en-US Sun, 17 Dec 2023 21:31:04 -0800 60 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg 17802724 At the heart of The Husband’s Secret is a letter that’s not meant to be read

My darling Cecilia, if you’re reading this, then I’ve died...

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

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

Acclaimed author Liane Moriarty has written a gripping, thought-provoking novel about how well it is really possible to know our spouses—and, ultimately, ourselves.]]> 396 Liane Moriarty 0399159347 Mary 0 3.94 2013
author: Liane Moriarty
name: Mary
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2013
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]]> 63241104 In this beautiful and moving novel about family, love, and growing up, Ann Patchett once again proves herself one of America’s finest writers.

In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family's orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew.

Tom Lake is a meditation on youthful love, married love, and the lives parents have led before their children were born. Both hopeful and elegiac, it explores what it means to be happy even when the world is falling apart. As in all of her novels, Ann Patchett combines compelling narrative artistry with piercing insights into family dynamics. The result is a rich and luminous story, told with profound intelligence and emotional subtlety, that demonstrates once again why she is one of the most revered and acclaimed literary talents working today.]]> 309 Ann Patchett 006332752X Mary 0 currently-reading 3.92 2023
author: Ann Patchett
name: Mary
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2023
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date added: 2023/08/30
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]]> 890 “I got you to look after me, and you got me to look after you, and that's why.�

They are an unlikely pair: George is "small and quick and dark of face"; Lennie, a man of tremendous size, has the mind of a young child. Yet they have formed a "family," clinging together in the face of loneliness and alienation. Laborers in California's dusty vegetable fields, they hustle work when they can, living a hand-to-mouth existence. But George and Lennie have a plan: to own an acre of land and a shack they can call their own.

While the powerlessness of the laboring class is a recurring theme in Steinbeck's work of the late 1930s, he narrowed his focus when composing Of Mice and Men, creating an intimate portrait of two men facing a world marked by petty tyranny, misunderstanding, jealousy, and callousness. But though the scope is narrow, the theme is universal: a friendship and a shared dream that makes an individual's existence meaningful.

A unique perspective on life's hardships, this story has achieved the status of timeless classic due to its remarkable success as a novel, a Broadway play, and three acclaimed films.]]> 107 John Steinbeck 0142000671 Mary 0 3.88 1937
author: John Steinbeck
name: Mary
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1937
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]]> 4671 The only edition of the beloved classic that is authorized by Fitzgerald’s family and from his lifelong publisher.

This edition is the enduring original text, updated with the author’s own revisions, a foreword by his granddaughter, and with a new introduction by National Book Award winner Jesmyn Ward.

The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s third book, stands as the supreme achievement of his career. First published by Scribner in 1925, this quintessential novel of the Jazz Age has been acclaimed by generations of readers. The story of the mysteriously wealthy Jay Gatsby and his love for the beautiful Daisy Buchanan is an exquisitely crafted tale of America in the 1920s.]]> 180 F. Scott Fitzgerald 0743273567 Mary 0 3.93 1925
author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
name: Mary
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1925
rating: 0
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]]> 58065033 390 Bonnie Garmus Mary 0 to-read 4.23 2022
author: Bonnie Garmus
name: Mary
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2022
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]]> 55738541 The bestselling author of American Housewife and Southern Lady Code returns with a viciously funny, deeply felt collection of essays on friendship among grown-ass women.

When Helen Ellis and her lifelong friends arrive for a reunion on the Redneck Riviera they unpack more than their suitcases: stories of husbands and kids, lost parents and lost jobs powdered onion dip and photographs you have to hold by the edges; dirty jokes and sunscreen with SPF higher than they hair-sprayed their bangs senior year, and a bad mammogram. It's a diagnosis that scares them, but could never break their bond. Because women pushing fifty won't be pushed around.

In these twelve gloriously comic and moving essays, Helen Ellis dishes on married middle-age sex, sobs with a theater full of women as a psychic exorcises their sorrows, gets twenty shots of stomach bile to the neck to get rid of her double chin, and gathers up the courage to ask, Are you there, Menopause? It's Me, Helen.

A book that reads like the best cocktail party of your life, Bring Your Baggage and Don't Pack Light is chockablock with fabulous characters: cat-lady plastic surgeons and waterpark Adonises, bridge ladies and poker players; platinum medallion fliers and Garage Sale Swindlers; forty-year-old divorc�es, fifty-year-old new moms and still-young octogenarians. Alive with the sensational humor and ferocious love for her friends that won Helen Ellis legions of fans, this book has a raw vulnerability and an emotional generosity that takes this acclaimed author to a whole new level of accomplishment.]]> 176 Helen Ellis 0385546157 Mary 0 to-read 3.57 2021
author: Helen Ellis
name: Mary
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2022/01/01
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]]> 54798456 Laugh-out-loud, deeply insightful, and emotion-filled essays from multi-talented actress, comedian, podcaster, and writer Casey Wilson.

Casey Wilson has a lot on her mind and she isn’t afraid to share. In this dazzling collection of essays, skillfully constructed and brimming with emotion, she shares her thoughts on the joys and vagaries of modern-day womanhood and motherhood, introduces the not-quite-typical family that made her who she is, and persuasively argues that lowbrow pop culture is the perfect lens through which to understand human nature.

Whether she’s extolling the virtues of eating in bed, processing the humiliation over her father’s late in life perm, or exploring her pathological need to be liked, Casey is witty, candid, and full of poignant and funny surprises. Humorous dives into her obsessions and areas of personal expertise—Scientology and self-help, nice guys, reality television shows—are matched by touching meditations on female friendship, grief, motherhood, and identity.Ìý

Reading The Wreckage of My Presence is like spending time with a close friend—a deeply passionate, full-tilt, joyous, excessive, compulsive, shameless, hungry-for-it-all, loyal, cheerleading friend. A friend who is ready for any big feeling that comes her way and isn’t afraid to embrace it.

Bed person --
The wreckage of my presence --
To all the boys I loved before --
Cool girl --
A saber story --
Send in the clowns --
Flyentology --
Hide your phones --
Expect a miracle --
Hiked out --
The BBQ --
Tears of a clown --
Happy endings --
My husband's just not that into me; or Afrin: a love story --
Grandpa's pretty girl --
It doesn't do --
What dis --
Open-door policy --
Mother's day --
People don't know how to act --
Gimme some sugar; or, the wreckage of my presence redux]]> 288 Casey Wilson 006296058X Mary 0 to-read 4.13 2021
author: Casey Wilson
name: Mary
average rating: 4.13
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]]> 56098124 NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER - From the best-selling, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of All Over but the Shoutin', the warmhearted and hilarious story of how his life was transformed by his love for a poorly behaved, half-blind stray dog.

Speck is not a good boy. He is a terrible boy, a defiant, self-destructive, often malodorous boy, a grave robber and screen door moocher who spends his days playing chicken with the Fed Ex man, picking fights with thousand-pound livestock, and rolling in donkey manure, and his nights howling at the moon. He has been that way since the moment he appeared on the ridgeline behind Rick Bragg's house, a starved and half-dead creature, seventy-six pounds of wet hair and poor decisions.

