Talking as Fast as I Can, Lauren Graham

Talking as Fast as I Can, Lauren Graham

I thoroughly enjoyed this biography. It maybe dips too far into Gilmore Girls fan club, but if you loved the Gilmores, you won't mind. I thought Lorelei was funny, turns out she's funny, because Lauren Graham is funny. She tells stories from her awkward growing up years, her 'Why do all my friends have kids? Where's my boyfriend?' years, and of course what it was like to play Lorelei Gilmore. Not only will it keep you entertained, but she has some really good ideas and deep thoughts. 

Graham divulges on Hollywood life, fashion, diets, flirting with famous people, etc. Only, she does it in a, "If I were in Hollywood, this is totally how I would act" kind of way that you'll be able to relate with. We all want to think we wouldn't be sucked into the must be more, must do more, must party more, must buy more black hole that is Los Angeles, and Lauren Graham shows us how.  

Favorite quotes:

"It's an accomplishment to do something well, but maybe even a bigger one to do something well when you'd really rather not be doing it at all."

"Life doesn't often spell things out for your or give you what you want exactly when you want it, otherwise it wouldn't be called life, it would be called vending machine."

The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher

The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher


Penelope: Daughter, friend, wife, mother, mentor. Rosamunde Pilcher weaves one woman's many roles into a beautiful and unforgettable story. Completely captivating, readers live Penelope's life, feel her feelings, her worries, her troubles. Rejoice in her accomplishments, and hope her hopes. The characters in Pilcher's novel become real before you can even remember they're fictional, and their lives stick with you long after you shut the last page.

Human life is so rich, full of so much potential, and so many hopes. Vast heartaches inevitably meet us on our way, so it isn't the lack of disappointment that creates the good life, but the dealing with, and learning from those disappointments. By discovering Penelope's life, you rediscover your own.

A Memory of Violets, Hazel Gaynor

A Memory of Violets, by Hazel Gaynor

Leaving a complicated past, and everything familiar behind, Tilly rides the train to London to begin new employment as a Housemother in a portion of Mr. Shaw's Training Homes for Watercress and Flower Girls. Grateful for the chance to start anew, and refreshed by the fact that no one knows Tilly, or her history, she revels in her new life, job, and friends. After finding a hidden, and forgotten collection of letters in her room, Tilly embarks on a journey of discovery revolving around two sisters living barefoot on the streets of London. As she learns more about their treasured relationship, she yearns for healing between her own sister and self.

Hazel Gaynor intricately weaves multiple viewpoints into one flawless story. Originally set on finding everything she can about these two mysterious sisters, Tilly didn't expect to relate so well to their sad tale, and discover her own wants, and needs. Gaynor beautifully instructs readers on the importance of empathy, the strength that can be found in familial relationships, and the power within new beginnings. Appropriate for Young Adult readers, and enjoyable for adults as well, A Memory of Violets tells an important, seldom told story.

The Magnolia Story, Chip and Joanna Gaines

The Magnolia Story, Chip and Joanna Gaines

I haven't even seen more than 1 episode of Fixer Upper, but this book, wow! It was truly amazing! If you want to read a book about how a company got started and became successful, read this book. If you want to read a book about a successful marriage, read this book. If you want to read a book about prioritizing kids, marriage, work, etc, read this book. If you want to read a book about putting God first and things working out differently, but more beautifully than you imagined, read this book!

Written mostly by Joanna, with excerpts from Chip, The Magnolia Story is full of humor, wisdom, and charm. Chip and Joanna didn't start out thriving, they were surviving for a long time, working really hard, and completely relying on each other and God. Their story is not only beautiful, but motivational. They make you feel like you too can accomplish great things with the help of your spouse, your family, and most importantly God. 

Favorite Quotes:

"I finally realized that life isn't found on the pages of a magazine - life is found in the glass of spilled milk and in the long, narrow hallway filled with socks and soccer balls." 

