Velva Jean Learns to Drive by Jennifer Niven

About the book: In this spellbinding debut, Velva Jean Hart finds true love-and then risks everything to follow her dreams.

Set in Appalachia in the years before World War II, Velva Jean Learns to Drive is a poignant story of a spirited young girl growing up in the gold-mining and moonshining South.

Before she dies, Velva Jean's mother urges her to "live out there in the great wide world". Velva Jean dreams of becoming a big-time singer in Nashville until she falls in love with Harley Bright, a handsome juvenile delinquent turned revival preacher. As their tumultuous love story unfolds, Velva Jean must choose between keeping her hard-won home and pursuing her dream of singing in the Grand Ole Opry.

My thoughts: This story, which takes place in the Appalachians in the 30's & 40's, was a great read. It is a simple story of this young girl's life told in an easy to read fashion that touched my heart.  I enjoyed getting to know Velva Jean and look forward to her next book! The characters were interesting and some were colorful. The one character I wish had a bigger part in the book was the mysterious Wood Cutter, who befriended Velva Jean but mostly kept to himself in his cabin at the top of the mountain. I would recommend this book wholeheartedly!
Rating: A

Monkeewrench by P.J. Tracy

About the book: People are dying for the new computer game by the software company Monkeewrench. Literally. With Serial Killer Detective out in limited release, the real-life murders of a jogger and a young woman have already mimicked the first two scenarios in the game.

But Grace McBride and her eccentric Monkeewrench partners are caught in a vise. If they tell the Minneapolis police of the link between their game and the murders, they'll shine a spotlight on the past they thought they had erased-and the horror they thought they'd left behind. If they don't, eighteen more people will die...

Paperback: 432 pages
Publisher: Signet (April 6, 2004)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 045121157X
ISBN-13: 978-0451211576

First line: The brandy had been absolutly essential.

My Thoughts: I read a couple of negative reviews of this book but decided to go ahead and read it. Boy am I glad I did. This has to be my new favorite thriller and I intend to get on with this series as soon as possible. It kept me engaged, pulling me along with a couple of subplots and several twists. I enjoyed the nuggets of humor that shined in the twist of a phrase or the observation of an incident. The characters were colorful and likable. The dog, Charlie, went straight to my heart. I'm hoping that Jackson, a boy who had a bit part, will be more fully reaalized in the next book. Get it, you'll like it.

Rating: A

The Postmistress by Sara Blake

About the book: In 1940, Iris James is the postmistress in coastal Franklin, Massachusetts. Iris knows more about the townspeople than she will ever say, and believes her job is to deliver secrets. Yet one day she does the unthinkable: slips a letter into her pocket, reads it, and doesn't deliver it.
Meanwhile, Frankie Bard broadcasts from overseas with Edward R. Murrow. Her dispatches beg listeners to pay heed as the Nazis bomb London nightly. Most of the townspeople of Franklin think the war can't touch them. But both Iris and Frankie know better...
The Postmistress is a tale of two worlds-one shattered by violence, the other willfully naïve-and of two women whose job is to deliver the news, yet who find themselves unable to do so. Through their eyes, and the eyes of everyday people caught in history's tide, it examines how stories are told, and how the fact of war is borne even through everyday life.

First line: It began, as it often does, with a woman putting her ducks in a row.

My thoughts: This historical novel left me wanting more. Like the people who listened to Frankie's radio reports and wondered what happened next I want to know what happened next to the three women in this story.

This story takes place from the points of view of three different women: the postmistress Iris James who believes in her job and takes pride in the order she brings to it, Frankie Bard who broadcasts the news from Europe and Emma Trask whose husband, a doctor, has gone to London to help in the hospitals.  As the story goes along it becomes emotional, more interesting, more compelling. The author did a wonderful job winding the three stories together and bringing a great sense of time and place to her novel. I recommend this to you but bring some tissues.

Rating: A

The City & The City by China Mieville

From the publisher: When a murdered woman is found in the city of Beszel, somewhere at the edge of Europe, it looks to be a routine case for Inspector Tyador Borlú of the Extreme Crime Squad. But as he investigates, the evidence points to conspiracies far stranger and more deadly than anything he could have imagined.


