The French Girl by Felicia Donovan - BOOK REVIEW

Title:  The French Girl
Author:  Felicia Donovan
Paperback, 196 pages
ISBN 10:     1469934477
ISBN 13:  9781469934471
The Book Depository / Amazon / Amazon Kindle

Goodreads description:

The heartwarming story of a young French girl, Etoile, who is raised in a world of prejudice and despair who becomes orphaned and is sent to live with her distant cousin, Giselle, and Giselle's partner, Jean. Embraced by Giselle, Jean, and their community of friends, Etoile discovers the true meaning of family, but their strength is put to the test when the state threatens to take her away.

My Take: 

First sentence:  Papa used to always say that the wind carried with it either secrets or souls and if you watched very carefully, you could tell which one it was.

Originally published as a Kindle-only novel, and recently released in paperback, The French Girl is a story of an eleven-year-old girl named Etoile living in the fishing town of Cote Nouveau, MA in the 1970's.

With the death of Etoile's father during a storm five years before that took the lives of 12 fishermen, Etoile's mother disintegrates into a neglectful and abusive drunk.  Anais, Etoile's 15-year-old sister, is responsible for making certain that Etoile is fed and taken care of.   When her mother dies under suspicious circumstances, Etoile is sent to live with her mother's cousin Giselle in New Hampshire.

Giselle is an artist who also crafts natural bath products for sale to the students at a nearby university.   Her partner Jean is a professor of Women's Studies at the university, and strives to find her own way to connect with Etoile.

Etoile is transported from a world of neglect and abuse into a world of love and acceptance.  At eleven, she knows there is something "different" about Giselle and Jean's relationship, but the care they and their friends show for her overrides everything else.  Of course, not everyone is accepting, and a law that does not permit adoption by a single person is used by a county worker as a basis for taking Etoile away from her new-found family.

Told in the first-person through Etoile's eyes, I really enjoyed the way the writing stayed true to how a young girl that age would perceive the happenings around her.  As Etoile learns to swim and ride a bike, she is also learning how to cope with a particular boy whose mother is virulently opposed to seeing Giselle and Jean as an equal couple.  She also finds a lovely friend in a girl named Winnie. I found myself holding my breath at a school open house, wondering how Winnie's parents would react to Giselle and Jean.

The only problem I had was a slight problem placing this large community of French-speakers in Massachusetts and New Hampshire; I kept picturing a town or towns in France rather than here in the United States, especially the Cote Nouveau scenes.

Some of Giselle's back story is also slowly revealed.  The way the author tied it in with Anais and HER story was very well-done and timed perfectly.

A heartwarming story and a fast-flowing read.

Writing:  3.5 out of 5 stars

Plot:   4 out of 5 stars

Characters: 3.5 out of 5 stars

Reading Immersion:   3 out 5 stars

BOOK RATING:   3.5 out of 5 stars

Book Clubs:  Yes; I think it would make a good book club selection, fostering discussions of adoption, same-sex couples, and proper care of children.

BLOGGERS:  Have you reviewed this book? If so, please feel free to leave a link to your review in the comments section; I will also add your link to the body of my review.

Author website

BUY IT:  At Amazon, The Book Depository, and through other on-and-off-line booksellers.

Disclosure:  I  received a  complimentary Kindle edition of this title from the author to facilitate my review.  No other compensation was received and I was not required to post a positive review.

The Whipping Club by Deborah Henry - BOOK REVIEW

Title:  The Whipping Club
Author:  Deborah Henry
Publisher:   T. S. Poetry Press
Release Date:  February 15, 2012
Hardcover, 345 pages
ISBN 13:  9780984553174
The Book Depository / Amazon

Goodreads description:

Inspired by her heritage and research of the Irish Industrial School system, Henry’s auspicious debut chronicles a couple’s attempt to save their son from horrific institutions.

Marian McKeever and Ben Ellis are not typical young lovers in 1957 Dublin, Ireland; she’s Catholic and teaches at Zion School, and he’s Jewish and a budding journalist. The two plan to wed, but their families object to an interfaith marriage. And when Marian becomes pregnant, she doesn’t tell Ben. Coerced by Father Brennan (a Catholic priest who is also her uncle), Marian goes to Castleboro Mother Baby Home, an institution ruled by Sister Paulinas and Sister Agnes where “sins are purged” via abuse; i.e., pregnant girls are forced to mow the lawn by pulling grass on their hands and knees. Marian is told that her son, Adrian, will be adopted by an American family. The riveting storyline provides many surprises as it fast-forwards to 1967 where Marian and Ben are married and have a 10-year-old daughter. Marian’s painful secret emerges when she learns that her son was dumped in an abusive orphanage not far from her middle-class home and Sister Agnes is his legal guardian. Thus begins a labyrinthine journey through red tape as the couple fight to regain their firstborn child. Ultimately, 12-year-old Adrian is placed in the Surtane Industrial School for Boys, which is rife with brutality and sexual abuse at the hands of “Christian Brother Ryder.” Though unchecked church power abounds, this is not a religious stereotype or an indictment of faith. Hateful characters like Brother Ryder are balanced with compassionate ones, such as a timid nurse from the Mother Baby Home. Father Brennan deepens into a three-dimensional character who struggles to do what is right. Henry weaves multilayered themes of prejudice, corruption and redemption with an authentic voice and swift, seamless dialogue. Her prose is engaging, and light poetic touches add immediacy. For example, when Marian returned to Mother Baby Home after 11 years, she “opened the car door and stepped onto the gravel, wanting to quiet its crunch, like skeletons underneath her shoes.” Echoing the painful lessons of the Jewish Holocaust, Henry’s tale reveals what happens when good people remain silent.

