Friday Fiction: Looking Back at My Favorite August Reading

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What's On Your Bedside Stand?

If you're like me, what's on your bedside stand is books...usually three or four at a time. I love to read and, even though I try to keep them organized in multiple bookshelves and book cases, I inevitably end up with several selections on my nightstand. This August, I have enjoyed some particularly good reads and thought I would share with my readers. Perhaps you will hear a title that interests you!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cat_Who...

I've been on a "Cat Who" kick lately and decided to start at the beginning of the series in June and re-read as many books as possible over the summer. Just finished ,"The Cat Who Knew Shakespeare," a couple of days ago. This is one of my fave books in the series because the main character, Quilleran, begins his relationship in earnest with Polly the librarian. Of course, the resident detective cats, Koko and Yum Yum, manage to save the day (mostly with Koko's help) and feed Quilleran catly clues to solve the murder....although they cannot save the mansion. (Don't want to give too much away here...spoiler alert!!) If you love cats and you love mysteries then this is the series for you! The story lines are entertaining, the characters are interesting, the mysteries are murders but not told about in a "gory" way and the cats are a perfect combination of being smart and yet cat-like in a believable way. And, although the cats are an integral part of the books, they don't "take over" the human part of the story, in my opinion. 

This is another great read that I have not actually finished yet, but started in August. Are you familiar with Julia Cameron? She wrote a wonderful book around twenty years ago about unblocking creativity called, "The Artist's Way." In that book, Julia gives a series of exercises such as "morning pages" and "artist's dates" that are designed to unlock the creativity that each of us have, but that sometimes gets beaten down or hindered by aspects of our lives. I own that book as well as several others by this author. So, when I saw this latest creation about discovering creativity at mid-life and beyond, I knew it was for me. After all, I'm definitely at mid-life and felt I could use some unlocking of the old "creative juices." Although the exercises in the book are somewhat similar to those in "The Artist's Way," there is a new component called "Memoir" which allows the reader to think back over the years of one's life and allow those memories to be pondered and to possibly influence the morning pages and artist's dates. I'm savoring this book and not rushing through so my thoughts on this book are far from complete. Perhaps I'll write more about it at a later time. (Source of book cover-juliacameronlive.com)

How about you? Have you read some great books in August or over the summer that you would like to share? Hope you'll take a moment to tell me about them....or about anything else you would like to share!

Until Next Time,

Debbie