Speck arrived in Rick's life at a moment of looming uncertainty. A cancer diagnosis, chemo, kidney failure, and recurring pneumonia had left Rick lethargic and melancholy. Speck helped, and he is helping, still, when he is not peeing on the rose of Sharon. Written with Bragg's inimitable blend of tenderness and sorrow, humor and grit, The Speckled Beauty captures the extraordinary, sustaining devotion between two damaged creatures who need each other to heal.]]> 256 Rick Bragg 0525658815 Mary 0 to-read 4.35 2021
author: Rick Bragg
name: Mary
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2021
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]]> 43212075 A Publishers Marketplace Buzz Books selection

Set in Appalachia and the Midwest at the turn of the twentieth century, this exquisite debut novel paints an intimately rendered portrait of one resilient farm family's challenges and hard-won triumphs--helmed by an unforgettable heroine.

Growing up on their hardscrabble farm in rural Kentucky, fifteen-year-old Albertina "Bertie" Winslow has learned a lot from her mama, Polly. She knows how to lance a boil, make a pie crust, butcher a pig, and tend to every chore that needs doing. What she doesn't know, but is forced to reckon with all too soon, is how to look after children as a mother should ...

When Polly succumbs to a long illness, Bertie takes on responsibility for her four younger siblings and their dissolute, unreliable daddy. Yet no matter how hard she tries to hold the family together, the task is overwhelming. Nine-year-old Dacia, especially, is resentful and stubborn, hinting at secrets in their mama's life. Finally, Bertie makes the only choice she can--breaking up the family for its own survival, keeping the girls with her, sending the boys off to their grown brothers, long gone from home.

Ever pragmatic, Bertie marries young, grateful to find a husband willing to take on the care of her sisters, and eventually moves to the oil fields of Kansas. But marriage alone cannot resolve the grief and guilt she carries over a long-ago tragedy, or prepare her for the heartaches still to come. Only by confronting wrenching truths can she open herself to joy--and learn how to not only give, but receive, unfettered love.

Inspired by stories told by the author's mother and aunts, All the Forgivenesses is as authentic as it is lyrical--a captivating novel of family loyalty, redemption, and resilience.]]> 368 Elizabeth Hardinger 149672044X Mary 4 4.00 2019
author: Elizabeth Hardinger
name: Mary
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2021/11/18
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]]> 28218864 Steve Jobs and Moneyball, Elon Musk is both an illuminating and authorized look at the extraordinary life of one of Silicon Valley’s most exciting, unpredictable, and ambitious entrepreneurs—a real-life Tony Stark—and a fascinating exploration of the renewal of American invention and its new “makers.�

Elon Musk spotlights the technology and vision of Elon Musk, the renowned entrepreneur and innovator behind SpaceX, Tesla, and SolarCity, who sold one of his Internet companies, PayPal, for $1.5 billion. Ashlee Vance captures the full spectacle and arc of the genius’s life and work, from his tumultuous upbringing in South Africa and flight to the United States to his dramatic technical innovations and entrepreneurial pursuits.

Vance uses Musk’s story to explore one of the pressing questions of our age: can the nation of inventors and creators who led the modern world for a century still compete in an age of fierce global competition? He argues that Musk—one of the most unusual and striking figures in American business history—is a contemporary, visionary amalgam of legendary inventors and industrialists including Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, Howard Hughes, and Steve Jobs. More than any other entrepreneur today, Musk has dedicated his energies and his own vast fortune to inventing a future that is as rich and far-reaching as the visionaries of the golden age of science-fiction fantasy.

Thorough and insightful, Elon Musk brings to life a technology industry that is rapidly and dramatically changing by examining the life of one of its most powerful and influential titans.]]> 416 Ashlee Vance 006230125X Mary 0 4.25 2015
author: Ashlee Vance
name: Mary
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at: 2021/07/26
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]]> 49127718 A poignant, charming novel about a crime that never took place, a would-be bank robber who disappears into thin air, and eight extremely anxious strangers who find they have more in common than they ever imagined

Looking at real estate isn't usually a life-or-death situation, but an apartment open house becomes just that when a failed bank robber bursts in and takes a group of strangers hostage. The captives include a recently retired couple who relentlessly hunt down fixer-uppers to avoid the painful truth that they can't fix up their own marriage. There's a wealthy banker who has been too busy making money to care about anyone else and a young couple who are about to have their first child but can't seem to agree on anything, from where they want to live to how they met in the first place. Add to the mix an eighty-seven-year-old woman who has lived long enough not to be afraid of someone waving a gun in her face, a flustered but still-ready-to-make-a-deal real estate agent, and a mystery man who has locked himself in the apartment's only bathroom, and you've got the worst group of hostages in the world.

Each of them carries a lifetime of grievances, hurts, secrets, and passions that are ready to boil over. None of them is entirely who they appear to be. And all of them—the bank robber included—desperately crave some sort of rescue. As the authorities and the media surround the premises, these reluctant allies will reveal surprising truths about themselves and set in a motion a chain of events so unexpected that even they can hardly explain what happens next.

Humorous, compassionate, and wise, Anxious People is an ingeniously constructed story about the enduring power of friendship, forgiveness, and hope—the things that save us, even in the most anxious of times.

Includes short story - The Last Round of Golf]]> 336 Fredrik Backman 198216963X Mary 0 to-read 4.17 2019
author: Fredrik Backman
name: Mary
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2021/04/12
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]]> 24988 557 Winston S. Churchill 0786888709 Mary 0 to-read 4.19 1967
author: Winston S. Churchill
name: Mary
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1967
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]]> 34847534 The Theory of Everything comes a revelatory look at the period immediately following Winston Churchill’s ascendancy to Prime Minister—soon to be a major motion picture starring Gary Oldman.

“He was speaking to the nation, the world, and indeed to history...�

ÌýMay, 1940. Britain is at war. The horrors of blitzkrieg have seen one western European democracy after another fall in rapid succession to Nazi boot and shell. Invasion seems mere hours away.

ÌýJust days after becoming Prime Minister, Winston Churchill must deal with this horror—as well as a skeptical King, a party plotting against him, and an unprepared public. Pen in hand and typist-secretary at the ready, how could he change the mood and shore up the will of a nervous people?

ÌýIn this gripping day-by-day, often hour-by-hour account of how an often uncertain Churchill turned Britain around, the celebrated Bafta-winning writer Anthony McCarten exposes sides of the great man never seen before. He reveals how he practiced and re-wrote his key speeches, from ‘Blood, toil, tears and sweatâ€� to ‘We shall fight on the beachesâ€�; his consideration of a peace treaty with Nazi Germany, and his underappreciated role in the Dunkirk evacuation; and, above all, how 25 days helped make one man an icon.

ÌýUsing new archive material, McCarten reveals the crucial behind-the-scenes moments that changed the course of history. It’s a scarier—and more human—story than has ever been told.

