*THE ALMOST MOON* by Alice Sebold

When all is said and done, killing my mother came easily."
So begins The Almost Moon, Alice Sebold's astonishing, brilliant, and daring new novel. A woman steps over the line into the unthinkable in this unforgettable work by the author of The Lovely Bones and Lucky.
For years Helen Knightly has given her life to others: to her haunted mother, to her enigmatic father, to her husband and now grown children. When she finally crosses a terrible boundary, her life comes rushing in at her in a way she never could have imagined.
Unfolding over the next twenty-four hours, this searing, fast-paced novel explores the complex ties between mothers and daughters, wives and lovers; the meaning of devotion; and the line between love and hate. It is a challenging, moving, gripping story, written with the fluidity and strength of voice that only Alice Sebold can bring to the page.

There was so much criticism of this book because of the dark subject, a daughter killing her mother that I could not wait to read it. I like to form my own opinions about a book. I have read many books that others praised and I could not finish 100 pages! I rate this book a 4.5/5 because the author aptly described a woman's decline into madness and she did it very well. Helen, the main character, was doomed from birth by both of her highly dysfunctional parents. She attempted to form a more intact, healthy family, but in the end, she became what her dysfuntional parents created. A great book.

*EAT, LOVE & PRAY* by Elizabeth Gilbert

Oddly but aptly titled, Eat, Pray, Love is an experience to be savored: This spiritual memoir brims with humor, grace, and scorching honesty. After a messy divorce and other personal missteps, Elizabeth Gilbert confronts the "twin goons" of depression and loneliness by traveling to three countries that she intuited had something she was seeking. First, in Italy, she seeks to master the art of pleasure by indulging her senses. Then, in an Indian ashram, she learns the rigors and liberation of mind-exalting hours of meditation. Her final destination is Bali, where she achieves a precarious, yet precious equilibrium. Gilbert's original voice and unforced wit lend an unpretentious air to her expansive spiritual journey.

When I began this book, and probably after I read 80% or more, I could not put it down and loved it. Ms. Gilbert emphasized over and over in the beginning how she was much too dependent on a man's opinion of her, she was nothing without a man's approval. She then goes on to describe how she frees her soul, her mind and her body in Italy (eating) India (praying) and finally Bali (love). She wound up in Bali seeking the truth and had promised to adhere to the lessons of an ancient guru. This began well, but then she reverted to a man she met and spent most of her last part of the journey having a raging, hot affair! She lost all of her authenticity with me at that point. She talked the talk very well, but in the end, she could not walk the walk. I would rate this book 2/5.

*CELEBRITY DETOX* by Rosie O'Donnell

When Rosie O'Donnell's mother, Rosanne, came down with cancer in 1972, ten-year-old Rosie came up with a way to cure her: She would become famous. With dogged determination, she tried to become a performer, in hope of earning money for Rosanne's treatment. It didn't work; her mother died, just days before Rosie's 11th birthday. What did survive was the need for fame. Rosie went from stand-up to Star Search to her own highly acclaimed television show. Then, like a recovering alcoholic, she quit her own quest for celebrity. This cleansing memoir explains how she did it and why. Intensely honest; wickedly funny.

I would give this a 3 out of 5. While expecting more of her opinion of her time on "The View", I was disappointed that most of the book was about her love and praise for Barbra Streisand.

*INTO THE WILD* by Jon Kraukour

In April 1992, a young man from a well-to-do family hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness north of Mt. McKinley. He had given $25,000 in savings to a charity, abandoned his car and most of his possessions, burned all the cash in his wallet and invented a life for himself. Four months later, his decomposed body was found by a moose hunter. Jon Krakauer brings Chris McCandless's uncompromising pilgrimage out of the shadows and illuminates it with meaning in this mesmerizing and heartbreaking tour de force.


* I would give this book a 2.5 out of 5. I realize that this young man wanted to find himself and assert his identity by going off into the wild, I just feel that he should have been a little more aware of the ruggedness and unforgiveness of the Alaskan territory. It was truly suicidal what he did.

*THE DIANA CHRONICLES* by Tina Brown

people's princess," who electrified the world with her beauty and humanitarian missions? Or was she a manipulative, media-savvy neurotic who nearly brought down the monarchy?Only Tina Brown, former editor-in-chief of Tatler, England's glossiest gossip magazine, Vanity Fair, and The New Yorker could possibly give us the truth. Tina knew Diana personally and has far-reaching insight into the royals and the queen herself.In The Diana Chronicles, you will meet a formidable female cast and understand as never before the society that shaped them: Diana's sexually charged mother, her scheming grandmother, the stepmother she hated but finally came to terms with, and bad-girl Fergie, her sister-in-law, who concealed wounds of her own. Most formidable of them all was her mother-in-law, the queen, whose admiration Diana sought till the day she died. Add Camilla Parker-Bowles, the ultimate "other woman" into this combustible mix, and it's no wonder that Diana broke out of her royal cage into celebrity culture, where she found her own power and used it to devastating effect.


Very well done, a 5 out of 5. I have read many books about Diana, but this one is the most thoroughly researched, the most non-judgemental, the best as far as I am concerned.

*THE TENDER BAR* by J.R. Moehringer

In a place that inspired Scott Fitzgerald's Great Gatsby, young J. R. Moehringer lives with his single mother and mercurial grandfather in a cramped home with a rather-too-colorful cast of strident aunts, down-on-their-luck uncles, and their various offspring. It is 1970s Manhasset, Long Island, and J.R. is lonely and adrift. Desperate to escape, J.R.'s mother takes him on long drives, where his dreams are fueled by the sight of the deep, plush lawns and dazzling, gated mansions that served as Fitzgerald's East Egg. But it is J.R.'s introduction to the local pub and its vibrant constellation of characters that would have the greatest effect on him. A panoply of discordant human notes, by turns raucous, witty, vulgar, and wise, these men -- who never quite grew up themselves -- became, for the forlorn young J.R., a veritable symphony of human succor and safety. As J.R. becomes a man, however, he realizes that the bar doesn't grant wishes as much as fill needs in a place where accepting the inevitability of failure is a defense against future disappointment.A keenly heartfelt memoir by a writer who has been deemed "the best memoirist of his kind since Mary Karr," The Tender Bar is filled with insight into the most fundamental human longings. Before J.R. can grasp such insight though, he is forced to face the truth -- about others and, most important, about himself


Totally unexpected great read! A 4 out of 5. Loved the characters and the author's description of his upbringing and his dysfunctional family.

*A THOUSAND SPLENDID SUNS* by Hosseini

After 103 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list and with four million copies of The Kite Runner shipped, Khaled Hosseini returns with a beautiful, riveting, and haunting novel that confirms his place as one of the most important literary writers today. Propelled by the same superb instinct for storytelling that made The Kite Runner a beloved classic, A Thousand Splendid Suns is at once an incredible chronicle of thirty years of Afghan history and a deeply moving story of family, friendship, faith, and the salvation to be found in love. Born a generation apart and with very different ideas about love and family, Mariam and Laila are two women brought jarringly together by war, by loss and by fate. As they endure the ever escalating dangers around them-in their home as well as in the streets of Kabul-they come to form a bond that makes them both sisters and mother-daughter to each other, and that will ultimately alter the course not just of their own lives but of the next generation. With heart-wrenching power and suspense, Hosseini shows how a woman's love for her family can move her to shocking and heroic acts of self-sacrifice, and that in the end it is love, or even the memory of love, that is often the key to survival. A stunning accomplishment, A Thousand Splendid Suns is a haunting, heartbreaking, compelling story of an unforgiving time, an unlikely friendship, and an indestructible love.

