Books I Bought, Read and Finished in November

And what I thought while I was reading them, or buying them, a very different thing

Scroll for the actual THOUGHTs.

Books Acquired:

($$, 1/2$ author discount, gifted, or library)

Selected Amazon Reviews by Kevin Killian ($$)

The Cobra and the Key by Sam Shelstad ($$)

Morning Pages by Kate Feiffer (Library)

The Temporary Roomie by Sarah Adams ($$, 2x’s oops)

Carolina Moon by Nora Roberts ($$) (PRH)

Like Mother, Like Mother by Susan Rieger ($$) (PRH)

Much Ado About Margaret by Madeleine Roux ($$) (PRH)

Kiss Me at Christmas by Jenny Bayliss ($$) (PRH)

Margo's Got Money Troubles by Rufi Thorpe ($$)

The Perfect Couple by Elin Hilderbrand ($$)

A Bit Much by Lyndsay Rush ($$)

The Lost Story by Meg Shaffer (loan from a friend :))

Books Read:

The Cobra and the Key by Sam Shelstad

Same As It Ever Was by Claire Lombardo

Reasons Not to Worry by Brigid Delaney

Meditations for Mortals by Oliver Burkeman

How to Solve Your Own Murder by Kristen Perrin

Margo's Got Money Troubles by Rufi Thorpe

Entitlement by Rumaan Alam

The Perfect Couple by Elin Hilderbrand

Books Finished:

Morning Pages by Kate Feiffer

Famous for a Living by Melissa Ferguson

Colored Television by Danzy Senna

The Bookshop of Hidden Dreams by Karen Hawkins

My Vampire Plus-One by Jenna Levine

My book-buying eyes were definitely bigger than my stomach in November. By now if you’re keeping up you know my most enjoyed book was Morning Pages, which I wrote about even more here.

But Colored Television was definitely also special, and yeah, already wrote about that too, along with a book that felt very thematically similar to me but failed to float my boat.

But let’s talk about WHY I bought so many books. I’ve been slumping, spending more time on fashion substack than reading. It’s easy, it’s snacky, it sometimes leads me to make impulse purchases, thus enabling my other non-demanding but annoying unintentional hobby: buying things online and then shipping them back.

Listen, I WANT to read. I also want to draw and paint more, which explains the sorry state of my dining room table (dusty art supplies, anyone else?) I want to do my very own morning pages (and I hit one day in three or so, but it’s DECEMBER as I write this, there are excuses!!).

I want to DO a lot of things. But what I tend to do instead is BUY the things to do the things and then… not do them.

I bought books I really thought would grab me, and some of them did, and the others have not yet failed. I just haven’t even started them yet.

So now it’s December. And instead of a book-buying spree, I trotted out and bought ONE book, and took it home and opened it and started it. (More on that in my December wrap-up.)

Did the books on my #tbr table give me the side-eye? They did. But I did it anyway.

Sometimes book-buying really is for a purpose other than reading. I buy books to give as gifts (coming next week—last minute book gift ideas that will please nearly anyone who is willing to read a book which sadly is not everyone), to support my friends, because I imagine myself to be a certain person that sometimes I manage to be and sometimes I do not. I buy them because I think they’ll teach me something about my work as a writer, or because I want to figure out what makes them tick.

But mostly I buy books to READ. And now—December madness aside—I really need to get back to myself and do just that.

I do not need anymore clothes (although I am totally allowed to enjoy buying them when I want to). I do need more stories in my head.

What do you do to encourage yourself to put down the phone and read more? I’m all ears.

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Ooh, someone told me that if you fly United, you can watch The Chicken Sisters. I’m on planes!! This is very cool. I’ll also tell you that this is a great moment to get your week trial of Hallmark Plus and binge the whole thing, which is cuddly yet snarky and fun, because then you also get all their best holiday movies. And then, at the end of the week, having set notifications and alarms to remind you to do so, you can unsubscribe if you so desire. I get you.

That’s it for me for now—