Burning Bright - Tracy Chevalier

Burning Bright follows the Jem Kellaway whose family comes to London after the death of his older brother. He and his father are chair makers and they find work working for Philip Astley a circus owner. Jem befriends his neighbor Maggie Butterfield and they spend much of their time following the circus life and William Blake Jem's next door neighbor who causes uproar by supporting the French Revolution in 1792.

On the four star scale

Sap Factor (*) - London in the late 1700's is not a easy place. People have to work hard and woman are often have little opportunity or resources.

Naughty Bits (****) - The Butterfields are riotous people who enjoy rough talk and song. On multiple occasions Maggie tries to embarrass Jem by pointing out the rougher or more sensual elements of London. At one point Maggie is forced to act out desperation to prevent a rape. Philip Astley's son is a lark who spends much of his time bedding and breaking up with the local young ladies. The community knows what he is up to but few people are willing to stand up to him.

Readability (****) - 320 pages. Although the book is about the eighteenth century the writing style is 21st and easy to follow.

Final notes (**) - An easy read with some entertaining parts but probably not worth the effort. Why did I pick up historical fiction. I know better. See in an attempt to move away from a strict mystery story review blog I'm reading all these books I don't like that much. Maybe I should just say bah humbug to Jason and go on a Mystery Book Binge. Anyone have some good suggestions?

Twilight - Stephenie Meyer

Twilight is the story of Bella Swan who in an effort to give her newly remarried mother a little privacy moves from Phoenix, Arizona to the small town of Fork, Washington to live with her sheriff father. She struggles living in a small dark place but is mesmerized at school by the aloof Cullens family, especially their son Edward who spends significant amounts of time trying to stay away from Bella. Soon she discovers he is really a vampire who is madly in love with her scent and even though she is risking her very mortality she cannot keep herself away from him.

I should preface this by saying I've never really been a fan of romance in books. It always feels contrived. I like when people fall in love I just get uncomfortable about the gritties.

On the Four Star Scale

Sap Factor (***) - Teenage love. Lots of statements of unending love. Need I say more.

Naughty Bits (*) - This book is marketed to the ninth grade crowd although it would be perfectly acceptable reading material and level for junior high. Edward does sneak into Bella's room. I guess if Grace was in sixth grade I would be hesitant about that part but it is mainly just all good stalker fun. Some kissing and a little gore although considering it is a book about vampires really not that much.

Frustration Factor (***) - You know when you were reading the fifth Harry Potter book and he makes all these mistakes because he is an idiot teenager and you want to rip his head off or put the book down because you were a teenager once and you really don't feel like reliving the moment (only a little more dramatic because for crying out loud it was dramatic but not that dramatic) but you keep reading because you are invested in the story and you need to know who dies but you really want Snape to turn out good because that would stick it to Harry. Well that is how I felt about Bella. Only I wasn't invested so I was going nuts.

Readability (***) - 544 pages but the type set is large and they go by fast.

Final notes (**) - So it was inevitable. Most of the women I know have read this book. Only one didn't like it. Almost everyone else loved it, some to the point of obsession (Flo and Nikita I'm talking about you). What to do, what to do. Originally I decided I was not going to read it. Then I was at the library walking the shelves and I saw it on the corner. I figured it was fate so I brought it home. It was a quick read so that was nice. Otherwise though I was disappointed. Maybe it had just been built up to high for me. Maybe I just really hate high school. Maybe I'm just going through a funk right now about women's ideals but I just couldn't get it to it. At one point Meyer mentions Pride and Prejudice and the truth is I had some of those feelings. Edward spends a lot of the book being a complete jerk because he is so wrong for Bella and he is trying to deny his feelings and protect her and his family and everything else. Felt familiar to me. Don't get me wrong. I love Pride and Prejudice but Darcy is such a jerk. Yes he loves her but I swear that sometimes I find the fact that Elizabeth Bennett falls so madly in love with him well just maddening. This is not an ideal way to start a relationship. Could it possible last past a year in our time period. Who knows? Sometimes I wonder if ideas like this become part of the general cultural knowledge, the general psyche or are the ideas just there and so they are written. Like in Twilight dangerous man, love, well I guess we can just love past the whole dangerous part. Or maybe I'm just looking too much into it and it is purely for entertainment value. Anyway it reads nice and lot of other people liked it so feel free to take your chance.

Whitethorn Woods - Maeve Binchy

This was my favorite book of winter vacation. Maeve tells the story of the citizens of Rossmore a small Irish town that hears that a major highway project is planned to bypass the town going through St. Anne's Well. A local holy shrine where locals and tourist alike go to pray for intercession for marriage, babies, or new jobs. The tale is told through the eyes of many of the town residents and often different characters are used to give an more complete picture of the different families of the area.

