Kitchen's of the Great Midwest

From Goodreads:

When Lars Thorvald’s wife, Cynthia, falls in love with wine—and a dashing sommelier—he’s left to raise their baby, Eva, on his own. He’s determined to pass on his love of food to his daughter—starting with puréed pork shoulder. As Eva grows, she finds her solace and salvation in the flavors of her native Minnesota. From Scandinavian lutefisk to hydroponic chocolate habaneros, each ingredient represents one part of Eva’s journey as she becomes the star chef behind a legendary and secretive pop-up supper club, culminating in an opulent and emotional feast that’s a testament to her spirit and resilience.

 

From Me:

For me, this book had a funky structure until I got used to it and then about halfway thru the book it dawned on me that it was a series of connected vignettes. Once I had that down I sat back and enjoyed all the "Midwestedness" of it. 

 I loved the narration,  (Narrated By Amy Ryan, Michael Stuhlbarg   ) especially Michael Stuhlbarg.  He gave a great cadence to that Midwest accent. 

This book has really good reviews and I did enjoy it --- all the talk about regional food was wonderful, because I love regional cooking, but it was more than that.  It was a book about  self-discovery. 

 My favorite chapter had to be the one about 'bars'!  All my Midwest friends say 'bars'  (I'm gonna make some bars today)  Who doesn't love bars?

I give this book 3 stars.

61 Hours

 

From Goodreads:

Sixty-one hours. Not a minute to spare.

A tour bus crashes in a savage snowstorm and lands Jack Reacher in the middle of a deadly confrontation. In nearby Bolton, South Dakota, one brave woman is standing up for justice in a small town threatened by sinister forces. If she’s going to live long enough to testify, she’ll need help. Because a killer is coming to Bolton, a coldly proficient assassin who never misses.

Reacher’s original plan was to keep on moving. But the next 61 hours will change everything. The secrets are deadlier and his enemies are stronger than he could have guessed—but so is the woman whose life he’ll risk his own to save.

 

From Me:

While I do love Lee Child's Jack Reacher books, I tend to put them on the back burner for other books.  I put them on the back burner for months at a time, and now I'm thinking-- Why?

Full of suspense and mystery and an intriguing main character who always comes out on top.

It was a fun listen!

The Handyman's pick for a long car ride.

 

 

Dollbaby

 

From Goodreads:

When Ibby Bell’s father dies unexpectedly in the summer of 1964, her mother unceremoniously deposits Ibby with her eccentric grandmother Fannie and throws in her father’s urn for good measure. Fannie’s New Orleans house is like no place Ibby has ever been — and Fannie, who has a tendency to end up in the local asylum — is like no one she has ever met. Fortunately, Fannie’s black cook, Queenie, and her smart-mouthed daughter, Dollbaby, take it upon themselves to initiate Ibby into the ways of the South, both its grand traditions and its darkest secret.

For Fannie’s own family history is fraught with tragedy, hidden behind the closed rooms in her ornate Uptown mansion. It will take Ibby’s arrival to begin to unlock the mysteries there. And it will take Queenie and Dollbaby’s hard-won wisdom to show Ibby that family can sometimes be found in the least expected places.

 

From Me:

Everyone knows I just read this book on a long car trip--thanks Instagram, Twitter and Facebook!

(I do like to post pics on car trips---isn't everyone interested in what I'm reading, drinking, and driving by?)

 

I liked it!

The title was a bit confusing to me while I was reading it, but the ending brought it all together for me. (oops--that could be a mini-spoiler)

I wish it had gone into a bit more of Dollbaby and her civil rights involvement (or protests).

The novel touched on a lot of issues of the 1960's --  just touched, didn't dig deep-- but then the story was more a coming of age story about Ibby and her grandmother and their relationships with Queenie and Dollbaby.

 

I loved all the food references.

3 stars from me.  (3.5 if they offered it)

It was good and I enjoyed it.  I think you will too.

An easy read.

 

It's Monday! What are you Reading?

 

 

It's Monday! What Are You Reading? is a place to meet up and share what you have been, are and about to be reading over the week.  It's a great post to organize yourself. It's an opportunity to visit and comment, and er... add to that ever growing TBR pile!

