Welcome to the September 2023 newsletter for the Book By Book blog! 

E-mail me at [email protected] to let me know what you think of this newsletter, what you would like to see here in the future, or any questions or comments.

Book Quote of the Month

“Ma, you scared a goin’? You scared a goin’ to a new place?”

Her eyes grew thoughtful and soft. “A little,” she said. “Only it ain’t like scared so much. I’m jus’ a settin’ here waitin’. When somepin happens that I got to do somepin—I’ll do it.”

“Ain’t you thinkin’ what’s it gonna be like when we get there? Ain’t you scared it won’t be nice like we thought?” 

“No,” she said quickly. “No, I aint. You can’t do that. I can’t do that. It’s too much—livin’ too many lives. Up ahead, they’s a thousan’ lives we might live, but when it comes, it’ll on’y be one. If I go ahead on all of ‘em, it’s too much. You got to live ahead ‘cause you’re so young, but—it’s jus’ the road goin’ by for me.”

---from The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, one of my Big Book Summer books this year. I absolutely loved this classic, with its rich, historical detail, gripping plot, and wonderful characters. In this quote, while riding on the long road to California, Ma is explaining to one of her sons why she just lives in the moment and doesn't worry about the future. Like so many passages in this thoughtful novel, it's surprisingly relevant to our world today, too. You can read my full review of this outstanding novel on my blog.

Blog of the Month

Cindy's Book Corner is a great blog with the tagline: "serious book addict reviewing clean reads across multiple genres." I discovered Cindy's blog when she signed up for this year's Big Book Summer Challenge. You can see Cindy's wrap-up for both Big Book Summer and the 20 Books of Summer Challenges here. Besides that, she writes reviews and has fun new posts almost every day of the week, including First Line Friday and Top Ten Tuesday. Check out her blog and leave a comment!

Booktuber of the Month

Aurélie is another new Big Book Summer participant--our first-ever from France! She has a wonderful channel on YouTube where she reviews books and talks about all things bookish! This was her sign-up video for Big Book Summer, where you can get a good idea of the breadth of her reading tastes. Fun fact: You CAN watch videos recorded in other languages! Just click on settings (the little gear icon) in the lower right corner of the video, select Auto-Translate and your language of choice, and turn on closed-captioning. Check out her channel!

My Reading Life

Today is September 1st, so I am in the middle of transitioning from my Big Book Summer reads to darker fall reading for the R.I.P. Challenge! My current reads, The Night Fire by Michael Connelly and A World of Curiosities by Louise Penny on audio, are cross-over books that fit both challenges, so I hope to finish those by Monday, when Big Book Summer officially ends (if you participated, feel free to post a wrap-up on your blog or YouTube channel or in the Goodreads group).

I always have HUGE stacks to choose from for the R.I.P. (Readers Imbibing Peril) Challenge because my husband reads a lot of great mystery, thriller, and suspense novels, so our shelves are full of them! You can see my giant Pile of Possibilities in my new R.I.P. Challenge video for fall. I love this time of year!

A Look Back

In honor of the start of the R.I.P. Challenge today, I looked back on my blog to my first time participating. I started doing this annual fall challenge in 2015 (so this is my 9th year). This was my very first R.I.P. Challenge post, with some great books on my plan-to-read list--I ended up reading all but one of those that fall.

What are YOU reading this fall?

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