I spent the morning having a socially distant visit with my 84-old mom who lives in town. I talk to her once a week on the phone, and the four of the kids that are local take turns going to the store for her or taking her to the bank because she doesn’t use credit cards. Yesterday I got a text from my developmentally disabled oldest sister while she was on break from work (and lives with Mom), saying that Mom’s landline wasn’t working. That’s a big problem, because in a house where cell phones can’t get a signal (not that my mother would have a cell phone, anyway), and there’s no wifi (or computers), just cable TV and a landline, there’s no way for my mom to communicate with the outside world. So I went over there to fix the problem but couldn’t stay for a visit. Mom asked me to bring her to the bank today because she won $50 in the Publisher’s Clearinghouse Sweepstakes (see, people really do win sometimes) and then we sat down and had a good visit. I came home with a couple loaves of home made chocolate chip banana bread, so life is good. If I don’t visit many other WWW posts today due to time constraints, I apologize. As you know, mothers always come first. I’ll try to catch up when I can.

It’s also WWW Wednesday, so let’s get to it:

The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

What are you currently reading?

Just As I am by Cicely Tyson (Amazon)(AbeBooks) . I’ve known Tyson ever since I was a just-turned four year old watching Roots (Amazon) with my family when it premiered the week after my birthday in 1977. And then I got to know her when my oldest sister, who used to read to me, read me The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman (Amazon) (AbeBooks) after watching her on TV (available to rent on Amazon Prime Video; luckily I bought the DVD last year when it was only $5 because now it is out of print) in the role. And who could forget Cicely’s portrayal of Sipsie in Fried Green Tomatoes? So you could say I knew a lot about her work, but not a lot about her life when I picked up the book. It’s a compelling story that was finally published just two days before the 96-year old actress and activist’s death last month. It’s a page turner for sure! I’m taking my time with this book because of the important messages the book relays.

On audiobook, Borrower of the Night (Vicky Bliss Mystery #1) by Elizabeth Peters (Amazon) (AbeBooks). Years ago, when I first started embracing books on tape (yes, that’s how long ago, on cassette tape, just after I married in 1998), I discovered Elizabeth Peters and her writing and fell in love with her stories through the narration of Barbara Rosenblatt. She does equally as well as tough-talking 1970’s feminist Vicky Bliss as she does Victorian English Egyptologist Amelia Peabody Emerson. The first books I bought when I joined Audible.com were hers, because the library had slowly taken the audiocassettes and CDs out of rotation. Another book blogger I follow is currently reading the Amelia Peabody’s for the first time and reviewing them, and that got me nostalgic to do the same. But to not step on any toes, I decided to start with Vicky’s mysteries.

What did you recently finish reading?

Books with Reviews this past week:

The Mystery of Mrs. Christie by Marie Benedict a novel supposing what really happened during Agatha Christie’s 11-day disappearance in 1926 when she was already a well-known author.

That Time of Year: A Minnesota Life by Garrison Keillor The author of the Lake Wobegon Days books (Amazon) (AbeBooks) and host of A Prairie Home Companion on public radio for 40 years (you can listen to old shows here) wrote a memoir that’s just as funny and poignant as his other works.

The Sign in the Smoke (Nancy Drew Diaries #12) by Carolyn Keene

Instant Replay: The Green Bay Diary of Jerry Kramer Seriously, any sports fan would like this book, not just Green Bay Packers or American football fans.

Football for a Buck: The Crazy Rise and Crazier Demise of the USFL by Jeff Pearlman Such a good book if you like football and are dubious about our former president and his role in the upstart league that wasn’t meant to take on the NFL until he came along.

Under a Gilded Moon (Amazon)(AbeBooks) was offered as part of Amazon’s First Reads program and I picked it up for free several months ago and then they had the audiobook version for only $1.99 so I bought that, too. Review to come tomorrow.

The Clue in the Crumbling Wall (Amazon) (AbeBooks), was first written in 1945, and was revised in 1973. There were no major re-writes for this story, as there were for several of the early volumes so I usually just skim the revised text to see if there were any major changes. Review to come, as always, on Friday.

What do you think you’ll read next?

The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman (Amazon) (AbeBooks), as mentioned above. I read it several times in my youth, and last spring, when my nephew finally moved out of our basement and I put out all the children’s books I had boxed up for years out for display, I realized I didn’t have my original copy from all those years ago. So I bought the book and DVD and plan to do a comparison review. My hope was to do it during February since it is Black History Month, but don’t know if I’ll have time to complete both by then.

On Audiobook, I’m planning on listening to No Filter: The Inside Story of Instagram by Sarah Frier (Amazon) (AbeBooks). Just as Facebook, The Inside Story was an interesting listen (read my review here), I anticipate this book to be just as compelling. I’m not a huge fan of Instagram even though I have a Bookstagram account. I may get a lot of likes on a post, but what I really want is to drive people to this site, and that’s not how people react; they simply like the photo and scroll on. I’m not creative enough to constantly take pictures of books with dried flowers and sea shells and cups of coffee and tea and other nick knacks like some people. (I’m not knocking those that do; I admire the photos, I just don’t have the photography skills or the props to pull them off myself!)

What are you reading? Do you have any recommendations? Drop your list in the comments. Thanks for stopping by!

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