Book lover, collector, and reviewer
This book is told from the perspectives of three women: Sarah, Connie, and Anna. Sarah is a London restaurant owner who leaves her husband (after the police start questioning her about his business practices) and returns to her family home to spend more time with her father. She ends up buying an old house to … Read More “The Orphan House by Ann Bennett” »
Answer Creek tells the story of Ada Weeks, a fictional 19-year-old adopted daughter of an undertaker and his wife, who treks across the United States with the fated (and real) Donner Party. If you know anything about the Donner Party, you have a good overview of what happens in this book, although it goes on … Read More “Answer Creek by Ashley E. Sweeney” »
I’m not sure what I just read, but I’m not sorry I read it. It was definitely strange reading about someone living through other historical pandemics while living through one in our own time, but I think that made it even better. Cora lives all alone on the abandoned North Brother Island, within view of … Read More “The Vines by Shelley Nolden” »
What would you do to save your child? The answer, always, is anything. This book was magical and sad and beautiful, and full of love, and I just wish these characters were real. Oh, and did I mention, there’s also time travel? Carly Sears just lost her husband in Vietnam, and now she’s found out … Read More “The Dream Daughter by Diane Chamberlain” »
This book has been on my TBR list since it was released, but it took my book club choosing it for our June book to move it up on my list, and I’m so glad I did. This was an understated and haunting novel about a family split apart when their teenage twins disappear and … Read More “The Vanishing Half by Britt Bennett” »
Diane Chamberlain is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors, and this book is the second one I read by her this year that has made it into my top list for 2021. What I like about her books is that she successfully fictionalizes serious events in recent history in a way that does not … Read More “The Last House on the Street by Diane Chamberlain” »
A father — President Abraham Lincoln — mourns his son, Willie — who has died of typhoid fever — as thousands of parents mourn their own sons — who have died in the first year of the American Civil War. This book takes place over one night (along with several flashbacks) in a crypt where … Read More “Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders” »
I’ve been reading books by Sandra Dallas since The Persian Pickle Club, and I always enjoy her style of writing. This one was a bit harder of a read for me – I don’t know if it was just that I am burnt out living through our own modern-day pandemic or if my expectations were … Read More “Little Souls by Sandra Dallas” »
This is the story of the American Dream told from the perspective of a centenarian on his deathbed looking back on a life-shaping adventure he had as an adolescent when he drove two giraffes across the country on the back of what amounted to not much more than a pick-up truck. Honestly, for whatever reason, … Read More “West with Giraffes by Lynda Rutledge” »
What do you do when your 9-year-old son asks you to read a book that he’s just finished so you can discuss it with him? You put down the thriller you were about to start and pick up the one he’s handing you. My 4th grader loves graphic novels and prefers to read them over … Read More “One Dead Spy: Nathan Hale’s Hazardous Tales Book 1 by Nathan Hale” »