Nonfiction November is being hosted this week by Katie at Doing Dewey.

Oh, my! I’ve seen about a hundred books this month that I want to read. I had to narrow it down, guys. Sorry for anyone I missed.

First – the answers to my call for experts on making big later-in-life changes, and for downsizing. Thank you to all who commented on this post!

Life Changes:
Oh, the Places You’ll Go! by Dr. Suess (to be covered in a separate post, coming soon) recommended by Brona at Brona’s Books

The Paper Garden: Mrs. Delany Begins Her Life’s Work at 72 by Molly Peacock also by Brona, and seconded by Rebecca at Bookish Beck and Marcie at Buried in Print (Doesn’t this look luscious?)

A Glorious Freedom: Older Women Leading Extraordinary Lives by Lisa Congdon also cited by Rebecca

Heather at Gofita’s Pages praised Fluent in 3 Months: How Anyone at Any Age Can Learn to Speak a Language from Anywhere in the World by Benny Lewis

 
Downsizing:
Duane Elgin’s Voluntary Simplicity: Toward a Life That is Outwardly Simple, Inwardly Rich was applauded by Jane at Hotchpot Cafe as the “bible” of downsizing from a cultural perspective

Rebecca also appreciated Year of No Clutter by Eve O. Schaub

The Year of Less by Cait Flanders was cited by Jade of Reading with Jade as being thought-provoking in terms of downsizing

Genevieve Parker Hill’s Minimalist Living: Decluttering for Joy, Health and Creativity was recommended by Michael at Inexhaustible Invitations as dealing with lifestyle shifts in general, in addition to offering practical advice about how to declutter

I also picked up a couple of other helpful resources:
GrowingBolder.com website and podcast also endorsed by Jane and
The Minimalists podcast applauded by Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best

I already have Voluntary Simplicity and Eva Schaub’s book on my bedside table, and have the rest of the above list reserved at the library.

Further down my TBR I added:

Word by Word: The Secret Life of Dictionaries by Kory Stamper
and
Lost in Translation: A Life in a New Languageby Eva Hoffman
I’ve misplaced the names of the bloggers who recommended these. If it was you, please let me know!

 
Although not part of a Nonfiction November post, Christie at the Ludic Reader highly praised Orchestra in My Garden: Lessons Learned from Digging Deep by Linda Brooks
 

I saw Educated by Tara Westover on many blogs this month, but it was Rebecca at Bookish Beck who was either the first who mentioned it, or the first to convince me to read it. She called it “one of the most powerful and well-written memoirs I’ve ever read.”

And last, but certainly not least, two books on race because I have biracial grandchildren and because I can’t see race as anything but a social construct:

Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates

and

 

Good White People: the Problem with Middle-Class White Anti-Racism by Shannon Sullivan, both brought to my attention by JoAnn of Lakeside Musing who has done a prodigious amount of reading on this subject.

What a great month. Thanks for all the great recommendations – it was really hard to narrow my list down.

Do any of my choices tempt you?

P.S. The links are affiliate links so I will receive a small percentage of any purchase you make after clicking through from this blog.

Nonfiction November is being hosted this week by Rennie at What’s Nonfiction. The prompt is

Nonfiction books often get praised for how they stack up to fiction. Does it matter to you whether nonfiction reads like a novel? If it does, what gives it that fiction-like feeling? Does it depend on the topic, the writing, the use of certain literary elements and techniques? What are your favorite nonfiction recommendations that read like fiction? And if your nonfiction picks could never be mistaken for novels, what do you love about the differences?

Whew! It’s these kind of questions that make me feel totally inadequate and unqualified to be discussing books.

Sure, I like narrative nonfiction, and it helps if there are real-life examples but nonfiction doesn’t necessarily have to read like a novel to keep my interest. Especially if it’s a book that is ‘teaching’ me: I don’t want just dry facts or a school textbook, but I don’t need it sound like fiction either, although history often can! And I doubt I differ from most casual (or even noncasual) readers of nonfiction here.

Memoirs are a slightly different kettle of fish, but even then, I don’t need to think they’re novels, although I think that many do have that feel – and thus seem to be the most widely read area of nonfiction. But what makes them seem so? I will leave that up to the more qualified to discuss.

