Back on the Bookshelf: The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie (Alan Bradley)

It's rare that I don't finish a book once it's started.  I always figure that once started, I have invested time into reading the beginning of it that I feel bad putting it down.  Am I not wasting those minutes or hours that I have already spent reading the first few chapters?  I also always hope that the book will get better all of a sudden or there will be some twist that will make things more interesting.

However, this time I looked at it a different way.  There are so many books out there that I have been wanting to read that I didn't want to waste time reading a book that I wasn't 100% into.  As much as I feel bad for returning this one to the library unfinished, I am excited to move on to something else.

I made it exactly half way through the book The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley when I decided that I wasn't going to invest any more time reading it. 

The book is a mystery about a young girl, Flavia de Luce.  At their home, a bird is left dead on their doorstep with a stamp on its beak.  The next day, Flavia finds the body of a man in their garden.  She is quite the little scientist and tries to take it upon herself to solve the mystery behind the death and clear her father's name since he is currently the prime suspect in this murder investigation. 

Sounds interesting, right?  It came highly recommended from a family member and Goodreads even describes it as a "wickedly brilliant first novel." 

I don't want to say that since I wasn't enjoying it, no one else will.  In what I read in the first half, it was a well written book with lots of description and good character development.  I think I found it very wordy and maybe it was a little bit too much for me right now with the type of reading I am doing - mostly on my lunch breaks, in noisy environments, and for short periods of time.

This book isn't one of my favourites this year, unfortunately...  Here's hoping my next book adventure goes a little better!

Beautiful Disaster (Jamie McGuire)

I received a text message one day from my friend and all it said was, "You need to read Beautiful Disaster ASAP."  It took a couple months for the library to order the book once I requested it, but I have now successfully received and read the book!

Beautiful Disaster by Jamie McGuire is focused around one main character, Abby (aka Pigeon).  She has moved away to school with her best friend, America.  Through America, Abby is introduced to Travis, a bad boy that she can't quite stay away from.  The book follows their year together as they try to figure out what it is about their relationship or friendship that is so complicated.

I'm not sure what to say about this book - I guess I was expecting a lot since it came highly recommended.  I did find myself glued to the book.  On Sunday, I spent the majority of my afternoon and evening reading since I just couldn't put it down. 

I enjoyed how there was so much detail about every event that occurs in the book.  Their relationship is explored, but it's more than some books - there is more of the conversations they have and the thoughts behind their actions.  Instead of just saying that they went out for dinner, there is lots of description about what happens while they are out.

In terms of writing, I wouldn't say that it's a literary masterpiece.  You could often predict what would happen in the book (or maybe it was just me wishing that what I wanted to happen would actually happen) and there isn't much thinking behind what you're reading. 

I would classify it as an easy to read, young adult fiction book.  It definitely wouldn't be a book for everybody, but this week, when I have had so much going on, I found it was a great distraction and was just what I needed.

If you enjoyed Twilight-type books, you will likely enjoy this one.  (Plus, judge the book by the cover - that's an amazing image, right?)

The Time Keeper (Mitch Albom)

Mitch Albom (the author of Tuesdays with Morrie), brings you The Time Keeper, a novel about how precious our time is on Earth. 

The story starts with Dor, a man who, thousands of years ago, is inventing the concept of time.  He's counting drops of water, watching shadows, figuring out the moon.  He, Father Time, is punished for having created time and is required, for thousands of years, to listen to everyone's wishes for time.  Finally the day comes when he is given an hourglass and a task to teach two people what time really means. 

Dor's story is combined with the stories of Sarah - a teenage girl who thinks she has had as much as she can handle - and Victor - a man who has a terminal illness.  Both of these people are, in some way, trying to change the "time" they have been given on Earth. 

"What you have done to this point cannot be undone.  What you do next... [...] It is still unwritten."  (p. 180)

This book was very easy to read.  The chapters are short, so it's very easy to keep telling yourself, "Just one more chapter..." 

For me, it was the stories of Sarah and Victor that kept me interested.  I found the concept of the novel a little strange.  I enjoyed the references to time, and I thought that the novel had a good message, but at times it seemed a little 'unreal' for me.  (I know, I AM the girl who will read stories like The Night Circus or Harry Potter and love them, even though they aren't "real," but this novel just seemed a little different...)

I can't put my finger on my feelings for this book, but I will say... It wasn't my favourite novel of 2012, but I did like the overall message of the book.  If you can read the next quotation and feel intrigued, you may be interested in The Time Keeper.