Ìý“McCarten's pulse-pounding narrative transports the reader to those springtime weeks in 1940 when the fate of the world rested on the shoulders of Winston Churchill.ÌýA true story thrillingly told. Thoroughly researched and compulsively readable.â€�—Michael F. Bishop, Executive Director of the International Churchill Society]]> 336 Anthony McCarten 0062749544 Mary 0 to-read 3.99 2017
author: Anthony McCarten
name: Mary
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2017
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]]> 54897158
Michael S. Schmidt’s Donald Trump v. The United States tells the dramatic, high-stakes story of those who felt compelled to confront and try to contain the most powerful man in the world as he shredded norms and sought to expand his power.

Schmidt has broken many of the major stories of the Trump era, from the news of Hillary Clinton’s use of a personal email account to the report on former FBI director James Comey’s contemporaneous memos of conversations with Trump that led directly to the appointment of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III. Now he takes us inside the defining events of the presidency, chronicles them up close, and records the clash between an increasingly emboldened president and those around him, who find themselves trying to thwart the president they had pledged to serve, unsure whether he is acting in the interest of the country, his ego, his family business, or Russia. Through their eyes and ears, we observe an epic struggle.

Drawing on secret FBI and White House documents and confidential sources inside federal law enforcement and the West Wing, Donald Trump v. The United States is vital journalism, recording the shocking reality of a presidency like no other, a riveting contemporary history, and a lasting account of just how fragile and vulnerable the institutions of American democracy really are.

With unparalleled reporting, a Pulitzer Prize–winning New York Times reporter continues to break news about the most important political story of our lives as he chronicles the clash between a president and the officials of his own government who tried to stop him.]]> 423 Michael S. Schmidt 1984854674 Mary 4 4.25 2020
author: Michael S. Schmidt
name: Mary
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2020/11/14
date added: 2020/11/14
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]]> 29868604
My Own Words offers Justice Ginsburg on wide-ranging topics, including gender equality, the workways of the Supreme Court, being Jewish, law and lawyers in opera, and the value of looking beyond US shores when interpreting the US Constitution. Throughout her life Justice Ginsburg has been (and continues to be) a prolific writer and public speaker. This book’s sampling is selected by Justice Ginsburg and her authorized biographers Mary Hartnett and Wendy W. Williams. Justice Ginsburg has written an introduction to the book, and Hartnett and Williams introduce each chapter, giving biographical context and quotes gleaned from hundreds of interviews they have conducted. This is a fascinating glimpse into the life of one of America’s most influential women.]]> 400 Ruth Bader Ginsburg 150114524X Mary 0 4.02 2016
author: Ruth Bader Ginsburg
name: Mary
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at: 2020/11/14
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]]> 332978
Franklin Delano Roosevelt took office in March of 1933 as America touched bottom. Banks were closing everywhere. Millions of people lost everything. The Great Depression had caused a national breakdown. With the craft of a master storyteller, Jonathan Alter brings us closer than ever before to the Roosevelt magic. Facing the gravest crisis since the Civil War, FDR used his cagey political instincts and ebullient temperament in the storied first Hundred Days of his presidency to pull off an astonishing conjuring act that lifted the country and saved both democracy and capitalism.

Who was this man? To revive the nation when it felt so hopeless took an extraordinary display of optimism and self-confidence. Alter shows us how a snobbish and apparently lightweight young aristocrat was forged into an incandescent leader by his domineering mother; his independent wife; his eccentric top adviser, Louis Howe; and his ally-turned-bitter-rival, Al Smith, the Tammany Hall street fighter FDR had to vanquish to complete his preparation for the presidency.

"Old Doc Roosevelt" had learned at Warm Springs, Georgia, how to lift others who suffered from polio, even if he could not cure their paralysis, or his own. He brought the same talents to a larger stage. Derided as weak and unprincipled by pundits, Governor Roosevelt was barely nominated for president in 1932. As president-elect, he escaped assassination in Miami by inches, then stiffed President Herbert Hoover's efforts to pull him into cooperating with him to deal with a terrifying crisis. In the most tumultuous and dramatic presidential transition in history, the entire banking structure came tumbling down just hours before FDR's legendary "only thing we have to fear is fear itself" Inaugural Address.

In a major historical find, Alter unearths the draft of a radio speech in which Roosevelt considered enlisting a private army of American Legion veterans on his first day in office. He did not. Instead of circumventing Congress and becoming the dictator so many thought they needed, FDR used his stunning debut to experiment. He rescued banks, put men to work immediately, and revolutionized mass communications with pioneering press conferences and the first Fireside Chat. As he moved both right and left, Roosevelt's insistence on "action now" did little to cure the Depression, but he began to rewrite the nation's social contract and lay the groundwork for his most ambitious achievements, including Social Security.

From one of America's most respected journalists, rich in insights and with fresh documentation and colorful detail, this thrilling story of presidential leadership--of what government is for--resonates through the events of today. It deepens our understanding of how Franklin Delano Roosevelt restored hope and transformed America.

The Defining Moment will take its place among our most compelling works of political history.]]> 414 Jonathan Alter 0743246012 Mary 4 3.92 2006
author: Jonathan Alter
name: Mary
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2006
rating: 4
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]]> 54114950
Mary Trump spent much of her childhood in her grandparents� large, imposing house in the heart of Queens, where Donald and his four siblings grew up. She describes a nightmare of traumas, destructive relationships, and a tragic combination of neglect and abuse. She explains how specific events and general family patterns created the damaged man who currently occupies the Oval Office, including the strange and harmful relationship between Fred Trump and his two oldest sons, Fred Jr. and Donald.

A first-hand witness to countless holiday meals and family interactions, Mary brings an incisive wit and unexpected humor to sometimes grim, often confounding family events. She recounts in unsparing detail everything from her uncle Donald’s place in the family spotlight and Ivana’s penchant for re-gifting to her grandmother’s frequent injuries and illnesses and the appalling way Donald, Fred Trump’s favorite son, dismissed and derided him when he began to succumb to Alzheimer’s.

Numerous pundits, armchair psychologists, and journalists have sought to parse Donald J. Trump’s lethal flaws. Mary L. Trump has the education, insight, and intimate familiarity needed to reveal what makes Donald, and the rest of her clan, tick. She alone can recount this fascinating, unnerving saga, not just because of her insider’s perspective but also because she is the only Trump willing to tell the truth about one of the world’s most powerful and dysfunctional families.]]> 236 Mary L. Trump 1982141484 Mary 4 3.87 2020
author: Mary L. Trump
name: Mary
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2020
rating: 4
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]]> 40819522 By the popular Vice contributor, a collection of full-throated appreciations, elaborate theories, and unflinching recollections

Joel Golby's writing for Vice and The Guardian, with its wry observation and naked self-reflection, has brought him a wide and devoted following. Now, in his first book, he presents a blistering collection of new and newly expanded essays--including the achingly funny viral hit "Things You Only Know When Both Your Parents Are Dead." In these pages, he travels to Saudi Arabia, where he acts as a perplexed bystander at a camel pageant; offers a survival guide for the modern dinner party (i.e. how to tactfully escape at the first sign of an adult board game); and gets pitted head-to-head, again and again, with an unpredictable, unpitying subspecies of Londoner: the landlord.

