Breathe To Read

Breathe To Read

Tuesday, October 29, 2024

Book: Dogland

 Book: Dogland

Author: Tommy Tomlinson

Pages: 256


This is my 194th read for the year

The author takes a deep dive into the land that is dog shows.  Ater watching the Westminster dog show on TV, he wondered what the lives of those dogs and their handlers were like.  Over the course of three years he meets and follows several owners, handlers and dogs and tries to form a picture of what dog shows are about and why people do them.  He does a deep dive into the start of dog lives over 15,000 years ago when wolves forms bonds with humans to what dogs have become today.  He talks to researchers who look at dog/human bonds as they try to find out if dogs truly love us, or we just think they do. 

This was a great book.  It is well written and well researched.  It even has some humor, along with some sadness (get your tissues ready, there is a section of this book where he recounts the loss of his own dog).  He talks to a lot of handlers but follows very closely the handler of a dog named Spiker who is among the best of the best in the dog world.  I learned a lot about different breeds of dogs, research, history, and the Dog Show world and I am glad I read this one.

Stars: 5



Book: After Annie

 Book: After Annie

Author: Anna Quindlen

Pages: 304


This is my 193rd read for the year

When Annie suddenly dies, she leaves behind a husband and 4 young children.  Her family is floundering and trying to figure out how to move on.  Bill, her husband, didn't realize how much he relied on Annie until she was gone.  The eldest, Ally, at 13 feels like she needs to step in and take over some of the adult chores of the house when her father goes into a deep depression at the loss of his wife.  His three sons at 11, 8, and 6 are all grieving in their own ways - the little one hardly understanding what has happened to his mother.  Annie's best friend Anne Marie steps in to try and help since Annie helped her at her lowest.  Over the course of the year this family goes from profound grief to pulling themselves up and trying to figure out how to move on.

This was a decent book.  It took me a little bit to get into - at first feeling like it was just a rambling story.  But then I started to realize that was kind of the purpose.  This is what would probably happen to most of us if we lost a mother or father/wife or husband.  I liked most of the characters - except Bill's mother.  I think the author wrote her especially awful.  It was a bit repetitive, but it did pull together in the end.

Stars: 4



Sunday, October 27, 2024

Book: The Frugal Wizard's Handbook for Surviving Medieval England

 Book: The frugal Wizard's Handbook for Surviving Medieval England

Author: Brandon Sanderson

Pages: 384


This is my 192nd read for the year

From Amazon:

A man awakes in a clearing in what appears to be medieval England with no memory of who he is, where he came from, or why he is there.  Chased by a group from his own time, his sole hope for survival lies in regaining his missing memories, making allies among the locals, and perhaps even trusting in their superstitious boats.  His only help from the "real world" should have been a guidebook entitled The Frugal Wizard's Handbook for Surviving Medieval England, except his copy exploded during transit.  The few fragments he managed to save provide clues to his situation, but can he figure them out in time to survive?

This was a decent book.  It took me a little while to get into it, but after awhile, I enjoyed the stoy. There are a ton of characters, so you need to pay attention.  It is a bit silly, and a fast read.  The blurbs from the handbook that were put in between the chapters were probably the best part.

Stars: 4

Saturday, October 26, 2024

Book: Thinner

 Book: Thinner

Author: Stephen King

Pages: 432


This is my 191st read for the year

This is the story of Billy Halleck.  Billy is an attorney who has it all - nice house, nice family - until a tragedy changes everything.  When he kills a woman with his car, his connections gets him off with a slap on the wrist.  However a gypsy who was the father of the woman he hit curses Billy with just one word - Thinner.  Billy, a very overweight guy, doesn't know what to make of this until he starts to shed pounds without trying.  Soon there will be nothing left unless he can find the gypsy who cursed him.

This was a pretty good book.  It was a bit too long in my opinion - we know how wordy King can be.  But overall a solid read.  I have seen the movie but somehow missed reading the book.  Ends just like the movie did, which was satisfying to know only because I know somehow shows can take liberties with books and change how things go. 

