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#70. LONG BRIGHT RIVER by Liz Moore // ★★★★☆
(amazon // bookshop // better world books)
This is a story about two sisters taking drastically different paths in life and how addiction affects them both. Quite the heavy book, but really good.
#71. THE POWER OF SILENCE: AGAINST THE DICTATORSHIP OF NOISE by Robert Cardinal Sarah // ★★★★☆
(amazon // bookshop // better world books)
This is a book to be read slowly. Cardinal Sarah is so wise and his book is full of insightful nuggets to contemplate and pray about. I enjoyed it so much and used a ton of sticky tabs throughout!
#72. ANNE OF THE ISLAND by L.M. Montgomery // ★★★★☆
(amazon // bookshop // better world books)
So good to return to Anne Shirley and Green Gables!
#73. RUFUS M. by Eleanor Estes // ★★★★☆
(amazon // bookshop // better world books)
I read this one aloud for school. We actually read the first book in the series, The Moffats, earlier this year and accidentally jumped into book number three. This book focused on the youngest brother’s antics, but we’ll have to go back and see what we missed in book two. 3.5 stars, rounded up.
#74. A MAN CLEANSED BY GOD: A NOVEL BASED ON THE LIFE OF SAINT PATRICK by John E. Beahn // ★★★★☆
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I have a special love for Saint Patrick and I really enjoyed this look at his early years. I learned a lot!
#75. THE HUNGRY YEARS: A NARRATIVE HISTORY OF THE GREAT DEPRESSION IN AMERICA by T. H. Watkins // ★★★☆☆
(amazon // bookshop // better world books)
This book was a doozy at over 500 pages and wasn’t exactly what I thought it would be. I was hoping to read personal firsthand accounts – and there were some – but it was primarily fact-based like a typical history book. I found some parts really interesting, but others were boring (ie. chapters upon chapters of detailed strike accounts). I’m glad to have read it as background for the Great Depression, but I’m still on the hunt for those firsthand accounts.
#76. THE SHEPHERD WHO DIDN’T RUN: FR. STANLEY ROTHER, MARTYR FROM OKLAHOMA by Maria Ruiz Scaperlanda // ★★★★☆
(amazon // bookshop // better world books)
This is the biography of a missionary priest from Oklahoma who was murdered in Guatemala in 1981. With a violent civil war raging and his name on a death list, he refused to leave his parishioners and was killed for it. So inspiring.
MY 2024 UNREAD SHELF PROJECT
Unread Books as of January 1, 2024: 209
Books Finished in October: 7
Books Donated/Sold in October: 0
Books Added: +11 (birthday gifts!)
Unread Books Remaining: 214
Oh how I do love Anne of Green Gables. Anne of the Island is a good one for sure! I’ve also read Long, Bright River and I loved it.
Isn’t Anne just good for the soul? She was a welcomed escape from this chaotic world.
I’d like to read some first-hand accounts of the depression, too. Adults and people who were kids or teenagers at the time.
When did it start? 1929? My Mom was 2 years old and lived in Indianapolis. She told me that she remembers going to bed hungry many nights. She was one of 7 kids. She could not eat bread pudding as an adult because her mom made it so often during the depression. They also ate a lot of beans.
She remembers getting “relief baskets”. Did the book you read talk about those?
At one point they couldn’t afford the water bill so they would go next door where a house was being built and take water from the outside faucet thingy in the dead of night.
Her biggest embarrassment was when she got sent home from school with a note scolding her mother for sending her to school without a warm coat or something…I don’t remember and my mom is no longer alive so I can’t ask her…but the fact was they couldn’t afford to buy her a warm coat.
Oh and there was only enough bacon for their dad to have some. They insisted he have it because he had to go out and work.