A Dog's Purpose by W. Bruce Cameron

Image from Library Thing

Each time we take a road trip I look for a book that I can read aloud in the car. It makes the miles go faster and gives me the joy of reading aloud. Something I really miss since my girls are grown and I am not teaching 4th graders anymore.

As we were preparing to go to Virginia for a college graduation I grabbed this book off the bedside table where it had laid since I had given this to my husband a couple of Christmas' ago.  It was the PERFECT book for this road trip!  

Now before October I would have thought this book was rather ridiculous...but in October we become the proud parents of a Maltese Yorkie mix and as I read the story of Bailey and her search for a purpose - it made so much more sense.

This book follows Bailey through a series of lives. She/he is born as a puppy and lives out each life feeling that it is complete - yet he comes back again.

Now - I do not believe in reincarnation.  But there is something compelling about this dog's search.  Each life adds information and experience - preparing him for the final act - when everything comes together.  

I have to admit that I had to stop more than once as I read this...my voice would choke and the tears would run.  I love books like that!  This story also made me rethink some of my reactions and training practices with our dog, Penny.   I especially appreciated his explanation of how hard it was for Baility understand potty training! :)  

Anyway - this is a great book for dog lovers and owners. It made me appreciate the commitment that we have agreed to as we become a pet owner and joy that comes as our little dog rushes to greet me each night I come home from work!  

The Clover House by Henriette Lazaridis Power

Image from Library thing
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This is the story of Calliope - a woman in search of an anchor, a woman wallowing in her mother's indifference, a woman who uses circumstances around her to justify the inevitability of her aloneness, one really sad lady!

This is also the story of Calliope - a woman surrounded with a great big Greek family, a woman loved and cared for by Jonah, a woman divided between her mother's Greece and her own American homeland.

This is also the story of the fingers of war and the long-term suffering that are held in their grip.

This is a story of existence - of living anyway - of sadness, and happiness, and rebirth and death and families and love and endurance and life.

The story moves between current day Greece as Calliope flies from Boston to sort through her uncle's home - the one that he left for her.  Calliope must face her mother, who lives in Greece, as she sorts through the collections of Nestor, the almost hoarder uncle.  Clio, Calliope's mom, is distant and distracted, and neglectful and mean.  And as Calliope sorts through the strands of life buried in Nestor's house she also discovers the hidden stories her mother only partially told.

But, the reader sees it all. Power moves the telling between Calliope's version in current day and Clio's life in prewar Greece.  We see the actual story through Clio's eyes and are able to hold that against the partial truth's that she shares with Calliope.

I liked this story - but even as I read I felt there were more layers that were too hard for Clio to tell even to her all seeing reader.  This, made me think again and again of the thousands of versions we tell ourselves of the events that enfold us. This follows a family's fall from great wealth to ruin during an impossible time.  And though we feel we are seeing it all as Clio remembers, we aren't.  It still holds the romanticized feeling of stories our grandparent's told.  Refrains we know and can repeat along with them.  So reality becomes what we want it to be - not what it really is.

It made me consider again the 'head' talks I have with myself - the things I believe as the truth and how they may or may not be reality.

Very interesting!

Thirteen Treasures by Michelle Harrison

image from LibraryThing

This was an interesting and fun read. The story is about Tanya a young girl who has an ability she wishes she didnt, she can see and talk to fairies and other little creatures. But the fairies she interacts with are vicious and vindictive, torturing her at night. Because of her odd behavior her mother decides to get rid of her for awhile and sends her to the overgrown home of her grandmother. She hates this home because of the creepy caretaker Warwick and his nasty son Fabian, and because no one wants her there, that is abundantly clear. The home is on the edge of Hangmans woods, a space she and Fabian are strictly forbidden to explore. The story continues in a mildly predictable fashion.

But, the part that really interests me about this story is how often descriptions and spells turn up in a variety of books. This happened over and over here. I was reminded of the Chestnut King. The fairies are much the same, and they both talk about the Seelie Court.

Anyway, I read this in an afternoon and would recommend it for those just getting started in fantasy worlds.

What Happened to Goodbye by Sarah Dessen

image from LibraryThing

This is the first Dessen I've read, and I really liked it! McLean Sweet is a master at remaking herself. Her mom and dad divorced in a messy and public ordeal- affair with a basketball coach at the favorite college. McLean's dad took a job remaking failing restaurants and she decided to join him. Four schools and four personalities later she is a pro at traveling light, no strings, no ties, no reason to say goodbye.

But, this time it was different. This time she allowed people to see the real her and she got sick of her mother pretending everything was the way it used to be, but mostly she made friends.

I believed in McLean and Gus her dad, and the kids she collected. It felt real and honest. I wanted her to notice Dave for who he was, and cheered when she reached out to the fringe sitter Deb.

Reading this as a mom whose daughter is in college across the country, and who sometimes feels each and every mile stretching between us made me feel for Katie, McLean's mom. I could understand her longing and her hovering. But, not enough to overlook the frustrations on the other end of the phone-smothering is smothering! I recognize it from both sides!

