Catching up on book reviews

Whew. Once again, it's been a while since I've blogged. I haven't done a ton of reading in that time, but I have finished a handful and am going to catch up on the reviews in one post. (I just looked back at my last post and am noticing a theme.)

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I've read quite a bit of Sharon Draper's books before (here, here, and three others I read before I blogged), and always have mixed feelings about them. This one was probably in my top two. It's about a young girl with cerebral palsy so severe she cannot walk or talk. Everyone around her thinks she is also mentally retarded as well, and she spends most of her life unable to defend or explain herself. This one was good, and also genuinely hard to read at times because of the content; I can't imagine being in her place. It's a good YA choice, especially for teaching about people who are different than us.

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I can't really say much about this one without giving a lot away, but I will say that I definitely recommend it. Zusak, also the author of The Book Thief, is one of my new favorites. The writing is beautiful, the dialogue is hilarious, and the characters are incredibly endearing. He also keeps you guessing and confused as you try to figure things out, which is fun. I can't wait to read the rest of his books.

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I'm really bummed to have to write what I'm about to write, but I just didn't love this book. I love Gary Schmidt...my favorite ever book in the whole world is Okay for Now, and some others that are very high on the list are Trouble and Lizzie Bright. This man is everything I want to be in a writer. This book was pretty much "eh" though. Oh well. I guess everyone's allowed a couple of bummers in their career.

Catch up

So remember that time I used to write reviews on all the books I read? And then suddenly I have four that I've read but haven't written about. Whoops. So these will be short and sweet.

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I've read quite a bit of Sharon Draper, and I've had mixed feelings about all of her books. They all tend to handle hardcore plot lines with Remember the Titans-type dialogue. I appreciate the PG-rating, but sometimes it just comes off as a little corny. There is a fair amount of that in this book too, but I think it's her best one. This story follows a slave from her village in Africa, to the ship that takes her across the ocean to America, to the plantation her new masters own, and then beyond. It's a heartbreaking, sweet, and interesting look at slavery in America. 

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I grabbed this book up when I saw a trailer for the upcoming movie. I really enjoyed it and thought it was incredibly interesting and well-written, even though it also terrified me (it was like a 9 hour episode of Law and Order: SVU. I've stopped watching SVU since Charlotte was born for a reason). I will say, though, that I think I only liked it as much as I did because I listened to it on audiobook. I think if I'd read it in actual book form, I would have been driven insane by the five-year-old narrator. But since I listened to it and heard a five-year-old voice reading the five-year-old words, it was perfectly fine. So I recommend the audiobook.

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I can't remember why I put this book on my list, but oh well. I liked it, despite the fact that it's about a mostly-failing marriage and that it's suuuuuuper depressing. There were elements of it, though, that were incredibly convicting and cause for reflection. Marriage is hard, and there's fighting, and listening to these two people fight and yell at each other was horrible...mostly because there were a couple of times where the things they were yelling sounded familiar. And that, friends, is not good. So I'm thankful for this depressing book, because good gracious, the last thing I want is to be able to relate to any of the crazies in this plot. (But all of that being said, it's a good read. Not a favorite or anything, but interesting.)

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I read Killing Kennedy a while ago, and loved it. This one, though, not as much. It was interesting, but it had a LOT of Civil War specifics and battle strategy, and I just cannot handle books about war (movies, yes...books, no). And the rest of it just wasn't nearly as interesting as Kennedy, I don't think. It was fine, just didn't love it as much.

Go Set a Watchman: a brief review

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The world just about shut down this summer when Harper Lee's previously unheard of second novel was released. As a big To Kill a Mockingbird fan, I was obviously excited....but also a little skeptical about some of the circumstances surrounding the release (it just didn't make a lot of sense, did it?). I didn't want to rush out and buy it, but borrowing it from the library sounded good. An audiobook read by Reese Witherspoon didn't hurt either. My verdict: it's good! I enjoyed it a lot. (For the record, I wasn't really skeptical about whether it would be good, just whether Lee really wanted it released after all these years when she's in her 90s.) It was a little different at the beginning because so many characters have changed and/or are gone, but overall I really did like it. I also appreciated the interesting discussions about race...although there was a huge uproar when it first came out because "Atticus is a racist!", I think I tried to come into the book with open eyes, and what I saw was a legitimate and difficult look at race. I don't think any of the characters come out at the end perfect, and no one side is absolutely right. I think Lee did a great job of showing that there's more than one view to the topic, and that everyone has a different reason for feeling the way they do. I might still have doubts about its publication, but I can say that I recommend the read.

And the Mountains Echoed: a brief review

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Several years ago, I read Hosseini's The Kite Runner, and enjoyed it as much as the next guy (or slightly less, maybe; I enjoyed it, but it wasn't my absolute favorite). But then more recently I listened to the audiobook version of his second book, A Thousand Splendid Suns, and loved it to pieces. I was excited, obviously, to snatch his third book, And the Mountains Echoed, on audiobook too. But I had to restart this book four separate times because I was so confused. I will say, though, that I think this is only because I was listening to it on audiobook while trying to cook dinner and keep dogs out of the kitchen and appease my screaming one-year-old who was clinging to my leg. This book has lots of different characters and lots of different story lines (that do connect to each other) and lots of different places/times in history. There's a fair amount to pay attention to, but once I was able to focus and make sure I was working hard to keep everything straight, it started getting a lot easier to remember all those connections. And then I fell in love with this book. It is brilliantly beautiful, and the web Hosseini weaves of family generations, relationships, and consequences is perfect. I loved this book...I think I do still love A Thousand Splendid Suns slightly more, but I really loved this book. It's beautiful, heartbreaking, and full of redemption. So one more time I'll say it: read Hosseini's books.

