So that's how you do it...

I've been wanting to post my updated numbers forever, but I haven't known how. This month, Tamie was kind enough to post instructions for morons like myself. Thanks, Tamie!

And I feel unreasonable pride at keeping pace with the out of control kids we know as B&J (not sure what your kid's name is but I hope it starts with P because than your family acronym can be a sandwich :-)). I'm kind of secretly hoping to break my leg or come down with mono so I have an excuse to lay in bed and catch up for real. Plus, you lot (speaking to the general posting public now) have been reading some good books lately! If I could read all the books you have liked lately, I'd be a happy camper.

Not a lot of new books this month, but I did reread the Chronicles of Narnia. I do that about once a year. More to the point, I did not read one single classic! Oh, it was good, my friends. I still can't talk about it. Need more time to process the relentless joy.

Clan of the Cave Bear, Jean M. Auel
This was a recommendation from a friend, and it's the first in a series that I initially mistook for a children's epic, but upon reading, changed my mind. It's pretty violent and intense in certain parts. It's about a young girl names Ayla who lives in prehistoric times when the world is split up between partially evolved humans (Clan, or "flatheads") and pretty much evolved humans ("Others"). Ayla is one of the Others, but when an earthquake kills her family and leaves her nearly dead, a Clan woman takes pity on her and raises her as one of their own.

The book is multilayered and quite a fascinating study of identity, family, home, humanity, love, and faith. This book, the first of three, details Ayla's life with the Clan and how she finds love there, despite never fitting in and always feeling/looking different. 495 pages.

Valley of the Horses, Jean M. Auel
Continuing the saga of Ayla, who finds herself alone once again, without her family and completely vulnerable to the elements-- though a good deal better equipped as a woman of fourteen than she was as a child of five. Much of the book deals with her solitary journey as well as that of another important character. Eventually, their paths cross.

As much as the first book was about family and love and what it means to belong to someone, this book was about self-sufficiency versus loneliness and it resonated with me right now. Ayla is fine going it alone, she can do it all herself and thrive, actually, as an independent strong woman. But she doesn't like it. She doesn't savor it, she doesn't relish it. The ability to go it alone does not the desire to go it alone make. How well I know. 544 pages.

Love Is A Mix Tape, Rob Sheffield
This was a very poignant, sweet book written by a young widower about the wife of his youth. Rob is a funny guy, and obviously something of a music fanatic as was his late wife, Renee. The book tells all about their relationship, and the whole thing was written while he was wrestling with his own grief (his wife died suddenly, of a brain aneurysm, completely out of the blue).

It's not deep, it's not groundbreaking, it's not witty or smart or Nobel Prize material by any means. It's just honest, and authentic. It's very heartfelt, and a lovely tribute to a woman who must have been something wonderful. 219 pages.

I'm going to read some of the books all of you have been writing about this month. Keep up the recommendations!

-Phoenix