Mini Review: Milk, Eggs, Vodka

A quick  fun read I had on my list for my food category in the 999 challenge. Keaggy has collected used grocery lists, and assembled them, along with funny, snarky, and insightful comments on who might have had such lists. The book actually shows the lists, with the bad penmanship, the eclectic assortment of paper (or wood chips) used to write them, and the abominable spelling. It was a quick and fun read...definitely not worth buying, but if you see at the library grab it for an enjoyable hour.

The author even has a web page with a downloadable master grocery list that looks kinda cool and a web site where you can submit your list if you think it's worth sharing.  All in all, a fun concept.

999 Challenge Complete - Part II

As promised, here is the list of the 2nd batch of reading completed for the Other 999 Challenge.  Some of my categories were the same - I love to read mysteries and fiction, some were designed to capture some of the ARCs that were stacking up, and some were simply to meet my need for whimsey.


Category #1: Mysteries

1. Lethal Legacy by Linda Fairstein.
2. The Girl of His Dreams Donna Leon
3. On What Grounds Cleo Coyle.
4. Mint Julep Murder Caroline Hart.
5. Cream Puff Murder Joanne Fluke.
6. chocolate chip murder mystery Joanne Fluke
7. Murder on K street Margaret Truman
8. The New Bedside, Bathtub, Armchair Companion to Agatha Christie by Julian Symons
9. The Terra Cotta Dog Andrea Camilleri

Category #2: Leftovers - some of these were leftover from my first challenge, and some had to do with food (get the pun?)

1. Fatally Flaky by Diane Mott Davidson.
2. In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan.
3. The Private Patient by P.D. James
4. There is a Season Joan Chittister, OSB
5. Chocolate: A Love Story by Max Brenner
6. The Recipe Club by Andrea Israel
7. Roux Morgue (Mary Ryan, Pastry Chef Mysteries) by Claire M. Johnson
8. Alice, let's eat by Calvin Trillin
9. Toast Nigel Slater
Category #3: Maine/New England - (this was originally setup to be the books we were reading in the "Maine Reads" online group, but that fell apart after the sponsoring newspaper got bought up by 'others.')

1. New England Days:Stories (our American Heritage) by Sarah Orne Jewett
2. Primal Obsession by Susan Vaughan.
3. The Paperwhite Narcissus by Cynthia Riggs
4. Absolute Certainty by Rose Connors.
5. Deadly Nightshade Cynthia Riggs
6. Shoutin' into the Fog Thomas Hanna.
7. Pink Chimneys: A Novel of Nineteenth Century Maine Ardeana Hamlin Knowles.
8. The Sea Chest by Toni Buzzeo.
9. Last Night at the Lobster Stewart O'Nan.

Category 4: Historical Fiction

1. The Other Queen by Philippa Gregory
2. The Lady Elizabeth Alison Weir
3. The Frozen Thames by Helen Humphreys.
4. Dinner at Mr. Jefferson's by Charles A. Cerami
5. Sacred Hearts by Sarah Dunant
6. Saint and the Fasting Girl by Anna Richenda
7. Shanghai Girls by Lisa See
8. The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Elizabeth Howe
9. The Gods of Newport John Jakes.

Category 5: ERs or ARCs

1. Wife of the Gods A Novel by Kwei Quartey
2. Obama's Blackberry
3. The Link by Colin Tudge
4. Labor Day by Joyce Maynard
5. Red to Black by Alex Dryden
6. The Rapture by Liz Jensen
7. Brutal Telling by Louise Penny
8. South of Broad by Pat Conroy
9. True Compass by Edward M. Kennedy

Category #6: LT Recommends (books that caught my eye from discussions on LT threads or more LT early review books)

1. Rule Number Two Heidi Squier Kraft
2. Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie Alan Bradley
3. The Second Death of Goodluck Tinubu Michael Stanley.
4. Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Phillips
5. A Novena for Murder by Sr. Carol Anne O'Marie
6. The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie.
7. Rizzo's War by Lou Manfredo
8. Brass Verdict by Michael Connelly
9. A Circle of Souls Preetham Gandhi

Category #7: Surprise!! (not sure what to expect, but give it a try...)

1.The Scarecrow and his Servant by Philip Pullman
2.Little Fingers Filip Florian
3.Guardian of Lies Steve Martini.
4.Moth Lew Griffin Mysteries James Sallis
5.Tea Time for the Traditionally Built Alexander McCall Smith
6.Spellbinder by Helen Stringer
7.a Rule Against Murder Louise Penny
8.Manana, Manana Peter Kerr
9.Dead Cat Bounce Sarah Graves

Category #8: Only Audio

1. Scarecrow Michael Connelly
2. Cemetery Dance Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
3. All Other Nights Dara Horn.
4. Executive Privilege Philip Margolin.
5. Knit Two Kate Jacobs
6. Tunnel Vision Sara Paretsky
7. Inventing a Nation Gore Vidal
8. Death is a Cabaret Deborah Morgan
9. Devil's Claw J.A. Jance 

Category #9: Christmas

1. A Christmas Secret by Anne Perry.
2. The Christmas Cookie Club Ann Pearlman
3. Irish Country Christmas Patrick Taylor
4. Angels: A Pop-Up Book by Chuck Fischer
5. Norman Rockwell's Christmas Book
6. Silent Nights Anne Perry
7. Shepherds Abiding Jan Karon
8. The Paper Bag Christmas by Keven Alan Milne
9. Secrets of a Christmas Box by Steven Hornby

This has certainly been a fun year. Looking back over the list, (parts 1 and 2) I see that at least 30% of what I read I'd have never given a glance to if I hadn't joined LT and this challenge.  The insights, suggestions and encouragement from that group have been such fun, and certainly have expanded my horizons.  Reading ARCs is another new joy I had this year...I tried to accept only those I know I'd be able to get through, but again, I stretched a bit, and wasn't disappointed.

