Turn Left at Thursday

By Frederik Pohl

Seven science fiction stories:

• Mars by Moonlight — Are they criminals? The small group of colonists on Mars have no memory beyond a set point of their past lives. They have been told they are in a penal colony and have had their memories erased as part of their rehab and punishment. But when a stranger turns up dead, the whole lie begins to unravel.
• The Richest Man in Levittown — Harlan finds himself suddenly wealthy due to the death of his rich Uncle Otto. Now the whole world is beating a path to his door with a variety of investment opportunities. But Harlan is not interested and turns them all down, including an old friend, McGhee. McGhee has created a pill that lets a person remember everything.  He just needs a backer. As they are talking, the pills fall on the ground and Harlan's baby eats a handful. Nothing good will come from this.
• The Seven Deadly Virtues — Life on Venus is hard. It's way too hot, way too muggy and power is concentrated in the hands of the elites. Step out of line and the consequences are terrible.
• The Martian in the Attic — A  man figures out the secret of a man's great success: all his fabulous inventions are really the product of a Martian the man holds captive. The  man tries to use the information as blackmail only to have it all blow up in his face.
• Third Offense — Using time travel, a criminal is sentenced to various terrible locations in the past in an attempt to rehabilitate him.
• The Hated — Astronauts returning from a trip to Mars have so much animosity for their fellow crew members that they are required to live in restricted areas to protect each other from their murderous wrath.
• I Plinglot, Who You? — Plinglot, posing as a human, is meeting with various factions on Earth with the goal of setting off world war and destroying humanity. But maybe we humans are not quite as easily manipulated as he thinks.

These stories were pretty good, even for someone who generally tries to avoid short stories.

A common theme in the stories is people sweating or shivering.

• From Mars by Moonlight: "...he shivered and his breath made a white mist in the thin air." "...he was sweating like a hog..." And more.
• From The Richest Man in Levittown:  "He was sweating—you could see the black patches on his blue shirt."
• From The Seven Deadly Virtues: "I felt her shiver in spite of the fact that the temperature was one hundred and ten." "...even inside the thermosuit I was wringing wet."
• From Third Offense:  "They marched off in the shivering cold." "...a cold place that stank...of sweat and sickness."
• From The Hated: "I began to sweat, although this place was air-conditioned too." "And I was drenched with sweat."
• From I Plinglot, Who You?: "...sweating, his forehead glistening..."

Only one story doesn't have its characters sweating or shivering, The Martian in the Attic. 

Masters of Time

By A.E. Van Vogt

Norma stood on the bank and contemplated throwing herself into the water. But her courage failed and she turned away only to find herself confronted by a strange man, Dr. Lell. Amazingly, he seemed to know a lot about Norma and he even offered her a job and a place to live.
Dr. Lell claimed to be recruiting men to fight in a war and he needed someone one to handle the front desk. And she could live in the apartment above the office.  Hungry and broke, Norma agreed to the deal. Only to find out that it was all a lie.
Dr. Lell is recruiting men to fight in a war, that part was true. But the war being fought far in the future and the recruits would never be coming home. Not only that, but he had control of Norma's mind and even of her body. Every time she tried to break away, he punished her by taking away her youth and turning her into a withered crone.
In desperation, Norma turned to a lost love from her past,  Jack Garson. He came to the recruiting station and, unable to do anything to help her despite his best efforts, he found himself kidnapped to the very far future and forced to fight in a war that he didn't understand or care about. But he was determined to escape and to find some way back to Norma.

This was an OK read. I did find a bit difficult to follow, something I have experienced in the past when reading a Van Vogt story. And, once again, it takes a man from a more primitive time to straighten things out for the poor, misguided future folks, just like in the other novel I recently read, The Long Way Home.

The Long Way Home

By Poul Anderson

Captain Edward Langley and his crew of two men and one alien creature, Saris, are traveling in an experimental space craft. This craft can travel incredible distances in mere seconds. But what the four didn't understand was that it was also traveling through vast amounts of time in mere seconds too. So when they come home to Earth it is the Earth of 5000 years in the future. And they have no way to ever return to their own time.
Earth is on the brink of interstellar war. Humans have widely colonized other planets and one group, the Centaurans, is getting a bit big for their britches and is pushing against Earth government, the Technon (a super computer). A third party is also involved, a confederation of planetless traders known as the Company. And, unknown to the major players in the developing conflict, a shadowy fourth party is pulling strings behind the scenes.
Into the midst of this lands Langley and his crew and  Saris, the alien, who has telepathic power to control electronics. All the interested parties want to gain control of Saris in order to study his power and develop it into a weapon.
Langley and company become pawns in the hands of the competing factions, as they are also trying to grapple with the knowledge that everything they loved and knew is long dead and buried.

This book didn't do it for me. It's basically a political story, as four different interests try to gain an advantage over each other. I am not a fan of  political stories, a subject I find boring. Also, the idea that it takes a man from 5000 years in the past to unmask the hidden fourth party was really not believable.

For another review, see http://www.sfreviews.net/longwayhome.html.

Holidays in Hell

By P.J. O'Rourke

O'Rourke sets off the discover life in some of the trouble spots and places of interest around the world:

• A Ramble Through Lebanon
• Seoul Brothers
• Panama Banal
• Third World Driving Hints and Tips
• What Do They Do for Fun in Warsaw?
• Weekend Getaway: Heritage USA
• The Post-Marcos Philippines
• Christmas in El Salvador
• At Sea with the America's Cup
• Intellectual Wilderness, Ho
• In Whitest Africa
• Through Darkest America: Epcot Center
• Among the Euro-Weenies
• Thirty-six Hours in Managua
• Through Darkest America, Part II
• Mexican Border Idyll
• The Holyland—God's Monkey House

Even though written in the 1980s, O'Rourke's tour still has a lot of interesting points to make about these modern times. I admit, at times I found it a bit boring. But even though dated, it is still an important look at the trouble spots and troublesome spots around the world.

Written during the era of President Reagan, O'Rourke's disdain for the Republican Idol comes through loud and clear:

"The last time an old, sick, addled American president (Roosevelt) sat down with a Soviet leader who'd had great press ("Uncle" Joe Stalin), half of Europe was given away."

Now the USA has another "old, sick, addled" president, Donald Trump, who is also no match for a dangerous, tyrannical Russian leader, Vlad Putin.
O'Rourke is a conservative Republican. I wonder what he thinks of the latest addition  to the senile president lineup?

For another review, see http://www.roadjunky.com/897/holidays-in-hell-by-pj-orourke-travel-books/

The Bachelor Home Companion

By P.J. O'Rourke

O'Rourke gives "advice" on the bachelor lifestyle, addressing such items as:

• House Cleaning
• Home Ownership
• Cooking
• Entertaining
• Home Decorating
• Home Repair
• Lawn and Yard Care
• Children

Much of this book reminded me of something you would find in MAD Magazine. This is not to say it is bad, quite the opposite. It is very funny and enjoyable. To quote just a few of the jokes:

"Bill Clinton was only a microscopic polyp in the colon of national politics, and Hillary was still in flight school, hadn't even soloed on her broom."