The one memoir I read this year Truck: a Love Story is the account of a few years in the life of a man while he is having his beloved derelict International Harvester truck restored. IH trucks were never widely sold and have become something of a rare collector’s item. Perry, however, wanted a working truck – and got one, despite having very little cash to work with. I recommend it.

Do the memoirs that you read need to have ‘novel’ qualities?

P.S. The links are affiliate links so I will receive a small percentage of any purchase you make after clicking through from this blog.

When I first posted this month for Nonfiction November, I implied that I was returning to my blog, after a break that started in May. Admittedly, it’s far easier to participate in prescheduled events than to actually create a blog post. But here I am.

Some of you may realize that before my break, I was using Exurbanis to list & describe all the books that I’ve read, as the years progressed. And you may also know that I was behind in monthly summaries – by about three years. In January of this year (2018) I posted my summary for January 2015 and determined to myself that I was going to be up to date by the end of the year. Instead, I stalled at October 2015, and am now a month further behind than I was in January.

The thought of trying to finish this project almost kept me from returning to blogging. So – I’ve rethought how I’ll keep my book records, and what I’ll use Exurbanis for. If you’re interested in my reading history, you’ll find it pretty much up to date in Library Thing or Good Reads.

That frees me up to post in greater detail about some of the books I read, the ones about which I have something to say to you, without feeling obligated to document them all. And it allows me to talk about other things that are going on in my life and (maybe) to return a bit to the intended purpose of Exurbanis which was to discuss country life.

For a start, here’s what my husband and three friends did yesterday afternoon with our winter’s supply of wood. It’s three stacks deep and there’s two rows stacked up on the deck.

Bill is repairing the ends as I speak, preparatory for tarping it against the rain and snow.

After the work was done, we sat by the wood stove in the dining room and ate chili and drank rum and Jägermeister and told tall tales. There’s nothing like a wood party to cement friendships.

I hope you’ll stay with me as my future journey on Exurbanis unfolds.

P.S. The links may be affiliate links so I will receive a small percentage of any purchase you make after clicking through from this blog.

NONFICTION NOVEMBER is being hosted this week by Julz at JulzReads.
 

This week we can be an expert, ask an expert, or become an expert.

I don’t feel like an expert on anything right now but I do need some inspiration.

What’s happening:

My husband and I are preparing for retirement which means selling our large home and drastically downsizing.

We are also thinking about making a big move to South America – for six months of the year anyway.

What I need:
1) memoirs of people who have made major life changes (or maybe learned a new language?) AFTER AGE 60;

2) the best books about downsizing, especially for when retiring and thinking about where the things you do keep will eventually end up.

 
Any experts out there? Bring on your recommendations – please!

P.S. The links are affiliate links so I will receive a small percentage of any purchase you make after clicking through from this blog.

NONFICTION NOVEMBER is being hosted this week by Sarah at Sarah’s Book Shelves. The prompt is to pair one of our nonfiction reads with a fiction title.

Fortunately, one of the few nonfiction books I read in the past year was The Crown: the Official Companion, Volume 1: Elizabeth II, Winston Churchill, and the Making of a Young Queen.

I don’t know how many of you have watched the Netflix series The Crown starring Claire Foy and Matt Smith but I was in love with it. I suspect most viewers felt the same, as it has a 90% rating at RottenTomatoes.com

The Companion book contained many photos of the series, but also of the real-life royals. It also provided history for each episode about the political and personal disasters taking place at the time. Although we googled the events as the show progressed, I found many things in this book that I had not previously known.

Reading the book greatly enriched my understanding of the time period and of the challenges facing the Queen and Winston Churchill, and I wish I had read it concurrently with watching the series.

* * * * *

My fiction pick for this is a book I read in 2016 titled The Royal We by Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan. It had originally been recommended by Shannon of River City Reading.

It’s a chick-litty romance which is not something I usually read, but I was intrigued by the royal connection. It features all-American Rebecca (Bex) Porter, who goes to Oxford and falls in love with the guy across the hall, who just happens to be the heir to the British throne. It was sort of based on William and Katherine, but would make great reading now in light of Harry & Meghan.

There are the meetings with “the family”, procural of the queen’s approval, the protocol, the protocol, and more protocol. If you’re a fan of the Duchess of Sussex and her handsome husband, I’m pretty sure that you’ll really enjoy this book.

So, tell me, are you a royals watcher?

P.S. The links are affiliate links so I will receive a small percentage of any purchase you make after clicking through from this blog.