I'm spending the rest of the year browsing through books sitting on the TBR mountain, and the ARC shelves to get myself organized for another great reading year.  We're predicted to get our first snow later today, so after a trip to an early holiday party, I'm hunkering down.

Tomorrow, if I get a chance, Sunday Salon will have some musings on where my reading challenges will take me next year.

999 Challenge Complete - Part I

Last weekend, while sitting and reading through the Thankfully Reading Weekend, I passed a huge milestone by completing my 2nd 999 challenge of the year.  Started as a Challenge Group on LibraryThing, that means 9 books in each of 9 categories read during the year 09.  I did this twice.  Admittedly, I had to fudge a couple of categories to make things fit, but forcing myself to read outside my normal comfort range, and to read (or listen to) 162 books for this was quite a feat.

I have taken this past week to do a wrapup and look at some interesting stats:
Of those 162 books

• 79 came from the public library (49%)
  
• 50 came from my own TBR piles (31%)
  
• 33 were ARCs or LT Early Review books (20%)

• 103 were print (64%)
• 59 were audio (36%)

Here's the breakdown by categories: (If I reviewed them, my review is in the LT page.)

The First Challenge

1. Fiction -

1. Pawing through the Past- Rita Mae Brown
2. Comforts of a Muddy Saturday - Alexander McCall Smith
3. 16 Lighhouse Road - Debbie Macomber
4. Sarah - Marek Halter
5. Heart and Soul - Maeve Binchy
6. Shape of water - Andrea Camillieri
7. The Red Tent - Anita Diamont
8. Suffer the Little Children -Donna Leon
9. Blood from a Stone - Donna Leon

2. Books about books, libraries, or language 

1. Free for all: oddballs, geeks and gangstas in the public library - Dan Borchert
2. Ex Libris Confessions of a Common Reader -Anne Fadiman
3. Sixpence House - Paul Collins
4. So Many Books, So Little Time - Sara Nelson
5. Reading Lolita in Tehran - Azar Nafisi
6. The Library at Night - Alberto Manguel
7. Dewey - Vicki Myron
8. The YellowLighted Bookshop - Lewis Buzbee
9. Soldier's Heart - Elizabeth Samet

3. Things Portuguese

1. Letters of a Portuguese Nun - Myriam Cry
2. Sonnets from the Portuguese - Elizabeth Barrett Browning
3. The Coffee Trader - David Liss
4. Our Lady of the Artichokes - Katherine Vaz
5. Portuguese Irregular Verbs - Alexander McCall Smith
6. Food of Portugal - Jean Anderson
7. The Alchemist - Paulo Coelho
8. Portugal - Carlos Vitorino da Silva Barros
9. Saudade - Katherine Vaz

4. Theology and Spirituality turned out to be my Lenten read

1. The Prince Mammoth Pumpkin - James Adams
2. Mere Christianity - C.S. Lewis
3. Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith  - Kathleen Norris
4. Misquoting Jesus - Bart Ehrman
5. Year of Living Biblically - A.J. Jacob
6. Christ the Lord:The Road to Cana - Anne Rice
7. Dating Jesus - Susan Campbell
8. Being Catholic Now  -Kerry Kennedy
9. The Shack Wm. P. Young

5. Politics, History and Biographies

1. The Dark Side: the inside story of how the war on Terror turned into a War on American Ideals -  Jane Mayer
2.The Nine - Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court - Jeffrey Toobin
3.Mysteries of the Middle Ages: The Rise of Feminism, Science and Art from the cults of Catholic Europe - Thomas Cahill
4.Savage Beauty: The Life of Edna St. Vincent Millay - Nancy Mitford
5.America's Hidden History: Untold Tales of the First Pilgrims, Fighting Women, and Forgotten Founders- Kenneth C. Davis
6. Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time - Dava Sobel
7. Great Souls: Six who changed the Century - David Aikman
8. American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House - Jon Meacham
9. Dear Fatty - Dawn French

6. Award Winners these could be either the author (for this or another work) or the work itself; might be a Pulitzer, Booker, National or other award.

1. Ship Fever - Andrea Barrett
2. The Blackford Oakes Reader - William F. Buckley
3. Here Lies the Librarian - Richard Peck
4. Night - Elie Wiesel
5. Mistress of the Art of Death - Ariana Franklin
6. The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane - Kate DiCamillo
7. The Spellman Files - Lisa Lutz
8. Hard Row - Margaret Maron 
9. A Taste for Death - P.D. James

7. Poetry, Letters and Short Stories

1. The Gift of story, A Wise Tale about What is Enough - Clarissa Pinkola Estes
2. Ella Minnow Pea - Mark Dunn
3. A Few Quick Ones - P.G. Wodehouse
4. Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
5. The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri "Inferno" 
6. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button & other stories - F. Scott Fitzgerald.
7. Ants on the Melon - Virginia Hamilton Adair
8. Morning Poems - Robert Bly
9. Short And Tall Tales: Moose County Legends - Lillian Braun

8. Books from somebody else's lists

1. The Little World of Don Camillo - Giovannino Guareschi
2. Olive Kitteridge - Elizabeth Stout  Maine Reads online book group