It's Monday is hosted by Kathryn at Book Date.

 

Today I will finish up Salem's Lot.

I've taken part in a Read-a-Long #SalemAlong and it's been a lot of fun to see everyone's reactions.

I LOVE Stephen King--just sayin'

 

 

 

And tomorrow I'll probably finish Doll Baby.

It's soooo different from Salem's Lot--I feel I am in two different worlds as I go back and forth
(one on audio, one in print).

I'm liking them both.

 

 

 

This past week I read  Go Set A Watchman by Harper Lee.

I had to do it---for book club.

I didn't want to do it.  I was NOT going to do it.

But---it's book-club and the whole point is to read things out of our box, chosen by members and then discussing it.

(sigh). 

Julie from Smiling Shelves actually helped me decide --- she told me that this was Harper Lee's first draft of Atticus and he wasn't fully developed until  To Kill a Mockingbird.

And to just keep that in mind.

So, I did just that.

And guess what?

I liked it.

(THERE!  I SAID IT!)

I listened to the audio version read by Reese Witherspoon.  She did an OUTSTANDING job!

No, I wasn't exactly happy with Atticus, but he also wasn't 'evil'. 

He was just a man.

3 stars.

 

From Goodreads:

Maycomb, Alabama. Twenty-six-year-old Jean Louise Finch--"Scout"--returns home from New York City to visit her aging father, Atticus. Set against the backdrop of the civil rights tensions and political turmoil that were transforming the South, Jean Louise's homecoming turns bittersweet when she learns disturbing truths about her close-knit family, the town and the people dearest to her. Memories from her childhood flood back, and her values and assumptions are thrown into doubt. Featuring many of the iconic characters from To Kill a Mockingbird, Go Set a Watchman perfectly captures a young woman, and a world, in a painful yet necessary transition out of the illusions of the past--a journey that can be guided only by one's conscience.

Written in the mid-1950s, Go Set a Watchman imparts a fuller, richer understanding and appreciation of Harper Lee. Here is an unforgettable novel of wisdom, humanity, passion, humor and effortless precision--a profoundly affecting work of art that is both wonderfully evocative of another era and relevant to our own times. It not only confirms the enduring brilliance of To Kill a Mockingbird, but also serves as its essential companion, adding depth, context and new meaning to an American classic.  

 

 

Five Days Left

 

From Goodreads:

Destined to be a book club favorite, a heart-wrenching debut about two people who must decide how much they’re willing to sacrifice for love.Mara Nichols is a successful lawyer, devoted wife, and adoptive mother who has received a life-shattering diagnosis. Scott Coffman, a middle school teacher, has been fostering an eight-year-old boy while the boy’s mother serves a jail sentence. Scott and Mara both have five days left until they must say good-bye to the ones they love the most.

 Through their stories, Julie Lawson Timmer explores the individual limits of human endurance and the power of relationships, and shows that sometimes loving someone means holding on, and sometimes it means letting go.  

 

From Me:

I'm not quite sure what I think of this book. 

At first it was so-so for me, then it was good for me and by the end it had me in tears (in a good way).

It was all those things mentioned in the Goodreads review-- the power of relationships, what a topic!

This might be a good book club book as the discussion could be endless.

3.876 stars from me!

The Fate of Mercy Alban

 

I just finished  my first book for the R.(eaders) I.(n) P.(eril) X challenge.

I signed up to read two 'scary' books between September 1st and October 31st, (and watch at least one scary movie)  but I'll be lucky to finish my second book(Salem's Lot read-a-long)... October is the busiest month of the year at work, and while I like it---the events we put on-- I also hate it, because I just want to relax.  I want to relax and read scary books!

I want to get in the Halloween mood!!

 

Okay, enough of my whining---everyone is busy---  I just finished this book:

 

 

 

 

From Goodreads:

From award-winning novelist Wendy Webb comes a spine-tingling mystery about family secrets set in a big, old haunted house on Lake Superior.

Grace Alban has spent twenty years away from her childhood home, the stately Alban House, for reasons she would rather forget. But when her mother's unexpected death brings Grace and her teen-age daughter home, she finds more haunting the halls and passageways of Alban House than her own personal demons.