Borlú must travel from the decaying Beszel to the only metropolis on Earth as strange as his own. This is a border crossing like no other, a journey as psychic as it is physical, a shift in perception, a seeing of the unseen. His destination is Beszel's equal, rival, and intimate neighbor, the rich and vibrant city of Ul Qoma. With Ul Qoman detective Qussim Dhatt, and struggling with his own transition, Borlú is enmeshed in a sordid underworld of rabid nationalists intent on destroying their neighboring city, and unificationists who dream of dissolving the two into one. As the detectives uncover the dead woman's secrets, they begin to suspect a truth that could cost them and those they care about more than their lives.


What stands against them are murderous powers in Beszel and in Ul Qoma: and, most terrifying of all, that which lies between these two cities.

First line: I could not see the street or much of the estate.

My thoughts: Having read a couple of this author's books before, I thought I knew what I was getting into. Not so. Apparently this author's imagination knows no bounds, has no limits. This is essentially a great mystery, a gritty police procedural that will keep you guessing till the end. What makes it uniquely Mieville's is the setting. The two cities, sharing one space set in the present reality of our world was.......quite intriguing. The way the citizens lived, unseeing and unhearing the other city and its population was made real by the way it was written. I have seen the term "Weird Fiction" applied to Mieville's writing and that is perfect. It is weird. And it draws me in each time. Loved it. My only complaint would be that I would have liked to know Dhatt and Borlu better.

This novel won the World Fantasy Award for best novel, The Hugo Award for best novel, and The BSFA Award for best novel.

Rating: A

Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand

About the book: With this acclaimed work and its immortal query, "Who is John Galt?", Ayn Rand found the perfect artistic form to express her vision of existence. Atlas Shrugged made Rand not only one of the most popular novelists of the century, but one of its most influential thinkers.

Ayn Rand's epochal novel, first published in 1957, has been a bestseller for more than four decades as well as an intellectual landmark. It is the story of a man who said that he would stop the motor of the world - and did. Was he a destroyer or the greatest of liberators? Why did he have to fight his battle, not against his enemies but against those who needed him most - and his hardest battle against the woman he loved? What is the world's motor - and the motive power of every man?

Tremendous in its scope, this novel presents an astounding panorama of human life - from the productive genius who becomes a worthless playboy...to the great steel industrialist who does not know that he is working for his own destruction... to the philosopher who becomes a pirate...to the composer who gives up his career on the night of his triumph...to the woman who runs a transcontinental railroad...to the lowest track worker in her Terminal tunnels.

Peopled by larger-than-life heroes and villains, charged with towering questions of good and evil, Atlas Shrugged is Ayn Rand's masterpiece. It is a philosophical revolution told in the form of an action thriller.

First line: "Who is John Galt?"

My thoughts: Wow! This has been in my TBR pile for several years and I have been putting it off, I guess because of the size of the tome. Even though I found it a bit wordy at times I thought it was captivating and compelling, I had a hard time putting it down. It is a dystopian novel set in an alternate 5os era so the sci/fi, fantasy nature of the book appealed to me. The author has very strong philosophical beliefs which were the foundation of this novel and are the source of much controversy. Basically I put the philosophy to the back of my mind, I read it for the fiction. The main characters were larger than life and I couldn't help loving them. Rand herself said about them that "they are not man as he is, rather man as he should be." There were no shades of gray here, all black and white. The good characters were good and the bad were evil.Even though I like this book, there were a few things that I didn't like: For one the sex was rough with little or no love involved. The 70 page speech on one of the main character's vision of life was a bit much (Yawn). All the main characters fall for Dagney and she has no trouble moving on to the next guy. Rand's treatment of her philosophy was preachy and heavy handed.


Rating: A

Quote: "She sat listening to the music. It was a symphony of triumph. The notes flowed up, they spoke of rising and they were the rising itself, they were the essence and the form of upward motion, they seemed to embody every human act and thought that had ascent as its motive. It was a sunburst of sound, breaking out of hiding and spreading open. It had the freedom of release and the tension of purpose. It swept space clean, and left nothing but the joy of an unobstructed effort. Only a faint echo within the sounds spoke of that from which the music had escaped, but spoke in laughing astonishment at the discovery that there was no ugliness or pain, and there never had to be. It was the song of an immense deliverance."