Twofer: Killing Kennedy and The Rosie Effect

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I've heard great things about this book (and O'Reilly's other, similar book Killing Lincoln) for several years now, and I've always wanted to listen to them. Thanks to the beauty of library audiobooks, I now know why everyone loves them so much. I really enjoyed O'Reilly's (and Dugard's) writing style, which made the complicated interpersonal and historical details roll off the pages like a casual conversation. I think the fact that the audiobook was narrated by Bill himself helped. I feel like I learned quite a bit, too, about all the major players in the Kennedys' story; I really enjoyed that he included so many details about all of the people who crossed paths with and/or had anything to do with JFK, rather than sticking just to JFK himself. I really enjoyed it, and I'm excited to listen to Killing Lincoln soon.

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I read Simsion's first Rosie book, The Rosie Project, at the beginning of the year and loved it. I loved the protagonist's unique voice (adult genetics professor who also lives somewhere on the autism spectrum), as well as the plot (adult genetics professor who also lives somewhere on the autism spectrum has formally decided that it's time to find a wife, and creates a detailed survey that he hands out to as many women as he can). This sequel, though...eh. I didn't love it. Most of it I didn't even like all that much. I loved a lot of the new characters and their relationships with Don, and I enjoyed the ending a lot, but most of the beginning and middle just made me mad. Rosie's all-powerful, alpha woman attitude is not my favorite (putting it mildly), and I hated how she handled her frustrations with Don. To be fair, he would be hard to be married to...but she did marry him. And decide to get pregnant with him. So that kind of seems like her fault, not Don's. That being said, I did love the first one and will definitely still recommend it.

The Martian: a brief review

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Our Book Club picks are on fire the last couple months. Holy cow...good book. Good, good book. I realize most people know this already, not necessarily because they've read the book but because they've seen the new movie starring Matt Damon, but you should all read the book anyway. It's really good. I was a little skeptical going in because I am not even a little bit scientific minded, and even proofreading JT's papers for school - about space - is sometimes a challenge for me. I wasn't sure how a book written entirely about space and scientific solutions would stay on my limited level, but Weir wrote it in a very accessible way. He figured out how to incorporate all the science and space and NASA protocol in a way that wasn't too far above the average reader's head. It didn't hurt that the protagonist was hilarious. So incredibly hilarious. I was also skeptical when my good friend Kelly said that it was one of the best books she's ever read...but I get it now. I think I'd have to agree.

No Country for Old Men: a brief review

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I saw this movie years ago and really enjoyed it, so when I heard someone mention the book on a podcast I figured I should check that out at some point. And I wasn't disappointed. Not by the book itself, (writing was incredible, characters were super interesting, social commentaries were spot on even though it's a couple decades old and takes place a couple decades before that) and not by the audiobook (which boasts an incredible reader). I really enjoyed this book, and can't wait to watch the movie again. I also can't wait to look into McCarthy's other books.

Twofer: two brief reviews

I slacked on writing a review again, so I have two different book reviews to write tonight. One I loved loved loved, and one I super duper didn't like at all.

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Oh my goodness. I loved this book. I loved this book so much I put it in my top 5 books ever. I loved the characters - the sweet, sweet, lovable characters - and I loved the twists and turns, and I loved the commentary on books and book people and I loved the whole thing. Not to be too dramatic (unless I've already crossed that threshold), but this was the kind of book for me that buries itself down deep in my heart and that I know I'll read many more times in the future. Sigh...so good. Also, as a small sidenote: something that I really appreciate is when a book or movie that is about a certain thing does a good job with that thing (translation: Jack Black's character in the The Holiday is a composer for movies, and the score for The Holiday is fantastic). Well this is a book about really good books, and it's indeed a really good book. I know I've given you absolutely nothing about plot or any information, and that's kind of on purpose. I don't want to spoil any of the surprises for you, and it's hard to give you much of a plot synopsis without doing that. So I'll just say this: read this book. Please read this book. Good golly, I'll probably buy it for you for Christmas to make sure you read this book.

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In contrast...eh. This book was surprisingly bad. I feel like I'm not allowed to really say that, because it's a classic. And it's Ray Bradbury. But goodness. I was bored out of my mind and when I wasn't bored out of my mind I was confused. There were good moments and good points made, and definitely some great commentaries on what the world could (and probably already has) easily become...but aside from that, whew. It was 4 CDs of pure effort for me. Sorry if that makes me a terrible former Language Arts teacher, but I'm just telling you the truth. But hey. I feel more well rounded, I suppose.

In Defense of Food: a brief review

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I'm in the middle of reading Jen Hatmaker's book 7, and in it she mentions that she read this book, In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto. I'll save the backstory for when I finish and review 7, but let's just say that she convinced me to check this book out. And it's incredibly interesting. Pollan's main argument is that we need to be eating food, not food products or imitation processed food or things that resemble food. He takes you through the history of how our Western diet has evolved over the course of the last couple generations, and how there is very little about our diet now that our ancestors would recognize. He explains the politics and nutritionism behind all of the food-related rules and standards we take for granted as being based in truth, when in reality they have been leading us further and further away from real food for decades. He has definitely made me think about some tweaks that can be made to help bring in more whole foods and less processed foods/food products. 

