List of Books Read

I'm not finding the time for book reviews these days, but I don't want to lose the memory of those I've read, so I'm just going to make a list for now and hopefully get back to it later:

June 2012 - Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (after Seth was born)
July 2012 - Little House in the Big Woods (read to kids while watching new chickens)
Oct 2012 - The Witch of Blackbird Pond
Oct 2012 - The Courage of Sarah Noble
Nov 2012 - Calico Bush
In China
Jan 2013 - A Grain of Rice
Feb 2013 - Li Lun, Lad of Courage
Mar 2013 - I Rode a Horse of Milk White Jade
May 2013 - Young Fu of the Upper Yangtze
Back in Virginia
Sept 2013 - Little Britches
Oct 2013 - Shades of Gray/Rifles for Watie
Nove 2013 - The Good Master
Dec 2013 - A Year Down Yonder
Jan 2013 - The Endless Steppe/The House of Sixty Fathers
Feb 2013 - The Giver/ Number the Stars/The Boy in the Striped Pajamas/I Am David
Mar 2013 - The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963
Apr 2013 - Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
May 2013 - The Chocolate Touch

The Burning Time

I thought this book would be about the Salem witch trials, but it was about witch burnings in England instead. Still a grim time period in history and this book really brought out the fear and the reality of what it was like for just a simple country girl. Awful, really awful, but the book was written well and kept my interest, or was it being 9 months pregnant and just wanting to lie down that kept me reading it?

Teach Like Your Hair's On Fire

This is such a fun how to book for teaching children. It is a non-fiction book about a teacher in Los Angeles. I recommend it to any teacher, public school or homeschool, as long as they realize that this is one of those take from it what you can and leave the rest or you will be overwhelmed. It really seems humanly impossible to do what this man has done in one lifetime, but he has, just not while raising 5 kids, serving in young women's and running a household all at the same time.

Captain Corelli's Mandolin

I started reading this book, another one on the BBC "classic" list that I got from the library. I don't remember exactly what happened but I know I stopped reading it, gave it a one star and got rid of it immediately, so I'm assuming it has some illicit content and that as soon as I came across it, I closed the book and was done.

Knife of Never Letting Go

The librarian recommended this book after I told him that I liked The City of Ember, he said it was another dystopian society book that a lot of the teens like. I started it and really liked the story, but I really didn't like the language, so I stopped reading it after a while. I actually got fairly far into the book, because I liked it, but I just didn't like bad language, so it just didn't work for me.

Sarah's Key

I thought that this book was typical of most contemporary literature. It takes a subject that should be interesting in and of itself, assumes that the reader will not be interested in the subject, and then proceeds to fill the book full of attention seeking drama to pull in the interest of the reader. A subject like the holocaust does not need the added topics of divorce, threatened miscarriage, affairs and such to make it interesting. I liked the idea that the story was told by the point of view of a journalist investigating the events of the Vel d' Hiv roundup in France. I enjoyed learning more about these events and I even enjoyed some of the characters, like the daughter of the journalist, but overall, I thought that the author could have left out all the modern drama.

The Hiding Place

I have wanted to read this book ever since college and finally got around to it. It was very good, very inspirational. I knew it was about Corrie Ten Boom surviving life in a concentration camp, but I had no idea how spiritual of a message it contained. I love to read books that I feel change my life and make me a better person and I feel like this is that kind of book. It has been helpful as I have been struggling with the uncomfortable pains of pregnancy to be reminded that no trial I ever face will compare with that of those who survived the holocaust. This reminder makes me grateful for all my comforts in life and especially for a God who loves me and watches over my family daily.

The Prisoner of Cell 25, Michael Vey

My friend recommended this book and I decided to read it, but had no idea what it was about. I thought it was an adult non-fiction book about a man in prison, boy was I wrong! This is a teen book and a fiction for sure. This was a fun and easy read. A typical wimpy-kid-turns-superhero type book. I had a little bit of a hard time getting past the shallow way the teenagers talked, but I guess that's actually more realistic than I'd like to believe. Still, I find it difficult to believe that these kids who can't even carry on a single conversation without insulting each other can hop in a car without telling their parents and drive across 5 states to an unknown designation without a map and then all of a sudden become experts at tactical warfare. Come to think of it, my son will probably love this book, every boy's dream right?

These Is My Words

This book was recommended from a friend/author who said that it is one of the best books she has ever read for character development. I would have to say that I agree wholeheartedly. I also enjoyed this book for it's rugged adventure, heartache and sorrow followed by life consuming happiness, and events that can be applied to my daily life for strengthening in tough times. I kept finding myself referring to "the book I'm ready right now" in conversations with friends about life struggles. The only part of the book I couldn't get used to was the romantic undertones. I don't read very many books with romantic scenes and there were a few that made me blush in this book, not that they were inappropriate, I'm just not used to it. There are some violently graphic scenes that might bother others, but didn't phase me a bit, so to each his own. Also, as an avid journal writer/blogger, I enjoyed the journal-style of the writing. There were a few times when I felt like the entries were unbelievable, but that's fiction right? Overall, I really liked the book.

