20 Apr, 2018

The Corner Shop in Cockleberry Bay

/ posted in: Book Review, Reading

The Corner Shop in Cockleberry Bay by Nicola May
on April 9th 2018
Pages: 364
Published by Nowell Publishing
Format: eARC
Source: Book Tour, From author/publisher
Setting: England

Praise for Nicola May’s books
‘This book will twang your funny bone & your heartstrings’ – Milly Johnson‘A fun and flighty read’ the Sun‘A funny and fast-paced romp – thoroughly enjoyable!’ Rosa Larkin is down on her luck in London, so when she inherits a near-derelict corner shop in a quaint Devon village, her first thought is to sell it for cash and sort out her life. But nothing is straightforward about this legacy. While the identity of her benefactor remains a mystery, he - or she - has left one important legal proviso: that the shop cannot be sold, only passed on to somebody who really deserves it. Rosa makes up her mind to give it a go: to put everything she has into getting the shop up and running again in the small seaside community of Cockleberry Bay. But can she do it all on her own? And if not, who will help her succeed - and who among the following will work secretly to see her fail? There is a handsome rugby player, a sexy plumber, a charlatan reporter and a selection of meddling locals. Add in a hit and run incident and the disappearance of a valuable engraved necklace – and what you get is a journey of self-discovery and unpredictable events. With surprising and heartfelt results, Rosa, accompanied at all times by her little sausage dog Hot, will slowly unravel the shadowy secrets of the inheritance, and also bring her own, long-hidden heritage into the light.

It seems like I’m going with the unpopular opinion based on the reviews I’ve read from other people. From the description I expected a light-hearted, funny read typical of the chick lit genre. This book is not that. It is surprisingly dark especially considering how it is being marketed.

The main character is self-destructive. She drinks excessively and can’t keep a job. Her main human contact is a series of one night sexual encounters. She uses sex to help make up for the fact that she can’t always pay for the rent on her flat. The only thing she loves at all is her dog, Hot. Getting an inheritance is a way for her to get out of her current life and start fresh.

Usually in this type of book the small town the heroine goes to is full of lovely characters. Here that isn’t the case. In short order she is scammed, sexually assaulted, and her secret is outed against her express wishes. Then she is threatened to provide someone with an alibi for a hit and run.

She eventually finds some nicer people but they have secrets too. Then people keep breaking into her house, she ends up with a pregnant teenager living with her, she gets scammed a few more times, she finds out about a decades old affair, and her dog gets hurt (but he’s ok). This isn’t a bad book but I didn’t read it anything like the laugh a minute romp I’m seeing other people review it as. I read it more as a cautionary tale about trying to keep secrets and the need to have someone who you can confide in. Rosa is very damaged emotionally and trying to move past that in her own way isn’t easy. Trying to open up and let other people in when you have learned over and over not to trust is hard. When those people then repeatedly violate your tentative trust, what do you do?

I read an ARC so hopefully things have been cleaned up but there was an error in my copy. She was reading letters about a person who was only referred to by an initial. But when she thought about the person she thought of them by their full first name. She had no way of knowing that.

20 Mar, 2018

The Best Boomerville Hotel

/ posted in: Book Review, Reading

The Best Boomerville Hotel by Caroline James
on March 13th 2018
Genres: Fiction
Published by Ruby Fiction
Format: eARC
Source: Book Tour, From author/publisher
Setting: England

Let the shenanigans begin at the Best Boomerville Hotel …
Jo Docherty and Hattie Contaldo have a vision – a holiday retreat in the heart of the Lake District exclusively for guests of ‘a certain age’ wishing to stimulate both mind and body with new creative experiences. One hotel refurbishment later and the Best Boomerville Hotel is open for business!
Perhaps not surprisingly Boomerville attracts more than its fair share of eccentric clientele: there’s fun-loving Sir Henry Mulberry and his brother Hugo; Lucinda Brown, an impoverished artist with more ego than talent; Andy Mack, a charming Porsche-driving James Bond lookalike, as well as Kate Simmons, a woman who made her fortune from an internet dating agency but still hasn’t found ‘the One’ herself.
With such an array of colourful individuals there’s bound to be laughs aplenty, but could there be tears and heartbreak too and will the residents get more than they bargained for at Boomerville?

This book wants to be a fun romp in the country with an eclectic group of people. That’s a fun premise for a book. I’m always on the look out for books with middle-aged or older protagonists.

I got a bit thrown off right at the beginning of the book with her definition of Boomers. She defines them as 50-69 which is a tad young for a book published this year. She then makes her main character 50. So this is supposed to be a book celebrating Baby Boomers yet she makes the lead as young as she possibly can. Then there are several comments throughout the book about how they don’t want “elderly people” at the hotel. Older women at the hotel are described as “ageing” in a disparaging way. That all seemed odd for a book that is supposed to be celebrating Baby Boomers.

