16 Lighthouse Road by Debbie Macomber

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


This is a short romance/soap opera without closure for a few of the characters which is to be expected I suppose since this is #1 in a very successful series by a very popular author. Not a squeaky clean read coffee table book, due to some minor sexual titallation, but at least there's no vulgar language.



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The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


In addition to this book's overall high ratings, its intriguing title captured my interest. Yet it failed to enchant me and clearly I'm in the minority. Her visuals were good but the characters were not engaging. I thought the writing was a bit verbose, yet overall it's probably a good book for older YA *confident* readers. After reading several books in this genre I've come to the conclusion that fantasy fiction is just not my thing.









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A Lesson Before Dying

A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest J. Gaines

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I felt that the main character was not Jefferson, the wrongfully condemned man and the lesson he learned before his execution, but was Grant, the narrator and his anger, nay rage, and cowardice regarding the treatment of his people (Blacks), in 1940's. Both men learn a valuable lesson: how to become a man, Jefferson by dying for his people, and Grant by standing up for his beliefs. The book was slow going & somewhat repetitive until the last 100 pages when we read Jefferson's thoughts and see his transformation. I'd like to have read more about Jefferson. It almosts get there, but not quite.







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The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


If your passion is English history, specifically the Tudor & Plantagenet dynasties and 15th-16th century succession to the throne, then this is the book for you! It satisfies academically, but is definitely not entertaining fiction. The "daughter of time" is not a person, but "truth," as opposed to "authority." Tey, the author, presents a convincing argument: the "princes in the tower" were *not* murdered by their uncle, Richard III, and he was in fact a competent & highly revered monarch. This of course is in opposition to public school history books, Shakespeare's famous play, and popular thought. Henry the VII was the real bounder. I liked it very much; but then I'm a bit of a nut for this kind of thing & wouldn't recommend it to casual readers.



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Unless by Carol Shields

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is beautifully written and deals with some serious topics. The main character is a 44 year old mother of 3 girls, one of whom is a bright college dropout who is essentially homeless and spending her days/months as mute, wearing a sign around her neck that says "Goodness" and panhandling on a Toronto street corner. Any $ or gifts she receives she promptly gives to the poor. It is also a story of a self analytical writer (the mother), writing about a writer, as she attempts to unravel not only the reasons behind her daughter's disturbed state but about herself and the place of women in an increasingly insensitive society. It has a happy conclusion. Shields is Pulitzer Prize winning author of "The Stone Diaries," which I loved. This book was published in 2002, shortly before her death from cancer.



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The Red Pony by John Steinbeck

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I wanted to love this, afterall it is Steinbeck. Audio version could have been better because it is read slowly, making the story drag, bordering boring. I'm certain I would have enjoyed it more and appreciated Steinbeck's considerable talent as a writer if I had read instead of listened to it.



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Brokeback Mountain. CD by Annie Proulx

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


This was a disturbing novella. It starts with a rape and ends sadly with what most of society would describe as destroyed lives. Actually, it doesn't "end;" it just stops. I felt like a voyeur and did not enjoy it, but I will remember it.



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2009 Book of the Year

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This is an absorbing family saga that moves from India to a mission hospital in Haile Selassie's Ethiopia, to an inner city hospital in NYC, and back to Ethiopia. The intersection between skillfully drawn plot and characters with accurate medical scenarios creates both a sense that the story is true and disappointment at the realization that it is not. If you read and liked The Kite Runner, this is even better and I highly recommend it. I listened to audio version which is particularly well done.



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The Man in the Rockefeller Suit

The Man in the Rockefeller Suit: The Astonishing Rise and Spectacular Fall of a Serial Imposter by Mark Seal

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I found this especially interesting beause part of this stranger-than-fiction real life true story took place in San Marino, the town in which I was raised, and because an incident related to his life was close to home. The man who calls himself Clark Rockefeler is currently in prison for abductng his little girl and has been charged with a murder that took place in the 1980's. His preliminary hearing for the murder trial is scheduled this week.



