It feels like sooooo much longer than five weeks (the week before Christmas) since I last posted one of these round-ups. The turn of the calendar to February will be a welcome milestone. My thanks, as always, go to Eleanor for her faithful participation in this monthly meme, and to Marcie for spotlighting her recent library reads.
Since last month:
READ
- Reproduction by Louisa Hall
- Flight by Lynne Seger Strong
CURRENTLY READING
- King by Jonathan Eig
- Babel by R.F. Kuang
- I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy
- The Tiger’s Wife by Téa Obreht (rereading for book club)
- A Thread of Violence by Mark O’Connell
- Went to London, Took the Dog by Nina Stibbe
- Before the Light Fades by Natasha Walter
CHECKED OUT, TO BE READ
- None of the Above by Travis Alabanza
- Death Valley by Melissa Broder
- Brother Do You Love Me? by Manni Coe
- Jungle House by Julianne Pachico
- Cahokia Jazz by Francis Spufford
RETURNED UNFINISHED
- Undercurrent by Natasha Carthew
RETURNED UNREAD
- Stories for Christmas and the Festive Season
What have you been reading or reviewing from the library recently?
Share a link to your own post in the comments. Feel free to use the above image. The hashtag is #LoveYourLibrary.
Bookish Beck = Rebecca Foster. American transplant to England. Freelance proofreader and book reviewer.
Bookish Beck 
I’m struggling with my local library, it is only open on the days when I am not there. It also has recently bought some good books but they’re all checked out, and because it’s volunteer-run, it doesn’t really have a functioning reservations system! However, I guess this might work to my favour, because when I finally get to it maybe they will all have come back in again 🙂
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What a shame about the reservation system. I work in a completely volunteer run library in rural North Yorkshire. We are able to tap into the NYCC Library catalogue and order books in. Or readers can do it themselves by logging in and browsing the catalogue at home.
It’s a very popular service.
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That’s great! I don’t blame my local library for this as the only reason it still exists is because volunteers took it over when the council wanted to close it, but they don’t have access to the Tyne & Wear catalogue. Technically it is possible to reserve books from their own stock but it never seems to work!
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We have a local library that was taken over by volunteers and pays a peppercorn rent to the council. They have such limited opening hours that I have never found it worthwhile to join, but I regularly frequent their book sales (monthly).
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I can see how that would be frustrating! Are there larger city libraries you could borrow newer stuff from? And then maybe continue to support the local one by going in to browse and borrowing backlist books?
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We do have a city library in central Newcastle but it’s a bit out of the way for my daily routine, and I actually am much more impressed by the local library’s stock!
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Thanks for linking to my library post! I’ve not been borrowing as much as usual, for a couple reasons but…mostly because after the big snow it took three-and-a-half hours to walk there and back (it’s an hour-long walk normally) and the next day I discovered all kinds of muscles exist in my butt that apparently I have never used before in my life. 😮 None of the Above looks like fun in your stack! And I am shocked by the size of the Francis Spufford….isn’t that exceptionally long for him? Maybe I’m confusing him with someone else? I think my library has finally started to receive some of their fall orders, as I suddenly have five items to pick up, when I wasn’t expecting anything this week. Uh oh…
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Wow, that’s dedication to walk so far in the snow! I hope you did some good nature-watching on the way. I’m lucky my nearest library is just 10-15 minutes away via a pleasant walk on the canal path.
I was taken aback by the size of the Spufford, too. I think it’s 460 pages? (Which now counts as a doorstopper for me!) I’ll open it up tonight and see how I get on. Eleanor (Elle Thinks) thought very highly of it, so I’m giving it a try even though I didn’t love his previous.
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Thank you for always highlighting libraries! I’m going to set a reminder for myself to participate next month!
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I would love that 🙂
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I enjoyed None of the Above, I think I must have had it from NetGalley. Well, enjoyed might not the word: found it useful and informative. I am way behind so you’ve probably read it by now or discarded it! I’ve had a massive blog post cull so maybe I’ll catch up one day!
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I DNFed None of the Above, I’m afraid.
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That’s a shame. I found it very illuminating but it was also a work in progress as the author’s life seems to be, so a bit chaotic at times. And I’ve been doing a deep dive into trans and gender binary issues over the last few years, perhaps like your bereavement and medical memoirs one.
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