There is a party that is held at one point in the book. They decide to have Indian food. That’s fine. Then they decide to make it a costume party where all these upper class white British people will be wearing saris, turbans, and other Indian styles of dress. That’s pushing pretty far towards creepy and inappropriate. Then they decide to make it a party celebrating the British Raj. Yeah. That’s pretty out of touch.

Then there is the Shaman. He doesn’t have a name. He isn’t seen often. He has both a “gypsy caravan” and a teepee. He does sessions of some kind in there. They appear to involve getting people high. Then he starts showing up and making mysterious pronouncements of doom while also healing people with a touch before disappearing from sight. One time he turns up to do a Shamanistic wedding ceremony and the guest indulge it as “a cabaret with a difference.”

So the guests are all rich white people who can take off for weeks at a time to stay at a hotel and putter about. The entertainment is a mish mash of other people’s cultures for fun. The “romances” in the book are pure insta-love. Our main character had two men fall for her on the first day she was there. They were just overtaken by her beauty. Once people decide to look at each other as a potential romantic interest, that’s it they are getting ready to get married. This is explained as people being old and not having much time left. I get not dawdling but this felt more like, “You’re breathing. You’ll do.”

I’d love to see this idea with maybe fewer characters so each could be well developed as a person instead of a stereotype – flighty artist, dirty old man, etc.

17 Mar, 2018

Ecstasy

/ posted in: Book Review, Reading

Ecstasy by Mary Sharratt
on April 10th 2018
Pages: 400
Genres: Fiction, Historical
Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Format: eARC
Source: Book Tour, From author/publisher

In the glittering hotbed of turn-of-the-twentieth-century Vienna, one woman’s life would define and defy an era
Gustav Klimt gave Alma her first kiss. Gustav Mahler fell in love with her at first sight and proposed only a few weeks later. Bauhaus founder Walter Gropius abandoned all reason to pursue her. Poet and novelist Franz Werfel described her as “one of the very few magical women that exist.” But who was this woman who brought these most eminent of men to their knees? In Ecstasy, Mary Sharratt finally gives one of the most controversial and complex women of her time the center stage.
Coming of age in the midst of a creative and cultural whirlwind, young, beautiful Alma Schindler yearns to make her mark as a composer. A brand-new era of possibility for women is dawning and she is determined to make the most of it. But Alma loses her heart to the great composer Gustav Mahler, nearly twenty years her senior. He demands that she give up her music as a condition for their marriage. Torn by her love and in awe of his genius, how will she remain true to herself and her artistic passion?
Part cautionary tale, part triumph of the feminist spirit, Ecstasy reveals the true Alma Mahler: composer, author, daughter, sister, mother, wife, lover, and muse.

I received this book from Historical Fiction Virtual Book Tours.

Alma Mahler was a very interesting woman. She was ambitious in a time and place that did not reward that in upper class white women. She wanted to be a composer but was told that she couldn’t if she wanted to marry the man she wanted.

This book does a good job of highlighting the mental cost of requiring a woman to be a wife and mother if that is not their desire. Her depression and their martial troubles in the face of his refusal to see her as a creative human being was well written.

I wish this book had pulled me deeper into the story emotionally. Great historical fiction should immerse you in the time and place. It should take a little effort to get your focus out of that world when you put the book aside. This reading experience felt very surface level which is a shame. Early 20th century Vienna and the artistic world there could be a very lush setting for a novel.

I enjoyed learning about this woman that I had not previous been aware of.

24 Feb, 2018

A Spell in the Country

/ posted in: Book Review, Reading

A Spell in the Country by Heide Goody, Iain Grant
on February 23rd 2018
Pages: 446
Genres: Fantasy & Magic, Fiction
Format: eARC
Source: Book Tour, From author/publisher
Setting: England

Dee is a Good Witch but she wonders if she could be a better witch.
She wonders if there’s more to life than Disney movie marathons, eating a whole box of chocolates for dinner and brewing up potions in her bathtub. So when she’s offered a chance to go on a personal development course in the English countryside, she packs her bags, says goodbye to the Shelter for Unloved Animals charity shop and sets a course for self-improvement.

Caroline isn’t just a Good Witch, she’s a fricking awesome witch.
She likes to find the easy path through life: what her good looks can’t get for her, a few magic charms can. But she’s bored of being a waitress and needs something different in her life. So when a one night stand offers her a place on an all-expenses-paid residential course in a big old country house, she figures she’s got nothing to lose.

