March was not my best month. I read 10 books, but only 3 of them were above average for me. But, as I've often said, just because the book wasn't for me, it doesn't mean it won't be for you. I had a range of genres, four backlisted books, one second in a series and 3 authors that I had read other books they have written. Half of the books I had checked out from the library, while half of them had been sitting on my shelf waiting for me to pick them up.
"Hail Mary" was my book for my 12 Books in 12 Months challenge that was recommended by Christa Resweber. "Five Decembers" was recommended to me by Bill Gautreau and was our Book Club read this month. "Will" was the book that I had gotten from out Book Club Christmas book swap. "The Nothing Man" and "The Current" were both books I had originally heard of from Currently Reading Podcast. As always, if you have any to recommend, please let me know. It may take me a while, but I will get around to reading it.
Tim Johnson
It's the dead of winter when Audrey and her roommate hit the road from Memphis to Minnesota. They are going to see Audrey's dad who is dying from lung cancer. Their trip is cut short when their car ends up in the icy Black Root River. One girl drowns, and the other survives. The plunge into the river is not accident, and it is not the first time that a young girl has been found in the river. The survivor sets out to discover how Holly ended up in the river 10 years ago. This journey opens her eyes to the violence, deceit and truths that lie just below the surface of the town in which she grew up.
This first book in March was a real disappointment to me. I have had this on my bookshelf since May of last year. I had heard about this on the Currently Reading Podcast where Meredith gave it a rare 5 star review. I usually agree with Meredith, but not on this one.
This book was slow going. I felt there were a lot of words, and there were some great lines that stood out. However, I felt that the number of words didn't result in that much depth. The chapters alternate between POV's and at times it took me a little reading before I knew which character it was. They all seemed to have the same voice, even though they had different experiences.
The blurb about the book says there is a connection between the two drownings. This is a little misleading as the connection is a tenuous one at best. The connection is through her dad, who was the sheriff at the time. I kept expecting more of a connection and only mention this - not as a spoiler - but because I may have enjoyed the book a little more if I wasn't waiting on the discovery of how they were tied together.
While I'm fine with a plot driven book, I like to have a balance of character development too. When it's missing, I find that I don't care that much about the story. I prefer to feel as if I really know the people instead of being a "peeping Tom" of sorts. I didn't get that at all from this book.
I will say that my opinion of the book is not with the mainstream readers if Goodreads is an indication. On Good reads it is rated by over 6,700 readers at an average of 3.63 stars.
My rating -
⭐ 1/2
Louise Fein
This is a historical fiction book based during the time of the build up to WWII. Eleanor and William Hamilton are Londoners who have the "dream life." He is a celebrated war hero who has parlayed his fame into a career and campaign in the area of eugenics. Eleanor and William are both believers that people who have certain diseases and/or personality disorders should not be afforded the same education as others, should be institutionalized and should not have the right to reproduce. They are convinced that it is a genetic issue that cannot be resolved. The couple comes face to face with these beliefs when their daughter, Mabel, is diagnosed with epilepsy.
In addition to their decision about how to handle this discovery, William is harboring a secret about his past. Eleanor also is keeping secrets from her husband about her sister, Rose. William is spending more and more time with supporters of eugenics, including several well known men from America, furthering his career, while Eleanor is staying home.
This book was another disappointment. The plot summary I had read led me to believe that the book was going to be centered completely on Mabel. In reality, Mabel is almost a side character until near the end. While we find out early that she has epilepsy, mention of her is scant. She is put away in the nursery and occasionally there is an update about how she is doing. There is rare mention of any interaction between her mother and her during most of this time. This made it hard for me to understand Eleanor's reaction when the decision was made to send Mabel away.
If I had gone into this book knowing that it was more about the eugenics movement as a whole, the relationship of Eleanor and William and the secrets they had, and not primarily focused on Mabel and her situation, I would have enjoyed the book more. I also did not connect to Ms Fein's writing style.
My opinion of this goes against the majority of readers who have rated it, once again. I'm not sure what that says about me, but for me -
⭐⭐
Will Smith with Mark Manson
I've seen this book classified as Memoir, Self-help and Auto-biography. I see it as a mixture of all three. This is the story all about how.... It covers Will Smith's life from youth until now. Along the story, he drops nuggets of thoughts about various areas of life. Most of them come from others in his life such as his dad, mom or grandmother. There are also 2 sections of pictures through the years.