If I could give this book a 6 out of 5 I would. This author has captured his characters so well that once you start the book, you will not be able to put it down.

*THE ICE QUEEN* by Alice Hoffman

Frozen in misery since age eight, when the mother she wished would disappear promptly obliged by dying in a car wreck, the thirtysomething unnamed narrator of Hoffman's hypnotic new novel has spent her life avoiding meaningful human contact. As a New Jersey reference librarian, she relentlessly pursues the details of death in all its countless causes while engaging in after-hours backseat trysting with a local cop. After settling near her brother in Florida, the narrator is struck by lightning. Now, with the color red stripped from her vision, she sees the ice that has surrounded her heart all these years. When she learns of a local legend named Lazarus Jones, dead for 40 minutes after his own strike, she feels compelled to track him down. Their affair ignites, literally, for Jones's aftereffects are so severe that touching him causes burns. Hoffman's genius allows the lovers to hang in suspended animation until the outside world intrudes, more threatening than the near-fatal electrical disruptions that have defined their lives. Less-skilled hands would have left readers awash in sticky metaphors of heat and ice. Have no such fear with the formidable Alice Hoffman.

A 5 out of 5. I would read Alice Hoffman if she published the yellow pages or even an address book. I adore her writing, her sense of fantasty and her imagination and know of no other writer that has this ability.

*SECOND NATURE* by Alice Hoffman

Beguiled by her seductive prose and her imaginative virtuosity, readers have always been willing to suspend disbelief and enjoy the touches of magic in Hoffman's novels ( Illumination Night ; Turtle Moon , etc). Here, credibility is stretched not by magical intervention but by the implausibility of a major character. When a feral young man is discovered living with wolves in a remote area of upper Michigan, he cannot speak and can barely remember his early life. Transferred to a hospital in Manhattan, he does not utter a sound and is on his way to being incarcerated in a mental institution until divorced landscape designer Robin Moore impulsively hustles him into her pickup truck and carries him to the sanctuary of her home on an island in Nassau County. There the Wolf Man reveals that his name is Stephen and that he was the sole survivor of a plane crash that killed his parents when he was three-and-a-half years old; thereafter he lived with a wolf pack. Within three months Robin teaches Stephen to read; soon afterwards they begin a passionate affair. How Stephen can so easily expand the small vocabulary he had mastered at a tender age but has never used since, how suddenly he can deal with sophisticated concepts, speak in grammatical sentences and even observe the social graces, is the central flaw that undermines what is otherwise a highly engaging tale. Stephen's presence in the community causes various people to reassess their lives; then there is a tragedy involving a child, (a device that is beginning to be a pattern in Hoffman's novels, as are strange changes in climate that herald a significant event). Hoffman's keen appraisal of human nature and her graceful prose do much to keep this novel appealing; but the bedrock implausibility may deter readers from whole-hearted enjoyment

Even though I love Alice Hoffman's writing, this is not her best. I did enjoy her writing though and would rate this as a 3 out of 5.

*GOING TO BEND* by Diane Hammond

In the small coastal town of Hubbard, Oregon, your man may let you down, your boss may let you down, life may let you down . . . but your best friend never will.
Welcome to Hubbard, where Petie Coolbaugh and Rose Bundy have been best friends since childhood. Now in their early thirties, both are grappling to come to terms with their age and station in life. As they struggle to make ends meet and provide for their children and the good-hearted but unreliable men in their lives, they take jobs cooking for a brand-new upscale restaurant, Souperior's Cafe, starting from scratch every morning to produce gallons of fresh soup from local recipes. The proprietors of the cafe, Nadine and Gordon, are fraternal twins from Los Angeles with adjustments of their own to make, but Rose's warmth and the quality of the women's soups quickly make them indispensable despite Petie's abrupt manner and prickly ways.The strains of daily life are never far, however, and the past takes its toll on the women. Petie's childhood as the daughter of the town drunk--a subject she won't talk about--keeps her at a distance from even her best friend, until an unexpected romance threatens to crack her tough exterior. And despite Rose's loving personality, the only man in her life is a loner fisherman who spends only a few months of the year in town. In this fishing village, friends are for life and love comes in the most unexpected ways. As the novel draws together lovers, husbands, employers, friends, and family, each woman finds possibilities for love and even grace that she had never imagined.

First book by an author that I hope to read again. I would compare her style of writing to that of Kent Haruf. Rate this 4.5 out of 5.

*THE DOUBLE BIND* by Chris Bohjajlian

In Chris Bohjalian's astonishing novel, nothing is what it at first seems. Not the bucolic Vermont back roads college sophomore Laurel Estabrook likes to bike. Not the savage assault she suffers toward the end of one of her rides. And certainly not Bobbie Crocker, the elderly man with a history of mental illness whom Laurel comes to know through her work at a Burlington homeless shelter in the years subsequent to the attack. In his moments of lucidity, the gentle, likable Bobbie alludes to his earlier life as a successful photographer. Laurel finds it hard to believe that this destitute, unstable man could once have chronicled the lives of musicians and celebrities, but a box of photographs and negatives discovered among Bobbie's meager possessions after his death lends credence to his tale. How could such an accomplished man have fallen on such hard times? Becoming obsessed with uncovering Bobbie's past, Laurel studies his photographs, tracking down every lead they provide into the mystery of his life before homelessness -- including links to the rich neighborhoods of her own Long Island childhood and to the earlier world of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, with its larger-than-life characters, elusive desires, and haunting sorrows. In a narrative of dazzling invention, literary ingenuity, and psychological complexity, Bohjalian engages issues of homelessness and mental illness by evoking the humanity that inhabits the core of both. At the same time, his tale is fast-paced and riveting -- The Double Bind combines the suspense of a thriller with the emotional depths of the most intimate drama. The breathtaking surprises of its final pages will leave readers stunned, overwhelmed by the poignancy of life's fleeting truths, as caught in Bobbie Crocker's photographs and in Laurel Estabrook's painful pursuit of Bobbie's past -- and her own.


I would rate this book as a 4 out of 5. I thought that I had the plot all figured out, but at the end, I was totally surprised. I would never have guessed the ending and thought myself able to pick out nuances and plots way before reaching the end of the book. I loved this book much more than "Midwife", which had another twist at the end when I remember it!

*STONER* by John Williams

William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.

