New Books (A Summer Haul)

I think it's safe to say that I've been exercising a lot of restraint over my book buying inclinations lately. As someone who consumes a lot of bookish content and is constantly getting recommendations, I'd say this is a pretty admirable feat! Plus, it means that all of books I have picked up are books I am genuinely interested in.

Books Mentioned:
Pigeon-Blood Red / Ed Duncan
Human Interest / Valerie Bandura
Where the Past Beings: A Writer's Memoir / Amy Tan
A Few Good Women / Evelyn M. Monahan and Rosemary Neidel-Greenlee
Goodbye to All That / Robert Graves

July and BookTubeAThon Wrap Up

Just when I was beginning to lose hope for my reading this year, July turned out to be quite the productive reading month! The credit for this suddenly uptake in my reading must be given to the one and only BookTubeAthon reading event. And while I've just realized that I never actually posted my TBR for the event here on the blog, I hope you enjoy hearing about what I read all the same.

Books Read

Common Sense / Thomas Paine
The Tale of Aypi / Ak Welsapar
The Girl Who Is Getting Married / Aoko Matsuda
Moonraker / Ian Fleming

Currently Reading
Are You My Mother? / Alison Bechdel
The Garden Party and Other Stories / Katherine Mansfield

What I Read Growing Up

I was very lucky to grow up in a household where my parents not only encouraged my brother and I to read, but were also very open to buying us books. As if we didn't get enough to read in our bimonthly library trips, we used to spend hours in our local bookshops, agonizing over which book we would be bringing home. And when we got those books home, we treated them like gold: read them individually, read them together, read them aloud, read them over and over.  And, as you can see, I've managed to hang on to quite a few of them!

One reason these books means so much to me is that we weren't allowed to watch television as children. So with the exception of the occasional Disney or Studio Ghibli film, all of the stories and characters I was exposed to came to me through my books. So I've taken as best care of them as I can and will treasure them forever as my first lessons in storytelling and my first windows into other worlds.

June Wrap Up

I'm back again with another two-book reading month. Unfortunately, trying to get through The Impossible Fairy Tale really put a damper on my reading in June because I felt like I shouldn't read anything else until it was finished and reviewed, but then dreaded picking it back up. But now that it is done and dusted, I'm hoping my July reading will fare much better!

Books Read

Live and Let Die / Ian Fleming

The Impossible Fairy Tale / Han Yujoo

> Read the review

Currently Reading

Northanger Abbey / Jane Austen

Under the Tuscan Sun / Frances Mayes

The USS Midway

A few weeks ago, my family and I decided to take a trip down to San Diego for Father's Day. We surprised him with a trip to the decommissioned aircraft carrier the USS Midway. And, of course, I took a few pictures!

If you've been reading my blog since my 2015 trip to the USS Iowa Battleship, you're probably wondering if my family and I have some sort of military connection. Well, sort of. My dad's father was in the Army Corps of Engineers back in the day and actually worked on some of the Midway's safety features. Both of my parents have a real appreciation for American history and I personally am really interested in military history. So trips like these are fun for all of us!

I would highly recommend this as a day trip. If you're interested in American or military history, this is a must see. Not only does it have a fantastic audio tour on what life was like on the ship throughout its decades of active duty, but it also has a wide selection of the historical aircraft used by the US Navy. You can see the kind of fighter jets used in films like Top Gun, sit in a camouflaged helicopter, and even sit in a few cockpits.

And if you're just hoping to get your kids excited about history, you can reward them at the end of the day with a spin in a flight simulator!