Coming Soon to a Blog Near You...

The Read-a-Thon is coming!!! I think this will be my sixth RAT, but I've lost track now...I'll have to go back through the blog and check. This is my favorite event in the Blogosphere, and I can't wait. Now I just have to see if I'm scheduled to work First Appearances that weekend, so I can get someone to cover.

If you want to sign up, go here.

Review: Loon: A Marine Story by Jack McLean

I'll be honest, when I received this book from LibraryThing's Early Reviewer program, I couldn't remember why I requested it. It's a book about Viet Nam, and I am not a reader of war stories. My grandfathers were both war veterans, but neither my parents nor any of my sisters were in the military. I have no real interest in the military or reading about war. I actually dreaded reading the book.

Until I opened it and read the first few pages.

I couldn't put it down. I started it last night before bed and finished it about a half an hour ago. I haven't sped through a book that fast in recent memory. The book isn't too long, about 250 pages, but it is intense, and it will keep you turning the pages. I was enthralled. It's a fictionalized memoir, I guess you could call it. The events are true, but some of the dialogue was created by the author, since it would have been all but impossible to recall the exact details of conversations held 40 years ago.

The book tells the story of McLean's enlistment in the Marines and his subsequent tour of duty in Viet Nam. McLean came from a place of privilege, private school and money. The kids in his graduating class went to college to avoid the draft, but McLean actually signed up for service. The story details his basic training, his first assignment in supply school, learning computerized inventory systems, and his eventual shipping off to Viet Nam to see action "in the shit."

I'll say it again, I was enthralled. Not being a reader of war stories, I haven't read anything about the Viet Nam war. My senior year English teacher in high school lived through Viet Nam and read us snippets of Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried, but that was the extent of my knowledge of the war. I don't even remember learning that much about it in history (except the mention of the domino effect theory in the book did ring some bells).

I'm so, so glad I read this book. It was touching and scary and fascinating, all in one. I cried at several points during the story. I give it five out of five Whatevers. LOVED it. I recommend this to just about anyone: those who remember Viet Nam or those who, like me, need to learn more about it. It is pretty scary, so it's not for young kids, but other than that, go for it.

2011-4

Review: Jo's Boys by Louisa May Alcott

This is the third and final book in Louisa May Alcott's trilogy which began with Little Women, the story of the four March girls. In this installment, Plumfield has become a part of Laurence College, and both boys and girls are being educated there together (a somewhat revolutionary idea for its time). The book tells the sweet stories of the men and women we have already met in previous books, as well as a few who are new to us, as they try to ready themselves to face the world.

I loved this book, in which Alcott lets her feminism shine through in the speeches and lectures of Jo Bhaer and the other characters. I love hearing her preach to her society of the time, exhorting them to allow women an education, and teaching them that a mixture of study and activity is best for young minds and bodies, rather than just locking students in a room all day for study, while neglecting their physical selves. Some might find the books a little preachy, but I enjoy the old-fashioned talks that Jo had with her boys. That kind of advice is out of fashion now, but it would be useful for some to hear.

I liked this novel better than Little Men, probably because the children were older and in college. I'd give it five out of five Whatevers, and recommend it for anyone who likes an old-fashioned read.

2011-3

Review: Dragonfly in Amber by Diana Gabaldon

FINALLY finished Dragonfly in Amber by Diana Gabaldon. I've been reading this book forever! Of course, it IS over 900 pages, so I guess I can cut myself a break. I've been reading it for so long that I have like five magazines piled up from the last month and a half. The copy I read is a used copy that I purchased somewhere...but I'm not sure where. I got it before I joined BookMooch, so it wasn't a Mooch. It's possible that I bought it at Powell's during the summer that I lived in Portland, while working for the Department of the Interior in law school.

ANYWAY, this is the second book in Gabaldon's Outlander series. And it's a re-read for me. I seriously love these books. This one wasn't as good as Outlander was, however. Too much Paris intrigue. Quick synopsis (SPOILER warning): this book was a little confusing because it switched time periods. In 1968, Claire and her grown daughter Brianna return to Scotland so that Claire can tell Brianna the truth about her birth (that Frank Randall, Claire's husband, is not really Brianna's father; rather she was fathered by Jamie Fraser, Claire's OTHER husband, in 1745 Scotland...trust me, it makes more sense if you read the series from the beginning). As they look into the historic fates of the men who lost their lives in the Scottish Rising of 1745 at Culloden Field, Claire is frightened of what she may find...that her husband Jamie was killed at Culloden after she left him to return to her own time. While telling Brianna and Roger Wakefield about her experiences in the past, we flash back to 1740's Paris, where Jamie and Claire are trying to stop Bonnie Prince Charlie from gathering support and funds for the Rising, knowing that many Scottish Highlands clansmen lose their lives in the fight. Claire is pregnant and, during this time, loses the baby, whom they name Faith. They then travel to Scotland, as the Prince has forged Jamie's name on a document showing support for the Uprising, and they are forced to then outwardly support Charles' efforts to retake the throne. Claire ends up pregnant again, and Jamie, having killed the MacKenzie clan chieftain, sends her away through the standing stones, back to her own time, while he goes to meet his fate at Culloden or at the hands of the clan MacKenzie. The book ends in 1968 Scotland again, with Claire learning that Jamie really did NOT die at Culloden, leaving the series open for further novels.