Long-buried family secrets, a packet of old love letters and a lost manuscript plunge Grace into a decades-old mystery about a scandalous party at Alban House, when a world-famous author took his own life and Grace's aunt disappeared without a trace. The night has been shrouded in secrecy by the powerful Alban family for all of these years, and Grace realizes her family secrets tangle and twist as darkly as the secret passages of Alban House. Her mother was intending to tell the truth about that night to a reporter on the very day she died - could it have been murder? Or was she a victim of the supposed Alban curse? With the help of the disarmingly kind--and attractive—Reverend Matthew Parker, Grace must uncover the truth about her home and its curse before she and her daughter become the next victims

 

From me:

On the front cover of the book I have it says  "A Perfect Read for a dark and stormy night".

I was very exited, because  I wanted to love it, I wanted to be spooked, I wanted to feel a bit nervous...but I ended up only  giving  it three stars.

 I liked it. I did. It kept my attention, I was pretty engaged in the writing and the characters, but I sometimes have issues with gothic type of novels.

 

The issues would be ---they never finish a conversation at all!!

They'll be in the middle of a deep conversation about an important plot twist and then the character will say, "we'll finish this later, after I take a nap."

That might be funny if it weren't true.

They NEVER finish a conversation---something always interrupts them.

 

I think the premise of the gothic (or gothic-like) novel is to keep the reader on the edge of their seats with FRUSTRATION, and just wanting to get to the bottom of the story.

I end up just getting annoyed with the situation.

Maybe I should give it 2 stars, but I really did like it, so I'll stay with 3.

Three, because after all is said and done, it was a fun little mystery with a tad bit of supernatural thrown in for good measure.

It's a paradox.

 

Now I am on to finish Salem's Lot and find a couple of creepy good movies to finish up my challenge.

What's a creepy good movie that you love?

 

The Round House

 

From Goodreads:

One Sunday in the spring of 1988, a woman living on a reservation in North Dakota is attacked. The details of the crime are slow to surface as Geraldine Coutts is traumatized and reluctant to relive or reveal what happened, either to the police or to her husband, Bazil, and thirteen-year-old son, Joe. In one day, Joe's life is irrevocably transformed. He tries to heal his mother, but she will not leave her bed and slips into an abyss of solitude. Increasingly alone, Joe finds himself thrust prematurely into an adult world for which he is ill prepared.

While his father, who is a tribal judge, endeavors to wrest justice from a situation that defies his efforts, Joe becomes frustrated with the official investigation and sets out with his trusted friends, Cappy, Zack, and Angus, to get some answers of his own. Their quest takes them first to the Round House, a sacred space and place of worship for the Ojibwe. And this is only the beginning.

 

From Me:

This was a book club selection--otherwise I probably wouldn't have picked it up.  The best thing about book clubs is that sometimes you are forced to read a book you would have otherwise passed up.

This is that book, and I'm glad I read it.

I love coming of age stories---and this is a good one, about a young Native American boy coming to terms with tragedy within his family.

I listened to this one on audio, and  loved the narrator.  I read one audio-reviewer say to listen to a sample first, because the narrator is definitely Native American and has a special rhythm and cadence to his voice, that you might not like.

I LOVED IT.

I think it made the story feel so true.

Besides coming of age--it also gave a unique look into the culture of the Ojibwe tribe. 

I gave it 3 stars. 

Finders Keepers

 

From Goodreads:

A masterful, intensely suspenseful novel about a reader whose obsession with a reclusive writer goes far too far—a book about the power of storytelling, starring the same trio of unlikely and winning heroes King introduced in Mr. Mercedes

“Wake up, genius.” So begins King’s instantly riveting story about a vengeful reader. The genius is John Rothstein, an iconic author who created a famous character, Jimmy Gold, but who hasn’t published a book for decades. Morris Bellamy is livid, not just because Rothstein has stopped providing books, but because the nonconformist Jimmy Gold has sold out for a career in advertising. Morris kills Rothstein and empties his safe of cash, yes, but the real treasure is a trove of notebooks containing at least one more Gold novel.