A powerful saga of love and survival.

My Take: 

This is a tale of the injustices wrought by the Irish Industrial Schools and orphanages in the 1950's and 1960's.

Marian, a teacher at a Jewish school, is Irish Catholic and her boyfriend Ben is Jewish.  Shortly before meeting Ben's parents, Mariam finds out that she is pregnant. After a totally disastrous meeting, Marian decides to go to a Mother Baby Home to have her child, who, she is told,  is subsequently given up and adopted by an American family.

Years later, after Ben and Marian have married and become parents to a daughter named Johanna, a nurse from the home visits Marian to tell her that the son she had given up, Adrian, is NOT in America, but is at an orphanage where he is being mistreated.

This novel follows Mariam as she tries to regain custody of Adrian.  It speaks of horrific abuse at the hands of the system, a mother's heartache in having failed her son, and the bias and prejudice that contributes to what is already an unbearable situation.

My feelings:  The novel feels a bit rushed and jumpy at the start, and reads more intellectually than emotionally - the writing is rather detached, and, as a reader, I was not able to connect with any of the characters.  I felt as though I were a dispassionate observer almost through the very end of the novel. If this were a non-fiction title, that would be acceptable; however, as fiction, most readers expect some feeling to come from the pages, especially around the issues that this novel centers around.

Marian imagines prejudice where none exists, and seems very close-minded and selfish.  Her husband Ben rightly believes that there is something a bit "off" about Adrian (and that is understandable, given how he has been raised up to this point).   Adrian is a bit more of a puzzle; I felt more for him, imagining how much worse his life must have felt once he got a true taste of family.

I feel that this novel is a good start towards shining a light on a system which few were aware of, but it could and should have been so much more.

QUOTES (from an eGalley; may be different in final copy):

The girl closed the door behind them and invited Marian to sit down while she herself remained standing, hovering by the door. It was then that Marian realized that the nurse wasn't there for comfort, but to keep her from running.

Sister Agnes told them that it costs to raise the spawn of whores and that orphans had nothing to add to what the state provided for their upkeep.

Writing:  4 out of 5 stars

Plot:  3.5 out of 5 stars

Characters:  2 out of 5 stars

Reading Immersion:   2 out 5 stars

BOOK RATING:   2.9 out of 5 stars

BLOGGERS:  Have you reviewed this book? If so, please feel free to leave a link to your review in the comments section; I will also add your link to the body of my review.

Author page

BUY IT:  At Amazon, The Book Depository,   and through other on-and-off-line booksellers.

Disclosure:  I  received a  complimentary eGalley of this title from the publisher through Net Galley to facilitate my review.  No other compensation was received and I was not required to post a positive review.

Carry the One by Carol Anshaw - BOOK REVIEW

Title:  Carry the One
Author:  Carol Anshaw
Publisher:   Simon and Schuster
Release Date:  March 6, 2012
Hardcover, 253 pages
ISBN 10:     1451636881
ISBN 13:  9781451636888
The Book Depository / Amazon

March, 2012 Indie Next List

Goodreads description:

This stunning, break-out achievement has already been hailed by Emma Donoghue, bestselling author of Room, for presenting “passion and addiction, guilt and damage, all the beautiful mess of family life. Carry the One will lift readers off their feet and bear them along on its eloquent tide.”

Carry the One begins in the hours following Carmen’s wedding reception, when a car filled with stoned, drunk, and sleepy guests accidentally hits and kills a girl on a dark, country road. For the next twenty-five years, those involved, including Carmen and her brother and sister, connect and disconnect and reconnect with each other and their victim. As one character says, “When you add us up, you always have to carry the one."

Through friendships and love affairs; marriage and divorce; parenthood, holidays, and the modest tragedies and joys of ordinary days, Carry the One shows how one life affects another and how those who thrive and those who self-destruct are closer to each other than we’d expect. Deceptively short and simple in its premise, this novel derives its power and appeal from the author’s beautifully precise use of language; her sympathy for her very recognizable, flawed characters; and her persuasive belief in the transforming forces of time and love.

My Take: 

In 1983, Carmen, who runs a suicide hotline, is pregnant and newly married to Matt Sloan.   Leaving the wedding in the wee morning hours, Alice (Carmen's sister - an artist), Maude (Matt's sister), Nick (Carmen's brother - a grad student), Tom (a folk singer - married - boyfriend of the wedding hostess Jean), and Olivia (Nick's new girlfriend, also the driver of the car), all doped up and/or drunk, hit a 10-year-old girl on the road and the little girl dies.

This story follows this disparate group of characters and others in the years following the accident.  Although it purports to be about how they "carry the one" (the young girl who was killed) with them in their memories afterwards, as I read, other than one particular character, I didn't get this feeling from them at all.

The main focus is on Carmen and her siblings, children of a famous artist who seems to resent any artistic success had by Alice.

Carmen is actively involved in many social issues. Alice is an artist who falls madly in love with Maude.  Nick is a perpetual student who can't get away from drugs.  Their lives are basically a train wreck, not because of the accident, but because of their own poor choices.

