Widow of the South by Robert Hicks ✔✔✔✔

I was told about this book by a woman I occasionally golf with here in Florida. She said it was an excellent book, and explained a bit about the subject of the book, and also told me the title was "Woman of the South". Well, I couldn't find that title, and I sort of forgot about it. Then, about two years later a member of our book club and I were talking about our mutual interest in reading historical fiction, and she mentioned a book she'd read called "Queen of the South". She had the book and said she'd leave it in my mailbox at home, but it never arrived. Meanwhile, I'm now searching for the title "Queen of the South" on the Internet, with no luck.

I don't even recall now how I found out the correct title, probably while I was searching for something else on the local library's website, but I immediately knew this was the title I was searching for - the library system here has five copies of the book, and it has been borrowed a total of 72 times to date. That's a good enough validation for me, plus the fact that I discovered the book was set in Franklin, TN, a small city south of Nashville on I-65 a city where we spent one night in a hotel on our way north a few years back, completely oblivious to the history around us.

Franklin, Tennessee was the site of one of the bloodiest Civil War battles, a battle which took place on a single morning in November,1864, with 9200 casualties. Carrie McGavock was named the Widow of the South ( and she was a real person) because first of all the plantation where she lived was turned into a hospital for survivors of the battle, and she nursed many of them herself. But Carrie also - some years after the war - took it upon herself to write to the parents of every single man who died in her hospital, and then eventually retrieved 1500 bodies of Confederates whose remains had simply been plowed over, identified them, and created a cemetery for them in a field near her plantation She herself had lost three children before the war even began, and so it was tremendously important to her to treat these casualties of war with respect and compassion.

The final chapter of the book is the true story of Carrie, with pictures of her family, her servant Mariah who was given to her as a slave when she was a child but who was almost the completion of her own soul, and the cemetery itself.

Mike is reading the book right now and I think we'll visit this area on our way home this year.

Gold Diggers: Striking It Rich In The Klondike by Charlotte Gray ✔✔✔✔

This book is the story of the Klondike Gold Rush told through the lives of six people: the miner Bill Haskell, the saintly priest, Father Judge, the savvy 24-year-old businesswoman Belinda Mulrooney, the British journalist Flora Shaw, the highly disciplined Sam Steele of the Mounties, and the writer Jack London, whose stories about the North made him a legend.

Mike and I visited Dawson City four years ago when we were on a Holland America trip. Mike has a family member who went to Dawson as a young man in the 1920s and died there in 1945, so we climbed a very long hill - me wearing flip flops, as I recall - to find the local cemetery where James McCrank was buried, and we did!


The stories of these six people in this book were fascinating - the author interwove their stories so well, and each one was so unique from the other. The hardships of Bill Haskell were perhaps the most affecting, particularly dealing with the challenges of spending a winter in such a remote area with so few resources.

I wish I'd read this before we went to Dawson, but it sure brought back some memories.

Wishin' and Hopin' By Wally Lamb ✔✔✔✔

This book just caught my eye when I was in Bay County Library - a little book, written by Wally Lamb, and a Christmas story - so I picked it up. Well, I read it in one day, laughed till I cried at least twice, and enjoyed some good chuckles too. It's the story of 10-year-old Felix Funicello, distant cousin of Annette Funicello, and his adventures at St. Aloysius Gonzaga Parochial School, especially as the 5th grade class prepares for their Christmas pageant.

There's Felix, who's small and very innocent, and doesn't understand the off-colour jokes he's told, the supply teacher who comes from Quebec, Rosalie, who is the class pain in the ass,Zhenya, a Russian immigrant with " big bazoom-booms" and a hilarious accent so funny I had to read it aloud, Felix's Mom and her adventure at the Pillsbury Bake-Off - wow, in some 254 pages, Wally Lamb packs in a lot.

I won't forget this one too soon! The pageant itself is the funniest since John Irving's "A Prayer For Owen Meany", which had me in stitches while driving from KL to Sudbury for a hockey tournament and Karen and David wondered why Mom was crying......

I Still Dream About You - Fannie Flagg ✔✔✔✔

A thoroughly entertaining novel, I Still Dream About You could be classified as chick lit, but with a difference. First of all, the chicks are older, and the level of writing is much better.

The novel is set in Birmingham, Alabama and the main characters, Maggie, Brenda, Hazel, and Edith all work at a real estate firm owned by Hazel, a midget who has died before this story takes place, but whose spirit is still very much present. There's a villain too, Babs Bingington, a rival agent, who is pure venom.

There's a mystery about a house high up on a mountain overlooking Birmingham, a house that has always fascinated Maggie, a former Miss Alabama. Brenda is an overweight friend whose main comfort is ice cream and doughnuts. All this is related with a gentle sense of humor, no condescension, just a sort of bemused or amused detachment.

I read it very quickly and enjoyed every minute of it. Flagg also wrote Fried Green Tomatoes, another favorite - I saw the movie,too with Kathy Baker - I saw her as Brenda in this, even though Brenda is black.

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern ✔✔✔✔✔

"The circus arrives without warning"
This is the first sentence of this imaginative story, a story that wrapped itself around me and wouldn't let go until I'd finished it.
Le Cirque des Reves is its name - and it only operates at night.
It's like a dream really - I don't like fantasy in fiction, but this is just on the edge of fantasy.
Probably the best novel I read this year.
Enough said. I'm still in love with it.

The Sisters Brothers by Patrick de Witt ✔✔

This was an interesting read when I first started it. It's basically a western, a story about Charlie and Eli Sisters, who are brothers, and hired assassins who are on a journey to find and kill a Mr. Warm, who has a formula for finding gold in the California Gold Rush. The author has chosen to use much more elevated language than one usually finds in a western: for example: "we set up in a drafty, lopsided hotel at the southernmost end of town. There was but a single vacancy and Charlie and I were forced to share a room, when we typically kept individual quarters." Most Western writers would have said instead: "We had to sleep in this dive at the end of town, and since there was only one room, we had to share a bed, doggone it"

Their journey to find Warm reminded me a bit of the Canterbury Tales, because they do meet some interesting and colorful characters along the way, and they do manage to kill quite a fair number of people while en route. But by the time they found Warm, I found I didn't really care anymore, so I skimmed through to the end.

Old City Hall by Robert Rotenberg ✔✔✔

I purchased this book in New Liskeard. I had already read about the author, who was the founder of a magazine about Toronto, T.O.,The Magazine of Toronto. It was first published in 2009.

