Ella's bookshelf: all en-US Mon, 03 Feb 2025 19:17:36 -0800 60 Ella's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg The Order of Time 48637390 A concise exploration of time from the bestselling author of Seven Brief Lessons on Physics.

Why do we remember the past and not the future? What does it mean for time to "flow"? Do we exist in time or does time exist in us? In lyric, accessible prose, Carlo Rovelli invites us to consider questions about the nature of time that continue to puzzle physicists and philosophers alike. He tears down our assumptions about time one by one, revealing a strange universe where at the most fundamental level time disappears. He explains how the theory of quantum gravity attempts to understand and give meaning to the resulting extreme landscape of this timeless world. Weaving together ideas from philosophy, science, and literature, Rovelli suggests that our perception of the flow of time depends on our perspective, better understood starting from the structure of our brain and emotions than from the physical universe.

Written with poetic vitality, The Order of Time offers a profoundly intelligent, culturally rich, novel appreciation of the mysteries of time.

]]> 212 Carlo Rovelli 0735216118 Ella 4 4.20 2017 The Order of Time
author: Carlo Rovelli
name: Ella
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/03
date added: 2025/02/03
shelves:
review:

]]> The Speed of Dark 1140949 With a new introduction by the author

In the near future, disease will be a condition of the past. Most genetic defects will be removed at birth; the remaining during infancy. Lou Arrendale, a high-functioning autistic adult, is a member of the lost generation, born at the wrong time to reap the rewards of medical science. He lives a low-key, independent life. But then he is offered a chance to try a brand-new experimental “cure� for his condition. With this treatment Lou would think and act and be just like everyone else. But if he was suddenly free of autism, would he still be himself? Would he still love the same classical music—with its complications and resolutions? Would he still see the same colors and patterns in the world—shades and hues that others cannot see? Most important, would he still love Marjory, a woman who may never be able to reciprocate his feelings? Now Lou must decide if he should submit to a surgery that might completely change the way he views the world... and the very essence of who he is.

Thoughtful, provocative, poignant, unforgettable, The Speed of Dark is a gripping journey into the mind of an autistic person as he struggles with profound questions of humanity and matters of the heart.]]> 376 Elizabeth Moon 0345447549 Ella 1 abandoned 3.89 2002 The Speed of Dark
author: Elizabeth Moon
name: Ella
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2002
rating: 1
read at:
date added: 2025/02/03
shelves: abandoned
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet]]> 55145261 A deeply moving and mind-expanding collection of personal essays in the first ever work of non-fiction from #1 internationally bestselling author John Green

The Anthropocene is the current geological age, in which human activity has profoundly shaped the planet and its biodiversity. In this remarkable symphony of essays adapted and expanded from his ground-breaking, critically acclaimed podcast, John Green reviews different facets of the human-centered planet - from the QWERTY keyboard and Halley's Comet to Penguins of Madagascar - on a five-star scale.

Complex and rich with detail, the Anthropocene's reviews have been praised as 'observations that double as exercises in memoiristic empathy', with over 10 million lifetime downloads. John Green's gift for storytelling shines throughout this artfully curated collection about the shared human experience; it includes beloved essays along with six all-new pieces exclusive to the book.]]> 304 John Green 0525555218 Ella 5 4.37 2021 The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet
author: John Green
name: Ella
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2024/12/27
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men]]> 41104077
Celebrated feminist advocate Caroline Criado Perez investigates the shocking root cause of gender inequality and research in Invisible Women�, diving into women’s lives at home, the workplace, the public square, the doctor’s office, and more. Built on hundreds of studies in the US, the UK, and around the world, and written with energy, wit, and sparkling intelligence, this is a groundbreaking, unforgettable exposé that will change the way you look at the world.]]> 448 Caroline Criado Pérez 1419729071 Ella 0 to-read 4.35 2019 Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men
author: Caroline Criado PĂ©rez
name: Ella
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Humans 18919445
He is disgusted by the way humans look, what they eat, their capacity for murder and war, and is equally baffled by the concepts of love and family. But as time goes on, he starts to realize there may be more to this strange species than he had thought. Disguised as Martin, he drinks wine, reads poetry, develops an ear for rock music, and a taste for peanut butter. Slowly, unexpectedly, he forges bonds with Martin’s family. He begins to see hope and beauty in the humans� imperfection, and begins to question the very mission that brought him there.

Praised by The New York Times as a “novelist of great seriousness and talent,� author Matt Haig delivers an unlikely story about human nature and the joy found in the messiness of life on Earth. The Humans is a funny, compulsively readable tale that playfully and movingly explores the ultimate subject—ourselves.]]> 304 Matt Haig Ella 4 4.25 2013 The Humans
author: Matt Haig
name: Ella
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at: 2024/12/02
date added: 2024/12/02
shelves:
review:

]]> The Diamond Eye 58490567 The New York Times bestselling author of The Rose Code returns with an unforgettable World War II tale of a quiet bookworm who becomes history's deadliest female sniper. Based on a true story.

In 1937 in the snowbound city of Kyiv, wry and bookish history student Mila Pavlichenko organizes her life around her library job and her young son--but Hitler's invasion of Ukraine and Russia sends her on a different path. Given a rifle and sent to join the fight, Mila must forge herself from studious girl to deadly sniper--a lethal hunter of Nazis known as Lady Death. When news of her three hundredth kill makes her a national heroine, Mila finds herself torn from the bloody battlefields of the eastern front and sent to America on a goodwill tour.

Still reeling from war wounds and devastated by loss, Mila finds herself isolated and lonely in the glittering world of Washington, DC--until an unexpected friendship with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and an even more unexpected connection with a silent fellow sniper offer the possibility of happiness. But when an old enemy from Mila's past joins forces with a deadly new foe lurking in the shadows, Lady Death finds herself battling her own demons and enemy bullets in the deadliest duel of her life.

Based on a true story, The Diamond Eye is a haunting novel of heroism born of desperation, of a mother who became a soldier, of a woman who found her place in the world and changed the course of history forever.]]> 435 Kate Quinn 0062943510 Ella 0 to-read 4.26 2022 The Diamond Eye
author: Kate Quinn
name: Ella
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/11/24
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Briar Club 181110045 A haunting and powerful story of female friendships and secrets in a Washington, D.C. boardinghouse during the McCarthy era.

Washington, D.C., 1950. Everyone keeps to themselves at Briarwood House, a down-at-the-heels all-female boardinghouse in the heart of the nation’s capital, where secrets hide behind white picket fences. But when the lovely, mysterious widow Grace March moves into the attic, she draws her oddball collection of neighbors into unlikely friendship: poised English beauty Fliss whose facade of perfect wife and mother covers gaping inner wounds; police officer’s daughter Nora, who is entangled with a shadowy gangster; frustrated baseball star Bea, whose career has ended along with the women’s baseball league of WWII; and poisonous, gung-ho Arlene, who has thrown herself into McCarthy’s Red Scare.

Grace’s weekly attic-room dinner parties and window-brewed sun tea become a healing balm on all their lives, but she hides a terrible secret of her own. When a shocking act of violence tears apart the house, the Briar Club women must decide once and for all: Who is the true enemy in their midst?]]> 432 Kate Quinn 0063244748 Ella 0 to-read 4.26 2024 The Briar Club
author: Kate Quinn
name: Ella
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/08/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Rose Code 53914938 The New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of The Huntress and The Alice Network returns with another heart-stopping World War II story of three female code breakers at Bletchley Park and the spy they must root out after the war is over.

1940. As England prepares to fight the Nazis, three very different women answer the call to mysterious country estate Bletchley Park, where the best minds in Britain train to break German military codes. Vivacious debutante Osla is the girl who has everything—beauty, wealth, and the dashing Prince Philip of Greece sending her roses—but she burns to prove herself as more than a society girl, and puts her fluent German to use as a translator of decoded enemy secrets. Imperious self-made Mab, product of East-End London poverty, works the legendary code-breaking machines as she conceals old wounds and looks for a socially advantageous husband. Both Osla and Mab are quick to see the potential in local village spinster Beth, whose shyness conceals a brilliant facility with puzzles, and soon Beth spreads her wings as one of the Park’s few female cryptanalysts. But war, loss, and the impossible pressure of secrecy will tear the three apart.

1947. As the royal wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip whips post-war Britain into a fever, three friends-turned-enemies are reunited by a mysterious encrypted letter—the key to which lies buried in the long-ago betrayal that destroyed their friendship and left one of them confined to an asylum. A mysterious traitor has emerged from the shadows of their Bletchley Park past, and now Osla, Mab, and Beth must resurrect their old alliance and crack one last code together. But each petal they remove from the rose code brings danger—and their true enemy...]]> 624 Kate Quinn 0062943472 Ella 5 4.42 2021 The Rose Code
author: Kate Quinn
name: Ella
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at: 2024/08/11
date added: 2024/08/11
shelves:
review:
Not exaggerating, it took me 6 months to read the first half, a day to read the second half. Would recommend for sure
]]> Pride and Prejudice 110810 Pride and Prejudice, one of the world's most popular novels. Pride and Prejudice—Austen's own "darling child"—tells the story of fiercely independent Elizabeth Bennet, one of five sisters who must marry rich, as she confounds the arrogant, wealthy Mr. Darcy. What ensues is one of the most delightful and engrossingly readable courtships known to literature, written by a precocious Austen when she was just twenty-one years old.

Humorous and profound, and filled with highly entertaining dialogue, this witty comedy of manners dips and turns through drawing-rooms and plots to reach an immensely satisfying finale. In the words of Eudora Welty, Pride and Prejudice is as "irresistible and as nearly flawless as any fiction could be."]]> 392 Jane Austen 1593082010 Ella 4 4.37 1813 Pride and Prejudice
author: Jane Austen
name: Ella
average rating: 4.37
book published: 1813
rating: 4
read at: 2024/04/26
date added: 2024/04/26
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Bravest Voices: A Memoir of Two Sisters' Heroism During the Nazi Era]]> 53238738
Ida and Louise Cook are two ordinary Englishwomen, seemingly destined never to stray from their quiet London suburb and comfortable jobs—Ida as a budding romance novelist and Louise as a civil service typist. But in 1923, a chance hearing of an aria from Madame Butterfly sparked a passion for opera in the sisters that led to the formation of friendships with some of Europe’s leading singers and their network, many of them Jewish. As the Nazis rose to power, Ida and Louise began working with the opera world’s insiders to save members of the community from persecution and death. Through ingenuity, thrift and bottomless goodwill, the sisters eluded the suspicion of the Nazis and helped secure safe passage for dozens of refugees. No one would have predicted such daring lives for Ida and Louise Cook—but that underestimation is exactly how they were able to save lives.

First published in 1950, Ida’s memoir of the adventures she and Louise shared remains as fresh, vital and entertaining as the woman who wrote it, and is a moving testament to the extraordinary acts of courage by two everyday heroes.]]> 288 Ida Cook 0778388093 Ella 0 to-read 3.53 1950 The Bravest Voices: A Memoir of Two Sisters' Heroism During the Nazi Era
author: Ida Cook
name: Ella
average rating: 3.53
book published: 1950
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/04/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Hamlet 23271929 Hamlet is Shakespeare’s most popular, and most puzzling, play. It follows the form of a “revenge tragedy,� in which the hero, Hamlet, seeks vengeance against his father’s murderer, his uncle Claudius, now the king of Denmark. Much of its fascination, however, lies in its uncertainties.

Among them: What is the Ghost—Hamlet’s father demanding justice, a tempting demon, an angelic messenger? Does Hamlet go mad, or merely pretend to? Once he is sure that Claudius is a murderer, why does he not act? Was his mother, Gertrude, unfaithful to her husband or complicit in his murder?]]> 374 William Shakespeare 074347712X Ella 4 4.02 1601 Hamlet
author: William Shakespeare
name: Ella
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1601
rating: 4
read at: 2024/03/01
date added: 2024/03/01
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World]]> 60310687 The international bestselling novel, sold in 21 countries, about grief, mourning, and the joy of survival, inspired by a real phone booth in Japan with its disconnected “wind� phone, a place of pilgrimage and solace since the 2011 tsunami—now in paperbackWhen Yui loses both her mother and her daughter in the tsunami, she begins to mark the passage of time from that date onward: Everything is relative to March 11, 2011, the day the tsunami tore Japan apart, and when grief took hold of her life. Yui struggles to continue on, alone with her pain.
Ěý ĚýĚý
Then, one day she hears about a man who has an old disused telephone booth in his garden. There, those who have lost loved ones find the strength to speak to them and begin to come to terms with their grief. As news of the phone booth spreads, people travel to it from miles around.

Soon Yui makes her own pilgrimage to the phone booth, too. But once there she cannot bring herself to speak into the receiver. Instead she finds Takeshi, a bereaved husband whose own daughter has stopped talking in the wake of her mother’s death.
Ěý Ěý
Simultaneously heartbreaking and heartwarming, The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World is the signpost pointing to the healing that can come after.]]> 416 Laura Imai Messina 1419754319 Ella 0 to-read 3.99 2020 The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World
author: Laura Imai Messina
name: Ella
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/01/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> A Thousand Splendid Suns 3850639
With the passing of time comes Taliban rule over Afghanistan, the streets of Kabul loud with the sound of gunfire and bombs, life a desperate struggle against starvation, brutality and fear, the women's endurance tested beyond their worst imaginings. Yet love can move people to act in unexpected ways, lead them to overcome the most daunting obstacles with a startling heroism. In the end it is love that triumphs over death and destruction.