On the Four Star Scale

Sap Factor (*) - Maeve's main tool is humor but some of the stories are tragic.

Naughty Bits (**) - There may be a few potty words although sitting here today I can't be sure on that. Also a crazy lady kills her lovers new lover off only to be thrown in jail and her mother take up with him.

Readability (****) - 352pages. A put down other books to read this one and get it finished in two afternoons

Final notes (****) - The stories in here made me laugh and I was always bugging Jason to share them like they were actual stories of real people. I'm a weirdo but I liked it a lot.

Foreign Babes in Beijing - Rachel DeWoskin

After graduating from college Rachel Dewoskin longed for excitement. She decided to use her college Chinese and found herself a job working in Beijing for a foreign relation company. She hates her job. The fact that she makes three times more then any of her coworkers makes her uncomfortable. The fact that she is spending her time trying to figure out the best way to market donuts to the Chinese makes her feel claustrophobic. On a fluke she tries out for a Chinese soap opera called Foreign Babes in Beijing, a show about two Chinese brothers who fall in love with and marry foreign babes. (Apparently due to the uneven numbers of men and women in China there is currently a push to have Chinese men marry outsiders). Rachel gets the job and for 80 yen an episode pretends to be the aggressive husband stealing Jiexi.

On the Four Star Scale

Sap Factor () - None.

Naughty Bits (**) - Um Jiexi is a naughty husbanding stealing girl. Some potty language.

Readability (***) - 304 pages. Quick nice read that can be done in a day.

Final notes (***) - DeWoskin is in China as it opens to foreign business and more foreign ideals. I have always thought it was interesting that China while a communist country is so open to capitalism. Through DeWoskins eyes you really see that coming about. Also I understand where DeWoskin is coming from when she says that she needed to go out of the country to see what made her American and actually appreciate her country.

Hate Mail from Cheerleaders and Other Adventures from the Life of Reilly - Rick Reilly

Rick Reilly writes a humorous editorial column for Sports Illustrated. This book is a compilation of his 100 favorite columns as well as a final note on how they resolved, or how the subject felt about them, or how he currently feels about them. Some are humors like his column about the MIT basketball team that hasn't won a single one of their last 50 games. Most of the players didn't even play varsity basketball in high school but what does that matter when you have to find straight A students for your team. Some of the columns are touching like the story of Dick Hoyt who has pushed his son through over 900 races. I've posted a you tube post on the Rick and Dick Hoyt story because I've heard it before and it is a wonderful story of love and accomplishment.

On the Four Star Scale

Sap Factor (*) - I'm putting one star here because Rick has written some sappy stories but for the most part this is about laughing.

Naughty Bits (**) - Some potty language and yes Rick does take his fourteen year old son to a swim suit photo shoot.

Readability (****) - 318 pages quick pages. They are little articles so you can read one and come back later and not feel like you've missed out at all.

Final notes (***) - Funny stuff. Nice for the sports lover in your home.

Water for Elephants - Sara Gruen

When Jacob Jankowski is 21 his parents die in an auto accident. Traumatized he walks out of his final veterinary medicine exam at Cornell without writing a final answer. With no family, no money, and no degree he runs away and joins up with a second rate circus train Benzini Brothers. What follows is a recount of his first days on the job until the end of the Benzini brothers. Gruen fills in the details of how a circus is run as well as what the depression looked/felt like. Jankowski is recounting the tale while in his nineties so you know he makes it but you are not so sure about the other characters that liven up his life.

On the Four Star Scale

Sap Factor (**) - Definitely some sad bits.

Naughty Bits (****) - Some language. We are talking about circus grifters who are not exactly on the up and up. Some ladies from the circus get Jacob drunk and take advantage of him. Someone is murdered. Also Jacob falls in love with the psychotic animal trainers wife and some stuff happens there as well. For the most part Jacob tries to be moral but he struggles in this moment in his life.

Readability (***) - 350 pages. Reads easily.

Final notes (***) - This story has some naughty bits that need to be skipped over but it really is intriguing. Jacob the protagonist is lovable and you really feel for his plight as well as most of the characters that are just trying to survive each day of the depression with something in their bellies. Also it is particularly enjoyable that ninety year old Jacob is telling you the story because you are able to see the resolution to some of the tale.

Persian Girls - Nahid Rachlin

At six months Nahid Rachlin was given to her mother's childless sister. Nine years later her father decided to reclaim his child. What follows is Nahids attempts to fit into her family, fit into her culture, and deal with the cultural/political/religious revolution of Iran. As a child Nahid decides that she wants to come to America and be a writer. Her sister Pari dreams of be an actress. Their parents want them to marry and have children. I'll let you read the book and find out what happens.

