The Sunday Salon: At Home...At Last!

 

Welcome! I'm happy 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 plus it's a great way to visit other blogs and join in the conversations going on there. 

I can't believe it, but, after being gone four weekends in a row, I'm staying home this weekend. 

As you might expect, I'm way behind in my reading and blogging, but I hope to catch up this next week. 

What I Posted Last Week Here at Readerbuzz:

Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter
Weekend Cooking: My Food Tour of Italy
The Sunday Salon: Out of Town for the Fourth Week in a Row!

I began to list 3 Good Things every day during the pandemic, and 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:

Thank you, Emma, at Words and Peace,

for the handpainted "I Love Paris" rock

as my prize from Paris in July.

Good Thing #2:

We spent time with an inquisitive ostrich

at the Busy B Ranch Wildlife Park in East Texas

last weekend.

Good Thing #3:

Annie and Wyatt and I made a cake

and cookies for their mom's birthday

while we were visiting in Big Sandy last weekend.

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.

Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter

Today's Featured Book 

Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter

Genre: Fiction

Published: June 12, 2012

Page Count: 372 pages

Summary: 

"The story begins in 1962. On a rocky patch of the sun-drenched Italian coastline, a young innkeeper, deep in daydreams, looks out over the waters of the Ligurian Sea and spies an apparition: a tall, thin woman, a vision in white, approaching him on a boat. She is an American starlet, he soon learns, and she is dying. 

And the story begins again today, half a world away, when an elderly Italian man shows up on a movie studio's back lot—searching for the mysterious woman he last saw at his hotel decades earlier..."

 

BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAY is hosted by Rose City Reader. What book are you happy about reading this week? Please share the opening sentence (or so) on BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAY! Add the link to your blog or social media post and visit other blogs to see what others are reading.

Happy Friday and welcome to the FIRST LINE FRIDAY, hosted by Reading is My Superpower! It’s time to grab the book nearest to you and leave a comment with the first line.

"The dying actress arrived in his village the only way one could come directly---in a boat that moored into the cove, lurched past the rock jetty, and bumped against the end of the pier."

THE FRIDAY 56 is hosted by Freda's Voice. To play, open a book and turn to page 56 (or 56% on your e-reader). Find a sentence or two and post them, along with the book title and author. Then link up on Freda's Voice and visit others in the linky. 

'"Did they tell you that I'm sick?"

"Yes. My friend Orenzio, he tell me this..."

"I wanted to tell you to explain that I might seem...frank...When I found out how bad it was...I decided that from now on I was just going to say what I think...We'll make a deal, you and me. We'll do and say exactly what we mean. And to help with what anyone thinks about it."'

The purpose of THE BOOK BLOGGER HOP is to give bloggers a chance to follow other blogs, learn about new books, and befriend other bloggers. THE BOOK BLOGGER HOP is hosted by Ramblings of a Coffee Addicted Writer.    

August 4th - 10th - What fictional character would you most like to meet in person? (submitted by Billy @ Coffee Addicted Writer)

I'd most like to meet Atticus Finch. I'd ask him to run for president.

August 11th - 17th - Do you have a routine for getting ready to read? (submitted by Billy @ Coffee Addicted Writer)

I just open my book and fall in...

    

Weekend Cooking: My Food Tour of Italy

We are leaving for Italy in less than a month. In that time I want to learn everything I can about Italian food. To help me, I've collected these books:

Let's Eat Italy: Everything You Want to Know About Your Favorite Cuisine

The Italian Baker: The Classic Tastes of the Italian Countryside---Its Breads, Pizza, Focaccia, Cakes, Pastries, and Cookies by Carol Field

Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking by Marcella Hazan

How Italian Food Conquered the World by John F. Mariani

Eating My Way Through Italy by Elizabeth Minchilli

Pasta Pane Vino by Matt Goulding

Italy for the Gourmet Traveler by Fred Plotkin

Italy for Food Lovers by Rick Steves and Fred Plotkin

Have you read any of these? What should I read first? Do you know of other books I should read?

For more photos, link up at Wordless Wednesday, Comedy Plus, Messymimi's Meanderings, Keith's Ramblings, Create With Joy, Wild Bird Wednesday, and My Corner of the World.

Weekend Cooking was created by Beth Fish Reads and is now hosted by Marg at The Intrepid Reader (and Baker). It is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. You do not have to post on the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page. For more information, see the welcome post. 