"Man alone measures time.  Man alone chimes the hour.  And, because of this, man alone suffers a paralyzing fear that no other creature endures.  A fear of time running out."  (p. 8)

One Day (David Nicholls)

I loved "One Day" by David Nicholls.  I was actually a little sad when I finished it because I just wanted it to keep going.

This book is the beautiful story of Dexter Mayhew and Emma Morley.  Each chapter in the book happens on July 15th of a different year.  The book explores how the friendship and relationship between Dexter and Emma has changed and evolved each year from 1988 to 2007. 

"How might she say that?  She couldn't of course.  Faint-hearted as usual, she had left it too late.  In the future, I'll be braver, she told herself.  In the future, I will always speak my mind, eloquently, passionately." (p. 429)

Emma and Dexter met each other at college, but only really started to become friends when they graduate.  They're faced with the challenging question of whether they should keep in touch or pretend that it never happened...  This novel really touches on the importance of timing, persistance, and following your heart.  What happens to a friendship when one person feels more than another?  What happens to a friendship when other relationships become involved?  What happens when you are just in different places emotionally?

"'Live each day as if it's your last', that was the conventional advice, but really, who had the energy for that?  What if it rained or you felt a bit glandy?  It just wasn't practical. Better by far to simply try and be good and courageous and bold and to make a difference.  Not change the world exactly, but the bit around you.  Go out there with your passion and your electric typewriter and work hard at... something.  Change lives through art maybe.  Cherish your friends, stay true to your principles, live passionately and fully and well.  Experience new things.  Love and be loved, if you ever get the chance."  (p. 433)

I loved this book because I really think it speaks to the reality of so many readers.  In the movies, there are so many romances where people are just "meant to be together."  In real life, it's sometimes hard to know with some friendships and relationships whether you should carry on or let it go.  Whether you should remain friends or try for something more.  Whether you should take a break and see what happens or take a break and never speak again.  Relationships are complicated and this book stresses the importance of timing and speaking what's on your mind. 

I'm sure we can all think back to past relationships and remember a time when you maybe should have said more than you did or taken a risk for something.  Or when you look back now and wonder why you waited so long to start something or end something.  You can relate to the characters this book.

I thought David Nicholls' writing did a wonderful job showing the inner thoughts and conflict of the characters.  As a reader, you sometimes felt like you knew a lot more about the characters than they knew about themselves. 

I would definitely recommend this novel.  It may be more of a girly book, but the issues are ones that any reader could relate to. 

The movie "One Day" starring Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess is already available to own on DVD - I am reading this book a bit late, based on the movie release date. And now, honestly, I am just about to start watching the movie.  (So that I can relive the magic of the book one more time...)

Two for the Dough (Janet Evanovich)

Two for the Dough is the second book in Janet Evanovich's "Stephanie Plum" series.  (The first book being One for the Money, which I talked about last month and has a Hollywood film.)

In this novel, Stephanie Plum continues her work as a (terrible) bounty hunter.  She's put on the "easy" case of finding Kenny Mancuso, who didn't appear for his court date.  As with most Stephanie Plum cases, the chase for Kenny turns out to be more difficult and complicated than anyone anticipated.  The hunt for Kenny uncovers other mysterious events, such as stolen goods, missing caskets, missing body parts (yes...) and sudden murders. 

By the wood stove... It's fall!

I enjoyed Two for the Dough.  It was written similarly to the first One for the Money book - that is, it was easy to read, funny, and entertaining.  There is a lot of humour in the conversations Stephanie has with her co-workers and family and in the situations that she finds herself in, yet she is in such desperate need of the job and the money that she continues on her search. Nobody thinks that she can do the job, but she may be smarter than people believe. 

"The truth is, I'm not the heroic type.  I'm afraid of spiders and extraterrestrials and sometimes feel the need to check under my bed for drooly guys with claws.  If I ever found one I'd run screaming out of my apartment and never come back."  (Two for the Dough by Janet Evanovich)

My favourite character in this book, by far, was Stephanie Plum's grandmother, Grandma Mazur.  Grandma Mazur, who can be remembered from the first book after she shot a cooked chicken at the dinner table, wants to be involved in the hunt for Kenny.  She goes on outings with Stephanie and her comments always made me laugh. You just kind of have to shake your head at what the grandmother does and wish that you are as cool of an older lady as she is someday. 

Again, I will mention that Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series has eighteen novels, this one being the second.  I think this book stands on its own and you could read it without having read the first book.  Two for the Dough is a completely different case than the one in One for the Money, but the main characters are all the same.  The advantage to reading this series in order is to see how the interactions between the main characters evolve.  I think I would want to read the books in order, if only to see how all of Stephanie Plum's personal affairs turn out... 

