The Widow of Larkspur Inn, Lawana Blackwell

I couldn't find a usable picture for this one.

This was an enjoyable book to read. Not a page turner the whole way through, but a nice, thoughtful and thought provoking book. It is a Christian author, so there are many thoughts from the main character, Julia Hollis, that are directed towards God. Through very difficult circumstances, Julia must come to terms with her faith and what she's made of. She has good friends who also help her to see things in a better or different light. For instance, there is a time when she is putting the Larkspur Inn together and wishes she had better silverware to use for service when she has lodgers. Her maid and closest friend, Fiona, suggests she pray for silver. At first the notion seems silly. When she had already been blessed so much, why pray to God for something that seems almost frivolous? But she reasons that she might as well, because if it's not right, then obviously God would know and would let her know or at the least not let a set of silverware fall into her path. Not much later, one of her other new found friends offers her a set of silverware, it's not a coincidence! And some people might say it was just luck. That's fine. Others might say that sort of thing doesn't happen in real life. But it does. Let me tell you. Twice in my life I've had to sell a home. Twice I've had a home sell in two weeks. And this current one we're in the process of is nothing short of a miracle because we listed on our own with just a sign in the yard and an ad on craigslist. I believe in God and I believe that when you are following His will, He makes a way. Sometimes that way is not always easy; ease of the way is not always evidence of His hand. But I believe when things REALLY matter, they have a way of working out. And when they DON'T, there's a reason.

There are some things that happen with other characters in the book that didn't need to have happened, but because of the mistake of another, vital information did not reach its intended target and there was a lot of anguish that might have been avoided. But there's also the chance that had those things NOT taken place, none of the characters could have turned out the way they did having NOT suffered a certain hardship.

Though this book is part of a series, each of the books (I'm told) are not a chronological continuation of the same people. They follow story lines of other people who live in the same town. I've got a stack of other books I need to read (all my holds from the library came at once!), but I do look forward to reading more of these books. There were times when I thought it was a little eye rolling with the Christianity, but then as I read more, I kept thinking about how different my daily life might be if I were more mindful of God and if I conversed with him in my thoughts throughout the day rather than just in formal prayer. It'd probably do me some good, to be honest.....

Unwholly, Neal Shusterman

The second book in the "Unwind" triology (which actually ended up turning into a quartet, by the way).

Same phenomal split narrative writing skills. Some of the same characters you know and love (Conner, Risa, Lev) and some new ones. You see different groups of people rise up. The group that saves tithes from themselves, the AWOLS who go in and actually rescue kids from their homes BEFORE the juvie cops get there. And the storks. One kid, who goes by the last name Starkey, was a kid who was storked. Not that he was the model child, but he went AWOL after getting away from the juvie cops that would take him to his unwinding. Oh. My. Goodness. This kid is a character you love to hate. Kids like him make you actually consider unwinding as a viable option to dealing with the problem. He plays the victim like the best special interest groups of today do. He gets every other kid who was storked to believe that they are special, that they have been second class citizens for far too long, that they deserve special privileges to make up for all the wrongs done to them. GAH! It made me SICK! And because of this attitude, his volatile temper and his inability to see the problem with using violence, he puts the entire resistance effort and ALL the kids in the Graveyard in a big compromise.

Another totally unexpected character is a boy named Cam. I won't say too much about him. You've got to learn who he is as you go.

And of course, the evil Nelson (the juvie cop Conner tranq'd with his own tranq gun) is back and you get his perspective too and it is down right CREEPY to be in that guys head. He has turned into a "parts pirate". Apparently, because the age of unwinding dropped to 17, there is a shortage of parts, if you will. So you have these 'parts pirates' who will take, unwind and sell parts on the black market to those who can't get them with the regular waiting list. They pay higher than the reward for turning in an AWOL so you can see how a guy like Nelson, shamed for his incompetence, would turn into a villain like that.

Hair raising, bone chilling, and page turning. But I'm really excited because you're starting to get more details. History. People at the head of the pioneering. How a man responsible for the technology that makes unwinding possible created an organization that was SUPPOSED to keep things in ethical balance, who are now responsible for some of the most horrific sci-fi stuff in society. I have hope that things can change in this futuristic society. Which is why I'll continue to read these books about such a crazy, messed up society.