*This book was so beautifully written that I hated finishing it. The kind of lyrical prose that makes reading such a pleasure is contained in this book. I found the story to be very sad, but I loved the characters immediately. I fell in love with the character of William Stoner immediately and deep within my heart, wished that his life could have been happier. Shear pleasure in reading rates this a 5 out of 5. It made me realize the different paths that people take, versus the path that they could have chosen. William Stoner loved literature and teaching so much that he chose his own path and not the one his parents had destined him to. His wife and his daughter were both a disappointment to me, but Stoner was able to deal with it and carry on with his love of literature and teaching. I wish he could have ended up with Katherine Driscoll, but this was a different time, a different place and a different world so he could not. I will always remember this book as being among the finest I have had the pleasure of reading.

*WATER FOR ELEPHANTS* by Sara Gruen

With its spotlight on elephants, Gruen's romantic page-turner hinges on the human-animal bonds that drove her debut and its sequel (Riding Lessons and Flying Changes)-but without the mass appeal that horses hold. The novel, told in flashback by nonagenarian Jacob Jankowski, recounts the wild and wonderful period he spent with the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth, a traveling circus he joined during the Great Depression. When 23-year-old Jankowski learns that his parents have been killed in a car crash, leaving him penniless, he drops out of Cornell veterinary school and parlays his expertise with animals into a job with the circus, where he cares for a menagerie of exotic creatures, including an elephant who only responds to Polish commands. He also falls in love with Marlena, one of the show's star performers-a romance complicated by Marlena's husband, the unbalanced, sadistic circus boss who beats both his wife and the animals Jankowski cares for. Despite her often clich d prose and the predictability of the story's ending, Gruen skillfully humanizes the midgets, drunks, rubes and freaks who populate her book

I tentatively only picked up this book because it had been rated as a favorite by my fellow reading addicts. I was hesitant because I had passed on it before because I didn't think the title interested me. One day during a library excursion, there it was on the shelf, so I picked it up. This book literally hooked me for the first sentence and would not let go. I cannot believe that the female author was able to speak from the lips of a 93 or is it 91 year old man! I was mesmerized with the story, and rate it 5 out of 5.

*THE BOY WHO WAS RAISED AS A DOG* by Dr. Perry

In beautifully written, fascinating accounts of experiences working with emotionally stunted and traumatized children, child psychiatrist Perry educates readers about how early-life stress and violence affects the developing brain. He offers simple yet vivid illustrations of the stress response and the brain's mechanisms with facts and images that crystallize in the mind without being too detailed or confusing. The stories exhibit compassion, understanding and hope as Perry paints detailed, humane pictures of patients who have experienced violence, sexual abuse or neglect, and Perry invites the reader on his own journey to understanding how the developing child's brain works. He learns that to facilitate recovery, the loss of control and powerlessness felt by a child during a traumatic experience must be counteracted. Recovery requires that the patient be "in charge of key aspects of the therapeutic interaction." He emphasizes that the brain of a traumatized child can be remolded with patterned, repetitive experiences in a safe environment. Most importantly, as such trauma involves the shattering of human connections, "lasting, caring connections to others" are irreplaceable in healing; medications and therapy alone cannot do the job. "Relationships are the agents of change and the most powerful therapy is human love," Perry concludes.

Rate 5 out of 5. I now have a better understanding of how to deal with my little patients and why they are so difficult 'to fix' to the traumatic lives they have lived.

*SKYLIGHT CONFESSIONS* by Alice Hoffman

A stunning new novel about three generations of a family haunted by love from the bestselling author of Practical Magic and Here on Earth.
Arlyn Singer believes in destiny and in love.
But fate seems to be playing a trick on the night when John Moody knocks on her door to ask for directions. Opposites who cannot understand each other, they are drawn to one another even when it's clear they're bound to bring each other grief. Their marriage is dangerous territory, tracing a map no one should follow. It leads them and their children to the Connecticut countryside, the avenues in Manhattan, the blue waters of the Long Island Sound, all in a search for family and identity.
There is Sam, the brilliant explosive artist who is drawn to self-destruction and dreams. Blanca, the beautiful loner who tries desperately to protect her brother from his destiny and lives her own life in a world of books. And Will, the grandson, who is left a legacy of broken pieces he needs to put together, an emotional and mysterious puzzle made up of people who don't know the first thing about love.
Here is a family so real, so tragic, so devoted it is as if they have written their own riveting history--a quest for love and truth. Glass breaks, love hurts, and families make their own rules. SKYLIGHT CONFESSIONS is a luminous and elegant work of true originality. No one who reads this novel will ever forget it or look at their own family in quite the same way.

Rate 5 out of 5. As with all of Hoffman's books, I eagerly await their release and then devour them. I was not at all disappointed in this one, she continues to keep me a fan of hers. I especially loved the way she described the 'necklace of pearls' throughout the story, as well as all of the magic and fantasy of the book. Only Hoffman can do this type of imagery and magic as well as she does. I cannot wait for her next one!

*HANNIBAL RISING* by Thomas Harris

Twenty-five years after Thomas Harris introduced the world to one of the most memorable literary villains of all time (in 1981's Red Dragon), he revisits his signature character with a chilling prequel that chronicles the horrific childhood of Hannibal "The Cannibal" Lecter. As a child growing up in Lithuania, life is blissful for young Hannibal and his little sister, Mischa, living in the majestic Castle Lecter with their loving parents. Hannibal's carefree existence, however, is turned into a living nightmare when Hitler's armies invade the Soviet Union and his family is forced to flee. After more than three years surviving in the wilderness during Hitler's bloody eastern campaign, the horror of war finally finds Hannibal, and he is forced to endure a never-ending barrage of brutality: the destruction of his home, the death of his parents, the gruesome murder of his sister at the hands of starving thugs, etc. But Hannibal's life is spared when his uncle finds him and relocates him to France. Even as he matures into an educated young man, though, the haunting images of his youth compel him to seek some kind of vengeance… With all the hype surrounding the publication of this book, there's a significant chance that the result will fall short of readers' expectations; but Harris pulls it off with a brilliantly restrained -- and powerfully moving -- story about the transformation of a sensitive, loving, intelligent boy into a cold-blooded monster. Hard-core fans of Harris's Hannibal quartet (Red Dragon, Silence of the Lambs, and Hannibal) will undoubtedly enjoy this read with some fava beans and a nice Chianti…


Rate 4 out of 5. An excellent followup to Silence of The Lambs and Hannibal. I always wondered how Hannibal Lector became the monster he grew into. Very well done.

*RUNNING WITH SCISSORS* by Augusten Burroughs

The #1 New York Times Bestseller An Entertainment Weekly Top Ten Book of the Year Now a Major Motion Picture Running with Scissors is the true story of a boy whose mother (a poet with delusions of Anne Sexton) gave him away to be raised by her unorthodox psychiatrist who bore a striking resemblance to Santa Claus. So at the age of twelve, Burroughs found himself amidst Victorian squalor living with the doctor’s bizarre family, and befriending a pedophile who resided in the backyard shed. The story of an outlaw childhood where rules were unheard of, and the Christmas tree stayed up all year round, where Valium was consumed like candy, and if things got dull an electroshock- therapy machine could provide entertainment. The funny, harrowing and bestselling account of an ordinary boy’s survival under the most extraordinary circumstances.


