julie

Thanks Bobbly, Yea, I've been reading a lot this year . I do like true crime, but it seems like the older ones are better than most of the new authors I have tried . If you are interested, try to find Fatal Vision by Joe McGinnis, And the Sea Will Tell by Vincent Bugliosi , or anything by Carleton Stowers , Darcy O Brien, Gregg Olsen .... I'll try to think of some others. I'm not sure why, but it seems as if the old ones had more of a story to them, went into lots more detail and you got to know the characters better .

A Plain Scandal The village of Appleseed Creek is mostly Amish people .Chloe , the main character isn't Amish , but is good friends with a brother and sister who have left the church . Events start to escalate in the community when a new Bishop arrives ,who is much more strict with the rules, especially for the young people . Then begins a series of hair and beard cuttings among the Amish, which escalate into a murder . Chloe decides to try to help the police solve the crimes and figure out who is behind these crimes . * I'm not much of a mystery fan ,so that's one of the reasons for the low review .The book didn't have a whole lot of excitement in it and seemed to draw out far too long .

On the Carpet I must say for someone who enjoys reading anything historical, this is an interesting book, filled with letters ,mainly from Penelope ,who is a young teen when the book starts . Her mother has died, and her and her brother are sent off to school ,where she is a frequent writer to her Father in the beginning ,then as she grows older, her letters continue on to her brother ,and then her husband in the end . You certainly get a good view of what life was like in the 1830's in the South, from a young woman's viewpoint She writes a lot about her schooling, then of family friends and neighbors, church sermons, crops and farm life, but mainly she likes to gossip about all the other girls getting engaged and married. It seems that is a consuming thought to her, to get married as soon as possible, but I guess in that time, that is what was done. She was apparently engaged or close to it MANY times ,and finally married a Dr . I'll leave off the ending so as not to ruin the book for others .

HiYa Kate ! Long time, no see ! I've spent all day trying to get up to date on everyone in here. I had to chuckle when I saw you were still buying books by the truckload down there ! You need to do that, as fast as you read them ! Getting hot down there yet ? It's in the 60's here today which is great !

Ruth I've had Papillon on my Kindle for a long time. I know I'll like it and have been excited to read it . I'm glad you thought it was so good . I'll have to bump it up one of these days .

Now you guys talked me into wanting one of these. I used to love to color when I was a kid !

Frankie I see you have read She's Come Undone . I'm so glad you liked it so much !

Holy Smokes, Pixie ! Look at your book list ! You are doing great this year ! Looks like you are onto a Mystery Kick ! Which ones have you liked best so far ?

The Moaning of Life Sorry , Karl. Not your best. No comparison to your previous " Idiot Adventures" when you went travelling . This book focuses on the bigger issues of life, about dating ,marriage, and how to find a mate. Whether to have children or not . I don't know, this one just didn't grab and keep my attention . Parts of it were interesting . I enjoyed learning a bit more about how they do arranged marriages in India. I find that fascinating . Other than that .. I can't think of much else that made it worth my time to read it . Get out on the road again, Karl.. Tell us about new places and adventures. You do better in those areas .

A Year Unplugged I really hate giving bad reviews , but this book really irritated me. Maybe it's my age . I can understand the theory behind the book. I think we all tend to rely too much on our gadgets nowadays. Everyplace you go, people are usually on their phones , either making calls or playing video games or watching videos or texting . It's their business, but it makes me wonder what this younger generation would do if they were plonked back down into the 60's, when you had one old rotary dial phone in your house ,which was probably on a party line. What would they do with ONE TV in the house ,so everyone had to watch the same show as a family or take turns on what to watch ? I might be old fashioned, but I wouldn't trade those years for any money . People actually TALKED to each other then. We had meals together and discussed our days . As kids, we LOVED going outside to play . Don't get me wrong. Technology and the ability to be able to LEARN and find out anything with one click of a button is great ,but I remember having a set of World Book Encyclopedias and thinking they were the greatest thing ever, to be able to look up things to learn THAT way. Do I love my computer ? Yes. Do I love having a Kindle so I can read anything I want with the push of a button ? Yes. But I still remember fondly, the days of going to the library, checking out FOUR books at a time, and feeling like I had TREASURE in my hands . I think we'd ALL be better off if we disconnected most of our gadgets and went back to simpler times. I didn't need this book to tell me that . I also thought the way the book was written was not that great. The author goes into detail about each day of the year, trying to figure out how to function and communicate . How to interact with her child .Then she tosses in a chunk of "educational material" about the pros and cons of technology . Good grief .....

