30 posts tagged “50 in 365”
I felt that the story was moving, and I wanted to read it when I was not reading it.
#16 in 2008
If anyone is interested, I'm actually updating my Shelfari page these days so you can add me as a friend if you want. It is great for keeping track of books I see in the library that I want to read without having a million scraps of paper in my pockets all the time.
I spent Sunday and Monday in the Outer Banks with my parents, and due to jellyfish and storms, I spent most of the time sitting on my butt reading. It was great!
What made the time even more pleasant was this whimsical debut novel from Lauren Groff. The Monsters of Templeton is about Willie's return to her hometown after a fling with her Ph.D. advisor went awry. She soon finds out that her father is a resident of Templeton who she has known all her life. The book chronicles her search for the identity of her father.
The story goes back and forth between a first person account of the main character's search and stories of her ancestors from their points of view. There are also some journal entries and letters that are used to tell the story. One chapter that consisted of two women's letters back and forth to each other was probably my favorite part of the book. I found her writing style and the unique structure of this story to be engrossing. The characters Groff created are complex and - for the most part - likable. I'm also partial to stories written about small town life so this definitely fit the bill.
I highly recommend this book to anyone, and I will be singing its praises to all of my friends as well!
This series just keeps getting better and better. Now they are in the eighties so he talks about Walkmans and whatnot. Lucky for me, Maupin is a Southern author so I could read one of these and count it in the "Southern Writers" category for ASRP.
In this novel, one of the characters gets involved in the Jonestown Massacre, which made for a really good story. I found this one to be pretty suspenseful in addition to being hilarious like the other two so far.
Cell is Stephen King's homage to zombie flicks. He dedicated the book to George Romero. This was very fast-paced and grabbed my interest from the first page. As any King fan will tell you, he has a very readable writing style and kept me interested until the end. I was a little disappointed with one thing he leaves up for interpretation at the end.
Basically, there is a pulse, and then everyone who answers their cell phone turns into a zombie. The book is mainly focused on Clay, Tom, and Alice, strangers who meet each other and decide to stick together for survival. There are plenty of twists to keep you interested to the end.
This was our book club selectin for July, which I thought was funny. I've never read a horror book for a book club, but I think this one does present a lot of material for discussion, especially since he leaves some big storylines unresolved.
I hope New Moon gets into the stories of the vampires and the werewolves more than this one did.
#12 in 2008
I would give this novel a B-. The first and last 100 pages of the book were the most interesting, and the 400 in between were, quite frankly, boring. It's basically a history of Manhattan, which I expected from the premise. Unfortunately, it ignores the story of the main character for too long to really keep me interested.
Hamill is too wordy for me in this novel as well. I kept thinking, "OK, get to the point!" It took me a really long time to finish the book because I just wasn't that interested in picking it up and reading.
According to the Amazon reviews, most people absolutely loved it so don't let me keep you from giving it a try.
#10 in 2008
#9 in 2008
Loved it of course. More fun Lula and Grandma Mazur antics. Lots of great Ranger/Morelli stuff too.
If you're not reading this series, what's holding you back?!
Murder on the Ballarat Train - Kerry Greenwood - Phryne Fisher gets caught up in another murder in the third book in this series. More fantastic characters and Roaring Twenties fun!
Suite Francaise - Irene Nemirovsky - This is a very moving fictional account of the German invasion of France during World War II. It tells the story of several different people along all class lines coping with the invasion. The story is very humanistic and does not portray all German soldiers as evil, which makes the story all the more compelling. I highly recommend this one.
These make 7 books read so far in 2008.
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