Since I sort book donations at the library and frequent bookstores I decided to start this challenge with countries that cross my path organically, we’ll see how far that gets me. Pakistan was the next country to have both a fiction and nonfiction book come through the book donations which makes it country number 4.
This is the first country that did exactly what I wanted this challenge to do. Listening to I Am Malala with my family on a road trip gave me the deeply religious northern part of the country and how Islamic radicals fought to take control. The Museum Detective gave me a glimpse of a more cosmopolitan Pakistan with the Karachi setting. Both gave a real sense of the country, even if they differed on what view they were offering.
We listened to the version that was ‘rewritten for an audience her own age’. I chose it for the main reason that it would be short enough for a road trip, it’s only 5 hours. It was a good choice for us, but I don’t know how much was missing or changed from the original version.
Malala is an amazing person. Confident, brave, dedicated. He activism for the education of girls at such a young age is amazing. Her parents are to be commended. Learning more about how the Taliban came to have such a prominent role in her region was enlightening. I hadn’t known much about her life before she was shot and this book does a really good job of showing what happened before that made her a target of the terrorist organiztion.
It felt a bit repetitive at times, but still worth reading 100%. The audio included her speech in front of the UN at the end and I liked hearing her voice and her passion for education.
The police find a sarcophagus on a drug bust and Dr. Gul Delani is called in the middle of the night. She works for the museum and is an expert on mummies. We learn of the old Persian Empire, the history of mummies, the customs and social structure of Karachi, as well as the role of women. Was the sarcophagus real? Would there be danger for her if it was?
This was a nice flip side to the Malala coin. Women in Karachi were also second place citizens, but women could rise above, especially if your family had money. I really liked this one and would gladly read another book about Gul.
The closest I’ve come to reading anything about Pakistan before this was American Dervish by Ayad Akhtar – Stacy’s Books about a boy whose parents came from Pakistan and a Pakistani friend who came to stay with them.
My goal is to read a fiction and nonfiction book set in and written by someone who was born in that country. As recommendations trickled in I realized that it’s the ‘born in that country’ part that is going to make some books not work. I’m excluding the immigrant experience. It wasn’t my intent, I just didn’t really think it through in those terms. I’m not going to change the rules at this point. Maybe I’ll do a spin off challenge for that.
I first fell in love with Susanna Kearsley’s stories with The Winter Sea and she’s captivated me ever since. It’s historical fiction, with varying degrees of romance and time travel, at its best. She reminds me of Diana Gabaldon in many ways.
The first book I read by her was The Winter Sea. I heard her tell someone that this is what some consider her ‘gateway’ book to introduce new readers to her work. If you want to judge her by the company she keeps these are the authors who wrote blurbs for the cover of the lastest book; Diana Gabaldon, Ariel Lawhon, Sarah Penner, Barbara Erskine, Susan Elia MacNeal.
If you like stories with historical intrigue, a little bit of magic and a hint of romance, and lots of great research holding it all together, she’s for you! I was able to meet her last year when she came to a local library to promote her latest book. She was every bit as wonderful in person as I’d hoped she’d be.
Satisfied. I finished this book tonight and I am completely satisfied. I was drawn into the story right away. Scotland, both now and in 1908, is an appealing setting and the idea of a successful woman being able to pick up and move anywhere in the world to world is exciting. I admit to being a little confused in the earlier chapters by all of the people and politics of 1708, but I got a handle on most of them and dismissed the others until they became useful in the story.
I was rooting for Carrie and Sophia to find love and happiness. I was sure of Carrie’s fate and hopeful for Sophia, but I did get nervous. I also kind of love that Sophia’s happy ending did not include everything she wanted. I shed tears and that’s not something I do often when reading a novel.
My love of genealogy was celebrated and Carrie’s discovery of ancestral memory was a fun one to consider. We all know we share DNA with our ancestors, why not the memories of them too? It’s safe to say that we won’t come close to this romantic notion in our own experience, but it is fun to dream.
A book full of love, political intrigue, strong women, strong men, mystery, and both storylines were good. I wish there’d been more of Carrie’s story but that’s because I’m greedy. I didn’t want it to end!
I loved The Winter Sea and this is a continuation of that story. I didn’t love it as much as its predecessor for one big reason. It also tells two stories, a modern one that links to a historical one, but in this book the modern story is not at all engaging. It involves two people who can read minds and travel in time by using their paranormal abilities. It was just to hard for me to care about Nicola and to a lesser extent, Rob. They could do too much. It was too easy. This was pretty much the first third of the book so I made a slow go of it. Once we got to Anna’s story in Imperial Russia, I loved it! Anna is the true star and I loved every minute of her adventures.
