Phyllis

This book is okay. While my personal experience is that diet does have a major impact on health, it doesn't follow that eating gluten is the root cause of all autoimmune diseases. Putting patients on elimination diets is great, but there are also people who just have messed up health and there's no magic bullet. Nor is it great to take a million supplements. There are some good recipes in the book and its worth a look, but I don't think the anti-gluten movement is fully researched.

Many members of our cookbook club enjoyed what they made, so there are definitely done keepers in this book. The stuffed pork chop recipe on p. 157 is really delicious, but I found myself a little uninspired to make some of these items.

The titular “The Goodbye Cat” and “Cat Island” are my favorite stories, although all the stories are heart-warming and centered around cats.

If you've read the author's “The Travelling Cat Chronicles,” you'll recognize some of the characters in “Finding Hachi” and “Life is Not Always Kind.” It's nice to get another point of view on those stories.

A few of the stories weren't fleshed out as well as I expected after the carefully-crafted “The Travelling Cat Chronicles.” This little book is still worth a read and will probably lift your spirits.

What a waste of time! “Eleanor and Park” has been sparkling around for sometime and had some sort of unspecified acclaim. It seems that some people i know who have good taste enjoyed this book, but now I cannot remember who any of them are! I wish I could because I'd like to talk with them and discuss what I'm missing (if, indeed, I'm missing anything).

After listening to the audiobook version via the library's Libby app, I was all too happy to return the book and be done with it. The entire storyline, dialogue, and almost every single character were flat and unimaginative. This seems like a book I might've written in seventh grade, and trust me, that would not have been a good book!

In an attempt to get close to my 2017 Goodreads Reading Challenge target, I selected a number of short books from the library that were between 100 and 200 pages. Some books, like “The Sage of Waterloo: A Tale” by Leona Francombe, caught my eye as I prowled around the fiction section.

After picking up the thin volume, TSOW's premise captured my attention. I know not to get too excited about comparisons to other beloved books, such as Richard Adams' “Watership Down.” However, I figured that there was no harm in trying a new book that wouldn't take forever to read.

Due to holiday activities, I didn't make it through TSOW. Boo. Early in the book, I found myself disappointed despite low expectations. TSOW could have been a really neat little book. Instead, it drags on, which is hard to do in a few hundred pages (small pages, at that, so think of the time commitment to read this book as about 100 normal pages).

There isn't anything “rabbitty” about William and all of the other rabbits, other than Old Lavender. Of course, each author has a different take on the level of anthropromorphism, without which it would be difficult for a human to read a book written from an animal's point of view. However, every rabbit knows every detail about the Battle of Waterloo, including the ball the night before the battle, as well as every name and maneuver of both sides. While the idea of stories passed down from generation to generation would be a great way to both expand the characters of each rabbit and to world-build, neither is successful. I had to skim through the dull battle scenes in order not get through this short tome.

William also takes a journey, of sorts, and interacts with Arthur, a blackbird who frequents Williams' owner's yard after leaving Hougoumont. Arthur is probably the most interesting character in the book besides Old Lavendar. In fact, a book written from his perspective would have been more interesting given the range and number of characters he could talk to. William barely talks to his fellow rabbits and never seems to develop his gift, which must be more than simply having a white coat inherited from a rabbit taken by a young French boy and released into the forest near the battle.

Overall, I was sad that a book filled with so many interesting options took advantage of none of them.

Minutes ago, I finished Katherine Arden's “The warm Hands of Ghosts,” and I'm still trying to catch my breath. This book is not for the faint-of-heart or your typical beach read, but it is worth it, no matter how haunted it leaves you.

Having loved the author's previous “Bear and the Nightingale“ series, I was very intrigued that she had chosen a story during the last few years of World War I. I did not realize how raw and gritty the book would be, perhaps, because I had some expectations that the fantastical elements of the other series would reappear. That is not a criticism against this book, but against my expectations going in. What is common between this and her other books is her great skill in taking you to a place, where you can see, smell, hear, and touch.

