WWRW July Link-Up

These titles are just the tip of the iceberg known as my reading pile.

Shadow on the Mountain by Margi Preus, a 2016 Caudill nominee, is a story about a boy named Espen who joins the Norwegian resistance during WWII. I love WWII fiction and Shadow on the Mountain is a solid addition to that genre. The character of Espen is based on actual events in the life Erling Storrusten, who was a teengae spy in Lillehammer during the Nazi Occupation.

Shadow on the Mountain is appropriate for any reader who can handle blood, shootings, beatings, and all the things that come with a Nazi story. Edmund can't wait to read it.

I was seriously scared at the beginning of Hidden by Helen Frost. An eight year old girl, Wren, waits in the car while her mother runs into a gas station. Gun shots. Someone gets in the car and drives away, not knowing about the child in the back seat. Wren hides in the car and then in a boat in the garage for days before  *SPOILER* she escapes and is rescued.

During her days of hiding, readers overhear conversations the driver of the car has with his wife and daughter,Darra, as well as hearing some domestic violence too. Darra leaves food and water out for Wren, while her parents think she must have gotten out of the car after the shooting.

Fast forward several years, Darra and Wren end up at the same summer camp. Wren has a happy family life, security, wealth. Darra's dad went to prison, her parents divorced, and she blames Wren for her woes.

Written in the girls' voices, the style of poetic verse changes back and forth. I didn't realize until I read the Author's Note at the end that the last words of Darra's longer lines tell another version of the story. Incredibly cool!  I love secrets like that!

Hidden is also a Caudill nominee, and though frightening at first, I think it would be okay for ages 10 and up.

Need picture book recommendations? Search the #housewifespicepicturebook hashtag on Instagram for everything we've enjoyed lately.

I'll be posting again next Wednesday. I have some new stuff from Pauline Press and Ignatius/Magnificat Kids to share with you. Susan and Lucy each have a review to share as well!

An InLinkz Link-up

WWRW: June Bundle of Books

It's been real busy in these parts. You know. May and all that comes with it, plus four birthdays at my house. I did manage to read a few books though.

Yes, I do bring books to my kid's baseball games. He's not always up to bat.

Speaking of Edmund, we both enjoyed Gerald Morris's The Squire's Tale. Our young protagonist, Terence, cares for a hermit with the gift of prophecy. When a wanna-be knight crosses his path, the hermit foretells both of their futures. Terence leaves with the future Sir Gawain as his squire.

Off they ride, to meet King Arthur and go on a quest. Like other Arthurian tales, some of the adventures are somewhat bizarre, but all come with a lesson to take away. Morris gives these ancient characters new life with flaws and personalities all their own. Terence is a kind-hearted boy and Gawain is a likable knight struggling to be noble.

This is not a new series. Just new to us. Back in 1998 the good people at School Library Journal wrote,

"Overall, this is a good story, well told, both original and true to the legend of Gawain, counteracting his lesser position in Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur. Readers who savor swashbuckling tales of knighthood will enjoy this adventure. Librarians will find a great choice of comic and breathtaking quests for booktalks."

I agree with those statements and with their assessed age of appropriateness as Grades 5 to 9. Edmund and I just got Book 2 of this series of 10 (hooray for series!): The Squire, His Knight, and His Lady.

The lovely Laura Pearl wrote a new novel for middle schoolers, Erin's Ring.

When Molly McCormick, new girl in Dover, New Hampshire, finds an old claddaugh ring outside the local Catholic church, she sets out on a journey of discovery about the city's history and Catholic heritage.

There are lots of heroines in this novel. We learn the lineage of the ring's owners while Molly makes a friend and works on a history project for school. Each of the women who owned the ring faced different challenges as immigrant, factory worker, single mother and widow, and star-crossed lover.

Erin's Ring is a sweet story with lots of Irish-American history and idioms. The Irish brogues are very thick and there is a glossary in the back of the book to help those unfamiliar with Irish vernacular.

I did note one anachronism is Erin's Ring.  One of the nineteenth century heroines finds herself on January 1st, bemoaning the fact that there is no Catholic church in town to celebrate the Solemnity of Mary. January 1st was the Feast of the Circumcision of Our Lord until 1969, when it was changed to the Solemnity of Mary. I know this because the pastor at the parish where I grew up joked that the diocese had been naming parishes after events in the life of our Lord. When our parish was built, there were only two events left: the Transfiguration and the Circumcision. But this doesn't affect the story in any way.

Erin's Ring is both shorter and more innocent than Laura's first novel Finding Grace, making it appropriate for any middle-school reader.

I'm trying to read more grown-up books this summer. I'm about a third of the way in to Jennifer Chiaverini's Mrs. Grant and Madame Jule. We are going to Galena later this month, and I have some distant familial ties to Ulysses S. Grant, so this historical novel is of particular interest to me.

