WWW Wednesday: March 25, 2020

Shelter at home here in Illinois continues. The first few days I really spent far too much time on my phone and computer just checking the news. Finally I set limits on my devices and have found myself reading more and more. I don’t know about the rest of you but it takes a significant amount of self control to keep my mind on my reading. Still, I swore that I would have some progress for this week’s WWW!

My favorite meme was last hosted by MizB at A Daily Rhythm and has found a new home with Sam @ Taking on a World of Words. Just answer the three questions below and leave a link to your post in the comments for others to look at. Don’t forget to check all the other participants. It is the #1 way I keep my TBR overflowing!

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The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

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WHAT AM I CURRENTLY READING?

I’m cracking into Tap! by Rusty E. Frank. I love reading nonfiction, especially during the daytime, and I am intrigued by this book that showcases “the greatest tap dance stars and their stories from 1900-1955.:

I continue listening to Emma every chance I get. But, I am trying to follow directions and keep my distance from people so my dog is only getting bathroom walks and not the longer ones I usually take her on. Perhaps today I will lay on my yoga mat and listen!

I also downloaded The Matchmakers List by Sonya Lalli after participating in 5 On My TBR on Monday. The prompt for this week is RomComs on your TBR and I saw this book and decided to start reading it. Thank goodness my library’s online catalog is still active! If you are interested in participating in this new bookish meme the information is here.

Finally, I pulled A Darker Shade of Magic off of my fabulous physical TBR shelf and started reading it. I am about 40% into it and it is getting really good.

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WHAT DID I RECENTLY FINISH READING?

Since I shut off my unfettered access to media I have actually finished reading some books! I loved the second Flavia de Luce, The Weed that Strings the Hangman’s Bag even more than the first. I never completely know how to review a series with so many books so I am playing with a new format on this one.

Meanwhile, the second Austenland book Midnight at Austenland by Shannon Hale was even better than the first book and those two I have already reviewed here. If you are looking for a perfectly paced romance book these two are ideal!

I also finished Quackery: A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything by Lydia Kang, MD and Nate Pedersen. This book combines dark humor, history, science, and the obscure / ridiculous ways people have tried to extend their lives into one fantastic book. The full review will be up Friday but briefly: it was awesome.

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WHAT WILL I READ NEXT?

The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George has sat idly on my bookshelf for far too long and the 5 On My TBR has reminded me of its adorable premise.

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“There are books that are suitable for a million people, others for only a hundred. There are even remedies—I mean books—that were written for one person only…A book is both medic and medicine at once. It makes a diagnosis as well as offering therapy. Putting the right novels to the appropriate ailments: that’s how I sell books.”

Monsieur Perdu calls himself a literary apothecary. From his floating bookstore in a barge on the Seine, he prescribes novels for the hardships of life. Using his intuitive feel for the exact book a reader needs, Perdu mends broken hearts and souls. The only person he can’t seem to heal through literature is himself; he’s still haunted by heartbreak after his great love disappeared. She left him with only a letter, which he has never opened.

After Perdu is finally tempted to read the letter, he hauls anchor and departs on a mission to the south of France, hoping to make peace with his loss and discover the end of the story. Joined by a bestselling but blocked author and a lovelorn Italian chef, Perdu travels along the country’s rivers, dispensing his wisdom and his books, showing that the literary world can take the human soul on a journey to heal itself.

Internationally bestselling and filled with warmth and adventure, The Little Paris Bookshop is a love letter to books, meant for anyone who believes in the power of stories to shape people’s lives. from Goodreads.

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Similarly, The Poison Squad is written by one of my favorite nonfiction author’s, Deborah Blum.

From Pulitzer Prize winner and New York Times-bestselling author Deborah Blum, the dramatic true story of how food was made safe in the United States and the heroes, led by the inimitable Dr. Harvey Washington Wiley, who fought for change

By the end of nineteenth century, food was dangerous. Lethal, even. “Milk” might contain formaldehyde, most often used to embalm corpses. Decaying meat was preserved with both salicylic acid, a pharmaceutical chemical, and borax, a compound first identified as a cleaning product. This was not by accident; food manufacturers had rushed to embrace the rise of industrial chemistry, and were knowingly selling harmful products. Unchecked by government regulation, basic safety, or even labelling requirements, they put profit before the health of their customers. By some estimates, in New York City alone, thousands of children were killed by “embalmed milk” every year. Citizens–activists, journalists, scientists, and women’s groups–began agitating for change. But even as protective measures were enacted in Europe, American corporations blocked even modest regulations. Then, in 1883, Dr. Harvey Washington Wiley, a chemistry professor from Purdue University, was named chief chemist of the agriculture department, and the agency began methodically investigating food and drink fraud, even conducting shocking human tests on groups of young men who came to be known as, “The Poison Squad.”

Over the next thirty years, a titanic struggle took place, with the courageous and fascinating Dr. Wiley campaigning indefatigably for food safety and consumer protection. Together with a gallant cast, including the muckraking reporter Upton Sinclair, whose fiction revealed the horrific truth about the Chicago stockyards; Fannie Farmer, then the most famous cookbook author in the country; and Henry J. Heinz, one of the few food producers who actively advocated for pure food, Dr. Wiley changed history. When the landmark 1906 Food and Drug Act was finally passed, it was known across the land, as “Dr. Wiley’s Law.”

Blum brings to life this timeless and hugely satisfying “David and Goliath” tale with righteous verve and style, driving home the moral imperative of confronting corporate greed and government corruption with a bracing clarity, which speaks resoundingly to the enormous social and political challenges we face today. from Goodreads.

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Tell me, please!

Everyone okay out there? And, what’s on your WWW?

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