Taylor's bookshelf: all en-US Sun, 06 Apr 2025 11:35:17 -0700 60 Taylor's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg A Gentleman in Moscow 34066798 The mega-bestseller with more than 2 million readers—Now a Paramount+ with Showtime series starring Ewan McGregor as Count Alexander Rostov

From the #1 New York Times-bestselling author of The Lincoln Highway and Rules of Civility, a beautifully transporting novel about a man who is ordered to spend the rest of his life inside a luxury hotel

In 1922, Count Alexander Rostov is deemed an unrepentant aristocrat by a Bolshevik tribunal, and is sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol, a grand hotel across the street from the Kremlin. Rostov, an indomitable man of erudition and wit, has never worked a day in his life, and must now live in an attic room while some of the most tumultuous decades in Russian history are unfolding outside the hotel’s doors. Unexpectedly, his reduced circumstances provide him entry into a much larger world of emotional discovery.

Brimming with humor, a glittering cast of characters, and one beautifully rendered scene after another, this singular novel casts a spell as it relates the count’s endeavor to gain a deeper understanding of what it means to be a man of purpose.]]>
462 Amor Towles Taylor 5 to-read 4.28 2016 A Gentleman in Moscow
author: Amor Towles
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2016
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
The September House 64623481 A woman is determined to stay in her dream home even after it becomes a haunted nightmare in this compulsively readable, twisty, and layered debut novel.

When Margaret and her husband Hal bought the large Victorian house on Hawthorn Street—for sale at a surprisingly reasonable price—they couldn’t believe they finally had a home of their own. Then they discovered the hauntings. Every September, the walls drip blood. The ghosts of former inhabitants appear, and all of them are terrified of something that lurks in the basement. Most people would flee.

Margaret is not most people.

Margaret is staying. It’s her house. But after four years Hal can’t take it anymore, and he leaves abruptly. Now, he’s not returning calls, and their daughter Katherine—who knows nothing about the hauntings—arrives, intent on looking for her missing father. To make things worse, September has just begun, and with every attempt Margaret and Katherine make at finding Hal, the hauntings grow more harrowing, because there are some secrets the house needs to keep.]]>
352 Carissa Orlando 0593548612 Taylor 0 to-read 3.87 2023 The September House
author: Carissa Orlando
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Butcher and the Wren (Dr. Wren Muller, #1)]]> 60672388
From the co-host of chart-topping true crime podcast Morbid, a thrilling debut novel told from the dueling perspectives of a notorious serial killer and the medical examiner following where his trail of victims leads

Something dark is lurking in the Louisiana bayou: a methodical killer with a penchant for medical experimentation is hard at work completing his most harrowing crime yet, taunting the authorities who desperately try to catch up.

But forensic pathologist Dr. Wren Muller is the best there is. Armed with an encyclopedic knowledge of historical crimes, and years of experience working in the Medical Examiner's office, she's never encountered a case she couldn't solve. Until now. Case after case is piling up on Wren's examination table, and soon she is sucked into an all-consuming cat-and-mouse chase with a brutal murderer getting more brazen by the day.

An addictive read with straight-from-the-morgue details only an autopsy technician could provide, The Butcher and the Wren promises to ensnare all who enter.]]>
242 Alaina Urquhart 1638930147 Taylor 0 to-read 3.72 2022 The Butcher and the Wren (Dr. Wren Muller, #1)
author: Alaina Urquhart
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
A Tale for the Time Being 15811545
Across the Pacific, we meet Ruth, a novelist living on a remote island who discovers a collection of artifacts washed ashore in a Hello Kitty lunchbox—possibly debris from the devastating 2011 tsunami. As the mystery of its contents unfolds, Ruth is pulled into the past, into Nao's drama and her unknown fate, and forward into her own future.Ěý

Full of Ozeki's signature humour and deeply engaged with the relationship between writer and reader, past and present, fact and fiction, quantum physics, history, and myth, A Tale for the Time Being is a brilliantly inventive, beguiling story of our shared humanity and the search for home.]]>
432 Ruth Ozeki 0670026638 Taylor 0 currently-reading 4.06 2013 A Tale for the Time Being
author: Ruth Ozeki
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2013
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/10/21
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]>
No Exit 35522836
Darby Thorne is a college student stranded by a blizzard at a highway rest stop in the middle of nowhere. She’s on the way home to see her sick mother. She’ll have to spend the night in the rest stop with four complete strangers. Then she stumbles across a little girl locked inside one of their parked cars.

There is no cell phone reception, no telephone, no way out because of the snow, and she doesn’t know which one of the other travelers is the kidnapper.

Who is the little girl? Why has she been taken? And how can Darby save her?]]>
287 Taylor Adams 1912106760 Taylor 0 to-read 3.98 2017 No Exit
author: Taylor Adams
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/09/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
The Push 52476830 An alternative cover edition for this ISBN can be found here.

A tense, page-turning psychological drama about the making and breaking of a family–and a woman whose experience of motherhood is nothing at all what she hoped for–and everything she feared.

Blythe Connor is determined that she will be the warm, comforting mother to her new baby Violet that she herself never had.

But in the thick of motherhood’s exhausting early days, Blythe becomes convinced that something is wrong with her daughter–she doesn’t behave like most children do.

Or is it all in Blythe’s head? Her husband, Fox, says she’s imagining things. The more Fox dismisses her fears, the more Blythe begins to question her own sanity, and the more we begin to question what Blythe is telling us about her life as well.

Then their son Sam is born–and with him, Blythe has the blissful connection she’d always imagined with her child. Even Violet seems to love her little brother. But when life as they know it is changed in an instant, the devastating fall-out forces Blythe to face the truth.

The Push is a tour de force you will read in a sitting, an utterly immersive novel that will challenge everything you think you know about motherhood, about what we owe our children, and what it feels like when women are not believed.]]>
307 Ashley Audrain 1984881663 Taylor 0 to-read 4.03 2021 The Push
author: Ashley Audrain
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/09/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Sometimes I Lie 32326398 1. I’m in a coma.
2. My husband doesn’t love me anymore.
3. Sometimes I lie

Amber wakes up in a hospital. She can’t move. She can’t speak. She can’t open her eyes. She can hear everyone around her, but they have no idea. Amber doesn’t remember what happened, but she has a suspicion her husband had something to do with it. Alternating between her paralyzed present, the week before her accident, and a series of childhood diaries from twenty years ago, this brilliant psychological thriller Is something really a lie if you believe it's the truth?]]>
387 Alice Feeney 0008225354 Taylor 0 to-read 3.73 2017 Sometimes I Lie
author: Alice Feeney
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/09/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Kind Worth Killing (Henry Kimball/Lily Kintner, #1)]]> 21936809 The Girl on the Train will love this modern reimagining of Patricia Highsmith’s classic Strangers on a Train from the author of the acclaimed The Girl with a Clock for a Heart—which the Washington Post said “should be a contender for crime fiction’s best first novel of 2014.�

On a night flight from London to Boston, Ted Severson meets the stunning and mysterious Lily Kintner. Sharing one too many martinis, the strangers begin to play a game of truth, revealing very intimate details about themselves. Ted talks about his marriage that’s going stale and his wife Miranda, who he’s sure is cheating on him. Ted and his wife were a mismatch from the start—he the rich businessman, she the artistic free spirit—a contrast that once inflamed their passion, but has now become a cliché.

But their game turns a little darker when Ted jokes that he could kill Miranda for what she’s done. Lily, without missing a beat, says calmly, “I’d like to help.� After all, some people are the kind worth killing, like a lying, stinking, cheating spouse. . . .

Back in Boston, Ted and Lily’s twisted bond grows stronger as they begin to plot Miranda's demise. But there are a few things about Lily’s past that she hasn’t shared with Ted, namely her experience in the art and craft of murder, a journey that began in her very precocious youth.

Suddenly these co-conspirators are embroiled in a chilling game of cat-and-mouse, one they both cannot survive . . . with a shrewd and very determined detective on their tail.]]>
320 Peter Swanson 0062267523 Taylor 0 to-read 3.98 2015 The Kind Worth Killing (Henry Kimball/Lily Kintner, #1)
author: Peter Swanson
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/09/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
No One Can Know 127305892
Emma has never told anyone what she saw the night her parents died, even when she became the prime suspect. But her presence in the house threatens to uncover secrets that have stayed hidden for years, and the sisters are drawn together once again. As they face their memories of the past, rivalries restart, connections are forged, and, for the first time, Emma starts to ask questions about what really happened that night.

The more Emma learns, the more riddles emerge. And Emma begins to wonder just what her siblings will do to keep the past buried, and whether she did the right thing staying quiet about what was whispered that night: “No one can know.”]]>
325 Kate Alice Marshall 1250859913 Taylor 0 to-read 3.65 2024 No One Can Know
author: Kate Alice Marshall
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.65
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/09/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Heart-Shaped Box 153025
But what UPS delivers to his door in a black heart-shaped box is no imaginary or metaphorical ghost, it's the real thing. And suddenly the suit's previous owner is everywhere - behind the bedroom door... seated in Jude's restored vintage Mustang... staring out from his widescreen TV - dangling a gleaming razor blade on a chain from one hand...]]>
376 Joe Hill 0061147931 Taylor 0 currently-reading 3.85 2007 Heart-Shaped Box
author: Joe Hill
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/09/03
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity]]> 11869272
In this brilliantly written, fast-paced book, based on three years of uncompromising reporting, a bewildering age of global change and inequality is made human.

Annawadi is a makeshift settlement in the shadow of luxury hotels near the Mumbai airport, and as India starts to prosper, Annawadians are electric with hope. Abdul, a reflective and enterprising Muslim teenager, sees "a fortune beyond counting" in the recyclable garbage that richer people throw away. Asha, a woman of formidable wit and deep scars from a childhood in rural poverty, has identified an alternate route to the middle class: political corruption. With a little luck, her sensitive, beautiful daughter - Annawadi's "most-everything girl" - will soon become its first female college graduate. And even the poorest Annawadians, like Kalu, a fifteen-year-old scrap-metal thief, believe themselves inching closer to the good lives and good times they call "the full enjoy."

But then Abdul the garbage sorter is falsely accused in a shocking tragedy; terror and a global recession rock the city; and suppressed tensions over religion, caste, sex, power and economic envy turn brutal. As the tenderest individual hopes intersect with the greatest global truths, the true contours of a competitive age are revealed. And so, too, are the imaginations and courage of the people of Annawadi.

With intelligence, humor, and deep insight into what connects human beings to one another in an era of tumultuous change, Behind the Beautiful Forevers carries the reader headlong into one of the twenty-first century's hidden worlds, and into the lives of people impossible to forget.]]>
278 Katherine Boo 1400067553 Taylor 0 to-read 3.97 2012 Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity
author: Katherine Boo
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/05/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Fighting for Dear Life: The Untold Story of Terri Schiavo and What It Means for All of Us]]> 623066 288 David Gibbs 076420243X Taylor 0 to-read 4.01 2006 Fighting for Dear Life: The Untold Story of Terri Schiavo and What It Means for All of Us
author: David Gibbs
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/03/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust]]> 408615
Incredibly, Immaculee survived the slaughter. For 91 days, she and seven other women huddled silently together in the cramped bathroom of a local pastor while hundreds of machete-wielding killers hunted for them.Ěý

It was during those endless hours of unspeakable terror that Immaculee discovered the power of prayer, eventually shedding her fear of death and forging a profound and lasting relationship with God. She emerged from her bathroom hideout having discovered the meaning of truly unconditional love—a love so strong she was able seek out and forgive her family’s killers.