Very interesting and readable. This young man has added such comedy to the description of his upbringing, but all in all, when one really thinks about how he was raised, it is so very sad.
Rate 3 out of 5

*THE BOOK THIEF* by Zuzak

Australian-born Markus Zusak grew up sitting at the kitchen table, glued to his chair, listening to his mother's tales of her childhood in Nazi Germany. Such tales would later serve as a springboard for his unusual novel about the power of words to both destroy and comfort. A daring work in the adventurous spirit of The Shadow of the Wind, this novel has a bizarre narrator: Death. Drawn into a tense and dangerous historical era, readers discover how Liesel Meminger first learns to read and is transformed into the "book thief," stealing books before they can be burned by the Nazis or confiscated from personal libraries. When her family decides to hide a Jew in the basement, Liesel holds out hope to him in the form of her two most precious commodities: words and stories

I really hesitated reading this book since it was over 500 pages, and while that normally is not a problem for me since I like lengthy novels, with this book it was near impossible. It sagged big-time in the middle and could have been much shorter. With the topic being as sad and difficult to read as it was, reading a book this size with continuing dark sadness was impossible, for me at least.

*GEMMA* by Meg Tilly

A series of sexual crimes against a wayward girl are put under a microscope. Twelve-year-old Gemma Sullivan seems like a familiar victim. Her father disappeared years ago, and her alcoholic mother is ill-equipped emotionally and financially to raise a child. Her mother's boyfriend, Buddy, begins molesting Gemma when she is eight, more and more frequently and hideously as time passes. When Gemma is 12, Buddy begins pimping her out to his friends. Her first "client," Hanzen, rapes Gemma and becomes obsessed with her. The bulk of the novel details the kidnapping and brutality perpetrated against Gemma at the hands of Hanzen. The graphic depictions of the brutality that Gemma must endure are enough to turn the stomach of the most hardened reader. In the early going, it's an effort to keep flipping the pages and endure Gemma's suffering. Tilly, an actress best known for her screen roles in Agnes of God and The Big Chill, successfully captures Gemma's wounded voice. The story is told from the point of view of both Gemma and her captor, and Tilly is equally proficient at conjuring up a revolting and consummate villain. The account of Gemma's happy rescue sucks some of the power from this work, as Gemma is adopted by a kindly policewoman with a troubled past. Tilly has talent, but it remains to be seen whether she will find an audience willing to take on this unsettling subject. A haunting tale of abuse that may leave readers queasy.

Rate a 3 out of 5. The content was very disturbing to me and I found this difficult to read. I read her first book and enjoyed it, but this was too frank and too graphic, even though I know this type of abuse does exist.

*THE THIRTEENTH TALE* by Diane Setterfield

Diane Setterfield's remarkable first novel -- a tale of ghostly legacies, descended from Jane Eyre -- begins like a reader's dream: a bookseller's daughter returns to the shop one night to discover a letter from England's best-loved writer, a woman whose life is shrouded in rumor and legend. Reading the strange missive from the famous Vida Winter, Margaret Lea is puzzled by its invitation to discover the truth about the author's mystifying past. Later that evening, unable to sleep, Margaret returns to the shop from her bedroom upstairs in search of something to read. Passing over her old favorites -- The Woman in White, Wuthering Heights, Jane Eyre -- she can't resist the temptation of the rarest of her correspondent's books, Thirteen Tales of Change and Desperation, the recalled first edition of a book that contained only twelve stories. Falling under Vida Winter's spell for the first time, Margaret reads it straight through. Not long afterward she is standing in the opulent library of Miss Winter's Yorkshire home, transported by the romance of books into a mysterious tale of her own. Only five short chapters into Setterfield's deft, enthralling narrative, her readers too have been transported: they've inhaled the dusty scent of Lea's Antiquarian Bookshop, shared the sense of adventurous comfort Margaret absorbs from her late-night reading, and been seduced by the glamorous enigma of Vida Winter. Yet The Thirteenth Tale has just begun. Commissioned by Miss Winter to compose her unvarnished biography, Margaret is soon swept up in the tragic history she must unravel -- a story stranger and more haunting than any the celebrated author has ever penned, encompassing a grand house, a beautiful yet doomed family, passion, madness, ghosts, and a secret that holds readers spellbound until the very end. Richly atmospheric and deeply satisfying, Setterfield's debut revives in all their glory the traditions of gothic and romantic suspense exemplified by the works of Wilkie Collins, the Brontës, and Daphne du Maurier. Old-fashioned in the best sense, it's an urgently readable novel that's nearly impossible to put down.

Rate 5 out of 5. For a first novel, this is unbelievably written. I can hardly wait for this author to publish her second book. I had to literally pace myself while reading it, because I wanted the enjoyment of reading it too last and not be gulped in one sitting! It is one of those books where one can visualize what the author is describing and feel as if one personally knows the characters!

*THE GLASS CASTLE* by Jeannette Walls

Jeannette Walls grew up with parents whose ideals and stubborn nonconformity were both their curse and their salvation. Rex and Rose Mary Walls had four children. In the beginning, they lived like nomads, moving among Southwest desert towns, camping in the mountains. Rex was a charismatic, brilliant man who, when sober, captured his children's imagination, teaching them physics, geology, and above all, how to embrace life fearlessly. Rose Mary, who painted and wrote and couldn't stand the responsibility of providing for her family, called herself an "excitement addict." Cooking a meal that would be consumed in fifteen minutes had no appeal when she could make a painting that might last forever.
Later, when the money ran out, or the romance of the wandering life faded, the Walls retreated to the dismal West Virginia mining town — and the family — Rex Walls had done everything he could to escape. He drank. He stole the grocery money and disappeared for days. As the dysfunction of the family escalated, Jeannette and her brother and sisters had to fend for themselves, supporting one another as they weathered their parents' betrayals and, finally, found the resources and will to leave home.
What is so astonishing about Jeannette Walls is not just that she had the guts and tenacity and intelligence to get out, but that she describes her parents with such deep affection and generosity. Hers is a story of triumph against all odds, but also a tender, moving tale of unconditional love in a family that despite its profound flaws gave her the fiery determination to carve out a successful life on her own terms.
For two decades, Jeannette Walls hid her roots. Now she tells her ownstory. A regular contributor to MSNBC.com, she lives in New York and Long Island and is married to the writer John Taylor.


Rated 5 out of 5. I could not put this book down once I started reading it. I was completely enthralled by Ms. Walls' story. I found it interesting that she could be so forgiving of her extremely neglectful and self-absorbed parents. I am, however, glad that she was able to overcome her childhood as well as she did. A brilliant book! Most people fail to realize that some people do survive extreme poverty and neglect, and not blame their failures later in life on their parents or circumstances.

*IT SEEMED IMPORTANT AT THE TIME* by Gloria Vanderbilt

Far from an anemic rehashing of a few bygone flings, Gloria Vanderbilt's "romance memoir" is a vivid, elegant reminiscence that covers a daunting number of one-night stands, affairs, and marriages. "Poor little rich girl" Vanderbilt was born into wealth but became a virtual hostage during her parents' long, well-publicized custody war. Fetchingly beautiful yet insecure and slightly wild, she began her amorous adventures early. Her partners included the rich, the eccentric, and the brilliant: Howard Hughes, Frank Sinatra, William Paley, Leopold Stokowski, Marlon Brando, Gene Kelly, Sidney Lumet, and finally writer Wyatt Cooper, the great love of her life. It Seemed Important at the Time displays both Vanderbilt's gifts as a writer and her acute ability to reflect on her life experience.

