RAE’S READS

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This year (2025) finds me with 53 years of teaching “under my belt.” I have taught all levels from pre-K “(library lady” or “book lady”–volunteer) to juniors, seniors, and graduate students enrolled in my Advanced Writing class at the university where I have just completed 34 years. My first paying teaching job was junior high, and I spent 13 years with ages 12-13, the “difficult years.” I had some of the “funnest” experiences with this age group. When I was no longer the “young, fun teacher,” I taught in an elementary school setting before sixth graders went on to junior high, teaching language arts blocs, an assignment that was a “dream-fit” for me. After completing graduate school in my 40s, I went on to community college, then university teaching. This past fall I accepted a part-time teaching job at Apogee Gulf Coast Schools in its first year at the Alvin campus. After my Better Half died n 2022, I achieved a lifelong dream: opening a bookstore of my own, Rae’s Reads. A year later, I sold the house we had lived in for 47 years and moved into the bookstore. My goal is to circulate and repurpose books. Just as teaching is “in my blood,” so is a passion for reading, writing, libraries, and everything bookish. This blog will be open to anyone who loves books, promotes literacy and wants to “come out and play.”

  • BOOKWORM: A MEMOIR OF CHILDHOOD READING by Lucy Mangan, THURSDAY REVIEW

    This lovely, nostalgic memoir/reading list is written by a “born and unrepentant bookworm.” A book for all readers who love books and all things “bookish,” Bookworm deals with both British and American authors. It describes books Mangan loved from ages one to three when she was still being read to (Most were UK authors and unfamiliar to this American reviewer.) and books from the time she learned to read, to her choices during her “coming of age period,” both physically and intellectually, as a reader.

    The books mentioned range from Barbar the Elephant (She did not like it.) to Bette Greene’s Summer of My German Soldier. (She describes herself, as a discriminating reader, thinking this one was “dense, beautiful, astonishing.”)

    One of the best “to the reader” asides of the book, and there are many delightful ones, comes near the end where Mangan gives advice to parents of bookworms: “We are rare and we are weird…there is nothing you can do to change us…Really, don’t try. We are so happy, in our own way…Be glad of all the benefits it will bring, rather than lamenting all the fresh air avoided, the friendships not made, the exercise not taken, the body of rewarding and potentially lucrative activities, hobbies, and skills not developed. Leave us be. We’re fine. More than fine. Reading’s our thing.”

    This was a most enjoyable Book about Books, a continuation of a challenge left from 2019. It was a gift from Deb Nance of Readerbuzz.

  • TUESDAY TEASER

    Tuesday Teaser, brought to you by the Purple Booker asks that you grab a book you are reading and copy a few lines in order to “tease” someone else into looking into that book for further reads. Here is my teaser for Sorry I’m Late, I Didn’t Want to Come, a non-fiction look at an introvert exploring extrovert territory, by Jessica Pan.

    Summing up the results of her one year experiment, Pan writes, “It was more than I ever could have hoped for when I started. I feel more in control of my life because I can extrovert.” She goes on to describe the many new things she can “handle” which she couldn’t before as a result of saying “yes” to things that were definitely out of her comfort zone before as a dyed-in-the-wool introvert.

    This has been the best non-fiction read of 2020 for me. I highly recommend it.

  • STACKING THE SHELVES ON SATURDAY

    ADDING THESE THREE to my TBR shelf:

    Also have been re-reading this blogger friend’s book in preparation for my Advanced Writing class this fall.

    I don’t teach creative writing; I teach writing argumentatively towards an academic audience, but this little book reminds me what writing is all about and has a ton of ideas to teach real-world writing, which makes up the second half of my semester.

  • SATURDAY MORNINGS FOR KIDS

    Saturday mornings are dedicated to kids. What they’re reading and what they like.

    Today’s recommendation of one of my favorites, the “Horrible Harry” Series.

    Some kind person left these in my Little Free Library.

    Harry is the typical second (and third) grader, not HORRIBLE; however, the situations he manages to get himself into are indeed just that–HORRIBLE. This is a laugh-out-loud series of chapter books that boys, especially, will adore.

  • DRIVING WITH BUDDHA

    I have just finished the road-trip books by Roland Merullo that have a philosophy side to them. I was hooked early on by Breakfast with Buddha ,the first book in the series and really enjoyed meeting Otto, his screwy sister, and her boyfriend, the semi-Buddhist priest, Rimproche. At first I was skeptical (as was Otto) about all this meditation and enlightenment “stuff,” and followed more closely Otto’s efforts to show Rimproche the “real America.” Picturing the Burgundy, gold-trimmed robed priest playing miniature golf and bowling was a fun thought, but soon I began to pay more attention to the Holy Man’s words. I think Otto’s reaction followed the same trajectory. By the end of Breakfast, I, like Otto was beginning to really like Rimproche and to wonder if there wasn’t something to this meditation “thingy.”I began to notice and sometimes read columns and articles that touted the value of meditation that came my way.

    Lunch with Buddha continued the saga, Rimproche now married to Otto’s sister with a small daughter. This second book dealt with another road trip, but also with Otto’s maturation of a spiritual side which was clearly necessary for him to survive the death of his beloved wife. It went into detail about his meditations, his seeking for enlightenment, and the relative success he had with both. My inquisitive mind and spirit “ate this up”! By this point I had found a columnist in our Houston newspaper that came out each week, featuring self-care and advocating guided meditation as a way to destress, relax, and change one’s busy lifestyle. I downloaded twenty something guided meditations and began enjoying them on a regular basis. In fact, I became “good at it” and saw a definite relax in my normal “driven” attitude and lifestyle.

