The Patient Poppy

Finding books

  • Learning to pay attention

    Excerpt from Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott This is an excerpt from the book Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott. Writing is about learning to pay attention and to communicate what is going on. Now, if you ask me, what’s going on is that we’re all up to here in it, and probably the…

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  • Embrace possibility

    This is a quote from the book How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu. Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below! If you’re interested, you can read an excerpt from the book here. How High We Go in the Dark – Summary A debut…

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  • Five Christmas classics to enjoy the holidays

    It’s the end of the year! Can you believe it? December in my mind means holidays and thinking about the new year. I find this time to be a great opportunity to reflect on what’s coming in the new year and all that’s happened over the past year. In the spirit of the holidays, I…

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  • And who wouldn’t want to help?

    Excerpt from How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu This is an excerpt from the book How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu. My tenuous friendship with Val was a constant reminder of how close I was to being entirely alone, which I think made me more thoughtful 50…

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  • I mean joy

    This is a quote from the book The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin. Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below! If you’re interested, you can read an excerpt from the book here. The Left Hand of Darkness – Summary Ursula K. Le Guin’s…

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  • Five books that take place in a winter wonderland

    It’s the end of the year! Can you believe it? December in my mind means holidays and thinking about the new year. I find this time to be a great opportunity to reflect on what’s coming in the new year and all that’s happened over the past year. In the spirit of the holidays, I…

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  • What is love of one’s country

    Excerpt from The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin This is an excerpt from the book The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin. “The best food I’ve eaten on Gethen has always been in your company Estraven.” “Not at that banquet in Mishnory.” “No, that’s true…You hate Orgoreyn, don’t…

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  • Discipline, discipline, and…

    This is a quote from the short story The Overcoat by Nikolai Gogol, translated from the Russian by Ronald Wilks. Have you read this story? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below! If you’re interested, you can read an excerpt from the book here. The Overcoat – from a collection of short…

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  • Five books to help you end the year on a positive note

    It’s the end of the year! Can you believe it? December in my mind means holidays and thinking about the new year. I find this time to be a great opportunity to reflect on what’s coming in the new year and all that’s happened over the past year. In the spirit of the holidays, I…

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  • An extraordinarily strange thing

    Excerpt from The Nose by Nikolai Gogol This is an excerpt from the short story The Nose by Nikolai Gogol, translated from the Russian by Ronald Wilks. An extraordinarily strange thing happened in St. Petersburg on 25 March. Ivan Yakovlevich, a barber who lived on Voznesensky Avenue (his surname has got lost and all that…

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