Even though I've been pretty much MIA here since June, I have still been participating in my real-life book club. It's been so nice to have one night a month to escape the craziness of my house and talk to adults for a while. These are the books that we read this year.

January - Wonderland Creek by Lynn Austin
February - The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah
April - A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson
May - A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
June - A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler
July - The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester
September - Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly
October - News of the World by Paulette Jiles
November - Circling the Sun by Paul McLain

Our Favorite Books: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. A couple of our members were reading it for the first time, and the rest of us loved revisiting this classic. Also The Nightingale. Such a powerful and well-written story.

Not-So-Favorite Book:​ News of the World wasn't quite what we were expecting. It was very well-written, but maybe not as gripping as we thought it would be.

Best Food Served: This is one of the best parts! We always have good food, but at our November meeting, we had warm, fudgy brownies for dessert, topped with peppermint ice cream and chocolate peppermint sauce. We all decided that we could easily eat that every time!

2016 was the third year that I've been part of an in-person book club. It's something I had wanted to participate in for a long time, and I'm so glad that I've found a group of people to read and discuss books and eat yummy food with me. At the end of the year, I like to look back at the books we've read for the year. I suddenly realized this week that I hadn't done that yet for 2016, so here it is now!

January - All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
March - One Mountain Away by Emilie Richards
April - The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion
May - The Boys in the Boat by Daniel James Brown
June - Etta & Otto & Russell & James by Emma Hooper
August - All the Birds, Singing by Evie Wyld
September - Prayers for Sale by Sandra Dallas
October - When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi
November - The Magic Strings of Frankie Presto by Mitch Albom

Our Favorite Books:​ Several! All the Light We Cannot See, The Boys in the Boat, and When Breath Becomes Air were books that we all enjoyed. They provided lots of meaningful conversation.

Not-So-Favorite Books: All the Birds, Singing. I'm not sure how this book made it on our list in the first place, but it was way too crude for our preference.

Julie of the Wolves is the February book for the Reading Together book club. I hadn't read this one in many, many years, so I didn't remember much about it. (The only reason that I know I must have read it as a kid is that it has my name in the title!) Julie is her English name; Miyax is her Eskimo name. In order to escape a bad arranged marriage, she sets off on a journey across the Arctic tundra. Becoming lost along the way, she befriends a wolf pack who help her survive.

I loved the glimpses of Eskimo culture and life scattered throughout the book. I was impressed with Miyax's resourcefulness as she fought to survive. I don't think I could bring myself to eat some of the things that she not only ate, but savored as a delicacy. I loved the way the wolf pack adopted her as one of their own, although I'm guessing it's not very likely to happen in real life. Surely wolves are smart enough to tell that you are only a human pretending to be a wolf, as you whine and grovel on all fours. But once Miyax was adopted by the pack, I enjoyed their protective and playful relationship. Wolves are fascinating creatures, and this book clearly portrays a way of life and a love of nature that is all too rapidly vanishing in today's day and age.

Little House on the Prairie will be my one and only reread for the Little House Read-Along. I read it back in 2014 and shared my thoughts on it then, so I won't write too much more this time around. When I read it the first time, I didn't even realize that it wasn't the first book in the series. I appreciated it much more this time around because I had actually read Little House in the Big Woods. I had already gotten to know the main characters, and I had some perspective on the Ingalls family and their background. When I read it this time, what stuck out to me was their willingness to get up and move. They had spent only one year on the prairie, and had just planted a garden. But Pa had no problem moving onto somewhere new (of course, the reason he decides to move is really his own fault, since he wasn't supposed to be living on that land in the first place). Would I be that willing to pack up the few things I could take with me, and leave my house and everything else behind? That would be hard enough nowadays, but they had to build an entirely new house wherever they decided to move to! I guess I'm too much of a homebody to have that sort of adventuresome, hard-working spirit. Just another reason to be impressed with the pioneers of that time!

I read The Year of Miss Agnes by Kirkpatrick Hill for the Reading Together book club. The book club is designed to be family-oriented, so sharing the books with your children is encouraged. Well, my child (while he does get a bedtime story every night) won't be able to show me his reactions until April (unless a few good kicks count). So I have no kid thoughts about The Year of Miss Agnes to share, but I'll share a few of my own!

I'm a teacher, so this story really resonated with me. Miss Agnes is exactly the sort of teacher I dream of being - she constantly has creative activities which make the learning come alive (and stick) and she does everything she can to help her students and their families. As a result of this, her students are inspired to go beyond what they dreamed was possible. I need to read a book like this every once in awhile to remind myself why I spend hours working on lesson plans and grading papers. The Year of Miss Agnes​ was just the sort of book I need to encourage me to head back into the classroom tomorrow morning refreshed and ready to teach!

I somehow missed out on reading the Little House books when I was a kid. I tried them and they just didn't interest me. I've always felt that I was missing something by never having read these books, so I'm glad the Little House Read-along has encouraged me to try them all!

