Books by My Bedside

I bombarded our local library with book purchase requests recently.  Instead of purchasing them, they sourced them from other libraries in the state and had them all sent to me - at the same time.  They've trickled in over the past couple of weeks and have stacked up alongside books I'd already checked out from the local branch, or borrowed from friends, or pulled from my own collection.  I guess knitting isn't the only thing I've been slightly attention-deficit in of late:

Beautiful Swimmers by William W. Warner - one of my collection that I learned about and purchased shortly after our arrival here in the Tidewater region of southern Maryland.  It's the book I turn to when the bedside table is empty.  I read a chapter or two at a time of this lyrically written account of the Bay's famous, mysterious blue crabs and the men that make a living hunting them out on the water.


44 Scotland Street by Alexander McCall Smith - loaned by a friend in response to my request for some light fictional reading requests.  Still being introduced to the panel of quirky characters.  Will probably get more interesting once the formal introductions are out of the way and we can get on with the story.  Originally written in installments for a Scottish newspaper and later compiled into a book.

How to Live:  A Search for Wisdom from Old People (While They Are Still on this Earth) by Henry Alford - culled from a friend's Goodreads list.  Picked up at the local library.  Will definitely read much more of this one, once I've finished...

Knitting the Threads of Time:  Casting Back to the Heart of Our Craft by Nora Murphy - one of the purchase suggestions that turned into a loan from a distant Maryland library.  Ties (or should I say "knits" in with my current knitting obsession.  A Minnesotan mom undertakes her first sweater - for her young son - in the depths of the Minnesotan winter and uses the experience to connect herself and her undertaking to the homemakers and knitters and seamstresses than have gone before - even thousands of years so.  This is the book that I pick up most regularly right now.

The Winter Queen by Boris Akunin - a light read recommendation from my friend Valerie that I picked up at the library.  Have only read a few pages, but will make it a priority once the fictional mood strikes again.  Russian author, book translated from Russian to English.  I'm hoping it will remind me a little The Master and Margarita - one of my top 10 reads of all time.


Bittersweet:  Thoughts on Change, Grace, and Learning the Hard Way by Shauna Niequist - recommendation from a neighbor in Texas.  Book purchase suggestion that found its way to me from Carroll County, Maryland.  Haven't cracked it open yet.


Unbowed:  A Memoir by Wangari Maathai - on display at the local library.  Looked interesting.  Author is Nobel Peace Prize winner.  Guess I thought I didn't have enough books by the bedside.  But, hey, that's the great thing about the library.  Impulse shopping costs you nothing, even if you never crack the book open.  Unless, of course, you forget to return it on time.

There's also a stack of knitting technique/project books in the guest/sewing/project room.  What can I say?  I'm a book lover.  But you already knew that, didn't you?

What are you reading?