The triumphant story of this remarkable young woman’s journey through the darkness of genocide will inspire anyone whose life has been touched by fear, suffering, and loss.]]>
214 Immaculée Ilibagiza 1401908977 Taylor 0 to-read 4.42 2006 Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust
author: Immaculée Ilibagiza
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/03/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Firekeeper’s Daughter 52346471
After Daunis witnesses a shocking murder that thrusts her into a criminal investigation, she agrees to go undercover. But the deceptions—and deaths—keep piling up and soon the threat strikes too close to home. How far will she go to protect her community if it means tearing apart the only world she’s ever known?]]>
496 Angeline Boulley Taylor 4 4.32 2021 Firekeeper’s Daughter
author: Angeline Boulley
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.32
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2022/02/17
date added: 2024/01/03
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis]]> 27161156 Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780062300546.

Hillbilly Elegy recounts J.D. Vance's powerful origin story...

From a former marine and Yale Law School graduate now serving as a U.S. Senator from Ohio and the Republican Vice Presidential candidate for the 2024 election, an incisive account of growing up in a poor Rust Belt town that offers a broader, probing look at the struggles of America's white working class.


Hillbilly Elegy is a passionate and personal analysis of a culture in crisis—that of white working-class Americans. The disintegration of this group, a process that has been slowly occurring now for more than forty years, has been reported with growing frequency and alarm, but has never before been written about as searingly from the inside. J. D. Vance tells the true story of what a social, regional, and class decline feels like when you were born with it hung around your neck.

The Vance family story begins hopefully in postwar America. J. D.'s grandparents were "dirt poor and in love," and moved north from Kentucky's Appalachia region to Ohio in the hopes of escaping the dreadful poverty around them. They raised a middle-class family, and eventually one of their grandchildren would graduate from Yale Law School, a conventional marker of success in achieving generational upward mobility. But as the family saga of Hillbilly Elegy plays out, we learn that J.D.'s grandparents, aunt, uncle, and, most of all, his mother struggled profoundly with the demands of their new middle-class life, never fully escaping the legacy of abuse, alcoholism, poverty, and trauma so characteristic of their part of America. With piercing honesty, Vance shows how he himself still carries around the demons of his chaotic family history.

A deeply moving memoir, with its share of humor and vividly colorful figures, Hillbilly Elegy is the story of how upward mobility really feels. And it is an urgent and troubling meditation on the loss of the American dream for a large segment of this country.]]>
264 J.D. Vance Taylor 4 3.81 2016 Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis
author: J.D. Vance
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/12/27
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes (The Hunger Games, #0)]]> 51901147
The odds are against him. He's been given the humiliating assignment of mentoring the female tribute from District 12, the lowest of the low. Their fates are now completely intertwined -- every choice Coriolanus makes could lead to favor or failure, triumph or ruin. Inside the arena, it will be a fight to the death. Outside the arena, Coriolanus starts to feel for his doomed tribute... and must weigh his need to follow the rules against his desire to survive no matter what it takes.]]>
541 Suzanne Collins Taylor 3 3.99 2020 The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes (The Hunger Games, #0)
author: Suzanne Collins
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2023/12/21
shelves:
review:

]]>
Year of Wonders 4965
Through Anna's eyes we follow the story of the fateful year of 1666, as she and her fellow villagers confront the spread of disease and superstition.

As death reaches into every household and villagers turn from prayers to murderous witch-hunting, Anna must find the strength to confront the disintegration of her community and the lure of illicit love.

As she struggles to survive and grow, a year of catastrophe becomes instead annus mirabilis, a "year of wonders."

Inspired by the true story of Eyam, a village in the rugged hill country of England, Year of Wonders is a richly detailed evocation of a singular moment in history. ]]>
304 Geraldine Brooks 0142001430 Taylor 0 to-read 4.00 2001 Year of Wonders
author: Geraldine Brooks
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2001
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/11/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Flowers for Algernon 18373 Winner of both the Hugo and Nebula Awards, the powerful, classic story about a man who receives an operation that turns him into a genius...and introduces him to heartache.
Ěý
Charlie Gordon is about to embark upon an unprecedented journey. Born with an unusually low IQ, he has been chosen as the perfect subject for an experimental surgery that researchers hope will increase his intelligence � a procedure that has already been highly successful when tested on a lab mouse named Algernon.

As the treatment takes effect, Charlie's intelligence expands until it surpasses that of the doctors who engineered his metamorphosis. The experiment appears to be a scientific breakthrough of paramount importance, until Algernon suddenly deteriorates. Will the same happen to Charlie?]]>
311 Daniel Keyes 015603008X Taylor 0 to-read 4.19 1966 Flowers for Algernon
author: Daniel Keyes
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1966
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/09/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Wicked: The Grimmerie 24937 Wicked

Wicked: The Grimmerie is the behind-the-scenes story of the hit that has captivated Broadway—and now the world. Designed to resemble the ancient book of spells that changes Ozian history, Wicked: The Grimmerie includes profiles of the cast and creative team, the complete, illustrated lyrics to all the songs, and more than 200 full-color photographs. Packed with thrillifying details, Wicked: The Grimmerie is also full of bonus features that will delight fans of the show, from an Ozian Glossararium and an Oz travelogue to a step-by-step look at how Elphaba gets green. No need for innuendo or outuendo: This is a must-have for Wicked fans of all ages.]]>
191 David Cote 1401308201 Taylor 0 to-read 4.19 2005 Wicked: The Grimmerie
author: David Cote
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2005
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/07/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Pet Sematary 33124137 This is an alternate Cover Edition for ASIN: B00K3NEE56. When the Creeds move into a beautiful old house in rural Maine, it all seems too good to be true: physician father, beautiful wife, charming little daughter, adorable infant son-and now an idyllic home. As a family, they've got it all...right down to the friendly car. But the nearby woods hide a blood-chilling truth-more terrifying than death itself-and hideously more powerful. The Creeds are going to learn that sometimes dead is better.]]> 580 Stephen King Taylor 0 to-read 4.21 1983 Pet Sematary
author: Stephen King
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1983
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/06/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
’Salem’s Lot 11590 Librarian's Note: Alternate-cover edition for ISBN 0450031063

Thousands of miles away from the small township of 'Salem's Lot, two terrified people, a man and a boy, still share the secrets of those clapboard houses and tree-lined streets. They must return to 'Salem's Lot for a final confrontation with the unspeakable evil that lives on in the town.]]>
483 Stephen King 0450031063 Taylor 0 to-read 4.06 1975 ’Salem’s Lot
author: Stephen King
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.06
book published: 1975
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/06/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Misery 10614 #1, #2, #3, #4

Paul Sheldon. He's a bestselling novelist who has finally met his biggest fan. Her name is Annie Wilkes and she is more than a rabid reader - she is Paul's nurse, tending his shattered body after an automobile accident. But she is also his captor, keeping him prisoner in her isolated house.]]>
370 Stephen King 0450417395 Taylor 0 to-read 4.22 1987 Misery
author: Stephen King
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1987
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/06/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Old Dogs and Children 166781 456 Robert Inman 0316419141 Taylor 0 to-read 3.96 1991 Old Dogs and Children
author: Robert Inman
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1991
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/05/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
The Murmur of Bees 42306076 From a beguiling voice in Mexican fiction comes an astonishing novel—her first to be translated into English—about a mysterious child with the power to change a family’s history in a country on the verge of revolution.

From the day that old Nana Reja found a baby abandoned under a bridge, the life of a small Mexican town forever changed. Disfigured and covered in a blanket of bees, little Simonopio is for some locals the stuff of superstition, a child kissed by the devil. But he is welcomed by landowners Francisco and Beatriz Morales, who adopt him and care for him as if he were their own. As he grows up, Simonopio becomes a cause for wonder to the Morales family, because when the uncannily gifted child closes his eyes, he can see what no one else can—visions of all that’s yet to come, both beautiful and dangerous. Followed by his protective swarm of bees and living to deliver his adoptive family from threats—both human and those of nature—Simonopio’s purpose in Linares will, in time, be divined.

Set against the backdrop of the Mexican Revolution and the devastating influenza of 1918, The Murmur of Bees captures both the fate of a country in flux and the destiny of one family that has put their love, faith, and future in the unbelievable.]]>
471 SofĂ­a Segovia 1542090490 Taylor 0 currently-reading 4.20 2015 The Murmur of Bees
author: SofĂ­a Segovia
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/05/01
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Where the Forest Meets the Stars]]> 40545956 In this gorgeously stunning debut, a mysterious child teaches two strangers how to love and trust again.

After the loss of her mother and her own battle with breast cancer, Joanna Teale returns to her graduate research on nesting birds in rural Illinois, determined to prove that her recent hardships have not broken her. She throws herself into her work from dusk to dawn, until her solitary routine is disrupted by the appearance of a mysterious child who shows up at her cabin barefoot and covered in bruises.

The girl calls herself Ursa, and she claims to have been sent from the stars to witness five miracles. With concerns about the child’s home situation, Jo reluctantly agrees to let her stay―just until she learns more about Ursa’s past.

Jo enlists the help of her reclusive neighbor, Gabriel Nash, to solve the mystery of the charming child. But the more time they spend together, the more questions they have. How does a young girl not only read but understand Shakespeare? Why do good things keep happening in her presence? And why aren’t Jo and Gabe checking the missing children’s website anymore?

Though the three have formed an incredible bond, they know difficult choices must be made. As the summer nears an end and Ursa gets closer to her fifth miracle, her dangerous past closes in. When it finally catches up to them, all of their painful secrets will be forced into the open, and their fates will be left to the stars.]]>
332 Glendy Vanderah 154204006X Taylor 3 3.98 2019 Where the Forest Meets the Stars
author: Glendy Vanderah
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2019
rating: 3
read at: 2023/04/30
date added: 2023/04/30
shelves:
review:

]]>
Under the Whispering Door 53205888 Welcome to Charon's Crossing.
The tea is hot, the scones are fresh, and the dead are just passing through.

When a reaper comes to collect Wallace from his own funeral, Wallace begins to suspect he might be dead.

And when Hugo, the owner of a peculiar tea shop, promises to help him cross over, Wallace decides he’s definitely dead.

But even in death he’s not ready to abandon the life he barely lived, so when Wallace is given one week to cross over, he sets about living a lifetime in seven days.

