Book Holidays: Diada de Sant Jordi (aka Saint George's Day, aka The Day of Books and Roses)

I feel like this wouldn't really be a good Book Blog if I didn't discuss one of the upcoming, most anticipated (at least in Catalonia), book holidays. In case you didn't read the title, I'm talking about Diada de Sant Jordi (Saint George's Day), aka The Day of Books and Roses.

Diada de Sant Jordi History

On April 23rd (which is also World Book Day), Catalonia honors their patron saint, Sant Jordi (Saint George), with love and literature. It’s a very popular festival which celebrates both World Book Day (remember this?) and Valentine’s Day.

It’s customary for couples to exchange books and roses. Much like with Jólabókaflóð (Christmas Book Flood) in Iceland (this will come back in December), book and rose sales go through the roof leading up to the Diada de Sant Jordi. Traditionally, men would receive books and the women roses. However, nowadays both men and women receive books and roses.

La Rambla de Barcelona

 

The streets of most Catalan cities end up full of book and rose stalls. People spend their day meandering the streets searching for the perfect gifts for their loved ones.

Most of the roses that are given are red, following Sant Jordi’s legend, but recently it’s been expanded to all kinds of colors.

 

The legend of Sant Jordi is an epic fairy-tale about a beautiful princess, a white knight, and a terrifying dragon. It’s a tale full of love, honor, and heroism.

The legend describes a fearsome dragon wreaking havoc on the inhabitants of the small town Montblanc in Catalonia. To soothe the dragon’s anger, the townspeople decided that they would sacrifice someone every day, drawing lots to determine who they would offer.

One day, it was the princess’ turn to be sacrificed, but just when the dragon was about to devour her, a handsome knight appeared and confronted the beast. This knight was Sant Jordi, he drove his lance into the dragon, and from where its blood spilled a bush of red roses appeared. Sant Jordi presented the princess with a rose from that rosebush, since then it has been tradition in Catalonia to present a red rose to your loved ones.

The book part of this tradition doesn’t come from Sant Jordi, it comes from the International World Book Day which started in Spain in 1923. The date coincides with the death date for Miguel de Cervantes (Spain) and William Shakespeare (England), two world-famous writers.

Roses

Now, if you're cheap like me, or just want to be creative, you can make your roses out of paper and pipe cleaners.

Use the origami instructions below, courtesy of The Daily Dabble, to make the rose head, then attach a pipe cleaner to the bottom of the head with glue.

Fold the paper in half twice from the edges

Fold the paper in half twice from the points

Bring the middle edges together, then top down over them

Fold the upper layer of the bottom points to the top

Open the flaps and squash fold them down evenly

Fold the bottom middle points diagonally in half

Fold the center flap up, directly in half

Flip over and repeat steps 4-7 on the back

Fold the paper in half twice from the points

Repeat these same folds on the last unfolded side

Open the bottom and fold it flat

Open up the two pockets on the top and twist to shape it

Finish spiraling and shaping the rose petals

Book Recommendations

Fantasy:

George by Kate Danley

Every story begins because someone was an idiot...
George is just your normal peasant, with parents who abandoned him to join up with pirates and a terrible family secret he carries around his neck.
But when a wandering knight scoops him up to carry all his heavy stuff, George feels like his dreams are coming true! Except the knight dies. And now George is in trouble. Will donning the knight's armor and taking his place solve his problems? What about when a dragon shows up and George is expected to fight it? Things are about to get complicated...
Chase away the darkness with George and his friends in this hilarious rollicking riff on George and the Dragon by USA TODAY bestselling author, Kate Danley.
These dragons aren't going to slay themselves!

I'm Afraid You've Got Dragons by Peter S. Beagle

Dragons are common in the backwater kingdom of Bellemontagne, coming in sizes from mouse-like vermin all the way up to castle-smashing monsters. Gaius Aurelius Constantine Heliogabalus Thrax (who would much rather people call him Robert) has recently inherited his deceased dad's job as a dragon catcher/exterminator, a career he detests with all his heart in part because he likes dragons, feeling a kinship with them, but mainly because his dream has always been the impossible one of transcending his humble origin to someday become a prince's valet. Needless to say, fate has something rather different in mind...