A Thousand Splendid Suns is a portrait of a wounded country and a story of family and friendship, of an unforgiving time, an unlikely bond, and an indestructible love.]]> 415 Khaled Hosseini 159448385X Ella 0 to-read 4.47 2007 A Thousand Splendid Suns
author: Khaled Hosseini
name: Ella
average rating: 4.47
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/01/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 1984 54972236 Nineteen Eighty-Four is a rare work that grows more haunting as its futuristic purgatory becomes more real. Published in 1949, the book offers political satirist George Orwell's nightmare vision of a totalitarian, bureaucratic world and one poor stiff's attempt to find individuality. The brilliance of the novel is Orwell's prescience of modern life--the ubiquity of television, the distortion of the language--and his ability to construct such a thorough version of hell. Required reading for students since it was published, it ranks among the most terrifying novels ever written.]]> 328 George Orwell Ella 3 4.14 1949 1984
author: George Orwell
name: Ella
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1949
rating: 3
read at: 2024/01/02
date added: 2024/01/02
shelves:
review:

]]> Lady Tan’s Circle of Women 62919732
According to Confucius, “an educated woman is a worthless woman,� but Tan Yunxian—born into an elite family, yet haunted by death, separations, and loneliness—is being raised by her grandparents to be of use. Her grandmother is one of only a handful of female doctors in China, and she teaches Yunxian the pillars of Chinese medicine, the Four Examinations—looking, listening, touching, and asking—something a man can never do with a female patient.

From a young age, Yunxian learns about women’s illnesses, many of which relate to childbearing, alongside a young midwife-in-training, Meiling. The two girls find fast friendship and a mutual purpose—despite the prohibition that a doctor should never touch blood while a midwife comes in frequent contact with it—and they vow to be forever friends, sharing in each other’s joys and struggles. No mud, no lotus , they tell from adversity beauty can bloom.

But when Yunxian is sent into an arranged marriage, her mother-in-law forbids her from seeing Meiling and from helping the women and girls in the household. Yunxian is to act like a proper wife—embroider bound-foot slippers, recite poetry, give birth to sons, and stay forever within the walls of the family compound, the Garden of Fragrant Delights.

How might a woman like Yunxian break free of these traditions and lead a life of such importance that many of her remedies are still used five centuries later? How might the power of friendship support or complicate these efforts? A captivating story of women helping each other, Lady Tan’s Circle of Women is a triumphant reimagining of the life of one person who was remarkable in the Ming dynasty and would be considered remarkable today.]]> 352 Lisa See 1982117087 Ella 0 to-read 4.31 2023 Lady Tan’s Circle of Women
author: Lisa See
name: Ella
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/12/25
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Looking for Jane 61273371
1971: As a teenager, Dr. Evelyn Taylor was sent to a home for “fallen� women where she was forced to give up her baby for adoption—a trauma she has never recovered from. Despite the constant threat of arrest, she joins the Jane Network as an abortion provider, determined to give other women the choice she never had.

1980: After discovering a shocking secret about her family, twenty-year-old Nancy Mitchell begins to question everything she has ever known. When she unexpectedly becomes pregnant, she feels like she has no one to turn to for help. Grappling with her decision, she locates “Jane� and finds a place of her own alongside Dr. Taylor within the network’s ranks, but she can never escape the lies that haunt her.]]> 400 Heather Marshall 1668013681 Ella 0 to-read 4.33 2022 Looking for Jane
author: Heather Marshall
name: Ella
average rating: 4.33
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/12/25
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Light Between Oceans 15015259 345 M.L. Stedman 1451681755 Ella 5 4.03 2012 The Light Between Oceans
author: M.L. Stedman
name: Ella
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2012
rating: 5
read at: 2023/12/19
date added: 2023/12/19
shelves:
review:
Holy crap, this book was amazing. So emotional, so sad, so worth the tissues used. The emotional depth of the writing is amazing, it took me so long to read because the weight of the grief you can feel in the pages was overwhelming at times. Like I told the concerned flight attendant who asked if I was alright as I cried over this book, I can’t recommend it enough.
]]> The Great Gatsby 396103 180 F. Scott Fitzgerald 1417656638 Ella 3 3.84 1925 The Great Gatsby
author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
name: Ella
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1925
rating: 3
read at: 2023/11/27
date added: 2023/11/27
shelves:
review:

]]> A Flicker in the Dark 59808291
Now twenty years later, Chloe is a psychologist in Baton Rouge and getting ready for her wedding. While she finally has a fragile grasp on the happiness she’s worked so hard to achieve, she sometimes feels as out of control of her own life as the troubled teens who are her patients. So when a local teenage girl goes missing, and then another, that terrifying summer comes crashing back. Is she paranoid, seeing parallels from her past that aren't actually there, or for the second time in her life, is Chloe about to unmask a killer?

From debut author Stacy Willingham comes a masterfully done, lyrical thriller, certain to be the launch of an amazing career. A Flicker in the Dark is eerily compelling to the very last page.]]> 384 Stacy Willingham 1250803845 Ella 5 3.99 2022 A Flicker in the Dark
author: Stacy Willingham
name: Ella
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2022
rating: 5
read at: 2023/11/18
date added: 2023/11/18
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Six: The Untold Story of America's First Women Astronauts]]> 101160753
When NASA sent astronauts to the moon in the 1960s and 1970s the agency excluded women from the corps, arguing that only military test pilots—a group then made up exclusively of men—had the right stuff. It was an era in which women were steered away from jobs in science and deemed unqualified for space flight. Eventually, though, NASA recognized its blunder and opened the application process to a wider array of hopefuls, regardless of race or gender. From a candidate pool of 8,000 six elite women were selected in 1978—Sally Ride, Judy Resnik, Anna Fisher, Kathy Sullivan, Shannon Lucid, and Rhea Seddon.

In The Six , acclaimed journalist Loren Grush shows these brilliant and courageous women enduring claustrophobic—and sometimes deeply sexist—media attention, undergoing rigorous survival training, and preparing for years to take multi-million-dollar payloads into orbit. Together, the Six helped build the tools that made the space program run. One of the group, Judy Resnik, sacrificed her life when the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded at 46,000 feet. Everyone knows of Sally Ride’s history-making first space ride, but each of the Six would make their mark.]]> 432 Loren Grush 1982172800 Ella 0 to-read 4.32 2023 The Six: The Untold Story of America's First Women Astronauts
author: Loren Grush
name: Ella
average rating: 4.32
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/11/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement]]> 52007534 The instant New York Times bestseller

"An instant classic of investigative journalism...'All the President's Men' for the Me Too era." -- Carlos Lozada, The Washington Post

From Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, the untold story of their investigation of Harvey Weinstein and its consequences for the #MeToo movement

For years, reporters had tried to get to the truth about Harvey Weinstein's treatment of women. Rumors of wrongdoing had long circulated, and in 2017, when Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey began their investigation for the New York Times, his name was still synonymous with power. But during months of confidential interviews with actresses, former Weinstein employees, and other sources, many disturbing and long-buried allegations were unearthed, and a web of onerous secret payouts and nondisclosure agreements was revealed. When Kantor and Twohey were finally able to convince sources to go on the record, a dramatic final showdown between Weinstein and the New York Times was set in motion.

In the tradition of great investigative journalism, She Said tells a thrilling story about the power of truth and reveals the inspiring and affecting journeys of the women who spoke up--for the sake of other women, for future generations, and for themselves.]]> 320 Jodi Kantor 052556036X Ella 0 to-read 4.37 2019 She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement
author: Jodi Kantor
name: Ella
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/11/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Family Lore 62949033 From bestselling, National Book Award-winning author Elizabeth Acevedo comes her first novel for adults, the story of one Dominican-American family told through the voices of its women as they await a gathering that will forever change their lives.

Flor has a gift: she can predict, to the day, when someone will die. So when she decides she wants a living wake--a party to bring her family and community together to celebrate the long life she's led--her sisters are surprised. Has Flor forseen her own death, or someone else's? Does she have other motives? She refuses to tell her sisters, Matilde, Pastora, and Camila.

But Flor isn't the only person with secrets. Matilde has tried for decades to cover the extent of her husband's infidelity, but she must now confront the true state of her marriage. Pastora is typically the most reserved sister, but Flor's wake motivates this driven woman to solve her sibling's problems. Camila is the youngest sibling, and often the forgotten one, but she's decided she no longer wants to be taken for granted.

And the next generation, cousins Ona and Yadi, face tumult of their own: Yadi is reuniting with her first love, who was imprisoned when they were both still kids; Ona is married for years and attempting to conceive. Ona must decide whether it's worth it to keep trying--to have a child, and the anthropology research that's begun to feel lackluster.

Spanning the three days prior to the wake, Family Lore traces the lives of each of the Marte women, weaving together past and present, Santo Domingo and New York City. Told with Elizabeth Acevedo's inimitable and incandescent voice, this is an indelible portrait of sisters and cousins, aunts and nieces--one family's journey through their history, helping them better navigate all that is to come.]]> 371 Elizabeth Acevedo Ella 0 to-read 3.51 2023 Family Lore
author: Elizabeth Acevedo
name: Ella
average rating: 3.51
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/11/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Kite Runner 17165596 The Kite Runner is a beautifully crafted novel set in a country that is in the process of being destroyed. It is about the power of reading, the price of betrayal, and the possibility of redemption; and an exploration of the power of fathers over sons—their love, their sacrifices, their lies.

A sweeping story of family, love, and friendship told against the devastating backdrop of the history of Afghanistan over the last thirty years, The Kite Runner is an unusual and powerful novel that has become a beloved, one-of-a-kind classic.

The 10th anniversary edition of the New York Times bestseller and international classic loved by millions of readers.

]]> 371 Khaled Hosseini Ella 5 4.47 2003 The Kite Runner
author: Khaled Hosseini
name: Ella
average rating: 4.47
book published: 2003
rating: 5
read at: 2023/10/16
date added: 2023/10/17
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Woman They Could Not Silence: The Shocking Story of a Woman Who Dared to Fight Back]]> 58443628 537 Kate Moore 1728242576 Ella 5 4.35 2021 The Woman They Could Not Silence: The Shocking Story of a Woman Who Dared to Fight Back
author: Kate Moore
name: Ella
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at: 2023/09/11
date added: 2023/09/11
shelves:
review:
This book agitated me every time I read it- not because the book was bad but contrarily because of how amazing it was. The injustices this woman faced and overcame made my jaw drop constantly and blew me away over and over again. The story is phenomenal, and the writing is absolutely incredible, never have I read a historical book that read so much like a novel, I couldn’t put it down. I will forever read anything and everything Kate Moore writes, the attention to detail and execution of this story makes it 1000 times better, I couldn’t imagine a better teller of Elizabeth Packard’s story. I would recommend this book to anyone and everyone
]]> The Running Dream 8354134 An award-winning and inspiring novel.Ěý When Jessica's dreams are shattered, she puts herself back together—and learns to dream bigger than ever before.

Jessica thinks her life is over when she loses a leg in a car accident. She's not comforted by the news that she'll be able to walk with the help of a prosthetic leg. Who cares about walking when you live to run?

As she struggles to cope with crutches and a first cyborg-like prosthetic, Jessica feels oddly both in the spotlight and invisible. People who don't know what to say, act like she's not there. Which she could handle better if she weren't now keenly aware that she'd done the same thing herself to a girl with CP named Rosa. A girl who is going to tutor her through all the math she's missed. A girl who sees right into the heart of her.

With the support of family, friends, a coach, and her track teammates, Jessica may actually be able to run again. But that's not enough for her now. She doesn't just want to cross finish lines herself—she wants to take Rosa with her.

Winner of the Schneider Family Book Award]]> 339 Wendelin Van Draanen 0375866671 Ella 5 4.29 2011 The Running Dream
author: Wendelin Van Draanen
name: Ella
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at: 2023/08/01
date added: 2023/08/01
shelves:
review:

]]> Every Last Word 23341894 If you could read my mind, you wouldn't be smiling.

Samantha McAllister looks just like the rest of the popular girls in her junior class. But hidden beneath the straightened hair and expertly applied makeup is a secret that her friends would never understand: Sam has Purely-Obsessional OCD and is consumed by a stream of dark thoughts and worries that she can't turn off.

Second-guessing every move, thought, and word makes daily life a struggle, and it doesn't help that her lifelong friends will turn toxic at the first sign of a wrong outfit, wrong lunch, or wrong crush. Yet Sam knows she'd be truly crazy to leave the protection of the most popular girls in school. So when Sam meets Caroline, she has to keep her new friend with a refreshing sense of humor and no style a secret, right up there with Sam's weekly visits to her psychiatrist.