On the Four Star Scale

Sap Factor (**) - There is a lot of suffering in this family

Naughty Bits (**) - Nahid imagines an interaction happening between her mother and another man. She also dates. As far as Iranian girls go Nahid is a bit naughty.

Readability (***) - 304 pages. Quick nice read that can be done in a day.

Final notes (***) - Persian Girls is an interesting look at an Iranian girl during an interesting time in their history.

Here If You Need Me - Kate Braestrup

This book is odd. Kate Braestrup was married to a highway patrol who died in a tragic car accident. With four children at home she knew she had to pull herself together but the task seemed insurmountable. To just get herself moving she enrolled in seminary to become a utilitarian minister a job her husband hoped to do after he retired from the police force. After graduation she began working as a Chaplin for the game wardens in Maine. She's the one they call out when children are missing to comfort families. She's the only who give death notices on hunters that have gone missing. She's the one who comforts the wardens when they are broken up about young women who go to the woods to kill themselves.

On the Four Star Scale

Sap Factor (**) - There are some sad stories here. I don't know what I would do if I lost my husband. I don't know how I would help my kids. I also don't know how I would deal if one of my children was to get lost in the woods.

Naughty Bits (*) - Kate is little different.

Readability (**)* - 224 pages. A nice quick read.

Final notes (*) - The book isn't necessarily bad and it just doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. Kate Kraestrup is a minister who tells her seminary teacher that she is religious but not spiritual. But that just doesn't make sense to me. She believes that God is all around us, in the good things that we do for each other. Maybe there is a supreme being maybe not. There might be an afterlife, but there probably isn't. It was just weird for me. Maybe someone else we get the point better.

Relentless Pursuit - Kevin Flynn

This book was written by Kevin Flynn, a Washington DC prosecutor, about a case he never really felt left him. Diana Hawkins and her 13 year old daughter Katrina Harris were brutally killed by Hawkins' ex-boyfriend. Flynn is assigned the case and follows it through from the discovery of the bodies to the cases closure and beyond. He can't let it go.

On the Four Star Scale

Sap Factor (**) - It is sad people can do these kinds of things to each other. The families suffer extreme grief. A two year old witnesses the crime and cousins and a son discover the scene.

Naughty Bits (***) - The killer Norman Harrell was a sick, sick man. He eviscerated Diana and cut Katrina's heart out of her body. Flynn lays it all out there.

Readability (**) - 384 pages. There is nothing difficult about this story to read, besides the emotional disturbance but there is something missing for me. I have no doubt that Flynn is a great prosecutor but his style is lacking that extra flair for me.

Final notes (**) - A terrible story. It is unreal that someone would do this. I think the story is missing the personal touch though by not including pictures of the victims in life. Also like I mentioned before I just did not feel his style. For me he just isn't a great mystery writer.

The Book fo General Ignorance - Everything You Think You Know is Wriong - John Lloyd and John Mitchinson

This book is hilarious. Jason of course was slightly irritated because some of the facts they point out are basically word games. An example, How many states are in the United States? Technically only 46 because Virginia, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts voted to be commonwealths, but a lot of it is just facts you were taught that are just wrong. Amazing. A few examples. Who was America named after? Most likely Richard Ameryk a Welshman that was the chief investor for the voyages of John Cabot in 1497 and 1498. What were chastity belts for? A way for women to keep off unruly suitors. How many words do Eskimos have for snow? Probably less then four.

On the Four Star Scale

Naughty Bits (*) - Well you do get to find out which creature has the longest phallus.

Readability (***) - 288 silly little pages. It is fun to read although it is fully of the kind of facts that annoying little thirteen year old brothers would love to throw out to make you feel like an idiot...I say beat them to it. Not academically written. If you want the sources on their research you have to check it out yourself.

Final notes (****) - Fun, fun. I love how they would follow where the "lies" would begin. It's sort of like the game telephone only it's scarier because some of this stuff is taught in schools, and I wish I was just talking elementary school...but I'm not!

You The Owner's Manual - Michael F. Roizen, Mehmet C. OZ

Does anyone besides me watch Oprah? Dr. Oz is her special doctor friend that is always coming on the show giving advice to people who only go to the bathroom once a week, or still smoke, or drink soda. This little book with cartoons gives you a simplified explanation(as much as most people would ever want to know) on the different parts of the body. It has advice on how to eat, exercise, and live longer. Apparently you need to make more love (in a monogamous relationship) and it needs to be the good kind. What does that even mean?

On the Four Star Scale

Sap Factor () - Um no.

Naughty Bits (**) - Lets just say there is a little body humor. I think it's funny but it might not be for everyone...mom!

Readability (***) - 432 pages. A beast but large type and filled with cartoons.

Final notes - It gave me a few new ideas for my weight training and diet. So it was worth it.