Book #49 of 2026 was Scythe, by Neal Shusterman. I hadn't even heard of this YA book before, even though it came out in 2016. I have the second one in the series on hold at the library!
Book #50 was The Children Act, by Ian McEwan. It looks like I'm going to have to read more of his books.
Book #51 was American Wildflowers: A Literary Field Guide, edited by Susan Barba. I didn't love everything in this anthology, but there was a lot of good.
Book #52 was Refugee, by Alan Gratz. This book follows the stories of three families of refugees in three different time periods. The first family is running from Nazi Germany, the second from Cuba, and the third from Syria. It's listed as suitable for grades 5-7, but I'd be careful with material as wrenching as this.
Book #53 was Vigil, by George Saunders. You've probably never read anything like this before; I sure haven't. I just looked up my review of the other George Saunders book I've read, Lincoln in the Bardo, and saw that I wrote the same thing. Well, it was true about that book too. Both of them are about death, and both communicate so much in a very elliptical and stream of consciousness style.
Book #54 was The Wind in the Willows, by Kenneth Grahame. Ann Patchett, the owner of Parnassus Books in Nashville, makes weekly reels with books that she recommends. A couple of weeks ago she mentioned this one, saying that many of her friends talk about it as one of the formative books of their childhood, but she realized she'd never read it. I'd never read it either, so I put a hold on it at the library, and now I have read it. I enjoyed it a lot!
Book #55 was The Storm, by Rachel Hopkins, an atmospheric tale of a beach hotel in Alabama and the various hurricanes that have hit it.
Book #56 was the sequel to #49, Thunderhead, by Neal Shusterman. Now I'm waiting for the third one to become available at the library. I can't imagine how Shusterman is going to continue the story, which is in a pretty big mess at the end of the second book.
Book #57 was The Horse and his Boy, by C. S. Lewis. I don't know how many times I've read this book, but I always love it.
Book #58 was Tana French's The Keeper, the third in the Cal Hooper trilogy. It wasn't my favorite of the three, but I did enjoy it.
Book #59 was a book of poetry that I've been wanting to read for a while, Braided Creek: A Conversation in Poetry. These are poems that Ted Kooser and Jim Harrison wrote to each other and sent through the mail or in faxes.
Book #60 was Prayer in the Night: For those Who Work or Watch or Weep, by Tish Harrison Warren. Warren focuses on the prayers of Compline to write a beautiful look at nighttime, suffering, and prayer.