Jenny is a Wicked Witch. She just wishes she wasn’t.
On her fifteenth birthday, she got her first wart, her own imp and a Celine Dion CD. She still has the imp. She also has a barely controllable urge to eat human children which is socially awkward to say the least and not made any easier when a teenager on the run turns to her for help. With gangsters and bent cops on their trail, Jenny needs to find a place outside the city where they can lay low for a while.

For very different reasons, three very different witches end up on the same training course and land in a whole lot of trouble when they discover that there’s a reason why their free country break sounds too good to be true. Foul-mouthed imps, wererats, naked gardeners, tree monsters, ghosts and stampeding donkeys abound in a tale about discovering your inner witch.

This book was absolutely ridiculous and I loved it. I actually, honestly, literally laughed out loud a few times. From surveys where the only right answer is commenting about the survey taker’s flaming hat to absolutely perverse imps to flying landscaping equipment, it took every stereotype about witches and twisted them delightfully.

This is a book that you don’t try to hard to make perfect sense. It is a madcap romp and you should just go along for the ride. There are witches of all ages and abilities. Some use herbs. Some use whatever is laying around. Others have a complete set of every type of mystical craft available in occult stores.

My only complaint is that with all the action the characterization took a back seat. Sometimes it was hard to keep track of which witch was which. But that is a minor quibble. Pick this one up for a light, silly story.

07 Feb, 2018

Sugar and Spice and All Those Lies

/ posted in: Book Review, Reading

Sugar and Spice and All Those Lies by Evy Journey
on November 29, 2017
Pages: 181
Genres: Fiction
Format: eARC
Source: Book Tour, From author/publisher

Cooking a wonderful meal is an art. An act of love. An act of grace. A gift that affirms and gives life—not only does it nurture those who partake of the meal; it also feeds the soul of the creator. These are lessons Gina learns from her mother, daughter of an unfortunate French chef.

Gina is a young woman born to poor parents, a nobody keen to taste life outside the world she was born into. A world that exposes her to fascinating people gripped by dark motives. Her passion for cooking is all she has to help her navigate it.

She gets lucky when she’s chosen to cook at a Michelin-starred restaurant in the San Francisco Bay Area where customers belong to a privileged class with money to spare for a dinner of inventive dishes costing hundreds of dollars. In this heady, scintillating atmosphere, she meets new friends and new challenges—pastry chef Marcia, filthy rich client Leon, and Brent, a brooding homicide detective. This new world, it turns out, is also one of unexpected danger.

The main character is working at a restaurant. She has a chance to serve one of the dishes she created to a favored client. He is there on a date with her childhood best friend. He immediately, like while sitting in front of his date, starts talking about his interest in the main character. That’s super creepy behavior. Then he starts to stalk her in spite of her repeated requests for him to stop.

Apparently every time her friend’s boyfriends meet our main character they immediately fall for her without her doing anything at all to encourage them.

I actually checked several times to confirm that this was written by a woman. You usually don’t see the ‘vapid heroine who doesn’t do anything to attract men but they fall all over her just for existing storyline’ in books written by women. You especially don’t see it to the point where other women are physically attacking her – repeatedly. This book also doesn’t really seem to consider stalking to be a bad thing. It is just proof he loves you. If he won’t stop, you just haven’t said no hard enough and why are you wanting to say no anyway?

I thought our stalking dude was obviously the bad guy of the story but I was wrong. Our MC decides to move in with her stalker because he’s rich and she wants to live that lifestyle until he gets tired of her and kicks her out. That’s her plan. When her mother tells her that it is a completely stupid idea she is presented as out of touch.

I didn’t care about anyone in this story except maybe Christi, the main character’s childhood best friend. Everyone else was only out for themselves and didn’t give you any reason to root for them. I’m not a fan of books with amoral characters. Books where everyone is just using each other with no concern about the right or wrong of their actions don’t usually work for me. That’s definitely the case here.

Evy Journey, writer, wannabe artist, and flâneuse (feminine of flâneur), wishes she lives in Paris where people have perfected the art of aimless roaming. Armed with a Ph.D., she used to research and help develop mental health programs.

She’s a writer because beautiful prose seduces her and existential angst continues to plague her despite such preoccupations having gone out of fashion. She takes occasional refuge by invoking the spirit of Jane Austen to spin tales of love, loss, and finding one’s way—stories into which she weaves mystery or intrigue.

Connect with the author: Website ~ Twitter ~ Facebook ~ Pinterest

I received a copy of the book from IRead Book Tours.

