Hate List by Jennifer Brown

Published on by Sheila (Book Journey)36 Comments

It was just a list.  Just a list that Valerie started in a notebook of those people in school…. in life who bugged her.  And when Valerie and Nick became a couple… she shared the list with him and it became a “thing” they liked to add to…. the bullies, the tormentors, just a way to vent and release the pressures of home life for both her and Nick.

or so Valerie thought.

Until one day at the end of their Jr year in High School, Nick pulls a gun in the commons, looking to take out those on “the list.”  When the shooting is done, 6 students and one teacher are dead, Valerie has a bullet in her leg from trying to stop Nick, who shoots her before he takes his own life.  The list is discovered as evidence and it looks to her fellow students as well as Valerie’s parents, that she was an accomplish in the shooting.

And even Valerie has to wonder…. was she to blame? 

When she bravely returns to school for her SR year she finds that everything has changed.  Her once friends have nothing to do with her.  With the help of her therapist and a determination to see things as they really are, Valerie begins to see things in a new light and finds friendship comes in many different forms.

Another cover, but I prefer the one I have which is the one at the top of this review

Ok… you may be saying, “really Sheila?  Another book on school shootings?”  And in a way you could be right.  I have no idea why tragedy draws me in to books – fiction and non, but it does.  Take my reviews of  Think No Evil by Jonas Beiler (true Amish school shooting), Columbine by Dave Cullen ( true story about the Columbine shootings), Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Piccoult (fictional story of a boy teased to the point of doing the unthinkable), We Need To Talk About Kevin (fictional take on a troubled boy…) read pre-blogging for book club, She Said Yes (pre blogging read about a girl who survived the Columbine shooting… ok, you get the gist… I do read about tragedy and overcoming…

BUT (and it is a big BUT) this book is not about a school shooting.  Ok – it is, as in it starts with a school shooting… but really, this book is about Valerie and what Valerie does to overcome what has happened.  Even the author says this in the back of the book under authors note, “Hate List was never a story about a school shooting.  From day one, this story was always Valerie’s story.”

I really like that because Valerie’s story can be so many others story…. others who have survived similar tragedies and must go on… because really, not only the dead are victims in any crime.  So many live, or try to live with the aftermath and Hate List is really about that.  What do you do when you feel you should have known what was going to happen?  When others blame you and you are not so sure they are wrong?

Author, Jennifer Brown says when the idea was forming in her mind for this book there was a song stuck in her head… it was Nickelback’s If Everyone Cared”, and  so to put you right “there for the rest of this review…. let’s get a little Nickelback going, shall we?


Hmmmm….. Valerie’s song?  I think so.  (I have to say this is an easy sell for me – I really like Nickelback).

I really liked the way Jennifer Brown wrote this book.  I mentioned books above that I have read with a similar topic but this is the first book I have read that focused on a survivor and how she moved forward.  And really I have to say this story speaks to anyone who has survived any tragedy…. you become someone new and as you try to understand this “new you” and you battle your old self as well.

Ok I digress…

Valerie is a well written character and Jennifer Brown does an excellent job of flushing out who she really is as she struggles to find her place in this new world, after the shooting.  What I also liked is that throughout the entire book we know that Valerie loved Nick and…. I can even understand that.  Nick is also written well so you can see him as a vulnerable victim as well.  I think the beauty of this particular book is that it takes some unlikely friends to change the mind of an entire school – to look at things differently and see things and people as they really are. 

“Just concentrate on being in the moment”, he said.  “Don’t read into things.  See what’s really there ok?”

                                                                                                                            ~ Dr. Hieler page 17 – Hate List

Hate List was an amazing read.  In the end – I was left with that gentle hum inside of reading a great book.  I still keep flipping through those final pages, mainly because it makes so much sense.  Its like I am trying to hold that to memory, that we are who we make ourselves to be… and sometimes… sometimes, it takes a completely different perspective to open our eyes to what is real.