"Plus a home gives you something to do around the house. Furthermore, there is no real satisfaction in pissing out of somebody else's window."

"Don't cook steaks in the toaster, even little ones. I've tried this and the fire department comes."

"Stay away from goofier kinds of lettuce. Any lettuce that comes from the store in a form that can't be thrown from third base to home is too exotic."

"The next best vegetable is the jalapeno pepper. It has the virtue of turning salads into practical jokes."

"But yogurt does make good shaving cream."

"Eggs: When something starts pecking its way out of the shell, the egg is probably past its prime."

Fields and Pastures New

By Dr. John McCormack

The setting is the early 1960s and John McCormack and his wife and children have moved to rural Alabama for John to start his career as a private practice veterinarian.  This would be a first for the locals too because there had never been a veterinarian in their area before.
Since it was a rural location, a lot of his work would be with farm animals and farmers. Folklore was quite important to these people and folk remedies were the order of the day, with the vet often being called in only when all else had failed. People also relied upon an untrained local man, Carney Sam, who, just like them, subscribed to strange and mostly worthless folk remedies to treat their ailing animals. Like rubbing turpentine on a horse's belly to treat kidney problems. The thinking was that the turpentine would be absorbed through the skin and travel to the kidneys. Total rubbish, but those sorts of treatments were very popular.
But Dr. John is a modern veterinarian and his methods relied upon proven, scientific knowledge. They weren't foolproof, of course, but they were certainly much more effective than the strange and useless cures inflicted upon the poor, suffering critters they were meant to treat.
So rural, backward Alabama got itself a fancy new vet and before long, it was  clear that the community was very lucky to have Dr. John in their midst. And it was clear to Dr. John and his family that they had found themselves a warm and welcoming new home.

This was an interesting read, the memoir of  a young vet establishing himself in his new location, coping with the backwards farmers and the less-trying doctoring of the local dogs, cats and other pets in addition to the work with livestock. The author has real feelings of affection for his neighbors and clients and he and his wife and kids become a greatly appreciated part of the community.

For another review, see https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/john-mccormack/fields-and-pastures-new/.

Slaves in the Family

By Edward Ball

Edward Ball's ancestor came to America and started plantations near the Atlantic coast, growing rice. They used slaves from Africa to do the plantation work.  At one point, the family owned several plantations in the same area of South Carolina.  They owned thousands of slaves. They also fought to keep their slaves in the Civil War.
Knowing this, Ball set out to connect with the descendants of those slaves that he was able to track down by perusing family documents and historical records. In several cases, he was able to find these people and give them the information he was able to gather about their ancestors and from their family lore piece together more of the story of their ancestors' history, even to the probable location their African origins.
Not surprisingly, he also figured out that his ancestors had mixed race children from informal liaisons with their female slaves. Ball was able to track down some of the descendants of these relationships, people who are distantly related to himself.
He encountered some anger but he also gave people a better understanding of their own personal history and this valuable information was welcomed by the families.

This was a very informative read as it goes quite deeply into the slave-owning experience of the author's own family. And his interviews with the descendants were touching to read. It's a long book and I must admit I got a bit bored with it towards the end. But I do feel it is a worthwhile book to read.

For another review, see http://www.thedailybeast.com/if-you-only-read-one-book-about-the-legacy-of-slavery-slaves-in-the-family.

The Statement

Pierre Brossard chose the wrong side in World War II. He was a Nazi collaborator and was responsible for the murder of at least fourteen Jewish people. He has been on the run for decades, helped out by a shady association of Catholic clergy who see no problem with helping out a mass murderer because, "the Church's law of asylum supersedes...the laws of the civil authority."
But now someone is on Pierre's tail. Driving up a isolated road, Pierre is waylaid by an assassin. But Pierre is too canny and shoots the killer first. He then flees to his Catholic refuge.
But this murder brings to the front the question of Pierre's real character. All along, the church claimed to believe that Pierre was truly repentant of his war crimes. But now that he has killed again, doubt arises and the church moves to distance itself from him. The word goes out and Pierre finds that he is no longer as welcome at his old haunts as he used to be.
Meanwhile, the police are actively involved in tracking Pierre down after decades of letting it slide. His face is in the newspapers and he is running for his life. facing down and killing a second man who came gunning for him. But the question he needs to ask himself and fails to do is how these killers know his routine and the locations of his hiding places. Because, although the killers want the world to believe Pierre is being hunted by Jewish avengers, this is not the case at all. Even though that is what Pierre fervently believes, his guilty conscience prevents him from seeing the simple truth.

This was an OK read. I found it a bit dull, to be honest.  I also found the ending unsatisfying.

For another review, see https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/brian-moore/the-statement/.

Paradise News

By David Lodge

Bernard's aunt is dying and she wants to see her brother before she dies. The aunt, Ursula, lives in Hawaii and Bernard and his father, Jack, live in Britain. Jack, who is rather frail, is not eager to undertake such a long trip. In fact, he has never flown on an airplane before and is rather alarmed by the whole idea. However, the thought that the estranged sister has money does much to reconcile Jack's family to the idea.
Bernard is a part time teacher and he has the time to escort his dad on the long trip. Bernard is a bit of a black sheep as is Ursula. Ursula married against the advice of the family. Bernard is an ex-priest who lost his faith and is regarded as a failure by the family.
Bernard bought a package tour for himself and his dad because it was the cheapest travel option and they end up traveling with a small group of their fellow Brits whose activities form a sort of backdrop to Bernard's story.
Arriving in Hawaii, not even there for one full day, Jack, used to British traffic patterns, steps in front of a car and gets hit. He is not gravely injured, but his hip is broken and he will be stuck in the hospital for quite a while. Meanwhile Ursula has taken a turn for the worse and she is also confined to her bed.  The reunion is delayed for the time being.
With his dad and his aunt in the hospital, Bernard is left to his own devices and he gets to know the woman who knocked his dad down with her car, Yolande. Yolande is at a turning point in her life. Her husband has left her for another woman (younger, of course) and Yolande is fighting the divorce, mostly because she is angry. She is attracted to Bernard and escorts him to some of the local tourist attractions. They end up in a relationship and she helps him with some of his personal problems.
Jack and Ursula eventually get to meet at Jack's hospital and they confront some issues and misunderstandings from their childhood and both find comfort in the reconciliation.
Soon Jack is well enough to travel home and they leave the islands behind, with hope for the future.

This was an entertaining story. Bernard is a good guy and the story ends very nicely.  And it is nicely amusing too, not hilarious, but just sweetly, mildly amusing.

For another review, see https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/david-lodge/paradise-news/.