Stars: 4


Friday, October 25, 2024

Book: Holidays on Ice

 Book: Holidays on Ice

Author: David Sedaris

Pages: 176


This is my 190th read for the year

This is  book of short stories revolving around the big holiays - Christmas, Easter, Halloween, Thanksgiving.  It starts with a diary from a Macy's store elf who has to work the holiday rush in various jobs around the Santa Village and ends with a secret santa exchange among barnyard animals.

This was a weird book.  I liked a few of the stories - probably about half.  Some of them were just okay.  I really liked the first two.  David Sedaris is a tricky writer for me - I love/dislike his stuff.  I think he is a good writer, but I don't always like the content.  I read this to fill two book challenges (this was on the Rory Gilmore list).  

Stars: 3


Book: Midnight Sun

 Book: Midnight Sun

Author: Stephanie Meyers

Pages: 832


This is my 189th read this year

What Amazon says:
When Edward Cullen and Bella Swan met in Twilight, an iconic love story was born.  But until now, fans have heard only Bella's side of the story.  At last, readers can experience Edward's version.  Told through Edward's eyes it takes the reader on a new and decidedly dark twist.  As we learn more fascinating details about Edward's past and the complexity of his inner thoughts, we understand why this is the defining struggle of his life.

This book is a tome.  And it was fine.  I read it for a challenge where I needed a vampire book.  I have read all the other ones, saw this at a Used books store for 99 cents and thought why not.  I listened to it which made it a little less painful.  It is way too drawn out.  There are pages and pages of dialogue that Meyer could have left out.  Hundreds of pages of inner monologue, or question and answer sessions between he and Bella that did not need to be written for us to get the point.  Twilight fans loved this thing, and like I said - it was fine.  I knew the story and hearing if from Edwards side was a unique take.  Just too long.

Stars: 3


Wednesday, October 23, 2024

Book: Vox

 Book: Vox

Author: Christina Dalcher

Pages: 352


This is my 188th read for the year

This is the story of Dr. Jean McClellan.  She and all the other women in the US have been limited to speaking 100 hours a day.  They wear bracelets that if they go over that number they get an electric shock.  They are not allowed to hold jobs, to read or write.  Dr. McClellan is then approached by the government to develop a serum for the president's brother who was in an accident.  She is freed from her bracelet for the time she is working.  And as she starts her work with her team, she discovers what is truly going on and begins to formulate a plan to fight back.

I wanted to like this book more than I did.  I liked the idea of it when I picked it up, but it isn't well written.  It reads more like Handmaid's Tale fan fiction than a stand alone novel.  The use of the word "Babe" was very overdone.  Too much foul language that just seemed off in the context of the story.  It felt so disjointed.  Didn't care for any of the characters.  

Stars: 2 



Monday, October 21, 2024

Book: Atomic Anna

 Book: Atomic Anna

Author: Rachel Barenbaum

Pages: 449


This is my 187th read for the year

This is the story of three women.  Anna - a brillian scientist in the early part of the century whose life changes on the day of the Chernobyl explosion.  Her daughter Molly and Molly's daughter, Raisa get intertwined with Anna's life when the explosion throws Anna ahead in time where she sees Molly shot and dying.  Anna goes about trying to figure out how to build the time machine so that she can save Molly and fullfill Molly's request of then saving Raisa.  Throughout the story we go back and forth in time over the course of all three women's lives to see what brought them to this moment and what it would take to change it.

I found this book for $2 at a used bookstore and thought it seemed interesting.  And it was.  I really enjoyed the story and the flow of the book.  I think it is well written with good character development.  I liked most the characters and there was just a hint of mystery as the story went along, but not so much to keep the reader unnecessarily in the dark.  I was surprised when I looked this book up on Amazon that it only had 200 reviews because I think it was great.  Time travel done right!

