The Journal
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Thoughts on books, reading, culture, and the literary life.
The Best of 2024 – Dabney’s List
January 5, 20252024…. this was a year of reading to escape. I did a lot of rereading–it helps to put me to sleep at night–but still managed to read almost 70 books…
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the ask@AAR: What were your favorite TV shows of the year?
January 3, 2025This year I discovered TV Time, a well-designed app that makes it easy to keep track of the shows you’ve watched and want to watch. Thus, I can tell you…
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the ask@AAR: What were your favorite films of the year?
December 27, 2024Pre-Covid, I loved going to the movies. Post, not so much. In fact, not only am I not munching on popcorn and watching the credits roll on the big screen,…
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Merry Christmas!
December 25, 2024Merry Christmas to all. I wish you hope and joy, in darkness and in light. Here’s to grace, peace, and love. 2024 was a tumultuous and often tough year…
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the ask@AAR: What’s the perfect length for a novel?
December 20, 2024Increasingly, the short novel seems to me to be the ideal literary form for our tired, distracted but still story-hungry age. The above is from a recent column by Margaret…
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the ask@AAR: Are you ready to agree to disagree?
December 13, 2024Currently, I am working a joint review with another reviewer on a book I loved and she did not. Neither is going to change the other’s mind about this work….
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the ask@AAR: What’s your favorite film adaptation?
December 6, 2024It is the era of the recycled tale. So much so I often wonder whether or not any original stories are being filmed. Cape Fear, a story originally written by…
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the ask@AAR: What’s the best proposal story?
November 22, 2024Yesterday, my husband, three of our kids, and their significant others got up at 4am, piled into two rental cars, and drove 90 minutes to the top of Haleakala (on…
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the ask@AAR: What was the best….?
November 15, 2024It’s that time of year: Our Best of 2024 lists will start to run soon! We don’t make lists by genre but that doesn’t mean you can’t! What is your…
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the ask@AAR: Do you need a hug?
November 8, 2024Whatever your politics and wherever you live, this week’s American election is something you’ve been inundated with stories and opinions about. On election day, I heard from friends in India,…
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the ask@AAR: What, if any, social media do you use?
November 1, 2024I’m old enough to have signed up for Facebook as soon as it was available to the general public. It was 2006 and my 15 year old son and I…
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You guys really like historical romance!
October 31, 2024As we approach the end of the year, I start running reports–how we’re doing financially, what pages readers visit the most, etc…. One I run each year that becomes less…
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