At the heart of all this is the question of the human soul. Apparently, if you don't technically die, then your soul (if it exists) is never released from your body. You continue to exist through others in this "divided state" of being. And of course, it's total speculation, but if you ceased to be YOU as a whole, how could your soul be split? I mean, aside from Horcruxes of course ;-)

Another discussion is how much control can mankind actually HAVE over the human body and/or soul. How much can science have control over before whatever Greater Being (if you believe in such) would surrender. For instance, even if such a thing as unwinding were possible, I have a hard time believing that a God would keep a person's soul trapped in a divided state. That while all the organs, bones and tissues were still "alive" according to science, they would just be parts. Yes, perhaps muscle memory *might* come into play, but I believe that the soul cannot be divided. But it is an interesting concept to explore-especially since unwinding is done while the subject is fully conscious (yet completely numbed from any pain) and the heart never stops, nor do any brain segments stop functioning either. But that's another thing entirely-can the brain be kept "alive" and functioning even if it is separated from itself? I have no idea if that science exists and part of me kind of hopes this kind of thing is never discovered to even be possible!!

Unwind, Neal Shusterman

Oh. My. Gosh. This has to be one of THE creepiest dystopian books I've ever picked up. Even more disturbing that Hunger Games.

This is set up post "Heartland War" which was a war that was fought between the Pro-Choice vs. Pro-Life people. It got out of hand that even the military was unable to quell either side. A compromise was struck.....life was protected from conception through age 12. Then, if the child were still unwanted, s/he could be retroactively aborted anytime between the ages of 13-18 if the child weren't technically "dead". In other words, their entire bodies would be harvested out. Medicine no longer tries to fix broken parts; they immediately transplant. Need a new kidney? Just throw in a new one. Need a new arm because of an accident? They graft on a new one. Have epilepsy? Easy, remove the part of the brain that causes seizures and replace it with other healthy brain tissue. All the parts come from teens who have been "unwound". Once a child is 18, they are considered an adult and are no longer eligible for being unwound. Parents (or guardians) have to sign the unwind order and once signed, it cannot be revoked. Many kids don't even know it's going to happen until there's no escape.

But the book opens with Conner finding out that his parents are having him unwound. Sure he's been kind of a trouble maker and got into fights, but he doesn't believe it warrants having to give up his life as he knows it! He manages to escape and what ensues is a crazy journey with new friends trying to survive. Along the way, we meet another group of kids who are going to be unwound, but these kids are "tithes". They are brought up knowing from their earliest childhood that they are holy and special; that like the "firstlings of the flock" or Christ Himself, their purpose in life is to be unwound when they are 13 as an offering to God and to mankind. They believe they are doing this for a better cause. To further humanity and serve in a way so complete that cannot be done any other way.

I will warn you, there is a pretty gruesome scene that I thought I was going to be sick. I was horrified. It was MUCH worse than the Twilight vampires in Italy feasting on the poor tourists (that almost made me puke too). This practice of unwinding is so common place-and people think it's great. I mean, no shortage of blood in the blood banks, no waiting in line for an organ transplant. Supplies to sustain and improve life are available in copious amounts. But no one thinks about the kids who are unwound. They were troubled or trouble makers at worst, just average and not quite good enough at best (and without parents to say they were wanted).

Conner's first friend is a girl named Risa, who is being unwound simply because she lives in a State Home as a ward of the state and they need to reduce their teen population by 5%, so they pick and choose the least likely to have a super rewarding adulthood I guess. Risa has always been well behaved and scores above average at school. But she chose classical piano training and it is a competitive field. She's not quite the best, so she is chosen to be unwound. When Conner makes his infamous escape, so does she. They partner up for survival sake. Conner is a guy who acts on impulses. Risa thinks things through. She observes and then makes calculating moves. It's actually kind of cool to see how Risa teaches Conner to harness his emotions and think before he acts. It transforms him from delinquent to respected leader.