As @reinventingmother commented on my Instagram photo, it is a little slow. Sometimes slow is what I need however. "Slow" allows me to take in all of the historical and political details of the time.

Mrs. Grant and Madame Jule is a tale of two women, both named Julia. One is the Southern belle, Julia Dent who eventually marries the quiet Captain Grant, and the other is her slave since childhood, Jule.  Jule was given to Julia at the age of four to be her playmate.

I was unaware that the great military mind of the North was married to a slave owner from St. Louis. The family politics alone are worth the read. Julia is the lesser of two heroines, at least where I am in the novel. She is naive to the feelings of the "help" and over-confident in her role as master/beneficiary.

What I like about this book is that it's missing the sex and graphic violence that I've come to expect from best-sellers. That's not to say that there isn't any romance or tales of the horrible treatment of slaves. Chiaverini does an excellent job with both without offending my delicate sensibilities.

Now for the monthly link up for people who found time to read books and write what they thought about them.

An InLinkz Link-up

7 Takes that are not Quick. Who are we kidding? They never are.

1.  Edmund has a blood circle.

In Boy Scouts, in order to safely use a blade, you extend your arm while holding the knife handle outward and turn in a circle.  That is your blood circle and no one should be in it while you are using a knife, saw, or axe.

Blood Circle sounds way cooler than Circle of Safety or Danger Zone or Safety Range.

Speaking of axes, I need to go to the Coinstar to cash in the last $13 Edmund gave me in change to pay for his very own Estwing E24A Sportsman's Hatchet .

Once upon a time, when Edmund was four or five, he ran in the back door and started opening all the cabinets searching furiously for something.  "Hey Mom, where do we keep the axes?"

You've come a long way, baby.

2.  Susan is getting her mane trimmed.  It's been far too long.  It is far too long.  It touches her plate at dinner, and that is just gross.

This is from last year.  I swear she has twice as much hair now.

I told her to google "haircuts for thick straight hair."

She said, "These haircuts are all for men!"  Sheesh.

3.  It's no secret that St. Jude has been all up in our business this past year, in a good way, and I'd like him to keep on keeping on.  But Jude is not on my list of Baby First Names (though it is on Patrick's list), and neither is his alias, Thaddeus.

Imagine:  Thad Thornton

Yeah, no.

Patrick said, "It would be tho thad."

That "tho thad" comment made me laugh hysterically, and is one of the many reasons I married this guy.

Gabriella has been vetoed by Patrick for 18 years and counting, "Because that's a beach volleyball player name."  Whatever that means.

If I could change one thing about myself, I would like to be Italian so I could have great skin, let go of anger easily, and use names like Gabriella legitimately.  Then, I might be a better singer and love cooking too!

4.  These are our baby name rules:

• We prefer new names.  I have over 100 FIRST cousins, and Patrick has a lot, like 60 or 70 or something.  (When people tell me they come from a big family, I try very hard not to roll my eyes.)  It's difficult, but we try to use new names.  

• The baby's name must include some terrifically awesome saint(s).  We've used St. Francis, St. Michael, St. Monica, St. Owen (besides meaning John, Owen was a saint and his best friend, St. Hubert, got canonized too), St. Catherine of Siena, St. Kevin, St. Therese of Lisieux, Our Lady, St. Rose of Lima, and St. Josephine Bakhita.  These are just of my cadre of faves, including St. Jude, so I can link this up with California to Korea's Three Reasons, right?  

Oh dear.  I missed Micaela's link-up window.  Tho thad.

• We never recycle.  Well, almost never.  For each child, we've picked a girl's name and boy's name, we use one, and the other one becomes "the name we would have named you if you were a girl/boy."  The names we didn't end up using were: Mary Grace, Maximilian , Daniel Patrick, and Austin.  So we've recycled one.  There is a growing contingent of people in this house who want to recycle Austin too.

• We don't abbreviate.  I'm Jessica, he's Patrick.  We use full names.  Though I would make an exception for a Bobby.  Or a Danny.  Bobby and Danny are such great names even on old guys.  Especially on old guys. 

•  The name has to sound good with Thornton.

5.  You might think Thornton is an easy name.  Aside from that sneaky middle "n" that gets omitted by careless nitwits, it's a classy name.  But not every first name goes with Thornton.

No relation.  No free gas for us.

Take Philip for instance.  Love the name, love the saint.

But Phil Thornton?  Say that five times fast.  If you're not hearing Phil Phornton, you're definitely thinking about my son, "Filth Ornton."

Ruth is also off-limits.  And I dearly, dearly love the name Ruth.  Love Bible Ruth, love my Grandma Ruth, but I just can't name a baby Ruth Thornton.  I just, I can't.

The same goes for the name Elizabeth.  Every time I say Elizabeth Thornton, I think of Slyvester the Cat spluttering all over the place.