This was my least favorite of all of her books. If she hadn’t written it I would have given up on it before the halfway point. There was a nice twist at the end that was a reward for making it that far, but it wasn’t nearly enough.
Mariana, one of my favorites, from my thoughts in 2017, the only one of her books I’ve read twice.
Here were my first thoughts on Goodreads when I finished this one, “My love affair with Susanna Kearsley continues. This was one of her first books and it may be my favorite so far. I didn’t want it to end. I was worried that the ending would be all wrong. But it wasn’t. It was perfect.” There is something so magical and romantic about her stories. There is history, romance, and a perfect sense of place in all of her books. This one also felt a little like a ghost story.
Julia was sure she’d found her house and she packed up and moved from London to a small English village without a second thought. She was a children’s book illustrator and was able to make a few friends right away just as she was being transported back in time at unpredictable times.
It’s tricky when you are going back and forth between time periods and characters. Inevitably, you are drawn more to one story than the other. This one did a great job of tying the two together so I was invested in both. Was this book, the first time she tried the time travel travel romance, perfect? No. Was it perfect enough to have me rereading the last few chapters again and again because I wasn’t quite ready for it to end? A resounding YES!
I love all of Susanna Kearsley’s books, but this is a favorite. King James has tasked Andrew Logan to find Sir David Moray and bring him back to the king to answer for the death of the prince. I LOVED the group making their way to the king while trying to escape from groups with competing interests.
There’s history, love in all its forms, second site, betrayal, respect, loyalty, and revenge. It’s fun and left me feeling satisfied for the futures of the characters. The authors note at the end tells what is based on truth (quite a bit) and what was made up in the mind of a gifted storyteller.
Sara, as explained early on, has Asperger syndrome. Her best friend is her cousin, who is offering her a chance at a code breaking job in Paris. A famous writer wants her to decipher an almost 300 year old diary and she accepts since she is between jobs. She gets put up at a nice home with a cook and with a good looking man who catches her eye as a neighbor. She begins to uncover Mary’s story, one that could easily be called a thriller, and it’s there that this book finds its heart.
I liked Sara and enjoyed the honest portrayal of a character on the autism spectrum, but it was Mary that had me turning the pages, hoping that she would get her happily ever after. For a girl abandoned by her family and then used to curry favor, she was easy to love. In the 1700s a trek from Paris to Italy was fraught with danger, especially when you were caught with a man who recognized the bounty on the head of her travel companions. I won’t spoil Mary’s end, but I will say that it was fitting.
Kearsley is a master at the dual storylines set in different time periods. Usually the storylines match up a bit better than they do in this one and there is most often more of a mystical aspect, but I was still happy to be reading.
I fell in love with Susanna Kearsley’s storytelling with The Winter Sea which connected to The Firebird which is connected to this one. They are all standalones, but you’ll recognize the Roman soldiers from this one in The Winter Sea and Robbie from this book appears all grown up in The Firebird. Just go ahead and read them all (you know you want to).
Verity makes a temporary move from London to Eyemouth, Scotland, a border town with a rich history. She is to help find evidence that the famed Ninth Roman Legion had been there. Archeological digs are not that exciting when they’re just starting out, so the slower pace allows Verity to get a feel for the new place and the new people who will feel like family before all is said and done. While most of Kearsley’s stories have contained dual story lines, one in the past and one in the present, this one was different with just a modern story and one active ghost.
Kearsley is one of my favorites. I always enjoy the trip into her magical worlds. This one had history, mystery, danger, just a touch of romance, and some paranormal shenanigans.
This was my first book of the year and it took me a while to become invested in the three characters whose stories make up Bellewether. Charley who moved to the area so that she could live with her niece after the untimely death of her brother, took a job as museum director of the under construction Wilde House. There she encountered maybe my favorite character of the book, the ghost. There was also a cute contractor and some animosity toward the grandmother she’d never met who lived nearby.
As for the 1700’s storyline, we move between Lydia and Jean-Philippe’s perspective as the former tries to come to grips with unwanted houseguests and brothers with problems of their own. Jean-Philippe only spoke French, so for much of the book he didn’t communicate freely.
I liked getting a deeper understanding of the war and what was happening in the region. Some of these characters were based on real people or compilations which made the story richer, but maybe not quite as fanciful as I’d hoped. There was romance, sure, but most of Kearsley’s books feel magical and this one didn’t quite get there for me. It’s still good and I really enjoyed the multitude of characters and history. My favorite ghost saved the day and the end was excellent and worth reading 400+ pages.
