But I like to challenge myself. 🙂

On the Blog

Over the past two weeks, I have reviewed Going Clear, by Lawrence Wright, Hillbilly Elegy, by JD Vance, & And I Darken, by Kiersten White. In a slightly hypomanic state, I felt the need to outline my reading goals for the rest of the year (I said that I changed my goal from 75 books to 60, but I have since then decided to add a graphic novel a week in order to make my 75.), as well as my reading goals for next year (which are subject to change). I also added a Nonfiction Challenge and a Fiction Challenge in order to diversify my reading.

Reading plans for the following week

These are the books that I expect to make progress on (though not necessarily complete) over the next week. The Witch of Willow Hall, Them, and The Re-Origin of Species ARCs. The Passage and The Wasp Factory are my Halloween season reads. And The Lies We Told is this month’s Book of the Month pick.

Completed

I finished 4 books over the past two weeks. Reviews for The Hate U Give and The Lions of Valletta are coming up next week. Beyond These Walls will not be not published until January, and the review will wait until then. Though I will say that I enjoyed it quite a bit.

Acquired

Perhaps I overdid my acquisitions over the past two weeks. I requested way too many books from NetGalley and Edelweiss, so my focus for a while will be to catch up on those ARCs. American Overdose, Fade, Bone Lines, The Patriot Bride, the Liberty Bride, The Cumberland Bride, and Beneath a Prairie Moon are NetGalley books. The Re-Origin of Species and The Torture Machine are from Edelweiss. Room and Steelheart are both Daily Deals from Audible. The Wasp Factory is a book I purchased because I wanted to read it for Halloween season. And The Lions of Valletta as a birthday present.

This update has been posted to Caffeinated Reviewer’s Sunday Post.

Summary: This is the story of a female Dracul of Wallachia. (In other words, I think she’ll develop into Dracula by the end of the trilogy?) In this first book of the trilogy, Lada and her brother Radu are taken hostage by the Ottoman Empire as insurance against their father’s uprising. Lada and Radu grow up friends with the Sultan’s  son, growing in power.

My Thoughts: This book had a slow beginning but picked up about a quarter of the way through. I wasn’t invested in any of the characters until then. But at that time, the characters became very interesting. The concept of a female Dracul is also creative and fun. It’s nice to see a strong female anti-hero. I am very interested in reading the rest of the series to see how Radu and Lada develop.

Now I will post some goals for next year: my goal for 2019 is at least 100 books.

NetGalley

I plan on reading an average of one nonfiction and one fiction ARC from NetGalley each month, for a total of 12 each in a year.

Total: 24, Running Total: 24

Award Winners

I plan on completing 2018 and 2019 shortlists for the Man Booker Prize and the Wellcome Book Prize. Pictured above are the books on 2018 shortlists that I do not plan to have already completed. The Wellcome Book 2019 Prize longlist will be announced in February, the shortlist in March, and the award winner in April. The Man Booker 2019 longlist will likely be announced in July, the shortlist in September, and the winner in October. Depending on how I’m doing on last year’s shortlists, I may read some of the longlisted books as well.

Total: 12, Running Total: 36

Studies

I am currently trying to educate myself with a variety of literary, philosophical, and historical studies. The categories are:

a. Scripture
b. Philosophy
c. World Literature
d. Meaning of Life
e. Judaism
f. History
g. Self Help
h. Myth

Total: 8, Running Total: 44

The Well-Educated Mind

I’m still working on the Well Educated Mind project, based on the list of books and discussion question suggestions in Susan Wise Bauer’s book, The Well Educated Mind.

Total: 12, Running total: 56

Miscellaneous Fiction

Total: 22, Running total: 78

Miscellaneous Nonfiction

Total: 22 Running Total: 100

Hey everyone! There are 87 days left of this year, and I’ve decided to change my goal of 75 books this year to 60 books. That’s another 23 books I need to read in 87 days, at an average of 1.85 books per week. 🙂 I have separated my goals categorically:

NetGalley

I have currently been approved 8 NetGalley books, and my goal is to finish and review them all by the end of the year. That’s approximately 1 book every 11 days.

Audiobooks

Rotating between fiction and nonfiction, I plan to finish these 8 audiobooks by the end of the year. Again, a total of 1 book every 11 days.

Litsy Markup Postal Bookclub

For the first time ever, I have signed up for the a postal bookclub through Litsy. In this one we join a group of 4 people. In November, we each pick a book, read it, and make highlights and notes in the margins. At the end of the month, we mail our book to the next person in our group, and receive one from someone else. Then we read, mark, and mail that one, and so on. As I have not been assigned a group and discussed what types of books to read, I will not venture a guess as to what my book choice will be. But this will be 2 books over the months of November and December.

General Reading

And my final 5 books will be these.

Summary: Vance reminisces about his Appalachian childhood in a struggling Ohio town. He describes why he (and people with the same poor white-kid background as he) switched from Democrat to Republican over the past decade. Despite this being touted as a book that helps you understand why Trump was elected, it was mostly a memoir and not a political book.

My Thoughts: This was an enlightening book, as it did a good job of showing how the attempts of the Democrats to help poorer people backfired on the poor white Appalachian folks, and why they would want a major change. Vance described how people flocked from deep in Appalachia to steel-working towns in Ohio before and during the Cold War. But when steel became a lagging industry after the Cold War, many people lost their jobs and struggled to find any job to support themselves. The welfare system (according to Vance) only made things worse, because it encouraged people not to find jobs.

I found Vance’s life story quite compelling, and his description of why his family switched from Democrat to Republican when they did was mostly reasonable. However, I wasn’t completely convinced by his argument that it isn’t racism that turned people  like himself against Obama. Vance claimed it was because they couldn’t relate to Obama because he was Ivy-league educated, from a big city, and wore a suit everywhere. That’s a load of bull. If THAT were their reason for not liking Obama, then they wouldn’t like Trump either. Unfortunately, that few paragraphs of the book colored my view of the rest of his argument.

Don’t get me wrong, I really enjoyed Hillbilly Elegy and it made a lot of good points. And, importantly, the narrative was interesting and always brought me back for more. And I would have been perfectly willing to listen to a valid argument about why their issue with Obama had nothing to do with race (I’m sure they have other reasons), but he gave a very poor excuse, which made me think it was simply that – an excuse. Vance literally couldn’t come up with a valid reason to say why they related to Trump better than Obama (other than race). This book would normally have gotten four stars, but I’m going to dock it .5 because of that big problem.