Darkness Under the Sun by Dean Koontz

About the book: The chilling account of a pivotal encounter between innocence and ultimate malice, Darkness Under the Sun is the perfect read for Halloween–or for any haunted night–and reveals a secret, fateful turning point in the career of Alton Turner Blackwood, the killer at the dark heart of What the Night Knows, the forthcoming novel by #1 New York Times bestselling author Dean Koontz. There once was a killer who knew the night, its secrets and rhythms. How to hide within its shadows. When to hunt. He roamed from town to town, city to city, choosing his prey for their beauty and innocence. His cruelties were infinite, his humanity long since forfeit. But still…he had not yet discovered how to make his special mark among monsters, how to come fully alive as Death.
This is the story of how he learned those things, and of what we might do to insure that he does not visit us.

First line: A week before his eleventh birthday, when Howie Dugley climbed to the roof of the former Boswell's Emporium to watch the normal people doing all kinds of ordinary things along Maple Street, he saw the monster for the first time.

My thoughts: This was a quick read and a good one. I liked Howie, the child and adult, a lot. Koontz has always been able to do that for me, create likable characters with good hearts that I want to root for. I felt bad for Howie and the decision he had to make at his young age. This is not just a horror story it is a psychological thriller. This novella, only found in eBook form, stands alone well but I am glad that there is more in the novel What the Night Knows. (I have to get it off my wish list and into the house, soon.) The tension built well and kept me turning pages. The creepiness of the story held on all the way to the end. If you have never read Dean Koontz, this is a great way to sample his work.

Rating:

Quote: "There's always a parade, Howie. When it's something you can't ever join but only watch, then it's a parade"

Links:
Dean Koontz

Riding the Bullet by Stephen King

About the Book: Riding the Bullet, the tale of a terrible encounter near a lonely graveyard, is, as the narrator points out, the kind of ghost story told around campfires. It's no surprise that no one tells such a story as well as Stephen King. From the moment Alan, a college student, decides to hitchhike to see his mother in the hospital (his car is out of action) and further decides to avoid the main highway where police might ticket him, you can imagine what's coming, and this makes what does come more awful and delicious. Josh Hamilton can't do a Maine accent (as who can not born to it?), so it's too bad he tried; everything else about this reading is delightful.

From Wikipedia: Riding the Bullet is a novella by Stephen King. This work marks King's debut on the Internet. Simon & Schuster, with technology by SoftLock, first published Riding the Bullet in 2000 as the world's first mass-market electronic book, available for download at $2.50. In 2002, it was collected in King's collection Everything's Eventual.

First Line: I've never told anyone this story, and never thought I would -- not because I was afraid of being disbelieved, exactly, but because I was ashamed...and because it was mine.

My Thoughts: What a scary, fun read. It's pure Steven King to take an ordinary person and put them smack in the middle of a nightmare. Being short I was afraid I would feel the story was incomplete, which is my feeling with most short stories I read. However the entire story is here. It had my heart racing as I flipped pages on my Nook. But as Alan's mother was fond of saying "Fun is fun and done is done." And so it is.

Rating:

Chasing Fireflies by Charles Martin

About the book: They have one summer to find what was lost long ago. "Never settle for less than the truth," she told him. But when you don't even know your real name, the truth gets a little complicated. It can nestle so close to home it's hard to see. It can even flourish inside a lie. And as Chase Walker discovered, learning the truth about who you are can be as elusive--and as magical--as chasing fireflies on a summer night. A haunting story about fishing, baseball, home cooking, and other matters of life and death.
First line: I stepped out into the sunlight humming a Pat Green tune, slipping on my sunglasses, and stared out over the courthouse steps.

