TW was right, I really liked My Notorious Life. A lot.
Really good historical fiction. Fictionalized story, in part, about Madame Restell.
Late 1800s. Orphan becomes midwife who also performs abortions and provides contraception. Comstock, obviously, is out to get her. Victorian morality my ass. Hmph.
I couldn’t really decide whether I liked The Yonahlossee Riding Camp For Girls. In the end, I decided I did because the writing was pretty. I’m not sure I liked the STORY very much at all though.
Well parts of it I did, parts of it I didn’t like at all. The biggest problem was that I didn’t really like any of the major characters. It’s hard to love a book when you don’t love SOMEONE in it, ya know? I think I loved the places more than the people… which makes sense, really, when you read the book. A lot of the characters loved places more than people, too.
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Gah. What a frustrating book for a frustrating situation. All of it — frustrating. What a mess. The whole thing, 35 years of bullshit. Roman Polanski can #suckit and so can the LA courts. Sheesh.
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I really loved Looking for Me — it had everything the nature loving, Charlestonian, chick lit, junk collecting parts of me appreciates.
And to think, I almost didn’t bother reading it because it was due back to the library in two days and it didn’t seem worth it when compared to all of the other books on my shelf. I cannot believe TW never mentioned it was set in Charleston. Sheesh.
I reserved A Shot to Die For because it was set in Lake Geneva (and I may have mentioned we had a mini holiday planned for Lake Geneva?) — turns out it’s a whole series of mysteries set (mostly) in the north suburbs of Chicago. The main character lives off of a road just down the street from me.
So, kind of fun — not a great mystery but not truly horrible either. I might reserve another one.
I didn’t do a very good job of talking about most of the books I read during the #readathon, so I’m backtracking a bit.
Astronaut Wives Club — I liked it but it wasn’t nearly as interesting as I’d hoped. I see now why someone (Julie?) said she didn’t really like it very much. It was vague where I wanted more detail. I’m glad I read it but I wish it had been better.
Jeanette Winterson’s The Daylight Gate was really good — witchery popery popery witchery, it’s really much the same when you think about it, right?
Troubled Daughters, Twisted Wives — a book of short stories, very good short stories. That’s saying something since I’m not really a fan of short story compilations.
Lake Geneva: Life At the Water’s Edge was a really nice coffee table type book. Great photos. Interesting. Makes me a little sad that we cancelled our mini vacation in November. We’ll do it in the spring, instead, and I’m looking forward to it now more than ever.
Day Trips From Chicago was nothing special. I didn’t find anything unusual or extra interesting. Not a bad book of day trips it was just a little vanilla.
A Short History of Myth, I think I did write about this one a little yesterday. It was ok. Dry, as you’d expect. Something to think about (or to try not to think about?) as I read the other books in the Myth series in the months ahead.
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I ran to the library one morning, by myself, to pick up some holds and pluck some books off of the shelf for TW because she was OUT of BOOKS. The Goddess Chronicle was one of those books. I really thought she’d probably already read it. But she hadn’t — thank goodness.
It was a good pick because not only is it a great feminist creation story, we discovered it’s part of a series so now we have another handful of books to look forward to reading.
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I loved Messenger of Truth — it might be my favorite since the first book (it’s #4.) I’m even getting used to the new reader (we’re listening to them on audio.)
So sad about Lizzie, though.
(We’re taking a little break from Maisie on audio to listen to Dexter but we’ll be back to her again, soon.)
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There were a half dozen books on the library cart that needed to go back soon, so I asked TW which of them I should read (as I often do) and she said I should read The Mermaid of Brooklyn. So I did.
I see why she thought I’d like to read it — it had potential. Park Slope mom with a degree in Russian folklore or some such thing and a crummy husband, jumps (I mean falls) off of the Brooklyn Bridge and is saved by a rusalka.
But, I didn’t really like Jenny — not before the rusalka or after or even after that. Not liking her made it very hard to enjoy the story. VERY hard. So I didn’t. Not really.
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Book three, Pardonable Lies was not my favorite Maisie Dobbs and not just because the narrator changed between book two and three (we’re doing this series on audio, now.)
Maisie was… not herself, which is probably as it should be but it made for a less fun adventure and a more serious, thoughtful story. I want the fun adventure with only a little bit of serious and thoughtfulness.
I also flipped from #TeamDean to #TeamInspector, Andrew Dean bugged me a lot in this one.
On to book four!
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