Hilarious, haunting, and kind, Under the Whispering Door is an uplifting story about a life spent at the office and a death spent building a home.]]>
376 T.J. Klune 1250217342 Taylor 0 to-read 4.11 2021 Under the Whispering Door
author: T.J. Klune
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/04/20
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
The Samurai's Garden 51113 ]]> 211 Gail Tsukiyama 0312144075 Taylor 4 4.15 1995 The Samurai's Garden
author: Gail Tsukiyama
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1995
rating: 4
read at: 2023/04/20
date added: 2023/04/20
shelves:
review:

]]>
House of Leaves 24800
Of course, neither Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist Will Navidson nor his companion Karen Green was prepared to face the consequences of that impossibility, until the day their two little children wandered off and their voices eerily began to return another story—of creature darkness, of an ever-growing abyss behind a closet door, and of that unholy growl which soon enough would tear through their walls and consume all their dreams.]]>
710 Mark Z. Danielewski Taylor 0 to-read 4.11 2000 House of Leaves
author: Mark Z. Danielewski
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2000
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/04/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Keeper of Enchanted Rooms (Whimbrel House, #1)]]> 60596112
Hulda Larkin of the Boston Institute for the Keeping of Enchanted Rooms has been trained in taming such structures in order to preserve their historical and magical significance. She understands the dangers of bespelled homes given to tantrums. She advises that it’s in Merritt’s best interest to make Whimbrel House their ally. To do that, she’ll need to move in, too.

Prepared as she is with augury, a set of magic tools, and a new staff trained in the uncanny, Hulda’s work still proves unexpectedly difficult. She and Merritt grow closer as the investigation progresses, but the house’s secrets run deeper than they anticipated. And the sentient walls aren’t their only concern—something outside is coming for the enchantments of Whimbrel House, and it could be more dangerous than what rattles within.]]>
347 Charlie N. Holmberg 1662500335 Taylor 0 to-read 4.14 2022 Keeper of Enchanted Rooms (Whimbrel House, #1)
author: Charlie N. Holmberg
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/04/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Fairy Tale 60177373 Legendary storyteller Stephen King goes deep into the well of his imagination in this spellbinding novel about a seventeen-year-old boy who inherits the keys to a parallel world where good and evil are at war, and the stakes could not be higher—for their world or ours.

Charlie Reade looks like a regular high school kid, great at baseball and football, a decent student. But he carries a heavy load. His mom was killed in a hit-and-run accident when he was ten, and grief drove his dad to drink. Charlie learned how to take care of himself—and his dad. Then, when Charlie is seventeen, he meets Howard Bowditch, a recluse with a big dog in a big house at the top of a big hill. In the backyard is a locked shed from which strange sounds emerge, as if some creature is trying to escape. When Mr. Bowditch dies, he leaves Charlie the house, a massive amount of gold, a cassette tape telling a story that is impossible to believe, and a responsibility far too massive for a boy to shoulder.

Because within the shed is a portal to another world—one whose denizens are in peril and whose monstrous leaders may destroy their own world, and ours. In this parallel universe, where two moons race across the sky, and the grand towers of a sprawling palace pierce the clouds, there are exiled princesses and princes who suffer horrific punishments; there are dungeons; there are games in which men and women must fight each other to the death for the amusement of the “Fair One.� And there is a magic sundial that can turn back time.

A story as old as myth, and as startling and iconic as the rest of King’s work, Fairy Tale is about an ordinary guy forced into the hero’s role by circumstance, and it is both spectacularly suspenseful and satisfying.]]>
607 Stephen King 1668002175 Taylor 3 4.05 2022 Fairy Tale
author: Stephen King
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2022
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2023/04/15
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration]]> 8171378
Wilkerson tells this interwoven story through the lives of three unforgettable protagonists: Ida Mae Gladney, a sharecropper’s wife, who in 1937 fled Mississippi for Chicago; sharp and quick-tempered George Starling, who in 1945 fled Florida for Harlem, and Robert Foster, a surgeon who left Louisiana in 1953 in hopes of making it in California.

Wilkerson brilliantly captures their first treacherous cross-country journeys by car and train and their new lives in colonies in the New World. The Warmth of Other Suns is a bold, remarkable, and riveting work, a superb account of an “unrecognized immigration� within our own land. Through the breadth of its narrative, the beauty of the writing, the depth of its research, and the fullness of the people and lives portrayed herein, this book is a modern classic.]]>
622 Isabel Wilkerson 0679444327 Taylor 0 to-read 4.45 2010 The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration
author: Isabel Wilkerson
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.45
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/09
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Maame 60784605 Shortlisted for the TikTok Book Awards in the Book of the Year, 2023 and the Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ Debut and Fiction Book of the Year, 2023.

It’s fair to say that Maddie’s life in London is far from rewarding. With a mother who spends most of her time in Ghana (yet still somehow manages to be overbearing), Maddie is the primary caretaker for her father, who suffers from advanced stage Parkinson’s. At work, her boss is a nightmare and Maddie is tired of always being the only Black person in every meeting.

When her mum returns from her latest trip to Ghana, Maddie leaps at the chance to get out of the family home and finally start living. A self-acknowledged late bloomer, she’s ready to experience some important “firsts�: She finds a flat share, says yes to after-work drinks, pushes for more recognition in her career, and throws herself into the bewildering world of internet dating. But it's not long before tragedy strikes, forcing Maddie to face the true nature of her unconventional family, and the perils—and rewards—of putting her life on the line.

Smart, funny, and deeply affecting, Jessica George's Maame deals with the themes of our time with humor and poignancy: from familial duty and racism, to female pleasure, the complexity of love, and the life-saving power of friendship. Most important, it explores what it feels like to be torn between two homes and cultures―and it celebrates finally being able to find where you belong.]]>
320 Jessica George Taylor 0 to-read 4.03 2023 Maame
author: Jessica George
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
The Librarian of Burned Books 61190260 For fans of The Rose Code and The Paris Library, The Librarian of Burned Books is a captivating WWII-era novel about the intertwined fates of three women who believe in the power of books to triumph over the very darkest moments of war.


Berlin 1933. Following the success of her debut novel, American writer Althea James receives an invitation from Joseph Goebbels himself to participate in a culture exchange program in Germany. For a girl from a small town in Maine, 1933 Berlin seems to be sparklingly cosmopolitan, blossoming in the midst of a great change with the charismatic new chancellor at the helm. Then Althea meets a beautiful woman who promises to show her the real Berlin, and soon she's drawn into a group of resisters who make her question everything she knows about her hosts--and herself.

Paris 1936. She may have escaped Berlin for Paris, but Hannah Brecht discovers the City of Light is no refuge from the anti-Semitism and Nazi sympathizers she thought she left behind. Heartbroken and tormented by the role she played in the betrayal that destroyed her family, Hannah throws herself into her work at the German Library of Burned Books. Through the quiet power of books, she believes she can help counter the tide of fascism she sees rising across Europe and atone for her mistakes. But when a dear friend decides actions will speak louder than words, Hannah must decide what stories she is willing to live--or die--for.

New York 1944. Since her husband Edward was killed fighting the Nazis, Vivian Childs has been waging her own war: preventing a powerful senator's attempts to censor the Armed Service Editions, portable paperbacks that are shipped by the millions to soldiers overseas. Viv knows just how much they mean to the men through the letters she receives--including the last one she got from Edward. She also knows the only way to win this battle is to counter the senator's propaganda with a story of her own--at the heart of which lies the reclusive and mysterious woman tending the American Library of Nazi-Banned Books in Brooklyn.

As Viv unknowingly brings her censorship fight crashing into the secrets of the recent past, the fates of these three women will converge, changing all of them forever.

Inspired by the true story of the Council of Books in Wartime--the WWII organization founded by booksellers, publishers, librarians, and authors to use books as "weapons in the war of ideas"--The Librarian of Burned Books is an unforgettable historical novel, a haunting love story, and a testament to the beauty, power, and goodness of the written word.]]>
416 Brianna Labuskes 0063259257 Taylor 0 to-read 3.85 2023 The Librarian of Burned Books
author: Brianna Labuskes
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Victory City 61111246
In the fourteenth century of the Common Era, in the South of what we now call India, nine-year-old Pampa Kampana, orphaned by war, starts hearing the voice of a goddess. Inspired, and imbued with powerful magic, she vows to ensure that no more women suffer her beloved mother's unconscionable fate. Aided by miracles and a gift for prophecy, she creates a mighty city; her whispered words galvanize its people to grow and change. Her poetry maps the rise and fall of its empire. And the prophetess herself--beloved, feared, timeless--watches as the world changes across the centuries and her body, frozen in the beauty of youth for decades upon decades, fades along with her city's glory. Half a millennium later, her writing is discovered, deep in the ancient earth.

The thirteenth novel from the incomparable Salman Rushdie, Victory City is an epic tale with a message for us all: our power is fleeting, but our stories last forever.]]>
336 Salman Rushdie 0593243390 Taylor 0 to-read 3.70 2023 Victory City
author: Salman Rushdie
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Last Tale of the Flower Bride]]> 61150759
Once upon a time, a man who believed in fairy tales married a beautiful, mysterious woman named Indigo Maxwell-Casteñada. He was a scholar of myths. She was heiress to a fortune. They exchanged gifts and stories and believed they would live happily ever after—and in exchange for her love, Indigo extracted a promise: that her bridegroom would never pry into her past.

But when Indigo learns that her estranged aunt is dying and the couple is forced to return to her childhood home, the House of Dreams, the bridegroom will soon find himself unable to resist. For within the crumbling manor’s extravagant rooms and musty halls, there lurks the shadow of another girl: Azure, Indigo’s dearest childhood friend who suddenly disappeared. As the house slowly reveals his wife’s secrets, the bridegroom will be forced to choose between reality and fantasy, even if doing so threatens to destroy their marriage . . . or their lives.

Combining the lush, haunting atmosphere of Mexican Gothic with the dreamy enchantment of The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, The Last Tale of the Flower Bride is a spellbinding and darkly romantic page-turner about love and lies, secrets and betrayal, and the stories we tell ourselves to survive.]]>
289 Roshani Chokshi Taylor 0 to-read 3.68 2023 The Last Tale of the Flower Bride
author: Roshani Chokshi
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Time's Undoing 61261007
Birmingham, 1929: Robert Lee Harrington, a master carpenter, has just moved to Alabama to pursue a job opportunity, bringing along his pregnant wife and young daughter. Birmingham is in its heyday, known as the “Magic City� for its booming steel industry, and while Robert and his family find much to enjoy in the city’s busy markets and vibrant nightlife, it’s also a stronghold for the Klan. And with his beautiful, light-skinned wife and snazzy car, Robert begins to worry that he might be drawing the wrong kind of attention.

2019: Meghan McKenzie, the youngest reporter at the Detroit Free Press, has grown up hearing family lore about her great-grandfather’s murder—but no one knows the full story of what really happened back then, and his body was never found. Determined to find answers to her family’s long-buried tragedy and spurred by the urgency of the Black Lives Matter movement, Meghan travels to Birmingham. But as her investigation begins to uncover dark secrets that spider across both the city and time, her life may be in danger.