Thank you Jennifer Brown…. for opening my eyes.

Amazon Rating

The 2011 WHERE Are You Reading Map has been updated to include Hate List

I purchased this book at Barnes and Noble

Morning Meanderings… Book Bloggers/Long Term Book Readers Beware

Published on by Sheila (Book Journey)76 Comments

Good morning!  😀
Lovely post title right?  Just gives you warm fuzzies I am sure…..

If you have been following my “pain” saga (here and here) the past few days you will know I have been having back pain and seeing a chiropractor.  Note:  This is something I don’t do…. haven’t done…. and am going because as of Thursday morning I could hardly turn my neck… what I thought was a pinched nerve went from between my shoulder blades, up my back into my neck and right arm.  Yesterday morning after having my first treatment on Thursday, I could not turn my back, sit in a chair, or stand.  My back felt like it was on FIRE and I called the chiropractor again in tears saying I was not sure if I needed them or a doctor but something was seriously wrong (and yeah…. scary too).

After this second time in they took x rays of my neck and spine.  My spine was perfectly straight (hey I have to take the little wins right?) however my neck was looking straight too which I though “yay me”, but was told…. nah ahh.

Apparently our necks are supposed to have a nice backward “C” shaped curve to them.  Mine does not.  What was shown to me is that people who do a lot of computer work, laptop work, and even reading, can cause their neck to pull straight from looking down so much…. putting pressure into my arm and back.

Guilty.  On all three accounts.  😯

So what do I do? 

I need to keep my laptop on a table at a level that I am not leaning over it (instead of my usual on my lap in the recliner).  When I read the book needs to come up more so I am not looking down to read it but more straight forward…. and I am supposed to exercise my neck by rolling it back as far as I can….

Even though I work out, the doctor said while that is good and strengthens muscles, it is apparently not enough  to counteract the time I spend at a computer.  This is true… between work and writing, I easily spend 4 – 10 hours on the computer a day. 

So there is this mornings post.  I figure many of you must spend pretty close to the same amount of time reading, and computer work as I do, so maybe a little heads up will prevent you from the pain I am currently in.I have been so tired!  😀 

This morning I have another appointment.  They have been doing an ultra sound on my shoulder and working out the ache and pain there and I am taking 800 milligrams of ibuprofen every 5 hours.

On the upside – hanging out at the house with an ice pack has caused me to really catch up on some reading.  I have finished two books in the last two days and started a third.  Nuts I know… but I am always looking for the bright side and hopefully will be back to working out on Monday. 

Do any of you experience any of this pain?  What do you do to prevent it?

Dreamland by Sarah Dessen

Published on by Sheila (Book Journey)27 Comments

Caitlin has always seemed to sit in her older sister Cass’s shadow.  Even now that Cass has left their home, running away to live with her boyfriend…. leaving… on Caitlin’s sixteenth birthday.

Caitlin tries to move forward in her life while her parents watch her every move wondering if she too will take flight.  Caitlin’s mom starts trying to mold Caitlin who had always been the invisible sister into her everything.  When Caitlin makes the cheer leading squad (ugh…. cheer leading) her mom takes charge with schedules and uniforms and showing up at practices – much as she used to do with Cass.  Could it be that Cass left because she felt smothered by this parental over achieving?

And as Caitlin deals with this new life she finds herself caught up in a whirl of new friends, friends that did not know here as Cass’s sister… friends she can hide herself in and Caitlin begins to become smaller and smaller, flying under the radar as she experiments with drugs and alcohol under the overly watchful eye of her new boyfriend Rogerson.

Strange, sleepy Rogerson, with his long brown dreads and brilliant green eyes, had seemed to Caitlin to be an open door. With him she could be anybody, not just the second-rate shadow of her older sister, Cass. But now she is drowning in the vacuum Cass left behind when she turned her back on her family’s expectations by running off with a boyfriend. Caitlin wanders in a dream land of drugs and a nightmare of Rogerson’s sudden fists, lost in her search for herself.