It's a detective story involving a popular radio talk-show host whose wife is found murdered in the bathtub in their condo on Front Street. There are lots of characters - Mr. Singh, former chief engineer of Indian Railways, who now delivers newspapers in Toronto, Rasheed, the security guard, the two detectives who investigate the case, the Crown attorney and the defense attorneys, the judge - they're all here.

The fact that it's set in Toronto, with lots of descriptions of the Market area, Front Street, Old City Hall, etc were also very interesting.

I read this in several days - very entertaining and well-written.

Through The Glass by Shannon Moroney ✔✔✔✔

This is a true story, and an amazing one. Shannon was married for one month when a knock came to her hotel door where she was attending a conference for school guidance counsellors in Toronto. A policeman informed her that her husband Jason, who was back home in Peterborough, had been arrested for forcibly confining and raping two women in the basement of the video store where he worked.

Her life just absolutely fell apart with this news, and over the next three years, she recounts the crimes in more detail, her husband's criminal history - which she did know about, incidentally, when she married him - how she herself was treated because of his actions, dealing with the justice system, visiting her husband in prison ( she visited him regularly, although they could only communicate through a glass - hence the title) his attempts at rehabilitation, how her family was affected, how Jason was loved and valued by Shannon and her family - of course they loathed his crimes, and knew he had to be punished for them but they still loved the man. We also learn about his difficult childhood which was a large part of his problems as an adult.

I read this very quickly - it was hard to put down.

Reading the novel "Sacajawea" by Anna Waldo.

I first read this novel some years ago- I just checked my earliest book journal, which I started in 1991, and it's not recorded there, so I must have read it in the 80s, and although I do recall it being very long, I really enjoyed the story of Sacajawea, the Shosone woman who accompanied Lewis and Clark on their expedition to the Pacific from North Dakota when it was only Indian tribes who inhabited the land.

I could end this entry right there, because that sentence pretty well sums up the whole book, all 1400 pages of it. But why am I even writing about it? Well, one of our Book Club members presented it as a possibility for us to discuss this year, and it was accepted, probably much more on the positive comments made by those who had read it, myself included. None of us mentioned its length, and if I'd recalled that, I'd have NEVER voted for it!

So, late in August I started reading Sacajawea for the second time, so I'd have it read by November 12, which is when we will meet to discuss it. About six chapters in, I decided it was boring, and anyway, I had a couple of other books on the go which were more interesting. But I felt some responsibility needed to be taken for having voted for it, so maybe I could just read the beginning of every chapter, which was an entry from Lewis and Clark's own journals on the expedition. Well, I did that for a bit, but then my curiosity got the better of me, so I decided to read it properly at least up to the middle of the book, then I'd decide if I was going to continue. Around page 600, I took a break, and I thought it was a permanent one- after all I knew enough of her story by this time, and I'd already read about her in Wikipedia. And I was also finishing those other books I mentioned earlier, and had my eye - as always - on the next one I wanted to read.

The novel is interesting enough as historical fiction, but I really feel the author did little beyond basically re-writing other journals and letters from Sacajawea's point of view, so that it's just a milder dose of a historic epic, written to make the story more accessible to general readers. There's also a fair amount of legend in there,too, which is all right - the story is interesting and certainly informative, but I thought my life would probably turn out all right if I didn't finish it.

So I left it - it's on my Kindle, stored under my "Did not finish" collection - quite content with my decision, until early last week Shirley mentioned she was just about finished it, and had really enjoyed it, and lo and behold, I felt guilty again about not finishing it.

Why is there this need to finish a book you're not fully committed to? It's not like you make a solemn oath or anything, the author doesn't care whether or not you read the whole thing and wouldn't feel himself or herself a failure if a little not old- but aging- lady in Northern Ontario didn't want to finish it, and there are so so many books to read! Is it so you can say you read the whole thing - Sandra said she "read every word" - is there some mountain--top experience if you actually finish something you don't really want to? I remember Gerry Pickett telling me he always finishes a book, whether he likes it or not. I'm not like that at all - I always have so many books ahead of me I'm dying to read. I used to make myself read 50 pages of a book before giving up on it, and nowadays it's more like 100 pages, but more often than not, I can tell within the first few pages if it'll be worth continuing with it.

The result of this latest - and last - guilt trip - is that I decided to finish it. Note that I said "finish" not "read" because I did not read every word. I didn't even read every page. When I woke up with a headache one morning because of skimming through about 20 pages before bedtime, I quit finishing.

And I don't feel guilty about it. And I don't know what there will be to discuss about Sacajawea as a book - I have a feeling it's going to be about the experience of reading - or not finishing - the book. Keep tuned!

Mrs. King by Charlotte Gray ✔✔✔✔

I'm a fan of Charlotte Gray's. I read Sisters In the Wilderness, about Susannah Moodie and Catharine Parr Traill ( and I think every woman should read it, just so we can keep things in perspective when the fridge breaks down or we get a flat tire on the 401), and Flint and Feather, the biography of Pauline Johnson, whose poems were a part of our readers in elementary school, as well as the biography of Alexander Graham Bell ( I think the title is Reluctant Genius), so when I saw this title on the list of Canada Reads 2011 top 40 titles in non-fiction, I found it at our library and settled down to enjoy another story of a well-known Canadian.

And it was very enjoyable, and very informative. Isabel Mackenzie King was the daughter of William Lyon Mackenzie who led the 1837 revolt in Upper Canada, and the mother of William Lyon Mackenzie King, who was one of our greatest prime ministers. Willie, as he was known by his family, absolutely adored his mother, almost unnaturally so, and she herself, disappointed by her husband's lack of initiative and constant financial problems, relied almost exclusively on Willie for both financial and emotional support.

As a portrait of Toronto in the late 19th century, it was particularly interesting to me - the way people lived, the city limits ( Isabel was in her twenties before she ever went north of Eglinton Ave), the At Homes which the King women attended and hosted, even as they scraped together enough money to hold them, the class distinctions, and so on, so the book also is a social history of women at this time. It must be fascinating to do research like this. Fortunately the King family were all great letter-writers,so there must have been lots of material to work from. For example, while Willie was in Chicago, he sent a ten-page letter home once a week!!

Twelve Steps To A Compassionate Life by Karen Armstrong ✔✔✔✔

I can't believe I didn't enter a posting on this book when I first read it back in May or June of this year, unless I knew that I'd probably be reading it again and again. I'm presently on my third reading of it, this time chapter by chapter because our study group is using it as our focus for this year.

