Books Read in 2022
However, this is a nearly 300 page book about complaining, and it gets very tiresome. She skips over important parts of her life -- like a husband she eventually divorced, who is never mentioned...just that he fathered children. She has four kids and is constantly upset by her failings as a mother, yet she books the kids and herself into countless activities and spends all of her time driving them places and then complaining that she has no time for them. I had five kids in seven years and never had any of the stress she creates for herself. And I didn't have the paid help that she had either. She continues to list the books she is reading, without a single word about why, how they were, if they affected her...it's just a list of books. This was a very disappointing book. Memory Keeper of Kyiv by Eve
Litteken Chrissie (2004), who was never raised to learn Ukrainian, discovers her grandmother Bobby's journal, all written in Ukrainian. The grandmother refuses to speak of her past life when asked about it but encourages Chrissie to have her friend Kevin (who learned Ukrainian in school) to translate the journal for her. Even after it is translated, it is difficult for Bobby to speak of the terrible events which happened to her family. This is a must read for those who are following the tragedies in Ukraine today. Stay
Close by Harlan Coben Coben takes several people who don't appear to have anything in common and over the course of ~400 pages, shows how their lives interact and impact each other. Megan is a suburban housewife, happily married 17 years, with two kids, who is hiding a secret past from her husband. Ray was an award-winning documentary photographer who, for some reason, has fallen on hard times and is now working unhappily as a paparozzo. Jack is a detective who can't forget an unsolved case from many years ago. Three people living lives they never wanted, hiding secrets that even those closest to them would never suspect, will find that the past doesn’t recede. Even as the terrible consequences of long-ago events crash together in the present and threaten to ruin lives, they will come to the startling realization that they may not want to forget the past at all. There are so many characters in the book that it's difficult to keep them all straight, especially as they begin to be murdered but as with all Coben books, the deeper you get into it, the more of a page-turner it becomes. Make sure you stay away from Ken and Barbie. This is also a Netflix series. Where
the Crawdad Sings by Delia Owens Kya, her mother and her siblings live with an alcoholic, abusive father in the North Carolina marsh. Kya is the youngest and when she was 7, her mother couldn't take it any more and walked away, never to return. Shortly after, her older siblings also, one at a time, left the home, leaving the 7 year old alone with her father. Kya has to learn how to cook, how to take care of the house, how to shop, and how to take care of her father and ultimately they have a brief closeness, which doesn't last and eventually he, too, leaves. Much of the book talks about how she lives by herself...the "marsh people" are looked down on by the people of the nearby town. She went to school for one day but was so bullied and teased for being "the marsh girl" that she never went back and spent years hiding from the truant officer. Two men become part of her life, Tate, who teaches her to read and promises he will never leave her -- and then does. And Chase, who promises marriage, but is in reality engaged. When Chase is found dead, the death is ruled a murder (though there are no real clues as to why) and Kya is brought to a trial that is very reminiscent of "To Kill a Mockingbird" and is pretty silly, since the authorities have no clues at all why Kya would be the murderer, except that she's a Marsh Girl who is angry with Chase for getting married to someone else. The results of the trial and the ending of the story were no surprise, but it was a fun read that kept me up until nearly 2 a.m. finishing. Memory
of an Elephant by Alex Lasker The narration alternates between Ishi, telling his story of his life with the "two legged beasts" (humans) and then the stories of the various people who have an impact, positive and negative, on him and on his relatives and friends. In reading Ishi's narrative, the reader learns a lot about what it is like to be an elephant. The book is is tender, loving, heartbreaking, cruel and definitely gives one the feel for poaching. The story is much better than I expected it to be, and the final quarter is one of those "can't put it down" experiences. The
Last to Die by Tess Gerritsen This story involves three families who are massacred, each leaving one child living. The child is placed in foster care and each foster family is also massacred, again leaving the child untouched. As the massacres occur in vastly different parts of the world, nobody suspects a serial killer at large, but Rizzoli begins to see patterns, after she begins her investigation following the murder of the foster family of young Teddy Clock. The children are put in a very secure school in Maine, with high tech electronic security, hundreds of acres of forest, and seemingly impenetrable fortress, until suddenly it doesn't seem like it is. Strange things are happening. A teacher commits suicide. Scary signs appear in the woods. And at the same time, Rizzoli is beginning to uncover the thing that connected all three of the murdered families. The last quarter of the book will be impossible to put down, and the ending was a surprise I certainly didn't see coming. Funny
Farm by Laurie Zaleski Publishable
by Death by ACF Brookens Run
