The procrastination period is over. Here is my book report for the last two months!
Books Bought February & March 2016
| Title | Author |
|---|---|
| Maggie Meister's Classical Elegance: 20 Beaded Jewelry Designs | Maggie Meister |
| What Knot? | Geoffrey Budworth, Richard Hopkins |
| One Big Beautiful Bead | Sarah McConnell |
| Jill Wiseman's Beautiful Beaded Ropes: 300 Quick & Easy Designs | Jill Wiseman |
| Nothing to Tell: Extraordinary Stories of Montana Ranch Women | Donna Gray |
| The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business | Charles Duhigg |
| Home to Italy | Peter Pezzelli |
| The Girl in the Glass | Jeffrey Ford |
| Every Day is a Holiday | George Mahood |
| The Sound of Language | Amulya Malladi |
The book worth noting here is the Nothing to Tell: Extraordinary Stories of Montana Ranch Women. These are collected oral histories of women who moved to Montana in the late nineteenth or early twentieth century. It’s better than any historical novel.
I’m also enjoying the beading books, but will report more specifically on those in another post.
Books Read February & March 2016
| Title | Author | Rating |
|---|---|---|
| Maggie Meister's Classical Elegance: 20 Beaded Jewelry Designs | Maggie Meister | Haven't read yet |
| What Knot? | Geoffrey Budworth, Richard Hopkins | Interesting |
| One Big Beautiful Bead | Sarah McConnell | Interesting |
| Jill Wiseman's Beautiful Beaded Ropes | Jill Wiseman | Thumbs up |
| Nothing to Tell: Extraordinary Stories of Montana Ranch Women | Donna Gray | Enjoying |
| The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business | Charles Duhigg | Good |
| Home to Italy | Peter Pezzelli | Thumbs down |
| The Girl in the Glass | Jeffrey Ford | Interesting |
| Every Day is a Holiday | George Mahood | Thumbs down |
| The Sound of Language | Amulya Malladi | Interesting |
| Shopaholic to the Rescue | Sophie Kinsella | Awful |
| The Flood Girls | Richard Fifield | Thumbs down |
| The Good Liar | Nicholas Searle | Interesting |
| The Empty House | Rosamunde Pilcher | Good |
| The Gilder | Kathryn Kay | Enjoyed what I read |
| Manhunting | Jennifer Cruisie | Thumbs down |
This looks like a long list, but everything book rated with a Thumbs Down or Awful lasted one chapter or less. I find it very difficult to plow through a book if it doesn’t grab my interest right away.
The caveat to my selections this month is that I was lucky enough to go on sunny vacations in February and March. I was looking for lighthearted, not too deep books. The Girl in the Glass, The Good Liar and The Sound of Language all fell into that category. Nothing too absorbing, but managed to keep my attention throughout – and to the end – of the story. I was enjoying The Gilder, but didn’t finish before my library checkout expired.
The Girl in the Glass is about a con man and his crew who put on fake seances for wealthy clients in Long Island during the Depression. It reminded me a little bit of a Donald Westlake story – the characters were real characters, but believable at the same time.
The Good Liar, surprising to me as I write this, is also about a con man who uses dating sites to sponge off of women. The backstory included in the blurb mentions that the woman in the story may also be up to something other than dating. It’s this piece of information that kept me reading to the end…and I actually was not disappointed. (Yes, that might be construed as words of praise.)
The Sound of Language is about an Afghan refugee who settles in Denmark, and how she and her family adjust to their new home. This particular woman gets an internship with a beekeeper who is adjusting to being a widower. I have been very interested in today’s refugee situation, and this was an interesting perspective that can be applied to Europe. It may be written as a Young Adult book. I found the writing to be simplistic, but the overall concept was compelling to keep me interested through to the end.