06 Feb, 2018

Deborah Calling

/ posted in: Book Review, Reading

Deborah Calling by Avraham Azrieli
on July 25, 2017
Genres: Fiction, Historical
Format: eARC
Source: Book Tour, From author/publisher
Setting: Jordan/Israel

Deborah’s father dreamed that, one day, she would become a prophet—a seemingly impossible dream for a woman in a patriarchal society. To see her father’s dream come true, Deborah made the cunning decision to become a man and sought out a mysterious elixirist who can turn women into men.
Under the elixirist Kassite’s tutelage and training, Deborah learns the essential traits of masculinity and steadily grows stronger, building muscle and willpower. But Kassite requests something in return: he needs Deborah's help to escape the tannery and return to his homeland. It is the beginning of another thrilling adventure through the desert—a cat and mouse chase between Deborah and her violent fiancé who still hunts her, a chance meeting with an ancient healer with a prophetic message, and a revelatory spiritual experience in an abandoned cave.
As she continues on the path God has laid before her, Deborah witnesses the darkness that can take hold in the hearts and souls of men—evil that causes her to reflect on the wisdom, insight, and inspiration she has gained from the women in her life. Will becoming a man truly help her become a prophetess, or might there be another path? Visionary dreams, a mysterious eagle, and an extraordinary band of ex-slaves will help Deborah find the answer . . . and ultimately her calling.

I haven’t read the first book in this series that imagines the life of Deborah from the biblical book of Judges. I received this book as part of a blog tour but it was not difficult to understand what had come before. We know in the bible Deborah is leading the tribes of Israel but how did a woman get to this position of authority? This story posits that her father had a dream that said that she would be a prophet. She can not imagine how this could happen as a woman so she decides to take a potion that would turn her into a man. Obviously, hormone therapy wasn’t available then so she is getting scammed by the people who are supposedly helping her.

She has a lot of internalized misogyny. This isn’t surprising given the thoughts about women in her time. But the men who are supposedly helping her keep drilling it into her head. Women are stupid and emotional. Men are in all ways superior. I started highlighting these comments as they came up in the book.

“Girls aren’t stupid.” “It is not a matter of stupidity, but of destiny. Women exist to keep the home—make food, sew clothes, bear children, care for infants. That is why the gods made women fit for domesticated submission—passive, temperamental, small-minded, and anxious.“

Deborah’s face flushed with shame. The mere sight of someone resembling Zariz had caused her to cast off all masculine strength and posture, instantly regressing to the foolish girl she had once been.

Kassite might view it as yet another manifestation of feminine weakness.

There are more but that is the general idea. They keep telling her that she needs to search inside herself to get the final inspiration to complete her transformation to a man. I was hoping that this led to her realizing her strength as a woman and deciding that she didn’t need to change herself externally in order to be able to be a prophet. The book could have easily had that be the outcome. I thought that was what it was leading to. Instead she decides to embrace her life as a woman because she has a magical dream where she sees herself dispensing justice as a woman. What?

When she declares this to her “mentors”, they dismiss her ideas and no longer accord her the same respect as when she was trying to be masculine.

“I am disappointed,” Kassite said. “You still think like a girl.”

Obviously the constraints of the time and place restrict how “Smash the Patriarchy” the story can go but I wanted more realization of feminine strength than was seen in this book.

This is part of a continuing series. You don’t know at the end how she rises in power. This is a story that I would love to hear but I’m not sure that I will be satisfied with this author’s imagining of the story. This book works fine as an adventurous historical fiction tale but it was worrisome to read this much internalized misogyny that isn’t disputed in the text from a male author.

There are also some anachronisms in the story especially in regard to the horses. I’m a horse history nerd so that might not bother anybody else.

18 Jul, 2017

When The Future Comes Too Soon

/ posted in: Book Review, Reading

When the Future Comes Too Soon by Selina Siak Chin Yoke
on July 18, 2017
Series: Malayan #2
Genres: Fiction, Historical
Format: eARC
Source: From author/publisher
Also in this series: The Woman Who Breathed Two Worlds

In Japanese-occupied Malaya, lives are shattered and a woman discovers her inner strength in a world ravaged by war.
Following the death of their matriarch, the lives of Chye Hoon’s family turned upside down. Now that the British have fled and the Japanese have conquered, their once-benign world changes overnight.
Amid the turmoil, Chye Hoon’s daughter-in-law, Mei Foong, must fend for her family as her husband, Weng Yu, becomes increasingly embittered. Challenged in ways she never could have imagined and forced into hiding, Mei Foong finds a deep reservoir of resilience she did not know she had and soon draws the attentions of another man.
Is Mei Foong’s resolve enough to save herself, her marriage, and her family? Only when peace returns to Malaya will she learn the full price she must pay for survival.

I loved the first book in this series – The Woman Who Breathed Two Worlds. That was the story of a woman in Malaya who witnesses the change of her area when the British colonize. Her oldest son is educated in England and she has huge hopes for him that he fails to live up to. He marries a Chinese girl to please his mother. This book picks up immediately after the death of the protagonist of the first book. Her Chinese daughter-in-law tells the story of how they survived the Japanese occupation of World War II.

