Let's Bust a Recap : Ramona Quimby

Here's the thing about Beverly Cleary: of all the books I've ever read in my entire life, Beverly Cleary can write a book that's supposed to be from a child's perspective, like it's actually from a real child's perspective. She has the uncanny ability to tap into a child's psyche so well, and it makes actual kids want to read her books. I love children's literature. Truly, it may be my very favorite genre. Children's books make it into my reading rotation every single year. And Beverly Cleary is the absolute queen of writing books about kids, for kids.  

Back in 2021, I started reading Beezus and Ramona with my nieces while they were visiting in the summer. It was just a quick trip and I wasn't quite able to finish the book with them, but of course that didn't stop me from finishing it by myself shortly after they left. Last year, during a week-long slumber party at Uncle Cody and Auntie Hannah's house, I picked up the next Ramona book to read to my niece and nephews. For the purposes of this post, I'll call them Thing One, Thing Two, and Thing Three. During that week, we flew through Ramona the Pest and Ramona the Brave. The kids immediately fell in love with Ramona and when Thing One realized there was actually a book before Ramona the Pest that I hadn't read to them, she checked it out of her school library to read for herself. If that's not a testament to Beverly Cleary's genuine connection with children, I don't know what is. For the rest of 2024, if I showed up at a family gathering without our current Ramona book, I was ordered back home to get it so total anarchy didn't ensue. (It's a good thing we all live in the same neighborhood!) We actually finished Ramona's World, the final book in the Ramona series, on Christmas day. 

There are eight books about Ramona Quimby, from Beezus and Ramona, published in 1955, all the way to Ramona's World, published in 1999. The very first book is from the perspective of Ramona's older sister Beezus who gets very annoyed with Ramona's antics but learns she can always love her little sister—even if she doesn't always like her. The following seven books are all from Ramona's perspective as she goes to kindergarten with her neighbor Howie in Ramona the Pest, up until her fourth grade year in Ramona's World. Ramona finds herself facing all sorts of challenges like bullies at school, teachers she loves and teachers she doesn't like, her dad losing his job, her family expecting a new baby, a family pet dying, making a best friend, and a beloved aunt getting engaged and married. While all these books were written and published before the twenty-first century, the struggles and triumphs, growing up and all the big feelings that go with it, are timeless, and Cleary's books have given children a protagonist they can honestly see themselves in for generations now. Thing One, Thing Two, and Thing Three were all absolutely riveted by Ramona Quimby, and the Ramona books are the only books I've ever read to them where I had the undivided attention of all three whenever I was reading. After we finished reading the entire series, I asked them each to tell me their favorite parts of the books and here's what they said:

Thing One liked when Ramona put the hard-boiled egg on her head (from Ramona Quimby, Age 8) and when she made the tiara out of burrs (from Ramona and Her Father). 

Thing Two liked it when Ramona made an engagement ring out of a worm in Ramona the Pest. (I love that Thing Two's favorite part was one that wasn't depicted in the phenomenal film adaptation starring Joey King as Ramona Quimby. Which we watched twice.)

And Thing Three loved drawing the longest picture (from Ramona and Her Father...and also from our basement because we obviously had to draw our own longest picture), and his other favorite part was when Ramona fell through the ceiling in Ramona's World. 

If my glowing review hasn't already tipped you off to my feelings about it, let me say this loud and clear: the Ramona Quimby books are an absolute treasure and I highly recommend them—specifically to be read aloud to children or for children to read for themselves. As I alluded to above, the movie is also a delight and one of my all-time favorites. Scenes from every single book are lovingly incorporated into it and I cannot get through it without laughing and sobbing—every. single. time. Don't miss out on Ramona Quimby. 

What is your favorite children's book? Seriously, please tell me. I'm always looking for good ones to ward off the cynicism that seems unavoidable in this world. 

Let's Bust a Recap : Seabiscuit

Y'all. I would read the phone book if Laura Hillenbrand wrote it. I've read Unbroken twice now; I've read her piece in The New Yorker about the sudden onset of a then unknown illness which she has suffered from ever since; and now I've finally read Seabiscuit. I think I waited so long to read it simply because it's her only other book and who knows if she'll ever write another one. Consider this my official plea to have all her freelance writing collected and offered in book format. At least all the stuff she wrote for Equus magazine. Pretty please with cherries on top?