This is a great story - one I would recommend

The Weird Sisters by Eleanor Brown

book cover from LibraryThing

I was ready for an adult book after so many YA titles and this one didn't disappoint me! I loved it!  yes - it's full of cliches and stereotypes - but I found that comforting and enjoyable!

The story follows three sisters all migrating back to their family home for different reasons - but there to help their mother as she faces breast cancer.  Well, they claim they are there for their mother.  But...

Rose (Rosalind) is the oldest and a math professor at a nearby college. She is the classic oldest - in charge of her own life and every other person around her.  She lives at home with mom and dad ( a professor of Shakespeare at another college) and picks up the slack as mom gets distracted and dad lives in the the literary world of his beloved Shakespeare.  She is engaged and her beau has taken a year visiting professorship in England.  Duties and responsibilities are keeping Rose grounded at home.

Then there is Bean (Bianca) who has fled home to the bright lights of New York, only to slink home broke and disgraced. Bean knows how to use her body to get what she wants - she is manipulative and selfish and focused.  She also is deeply in hate with herself and trapped in her destructive ways.

Lastly, there is the baby Cordy (Cordelia).  She has been on a several year tour of the US - following bands and homeless and living the life of the sixties hippies decades too late.  She is drawn home by an un-expected pregnancy.  And steps in not explaining or making excuses.

Mom and dad are slight characters - they are important to the story - but they aren't the story.

Rather it is the sisters and the way the move between what their stereotype says and way they want to be. This is a feel good family book - all works out the way it's supposed to... that was exactly the kind of story I was looking for!

I have two sisters and kept wondering if we fit in the same molds.
I don't think so... but I liked wondering.

Read it.

The Summons by John Grisham

cover image by LibraryThing

We have a tradition in our family  - when we go on a road trip I choose a book to read aloud to my husband. It makes the time go quickly and doesn't bother my daughters watching movies in the back seat. This year our trip took us on a 12 hour road trip to Colorado and The Summons was perfect for that. It had just enough details to keep our attention but not bury us and not too many characters.  We have read many Grisham's over the years and some how we missed this one.

In the opening scenes retired Mississippi Judge Atlee summons his two sons to a meeting.  He is then found dead by his son Ray, the law professor from up north in Virginia.  While waiting for his delinquent brother Forrest to show up at the house Ray stumbles on boxes of cash in an old bookshelf - lots of cash - three million dollars of cash.

And with that Ray's organized world disintegrates.  How can his straight laced, law abiding, pig headed father have so much cash and never mention it?  And what in the world was he supposed to do with it? If he turns it over to the police it will disappear to the inheritance taxes.
If he shares it with his brother Forrest will probably kill himself with drugs and alcohol.
If he hides it how will he be able to use it?
And who is that person rattling the windows on his father's deserted house - do they know about the money???

Ray begins a cross-country odyssey carrying the money from hotel room to trunk to storage unit and back again all the while trying to solve the mystery of his father and the cash and who is following him.

All of Grisham's books make you care about the character - but most also have a perfect moral compass. This one doesn't quite.  The money is not Ray's - right?  So what would you do?

And at the end I was happily surprised.

This was a great page mile-eating page-turner!!

The Roar and The Whisper by Emma Clayton

Cover image by LibraryThing

I really liked The Roar and was anxious to read the sequel The Whisper. Anxious enough to buy it online and read it on my iPad while at a conference out of state.  But, I was very disappointed!

Let me start back at the beginning again.

The Roar is the story of a horrible world future.  In this world an animal plague was turned loose and pets attacked and killed their owners. In order to keep humanity safe - an enormous wall was built encircling the globe just a little south of England.  All humanity was secured behind the wall and all life outside the wall was destroyed - a vast wasteland.

A very odd thing happened after this event - no children were born for years and the first offspring were born with strange appendages and mutant traits.  Life continues in this horrible concrete pen until the children are 12.  And then...

cover image by LibraryThing

The head of the Youth Development Organization, Mal Gorman, has a new idea - a way to take over the entire remaining world. He must figure out a way to control this children and mold them into his very own army.  The first step is to kidnap Ellie and figure out her special talent of moving things with only her eyes. Ellie disappears and her twin brother Mika is left alone, the only one who believes she is alive.

He continues to believe in her even as weird things begin to happen to him - like a strange dog that appears first in his dreams and then by his side, a feeling that he is connected to Ellie and finally his uncanny ability to fly the new space ships in the local game room.  Those space ships are not only a game - instead they are all part of Gorman's master plan.

That sets the stage...a pair of twins, a kidnapping, a secret and a mad man.  It seems like a perfect plot. And honestly throughout The Roar I agreed.  I rooted for the kids and their friends as the evil plot unfolded.

Then I started reading The Whisper.

Honestly - I felt like I was reading a rough draft about a book rather than the actual book. The conversation was stilted and the plot quite predictable.  I was sorely disappointed.

The story does resolve itself - but by the end I just wanted it to be over.
Too bad!!