I really enjoyed Little House in the Big Woods. The story was sweet and innocent, and I loved being welcomed into the Ingalls family. I'm also exceedingly glad that I live in a day and age where I have modern conveniences. I'm not sure I could survive doing all the work that Ma has to do to feed and clothe her family. We are truly blessed in the 21st century! Still, there are some parts of days gone by that we are lacking today - such as respect for elders and the willingness to work hard. Things like that should never go out of style. Fortunately, we can return to the little house and the Ingalls family to remind us how we should live our lives surrounded by the love of our family.

Two years ago, I made a New Year's resolution to start a book club. I had always wanted to belong to one, but there weren't really any available in my area. So I rounded up a few friends and started one! We read some awesome books in 2014. And 2015 was just as good. In case you're curious, here is the list of what we read this past year.

January - Pick any biography you want & share about that person with the group
February - To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
March - In the Woods by Tana French
May - The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd
June - The Hundred Foot Journey by Richard Morais
July - Call the Midwife by Jennifer Worth
August - Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee
September - House of Living Stones by Katie Schuermann
October - America the Beautiful by Ben Carson
​November - The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender

Our favorite books were the ones we could connect with the best. House of Living Stones by Katie Schuermann takes place in a small town (most of us live in one) about people who work in a Lutheran church (which most of us do). We also enjoyed Call the Midwife, as it brought back stories we had heard our parents and grandparents tell.

We had a healthy discussion about Go Set a Watchman in August, and enjoyed a little political debate when we read America the Beautiful by Ben Carson. Personally, my least favorite was In the Woods by Tana French because a graphic-ish murder mystery is so completely not my thing. Yet I can still say that I was glad that I read it. And shouldn't that be what book clubs are all about? Discussing and learning and growing as a reader and as a person.

Our first read for 2016 is All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. I'm so excited for this one, and for another great year of book club reads!

In the beginning of 2014, I made a New Year's resolution. This is a pretty common thing for me to do. What was uncommon was its success. My resolution was to start a book club. And this week, we just had our ninth meeting!

I know some of you reading this are book club aficionados. You've belonged to a book club for years. Others are rookies, or maybe looking to start a book club like I was hoping to. I don't have many words of wisdom, but I can share how our group went this year.

We started out with four members, and have gradually grown to six. Seems about the perfect size so far. Each month, we meet at a different member's house, and they provide the food. We haven't done anything fancy or themed with the food yet (although we did order Chinese food when we read Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet). Discussion about the book happens before, during, and after we eat. It just seems to flow around our conversation about our lives and other things. We usually refer to the reader's guide questions in the back of the book if there are any. At the end of each meeting, we pick the next book we will read, as well as where and when we will meet.

So we're not the most organized, plan-ahead sort of group. But I've discovered that book club is really just whatever works for you and your group, so we're going with this for now!

Here are the books we've read this year:

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer & Annie Barrows
The Help by Kathryn Stockett
Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford
Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline
Room by Emma Donoghue
Wonder by R.J. Palacio
The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand

The Book Thief and Orphan Train seemed to be our favorites. The Goldfinch was our worst read of the year. Our advice is to avoid that one, if at all possible. The one we just discussed on Monday was Unbroken. What a powerful book!

Lots of great books generated lots of great discussion. I can't wait to see what 2015 will bring.

I really didn't know what to expect when I began reading this book. If you haven't heard of King Solomon's Mines by H. Rider Haggard or don't know what to expect either, then I can sum it up pretty much in two words: Indiana Jones. Picture adventure, fighting, mystery - and all in a far away place.

Allan Quatermain and two British gentlemen venture into the wilds of Africa with a dual purpose - to find Sir Henry's lost brother and to discover the fabled diamond mines of King Solomon. Along the way, they nearly starve to death, nearly get gored by an elephant, nearly get killed at the hands of the natives, and nearly die while trapped underground. In case you can't tell, it's a rather adventurous story.

It was this edge-of-your-seat plot that kept me going. H. Rider Haggard did know how to write a good story. I have to admit that I almost stopped reading at the elephant hunt (shudder) and kind of skimmed the war chapters. But this book really does have everything, and I would imagine that a boy would thrill to it ever-so-much-more than I did. Many readers obviously have enjoyed Allan Quatermain, since Haggard went on to write fourteen more books about him.

It's not politically correct by today's standards, but it was far ahead of its time in recognizing the individuality and rights of every race. I enjoyed the Biblical connection, because I somehow never realized from the title that King Solomon meant the King Solomon. Is it that unrealistic that he had diamond mines in Africa? After all, his wealth had to come from somewhere.

Despite the hunting and the war (again, shudder), King Solomon's Mines really did have a good message about what and who are important in life. This message, and the adventures that taught it to Quatermain and his friends, are what make this story worth reading.

I'm so glad I've been participating in the Reading to Know Book Club this year. It's introduced me to books that I should have read as a child yet hadn't even heard of before. The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Goudge was one of these books. The Wolves of Willoughby Chase by Joan Aiken is another.

