Unravel Me

Unravel Me

by Tahereh Mafi

Genre: Young Adult Fiction, Dystopian Fiction

Synopsis:  Tick tick tick tick tick it's almost time for war.

Juliette has escaped to Omega Point.  It is a place for people like her-people with gifts-and it is also the headquarters of the rebel resistance.

She's finally free from The Reestablishment, free from their plan to use her as a weapon, and free to love Adam.  But Juliette will never be free from her lethal touch.

Or from Warner, who wants Juliette more than she ever thought possible.

Haunted by her past and terrified of her future, Juliette knows that in her present, she will have to make some life changing choices.  Choices that may involve choosing between her heart-and Adam's life.

From the book jacket

Review:  I could not wait to finish this book and that is not a good thing.  I got so bored with this book and I just couldn't keep reading it.  I almost abandoned it after about 380 pages but I figured I might as well finished it.  The last book, Shatter Me, ended with me wanting to find out what happens next.  This book did not end that way.  I can't read another book where the figurative language takes over and turns one paragraph into pages of metaphor after metaphor.  I also can't read another book with more cross outs.  The last book started out with a lot of figurative language and cross outs but got better so I had hoped that this book would be better but it was definitely NOT!  The first half or more of this book was just a romance between Juliette and Adam and less about the powers they have and the resistance that they were planning.  There was hardly any action in this book and a lot of pity parties.  I will most definitely not read the third book.

Rating:  1 star

Biblioburro

Biblioburro

by Jeanette Winter

Genre: Picture Book

Synopsis:  Join Luis and his trusty burros, Alfa and Beto, as they travel far and wide to bring treasured books to eager children in the remote villages of rural Colombia.

Based on the inspiring life of a real man and his devoted burro team, here is a book to remind us of the immense power stories have to connect us all.

From the book jacket

Review:  I checked out this book because I had told N2 about a book I had read with my stories about Luis Soriana and how he used his donkeys to take books to children who didn't have access to any books or libraries.  They wanted to read a book about this man so this is the book my library had.  The illustrations are very fun and colorful and reminded me of folk art from South America.  The author writes very simply about what Luis does and tells how Luis got his idea, some troubles he had when traveling to remote villages and what happens when he gets to the village.  I think there could have been more meat to this story, it may have been a little too simplified.  Maybe I felt this way because I had read a more in depth story with my students at school.  The last page does contain more information about Luis Soriana and his Biblioburro.  My kids did enjoy reading about this and had some questions about the book.

Rating: 3 1/2 stars

Serious Farm

Serious Farm

by Tim Egan

Genre: Picture Book

Synopsis:  Farmer Fred never smiled much.  "Farmin' is a serious business," he'd say.  "Nothin' funny about corn."  And so life on his farm was pretty serious.  None of the animals laughed or even smiled.

But everyone has to laugh sometime, and finally the animals decide to leave Serious Farm in search of a more cheerful place to chuckle and graze. Will the animals find a livelier home, and will Farmer Fred ever lighten up?  Tim Egan's seriously silly Serious Farm is a story for all who need a little more laughter in their lives.
from the book jacket

Review: This was a really cute story about animals on a farm who decide that the farm is too serious so they come up with a plan to make the farm a funnier place.  My kids really enjoyed this book and reading all the antics that the animals tried to make Farmer Fred laugh or smile.  They really liked the sheep wearing sunglasses with mustaches on!  I liked the quirky humor in this book and all the illustrations of the farm animals doing silly things.  I think I am going to have to check out other books by this author!

Rating: 5 stars

The Husband's Secret

The Husband's Secret

Liane Moriarty

Genre: Fiction

Summary (from Goodreads):  From the author of the critically acclaimed What Alice Forgot comes a breakout new novel about the secrets husbands and wives keep from each other.

My Darling Cecilia
If you're reading this, then I've died . . .

Imagine your husband wrote you a letter, to be opened after his death. Imagine, too, that the letter contains his deepest, darkest secret - something so terrible it would destroy not just the life you built together, but the lives of others too. Imagine, then, that you stumble across that letter while your husband is still very much alive . . .