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Sometimes a Great Notion

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/529626.Sometimes_a_Great_Notion">Sometimes a Great Notion by Ken Kesey
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is a fantastic book, considered an American classic, by the author of "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/853494.One_Flew_over_the_Cuckoos_Nest, told from several points of view combined with flashbacks. Suggest not trying to listen to audio version (I tried & found I had to get the print version to figure out what was going on.) A rewarding read. I know that movie versions of great books are often a letdown, but I'm going to check it out so that I can drool over Paul Newman.

http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/2455252-linda-hart">View all my reviews

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/77554.The_Stone_Diaries">The Stone Diaries by http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/12034.Carol_Shields">Carol Shields
My rating: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/192451154">5 of 5 stars

The ordinary life of an ordinary lady told in an extraordinary way. The characters develop and scenes unfold beautifully with nuances of language shifting rom 1st to 3rd person and back again. In one instance the main character is describing her feelings and then you go on and read how her family and friends interpreted the same thing. The publisher calls it "seductive prose" which is fitting description, It won the 1995 Puitzer prize.

http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/2455252-linda-hart">View all my reviews

so many books....so little time

The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson

My rating: 1 of 5 stars


Clearly in the minority of readers, I found this NY Times Best Seller "epic fantasy" to be a verbose, bloated, complex and disjointed mess with the characters going in circles, battle after battle, flashback after flash-forward, and constantly changing voices. It doesn't even begin to come together until about page 600, and even then it doesn't really ramp up for another 250 pages, with the final result being a giant prologue to his newest fantasy series. When the 1007 page novel finally ends it isn't really over and I don't care to read another 9,000 pages of sequels to reach the real conclusion. This is one novel that would benefit from a ruthless Reader Digest condensation.



But don't decide to read it or not based upon my opinion as I'm definitely not an epic fantasy aficionado and 66% of Goodreads readers give it 5 stars; less than 1% give it 1 star. I give him high marks for masterfully crafting a complex fictional world of fauna, flora, terrains, extreme ecospheres, civilizations with multiple races, cultures, ethnicities and class structures, complete with its own Stormlight Series taboo words & phrases e.g. "storm it". Hey, there are even multiple palindromes. And I give high praise for omitting all too common obscene language, vulgarities and gratuitous sex.*



His overall theme is laudable: Life before death; strength before weakness; journey before destination. Still, the clever complexity feels more like schizophrenic disorganization. With so many books, and so little time, choose carefully.


*This is a "Squeaky Clean Reads" book http://www.squeakycleanreads.com/







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Louie Zamperini is the Unbroken in Laura Hillenbrand's 2nd Best Seller

Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Absolutely compelling, amazing nonfiction. Clear, evocative, and emotionally exhaustive narrative about the indomitable will of Louis Zamperini, and his fellow POWs to survive man's inhumanity to man in the Pacific Theatre of WWII. Louie, an Olympic Runner(1938 4 min. mile)known worldwide as the Calif. "Torrance Tornado", the son of Italian immigrants and his fellow airmen Phil, and Mac, were adrift 47 days(!) covering 4000 miles(!)in a life raft with *no* food & scant provisions (fish hooks but no bait, 4 canisters of water...) 4 attacks of enemy airfire, sea storms, and horrendous daily shark attacks, only to be captured by the Japanese Army and endure prison camp atrocities for an additional 2 years 4 months. I will remember these men, along with Harris and the other POWs, the Zamperini family, and the sadistic camp commander, Watanabe ("the Bird"). I will forever be grateful for these men and carry sadness for 140,000 POWs held in Japan's camps, 36,000 of whom died. This book will make you cry, rage, wonder and cheer.



Hildebrand is also the author of Sea Biscuit.



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Garden Spells

Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Another book dripping with Southern (North Carolina) charm, that was a fun escape read. Romantic fiction with a culinary twist--think of Like Water for Chocolate. It is whimsical, lovely, magical, enchanting, and a thoroughly delightful book. I LOVED this book by a first time author!



from the flyleaf:
"The women of the Waverley family -- whether they like it or not -- are heirs to an unusual legacy, one that grows in a fenced plot behind their Queen Anne home on Pendland Street in Bascom, North Carolina. There, an apple tree bearing fruit of magical properties looms over a garden filled with herbs and edible flowers that possess the power to affect in curious ways anyone who eats them.