Incidentally, I have discovered that my toxic trait (well, one of them anyway) is reading one-star reviews for objectively exceptional books. (Or maybe just my favorite books. Semantics.) One Goodreads user in their one-star review of Seabisuit said—and I quote: "I want to read about people, not horses."

FOR A BOOK ENTITLED SEABISCUIT.

Oh for the love of Lori Loughlin. 

And while Seabiscuit is certainly a thorough biography of one of the most beloved racehorses of all time, it is also a biography of three men: Charles Howard, Seabiscuit's owner; Red Pollard, Seabiscuit's best jockey; and Tom Smith, the horse trainer to end all horse trainers. 

Laura Hillenbrand first covered the subject of her 2001 biography Seabiscuit in an essay that was published in American Heritage magazine. After getting so much positive feedback, she proceeded to write a full-length book which went on to become a bestselling, award-winning masterpiece and the source material for the 2003 film starring Tobey Maguire as Red Pollard which went on to be nominated for seven Academy Awards. (The film ultimately didn't win in any of the seven categories but what can you do when you're up against the third installment of the Lord of the Rings trilogy which beat it out in six of the seven categories??)

Much like her later biography Unbroken, Seabiscuit absolutely captivated me and I had a hard time putting it down. For probably a solid month while reading it and afterward, I talked Cody's ear off about every single detail and made him listen to excepts that I'd read to him aloud. And don't get me started on those one-star reviews again. My poor husband was audience to a passionate tirade about all the idiots who wouldn't know good writing if it bit them in the armpit. 

Seabiscuit is a true underdog story and I think therein lies the appeal. Of Charles Howard, the bicycle-repairman-turned-millionaire that no one took seriously as a horse owner. Until Seabiscuit started winning. Of Tom Smith, the unconventional horse trainer that everyone ridiculed and dismissed, mocking his unorthodox methods. Until Seabiscuit started winning. And of Red Pollard, the most accident-prone jockey you ever heard of that everyone actually gave up for dead. Until he rose from the grave and saddled a horse people thought would never race again and won. 

But the undisputed star of Hillenbrand's sensational book is Seabiscuit himself. This awkward little horse with his Eggbeater gait won the hearts of the entire country back in the 1930s and he completely won mine as well. I was on the edge of my seat for every single race Hillenbrand covered and what I wouldn't give to have seen him run in person. I cried when I came to the end of the book. Charles Howard was known to silver Seabiscuit's race-worn horseshoes, mount them on ashtrays, and give them as gifts. I may or may not have done an internet search after finishing the book to see if any are still in existence and what it might cost to obtain one. (Spoiler: they're rare and completely out of my budget.)

And you guys. What jockeys would do to make weight will forever be seared into my memory after reading Seabiscuit. I somewhat expected the fasting, the sweatboxes, the laxative use. But intentionally ingesting tapeworm eggs?? Horrifying. The lengths these men would go to for their profession was life-threatening and absolutely appalling, but fascinating nonetheless.

On a final note, after finishing the book I watched—for the first time—both the 2003 film adaptation of Seabiscuit and also The Story of Seabiscuit starring Shirley Temple that came out in 1949. Neither one can touch Laura Hillenbrand's phenomenal writing and I'm sad to report that the Shirley Temple film just isn't any good at all. Whoever decided that my beloved Shirley Temple should attempt an Irish accent should be criminally tried. 

While I may not recommend Seabiscuit as widely as I recommend Unbroken, it is an absolutely brilliant piece of storytelling and a gripping bit of history. If you have any interest in horses at all, this is a book you cannot miss. 

Who's your favorite non-fiction writer?

Let's Bust a Recap : The Devil in the White City

Hello there! I think we can all agree that there is no longer any rhyme or reason to this blog. 

Do I have eight or nine other recaps sitting in drafts? Yes.

Are some of those recaps for books I read last year? Also yes.

Am I recapping the book I most recently finished reading? Another resounding yes.

