Saturday in the Garden | Bookcases that are doors, Doors that are bookcases

OUTSIDE

This will be a short post this week!  Lucky you:)!  More blueberries this week and I now have a respectable pile of green beans.  The green bean seeds I put in the ground last weekend are coming up already thanks to warm temps and some good rains this week.  The tomatoes are also finally starting to come on though I've had to cull a few and toss them because of blossom end rot.  Also my chard is looking pretty if a little chewed on.

GAK

I went on another parade of homes tour today with a friend and you will be completely unsurprised that my favorite house had this little library tucked on the second floor.

So that bookshelf that kind of looks tucked behind the other in the middle of the pic? It's a DOOR. 

WATCHING, READING and BLOGGING

Watching 

This week I had the pleasure of watching my favorite K Drama yet - Queen In Hyun's Man.  It's so ridiculously romantic, charming, suspenseful and has the best lead male character that I've run into in a long time.  I plan on gushing about it in a post so won't say too much more but WATCH IT.

Reading

Finished Last Week:

Nothing Finished This Week.

Currently Reading:

• One Magic Square by Lolo Houbein: A gardening book about maximizing food production in a small space.  An ARC from Netgalley (though I think it's an older title).  
• The Passage (The Passage #1) by Justin Cronin:  This literary novel about a vampiric plague has been recommended to me a thousand times in a thousand ways.  I am now on chapter 28 or 29.  
• Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith: I will try almost any take on Jane Austen's novels, even (especially?) ones involving zombies. 
• Tiger Eye by Marjorie M. Liu:  This is a paranormal romance with a super promising premise and which started well enough.  With 100 pages left, it is really not working for me and I'm on the fence about whether to continue or not....

Added to the TBR:

This is a list of books that I have added to my Goodreads TBR list this week.  It helps to burn the books I want to read a little more firmly into my mind, maybe get them on some other folks TBRs and gives me a chance to recognize a lot of the awesome bloggers that add stuff to my TBR!

• The Charm School (Calhoun Chronicles #1) by Susan Wiggs: Romance! On a boat!
• The Rogue Pirate's Bride by Shana Galen: The search for te perfect pirate romance novel continues.
• The Line (Witching Savannah #1) by J.D. Horn:  Urban Fantasy about witches in Savannah Georgia.
• Prophecy (The Dragon King Chronicles #1) by Ellen Oh:  Asian inspired fantasy with a bad ass female protagonist. Okay. I'm interested.  

Blogging 

On the BLOG LAST WEEK:

WEDNESDAY:  Top Ten Wednesday | My Random Bookish Trivia

Throw back  - Jasper as a puppy.  He still occasionally gives me this intense stare as if to say "Why do you crimp my ear hair?! This is not the 1980s!"  Have a good week everyone!

A teen-aged Jasper showing off his crimped ear hair a little clearer. No idea why the hair on his ears does this. I do NOT as implied above, crimp his ear hair.  Not that I wouldn't I just don't have time for that sh*%:).

Top Ten...errr...Wednesday | My random book trivia

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme for bloggers who like books and lists. It's awesome and is graciously hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

These week's topic is all about getting to know people which is cool:

Ten Facts About Me (bookish or just general about you facts or ten facts about you as a blogger...whatever you want) 

My first fact is this. 
1) You may notice that it is not Tuesday.  Unfortunately, my internet service went kaput for the whole of Monday evening.  The scene at my house during this crisis was NOT pretty.  I have realized that to destroy the human race through apocalyptic mayhem, evil doers don't need to do anything so extreme as cutting the supply of electricity, they need only take away the internet.  It's scary how dependent we've (well at least I've) become on a technology that has only been around for half my life. 

