Waiting on Wednesday

This meme was hosted by Breaking the Spine and is meant to highlight some great pre-publication books we all can't wait to get our grubby little mitts on. I'm choosing to continue the tradition even though she has stopped.

The Night Travelers by Armando Lucas Correa

The book is being released by Atria Books on January 10, 2023.

The book's jacket copy says: Four generations of women experience love, loss, war, and hope from the rise of Nazism to the Cuban Revolution and finally, the fall of the Berlin Wall in this sweeping novel from the bestselling author of the “timely must-read” (People) The German Girl.

Berlin, 1931: Ally Keller, a talented young poet, is alone and scared when she gives birth to a mixed-race daughter she names Lilith. As the Nazis rise to power, Ally knows she must keep her baby in the shadows to protect her against Hitler’s deadly ideology of Aryan purity. But as she grows, it becomes more and more difficult to keep Lilith hidden so Ally sets in motion a dangerous and desperate plan to send her daughter across the ocean to safety.

Havana, 1958: Now an adult, Lilith has few memories of her mother or her childhood in Germany. Besides, she’s too excited for her future with her beloved Martin, a Cuban pilot with strong ties to the Batista government. But as the flames of revolution ignite, Lilith and her newborn daughter, Nadine, find themselves at a terrifying crossroads.

Berlin, 1988: As a scientist in Berlin, Nadine is dedicated to ensuring the dignity of the remains of all those who were murdered by the Nazis. Yet she has spent her entire lifetime avoiding the truth about her own family’s history. It takes her daughter, Luna, to encourage Nadine to uncover the truth about the choices her mother and grandmother made to ensure the survival of their children. And it will fall to Luna to come to terms with a shocking betrayal that changes everything she thought she knew about her family’s past.

Separated by time but united by sacrifice, four women embark on journeys of self-discovery and find themselves to be living testaments to the power of motherly love.

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

With the Christmas countdown happening, I am busy finishing up gifts, cooking, and the like so not much reading is getting done! This meme is hosted by Kathryn at Reading Date.

Books I completed over the past couple of weeks:

Death on a Winter Stroll by Francine Mathews
Under a Veiled Moon by Karen Odden
Why We Ride edited by Verna Dreisbach
How to Kill our Family by Bella Mackie

Bookmarks are still living in the middle of:

The Wings of the Dove by Henry James
The Witches of Moonshyne Manor by Biana Marais

Reviews posted this week:

The Foundling by Ann Leary
Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr
Death on a Winter Stroll by Francine Mathews
Under a Veiled Moon by Karen Odden

Books still needing to have reviews written (as opposed to the ones that are simply awaiting posting):

Imperfect Birds by Anne Lamott
Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal
Tiddas by Anita Heiss
The Tourist Attraction by Sarah Morgenthaler
Finlay Donovan Knocks 'Em Dead by Elle Cosimano
The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman
The Night Always Comes by Willy Vlautin
If I Were You by Lisa Renee Jones
McMullen Circle by Heather Newton
Dangerous Alliance by Jennieke Cohen
Donut Fall in Love by Jackie Lau
Twenty-One Truths About Love by Matthew Dicks
The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood
Home Repairs by Trey Ellis
Skinny Bitch in Love by Kim Barnouin
Looking for a Weegie to Love by Simon Smith
This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay
A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers
Love and Saffron by Kim Fay
The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet by Eleanor Cameron
Shady Hollow by Juneau Black
Four Gardens by Margery Sharp
Uncommon Measure by Natalie Hodges
Jane of Hearts by Katharine Weber
Laura Rider's Masterpiece by Jane Hamilton
Surviving Savannah by Patti Callahan
Chivalry by Neil Gaiman and Colleen Doran
Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez
She Is Haunted by Paige Clark
A Woman's Place by Marita Golden
Murder Above the Silver Waves by Blythe Baker
Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou
Easy Beauty by Chloe Cooper Jones
The Witches of New York by Ami McKay
The Desert Smells Like Rain by Gary Paul Nabhan
Stay Gone Days by Steve Yarbrough
The Mason House by T. Marie Bertineau
A Map for the Missing by Belinda Huijuan Tang
Just One Taste by Louisa Edwards
The Good Byline by Jill Orr
Truth and Other Lies by Maggie Smith
Dance of the Returned by Devon A. Mihesuah
Like a Drop of Ink in a Downpour by Yelena and Galina Lembersky
The Woman They Could Not Silence by Kate Moore
These Precious Days by Ann Patchett
Tomorrow in Shanghai by May-Lee Chai
What's Mine and Yours by Naima Coster
Geographies of the Heart by Caitlin Hamilton Summie
Setting Fire to Water by Phoebe Tsang
My Days of Dark Green Euphoria by A. E. Copenhaver
Last Summer on State Street by Toya Wolfe
My Monticello by Jocelyn Nicole Johnson
Provenance by Sue Mell
I Will Die in a Foreign Land by Kalani Pickhart
The Two Lives of Sara by Catherine Adel West
A Girlhood: Letter to My Transgender Daughter by Carolyn Hays
The End We Start From by Megan Hunter
The Hawk's Way by Sy Montgomery
The Man with Eight Pairs of Legs by Leslie Kirk Campbell
Here Lies by Olivia Clare Friedman
The Barrens by Kurt Johnson and Ellie Johnson
Night of the Living Rez by Morgan Talty
Blue-Skinned Gods by S.J. Sindu
Everything Harder Than Everyone Else by Jenny Valentish
Drowned Town by Jayne Moore Waldrop
Beasts of a Little Land by Juhea Kim
Fighting Time by Amy Banks and Isaac Knapper
Oklahoma Odyssey by John Mort
Ballad of the Whiskey Robber by Julian Rubenstein
Let the Wild Grasses Grow by Kase Johnstun
A House in the Country by Ruth Adam
Lost in the Moment and Found by Seanan McGuire
Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee
The Year of the Horses by Courtney Maum
Colonel Sandhurst to the Rescue by M.C. Beaton
Color Me Murder by Krista Davis
In the Wake of the Boatman by Jonathon Scott Fuqua
Book Lovers by Emily Henry
The Marlow Murder Club by Robert Thorogood
The Marseille Caper by Peter Mayle
The Paris Bookseller by Kerri Maher
The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka
The Finder by Will Ferguson
Sandman by Bob Drews
We Ride Upon Sticks by Quan Barry
What We Talk About When We Talk About Dumplings edited by John Lorinc
Book of Extraordinary Tragedies by Joe Meno
The English Understand Wool by Helen DeWitt
50 Things to Do When You Turn 50 edited by Ronnie Sellers
Near the Exit by Lori Erickson
She Left Me the Gun by Emma Brockes
The Secrets Between Us by Thrity Umrigar
Beheld by Tarashea Nesbit
The Secret History of Food by Matt Siegel
My Fake Rake by Eva Leigh
Mothercare by Lynne Tillman
Hockey Karma by Howard Shapiro
Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel
Kiss and Tango by Marina Palmer
Galatea by Madeline Miller
The Librarian Always Rings Twice by Marty Wingate
The Field Guide to Dumb Birds of the Whole Stupid World by Matt Kracht
Why We Ride edited by Verna Dreisbach
How to Kill our Family by Bella Mackie

Waiting on Wednesday

This meme was hosted by Breaking the Spine and is meant to highlight some great pre-publication books we all can't wait to get our grubby little mitts on. I'm choosing to continue the tradition even though she has stopped.

In the Time of Our History by Susanne Pari

The book is being released by John Scognamiglio on January 3, 2023.

The book's jacket copy says: Inspired by her own family’s experiences following the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Susanne Pari explores the entangled lives within an Iranian American family grappling with generational culture clashes, the roles imposed on women, and a tragic accident that forces them to reconcile their guilt or forfeit their already tenuous bonds. Set between San Francisco and New Jersey in the late-1990’s, In the Time of Our History is a story about the universal longing to create a home in this world – and what happens when we let go of how we’ve always been told it should look.

Twelve months after her younger sister Anahita’s death, Mitra Jahani reluctantly returns to her parents’ home in suburban New Jersey to observe the Iranian custom of “The One Year.” Ana is always in Mitra’s heart, though they chose very different paths. While Ana, sweet and dutiful, bowed to their domineering father’s demands and married, Mitra rebelled, and was banished.

Caught in the middle is their mother, Shireen, torn between her fierce love for her surviving daughter and her loyalty to her husband. Yet his callousness even amid shattering loss has compelled her to rethink her own decades of submission. And when Mitra is suddenly forced to confront hard truths about her sister’s life, and the secrets each of them hid to protect others, mother and daughter reach a new understanding—and forge an unexpected path forward.

Alive with the tensions, sacrifices, and joys that thrum within the heart of every family, In the Time of Our History is also laced with the richness of ancient and modern Persian culture and politics, in a tale that is both timeless and profoundly relevant.

