Monday, February 22, 2021

What I'm reading this week (2/22/21)

 Last week I finished


The Lazy Genius Way, Kendra Adachi
I was seeing this book all over on book vlogs and Bookstagram, and when I looked into it, it seemed right up my alley. In it, Adachi talks about the 13 ways to be "lazy about the things that don't matter and genius about the things that do." It's an empowering book, and I found it encouraging and helpful. It's a good one for all women because you get out of it what you bring to it. You decide what matters to you, and Adachi tells you how you can more easily make time and space for it in your life. I will say, though, that the principles here are already things I do in my life. Perhaps that's due to unique insight, perhaps due to my need to organize and efficient-ize my existence, or perhaps it's what I flippantly told my husband when describing the book, "it's called being in your 40s." I think a lot of this stuff you just figure out as you go through life stages, but maybe not. At any rate, the fact that I already do these things (or the ones that make sense for my current lifestyle) takes nothing away from the book. It's a very friendly, generous, warm hug of a book, whether the principles are new to you or not. (Note: Adachi has a podcast, too, which I have not really checked out, but you might want to.) My rating: 5 stars.


Love & War, Mary Matalin and James Carville
Wow, what a ride. This politically mismatched couple is something else. Matalin worked for President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney, and she worked on President George H. W. Bush's reelection campaign the same year that Carville was working to get President Clinton elected. I'd always thought James Carville was the crazy wildcard in this marriage, but now I wonder if he isn't the saner one--though I still disagree with most of his politics. This is a very frank look at how the couple gets along--and how it doesn't. They spent the first two years of President George W. Bush's administration not talking to each other. Carville could not let the election go, to this day saying it was stolen from Gore. Meanwhile, Matalin was working for the Bush White House! Her account of 9/11 inside the White House was riveting. But the book is not all politics. They also talk about their beloved daughters, their move from Washington to New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina (Carville is from Louisiana), as well as Matalin's love for creatures and Carville's loathing of the same. I enjoyed the book, but the years when they weren't speaking sent chills down my spine. If hubby and I even have a spat, I get panicky. I would never have the presence to not be talked to for months or years and live an otherwise normal life. Whew. I recommend this one. I like this quirky couple. My rating: 4 stars.  

Jackie, Janet, & Lee, J. Randy Taraborrelli
This is a re-read for me, but this time I listened to it on audio. I have to say that the audio version is not my favorite. The narrator pronounced every letter of every word, and it came off as haughty and pretentious, which isn't the tone at all with any of Taraborrelli books in print. This was still a good story, though, as it details the lives and relationships of Jackie Kennedy Onassis, her sister Lee Radziwell, and their mother Janet Auschincloss. These three would be great characters in any novel, but the stuff here is real. I recommend this one (and really anything by Taraborrelli) to anyone who wants a good well-researched story with some dirt thrown in. My rating: 4 stars. (Read my original, much more eloquent,  review here.)

This week I'll finish:



At night, I'm reading:



My audiobooks for this week:





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