Okay now for the bookish facts.
2) I have super love for fiction written by women in the 1950s and 60s: This is a recent revelation and is likely not universal but there is a certain type of writer that I just don't think I can get enough of.  Dorothy Gilman, Mary Stewart, Barbara Pym are so rad. Expand that time frame a little and throw in Georgette Heyer, Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers as well.  This propensity is a little weird because I am much more drawn to pre-1900 history and almost downright despise the 1950s and 60s.  But I apparently really like a certain kind of fiction written in that era.  By women.  *shrugs*

3) I Hate Time Travel Books (Not really but kinda): I can't seem to find a time travel book I like - HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE?? IT'S TIME TRAVEL.  Books I've recently tried and either DNFed or at best was meh about? Doomsday by Connie Willis, In the Garden of Iden by Kage Baker, Just one Damned Thing After Another by Jodi Taylor.  I did like the Doctor Who media tie-in books that I read.  And I'm currently watching and am completely delighted by a K Drama involving a person from 300 years in Korea's past traveling to modern Korea.  So why do so many time travel books disappoint?  Do you have any suggestions?

4) Audiobooks have profoundly changed my life:  Seriously.  My house is cleaner (chores are much more fun while reading a book), I look forward to long drives on my own, I read twice as many books as I used to.  I love them.  They are my best friend

5) I prefer my books and my men the same way: with a sense of humor :0).

6) Books make me want to do/be weird things:  Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey and Maturin series makes me wish I were a sailor on a big ole sailing Man-O-War despite the fact that a) they don't exist anymore, b) I'm a lady, c) they were incredibly dangerous and frequently miserable and d) I suffer terribly from motion sickness.  Ellis Peters' Cadfael series makes me wish I were a monk in a medieval monastery despite the fact that a) again, I'm a lady, b) I'm not Catholic or even religious, and c) the middle-ages kinda sucked.  Every Western I've ever read has made me wish I lived on the American frontier in the late 1800s despite the fact that a) terrible, terrible violent things happened to so many people, b) we were actively engaged in a criminal and heartbreaking genocide at the time, c) most females on the frontier were either prostitutes or engaged in back-breaking work on a small farm while living in a hole dug in the side of a hill and d) I'm terrified of firearms.

7) Some of the weirdest words that will make me pick up a book:  time travel (even though #3!), cross-dressing (girl dressed as boy etc...), murder, pirates, lady detective, Greek Gods, dragons, serial killer, series.

8) I never want to interact with authors: I'm embarrassingly stick-my-head-in-the-sand about this.  And I have no idea what I would say to them anyway. "I like your book." seems a little lame and not really conducive to further conversation.

9) I am way more critical of Female vs. Male characters:  An argument could certainly be made that this is some kind of internalized sexism and I can't deny that there may be some of that but I like to think part of it is just that women are super awesome and I hold them to a higher base standard than a man can ever hope to achieve.

10) I love professional "fan-fiction":  I will particularly read anything inspired by or based on or re-imagined from Sherlock Holmes and Jane Austen.  I actually just finished reading a a book about a modern day female descendant of Holmes paired with a modern-day male descendant of Watson in a U.S. boarding school (A Study in Charlotte by Brittany Cavallaro - It was Fab) and I am currently reading Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Jane Austen and Seth Graham Smith (which is cute but I think this Mr. Smith made a butt-ton of money for roughly 2 hours work tops).

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That's all the facts I can handle for one day.  Hoe about you?  Got any random bookish trivia about yourself you want to share?

Saturday in the Garden | My TBR Hits New Heights of Ridiculousness

OUTSIDE

My bountiful harvest this week: a handful of Green Beans and a tiny pile of adorably minuscule Blueberries.  Awww....

I've suspected for some time that at least one thing eating my Kale so thoroughly was Cabbage White butterfly caterpillars.  This was pretty much confirmed today.  I feel bad that it makes me feel such rage towards them as one of the focuses of my job is butterfly conservation but Cabbage Whites are originally non-native - introduced from Europe. So Screw 'em.

Speaking of butterflies, my field work lately has been looking for Monarch Butterfly caterpillars on milkweed plants.  I only found two Monarch eggs this week (on about 175 examined plants at 4 sites) but I did find a couple of other cool critters:

Milkweed Tussock Moths (I think) - They feed gregariously at least during early larval stages.

