Weekly Wrap-Up: May 16, 2026

Added: 2026-05-17

[00:00:00]Hi, my name is Pat and this is my channel Book Chat with Pat and I'm glad that you're here. Today I'm going to be doing my weekly wrap-up for the week ending Saturday, May 16th. I'm posting this a little bit late though because this has been a week of family and friends graduations and celebrations and I'm just a little bit off my regular schedule this week.

[00:00:29]Um as this video is posting, uh we will have already had our live stream discussion of uh Ursula K. Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness.

[00:00:46]Um that live stream is taking place on Gareth's channel at Books, Songs, and Other Magic. Our long-awaited live stream discussion of this classic of Ursula K. Le Guin's. I will uh put a link to that discussion in the notes below. Um >> [clears throat] >> we are moving on to a discussion We're reading the the Hainish Cycle in chronological order. So, we're moving on now to uh a reading and discussion of the novella uh The Word for World is Forest. I have two um version Well, it's the same version, but I have two editions. Uh one in here in this volume uh put out by the Library of America. Uh and then I also have the collection where it was originally published, which is in Again, Dangerous Visions, 46 original stories edited by Harlan Ellison. And this was where the novella was first printed in 1972.

[00:02:09]This novella is Ursula K. Le Guin's allegory about the US involvement in the Vietnam War. She wrote the story in 1968-1969.

[00:02:29]And then Harlan Ellison published it in this anthology in 1972.

[00:02:35]And then it was eventually published as a separate book in 1976.

[00:02:43]So I'm looking forward to our discussion of this novella. This is a new to me Ursula K. Le Guin story, but for some people in the group, it it is a favorite of of theirs. So I'm really looking forward to our discussion about this. So more about that in in the weeks to come.

[00:03:06]I imagine our live stream on this novella will be sometime in June. I'll keep you posted about about that.

[00:03:16]Um I finished reading this week and I did a separate review of a brand new YA novel written by BookTube's own Suey from the channel Suey's Bookish Banter.

[00:03:37]And this is her novella Always Best Buds.

[00:03:44]And it's written by K.S. Jensen, who is Suey at Suey's Bookish Banter. I was privileged to have an advanced reader copy of of this of this novel. The novel's publication day was May 12th and I released my video reviewing the novel on on that day. I'll put a link to that in the notes below as well.

[00:04:19]The book is now available in paperback form and also in ebook format.

[00:04:29]This is a delightful best friends novel written in the form of notes passed back and forth between these these two these these two best friends and I I just found it to be an absolute delightful YA novel and it's also filled with really wonderful nostalgia from the 1980s.

[00:05:03]>> [clears throat] >> We are continuing our group read of John Irving's novel A Prayer for Owen Meany.

[00:05:15]This week we move on to chapters five and six.

[00:05:20]This this is a a really big chunker of a novel and it only has nine chapters in it. They're really long chapters.

[00:05:29]Um So we're we're continuing to to make our way through that and to discuss that in in a Voxer chat.

[00:05:40]I think this is one of Irving's very best novels.

[00:05:46]We've been talking this past week about his his fascination with the grotesque in in many of its forms about parallels between John Irving and Charles Dickens. Irving absolutely loved Dickens and and much of his fiction is is written with an awareness of of Dickens and sometimes really in in homage to um to to Dickens as as well.

[00:06:22]And and we're also talking a lot about the wonderful mix of of the the deadly serious with the absurdly humorous. So, I'm really enjoying this ongoing discussion about one of my all-time favorite John Irving novels.

[00:06:47]Um My dear friend and subscriber and commenter Ali from Ali Avid Reader and I are continuing our buddy read of Flora Thompson's Lark Rise to Candleford.

[00:07:04]We had an in-person meet up online meet up a a chat a WhatsApp for the first time >> [snorts] >> which was absolutely delightful. We've become very good friends over the past couple of years, I guess.

[00:07:27]Um This is the first time that we had in real time conversation and and it was absolutely lovely and we are continuing in our talks to determine what our next buddy read is is going to be. While we've both absolutely loved Flora Thompson's writing, especially for its its evocation of an really all but gone time and place in in English in in in the England in England's countryside, we were hoping I think when we selected this this this book, we were hoping for more of a narrative.

[00:08:20]And this really isn't a narrative as much as it is a collection of observations about really every aspect of country life in England at the end of the 18th century.

[00:08:41]It isn't really a novel. There there are a couple of characters, you know, Laura is the fictional rendition of Flora Thompson, but there is no real character development and there's not much character interaction. There's no real there's no real narrative to to speak of. Rather, it's it's a series of descriptions of many many different aspects, really almost every aspect of of country life at the end of of the 19th century. So we're looking now for for something with more of a with with more of a narrative and and more character development. So I will keep you posted about that as as well. I also finished this week Tayari Jones' newest novel Kin.

[00:09:46]And this is a book that I'm reading with my in-person book group and we will be discussing this on Monday, May 18th. So, I'll do my formal review of the novel um after that. Um I have absolutely loved this novel. This is a novel about two young women, Vernice also known as Niecy and Annie. And they have been friends since Well, they've been friends all their lives. Um you know, they they first met as as babies and they grew up together and they were childhood um best friends.

[00:10:32]Um and they are linked by something very significant that that they they share.

[00:10:39]Um each one is um living and growing up without her mother. One lost her mother to um to murder um and one lost her mother when her mother basically abandoned her.

[00:10:57]The novel is narrated by both women in alternating chapters. Um by early adulthood, these two friends have gone off in really, really different directions and we continue to follow each woman's um young uh adulthood. Um I loved both of their voices.

[00:11:25]Uh I loved the themes that this novel asks us to consider um many of which are related to the idea of kin and kinship and and family. And as I said, I will I will do an individual review of this novel after my in person book group has had a chance to to discuss it. So that's what I've been up to this week. You know I always love to hear from you in the comments. Are you reading any of the things that I'm reading or have you read them or what have you been reading? I always love to hear from you.

[00:12:08]As always, I thank you for watching. I hope that you're doing well. I'll speak with you again soon. Take care.