Knight of Ash: The Venomous Tempest by S.C. van Doorn

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Dragons might seem dangerous to most of the people of Anglavar, but to the Knights of Ash, hunting them down is just another job. When Yara starts off her apprenticeship with the order of dragon hunters, it seems like she may get used to this new reality fairly easily, even if her mentor Arran is a little more closed off than she’d like. Just when she’s beginning to feel comfortable, a new threat rears its ugly head. Undead dragons, called Titans, have begun to show up across the country and the source is dangerously unclear. Yara and Arran find themselves with the responsibility of finding the cause of the undead creatures — and cleaning up the mess that comes with them.

The Fireborne Blade by Charlotte Bond

Kill the dragon. Find the blade. Reclaim her honor.
It’s that, or end up like countless knights before her, as a puddle of gore and molten armor.
Maddileh is a knight. There aren’t many women in her line of work, and it often feels like the sneering and contempt from her peers is harder to stomach than the actual dragon slaying. But she’s a knight, and made of sterner stuff.
A minor infraction forces her to redeem her honor in the most dramatic way possible, she must retrieve the fabled Fireborne Blade from its keeper, legendary dragon the White Lady, or die trying. If history tells us anything, it's that “die trying” is where to wager your coin.

 

 

Romance:

My Commander by Alanea Alder

🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

When the topic of grandchildren comes up during a weekly sewing circle the matriarchs of the founding families seek out the witch Elder to scry to see if their sons have mates. They are shocked to discover that many of their son’s mates are out in the world and are human!
Fearing that their future daughter in laws will end up dead before being claimed and providing them with grandchildren to spoil, they convince their own mates that something must be done. After gathering all of the warriors together in a fake award ceremony the witch Elder casts a spell to pull the warrior’s mates to them, whether they want it or not.
Aiden McKenzie is adamant that he doesn’t need a mate and that she would only get in the way. He doesn’t have time to coddle a female. He likes his world run with military precision. Little does he realize, Fate is sending him his mate first! He meets his destined mate Meryn Evans and things go downhill from there. She is the embodiment of chaos. In the first twenty-four hours she kicks, screams and knocks her bear shifting mate unconscious.
Eventually they discover that life before finding each other may have been good, but life afterwards is perfect, even if it involves super soaker battles and accidentally discharging hand grenades.
Unfortunately the joy of their mating is overshadowed when Aiden and Meryn find themselves embroiled in a missing persons case assigned to Aiden by the Lycaonian Council. By assisting Aiden, Meryn finds herself the focus of a demented killer.
Can Aiden and the elite warriors from the Alpha Unit keep Meryn safe? Or did Fate bring her to Lycaonia to die?

Fate Knows Best by Alanea Alder

🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

After her boss became her ex-boyfriend and turned her life inside out, Rebecca is on the road looking for adventure and a place to call home. She never imagined the mysterious road she would take would lead her to a grumpy hot Sheriff, a gorgeous playboy and a group of gay fashionistas, or, that they would be bear and lion shifters. Reading about being a shifter's mate was one thing, living it was another.
Aleks has sworn off human women. After working a brutal homicide he as returned to the shifter-only town of his birth to date the local shifter women and hopefully find a nice female bear-shifter to give him cubs. When Fate throws him an itty, bitty human as a mate, he refuses to have anything to do with her.
As the attraction between them grows Aleks realizes that he can't seem to stay away from the tiny dark-haired human, but the realization may come too late, as he faces the fact that though her body was never in any danger, he may have shattered her heart.
He wonders if she will be safe with him and she wonders if she will ever be what he he truly wants.
In the end they will both see that, Fate Knows Best.

Burning Heaven by Haydn Hubbard

🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

Addie has a stalker.
And not one of those hot ones from the romance novels. A real, murderous, and probably not-so-drool-worthy stalker. So when her best friend pushes her towards a private security company how could she say no? Especially when the owner of the company has dark hair, tattoos, and… oh no.
Natalia has an obsession.
A lethal obsession in the form of blue eyes and freckles. Her line of work is dangerous, both her day job and her double life. She hides bullet wounds under finely pressed suits as she uses her security company as a cover for the less than savory work she does for the mafia. When Addie bursts into her life with a stalker whose modus operandi matches that of a serial killer she’s searching for, it is all too easy of an excuse to fall for her deadly obsession.