What The?! ... August Reading

This should tell you just how off my entire month was.

I only read three books.

You read that right....three. I think my average is somewhere around 8-10, with half of those being audio and the other half being print.

1. Nothing Daunted: The Unexpected Education of Two Society Girls in the West, Dorothy Wickenden (ebook) This book came with multiple recommendations - from Books on the Nightstand and NPR. It is a nonfiction book, based upon the authress's family history and the letters written by our two society girls, Dorothy and Ros. I absolutely adored this book, which tells the story of two well-educated society girls who just decided to go teach school in Colorado in the early part of the last century. Wickenden is a great storyteller, and you can tell that she loves her subjects dearly. Along the way, she also talks about many of the characters that Dorothy and Ros met along the way, discusses historical events important to the story and to the character of her two main subjects, and introduces the reader to a place and time that perhaps aren't all that well known in the larger subject of American History. Really, if you love reading about women who have more than their share of gumption, you'll love this book.

2. 44 Scotland Street and 3. Espresso Tales - (CD audio, library) by Alexander McCall Smith. Light and fun, these books are exactly the sort of non-taxing audio that I needed this month. I actually checked out all five books in the series, and the next three are already loaded into my computer, waiting for me to find the time to listen to them. (I am catching up on my podcasts right now.) The Scotland Street novels were originally published in serialized form in a daily newspaper, and there is a bit of information from the author on the first book that explains what special requirements that created for both his writing process and the story itself. These are quiet books about everyday life with people you are very likely to meet and know in a city, so if you are looking for big action they aren't for you. If you love great characters, though.... By the way, Smith has created a villianess so vile in Irene that if I knew someone named Irene I'd be tempted to call her and yell at her just because of the unfortunate circumstances of her name. That's how much I loathe the character!

It's probably that I'll finish a fourth book before tomorrow, so I'm going to go ahead and include it here:

4. Silver Sparrow, Tayari Jones (library e-book) Add an NPR author interview to the same list of recommendations that Nothing Daunted received, and you have a book I couldn't pass up - especially when it showed up on the library's ebook list. It's not a spoiler to tell you that this book is about the two separate families of a man who commits bigamy. The first half is the story of the daughter in the second, illegal family - who actually knows about the first family. The second half (which I just started last night) is told from the perspective of the daughter in the first family, which knows nothing at all of the father's duplicity. I'm enjoying it, but I'm glad that I checked it out of the library, and I don't think it's going to stay with me for very long.

Comments

Leciawp said…
Thanks for the list - it's kind of small for you, isn't it?

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