Lost & Found: January at the Reader's Nook
Dear reader,
Welcome to a new year, a new set of book bingo prompts {which you can find here}, and another year filled with bookish delights!
It’s a brand new year, so let’s talk goals.
I usually set a reading goal on Goodreads — my goal for this year is 40 books. It’s been set at 40 books since a couple of years, actually, even though I usually end up reading a lot more than that. This year, I thought I’d bump that number up to 50, but I immediately felt anxious about it, so back down to 40 it went. After all, there’s no point in stressing yourself out over something that you enjoy doing!
I’ve already read 5 books this year, which puts me 3 books ahead of schedule. How cool is that? ;-) As usual, you will find the reading wrap-up on my blog.
This year, I’ve also given myself a goal of reading taking a deep dive with 1 non-fiction book each quarter. The idea is to read, make notes, and then take some of the ideas/concepts to my journal or blog and think about it deeply + see how I can apply it to the way I approach life.
Your turn: What are your reading goals for this year? Do tell me in the comments {or simply reply to this email}.
Recommendation corner:
Have some of the bingo prompts got you scratching your head, wondering what to read or maybe even what it means? I got you covered! Every month, I will pick 2 bingo prompts and share a couple of recommendations with you. And just so you’re not here all day reading this, I’ll link you up to Goodreads so you can check out the book and add it to your Want-to-read shelf. Here we go!
Nominated for the 2024 Goodreads Choice Awards
Go through the Goodreads Choice Awards nominees across your favorites genres and pick a book for this prompt! Here are a few of my favorites to get you started:
The Lion Women of Tehran by Marjan Kamali (Historical fiction): A heartfelt novel of friendship, betrayal, and redemption set against three transformative decades in Tehran, Iran. You can read my review here.
Margo’s Got Money Troubles by Rufi Thorpe (Fiction): A bold, laugh-out-loud funny, and heartwarming story about one young woman’s attempt to navigate adulthood, new motherhood, and her meager bank account in our increasingly online world.
All The Colors of the Dark by Chris Whitaker (Mystery & Thrillers): A missing person mystery, a serial killer thriller, a love story, a unique twist on each, Chris Whitaker has written a novel about what lurks in the shadows of obsession, and the blinding light of hope.
The Book of Doors by Gareth Brown (Debut novel): A debut novel full of magic, adventure, and romance, The Book of Doors opens up a thrilling world of contemporary fantasy for readers of The Midnight Library, The Invisible Life of Addie Larue, The Night Circus, and any modern story that mixes the wonder of the unknown with just a tinge of darkness.
Meditations for Mortals by Oliver Burkeman (Non-fiction): Meditations for Mortals takes us on a liberating journey towards a more meaningful life – one that begins not with fantasies of the ideal existence, but with the reality in which we actually find ourselves.
A memoir
Memoirs come in many varieties and flavors: from celebrity memoirs, to writers, artists, bloggers, and the family-next-door penning stories and wisdom gained from their life. Here are a few suggestions to get you started.
Ingrained: The Making of a Craftsman by Callum Robinson: The eldest son of a master woodworker, Callum Robinson spent his childhood surrounded by wood and trees, absorbing lessons in his father’s workshop. In time he became his father’s apprentice, helping to create exquisite bespoke objects. But eventually the need to find his own path—to chase ever bigger and more commercial projects and establish a workshop of his own. Faced with the end of his business and everything he had worked so hard to build, he was forced to question what mattered most. In beautifully wrought prose, Callum tells the story of returning to the workshop and to the wood, to handcrafting furniture for people who will love it and then pass it on to the next generation—an antidote to a culture where everything seems so easily disposable. Blending memoir and nature writing at its finest, Ingrained is an uplifting meditation on the challenges of working with your hands in our modern age, on community, consumerism, and the beauty of the natural world.
Lost & Found: Nine life-changing lessons about stuff from someone who lost everything by Helen Chandler-Wilde: On New Year's Eve of 2018, journalist Helen Chandler-Wilde lost everything she owned in a storage unit fire in Croydon, England. She was left devastated and forced to re-evaluate her relationship with owning material things. In Lost & Found, she offers a profound mix of memoir, self-help, and journalism to explore the psychological reasons, sociological quirks of human nature, and fascinating science behind why we buy and hold onto things.
The House of My Mother: A Daughter's Quest for Freedom by Shari Franke: Shari Franke’s childhood was a constant battle for survival. Her mother, Ruby Franke, enforced a severe moral code while maintaining a façade of a picture-perfect family for their wildly popular YouTube channel 8 Passengers, which documented the day-to-day life of raising six children for a staggering 2.5 million subscribers. As the family’s YouTube notoriety grew, so too did Ruby’s delusions of righteousness. Fueled by the sadistic influence of relationship coach Jodi Hildebrandt, together they implemented an inhumane and merciless disciplinary regime. Ruby and Jodi were arrested in Utah in 2023 on multiple charges of aggravated child abuse. In this searing memoir, Shari exposes the perils of influencer culture and shares for the first time her battle for truth and survival in the face of her mother’s cruelty.
All the Beauty in the World: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Me by Patrick Bringley: Millions of people climb the grand marble staircase to visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art every year. But only a select few have unrestricted access to every nook and cranny. They’re the guards who roam unobtrusively in dark blue suits, keeping a watchful eye on the two million square foot treasure house. Caught up in his glamorous fledgling career at The New Yorker, Patrick Bringley never thought he’d be one of them. But when his older brother was diagnosed with fatal cancer he quit The New Yorker and sought solace in the most beautiful place he knew. To his surprise and the reader’s delight, this temporary refuge becomes Bringley’s home away from home for a decade. We follow him as he guards delicate treasures from Egypt to Rome, strolls the labyrinths beneath the galleries, and marvels at the beautiful works in his care. In the tradition of classic workplace memoirs like Lab Girl and Working Stiff, All The Beauty in the World is a surprising, inspiring portrait of a great museum, its hidden treasures, and the people who make it tick, by one of its most intimate observers.
For the love of poetry
I use random poem generators from time to time as a little oracle — more often than not, the poems that appear are just what I need in that particular moment. Or maybe that is simply the function a poetry. In either case, poem are balms for the world-weary soul. My hope is that these monthly poems will offer you wisdom, comfort, joy, wonder.
The World Has Need of You
Ellen Bass
everything here
seems to need us
— Rainer Maria Rilke
I can hardly imagine it
as I walk to the lighthouse, feeling the ancient
prayer of my arms swinging
in counterpoint to my feet.
Here I am, suspended
between the sidewalk and twilight,
the sky dimming so fast it seems alive.
What if you felt the invisible
tug between you and everything?
A boy on a bicycle rides by,
his white shirt open, flaring
behind him like wings.
It’s a hard time to be human. We know too much
and too little. Does the breeze need us?
The cliffs? The gulls?
If you’ve managed to do one good thing,
the ocean doesn’t care.
But when Newton’s apple fell toward the earth,
the earth, ever so slightly, fell
toward the apple as well.
Monthly round-up
Things that caught my attention this month
⫸ The best apps and tools to track your reading goals and habits
⫸ Building a personal archiving practice
⫸ Creative living documentary series (trailer)
Thank you for being here and for spending some time in my bookish world. Hit reply — or leave a comment below — and tell me what you’ve been reading and enjoying this month!
Happy reading,
Shinjini