Stars: 4.5


Sunday, October 20, 2024

Book: Daughter of Moloka'i

Book: Daughter of Moloka'i

Author: Alan Brennert

Pages: 336


This is my 186th read for the year

Here is what Amazon says:
This tells the story of Ruth, the daughter that Rachel Kalama, was forced to give up at birth.  This book folows young Ruth from her arrival at the Kapi'olani Home for Girls to her adoption by a Japanese couple who riase her on a strawberry and grape farm in California, her marriage and unjust internment at Manzanar Recloation Camp during WWII, and then  - after the war - to the life-altering day when she recevies a letter from a woman who says she is Ruth's birth mother.  It expands on the Ruth and Rachel relationship that was hinted at in book one.

This book was okay.  I loved the first book and was excited when I saw there was a second one written.  But this book was a lot of fluff and not a lot of substance.  It was more like the author was just trying to capitalize on the success of his first novel instead of really developing a good story.  Even at just a bit over 300 pages, it drags.  There is very little discourse (none really) among the characters which was just odd - especially since they were in a Japanese internment camp.  Everyone is wonderful, the children are sweet and endearing to the point of it just not being realistic.  Just too sappy.  Overall - just not high quality story telling or writing.

Stars: 3

 

Saturday, October 19, 2024

Book: Remember

 Book: Remember

Author: Lisa Genova

Pages: 272


This is my 185th read for the year

Lisa Genova is a neuroscientist turned author, and she uses this non-fiction book to delve into how memories are made and how we retrieve them.  She describes the distrinction between dementia, alzheimers, and just a "lapse in memory".  She discusses how memory is affected by diet and exercise, sleep and age.  She then gives tips and tricks to help improve your memory and what really works and what is just a myth.

This was a fantastic book.  I like Genova's fictional books and this one was no different.  She is a Harvard trained neuroscientist and she uses clear and understandable language to talk through how memory works.  The conclusion for me is that most lapses in memory are completely normal and there are things you do without even realizing it that makes you feel like you have a bad memory.  Forgot where you parked your car?  You probably never took a second to calculate where the car was in the first time, so when you don't form a memory, of course you cannot remember it.  It was fascinating and enlightening, and I encourage you to read it.  Especially if you are in the second half of your life.

Stars: 5


Wednesday, October 16, 2024

Book: Poster Girl

 Book: Poster Girl

Author: Veronica Roth

Pages: 288


This is my 184th read for the year

This is the story of Sonya.  Her family was part of the elite members of a society until the Delegation collapsed.  Now she is a prisoner in the Aperture - a walled off city for the members of the Delegation who survived the uprising and were jailed.  The rest of her family is dead.  And she - the one time Poster face of the Delegation thinks this is where she will die.  However - she is given a chance for freedom and to rejoin society.  The brother of her dead fiance has given her a nearly impossible task to find a missing girl so that she can rejoin her family.  This task leads Sonya on a path through the Delegation's past that she did not know about.  And in the end she needs to decide for herself where her true loyalties lie.

I really liked this book.  I thought it was well written and the story flowed well.  I liked the characters, and there were a few surprises I didn't see coming.  It is a short book, but she was still able to build a sci-fi world that was satisfactory to the reader.  I knocked it a star because the ending was so unsatisfactory.  I was disappointed - I was left wanting more.  It kind of wraps up, but leaves you hanging and the epilogue is only 2 pages.  A bit frustrating.  But overall - glad I read this one.

Stars: 4





Monday, October 14, 2024

Book: Interesting Facts About Space

 Book: Interesting Facts About Space

Author: Emily Austin

Pages: 310


This is my 183rd read for the year

This is a story about Enid.  She is obsessed with space and has a phobia of bald men.  She loves listening to true crime podcasts, and she is trying to forge a relationship with her step sisters now that her dad is gone.  She becomes paranoid when she thinks someone is following her and breaking into her apartment.  

This book was terrible.  I almost didn't finish it, but I was reading it as part of a reading challenge and didn't want to start a new book.  It isn't funny.  It is boring and disjointed and chaotic.  I ddn't like Enid at all.  I felt like I was reading about a middle schooler instead of a grown woman.  Pass.

