First post for December...

It’s mid-afternoon on the first weekend of December, and I’m starting to feel all the stress that this season always brings.  Good thing I’m taking some time to enjoy a steaming cup of chai and a delicious Date Bar as I write this post.  I’ve even got a kitty on my lap (typing with one hand) and the fireplace channel on to help create a relaxing mood.

Yesterday my Volunteer Book Group met to discuss Christmas Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella.  I’ve never read any books in this series, figuring that they would be too “fluffy” for me, and they are... except sometimes you need a bit of fluff.  This book hit the spot after my last book about the Nazi officer’s wife, and while this is last in the series, I think you can read it without knowing what went on in the main character’s life previously.  Becky Brandon, née Bloomwood, is living in a cottage in the small British village of Leatherby with her husband Luke and daughter Minnie.  Her friend Suze lives nearby and has given Becky a job helping out at the gift shop at Suze’s stately home.  It’s Christmas, a season Becky loves.  But this year things are going to be a bit different.  Becky’s parents have offered their home in nearby Oxshott to her half-sister, Jess, who is coming back from mission work in Chile for a time, and they’ve rented an apartment in a trendy neighbourhood in London.  This means that Becky will have to host Christmas for the first time ever, and she is feeling more than a little panicked about it.  She wants it to be perfect for everyone, but there seems to be some tension between her parents and their best friends.  She also suspects that Jess is having marital problems but can’t pry any details out of her.  There's also the fact that Becky’s former boyfriend and hunky rock star just happens to show up at the gift shop asking for her.  And how will she ever find that perfect gift for Luke when he claims to only want aftershave?  This book was both hilarious and totally unbelievable.  Being a huge shopper myself, I could totally empathize with Becky, although she takes shopping to a whole other level!  There was a passage I love near the beginning of the book when she is talking about going to London to do her Christmas shopping and she talks about how much she’s missed it, the sights, the sounds, the smells, the whole shopping experience.  She says: ”I mean, I’ve shopped online, obviously.  But that’s a whole different activity.  In fact, they should invent a different word for it.  Online ordering isn’t really shopping, it’s “procuring”.  You procure stuff online.  But you don’t get the buzz of actually stepping into a shop and seeing all the gorgeous stuff, feeling it, stroking it, being seduced by it.”  (p 62-63).  Just yesterday I ordered a new winter coat online and I thought of these exact words.  I wasn’t “seduced” by this coat, I just ordered it out of necessity.  I, too, prefer to be seduced by all that retail stores have to offer.  My book group didn’t spend much time discussing the book, which brought home the very reason that we don’t read many light, fluffy books for book club - there isn’t much to talk about!  We all liked Becky’s spunkiness and ability to stay “up”, even when things look like they aren’t going to work out.  We liked her resourcefulness and her ability to create stories on the spot to cover her activities.  We enjoyed reading about her antics and agreed that this was much like those Christmas movies that are on tv so much over the holidays.  I’ll admit that I shed a tear or two at the emotional ending, and I thought Jess’ idea for environmentally conscious, ethical gifts was brilliant.  All in all, I think it was just the type of book we all needed at this point, and I think it also got us thinking about all the things we still have to do before the “big day”, but still with plenty of time to get everything done.  I’m curious to read the first book, and would be happy to read the others, just not too many in succession.  Maybe I’ll see if Confessions of a Shopaholic is available as an audiobook.  

That’s all for today.  Stay warm and have a wonderful Sunday afternoon!

Bye for now…
Julie

On the joys of little free libraries...

It’s very early on this chilly Sunday morning.  There is a dusting of snow right now and more is expected to fall throughout the day.  Good thing I have my steaming cup of chai to keep me company as I begin this blog.

I finished reading a book that I found in one of the little free libraries that are everywhere these days.  It is something I would never have sought out in a public library for a couple of reasons.  First, it is non-fiction, which I hardly ever read.  Second, since the public library has so many books, I would probably never have chosen this, instead going for some other book that I thought would be more to my liking.  So it was serendipitous that I was at the right little free library (not one I normally go to) at the right time.  The book in question is The Nazi Officer’s Wife by Edith Hahn Beer.  This memoir tells the story of how one Jewish woman from Vienna survived the Holocaust by becoming a “u-boat”, or a Jew hiding in German society.  Edith was just finishing up her law degree when the violence of Kristallnacht brought home the reality of Hitler’s terror.  She was expelled from the university and sent to work on a farm, then in a factory, and once she returned home, she realized that the only way to survive the growing threat of anti-Semitic laws and widespread hatred of the Jews was to assume a Christian identity and hope this deception was never discovered.  I can’t give away any more details, but let me tell you that this was one of those books that I just could not put down.  The story and the writing style grabbed me immediately and didn’t let go until the very last page, which I turned, hoping for one more chapter.  The conversational tone, as though she were telling her story over a cup of coffee, really made this story accessible.  She wasn’t out to teach a lesson, only to convey her story so others could understand what she and many others went through in order to survive.  I would highly recommend this to anyone with an interest in WWII history and memoirs, especially women’s stories.  