Morris hides the money and the notebooks, and then he is locked away for another crime. Decades later, a boy named Pete Saubers finds the treasure, and now it is Pete and his family that Bill Hodges, Holly Gibney, and Jerome Robinson must rescue from the ever-more deranged and vengeful Morris when he’s released from prison after thirty-five years.

Not since Misery has King played with the notion of a reader whose obsession with a writer gets dangerous. Finders Keepers is spectacular, heart-pounding suspense, but it is also King writing about how literature shapes a life—for good, for bad, forever.

 

From Me:

I was prepared to be let down.  I didn't want to get my expectations too high, and while I still prefer when Stephen King does horror (although I hate that label too), I was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked this.

I won this audio version (CD's) in a give-away this past June from Armchair BEA.  We finally got around to listening to it on a long car trip to Washington. When we got back from our trip, we had one CD left (Out of 12), so the next weekend, we took a nice long drive and finished our book.

The Handyman liked it very much---this crime suspense novel of SK.

I'm giving it 3 stars.

The Bishop's Wife

From Goodreads:

In the predominantly Mormon city of Draper, Utah, some seemingly perfect families have deadly secrets. 

Linda Wallheim is a devout Mormon, the mother of five boys and the wife of a bishop. But Linda is increasingly troubled by her church’s structure and secrecy, especially as a disturbing situation takes shape in her ward. One cold winter night, a young wife and mother named Carrie Helm disappears, leaving behind everything she owns. Carrie’s husband, Jared, claims his wife has always been unstable and that she has abandoned the family, but Linda doesn’t trust him. As Linda snoops in the Helm family’s circumstances, she becomes convinced that Jared has murdered his wife and painted himself as a wronged husband.

Linda’s husband asks her not to get involved in the unfolding family saga. But Linda has become obsessed with Carrie’s fate, and with the well-being of her vulnerable young daughter. She cannot let the matter rest until she finds out the truth. Is she wrong to go against her husband, the bishop, when her inner convictions are so strong?

Inspired by a chilling true crime and written by a practicing Mormon, The Bishop’s Wife is both a fascinating look at the lives of modern Mormons as well as a grim and cunningly twisted mystery.

From me:

I liked it.

If you like cozy mysteries--this one can hold it's own.

I listened to it on audio, because in the library magazine "Book Page", it said it was an outstanding audio book.

I don't know if it was outstanding but it was  good.

It was an interesting and positive look at the Mormon religion, all done within the context of the novel.  I feel that Harrison did a great job at explaining certain points about her religion within the story.

I appreciate the fact that it was inspired by a true crime--as it seemed to have that feel to it.

 

I seem to think this is the first in a new series---if not, it sure leads that way.

I'll be reading the next one.

3 stars

Station Eleven

From Goodreads:

An audacious, darkly glittering novel set in the eerie days of civilization's collapse, Station Eleven tells the spellbinding story of a Hollywood star, his would-be savior, and a nomadic group of actors roaming the scattered outposts of the Great Lakes region, risking everything for art and humanity.

One snowy night Arthur Leander, a famous actor, has a heart attack onstage during a production of King Lear. Jeevan Chaudhary, a paparazzo-turned-EMT, is in the audience and leaps to his aid. A child actress named Kirsten Raymonde watches in horror as Jeevan performs CPR, pumping Arthur's chest as the curtain drops, but Arthur is dead. That same night, as Jeevan walks home from the theater, a terrible flu begins to spread. Hospitals are flooded and Jeevan and his brother barricade themselves inside an apartment, watching out the window as cars clog the highways, gunshots ring out, and life disintegrates around them.

Fifteen years later, Kirsten is an actress with the Traveling Symphony. Together, this small troupe moves between the settlements of an altered world, performing Shakespeare and music for scattered communities of survivors. Written on their caravan, and tattooed on Kirsten's arm is a line from Star Trek: "Because survival is insufficient." But when they arrive in St. Deborah by the Water, they encounter a violent prophet who digs graves for anyone who dares to leave.

