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What I'm reading Now:
Who knew that they were training women to be astronauts way back when they trained the Mercury men? I sure didn't! I have only just read the introduction so I don't know if the book is good or not, but I can't wait to find out.
King of Torts: John Grisham
a Thousand Days in Venice
What I Just Finished:
This is a fun romance that's slightly less dorky than a Danielle Steele. It's about an aspiring writer who is dumped at age 42 by her boyfriend of 12 years and who takes that opportunity to move to Cape Cod to ghostwrite a tell all story for the "other woman" involved in a case where a woman shot her socialite husband to death when she caught him in bed with another woman. Isabel is the other woman. It's good and a fun beach book.
I got this one in anticipation of Lipman's new book that got good reviews. I ordered that from the library and wanted to make sure I liked her before starting the new book.
This is a short book, with chapters just over a page long, that details a woman's total obsession with candy. She describes a bunch of different kinds, from circus peanuts to bubble burgers to petite swiss fruit, and relates it all to different milestones in her life.
It's fun and kind of pointless. More than anything it made me want to read her other book, Dear Exile, so stay tuned for that review.
I think this is good for the beach or for reading just a little before you go to bed because you don't have to concentrate at all.
Yeah, yeah, I know it's a bizarre book. But it got really good reviews in both Bookmarks and Book and I couldn't pass on it. I was totally mortified today when the new guy in the office came to chat with me today at lunch with the opening line "So what are you reading today?" and I had to show him this! Now I'm sure he thinks I'm a creepy psycho. [Good think he's older and I'm not in the market for a boyfriend or this book could have ruined everything!]
But you want to know about the book. So far it's funny, very compelling, and totally vile. We've learned the history of body-snatchers (including the difference is between grave robbing and body snatching) and we've been to a practice lab for face-lifts where there are heads w/o bodies. The part I'm reading now takes place at The Body Farm at the University of Tennessee and it was grusome enough that I had to stop reading until after lunch.
Final Analysis: I'm middle of the road on this one. At first I like it a lot but by the end it just seemed morbid and kind of boring. This started out as a magazine article and I think it probably should have stayed at that length.
Educating Esme: diary of a teacher's first year - Esme Raji Codell
I can't remember where I found out about this little gem of a book but I'm glad I found it. It's small and short and you can probably read it in one sitting. It's about a young teacher in Chicago telling you about her classroom and how she & the kids survived one year of school.
I just loved this book and I wish that I could have had a teacher like Esme. She is everything I ever dreamed of being when I would play school as a kid. Only I wasn't nearly as imaginative as her so I think she's even better than my ideal teacher.
Now I just LOVE Bill Bryson but so far this book is just a little bit dry. He's trying to make science interesting and understandable to everybody and to a certain degree it's working -- but you know, physics and geology really aren't that interesting!
He's painting some funny portraits of seventeenth century scientists but I'm not sure it's going to hold me for the whole 3 inch book.
7/21 I'm still hanging in there! This book is really very good but it's long. I'm leaning some interesting things though, like how Yellowstone National Park is a giant supervolcano that is due to explode any minute now and pretty much decimate the planet. Great news!
7/24 - Do you believe I never managed to finish this one? By the time I got to the arrival of mammals it was time for me to return the book. And this was after I renewed it to the max! So I gave it back to the library but I am sure I'll check it out later to find out just how we finally got here.
I am the Central Park Jogger: A Story of Hope and Possibility - Trisia Meili
This one I picked up on a whim at the library because I had seen the very end of her interview with Katie Couric and was intrigued by her story. The book has very little to do with the crime or the trial because she has no memory of the attack at all. Instead, it details the extent of her injuries (she'd been beaten very badly and had lost between 75-85% of her blood) and the recovery process.
It's amazing to see what the body can accomplish and how determination and support can aid a person in recovery from severe trauma. I was really impressed by the support the jogger got from her employer (both financial and otherwise) as well as from the community at large. She discusses the people, both familiar to her and complete strangers, who gave support over the months and years of her recovery and explains how she believes that support and the power of prayer helped her to recover so remarkably.
She's really quite amazing and while the book wasn't spectacular it was worth checking out.
