Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine. Finished 2-7-18, 4.5/5 stars, fiction, 323 pages, pub. 2017

Meet Eleanor Oliphant: She struggles with appropriate social skills and tends to say exactly what she’s thinking. Nothing is missing in her carefully timetabled life of avoiding social interactions, where weekends are punctuated by frozen pizza, vodka, and phone chats with Mummy. All this means that Eleanor has become a creature of habit (to say the least) and a bit of a loner. 

But everything changes when Eleanor meets Raymond, the bumbling and deeply unhygienic IT guy from her office. When she and Raymond together save Sammy, an elderly gentleman who has fallen on the sidewalk, the three become the kinds of friends who rescue one another from the lives of isolation they have each been living. And it is Raymond’s big heart that will ultimately help Eleanor find the way to repair her own profoundly damaged one.      from Goodreads

At first, Eleanor was not for me.  She was weird, quirky, possibly on the spectrum (somewhat of a judgy trigger for me), emotionally absent, and friendless.  I thought she was a unique voice so that was compelling, but it really wasn’t until Eleanor’s past started to reveal itself that I felt myself being drawn into her story.  She is ridiculed at work, drinks too much on weekends, withstands weekly calls from her horrible mother, and somehow convinces herself that a rocker she sees on stage is her destiny.  Poor, poor Eleanor.  With the help of a few people she opens herself up to, Raymond the new IT guy and Sammy the man’s life she helped save, she comes to realize  that she deserves more than she’s let herself believe.

What a treat this book was.  The story reveals its secrets at just the right pace.  Her struggles yanked at my heartstrings at the same time she made me laugh out loud.  Her first stop to when deciding to prep herself for the love of her life, who she has never spoken to?  A trip to the beauty shop for a Hollywood wax.  I learn something new everyday.

We read this for my book group and we all really liked it.  I was excited to find out that Reese Witherspoon has purchased the rights to Eleanor.  I think it could be a fantastic movie.

A pic from my book group (I post these on Instagram if you want more book eye candy :))

The Bleak and Empty Sea. Finished 2-19-18, 3.5/5 stars, mystery, 216 pages, pub. 2017

Book 3 in the Merlin Mysteries

When word comes to Camelot that Sir Tristram has died in Brittany of wounds suffered in a skirmish, and that his longtime mistress, La Belle Isolde, Queen of Cornwall, has subsequently died herself of a broken heart, Queen Guinevere and her trusted lady Rosemounde immediately suspect that there is more to the story of the lovers’ deaths than they are being told. It is up to Merlin and his faithful assistant, Gildas of Cornwall, to find the truth behind the myths and half-truths surrounding these untimely deaths. They take ship to Brittany to investigate, and find themselves stymied by the uncooperative attitudes of Tristram’s close friend Kaherdin, lord of the city; his sister and Tristram’s wife Isolde of the White Hands; and Brangwen, La Belle Isolde’s faithful lady-in-waiting.

The case is complicated by the facts that King Mark of Cornwall is Gildas’s own liege lord, and that Duke Hoel, Lord of Brittany, is King Arthur’s close ally and father of the lady Rosemounde, who urges Gildas to clear the name of her half-sister, Isolde of the White hands, whom gossip has implicated in Tristram’s untimely death. By the time they are finally able to uncover the truth, Gildas and Merlin have lost one companion and are in danger of losing their own lives.  from Goodreads

I am not a King Arthur or his Knights of the Round Table expert but I’m a sucker for a good love story so I thought I’d check out this mystery of Tristram and Isolde.  I admit that the first quarter or so of the book was a bit confusing for me since I wasn’t familiar with so many of the names and their relationships to each other, but I don’t think someone who had knowledge of the legends of the period would have any problem.  But as I was prepared to skim as necessary, the story evened out and I was able to get into the mystery.

The story was solid. I loved the Merlin and squire Gildas combo as they were sent to find out the truth of these lovers’ deaths.  The mystery was good and I learned a lot about the period since this series of books are written by a retired Medieval Literature professor.  This was a short book packed with so many entertaining stories of the period that it made the mystery much more layered that it might have been.  I ended up liking this story quite a bit.

Recommended for fans of King Arthur legends or historical mysteries.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher through TLC Book Tours in exchange for my honest review.

Ashley Bell.  Finished 2-4-19, rating 3.5, scifi/fantasy, pub. 2015

Unabridged audio read by Suzy Jackson.  17 hours 15 minutes.

At twenty-two, Bibi Blair’s doctors tell her that she’s dying. Two days later, she’s impossibly cured. Fierce, funny, dauntless, she becomes obsessed with the idea that she was spared because she is meant to save someone else. Someone named Ashley Bell. This proves to be a dangerous idea. Searching for Ashley Bell, ricocheting through a southern California landscape that proves strange and malevolent in the extreme, Bibi is plunged into a world of crime and conspiracy, following a trail of mysteries that become more sinister and tangled with every twisting turn.

Unprecedented in scope, infinite in heart, Ashley Bell is a magnificent achievement that will capture lovers of dark psychological suspense, literary thrillers, and modern classics of mystery and adventure. Beautifully written, at once lyrical and as fast as a bullet, here is the most irresistible novel of the decade.    from Goodreads

I have at least one Koontz book on my Top 100, but I’m not a regular reader of his books.  It’s been a while.  But I was headed back home for a funeral by myself and didn’t have anything to listen to (hard to believe I know) so Jason gave me the first several cds of this one telling me he was listening to it and I would really like it.  Well, the first two cds were about Bibi finding out that she had incurable brain cancer and by the time I arrived – to go directly to calling hours – I was pretty sad.  I hadn’t read the description so I didn’t have any idea that she would be cured (but that is somewhat misleading).  I may have sent Jason a text telling him that the story choice was not appropriate for a funeral.

Okay, now for the story.  I really liked the first half of the book, even the sad parts.  Bibi was a gifted writer and she had a Navy Seal fiancé and loving parents.  When the diagnosis comes she reacts with disbelief and then fight.  I hesitate to say anymore.  At the halfway-ish mark it lost Jason (although he finished it) but I was okay with the twists and turns.  It was interesting.  My main issue is that I think it could have been shorter.  By the last of the cds (14!) I was grumbling that it needed to finish up 🙂  It was both exciting and slow, so it was a mixed bag for me.

If you like Koontz you’ll probably like this one, but this one is just average Koontz, for me.