Some have asked me how I listen to so many audiobooks in a month. My answer I listen whenever I can: my morning walks (45 minutes 5 days a week), on my commute into work (even though 15 minutes in length driving and then 10 minutes walking to my office- the time adds up), when I'm doing "household chores", and when driving long distance if the rest of the car's occupants are listening to their own music, books, and movies.
Due to the amount of books this month I will try and shorten my comments and give brief thoughts on each book. There were some goods ones. There was one over the top "steamy/X-Rated" audiobook. A five star read graces this list - so good I took four pages of notes and already shared some comments on instagram/facebook. Hope you are enjoying summer reading as much as I am.
Everything Happens For a Reason and other lies I've loved
by Kate Bowler
4 stars. Audiobook read by the author. This is the author's living story of her life as a Duke divinity professor, wife, mom to 4 year old son, and fighting for her life from stage 4 cancer- abdominal tumor that metastasized. This book highlights some of the stupid things people say when someone is going through a stressful, heart wrenching, life altering experience. I appreciated her honesty about how religion can not always have the answer to questions like "Why is this happening?", "Where is God during times of horrible life events?", etc. A good listen, but a little tough to listen to as I have a friend who is fighting stage 4 cancer currently. Tough stuff this life we live.
Maybe In Another Life
by Taylor Jenkins Reid
4 stars. I first was introduced to the author through her book "The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo", then I met her again through reading "Daisy Jones and the Six". I will continue to pick up her books and I'm thinking I will continue to really enjoy them and meet a different author each time. All three of her books have read so differently for me. I can't say much without giving this story away. It reminded me of a present day "It's a Wonderful Life" or the 1990's movie "Sliding Doors"- a look at how one woman's life could be different based on a decision or an event. Easy, quick, and enjoyable read.
The Kiss Quotient
by Helen Hoang
4 stars. This is the steamy, x-rated audiobook I listened to this past month. Stella Lane is smart (mathematician) who is struggling to know how to have a relationship (both physical and emotional) due to her Asperger's. She is logical and so hires an escort hoping he can show her how it is done (both the physical and emotional). The escort is Michael. He comes to the book with his own baggage and "outside story". I enjoyed the story, just felt like the bedroom scenes were a little too descriptive for me to listen to out loud around anyone else's ears. Not sure that will deter me from reading the next one in the series "The Bride Test".
Maybe you Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, Her Therapist and Our Lives Revealed
by Lori Gottlieb
5 stars. This book just really spoke to me in so many ways. Memoir, honest/real life writing/story sharing, fun characters, and made me cry. Lori Gottlieb is a psychotherapist and advice columnist who is a New York Times best selling author. Sounds great right? Well as she shares in this book life is not always going great and she finds herself needing the services of a therapist, for herself. She also shares stories from her own client's as she interweaves those stories with her own. Here are some of my favorite quotes from the book.
pg 6 "that change and loss travel together. We can't have change without loss, which is why so often people say they want change but nonetheless stay exactly the same."
pg 8 "No matter how open we as a society are about formerly private matters, the stigma around our emotional struggles remain formidable. We'll talk with almost anyone about our physical health... even our sex lives, but bring up anxiety or depression or an intractable sense of grief, and the expression on the face looking back at you will probably read, Get me out of this conversation, pronto."
pg 336 "But Wendell told me that by diminishing problems, I was judging myself and everyone else whose problems I had placed lower down on the hierarchy of pain. You can't get through your pain by diminishing it, he reminded me. You get through your pain by accepting it and figuring out what to do with it... And, of course, often what seems like trivial worries are manifestation of deeper ones."
Read this book!!!
Light From Distant Stars
by Shawn Smucker
4.5 stars. I previously posted on this book. Go to: http://imchattynatty.blogspot.com/2019/07/light-from-distant-stars.html for the full review. It is a fascinating story and had some "fantasy" aspects which is not my normal MO, but I enjoyed. Thanks again to Revell for sending me this book to review.
Transcription
by Kate Atkinson
3 stars. Audiobook listen. Julie Armstrong, the protagonist, is a MI5 transcriptionist during WWII. She gets involved with some double agent story lines. This story drug on for me and I just lost interest after awhile. I enjoyed some of her other books much better.