Inspired by true events, Time’s Undoing is both a passionate tale of one woman’s quest for the truth behind the racially motivated trauma that has haunted her family for generations and, as newfound friends and supporters in Birmingham rally around Meghan’s search, the uplifting story of a community coming together to fight for change.]]>
384 Cheryl A. Head 0593471822 Taylor 0 to-read 3.98 2023 Time's Undoing
author: Cheryl A. Head
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[What Happened to Ruthy Ramirez]]> 61399125
The years since Ruthy's disappearance haven't been easy on the Ramirez family. It’s 2008, and their mother, Dolores, still struggles with the loss, Jessica juggles a newborn baby with her hospital job, and Nina, after four successful years at college, has returned home to medical school rejections and is forced to work in the mall folding tiny bedazzled thongs at the lingerie store.

After seeing maybe‑Ruthy on their screen, Jessica and Nina hatch a plan to drive to where the show is filmed in search of their long‑lost sister. When Dolores catches wind of their scheme, she insists on joining, along with her pot-stirring holy roller best friend, Irene. What follows is a family road trip and reckoning that will force the Ramirez women to finally face the past and look toward a future—with or without Ruthy in it.]]>
240 Claire Jiménez 1538725967 Taylor 0 to-read 3.51 2023 What Happened to Ruthy Ramirez
author: Claire Jiménez
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.51
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Weyward 60654349 I am a Weyward, and wild inside.

2019: Under cover of darkness, Kate flees London for ramshackle Weyward Cottage, inherited from a great aunt she barely remembers. With its tumbling ivy and overgrown garden, the cottage is worlds away from the abusive partner who tormented Kate. But she begins to suspect that her great aunt had a secret. One that lurks in the bones of the cottage, hidden ever since the witch-hunts of the 17th century.

1619: Altha is awaiting trial for the murder of a local farmer who was stampeded to death by his herd. As a girl, Altha’s mother taught her their magic, a kind not rooted in spell casting but in a deep knowledge of the natural world. But unusual women have always been deemed dangerous, and as the evidence for witchcraft is set out against Altha, she knows it will take all of her powers to maintain her freedom.

1942: As World War II rages, Violet is trapped in her family's grand, crumbling estate. Straitjacketed by societal convention, she longs for the robust education her brother receives––and for her mother, long deceased, who was rumored to have gone mad before her death. The only traces Violet has of her are a locket bearing the initial W and the word weyward scratched into the baseboard of her bedroom.

Weaving together the stories of three extraordinary women across five centuries, Emilia Hart's Weyward is an enthralling novel of female resilience and the transformative power of the natural world.]]>
329 Emilia Hart 125028080X Taylor 0 to-read 4.03 2023 Weyward
author: Emilia Hart
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/03
shelves: to-read
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 Taylor 0 to-read 4.37 2020 The House in the Cerulean Sea (Cerulean Chronicles, #1)
author: T.J. Klune
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/03/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Yellow Wife 54304031 Wench and Twelve Years a Slave, this harrowing story follows an enslaved woman forced to barter love and freedom while living in the most infamous slave jail in Virginia.

Born on a plantation in Charles City, Virginia, Pheby Brown was promised her freedom on her eighteenth birthday. But when her birthday finally comes around, instead of the idyllic life she was hoping for with her true love, she finds herself thrust into the bowels of slavery at the infamous Devil’s Half-Acre, a jail where slaves are broken, tortured, and sold every day. Forced to become the mistress of the brutal man who owns the jail, Pheby faces the ultimate sacrifice to protect her heart in this powerful, thrilling story of one slave’s fight for freedom.]]>
278 Sadeqa Johnson 1982149108 Taylor 3 4.41 2021 Yellow Wife
author: Sadeqa Johnson
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.41
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2023/03/03
date added: 2023/03/03
shelves:
review:

]]>
The Kite Runner 77203 371 Khaled Hosseini 159463193X Taylor 4 4.34 2003 The Kite Runner
author: Khaled Hosseini
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2003
rating: 4
read at: 2023/02/28
date added: 2023/02/28
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Girl with the Louding Voice]]> 50214741 All you have are your words.

Adunni is a fourteen-year-old Nigerian girl who knows what she wants: an education.

As the only daughter of a broke father, she is a valuable commodity. Removed from school and sold as a third wife to an old man, Adunni's life amounts to this: four goats, two bags of rice, some chickens and a new TV. When unspeakable tragedy swiftly strikes in her new home, she is secretly sold as a domestic servant to a household in the wealthy enclaves of Lagos, where no one will talk about the strange disappearance of her predecessor, Rebecca. No one but Adunni...

As a yielding daughter, a subservient wife, and a powerless servant, fourteen-year-old Adunni is repeatedly told that she is nothing. But Adunni won't be silenced. She is determined to find her voice - in a whisper, in song, in broken English - until she can speak for herself, for the girls like Rebecca who came before, and for all the girls who will follow.

]]>
371 Abi Daré 1524746029 Taylor 4 4.40 2020 The Girl with the Louding Voice
author: Abi Daré
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.40
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2023/02/28
date added: 2023/02/28
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Teacher of Warsaw: A WWII Novel]]> 59608950 For fans of The Warsaw Orphan and The Tattooist of Auschwitz: the start of WWII changed everything in Poland irrevocably—except for one man’s capacity to love.

“I want everyone I know to read this book.� �Kelly Rimmer, New York Times bestselling author of The Warsaw Orphan

September 1, 1939. Sixty-year-old Janusz Korczak and the students and teachers at his Dom Sierot Jewish orphanage are outside enjoying a beautiful day in Warsaw. Hours later, their lives are altered forever when the Nazis invade. Suddenly treated as an outcast in his own city, Janusz—a respected leader known for his heroism and teaching—is determined to do whatever it takes to protect the children from the horrors to come.

When over four hundred thousand Jewish people are rounded up and forced to live in the 1.3-square-mile walled compound of the Warsaw ghetto, Janusz and his friends take drastic measures to shield the children from disease and starvation. With dignity and courage, the teachers and students of Dom Sierot create their own tiny army of love and bravely prepare to march toward the future—whatever it may hold.

Unforgettable, devastating, and inspired by a real-life hero of the Holocaust, The Teacher of Warsaw reminds the world that one single person can incite meaning, hope, and love.

Praise for The Teacher of Warsaw:

“Through meticulous research and with wisdom and care, Mario Escobar brings to life a heartbreaking story of love and extraordinary courage. I want everyone I know to read this book.� �Kelly Rimmer, New York Times bestselling author of The Warsaw Orphan

“A beautifully written, deeply emotional story of hope, love, and courage in the face of unspeakable horrors. That such self-sacrifice, dedication and goodness existed restores faith in humankind. Escobar'sĚýheart-rending yet uplifting tale is made all the more poignant by its authenticity. Bravo!â€� —Tea Cooper, award-winning and bestselling author ofĚýThe Cartographer’s Secret


World War II historical fiction inspired by true events
Includes discussion questions for book clubs, a historical timeline, and notes from the author
Book length: 83,000 words
Also by author: Auschwitz Lullaby, Children of the Stars, Remember Me, The Librarian of Saint-Malo]]>
368 Mario Escobar 0785252177 Taylor 0 to-read 4.07 2022 The Teacher of Warsaw: A WWII Novel
author: Mario Escobar
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/02/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Queen Takes Knights (Their Vampire Queen, #1)]]> 36434365 A lost virgin vampire queen. Two vampire knights sworn to protect her. It’s about to get very hot� and bloody� Ever since her mother was murdered by monsters five years ago, Shara Isador has been on the run. Alone, scared, and exhausted, she’s finally cornered in Eureka Springs, Arkansas. Out of hope with nowhere else to turn, she’s ready to end it all when two men come to her rescue.They say she’s a lost queen descended from Isis, and they’re her Blood, vampire knights sworn to protect her. It all seems like a crazy nightmare, until the alpha offers his blood. Then she realizes she’s never wanted anything more. Except maybe his body� and his friend’s, too.But they’re not the only ones searching for a lost queen. Shara must learn how to wield her new powers quickly and conquer her fears if she intends to keep them all alive.]]> 190 Joely Sue Burkhart Taylor 0 to-read 3.80 2017 Queen Takes Knights (Their Vampire Queen, #1)
author: Joely Sue Burkhart
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/02/25
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[How Not to Drown in a Glass of Water]]> 59808037
Structurally inventive and emotionally kaleidoscopic, How Not to Drown in a Glass of Water is Angie Cruz’s most ambitious and moving novel yet, and Cara is a heroine for the ages.]]>
195 Angie Cruz 1250208459 Taylor 0 to-read 3.87 2022 How Not to Drown in a Glass of Water
author: Angie Cruz
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/02/23
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
The Only Good Indians 52180399 The creeping horror of Paul Tremblay meets Tommy Orange’s There There in a dark novel of revenge, cultural identity, and the cost of breaking from tradition in this latest novel from the Jordan Peele of horror literature, Stephen Graham Jones.

Seamlessly blending classic horror and a dramatic narrative with sharp social commentary, The Only Good Indians follows four American Indian men after a disturbing event from their youth puts them in a desperate struggle for their lives. Tracked by an entity bent on revenge, these childhood friends are helpless as the culture and traditions they left behind catch up to them in a violent, vengeful way.]]>
305 Stephen Graham Jones 1982136456 Taylor 2 3.68 2020 The Only Good Indians
author: Stephen Graham Jones
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2020
rating: 2
read at: 2023/02/23
date added: 2023/02/23
shelves:
review:
Truly it stinks I can only rate it a flat 1-5 stars. If I could rate it for writing style it would be a 0 all the way... I had to reread sentences and it was just very sloppy. At first I thought it was me and I was dumb and my reading comprehension was failing me, til I realized reading reviews I wasn't the only one feeling this way. BUT!!!! Despite being poorly written, it did not dissuade me from reading the book. The idea of the book was very original and while sloppily creating an image, he was still able to get it done. Which was very surprising to me. Overall, if this book wasn't given to me by someone to read, I would have put it back on the shelf after reading the first 5 confusing pages.
]]>
The House of Eve 61273858 From the award-winning author of Yellow Wife, a daring and redemptive novel set in 1950s Philadelphia and Washington, DC, that explores what it means to be a woman and a mother, and how much one is willing to sacrifice to achieve her greatest goal.

1950s Philadelphia: fifteen-year-old Ruby Pearsall is on track to becoming the first in her family to attend college, in spite of having a mother more interested in keeping a man than raising a daughter. But a taboo love affair threatens to pull her back down into the poverty and desperation that has been passed on to her like a birthright.

Eleanor Quarles arrives in Washington, DC, with ambition and secrets. When she meets the handsome William Pride at Howard University, they fall madly in love. But William hails from one of DC’s elite wealthy Black families, and his par­ents don’t let just anyone into their fold. Eleanor hopes that a baby will make her finally feel at home in William’s family and grant her the life she’s been searching for. But having a baby—and fitting in—is easier said than done.