Liar & Spy: a brief review

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Yeah, so remember in the last post when I said it was book #50, but I never actually wrote a review for book #49? I'm sure you were all paying suuuuper close attention and picked up on that. Well anyway, I finished Liar & Spy before I read Ghosts of Tupelo Landing, and it's a perfectly fine and cute Young Adult book. I've kind of been half and half with whether I like Stead's books or not, and this one was probably my favorite of hers so far. It was grounded in reality (which her others have not been, which has bugged me), and the characters are genuine and very likable. It's a short, easy read and I liked it a lot.

Ghosts of Tupelo Landing: a brief review

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Ghosts of Tupelo Landing is the sequel to Sheila Turnage's book Three Times Lucky, which I listened to and loved a couple months ago. I really liked this book as well - which picks up the story of rising sixth graders Mo and Dale right where the last story ended - but the audiobook was unbearably terrible. Just awful. And it's such a bummer because the first audiobook was great. This one had a different reader (why?) and the sound quality was just awful. So I definitely don't recommend the audiobook, but I do very much recommend this series (a third book is due to come out in the beginning of October).  The characters are super adorable and original, the dialogue is hilarious and clever, and the plots have enough mild twists and turns that you genuinely want to keep reading to find out what happens. I really do love these books, and even though I kind of sort of like the first one better, I blame the crappy audiobook. These are great, and I definitely recommend them.

Friends, a brief extension to the post is needed to acknowledge that this is my 50th book so far this year! I can't believe it. My goal for last year was to get to 40 books and I only made it to 32. Granted, I did have a baby in that year, but I had a rolling, crawling, climbing baby in this year and I've already far surpassed last year's goal. I will admit, though, that 33 of the 50 books so far have been audiobooks. I cannot stress enough the way audiobooks have changed my reading game. I'm already bummed about how I'll have to change things up again a couple years from now when Charlotte will be able to hear and understand the things I'm listening to...but I'll figure something else out then. For now, audiobooks are incredibly helpful. It is so much fun for me to get to read and cross books off my list and feel productive. It's been really great, and I'm enjoying it a lot. I also highly recommend audiobooks :)

Al Capone Does My Homework: a brief review

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Al Capone Does My Homework is the third and last of the Al Capone/Alcatraz series from Gennifer Choldenko. It was my least favorite of the three, but it was still super cute and I liked it a lot. Moose's dad has become the Assistant Warden, which means that Moose feels a whole new weight of responsibility on his shoulders as he attempts to protect his father. Al Capone makes a cameo just like in the other two books, but this time it's to help Moose. I really like all three of these books, and highly recommend them; they're great historical fiction for middle schoolers.

Okay for Now: a brief, passionate review

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I read this book for the first time a handful of years ago, and I absolutely feel completely in love with Gary Schmidt. Really and truly fell in love. And this is my favorite of all his books. I love this book. I love this book. I love the characters, I love the dialogue, I love the writing style, I love the tears it makes me cry....I love this book. It is literally and concretely my favorite of all books. My favorite of all time. That's a big deal. So read this book, and then read the rest of this books in this order: Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy, Trouble, The Wednesday Wars, and then don't under any circumstances read What Came From the Stars. He was apparently on LSD when he wrote that book.

He doesn't have the popularity or public awareness of a John Green or whoever, but I think that's a shame. Because, like I've said now lots of times, this is my favorite book. And he is an incredible writer.

Isla and the Happily Ever After: a brief review

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I read both Anna and the French Kiss and Lola and the Boy Next Door when they each came out a couple years ago. I liked them a lot (cute, borderline cheesy teen romances) and was excited when the third and last companion book was finally released. I did like it, but I think I've realized (as I mentioned in this post) that I'm just getting way too old. These teen romances about declaring love after a month and traveling Europe and having sex everywhere/all the time just kind of make me want to vom. And I get it that some people's kids have a lot of money and attend black tie Christmas parties at the Met and have drivers/security guards who allow them into restricted areas for make out sessions with their girlfriends, but most people's kids don't. So after a while it's all just kind of eh. It was a perfectly fine book, but I really do think I need a break from teen fiction. I'm just getting too grumpy and jaded about it.

Another Twofer: brief reviews

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Sequel to Al Capone Does My Shirts, Al Capone Shines My Shoes continues the story of Moose Flanagan. As the middle school-aged son of a prison guard at Alcatraz during the 1930s, Moose and his family live on the island, along with all the other guards' families. Things are finally going so much better for the Flanagan family, until Mr. Capone himself decides it's time to cash in on a favor he secretly did for Moose in the first book. Just as cute as the first one, Shines My Shoes is full of great historically accurate fiction and fun characters. Definitely recommend it (and the first one, and I'm guessing the third one although I haven't read it yet...stay tuned).

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Going into this one, I had read two Rainbow Rowell books, Fangirl and Eleanor & Park. One of them I liked and one of them I didn't like. So I was curious about how I'd feel about this one (one written for adults and not for young adults, and one that's about a failing marriage, which is the kind of topic I would have very strong opinions about), and I was pleasantly surprised. I listened to it through audiobook, which was also much better than I expected once I realized a lot of the book is dialogue over the phone. I wasn't sure how that would play out via audiobook, but it worked. Much more importantly, though, is that the book was good. It was very interesting. The commentary on marriage was one I didn't agree with start to finish, but it brought up some very good (and, to my surprise) very conservative principles. Rowell provided quite the discussion about why this particular marriage went downhill, and the very common and simple actions that were taken (or not taken) to avoid such a downfall. I wouldn't go out of my way to demand that people read it, but I did enjoy it and thought it was interesting. I'm curious to keep reading Rowell's work (or just Attachments, I guess, because I think that's all I have left at the moment).