I could not really identify with the characters, but the writing and what I thought would be the storyline did keep me reading to see what happened.  In the end, for me, it didn't feel substantial.  Maybe it was the shifting perspectives in time and/or character, or maybe it was that I simply couldn't find a character to bond with, but I was never fully caught up in the novel.

MAYBE it was because nothing really good happens.  I realize that all of life has bad moments, but life isn't ALL bad, and in this novel, there isn't a bright spot to be found.   Every time I came across what I THOUGHT would be one, my hopes were dashed to the ground.

The writing, however, is impeccable.  For me, the story itself just wasn't enjoyable or compelling, and the wonderful writing style couldn't make up for that.  It will, however, appeal to many other readers, as attested by the fact that the reviews for this one are all over the board.  Readers seem to either love it or feel "meh" about it.

QUOTES (from an ARC; may be different in final copy):

For a few years after she came out, Alice essentially got dumped by Loretta, who couldn't see the point of being a lesbian.  In her scheme of things where men were everything, if you weren't one, or attached to one, what was your value?  

Carmen said, "I guess I was looking at everything from the wrong angle.  I didn't think we were breaking up. I thought he and I were just having this interesting conversation about how to be married in the late twentieth century.  And how to go forward, together.  It was kind of like when I had all those parking tickets I was contesting with the city.  I thought that was a lively back-and-forth, too, and then I came out of the house one day and my car was booted."

In order to keep liking Nick (as opposed to loving him, which was non-negotiable), Alice sometimes had to look at him obliquely, or with her eyes half closed, or through a pinhole in a piece of cardboard. Straight on would burn her retinas.

On 9/11:

By mid-afternoon, Carmen was sifting the text for the subtext. "We're through the information-gathering part. The information is now in.  Now they're shaping this for our consumption, imposing a story line. The brave passengers taking the last plane down in the field.  The firemen rushing in heedlessly, answering their call to duty. And pretty soon, they'll get the president ready for his close-up to congratulate us for being Americans.  This huge unprecedented, unmanageable mess, and all the complexity behind it - they're already starting to manage it.  They're making a theater piece out of pure horror so we can watch the unwatchable then get back to the mall."

Writing:  4.5 out of 5 stars

Plot:  3.5 out of 5 stars

Characters:  3 out of 5 stars

Reading Immersion:   2.5 out 5 stars

BOOK RATING:   3.4 out of 5 stars
 
BLOGGERS:  Have you reviewed this book? If so, please feel free to leave a link to your review in the comments section; I will also add your link to the body of my review.

Sensitive reader:  This book contains sexual scenes and references.

Browse Inside

BUY IT:  At Amazon, The Book Depository, through the publisher's website,  and through other on-and-off-line booksellers.

Disclosure:  I  received a  complimentary ARC of this title from the publisher to facilitate my review.  No other compensation was received and I was not required to post a positive review.

Arcadia by Lauren Groff - BOOK REVIEW

Title:  Arcadia
Author:  Lauren Groff
Publisher:   Hyperion Voice
Release Date:  March 13, 2012
Hardcover, 304 pages
ISBN 10:    1401340873
ISBN 13:  9781401340872
The Book Depository / Amazon

March, 2012 Indie Next List

Goodreads description:

A brilliant follow-up to Groff's bestselling debut novel, The Monsters of Templeton, Arcadia is the romantic, lush, haunting story of the American Dream and of a gifted young man born into an idealistic community.

In the fields and forests of western New York State in the late 1960s, several dozen idalists set out to live off the land, founding what becomes a famous commune centered on the grounds of a decaying mansion called Arcadia House.  Arcadia follows this lyrical, rollicking, tragic, and exquisite utopian dream from its hopeful start through its heyday and after.  The novel particularly centers on a young boy - Ridley Sorrel Stone, known as "little Bit," and later, "it", who is born soon after the commune is established.

While Arcadia and the Arcadians rise and fall an evolve across three generations , Bit, of course, ages too. Played out against the backdrop of Arcadia is Bit's lifelong love affair with a young woman on the commune - the lithe and deeply troubled Helle.  How does he, an extremely sensitive man, make his way through life and through the world outside Arcadia where he must eventually live?

What unfolds is an astonishingly beautiful and gripping novel.  With Arcadia, Lauren Groff establishes herself as one of the most gifted young fiction writers at work today.

My Take: 

This is the story of Bit, the first child born to the Free People, a commune headed by a charismatic leader named Handy in New York state.  We follow him through his childhood and adolescence, then skip to his adulthood living in New York.

There is a large cast of disparate characters, but Ms. Groff does an excellent job sorting them out for us and making them fully dimensional. 

The commune grows and eventually disintegrates as do all utopian visions when faced with the reality of human nature, and Bit's maturing voice keeps the reader in his present moment.  As a toddler, his observations are somewhat superficial, and as he grows, his observations become more in-depth, but still stay true to his projected age at the time of the telling. We see through his eyes the eventual disillusionment of both of his parents, Hanna and Abe, with the commune's leader and with the eventual hierarchy that places one group in the main house and the others in cottages separated into certain groups.  We witness through a child's eyes a horrible accident that happens to his father, and through an adolescent's eyes first love, and a wrenching away from all that is familiar.

When we again meet Bit as an adult, he is raising his daughter Grete as a single father,  his wife having disappeared. We walk with him through the care-taking of his mother Hannah, who has ALS and we are saddened by the situation that put her into full-time care.  Once again, disintegration creeps into the plot - the disintegration of Hannah's abilities as well as a disintegration of the wider world, which is fighting a pandemic and going through various crises, including a citrus blight.