At first, I had a hard time getting into the characters and I think it's because both Laura and her brother, Freddie, weren't always fully in the present moment, sometimes jarred back to horrific scenes of war or the aftermath in field hospitals in the middle of sentences or thoughts. Both of them, like so many other people returning from war, were shattered by what they experienced.

Unfortunately, I only met one of my Great Grandparents who had served as in World War I; the others had passed away before I was born. I would've been interested to hear my Moravian Great Grandfather‘s stories; he deserted and was imprisoned in a castle for a chunk of the war. I probably wouldn't be here if he hadn't done so. As I read this book, I pictured each of them and imagined what they may have went through.

And after reading this book, as well as Robert Graves' “Goodbye to All That” and some of Wilfred Owen's poems, the terrifically awful tragedy of the Great War was amplified. The descriptions of trench and hospital life seem like something out of a horror movie, not something that could possible happened to so many of our ancestors. But it did. Not to be outdone by the horrific actuality of that war, Katherine Arden wove in the sinister fiddler, one of the more evil and mysterious villains I've read in a long time. I won't say too much about that party if the story because it's better to read it yourself.

The Author's Note, as well as a post in Goodreads (wouldn't recommend reading those before reading the book) delve into Arden's struggle to write this book, as well as some of the inspirations. Her journey to complete. This book was almost heartbreaking. And now, I look forward to any further books she might be able to share with us.

“Public Library and Other Stories” gets a star simply for the title. And, the other two are for the inter-story commentary or quotes about the importance of the library in each person's life or the services that the public library system provides to the community. These interspersed vignettes are marvelous and I wish that Ali Smith had made the entire book a love letter to libraries.

Honestly, the short stories were really odd. I couldn't get into any of them, nor did they really say much about libraries. Maybe I'm just missing the boat on the author's style, which I found disjointed, a bit stream of consciousness, and not enlightening.

At first, I could not quite get into this mystery, but then I reminded myself that “The Curse of La Fontaine” is 6th in the series. Also, I was on an airplane and overtired from overscheduling myself.

For an OCD person like myself, starting a series 6 books in and not at the beginning (!!!!) is practically a crime. Yet, after a few chapters spent warming up with a few glasses of French wine and delicious meals, I found myself enjoying not only Aix, but also Jusge Verlaque and his new wife, Professor Bonnet.

The murder at the centerpiece takes several chapters to be unearthed, but I suspect many readers will enjoy the story's progression. I shan't say more, but, should you enjoy a bottle (mini, mind you) of French wine on your way back home and have this book in hand, I think you'll be able to imagine a bise and dinner on a patio. In earshot of an old fountain.

I highly recommend the audiobook version of this book. While there is much to be gained by reading any book, hearing examples in the audiobook really adds to what a reader/listener can learn.

As someone who has studied a bit of music theory and plays the clarinet (in a mediocre fashion in a summer village band), I found this book to be a nice refresher.

Beyond music theory, there are a number of interesting psychological studies relating to how the brain processes music are referenced in the latter half of the book.

After hearing about this book for years, not only as a top pick by some friends, but also as a particularly Chicago read, I was looking forward to a short, packed-with-feeling and quality. Instead, I was pretty disappointed and underwhelmed (truly a 2.5 star rating, as opposed to 3). Before you get out the pitchforks, let me explain.

Chicago was once a patchwork of ethnic neighborhoods, where recent immigrants would flock to be near relatives and a network of other people from their homeland, but have the opportunities a growing city afforded. My Czech and Polish forepeople settled into neighborhoods where their language and customs were observed. Eventually, they moved out to the suburbs and new incoming ethnic groups moved into the same neighborhoods, like Pilsen and South Lawndale. While the city is technically ethnically diverse, it has also has the unfortunate honor of being the most segregated city in the U.S. When you look at an ethnic map, there appear to be slices of pie, with one of the slices represented by people of varying Hispanic/Latin heritages. Mango Street, according to Ms. Cisneros' website (http://www.sandracisneros.com/~features/homs_real_place.php), represents the real-life Campbell Street in today's Eastern Humboldt Park neighborhood.