Joanna Gaines

"I felt good about having made the decision to walk away and lock that door. It's funny though, looking back on it now, because one very simple concept in life never occurred to me as I was walking away: Even locked doors can be unlocked in time. I simply never could have imagined just how much God had in store for us, and I certainly couldn't have dreamed just how many keys to other doors God had already placed in our hands."

Joanna Gaines

"Chip, I always thought, when I was out on the baseball field hitting you those grounders, that I was training you to be the next greatest baseball player. But now, looking back and seeing the person you've become, I was really training you to be the next greatest dad."

Chip's Dad

And something really fun, is that Joanna's dream (not having a TV show...they don't even own a TV!) came true. Magnolia Market is a real place in Waco, TX

The Secret Keeper, by Kate Morton

The Secret Keeper, by Kate Morton

Laurel grew up in a fairy tale home. An English country cottage, with a tree house and chickens, gads of sisters and an adorable baby brother, and parents who were absolutely nutty about each other. As a 16 year old, Laurel witnessed a murder in her front yard. 50 years later, she decides to confront that mystery and in the process learns to adore her family even more through researching her mother's WWII experiences with love, loss and new beginnings.

A 'can't put it down' read for all you mamas out there who are suckers for clean criminology. Accompanied by a fascinating reminder that all our mothers were people before they birthed us, The Secret Keeper captures all the charm of English 1940's, all the romance of first loves, and all the intrigue of deceit. 

Inside Out & Back Again, Thanhha Lai

Inside Out & Back Again, Thanhha Lai

Ha and her family narrowly escape the rise of communism in Vietnam and dangerously travel to America to start fresh, safe lives in Alabama. Growing up in a small hut with her mother and brothers, Ha misses her father who went missing in combat. She nurtures a precious papaya tree, and holds what is left of her family close. With the promise of a bright future, they bravely board a ship headed for America. There are pieces of their new life in Alabama that are better. Adequate clothes, enough food, daily schooling, and stable jobs to support themselves are new realities Ha's family did not experience in Vietnam. However, there are also new painful pieces that make Ha wish for her war-torn childhood home. Written in verse, Lai offers a raw view of immigration and family through a child's eye that is sure to leave the reader reeling for more.

Living in a country and attending classes where immigration, multiculturalism, and language barriers are an everyday reality for the majority of America's citizens, holds many difficulties. Prejudices are easily found and adopted. That does not have to be the case. Lai aids readers into the shoes of a young, scared, shy immigrant who just wants to fit in and discover what normal means. Teachers will be able to help their foreign students with more sympathy and students will develop empathy for their classmates that do things a little differently, after reading Inside Out and Back Again.

Wonder, R.J. Palacio

Wonder, R.J. Palacio

Encouraging all readers to exercise a little more kindness, Palacio explores different levels of what it is to be mean and inspires a desire to avoid everything mean and to build everything nice. Auggie was born with a facial deformity. His appearance is different enough to initially spark fear, distrust, and discomfort in almost all his first encounters. He's used to it. It's been that way his whole life, and while it is perpetually hurtful, he approaches the subject with humor. Making the switch from being home schooled, to entering the cruelty of middle school ignites a painful growing experience not only for Auggie, but all those he interacts with as everyone involved learns the importance of kindness.

Some kids are rude on purpose. Sometimes kids aren't trying to be blatantly rude, but still are due to an insensitivity. Sometimes adults are rude. Some adults place their objectives higher than anyone else and don't really care who they tred on to get what they want. Some adults simply give too much or too little attention to sensitive subjects. Palacio delves into a multitude of unkind behavior, helps readers recognize potential scenarios where they could improve, and convinces all of the importance and the potency of kindness. A vital read for middleschoolers or those about to enter middle school, but really anyone and everyone will walk away from this novel a bigger and more understanding person than before.