For nearly a decade, 34-year-old Claire Waverley, at peace with her family inheritance, has lived in the house alone, embracing the spirit of the grandmother who raised her, ruing her mother's unfortunate destiny and seemingly unconcerned about the fate of her rebellious sister, Sydney, who freed herself long ago from their small town's constraints. Using her grandmother's mystical culinary traditions, Claire has built a successful catering business -- and a carefully controlled, utterly predictable life -- upon the family's peculiar gift for making life-altering delicacies: lilac jelly to engender humility, for instance, or rose geranium wine to call up fond memories. Garden Spells reveals what happens when Sydney returns to Bascom with her young daughter, turning Claire's routine existence upside down. With Sydney's homecoming, the magic that the quiet caterer has measured into recipes to shape the thoughts and moods of others begins to influence Claire's own emotions in terrifying and delightful ways.


As the sisters reconnect and learn to support one another, each finds romance where she least expects it, while Sydney's child, Bay, discovers both the safe home she has longed for and her own surprising gifts. With the help of their elderly cousin Evanelle, endowed with her own uncanny skills, the Waverley women redeem the past, embrace the present, and take a joyful leap into the future. "



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Comingof Age in Savannah Georgia

Saving CeeCee Honeycutt by Beth Hoffman

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Loved it. A young girl surrounded by beautiful, strong, crazy, and wise women with Southern charm discovers who she is and how to let go of an unhappy past. A fun chick-lit read. I LOVED this book by a first time author! Reminded me of The Secret Life of Bees.

From goodreads.com review:

"Steel Magnolias meets The Help in this Southern debut novel sparkling with humor, heart, and feminine wisdom

Twelve-year-old CeeCee Honeycutt is in trouble. For years, she has been the caretaker of her psychotic mother, Camille-the tiara-toting, lipstick-smeared laughingstock of an entire town-a woman trapped in her long-ago moment of glory as the 1951 Vidalia Onion Queen. But when Camille is hit by a truck and killed, CeeCee is left to fend for herself. To the rescue comes her previously unknown great-aunt, Tootie Caldwell.

In her vintage Packard convertible, Tootie whisks CeeCee away to Savannah's perfumed world of prosperity and Southern eccentricity, a world that seems to be run entirely by women. From the exotic Miz Thelma Rae Goodpepper, who bathes in her backyard bathtub and uses garden slugs as her secret weapons, to Tootie's all-knowing housekeeper, Oletta Jones, to Violene Hobbs, who entertains a local police officer in her canary-yellow peignoir, the women of Gaston Street keep CeeCee entertained and enthralled for an entire summer.

Laugh-out-loud funny and deeply touching, Beth Hoffman's sparkling debut is, as Kristin Hannah says, "packed full of Southern charm, strong women, wacky humor, and good old-fashioned heart." It is a novel that explores the indomitable strengths of female friendship and gives us the story of a young girl who loses one mother and finds many others."

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Gorky Park--A Cold War Era Russian Crime Detective Novel

Gorky Park by Martin Cruz Smith

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


This is a time-tested popular classic crime fiction, obviously much appreciated according to its high ratings, but this is not a fun read. I admit that Smith is a word smith (no pun intended), but this is not my favorite genre --international intrigue, labyrinthine crime thriller with lots of bloody violence, gore, and more f-words and macho sex than I care for.



Although the mostly corrupt characters are well drawn, except for bumbling Pasho, I didn't care for any of them. Irina is self absorbed, shallow, completely lacking in moral strength, but hey, she's so gorgeous that even ragged shabby clothes look terrific on her. Arkady, the good guy hero, scorns almost everyone & everything. He is arrogant, morose, cynical, and emotionally conflicted. I couldn't decide if he was skilled or just plain lucky with his unrealistic, "gut feeling" approach to exposing corruption and dishonesty. But he was a maverick with integrity and afterall he was successful.



Having been to Moscow & Leningrad in the early 90's, and being somewhat famiiar with Russian history & cultrue, I got right into the dark feeling of the book, but I felt the first 1/3 of it dragged.