Karen Armstrong is one of my favorite spiritual writers, and this one is a handbook, if you like, to leading a compassionate life. I've felt for some time that, even as my views on faith and religion have changed so much over the past five years or so, I could be doing more - more to help others, more to express in a positive way those changes in my perspective, more to help myself along this life journey. This book is built around the Golden Rule, and the twelve steps are presented first as a treatise on compassion itself and how it is built into the major religions of the world, but then she moves on to finding compassion within your own world, within yourself, then moving out to others.

Reading this enabled me to finally be able to communicate with Brooke as the mother of our grandchild to present as clearly as I could how David needed some compassion in this trauma he's experienced for the past 16 months. I don't know what influence it had, but it doesn't matter - there were finally some more positive movements. I felt infinitely better for having done it, too.

The Boy In The Moon by Ian Brown ✔✔✔✔✔

If I were to record everything I either learned or deeply appreciated from this book, I'd be here all day trying to put my thoughts in order. First, let me say that the writing is wonderful - clear and concise but at the same time deeply moving without ever getting sentimental. Ian Brown is a Globe and Mail writer, and I've heard him talking about books on CBC as well. I first read about this story in the Globe when Ian wrote a Focus article on his son Walker, the boy in the moon.

Walker was born with a rare genetic mutation called "cardiofaciocutaneous syndrome" - he is globally delayed, cannot speak, will always be in diapers, and is constantly hurting himself. His father describes him: "Walker, my teacher, my sweet, sweet, lost and broken boy".

In someone else's hands, this could turn into a litany of how challenging and yet how significant this child is, and how the lives of his family are in constant turmoil, But Brown goes way beyond that, and this is what makes the book so exciting. He sets out on a journey to find other CFC children and their families to discover similarities between them and Walker, he turns to science - genetics - to find the answer to why Walker is so profoundly disabled, he journeys to France to visit Jean Vanier's L'Arche to live with disabled people to discover how Walker might be able to live and prosper after his parents die.

The L'Arche community is very interesting because, unlike many many other agencies, the disabled people themselves make up the community and the dynamic - there is no integration such as in our own schools here - they define their own world, rather than constantly trying to adapt themselves to a world they don't understand. I found this enlightening, because who says our "normal" is something to be admired or longed for when your "normal" is something else entirely?

When I mentioned this book to the two other people I know who read it, one said "What a sad life", but I couldn't see it that way. Yes, it was sad, but it was also life-changing and strengthening and I come out of it thinking what wonderful creatures we all are, with our various flaws and deficiencies, and how we continually enrich one another's lives, often with even being aware of it.

The High Road by Terry Fallis ✔✔✔✔

Our Book Club has just finished discussing The Best Laid Plans, Fallis' first book, which I have talk about elsewhere on this blog - May, 2011. Everyone enjoyed it so much that I thought the sequel, The High Road, would be a good segue, and it certainly was.

Angus has brought down the government in BLP, and now there's a campaign for the upcoming election, a few momentous trips in Baddeck I, Angus' hovercraft, a romance between Daniel and Lindsay, a visit from the US President and First Lady to Angus' home, all kinds of hi-jinks, and just a rollicking good story, well-crafted and a hoot to read.

I'd like to mention also that I invited our MP, Charlie Angus, to our book club meeting way back in September. He never replied, and I was disappointed in that. I didn't put any pressure on him, but it would have been nice if he'd even acknowledged my invitation! Mind you, the NDP doesn't contribute much to this story - it's more a Liberal/Conservative kind of thing.

Saints and Villains by Denise Giardina✔✔✔✔✔

I ordered this book after reading about it in a list of favorite historical fiction novels created by a book club in the U.S. and it stayed on the shelf for probably five years before picking it up to read two weeks ago. It wasn't that I didn't want to read it , but how I choose a book already on my shelf varies considerably. Since I've been reading non-fiction almost exclusively, I felt that historical fiction wasn't too far off the track, and this just caught my eye one day - and I knew it would be the next one I read.

The name Dietrich Bonhoeffer first became known to me when I was organist at a German Lutheran Church in London, Ontario during my years in university. The Pastor, Godfrey Oelsner, mentioned him often in his sermons, so I knew that he was a German theologian who had been imprisoned by the Nazis during WW II, and finally executed. I can't remember whether I read any of his Letters and Papers From Prison, but I was aware that he was a man of great faith and compassion, and was considered a martyr by the Lutheran Church.

This was an incredible book to read, and for me it was the first book I have ever read detailing the rise of Hitler, the overthrow of the German government, the resistance movement led many Germans, and the unfolding of the war from a German vantage point. It also depicts the confusion within the Church - those who sympathized with Hitler, and those who knew the only way to defeat him from within was to kill him. Bonhoeffer had to leave Germany at least twice because he so inflamed the hierarchy in the Church.

The most illuminating part was Bonhoeffer's time in prison leading up to his execution - the terrible conditions under which he was held in the beginning, then a relaxing of rules as time goes on, and it is at this point that he becomes truly a pastor as he ministers to other prisoners and becomes a friend to one of his guards.


A quote from Bonhoeffer: " God makes a convenient scapegoat. Or people always think God is absent when things are going bad for them. Things go better and God is back. Well, I want to live in a world as if there were no God. That is the only way God can truly be with any of us."

Lives Like Loaded Guns - Emily Dickinson and her Family's Feuds by Lyndall Gordon ✔✔✔✔

The author of this remarkable biography was interviewed on CBC the day before the book was released, and I was so intrigued by the title, plus the story of these feuds, that I wasted no time in purchasing the book. I only started reading it this past summer, in between several others I was enjoying, and I finally came back to it this week to finish it.

I'm not even certain the book can be described as a biography - I guess it's a literary biography of the Dickinson family and the other families who were involved - and in many ways it seems to operate more as a literary thriller. The title of the book, taken from one of Emily's 1789 poems, more than aptly describes the families and their feuds, and I often felt I was reading a novel. These were flesh and blood creatures for sure, including Emily - the typical view of her as a recluse in a white dress, shy and retiring, is not accurate. The recluse part is, to be sure, but not the rest of it.

I've chosen one of Lyndall Gordon's paragraphs to sum up the book:

"Emily Dickinson is now recognised as one of the greatest poets who ever lived, yet her life remains a mystery. She continues to be encased in claims put out by opposed camps fighting for possession of her greatness. These camps originated in the clash between Austin Dickinson ( Emily's brother) and his wife, who had been the poet's intimate and her keenest reader. Out of this feud, a lasting feud developed, and it was the opponents in this feud, their allies and warring descendants, who devised the image of the poet as her fame grew and endured. What began as a split over adultery turned into a feud over who was to own the poet: in the first instance, who was to have the right to publish her works; in the second, whose legend would imprint itself on the public mind."

