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Reading Wednesday

    Reading Wednesday

    Book Review The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christy Lefteri

    Wow. This is the word that comes to mind for this book. I loved this story. Here is my book review The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christy Lefteri.

    On our recent road trip (3 months and 6000 miles) we listened to a total of five Audible books. We never listen to music when we drive, we always have an audio book in the works, in addition to whatever books we are reading on Kindle or in paperback. And this beautiful book, The Beekeeper of Aleppo was perfect for audio. Both for the exquisitely written word Lefteri created, and for the the brilliant performance by reader Art Malik.

    Books about war and war refugees are certainly not rare. But this story is incredibly rare as it deals with the plight of the worn torn region of Syria and the dangerous and nearly impossible lives of refugees trying to get to Europe.

    Lefteri’s own experience working for an NGO in Syria inspired her to write this novel. And though this is a work of fiction, the author uses real people she met to mold the main characters of this captivating story. The character develop is at the heart of this work…as the reader (or listener) becomes engrossed in the tragedy of innocent people, the unbearable grief of war and loss and the mostly hopeless flight out of war torn Syria.

    Following the beekeeper Nuri and his artist wife Afri who has lost her sight in a violent act, readers of this novel will feel each step, each catastrophe and each triumph of their journey. Lefteri shows the reader how the human mind searches for coping mechanisms during life’s most cruel and devastating misfortunes.

    Everyone should read this book to better understand the war in Syria. It is presented in such a sensitive and powerful way, a true masterpiece about being human.

    *****Five stars for The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christy Lefteri.

    Read last week’s review of The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah

    My current read Tidelands by Philappa Gregory

    See this week’s top performing book review pin News of the World here

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    Reading Wednesday

    Book Review The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah

    We listened to several audio books while on our recent road trip through the southwest USA. This new release by Kristin Hannah was one of them. I struggled to enjoy the voice of this audio book, but in the end I enjoyed the overall story. Here is my book review The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah.

    This is the story of the dust bowl and the migration to California and those who suffered through it, those who survived it, and those who didn’t. But Hannah is no Steinbeck, so don’t expect Grapes of Wrath here. It is however a touching story, and in true Hannah form, a story of women who endure the unimaginable for their families and what they believe.

    We are introduced to Elsa, a young women who has been coddled by her wealthy family her entire life after being a sickly child. Elsa’s family expect her to live her life as a spinster, refuse her hopes of college and rarely even let her leave the house. By age 25, she has no self-confidence and no future. And then she meets a younger man whose family is from Scilly and soon is pregnant with his child. Elsa’s reputation- obsessed Texas family disown her and she is literally left on the doorstep of the Italian speaking family whose son gives up college to marry her.

    This is certainly not a good way to begin a marriage, and you can only imagine how things develop, particularly as crops dry up and fail, drought takes over the land and Texas becomes a dust bowl.

    Elsa will find herself abandoned and alone with two young children looking for a new life in California, with thousands of other families just like her. When she becomes involved with a movement for better conditions for workers things get both complicated and dangerous for Elsa, her family and all the downtrodden, starving and destitute depression era laborers.

    Although there was much of this book I found weak, and I disliked Elsa’s character in the beginning, she definitely grows throughout the book and finds her voice in the end. I might have liked the book better if I had read it instead of listened to it.

    If you are a Kristine Hannah fan you won’t be disappointed. I hope you enjoyed my Book Review The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah.

    ****Four stars for The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah

    Read last week’s review of News of the World by Paulette Jiles

    My current read The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christi Lefteri

    This week’s top performing Book Review Pin is Ordinary Grace.

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    Reading Wednesday

    Book Review News of the World by Paulette Jiles

    I reviewed Jiles novel Simon the Fiddler last week, and finally got my hands on News of the World after being on the library waitlist for months. I’m happy to say it was worth the wait. Not sure why I had never read it before. Here is my book review News of the World by Paulette Jiles

    I haven’t seen the movie, but it was hard to read the book without seeing Tom Hanks (one of my favorite actors – well isn’t he everyone’s favorite?) in the roll of Captain Jefferson Kidd. It’s 1870 and Kidd, going on 70 years (old for the era) earns his living in northern Texas going from town to town reading the world news to residents hungry for news.

    It’s definitely the wild west with danger, bandits, thieves, rapists and murderers lurking in every town. But Kidd enjoys his solitary existence, though often pines for his deceased wife.

    Then while stopping in Wichita Falls, Kidd is asked to transport a young orphan back to her relatives in San Antonio. Johanna has been living among the Kiowa for four years and has adopted the Kiowa ways and language. She is frightened and has no interest in leaving her Kiowa family.

    This beautifully written book takes the Captain and Johanna on a 400 mile journey, escaping bandits, Indians, and desolate landscape to arrive in San Antonio to a less than welcoming aunt and uncle, Johanna’s only relatives.

    The journey Johanna and the Captain have undertaken is more than crossing 400 miles…it is also crossing the bounds of trust, loneliness, honor and love. Finding hope and a new life can come in the most unexpected places, for a young girl and an old man.

    I hope you enjoyed by Book Review News of the World by Paulette Jiles.

    *****Five stars for News of the World by Paulette Jiles.

    Read last week’s review of Simon the Fiddler

    My current read The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah

    See this week’s top performing pin here Tubac, Bisbee Tombstone Day Trip from Tucson

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    Reading Wednesday

    Book Review Simon the Fiddler by Paulette Jiles

    Reading Wednesday

    Recently Jiles book News of the World has gained popularity again, due to the movie starring Tom Hanks. I am actually reading News of the World now. But before I started it, I read Jiles more recent book, Simon the Fiddler. Here is my book review Simon the Fiddler.