Through it all, he shows that no matter how cruel the misfortune, how absurd the circumstance, there's always the soft punch of a lesson tucked within. This is a book for anyone who overshares, overthinks, has ever felt lost or confused--and who wants to have a good laugh about it.]]> 304 Joel Golby 052556277X Mary 3 3.45 2019
author: Joel Golby
name: Mary
average rating: 3.45
book published: 2019
rating: 3
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]]> 40983137 American Housewife is back with a fiercely funny collection of essays on marriage and manners, thank-you notes and three-ways, ghosts, gunshots, gynecology, and the Calgon-scented, onion-dipped, monogrammed art of living as a Southern Lady.

Helen Ellis has a mantra: "If you don't have something nice to say, say something not-so-nice in a nice way." Say "weathered" instead of "she looks like a cake left out in the rain." Say "early-developed" instead of "brace face and B cups." And for the love of Coke Salad, always say "Sorry you saw something that offended you" instead of "Get that stick out of your butt, Miss Prissy Pants." In these twenty-three raucous essays Ellis transforms herself into a dominatrix Donna Reed to save her marriage, inadvertently steals a $795 Burberry trench coat, witnesses a man fake his own death at a party, avoids a neck lift, and finds a black-tie gown that gives her the confidence of a drag queen. While she may have left her home in Alabama, married a New Yorker, forgotten how to drive, and abandoned the puffy headbands of her youth, Helen Ellis is clinging to her Southern accent like mayonnaise to white bread, and offering readers a hilarious, completely singular view on womanhood for both sides of the Mason-Dixon.

Making a marriage magically tidy --
Topeka three-way --
How to stay happily married --
Free to be...you and me (and childfree) --
Room of one's own (that's full of gay men) --
Other woman's Burberry coat --
Peggy Sue got marijuana --
What every girl should learn from ABC's The bachelor --
Ghost experience --
Party foul --
Today was a good day --
Straighten up and fly right. --
Halloween people --
Tonight we're gonna party like it's 1979 --
How to be the best guest --
When to write a thank-you note --
An Emily Post for the apocalypse --
How I watch pornography like a lady --
Dumb boobs --
Young ladies, listen to me --
Seven things I'm doing instead of a neck lift --
Serious women --
That kind of woman]]> 203 Helen Ellis 0385543891 Mary 0 to-read 3.58 2019
author: Helen Ellis
name: Mary
average rating: 3.58
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/09/11
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]]> 824679 Ìý
Featuring Roger Tory Peterson's classic art in a larger format, this guide has the most commonly seen birds first, followed by those that are harder to identify or that rarely visit feeders. Range maps, descriptions of birds and foods that attract them, and illustrations are on facing pages, so identification is fast and easy. The introduction covers important bird-feeding topics, including types of feeders and where to place them, birdbaths, kinds of food and when to feed, plantings that attract birds, and solutions to problems with squirrels and cats. A handy quick-reference list tells what kind of food each species prefers, and a feeder checklist provides a record of birds as they are seen.

For more than 85 years, Peterson Field Guides have set the standard by which other field guides are measured. Comprehensive and authoritative, they are essential additions to any naturalist's bookshelf or backpack.]]> 112 Noble S. Proctor 061805944X Mary 0 to-read 4.31 2000
author: Noble S. Proctor
name: Mary
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2000
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/08/19
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]]> 39900791 The Garden of Small Beginnings returns with a hilarious and poignant new novel about four families, their neighborhood carpool, and the affair that changes everything.

At any given moment in other people's houses, you can find...repressed hopes and dreams...moments of unexpected joy...someone making love on the floor to a man who is most definitely not her husband...

*record scratch*

As the longtime local carpool mom, Frances Bloom is sometimes an unwilling witness to her neighbors' private lives. She knows her cousin is hiding her desire for another baby from her spouse, Bill Horton's wife is mysteriously missing, and now this...

After the shock of seeing Anne Porter in all her extramarital glory, Frances vows to stay in her own lane. But that's a notion easier said than done when Anne's husband throws her out a couple of days later. The repercussions of the affair reverberate through the four carpool families--and Frances finds herself navigating a moral minefield that could make or break a marriage.]]> 330 Abbi Waxman 1683318250 Mary 0 to-read 3.53 2018
author: Abbi Waxman
name: Mary
average rating: 3.53
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/08/08
shelves: to-read
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]]> 11468377 Thinking, Fast and Slow, Kahneman takes us on a groundbreaking tour of the mind and explains the two systems that drive the way we think. System 1 is fast, intuitive, and emotional; System 2 is slower, more deliberative, and more logical. Kahneman exposes the extraordinary capabilities—and also the faults and biases—of fast thinking, and reveals the pervasive influence of intuitive impressions on our thoughts and behavior. The impact of loss aversion and overconfidence on corporate strategies, the difficulties of predicting what will make us happy in the future, the challenges of properly framing risks at work and at home, the profound effect of cognitive biases on everything from playing the stock market to planning the next vacation—each of these can be understood only by knowing how the two systems work together to shape our judgments and decisions.

Engaging the reader in a lively conversation about how we think, Kahneman reveals where we can and cannot trust our intuitions and how we can tap into the benefits of slow thinking. He offers practical and enlightening insights into how choices are made in both our business and our personal lives—and how we can use different techniques to guard against the mental glitches that often get us into trouble. Thinking, Fast and Slow will transform the way you think about thinking.]]> 499 Daniel Kahneman 0374275637 Mary 0 to-read 4.17 2011
author: Daniel Kahneman
name: Mary
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2011
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/08/08
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]]> 30165203
Together they embark on a profoundly strange journey across the heart of the USA, whilst all around them a storm of preternatural and epic proportions threatens to break.

Scary, gripping and deeply unsettling, American Gods takes a long, hard look into the soul of America. You'll be surprised by what - and who - it finds there...]]> 635 Neil Gaiman Mary 5 4.11 2001
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Mary
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2001
rating: 5
read at: 2020/08/08
date added: 2020/08/08
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]]> 7015403 New York Times best seller, Dr. Brené Brown, a research professor and thought leader on vulnerability, courage, worthiness, and shame, shares ten guideposts on the power of Wholehearted living—a way of engaging with the world from a place of worthiness.]]> 137 Brené Brown 159285849X Mary 5 4.25 2010
author: Brené Brown
name: Mary
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2010
rating: 5
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date added: 2020/08/08
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]]> 139176 246 M.C. Beaton 0312939167 Mary 3 3.77 1992
author: M.C. Beaton
name: Mary
average rating: 3.77
book published: 1992
rating: 3
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date added: 2019/10/22
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]]> 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 Mary 0 to-read 4.27 2008
author: Mary Ann Shaffer
name: Mary
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2008
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/10/17
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]]> 39280445 Could ten days at a health resort really change you forever?

These nine perfect strangers are about to find out...

