my oh my, its been awhile

A part of me loathes grad school as it takes away all (or almost all) of my reading for pleasure time.  Regardless, I've finished up some reading recently and hope to knock out a couple more books before going back for another quarter next week.

Old Wives Tale by Arnold Bennett.  This is one of the books on my 100 book list that I'm slowly plowing through.  It follows the lives of two sisters, Constance and Sophia, through the 19th century, from their lives starting as teens in England to their deaths in the same town in which they were born.  Constance remained in the same town, Bursely, her whole life, marrying, raising her son, then becoming a widow, all in one town.  Sophia, conversely, married young in a scandal that severed ties with her immediate family for a lengthy time.  After moving to Paris with her new husband, she realizes he's a bit a loser, squanders their money, and then finally leaves her.  Playing off the assumption that she's a recent widower, Sophia establishes a hotel which, eventually, becomes somewhat well known and makes Sophia a wealthy women.  After a small stroke slows her down, she moves back to England and reunites with the sister, Constance, she hasn't seen or spoken to in years and years.

Water Witch by Juliet Dark.  Juliet Dark is a pen name for Carol Goodman, who's books I've loved since I was given Lake of Dead Languages a decade ago.  She ventured away from her usual, best-selling style and moved into a more fantasy type of writing.  Water Witch is the second book of the trilogy, in which the heroine, a professor of fairy tales, finds herself living in a world inhabited by witches and other fantastical creatures.  Callie's forte is the sex lives of demon lovers, the subject of her dissertation and the title of her popular class.  It's not as titillating as one would think, but still an interesting read.  I don't know if I would have picked it up had I not known it was written by Carol Goodman.  Ironically, the third book seems the most interesting of the series, which I might order from amazon, and give it a try.  Some common elements from her other books remain:  boarding school, single, somewhat lonely heroine, setting of New England or upstate NY.

The Inferno by Dan Brown.  I seldom read books reviews, but I saw a review for this on a plane and continued reading against my better judgement.  I don't remember anything else about the review except that the author complained the book read like a tour book in many places.  I couldn't shake that feelings while reading it.  Regardless, having been to Venice, Florence, and Istanbul, the descriptions intrigued me, made me remember places that have faded from memory, and made me want to plan trips to go back for all the sights I missed.  Robert Langdon wakes up with a nasty head injury in a Florence hospital, and has no recollections of getting to Europe, much less Florence.  The entire book takes place in a very short period of time.  Following clues from Dante's Inferno, Langdon and his new doctor friend traipse around Italy trying to discover why Langdon was injured, who is chasing him, and why Langdon is linked to an incredibly intelligent billionaire who recently committed suicide.  It lacks the panache of many of his other books, but The Inferno is a fast read with some interesting plot twists.

Songs for the Missing by Stewart O'Nan

I haven't disappeared, it just seems that way!  I started graduate school last fall and it has almost eliminated my entire time to read for pleasure!  Seriously cramping my style, but sometimes life gets in the way.

I did dive into a book two nights ago as a way to unwind from a day of non-stop studying.  My brain was too fried to continue, so I picked up Songs for the missing.  What I miss most about reading is falling into a book and loosing all sense of reality.  It's better than drugs. It happened with this book.

Kim was a regular teenager in a boring Ohio town who recently graduated high school.  I remember those days well. On her way to work at a Conoco, Kim disappeared.  The story is less about Kim and what happened to her, and more about her family and how they coped.  I liked this family so much.  The writing is awesome.  I kept trying to force the book to turn in a direction I wanted it to go; towards more of a murder mystery story.  It's really a family drama under the guise of a kidnapped teenager, which is so much better.  I surrendered by own desires for the book and let it take me where it wanted to go.  

The star of the book isn't Kim at all, its her younger sister Lindsey who spent her whole life in the shadow of her younger sister.  As Kim slowly recedes from her life, Lindsey finds a new identity and a new strength in herself.  She struggles with being the sister of the 'famous missing girl,' but handles it well.  She makes a promise with herself that she will be perfect until they find Kim, and ends up excelling her whole way through high school.

Kim's parents hit a (predictable) rough patch after Kim is gone, but in the end their craziness prove one thing: they will both do anything for their daughter, regardless of time or cost.  Aside from the tragedy this is a golden family.

After I finished the book, I stayed up late, laying in my bed in the dark and wondering about Kim and Lindsey.  Stewart O'Nan really nailed the emotional plot line.

The Athena Project by Brad Thor

I'm not really one for spy/thriller novels.  I feel like they are written primarily for the testosterone set, and I've steered away from them, thinking I wouldn't really like the books.

The Athena Project proved me wrong.

This was (obviously) my first Brad Thor book, although there's a not insignificant book list in the front of which this was one of many.

This book takes place all over the globe, reminding me a bit of the Bourne movies.  South America, Czech Republic, Croatia, Venice, Denver.  Some of the premises might be technologically futuristic, but the novel starts back at the time of Nazis.  Thor might be on to something here, since I don't think all the horrible research performed by the Nazis is either fully understood or even known about today.

My favorite part of the book isn't the science though, its the inspiration for the book title.  The Athena Project is an elite group of women, only women, trained to perform clandestine operations around the globe.  Similar to the Seals or the Rangers, this is an elite group of ass-kickers.  The best part is that they are all close friends, loyal to each other, and good at their jobs.  Apparently this group was introduced in one of the Thor's other novels, and he liked the concept so much he gave them their own book.

These women are tasked to uncover information about a top secret Nazi project, long thought abandoned until the results start showing up in South America.  This takes them around Europe where they must resort to kidnapping and killing to find answers before the experiment falls into the wrong hands with catastrophic results. In America, an undercover FBI agent is trying to handle a Russian spy bent on exposing secrets at, of all unlikely locations, the Denver International Airport.  I am intrigued about looking more closely at DIA when I fly through there in December!

