With Christmas falling on Sunday, that means Monday is a day off from work (nice!) but I still didn’t manage to get my blog post done in the morning.
I had to curtail Christmas preparations and celebrations due to coming down with a cold the week before. And, of course, being concerned that it was more than just a cold while this tripledemic of COVID-19, RSV, and the flu is in full swing.
I skipped some of the larger gatherings and wore a mask much of the time; we had air purifiers going, and I kept trying to open windows, but unfortunately the temperature had suddenly dropped below freezing again (although not as bad as in other places) and vocal family members prone to feeling cold wouldn’t let me let in fresh air.
Plus, as my husband pointed out, it didn’t make sense to run the air purifiers AND open the windows, as we would then be trying to purify the air of the Great Outdoors as well as our living room.
Being sick and having energy at low ebb, did give me a little more reading time, though!
Currently Reading
A Lot Like Christmas: Stories by Connie Willis
This expanded edition of Miracle and Other Christmas Stories features twelve brilliantly re-imagined holiday tales, five of which are collected here for the first time. – from the Publisher
Connie Willis is one of my favorite authors, and this collection is perfect for Christmas week.
Happy Holidays by Craig O’Connor
A collection of horror tales – one for each major holiday of the year – that I started with New Year’s in January 2022 and will be finishing this month with the Christmas-themed story. Written by a local author and self-published, Happy Holidays can be found on Amazon.
Santa Shortbread by P.D. Workman
Somebody is stealing Christmas gifts from the Bald Eagle Falls children.
Gluten-free baker Erin Price and her friends are on the case to try to unmask the Grinch and bring him to justice, and toys to the children. But time is not on their side. Soon it will be Christmas Eve—will the winner be the Grinch or Santa?
I usually like to start a series at the beginning, but I was browsing through the free holiday-themed e-books available through BookFunnel earlier this month and downloaded a few of them, including Santa Shortbread by P.D. Workman, #12 in the Auntie Clem’s Bakery series of cozy mysteries. We do a lot of gluten-free baking around the holidays, and this is the first culinary cozy with all g/f recipes that I’ve come across, so I was intrigued.
The author even offers a free e-book of gluten-free recipes!
Recently Listened To
Currently Listening To
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
An annual tradition…trying to find a new recording of A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens that I haven’t listened to. This version is read by LeVar Burton! I downloaded it free from Apple Books.
I am enjoying it, but I don’t think it’s going to displace my (so far) favorite versions narrated by Ralph Cosham and Patrick Stewart. LeVar Burton’s voice is a tad too kind and jovial for the darker, sterner parts of this holiday classic ghost story.
The Matzah Ball by Jean Meltzer
Oy! to the world
Rachel Rubenstein-Goldblatt is a nice Jewish girl with a shameful secret: she loves Christmas. For a decade she’s hidden her career as a Christmas romance novelist from her family. Her talent has made her a bestseller even as her chronic illness has always kept the kind of love she writes about out of reach.
The Matzah Ball (Harlequin Audio, 2021) is a rom-com that didn’t hit the mark for me, despite the great narration by Dara Rosenberg. As with In a New York Minute that I wrote about recently, the book has some funny lines and several comedic scenes, but the author tries to get too many serious points across (in this case about the male lead’s abandonment issues and the female lead’s chronic “invisible” illness) to keep the light touch and amusing tone required for a great rom-com.
This post is linked to “It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?” hosted by Kathryn at The Book Date. Check out the link-up party there for more book lists!
All look like fun holiday reads! Hope everyone is healthy – Happy Reading!
I hope you are feeling better soon
Wishing you a merry week!
So sorry you’ve been sick during the holidays! My son had a cold, but he just had COVID a few weeks ago, so we weren’t worried about that. Hope you can rest now and recover!
Connie Willis has a collection of Christmas stories?? That’s going on my list for next year!
We also used to listen to a different version of A Christmas Carol on audio each year – it was our tradition on the long drive home from Rochester after Thanksgiving 🙂 Haven’t done it since the kids grew up though – they drove themselves home this year! I agree the Patrick Stewart version is a good one.
I’m enjoying The Matzah Ball so far – since the author and her main character have MY illness, I am loving the matter-of-fact inclusion of it in the narrative – so rare!
Hope you can rest now, read a lot, and recover!
Sue
Book By Book
I thought of you, actually, as I was listening to The Matzah Ball! I liked that aspect of the book, but it also made it harder for me to laugh at the parts that were supposed to be funny, because I was too concerned for her welfare to laugh at the situations she found herself in.
Yes, the Connie Willis collection is an updated edition with some new stories of a collection that came out with a different title (Miracle at Christmas, or something like that) and I’m loving re-reading the old ones and reading the new ones. You definitely want this book for next year!
Aw, thanks, Laurie, for thinking of me! I get what you’re saying, for sure. I keep thinking, “She can’t do that! She’ll crash so badly!” ha ha I do, though, think the inclusion is SO important. It’s an exciting new thing for the millions of us with ME/CFS, to see our illness included in media/pop culture this way. I don’t read many romances or rom-coms, so I don’t have much to compare it to.
Thanks for the rec on Connie Willis! You know she’s one of my favorites!
Sue
hope you’re feeling better now. Happy New Year!
I’m glad you are starting to feel better but were able to get some good reading time in while you were feeling bad. I’m really enjoying A Lot Like Christmas on audio. I’m just getting worried that I’m not going to finish it before it has to go back to the library! My routine is currently disrupted and I’m not listening to much of anything. It did inspire me to watch the original Miracle on 34th Street though.
Enjoy your week! Feel better!
I hope you enjoy Santa Shortbread!