This month I read 4 books, bringing my 2017 total to 36. I’d love to hear what you are reading lately.

• Balancing Acts by Zoe Fishman – This was a cute, fiction, chic lit book I found on sale for my Nook, and it was the perfect vacation read! Four women meet up at their 10-year college reunion, and strike up a deeper friendship than they had in college, centered around developing a new yoga practice. Each women is in a different phase of relationship and career struggles, and as their friendships blossom, they find clarified in their lives.  It was a sweet story.
• The Cove by Catherine Coulter – This author is new to me, and this story was one of two that I bought in an e-book package. It is a series and I’m excited to read more and see which characters continue in the series. The Cove is about a young woman, Sally, who escaped an abusive father, a twister husband, and being locked up in a sanitarium, only to find more danger awaiting her when she arrives at her aunt’s quaint town in Oregon. She soon connects with an FBI agent, Quinlan, who was searching for her, but realized he was looking for something bigger. There were a lot of secondary characters, including the bizarre town, and some danger throughout. I enjoyed the story!
• The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood – I listened to the audio version of this book, read by Claire Danes. I haven’t yet watched the TV series based on the book, but I want to now that I know the story. I have always loved a good dystopian novel, though they are usually more in the Young Adult realm. This was eery because it was about adults, because it was written so long ago but reminds me of 1984 and other connections to some modern-day politics, and because it wasn’t exactly what I expected. It was great to hear the story from Offred’s point of view, a handmaid in the middle of this bizarre new world order. The novel gives you hope that the times change or that she escapes, since we are listening to her retell the tales. I appreciate the end chapters, one told by a researcher who found her tapes years later and transcribed them, and one by the author explaining her thought process as she created this vivid world.
• Break Your Own Rules: How to Change the Patterns of Thinking that Block Women’s Paths to Power by Jill Flynn, Kathryn Heath, and Mary Davis Holt – I received this book at the culmination of Women in Leadership initiative I participated in last year. As part of that initiative, I had a mentor I worked with virtually, I attended the AASA annual conference, and I interacted with the 19 other mentees and 9 other mentors in this national initiative. What I appreciated about this book is how the authors, who are women leaders who coach other women leaders, lay out the mistakes women often make, and then line them up with new rules. These new rules help you change your mindset about your role within your own organization, your career aspirations, and how to achieve your goals. The section on politics really resonated with me, because I’ve always been someone who said, “I don’t do politics”. In reality, we all DO politics. The authors explain very clearly how to get to know the way decisions are made in your organization and how to become a part of that world.

*I also reread most of The Innovator’s Mindset, since I’ve been participating in #IMMOOC.