The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

This is a book that touches the human heart and highlights all the complexity and drama of daily living as well as the beauty that is inherent in even the most ordinary life.  Matt Haig manages to use his facility with language and his empathy for the human condition to take us on an extraordinary adventure, only to find out in the end we never left home, and not only that, there's no place like it.  Loved this book! 

All Things Left Wild by James Wade

 

This was an extraordinary book.  The language is beautiful and atmospheric and moody and elegiac as well as harsh and unforgiving.  Anytime I read something this strong language wise, I am amazed that it is a debut novel.  It has a Cormac McCarthy feel to it and the dialogue is pitch perfect in driving the story.  This is something it usually takes writers awhile to learn.  This writer has a great career ahead of him and I look forward to his next offering.  In the meantime, if you want to explore the magnificence of the American West as reflected in human souls, read this book.

The Book of Two Ways by Jodi Picoult

 

Picoult is a wonderful storyteller.  Each tale she weaves she spins with interesting and complex characters navigating a fascinating storyline.  This is a book about death (obviously) as her main character Dawn is a death doula and spends her life trying to help people make that final transition peacefully.  And Picoult has done her research,  so  the information we learn about differing cultures and their approach to death as well as the responsibilities inherent in the position of death doula is extremely interesting.  But it is also a book about so much  more than death.  It's about life, and the choices we make along the way to that final transition, and she entertains the question about what your life would be like had you made different choices along the way.  This is one of Picoult's best.  I highly recommend it.

Migrations by Charlotte McConaghy

 

Franny Stone has always been a wanderer. By following the ocean's tides and the birds that soar above, she can forget the losses that have haunted her life. But when the wild she loves begins to disappear, Franny can no longer wander without a destination. She arrives in remote Greenland with one purpose: to find the world's last flock of Arctic terms and track their final migration. She convinces Ennis Malone, captain of the Sagnani, to take her onboard, winning over the eccentric crew with promises that the birds will lead them to fish.

As the Sagnani fights its way south, Franny's dark history begins to unspool. Battered by night terrors, accumulating a pile of unsent letters, and obsessed with pursuing the terms at any cost.  Franny is full of secrets.  When her quest threatens the safety of the entire crew, Franny must ask herself what she is really running toward--and running from.

This book is truly extraordinary,  and it was so beautifully written.  It is also the author's first, which is itself pretty amazing.  Full of stunning imagery and raw emotions, sad and joyful, and utterly heartbreaking.  I hardly ever give a book 5 stars, but I would this one because I found it to be captivating, and highly recommend it.

The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo

 

Powerful,  powerful book.  I loved it.  Such mastery of words and rhythm.  This is what poetry is all about.  You need to read this book.  Then go watch some of her Slam videos.  You will be glad you did.

A Spark of Light by Jodi Picoult

This was a Book Club read and is sure to spark some good conversation over a controversial topic. Picoult does not shy away from controversy and tries to interweave all the various schools of thought about abortion into her narrative. I doubt whether reading this book will change your mind about the subject (whichever side you come down on), but it is thought provoking. As I was reading the book, I couldn't help but think of Maya Angelou's quote "Hate--it has caused a lot of problems in this world, but it has not solved one yet." Like Picoult, I don't think that we as a society are ever going to agree on this issue. But even on issues where we don't see eye to eye, we need to respect each other's opinions and continue to have honest conversations, instead of demonizing each other.

Winter Counts by David Heska Wanbli Weiden

 

This book had equal parts grit and heart.  I really liked it a lot.  The glimpse into life on the Rez and the issues they confront daily, the wit, the characters that you immediately take to heart--all of that combines for a compelling read that you just don't want to put down.  I highly recommend it.

Killing Crazy Horse: The Merciless Indian Wars in America by Bill O'Reilly & Martin Dugard

 

O'Reilly and Dugard take us through the history of the founding of the American frontier and the Indian wars that were a part of it.  From President Andrew Jackson's brutal policy of Indian removal to Martin Van Buren's roundup of the Cherokee that became the Trail of Tears.  They do introduce some never before told historical moments in telling this story and I believe they tried to present each tribe as unique with its own culture.  I also believe they tried to be accurate and respectful.  It is a painful history nonetheless that will shock you and provide lessons that resonate even today.  The battles are intense and bloody and the descriptions of them really bring that home.  The Bibliography is a good place to start if you are interested in further reading on the subject and there are quite a few Native American tribal websites that are easily accessible.  

Memorial Drive: A Daughter's Memoir by Natasha Trethewey

 

This heartbreaking memoir of a daughter coming to terms with the brutal murder of her mother (at the hands of her stepfather) is told in exquisite language (it is her poetic background of course).  It is a profound experience, quite visceral, and very wrenching.  The pain, loss, and grief comes washing over you and the setting of the deep South at a time of deep segregation just add to the elegiac feelings.  The way she confronted life and death and the aftermath of such a horrible crime is truly amazing.  It is a compelling look at loss and the ripple effects of racism and domestic abuse.  