3. One Man's Meat - E.B. White Maine Reads
4. Any Bitter Thing - Monica Wood  Maine Reads
5. The Girl who loved Tom Gordon - Stephen King Maine Reads
6  Corduroy Mansions - Alexander McCall Smith
7. On What Grounds - Cleo Coyle
8. Pillars of the Earth - Ken Follett
9. Lobster Chronicles - Linda Greenlaw Maine Reads

9. No place else to put them!

1. Shakespeare:The World as Stage - Bill Bryson
2. Plato and a Platypus walk into a bar - Thomas Cathcart
3. Best Seller! Jane Daniel
4. Geography of Bliss: One Grump's Search for the Happiest Places in the World - Eruc Weiner
5. Stupid American History: Tales of Stupidity,Strangeness and Mythconceptions - Leland Gregory
6. Bad Blood - Linda Fairstein
7. The New 50 Simple Things Kids can Do to Save the Earth by the Earthworks Group
8. Delectable Mountains - Earlene Fowler
9. Summer in Tuscany - Elizabeth Adler

The Second 999 and New Challenges

Since this post is getting pretty long, and I've tons of books to read, I'm going to do a second post for the 2nd challenge sometime later this week. After that I'll be choosing my Best of the Year list to publish on New Year's Eve.  In the meantime, I have to decide on and get organized for what (if any) challenges I'm going to do in 2010.  In the meantime READ ON.................

Wednesday Earplugs- the Weekly audios

What a week! The Thankfully reading weekend induced me to put in a lot of time on print books, but the baking allowed for time with audios.

Several of this past weeks audios have already been reviewed (click on links to see reviews):

Roux Morgue - a so so mystery about cooking school, and who knows what.
Toast - a terrific memoir of  a boy's hunger, and memorably awful food- narrated by the author Nigel Slater.
Malice Prepense - an installment of the Barbara Holloway series....wonderful wonderful.

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Tonite I finished


No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II by Doris Kearns Goodwin.

An extraordinary work --giving a very detailed and intimate portrait of an extraordinary relationship. Set almost exclusively during the years in the White House, Goodwin gives us great insight into this very dynamic couple and their relationships - with each other, and with others.
And....as an audio, it's top-drawer.  Ed Herrman is an outstanding narrator, and Goodwin hersekf giving us an introspective intro and pleasant wrap-up. Well worth your time.

I've got a batch stacked up to listen to, but I also have some print ones waiting too.

Stay tuned....

Christmas Challenge: Review- Silent Nights by Anne Perry

Another Christmas book for my challenge.  This one actually consisted of two separate 'novellas' each featuring one of Perry's secondary characters from her William Monk and Charlotte Pitt series.

The first, A Christmas Beginning, features Superintendant Runcorn from Perry's William Monk series.  We see Runcorn arriving on a bleak island off the coast of Wales to spend his Christmas holiday.  There he discovers the secret love of his life whom he met working a case  in London, and further discovers a dead body in the Church yard shortly after his arrival.  In very UN-Runcorn fashion, he treads delicately with the local constable as he helps solve the murder.  There was a completely unexpected ending (in the very last sentence of the story) that really blew me away.  I enjoyed getting to know Runcorn better--I've been a fan of the Monk series for years, and feel I know him better now that this case is finished.  It will be interesting to see if Perry takes these personality developments further in future books in the Monk series.

The second story, A Christmas Grace was a real stretch.  It has Emily Radley (sister of Charlotte Pitt- another of Anne Perry's series) spending her Christmas in very rural Ireland, nursing her dying aunt from whom the entire family has been estranged for years.  I found this story awkward, with the characters very cardboard, and the plot really contrived.  I had to force myself to finish it because frankly, it just wasn't very interesting...

I like Anne Perry's works, but the Christmas stories (I've read 3 now) seem to be quickies thrown together without a lot of thought. I'll try one more next year, but after that, we'll see............

Reading Weekend wrap-up

What a great way to recover from pies, pies, pies and more pies.  The weather cooperated by giving us a horrendous Nor'easter (no snow just rain) that meant nobody wanted to go out to do anything, except stay home curled up with the cats in front of the fire.  So for the weekend, I managed to get through:

New Yorker staff writer Calvin Trillin gives us a fun little book about the eating adventures of a true gastronome, and his wife Alice who believes life should be strictly limited to three meals a day. Trillin takes us on a series of trips to France, Montreal, Omaha, Kansas City (his hometown), San francisco, Baltimore, and New Orleans among others. His attempts to experience food has him flying in tamales from New Mexico, barbeque from Kansas City, crab etouffee from New Orleans, crabs from Baltimore and other such delectables.

Reading this the day after the Thanksgiving Day feast was perfect. I could read it and not feel that I HAD to track down some of these feasts. Otherwise, I'd have been on google looking up home delivery!

For all who enjoy food, and humorous writing, this is a treat. As one of the last books in my Food category for my 2nd 999 challenge, it was really fun. Bon Appetit!

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I picked this up last year, but never got around to reading it.  Several LTers have indicated it was a good read, and I second the motion.  It is a gentle, loving, easy to read, tear-jerker.  A wonderful story to read with youngsters, and remind us all what Christmas is really about.  A great way to kick off the Christmas season on a gentle reading weekend.

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Subtitled The story of a boy's hunger, this is the story of a young boy whose mother was (to put it gently) not the greatest cook in the world. As he describes the horrors of the food she made, he manages to highlight the relationship of food to love in our lives.

