Leigh Kramer

"Reading Was Her Great Love": How I Created My Favorite Bookstagram Photo

 

Book Of The Month offered John Green's new novel Turtles All The Way Down as a bonus selection in October. (You can get the book free if you join BOTM this month.) Since I had a book credit, I wasted no time in adding it to my order. I loved The Fault In Our Stars and I was curious to see what he'd come up with next. Not that there was any pressure.

When the book arrived, I fell in love with its accompanying bookmark. "Reading was her great love." Truer words were never spoken. I wanted it as a tattoo. 

I wanted to lay in a pile of my favorite books.

That idea took hold of me. BOTM was hosting a contest involving the bookmark. What if I surrounded myself with favorite books while holding the bookmark and Turtles All The Way Down?

The tricky part was figuring out how many books I'd need and then which ones, as complicated by the fact that most of my books have been in storage for over two years. I'd recently purchased used copies of A Prayer For Owen Meany and The House Of Belonging because I just plain needed them but otherwise, I only had access to what I'd read in the past year. (I took another box or two of books to storage before I moved away from San Francisco.) You'll recognize a few of these from my Favorite Fiction of 2016 list and, spoiler alert, some of these will be on my forthcoming favorite lists for 2017.

 

The chosen books:

A Prayer for Owen Meany- John Irving

The Winter Sea- Susanna Kearsley

My Glory Was I Had Such Friends- Amy Silverstein

Under Her Skin- Adriana Anders

The Almost Sisters- Joshilyn Jackson

It Ends With Us- Colleen Hoover

Truth Or Beard- Penny Reid

All The Ugly And Wonderful Things- Bryn Greenwood

The House Of Belonging- David Whyte

The Garden Of Small Beginnings- Abbi Waxman

The Animators- Kayla Rae Whitaker

The Comfort Food Diaries- Emily Nunn

Harry Potter and The Philosopher's Stone (UK 20th Anniversary Ravenclaw Edition)- JK Rowling

180 Seconds- Jessica Park

In The Woods- Tana French

 

*All The Ugly And Wonderful Things and The Animators were BOTM selections. They have introduced me to such great books! If you're already a member, you can often add past selections to your order. I've been known to do this a time or two.

 

I laid the chosen books out on my bedroom floor to get an idea of how many books I might need for this photo shoot. Then I asked my roommate to take pictures before she went to work.

The lighting inside the house isn't that great so the pictures were taken in the front yard. We hadn't raked the leaves yet, which was an even more perfect backdrop. 

I laid the books out again, estimating how much space my body needed. I also tried to add depth by placing a few books on top of others. Then I laid down.

My roommate took a couple of photos and then I checked the layout, moving the books by my arms further out so you could see more of the covers.

Once that was taken care of, my roommate took a few more. After looking at those, I decided to change the way I was holding the book and bookmark.

Now she's about as short as I am and we probably should have dragged a chair outside so she could stand on top of that to take the pictures. But we were on limited time and amateur photography can lead to brilliant ideas. She decided to take the pictures standing by my head.

And wouldn't you know, I loved this upside down angle best of all? It's more flattering, too. I flipped the picture around at first but decided I liked it better just as she'd taken it. 

I ran it through my Pic Tap Go app to brighten it up. Then it was ready for Instagram!

I love it! This is probably my favorite picture of myself. It is Peak Leigh. 

If I were to do it again, I'd probably add a few more books on the side but overall, this #bookstagram really captures me and the message of the bookmark.

It would be fun to take this kind of picture every few years and see how my favorites evolve and change.

 

What books would you choose for a photo like this?

 

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. Any purchase you make helps support this site! 

The Question Single Women In Their 30s Ask Each Other

Photo by Aziz Acharki on Unsplash

 

It's possible this question came up at some point in my 20s. I clearly recall a couple of conversations around it in my early 30s.

I've lost track of how many times the question has come up in the past year or two as I straddle the line between mid and late 30s.

"Have you thought about having kids on your own?"

It's not a question we start with. No, it comes up when we're well into the conversation and our meal or drinks are almost gone. We've pushed back a little from the table we're sitting at, our bodies more in tune with ourselves and each other.

It's not a question I would want my married and mothering friends to ask me, though it's possible one or two have. I would probably be horrified if a relative brought it up. (This is different from me raising the topic with them, when I can set the tone for the conversation with the people closest to me.)

But when I'm with my friends who are also single, the question is natural at this point. It might flow out of a discussion of singleness or dating or something else altogether.

For those of us in our late 30s and early 40s, the question takes on a different tone. Not all of my friends want to have children but most of them do. The years of this particular possibility start to dwindle and it may not be left to fate. We may still get married but will it happen while we're still able to have biological children? There's an urgency there now.

So this is why we ask each other. We want to know whether the dream of motherhood matters enough to do something about it. Do we want to be mothers regardless of whether marriage is in our future? 