Gordon has written other bios: Virginia Woolf, T.S. Eliot and Charlotte Bronte.

Shania Twain: From This Moment On

I've long been a fan of Shania Tawin. She's a Northern gal, she always seems very down-to-earth, she sings well, and I loved how she appeared at the Juno Awards some years ago wearing different hockey sweaters of Canadian teams. I knew that she had had a difficult childhood, and that her parents had both died in a car accident, and more recently, the news of her marriage breakdown because of the affair her husband and producer was having with her best friend and confidante made me sympathize with her even more.

I really enjoyed reading this book - her childhood was even more difficult than I knew- a lot of physical violence between her parents, much of which she witnessed, extreme poverty ( she tells of taking a sandwich made with mustard as the only filling to school), and finding escape in her music - writing and singing songs. Her mother was very much involved in getting her career in music started, and it's also interesting how, as an adult, Shania still has a lot of respect for her father, despite the fact that he beat his wife so often, seemingly more over financial difficulties than any troubles with alcohol or drugs.

Her rise through the music business is interestingly told - I never knew that emerging artists basically "shop" for songs in Music Row in Nashville ( our hotel was next to the Row when we visited there three years ago) and how Mutt Lange, her husband and partner, was such a master in producing her albums, and helped her go in musical directions much different from other country artists.

She's quite candid about the marriage breakdown, and the developing relationship with Fred, her husband now, who was the husband of her best friend, Marie-Anne, who is now with Shania's ex....( will there be a test on this after??)

She is also quite inspirational, and I especially appreciated the fact that she got through a lot of these situations in her life on her own two feet and using good common sense - not giving all the credit to God as so many of the country artists do. And I will always admire someone who could lead a tree-planting crew of men at age 17, set a bear trap and wash clothes in a river. Way to go, Shania!!

The Cello Suites by Eric Siblin ✔✔✔

Subtitled "J.S. Bach, Pablo Casals, and the search for a Baroque Masterpiece.

I am presently leading some worship services at Trinity, and I'm using Music as my theme, so I read this book - which I purchased in Peterborough two years ago - to give me a refresher on the life of J.S. Bach, which was timely, and certainly about 80% more information about Pablo Casals, whom I had known merely as one of the world's greatest cellists, and that he had played in Washington for JFK back in the early 60s, than I previously had had.

It was an interesting read, both for reading about these two great musicians, but also for their creative life, and how these Cello Suites came to life only in the 20th century by Casals. The connections between the 18th century and the 20th were very interesting, and the author, who describes his own attempts to sing in a Bach cantata with no previous choral experience, and absolutely no music-reading experience, made this a very readable book.

Eric Siblin was a pop music critic for the Montreal Gazette, and had had his fill, as he says, of music is his head that he didn't want to have there, so the Cello Suites offered " a way out of a jam". He travelled extensively throughout Spain and Germany, attended a Bach festival, interviewed other cellists, and, as I mentioned before, immersed himself as completely as he could in the music of Bach.

Queen Elizabeth by William Shawcross

It's taken me a long time to finish this 943-page bio. I read the first 300 pages or so in June, amidst other books, then decided to read it exclusively through to the end. I had started reading Follett's "Fall of Giants", and after a hundred pages or so, thought Shawcross had done a better, more-informed job of the First World War, so I turned to QE full-time.

This is sub-titled "The Official Biography", and Shawcross evidently took that very seriously, because it is so detailed in every aspect of QE's public life, and it does paint an extremely flattering picture of her.

I have great admiration for Royals - their job is not an easy one, and George VI and Elizabeth were the ultimate, I'd say, in meeting and visiting people, keeping in touch, becoming patrons and so on. The rigours of royal tours became very evident in this book - there would be complaints from people around them, but rarely from the main attractions themselves. Right up to the year she died, QE was out visiting, trooping the colours, travelling, entertaining. I'd have been gasping for some time to myself!

King George V's biographer called her " one of the most amazing Queens since Cleopatra". Her smile was infectious, and she never lost the warmth and grace of her childhood years, living in Glamis, Scotland.

Her smile, her unwavering faith and her love of surprises were, for me, the most notable things about QE. She took a lot of delight when things went awry at events. For example, on one visit to Canada, poor weather forced her plane down in Cold Lake, Alberta. She sat in the officer's mess and talked happily with the officers and their wives until her plane could continue its journey.

After her 90th birthday, her daughter Margaret mentioned how much they were now looking forward to her 100th birthday. She replied:" Oh, you mustn't say that. It's unlucky. I mean, I might be run over by a big red bus". When someone mentioned that this was highly unlikely, she replied:"No, it's the principle of the thing. Wouldn't it be terrible if you'd spent all your life doing everything you were supposed to do, didn't drink, didn't smoke, took lots of exercise, all the things you didn't want to do, and suddenly one day you were run over by a big red bus, and as the wheels were crunching into you, you'd say "Oh, my God, I could have got so drunk last night" That's the way you should live your life, as if tomorrow you'll be run over by a big red bus"

And that's exactly how she did live!

In The Land of Believers by Gina Welch ✔✔✔✔

I don't even remember how I found out about this, but when I read about it, I downloaded it immediately. Gina is a young woman who decides she wants to write about evangelical Christians by "embedding" herself in one of their churches, and chooses Dr. Jerry Falwell's church. She is an athiest, and remains so throughout the book, but nonetheless is changed by her experiences there - she even gets baptized by immersion! She also attends something called a Scaremare, which I had never heard of - a sort of haunted house experience designed to scare you enough into becoming a Christian - yes, I kid you not!

I was wondering how she would get herself out of all this, so it was very interesting to read, and find out the members' reactions to her book.

The Art of Racing In The Rain - Garth Stein✔✔✔✔

This story was so close to David's situation right now, plus his relationship with his golden retriever, Charlie. It tells the story of a family with the dog, Enzo, as the narrator. Here's the beginning:

"Gestures are all I have; sometimes they must be grand in nature. And while I occasionally step over the line and into the world of the melodramatic, it is what I must do to communicate clearly and effectively....I have no words I can rely on because, much to my dismay, my tongue was designed long and flat and loose, and...an even less effective tool for making...sounds that can be linked together to form sentences"

But Enzo is also a very important character in this novel, as he nurtures and helps heal Denny, his owner, Eve, Denny's wife, who is dying of cancer, and their daughter,Zoë.

This would be a wonderful book for a Book Club to read and discuss.