I hoped that this book would really capture these voices that are underrepresented or unrepresented in literature and a voice that you know if you live in Chicago. But, instead, the series of vignettes about Esperanza missed the richness of other urban coming of age tales like “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.”

Some criticism I read suggest that Hispanic males were characterized stereotypically as controlling or even as wife beaters, but these depictions felt (at least, to me) generally more about what happens when the pressures working class, urban people compress families, patriarchal or not. Women are often in windows in “THOMS,” which is also supposed to indicate oppression of women. I guess, sort of, although it's an image that I've read or seen in all kinds of urban stories/shows/movies (why “227” pops into my head first, I can't say) where women are at home watching the kids, but want fresh air and a little socialization. Other critics said that Esperanza's longing to leave the barrio indicated she was a sell-out. But, isn't it often the case that people want to find nicer homes to live in, especially if they live in a part of the city that isn't developed or maintained properly by the folks who run Chicago?

Ms. Cisneros certainly has a lyrical style and I suspect that this story would have been far better had she abandoned the self-defined “lazy poem” vignettes and stuck with poems. While there was beauty in her sparse prose, reminiscent of the early 20th century realists, I think the author fell short on characterization.

I read that the short chapter bursts represent a young girl's attention span, but I seem to remember having a longer attention span as a child, although everything also seemed to take a lot longer than it does as a middle-aged woman. I'm not sure that was the author's intent, but it is interesting to think about the snipets of everyday life in “THOMS,” some of which remind me of stories my Mom and Grandparents told me about growing up or living in Chicago's cold-water flats or tenements (where it's a good idea to put the legs of your bed in kerosene to keep the bed bugs away). Some chapters, like “Hips,” were excellent and captured the chants children sing when jumping rope and dissecting topics like what happens to hips when a women gives birth. Or “Born Bad.” These were fully developed scenes with better characterization and language. Also, the anecdote Esperanza's father told about eating “hamandeggs” meal in, meal out, reminds me of the story that Aunt Catherine related about how her Italian immigrant parents referred to the “backhouse” (the out house in the back yard), which she thought was a Italian word until she was old enough to parse it out.

All in all, I'm glad I finally got around to reading “THOMS,” but I can't say I'd put it up there with other great coming-of-age literature.

This is the first installment in the Maisie Dobbs series that I found really boring.

There seemed to be too many characters introduced that didn't provide interesting red herrings or do anything for the story. And the central mystery was underwhelming and didn't make any sense.

Also, the entire “romance” with James Compton is very superficial and really needs to be jettisoned!

“Dreamers” is a delightful, comedic tale full of colorful characters. At first, I thought that the book was just a sweet little story and the perfect snack for a summer's evening. However, after letting the book marinate in my mind for a few days, it occurs to me that the sudden switches in point of view make the quality of the story more dreamlike.

Near the end of the book, oafish and endearing Ove Rolandsen says: “Summer is the time for dreaming, and then you have to stop. But some people go on dreaming all their lives, and cannot change.” There are characters in the book who are of the former stripe (Ove, Elise Mack) and those who are of the latter flavor (Miss van Loos, the curate's wife). Thus, the story suggests that living life instead of always imagining what may be is the path to success.

Despite dreamlike elements, the dialogue crackles with realism over 100 years after original publication and I found myself laughing out loud in several spots.

Although I previously read this book in 2013, I remembered almost none of it. Which is a sad commentary on my mental state at that time; I was going through some health and other personal issues at the time and am not totally surprised I was checked out.

With that said, this book is well worth reading more than once and not just because it won a National Book Award in 2012 or because my Great Books book club selected the novel for our March read.

Each book I read by Louise Erdrich is full of humor, pathos, and very real characters (from the main characters to the most side of side characters) and I end the books wanting to hear more of her voice and go to her book store in North Dakota, Birchbark Books. This particular book is also a coming-of-age novel about a young Ojibwe teenager named Joe Coutts, what it means to be a true friend, the plague of crimes against indigenous women, contemporary Ojibwe culture, the complex legal authority and sovereignty affecting different indigenous Americans living on and near reservations, and a huge family tragedy. Okay, and a lot more.