Stars: 1


Book: The Unclaimed

 Book: The Unclaimed

Author: Pamela Prickett

Pages: 336


This is my 182nd read for the year

Here is what Amazon says:

For centuries, people who died destitute or alone were buried in potters' fields - a Dickensian end that even the most hard-pressed families tried to avoid.  Today, more and more relatives are abandoning their dead, leaving it to local governments to dispose of the bodies.  Up to 150,000 Americans now go unclaimed each year.  The author uncovers a hidden social world.  They follow four individuals in Los Angeles, tracing the twisting, poignant paths that put each at risk of going unclaimed, and introducting us to the scene investigators, notification officers, and crematorium workers who care for them when no one else will. 

This book was fine.  I found it a little dry, but I liked the subject.  I found it interesting to learn more about what happens with bodies who don't get claimed.  And I didn't realize that this was happening more and more.  I wonder if I would have read it instead of listened to it, it would have been a better read.  The narrator was fine, but just a little boring.

Stars: 3

Saturday, October 12, 2024

Book: The Marriage Act

 Book: The Marriage Act

Author: John Marrs

Pages: 497


This is my 181st read for the year

What Amazon Has to Say:

Britain.  The near future.  A right-wing government believes it has the answer to society's ills - the Sanctity of Marriage Act, which actively encourages marriage as the norm, punishing those who choose to remain single.  But four couples are about th doscover just how impossible relationships can be wen the government is supervising every aspect of our personal lives, monitoring every word, every minor disagreement - and will use every tool in its arsenal to ensure everyone will love, honour, and obey.

This was a pretty good book.  I listened to it, and it passed the time.  I have read a lot of Marrs books, and I like his dystopian take.  There is a bit of reality mixed in with an alternate universe that doesn't seem all that unlikely.  I think there was overall good character development, and a few twists in the book that I didn't see coming which was nice.  It even wraps up nicely.  I THINK this might be a bit of a sequel to "The One" - which I have not read yet, but it is a netflix show I have watched.

Stars: 4

Friday, October 11, 2024

Book: Sway

 Book: Sway

Author: Matthew Bocchi

Pages: 288


This is my 180th read for the year

This is the story of the author.  Matthew was only 9 years old when his father was killed in the 9/11 attacks.  His father - who worked on the 105th floor was above where the planes hit and knew he would never make it out.  However - Matthew and his three brothers - never could understand why.  At such a young age, they thought their father would walk through the door at any minute.  Once Matthew's father was confirmed dead, Matthew started down a rabbit hole of trying to figure out what happened to his father.  He became obsessed with watching videos of jumpers - tryings to see if one was his father.  In the midst of his grief, a family member who he trusted took his innocence and that, along with the death of his father, sent Matthew down a path of personal distruction.  He spent years uner a fog of drugs and alcohol being well into his 20s before he got help.

This is a hard book to review.  Matthew sustained a terrible trauma with the death of his father and the abuse from an uncle that his path didn't surprise me all that much.  His mother was trying to hold herself together and that of his younger brothers (one that was only a few months old when 9/11 happened) that I think Matthew's struggle got easily overlooked.  Matthew was an adult before he told someone about the abuse.  I was happy to hear that he finally got the help he needed and has been in recovery for a few years now.  I hope it takes.  The downside for me of this book was there was just page after page of drug abuse.  It started strong in the beginning of his tale of what happened after 9/11.  But I don't think there is enough substance of this book to make me give it higher than 3 stars because it was just endless drugs.  And while that was obviously his story, it just got to be overwhelming and I was hoping to read more about his family or his brothers.  It could be that they asked not to be a part of it - who knows.

Tragic story.  I hope his path forward continues to improve.

Stars: 3


Thursday, October 10, 2024

Book: Full Dark No Stars

Book: Full Dark No Stars

Author: Stephen King

Pages: 384


This is my 179th read this year

This is a book of 4 short-ish stories.  In "1922" a man is upset that his wife wants to sell the family homestead, and when tragedy strikes, he has to decide what to do.  In "Big Driver" - a write is assulted on her way home from a book reading, and as she pieces together what happened to her, she discovers that revenge is the best approach.  In "Fair Extension" a man makes a deal with the devil which then spirals another family out of control.  And in "A Good Marriage" a wife discovers the horrific past of her husband and has to decide what she should do next.