Nine people gather at a remote health resort. Some are here to lose weight, some are here to get a reboot on life, some are here for reasons they can’t even admit to themselves. Amidst all of the luxury and pampering, the mindfulness and meditation, they know these ten days might involve some real work. But none of them could imagine just how challenging the next ten days are going to be.

Frances Welty, the formerly best-selling romantic novelist, arrives at Tranquillum House nursing a bad back, a broken heart, and an exquisitely painful paper cut. She’s immediately intrigued by her fellow guests. Most of them don’t look to be in need of a health resort at all. But the person that intrigues her most is the strange and charismatic owner/director of Tranquillum House. Could this person really have the answers Frances didn’t even know she was seeking? Should Frances put aside her doubts and immerse herself in everything Tranquillum House has to offer—or should she run while she still can?

It’s not long before every guest at Tranquillum House is asking exactly the same question.

Combining all of the hallmarks that have made Liane Moriarty's writing a go-to for anyone looking for wickedly smart, page-turning fiction that will make you laugh and gasp, Nine Perfect Strangers once again shows why she is a master of her craft.]]> 453 Liane Moriarty 1250069823 Mary 0 to-read 3.53 2018
author: Liane Moriarty
name: Mary
average rating: 3.53
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/10/17
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]]> 5941114 466 Tana French 0143115626 Mary 3 4.06 2008
author: Tana French
name: Mary
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2008
rating: 3
read at: 2019/07/29
date added: 2019/07/29
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]]> 37703550
But Kya is not what they say. A born naturalist with just one day of school, she takes life's lessons from the land, learning the real ways of the world from the dishonest signals of fireflies. But while she has the skills to live in solitude forever, the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. Drawn to two young men from town, who are each intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new and startling world–until the unthinkable happens.

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

The story asks how isolation influences the behavior of a young woman, who like all of us, has the genetic propensity to belong to a group. The clues to the mystery are brushed into the lush habitat and natural histories of its wild creatures.]]> 370 Delia Owens 0735219095 Mary 0 to-read 4.42 2018
author: Delia Owens
name: Mary
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/07/07
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]]> 4667024
Twenty-two-year-old Skeeter has just returned home after graduating from Ole Miss. She may have a degree, but it is 1962, Mississippi, and her mother will not be happy till Skeeter has a ring on her finger. Skeeter would normally find solace with her beloved maid Constantine, the woman who raised her, but Constantine has disappeared and no one will tell Skeeter where she has gone.

Aibileen is a black maid, a wise, regal woman raising her seventeenth white child. Something has shifted inside her after the loss of her own son, who died while his bosses looked the other way. She is devoted to the little girl she looks after, though she knows both their hearts may be broken.

Minny, Aibileen's best friend, is short, fat, and perhaps the sassiest woman in Mississippi. She can cook like nobody's business, but she can't mind her tongue, so she's lost yet another job. Minny finally finds a position working for someone too new to town to know her reputation. But her new boss has secrets of her own.

Seemingly as different from one another as can be, these women will nonetheless come together for a clandestine project that will put them all at risk. And why? Because they are suffocating within the lines that define their town and their times. And sometimes lines are made to be crossed.

In pitch-perfect voices, Kathryn Stockett creates three extraordinary women whose determination to start a movement of their own forever changes a town, and the way women, mothers, daughters, caregivers, friends, view one another. A deeply moving novel filled with poignancy, humor, and hope, The Help is a timeless and universal story about the lines we abide by, and the ones we don't.


Librarian's note: An alternate cover edition can be found here]]> 464 Kathryn Stockett 0399155341 Mary 0 to-read 4.46 2009
author: Kathryn Stockett
name: Mary
average rating: 4.46
book published: 2009
rating: 0
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]]> 2459785
Twenty years later, the found boy, Rob Ryan, is a detective on the Dublin Murder Squad and keeps his past a secret. But when a 12-year-old girl is found murdered in the same woods, he and Detective Cassie Maddox (his partner and closest friend) find themselves investigating a case chillingly similar to the previous unsolved mystery. Now, with only snippets of long-buried memories to guide him, Ryan has the chance to uncover both the mystery of the case before him and that of his own shadowy past.

A gorgeously written novel that marks the debut of an astonishing new voice in psychological suspense.]]> 448 Tana French Mary 4 3.83 2007
author: Tana French
name: Mary
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at: 2019/06/08
date added: 2019/06/08
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]]> 23398965 An alternate cover edition for this book can be found here.

A year ago a boy was found murdered at a girlsʼ boarding school, and the case was never solved. Detective Stephen Moran has been waiting for his chance to join Dublin’s Murder Squad when sixteen-year-old Holly Mackey arrives in his office with a photo of the boy with the caption: “I KNOW WHO KILLED HIM.� Stephen joins with Detective Antoinette Conway to reopen the case—beneath the watchful eye of Holly’s father, fellow detective Frank Mackey. With the clues leading back to Holly’s close-knit group of friends, to their rival clique, and to the tangle of relationships that bound them all to the murdered boy, the private underworld of teenage girls turns out to be more mysterious and more dangerous than the detectives imagined.]]> 480 Tana French Mary 4 3.86 2014
author: Tana French
name: Mary
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2014
rating: 4
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]]> 18728 No Ordinary Time is a chronicle of one of the most vibrant & revolutionary periods in US history. With an extraordinary collection of details, Goodwin weaves together a number of story lines—the Roosevelt’s marriage & partnership, Eleanor’s life as First Lady, & FDR’s White House & its impact on America as well as on a world at war. Goodwin melds these into an intimate portrait of Eleanor & Franklin Roosevelt & of the time during which a new, modern America was born.]]> 633 Doris Kearns Goodwin 0684804484 Mary 4 4.19 1994
author: Doris Kearns Goodwin
name: Mary
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1994
rating: 4
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]]> 160251 (back cover)]]> 263 Judith Guest Mary 3 3.92 1976
author: Judith Guest
name: Mary
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1976
rating: 3
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date added: 2019/02/24
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]]> 3306248 245 H. Tatlock Miller Mary 0 to-read 4.60 2008
author: H. Tatlock Miller
name: Mary
average rating: 4.60
book published: 2008
rating: 0
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]]> 35791968 From the #1 New York Times bestselling author Jojo Moyes, a new book featuring her iconic heroine of Me Before You and After You, Louisa Clark.

Louisa Clark arrives in New York ready to start a new life, confident that she can embrace this new adventure and keep her relationship with Ambulance Sam alive across several thousand miles. She steps into the world of the superrich, working for Leonard Gopnik and his much younger second wife, Agnes. Lou is determined to get the most out of the experience and throws herself into her new job and New York life.

As she begins to mix in New York high society, Lou meets Joshua Ryan, a man who brings with him a whisper of her past. Before long, Lou finds herself torn between Fifth Avenue where she works and the treasure-filled vintage clothing store where she actually feels at home. And when matters come to a head, she has to ask herself: Who is Louisa Clark? And how do you find the courage to follow your heart—wherever that may lead?