Spanning decades, moving back and forth in time, and vividly depicting life before and after the pandemic, this suspenseful, elegiac novel is rife with beauty. As Arthur falls in and out of love, as Jeevan watches the newscasters say their final good-byes, and as Kirsten finds herself caught in the crosshairs of the prophet, we see the strange twists of fate that connect them all. A novel of art, memory, and ambition, Station Eleventells a story about the relationships that sustain us, the ephemeral nature of fame, and the beauty of the world as we know it

From Me:

This is the book! The one in which I made the quiche to discuss it by.

The quiche is in the previous post---and no, you don't have to make it to discuss the book by, but it's really good, so maybe you should just make it.

 

I wanted to read this book because, for a short while, it was buzzing around all the blogs I read.  That, and it was recommended to me at a bookstore.

 

I am giving it 3 stars.  I liked it.  Didn't love it.

My friend Robin, who was at the book discussion said it was like  'Mad Max' meets 'Children of the Corn'.

(with characters who played the violin and recited Shakespeare.)

I usually love a good dystopian novel---and don't get me wrong---I really did like this one, but I didn't really connect with the characters.

I thought the writing was good, the  story line was interesting, but I guess I just wanted a bit more character development.

 

There were some really  unique characters in this book, but you never really got to know them well.  And in the traveling symphony, they didn't even call each other by name, they called them by their position (first clarinet, etc), which, for me, put a distance between the characters.

 

I would recommend it tho, if you like dystopian.

 

I found it funny/interesting,  all the reviews on Audible are bad, but on Goodreads they are mostly positive.

The Obituary Writer by Ann Hood

From Goodreads:

On the day John F. Kennedy is inaugurated, Claire, an uncompromising young wife and mother obsessed with the glamour of Jackie O, struggles over the decision of whether to stay in a loveless marriage or follow the man she loves and whose baby she may be carrying. Decades earlier, in 1919, Vivien Lowe, an obituary writer, is searching for her lover who disappeared in the Great San Francisco Earthquake of 1906. By telling the stories of the dead, Vivien not only helps others cope with their grief but also begins to understand the devastation of her own terrible loss. The surprising connection between Claire and Vivien will change the life of one of them in unexpected and extraordinary ways. Part literary mystery and part love story, The Obituary Writer examines expectations of marriage and love, the roles of wives and mothers, and the emotions of grief, regret, and hope.

From Me:

3 stars

It was an enjoyable book and I would recommend it, it was an easy read and kept my attention.

However.....a few things bothered me.

Like when the children in Napa, CA were trying to catch fireflies. 

There are no fireflies west of the Rocky Mountains.

That's a small detail, but I can't get things like that out of my mind.

Also,   one of the characters took the train from San Francisco to Denver and when she stepped from the train in Denver she said she had never seen mountains before until she saw the Rocky Mountains in Colorado.

Seriously?  She just traveled over the Sierra-Nevada Mountains.  A range so high the Donner party got stuck there in an early snow storm and had to ---well,  you know the rest of the story.

Nevada is the most mountainous state in the United States.

Not bragging, I'm just saying that the character HAD TO HAVE SEEN MOUNTAINS---HUGE RANGES, to be able to get to Denver.

Unless she was asleep.

So, does one little line ruin a book for you sometimes?

Don't get me wrong, like I said, it was an enjoyable read,  I liked the book.

I just get caught up in the details sometimes.

Boundary Waters

From Goodreads:

The Quetico-Superior Wilderness: more than two million acres of forest, white-water rapids, and uncharted islands on the Canadian/American border. Somewhere in the heart of this unforgiving territory, a young woman named Shiloh -- a country-western singer at the height of her fame -- has disappeared.

Her father arrives in Aurora, Minnesota, to hire former sheriff Cork O'Connor to find his daughter, and Cork joins a search party that includes an ex-con, two FBI agents, and a ten-year-old boy. Others are on Shiloh's trail as well -- men hired not just to find her, but to kill her.

As the expedition ventures deeper into the wilderness, strangers descend on Aurora, threatening to spill blood on the town's snowy streets. Meanwhile, out on the Boundary Waters, winter falls hard. Cork's team of searchers loses contact with civilization, and like the brutal winds of a Minnesota blizzard, death -- violent and sudden -- stalks them

 

 

From Me:

3.5 stars.

