Kristi Stewart

09/18/2022

The earth has music for those who listen.

09/16/2022

Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans.

09/14/2022

Beauty is an attitude.

09/12/2022

The ocean is this beautiful, unexplored place.

09/10/2022

A good rest is half the work.

09/08/2022

A little progress each day adds up to big results.

09/06/2022

Looking at beauty in the world, is the first step of purifying the mind.

09/03/2022

Time to relax.

09/01/2022

Morning Yoga.

08/27/2022

I'd heard so much about Colleen Hoover, I just had to see what all the fuss was about - so I picked up this book, and boy was I glad I did. It Ends With Us is compulsively readable with a heartbreaking and powerful story. The characters are so well drawn, there is no black and white here - which is hugely important considering the subject matter. To make your reader fall in love with a character and also hate them is quite a feat. I also really liked the simple yet sharply observed descriptions of how the characters moved; I don't think I've ever visualised that so vividly, and it really added to the action in each scene. I was completely drawn in and sat staring at the book long after I'd finished it. Thank you Colleen Hoover for bravely writing this story.

08/24/2022

Mr. Perfect on Paper is a wonderful, lighthearted funny story from author Jean Meltzer, author of The Matzah Ball.

CEO of a Jewish dating app, (J-Mate) and third generation family matchmaker, Dana Rabinowitz knows her love skills. She is a confident woman with incredibly amazing business ideas. She can match two Jewish customers with her eyes closed. As for her own love life…meh! She is afraid to swipe right for her own love life! You see Dana suffers from Generalized Anxiety Disorder and is afraid of well, just about everything. All fears lead to dying!

So, when her team convinces her and her Bubbe, (grandmother) to go on a television show called Good News New York to promote their new app, she is not convinced she can do it, but she is comforted knowing her Bubbe will be there with her. She is also a bit uncomfortable because she has a bit of a crush on the anchor who will be interviewing them, Christopher Steadfast, but him being non-Jewish puts him out of the running as far as Dana is concerned.

Christopher Steadfast is a widow with a young daughter who moved to New York after his wife died. Trying to juggle a career and being both a mother and father to his daughter has made his life a bit hard. But he is so grateful to have her as a memory of the love he had for his late wife.

Unfortunately, things do not go as planned during the interview. Somehow Bubbe seems to take over the talking and produces an actual list Dana had written after a few drinks awhile back which is titled Mr. Perfect on Paper with all the “ingredients” for a perfect Jewish husband. Dana is horrified! But the audience loves it!

With the uptick in ratings from the episode, Chris convinces Dana to do a few more shows in which they try and set her up with her Mr. Perfect on Paper. She meets blind dates which the show has vetted, and they film her on the date.

This is when the true hilarity ensues!

As Dana and Chris begin to spend more time together due to some unfortunate yet funny events, Dana can’t help herself from thinking she could fall hard for him if only he were Jewish. He’s just not perfect on paper. But when Dana seems to meet “the one” who is perfect, she must decide what to do. Chris, who has feelings for Dana can’t do anything to help the situation. It must be up to Dana. She must ponder the question is true love based on what’s written down, or what’s written in the heart.

Mr. Perfect on Paper is funny, entertaining and believe it or not very educational for those who don’t know much about Jewish traditions and sayings. How much did I enjoy this story? It’s Perfect!

08/23/2022

This book is everything a memoir should be. It's beautiful storytelling. It manages to be at once completely unique (and harrowing) and universal to the human experience. It challenges you to think about your own experiences and assumptions about people and the world. I couldn't put it down and even after I finished it, I couldn't stop thinking about it.

08/22/2022

08/22/2022

08/18/2022

This was my favorite kind of story and I loved every second.Give me all the old Hollywood and vintage glamour. All of it. I can never get enough. And that's only a fraction of the greatness of this one.I gobbled this up in a few reading sessions, finishing it on a flight home the other night; where I sat with tears falling down my face and only a cocktail napkin to assist me in not causing a scene with my sniffling.The story touched me in a profoundly personal way. It's now a forever favorite on my shelf.Evelyn Hugo is a brilliant character. Powerful, unflinching, and uniquely inspiring. Monique Grant is perfectly relatable for me - a 30-something writer navigating her recently failed marriage.The underlying theme is wildly present in my own life and too good to spoil. But I will say that the novel is credited as a gift to the LGBTQ+ community and indeed it is. The all too often ignored letter of that acronym placed front and center. A period piece that illustrates the challenges faced in the past, and how the overcoming is and always will be a valuable and important effort in this world.There is love and loss, passion and betrayal, life and death. A telling of the conflict in all of us between what is good, bad, right, and wrong. The way we become committed to preserving ourselves and our loved ones, and the choices we make to see those efforts through. Decisions that are at times heartbreaking, other times exhilarating, and often every feeling in between.So freaking good. Five stars for me. And a poignant reminder that love is love.

08/17/2022

We are only 5 months through the year and I’ve found my favorite read so far: Every Summer. Where to start with this incredible romance/ summer lit book? Persephone spent every summer of her childhood at a lake in northern Ontario next to Sam and Charlie Florek. These boys were her best friends until it turns into more with Sam. Things are magical until that one moment when everything goes wrong. Years later, after a family death, she heads back to the lake where her life was change so many years ago.This book is absolute perfection. It gets everything right: the feeling of isolation when moving to a new area, childhood friends made in no time, first love, long distance friendships and romance, the death of a parent, even sibling rivalry. I loved the relationship between Sam and Percy; it felt so genuine and real. I had to keep reading to find out more. I needed to know what the big conflict was that changed everyone. It was so well executed!I can hardly believe this is a debut novel, but I’m going to need more from Carley immediately. I hope she’s working on new stuff! I would also love to shout out that Sam’s family restaurant serves Polish food and I would love to go to their restaurant. I would love to know what made the author decide to have them own a Pierogi restaurant! 🇵🇱10 stars (5 doesn’t seem enough!)

07/31/2022

This book is.a wonderfully written story starting in tragedy and pessimism and ending in optimistic wonderment for a group of players who find themselves at 80 looking forward instead of back.
I'm sure many will find this sugar coated and somewhat Pollyanna-ish. However it is uplifting and has you rooting for the underdog.
Being a lover of many things British I was enchanted with the dialect and how perfectly it was applied in the social setting.given..
Also having traveled in the UK and having read a great many stories set in the British Isles I loved following the story as it moved from place to place. I certainly could smell the sea and feel the sand in my toes. But also appreciate the pathos in which the story began and ran throughout the book.

The Woman Who Kept Everything: The new, most uplifting feel good fiction book to read this year

07/31/2022

Прага

07/28/2022

I only picked this up as it was on a reading bucket list I was given. I have to say, I find the writing a little fractured and the author often draws on overly complicated similes as adjective and adverb. I dare say, I found the writing a little... juvanile(?). That said, however, the book is a good page turner and, once I started reading, I was compelled to find out what was going on. An easy and somewhat enjoyable read that doesnt dissapoint in its narrative arc, let down (in my very humble opinion) by obscure similes and some lazy racial stereotyping (a point I'm sure others would challenge). Read it if you're a fan of the genre/author, otherwise it offers little.

Tell No One: A Novel

07/28/2022

Закат в Индонезии 🇮🇩 #индонезия

07/25/2022

07/25/2022

Сиреневые маки! Очень красиво!!!!

07/25/2022

Озеро Люцерн, Швейцария