A Grey Tree Frog  - These frogs can change their color based on the color of the background they are sitting on, hence why this fellow looks green instead of grey!

WATCHING, READING and BLOGGING

Watching 

I've been making my way through some K Dramas, so far Oh My Ghostess (very good!) and then a couple of mini-dramas; Splash, Splash, Love (despite the ridiculous name, very good!) and Noble, My Love (hmmm... jury's still out).  Watching these dramas (it also happened with Coffee Prince) has made me very curious about Korea and its culture which as portrayed in the Dramas is still steeped in its own traditions but with heavy influences by Western, particularly American culture.  America's influence is not surprising considering the Korean War and the North and South Korea situation which America heavily butts into because of the Communism and such.  Anyway, it makes for a fascinating dynamic and it is part of the reason why I like the Dramas as more than just silly fluffy romance.

My overall relationship with television still feels very broken.  Besides the K Dramas I can't really get into anything, and even my enthusiasm for the K Dramas is somewhat muted.  It would be a good time to explore other hobbies and break my TV addiction, right?  Nahhhh..... Hopefully this slump ends soon.  Thankfully, I've been reading some good books of late.


Reading

Finished Last Week:

• Broken Homes (Peter Grant #4) by Ben Aaronovitch:  I LOVE this series so much.  The ending of this one may have broken my heart though.
• In a House Made of Bones and Teeth (Lovegrove Legacy #3) by Alyxandra Harvey: A short self-published conclusion to Harvey's Lovegrove Legacy trilogy.  It was less than satisfying of course, being only 55 pages in length but at least she provided something after the publishers dropped the series.  
• A Study in Charlotte (Charlotte Holmes #1)by Brittany Cavallaro: A YA novel that takes place at a modern day boarding school focused on a team up between the female descendant of Sherlock Holmes and the male descendant of John Watson.  LOVED this book.  So much fun and then some.

Currently Reading:

• One Magic Square by Lolo Houbein: A gardening book about maximizing food production in a small space.  An ARC from Netgalley (though I think it's an older title).  
• The Passage (The Passage #1) by Justin Cronin:  This literary novel about a vampiric plague has been recommended to me a thousand times in a thousand ways.  My first thoughts: 1) I am 13 chapters in to the whopping 75 total chapters and already feel like I've been reading it for AGES, and 2) I sometimes think literary fiction authors' whole goal in life is to imagine up new levels of misery they can put their characters through.  Despite the fact that those two comments are kind of negative, I am sucked into it.  
• Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith: I will try almost any take on Jane Austen's novels, even (especially?) ones involving zombies. 

Added to the TBR:

This is a list of books that I have added to my Goodreads TBR list this week.  It helps to burn the books I want to read a little more firmly into my mind, maybe get them on some other folks TBRs and gives me a chance to recognize a lot of the awesome bloggers that add stuff to my TBR!

The Top Ten Tuesday topic this week (see below) was killer on my TBR as were some podcasts....

