My Favorite Books of 2013

It's awards season which means it's time for my 2nd annual Favorite Books of the Year list. I know how anxiously some of you wait for this post each year, and I don't want to keep you in suspense any longer, because I know there is one question on everyone's mind:

What's Stephanie wearing?

Well, wait no longer, my faithful fans, because the answer is an OU sweatshirt and bejeweled jeans. (They are my fanciest! This outfit comprises nearly my entire winter wardrobe, by the way, so you will find me in it quite regularly.)

 A message from our accountants, Ernst and Julio:
We have counted the ballots in this year's list carefully and certify that all the books included therein were read by Stephanie in 2013, though they were not all written in 2013.

And now that that's out of the way, let's get to the books!

This was a banner year for good books. Last year you may recall only two books earned the coveted 5-star ranking, but this year the number doubled. Coming in at the top were The Great Dissent: How Oliver Wendell Holmes Changed His Mind--and Changed the History of Free Speech in America, Brave Genius: A Scientist, a Philosopher, and Their Daring Adventures from the French Resistance to the Nobel Prize, Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk, and Beautiful Ruins.

Note to self: If you ever decide to write a non-fiction book, be sure to pick the longest title you can, because that is obviously the sign of a winner.

Interesting fact #1- Beautiful Ruins was the first book I read in 2013 and Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk was the last. All you authors who want to end up on next year's list, remember that when picking a publication date.

I was very lax about writing up my reviews toward the end of the year, so I haven't said much about Billy Lynn, but it was interesting on several levels. It takes place during the 2004 Dallas Cowboys Thanksgiving game halftime show. I happened to be at that show and interesting fact #2, my-very-famous-brother produced the show. I kept waiting for his character to appear, but it didn't. (Which is probably a good thing.) On a deeper level it was about the lip service Americans pay to war and warriors while having no idea of what actually happens during war and to its soldiers. And on yet another level it is about how slimy some Texans can be. And, trust me, it's pretty darn slimy.

Beautiful Ruins is also fascinating on several levels. You can read more here if you like, but interesting fact #3 I've added it to my all-time favorite list. And it's definitely my favorite of all the above.

Three books tied at 4 1/2 stars. They were A Prayer for Owen Meany, which was a 27-hour marathon via Audible.com, but well worth the listen (great narration!), The Handmaid's Tale, an icky subject, but another Audible winner combining the great writing of Margaret Atwood and pitch-perfect narration by Clare Danes, and The Interestings, which along with The Great Dissent and Brave Genius, I picked up for free in the LibraryThing.com Early Reviewer program. (Do this!)

And finally earning a very respectable 4-star rating was Lost in Shangri-La: A True Story of Survival, Adventure, and the Most Incredible Rescue Mission of World War II. I picked this book up as an Audible.com Daily Deal and got way more than my money's worth. It tells the story of a plane full of site-seeing military folks who crash into a hidden valley in New Guinea and come in contact with an unknown, secluded civilization who haven't even invented the wheel yet. What I found most interesting about this story is that the author, who also doubles as the narrator, was able to go to the valley and interview natives who were children at the time to ask them to tell the story from their own point of view. Imagine being able to communicate with someone whose father was shaking a spear at an airplane and asking what they were all thinking. Amazing!

And there you have it. If you want to see all the books I read last year, including the real clunkers, check out the complete list on LibraryThing.com. Let me know below what your favorite books were this year and here's to happy reading in 2014!

Lovely Hearts

Here's some more fun for Valentine's Day. This first one is actually a custom order I made a few months ago. The buyer wanted a special gift for her husband.

I like the way that Love looks in this font. Isn't that a great curve? And the heart-filled endpapers make a great background!

So this particular one is gone, but I can make you one just like it if you'd like. Just let me know on Facebook or Etsy.

Or...you might like this one instead.

It's shiny!

Even the cover gets in on the act.

I Heart You...and You...and You...and....

So it's the new year and I promised you pictures of all the Christmas frivolity I got to make last month, so here's one neat project. There are some very fun ladies at my church who frequent the choir and like to refer to themselves as the Divas.

One of them commissioned me to make the rest of them books to show her Diva love, and here's what we came up with.

Hearts!

We covered the endpapers with sparkly paper because everyone knows Divas love sparkles...

...and then we added more sparkles because...

we could!

And then we made a sparkly Diva so everyone would know that these books were for very special people.

Hearts would make great Valentine gifts! Especially with shiny red endpapers. Want one? Request a custom order on Etsy. 

Happy New Year! And Here's to a Great 2013!

Well, the annual family book exchange is over. We all had a great time getting together to chat. Here are my brother in Dallas and my uncle in Baltimore catching up the new-fangled way.

And here is my other uncle and cousin showing them the book my uncle had just picked from that big pile on the floor.

We had 22 books in the hopper this year, and here's the one I came away with. 

I liked the Harry series so will have to give this one a try in the new year. But before we get too far into the new year I just wanted to thank all of you friends of Reading With Scissors who helped make this year such a fun one for me.

I put away enough money folding books that I was able to surprise Captain America with a new bike for Christmas.

And look at the fancy-dancy tag I made to put on it.

