Debra's Updates en-US Fri, 23 May 2025 15:23:32 -0700 60 Debra's Updates 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg Review7593893887 Fri, 23 May 2025 15:23:32 -0700 <![CDATA[Debra added 'Roll the Sun Across the Sky']]> /review/show/7593893887 Roll the Sun Across the Sky by Barbara Linn Probst Debra gave 5 stars to Roll the Sun Across the Sky (Paperback) by Barbara Linn Probst
Where to begin with such a complex and fascinating novel? I struggled at first with this most unlikable, self-centered, thoughtless protagonist, Arden, but having read Barbara Linn Probst’s previous novels, I had faith in the journey about to unfold. That and the title itself which implies rebirth: Egyptian God of the Rising Sun, Khepri, reappears each morning from a place of darkness to roll the sun across the sky. A new day. A new chance.
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Even more symbolic of Arden’s journey is the Egyptian scarab beetle that rolls its eggs in dung and pushes the ball across the ground until the time when the little ones emerge and new life begins—for it is unexpected motherhood that gives Arden a chance to act on her lifelong yearning: “Let me be good.� Being good does not come easily to Arden, for her desire to give her daughter the best life possible leads her to use and sometimes deceive the men in her life—a boyfriend she hurts deeply and three husbands that follow, though she does find love with her third husband. The novel’s dual timeline alternates between the younger, self-centered Arden: her trip to Europe with the boyfriend and her three marriages; and then older Arden, on her sixtieth birthday, as she endures a horrific tragedy that leaves her the sole caretaker of her ten-year-old granddaughter.
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Here is where Arden finds her way to a deeper understanding of herself and the goodness she has yearned for. She learns the importance of bonds, not those that hold us back, but those that connect us to others, for it is when we reach out to help or accept help from others, we celebrate our communal lives. Not only has Arden had a chance to set things right, but she has learned the true meaning of for the good of all.
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Truly a triumph for Barbara Linn Probst. While I particularly liked her third novel, The Color of Ice, this, her fourth, is truly her best. ]]>
Review7461630534 Fri, 04 Apr 2025 06:27:46 -0700 <![CDATA[Debra added 'Chick Singer: A Novel']]> /review/show/7461630534 Chick Singer by Lorraine Devon Wilke Debra gave 5 stars to Chick Singer: A Novel (Kindle Edition) by Lorraine Devon Wilke
A love story for the rock of ages! With pitch-perfect writing, fully fleshed out characters, and a page-turning storyline, Chick Singer belts out a classic tune of love, not just about love-of-your-life soulmates, but also that between mother and daughter, best girlfriends, and. finally, about that undeniable passion that pulses through your blood and defines your true self. Lorraine Devon Wilke’s best book yet! ]]>
Review7074496671 Tue, 10 Dec 2024 13:56:09 -0800 <![CDATA[Debra added 'The Irish Girl']]> /review/show/7074496671 The Irish Girl by Ashley E. Sweeney Debra gave 5 stars to The Irish Girl (Paperback) by Ashley E. Sweeney
With the spunk of the Irish, Mary Agnes will win your heart from the start. Facing adversity at a very young age, she perseveres as her determination and courage carry her across an ocean to a life of struggle and great loss in America that would deflate most spirits. With writing as lush as a Galway countryside, The Irish Girl is a powerful story of a young woman’s discovery of hidden strengths despite all odds—a story emblematic of the resilient American immigrant spirit that keeps the love of home country while embracing, wholeheartedly, the new. ]]>
GiveawayRequest615186030 Thu, 15 Aug 2024 03:23:42 -0700 <![CDATA[<a href="/user/show/114017185-debra-thomas">Debra Thomas</a> entered a giveaway]]> /giveaway/show/394812-the-backyard-bird-chronicles The Backyard Bird Chronicles by Amy Tan
by Amy Tan
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Review6626922761 Sat, 29 Jun 2024 16:56:31 -0700 <![CDATA[Debra added 'Eat and Get Gas']]> /review/show/6626922761 Eat and Get Gas by J.A.  Wright Debra gave 5 stars to Eat and Get Gas (Paperback) by J.A. Wright
Eat and Get Gas is a tender and charming coming-of-age novel, reminiscent of To Kill of Mockingbird, but with a focus on the tragic effects of the Vietnam War on our veterans and their families, as seen through the eyes of a young girl.

It’s one of those novels that, once you finish it—once you’ve discovered the plot twists and reveals in the last third—you want to go back and read it again. And it’s on that second read, even if it’s a quick one, that you see layers of meaning and depth of character that you just might have missed on your first run through. I must also add—what a unique cast of characters! They will stay with me a long time, as will Evan’s voice as she struggled to make sense of the confusing world around her. A great read! ]]>
AuthorFollowing102651357 Sat, 29 Jun 2024 16:55:48 -0700 <![CDATA[<AuthorFollowing id=102651357 user_id=114017185 author_id=14071141>]]> Rating716602547 Wed, 10 Apr 2024 10:44:45 -0700 <![CDATA[Debra Thomas liked a review]]> /
Sipsworth by Simon Van Booy
"The ordinary is made extraordinary in Simon Van Booy’s Sipsworth. The breath of life is blown into the simple premise of an octogenarian coming to terms with meting out her final days, and the keen insight into domestic tedium unfolds day upon day with balanced pacing that belies what ultimately becomes a heart-and-soul transformative story centered on a mouse.