And this begins my adventures in reading with Sarah Dessen.  I thoroughly enjoyed this book in audio format.  Narrated by Liz Morton, she brought the perfect “bored and uninterested” voice to Caitlin and her friends as well as she brought the concern into her parents.  I found this book to be an important read just like SPEAK is. 

Caitlin’s attempt to lose herself after she loses her sister is one that I believe speaks volumes to our society.  As Cass was the one who always took the spotlight, Caitlin had no idea what to do when Cass left and the spotlight was all too glaring on her.  In times of great tragedy or loss in our lives it is tempting to try to reinvent yourself to cover up the pain.  Cass nearly succeeds but by doing so puts herself in grave danger with an abusive boyfriend and drug loving friends.

SO just for a moment without going “spoilerly”… I can’t stand Rogerson.  He is a horrible teen who is obviously carrying on what he has learned in his own home.  Sad…. very sad.  So saying that – I can also say that I am reading this from a parental perspective and Rogerson is a bug that must be squashed…. from a teen girls perspective he is dreamy.  Mysterious.  Brooding.  Handsome.  Dangerous.  All the things that many young girls are attracted to and really this is where the heart of Dreamland lies within the relationship between Rogerson and Caitlin.

This book as I mentioned above is an important read.  Abuse is never something to be accepted.You can feel bad for the one causing the abuse, you can understand why they may be doing it – but it is wrong and they need help. 

The following is taken from the ACADV Dating Violence:

Teen dating violence often is hidden because teenagers typically:

  • are inexperienced with dating relationships.
  • are pressured by peers to act violently.
  • want independence from parents.
  • have “romantic” views of love.

Teen dating violence is influenced by how teenagers look at themselves and others.

Young men may believe:

  • they have the right to “control” their female partners in any way necessary.
  • “masculinity” is physical aggressiveness
  • they “possess” their partner.
  • they should demand intimacy.
  • they may lose respect if they are attentive and supportive toward their girlfriends.

Young women may believe:

  • they are responsible for solving problems in their relationships
  • their boyfriend’s jealousy, possessiveness and even physical abuse, is “romantic.”
  • abuse is “normal” because their friends are also being abused.
  • there is no one to ask for help.

Sarah Dessens characters are memorable and even beyond the abuse in the book the story line is strong, and witty.  There is more to this book than your typical YA although it will appeal to those who are just looking for a good read as well.

Amazon Rating

The 2011 WHERE Are You Reading Map has been updated to include Dreamland

I borrowed this audio from my local library

Morning Meanderings…. Last Weekends Girl Weekend and Concert

Published on by Sheila (Book Journey)27 Comments

Good morning!  Quick check in on my back….. PAIN.  BIG PAIN.  Not sure what my next step is.  I seen the chiropractor yesterday and felt pretty good when I left but as the day went on it got worse… now if I clench my hand into a fist on my right hand a shoot of pain goes into my back.  Good grief…. I am so not this girl.  My back hurts so bad I am propped in the recliner and even that is not helping.  I am trying to decide if I try the chiropractor again or if I need to go to the hospital.  GAH.  Hate this. 

Ok… anyway… last weekend I had went with 8 other girls to Walker Minnesota for a girls weekend.  This group does this once a year and last year I had missed out because it was the home show weekend and I was already committed to it.

So this years adventure was not very far away – a little over an hour from home is Walker Minnesota and our reasoning for going was to go to the Rick Springfield concert.  Now personally – while Rick Springfield was ok back int he 80’s… I probably would not have chosen to go to his concert…. HOWEVER you mix in 8 fun friends and suddenly the idea sounds brilliant.  😛

We left on Friday and went to a beautiful hotel called Chase on The Lake.  We had two suites and you have to see these rooms:

One of the two bedrooms in our suite
The kitchen
The living room

The rooms were fun and Friday night we stayed in, had dinner, and played board games.  On Saturday we went to the shops near by and I bought a cute summer shirt and a sweater (ugggh…. with our weather lately you just do not know which way to go).  Saturday afternoon I even had time to write a review while some of the girls played more games or napped.  Saturday evening after a good dinner in the hotel we went to the concert.