My Thoughts: This 2008 Christy Award winner is the first Charles Martin novel I have read and I found that I liked. I will read more by this author. The parallel stories of a six year old abandoned boy, and that of Chase, who had been taken in as a young boy by Unc, and that of Tommy, Chase's cousin, are told intertwined with the digging out of family secrets that Chase is determined to bring to light. It is a beautifully written story of a father and son, of love of family, of sacrificial love. The sense of place is great. It jumped back and forth between the past and present but was easy to keep up with. The character of Unc was so well drawn and was such a wonderful person. One part of the book I just couldn't understand, a small part to be sure, had to do with an action Unc took. It was just so...un-Unc like. It is a spoiler so can't say here what it is but if you read this book you'll find it. I would suggest this novel to anyone, it was sad and sweet and ultimately satisfying. Just keep your tissues near to hand.

Rating:



Quote: "Inside you is a thing worth putting on a pedestal--worth putting out there for all the world to see. That piece of rock might been knocked around, roughed up a bit, considered scrap, and thrown on the trash pile...but that's only because they don't know what's on the inside. They can't see like Michaelangelo. 'Cause if they could, they'd know that there's something in there that's just waiting to jump out. Like there is inside you. I'm sorry for the hammer and chisel. I wish life didn't work that way. Just remember...the velvet cloth ain't far behind."

Links:
Charles Martin

Jolie Blon's Bounce by James Lee Burke

Description: When a beautiful teenage girl is killed, the victim of a particularly savage rape, New Iberia, Louisiana police detective Dave Robicheaux senses from the very start of the investigation that the most likely suspect, Tee Bobby Hulin, is not the actual killer. Though a drug addict and general ne'er-do-well, Hulin just doesn't fit the profile for this kind of brutal crime.
But when another murder occurs -- this victim a drugged-out prostitute who happens to be the daughter of one of the local mafia bigwigs -- all clues once again point to Tee Bobby Hulin, and the cries for arrest become too loud to ignore. The dead girl's father, however, prefers to take matters in his own hands and sets out to find -- and punish -- the killer himself.
But before Robicheaux can solve these crimes and bring the killer or killers to justice, he is forced to battle his own inner demons, including a painkiller addiction, a habit that begins as the result of a brutal and humiliating beating he suffers at the hands of the mysterious and diabolical character known as Legion. A fixture in the area for years, Legion was once the overseer on a local sugarcane plantation and now gets by doing odd jobs. In temperament, however, he's still the malicious and malevolent bully he always was, a man defined by evil and seemingly possessed with supernatural skills of survival.
Added to the mix, and on the good guy side of the balance sheet, is Clete Purcel, a longtime buddy of Robicheaux's and a confirmed boozer and womanizer. Clete comes to New Iberia for a visit and is quickly drawn into the struggle between the various forces of evil in the town, including Jimmy Dean Styles, a black man intent on maintaining his empire of corruption; Joe Zeroski, a trailer park mafioso with palatial aspirations -- and of course, Legion Guidry, the devil incarnate, in whom Robicheaux finds himself facing a challenge and an enemy unlike any he has ever known. And soon, what began as a duel of wits has turned into a dance of death.

First line: Growing up during the 1940s in New Iberis I never doubted how the world worked.

My Thoughts: I am a big fan of this series so when I found Jolie Blon's Bounce as an audio book at a used book sale I jumped on it. In fact I purchased two James Lee Burke audio books that day. As I've come to expect from Burke, his ability to write a sense of place and make you feel it in your heart is wonderful. His characters are flawed and and so they are absolutly believable. Dave is a troubled and at times violent soul that is fighting himself as well as the evil in his world. The evil in this book comes at him on several fronts as he strains to remain sober and find the answers. Clete Purcel, his friend and partner (at times) is troubled in his own way but always there for Dave. This book was a page turner, the suspense is maintained and kept me looking for reasons to drive somewhere so I could listen to more of it. The narrator, Will Patton, does an excellent job with the voices and accents. All in all a great "listen."

Rating:

Quote: "It was dark where we stood under the trees, the molded pecan husks and blackened leaves soft under our feet, the air tannic, like water that has stood for a long time in a wooden cistern. The dying light was gold on the tops of the cypresses in the swamp, and the snow egrets were rising into the light, their wings feathering in the wind."

