Book Review: The Lace Makers of Glenmara

"You can always start again," Kate Robinson's mother once told her, "all you need is a new thread."

This line is the recurring theme in this lovely novel The Lace Makers of Glenmara by author Heather Barbieri. Reeling from heartbreak and loss, Kate embarks on a journey she and her mother had always planned. Her mother's early death, the ending of her long-term relationship, and the failure of her life-long dream of her own clothing design send the 26-year-old to Ireland, the home of her mother's ancestors, to try to discover a way to move on from the pain she carries in her heart.

She stumbles upon the small town of Glenmara, a tiny coastal village that is struggling to survive as their young people abandon it for the bigger cities of Dublin and London. She meets a group of women who carry on the ancient tradition of making lace, having been taught by their mothers and grandmothers. Embracing Kate and taking her into their group, they teach her their craft and soon she finds a home for her talents as well as her heart.

For, not only are these women lacemakers, they are also women who carry their own burdens of loss and heartache. Bernie is looking for a purpose for her life since her husband died two years ago, Oona is trying to regain her sense of self after surviving breast cancer, Moira is dealing with an abusive husband, and Colleen's fisherman husband is missing at sea, and Aileen is watching her teen-aged daughter, and possibly her marriage, slip through her fingers. Then Kate meets Sullivan Deane, a man who has his own haunted, and tragic tale and recognizes the same in Kate.

This is such a sweet story. It is not all sweetness and light; Aileen resents Kate's presence and feels threatened by the young American who seems to have captivated the rest of the women. The parish priest sees her as a menace to his flock and is determined to drive her away from Glenmara. But through it all Kate remembers how her mother showed her the way. Nothing is so awful it cannot be recovered from. All you need is a new thread.

My best friend of 43 years, Beth, recommended this book to me, saying it reminded her of my own novel In the Company of Women. There are many similarities, specifically how women support, love and share each others burdens. The relationship between Bernie and Aileen reminded me a lot of Beth and myself. They've been friends forever, and their conversations are sprinkled with memories of their long history together.

While I completely enjoyed this book, there is a feeling toward the end that Ms. Barbieri is trying to wrap things up, and it felt a bit rushed to me. It does not detract from the story, and I would whole-heartedly recommend this book to anyone who has had a friend who has stood by her through the trials of her life. I think if you read the story of The Lace Makers of Glenmara you will find some familiar characters.

A Summer Rerun

The movie The Help opened this week. It is based on a book that I just loved. Little nervous about seeing the movie, but others have told me that it doesn't disappoint. In honor of the movie coming out, I thought I would repost my review of the book, first posted in April 2010. It's a summer rerun!

The Help, Kathryn Stockett’s debut novel, is one of those books where the characters stay with you long after you put the book down. The story of three ordinary, yet amazing women, in Jackson, Mississippi in the early 1960s, The Help bring to light the life of two black women working as maids at the dawn of the civil rights movement.

Aibileen and Minny have stories to tell of what life is like for them, and Skeeter, one of the privileged young white women of the time who is trying to listen to those stories and write them down into a book all the while having her eyes opened to the cost of the life she has known. Taking on this project, this book that describes what life is like for a black maid in the Deep South, the chances they take and the consequences of it, you see how much was sacrificed to move us forward.

As these three women come together an incredible story comes out; a timeless story that transcends race, age and time…that we are all the same. We are all women with a heart, a mind, dreams, fears and joys.

Their stories are scattered among the chapters, each written in their own voice. Stockett’s ability to do that is so good, you feel as if the book truly were written by three different women.

While the book is sad at times, there is a triumphant feel to it. These women show a courage and a tenacity that is inspiring. In some ways it was reminiscent of A Thousand Splendid Suns by revealing how little really is different between us as women.

A favorite line from the book sums it up best: Wasn’t that the point of the book? For women to realize, We are just two people. Not that much separates us. Not nearly as much as I’d thought.

Pick this book up. You won’t regret it.