Funny, romantic, and poignant, Still Me follows Lou as she navigates how to stay true to herself, while pushing to live boldly in her brave new world.]]> 368 Jojo Moyes 0399562451 Mary 0 to-read 4.09 2018
author: Jojo Moyes
name: Mary
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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]]> 22501028 From the beloved Pulitzer Prize-winning author--now in the fiftieth year of her remarkable career--a brilliantly observed, joyful and wrenching, funny and true new novel that reveals, as only she can, the very nature of a family's life.
ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý"It was a beautiful, breezy, yellow-and-green afternoon." This is the way Abby Whitshank always begins the story of how she fell in love with Red that day in July 1959. The whole family--their two daughters and two sons, their grandchildren, even their faithful old dog--is on the porch, listening contentedly as Abby tells the tale they have heard so many times before. And yet this gathering is different too: Abby and Red are growing older, and decisions must be made about how best to look after them, and the fate of the house so lovingly built by Red's father. Brimming with the luminous insight, humor, and compassion that are Anne Tyler's hallmarks, this capacious novel takes us across three generations of the Whitshanks, their shared stories and long-held secrets, all the unguarded and richly lived moments that combine to define who and what they are as a family.]]> 358 Anne Tyler 0385683421 Mary 5 3.39 2015
author: Anne Tyler
name: Mary
average rating: 3.39
book published: 2015
rating: 5
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]]> 2199 Winner of the Lincoln Prize

Acclaimed historian Doris Kearns Goodwin illuminates Lincoln's political genius in this highly original work, as the one-term congressman and prairie lawyer rises from obscurity to prevail over three gifted rivals of national reputation to become president.

On May 18, 1860, William H. Seward, Salmon P. Chase, Edward Bates, and Abraham Lincoln waited in their hometowns for the results from the Republican National Convention in Chicago. When Lincoln emerged as the victor, his rivals were dismayed and angry.

Throughout the turbulent 1850s, each had energetically sought the presidency as the conflict over slavery was leading inexorably to secession and civil war. That Lincoln succeeded, Goodwin demonstrates, was the result of a character that had been forged by experiences that raised him above his more privileged and accomplished rivals. He won because he possessed an extraordinary ability to put himself in the place of other men, to experience what they were feeling, to understand their motives and desires.

It was this capacity that enabled Lincoln as president to bring his disgruntled opponents together, create the most unusual cabinet in history, and marshal their talents to the task of preserving the Union and winning the war.

We view the long, horrifying struggle from the vantage of the White House as Lincoln copes with incompetent generals, hostile congressmen, and his raucous cabinet. He overcomes these obstacles by winning the respect of his former competitors, and in the case of Seward, finds a loyal and crucial friend to see him through.

This brilliant multiple biography is centered on Lincoln's mastery of men and how it shaped the most significant presidency in the nation's history.]]> 916 Doris Kearns Goodwin Mary 4 4.27 2005
author: Doris Kearns Goodwin
name: Mary
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2005
rating: 4
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]]> 3613997 373 John Grisham 0385517831 Mary 4 3.68 2009
author: John Grisham
name: Mary
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2009
rating: 4
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date added: 2017/05/06
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]]> 5351
But a violent encounter with a homeless man stopped him cold. Michael survived; his assailant did not. Who was this man? Michael did some digging, and learned that he was a mentally ill veteran who'd been in and out of shelters for many years. Then Michael dug a little deeper, and found a dirty secret, and the secret involved Drake & Sweeney.

The fast track derailed; the ladder collapsed. Michael bolted the firm and took a top-secret file with him. He landed in the streets, an advocate for the homeless, a street lawyer.

And a thief.]]> 384 John Grisham 0385339097 Mary 3 3.87 1998
author: John Grisham
name: Mary
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1998
rating: 3
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date added: 2017/05/06
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]]> 139177 192 M.C. Beaton 1841197769 Mary 5 3.76 1995
author: M.C. Beaton
name: Mary
average rating: 3.76
book published: 1995
rating: 5
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]]> 43669 352 Lawrence Sanders 0425145301 Mary 4 3.89 1994
author: Lawrence Sanders
name: Mary
average rating: 3.89
book published: 1994
rating: 4
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date added: 2015/04/21
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]]> 645229 336 Lawrence Sanders 0425142868 Mary 4 3.90 1993
author: Lawrence Sanders
name: Mary
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1993
rating: 4
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date added: 2015/04/21
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]]> 645289 324 Lawrence Sanders 0425137457 Mary 4 3.88 1992
author: Lawrence Sanders
name: Mary
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1992
rating: 4
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]]> 135907 352 Lawrence Sanders 0425135721 Mary 4 3.81 1992
author: Lawrence Sanders
name: Mary
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1992
rating: 4
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date added: 2015/04/21
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]]> 1434463 309 Vincent Lardo 0399148795 Mary 4 3.84 2002
author: Vincent Lardo
name: Mary
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2002
rating: 4
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date added: 2015/04/21
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]]> 135893 320 Vincent Lardo 0425197417 Mary 5 3.75 2003
author: Vincent Lardo
name: Mary
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2003
rating: 5
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date added: 2015/04/21
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]]> 15306783 0 Lawrence Sanders 0425065464 Mary 0 4.29 1983
author: Lawrence Sanders
name: Mary
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1983
rating: 0
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]]> 515139
Pilot Douglas Grimes’s best days are long behind him. Grounded due to a medical condition, Douglas has resigned himself to menial work as a desk clerk at a seedy hotel. But his fortune flips when he discovers a hotel guest dead from a heart attack and, next to him, a tube jammed with hundred-dollar bills. Douglas grabs the money and, with it, the chance to remake his life. In Europe, he meets Miles Fabian, an elegant and erudite con man with a flair for extravagance. Fabian recruits him for his latest ploy: robbing members of the idle rich. But what will happen when his bad behavior catches up with him?]]> 344 Irwin Shaw 0440057574 Mary 3 3.89 1975
author: Irwin Shaw
name: Mary
average rating: 3.89
book published: 1975
rating: 3
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]]> 315513 480 Irwin Shaw 0440108446 Mary 4 3.98 1981
author: Irwin Shaw
name: Mary
average rating: 3.98
book published: 1981
rating: 4
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date added: 2015/04/21
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]]> 315519 666 Irwin Shaw 0440174244 Mary 4 4.16 1969
author: Irwin Shaw
name: Mary
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1969
rating: 4
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]]> 31623
She is settling into a new life as a private forensic consultant and is deep into a case that has left colleagues in Louisiana profoundly disturbed. A woman is found dead in a seedy hotel, dressed to go out, keys in her hand. Her history of blackouts, and her violent outbursts while under their spell, offer more questions than clues about the cause of her death. Then Scarpetta receives news that chills her to the core: Jean-Baptiste Chandonne - the vicious and unrepentant Wolfman, who pursued her to her very doorstep - asks to see her. From his cell on death row, he demands an audience with the legendary Dr. Scarpetta. Only to her will he tell the secrets he knows the authorities desire: the evidence that will bring a global investigation to a swift conclusion. Scarpetta, her niece Lucy, and her colleague Detective Pete Marino are left to wonder: After all the death and destruction, what sort of endgame could this violent psychopath have in mind? And could this request be somehow related to the Louisiana case?

