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Out Stealing Horses by Per Petterson

“We decide when it will hurt.�� As our 67 year old narrator recollects the events of the summer of 1948, when he was 15 years old, the wisdom of this observation made by his father is revealed. The prose is exquisite, deceptively simple.

Finished by Therese Anne Fowler-- 4 Stars!!

Mysterious life of Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald brings this novel to life. I couldn't put it down!! Can't wait to find out more about the famous Fitzgerald couple!

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Perhaps it's time that I finally reply to this thing. It's been a while.

I just recently finished reading Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster, Casino Royale, and The Bourne Identity.

Currently, I just started The Rock & Roll Rebellion: Why People of Faith Abandoned Rock Music and Why They're Coming Back and Winter of the World.

Finished by Jodi Picoult-- 3 Stars!!

Another solid read by Picoult. Tackles some difficult civil rights issues, in a way where Picoult presents cases for both sides and puts the reader right in the middle.

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Some Luck by Jane Smiley

This story of an Iowan farming family began in 1920 with the birth of the first child and continued for three decades across births, deaths, hardships and joys. Each chapter summarized a single year with what felt like a snap shot. This novel never drew me in. Rather, I always felt like an outsider looking at someone else’s photo album or reading a series of Christmas letters from an acquaintance.

Finished by Mitch Albom-- 3 Stars!

Father Time, 3 stories twisting together, a feel good book that allows you to appreciate the meaning of time.

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Finished by Elizabeth Strout-- 3 Stars!

2 Brothers- 1 a famous litigator, and the other a hapless man scarred by a childhood accident come together to help their sister and her son fight against charges brought upon Zachary. Strout is a brilliant writer and this book is another point in her card.

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i just finished Moving day by Meg Cabot and Dear Dumb Diary Let's pretend this never happened and currently i'm reading Eat Pray Love (just remebered i didnt finished it LOL)

Britany wrote: "Finished by Therese Anne Fowler-- 4 Stars!!

Mysterious life of Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald brings this novel to life. I couldn't put..."

I keep hearing about this book, but haven't read it. Is it a novel based on her life, or more non-fiction? Looks interesting, regardless.

The Storied Life of AJ Fikrey by Gabrielle Zevin

Not surprising, I am going to be in the minority with my opinion of this book. True, the setting was charming, an independent bookstore in a small New England community. The characters were generally quite likable. But, it takes more than a quaint setting and likable characters to create a good book. The plot was hackneyed. The characters were poorly developed. The critical details were not believable. When, a quarter into the book, a two year old is abandoned in an empty book store after hours and that little girl never cries for her mother, social services allows an alcoholic widower to retain custody of her without vetting him, my eyes rolled so far into my head that I had to put the book down mid chapter and walk away until another day.

It's a novel based on her life. Historical Fiction-- reads really strong and I really enjoyed it!

Finished by Chip Heath and Dan Heath-- 3 Stars!

Good nonfiction read about changing behavior in a stagnant world...

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Finished by Diana Gabaldon-- 5 Stars!!

First 5 Star read of 2015. I know I'm late to the party on this series, but I can't express how hesitant I was to read these. I'm not a fan of science fiction or time travel, I also hate starting unfinished series... This book was so much more than I could explain. I fell in love with the Highlands...

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I got my hands on the school library copy of . I am thoroughly enjoying it. Although I usually prefer non-child protagonists, I am enjoying both Marie-Laure and Werner. I also love the short chapters that switch between the two: Exciting and intellectually interesting with a twist of myth as well.

Just finished Deep Down Dark by Hector Tobar

Finished by Gabrielle Zevin-- 4 Stars!!

Loved this little gem of of a novel. This is a book for book lovers. When we have words, characters, and books-- we are never alone!

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tomorrow is MY B-DAY i mean 20 th of Jan.!!bored but happy :}

Happy Birthday!

thank uuuuu :>so happy

I'm currently ready The Dirt: Confessions of the World's Most Notorious Rock Band. It's pretty interesting. Quite vulgar as well, but it is interesting and introspective of the band members.

The Tie That Binds by Kent Haruf

This is the story of a 20th century woman, raised on an isolated farm by an emotionally abusive father, trapped by duty when that father becomes disabled from a farm accident. This is the depressing chronicle of a woman who can never say a sustained “yes�� to her own happiness. This account of endless self-sacrifice lacks the hart-warming pull of affection; pure duty motivates her self-denial. The narration has the chatty tone of one sharing a story over a cup of coffee. The characters are vivid, the drama is gut-wrenching, the prose expertly serves the unfolding tale.

Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald by Therese Anne Fowler

This is a fictional memoir of Zelda Fitzgerald. I have read credible reviews that claim that it does not accurately portray Zelda’s relationship with F. Scott, particularly her years of mental health hospitalization. I do not know very much about this woman, so can not evaluate the historicity of this book. As a pure work of fiction, it is sufficiently readable. It could have been served by editing out about three dozen drunken party scenes and a score fewer musings about her failing marriage. It began to get tedious.

i'm now reading Snail Mail, No More.it's not a new book.but very interesting one so it's abt BFF'S and one of them moved to Ohio and they email each other and tell the news and dtuff like that and it's not an ordinary book,recommending it!
P.S. it's the times of 2001 and 2002 when there first appeared email but it doesnt look like an old book!!

Their Name is Today by Johann Christoph Arnold

These thoughts on best practices for raising children had some challenges for our current society. However, it was so simplistic and idealistic that the challenge was hard to hold on to.

Villette by Charlotte Bronte

Maybe I reveal myself to be a Neanderthal by hating a novel written by such a well-regarded author. But I found the wordy, melodramatic, morally supercilious style of narration grating. If contemporary novels were popularly written like this, I doubt I would be much of a reader.

Finished by John Boyne-- 3 Stars!

WWII- Poland: Nine year old Bruno notices that the people behind his house, behind the other side of the barbed wire fence are all wearing grey striped pajamas and he's intrigued... The innocence of Bruno is the piece that pushes this book further for me.

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Finished by Kent Haruf-- 4 Stars!!

Wasn't expecting to enjoy this one as much as I did. Really surprised by how wrapped up in the lives of the characters as I was.

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The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce

I thoroughly enjoyed this tale of a man reconciling with the pieces of his life. A short walk to the corner mailbox to post a reply to a former colleague’s unexpected note turns into a three month pilgrimage across England to see the woman in person. Along the way, Harold encounters a wide assortment of people who challenge his perceptions and is joined by the memories of his past which slowly come into a new focus. This never felt sentimentally manipulative, but genuine and gentle as both Harold and his wife come to terms with loss, betrayal and personal short comings, as they learn to accept themselves and to love one another.

The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey

This is not the story line that I would naturally gravitate to. A middle aged couple move to homestead in Alaska around 1920 trying to flee their grief over their inability to conceive, except for one still born child. Their first snowy night there, they playfully build a miniature snowman, a snow child, and supply it with an etched face, golden hair and homemade scarf & mittens. The next morning, the snow creature is gone, but a little girl looking strikingly like the snow creation is seen running through the woods. Over time, they try to befriend, to nurture and to know this child. Aspects of this girl are very carnal, others are almost magical; a dichotomy that never felt adequately resolved. Despite the fact that I did not enjoy the plot and thought the characters were a bit too

Irene wrote: "The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey..." I read this for another group. I thought there were moments of brilliance punctuated with moments of mediocrity. A clever idea which didn't really go anywhere by the end...

However a good first novel. Very atmospheric at times.

Finished by Celeste Ng-- 3 Stars!!

Tough read-- hard characters, and lots of mental entrapments...

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Finished by Deborah Harkness-- 3 Stars!

Third and final installment in the series. Nice way to tie up all the loose ends, and my favorite of the three...

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On to The Bell Jar This will be read #55 of the list!

Billy Lynn’s Long Half Time Walk by Ben Fountain

The boys of Bravo Company become instant heroes when a firefight in which they are involved is captured by an imbedded journalist. Home on leave, these boys are treated to celebrity status, a series of guest events culminating in a Dallas football game during which they participate in the half time show. This acclamation contrasts with Billy Lynn’s internal thoughts which are more ambivalent: existential anxt, survival guilt, fear of death and uncertainty about life, pride in their role and doubts about the war, lust for the attention and suspicion that it is more exploitative than sincere. I have mixed reactions about this novel. Ben Fountain manages to communicate a tension, an anxt that hovers below the surface, just beyond full rational explanation, never adequately captured by language. But, the narrator’s voice was inconsistent. The third person narrator, who relays Billy’s experience, speaks at times in the language of a street thug and at times with the vocabulary and poetic flair of an ivory tower resident. There are so many self-consciously creative similes that they seemed to serve the ego of the author rather than the strength of the story. The majority of this novel takes place at this Dallas football game, asking the reader to make comparisons between football and war. Either I missed some unique insights or these comparisons are rather weather worn, having been part of the culture for decades.

Finished by Eowyn Ivey-- 3 Stars!!

Russian fairytale retold on the Alaskan frontier in the 1920s. Magical, Chilly, and powerful characters make this book worth reading...

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Winter of the World by Ken Follett

This second installment in a historical fiction trilogy of the 20th century covers the 1930s & 1940s. Linked families in England, Germany, Russia and the USA influence the course of the Second World War in large and small ways. This novel has the feel of a soap opera with its mediocre prose, its valorous heroes and despicable villains, its sexy women and men, its overly simplistic portrayal of social and political situations and its plot that pulls the reader from chapter to chapter with little effort. I think this should have been edited significantly, leaving out the endless explanatory asides and repetition of information about characters and their back story. This is already a mammoth book that did not need the superfluous verbiage.

