FitMary202 wrote: »

Happy New Year! Reading Kidnapped, which covers Scottish politics from the 1740s in more detail than I expected. As luck would have it, there was a question about a decisive 1745 battle in our New Year's Eve Trivial Pursuits game. It went to the other team, but still.... Never hurts to keep reading!

The more you read, the more stuff you learn. Some of it isn't very practical... I just read Practical Magic and it wasn't very practical. It was an ok book but the end was abrupt it seemed to me, I wanted more story but no, it just ended. Maybe the sequel will have the answers I seek, but I am going to read something else before I get to it.

A book that piqued my interest in a subject that I also like was the western series I recently read by William (aka his niece J.A.) Johnstone, they were drinking Lapsang Souchong smoked tea and they really liked it. I have never had any so I bought some to try (tomorrow). The Chinese tea leaves are smoked over pine, I wonder if it will taste like pine tar, or smell like pine tar medicated dandruff shampoo (yuck)? I would hope not, or one would wonder why or how it became popular?

Since I am probably the only person left that never read The da Vinci Code, I am starting with book 1 of the Robert Langdon series with Angels & Demons by Dan Brown. I'm almost done with it.

@Btrflydog I agree with the reviewer. I didn't care for the book and was very surprised at how much I'd apparently missed (or they added!) when I watched the series. I've just started reading Peach Blossom Paradise by Ge Fei. The translator is coming to town so I decided to see what the book is about.

After two of the Lost Fleet space opera novels (which is a series I intend to continue), I am breaking it up by reading a stand alone thriller by Lincoln Child originally published as Utopia, later renamed Lethal Velocity. I don't know why publishers or authors rename books, that makes it more difficult to find them in public library databases. I found the audiobook under Utopia and the kindle e-book under Lethal Velocity and they are the same book. Lincoln Child, not to be confused with Lee Child of Jack Reacher fame, is a co-author with Douglas Preston of the Agent Pendergast thriller series that I have been enjoying. It is one of Child's early books.

Finished Practical Magic - Alice Hoffman - enjoyed it more this time through - though I do still prefer the movie, which is unusual for me.

Next up The Book of Lost Names - Kristin Harmel.

@FitMary202 - let us know how you like The Sellout - I need to know if I need to add it to Mount TBR.

The Rules of Magic by Alice Hoffman was much better than Practical Magic, and I am looking forward to Magic Lessons next up.

I found this article in yesterday’s Reminder newspaper. I was recently asked about “immersion reading” and studies related to it (reading a text along with the audiobook), I think that the study mentioned below from 2013 Emory University that looked at MRI scans as people read is interesting. Might point to a benefit from immersion reading because you get more deeply into the stories, activating more areas of the brain? Just a thought, so I copied the article.
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The impact of reading on cognitive decline

Aging and change go hand in hand. Although some may bemoan the gray hairs that start to arrive or stiffness in the knees that seems to sneak up on a person in middle age, such concerns are not necessarily enough to lose sleep over. However, many people 50 or older are nervous about the potential for cognitive issues like dementia as they grow older.

The Alzheimer's Association estimates that 6.7 million people have Alzheimer's disease in the United States. The Alzheimer Society of Canada estimates that there were 733,040 people living with dementia in the country as of January 1, 2024. Alzheimer's disease and other dementias can rob people of their memories, personalities and abilities to live satisfying, independent lives. While it may be impossible to prevent all cognitive issues completely, there is reason to believe that reading could be an ally in cognitive care.

The American Academy of Neurology says that reading stimulates the brain and has been shown to slow down cognitive decline in old age. Reading also may help slow down memory loss.

The powers of reading were noticed more than 10 years ago when a 2013 study from researchers at Emory University measured readers' MRI scans as they read books. They found the deeper readers went into a story, the more areas of their brains were activated. This activity remained elevated for several days after participants finished their books. The more a person reads, the stronger complex networks in the brain become.

Additional evidence that reading can help the brain was noted by researchers at the Texas A&M School of Public Health. A 2024
study suggests that older people with mild cognitive impairment who engage in high levels of activities like reading, hobbies and word games have better memory, working memory, attention, and processing speed than those who do not take part in such endeavors. Furthermore, a 2021 study published in Neurology found that high levels of cognitive activity, like reading and writing letters, can delay the onset of Alzheimer's disease by five years among those age 80 and over.

Reading can keep brains functioning optimally and potentially delay age-related cognitive decline.

- Metro Creative

Just finishing up The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier space opera series by Jack Campbell with book 5, Leviathan. It is quite a bit better than I expected it to be.