Poems to See By: A Comic Artist Interprets Great Poetry by Julian Peters

 Seeing these 24 classic poems in Graphic Novel format is a true delight.  The themes of empathy, identity, creativity, time, mortality, and nature are perfect compliments to the artwork itself and can really change the way we see ourselves and others--hence the title.  I absolutely adore poetry, and if this book will unlock that world for a new generation who were raised on visual communication, then it  will have served a noble purpose.

An African Prayer Book by Desmond Tutu

Prayer is a conversation with God and words that others give us can be a wonderful devotional aid towards these conversations.  This collection is divided into Adoration, Contrition, Thanksgiving, Supplication, and Daily Life.  It is spiritually quite rich and there is something for everybody.  I highly recommend it.

Jesus Feminist by Sarah Bessey

 

I absolutely loved the poem between the Foreward and Introduction of this book.  "Let Us Be Women Who Love" was written by Idelette McVicker, who is founder and Editor of She Loves magazine.  I also love the passionate yet never strident approach Bessey takes in promoting her viewpoint.  Her narrative is very insightful and empowering and came at a really appropriate time in my life.  This is a fearless book to help each of us find freedom and move beyond all those man made restrictions that tend to hold us back.  I recommend it highly for the searching soul.  

The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones

This is a horror novel with humor, intelligence, and sharp social commentary.  The images of contemporary native life are juxtaposed with old traditions.  Flawed characters and an engaging plot, it is a novel about identity, grief, pain, desperation, and guilt.  Jones is a Blackfeet writer that has written more than 20 books.  He has also spent a lifetime interpreting Native American culture and mythology for contemporary readers.  The novel follows four American Indian men from the Blackfeet Nation who were childhood friends, as they find themselves in a desperate struggle for their lives, against an entity that wants to exact revenge upon them for what they did during an elk hunt 10 years earlier by killing them, their families, and friends.  If you are looking for a book of smart horror and one that will open you up to cultures both human and animal...this is one you should try.

 

The Hideaway by Lauren K. Denton

 

This was a book club selection, that I did like, even though it is probably not something I would have picked out on my own.  Family is always complicated, and I loved how this was dealt with in a southern setting.  The author was born and raised in Mobile, AL and lives outside Birmingham.  She also writes a monthly newspaper column about life, faith, and how funny (and hard) it is to be a parent. 

After her last remaining family member dies, Sara Jenkins goes home to The Hideaway, her grandmother Mags’s ramshackle B&B in Sweet Bay, Alabama. She intends to quickly tie up loose ends then return to her busy life and thriving antique shop in New Orleans. Instead, she learns Mags has willed The Hideaway to her and charged her with renovating it — no small task considering her grandmother’s best friends, a motley crew of senior citizens, still live there.

Rather than hurrying back to New Orleans, Sara stays in Sweet Bay and begins the biggest house-rehabbing project of her career. Amid drywall dust, old memories, and a charming contractor, she discovers that slipping back into life at The Hideaway is easier than she expected.

Then she discovers a box Mags left in the attic with clues to a life Sara never imagined for her grandmother. With help from Mags’s friends, Sara begins to piece together the mysterious life of bravery, passion, and choices that changed her grandmother’s destiny in both marvelous and devastating ways.

When an opportunistic land developer threatens to seize The Hideaway, Sara is forced to make a choice — stay in Sweet Bay and fight for the house and the people she’s grown to love or leave again and return to her successful but solitary life in New Orleans.

The author does a good job of creating the world that is The Hideaway, and the setting is truly my favorite part of the book.  The characters are interesting and she does a good job in weaving together the two story lines between past and present.  

It was not a deep reading experience, but enjoyable nonetheless.

The Guest List by Lucy Foley

 

This was an interesting read about secrets and motives set on a remote Irish island and told from various perspectives of the guests on the guest list (hence the title).  It definitely holds your interest and the author does a good job in handling all that jumping around in and out of those various perspectives.  She also does a good job in gradually revealing who is murdered and how all these various perspectives lead to the final reveal of who and why.  It was a Reese's Book Club pick and received the Gold Dagger Award from the Crime Writer's Association of the UK for best crime novel of the year.  In these days of social isolation, perhaps people are reading it and thinking to themselves "could be worse, I could be stuck in the middle of nowhere with these folks!"  A nice distracting read that will keep you guessing until the end.

The Book of Longings by Sue Monk Kidd

 

I am a fan of Sue Monk Kidd's writing and certainly enjoyed this novel about the fictional wife of Jesus as much as her other books.  I especially found the Author's Note at the end of the book interesting as she explains to us why she wrote the book and what she hoped to take from the experience.  The quote she kept on her desk throughout the four and a half years it took her to write the book truly spoke  to me as well:  "Everything is the proper stuff of fiction." --Virginia Woolf.  After reading this section I had a better feel for why she named it The Book of Longings.  Women's voices are sometimes silenced in history.  With meticulous research and written reverentially, this is an account of what might have been.  Just one woman's struggle, living in a time and place and culture that would have tried to silence her.  I appreciate the voice she was given.

