2010 Book 23 - The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

I told you...I am on a roll. I'm addicted to reading at the moment....Can't get enough....

I just finished Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows' book The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, and loved it. As always, let me give you the back of the book blurb first:

January 1946: Writer Juliet Ashton receives a letter from a stranger, a founding member of the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. And so begins a remarkable tale of the island of Guernsey during the German occupation, and of a society as extraordinary as its name.

Let me first say that I wasn't initially drawn to purchase this book. I had seen it on the shelves of many a bookstore and never even picked it up. But then, I recently put in an order of books at Amazon.com and for some reason decided to include this in my order. Amazon seemed to think I would enjoy it as he/she/it kept including it in my "recommendations", which by the way I check almost daily and seemed to flag at least a couple to go into wish list. I thought this book was going to run along the lines of Fannie Flagg and her Fried Green Tomatoes book, and that is probably only due to the strange foods mentioned in the titles. However, I was pleasantly surprised when I picked this book up, looking for a short tome from my shelf, and found that the entire tail is told through a series of letters. I thought "what a great idea to convey a story" and as you can tell completely ate this book up (although not sure I would do the same for a potato peel pie). In my opinion, this is a feel-good, hopeless/hopeful romantic, warm fuzzy, sad and poignant tale that is a totally flipped coin from the last book that I read (The Last Child). This book I give a big two-thumbs-up and hope that if any of you out there want a little cupcake for your mind, you will pick this book up and enjoy it as I did.

(By the way, I call this a cupcake for the mind as it isn't necessarily empty calories like brain-candy but it also isn't a full meal for the mind, either.)

(Also, I've never read any Fannie Flagg, although I have now included FGT on my wish list.)

2010 Book 22 - The Last Child

I know, I'm on quite a reading streak at the moment. The reason is that I did some math in my head and figured that I'm so close to getting 25 books in before the end of the year and thought "wow, that would be a really good achievement for you, ABBA." So, I'm plowing through books and not watching television, which is, I'm sure we'll all agree, probably a really good thing.

So, I just finished reading The Last Child by John Hart. Here is what is on the back cover:

Johnny Merrimon was thirteen when his twin sister disappeared. Now, one year later, she is presumed dead. His mother is devastated, his father gone, and life will never be the same. But Johnny has a map, a bike, and a plan. He's going to find his sister, even if he has to track down every dangerous character in the county - a do-or-die mission that troubles police detective Clyde Hunt. He's also been searching for Johnny's sister, and he knows to what dark places a case like this can lead. But even Hunt can't imagine how far Johnny will go to learn the truth - or what he will find when he gets there.

I have to say that I originally picked this book up last spring while in an airport bookstore and just never could get myself into the mood to read it. I now wish that I had picked it up and read it much sooner. It is a really good book and I can see them making it into a movie some time....maybe I'll start working on the screenplay myself and try to get Spielberg to make it for me (since he and I go so far back...) Okay, enough of my dreams of being a great play-write and back to the book. This is one that I highly recommend...it has everything that a good book should have: well written and thought out plot, intriguing characters, twists and turns, good and evil, peanut butter and grape soda, cats and dogs, violence, abuse, and love.

I'll be adding it to my pile of read books, just let me know who wants to borrow it from me!!

2010 Book 21 - Murderous Urges of Ordinary Women - A Novel

I just picked up and inhaled this book. Murderous Urges of Ordinary Women - A Novel by Lois Meltzer is fantastic!! First, the back cover:

Meet: Best friends Sandi, Janet, Ellie, and Carole - four ordinary women confronting the ordinary angst of being middle-aged and female.

"All of a sudden," Ellie says, "it's as if we've become invisible."
It makes them angry.
And that isn't all that makes them angry.
More and more the routine irritations of modern life - the tailgating trucker, the parking-spot thief - seem to fill them with this fierce, impotent rage.
Then one day, at a trendy seafood restaurant, Sandi tosses an obnoxious jerk's cellphone in the lobster tank, and nobody notices. Invisibility, the friends realize, may have its uses: A middle-aged woman might be able to get away with anything, absolutely anything....
Soon they take up Vengeance as their mid-life hobby, the way other women might take up the auto harp or learn Portuguese...

Meet: The Book Group from Hell.....

I picked up this book partially because of the title and partially because of the cover (I'm a sucker for the cover of a book). The cover has a bastardized picture of Grant Wood's painting American Gothic. This is one of my mother's favorite artists and paintings and I am therefore very susceptible to the image and the many forms that it has taken over the years.

However, once I got past the title and the cover art and started reading, I could not put this book down. It isn't a lengthy tome by any stretch of the imagination, a short 200+ pages, and it isn't very complicated, but it is a fast read and actually has a bit of "hmm, maybe we should think on this more" flavor to it. I would highly recommend this book to anybody out there and intend to put it into the hands of my mother the next time I see her.

My only concern in giving this to my mom to read is that she may just decide to introduce these ideas to her Creative Crones quilting group and then there is no telling where things might end up.

And once you've read this you'll understand that I intend to some day start my own Book Group from Hell as I approach middle age.....

Work From Home = Lose My Mind

I've had the luxury of working from home for going on three weeks now and I have to admit that I do enjoy it. I enjoy rolling out of bed and getting right to work without the fuss of showering and getting all "did up" as I would if I were to go into the office. I also take advantage of the time at home and will throw in a load of clothes or wipe down the kitchen while taking a break from staring at the computer screen. I'm definitely saving gas since my car doesn't leave the garage. And I don't have the same qualms about running to the store mid-day to grab something as I would when I worked at the office (this is mostly because I know that I won't have to spend 30 minutes when I get back trying to find a parking spot since at home I'm pretty much guaranteed that my garage will still be empty).

There are, however, some down-sides from this self-imposed hermitting. I haven't put on makeup more than twice in this three week period. I dried my hair for the first time after my shower and that had more to do with the fact that I didn't want to sit around in the "cold" with a wet head. I will go days without speaking to another soul, so I've started talking to myself more than normal....and I'm talking out loud, not just in my head....and I'm speaking to myself in a British-My Fair Lady kinda of accent. Yesterday, I was singing "The Rain in Spain..." and rolling my R's like a mad woman (the rrrrrrrrain in Spain falls mainly on the pllllaaaaiinnn...). I also have started dancing a la the ballerina hippos from Fantasia (Disney movie, not wacky American Idol singer cum reality show star).

Luckily, The Queen and I have started making it a point to get together one night a week for dinner and television catching-up. And she has been given strict instructions to contact my family if she starts seeing any truly frightening behavior that could end me up on a Bravo show like Intervention or Hoarders - Buried Alive. We want to nip that in the bud....