November CalendarCAT

Welcome to November CalendarCat!

November's name comes from the Latin novem meaning 9 because it was the 9th month of the Roman calendar. So you could read a book with 9 in the title, or the 9th book of a series.

Anglo-Saxons called November ‘Blotmonath’ (“Blood month”) after the blood of slaughtered animals. You could read a book about fall harvest or one with blood in the title or on the cover.

In Australia, United States and Canada, this month is associated with Movember (mustache November), a movement that encourages men to grow a moustache as a symbol of celebrating men’s health and raise awareness regarding different male diseases. So you could read a book with a man on the cover sporting a mustache. Or one that is about men's health/diseases.

The Zodiac sign is Scorpio and Sagittarius.

Famous people born in November include;
Mark Twain, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court
Winston Churchill, The Gathering Storm
L. M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables
Boris Becker, The Player: the autobiography
Charles de Gaulle,
Carlos Fuentes The Death of Artemio Cruz

The birthstones of November are the topaz and the citrine, both known for their calming energies, bringing warmth and fortune to those who wear them. The topaz in particular symbolizes friendship and it is said to cure madness and eliminate nightmares. Pure topaz is colorless but in its most common form ranges in color from brownish orange to yellow. This is why it is often mistaken for the citrine, another yellow colored stone. The citrine is supposed to spark imagination and symbolizes new beginnings.
Topaz by Leon Uris

• The traditional flower of the month of November is the chrysanthemum. Depending on their color, chrysanthemums have different meanings: the red ones symbolize love, the white ones stand for innocence, and the yellow ones denote unrequited love.
Red, read a romance novel
White: read a coming of age book
Yellow: love gone wrong?

• Special holidays in November include All Saints’ Day (November 1st), All Souls’ Day (November 2nd), Thanksgiving (the forth Thursday in November), Universal Children’s Day (November 20th).

Have Fun!

I am going to go through the list and find a book for all the possibilities. I will post that as well. I never read them but it is always fun.

Thank you! Lots to choose from here.

I love your lists too, it's fun to find off the beaten track books to fit each day.

I'm considering The Gathering Storm by Churchill that has been gathering dust for a while.

Some others I'm considering are:
Aviation History month: Into the Abyss by Carol Shaben, a bullet from rabbitprincess
Native American Heritage month: Indian Horse by Richard Wagamese
Universal Children's Day (20th) - I have several that would fit

I have Cheer Up Love, by Susan Calman, on the pile for this month's CAT. Calman's birthday is November 7.

>3 VivienneR: I have wanted to read Indian Horse.

The first books from my TBR shelves that comes to mind are Of Beards and Men by Christopher Oldstone-Moore and Number9dream by David Mitchell

1. Chemistry Week: The Elements: A Visual Exploration of Every Known Atom in the Universe by Theodore Gray
2. Deviled Eggs Day Who Put the Devil in Deviled Eggs? Ann treistman
3. Sandwich Day Twilight Years by Sawako Ariyoshi (this 1001 Book is a story of a young woman taking care of the elderly parents as well as her own family.
4. King Tut day: The Murder of King Tut: The Plot to Kill the Child King by James Patterson
5. Model Railroad Month: Closely Watched Trains or Trainspotting (More 1001 Books)
6. Saxophone Day Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtix
7. Drum month: The Tin Drum by Günter Grass 1001 Book
8. Dunce Cap Day Notes on My Dunce Cap by Jesse Ball
9. Chaos Never Dies Day, Special Topics in Calamity Physics by Marish Pessl
10. Forget me not day: The Book of Laughter and Forgetting by Milan Kundera 1001 book
11. Peanut Butter Lover's Day: I was a Sixth Grade Alien: Peanut Butter Lover Boy by Bruce Coville
12. Aviation History Month: The Aviator's Wife, Code Name Verity, The Dog Stars, West With The Night
13. World Kindness Day: The Kindly Ones (Not), A Christmas Carol by Dickins
14. Sleep Comfort Month Call It Sleep, The Big Sleep A Man Asleep (1001 Books
15. Clean Your Refrigerator Day: The Refrigerator Monologues
16. Button Day The Corduroy, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
17. Take A Hike: Wild, A Walk in the Woods
18. Game and Puzzle Week The Player of Games, The Glass Bead Game (1001) BOOKS
19. Novel Writing Month On, Writing by Steven King, A Room of One's Own
20. Universal Children's Day The Children's Book 1001
21. world Hello Day; Hello, Sunshine
22. Go For a Ride Day: Under the Skin, Maximum Ride, The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet
23. Cashew Day: Vegan Reset honest she uses a lot of cashews in this book
24. Native American Day: Love Medicine,The Last of the Mohicans, (1001 books), There, There, Killers of the Flower Moon, Laughing Boy
25. Parfait Day When in French : love in a second language
26: Shopping Reminder Day: Shopaholic Abroad
27. Pins and Needles: Pins and Needles
28. Red Planet Day: The Martian, Red Mars
29. Square Dance Day: Looking for the Possible Dance
30. Stay Home Well Day: You are Not a Rock