Obviously, there is no order here, no posting schedule, and certainly no goals—stated or unspoken—of getting caught up in any particular timeframe. It just is what it is and that's all it'll ever be. So if you've stuck around, thank you for your loyalty and I hope you enjoy what I have to say whenever I randomly pop in to say it. 

The Devil in the White City is the tenth book I've completed from my original 2025 book list which, may I remind you, consisted of only twenty titles. I have a flickering hope of finishing three or four more from that list by the end of the year. We'll see what happens. 

But to get to the actual recap: The Devil in the White City is Erik Larson's 2003 historical non-fiction book which interweaves the stories of Daniel Burnham, the chief architect of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition (aka the World's Fair), and H. H. Holmes, a cunning serial killer who lured his victims to his "Murder Castle" in Chicago, many while the World's Fair was going on from May to October of 1893. 

Larson has been lauded for the novelistic style he brings to writing his factual subject matter, and The Devil in the White City is easily his most famous book. So many people have recommended it to me, and I've been meaning to read it for ages. I bought a copy back in 2018 and, as you can see in the photograph, I've even been collecting Larson's other books since then. I knew I wanted to read The Devil in the White City first, and I actually put it on my book list a couple years ago, but just didn't get to it. I was determined to finally read it this year, and my sister-in-law agreed to buddy read it with me which is sometimes just the kick in the pants I need to get started. 

So what did I think? Larson's writing is very good and he definitely does have a talent for bringing what could be dry material to life. His coverage of what it took for Chicago and Burnham specifically to bring the World's Fair to fruition was actually fascinating. What Burnham managed to accomplish in just two years' time despite the physical (devastating windstorms, fires, Chicago's challenging soil) and financial (the Panic of 1893!) hardships he faced is nothing short of miraculous. Larson's handling of Dr. H. H. Holmes and his elaborate "Murder Castle" was deeply unsettling and extremely compelling. I particularly enjoyed the saga of George Ferris and his architecturally "impossible" Wheel. I love when a book I'm reading connects and contextualizes things outside of itself for me that I wasn't expecting and in The Devil in the White City, I felt like my own personal little Easter eggs were popping up throughout the book. Like how Olmstead, the landscape architect of the World's Fair was simultaneously working on the Biltmore, or how Walt Disney's father Elias was enamored with the World Fair and visited several times. Larson also details how Holmes managed to dispose of several of his victims by having their skeletons articulated and selling them which wasn't suspicious because of how widely accepted grave robbing was at the time. Medical schools in particular were so desperate for cadavers that they didn't ask questions about where bodies came from and would even send envoys with armed guards to rob graves. Unapologetically! This gave me a deeper appreciation for Robert Louis Stevenson's short story "The Body Snatcher" which I read last year. 

But for all that, I felt like I was reading two separate books. I don't think Larson successfully ties his subject matter together, and when I got close to the end of the book and he threw in even more subplots like the assassination of Chicago's extraordinarily popular mayor, and a bit about Theodore Dreiser, it felt very disorienting to me. Don't get me wrong, it was all very interesting and it definitely hasn't put me off Larson as an author, but it wasn't cohesive and I'm a little surprised at just how mainstream The Devil in the White City has become. It will be very interesting as I continue to read Larson's books if The Devil in the White City will stand out for me as his best. My mom has read this one and also Dead Wake, his book about the sinking of the Lusitania, and she has said that Dead Wake is far and away the better of the two. That's probably the one I'll read next, but I'm also very curious to compare The Devil in the White City to his 2006 offering entitled Thunderstruck in which he employs the same device of interweaving two historical events. 

For a history buff like me, The Devil in the White City was a good read, but at this point, I wouldn't recommend Erik Larson over say, Laura Hillenbrand or David McCullough. We'll see how I feel once I have a few more of his books under my belt. 

Have you read any Erik Larson? If you've read any of his other books, did you think they were better than The Devil in the White City?

Pumpkin Carving 2025

Happy Halloween! 

The time has come around again for my favorite little tradition: pumpkin carving! And it just so happens that this year, we combined our love of reading with our love for spooky season. Can you guess what books inspired our pumpkins this year? Hint: my apparel is a clue. Keep scrolling to see what I mean.