Dreadnought by Cherie Priest

Synopsis: Nurse Mercy Lynch is elbows deep in bloody laundry at a war hospital in Richmond, Virginia, when Clara Barton comes bearing bad news: Mercy’s husband has died in a POW camp. On top of that, a telegram from the west coast declares that her estranged father is gravely injured, and he wishes to see her. Mercy sets out toward the Mississippi River. Once there, she’ll catch a train over the Rockies and—if the telegram can be believed—be greeted in Washington Territory by the sheriff, who will take her to see her father in Seattle.
Reaching the Mississippi is a harrowing adventure by dirigible and rail through war-torn border states. When Mercy finally arrives in St. Louis, the only Tacoma-bound train is pulled by a terrifying Union-operated steam engine called the Dreadnought. Reluctantly, Mercy buys a ticket and climbs aboard.
What ought to be a quiet trip turns deadly when the train is beset by bushwhackers, then vigorously attacked by a band of Rebel soldiers. The train is moving away from battle lines into the vast, unincorporated west, so Mercy can’t imagine why they’re so interested. Perhaps the mysterious cargo secreted in the second and last train cars has something to do with it?
Mercy is just a frustrated nurse who wants to see her father before he dies. But she’ll have to survive both Union intrigue and Confederate opposition if she wants to make it off the Dreadnought alive.

First line: Down in the laundry room with the bloody-wet floors and the ceiling-high stacks of sheets, wraps, and blankets, Vinita Lynch was elbows-deep in a vat full of dirty pillowcases because she'd promiseh - she'd sworn on her mother's life - that she'd find a certain windup pocket watch belonging to Private Hugh Morton before the device was plunged into a tub of simmering soapy water and surely destroyed for good.

My thoughts: This is the third book in the Clockwork Century series by Cherie Priest. I read the first one, Boneshaker, last year and really enjoyed it. I liked this one just as much. I found the alternate history senarios to be facinating. At 400 pages this Civil War steampunk thriller didn't lack much to qualify for the Chunkster Challenge. This book went very fast for me, kept me on the edge of my seat with the action. Mercy Lynch, the main character, was a treat. I enjoyed getting to know her and meeting all the people along on her exciting journey west to see her dad. I only wish we had learned more about Theodora Clay, she is a mystery. A young woman escorting her eldery aunt west, she is knowlegable about guns and shooting but we are never told why. Maybe she'll show up in another Priest book. This was a fun read. If you like Steampunk or would like to dip into the growing Steampunk mini-genre, you should try this book.

Rating:


Quote: It's funny what they say about men in uniform - how people think women just can't resist 'em. Fact is, I think we're just pleased to see a man groomed, bathed, and wearing clothes that fit him.

A Prisoner of Birth by Jeffrey Archer

About the book: If Danny Cartwright had proposed to Beth Wilson the day before, or the day after, he would not have been arrested and charged with the murder of his best friend. And when the four prosecution witnesses are a barrister, a popular actor, an aristocrat and the youngest partner in an established firm's history, who is going to believe his side of the story?
Danny is sentenced to 22 years and sent to Belmarsh prison, the highest security jail in the land, from where no inmate has ever escaped. But Spencer Craig, Lawrence Davenport, Gerald Payne and Toby Mortimer all underestimate Danny's determination to seek revenge and Beth's relentless quest to win justice, which forces all four protagonists to fight for their lives.

First line: "Yes'" said Beth. She tried to look surprised, but wasn't all that convincing as she had already decided that they were going to be married in secondary school.

My Thoughts: There is a possibility that this book will end up on my favorites list for the year. I was quite interested when I learned that this novel was a modernised version of Alexander Dumas' book The Count of Monte Cristo. I liked the way this book flowed, it was straight forward starting at the beginning and going on from there with a couple of twists especially at the end. The courtroom scenes were long but intense, there was a little sweet romance (not graphic,) switched identities, financial intrigue, forging, stamp collecting, and..... well more. Had I been reading this I might have found it to drag in the middle, however I listened to the unabridged version and thought that the person who read it, Roger Allam, did a fantastic job. I'm going to recommend this book to you, I think you'll enjoy it.