• Night Hawk by Beverly Jenkins:  A romance set on the American frontier featuring people of color.  It sounds amazing!
• Bet Me by Jennifer Crusie:  I'm not really a contemporary romance or "chick-lit" fan but the premise of this book sounds so good.  Guy takes a bet to ask a girl out, girl knows this is why he's asking her out but stays mum about it and there is apparently some great scenes with donuts. 
• HEX by Thomas Olde Heuvelt:  A modern day town is home to a creepy old witch who placed a curse on it 100 years prior.  
• The Bourbon Thief by Tiffany Reisz:  A really interesting sounding mystery. About Bourbon and Thievery.
• The Voyage of the Basset by James C. Christensen: 18th Century folks go sailing into the ancient myths.  Sign. Me. Up.
• A Cat Called Dog by Jem Vanston: A cat who acts like a dog and the proper cats that take on his re-education.
• The Secret Notes of Lady Kanoko (Volume 1) by Ririko Tsujita:  I am flummoxed by but drawn to manga so am always on the look out for recs.  
• Daughter of Xanadu (#1) by Dori Jones Yang:  Historical fiction about the grand-daughter of Kubilai Khan.  
• The Kingdom of Little Wounds by Susann Cokal: Fairy Tale-esque political intrigue set in a Scandinavian royal court.
• Above World (#1) by Jenn Reese: People living under the sea.  
• The Mark of the Horse Lord by Rosemary Sutcliff:  I've not read any thing by Rosemary Sutcliff and need to fix that I think.  This looks like a good one featuring retired Gladiators and mistaken identities.
• Peaceweaver by Rebecca Barnhouse: Looks like a very fun YA epic fantasy with a female protagonist.  
• The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes: The Albino's Treasures by Stuart Douglas: I am always on the look out for good "professional" Holmes fan fiction. 
• The Spirit Chaser by K.M. Montemayor:  Ghost hunters.
• A Two Reel Murder (Maisy Malone #1) by Larry Names:  Mystery featuring stars from the golden age of silent cinema.  
• Claymore, Vol. 1: A Silver-eyed Slayer by Norihiro Yagi:  See above note about Manga.
• Rivers of London: Body Work #1 by Ben Aaronovitch:  A graphic novel version of one of if not my very favorite Urban Fantasy series!

The next few were inspired by my recent K Drama watching and desire to learn more about Korea.

• Drifting House by Krys Lee:  Short story collection.
• Without Me There is No Us by Suki Kim: Non-fiction about a Korean-American's stint as a teacher in North Korea.
• Korea and Her Neighbors by Isabella Bird: A classic non-fiction book about the region circa 1890s.
• The Memoirs of Lady Hyegong by Lady Hyegong: Another classic which is the diary of a member of the royal household during a particularly dramatic and brutal time period - her husband, the Crown Prince, was murdered terribly by his father.
• Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea by Barbara Demick:  A look at every day life of every day people in North Korea.
• Nation Building in South Korea: Koreans, Americans and the Making of Democracy by Gregg Brazinsky: I think the title is pretty self-explanatory and is a big part of my interest - the Western influence on this Eastern Culture.   

I TOLD you my TBR exploded this week!  My TBR has hit the milestone of outnumbering my "Have read" list on Goodreads.

Blogging 

On the BLOG LAST WEEK:

TUESDAY:  Top Ten Tuesday | Underrated Books
THURSDAY: REVIEW | The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater

Never be Afraid to Look Unintentionally Silly. And have a good week!- Jasper 

REVIEW | The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater

The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater

Publication Year: 2011

Genre: YA, Fantasy

Series: NA

Awards: Nominated for a few including the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Children's Literature
Format: Audio

Narrator: Steve West and Fiona Hardingham

Why?:  I fell in love with Maggie Stiefvater's writing, reading the Raven Cycle but when  I tried the Wolves of Mercy Falls series, I immediately hated it.  I turned to The Scorpio Races in desperation, and within 5 pages let out a sigh of relief.  Plus - Carnivorous Fairy Horses from the Sea.  Need I say more?

Synopsis: The small island of Thisby somewhere in a northern sea off of a U.K. like coast, a small community makes their way through life in a harsh environment and amidst a thin veneer of mysticism, magic, and tradition. Most want to escape but for a few the island calls to them and they can't imagine being anywhere else no matter how hard life there is.  One thing the island has going for it is being famous for its horses and the annual Scorpio Races.  The horses and the race are not typical however because the contestants ride wild, carnivorous water horses known as capaill uisce.   Except Puck Conolly who is the first girl ever to ride in the deadly race and who also insists on riding her island pony rather than one of the powerful, dangerous but other worldly fast water horses.  She is doing it at first in a bid to keep her older brother on Thisby, then to keep their house but then it becomes something she must do for herself and for Sean Kendrick, the quiet returning champion of the Scorpio Races, who has taken her under his wing.  