Her friends and family by her side, Scarpetta must unravel a twisting conspiracy with an international reach and confront theshock of her life - a blow that will force her to question the loyalty and trust of all she holds dear.]]> 467 Patricia Cornwell 0425198731 Mary 4 3.81 2003
author: Patricia Cornwell
name: Mary
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2003
rating: 4
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date added: 2015/04/21
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]]> 6541 356 Patricia Cornwell 0425213382 Mary 3 3.95 1996
author: Patricia Cornwell
name: Mary
average rating: 3.95
book published: 1996
rating: 3
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]]> 232145 here

Virginia Medical Examiner Kay Scarpetta has a bloody puzzle on her hands: five headless, limbless cadavers in Ireland, plus four similar victims in a landfill back home. Is a serial butcher loose in Virginia? That's what the panicked public thinks, thanks to a local TV reporter who got the leaked news from her boyfriend, Scarpetta's vile rival, Investigator Percy Ring. But the butchered bodies are so many red herrings intended to throw idiots like Ring off the track. Instead of a run-of-the-mill serial killer, we're dealing with a shadowy figure who has plans involving mutant smallpox, mass murder, and messing with Scarpetta's mind by e-mailing her gory photos of the murder scenes, along with cryptic AOL chat-room messages. The coolest innovation: Scarpetta's gorgeous genius niece, Lucy, equips her with a DataGlove and a VPL Eyephone, and she takes a creepy virtual tour of the e-mailed crime scene.

Unnatural Exposure boasts brisk storytelling, crackling dialogue, evocative prose about forensic-science sleuthing, and crisp character sketches, both of familiar characters like Scarpetta's gruff partner Pete Marino and bit players like the landfill employee falsely accused by Ring. Plus, let's face it: serial killers are old hat. Cornwell's most vivid villains are highly plausible backstabbing colleagues like Ring, who plots to destroy Lucy's FBI career by outing her as a lesbian. Some readers object to the rather abrupt ending, but, hey, it's less jarring than Hannibal's, and it's the logical culmination of Cornwell's philosophy about human nature. To illuminate the novel's finale, read Cornwell's remarks on paranoia in her Amazon.com interview. --Tim Appelo]]> 370 Patricia Cornwell 0751530492 Mary 4 4.08 1997
author: Patricia Cornwell
name: Mary
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1997
rating: 4
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]]> 232123 373 Patricia Cornwell 0684193957 Mary 4 4.08 1992
author: Patricia Cornwell
name: Mary
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1992
rating: 4
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]]> 6531 A farmhouse destroyed by fire
A body amongst the ruins

Dr Kay Scarpetta, Chief Medical Examiner and consulting pathologist for the federal law enforcement agency ATF, is called out to a farmhouse in Virginia which has been destroyed by fire. In the ruins of the house she finds a body which tells a story of a violent and grisly murder.

The fire has come at the same time as another even more incendiary horror: Carrie Grethen, a killer who nearly destroyed the lives of Scarpetta and those closest to her, has escaped from a forensic psychiatric hospital. Her whereabouts is unknown, but her ultimate destination is not, for Carrie has begun to communicate with Scarpetta, conveying her deadly - if cryptic - plans for revenge.

Chillingly mesmeric in tone, labyrinthine in structure, Point of Origin is Patricia Cornwell at her most dazzling.]]> 440 Patricia Cornwell 0751530484 Mary 5 4.05 1998
author: Patricia Cornwell
name: Mary
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1998
rating: 5
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]]> 132336 403 Patricia Cornwell 0743493915 Mary 4 4.04 1991
author: Patricia Cornwell
name: Mary
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1991
rating: 4
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]]> 6534 342 Patricia Daniels Cornwell 0743477154 Mary 5 4.04 1990
author: Patricia Daniels Cornwell
name: Mary
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1990
rating: 5
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]]> 85379 An earlier cover edition for this ISBN can be found here

Virginia Chief Medical Examiner Kay Scarpetta is called in to autopsy the body of convicted murderer Ronnie Waddell after his execution. Several days after the execution, a young boy is discovered murdered in the fashion of Waddell's earlier killings, with Waddell's prints near the body. Scarpetta, along with FBI Agent Benton Wesley and Detective Pete Marino, try to discover how a dead inmate could have possibly committed another murder after his death. As the story progresses she seeks the assistance of her 17-year-old niece Lucy after she discovers a strange folder on her computer.]]> 407 Patricia Cornwell 0380718340 Mary 5 4.14 1993
author: Patricia Cornwell
name: Mary
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1993
rating: 5
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date added: 2015/04/21
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]]> 22716448
In medical school, Matt McCarthy dreamed of being a different kind of doctor—the sort of mythical, unflappable physician who could reach unreachable patients. But whenÌýa new admissionÌýto the critical care unit almost died his first night on call, he found himself scrambling. Visions of mastery quickly gave way to hopes of simply surviving hospital life, where confidence was hard to come by and no amount of med school training could dispel the terror of facing actual patients.

This funny, candid memoir of McCarthy’s intern year at a New York hospital provides a scorchingly frank look at how doctors are made, taking readers into patients� rooms and doctors� conferences to witness a physician's journey from ineptitude to competence. McCarthy's one stroke of luck paired him with a brilliant second-year adviser he called “Baio� (owing to his resemblance to the Charles in Charge star), who proved to be a remarkable teacher with a wicked sense of humor. McCarthy would learn even more from the people he cared for, including a man named Benny, who was living in the hospital for months at a time awaiting a heart transplant. But no teacher could help McCarthy when an accident put his own health at risk, and showed him all too painfully the thin line between doctor and patient.

The Real Doctor Will See You Shortly offers a window on to hospital life that dispenses with sanctimony and self-seriousness while emphasizing the black-comic paradox of becoming a How do you learn to save lives in a job where there is no practice?]]> 336 Matt McCarthy 0804138656 Mary 0 to-read 4.07 2015
author: Matt McCarthy
name: Mary
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2015
rating: 0
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]]> 112322
Depressed and depleted, Ian is almost crushed under the weight of an unbearable, secret guilt.ÌýÌýThen one crisp January evening, he catches sight of a window with glowing yellow neon, the CHURCH OF THE SECOND CHANCE.ÌýÌýHe enters and soon discovers that forgiveness must be earned, through a bit of sacrifice and a lot of love...


A New York Times Notable Book]]> 337 Anne Tyler 0449911608 Mary 3 3.88 1991
author: Anne Tyler
name: Mary
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1991
rating: 3
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date added: 2015/04/19
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]]> 60792 352 Anne Tyler 0345452003 Mary 4 3.90 1985
author: Anne Tyler
name: Mary
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1985
rating: 4
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date added: 2015/04/19
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]]> 77699 303 Anne Tyler 0449911594 Mary 5 3.81 1982
author: Anne Tyler
name: Mary
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1982
rating: 5
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date added: 2015/04/19
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]]> 187650 399 William Diehl 034591452X Mary 3 4.23 1992
author: William Diehl
name: Mary
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1992
rating: 3
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date added: 2015/04/19
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]]> 19486412
A murder . . . a tragic accident . . . or just parents behaving badly?
What’s indisputable is that someone is dead.
But who did what?

