FEBRUARY 2023

 Hello Book Lovers,

We met last month at Beth Hedengren's home and had a wonderful discussion of some excellent books.  We will be meeting again tonight at Maryann Stevens' home.  Come and enjoy getting together and hearing about what everyone has been reading this past month.  Here is a list of the latest books:

Elizabeth Orton

A Horse Came Running by Meindert DeJong.

 Miracles on Maple Hill by Virginia Sorensen.

 

Geri Christensen

Little Souls by Sandra Dallas - A very interesting novel and a surprisingly good mystery, as well.  I enjoyed it from the very beginning and was surprised by the ending.  I rate it four stars.

The Danger of Diamonds by Traci Hunter Abramson - Not as good as the first book in the series, Heirs of Falcon Point, but a good read and interesting background.  3 Stars.

Coming Home by Rosamunde Pilcher- One of my all-time favorite books.  It is so easy to get lost in the story and the characters are so believable that you feel that you know them.  It is one of those books that you don't want to end because you will miss the characters so much.  It's the same with most of Ms. Pilcher's books, at least it is for me.  I give this book 5 stars.

 

Beth Hedengren

The End of the World is Just the Beginning: Mapping the Collapse of Globalization

by Peter Zeihan

Zeihan, a well-known geopolitical analyst (you can find his talks on youtube. Try this recent one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SyaqloUsSBE), has crafted this very detailed explanation of what may happen after the de-globalization of world economy. The book provides a very detailed analysis of six different areas: Agriculture, Energy, Finance, Manufacturing, Materials, Transport and Agriculture. The sobering scenarios are backed up with many statistics and charts and graphs. The doomsday scenarios are attributed to dwindling birth rates and the United States ceasing to patrol the seas, making possible cheap and safe transportation of goods. A bit scary, but I’ve heard doomsday predictions before that never happened. Thought-provoking none the less. We have lived in a very comfortable world for the last few decades. Bonus: Zeihan tells us this scary stuff with a very humorous, sarcastic delivery. The audio book, read by him, is entertaining as well as informative.

 

The Murder of Mr. Wickham by Claudia Gray

Very fun mystery, especially if you are a fan of Jane Austen’s novels. Gray has figured out a timeline for the various characters and puts them all together in a country house party. The hosts are Mr. Knightly and his wife Emma from Emma. Guests include newlyweds Colonel Brandon and Marianne (Sense and Sensibility); Mr. Darcy, his wife Elizabeth, and their 20-year-old son Jonathan (Pride and Prejudice); Captain Wentworth and his wife Ann (Persuasion); and Fanny and Edmund Bertram (Mansfield Park). Also attending is the teenage daughter of Catherine Tillney (Northanger Abbey): Juliet. (By the way, Catherine is now an author herself.) When Mr. Wickham crashes the party and is murdered, the youngsters Juliet and Jonathan team up to solve the mystery. Really fun to see the characters as grown adults interacting with each other. The only problem is that, since you love all the characters, you don’t want anyone to be the murderer! But that sorts itself out. A very cozy mystery. 

 

Triple Chocolate Cheesecake Murder by Joann Fluke

Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder by the same

Very light, very cozy murder mysteries. Going-to-bed reading. Fun for me because of the Minnesota setting. Also fun to get the recipes at the end of each chapter. I came to like the intrepid sleuth/baker Hannah, who almost completed her PhD in English Lit before coming home to the tiny town of Lake Eden to start a bakery business. She’s a smart girl!

 

In Pieces by Sally Fields

An autobiography of the actress Sally Fields, Gidget herself. Unfortunately, her life was harder than it looks, as seems to be the case for most actors. It’s a hard field. But it’s well-written and interesting to get the back story on all the shows and movies we have seen her in. 

 

Maryann Stevens

Agatha Raisin: The Wellspring of Death 3️ two murders in a quiet Cotswold village over the right to tap a spring for commercial development. ok to read when you’re trapped in a car for 9 hours. 

Maya’s Notebook by Isabel Allende 4.5 ️ I love Isabel Allende. Contemporary coming of age story. Maya Vidal, beloved by the grandparents who raised her goes off the rails when her beloved grandfather dies. She ‘escapes’ a rehab center, is abducted by a truck driver who drops her off in Las Vegas where she works as a drug runner for wealthy clientele. After desperate months she returns to Grandma who sends her to live on an island off the coast of southern Chile where she heals, crashes, & heals again. 

Personal Librarian by Marie Benedict & Victoria Christopher Murray. 4️Miss Belle da Rosa Greene aka Belle Marion Greener ( 1879-1950) passes as white, (Portuguese) & becomes the curator & collector of medieval manuscripts & art for JP Morgan. Though her father is a light-skinned ‘colored’ he is nonetheless an adamant civil rights activist. Her equally fair-skinned, but also ‘colored’ mother is determined she & her children pass as white in order to access the level of education, housing, & employment unavailable to colored people in the early twentieth century….& ironically, in the early twenty-first century as well. 

Through complicated subterfuge & the great personal sacrifice for romance & children, she becomes one of the most famous, respected, & well-paid woman of her era. 

Great read. Semi-historical. 

Marlene Matheson

 The Lost Girls of Ireland by Susanne O'Leary - light

The Maid by Nita Prose - delightful to listen to, turned into a mystery

Mornings on Horseback by David McCullough - about Theodore Roosevelt

Facing the Mountain by Daniel James Brown - Japanese Americans in internment camps and WWII

The Family Romanov by Candace Fleming - lots of Russian history, the end took place in Yekaterinberg where our son served his mission.