SmallWorld Reads: June 2014

Sunday, June 29, 2014

The Sunday Salon: Mid-Year Review

Books Read and Reviewed January—June

Books Read But Not Yet Reviewed
The Graveyard Book (Neil Gaiman)
The Ocean at the End of the Lane (Neil Gaiman)
Blessings (Anna Quindlen)
Skylight Confessions (Alice Hoffman)

Best Books So Far
Sadly, nothing so far has been knock-my-socks-off amazing. But I must say I really loved the last four books—the ones I haven't yet reviewed and Lee Smith's Last Girls a whole lot. Well, and of course, The Book Thief—but that is a multiple re-read.

Book Club Books
Labor Day (Joyce Maynard)--(January)
Winter Wheat (February)
Girls of Atomic City (Denise Kiernan)-- (March)
Jane Eyre (April)
And...I think we missed a month. I didn't re-read Winter Wheat or Jane Eyre, but I did bring a paper on Jane Eyre that I had written in college!

Movies From Books
Labor Day (book club outing)
The Fault in Our Stars (I actually haven't read the book, but I've been assured it's close)
The Book Thief (Watched with my World Lit class. A good movie but very disappointing after reading the book)
Great Expectations (loved the Masterpiece Classic on Netflix. Really fabulous.)

Added to TBR List

41 False Starts: Essays on Artists and Writers by Janet Malcolm
Alena by Rachel Pastan
Americanah by Chimanda Adichie
The Baker's Daughter by Sarah McCoy
Bellman & Black: A Ghost Story by Diane Setterfield
Booked: Literature in the Soul of Me by Karen Swallow Prior
The Book of Unknown Americans by Cristina Henriquez
China Dolls by Lisa See
Cider with Rosie by Laurie Lee
Ecology of a Cracker Childhood (The World As Home) by Janisse Ray
Glow by Jessica Maria Tuccelli
The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
The Good Lord Bird by James McBride
Guests on Earth by Lee Smith
The House at Tyneford by Natasha Solomons
In My Father's Country by Saima Wahab
The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd
The Light Between Oceans by M.L. Stedman
The Light in the Ruins by Chris Bohjalian
Long Man by Amy Greene
The Lowland by Jhumpa Lahiri.
The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton
Mockingbird Next Door: Life with Harper Lee by Marja Mills
The Orchid House by Lucinda Riley
The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich
A Prayer Journal by Flannery O'Connor
Radiance of Tomorrow by Ishmael Beah
The Rest of the Story by Phan Thi Kim Phuc
Snow by Orhan Pamuk
Still Life with Bread Crumbs by Anna Quindlen
Still: Notes on a Mid-Faith Crisis by Lauren F. Winner
A Thousand Mornings: Poems by Mary Oliver
The Valley of Amazement by Amy Tan

Yeah, that kind of makes me dizzy. Why have I added so many books already this year, and read so few?

I just noticed that on my mid-year post from 2013, I posted all kind of literary pictures from our trip to Paris. No such excitement this year! But I am most excited about read Amy Greene's The Long Man.

And that's it so far for 2014!

Saturday, June 28, 2014

Book Review: The Last Summer (of You and Me)

Author Ann Brashares is the creator of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, that fabulously fluffy teen series about a pair of jeans circulated among four best friends that does wonderful things for all of them. The Last Summer (of You and Me) is her first novel for adults, and it is definitely a beach read, bordering on a fluffy teen read and definitely a coming-of-age story.

The story mostly takes place on Fire Island (off the Northeast coast somewhere), and I'm always a little envious of great island stories—families who take the ferry over to some island every summer to their fabulous beach house. I mean, I live in Tennessee, so of course this all sounds terribly exotic and dramatic. And beachy. Who are these people?

Still, because I grew up in New York and had lots of friends with summer cottages on the lake, I get it, at a certain level. Anyway, the story is about next-door-neighbors on the island: two sisters and the boy-next-door. It's not what you think: the sisters don't fight over the boy. It's a more complicated relationship among the three, and I think it all made sense in the end. I think. It wasn't all terribly clear, and I was really more drawn into the story of Alice and Paul and not so much the story of Alice's sister, Riley, who lacked any depth but had a rather major role.

