The Death of Bees by Lisa O'Donnell - I hesitate to even put this on my list because most of my friends won't like it. And I don't normally read books with heavy swearing. But I was hooked from the very first page. It starts with two young girls burying their parents in their backyard. A very dark book but uplifting by the end. If it was a movie it would be R rated.
4 stars
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Learning to Swim by Sara J. Henry - this book won 3 awards for best first novel. Another one that had me from the very first page. A woman thinks she sees a child thrown from a ferry and dives in to save it. I was a little disappointed at first by the ending but think it had to be that way to develop into a series.
4 stars
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A Cold and Lonely Place by Sara J. Henry - the second book in the series. I almost liked this one better because I couldn't figure out what was going on. I'd say it lived up to the promise of the 1st book. I hope the author writes more, I really like her main character.
4 stars
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Collateral Damage by Stuart Woods - a Stone Barrington book that takes place very soon after the previous book. This one is really more about Holly Hunter though. The CIA is tracking a terrorist.
3 stars
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The Cold Dish by Craig Johnson - the first in the Sheriff Walt Longmire series. I read the second out of order because it took so long to get this one. And the second book had told me whodunnit in this one but I'd already forgotten that until the very end.
3 stars
Saturday, March 30, 2013
Sunday, March 24, 2013
March 17-23, 2013
Unwholly by Neal Shusterman - #2 in the Unwind Trilogy. I had a hard time getting into this book. The author says he never meant the first book to become a trilogy and I thought that showed in this book. It jumped around too much from character to character and just kept adding more. I finally got into the story about half way through.
3 stars
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The Emerald City of Oz
The Patchwork Girl of Oz both by L. Frank Baum - poor Mr. Baum, at the end of the Emerald City he has come up with a surefire way to quit writing about Oz but he is foiled and must continue writing. His publishers and finances probably had a lot to do with it. Both of these had some clever word usage which led me to give them
3 stars
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The Sniper's Wife by Archer Mayor - the 13th in the series and somewhat of a departure. The main character isn't Joe Gunther, although he is in the book. And it takes place in New York city instead of Vermont.
3 stars
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The Paris Wife by Paula McClain - I don't mind historical fiction but usually have a problem when it's written from a first person point of view. How can the author possibly know what the person was actually thinking? And I think it's too easy to project our today sensibilities onto historical events. However, I really enjoyed this book and the writing. Trying to decide if I want to read a biography of Hadley Hemingway now.
4 stars
3 stars
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The Emerald City of Oz
The Patchwork Girl of Oz both by L. Frank Baum - poor Mr. Baum, at the end of the Emerald City he has come up with a surefire way to quit writing about Oz but he is foiled and must continue writing. His publishers and finances probably had a lot to do with it. Both of these had some clever word usage which led me to give them
3 stars
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The Sniper's Wife by Archer Mayor - the 13th in the series and somewhat of a departure. The main character isn't Joe Gunther, although he is in the book. And it takes place in New York city instead of Vermont.
3 stars
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The Paris Wife by Paula McClain - I don't mind historical fiction but usually have a problem when it's written from a first person point of view. How can the author possibly know what the person was actually thinking? And I think it's too easy to project our today sensibilities onto historical events. However, I really enjoyed this book and the writing. Trying to decide if I want to read a biography of Hadley Hemingway now.
4 stars
Sunday, March 17, 2013
Mar 10-16, 2013
Somehow deleted my post so this will just be a list, no descriptions.