In a Sunburned Country

By Bill Bryson

Australia: perhaps the most exotic place in the world. Full of flora and fauna found nowhere else on our planet, some of which is dangerous and/or toxic. Much of it is inhospitable, uninhabited and pretty much unexplored. Parts of the interior have never been closely surveyed and may possibly contain unknown  reserves of mineral wealth.
Australia is nearly the same size as the continental United States but sparsely populated, with most of the people living in cities on the  southern and eastern coasts.  The coasts have the best climate, with lush forests and land suitable to grow crops. The interior is desert of the harshest, most deadly kind.
Bill Bryson has a love affair with Australia, despite its much touted dangers. He set off on a tour of the civilized places, visiting some of Australia's most outstanding and amazing attractions. Throughout his trip he finds the people welcoming and helpful and the natural wonders simply amazing. He rarely has a harsh word to say and is looking forward to returning in the future.

I enjoyed the book a lot. Bryson has a lovely sense of humor and doesn't mind poking fun of himself. I laughed out loud several times as Bryson describes some of the predicaments he gets himself into.
But besides the humor, Bryson's descriptions made me long to visit Australia some day. If I could, I would go there without hesitating, eager to see all the sights that Bryson does such an excellent job describing.

For another review, see https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-7679-0385-1.

Middlesex

By Jeffrey Eugenides

Callie was born a male. But due to his lack of testicles and minuscule penis, he was misidentified as a female. So his parents, believing he was a girl, raised him as a girl. Which was fine. He was a very pretty little girl and did all the girly things most little girls do. But then when he didn't go through the usual transformations that occur to most young teen girls, his parents decided to take him to a specialist in New York City.  The doctor recommends to the parents that Callie have surgery to remove his undescended testicles and put him on hormone therapy and  let him live out his life as the female he has been raised to be.
But Callie reads his medical file and suddenly his life makes sense: his attraction to girls, his budding mustache, his gangly body, his height.  And he runs away to California.
But before we get to this point in the story, we have to delve into Callie's antecedents. We have to learn about his grandparents, brother and sister, who fled Europe to the safety of America. We have to follow them as they get married (to each other!), have two kids and settle in Detroit. Then there is their son, Milton, who marries a cousin, Tessie and who gives birth to two sons, one of whom is Callie who they think is a girl. It takes almost 200 pages for the story to even get to the moment of Callie's birth. Then we have to read about her childhood before we get to the meat of the story, Callie's struggle to understand the truth about himself.

This book is really a family saga and is more concerned about the story of the whole family than it is about the story of Callie's sexual identity.  I wanted the story of Callie, not the story of the whole family. Two hundred pages into a five hundred page novel and Callie is only briefly touched on, which was rather annoying. For me, the story didn't really get that interesting until it focused more on Callie and less on her family.
Also, this novel is described, by some, as a comedy and as a comic epic, as hilarious, funny, playful. I didn't find it to be any of those things.
For another review, see http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/11/29/american-dreams-middlesex-by-jeffrey-eugenides?source=dictionary.

The story of Callie reminded me of David Reimer. He was a boy whose penis was accidentally removed as a baby and who, as a result, was castrated and raised as a girl until he rebelled and reclaimed his male identity. I wonder if Eugenides based his novel on David's tragic story.

The Passage

By Justin Cronin

A new virus has been discovered in a South American jungle. The bad news: it kills most. The good news: those who survive are changed into super-beings. The further bad news: they become remorseless, bloodthirsty killers. In other words, they become vampires.
So the government, with dreams of deathless superhuman soldiers decides to take this virus and engineer the vampire-ness out of it and retain the superhuman-ness. To do so, they require human subjects: men on death row whom no one will miss.
But all they get are more vampires. Finally, they think they have refined the virus to what they want. They think the reason they keep getting vampires is that the test subjects are too old, too flawed, too evil. They decide they need an innocent child, a homeless child with no family, who, like the condemned men, will not be missed. That is how they acquire Amy, who they heartlessly inject with their vampire virus. But they are wrong that no one will miss Amy. Two people who have encountered her have an instant bond with the little girl: a nun and  the FBI agent who brought Amy to the secret government facility in Colorado.
So Amy gets injected with the vampire virus and becomes ill and slowly begins her transformation into superhuman. Meanwhile the 12 convicts/vampires are exerting their superhuman powers on the people of the facility resulting in a disaster: The vampires get loose and bring down Armageddon on the world. Most people die but lots of people become vampires too. The surviving people live in hiding and in isolated locations as they fight to survive the vampire onslaught.
And then there is Amy. What can she bring to the struggle of humanity vs vampire? For in her case, the scientists were right. She has the strengths and vitality of the vampires but without their craziness and thirst for blood. She may be humanity's best hope, if she is up to the job.

This was a really long book: 891 pages. Parts of it were really interesting and parts just seemed like they could have been condensed quite a bit. I know I skipped through some of the later part of the story. This is a bloody story. People are slaughtered, torn to shreds. Animals are slaughtered, torn to shreds.  Characters that you start to care about are killed. A pet dog is killed, pointlessly, I thought. Just to be cruel, it seemed to me.
This book is the first in a trilogy. It is an interesting story but just too bloody for me. Once the author killed off that poor dog, I knew I wouldn't be reading the next book in the trilogy. Plus it is just too damn long.

For another review, see http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2010/06/24/justin-cronins-the-passage-reviewed-by-lizzie-skurnick.

Long Hot Summoning (The Keeper's Chronicles #3)

By Tanya Huff

Diana Hansen has just graduated from high school and now she is, at last, a Keeper. As a Keeper, Diana, along with her older sister Claire, who is also a Keeper, has to maintain the balance between Light and Darkness. Mainly they have to keep the powers of Darkness from taking over the normal world.
Diana's first summons as a Keeper is to a shopping mall. Some strangeness has been spotted at the Erilking's Emporium, a gift shop. Upon arrival at the mall, the first clue that something is up is the excess number of minivans in the parking lot. Sure enough, Darkness is trying to sneak into the world and is doing so by creating a mall identical to the real mall in the Dark realm. It is to this counterfeit mall that Diana, her angel cat Sam, and Claire must enter and put a stop to the foul plan. In the process, they are helped by King Arthur and his merry band of mall elves who are a group of homeless teens who somehow got sucked into the Dark realm and have been transformed into elves, which is some kind of side effect of being too long on the Dark side of things.
Meanwhile, back home, Claire's boy friend (husband?) and her elderly cat Austin are facing problems of their own. Namely, an ancient Egyptian mummy who is surreptitiously draining the life force from all around her in order to restore herself back to life.

This was a fun and enjoyable read. The book is quite amusing, with lots of silliness, fantasy and adventure. I did feel a bit lost at times, not having read the previous two books in the series, especially at the beginning. It never really explains why the cats can talk or why the cat Sam used to be an angel or why he stopped being an angel. Or even what the whole deal is with the cats. This is one of those series where it really helps to have read the previous stories. But even feeling a bit lost at times, I still liked the book a lot.

For another review, see: http://www.errantdreams.com/2014/06/review-long-hot-summoning-tanya-huff/.

