April In Review


April was a fantastic month for reading! My neighbourhood library branch re-opened after being closed for 2 years for renovations. It's beautiful. There is a huge interactive kids space which my little ones absolutely love and now it's only a two minute walk for me to get books. Perfect! We've been spending a lot of time there, and of course I'm coming home with more books than I can possibly read.

I have challenged myself to read more Canadian literature and this month I read four great books including Late Nights on Air by Elizabeth Hay (winner of the Giller Prize in 2007) and What We All Long For by Dionne Brand. The other two books stood out as exceptional - The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood and More by Austin Clarke.

After reading a lot of (great) serious stuff, I returned to my first love - British chick lit! I love a lot of chick lit but for some reason, the British stuff is the best to me! I read The Personal Shopper by Carmen Reid, which has been on my to read list forever, and Forget Me Knot by Sue Margolis, which I randomly picked up at the library. Two of my favourite blogs for keeping up with chick lit are Bookalicious Ramblings and Chick Lit Reviews. They have made my to read list much longer than I will ever be able to keep up with!

Also, check out my list of Earth Day reads. There is such a wealth of great books out there about what we can do to make ourselves healthier and the earth healthier. It's not as hard or expensive to do as you may think.

A special thanks to Bethany at words, words, words for presenting me with the Honest Scrap award and Becki at Confessions of a Bibliophile for presenting me with a Prolific Blogger award. I'm honoured that people are finding my blog useful and good to read. There is such a great book blog community and I'm so glad that I can be a part of it and share my reading journey with such wonderful bloggers.

Crazy for Books hosts a Book Blogger Hop which I just signed up for. Check it out to find some great book bloggers (I'll be doing that as soon as I can get my son down for a nap!)

Hope you all had a great month, and I'm looking forward to a wonderful (and hopefully warm) May.



Comments

  1. Kinna ReadsApril 30, 2010 at 11:17 AM

    Love your blog. I have to read the Austin Clarke book.

    ReplyDelete
  2. ShanApril 30, 2010 at 1:09 PM

    Thank you! I hope you enjoy the Austin Clarke book, it was a great story, I'm so happy to recommend it to people!

    ReplyDelete
  3. BeckiApril 30, 2010 at 2:36 PM

    I *so* want to do the hop this week but I can't with my internet playing up. I don't feel like it's fair to claim a bunch of traffic and not give back. I did find some great blogs last week through the hop though.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Booklover Book ReviewsMay 1, 2010 at 12:54 AM

    Found you through the hop and am now a follower!

    ReplyDelete
  5. JessicaMay 1, 2010 at 5:14 AM

    Thats the thing with libraries, its like being in a book shop but all the stock is free. I have to seriously limit myself. Thanks for the reads on canadian fiction, apart from Margaret Atwood and Mary Swan I dont think I've read any books by canadian authors at all.

    ReplyDelete
  6. ShanMay 1, 2010 at 7:34 AM

    Welcome Kelly and Booklover Book Reviews - this is the first hop I've done and I've really it. I hope you enjoy my blog

    Jessica - I was surprised at how little Canadian books I've read, and how great they are. And you're right, because free books are a dangerous thing.

    ReplyDelete
  7. LindyLouMacMay 1, 2010 at 9:51 AM

    Thankyou for calling by my blog and commenting. You may be interested to know that I have now written my post on 'Human Traces'

    http://lindyloumacbookreviews.blogspot.com/2010/05/human-traces-by-sebastian-faulks.html

    ReplyDelete
  8. AnonymousMay 2, 2010 at 3:06 AM

    Hey! Great blog :-) found you through the hop...

    ReplyDelete
  9. ClaireMay 2, 2010 at 12:41 PM

    Oooh, some exciting things here!

    Cxx

    ReplyDelete

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