Color me impressed.  Rick put on a very good concert and turns out I knew more songs than I thought I did.  He was high energy, pulled people on to the stage including a little 7-year-old girl who sang “Don’t Talk To Strangers” with him.  Amy, Paula, and Heidi spent the whole concert right up front and Paula and Heidi were both hugged by Rick when he went into the crowd.


Saturday night we were back in the hotel and played board games again until one in the morning…. I love board games! 

My friend Amy playing "Headbandz"

A fun weekend and I actually liked that we were not that far away as we were home on Sunday around 1:00 pm.  So I still had Sunday to get the house cleaned up and have dinner with Al.

Seven of the nine: (left) Dee, Jill, Paula, Me, Heidi, Deb (front) Amy

Morning Meanderings…. Well Everyone Else Is Doing It….

Published on by Sheila (Book Journey)31 Comments

Good morning.  Probably going to the chiropractor this morning…. so ridiculous but the nerve in my back has now went up to my neck (I can’t look down) and over to my right arm – it hurts to lift my coffee cup….. now that is serious.  😛 

In the mean time – as I psych myself up to use the shower…. (how sad that it takes a pep talk with myself to get me going in that direction because it calls for standing and moving), I thought I would do this little meme thingy that Bonnie linked me up too.


Ok… with no more rambling ( as I really do need to figure out a way to move), here is the 4 x 4

Four jobs I’ve had in my life:

  1. Wal-Mart (Customer Service Manager, Support Team, Promotional Chairperson, Department Manager)
  2. Family Life Administrator (I prefer the FLA – it sounds very CSI)  😛
  3. Hardees fast food counter person
  4. Domino’s Pizza (driver, day shift manager, office manager)

Four books I would read over and over:

  1. The Bible
  2. Any of the Harry Potter books
  3. Summerhouse by Jude Deveroux
  4. Three Sisters Trilogy Nora Robers – Dance Upon The Air, Heaven and Earth, and Face The Fire

Four places I have lived:

  1. Bemidji Minnesota
  2. Virginia Minnesota
  3. Soldotna Alaska (one year with my aunt and uncle and mom after the house fire)
  4. Brainerd Minnesota (there is no place like home :D)

Four books I would recommend 

  1. Summer House by Jude Deveroux
  2. Three Sisters Trilogy by Nora Roberts (see book titles above)
  3. ROOM by Emma Donoghue
  4. Little Princes by Conor Grennan
  5. (bonus) Thirteen reasons Why by Jay Asher

Four places I have been:

  1. Honduras
  2. Costa Rica
  3. California
  4. New York!

Four of my favorite foods:

  1. Thai
  2. Mexican
  3. Chinese
  4. anything chocolate….

Four of my favorite drinks:

  1. Ice water
  2. fresca
  3. diet Dr Pepper
  4. skim mocha latte no whip

Four places I would rather be right now:

  1. on a secluded SUNNY beach
  2. Disney World
  3. in a hot tub
  4. can I just say the secluded SUNNY beach again?

Four things that are very special in my life:

  1. my family (Al, Brad, Justin) and friends
  2. my church
  3. my activities: biking, rollerblading…
  4. my online conversations here

Alright…. yes, I am still going to recap last weekend…. really.  I just need to prep some pics and I know… I can not believe it is Thursday already.  Have a super day everyone… I am off to slowly get ready for work and make that appointment to hopefully get this pain taken care of as I have never experienced anything like this before and it is driving me crazy that I can not be active. 