Rate this 3.5 out of 5. I did not think I would really like this book as much as I did, but I did enjoy it. She always wished for the love that she had never received from her own mother and could not find it ever in the men she loved. It could have been written any women who had many lovers in that elusive search for unconditional love, Gloria just happened to travel in circles that featured rich and famous men.

*DISPATCHES FROM THE EDGE* by Anderson Cooper

Few people have witnessed more scenes of chaos and conflict around the world than Anderson Cooper, whose groundbreaking coverage on CNN has changed the way we watch the news.
After growing up on Manhattan's Upper East Side, Cooper felt a magnetic pull toward the unknown. If he could keep moving, and keep exploring, he felt he could stay one step ahead of his past, including the fame surrounding his mother, Gloria Vanderbilt, and the tragic early deaths of his father and older brother.
But recently, during the course of one extraordinary, tumultuous year, it became impossible for him to continue to separate his work from his life. From the tsunami in Sri Lanka to the war in Iraq to the starvation in Niger and ultimately to Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans and Mississippi, Cooper gives us a firsthand glimpse of the devastation that takes place. Writing with vivid memories of his childhood and early career as a roving correspondent, Cooper reveals for the first time how deeply affected he has been by the wars, disasters, and tragedies he has witnessed, and why he continues to be drawn to some of the most perilous places on earth.
Striking, heartfelt, and utterly engrossing, Dispatches from the Edge is an unforgettable memoir that takes us behind the scenes of the cataclysmic events of our age and allows us to see them through the eyes of one of America's most trusted, fearless, and pioneering reporters.

Rated 5 out of 5. I am glad that this compassionate young man with a strong wonderlust decided to enter the reporting/publishing field instead of falling back on his familie's wealth. He is an excellent reporter as well as now, a thorough, compassionate and interesting author.

*DON'T KISS THEM GOODBYE* by Allison DuBois

In this stunning book, Allison shares fascinating stories of her encounters with people who have passed and her adventures as a profiler for various law enforcement organizations. With wit and compassion, Allison shows us what it is like to live with these special gifts and talents and also tells about her struggle to live a normal life as a devoted wife and mother. She shows how learning to accept her own gifts has helped her accept the unique gifts of others and how her compelling desire to relieve the pain of others has helped define her own life, a life committed to the search for ultimate truth.
If you have ever questioned whether there is an afterlife, this book will help you see that there is a living energy beyond death.

Rate this 5 out of 5. Read it cover to cover in one sitting. I have long been interested in paranormal and psychic ability, as well as the ability of mediums. This book reinforced my belief that certain people are gifted with this ability. When I was a young girl, I never considered it the least bit odd that my paternal grandmother had 'the gift'. She could only use it on occasion with people that believed in her because her offspring and family considered it 'evil'. I believe as this author does, that it is genetic. I myself, have very strong intuitive powers and have sensed death before it happened, as well as other things and occurences. I can actually 'smell' funeral flowers for an instant and recognize that as a death about to happen. I can also sense when my deceased daughter's spirit is around and that is comforting.

*YOU REMIND ME OF ME* by Dan Chaon

"You Remind Me of Me begins with a series of separate incidents: In 1974, a little boy is savagely attacked by his mother's pet Doberman; in 1997, another little boy disappears from his grandmother's backyard on a sunny summer morning; in 1966, a pregnant teenager admits herself to a maternity home, with the intention of giving up her child for adoption; in 1991, a young man drifts toward a career as a drug dealer, even as he hopes for something better. Dan Chaon explores the secret connections that irrevocably link them. In the process he examines questions of identity, fate, and circumstance: Why do we become the people we become? How do we end up stuck in lives we never wanted? And can we change the course of what seems inevitable?" Chaon moves deftly between the past and the present in the small-town prairie Midwest and shows us the extraordinary lives of "ordinary" people.


I hoped to really love this book, it started out great and I immediately fell in love with the character, Jonah, but ultimately the book began to drag and I did not like the ending. Having to rate this as a 2.5 out of 5. I felt that the book could have ended much better for Jonah's character. I wound up hating his mother, Norah, even though she was a weak individual, she ruined any chance of happiness for her offspring.

*THE DRESS LODGER* by Sheri Holman

Industrial Age Europe was a hothouse for disease -- cholera, bubonic plague, and typhoid epidemics were common and as deadly as war. In 1831, a particularly virulent outbreak of cholera decimated cities on the Continent and in the British Isles. Spread by the "traveling salesmen" of the great mercantile fleets, the disease took up residence in dank, miasmic neighborhoods and preyed upon the young, the old, and the very poor. In her Dickensian second novel, The Dress Lodger, Sheri Holman shows what happens when cholera invades the riverside city of Sunderland, England.
It is on Sunderland's mucky, airless streets that we meet the story's "dress lodger," a 16-year-old single mother named Gustine, whose baby has been born with a bizarre anatomical deformity. To keep the boy alive, Gustine works as a prostitute. After a full day's work at a potter's factory, Gustine dons an expensive blue gown loaned out by her sleazy, libertine landlord, Whilky Robinson. To ensure the dress's safety, Whilky also assigns a shadow to Gustine -- a deformed crone appropriately known as The Eye -- to watch Gustine's every move and goad her to keep looking for clients. The dress does attract upscale clients, but it hardly affords Gustine treatment befitting a lady. When Gustine's admirers realize that she is a whore, they roughly take her in squalid alleys, dimly lit parks, or in the upstairs room at an East End pub called The Labour in Vain.
There she meets Dr. Henry Chiver, a young, effete teacher of anatomy. Chiver came to Sunderland in 1830 fleeing disgrace and outrage in Edinburgh, where he was implicated in the procurement of bodies for medicine's higher purpose. In addition to his legitimate need for cadavers, there is a darker side to Chiver's lust for the dead. He is a collector of specimens, and his study is lined not by books but with jars containing organs and freaks of nature preserved in formaldehyde. When Gustine learns of Chiver's morbid hobby, she offers to troll the piers and alleyways of Sunderland for corpses. For this, she will of course pocket a shilling or two. Her real motive, however, is to ingratiate herself with a doctor who can prolong the life of her son.
When cholera begins to overwhelm the city, Henry's supply of bodies is interrupted by a grieving, suspicious populace that has begun to mistrust all men of medicine. As a result, he must resort to his old ways, robbing graves and the lodging houses of the recent dead. Such disappearances further raise the ire of the city's poor, who are convinced that the disease has been created by the government to weed them out of society. Henry and his Uncle Clanny, a much more principled doctor, are outraged at the ignorance of the city's poor, who cling to the poisoned vestments and remains of their loved ones and thereby spread the infection. A popular melodrama called "Cholera Morbus" further stokes the heat between the poor and the rich, the doctors and the patients, turning the quarantined city into a theater of superstition.
At the same time, Henry has become dangerously preoccupied with Gustine's son, an obsession that disturbs the fine balance he maintains between fetish and Hippocratic duty. Sensing Henry's tenuous grip on sanity, Gustine backs out of an arrangement to have her son live with him. But nothing will stop Henry -- not even cholera's blue stranglehold on Sunderland, or the ravages a mob inflicts upon his elegant townhouse. When she seems bereft of hope, Gustine makes amends and joins forces with a most unlikely partner.