Another thing that is a little creepy is that at the beginning of some parts (the book is separated into Parts and then chapters), there are actual real life things that obviously were the inspiration for this book. Like the case from 2003 in Ukraine where BBC found that there were several mothers who gave birth to healthy babies but had the babies taken away by maternity staff and were gone-told they were dead. An investigation led to exhume around 30 of these little bodies and found them to be stripped, some dismembered and that it was possible evidence of harvesting stem cells from bone marrow. There is a link in the book the full BBC story. And a 2001 incident of someone trying to sell their soul on ebay. There is constant conversation about whether or not a person has a soul, and if one is not technically dead, where can the soul go? What about consciousness? And there is growing evidence that "parts come with their own personality". For instance, if you have a grafted hand, that hand has muscle memory to do things you've never done. In one minor character, he has a part of brain that sometimes shifts him to be more like the grafted brain portion than himself. He has memories that are not his.

There there are other things to think about, chicken and egg things, for instance, which statement is more true: "You can't change laws without first changing human nature." or "You can't change human nature without first changing the law." Which is more compelling? Which needs to change first? Can laws shift human nature? Or does human nature shift laws?

Another thing that got me thinking is that the age they picked for this 13-18, is the most challenging age to parent! We often joke about how we'd like to send our teenagers away during that time; but would anyone really want to get rid of a child forever? As I have a 10 year old getting more and more mouthy each day and more moody each year, I have come to the conclusion that NOTHING she does (or doesn't do) could push me to the limit of wanting her in my life.

In this society, they have decided the best way to deal with those who don't fit in, conform, or act out is to just get rid of them. Sure it's super easy, but is that really the best solution? When I teach, sure it's easier when certain disruptive kids happen to be home sick and I don't have the deal with it and a ton of learning happens. But this book drives home the point that ignoring or doing away with a problem doesn't truly fix anything. Or make anyone better. And that there are probably a rare few who are past rehabilitation. You can see how in a society that just doesn't want to deal with problems would pressure parents to just "unwind" their unruly kids rather than try to help them, that parents cave. Or they make the decision in haste or with emotion (like when we adults dole out unfair punishments of infinitely LESS consequence than unwinding!)-and of course it's irrevocable.

This book is a series....there are 4 books (the last one came out last year) plus a novella of what happened to one of the characters while he was absent from the narrative in the first book. At the end of book 1, a law is changed in favor of these kids, so it gives me enough hope that this society would get rid of such a horrid practice that I'm going to eventually read the other books.

I have to say the thing that impressed me the most in this writing is that all of the different narrators have a VERY strong individual voice. When I'm reading Conner's parts, I am in Conner's head, I hear Conner's voice. When it's Risa's turn, all that fills my head is HER and HER voice. Same for incidental characters that don't even have names or only 1-2 chapters. It's absolutely incredible! I've read split narratives before, but there's always something similar in the narrative, something that always makes me need to double check who is narrating the passage. This was not like that at ALL. I think this is probably the best specimen of split narrative that I've read in quite a while. I think the last one that had such stark individuality was "The Elegance of the Hedgehog", but the split narrative there was split between an early teen and a woman in her mid 50s, so I would think it easier to make them sound different and unique enough. This book is more impressive because you have 3 main teenagers, and others that are all incredibly unique. Conner and Lev sound like boys, Risa sounds like a girl. It's crazy good writing in that way!

Hidden Girl, Shyima Hall

I couldn't find an image url that would work here, I guess the book is too new!

This book is incredible.

Shyima Hall is a beautiful woman who went through something NO CHILD should ever have to go through.

This book is her memoir of what it was like for her to be sold into domestic slavery by her family in Egypt when she was 8. A couple of those years were spent in Egypt, where unfortunately, it is fairly common and accepted practice for wealthy families to "employ" the lower class as servants. Some of these families receive a small compensation. For instance, it was Shyima's older sister who first served a wealthy family and her family got paid the equivalent of $17 US dollars per month for her to work for them. She stole from this family and the family required something for justice. So they said they'd take Shyima to work in her sister's place to uphold the family honor and repay her sister's debt.