The Obituary Writer Oh my gosh, what a good book ! It's told by 2 separate women ,one from the early 1920's, the other from the 1960's . It's very easy to follow, but at first ,you don't see a connection between the two, so you wonder how the book will weave the stories together . It talked quite a bit about the role a housewife had in the 60's and what her expectations were . I've often pondered whether life was better then , when people stayed married because they made vows ,and tried to work through problems, or whether it's better now when people seem to feel the freedom to get out of a marriage sooner ,without the stigma of being a "divorced person " ,like it was so long ago . It's a story of grief , of many different forms and types of grief, of marriages gone bad, and whether to work on repairing them or move on . It's the story of holding onto the past ,when you might be happier looking into your future . Just a wonderful book . My kind of story. It leaves you with an important life lesson .

House of Echoes Ben Tierney's young family has its share of problems :his wife has lost her job ,Ben , who is a writer has a major writer's block. Their son is being bullied at school. They feel it is time to pick up , move and make a new start . So, they move to an area where Ben's ancestors were from, out in the woods . They find a huge old abandoned house that needs a lot of work, but they buy it, and decide to work on it to make it an Inn . Little do they know the trouble that follows them to their new place. It starts with the animal mutilations . There oldest son's fascination with going into the woods, that is a very eerie place to be .He starts acting very strange ,after seeing things in the woods that no young boy should ever see. Things go from bad to worse in this novel, as the tension builds. You will have a shock of an ending !

Pixie Thanks, glad you are enjoying them. Just a couple more to go and I'll be caught up .

The Dirty Dust I tried . I really did. This one just didn't do much for me . Do you have to be Irish to get it ? I'm not sure . The idea for the story was a good one . I've often wondered myself , if the dead realize who they are buried next to , and in a way , it'd be a comfort to know that dialogue can go on once we are in the grave . We'd have a "captive audience "that would have to listen to our ramblings . I guess it would have been easier to understand if the talking didn't just go on and on, with no idea of who was talking next, or what they were talking about . I get it that some of them were less than happy with their laying out, or the choice of grave plots they got . Wish I could give this a better review . Sorry !

Pines What if you woke up in the woods , severely injured , and with no memory of who or where you were ? No ID, cell phone, or ability to contact anyone ? That's what happens to Ethan ,the main character in this story . He's a Secret Service Agent, sent to a small town in Idaho to search for 2 of his co-workers , who came up missing in the same area . He soon finds out he is living in an unusual place, almost like the "Perfect Town ". But is it as perfect as it looks from the outside ? Will Ethan ever see his family again ? I don't usually read this sort of book , but it actually held my interest and I read it within a few hours' time . Give it a try and see what you think of "The Pines ".

Biggie Henry, nicknamed "Biggie" by a classmate when he was younger, is a teen who seemed to eat to hide his feelings of failure in his life. He doesn't sound like he realizes that in the beginning of the book. He just gets used to being called Biggie, so he eats and gets bigger . His social life is pretty much all online ,making lots of friends that he can keep at a distance . He has a crush on a girl named Annabelle, from his school , and one day in gym class, his coach makes him pitch the ball .They find out he is really good at it Annabelle tells him he should try out for the baseball team. His father and stepfather are both star athletes in their town , and Biggie has always rejected the sport, probably because he feels they have both rejected him. What happens when the girl he likes tells him to play baseball ? Read the book and find out . A great lesson about life at the end of this one .

Wylding Hall I'm not sure what type of review to give on this one. It's written in the voice of several different members of an old 70's folk music type band . They had some early success , and went to an old run down abbey to work on some new songs and record another album . I'll have to be truthful and say I didn't quite get it . They were all on drugs and drinking , and the main star of the band, Julian, who everyone seemed to love , started acting a little odd and wandering off in the woods to an old ruin . They all were making their last album ,and a local boy came to take photos of them singing. A few days later , Julian came up missing ,and part of the clue to who he may have gone off with was in the photos . Each band member thinks differently about what may have happened to him . I wasn't super enthused with this one, but I really didn't get the ending .

A Journey With Strangers I love reading travel books, but have to say I was disappointed in this one. I had high hopes for it being close to the age the author was and remembering the times well as a teen . I can't quite put my finger on what this was lacking ,but it seemed a bit dull in parts and I couldn't really relate well to the character . He leaves from California to hitchhike to Florida to meet up with some girl he is supposedly nuts about ,but meets another one along the way that he also had met before , and seemed pretty willing to have a good time with her too, if she would have been willing. I don't know, maybe that's just teen boys for you, but the whole journey seemed a little stupid if he liked this Florida girl enough to go that far across country to meet her again . Anyhow, I can' quite describe what it was about this book that didn't quite do it for me ... the writing was ok, but nothing special .