I also do weird stuff like visualize potential baby names on a major league baseball card and fancy letterhead, because I have ridiculously high expectations.

This Matt Thornton is no relation, but the name Matthew has been taken.

As of this time, we have decided on 25% of the names needed for Thornton 6.0.  Every night, I suggest names and Patrick vetoes them.  It's a lot like the fairy tale, Rumplestiltskin.

He has a horrible memory though, so I rotate the ones I really like in my suggestions on a regular basis. Soon, he'll present one of my names as his own suggestion and voila! That's how I get it done.

Playing along with Team Whitaker's Baby Name link-up.

6.  Are you celebrating Fat Week yet?

I made a Tunnel of Fudge cake this week.  Someone asked me what was the occasion. I thought about it, and the fact that I wanted to use my new pretty Bundt pan wasn't good enough.  So I declared Fat Week!

Tell you what, making the Tunnel of Fudge cake from Cook's Country is a Labor of Love.  All that mess is for one cake.

All that mess, minus this:

This was just for me.

The recipe made far too much frosting, but nobody complained.

Oops.  After linking to the recipe, I think I may have doubled the amount of chocolate chips (I didn't have enough bittersweet chocolate) in the glaze.  Oh well.  That makes up for the fact that I had half as many pecans as the recipe called for.

Mmmmm...fudgy!

Throwing this out for Bobbi's Pinterest Party!

7.  

Let's count 'em up:  Jen's 7 Quick Takes, Jen's 7 Posts in 7 Days, , Kathryn's Baby Name Link-Up, also Micaela's Three Reasons (which I totally cheated on and did not actually link up to), and  Bobbi's Pinterest Party.

Purse, Projects, and Poop

First of all, I think I have a learning disability in technology.

All I wanted was to make a nice grid-like collage like Kendra did here, but I got this instead.  I'm working with PSE 11 on a Windows computer so if you have knowledge to spare, please share.  Kendra also has a cool graphic (that I couldn't make if my life depended on it), and a cool purse, and a whole lotta pens.

This is my favorite thing (not in my purse).  My purse itself.  It was a Christmas gift from Patrick in 2013 2012.  I love it and care for it and it matches everything (EVERYTHING!) and it holds all the things and will last forever because it was not cheap.

The color is cognac and the strap is just long enough for me to one-hand it over my shoulder.  The ability to one-hand it over my shoulder is key. I test-drove a lot of purses to get this feature. One strap is important too.  Very important.

Here are it's contents.

Here are the things made from paper:  receipt, notes from a meeting, Kleenex, trash, February Magnificat,
and coupons held with a butterfly clip.  Need a tissue at church? I'm your gal.  But it might be crusty.

These are the things I need because I live in Chicago and it's February:  gloves that work with my iPhone and sunglasses, mine and Jill's.  Sun glares off snow something fierce.

Hand things.  Pen, hand cream, and epi-pen for Edmund's peanut allergy. Actually, I don't know why the epi-pen is in this photo, maybe because it's a pen?

Because I'm a girl:  face powder and FIVE items for my lips.  I am addicted to these new chubby sticks from Clinique.  They don't have the best names, but they do have the best colors.  Chunkiest Chili is my favorite. See what I mean by bad names?

These are the only essential things in my purse.  Well, these and the epi-pen.  Wallet, keys (with my Masters key fob from Augusta when I saw Bubba Watson tee off.  He won that year!), and phone.

Because I'm a mom.  That epi-pen and this tiny notebook for Jill to scribble on in Mass.

That shouldn't be in there!  Peter's keys, embroidery floss, Cub Scout patches which I won't be sewing on any red vests.  That Arrow of Light will go on Edmund's new khaki Boy Scout shirt, but Cub Scouts is ovah!

Because I'm Catholic.  That Magnificat again, and my rosary.  My grandma gave me this ruby red rosary right before I left for my Rome semester in college.  Clinton was elected for the first time while I was there, so it was quite awhile ago.

The embroidery floss from up above was for this project for Cari:

I tried to do lettering that said, "Thank you for your service."  It turns out that lettering is way harder than it looks.  Just getting it straight proved impossible for me, so I ripped it out.

I love her hair.  Those are bullion knots, which were fun to do.  Yes, I need to wash the transfer ink off before I mail it.  Noses are also impossible to embroidered.

It seems I'm a sucker for all of Cari's projects because I went outside today.  I'm officially trying to hibernate, so it's rare for me to leave the house.  I went outside, slipping on the sliding ice, to get this dreadfully dreary picture of a fence.  I did not include the garbage cans, but it's still depressing.

I spy a hockey stick, an extension cord, a rusty pot hook from the previous owners, and ohmygosh that's not...oh it is, it really is a dog turd.  If Cari's fence photo has feces, mine does too.

I also spy Sunlight!

Linking up with Kendra and Cari and Jen.  Tomorrow, I think I can do even MORE link-ups in one post. Stay tuned!