My Cozy Book Corner: January 2015

Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Neil Patrick Harris: Choose Your Own Autobiography by Neil Patrick Harris

I read a fair number of biographies and memoirs.

This was unlike any I have ever read!!

NPH gives his story in a clever way that shares some details about his life to date but also throws in some silly side trips into a fictionalized what if I made a different life choice way.

When I was young I read the choose your own adventures and that is the style he writes his book in. At different points you can choose to skip to different moments in his life or see what would happen if you had lead him down a different path. Maybe it would be death, maybe it would be flipping burgers...who knows...

What you end up with is a fun read that at the end of the day gives you some insight into the life of the fabulous NPH, his sweet husband David and their twins.

(Finished January 21, 2015)

Food: A Love Story by Jim Gaffigan

This is Gaffigan's second book. If by some chance you've never heard of him, he is a stand up comedian who I like to call the food whisperer. A large part of his shtick is talkinh and whispering lovingly about food.

I really enjoyed his first book Dad Is Fat and so I had high expectations for this one.

It wasn't as funny. But it did have a good number of laughs. Mostly though I found it a little chuckle worthy but filled with jokes we all make in some form or another about food, restaurants, and eating.

I didn't laugh out loud the way I did when reading Dad Is Fat but maybe that wasn't the intent here. Maybe he was just being snarky and observational.

Not a bad read but not as good as I had hoped.

(Finished January 19, 2015)

Saturday, January 17, 2015

The Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom

This was the book pick for book club this month. I don't think I would have had it on my radar otherwise so thank you Kate.

We can all agree slavery was an awful part of US history. This story takes us inside life at a plantation through the story of Lavinia. She is a young Irish girl whose parents die on the ship over and so she ends up living on a plantation in Virginia.

Lavinia lives in the kitchen house with Belle. Belle is the daughter of the plantation owner but since her mother was a slave she is too. There is also Mama, Papa, Uncle Jacob, Ben, and twins Beattie and Fanny. They take in Lavinia as one of their own.

While there is hardship, cruelty, pain for the people who are the property of the Captain, there is also much love.

Lavinia is told that family is more than blood ties but it is over a number of years that she learns the true meaning of that statement.

A powerful story and a great book despite the ugliness it contains.

(Finished January 17, 2015)

Thursday, January 15, 2015

The Tower, the Zoo, and the Tortoise by Julia Stuart

This book reminded me a little of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry. It has the same slow burn feel to it, there is mystery as to what happened to the main character's son, and the characters begin to grow on you. Harold Fry was better but this wasn't bad.

Set in the Tower of London the main story is the story of Beefeater Balthazar Jones and his wife Hebe. The cast of characters is rounded out by the rest of the inhabitants of the Tower community and Hebe's coworker at the London Underground Lost Items department.

The amazing list of things that get turned into the lost items department is one of the best parts of the read.

Balthazar and Hebe lost their young son Milo and the loss has put a dent into their deep and long lasting love.

The story of what loss can do to people is the backbone of this tale and while it unfolds the time spent with the rest of the characters runs from aggravating to charming.

The story of tower chaplain Septimus Drew is quite interesting.

I will admit that the while the facts about the history of the Tower of London was interesting, at times it felt like too much.

Overall a pretty good read, but it wasn't perfect.

(finished January 15, 2015)

Sunday, January 11, 2015

The Prime Minister's Secret Agent (Maggie Hope Mystery #4) by Susan Elia MacNeal

In the 4th Maggie Hope mystery Maggie is recovering from the events of her undercover assignment in Berlin back at the training facility in Scotland.

There are a few threads woven together this time around...and here is something MacNeal has been doing well throughout this series...the reader knows what is going to happen but the characters don't and it creates a really great bit of tension.

In this volume it is approaching December 7, 1941, there is some kind of weird stuff happening with sheep, and Maggie's dear friend Sarah is among some women who have been poisoned.

The only complaint I have here is that there isn't another Maggie Hope story until Fall.

(Finished January 11, 2015)

His Majesty's Hope (Maggie Hope Mystery #3) by Susan Elia MacNeal

Maggie Hope is back. First she cracked a code and saved a church while working for Churchill as a secretary, then she saved Princess Elizabeth, and now she is going to Berlin on an undercover assignment.