Away by Harlan Coben Rough
Draft by Katy Tur
But her father was also abusive, prone to flying into rages that sometimes resulted in punching holes in the walls, or beating his wife and daughter. When Katy was in her 30s, he called to tell her that he had decided to undergo surgery to become a woman and that the reason he was so violent was because he was not really a man. The story goes on to talk about her rise in television news reporting, and meeting her husband, Tony Dokoupil (co-anchor of CBS Mornings). The story of the birth of their first child was perhaps the most ugly birth story I've ever read, as well as her reaction to baby after birth. It seems that she can't have any pride in her many accomplishments, but always finds a way that there was something wrong, or not quite right -- obviously a result of her father telling her throughout her whole childhood that she was worthless (something I can relate to, though not on the same level). The timeline for this book goes up through January 6 and the events at the capitol.. This book is worth reading and I know you will never look at Katy Tur on television in the same way again. I have always found her an important reporter, and now feel more proud of her. You
What?!: Humorous Stories, Cautionary Tales, and Unexpected Insights
About A Career in Medicine Zero
day by David Baldacci Puller is sent to investigate an "unusual" murder -- a whole family slaughtered -- in a small W. Virginia, coal town. As bodies pile up, Puller begins to realize that the story behind the murders stretches way beyond the confines of this small town and may spell a catastrophe for the whole country. The federal government is intensely interested, but unwilling to commit any other personnel to help in the investigation and it is up to John to save the country. The
Rainbow Comes and Goes by Anderson Cooper and Gloria Vanderbilt Both were strongly affected by death. Gloria lost her father at age 9 and Anderson lost his father at age 10. They both lost Anderson's brother Carter, who committed suicide at age 23. The story of Gloria's childhood was completely unbelievable, with a mother who didn't like her and rarely even saw her, much less interacted with her. An ugly custody battle between Gloria's mother and her aunt, when Gloria was 10 was the defining moment in her life and throughout the book much of her memories deal with the hatred between her mother and her aunt. The book is a beautiful, loving celebration of the bond between mother and son. Their texts end shortly before Gloria's 92nd birthday and she mentions that she hopes some day Anderson will become a parent himself. Sadly, she did not live long enough to know that he actually did become a parent. His first child was born a year after his mother died, at age 95. Earth
Abides by George Stewart The book takes you from the first days, when Ish is in his 20s, to his death as an old man and all of the changes that happen to society when all the familiar things are no more (e.g., he has access to the UC Berkeley library, but he is the only one who knows how to read and the children aren't interested in learning). This is an interesting look at the start of civilizations and how they learn to live. There is also a lot about how the land itself changes as the years pass without human intervention. Makes one glad COVID-19 wasn't worse than it is. Kitchen Confidential by Anthony
Bourdain The
Secret Language of Dogs by Victoria Stilwell Rhino Dreams by Carolyn
Waggoner and Kathryn Williams The first part of this books reads like a study on African animals and their dangers from poachers, while the last part is more of a developing romance without much about animals. Still, the whole book was totally entertaining and I read it in one day. The
Match by Harlan Coben It is amazing the situations that his DNA match led him into and the dangerous situations he finds himself in. I won't even go into them because it's more fun reading about them. And, as with all of his books, Coben's finale was a surprise. I read this book in 24 hours and sat up until 5 a.m. finishing it because I couldn't put it down. Playing
with Myself by Randy Rainbow Rainbow's (yes, that's his real name) childhood reads like the script of a bad sitcom that nobody would believe, but with a mother (whom he adores) who brought him up on musicals, which kept him sane despite bullies in school and a not very nice father. It's fascinating to see how he uses the newly formed social media to create the person he will ultimately become, and how his early videos became so popular that they would have thousands of viewers in the first day (compared with millions with his later videos). His chapter about his cat is worth at least two if not more tissues. Learning about how the far right decided to take this Jewish gay man on as a homophobic anti-Semitic because of jokes he told at the start of his career, and how he dealt with that, thanks to advice from Carol Burnett is fascinating, if depressing. This is just a delightful book from start to
finish. The
Boy from the Woods by Harlan Coben In this story, teen age girl, Naomi, has gone
missing. She has been bullied by her fellow students and was unhappy
and withdrawn and nobody knows where she is. Her friend Matthew (who
is Wilde's godfather) asks Wilde if he will help find her. Her
divorced parents each claim that the other abused her. Wilde's search leads
in all sorts of directions, which are difficult to describe without giving
away the plot, but nobody in the story is who he or she claims to be, the
receipt of a finger, which has been amputated helps bring the story to a
conclusion and, as the fairy tales say, all live happily ever after.
