Top 5 Saturday: Gift Books

1. Gifted by: My Parents!

I feel so lucky to have such a close relationship with my parents; they truly know me so well and have gifted me some books that I really cherish and am excited about! The ones I’m highlighting here were all from Christmas 2020.

The Rise: Black Cooks and the Soul of American Food

You Had Me at Hola

Cemetery Boys

There have been many more over the years, but these are some recent ones that I’m really excited about! I read The Rise recently (review coming soon!) and I LOVED it, and I can’t wait to read the others! I’m hoping to get to them at some point this year.

2. Gifted by: My Sister!

I also feel very lucky to be so close with my sister. As kids, we didn’t always get along, but now that we’re adults she’s one of my closest friends! For Christmas, I created a list of books I was interested in and didn’t yet own (to help those who might want to get books for me, but didn’t know what I already had on my shelves). However, my sister went off-list and found the perfect book!

The Answer Is…: Reflections on My Life

My sister is the one who got me to start watching Jeopardy once it was available on Netflix, and once I started I couldn’t stop! Alex Trebek seems like he was such a wonderful man, and I absolutely can’t wait to read his memoir.

3. Gifted by: My Husband!

My husband is so sweet to indulge (enable?) my love of reading and buying books, and continue helping me add to my collection even though I’m officially out of shelf space and currently have piles of books taking up space in our bedroom! He knows me so well, and over the last year has picked out books for my birthday and for Christmas that I’m so excited about!

Midnight Sun

Anxious People

A Song Below Water

Grown

I’m also hoping to get to all of these at some point this year, but for now you can check out my review of Midnight Sun HERE!

4. Gifted by: My Best Friend

My best friend and I met in preschool and we’ve been best friends ever since! She knows me better than just about anyone. We share a love of learning, dance, games, books, and many other things. She always has great book recommendations and picks out books for me that I’m not only interested in, but that I don’t have yet!

Girl, Woman, Other

She gifted me this book for my birthday last year, and I can’t wait to read it! I’ve heard so many great things about it.

5. Gifted by: Me!

I’m kind of obsessed with books (if you hadn’t noticed), so I can’t help but give them as gifts to other people as well!

The Rise – My mom and I got each other matching books for Christmas because we listened to Marcus Samuelsson speak at a book festival last year and we both really wanted to read his book (and cook from it)!

A Promised Land – My dad loves reading political biographies and autobiographies, so I was excited to get this one for him for Christmas!

What Alice Forgot – This is one of my favorites that I’ve read in recent years, so I was excited to gift it to my best friend in the hopes that she would enjoy it too!

Maus – I got this for my husband for Christmas this year since he’s interested in World War II. He also sometimes struggles to make time for reading (as we all can when trying to balance work, chores, self-care, and more), so I thought a graphic novel would be a good way to fit in some reading time. (I’ve also gifted this to my mom in the past and she said it was really good!)