Ms. Groff's writing is slow-paced and luminous, which makes for a lovely story.  I must admit that the first half of the book, while it held my attention, did not draw me totally in, although I did connect with many of the characters and situations.  Once I met Bit as an adult, however, I was transfixed by this truly gentle, loving soul and hoped against hope for his own happy ending.

While this is a contemplative novel, it can be enjoyed by the more casual reader because a LOT happens in these pages.  For the more "serious" reader, it can be read with a mind towards the deeper connections implied in the growth of one person and what happens in that person's wider world.

I closed the pages reluctantly, not wanting to let Bit go off into the ether, but very happy to have met him.

QUOTES (from an ARC; may be different in final copy):

There is, Bit knows, what happens on the surface, and there is what pulls beneath.

Though people here have private rituals, Muhammad kneeling on a bit of carpet during the day, Jewish Seders and Christmas trees, religion here is seen much like hygiene:  a personal concern best kept in check so as to not bully the others.

I don't know how much longer I can handle it, Hannah says.  This isn't what I signed up for, this isn't a better life, this isn't anything but poverty and hard work and not enough money to buy the kids winter boots.

He imagines cities as larger Arcadias, but harder, meaner, people walking around thrusting cash at each other.  He has seen the coins like embossed washers, the bits of green paper.  Humans out there are grotesque:  Scrooges and Jellybys and filthy orphans in the caverns of blacking factories, in lonely depopulated homes, a blight called television like tiny Plato's caves in every room.  It is grimmer in the Outside.  There is war in the Falkland Islands, there are Sandinistas and Contras, there are muggings and rapes, terrible things he had heard the adults talking about, has read about himself when he can find an old wrinkled paper in the Free Store.  The president is an actor, placed in power to smoothly deliver the corporations' lies.  

Writing:  5 out of 5 stars

Plot:  4.5 out of 5 stars

Characters:  4 out of 5 stars

Reading Immersion:   4 out 5 stars

BOOK RATING:   4.3 out of 5 stars
 
BLOGGERS:  Have you reviewed this book? If so, please feel free to leave a link to your review in the comments section; I will also add your link to the body of my review.

BUY IT:  At Amazon, The Book Depository, through the publisher's website,  and through other on-and-off-line booksellers.

Disclosure:  I  received a  complimentary ARC of this title from the publisher to facilitate my review.  No other compensation was received and I was not required to post a positive review.

THE LANTERN by Deborah Lawrenson - BOOK REVIEW/BLOG TOUR

Title:  The Lantern
Author:  Deborah Lawrenson
Publisher:   Harper Collins
Release Date:  February 28, 2012
Paperback, 400 pages
ISBN 10:     0062192973
ISBN 13:  9780062192974
The Book Depository / Amazon

September, 2011 Indie Next List

Goodreads description:

When Eve falls for the secretive, charming Dom, their whirlwind relationship leads them to purchase Les Genevriers, an abandoned house in a rural hamlet in the south of France. As the beautiful Provence summer turns to autumn, Eve finds it impossible to ignore the mysteries that haunt both her lover and the run-down old house, in particular the mysterious disappearance of his beautiful first wife, Rachel. Whilst Eve tries to untangle the secrets surrounding Rachel's last recorded days, Les Genevriers itself seems to come alive. As strange events begin to occur with frightening regularity, Eve's voice becomes intertwined with that of Benedicte Lincel, a girl who lived in the house decades before. As the tangled skeins of the house's history begin to unravel, the tension grows between Dom and Eve. In a page-turning race, Eve must fight to discover the fates of both Benedicte and Rachel, before Les Genevriers' dark history has a chance to repeat itself.

My Take: 

I've wanted this one ever since it came out in hardcover.  With reviews comparing it to Daphne du Mauriers' gothic Rebecca, I just knew it had to be on my own bookshelf.  Given the opportunity to review it for its paperback release, I jumped at the chance :).

First paragraph:  Some scents sparkle and then quickly disappear, like the effervescence of citrus zest or a bright note of mint.  Some are strange siren songs of rare origin that call from violets hidden in woodland, or irises after spring rain. Some scents release a rush of half-forgotten memories.  And then there are the scents that seem to express truths about people and places that you have never forgotten:  the scents that make time stand still.

I had to include this paragraph to give you a taste of the lush and evocative writing contained within these pages.  Shifting POV's give the reader glimpses into Les Genevriers' past and present, with both stories being almost equally entrancing.

As in Rebecca, the modern-day narrator remains unnamed, although her partner Dom calls her "Eve".  A whirlwind romance later, they are ensconced in Les Genevriers, an estate located in the south of France.    Eve finds herself at first enjoying their isolation, but then beginning to  have questions about Dom's ex-wife Rachel.  Her questioning is urged along by Sabine, a woman they meet at a party. Sabine insists that she remembers Dom from a previous visit with his wife, but Dom conversely insists he has never met her before.

Local girls are going missing, Eve is wondering about Dom and his secrets, and what appears to be a ghost fleetingly appears on the garden path of the estate.

Benedicte and her family grew up in Les Genevriers when it was a productive farm, with tenants and regular output. When we meet her, she is a haunted woman - haunted by memories and by the ghost of her cruel brother Pierre.  We learn of her sister Marthe, who became blind as a child, but grew up to become a famous perfume creator, and of the slow decline of the estate.