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Y is for Yorick, A Slightly Irreverent Shakespearean ABC Book for Grown-Ups

Y is for Yorick: A Slightly Irreverent Shakespearean ABC Book for Grown-Ups by Jennifer Adams

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I loved this little book!! It's a humorous tongue-in-cheek quick reference on Shakespeare's characters and works. "C is for Claudius. He killed his brother and married his brother's widow, Gertrude. However, he forgot to take into account the stepchildren.(Hamlet). . ."U is for Ursula, a maid who nobody remembers...If you want to be remembered it is better to be a queen, king, murderer, cross-dresser, or ghost.(Much Ado About Nothing)"

The book includes a brief synopsis of each of his plays. I enjoyed it so much that it is my current bathroom book and am now reading it a second time. In addition to being a great graduation gift, I highly recommend it to anyone who, like the author, "has a general affinity for civilized dark humor and all things British." (flyleaf)



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The Scent of Rain and Lightning

The Scent of Rain and Lightning by Nancy Pickard

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This story kept me involved with sustained suspense. I didn't expect the truth until the big reveal at the end. The plot, sub-plot and characters are all successfully developed. I felt the joys and the pains of each of the latter as their individual stories unfolded. The novel is a well written, stand alone mystery reminiscent of Mary Higgins Clark. It would have earned 5 stars from me were it not for the occasional "f-bombs" and some adult content. This is my first read from Pickard and won't be my last.



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Moon Over Manifest

Moon Over Manifest by Clare Vanderpool

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


It's easy to see why this is a 2011 Newberry Award winner, but difficult to credit as Vanderpool's *debut* novel. The plot is cleverly complex with a pervasive air of mystery; the voices of the characters are clear and distinctive; the 1936 town and its 1918 incarnation come alive; and the whole thing is written with a steady hand. Please, please don't dismiss a book because it is labeled as a children's or YA book. There is plenty of substance in there for us big people. There are many nuances and undercurrents, and imho many under age 15 would not "get it" and may find it slow & boring. (If you want to get teens to read, give them Printz Award winners.) That being said, this is a beautiful coming of age story about a girl finding out about herself and the world around her. It is an absolute gem.





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Intrigue and Suspense

Einstein's Trunk by Jim Haberkorn

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This mystery/thriller piqued my interest immediately and I didn't want to put it down. The plot is exciting, suspenseful, gripping and keeps the reader wondering what's going to happen next. The good guy is really "good:" an international spy who believes in no sex before marriage, and who doesn't drink, smoke, or cuss. No gratuitous sex or vulgar language. The characters are so well drawn and the locale so well described that 2 weeks later I still have visual pictures of both in my mind and am waiting for the next adventure from this talented author. I can imagine a movie being made of this.







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EINSTEIN'S TRUNK

Einstein's Trunk by Jim Haberkorn




I'm only into this suspense novel a little way and don't want to put it down. This promises to be a great quick read!



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When You're Holding a Hammer, Everything Looks Like a Nail

Tennessee middle school assistant football coach, age 26, fired for a song he wrote & sent to his family & friends by private email. When you go to the link for the song, there are a couple of sites that give the news on the firing. This could be the next number one hit country song. It's the best effort yet at encapsulating the outrage at the oversteps of this government in an entertaining song .. Apparently the guy was fired over the song because some parents complained. Shameful if it´s true. If you like it, help it go "viral" by passing it along to everyone you know.

Click for a great song!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfH46DTAkxo

Outliers: The Story of Success

Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Read this. You will be talking about it to your family & friends for a long time. Many people read only fiction and that is a shame, because Malcolm Gladwell has revolutionized non- fiction writing. His first 2 books were best sellers: "The Tipping Point" and "Blink." I’ve read both and being primarily a fiction reader, I was surprised at how much I enjoyed them. But this third book, in which he explains the story of success, is my favorite.



Citing case after fascinating case of successful people & organizations Gladwell’s point becomes unforgettably clear: successful people are often talented, intelligent, and ambitious, yes, but these traits *always* converge with opportunities. These opportunities include cultural environment, where and when a person is born—even their birth month, and luck: being in the right place at the right time. Forget genius. Hard work combined with opportunity is everything. Since he writes so clearly this is a fast and fascinating read, well woth the few hours invested.





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