I enjoyed the first part of this book. The young, growing up, finding his place Will was fun to get to know. He told a lot about his family and friends and the life he lived day to day. It was written in an entertaining yet truthful way. As the book went on, it changed though, I guess just like Will did. It was still fairly honest about Will - blemishes and all - but became more of a "pat myself on the back" book. I lost count of how many times he pointed out that he was the most successful movie star at the time. He even lists his movies and their statistics at one point. I agree that is something to be proud of, but for that long of a book, I wanted more along the lines of the chapters where he talked about making "Ali" and less of the "look at me".
During the last half I felt that he was more discerning about the blemishes he showed, which is his right. We don't always want to expose everything about ourselves. The problem though was he would mention an event that would happen and there would be no real background to it. For example, he goes through several paragraphs talking about how close his son and he had gotten. Then - boom - his son is seeking to be emancipated. Why? What happened? Will just explains it as something a lot of kids his sons age does. Really?! I've known a lot of kids, but none that did that. Grant it I run in a different social strata, but I don't think the majority of kids do that. I also felt that way about some of the things he covered about his marriage to Jada. Let me say again, that is his right not to tell, but he opened up those questions because of things he did tell.
I have issues with some of the choices he has made in his life and some of his actions. I've tried to separate those from the book as a whole. In other words, I've tried to not let my thoughts about him as a person affect my thoughts about the book. But I know that always is an influence. So overall an average read for me.
As a side note - I wrote these thoughts before the now famous slap. You might can tell that I was not surprised by any of it whether real or staged.
⭐⭐⭐
Andy Weir
Ryland Grace is minding his own business, teaching middle school science, when he is called upon to save earth. As the story begins, he finds himself on a mission that he remembers nothing about, alone with only a computer to "talk to" and he must figure out not only the past, but the present and what to do in the future. The printed synopsis says it is a "tale of discovery, speculation, and survival." I think it is a story best discovered as it unfolds and not told about in advance so I'll leave it at that.
It is science fiction, so I had to suspend my belief several times. That is hard for me to do in some stories, and not so hard in others. I am also not a science junkie, so when Mr. Weir starts explaining things using scientific terms and equations, I would just skip over the section. All I need to know is the pressure is high, low or perfect. 😃
The characters in this book were interesting. The interactions between them all helped define them. Parts of the story that I don't want to reveal because of spoiler potential, made me think - not so much about the plot but about relationships.
This is the type book that at times I was totally engrossed in but at other times I fought to keep my attention on it. I also had a hard time with the main protagonist being a middle school science teacher. Having read "The Martian" I also kept thinking about how the trope in this was so similar - a man left in space by himself.
This was one of my 12 Books in 12 Months books and was recommended by Christa Resweber. I had it on my TBR list already and in fact had checked it out in e-book form previously. I started it but just wasn't ready for it then. I still had it on my list so was glad it came up.
I had heard a lot of good things about it and I'm glad I read it. If you like Sci-Fi and read "The Martian" and liked it, then be sure and pick this one up.
⭐⭐⭐
Kevin Wilson
A story of a woman, Lillian, who finds meaning and love in her life when she is called upon by her only friend, Madison, to be the caretaker of her twin step kids. Madison and her husband are high society in Tennessee where he is involved in politics. They both have higher aspirations, which could be derailed if the press discover that the twins have a rare condition that causes them to spontaneously combust when they get upset. Lillian assesses her dead end life and figures she has nothing to lose by taking on the challenge of trying to help the kids control this while keeping them hidden away from the public.
Kevin Wilson is the master of the quirky story with a deeper meaning. For some reason, I can suspend my belief when reading his books and totally accept that the twins catch on fire, yet do not suffer harm. I totally had all the feels for Lillian and the twins as their relationship developed. A story to make you think about what it is like to be a kid and how we all just need to be loved.
⭐⭐⭐
Catherine Ryan Howard
Eve is a survivor. Her entire family was killed when she was 12 years old by the Nothing Man. He earned that name when he was able to commit several crimes, each building in violence, while leaving absolutely no clues. Her family was the last act of violence. Now, as an adult, Eve is obsessed with finding the man responsible for ruining her life.
Jim Doyle is a retired LEO, who is now a supermarket security guard. He has just been made aware of, and begun reading Eve's true crime memoir, "The Nothing Man". He is interested in this book because Jim Doyle is the Nothing Man. As he reads, he begins to see how close to the truth Eve is getting and he has a decision to make about how far to go to stop her.
Oh my! This is a thriller - which is not a descriptive word I often use. There are few books that make me nervous when I read them, but this one did. Catherine Ryan Howard pulled me in with her writing and kept me on the ride throughout the book. The point of view told by both Eve and Jim was a perfect balance. I liked reading Eve's book while getting a glimpse into Jim's mind and I especially liked Catherine Ryan Howard getting a mention in the Acknowledgement section.