It kind of fell apart as you can see. Maybe if he could have waited for the glue to dry before I gave it to him. But the kids didn't get to our house until late afternoon and he was going crazy not being able to open a present, so I gave him the bike before they got there.

Speaking of gifts a few years ago my parents established a scholarship in my name at my alma mater. And thanks to your help, this year Reading With Scissors was able to make a very nice contribution to the Stephanie Dahlem Pounds Endowed Scholarship.

Thank you for sharing all the book-folding fun with me in 2013 and for buying more than a few of works. Here's to more fun in 2014! Here we go!

I Can't Do Math - The Christmas Edition

I am reading this book right now about this plane that went down in the Dutch New Guinea jungle toward the end of World War II. The survivors of the crash met up with island natives who had had no contact with the rest of the world--ever. 

In today's passage the author is describing the natives and reported that they could only count to three and after that everything was "many."

I've found my people!

At least you would have believed it if you had been at my house this week when I was baking for the annual cookie exchange. Remember last year's exchange? Well, this year was tons better because now I have DIL#1, my daughter-in-law, to help me bake.

Our recipe this year was Caramel Apple Cider Cookies that we stole borrowed from our soon-to-be cousin over at A Little Alana. Kudos to cousin Paul for snagging someone with such mad baking skills. We will be stealing stuff from Alana for the foreseeable future.

The recipe starts with caramel, and frankly we could have just stopped right there and had a winner in my book. The hardest part of the whole baking process was making sure we had enough caramels to fill 7 dozen cookies.

But that's where the problems started. I was never great at my 7 times table and a total loser at my 12s. As the good people in New Guinea would have said, "We just need many."

Thank goodness DIL#1 was there to guide me through. "We need 84," she said. And good thing she mentioned it because at that point we had already used up all our dough and were only at about 70. So we pinched and rerolled and soon we had many. They looked so good coming out of the oven...

...but the hardest part was flipping them upside down to cool to keep the caramel from sticking to the rack.

I take that back. The hardest part was not popping every one of those gooey bites of deliciousness in our mouths before we got them wrapped up.

After the cookies were done we started punching out snowflakes for our cookie bags, like these.

The plan was to punch two small flakes from yellowed paper and one large flake from whiter paper. Earlier in the week I had gone to Michael's to get the large and small punch. When I got home I realized that I already had a large snowflake punch, so I took it back.

On baking night DIL#1 punched away until we 12 white and 24 yellow snowflakes. Then she had to go away to work. :(

I took the snowflakes to my craft room to glue them on the bags. I laid out the 12 large white and the 24 large yellow. Wait. There were supposed to be 24 small yellow.

I checked the punches. I checked the snowflakes. All the snowflakes were the same size. Then I looked again. The large punch and the small punch were both 3" punches. 

So yep you got that right--I bought three snowflake punches and all three were 3" punches. Even my New Guinea friends could have counted that!

I combed through my boxes of punches and came up with another even smaller snowflakey looking thing like this:

It would have to do. Next, I ran to the store to get ribbon to tie the bags shut like this.

And in the end they looked like this.

The ribbons are not the same size because I also cannot measure. They say... 

"Let's snow?" Really? I've never snowed before. So I maybe I can't do math, but I can do English.

Captain America even got in on the act and help me fill the bags with cookies. He was not a fan of Caramel Apple Cider cookies ("Why can't you just make chocolate chip??"), and threatened to add Cheetos to each bag so recipients would have options.

He needn't have worried. After an hour of everyone tasting delicious cookies of all kinds at the cookie exchange, the Caramel Apple Cider cookies all found good homes.

And the fun part was I came home with 12 new kinds of cookies for to share with DIL#1 and munch on this holiday season--AND a new cookbook full of cookie recipes.

Captain America and #1 Son liked that part especially.

Twisted Twas

It's December! Time for giving and receiving. Decorating, wrapping, and surprises!

So what could be behind this festive red cover?

It's a "Twas" book for my friend, Sharon. 

Remember when I made one of these last year? Well, Sharon wanted another...but with a twist. Literally.

Sharon provided this pretty vintage looking paper to cover the endpapers. It is full of all kinds of Christmas quotes and pictures, but Sharon wanted to finish the whole thought behind the word "Twas," so...

...I twisted the design to buy us just a little more room in the bottom corner. Then I used my handy-dandy Silhouette machine to cut out the words to finish the thought!

It turned out really nice, I think. The original red endpaper was in great shape and just the right color to match Sharon's "Twas the Night Before Christmas" dishes in her December dining room hutch! 

Mission accomplished!

I like this new technique and when I get time, I'm going to try it again with more phrases. 

Can you think of any good phrases you'd like to see? Which word would you fold and which would go on the endpapers?

Gobble 'Em Up! It's the First Black Friday Sale at Reading With Scissors!

Reading With Scissors is holding its first ever Black Friday sale. Starting at midnight CST on Friday morning, enter BLACKFRIDAY13 in the coupon code at checkout to receive 20% off any book in stock. (Sorry no custom orders. I'm booked! Get it... booked? haha) The coupon lasts until Cyber Monday is over at midnight.

Stay out of the malls and shop online! It's while supply lasts.