Review: Under a Veiled Moon by Karen Odden

The (misquoted) maxim "Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it" takes on new meaning in Karen Odden's Victorian set mystery, Under a Veiled Moon, the second in the Inspector Corravan Mystery series. Although the ethnic group is different (the Irish as versus the groups who are the targeted today), people and media still scapegoat "others" and consider them lesser than. These bigoted beliefs led to resentment and violence in the past, as shown in the novel, and similar bigoted beliefs lead to resentment and violence today. Perhaps one day we will learn.

Michael (Mickey) Corravan is the Acting Superintendent of the Wapping River Police. As the novel opens, he has found a unidentified body but quickly this one, potentially murdered man becomes a side note to a much bigger investigation. There's a collision on the Thames between a daily, wooden, pleasure boat and a heavy iron-clad collier that causes massive loss of life and Corravan must determine whether it was an accident or if it was intentionally caused by the Irish Republican Brotherhood as the newspapers attest. The possibility that the IRB is behind the collision causes a massive swell of anti-Irish sentiment at a time when the Irish were already considered vermin. And Michael Corravan is Irish. His superiors and colleagues want a speedy conclusion to the case and question whether he can investigate impartially given his own heritage and close ties to the community. At the same time, Corravan is worried about the youngest son of the family who took him in after his mother left. Colin Doyle has join the Cobbwallers, another Irish gang, and Corravan wants nothing more than to get Colin out of the gang and keep him safe for Ma Doyle.

The prevailing sentiment about the Irish and the debate about Irish Home Rule weaves through the entire story. Newspapers fan the flames of bigotry, falsifying evidence and printing half-truths, allowing extremists and other bitter and angry people an outlet and mouthpiece for their beliefs. Through it all, Corravan keeps his head, tamps down his own reaction, and doggedly goes about uncovering the actual truth of the collision, finding connections to his loved ones that will fill him with regret and sadness forever. Corravan's backstory before and then with the Doyle family weaves through the investigation but there is obviously more to be unveiled in future books. The plot is quite intricate and Odden does a fantastic job keeping it moving along and tying it all together. The politics of the time, the vitriol toward the Irish, and the quiet machinations of Parliament are front and center and at the root of everything here so readers should be prepared for politics to carry as much weight as the mystery itself. The whole thing is detailed, well researched, and well written. The larger story of Michael Corravan is intriguing and the secondary characters in his work and personal life are appealing. This is a good read for historical mystery readers, with a spot on sense of time and place and a sometimes troubling parallel to life, beliefs, and media today.

For more information about Karen Odden and the book, visit her author page, follow her on Facebook, Twitter, or Pinterest, look at the book's Goodreads page, or look at the reviews for others' thoughts and opinions on the book.

Thanks to Laurel Ann from Austenprose and the author for sending me a copy of the book to review.

Review: Death on a Winter Stroll by Francine Mathews

I am newish to the mystery genre so I had never read a Francine Mathews novel before. Diving into this 7th in the Merry Folger series was delightful and easy and now I'll have to go back and start at the beginning!

Merry Folger is the chief of police on Nantucket. With Covid lockdowns in the past, Christmas time on the island is busier than ever. The President and his family have just left and Merry is anticipating a quieter stretch despite the fact that a bunch of high profile Hollywood actors are filming a new series on the island, the Secretary of State and her family are visiting for the weekend, and the annual Christmas Stroll is about to happen. Unfortunately for Merry, right after the Stroll, the first body is discovered. And then there's a second victim killed in the same manner. But what could possibly connect a quiet recluse living in a supposedly abandoned home with one of the Hollywood people?

Mathews has drawn a varied cast of characters, some sympathetic and others a lot less so. Ansel, the Secretary of State's stepson, is a recovering drug addict who is trying to move forward with his life. Winter, the beautiful and troubled daughter of a famous Hollywood actor, is fighting to keep from relapsing into anorexia. They meet on the island and instantly identify with each other and their respective struggles. Both Ance and Winter's overprotective fathers love, worry, and want the best for their children although they react to their children in quite different ways, hardly daring to trust them and their fragile recoveries. Then these two young people trying so hard to find their respective ways in the world find themselves smack in the middle of the murder investigations.

Merry and Detective Seitz know that the two murders have to be connected but they are having trouble figuring out how. The first victim had few enemies while the second had no shortage of people who could have wanted him dead. The investigation is patient as Mathews slowly draws the reader to a surprising but perfect conclusion. Her depiction of Nantucket is gorgeously rendered and the Christmas Stroll is a charming tradition. The scenes of nature photography are well done technically and also quite visual so the reader can see in their mind's eye the winter birds that come to the island. The mystery is intriguing but so are the relationships between the major players. The characters are flawed and realistic and the way that the separate worlds of Hollywood and Washington come together, via Ance and Winter, works well. All in all, a fun and seasonally appropriate book that kept me guessing and left me happy to have read it.

For more information about Francine Mathews and the book, visit her author page, follow her on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or Pinterest, look at the book's Goodreads page, or look at the reviews for others' thoughts and opinions on the book.

Thanks to Laurel Ann from Austenprose and publisher Soho Crime for sending me a copy of the book to review.

Review: Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr

I still have the very first library card that was ever issued in my name. I was just a little, bitty thing and I'm sure the card had restrictions on it as to what I was allowed to check out (as well as being tied to my mother's account). And even though I've had many others through the years, that first one remains very cherished. I now have enough books around me in my home to qualify as my own library so I don't often go to my local library anymore but I will never forget the wonderful feeling that libraries and books gave me as they opened up a whole new world beyond the one I was living in. Anthony Doerr too obviously feels this same reverence and thankfulness for libraries and books as is evidenced by his long and sprawling novel, Cloud Cuckoo Land, which is first and foremost an ode to the way that stories sustain human beings and how librarians and other story tellers have kept those stories alive for centuries.

Weaving together five seemingly disparate stories ranging from the fifteenth century well into an imagined future, Doerr uses as his connective tissue, a fictional story written by Diogenes in the first century, the tale of Aethon searching for the magical, mystical, heaven-like Cloud Cuckoo Land. Each of the five people we subsequently follow through the pages comes to a connection with this story in some way. There's Anna in fifteenth century Constantinople. She's a rather unskilled seamstress working in a workshop but her heart is in the reading lessons she finagles from a teacher. Literacy opens the world to her. There's Omeir, a child born with a cleft palate and viewed as bad luck, whose family is cast out of their village because of his facial difference and the superstitions of the fifteenth century. Raised by his grandfather and suckled on the stories his grandfather tells, he becomes an oxen driver, raising two incredibly powerful beasts. There's Zeno who grows through the years from a child realizing his sexuality to a prisoner of war in Korea and finally to be an elderly man leading a school children's performance of the play of Cloud Cuckoo Land. There's Seymour who is pretty clearly neurodivergent and finds his peace in nature. He desperately grieves the devastation of nature that he sees all around him as developers eat up the places most important to him and he plots ways to fight back. And there's Konstance in the future. She was born on the space ship Argos that is traveling to another planet. She is an interim link in the chain of the future hope for humanity. She has never been unquestioning and her father cultivates her curiousity.

The threads of the different stories take a while to come together so the reader struggles to make sense of things in the beginning. The plot jumps from timeline to timeline in fairly short chapters which ultimately makes sense but is a major contribution to the initial struggle to sink into the story as a whole. Each of the plot lines is quite different, even those that take place in the same time period, but they all highlight the importance of story, the strength and resilience of human beings, and the power of those who keep or hold story for all of us. The writing is detailed and incredibly descriptive and Doerr does a fantastic job drawing time and place. There are portions of the book that have little to no action and so drag a bit and certain of the plot threads are more interesting than others (I personally had a fondness for Konstance's and Anna's early stories) but overall this is a far reaching, ambitious novel that lovers of literary fiction will devour.

Review: The Foundling by Ann Leary

Women have long had little control over their own bodies and lives. This is both true historically and even up to today, despite what we have already overcome. Ann Leary's disturbing and horrifying, but ultimately captivating, Prohibition-era historical fiction, The Foundling, based on her own grandmother's experiences, shows how little autonomy women had historically through the horrors of eugenics.

Although Mary Engel's father is alive, she was raised in an orphanage until the age of 12 when her father reclaimed her and dropped her off, unwanted and unwelcome, at her aunt's house. It's 1927 and Mary is attending stenography school when she meets Dr. Agnes Vogel, a respected psychiatrist, one of the few women in her profession, and a hero of Mary's. Dr. Vogel invites Mary to become her secretary at the remote Nettleton State Village for Feebleminded Women of Childbearing Age. Initially Mary believes that the women held at the asylum are of limited mental capacity and that their incarceration at Nettleton is a kindness to them. Then she recognizes a woman who was raised in the same orphanage Mary was, a woman who is most emphatically not "mentally incompetent." As she looks further into Lillian's situation, she unwittingly uncovers the truth about the troubling institute and the doctor at its head. Will she turn a blind eye or will she stand up for the voiceless women, trapped in a mental institution with no hope of release and suffering terrible abuse and cruelty?