Cecilia Fitzpatrick achieved it all - she's an incredibly successful business woman, a pillar of her small community and a devoted wife and mother. Her life is as orderly and spotless as her home. But that letter is about to change everything, and not just for her: Rachel and Tess barely know Cecilia - or each other - but they too are about to feel the earth-shattering repercussions of her husband's devastating secret.

Marcie's Review: This was such a captivating book to read - I couldn't put it down!  I had a bit of a hard time keeping the characters straight, but perhaps that's because I was usually reading while distracted by a small child.  Moriarty's strength, I think, is in making her characters seem so real; I could identify, in some way, with almost all the characters, and their thoughts and voices struck a chord with me.  I spent most of the book wondering how on earth she was going to resolve the conflict around the secret, and while I didn't exactly like the ending, it was certainly creative and thought-provoking.

Becky's Review:  I had a hard time getting into this book.  Perhaps I am not in the mood to read books such as this one but I wanted more depth.  While I felt like this book was very well written and engaging, I wanted more which is why I think my feelings towards this book may be based on what I was in the mood for reading.  I really dislike when authors hint at something and dangle the carrot in front of me for a long time before they finally let me in on the secret.  It is really one of my pet peeves in life!  I hate knowing there is a secret but not knowing what it is.  The fact that I knew about the letter that Celia's husband wrote but yet I don't know until half way through what was in the letter drove me nuts!  Once I got into the book, it was a quick and easy read.  Just make sure you are in the mood for the book before picking it up!

Marcie's Rating: 5 stars

Becky's Rating: 3 1/2 stars

The Sisters

The Sisters

Nancy Jensen

Genre: Fiction

Summary (from Goodreads):  In the tradition of Marilynne Robinson’s Housekeeping and Elizabeth Strout’s Olive Kitteridge, a dazzling debut novel about the family bonds that remain even when they seem irretrievably torn apart

Growing up in hardscrabble Kentucky in the 1920s, with their mother dead and their stepfather an ever-present threat, Bertie Fischer and her older sister Mabel have no one but each other—with perhaps a sweetheart for Bertie waiting in the wings. But on the day that Bertie receives her eighth-grade diploma, good intentions go terribly wrong. A choice made in desperate haste sets off a chain of misunderstandings that will divide the sisters and reverberate through three generations of women.

What happens when nothing turns out as you planned? From the Depression through World War II and Vietnam, and smaller events both tragic and joyful, Bertie and Mabel forge unexpected identities that are shaped by unspeakable secrets. As the sisters have daughters and granddaughters of their own, they discover that both love and betrayal are even more complicated than they seem.

Gorgeously written, with extraordinary insight and emotional truth, Nancy Jensen’s powerful debut novel illuminates the far-reaching power of family and family secrets.

Review: I wanted to like this book because it's about relationships between sisters and mothers and daughters, and it takes place throughout the last hundred years of US history.  But it just wasn't for me.

It was very well written, with interesting characters and an intriguing story, but it was so sad, so bleak, and ultimately, so depressing to read.  Even when positive things happened to the characters, they managed to be negative or bitter.  Throughout the novel, I kept hoping that the next generation of women would overcome this history of sadness, but time and time again, it just didn't happen.  It's not that I uniformly dislike sad books, it's that there needs to be something positive, some ray of hope or sense of joy, and this book didn't have that.

Each chapter was written from the perspective of a different character some time in the future from the last chapter, and while this was interesting and could have worked well, I found myself wanting more information about each character before the book jumped to the next.  Perhaps if the chapters were longer, or there weren't such big jumps in the timeline, so that I got to know each character better, I would have liked it more?

Rating: 2 stars

Prodigy

Prodigy

by Marie Lu

Genre: Young Adult Fiction, Dystopian Fiction

Synopsis: After escaping from the Republic's stronghold of Los Angeles, June and Day arrive in Vegas just as the unthinkable happens: the Elector Primo dies, and his son Anden takes his place.  With the Republic edging closer to chaos, the pair joins a group of Patriot rebels eager to help Day rescue his brother and who offer them passage to the Colonies.  The Patriots have only one request-June and Day must assassinate the new Elector.