Her stroke of luck came when the family she was serving had to move out of Egypt because The Dad of the family had gotten into some sort of trouble and couldn't stay or was running from the government. They chose California in the US to come. They smuggled Shyima with them. She was around 10. They had 2 older daughters (teens), a daughter Shyima's age and two younger twin boys. Shyima was their only servant they brought to the states.

A day in her life: wake up on her own before dawn in her tiny garage room. Knock on door to be let in (since it was locked) to even be able to use a bathroom. Then she'd get the twins up, iron their clothes for school, wake the 10 year old daughter, iron her clothes for school, make breakfast and lunch for the 3 younger kids and get them off to school. Ask the older girls "What can I do for you?" and iron their clothes, make them a breakfast of coffee, orange juice, cereal, eggs and bacon. Bend to their every whim of requests to re-iron clothes, find purses and keys, etc. Clean kitchen, bathroom, office. The Mom and the Dad would wake up around noon, she would then have to draw a bath from The Mom, then vacuum and dust two living spaces that were never used. Then clean all the upstairs bedrooms and bathrooms. Go next door to where a family member of The Mom's lived and clean THAT house top to bottom. Come home, get snack ready for younger kids, start cooking dinner. Serve dinner, get younger kids ready for bed by turning down their beds (that she had made that morning), laying out PJs and even putting toothpaste on the boys' toothbrushes! If the boys were late for bed, or didn't listen to her to go to bed, SHE would get in trouble for them not getting to bed on time, not them. Then she would finally be able to eat her one and only meal-whatever was leftover from the family's dinner. She often didn't even drink water during the day. She'd have to clean up the kitchen and the house long after the rest went to bed. Sometimes she'd be up as late as 4am only to get up and do it again in a couple hours. The one thing we can be grateful for is that she was not sexually molested during any of this period of time. The only time she had issues with that was some of her older brothers in Egypt when she lived with her family. Her clothes were not allowed to be washed in their washing machine, so she had to wash them in a bucket. They denied her medication when she was sick. When she started her period, The Mom said she didn't deserve to have good pads, so they bought her the cheapest thing available. They only spoke Arabic at home so she never learned English.

She has no idea who made a call about her to rescue her. But she is grateful. She gives you ideas on how to potentially spot a child or adult who is the victim of human trafficking. It was a LONG way for her to learn English, to become literate, and to become a citizen of the United States. She has come a long way in being able to trust people. I may not agree with the way she thinks about everything, but if I had gone through what she did, I am almost certain I would feel nearly identical to her. And she is definitely evolving as a person. I found a few interviews with her that I will post links too.

If you want a fresh perspective on life, read this book! I love how she says that these bad things need to be a memory not a present thing if you are to be able to live the life you want.

http://live.huffingtonpost.com/r/segment/human-trafficking-survivor-speaks-out/52d577bd02a76077a300088b

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqRMglSSD7s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qEKoI6kaJ4

If you want a long one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKu8NuKCe4s

And one thing that I think is exceptionally incredible is that whoever Shyima's rescuer is has continued to remain anonymous. This person obviously does NOT care about getting ANY fame or glory for doing the right thing. I could understand giving an anonymous tip until you knew for sure that something was wrong. False accusations to CPS can be crippling to an innocent person, so no one wants to be on the wrong end of a false accusation. But once it came to light that it WAS a bad situation, to never come forward and claim that you were responsible for setting her free, I like to think that it shows that the motives for this person were pure.

Artemis Fowl The Eternity Code (#3)

Another fast paced adventure!

I enjoyed this installment and particularly liked Artemis' character development. I also enjoyed the point made in this novel that we are who we are because of what we experience and what we remember. Kinda falls back on the "What Alice Forgot" line of thinking. Artemis underestimates himself and his opponent. This gets him in a VERY sticky situation and he calls on the People for help. In return for one last epic help-he agrees to be mind wiped at the end of it all.

He does warn them that he is worried he will physiologically revert back to who he was before he had all the experiences with the People. Well, "worried" is a loose term meaning that Artemis wants THEM to worry about it enough to not rob him of the memories he has grown to really like-and potentially profit from.

But it does bring to light the fact that we are VERY complex beings. And no one factor can truly dominate how and why we make the choices we do. It's a mixture of personality, knowledge, mistakes, successes, failures, being wronged, being supported, being rewarded, moral values-and our level of understanding and/or commitment to those moral values, levels of personal endurance and probably a whole lot more!