My edition included an interview with the author at the end. Here are a few other interesting videos related to this book:

PBS News Hour conversation with Louise Erdrich after the book release: https://www.pbs.org/video/pbs-newshour-conversation-louise-erdrich-author-of-the-round-house/

Louise Erdrich short reading from novel on PBS NewsHour: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFVgqde1XQI

Montgomery Foundation of Dartmouth Reading and Conversation with Louise Erdrich: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vK9G0ydx12M

“The Polish Boxer” is a book I picked up after coming across a list of books from the blog “A Year of Reading the World.” I, too, had been thinking about finding ways to diversify points of view in the books I read when I came across the blog. It is also a topic that is spoken about regularly by the students at Shimer College, where I currently work, and also in my Great Books book club; it can be challenging to find all of the “Great Books,” even if they aren't officially noted as such. And this is one book that should certainly be considered in that category.

What is this book? Is it a set of short stories or linked snapshots of important events in a man's life? Is it semi-autobiographical or is the author playing with the audience? Did the synopsis on the back of this book make me want to not read this book? But, once I started the book, did I find myself drawn into and born away the swirling smoke of the fictional Halfon's cigarettes? Yes!

In fact, the blocks of unaccounted-for time between stories, the lack of resolution about the meaning of gypsy pirouettes, the embedded dialogue, and the globe-traveling stories could, in the wrong hands, be obnoxious and frustrating, but are handled beautifully by Mr. Halfon. The author wove together each story to frame the true (or not true?) story that his grandfather was saved in Auschwitz by the advice of a Polish boxer, who the grandfather never saw again. All of these hijinks play with the idea of whether literature is true, is always masking another tale (true or not), and what is real and not real in everyday life; the entire novel plays with the idea of what is reliable. Is Milan Rakic Gypsy or Serb? Did a Polish boxer or something else save Halfon's grandfather in the concentration camp? Does a disgruntled literature professor find every moment tedious or is he moved by the talent of one student that he travels out to the countryside to try to understand why the student has suddenly left school?

Interestingly, five translators brought this Guatemalan novel into English; either they are very magical people or they all were able to sing with Halfon's voice such that the final product is cohesive. I do not have the talent to read this book in Spanish, but I hope to cajole my brother or a Guatemalan friend to read the book in its native language and then read it in English to see whether the translators did as marvelous a job as I suspect they have. Also, I can only hope that more of Mr. Halfon's works become available in English translations!

Hm. I just finished “My Brilliant Friend,” and while I thought it was somewhat entertaining, I am at a loss as to understand how this novel is as great as major reviewers and other readers think it is. I found it just okay. Perhaps, a 2.4. Honestly, the best thing about the book was the relationship between Elena and Lila. Who didn't have that best friend growing up who made everything brighter, but who you also competed with a bit? The ebbs and flows of each girl's day-to-day successes were very realistic; it has been suggested that the novels are autobiographical, although the author's true identity remain a mystery. However, the author doesn't do a very good job of characterizing others in the book other than Lila and Elena; the other characters seemed like placeholders, which, perhaps, they were intended to be given Elena's inability to really fit in anywhere.

I also liked the descriptions of the lower middle class neighborhood filled with gossip and jealousy, where the world is small and close-knit. The author does manage to evoke life in the neighborhood and how amazing it is to visit Ischia or other parts of Naples.

The writing is also just okay. It's not bad, but it isn't anything special, and I don't think that is to do with the novel I read being a translation from Italian. This book seems most suited to the young adult category and is better than a lot of recent releases in that genre, but I can't find don't see the genius of it. After I reached the halfway point, the rest of the book was a bit of a slog. The “twist” at the end of the novel didn't compel me to continue the series; in a rather uncharacteristic move, I read summaries from reviews containing spoilers to learn what happens in the three sequels and I feel okay about it.