I thought I would like this book but I totally hated it. As soon as I got to the bit about the bride insisting on a horse drawn carriage I knew it was not the right kind of book for me. Back to the library it goes....
Animals are smarter than you think! I'm not a big pet person but I like animals in general. I read about this book in Bookmarks magazine and they said it was excellent and so far I have to agree.
Here's my take so far: Organgutans are totally awesome even if they are hideous! Really -- they're clever and escape a lot and make jokes.
I can't close the deal on this book. It's interesting but kind of scientific and it's just not all that exciting. I'm taking it to Maine where I better finish it.
I did manage to finish the book in Maine and while it was interesting enough I think the reviews oversold it. Plus, the author reuses the same stories over and over again to illustrate different points. Orangutans escape -- OK we get it!
Totally quick read. It doesn't even hold a candle to her first book, If Looks Could Kill, which is also reviewed on this page.
It's a pretty predictable mystery story solved by crime reporter Bailey Weggins. She's vacationing at a spa and people get murdered while she's there. Plus there's some romance floating around.
It requires no brain power and it doesn't totally stink but it's not worth buying in hard back.
I think you all know about this one! And of course, it's great. I'm only a few chapters into it but it's awesome already.
I'm going to dial back my statement that it was awesome. The book is good, there are some really good new characters, but mostly it was just OK. I enjoyed it but not nearly as much as some of the others. (Prisoner of Azkaban is still my favorite!) I think she's setting up a lot of stuff for the last two books and the final confrontation with Lord Voldemort.
I can't wait for book 6!
I've just started to skim this one and I'm already distracted by Harry Potter.
However, the concept of hidden messages in the bible that predict the future is both absurd and highly intriguing. Stay tuned for more analysis...
I gave up. Too many charts of hebrew letters and too goofy a concept. Plus they're going to predict the end of the world. I really don't need to know that.
I love the concept of this but I'm having a really hard time getting into the flow of the book. It's too dry or something and I've been distracted by the marathon and now the engagement.
I'm finally to Vegas now, and out of blackjack school, so maybe things will pick up soon. But if they don't, this is headed back to the library.
OK, yes! It definately picked up considerably! I just had to get to the gambling and past the "blah, blah, blah, smart kids from MIT" part.
Suddenly it's really action packed. High stakes, evil casino henchman, disguises, violence. It's like a movie! In fact -- I hear that it is going to be a movie! Read the book and see the flick when it comes out, I'm sure you won't be disappointed.
A memoir by the author of The Lovely Bones (see my review lower on this page) that recounts the story of her rape at age 18 and the subsequent trial and conviction of her rapist.
It's interesting, dark, but not as dark as you'd expect. Once you're out of the first chapter, it's not particularly graphic or grusome. She tells you how it changed her whole life and how it changed the lives of the people around her.
It was good. If you can stomach the subject matter, it's worth reading.
Why the odd title? In the tunnel where she was raped, another girl had been murdered. The cops told her that she was lucky.
This is a tiny little book, very few words, cartoon illustrations. It's funny though and most women would appreciate it. I forget where I read that it was funny -- I think maybe in my Book A Day calendar.
Anyway, the best part is the first page: "A mother would rather have her daughter in a mediocre marriage than single and happy."
Not worth buying, probably not even worth checking out of the library. Just read it quickly at the library or while you're drinking coffee at Barnes & Noble.
This is the 6th book in the series starring Japanese-American sleuth Rei Shimura. She's San Francisco born but lives in Tokyo and she is trying to make a living as an antique dealer but she's always running into trouble. Running through the series is Rei's rocky love-life and her troubles being an outsider in the intricate society of Japan.
I really enjoy the series but this wasn't the best of the novels. I'm fascinated by the culture of Japan and all of the Rei Shimura books cover that well. This mystery was a little bit dull but the book did have an interesting ending and I'm curious where the series will go from here.
It's an easy to read story and doesn't require a whole lot of thought. A beach book, I guess.
What an awesome book! When I say that I mean awesome as a great beach book and not great literature. It takes very little concentration but it hooks you quick and never lets up. I read most of this on the airplane and I couldn't wait to get some time on the ground to finish it. I'm anxious to read her next book -- I think If Looks Could Kill introduced a character that will continue on in other novels: Bailey Weggins, a thirty-something crime reporter in New York with a wacky love life. Definately worth reading for fun.