This is going to be a short review because the best thing I can say is that The Scorpio Races exemplifies everything I love the most about Stiefvater's writing - fantastic  characters, complex relationships and a setting that feels alive.  The island of Thisby feels like it has its roots in two worlds.  One which is very real and includes harsh weather, poor soil and few jobs, the other which is magical with ritual, steeped in the tradition and which lives with and reveres fairy horses that can kill you.  It's distinctive and atmospheric and practically a character in the story.

For the people who are born on Thisby it is either in their blood and has them in thrall or they can't wait to escape.  The fact that our main characters, Puck and Sean, would never dream of leaving Thisby, even though both lost their parents to the island's unique dangers, is enough to reveal a lot about their characters.  I love that Sean begins to mentor Puck when he perceives her connection to the island and to her horse because for Sean, horses are king.  We get both Puck's and Sean's  POVs which are significantly different enough and keep the story flowing.  Stiefvater evolves Sean and Puck's relationship slowly and subtly which perfectly fits their characters and Thisby.  She has an anecdote on the audio or perhaps in another interview I read that she wrote this book after she finished the Mercy Falls series which was apparently loaded with lots of kissing.  She mentions that she kind of started to panic when there wasn't more kissing in The Scorpio Races but it just felt right to take things slow.  I love this because the relationship and in fact the whole story and book feels very organic, like it just flowed, of its own accord, out of Stiefvater's pen.   

This is not a light-hearted book with the clever funny lines like The Raven Cycle but even though the overall tone is somewhat desperate and somber, it still feels hopeful and the story pulled me along. I listened to the audio and it was fantastic.  It has two readers, male and female, both of which were perfect.  Also on the audio you get some original music, written and performed by Stiefvater and it fits the book perfectly (see trailer below for a snippet).

Finally, I have to mention that all the horse stuff is just so fab!  I was a little girl who loved horses... A LOT... and I still really like them and this book was really good for my horse loving soul.  The capaill uisce are an amazing creation with Stiefvater really capturing the heart of a horse but with predator instead of prey instincts.

FINAL VERDICT:  I feel like I got completely lost in this book and was totally happy about it.  4 out of 5 Stars.

Other Opinions are Available:  The Honest Bookclub | The Book Smugglers | Chachic's Book Nook

TOP TEN TUESDAY | Underrated Books

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme for bloggers who like books and lists. It's awesome and is graciously hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

I ADORE this topic!  The book nerd in me likes touting books that I loved that haven't gotten enough attention and the data nerd in me loves how The Broke and Bookish decided to approach this topic which is: 

Top Ten Books We Enjoyed That Have Under 2000 Ratings On Goodreads (we've done underrated books a bunch of times in the past 6 years but thanks to Lenore at Celebrity Readers for suggesting this topic as a new way to talk about underrated books especially when underrated is subjective. An easy way to find this -- go to Goodreads, your read list, at the top of your read list where it says settings you can add a column for # of ratings, then you can sort by that. If you aren't a Goodreads user you can look up books you think are underrated and see what their # of reviews is on Goodreads? Or if that's too hard you can spin it some other way!

Without further ado, here are  my choices:

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First up is non-fiction which I am betting gets fewer ratings/reviews in general (i.e. has smaller readership) vs fiction.

1) Wild Comfort: The Solace of Nature by Kathleen Dean Moore

# of Goodreads Ratings: 367

Average Goodreads Rating: 4.08 out of 5 stars

My Rating: 5 out of 5 stars (my review)

A collection of nature essays most of which address grief and loss in some way and the healing power of the natural world.  The writing is so beautiful and the essays are engaging.

2) Unfinished Business: Women Men Work Family by Anne-Marie Slaughter

# of Goodreads Ratings: 1,092

Average Goodreads Rating: 3.93 out of 5

My Rating: 5 out of 5 (my review) 

I am baffled why this book about feminism and work-life balance written by a relatively high profile successful woman got so little buzz.  It is incredibly readable and presents a vision of how to move forward toward a more gender equal future succinctly, clearly and logically.  I really loved it and I recommended it to a friend who also really loved it.  I was even more surprised that it slipped under the radar of even a site like Book Riot which would usually be all over this type of book. *shrugs* I have no idea where buzz comes from.

