Cover with a Dog

A few days after my birthday last month I left on an amazing journey with two of my best friends. We traveled far far away and spent two weeks in a car with each other without causing any harm. Two weeks of laughter was just the stress relief I needed. This is also partly why entries are a bit behind. When I first packed my suitcase I had 18 books with me (yes 18!). Then I narrowed it down to 11 (only so I could take more shoes!). Final count was 6 (although I didn't have a carry on so it could have been less and I was not to know, thanks C!) My mom (silly sometimes) assumed I would need some reading for my trip so she was kind enough to buy my a book for my birthday. I'm fairly certain she didn't mean to pick up a borderline romance novel such as Stay by Allie Larkin, but it had a dog on the cover and it was blue so I'm fairly certain it was entirely judging a book by its cover.

Flash forward to plane ride one (before all that driving we had to fly far away) silly me didn't bother to get a book out of the shared carry on. What was I thinking? By flight two (though I mostly slept on flight one since it was much too early) I was craving a book in a serious way. I was in the middle so I asked one of my awesome travel partners to go grab a book out of the carry on for me and when asked which one I said ANY! probably a bit too harshly. Stay is what what was returned to me.

Though it was a bit too borderline romance novel for me (nothing against them, just not my cup of tea), it was the perfect plane/vacation book. A cute love story with a dog that plays match maker. It also featured a friends wedding, which was the main reason for our trip. The story was predictable and very cutesy but definitely a relaxing light read which is the perfect way to start a vacation!

Generations

Three Women by Marge Piercy is a novel told from three characters in the same family spanning 3 generations. The story is told through the eyes of Beverly (grandmother), Suzanne (mother), and Elena (daughter). The women share their family stories from past and present. Each character is unique and I loved that grandmother and granddaughter had so much in common, more so than the mother and daughter pairs.

I can't say I didn't enjoy parts of the book or that I regret reading the book, but it didn't really live up to my expectation. The storyline sounded much more interesting that it actually became. It was more of a leisure read too where I didn't really care if I finished it but I wanted to finish it to move on on my list.

The concept was great, but the book fell a little short on delivery. That said I've never read anything by this author before and I would definitely give her another shot.

SATC

I read The Carrie Diaries by Candace Bushnell with a bit of hesitation. I have to say that though I love the TV show Sex and the City, I tried many times to read the book and failed. The book just didn't appeal to me for whatever reason. That being said I wanted to read The Carrie Diaries and decided if I didn't like it I'd just put it down like I had all those times with The Sex and City novel.

Instead of hating it though, I loved it. It worked because it fit right with the Carrie character. There was a flow to it that you could see that yes this could have been her adolescence and how she turned into a writer and moved to New York and met these other girls.

I was hurrying through the book to get to the ending but also not wanting it to end at all because it was so good. To me this is the sign of a good read.

Believe

Wally Lamb is an author I enjoy reading. I read his first novel She's Come Undone way before it got popular and Oprah decided it was cool. I think it was the very blue cover that caught my attention some day in my teens when I was browsing our local Borders with my dad. The book was good. Long, intimidatingly long at the time, but good. Lamb's other novels have been on my list and I'm glad I finally got to listen to The Hour I First Believed.

The jacket description of this book does not do it justice at all. The jacket describes it as another Columbine novel, and yet it was so much more. The main character is a teacher at Columbine and his wife is the school nurse. His wife is there on that tragic day and he is not. The story takes the husband and wife couple through their marriage and the impact of these events on their lives. I have to say I found a few parts to be unrealistic (which if you haven't guessed by now is not a positive in my book) but overall you could really see most of this unfolding.

Columbine really affected me as it happened my freshman year of high school and changed our school lives for ever. It was sort of like Virginia Tech in that you could look at the students on the news and they looked no different than you and your friends at the time. That's really the only explanation I have for why these two shootings in particular affected me.

Back to the book though, Lamb takes the reader beyond Columbine and through the after math which also includes Hurricane Katrina. I found it interesting he choose to focus on that tragedy and not as much on 9/11. 9/11 is mentioned but just barely. This book is long too, it seems the author is not a fan of shortening his thoughts, but well worth reading.

Current Listen: A Lion Among Men by Gregory Maguire

Another Wedding Book

Wedding Girl by Madeleine Wickham was a strange book. Very predictable and oddly written if you ask me. Wickham is a pen name of Sophie Kinsella author of the shopaholic series. The shopaholic books weren't necessarily bad, but not the greatest books ever. The library really sucked me in on this one though by featuring it on the website and making me think it would be good. The plot just jumped way too much and was too unbelievable. The main female lead was also not a strong character and this bothered me greatly. Overall a quick read so not upset I read it, but not really worth the (even limited) time it took to get through.

Current Read: The Carrie Diaries by Candace Bushnell

A Famous Author

Until now I had never read a Nora Roberts book. When I worked at the library though, I think she had the most shelf space of any author. I may be exaggerating, but honestly I can't think of another that took up as much space as she did. So I thought I needed to add a book or series of hers to my list. I saw the bride on the cover of Vision in White and thought that would be a good one if I felt like I needed to read a Nora Roberts book. A friend saw it on my list and thought I would like the series as well.

I happened to be reading this a couple weekends ago while visiting my mom. She saw the book and asked if I liked the author and explained she had always heard the books read like romance novels. I hoped she was wrong as that is just not a genre I enjoy. She was kinda right though. Not entirely I guess, but to some extent it was more or less. I guess the best description is that it is a very well written romance novel. It's not all bedroom scenes and thesaurus overuse. I am going to go ahead also and read the rest of the series, though I expect they will all be sappy romanticy novels. Oh well, I now need to know what happens to the other three women. Series is clearly unrealistic and all, but right now that is just fine by me.

Current Read: Wedding Girl by Madeleine Wickham

L.A.

Finished listening to Bright Shiny Morning by James Frey. I have to say I have a love hate relationship with Frey. I read his first novel A Million Little Pieces a few years ago. I started it on our plane ride to Paris and remember being super jet lagged when we got there but not being able to put the book down so I finished it up when we got there instead of taking a nap. I loved that book. It was one where you rush through it but then are sad when you get to the end. Obviously though a few months later I was very disappointed? when the controversy of this book arose.

Either way though I think Frey is a great write. Which is really why I didn't understand why he couldn't be honest with his first book. Whether it was fiction or non fiction (or as wikipedia says in the link above "semi fictional") it was a great book. I do have to say though I was mostly disappointed in the second book Frey authored. My Friend Leonard wasn't exactly bad, just not near as good as Frey's first book.

Still when I saw a third novel was out I added it to my list and BSN did not disappoint in the least. I was hooked from the beginning. The novel's central theme is Los Angeles and is told in two parts woven together. Los Angeles history is explored throughout the book as one of the parts. Additionally short stories taking place in L.A. makes up the second part. Most of the short stories are a few pages long and then that's it for the characters. There were however a handful of stories that we got to find out more about throughout the story. These were the characters you were routing for to succeed. Some did and some tragically did not. I've never been to L.A. and I don't have any real passion for the city, but this book made me fall in love with L.A. More so though it just makes you take a look at the intermingling of our lives and the history of time and where it can take us. I highly recommend it.

Current Listen: The Hour I First Believed by Wally Lamb