It's the chance to change the nation, to give voice to a people silenced for too long.  But as June realizes this Elector is nothing like his father, she's haunted by the choice ahead.  What if Anden is a new beginning?  What if revolution must be more than loss and vengeance, anger and blood?  What if the Patriots are wrong?

From the book jacket

Review:  Oh my, I highly enjoyed this book and I cannot wait to read the conclusion to this series!  I really enjoyed the first book of the series but I liked this one better.  Now that we know the characters, there can be more action.  The characters and their relationships continue to develop but we don't need to know all their background again like we did in the beginning.  In this book you really get to see what the 2 warring nations are-the Republic and the Colonies.  You know much more about them and how they became to be.  I always like when my questions are answered!  The assassination plot was full of action and was quite a page turner and you really didn't know what was going to happen.  Then when June and Day venture into the Colonies you learn about the other part of the former USA are living and how it is so different from the Republic.   I was surprised by the twist at the end and like I said before this book left me wanting to rush out right now to get the third book.  I can't wait to see how this series finishes.

Rating: 5 stars

Fly Away

Fly Away

Kristin Hannah

Genre: Women's Fiction

Summary (from Goodreads):  Once, a long time ago, I walked down a night-darkened road called Firefly Lane, all alone, on the worst night of my life, and I found a kindred spirit. That was our beginning. More than thirty years ago. TullyandKate. You and me against the world. Best friends forever. But stories end, don’t they? You lose the people you love and you have to find a way to go on. . . .

Tully Hart has always been larger than life, a woman fueled by big dreams and driven by memories of a painful past. She thinks she can overcome anything until her best friend, Kate Ryan, dies. Tully tries to fulfill her deathbed promise to Kate--to be there for Kate’s children--but Tully knows nothing about family or motherhood or taking care of people.

Sixteen-year-old Marah Ryan is devastated by her mother’s death. Her father, Johnny, strives to hold the family together, but even with his best efforts, Marah becomes unreachable in her grief. Nothing and no one seems to matter to her . . . until she falls in love with a young man who makes her smile again and leads her into his dangerous, shadowy world.

Dorothy Hart--the woman who once called herself Cloud--is at the center of Tully’s tragic past. She repeatedly abandoned her daughter, Tully, as a child, but now she comes back, drawn to her daughter’s side at a time when Tully is most alone. At long last, Dorothy must face her darkest fear: Only by revealing the ugly secrets of her past can she hope to become the mother her daughter needs.

A single, tragic choice and a middle-of-the-night phone call will bring these women together and set them on a poignant, powerful journey of redemption. Each has lost her way, and they will need each one another--and maybe a miracle--to transform their lives.

An emotionally complex, heart-wrenching novel about love, motherhood, loss, and new beginnings, Fly Away reminds us that where there is life, there is hope, and where there is love, there is forgiveness.

Review: This book is the sequel to Hannah's novel Firefly Lane which I read quite a few years ago.  While I'd say this one is a stand alone novel, it certainly helped to have read the first book (and would have helped more if I'd read it recently).  I remember loving Firefly Lane, and while I certainly enjoyed this book, I didn't think it was quite as good.

First, the story jumped around in time, since it is told primarily through characters reminiscing about their histories.  This was an effective way to tell a story from multiple points of view, although it took a while for me to get used to.  What threw me off is that occasionally, when the story came back to Tully's point of view, it would jump backwards in time and confuse me.

Second, there were an awful lot of serious issues covered in this book, and at times it felt too heavy.  All the main characters experienced tragedies and addictions, and I just wanted someone to have had SOMETHING happy happen to them.

But, like all of Kristin Hannah's novels, this book is so well-written and so readable that I couldn't put it down, and read the whole thing in two days.  It had me grabbing for the tissues and wishing it would keep going so that I could learn how everyone manages to put their lives back together.

Rating: 4.5 stars