I love to find a series with characters I can watch develop and  grow, and although this is only the 2nd book in the series by William Kent Krueger, I think I will enjoy reading them  till he can't write any more

   (which hopefully is never)

about Cork O'Conner, his family, the townspeople and the fictional town of  Aurora, Minnesota.

I assume that sometimes a writer grows tired of a character or just can't  think of another good plot.  But I hope this doesn't happen for a long, long time for Krueger.

 

We all know that in a series, the main character comes out okay at the end, so it's the journey there that keeps our attention.  I feel Krueger does a good job of that in this set of books.

I love the feel of being in Northern Minnesota.  He does a good job with the setting, making sure we know little details about the place as well as the smaller characters in the book.

 

I am enjoying them.

 

Euphoria

From Goodreads:

From New England Book Award winner Lily King comes a breathtaking novel about three young anthropologists of the '30s caught in a passionate love triangle that threatens their bonds, their careers, and, ultimately, their lives.

English anthropologist Andrew Bankson has been alone in the field for several years, studying the Kiona river tribe in the Territory of New Guinea. Haunted by the memory of his brothers’ deaths and increasingly frustrated and isolated by his research, Bankson is on the verge of suicide when a chance encounter with colleagues, the controversial Nell Stone and her wry and mercurial Australian husband Fen, pulls him back from the brink. Nell and Fen have just fled the bloodthirsty Mumbanyo and, in spite of Nell’s poor health, are hungry for a new discovery. When Bankson finds them a new tribe nearby, the artistic, female-dominated Tam, he ignites an intellectual and romantic firestorm between the three of them that burns out of anyone’s control

From Me:

3 stars, but I liked it a lot.

3.8 stars.  I might put it at 4 stars on Goodreads.

I chose this book right after I heard that it won the Audie Award for best Literary Fiction.  Xe Sands and Simon Vance narrated and--WOW!

What a great job they did.

The story did draw me in---it was haunting in a way--but maybe that was Xe Sands voice, as she can draw me in to any story.  

It reminded me of old Tarzan movies ( I  know--that's weird) and I can't explain why.  

The study of cultures and people that are so foreign to us? 

The isolation of the main characters and the loneliness and sense of desperation they must have felt at times?

When I was 13, I was planning on being an archaeologist and later, an anthropologist.  

Now, I look back at my 13 year old self and wonder what I was thinking?!  I was not made to live in a jungle, eat food I'm not accustom to, worry about critters and customs not familiar to me, but it does intrigue me and I admire those who can and did.

I guess this book was based loosely on a true account of the anthropologist Margaret Mead and her husband,  Reo Fortune, an Australian, and Gregory Bateson  (an Englishman, who would become her third husband) spent together on the Sepik River in New Guinea. 

It might be important to know this before you read it.

I found it an interesting tale.  Some say the ending was abrupt, but I found it to add to the attraction.

An Unmarked Grave

From Goodreads:

 World War I nurse and amateur sleuth Bess Crawford matches wits with a devious killer in this exciting and suspenseful adventure from New York Times bestselling author Charles Todd

In the spring of 1918, the Spanish flu epidemic spreads, killing millions of soldiers and civilians across the globe. Overwhelmed by the constant flow of wounded soldiers coming from the French front, battlefield nurse Bess Crawford must now contend with hundreds of influenza patients as well.

However, war and disease are not the only killers to strike. Bess discovers, concealed among the dead waiting for burial, the body of an officer who has been murdered. Though she is devoted to all her patients, this soldier's death touches her deeply. Not only did the man serve in her father's former regiment, he was also a family friend.

Before she can report the terrible news, Bess falls ill, the latest victim of the flu. By the time she recovers, the murdered officer has been buried, and the only other person who saw the body has hanged himself. Or did he?

Working her father's connections in the military, Bess begins to piece together what little evidence she can find to unmask the elusive killer and see justice served. But she must be as vigilant as she is tenacious. With a determined killer on her heels, each move Bess makes could be her last.

 

 

From Me:

3 stars.