Any book that takes me to Italy starts as a winner and when Kearsley does it, well, don’t talk to me until I’ve turned the last page. This one felt different than all of her others, there was a gothic atmosphere that I always like. I liked the setting and the dark nature of it, Italy and Kearsley will always save a bad day.
Susanna Kearsley is a perfect escape for me. I fall into a different world, both geographically and historically, get a little romance (never too much), and close the book with a smile on my face a little smarter than when I started. This book took me to a small village in Wales, where literary agent, Lyn, is accompanying one of her clients to her boyfriend’s home for Christmas. He happens to be a successful author and Lyn hopes she can land him as a client. He also has a cute brother, but the real thrill is when she discovers one time flavor of the month writer, Gareth, hiding himself from the literary crowd.
Kearsley has officially become a comfort read for me. This was my third read from her and each of them has left me satisfied and happy. There is always a back story that takes place in another time that connects with the current story in some way. This book had less of the back story, which I think it suffered for, but the mystery, romance, and yes, evil all combined to make this a fun read.
The essence of the setting is always so easily felt and her writing is so accessible that once I get started I find it hard to put down. There were so many potential bad guys in this one that I didn’t really have and handle on it until late in the game, but those smarter than I probably figured it out much sooner.
The Rose Garden was set on the Cornish coast with Eva traveling between today and the time of the Jacobite Rebellion. I had to resist the urge to peek at the last page to see how things ended up. Rest assured, everything was good.
This one had an extra twist to the time travel storyline that was as confusing to my brain as it was a fun twist at the end.
This book is a collaboration with three other women, none of whom I’ve read before. I’m going to ruin the surprise and tell you that I loved this.
There once was a watch made from cursed gold and it ruined the lives of all who touched it. The four women seamlessly tell the tale of the watch, from its inception in 1700s Spain (Kearsley), to 1831 Scotland (Huber), 1870 London (Trent), and finally to 1944 Kent (Harris). The authors use characters from their previous books or series which will make their readers happy, but didn’t confuse me when I wasn’t familiar. It only made me want to read more about them.
You can see who else is on my Top 100 Authors list here.
I’m rereading books from my long ago compiled favorite books list to see if they should make my Top 100. This is a slow moving project, but one that this list maker enjoys. So, I first read this book when it came out in the 1990s and I remember being blown away by how good it was. I saw the movie they made with Billy Bob Thornton and was less than impressed, but I’m going to give that another try while the book is fresh.
Two brothers and one of their best friends happen upon a plane crash with a dead pilot and $4.4 million inside. They agree to a simple plan. One of them will take the money home and keep it for six months and if no one comes forward claiming it then they’ll divide up the money and go their separate ways. Obviously if that had happened there would be no book. What did happen was one bad decision after another that left the narrator, one of the brothers, hurtling toward the point of no return. He had a wife with a baby on the way and while he threatened to burn the money to keep the other two in check, it became obvious to everyone that he would never do that.
“Greed is what’ll get us caught,’ she said.
What’s so great about this book is that the moral questions are timeless. There is a depth to these characters because they are not criminal masterminds, they are just normalish people in small town Ohio. And parts will make you uncomfortable. Quite a few parts probably. As I reread this, I realized that three of the most disturbing parts didn’t even register in my memory, although I have no idea how I could have forgotten them.
The money, by giving us a chance to dream, had also allowed us to begin despising our present lives.
Will their plan work? It’s simple after all. As a reader you need to know what happens to the money and Smith escalates, shocks, and has you questioning what you would do at every turn. I don’t think that many thrillers will make it on my Top 100 list, but this one hits differently
“What we’ve done is horrible,” Sarah said. “But that doesn’t mean we’re evil, and it doesn’t mean we weren’t right to do it. We had to save ourselves.”
I finally finished my second book for this challenge. I really need to pick up the pace. Since I sort book donations at the library and frequent bookstores I decided to start this challenge with countries that cross my path organically, we’ll see how far that gets me. The fiction book showed up in my quarterly TBR box and the memoir came through the library donations.
A memoir by Kyoto Mori telling of her trip back to Japan after living in the US since college. This took me a while to finish. I had a hard time getting into it, but the last half was good. The first half was a lot of looking back at her childhood in Japan before her mother committed suicide and her father remarried. The second half interspersed those memories with what was happening on her trip more smoothly and I found myself picking up the pace as I finished.