I'm obsessed by Maine right now since we're going there on vacation, so this book about love among the lobstermen of a remote island off of Maine was right up my alley. It's good but not great. I'm not sure I would have finished it if I wasn't stuck on the plane with it. I don't think they developed the main characters enough for me to care what happened to them. I think the colorful people who populated the island were far more interesting than the girl who was the star.
This book (non-fiction) is about some crazy guy who decided to sell everything he owned on ebay. Like everything -- including half used jars of peanut butter and old socks. The book has pictures of everything, how many bids, what it sold for and where it went. There is some degree of follow up story too. Totally bizarre but good to flip through!
I am just starting to skim through this. I'm less interested in his inspiration stuff and more interested in the training plans. I'm hoping that this will get me on track to run the full 13 miles on Labor Day weekend. I think that's probably a long shot -- but I can do the run/walk program and hope for the best and maybe do the same in January.
Update: The more I read this book, the more I really like it. I'm especially fond of the chapter "It's all about the medal". It really reinforces how great it is to finish the race and why the training is worth it. It pumped me up before leaving for San Diego.
I've just started this one and so far it's good in a slow-paced kind of way. It's about a young woman, one year out of college, engaged to a boy she's been dating for 8.5 years. She's starting to become unhappy with the relationship when tragedy strikes: he dives into a lake on Memorial Day weekend and breaks his neck. At the moment, early in the book, he's in a coma. I don't know where it's going to go from here -- but it seems the book is about how much loyalty and devotion does she owe this guy.
OK -- I finished it. And the verdict is mixed. I couldn't put it down, which is a good thing -- but over all it's a very melancholy and kind of depressing book. It makes you wonder how you'd react to her situation -- if you'd be loyal and devoted to the person you loved if life changed so dramaticly.
Worth a read, I think, but it's sad.
I wanted to love it, because it has such a fun title -- but it just didn't work for me. She came off as too much of a drunken lout. However, I did enjoy reading about how her tooth came out while eating gummi bears and watching TV because I'm going through a similar horror myself.
This is the chick from 'The Perfect Storm'. It's a nice little book, I guess, about small town life in Maine, but over all pretty dull. Not much about lobsters, not much about her really. Just a lot of fluff. Quick read though, it's a short book. I can't decide if this makes me want to read her other book -- I guess not.
Typical Maeve Binchy book. A nice story but you can tell right away that it's going to have an unpleasant ending. Well, that's not entirely true, but as usual, most of the people she wants you to think are wonderful and nice turn out to be mean and rotten or have giant skeletons in the closet. She's definately a glass half empty kind of woman.
I love, love, love this series! Thursday Next just rocks! I can't explain really, just that she and Miss Havisham jump around through books trying to save the world from utter distruction while also trying to root out the fictional characters who are running amuck in the real world. Read the Eyre Affair (see prior review) first and then this one. Fun!
This is a great summer book. It's fast paced and totally entertaining. It's about baddies taking over a theme park called Utopia. They're holding the place hostage but none of the guests know, just the people in charge. It's a good action book. (But wait for paperback -- that's probably coming out soon!)
What can I say about this one? It's Anna the Park Ranger at Dry Tortugas NP in the Florida Keys. This book has an odd style -- told in large part in flashback to the Civil War. I didn't enjoy this nearly as much as her other books. I think she tried so hard on the gimmick that the mysteries themselves were pretty lame.
This is about George W in the first 100 days after 9/11. It was good, interesting to learn about the behind the scenes action during that horrible period and also interesting as I was reading it during the ramp-up for the war in Iraq. If you're interested in politics and history, it's worth a look.
By: Dougless Preston and Lincoln Child
I like these guys, but this is not their best effort. I can usually fly through one of their books in a couple of days but this never grabbed me enough to keep me up at night reading.
It's about the recovery of a giant inter-stellar meteorite from close to the antarctic circle. It's an engineering feat as well as a tricky operation to get the rock out of Chilean waters without causing an international incident. There are some crazy millionaires, some evil scientists and a psycho naval officer in there to liven up the plot.