I love Bess Crawford!

And I love the detail Charles Todd puts into each book.

WWI was a horrific war (aren't they all?), but I knew so little about the details. The author brought me right in,  with descriptions and images to set the scene.

If you like historical mysteries, this is a good series. 

The Road To Character

From Goodreads:
With the wisdom, humor, curiosity, and sharp insights that have brought millions of readers to his New York Times column and his previous bestsellers, David Brooks has consistently illuminated our daily lives in surprising and original ways. In The Social Animal, he explored the neuroscience of human connection and how we can flourish together. Now, in The Road to Character, he focuses on the deeper values that should inform our lives. Responding to what he calls the culture of the Big Me, which emphasizes external success, Brooks challenges us, and himself, to rebalance the scales between our “résumé virtues”—achieving wealth, fame, and status—and our “eulogy virtues,” those that exist at the core of our being: kindness, bravery, honesty, or faithfulness, focusing on what kind of relationships we have formed.

Looking to some of the world’s greatest thinkers and inspiring leaders, Brooks explores how, through internal struggle and a sense of their own limitations, they have built a strong inner character. Labor activist Frances Perkins understood the need to suppress parts of herself so that she could be an instrument in a larger cause. Dwight Eisenhower organized his life not around impulsive self-expression but considered self-restraint. Dorothy Day, a devout Catholic convert and champion of the poor, learned as a young woman the vocabulary of simplicity and surrender. Civil rights pioneers A. Philip Randolph and Bayard Rustin learned reticence and the logic of self-discipline, the need to distrust oneself even while waging a noble crusade.

Blending psychology, politics, spirituality, and confessional, The Road to Character provides an opportunity for us to rethink our priorities, and strive to build rich inner lives marked by humility and moral depth.

“Joy,” David Brooks writes, “is a byproduct experienced by people who are aiming for something else. But it comes.”

From me:

I had to read this for Book Club.

To be honest, I didn't want to read it.  I wasn't in the mood.  Then I forced myself to read it, because I have made a book club commitment to read all the books.  (that and plus I want to win the socks--see here) 
And then I was glad to have read it.

I am giving it 3 stars.
We don't read non-fiction much in book club, but when we do it always makes for great discussion.
I have not read Brooks' other books or his newspaper column, but I feel in this one, he was searching/researching the lives of great, alhto low-key, behind the scenes,  people, looking for what shaped their character.
They had many struggles and hurdles to get thru, but they managed to come out at the end... well--people of great character.
It was a spiritual book, but not overly preachy, if that is an issue for you.
It was worth the read.

*****************

And because...   I can't do a book club post without a few pictures...

In Lit Wits we always have dinner.
This night some great shrimp and pasta.
As always, a great evening.

And Because I am a WHIZ at all things technology...

I couldn't figure out how to get my phone off black and white!

Waiting on our drinks.

We always have a great cocktail to go with our book discussion.

The Ocean at the End of the Lane

From Goodreads:

 Sussex, England. A middle-aged man returns to his childhood home to attend a funeral. Although the house he lived in is long gone, he is drawn to the farm at the end of the road, where, when he was seven, he encountered a most remarkable girl, Lettie Hempstock, and her mother and grandmother. He hasn't thought of Lettie in decades, and yet as he sits by the pond (a pond that she'd claimed was an ocean) behind the ramshackle old farmhouse, the unremembered past comes flooding back. And it is a past too strange, too frightening, too dangerous to have happened to anyone, let alone a small boy.

Forty years earlier, a man committed suicide in a stolen car at this farm at the end of the road. Like a fuse on a firework, his death lit a touchpaper and resonated in unimaginable ways. The darkness was unleashed, something scary and thoroughly incomprehensible to a little boy. And Lettie—magical, comforting, wise beyond her years—promised to protect him, no matter what.

A groundbreaking work from a master, The Ocean at the End of the Lane is told with a rare understanding of all that makes us human, and shows the power of stories to reveal and shelter us from the darkness inside and out. It is a stirring, terrifying, and elegiac fable as delicate as a butterfly's wing and as menacing as a knife in the dark.

