What are you up to this weekend? Around here we’re seeing a Shakespeare play (not something I expected to say!) and getting ready for Thanksgiving. I’m also hoping to sneak in a little holiday shopping. (Who can tell me what my husband might appreciate this year?)
I hope you have something to look forward to this weekend, and that this collection of interesting reads and favorite things helps ease you in to that weekend frame of mind.
My favorite finds from around the web:
We All Love ‘Anne of Green Gables.’ What About ‘Emily of New Moon’? (New York Times gift link) Great piece by Elisabeth Egan to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Emily Byrd Starr.
I’ve cooked over 1,000 Ina Garten recipes. Here are 10 of my favorites for an easy dinner. (Insider) Bookmarking these.
What I’ve Been Reading Lately: the new and the notable. (MMD) November Quick Lit with literary fiction, a novel in translation, dystopian climate fiction, a holiday novella, a biographical pageturner, informational nonfiction, and several good-on-audio books.
Madewell’s Black Friday event is on: 40% off everything. I’ve found good stuff there this fall: today I’m wearing this (Re)sponsible Cashmere Oversized Crewneck Sweater—in the cheery Roasted Squash color because it’s raining and that’s how my mama taught me to dress for dreary days. I also LOVE the Heather Soft Purple; it’s so pretty. Other popular picks straight from my closet are the 90s Straight Leg Jean, the Perfect Vintage Wide-Leg Jean, and this versatile V-Neck Relaxed Cardigan (mine is Heather Indigo but they have great colors in addition to neutrals).
You Only Like the Beginning of Things. (Culture Study substack) “If you’re a big Swift fan, the interest in this romance makes sense. But I think a lot of people who consider themselves casual fans at best have been taken aback by their own investment.”
No, I Don’t Want to Join Your Book Club. (Wall Street Journal gift link) “Though traditional book clubs have been a fixture of American social life for decades, some bibliophiles think they have lost the plot. These bookworms don’t want to read books that don’t interest them. Even worse is recommending a book the rest of the group hates.”
Favorite Gifts to Give and Receive. (MMD) It’s always fun to put together this annual collection.
The Last Lighthouse Keeper in America. (The New Yorker) Bittersweet profile of the death of a profession and an old way of life.
Gen Z and Millennials Use Public Libraries More Than Previous Generations, Study Says. (Blavity) “They also noted a preference for print copies of books.”
The Best Thing to Text a Friend. (Cup of Jo) So simple, so freeing.
What’s the Future of Books? (Esquire) There are so many changes in the industry right now: harder-to-launch debuts, lots of literary and auto-fiction, the increased use of multiplatform storytelling, and more.
This week Ginger was raving about this e.l.f. Wow Eyebrow Enhancer Gel from Target. She says it’s a brilliant substitute for Glossier Boy Brow (which she reminded me I turned her on to many years ago) and you can’t beat the $5 price tag! Ginger’s shade is Brunette.
How American Critics Originated Jane Austen Scholarship. (Literary Hub) Fascinating.
What Emojis Tell Us About the History of Tea. (Smithsonian Magazine) What an interesting connection!
Don’t miss these posts:
24 winter holiday romances that will make your season bright. These winter holiday romances will take you from Thanksgiving to New Year’s Eve!
My kitchen must-haves. The tools that help me create great meals that don’t take all day.
25 family sagas that will sweep you away. With the holidays approaching, now is the perfect time to pick up an engrossing story about complicated families.
Have a great weekend!
16 comments
I love Anne so, so much, but I’ve always secretly preferred the Emily books even more. ♥️ There’s a maturity to them, and to Emily herself, that just makes the whole experience a bit richer and more rewarding. Can’t wait to read that essay!
Emily has always been my favorite! Except for the creepy Dean side story, it is definitely a novel that holds up when read again and again as an adult. Emily is the reason that I wanted to become a writer!
You’re so right (and I appreciated Elisabeth Egan’s references to Dean in that essay).
I’m glad to hear YOU are one of the many Emily Starr inspired!
I find the study that Gen Z and Millenials use the library more than previous generations (and having a preference for print copies of books) absolutely hilarious! Why, you ask?
Just this week, I posted (what I thought was) a fairly innocuous comment to a YouTube Community post about finding answers to questions on the internet. I commented I remembered how, in the days before the internet was at our fingertips, I would write all my questions down on a piece of paper. When I got enough of them, I would take them to the library and look them all up. As of the writing of this, that comment has over 2K likes, and 64 comments. All but *THREE* of those comments have in one way or another told me I’m old (I’m not), I’m a “boomer” (I’m not), or called me some other derogatory term for the elderly population, and said you no longer need to go to the library because of the internet. Man, how I’d love to be that person, and link this study! (Also, it again shocked me how absolutely nasty people on the internet can be).