This question is both clarifying and revealing. Each time it comes up, we learn something about each other and we reaffirm our respective decisions.

For me, I've determined parenthood isn't something I would want to purposefully do on my own. Wanting to be a mother has always been in the context of raising children with my husband. 

That could still happen but it might not. It won't negate feelings of sadness if I find myself in the same situation a few years from now. But it does show me I don't need to take concrete action toward motherhood either.

I remember the granddaughter of a hospice patient who adopted her daughter when she was in her 30s. She lived next door to her parents and they watched her daughter while she was at work and the set-up completely worked for them. I've met a few other single women since then who adopted and at least one friend is seriously considering it now.

A couple of friends have tried or are thinking about trying IVF. I always think of one of my high school English teachers when this option comes up. She was the first person I knew who was unmarried and had a child this way.

A couple of friends volunteer for CASA or something similar. They're not acting as mothers but they are playing an important role for those children and that's worth noting. There are a number of ways to nurture children without being their sole caregiver.

There is beauty and joy in cheering someone on who is pursuing a path different from mine and in talking things over with someone who has come to the same conclusion.

More than anything, I'm grateful to be friends with amazing single women who are a safe place for the hard conversations and who consistently champion one another. I've grown to love discussing this question with them because it reminds me of the support and solidarity we extend to one another, no matter where we land on the subject. 

Little Free Libraries and the Bookish Sisters of Mercy

A couple of months ago, I started keeping a bag of books in my car just for Little Free Libraries. That way I always have a book on hand when I stumble across a new one or the ones in my neighborhood are looking low. 

It's also a nice way to pass along Advance Reader Copies and books I don't plan on rereading. I try to be careful about what books I buy in the first place , as well as what ARCs I say yes to, but book storage is always an issue for me. Always. Little Free Libraries helps me out on that front, so long as I don't always find a book or two that I need to take home.

In any case, it pays to be bookishly prepared!

When I visited my friend Anne of Modern Mrs. Darcy a few weeks ago, we wound up doing this on a much larger scale. Anne's book situation was out of control and my INFJ self itched to help her get organized. Before Anne knew it, I was "making" her go through her stacks and figure out what she was keeping and what she could let go of, like duplicate copies and ARCs she probably wasn't ever going to get around to reading and books she didn't actually like.

IT WAS SO MUCH FUN.

And I'm not just saying that because I wound up with a pile of books to take home.

The next morning we decided to share the love with a few of the Little Free Libraries in Louisville. There were way too many culled books to do it at once but we estimate we left around 35-40 books between four LFLs.

If I was still a child I would not be able to dream up anything better than a Little Free Library tucked behind a tree house. Can you even imagine?! 

This one was only a quarter full when we got to it. Heh. Not anymore.

Anne stopped by this one about a week after we'd filled it up and said it was depleted again. It must be a highly trafficked LFL but I'm concerned that so many people are not following the practice of Take A Book, Leave A Book. I mean, it's okay if you find something you want and you don't have anything to give but that should not be your standard operating procedure. Ahem.

 

Sometimes we'd rearrange the books within the LFLs. Highlight some favorites, move them around so it was more aesthetically pleasing. Normal book nerd stuff.

Miraculously, I only found one book I wanted in return- a vintage Nancy Drew mystery- and Anne didn't find anything she wanted. 

Who gets rid of vintage Nancy Drew?! 

When we returned home from our mission, I commented something along the lines of feeling like Robin Hood. We couldn't make the comparison work- we weren't stealing books from the rich, after all. And then Anne said it was more like Sisters of Mercy.

Yes. That's us. The Bookish Sisters of Mercy, dispensing books to anyone in need or at least anyone who frequents their Little Free Library. 

Looking forward to the next time we strike! 

Code Girls: The Untold Story of the American Women Code Breakers of World War II by Liza Mundy (Review)

Code Girls: The Untold Story of the American Women Code Breakers of World War II - Liza Mundy 

 

My Review - 4 Stars

"Almost everybody thought we were nothing but secretaries," one of the women would say years later. (p. 31)

If you enjoyed Hidden Figures or The Boys In The Boat, you are definitely going to want to pick up a copy of Code Girls.

While I was loosely familiar with Bletchley Park codebreakers in England, I didn't know anything about the US efforts, much less the important role women played. Due to the level of secrecy their job required, many people haven't heard of these amazing cryptanalysts and what they did to help end the second World War. Many of the women maintained confidentiality for decades after the war, even after the ban on talking was lifted, to the extent they were doubtful about whether they should talk to the author. I'm so grateful they did decide to share their stories, however. Mundy gives us a fascinating and valuable history with this work.

The effort to recruit women to serve as codebreakers began shortly before the attack on Pearl Harbor. (Women also helped with cryptanalysis during the first World War and the chapter that centers on that period of time was mind-blowing, particularly how the women were basically dropped once the war ended.) The Navy targeted women's colleges of the Northeastern Seaboard, while the Army sent recruiters to teaching colleges throughout the South and Midwest.