(Twofer) Silas Marner and The Sky is Everywhere: brief reviews

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I kind of cheated with this one. I listened to it, but not exactly with an audiobook. I listened to this book in the form of a radio drama by Focus on the Family, which is super close to an audiobook except there's a full cast and sound effects and perhaps some minor editing. So, in the efforts of full disclosure, there's a chance I didn't actually read it all. Not in the traditional sense. But I'm counting it, because I feel like it. Attitude aside, I enjoyed this story. I had an incredibly hard time getting into it, which is a problem since it's so short. I would probably have to say that I struggled with understanding/following any of the first half of the plot, but the second half was great. The character of Silas Marner is a gem, and the other opposing character is a total jerk. Wanted to punch him in the face. Good, sweet classic. 

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This one is a teen drama/romance, with all the typical teen drama/romance elements despite its heartbreaking and unique plot, in which a high school girl deals with the recent death of her older sister. It's a good plot, but the fact that there's also a love triangle, a miscommunication that leads to many tears, and a painfully predictable reunion in the end (spoiler...but not really, because it's painfully predictable). Also, I felt SO OLD while I was reading about this sweet teenage child who is speaking about wanting to "give all of herself" to this boy she just met, and "belonging" to him, and being "so incredibly in love" with him. No. A thousand times no. You are not incredibly in love with him, because you met him two months ago and you're an infant. Other than that, it is predictable but it's also cute and very sweet.

The Silver Star: a brief review

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Well. I told you all about my thoughts regarding Walls' book Half Broke Horses a couple weeks ago, and today I finished her book The Silver Star (via audiobook). And I loved it just as much as both of Walls' other books. Actually, I think I liked it more. This one isn't a memoir of any kind, but is instead a novel about two young girls with an unstable mother and no father who decide to strike out on their own in search of long lost family members on the other side of the country. Walls follows her usual style of heartache mixed with comedy and wonderfully endearing characters. I really enjoyed this book, and I would even go so far as to say that I'd love to read it again sometime. I definitely recommend this book, along with The Glass Castle and Half Broke Horses. If you haven't read any of them, it's time.

Diary of a Young Girl: a brief review

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Since high school, I've tried to read this book three separate times and haven't gotten very far any of those times. I don't know what it was about it, but I just couldn't ever get into it. The fact that this is a worldwide classic and a staple of most middle and/or high school reading lists didn't make me feel too great about never reading it, and I always had it on that list in the back of my head that I would get to one day. Once again: audiobooks save the day. I enjoyed this book a lot; it's amusing to me because Anne is SUCH a teenage girl, but she also has moments of incredibly wise insights. The way she sees and comments on the world is pretty incredible, and definitely worth a place on the shelves of the Classics. I did find myself thinking, though, on several occasions, that all the rest of it (the parental drama, the boy drama, the incredibly detailed personal/sexual descriptions) seemed a little unnecessary and long winded - and maybe even inappropriate? - for a book to teach in a classroom. As a stand-alone book and memoir, though, I definitely enjoyed it.

The Impossible Knife of Memory: a brief review

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This book caused me to have a pretty significant epiphany; the first two books of Anderson's that I ever read were Speak and Wintergirls, which are both hardcore, intense, and super good. Because of them, I got it in my head that Anderson's books were all hardcore, intense, and super good, despite the fact that the last four books of hers that I've read (Prom, Twisted, Chains, and Forge) weren't nearly as "wow"-filled. I kept thinking and saying over and over that each of those books just weren't filled with the old Laurie Halse Anderson ka-pow, when maybe it's just that the first two books I read were the only ones that had that ka-pow. This book (which only had a little bit of ka-pow) made me finally realize that if five of the seven books I've read by this author are kind of run-of-the-mill, typical teen books and two are blow-you-out-of-the-water intense, maybe those are the exceptions. And not the rules.

But anyway, a book review. I liked this one, a comfortable 3 out of 5 stars worth. Some tougher issues are definitely approached with this plot (the lasting effects of war, PTSD, childhood trauma, drug abuse of both teens and adults, alcoholism) but the rest of it is pretty typical teen drama. Not only is it typical teen drama, it's kind of realistic teen drama (aka: the protagonist's crush is kind of moody and inconsistent and dumb and I didn't like him). I thought maybe she was going to blow me away with a crazy and traumatic ending, but then she mellowed out and gave kind of a glossed-over, middle of the road ending instead. I enjoyed it, but it didn't change my world or anything.

Marriage and Parenting: brief reviews

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JT and I just finished this book after reading it with our small group over the course of the last couple months. Its basic premise is that there are 10 emotional needs that every person needs, although 5 are typically associated with women and 5 are typically associated with men. There is a chapter on each need and a survey in the back of the book for each spouse to take in order to determine which needs they specifically identify the most with. We liked this book; even though a lot of it seemed common sense and straightforward to us, there were certainly a lot of points that made an impact and gave us great starting points for conversation and change in our relationship. There were also a handful of points he made that we didn't quite agree with, but no book is perfect. I definitely think that if you're feeling at a loss or in need of direction in your marriage this is a great starting point. The thing that's helpful about this book, I think, is that even though each chapter just kind of scratches the surface on each issue/need, there are a couple hundred books out there written on each of these 10 needs that you can dive into as needed for a deeper level of help and direction. It's a great starting point, though.

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I picked this book up a little bit ago after JT heard an interview with the writer on Focus on the Family. After finishing Created to be His Help Meet, I was looking for a parenting book and I started this one. I didn't necessarily dislike this book, but it was kind of "eh." There just wasn't a lot of depth to it and there wasn't anything I read that wasn't either common sense or way over on the other end of the spectrum, taking parenting to an extreme that I don't think is entirely necessary. I ended up skimming the last half of it or so so I could move on. I like the basic argument of the book (that parents need to be intentional and proactive in making their home a comfortable, safe, and warm environment for their children), and pretty much could have gotten that from the back of the book.