This book was excellent.  Each story was well written, and around 100 pages each.  It was enough for good character development and to have a nice beginning, middle and end.  I read a lot of King's short story books, but most of them have stories that are less than 50 pages - I liked this better.  My favorite story of the group was "1922" - but probably because it was the longest.  Check this one out.

Stars: 5

Wednesday, October 9, 2024

Book: Working Stiff

 Book: Working Stiff

Author: Judy Melinek

Pages: 288


This is my 178th read for the year

This is the story of the author.  As a fellow in forensic pathology, she spent two years in New York City as a medical examiner.  Her tenure started 2 months before 9/11 and carried through the following months that she was involved in the recovery efforts and finally her move to California when she had enough.  Her husband and son by her side, she recounts her day to day work as a medical examiner and then what it was like to work the scene of 9/11.  She gets into the details of what it was like to see bodies in various stages as she learned how to determine cause of death, to speak to families, and to present her findings in court.

This was a great book.  I do have to admit that these kind of books fascinate me, and as a nurse, I am not bothered by the content.  But this book should come with a warning for those who are squeemish.  She gets into the details of bodies as they come to her in the morgue, and especially at the scene of 9/11.  She works the 9/11 scene for 8 months - under harsh conditions where bodies and parts are brought to her as they work to try and identify people.  It will chill you.  

Stars: 4


Tuesday, October 8, 2024

Book: A Fatal Inheritance

 Book: A Fatal Inheritance

Author: Lawrence Ingrassia

Pages: 320


This is my 177th read for the year

This is the story of two families.  The Ingrassia family - the author's family - and the Kilius family.  Both of these families are riddled with cancer throughout their family tree.  The author lost his mother, two sisters, a brother, and a nephew all to cancer.  He takes us back to the 1960s when scientist Dr Li and Dr. Fraumeni started to delve into familial cancer to trace family trees and find out if it was genetic or environmental that was the root cause.  They discover the P53 gene, also know as Li-Fraumeni syndrome and if a person carried this gene, they would get cancer at some point in their lifetime.  It is extremely rare, but it set the path to find out if they could detect the cancers early enough and screne patients often enough, if they could keep them alive.  Moving on from that, they hoped to then be able to attack the inevitable cancer and cure it.  While the first part has been successful in catching cancers early, they are still trying to stop it before it gets any further.  It is passed on from generation to generation - sometimes without people being aware they even carry it before it is too late.

This is a fantastic book.  And very sad.  One story after another of babies all the way through adults who had the P53 gene and did all get cancer.  Hardly any of them survived - even with early detection.  It would riddle their bodies in a wide variety of places - breast, lung, brain, lymph, pancreas, etc and little could be done to stop it from coming.  It is more rare than the BRCA gene.  It was fascinating to read about the research as it progressed through the decades, and how Crisper (and even LCA) was mentioned near the end as gene therapy takes a forefront in controlling disease.  And beyond that were the stories of these two families and the heartbreak of what it must be like to know that if you have this gene, you will get cancer.  And it will almost always be fatal.  Very interesting read.

Stars: 4.5


Book: Bridge of Sighs

 Book: Bride of Sighs

Author: Richard Russo

Pages: 642


This is my 176th read for the year

What Amazon has to say:

Lucy Lynch is sixty years old and has spent his entire life in Thomaston, NY.  Like his late, beloved father, Lucy is an optimist, though he's had plenty of reasons not to be - chief among them his mother, still indomitably alive.  Yet it was her shrewdness, combined with that Lynch optimism, that has propelled them years ago to the right side of the tracks and created an "empire" of convenience stores about to be passed on to the next generation.  Lucy's oldest friend, once a rival for his wife's affection, leads a life in Venice far removed from Thomaston.  In fact, the exact nature of their friendship is one of the many mysteries Lucy hopes to untangle in the history he's writing of his hometown and family.  And with his story interspersed with that of Noonan, the native son who'd fled so long ago, the destinies building up around both of them are relentless, constantly surprising, and utterly revealing.