Caroline introduces Sam to Poet's Corner, a hidden room and a tight-knit group of misfits who have been ignored by the school at large. Sam is drawn to them immediately, especially a guitar-playing guy with a talent for verse, and starts to discover a whole new side of herself. Slowly, she begins to feel more "normal" than she ever has as part of the popular crowd . . . until she finds a new reason to question her sanity and all she holds dear.]]> 358 Tamara Ireland Stone 1484705270 Ella 5 4.21 2015 Every Last Word
author: Tamara Ireland Stone
name: Ella
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2015
rating: 5
read at: 2023/07/02
date added: 2023/07/31
shelves:
review:
This summer I’ve been getting through some of my old YA books, expecting some light and quick reads, I was NOT prepared to be emotionally destroyed like that at 10:30am. The twist at the end makes the whole thing, and I was nearing tears by that point. I highly recommend this book, it hits on a deeper level and has so many good life lessons intertwined.
]]> Love Letters to the Dead 18140047 Love Letters to the Dead.]]> 336 Ava Dellaira 0374346674 Ella 3 3.79 2014 Love Letters to the Dead
author: Ava Dellaira
name: Ella
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2014
rating: 3
read at: 2023/07/25
date added: 2023/07/25
shelves:
review:
Honestly, this book pulled at my heartstrings just a little, more in the way of “holy crap this is depressing is it over yet� and not in a way that made me want to keep reading. In short, it was really dull. I read this on a plane in about 3 hours, and the only reason I didn’t stop was the fact that I’m too cheap to buy the $8 in flight internet so I had nothing else to do. The main character has 0 personality, and the whole thing was just the benign ramblings of an immature 15 year old who should really see a therapist. Overall it’s not worth whatever scraps of emotion you might feel from the premise since the “plot� to get there is an excruciating trek through the inner thoughts of an incredibly boring teenage girl.
]]> <![CDATA[Astrophysics for People in a Hurry]]> 32191710
But today, few of us have time to contemplate the cosmos. So Tyson brings the universe down to Earth succinctly and clearly, with sparkling wit, in tasty chapters consumable anytime and anywhere in your busy day.]]> 223 Neil deGrasse Tyson 0393609391 Ella 5 4.07 2017 Astrophysics for People in a Hurry
author: Neil deGrasse Tyson
name: Ella
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2017
rating: 5
read at: 2023/07/06
date added: 2023/07/06
shelves:
review:

]]> Death by Black Hole 45583631 A vibrant collection of essays on the cosmos from the nation's best-known astrophysicist. “One of today’s best popularizers of science.”�Kirkus Reviews.


Loyal readers of the monthly "Universe" essays in Natural History magazine have long recognized Neil deGrasse Tyson's talent for guiding them through the mysteries of the cosmos with clarity and enthusiasm. Bringing together more than forty of Tyson's favorite essays, ?Death by Black Hole? explores a myriad of cosmic topics, from what it would be like to be inside a black hole to the movie industry's feeble efforts to get its night skies right. One of America's best-known astrophysicists, Tyson is a natural teacher who simplifies the complexities of astrophysics while sharing his infectious fascination for our universe.]]> 385 Neil deGrasse Tyson Ella 0 to-read 4.28 2006 Death by Black Hole
author: Neil deGrasse Tyson
name: Ella
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/06/30
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Daughters of the Resistance 56645202 Ukraine, 1943

On a train from Ukraine to Germany, Lisa Smirnova is terrified for her life. The train is under Nazi command, heading for one of Hitler’s rumoured labour camps. As she is taken away from everything she holds dear, Lisa wonders if she will ever see her family again.

In Nazi-occupied Kiev, Irina Antonova knows she could be arrested at any moment. Trapped in a job registering the endless deaths of the people of Kiev, she risks her life every day by secretly helping her neighbours, while her husband has joined the Soviet partisans, who are carrying out life-threatening work to frustrate the German efforts.

When Lisa’s train is intercepted by the partisans, Irina’s husband among them, these women’s lives will take an unimaginable turn. As Irina fights to protect her family and Lisa is forced to confront the horrors of war, together they must make an impossible decision: what would they be willing to lose to save the people they love?]]> 352 Lana Kortchik 0008473013 Ella 4 3.71 2021 Daughters of the Resistance
author: Lana Kortchik
name: Ella
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2023/06/16
date added: 2023/06/16
shelves:
review:
This was a good book that I enjoyed a lot, the writing wasn’t my favorite and at times it read more like a romance than a war book but I guess that’s the style if you’re into that. Pretty much was a war chick flick but it had good research behind it and a storyline that kept you guessing so overall I would recommend.
]]> Between Shades of Gray 58079693
Lina finds solace in her art, meticulously—and at great risk—documenting events by drawing, hoping these messages will make their way to her father's prison camp to let him know they are still alive. It is a long and harrowing journey, spanning years and covering 6,500 miles, but it is through incredible strength, love, and hope that Lina ultimately survives. Between Shades of Gray is a novel that will steal your breath and capture your heart.]]> 384 Ruta Sepetys Ella 5 4.36 2011 Between Shades of Gray
author: Ruta Sepetys
name: Ella
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at: 2023/06/05
date added: 2023/06/05
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow]]> 58784475 In this exhilarating novel, two friends—often in love, but never lovers—come together as creative partners in the world of video game design, where success brings them fame, joy, tragedy, duplicity, and, ultimately, a kind of immortality.

On a bitter-cold day, in the December of his junior year at Harvard, Sam Masur exits a subway car and sees, amid the hordes of people waiting on the platform, Sadie Green. He calls her name. For a moment, she pretends she hasn't heard him, but then, she turns, and a game begins: a legendary collaboration that will launch them to stardom. These friends, intimates since childhood, borrow money, beg favors, and, before even graduating college, they have created their first blockbuster, Ichigo. Overnight, the world is theirs. Not even twenty-five years old, Sam and Sadie are brilliant, successful, and rich, but these qualities won't protect them from their own creative ambitions or the betrayals of their hearts.

Spanning thirty years, from Cambridge, Massachusetts, to Venice Beach, California, and lands in between and far beyond, Gabrielle Zevin's Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is a dazzling and intricately imagined novel that examines the multifarious nature of identity, disability, failure, the redemptive possibilities in play, and above all, our need to connect: to be loved and to love. Yes, it is a love story, but it is not one you have read before.]]> 401 Gabrielle Zevin 0735243344 Ella 5 4.12 2022 Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow
author: Gabrielle Zevin
name: Ella
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2022
rating: 5
read at: 2023/05/30
date added: 2023/05/30
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Tragedy of MacBeth (The Folger Library General Readers Shakespeare)]]> 187468 188 William Shakespeare 0671509802 Ella 3 3.96 1623 The Tragedy of MacBeth (The Folger Library General Readers Shakespeare)
author: William Shakespeare
name: Ella
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1623
rating: 3
read at: 2023/05/30
date added: 2023/05/30
shelves:
review:

]]> The Handmaid's Tale 49982302 311 Margaret Atwood Ella 0 to-read 4.13 1985 The Handmaid's Tale
author: Margaret Atwood
name: Ella
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1985
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/05/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The End of Everything (Astrophysically Speaking)]]> 52767659
We know the universe had a beginning. With the Big Bang, it went from a state of unimaginable density to an all-encompassing cosmic fireball to a simmering fluid of matter and energy, laying down the seeds for everything from dark matter to black holes to one rocky planet orbiting a star near the edge of a spiral galaxy that happened to develop life. But what happens at the end of the story? In billions of years, humanity could still exist in some unrecognizable form, venturing out to distant space, finding new homes and building new civilizations. But the death of the universe is final. What might such a cataclysm look like? And what does it mean for us?

Dr. Katie Mack has been contemplating these questions since she was eighteen, when her astronomy professor first informed her the universe could end at any moment, setting her on the path toward theoretical astrophysics. Now, with lively wit and humor, she unpacks them in The End of Everything, taking us on a mind-bending tour through each of the cosmos� possible finales: the Big Crunch; the Heat Death; Vacuum Decay; the Big Rip; and the Bounce. In the tradition of Neil DeGrasse’s bestseller Astrophysics for People in a Hurry, Mack guides us through major concepts in quantum mechanics, cosmology, string theory, and much more, in a wildly fun, surprisingly upbeat ride to the farthest reaches of everything we know.]]> 226 Katie Mack 198210354X Ella 5 4.24 2020 The End of Everything (Astrophysically Speaking)
author: Katie Mack
name: Ella
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2023/04/29
date added: 2023/04/29
shelves:
review:

]]> The Midnight Library 52578297
When Nora Seed finds herself in the Midnight Library, she has a chance to make things right. Up until now, her life has been full of misery and regret. She feels she has let everyone down, including herself. But things are about to change.

The books in the Midnight Library enable Nora to live as if she had done things differently. With the help of an old friend, she can now undo every one of her regrets as she tries to work out her perfect life. But things aren't always what she imagined they'd be, and soon her choices place the library and herself in extreme danger.

Before time runs out, she must answer the ultimate question: what is the best way to live?]]> 288 Matt Haig 0525559477 Ella 5 3.96 2020 The Midnight Library
author: Matt Haig
name: Ella
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2023/04/24
date added: 2023/04/24
shelves:
review:

]]> Life of Pi 170453
The ship sinks. Pi finds himself alone in a lifeboat, his only companions a hyena, an orangutan, a wounded zebra, and Richard Parker, a 450-pound Bengal tiger. Soon the tiger has dispatched all but Pi, whose fear, knowledge, and cunning allow him to coexist with Richard Parker for 227 days while lost at sea.]]> 326 Yann Martel 0156027321 Ella 4 3.88 2001 Life of Pi
author: Yann Martel
name: Ella
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2001
rating: 4
read at: 2023/04/20
date added: 2023/04/20
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Making Numbers Count: The Art and Science of Communicating Numbers]]> 58605460 A clear, practical, first-of-its-kind guide to communicating and understanding numbers and data—from bestselling business author Chip Heath.

How much bigger is a billion than a million?

Well, a million seconds is twelve days. A billion seconds is…thirty-two years.

Understanding numbers is essential—but humans aren’t built to understand them. Until very recently, most languages had no words for numbers greater than five—anything from six to infinity was known as “lots.� While the numbers in our world have gotten increasingly complex, our brains are stuck in the past. How can we translate millions and billions and milliseconds and nanometers into things we can comprehend and use?

Author Chip Heath has excelled at teaching others about making ideas stick and here, in Making Numbers Count, he outlines specific principles that reveal how to translate a number into our brain’s language. This book is filled with examples of extreme number makeovers, vivid before-and-after examples that take a dry number and present it in a way that people click in and say “Wow, now I get it!�

You will learn principles such

-SIMPLE PERSPECTIVE CUES: researchers at Microsoft found that adding one simple comparison sentence doubled how accurately users estimated statistics like population and area of countries.
-VIVIDNESS: get perspective on the size of a nucleus by imagining a bee in a cathedral, or a pea in a racetrack, which are easier to envision than �1/100,000th of the size of an atom.�
-CONVERT TO A PROCESS: capitalize on our intuitive sense of time (5 gigabytes of music storage turns into �2 months of commutes, without repeating a song�).
-EMOTIONAL MEASURING STICKS: frame the number in a way that people already care about (“that medical protocol would save twice as many women as curing breast cancer�).

Whether you’re interested in global problems like climate change, running a tech firm or a farm, or just explaining how many Cokes you’d have to drink if you burned calories like a hummingbird, this book will help math-lovers and math-haters alike translate the numbers that animate our world—allowing us to bring more data, more naturally, into decisions in our schools, our workplaces, and our society.]]> 224 Chip Heath 1982165456 Ella 0 to-read 3.88 2022 Making Numbers Count: The Art and Science of Communicating Numbers
author: Chip Heath
name: Ella
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Sensational: The Hidden History of America's “Girl Stunt Reporters”]]> 54496049 A vivid social history that brings to light the “girl stunt reporters� of the Gilded Age who went undercover to expose corruption and abuse in America, and redefined what it meant to be a woman and a journalist � pioneers whose influence continues to be felt today.

In the waning years of the nineteenth century, women journalists across the United States risked reputation and their own safety to expose the hazardous conditions under which many Americans lived and worked. In various disguises, they stole into sewing factories to report on child labor, fainted in the streets to test public hospital treatment, posed as lobbyists to reveal corrupt politicians. Inventive writers whose in-depth narratives made headlines for weeks at a stretch, these "girl stunt reporters" changed laws, helped launch a labor movement, championed women’s rights, and redefined journalism for the modern age.

The 1880s and 1890s witnessed a revolution in journalism as publisher titans like Hearst and Pulitzer used weapons of innovation and scandal to battle it out for market share. As they sought new ways to draw readers in, they found their answer in young women flooding into cities to seek their fortunes. When Nellie Bly went undercover into Blackwell’s Insane Asylum for Women and emerged with a scathing indictment of what she found there, the resulting sensation created opportunity for a whole new wave of writers. In a time of few jobs and few rights for women, here was a path to lives of excitement and meaning.

After only a decade of headlines and fame, though, these trailblazers faced a vicious public backlash. Accused of practicing "yellow journalism," their popularity waned until "stunt reporter" became a badge of shame. But their influence on the field of journalism would arc across a century, from the Progressive Era "muckraking" of the 1900s to the personal "New Journalism" of the 1960s and â€�70s, to the "immersion journalism" and "creative nonfiction" of today. Bold and unconventional, these writers changed how people would tell stories forever.Ěý]]> 400 Kim Todd 0062843613 Ella 0 to-read 3.84 2021 Sensational: The Hidden History of America's “Girl Stunt Reporters”
author: Kim Todd
name: Ella
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Zookeeper's Wife 3302985 The New York Times bestseller: a true story in which the keepers of the Warsaw Zoo saved hundreds of people from Nazi hands.

