What’s on Your Nightstand?

5 Minutes for Books hosts a monthly “What’s on your nightstand?” carnival on the fourth Tuesday of each month. The idea is that you let everybody know what you’ve been reading or are planning on reading this month.

It suits me to a T since the books I’m reading are literally on my nightstand. Here’s today’s photo.

Fiction

• The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien (I’ve been re-reading this one. Check out my notes on Chapter 1, 2, 3a, and 3b.)
• Dangerous Sanctuary by Lois Richer (A recommendation from my little sister that I haven’t started yet.)

Nonfiction

• How Do Astronauts Scratch an Itch by David Feldman. (Halfway through–just finished reading about why ceiling fans get dusty.)
• Your Two-Year-Old by Loise Ames. (Still trying to finish up that 649.122 Section at the library.)
• Secret’s of the Baby Whisperer for Toddlers by Tracy Hogg. (Ditto above. Only about a dozen books to go in the section–can’t let them multiply too fast on me.)
• Bicycling Magazine’s Complete book of Road Cycling Skills (Now that I’m commuting by bike and training for my big ride next year, I’d like to develop some skills.)
• How to Expand and Upgrade PCs. (Got my new hard drive installed, now I just need to clone my current hard drive over and get everything arranged right.)
• Do it Yourself PC Upgrade Projects. (Do you mean to tell me that you do not routinely check out at least two books on any given subject before attempting to accomplish a task?)
• The Perfect Apron by Rob Merrett. (Felt the need for some cute new aprons for while I’m teaching my cooking-I mean-Scientific Principles of Food Preparation-lab. And these aprons are HARD-CORE cute. I made the bias cut one and wore it to lab today.)
• Get out of that pit by Beth Moore. (My church’s ladies retreat this fall is based on this book. A friend and I decided to read it and discuss it together prior to the retreat. So far, so good.)
• Opposing Viewpoints: Medicine. (With the current Health Care debate raging, it helps to be informed!)

Childrens/Young Adult

• Leonardo, the Terrible Monster by Mo Willems. (Carrie at Reading to Know recommended Mo Willems–and I’ve fallen in love with his cute illustrations and story lines–in that order. I haven’t read this one yet though.)
• Breathing Underwater by Alex Flynn. (I read Alex Flynn’s Beastly and loved the modern-day retelling of Beauty and the Beast from the Beast’s perspective. This one looks to be pretty different, but I’m eager to read it regardless.)

School

It’s too depressing to enumerate these. Suffice to say that I’ve got a biochemistry text and a couple of library biochem primers, a book of lab tests (to study for the RD Exam), a text for my program planning class, and a half dozen texts for my counseling class.

Just finished

• Farmer Boy Days (A very abridged version of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Farmer Boy for new readers. Unless your child is seriously intimidated by the bulk of the Little House books, I’d encourage them to read the “real thing”. I was reading the Little House books by 2nd grade–and I don’t see why others shouldn’t be able to as well.)
• Nurse Matilda: Collected Tales by Christiana Brand. (I loved Nanny McPhee, so when I saw this book at the library, I snatched it right up. I enjoyed the first novel, but found the second two to be a bit too repetitive.)
• The Contented Soul by Lisa Graham McMinn. (This wasn’t a bad book, but it wasn’t great either. It had nice thoughts of contentment, but seemed a lot more “worldly wisdom” than “wisdom from above”. I can get enough worldly wisdom from worldly books. I don’t want to have to read it in “Christian” books too.)
• Rose Daughter by Robin McKinley. (I LOVED Beauty, McKinley’s first retelling of Beauty and the Beast. In Rose Daughter, McKinley tells the story again–with a completely different twist. I love both. These are books you definitely don’t want to miss.)