Tell Me a Story by Cassandra King Conroy

 

If I had to pick an all time favorite author, I guess Pat Conroy would be at the top of the list.  He was witty, sarcastic, funny and would have you laughing one moment and crying the next.  And nobody writes family relationships and dynamics like he did.  So I was looking forward to reading this by Cassandra King, his widow.  It is told straight from the heart and gives you an intimate glimpse into their lives together.  As an adjunct you can go to Cassandra's website, CassandraKingConroy.com for photos of their life together by clicking on the Tell Me a Story book image.  If you are a Conroy fan (as I am), read this book.

American Harvest: God, Country, and Farming in the Heartland by Marie Mutsuki Mockett

I found this book so very interesting.  It had been advertised as a blend of science, philosophy, and spirituality--and it's a pilgrimage of sorts.  When Marie inherited the family farm from her father and Japanese mother she accompanies a group of evangelical christian wheat farmers through the heartland for a thoughtful examination of not only food production but the growing divide between rural and urban America.  It is an examination of landscape, ourselves, others, and faith in an attempt to better understand that divide and perhaps form a bridge across it.  A thought-provoking read.

The Dry by Jane Harper

The small town big secrets nature of this debut novel from Harper is what drew me in, and obviously a lot of other people. It has sold more than one million copies worldwide. And a film is set to be released soon. It is an Australian novel with a sense of place that is very vivid. In the grip of the worst drought in a century, the farming community of Kiewarra is facing life and death choices daily when three members of a local family are found brutally slain. When Federal Police investigator Aaron Falk returns to Kiewarra for the funerals, he is loath to confront the people who rejected him twenty years earlier. But when his investigative skills are called on, the facts of the Hadler case start to make him doubt this murder-suicide charge. And as Falk probes deeper into the killings, old wounds start bleeding into fresh ones. For Falk and his childhood friend Luke shared a secret… A secret Falk thought long-buried… A secret which Luke’s death starts to bring to the surface. A well written page turner of a mystery that David Baldacci calls one of the most stunning debuts he's ever read.

Rough Beauty: Forty Seasons of Mountain Living by Karen Auvinen
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I like books about "living wild," and especially if they are written by women on their own. Auvinen also has a lot of references to other books and emphasis on poets and poetry that I loved, as well as the usual emphasis on meditation and solitude. I felt this book might help me make deeper connections in my own daily experience, which is pretty far removed from Colorado's Rocky Mountains. I am very much a canine oriented person as well, so the relationship she had with her dog (which is richly explored in this memoir) was of great interest to me. It is truly an homage to nature and makes me appreciate what Thoreau meant when he said "in Wildness is the preservation of the world."


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Mary's Monster: Love, Madness, and How Mary Shelley Created Frankenstein by Lita Judge
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Wow. Just wow. Lita Judge spent a summer reading the handwritten journals of Mary Shelley and then spent 5 years writing this story. It is told in free verse with over 300 pages of black & white watercolor illustrations.

To quote Tui T. Sutherland (author of the Wings of Fire series) "What an intensely, darkly beautiful book." Another reviewer said "extraordinary in both art and language." I wholeheartedly agree. Another reviewer: "...gripping text and heartbreaking images, the story unfolds like a gothic fairy tale--crackling with rage, riven with pain, and pulsating with ferocious beauty."

Some of the wonderful information Judge included: Mary Shelley was a pregnant teenage runaway when she wrote Frankenstein. She created the first industrial-age science fiction novel as well as the first "mad scientist," a character archetype utilized in many modern stories. The ideas in Frankenstein grew from lectures Mary attended; extensive reading; discussions with Shelley, Byron, and Polidori; and her knowledge of grisly experiments performed on the bodies of executed convicts from Newgate Prison.

In an era of heated debate about humanity's relationship to nature and God, Mary's Creature was also conceived as a warning to those who assume too much power over nature. Her call for caution still holds surprising relevance today, with ethical debates swirling around genetically modified crops, recombinant DNA technology, cloning, cloud seeding, and genetic screening of human fetuses.

The novel also challenged the idea that men alone, without women, could create life, overruling the laws of nature. She depicted her Creature as motherless, like herself.

With her writing and her life, Mary defied the restrictions put on women, and for two hundred years her Creature has lived on to inspire new stories, films, plays, and artwork, as well as ethical debates about science's role in humans' lives. It is a testament to the teenage Mary Shelley's strength and enduring genius.

Read this book!


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Revival by Stephen King
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I wanted to read this because I am a huge fan of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and this book has been called the modern Frankenstein. It has all the classic King elements: a small town in Maine, the supernatural, and human obsession. It is a dark and electrifying look at addiction, religion, music, and what might exist on the other side of life. The story follows Jamie Morton and Charles Jacobs. Jamie is six when he first meets Charles when he becomes the new minister at his church. When tragedy strikes the Jacobs family Charles goes off the deep end and denounces his belief in God and is forced to leave town. They encounter one another many years later and this encounter leaves Jamie indebted and connected. They do come back together one last time at the end of Charles Jacobs' life in a mind bending stretch of reality that is classic King.


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