Rating:

Quote: "No, Mr Redmayne, not my tears. Although I've read that letter every day for the past eight months, those tears were not shed by me, but by the man who wrote them. He knew how much I loved him. We would have made a life together even if we could only spend one day a month with each other. I'd have been happy to wait twenty years, more, in the hope that I would eventually be allowed to spend the rest of my life with the only man I'll ever love. I adored Danny from the day I met him, and no one will ever take his place."

The Weed That Strings the Hangman's Bag by Alan Bradley

Product Description: From Dagger Award–winning and internationally bestselling author Alan Bradley comes this utterly beguiling mystery starring one of fiction’s most remarkable sleuths: Flavia de Luce, a dangerously brilliant eleven-year-old with a passion for chemistry and a genius for solving murders. This time, Flavia finds herself untangling two deaths—separated by time but linked by the unlikeliest of threads.

Flavia thinks that her days of crime-solving in the bucolic English hamlet of Bishop’s Lacy are over—and then Rupert Porson has an unfortunate rendezvous with electricity. The beloved puppeteer has had his own strings sizzled, but who’d do such a thing and why? For Flavia, the questions are intriguing enough to make her put aside her chemistry experiments and schemes of vengeance against her insufferable big sisters. Astride Gladys, her trusty bicycle, Flavia sets out from the de Luces’ crumbling family mansion in search of Bishop’s Lacey’s deadliest secrets.

First line: I was lying dead in the churchyard.

My thoughts: I found this, the second Flavia de Luce novel, to be as charming as the first. I loved going with Flavia as she rode trusty Gladys around town searching for clues. I cheered for her with each new find. I felt sorry for her as her sisters tormented her and when she was wondering about her mother.Her character is developing nicely and I can't wait to read the next book to see how she grows. I especially like the way Bradley captured the time and place, 1950 in England. Reading the description of the puppet show here reminded me of the time I saw a puppet show in the early sixties at school. I recommend this book to anyone.

My rating:





Quote:
"On my Honor," I said, holding up three fingers in the Girl Guide salute. Although I had been chucked from that organization for insubordination (among other things,) I felt it was hardly necessary to share the gruesome details with Nialla.

Links:
about the book
Flavia's Fan club

Bear Feels Scared by Karma Wilson

About the book: Bear is out looking for a snack, but when the sun sets he loses his way. How bear wants to go home! But where is his cozy cave? Bear searches and searches and as the skies grow dark, Bear feels scared! But bear is never alone, and his resourceful friends put together a search party to find their missing companion. A tale about friendship and feelings, this story will be sure to resonate strongly with children.


First line:
In the deep dark woods
by the Strawberry Vale,
a big bear lumbers
down a small, crooked trail.

My thoughts: Another great addition th Wilson's Bear series. This is one of my favorites. This can be used to explore feelings, friendship, being helpful and seasons. Again the rhyme is catchy and the repeated phrases beg the kids to participate in the reading. I love the illustrations. You and your kids will love it!

Quote:
The friends bundle up
and begin to prepare.
They form a search party
for their lost friend Bear.

My Rating:

Links:

about the book

look inside

about the author

a note to parents

Bear Feels Sick by Karma Wilson

Product Description:
Bear is not feeling well at all; he is achy, sneezy, wheezy and sick and in no shape to go outside to play. Mole, Hare, Mouse and the rest of the gang try to make Bear feel as comfortable as possible in his cave. Under the care of his friends, Bear starts to get better but as soon as Bear is well, guess what happens? All of his friends get sick!



First line:

Alone in his cave

as the autumn wind blows,

Bear feels achy

with a stuffed-up nose.

My thoughts: I love the entire Bear series. The stories keep the kids attention, the illustrations are charming, the rhyme is fun. This particular book was a great jumping off spot for a health lesson. The discussions included hand washing and covering mouth when sneezing. After reading it we also discussed how family and friends can help one another. This book is great for the classroom and home. Your kids will love it!

My Rating:

Quote:
Mouse queezes Bear tight.
He whispers in his ear,
"It'll be just fine.
Your friends are all here."


Links:
About the book
Look inside