JULY 2024

Hello All,

We met last month for our Bookshare gathering at the home of Geri Christensen.  We shared a lot of things, including books. :)  Here is the list:

BETH HEDENGREN

More Elly Griffiths

            The Woman in blue

            The Chalk Pit

            The Dark Angel

The Stone Circle

            The Lantern Men

            The Night Hawks

 

Jane Austen at Home by Lucy Worsley

Lucy Worsley hosts a BBC history program. She’s young and attractive and does things like dress up in Elizabethan costumes while narrating the history in an almost melodramatic tone. But it turns out she is also a very good historian. This may be my favorite Jane Austen biography, and I’ve read several. I like the way Worsley researches houses and towns in which Austen lived to provide insights on her life. Her evidence is compelling. 

 

Postwar by Tony Judt

Still plugging away. Interesting history of post WWII Europe, but very long. I like learning about how Europe became what it is. The part about East European countries and their relationship to the Soviet Unition is very interesting. 

 

Generations: The Real differences between Gen Z, Millennials, Gen X, Boomers, and Silents—and What They Mean for America’s Future by Jean M. Twenge

Interesting historical analysis of the way people in each generation are influenced by their context in history. 

 

ADHD is Awesome by Penn and Kim Holderness

Penn Holderness is a successful You-tuber and a comedian. He also has adult ADHD. This book is thoroughly researched in science, and also comfortingly personal, filled with his experience with ADHD. The thesis is ADHD makes many necessary life skills difficult, but it also allows for great bursts of creativity and hyper focus. Good to see this condition framed as a positive!

 

Sacred Struggle by Melissa Wei-Tsing Inouye

Beautiful essays on living life in the Church by a talented scholar of Church history. Her insights are especially poignant because she died of cancer recently, just a young woman of 44.

 

Both Things Are True by Kate Holbrook

Kate is also a scholar of Church history—both women were employed by the Church history department. These essays were compiled after Kate died of cancer, about a year ago. Again, these essays and touching and insightful. 

 

However, I enjoyed hearing each of the women speak in their own voices even better than reading their work. Look on YouTube to find speeches given by each of them. They are engaging and powerful.

KARLA COX

All But My Life by Gerda Weismann Klein

A personal, tender first-hand telling of the Holocaust and the agonizing buildup to that horrific period, as well as the brutal reality and the miraculous survival of a few; and finally the assurance that a meaningful life can be recovered, even after the horrors Hitler created. 

Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns

I’m glad I listened to this story, on Marlene’s recommendation, having read it many years ago. 

There’s so much wisdom and gentle comprehension of God and His love in this story told through a teenage Kentucky boy’s eyes. And behind the gentle reminders that the world is changing and some change is really good, is the universal lesson that love is not limited to the perceptions of us foolish mortals; and it really does conquer all. 

Being Mortal  by Atul Gawande

Beautiful, informative, thought-provoking, inspiring. I loved this book. It focuses on what Tim spent his career building - autonomy and independence for the frail elderly. So well-written, I had a hard time stopping to do what was necessary without a book playing in my ears! I will probably buy a copy to keep and to share. SO worthwhile. I honestly think everyone should read it!

If the Creek Don’t Rise by Leah Weiss 

A most unusual book. It brought to mind so many others I have read about Appalachia. But this wasn’t moving; it was a hard-hitting, seemingly loose ends story that held elements of mystery, horror, and vengeance. I enjoyed it and I’m glad I listened to it, so I got the flavor of the characters and the area. But it falls below the other Appalachia stories I’ve learned from and enjoyed. 

Agatha Raisin and the Fairies of Fryfam by MC Beaton

Is there any need to say much about an Agatha Raisin book? She’s snarky, nasty, grumpy - and smart, entertaining and fun. 

This story takes her to Norfolk, where the country and traditions are old enough to include acceptance of the notion of fairies. But there’s also murder, and a confusing love story tangled up with friendship. 

Not as good as the quiche of death, but still the light entertainment for which I was looking. 

Secrets of a Charmed Life by Susan Meissner

“…There are no secrets to a charmed life; there is just the simple truth that you must forgive yourself for only being able to make your own choices, and no one else’s.” Here lies the reason for the title of this astounding story, and the message that the main charcter wants understood. But there is so much to this story that to summarize it is to insult it. So I won’t. I will simply encourage you to trust this brilliant writer and read (or listen to the reader’s lovely and appropriate British accent) a story that spans decades, tears lives apart, and brings broken hearts and damaged lives into sweet, unbelievable union. 

It’s so difficult for me to rate or rank books. But this one may be in my all-time top 25 or 30. I’m not sure I could give any better recommendation than that.

under the Cover of Mercy by Rebecca Connolly

Another tenderly told tale of a terrible time - though this account involves the events of WW1. Edith Cavell, a real British nurse and matron of a Brussels Belgium healing and teaching facility, becomes quietly engaged in the rescue of wounded soldiers, including helping to transport them to safety from German punishment. The events are told mildly in this story, the way one sister might tell another. After reading so much about WWII, this was worthwhile look into the conditions and challenges of the First World War. 