Or almost all. The description of Wilde's house is amazing. And,
of course, this being Coben there is a surprise ending that nobody expects. The
Eye of the Elephant by Delia and Mark Owens Since 1973 between seventy-five thousand and
one hundred thousand elephants have been poached in the Luangwa Valley as a
whole; that's roughly one for every word in this book. Perhaps twenty
thousand to thirty thousand elephants are left in Luangwa....At this rate
they will all have perished in four to five years. While the book is fascinating, there is so much
driving and flying in life-threatening conditions that it seems to be at
least a quarter of the book. It makes you wonder whoever would want to
do such a thing. Also, there is no mention whatsoever of where their
funding is coming from. They are spending thousands on equipment and
supplies to natives but nothing about money. And they needed an
editor...at least one discussion of a meeting was duplicated and dumped in
the middle of a chapter on something else, with the chapter resuming at the
end of the meeting. In spite of that, however, this is a shocking
look at what is happening to elephants by poachers and the work the Owens
were doing in the 1980s to get the sale of ivory and other elephant parts
banned. Thankfully, in 2020 poaching is less, but still there are some
10,000 to 15,000 elephants killed each year. How
to Forget: A Daughter's Memoir, by Kate Mulgrew Uncommon
Reader by Alan Bennett The
Crow Trap by Ann Cleeves I also hated the description of Vera, who seems
so completely ugly and unlikeable (including brown teeth!) that she had no
resemblance to Brenda Blethyn, who plays her in the TV show. Blethyn's
Vera is older, overweight, unconcerned with her appearance, and has poor
eating habits, like in the book, but she is at least more likeable. Despite all that, the basic story was engaging
and I will probably read another Vera book, since the early books are free
for my Kindle on Amazon! Last
Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo I gave up reading this halfway through. I
felt that the author was eventually going to take the heroine into her
adulthood and deal with the problems she had there, but I got very tired of
reading about her high school days and her confusion. The book got all
sorts of good reviews, so maybe it gets better, but it read like kiddie lit
to me and I just couldn't get into it. State
of Terror by Louise Penny and Hillary Clinton Given the situation in Ukraine at the moment,
this quote by Einstein, found in the book, is appropriate both to today's
political situation and the plot of this book:
I know not with what weapons World War III will
be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones. Buses in France, Germany and
London are blown up and investigation into the bombings leads to a major
plot to destroy a good portion of the world with nuclear bombs. The US
Secretary of State sets out to investigate. Clinton's knowledge of
what a Secretary of State goes through, how she thinks, how she interacts
with leaders of other countries, and even her personal appearance etc. is
fascinating. Penny creates believable characters, and Clinton's
feelings for Trump, barely disguised as an ex-president character, are very
clear. In fact, the part about meeting with him and how his
personality affected her explained a lot about how he has remained in power. This kept me reading far into the night,
especially the last 2/3 of the book, where things get more and more
dangerous for several groups of people. My problem with it was timing.
the Secretary of State flies from one country to another in such a short
period of time I wondered if the Concord was still running. When you
think of having to get to a plane, fly somewhere, then get to the head of
the country's president's residence, having important meetings, being
interrupted by more dangerous information, then having to fly somewhere
else...well, it just doesn't make sense, time-wise, though definitely a
gripping story. The finale, with minute by minute counted down
went on forever and just seemed to be too unbelievable...and hard to realize
who was the good guy and who was the bad guy. But the negatives don't diminish the enjoyment
of the book overall. Five stars. The
Friendship Quilts by June Calender She learns of Geneva Gardner, a lifelong friend
of her great aunt, in the tiny town of Friendship, Indiana. Geneva
makes quilts for the needy and most people find them ugly, but give her
fabric to create quilts. Her goal is to make 100 quilts to send to
Africa for a missionary there. Liz calls the quilts "outsider art" and
thinks of 86 year old Geneva as a fabric Grandma Moses. The book is mostly her many interviews with
Geneva, and their growing friendship. There are also people who help
her (like Jake, an amateur photographer, and Sam a professional
photographer, both of whom become physically involved with Liz). The simple
"write a thesis" project turns into making the photos into a coffee table
book, a TV drama about Geneva, and a display in some museum. I learned
a lot about quilting, but was sad to learn that there is no photograph on
line of something like Geneva's "ugly quilts," which makes them difficult to
imagine, though I did get some idea by Googling "Outsider art, quilts." One of the books that kept me reading late into
the night toward the end and involved several kleenex tissues. Dear
Bob and Sue by Matt and Karen Smith This was a surprisingly delightful book!