Three Times Lucky: a brief review

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I heard about this one several years ago, back when I was still reading a lot of YA book review blogs. I spotted both it and its sequel a couple weeks ago at the Green Valley Book Fair, and I'm so glad I did because this one is fantastic. I actually listened to the audiobook - which I recommend if you can get your hands on it - and it's one of my new favorites. This adorable detective/murder mystery/comedy is told by "rising sixth grader" Mo, whose attitude and spunk remind me of both Scout Finch and Tom Sawyer. I definitely recommend this one, with two thumbs and five stars. And I can't wait for the sequel.

A Thousand Splendid Suns: a brief review

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I'm a little behind the curve with reading Mr. Hosseini's books, but after reading The Kite Runner about a year ago I definitely made sure to read his others at some point. A Thousand Splendid Suns, which I read via audiobook, did not disappoint. Similar to The Kite Runner, this book is graphic, heartbreaking, and at times even sickening as the story of two neglected and abused Afghan women is woven through several decades. As hard as some (most?) of the contents of this book were to listen to, I very much enjoyed it, and I deeply respect Mr. Hosseini's gift as an author. If you haven't read any of his work, I definitely recommend him. I might even recommend this one more than The Kite Runner.

Cold Tangerines: a brief review

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Although I feel like I am close person friends with Shauna Niequist because of her role on the Relevant podcast (and her blog), Cold Tangerines is the first book of hers that I've read. Well, that's not true; I have read some of her devotional book Savor, but I will say that that maybe doesn't count. Anyway, I enjoyed this one very much. Each chapter is its own individual essay, with the same overarching theme of seeing the beauty and Godly in everyday circumstance; I highlighted many words and found great truth throughout the entire book but I confess it's not my favorite way to read a book. I usually love it until about three-quarters of the way through and then I'm ready for a "real" book. So I did enjoy it a lot, I definitely recommend it, but I'm looking a little more forward to reading her book Bittersweet soon.

Rapidfire book reviews

As promised, here are the single paragraph book reviews of the last several books I've read, since they haven't made it onto the blog yet. Moving forward, I may stick to this style for time's sake.

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I grew up hearing about this book, Created to be His Help Meet by Debi Pearl, from my mother and many of her friends who studied it and adopted it as their lifestyle. Now that I've read it myself, I can say with confidence that I agree wholeheartedly with about 95% of this incredibly conservative and biblical description of God's design for wives. My only wish - apart from the minor details I disagree with her on - that she had written the book with a little less harshness and a little more grace.

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This one, Wonder by R.J. Palacio, had been on my list for years, and I finally listened to it on audiobook. This YA book about a middle school boy with severe birth defects and facial deformities is heartbreaking, hilarious, and deeply heartwarming. I loved the way the author explores both the very worst and the very best about the middle school-aged population. I definitely recommend it and I am excited to read the companion books.

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To Kill a Mockingbird was a reread, half in honor of the release of Harper Lee's Go Set a Watchman and half because I claim it's one of my favorite books and yet I have never reread it. (I never ever reread books anymore, always in the pursuit of the ever growing "list." That's something I'm determined to change in the future.) This particular reread was well worth it: I still love it and it's still wonderful. And I am equal parts giddy and terrified of the sequel.

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Elie Wiesel's Night is one of the books that I am shocked I'd never read until now. I hadn't realized before listening to the audiobook that this book is actually the author's story of imprisonment in various concentration camps during the Holocaust. The tale is horrifying, heartbreaking, sickening, and shocking; there are so many stories about the Holocaust that it's almost easy to become hardened to it, in one ear and out the other. But some of the specific details of this story were too disgusting and horrifying to grasp, and when I tried to tell JT about them later on the words literally wouldn't come out of my mouth because I knew I'd start crying. This is both a terrible and special book, and if you haven't read it I do recommend it.

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I read Jeannette Walls' first book The Glass Castle, which is her own personal memoir, when I was in college. It made a huge impression on me and whenever I've seen her other two books for sale or on friends' shelves I have made a note to read them someday. Someday came in the form of an audiobook for Half Broke Horses, which is the hilarious and thought-provoking story of her grandmother's life. This story becomes especially interesting when Walls' grandmother's daughter Rosemary is born, and you learn of so many of the reasons and life events that turn her into the future mother and wife that raises Walls. (Super confusing sentence...I couldn't figure out how to make it more clear so just reread it a couple times till you see what I mean.) This overlapping of the two books and three generations makes me really want to reread The Glass Castle.


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So there you have it. You're caught up on the reading I've been doing since the blog went quiet. I'm up to 33 books this year, which is already one more than last year's 32, and I'm pretty stoked about that.

Updates, Changes, Etc.

Hi friends. It's been such a long time since I've written, which on the one hand is because I haven't had too much to write about, and because on the other hand I just haven't really felt like it. We've been slow on the projects and house updates so far this year, which is actually a really good thing since it probably means nothing it too terribly broken or in need of immediate repair. I have still been reading books, but I was starting to feel like every time I finished a book I had this immediate chore/burden of writing a review, and I am not such a fan of that. I think I'm past my blogging apathy, though, and am ready to come back. The result is that I'm going to be writing one post soon that has all of the books I've read recently, but with extremely short reviews. I might stick to that style moving forward for my own sanity's sake. We will see.

