The Sunday Salon: New York!

  

Welcome! I am delighted that you joined us here at the Sunday Salon. 

What is the Sunday Salon? 

The Sunday Salon is a place to link up and share what we have been doing during the week. It's also a great opportunity to visit other blogs and join in the conversations going on there. 

I'm off in New York City with my friend, Rae, if all has gone well. Rae has always wanted to visit NYC, her favorite city in the world, but somehow things have never worked out until now. We are doing the two things Rae has on her NY bucket list: (1) go to the Strand Bookstore and (2) see a Broadway play. In addition, we are doing one thing I've always wanted to do: (1) stay at the Library Hotel. Wish us luck!

What I Read Last Week:

How to Listen by Thich Nhat Hanh

What I'm Reading Now:

A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens (Classics Club)

Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry (Reread)

Spying on the South: An Odyssey Across the American Divide by Tony Horwitz (Nonfiction)

What I Posted Last Week Here at Readerbuzz:

The Sunday Salon: Prepping for NYC

The 2025 Houston Bookstore Crawl: Then & Now Bookshop in Galveston

Taken in 2017 from my hotel window

when I last visited NYC for BookExpo

I began to list 3 Good Things every day during the pandemic. Now I've established a regular routine of writing down my 3 Good Things. Here are 3 (recent) Good Things:

Good Thing #1:

Birders at Quintana Neotropical Bird Sanctuary

Good Thing #2:

Ah, a mystery I might enjoy...

setting is near me 

with characters that are birders.

Good Thing #3:

Enjoying a slice of pie

at House of Pies

with a friend,

along with some House of Pies wisdom. 

Weekend linkup spots are listed below. Click on the picture to visit the site.

        

I hope you will join the linkup for Sunday Salon below.

The 2025 Houston Bookstore Crawl: Then & Now Bookshop in Galveston

I was delighted to participate in the Second Annual Houston Bookstore Crawl #HTXBookCrawl25 in April. Here is a map I made of the twenty-five indie bookstores in the Houston area.

How it worked: I picked up a crawl card at Then & Now Bookstore in Galveston, one of the 25 participating stores. I got my card stamped or signed by each of the stores I visited through the end of April. Once I visited 10, I submitted my card to any of the participating bookstores to be entered into a raffle for gifts. Every store I hit after the first 10 counts as an additional entry. The cards had to be turned in by the end of business on April 30.

April 26 was Indie Bookstore Day, and indie bookstores all over the US hosted events. Take a look at the map here to see what events were held in April.

Say hello to the Participating Bookstores:

Basket Books & Art · Blue Willow Bookshop · Books Abound · The Book Attic · Books by the Bay · The Book Readers Venue · Brazos Bookstore · Buy the Book · Candescent Books · CLASS Bookstore · Copperfield's Books · Dreamers Books + Culture · Good Books in the Woods · Good on Paper Books and Stationery · Gulf Coast Cosmos Comics · Houston Book Warehouse · Kaboom Books · Katy Budget Books · Kindred Stories · LIT bookbar · LIT Java Coffee & Books · Mossrose Bookshop · Murder by The Book · Then & Now Bookshop · Village Books

I visited twelve bookstores in April. 

Here is my first bookstore: 

Then & Now Bookshop began life as a pop-up bookstore in Galveston. It was always Lori's dream to own a bookshop. After working for thirty years as a preschool teacher and librarian, Lori, with a nudge from her daughter did just that.

Then & Now Bookshop

2118 Postoffice St.

Galveston, Texas 

(409) 502-2234

The owner, Lori.

What I bought there.

Texas Authors I've Met in Real Life

I have found great happiness in meeting authors and photographing them, 

like some folks enjoy seeing birds and taking photos of them.

All of these authors at one time were Texans.

Pinterest Page of Authors I Have Met and Photographed

What these authors have written...Katherine Center (Things You Save in a Fire, The Bodyguard, The Rom-Commers, and Happiness for Beginners)...John R. Erickson (Hank the Cowdog series)...Austin Kleon (Steal Like an Artist, Show Your Work)...Mary Karr (The Liar's Club, Cherry, Lit)...Rick Riordan (The Lightning Thief series)...Elizabeth McCracken (The Giant's House, Here's Your Hat What's Your Hurry, and Bowlaway)...Kinky Friedman (Elvis, Jesus & Coca-Cola, and Armadillos & Old Lace)...Stephen Harrigan (The Gates of the Alamo, Remember Ben Clayton, and Big Wonderful Thing: A History of Texas)...Naomi Shihab Nye (Everything Comes Next and There is No Long Distance Now)...Chris Barton (Shark vs. Train and What Do You Do With a Voice Like That?)...Don Tate (It Jes' Happened, Ron's Big Mission, and Carter Reads the Newspaper)...Christina Soontornvat (The Last Mapmaker, All Thirteen, and A Wish in the Dark)...Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni (Mistress of Spices, Sister of My Heart, and One Amazing Thing)...Sandra Cisneros (The House on Mango Street, Woman Hollering Creek, and Caramelo)...Aaron Reynolds (Creepy Carrots and Nerdy Birdy).

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. Each Tuesday That Artsy Reader Girl assigns a topic and then post her top ten list that fits that topic. You’re more than welcome to join her and create your own top ten (or 2, 5, 20, etc.) list as well. Feel free to put a unique spin on the topic to make it work for you! Please link back to That Artsy Reader Girl in your own post so that others know where to find more information.    

The Sunday Salon: Prepping for NYC

  

Welcome. I am delighted that you joined us here at the Sunday Salon. 

What is the Sunday Salon? 

The Sunday Salon is a place to link up and share what we have been doing during the week. It's also a great opportunity to visit other blogs and join in the conversations going on there. 

I am delighted to have met and spent time with Mae of Mae's Food Blog this week. What a lovely person she is, and how fortunate I am to have gotten to talk with her in real life!

What I Read Last Week:

New York Melody by Hélène Druvert

Going into Town by Roz Chast

New York: 365 Days by James Barron

A History of New York in 101 Objects by Sam Roberts

What I'm Reading Now:

A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens (Classics Club)

Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry (Reread)

Spying on the South: An Odyssey Across the American Divide by Tony Horwitz (Nonfiction)

My friend Cindy and I visited two bookstores this week to conclude my 2025 Houston Bookstore Crawl. We stopped at two of the oldest independent bookstores in Houston, Murder by the Book and Brazos Bookstore. I'll be featuring a bit about my visits to twelve independent bookstores over the next three months on my blog. 

What I Posted Last Week Here at Readerbuzz:

Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry: Book Beginnings on Fridays, First Line Friday, The Friday 56, and Book Blogger Hop

National Poetry Month: Gate A-4 by Naomi Shihab Nye

Some Great Books to Read for a Person Traveling Soon to New York City

The Sunday Salon: A Volunteering Weekend at Quintana Neotropical Bird Sanctuary and San Bernard National Wildlife Refuge

I began to list 3 Good Things every day during the pandemic. Now I've established a regular routine of writing down my 3 Good Things. Here are 3 Good Things from last week:

Good Thing #1:

First harvest from our garden this year.

Good Thing #2:

I brought home a

Painted Lady butterfly-to-be

from Migration Celebration.

Good Thing #3:

A 700-day streak,

learning Spanish, French, and Italian

on Duolingo.

Weekend linkup spots are listed below. Click on the picture to visit the site.

        

I hope you will join the linkup for Sunday Salon below.