Fifefly Lane - Kristin Hannah

Tully Hart and Kate Mularkey make an unlikely pair. In junior high when they meat Tully is a worldly well dressed daughter of a doped up hippie. Kate is a lonely catholic girl from a good family who lost her best friends when she decided she didn't want to bend to peer pressure. Everyone wants to be Tully's friend. Kate is all alone. Each girl feels alone. One night Tully is invited to a high school party with the captain of the football team. Her doped up mother has no objections and she finds herself the victim of a date rape. Abandoned in the woods she finds her way home only to have no one to talk to. By chance she runs into Katie who has snuck out to spend time with her horse. The two become fast friends and this book follows them through a lifetime of friendship.

On the Five Star Scale *****

Naughty Bits (****) - So there is a rape in this story, some potty words, and some "relationships".

Readability (****) - 496 pages but really a fast read. I couldn't put it down.

Sap Factor (*****) - I think I cried through the entire last third of the book. I had just had a miscarriage and the hormones were going wild but the subject matter was pretty intense so I think that most people would find themselves in a similar sappy situation.

Final notes (*****) -I loved this book. Maybe it was the timing, but I just really invested in the characters. Kate is the girl I always saw myself as. Sometimes it is hard to have a friend like Tully. You are always unsure of where you stand in the world. I related to that aspect of the story. I also found the mother daughter relationships to be especially poignant. Not recommend if you can't handle a little romance. Previously Hannah mostly stuck to that genre.

The Golden Ticket: An Inspirational Novel - Brendon Burchard

This book is basically a salesman's motivational guide. It was predictable, poorly written, and not very earth shattering. What should have been done in three pages pamphlet was dragged out into a boring story. I want these hours back :)

NO STARS

The White Masai: My Exotic Tale of Love and Adventure - Corinne Hofmann

Corinne Hofmann was a Swedish tourist on holiday in Kenya with her live in boyfriend. Then she saw a Masai warrior on a ferry. She became obsessed. Within a few short days she had broken up with her boyfriend and tried to get "her Masai" out of jail. She had to return to Switzerland but swore she'd be back in spite of language barriers. She sold her business and her apartment and returned to Kenya not even sure if "her Masai" liked her or where he was. She found him, found he did like her, and then married him. For four years she lived in a remote village. She had malaria three times, almost died twice, had TB and had to be quarantined, started a store, and had a baby. After four years she took her daughter and returned to Switzerland.

On the five star scale

Sap Factor () -

Naughty Bits (****) - Definite lusting and drug use.

Readability (****) - 320 pages.

Final notes (**) - After I read Reunion I had to read this book to figure out what would posses someone to leave everything known for the unknown. I never really figured it out. Yes there was lust but it became evident very quickly that Masai culture does not lend itself to ours as well. Corinne sticks it out in village life for four years though much of which she is sick. She also builds a store and helps support the village long after she leaves.

Reunion in Barsaloi - Corinne Hofmann

When Corinne Hofmann fled Kenya with her two year old daughter she didn't know if she would ever be back. Fourteen years later she returned to see her ex-husband and his family that she considered her own.

On the five star scale

Sap Factor () - This book is about reunion but for me personally all of the emotion you would normal expect were absent. It was almost told in a clinical manner.

Naughty Bits ()-

Readability (***) - 162 page, interesting story.

Final notes (**) - I picked this book up because the cover looked interesting. A few pages in and I realized I had started the story at the end. Corinne Hofmann told why she was in Kenya in a book previous. She then told about returning to Switzerland, in another book. This book was about returning to see her ex husband and his family. Of brining back photos of his daughter so he could see the woman she was becoming. Of getting pictures for her daughter so she could see the land where she was born. I found some of the thing Corinne did really irritating and her writing style was not my taste but the story of a vacationer who gives up everything to marry a Masai warrior was interesting.

Does My Head Look Big in This? - Randa Abdel-Fattah

A coming of age book that explores one teenagers choice to start wearing a head scarf.

On the five star scale

Sap Factor (*) - You have to deal with some of the normal teenage drama.

Naughty Bits (**) - Some potty talk and underage drinking although I might be wrong about that. Does anyone know the legal age of drinking in Australia.

Readability (****) - 368 pages, teenage fiction. Easy read.

Final notes (***) - Funny coming of age story. Amal is a normal Australian teen until she decides to wear a head scarf. Then she stands out at a time when most of us want to blend in.

Shattered Dreams: My Life as a Polygamist's Wife - Irene Spencer

This was a book I had to read. My father has a much older sister. As a child the only things I knew about her were that she had stayed in Mexico when the rest of the family had immigrated to the states and that her children had blue eyes. That never made any sense to me because everyone else in my family has brown eyes. When I was a teenager my mother told me that previously to be married to my grandfather my Grandmother had married a white man originally from the states, a Lebarron. When her father found out that members of his family had started to live as polygamist he came in with her brothers and took his daughter and her little baby back home. He then helped to have the marriage annulled. Irene Spencer also married a LeBarron only she lived with him 28 years as his second wife, one of seven. I couldn't help thinking while I was reading this story that if it wasn't for a foreseeing great grandfather this could have been my grandmothers story. It could have been my story. It was just to much of a draw.

On the five star scale

Sap Factor (*) - Irene Spencer became a second wife at sixteen. She spent much of her life begging for love and affection. She lived in extreme poverty and spent much of her life trying to come to terms with what she had been raised to believe God wanted her to do and a healthy future.

Naughty Bits (**) - Irene isn't shy about the details of a polygamist life, of the scheduling dilemmas and of her own desires that were never met.

Readability (****) - 400 page, interesting biography.

Final notes (****) - There has been a lot of news out lately about polygamist. This gives you a in depth look at what goes on in a society like this and what the woman in these groups may be thinking.