With new life seasons and life priorities, though, usually comes a good, solid spring cleaning or two. Mine came in the form of my bookshelves today. I took Charlotte to the Green Valley Book Fair for the first time this morning and when it was time to put the new books I'd purchased on the shelves, I realized that so many of those 94 books that I had left to read were of no interest to me. That's why they still hadn't been read. I might have wanted to read them at some point or I might have heard something good about them from someone I trusted or whatever, but if I don't at this current time have any desire at all to read them, it probably wouldn't hurt to do some donating to Goodwill. So I took down a pile of books, reevaluated my list of remaining books on the ever huge 94 books, and decided that there just didn't even need to be such a list any more. My "to read" list on Goodreads is quite modest and doable now, and I plan to just keep whittling away at it. That list includes all the books left on my shelf to read and it includes the ones I bought today and it includes the ones on my wishlist at the library and on Amazon. Manageable lists are much more tackle-able and I like that. So I guess I've come full circle, and the 94 book list concept was a good one that taught me a ton about how to shop (for books, for decorations, for clothes) within the piles of stuff you already own, and for that I am so thankful. But I think I can safely move on and trust myself at this point to not spend money on new books without abandon and without ever actually reading them (which is pretty much what I had been doing). Yay for reading, yay for lessons learned, and yay for getting lists accomplished and defeated and minimized. All those things are so, so good.

As far as what I'm planning on reading now or reading next, either follow me on Goodreads or just wait till my next post :)

This is Where I Leave You: a brief review

taken from goodreads.com

And just like that, all of the books that I had intended to read during the calendar year are crossed off my list. I meant to set the bar a lot lower this year to give myself some grace post-first baby, but it seems I set the bar just a tad too low. (Although I should point out that I read most of these by having them read to me while I did my chores, fed my daughter, and drove all over the place, so it's possible I still would have been working on getting them read in December otherwise.)

This is Where I Leave You (recently turned into a movie that I'm really excited to see, especially given the cast list) tells the tale of an extremely dysfunctional family that comes together to sit shiva following the death of their father. For seven days, these adult siblings and their mother must sit in chairs and mourn while everyone they've ever met comes to bring them food and share in their grief. They all have their own (fairly severe) issues and all of those issues come out in full force when the family is stuck in close quarters for over a week.

Good things about this book: it made me laugh a lot. I really enjoyed almost all of the characters, and I enjoyed how the author gave each of them a considerable amount of depth as the book progressed. I thought the overall plot was sweet and addressed many real-life issues that people have (although I sure hope no single family has all of those real-life issues at once like this one does). Bad things about this book: good gracious I did not need to read about that much sex. I get it...I'm an adult and I am fine with reading about adult things. But I think I've just read way too much adult things recently and I need to cleanse my pallet with some Young Adult for a while. Also, the sex in this one was specific. And detailed. But enough about that...I also thought that a lot of the life-changing, reevaluate your life moments in the book were still a very wordly version of shallow. Most of those moments were really disappointing to me; I just didn't think the characters made much progress even though they had all kinds of deep, serious talks and deep, serious moments. And that's kind of a bummer, I think. Also, I hated the end.

With this book behind me, I'm excited to start a new group of books. I do have a list of books I want to get to soon, but it's not a firm list like this one was. Even though I had made that list of books I genuinely wanted to read, I always kind of felt bummed when I finished a book and knew the next one I would read had already been picked. I like being a little more free with what I'm in the mood for. So you and I will both have to wait and see what I end up reading this summer.

Still Alice and Al Capone Does My Shirts: two brief reviews

taken from Goodreads.com

I finished Still Alice sometime last week and meant to write the blog post about it, but time passed and I forgot. So here I am, writing another post with two reviews. Whoops.

I absolutely loved this book (and the audiobook, which was read by the author and was very well done). Alice Howland is an incredibly successful linguistics professor at Harvard University. With an equally successful scientist husband and three beautiful adult children, Alice enters her 50th birthday with pride. She blames lost keys and forgotten appointments on her stressful schedule, but when she gets hopelessly lost just two blocks from her house one day, she is forced to admit that something may be wrong. Alice is diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's disease, and the rest of the book follows her gradual mental decline.

This is a heartbreaking book, and scary in a way that watching The Notebook is scary, but it's also a great read. I enjoyed the relationships Alice had with the other characters (except for her stupid husband who I very much did not like) and I thought Genova did an incredible job walking us through the progression of Alice's disease. I'm excited to see the movie at some point soon; I think Julianne Moore will do/did an awesome job.

taken from Goodreads.com

This is another one of those books that has been on my radar for a long time; I first saw it (and it's companion books) when I was student teaching. When I was shopping for new audiobooks at the library a couple weeks ago I saw they had this one and I grabbed it.

Moose Flanagan's family moves to Alcatraz Island in the 1930s when his dad gets a job as a prison guard. Moose has a hard time adjusting to this new community, with world-class murderers and rapists living right next door to him. At school - across the bay on the mainland - the Alcatraz kids are like celebrities, and the overbearing warden's daughter soon has Moose wrapped up in a money-making scheme that has potential to get them all in trouble.

This book was super cute. It's not my new favorite and although I'm planning on reading the other two companion books at some point, I'm not feeling the need to rush right into them. That being said, I really did enjoy it. The shining star of the book - and probably the reason it won the Newberry Award - is the historical accuracy of the plot. I feel like I learned so much (confirmed as facts by the author's note at the end) about what life on Alcatraz was like: guards' families really did live on the island, and they really did go to school across the bay with San Francisco kids. The other interesting story line follows Moose's sister, who suffers from some sort of unknown mental disabilities (in the author's note, Choldenko explains that Natalie has autism, which hadn't been named at that point in history). The discussion about mental handicaps in the 1930s - and today, really - is a very interesting one that's handled well in this book. So even though it wasn't the most funny or endearing or sweet book in the whole world, it would be a great book (and, I suspect, series) to give kids some solid historical fiction and open up some dialogues about history.