The Last Romantics by Tara Conklin
4 stars. A family story with grief and challenges at the heart of it. The book starts way in the future, in an apocalyptic type atmosphere. I struggled a little with why the author chose to begin the book in 2079. This family has deals with quite a bit of change, challenge and heart ache throughout the book. A father who dies leaving a mother with 4 children. The mom takes "the pause" which bothered me and yet intrigued me to read on. You'll have to read the book to see what I mean about "the pause". I enjoyed the different characters who make up this family: Renee- the oldest and the matriarch type sister who is the responsible, organized and mother figure for the younger three children. Then Caroline who marries young and raises her own brood of children and then has a "come to Jesus"/mid life moment. Followed by the only boy in the family, Joe. Joe's character development, now looking back, is foreshadowed by his actions during his father's funeral at the beginning of the story. Fiona rounds out the siblings as the youngest sister, poet, and blogger with a very INTERESTING blog topic. Lastly, the mother Noni who I really disliked. A great family saga.
Only Ever Her
by Marybeth Mayhew Whalen
4 stars. An interesting mystery begins with a murder of a mother. The three year old daughter identifies her mother's murderer and he is sent to prison. Flash forward years later and it is a few days before the 3 year old, now all grown up, named Annie, is going to get married. Annie however has disappeared. Ironic that at the same time she disappears the man she identified as her mother's murderer had been released from prison due to DNA that was found exonerating him of the murder. I liked the side stories and character development in this book. I was nervous to find out where Annie would be found.
The Great Treehouse War
by Lisa Graff
4 star. Audiobook with my daughter. A daughter, Winnie, is being pulled apart by her parents who have divorced. Each parent has chosen days/nights that Winnie will spend with them and her father bought a house that abuts her mother's back yard. Between the two yards is a tree house. This tree house is the only saving grace. One night a week she gets to stay in the tree house as a night just to herself. However, this grace is going away as her father is traveling abroad this summer for his teaching position and wants Annie to come with him. To make up for the days that she will not be with her mother this summer her parents decide the only thing they can do is take away her "free night" by taking away her "tree house night". Her friends come to her aide and they "hole" themselves up in the tree house. A great story with diversity of characters (race/ethnicity/personalities).
Dear Mrs. Bird
by AJ Pearce
4 stars. Book club read for July. I enjoyed this book. I love historical fiction that takes place during WWII. This story had a different representation of WWII- a view from London during the war. Emmy Lake wants to be a war correspondent. Her dreams take her to the offices of the London Evening Chronicle where she awakes to reality as a "worker bee" for "Dear Mrs. Bird" and advice columnist who is mean and not empathetic to any of the readers who write in to get her advice. Emmy is in charge of going through Mrs Bird's mail and assigned the job of picking out "appropriate" reader's questions/concerns that Mrs. Bird will take time to respond to. When Emmy isn't doing her day job she is volunteering her time as a telephone operator with the Auxiliary Fire Services in London. The war, her dreams, and friend's losses during this hard time in London push her to take action.
My Favorite Half-Night Stand
by Christina Lauren
5 stars. Audiobook- enjoyed listening to this on a long car ride by myself- not for "younger ears".
4 friends, three boys and one girl, all in their late 20's/early 30's, all professors at UC Santa Barbara. They find out Barack Obama is coming for a black tie dinner at their college and they all decided they need dates. So they do what millennials do... they sign up on a on-line dating site. From the start of their entry into this dating service there begins the story - a romantic comedy. I would love to see this book on the big screen.
11 great reads in July...
Then I discovered that I missed a June book- so here is a bonus.
Time After Time
by Lisa Grunwald
4 stars. This book is a mix of mystery, history, fiction and fantasy. I'm not a fantasy person and that part of the book made this book even more special and intriguing- a sign of a great book if I'm singing praises of the "fantasy" part. Joe works at Grand Central Terminal- NYC. He meets Nora Lansing who has a flare for the 1920's flapper era- however, it is the late 1930's not the 20's. Nora is strange and yet Joe and her hit it off. Joe and Nora's relationship seems typical, but there is a twist.