Big Little Lies follows three women, each at a crossroads:

Madeline is a force to be reckoned with. She’s funny and biting, passionate, she remembers everything and forgives no one. Her ex-husband and his yogi new wife have moved into her beloved beachside community, and their daughter is in the same kindergarten class as Madeline’s youngest (how is this possible?). And to top it all off, Madeline’s teenage daughter seems to be choosing Madeline’s ex-husband over her. (How. Is. This. Possible?).

Celeste is the kind of beautiful woman who makes the world stop and stare. While she may seem a bit flustered at times, who wouldn’t be, with those rambunctious twin boys? Now that the boys are starting school, Celeste and her husband look set to become the king and queen of the school parent body. But royalty often comes at a price, and Celeste is grappling with how much more she is willing to pay.

New to town, single mom Jane is so young that another mother mistakes her for the nanny. Jane is sad beyond her years and harbors secret doubts about her son. But why? While Madeline and Celeste soon take Jane under their wing, none of them realizes how the arrival of Jane and her inscrutable little boy will affect them all.

Big Little Lies is a brilliant take on ex-husbands and second wives, mothers and daughters, schoolyard scandal, and the dangerous little lies we tell ourselves just to survive.]]> 458 Liane Moriarty 0399167064 Mary 5
At it's heart it is a mystery novel and keeps you wondering when you will find out who, in fact died and how until the final chapter. A basic premise but it worked and kept me turning pages furiously hoping to find out what happened. :)

]]> 4.24 2014
author: Liane Moriarty
name: Mary
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2014
rating: 5
read at: 2015/04/19
date added: 2015/04/19
shelves:
review:
Loved it! Read it every spare moment I had, and was sad to have just finished it I wish I had ordered The Husbands Secret (authors previous book) before I finished this one. I loved the dialogue and humor. I even underlined quotes and phrases that struck me as a unique and humorous way to tell the story, and I don't think I've ever done that with book I've read strictly for pleasure.

At it's heart it is a mystery novel and keeps you wondering when you will find out who, in fact died and how until the final chapter. A basic premise but it worked and kept me turning pages furiously hoping to find out what happened. :)


]]> 6919672 198 T.J. Richards 0741408848 Mary 0 to-read 5.00 2001
author: T.J. Richards
name: Mary
average rating: 5.00
book published: 2001
rating: 0
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date added: 2014/05/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 332613 9780451163967

Tyrannical Nurse Ratched rules her ward in an Oregon State mental hospital with a strict and unbending routine, unopposed by her patients, who remain cowed by mind-numbing medication and the threat of electric shock therapy. But her regime is disrupted by the arrival of McMurphy � the swaggering, fun-loving trickster with a devilish grin who resolves to oppose her rules on behalf of his fellow inmates. His struggle is seen through the eyes of Chief Bromden, a seemingly mute half-Indian patient who understands McMurphy's heroic attempt to do battle with the powers that keep them imprisoned. Ken Kesey's extraordinary first novel is an exuberant, ribald and devastatingly honest portrayal of the boundaries between sanity and madness.]]> 325 Ken Kesey Mary 0 to-read 4.20 1962
author: Ken Kesey
name: Mary
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1962
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2014/02/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 2657
Compassionate, dramatic, and deeply moving, "To Kill A Mockingbird" takes readers to the roots of human behavior - to innocence and experience, kindness and cruelty, love and hatred, humor and pathos. Now with over 18 million copies in print and translated into forty languages, this regional story by a young Alabama woman claims universal appeal. Harper Lee always considered her book to be a simple love story. Today it is regarded as a masterpiece of American literature.]]> 323 Harper Lee 0060935464 Mary 5 4.25 1960
author: Harper Lee
name: Mary
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1960
rating: 5
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date added: 2014/02/10
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]]> 360253 The Gathering Storm a unique work. The first volume of Churchill's memoirs, this selection is broken into two parts. The first, From War to War, consists of Churchill's critical observations on the settlement of World War I and its place in the causes of the Second World War. The second volume contains letters and memoranda from the British government--of which Churchill was part--as the country plunged unprepared into war. This stands as the best of history: written as it was made, by the man who made it.]]> 752 Winston S. Churchill 0141441720 Mary 0 to-read 4.36 1948
author: Winston S. Churchill
name: Mary
average rating: 4.36
book published: 1948
rating: 0
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date added: 2013/08/07
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]]> 90229 Here, in his own words, are the fascinating first thirty years in the life of one of the most provocative and compelling leaders of the twentieth century, Winston Churchill.

As a visionary, statesman, and historian, and the most eloquent spokesman against Nazi Germany, Winston Churchill was one of the greatest figures of the twentieth century. In this autobiography, Churchill recalls his childhood, his schooling, his years as a war correspondent in South Africa during the Boer War, and his first forays into politics as a member of Parliament. My Early Life not only gives readers insights into the shaping of a great leader but, as Churchill himself wrote, "a picture of a vanished age."

If you want to fully understand Winston Churchill, My Early Life is essential reading.]]> 396 Winston S. Churchill 0684823454 Mary 0 to-read 4.26 1930
author: Winston S. Churchill
name: Mary
average rating: 4.26
book published: 1930
rating: 0
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date added: 2013/08/07
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]]> 2967752
We are in the center of Paris, in an elegant apartment building inhabited by bourgeois families. Renée, the concierge, is witness to the lavish but vacuous lives of her numerous employers. Outwardly she conforms to every stereotype of the concierge: fat, cantankerous, addicted to television. Yet, unbeknownst to her employers, Renée is a cultured autodidact who adores art, philosophy, music, and Japanese culture. With humor and intelligence she scrutinizes the lives of the building's tenants, who for their part are barely aware of her existence.

Then there's Paloma, a twelve-year-old genius. She is the daughter of a tedious parliamentarian, a talented and startlingly lucid child who has decided to end her life on the sixteenth of June, her thirteenth birthday. Until then she will continue behaving as everyone expects her to behave: a mediocre pre-teen high on adolescent subculture, a good but not an outstanding student, an obedient if obstinate daughter.

Paloma and Renée hide both their true talents and their finest qualities from a world they suspect cannot or will not appreciate them. They discover their kindred souls when a wealthy Japanese man named Ozu arrives in the building. Only he is able to gain Paloma's trust and to see through Renée's timeworn disguise to the secret that haunts her. This is a moving, funny, triumphant novel that exalts the quiet victories of the inconspicuous among us.]]> 325 Muriel Barbery 1933372605 Mary 0 to-read 3.76 2006
author: Muriel Barbery
name: Mary
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2006
rating: 0
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date added: 2013/08/07
shelves: to-read
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