My November List. For Fun.

>1 Kristelh: Sorry, can I make a correction?

Zodiac sign is actually - for most of the month - Scorpio. Sagittarius starts toward the end of November and goes through most of December (I'm a Sagittarius (Dec 1) and my brother (Nov 19) is a Scorpio).

I am planning on reading Little Exiles by Robert Dinsdale which is about English children that were transported to Australia in the years following WW II. This is in honor of Universal Children's Day, Nov. 20th.

I have The Testaments by Margaret Atwood. Her birthday is 18th November.

>8 LibraryCin: thanks for the correction, I should have checked my source.

>11 Kristelh: No problem!

I will be reading The Murder of King Tut by James Patterson

I have that book too! Bought it in Chicago years ago, and it is in my TBR pile.

I plan to read the autobiography of Norman Hartnell, the designer of Queen Elizabeth's wedding dress, for Pins and Needles Day, November 27. I stumbled upon this explanation:

The real origin of this special day goes back to the labor movement in the 1930s. The pro-labor Broadway musical Pins and Needles, opened on this day in 1937, at the Labor Stage Theater in New York City. This play was written by Harold Rome. It was produced by the International Ladies Garment Workers' Union. Union members made up the cast. It ran for 1108 performances, once holding the record for longevity.

I became aware of Hartnell when reading The Gown a few months back and bought this book then. I looked for it last night and couldn't find it but will hopefully find it in time to read it for this challenge.

>15 clue:, that is so interesting! Thanks for sharing.

I have been trying to get to this one for a few months:
- Tracks / Louise Erdrich (Native American Heritage Month)

Also, I will be reading something for Remembrance Day, anyway, possibly this one:
- Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin / Timothy Snyder

And/or possibly for Take a Hike Day:
- On Thin Ice / Eric Larson

>15 clue: - I don't think your link is right.

Thirtieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. On November 9th 1989, East German citizens were free to cross into the west.

https://www.bookish.com/articles/happy-birthday-authors-a-look-at-writers-born-i...

>7 Kristelh: Congratulations Kristel, on finding a book, sometimes more, for each day! Who would have thought there was a deviled eggs book?

I am going to read The Rebel for Albert Camus's birthday.

>15 clue: I have that autobiography on my list for next year, also after reading The Gown.

>7 Kristelh: For November 6, don't forget The Bass Saxophone by Josef Škvorecký!

>24 NinieB:, that's a good one!

>20 pamelad: Great lineup! November ought to have 60 days to do them justice.

I am going to count They Shoot Horses, Don't They for Square Dance Day, not exactly square dancing but this book featured dance marathons during the Great Depression.

It just occurred to me that Flavia de Luce would be a perfect choice to mark Chemistry week. Plus this month's SeriesCAT...

I found a list that said Nov 1 was National Author's Day so I'm going to count my latest book A Piece of the World by Christina Baker Kline for this.

Native American Heritage Month

Tracks / Louise Erdrich
2 stars

This was set in the 1910s, I believe on a Native reserve. Not sure what it was supposed to be about. There was a girl, Fleur, who gambled with the men, then slept with and married someone. There was a nun (or maybe that was a different woman, not the nun?), who seemed to have a crush on one of the other women in the story. Other reviews tell me the book was set in North Dakota and about the Native land being taken away. Had no idea.

I was confused. I didn’t “get” it. “I” was used in the book, but part of the time “I” was male and part of the time “I” was female. I wasn’t sure if “I” was switching back and forth somehow or what, but a review I saw said something about there being two narrators, one an old man and one a young woman. Had no idea.

Nanapush was the name(?) of the old man “I”, but I don’t know if it was just a name or if it was meant to represent the native trickster/legend of the same name?