Expiration Dates by Rebecca Serle

“Life is a catch-22. That’s why God invented female friendships.” 

“Whose job is it to look out for our own happiness? Us, or the people who love us?” 

And finally, “Being surprised by life isn’t losing; it’s living… The only way to get it wrong is to refuse to play.”

This a complicated love story. A many loves story, and one woman’s desire for one perfect love, so she could have a perfect life. But we all know neither exist. So this the story of how a woman and some others do their best with what they have. Listening to this was better than watching a movie! 

MARYANN STEVENS

MAISY Dobbs By Jacqueline Winspear 3.5 stars. Dobbs is an investigator Post World War I. This prequel tells of her life as a manner made, and then as a war nurse.

THE WHITE LADY by Jacqueline Winspear. Four stars. The clandestine work of Eleanor DeWitt is chronicle across both World War I and World War II, Belgium, Britain and France. Sabotage, espionage, betrayal are finally left to be behind.

SECRETS OF A CHARMED LIFE by Susan Misner. Five stars. Kendra, and Oxford student from California interviews, a 93-year-old who live through the London blitz, and who was separated from her younger sister and mother. One of the best descriptions of the destruction of London and the great disruption of families I have ever read. Imagine sending your children far from home not knowing the care they would receive, and whether you would ever be together again. Many children were separated for six years. There resilience through this trauma astound me. Fiction. I will read this author again. 

BEYOND THE SILENCE by Tracy Peterson and Kimberly Woodhouse. 3.5 stars. Lillian Porter is tired of feeling in prison by her grandfather’s mansion in Indianapolis and answers an ad to be a nanny for a six-year-old boy on a farm in California. She was not looking for as much adventure as she found. This is a western Christian city in the late 19th century.

BIRDS OF A FEATHER by Jacqueline Winspear. 3.5 stars. My first MAISY Dobbs mystery. Takes place in post World War II England. Good read.

The Women by Kristen Hanna. Five stars. One of the best books by one of the best authors of our day. Francis McGrath, a new nurse, volunteers to servant Vietnam. This book, realistically chronicles are operator room work in the central Highlands during the Tet offensive and beyond. When she returns after two years in Hell, she finds her country club parents. I told Friend she was studying in Florence so ashamed of her they were. When she figures out she needs medical health help, the VA tells her no women served in Vietnam. Her struggles are amplified by men. She loved who lied to her and used her. Redemption is low income. The saga is wrenching. 

THIS TIME NEXT YEAR WE'LL BE LAUGHING by Jacqueline Winspear. 3.5 stars. The author tales of her early live on an English farm with her parents, both of them suffered emotional trauma from having live through World War III as teens, who actually pass on their PTSD to her through her their stories great narrative.

UNIVERSE OF TWO by Stephen Kieran. Four stars. Charlie Fisk is a 19-year-old math quiz who uncle as a professor of physics gets him assigned to Los Alamos. Chicago girlfriend follows him there to witness his emotional angst of working on the bomb. Although the name of the protagonist is historical the rest of the novel Is fiction, but is still good.

JO ANN ABEGGLEN

Being Mortal  by Atul Gawande

Beautiful, informative, thought-provoking, inspiring. I loved this book. It focuses on what Tim spent his career building - autonomy and independence for the frail elderly. So well-written, I had a hard time stopping to do what was necessary without a book playing in my ears! I will probably buy a copy to keep and to share. SO worthwhile. I honestly think everyone should read it!

MY DEAR HAMILTON by Stephanie Dray and Laura Kamoie. 

A coming of age novel on the perilous frontier of revolutionary New York. Elizabeth Schuyler champions the fight for independence. And when she meets Alexander Hamilton, Washington's penniless but passionate aide-de-camp, she's captivated by the young officer's charisma and brilliance. They fall in love,m despite Hamilton's bastard birth and the uncertainties of war. 

GERI CHRISTENSEN

THE CONFESSION by John Grisham

A compelling and fascinating book about the perils of capital punishment. When a recently-released prisoner comes to a young minister in the town of Wichita, Kansas and confesses to a murder he committed almost 10 years ago in a small Texas town, it sets into a motion a chain of events that is almost too intense to put down. A young black man sits on death row in a Texas prison, awaiting execution for a crime he did not commit.  It is a nail-biting story that is fun to read and a great eye-opening read about the perils of capital punishment when an innocent person's life is on the line.

THE HIDING PLACE by Corrie Ten Boom

One of my favorite World War II stories about a courageous family, including two amazing sisters, Corrie and her sister who help hide Jewish people who are tryinng to escape the evils of the Nazi regime. Eventually they are sent to a concentration camp where they are able to teach prisoners about Jesus Christ and his mission and how they can have redemption. It is a wonderful book, one I never get tired of reading. The movie is also good.

THE WHITE LADY by Jacqueline Windspear

(See Maryann's description above).

THE FIRST LIE WINS BY Ashley Elston

A fun book about a young woman who is able to change her identity to steal from unsuspecting men. This works well for her until she falls in love with her latest "assignment".  A great book with a good ending.

First World War. 

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