While he has always been interested in food and cooking, his father did not allow him in the kitchen, so when his mother dies and father must take over the provision of meals, life becomes even more dire. After dad hires (and later marries) a cook/housekeeper, the food gets better, but life somehow does not. In fact, the family is uprooted and moved halfway across England to establish a more uppity lifestyle to please the 'new mum.'

Later when he gets old enough to get a job at a pub, and then a posh hotel, he realizes his calling in food prep. His father's death brings everything to a boil, severs the link with bridezilla, and provides Nigel with the impetus to go to cooking school and take up his true vocation.

I 'read' this one as an audio while preparing our leftover Thanksgiving meal. I loved hearing the British terms for foods --had to go look up a few--and laughed so hard I had tears in my eyes in a few places. It really brings out the role food (and in Britain the role of TOAST) plays in our lives, and how our relationships with food providers are formed so early in life. An enjoyable read--it's as much a coming of age bio as a food event-- even if you're not a foodie.

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A sweet story focusing on talking Christmas ornaments.  A bit over the top for adults, but it's designed to be read, one chapter a night, starting on Dec 1st through Christmas Eve.  I personally think there are far better Christmas tales to share with children.  I just couldn't help thinking that it would make a great 1/2 cartoon TV special for the holiday season

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I'm about 1/2 way through this delightful story of three generations of women living in rural North Carolina in the early part of the 20th century.  I'm already in love with all of them and can't wait to see the story progress.  This book was thrust (literally) into my hands by one of our library patrons, who imperiously demanded that if I hadn't read it, I must, because it was probably the most beautifully written story she'd ever read.  Well, so far, she's not too far off the mark.  I'll probably be up late tonite finishing it.  A beautiful way to finish up the weekend.

Many thanks to Jenn for starting this tradition.  Maybe we should do it again sometime.

Review: The Gods of Newport by John Jakes

John Jakes is a touted master of American historical fiction. He presents stories of various communities and cultures in North America, mixing real and fictitious persons and relying on well done research to set scenes of authentic lifestyles.

Jakes tells the story of a self-made wealthy man, Sam Driver, and his daughter Jenny as they try to break into the very structured and snobby summer society of Newport Rhode Island. The summer set is 'ruled' by grande dames such as the famous Mrs. Astor, Mrs. Vanderbuilt, and others who kowtow to Mrs. A's rules about what is proper, what is forbidden, who is acceptable and who is not.

By introducing a love interest from the wrong class, Prince Molloy, an Irishman who works at the tennis Casino, and who falls for Jenny, we are exposed to life at all levels of society.

As Jenny and Sam try to ingratiate themselves with this group, Prince tries to win Jenny. There are many scenes of violence, back-stabbing, cheating, bribing, whoring, sailing, horse racing, and other instances of life in the late 1800's that paint a clear picture of what Newport was like both for the very rich, and those whose life was to serve the very rich.

NO spoilers, but there is a rather corny ending that will disappoint some, and be enchanting for others. All in all it was a pleasant read. Having lived several years in Newport, (my first apartment was actually on Bellevue Ave!) I found the descriptions of the town and the opulent 'cottages' a wonderful stroll down memory lane

The Christmas Challenge

Michelle, The True Book Addict has challenged us to read Christmas books during the upcoming holiday season.  The link to the challenge is on her page.  It's quite simple, you have to read 1-3 books (no kiddie lit allowed) about this wonderful holiday.  Then blog about it and link it to her page via Mr. Linky.  Get over there and sign up.  It will give you something fun to do during these next few stress-filled weeks.

I've been doing a Christmas books category for my 999 Challenge on LT. Here are some of the books I've read or plan to read to complete the 9 for that challenge:

A Christmas Beginning by Anne Perry
The Christmas Cookie Club by Anne Pearlman (see my review)
Secrets of a Christmas Box by S. Hornby
The Gift of Murder (An anthology of Christmas mysteries being sold to benefit Toys For Tots)
Murder for Christmas (another anthology edited by Thomas Godfrey)
The Paper Bag Christmas by Kevin Alan Milne
Maigret's Christmas - a collection of nine stories by George Simenon
Irish Country Christmas by Patrick Taylor (see review)
And one of my all time favorites.......Shepherds Abiding by Jan Karon.

So.....have you started yet?  If not, put a log on the fire and forget the wrapping, decorating, baking for awhile each day.  Give yourself a gift....Where's the eggnog?

Review: The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe

Normally, I don't have a great interest in witches, witchcraft, or even the Salem history about them.  But this book is so well written that it really has whetted my interest to find out more.  While not exclusively historical fiction, it is fictional and does have as its central theme witchcraft and the question of whether it was responsible for the events that occurred in Salem Massachusetts in the late 1600's.

Connie Goodwin, a PhD candidate at Harvard, is trying to define the topic she will develop for her dissertation. As summer opens, her mother, living in the Southwest, phones to ask Connie to please spend the summer cleaning out her dead grandmother's vacant but furnished house in Marblehead.  Urged on by an academic advisor whose motives become more suspect as the story unfolds, she begins her dissertation research at the same time she moves to the house. While there, Connie discovers that the house has no electricity, no phone, a mountain of grime encrusted furniture, a collection of filthy bottles, and a jungle-like yard, completely hiding the house from the road. 

The principle discovery on her grandmother's shelves is a Bible and key.  Inside the key, there is a tiny curled piece of paper with the name Deliverance Dane.  Connie's search for information about "Livvy" Dane leads her to various libraries, archives, auction houses, as she becomes more and more anxious to find Dane's missing 'receipt' book.  In the process, she meets Sam the steeple climber who is an old house restoration expert. 