The history and practice of eugenics is a shameful one in our history. It is a moral failure of gigantic proportions that required complicity and compliance from too many people. In Mary, Leary has created an initially naïve character who must look to herself and find her moral center before she can acknowledge the great wrong going on around her. She gains strength as the novel goes on and learns to see the complex layers of those around her and to acknowledge the ways in which society has failed, or chosen to punish, women who do not conform to the accepted norms, especially the young women incarcerated in the asylum because their husbands or fathers didn't approve of their behavior. The story itself is dramatic and action packed and Leary manages to weave a recognition of the grievous wrongs of not only eugenics but also racism and anti-Semitism into Mary's moral awakening. Readers will want to race to the end to see what happens to each of the characters in this twisting and surprising novel.

This book is one of the Women's National Book Association's 2022 Great Group Reads.

Waiting on Wednesday

This meme was hosted by Breaking the Spine and is meant to highlight some great pre-publication books we all can't wait to get our grubby little mitts on. I'm choosing to continue the tradition even though she has stopped.

The Book of Everlasting Things by Aanchal Malhotra

The book is being released by Flatiron Books on December 27, 2022.

The book's jacket copy says: On a January morning in 1938, Samir Vij first locks eyes with Firdaus Khan through the rows of perfume bottles in his family’s ittar shop in Lahore. Over the years that follow, the perfumer’s apprentice and calligrapher’s apprentice fall in love with their ancient crafts and with each other, dreaming of the life they will one day share. But as the struggle for Indian independence gathers force, their beloved city is ravaged by Partition. Suddenly, they find themselves on opposite sides: Samir, a Hindu, becomes Indian and Firdaus, a Muslim, becomes Pakistani, their love now forbidden. Severed from one another, Samir and Firdaus make a series of fateful decisions that will change the course of their lives forever. As their paths spiral away from each other, they must each decide how much of the past they are willing to let go, and what it will cost them.

Lush, sensuous, and deeply romantic, The Book of Everlasting Things is the story of two lovers and two nations, split apart by forces beyond their control, yet bound by love and memory. Filled with exquisite descriptions of perfume and calligraphy, spanning continents and generations, Aanchal Malhotra’s debut novel is a feast for the senses and the heart.

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

This meme is hosted by Kathryn at Reading Date.

Books I completed over the past week:

Hockey Karma by Howard Shapiro
Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel
Kiss and Tango by Marina Palmer
Galatea by Madeline Miller
The Librarian Always Rings Twice by Marty Wingate
The Field Guide to Dumb Birds of the Whole Stupid World by Matt Kracht

Bookmarks are still living in the middle of:

The Wings of the Dove by Henry James
Death on a Winter Stroll by Francine Mathews

Reviews posted this week:

The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw

Books still needing to have reviews written (as opposed to the ones that are simply awaiting posting):

Imperfect Birds by Anne Lamott
Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal
Tiddas by Anita Heiss
The Tourist Attraction by Sarah Morgenthaler
Finlay Donovan Knocks 'Em Dead by Elle Cosimano
The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman
The Night Always Comes by Willy Vlautin
If I Were You by Lisa Renee Jones
McMullen Circle by Heather Newton
Dangerous Alliance by Jennieke Cohen
Donut Fall in Love by Jackie Lau
Twenty-One Truths About Love by Matthew Dicks
The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood
Home Repairs by Trey Ellis
Skinny Bitch in Love by Kim Barnouin
Looking for a Weegie to Love by Simon Smith
This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay
A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers
Love and Saffron by Kim Fay
The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet by Eleanor Cameron
Shady Hollow by Juneau Black
Four Gardens by Margery Sharp
Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr
Uncommon Measure by Natalie Hodges
Jane of Hearts by Katharine Weber
Laura Rider's Masterpiece by Jane Hamilton
Surviving Savannah by Patti Callahan
Chivalry by Neil Gaiman and Colleen Doran
Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez
She Is Haunted by Paige Clark
A Woman's Place by Marita Golden
Murder Above the Silver Waves by Blythe Baker
Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou
Easy Beauty by Chloe Cooper Jones
The Witches of New York by Ami McKay
The Desert Smells Like Rain by Gary Paul Nabhan
Stay Gone Days by Steve Yarbrough
The Mason House by T. Marie Bertineau
A Map for the Missing by Belinda Huijuan Tang
Just One Taste by Louisa Edwards
The Good Byline by Jill Orr
Truth and Other Lies by Maggie Smith
Dance of the Returned by Devon A. Mihesuah
Like a Drop of Ink in a Downpour by Yelena and Galina Lembersky
The Woman They Could Not Silence by Kate Moore
These Precious Days by Ann Patchett
Tomorrow in Shanghai by May-Lee Chai
What's Mine and Yours by Naima Coster
Geographies of the Heart by Caitlin Hamilton Summie
Setting Fire to Water by Phoebe Tsang
My Days of Dark Green Euphoria by A. E. Copenhaver
Last Summer on State Street by Toya Wolfe
My Monticello by Jocelyn Nicole Johnson
Provenance by Sue Mell
I Will Die in a Foreign Land by Kalani Pickhart
The Two Lives of Sara by Catherine Adel West
A Girlhood: Letter to My Transgender Daughter by Carolyn Hays
The End We Start From by Megan Hunter
The Hawk's Way by Sy Montgomery
The Foundling by Ann Leary
The Man with Eight Pairs of Legs by Leslie Kirk Campbell
Here Lies by Olivia Clare Friedman
The Barrens by Kurt Johnson and Ellie Johnson
Night of the Living Rez by Morgan Talty
Blue-Skinned Gods by S.J. Sindu
Everything Harder Than Everyone Else by Jenny Valentish
Drowned Town by Jayne Moore Waldrop
Beasts of a Little Land by Juhea Kim
Fighting Time by Amy Banks and Isaac Knapper
Oklahoma Odyssey by John Mort
Ballad of the Whiskey Robber by Julian Rubenstein
Let the Wild Grasses Grow by Kase Johnstun
A House in the Country by Ruth Adam
Lost in the Moment and Found by Seanan McGuire
Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee
The Year of the Horses by Courtney Maum
Colonel Sandhurst to the Rescue by M.C. Beaton
Color Me Murder by Krista Davis
In the Wake of the Boatman by Jonathon Scott Fuqua
Book Lovers by Emily Henry
The Marlow Murder Club by Robert Thorogood
The Marseille Caper by Peter Mayle
The Paris Bookseller by Kerri Maher
The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka
The Finder by Will Ferguson
Sandman by Bob Drews
We Ride Upon Sticks by Quan Barry
What We Talk About When We Talk About Dumplings edited by John Lorinc
Book of Extraordinary Tragedies by Joe Meno
The English Understand Wool by Helen DeWitt
50 Things to Do When You Turn 50 edited by Ronnie Sellers
Near the Exit by Lori Erickson
She Left Me the Gun by Emma Brockes
The Secrets Between Us by Thrity Umrigar
Beheld by Tarashea Nesbit
The Secret History of Food by Matt Siegel
My Fake Rake by Eva Leigh
Mothercare by Lynne Tillman
Hockey Karma by Howard Shapiro
Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel
Kiss and Tango by Marina Palmer
Galatea by Madeline Miller
The Librarian Always Rings Twice by Marty Wingate
The Field Guide to Dumb Birds of the Whole Stupid World by Matt Kracht

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

A houseful of people and a holiday does not make a conducive atmosphere for reading, at least for me. I got a little read though. This meme is hosted by Kathryn at Reading Date.

Books I completed over the past week:

Hockey Karma by Howard Shapiro
Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel

Bookmarks are still living in the middle of:

The Wings of the Dove by Henry James
Kiss and Tango by Marina Palmer

Reviews posted this week:

The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw

Books still needing to have reviews written (as opposed to the ones that are simply awaiting posting):