*I do not do a lot of these meme/questionnaires anymore, and I don’t mean to be rude when people tag me or connect me with blog awards – it’s just honestly… I don’t have the time to do all that they entail.  I apologise to people who gave my a blog award and I commented “I will stop by and check it out” because more times than not, as I continue doing whatever I am doing I forget to stop by and do that.  Thank you for thinking of me though, I think that it is so nice that you even find my ramblings blog award worthy.  😀

Morning Meanderings…. Books and Such… oh – and Undesireable #1

Published on by Sheila (Book Journey)29 Comments

Good morning!  😀

32 degrees here this morning in Minnesota…… thirty-two…. 

They are talking snow and rain for the rest of this week.  Uggghhhhh… it is snowing right now….

Oh come on Spring!!!

*my heart sinks with the weight of waiting for weather I can bike in*

So…. change of subject – lets talk books. 😀


I visited the Monday What Are You reading Monday between time I had on Monday and then finished yesterday evening.  Wow…. there are good books out there.


At Serendipity, Vivienne wrote a review on an interesting looking book called A Year Without Autumn by Liz Kessler. 



At The Eclectic Reader, Sheree read and reviewed Stay by Deb Caletti that seems so SSQQUUUEEEE worthy I am looking for that one now!



At “And Anything Bookish“. Kim had a post up about Sarah Dessen’s book What Happens To Good Bye.  I have only experienced Dessen once but liked it very much and this one sounds as though it may be my next Dessen stop. 



At Kristen’s Book Nook, she had a review of Bossy Pants by Tina Fey.  I have watched and wondered about this book from afar.  I find Tina Fey to be really fun and have enjoyed movies she is in. 



Library says YES to all 😛 except a Year Without Autumn…. 😦 they do not have that one. 


Oh and finally I heard about this in my travels too…. there is a website called Magic Is Mite, News From The Ministry Of Magic.  This site has updated posts regarding the search for well….. undesirable #1….. (the site is hilarious) and a must view for all you Potter heads out there.  (Uhhhh…. not me of course….. I am posting this for you…. :razz:)

Ok – I have to get ready for work.  I have a pinched nerve in my back which is ridiculously annoying and makes me walk a bit like the hunchback of Notre Dame.  Well then….life – is never dull 😛

Massacre At Mountain Meadows by Ronald Walker, Richard Turley Jr, Glen Leonard

Published on by Sheila (Book Journey)28 Comments

When we hear the date of 9-11 or September 11th, we have memories of a horrific event in our history.  What you may not know, is that this was not the first September 11th on record for being a horrific event. 

On September 11, 1857, more than 120 men, women, and children who were traveling by wagon train from Arkansas to California were murdered by Mormon militiamen and Paiute Indians at Mountain Meadows in southern Utah (35 miles south-west of Cedar City). 

At the time, the massacre lasted five days, ending on September 11th when John Lee entered the meadows with a white flag and convinced those of the wagon train to surrender peacefully.  Once he escorted the men, women, and children out of the safety of their wagons, he gave a signal and they were attached by the militia and indians and killed.  (*Note – John Lee was the only man tried, convicted, and executed for his role in the massacre).

Following the massacre the perpetrators hastily buried the victims, leaving their bodies vulnerable to wild animals and the climate. Local families took in the surviving children, and many of the victims’ possessions were auctioned off. Investigations, temporarily interrupted by the American Civil War, resulted in nine indictments during 1874. Of the men indicted, only John D. Lee was tried in a court of law. After two trials Lee was convicted and executed.

How could basically good people commit such an act? 