That’s all for today.  Stay warm and keep reading!

Bye for now…
Julie

A very short post on a very November day...

I love November.  I love seeing the bare branches with just a few brightly coloured leaves still clinging to them.  I love that you can see the cardinals flitting around in the bare bushes.  I love the crispness of the air and the way this always makes me feel invigorated.  I love that we change the clocks back to regular time so the mornings are brighter. I love that there are often days in November when the weather is perfect for reading.

Alas, I did not have time to read this past week, as I was hosting a Scholastic Book Fair in my library and had two Family Night events, as well as a Friends Book Club meeting on Monday.  I look forward to this coming week, when things will hopefully get a bit more back to normal.

I thought I would quickly talk about Tana French, as I am re-listening to one of her books, The Trespasser, as an audiobook.  I love her books in the “Dublin Murder Squad” series, as well as her standalone novel, The Witch Elm.  Her “Murder Squad” books take place in, you guessed it, Dublin! where an elite squad of detectives try to solve complex murders.  These psychological murder mysteries are interesting because they don’t feature the same cast of characters in each book, such as the “Detective Alan Banks” series by Peter Robinson.  Rather, in the first book, In the woods, Rob Ryan and Cassie Maddox pair up to solve a murder that may be connected to a cold case.  The next book features Cassie and veteran detective Frank Mackey.  The following book focuses on Frank Mackey and follows what I assume is the pattern by introducing another detective with whom Mackey works that will then be the main detective in the next book, and so on and so on.  I find this “chain” pattern to be more interesting than just having the same main character leading the team of police to solve the mysteries, since just as much of the novels I’ve read so far have been taken up with the development of characters and relationships as with the actual criminal investigations.  Her books have won many awards, and I can completely understand why.  They are very complex and “meaty” (to use a non-vegetarian term), so while I have the second book in the series on my shelf upstairs, one I haven’t read yet, I am putting off reading it until I have a good solid chunk of time to really sit and read and appreciate the character development, the psychological aspects of the book, the relationships between characters, and the absorbing writing style.  I would recommend these books to anyone who enjoys gritty British mysteries (even though these are Irish) or psychological thrillers.

That’s all for today.  Stay warm and keep reading!

Bye for now…
Julie

Post on a cold, rainy November morning...

It’s cold and windy and it’s just started to rain (turning to snow later this afternoon), so it’s a perfect day for writing about books and reading them, too!  I’ve got a steaming cup of chai, a delicious Date Bar and a slice of freshly baked Banana Bread to help me through this rather miserable fall day.

My Friends Book Club will be meeting virtually (due to rising covid cases) tomorrow night to discuss Lisa Wingate’s novel Before We Were Yours.  Told from the points of view of Avery Stafford and Rill Foss, this novel tells the story of the Tennessee Children’s Home Society and the horrific practices that went on from the 1930s to the 1950s and the blind eyes that were turned to allow them to continue.  Avery is a young woman whose family is steeped in US politics. Her side of the story is set in present day and begins with her and her father attending ribbon-cutting ceremonies and press conferences in Tennessee.  Her father is ill and she has returned home to help out, while also being groomed to take his place in the US Senate in the event of his decline, despite having a successful law practice in Washington.  Her fiancé is also her childhood friend whose family remains close to the Staffords.  Both mothers are eager to set a date and begin wedding plans, but the couple keep putting things off for one reason or another.  When Avery attends an event with her father at a Retirement Home celebrating a resident’s 100th birthday, an elderly woman approaches and clutches her arm, claiming to recognize her and commenting on her dragonfly bracelet, an heirloom from her grandmother.  This brief interaction marks the beginning of Avery's journey in her quest to find out who the woman is and what her connection might be to her Grandma Judy.  Rill’s story begins in 1939 on a riverboat, the Arcadia, on the Mississippi River where she, her three sisters and her brother live with Briny and Queenie, their father and mother.  Queenie is in labour and it is not going well.  When Briny reluctantly takes Queenie to the hospital in Memphis, on the advice of the midwife, some corrupt police officers come and take the children away and deliver them to the Tennessee Children’s Home Society, run by Georgina Tann and Mrs Murphy.   Since Rill is twelve years old and the eldest child in the Foss family, she was given responsibility by Briny to take care of her brother and sisters, but she can do nothing to save them from the cruelty, neglect and brutality of the Home.  These children and many others were housed, or should I say “warehoused”, in a network of orphanages in deplorable conditions with the plan to “sell” them under the guise of adoption to wealthy families, families that were often blackmailed afterwards and forced to pay huge sums to Tann to keep their dirty little secret.  Rill's sections of the book focus on her attempts to save herself and her siblings and return to the Arcadia and to their parents. The two stories eventually came together and, along with the author's note at the back of the book, answered all of this reader's questions. This was an interesting book dealing with a topic I knew nothing about, and it was a real page-turner, as I really wanted to know what happened next and how things ended up for both Rill and Avery.  I may write more about this next week if there are things I want to highlight from our discussion, but I’m guessing everyone in my group enjoyed it.  It really called into question the notion of Nature vs Nurture, and whether children are better off being raised in poverty by biological parents or in relative comfort by adoptive parents.  I would recommend this book if you like reading about these types of stories, especially ones based on real events, or if you have read and enjoyed Christina Baker Kline’s Orphan Train. 