My nearly 10 year old and I had a good conversation about the enemy in this book, Jon Spiro, and what the ramifications of owning/controlling TV and media. Spiro states that if he had the wealth and technology he wanted, he could most importantly control TV and the world. So we talked about how the dissemination of information is vital to being able to have an informed and educated opinion. We talked about countries who give VERY one sided information to their citizens (i.e. N. Korea, China, Middle East, etc.) and how they have certain opinions simply for lack of being able to have access to another side of the story. And how that happens even on a smaller scale in America, based on the political leanings of those in control of the network channels. It was a great side discussion that I hope starts bringing awareness to my daughter about the importance of seeking out ALL the information-and trying to find objective information when possible-before coming to a conclusion of how you feel about a certain situation or issue.

What Alice Forgot, Liane Moriarty

Oh. My. GOODNESS. This was a FABULOUS book! I could not put it down. From page one-a dream-like sequence where Alice is waking up from a head injury.....to a life she has no idea she's living. She has lost 10 years of her memory and thinks she is pregnant with her first child. This resonated with me quite a bit because if I had a head injury today and lost the last 10 years of MY life, I would be pregnant with my first child as well.

It's told from the perspective of Alice, from her sister Elizabeth in her "homework" journal entries to her counselor, and from their adopted Grandmother Frannie in her letters to a man named Phil. I loved all the perspectives and I think it really pieced the story together nicely.

You are completely confused-you are right along with Alice in her inability to understand anything going on. She wakes in the hospital to find out that she and her husband are separating and she has no idea why. WHY would they separate? They are madly in love! They had a baby together (she has a whole FAMILY she can't remember). But without the experiences of the last decade of her life to form her current opinion, she looks at everything differently. The way she parents is different; the years of having kids haven't worn her down, which help her to have a better relationship with them, I think. It's SO funny, when she realizes that she doesn't know their routines, she wonders when they should go to bed and what she ought to pack them for lunch, for instance. She has to ask her kids what usually makes her upset. Talk about taking a step back!

Anyhow, I can't write a ton without giving everything away, but this book also deals with situations such as infertility and how it affects people (one quote was "We'd done all those things that people with children seem to miss so passionately"), lost love, death, grieving, real friends vs. fake ones, the affects of husbands working hard and not being present (but caught up needing to make the money their wives insist on having to spend), and keeping up with the Jones', who to handle other's situations, ("I don't know why I did it, except that I understand now that desperate, clumsy desire to make people feel better-even when you know perfectly well that nothing will."). However, my FAVORITE lesson here is the role that forgetting MUST play in order to forgive. Not necessarily erase from your memory, but the ability to look back to BEFORE an incident occurred to remember how you felt about a person before they did something to wrong you, pretend it never happened and contemplate your reaction. Then, remembering those good feelings, look at the reality, the wrong, and then choose to forgive them even though you know what they did and how it made you feel. The phrase "forgive and forget" doesn't necessarily mean to me that you actually forget the incident as if you had it wiped from your memory. One quote I LOVED was: "It was good to remember that for every horrible memory from her marriage, there was also a happy one. She wanted to see it clearly, to understand that it wasn't all black, or all white. It was a million colors."

I also really liked how believable things were with her amnesia and the memory coming back. For instance, muscle memory. When she goes to the computer and needs to enter a password for her profile, she rests her hands on the keyboard and her fingers automatically type in the password (which she thinks is the strangest password, WHY would her password be THAT???"). And that when she remembers things, it's usually because of a smell that throws her back in time. Studies have shown that sense of smell is most strongly linked to our memories than any other sense we have. My science teacher in high school once told us of a study where they gave people something to smell and though none of the adults could identify it, they all said it reminded them of playing outside as a child. The scent turned out to be some pheromone that ants secrete, so it would make sense that people as kids paying outside in the dirt would have been exposed to it completely unaware.