This book was a tome.  It was pretty good, but if I had to sum it up in one word it would be "rambley".  It starts when Lucy and Noonan are kids, all the way until grown adults - but moving back and forward in time as the book progresses.  I found myself wishing Russo would just speed it up a bit - he seemed to want to put every mundane detail of their lives into this book.  I loved his "Empire Falls" book, but this one didn't flow for me like that one did.  I did like Lucy and his dad, and I did like Noonan as an adult.  Sarah - didn't love her character and she seemed to really unravel at the end.  It wraps up nicely, but it just took so long to get there.  

Stars: 3.5

Book: Skeleton Crew

 Book: Skeleton Crew

Author: Stephen King

Pages: 672


This is my 175th read for the year

This is a book of short stories.  I liked almost all of them.  There were some longer ones, and a few that were only a few pages, but overall - I felt they were entertaining and well written.  The Mist is the first short story in this book.  It ended differently than the movie and I know they have parceled it out to its own novel, so I would be interested to read it and see if changes were made.

Stars: 4.5


Thursday, October 3, 2024

Book: Yours Truly

 Book: Yours Truly

Author: Abby Jimenez

Pages: 416


This is my 174th read for the year

This is what Amazon says:

Dr. Briana Ortiz's life is seriously flatlining.  Her divorce is just about finalized, her brother's running out of time to find a kidney donor, and that promotion she wants?  Oh, that's propbably going to be a new man-doctor who's already registered eight-friggin-seven on Briana's "pain in my butt" scale.  But just when all systems are set to hate, Dr. Jacob Maddox completeyl flips the game - by sending Briana a letter.  And it's a really good letter.  Like the kind that proves that Jacob isn't actually Satan.  Worse, he might be this fantastically funny likeable guy who'se terrible at first impressions.  Because suddently he and Bri are exchanging letters, sharing lunch dates in her "sob closet", and discussing the merits of freakishly tiny horses.  But when Jacob decides to give Briana the best gift imaginable - she wonders just how she can resist this quietly sexy new doctor.  Especially when he calls in a favor she can't refuse.

This book started off strong and then about half way through I felt it went downhill.  I started to notice it about a 1/4 into the book that this wasn't going to be for me, but then it truly took a turn.  I am not a big romance genre fan to start with, but I did like another book by this author.  But this "miscommunication" trope - I hate it.  It is worth of Hallmark Christmas movies and really nothing else.  At least not to the level that is in thie book.  The dialogue started to get cheesy - especially with the side characters.  Jacob's anxiety was either off the charts, or barely noticable to fit moving the story along.  I just could not get into it.

Stars: 2


Wednesday, October 2, 2024

Book: The Bean Trees

 Book: The Bean Trees

Author: Barbara Kingsolver

Pages: 272

This is my 173rd read for the year

This is the story of Taylor Greer.  She is running from her old life and in the process of doing so, she is handed a three year old Native American girl to take care of.  She knows nothing of this child or why she was given the child, but she takes her and nicknames her Turtle.  Over the new few months, Taylor settles into a life in Arizona and starts to meet friends.  She moves in with one of her friends, Lou Anne, who recently got a divorce and has a baby of her own.  They support each other and when there is threat that Turtle might be taken away from Taylor, she decides she will do anything she can to stop that from happening.

This was a great book.  I do like most of Kingsolver's novels.  She is a pretty good storyteller.  I listened to this one and the narrator was excellent.  It flows pretty well, and there is good character development.  I really like Taylor and Lou Anne and their support of one another.  The flaws for me of this book was that some conversations did seem to be too drawn out - especially when it was a side character.  And also the ending was a bit unbelievable - but I won't spoil why.  I am happy it turned out the way it did, but it didn't seem believable.

Stars: 4