Whew! I'm sure that sounds ridiculous to anyone who hasn't followed the series, but Gabaldon is gifted, in that she makes even the most ridiculous plot points sound completely believable. I really didn't care for the section where they were in Paris. It was kind of boring to read about the society goings-on, and political intrigue isn't really my thing. This book was VERY political and focused a lot on the military maneuvers of the Scottish army. This stuff slowed the novel WAY down for me. I would have liked more of the Claire-and-Jamie-on-the-run type storyline from the first novel. But, if I recall correctly, the third book gets back to that. I would give this book four out of five Whatevers. It's still REALLY good, and is a must-read for anyone who loved Outlander, but there were some elements that I didn't care for.

2011-2

Review: Amagansett by Mark Mills

I don't recall whose blog reviewed Amagansett, but I'm almost positive that's where I got the recommendation: a fellow blogger. And a good recommendation it was. I actually finished the book Monday night, late, when I couldn't sleep, but it's taken me a few days to get motivated to write a review (and not because the book wasn't good). After I heard about it, I bought it at Barnes and Noble, then it sat on my shelf for over a year.

But it was worth the wait.

It's a murder mystery, but also a picture of the vast divide between the haves and have-nots in Montauk, Long Island. Conrad Labarde, a Basque fisherman, hauls in the dead body of a woman, which starts turning the wheels of the investigation into her death. What, if anything, is Labarde's connection to the woman? Who killed her? Why? Finding out the answers to the mystery started to take second place, however, to the mystery that was Conrad Labarde.

This book had a lot of similarities to the last book I read, The Disappearance. Both novels featured a crime as the central impetus. Both novels were set in the Northeast. Both novels featured a fairly compled male lead character. However, of the two, I preferred this one. It was simply better-written and more fully developed the characters. The mystery was done better, too.

I'm finding it hard to write about this book, for some reason. But I really, really liked it. I'll give it four and a half out of five Whatevers. For those who like a really well-crafted mystery or who love the Northeast.

2011-1

Review: The Disappearance by Efrem Sigel

This was another LibraryThing Early Reviewer book. And this one was spectacular. Slow to get started, The Disappearance did pick up in pace, and by the end, I couldn't put it down. This novel tells the story of Joshua, Nathalie, and Daniel Sandler, before and after Daniel's mysterious disappearance one August afternoon. But it's not a mystery. The fact that Dan is missing is, rather, the fulcrum on which Josh and Nathalie's marriage teeters. The book tells the story of how their marriage is rent and the question the reader faces is whether the pieces of their marriage can be stitched back together or whether they will flutter apart for good. The undercurrent is, of course, the whodunnit of Dan's disappearance.

I really don't want to say much more about the plot, since I don't want to give it away. But Sigel excels in bringing the pastoral northeastern part of the country to life. He draws the landscape in breathtaking detail, so that the reader knows every inch of the land almost as intimately as Josh does. Josh was a sympathetic character, the distraught father, ceaselessly searching for his missing son. Nathalie, however, was a bit two-dimensional for me, but that could simply be a symptom of the way she expressed her grief; while Josh was spurred into frenzied action by his sadness and anger, Nathalie was stupefied and frozen by hers.

I can't say how much I enjoyed this book, which was wonderful, after the disappointment of the last Early Reviewer book I read. Four and a half out of five Whatevers. I think of myself as someone who requires a great deal of action out of her reading, in order to be satisfied. Despite the fact that there is very little action in this novel, or rather that the action occurs slowly, over a long period of time, I enjoyed the characters and the setting enough that this worked for me. And there was enough of a mystery behind Dan's disappearance that I wanted to hang in there and find out who, in fact, DID do it. Lovely. Just lovely.

Merry Christmas!!!

I'm so excited! I got a Kindle for Christmas!!! I kind of suspected I would, but it's awesome, just the same. I also got about six real paper books, a Powell's gift card, and some Amazon gift cards to buy Kindle books with, in addition to a lot more stuff. We always spoil each other at Christmas. More later, I'm off to play with my Kindle. And Merry Christmas to everyone out there in blogland! I hope your day has been as wonderful as mine has!