With their stories colliding in the most unexpected of ways, Ruby and Eleanor will both make decisions that shape the trajectory of their lives.]]>
384 Sadeqa Johnson 1982197366 Taylor 0 to-read 4.23 2023 The House of Eve
author: Sadeqa Johnson
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/02/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
River Sing Me Home 61111298 Her search begins with an ending....

The master of the Providence plantation in Barbados gathers his slaves and announces the king has decreed an end to slavery. As of the following day, the Emancipation Act of 1834 will come into effect. The cries of joy fall silent when he announces that they are no longer his slaves; they are now his apprentices. No one can leave. They must work for him for another six years. Freedom is just another name for the life they have always lived. So Rachel runs.

Away from Providence, she begins a desperate search to find her children--the five who survived birth and were sold. Are any of them still alive? Rachel has to know. The grueling, dangerous journey takes her from Barbados then, by river, deep into the forest of British Guiana and finally across the sea to Trinidad. She is driven on by the certainty that a mother cannot be truly free without knowing what has become of her children, even if the answer is more than she can bear. These are the stories of Mary Grace, Micah, Thomas Augustus, Cherry Jane and Mercy. But above all this is the story of Rachel and the extraordinary lengths to which a mother will go to find her children...and her freedom.]]>
322 Eleanor Shearer 0593548043 Taylor 0 to-read 3.96 2023 River Sing Me Home
author: Eleanor Shearer
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/02/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Revelator 56212587 From the acclaimed author of Spoonbenders comes the gripping tale of a family's mysterious religion, and the daughter who turns her back on their god.

In 1933, nine-year-old Stella is left in the care of her grandmother, Motty, in the backwoods of Tennessee. These remote hills of the Smoky Mountains are home to dangerous secrets, and soon after she arrives, Stella wanders into a dark cavern where she encounters the family's personal god, an entity known as the Ghostdaddy.

Years later, after a tragic incident that caused her to flee, Stella--now a professional bootlegger--returns for Motty's funeral, and to check on the mysterious ten-year-old girl named Sunny that Motty adopted. Sunny appears innocent enough, but she is more powerful than Stella could imagine--and she's a direct link to Stella's buried past and her family's destructive faith.

Haunting and wholly engrossing, summoning mesmerizing voices and giving shape to the dark, Revelator is a southern gothic tale for the ages.
]]>
337 Daryl Gregory 052565738X Taylor 3 3.96 2021 Revelator
author: Daryl Gregory
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2023/02/15
date added: 2023/02/15
shelves:
review:

]]>
All the Light We Cannot See 18143977
In a mining town in Germany, Werner Pfennig, an orphan, grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find that brings them news and stories from places they have never seen or imagined. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments and is enlisted to use his talent to track down the resistance. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, Doerr illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another.

From the highly acclaimed, multiple award-winning Anthony Doerr, the stunningly beautiful instant New York Times bestseller about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II.

An alternate cover for this ISBN can be found here]]>
544 Anthony Doerr 1476746583 Taylor 3 4.31 2014 All the Light We Cannot See
author: Anthony Doerr
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2014
rating: 3
read at: 2023/02/15
date added: 2023/02/15
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society]]> 39832183 #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE ON NETFLIX - A remarkable tale of the island of Guernsey during the German Occupation, and of a society as extraordinary as its name.

"I wonder how the book got to Guernsey? Perhaps there is some sort of secret homing instinct in books that brings them to their perfect readers." January 1946: London is emerging from the shadow of the Second World War, and writer Juliet Ashton is looking for her next book subject. Who could imagine that she would find it in a letter from a man she's never met, a native of the island of Guernsey, who has come across her name written inside a book by Charles Lamb...

As Juliet and her new correspondent exchange letters, Juliet is drawn into the world of this man and his friends—and what a wonderfully eccentric world it is. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society—born as a spur-of-the-moment alibi when its members were discovered breaking curfew by the Germans occupying their island—boasts a charming, funny, deeply human cast of characters, from pig farmers to phrenologists, literature lovers all.

Juliet begins a remarkable correspondence with the society's members, learning about their island, their taste in books, and the impact the recent German occupation has had on their lives. Captivated by their stories, she sets sail for Guernsey, and what she finds will change her forever.

Written with warmth and humor as a series of letters, this novel is a celebration of the written word in all its guises and of finding connection in the most surprising ways.]]>
291 Mary Ann Shaffer 1984801813 Taylor 3 4.27 2008 The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
author: Mary Ann Shaffer
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2008
rating: 3
read at: 2023/02/15
date added: 2023/02/15
shelves:
review:

]]>
Twelve Years a Slave 18478222 363 Solomon Northup 0989794806 Taylor 4 4.21 1853 Twelve Years a Slave
author: Solomon Northup
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1853
rating: 4
read at: 2023/02/15
date added: 2023/02/15
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek (The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, #1)]]> 40914165 An alternate cover edition for ISBN 978-1492671527 can be found here.

In 1936, tucked deep into the woods of Troublesome Creek, KY, lives blue-skinned 19-year-old Cussy Carter, the last living female of the rare Blue People ancestry.

The lonely young Appalachian woman joins the historical Pack Horse Library Project of Kentucky and becomes a librarian, riding across slippery creek beds and up treacherous mountains on her faithful mule to deliver books and other reading material to the impoverished hill people of Eastern Kentucky.

Along her dangerous route, Cussy, known to the mountain folk as Bluet, confronts those suspicious of her damselfly-blue skin and the government's new book program. She befriends hardscrabble and complex fellow Kentuckians, and is fiercely determined to bring comfort and joy, instill literacy, and give to those who have nothing, a bookly respite, a fleeting retreat to faraway lands.]]>
309 Kim Michele Richardson Taylor 3 4.17 2019 The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek (The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, #1)
author: Kim Michele Richardson
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2019
rating: 3
read at: 2023/02/15
date added: 2023/02/15
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents (Discworld, #28)]]> 34534
As Maurice and the rats battle for their very survival, a number of provocative themes surface: life after death, good versus evil, and the sacrifice of the few for the many.]]>
256 Terry Pratchett 006001234X Taylor 0 to-read 4.05 2001 The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents (Discworld, #28)
author: Terry Pratchett
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2001
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/02/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Where the Crawdads Sing 36809135
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.]]>
384 Delia Owens 0735219117 Taylor 4 4.35 2018 Where the Crawdads Sing
author: Delia Owens
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2022/01/23
date added: 2023/02/07
shelves:
review:

]]>
Dr. Sleep (The Shining, #2) 16092173 568 Stephen King 9024559154 Taylor 3 4.16 2013 Dr. Sleep (The Shining, #2)
author: Stephen King
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2013
rating: 3
read at: 2023/02/07
date added: 2023/02/07
shelves:
review:

]]>
Little Fires Everywhere 51704136 Everything I Never Told You, a riveting novel that traces the intertwined fates of the picture-perfect Richardson family and the enigmatic mother and daughter who upend their lives.

In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is planned--from the layout of the winding roads, to the colors 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 teenaged daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than 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 status quo that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community.

When old family friends of the Richardsons 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 unexpected and devastating costs.

Little Fires Everywhere explores the weight of secrets, the nature of art and identity, and the ferocious pull of motherhood--and the danger of believing that following the rules can avert disaster.

Named a Best Book of the Year by: People, The Washington Post, Bustle, Esquire, Southern Living, The Daily Beast, GQ, Entertainment Weekly, NPR, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Audible, Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ, Library Reads, Book of the Month, Paste, Kirkus Reviews, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and many more...


Perfect for book clubs! Visit celesteng.com for discussion guides and more. ]]>
368 Celeste Ng 0143135163 Taylor 3 4.06 2017 Little Fires Everywhere
author: Celeste Ng
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2017
rating: 3
read at: 2021/01/01
date added: 2023/02/05
shelves:
review:

]]>
Sandcastle 13000768
But this utopia hides a dark secret.

First there is the dead body of a woman found floating in the crystal-clear water.

Then there is the odd fact that all the children are aging rapidly. Soon everybody is growing older—every half hour—and there doesn’t seem to be any way out of the cove. Levy’s dramatic storytelling works seamlessly with Peeters’s sinister art to create a profoundly disturbing and fantastical mystery.]]>
112 Pierre Oscar Lévy 1906838380 Taylor 0 to-read 3.25 2010 Sandcastle
author: Pierre Oscar Lévy
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.25
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/02/01
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Ariadne 54860614
When Theseus, the Prince of Athens, arrives to vanquish the beast, Ariadne sees in his green eyes not a threat but an escape. Defying the gods, betraying her family and country, and risking everything for love, Ariadne helps Theseus kill the Minotaur. But will Ariadne's decision ensure her happy ending? And what of Phaedra, the beloved younger sister she leaves behind?

Hypnotic, propulsive, and utterly transporting, Jennifer Saint's Ariadne forges a new epic, one that puts the forgotten women of Greek mythology back at the heart of the story, as they strive for a better world.]]>
308 Jennifer Saint 125077358X Taylor 0 to-read 3.77 2021 Ariadne
author: Jennifer Saint
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/01/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Doctor Sleep (The Shining, #2)]]> 16130549 WHSmith Collector's Edition

Stephen King returns to the characters and territory of one of his most popular novels ever, The Shining, in this instantly riveting novel about the now middle-aged Dan Torrance (the boy protagonist of The Shining) and the very special 12-year-old girl he must save from a tribe of murderous paranormals.

On highways across America, a tribe of people called The True Knot travel in search of sustenance. They look harmless - mostly old, lots of polyester, and married to their RVs. But as Dan Torrance knows, and spunky 12-year-old Abra Stone learns, The True Knot are quasi-immortal, living off the "steam" that children with the "shining" produce when they are slowly tortured to death.

Haunted by the inhabitants of the Overlook Hotel where he spent one horrific childhood year, Dan has been drifting for decades, desperate to shed his father's legacy of despair, alcoholism, and violence. Finally, he settles in a New Hampshire town, an AA community that sustains him, and a job at a nursing home where his remnant "shining" power provides the crucial final comfort to the dying. Aided by a prescient cat, he becomes "Doctor Sleep."

Then Dan meets the evanescent Abra Stone, and it is her spectacular gift, the brightest shining ever seen, that reignites Dan's own demons and summons him to a battle for Abra's soul and survival. This is an epic war between good and evil, a gory, glorious story that will thrill the millions of hyper-devoted fans of The Shining and wildly satisfy anyone new to the territory of this icon in the King canon.]]>
531 Stephen King 1476727651 Taylor 0 to-read 4.11 2013 Doctor Sleep (The Shining, #2)
author: Stephen King
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2013
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/12/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Carrie 10592
Make a date with terror and live the nightmare that is...Carrie
--back cover]]>
272 Stephen King 1416524304 Taylor 0 to-read 4.00 1974 Carrie
author: Stephen King
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1974
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/12/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Littel Tale Of Wintering (Snow Trilogy #3)]]> 62079614 THE SECRET OF THIS WINTER'S TALE HIDES IN PLAIN SIGHT

FREE ARC DOWNLOAD FROM "BOOK SIRENS"

A dark Christmas story. An intriguing winter mystery. A moving, thought-provoking tale to take into the nights of the coldest season.