Four of the nine Utah Territorial militiamen of the Tenth Regiment
“Iron Brigade” who were indicted in 1874 for murder or conspiracy
(Not shown: William H. Dame • William C. Stewart • Ellott Willden • Samuel Jukes • George Adair, Jr.)
Isaac Haight.jpg John H. Higbee.jpg
photograph of John D. Lee
Image via Wikipedia
 Philip Klingensmith.jpg
Isaac C. Haight—Battalion Commander—died 1886 Arizona Maj. John H. Higbee, said to have shouted the command to begin the killings. He claimed that he reluctantly participated in the massacre and only to bury the dead who he thought were victims of an “Indian attack.” Maj. John D. Lee, constable, judge, and Indian Agent. Having conspired in advance with his immediate commander, Isaac C. Haight, Lee led the initial assault, and falsely offered emigrants safe passage prior to their mile-long march to the field where they were ultimately massacred. He was the only participant convicted. Philip Klingensmith, a Bishop in the church and a private in the militia. He participated in the killings, and later turned state’s evidence against his fellows, after leaving the church.

as found at wikepedia

I had never heard of this until I found this book in audio format at audible.com.   I was interested in knowing more about this event in our history that I knew literally nothing about. 

What I found within this ten and half hour audio was a lot of history prior to the massacre.  While the audio starts with a graphic description of what was found at Mountain Meadows even years after the event, it quickly backtracks years before the event and perhaps covering what is believed to have caused the massacre to happen.

At the time, the massacre lasted five days, ending on September 11th when John Lee entered the meadows with a white flag and convinced those of the wagon train to surrender peacefully.  Once he escorted the men, women, and children out of the safety of their wagons, he gave a signal and they were attached by the militia and indians and killed.  (*Note – John Lee was the only man tried, convicted, and executed for his role in the massacre).


As I listened to this audio it seems so many things played a part in this tragedy.  Politics, war hysteria, misinformation, misunderstandings, personal vendettas,  and Mormons themselves were being heavily persecuted and attached in these times.  Many had moved from state to state trying to stay alive. 

All in all this is a heartbreaking, awful event, where so many people of all faith and all race suffered – even beyond the event itself.   No one can possibly know all what drove what happened that day to happen.  I appreciated  that all three of the authors on this book are Mormon and told as accurate account of what happened that day as they could.  Much research was done to tell this historic event.  As hard as it is to listen to, I think it is an important part of our history and I am glad I took the time to learn about this. 


Amazon Rating

The 2011 WHERE Are You Reading Map has been updated to include Massacre at Mountain Meadows


I purchased this audio from audible.com


In September of 2007, 150 years after the massacre, this article was released in Ensign Magazine

A fictional movie called September Dawn is based loosely on the Massacre At Mountain Meadows

Morning Meanderings…. I am sooooo BAD

Published on by Sheila (Book Journey)16 Comments

Good morning early.  I am off today to the cities – meeting Dawn at 6:30 in the morning to drive three hours for training all day and then home probably about 8 or 9 pm tonight….

welcome to Tuesday 😛

Yesterday I just felt a little queasy…. actually noticed it Sunday evening after floor hockey and it lingered into Monday…. I went to work hoping it would pass but did not so canceled my evening “to do’s” and stayed home and breathed instead.  Guess what?  Breathing is GOOD.

However when I made dinner for Al and I, I was making grilled chicken with carrots and broccoli and cauliflower, and then I made a pan of noodles to put the chicken goodness on top – and wound up eating just a plate of noodles and butter.  SO BAD.  I don’t think I have done that since I was a kid.  😉

I have much to share this week but will not get to it today…. I have a recap coming up on the Girls Weekend/Rick Springfield concert and books I have found in my blog visit adventures…. but that… will wait until later this week. 

Noodles and butter….. hmmm….. guilty yummy food. 

Ok… fess up… what’s your guilty pleasure food? 

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

Published on by Sheila (Book Journey)106 Comments

It’s Monday!  What Are You Reading is where we share what we read this past week, what we hope to read this week…. and anything in between!  D  This is a great way to plan out your reading week and see what others are currently reading as well… you never know where that next “must read” book will come from!

I love being a part of this and I hope you do too!  As part of this weekly meme I love to encourage you all to go and visit the others participating in this meme.  I offer a weekly contest for those who visit 10 or more of the Monday Meme participants and leave a comment telling me how many you visited.  **You do not have to have a blog to participate! You receive one entry for every 10 comments, just come back here and tell me how many in the comment area.