While not a perfect book and certainly not a literary masterpiece, this is definitely perfect when you are in the mood for something kinda sappy, pretty sweet, and a little sad.

Friday, June 20, 2014

Book Review: The Last Girls

I've had The Last Girls on my TBR list forever, and I grabbed a nice hardback copy at a used book store's "bargain books" aisle a couple of weeks ago.

Lee Smith never disappoints. She's a southern writer who never succumbs to southern clichés, who paints characters with such vivid details that I think I know the person in real life.

So, this novel made me kinda jealous that I never thought of doing this in a million years. I like adventure, theoretically now anyway but certainly in reality when I was 22. In her real life, Lee Smith and a dozen of her friends took a raft trip down the Mississippi River, Huckleberry Finn-style, upon their college graduation. How amazing is that? They really did it!

This fictionalized account takes the trip a step further: 35 years later, the women reunite and take the same trip, except this time on a steamboat, so that they can sprinkle the ashes of Baby Ballou into the river. Baby had been the wildest one in the bunch, and the friends all assume she committed suicide at the end. But who was Baby, really?

The novel focuses on five of the women, reflecting on who they were back in college and who they are now. I really loved this because I am often amazed at how little I think I know my best girlfriends from college now, 25 years later, even though we've kept vaguely in touch and claimed to be absolute soulmates back then and for a decade after. But really, we were still in the early stages of formation back then, figuring out who we were and who we were to become.

Smith's characters might be a bit typecast: the lonely librarian, the mysterious romance writer, the unhappy rich southern belle, the wild Sylvia Plath-like girl, but I didn't care at all. I love stories that wrap up nicely and have hopeful endings, and I especially love how Smith takes unformed college girls and shoots them 35 years into their future. This was a perfect summer read, and I need to go back and see if I've missed any of Smith's other novels.

Tuesday, June 10, 2014

Ever-Growing TBR List (2014)