Unlikely Warrior, Georg Rauch

Unlikely Warrior: A Jewish Soldier in Hitler's Army, Georg Rauch

Georg Rauch's maternal grandmother was a Jew, thus making him Jewish by tradition. Because his father was a German captain in World War I, Rauch's family was spared the concentration camps, but not the horrors of battle. At age 19, Rauch leaves his family, and the other Jews hiding in their attic, to fight for Hitler. When he makes his heritage known to his superiors, he is sent to the front lines. In a detailed, but non-grotesque, account, Georg Rauch helps the reader experience first hand what it would have been like to fight in the trenches during World War II, starve in a Russian prison camp, and to finally see their home again, through blurred vision and alive, but an old man in a 21 year old body.

In his memoir, Rauch utilizes his own letters he wrote home to his parents during the war. Although he is aware of his desperate situation, Rauch somehow still captures what little humor is available in telling his tales. Citizen accounts of Nazi Germany are quiet common, but a solder's experience rare, quite possibly merely because not many of them made it home. Miracle after miracle, Rauch survives and goes on to inspire readers that they too can keep their chin up in the midst of difficulties, can encourage those around them, and most importantly, can use their experiences to help others. 

Liar, Temptress, Soldier, Spy by Karen Abbott

Liar, Temptress, Soldier, Spy: Four Women Undercover in the Civil War, by Karen Abbott

Liar Temptress Soldier Spy follows the involvement of 4 women, 2 confederates and 2 unionists through their daring secrets and bold assertiveness during the Civil War. The title conveys an interesting mix of adjectives and all four women at some point portray each title. 

Abbott opened my eyes to the Civil War. Quickly I became aware of how simultaneously ignorant I was in regards to this American Historical landmark, and fascinated. Similar to The Devil in the White City, everything within quotations comes from original sources, be they letters, journals or court briefings. She does an excellent job portraying that women are capable even when their society tells them they aren't, without being annoyingly feminist. Abbott successfully corrals the sensitive topic of womanhood and declares to the world that females have roles to play. 

Tuck Everlasting, by Natalie Babbit

Tuck Everlasting, Natalie Babbit






Winnie Foster's childhood is suffocating her. Button up boots, tight lace dresses, and the stifling heat of summer makes her yearn for something more. Even just exploring beyond the iron gate enclosing everything she's ever known into a neat little square would suffice. Tampering with the idea of running away, she accidentally finds herself a victim of kidnapping. Her kidnappers, however, don't frighten her; they fascinate her and teach her lessons on life that she will not soon forget.

Tuck Everlasting explores ideas on what it means to actually live. Not merely to be alive, not merely to not have died, but to live. Natalie Babbit's writing style drips with sophistication that will entertain advanced readers, but tells a story that will captivate young audiences as well. Readers will juggle moral dilemmas around in their heads they haven't previously considered and view life through a different lens after having read Tuck Everlasting.

Bo At Ballard Creek

Bo At Ballard Creek, by Kirkpatrick Hill

When Mean Millie asked a gold miner for a favor, he had no idea she would hand him a swaddled, blond haired, tiny bundle and recite the name of an Alaskan orphanage. Outside the orphanage gates, the two gold miners who agreed to to the task fell in love with the baby's charm, were disappointed by the strict damp look of the place, and enthusiastically decided to raise the child themselves. They named her Bo, and set out on their way to raising a child on the Alaskan frontier. 

In a Little House on the Prairie kind of way, Hill masterfully tells stories of Bo's childhood. With no strong plot line to follow, Bo at Ballard Creek takes on a historical memoir feeling and wins the hearts of readers as they discover what it might have been like to live with, cook for, and learn from a gold mining crew in the 1920's in the middle of Alaska. 

The Story of the Trapp Family Singers, Maria Augusta Trapp

The Story of the Trapp Family Singers,

Maria August Trapp

They're real! Did you know she was only 20 when she married into 7 children? Did you know they escaped to America so they wouldn't have to sing at Hitler's birthday party? Re-experience the magic, the wonder, the romance and the music you grew up loving in The Sound of Music. Maria has a way of mystifying her audiences, both as the leader of her traveling singing group, as well as in her memoir. The Sound of Music resembles the truth, but that story ends by the 4th or 5th chapter while the lives of the Trapp family continue on in splendor.