The Flying Troutmans by Miriam Toews ✔✔✔✔✔

It's been a long while since I shed a few tears at the end of a novel, but I did with this one. It's a quick read, a family road trip, and last night I thought I'd skim through to the end but today I backed up to re-read the last thirty pages and was overwhelmed, both by the beauty of the writing and the love of family that permeates the end of the book, as well as the fact that it resembles so closely the dilemma our David continues to endure with his separation from his 17-month-old daughter.

Min, the mother, is in a psychiatric hospital for the nth time, and tells her sister Hattie, the narrator, that she wants to die. Min has two children: Logan, aged 15 and Thebes, 12, and Logan, who has seen the exchange between the two sisters, wants to know what his mother said. Hattie doesn't want to tell him, so instead she says that Min wants the three of them to find Cherkis, their father and promptly sets out on a road trip with the two teenagers to find their father - a seemingly impossible task, given the fact that they have no clue where he is and they're driving in an aged and inform Ford Aerostar, and all three of them are a bit nuts themselves.

It's a unconventional trio, but you know all along that they do love each other, and of course they meet some interesting characters along the way.

A five-star read for sure, Toews certainly knows how to write about teenagers and family. As the Edmonton Journal said, " She shines a kindly light on family dynamics that the average social worker would find worthy of a hefty investigation. And she balances heartbreak with laugh-out-loud wit."

Shirley loaned me this book - it came from her cousin Cheryl.

The Paris Wife by Paula McLain ✔✔✔✔

This is our first Book Club selection for September 2011, which I downloaded to my Kindle. It was a slow start, but I was very busy with other things while reading it. I ended up enjoying it and look forward to our discussion of it. Meanwhile, I've copied this from Book Browse because, once again, I'm feeling lazy...


A deeply evocative story of ambition and betrayal, The Paris Wife captures a remarkable period of time and a love affair between two unforgettable people: Ernest Hemingway and his wife Hadley.

Chicago, 1920: Hadley Richardson is a quiet twenty-eight-year-old who has all but given up on love and happiness—until she meets Ernest Hemingway and her life changes forever. Following a whirlwind courtship and wedding, the pair set sail for Paris, where they become the golden couple in a lively and volatile group—the fabled “Lost Generation”—that includes Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound, and F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald.

Though deeply in love, the Hemingways are ill prepared for the hard-drinking and fast-living life of Jazz Age Paris, which hardly values traditional notions of family and monogamy. Surrounded by beautiful women and competing egos, Ernest struggles to find the voice that will earn him a place in history, pouring all the richness and intensity of his life with Hadley and their circle of friends into the novel that will become The Sun Also Rises. Hadley, meanwhile, strives to hold on to her sense of self as the demands of life with Ernest grow costly and her roles as wife, friend, and muse become more challenging. Despite their extraordinary bond, they eventually find themselves facing the ultimate crisis of their marriage—a deception that will lead to the unraveling of everything they’ve fought so hard for.

A heartbreaking portrayal of love and torn loyalty, The Paris Wife is all the more poignant because we know that, in the end, Hemingway wrote that he would rather have died than fallen in love with anyone but Hadley.

God's Secretaries by Adam Nicolson ✔✔✔✔

How the King James Bible came about is the theme of this informative, reader-friendly book. I have always loved the King James version, with its beautiful language, which flows so majestically, especially in the Psalms. I already knew, of course, that it had been put together in the 17th century in England, but I never knew exactly how, or how much James I - who succeeded Elizabeth I - was actually involved in the making of it. This book answered those questions, but was also a vivid portrayal of that post-Elizabethan time in England, plus a comparison of the Puritans to the Church of England clergy.

Some of the highlights were: - a Puritan minister who spent five years from 1594 - 1599,preaching each and every Thursday on the book of Jonah, which consists of four chapters, a total of 48 verses! The author calls this "word - inflation".

- the fact that James I commissioned this translation as a way of unifying England and Scotland.

- the translators divided up the Bible amongst some 50 of themselves, and each translator was to work on a chapter, then submit it to his particular group to work on it together, then to submit it to the entire group. In this way, the richness and majesty of the text was the result - each word was important.

- this richness and lushness was reflected in the stained-glass windows and beautifully-wrought interiors , not to mention vestments of the churches and clergy. It reminds me of the Baroque period in Europe, particularly in Bach and Vivaldi.

This was not a stuffy, scholarly read. Nicolson was obviously passionate about the subject - he says he is a Christian, but doesn't go to church - and has made this book as readable as its subject.

If I Stay - and - Where She Went by Gayle Forman ✔✔✔

I put these two books together, because the second one is a sequel. These are young adult books, and both were highly recommended in blogs that I read. I was intrigued by these books, first because the story is about a young classical cellist, Mia, and her boyfriend, Adam Wilde, who is a star in a rock band, and also because in the opening pages, Mia's family suffers a terrible tragedy, which Mia alone survives. The first novel is told from Mia's perspective, and the second one from Adam's, so it's interesting to see how events unfolded from one another's vantage point. These were easy reads for me, but entertaining enough.

I guess it must be bcause I now have a Kindle, but in the past month or so, I've been reading several books at the same time - my last three entries here have all been read at the same time, and I have three others on the go right now. I read whatever I feel like at any particular time. The fact that they're all non-fiction makes it more possible to do this, and actually as I'm writing this, I just received a book I won on Book Browse - My Reading Life by Pat Conroy, so I'm going to sit right down now and start it, so I guess I'm up to four at a time!

The Best Laid Plans by Terry Fallis✔✔✔

I purchased this book because I had heard about it on Canada Reads 2011, and it actually won the title as "the most essential book of the decade", beating out The Birth House, which was my first choice. Now I'm considering recommending it for Book Club next year, not because it's the best book I've read this year, but because it covers a topic we've never had - politics, and Canadian politics at that. The subject is quite interesting right now since the Conservatives have a majority for the first time in years, the NDP have all these rookie MPs from Quebec, and Jack Layton wants to restore order and dignity to the house. In another year we'll see how things are doing, and it might be fun to discuss them from the vantage point of this novel, where the candidate does not want to run, but when he is elected, finds his political soul in doing what is right, not what will win him more votes next time.

The other interesting thing about this novel is that the author first offered the entire novel as a free podcast online in the hopes that someone would hear it and consider publishing it. The author's webpage has the complete podcast.