Last weeks winner:

Shirley from My Bookshelf

Congratulations!  Please choose an item out of the PRIZE BOX and email me your choice with your mailing address as well!   journeythroughbooks@gmail.com

I felt like I had a pretty good week this past week… had some wonderful audio times periods and even a couple good reading evenings. It felt good to have some time to actually get into a book!


Here is how last week shaped up for me:

The Priest’s Graveyard by Ted Dekker:  If you have not read Dekker, you need to and this would be a good one to start with 🙂

Heart Of Deception by ML Malcolm: This sequel is smoking and I am bummed I didn’t read the first book in this series….

The Sandalwood Tree by ElleNewmark:  Book review and book tour – a treasure for the imagination!

Sunday at Tiffany’s by James Patterson: Our Bookies book club read for April and our book review (of course there is food!)

Little Princes by Conor Grennan:  This book is one of the best books I have read this year!  WOW WOW – DOUBLE WOW!

Open House by Elizabeth Berg – audio review:  Berg puts together a story of divorce, despair, and making new life

Yeah… it was a book tour heavy week but for the most part I had the tour books read before this week.  I also had book club this week which was FUN and this weekend seen Rick Springfield in concert… but more on that later this week 😀

This week is a meeting heavy week early on but Thursday and Friday are looking good and then being Easter weekend the only big thing on my agenda is the big “YAY” Justin is coming home for Easter!  That said here is what I plan to read this week:


In the three years since the tragic accident Mia barely survived in If I Stay, she and high school ex-boyfriend Adam have lived separate lives on opposite coasts. But then Adam, now the dissatisfied front man of popular LA-based band Collateral Damage, stops over in New York City for one night before kicking off the European leg of his tour. It happens to be the same evening that Mia, now well on her way to becoming a renowned cellist, is performing at Carnegie Hall. Adam buys a ticket, planning to slip in and out, but Mia spots him and for the first time in years they’re face-to-face with each other and their shared past. Over the course of one evening, as Adam and Mia traverse the city’s streets, they relive the four days Mia spent in the intensive care unit as well as her departure to Juilliard and from the life she knew.

Yeah – like I need another New York read but after having read If I Stay for book club I have to admit I am curious as to where she went.  😉


Shallow, poorly educated Kitty marries the passionate and intellectual Walter Fane and has an affair with a career politician, Charles Townsend, assistant colonial secretary of Hong Kong. When Walter discovers the relationship, he compels Kitty to accompany him to a cholera-infested region of mainland China, where she finds limited happiness working with children at a convent. But when Walter dies, she is forced to leave China and return to England. Generally abandoned, she grasps desperately for the affection of her one remaining relative, her long-ignored father. In the end, in sharp, unexamined contrast to her own behavior patterns, she asserts that her unborn daughter will grow up to be an independent woman.

I suspect I will finish the Meadow Massacre this week so this is what is going on my IPOD next.  I picked this one up on sale at audible.com, hoping it is a good one!


During the last days of the Trujillo dictatorship in the Dominican Republic, three young women, members of a conservative, pious Catholic family, who had become committed to the revolutionary overthrow of the regime, were ambushed and assassinated as they drove back from visiting their jailed husbands. Thus martyred, the Mirabal sisters have become mythical figures in their country, where they are known as las mariposas (the butterflies), from their underground code names. Herself a native of the Dominican Republic, Alvarez ( How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents ) has fictionalized their story in a narrative that starts slowly but builds to a gripping intensity. Each of the girls–Patria, Minerva and Maria Terese (Mate) Mirabal–speaks in her own voice, beginning in their girlhood in the 1940s; their surviving sister, Dede, frames the narrative with her own tale of suffering and dedication to their memory. To differentiate their personalities and the ways they came to acquire revolutionary fervor, Alvarez takes the risk of describing their early lives in leisurely detail, somewhat slowing the narrative momentum. In particular, the giddy, childish diary entries of Mate, the youngest, may seem irritatingly mundane at first, but in time Mate’s heroism becomes the most moving of all, as the sisters endure the arrests of their husbands, their own imprisonment and the inexorable progress of Trujillo’s revenge. Alvarez captures the terrorized atmosphere of a police state, in which people live under the sword of terrible fear and atrocities cannot be acknowledged. As the sisters’ energetic fervor turns to anguish, Alvarez conveys their courage and their desperation, and the full import of their tragedy.