While not a retelling of du Maurier's classic, the same feeling of unnamed dread and questioning runs through the narrative, although THIS story actually does slowly tie many of the mysteries together in a wonderfully satisfactory way.

QUOTES (from an ARC; may be different in final copy):

Until it happens to you, you don't know how it will feel to stay with a man who has done a terrible thing.

Surely, though, it was only natural to want to know their story.  It was precisely because he would not talk about Rachel that I found myself wondering more and more about her.

It was all such a long time ago, yet in so many ways the circle is closing. I feel closer to the past now than I did twenty years ago. Bats have recolonized the lower rooms. My clothes are torn and patched and I care as little as I did when I was a girl who ran all day in the hills.  The generator has broken down, so I live by candlelight and oil lamps.  Life is reverting to the ways I knew as a child.

Writing:  5 out of 5 stars

Plot:  4.5  out of 5 stars

Characters:  4 out of 5 stars

Reading Immersion:  3.5  out 5 stars

BOOK RATING:  4.25  out of 5 stars

BLOGGERS:  Have you reviewed this book? If so, please feel free to leave a link to your review in the comments section; I will also add your link to the body of my review.

Read an excerpt

Author website

Author blog

Find Deborah Lawrenson on Facebook



BUY IT:  At Amazon, The Book Depository, through the publisher's website,  and through other on-and-off-line booksellers.

One of my listed titles for the 2012 150+ Reading Challenge

Disclosure:  I  received a  complimentary copy of this title from TLC Book Tours to facilitate my review.  No other compensation was received and I was not required to post a positive review.

Other Waters by Eleni N. Gage - BOOK REVIEW

Title:  Other Waters
Author:  Eleni N. Gage
Publisher:   St. Martin's Press, a division of Macmillan
Release Date:  February 14, 2012
Hardcover, 352 pages
ISBN 10:     0312658516
ISBN 13:   9780312658519
The Book Depository / Amazon

Goodreads description:

When her grandmother dies in India, a family squabble over property results in a curse that drifts across continents and threatens Maya's life. Or so her father says-- Maya (being a modern woman, an American, and a doctor, for goodness' sake) doesn't believe in curses, Brahman, or otherwise. But when her father suffers a heart attack, her sister miscarries, and her career and relationship both start to falter, Maya starts to worry. A trip back to India with her best friend Heidi, Maya reasons, will be just what's needed to remove the curse, save her family, and to put her own life back in order. Thus begins a journey into Maya's parallel world-- an India filled with loving and annoying relatives, vivid colors, and superstitious customs--a cross-cultural, transcontinental search to for a chance to find real love.

My Take: 

Maya is a second-year psychiatry resident, an Indian-American who is keeping her long-term relationship with her boyfriend Scott a secret from her parents, especially her mother, who wants nothing more than for her to find a nice Indian boy to settle down with.  Her sister Priya married Tariq, who is Indian, but Muslim, and even now, two children later, her mother Seema has still not fully accepted him.

After her grandmother dies in India, her father Ajit, in India to keep an eye on his mom before she died, calls Maya and tells her (somewhat sheepishly, after all, superstitions and curses are not something modern people are supposed to believe in) that Parvati, the woman who lived in Dadyi's home, put a curse on his family.  Not just any curse, either, but a Brahman curse - more powerful than most and one that will supposedly affect the blood.

When bad things start happening to Maya's family, she hopes that a trip back to India for a family wedding with her best friend Heidi will give her the chance to find Parvati and counteract the curse that by now, Maya at least halfway believes in.

For me, this novel got off to a confusing start, but soon smoothed itself out.  I enjoyed the cross-cultural references and the friendship between Maya and Heidi, as well as the true-to-life relationship between Maya and her family.  I found myself quite a bit peeved at Maya for not introducing Scott to her family - after all, they'd been together, off and on, for seven years.  It seemed to me that an intelligent woman of almost thirty should simply square her shoulders up and take any heat that she might get from her family.

The ending kind of just ... ended, but in a way that I didn't fully expect.  Believe it or not, the character that I enjoyed most was Seema, Maya's mother.  She is quietly strong, and in spite of how Maya perceives her throughout most of the book, seems to be the one with the most character and honesty.

If you like a touch of romance mixed with a bit of Bollywood, you will like this book.

QUOTES (from an ARC; may be different in final copy):

. . . she hadn't been able to control any of them.  Mohan, Seema's beloved eldest, her only son, resisted medicine, going into advertising instead, which, to Maya's parents, was akin to renting a hovel and attempting to write the great Indian-American novel. Priya, the pretty daughter, was a doctor, and a real one, not a psychiatrist, but she had married a Muslim and seldom visited the temple anymore.  

Seema said a vegetarian with a leather bag was nothing but a hypocrite, and she had apparently raised two of those, which was quite enough for any family.

You carried all of the people you loved into your present and future, even if just in a small way, Maya realized. 

Writing:  4 out of 5 stars

Plot:  3.5 out of 5 stars

Characters:  3 out of 5 stars

Reading Immersion:  3  out 5 stars

BOOK RATING:  3.4  out of 5 stars



BLOGGERS:  Have you reviewed this book? If so, please feel free to leave a link to your review in the comments section; I will also add your link to the body of my review.

About the author

BUY IT:  At Amazon, The Book Depository, through the publisher's website,  and through other on-and-off-line booksellers.