This book was my recommendation for Book Club next year, and was accepted by the group. We'll do it in October.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot ✔✔✔

I copied this from Book Browse:

Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. She was a poor Southern tobacco farmer who worked the same land as her slave ancestors, yet her cells—taken without her knowledge—became one of the most important tools in medicine. The first “immortal” human cells grown in culture, they are still alive today, though she has been dead for more than sixty years. If you could pile all HeLa cells ever grown onto a scale, they’d weigh more than 50 million metric tons—as much as a hundred Empire State Buildings. HeLa cells were vital for developing the polio vaccine; uncovered secrets of cancer, viruses, and the atom bomb’s effects; helped lead to important advances like in vitro fertilization, cloning, and gene mapping; and have been bought and sold by the billions.

Yet Henrietta Lacks remains virtually unknown, buried in an unmarked grave.

Now Rebecca Skloot takes us on an extraordinary journey, from the “colored” ward of Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1950s to stark white laboratories with freezers full of HeLa cells; from Henrietta’s small, dying hometown of Clover, Virginia — a land of wooden slave quarters, faith healings, and voodoo — to East Baltimore today, where her children and grandchildren live and struggle with the legacy of her cells.

Henrietta’s family did not learn of her “immortality” until more than twenty years after her death, when scientists investigating HeLa began using her husband and children in research without informed consent. And though the cells had launched a multimillion-dollar industry that sells human biological materials, her family never saw any of the profits. As Rebecca Skloot so brilliantly shows, the story of the Lacks family — past and present — is inextricably connected to the dark history of experimentation on African Americans, the birth of bioethics, and the legal battles over whether we control the stuff we are made of.

Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout

This is our next selection for Book Club, and I will be presenting it. I think this is the third time I've read it - and each time I find something new. Olive is quite a person, and I guess what draws me to this novel, which is presented in thirteen short stories, is that I see myself, and many other women, in her. And Crosby, Maine is a small town, just like my own town, so I see many resemblances. Should be an interesting discussion!
I first posted on this book in May, 2009.

The Last Concubine by Leslie Downer ✔✔

Heather dropped this off to me, I started reading it Thursday afternoon and I finished it today. It tells the stories of women in Japan in the early 19th century, just at the point in time where the old ways are supplanted by new ways brought about by rebellion and upheaval. It really was more of a historical romance than historical fiction, but it was interesting enough. Only two stars though. Good to read during the snowstorm, though!

Careless Love - The Unmaking of Elvis Presley ✔✔✔✔

I've been thoroughly immersed in Elvis Presley ever since visiting Graceland. Reading these two volumes was a revelation in so many ways - so many things about Elvis' life I didn't know. The last time I was as emotionally affected by a biography of a musician was some twenty years ago when I read Beethoven's biography.

This second volume was sad a lot of the time as I watched Elvis go steadily downhill. The large quantities of prescription drugs that he took, the many doctors he had at his beck and call, the women who came into his life, his changes in temperament - there were times when I didn't like him too much, but then I would become sad when I saw how needy he was, how lonely he was even amidst his ever-constant companions.

He obviously never got over the death of his mother, and his relationships with women illustrate that over and over again. I think he even had a death wish in those last few years. - he certainly seemed obsessed by mortality.

The Colonel,too, was an enigma, and the author didn't appear to like him very mich - the same can be said for Ginger Alden, his last "girlfriend", who was with him when he died.

These books were extra-special for me - an excellent, gifted young man whose life was wasted away.

Last Train To Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley by Peter Guralnick ✔✔✔✔

I am an Elvis fan. Not enough to go to Collingwood every year for the Elvis Impersonator festivals, but I was always interested in his career, especially his meteoric rise to fame when I was 10 or 11 years old. I remember seeing him on The Ed Sullivan Show with all the screaming girls and his gyrations on stage ( I was watching the show at Helen and Jim's home in Edmonton - that I do remember), then reading about him in Photoplay and Modern Screen magazines. I also occasionally purchased Hit Parader and Song Hits magazines when my measly allowance covered it.

I sort of lost track of him in the sixties when I was studying piano so intensely, but I seemed to always know what was going on in his life. The day he died, I was visiting a friend here in KL with David (two years) and Karen ( two months old) along with me - her husband came up the stairs to tell us Elvis had died. I remember being sad, and I have always remembered that date.

This year we visited Memphis and Graceland on our trip home from Florida, and I found the Guralnick books in one of the Elvis souvenir stores at Graceland. I had long known about them, and wanted to read them, so it seemed appropriate to buy them as my own souvenir of Graceland and Elvis' life. I wish now I'd been able to read them first, as I think our visit, interesting and enlightening as it was, would have been even more significant.

Before we drove to Memphis, we stopped in Tupelo and visited Elvis' birthplace home and the church he attended with his parents, and the story of Last Train To Memphis begins there.

I learned so much about Elvis from this book - he was a bit of a loner as a child, was extremely close to his mother all of his life ( she died in 1958 ), always knew he would do "something with his life", was very religious, was scared and shy before performing, but became a different person onstage, to the point that he didn't even know he was making all those movements which defined his stage presence, was really and truly a polite, engaging, likeable young man whom everyone eventually admired and adored, even some of his harshest critics (except for Frank Sinatra, who must have been as jealous as all get out), who refused to take acting lessons because he wanted to be himself in his movies ( too bad- I never thought they were very good...), who respected and revered other performers who may have imitated his own particular style ( like Gene Vincent of Be-Bop-A-Lula, and Jerry Lee Lewis)

I also have the second book, which I'm anxious to read, too. These books are definite keepers!

The Three Weissmanns of Westport by Cathleen Schine ✔✔✔

A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice
Betty Weissmann has just been dumped by her husband of forty-eight years. Exiled from her elegant New York apartment by her husband's mistress, she and her two middle-aged daughters, Miranda and Annie, regroup in a run-down Westport, Connecticut, beach cottage. In Schine's playful and devoted homage to Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility, the impulsive sister is Miranda, a literary agent entangled in a series of scandals, and the more pragmatic sister is Annie, a library director, who feels compelled to move in and watch over her capricious mother and sister. Schine's witty, wonderful novel "is simply full of pleasure: the pleasure of reading, the pleasure of Austen, and the pleasure that the characters so rightly and humorously pursue..An absolute triumph" (Cleveland Plain Dealer).

The above is from Chapters Indigo website - I'm feeling lazy tonight. However, I must say I really enjoyed this book - a fairly light read, and certainly witty - I especially enjoyed the character of Felicity, the above-mentioned mistress.

Bury Your Dead by Louise Penny ✔✔✔✔

It's interesting that the last novel I sign out from our local library here in Florida was written by a Canadian! I've read four of Penny's novels now, and by checking The Brutal Telling, which I entered on this blog on June 10, 2010, you'll get some background into this particular novel which I've just finished.

