The Next Book On My List

Bossypants by Tina Fey What would you like to know about Tina Fay? Would you like to know about her dreams and aspirations? Would you like to know about her childhood woes and life as a young girl? What about high school, friends and relationships? Well, you’ll get it here but I’m not sure if it will be what you expected. This comedian takes her life and in a very entertaining way tells her story. You do learn about her life and the experiences that brought her into the position that she is in today: a successful writer, producer and director. Tina also talks about her family and what it is like to be a working mother. But it’s lighthearted and hilarious. I’m not sure if it will be to everyone’s taste but I found it entertaining. Personally, I guffawed (I love that word) often while reading Tina’s story. I was in the mood for something fresh, funny, and easy to read. Check. Check. Check. I picked this book up, dived right in and giggled throughout. Tina Fey is a comedian an...

Rod: The Autobiography by Rod Stewart                 The opening pages of this autobiography were written in such a hilarious form that I knew instantly that I was going to enjoy this book. When Rod Stewart announced in the first paragraph of the first chapter that he knew he was a mistake because his parents were “forty two and thirty nine with four children to feed, the youngest of them already ten” I laughed. Then he took it further to justify these feelings by also announcing that his birth happened during World War II, though near the end. Rod Stewart set the stage early on that he was going to make fun of himself, many of his situations and be honest. He was all of those things throughout the pages, which takes us through his untimely birth, his youth in London, his many trials and tribulations with bands, his solo careers and his marriages, turbulent as they may have been.    ...

The Devil’s Arithmetic by Jane Yolen Hannah never wanted to remember what happened to her grandparents and aunt when they were children in the Holocaust. Now that she is experiencing it for herself, she realizes that the memories are all they have. All of their possessions and many of their loved ones are all gone and all that remains are the things they can remember. Hannah isn’t sure how she ended up in a village in the 1940’s. She was (not really) enjoying the Passover Seder at her grandfather’s house when she opened the door for the prophet Elijah, per tradition, and found herself in Poland. People were calling her Chaya, her Hebrew name, and she could understand Yiddish. Hannah also understood when she saw the line of officers near a distant village that they were Nazi’s. The memories of her real life that she was clinging to forced her to warn the others of what was to come but they wouldn’t listen. It was too late. As Hannah was loaded into the trucks, and eventually i...

The Sound of Glass by Karen White                 When Merritt Heyward moved to South Carolina she was hoping to start a new life far away from her hometown in Maine. Her husband Cal was a fireman who had died on the job. His grandmother Edith had left him the home that had been in the Heyward family for generations. Since he was also deceased the home passed to Merritt, who had never been to South Carolina and didn’t know anything about Cal’s family. Moving to South Carolina would change Merritt and her outlook on life. Not just moving to a new home, meeting Cal’s brother Gibbes, and realizing a cycle of abuse. But meeting her half-brother, Owen and her stepmother Loralee, the woman who had damaged her relationship with her father.                  The Sound of Glass is a well written, enjoyable, fascinating story about ...

Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood                 A plague has destroyed mankind leaving Jimmy with the Children of Crake, Crakers as he calls them. Crake is dead. Oryx is dead. It’s just Jimmy, the Crakers, and the genetic experiments like, pigoons, wolvogs, snats and rakunks. People had been pushing the boundaries with playing God for decades. The pleeblands had become cesspools for disease. Those who lived on compounds or modules were relatively safe because of the air purifiers. The vaccines were being created almost as fast as the diseases were spreading. Crake had theories about why that was before he died. That was before he created the Crakes, a species immune to diseases that held none of the human weaknesses. This is not a world I know. This is not a future I want. This is a world that envisions man at its breaking point because of the actions of man. We are to blame. This was highly inter...

Beatles vs. Stones by John McMillian                 The Beatles were considered to be the respectable, clean, lovable boys from the North of England. Their signature hair was mimicked by up and coming bands and their hometown of Liverpool started drawing countless talent scouts looking for the next big thing. But this image of the Beatles was one created over time, in an effort to get noticed and sign a record deal. The Beatles started off playing in a cavern to a crowd of loyal fans who liked their rough behavior. In Hamburg, Germany where they played for countless hours, they had already started to experiment with drugs and have a lot of sex with groupies in a rundown room. This was before they started wearing all black and had choreographed bows. Then there was Beatlemania. Then came the Rolling Stones, five young men from posh London with a completely different upbringing than that of the Beatles. ...

The Young Elites by Marie Lu                Well that was interesting, easy to read and enjoyable. I like Lu. She is subtle and knows how to draw out a plot while still making things interesting. She is unpredictable and man, can she bring a story together and wow you. I was not disappointed. I am interested. I am invested. I am patiently waiting for the next novel in this series to come out.                 The Young Elites is a story about Adelina Amouteru, a victim of the blood fever that ravaged the nation, who was left scarred and known, like many other scarred survivors, as a malfetto. She is considered cursed. Her father’s business is suffering. She suffers her father’s fury. His fury eventually releases her powers and she unwittingly kills him. Adelina is captured and sentenced to death. She is rescued by the Dagger Society and brought to Estenzia, th...