One of my listed titles for the 2012 ARC Reading Challenge (Eclectic Bookshelf)

One of my listed titles for the 2012 ARC Reading Challenge (So Many Books)

One of my listed titles for the 2012 150+ Reading Challenge

Disclosure:  I  received a  complimentary ARC of this title from the publisher to facilitate my review.  No other compensation was received and I was not required to post a positive review.

Wonder by R. J. Palacio - BOOK REVIEW

Title:  Wonder
Author:  R. J. Palacio
Publisher:   Alfred Knopf Books for Young Readers, a division of Random House
Release Date:  February 14, 2012
Hardcover, 320 pages
ISBN 10:    0375869026
ISBN 13:  9780375869020
The Book Depository / Amazon

Goodreads description:

I won't describe what I look like. Whatever you're thinking, it's probably worse.

August (Auggie) Pullman was born with a facial deformity that prevented him from going to a mainstream school—until now. He's about to start 5th grade at Beecher Prep, and if you've ever been the new kid then you know how hard that can be. The thing is Auggie's just an ordinary kid, with an extraordinary face. But can he convince his new classmates that he's just like them, despite appearances?

R. J. Palacio has written a spare, warm, uplifting story that will have readers laughing one minute and wiping away tears the next. With wonderfully realistic family interactions (flawed, but loving), lively school scenes, and short chapters, Wonder is accessible to readers of all levels.

My Take: 

What a wonder of a book!

First sentence:  I know I'm not an ordinary ten-year-old kid.

August (Auggie) is 10-year-old born with a cranio-facial abnormality that, in spite of who he is inside, makes him stand out in a crowd.

This is the story of his first year in school, told in the first person through various viewpoints - Auggie, his sister Olivia(Via), her boyfriend Justin, her friend Miranda, and Auggie's friends Jack and Summer.

I love how this story is told in a realistic, "that's just the way it is" fashion - even Via, who is a teenager, pretty much rolls with the fact that most of the attention goes to Auggie - with all of the surgeries that he has had, that's just to be expected.  She's always stuck up for him, and never, until this first year of her going to a new high school, felt at all ashamed of his appearance.

Auggie?  Well, he's just a great kid - a Star Wars fan, an XBox-playing, joke-making, pretty smart little dude who loves his family and their dog Daisy, bought off of a homeless guy for $20 by Auggie's father.  He has a loving and imperfect family, he doesn't feel sorry for himself (much), and seeing the world through his eyes made this reader even more grateful and appreciative.

Of course we run into the casually (and not so casually) cruel kids and adults, but Auggie, who wasn't too keen on the idea of going to school, manages to make some friends, and, if he doesn't blend in, at least people get used to him.  Then a boy he thought was his friend seems to turn against him, and we all feel the hurt.  Another boy starts a bullying campaign, and here is where we see Auggie's true strength come to the fore.  His friendships are tested, and his friends make the reader proud.

At the end of this book, and throughout the last pages, I was wiping away tears, the kind of tears inspired by hope and a touch of the happy.

This book is geared to middle readers (8-12 years old), but is definitely one that everyone should read.  Teachers, homeschoolers, parents, and even adults - pick this one up - you will love it as much as I did.

And you will LOVE Auggie!  This one will definitely be showing up on my "Best of" list for 2012; it's a winner all around.

QUOTES (from an ARC; may be different in final copy):

Auggie:  I know ordinary kids don't make other ordinary kid run away screaming in playgrounds.

Auggie:  I think it's like the Cheese Touch in "Diary of a Wimpy Kid".  The kids in that story were afraid they'd catch the cooties if they touched the old moldy cheese on the basketball court.  At Beecher Prep, I'm the old moldy cheese.

Summer:  So I just went over and sat with him.  Not a biggie.  I wish people would stop trying to turn it into something major.
He's just a kid.  The weirdest-looking kid I've ever seen, yes.  But just a kid.

Writing:  5 out of 5 stars

Plot:  5  out of 5 stars

Characters:  5 out of 5 stars

Reading Immersion:  5  out 5 stars

BOOK RATING:  5  out of 5 stars

BLOGGERS:  Have you reviewed this book? If so, please feel free to leave a link to your review in the comments section; I will also add your link to the body of my review.

Read an excerpt

BUY IT:  At Amazon, The Book Depository, through the publisher's website,  and through other on-and-off-line booksellers.

One of my listed titles for the 2012 150+ Reading Challenge

Disclosure:  I  received a  complimentary eGalley of this title from the publisher through Netgalley to facilitate my review.  No other compensation was received and I was not required to post a positive review.

When the de la Cruz Family Danced by Donna Miscolta - BOOK REVIEW

Title:  When the de la Cruz Family Danced
Author:  Donna Miscolta                                 
Publisher:   Signal 8 Press
Release Date:  June 28, 2011
Hardcover, 320 pages
ISBN 10:     9881989590
ISBN 13:  9789881989598
The Book Depository / Amazon

Goodreads description:

During his one and only return visit to the Philippines, Johnny de la Cruz - plagued by a sense of isolation - succumbs to a quick sexual encounter with an old flame, the attractive and beguiling Bunny Piña. 

Years later, nineteen-year-old Winston Piña has barely finished eulogizing his recently deceased mother when he finds a letter she wrote, but never sent, to Johnny. This leads Winston into the lives of the de la Cruz family - a family to which he might or might not belong. 