After their zoo was bombed, Polish zookeepers Jan and Antonina Zabinski managed to save over three hundred people from the Nazis by hiding refugees in the empty animal cages. With animal names for these "guests," and human names for the animals, it's no wonder that the zoo's code name became "The House Under a Crazy Star." Best-selling naturalist and acclaimed storyteller Diane Ackerman combines extensive research and an exuberant writing style to re-create this fascinating, true-life story—sharing Antonina's life as "the zookeeper's wife," while examining the disturbing obsessions at the core of Nazism.]]> 368 Diane Ackerman 039333306X Ella 4 3.45 2007 The Zookeeper's Wife
author: Diane Ackerman
name: Ella
average rating: 3.45
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at: 2023/03/07
date added: 2023/03/07
shelves:
review:

]]> Frankenstein 18306732
This edition also includes â€A Fragmentâ€� by Lord Byron and â€The Vampyre: A Taleâ€� by John Polidori, as well as an introduction and notes. Mary Shelley (1797-1851), the daughter of pioneering thinkers Mary Wollstonecraft and William Godwin, eloped with the poet Percy Shelley at the age of sixteen. Three years later, during a wet summer on Lake Geneva, Shelley famously wrote her masterpiece, Frankenstein. The years of her marriage were blighted by the deaths of three of her four children, and further tragedy followed in 1822, when Percy Shelley drowned in Italy. Following his death, Mary Shelley returned to England and continued to travel and write until her own death at the age of fifty-three.]]> 352 Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley 0141393394 Ella 4 4.07 1818 Frankenstein
author: Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
name: Ella
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1818
rating: 4
read at: 2023/03/01
date added: 2023/03/01
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks]]> 6493208
Yet Henrietta Lacks remains virtually unknown, buried in an unmarked grave.

Now Rebecca Skloot takes us on an extraordinary journey, from the “colored� ward of Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1950s to stark white laboratories with freezers full of HeLa cells; from Henrietta’s small, dying hometown of Clover, Virginia � a land of wooden quarters for enslaved people, faith healings, and voodoo � to East Baltimore today, where her children and grandchildren live and struggle with the legacy of her cells.

Henrietta’s family did not learn of her “immortality� until more than twenty years after her death, when scientists investigating HeLa began using her husband and children in research without informed consent. And though the cells had launched a multimillion-dollar industry that sells human biological materials, her family never saw any of the profits. As Rebecca Skloot so brilliantly shows, the story of the Lacks family � past and present � is inextricably connected to the history of experimentation on African Americans, the birth of bioethics, and the legal battles over whether we control the stuff we are made of.

Over the decade it took to uncover this story, Rebecca became enmeshed in the lives of the Lacks family—especially Henrietta’s daughter Deborah, who was devastated to learn about her mother’s cells. She was consumed with questions: Had scientists cloned her mother? Did it hurt her when researchers infected her cells with viruses and shot them into space? What happened to her sister, Elsie, who died in a mental institution at the age of fifteen? And if her mother was so important to medicine, why couldn’t her children afford health insurance?

Intimate in feeling, astonishing in scope, and impossible to put down, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks captures the beauty and drama of scientific discovery, as well as its human consequences.]]> 370 Rebecca Skloot 1400052173 Ella 5 4.12 2010 The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
author: Rebecca Skloot
name: Ella
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at: 2023/01/07
date added: 2023/01/07
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The House in the Cerulean Sea (Cerulean Chronicles, #1)]]> 45047384
Linus Baker leads a quiet, solitary life. At forty, he lives in a tiny house with a devious cat and his old records. As a Case Worker at the Department in Charge Of Magical Youth, he spends his days overseeing the well-being of children in government-sanctioned orphanages.

When Linus is unexpectedly summoned by Extremely Upper Management he's given a curious and highly classified assignment: travel to Marsyas Island Orphanage, where six dangerous children reside: a gnome, a sprite, a wyvern, an unidentifiable green blob, a were-Pomeranian, and the Antichrist. Linus must set aside his fears and determine whether or not they’re likely to bring about the end of days.

But the children aren’t the only secret the island keeps. Their caretaker is the charming and enigmatic Arthur Parnassus, who will do anything to keep his wards safe. As Arthur and Linus grow closer, long-held secrets are exposed, and Linus must make a choice: destroy a home or watch the world burn.

An enchanting story, masterfully told, The House in the Cerulean Sea is about the profound experience of discovering an unlikely family in an unexpected place—and realizing that family is yours.]]> 394 T.J. Klune Ella 2 4.37 2020 The House in the Cerulean Sea (Cerulean Chronicles, #1)
author: T.J. Klune
name: Ella
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2020
rating: 2
read at: 2023/01/02
date added: 2023/01/02
shelves:
review:
I personally thought this book was not the best, mainly because I found the main character to be highly unlikable. This made it pretty difficult to enjoy. As tough as getting there was, I liked the ending a lot.
]]> <![CDATA[What If? 2: Additional Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions (What If?, #2)]]> 60190659
The millions of people around the world who read and loved What If? still have questions, and those questions are getting stranger. Thank goodness xkcd creator Randall Munroe is here to help. Planning to ride a fire pole from the moon back to Earth? The hardest part is sticking the landing. Hoping to cool the atmosphere by opening everyone’s freezer door at the same time? Maybe it’s time for a brief introduction to thermodynamics. Want to know what would happen if you rode a helicopter blade, built a billion-story building, made a lava lamp out of lava, or jumped on a geyser as it erupted? Okay, if you insist.

Before you go on a cosmic road trip, feed the residents of New York City to a T. rex, or fill every church with bananas, be sure to consult this practical guide for impractical ideas. Unfazed by absurdity, Randall consults the latest research on everything from swing-set physics to airplane-catapult design to clearly and concisely answer his readers� questions. As he consistently demonstrates, you can learn a lot from examining how the world might work in very specific extreme circumstances.

Filled with bonkers science, boundless curiosity, and Randall’s signature stick-figure comics, What If? 2 is sure to be another instant classic adored by inquisitive readers of all ages.]]> 354 Randall Munroe 0525537112 Ella 5 4.35 2022 What If? 2: Additional Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions (What If?, #2)
author: Randall Munroe
name: Ella
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2022
rating: 5
read at: 2022/12/19
date added: 2022/12/19
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo]]> 45416596 From the New York Times bestselling author of Daisy Jones & the Six—an entrancing and “wildly addictive journey of a reclusive Hollywood starlet� (PopSugar) as she reflects on her relentless rise to the top and the risks she took, the loves she lost, and the long-held secrets the public could never imagine.

Aging and reclusive Hollywood movie icon Evelyn Hugo is finally ready to tell the truth about her glamorous and scandalous life. But when she chooses unknown magazine reporter Monique Grant for the job, no one is more astounded than Monique herself. Why her? Why now?

Monique is not exactly on top of the world. Her husband has left her, and her professional life is going nowhere. Regardless of why Evelyn has selected her to write her biography, Monique is determined to use this opportunity to jumpstart her career.

Summoned to Evelyn’s luxurious apartment, Monique listens in fascination as the actress tells her story. From making her way to Los Angeles in the 1950s to her decision to leave show business in the �80s, and, of course, the seven husbands along the way, Evelyn unspools a tale of ruthless ambition, unexpected friendship, and a great forbidden love. Monique begins to feel a very real connection to the legendary star, but as Evelyn’s story near its conclusion, it becomes clear that her life intersects with Monique’s own in tragic and irreversible ways.

“Heartbreaking, yet beautiful� (Jamie Blynn, Us Weekly), The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo is “Tinseltown drama at its finest� (Redbook): a mesmerizing journey through the splendor of old Hollywood into the harsh realities of the present day as two women struggle with what it means—and what it costs—to face the truth.]]> 434 Taylor Jenkins Reid Ella 5 4.46 2017 The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo
author: Taylor Jenkins Reid
name: Ella
average rating: 4.46
book published: 2017
rating: 5
read at: 2022/11/24
date added: 2022/11/24
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Have I Told You This Already?: Stories I Don’t Want to Forget to Remember]]> 60113442
With her signature sense of humor and down-to-earth storytelling, Lauren Graham opens up about her years working in the entertainment business—from the sublime to the ridiculous—and shares personal stories about everything from family and friendship to the challenges of aging gracefully in Hollywood. In "RIP Barneys New York," she writes about an early job as a salesperson at the legendary department store -- and the time she inadvertently shoplifted; in "Ne Oublie" she warns us about the perils of coming from an extremely forgetful family; and in "Actor-y Factory" she recounts what a day in the life of an actor looks like (unless you’re Brad Pitt).

Filled with surprising anecdotes, sage advice, and laugh-out-loud observations, Graham's latest collection of all-new, original essays showcases the winning charm and wit that she's known for.]]> 186 Lauren Graham 0593355423 Ella 5 3.66 2022 Have I Told You This Already?: Stories I Don’t Want to Forget to Remember
author: Lauren Graham
name: Ella
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2022
rating: 5
read at: 2022/11/20
date added: 2022/11/20
shelves:
review:

]]> Night 1617 Night is the terrifying record of Elie Wiesel's memories of the death of his family, the death of his own innocence, and his despair as a deeply observant Jew confronting the absolute evil of man. This new translation by his wife and most frequent translator, Marion Wiesel, corrects important details and presents the most accurate rendering in English of Elie Wiesel's testimony to what happened in the camps and of his unforgettable message that this horror must simply never be allowed to happen again.]]> 120 Elie Wiesel 0374500010 Ella 4 4.38 1956 Night
author: Elie Wiesel
name: Ella
average rating: 4.38
book published: 1956
rating: 4
read at: 2022/11/19
date added: 2022/11/19
shelves:
review:

]]> Animal Farm 54787 168 George Orwell 0030554349 Ella 3 3.65 1945 Animal Farm
author: George Orwell
name: Ella
average rating: 3.65
book published: 1945
rating: 3
read at: 2022/10/16
date added: 2022/10/16
shelves:
review:
Animals should not be able to talk and write.
]]> <![CDATA[Three Hours in Paris (Kate Rees, #1)]]> 56437646 In June of 1940, when Paris fell to the Nazis, Hitler spent a total of three hours in the City of Light—abruptly leaving, never to return. To this day, no one knows why.

The New York Times bestselling author of the Aimée Leduc investigations reimagines history in her masterful, pulse-pounding spy thriller, Three Hours in Paris.

Kate Rees, a young American markswoman, has been recruited by British intelligence to drop into Paris with a dangerous assignment: assassinate the Führer. Wrecked by grief after a Luftwaffe bombing killed her husband and infant daughter, she is armed with a rifle, a vendetta, and a fierce resolve. But other than rushed and rudimentary instruction, she has no formal spy training. Thrust into the red-hot center of the war, a country girl from rural Oregon finds herself holding the fate of the world in her hands. When Kate misses her mark and the plan unravels, Kate is on the run for her life—all the time wrestling with the suspicion that the whole operation was a set-up.

Cara Black, doyenne of the Parisian crime novel, is at her best as she brings Occupation-era France to vivid life in this gripping story about one young woman with the temerity—and drive—to take on Hitler himself.]]> 360 Cara Black 164129258X Ella 4 3.83 2020 Three Hours in Paris (Kate Rees, #1)
author: Cara Black
name: Ella
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2022/06/23
date added: 2022/06/23
shelves:
review:
I enjoyed this book� but not the best I’ve ever read. Solely based on the plot, it was incredible. Pacing, shock factor, intrigue, the plot was great. However, the quality of writing left a lot to be desired. I get that with a crime novel you kind of have to go in expecting that, but since it was marketed towards historical fiction I was looking for more. With alternating perspectives an author has to know what they’re doing and in this case it felt very uniform. All the characters had identical tones, if that makes sense. Similar to when in an audiobook all the characters are read by the same voice. In a book with a plot as interesting as this, some good writing would really round this out but it just didn’t hit the spot for me. There weren’t any sentences that made me want to reread it because it was so good. The whole thing read a little like a middle school writing assignment. Creative and interesting, but mediocre writing. Also, the amount of historical inaccuracies were shocking. As a frequent and avid reader of WWII historical fiction (especially French resistance/women spy stories) it was astonishing how little research the author did. I don’t know if this was her first historical fiction book, but wow I could’ve found out more with a Google search. Overall, if you are simply looking for a fast-paced crime novel and couldn’t care less about writing quality, then I would totally recommend this book. Otherwise, there are many other books that are far superior.
]]> <![CDATA[Our Women on the Ground: Essays by Arab Women Reporting from the Arab World]]> 42902454 Nineteen Arab women journalists speak out about what it's like to report on their changing homelands in this first-of-its-kind essay collection, with a foreword by CNN chief international correspondent Christiane Amanpour



A growing number of intrepid Arab and Middle Eastern sahafiyat--female journalists--are working tirelessly to shape nuanced narratives about their changing homelands, often risking their lives on the front lines of war. From sexual harassment on the streets of Cairo to the difficulty of traveling without a male relative in Yemen, their challenges are unique--as are their advantages, such as being able to speak candidly with other women at a Syrian medical clinic or with men on Whatsapp who will go on to become ISIS fighters, rebels, or pro-regime soldiers.