This book is soooo much fun!

During the summer, the step kids and I liked to do art together at least once a week. Midway through this hot summer (and approaching non-Summer Camp days around July 4th), I found this book at the library. A treasure!

A we had a blast doing about 25% of different exercises (draw a specific thing with your non-dominant hand, then eyes closed with dominant hand, and so forth). We were truly cracking up while ding these exercises and there weee nearly daily requests for “the nonsense book.”

If you are into Oprah Book Club books, this one is for you.

When I first began “The Orchardist,” the descriptive passages led me to believe that I might be in for a pleasant surprise, although the summary on the dust jacket promised me “feral, scared, and very pregnant” girls. “In certain seasons, in certain shades, memories alighted on him like sharp-taloned birds: a head turning in the foliage, lantern light flaring in a room.” Sort of nice, no?

Then we spend pages and pages of Talmadge, the titular character, preparing this or that food and placing the plate on the porch with every creak of the elbow described. From there the book simply tries too hard to be sensational and manages to drag boringly while doing so. Not an easy task! (Spoiler) There's a sister who disappearing mysteriously (okay, that happened earlier than the endless delivery of plates, but it belongs in the list), girls hanging themselves from trees, a child prostitution house, horse wrangling, tree topping, an attempted assassination, and a jailbreak (or at least a attempt to flee on a flipping ferry), shootings...blardy blardy blah. All of this lurid, melodramatic fare is why I compare this to the typical Oprah Book Club book: not a lot of substance, but a whole lot of poppycock.

The conceit of characters trapped by a lack of communication (I could make a list of which characters, but only Caroline Middey sort of speaks her mind) could have been alright if the author didn't bludgeon the reader over the head with it at every turn of the page. There's so much dithering about whether to say SOMETHING that I just wanted the book to get on with already! Said dithering thus wiped out whatever interest was supposed to be created with the outlandish plot.

On a stylistic note, the author chose not to use quotation or other punctuation to set off dialogue. While there's a case to be made for trying out different methods of writing a story, this particular choice was distracting and annoying. In fact, the dialogue, such as it was, was poorly written. Was the lack of punctuation meant to make you think the dialogue was more exciting or to make you feel less connected to any of the characters? I wish I could say that a wise editor could have have saved this novel, but there were just too many negatives for me to enjoy it.

To be honest, I did not expect much from “A Casual Vacancy,” J.K. Rowling's first foray into post-Potter adult lit. However, I was pleasantly surprised and finished the book with a 3.5 star feeling. At least some portion of my enjoyment came from the audiobook version as performed by the marvelous Tom Hollander; his excellent voicing of the characters really brought out each personality.

And what truly shines in this offering is the characterization; in the words of Fats Wall, the people of Pagford and the Fields are authentic. The book seemed to start off a bit slowly, but it takes time to build each character word by word, while painting the general society of the small town of Pagford. By the time you reach the end of the novel, you practically feel enmeshed in the fabric of the town; despite all of the tragedies along the way, I was rather sad to leave. In a way, “ACV” is a drama of manners, not just a character study.

Was there a main character? I say yes, it was Barry Fairbrother's ghost. Not the ghost “haunting” the message board of Pagford's council parish, mind you. The thread tying all of the people in the book together was the impact that Barry had while alive or the ripple-effect of his death. His very absence kicked off the fire-storm of accusatory posts against contenders for Barry's seat; a not-at-all-casual visitation of sins of the father/mother on their children returning to beleaguer them. Anonymousish electronic communication is used at parents when in-person communication is either missing or extremely derogatory.

The two casual vacancies sandwich a bit of soap opera and a bit of muckraking with a lot of real-life situations, both brutal and hum-drum. To say there is no plot in this book is a mistake; characters change or do their best to change from Crystal to Fats to Sukhvinder to Samantha Mollison. So, truly quite an enjoyable book and I look forward to more non-Harry Potter (or more Harry Potter) from Ms. Rowling.