 

 

From Me:

I had been wanting to read Neil Gaiman forever.

But... I just didn't get this book.

I listened to it on audio and it was narrated by  Gaiman.  I think he did a wonderful job reading his own story, and  while there were parts that kept me engrossed, there were many more parts that had me thinking....wha???

Maybe that was the whole point.

I will give Gaiman another try--I do own 'The Graveyard Book'-- he is so well respected and loved in the literary world--- and seriously, I can understand a clown in a sewer named Pennywise? Why not this one? -- I'm sure I can 'get' another of Gaiman's books.

It must have been my mood.

 

I hate when that happens.

3 stars.

When Gods Die

From Goodreads:

 Brighton, England, 1811. The beautiful wife of an aging Marquis is found dead in the arms of the Prince Regent. Draped around her neck lies an ancient necklace with mythic origins-and mysterious ties to Sebastian St. Cyr, Viscount Devlin. Haunted by his past, Sebastian investigates both the Marchioness's death and his own possible connection to it-and discovers a complex pattern of lies and subterfuge. With the aid of his lover, Kat Boleyn, and a former street urchin now under his protection, Sebastian edges closer to the killer. And when one murder follows another, he confronts a conspiracy that threatens his own identity...and imperils the monarchy itself.

 

 

From Me:

Why did this book call to me?

I used to read "Historical Romance" novels all the time, and I loved them.

Then, I stopped. 

I always felt that I grew out of them, but that's not a kind description, because whether you like them or not, Historical novels take a great deal of research to be true to their time  period and most are very well written and developed.

They can be fun, fast, suspenseful and emotional.

(after reading these first books I've found I've missed them!)

 

But, nevertheless, I stopped reading them, about 25 years ago.

Until...   The Quirky Bookworm wrote a post titled: 

Addicting Books:  8 Titles you won't be able to put down, 

and she said:

 I always devour the new entries in C.S. Harris's Sebastian St. Cyr series too (there are ten in the series so far, so you have a lot of great books to look forward to if you haven't read any!). It's not so much about the mysteries as it is about the relationships between the main characters.

 

and then...the rest is history!

It's about the relationships between the main characters.

She had me at that!!

 

This is the 2nd book I've read in the series and I really enjoyed it.

I do love to see character development, and Harris does a great job.

Not to mention their is a murder mystery plot to go along.

I know I'll enjoy this series.

3 stars from me.

 

*You probably already know this, but I just found out that 'Regency'

Historical novels (and that is what this is) are from 1811 to 1820, in the United Kingdom when King George III was deemed unfit to rule and his son, the Prince of Wales ruled as his proxy as Prince Regent.  In 1820  the Prince Regent became George IV   on the death of his father.

Helter Skelter

From Goodreads:

 
Prosecuting attorney in the Manson trial, Vincent Bugliosi held a unique insider's position in one of the most baffling and horrifying cases of the twentieth century: the cold-blooded Tate-LaBianca murders carried out by Charles Manson and four of his followers. What motivated Manson in his seemingly mindless selection of victims, and what was his hold over the young women who obeyed his orders? Here is the gripping story of this famous and haunting crime. 50 pages of b/w photographs.

 

From Me:

I did an audio re-read for this one.  

That's right---25 hours of investigation into this creepy, puzzling, cult killing.

I have always found Charles Manson--intriguing, in a weird way.

I just don't 'get it'--why people would follow him and that makes me want to read more to find out.
I still don't get it.

Helter Skelter is a disturbing look into the Tate-LaBianca murders.

It's very thorough and interesting.

It amazes me how the prosecuting attorneys  were able to piece this all together and get a conviction.

I loved this book when I read it 30 years ago.

 

Listening to it again?

It became a bit of  a chore. 

I'm not sure why.

Maybe it was the 25+ hours.

 

Still, if you are interested in Charles Manson, how attorneys make their cases and courtroom procedures-- it's a great read. 

It is the #1 True Crime Bestseller of all time.

3 Stars.

 

******************

The reason I thought to re-read this is because  on Thursday, NBC is premiering a new show, called Aquarius, which is based on a runaway girl, who joins the Manson Family, 2 years before the murders took place.