The Sound of Broken Glass by Deborah Crombie - 4 stars
Me Before You by Jojo Moyes - 4 stars
Step By Step: A Pedestrian Memoir by Lawrence Block - 3 stars
The Marvelous Land of Oz - 2 stars
Ozma of Oz - 3 stars
Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz- 3 stars
The Road To Oz - 2 stars
all by Frank L Baum
The Sound of Broken Glass by Deborah Crombie - 4 stars
Me Before You by Jojo Moyes - 4 stars
Step By Step: A Pedestrian Memoir by Lawrence Block - 3 stars
The Marvelous Land of Oz - 2 stars
Ozma of Oz - 3 stars
Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz- 3 stars
The Road To Oz - 2 stars
all by Frank L Baum
Sunday, March 10, 2013
Mar 3-9, 2013
Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillebrand - this is a true story of a man who is on his way to becoming a delinquent when he becomes interested in running. He is in the Olympics right before the war. After he joins the Air Force, his plane is shot down and he spends many days on a raft. Then he is captured by the Japanese. The time of his captivity is a hard part of the book to read. I actually wish more of his story after the war had been covered.
4 stars
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Standing in Another Man's Grave by Ian Rankin - a John Rebus book. I guess the author missed his character after having retired him a few years ago. Rebus is still as crochety and maverick as his previous books. This time he is working as a civilian for the cold cases branch and becomes convinced they are looking for a serial killer.
4 stars
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The Last Runaway by Tracy Chevalier - a young Quaker girl comes to America in the 1850's with her sister. Her sister dies soon after they arrive and she is left to depend on the kindness of near strangers. She becomes involved by accident with the Underground Railway. There is a sex scene that surprised me, not gratuitous, somewhat necessary to the story.
4.5 stars
4 stars
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Standing in Another Man's Grave by Ian Rankin - a John Rebus book. I guess the author missed his character after having retired him a few years ago. Rebus is still as crochety and maverick as his previous books. This time he is working as a civilian for the cold cases branch and becomes convinced they are looking for a serial killer.
4 stars
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The Last Runaway by Tracy Chevalier - a young Quaker girl comes to America in the 1850's with her sister. Her sister dies soon after they arrive and she is left to depend on the kindness of near strangers. She becomes involved by accident with the Underground Railway. There is a sex scene that surprised me, not gratuitous, somewhat necessary to the story.
4.5 stars
Sunday, March 3, 2013
Feb 25-Mar 2, 2013
The Age of Miracles by Karen Thompson Walker - a young girl tells the story of the earth suddenly starting to spin slower. At first it's just a few minutes a day. It's as much a coming of age story as anything.
4 stars
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The Earth Moved: On the Remarkable Achievements of Earthworms by Amy Stewart - all about worms. They're much more important than we think.
3 stars
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Hit Me by Lawrence Block - the 5th book in the Keller series. He's now a retired hitman but gets back in the business because his construction business isn't doing well in the economy. Lawrence Block is one of my favorite authors, I like his weird humor. Don't know why I like these books about a man who kills people for a living but I do. He also collects stamps and you learn quite a bit about that. They are not graphic.
4 stars
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The Bughouse Affair by Marcia Muller and Bill Pronzini - this is set in the 1890's and feature a former Secret Service agent and a woman who used to work for the Pinkertons. They have opened a detective agency together. I was all set to enjoy the book and then they introduced a person purporting to be Sherlock Holmes. The book seems to present Holmes as a real person although we're not supposed to know if the man claiming to be him really is. That threw the whole book out of kilter for me. I would have enjoyed it more with just the two main characters.
2 stars
4 stars
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The Earth Moved: On the Remarkable Achievements of Earthworms by Amy Stewart - all about worms. They're much more important than we think.
3 stars
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Hit Me by Lawrence Block - the 5th book in the Keller series. He's now a retired hitman but gets back in the business because his construction business isn't doing well in the economy. Lawrence Block is one of my favorite authors, I like his weird humor. Don't know why I like these books about a man who kills people for a living but I do. He also collects stamps and you learn quite a bit about that. They are not graphic.
4 stars
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The Bughouse Affair by Marcia Muller and Bill Pronzini - this is set in the 1890's and feature a former Secret Service agent and a woman who used to work for the Pinkertons. They have opened a detective agency together. I was all set to enjoy the book and then they introduced a person purporting to be Sherlock Holmes. The book seems to present Holmes as a real person although we're not supposed to know if the man claiming to be him really is. That threw the whole book out of kilter for me. I would have enjoyed it more with just the two main characters.
2 stars
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