December 2022; Littel Wade village, Dorset, UK.

In the four days leading to Christmas, as dark nights fall, darker secrets rise.
Seemingly impossible objects are discovered in a scrapyard that may be home to much more than just junk.
...While two friends try to unravel why their village is bereft of smiles, and how events of hundreds of years ago could change everything for one of them.



Winter 1533. Thomas Cromwell, Henry VIII’s chief minister, is tasked by his king with finding a garrison site in deepest Dorset. His depressing snowbound mission is unsuccessful in many ways.



Christmas, 2022. Post-COVID, Littel Wade, a tiny, unwelcoming village in Dorset, remains indifferent to the festive season. But over the days leading up to the 25th of December, seemingly impossible objects are discovered which may have completely logical explanations or wonderfully fantastical ones.

Prompted by this mysterious find, two friends try to understand why their village is so bleak, what once lay unnoticed in a nearby scrapyard, and why snow is coming…that may not be snow at all.

The Littel* Tale Of Wintering is a story to be enjoyed as the nights close in, temperature drops, and both magic and reality jostle for our attention.

It is a Christmas enigma full of drifts and shadows and a very strange December indeed.



*And there is a very good reason it is spelled Littel.

“The Little Tale Of Wintering� is part of Richard Easter’s Snow Trilogy; three books that can be read independently but all of which share themes, characters, and locations.

And you can’t write three books about snow without at least one involving a dark Christmas tale�

]]>
236 Richard Easter Taylor 0 to-read 4.22 2022 The Littel Tale Of Wintering (Snow Trilogy #3)
author: Richard Easter
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/11/30
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
I Choose Darkness 62330020
The holly-jolly holidays aren’t for everyone, least of all when you look back on that one Christmas when there were two definitely haunted dolls waiting for you and your sister under the tree. You have to assume that’s where it all started.

And so it was for Jenny Lawson. Now, she lives in the land of eternal Halloween, as evidenced by her interior decor and general state of darkness. (Although, if you ask her, her taxidermy zoo is less dark, more delightful. But not everyone has taste, so what are you going to do?)

This essay takes Jenny back to where it all started, from her humble beginnings as a trick-or-treater in the 1980s, on high alert for (logistically improbable) candy laced with razor blades and the (allegedly) ever-present threat of satanists on the loose. From there, she has risen from the candy-wrapper ashes of her childhood to claim her rightful lifestyle as the queen of Halloween.]]>
25 Jenny Lawson 1662511116 Taylor 0 to-read 3.95 2022 I Choose Darkness
author: Jenny Lawson
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/11/30
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
The Stroke of Winter 59976867
As the house’s restoration commences, a shuttered art studio is revealed. Inside are paintings Tess’s late grandfather, beloved and celebrated artist Sebastian Bell, hid away for generations. But these appear to be the works of a twisted mind, almost unrecognizable as paintings she and others familiar with his art would expect. The sinister canvases raise disturbing questions for Tess, sparking nightmares and igniting in her an obsession to unearth the truth around their origins.

What evil has been locked away for so many years? The ominous brushstrokes, scratching at the door, and moving shadows begin to pull Tess further and further into the darkness.]]>
300 Wendy Webb 154203759X Taylor 0 to-read 3.99 2022 The Stroke of Winter
author: Wendy Webb
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/11/30
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Clockwork Lives (Clockwork Angels, #2)]]> 24612470 Clockwork Angels, Anderson and Rush band musician Pearl create a world of airships and alchemy, clockwork carnivals, pirates, and lost cities. A rigid Watchmaker controls every aspect of life; his nemesis, the ruthless and violent Anarchist wants to destroy it all.

Anderson and Peart have returned to their colourful creation to explore the places and the characters that still have a hold on their imagination. Marinda Peake is a woman with a quiet, perfect life in a small village; she long ago gave up on her dreams and ambitions to take care of her ailing father, an alchemist and an inventor. When he dies, he gives Marinda a mysterious inheritance: a blank book that she must fill with other people’s stories � and ultimately her own.

Clockwork Lives is a steampunk Canterbury Tales, and much more, as Marinda strives to change her life from a mere “sentence or two� to a true epic.]]>
400 Kevin J. Anderson 1770412948 Taylor 4 4.14 2015 Clockwork Lives (Clockwork Angels, #2)
author: Kevin J. Anderson
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/11/25
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Clockwork Angels (Clockwork Angels, #1)]]> 13592828 304 Kevin J. Anderson 1770411216 Taylor 4 3.70 2012 Clockwork Angels (Clockwork Angels, #1)
author: Kevin J. Anderson
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2012
rating: 4
read at: 2022/11/25
date added: 2022/11/25
shelves:
review:

]]>
Winterwood 43822698 Be careful of the dark, dark wood�

Especially the woods surrounding the town of Fir Haven. Some say these woods are magical. Haunted, even.

Rumored to be a witch, only Nora Walker knows the truth. She and the Walker women before her have always shared a special connection with the woods. And it’s this special connection that leads Nora to Oliver Huntsman—the same boy who disappeared from the Camp for Wayward Boys weeks ago—and in the middle of the worst snowstorm in years. He should be dead, but here he is alive, and left in the woods with no memory of the time he’d been missing.

But Nora can feel an uneasy shift in the woods at Oliver’s presence. And it’s not too long after that Nora realizes she has no choice but to unearth the truth behind how the boy she has come to care so deeply about survived his time in the forest, and what led him there in the first place. What Nora doesn’t know, though, is that Oliver has secrets of his own—secrets he’ll do anything to keep buried, because as it turns out, he wasn’t the only one to have gone missing on that fateful night all those weeks ago.

For as long as there have been fairy tales, we have been warned to fear what lies within the dark, dark woods and in Winterwood, New York Times bestselling author Shea Ernshaw, shows us why.

From New York Times bestselling author of The Wicked Deep comes a haunting romance perfect for fans of Practical Magic, where dark fairy tales and enchanted folklore collide after a boy, believed to be missing, emerges from the magical woods—and falls in love with the witch determined to unravel his secrets.]]>
323 Shea Ernshaw 1534439412 Taylor 0 to-read 3.81 2019 Winterwood
author: Shea Ernshaw
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/11/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Long Live the Pumpkin Queen: Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas]]> 57190803 Jack and Sally are "truly meant to be" ... or are they?

Sally Skellington is the official, newly-minted Pumpkin Queen after a whirlwind courtship with her true love, Jack, who Sally adores with every inch of her fabric seams -- if only she could say the same for her new role as Queen of Halloween Town. Cast into the spotlight and tasked with all sorts of queenly duties, Sally can't help but wonder if all she's done is trade her captivity under Dr. Finkelstein for a different -- albeit gilded -- cage. But when Sally and Zero accidentally uncover a long-hidden doorway to an ancient realm called Dream Town in the forest Hinterlands, she'll unknowingly set into motion a chain of sinister events that put her future as Pumpkin Queen, and the future of Halloween Town itself, into jeopardy. Can Sally discover what it means to be true to herself and save the town she's learned to call home, or will her future turn into her worst... well, nightmare]]>
315 Shea Ernshaw 1368069606 Taylor 0 to-read 3.84 2022 Long Live the Pumpkin Queen: Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas
author: Shea Ernshaw
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/11/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
A Raisin in the Sun 5517 A Raisin in the Sun opened on Broadway in 1959.

Indeed Lorraine Hansberry's award-winning drama about the hopes and aspirations of a struggling, working-class family living on the South Side of Chicago connected profoundly with the psyche of black America--and changed American theater forever.ĚýĚýThe play's title comes from a line in Langston Hughes's poem "Harlem," which warns that a dream deferred might "dry up/like a raisin in the sun."

"The events of every passing year add resonance to A Raisin in the Sun," said The New York Times.ĚýĚý"It is as if history is conspiring to make the play a classic."ĚýĚýThis Modern Library edition presents the fully restored, uncut version of Hansberry's landmark work with an introduction by Robert Nemiroff.]]>
162 Lorraine Hansberry 0375508333 Taylor 0 to-read 3.84 1959 A Raisin in the Sun
author: Lorraine Hansberry
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1959
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/08/04
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Commonwealth 28214365
Spanning five decades, Commonwealth explores how this chance encounter reverberates through the lives of the four parents and six children involved. Spending summers together in Virginia, the Keating and Cousins children forge a lasting bond that is based on a shared disillusionment with their parents and the strange and genuine affection that grows up between them.

When, in her twenties, Franny begins an affair with the legendary author Leon Posen and tells him about her family, the story of her siblings is no longer hers to control. Their childhood becomes the basis for his wildly successful book, ultimately forcing them to come to terms with their losses, their guilt, and the deeply loyal connection they feel for one another.

Told with equal measures of humor and heartbreak, Commonwealth is a meditation on inspiration, interpretation, and the ownership of stories. It is a brilliant and tender tale of the far-reaching ties of love and responsibility that bind us together.]]>
322 Ann Patchett 0062491792 Taylor 3 3.81 2016 Commonwealth
author: Ann Patchett
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2016
rating: 3
read at: 2022/07/27
date added: 2022/07/27
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine]]> 31434883 No one’s ever told Eleanor that life should be better than fine

Meet Eleanor Oliphant: she struggles with appropriate social skills and tends to say exactly what she’s thinking. Nothing is missing in her carefully timetabled life of avoiding unnecessary human contact, where weekends are punctuated by frozen pizza, vodka, and phone chats with Mummy.

But everything changes when Eleanor meets Raymond, the bumbling and deeply unhygienic IT guy from her office. When she and Raymond together save Sammy, an elderly gentleman who has fallen, the three rescue one another from the lives of isolation that they had been living. Ultimately, it is Raymond’s big heart that will help Eleanor find the way to repair her own profoundly damaged one. If she does, she'll learn that she, too, is capable of finding friendship—and even love—after all.