Penny keeps us guessing on three separate levels here all through the book - from Gamache investigating a strange murder in an Anglo historical library in Quebec City, to his second-in-command, Beauvoir, re-investigating the accused killer from The Brutal Telling - and finding him innocent - then finally to a hostage-taking incident some months previously when both Gamache and Beauvoir were severely injured, both physically and emotionally. Two of these levels finally intersect, but this author is quite adept at writing mysteries, without undue violence, too.

A comment on the book cover that her writing could well be a model for students of this genre is spot on. She's a wonderful mystery writer! She obviously has a great affection for Quebec City and it brought back lots of memories for me of visiting there over the years.

Even Silence Has An End by Isabel Betancourt ✔✔✔

This is the story of the author's six-year captivity by FARC - the people's army of Columbia - in the jungles of the Amazon. It was an interesting contrast to Unbroken, which I read earlier this year, because this book explores the relationships between people under such constant stress much more deeply.

"When you're chained by the neck to a tree, and deprived of all freedom - the freedom to move around, to talk, to eat, to drink, to carry out your most basic bodily needs - well, it took me several years to realize it, but you still have the most important freedom of all, which no one can take away from you: that is the freedom to choose what kind of person you want to be".

Ingrid never stopped dreaming of escape and did get away several times, only to be re-captured. The book is a treatise on the basics of life - fear, freedom, hope. She was often derided by her fellow captives, and suffered many indignities from her captors, forced to march many miles through dense jungle, with only her mother and children's broadcasts to hostages over the radio sustaining her - she was never allowed to speak to them, and they broadcast every day not knowing whether she was alive to hear them.

After finishing the book, I read some reviews, and found the readers' comments following them very interesting. Many people absolutely hate this woman, for being part of the "elite" in Columbia, for going into a dangerous region in the first place, and especially for suing the Columbian government after her release on the basis that she was not sufficiently warned about the area she was visiting at the time of her capture.

So the controversies that followed her time in the jungle have not really been resolved, including scathing remarks from some of her fellow hostages. But, for me, it was a good read, and I admired her spirit in facing each day with hope that this one might be the last in the jungle.

The Autobiography of Henry VIII by Margaret George ✔✔✔✔

Margaret George writes excellent historical fiction, including Mary, Queen of Scots and Helen of Troy, and now this one, which I read for our Tudor theme study at April's book club meeting. She is easy to read, never sensational, and always remains true to historic fact.

The Tudors is a favorite subject of mine, and I've already read many books on this theme, but I picked this one - some 900 pages long- first because most of the books I've read deal with Anne Boleyn or Elizabeth I, and I wanted to know more about Henry's other wives, especially after Anne Boleyn. Wolf Hall by Hillary Mantel, which I read last year, had Thomas Cromwell as its subject and I found it overly scholarly. This one was an excellent choice.

Henry is seen as a man who never got over the fact that his mother never loved him, or at least never demonstrated any affection towards him. You also see the loneliness of the reigning monarch, not knowing who to trust, even himself. It's also quite obvious that once Henry made up his mind about someone's treachery, whether real or suspected, or wanted to get rid of someone, like three of his six wives, that he never spoke directly with the object of his wrath, almost as if he knew if he did, he'd be talked out of it. He really was just a little boy who wanted a mommy!

Nothing To Envy: Ordinary Lives In North Korea by Barbara Demick ✔✔✔✔✔

Demick follows the lives of six North Korean citizens over fifteen years, bringing to life what it means to be living under the most repressive totalitarian regime today, where displays of affection are punished, informants are rewarded and an indiscreet comment can send a person to prison for life, and all his family suffer from generation to generation as a result. The book also follows the journeys of these six persons as they become disillusioned with the government and finally realize, only after they've been able to leave by way of China into South Korea, how their country has betrayed them.

Each chapter of this book begins with a small photo of life in North Korea. The first chapter shows a satellite image of North and South Korea taken at night, where South Korea is bathed in light, and North Korea is completely dark, except for one little dot at Pyongyang, the capital city.

I quote from the first chapter: "North Korea faded to black in the early 1990s.With the collapse of the Soviet Union,which had propped up its old Communist ally with cheap fuel oil, North Korea's creakily inefficient economy collapsed. Power stations rusted into ruin. The lights went out......Even in parts of the showcase capital Pyongyang, you can stroll down the middle of a main street at night without being able to see the buildings on either side."

The citizens of North Korea are living life as if they were in a prison camp. The eternal, un-ending search for food, even to scooping up mud from the docks, spreading it over a roof till it dries, so any little speck of corn or rice can be extracted, the teacher who feels guilty because she knows as she eats a morsel or two for lunch that she will see several of her students die from starvation, and who feels guilty because it doesn't bother her anymore - this is a gut-wrenching book, made even more horrible by the fact that the reader knows the nightmare - and the majority of them don't even know it's a nightmare - continues.

Charlotte and Emily by Jude Morgan ✔✔✔✔

I purchased this book after looking at it on the shelf at Borders for some time. I've always been fascinated by the Bronte sisters' lives, and Wuthering Heights is one of my favorite classic novels. The book wasn't available at the local library, so I finally decided to buy it - a good decision, because I found it one of the best historical fiction novels I've read.

Before reading it, however, I did read Jane Eyre, and I'm glad I did, because I could see so many details in this book which appeared in Jane Eyre - the awful, awful experiences in a girls' school, the terrible deaths of Charlotte's two older sisters as a result of this same school's discipline, to mention just two. Class differences certainly show themselves too, particularly through the families whose children were educated by Charlotte and Anne.

Although the novel is entitled "Charlotte and Emily", the story is definitely Charlotte's, and I wondered why this novel was also published under the title "The Taste of Sorrow". In following some links, I found a novel devoted to Emily, which I'll try to locate - plus some others - I feel a pull towards stories on literary giants, and there are lots!

I had a hard time deciding what to write here about this novel, because there was so much that spoke to me,so I've left it to goodreads.com to summarise the novel for me:

From an obscure country parsonage came the most extraordinary family of the nineteenth century. The Bronte sisters created a world in which we still live - the intense, passionate world of JANE EYRE and WUTHERING HEIGHTS; and the phenomenon of this strange explosion of genius remains as baffling now as it was to their Victorian contemporaries. In this panoramic novel we see with new insight the members of a uniquely close-knit family whose tight bonds are the instruments of both triumph and tragedy. Emily, the solitary who turns from the world to the greater temptations of the imagination: Anne, gentle and loyal, under whose quietude lies the harshest perception of the stifling life forced upon her: Branwell, the mercurial and self-destructive brother, meant to be king, unable to be a prince: and the brilliant, uncompromising, tormented Charlotte, longing for both love and independence, who establishes the family's name and learns its price.

