The Automatic Millionaire: A Powerful One-Step Plan to Live and FinishRich

So I found another personal finance book that I had to read: The Automatic Millionaire by David Bach. I was happy to see that it was the Canadian Edition too.

Now there's a big caveat to this book: like The Wealthy Barber, The Automatic Millionaire is rather out of date.  It was published before tax free savings accounts were available for Canadians (and presumably before ETFs and index funds were around/talked about).  So he only talks about RRSPs and mutual funds.

But Bach's advice is still pretty solid. He recommends paying yourself first (at least 10% of your pay). Buying a house. Getting out of debt (especially credit card debt). And tithing (giving money or time to charity).  While some of this advice is pretty standard (you can't build wealth if you're saddled with debt), I found the house discussion particularly interesting. Here Bach was saying you can't get rich if you don't own your own house because if you're paying rent, that money is going towards making your landlord wealthy, not to your own net worth (whereas if you're paying down a mortgage, every payment is building equity within your house). This goes against the advice JL Collins gave in The Simple Path to Wealth, but is definitely worth considering.

I also liked the discussion on tithing. It's a short chapter at the back of the book that just talks about how giving attracts abundance (and how giving is very common for people who later became quite wealthy), and also how you should make sure your money is actually going to help the cause you're supporting (and not to administration fees). Again, something worth considering.

Overall, The Automatic Millionaire is another fairly basic book on personal finance. But I think it's still worth reading because now I have more to think about in terms of my own finances (which is always a good thing!)

How to Make a Plant Love You: Cultivate Green Space in Your Home and Heart

When I first saw Summer Rayne Oakes' How to Make a Plant Love You, I was pretty intrigued. I love house plants and currently have about twenty in my space. But after recently losing a couple, I was thinking reading about better cultivating green space in my apartment might help me make sure my plants are happy.

How to Make a Plant Love You starts out by talking about the many benefits of plants for people, and how we are losing our connection to them (and nature in general) as we're migrating into cities. There is a lot of research that talks about how beneficial it is for us to be out in nature, or at the very least around plants. Oakes also talked about what cities like Singapore are doing to green the space in an attempt to make people healthier; I really want to go and see it now!

She also talks a bit about how plants function; this discussion reminded me of what was in The Soil Will Save Us (except that Kristin Ohlson's book goes into far more detail on the subject).

Unfortunately, the subtitle of How to Make a Plant Love You is a bit misleading; I found the book to be extremely light on the details of how to actually cultivate your own space and get plants to love you (beyond "do research to make sure the plant you like will actually like it in your place"). The few chapters on the subject really didn't have a lot to them; while giving a few very basic tips (consider light, soil, and water), Oakes talked more about what she has done in her own apartment and life. I'm sure you can adapt that to your own life if you'd like (and really, her main message is just to get started and bring a plant into your home). But if you already live with plants, this part of the book really brings nothing new.

How to Make a Plant Love You is ultimately a quick read though that does have some interesting tidbits. If you're curious about the benefits of plants within your home, definitely consider giving this a read. But if you've lived with plants for awhile (and researched them at all), you might want to give this one a pass.

Unquiet Land

Well, here we are: Unquiet Land, the last book in Sharon Shinn's Elemental Blessings series. I brought it out to camp with me over the long weekend, starting it on Saturday night, bringing it out to the dock with me on Sunday, and finishing it Sunday night (or more accurately, Monday morning around 3am). I've been super excited to read it because overall I've really enjoyed Shinn's Elemental Blessings, but I was also a bit sad to be reading it because this is it.

Unquiet Land follows Leah, who was working in Malinqua as a spy for Darien Serlast; she helped Corene out a fair bit in that city. At the end of Jeweled Fire, she agreed to go home to Welce.  She decided that after five years of running, it's time she tries to be a mother to her daughter, Mally (who in Royal Airs was the decoy princess because she looked so much like Odelia, but now that Odelia was determined to be unfit to rule, Mally is free to be herself).

After arriving in Welce to restart her life, she is approached by Darien Serlast, who wants her to open a shop in the hopes of attracting some foreign visitors.  While in Malinqua, Leah had been working at a booth in the Great Market with Chandran, so she has some experience with this sort of thing (and determined that she actually has a talent, both for choosing wares to sell, and for selling to wealthy clients).  With his wife, Zoe Lalindar, and Zoe's best friend Annova, and some help from Chandran from afar, Leah puts the shop together in record time. She is also surprised by Chandran, who has followed her to Welce.  He shares a secret with her that leads her to keep him at arms length for a bit while she considers it, but over time (and through working with Annova at the shop), they become closer.