In Our Women on the Ground, nineteen of these women tell us, in their own words, about what it's like to report on conflicts that (quite literally) hit close to home. Their daring and heartfelt stories, told here for the first time, shatter stereotypes about the region's women and provide an urgently needed perspective on a part of the world that is frequently misunderstood.

INCLUDING ESSAYS BY: Donna Abu-Nasr, Aida Alami, Hannah Allam, Jane Arraf, Lina Attalah, Nada Bakri, Shamael Elnoor, Zaina Erhaim, Asmaa al-Ghoul, Hind Hassan, Eman Helal, Zeina Karam, Roula Khalaf, Nour Malas, Hwaida Saad, Amira Al-Sharif, Heba Shibani, Lina Sinjab, and Natacha Yazbeck]]> 278 Zahra Fatima Hankir 0143133411 Ella 0 to-read 4.41 2019 Our Women on the Ground: Essays by Arab Women Reporting from the Arab World
author: Zahra Fatima Hankir
name: Ella
average rating: 4.41
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/18
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Lord of the Flies 40542121 189 William Golding Ella 3 3.76 1954 Lord of the Flies
author: William Golding
name: Ella
average rating: 3.76
book published: 1954
rating: 3
read at: 2022/05/20
date added: 2022/05/20
shelves:
review:

]]> A Long Petal of the Sea 46042377 From the author of The House of the Spirits, this epic novel spanning decades and crossing continents follows two young people as they flee the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War in search of a place to call home.

In the late 1930s, civil war grips Spain. When General Franco and his Fascists succeed in overthrowing the government, hundreds of thousands are forced to flee in a treacherous journey over the mountains to the French border. Among them is Roser, a pregnant young widow, who finds her life intertwined with that of Victor Dalmau, an army doctor and the brother of her deceased love. In order to survive, the two must unite in a marriage neither of them desires.

Together with two thousand other refugees, they embark on the SS Winnipeg, a ship chartered by the poet Pablo Neruda, to Chile: “the long petal of sea and wine and snow.� As unlikely partners, they embrace exile as the rest of Europe erupts in world war. Starting over on a new continent, their trials are just beginning, and over the course of their lives, they will face trial after trial. But they will also find joy as they patiently await the day when they will be exiles no more. Through it all, their hope of returning to Spain keeps them going. Destined to witness the battle between freedom and repression as it plays out across the world, Roser and Victor will find that home might have been closer than they thought all along.

A masterful work of historical fiction about hope, exile, and belonging, A Long Petal of the Sea shows Isabel Allende at the height of her powers. ]]> 325 Isabel Allende Ella 4 4.03 2019 A Long Petal of the Sea
author: Isabel Allende
name: Ella
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2022/04/22
date added: 2022/04/22
shelves:
review:

]]> The Old Man and the Sea 49048169 Ernest Hemingway’s most beloved and popular novel ever, with millions of copies sold—now featuring early drafts and supplementary material as well as a personal foreword by the only living son of the author, Patrick Hemingway, and an introduction by the author’s grandson Seán Hemingway.

The last novel Ernest Hemingway saw published, The Old Man and the Sea has proved itself to be one of the enduring works of American fiction. It is the story of an old Cuban fisherman, down on his luck, and his supreme ordeal: a relentless, agonizing battle with a giant marlin far out in the Gulf Stream.

Using the simple, powerful language of a fable, Hemingway takes the timeless themes of courage in the face of defeat and personal triumph won from loss and transforms them into a magnificent twentieth-century classic. Written in 1952, this hugely successful novel confirmed his power and presence in the literary world and played a large part in his winning the 1954 Nobel Prize for Literature.]]> 128 Ernest Hemingway 1476787867 Ella 0 to-read 3.92 1952 The Old Man and the Sea
author: Ernest Hemingway
name: Ella
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1952
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/04/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Little Women 25994798 260 Louisa May Alcott 1514640805 Ella 1 abandoned 4.06 1868 Little Women
author: Louisa May Alcott
name: Ella
average rating: 4.06
book published: 1868
rating: 1
read at:
date added: 2022/04/02
shelves: abandoned
review:

]]> Red Scarf Girl 22291337 Ji-li Jiang Ella 0 to-read 0.0 1997 Red Scarf Girl
author: Ji-li Jiang
name: Ella
average rating: 0.0
book published: 1997
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Winter Guest 56383018 A stirring novel of first love in a time of war and the unbearable choices that could tear sisters apart, from the New York Times bestselling author of The Orphan’s Tale

Life is a constant struggle for the eighteen-year-old Nowak twins as they raise their three younger siblings in rural Poland under the shadow of the Nazi occupation. The constant threat of arrest has made everyone in their village a spy, and turned neighbor against neighbor. Though rugged, independent Helena and pretty, gentle Ruth couldn’t be more different, they are staunch allies in protecting their family from the threats the war brings closer to their doorstep with each passing day.

Then Helena discovers an American paratrooper stranded outside their small mountain village, wounded, but alive. Risking the safety of herself and her family, she hides Sam—a Jew—but Helena’s concern for the American grows into something much deeper. Defying the perils that render a future together all but impossible, Sam and Helena make plans for the family to flee. But Helena is forced to contend with the jealousy her choices have sparked in Ruth, culminating in a singular act of betrayal that endangers them all—and setting in motion a chain of events that will reverberate across continents and decades.]]> 333 Pam Jenoff 0778311570 Ella 0 to-read 3.79 2014 The Winter Guest
author: Pam Jenoff
name: Ella
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2014
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Forest of Vanishing Stars 55711683 The New York Times bestselling author of the The Book of Lost Names returns with an evocative coming-of-age World War II story about a young woman who uses her knowledge of the wilderness to help Jewish refugees escape the Nazis—until a secret from her past threatens everything.

After being stolen from her wealthy German parents and raised in the unforgiving wilderness of eastern Europe, a young woman finds herself alone in 1941 after her kidnapper dies. Her solitary existence is interrupted, however, when she happens upon a group of Jews fleeing the Nazi terror. Stunned to learn what’s happening in the outside world, she vows to teach the group all she can about surviving in the forest—and in turn, they teach her some surprising lessons about opening her heart after years of isolation. But when she is betrayed and escapes into a German-occupied village, her past and present come together in a shocking collision that could change everything.

Inspired by incredible true stories of survival against staggering odds, and suffused with the journey-from-the-wilderness elements that made Where the Crawdads Sing a worldwide phenomenon, The Forest of Vanishing Stars is a heart-wrenching and suspenseful novel.]]> 376 Kristin Harmel 198215893X Ella 0 to-read 4.22 2021 The Forest of Vanishing Stars
author: Kristin Harmel
name: Ella
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Women of Pearl Island 56383011
When Tartelin answers an ad for a personal assistant, she doesn't know what to expect from her new employer, Marianne, an eccentric elderly woman. Marianne lives on a remote island that her family has owned for generations, and for decades her only companions have been butterflies and tightly held memories of her family.

But there are some memories Marianne would rather forget, such as when the island was commandeered by the British government during WWII. Now, if Marianne can trust Tartelin with her family's story, she might finally be able to face the long-buried secrets of her past that have kept her isolated for far too long.]]> 352 Polly Crosby 0778311147 Ella 0 to-read 3.34 2021 The Women of Pearl Island
author: Polly Crosby
name: Ella
average rating: 3.34
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Last Bookshop in London 53331577 Inspired by the true World War II history of the few bookshops to survive the Blitz, The Last Bookshop in London is a timeless story of wartime loss, love and the enduring power of literature.

August 1939: London prepares for war as Hitler’s forces sweep across Europe. Grace Bennett has always dreamed of moving to the city, but the bunkers and blackout curtains that she finds on her arrival were not what she expected. And she certainly never imagined she’d wind up working at Primrose Hill, a dusty old bookshop nestled in the heart of London.

Through blackouts and air raids as the Blitz intensifies, Grace discovers the power of storytelling to unite her community in ways she never dreamed—a force that triumphs over even the darkest nights of the war.]]> 325 Madeline Martin 133528480X Ella 0 to-read 4.07 2021 The Last Bookshop in London
author: Madeline Martin
name: Ella
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Spy Who Loved: The Secrets and Lives of Christine Granville]]> 16045166
The Untold Story of Britain's First Female Special Agent of World War II

In June 1952, a woman was murdered by an obsessed colleague in a hotel in the South Kensington district of London. Her name was Christine Granville. That she died young was perhaps unsurprising; that she had survived the Second World War was remarkable.

The daughter of a feckless Polish aristocrat and his wealthy Jewish wife, Granville would become one of Britain's most daring and highly decorated special agents. Having fled to Britain on the outbreak of war, she was recruited by the intelligence services and took on mission after mission. She skied over the hazardous High Tatras into occupied Poland, served in Egypt and North Africa, and was later parachuted behind enemy lines into France, where an agent's life expectancy was only six weeks. Her courage, quick wit, and determination won her release from arrest more than once, and saved the lives of several fellow officers - including one of her many lovers - just hours before their execution by the Gestapo. More importantly, the intelligence she gathered in her espionage was a significant contribution to the Allied war effort, and she was awarded the George Medal, the OBE, and the Croix de Guerre.

Granville exercised a mesmeric power on those who knew her. In The Spy Who Loved, acclaimed biographer Clare Mulley tells the extraordinary history of this charismatic, difficult, fearless, and altogether extraordinary woman.]]> 426 Clare Mulley 1250030323 Ella 0 to-read 3.68 2012 The Spy Who Loved: The Secrets and Lives of Christine Granville
author: Clare Mulley
name: Ella
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Orphan's Tale 29239940 Alternate cover edition for ASIN B01HB9Q7CW

A powerful novel of friendship set in a traveling circus during World War II, The Orphan's Tale introduces two extraordinary women and their harrowing stories of sacrifice and survival.

Sixteen-year-old Noa has been cast out in disgrace after becoming pregnant by a Nazi soldier and being forced to give up her baby. She lives above a small rail station, which she cleans in order to earn her keep. When Noa discovers a boxcar containing dozens of Jewish infants bound for a concentration camp, she is reminded of the child that was taken from her. And in a moment that will change the course of her life, she snatches one of the babies and flees into the snowy night.

Noa finds refuge with a German circus, but she must learn the flying trapeze act so she can blend in undetected, spurning the resentment of the lead aerialist, Astrid. At first rivals, Noa and Astrid soon forge a powerful bond. But as the facade that protects them proves increasingly tenuous, Noa and Astrid must decide whether their friendship is enough to save one another - or if the secrets that burn between them will destroy everything.]]> 353 Pam Jenoff 0778319814 Ella 0 to-read 4.00 2017 The Orphan's Tale
author: Pam Jenoff
name: Ella
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Tattooist of Auschwitz (The Tattooist of Auschwitz, #1)]]> 38359036 °ŐäłŮ´Ç·Éľ±±đ°ů±đ°ů (the German word for tattooist), tasked with permanently marking his fellow prisoners.

Imprisoned for more than two and a half years, Lale witnesses horrific atrocities and barbarism—but also incredible acts of bravery and compassion. Risking his own life, he uses his privileged position to exchange jewels and money from murdered Jews for food to keep his fellow prisoners alive.

One day in July 1942, Lale, prisoner 32407, comforts a trembling young woman waiting in line to have the number 34902 tattooed onto her arm. Her name is Gita, and in that first encounter, Lale vows to somehow survive the camp and marry her.

A vivid, harrowing, and ultimately hopeful re-creation of Lale Sokolov's experiences as the man who tattooed the arms of thousands of prisoners with what would become one of the most potent symbols of the Holocaust, The Tattooist of Auschwitz is also a testament to the endurance of love and humanity under the darkest possible conditions.]]> 272 Heather Morris 006287067X Ella 0 to-read 4.32 2018 The Tattooist of Auschwitz (The Tattooist of Auschwitz, #1)
author: Heather Morris
name: Ella
average rating: 4.32
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Sold on a Monday 40216800 2 CHILDREN FOR SALE

The scrawled sign, peddling young siblings on a farmhouse porch, captures the desperation sweeping the country in 1931. It’s an era of breadlines, bank runs, and impossible choices.

For struggling reporter Ellis Reed, the gut-wrenching scene evokes memories of his family’s dark past. He snaps a photograph of the children, not meant for publication. But when the image leads to his big break, the consequences are devastating in ways he never imagined.

Haunted by secrets of her own, secretary Lillian Palmer sees more in the picture than a good story and is soon drawn into the fray. Together, the two set out to right a wrongdoing and mend a fractured family, at the risk of everything they value.