A good beach book, but nothing special.
by: Tony Horwitz
This is a great book if you like history but it's taking me forever to read it. I'm on the last chapter now and it's telling me about how Captain Cook died and why he was killed. Did you know that Cook made maps of New Zealand that were so good they used them until the 1970's? He's really quite a guy!
I didn't know a thing about Cook before this book and I bought it because I saw a show on the History Channel about regular people sailing on an exact replica of Cook's ship Endeavor. Anyway, the guy who wrote this book did sail on the Endeavor replica to experience a little bit of what Cook's voyages were like but he also traveled to the major stops Cook made on his three major voyages and detailed how the areas were when Cook arrived and how they've changed since. It's really fascinating.
by: Leif Enger
I love this book. I'm only about a third of the way into it but it's just completely relaxing. The story is old fashioned and warm and I was hooked from the first page. I didn't expect to enjoy the plot -- something seems wrong about being sympathetic to a double murder -- but I am sympathetic and I love the feel of the book.
by: Jeffrey Archer
This is a short story collection by Jeffrey Archer. I usually love his books but this (so far) has been a total disappointment. The best story in it was a 2 page prologue that is really an old Arabic story and he can't even take credit for it. I'm about 3/4 of the way through this and I'm hoping that the longer stories, which I haven't read yet, will be as good as his old stuff.
by: Meggin Cabot
A totally great book for those of you out there who appreciate stupid love books. I started reading this last night to see if I wanted to take it to Bermuda with me and 3.5 hours later I finished it. At 3:30 in the morning. I stayed up half the night reading this piece of fluff. I can't say why I was so captivated by it but I just couldn't put it down.
The story is told entirely via e-mail (you can read a short excerpt if you click on the title) and tells us about Mel, a young gossip columnist and her romance with the rich-boy undercover who lives next door. They're amateur sleuths, buddies, and dog walkers.
The woman who wrote it also wrote the Princess Diaries so if you like that movie, and that type of silly, wholesome plot, you'll like this. But it is completely brainless.
This book is about a sportswriter turned runner who becomes fascinated by an ultramarathon event called Badwater. Badwater is for the craziest of the crazy endurance athletes. It runs from the lowest point in the continental US to the highest point in the continental US (Badwater in Death Valley to the Mount Whitney) a distance of 135 miles through Death Valley and into the high elevation at Mt. Whitney. And they do it in July when daytime temperatures exceed 120 degrees and peoples shoes actually MELT during the race.
When he signs up for the race, and begs to get in, he'd never even run a marathon. So, it's quite a test for him to get in shape to compete and try his luck at Badwater.
The book is OK but I didn't like it as much as I wanted to. Lots of mumbo-jumbo spiritual stuff about his brother who committed suicide and other things that don't even shed any light on why he wanted to run the race or how that motivated him to do it. Still, if you're into endurance events and obscure challenges, this is a decent book. But get it from the library!
Edited by: Michael Cart
Just what the title says --- I've only read two stories but they were both great. You have to love a mystery involving LC cataloging. I'm really enjoying these anthologies lately because I've been so busy and they are so easy to fit into my schedule. I'm not sure how this would appeal to non-library types though.
Edited by: Gail Waesche Kislevitz
I can't help it! I'm obsessed by this topic. This has a bunch of people telling the story of their first marathon. I wish that I could run!
Edited by: Frances Mayes
A super collection of the best travel writing of the past year. I have read the anthologies of sports writing and travel writing in 2001 and they were both great. I'm sure this one won't disappoint me either.
by Jasper Fforde
Hmm. A science fiction, literary, mystery? Sounds peculiar! What a great book! It's silly and funny but has an interesting plot to it --- imagine how cool it would be if you could jump in and out of books and intereact with the characters and the story! I can't wait until another Thursday Next story comes out.
by: Dorothy Gilman
This is kind of Mrs. Pollifax goes to the middle east. She's visiting Jordan with her friend to pick up a secret manuscript wanted by Iraqi officials and she gets caught up in a terrorist plot to assassinate the King of Jordan. It's an entertaining story but the fake old lady voice the reader uses kind of gets on my nerves.