Wit & Wisdom of America's First Ladies I always enjoy books about the first ladies, mainly because they sometimes get left in the dust while their husbands get all the attention . I liked this book because it gives you a glimpse of the first ladies and a few of their memorable quotes, so you get to know a bit more about their personalities or some cause they were passionate about . I always say the same thing about books like this -- too short ! Thus, the lower stars, but still a nice little book .

The Nightingale Girls The setting is a teaching hospital in 1930's England. The story centers around 3 main student nurses ,who each sign up for the class for different reasons, each coming from totally opposite backgrounds. In the beginning, it's a bit confusing because there are several other characters in the story : other students, teachers, head nurses, hospital board members. It took me quite awhile to get everyone sorted out . It was well with the time it took ,and also for the good story it told. I guess it'd remind you a bit of Call the Midwife, only this hospital talks about all the different areas of the hospital the nurses train in, and all that hey have to learn to deal with as beginning nurses . A very good book, and I'm thrilled to see that there are several others in the series !

I started it myself a few times before and never got very far on it. Maybe it's a timing thing. Once I got going, it was really interesting . Not sure if you are interested in magicians of the olden days like Houdini, but he plays a part in this . It told a lot of history about those days so I thought it quite good . Lots of colorful characters too !

Travels With Gannon and Wyatt : Ireland This is apparently part of a series of books with many more in the works about twins boys who visit different countries all over the world. It's apparently loosely based on real twin that have done the same . The book would be for middle school aged kids, I'd guess. It reminded me of a book that a homeschool family would use. It tells a bit of a story of the boys traveling ,with each of them keeping a sort of journal of their adventures so they each take turns telling a part of the story . There are a few photos sprinkled throughout the book . The story seems to concentrate quite a bit on saving the environment, growing safe crops and animals without using a lot of pesticides and growth -hormone type things for the animals, etc . As said, I think this book would be great for homeschool kids whose families want the to learn about other countries ,while also learning about some of their history, culture, foods, etc .

Eyewitness to Titanic If you are looking for a book for your middle-grade child to use for a report on the Titanic, I doubt you could find better than this. It has so many facts about the ship, from the men who first got the idea of building it ,to the people who built and designed it, the passengers ,crew, capacity , price of tickets , all the "extra features " that made it such a classy ship, lists of some of the famous people on board and whether they survived or not , reasons why they may have avoided such a catastrophe ( seems as if they spent more on the luxury end of things and not enough on the safety and building materials used . I honestly can't think of much f anything more detailed someone would need to know about the Titanic . I think young boys who are interested in ship would absolutely love this book !

Thanks, it's good to be back . Been reading a lot this year ! I thought of you while reading this. It really was extremely good, but if you don't wanna read it ,you don't have to ! We all like different books .

No one Helped : Kitty Genovese, New York City, and the Myth of Urban Apathy I've read about the Kitty Genovese case before in other books and articles. The book about there supposedly being 38 witnesses who heard and saw the entire crime and ignored it, was apparently not the "true" version ,according to this author . This book was very well researched and went into a lot of detail about the neighborhood where the crime happened and its residents, about the city of New York, about the newspapers and media of the time, and the culture and plight of the lesbian women of that time . It told about the changing times in not only the city, but the country in general, regarding women's roles ,and young girls who decided to do something a bit out of the "norm " than generations before . They could live in a big city, have a job and their own apartment, and live with anyone they chose and have that freedom . I'm glad that those freedoms have evolved and that girls growing up today know that their choices are so much more open than they were all those ears ago . The book was good, but it may not be of as much interest to someone who likes reading just "True Crime" books. This book seemed more to me as a book that could be used in a college classroom setting to learn more about truth in journalism, how one newspaper making a sensational claim can change the outlook of the world on a crime, how the culture of a city can change over time, etc . As far as the crime part, it isn't really gone into in as great a detail as a regular true crime book would have . There are lots of other issues discussed in this book ,which kind of override the crime itself . The crime was still the centerpiece of this tory, but this book uses it to address so many other issues .... Bottom line is that a beautiful young girl who lived in a middle class neighborhood ,was doing nothing wrong , other than coming home from work. A lowlife spotted her and followed her home, stabbed her and she died. She DID have people who heard her scream, but most thought it was nothing more than some noisy bar patrons or an argument .There weren't 38 people who heard and saw everything that happened an did nothing to help . What happened was a tragedy, but it happened quickly, the killer got away but was arrested shortly after . A very sad story of a young girl's life cut way too short .