Howe skillfully interweaves the story of Deliverance and her decendants -- and the story of her book-- with the present day story of Connie and her immediate antecedants -- and the story of her search for the book in alternating chapters.  We are lead inexorably to a climax where evil, romance, reconciliation, and historical conformation all meet. We are also lead to the ultimate question "Is Connie a witch? Does she possess certain mysterious powers she's only now discovering?"  We are left to decide on our own.  This  was a powerful, emminently readable, and exciting book: one I highly recommend.

Howe gives us a short but interesting list of sources to get us started on our own quest to find out more. 
This was an ARC I swapped with another blogger friend who highly recommended it.  Thanks to her (I can't remember who sent it to me) and to Hyperion Books who originally made it available. 

Review: The Recipe Club by Andrea Israel

This was quite an interesting read following on the heels of The Christmas Cookie Club. The Recipe Club is a Mercedes compared to Pearlman's Chevy. Recipe Club is a novel about friendship, a cookbook, and a history of the relationship of two women from the time they are in their pre-teens through their mid-twenties; then again after a 20+ year hiatus following "a disagreement", and to the present when they reunite.

The recipes are numerous and diverse, cleverly woven into the story of Lilly and Val, and their parents. The girls form a Recipe Club, correspond via mail, and help each other throughout their lives, up to the time when Val graduates from college.  They are as different as night and day. Neither set of parents would ever be nominated for parents of the year, and the girls help each other relate to the individual parents by seeing them through the other's eyes.

The book is written not just as a series of letters, interspersed with yummy recipes but also as emails (when the relationship takes up again in 2000) and also has a section written in normal fiction format.

It is an elegant, thoughtful, delicious book. You have to love the two characters, although you also want to smack them. You have to wonder how two people who are so different in so many ways, can stay such good friends. And then you wonder as you work your way through the book, what caused the estrangement.

The ending of the book was quite surprising to me, but I think I should have seen it coming. It's a well-written, well-planned book that will be enjoyed by women of all ages.

The characters have so much more depth than Pearlman's women, while dealing with many of the same real life issues.  It's amazing to read them back to back and compare.  There truly is no comparison.  If you have to read only one, pick The Recipe Club  You won't be disappointed.

Edited to add:  One of my LT buddies asked if I had tried any of the recipes yet.  Short answer: No, but.....I'm on the road and have marked a couple to try when I get back.  I realize people will want to know about the recipes, but this book stands alone as a novel....the recipes are frosting on the cake. (Pardon the pun.)

Hidden in Plain View Thursdays

Buckley: The Right Word: About the Uses and Abuses of Language, including Vocabulary; Usage; Style & Speaking; Fiction

by William F. Buckley, Jr.

Welcome to the weekly feature where we use Random.org to pick a book from our library shelves (real or virtual) and bring it out into daylight.  To join in, the 'rules' are here.

 Be sure to leave us a link to your post so we can compare notes.

This week's selection was hidden so well, I had to go to the attic annex to get it.  It looked so fascinating, it got promoted to the 'real' library downstairs.  Can you find it in the shot above? Answer at the bottom.

Now here's a title!!.  I discovered William F. Buckley Jr last year.  We inherited a number of his books from auntie, and I had one of them, The Blackford Oakes Reader in my 999 challenge for short stories.  It was so delightful, I have resolved to read at least two more during the coming year.  This one looks like a winner, although at 541 pages, it is not necessarily one you'd want to read from cover to cover.  Since it is formatted as an omnibus series of essays, interviews, and other presentations, it looks doable in short bursts.  It certainly looks like something that would be fun to browse through.

From the back cover: Buckley’s provocative observations on the use and abuse of English, gathered for the first time in a single volume - a “veritable cornucopia of language and logic that belongs in every library” (Library Journal). Edited by Samuel S. Vaughan.

Did you find it?  Hint: It's on the top shelf at the left end of the books--next to the angel and the picture frame.

Review: The Christmas Cookie Club

This book was part of the BEA Atrium Galley Grab earlier this summer, but I just couldn't bring myself to read about Christmas cookies in the heat.  I grabbed it earlier this week, and can't say I missed too much by waiting. It has good recipes, great little non-fiction essays on the history of various ingredients, like flour, butter, almonds, chocolate, vanilla, etc, loosely tied together by the stories of the 12 women who form the Christmas cookie club.

They meet the first Monday of December to exchange cookies and catch up for the year. Their stories are wooden, formulaic, and re-hash many of today's "women's" issues (sex, divorce, pregnancy, widowhood, money, sullen teenagers, aging parents, etc etc) with nothing much new to say about them. The author could have done a much better job of building some character into these women. They all seem like wax figures from a museum who spit out their stories when someone winds them up and it's their turn.

There seems to be a glut of these women's support group books being published, and it really is going to take some effort to come up with an angle that allows the group to present something fresh. This just didn't work for me. I enjoyed the food parts, but could have easily skipped the soap opera.

Sunday Salon

Sundays are supposed to be the day we relax, enjoy friends and family, take stock of what's been accomplished in the past week, and plan what's coming this week.  I don't even usually do a SS post because I'm generally too wrapped up doing whatever you're supposed to post about.  HOWEVER.........

This Sunday finds me trying to take a breath after a rather busy book week, and trying to get my mental arms around an upcoming ROAD TRIP this week.  So here's a quick splash of what's been happening and what's planned.

