Review: Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail

Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I’ve wanted to read this for a few years. In fact, I started reading it once and thought I wasn’t interested. It turns out that this is the right time in my life to read this book. Before, when I started it, I wondered what hiking the PCT had to do with the death of Strayed’s mother. What I wouldn’t have truly understood until now is that this is a story of profound grief and loss. A young woman was unmoored and untethered when her mother died of cancer at the age of 21 and her siblings drifted apart. Without her mother to ground her, she buried her grief in rage and slowly began her downward spiral to self destruction. Without the shared grief of siblings and a father, she destroyed her marriage with casual sex, slipped onto the path of alcohol and hard drugs, and nowhere to safely grieve or begin healing.

Her reasoning for hiking the PCT alone were nebulous and poorly planned. She was ill prepared but she knew enough to start. She sold everything and bought only what she wore on her back (what she referred to as “monster”), and off she went on her 100 day excursion through 3 states, hiking through rain, snow, cold, heat, rocks, cliffs, meeting new characters, parting ways, meeting up again, and hiking, and hiking and hiking.

The real heart of the story is Strayed’s leaving all of her vices behind and discovering herself in relation to her grief and to her mom. It is so very raw and honest. I had to put it down a few times to process and cry. There are no empty platitudes. There is just a girl who is hiking, struggling physically, and with every step, going through stages of grief, learning, raging, growing, healing, crying, processing, and everything in between.

The reason I didn’t like the book two years ago when I began it is because it begins with her mother’s cancer diagnosis and the days leading up to her young death. I was already living that. I didn’t need to read about someone else’s experience. Except I was 37 when my 67 year old mother learned she had metastatic cancer. I can’t go back there. Even now. My mind still freezes in shock and helplessness. My mother died last September. She was 81 and I’m still too young to be without my mother. This is why this book worked this time around.

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Review: Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption

Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Somehow I believed I had an understanding of discrimination. My dad was a freedom rider. He started Head Start in Mississippi and Detroit. He got beat up by the sheriff we saw in Mississippi Burning. He was out on the night that MLK Jr. died and feared for his life. He told us all of these stories and more and taught is about civil rights. And all this happened when I was a little girl so it was a long time ago.

BUZZ!

The events covered in this book did not happen a long time ago. There may be more discrimination in southern states but it’s happening now all the time, all around me, to people I know. For all my talk and even action to champion the underdog, at the end of the day I come home to my middle class home, mortgaged against my husband’s and my underpaid but highly educated jobs, where my kids have plenty of food but “nothing to eat,” and my reflection in the mirror is of a white, middle aged woman.

To Bryan Stevenson - I am in awe of his perseverance and rabid optimism in his cause. He has made a huge dent in a societal problem that MLK Jr. died for. The issues persist in much more sneaky manner which makes this problem harder to fight and so insidious. But there innocent are men and women who are living life because of this man and his vision. I honestly can’t celebrate him enough.

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Review: Another Woman's Husband

Another Woman's Husband by Gill Paul
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I wondered if this book would be redundant of another book I read a couple of decades ago about the king who abdicated for an American divorcee. In some ways, it was but only to the extent to establish Wallis’ character. What previous accounts left blank that this one covers wonderfully are the supporting characters of Wallis Simpson’s climb into the history books. In fact, the POV is written as a very old friend of Wallis who plays an important part in her story.

Since I read the earlier book, letters have been released by an anonymous person from Wallis to her ex-husband, Ernest Simpson. They are quite telling of the former Mrs. Simpson and her unrealistic understanding and comprehension of how her own actions created her gilded cage. My previous opinion of Wallis remains unchanged, although there is more depth to my understanding of her. There is a little pity but a more comprehensive understanding of the carnage she left in her wake. She was not the only person who made poor choices and suffered the consequences.

The book also peripherally covers Diana as a parallel storyline covers the time period of her untimely death. Like my parents who could recall where they were and what they were doing when JFK was shot, my generation remembers the shock and horror when Diana died. We felt like we knew her even though we didn’t. She bucked the royal norms and we saw her doing what we were doing; being a mother, playing with her sons, and wearing slacks.

Both of these woman changed the monarchy in some way. Wallis brought down a king. Diana divorced a prince and went on to do charitable work while raising her sons. Prince Charles married his divorced mistress. Can he ascend to throne as king?

Excellent research skills were used to portray the characters of this book.

Thank you to Edelweiss for a digital ARC for review.

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Review: Whisper

Whisper by Lynette Noni
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

4.5 stars. A really good YA fantasy. I had expectations and I loved every minute of this book. Looking forward to next book!

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Another Woman's Husband: A Novel by Gill Paul

Another Woman's Husband: A Novel by Gill Paul
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I wondered if this book would be redundant of another book I read a couple of decades ago about the king who abdicated for an American divorcee. In some ways, it was but only to the extent to establish Wallis’ character. What previous accounts left blank that this one covers wonderfully are the supporting characters of Wallis Simpson’s climb into the history books. In fact, the POV is written as a very old friend of Wallis who plays an important part in her story.

Since I read the earlier book, letters have been released by an anonymous person from Wallis to her ex-husband, Ernest Simpson. They are quite telling of the former Mrs. Simpson and her unrealistic understanding and comprehension of how her own actions created her gilded cage. My previous opinion of Wallis remains unchanged, although there is more depth to my understanding of her. There is a little pity but a more comprehensive understanding of the carnage she left in her wake. She was not the only person who made poor choices and suffered the consequences.

The book also peripherally covers Diana as a parallel storyline covers the time period of her untimely death. Like my parents who could recall where they were and what they were doing when JFK was shot, my generation remembers the shock and horror when Diana died. We felt like we knew her even though we didn’t. She bucked the royal norms and we saw her doing what we were doing; being a mother, playing with her sons, and wearing slacks.

Both of these woman changed the monarchy in some way. Wallis brought down a king. Diana divorced a prince and went on to do charitable work while raising her sons. Prince Charles married his divorced mistress. Can he ascend to throne as king?

Excellent research skills were used to portray the characters of this book.

Review: The Tattooist of Auschwitz

The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

What a beautiful and heartbreaking book. Written as a novel but clearly the story was picked from the brain of the man who worked as a tattooist in Auschwitz, the author weaves together a difficult story of human cruelty, survival, and somehow, a beautiful live story.

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Review: The Secret of the Irish Castle

The Secret of the Irish Castle by Santa Montefiore
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

2.5 Stars

This is the third book in the Deverill series but it was my first. I didn’t find it necessary to read the previous book to follow the storyline although there is clearly greater depth and history to the characters in the previous books. The story is more of a family saga which is great for those who like those. I found it mildly entertaining but am underwhelmed. Perhaps had I read the previous books I would have been more invested. It was convoluted but shallow. A lot of tawdry affairs that reminded me of bad romance novels. Not for me.

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Review: The Au Pair

The Au Pair by Emma Rous
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Very well developed twists and turns in this thrilling family drama. As clues are revealed, the reader follows the reasoning and thought process of one of the protagonists only to be wrong and then deduce another theory. Eventually, enough of the truth is revealed to solve the main mystery but it is definitely a roller coaster. Great thriller.

ARC from publisher

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Review: The Tattooist of Auschwitz

The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

What a beautiful and heartbreaking book. Written as a novel but clearly the story was picked from the brain of the man who worked as a tattooist in Auschwitz, the author weaves together a difficult story of human cruelty, survival, and somehow, a beautiful live story.

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