The Smiths decided to quit their jobs and visit all 59 national parks in the
country. The title of the book comes because presumably they wrote
text messages back to their friends, who decided not to join them on their
quest. This is a sort of travel book, but not really. It's
like the letters I would write to my friend Char if I were visiting a
national park, talking about the park, the animals, the people, and the
experiences. Their own description reads, "“If
you’re looking for a guide to the National Parks, this isn’t one. If you
like long eloquent descriptions of mountains and rivers and rainbows, you
won’t find them in this book. If you want to read about a couple
accomplishing an incredible feat against all odds, look elsewhere. This is
our day-by-day account of our travels together to some of the most stunning
places in America.” Though I enjoy the relationship of this
many-years married couple, these are not people I would ever feel comfortable with,
their primary activity being hiking (just a few miles a day....like 11
miles, 7 miles, etc.) Since I can't make it from our front door to the
sidewalk, "hiking" is not something that appeals to me, but they have seen
incredible sights. And the nice thing is that you can Google anything
that seems extraordinarily interesting. They seem to eat peanut butter and jelly
sandwiches for lunch every day and more often than any other dinner, eat
pizza all over the country. But their stories and their experiences
(especially with animals...in the Katmai National Park in Alaska, they saw about 100 bears in a
day!) are just fascinating. Read about their mid-air plane collision in
Alaska and the hotel room Matt wouldn't stay in because it "smelled of BO."
Highly recommended. Tell
No One by Harlan Coben I should know better than to pick up a Harlen
Coben book at 11 p.m. just to read the first chapter and see if I wanted to
continue. Several hours later, I forced myself to put it down so I
could try to sleep, but I picked it up again in the morning and pretty much
did nothing all day but finish the book. Eight years after the murder of his wife, Dr.
David Beck is still mourning her loss and reliving that horrible night when
she was taken from him and he nearly died in an attack. Then he gets
an anonymous e-mail containing a cryptic message, a phrase only he and his
wife know and a caution to tell no one. Can it be possible she is
still alive? Despite being identified in the morgue by her father and
her accused killer on death row for killing her and 15 other women? As Beck begins to relive and re-open the
information about her case, bodies start falling as one person after another
who helps him is killed. The closer Beck gets to the truth, the more
he is pursued. As with all Coben books, things are never what they
seem and the twists and turns are dizzying, but you won't be able to put it
down. Autopsy
by Patricia Cornwell I had been a big fan of Patricia Cornwell for
many years until 2003 when I hated her latest book. I hated what she
did to my favorite characters (Marino and her niece Lucy). I read her
next book and hated that too, so I have not read any Cornwell books in a
long time. But I won this in a GoodReads drawing and I finished it, so
happy to see that the "old" Patricia Cornwell is back, the Marino and Lucy
that I loved are back and I look forward to her next book! Medical examiner Kay Scarpetta has left
Massachusetts with husband Benton Wesley and has returned to Virginia to
take back the job of chief medical examiner, which she held for several
years. She has replaced an inept examiner, who was loved by the staff,
all of whom hate the new chief. She’s inherited not only an
overbearing secretary, but also a legacy of neglect and potential
corruption. Most of the story deals with investigating two
grisly murders, plus who poisoned the special wine she was going to serve to
her guests, At the same time, a catastrophe occurs in a top-secret
laboratory in outer space, endangering at least two scientists aboard, which
she has been called by the President to investigate. All in 408 pages.