Note: Here is a link to film critic Roger Ebert's review of the film: http://t.co/6DXdEwK

Book Review: Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet

Jamie Ford’s debut novel, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, brings to life a collection of characters that will stay with you long after you close the book. Switching between 1986 and the war-torn years of the 1940s, this is the story of Henry Lee and the relationships in his life

As the story opens, Henry has recently lost his wife. Finding himself at loose ends he happens by a hotel from his youth where items stored by Japanese Americans who were interred during World War II have been discovered. This is the trigger that sends Henry back in time to when he was 12-years-old and fell in love with a Japanese girl who was sent away.

Searching through the items looking for a trace of the girl who once figured so prominently in his life has him reflecting on those times and the changes that happened in him and the bonds that were such a huge part of his life.

His father, who wants so much for his son to be American, and yet holds to his memories of and conflicts from his life in China; Henry’s parents who refuse to let him speak in their native tongue, yet cannot understand when he tries to speak English to them; Sheldon, the black jazz musician who understands Henry in ways his family never could and introduces him to the music scene of 1940s Seattle; Mrs. Beatty, the cafeteria worker at the white school where Henry is “scholarshipped” who empathizes with young Henry and offers him help when he needs it most; Henry’s son Marty who learns about his father’s life along with us, and begins to see his father as a person besides being his parent--all these relationships help form Henry into the man we see in 1986.

But most important is his relationship with Keiko Okabe. The only other Asian student at the school Henry is forced to attend, Keiko becomes first his ally, then his friend, then his true love. She is the motivation behind Henry’s taking his first steps into adulthood. Watching the fear and bigotry as it races through the Japanese community, forcing his friend and her family to make unreasonably difficult choices to prove their loyalty, Henry must decide where he stands.

This book touched me deeply. I wept, laughed, and found myself wishing I too could spend time with Henry. This is a heart wrenching period in history, and reading about it on such a personal level was profoundly moving. I highly recommend Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet. It is a well titled book, and I hope it is not the last we hear from Mr. Ford.

Book Review: Secret Lives

Secret Lives by Diane Chamberlain is the fourth book of hers I’ve read, and I have to say that it most definitely won’t be the last. She has a sensitive way of writing that helps you to see the plight of her characters, and makes them more than the caricatures they could be in another’s hands.

Actress Eden Riley returns to her roots to research her mother’s life for a movie she plans to make about her. Katherine Swift was a beloved children’s author with a lot of secrets and hardships in her life. Eden’s uncle gives her Katherine’s journals so her mother tells her story in her own voice.

There are problems in Eden’s relationship with her aunt and uncle, which is full of secrets they keep from and share with one or another in their threesome.

In addition, a friend of theirs enters Eden’s life. He too has secrets and troubles that cause problems as the two of them become close.

Dysfunctional families are rife with secrets, and the people in this book are surrounded by them; crippled by them, almost. As they learn to trust, and to heal broken trust, these characters also learn to love each other in fresh ways that help them all find the healing, love and the safety, they so long for.

Beautifully written, Secret Lives is so layered and multidimensional that once I was in it I found it hard to put it down. People are so interesting, and you never know what you find when you scratch below the surface. And, as this novel shows us, everyone is, to some degree, an unsung hero.

Book Review: The Icing on the Cake

I was interested in reading The Icing on the Cake because the author, Elodia “Dee” Strain, grew up in my parent’s ward. This is her debut novel and it was hoot.


Annabelle Pleasanton is a 24-year-old magazine editor hoping for a fresh chance as a writer after a disastrous first attempt. In an effort to impress her boss she makes a trip from her hometown of Monterey, California to the small town of Los Banos to purchase a Portuguese cake to impress her boss. While there she meets a photographer named Isaac who makes her heart do a couple of somersaults.

After one date Annabelle decides she must end it with her Prince Charming before she gets in any deeper since it has always been her goal to be married in the temple. Low and behold, when she attends the singles ward that Sunday …. well you can probably put the pieces together.

In classic chick lit fashion, Annabelle and Isaac deal with many romantic moments that are fraught with complications while Annabelle navigates her attempts at magazine reporting, planning her best friend’s wedding shower and dealing with interferences from the opposite sex.