Leah also slowly grows closer to her daughter.  At five years old, Leah doesn't know quite how to tell Mally that they belong together.  But with the help of her friends, she spends more and more time with Mally and grows closer to her.  I actually really liked this aspect of the story; it would be very hard to grow closer to a child whom you've never met (and very hard to find the right moment to tell them that you are their mother).

The story took a couple of weird twists near the end.  Leah does manage to befriend one of the foreign people Darien wanted her to learn information about.  These foreigners are people of extremes: they will do works of great charity in order to do things of great sin. Their country was annexed some time ago by another one, so they are in Welce trying to gain an alliance.  Because Darien doesn't want an alliance with them, he has been holding them off, telling them he has to speak with the primes.  The prince believes that Darien is therefore weak, or else that he is not actually going to be crowned king instead of Odelia (Odelia is a blood heir of the last king, and therefore the only one who should wear the crown in his opinion).  Unfortunately, his people have encountered Mally, who still introduces herself as Odelia (as she had to as the decoy princess).  Believing they have found the true heir, they kidnap her in the hopes of securing the alliance they seek.

This was a weird turn in the story in my opinion.  I was expecting them to kidnap Celia, Darien and Zoe's daughter.  But whatever.

Darien and company go chasing after the kidnappers to head them off before they board ships and leave the country.  Their plan is to offer Chandran in exchange for Mally; Chandran believes they will accept this because he greatly wronged the prince's family in the past.  Leah is heartbroken because she wants both Mally and Chandran to be safe.  An unexpected twist sees Mally freed: Leah's friend among the foreigners realized Mally was Leah's daughter and stole her away from the others to give her back.  And when enemy soldiers try to stop them, Mally literally moves mountains to save them, revealing herself as the heir to the torz prime.  It was very climatic, but in a lot of ways not entirely fitting with the rest of the book.

Overall though, I did enjoy Unquiet Land.  As a story about a woman trying to navigate her way among family (and in many ways building her own family), it's wonderful.  I actually really loved how Mally's father explained things to Leah, too - he called them a family and she disagreed (she wants nothing to do with him because he broke her heart, but she has to see him because he is Mally's father).  He countered by saying that they're not a household, but they're still a family. That's such a great sentiment because it is so true: once you have a child together, you are connected, even if you're not living in the same house. 

I also liked how Lean and Chandran navigated the way through their relationship in the aftermath of Chandran sharing his great secret with her.  They kept trying to stay apart so Leah could consider things (especially whether or not she could trust Chandran around her daughter).  But slowly they grow closer while working in the shop together (plus one of the primes endorses Chandran to Leah, saying he's a good man).

Even though it is the first book not to deal specifically with the princesses (or Zoe who was supposed to marry the king), Unquiet Land is a good addition to the Elemental Blessings series. I just wish it wasn't the last one - I would love to read more about Shinn's fantastic characters and setting!

Happy Go Money: Spend Smart, Save Right & Enjoy Life

I read about Melissa Leong's Happy Go Money: Spend Smart, Save Right & Enjoy Life in the same article as You Are a Badass at Making Money.  I was attracted because Leong is Canadian, so her book is going to be a lot more relevant to me than most American financial planning books are.  I also liked how Leong wants you to rethink your relationship to money so that you can be happier in your life. 

I honestly almost stopped reading Happy Go Money part way through because it starts off very much like a self-help book (like You Are a Badass at Making Money was).  But after that point, it got into a lot more tangible financial stuff (such as explaining different options for your cash like mutual funds, ETFs, and GICs, or explaining different kinds of insurance and why you might need them).  By the end of the book, I was glad that I kept reading; Leong's writing was both practical and lighthearted as the TBPL Off the Shelf article promised.  I will offer the caveat though that Happy Go Money is very much for people who are new to the world of personal finance; if you've done some reading on the subject, you may want to give this book a pass because it is very basic. 

As a fun side note, I've actually read 2 of the 4 books she recommends in her resource list: Preet Banerjee's Stop Over-thinking Your Money! and Shannon Lee Simmons' Worry-Free Money, which were both excellent. And the other two, The Wealthy Barber Returns and Money Rules, are both already on my list of books to eventually read on the subject! :)

Jeweled Fire

As I already mentioned when I read Royal Airs, I got Jeweled Fire through interlibrary loan after unsuccessfully trying to buy it in paperback a few years ago. The book arrived and I only had a few weeks to get through it so it could go back to its home library out of town.  So I've been reading it over the last few days to make sure it was finished in time to go back.