Heidi

This was one of my favorite books as a child and I loved sharing it with my kids. They loved it. It has some great themes to talk about as a family and gives a beautiful depiction of life on the Alps. Plus we got to eat goat cheese at book group and it was so yummy!

Unbroken

This book was so inspiring. I can't believe what these soldiers had to endure. It seems humanly impossible. It really makes me think twice about judging those vets on the side of the road. Also, if I could just remember this book, I will never feel like I have problems in my life. Because of this book, I have started recording my own trials (not that they compare) and my road to overcome them hoping that some day my stories could help someone else like this story helped me. Although this is non-fiction, it is very riveting and kept me interested from page 1 to the end. I have recommended this book to many and find myself referring to it often.

The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle

It was fun. I mean, what kid doesn't love a man who can talk with animals, traveling to an island, volcanoes, pink snails...what's not to love. My favorite part of it though is what it tells about the world at the time it was written, a time when British domination was the norm, a time when cannibalism was not unheard of and most of all, it reminds me of stories of my great grandfather living in the British East Indies. Fun stuff!

The Door in the Wall

It was okay.  A little slow to get through, but some good values are taught and it opens a little window into what Medieval life may have been like.

The Book Thief

I think from now on if anyone ever asks me what kind of books I like to read, I will answer, "Books like The Book Thief." It was perfect. My friend who lent it to me said, "You have to read about 50 pages in before it gets really good." Dear friend, I totally disagree, I was hooked at word one. The narrator - Brilliant. The imagery - amazing! I love words, I love to write with them, play with them, dream about them and this book did more with words than I could ever imagine. Plus, I love historical fiction and have always been a sucker for books set in Nazi Germany. For some strange reason, when I am reading, I love to have my heart ripped out and trampled on and this book did that. Interestingly enough, I did not cry like a baby, just a few well placed tears is all. It probably has a lot to do with the narrator's nasty habit of telling you the end of the story before it actually gets there. But, as one friend observed, that leaves you open to truly experience what Liesel is going through rather than wondering what is going to happen next. Now that I am done reading, I really miss Liesel and Rudy, Hans and Rosa and the rest of the family of Himmel Street.

Dear Mr. Henshaw

Not my favorite book group book, but it was set in California and I found myself telling the kids about this or that detail from my life that the book would bring to memory.  Divorce, low income, family disappointments, I guess it's good for kids to understand these parts of life, just not my cup of tea. But it does encourage them to write, although I don't think I've seen much of an improvement in that in our household.

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet

This was a sweet book. It took me a while to get into it, but sticking it out was worth it. I loved that it was about relationships, both romantic and family. It made me have an interest into studying some more about WWII from the perspective of the Japanese Americans. Also, I craved Chinese/Japanese food the whole time while I was reading it. Funny side note.

Trumpet of the Swan

We figured since we loved Charlotte's Web that E.B. White's The Trumpet of the Swan might be just as good...and it was!  Again, every chapter has some lesson or activity that we could do to reinforce the learning. I think my favorite was teaching the kids about N,S,E,W etc. on a compass.  We love our family read alouds. Jared was so interested in the book that he did a whole research unit on swans and made a book of swans with beautiful drawings on each different kind with all their characteristics. I love homeschooling!

Little Women

I think every 12 year old girl should read this book with her mother. Then, read it again on her own each year until she is 18. This book embodies the time-honored values that women used to have and live by, but are now fading away as society becomes more self-absorbed. I love that the young women in this book are still human with individual weaknesses, but strive to overcome their shortcomings to make life better for those around them, while still retaining their unique personalities. When my girls caught me reading this book, they asked me to read it out loud and even though I was in the middle of the story, they loved every bit of it. They kept asking me to tell them what came next and how it ended. It took me several times of starting this book to finally get through it, but once I did, what a reward. My favorite memory while reading this book sitting out on the porch reading it to the girls. Of course, they wanted to be the characters and "played" Little Women for weeks after. They also love watching the movie and reliving it all over again. The characters, the setting, the family ties, it's all beautiful.

The Jefferson Key

Okay, I have to preface this review with the fact that I don't normally read thrillers. I was interested in this book because of the history included. I did enjoy learning more about the history of piracy and privateering and it actually came in handy while playing a game of pirate minature golf with the kids one day. That said, I really had a hard time with all the guns and killing, especially the graphic details of acts of torture from the pirates, and no I don't normally squirm from gore, it was just so unnecessary and unrealistic being that it was set in modern times. I was also distracted by the author's continual switching back and forth between the different plot lines. I don't usually mind that technique, but this was extreme, happening literally after one or two sentences in some cases. My last critique was the over use of the phrase ingress and egress. I thought it was creative vocabulary usage the first time it appeared, but after the third or fourth time it was distracting and I thought that a simple entrance or exit would have sufficed.

Catch-22

I love war books so when I found this classic for sale at the library I snatched it up.  I wanted to like it so that I could check it off of that list of 100 classics that everyone should read, but I just couldn't. Although the story was interesting, the language and imagery was awful and by awful I mean crude. I know, it's a war book and war is not pretty and I really can handle a fair amount of violence, but I just choose not to read foul language and fill my mind with words that may someday slip out and corrupt the impressionable minds I spend my days with, so...sorry classics list, but I did not finish this book and I don't intent to.