Billionaire Blend

By Cleo Coyle

A new customer at Village Blend ( a New York City coffeehouse) has the baristas abuzz. Handsome billionaire Eric Thorner has been coming in and quizzing the staff on their knowledge of coffee. Manager Claire Cosi finally gets to meet him and dazzle him with her encyclopedic knowledge of all the ways coffee can be prepared. It turns out Eric has a proposition for her. But before she can find out what his proposition is, his car, parked outside, explodes, killing his chauffeur and heavily damaging the coffee shop and hurting him and Claire too.
Even though she is hurt (but not badly) Claire has the presence of mind to tend to Eric and call 911. Eric is hustled off to the hospital and Claire is left to deal with the disaster that has put the coffee shop out of business for the foreseeable future.
But the tech tycoon steps up and arranges for the shop to be speedily repaired, including the addition of an awesome new coffee machine, the Slayer (http://slayerespresso.com). And he explains what he wanted from Claire before the blast: he wants her to develop a special coffee made of the most delicious, subtle and expensive coffee beans in the world.
But who wanted Eric dead? Claire has a large bump of curiosity and the chance to tackle a new mystery plus make some much need cash has her putting her concerns aside and embarking on new adventure, traveling the globe with Eric and Matt (her ex-husband) searching for the perfect coffee bean and solving the many mysteries in Eric's life.

This was an OK read. I have nothing against it. It was quite acceptable. But it never really grabbed me the way I would like a book to do.

For another review, see https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/cleo-coyle-2/billionaire-blend/.

Give Up the Ghost

By Juliet Blackwell

Mel Turner is a building contractor. She does a lot of renovation work. She also has the dubious ability to see ghosts.
Andrew Flynt is the proud owner of a renovated Victorian mansion. The mansion's insides were completely gutted and modernized. But in the process of renovating the house, a ghost became aroused and upset and made life difficult for the Flynts. So they decided to sell the house. But the ghost keeps scaring potential buyers away.
Flynt hired a psychic to help him with the problem and the psychic, Chantelle, told him the ghost didn't like the changes and she gave him a list of things that needed to be restored to put the ghost to rest. Thus the hiring of Mel Turner.
The first thing Turner decided to do was pay a visit to Chantelle. But when she arrived at Chantelle's apartment it was only to find her dead with her brother kneeling beside his sister's body.
And Mel Turner's new renovation project just got a lot more complicated.

This was a fairly good read. It really got my interest for the first half of the book. But then it just seemed to drag on and on and I was getting tired of it. But I think the first part was stellar, I just wish it held up better.
For another review, see  https://suspense.nightowlreviews.com/v5/reviews/roxanne-reviews-give-up-the-ghost-by-juliet-blackwell.

Kitchens of the Great Midwest

By J. Ryan Stradal

Eva Thorvald is a gifted chef with an exquisite palate. She throws occasional private dinners which have very long waiting lists and cost thousands of dollars per person. This is her story.
It starts out with Eva's mother deserting baby Eva and her father, Lars. Lars soon dies and Eva is adopted by Lars' brother Jarl and his wife, Fiona.
In grade school, Eva was picked upon and bullied. She got her revenge in a very unusual way and then ran away to her cousin, Braque, Braque is in college and has just discovered she is pregnant when Eva shows up.
Eva's refined palate and passion for food leads her to a career in the food industry. In the course of time, her life intersects with lots of other people as she finds her niche in the world of fine cuisine. Yet, at the end of the book, Eva is eating mac and cheese, broccoli and drinking beer with Pat Prager's Lutheran peanut butter bars for desert. And that suits her just fine.

Even though this is the story of Eva, the book jumps around a lot and the story switches from one perspective to another, with Eva's story set off to the side. There are so many characters and their lives intersect in many different ways. I had to make a list to keep track of them all. Still, it was a really interesting story and very unforgettable.

For a better review, see https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/09/books/review/kitchens-of-the-great-midwest-by-j-ryan-stradal.html?_r=0.

Girl Waits With Gun

By Amy Stewart

It's the early 1900s and Constance, Norma and Fleurette are out for a ride in their buggy when a car smashes into it, injuring both Constance and Fleurette. Unfortunately, the man driving the car was a thoroughly unpleasant person. He claimed the women ran into his car and he refused to pay for the repairs to the buggy.
Constance tracked him down to his office in the factory his family owned. She found him surrounded by his gang of toughs but that didn't stop her from demanding payment.
She may have been in the right, expecting him to pay for the repairs. But he is of another mind and thus begins a trying time for the three women with harassing letters, bricks thrown through the windows of their farm house and threats to kidnap the youngest one, Fleurette, who is only eighteen. Their house is broken into, their furniture and knick-knacks smashed, and a fire started in the kitchen in an attempt to burn down the house.
Constance goes to the sheriff and he and his deputies try their best to keep the women safe from the gang. The sheriff even goes so far as to arm the three women with pistols and teach them how to use them safely. And working together, Constance and the sheriff will attempt gather enough evidence to put Mr. Evil Factory Punk and his gang of toughs behind bars for a good while.
The three women live in an isolated farm house they inherited after their mother died. The two older sisters are in their thirties and the youngest is a mere teenager. Since there is no man in their lives, the gangsters view them as easy targets. But Constance is made of stern stuff and she refuses to knuckle under to the threats and scare tactics.

This was an interesting story, based loosely on the real Constance Kopp, who was one of the first women to be a sheriff's deputy. The sheriff was so impressed with her during the course of that terrible year when she and her sisters were under attack, that he offered her a position as deputy and she accepted.
However, I was rather disappointed because, once again, I was fooled by the blurbs which claimed the book was "romping, hilarious" and "funny" and that it had "humor." What the blurbers consider to be funny and what I consider to be funny must be vastly different. I didn't find the book the least bit amusing. This is not to say it was not a good and interesting story and I enjoyed it very much. But funny? No.

For another review, see https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/amy-stewart/girl-waits-with-gun/.

Miss Julia Delivers the Goods

By Ann B. Ross

Things are all upset at Miss Julia's house. Hazel Marie is ill and she has ended her long-time relationship with J.D. Pickens. He just won't pop the question and she is sick and tired of waiting. In fact, she is so sick she ends up in the hospital.
Miss Julia is pretty sure Hazel Marie's problem is "female matters." After all, Hazel Marie is well into her forties. However, it turns out to be the exact opposite. Hazel Marie is not in menopause, she is pregnant!
Once she finds out she is pregnant, Hazel Marie is determined to hide her fallen condition from the judgmental folks in their town, even if she has to move to Florida. The one thing she refuses to do is reconcile with Pickens or even let him know his is going to be a daddy.
Meanwhile, Sam, Miss Julia's husband, has had his old house broken into and some papers relevant to a book he is writing stolen. And the originals  of the papers at the court house have gone missing too. What doesn't make sense is why anyone would want such papers dealing with criminal cases from decades ago.
So Miss Julia has two crises to solve and spends most of the novel accomplishing very little beyond wondering what can be done to make things right.

This was a boring story. Feels like the author has run out of things to say about her characters. As I said above, very little happens beyond Miss Julia and crew wondering what they are going to do to keep Hazel Marie from leaving and how they are going to get the star-crossed lovers back together. The missing papers plot line has nothing to do with the Hazel Marie plot line and comes off a mere filler. Disappointing.