After sitting outside on our front porch for a couple of weeks, our pumpkins were positively frosty when we brought them in last night for our annual fun. We both agreed that digging out nearly frozen pumpkin guts while sitting next to our cozy fire is exceedingly preferable to hot, steamy ones, something we've experienced a time or two in Florida Octobers. 

Can you make out Cody's design? Back at the beginning of March this year, Cody and I began reading the Harry Potter series aloud together. As you know if you've been around a while, I read Harry Potter for the first time back in 2019 and ended up loving them. Cody had read the first four books prior to this year, but had never read Order of the Phoenix, the Half-Blood Prince, or the Deathly Hallows. At the beginning of October, we started the final book in the series, so when we were deciding what to carve on our pumpkins this year, I had the brilliant idea to make them Harry Potter themed. Cody immediately got on board.

The result?

Cody decided to do the Sign of the Deathly Hallows, very apropos. I attempted Harry's messy hair, spectacles, and signature lightning bolt scar. We did both of these freehand—no stencils—and I just love how they turned out. 

We put Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone—my favorite of the film adaptations—on the TV while we carved, lit our glass pumpkin candles from the Dollar Tree, set up next to a cozy fire, and had a marvelous time of it. After our pumpkins were finished and we took them back outside to see how they looked all lit up, we made some hot chocolate and snuggled in to watch Harry discover the wizarding world. A successful night all around, I'd say, and certainly another successful year of our fun tradition. 

From us to you, a very happy Halloween and a jolly start to the holiday season. Can you believe there are only 61 days left in 2025? 

October 30, 2025

Let's Bust a Recap : Pollyanna

Well, despite the fact that I have no less than nine recaps sitting in drafts—some still from last year—I've spent this week blogging about my three most recently finished books. And none from my 2025 book list, to boot! C'est la vie. 

I've loved the 1960 film adaptation of Pollyanna since I was a little kid, and while I thought it would probably be lovely to read the 1913 novel by Eleanor H. Porter that inspired this classic, I've never come across a copy or made it a point to seek one out. 

But when my thirteen year old niece got her assigned reading list for school this year and Pollyanna was on it, I ordered a copy immediately and told her I'd happily read it with her.

And what a joy.

If you're unfamiliar with Pollyanna, that extraordinary child, well, don't feel bad because as it turns out, none of my nieces have yet seen the film. I know. It is a situation I will rectify as soon as possible. Pollyanna is the story of an eleven year old orphan sent to live with her dutiful Aunt Polly Harrington. After getting a pair of crutches instead of the hoped-for doll in a missionary barrel, Pollyanna's father makes a game out of finding something to be glad for in every situation. After Pollyanna's father dies and she's sent to live with Aunt Polly, she immediately begins a personal campaign to convert the inhabitants of Beldingsville to her glad way of life—except Aunt Polly who won't tolerate any mention of Pollyanna's father. And so our titular character became a byword for every eternal optimist. (Although calling someone a "Pollyanna" seems to be fading out of the vernacular to my everlasting chagrin.)

For the first eleven or twelve chapters, my beloved movie adaptation starring the perfectly cast Hayley Mills as sunshine-y—but not saccharine—Pollyanna seemed to follow the book to the letter, and I truly wondered if I would get much out of the reading experience. But as is almost unfailingly the case, the book had so much more to offer. One of the biggest changes was making young John Pendleton from Porter's beloved book into a much older man in the film adaptation. In the book, it's more of a mystery who Aunt Polly's scorned lover is and Mr. Pendleton is a strong contender. In my opinion, Porter's original story makes the adoption of Jimmy Bean so much more meaningful. The other big change is the nature of Pollyanna's horrible accident and subsequent care she received from her aunt and the town. The book proves so much better, but I'll always love Walt Disney for bringing this one to life on the screen. 

In case you couldn't already tell, I absolutely loved Pollyanna. It had all the hallmarks of an All-Time Favorite: it made me laugh and cry, I couldn't put it down but was sad when it ended, and it's a book I'm sure I'll reach for again. Yes, read the book; and yes, watch Hayley Mills bring Pollyanna to life. 

So there you go: a short and sweet review for this short and sweet book. What things make you glad?  