This is a book that was highly recommended by many on my reading boards. I tried my best to read about Gustine, the young prostitute, but I had to put the book down 2/3 into it. She is involved with a young doctor harvesting bodies for autopsy learning. Life is just too short to read something one doesn't like.

*WE ARE ALL WELCOME HERE* by Elizabeth Berg

It is the summer of 1964. In Tupelo, Mississippi, the town of Elvis's birth, tensions are mounting over civil-rights demonstrations occurring ever more frequently - and violently - across the state. But in Paige Dunn's small, ramshackle house, there are more immediate concerns. Challenged by the effects of the polio she contracted during her last month of pregnancy, Paige is nonetheless determined to live as normal a life as possible and to raise her daughter, Diana, in the way she sees fit - with the support of her tough-talking black caregiver, Peacie.Diana is trying in her own fashion to live a normal life. As a fourteen-year-old, she wants to make money for clothes and magazines, to slough off the authority of her mother and Peacie, to figure out the puzzle that is boys, and to escape the oppressiveness she sees everywhere in her small town. What she can never escape, however, is the way her life is markedly different from others'. Nor can she escape her ongoing responsibility to assist in caring for her mother. Paige Dunn is attractive, charming, intelligent, and lively, but her needs are great - and relentless. As the summer unfolds, hate and adversity will visit this modest home. Despite the difficulties thrust upon them, each of the women will find her own path to independence, understanding, and peace. And Diana's mother, so mightily compromised, will end up giving her daughter an extraordinary gift few parents could match.


Rate: 5 out of 5. I am such a big fan of Elizabeth Berg, this was her best book by far for me. Read it in 2 sittings because I had to leave, go to work, come home and finish it and I love books that are that readable. One of the finer books on human kindness, toughness and determination that I have read. Truly a wonderful story that Ms. Berg based on someone's life, someone that she had received a letter about from the daughter. Initially, she would never have written this type of book because she is so adept at telling her own stories, not others. I am so glad that she did decide to tell it though, I thoroughly enjoyed it!

*HONEYMOON* by James Patterson

How does it feel to be desired by every man and envied by every woman? Wonderful. This is the life Nora Sinclair has dreamed about, the life she's worked hard for, the life she will never give up. Meet Nora Sinclair.
When FBI agent John O'Hara first sees her, she seems perfect. She has the looks. The career. The clothes. The wit. The sophistication. The tantalizing sex appeal. The whole extraordinary package - and men fall in line to court her. She doesn't just attract men, she enthralls them. If you dare.
So why is the FBI so interested in Nora Sinclair? Mysterious things keep happening to people around her, especially the men. And there is something dangerous about Nora when Agent O'Hara looks closer - something that lures him at the same time that it fills him with fear. Is there something dark hidden among the unexplained gaps in her past? And as he spends more and more time getting to know her, is he pursuing justice? Or his own fatal obsession?


Rated 3.5 out of 5. Easy reading, but I expected more from James Patterson. I like his books with Lucas Davenport, the detective series, much better.

*CRACKED* by Dr. Drew Pinsky

Dr. Drew Pinsky is best known as cohost of the long-running advice program Loveline. But he is also the medical director of an addiction rehab clinic in Southern California, treating the severest cases of drug dependency and psychiatric breakdown. Now, in this emotionally arresting narrative, Pinsky takes readers into the hospital with him, sharing the stories behind his struggle to help the patients he calls "the disconnected" regain control of their lives.
It is a struggle that feels triumphant one moment, catastrophic the next. The patients Pinsky treats come from every walk and stage of life -- from a young graphic artist to an elderly onetime socialite, from a music-industry talent scout to a BMW-driving soccer mom. Their nemeses include alcohol and marijuana; ecstasy, GHB, and heroin; speed, cocaine, Klonopin, and Vicodin. Yet their trials are eerily similar: Pinsky's patients are all fighting a disease that seizes control of mind and body alike, shattering their lives and depriving them of the very thing they need to survive -- the ability to maintain lasting connections with other people. Each of these patients is rendered with a doctor's compassion and an eye for telling detail. Some we encounter on the promising road to recovery, others are aggressive, subversive, and actively damaging to those around them. Yet the most indelible portraits are those of victims teetering uneasily between recovery and oblivion -- patients like Earle, whose capacity for human connection has been eroded by a lifetime of crack cocaine, and the dynamic, heartbreaking Amber, whose harrowing struggle with opiate addiction tests Pinsky's patience, self-control, and faith.
And at the quietheart of the book is Pinsky himself, his voice urgent, intimate, vulnerable, and utterly compelling. As he struggles to manage his own compulsions, we witness the extraordinary human toll addiction and other behavioral and psychological dysfunctions can take on patient and doctor alike -- and also the life-affirming magic that each can find on the road to recovery.


Another 4.5 out of 5. I loved this book. As a nurse, it was wonderful and refreshing to see a doctor that cared for his patients as nurses do, with compassion and caring, not as a disease. I have never read anything by this author before, but I loved this one.

*INSIDE THE MIND OF SCOTT PETERSON* by Dr. Keith Ablow, MD

The highly publicized Scott Peterson murder case captivated a public hungry for the answer to one question: Why would a man with no known history of violent crime or mental illness and with a pretty wife about to give birth brutally murder her and his unborn son? Forensic psychiatrist Keith Ablow's national media appearances, including a groundbreaking interview on Oprah, resulted in enormous public response, saying that his theories about the spawning of a killer inside Peterson were the first that made sense to them. Members of Scott's and Laci's families have also stated that his comments were the first that helped them understand what might have happened inside Scott's mind. Inside the Mind of Scott Peterson takes readers into the psyche of a killer, exploring:How Scott Peterson's empathy for others was shattered by a three-generation "bloodline" of childhood loss and abandonmentWhy an addiction to sex took root in Peterson's psycheWhy Peterson's meeting Amber Frey while his wife was pregnant triggered the "perfect" psychological stormClues to Peterson's guilt in his interviews with Gloria Gomez and Diane SawyerWhat Peterson was probably thinking as he listened to testimony in court and received his death sentenceWhy Peterson could kill again, if released Using contacts at the FBI, and hiring private investigators and researchers, Keith Ablow delves deeply into Scott Peterson's life story to answer the question: How did an all-American boy turn into a ruthless killer?


Rated: 4.5 out of 5 Quite an interesting book! I couldn't hardly believe the coldness and the aloofness of Mr. Peterson during his trial and subsequent conviction until I read this book. A true sociopath and narcissist described very thoroughly by this author.