I was a bit reluctant to pick this book up because of the time period. I know that Japanese occupations in Asia were brutal. This book does talk about one massacre but overall it keeps a much narrower focus. It looks at how this one family survived the war. They know people in the resistance but that isn’t talked about much.

One of the conflicts was knowing how to react to the Japanese. They were invaders and they could be cruel but they also allowed Asian people into high ranking jobs that the British establishment would have never allowed. Our narrator Mei Foong’s husband, Weng Yu is given a job that he has always wanted by the Japanese. She has learned that her husband is a coward. He would head to bomb shelters first before helping her or their children. She has lost a lot of respect for him. He is in turns indifferent and cruel to her. Mei Foong learns to grow her own food and sells her mother’s jewelry in order for her family to be able to eat. The family basically keeps their heads down and does what they have to do to survive unnoticed.

“If anyone had called me a collaborator to my face, I would have recoiled. As far as I was concerned, we were only giving the Japs our unwilling cooperation.”

This is a shorter book than the first one. It only covers the years of the war. It mostly the story of the disintegration of a marriage and a woman’s finding strength in herself that she didn’t know she had set against a backdrop of war instead of a novel about the war. It isn’t necessary to read the first book before picking this one up but it adds to your background knowledge of the area and the characters.

I would recommend this to anyone who likes historical fiction. Mei Foong is a great character. She grows from a shy, pampered, upper class bride into a woman who knows her worth and is able to take care of herself.

About Selina Siak Chin Yoke

Of Malaysian-Chinese heritage, Selina Siak Chin Yoke (石清玉) grew up listening to family stories and ancient legends. She always knew that one day, she would write. After an eclectic life as a physicist, banker and trader in London, the heavens intervened. In 2009 Chin Yoke was diagnosed with cancer. While recovering, she decided not to delay her dream of writing any longer.

Reading this book contributed to these challenges:

Books Set in Asia
POC authors

19 Jun, 2017

Sweet Tea Tuesdays

/ posted in: Reading

Sweet Tea Tuesday by Ashley Farley
on February 22nd 2017
Genres: Fiction
Format: eARC
Source: From author/publisher
Setting: South Carolina

Three best friends met every Tuesday for twenty-six years. And then they stopped.
From the author of the bestselling Sweeney Sisters Series comes a novel of friendship, family, and hope.
When new next-door neighbors Georgia, Midge, and Lula first assembled on Georgia's porch in Charleston for sweet tea, they couldn't have known their gathering was the beginning of a treasured tradition. For twenty-six years they have met on Tuesdays at four o'clock, watching the seasons change and their children grow up, supporting each other in good times and in bad. With their ambitions as different as their personalities, these best friends anticipate many more years of tea time. And then, one Tuesday, Georgia shares news that brings their long-standing social hour to an abrupt halt. And that's only the beginning as unraveling secrets threaten to alter their friendship forever.

This book was not what I was anticipating. I expected a book about friendship. This isn’t really about that. The book starts with the friendship of the three women unraveling because one woman gets a job and asks to change their meeting time. That seems like a reasonable request but it causes a major meltdown in Lulu who then refuses to speak to them anymore.

We come to find out that Lulu is actually a horrible angry woman who hides it behind a mask of gentility. She is thrilled to find out that her favorite daughter who lives in California is coming back for a visit.

We find out that:

She went to California for college
She doesn’t visit
She cut her hair short

It is like the Holy Trinity of Lesbian Foreshadowing. /sarcasm

When the prodigal daughter tells her mother that she is gay, the mother starts in on homophobic rants that are absolutely vicious. I certainly didn’t expect this level of hatred spilling out of a book that appears to be marketed as a light read. People may attempt to explain this character’s hatred away by saying that she is sick and not in her right frame of mind. She may not really mean that. I think that is negated by the fact that the older daughter had stayed away for years because she knew her mother would react poorly to finding out that she was a lesbian.

She’s also racist. When she is imaging that her daughter’s friend that is coming home with her is a man, she starts to worry about what will happen if she doesn’t like him. In her list of concerns is, “What if he was a foreigner or a hog farmer?” Excuse me, what? She also reacts negatively to finding out that the name of the home care nurse she has been recommended is Gladys Guzman.

It is ok to have a horrible character in a book. But this book doesn’t limit the tone-deaf narrative to that character. There is repeated use of the phrase “chosen lifestyle” to describe lesbianism from different characters. Lula’s younger daughter has just graduated from college and lives in downtown Charleston. Somehow she also doesn’t know anything about gay people? “She asked herself if she approved of her sister’s chosen lifestyle and was surprised her answer was yes.” Well, thank you for bestowing your seal of approval.

She also feels bad about thinking that her mother was bigot. Nope, honey, your mother is a bigot. Go with your gut on this one.