In the past two weeks I've gotten 8  books in my mailbox (either ARCs or contest winnings):

When Everything Changed by Gail Collins
Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
The Calligrapher's Daughter by Eugenia Kim
Secrets of a Christmas Box by S. Hornby
The Gift of Murder (A Holiday Crime Anthology I bought to benefit Toys 4 Tots)
The Recipe Club by  Andrea Israel and Nancy Garkinkel
Who Turned out the Lights by Scott Biddle and Jean Johnson
The Gift of an Ordinary Day by Katherine Kenison


I'm trying to decide what to take with me on this trip.  How much reading can I realistically expect to get done while visiting my Mom in Baltimore  (none--it's a fix the computer visit!),  my children (not much--too much food and catching up to do) and my granddaughter (none-girls are supposed to go shopping!).  So much for the first 5 days...

Then there's a week in Florida attending a Navy reunion (reading??? I don't think so) seeing old friends ("excuse me, I know we haven't seen each other in over 20 years, but there's a cozy mystery I need to read!!"), and then more friends on the way back north from FL to Maine.  We even have a planned stop in NJ to have lunch with hubbie's agent for his book (keep your fingers crossed!), so my only reading time will probably be early AM, late evening and in the car. Since there are a total of almost 60 hours in the car, I should be able to knock a couple off the TBR pile.

I'm trying to finish up my 2nd 999 Challenge over on LT, and decided at the last minute to re-arrange my categories to include a Christmas category.  So between now and Dec 31, I have 4 food books, 2 historical fiction, and 7 more Christmas books to finish up.

I think my New Year's Resolution is going to be NOT to add any more challenges to the two I have already for 2010: to read 75 books (that's a no-brainer), and to get at least bios read toward the US President Challenge.  So...here's what going with me when we leave town

• Calligrapher's Daughter and The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane for the historical fiction category.
• Irish Country Christmas (audio), for the Christmas category
• The Recipe Club for the food category
• Aunt Dimity Slays the Dragon and The Dead Cat Bounce for a feature I've been working on about amateur female cozy sleuths
• If You Need Me-- just because I want to read it.

Also my MP3 has 11 mysteries, 9 novels including The Shadow of the Wind which is my current 'ear-read', and 5 non-fictions loaded up, so I'll be able to dip into whatever floats my boat along the drive.  Hubbie and I have similar tastes so we often listen to either a non-fiction or a mystery in the car. In any case, there will be plenty of reviews coming in late November.

So it's going to be a busy week....I know I'll get at least 4-5 hours of listening in while I pack, and run errands around town, so stay tuned.  The laptop is going with me, and we'll be sending back a few pictures of our adventures.  In the meantime, enjoy the crisp autumn air, the beautiful colored foliage, and the smell of wood burning in the fireplace or woodstove. 

I think it's time for a walk ---where's my MP3?

Review: A Circle of Souls by Preetham Grandhi

All I can say is Wow!  Anyone who knows me can tell you that I don't normally read scary stories, stories about child murders, and I normally shun anything that is about the "paranormal."  So why am I reading so many of them lately?  A Circle of Souls was sent to my by the author Dr. Preetham Grandhi back in July and I'm ashamed that I haven't gotten to it sooner.  It's a winner!

I've finished it, and I'm not quaking in my boots, and I don't think I'm going to have nightmares.  While the subject matter is unpleasant, the writing is so crisp, clear and centered on the good guys that it quickly becomes a real page turner.

This debut book is extremely well-written, has a tightly woven plot, and well-developed characters.  Beginning with seemingly separate stories: a brutally murdered young girl and another young girl with hellacious nightmares, the author moves us inexhorably toward the meeting of these two separate stories and blends them believably into one.  In the beginning,  there are no clues to the murder, and no reason (either physical or mental) for the nightmares, but they are related, and the pychiatrist treating the young nightmare victim intuits their relationship from drawings made by his patient.  As he searches for the meaning of her drawings, and recognizes the locale in the pictures, he anguishes over how to help his patient and whether he should share his intuitions with the special FBI agent who has been called in to help local police investigate the case.

This is not a normal murder mystery suspense thriller.  The characters are the strong point in this story: even the bad guys are well developed, with sound background and motivation presented to pull the reader in.  There is a large dose of the paranormal entwined with Indian cultural traditions, and Jamaican/West African folklore.  There are several side issues and players building enough doubt in the reader's mind to make it interesting and challenging to figure out 'whodunit.'

It was written in short chapters that encouraged the reader to read 'just one more' before putting the book down, and in the end, to just continue reading to the climax.  Let's hope that Preetham Grandhi has more such well-written tales up his sleeve. 

Just a note:  I find it fascinating that two of the best books I've read this year are debut crime stories written by doctors...the other was "Wife of the Gods" by Dr. Kwei Quartey.  We may not be able to read their prescriptions, but their books are great.

Edited later to add a note:  I just found out that A Circle of Souls has just been announced as the winner of the General prize for Fiction in the 6th Annual National Best Books Awards sponsored by USA Book News. Congratulations to Dr. Grandhi.  It's nice to know others thought as much of this book as I did.

Review: Spellbinder by Helen Stringer

Move over Harry Potter!!  Belladonna Johnson is here!  This delightful book (an ARC) arrived earlier this week, and it looked so fascinating that I moved it to the top of the queue, and bumped a couple others I was reading to the side.  I finished this in a day.   It's billed for 9-12 yr olds, YA LIT, but this is going to be enjoyed by all ages from about 9 up (I'd be more inclined to say 10 or 11 but....)