The Sunday Salon: Out of Town for the Fourth Week in a Row!

 

Welcome! I'm happy 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 a great way to visit other blogs and join in the conversations going on there. 

I'm off again, out of town for the fourth week in a row. I'm headed for Big Sandy, Texas to visit with my son and his family before his kids go back to school. Can't wait to see them all!

What I Read Last Week:

I'm no sports person, but I loved the audiobook of sportscaster Mike Greenberg's Got Your Number. Greenberg chose a sports legend to go with every number from 1-100. I can talk books now with people with whom I am normally unable to talk books.

My last Paris-in-July book this year is French Milk, a graphic novel of the experiences author/illustrator Lucy Knisley had in Paris when she was almost twenty-two.

Jane Goodall is interviewed by Douglas Abrams in The Book of Hope. It makes me feel a teensy bit more hopeful about the world to think that Jane Goodall has hope.

A scammer from Romania takes everything from Mrs. Plansky during a late night call, but Mrs. Plansky will not accept her government's assessment that nothing can be done. Mrs. Plansky's Revenge is a gentle summer read.

What I'm Reading Now:

I spent July in Paris,

and now I'm off to Italy for August.

What I Posted Last Week Here at Readerbuzz:

Dreaming of Italy

Forgotten Backlist Titles

The Sunday Salon: Away for the Third Weekend in a Row!

I began to list 3 Good Things every day during the pandemic, and I found I greatly increased my happiness when I did this. 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:

G-granddaughter Lucy's favorite birthday present?

Happily for this G-Nana---Lucy loves her books.

Good Thing #2:

We had a huge turnout of folks in my town

to help figure out if we can fully reopen our Y.

Good Thing #3:

Hummingbird.

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.

Dreaming of Italy

 

Photo taken in 2018, during the trip my husband and I took to Italy to celebrate our retirement.

My husband and I will be flying off to Italy on September 4th. We will be going with my sister and her husband to celebrate their retirement. I plan to spend August reading about Italy, especially her food. I welcome suggestions for reading.

For more photos, link up at Wordless Wednesday, Comedy Plus, Messymimi's Meanderings, Keith's Ramblings, Create With Joy, Wild Bird Wednesday, and My Corner of the World.

Forgotten Backlist Titles

My Favorites shelf on Goodreads currently has 194 books on it. 

To Kill a Mockingbird is on my list, and I note that 5,775,578 people have rated it. The Hobbit...Harry Potter...The Giver...The Little Prince...all of these have been rated more than a million times.

I think these books are getting plenty of buzz.

What books on my Favorites list have been overlooked? Let me take a moment to bring them to your attention.

Do you like historical fiction? The best book of historical fiction I've ever read is The World is Not Enough by Zoé Oldenbourg, a French historian who specialized in medieval French history. The World is Not Enough is the story of a minor baron and his wife during the 12th century. Only 228 people have rated it on Goodreads...if you haven't read it, and you like historical fiction, I'd encourage you to add it to your list.

The fact that only 182 have read and rated Stephen Carter's brilliant book, Civility, and that a mere 1,376 people have read and rated Robert Reich's The Common Good---well, these facts say a lot about the state of our world. Yes, both of these are nonfiction, but the ideas of civility and the common good are qualities we desperately need today. Give these a try, please, if you are concerned about the world and you'd like to make it better.

It's understandable that many children's books haven't been read and rated on Goodreads; after all, how many children write book reviews there? Still, there have only been ten ratings of The Adventure of Treehorn by Florence Parry Heide? And just 135 ratings for Chancy and the Grand Rascal by Sid Fleischman? Good grief, why only 229 ratings for William Steig's Rotten Island? 

Please get past the idea that it's a western and read Charles Portis' True Grit. Today, please.

I know many people roll their eyes when they think about reading poetry, but would you trust me on this? Ron Patchett's book of poetry, How to Be Perfect, is ideal for the person who thinks they don't really like poetry, and, at 306 Goodreads ratings, it needs more readers.

I became a fan of the great Canadian fiction writer, Carol Shields, back in the early 2000s, and I'm sad to say that she is apparently not being read anymore. I hope you will seek out her lovely fiction stories, especially The Box Garden, Happenstance, Unless, The Republic of Love, Larry's Party, and The Stone Diaries. 

I can't wait to hear what books you love that are more-or-less forgotten...Please share them with me.

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.