Lincoln in the Bardo

By George Saunders

Based on an actual event, the death of Abraham Lincoln's young son, Willie.
After his body is placed in a crypt in the cemetery, Willie's spirit leaves his body and meets the other denizens of the cemetery, the spirits of the dead who have chosen to linger on Earth rather than pass on to their ultimate fate. Since Willie is an innocent child, the spirits expect he will soon pass on, as most little ones do.
But then Lincoln comes to visit his dead son and Willie, who doesn't quite understand he is deceased, lingers to be with his father.
Actually, the spirits inhabiting the cemetery also don't seem to understand they are dead. They think they are merely ailing and refer to their coffins as sick-boxes. There are spirits who have been there for many decades who still don't get they are dead. But they all are anxious to tell young Willie their life stories.
So Willie lingers because his father keeps returning to his dead son and eventually Willie comes to know he is dead and communicates that knowledge to the other spirits, causing much consternation and mass exodus of spirits ensues as the realitzation they are all dead finally sinks in.

This was an interesting story, especially as it includes excerpts from books about Lincoln. Although I did read that some of those references are not real.

For another review: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/mar/08/lincoln-in-the-bardo-george-saunders-review.

Eater

By Gregory Benford

Earth is under attack! A billions-of-years-old intelligent black hole has come to reap the planet, with no regard for the life upon it.
Just as this threat emerges, Dr. Ben Knowlton, astrophysicist, is in the midst of a consuming personal tragedy: his beloved wife Channing is dying of cancer.
Putting tragedy aside, Ben, along with other experts, gather to develop a defense against the relentless Eater. But what can puny humans do to stop Eater's inexorable advance?

This was an OK read. It is of the "hard science" genre of science fiction, a bit too technical for me.

Love Me

By Garrison Keillor

Larry is just an ordinary guy living in Minnesota. He wants to be a novelist. And he succeeds. His novel is a big hit. He's famous, acclaimed, money pouring in. Now he wants to take advantage of it all and move to New York and work for the New Yorker. But he's married and his wife refuses to leave Minnesota. She is not interested in the advantages that New York offers. So she stays in Minnesota and Larry goes to New York.
New York is everything Larry wanted. He loves life in the city. He loves his apartment, especially the terracer. He loves being at the New Yorker. Only two things are messing it up for him. He's got writer's block and his wife is adamant about staying in Minnesota.
The years pass. His writing career is in the toilet. He is drinking too much. He is chasing after women. His wife is leading her own life. He ends up writing an advice column for a newspaper. It isn't until he thinks his wife is becoming attached to someone else that he finally returns home to Minnesota.

I enjoyed this story quite a lot. It got my attention from the very start, always a good sign. It has some fun and rather silly bits and the advice column stuff is really great, maybe one of the best parts of the whole thing. One of the advice-seeking letters is from a famous George:

"I grew up in Midland, Texas, and went to Yale though I am no reader and married a fine woman who supported me through my Lost Weekend years when I goofed around in the oil business and got high as a kite on weekends and went around making a fool of myself. With the help of dear friends, I was able to sell my bankrupt company at a handsome profit and then obtain a major-league baseball franchise and get public financing for a ballpark, whereupon I sold the team for a fabulous profit. What a lucky duck. Now that I'm off the sauce, I am considering taking a stab at politics (my dad was a politician though not a very good one, IMHO,) but I hate hanging around with dull people who yak about the fine points of public finance or Whatever! And my wife says, "Why don't you try writing? You have so many good ideas." What do you think?"

And since I included the George letter, I want to also include Larry's rant about Republicans:

"...Bullet-headed ideologues devoted to prisons and sterile office parks and McMansion developments and pumping oil and destroying the Alaska wilderness to power their SUV's while taking away funds for homeless children sleeping in doorways to pay millions to fat-cat farmers and ranchers firmly attached to the right hind teat of federal welfare." 

 The only thing I didn't care for in the whole story was the ending, which was depressing and disappointing. Oh, well.

Ellen Foster

By Kaye Gibbons

Ellen has it rough. She is only nine years old when her mother dies of an overdose of heart medicine. Her father is an abusive drunk. Ellen fantasizes about killing him and is finally forced to run away when he starts making sexual advances.
She finds a temporary home with her art teacher, but is soon taken and placed with her grandmother on her mother's side.
The grandmother is a mean old woman who hates Ellen's father and blames Ellen for the mother's death.  Ellen tries to be a good but the grandmother is unyielding. Ellen's father dies and even that doesn't improve the grandmother's feelings towards her granddaughter. However, the old woman is soon dead too.
Ellen is next placed with her maternal aunt but things don't get any better. The aunt and her daughter are not welcoming and things come to a head one Christmas when the only gift Ellen receives is a package of drawing paper. Although it is exactly what she said she wanted when her aunt asked her what she would like for Christmas, Ellen had a childish fantasy that her aunt and cousin would realize they loved her and buy her some nice presents. After an angry confrontation, her aunt kicks Ellen out. Ellen sets off to find the love and acceptance that has been lacking all her young life.

This was a pretty good story.  From the beginning of the story, Ellen has apparently found the family she has been craving as she describes her life with "new mama." She has her own bedroom, nicely decorated. There is plenty of good, wholesome food and new mama treats Ellen and the other kids in the house with love and patience and kindness. The house is kept clean and tidy, the kids are also clean and properly dressed, everything is orderly and disciplined and new mama seems to be the real deal. But is she a real person or just the fantasy figure of a little girl desperate for a loving home?

See also https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/kaye-gibbons-6/ellen-foster/.

Sandcastles

By Luanne Rice

Honor's marriage was in trouble but it seems only she knew it. She kept her unhappiness to herself but it affected her work. A talented painter, her spark was now gone and she blamed her husband, John.
When they first fell in love, John was everything she thought she wanted. He too was a talented artist who constructed ephemeral sculptures built from rocks, sticks and things he found in the environment. He was quite successful and traveled to locations around the world to create his sculptures.
But then the babies arrived and as her family grew, Honor found herself turning away from her husband, yearning for a more settled lifestyle.
Honor and their daughters accompanied John on one of his sculpture trips, this time to Ireland. John built a large sculpture located on a cliff. But a local man began vandalizing John's work and John threatened to kill him in front of witness. Then one rainy night, John confronted the vandal on the cliff top and the man was killed. John's oldest daughter Regis was there too and saw everything. John ended up in prison when he pleaded guilty, sentenced to six years.
So the six years go by and John is out of prison and wanting to reconnect with his wife and children. He turns up in their home town and his three daughters are thrilled to have him back in their lives. But his wife is not thrilled. She is still angry about what she sees as his failings and about what happened in Ireland.
Having their father locked up for six years has traumatized his three daughters. The worst off is Regis, who can't remember what happened that fatal night. The girls are also anxious for their parents to get back together, but Honor is not ready to accept John back into their lives. She is very distant and remains so until her daughters' crises forces John and Honor to confront their differences.