Thanks to Currently Reading Podcast and Meredith Schwartz for putting this on my radar. This is my second book by Catherine Ryan Howard and she is becoming a "must read" author for me. I like her style, her plots and her characters. So well written that I had to remind myself it was fiction and not true crime.
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
J Ryan Stradal
A family is split when a father leaves the family farm to the younger daughter, Helen, and nothing to the older one, Edith. Edith is left struggling through life to make ends meet while staying estranged from her sister, Helen, who uses the inheritance to start a brewery. Meanwhile Edith's granddaughter grows up knowing that she needs to be tougher than her grandmother. Through her work ethic she earns the opportunity to learn the IPA business from the ground up. Her goal is to change their family fortune. And who knows - maybe a side benefit will be reuniting the family.
This was an entertaining multigenerational family story. I enjoyed getting to know the women, even though at the same time I would have liked a little more character development. I needed a lighter read after "The Nothing Man' and this one delivered that. It wasn't a fluff piece, but it also didn't require any deep thinking. It is just a nice family saga with strong women.
⭐⭐⭐
Alexandra Andrews
Florence Darrow is working at a publishing company, striving to advance and become an author. Out of the blue, she is given the chance to be the assistant to the famous debut author, Maud Dixon. Maud Dixon is the pen name for Helen, an anonymous author who nobody knows the true identity of except for her agent, and now Florence. Florence jumps at the chance, seeing it as her big break. She soon finds Helen to be a little difficult, but she takes in the lessons that Helen gives her.
Things take a darker turn when Helen takes Florence with her to Morocco to do research for her current novel. After a car accident where Florence ends up in the hospital and Helen is nowhere to be found and presumed dead, Florence becomes Helen, and begins to imagine stepping into the role of Maud Dixon.
This book has been all over the internet and was sitting on my shelf for a little while. I was excited about getting in to it as the premise had intrigued me. Unfortunately, I was disappointed. First off, the book starts slowly. I can't think of a single character I liked and there were some unbelievable coincidences, plus I had a lot of it figured out fairly early on. I also had a hard time with Helen's characters age. The story and dialogue had me picturing her as a much older woman. When Florence starts to take on Helen's identity, I had to remind myself that Helen and Florence were almost the same age so she could pull it off. I can sometimes overlook all these things in a story, but there were just too many of them here. I was expecting so much more.
⭐⭐⭐
James Kestrel
It's December, 1941, and a Hawaii detective, Joe McGrady, is assigned a homicide case that will change his life forever. The trail for the murderer will lead him across the Pacific just as World War II is beginning. This is the story of the crime, McGrady's survival, the affects of war and love and loss.
I first heard of this book when it was recommended by a friend, Bill Gautreau. Almost immediately after he recommended it, I started seeing it on social media. Most everyone said the same thing - ignore the cover, read the book. I have to agree with them. The cover is a 🙄. I guess it ties loosely to the story, but it gives a different impression about what the book is about compared to what it really is about.
I would call this book Crime Noir. McGrady, our protagonist, is a likable guy and I got invested in him and wanting to see how things ended. The characters were well developed. Mr. Kestrel did a great job of setting the mood and time frame. I felt as if it were written in the 1940's. There's not a lot of time spent solving the crime, but it is always there in the background. Well written and a nice change of pace.
This was the book picked for our Book Club read this month. Due to a couple of circumstances, we haven't been able to meet yet. I'm looking forward to hearing how the rest of the ladies felt about it.
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Holly Jackson
Pip is back on the trail. When Connor's brother, Jamie, disappears, Pip agrees to help find him. She sets out interviewing people, following clues and including what she is finding on her podcast. The police are sure that Jamie, being an adult, is not truly missing, but his family believes differently. Pip is determined to find out which is right. Sal is once again helping Pip along with her best friend, Cara.
I didn't enjoy this second book as much as I enjoyed "A Good Girl's Guide to Murder". The writing felt just a little "off" to me. I don't know why. While the story is different, in a lot of ways it is the same. Pip is able to get people to talk to her that normally a High School senior would be shut out from. She also has a lot of independence, leaving the house without telling anyone for example. I understand sneaking out some, but at times it would be a phone call at night and out she goes. I don't know how realistic that is for most families.
There was a little foreshadowing for the ending, but overall, it didn't fit that well to me. It felt just a little forced. I don't often read Young Adult, so that may be some of the reason I didn't enjoy it that much. I might not understand the rhythm of it.
⭐⭐⭐
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