Frauline Maria was determined to become a nun before she joined the Trapp family. She continually weaves her devout faith throughout the journey she travels one step at a time, never knowing what lays around the corner, but ever hopeful. I found it refreshing to discover a faith promoting, inspiring and hopeful story that didn't come from Deseret Book. This book was amazing. I will own it and I will read it over and over again. 

From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, E. L. Konigsburg

From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler,  
E. L. Konigsburg

 

This one is just fun. Maybe you read it in elementary school, I didn't, but I should have. When Claudia, an unsatisfied 12-year-old, decides to run away from home and take her little brother Jamie, and his piggy-bank, along, she has a plan for everything. They pack their clothes in their instrument cases and head to the Metropolitan Museum of Art instead of school. While sneakily staying at the Museum, Claudia becomes entranced with the mystery behind a new sculpture and refuses to go home until they discover all they can about its origin. 

Claudia and Jamie are easy to love, and their unique approach to running away from home piques intrigue and sparks imagination. All humans can relate to a child's dream of running away from home, and are able to rediscover that forgotten piece of childhood as they become involved in these very advanced, yet still juvenile schemes. From the Mixed-Up files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler should go on everyone's library card queue.

Little Britches: Father and I were Ranchers, Ralph Moody

Little Britches: Father and I were Ranchers, 
Ralph Moody

 

Sterling North, whoever that was, said that Moody's books should be read aloud in every family circle in America, and I think he's absolutely right.  Elementary aged Ralph moves across the country alongside his family with high hopes of living off the land and tending a successful ranch. When they arrive however, they stare at empty fields and a crooked house with broken windows. Ralph learns from his Pa how to make ends meet, try new and daunting things, and most importantly stay true to ones character. 

When reading Little Britches, Ralph's hardships are your hardships, his triumphs your triumphs, and life altering lessons change your life as well as his. I loved reading this book and could hardly set it down. Written in 1898, Moody captures the joy, pain, drama, suspense and achievement involved in so many of the hearts of our own ancestors. My family raised a ranch from scratch in Whitehall, Montana in the late 1800s early 1900s, and I loved reading this novel and simultaneously imaging the Capp family and their struggles as well as their triumphs. Highly recommending this book.

The Dead in Their Vaulted Arches, Alan Bradley

The Dead in Their Vaulted Arches, Alan Bradley

Flavia de Luce, an eleven-year-old amateur detective, desperately wants the approval of those around her. Her sisters, her father, Bishop Lacey's real detective, and his beautiful wife Antigone. Her deepest desire comes to fruition in The Dead in Their Vaulted Arches as she not only discovers that her family is essential in classified government missions, but that she has been unknowingly prepared her entire life, by those closest to her, to play an extensive role herself.

The Dead in their Vaulted Arches is beautiful and the reader celebrates with Flavia as she matures, makes connections, and discovers her self worth and self importance. The unraveling ends in this novel leave room for even greater adventures to be had and stories to be told.

Speaking from Among the Bones, Alan Bradley

Speaking from Among the Bones, Alan Bradley

With the 500th anniversary of the death of Bishop's Lacey's patron saint, St. Tancred, nearing, plans are made to celebrate with an exhumation of his grave. Flavia, the eleven-year-old part-detective, part-chemist, elbows her way into being helpful during the private event so she can be the first to eye these holy bones. What she finds however, is both unexpected and shocking. Readers will race with Flavia through the pages of this novel as she unfolds the clues behind the church organist's murder. 

Alan Bradley does not disappoint in the 5th book of his Flavia de Luce novels. I love each one more then the last, become more endeared to Flavia herself, more fascinated with mystery, and feel more and more like I am a resident of Bishop's Lacey. I would and will purchase this book for my library and continue to call out to everyone within reach that Flavia de Luce is a literary friend they want to make. 