I didn't like Honor and her three daughters. The daughters are all loons and Honor is pissed at John for being himself, the same person he was when she fell in love with him.  I also didn't much care for the emotionalism of the characters and the needless drama they create. Also, it doesn't take a brain surgeon to figure out pretty quickly that (spoiler alert) Regis was the one who caused that man's death and that her father took responsibility for it to protect her. I  guessed it by the end of Chapter 3. So no big shocking reveal for the reader who knows way before she and her brainless family does that she is the killer.
I found this story boring. It didn't appeal to me. It wasn't suspenseful, the mystery is not mysterious and the whole lot of them come off as either stupid or unstable. I was glad when it came to its predictable conclusion.

For another review, see http://www.curledup.com/lrsandca.htm.

Daddy's Girl

By Lisa Scottoline

Natalie Greco is a young professor when she is invited by a fellow professor to accompany him on a visit to the local prison where he teaches a clinic and provides legal aid to the inmates. Unfortunately, they get caught up in a prison riot where Natalie is attacked and nearly raped and where she stumbles upon a dying guard in just enough time to hear his dying words, "Tell my wife it's under the floor."
When Natalie tries to pass on the dead man's message to his wife, her life becomes extremely complicated. She ends up being accused of the murder of a policeman, the wife ends up in the hospital with two gunshot wounds to her chest, Natalie breaks up with her long time boyfriend and hooks up with the professor who got her involved in the whole mess, and she ends up on the run as a suspect for murder and drug dealing.

This was an OK read. I found much of it rather boring The reason for the professor taking Natalie to the prison to begin with is never really fully explained.  Also I am a lot foggy on why the  prisoner and the guard were murdered during the riot. Because they knew too much, it is said. But exactly what they knew or how they found out or which was the real target or were they both targets escaped me. Anyway, there is quite an amazing plot twist at the end, which I really didn't like and which seems to paint the heroine as a bit of a dope for not having good judgment. Too bad.

The Unwanted Wedding

By Barbara Cartland

The Duke of Tynemouth is in a bit of a bind. Queen Victoria is rumored to have chosen a bride for the Duke, a fat, homely German princess. The Duke is involved with a married woman, Aline, the Countess of Langstone.  He is certainly not interested in having a wife, especially not the fat princess.
Aline convinces him that his only way out is find himself a willing bride and forestall the Queen's matchmaking. And she has the perfect candidate, Honora, her niece.
Honora, an orphan, has been away at school in France for years. Now she is returning home to England and to the only relatives she has, her aunt and uncle.  Her parents had no money and so Honora is dependent upon her aunt and uncle for her support. This is how Aline coerces Honora into agreeing to this arranged marriage. Either agree to wed the Duke or be shut away in a convent for the rest of her life.
Aline is a bit of a dope. She thinks the Duke will marry Honora then dump her at his country estate and return to London to be with herself. Of course, it doesn't work out that way. Honora is a young, beautiful innocent girl and the Duke, resentful at first, finds himself quickly thawing out, especially after having to rescue Honora from kidnappers. And the more time they spend together, the clearer it becomes that the two have many of the same interests and a lot in common. So what will the Duke do about Aline when she stupidly crashes his and Honora's honeymoon?

This was not a good read. The idea is kind of interesting but the story seems sparse and unfilled out. The characters are pretty much stock Cartland characters, the handsome Duke, the innocent beauty, the evil slutty woman. It is just the bare bones of a story though, kind of lifeless and rote. It just lacks the liveliness, the color, the juice of her earlier novels.

The Wings of Love

By Barbara Cartland

Amanda Burke is the innocent young daughter of an impoverished vicar in Regency England when she finds herself the unwilling focus of the very wealthy local lord's attention.
Lord Ravenscar is the sort of man that any decent, god-fearing young woman would most want to avoid. Cruel, dissipated and domineering, known to live a life of vice and corruption, when he finds Amanda in his garden, he is smitten by her beauty and innocence. Determined to make her his own, he approaches her parents, asking for Amanda to be his bride.
This puts Amanda is a very uncomfortable position. Her family needs the money. Her father, the vicar, owes his living to Lord Ravenscar. Ravenscar uses his power and position to woo Amanda's family, promising her father a new, better-funded vicarage, promising to introduce Amanda's younger sister to society, promising to get Amanda's little brother into college. But even these blandishments are not enough to overcome Amanda's distaste for Ravenscar.
Meanwhile, Amanda has stumbled across a handsome, young, wounded stranger on Ravenscar's grounds. He needs her help or the local dragoons will haul him off to be hanged as a smuggler or as a spy. In short order, the two young people know they are in love and clever Ravenscar is onto them. He gives Amanda a choice, agree to marry himself or see her young beau hauled away to certain death. She gives in and agrees to be his wife.
Lord Ravenscar is anxious to seal the deal and hauls Amanda off to London to be outfitted in a manner suitable to a man of his wealth and position, leaving behind her parents and siblings. The only one to stand between him and Amanda is his sister, a sad. older woman who, it turns out, actively despises her brother. She also rather despises Amanda who she thinks is marrying Ravenscar for his money. The sister is not the only one in London who hates Amanda. Ravenscar was involved with a society woman who was counting on being his bride. When she finds out that Ravenscar has chosen Amanda, she goes off the deep end, hatching a plan to have Amanda snatched and sold into sexual slavery. Amanda, finding out that her true love is dead and that Ravenscar is through waiting and has arranged for the marriage to take place shortly, leaves her feeling well and truly trapped and totally alone.

This was an Okay read. Given Ravenscar's unsavory reputation, you would think that Amanda's parents would keep their beautiful daughter at home every time he is known to be in the area. Instead, she is sent to gather flowers for the altar from his greenhouse and runs afoul of the evil lord. If her parents or herself had any foresight, all of this could have been easily avoided. Oh, well.
This book dates to the early 1960s and has a pretty decent plot, unlike Cartland's later works, when she was just coasting on her reputation.

Notorious Nineteen

By Janet Evanovich

Stephanie is after another bail skip, this time for a man accused of stealing $5,000,000.  While out on bond, the accused became ill with appendicitis and had to have his appendix removed. But he vanished from the hospital after the surgery. The mystery is that no one saw him leave. Nor did any of the security cameras show him leaving either.
Besides the main quest, Stephanie has two side quests. Track down a wooden tiki god that was pledged as collateral for a bond and help Ranger deal with an unknown person who has a vendetta against Ranger.
With the help of Lula, Grandma and the tiki god, Stephanie cracks the case, with Ranger doing most of the heavy lifting.

This was an OK read. The Stephanie Plum books have gotten very formulaic. The main character is still pretty much incompetent at her job, still lives in her apartment with her hamster and is still stringing along both Ranger and Morelli, the cop who is her other love interest. And her car is still getting destroyed. In other words, the Stephanie Plum stories have become stagnant. Too bad. It was fun in the beginning but now it has become too predictable.