Imperfect Birds by Anne Lamott
Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal
Tiddas by Anita Heiss
The Tourist Attraction by Sarah Morgenthaler
Finlay Donovan Knocks 'Em Dead by Elle Cosimano
The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman
The Night Always Comes by Willy Vlautin
If I Were You by Lisa Renee Jones
McMullen Circle by Heather Newton
Dangerous Alliance by Jennieke Cohen
Donut Fall in Love by Jackie Lau
Twenty-One Truths About Love by Matthew Dicks
The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood
Home Repairs by Trey Ellis
Skinny Bitch in Love by Kim Barnouin
Looking for a Weegie to Love by Simon Smith
This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay
A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers
Love and Saffron by Kim Fay
The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet by Eleanor Cameron
Shady Hollow by Juneau Black
Four Gardens by Margery Sharp
Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr
Uncommon Measure by Natalie Hodges
Jane of Hearts by Katharine Weber
Laura Rider's Masterpiece by Jane Hamilton
Surviving Savannah by Patti Callahan
Chivalry by Neil Gaiman and Colleen Doran
Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez
She Is Haunted by Paige Clark
A Woman's Place by Marita Golden
Murder Above the Silver Waves by Blythe Baker
Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou
Easy Beauty by Chloe Cooper Jones
The Witches of New York by Ami McKay
The Desert Smells Like Rain by Gary Paul Nabhan
Stay Gone Days by Steve Yarbrough
The Mason House by T. Marie Bertineau
A Map for the Missing by Belinda Huijuan Tang
Just One Taste by Louisa Edwards
The Good Byline by Jill Orr
Truth and Other Lies by Maggie Smith
Dance of the Returned by Devon A. Mihesuah
Like a Drop of Ink in a Downpour by Yelena and Galina Lembersky
The Woman They Could Not Silence by Kate Moore
These Precious Days by Ann Patchett
Tomorrow in Shanghai by May-Lee Chai
What's Mine and Yours by Naima Coster
Geographies of the Heart by Caitlin Hamilton Summie
Setting Fire to Water by Phoebe Tsang
My Days of Dark Green Euphoria by A. E. Copenhaver
Last Summer on State Street by Toya Wolfe
My Monticello by Jocelyn Nicole Johnson
Provenance by Sue Mell
I Will Die in a Foreign Land by Kalani Pickhart
The Two Lives of Sara by Catherine Adel West
A Girlhood: Letter to My Transgender Daughter by Carolyn Hays
The End We Start From by Megan Hunter
The Hawk's Way by Sy Montgomery
The Foundling by Ann Leary
The Man with Eight Pairs of Legs by Leslie Kirk Campbell
Here Lies by Olivia Clare Friedman
The Barrens by Kurt Johnson and Ellie Johnson
Night of the Living Rez by Morgan Talty
Blue-Skinned Gods by S.J. Sindu
Everything Harder Than Everyone Else by Jenny Valentish
Drowned Town by Jayne Moore Waldrop
Beasts of a Little Land by Juhea Kim
Fighting Time by Amy Banks and Isaac Knapper
Oklahoma Odyssey by John Mort
Ballad of the Whiskey Robber by Julian Rubenstein
Let the Wild Grasses Grow by Kase Johnstun
A House in the Country by Ruth Adam
Lost in the Moment and Found by Seanan McGuire
Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee
The Year of the Horses by Courtney Maum
Colonel Sandhurst to the Rescue by M.C. Beaton
Color Me Murder by Krista Davis
In the Wake of the Boatman by Jonathon Scott Fuqua
Book Lovers by Emily Henry
The Marlow Murder Club by Robert Thorogood
The Marseille Caper by Peter Mayle
The Paris Bookseller by Kerri Maher
The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka
The Finder by Will Ferguson
Sandman by Bob Drews
We Ride Upon Sticks by Quan Barry
What We Talk About When We Talk About Dumplings edited by John Lorinc
Book of Extraordinary Tragedies by Joe Meno
The English Understand Wool by Helen DeWitt
50 Things to Do When You Turn 50 edited by Ronnie Sellers
Near the Exit by Lori Erickson
She Left Me the Gun by Emma Brockes
The Secrets Between Us by Thrity Umrigar
Beheld by Tarashea Nesbit
The Secret History of Food by Matt Siegel
My Fake Rake by Eva Leigh
Mothercare by Lynne Tillman
Hockey Karma by Howard Shapiro
Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel

Waiting on Wednesday

This meme was hosted by Breaking the Spine and is meant to highlight some great pre-publication books we all can't wait to get our grubby little mitts on. I'm choosing to continue the tradition even though she has stopped.

The Light Pirate by Lily Brooks-Dalton

The book is being released by Grand Central Publishing on December 6, 2022.

The book's jacket copy says: Florida is slipping away. As devastating weather patterns and rising sea levels wreak gradual havoc on the state’s infrastructure, a powerful hurricane approaches a small town on the southeastern coast. Kirby Lowe, an electrical line worker, his pregnant wife, Frida, and their two sons, Flip and Lucas, prepare for the worst. When the boys go missing just before the hurricane hits, Kirby heads out into the high winds in search of his children. Left alone, Frida goes into premature labor and gives birth to an unusual child, Wanda, whom she names after the catastrophic storm that ushers her into a society closer to collapse than ever before.

As Florida continues to unravel, Wanda grows. Moving from childhood to adulthood, adapting not only to the changing landscape, but also to the people who stayed behind in a place abandoned by civilization, Wanda loses family, gains community, and ultimately, seeks adventure, love, and purpose in a place remade by nature.

Told in four parts—power, water, light, and time—The Light Pirate mirrors the rhythms of the elements and the sometimes quick, sometimes slow dissolution of the world as we know it. It is a meditation on the changes we would rather not see, the future we would rather not greet, and a call back to the beauty and violence of an untamable wilderness.

Review: The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw

Every year my book club chooses to read a book that fits the spooky season. Although this one takes place in the summer, the premise made it ripe for our October read. Now, I am a huge coward and I wince every year when we try to settle on an appropriate read. Luckily for me, The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw turned out to be far more unintentionally absurd than scary.

The small town of Sparrow, Oregon has a rather macabre claim to fame. In the early 1820s, the townspeople convicted the three Swan sisters, Marguerite, Aurora, and Hazel, of witchcraft and drowned them in the town's harbor for the crime of being young and beautiful and seducing the men, especially the married men, of the town. Now the sisters come back every June 1 through the summer solstice. They take possession of three local girls' bodies to lure boys into the water and drown them in turn as revenge on the town for the sisters' own deaths. The town has made a festival of this grisly occurrence and tourists flock to the town during the festival despite the danger.

This year there's a new boy in town named Bo Carter. He says he knows nothing about the history or the town festival, despite showing up on the eve of the sisters' return. He meets Penny, who was born in Sparrow and lives on an island at the decommissioned lighthouse. Penny's father disappeared without a trace several years ago and her mother has been in a deep depression ever since. Something inspires Penny to hire Bo to help out at the lighthouse and to try and keep him safe from the murderous sisters but everything is not as it seems.

The broad plot here is definitely an interesting and unique one but there are so many plot inconsistencies and inaccuracies that it makes for a frustrating read. Just to start, Penny hops in a small outboard to get from the island into the town to go to school, having to make her way through a shipwreck strewn harbor to the shore in a fog so dense that she cannot see the shore in front of her. No sailor worth their salt would even consider going out in a boat in such conditions, especially given the treacherous waters. Later in the story, Penny doesn't know one of the drowned boys, despite both of them having lived and gone to school in this tiny town for their entire lives, something that is patently implausible given the setting. Then there's the question of why the townspeople continue to stay in the town, potentially sacrificing their sons to these angry spirits. As the mother of boys, I'd move away in a heartbeat. And why on earth would tourists come with their teenaged sons to risk their deaths too? It just makes zero sense. As for the story of the sisters, which is interspersed periodically with the more present day story, it also doesn't make a lot of sense. Firstly, the sisters were apparently not actually witches, which begs the question of how they could come back as these bloodthirsty, avenging body snatchers intent on murder. Secondly, the 1820s is quite late for the persecution of (non)witches, especially resulting in the execution of said convicted witches. Was the West Coast just that far behind the East Coast (and Europe) in moving beyond such barbaric practices? Finally, without giving too much away, the ending made less than no sense at all. (I'm happy to rant about it with/at anyone who has read the book and who wants me to though.) There were also plot points that were mentioned that might have been intended to go somewhere but were ultimately dropped like Penny's best friend's mother running a bakery that made muffins specifically designed to help people from out of the Swan sisters' former store. A muffin gets sent out to Penny's mother with the specific injunction that she eat the whole thing but nothing is ever mentioned about it again. Basically the whole book made me want to throw my hands in the air and shout at it. It comes across as being an adequate first draft but one that needs work. There are a whole lot of people who seem to really like this book online but I was definitely in the majority at book club so it's not just me. On the positive side, scary books often cause me nightmares and this one absolutely did not, so there's that.

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

I got a lot read but nothing reviewed since I dumped water on my keybooard and the computer had to be turned off and disconnected from power for days to dry out. Luckily, things seem to be okay now but I couldn't do some of the things I had intended to do sans computer. This meme is hosted by Kathryn at Reading Date.