Belladonna sees ghosts...she sees her parents, who died in an accident 2 years ago, but who still live at home with her and take care of her, although officially, she lives with her grandma who is still alive and who also sees ghosts. She sees the old man who used to run the launderette and various other friends no one else can see.  It can be embarassing though--all the kids at school think she's loony because she's always 'talking to herself.'

Things are going just fine, until her parents disappear to the Land of the Dead (THE OTHER SIDE) and she sets out to find them, and to prevent other dire and drastic occurences from happening.  She is accompanied in this adventure by another ghost Elsie, who 'died' tripping over a tennis net 100 years ago when she won her match, and by Steve--the school's bad boy who turns out to be very handy at breaking and entering and climbing and slaying hounds, and all those other things a spare manchild can be useful for.

This is a delightful book.  I don't read a lot of fantasy, but this one had me turning the pages as fast as I could gallop along to find out what happened next. There are beasties, and baddies, and wicked Queens, and spells, and elixirs, and magic rulers.  Everything one needs for a good old fashioned ghostie fantasy. It it due to be published this month, and I suspect it will become a runaway big seller.

Finally, I noticed--happily--that the ending left plenty of room for further adventures.  I hope so. Belladonna is a real winner.

Review: Chocolate- A Love story

Well.....the UPS man dropped off this ARC earlier this week.  I don't dislike chocolate, but I confess that I am by no means a chocaholic, so I thought this might spur me to dive more into this delicious (and good for you) ingredient.

This is a cookbook....there is very little text except for the recipes themselves.  It comes appropriately blurbed on the back cover by Paula Dean and John Travolta and Kelly Preston.

My husband always had chocolate cake with chocolate frosting for his birthday, a habit we've kinda gotten out of these past years.  Now I have the recipe for "my lost childhood chocolate birthday cake sprinkled with shiny colorful candy tears" (lower case is from the author!), and it looks like something I might be able to assemble although I've never tried to make chocolate ganache....

I myself could go for the 'therapeutic chocolate pot pie with a rich filling of soul-refreshing strawberries'.......at least it comes with a picture to tempt me.  And herein lies my big problem with this book: While the recipes are yummy looking, clearly written and come with 3-4 lines of 'teaser text', the pictures are IMHO AWFUL.  I am not an art deco person, and when I pick up a cookbook, I want to see a picture of what this is supposed to look like when I'm finished mixing all these ingredients together.  I don't want to see something that looks like a 1st grader made it from torn construction paper.

There's chocolate rice pudding, meaningless sweet spaghetti, and bad-boy chocolate pizza. And then there's 'miltary porridge' with the following introduction:

My love, three years have passed since I last saw you.  So many things are changing around me and the war seems endless.  Only this late afternoon ritual, standing in the long line of soldiers in front of the huge aluminum saucepans covered with steam leaves me with the feeling that after all there are some things that never change in life.  Still waiting for your letter.

This is on a page opposite a very tacky art deco sillouette of helmets atop rifles, with a tank and a missile in the background.  Ok...what pray tell does that have to do with food?  The recipe appears to be a semolina  bowl of grits/polenta type gruel, topped with sugar, water, heavy cream, stirred together to make a toffee sauce, and sprinkled with milk choc chips...I guess we have to be there.
 
In spite of its avant garde-ness, it's a fun book.  If you don't mind the illustrations, and you love chocolate, this is the book for you.  It definitely fills a void in my cookbook collection.   I just wish it weren't so gosh darn UGLY.  Now I just have to make sure my membership is in good standing at the Y!

Many thanks to Hachette Books for the review copy.

Mini Review: The Mysterious Affair at Styles

Normally, I would have included this in my weekly audio post, but since this is my very first Agatha Christie I wanted to post it separately.  I've seen several Hercule Poirot mysteries on TV, and Agatha Christie has received millions of words of praise for her writing abilities, so I have no intention of doing a formal review.

The Mysterious Affair at Styles is the first Poirot story in which not only Poirot, but also Hastings, his sidekick are introduced.  Poirot's sartorial fastidiousness, his tendency to assume Hastings is making the same assumptions he does--only to discover that Hastings is often in the dark--and his meticulous methodology are well established even in this first story.

I found reading this (even with my ears) a delightful experience and look forward to many more Christies.  I think that I had been afraid that perhaps the writing would have had an old-fashioned stiltedness that I would find boring.  I assure you it wasn't the case.  This was every bit as fun as the TV series--in fact I suspect I will find the rest even more so.

Nadia May(aka Davina Porter) did her usual good job of narration.

Review: True Compass by Edward M. Kennedy

I have always been a fan of the entire Kennedy clan, so it is hard for me to be objective when 'reviewing' this book. It is well written with typical Kennedy lyric prose; it is well-organized into sections that are somewhat different from a typical lineal time-line autobiography; it contains dozens of photographs that are not the standards we're used to seeing; and most important, it gives us an insight into a man who may be the least known of the famous family. 

When I say least known, I don't mean unfamous or not well-known, but more private in terms of sharing his thoughts and inner motivations.  The influence of his parents, and his older brothers is beautifully explained, as well as his love of sailing,the sea (hence the title) and his home state Massachussetts.

We are treated to stories about his relations with his parents, all his siblings and their spouses, his children and grandchildren, both his wives, his dozens of nieces and nephews, and his close friends.  In these, his introspection shines, as he opens the door to his feelings and emotions which have often been tucked away from public view.