I liked getting to know the traditions and stories. Her father’s family was in Hiroshima when the atomic bomb was dropped. Her grandparent’s lived in the country in poverty. Even the way her family interacts with her and each other was an interesting observation.
Her relationship with her father was a recurring theme and I totally got it. Reading some of the other reviews that was a complaint by many, but I thought it made sense. If your father was the big reason that you left, going back would color all of your interactions with family.
The book is a collection of stories with a central location, the Nakagyo Kokoro Clinic for the Soul in Kyoto. The clinic can only be found when a person is struggling with life and the doctor only ever prescribes one thing, a cat!
Such a charming story with each chapter the name of the prescribed cat with a picture. Cat lovers will like the sweetness of a cat being able to cure all ills. A fun magical fiction book for Japan.
***
That being said here are four books I’ve read and liked in the last few years that were set in Japan.
My goal is to read a fiction and nonfiction book set in and written by someone who was born in that country. As recommendations have trickled in I realized that it’s the ‘born in that country’ part that is going to make some books not work. I’m excluding the immigrant experience. It wasn’t my intent, I just didn’t really think it through in those terms. I’m not going to change the rules at this point. Maybe I’ll do a spin off challenge for that.
I read 12 books on January, a little bit of everything. Five nonfiction is a pretty good start to the year.
Five Star Books
On Freedom by Timothy Snyder. Nonfiction. This is such an important read. “In dehumanizing others, we make ourselves less free.”
These are not the most profound thoughts of On Freedom, but they are the most relevant to today. If you have an interest in the fascism we are seeing today read On Tyranny. If you want a more nuanced discussion about how free we really are as a nation, read his latest On Freedom.
I can’t recommend both of these books enough. On Tyranny will get you started. At just over 100 pages it packs a punch with little time commitment. I loved the graphic novel adaptation. On Freedom is longer and takes more time to absorb, but is so worth it. I almost gave up on On Freedom because it felt a little too textbooky, but once it got past that it was gold.
The Book Club for Troublesome Women by Marie Bostwick. Fiction. This was my book blub read this month and we all really liked it. Four women form a book group to read The Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan, thus giving themselves the name the Bettys. This is the early 1960s so women’s role were different and although each of them were married, they each were constructed by things out of their control. Can a woman ‘have it all’?
It focused on the bonds between the women, and ALL women. It explored what these friendships mean through these book group meetings with the fun cocktails, even if sometimes the book didn’t get read by everyone. Hey, it happens! There’s plenty of drama to keep you turning the pages making this a fast, satisfying read.
I loved that it was a good mix of women I did and don’t know. And a range of ages too. The essays were written by different people so there was a mix of writing styles too, some choosing a more biographical approach and other leaning into their personal connection with person. Let’s lift each other up. Our country needs it now more than ever.
4 1/2 Stars
The Art and Life of Hilma af Klint by Ylva Hillstrom and Karin Eklund. Nonfiction. A 64 page biography about someone who I didn’t really know anything about. And now I know about her and have seen her art, but I also know what was going on in the world in the late 1800s/early 1900s with spiritualism, homemade ouiji boards, thoughts on communicating with spirits, theosophy, alchemy…. It was so much more than I thought it would be.
Hilma af Klint really thought that the spirits were showing her the secrets of the universe. So she painted it. But no one wanted to see them until decades after her death. Now they hang in the most prestigious museums in the world.
4 Stars
The Onion Came First by Elinor Wilder. Paranormal romance. STEM Meets Supernatural is right on the cover. Annelie is a neurodivergent numbers gal from Wall Street. Reed is an alpha wolf shifter. They both become neighbors in the Claw Ridge Mountains. I loved how Annelie found a place and people who felt like home. Could you love a wolf? One that did math with rocks that it brought to your porch? Somehow Reed made that work🔥
I love this book and it’s not just because my friend wrote it, her first novel. Not only did it feel like a love story between Reed and Annelie, it also felt like a love story to and for neurodivergents and the people who love them.
The Soulmate Equation by Christina Lauren. Romance. The duo Christina Lauren has become a favorite of mine in the last few years. I’m a little later to the party so there’s a huge backlist, yay for me!
In the Soulmate Equation two people who barely tolerate each other are matched up as the perfect couple based on their DNA. She’s a single mother barely making ends meet and he is the creator of the matchmaking science. I thought this one was funny and sweet, a perfect escape from the news.
Sandwich by Catherine Newman. Fiction. I finally got around to the book most of bookish friends of a certain age have already read. It’s definitely for the woman who can understand what hormones, or lack thereof, can do to person and for the men who love them! You’ll feel seen even if Rocky is a bit much.
