Quiet Neighbors by Catriona McPherson. A woman on the run
uncovers a series of deadly secrets
Jude found the rambling old bookshop
when she visited last summer, the high point of a miserable vacation. Now, in
the depths of winter, Lowell's store is a warm, safe place.
Jude needs a bolt-hole, Lowell needs
an assistant, and when an affordable rental is thrown in, life begins to look
up. The gravedigger's cottage isn't perfect for a woman alone, but at least she
has quiet neighbors.
Quiet, but not silent. The long dead
and the books they left behind have tales to tell, and the bookshop is not the
haven it seems to be. Lowell's past and Jude's present are a dangerous blend of
secrets and lies, and someone is coming to light the taper that could destroy
everything.
A Child’s Garden by Catriona McPherson. Eden was it’s name. “An alternative
school for happy children”. But it closed in disgrace after the suicide of one
of its children.
When Breathe Becomes Air by Paul Kalanith. 2/16 This was Joe’s
Christmas Book exchange to me this year. Quick read, beautifully written. Lots
of literary references which I love. At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of
completing a decade’s worth of training as a neurosurgeon, the author was
diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer.
Book of a Thousand Days by Shannon Hale 2/25 reread of a favorite.
Firebirds An anthology of original Fantasy and Science Fiction
edited by Sharyn November authors include Delia Sherman, Megan Whalen Turner,
Sherwood Smith, Nancy Springer, Lloyd Alexander, Meredith Ann Pierce, Michael
Cadnum, Emma Bull and Charles Vess (illustrations), Patricia A McKillip, Kara
Dalkey, Garth Nix, Elizabeth E Wein, Diana Wynn Jones, Nancy Farmer, Nina
Kiritimati Hoffman, Laurel Winter.
The Crucible of Doubt (Reflections on the Quest for Faith) by Terryl Givens
and Fiona Givens. 4/12 A careful, intelligent look at doubt-at some of its
common sources, the challenges it presents, and the opportunity it may open up
in a person’s quest for faith. Whether you struggle with your own doubts or
mostly want to understand loved ones who question, you will appreciate this
candid discussion. You’ll come away more certain than ever of the Lord’s love
for all his children.
Dust and Shadow An Account of the Ripper Killings by Dr. John H. Watson by
Lyndsay Faye. Sherlock Holmes tackles the Jack the Ripper murders. Wonderful
for a Holmes enthusiast.
How We Got to Now (Six Innovations That Made the Modern World) by Steven
Johnson 4/24 Christmas exchange from Joe.
David and Goliath by Malcolm Gladwell 5/5
East of the Sun and West of the
Moon 5/7
The Sea of Trolls by Nancy Farmer 6/5 Great YA fantasy based in Norse
gods. Jack apprentices to the local Bard and when Northman invade their village
his adventure begins. Trolls, dragons, giant spiders, a spoiled sister and a
young Valkyrie bent on a worthy death to take her to Valhalla. Bought this
trilogy hoping Jacob would love it and he will.
The Land of the Silver Apples by Nancy Farmer 6/8 Jack heads off to find out what
happened to his sister Lucy. She’s been kidnapped again. He encounters unruly
monks, earthquakes, hobgoblins, kelpies and elves, the fallen angels of legend.
Jack is joined by Pega a slave girl from their village and discovers Thorgil in
a close encounter with burial by moss.
The Island of the Blessed by Nancy Farmer 6/11 The amazing conclusion to this
wonderful trilogy. Three thumbs way up.
The Underneath by Kathy Appelt 7/6 A calico cat left on the side of
the road about to have kittens hears the howl of a chained-up hound dog.
Together this unlikely pair must keep these precocious kittens in the
underneath of the house or Gar Face will use them as gator bait. Fairly brutal
story.
A
Brazen Curiosity, A Scandalous Deception, An Infamous Betrayal, A Nefarious
Engagement by Lynn
Messina 7/21 Quiet, unassuming, biddable Beatrice Hyde-Clare poor relation
discovers she has a mind for solving murder when she finds a Duke standing over
a body in the library late at night. Working together they solve three murders
and find they work very well together. The last murders she solves are the
death of her own parents while navigating the waters of being engaged to a Duke.