Inspired by an actual newspaper photo that stunned readers across the nation, this touching novel explores the tale within the frame and behind the lens—a journey of ambition, love, and the far-reaching effects of our actions.]]> 344 Kristina McMorris 1492663999 Ella 0 to-read 3.83 2018 Sold on a Monday
author: Kristina McMorris
name: Ella
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Diary of a Young Girl 48855
In 1942, with the Nazis occupying Holland, a thirteen-year-old Jewish girl and her family fled their home in Amsterdam and went into hiding. For the next two years, until their whereabouts were betrayed to the Gestapo, the Franks and another family lived cloistered in the “Secret Annexe� of an old office building. Cut off from the outside world, they faced hunger, boredom, the constant cruelties of living in confined quarters, and the ever-present threat of discovery and death. In her diary Anne Frank recorded vivid impressions of her experiences during this period. By turns thoughtful, moving, and surprisingly humorous, her account offers a fascinating commentary on human courage and frailty and a compelling self-portrait of a sensitive and spirited young woman whose promise was tragically cut short.
--back cover]]> 283 Anne Frank Ella 0 to-read 4.19 1947 The Diary of a Young Girl
author: Anne Frank
name: Ella
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1947
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Lovely War 44107480
Aubrey Edwards is also headed toward the trenches. A gifted musician who's played Carnegie Hall, he's a member of the 15th New York Infantry, an all-African-American regiment being sent to Europe to help end the Great War. Love is the last thing on his mind. But that's before he meets Colette Fournier, a Belgian chanteuse who's already survived unspeakable tragedy at the hands of the Germans.

Thirty years after these four lovers' fates collide, the Greek goddess Aphrodite tells their stories to her husband, Hephaestus, and her lover, Ares, in a luxe Manhattan hotel room at the height of World War II. She seeks to answer the age-old question: Why are Love and War eternally drawn to one another? But her quest for a conclusion that will satisfy her jealous husband uncovers a multi-threaded tale of prejudice, trauma, and music and reveals that War is no match for the power of Love.

A sweeping, multi-layered romance with a divine twist, by the Printz Honor-winning author of The Passion of Dolssa, set in the perilous days of World Wars I and II.]]> 471 Julie Berry Ella 0 to-read 4.23 2019 Lovely War
author: Julie Berry
name: Ella
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Since We Last Spoke 38338708 When true love is shattered by tragedy—how much would you risk to save it all?

When Aggi Frank and Max Granger finally admitted their feelings for each other last December, it felt like love was beautiful and endless... until it wasn’t.

A fatal car accident involving their older siblings throws their lives into sudden chaos. And with a restraining order now in place between the two bitter households, Aggi and Max’s love runs cold. Being together again seems like a distant fantasy, even though they share the same driveway.

Still, Plum Lake is a small town, and staying apart can’t last forever. Aggi and Max eventually reunite at a lake-house party hosted by a mutual friend and break the ice after a year of silence. But just as they begin to rebuild their relationship, the unthinkable happens when Aggi’s little sister, Grace, flees from home after their father spirals into a ď¬t of rage. With a support system of friends close by, Aggi and Max must confront each other and their families in the hopes of mending all the broken pieces.

Perfect for fans of Jennifer Niven and Nicola Yoon, Brenda Rufener’s (Where I Live) second heartbreaking and uplifting novel captures the ups and downs of star-crossed lovers in the face of unimaginable grief, the fragile balance of their family relations, and the rocky journey to healing, peace, and forgiveness.]]> 292 Brenda Rufener 0062571087 Ella 0 to-read 3.49 2019 Since We Last Spoke
author: Brenda Rufener
name: Ella
average rating: 3.49
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> All the Ways We Said Goodbye 44890073 New York Times bestselling authors of The Glass Ocean and The Forgotten Room return with a glorious historical adventure that moves from the dark days of two World Wars to the turbulent years of the 1960s, in which three women with bruised hearts find refuge at Paris� legendary Ritz hotel.

The heiress . . .
The Resistance fighter . . .
The widow . . .
Three women whose fates are joined by one splendid hotel

France, 1914. As war breaks out, Aurelie becomes trapped on the wrong side of the front with her father, Comte Sigismund de Courcelles. When the Germans move into their family’s ancestral estate, using it as their headquarters, Aurelie discovers she knows the German Major’s aide de camp, Maximilian Von Sternburg. She and the dashing young officer first met during Aurelie’s debutante days in Paris. Despite their conflicting loyalties, Aurelie and Max’s friendship soon deepens into love, but betrayal will shatter them both, driving Aurelie back to Paris and the Ritz� the home of her estranged American heiress mother, with unexpected consequences.

France, 1942. Raised by her indomitable, free-spirited American grandmother in the glamorous Hotel Ritz, Marguerite “Daisy� Villon remains in Paris with her daughter and husband, a Nazi collaborator, after France falls to Hitler. At first reluctant to put herself and her family at risk to assist her grandmother’s Resistance efforts, Daisy agrees to act as a courier for a skilled English forger known only as Legrand, who creates identity papers for Resistance members and Jewish refugees. But as Daisy is drawn ever deeper into Legrand’s underground network, committing increasingly audacious acts of resistance for the sake of the country—and the man—she holds dear, she uncovers a devastating secret . . . one that will force her to commit the ultimate betrayal, and to confront at last the shocking circumstances of her own family history.

France, 1964. For Barbara “Babs� Langford, her husband, Kit, was the love of her life. Yet their marriage was haunted by a mysterious woman known only as La Fleur. On Kit’s death, American lawyer Andrew “Drew� Bowdoin appears at her door. Hired to find a Resistance fighter turned traitor known as “La Fleur,� the investigation has led to Kit Langford. Curious to know more about the enigmatic La Fleur, Babs joins Drew in his search, a journey of discovery that that takes them to Paris and the Ritz—and to unexpected places of the heart. . . .]]> 448 Beatriz Williams 0062931091 Ella 0 to-read 4.01 2020 All the Ways We Said Goodbye
author: Beatriz Williams
name: Ella
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Little Fires Everywhere 34273236
In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is meticulously planned � from the layout of the winding roads, to the colours of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules.

Enter Mia Warren � an enigmatic artist and single mother � who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenage daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than just tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the mother–daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past, and a disregard for the rules that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community.

When old family friends attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town � and puts Mia and Elena on opposing sides. Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Elena is determined to uncover the secrets in Mia's past. But her obsession will come at an unexpected and devastating cost . . .]]> 338 Celeste Ng 0735224293 Ella 4 4.05 2017 Little Fires Everywhere
author: Celeste Ng
name: Ella
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2022/01/29
date added: 2022/01/29
shelves:
review:

]]> The Secret Life of Bees 37435 The Secret Life of Bees tells the story of Lily Owens, whose life has been shaped around the blurred memory of the afternoon her mother was killed. When Lily's fierce-hearted black "stand-in mother," Rosaleen, insults three of the deepest racists in town, Lily decides to spring them both free. They escape to Tiburon, South Carolina--a town that holds the secret to her mother's past. Taken in by an eccentric trio of black beekeeping sisters, Lily is introduced to their mesmerizing world of bees and honey, and the Black Madonna. This is a remarkable novel about divine female power, a story women will share and pass on to their daughters for years to come.]]> 302 Sue Monk Kidd 0142001740 Ella 5 4.10 2001 The Secret Life of Bees
author: Sue Monk Kidd
name: Ella
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2001
rating: 5
read at: 2022/01/18
date added: 2022/01/19
shelves:
review:

]]> All the Light We Cannot See 34006942
In a mining town in Germany, the orphan Werner Pfennig grows up with his younger sister, Jutta, both enchanted by a crude radio they find that brings them news and stories from places they have never seen or imagined. Werner becomes an master at building and fixing these crucial new radios, a talent that wins him a place at an elite and brutal military academy and, ultimately, makes him a highly specialized tracker of the Resistance. More and more aware of the human cost of his intelligence, Werner travels through the heart of Hitler Youth to the far-flung outskirts of Russia, and finally into Saint-Malo, where his path converges with Marie-Laure. The story Illuminates the ways, against all odds, that people try to be good to one another.

At the same time, far away in a walled city by the sea, an old man discovers new worlds without ever setting foot outside his home. But all around him, impending danger closes in.

Ten years in the writing, a National Book Award finalist, All the Light We Cannot See is a magnificent, deeply moving novel from a writer “whose sentences never fail to thrill� (Los Angeles Times).]]> 531 Anthony Doerr 1501173219 Ella 5 4.31 2014 All the Light We Cannot See
author: Anthony Doerr
name: Ella
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2014
rating: 5
read at: 2022/01/08
date added: 2022/01/08
shelves:
review:

]]> The Room on Rue Amelie 35297316
When newlywed Ruby Henderson Benoit arrives in Paris in 1939 with her French husband Marcel, she imagines strolling arm in arm along the grand boulevards, awash in the golden afternoon light. But war is looming on the horizon, and as France falls to the Nazis, her marriage begins to splinter, too.

Charlotte Dacher is eleven when the Germans roll into the French capital, their sinister swastika flags snapping in the breeze. After the Jewish restrictions take effect and Jews are ordered to wear the yellow star, Charlotte can’t imagine things getting much worse. But then the mass deportations begin, and her life is ripped forever apart.

Thomas Clarke joins the British Royal Air Force to protect his country, but when his beloved mother dies in a German bombing during the waning days of the Blitz, he wonders if he’s really making a difference. Then he finds himself in Paris, in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower, and he discovers a new reason to keep fighting—and an unexpected road home.

When fate brings them together, Ruby, Charlotte, and Thomas must summon the courage to defy the Nazis—and to open their own broken hearts—as they fight to survive. Rich with historical drama and emotional depth, this is an unforgettable story that will stay with you long after the final page is turned.]]> 400 Kristin Harmel 1501171402 Ella 5 4.16 2018 The Room on Rue Amelie
author: Kristin Harmel
name: Ella
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/07
shelves:
review:

]]> The Book of Lost Names 52762903 The Book of Lost Names.

The accompanying article discusses the looting of libraries by the Nazis across Europe during World War II—an experience Eva remembers well—and the search to reunite people with the texts taken from them so long ago. The book in the photograph, an eighteenth-century religious text thought to have been taken from France in the waning days of the war, is one of the most fascinating cases. Now housed in Berlin’s Zentral- und Landesbibliothek library, it appears to contain some sort of code, but researchers don’t know where it came from—or what the code means. Only Eva holds the answer—but will she have the strength to revisit old memories and help reunite those lost during the war?

As a graduate student in 1942, Eva was forced to flee Paris after the arrest of her father, a Polish Jew. Finding refuge in a small mountain town in the Free Zone, she begins forging identity documents for Jewish children fleeing to neutral Switzerland. But erasing people comes with a price, and along with a mysterious, handsome forger named RĂ©my, Eva decides she must find a way to preserve the real names of the children who are too young to remember who they really are. The records they keep in The Book of Lost Names will become even more vital when the resistance cell they work for is betrayed and RĂ©my disappears.

An engaging and evocative novel reminiscent of The Lost Girls of Paris and The Alice Network, The Book of Lost Names is a testament to the resilience of the human spirit and the power of bravery and love in the face of evil.]]> 388 Kristin Harmel 1982131896 Ella 5 4.41 2020 The Book of Lost Names
author: Kristin Harmel
name: Ella
average rating: 4.41
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> The Lost Girls of Paris 39816076 From the author of the runaway bestseller The Orphan’s Tale comes a remarkable story of friendship and courage centered around three women and a ring of female spies during World War II.

1946, Manhattan

Grace Healey is rebuilding her life after losing her husband during the war. One morning while passing through Grand Central Terminal on her way to work, she finds an abandoned suitcase tucked beneath a bench. Unable to resist her own curiosity, Grace opens the suitcase, where she discovers a dozen photographs—each of a different woman. In a moment of impulse, Grace takes the photographs and quickly leaves the station.

Grace soon learns that the suitcase belonged to a woman named Eleanor Trigg, leader of a ring of female secret agents who were deployed out of London during the war. Twelve of these women were sent to Occupied Europe as couriers and radio operators to aid the resistance, but they never returned home, their fates a mystery. Setting out to learn the truth behind the women in the photographs, Grace finds herself drawn to a young mother turned agent named Marie, whose daring mission overseas reveals a remarkable story of friendship, valor and betrayal.

Vividly rendered and inspired by true events, New York Times bestselling author Pam Jenoff shines a light on the incredible heroics of the brave women of the war, and weaves a mesmerizing tale of courage, sisterhood and the great strength of women to survive in the hardest of circumstances]]> 377 Pam Jenoff 0778330273 Ella 5 favorites 3.88 2019 The Lost Girls of Paris
author: Pam Jenoff
name: Ella
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2019
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves: favorites
review:
I absolutely loved this book. The intertwining storylines with the different perspectives and times are very well done and make for a very interesting read. While at times the unnecessary romance can take away from the story, the historical aspects, powerful women, and riveting mystery far overpower this and make for an excellent read worthy of anyone's time.
]]> Salt to the Sea 34342006
Sepetys (writer of 'Between Shades of Gray') crafts four fictionalized but historically accurate voices to convey the real-life tragedy. Joana, a Lithuanian with nursing experience; Florian, a Prussian soldier fleeing the Nazis with stolen treasure; and Emilia, a Polish girl close to the end of her pregnancy, converge on their escape journeys as Russian troops advance; each will eventually meet Albert, a Nazi peon with delusions of grandeur, assigned to the Gustloff decks.]]> 379 Ruta Sepetys 0142423629 Ella 5 favorites 4.37 2016 Salt to the Sea
author: Ruta Sepetys
name: Ella
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2016
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves: favorites
review:
This is an incredible and impactful book that I hope is taught in schools one day. The transitioning perspectives offer a panoramic look at the storyline, and Ruta Sepetys has an impeccable talent for timing. Four differing perspectives intertwining in a historical event with lots of minuscule details are hard enough to manage, but Sepetys does it with such skill. She reveals the right details at just the right time that leads to shock factor and plot development. It is a fast-paced story that has severe emotional depth, which keeps it interesting and the reader invested. It is an incredible book that I am already looking forward to rereading.
]]> Where the Crawdads Sing 37703550
But Kya is not what they say. A born naturalist with just one day of school, she takes life's lessons from the land, learning the real ways of the world from the dishonest signals of fireflies. But while she has the skills to live in solitude forever, the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. Drawn to two young men from town, who are each intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new and startling world–until the unthinkable happens.