Smart, warm, uplifting, Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine is the story of an out-of-the-ordinary heroine whose deadpan weirdness and unconscious wit make for an irresistible journey as she realizes. . .

the only way to survive is to open your heart.]]>
336 Gail Honeyman 0735220689 Taylor 3 4.21 2017 Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine
author: Gail Honeyman
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2017
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2022/07/21
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Street of a Thousand Blossoms]]> 294084
"Just remember," Yoshio said quietly to his grandsons. "Every day of your lives, you must always be sure what you're fighting for."
Ěý
It is Tokyo in 1939. On the Street of a Thousand Blossoms, two orphaned brothers are growing up with their loving grandparents, who inspire them to dream of a future firmly rooted in tradition. The older boy, Hiroshi, shows unusual skill at the national obsession of sumo wrestling, while Kenji is fascinated by the art of creating hard-carved masks for actors in the Noh theater.
Across town, a renowned sumo master, Sho Tanaka, lives with his wife and their two young daughters: the delicate, daydreaming Aki and her independent sister, Haru. Life seems full of promise as Kenji begins an informal apprenticeship with the most famous mask-maker in Japan and Hiroshi receives a coveted invitation to train with Tanaka. But then Pearl Harbor changes everything. As the ripples of war spread to both families' quiet neighborhoods, all of the generations must put their dreams on hold---and then find their way in a new Japan.
In an exquisitely moving story that spans almost thirty years, Gail Tsukiyama draws us irresistibly into the world of the brothers and the women who love them. It is a world of tradition and change, of heartbreaking loss and surprising hope, and of the impact of events beyond their control on ordinary, decent men and women. Above all, The Street of a Thousand Blossoms is a masterpiece about love and family from a glorious storyteller at the height of her powers.
]]>
422 Gail Tsukiyama 0312274823 Taylor 4 3.97 2007 The Street of a Thousand Blossoms
author: Gail Tsukiyama
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at: 2022/07/13
date added: 2022/07/15
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Snow Flower and the Secret Fan]]> 1103
As the years pass, Lily and Snow Flower send messages on fans, compose stories on handkerchiefs, reaching out of isolation to share their hopes, dreams, and accomplishments. Together, they endure the agony of foot-binding, and reflect upon their arranged marriages, shared loneliness, and the joys and tragedies of motherhood. The two find solace, developing a bond that keeps their spirits alive. But when a misunderstanding arises, their deep friendship suddenly threatens to tear apart.]]>
269 Lisa See 0812968069 Taylor 4 4.06 2005 Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
author: Lisa See
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2005
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/07/09
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Haunting of Blackwood House]]> 28870482 Could you survive a week in a haunted house?

Mara is the daughter of spiritualists. Her childhood was filled with seances, scam mediums and talk of ghostly presences.

When Mara finally left her family's home, she vowed she would never allow superstition or false religion into her life again. Now she's ready to start over with her fiance, Neil, in a world based on rationality and facts.

But her past isn't ready to let her go just yet.

Mara and Neil purchase Blackwood House, a derelict property outside of town. They're warned about strange occurrences in the crumbling building. Doors open by themselves, voices whisper in the night, bloody handprints appear on the walls, and cold spots linger in the basement, where the house's original owner was murdered.

But Blackwood was dirt-cheap and came with a large plot of overgrown land. Mara loves her new home, and disregards the warnings.

Because ghosts aren't real...

...are they?]]>
356 Darcy Coates 0992594979 Taylor 0 to-read 3.66 2015 The Haunting of Blackwood House
author: Darcy Coates
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/25
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Shadow Country 2253484 Shadow Country, he has marvelously distilled a monumental work, realizing his original vision.

Inspired by a near-mythic event of the wild Florida frontier at the turn of the twentieth century, Shadow Country reimagines the legend of the inspired Everglades sugar planter and notorious outlaw E. J. Watson, who drives himself relentlessly toward his own violent end at the hands of neighbors who mostly admired him, in a killing that obsessed his favorite son.

Shadow Country
traverses strange landscapes and frontier hinterlands inhabited by Americans of every provenance and color, including the black and Indian inheritors of the archaic racism that, as Watson’s wife observed, "still casts its shadow over the nation."]]>
892 Peter Matthiessen Taylor 0 currently-reading 4.07 2008 Shadow Country
author: Peter Matthiessen
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2008
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]>
Boy's Life 11553
Robert McCammon delivers "a tour de force of storytelling" (BookPage) in his award-winning masterpiece, a novel of Southern boyhood, growing up in the 1960s, that reaches far beyond that evocative landscape to touch readers universally.

Boy's Life is a richly imagined, spellbinding portrait of the magical worldview of the young -- and of innocence lost.

Zephyr, Alabama, is an idyllic hometown for eleven-year-old Cory Mackenson -- a place where monsters swim the river deep and friends are forever. Then, one cold spring morning, Cory and his father witness a car plunge into a lake -- and a desperate rescue attempt brings his father face-to-face with a terrible, haunting vision of death. As Cory struggles to understand his father's pain, his eyes are slowly opened to the forces of good and evil that surround him. From an ancient mystic who can hear the dead and bewitch the living, to a violent clan of moonshiners, Cory must confront the secrets that hide in the shadows of his hometown -- for his father's sanity and his own life hang in the balance....]]>
580 Robert McCammon Taylor 0 to-read 4.33 1991 Boy's Life
author: Robert McCammon
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.33
book published: 1991
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Prodigal Summer 14249 Prodigal Summer weaves together three stories of human love within a larger tapestry of lives inhabiting the forested mountains and struggling small farms of southern Appalachia.

From her outpost in an isolated mountain cabin, Deanna Wolfe, a reclusive wildlife biologist, watches a den of coyotes that have recently migrated into the region. She is caught off-guard by a young hunter who invades her most private spaces and confounds her self-assured, solitary life. On a farm several miles down the mountain, Lusa Maluf Landowski, a bookish city girl turned farmer's wife, finds herself unexpectedly marooned in a strange place where she must declare or lose her attachment to the land that has become her own. And a few more miles down the road, a pair of elderly feuding neighbors tend their respective farms and wrangle about God, pesticides, and the possibilities of a future neither of them expected.

Over the course of one humid summer, these characters find their connections to one another and to the flora and fauna with whom they share a place. Prodigal Summer demonstrates a balance of narrative, drama and ideas that is characteristic of Barbara Kingsolver's finest work.]]>
444 Barbara Kingsolver 0060959037 Taylor 0 to-read 4.03 2000 Prodigal Summer
author: Barbara Kingsolver
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2000
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Go Down, Moses 17726 Ěý
Go Down, Moses is composed of seven interrelated stories, all of them set in Faulkner’s mythic Yoknapatawpha County. From a variety of perspectives, Faulkner examines the complex, changing relationships between blacks and whites, between man and nature, weaving a cohesive novel rich in implication and insight.]]>
365 William Faulkner 0679732179 Taylor 0 to-read 3.93 1942 Go Down, Moses
author: William Faulkner
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1942
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Complete Tales of Uncle Remus]]> 77152 848 Joel Chandler Harris 0618154299 Taylor 0 to-read 4.14 1880 The Complete Tales of Uncle Remus
author: Joel Chandler Harris
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1880
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
The Complete Stories 284996 ISBN: 0374515360 (ISBN13: 9780374515362

Winner of the National Book Award

The publication of this extraordinary volume firmly established Flannery O'Connor's monumental contribution to American fiction. There are thirty-one stories here in all, including twelve that do not appear in the only two story collections O'Connor put together in her short lifetime - Everything That Rises Must Converge and A Good Man Is Hard to Find.

O'Connor published her first story, "The Geranium," in 1946, while she was working on her master's degree at the University of Iowa. Arranged chronologically, this collection shows that her last story, "Judgement Day" - sent to her publisher shortly before her death - is a brilliantly rewritten and transfigured version of "The Geranium." Taken together, these stories reveal a lively, penetrating talent that has given us some of the most powerful and disturbing fiction of the twentieth century. Also included is an introduction by O'Connor's longtime editor and friend, Robert Giroux.

Contents:
The geranium --
The barber --
Wildcat --
The crop --
The turkey --
The train --
The peeler --
The heart of the park --
A stoke of good fortune --
Enoch and the gorilla --
A good man is hard to find --
A late encounter with the enemy --
The life you save may be your own --
The river --
A circle in the fire --
The displaced person --
A temple of the Holy Ghost --
The artificial nigger --
Good country people --
You can't be any poorer than dead --
Greenleaf --
A view of the woods --
The enduring chill --
The comforts of home --
Everything that rises must converge --
The partridge festival --
The lame shall enter first --
Why do the heathen rage? --
Revelation --
Parker's back --
Judgement Day.]]>
555 Flannery O'Connor Taylor 0 to-read 4.41 1971 The Complete Stories
author: Flannery O'Connor
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.41
book published: 1971
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Garden Spells (Waverley Family, #1)]]> 1158967 In a garden surrounded by a tall fence, tucked away behind a small, quiet house in an even smaller town, is an apple tree that is rumored to bear a very special sort of fruit. In this luminous debut novel, Sarah Addison Allen tells the story of that enchanted tree, and the extraordinary people who tend it.�

The Waverleys have always been a curious family, endowed with peculiar gifts that make them outsiders even in their hometown of Bascom, North Carolina. Even their garden has a reputation, famous for its feisty apple tree that bears prophetic fruit, and its edible flowers, imbued with special powers. Generations of Waverleys tended this garden. Their history was in the soil. But so were their futures.

A successful caterer, Claire Waverley prepares dishes made with her mystical plants—from the nasturtiums that aid in keeping secrets and the pansies that make children thoughtful, to the snapdragons intended to discourage the attentions of her amorous neighbor. Meanwhile, her elderly cousin, Evanelle, is known for distributing unexpected gifts whose uses become uncannily clear. They are the last of the Waverleys—except for Claire’s rebellious sister, Sydney, who fled Bascom the moment she could, abandoning Claire, as their own mother had years before.

When Sydney suddenly returns home with a young daughter of her own, Claire’s quiet life is turned upside down—along with the protective boundary she has so carefully constructed around her heart. Together again in the house they grew up in, Sydney takes stock of all she left behind, as Claire struggles to heal the wounds of the past. And soon the sisters realize they must deal with their common legacy—if they are ever to feel at home in Bascom—or with each other.

Enchanting and heartfelt, this captivating novel is sure to cast a spell with a style all its own�.]]>
304 Sarah Addison Allen 0553805487 Taylor 0 to-read 4.07 2007 Garden Spells (Waverley Family, #1)
author: Sarah Addison Allen
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl]]> 152519 Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl remains among the few extant slave narratives written by a woman. This autobiographical account chronicles the remarkable odyssey of Harriet Jacobs (1813�1897) whose dauntless spirit and faith carried her from a life of servitude and degradation in North Carolina to liberty and reunion with her children in the North.

Written and published in 1861 after Jacobs' harrowing escape from a vile and predatory master, the memoir delivers a powerful and unflinching portrayal of the abuses and hypocrisy of the master-slave relationship. Jacobs writes frankly of the horrors she suffered as a slave, her eventual escape after several unsuccessful attempts, and her seven years in self-imposed exile, hiding in a coffin-like "garret" attached to her grandmother's porch.

A rare firsthand account of a courageous woman's determination and endurance, this inspirational story also represents a valuable historical record of the continuing battle for freedom and the preservation of family.]]>
176 Harriet Ann Jacobs 0486419312 Taylor 0 to-read 4.15 1861 Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl
author: Harriet Ann Jacobs
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1861
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
The Pelican Brief 32499 400 John Grisham 0385339704 Taylor 0 to-read 4.06 1992 The Pelican Brief
author: John Grisham
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.06
book published: 1992
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Absalom, Absalom! 373755 316 William Faulkner 0679732187 Taylor 0 to-read 3.98 1936 Absalom, Absalom!
author: William Faulkner
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.98
book published: 1936
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
A Painted House 5360 Thus begins the new novel from John Grisham, a story inspired by his own childhood in rural Arkansas. The narrator is a farm boy named Luke Chandler, age seven, who lives in the cotton fields with his parents and grandparents in a little house that's never been painted. The Chandlers farm eighty acres that they rent, not own, and when the cotton is ready they hire a truckload of Mexicans and a family from the Ozarks to help harvest it.