I should probably not bother reading any more of Erdrich’s adult novels, though I have enjoyed a couple of her children’s literature.

>28 MissWatson: And I have finished I am half-sick of shadows where Flavia cooks up spectacular fireworks.

I read an American Girl book for Universal Children's Day.
Samantha Learns a Lesson by Susan Adler

I read Printer's Devil, by Clemence Dane and Helen Simpson; some of the characters are veterans of World War I, which is remembered in the US by Veterans' Day, November 11.

COMPLETED Of Beards and Men by Christopher Oldstone-Moore for Movember.

Remembrance Day. I pretty much include anything set during a war to fit.

The Librarian of Auschwitz / Antonio Iturbe
4 stars

Dita was 9-years old when the war started, and 14-years old when she and her parents were brought to Auschwitz. At Auschwitz, for a while, there was a children’s school in Block 31. Dita was soon asked to be the school’s “librarian”. Books were prohibited, but somehow there were 8 books that had been smuggled in. It was a dangerous job, as Dita would have to make sure the books were never discovered by the guards.

Dita was a real person, and the author interviewed her. Many of the additional people were also real – a couple of additional people/situations the author included were people who escaped (one SS guard, and one Jewish boy who was was helping in the camp, so actually was in a “good” position, as compared to some of the others) to try to get help (the SS guard wanted to help one of the prisoners escape, along with her mother, and the Jewish boy wanted to get word out to the international community as to what was really happening in the concentration camps). I quite enjoyed this one, and it was interesting to read about the Block 31 school, the “library”, and the escapees, none of which I’d heard about before (that I recall).

December CalendarCAT is posted:
http://www.librarything.com/topic/313103

I read The Testaments for Margaret Atwood's 80th birthday, which is today.
Happy birthday!
Such a prolific writer. In The Testaments, the 'other works' took up a double page spread.

I found the perfect book for NOvember 9th Dunce hat day.
Dunce by Mary Ruefle

Although I did not know this when I started Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, his birthday was 16 November.

I have three so far this month, none of which I initially realized fit CalendarCAT.

First, I listened to The Sisters by Dervla McTiernan, an Audible Originals prequel of sorts to her Cormac O'Reilly mystery series. I enjoyed it, and it just happened to be set in November.

Then, I listened to an L.A. Theater Works production of Steel Magnolias by Robert Harling. Harling, as it turns out, was born in November.

Finally, it belatedly occurred to me that Janet Evanovich's Eleven on Top worked, simply because November is the 11th month.

I just got lucky!

For Native American Heritage month I read Indian Horse by Richard Wagamese. Outstanding.

>41 VivienneR:. I so need to get to this book. Glad to hear it was so good.

I now have a few of his books on my ever growing want to read list! Thank you!

Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo; The Nine Tailors by Dorothy L. Sayers

>41 VivienneR: >42 Kristelh: It's really good!

Native American Heritage Month
An American Sunrise
This collection of poems by the current Poet Laureate of the US served as a memoir and a tribute to her family who were forced to relocate and travel over the Trail of Tears. Many of the poems were narrative and others lyrical. As with all collections, I found some that moved me deeply and others that I could let go. I would especially recommend this book for those who appreciate tributes to past generations.

>46 beebeereads: I have this book setting by my bed

>47 Kristelh: Enjoy!

Remembrance Day. Another (in part) war one.

Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin / Timothy Snyder
3 stars

This book looks at Stalin’s Soviet Union and Hitler’s political policies, mostly in the years leading up to and including the 2ndWorld War. Stalin took over many of the Baltic states, and – via policy – starved many of the peasants in the Ukraine: even as they were growing food for others, they were left to starve. I didn’t know any of this, so this part was particularly interesting to me. Both Stalin and Hitler wanted to take over Poland, and of course, we ended up with the Holocaust and World War II.

I feel like I would have liked this better if I hadn’t listened to the audio. I was afraid right from the start, though, when I heard the voice. Male voice (already a bad sign for me), and I’m sure I recognized it from another audio that didn’t hold my attention. There were parts that did, though, particularly about the starvation of the people in the Ukraine. Overall, I’m considering it ok.

I read A Single Thread by Tracy Chevalier for Pins and Needles Day, November 27. The book is about borderers, women who made kneeling and seat cushions, in this case for Westminster Cathedral.

I read An American Sunrise by Joy Harjo for Native American Heritage month.

A little late, but finally finished Scenes from Clerical Life by George Eliot, whose 200th birthday was in November.