When the de la Cruz Family Danced explores the ties within family and how they are affected by circumstances of birth, immigration, and assimilation.

My Take: 

This is an interesting family story centering around Johnny de la Cruz - now suffering from a debilitating illness - and the choices he makes, as well as the lives of his wife and daughters and a young man named Winston who may or may not be the product of a long-ago, one-time encounter with a high school flame on a visit to the Philippines.

It is quietly reflective, illuminating both the rueful emotions of family members who love each other in a disconnected sense as well as the memories of past events that helped shape each of them into who and what they have become.  There are some lovely moments of poignant clarity in these pages that will have the reader saying to him/herself:  "I totally understand that feeling", as the author puts into words those intangible and fleeting emotions that come into play in almost any family dynamic.

QUOTE:

Johnny himself had been encouraged to join a group.  People feel less alone the doctor said.  But Johnny had never been a joiner.  He had always declined the invitations by his neighbors to join their Filipino social clubs, their bowling leagues, their mah jongg foursomes.  No, he had never joined anything.  Except the navy.

Writing:  3.5 out of 5 stars

Plot:   3.5 out of 5 stars

Characters:  3.5 out of 5 stars

Reading Immersion:   3 out 5 stars

BOOK RATING:   3.3 out of 5 stars

BLOGGERS:  Have you reviewed this book? If so, please feel free to leave a link to your review in the comments section; I will also add your link to the body of my review.

Author website

BUY IT:  At Amazon, The Book Depository, through the publisher's website,  and through other on-and-off-line booksellers.

Disclosure:  I  received a  complimentary eBook of this title from the author to facilitate my review.  No other compensation was received and I was not required to post a positive review.

All I Did Was Shoot My Man by Walter Mosley - BOOK REVIEW

Title:  All I Did Was Shoot My Man
Author:  Walter Mosley
Publisher:   Riverhead Books, a division of Penguin Group
Release Date:  January 24, 2012
Hardcover, 326 pages
ISBN 10:    159448824X
ISBN 13:  9781594488245
The Book Depository / Amazon

Goodreads description:

In the latest and most surprising novel in the bestselling Leonid McGill series, Leonid finds himself caught between his sins of the past and an all-too-vivid present. 

Seven years ago, Zella Grisham came home to find her man, Harry Tangelo, in bed with her friend. The weekend before, $6.8 million had been stolen from Rutgers Assurance Corp., whose offices are across the street from where Zella worked. Zella didn't remember shooting Harry, but she didn't deny it either. The district attorney was inclined to call it temporary insanity-until the police found $80,000 from the Rutgers heist hidden in her storage space. 

For reasons of his own, Leonid McGill is convinced of Zella's innocence. But as he begins his investigation, his life begins to unravel. His wife is drinking more than she should. His oldest son has dropped out of college and moved in with an ex-prostitute. His youngest son is working for him and trying to stay within the law. And his father, whom he thought was long dead, has turned up under an alias. 

A gripping story of murder, greed, and retribution, All I Did Was Shoot My Man is also the poignant tale of one man's attempt to stay connected to his family.

My Take: 

Last year I read and reviewed my first (but Mosley's third) installment in the Leonid McGill series, When the Thrill is Gone (link to my review).  It was enough to make me love this character - a thinking man's P.I. with a philosophical bent:

 The path of my life appeared before me-hard and clear.  I could,

in the dream, turn around and take everything back.  I could pass

through time and decide not to help Zella or lie to Shelly.  I could

travel all the way back to the womb and be another person or no

one at all.  But I was too comfortable on that quartz plinth under

the summer's sun.  Laying there my life seemed to have enough 

meaning to engender nostalgia - the greatest enemy of human logic.

In All I Did Was Shoot My Man, Leonid is back, trying to atone for some of his past wrongs.  When a woman named Zella gets out of prison for the double crime of shooting her boyfriend for cheating on her with her best friend as well as being part of a multi-million dollar heist from the Rutgers Assurance Corp., he meets her at the station with start-up money, a place to stay, and a job.

When people Mosley knows are actually associated with the heist start to turn up dead, Leonid convinces Zella to go to one of his safe houses while he tries to figure out who is responsible.  The consummate multi-tasker, he is following up leads on his own father (who deserted the family when Leonid was young), trying to keep his younger son out of trouble by hiring him, looking for the baby that Zella was pregnant with when she went to prison, and working to keep from being killed himself.

Mr. Mosley has come up with another winner - part mystery, part thriller, part family drama - completely entertaining.

QUOTES

I mean Katrina and I hadn't been intimate or jealous of each other's lives in years.  We had three children but two of those had nothing to do with my DNA.  Katrina said they were mine and I went along with the sham because they were in my house and Katrina maintained that house.  She also made the best food I ever ate in my life.

"Mr. Plimpton, I'm going to sit on this couch and wait until I either speak to Miss Lowry or somebody she reports to.  You can go back into your rat's maze and tell the king rat that I said so."

"Somebody's trying to kill me?" I asked.
"I believe that your name might be on a list somewhere."
"What kind of sense does that make?"
"You think you're so innocent that no one could ever mean you harm?"
"No. What I wonder is why would you care?"
"I'm a cop, LT.  It's my job to protect the welfare of even garbage like you."
I disconnected the call.  No reason to argue or protest.  I was interested at the obvious anger that Kit was feeling.  He rarely showed his feelings.  I didn't much either.  That's why we might have been friends in another life.