I like people who can be a bit much. I usually find them fascinating and Rocky was that for sure. The book takes place over a weeklong vacation with her husband, two grown kids, one girlfriend, and her two elderly parents. It’s a vacation they always take and the familiarity brings memories, both bittersweet and painful. I can see not liking this one if Rocky is too loud, too liberal, or too narcissistic for you. But for me, I found an underlying truth to this stage of life and Rocky made me feel a little less like a hot mess myself.
The Kiss Countdown by Etta Easton. Romance. This was a sweet debut with likable characters. The main characters agree to pretend to be dating even if the pretend doesn’t seem so fake.
Vincent is prepping to fly to the moon, yes, a real astronaut, and Amerie is trying to start her own business. Was it the most believable story? No.the engagement and her moving in with him only days after meeting were both pretty crazy. BUT I was still invested and enjoyed their journey.
The Midnight Lock by Jeffery Deaver. Lincoln Rhyme series #15. Thriller. No lock is going to stop the Locksmith 🔓. He likes to break into women’s apartments and watch them while they sleep, leaving clues all over that he’d been there. Lincoln Rhyme, Amelia Sacks and crew are back and ready to catch the bad guys! I love the team, the science, the twists and turns, NYC. It all works! It’s best to start at the beginning with The Bone Collector.
3 1/2 Stars
The Dream of Water by Kyoka Mori. Memoir. This took me a while to finish. I had a hard time getting into it, but the last half was good. The first half was a lot of looking back at her childhood in Japan before her mother committed suicide and her father remarried. The second half interspersed those memories with what was happening on her trip more smoothly and I found myself picking up the pace as I finished.
I liked getting to know the traditions and stories. Her father’s family was in Hiroshima when the atomic bomb was dropped. Her grandparent’s lived in the country in poverty. Even the way her family interacts with her and each other was an interesting observation.
Her relationship with her father was a recurring theme and I totally got it. Reading some of the other reviews that was a complaint by many, but I thought it made sense. If your father was the big reason that you left, going back would color all of your interactions with family.
I Will Judge You by Your Bookshelf by Grant Snider. Comics. I Will Judge You by Your Bookshelf by Grant Snider is a perfect gift for that capacious reader or writer in your life. It’s for readers, writers, poets, and those who want to understand them better. So, do YOU judge a person’ bookshelf? I judge only if they don’t have one!
Before I add books to my Top 100 I do a reread, or in this case a re-listen last year, to make sure they still belong on the list. As I read the review I originally posted in 2015 I still agree with everything I said. but the most compelling part is what I didn’t say. I didn’t spoil Hanna’s big secret. But Hanna’s big secret is the thing that turns the story into something worth reading, contemplating, and discussing. I think the emphasis on the relationship between a 15 year old boy and a 30 year old woman is obviously worth debating, but it isn’t what makes this story stick.
So much story in 200 pages. It’s translated from German so it may not feel the most poetic, but it packs a punch. I’m drawn to books that can say much with few words. I recommend the audio book and the movie.
Unabridged audio read by Campbell Scott. 4 hours, 30 minutes
Hailed for its coiled eroticism and the moral claims it makes upon the reader, this mesmerizing novel is a story of love and secrets, horror and compassion, unfolding against the haunted landscape of postwar Germany. When he falls ill on his way home from school, fifteen-year-old Michael Berg is rescued by Hanna, a woman twice his age. In time she becomes his lover–then she inexplicably disappears. When Michael next sees her, he is a young law student, and she is on trial for a hideous crime. As he watches her refuse to defend her innocence, Michael gradually realizes that Hanna may be guarding a secret she considers more shameful than murder.
I watched the movie made from this book in 2009 when it came out because I love Kate Winslet and I ended up being very moved by it. And it was with those images in my mind that I listened to the book expertly narrated by Campbell Scott. He became the young and then the adult Michael for me. Between the movie and Campbell’s narration there was a warmth and richness to this story that I don’t know if I would have found in reading the book alone. At just over 200 pages it tackled a lot and much of it had to be personally considered by the reader. What I’m saying is that I can vouch for the audio, but I don’t know it I would have loved it as much if I had read the book alone.
The first part is the love? story between the 15 year old Michael and the 30 something old Hanna. I didn’t ever truly figure out the why of it on her end, but it’s an easier sell for a 15-year-old boy to be captivated by a woman who teaches him all about sex . I found it realistic especially since as he started to spend more time with his peers he began to question Hanna’s place among them.