The Spell of New Mexico

Edited by Tony Hillerman

A collection of essays by writers on their perceptions and feelings about New Mexico, both as residents and as visitors. They include Oliver La Farge, D.H. Lawrence, Ernie Pyle, Conrad Richter and C.G. Jung, among others.

This was an OK read. I found a lot of it a bit boring, but the descriptions of the countryside were like a visit to my childhood. I have never been back, but I still miss the place.

Aunt Erma's Cope Book

By Erma Bombeck

Written in the 1970s, Erma Bombeck takes on the self-help industry as she pretend tries to live her life according to the advice given in several popular books of the time.
Some of the books she lampoons, as near as I can figure out, are:

• The Total Woman by Marabel Morgan (Erma's version is The Sub-Total Woman by Clarabelle Sweet)
• Open Marriage: A New Life Style for Couples by Nema & George O'Neill (Erma's: Is There a Draft in Your Open Marriage by Pam & Richard McMeal)
• Passages by Gail Sheehy (Packages by Gayle Teehee)
• Astrology books by Jean Dixon (Get Off Your Cusp and Live! by Jeanne Vixon)
• Meditation books by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi (Far Out and Far East by Edith Marishna)
• The Complete Book of Running by Jim Fixx (The Complete Book of Jogging by Jim Fixit)
• Looking Out for #1 by Robert Ringer (Looking Out for You-Know-Who by Robby Winner)

She also takes on books that analyze shoppers' buying habits, books on understanding body language, books on getting organized, books on living cheaply, books on dealing with guilt and, of course, weight loss advice.

Needless to say, these various self-help programs accomplish very little in her life and she reverts to her old ways, comfortable in her own skin at the conclusion. And she gives a nod to the Gail Sheehy book, Passages,  with a quote from the book on self-respect:

"Would that there were an award for people who come to understand the concept of enough. Good enough. Successful enough. Thin enough. Rich enough. Socially responsible enough. When you have self-respect you have enough, and when you have enough, you have self-respect."

 It was fun reading Erma Bombeck's take on the self-help industry and the havoc it can wreak on your life and relationships. I had a slight familiarity with the various books, having heard of them, but never having read any of them. Not that I haven't read self-help books, I have, Just not any of those lampooned by Bombeck in this book. I certainly heard of them, especially The Total Woman, Passages, The Complete Book of Running and Looking Out for #1. 
One of the things Bombeck points out is missing in the self-help industry of her day is a lack of humor:

"After reading sixty-two books and articles on how to deal with oneself, I realized something was missing . . . a sense of humor. I cannot believe that people look into the mirror that reflects their actions and behavior and keep a straight face."

This was an enjoyable read, and even though published in 1979, is very much relevant today.

City of Bones

By Cassandra Clare

Clary Fray is just a "mundane" teenage girl when she sees something she shouldn't: three teenage Shadowhunters killing a demon. And so begins her adventure in the world of the Mortal Instruments.
In the world of the Mortal Instruments, humans are blind to the other denizens of the world: demons, vampires, werewolves, fairies, witches, warlocks, and so on. All these others, except demons, co-exist with humankind fairly peacefully. Indeed all these others are the result of contamination of humans by demons. Demons are the true enemy, preying upon humanity and the Shadowhunters are there to take them out.
Things go south quickly after Clary's encounter with the Shadowhunters. Not only are they hostile to her and unpleasantly surprised that Clary can see through their enchantments but when Clary gets home, it is to find that her house has been ransacked, her mom is missing and a Clary herself is attacked by a demon-sent monster. Which she manages to kill. Because, as it soon becomes apparent, Clary is not a "mundane" teen girl, she is also a Shadowhunter whose heritage has been hidden from her for unknown reasons.

This is first book in the Mortal Instruments trilogy. It was an OK read. Just the typical story about a group of gorgeous teens who are "special" and set apart from us "mundane" humans. Most of the bad guys in the story, apart from the demons, are all adults that the beautiful, talented teenagers have to fight against and bring down.
So, in conclusion, the story did not capture my interest and towards the last third of it, I just wanted it to be over. I have no plans to read the second book in the trilogy, City of Ashes.

The Good Times

By Russell Baker

The sequel to Growing Up starts with young Russell getting his first job in the newspaper business: newspaper boy.
World War II intervenes and college, but he gets a job working for the hometown paper, The Baltimore Sun. He was assigned to the police beat, a common assignment for beginners.
He didn't really like the job, but it was a good way to learn the newspaper business. Money was a problem as the Sun did not pay its people well and Baker was desirous of getting married.
Baker didn't have to labor long on the police beat. Before much longer, he was in London, covering the coronation of Queen Elizabeth and living on an expense account. This experience he characterized as the best year of his life. Apparently, everything that followed just didn't measure up.
After London, he went on the White House Press Corps and eventually to working as a reporter for The New York Times.  He moved from being a reporter to being a columnist and father to three children. All in all, he had a very successful career, even to winning the Pulitzer Prize. But the best year of his life was still the year spent in London.
He concentrates on his career in this book, with his wife and kids barely mentioned at all. Towards the end, he realizes that he didn't make his family his top priority and worries about his failures as a father, for which he seems to blame his mother, who always pushed him to do better. He claims that his mother's obsession with success pushed him to focus on it at the expense of his wife and children.

This was an OK read. The first part was better than the latter part. After the London episode, the book starts to get pretty boring unless you are interested in newspapers and reporters. I am not. The book just didn't measure up to the first one for me.

See also, the LA Times.

Where Angels Walk

By Joan Wester Anderson

A collection of anecdotes of people's encounters with heavenly messengers or angels. Many of the stories recount instances of angels intervening to prevent people and especially children from being injured.

This was a very interesting read, although I remain skeptical. The stories are supposed to be true, but I have my doubts. I think a lot of this sort of thing is made up or just a delusion. But still I enjoyed reading the tales.

Don't You Know There's a War On?

By Avi

It's World War II and Howard Crispers is eleven years old and lives in Brooklyn, New York. He and his best friend Denny both have fathers off serving in the war, so naturally the two boys are very caught up in all the drama of that time. They believe their public school principal is a German spy.
One day, Howard is late getting off to school and he sees the principal on the street. Normally, the principal is the first one to arrive at school in the morning and so seeing him sets off all Howard's alarm bells and he follows the man to see where he is going. He ends up eavesdropping on a conversation between the man and an unknown woman. To his consternation, he hears that his very own teacher is slated to be fired, for reasons unknown.
Thus begins Howard's and Denny's campaign to save their teacher from losing her job, against the background of the United States in the depth of World War II.

This was a pretty good story, even though it is intended for children. The end of the story is very much like that of real life endings, bittersweet.

No Time for Sergeants

By Mac Hyman

It's World War II and Will Stockdale hasn't received the four letters sent to him from the draft board and now they are coming to forcibly remove him from his rural home with his father and stick Will in the military.
Will is not reluctant to go but his father puts up a fight, the end result of which is that Will goes but with a reputation for trouble-making, a reputation that will dog him from the very start of his time in the military.
Will is a sort of yokel superman, expert at shooting pool, strong enough to bend steel with his bare hands, and able to drink experienced drinkers under the table. But really he is an amiable guy who just wants to get along with people but whose lack of experience and understanding constantly cause him to get into trouble. But, despite the ill will of his superiors in the military, Will keeps coming out on top.