*A MILLION LITTLE PIECES* by James Frey

James Frey's memoir of drug addition and recovery was a bestseller even before Oprah Winfrey picked it for her book club in 2005, but the subsequent revelations about discrepancies between the story and the author’s real life touched off a national debate about the line between fact and fiction. Filled with graphic scenes of epic substance abuse and the torments of withdrawal, A Million Little Pieces was widely heralded upon its publication as a harrowing, self-lacerating, and courageously confessional autobiography. It received many admiring critical reviews, carried cover endorsements from noted literati, and was selected by Barnes & Noble as a 2003 Discover pick. (Our reviewer called Frey “prodigiously talented,” “poetic,” and “unflinchingly honest”). In January 2006, the author acknowledged the truth of charges that many details in the book were embellished or fabricated. In a note to readers that was prepared for subsequent printings, he apologized to those who felt they had been misled and explained why he wrote the book the way he did. Reactions to these revelations included soul-searching by publishers about their responsibilities for ensuring accuracy, ruminations by critics on the line between fact and fiction in modern culture, and spirited defenses of the author by readers who maintained that the book's inspirational message was of primary importance. One thing seems certain: A Million Little Pieces is a book that promises to have a long-lasting impact.

Rated this as a 5 out of 5. I love James Frey and feel that he was literally 'crucified' by Oprah Winfrey. Having much experience in the field of addiction as a parent and also as a nurse, Mr. Frey has captured the mindset and the thinking and rationalizing better than anyone I have ever read in the past. In spite of all of the controversy vis-a-vis Ms. Oprah, this is a book that I highly recommend and shame on you, Ms. Oprah!

*THE YEAR OF PLEASURES* by Elizabeth Berg

Betta Nolan moves to a small town after the death of her husband to try to begin life anew. Though still dealing with her sorrow, Betta nonetheless is determined to find pleasure in her simple daily routines. Among those who help her in both expected and unexpected ways are the ten-year-old boy next door, three wild women friends from her college days with whom she reconnects, a young man who is struggling to find his place in the world, and a handsome widower who is ready for love.Elizabeth Berg's The Year of Pleasures is about acknowledging the solace found in ordinary things: a warm bath, good food, the beauty of nature, music, and art. Above all, The Year of Pleasures is about the various kindnesses people can - and do - provide one another. Betta's journey from grief to joy is a meaningful reminder of what is available to us all, regardless of what fate has in store. This exquisite book suggests that no matter what we lose, life is ready to give bountifully to those who will receive.

Rated this as a 4.5 out of 5. I love Elizabeth Berg and I loved this book, however, the score is not 5 because I have read other books by her that I loved better.

*THE KITE RUNNER8 by Khaled Hosseini

I became what I am today at the age of twelve, on a frigid overcast day in the winter of 1975." So begins The Kite Runner, a poignant tale of two motherless boys growing up in Kabul, a city teetering on the brink of destruction at the dawn of the Soviet invasion.
Despite their class differences, Amir, the son of a wealthy businessman, and Hassan, his devoted sidekick and the son of Amir's household servant, play together, cause mischief together, and compete in the annual kite-fighting tournament -- Amir flying the kite, and Hassan running down the kites they fell. But one day, Amir betrays Hassan, and his betrayal grows increasingly devastating as their tale continues. Amir will spend much of his life coming to terms with his initial and subsequent acts of cowardice, and finally seek to make reparations.
Hosseini's depiction of the cruelty children suffer at the hands of their "friends" will break your heart. And his descriptions of Afghanistan both before and after the war will haunt readers long after they've read the last page. The Kite Runner is a stunning reminder that the dark hearts of adults are made, step-by-step, by the hatred they learn as children, and that all it takes for evil to triumph is for a good man to stand back and do nothing.

Rated: *****5/5
I fought reading this book for so long after having seen it on so many different book boards and bestseller lists. I thought that it was all about Afghanistan with it's social issues and problems. One day while at the library, I decided to pick it up and see what all the interest in it was. I am so happy that I did. This book made me cry, such a great and compassionate book on friendship, love and integrity. I have enriched my life by reading it.

*PEOPLE OF THE LIE* by Dr. Scott Peck

The author of this book, Dr. Scott Peck, is a psychiatrist turned author and lecturer. His name is a household word with the self-help crowd. In this book, Peck takes on the topic of 'evil'. It is a volume or group of case studies from the first chapters of the book with attached commentary. The presentations are consistently welll done.


Rated: *** 3/5 Recommended to me by another reading board about people who are born truly evil and are psychopaths. It describes how their inherent evil is missed by most of society, but is there if you care to really look for it. The author is also a religion teacher. Very interesting and factual book that puts a whole new light on psychopaths and evil people.

*THE MERMAID CHAIR* by Sue Monk Kidd

Originally having read The Secret Life of Bees by this author, I was not prepared to like this book at all since I didn't like Bees. I was, however, impressed by this story of a woman's trip home to visit her mother who never fully recovered from the father's death 33 years earlier. The mother having cut off her own finger with a meat cleaver prompts her friends' to call for the daughter to come home. Frantc with worry, and apprehensive at the thought of returning to the small island where she grew up in the shadow of her beloved father's death and her mother's fanatical Catholicism, Jessie, the main character, gets on the next plane leaving behind her psychiatrist husband, Hugh and their college-age daughter, Dee.

While on the tiny island where she grew up Jessie meets and is wildly attracted to Brother Thomas, a junior monk at the secluded Benedictine monastery. Brother Thomas is just as confused with taking his final vows as Jessie is confused about the state of her bland marriage.


Rated ****4/5 I loved this book. Totally unprepared to like it since I though her first book about bees was dull, and overrated.

*GENEVIEVE* by Eric Jerome Dicky

Bestseller Jerome Dicky offers more sex-drenched melodrama with an instantly engrossing sotry about a couple whose marriage is tested by secrets both familial and sexual. Beautiful, independent Genevieve Forbes and her husband, a medical research scientist are both by-products of broken families. Genevieve ran away after suffering intolerable abuse by her murderous father and cruel grandmother, and the husband's rural Texas childhood was marred by his mother's death and a virtually absent, errant father. The death of Genevieve's grandmother forces both to return to her backwoods Alabama hometown for a reunion that stirs up old grudges, reopens still painful wounds and sparks reckless familial infighting.


Rated: *** 3/5. This is probably the most sexual book I have ever read, but a good storyline was present nontheless.

*THE HISTORIAN* by Elizabeth Kostova

It would take a lot to kill a runaway bestseller like Kostova's debut. The Historian is a story about a centuries-long vampire hunt from a historian, Paul, as he slowly tells the sage of his covert research to his teenage daughter. Paul's tale is supposed to be a secret, painfully pried from him by his daughter for whose safety he fears, but Paul recites it in a nonchalant and impersonal way.

Rate **** 4/5, Wow, what a read, all 642 pages of it. It was a story about a girl who found a book in her father's library about the search for Count Dracula. This is a book very rich with history that takes one all over Europe and especially Bulgaria. It is not a light read, but I am glad that I read it. Excellent for a first novel.