Flash forward a few years and Michael is at university studying law and his class is studying a trial of women accused of Nazi crimes and he sees Hanna for the first time since he was 15. She was a guard for one of the concentration camps and now must face her day in court. Michael is riveted and doesn’t miss a day.
I loved this for how much it manages to pack into such a short book. There was the strange physical relationship between the two, but then it moved into things more thought-provoking, horrifying and sad. It’s a great book for discussion and those who are interested in post-war Germany. Not a happy book, but one that left me satisfied and enriched.
A slow reading month with only eight books, but given the craziness of the month it’s a win! October had two birthdays (mine and Gage’s), one anniversary (our 27th wedding anniversary), and a wedding trip/vacay to Colorado where the three of us and my mom watched my cousin’s daughter (and one of my flower girls) get married. Oh, and we also added a 2 pound furball to the house, making this a 3 cat house, and one of the other cats, Razzi, had to have surgery. I’m honestly looking forward to a more low key November!
My friend wrote a book! This novella is a set up for the series and I’m so proud of her! Not a Free Ion is a novella that sets up the Claw Ridge Mountains community that is home to wolf shifter packs. It’s a love story with a shifter who lost his sense of smell and a neurodivergent woman who has always loved him. They finally get there second chance when the stakes are high.
I’m not usually into wolf shifters or novellas BUT this was a fun introduction to the first book, where I’ve had the privilege to read a few early chapters. If you do like shifter stories, go ahead and show some love to my friend by reading this one. The opening rescue chapters will have you hooked from page one.
This was my favorite book of the month by one of my favorite authors. A widowed matriarch who is dying, a granddaughter once cast away now invited back with the promise of a sizeable inheritance for her daughter, and an absent son/father who still has a role in the story.
I loved watching Emma come into her own as she went back to the place she was raised and where her one and only love still lived with his new family. I liked hearing Genevieve’s voice as she told her story and the purified air way she had at looking at the world. I also loved that the mystery of the missing, presumed dead son was just a small part of the story and that when the truth finally became known it was almost a surprise I wasn’t sure was going to happen.
I really liked this age gap, social disparity romance. I loved watching kind hearted, somewhat clueless Alexis of a medicine dynasty fall in love with Daniel and the small town he lived in. I also fell in love with Daniel, the man of many hats, and the close-knit small town that needed and embraced Alexis.
This did address abuse both emotional and physical, which I appreciated. Too many girls/women can’t see the emotional abuse after they’ve accepted it as fact. Any story that can save girls from those relationships is one that should be shared widely.
Simons is a Charleston blue blood who always feels out of place. When she starts questioning her engagement to the perfect man according to her family she must make a choice.
I loved the Charleston setting and all of the ins and outs of the elites that live there. The story was part family ties and part dating horror stories and it moved along at a good pace. The grandma’s story of being brave was a nice through line.
The book is a collection of stories with a central location, the Nakagyo Kokoro Clinic for the Soul in Kyoto. The clinic can only be found when a person is struggling with life and the doctor only ever prescribes one thing, a cat!
Such a charming story with each chapter the name of the prescribed cat with a picture. Cat lovers will like the sweetness of a cat being able to cure all ills.
Zany scenes told with wit and humor are a Katherine Center gift. Her latest, the Lover Haters, has that along with a perfect specimen of a man and a woman dealing with body issues. Oh, and a large Great Dane who is involved in much of the story.
This was fun and I liked it. Not my favorite of hers, I like my men with at least as many flaws as I have, but still good.
Gage and I read the second Percy Jackson together. It’s slow going with school starting, but we did it! And he’s willing to continue so that’s the best thing
I still like how these books make mythology fun and are educating as well as entertaining. I’m looking forward to the next one just as much as he is!
So, this is my first Danielle Steel book in decades and, wow, it was not what I was expecting! I am not a big believer in trigger warnings and am sure I would have ignored them if there’d been any, but this book was just one big trigger for me.
My trigger warnings for you includes sick children and lots of child ER visits. I found no joy in this book from beginning to end, so if you like those types of books, have at it 😆
I don’t often post about books I don’t really like, but given how much it bothered me I thought I’d warn you.
How I found, chose this book-It chose me. I ran across this book while I was cleaning up our spring book sale and the cover spoke to me.
I finally finished my fiction read from Israel and it was a gritty, moral look at the prejudice one can have against refugees in any country. It’s dense and slow moving, but it does pack a punch.