Since I don't have anything to compare it to, I'd say I liked the book.  Thor maybe doesn't write about women too well, but not many men can pull that off. Regardless, the book is interesting.  I hope this group of women show up in other books in the future.

Bunheads by Sophie Flack

I'd forgotten how much I love young adult fiction before I picked up this book.  It's been years since I picked up my last YA book, after years of obsessively reading them.  An old coworker, Crystal, herself a voracious young adult reader, recommended some books to me after I asked her why an adult read so many children's books. Clearly the joke was on me.  Many YA books are just plain awesome.

I bought Bunheads on a recent trip to Colorado.  The title comes from a slang term for ballerina.  Hannah is a ballerina in the corps of the Manhattan Ballet.  After spending her life working hard to first get into the corps, then get promoted to a soloist, real life starts intruding onto Hannah's life, making her  wonder if her choices that were once perfect for her are still right for her now.  She meets a guy, makes life long friends, and starts dreaming of life outside the ballet.  After sacrificing most of her childhood for the ballet bar, doubts start creeping into her mind about how willing she is to sacrifice most of her adult life as well.

Hannah is smart, brave, and willing to work hard.  As a former ballerina, I loved the minute details of life behind the curtains. This is Flack's first novel, and she did well.  She's a former ballerina, which adds a sense of realism to the hard work and dedication present everyday in a ballet company.

Wow, its been awhile...

Not sure where I've been.  Buried under working, running, traveling, and moving I guess.

I still have been reading a bunch though.  I think last month I polished off Deanna Raybourn's books and then read all of Kathy Reichs' books, which are my guilty pleasure.

For my book list, I'm (still) reading Anna Karenina and Hunchback of Notre Dame.  I also started reading The Old Wives Tale by Arnold Bennett and am really enjoying it.

Earlier this month I read Off Balance, a non-fiction sports book written by Dominique Moceanu about her life as an elite gymnast.

In keeping tabs on popular fiction, I started reading the Fifty Shades of Gray trilogy.  I'm halfway through the second book, and therefore consequently halfway through the trilogy, and still haven't formed a solid opinion one way or the other about how much I like it.  Sometimes I get annoyed by the characters and I have to put my Kindle down.  Then I feel like I need to know what's going to happen next, so I turn my Kindle back on and sink back into it.  Way better then the mess that was Twilight, but not as awesome as the Hunger Games series.

I won't be gone for so long next time, I promise.

Silence in the Sanctuary by Deanna Raybourn

This is the second in the series following  Silent in the Grave.  Raybourn's sophomore book continues in the aftermath of the first.  Lady Julia Grey is recuperating in Italy with two of her brothers when their father summons them all home for Christmas at the family estate in England.  During an innocent games of sardines, a man is found dead in the chapel, with one of Julia's cousins, Lucy, standing above him with a bloody candelabra.

I liked this book.  I like Raybourn's style of writing.  I feel like a better author could have tackled this same plot in a much more convincing manner.  Most of Julia's family were staying at the house (a former Abbey so its massive), her love interest from book one with his new fiance, her poor distant cousins Lucy and Emma, Lucy's new fiance, his cousin, and the new pastor in the nearby village.  The night of the murder a huge snowstorm trapped everyone in the family in the Abbey for next few days, creating an island with one murderer on it, and a dead body stored in the larder, in the middle of pastoral England.  However, it was easy to assume that no one in Julia's immediate family would have been the murderer, which immediately eliminated quite a bit of the household.  Despite the large gathering, only a few people could possibly have been viable suspects.

In the middle of the book, a second crime is committed, which brings to light the true story behind Brisbane and his new fiance, and why they are staying with Julia's family.  This angle essentially fell into the story from nowhere.  Usually when surprises happen mid-plot, there were clues leading up the event if you were reading close enough to catch them.  That didn't happen here.

All that being said, I still enjoyed the book.  Julia's family is eccentric, but instead of shunning them, the wayward family members are embraced.

I already downloaded book 3 in the series.  Reading these in a row makes me feel like I'm falling into Victorian England.

Silent in the Grave by Deanna Raybourn

This book (or author, or series) came to my attention while perusing through Tasha Alexander's books on amazon.  At Christmas my mother asked for a list of books I wanted.  After reading through the description of this book, I added it to my list since it seemed like something I'd like.

And like it I did.  Despite the 435 pages, I started it Saturday and finished it Sunday.  Lady Julia Grey is a recent widow.  Her husband, her childhood sweetheart, collapsed and died in the midst of a dinner party.  Suffering from a heart ailment for most of his life, nobody really questioned his death, including his widow.  When a man approached Julia, telling her her husband had paid him to discover who had been sending him death threats, Julia rudely dismisses him.  Nearly a year into her mourning, Julia discovers a death threat logged in the desk drawer of her late husband.  Finally believing his death might be from something other then natural causes, Julia humbly approaches the private investigator, Nicholas Brisbane, with the note.  And so begins an interesting mystery story set in Victorian England.

I spent a good portion of the book comparing Deanna Raybourn to Tasha Alexander, which I didn't think was fair and I won't do here.  Both authors are very talented, creating interesting plots and characters that I really enjoy.

Despite the prudishness of Victorian England (at least literary), this book delved a bit into prostitution, abortion, and Gypsies.   The culprit actually surprised me, which really pleased me.  I hate it when I'm 30 pages into a detective/mystery story and already know who did it!

And since I'm a bit of a hopeless romantic, I'm interested in the attraction story between Brisbane and Julia which may or may not be developing.  Julia's eccentric family is also highly entertaining.

I downloaded the next book in the series on my Kindle, since I just couldn't wait to read the next one.