• The Hunger Games series  Suzanne Collins
• Started Early, Took My Dog  Kate Atkinson (2011)
• My Life in France  Julia Child (2005)
• One Thousand White Women: The Journals of May Dodd  Jim Fergus (1998)
• Bossypants  Tina Fey (2011)
• Wish You Were Here  Stewart O’Nan (2002)
• Game of Thrones  George R.R. Martin (1996)

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I would never have chosen to read this book–despite the raving popularity of the HBO mini-series adaptation–had it not been recommended to me by someone whose opinion I trust, and boy, am I glad I did. This first installment of the Song of Ice and Fire series was the big surprise of my reading year and easily one of my favorite books of 2011.

That this series is classified as fantasy fiction was a huge red flag; scifi and adult fantasy novels hold no appeal for me. (Young adult fantasy is another story.) However, on the strength of solid writing and fantasy elements that are suppressed for much of the story, I was able to enjoy the book as a work of period fiction, completely immersing myself in the details of the medieval setting, the complex characters, and an exciting, tangled drama of warring kingdoms.

This tome is a breathless, whirlwind of a read. By the end, when a fantastical storyline reared its head, I was so invested in the characters, I hardly minded and couldn’t wait to start the next book in the saga.

Look what I discovered this afternoon. The witch hazel bushes that were planted last fall are showing the first tiny blooms of spring. The second week of February seems early to me, but that’s probably a product of our crazy-warm winter–the warmest in eighty years.

While it’s nice to see a little (and I mean l-i-t-t-l-e) color in the yard, I’m still waiting for more snow. Hopefully I’ll get my wish tomorrow, when the prediction is for 6+ inches of lake effect snow. I’ll take it any way we can get it.

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Usually, I’m not one for contemporary memoirs. The history buff in me prefers to wait at least a hundred years before reading about anyone, historical or celebratory. But when I saw that Tina Fey, the creator of one of my current favorite TV shows (30 Rock), had a comic memoir out, I knew I had to give it a try.

First of all, let me state for the record that I think Tina Fey is comic gold. She could write a version of the tax code and I’d probably read it from cover to cover, chuckling all the way. For the most part, Bossypants was an entertaining chucklefest but it wasn’t hilarious nor terribly compelling. It felt more like a series of amusing New Yorker pieces cobbled together as a book. Perhaps enjoying it in small bits over time would have been preferable to a straight-through reading. About three-quarters of the way in, I was starting to get antsy to wrap it up and start something new.

All this sounds like a mediocre review, but it’s more positive than that. I’d definitely recommend it to fans of Fey, and for those of us in the Chicago area, there’s a lot to enjoy during Fey’s early years at Second City. There are even shout-outs to Evanston and a hilarious bit at the YMCA.

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Stewart O’Nan is one of my favorite authors. I’d read anything by him, sticking it out to the last page, no matter how difficult it was to get through. Not that Wish You Were Here was a drudgery to read; it just helps to adjust your expectation going in and understand that nothing much happens in this book. And that’s okay. This book isn’t about the destination, it’s pleasure comes in the journey and if you accept that going in, you’ll be richly rewarded.

Emily Maxwell and her two grown children, along with their families and their spinster aunt, spend a final week in the family summer home on a lake in upstate New York. The patriarch has recently died and mom, to the bafflement of her son and daughter, has sold the cottage. Moving chronologically through the week, O’Nan gives each character a distinct voice, bouncing back and forth between family members and their unique perspective on shared events. Wish You Were Here will resonate with anyone who’s vacationed with their family, as it evokes the nostalgia and inevitable messy interpersonal kinks that come with familial history in close quarters.

As each adult family member grapples and grieves with the loss of father and family home (as well as their own long-lost dreams), the author weaves a subdued yet complex interpersonal tale with such tenderness and detail that I was thinking about the Maxwells long after I finished, finding it hard to believe at times that they do not really exist.

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The formidable chef’s memoir of her travels through France and awakening to the fine food and wine of her adopted country is pure pleasure to read. Wonderfully written, she recalls in delectable detail her discovery of delicious dishes and her struggle to not only learn to cook, but master the art of French cooking and translate it into one of the most influential cookbooks of all time. Her enthusiasm for life and learning leaps off each page and left this reader unexpectedly inspired and, not surprisingly, hungry.

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

At times, reading this felt positively Sisyphean; for every one page read, two would regenerate on the back end. Lewis makes his point repeatedly until you feel as trapped in Gopher Prairie as his central character, Carol Kennicott.

Lewis’ fine writing kept me slogging through the middle of this overly long book and I’m glad I finished it. It’s helpful to keep the book in the context of its time (1920) and importance (in blowing the lid off the idyllic fantasy of life in small-town America.)

Recently I’ve gotten back in to knitting and after making a number of baby blankets I decided it was time to break out of my knitting rut and try something new. I discovered the Morehouse Farm knitting yarn website and flipped for the cuteness of their “critter kits.” It took all my restraint not to buy one of everything.

I decided to start with two kits and see how it went. My first project was the hedgehog mittens, which I stupidly thought would be a quick project to knock off over the holidays, in time for JD’s fifth birthday. Did I not notice the cute little quills and wonder how they were made? The pattern is relatively simple but each quill is the equivalent of nine stitches in one. Can you say time-consuming-pain-in-the-***?

Added to that, is the fun of knitting with tiny double-pointed needles (my least favorite type of needle to use.) You also have to really pay attention to the pattern. I kept screwing up, so there was a fair amount of ripping and swearing involved, mostly because of the tight little stitches involved. But it was a good learning experience and I was very happy with the end result. Not bad for my first pair of mittens.

In comparison, this dinosaur hat was a breeze and took no time at all. In fact, it seemed to take longer to sew the points on.

It was a huge hit with the four-year-old recipient and I think she’s been wearing it non-stop since I gave it to her a week ago.

Next up, a scarf for myself.

Told as a series of journal entries, this work of fiction takes the premise that in 1875, when Cheyenne Chief Little Wolf proposed assimilating his culture with the whites by having a thousand white women “marry” into the tribe, President Grant agreed. The narrator, May Dodd, joins a trainload of women from the fringe of society (convicts, the mentally ill, spinsters, and prostitutes) traveling west to meet their fate. Fergus spins a good story, impressively conjuring up a vivid time and place as well as the mind-set of a woman thrown into a forbidding situation. An interesting “you are there” perspective on a sad chapter in this country’s Native American history.

In our never-ending quest to find tasty ways to eat Brussels sprouts, we tried another salad recipe, this one includes carmelized red onion and mozzarella cheese.

And for dessert, a cake that uses one of our new favorite ingredients, pomegranate molasses butter cake. I took this photo the next day, when I had a slice for breakfast with homemade chai tea, a winning combination.

Keeper recipes all.