Dr. Etian Green hits a black migrant on his drive home from a long shift at an Israeli hospital. Even a doctor couldn’t save the man and so begins the moral crisis for this husband, father, and healer. When he is blackmailed by the man’s widow Etian’s whole life begins to spiral.
It felt like a quiet book because there wasn’t a lot of dialogue. What I got instead was a front row seat to the inner minds of Etian, his wife, and the beautiful widow. Fascinating. Etian goes from dislike of the refugees to understanding their plight in his country.
The writing was beautiful. The story was thoughtful and somewhat suspenseful. But I had zero problem putting this down until about 3/4 of the way through, when it picked up and I stayed up late to finish it. So, it’s a good book, but not one you’ll breeze through. And it’s the better for it.
And that cover? Gorgeous.
A few examples of the writing…
“However much he wanted to feel compassion for them, he couldn’t help recoiling from them. Not only from their smell and bodily fluids but also from their faces-alien, staring, filled with undying gratitude. He didn’t speak their language, and they didn’t speak his, so they communicated with waving hands and facial expressions.” p. 54
“A thin man reached out for a handshake, and Eitan shook his head, thinking that somewhere along the way, his empathy button had stopped functioning. He should have felt something. Kindness. Compassion. The responsibility of one human being for another. Not only toward this man standing here and shaking his hand emotionally while he himself was only waiting for him to stop. He hadn’t felt anything for the man on the ground with his head split open either. Or perhaps he had felt something but not the right something. Not what he should have felt.” p.75
“But Eitan knew he had never been more awake. And, appalled, he realized that at that moment, at that specific moment, he was prepared to set the whole house on fire.” p.208
“It would be his fault. Because he hadn’t taken good enough care of his family, and families are fragile things.” p.227
This YA dystopian trilogy is not one that I’d consider in my wheelhouse, but sometimes when you open yourself up to something new, great things happen. This is what I said about the books when I read them…
When I started reading this one I hated it. I disliked Todd and I didn’t understand why some of it was written phonetically. By the end I still had the phonetic question, but Todd turned into a character that I loved. Todd is being raised by two dads in Prentisstown, a town in the New World made up only of men, when he is forced to flee for reasons he doesn’t understand. He is the last boy in town. As he escapes he finds what he thinks is a girl, but doesn’t understand how this can be since all of the women were killed by the Spackle in the war. And he is accompanied by his faithful dog Manchee whose thoughts you can also hear.
The unlikely threesome run for their lives and the chase takes them to new towns with facts long hidden from Todd and astonishing to the girl, Viola. The men and women they encounter change their view of the world and shed light on the inclinations of people that is truly alive and well today. Manchee, my favorite character, is all things a good dog is, loyal, clever, and loving.
This may not sound like it’s in your wheelhouse and I get that. I remember reading all of the rave reviews when this came out 12 years ago, but didn’t think it sounded like something I’d be interested in. I was wrong. I got sucked in and the book kept it’s hooks in me the entire time.
The appeal of the first book of the series lay in large part with the relationship between Todd and Viola as they learn to trust each other to stay alive. This book has them separated most of the book, so it’s the hope they’re holding on to and the trust that they have in each other that sell the story.
Todd is being kept captive, watched, and groomed by the man he’d spent all of the first book trying to escape. He also is being partnered with Davey Prentiss, the same Davey who has been trying to kill him. Viola is put in a hospital for and run by women and when she recovers must figure out what is going on in the town and how she can reach Todd. The two end up on opposite sides.
I loved continuing the journey of these two teens and hope that the next book brings them the happy ending they deserve, but I’m skeptical. Way too many of the bad guys seem to survive and desperate times call for desperate allies, so it’s hard to say what lines will be drawn and crossed in the finale. I look forward to finding out!
This last book brings the same fight for good, with Todd and Viola doing much of it apart. Todd is with the Mayor who grows more powerful every day. Viola is with the women healers who are fighting the Mayor for control. A scout ship from earth brings reinforcement and weapons, but on a small scale. The Spackle get their own, prominent storyline so that we can see what gifts they can bring to the peace process. There is a lot going on.
And I was rivetted for all of it. There was a ‘resurrection’ and a rebirth and the end was not what I expected, it was better. I loved the short story that ended the series and how it added to and closed the trilogy.
Who should read it? Dystopian/Sci-Fi lovers, YA readers, and those who want to immerse themselves in 1724 pages of top notch storytelling.
Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America by Heather Cox Richardson. I started reading Heather Cox Richardson’s daily posts a few years ago. As a history professor she can give historical context to what’s happening politically. She is a must read if you want to understand the state of the country. This goes for both sides of the aisle. Her perspective may not be yours, but truth doesn’t take sides, and it shines through.