The road to romance is never smooth, particularly in romance novels, but Strain infuses hers with some sweet moments, lots of gentle humor, and a sprinkling of gospel/spiritual moments that remind us of what is the highest priority.

I think you’ll like this one if you pick it up. Elodia Strain now has a second book out, and I am looking forward to getting a chance to read that one too.

Book Review: A Real Basket Case

I think I should start out by confessing that sadly, I hadn’t heard of this author until recently. She “friended” me on FaceBook and told me she too lives in Colorado Springs. Anxious to read something by a fellow writer from my home town, I went out and got her first book, a cozy mystery called A REAL BASKET CASE. You should get it too.

Beth Groundwater’s debut novel is tightly written with well rounded, fully believable characters. One of the things about cozies is they are usually about amateur detectives who are drawn by circumstances into solving a mystery.

In this case, Claire Hanover has a real doozie thrown at her. While in the middle of a home massage someone enters her home and shoots the man attending to her. Understandably terrified and in shock, a screaming Claire soon finds her husband rushing to the room carrying the gun. Of course the police think they have their man.

Claire, however, is just as certain they do not and sets out to prove her husband’s innocence. Not only is Claire trying to prove her husband is not guilty of murder, she is also trying to convince him that the massage was not a prelude to an affair.

Set in Colorado Springs it was fun for me to watch Claire swallow her fears as she confronts the detective, meets with a drug lord and interviews scurrilous suspects all in an effort to free her husband. Which was another aspect of the book I liked … Groundwater doesn’t have her heroine jump into her investigation lightly. It was hard for her and she had to screw up her courage in order to accomplish some of the things she did, which added a greater level of believability to the story.

What a fun book. Well written, A REAL BASKET CASE is good mystery and filled with characters I’m hoping show up in the second book (I have yet to read it). I would absolutely recommend reading this book. And if you happen to live in Colorado Springs, as I do, you’ll find plenty of familiar landmarks that will add to your enjoyment. PPPLD has a copy of the book as well as the second one if you should want to check it out. Believe me, you won’t be sorry you did.

Book Review: The Secret Life of CeeCee Wilkes

Have you ever seen one of those news reports of a woman who has been arrested after living "underground" for 25 years?  You know the story, she was involved in some bank robbery or something when she was in college and elluded capture--and then they discover she's been living as a professor's wife in Connecticut for the past two decades living an exemplary life aiding the homeless and protecting battered women or some such thing.  Every wonder what happened and how she did that?  Well, apparently so did Diane Chamberlain. 

In her book The Secret Life of CeeCee Wilkes Chamberlain takes this premise and runs with it.  And boy does she run.  She takes the character of CeeCee and infuses her with so much compassion that you begin to see how something like this could actually happen. 

CeeCee is a sixteen year old girl who has bascially been raising herself since she was 12.  When she meets a college student named Tim Gleason she is quickly seduced by the thought of someone loving her and caring for her.  Sadly, Gleason's only real interest in her is for his own means, and when she finds herself going underground and on the run with a newborn infant that is suddenly thrust upon her she makes the most of a terrifying situation and turns her life around.

Years later when the past comes back to haunt her she has to make the decision of whether to let the past alone and the chips fall where they may, or to stand up and do the right thing but in so doing destroy the life and the family she has worked so hard to create.

All along as you read this book you ask yourself what you would have done.  It's hard for me to remember being 16; the way I thought and felt at that age.  But I do know I wasn't capable of dealing with a situation like CeeCee did.  It's a terrific book.  I believe Chamberlain put a lot of herself into the character of CeeCee, which makes her all the more believable. 

Most of Chamberlain's books deal with families and the situations that surround them.  This was the second book of her I've read, and I have to admit, I'm looking forward to reading the rest.

Book Review: The Help

The Help, Kathryn Stockett’s debut novel, is one of those books where the characters stay with you long after you put the book down. The story of three ordinary, yet amazing women, in Jackson, Mississippi in the early 1960s, The Help bring to light the life of two black women working as maids at the dawn of the civil rights movement.