For six weeks they pick cotton, battling the heat, the rain, the fatigue, and sometimes each other. As the weeks pass Luke sees and hears things no seven-year-old could possibly be prepared for, and he finds himself keeping secrets that not only threaten the crop but will change the lives of the Chandlers forever.

©2000, 2001 Belfry Holdings, Inc. (P)2001 Random House, Inc. Bantam Doubleday Dell Audio Publishing, a Division of Random House, Inc.]]>
384 John Grisham 0385337930 Taylor 0 to-read 3.74 2001 A Painted House
author: John Grisham
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2001
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
Light in August 10979 Light in August, a novel that contrasts stark tragedy with hopeful perseverance in the face of mortality, which features some of Faulkner’s most memorable characters: guileless, dauntless Lena Grove, in search of the father of her unborn child; Reverend Gail Hightower, a lonely outcast haunted by visions of Confederate glory; and Joe Christmas, a desperate, enigmatic drifter consumed by his mixed ancestry.]]> 507 William Faulkner 0679732268 Taylor 0 to-read 3.93 1932 Light in August
author: William Faulkner
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1932
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
All the King's Men 5527 All the King's Men is a 1946 novel by Robert Penn Warren. Its title is drawn from the nursery rhyme "Humpty Dumpty". The novel tells the story of charismatic populist governor Willie Stark and his political machinations in the Depression-era Deep South. It is commonly thought to have been loosely inspired by the real-life story of U.S. Senator Huey P. Long, who was assassinated in 1935. Warren won the Pulitzer Prize for All the King's Men in 1947. The novel has received critical acclaim and remained perennially popular since its first publication. It was rated the 36th greatest novel of the 20th century by Modern Library, and it was chosen as one of Time magazine's 100 best novels since 1923. All the King's Men portrays the dramatic and theatrical political rise and governorship of Willie Stark, a cynical populist in the 1930s American South.]]> 439 Robert Penn Warren Taylor 0 to-read 4.08 1946 All the King's Men
author: Robert Penn Warren
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1946
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
The Glass Menagerie 92517
The Glass Menagerie (in the reading text the author preferred) is now available only in its New Directions Paperbook edition. A new introduction by the editor of The Tennessee Williams Annual Review, Robert Bray, reappraises the play more than half a century after it won the New York Drama Critics Circle Award. This edition of The Glass Menagerie also includes Williams's essay on the impact of sudden fame on a struggling writer, "The Catastrophe of Success," as well as a short section of Williams's own "Production Notes."
(back cover)]]>
104 Tennessee Williams 0811214044 Taylor 0 to-read 3.73 1945 The Glass Menagerie
author: Tennessee Williams
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.73
book published: 1945
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[Hillbilly Tales from the Smoky Mountains - And Other Homespun Remedies, Proverbs, and Poetry]]> 11451865 126 Patricia H. Graham 1608622835 Taylor 0 to-read 3.85 2011 Hillbilly Tales from the Smoky Mountains - And Other Homespun Remedies, Proverbs, and Poetry
author: Patricia H. Graham
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn]]> 2956 327 Mark Twain 0142437174 Taylor 0 to-read 3.82 1884 The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
author: Mark Twain
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.82
book published: 1884
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
The Yearling 159582 --back cover]]> 513 Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings 0689846231 Taylor 0 to-read 4.02 1938 The Yearling
author: Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1938
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
The Color Purple 11486
Then her husband's lover, a flamboyant blues singer, barreled into her world and gave Celie the courage to ask for more - to laugh, to play, and finally - to love.]]>
295 Alice Walker Taylor 4 4.22 1982 The Color Purple
author: Alice Walker
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1982
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/06/21
shelves:
review:

]]>
Circe 35959740
Threatened, Zeus banishes her to a deserted island, where she hones her occult craft, tames wild beasts, and crosses paths with many of the most famous figures in all of mythology, including the Minotaur, Daedalus and his doomed son Icarus, the murderous Medea, and, of course, wily Odysseus.

But there is danger, too, for a woman who stands alone, and Circe unwittingly draws the wrath of both men and gods, ultimately finding herself pitted against one of the most terrifying and vengeful of the Olympians. To protect what she loves most, Circe must summon all her strength and choose, once and for all, whether she belongs with the gods she is born from or with the mortals she has come to love.]]>
393 Madeline Miller 0316556343 Taylor 2 4.22 2018 Circe
author: Madeline Miller
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2018
rating: 2
read at: 2022/06/21
date added: 2022/06/21
shelves:
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry]]> 23604559 A charming, warmhearted novel from the author of the New York Times bestseller A Man Called Ove.

Elsa is seven years old and different. Her grandmother is seventy-seven years old and crazy—as in standing-on-the-balcony-firing-paintball-guns-at-strangers crazy. She is also Elsa’s best, and only, friend. At night Elsa takes refuge in her grandmother’s stories, in the Land-of-Almost-Awake and the Kingdom of Miamas, where everybody is different and nobody needs to be normal.

When Elsa’s grandmother dies and leaves behind a series of letters apologizing to people she has wronged, Elsa’s greatest adventure begins. Her grandmother’s instructions lead her to an apartment building full of drunks, monsters, attack dogs, and old crones but also to the truth about fairy tales and kingdoms and a grandmother like no other.

My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She’s Sorry is told with the same comic accuracy and beating heart as Fredrik Backman’s bestselling debut novel, A Man Called Ove. It is a story about life and death and one of the most important human rights: the right to be different.]]>
372 Fredrik Backman 1501115065 Taylor 3 4.04 2013 My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry
author: Fredrik Backman
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2013
rating: 3
read at: 2022/06/21
date added: 2022/06/21
shelves:
review:

]]>
Before We Were Yours 32148570 Memphis, 1939. Twelve-year-old Rill Foss and her four younger siblings live a magical life aboard their family’s Mississippi River shantyboat. But when their father must rush their mother to the hospital one stormy night, Rill is left in charge—until strangers arrive in force. Wrenched from all that is familiar and thrown into a Tennessee Children’s Home Society orphanage, the Foss children are assured that they will soon be returned to their parents—but they quickly realize the dark truth. At the mercy of the facility’s cruel director, Rill fights to keep her sisters and brother together in a world of danger and uncertainty.

Aiken, South Carolina, present day. Born into wealth and privilege, Avery Stafford seems to have it all: a successful career as a federal prosecutor, a handsome fiancé, and a lavish wedding on the horizon. But when Avery returns home to help her father weather a health crisis, a chance encounter leaves her with uncomfortable questions and compels her to take a journey through her family’s long-hidden history, on a path that will ultimately lead either to devastation or to redemption.

Based on one of America’s most notorious real-life scandals—in which Georgia Tann, director of a Memphis-based adoption organization, kidnapped and sold poor children to wealthy families all over the country—Lisa Wingate’s riveting, wrenching, and ultimately uplifting tale reminds us how, even though the paths we take can lead to many places, the heart never forgets where we belong.]]>
342 Lisa Wingate 0425284689 Taylor 4 4.38 2017 Before We Were Yours
author: Lisa Wingate
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/06/19
shelves:
review:

]]>
The Trumpeter of Krakow 825546
When Joseph and his family seek refuge in medieval Krakow, they are caught up in the plots and intrigues of alchemists, hypnotists, and a dark messenger of evil. Will Joseph be able to protect the crystal—and the city—from the plundering Tartars?]]>
208 Eric P. Kelly 0689715714 Taylor 0 to-read 3.75 1928 The Trumpeter of Krakow
author: Eric P. Kelly
name: Taylor
average rating: 3.75
book published: 1928
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
The Mother-Daughter Book Club 318016 The book club

is about to get

a makeover....

Even if Megan would rather be at the mall, Cassidy is late for hockey practice, Emma's already read every book in existence, and Jess is missing her mother too much to care, the new book club is scheduled to meet every month.

But what begins as a mom-imposed ritual of reading Little Women soon helps four unlikely friends navigate the drama of middle school. From stolen journals, to secret crushes, to a fashion-fiasco first dance, the girls are up to their Wellie boots in drama. They can't help but wonder: What would Jo March do?

Acclaimed author Heather Vogel Frederick will delight daughters of all ages in a novel about the fabulousness of fiction, family, and friendship.

]]>
245 Heather Vogel Frederick 0689864124 Taylor 0 to-read 4.06 2007 The Mother-Daughter Book Club
author: Heather Vogel Frederick
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/04/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
<![CDATA[The Good, the Bad, and the Bossy (Best Babysitters Ever, #2)]]> 40796165
Just when Malia, Dot, and Bree (aka the Best Babysitters Ever)ĚýcornerĚýthe Playa Del Mar babysitting market, their lives get even busier.ĚýMalia’s evil older sister ropes her into a thankless internship. DotĚý mustĚý win the science fair. And Bree’s brand new cat turns out to be a holy terror.Ěý Meow!Ěý Malia is frustrated by the group’s lack of commitment until she has an idea so great it rivals the creation of the club in the first place: they can hire new babysitters and take a cut of their wages! It’s all of the money, and lessĚýof the babysitting. This plan is too perfect to fail. Until—spoiler alert—it does, in the most hilarious way possible.]]>
304 Caroline Cala 1328850900 Taylor 5 4.09 2019 The Good, the Bad, and the Bossy (Best Babysitters Ever, #2)
author: Caroline Cala
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2019
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2022/04/15
shelves:
review:

]]>
We Need to Talk About Kevin 80660 The gripping international bestseller about motherhood gone awry.

Eva never really wanted to be a mother - and certainly not the mother of the unlovable boy who murdered seven of his fellow high school students, a cafeteria worker, and a much-adored teacher who tried to befriend him, all two days before his sixteenth birthday. Now, two years later, it is time for her to come to terms with marriage, career, family, parenthood, and Kevin's horrific rampage in a series of startlingly direct correspondences with her estranged husband, Franklin. Uneasy with the sacrifices and social demotion of motherhood from the start, Eva fears that her alarming dislike for her own son may be responsible for driving him so nihilistically off the rails.

]]>
400 Lionel Shriver 006112429X Taylor 0 to-read 4.07 2003 We Need to Talk About Kevin
author: Lionel Shriver
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2003
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/03/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>
What the Buddha Taught 390562 Journal of the Buddhist Society, “the newcomer to Buddhism has lacked a simple and reliable introduction to the complexities of the subject. Dr. Rahula’s What the Buddha Taught fills the need as only could be done by one having a firm grasp of the vast material to be sifted. It is a model of what a book should be that is addressed first of all to ‘the educated and intelligent reader.� Authoritative and clear, logical and sober, this study is as comprehensive as it is masterly.�

This edition contains a selection of illustrative texts from the Suttas and the Dhammapada (specially translated by the author), sixteen illustrations, and a bibliography, glossary and index.

]]>
151 Walpola Rahula 0802130313 Taylor 0 to-read 4.17 1959 What the Buddha Taught
author: Walpola Rahula
name: Taylor
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1959
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/03/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>