Friday Reads 12/11/2020

This was the longest 5-day week ever! I had a bunch of meetings this week. Good stuff happened. Bad stuff happened. More good than bad, so there's that. Let's talk about what I'm reading. I have to go to the church for a few hours to film some bell videos, but mostly I'm footloose and fancy free this weekend.

Mimi Lee Reads Between the Lines by Jennifer J. Chow - I will hopefully finish this up this weekend. It reads quickly and I can get a lot done in a short amount of time. I haven't worked out what the title refers to yet. Marshmallow is still sassy and wonderful. Now there is a kitten called Nimbus who came from the same wacko guy that made it so Marshmallow can talk. So Mimi is also trying to get rid of that guy.

Reading Nonfiction by Kylene Beers and Robert E. Probst - I waited almost 2 months to get this from out of state. It's mostly about how to teach students to read nonfiction, which I don't have occasion to do, but I am so interested in it, I'm reading all of those parts too! I read almost 100 pages the day I got it, but I haven't really picked it up since then. I have time.

Punching the Air by Ibi Zoboi and Yusef Salaam - The story is about a boy on trial for assault and battery. Amal is black and the boy he fought is white. Yes, he threw the first punch. And now the boy is in a coma and can't say what happened. Amal insists he didn't hurt the boy the way he is now hurt. He says he didn't throw the last punch. Someone else did that damage. But here he is in court being convicted. I'm almost a quarter through it so far. I'm listening on audiobook. Yusef Salaam knows about being convicted of a crime he didn't commit. He is one of the Exonerated Five who were once convicted of raping a white woman in Central Park.

The Phantom of Fifth Avenue by Meryl Gordon – When I finish Mimi Lee, I'll probably start on this one. I am fascinated by Huguette Clark and I have much respect for Meryl Gordon's biographical writing.

Don't Ask Me Where I'm From by Jennifer De Leon - When I finish Punching the Air, I might pick this up next. I can get an audiobook from my library. People on YouTube have been doing a thing where they listen to a book on audio as they read the physical copy along with it. They can set the speed on the audiobook to 2-times speed and get it done much faster than reading either format alone. I might try that with Punching the Air and this one. I have both in paper, so ostensibly I could make it happen.

That's probably enough for one week. Crossing fingers I can squeeze in some reading time (and actually feel like reading).