Books I completed over the past week:

Near the Exit by Lori Erickson
She Left Me the Gun by Emma Brockes
The Secrets Between Us by Thrity Umrigar
Beheld by Tarashea Nesbit
The Secret History of Food by Matt Siegel
My Fake Rake by Eva Leigh
Mothercare by Lynne Tillman

Bookmarks are still living in the middle of:

The Wings of the Dove by Henry James
Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel

Reviews posted this week:

nothing yet

Books still needing to have reviews written (as opposed to the ones that are simply awaiting posting):

Imperfect Birds by Anne Lamott
Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal
Tiddas by Anita Heiss
The Tourist Attraction by Sarah Morgenthaler
Finlay Donovan Knocks 'Em Dead by Elle Cosimano
The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman
The Night Always Comes by Willy Vlautin
If I Were You by Lisa Renee Jones
McMullen Circle by Heather Newton
Dangerous Alliance by Jennieke Cohen
Donut Fall in Love by Jackie Lau
Twenty-One Truths About Love by Matthew Dicks
The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood
Home Repairs by Trey Ellis
Skinny Bitch in Love by Kim Barnouin
Looking for a Weegie to Love by Simon Smith
This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay
A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers
Love and Saffron by Kim Fay
The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet by Eleanor Cameron
Shady Hollow by Juneau Black
Four Gardens by Margery Sharp
Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr
Uncommon Measure by Natalie Hodges
Jane of Hearts by Katharine Weber
Laura Rider's Masterpiece by Jane Hamilton
Surviving Savannah by Patti Callahan
Chivalry by Neil Gaiman and Colleen Doran
Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez
She Is Haunted by Paige Clark
A Woman's Place by Marita Golden
Murder Above the Silver Waves by Blythe Baker
Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou
Easy Beauty by Chloe Cooper Jones
The Witches of New York by Ami McKay
The Desert Smells Like Rain by Gary Paul Nabhan
Stay Gone Days by Steve Yarbrough
The Mason House by T. Marie Bertineau
A Map for the Missing by Belinda Huijuan Tang
Just One Taste by Louisa Edwards
The Good Byline by Jill Orr
Truth and Other Lies by Maggie Smith
Dance of the Returned by Devon A. Mihesuah
Like a Drop of Ink in a Downpour by Yelena and Galina Lembersky
The Woman They Could Not Silence by Kate Moore
These Precious Days by Ann Patchett
Tomorrow in Shanghai by May-Lee Chai
What's Mine and Yours by Naima Coster
Geographies of the Heart by Caitlin Hamilton Summie
Setting Fire to Water by Phoebe Tsang
My Days of Dark Green Euphoria by A. E. Copenhaver
Last Summer on State Street by Toya Wolfe
My Monticello by Jocelyn Nicole Johnson
Provenance by Sue Mell
I Will Die in a Foreign Land by Kalani Pickhart
The Two Lives of Sara by Catherine Adel West
A Girlhood: Letter to My Transgender Daughter by Carolyn Hays
The End We Start From by Megan Hunter
The Hawk's Way by Sy Montgomery
The Foundling by Ann Leary
The Man with Eight Pairs of Legs by Leslie Kirk Campbell
Here Lies by Olivia Clare Friedman
The Barrens by Kurt Johnson and Ellie Johnson
Night of the Living Rez by Morgan Talty
Blue-Skinned Gods by S.J. Sindu
Everything Harder Than Everyone Else by Jenny Valentish
Drowned Town by Jayne Moore Waldrop
Beasts of a Little Land by Juhea Kim
Fighting Time by Amy Banks and Isaac Knapper
Oklahoma Odyssey by John Mort
Ballad of the Whiskey Robber by Julian Rubenstein
Let the Wild Grasses Grow by Kase Johnstun
A House in the Country by Ruth Adam
Lost in the Moment and Found by Seanan McGuire
Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee
The Year of the Horses by Courtney Maum
Colonel Sandhurst to the Rescue by M.C. Beaton
Color Me Murder by Krista Davis
In the Wake of the Boatman by Jonathon Scott Fuqua
Book Lovers by Emily Henry
The Marlow Murder Club by Robert Thorogood
The Marseille Caper by Peter Mayle
The Paris Bookseller by Kerri Maher
The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw
The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka
The Finder by Will Ferguson
Sandman by Bob Drews
We Ride Upon Sticks by Quan Barry
What We Talk About When We Talk About Dumplings edited by John Lorinc
Book of Extraordinary Tragedies by Joe Meno
The English Understand Wool by Helen DeWitt
50 Things to Do When You Turn 50 edited by Ronnie Sellers
Near the Exit by Lori Erickson
She Left Me the Gun by Emma Brockes
The Secrets Between Us by Thrity Umrigar
Beheld by Tarashea Nesbit
The Secret History of Food by Matt Siegel
My Fake Rake by Eva Leigh
Mothercare by Lynne Tillman

Waiting on Wednesday

This meme was hosted by Breaking the Spine and is meant to highlight some great pre-publication books we all can't wait to get our grubby little mitts on. I'm choosing to continue the tradition even though she has stopped.

The Sunshine Girls by Molly Fader

The book is being released by Graydon House on December 6, 2022.

The book's jacket copy says: Two friends. A lifetime of secrets. One sparkling story.

1967 Iowa. Nursing school roommates BettyKay and Kitty don't have much in common. BettyKay has risked her family's disapproval to pursue her dreams away from her small town. Cosmopolitan Kitty has always relied on her beauty and smarts to get by and to hide a painful secret. Yet the two share a determination to prove themselves in a changing world, forging an unlikely bond on a campus unkind to women.

Before their first year is up, tragedy strikes, and the women's paths are forced apart. But against all odds, a decades-long friendship forms, persevering through love, marriage, failure, and death, from the jungles of Vietnam to the glamorous circles of Hollywood. Until one snowy night leads their relationship to the ultimate crossroads.

Fifty years later, two estranged sisters are shocked when a famous movie star shows up at their mother's funeral. Over one tumultuous weekend, the women must reckon with a dazzling truth about their family that will alter their lives forever...

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

Not my best week in terms of moving things off the tbr mountain! This meme is hosted by Kathryn at Reading Date.

Books I completed over the past week:

The English Understand Wool by Helen DeWitt
50 Things to Do When You Turn 50 edited by Ronnie Sellers

Bookmarks are still living in the middle of:

The Wings of the Dove by Henry James
She Left Me the Gun by Emma Brockes
Near the Exit by Lori Erickson
Beheld by Tarashea Nesbit

Reviews posted this week:

nothing yet

Books still needing to have reviews written (as opposed to the ones that are simply awaiting posting):

Imperfect Birds by Anne Lamott
Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal
Tiddas by Anita Heiss
The Tourist Attraction by Sarah Morgenthaler
Finlay Donovan Knocks 'Em Dead by Elle Cosimano
The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman
The Night Always Comes by Willy Vlautin
If I Were You by Lisa Renee Jones
McMullen Circle by Heather Newton
Dangerous Alliance by Jennieke Cohen
Donut Fall in Love by Jackie Lau
Twenty-One Truths About Love by Matthew Dicks
The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood
Home Repairs by Trey Ellis
Skinny Bitch in Love by Kim Barnouin
Looking for a Weegie to Love by Simon Smith
This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay
A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers
Love and Saffron by Kim Fay
The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet by Eleanor Cameron
Shady Hollow by Juneau Black
Four Gardens by Margery Sharp
Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr
Uncommon Measure by Natalie Hodges
Jane of Hearts by Katharine Weber
Laura Rider's Masterpiece by Jane Hamilton
Surviving Savannah by Patti Callahan
Chivalry by Neil Gaiman and Colleen Doran
Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez
She Is Haunted by Paige Clark
A Woman's Place by Marita Golden
Murder Above the Silver Waves by Blythe Baker
Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou
Easy Beauty by Chloe Cooper Jones
The Witches of New York by Ami McKay
The Desert Smells Like Rain by Gary Paul Nabhan
Stay Gone Days by Steve Yarbrough
The Mason House by T. Marie Bertineau
A Map for the Missing by Belinda Huijuan Tang
Just One Taste by Louisa Edwards
The Good Byline by Jill Orr
Truth and Other Lies by Maggie Smith
Dance of the Returned by Devon A. Mihesuah
Like a Drop of Ink in a Downpour by Yelena and Galina Lembersky
The Woman They Could Not Silence by Kate Moore
These Precious Days by Ann Patchett
Tomorrow in Shanghai by May-Lee Chai
What's Mine and Yours by Naima Coster
Geographies of the Heart by Caitlin Hamilton Summie
Setting Fire to Water by Phoebe Tsang
My Days of Dark Green Euphoria by A. E. Copenhaver
Last Summer on State Street by Toya Wolfe
My Monticello by Jocelyn Nicole Johnson
Provenance by Sue Mell
I Will Die in a Foreign Land by Kalani Pickhart
The Two Lives of Sara by Catherine Adel West
A Girlhood: Letter to My Transgender Daughter by Carolyn Hays
The End We Start From by Megan Hunter
The Hawk's Way by Sy Montgomery
The Foundling by Ann Leary
The Man with Eight Pairs of Legs by Leslie Kirk Campbell
Here Lies by Olivia Clare Friedman
The Barrens by Kurt Johnson and Ellie Johnson
Night of the Living Rez by Morgan Talty
Blue-Skinned Gods by S.J. Sindu
Everything Harder Than Everyone Else by Jenny Valentish
Drowned Town by Jayne Moore Waldrop
Beasts of a Little Land by Juhea Kim
Fighting Time by Amy Banks and Isaac Knapper
Oklahoma Odyssey by John Mort
Ballad of the Whiskey Robber by Julian Rubenstein
Let the Wild Grasses Grow by Kase Johnstun
A House in the Country by Ruth Adam
Lost in the Moment and Found by Seanan McGuire
Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee
The Year of the Horses by Courtney Maum
Colonel Sandhurst to the Rescue by M.C. Beaton
Color Me Murder by Krista Davis
In the Wake of the Boatman by Jonathon Scott Fuqua
Book Lovers by Emily Henry
The Marlow Murder Club by Robert Thorogood
The Marseille Caper by Peter Mayle
The Paris Bookseller by Kerri Maher
The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw
The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka
The Finder by Will Ferguson
Sandman by Bob Drews
We Ride Upon Sticks by Quan Barry
What We Talk About When We Talk About Dumplings edited by John Lorinc
Book of Extraordinary Tragedies by Joe Meno
The English Understand Wool by Helen DeWitt
50 Things to Do When You Turn 50 edited by Ronnie Sellers

Waiting on Wednesday

This meme was hosted by Breaking the Spine and is meant to highlight some great pre-publication books we all can't wait to get our grubby little mitts on. I'm choosing to continue the tradition even though she has stopped.

