MONDAY FROM THE INTERIOR: WHAT ARE YOU READING? — JUNE 23

Welcome to our weekly bookish place where we share our adventures in reading.  Come along and join us as we explore other blogs and feel a community spirit.

Today I’m linking up at Monday Reading, hosted by Book Journey.

Click over to see my Mailbox Monday post.

Here is what I accomplished this week.

ON THE BLOGS:

Tuesday Potpourri:  Intros/Teasers-Secrets from the Past

Hump Day Potpourri:  Reading, TV, & Cool Breezes

Going out on a Limb with Upcoming Releases:  W is for Wasted

A Journey Through Book Beginnings & the Friday 56:  The Red Garden

Sweet Saturday Sample:  A Single Dad Ponders His Life (An Excerpt)

Sunday Potpourri:  Taking a Break from the List

Reading:  Click Titles for Reviews:  THIS WEEK, I FINISHED MY 100TH BOOK OF THE YEAR!  YAY!!

Innocent Little Crimes, by C. S. Lakin (Review Book)

Secrets from the Past, by Barbara Taylor Bradford

The Red Garden, by Alice Hoffman (From Mt. TBR)

Looking for Me, by Beth Hoffman

What’s Up Next?

Since I didn’t stick to the list last week, this is a tentative list.

A Widow’s Story, by Joyce Carol Oates (Mt. TBR Challenge) – Currently Reading (and from last week)

The Glass Wives (e-book), by Amy Sue Nathan

Evie and Nicole Glass share a last name. They also shared a husband.

When a tragic car accident ends the life of Richard Glass, it also upends the lives of Evie and Nicole, and their children. There’s no love lost between the widow and the ex. In fact, Evie sees a silver lining in all this heartache—the chance to rid herself of Nicole once and for all. But Evie wasn’t counting on her children’s bond with their baby half-brother, and she wasn’t counting on Nicole’s desperate need to hang on to the threads of family, no matter how frayed. Strapped for cash, Evie cautiously agrees to share living expenses—and her home—with Nicole and the baby. But when Evie suspects that Nicole is determined to rearrange more than her kitchen, Evie must decide who she can trust. More than that, she must ask: what makes a family?

The Glass Wives is Amy Sue Nathan’s heartfelt debut novel.

Obsolete (e-book), by C. T.  French

Book 1 of the Obsolete series.

In a dystopian future, an epic battle between the sexes will determine who lives and who dies.

After the Blue Pox pandemic wipes out 99.99 percent of males and 99.95 percent of females, the majority under the age of 50,18-year-old Madison wanders the countryside, lost and alone. She joins forces with Katherine, a former anthropologist, in search of a safe place to live, and the two find a group of women gathered on the campus of a small college in East Tennessee. Katherine quickly establishes herself as leader and under the influence of Callie, a former prison guard, begins to imprison men, whom they refer to as the “others”, for what Madison perceives can only be nefarious reasons. When older and weaker prisoners start mysteriously disappearing, Madison suspects Callie and her band of deputies are killing them. After a pregnant woman joins their commune, Callie and Katherine, aware that females outnumber males and hoping to create a new world ruled by women, make plans to build their community and attain power. They devise a procreation policy, mating the younger women with the healthy male prisoners, and Madison must make a decision to either stay and become puppet to their plans or make her way alone in a desolate, violent world. But before she can do so, she meets Jonah, a young man captured by Callie, and Madison finds herself caught between her love and loyalty to Katherine and her attraction to Jonah. Madison is forced to make a harder decision: to stay and condone what Callie and Katherine are doing or risk her life and escape with Jonah.

Happy Accidents, by Jane Lynch

In the summer of 1974, a fourteen-year-old girl in Dolton, Illinois, had a dream. A dream to become an actress, like her idols Ron Howard and Vicki Lawrence. But it was a long way from the South Side of Chicago to Hollywood, and it didn’t help that she’d recently dropped out of the school play, The Ugly Duckling. Or that the Hollywood casting directors she wrote to replied that “professional training was a requirement.”

But the funny thing is, it all came true. Through a series of Happy Accidents, Jane Lynch created an improbable–and hilarious–path to success. In those early years, despite her dreams, she was also consumed with anxiety, feeling out of place in both her body and her family. To deal with her worries about her sexuality, she escaped in positive ways–such as joining a high school chorus not unlike the one in Glee–but also found destructive outlets. She started drinking almost every night her freshman year of high school and developed a mean and judgmental streak that turned her into a real-life Sue Sylvester.

Then, at thirty-one, she started to get her life together. She was finally able to embrace her sexuality, come out to her parents, and quit drinking for good. Soon after, a Frosted Flakes commercial and a chance meeting in a coffee shop led to a role in the Christopher Guest movie Best in Show, which helped her get cast in The 40-Year-Old Virgin. Similar coincidences and chance meetings led to roles in movies starring Will Ferrell, Paul Rudd, and even Meryl Streep in 2009’s Julie & Julia. Then, of course, came the two lucky accidents that truly changed her life. Getting lost in a hotel led to an introduction to her future wife, Lara. Then, a series she’d signed up for abruptly got canceled, making it possible for her to take the role of Sue Sylvester in Glee, which made her a megastar.

Today, Jane Lynch has finally found the contentment she thought she’d never have. Part comic memoir and part inspirational narrative, this is a book equally for the rabid Glee fan and for anyone who needs a new perspective on life, love, and success.

WITH A FOREWORD BY CAROL BURNETT

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I’m hoping for a great week….and I invite you to stop by and share what’s happening on your blog(s).