3) The Splendid Table's How to Eat Supper by Lynne Rosetto Kasper and Sally Swift

# of Goodreads Ratings: 1,711

Average Goodreads Rating: 4.03 out of 5

My Rating: 5 out of 5

This probably has low ratings numbers just because it's a cookbook but I thought it worth a mention because it's my favorite.  It's the only cookbook that I sat down and read cover to cover when I received it.  It's not just about some really delicious recipes but is also about how to truly enjoy food  - the making and eating of it.  

4) Forty Ways to Look at JFK by Gretchen Rubin

# of Goodreads Ratings: 87

Average Goodreads Rating: 3.48 out of 5

My Rating: 4 out of 5

This is a book that I appear to have liked better than the average person.  It's a uniquely constructed biography of President John F. Kennedy which strives with each of 40 essays to view its subject from a different angle or perspective.  It's a lighter read than most biographies and gave me exactly what I wanted to get out of the book which was to answer why JFK is such a legend in American politics.  I remember that this book impressed upon me, for the first time, just how important the ability to inspire is in a leader and that even if you aren't that great at anything else you can still accomplish much with eloquent words.

Now for the fiction which seems to be made up of a lot of later additions to series which is a shame because they can often times be better than their predecessors!

5) The Miss Mirren Mission (The Regency Reformers #1) by Jenny Holiday

# of Goodreads Ratings: 48

Average Goodreads Rating: 3.90 out of 5

My Rating:  4 out of 5 (my review)

This is a very enjoyable Regency romance with a heroine who is a "reformer".  It's nothing earth shattering but I'm pretty picky about romance and really enjoyed the characters, relationship and plot of this basically unknown book.

6)  Breath of Frost / Whisper the Dead (Lovegrove Legacy #1 and 2) by Alyxandra Harvey

# of Goodreads Ratings: 1,611/601

Average Goodreads Rating: 3.91/4.21 out of 5

My Rating:4/4 out of 5 (my reviews of BoF and WtD)

Of all the books on the list these are probably the biggest heartbreaker for me that they didn't get more attention.  Whisper the Dead ends on a HUGE cliffhanger and yet because of the lack of sales I suppose, the publisher dumped this series.  I even wrote an e-mail to the publisher begging them to publish the final book which I'd never done that before or since.  Harvey, bless her kind heart, has self-published a concluding novella on Smashwords so fans of the series wouldn't be left hanging. I wish Harvey was not as seemingly neglected as she is as a YA author.  She has strong, independent female protagonists, great female friendships, well developed characters in general and dreamy romantic relationships, PLUS interesting plots. Definitely an author that deserves way more attention.

7) Holmes on the Range (Holmes on the Range Mystery #1) by Steve Hockensmith

# of Goodreads Ratings: 1,392

Average Goodreads Rating: 3.80

My Rating: 3 out of 5 Stars

My rating may not be fantastic but honestly I really like this cozy mystery series featuring two cowhands/brothers on the American frontier who also happen to be huge fanboys of Sherlock Holmes and go about solving mysteries.  These books are a lot of fun, very humorous, have a great setting and the two brothers who stand in for Holmes and Watson are really great characters.  This first in the series has the highest number of ratings with the sequels being lower.

8) The Hidden Goddess (Veneficas Americana #2) by M.K. Hobson

# of Goodreads Ratings: 933

Average Goodreads Rating: 3.70 out of 5

My Rating: 5 out of 5 Stars (my review)

I have mentioned this book series at least 4,769 times on the blog - in fact I mentioned it last week - and my love for it seems to be a little more intense than the average reader but I don't care.  I'm touting it again because it's awesome and I know there will be others like me that will love it.  A fantasy, romance, western/alt-history series with a really interesting magic system and characters I love.  The first book in the series was actually nominated for a Nebula award for best novel so it just goes to show that awards don't always give a book/series a boost.