Even though towards the end there is magical reconciliation in the family, you don’t see if she changes her mind about gay people or “foreigners”. The people around her don’t call her out on it much. If fact they use these phrases to describe her:

“Her faith is so strong.”
“She was ornery and set in her ways, but she had the kindest heart of them all.”

No. This is a woman who told a doctor who called her out on her homophobia that she didn’t want to be treated by any LGBT doctors or nurses. She did not have a kind heart.

There are two other women in this story but their narratives took a back seat to Lulu’s. They weren’t as hateful as she was which is good. I actually liked Georgia who has spent her life as a doctor’s wife only to find out that he’s been cheating on her for years. She doesn’t take his crap (much) when he tries to blame it all on her. Midge is in a new relationship with a man that everyone assures her is rotten. She doesn’t listen to her friends or her instincts and yet somehow it is all ok?

I’ve never been a big proponent of trigger warnings but this book might change my mind. The anti-homosexual hatred in this book is so intense and there is no mention of any discussion of homosexuality in the blurb so people would be unaware of it coming. A mention in the description of conflict between a mother and her lesbian daughter might help people not be blindsided.

About Ashley Farley

Ashley Farley writes books about women for women. Her characters are mothers, daughters, sisters, and wives facing real-life issues. Her goal is to keep you turning the pages until the wee hours of the morning. If her story stays with you long after you’ve read the last word, then she’s done her job.

After her brother died in 1999 of an accidental overdose, she turned to writing as a way of releasing her pent-up emotions. She wrote SAVING BEN in honor of Neal, the boy she worshipped, the man she could not save.

Ashley is a wife and mother of two young adult children. While she’s lived in Richmond, Virginia for the past 21 years, part of her heart remains in the salty marshes of the South Carolina Lowcountry where she grew up. Through the eyes of her characters, she’s able to experience the moss-draped trees, delectable cuisine, and kind-hearted folks with lazy drawls that make the area so unique.

Reading this book contributed to these challenges:

Books Set in North America
LBGTQ authors/characters

02 Nov, 2016

The Whole Town’s Talking

/ posted in: Reading The Whole Town’s Talking

The Whole Town's Talking by Fannie Flagg
on November 29th 2016
Pages: 224
Genres: Fantasy & Magic, Fiction
Published by Random House
Format: eARC
Source: From author/publisher
Buy on Amazon (affiliate link)
Setting: Missouri

“Elmwood Springs, Missouri, is a small town like any other, but something strange is happening out at the cemetery. “Still Meadows,” as it’s called, is anything but still.”

I love Fannie Flagg’s books. You know what you are going to get with them. They will be funny and heartfelt stories of small towns.

This is the story of the founding of Elmwood Springs, Missouri. It is settled by Swedish farmers who decide that they need to carve out a town to support their farms. The first white settler in the area was named Lordor Nordstrom. Eventually the women of the surrounding farms decide that he needs a wife. He advertises for a bride and finds a nice Swedish woman in Chicago. Their romance is sweet and charming.

The town grows through the years and eventually the founding settlers begin to die. This is where the story takes a turn. In Elmwood Springs the residents of the cemetery are still involved in town life. They keep up on the local gossip from interviewing new arrivals and from listening to what visitors to the cemetery say.

I liked the beginning of the book but most of the cemetery section was less interesting for me. The action skipped over years at a time. It was hard to keep track of the family trees as time passed. The epilogue of the book redeemed it for me though. It ties together what appeared to be major plot holes in the story in a satisfying way.

This was a quick read. I read it in one setting. This is a great book for a cozy night of comfort reading when you don’t want anything too challenging.

Book received from NetGalley in exchange for a review

03 Oct, 2016

Born A Crime

/ posted in: Reading Born A Crime

Born a Crime by Trevor Noah
on November 15th 2016
Pages: 224
Genres: Nonfiction, Personal Memoirs
Published by Doubleday Canada
Format: eARC
Source: From author/publisher
Buy on Amazon (affiliate link)
Setting: South Africa

“The compelling, inspiring, and comically sublime story of one man’s coming-of-age, set during the twilight of apartheid and the tumultuous days of freedom that followed. Trevor Noah’s unlikely path from apartheid South Africa to the desk of The Daily Show began with a criminal act: his birth. Trevor was born to a white Swiss father and a black Xhosa mother at a time when such a union was punishable by five years in prison. Living proof of his parents indiscretion, Trevor was kept mostly indoors for the earliest years of his life, bound by the extreme and often absurd measures his mother took to hide him from a government that could, at any moment, steal him away. Finally liberated by the end of South Africa’s tyrannical white rule, Trevor and his mother set forth on a grand adventure, living openly and freely and embracing the opportunities won by a centuries-long struggle.”

