Memberjlshall(she/her)

Real Name

Joy

About My Library

The books that I have cataloged here are mostly (with the exception of the "read but unowned" collection) books in our home library - some were acquired by my husband, some by me, some by the two of us together, and some were thrust upon us by friends or family. I have read many of the books, but there are also many I haven't read yet. If I live to be 600 years old, I may be able to get through most of them.

About Me

Leading-edge Baby Boomer. Retired after many years working as one of the faceless swarm of "program assistants" keeping Washington DC moving along everyday. Now I'm back in my home state of Texas, with lots of time to read, and play with my books. I've always been a bookworm and enjoy a variety of genres, although in recent years I've been reading mostly mysteries, true crime, and spooky stuff.

Not about me exactly - about my Favorite Authors list:
In general, for a writer to make my favorite authors list, I need to have read (and enjoyed) more than one of his/her works. (Assuming, of course, that he/she has produced more than one work.) So the authors of some of my favorite books might not make it onto my favorite authors list.

For my list of all-time favorite books, see this post:
My Top Ten List of 59 Favorite Books

CURRENT READING CHALLENGES
...My ALPHABET CHALLENGE thread

CHALLENGES FROM OUT OF THE PAST
...My 2022 CATEGORY CHALLENGE thread
...My 2021 CATEGORY CHALLENGE thread
...My 2020 CATEGORY CHALLENGE thread
...My 2019 CATEGORY CHALLENGE thread
...My 2018 CATEGORY CHALLENGE thread
...My 2017 CATEGORY CHALLENGE thread
...My 2016 CATEGORY CHALLENGE thread
...My 2015 CATEGORY CHALLENGE thread
...My 2014 CATEGORY CHALLENGE thread
...My 2013 CATEGORY CHALLENGE thread
...My 12 in 12 CATEGORY CHALLENGE thread

...My 2022 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2021 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2020 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2019 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2018 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2017 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2016 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2015 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2014 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2013 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2012 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2011 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2010 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2009 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread
...My 2008 FIFTY BOOK CHALLENGE thread

My List of EARLY REVIEWER books read and reviewed

My List of EARLY REVIEWER books requested

My List of EARLY REVIEWER books WON

My "FAVORITE CHILDHOOD BOOKS" List
My "READ the BOOK / SAW the MOVIE" List

My PERSONAL WIKI PAGE is HERE, although at the moment it's empty

And some instructions for doing FANCY STUFF at LibraryThing: HERE

MY PERSONAL RATING SYSTEM
Here at LibraryThing, I use the following:
✭✭✭✭✭ All-time favorites and new discoveries that I loved - not many get this rating
✭✭✭✭ Really liked it - an author I might consider reading again
✭✭✭ An enjoyable read, but nothing extraordinary; most books will fall into this category
✭✭ It was OK, but I probably wouldn't recommend it to others
✭ Mediocre; disappointing; had trouble finishing
DNF (Did Not Finish) Books I started reading and then abandoned. This doesn't necessarily mean I didn't like a book, just that I wasn't able to finish it or didn't feel like continuing with it. Might or might not finish it later.

With maybe just a few exceptions, I think I've rated every book I've read since joining LibraryThing. I'm also in the process of rating all the books I've read in the past, but since I'm one of the oldest people on the planet, and I've read a lot of books (and I'm also really really slow), it's going to take me a while to complete that project. So just because a book in my library has no star rating doesn't necessarily mean I haven't read it or didn't like it. Also, since many of the books in my catalog were actually acquired by my husband, a few have been rated by him.

MY READING IN 2023

1. High Rising (Barsetshire #1), by Angela Thirkell (1933) ✭✭✭✭
2. Wild Strawberries (Barsetshire #2), by Angela Thirkell (1934) ✭✭✭✭
3. Bramton Wick, by Elizabeth Fair (1952) ✭✭✭✭
4. Windsors at War: The King, His Brother, and a Family Divided, by Alexander Larman (2023) ✭✭✭✭
5. Landscape in Sunlight, by Elizabeth Fair (1953) ✭✭✭✭
6. Death Comes to Marlow (Marlow Murder Club #2), by Robert Thorogood (2023) ✭✭✭½
7. Looking Glass Sound, by Catriona Ward (2023) (ARC: NetGalley) ✭✭
8. The Heiress, by Rachel Hawkins (2024) (ARC: NetGalley) ✭✭½
9. The Messy Lives of Book People, by Phaedra Patrick (2022; reading now)
10. After Annie, by Anna Quindlen (2024) (ARC: NetGalley; reading now)
11. When You Are Engulfed in Flames, by David Sedaris (2008) (reading now)
12. It's OK That You're Not OK: Meeting Grief and Loss in a Culture That Doesn't Understand, by Megan Devine (2017) (reading now)