*Indicates books added in 2014

*41 False Starts: Essays on Artists and Writers by Janet Malcolm
* Alena by Rachel Pastan
An Altar in the World: A Geography of Faith by Barbara Brown Taylor
* Americanah by Adichie.
Annie's Ghosts: A Journey into a Family Secret by Steve Luxenberg.
Aprons on a Clothesline by T. DePree
Arctic Dreams by Barry Lopez
The Art of Hearing Heartbeats by Jan-Philipp Sendker
Autobiography of a Recovering Skinhead: The Frank Meeink Story as Told by Jody M. Roy, Ph.D. (reviewed at Musings of a Bookish Kitty)
*The Baker's Daughter by Sarah McCoy
Barefoot in Baghdad by Manal M. Omar (reviewed at Bookworm's Dinner)
Before the Storm by Diane Chamberlain
The Beginner's Goodbye by Anne Tyler
~~Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity~~ by Katherine Boo (read and reviewed 3/14)
Behind the Burqa by Sulima and Hala (reviewed by Semicolon)
* Bellman & Black: A Ghost Story by Diane Setterfield.
Blackberry Winter by Sarah Jio
Blood Hollow by W. Krueger
Blood of Flowers by A. Amirrezvani
Blood Work by M Connelly
* Booked: Literature in the Soul of Me by Karen Swallow Prior.
Book of a Thousand Days by S. Hale (reviewed on Semicolon and Maw Books)
Book of Lost Things by J. Connelly
* The Book of Unknown Americans by Cristina Henriquez
Bootletter’s Daughter by M. Maron
Born on a Blue Day by D. Tammet (reviewed on Sam’s Book Blog)
* China Dolls by Lisa See
*Cider with Rosie by Laurie Lee.
~~Clair de Lune~~ by Jetta Carleton (read and reviewed 1/14)
Close Your Eyes by Amanda Eye Ward
Coming Up for Air by Patti Callahan Henry
Commoner by J.B. Schwarz
Confessions of a Common Reader by Anne Fadiman
A Country Doctor’s Casebook by R. MacDonald
The Dawning of the Day: A Jerusalem Tale by Haim Sabato
Departed, The by K. Mackel
Digging to America by Anne Tyler
Dinner with a Perfect Stranger by D. Gregory
Dough: A Memoir by Mort Zachter (reviewed by Lisa at 5 Minutes for Books)
~~Dry Grass of August~~ by Anna Jean Mayhew (read and reviewed 3/14)
* Ecology of a Cracker Childhood (The World As Home) by Janisse Ray.
Every Last One by Anna Quindlen (Reviewed at S. Krishna's Books)
Executioner's Song by Mailer
Extraordinary Journey of a Desert Nomad by Waris Darie (reviewed at Maw Books)
Far to Go by Alison Pick (Reviewed by Kristina at The Book Keeper)
Family Nobody Wanted by Doss
Fatal Vision by J. McGinnis
Father, Mother, God: My Journey Out of Christian Science by Lucia Greenhouse
First Wife by Emily Barr (recommended by Fleur Fisher)
Flowers by D. Gilb
Fortune Cookie Chronicles by J. Lee
Franklin and Lucy by Joseph Persico
Gentle Rain by Deborah Smith (reviewed by Leah at Good Reads)
Ghost Map by S. Jackson
Ghost Moth by Michele Forbes
Ghost Writer, The by J. Harwood
The Girl in the Italian Bakery by Kenneth Tingle
The Girls by Lori Lansens
Giving Up the Ghost by Hilary Mantel
Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton
* Glow by Jessica Maria Tuccelli:
* The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
* Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn (read and reviewed 11/14)
* The Good Lord Bird by James McBride
* Guests on Earth by Lee Smith
Hannah Coulter by Wendell Berry
Hava: The Story of Eve by Tosca Lee
The Heretic's Daughter by Kathleen Kent (reviewed by Gautami at Reading Room)
High House, The by James Stoddard
Hiroshima by John Hershey
Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler's Shadow by Susan C. Bartoletti (reviewed by Natasha at Maw Books)
Hot Zone by R. Preston (reviewed by Semicolon)
* The House at Tyneford by Natasha Solomons
How Reading Changed My Life by Anna Quindlen (mentioned by The Magic Lasso)
Human Cargo by C. Moorehead
A Hundred Summers by Beatriz Williams.
I Am Scout by Charles J. Shields (reviewed by Becky)
In Country by Bobbie Ann Mason
*In My Father's Country by Saima Wahab
Introverts in the Church by Adam McHugh
* The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd
Iris and Ruby by Rosie Thomas
Ishmael by E. Southwark
Jesus, My Father, the CIA, and Me by Ian Morgan Cron (reviewed at Rachel Held Evans)
Keeping the House by E. Baker
Last Chinese Chef by Nicole Mones (reviewed by Bookeywookey)
Last Days of Summer by Steve Kluger (reviewed at Thoughts of Joy)
~~The Last Girls~~ by Lee Smith (read and reviewed here 6/14)
Last Storyteller by D. Noble
Leave it to Claire by T. Bateman
Leave Me Alone, I'm Reading by Maureen Corrigan (reviewed by Literary Feline)
Left To Tell by Immaculee Ilibagiza (reviewed at Maw Books and Just a Reading Fool)
Liar’s Diary by P. Francis (reviewed by Semicolon)
Life Among Savages by Shirley Jackson (reviewed at Dwell in Possibility)
Life Is So Good by R. Glaubman
* The Light Between Oceans by M.L. Stedman
* The Light in the Ruins by Chris Bohjalian.
Little Altars Everywhere by R. Wells
Living End by L. Samson
Look Me in the Eye by John Elder Robison
A Long, Long Time Ago and Essentially True by Brigid Pasulka (reviewed at The Lost Entwife)
*~~Long Man~~ by Amy Greene (Read 9/14)
Lost Children of Wilder by N. Bernstein
Love Anthony by Lisa Genova
Loving Frank by N. Horan
* The Lowland by Jhumpa Lahiri.
* The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton
Mad Girls in Love by M. West
Man without a Country by Kurt Vonnegut
Many Sleepless Nights by Lee Gutkind
Mariner's Compass by E. Fowler