This was an amusing book. Will is a sort of unbelievable character, with his powers and abilities so much greater than that of his fellow humans. But the fixes he gets himself into and out of are well worth the read.

M.D.

By Neil Ravin

William Ryan has just started his internship at a prestigious New York City hospital. A young man of strong principles, nevertheless he becomes involved with a beautiful, successful but married cardiologist. He also has a series of on again off again romantic entanglements with nurses and a patient being treated for recurring bouts of cancer.
However, his principles do cause him to fall victim to hospital politics and jeopardize his blossoming medical career.
But mainly this book is more about being an intern in a big city hospital and less about Ryan's less-than-satisfying romantic life. It has lots of medical details, some of it quite gruesome. Because, unlike horror stories, the horrors of illness are reality.

This was a pretty interesting story. But if you are  the least bit of a hypochondriac, avoid this book. There are just too many disturbing descriptions of the many ways your body can screw you over.

If Life Is a Bowl of Cherries -- What Am I Doing in the Pits?

By Erma Bombeck

Erma Bombeck was a humor columnist who wrote about the joys and chores not only of parenthood but of coping with life in general. Her columns appeared in numerous newspapers and were collected into book form, including this one, which was the second of her books.

I suppose her humor can best be appreciated by those in the throes of parenthood, who no doubt will see themselves in her depictions. But even those who are not yet or who may never be parents will still probably enjoy her amusing columns. Though a bit dated by now, she still makes for a diverting read.

Queen Bee of Mimosa Branch

By Haywood Smith

Lin Scott is recovering from her divorce, which left her destitute. She ends up moving back in with her parents, a sorry situation as far as she, a woman in her fifties, is concerned.
Tension is high at home. Her mom is a bit controlling, her dad is fading into senility. Her alcoholic brother also lives there as does her elderly aunt and uncle. The uncle is also senile and off his medication.
Lin was a wife and mother. Her husband was successful and she never had to have a job outside of the home. She has never used a computer, she never graduated from college and she has arthritis, so a job where she has to be on her feet is out. But somehow she has to figure out a way to support herself. Relying on her elderly parents is not fair to them even though they are glad to have her back home.
She lucks into a job when she stops by the local drugstore. One of the clerks has collapsed and been taken to the hospital and won't be fit to return to work for many weeks. Since Lin used to work at this drugstore when she was a high schooler, she steps in to lend a hand and lands a temporary job. She is also going to night school, studying to get a real estate license.
Things are definitely looking up for Lin and the hunky new owner of the drugstore is more than just a little interested in his new employee.

This is an okay story. It is mainly about Lin finding her way in her new situation, with a little romance thrown in. There is also a political subplot that I found completely boring and uninteresting. Also, a one point early in the story, it is revealed that Lin's parents are having money troubles but that is never dealt with beyond a few mentions. Plus, even knowing this, she still lets her mother pay for the real estate course. Also, Lin dreads moving back in with the parents because they are such a pain to live with. But they don't seem to be that horrible in the story and her judgment of them as difficult is not really illustrated.
I think the story has quite a few gaps and would have been more interesting without the politics story.

Confessions of a Pregnant Father

By Dan Greenburg

As a young man, Dan Greenburg was sure he didn't want to ever be a father. But moving into middle age and gaining a new, young wife changed his mind. And so, at the age of 49, Dan Greenburg became the father of baby Zack. This book is his chronicle of going through the experience of conceiving a child. bearing the child and caring for it for the first months of the child's life, with the help of a nanny.

If you are a parent or are thinking of parenthood, this book is a valuable record of the fears and pleasures of the whole process and probably pretty entertaining.
However, if you are not a parent and you don't really get that worked up over kids and babies, you might find it rather boring. I know I did. The amount of detail gets really old really fast and there are way too many descriptions of baby poop and baby pee.

On a side note, when baby Zack was five years old, he played the role of Lorenzo in the movie, Lorenzo's Oil. As a further side note, Lorenzo's Oil was not a cure, merely a treatment and the real Lorenzo died of his ailment at the age of thirty.

A final side note: Dan and his wife were divorced when Zack was a young teen, after a five year separation. I also know his ex-wife took him to court for back child support of over $30,000. That is something to think about as you read his rapturous descriptions.  Sounds like he got over the thrill of being a father pretty fast.

Miss Julia Throws a Wedding

By Ann B. Ross

Miss Julia's handsome border, Deputy Bates has popped the question and been accepted. But he and Binkie, his betrothed, say they are going to get married in a week at the courthouse. They claim it is the only time they can do it, as they are both busy professionals.
Miss Julia is horrified. She feels that a proper ceremony is required to get a marriage off to a good start. (Never mind that it didn't work for her marriage to her cheating husband who is now, fortunately, deceased.) She talks them into it by promising she will put it all together herself: the preacher, the flowers, the church, the music, the invitations, the food, everything! All in the space of one week!
She plunges into creating a wedding, with the help of her other border, Hazel Marie and Hazel Marie's young son, Little Lloyd, and her cook/housekeeper, Lillian. The church is booked up and so the wedding will be at her house instead.  The preacher requires the young couple to attend counseling sessions and that is when it all starts to fall apart. Something the preacher says has given the bride cold feet and she is backing out.
But Miss Julia is not going to stand for it. She and her helpers have been busting their humps getting this wedding set up and she is determined to talk some sense into Binkie, especially after she learns that Binkie is pregnant. Even if it takes a miracle. Which might not be that hard to achieve, as a "miracle" has appeared at the building site across the street from Miss Julia's house!

This was an enjoyable read, if a bit contrived, plot-wise. Miss Julia can be a tad uncharitable and bit too rigid, but that just keeps her from being too good to be true. A fun, lighthearted read.

Toujours Provence

By Peter Mayle

Mayle continues his love affair with Provence, France. His book is a tour through his daily life. He talks about encounters with the locals, foods enjoyed and beverages consumed. Events attended and weather experienced. He rarely has a critical thing to say about Provence and seems much more accepting of the people than he did in the first book, A Year in Provence. Maybe he has just become used to the locals' way of doing things. He does make it seem very appealing, especially the cuisine. Seems like the only drawbacks are the growing popularity of the area with vacationers and the hot and sometime dry summers.

This was an enjoyable read, if a bit less interesting than the first book.

I'm a Stranger Here Myself

By Bill Bryson

After living in England for a long time, Bryson decided it was time to move back home to the United States with his wife and children. They settled into a college town in New England.
Moving to England had required some adjustments to the English way of doing things. And moving back home also required some adjustments.
This book is some of Bryson's newspaper columns he wrote while living in America. He enjoyed the contrasts between here and there. He also enjoyed pointing out each country's foibles. Even though he is not really a foreigner, he had been gone long enough to see things through a different eye.
His columns are amusing and also thought-provoking. A very nice read.