“The key to the rise of authoritarians, they explained, is their use of language and false history.”
So many people are being misled right now with blatant attacks on truth. Scary times are ahead if enough people don’t wake up to what’s happening. Highly recommend.
The Promise of a New Day: A Book of Daily Meditations. Do you read daily meditation/inspirational books/journals? I love them! I’ve been reading this classic for awhile and was a little sad to come to the end. Not religious but sometimes spiritual, it was a positive way to start the day. Originally published in the 80’s these thoughts are still relevant to lives today. This came though our book sale donations and I’m so happy I brought it home.
All My Friends Are Dead. A link to a little bit of the book I put on IG. This is such a cute book. If you see it, make sure to pick it up and take a few minutes to read through it. I guarantee at least one chuckle.
4 Star Reads
How Reading Changed my Life by Anna Quindlen. This is is one of those lovely books to sit down with for an hour in a comfy chair with a cup of tea. I love her stories of growing up being a reader and what books meant to her. By reading this it somehow put to words my own feelings regarding books and the home we make for ourselves in them. It’s only 84 pages.
The Lincoln Lawyer by Michael Connelly. Jason and I have loved the Lincoln Lawyer series on Netflix so I thought I’d give the first book in the long series a try. As usual, Michael Connelly is a master.
Courtroom drama ✔️ Family issues ✔️ Innocent man in jail ✔️ Life or death situations ✔️
I really liked it and will most likely continue the series when I get my hands on book 2. Have you watched the series or the movie with Matthew McConaughey?
Galatea by Madeline Miller. This little gift book is a 56 page novella that would go well with a collection or look great on a shelf or table. Based on Ovid’s Pygmalion myth.
Pygmalion creates a real woman from a marble statue he sculpted himself. Told from the woman’s perspective this was a liberated take the unnamed statue and the distasteful man who created her. I thought it was everything a grown-up myth should be.
Jackpot by Nic Stone. I’m a new Nic Stone fan. Rico Danger spends her days working to keep her family afloat and attending a high school where she feels alienated for being so poor. When the gas station she works at sells a winning lottery ticket she decides to try and find the lady who bought it. Enter Zan Macklin, son in a wealthy family with lots of expectations. They two go on this lottery ticket hunt together, growing close in the process.
Things I loved…Rico and Zan were cute together. I liked seeing his crush on her wear her shields down a bit. I liked Rico making friends. Pretty much I loved it all until…
Things I didn’t like…the end! No. Just no. And that’s all I’m going to say about it.
The Thursday Murder Club. Four residents in a retirement village form a club to solve old cold cases that the police couldn’t. There was a LOT going on in this book. I listened to it and did occasionally get lost, but I’d rather have that problem than there being too little to focus on. I thought the ‘pushing eighty’ club was brilliant and loved each of the members. I’m undecided about continuing on. Have you read it? Yea or nay?
3 1/2 Stars
The Amateur Marriage by Anne Tyler. I picked up one from Anne Tyler I hadn’t read since she’s one of those authors I love. Her stories are always about real relationships with all of the ups and downs.
We meet Michael and Pauline right before Michael is shipped off to war in 1941. The marriage was a rocky one, but three kids in they’d found a rhythm. They even held it together when their daughter ran away. It wasn’t until they were older that the bond crumbled.
I was a little bored for a while and almost gave this one up, but there was just enough there for me to keep going and I’m glad I did. It’s a solid family saga.
The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion. This is a memoir of the year after author Joan Didion’s died. The night he died their daughter was spreading in the hospital ICU. Can you imagine? There were some insightful thoughts in this National Book Award Winner. I think it would be a good recommendation for anyone going through their own grief journey.
Al Capone Does My Shirts by Gennifer Choldenko. Alcatraz Island. If you’ve ever visited you know its isolation. You also know that there were many families that lived there to support the prison. Can you imagine living on an island with the worst of the worst?
It’s 1935 and Moose has just moved there with his parents and sister. He finds some friends, but his life is very much affected by his sister, who in today’s world would be diagnosed with moderate autism. Since both of his parent’s work Moose is often in charge of his sister. It’s not always easy to put her needs first, but then his friends become hers.
This is a middle school or younger book and the beginning of a trilogy. I think this is a great book for any kid who has a sibling with autism or another disability. I think it would help them feel seen. And who wouldn’t think it would be cool to live among the convicts?
Stacy's Books 