Mundy gives her readers a good understanding of what cryptanalysis is, as well as what it takes to be a good code breaker. This understanding made me even more in awe of what these women accomplished, especially given how much sexism and misogyny they experienced.

Women were not welcomed with open arms when it came to the war effort, even though hundreds of thousands ultimately served. While the war was largely viewed as men's domain, women were given positions deemed less interesting, like code breaking. Mundy does not shy away from showing how prevailing sexist attitudes negatively affected the women's careers, especially post-war.

Racism was also a factor. Although Eleanor Roosevelt wanted a certain percentage of the Arlington Hall workforce should be black, segregation and Jim Crow were at work. Black workers were given primarily menial jobs but the Army did have an African American code-breaking unit whose existence was so secretive, most white workers didn't know anything about it. Racism also affected Asian Americans who served as translators and in other capacities and who were largely distrusted due to the campaigns against the Japanese.

Mundy showcases stories from both the WAVES at the Navy and the Arlington Hall workers at the Army. At times, I became confused about who was who and whether we were talking about the Army or the Navy. Picking a few women to focus on and letting their stories play out throughout the war years would have made for a stronger narrative. However, I learned a lot and I can't imagine how hard it would be to leave certain women's stories out so I can appreciate the choices Mundy made. 

I was caught up in the code breaker's successes and frustrations and by the time Germany and then Japan surrendered, I wanted to shout their names from the rooftops. These women sacrificed so much for their country and received little recognition in return. Mundy has changed that by shining a light on their contributions and we are better for it.

Oh, and the last paragraph of this book? Perfection.

 

Synopsis

In the tradition of Hidden Figures and The Girls of Atomic City, Code Girls is the astonishing, untold story of the young American women who cracked key Axis codes, helping to secure Allied victory and revolutionizing the field of cryptanalysis.

Recruited by the U.S. Army and Navy from small towns and elite colleges, more than ten thousand women served as codebreakers during World War II. While their brothers and boyfriends took up arms, these women moved to Washington and learned the meticulous work of code-breaking. Their efforts shortened the war, saved countless lives, and gave them access to careers previously denied to them. A strict vow of secrecy nearly erased their efforts from history; now, through dazzling research and interviews with surviving code girls, bestselling author Liza Mundy brings to life this riveting and vital story of American courage, service, and scientific accomplishment.

 

Buy The Book Here:

Amazon | Barnes & Noble

 

Disclosure: I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Affiliate links included in this post.

Read Between The Lynes (Bookstore Spotlight)

While I was visiting my friend Megan a couple of weeks ago, I asked her to take me to the farmers market as she's raved about it for years. She agreed and said we should also stop by the local independent bookstore and have tea and coffee afterward.

SIGN ME UP.

That's how I found myself wandering the town square in Woodstock, Illinois. The famers market was darling and I happily bought cider doughtnuts and honeycrisp apples. I also took a picture with the plaque proclaiming the good news that Groundhog Day was filmed there.

Then we headed over to Read Between The Lynes, which was as whimsical and delightful as I hoped. Part bookstore and part cafe, it more than met our needs. I took so many pictures, I thought I might as well turn them into a post. Maybe bookstore spotlights will be a new feature here.

A note about the cafe: not only can you get coffee and Harney & Sons tea, they also sell ice cream and candy. There's not a ton of indoor seating but if the weather is nice, you can take your treat over to the square and sit there.

Every part of the bookstore has been chosen with care, from the genres they carry to the decor. I loved seeing all of the details unique to Read Between The Lines. They had a good amount of autographed copies and I was delighted by how extensive their fiction and YA sections were. I didn't see any romance titles but hey, no store is perfect. ;)

Read Between The Lynes has been in its present location for a couple of years. It expanded to 1600 square feet when another business closed. In a time when people moan about the dearth of bookstores, it's exciting to hear about the ones that are thriving, especially to the point of needing more space.

A book tree in the children's section. 

I had to talk myself out of buying both of Amy Thielen's books for budgetary reasons but I want them so badly. In the meantime, it's the library waitlist for me.

 

Blind Date With A Book is my newest obsession and I love the way this bookstore does it. They use Advance Reading Copies! They're $2 apiece and the money goes toward local schools. Is that not the best idea? 

I bought two. Anything for a good cause, amirite? 

Book pages hang from the ceiling throughout the store. I LOVED THIS. I also love how they highlight local authors.

I also thought this was a darling idea: I found love in my bookshop when... cards. How would you answer? 

Clearly this is the best answer!

If you find yourself in or near Woodstock, make it a point to stop by Read Between The Lynes. Browse the books, get yourself a beverage or a treat, maybe buy a Blind Date or two. It's worth it.