Aibileen and Minny have stories to tell of what life is like for them, and Skeeter, one of the privileged young white women of the time who is trying to listen to those stories and write them down into a book all the while having her eyes opened to the cost of the life she has known. Taking on this project, this book that describes what life is like for a black maid in the Deep South, the chances they take and the consequences of it, you see how much was sacrificed to move us forward.

As these three women come together an incredible story comes out; a timeless story that transcends race, age and time…that we are all the same. We are all women with a heart, a mind, dreams, fears and joys.

Their stories are scattered among the chapters, each written in their own voice. Stockett’s ability to do that is so good, you feel as if the book truly were written by three different women.

While the book is sad at times, there is a triumphant feel to it. These women show a courage and a tenacity that is inspiring. In some ways it was reminiscent of A Thousand Splendid Suns by revealing how little really is different between us as women.

A favorite line from the book sums it up best: Wasn’t that the point of the book? For women to realize, We are just two people. Not that much separates us. Not nearly as much as I’d thought.

Pick this book up. You won’t regret it.

Book Review: Not My Daughter

Barbara Delinsky is an author I enjoy reading. Her books are often compelling and deal with such a wide variety of topics and situations that women can all relate to and empathize with. Her latest offering, Not My Daughter, comes straight from the headlines. In a small town in Maine, three teenaged girls make a pregnancy pact. These girls are in the top of their class, come from good homes and are preparing for college after graduation. None wants to get married, or even to have the babies fathers be a part of the picture. To make matters worse, one of the girls is the daughter of the high school principal, who happened to have been pregnant at 17 herself.  Their daughters soon find that an idea that seemed exciting in it's inception turns out to have consequences none of them could have anticipated.

In this small, conservative and inflexible community the principal finds herself under attack from the school board and the local newspaper, and as she fights to keep her job, she, her daughter, the others girls and their mothers find themselves struggling to defend themselves as women, and more importantly, as mothers. When do mother's trust that they've raised their children with the skills to make wise decisions, and how long do you monitor their day to day activities?   And how long do parents need to be held accountable for choices their children make?  Hard questions to answer.

The thing I liked about this book, aside from Delinsky’s talent as a wonderful writer, is that she brings up some hard topics and deals with hard choices many of us have to make as we go through life. Sometimes bad choices can be turned around, relationships repaired and open communication is the key. Delinsky is always good at showing her readers that we all have reservoirs of strength to pull from and that we can overcome and triumph over whatever adversity is thrown at us.

However, Not My Daughter is full of tension and contention. It was a very emotional read for me, and most of the time when I would put it down that tension would stay with me. A sign of a good writer and a good book, but I would caution you if you read this that you may not want to read it if you are feeling stressed out. Other than that, this is a terrific book by one of the best in women’s fiction.

Book Review: The Last Song

From the first pages of Nicholas Sparks’ new book The Last Song there are no surprises. You know from the get-go where this story will lead you and how it will turn out. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t read it.

Ronnie (Veronica) Miller is an angry 17-year-old who is being forced to spend a summer in a small town in North Carolina with her estranged father and ten-year-old brother. Since her parents divorce three years earlier she has refused to speak or have anything to do with her father blaming him for the breakup of their family. In her acting out her anger she has developed a huge chip on her shoulder and in the process been arrested for shoplifting, among other things.

Her father Steve, a former concert pianist and teacher at Julliard, used to share a passion for the piano with his daughter; a commonality she has dismissed and forbidden any mention of.

As the summer progresses, Ronnie forms some unsavory enmities in the small town as well as a relationship with the town’s charming heartthrob which soon develops into Ronnie’s first love.

By allowing herself to drop her guard and open up to love’s possibilities, Ronnie also allows herself to be happy, truly happy, and to heal her heart and her most precious relationships.

As I said, there were no surprises in this book. When you go for a Whopper at Burger King there are no surprises, but it’s still a good sandwich. The joy here is in the reading. Sparks is a good writer and even when you realize he’s going for your emotional jugular it’s an interesting story and good to read.

But remember, like you need a few napkins when you eat a Whopper, you’ll need some Kleenex when reading a Nicholas Sparks book. But go ahead. It’s part of the experience.