9) The Interrupted Tale and The Unmapped Sea (Books 4 and 5 of The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place by Maryrose Wood

 # of Goodreads Ratings: 1,839/944

Average Goodreads Rating: 4.08/4.12 out of 5

My Rating: 5/4 out of 5 Stars (my review of The Interrupted Tale)

This middle-grade series is one of the most charming, delightful and fun I've ever read. Why aren't all parents reading these books to their kids!!

10)  A Curtain Falls (Simon Ziele #2) by Stefanie Pintoff

# of Goodreads Ratings: 984

Average Goodreads Rating: 3.79 out of 5

My Rating: 3 out of 5 Stars 

This is another example of how winning an award doesn't = popularity.  The first book in this historical mystery series (see above image), which is one of my favorites, won a number of awards for the best debut including the Edgar and the Agatha but obviously a majority of the audience for that first book did not stick around for the sequels :(.  It's a shame because the series as a whole is quite good!

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This was a really fun list to make and I hope it helps others discover some awesome reads!  What's your number one favorite book that you think is the most underrated?

Saturday in the Garden | G and Ts and K-Dramas

OUTSIDE

An inspection of the garden this morning found things to be so-so.  A handful of green beans are getting close to harvesting which is exciting!  I think I will plant a few more bean seeds where the garlic and the lettuce were and see if I can't get a few more plants going for later in the summer.

The tomatoes are looking a little disappointing.  All the plants are small (I transplanted outside late) and only one has fledgling tomatoes.  The plants in pots are seeming particularly pathetic this year.  I think a jolt of fertilizer may be in order?  I don't know.  Fertilizer confuses me.  

 

This is why I let cat mint stay and bloom in my garden.  The bumbles get food which makes them happy and that makes me happy and it's just a regular old nature love fest in the garden.  

A first for me this week!  Along with the 3.5 lbs of blueberries I picked last week at a nearby berry farm I also bought some tart pie cherries and made cherry pie filling, which I will freeze and make into tarts or something - Yum!

GAK

Drink of the Week:

I wish I could write poetry about G&Ts I love them so.  

WATCHING, READING and BLOGGING

Watching 

I was bitching last week about how I kept stalling out on so many shows and that I had finally settled on Miss Fisher's Mysteries.  Well. I stalled out on that too!  Dang it all!  The second half of season two for that series was just a little hum drum and I heard that season three is even worse. Arghhhh... I need to stop reading reviews.

Anyhoo, thanks to Just Us Blog's awesome Top Ten Tuesday post which listed K Dramas (and boy bands), I got all jazzed up to check out some more K Dramas.  K Dramas for the uninitiated is short for Korean Dramas and the one I've watched (my rave about Coffee Prince) was totally addictive. I hadn't jumped into any more because I have the bad habit of multi-tasking while watching TV and that's not possible when watching something with subtitles.  I decided to commit however and have been watching Oh My Ghostess which is at its heart very similar to Coffee Prince though not quite as good.  At least not yet - I'm only halfway through.  I've been watching it on Viki.com which is a treasure trove of K Dramas and other Asian television and movies.  As far as I can tell, the subtitles on the site are done by volunteers or freelancers that sign up which is pretty awesome but the subtitles have been frequently problematic for this one.  They often don't make sense and I'm not sure if it's a wrong translation or a literal translation of a saying that is slang or just a flat out cultural difference that I don't get.  For example this was a recent line said by male protagonist to female protagonist: "You're like a little chesnut...looking like a puppy."  Ha, Ha!  What?  I gather that he is telling her she's adorable but that makes NO sense.


Reading

Finished Last Week:

• Just One Damned Thing After Another  (The Chronicles of St. Mary's #1) by Jodi Taylor: British time travel series.  I wasn't too thrilled with this one.
• Ink and Bone (The Great Library #1) by Rachel Caine:  This is an alt history/steampunkish story in a world where a somewhat insidious library rules the world with violent automatons.
• City of Glass (The Mortal Instruments #3) by Cassandra Clare:  Shadowhunters vs. "down worlders".  I'm (very) slowly making my way through this YA series. And actually I'm done though there are inexplicably three more books in the series.