McNeal again spins a tale filled with intrigue and danger. In the third book in the series we get to know more about Maggie's family including a big surprise.

So far this has been a really well done series that has left me wanting more. Maggie Hope is a great character and going along with her as she breaks into traditionally male roles has been a great ride, sometimes scary but always interesting and exciting.

(Finished January 10, 2015)

Friday, January 9, 2015

To Save a People by Alex Kershaw

Most people have heard of Oskar Schindler but not many have heard of Raoul Wallenberg. This is his story. It is also the story of the thousands of Jews who were spared death at the hands of Adolf Eichmann in Hungary because of the young Swedish diplomat.

At great risk to himself and with no desire for reward Wallenberg intervened time and time again during the bloody summer of 1944. He faced down Eichmann and members of the Arrow Cross to save such a great many people.

Then the Soviets finally arrived which was supposed to bring safety and liberation. That was when the mystery began. What happened to Wallenberg at the hands of the Soviets?

Those he saved never forgot him and neither will you after reading this.

(Finished January 9, 2015)

Princess Elizabeth's Spy (Maggie Hope Mystery #2) by Susan Elia MacNeal

Maggie Hope is back for another assignment. After her success breaking a code as Mr. Churchill's Secretary she is now posing as a maths tutor for the princess Elizabeth at Windsor Castle.

Proving again that women can do anything men can do Maggie isn't perfect but she is good and smart.

MacNeal spins a good tale and the mystery is well drawn. The tension is thick right up until the end and beyond thanks to a big cliffhanger.

I am looking forward to starting book 3.

(Finished January 7, 2015)

Monday, January 5, 2015

2015 Book List

Missed my goal of 60 by 6 books. I think had I not had such a rough semester and spent over a month sick near the end of the year I would have passed my goal. (12/31/15)

Life After Life by Kate Atkinson

At first I wasn't sure if I liked this one. It took about 100 pages for me to start to really get into it and then I couldn't put it down.

What if you were born, died, and then born again....over and over? That is what happens to Ursula. She is born February 11, 1910 and dies before she can breathe. Then she is born again. Every time she dies it is at a different point in her life and she is immediately born to live her life over again. Each time her life and the life of those she come into contact with turns out a bit different depending on the choices made.

At some point she begins to remember having lived this life before in a hazy deja vu way and that too changes outcomes of the current timeline.

While each run through has its share of tragedy there are so many interesting thoughts woven in. If someone you love and trust turns away from you is it the situation and time or is it the person's character? Or is less simple than that? What does it mean to be a mother? What does it mean to be a family? How much of a ripple effect does even the most seemingly insignificant action have?

(Finished January 5, 2015)

The Ice Dragon by George R.R. Martin

I will read anything by Martin that has to do with Westeros which is why I grabbed a copy of this very thin book.

It is listed as a YA novel but it is really more of a short story for young readers, it clocks in at about 120 pages and I read it in a short time.

The art work by Luis Royo is beautiful and worth seeing.

The Ice Dragon is the story of Adara who is a child of winter and her love and sacrifice. She also gets to ride an ice dragon, and hey, who wouldn't want to ride a dragon?

(Finished December 30, 2014)

The Secret Place (Dublin Murder Squad #5) by Tana French

I love the way Tana French writes so I was looking forward to reading book 5 of the Dublin Murder Squad series.

My favorite thing about mysteries is not figuring out the who in who-done-it. Part way in I thought I had it and while I was correct I ended up still enjoyed the unfolding of how and why.

In The Secret Place the world of teen girls and the angst they suffer and cause each other to suffer is the world where the murder of a teen boy takes place. The creep factor inherent in the world of mean girls drips off the page and that is meant as a compliment to the writing. There were times I wanted to slap more than one of the characters. At a school where the headmistress is determined to protect the rich girls and their families someone has committed a murder and for a year has gotten away with it. They would have continued to remain free if not for the daughter of a police officer figures it out and wants justice for the dead and those who loved him. But is she really guided by the desire for justice or does she have something to hide?

While this is the 5th in a series (In The Woods, The Likeness, Faithful Place, Broken Harbor) it wouldn't be confusing to start here. Each story stands alone and what makes it a series is that it follows those who are part of or want to be part of the murder squad, names thread through the books but the stories can be read out of order without difficulty.

(Finished December 30, 2014)