The Vibrant Years by Sonali Dev

The book is being released by Mindy's Book Studio on December 1, 2022.

The book's jacket copy says: Living on their own terms means being there for one another.

When sixty-five-year-old Bindu Desai inherits a million dollars, she’s astounded—and horrified. The windfall threatens to expose a shameful mistake from her youth. Desperate to keep the secret, Bindu quickly spends it on something unexpected: a condo in a posh retirement community in Florida.

The impulsive decision blindsides Bindu’s daughter-in-law, Aly. At forty-seven, Aly still shares a home with Bindu even after her divorce from Bindu’s son. But maybe this change is just the push Aly needs to fight for the segment she’s been promised for years at the news station where she works.

As Bindu and Aly navigate their new dynamic, Aly’s daughter, Cullie, is faced with losing the business that made her a tech-world star. The only way to save it is to deliver a new idea to her investors—and of course they want the half-baked dating app she pitched them in a panic. Problem is, Cullie has never been on a real date. Naturally, enlisting her single mother and grandmother to help her with the research is the answer.

From USA Today bestselling author Sonali Dev comes a heartfelt novel about three generations of hilarious, unconventional, ambitious women navigating bad dates, a spiteful HOA board, reemerging exes, and secrets that refuse to remain hidden. Join the Desai women on a shared journey of self-discovery as they dare to live their most vibrant lives.

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

Not my best week in terms of moving things off the tbr mountain! This meme is hosted by Kathryn at Reading Date.

Books I completed over the past week:

We Ride Upon Sticks by Quan Barry
What We Talk About When We Talk About Dumplings edited by John Lorinc
Book of Extraordinary Tragedies by Joe Meno

Bookmarks are still living in the middle of:

The Wings of the Dove by Henry James
She Left Me the Gun by Emma Brockes

Reviews posted this week:

Godmersham Park by Gill Hornby

Books still needing to have reviews written (as opposed to the ones that are simply awaiting posting):

Imperfect Birds by Anne Lamott
Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal
Tiddas by Anita Heiss
The Tourist Attraction by Sarah Morgenthaler
Finlay Donovan Knocks 'Em Dead by Elle Cosimano
The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman
The Night Always Comes by Willy Vlautin
If I Were You by Lisa Renee Jones
McMullen Circle by Heather Newton
Dangerous Alliance by Jennieke Cohen
Donut Fall in Love by Jackie Lau
Twenty-One Truths About Love by Matthew Dicks
The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood
Home Repairs by Trey Ellis
Skinny Bitch in Love by Kim Barnouin
Looking for a Weegie to Love by Simon Smith
This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay
A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers
Love and Saffron by Kim Fay
The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet by Eleanor Cameron
Shady Hollow by Juneau Black
Four Gardens by Margery Sharp
Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr
Uncommon Measure by Natalie Hodges
Jane of Hearts by Katharine Weber
Laura Rider's Masterpiece by Jane Hamilton
Surviving Savannah by Patti Callahan
Chivalry by Neil Gaiman and Colleen Doran
Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez
She Is Haunted by Paige Clark
A Woman's Place by Marita Golden
Murder Above the Silver Waves by Blythe Baker
Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou
Easy Beauty by Chloe Cooper Jones
The Witches of New York by Ami McKay
The Desert Smells Like Rain by Gary Paul Nabhan
Stay Gone Days by Steve Yarbrough
The Mason House by T. Marie Bertineau
A Map for the Missing by Belinda Huijuan Tang
Just One Taste by Louisa Edwards
The Good Byline by Jill Orr
Truth and Other Lies by Maggie Smith
Dance of the Returned by Devon A. Mihesuah
Like a Drop of Ink in a Downpour by Yelena and Galina Lembersky
The Woman They Could Not Silence by Kate Moore
These Precious Days by Ann Patchett
Tomorrow in Shanghai by May-Lee Chai
What's Mine and Yours by Naima Coster
Geographies of the Heart by Caitlin Hamilton Summie
Setting Fire to Water by Phoebe Tsang
My Days of Dark Green Euphoria by A. E. Copenhaver
Last Summer on State Street by Toya Wolfe
My Monticello by Jocelyn Nicole Johnson
Provenance by Sue Mell
I Will Die in a Foreign Land by Kalani Pickhart
The Two Lives of Sara by Catherine Adel West
A Girlhood: Letter to My Transgender Daughter by Carolyn Hays
The End We Start From by Megan Hunter
The Hawk's Way by Sy Montgomery
The Foundling by Ann Leary
The Man with Eight Pairs of Legs by Leslie Kirk Campbell
Here Lies by Olivia Clare Friedman
The Barrens by Kurt Johnson and Ellie Johnson
Night of the Living Rez by Morgan Talty
Blue-Skinned Gods by S.J. Sindu
Everything Harder Than Everyone Else by Jenny Valentish
Drowned Town by Jayne Moore Waldrop
Beasts of a Little Land by Juhea Kim
Fighting Time by Amy Banks and Isaac Knapper
Oklahoma Odyssey by John Mort
Ballad of the Whiskey Robber by Julian Rubenstein
Let the Wild Grasses Grow by Kase Johnstun
A House in the Country by Ruth Adam
Lost in the Moment and Found by Seanan McGuire
Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee
The Year of the Horses by Courtney Maum
Colonel Sandhurst to the Rescue by M.C. Beaton
Color Me Murder by Krista Davis
In the Wake of the Boatman by Jonathon Scott Fuqua
Book Lovers by Emily Henry
The Marlow Murder Club by Robert Thorogood
The Marseille Caper by Peter Mayle
The Paris Bookseller by Kerri Maher
The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw
The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka
The Finder by Will Ferguson
Sandman by Bob Drews
We Ride Upon Sticks by Quan Barry
What We Talk About When We Talk About Dumplings edited by John Lorinc
Book of Extraordinary Tragedies by Joe Meno

Waiting on Wednesday

This meme was hosted by Breaking the Spine and is meant to highlight some great pre-publication books we all can't wait to get our grubby little mitts on. I'm choosing to continue the tradition even though she has stopped.

The Lindbergh Nanny by Mariah Fredericks

The book is being released by Minotaur on November 15, 2022.

The book's jacket copy says: When the most famous toddler in America, Charles Lindbergh, Jr., is kidnapped from his family home in New Jersey in 1932, the case makes international headlines. Already celebrated for his flight across the Atlantic, his father, Charles, Sr., is the country’s golden boy, with his wealthy, lovely wife, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, by his side. But there’s someone else in their household—Betty Gow, a formerly obscure young woman, now known around the world by another name: the Lindbergh Nanny.

A Scottish immigrant deciphering the rules of her new homeland and its East Coast elite, Betty finds Colonel Lindbergh eccentric and often odd, Mrs. Lindbergh kind yet nervous, and Charlie simply a darling. Far from home and bruised from a love affair gone horribly wrong, Betty finds comfort in caring for the child, and warms to the attentions of handsome sailor Henrik, sometimes known as Red. Then, Charlie disappears.

Suddenly a suspect in the eyes of both the media and the public, Betty must find the truth about what really happened that night, in order to clear her own name—and to find justice for the child she loves.

Review: Godmersham Park by Gill Hornby

Anne Sharp was a real person. She was young Fanny Austen's governess. And she did develop a lifetime friendship with Fanny's aunt, Jane Austen. Those are the facts we know. We do not know what brought her to working as a governess and what her early life was like but luckily we have Gill Hornby, who has imagined a rich and interesting backstory for Anne and fleshed out her life at Godmersham Park, the inherited home of Edward Austen (eventually known as Edward Austen Knight). Godmersham Park is not a story of Jane Austen. It is a story of Anne Sharp, who became her friend but who lived the kind of life that so many women without male protectors or kind relatives might face in that time.