The Memory Palace by Mira Bartok
Mercy Falls by WK Krueger
Minding the South by J. Reed
* Mockingbird Next Door: Life with Harper Lee by Marja Mills
Moloka’I by A. Brennert
Monique and the Mango Rains by Kris Holloway (Reviewed at The Bluestocking Society)
Murder in the Name of Honor by Rana Husseini (Reviewed at Reading Through Life)
My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier (Reviewed by Reading to Know)
Night Strangers by Chris Bohjalian
The Ninth Wife by Amy Stolls
Not without My Daughter by B. Mahmoody
* The Orchid House by Lucinda Riley
Papua New Guinea: Notes from a Spinning Planet by M. Carlson (reviewed by Clean Reads)
Perfect Example by John Porcellino (reviewed at The Hidden Side of the Leaf)
* The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich.
Please Look After Mom by Kyung-Sook Shin (reviewed at Reader Buzz)
Prairie Tale by Melissa Gilbert
* A Prayer Journal by Flannery O'Connor
Promise Not To Tell by Jennifer McMahon (reviewed at Missy's Book Nook)
Proof of Heaven by Mary Curran Hackett
Property by Valerie Martin (reviewed by The Magic Lasso)
Quaker Summer by Lisa Samson
Quilter’s Apprentice by J. Chiaverini
The Quilt Walk by Sandra Dallas
* Radiance of Tomorrow by Ishmael Beah
Raising Demons by Shirley Jackson
Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi
Refuge on Crescent Hill by Melanie Dobson (Reviewed at Reading to Know)
The Reservoir by John Milliken Thompson
* The Rest of the Story by Phan Thi Kim Phuc.
~~Riding the Bus with My Sister~~ by Rachel Simon (read and reviewed 7/14)
Rise and Shine by Anna Quindlen
Rises the Night by C. Gleason
The Round House by Louise Erdrich
Ruined by Reading: A Life in Books by Lynne Schwartz (reviewed on Shelf Life)
Rumspringa by Shactman
Rush Home Road by Lori Lansens
Russian Concubine by Kate Furnivall
Sailing Alone Around the Room by Billy Collins (reviewed by Just a Reading Fool)
Same Kind of Different As Me by Ron Hall and Denver Moore (recommended by Stray Thoughts)
Saving Levi Left to Die by Lisa Bently
Secret Keeper by Mitali Perkins (Reviewed by Word Lily)
Secrets of Eden by Chris Bohjalian (Reviewed at In the Pages)Sentimental, Heartbroken Rednecks by Greg Bottoms (Reviewed by Sage)
Seven Loves by Trueblood
She Got Up Off the Couch: And Other Heroic Acts from Mooreland, Indiana by Haven Kimmel
Slaves, Women & Homosexuals by William J. Webb
* Snow by Orhan Pamuk
So Long, See You Tomorrow by William Maxwell
The Soldier's Wife by Margaret Leroy (reviewed at Polishing Mud Balls)
Someone Knows My Name by Lawrence Hill
Someone Named Eva by Joan M. Wolf (reviewed at Maw Books)
Some Girls by Jillian Lauren (reviewed by Book Club Classics)
Song of the Cuckoo Bird by Amulya Malladi
Song Yet Sung by James McBride
Songs for the Missing by Stewart O'Nan
Songs of Willow Frost by Jamie Ford
Soon to Be a Major Motion Picture by Donna Partow
* Still Life with Bread Crumbs by Anna Quindlen
* Still: Notes on a Mid-Faith Crisis by Lauren F. Winner:
Stillwater by William Weld
Stoner by John Williams (suggested by JoAnn at Every Day Matters)
The Strange Case of the Broad Street Pump by Sandra Hempel
Summer Crossing by Truman Capote (reviewed by CaribousMom)
Summerland by M. Cabon
Teahouse Fire, The by Ellis Avery
Stones Cry Out by M Szymusiak
Testament of Youth by Vera Brittain (recommended at Musings)
There Are No Children Here by A. Kotlowitz
Things I Overheard While Talking to Myself by Alan Alda
This Boy's Life by Tobias Wolff
Thousand Years of Good Prayers by Yiyun Li
The Threadbare Heart by Jenny Nash (reviewed at Maw Books)
Three Cups of Tea by G. Mortenson
The Tiger's Wife by Tea Obreht
Those Who Save Us by Jenna Blum
Thousand Lives by Julia Scheeres
* A Thousand Mornings: Poems by Mary Oliver
Time Between by Mary Duenas
To My Senses by A. Weis (reviewed by J. Kaye)
Tomorrow, the River by D. Gray
Translator: A Tribesman's Memoir of Darfur by D. Hari (reviewed by CaribousMom and Maw Books)
Trauma and Ghost Town by P. McGrath
Unbearable Lightness of Being by Kundera
Uprising by Margaret Haddix (reviewed by Semicolon)
Undress me in the Temple of Heaven by Susan Jane Gilman (reviewed by Book Zombie)
* The Valley of Amazement by Amy Tan
Very Valentine by Adriana Trigiani
The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson
Well and the Mine, The by Gin Phillips (reviewed by Semicolon)
Wench by Dolen Perkins-Valdez
What I Though I Knew by Alice Eve Cohen
What Is What by D. Eggers (reviewed at Maw Books)
What Looks Like Crazy on an Ordinary Day by Pearl Cleage
What Peace There May Be by Susanna Brarlow
What Was Lost by Catherine O'Flynn (Reviewed at Big A, Little A)
When I Lay My Isaac Down by C. Kent
~~When She Woke~~ by Hillary Jordan (read and reviewed 1/14
When We Were Strangers by Pamela Schoenewalt
Wherever you Go by Joan Leegant (reviewed by Bibliophiliac)
Whistling in the Dark by L. Kagen
Who Killed My Daughter by Lois Duncan (Reviewed at Nonfiction Lover)
Winter Garden by Kristin Hannah
Winter Seeking by V. Wright
Winter Walk by L. Cox
Woman in White by Wilkie Collins (recommended at Rebecca Reads)
Women of the Silk by G. Tsuriyama
Year of Living Biblically by AJ Jacobs (reviewed by Andi Lit)
Years of Grace by Margaret Ayer Barnes
The Yonahlossee Riding Camp for Girls by Anton Disclafani.