I also thought about taking a step back in parenting. It's apparent that Alice and her older daughter probably haven't seen eye to eye in years. She is very sullen and doesn't respond to who Alice has become (albeit probably from years of parenting!), but as amnesia Alice meets her oldest daughter and finds way to make her smile, she realizes things about her daughter that she probably had overlooked having "been there" the whole time verses looking at her through new lenses. I could probably benefit from doing that.....try to see my kids as other people see my kids, even though I KNOW they have faults and quirks that drive me nuts that these other people don't see, it would benefit me to try to choose to see only the good in more instances than I currently do.

I DO have to warn you that there IS some foul language, including the F-bomb every now and again (only used in extreme anger, not as a casual everyday piece of vocabulary, like the way swear words were used in "Fangirl" that I wasn't a fan of), and discussion of extra-marital relationships (no details). However, if you view it from these people's perspective, it is REAL dialog used and real behaviors of our day and if I didn't know any better, I might react in exactly the same way. I feel the lessons learned overshadowed the incidents. If I could, because of that, I would give this book 4.5 stars, but Goodreads doesn't do half star ratings, so I did give it a 5.

I can't wait to read more from this author!


SPOILER AHEAD, ONLY READ IF YOU'VE READ THE BOOK




The tone of this book is HILARIOUS as well. For instance, when Alice has to help a child with homework "(She'd actually groaned when she saw the number of worksheets Tom had pulled out from his bag the other night, which wasn't very parental of her)," and contemplative: "She had always thought that exquisitely happy time at the beginning of her relationship with Nick was the ultimate, the feeling they'd always be trying to replicate, to get back, but now she realized that was wrong. That was like comparing sparkling mineral water to French champagne. Early love is exciting and exhilarating. It's light and bubbly. Anyone can love like that. But love after three children, after a separation and a near-divorce, after you've hurt each other and forgiven each other, after you've seen the worst and the best-well, that sort of a love is ineffable. It deserves its own word.

The Traitor's Wife, Alison Pataki

Holy WOW! What a debut novel! Some of the most riveting Historical Fiction I've read. I am DEFINITELY going to seek out more Allison Pataki books in the future-especially as she's chosen Historical Fiction as her genre of choice.

The other thing I found absolutely FASCINATING is that this is the SECOND Historical Fiction piece I've read about the exact same historical event. The first being "Sophia's War" by Avi. The first historical fiction book I read with my older daughter to introduce her.

What was intriguing about juxtaposing both of these is that it was the maid who made privy the information that a betrayal was going on. Sophia, if I remember correctly, from the New York front, as she was recruited to be a spy posing as a maid to John Andre, and in this one, Clara, the ladies maid to Miss. Peggy Shippen Arnold. What is striking is that in both accounts, the fatal flaw was that they assumed their help to be of such a simple mind that they couldn't possibly understand what was going on; either that or they overestimated the loyalty such a person of help could have. The upper class was so high as to believe that out of their magnanimity, they provide their servants with food, shelter and employment, and in return they brazenly expect loyalty. Or at the very least, they expect their hired help to agree with their political sentiments. But in both cases, the hired help were greatly underestimated. Sophia by her agreement to be a spy and Clara by her free will as a person who wants freedom-and who is, in fact, a very smart person with morals and integrity.

So this story, is, as you may have surmised, told by Clara, Peggy's maid from the time she was 18 years old. She is at the height of Philadelphia society and the most sought after beauty. A loyalist through and through, youngest child of Judge Shippen who also has him wrapped around her little finger. She's used to getting what she wants, and sources after her death strongly suggest that it was she who orchestrated the treachery that was to be handing over West Point and even perhaps General Washington's life. Of course, nothing is simple and Benedict Arnold was certainly wronged on many accounts and appears that he was kind of a difficult personality to deal with as well. I absolutely loved reading the section at the end that talked about what was fact and what was fiction. I TOTALLY want to read some of the non-fiction books she read as preparation for writing this novel! This is truly only of those salacious stories that are so crazy it probably all reads more like fiction than reality.

And if you aren't familiar with the story of the Revolutionary War enough to know about Benedict Arnold and his betrayal-you should get yourself familiar with it! Kudos to the real people in history who uncovered this plot. Otherwise, it is quite likely that we never would have had a United States of America.