This book is amazing. That is all. Go preorder it.

I was reading this on my Kindle app and was highlighting like crazy. Trevor Noah has been an outsider all his life. In South Africa under apartheid there were four racial categories – white, black, colored, and Indian. Colored people were the descendants of interracial relationships in the past. There was no category for 50/50 black/white children because it couldn’t legally happen. He chose to identify as black because that’s what his mother was but he wasn’t accepted there either.

Growing up both defined by and outside of such a strict racial hierarchy sharpened his insights.

“That is the curse of being black and poor, and it is a curse that follows you from generation to generation. My mother calls it “the black tax.” Because the generations who came before you have been pillaged, rather than being free to use your skills and education to move forward, you lose everything just trying to bring everyone behind you back up to zero.”

“British racism said, “If the monkey can walk like a man and talk like a man, then perhaps he is a man.” Afrikaner racism said, “Why give a book to a monkey?”

He talks about history when describing why having a friend named Hitler wasn’t considered strange.

“Every country thinks their history is the most important, and that’s especially true in the West. But if black South Africans could go back in time and kill one person, Cecil Rhodes would come up before Hitler. If people in the Congo could go back in time and kill one person, Belgium’s King Leopold would come way before Hitler. If Native Americans could go back in time and kill one person, it would probably be Christopher Columbus or Andrew Jackson.”

“Holocaust victims count because Hitler counted them. Six million people killed. We can all look at that number and rightly be horrified. But when you read through the history of atrocities against Africans, there are no numbers, only guesses. It’s harder to be horrified by a guess.”

This is the story of growing up illegally because his mother fought to make a place for him even before the fall of apartheid. She was a visionary. However, even after apartheid there wasn’t a place for him to make a legal living as easily as it was to make an illegal one in the townships. He talks about the saying about teaching a man to fish vs giving him a fish. He points out that it doesn’t work if you don’t also help him get a fishing pole.

This isn’t the story of how he became a comedian or how he ended up taking over for Jon Stewart as the host of The Daily Show. That all comes later. This is the story of the world that shaped him into the person he is today. It is funny. It is horrifying. It is necessary reading.

I received this book from NetGalley.

29 Sep, 2016

Seducing the Marquess

/ posted in: Reading Seducing the Marquess

Seducing the Marquess by Callie Hutton
on October 17th 2016
Genres: Regency, Romance
Format: eARC
Source: From author/publisher
Buy on Amazon (affiliate link)
Setting: England

“Richard, Marquess of Devon is satisfied with his ton marriage. His wife of five months, Lady Eugenia Devon, thought she was, too, until she found the book. Their marriage is one of respect and affection, with no messy entanglements such as love. Devon’s upbringing impressed upon him that gentlemen slake their baser needs on a mistress, not their gently bred wives. However, once married, he was no longer comfortable bedding a woman other Eugenia. When she stumbles onto a naughty book, she begins a campaign to change the rules.”

This book started with an interesting twist. Instead of being all about the courtship like most Regency romances, this story starts after the couple has been married for five months. Eugenia hears the news that her husband’s mistress has died in an accident and decides to take this opportunity to convince him to not find another one. At the same time she comes across a sex manual in a book store. (Let’s just set aside the unlikeliness of a sex manual in a Regency bookstore in a place where a lady could come across it, ok?)

Up until now their physical relationship has consisted of scheduled three nights a week sex mostly clothed in the dark in order to produce an heir. She was told by her mother that she should just lie still and think about redecorating and it would be over soon. He was told that you do you duty with your wife and keep a mistress on the side for any of your desires other than procreation. All this advice has resulted in some people with some very mixed up ideas and hang ups about sex.

Eugenia’s attempt to spice up their marriage does not go well. Her husband is horrified. He starts to avoid her. No more scheduled times. Now she has to try to seduce him to get him back. He is convinced that she has taken a lover because of her new found knowledge. It is all an object lesson about why people should talk to each other when they are married instead of making assumptions.

I did enjoy this twist on a historical romance. This book would be good for Regency fans who don’t mind a little bit of explicit sexual talk and activity.

I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for a review.

26 Sep, 2016

Dancers After Dark

/ posted in: Reading Dancers After Dark

Dancers After Dark by Jordan Matter
on September 28th 2016
Pages: 256
Genres: Photography, Subjects & Themes, Sports
Published by Workman Publishing
Format: eARC
Source: From author/publisher
Buy on Amazon (affiliate link)

“Dancers After Dark” is an amazing celebration of the human body and the human spirit, as dancers, photographed nude and at night, strike poses of fearless beauty. Without a permit or a plan, Jordan Matter led hundreds of the most exciting dancers in the world out of their comfort zones not to mention their clothes to explore the most compelling reaches of beauty and the human form. After all the risk and daring, the result is extraordinary: 300 dancers, 400 locations, more than 150 stunning photographs. And no clothes, no arrests, no regrets. Each image highlights the amazing abilities of these artists and presents a core message to the reader: Say yes rather than no, and embrace the risks and opportunities that life presents. “

It started with an offhand comment from a contortionist. She’d be available for a photoshoot after her show. It might be raining. Maybe they should try nudes.