Book Review: No Place Safe

Generally speaking, memoirs are not my cup of tea.  Recently, when checking out a literary agent's blog, she mentioned this book and posted an excerpt.  I was hooked and had to go out and get it. 

Kim Reid's memoir No Place Safe reads like a novel, and an intriguing one at that.  It's easy to see why she won the Colorado Book Award in Creative Nonfiction.  It's amazing.

Set in Atlanta from 1979 through 1981, it tracks her family's life during the Atlanta Child Murders, which I remember well.  Her mother, a single mother and one of the most inspiring and incredible women I've ever read on the printed page, is an investigator for the DA's office and is assigned to the case.  This leaves young Kim, who is 14 the summer of the first killing, in charge of her younger sister.  As her mother becomes more and more enmeshed in the investigation, Kim soon finds herself running the household as well as trying to emotionally support and care for her mother.

In the midst of this she begins high school, tranferring to an all-white school in an affluent part of the city.  She struggles to find her way, trying to fit in with the rich white kids while remaining true to her roots.  The pain, confusion and anger the young girl deals with feels like a heat rising off the printed page.  You cannot help but be pulled into her world, and see how her life--and the life of her family--is being changed forever.

This book, while nonfiction and a personal memoir, reads like a thriller on one hand, and a poignant coming-of-age story on the other.  Her writing is honest, fresh and lively.  I absolutely could not put it down.

I am dismayed after having read No Place Safe, to see on the agent's blog (click here to read the excerpt: http://pubrants.blogspot.com/2010/01/publishing-is-not-color-blind.html) that this book is erroneously placed in African-American studies. I fear it won't get the attention it deserves there. It should be with the other memoirs and autobiographies where it belongs. Don't let the opportunity pass you by to read this heartfelt, well written book.  I'm so glad I didn't.

Book Review: Shanghai Girls

In Lisa See's latest book Shanghai Girls she leaves behind 17th and 19th century China of her last two books and takes us to 20th century America with a story of two sisters, two cultures and the resiliance of the human spirit.

May and Pearl, two sisters living in 1937 Shanghai, live privledged lives that seem perfect to them.  As that old saying goes if something seems to good to be true it is, so it is with the girls.  Their father goes bankrupt and arranges marriages for them to help him out of his financial difficulties.  When the Japanese invade they find themselves facing situations they were never prepared for.

They finally make it to Angel Island outside San Francisco.  After many months, and countless interrogations they make it to their husband's home in Los Angeles where the story covers their lives over the next twenty years.

See, who does intricate and detailed research in her books, brings to light and life a time many of us have no idea about.  The discrimination and trials May, Pearl and their family face would break many, but the sisters perservere and, eventually, triumph.  Through it all they remain more than sisters, they are best friends.

With themes of tradition, the effects of war, family and sacrifice running through it, Shanghai Girls is often an emotionally difficult and draining book to read, but I found it to be one that I was glad to have taken the time to invest in. 

If you were fortunate to have read her earlier books, particularly Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, you will find a treat in store with Shanghai Girls.  My eyes and heart were opened to many things, and I'm sure yours will be too.

BOOK REVIEW: One Simple Act

I just have to share this book with you!  Debbie Macomber's ONE SIMPLE ACT: DISCOVERING THE POWER OF GENEROSITY is a perfect book to start 2010 with. 

Macomber, who is best know for her romance and women's fiction novels, asks the question "what would you do if you could make the world a better place?"  It's a good question and it bears listening to her answer. 

She starts off by explaining that gratitude is the springboard to making generosity possible.  If you have a thankful attitude you will benefit in many ways.  Studies have shown it makes you healthier, happier, more attuned to your surroundings, and able to enjoy life more.  It also allows you to extend that to helping others around you.

Chapter by chapter the author shows us there are many ways to be generous, not just the assumed method of handing money out, although that is one way.  She shows how just listening to someone who needs to be heard is a way of being generous.  Encouragement, offering a prayer, being a caregiver, offering hospitatlity, why even forgiving someone is an act of generosity.  Her words are inspiring.

