The Sunday Salon: Bookish

 

Welcome! I am so glad that you joined us here at the Sunday Salon. Everyone is welcome here.

What is the Sunday Salon? 

The Sunday Salon is a place to link up and share what we have been doing during the week. I hope you will take this great opportunity to visit other blogs and join in the conversations going on there. 

We are (hopefully) in East Texas this weekend, spending time with our kids and g-kids, watching basketball and playing lots of games together. 

What I Read Last Week:

Wherever You Go, There You Are by Jon Kabat-Zinn (Nonfiction)

By the Shores of Silver Lake by Laura Ingalls Wilder (Little House #5)

The Summer War by Naomi Novik (Fantasy)

What I'm Reading Now:

The Brothers Karamozov by Fyodor Dostoevsky (Classic)

What Mad Universe by Frederic Brown (Science Fiction)

Grand Hotel by Vicki Baum (Classic)

The Remarkable Ordinary: How to Stop, Look, and Listen to Life 

by Frederick Buechner (Spirituality)

What I Posted Last Week Here at Readerbuzz:

The Sunday Salon: What Mad Universe

Bookish Discoveries I Made in 2025

The Circuit by Francisco Jiménez:Book Beginnings on Fridays, First Line Friday, The Friday 56, and Book Blogger Hop

I began to list 3 Good Things every day during the pandemic. Now I've established a regular routine of writing down my 3 Good Things. Here are 3 Good Things from last week:

Good Thing #1:

Masterpiece Theater: Bookish

is a delight.

Good Thing #2:

I will be going to the Texas

Library Association Conference 

in March this year!

Good Thing #3:

We are staying in a cabin

in a vineyard in East Texas

this weekend.

Weekend linkup spots are listed below. Click on the picture to visit the site.

        

I hope you will join the linkup for Sunday Salon below.

The Circuit by Francisco Jiménez: Beginnings on Fridays, First Line Friday, The Friday 56, and Book Blogger Hop

Today's Featured Book: 

The Circuit

by Francisco Jiménez

Genre: Graphic Novel; Memoir; Children's Book

Published: 2024

Page Count: 233 pages

Summary: 

An honest and evocative account of a family’s journey from Mexico to the fields of California—and to a life of backbreaking work and constant household moves—as seen through the eyes of a boy who longs for education and the right to call one place home.

 

BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAY is hosted by Rose City Reader. What book are you happy about reading this week? Please share the opening sentence (or so) on BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAY! Add the link to your blog or social media post and visit other blogs to see what others are reading.

Happy Friday and welcome to the FIRST LINE FRIDAY, hosted by Reading is My Superpower! It’s time to grab the book nearest to you and leave a comment with the first line.

THE FRIDAY 56 is hosted by Anne of Head Full of Books. To play, open a book and turn to page 56 (or 56% on your e-reader). Find a sentence or two and post them, along with the book title and author. Then link up on Head Full of Books and visit others in the linky. 

The Circuit is a graphic novel made from a book of short stories about the life of the author, Francisco Jiménez. When he was a boy, his parents decided to come to the United States for a better life. The family worked as day laborers on farms in California, moving from cotton fields to strawberry fields to fields of grapes, moving from tents to shacks to tenant houses, moving from school to school.

I've wanted to read this book for years, and what better time than now to learn about the life of an immigrant?

Now that I have read the graphic novel of this memoir, I plan to go ahead and read the author's original book and the sequels.

Jennifer of Introverted Jen is sponsoring the 2026 Immigration Reading Challenge. Jennifer notes, 'I firmly believe that a little empathy and understanding can help us put aside our differences, stop seeing people as “other” or “less than,” and find common ground and ways to live together peacefully.' You can find a list of books you might consider reading for the challenge here, and you can join in the challenge yourself here.

#2026immigrationreading

The purpose of THE BOOK BLOGGER HOP is to give bloggers a chance to follow other blogs, learn about new books, and befriend other bloggers. THE BOOK BLOGGER HOP is hosted by Ramblings of a Coffee Addicted Writer.    

Do you struggle to start a new read after finishing a truly amazing one? (submitted by Elizabeth @ Silver's Reviews)

Yes! Do you?

Bookish Discoveries I Made in 2025

 

1. History can be fascinating.

2. There are so many good science books.

3. In difficult times, it can help to read about heroic people.

4. In difficult times, it can help to learn more about bad political systems.

5. In difficult times, it helps to think about what's good for all.

6. In difficult times, it can help to read about the problems. 

7. In difficult times, it can help to read some philosophy.

6. Hurray for poetry!

8. Why did I wait so long to read this?

9. I like small gentle stories sometimes.

10. Nature stories can be comforting.

10. Sometimes classics are classics for a reason.

11. I want to read more science fiction and fantasy.

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. Each Tuesday That Artsy Reader Girl assigns a topic and then post her top ten list that fits that topic. You’re more than welcome to join her and create your own top ten (or 2, 5, 20, etc.) list as well. Feel free to put a unique spin on the topic to make it work for you! Please link back to That Artsy Reader Girl in your own post so that others know where to find more information.