Wow right?  I think this one will take some concentration!


Mickey Haller is a Lincoln Lawyer, a criminal defense attorney who operates out of the backseat of his Lincoln Town Car, traveling between the far-flung courthouses of Los Angeles to defend clients of every kind. Bikers, con artists, drunk drivers, drug dealers – they’re all on Mickey Haller’s client list. For him, the law is rarely about guilt or innocence, it’s about negotiation and manipulation. Sometimes it’s even about justice.

A Beverly Hills playboy arrested for attacking a woman he picked up in a bar chooses Haller to defend him, and Mickey has his first high-paying client in years. It is a defense attorney’s dream, what they call a franchise case. And as the evidence stacks up, Haller comes to believe this may be the easiest case of his career. Then someone close to him is murdered and Haller discovers that his search for innocence has brought him face-to-face with evil as pure as a flame. To escape without being burned, he must deploy every tactic, feint, and instinct in his arsenal – this time to save his own life.

I seen this movie a few weeks back and yeah.. this is a little backwards but I was so enthralled by the movie…. I am interested in seeing what I really missed. 


I am thinking this is more than enough to keep me busy and out of trouble!  I am excited to see what you have been reading!  be sure to add your link to your What Are You Reading post below and I will do my best to stop by and see you.  😀

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Open House by Elizabeth Berg

Published on by Sheila (Book Journey)19 Comments

Divorce is a series of internal earthquakes…. “one after the other”.  Samantha ought to know.  At the age of 42, Samantha’s husband Dave decides that he needs to move on leaving Samantha shocked.  Sure they had their arguments, but didn’t everyone?

Finding herself left with a home, a mortgage, and their 11 year-old-son and learning in short time David has had no problem moving on not only to another woman, but also a cute apartment – AND the white couch that she had wanted for years but he told her was impractical…. “Sam” knows she has to pull it together.

When a decision is made to take in boarders to help with the house payment, a host of colorful characters come into play.  And ultimately a decision that has a life long impact on Sam and those in her life.

There are many layers to Elizabeth Berg and I have enjoyed experiencing her many ways of writing characters who come to life on the pages of her books.  Samantha was one of those characters I came to know and enjoy.

Samantha, “Sam” was not wishy-washy and I liked that.  Although she grieved for the loss of her husband in her life, she did not lay down and die.. she seen what she needed to do and she did it.  Samantha’s pain of losing David, and the emotions and decisions that followed felt real to me and I appreciated that Samantha was written as a strong female character, but was not too strong too hurt and to make poor decisions along the way to finding herself again. 

Something about this particular Berg book appealed to me… I liked the way Samantha opened up the house to boarders and imagine that had to be both an important and hard thing to do as you let strangers into the home where you lived a marriage and raised a son.  I laughed at times, and felt the tinge of pain at others as I can imagine Samantha did as well.

Perhaps this one notches it way up towards the top of the Elizabeth Berg books I have read, not taking hold of the number one position, but floating around the top there as a well written story on a topic that unfortunately many women know all too well. 

I applaud Elizabeth Berg’s ability to take a character like Sam and build her into someone stronger than even she had realized.  While not a perfect read, one that left me thinking long after the final page was turned.

Amazon Rating

The 2011 WHERE Are You Reading Map has been updated to include Open House

I listened to this book on audio, borrowed from my local library