I've never read a Mrs. Pollifax book before and I have to admit, I expected her to be spunkier than she is. She's afraid of horses! How can she be afraid of horses?
by James Patterson & Peter de Jonge
I started this book on the beach on Saturday afternoon around 2:00 and was done it by Sunday night at 11. In the meantime I walked a half-marathon, watched a whole football game, and drove home from the shore. That gives you some idea of just how quickly I read this book.
Does that mean it was good? Not really!
I liked it well enough but it's really complete fluff. Perfect for the beach but not much else. The chapters are 2 pages long! But it was entertaining, I will give them that.
by Marcia Muller
This one was OK if you enjoy books about tough-as-nails lady detectives. Sharon McCone (the tough detective) is searching for a kidnap victim as well as her missing boyfriend and she has lots of interesting adventures in San Diego and Baja Mexico. It's an entertaining story and kind of funny because it was written in 1993 and they keep talking about cellular phones as having giant antennas attached to cars and as being an unusual luxury. My how times change!
I found the audio-version a little pesky because the story is told in the first person with Sharon as the speaker. The missing boyfriend's name is Hy and because of the way the reader speaks it's sometimes hard to tell if she is saying Hy or I. It won't ruin the book or anything, but it took some getting used to.
I may have to go back and listen/read some of the other Sharon McCone books. There are at least 15 of them.
by Ann Patchett
Not my usual type of book but I definately liked it. It has an unusual pace --- very slow and almost dreamy. It's hard to explain but it's very relaxing to read. It really made me wish that I knew about opera because the cast of characters are just mesmerized by the singing of a captive soprano.
I liked just about all of the characters and I couldn't wait to find out what would happen in this ill-fated hostage caper. The last few pages contain an unexpected twist that at first struck me as unnecessary and unbelievable but the more I thought about it the more relalistic it becomes.
Worth reading, for sure!
by Jeff Salvage
A great book with lots of excellent tips of walking smarter and faster. I trust him because he's given me pretty good advice in person.
by Dave McGovern
This has everything you could possibly want to know about training for the marathon, doing the marathon and recovering from the marathon. I had to wait a few weeks to get it from Amazon but it really was worth it.
by Alice Sebold
I'm in the middle of this one --- creepy and strange but very interesting and hard to put down. I'll give a final review when I'm done it.
OK I'm done. I wouldn't buy this but it's worth checking out of the library. It got a little too hokey for me towards the end and that kind of tainted the rest of the story for me.
I was also creeped out because they talk about Valley Forge park a lot and the fact that the killer hung out there. Obviously, that wouldn't effect most people but I didn't like it one bit.
by William Stone Barbara am Ende and Monte Paulsen
This is an adventure/disaster book along the lines of Into Thin Air only in a cave instead of on a mountain. I had a hard time sympathizing with the characters and didn't find the story nearly as compelling as I wanted to. Get it from the library if you're into caves, otherwise skip this one.
by Adrienne Hall
I just started this one last night --- seems good so far but I'm only about 10 pages into it. I doubt she'll be as funny as Bill Bryson and the link I'm sending you to above doesn't give a stellar review but I'm really interested in this idea so I bet I wind up liking the book.
OH MY GOD! I HATE THIS BOOK! HATE HATE HATE IT!!!
This chick is an incredibly preachy KIAP who moans constantly about the encroachment of civilization and non-thru hikers on the AT. Get over yourself already. Oh no! There are boy scouts on the trail! Heavens to betsy! A guy wearing SNEAKERS in the woods! She's the most annoying woman EVER.
by Michael Palmer
I just finished listening to this in my car. It's a great beach book about a horrible terrorist guy who has a severe brain tumor and needs surgery to have it removed. He takes over a Boston hospital and holds a couple of neurosurgeons hostage and forces them to do the operation using a prototype robotic assistant. They have to do it because he's holding the city of Boston hostage with hidden vials of horrible poison gas. Totally goofy premise but it was entertaining all the way.
The guy who read on the CD was good and the last CD has an interview with the author that is really quite interesting. I'm not finished with that part yet.
This is worth reading for a simple page turner.
Love and Death (Audio-Book)
edited by Carolyn Hart
This is a collection of 14 short stores about murder & crime that all center around some aspect of love. I wasn't crazy about it but I didn't hate it either. This is a classic example of getting something I wouldn't normally read just because it was the only thing available on CD that day.
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