(It's also another book club book that I had some difficulty getting my hands on. The local library didn't have their copy on the shelves. They finally tracked it down in the Bookmobile, and said it hadn't been checked out in 14 years. How sad! Hopefully my checking it out bought it a few more years of life on the library shelves.)

The Wolves of Willoughby Chase embodies an element that all great classic children's literature has and that modern children's literature seems to be missing - simplicity. Life is simple and straight-forward, and the story is told simply and straight-forwardly. That doesn't mean that it's a happy book. A lot of terrible things happen to Bonnie and Sylvia. And you have to wait for the happy ending until nearly the last page. Life was scary and sad for them for a long time.

But I still came away from the book feeling refreshed. All the clutter of modern life was stripped away. Decisions were black and white; people were good or evil. Love and family were all-important. Loyalty to those you loved existed. Strangers would help you.

There's nothing wrong with modern children's books. But every once in awhile, it's necessary to read a classic like The Wolves of Willoughby Chase to remind us of the basics of life and how we should (and shouldn't!) treat one another.

It took some doing to get ahold of My Man Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse. None of the library systems around me had it (and there are 4!). I finally discovered it accidentally on an audiobook app I had just downloaded - Librivox. Otherwise, I would have been out of luck. I'm not a huge audiobook person, so I've only been listening to it when I go running. Which means, after nearly a month, I'm still not quite finished. Just half of the last story to go (so please, nobody tell me how it turns out!).

I also decided to read a paper Jeeves novel that I already owned during this month - Aunts Aren't Gentlemen. Turns out it's the last Jeeves novel written by Wodehouse, so inadvertently, I ended up reading Bertie and Jeeves' first and last adventures during April.

It was very interesting to see what had changed over the course of those 15 novels and what hadn't. Wodehouse's humor was the same. Bertie Wooster was just as bumbling and helpless as ever, and Jeeves is just as wise and resourceful as ever. In My Man Jeeves, though, there was a bit more emphasis on Bertie's battle for independence, although that only stretched as far as the purchase of a hat or coat that Jeeves disapproved of. In Aunts Aren't Gentlemen, Bertie was wrapped completely around Jeeves' little finger, even if he didn't understand him any better as a person than he had in the first novel. The other major difference I noticed was that Aunts Aren't Gentlemen had a lot of abbreviations that sometimes took me quite awhile to puzzle out. For example, "And life in a country cottage with the aged r just around the corner would be a very different thing from a country c with her. . ." Kind of brings the fluid reading to a halt. Whereas, My Man Jeeves didn't have any of these. Or it's possible that the audiobook narrator just read the whole word instead of the abbreviation for the sake of clarity.

Wodehouse seems to have found a formula, a style, and a voice that worked for him in My Man Jeeves, and he stayed true to form all the way through Aunts Aren't Gentlemen. It takes quite the imagination to think up all the scrapes that Bertie was constantly getting himself into, inadvertently or through his own foolishness. At the end of the day, though, it wasn't the plots that stuck with me. It was Wodehouse's laugh-out-loud wit, which I'm sure garnered me some strange looks as I'm running along laughing to myself. But who can help it, when confronted with such lines as, "The man looked like Clarence, only an earlier model. I concluded that it must be Clarence's father." Still makes me chuckle even now.

Confession right up front: I had never heard of this book before seeing it on the Reading to Know Book Club list. It took some tracking down to find a copy of it - my two local libraries didn't have it. I ended up having to request from the neighboring county's library system. I figured this was not a very well-known book.

Then I did a little poking around online about it. And do you know what comes up an awful lot when you search The Little White Horse? That J.K. Rowling said it was her favorite book as a child. I guess it's not that obscure after all.

Secondary Confession: I am incredibly sad that I didn't read this book as a child. This would have fit perfectly right between Anne of Green Gables and the Chronicles of Narnia. It's a book I would have loved at first reading, and subsequently reread repeatedly. I would have gladly retreated to Moonacre Manor whenever I could. Unfortunately, I had to wait until I was nearly 30 to have my first experience with this book.

And yet, the result is the same. I absolutely loved it. I will gladly reread it anytime, and I plan on getting ahold of a copy of my own as soon as I can. So what is it about this book that is as magical at age 29 as it would have been at age 9?

The characters - I would like a Robin of my own. And a Marmaduke Scarlet to cook me my meals, while we're at it.
The animals - Animals that are more than just animals. They are protectors and friends who will never lead your side. And they're just as intelligent as you always suspected they were.
The heroism - When Maria knows she is right, nothing will get in her way. Not scary heights or stubborn Black Men.
The romance - Who doesn't love a happy ending? And everyone gets one in this book by being united with the person they were always meant to be with.
The message - As an adult, I appreciate the balance between fantasy and God. Magic and fantasy don't preclude God. He is in everything, and it is only in putting Him first that we can truly find peace.

I am so glad to have been introduced to The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Goudge. And I am glad that one day, I will get to introduce it to my future children and watch them experience it for the first time. It's sure to be just as magical as my first read.