In Where the Crawdads Sing, Owens juxtaposes an exquisite ode to the natural world against a profound coming of age story and haunting mystery. Thought-provoking, wise, and deeply moving, Owens’s debut novel reminds us that we are forever shaped by the child within us, while also subject to the beautiful and violent secrets that nature keeps.

The story asks how isolation influences the behavior of a young woman, who like all of us, has the genetic propensity to belong to a group. The clues to the mystery are brushed into the lush habitat and natural histories of its wild creatures.]]> 370 Delia Owens 0735219095 Ella 5 favorites 4.42 2018 Where the Crawdads Sing
author: Delia Owens
name: Ella
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves: favorites
review:
This is my all-time favorite book, hands down, which is definitely saying a lot. I honestly don't know what it is about it, but I tore through it in three days and I loved it so so much. The plotline, first of all, is fantastic. It is the best part of every type of book: coming of age, historical fiction, mystery, romance, it really couldn't get any better. I was shocked this was the author's debut; this book is the material of a very experienced writer. I loved the side-by-side narratives set in different years, it was almost like two different books and they intertwined and wove together seamlessly. I would very highly recommend reading this book, you will not regret it.
]]> The Book Thief 25739188 The 10th-anniversary edition of the #1 New York Times bestseller and modern classic beloved by millions of readers.
Ěý
One of the most enduring stories of our time, The Book Thief is just a small story really, about, among other things: a girl, some words, an accordionist, some fanatical Germans, a Jewish fist fighter, and quite a lot of thievery.
Ěý
The 10th-anniversary editionĚýfeatures pages of bonus content, including marked-up manuscript pages, original sketches, and pages from the author's writing notebook.]]> 592 Markus Zusak 1101934182 Ella 5 favorites 4.61 2005 The Book Thief
author: Markus Zusak
name: Ella
average rating: 4.61
book published: 2005
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves: favorites
review:
The Book Thief is one of my favorite books of all time. The fact that I was assigned this book for school and still really enjoyed it should definitely tell you something about its merit. It is an excellent book with implications rooted in history and modern times that is both influential and informative. It has a historical accuracy that not only informs the reader about the war and it’s background but also shows the impact it had on individual people. The perspective from which the book is told adds another layer of storytelling that examines how the war, if death were a living being, would affect the entity of death itself. This unique view allows the reader to acquire a deeper understanding of the war, the people involved, and how it affected being of all types, even supposedly impartial ones such as death. This impartial stance that death would supposedly take is mirrored in the innocence of the main character, further cementing the depth that this book has.
]]> Clap When You Land 52516332 In a novel-in-verse that brims with grief and love, National Book Award-winning and New York Times bestselling author Elizabeth Acevedo writes about the devastation of loss, the difficulty of forgiveness, and the bittersweet bonds that shape our lives.

Camino Rios lives for the summers when her father visits her in the Dominican Republic. But this time, on the day when his plane is supposed to land, Camino arrives at the airport to see crowds of crying people�

In New York City, Yahaira Rios is called to the principal’s office, where her mother is waiting to tell her that her father, her hero, has died in a plane crash.

Separated by distance—and Papi’s secrets—the two girls are forced to face a new reality in which their father is dead and their lives are forever altered.

And then, when it seems like they’ve lost everything of their father, they learn of each other.]]> 432 Elizabeth Acevedo 0062882767 Ella 4 4.22 2020 Clap When You Land
author: Elizabeth Acevedo
name: Ella
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> Out of the Easy 18079576
With characters and atmosphere reminiscent of the great Southern novels, Ruta Sepetys creates a rich story of secrets, lies, and the haunting reminder that our decisions shape our destiny.]]> 346 Ruta Sepetys 0147508436 Ella 5 4.13 2013 Out of the Easy
author: Ruta Sepetys
name: Ella
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2013
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> Cosmos 17883935 Cosmos is one of the bestselling science books of all time. In clear-eyed prose, Sagan reveals a jewel-like blue world inhabited by a life form that is just beginning to discover its own identity and to venture into the vast ocean of space. Featuring a new Introduction by Sagan’s collaborator, Ann Druyan, full color illustrations, and a new Foreword by astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, Cosmos retraces the fourteen billion years of cosmic evolution that have transformed matter into consciousness, exploring such topics as the origin of life, the human brain, Egyptian hieroglyphics, spacecraft missions, the death of the Sun, the evolution of galaxies, and the forces and individuals who helped to shape modern science.

Praise for Cosmos
Ěý
“Magnificent . . . With a lyrical literary style, and a range that touches almost all aspects of human knowledge, Cosmos often seems too good to be true.��The Plain Dealer
Ěý
“Sagan is an astronomer with one eye on the stars, another on history, and a third—his mind’s—on the human condition.��Newsday
Ěý
“Brilliant in its scope and provocative in its suggestions . . . shimmers with a sense of wonder.��The Miami Herald
Ěý
“Sagan dazzles the mind with the miracle of our survival, framed by the stately galaxies of space.��Cosmopolitan
Ěý
“Enticing . . . iridescent . . . imaginatively illustrated.��The New York Times Book Review]]> 396 Carl Sagan 0345539435 Ella 1 abandoned 4.58 1980 Cosmos
author: Carl Sagan
name: Ella
average rating: 4.58
book published: 1980
rating: 1
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves: abandoned
review:

]]> Island of the Blue Dolphins 563040 189 Scott O'Dell 0440940001 Ella 4 3.82 1960 Island of the Blue Dolphins
author: Scott O'Dell
name: Ella
average rating: 3.82
book published: 1960
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Gathering Blue (The Giver Quartet, #2)]]> 15816557 Gathering Blue to tell the story of Kira, orphaned, physically flawed, and left with an uncertain future.]]> 256 Lois Lowry 0547904142 Ella 4 3.86 2000 Gathering Blue (The Giver Quartet, #2)
author: Lois Lowry
name: Ella
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2000
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> The Outsiders 30212041 50 years of an iconic classic! The international bestseller and inspiration for a beloved movie--now with bonus content.

This special edition of the groundbreaking novel contains:

Never before seen photos and letters from the publisher's archives
Original review clippings and media coverage
Photos from the author’s personal collection
A gallery of covers around the world
New material from the stars and director of the iconic film--including Francis Ford Coppola, Rob Lowe, Matt Dillon, and others
And much more!

Celebrating 50 years of the novel that laid the groundwork for the YA genre, this is the ultimate edition for fans of THE OUTSIDERS. A perfect way to honor this impressive milestone and a must-have for fans of all ages.

Ponyboy can count on his brothers. And on his friends. But not on much else besides trouble with the Socs, a vicious gang of rich kids whose idea of a good time is beating up on “greasers� like Ponyboy. At least he knows what to expect—until the night someone takes things too far.]]> 180 S.E. Hinton 0425288293 Ella 4 4.32 1967 The Outsiders
author: S.E. Hinton
name: Ella
average rating: 4.32
book published: 1967
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> The Dictionary of Lost Words 54814839 Oxford English Dictionary. Young Esme's place is beneath the sorting table, unseen and unheard. One day a slip of paper containing the word "bondmaid" flutters to the floor. She rescues the slip, and when she learns that the word means slave-girl, she withholds it from the OED and begins to collect words that show women in a more positive light.

As she grows up, Esme realizes that words and meanings relating to women's and common folks' experiences often go unrecorded. And so she begins in earnest to search out words for her own dictionary: The Dictionary of Lost Words. To do so she must leave the sheltered world of the university and venture out to meet the people whose words will fill those pages.

Set during the height of the women's suffrage movement with the Great War looming, The Dictionary of Lost Words reveals a lost narrative, hidden between the lines of a history written by men. Based on actual events and combed from author Pip Williams's experience delving into the archives of the Oxford English Dictionary, this highly original novel is a delightful, lyrical, and deeply thought-provoking celebration of words and the power of language to shape the world.]]> 376 Pip Williams 0593160193 Ella 3 3.93 2020 The Dictionary of Lost Words
author: Pip Williams
name: Ella
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> Where the Red Fern Grows 31428755 9780440412670

For fans of Old Yeller and Shiloh, Where the Red Fern Grows is a beloved classic that captures the powerful bond between man and man’s best friend. This special edition includes new material, including a note to readers from Newbery Medal winner and Printz Honor winner Clare Vanderpool, a letter from Wilson Rawls to aspiring writers, original jacket artwork, and more.

Billy has long dreamt of owning not one, but two dogs. So when he’s finally able to save up enough money for two pups to call his own—Old Dan and Little Ann—he’s ecstatic. It’s true that times are tough, but together they’ll roam the hills of the Ozarks.

Soon Billy and his hounds become the finest hunting team in the valley. Stories of their great achievements spread throughout the region, and the combination of Old Dan’s brawn, Little Ann’s brains, and Billy’s sheer will seems unbeatable. But tragedy awaits these determined hunters—now friends—and Billy learns that hope can grow out of despair.

Source: penguinrandomhouse.com]]> 304 Wilson Rawls Ella 2 4.18 1961 Where the Red Fern Grows
author: Wilson Rawls
name: Ella
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1961
rating: 2
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> The Giver (The Giver, #1) 18812101
Everyone is the same.

Except Jonas.

At the Ceremony of Twelve, the community's twelve-year-olds eagerly accept their predetermined Life Assignments. But Jonas is chosen for something special. He begins instruction in his life's work with a mysterious old man known only as The Giver. Gradually, Jonas learns that power lies in feelings. But when his own power is put to the test -- when he must try to save someone he loves -- he may not be ready. Is it too soon? Or too late?]]> 225 Lois Lowry 0544336267 Ella 5 4.17 1993 The Giver (The Giver, #1)
author: Lois Lowry
name: Ella
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1993
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> Under a Painted Sky 25734156
“This moving novel will captivate you.”—Buzzfeed.com
All Samantha wanted was to move back to New York and pursue her music, which was difficult enough being a Chinese girl in Missouri, 1849. Then her fate takes a turn for the worse after a tragic accident leaves her with nothing and she breaks the law in self-defense. With help from Annamae, a runaway slave she met at the scene of her crime, the two flee town for the unknown frontier.
Ěý Ěý But life on the Oregon Trail is unsafe for two girls. Disguised as Sammy and Andy, two boys heading for the California gold rush, each search for a link to their past and struggle to avoid any unwanted attention. Until they merge paths with a band of cowboys turned allies, and Samantha can’t stop herself from falling for one. But the law is closing in on them and new setbacks come each day, and the girls will quickly learn there are not many places one can hide on the open trail.Ěý Ěý Ěý Ěý Ěý

Winner of the SCBWI Crystal Kite Award
An ALA Best Fiction for Young Adults Pick
An Amelia Bloomer Book]]> 384 Stacey Lee 0147511844 Ella 1 3.94 2015 Under a Painted Sky
author: Stacey Lee
name: Ella
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2015
rating: 1
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:
I am rather notorious for liking every book I read, so when people ask me for an example of a book I didn't like, I typically use this one. I did not like the writing style at all, and I found the characters to be horribly unrealistic. The book is supposed to be set in the mid-1800s and the characters did not reflect that at all, they were far too modern to be convincing. As far as the writing style goes I am sure some people enjoy it, but I was definitely not one of them.
]]> <![CDATA[The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women]]> 31409135 The incredible true story of the women who fought America's Undark danger

The Curies' newly discovered element of radium makes gleaming headlines across the nation as the fresh face of beauty, and wonder drug of the medical community. From body lotion to tonic water, the popular new element shines bright in the otherwise dark years of the First World War.

Meanwhile, hundreds of girls toil amidst the glowing dust of the radium-dial factories. The glittering chemical covers their bodies from head to toe; they light up the night like industrious fireflies. With such a coveted job, these "shining girls" are the luckiest alive—until they begin to fall mysteriously ill.

But the factories that once offered golden opportunities are now ignoring all claims of the gruesome side effects, and the women's cries of corruption. And as the fatal poison of the radium takes hold, the brave shining girls find themselves embroiled in one of the biggest scandals of America's early 20th century, and in a groundbreaking battle for workers' rights that will echo for centuries to come.

Written with a sparkling voice and breakneck pace, The Radium Girls fully illuminates the inspiring young women exposed to the "wonder" substance of radium, and their awe-inspiring strength in the face of almost impossible circumstances. Their courage and tenacity led to life-changing regulations, research into nuclear bombing, and ultimately saved hundreds of thousands of lives.