    That’s when the fun began. Book three , Dinner with Buddha (published in 2015–hopefully there will be a book four, maybe “After Dinner Coffee With Buddha,” LOL, because this book upped and amped the plot 100%. Otto’s little niece turns out to be a very special child with special abilities (bordering on superpowers, LOL). Plus sinister Chinese strangers seem to be stalking her and her family and join the “chase” across country in the third road trip. Talk about action! The final meet-up in Las Vegas, of all places, is action packed and eerie to say the least. Otto comes to a turning place in his life and the end of the book gives us his dramatic decision. All of this action and many side-trips to National parks and scenic places manage to tie in all this meditation recommendation with an appreciation of Nature and a sense of cosmic and spiritual benefits to those who seek.

    The three road trips with Otto and Rimproche have not only been a darned good, fun read, but they have enlightened my way of thinking about meditation specifically and “religion” in general. Who says a novel (or series of novels) can’t make you think?

  • FIRST LINE FRIDAYS

    Both Hoarding Books and Wandering Words have First Line Friday memes. The idea is to copy the first line (or so) from what you are currently reading to see if someone else would like it too.

    This is the first line from the second story “Big Driver” in Stephen King’s Full Dark, No Stars. “Tess accepted twelve compensated speaking engagements a year if she could get them.” Spoiler alert: The story includes a violent, graphic rape.

    After reading “1922” about a man who murders his wife (see post last Friday, “Friday Firstliners”) and now “Big Driver” in which an innocent cozy mystery writer is brutally raped after speaking in a small town and taking a short cut home, I think I have had enough of this book. This is not the Stephen King who wrote The Stand trilogy or The Dark Tower series I admire as a favorite author because of his masterful writing style, but a writer who has nightmare ideas and jots them down as short stories. I think from now on I will stick to well-written novels like Mr. Mercedes or Dr. Sleep, which demonstrate the versatility and cleverness of King’s writing style rather than his weird short stories.

  • REVIEW: REDHEAD BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD by Anne Tyler (2020)

    Ann Tyler’s latest offering, Redhead by the Side of the Road, delivers what we have come to expect from Ann Tyler: excellent characterization, “ordinary” protagonists, and middle aged angst.

    The opening lines, “Micha Mortimer is a creature of habit,” introduce us to the most neutral man in the United States, and our first impression of him, as well as our empathy for him is just that–neutral. Micha is a handyman and manager of an apartment building who also runs a computer fix-it business, “Tech Hermit.”

    The storyline is described as being, “an intimate look into the heart and mind of a man who finds those around him just beyond reach.” We, as readers, are vaguely interested in Micha, this vague man who just “doesn’t seem to get it,” yet is satisfied with his mundane life. He goes about his scheduled routine, a specific day for each household chore, a specific daily round of activities, beginning with a morning run. It is on one of these runs that the reader sees the world through Micha’s myopic eyes, as he looks at a fire hydrant and sees it as a person, “a red head by the side of the road”–thus the title.

    The book/narrative itself is not dull nor myopic, it is written in a witty, clever, detailed, pleasing style and never loses the reader from the first line to the last, a darned good read.

    a darned good read

  • Mr. Penumbra’s 24 Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan (2012): A Review

    Billed as a “literary adventure story,” Penumbra’s was a delightful read. Set during The Great Recession in the US, we find Clay Jannon, the protagonist and narrator up to his eyebrows in mystery thanks to his new night-shift bookstore job.

    There are many strange things about the bookstore, first the fact that it’s open 24 hours, second that there are “customers” who come in during the overnight hours. The customers are strange themselves, hurried, older, “driven” and they do not buy many books, but instead hold cards that allow them to “check out” books from the “wayback” stacks. When he finally peeks into one of the massive tomes, these requested books, Clay finds out they are all written in some kind of code.

    Who better at breaking a code than the attractive “computer-geek girl” who becomes more than a friend to Clay and his wealthy junior high geeky friend who finances and participates in the wacky adventure the three undertake to solve the 21st century mystery.

    Even stranger than the bookstore is the its namesake, himself, Mr. Penumbra. A true “character” has been created here, a likable, peculiar, eccentric old man who reveals not only his respect for Clay and his computers but his “connections” with a medieval, possibly dangerous cult/sect.

    This book has everything: things to make you laugh, things to make you sigh, as you travel all over the country to solve all things Penumbra. A great read!

  • WEDNESDAY SUMMING UP

    I did some good reading this week.

    I finished Dinner with Buddha, the Netflix series, Sweet Magnolias and Virgin River, and a poetry collection, When You Ask Me Where I’m Going.

    I am continuing to read Mr. Penumbra’s 24 Hour Bookstore–nearing the end; I am slowly reading and thinking about Things That Join the Sea and the Sky: Field Notes on Living, and I am close to finishing Redhead by the Side of the Road.

    This is WHAT I have finished and WHAT I am reading currently. As far as what’s next–anything goes!

  • BEAUTIFUL WORDS

    Rae Longest's avatarLiteracy and Me

    “AND SO IT GOES”

    “We were walking near the water when you saw something in the waves that I couldn’t see. It made the years peel away from your heart. And there, by the sea, the flower of your life opened, and the seed of the Universe you carry, which some call God, was shining like a diamond softened by time. You turned and said, “We have loved each other well. Please, take it. Your wild kindness opened the flower of my life where the seed of the Universe that I carry fluttered out of me like a red bird born to make a nest for diamonds softened by time. So my gift took your gift and flew off to seed the future, revealing something deeper in each of us. And arm in arm, we thanked all that is and happily began again.”

    From Mark Nepo’s Things That Join the…

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