Anne Sharp is 31 years old. Her mother has died and her adoring father has inexplicably abandoned her. Gently raised and alone in the world save her old nurse, she has few options for her future life. She can accept the marriage proposal from the leering and odious lawyer who tells her of her straightened circumstances or she can take one of the only other avenues available to an educated woman in the early 1800s in England: she can become a governess. Although being a governess is a rather tenuous position, neither upstairs nor downstairs and employed completely at the discretion of the master or mistress of the house, it is still a respectable position. Anne takes up her first post at Godmersham Park, the Kent estate of Edward Austen, as the governess to 12 year old Fanny Austen, the oldest child and daughter of the house.

As Anne settles into her role as governess she must learn her place adjacent to the family. She suffers the animus of many of the other servants but she genuinely likes her charge and finds life at Godmersham Park mostly comfortable and untaxing. She is lonely though. She doesn't entirely approve of Henry Austen, Mr. Edward's good humored and playful brother who visits often. He is much beloved by the family and while Anne sometimes enjoys sparring with him, she is also always cognizant of her place and incredibly frustrated when he teasingly crosses lines that could cost her. When the newly widowed Mrs. Austen, Cassandra Austen, and Jane Austen come to Kent, Anne's intellect can shine and she revels in their comfortable and welcoming company. But that shining may be one more piece in her eventual downfall.

Hornby has created an intriguing and certainly possible backstory for Anne Sharp. The narrative goes back and forth between the present of Anne's life in the Austen household and her past as she tries to understand why she has been forsaken by her father. The reason is quite obvious to the reader though, even if not to Anne. There are glimpses of Anne's skill as a teacher and her great understanding of the pitfalls of being a woman in her time, especially one who has no wish to marry. She is both an advocate for women's right to self-determination and freedom and very cognizant of reality. The book is historically accurate and Hornby has woven fact and fiction together seamlessly, using Fanny's childhood diaries as a major source for her characterizations. This is not a Jane story but it is smart and compelling (and sometimes horrific) and gives an intriguing glimpse into the well to do life of Edward Austen, his family, and into the life of an intelligent and perceptive governess during her two years with such a family.

For more information about Gill Hornby and the book, follow her on Twitter orInstagram, look at the book's Goodreads page, or look at the reviews for others' thoughts and opinions on the book.

Thanks to Laurel Ann from Austenprose and publisher Pegasus Books for sending me a copy of the book to review.

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

Not my best week in terms of moving things off the tbr mountain! This meme is hosted by Kathryn at Reading Date.

Books I completed over the past week:

The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw
The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka
Godmersham Park by Gill Hornby
The Finder by Will Ferguson
Sandman by Bob Drews

Bookmarks are still living in the middle of:

The Wings of the Dove by Henry James
Book of Extraordinary Tragedies by Joe Meno
We Ride Upon Sticks by Quan Barry
What We Talk About When We Talk About Dumplings edited by John Lorinc

Reviews posted this week:

Libertie by Kaitlyn Greenidge
Other People's Children by R.J. Hoffmann

Books still needing to have reviews written (as opposed to the ones that are simply awaiting posting):

Imperfect Birds by Anne Lamott
Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal
Tiddas by Anita Heiss
The Tourist Attraction by Sarah Morgenthaler
Finlay Donovan Knocks 'Em Dead by Elle Cosimano
The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman
The Night Always Comes by Willy Vlautin
If I Were You by Lisa Renee Jones
McMullen Circle by Heather Newton
Dangerous Alliance by Jennieke Cohen
Donut Fall in Love by Jackie Lau
Twenty-One Truths About Love by Matthew Dicks
The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood
Home Repairs by Trey Ellis
Skinny Bitch in Love by Kim Barnouin
Looking for a Weegie to Love by Simon Smith
This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay
A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers
Love and Saffron by Kim Fay
The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet by Eleanor Cameron
Shady Hollow by Juneau Black
Four Gardens by Margery Sharp
Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr
Uncommon Measure by Natalie Hodges
Jane of Hearts by Katharine Weber
Laura Rider's Masterpiece by Jane Hamilton
Surviving Savannah by Patti Callahan
Chivalry by Neil Gaiman and Colleen Doran
Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez
She Is Haunted by Paige Clark
A Woman's Place by Marita Golden
Murder Above the Silver Waves by Blythe Baker
Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou
Easy Beauty by Chloe Cooper Jones
The Witches of New York by Ami McKay
The Desert Smells Like Rain by Gary Paul Nabhan
Stay Gone Days by Steve Yarbrough
The Mason House by T. Marie Bertineau
A Map for the Missing by Belinda Huijuan Tang
Just One Taste by Louisa Edwards
The Good Byline by Jill Orr
Truth and Other Lies by Maggie Smith
Dance of the Returned by Devon A. Mihesuah
Like a Drop of Ink in a Downpour by Yelena and Galina Lembersky
The Woman They Could Not Silence by Kate Moore
These Precious Days by Ann Patchett
Tomorrow in Shanghai by May-Lee Chai
What's Mine and Yours by Naima Coster
Geographies of the Heart by Caitlin Hamilton Summie
Setting Fire to Water by Phoebe Tsang
My Days of Dark Green Euphoria by A. E. Copenhaver
Last Summer on State Street by Toya Wolfe
My Monticello by Jocelyn Nicole Johnson
Provenance by Sue Mell
I Will Die in a Foreign Land by Kalani Pickhart
The Two Lives of Sara by Catherine Adel West
A Girlhood: Letter to My Transgender Daughter by Carolyn Hays
The End We Start From by Megan Hunter
The Hawk's Way by Sy Montgomery
The Foundling by Ann Leary
The Man with Eight Pairs of Legs by Leslie Kirk Campbell
Here Lies by Olivia Clare Friedman
The Barrens by Kurt Johnson and Ellie Johnson
Night of the Living Rez by Morgan Talty
Blue-Skinned Gods by S.J. Sindu
Everything Harder Than Everyone Else by Jenny Valentish
Drowned Town by Jayne Moore Waldrop
Beasts of a Little Land by Juhea Kim
Fighting Time by Amy Banks and Isaac Knapper
Oklahoma Odyssey by John Mort
Ballad of the Whiskey Robber by Julian Rubenstein
Let the Wild Grasses Grow by Kase Johnstun
A House in the Country by Ruth Adam
Lost in the Moment and Found by Seanan McGuire
Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee
The Year of the Horses by Courtney Maum
Colonel Sandhurst to the Rescue by M.C. Beaton
Color Me Murder by Krista Davis
In the Wake of the Boatman by Jonathon Scott Fuqua
Book Lovers by Emily Henry
The Marlow Murder Club by Robert Thorogood
The Marseille Caper by Peter Mayle
The Paris Bookseller by Kerri Maher
The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw
The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka
Godmersham Park by Gill Hornby
The Finder by Will Ferguson
Sandman by Bob Drews

Review: Other People's Children by R. J. Hoffmann

Parenthood. Some people become parents biologically while others become parents through adoption. Some people are amazing parents while others really struggle. What makes a parent? And perhaps more importantly, what makes a good parent as versus a bad parent? Is it love? Is it some other intangible?

Gail and Jon Durbin are beaten down by Gail's repeated miscarriages. They have arranged their whole lives to welcome a child, buying a house in the suburbs and setting up a nursery but the one thing they can't arrange is a pregnancy that doesn't end in loss and heartbreak. Gail is obsessive about becoming a mother while Jon, remembering his own childhood, is far more ambivalent about fatherhood. After much soul searching though, they decide to adopt. But this is one more process in creating a family that they don't have much control over.

Carli is a pregnant teenager living a couple of towns away. She doesn't have a relationship with the father of her baby any more and she's pretty sure she's not ready to be anyone's mother, especially given the poor role model she has in her own mother, Marla. She wants to go to college and escape her mother and the unhappy life they live. So she decides to give the baby up for adoption and she chooses Gail and Jon to be the baby's parents. Their dreams are coming true even while Marla pressures Carli to keep her baby, thinking perhaps that she can atone for her own failings as a mother by helping raise her grandbaby. What happens to Gail and Jon's dreams if Carli listens to Marla and changes her mind? Who actually is little Maya's family? What lengths will any of them go to to keep this baby?

This novel is both a domestic story about infertility and adoption as well as an on the run thriller. The narration shifts through each of the main characters so that the reader can sympathize with each of them, their hopes, dreams, fears, and motivations. There are right actions and wrong actions here but there's such a moral ambiguity that there's no clear and easy answer. Everyone is right and everyone is wrong. The story is an emotionally packed page turner, heartbreaking and tragic all the way round. If want and love makes a mother, both Gail and Carli are clearly mothers but only one of them can be Maya's mother. Carli's mother Marla is really the only clear villain here. The ending is a bit too perfect and hopeful after the wild ride that comes before it but overall Hoffmann has written an engrossing and moving story about love, adoption, parenthood, and ethics.

Waiting on Wednesday

This meme was hosted by Breaking the Spine and is meant to highlight some great pre-publication books we all can't wait to get our grubby little mitts on. I'm choosing to continue the tradition even though she has stopped.

None of This Would Have Happened If Prince Were Alive by Carolyn Prusa

The book is being released by Atria on November 22, 2022.