It's so good to discover that the Cornwell I loved for so long is back and I
can't wait for her next book. As an aside, there is a brief bit, near the end
of the book, where she and Marino are flying in a helicopter over Washington
,D.C. and remarking on the changes in five years (the book was written after
the Jan. 6 riot) -- the businesses that are closed, the graffiti
everywhere, signs of civil unrest, and they say it is not the beautiful city
they remember. That made me very sad. I have loved Washington,
D.C. Hiding
in Plain Sight by Michael Starr I was a big fan of Perry Mason and
Ironside and I stumbled across something the other day about Raymond
Burr that made me want to read this book. I'd give it 2 out of 5
stars. While the facts are interesting, the writing is not, especially
in the beginning. Amazing at
how kind of boring it is. Boring because he did so much in his early acting
years that I'd never heard of. Made dozens of film noir movies that I've
never heard of, starring movie stars I've never heard of. Not only that, but the
author of the book tells the story of each movie in great detail,
even if Burr only had a small role in it, as he did in most of his early
movies. Perhaps the biggest role he had was in Rear Window, which I
know well. He has no lines and is only seen from his apartment window
throughout the movie, until the end, but the author of the book gives the
entire plot of the movie, including what all the other people in other
apartments are doing. It's like the author is trying to make more
pages in the book Things get more interesting when
he gets cast as Perry Mason and the story behind that and Ironside is
interesting. What is interesting about this man is how he fabricated
his history to include 3 wives and one son. One wife divorced him
after a few months, the other two wives and the son, all of whom died, never
existed. The military history he tells, including receiving a purple heart,
never happened, but people believed it so much that these appeared in some
of his obituaries. Throughout his life he refused to discuss personal
matters and it was not until he died that I found out that he was gay and
had been living with his partner for 33 years. He was a strange man who had an
amazing work ethic and even worked on his last movie while he was dying of
cancer, without telling anyone he was sick and in excruciating pain.
He had a terrible weight problem his whole life and at one point weighed 380
lbs. He could be ridiculously generous, but he also had a terrible
temper. I don't think I would have liked him if I ever met him. West
with Giraffes by Lynda Rutledge Seventeen year old Woody
manages to get a job driving the truck with the giraffes, though he has
no driver's license and no experience, but lies well. He's an
orphan whose mother, sister and father have all died in the dust storm
that ravaged Texas and all he wants to do is to get to "Californy." He falls in love with the two giraffes, Boy and
Girl, and tries to impress The Old Man, who works for the San Diego Zoo, as
well as a red haired woman who follows the truck, taking pictures, which she
says are for Life magazine. The experiences of bad roads, perilous
detours, bad weather,
bad people, unexpected kindness, attempted giraffe napping, and all sorts of adventures is a page turner and it explores
what it means to be changed by the grace of animals, the kindness of
strangers, the passing of time, and a story told before it’s too late. Chaos
by Patricia Cornwell Almost the entire first half of the book is a
conversation between Scarpetta and Marino as they approach the scene of a
dead woman, found in a park. That did drag a bit, but the second half
was an in depth look at every possible thing you can do during an autopsy
and the thing I needed to read before starting "Autopsy" turns out not to be
important since the villain will not be in that book. Anyway, it's back to the Cornwell I have
enjoyed for so many years and that's nice. Now to read "Autopsy." Matchless
Gene Rayburn by Adam Nedeff That said, however, the story of Gene Rayburn's
success, the dozens of quiz shows and stage shows he was involved with, and
the problems he had with Mark Goodson, who produced the show--and hated
it--was fascinating. Problems with various celebrities were
interesting, particularly Richard Dawson, who tried to get out of his
contract when he was hired to do Family Feud and could not, so never
participated in the camaraderie of the panel after that. Very sad to
read that Rayburn died of dementia. Juice
and Crackers by Charlotte Blackford Go
Tell the Bees that I Am Gone by Diana Gabaldon I also consider myself to have a pretty
extensive vocabulary, but Gabaldon seems to choose unusually complex words.
Some examples: stramash (a disturbance), rannygazoo (nonsense),
absquatulate (leave abruptly), stertorous (labored breathing), and many
more. This is written like a number of short(er)
stories, with characters going off on their own. Not enough Jamie and
Claire, who are the reason I read these books. I don't need to have
them having sex all the time, but I miss just their relationship as they
grow older. In the middle of one of the stories, I was
interested, but there were too many places where things were happening that
were just downright boring. My big fear now is that, at 79, I am afraid
that it takes Gabaldon so long to write a book that I won't live long enough
to find out what happens to everyone at the end of the saga. |
Bookends
by Zibby Owens
Photo
is of Lucy the elephant, who plays an important role in the story.
She had perhaps the oddest childhood anyone could have,
the child of the couple who first started helicopter coverage for the
news (Zoey [formerly Bob] Tur, and Marika Gerrard). Her parents
were famous, covering such things as the OJ Simpson chase, Madonna's
wedding, and other major stories. Katy herself watched these events
from the helicopter from age 2 on and learned
how to announce a new story when the phone rang. 
The fact that I sat up until 3 a.m.
finishing this book should explain how I felt about it. The book
is based on a true story of 2 giraffes who survived a hurricane while
crossing the Atlantic and were transported by truck in twelve days
from New York to the San Diego Zoo in 1938. The story is written
by Woodrow Wilson Nickel, 105 years old, writing for the daughter
of a woman who was part of the adventure.