Fum.
The
Hazel Wood by
Melissa Albert 7/24 Alice and her mom have lived a life on the run as they try
to avoid the bad luck that seems to follow them. Then her mom gets kidnapped
and her last message is don’t go to the Hazel Wood. Dark Fairy Tale. The Grim brothers
at their grimmest.
Peter
Pan by J M Barrie
7/26 It’s one of those books you think you have read because you have seen the
movies and plays. Darker than I expected.
The
Lion and the Lamb by Packer
9/15 Story of Willard and Rebecca Bean. Sent on a three-year mission to live in
the old Smith home in Palmyra, NY. They were to try to acquire the land of the
Hill Cumorah. They ended up staying 25 years. Wonderful story.
Fermat’s
Enigma by Simon
Singh 9/22 The mathematical journey to the solving of Fermat’s Theorem a 350 year-old
challenge that captivated the mathematical world😊.
Legion
by Brandon
Sanderson 10/1 Audible. Stephen Leeds has multiple personalities residing in
his head. They each keep a piece of the massive amounts of information he owns
compartmentalized. But when one of them dies??? I always enjoy a good Brandon
Sanderson story. This one was no exception.
world. He
has a micro power. He can tell who lost anything that is just laying around, ie
hair scrunches, toys, bicycles. Beth his friend things he can be used for good
and so does a FBI agent when he thinks Ezekiel can help find a lost child😊.
My
Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She’s Sorry by Fredrick Backman 10/8 From the author who gave us
A Man Called Ove, Elsa is seven years old and different. Her grandmother
is seventy-seven years-old and crazy—as in standing-on-the-balcony-firing-paintball-guns-at-strangers
crazy. She is also Elsa’s best, and only, friend. At night Elsa takes refuge in
her grandmother’s stories, in the Land-of-Almost-Awake and the Kingdom of
Miamas, where everybody is different and nobody needs to be normal. When Elsa’s
grandmother dies and leaves behind a series of letters apologizing to people
she has wronged, Elsa’s greatest adventure begins. He grandmother’s
instructions lead her to an apartment building full of drunks, monsters, attack
dogs, and old crones but also to the truth about fairy tales and kingdoms and a
grandmother like no other😊.
The
Weed That Strings the Hangman’s Bag by Alan Bradley 10/18 From the author of ‘Sweetness
at the Bottom of the Pie’. Flavia de Luce, a dangerously smart eleven-year-old
with a passion for chemistry and a genius for solving murders, thinks that her
days of crim-solving in the bucolic English hamlet of Bishop’s Lacey are over—until
beloved puppeteer Rupert Porson has his own strings sizzled in an unfortunate
rendezvous with electricity. But who’d do such a thing, and why? Does the
madwoman who lives in Gibbet Wood know more than she’s letting on? What about Porson’s
charming but erratic assistant? All clues point toward a suspicious death years
earlier and a case the local constables can’t solve—without Flavia’s help. But
in getting so close to who’s secretly pull the strings of this dance of death,
has our precocious heroine finally gotten in way over her head.
The Kingdom of Auschwitz by Otto Friedrich 11/19
Quick read of the story of Auschwitz. The major players; Hoess and Himmler. The
Final Solution, death camps, brutality, starvation, cruelty.
Night by Ellie Wiesel 11/19 Harrowing tale of a 13
year-old boy’s survival of the Holocaust and internment in Auschwitz.
A Dangerous Place by Jacqueline Winspear 11/20 Maisie
Dobbs in Gibraltar coming to terms with the tragic death of her husband and the
loss of her unborn daughter. She literally stumbles across a dead body. While
her family is sending agents to keep her safe and convince her to come home,
she goes about trying to unravel the death of this young photographer.
Ammunition smuggling and battles waging in Spain are all wrapped up in this.
From the Two Rivers by Robert Jordan 12/12 First half
of the Eye of the World
Book of Mormon 12/27
