The latest issue of Poets & Writers has arrived!  Seems all I have done for weeks is work at the office, work in the gardens, work in the house.  But I keep telling myself that summer is here, and if I don’t make time for writing, I have only myself to blame.  So I have instituted some new mini-goals to keep my book research going.  And this weekend, I’ll be giving myself permission to lie in my newly-furnished guest room, overlooking my newly-constructed perennial border, and soak in the pages of a favorite periodical!

What are you all doing this summer?  Any progress on the writing projects and TBR stacks?

Despite spending most of my recent “off” hours digging up sod, laying in a new perennial border, and planting my vegetable and herb garden, I have managed to read several books in the last couple weeks, all of which I hope to review here soon.  For now, I just wanted to state for the record how much I love living 2 blocks from an award-winning library!  The Way Public Library recently was ranked #6 nationwide in its class, and I say, congratulations to all of its patrons!  It’s rare when they don’t have what I’m looking for, and the convenience of logging in from home, putting books on reserve for myself, and walking down to pick them up is making it very hard to be “reasonable” about my TBR stack.  I just returned Nadine Gordimer’s Beethoven was One-Sixteenth Black and Other Stories and James Shapiro’s A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare, am currently reading Rivka Galchen’s Atmospheric Disturbances, and just got an email notice that the copy I reserved of Emily St. John Mandel’s The Singer’s Gun is ready for me to pick up!  I am definitely a multiple-book-source girl (a copy of Laura Lippman’s What the Dead Know arrived via BookMooch yesterday), but I see the balance tilting in favor of the library, now that I live just down the street.

How much do you use your local library?  How does that compare to your other book sources?  And what makes your local library unique?

Burns Day (poet Robert Burns, b. January 25, 1759) is as good as any to return to blogging after my moving-induced hiatus.  (And thanks for reading through my archives while I was offline!)  Most years Brandon and I remember too late, but this year we’re on the ball.  Perhaps we’re just looking for excuses to celebrate in our new house?

The house, by the way, is coming along.  We took possession just over a month ago, immediately remodeled the only bathroom, moved in on January 1, painted the front bedroom to work as our study/library, updated some wiring, and have been busy doing all the little things you do to unpack and make a new space your own.  We still have lots of work to do—a complete kitchen remodel in the next few years is becoming apparent—but are trying to take it one room at a time.  And the fact that I’m writing this in “my” corner of the study, enjoying a cheery new Pottery Barn rug and keeping an eye on the birdfeeder outside one window and the snowflakes curling over the porch railing out the other window means HOME is coming to fruition!

But for now, back to Robert Burns.  Our fascination with him is partly our Scottish backgrounds (more than a few generations ago), partly his apparent disgust for one of Brandon’s ancestors (Patrick Wodrow, son of Robert—who, like Brandon, was a church historian—mentioned in “The Twa Herds”), and partly a simple appreciation for all poets.  We also like to celebrate Emily Dickinson’s birthday on December 10, but there seem to be a lot more poetry-lovers who come out of the woodwork for Rabbie!  We will not be having haggis for dinner tonight (despite our friend Sam’s hearty recommendations!) but we will gladly lift a finger or two of Scotch while reading a few selections.  I found some cool resources at the Burns Country website, including recipes and a guide to hosting a Burns Supper.

Are you an observer of Burns day?  Leave a comment and let me know how you celebrate.  Now that I’m settling in again, I’m looking forward to making the blog rounds and catching up with all of you!

As you know, I’m a big fan of short fiction (still can’t believe I missed National Short Story Month!) and I recently mentioned I was compiling a list of links to places that celebrate the form and/or post stories in their entirety.  So without further ado, here’s what I’ve discovered in my browsing.

Dedicated sites/organizations:
Fifty-Two Stories (posting a new story a week for the whole year)
Story (news, reviews & free story downloads—including “Deep Blue Sea” by Peter Hobbs, whose novel The Short Day Dying is in my Top 10!) 
Save the Short Story (genre news & links to story writers and publishers) 
One Story (genre news & interviews plus a unique subscription)
The Short Review (reviews of story collections plus writer interviews)
DailyLit’s “Classic Shorts: Eight Stories for Summer” (subscribe to read a few gems by emailed installments)

Interesting Articles:
Newsweek’s “Don’t Sell the Short Story Short” (a quarrel with Stephen King)
The Guardian’s ongoing series “A Brief Survey of the Short Story” (biographical highlights of genre masters)
The Daily Beast’s “Year of the Short Story” (glimpses of collections new and forthcoming)
The New York Times‘ “In Praise of the American Short Story” (will it outlast even print media itself?)
The Millions’ “45 Favorite Short Story Collections” (results of a poll)

Anyone have any other links I should add?

You creative types out there who also happen to be religious/spiritual types will love this:  the creators of the absolutely gorgeous hand-illumined Saint John’s Bible (so called as it originated at Saint John’s Abbey in the Minneapolis area) are hosting “Praying with Imagination: A Retreat with The Saint John’s Bible.”  The Sunday through Saturday retreat will focus on visio divina (a form of lectio divina), a method of praying based on meditating on a particular image (in this case, artwork from this ongoing manuscript project) while hearing Scripture read.  In addition to these guided prayer times, retreaters have the option of praying the hours with the monks; engaging in creative expressions such as bookbinding, writing, painting, and pottery; fasting following by a feast with music and poetry reading; and hiking and swimming in the woods.  If my sister and her kids weren’t going to be in town (and if I had the $!), I would love to do this.  I hope one of you will consider it and then report back on how much good it did you!

I have posted before about how I’m collecting the 7-vol. reproduction of this Bible–if only one volume so far (plus the slipcovered book of illuminated prayers) counts as collecting!  (I have Gospels and Acts.) There also happens to be a sale going now on offset prints and notecards of the artwork if anyone is interested. Next time I make it out to Minnesota, I will definitely be visiting the Hill Museum & Manuscript Library on the campus of Saint John’s University, where the gorgeous folios are currently on display.