By using short stories and true anecdotes Macomber supports her ideas in a way that shows you that you can do this too.  But she also illustrates her point with scriptural references and examples that tie in with a strong faith.  As she writes, "... when Jesus gave us an example, He focused on just one simple act."

I have kept a gratitude journal for a long time, and wrote about it in my last novel.  If you keep such a journal, I promise it will change your life.  And, according to Macomber, you can change other lives as well. 

And if we all did that .... we could change the world, couldn't we?

BOOK REVIEW: The Book Thief

THE BOOK THIEF by Markus Zusak was recommended by several friends, and finally loaned to me by one of them. And how glad I am! This amazing book, written ostensibly for young adults, will captivate adult readers as well.

Narrated by Death and set in World War II Nazi Germany it is the story of Liesel Meminger who is brought at age nine to live with a foster family in a poor suburb of Munich. Her tough mother, who curses a blue streak, is off-set by her peaceful loving father who teaches Liesel how to read and arouses in her a love of the written word. A love, by the way, Death himself shares.

Liesel becomes the book thief when she takes a book that is abandoned on her brother’s fresh grave as she makes her way to her new home. It is this book that inspires her foster father to teach her to read, and from there she “steals” other books, one of which is rescued from a book burning to celebrate Hitler’s birthday.

The family hides a Jewish man in their basement, and Death often looks at their hardships and how it shapes them. He muses on the effects of words in our lives; how words have promoted good and evil, love and hate. And how, he questions, have words put Hitler where he is. In effect, this is a story that has shaped all of us in one way or another.

Written with a beautiful, lyrical voice, THE BOOK THIEF covers the years from the late 1930s into the 1940s. Liesel has a motley group of friends who are part of a captivating story that will live on in your memory for a long time. I would highly recommend this book, and look forward to trying out some of Zusak’s other novels.

Book Review: The Matchmakers

The other day I was feeling miserable and picked up a book I'd brought home from the library, and was delighted I did. One of Debbie Macomber's first books that's been reissued, THE MATCHMAKERS is a sweet romance that made me feel better reading it.

The story is about two lonely people. One a widow who's son wants her to find him a new father, the other a bitter divorced man who's daughter wants the same thing. These two children contrive to throw their parents together and to, hopefully, make all their dreams come true.

Like most of Macomber's books, this one is set in Seattle in the fall and holiday season. The story isn't really deep, it doesn't ask much of you beyond coming along for the ride, but I found it to be an enchanting little book (I read it in an afternoon) and found the characters and situations realistic. None of that the governess falls for the rich prince situation here!

Anyway, if you're looking for a good story to make you feel good when you're battling, as I was, a headache or a cold, I'd recommend THE MATCHMAKERS. It'll make you forget your troubles for awhile.

Book Review: A Thousand Splendid Suns

I just finished an amazing novel. A THOUSAND SPLENDID SUNS, written by Khaled Hosseini is written with such passion and depth and insight it was amazing to me that a man wrote it. His insight into women's emotions and how they think was truly inspired.

This is the story of two women who live in Afghanistan from the late 1950s until 2007. From vastly different backgrounds, they both wind up in the same place and learn to love and rely on each other in a way neither of them have before.

Reading about the the wars and dissentions, the changes that this lovely country has endured over the years brought tears to my eyes. The women there have gone through so much, put up with such sorrows and indignities that it makes you respect them in such a way as to view them as heroines. I cannot imagine, nor would I pretend to say I know, what their lives have been like and how they have made it through such hardships.

This story, these women, were so real to me that their names and faces swirl around in my mind even though I have put the book down. I find it hard to believe these people don't truly exist.

But the one overriding emotion that gripped me as I read Hosseini's novel was one of gratitude. My heart is so full of thanks that I have been given the opportunities, freedoms and life that I have; that I need not fear for my life or the lives of my children or family. That I can and do have an education, the ability to express my opinion, am able to travel about freely without fear of recrimination, and most of all, that I may feel/believe/think whatever way I wish.

I'm glad I found and read this book. My eyes and heart have been opened and touched.

Book Review: The Last Coyote

A few months ago I discovered Michael Connelly. The book I read, The Brass Verdict, had a character in it, Harry Bosch, that was intriguing. When researching the writer I discovered he had an entire series of mysteries based on the Hollywood Homicide detective, and have started reading them.