Other reviewers have provided a more robust analysis of precisely what is wrong with this novel, so I shall be brief. The characters, plot, world building (or lack of), and writing are nowheresville. The success of this book (and series) clearly piggybacks off of “Hunger Games,” but can't begin to worship at Katniss' blood-tinged arrow. I was hoping for more Chicago dystopia in the book, but even that was missing. Frankly, this book was worse than “Twilight,” and that was a snore. So, waste not your time!!

I agree with other reviewers that there are some issues with this book, although I'm not sorry I picked it up. I won't belabor the point that the handful of people used to represent the rich genetic background of the US wasn't remotely representative.

What really bothered me was a section on page 158 of the hardcover version. Sykes proposes that all living homo sapiens descend from a “universal ancestor” who originated about 1,900 years ago. The model used to calculate this estimate is supposed to take the impact of cross-continent migration. So, the figure of 1,900 years wouldn't seem to support estimates related to the ancestry of Native Americans. If someone can explain why Sykes' theory is correct, I'd love to hear the explanation.

However, the book is enjoyable and does provide some interesting stories, such as the Scottish surname investigation and how mitochondrial DNA is passed.

James Barke's first novel about Robert Burns' life as a young man is very well written. He, like the poet, uses a mix of English and Scots cadences to bring to life the landscape, daily life, and people surrounding Burns. Although I am not well-versed in Scots, the online Dictionary of Scots Language was a helpful supplement to this book.

Thus is a delightful little book, made even more delightful (in the audiobook version) by Simon Callow's narration.

I remember loving “Julius Caesar” I high school. And there are still brilliant speeches and dramatic moments to enjoy, and certainly glimpses into the character's psyches. But, I do think that this play, supposedly one of Shakespeare's earlier works, suffers from lack of even a few stanzas of exposition about Julius Caesar's lack of character or Brutus' motivation. Perhaps, an older Shakespeare would have addressed that weakness.

My book club read the play along with Plutarch's “Lives” segment about Julius Caesar, which provides a more comprehensive view of historical events of the time. Shakespeare is said to have used Thomas North's translation Plutarch's “Lives” (available online I found that one dry as dust but there are entire passages that are nearly lifted from that translation. It's worthwhile to read the two works in conjunction for that reason alone. Eventually, I plan to read all of the associated “Lives,” although tax season is not the time to do it.

Denis Johnson has this lovely way of writing that sometimes sneaks up on you in its Americanness. Some sentences just jump out of books and clobber you with their greatness, making you rock back out of the story to appreciate said beauty. There's an art to creating something lovely that lets you keep going and not drive off the road from distraction, so to speak.

It is a quiet book, largely about the life of a man after he loses his wife and child in a tragedy. Despite working on the railroad's trek west, Granier ends up living solitarily, appreciating the little red dog or fighting back the encroaching wilderness. Mr. Johnson truly has a knack for dialogue that lives and breathes, which I consider to be a true accomplishment.

Perhaps, there is something very American not just about the language, but also about the book. After Granier's Aunt and Uncle take him in, he lives amongst his extended family, never quite belonging. He finds a true home with his wife and child, but then spins into loneliness, still following a somewhat nomadic career until his body can no longer handle the work. Americans have became lonelier as they shifted away from living in extended family clusters. “Conquering” America's West did mean giving up sitting around the hearth with your kin, but was it worth it? For Granier specifically, would he have found a woman he loved as much as Gladys? We'll never know, but Johnson's novella is definitely worth a read, coming in at 3.4 stars for me.

The premise sounded interesting, so I thought, why not?

Why not, indeed.

The main character and her classmates are close to my age, yet nothing these characters say or do (other than listening to Duran Duran) seemed mid-80s to me. In fact, there was little differentiation between the way characters spoke.

“When We Were Silent” was inspired by the 1990's true story of a swimming coach who abused the children he was supposed to be training. The book is about that story and how the silence of the abused isn't just from fear, but also from other people keeping you silent.
If a book isn't well-written, any subject matter, no matter how important, is going your way fall flat. And that's what happened here.