Friday Favorites No. 539~a weekly series where I share interesting articles, books, fashion finds, recipes and more.
Happy Friday friends. It’s 4th of July weekend can you believe it? It seems like summer just started, well technically it did last week, but you know what I mean.
It’s hot here this week, sadly it looks like we may see rain for some of the weekend. Hopefully not on the day of the fireworks. How is your weather?
What are your plans for the weekend? I hope that none of you are flying anywhere, it looks like a nightmare with no end in sight. Whatever you do have fun and be safe.
I’ve got lots of fun things to share this week so let’s get to it!
FRIDAY FAVORITES NO. 539
FOOD~RECIPES TO TRY
I cannot wait to make this artichoke lemon pesto pasta.
Summer flatbread with tomatoes, basil and zucchini looks like a delicious day to use all of your garden produce.
Three ingredient dairy-free ice cream!
Tired of the usual fruit salad? Try this watermelon berry salad with lime dressing!
Don’t forget dessert! I will be making these raspberry lemon cheesecake bars.
Links
Costco takes a page from Netflix and cracks down on membership sharing
How to Deal With People Who Pretend to Know More Than They Do
The Best French Streaming for Franchphiles
The best rhubarb crumb cake recipe.
If the deer haven’t devoured your zinnias here are some simple and easy arrangements.
A colorful coastal Maine Summer House
Candice Bergen Reminisces About Playing Murphy Brown
Is It Time to Do Away With “Good Taste”?
How Review Bombing Can Tank a Book Before It’s Published
When wealthy adventurers take huge risks, who should pay for rescue attempts?
The Designer Strawberry Has Arrived!
Books
A four day weekend leaves plenty of time to sit back and relax on the porch, beach or on the couch with a book. Take a little time for yourself this weekend and do a little reading.
Scent of a Garden
A perfumer in Paris is forced to return to her California roots in an exhilarating novel about family, self-discovery, and taking risks by the author of The Candid Life of Meena Dave.
The daughter of proud Napa Valley hoteliers, Asha “Poppy” Patel chose a different line as a Paris perfumer, gifted with a nose for fragrances and business. Until her heightened sense of smell disappears. Her career in jeopardy, her world now muted, Poppy returns home. Maybe tending to her grandmother’s massive aromatic garden, where Poppy’s gift first flowered, will bring restorative hope.
But when she arrives, Poppy discovers that the land upon which the beautiful garden once thrived has been uprooted and destroyed. She realizes that the years she spent away from her home have loosened so many ties with the past. Torn between a mother who lives vicariously through her and a father who wants her to embrace her family’s legacy, Poppy is determined to chart her own path of rediscovery.
Poppy must juggle family drama, childhood friendships, and a former love to forge a future of her own choosing and, in time, heal an unscented life.
The Island of Zoe
A young Greek American woman travels to the island of Petra bearing precious cargo: her late grandmother’s body, to be buried on the land where the old woman spent her youth. But when Zoe arrives on Petra, she finds that her grandmother, Maria, has left her an opulent villa and old family secrets hidden in the mystery of the island.
Zoe notices how spry and fit the island’s elderly residents are. In fact, no one has miraculously died in over seventy years, and time actually stands still on Petra. After Stefanos, a dapper older gentleman, ends his life the night of Grandma’s funeral, Zoe learns that Stefanos and her grandmother were lovers and realizes there’s much more to the island than meets the eye.
Zoe sets out to discover the island and uncovers strange happenings: there isn’t a single working clock or telephone, rich migrants from all over the world live clandestinely in the hills, the island is on permanent lock-down by the Greek Navy, and the main residents are subjected to repeated medical tests. Manos, the raki-loving bon vivant who runs the local general store, hints that the islanders are paying a price for what they did to Grandma Maria and Stefanos but refuses to reveal more.
Aix Marks the Spot
Jamie has been dreaming of this summer forever: of road trips and intensive art camps, of meeting cute boys with her best friend Jazz. What she didn’t count on was the car accident.
Exiled away from her family as her mother slowly learns to walk again, Jamie is sent to Provence and trapped in an isolated home with the French grandmother she has never met, the guilt of having almost killed her parents, and no Wi-Fi. Enough to drive a girl mad. That is, until, she finds an old letter from her father, the starting point in a treasure hunt that spans across cities and time itself. Somehow, she knows that the treasure is the key to putting her shattered family back together and that whatever lies at the end has the power to fix everything.
Armed only with a high-school-level of French and a map of local train lines, she must enlist the aid of Valentin, her handsome neighbor who’s willing to translate. To save her family, she has castle ruins to find and sea cliffs to climb; falling for her translator wasn’t part of her plan…
Anne Boleyn & Elizabeth I: The Mother and Daughter Who Forever Changed British History
Much of the fascination with Britain’s legendary Tudors centers around the dramas surrounding Henry VIII and his six wives and Elizabeth I’s rumored liaisons. Yet the most fascinating relationship in that historic era may well be that between the mother and daughter who, individually and collectively, changed the course of British history.
Yet as Tracy Borman reveals in this first-ever joint portrait, both women broke the mold for British queens and for women in general at the time. Anne was instrumental in reforming and reshaping forever Britain’s religious traditions, and her years of wielding power over a male-dominated court provided an inspiring role model for Elizabeth’s glittering, groundbreaking 45-year reign. Indeed, Borman shows how much Elizabeth—most visibly by refusing to ever marry, but in many other more subtle ways that defined her court—was influenced by her mother’s legacy.
In its originality, Anne Boleyn & Elizabeth I sheds new light on two of history’s most famous women—the private desires, hopes, and fears that lay behind their dazzling public personas, and the surprising influence each had on the other during and after their lifetimes. In the process, Tracy Borman reframes our understanding of the entire Tudor era.
NEED MORE BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS?
If you have already read these books or missed something I have featured before on the blog check out My Bookshop on Amazon.
Finds
Are you shopping the summer sales? Is it just me or does it seem strange to see all of the summer clothing on clearance when summer started last week?
Outfit of the Day
dress//sandals//glasses//polish//hat//earrings
Love this summer print top!
J.Crew is having a great sale has 60% off all sale styles with code FOURTH. I love these slide sandals, this dress, and this white eyelet blouse.
Have you seen the cute dresses at Anthropologie this summer? This one is a favorite. Anthropologie has up to 40% off furniture, decor and more, plus an extra 40% off sale items.
UNTIL TOMORROW
I hope you enjoyed the recipes, links and books I discovered this week on Friday Favorites No. 539. If you have missed a Friday Favorites post you can find them all here.
Don’t forget to visit the blog tomorrow for Weekend Meanderings with Kim and Juliet. Juliet and Kim will be sharing all of the details of their recent adventures to Italy and Hawaii!
This post contains affiliate links, if you make a purchase I will earn a small commission at no cost to you.
So many great book suggestions . Any book that takes place in Provence ,has my interest!
I know what you mean about summer sales…. Summer just started! Oh and school supplies are already filling shelves!
Thanks for the mention last Saturday!!!
Xo
Thank you Annie! Have a wonderful and safe Weeknd.
We now have to scan our membership card when arriving at Costco so these changes have hit the UK too.
Rachel,
I guess everyone is trying to cut back on sharing of memberships! Have a wonderful weekend.
So many yummy recipes, great books and amazing clothing items! I am going to go shopping form your post.
Thank you Wendy! I hope that you have a wonderful weekend and a safe 4th of July!