I Am Half-Sick of Shadows

I Am Half-Sick of Shadows, Alan Bradley

With finances running low, Colonel de Luce agrees to transform Buckshaw Manor into a movie set over Christmas. Caught between wanting to avoid these high profile visitors, and having late night private chats with them, Flavia de Luce overhears secrets, discovers scandals, and gets caught right in the middle of a jealous revenge plot. Although Flavia desperately wants to beat the investigators to the bottom of this surprising murder, she also is highly concerned with ensnaring Saint Nicholas on Christmas Eve and proving to her sisters that he really does exist. Her split focus causes her to overlook important details and she finds herself staring death in the face. 

This may be my favorite Flavia de Luce novel. I absolutely loved it. Flavia + Christmas + high profile  movie stars? Yes please. I loved this book. And there were no dead babies. I can't swallow murdered babies very well, which spoiler alert, book 2 and 3 have those. This one however, was brilliant, fantastic, a page turner and every other positive compliment one could contrive. I read it in 2 days; I couldn't even help it. 

The Weed that Strings the Hangman's Bag

The Weed that Strings the Hangman's Bag,
Alan Bradley

When a famous puppeteer rolls into the tiny town of Bishop's Lacey, curiosities abound and Flavia de Luce is in the center of all of it. Just as Flavia's thirst for figuring out the untold dramas peaks, the puppeteer ends up dead. Resolved to figure out the small and overlooked details leading up to murder, Flavia, once again, uncovers old town secrets, makes progress one step ahead of the investigators and gives readers a close up look into the silly and lovable mind of an eleven-year-old. 

After finishing the first book in this series, I couldn't wait to get started on the second, and I wasn't disappointed. The particulars in this story however are a little heavier to bear than in the last. Upon closing this purple book, I didn't dare start on the third without giving myself time to breath, consider and let my mind unravel. Flavia had me wrapped around her little finger from page 1 til the end. But today I start the third, and I can hardly wait, because these books are fascinating.

Boston Jane

Boston Jane, Jennifer L. Holm

Jane finds the propriety of Philadelphia society tiring. She wants to play, she wants to be silly, she wants to get her hands dirty, and she does not want to follow Lady Godey's Guidebook on how to be a young lady. When she receives an invitation from a handsome suitor to sail over to the Washington Territory and be his bride, Jane jumps at the opportunity, leaving all familiarity behind. When she arrives however, and her fiance is nowhere to be found, Jane must embark on her own life among the settlers, fur trappers, and Indians in the Washington Territory.

Boston Jane is one of my guilty pleasures. We all have books that we love, but wouldn't necessarily be caught reading on campus. But I'm saying it now, I love it. And there's really nothing guilty about it; it's amazing. Jane is a role model. While showing that being a girl is not about to slow her down, and that she too is capable of doing hard things, she simultaneously encompasses all that is feminine. She constantly stands up for herself, yet swallows scrutiny when no other option is available. Prone to tantrums and bemoaning tragedy, as Jane learns from her trials, she encourages us that we too can learn to gracefully wade through difficulty. 

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, Alan Bradley

Flavia de Luce is the child you wish you were. Imaginative, brave and curiously sweet, Flavia is sure to capture the reader's heart as she tumbles her way through murder clues, determined to solve the mystery. After overhearing an argument in her father's study, Flavia wakes up to find a dead man in the garden lying among the cucumbers. When her father is accused as the murderous villain, she resolves to get to the bottom of the riddle and in doing so uncovers deathly, overlooked secrets from years past. 

Okay I absolutely loved this book. I snatched the last copy from the library and promised myself I would only read it at work and while walking home from work so as to savor the pages. Today, being only halfway through, I forgot the blasted book at home. Never surrendering, I found a copy online, and finished it. I honestly haven't turned pages like this since the seventh Harry Potter book.