Location

Texas

Homepage

http://jlshall.blogspot.com/

Memberships

TinyCat

Also On

Pinterest

Currently Reading

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

When You Are Engulfed in Flames by David Sedaris

It's OK That You're Not OK: Meeting Grief and Loss in a Culture That Doesn't Understand by Megan Devine

After Annie: A Novel by Anna Quindlen

The Messy Lives of Book People by Phaedra Patrick

Favorite Authors

Edward Albee, Woody Allen, Margery Allingham, Kingsley Amis, Aristophanes, Louis Auchincloss, Jane Austen, Alan Ayckbourn, Linwood Barclay, M. C. Beaton, Ann Beattie, Robert Benchley, Jorge Luis Borges, Ray Bradbury, Anita Brookner, Truman Capote, Lewis Carroll, Raymond Chandler, Agatha Christie, Arthur C. Clarke, Noël Coward, Will Cuppy, Len Deighton, Peter De Vries, Colin Dexter, Emily Dickinson, Joan Didion, John Donne, Arthur Conan Doyle, Lawrence Durrell, Edward Eager, Harlan Ellison, Elizabeth Fair, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Janet Flanner, E. M. Forster, John Fowles, John Gardner, Edward Gorey, Caroline Graham, Ann Granger, Graham Greene, Dashiell Hammett, David Handler, Thomas Hardy, Moss Hart, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Robert A. Heinlein, Joseph Heller, Lillian Hellman, Ernest Hemingway, Hermann Hesse, Hazel Holt, Shirley Jackson, Henry James, M. R. James, P. D. James, Jonas Karlsson, George S. Kaufman, John Keats, Carolyn Keene, Garrison Keillor, Jean Kerr, Milan Kundera, Doris Lessing, Ira Levin, Elinor Lipman, Penelope Lively, H. P. Lovecraft, Alison Lurie, Ngaio Marsh, W. Somerset Maugham, Daphne du Maurier, Larry McMurtry, James A. Michener, Arthur Miller, Steven Millhauser, A. A. Milne, Jan Morris, John Mortimer, Kate Morton, Iris Murdoch, Vladimir Nabokov, Joyce Carol Oates, Arturo Pérez-Reverte, Jean Plaidy, Edgar Allan Poe, Anthony Powell, Douglas Preston, Barbara Pym, Ruth Rendell, Mary Roberts Rinehart, Philip Roth, J. D. Salinger, Dorothy L. Sayers, Rod Serling, Dr. Seuss, William Shakespeare, Robert Silverberg, Clifford D. Simak, Neil Simon, C.P. Snow, Muriel Spark, Rebecca Stead, Rex Stout, Elizabeth Taylor, Angela Thirkell, Dylan Thomas, Hunter S. Thompson, James Thurber, Anthony Trollope, Mark Twain, Anne Tyler, John Updike, Kurt Vonnegut, Irving Wallace, Evelyn Waugh, H. G. Wells, Eudora Welty, Patricia Wentworth, Edith Wharton, T. H. White, Oscar Wilde, Tennessee Williams, Angus Wilson, P. G. Wodehouse, Larry Woiwode, Tom Wolfe, Virginia Woolf, John Wyndham, Carlos Ruiz Zafón

Favorite Lists

Books Read in 2021, Favorite Childhood Books, Read the book and saw the movie

Member Connections

Friends

bermudaonion, bostonbibliophile, boyett-brinkley, brendanphughes, callmejacx, DTChantel, edlynskey, EdwardEinhorn, HannahHolborn, happyone, lilith7, lmgrim, notyourkimmy, the_red_shoes, virgingloves

Interesting Library

EarlyReviewers, JackieGleason, ManWithAnAgenda