The Last Coyote is the fourth book in the series. Amazingly enough, these books just keep getting better and better.

Detective Bosch, on involuntary suspension for accosting his commanding officer, decides to tackle a case that has been spoken of in all the previous novels: his mother's murder. As he probes and delves into the mystery that his entire life has been based on, the narrative is interspersed with his sessions with a psychiatrist that reveal more and more of the what makes this fascinating character tick.

We are all products of our parents, whether they are with us or not, and as you read this book you cannot help but question some of the situations/events in your own background that may have led you to this point in your own life. It's a fabulous novel.

Connelly, a former reporter for the L.A. Times covering the police beat, knows his stuff. His writing is tight, clever, and riveting. Some of the events and language is tough, but fitting in the situations not just there for shock value. He is one of the best writers I have ever read; I would put him up there with Marcia Muller in the detective/mystery genre.

I'm so glad I discovered this writer. I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the Harry Bosch novels as well as other books Michael Connelly has written. If you decide to try him, I can guarantee you won't be disappointed.

Book Review: Scarpetta

I just finished reading Scarpetta by Patricia Cornwell. Her character of Kay Scarpetta is one of the best fictional/mystery characters ever, and I have been reading her books for twenty years now. But this one was so disappointing I'm not sure why I bothered to finish it.

The characters all seem so broken and sad in ways they never felt before to me. That's understandable considering what they've all gone through since the late eighties. But in this book they continue to rehash and reiterate the same things over and over and over. So much of it was monotonous and dull. I kept screaming in my head "Get on with it!" and was bored much of the time reading the conversations. I think a good third of this thick tome could have been eliminated.

If you want to read a Kay Scarpetta book that is amazing, try Post Mortem. Cornwell's first book about the medical examiner won several awards, and rightly so. Also, it is written in first person with Scarpetta herself telling her story, something Cornwell has dropped these last few books. Her writing is sharp, the story is focused and gritty. And I think she started the national craze into forensics long before CSI his the scene. Give it a shot. But I'd pass on this one.

Book Review: True Colors

New York Times bestseller Kristin Hannah has done it again! She has created a beautifully written novel about three sisters, and the things that tear them apart, draw them together and keep them connected.

Sisters Winona, Aurora and Vivi Ann Grey have been raised by a cold-hearted, sometimes cruel father since their mother's death when they were girls. As a result, the three share a bond that seems unbreakable. That is, until an old friend and a stranger come to the town they call home on the Oregon coast. Jealousies, secrets and a competing desire to earn their father's love seems to tear the girls apart.

When a tragedy appears to finally do the trick the sisters learn about the gift and the power of forgiveness and how sisterly love is stronger than almost anything else.

I loved this book! Hannah is a writer I return to time and again. She paints a lush, colorful picture of women and life. Her characters are so real that I felt as if I knew them personally. As I finished this novel I was almost wishing there were a sequel in the works so that I could revisit these three women and see how they were doing. I'd recommend it to all women who cherish their relationships, be they sisters by birth, or sisters of the heart.

Book Review: Hannah's Dream

I've just finished one of the sweetest and most loving novels I've ever read. It's Hannah's Dream by Diane Hammond. It's the story of Hannah, and Asian elephant, her loving caretaker, and the down-on-its-luck zoo in Washington state where she calls home.

Since the 1950s Hannah has lived in the zoo, lovingly tended for by Sam. As it becomes clear that Sam's ability to care for her is growing to a close, and the quality of Hannah's life is compromised, the people that surround her rally to help this sweet, gentle creature who needs their help.

The characterizations are true to life and full of color. It almost makes you wish that you could be there to help Hannah yourself. The novel also helps you to see that love comes in all shapes, sizes and species. This book will live in my heart for a long time.

Inspired by the story of Shirley the Elephant which is one of the most touching tales I've ever heard, Hammond has written a poignant novel about love, devotion and doing the greater good. Well written, it captured my attention and made me want more. If you pick up this book you won't be disappointed!