JANE EYRE by Charlotte Bronte ✔✔✔✔

I like to read at least one classic novel a year, and now that so many can be downloaded for free on Kindle, it was a matter of choosing which one. When I saw that a new film version of Jane Eyre will be released in March, I decided Jane Eyre would be the one.

Jane Eyre was first published in 1847, under the name Currer Bell, because Charlotte feared it would not be published if a woman's name appeared as the author.

Wikipedia has an excellent entry on this novel, exploring its many themes. While I was reading the novel, I was certainly aware of gender bias, class distinctions, the search for acceptance, plus passion and romance, the influence of religion, but the things that struck me as I read were first, the education of young women in those days amidst the most prejudicial males ( reminded me of our times, when the most strident voices for anti-abortion are male), and second, the often odd behaviour patterns of Rochester. Why did he lead her on so much to get closer to her - disguising himself as a gypsy, pretending to court Lady Ingram, misleading her into an almost bigamous marriage?

There's no question it's a highly literate novel, and a wonderful story, with many layers of meaning. Charlotte and her sisters lived a great life of full imagination even while being so secluded - it's amazing that she depicted life - especially romance - so accurately and so fully. I really can't recall whether I ever read the novel previously, but it was an engrossing, enlightening read. I love the sentence: "Reader, I married him" - I felt she was reaching out to communicate with all her readers down through the last 150 years, and it's almost as if she was talking directly to us all.

Still Missing by Chevy Stevens✔✔✔✔

I read this in 24 hours! Annie O'Sullivan is a real estate agent who is just ending an open house at one of the homes she is selling when she is suddenly and violently abducted, taken to a cabin in the wilderness of BC, and held prisoner there for close to a year by her abductor, who controls every aspect of her life, including how often she can pee!

You know right from the get-go that she has survived this terrible ordeal, because she is relating her experiences to a psychiatrist after she returns to the world, but the story is not yet over- hence the title, Still Missing.

A can't-put-it-down story and a really exciting read.

Blonde by Joyce Carol Oates ✔✔✔✔

Blonde is a historical fiction account of the life of Marilyn Monroe, one of the most intriguing stars of the 20th century. Apparently, Oates began this project as a novella of some 15,000 words, but became so fascinated by the subject that the novella became a novel of over 700 pages!

The author insists this is a novel, but those of us who were aware of the details of Monroe's life knew exactly who the Ex-Athlete, the Playwright, the President were. Marilyn always referred to herself as Norma Jean Baker- Monroe was a name given to her by MGM Studios, who at that time virtually owned their stars. Marilyn's greatest tragedy is that she never really knew exactly WHO she was - her mother was a paranoid schizophrenic who spent most of her life in a mental institution, and she never did find out who her father was. She spent most of her childhood in an orphanage, then in a foster home, where the woman of the house, Elsie Pirig, managed to get Norma Jean married off at the age of 16 because she was afraid her husband was lusting after her.

The only life of an artist that I've read or known about that was more tragic was Mozart's, and time and again in this novel her genius at acting was referred to again and again. We always think of Marilyn as the body, the platinum blonde hair, huge mouth and liquid eyes, and there's certainly lots of that - one chapter lists the names of the men and women she slept with in her lifetime, but also we see her talent, becoming the characters she was playing, how she was unfairly over looked for an Oscar nomination for Bus Stop, how when she went to England to do The Prince and the Showgirl she was derided by the British actors but only until they saw the rushes from the movie they were shooting and realized she'd out-acted them all.

Why the drugs, the absolute disregard for her body and how it was exploited by so many? She had no idea who she was, no one to guide her or provide a model, and it was obvious her mother, with her own multitude of problems, had never bonded with Norma Jean so she had no anchor. She so desperately wanted to love and be loved, but was treated over and over again like a toy. Just tragic - that's the only word for it.

Unbroken by Laura Hillebrand ✔✔✔✔✔

The next time I think life is tough, or I'm not getting a break I deserve, or I complain about how I'm treated, I hope I think about Louis Zamperini, the subject of this book. Louis is now 93, the survivor of an odyssey like no other I've ever heard of, even more amazing that every event, every hardship, every example of man's inhumanity to man, or the tiny glimmer of spirit that kept the faintest hope alive actually happened.

I began reading this after Mike was about halfway through it, and read it in just a few days - jealously eyeing it while Mike was taking his turn reading it, anxious to see if Louis could possibly live through another day.

Everyone should read this book, if only to see a living example of true grit and courage. Would I - could I - ever be the tiniest bit like Louis? I doubt it, but just having Louis as a role model makes it possible.

FAVORITES OF 2010

The top three books I read this year were: 1. The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell
2. Room: A Novel by Emma Donoghue
3. We Were The Mulvaneys by Joyce Carol Oates

And the remainder:

The Mistress of Nothing by Kate Pullinger
Galore by Michael Crummey
This Body of Death by Elizabeth George
Losing My Religion by William Lobdell
Amy and Isabelle by Elizabeth Stout
Latitudes of Melt by Joan Clark
My Stroke of Insight by Jill Bolte Taylor
The Help by Kathryn Stockett

The Lonely Polygamist by Brady Udall ✔✔✔✔✔

Finally, a book I couldn't put down! It had seemed like a long time since I added five checkmarks to a book, and this one was like a drink of cold water after a long, dusty walk. I just absolutely loved everything about it, and knew I would before the first page was completely read - the writing is conversational, humorous, and intelligent, the characters are so completely human with all their various idiosyncracies, and some of the events in this novel made me laugh so hard I cried, and also made me shed a tear or two of sadness, What more could you ask for in an excellent book?

Golden Richards has four wives and 28 children, but he's lonely, and finds himself heading for an affair. When you hear the title, your mind conjures up pictures of a stiff-necked patriarch, women in prairie dresses and long hair wound around their heads, children with pinafore dresses or breeches, shy smiles on their faces - but NONE of those images work for this family - the four wives are regular people, albeit with the odd issue here and there, the children are always fighting or conniving against one another, and through it all floats Golden, who is trying to recover from the death of Glory, one of his daughters, some three years earlier.

That's all I'm going to say - you just have to read it. This makes my list of all-time favorites. About 3/4 of the way through the book, I was already grieving the end of the story, and the wonderfully colorful people who make up this novel.