We meet 83-year-old Helen Cartwright in the overture. “Life for her was finished . . . each day was an impersonation of the one before with only a slight shuffle . . . Not a single person who saw her boney figure flapping down Westminster Crescent could say they knew her. She was simply part of a background against which their own lives rolled unceasingly on.�

The lure of Van Booy’s nuanced language lifts what might be maudlin to captivating heights by describing Helen’s solitary return, after 60 years abroad, to the English village in which she was raised. Just as we are lulled into the sameness of Helen’s days, Van Booy hooks the reader with, “Then early one morning, something happens.�

The widow Cartwright is in the habit of battening down the hatches and keeping the world at arm’s length until a seemingly inconsequential act sets off a chain of events that unwittingly knock on the door of her self-imposed isolation giving her no choice but to let the world in.

It all starts with her neighbor’s discarded fish tank, which Helen spies on the sidewalk and brings inside, and in which she discovers a living mouse. Her discovery gives rise to a search for a solution and runs the gamut from possible rodent extermination all the way through to the wider sphere of the care and maintenance of a sentient being.

The story weaves and grows and includes a wonderful cast of village characters who come to Helen’s assistance, and, in the manner of neighborly, smalltown life, her days become filled with camaraderie and a strong sense of purpose. Whereas Helen drifted through her days preparing to die, she names the mouse, now buys it treats, and speaks to it like a family member. “Reality is all corners and sharp edges,� when Helen realizes her life is now arranged around a mouse she named Sipsworth, and that “It’s like having a baby! At eighty-three!�

On the one hand, Sipsworth is the touching story of the soul-satisfying bond between a lonely, elderly woman and a small animal. On the other hand, it is an existential treatise that looks over life’s shoulder with laser sharp perception from the vantage point of old age. When Helen considers that some of her nagging feelings were “simply the conditions of old age and largely the same for everybody,� she concludes, “Those who in life held back in manners of love would end in bitterness. While people like her, who had filled the corners of each day, found themselves marooned on a scatter of memories.� Van Booy continues, “And herein lies the cruel paradox of human existence—not that you die, but that all happiness eventually turns against you.�

What’s unusual about Sipsworth is that we early on are fascinated by Helen Cartwright’s private life without knowing her full story. Van Booy enlightens the reader on a need-to-know basis that unfurls in a graceful wave linking past and present.

The author’s voice walks the line between succinct and delightfully quirky. Sipsworth is a European set story, and Van Booy seamlessly employs compatible turns of phrase that dance like poetry.

Van Booy’s unique gift lies in scene setting: “During the night, a thick band of low-pressure snaps over the town. The house creaks as though something is trying to uproot it. Between growls of thunder the curtains flash like bared teeth. Outside, garden furniture is being rearranged like pieces on a board game.�

There’s an enchanted quality to Simon Van Booy’s Sipsworth, an uncanny blend of reality and fable with magical turns of event that move the story forward, bringing Helen Cartwright’s past into alignment with what appears to be fatalistic framework for her life’s new beginning. Everyone who has ever loved a pet will cheer on this story. They’ll identify with Helen Cartwright’s fulfilled heart, all for the love of a mouse.

The poignant story is masterly crafted and beautifully rendered, securing Simon Van Booy’s presence on the world-wide literary landscape as a writer of exceeding importance, whose Sipsworth will be included in a body of work sure to stand the test of time. "
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ReadStatus7745800684 Tue, 26 Mar 2024 06:12:32 -0700 <![CDATA[Debra wants to read 'The Backyard Bird Chronicles']]> /review/show/6375842206 The Backyard Bird Chronicles by Amy Tan Debra wants to read The Backyard Bird Chronicles by Amy Tan
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Review6018737980 Sat, 02 Dec 2023 09:07:40 -0800 <![CDATA[Debra added 'Bloodlines: A Memoir of Harm and Healing']]> /review/show/6018737980 Bloodlines by Tracey Yokas Debra gave 5 stars to Bloodlines: A Memoir of Harm and Healing (Paperback) by Tracey Yokas
What a beautiful, powerful, and moving story of a mother’s love for her daughter, as they both journey toward healing.

Reeling from her own mother’s unexpected death, Tracey Yokas discovers that her thirteen-year-old daughter is struggling with an eating disorder and self-harm. Tracey and her husband exhaust every option to help her, only to have their daughter make little progress or relapse even further into her dark world.

Tirelessly, Tracey digs deep, into books, therapy, journal writing, as well as into her own past and into what she learns her daughter needs most. With determination and incredible willpower, she finds the strength to step back (while still being there) and let her daughter make her own way out of the darkness—the hardest thing any mother can do.

As Tracey reflects on her own life-long struggle with weight and poor self-image and her troubled relationship with a distant mother, she realizes that silence is never the answer. In fact, it’s downright harmful. This strikingly honest and intimate memoir is the author’s response to just that—the necessity to talk openly about mental health challenges.

Bravo to her for writing this brave and bold memoir and to her husband and, especially, her daughter for their unwavering support.

The writing is impeccable. The emotion heartfelt and genuine. The topic of dire importance. Get ready to be moved to tears—both happy and sad.

I highly recommend this 5 star memoir. ]]>