]]> 479 Kate Moore 149264935X Ella 5 4.13 2016 The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women
author: Kate Moore
name: Ella
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2016
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> Someday, Someday, Maybe 16071745 A charming and laugh-out-loud novel by Lauren Graham, beloved star of Parenthood and Gilmore Girls, about an aspiring actress trying to make it in mid-nineties New York City.

Franny Banks is a struggling actress in New York City, with just six months left of the three-year deadline she gave herself to succeed. But so far, all she has to show for her efforts is a single line in an ad for ugly Christmas sweaters and a degrading waitressing job. She lives in Brooklyn with two roommates - Jane, her best friend from college, and Dan, a sci-fi writer, who is very definitely not boyfriend material - and is struggling with her feelings for a suspiciously charming guy in her acting class, all while trying to find a hair-product cocktail that actually works.

Meanwhile, she dreams of doing "important" work, but only ever seems to get auditions for dishwashing liquid and peanut butter commercials. It's hard to tell if she'll run out of time or money first, but either way, failure would mean facing the fact that she has absolutely no skills to make it in the real world. Her father wants her to come home and teach, her agent won't call her back, and her classmate Penelope, who seems supportive, might just turn out to be her toughest competition yet.

Someday, Someday, Maybe is a funny and charming debut about finding yourself, finding love, and, most difficult of all, finding an acting job.]]> 340 Lauren Graham 0345532740 Ella 5 3.52 2013 Someday, Someday, Maybe
author: Lauren Graham
name: Ella
average rating: 3.52
book published: 2013
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Talking as Fast as I Can: From Gilmore Girls to Gilmore Girls (and Everything in Between)]]> 40411206
In Talking as Fast as I Can, Lauren Graham hits pause for a moment and looks back on her life, sharing laugh-out-loud stories about growing up, starting out as an actress, and, years later, sitting in her trailer on the Parenthood set and asking herself, “Did you, um, make it?� She opens up about the challenges of being single in Hollywood (“Strangers were worried about me; that’s how long I was single!�), the time she was asked to audition her butt for a role, and her experience being a judge on Project Runway (“It’s like I had a fashion-induced blackout�).

In “What It Was Like, Part One,� Graham sits down for an epic Gilmore Girls marathon and reflects on being cast as the fast-talking Lorelai Gilmore. The essay “What It Was Like, Part Two� reveals how it felt to pick up the role again nine years later, and what doing so has meant to her.

Some more things you will learn about Lauren: She once tried to go vegan just to bond with Ellen DeGeneres, she’s aware that meeting guys at awards shows has its pitfalls (“If you’re meeting someone for the first time after three hours of hair, makeup, and styling, you’ve already set the bar too high�), and she’s a card-carrying REI shopper (“My bungee cords now earn points!�).

Including photos and excerpts from the diary Graham kept during the filming of the recent Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life, this book is like a cozy night in, catching up with your best friend, laughing and swapping stories, and—of course—talking as fast as you can.]]> 224 Lauren Graham 0425285189 Ella 5 3.92 2016 Talking as Fast as I Can: From Gilmore Girls to Gilmore Girls (and Everything in Between)
author: Lauren Graham
name: Ella
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2016
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> I Must Betray You 56970272 Romania, 1989. Communist regimes are crumbling across Europe. Seventeen-year-old Cristian Florescu dreams of becoming a writer, but Romanians aren’t free to dream; they are bound by rules and force.

Amidst the tyrannical dictatorship of Nicolae Ceaușescu in a country governed by isolation and fear, Cristian is blackmailed by the secret police to become an informer. He’s left with only two choices: betray everyone and everything he loves—or use his position to creatively undermine the most notoriously evil dictator in Eastern Europe.

Cristian risks everything to unmask the truth behind the regime, give voice to fellow Romanians, and expose to the world what is happening in his country. He eagerly joins the revolution to fight for change when the time arrives. But what is the cost of freedom?

A gut-wrenching, startling window into communist Romania and the citizen spy network that devastated a nation, from the number one New York Times best-selling, award-winning author of Salt to the Sea and Between Shades of Gray.]]> 321 Ruta Sepetys 198483603X Ella 0 to-read 4.38 2022 I Must Betray You
author: Ruta Sepetys
name: Ella
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Fountains of Silence 43220998 A portrait of love, silence, and secrets under a Spanish dictatorship.

� Madrid, 1957 �

Under the oppressive dictatorship of General Francisco Franco, Spain is hiding a dark secret. Meanwhile, tourists and foreign businessmen flood into Spain under the welcoming promise of sunshine and wine. Among them is eighteen-year-old Daniel Matheson, the son of an oil tycoon, who arrives in Madrid with his parents hoping to connect with the country of his mother's birth through the lens of his camera. Photography—and fate—introduce him to Ana, whose family's interweaving obstacles reveal the lingering grasp of the Spanish Civil War, as well as chilling definitions of fortune and fear. Daniel's photographs leave him with uncomfortable questions amidst shadows of danger. He is backed into a corner of difficult decisions to protect those he loves. Lives and hearts collide, revealing an incredibly dark side to the sunny Spanish city.

Master storyteller Ruta Sepetys once again shines light into one of history's darkest corners in this epic, heart-wrenching novel about identity, unforgettable love, repercussions of war, and the hidden violence of silence—inspired by the true postwar struggles of Spain.

Includes vintage media reports, oral history commentary, photos, and more.]]> 495 Ruta Sepetys 0399160310 Ella 5 4.30 2019 The Fountains of Silence
author: Ruta Sepetys
name: Ella
average rating: 4.30
book published: 2019
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> Son (The Giver, #4) 13324841
Son thrusts readers once again into the chilling world of the Newbery Medal winning book, The Giver, as well as Gathering Blue and Messenger where a new hero emerges. In this thrilling series finale, the startling and long-awaited conclusion to Lois Lowry’s epic tale culminates in a final clash between good and evil.]]> 393 Lois Lowry 0547887205 Ella 5 3.98 2012 Son (The Giver, #4)
author: Lois Lowry
name: Ella
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2012
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> Messenger (The Giver, #3) 12930 Ěý
Matty has lived in Village and flourished under the guidance of Seer, a blind man known for his special sight. Village once welcomed newcomers, but something sinister has seeped into Village and the people have voted to close it to outsiders. Matty has been invaluable as a messenger. Now he must risk everything to make one last journey through the treacherous forest with his only weapon, a power he unexpectedly discovers within himself.]]> 169 Lois Lowry 0385732538 Ella 4 3.90 2004 Messenger (The Giver, #3)
author: Lois Lowry
name: Ella
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2004
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The War I Finally Won (The War That Saved My Life, #2)]]> 33865643 Ěý
World War II continues, and forces the small community to come together and rely on one another. Ada has never been interested in getting to know her friend’s family—especially Maggie’s mother, the formidable Lady Thorton. However, circumstances bring them in close proximity along with other unexpected characters.

Ada comes face to face with another German! This time she isn’t sure what she should do. How can she help the ones she loves and keep them safe?

Ada’s first story, The War that Saved My Life, won a Newbery Honor, the Schneider Family Book Award, and the Josette Frank Award, in addition to appearing on multiple best-of-the-year lists. This second, marvelous volume continues Ada’s powerful, uplifting story.]]> 387 Kimberly Brubaker Bradley 0525429204 Ella 5 4.46 2017 The War I Finally Won (The War That Saved My Life, #2)
author: Kimberly Brubaker Bradley
name: Ella
average rating: 4.46
book published: 2017
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/01/06
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments]]> 48615751
As a child, Nezhukumatathil called many places home: the grounds of a Kansas mental institution, where her Filipina mother was a doctor; the open skies and tall mountains of Arizona, where she hiked with her Indian father; and the chillier climes of western New York and Ohio. But no matter where she was transplanted--no matter how awkward the fit or forbidding the landscape--she was able to turn to our world's fierce and funny creatures for guidance.

"What the peacock can do," she tells us, "is remind you of a home you will run away from and run back to all your life." The axolotl teaches us to smile, even in the face of unkindness; the touch-me-not plant shows us how to shake off unwanted advances; the narwhal demonstrates how to survive in hostile environments. Even in the strange and the unlovely, Nezhukumatathil finds beauty and kinship. For it is this way with wonder: it requires that we are curious enough to look past the distractions in order to fully appreciate the world's gifts.

Warm, lyrical, and gorgeously illustrated by Fumi Nakamura, World of Wonders is a book of sustenance and joy.]]> 165 Aimee Nezhukumatathil 1571313656 Ella 4 4.05 2020 World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments
author: Aimee Nezhukumatathil
name: Ella
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2021/10/05
shelves:
review:

]]> The Eighth Life 41071389 Six romances, one revolution, the story of the century.

'That night Stasia took an oath, swearing to learn the recipe by heart and destroy the paper. And when she was lying in her bed again, recalling the taste with all her senses, she was sure that this secret recipe could heal wounds, avert catastrophes, and bring people happiness. But she was wrong.'

At the start of the twentieth century, on the edge of the Russian Empire, a family prospers. It owes its success to a delicious chocolate recipe, passed down the generations with great solemnity and caution. A caution which is justified: this is a recipe for ecstasy that carries a very bitter aftertaste ...

Stasia learns it from her Georgian father and takes it north, following her new husband, Simon, to his posting at the centre of the Russian Revolution in St Petersburg. Stasia's is only the first in a symphony of grand but all too often doomed romances that swirl from sweet to sour in this epic tale of the red century.

Tumbling down the years, and across vast expanses of longing and loss, generation after generation of this compelling family hears echoes and sees reflections. Great characters and greater relationships come and go and come again; the world shakes, and shakes some more, and the reader rejoices to have found at last one of those glorious old books in which you can live and learn, be lost and found, and make indelible new friends.]]> 944 Nino Haratischwili 191161746X Ella 1 abandoned 4.47 2014 The Eighth Life
author: Nino Haratischwili
name: Ella
average rating: 4.47
book published: 2014
rating: 1
read at:
date added: 2021/10/05
shelves: abandoned
review:

]]> Lilac Girls (Lilac Girls, #1) 25893693
On the eve of a fateful war, New York socialite Caroline Ferriday has her hands full with her post at the French consulate and a new love on the horizon. But Caroline’s world is forever changed when Hitler’s army invades Poland in September 1939—and then sets its sights on France.

An ocean away from Caroline, Kasia Kuzmerick, a Polish teenager, senses her carefree youth disappearing as she sinks deeper into her role as courier for the underground resistance movement. In a tense atmosphere of watchful eyes and suspect neighbors, one false move can have dire consequences.

For ambitious young German doctor, Herta Oberheuser, an ad for a government medical position seems her ticket out of a desolate life. But, once hired, she finds herself trapped in a male-dominated realm of Nazi secrets and power.

The lives of these three women are set on a collision course when the unthinkable happens and Kasia is sent to Ravensbrück, the notorious female-only Nazi concentration camp. The tragedy and triumph of their stories cross continents—from New York to Paris, and Germany to Poland—capturing the indomitable pull of compassion to bring justice to those whom history has forgotten.

In Lilac Girls, Martha Hall Kelly has crafted a remarkable novel of unsung women and their quest for love, happiness, and second chances. It is a story that will keep readers bonded with the characters, searching for the truth, until the final pages.]]> 487 Martha Hall Kelly 1101883073 Ella 5 4.27 2016 Lilac Girls (Lilac Girls, #1)
author: Martha Hall Kelly
name: Ella
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2016
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2021/08/19
shelves:
review:

]]> Water for Elephants 43641
Beautifully written, Water for Elephants is illuminated by a wonderful sense of time and place. It tells a story of a love between two people that overcomes incredible odds in a world in which even love is a luxury that few can afford.]]> 368 Sara Gruen 1565125606 Ella 5 4.11 2006 Water for Elephants
author: Sara Gruen
name: Ella
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2006
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2021/08/19
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The War That Saved My Life (The War That Saved My Life, #1)]]> 20912424 An exceptionally moving story of triumph against all odds set during World War 2, from the acclaimed author of Jefferson’s Sons and for fans of Number the Stars.
Ěý
Ten-year-old Ada has never left her one-room apartment. Her mother is too humiliated by Ada’s twisted foot to let her outside. So when her little brother Jamie is shipped out of London to escape the war, Ada doesn’t waste a minute—she sneaks out to join him.
Ěý
So begins a new adventure of Ada, and for Susan Smith, the woman who is forced to take the two kids in. As Ada teaches herself to ride a pony, learns to read, and watches for German spies, she begins to trust Susan—and Susan begins to love Ada and Jamie. But in the end, will their bond be enough to hold them together through wartime? Or will Ada and her brother fall back into the cruel hands of their mother?
Ěý
This masterful work of historical fiction is equal parts adventure and a moving tale of family and identity—a classic in the making.]]> 316 Kimberly Brubaker Bradley 0803740816 Ella 5 4.47 2015 The War That Saved My Life (The War That Saved My Life, #1)
author: Kimberly Brubaker Bradley
name: Ella
average rating: 4.47
book published: 2015
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2021/08/19
shelves:
review:

]]>