After reading (and enjoying) the first two books in the series, I would say that there is a good chance I will continue with this list and read Three to get Deadly.  If you want a funny little mystery, this series of Stephanie Plum books could be the one for you. 

Devil's Waltz (Jonathan Kellerman)

This book had been sitting on my shelf for quite some time.  About a year ago, my mom put this book in my room and said, "I read this a long time ago and it was good."  Of course, I judged the cover and thought the book looked weird and old. 

So my lesson of the week: Don't judge a book based on the fact that it was written a long time ago.  And just because a book looks a little torn up doesn't mean it's bad - it probably just means that lots of people read it, therefore likely making it a good book (right?  I'll believe that logic).

Enjoying one of the last few
warm days of fall...

Jonathan Kellerman's book Devil's Waltz was written in 1993 - at least I was alive when it was written, unlike some of the other published books by Kellerman.  Despite the fact that the book was written nearly 20 years ago, I found it was still dealing with a topic that would be interesting to today's audience.  I was a young child when the book was published, and now, as a 20-something-year-old, I found the book exciting. 

The book is about a case that is going on at a hospital.  A two-year-old girl, Cassie Jones, is brought to the emergency room frequently with different symptoms.  By the time they get to the hospital and run tests each time, the doctors can't find anything wrong with her.  The doctor on the case, Stephanie, begins to suspect that this could be a case of Munchausen by proxy, which is basically when a parent does something to the child to cause them to be sick.  Alex Delaware, the main character in the story, is introduced to the case as a psychologist and is trying to figure out the mystery behind Cassie's illness.  Is the child actually sick or is someone purposely trying to harm this young child?

Throughout the book, I think I suspected just about every character at one time or another.  Is it Cassie's mother, Cindy, who is doing something to her own daughter, or could it be the father, Chip, who always seems very cooperative at the hospital.  Maybe it's the lead physician or the nurse dealing with Cassie, trying to advance their careers by bringing attention to her case.  Or possibly, it's Cassie's grandfather, who is actually the head of the hospital. 

It deals with such a complicated topic and analyzes the characters in so much depth.  There is so much more to the story than what it looks like on the outside and you really find yourself trying to figure out the mystery.  I would read a chapter and say, "It's definitely Cassie's mom, she's been acting a little weird lately."  Then, twenty minutes and a couple chapters later, I'd say, "No, scrap that, it's actually got to be the doctor.  She's hiding something, I can feel it."  It was a continuous guessing game and you keep finding out new information that keeps the story exciting. 

I loved the book and would recommend it to everyone.  It's very much a mystery book, but not a scary mystery - no one dies (well, almost no one) and it's not the type of novel that will keep you up at night.  (Well, it might keep you up at night since you won't want to put it down, but it won't keep you up with scary thoughts.)

Magic in the Air (Christine Feehan)

This book came recommended by a friend.  It's the first book in the seven book Drake Sisters series.  (I would also like to add that this is the first book that I have read in its entirety on my Kindle eReader!)  You can order a paperback version of this book online, but the eReader versions are only about $3 per book.

Magic in the Wind by Christine Feehan takes place in Sea Haven, a small town where seven sisters (the Drake Sisters) live.  In this book, though, not all of the sisters make an appearance.  There is something a little bit magical about these sisters... They seem to be able to help people out in different ways.  The main sister in this book, Sarah, has a good ability at convincing people that they should do something - like go visit a cardiologist or hire someone to do the roofing - because she seems to be able to tell when things may go wrong for people.  Damon Wilder is new in town and all he knows about the sisters is what he has heard through town gossip.  Though he thought that moving to the small town would be a good way to escape his old life, some men have tracked down his whereabouts.

The book was decent.  I didn't know very much about the book at all when I read it - I simply trusted my friend and started to read.  When I was talking to her about it, she did say that the first book was a bit slow but then the rest of the series really got exciting.  I would agree that this book, Magic in the Wind, was slow, but I do think that they did a decent job of setting up the characters for the rest of the series.  You started to really see the relationships between characters and see how things could get more intense and exciting in future books.

I was trying to figure out what the genre or target audience of the book would be... I would say Young Adult-ish... But not in the "I-like-Twilight" YA category.  More in the "I'm-over-twenty-years-old" type of YA series.  It has the love story in this book, but also a bit more than just the love story. 

It was by no means a challenging read.  It was easy to follow and a fast read. I'm looking forward to reading the next book, but unfortunately I am going to hold off for a week or two before reading book number two...  Only because I'm going on holidays (and possibly spending a day at the pool) before schools starts up again next week (yay for teaching!) and don't want anything to happen to my nice Kindle eReader!