Kit watched me for a few moments before saying, "That was some  impressive killing you did.  Naked too."
"I hope I didn't embarrass Officer Palmer."
"She said that after all she heard about you she thought your Johnson would be bigger.'
"Tell her that the air conditioner was on."

Writing:  4 out of 5 stars

Plot:   4 out of 5 stars

Characters:  4 out of 5 stars

Reading Immersion:  4 out 5 stars

BOOK RATING:   4 out of 5 stars

Sensitive reader:  Some rough language.

BLOGGERS:  Have you reviewed this book? If so, please feel free to leave a link to your review in the comments section; I will also add your link to the body of my review.

Author website

BUY IT:  At Amazon, The Book Depository, through the publisher's website,  and through other on-and-off-line booksellers.

Disclosure:  I  received a  complimentary ARC  of this title from the publisher to facilitate my review.  No other compensation was received and I was not required to post a positive review.

One of my listed titles for the 2012 150+ Reading Challenge

One of my listed titles for the Mystery and Suspense Reading Challenge 2012

One of my listed titles for the 2012 ARC Reading Challenge

One of my listed titles for the Around the Stack in How Many Ways Reading Challenge

One of my listed titles for the 2012 ARC Reading Challenge

One Amazing Thing by Chitra Divakaruni - BOOK REVIEW

Title:  One Amazing Thing
Author:  Chitra Divakaruni
Publisher:   Hyperion Books
Paperback, 240 pages
ISBN 10:    1401341586
ISBN 13:  9781401341589
The Book Depository / Amazon

Goodreads description:

Late afternoon sun sneaks through the windows of a passport and visa office in an unnamed American city. Most customers and even most office workers have come and gone, but nine people remain. A punky teenager with an unexpected gift. An upper-class Caucasian couple whose relationship is disintegrating. A young Muslim-American man struggling with the fallout of 9/11. A graduate student haunted by a question about love. An African-American ex-soldier searching for redemption. A Chinese grandmother with a secret past. And two visa office workers on the verge of an adulterous affair.
When an earthquake rips through the afternoon lull, trapping these nine characters together, their focus first jolts to their collective struggle to survive.


There's little food. The office begins to flood. Then, at a moment when the psychological and emotional stress seems nearly too much for them to bear, the young graduate student suggests that each tell a personal tale, "one amazing thing" from their lives, which they have never told anyone before. And as their surprising stories of romance, marriage, family, political upheaval, and self- discovery unfold against the urgency of their life-or-death circumstances, the novel proves the transcendent power of stories and the meaningfulness of human expression itself. From Chitra Divakaruni, author of such finely wrought, bestselling novels as Sister of My Heart, The Palace of Illusions, and The Mistress of Spices, comes her most compelling and transporting story to date. One Amazing Thing is a passionate creation about survival—and about the reasons to survive.


My Take: 

This novel revolves around nine disparate people trapped together in a visa office after an earthquake, their work to survive until they are rescued, and the tension that comes out when people are worried for their lives.

To break up the tension, Uma, a graduate student, suggests that they each tell an important story from their lives to give them all something to focus on.

THIS is where the story gets interesting.  Although a couple of the stories never get fully told as they are interrupted by shifting of debris, the stories that we DO read give the reader a greater insight into each character.  Because they are so different from each other, each story is unique and some are rather heartbreaking.

The beginning third of the book was almost ho-hum for me.  I didn't feel much connection with the characters, and there was a lot of animosity between a few of the characters that I felt was not fully justified or explained very well.

When the stories started coming, however, I was caught up.  Many of them revolved around love and marriage:  love lost, expectations thwarted, love found.  These glimpses are what made me finally feel for the characters and somewhat redeemed the novel for me, especially those that gave me insight into different cultures.

Worth a read, even if the first part does sort of drag along.  I really would have liked to see more development of character closer to the beginning of the novel, but when I think about it, if you really WERE stuck in an office with a bunch of other people, how much would you know about them in the beginning/

QUOTES

"Please don't be afraid of me," he said.  He wanted to tell them what he'd seen in Mexico, where he'd gone to help after an earthquake in one of his attempts at expiation.  People who had been too impatient and had tried to dig themselves out of the rubble often died as more debris collapsed on them, while people who had stay put - sometimes without food and water for a week or more - were finally, miraculously rescued.

The time and money he had spent planning this trip to India, the tickets he had booked.  Just because here eyes had shone for a moment when she saw the cursed picture.  The words were in his mouth:  If it weren't for tying to take care of you, I wouldn't be stuck down here, bout to die. Everything I worked so hard for brought to zero.

"Everyone has a story," said Uma, relieved that one of them was considering the idea.  "I don't believe anyone can go through life without encountering at least one amazing thing."

Writing:  4 out of 5 stars

Plot:  3 out of 5 stars

Characters: 3 out of 5 stars

Reading Immersion:  3 out 5 stars

BOOK RATING:  3.25 out of 5 stars

BLOGGERS:  Have you reviewed this book? If so, please feel free to leave a link to your review in the comments section; I will also add your link to the body of my review.

About Chitra Divakaruni

BUY IT:  At Amazon, The Book Depository, through the publisher's website,  and through other on-and-off-line booksellers.

One of my listed titles for the 2012 150+ Reading Challenge

One of my listed titles for the Mount TBR Reading Challenge 2012

 Disclosure:  This is a review for a book in my personal library.