Jeweled Fire picks up just a few days after Royal Airs ended. Princess Corene has joined Steff and his grandmother, the Empress Filomara of Malinqua, on their journey to bring Steff home. She left without her father's permission (her father being Darien Serlast, so that's kind of a big deal).  Because she ran away in the middle of the night, the only one to accompany her is her bodyguard, Foley (he was Josetta's bodyguard, but told her he was moving on to another assignment because Josetta now had Rafe to watch over her).

Corene knows she is arriving in Malinqua as a potential suitor to one of the four potential heirs to Filomara's throne.  She is joined by Princess Melissande of Cozique, Princess Alette of Dhonsho, and Liramelli, the daughter of the prefect of Malinqua. Filomara has not yet chosen her successor, and Steff's arrival complicates the playing field, which otherwise consists of Filomara's nephews Garameno, Jiramondi, and Greggorio.  All three have a flaw: Garameno had a riding accident that has left him in a wheelchair; he is considered to be "half a man" by many people, and there is some question as to whether or not he can have heirs.  Jiramondi is, as Melissande says,  "sublime": he prefers the romantic company of men.  In Malinqua, that is considered a detriment.  And Greggorio, the youngest, looks the part, but is not terribly bright nor interested in running the kingdom (although people say perhaps advisors could make up for his severe lack when it comes to running the kingdom)?  The succession is further complicated because Filomara's daughters have both died, two of her brothers died, and the remaining two have been exiled from court because they are suspected of having something to do with the other brothers deaths.  As the bodies continue to pile up, it becomes increasingly clear that someone is trying to eliminate the competition.  And unfortunately Corene and her new friends are right in the middle of everything!

I absolutely loved Jeweled Fire.  I wasn't expecting to like Corene as much as I did.  But I loved the story of how she finally came to have friends she cared about.  She's no longer the spoiled and selfish princess that she fears she is (that her mother tried to make her into).  While she can still be quite sassy (and sometimes rude when she wants to be), she means well and is just a lot of fun.

I also really liked how she came to realize what she wanted out of life.  Corene had been raised to think she should be queen, so she came to Malinqua intending to secure her crown now that she has no place in Welce.  Her father is due to be crowned king, but she is being overlooked in favour of her half-sister to be his heir.  So Corene was left adrift, thinking that she was a burden on everyone, and I enjoyed reading about how she found her own place in life while also discovering that people do care about her for being herself, not for being a potential queen. 
And of course, I loved her interactions with Foley.  Foley is a torz man whose only blessing to ever be drawn is "loyalty."  He is the perfect, no-nonsense bodyguard.  So when Corene wanders up and starts asking him ridiculous questions, their interactions get pretty great (especially in how they try to outmaneuver each other).  As the book continued, it became increasingly obvious that these two were meant for each other, and I was so happy when it finally happened that I cried (it was also a fairly emotional scene: Corene had to jump from a burning tower and he promised that he would catch her.  She didn't want to jump because she was terrified that landing on him would kill him. And he wanted her to jump because he couldn't stand the thought of her dying).

I also really liked Corene's friends.  Steff is so practical and blind to court politics that you just have to love him.  The three other girls were such opposites that managed to compliment one another, and they really looked out for one another.  And the heirs were all so intriguing: Garameno was the oldest who already advises the queen - he was knowledgeable, gallant, and didn't let his accident stop him.  Jiramondi was fun, and fit in really well with the group.  And Greggorio was a good person: he watched out for people and was always there to help.

As I said, I really did love this book.  Jeweled Fire is, at its heart, a story I think we can all relate to: finding our place in the world (and our people).

The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning

Rather than jump right into reading Jeweled Fire, I decided to take a very quick nonfiction break and read The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning first.  This tiny book was given to me by a friend because she knew I liked this sort of thing. For my part, I've seen The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning around and figured I would give it a read, especially since it's only about 100 pages long. 

The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning is all about clearing your clutter so your family doesn't have to deal with all your things when you pass away.  That is the primary focus of the book, but it's also fine if you're just wanting to downsize, perhaps because you are moving, or perhaps because you just know you have too much stuff.  Margareta Magnusson, a woman who is "between eighty and one hundred years old," has death cleaned for her parents and husband; she knows her time on this earth is limited now, so she wants to make her passing easier on her children by getting rid of her clutter. She looks at various facets of life and offers advice on how to deal with your various objects (the usual keep, give to friends and family, donate, or trash/paper shredder/recycle).  She also offers many fun anecdotes along the way (like how she once went skiing in a bikini).  The book also has some really cute drawings that accompany it (including one of skiing while wearing a bikini).