Book Review: Sycamore Row

I usually give John Grisham a hard time. In fact, I began the review of the last book of his that I read with "Somebody, please, stop me next time I say I'm going to read the newest John Grisham novel! Why do I keep doing this to myself?"

Don't get me wrong: I admire John Grisham greatly. He is fantastic at what he does. It's just that so many of his books sound exactly the same, and, as I said in my last review, feature "bad dialogue and stereotypical characters." Lawsuit, courtroom, big scandal.

But guess what? I loved Sycamore Row. Honestly, I started reading it because I finished a book and didn't have another one to read. I absolutely loved A Time to Kill, Grisham's first book. Sycamore Row brings back Jake Brigance and Clanton, Mississippi. This takes place several years after the Carl Lee Hailey trial in A Time to Kill. Jake is a struggling small-town lawyer, trying to put his finances back in order after that famous trial. Nothing big ever really happens, until Seth Hubbard commits suicide.

Hubbard was an enigmatic man, reported as being unknowable and cold-hearted. His grown children have nothing to do with him until his death. The kids knew he was rich but had no idea exactly how many millions he was worth. To their utter shock, his handwritten will leaves almost everything to his black housekeeper and specifically demands that his children and grandchildren get nothing.

Jake Brigance, who never heard of Seth Hubbard until his death, is named as the lawyer for his estate in a letter mailed by Seth right before his death. And the legal battle is on between the estate of Seth Hubbard and his greedy, unpleasant children.

Here is why this book was different for me that many of Grisham's formulaic lawyer books: I think Grisham really cared about this book. I think he loves Jake Brigance and took his time in doing right by Jake. It's been 25 years since A Time to Kill. He's written a lot of law novels in that time period that follow a formula and wrap up nicely, and a couple that are really excellent (A Painted House, The Innocent Man). I think that Grisham's writing is at its best when Grisham is passionate about his subject or the characters. I think all that in-between stuff is just fluff, just a way to fulfill contracts and make a great salary. But his artistry? Those gems come just often enough to keep me coming back. Because when Grisham is good, he's really, really good.