I've just started reading House of many ways (Howl #3) and I'm almost reached the half ..

Do Hard Things by Alex & Brett Harris

Written by 19 year old, high achieving, Evangelical Christian, twin brothers, this book is a challenge to youth to surpass the insultingly low expectations held out for them by society so that they might do greater things for the glory of God, the good of others and the blessing and fulfillment of self. The introduction names high school and college youth as its reader, but the language and chatty style felt as if the audience was a bit younger, 12 to 15 year old adolescents. The vision held out in this book is one that is worthwhile for many young people to hear, but I was less than impressed by the writing that conveyed it. That may be more a factor of my age than of the book itself.

Complete Novels by Dashiel Hammett

Finished by Menna van Praag-- 3.5 rounded up to 4 Stars!!

Really enjoyed this little book. Lighthearted with serious undertones, friendly ghosts, and a magical house make this one fun to curl up with!

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Little Man, What Now? By Hans Fallada

This is a tender story of a young couple living in Germany during the economic hard times between the two world wars. We watch them slip from starry-eyed, working class youth to impoverished, crushed young parents desperately clinging to their mutual love to survive. The characters, the dialogue, the emotions were beautifully drawn with simplicity and clarity

White Noise by Don Delillo

This is a satire of modern angst, family life consumerism and academic pretentiousness, to name a few themes ridiculed in this novel. Our primary character is a middle aged man in middle America, a professor of an invented field of study, on his fifth marriage. When a rail accident leaks toxic gases into the air prompting an evacuation of the college town, he is given irrefutable medical information that now he will die in the near or distant future, causing him to obsess over this existential crisis and fear of death. I am not sure if I was not in the right mood for satire or if the social commentary is just dated, but this book neither made me laugh nor look at things differently; it just made me roll my eyes.

Finished by Toni Morrison-- 3 Stars!!

Equal parts interesting and dense. Hard to pick back up and felt a little too lengthy in parts...

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A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler

Family tensions and tenderness is on display when four adult children come together to cope with their parent’s aging and impending death. This account of family dynamics is interrupted by the stories of the parent’s and the paternal grandparent’s earliest relationship. Anne Tyler is a master of character crafting, of capturing the little moments in which relationships are formed.

Finding The Dragon Lady: The Mystery of Vietnam’s Madame Nhu by Monique Denery

I knew nothing of Madame Nhu prior to this biography and have no way of evaluating its research. I would have liked more details, more of those telling stories that enable the reader to see under the surface of a person’s life. I found the insertions of the author’s life distracting.

We Were Liars by E. Lockhart

Our narrator is the snobby daughter of a snobby, old-money New England family. After suffering some accident while summering on the family private island when she was 15, she devolves into some post traumatic wreck, plagued by migraines so debilitating she drops out of school, pushing others away, divesting her life of personal possessions. Two years later, when she returns to the island for the annual extended family summer vacation, the memories of the tragic night slowly return. This book depended more on gimmicks than on a well told story or vivid characters. Being a young adult story, nearly all the action centers around the narrator and her three cousins/step cousin. Only people in teen novels and on the silver screen speak and act like these four youth. As the reader, I never felt as if I knew the narrator or the other young people. At one point, the step cousin argues that the others do not really know him because they only encounter him during these summer weeks on the island; they do not know the air shaft outside his window, the smell of his mother’s cooking, the posters on his bedroom walls. And, that is exactly what the reader might argue about these youth. We are never shown the ordinary events of daily life that breeds familiarity. We never meet Cady’s high school friends, see her struggles as she withdraws from school, witness the growing tension between her and her parents. Therefore, none of this is any more real than Cinderella. When her memories return at the end of the novel, the truth is altered so abruptly without any substantial foreboding in the text, that I felt tricked.

Finished by Jenny Lawson-- 4 Stars!!

This might just be my favorite audio book I've ever listened to! The author reads the book and she is HILARIOUS!!! Not for those that do not like cursing and female genitalia mentions throughout ;)

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Finished by Christina Baker Kline-- 3 Stars!!

Orphans left in the streets of New York City are rounded up and shipped via train out to the Midwest into the arms of the weary farmers looking for hard labor, or additional helping hands. Great book-- just wanted more!

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The People In The Photo by Helene Gestern

This is an epistolary novel. An old photo of her long dead mother inaugurates a hunt for information about this mysterious mother. Enlisting the help of the son of another person in that photo leads to the discovery of connections between the two in the past and the present. This was a quick sweet read. I thought the unexpected locating of an old diary and a letter delivered post-mortem was just too convenient and wrapped up the mystery too easily and neatly. I was also disappointed by the failure to craft unique voices or writing styles for each of the two main characters.

Finished by Paula Hawkins -- 4 Stars!!

Great, quick read!! Psychological thriller, and had to keep reading to find out how it was going to end! Would recommend!

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