Welcome

Hi! My name is Margot. My blog is about the things I love to do. That could be what I'm reading, places we visit, my family, food, or whatever else is happening. I hope you'll stay and visit a while. Contact me by email: joyfullyretired (at) gmail (dot) com.

What I’m Reading

Justice

Forever

The Sense of an Ending

Wish You Were Here

A Moveable Feast

Clarissa

The Odyssey

My Book Rating System

A = Excellent in every way
B = Very good story
C  = Good/Average
D = Poor
F = So Bad I couldn't finish it

Archives

A Food Book: Home Cooking

HOME COOKING: A WRITER IN THE KITCHEN Laurie Colwin Perennial/Harper Collins, 1988 My Rating: A+ “One of the delights of life is eating with friends; second to that is TALKING about eating. And, for an unsurpassed double whammy, there is talking about eating WHILE you are eating with friends. People who like to cook like [...]

Book Review: The Blue Heron Ranch Cookbook

by Nadia Natali Illustrated by Marica Natali Thompson North Atlantic Books, 2009 My Rating: B In addition to recipes, The Blue Heron Ranch Cookbook is a story about the creation of the Blue Heron Ranch and Zen Retreat Center. It’s the story of how the Natali family bought forty acres near Ojai, California and built [...]

Book Review: The Recipe Club

The Recipe Club: A Tale of Food and Friendship by Andrea Israel and Nancy Garfinkel Recipes in collaboration with Melissa Clark Polhemus Press, 2009 My Rating: B+ I’m calling this book a food novel about two friends Valerie and Lilly. They’ve been friends since childhood. As young girls they created a club-for-two in which they [...]

My Favorite Reads: A Culinary Mystery

The Cooking School Murders Virginia Rich E. P. Dutton, 1982 Rating: A Are you a cozy-mystery lover? Do you like that cozy-mystery mixed with talk of food? There are plenty of books available now that fill both of those qualifications. One of my favorites is from the early 1980′s. It’s The Cooking School Murders by [...]

Book Review: American Food Writing

American Food Writing Edited by Molly O’Neill Library of America, 2007 Rating: A I was lucky enough to get this book from my daughter Candice and her husband Mark last Spring. I have been tasting it, a few pages at a time, ever since. It’s the perfect book for readers who love first class food writing. [...]