The book's jacket copy says: Perfect for fans of Maria Semple and Jennifer Weiner, this smart and witty debut novel follows Ramona through the forty-eight hours after her life has been upended by the discovery of her husband’s affair and an approaching Category Four hurricane.

Ramona’s got a bratty boss, a toddler teetering through toilet training, a critical mom who doesn’t mind sharing, and oops—a cheating husband. That’s how a Category Four hurricane bearing down on her life in Savannah becomes just another item on her to-do list. In the next forty-eight hours she’ll add a neighborhood child and the class guinea pig named Clarence Thomas to her entourage as she struggles to evacuate town.

Ignoring the persistent glow of her minivan’s check engine light, Ramona navigates police check points, bathroom emergencies, demands from her boss, and torrential downpours while fielding calls and apology texts from her cheating husband and longing for the days when her life was like a Prince song, full of sexy creativity and joy.

Thoroughly entertaining and completely relatable, None of This Would Have Happened if Prince Were Alive is the hilarious, heartwarming story of a woman up to her elbows in calamities and about to drive off the brink of the rest of her life.

Review: Libertie by Kaitlyn Greenidge

Parents have dreams for their children. But we need to be careful to nurture our children's dreams even if, or perhaps more importantly when, they do not match the dreams we have for them. We can guide and suggest, but in the end, it is not our life to lead. It is our children's. This is hard to face under normal conditions but when there are many other extenuating circumstances, it must be that much harder. Kaitlyn Greenidge's second novel, Libertie, shows how hard it is for a child to go against her mother's dreams and expectations and reach for her own.

Set in Brooklyn and Haiti, this historical novel tells the story of Libertie, the dark skinned daughter of a light skinned, female, Black doctor who rejects her mother’s profession and instead marries and moves to Haiti. The story opens with Libertie watching as her mother saves an escaped enslaved man; at least physically she saves him. And young Libertie is awed by her mother's power but also horrified at the emotional cost, both to her mother and to the patient. As she eventually leaves home for medical school, she finds that she is drawn more to music than medicine, knowing that she is unwilling and unable to pay the emotional cost of healing, especially of failing to heal the whole person. She cannot and will not follow in her mother's footsteps, choosing instead a different path, one that will provide her with her own brand of heartache.

This is a novel of strong women. In fact, it is inspired by the first black, female doctor in the US and her daughter. Greenidge writes movingly of mother daughter dynamics at the tail end of the Civil War. She has drawn the realities of the time into the text seamlessly, richly detailing the community and the challenges facing women, and especially a dark skinned woman like Libertie in the time of Reconstruction. Place is beautifully evoked here although the vast differences in the Brooklyn setting and the Haiti setting make this feel a little like two different novels mashed together and the travel to Haiti turns the novel toward the gothic and atmospheric with hints of Jane Eyre. Libertie's search for independence is moving and the reader sees it from her own perspective through the first person narration. The novel is a bit slow moving and contemplative with a lot of story lines, not all of which get a full enough treatment. Over all though, this is a powerful look at the high cost of slavery, colorism, and liberation in a story about family relationships, both mother daughter and husband wife, and about freedom and becoming.

This is one of the books chosen for the Women's National Book Association Great Group Reads list for 2022. (And yes, I stole a line or two from the description on that page for my review but since I wrote those descriptions, I consider that fair game.)

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

Not my best week in terms of moving things off the tbr mountain! This meme is hosted by Kathryn at Reading Date.

Books I completed over the past week:

The Paris Bookseller by Kerri Maher

Bookmarks are still living in the middle of:

The Finder by Will Ferguson
The Wings of the Dove by Henry James
The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw

Reviews posted this week:

Dark Country by Monique Snyman
The Belle of Belgrave Square by Mimi Matthews
Three by Valérie Perrin
The World's Greatest Sort Stories edited by James Daley (Dover Thrift Edition)

Books still needing to have reviews written (as opposed to the ones that are simply awaiting posting):

Imperfect Birds by Anne Lamott
Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal
Tiddas by Anita Heiss
The Tourist Attraction by Sarah Morgenthaler
Finlay Donovan Knocks 'Em Dead by Elle Cosimano
The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman
The Night Always Comes by Willy Vlautin
If I Were You by Lisa Renee Jones
McMullen Circle by Heather Newton
Dangerous Alliance by Jennieke Cohen
Donut Fall in Love by Jackie Lau
Twenty-One Truths About Love by Matthew Dicks
The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood
Home Repairs by Trey Ellis
Skinny Bitch in Love by Kim Barnouin
Looking for a Weegie to Love by Simon Smith
This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay
A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers
Love and Saffron by Kim Fay
The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet by Eleanor Cameron
Shady Hollow by Juneau Black
Four Gardens by Margery Sharp
Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr
Uncommon Measure by Natalie Hodges
Jane of Hearts by Katharine Weber
Laura Rider's Masterpiece by Jane Hamilton
Surviving Savannah by Patti Callahan
Chivalry by Neil Gaiman and Colleen Doran
Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez
She Is Haunted by Paige Clark
A Woman's Place by Marita Golden
Murder Above the Silver Waves by Blythe Baker
Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou
Easy Beauty by Chloe Cooper Jones
The Witches of New York by Ami McKay
The Desert Smells Like Rain by Gary Paul Nabhan
Stay Gone Days by Steve Yarbrough
The Mason House by T. Marie Bertineau
A Map for the Missing by Belinda Huijuan Tang
Just One Taste by Louisa Edwards
The Good Byline by Jill Orr
Truth and Other Lies by Maggie Smith
Dance of the Returned by Devon A. Mihesuah
Like a Drop of Ink in a Downpour by Yelena and Galina Lembersky
The Woman They Could Not Silence by Kate Moore
These Precious Days by Ann Patchett
Tomorrow in Shanghai by May-Lee Chai
What's Mine and Yours by Naima Coster
Geographies of the Heart by Caitlin Hamilton Summie
Setting Fire to Water by Phoebe Tsang
My Days of Dark Green Euphoria by A. E. Copenhaver
Last Summer on State Street by Toya Wolfe
My Monticello by Jocelyn Nicole Johnson
Provenance by Sue Mell
I Will Die in a Foreign Land by Kalani Pickhart
The Two Lives of Sara by Catherine Adel West
A Girlhood: Letter to My Transgender Daughter by Carolyn Hays
The End We Start From by Megan Hunter
The Hawk's Way by Sy Montgomery
The Foundling by Ann Leary
The Man with Eight Pairs of Legs by Leslie Kirk Campbell
Here Lies by Olivia Clare Friedman
The Barrens by Kurt Johnson and Ellie Johnson
Night of the Living Rez by Morgan Talty
Blue-Skinned Gods by S.J. Sindu
Everything Harder Than Everyone Else by Jenny Valentish
Drowned Town by Jayne Moore Waldrop
Beasts of a Little Land by Juhea Kim
Libertie by Kaitlyn Greenidge
Fighting Time by Amy Banks and Isaac Knapper
Oklahoma Odyssey by John Mort
Ballad of the Whiskey Robber by Julian Rubenstein
Let the Wild Grasses Grow by Kase Johnstun
A House in the Country by Ruth Adam
Lost in the Moment and Found by Seanan McGuire
Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee
The Year of the Horses by Courtney Maum
Colonel Sandhurst to the Rescue by M.C. Beaton
Color Me Murder by Krista Davis
In the Wake of the Boatman by Jonathon Scott Fuqua
Book Lovers by Emily Henry
The Marlow Murder Club by Robert Thorogood
The Marseille Caper by Peter Mayle
The Paris Bookseller by Kerri Maher

Monday Mailbox

It's been a long time since I did this but I thought I'd try again, especially since I got some fabulous looking books this past week. This past week's mailbox arrivals:

Go As a River by Shelley Read came from Spiegel and Grau.

A coming of age novel paired with the natural world is completely up my alley (plus I've heard amazing things about this).

Skull Water by Heinz Insu Fenkl came from Spiegel and Grau.

About a mixed race boy living in South Korea who is determined to find a cure for his sick Big Uncle, this novel sounds so good.

Godmersham Park by Gill Hornby came from Pegasus Books and Austenprose PR for a blog tour.

A novel of the Austen family? Just try to keep me from reading it! I can't wait.

The Unplanned Life of Josie Hale by Stephanie Eding came from a friend.

When a woman turns up unexpectedly pregnant with her ex-husband's baby, her two male best friends step in to make sure she has all the food she craves as they create a family together. Fun, right?

The Wedding War by Liz Talley came from a friend.

What a premise! Two former best friends who fell out and haven't spoken in twenty years have to come together and plan the wedding for their children. This has all kinds of promise.

The Cybernetic Tea Shop by Meredith Katz came from a friend.

An AI repair person and an old autonomous robot who still runs her late master's tea shop cross each other's paths. This is very different than what I usually read but it is intriguing sounding.

If you want to see the marvelous goodies in other people's mailboxes, make sure to visit Mailbox Monday and have fun seeing how we are all doing our part to keep the USPS and delivery services viable.