Let's Bust a Recap : Julie Andrews

Okay, every time I recap a memoir, I feel like I'm always saying how I'm not really a "memoir girl". And I stand by that, I do. But they have been sneaking into the reading rotation more and more in recent years and I feel the need to say, right at the outset: Julie Andrews' memoirs are the first I've picked up and read for the pure fandom. Mary Poppins was my first ever favorite movie. My mom can attest to the fact that I wore out a VHS watching it on repeat. And as you know, I paid good American money a couple weeks ago to go and see The Sound of Music in the cinema, even though I own it on DVD and just watched it earlier this year. Ever since I was a teeny-bopping middle schooler, Julie Andrews has been my number one choice of the person I'd love to sing a duet with if I could choose anyone in the whole world. When Princess Diaries 2 came out and Raven-Symoné got to sing with Queen Clarisse Renaldi at Mia's bachelorette party, I died a little inside. That could have been me, y'all. And listen, if these references are lost on you, don't sweat it, but maybe go to your local library and check out these movies. You're in for a great time. 

When these memoirs first came on my radar a few years ago, they immediately went on my wishlist because Julie Andrews, duh. And by the time I came across two pristine copies at my local Friends of the Library bookstore a few months ago (for a mere $2 apiece, I might add), I already had my ticket to the 60th anniversary screening of The Sound of Music in theaters. And even though these books were obviously not on my list for 2025, I can't turn up my nose at these serendipitous events of circumstance that life sometimes throws us. So shortly after finishing The Story of the Trapp Family Singers by Maria Trapp, I picked up Home, the first of Julie Andrews' two memoirs, published in 2008. 

This book is a memoir of Andrews' early years, starting with a bit of her own family history. Throughout the course of her narrative, Andrews takes us along as she remembers what it was like living in and around London during World War II, her parents' sad divorce that consequently split her and her brother Johnny up between her mother and father, and then beginning voice lessons and touring with her mother and stepfather's vaudeville act. Then getting her big break to star as Eliza Doolittle on Broadway, a role she originated there (oh, to have seen that!). She details more of her stage career leading up to Walt Disney himself contacting her and asking her to be his Mary Poppins. 

While I found this first of her memoirs to have a lot of interesting information, it was a bit slow-going at times. The memories of her early childhood are a bit disjointed (as I imagine most everyone's are), and the details of the different performers and managers she worked with in vaudeville and the stage throughout England were largely unfamiliar to me, making the reading a bit of a slog. 

Her second memoir, Home Work published in 2019, picks up where Home left off, with Julie and her first husband and baby daughter traveling to Hollywood to work on Mary Poppins. This is the book about her Hollywood years—from Mary Poppins to Victor/Victoria—and the flow of this memoir was a lot better, in my opinion. The names cropping up in Home Work were also a lot more familiar to me so naturally it made the reading a bit more interesting. The introduction in Home Work serves as a very serviceable review of Home so unless you are also a diehard fan, I would recommend skipping Home and just reading Home Work. The disappointing thing about her second memoir is that it ends before the infamous throat surgery that ruined her singing voice. While I imagine it wouldn't be pleasant to relive that time in her life for any reason, I was sort of hoping for Andrews' own perspective on the aftermath of that surgery and the impact it had on her life. 

Julie Andrews has always been class personified, and that shines through in her books. Everything in her life, even the difficult things, she writes about with a sort of rose-colored tint to it all—with a spoonful of sugar, if you will. It didn't feel very personal at all, more like she was just relating all the events of her life from almost an outsider's perspective. It was interesting. As much as I enjoyed reading her memoirs, I don't feel as if I really know her any better for it. 

Ultimately, I walked away from these books with a profound gratitude for my own mother. Julie Andrews' mum seemed like a real piece of work, and Julie herself seemed so swept up in her career, her second marriage to a substance-abusing husband, her ideal of living in Switzerland, that she never seemed to prioritize being a stabilizing force in her own children's lives. Her daughter and stepchildren were shuffled back and forth between parents, and the two little girls she adopted from Vietnam were raised by nannies. My own mother is an incredibly talented woman with a remarkable work ethic, and I'm not being glib when I say she could have done or been anything she wanted to be. But she chose to be fully present in the lives of her four children. She gave us the foundation to be anything we wanted to be. And I've watched her be my dad's rock my whole life. We would all fall apart without her, and I'm thankful she didn't leave my upbringing to chance or someone else. 

