Weekly Reading Thread: Jan 13-19

First up was When the Lights Go Out by Mary Kubica. Sadly, half-way through the book I gave up. I just couldn't connect to the book so I gave myself permission to move on.

Next up was The Last Thing She Ever Did by Gregg Olsen. Now this one got my attention! The beginning made me sick to my stomach and the characters were seriously flawed people, for the most part, but I held out hope for the resolution to be what I guessed. 4/5 stars.

Now I'm reading Something in the Water by Catherine Steadman. Only a few chapter in.

You were smart to quit. I was *not a fan of this one. At all. 

I am in the midst of moving in a few weeks, so I have not been reading much. I finished nothing but am working through Bridge of Clay. I really struggled with the beginning, but it's definitely improving. 

Lisa 

I just finished Where The Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens. I loved it!

It’s about a young girl who is abandoned as a child. She lives in the marsh land of NC. It carries on through her life and is somewhat of a thriller later in the book I don’t want to give away too much but I am eager for my book club to discuss it!

ETA: Sorry about the bold mess up. 

This sounds like a book I'd love. Thanks for the recommendation!

I read The Rosie Project, by Graeme Simsion, which I'd give a solid 4. I really liked it. It's a bit of an older book (few years old) about a man with Asberger's who doesn't realize he has it, but realizes he is different. He is ready to get married so he has a plan. I thought it was funny and interesting and a pretty quick read.

I got the sequel from the library as well, The Rosie Effect, which I'd give 3 to 3.5 stars. This maybe had some more laugh out loud moments, but the premise of the problem in the book didn't work for me. There were a lot of things that didn't jive with the how Don, the protagonist, acts. It still held me from beginning to end.

I lost all my kids to college by Friday night and it was a snowy weekend so I treated myself to a big reading weekend. I cannot believ I have read 3 of my 26 book goal already. I hope I continue. It was a great weekend!!

I got pretty far in to this one and then put it down.  It was so very slow for me.  And the lack of dialogue was tough for me.  But most of the people I talked to, and the ladies in book club liked it very much.

I finished Becoming by Michelle Obama on Saturday night.  I enjoyed it a lot.  Her life before the White House wasn't exceptionally fascinating, but it was definitely interesting enough for me to learn from and continue to gain insights to what it's like to be black, to be a black woman, to live in a poor part of a large city...  She is a good storyteller.  

I'll start The Immortalists by Chloe Benjamin this week for book club.

I've added Virgil Wander to my list...sounds wonderful!

I finished two last week.

Lincoln's Last Trial by Dan Abrams was ok, but a bit slow moving in places. I was interested in what the law was like in the 1800's - how you became a lawyer, what a court proceeding was like, the general ways that law was practiced.

I also finished an ARC of a book coming out Feb. 5 called The Night Olivia Fell by Christina McDonald. I was really good. It has been compared to Reconstructing Amelia, if you have read that one. Abi gets the call no mother wants - her daughter has fallen off a bridge and is the hospital brain dead. But they also discover she is pregnant. Because of state law the hospital must keep Olivia alive until they can deliver the baby. In the meantime. Abi investigates to find out who is the father of the baby and what caused Olivia's fall. I was into this book from the start and read it in just a couple of days.

I read this a few weeks ago.  I absolutely loved it as well!  

I was reading Beartown, but had to put it down. I'll pick it up again but I don't think I have the brain capacity at this point. I started Nine Women, One Dress and despite the dumb title, is a really good book! I'm halfway through and I'm enjoying it. I think I just need to read lighter books at this point in my life. As long as I'm reading, I'm happy.

It was kind of slow at times, but absolutely loved this book. 

I finished Heidi by Johanna Spyri. I read it every once in a while. It's the ONLY book I re-read.
I finished Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens. It was our January book club choice and I really enjoyed it. Our entire book club did and that rarely happens.
I finished A Spark of Light by Jodi Picoult. I didn't like this book at first and probably would not have finished it but my husband bought it for me as a Christmas gift and I didn't want to hurt his feelings. I ended up liking it more and more as the story went along so I'm glad I finished it.
I'm currently reading The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck by Mark Manson.

I read New Boy by Tracy Chevalier. This is the same author who wrote Girl with a Pearl Earring and this book is part of what is called the Hogarth Shakespeare series. Different authors giving modern retellings of Shakespearean works. This book is a modern retelling of Othello set in a suburban schoolyard. I am embarrassed to say that although I studied Shakespeare in high school I didn't "get it" and haven't read it since nor have I watched any plays or movies. So for me this book was judged on it's own. I'm sure for other readers who know Shakespeare they'd have more or less enjoyment in this book. 
I very much liked it. It takes place at a school in a Washington suburb in the 1970's. The new boy that morning is the son of a diplomat-Osei Kokote and he's the first black student in this all white school. He's been the new boy many times before so he knows the drill. He knows he needs an alley if he is to survive the first day and he's lucky enough to hit it off with Dee, the most popular girl in the school. 

The students are in the 5th grade and most of the action of the book takes place on the playground. This is the time of life when most students fall in and out of love with each other before lunchtime. Ian, the school master manipulator doesn't like the fact that Dee is warming up to Osei and decides to destroy their friendship. By the end of the day no one will be the same. I gave this book 4 stars on goodreads. 

Today I started reading Someone Like Me by M. R. Carey. I woke up early, it was freezing out and had snowed all weekend. I snuggled down into the covers and read for 3 hour having my morning coffee in bed. I love this book. I got 1/3 of the way through the book already and it's 501 pages. I have liked this author since I read The Girl with all the Gifts. This book just came out and I'm having a great time reading it. My reading mojo is back again. I didn't realize it but I slipped into a depression after my aunt passed away suddenly in December that impacted my reading too. That's why it took me a month to read that Alison Weir book. It wasn't the book at all-I was in mourning and didn't realize the depression was impacting my reading. It took me a week to read New Boy and that was a really short book. Today is the first day I feel like myself again. So please ignore my review that I posted last week on the Alison Weir book please. I'll write my review on this book-Someone Like Me-next week. 

     I'm so glad you're feeling better and reading like crazy again. I've experienced clinical depression before in my life years ago and it never impacted my reading back then, so when this happened recently I didn't make the connection. But that depression and the one I just went through were very different. I'm just very happy that I'm reading again like my normal self-lickity split-and you are too. 

I read Severance by Ling Ma, which was weird but VERY good. Post-apocalyptic, but super interesting and not your average dystopian book.

Iam currently reading White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide by Carol Anderson. The amount of history we are not taught in school that appears in the first two chapters is simply appalling.

I'm also reading The Map of Salt and Stars by Jennifer Zeynab Joukhadar, which is good so far.