Anne, did you see there is a new(ish) book out called “Every Season Is Soup Season” by Shelly Westerhausen Worcel? I just saw it yesterday, and immediately thought of you! And then promptly requested it … FROM MY LIBRARY 🤭
Goodness! Allie, at least you know you’re surrounded by library lovers here in *this* space ❤️
That book sounds right up my alley—thanks for sharing!
Madewell’s Black Friday event is awesome. But unfortunately it doesn’t include the cashmere. I know because I was there yesterday stocking up, and tried to include several cashmere sweaters.
🙂 I double-checked the online terms to see if they are different but alas, they also say that cashmere is excluded.
Well, bummer! I totally missed that. Thanks for chiming in!
I feel seen about not wanting to join a book club! What kept me from reading for so many years was being assigned A LOT of books in school that didn’t interest me. Now I read constantly. I sometimes read up to 5 samples before choosing the right book for me at the right time. I almost never want to read the book assigned in book club and want to scream that there are far more books out there than the most popular book of the moment. Oh how shocking, your book club read Lessons in Chemistry. I sound bitter- I guess I feel left out because I leave myself out of these gatherings. I’m going to sit with that for a minute.
I bailed on two different book clubs years ago. I liked meeting the members but the book choices didn’t interest me. Or nobody read the book so the conversation veered completely off books and reading and on to whatever the host felt like venting about (PTA, home buying, neighbors, etc). Many years later I shared my guilty feelings with a bookish friend who replied “That club sounds awful! You should read whatever and whenever you want to.” And that quickly quashed my shame. It also launched a new liberty of browsing for varied books and restored my love of reading.
My library’s book club has loose definitions for what they’re reading. This month the theme is “A book whose author’s name begins with the the same first letter of your name” and next month is “A book that takes place somewhere you’d like to visit”. It’s fun and no pressure!
I’m also doing a book club with my teenage/twenty something boys, knowing they’d never read what I would! It’s been so much fun to push myself to read more sci-fi, and in the process I’ve gotten them to read a couple of classics 😉 An added bonus I didn’t expect is the relationship I’ve developed with one of the young librarians who also likes sci-fi, as he helps me choose books he thinks we’ll all enjoy.
I, too, felt seen about book clubs! I love to read, but please don’t force me to read whatever the newest celebrity’s book club calls “life changing.” Life is too short, and there are too many books!
Have you heard about Silent Book Clubs? A group of people get together for a couple hours. The 30 mins at the beginning and end are for talking to the other members about books, or whatever. Or you don’t even have to socialize, you can just read your chosen book. The hour between is spent reading whatever book YOU choose. It’s exactly like “Silent Reading Time” we used to have in my elementary school. It was my favorite thing! It gives the camaraderie of a book club, without the rabbit trails and, ya know, a book you *actually* want to read. I’ve looked into chapters near me. Here’s some info if anyone wants to take a look (or maybe start your own chapter, if not one near you?):
https://silentbook.club/
Dohhh!! Commented before I read the article. It’s literally about Silent Book Club! Oops. That’ll teach me to read comments before reading all the links.
I still remember how much I loved Emily of New Moon the first time I read it. She felt much more like a real girl than Anne did. Thanks for the article and reminding me it’s time to re-read Emily.
I was so excited to see the link to Ina’s easy, fast recipes! But so sad to realize the article linked to the cookbooks where these recipes can be found. So in order to actually get the recipes you must purchase all the various cookbooks.
I understand, of course, they want to sell the cookbooks, but I felt so disappointed and feel like the the post/link could have mentioned that fact?
The Blue Castle is my absolute favourite LM Montgomery novel that no-one has ever heard of 🙂 Older protagonist who receives a terminal diagnosis and decides to do all the things, embarrassing her very proper family. Deals with topics like having children out of wedlock (pretty radical for the times), and death/ mortality. And I always thought the crabby-but-kind love interest was way more interesting than Gilbert…
Thank you SO much for providing an unlocked link to the Emily of New Moon article – I saw it mentioned in another literary email I get but of course I couldn’t actually read the article on the NYT website. I was thrilled to see it here and available for me to read. Now I need to read the BOOKS – they were not on my radar until I saw them mentioned in Russian Doll. It’s so funny that the author actually mentions that in her article:
Perhaps Natasha Lyonne’s character in “Russian Doll” summed it up when she said, “Everybody loves Anne. But I like Emily. She’s dark.”
Always appreciate your links on Fridays!