* TIM * by Colleen McCullough

Since I loved the book, "The Thornbirds* by Colleen McCullough, I decided to read this as well. This story is set in Australia and is about a spinster, Mary Horton, who is in her 40's. Wealthy through her own hard efforts, solitary, plain and believing that she needs neither friends nor love, finding reward enough in her comfortable home, her garden, her Bentley, the beach cottage, her job and investments have brought her and in books read and music listened to in solitude. There is no hunger in her for what she has missed. That is until she sees Tim Melville, unskilled laborer, age 25, the son of Ron and Eame as the firstborn gift of their marriage. The face, the body, the grace of a Greek god, fair and flawless - but not the intellect to match it. Sharing what happens to Tim and Mary makes one realize it is we ourselves who set boundaries on what is possible. They show us horizons instead of boundaries.

****Rated 4/5. I loved this book. It is every mature woman's fantasty really. Mary and Tim have a very happy relationship over the years in spite of the age difference which is really not all that many years when you think about it.

*THE RIVER KING* by Alice Hoffman

There are two things any reader can count on when coming to Alice Hoffman: her prose and a remarkable empathy for those who live on the fringes of society. I adore her books and she has become my alltime favorite author.

Set in a tony private school located in a small New England town, the River King traces an intricate weave of intersecting lives over the course of a year. A tremendous storm hits the town and floods the grounds of The Haddan School. The school is never the same, it develops a musty odor, roses planted by Annie Howe, a villager who married the headmaster and later hanged herself. have an unusual effect on sensitive girls.

As with all Hoffman novels, there is magic and this one was no different. Hoffman spins her web of love and heartbreak and transcendence with a sure hand, and in the process creates characters so palpably human in all their petty flaws and small instances of heroism that one almost expects them to step out of the book and into the room.

***Rated a 3/5. Although this is not my favorite book by Alice, I will continue to read everything she writes and eagerly anticipate the next book.

* MIDWIVES * by Chris Bohjalian

On a violent, stormy winter night, a home birth goes disastrously wrong. The phone lines are down, the roads slick with ice and untravelable. The midwife, unable to get her patient to a hospital, works frantically to save both mother and child while her inexperienced assistant and the woman's terrified husband look on. The mother dies but the baby is saved thanks to an emergency C-section. And then the nightmare begins: the assistant suggests that maybe the woman wasn't really dead when the midwife operated. At some point within minutes of what the narrator's mother believed had been a stroke, after she concluded the cardiopulmonary resuscitation had failed to generate a pulse or a breath, the midwife screamed for the asst. and the husband to grab the sharpest knife in the house. In Midwives, the author chronicles the events leading up to the trial of Sibyl Danforth, a respected midwife in the small Vermont town of Reddington, on charges of manslaughter. The author takes the reader through the intricacies of childbirth and the law.

***Rated 3/5. Overall, I enjoyed this book, it being the first that I had read by this author. I found it amazing that the author is a man, he portrayed a woman's thoughts very well. Although as a nurse, I don't agree with homebirthing babies, it was an interesting concept the way it was portrayed. I found the shocking thoughts of the midwive at the end of the story very thought-provoking.

*GRANITE ISLANDS* by Sarah Stonich

Stonich's rich debut is a romance in the best sense of the word: it's a tale of love and adventure set in a remote time. From her hospital bed, a 99 year old Isobel Howard recalls her unexpected friendship with Cathryn Malley, a childless, Chicago born heiress who shunned her family, attended art school and married an Irishman with no pedigree. During the summer of 1936, the women find themselves alone in Cypress, a mining town on the edge of a glacier-fed lake in Minnesota. Isobel is the wife of a tailor, mother of 3 children and a milliner by trade whose husband, Victor, has taken their 2 boys away to an island he has purchased - an extravagance that has become a sore point in their marriage. Left behind with her quiet daughter, Louisa, Isobel revives her interest in hatmaking, and Cathryn helps her. During their shared days, Cathryn introduces Isobel to literature, art and a more cosmopolitan view of life, unlimately making Isobel an accomplice to the affair she is having with a local forest ranger. But there is a darker side to this idyll, and as the elderly Isobel reflects on the ensuing events, it is clear that this summer has exacted a heavy price. Sticklers for logic may question some turns of the story, and Stonich's prose, despite an eye for exquisite detail, occasionally succumbs to flights of lyrical fancy. But once past the unsteady opening chapters, the novel gains its footing and opens up into atmospherically rendered, carefully observed scenes. Stonich unfurls a complex, many-layered and suspenseful story; and like Susan Minot and Anita Shreve, she handles flashbacks and contemporary details with equal precision.

*****Rated 5/5. I loved this book! It tells the story of a woman's life over a period of 99 years. How she loves, how she accepts loss and despair. The whole story caught my interest from the very first page and never let go. Great first novel, believable characters, I can hardly believe that this is a first book and I anxiously anticipate her next novel.

*DANCING NAKED AT THE EDGE OF DAWN* by Kris Radish

Everything changes and the very foundation of her life comes into question when Meg witnesses her husband having sex with another woman on her bed in her suburban Chicago home. In order to find her way to a new life, Meg, along with three friends, recreates the journey to Mexico that her favorite aunt took as a young woman. Her aunt's influence is still visible in remote Mexican villages, and the journey becomes spiritual as well as geographical. As Meg finds out more details of her aunt's life, she wonders whey this wonderful woman's influence on her took hold before she went into crisis. When she returns to Chicago, she finds kindred spirits who have felt lost and oppressed but who now may be willing to let go and even dance naked.

**Rated 2/5. When I began this book I thought that I would like it, but having been through a breakup in a relationship myself, I found Meg's journey to be just too, too wonderful a transition from a long marriage through divorce and a new life. This women had money, a great job and no hassle from the husband. I think overall I prefer women that struggle, that overcome crisis and pain. This book book was a lot of fluff and nonsense to me.

*MY SISTER'S KEEPER* by Jodi Picoult

The difficult choices a family must make when a child is diagnosed with a serious disease are explored with pathos and understanding in Ms. Picoult's 11th novel. The author, who has taken on such controversial subjects as euthanasia (*Mercy*) teen suicide (*The Pact*) and sterilization laws (*Second Glance*) turns her gaze on genetic planning, the prospect of creating babies for health purposes and the ethical and moral fallout that results. Kate Fitzgerald has a rare form of leukemia. Her sister, Anna, was conceived to provide a donor match for procedures that become increasingly invasive. At 13, Anna hires a lawyer so that she can sue her parents for the right to make her own decisions about how her body is used.

****I rate this book as 4/5 mainly because the topic so bothered me. I find it deplorable that a mother could even think of conceiving and having a child for the sole purpose of providing for another child. The book was well-written and the end was heartbreaking.

* MY FRIEND LEONARD * by James Frey

I first read "A Million Little Pieces" by Mr. Frey and loved the character named Leonard that he met in rehab. I was anxious to read his second book and I am glad that I did.

Mr. Frey chornicles his journey out of the terrifying darkness of addiction and the friend he meets along the way.

*****Rated this book 5/5 because I literally loved it. In his first book, Mr. Frey had attitude and arrogance issues in the he felt that he could conquer addiction all on his own so I was hesitant to even contemplate reading this, his second book. This was great book in which Mr. Frey beautifully explained learning to deal with raw issues sober and to not rely on crutches to help you through the pain and problems in life. This book created so much emotion and feeling, that I would have to lay the book down to cry and then recompose myself before I could begin again. Someday, I will read this book again.