Friends, just a little 2015 goals update: I'm currently reading my very last book on my list. Woot. 

The Graveyard Book: a brief review

taken from goodreads.com

About a million years ago, when I was a Graduate Assistant working in the College of Education's office, a sweet friend and fellow Graduate Assistant recommended this book to me. I've had it on the super long list of books that lives somewhere in the back of my mind ever since, and I snatched it up when I saw the library had it on audiobook. It did not disappoint.

When an assassin murders almost an entire family one night, he realizes too late that he's let the barely walking toddler slip out of the house and into the neighboring (locked up) graveyard. The ghosts who live in the graveyard decide to adopt the orphaned boy and raise him as their own. Meanwhile, though, the assassin spends the next 15 years searching for the boy who escaped from his grasp that night.

This book is very Jungle Book-like. I really enjoyed it, possibly because I really enjoy The Jungle Book. It did get a little bit more magical/fantasy than I anticipated but it wasn't too overpowering and it worked. I really liked the book overall; the sweet dialogue between the boy and his ghostly guardians is incredibly endearing. The opening scene is horrifying and the end does get a little hectic and scattered feeling, but all in all I enjoyed this one a lot. I'd definitely recommend it, especially to people who tend to enjoy fantasy more than me.

Crash and Monster: two brief reviews

Since I finished two books at the same time (one on Kindle and one on audiobook), I'm just going to write their reviews in the same post.

taken from goodreads.com

I picked this audiobook up from the library because Jerry Spinelli is a big deal and I thought I'd probably heard of the book before. I'd somehow only ever read Spinelli's Stargirl, and although I didn't hate it, I also didn't necessarily love it. Crash, though, I really loved. A lot. It was a really cute book, and the fact that the person reading the audiobook was incredible. Loved it.

Crash is your typical middle school bully/star of the football team. Pen is your typical middle school nerd/free spirit/star male on the cheerleading team. Crash makes it his life mission to make Pen's life miserable for years, but Pen's spunky, carefree attitude simply cannot be broken.

This book reminded me a little bit of a middle school version of something Laurie Halse Anderson would write. Reading a book from the perspective of a bully was really uncomfortable at times, but it also made a huge impact. I loved the characters, loved the dialogue, loved the little plot twists, and loved the heartwarming lessons learned. Plus, it's a very short book. I knocked out the audiobook in a day. That's always nice.

taken from goodreads.com

In contrast to the low expectations I went into Crash with, I went into Monster with super high expectations. Also in contrast to how much I loved Crash, I did not love Monster. It had been on my radar for years and I always thought it looked like such a crazy plot that I would love getting into. When it came time to read it though...eh. It wasn't. It wasn't a very crazy plot and I didn't love it. In fact, it was hard to get into at all.

Steve Harmon is a 16-year-old boy on trial for his involvement in an armed robbery that also resulted in the murder of the shop owner. He and two other boys were supposedly working together, and are all on trial. The book follows Steve through the trial, both in and out of the courtroom.

I love law and order-type shows and I think the ones that focus on younger people are especially interesting. Since the book is called Monster, I thought that this was going to be about a deeply troubled young man who had done some unthinkably awful things that have landed him on trial. I expected to be wowed by the horror of it all as I followed his trial through his eyes. This isn't at all what the book is about, though. It's also not the opposite of that, which would be a book about an innocent boy who was in the wrong place at the wrong time because he has some of the wrong friends and is now just thrown into the system without thought because he's black and from the projects. That book would have also been an interesting read. It wasn't either of those things, though; it was a book about a boy who did in fact grow up in a loving family on the poorer side of town who definitely seems to be innocent but never actually explains what his involvement/lack of involvement was in the robbery, who does question how on earth he got into this mess but also calls himself a monster and wonders if everyone knows something about himself that he doesn't know.

This was really confusing, to be honest. I'm reading a book from this kid's own perspective, and I don't even know if he did it or not. I don't even know if he was minimally involved or if he was plucked off the street and put on trial despite the fact that he was nowhere near the store at the time of the robbery. I have a hard time with books like that, that don't just say what they mean and mean what they say. He certainly seems innocent based on how scared and confused he is by everything that's happening around him, but why on earth is he calling himself a monster and questioning himself so deeply? Why would anyone question their own moral standing if they knew they were innocent? I get that he's a kid, but...still. I would have been fine reading a social commentary on the injustices of life for black teenage boys, and I would have been fine reading a shocking and grim look inside the mind of a teenage sociopath, but this wishy washy, weird middle ground was boring and hard to get excited about.

Also, fun fact: it's written in the style of a movie screenplay, because Steve is interested in making films and is using his time in jail and at trial to document everything for a movie. Interesting approach...super sucked to read. Following stage directions and screenplay shorthand required much more effort than I wanted to give, and since I didn't know it was going to be written that way it kind of annoyed me.

When You Reach Me: a brief review

taken from goodreads.com

This is one of those books that I've seen around for several years, and it's always been associated with a lot of praise. I saw it at the library on audiobook and snatched it up. And truthfully...it is good. It's also a little weird, and there were moments when I thought it was confusing and a little too far out there for me, but in the end I enjoyed it.