That’s all for today.  Take care, stay warm, and keep reading!

Bye for now…
Julie

Quick post on a long-ish weekend...

You’d think that, with the extra hour we got today because of the clocks going back, I’d be more on top of things, but alas, I’ve managed to overbook my hour and now it’s late afternoon on a gorgeously golden day and I’ve still got plenty more to do before I rest., so this will, once again, be a short post.

My Volunteer book club met yesterday to discuss Yann Martel’s amazing book, Life of Pi, and everyone loved it.  This book tells the story of sixteen-year-old Pi Patel, the son of a zookeeper in India in the 1970s.  When the Patels decide to emigrate to Winnipeg, they board a ship with some of their animals that are being delivered to other zoos, but tragedy strikes and the ship sinks, with Pi being the lone survivor… except for a zebra, a hyena, an orangutan and a Bengal tiger.  Pi must manage his own “zoo” on the small lifeboat and hopefully save himself and as many animals as possible.  His days at sea are both monotonous and adventurous, and packed with details about his survival skills and his interactions with Richard Parker, the tiger who is his constant companion.  This book is about so much more than I can summarize here that I will just say that it was a fabulous reread for me and a real adventure for my book club members who have never read it before.  They commented that it was a “unique story”, that “everything was unexpected”, and that they “didn’t know where (the story) was going from minute to minute”.   They found the characters fascinating, and they wondered how Martel knew so much about the psychology of animals.  It was a book about zoology and theology, politics and human-animal connections.  We discussed the ending at length and, while I don’t want to give anything away, I’ll just say that we all liked the story about Pi and Richard Parker better than the other one.  If you haven’t already read this Booker Prize-winning novel, I would strongly recommend that you give it a try.

That’s all for today.  Enjoy the lovely mild fall weather.

Bye for now…
Julie

Another quick post...

It’s late afternoon on Halloween and I’ve got a treat for myself, a Date Bar and cup of Mulled Apple Cider, no tricks required.  I will briefly tell you about the books I’ve started over the past week, but that’s as much as I can offer. My friend read my blog post about audiobooks and was intrigued by the description of A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki, so he read it and loved it.  He asked if I’d read her newest book, The Book of Form and Emptiness and I said no, that I had it but haven’t had time to read it.  I started reading the three library books I picked up last weekend but none of them grabbed me so I thought, what the heck!  I only have four days before I have to start my next book club book, and The Book of Form and Emptiness is nearly 600 pages, but why not start it right now?  So I did… and I was sucked in immediately.  I want to say that, so far, Benny is a less intriguing character than Nao, but the writing and observations and the way things are expressed are so very… Ozecki, that I think I’m going to love it!  Alas, I’m less than a fifth of the way in and now I must wait two weeks until I can continue reading it, as I have two book club meetings back-to-back.  *sigh* But on the plus side, the book my group is discussing next Saturday is Yann Martel’s Life of Pi, which I’ve read before but I’ve forgotten what a truly wonderful book it is.  I just started it last night, and I was so very impressed with his expressions and his brilliant use of language.  Actually, Ozeki and Martel (at least Life of Pi) are similar in that they use language simply but fully, with expressions that are deeply meaningful.  I think it’s going to be a good reading week.

That’s all for now.  Take care and have a Happy Halloween!

Bye for now... Julie

Late afternoon post...

I’ve got to start thinking about getting ready for work tomorrow, but I wanted to get this post done today instead of waiting until next week (by then I might have forgotten what I read or what it was about!)

I finished Good Mothers Don’t by East Coast author Laura Best.  This is her first novel for adults and it was mostly very good.  Elizabeth McKay is a wife and mother in rural Nova Scotia in 1960.  She has a great husband and two lovely children, so what could be wrong, and why does she behave strangely so often?  Turns out that she has mental health issues that significantly impact her ability to care for her family… and herself.  When things get worse after her father’s death, she is sent to a psychiatric hospital, where she undergoes treatments and therapies to help her “get well”.  Fifteen years later, she is living in a group home and doesn’t remember much about her past, but she hangs on to the five words that are the key to opening the door as she struggles to learn her “truth”.  Told from various points of view and shifting from past to present, this novel explores isolation and connection, mental health issues and treatments in the 1960s, and what it means to be family.  I loved this book until about two thirds of the way through, but found that the ending, at least for me, was a bit flat. I guess I was expecting more, or not necessarily “more”, but maybe “different”.  Anyway, it was a good book, well-written, with believable characters, exploring serious topics, so I would recommend this to anyone who is interested in domestic fiction.

That’s all for today.  Enjoy the lovely fall weather and stay dry this coming week!

Bye for now…
Julie