His respect for the Senate, and his pride in having served there for so long and so well, are quite evident, providing us with some of the most eloquent prose in the book, although here the book could have done with a bit of editing down...there was lots of detailed information about meetings, and phone calls and bargains struck that probably could have been pared a bit.  At times I had to force myself not to flip to the next page or paragraph.

His love for his family is especially evident in the chapter where he speaks of the period 1994-1999, of being buffeted by the deaths of his mother at age 104, his nephew Michael in a skiing accident, Jackie Onnasis, and his nephew John Kennedy Jr in a plane crash -- all within five years.  As the surviving patriarch, he is called upon to eulogize all of them, a feat that requires him to keep his own grief somewhat tucked in. 

In the end of this he quotes his father in a letter Joe Kennedy Sr wrote to a grieving friend on the loss of his son:

"There are no words to dispel your feelings at this time, and there is no time that will ever dispel them...I cannot share your grief, because no one could share mine.  When one of your children goes out of your life, you think of what he might have done with a few more years, and you wonder what you are going to do with the rest of yours.  Then one day, because there is a world to be lived in, you find yourself a part of it again, trying to accomplish something--something that he did not have time enough to do.  And, perhaps, that is the reason for it all.  I hope so."

Ted Kennedy continues:  "I wish that life were simpler.  I wish that loved ones didn't have to die too young.  I wish that tragedy never haunted a single soul.  But to wish all that is to ask for an end to our humanity.  God, family, and country sustain us all."

His indomitable spirit, inherited from parents, and nourished by his experiences in this incredible family, has left us all enriched.  His memoir provides us with the inspiration to continue his work.

Thanks to Hachete Books for making this review copy available and for letting me host the giveaway we completed last week.

Review: Shanghai Girls by Lisa See

Having never read any of Lisa See's books, I wasn't sure what to expect.  I finished this one earlier this week, but had to let it settle before I could decide how I felt about it.  I have purposely not read other reviews, although one of my online books buds at LT said she hadn't read the book yet because the reviews had been mixed.

Normally I try to describe the characters, the setting, enough of the plot to spark an interest and then comment on how I liked (or didn't like the book).

The characters: May and Pearl are sisters born in Shanghai who were raised by parents much more liberal and open-minded about the role of women than their ancestors.  Although their mother suffers from having had her feet bound as an infant, the girls are able to wear high heels, work as models, go to nightclubs, keep the money they earned (they gave it to their father to 'invest' for them) and generally enjoy the good life.  However, the father turns out to have gambled the family's money away, and to pay off his debts to the Chinese mafia, he arranges marriages for his daughters to Chinese living in America, something their mother had promised would never happen.

The setting: We are treated to a very realistic description of Shanghai (I've seen it described as the Paris of the Orient) in the 1930's.  Then once the Japanese invade China, we see the Chinese countryside with all its poverty and desperation and we must endure the horrors visited upon the Chinese by their invaders. Then we are transported to Angel's Island off the coast of California, where the sisters are incarcerated for almost a year waiting to be believed that they are in fact married to American citizens.  The Angel's Island scenes are evokative of a combination of Ellis Island and concentration camps, and while they can be depressing, they are enobling in the scenes of women taking care of each other. After their release from Angel's Island, the sisters settle with their husbands' family (they married brothers) in the Chinatown section of Los Angeles.

From here the book is devoted to a description of the Chinese immigrants who live in America and who are divided into the group who longs to return to 'the old country' and those who want to assimilate into American life and wants their children to have a better life (AKA The american Dream).  As the anti-communist campaign in American heats up in the 1950's, we see the results of secrets kept, lies told, papers lost, and dreams shattered.  The constant conflict between the old and the new, the wish to honor one's past and one's ancestors, and still belong to the present makes this a compelling story.

I enjoyed this book, I learned a lot about many subjects where I knew very little, and I developed an appreciation for the trials of all immigrants- legal and illegal.  I wish the ending had been different, (can't say anymore without a spoiler) but I was left with the thought that there may be room for a sequel.  That way one could see the ending here as the precursor to a new beginning and that's what immigration and settlement in a new country are all about.

I 'read' this book as an audio- it was a download from the public library's Overdrive database.

Review: The Sea Chest by Toni Buzzeo

" Tutu" is hawaiian for 'grandmother' and although this Tutu doesn't usually review children's books, this one is super special. Toni Buzzeo, the author, is a fellow Maine librarian, author of many gorgeous children's books, and when this one came into our town library last week, Tutu could not resist buying one to give to our grand-daughter for her upcoming birthday. Buzzeo has a long list of wonderful children's books to her credit, and I urge you to take a look on her webpage, if for no other reason than to dispel the stereotype of the uptight, rigid librarian of mythology.

Besides the beautiful prose, the illustrations by Mary GrandPre (she of Harry Potter cover fame) which are done in oils, are breathtaking.

The story, one of quiet beauty, portrays the intense loneliness of the life of a small girl living alone with her parents on an island off the coast of Maine where the lighthouse helped protect ships at sea. A violent storm washes ashore a seachest with a special treasure inside. This gorgeous book is spellbinding for the 4-8 age group, and inspiring for adults. The illustrations are absolutely spectacular.

If you are looking for a special gift for a special child, this is it. If you don't have a special child in your life, then treat the child in yourself and wallow in this book for awhile. It's a stunner.

Heads up FTC: Although we both work in Maine libraries, I've never met Toni Buzzeo, and paid for this book myself.