Currently Reading:

• One Magic Square by Lolo Houbein: A gardening book about maximizing food production in a small space.  An ARC from Netgalley (though I think it's an older title).  
• A Study in Charlotte (Charlotte Holmes #1)by Brittany Cavallaro: A YA novel that takes place at a modern day boarding school focused on a team up between the female descendant of Sherlock Holmes and the male dscendant of John Watson.  

Added to the TBR:

This is a list of books that I have added to my Goodreads TBR list this week.  It helps to burn the books I want to read a little more firmly into my mind, maybe get them on some other folks TBRs and gives me a chance to recognize a lot of the awesome bloggers that add stuff to my TBR!

• The Cutting Season by Attica Locke:  This is sort of a mystery I think that centers on a  woman who is the manager in the modern day at a plantation where her ancestors were slaves.  I think I heard about this one on the podcast Get Booked (Book Riot).
• Huntress by Melinda Lo:  This is the prequel to Ash which I haven't read but I guess it sounds like I don't have to have to be able to pick this one up.  A dying earth and two girls have to save it all.  Not sure where I ran across this one...

Blogging 

On the BLOG LAST WEEK:

TUESDAY:  Top Ten Tuesday | Some Favorite Genre Mash-ups

May you have a safe and relaxing weekend whether it involves fireworks, gin and tonics or the same old, same old (or all three)!

TOP TEN TUESDAY | Genre Mash-ups I Have Loved

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme for bloggers who like books and lists. It's awesome and is graciously hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

It's a freebie week in TTT land  - any topic of our choosing is acceptable. It's total anarchy and it is awesome.  I actually had two other much cooler ideas in mind (Books I think my favorite TV characters would read/love or Authors who love authors who I love - confusing but awesome, trust me) but they both required a lot more work and time then I had so I decided to highlight one of my most favoritest literary things.  Genre Mash-ups; when an author throws genre barriers and distinctions out the window and just smooshes it all together. It's total anarchy just like freebie week in TTT land so an appropriate topic for this week.  Here goes....

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1) The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

What does it mash?: Historical Fiction, Mystery, Romance and even a smidge of the supernatural.

2) 11/22/63 by Stephen King

What does it mash?: Science Fiction, Historical Fiction, Horror  

Okay so it's a time travel book which by its very nature is almost always a mash-up but this does a particularly deep dive into specific historical events.

3) The Peter Grant Series by Ben Aaronovitch

What does it mash?: Police Procedural Mystery, Urban Fantasy.  

It struck me that a LOT of urban fantasy focuses on detectives of one kind or another.  Or at least the UF I like does.  This series is particularly strong as a police procedural which happens to have some magical elements.

4) The Veneficas Americana series by M.K. Hobson

What does it mash?: Historical Fiction-Western, Fantasy, Romance

5)  Girl Waits With Gun by Amy Stewart

What does it mash?: Crime, Historical Fiction

6) The Brother Cadfael Series by Ellis Peters

What does it mash?: Historical Fiction, Mystery

Historical mysteries are my favorite but sometimes the "history" really just appears as the most superficial of settinga.  Some however, like the Cadfael series reflect or use historical events as more than just backdrop and are more immersive in the time.

7) Jasper Fforde's Novels - Notably the Thursday Next Series and Shades of Grey

What does it mash?:  Mystery, Fantasy

8) The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon

What does it mash?: Mystery, Science Fiction (Or fantasy - I get confused where alt-histories go)

9) The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller

What does it mash? Historical Fiction, Romance

10) The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer

What does it mash?: Science Fiction, Fantasy - Fairy Tales, Romance

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Do you have a favorite book that you think could classify as a genre mash-up?  I'd love to hear about it!

** I apologize for no pictures or links this week.  I was squeezed for time!  I will work on adding links later.