While I still wouldn't classify myself as a big memoir reader, I appreciate the compassion for others and the gratitude for my own life that reading these books brings up in me. And I guess that's a compelling enough reason to pick one up every once in a while. 

What memoir would you read based solely on your personal fandom of the writer? What person do you wish would write one?

Let's Bust a Recap : Desiring God

In 2003, the third edition of John Piper's seminal work, Desiring God, was published. It was big that year with one of the circles in my church's youth group so, naturally, being the bookworm that I am, I expressed an interest in reading it and my Dad got me a copy for Christmas. Well, I tried to start it a couple different times but never got much farther than the introduction. It's just not very easy to read. And it took me a while to get into it this time around as well. But your girl's not a quitter so I muscled my way through it and now I have a lot of thoughts about it that feel very disjointed so this recap is turning out to be a real struggle. 

Let me begin by saying: overall, I agree with pretty much everything Piper says in this book. It's Biblically sound and doctrinally I align with him.

But let me follow that up immediately with: I fundamentally disagree with the term "Christian hedonist" and as this entire 400 page book is a defense of this label, it was tough sledding at times. Piper himself is quick to admit that his pet phrase is shocking and that many respected theologians he is friends with don't appreciate it either. And he gives his reader permission to dismiss the vocabulary, if not the actual concept. So I have. You will never catch me calling myself a "Christian hedonist" and here's why. Words have meaning. And when you say certain words to people who don't have the time to read a whole book about why that word should mean something different than what they think, you're liable to give them the completely wrong idea about what you're saying. 

Piper quotes Saint Augustine early in the book:

If I were to ask you why you have believed in Christ, why you have become Christians, every man will answer truly, "For the sake of happiness."

This sums up Piper's thesis quite nicely and for the entirety of Desiring God, Piper quotes other thinkers and writers to great effect. So much so that I almost appreciated his quotations more than his original writing. And I'm not mad at that. The idea that as a Christian I should strive to find and do find all my happiness in God and that I cannot be truly happy apart from God is one I wholeheartedly agree with. He works out this concept for the reader in nine different areas of the Christian life including conversion, prayer, money, marriage, suffering, etc. And like I said at the beginning, I agree with his conclusions. The thing that makes this book so difficult to read is his writing. I would start a chapter and within the first quarter of the chapter, I would grasp exactly what he was trying to convey. And then the chapter went on unnecessarily for another three quarters. He would muddy up his clearly stated premise, and then at the end of each chapter offer another clear summary of his belief. Ultimately, I think this book could have accomplished his mission with about half the word count. 

This came as a bit of a curveball for me as the only other Piper I've read (This Momentary Marriage which I read in 2020) I praised as being so clear and straightforward (if a bit repetitive). But given that Desiring God was the third book Piper ever wrote and it came over twenty years—and over forty books!—before This Momentary Marriage, perhaps that makes sense. 

The greatest value for me in reading Desiring God was the reminder, the argument that being a Christian is supposed to be a joyful, happy thing. Piper rightly states in his book that so often in Christendom, the command to deny ourselves is misinterpreted to mean that if we're coming to Christ in a desire for our happiness, our motives are selfish and therefore, invalid. It can feel exhausting at times to be obedient to God and so we like to make that exhaustion in and of itself a virtue. But how better can we glorify God—our chief aim in life—than by being exuberantly, abundantly happy in Him? 

Would I recommend Desiring God? Not to everyone. If you're having a difficult time reconciling how to come to God seeking your own happiness while simultaneously giving Him all the glory, this is your book. If you're feeling cynical and hopelessly weighted down in your Christian walk, give this book a try. I'm definitely glad I read it, though it's not one I would necessarily pick up again. I am looking forward to reading The Pleasures of God which is the next book in Piper's unofficial Desiring God trilogy which concludes with his book Future Grace. The Pleasures of God is my husband's favorite book by Piper and he recommended Desiring God for my book list this year mainly so I could get to The Pleasures of God next.  

The TL;DR version: good, not great; glad I read it, probably wouldn't read again.

What do you think of when you hear the term "Christian hedonist"?