R&R and the TBR

Okay, the book is now someone else's problem, at least momentarily. And I have a life again -- at least momentarily.

So . . . besides doing what I told Christa I was going to do this weekend (it involved "deep dusting" and probably some "deep vacuuming" and a whole lot of "deep filing" as well as deep-sixing a lot of notes and assorted piles of junk that have accumulated in my office) . . . I'm going to read.

Give me suggestions! It isn't that I don't already have a TBR (to-be-read) pile. It's that I would really like to hear what you are reading and if you like it and if I should read it, too. I single-bloggedly sold at least half a dozen copies of Twyla Tharp's The Creative Habit when I was nattering on about it here.

I'd like to think I might have convinced a few people that Liz Fielding's The Secret Life of Lady Gabriella was worth a read. And Loretta Chase's Not Quite A Lady.

So here's your chance . . . convince me. Tell me some good books you've read recently -- or last year or when you were a kid. Whenever. If they're memorable, I'll probably want to read them.

You don't have to talk me into it very much. Just an author and a title will do. I'm a sucker for good books. And now -- for a week or so at least -- I fully intend to READ.

I had to drive out of town today and I was gone most of the day. When I got where I was going I had an hour before I needed to be where I needed to be. Naturally I took along a book. So I began reading about Loretta Chase's mad earl in her novella in Three Weddings and a Kiss.
I thought I'd read most everything she'd written -- but I'd missed this. I'm just getting going in it, but I'm enjoying it. It's intriguing. Definitely different.

I've also got a couple of local history texts, Pamela Brook's book on How to Research Your House (thanks, Pam!) and The Home-Based Bookstore by Steven Weber, because somehow I'm going to have to get rid of some of these books!

Yes, I know it's possibly counter-productive for an author who depends on royalties to stay alive to sell used books. But I would never have written a romance if I hadn't been exposed to them through used bookstores. And I wouldn't buy new many of the writers I do buy "new" without having read them first gently used. Used bookstores are a fact of life -- and are better, in my opinion, than having books shredded and used as mulch along the nation's highways.

Anyway, polemic aside, in between deep dusting and thinking of a new story (you can suggest there, too, if you want), I'd like some great reads. Suggestions, please!!

Theo says, don't forget his contest! Check my website homepage for details.