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What We're Reading NowMay 2015
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First frost
by Sarah Addison Allen
Allen’s fans—especially those who loved Garden Spells—will embrace the author’s latest mix of magical caprice and relatable family drama.
Claire and Sydney Waverley are back—ten years later—with auspiciously expanded families, some new issues, and some ongoing ones. In quirky Bascom, North Carolina, the Waverley clan has a reputation for strangeness (not to mention magical powers), and the family of Sydney’s high school flame is still wary of her motives. But now Sydney has a teenaged daughter. And a stranger in town has disquieting evidence about Claire’s parentage.
Light, entertaining, upbeat.
LS
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The paying guests
by Sarah Waters
The Great War has brought irrevocable changes to Britain, and in 1922 some of those implications have yet to be fully realized. One thing hasn’t altered: in the tony Champion Hill neighborhood, one must avoid the appearance of doing one’s own housework even if that is necessary due to a financial reversal.
So Frances Wray and her mother are discreet about their chores, and they use the acceptable term “paying guests” for the young couple who have signed on as their new lodgers.
But the couple stirs up an old issue and plunges the household into a criminal investigation. Great historical fiction with a very modern point of view.
LS
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The last good paradise : a novel
by Tatjana Soli
Can paradise be purchased?
Unlike the castaways of Gilligan’s Island, this ensemble actually wants to be marooned on an island (resort cost: $2,000 per day): a chef and his attorney wife, an aging rock legend and his much younger “muse”, the Tahitian couple employed to keep things running, the brooding French owner. It’s supposed to be “unplugged”, but civilization and digital communication resurface at regular intervals—and so does reality.
You may wish for greater coherence in the main narrative, as I did, but Soli’s prose is a delight to read.
LS
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Dead wake : the last crossing of the Lusitania
by Erik Larson
Larson uses four different, though interwoven, stories to tell the tale of the ship’s final voyage. First, the Lusitania itself where Larson relates stories from survivors about the glamour of sailing on the finest passenger ship of its time and the terror of surviving its sinking. Second, the U-20 submarine commanded by Walther Schwieger, who had already proven himself a deadly hunter willing to open fire on passenger ships without warning. Third, the White House where a recently widowed President Wilson attempts to navigate a deteriorating relationship with Germany while weighed down by his own grief. Finally, the offices of British Naval Intelligence whose policies left the Lusitania unprotected and prevented a more robust rescue of the survivors.
Drawing on a great variety of resources, Larson transforms the sinking of the Lusitania from an obscure footnote to a demonstration of 20th century warfare, when civilians became legitimate targets, a shift in war strategy with profound consequences that still reverberate to this day.
JD
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The daring ladies of Lowell
by Kate Alcott
The textile mills of Lowell, Massachusetts may have owed their technology to the English industry, but for young American women, they represented an almost revolutionary opportunity.
Farm girls could escape their destiny and work for wages, helping to support their families (or save for their own futures) while establishing personal independence. But, as Alice Barrow discovers, working conditions at the mill are dangerous.
The murder of one mill girl and work-related death of another embroil Alice in local politics and an uneasy relationship with the mill owners. Historical fiction fans will appreciate learning about Lowell, a landmark factory town.
LS
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Digging for Richard III : the search for the lost king
by Michael W Pitts
In 2012, the discovery of the remains of King Richard III (beneath the tarmac in a parking lot in Leicester) made headlines around the world.
What were the chances of locating that burial site after hundreds of years? And how can we be certain of the body’s identity?
Come to think of it—who was Richard III, really? Were all the dreadful rumors (and Shakespeare’s portrayal) true?
Pitts addresses all these questions in a highly readable style that even fiction lovers--like me—can appreciate.
LS
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The dog who saved me
by Susan Wilson
Families are special. Even when they include a dad battling PTSD from Viet Nam with alcohol, a brother who is dealing in drugs, and a special K-9 brother who has been killed in the line of duty through what you believe is your fault.
Add a bedraggled, abused, and scared adolescent Labrador pup and you have the makings of a good work of fiction.
PB
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The boys in the boat : nine Americans and their epic quest for gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics
by Daniel Brown
This affirming, exciting read will delight fans of Erik Larson (Isaac’s Storm, The Devil in the White City) and Laura Hillenbrand (Seabiscuit, Unbroken), not to mention rowing enthusiasts.
The Depression-era true story of the 1936 University of Washington 8-man rowing crew—which ultimately won the right to represent the U.S. in the Berlin Olympics—engages readers like a compelling novel.
Combined with the political drama of Hitler’s Olympic games, accounts of individual team members’ grit and determination portrays perseverance at its finest. LS
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American Crucifixion : The Murder of Joseph Smith and the Fate of the Mormon Church
by Alex Beam
At the beginning of 1844, Joseph Smith was a well-known leader of a religious sect. While not a popular man, he and his followers had found a measure of security and financial stability on the western edge of Illinois. By June, Smith was accused of treason against the United States, imprisoned, and killed by a mob of drunken militia, while his followers were fearful that they would soon be killed as well.
Beam examines how the doctrine of polygamy created divisions within the Mormons and how these divisions led to schisms, betrayals, denunciations, excommunications, and eventually, an awful bloodletting. After Smith’s death, the new leadership decided that the only way to survive was to exile themselves from the United States once and for all.
JD
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The Ice Cream Queen of Orchard Street : a novel
by Susan Jane Gilman
Are you in the mood for a rags-to-riches tale? How about decade-spanning historical fiction—or a life story related by a character whose choices will have you alternately cheering and despairing?
Little Malka Treynovsky’s family escapes persecution in Russia only to discover other perils in New York City: hunger, overcrowded and unsanitary living conditions--and traffic. Seriously injured by the ice peddler’s cart, the abandoned child gains a new home, unwelcoming and strange but affording her the chance to learn the ice cream business inside out, capitalizing on her innate creativity and cunning. Gilman renders Malka’s transformation—and that of the country—unforgettably.
LS
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H is for hawk
by Helen Macdonald
Macdonald has written a beautiful meditation on life and loss. When her father dies unexpectedly, Macdonald, an experienced falconer, resolves to train that most vicious of raptors, the goshawk. Focusing on the goshawk as it mirrors her own fierce and feral temperament, taming the bird becomes the purpose of her life, and not just for its own sake. It is a rite of reckoning, of approaching a more inaccessible, unavoidable inner process.
Nature readers and those who like to read about people overcoming adversity will enjoy this well-written book.
CS
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A taste of cowboy : ranch recipes and tales from the trail
by Kent Rollins
This book has a lot of recipes using green chilies and/or can opener cookery. It also provides the history of the chuck wagon and its usage today.
Did you know that there is a chuck wagon etiquette?
Some of those rules still reside in today’s kitchens.
Along with all this information is a good sprinkling of common sense philosophy told with homespun language. Of course, there are also a few tall tales to enhance the flavor.
PB
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