Jordan Matter had been photographing dancers and circus performers for years but now that work went in a new direction. This is a book of photos of dancers naked in public at night. There were no permits. No closed sets.

The photographs in the book are beautiful. Several of them I stared at just to try to figure out how they got into those positions. I love one of a dancer balancing on pointe on top of a wine bottle. Other times I could only imagine how incredibly cold they must have been. Here’s a behind the scenes video of one of the shots that made me freeze just looking at it.

The cover dancer is Michaela Prince, whose autobiography I reviewed. Most of the rest are anonymous except for Alan Cumming. At the end of the book there are some of the stories behind the pictures. It wasn’t enough. I wish there had been a story for every picture. I wanted to know if the participants were ballet dancers or modern dancers. Did they perform on Broadway or in circuses? Luckily there is video of the process that gives more background on his website.

15 Jul, 2016

Santa Muerte

/ posted in: Reading Santa Muerte

Santa Muerte (The Daniela Story #1) by Lucina Stone
on January 1st 1970
Genres: Fantasy & Magic, Fiction
Format: eARC
Source: From author/publisher
Set in New York and Mexico

In 2030 college student Daniela Delgado decides to kill herself. Instead of dying though, she is dropped through time to 1923 where her pixie cut and boy clothes convince people that she is a young colored boy. Soon she is on the run with an abused farm girl posing as an aristocrat and her male servant.

Back in 2030 Daniela’s mother fears that the only way to find her daughter is to contact her mother. They have been estranged ever since Emma came out as a lesbian. She also didn’t want any part in her mother’s delusions that she was a witch. But what if she wasn’t crazy and she is the only one who can help Daniela?

This is one of the more realistic time travel books that I’ve read. Daniela doesn’t land among rich people who will help her. She isn’t a history scholar who can fix past events. She’s just a girl who knows that the 1920s aren’t a good time to be mistaken for a young colored man and she needs to get out.

Things get weird when her smartphone still works. She is able to message another smartphone user in the area. This turns out to be another time traveler who recognizes the significance of her last name. The Delgados are family of powerful witches. An unprotected Delgado is an opportunity to earn a big ransom.

In the future, Emma is getting a crash course in the magic that she has rejected all her life. Can she embrace her family legacy and not destroy her relationship with her wife?

This is the first book in a series so things aren’t tied up at the end. I like a little more ending than we got here. I am interested to see what comes next in the series.

3flower

10 Apr, 2015

Learning the Secret Language of Cats by Carol Teed

/ posted in: Reading Learning the Secret Language of Cats by Carol Teed

Learning the Secret Language of Cats by Carol Teed
on 2013
Pages: 234
Format: eARC
Source: Book Tour
Buy on Amazon (affiliate link)

Exploring the mind of the cat, Dr. Teed describes what can be learned from understanding this most mysterious of creatures. She explores the body-mind-soul connection and notes that what feeds the mind and soul is often deficient in the modern world we have constructed for ourselves and our cats. These deficiencies then become written on the body. She feels a more integrated body-mind-soul approach to care for our felines is what is needed now for the modern cat. Describing cats as motivational or inspirational speakers who can teach us how to live a life worth living, Dr. Teed relates how she observed first-hand, time and time again, the positive power of the cat to affect change in small spheres. And she reflects on what an amazing thing it would be if we were all a bit more cat-like. In her words, every household can benefit from a cat.

One of the most frustrating parts of my job is trying to explain cats to people who don’t want to listen. People think that cats should be happy to live in a house with people and dogs and other cats just like dogs are. Cats are not like dogs.

My first line of questions when someone brings in a cat for urinating outside the litter box is – “Has anything changed in the house that might have upset him? Are there any other pets in the house? Do they get along?” The answers are always, “No. Yes. They get along great! Sometimes they play rough but other than that they love each other.” Then we start going deeper into what is going on in the house.

Stress is a major cause of illness in cats and people don’t recognize a stressed cat when they see one. That’s why I was excited to read this book written by a veterinarian about understanding cats.

This isn’t a “how to take care of your cat” book. It is written partially as a memoir of her experience in practice, using stories of patients she treated to illustrate points. It talks in a conversational tone about nutrition and behavior and illness. I also appreciated the section about how vets are not out to steal all your money.

I wish all cat owners would read this book to start to understand what their cat is trying to tell them. It would make the life of the cat and the humans they live with so much better.