Miranda lives with her single mother in their small apartment in the 1970s. She has a fairly normal middle school life (her childhood best friend has suddenly stopped talking to her and she doesn't know why, she starts spending time with some new girls who she has more in common with than she originally thought, there's a weird boy at school who she keeps bumping into, etc. etc.) until mysterious notes start showing up addressed to her. She has no idea where they're coming from or what any of them mean, until something horrible happens and she realizes what all the puzzle pieces look like together.

Like I said, there were times when I was a little annoyed with the book because I didn't think it was any good, and there were other times when I liked it a lot and thought it was super cute. Thankfully, it ended with me thinking it was super cute, and I therefore can say that overall I liked it. It's not my new favorite, but I definitely did like it. And since the only other book I've read by this author might as well have been written in a foreign language I hated it so much...we will see if I read any more of hers. I'm feeling like maybe it's a hit or miss with Ms. Stead. 

House of Hades: a brief review

taken from goodreads.com

Friends, I'm not going to lie to you. I didn't love this book and I'm not going to waste a lot of time writing a big long review. Basically: this is the ninth book in the Percy Jackson saga (if you count both series), and I feel like I need to finish the course and read them all even though I just do not care about Percy Jackson anymore. So I listened to the [TERRIBLE] audiobook, and it took forever because these books are just stupid long, and I can now say that I've read it. Yay.

The last book left off with Percy and Annabeth falling into a bottomless, horrible pit. This book bounces between them and the other five who are trying to find them; meanwhile everyone is simultaneously trying to close the Doors of Death. This one ends with them all reunited and deciding to move on to some battle that's going to take place in Greece. And there you go. I just saved you 600-some pages of reading/listening. But hey. At least I got to listen to it (or rather, kind of sort of half listen to it) on audiobook rather than actually read the thing. So there's that.

The Girl on the Train: a brief review

taken from goodreads.com

The subtitle of this post should actually be: a super brief review because this is a book club book and I'm saving all my talking for book club because OHMYGOSH do I have a whole lot of talking to do about this book and actually talking about it would spoil the plot for you so just read it.

That should be the subtitle. But I figured maybe that's a little too long.

It's true. This is indeed a book club book and our meeting isn't for several weeks so I'm going to respect that and keep any specific opinions and OHMYGOSHs to myself. Here's the basic plot though, told in a super choppy way in an attempt to leave all spoilers out:

Rachel rides the same train to and from London every day. On her ride she sees the same couple outside their home and has a little made up version of who they are that plays in her head as she passes them every day. In her fantasy they're Jess and Jason, but in real life they're Megan and Scott; when Megan shows up everywhere on the news because she's disappeared, Rachel becomes obsessed with figuring out what happened. Meanwhile, Rachel's ex-husband Tom and his new wife Anna are bugged that Rachel keeps drunkenly calling and harassing them...but it also quickly becomes a little more complicated than that.

The short story: I freaking loved this book. Ate it up. Did all kinds of guessing and trying to figure it all out. In the end, I did kind of figure it out but I didn't even care because it was still super good. I'm not the first person to make this comparison at all, but it's a little Gone Girlish, but as Shauna Niequist said, "in a good way." Translation: it has all the crazy (well, slightly less crazy actually, because Gone Girl is just straight up bananas) and all the mystery and thrills and sociopaths but I wouldn't feel bad recommending it to someone. If you want the long version of my thoughts...read it and then grab coffee with me sometime. I've got lots to say. (But in all honesty it's mostly just a bunch of "OHMYGOSHTHISPART".)

Oh and P.S., they're already starting to work on the movie and I have several casting suggestions. I'm waiting for the phone call.

Bossypants: a brief review

taken from goodreads.com

So, earlier this year I read Amy Poehler's Yes Please and pretty much hated it. Then I listened to the audiobook version of Mindy Kaling's Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? and straight up loved it/her to death. Between those two, I went into Tina Fey's Bossypants with tentative excitement: I might love it but I also might hate it and I was open to both possibilities. Well friends, the verdict is in and I am just crazy about Mrs. Tina Fey. Or her book, at the very least.

It's an autobiography about all the typical things (childhood, parents, teenage years, college, rise to fame through the comedy clubs of Chicago, etc. etc.) so it's not like I really need to go into details about what it's about. It's about Tina. But I would like to share some thoughts on the things that I really really loved about it (in the order that they pop into my head) and call it a day. (Also note, I listened to the audiobook. I highly recommend this. She's great.)

• The way she talks about her parents, but more specifically her father. I died of laughter while washing the dishes and listening to her tales of Don Fey (kind of sort of because they really reminded me of my grandfather). 
• The way she talks about college at UVA, because the stereotypes she describes are exactly what all of us JMU girls think about UVA girls (also, please realize that I am kind of the farthest thing from a stereotypical "JMU girl" as can be. But I went to JMU and I'm a girl so there's that). 
• The way she describes going through puberty. Classic and hilarious. 
• The way she candidly discusses differences in female body types, and the fact that we are always and forever trying to fabricate the features we don't have rather than be proud of the ones we do have. 
• The way she shared stories about 30 Rock, making me very interested in giving it another try. 
• The way she described motherhood. Guys, if I was laughing during the Don Fey stories, I was absolutely rolling on the floor laughing out loud during her chapters on motherhood. Breastfeeding and pumping and the cruel ways we shame each other and using the shower as "mommy time." It's gold, friends. I loved it all. 
• The way she included the actual audio of the original Sarah Palin/Hilary Clinton SNL skit on the audiobook. Because who doesn't love hearing that for the 32nd time? Never gets old. 

There's more. I know there is.  The basic conclusion is that I really loved it, and I have already passed it on to my mother and sister to listen to on their cross-country road trip that starts in a couple days. Definitely recommended.