If you’re not a fan of what happens to your food from one end of your body to the other, stop reading this review right now! For those that are curious, Mary Roach’s Gulp is the book for you. Roach humorously covers both silly and taboo topics: pet food taste-testers, internal deodorizers that keep bathroom odors away, resourceful prisoners who know just where to hide unbelievable amounts of contraband, and, yes, even the constipation that may have killed Elvis. For me, the chapter describing an American surgeon in 1825 that used a wounded trapper as his own lab r
The Sinclairs spend every summer on their private island, Beechwood. Born within a few short months of each other, 3 of the Sinclair grandchildren and one friend of the family spend the summers thick as thieves, calling themselves The Liars. Cadence, Johnny, Mirren and Gat are inseparable every year, but the summer of their fifteenth year, things start to change. Cadence begins to fall in love with Gat (a friend of the family who is invited to Beechwood every summer) while the Sinclair family falls apart around them.
The First Fifteen Lives is an excellent and satisfying journey through time travel. Harry August is a Kalachakras, a group of people born and reborn many times. After a message from a young girl is passed to Harry that the world is ending, Harry is left with the task of saving the world. From the beginning of the story "Let us begin at the beginning" I was hooked. The author lets us see just enough of Harry's previous lives to allow the reader an idea of how being reborn works. North had me questioning the people I cross paths with.
Zack Dylan has a voice like Tim McGraw and a dream for fame. He tries out for a popular star search show, Fifteen Minutes. There is more at stake than fame, however. Zack’s family farm in Kentucky is nearing the auction block, and this might be his last chance to save it. Zack’s chances are good for making the Big Time, and he is committed. He promises his college sweetheart Rene that being famous won’t change his beliefs.
There are some books that I’ve read that could have benefited from being trimmed down. It seems that authors sometimes try to get dense and intense, especially in the sci-fi/fantasy genres. Dune springs to mind. And while I haven’t even finished the Game of Thrones, its emphasis on royalty and lineage and so forth intimidates me. I like to be challenged with what I read, but if it gets to be more-work-than-fun (particularly in a genealogical way) I usually give up. Call it a mixture of ADD/laziness…
In The Book of Heaven, Patricia Storace creates the mythology of an alternate universe, but one the reader recognizes, as if through a veil, from its allusions to Greek legends and Old Testament stories. It is different from anything I’ve read and therefore hard to describe. Although the sections hinge on central themes, such as of the oppression of women and the nature of God and of love, they can be read in isolation. Each section presents the tale of a different woman, eulogized in the stars themselves in this world Storace creates.
Amy Gumm wants to get the hell out of Kansas. She is sick and tired of being mocked at school for her worn out clothes and trailer trash mom. After getting kicked out of school for getting into a fight with a pregnant girl (a fight that Amy did NOT start she would like me to point out), she comes home to find her mother out of her usual funk and primping for an evening at the local dive bar. The news on the TV in the living room shows radar towards Dusty Acres (their luxurious trailer park).
"Paranormal," Volk reminds us in the introduction, is a word that means "experiences or events that cannot be explained by science." Volk takes pains to carefully point out that this may mean "paranormal events" actually have a scientific explanation that we have not found yet, either by chance or because it is beyond our current scientific capabilities. Or it could mean that paranormal events actually have a supernatural cause. Human beings, Volk accurately writes, do not sit well with not knowing.
Forty-two people were killed in the 1929 dance hall explosion in the fictional Ozark town of West Table, Missouri. Alma, a maid for one of West Table's richest families, knows just how it happened. For being such a slim book, Alma's story spans many decades, and weaves in numerous suspects; mobsters from St. Louis, persecuted local gypsies, or maybe an overzealous preacher. Alma’s memory of the event drifts in and out of focus as she ages, jumping back and forth in time, while either leading the reader to the culprit or describing another victim of the horrible explosion.
Growing up, Vinnie Warren Bump longed to see the world, but her parents were concerned that the world would be cruel to Vinnie who was only 32 inches tall. Determined to make a name for herself, Vinnie signed a contract with Colonel Wood who promised to make her a singing sensation. Instead, Vinnie was exhibited as one of his “oddities” on a shabby showboat on the Mississippi River. Vinnie returned home humiliated. She reached out to P. T. Barnum who agreed to hire her to sing at his American Museum. Thus began a long, mutually respectful friendship.