    If you have read News of the World, then you have already met Simon. He appears in that book as well. Jiles has said that in writing News of the World she became captivated with the idea of Simon and so pursued a novel just about him. I’m glad she did.

    We meet Simon in 1865 as the long Civil War is coming to a close and the “United” States is in turmoil. Simon has managed to stay out of the war through out most of it, but as the Confederates are surrendering, Simon is conscripted into a regimental band.

    Simon meets three other musicians and they are commissioned to play for officers of both sides of the war at an elegant party. Here is when Simon will first lay his eyes on his future – the beautiful young, indentured governess Doris Dillon from Ireland.

    Jiles “spare and lilting” style takes the reader right into the Texas heat, the musicians pain, the indentured servants turmoil and the post-civil war chaos. It’s a exquisitely written page turner as we root for Simon and Doris and fear for them as well. I hope you enjoyed my book review Simon the Fiddler by Paulette Jiles

    *****Five stars for Simon the Fiddler

    Read last week’s review The Lady and the Unicorn

    My current read News of the World

    See this week’s top performing pin Flora of the Desert here

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    Reading Wednesday

    Book Review The Lady and the Unicorn by Tracy Chevalier

    Reading Wednesday

    One of my favorite books I read over the past few years was a little known book called Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier. I really enjoyed that book, as well as her most well-known book The Girl With the Pearl Earring. So when The Lady and the Unicorn popped up on my Kindle recommendations I thought I would give it a try. Here is my book review The Lady and the Unicorn by Tracy Chevalier.

    Chevalier consistently writes books about strong female characters who challenge the constraints women endured in the past. In The Lady and the Unicorn, Chevalier’s brilliant research about one of today’s greatest masterpieces, combines with her imagination to create The Lady and the Unicorn.

    We are transported to Paris and Belgium in 1490, where a French nobleman commissions tapestries to elevate himself in the eyes of the French Court. We meet artist Nicholas des Innocents who creates the paintings the tapestries will be based on. We meet Georges de la Chappelle whose family will risk everything to weave the tapestries. And throughout this story we meet women and young girls who, behind the scenes play a remarkable role in the story that unfolds in the tapestry…the story of the Lady and the Unicorn.

    I love well written novels about this time period and Chevalier never disappoints. I learned amazing information about what it took in that period to create such tapestries. And as in all Chevalier’s novels, the underlying story of the women captivated me.

    By the way, the medieval tapestries, now restored, can be seen in the Cluny Museum in Paris. My next visit to the City of Lights will include a visit to the The Lady and the Unicorn. I hope you enjoyed my book review The Lady and the Unicorn by Tracy Chevalier.

    *****Five Stars for The Lady and the Unicorn

    Read last week’s review Rabbits for Food

    My current read News of the World

    See this week’s top performing pin The Flora of the Desert here

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    Reading Wednesday

    Book Review Rabbits for Food by Binny Kirshenbaum

    This is a book about mental illness. But don’t let that scare you away. Because honestly we all should make an effort to better understand what mental illness is. And thanks to the brilliant, and often comical writing of Binny Kirshenbaum, Rabbits for Food helps us learn. Here is my book review Rabbits for Food by Binny Kirshenbaum.

    Rabbits for Food follows the life of a clinicallly depressed, admittedly outcast, outspoken and witty New York writer Bunny. Bunny has known she was “different” and unloved throughout most of her life, raised in a family who didn’t understand and didn’t care about the demons she harbored.

    On New Years Eve at a dinner party with “friends”, Bunny becomes unhinged and lands in a prestigious New York mental institution. She refuses to take any treatment, and instead befriends a handful of other “loonies” who help her see she is not alone. As her own personal therapy she begins to write – pages and pages- about the facility and the variety of people living and dyeing there.

    It’s not a happy book in any way, despite some comic relief. But is it is a brutally honest look at one woman’s lifelong struggle, the institutionalized, and the revolving door of mental health services in America. I hope you enjoyed my book review of Rabbits for Food by Binny Kirshenbaum.

    ****Four stars for Rabbits for Food by Binny Kirshenbaum

    Read last week’s review of Olive Again

    My current read Simon the Fiddler

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    Reading Wednesday

    Book Review Olive Again by Elizabeth Stout

    Reading Wednesday

    This book. This character. Holy Cow. There has never been a character like Olive Kitteridge in literature history. I enjoyed this book just as much as the first book Olive Kitteridge, and didn’t want it to end. Here is my book review Olive Again by Elizabeth Stout.

    It’s hard to describe the plot of this book…but there are so many adjectives to describe Olive herself. Cranky, cantankerous, outspoken, rude. But she is also empathetic, insightful, kind and sad. All of these things make up this astonishing character who you can’t help falling in love with.

    In Olive Again, we find Olive dealing with her aging body, and end of life issues with the same honest and sometimes bewildering approach she had in the first book. Alone and nearly friendless Olive searches for peace of mind while trying to understand all that has happened in her 80 plus year life.

    She is a character for the ages and this book will pull at your heartstrings and make you think of your own parents and your own life. Stout is a brilliant writer and Olive is my favorite of all time.

    The kind of book you won’t be able to stop thinking about when you close it for the last time.

    *****Five stars for Olive Again by Elizabeth Stout

    Read last week’s review of The Midnight Library

    My current read The Lady and the Unicorn

    See this week’s top performing pin My Favorite Coffee Around the World

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