The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning is more of a coach than a real how-to manual.  If you're looking for a book that has lots of nitty-gritty ideas for clearing clutter, that is not this book.  Wha it is is a cheerful, gentle read to help you think about decluttering, especially when you know your time is almost up. 

Royal Airs

Oh my gosh, has it really been almost FOUR YEARS since I read Sharon Shinn's Troubled Waters??? 

I bought Royal Airs not long after loving Troubled Waters.  But the third book, Jeweled Fire, had just come out in hardback, so I decided to wait to read Royal Airs until I had the third one in paperback, too.  I waited.  And waited.  And saw the publication information change, saying the paperback version of Jeweled Fire wouldn't be coming out for like twenty years!  I pre-ordered it on Amazon in 2016; earlier in June (2019), Amazon cancelled my order because they found out the book wouldn't be released at all. :(

(Yesterday I discovered the reason why: the publisher decided that people will prefer ebooks to paperbacks). So much for my paperback collection of these books. :(

Thankfully, interlibrary loan started back up at the local library.  So I put in a request for Jeweled Fire.  In the meantime, I also found a copy of the fourth book, Unquiet Land (also hardback).  So once Jeweled Fire arrived from out of town, I knew I had to get reading Royal Airs!

Of course, this being four years later, I don't really remember all the details of Troubled Waters.  Thankfully, Royal Airs gives enough of the background information that I was able to piece together the important bits as I went along.

Royal Airs takes place about five years after the events of Troubled Waters.  Rafe Adova, a man who gambles at cards against people for a living, notices a well-dressed red-head slip into the bar he's in.  When some unsavoury sorts corner the red-head at the table, Rafe is quick to stop them.  He has lived on the streets for years now, and appreciated when strangers helped him.

Of course, he wasn't expecting that the wayward girl he was helping was Princess Corene.  And he most definitely wasn't prepared to meet her sister, Princess Josetta, who operates a shelter in the slums.  While in the area, Rafe is later jumped and almost killed because of the strange markings on his ear.  Josetta's guards find him and bring her back to the shelter, where their lives become unexpectedly intertwined because they find each other fascinating.  But when the truth about the attack comes to light (and to the attention of Darien Serlast, regent of the Welce throne and Corene's father) their lives get a whole lot more complicated!

Okay, I'll admit that's a pretty lame synopsis.  There's a lot more to Royal Airs than that, but also a lot less political maneuverings than were in Troubled Waters (I think? Maybe I'm wrong about that?  It's been four years?)  The two main characters, Josetta and Rafe, want to lead ordinary lives.  Josetta likes caring for the poor in her shelter in the slums (I loved how Zoe brought water to the building for her because of course the coru prime can do that!)  I also loved how Rafe had no elemental blessings for years (every time people pulled ghost coins, which are coins that are so old and worn that you can't tell what blessing was supposed to be on them) until Josetta pulled blessings from her shelter's temple, where none of the coins were old enough; only then did Rafe get actual blessings (but they were all extraordinary ones, not ones associated with particular elements). 

But then Royal Airs also has the technological aspects as well.  The elay (air) prime invented cars (elaymotives), and is working on creating flying machines as well (aeromotives).  Rafe was given a fortune for helping Corene, and at Josetta's suggestion he meets the elay prime to invest in an elaymotive factory.  But while there, he discovers the plans for the aeromotives, and gets recruited to be a pilot (which is a huge gamble because there have been seven fatalities already!)

The political maneuverings happen mostly around visits to the state.  First one foreign prince arrives to tour Welce in the hopes of making some trade negotiations.  Then the empress from a second nation arrives as well.  As one of the heirs to the throne, Josetta has to attend both.  And after Darien Serlast discovers Rafe (and Serlast knows exactly who Rafe's parents were, even though he keeps that information close to his chest), Rafe is drawn into the affairs of state as well.  There's also a huge question as to the heir of the country, because the named heir hasn't been seen at court for a year or two (only her decoy). 

All in all, I really enjoyed Royal Airs.  It was great to read more about the characters I liked from Troubled Waters, plus I really liked the new additions as well.  Once again, this book was full of superb worldbuilding, and I can't wait to start Jeweled Fire!