Books Read in September

No, that isn't a typo...it is now November, and I am just now getting to my summary of books read in September! I read a lot in September & October but was sick most of the time, so I got way behind on my reviews - almost caught up now.


September was a BIG reading month for me - I read 9 books in all, which is a lot for me. Here's what I read:

• Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee (AL), fiction
• How To Wake Up by Toni Bernhard, nonfiction/self-help
• All Fall Down by Ally Carter (fictional location), teen/YA audio novel

 

• If the Oceans Were Ink by Carla Power (UK), nonfiction & memoir
• Doll Bones by Holly Black (PA), middle-grade fiction
• Ghost Hawk by Susan Cooper (MA), middle-grade fiction

• Looking for Alaska by John Green (AL), teen/YA audio fiction
• Persepolis by Marji Satrapi (Iran), graphic memoir
• The Martian by Andy Weir (Mars & TX), fiction

 
This reading month was remarkable for me in several respects. First, I normally read only 5 - 7 books, so to finish 9 in a single month is quite a feat for me. And I normally read almost all fiction, but I read 3 nonfiction books in September. Other than that, it was a great mix, with 2 middle-grade novels, 2 teen/YA novels, 2 audio books, and even a graphic memoir. Best book of the month? I always hate making this choice! I guess if I have to choose, it would be Looking for Alaska by John Green, with honorable mentions to both middle-grade novels which were perfectly compelling while I was sick. I enjoyed all nine books, though.

Update on 2015 Reading Challenges:
For my 2015 Where Are You Reading Challenge, I added 2 new states (Texas and Alabama) and 2 new countries (Iran and...does Mars count??) to my list. I finally made some TBR progress and read 4 books from my own shelves for my Mount TBR Reading Challenge 2015! I listened to two more audio books for my 2015 Audio Book Challenge, and added 3 books to my 2015 Nonfiction Reading Challenge, including my first nonfiction of the year that was not a memoir! No new books for my Back to the Classics Challenge. I added Iran and Mars to my Travel the World in Books Challenge. And, best of all for fall, I read 4 books for my R.I.P. X Challenge - spooky, creepy, thriller-ish fun!

What was your favorite book(s) read in September? 

Fiction Review: Dracula

Last October, I enjoyed reading the monster classic Frankenstein by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, so I was excited to listen to another spooky standard this fall, Dracula by Bram Stoker, which I downloaded free from SYNC this summer. I thoroughly enjoyed the audio production of this creepy classic, filled with intrigue and suspense.

Jonathan Harker is a young attorney who has been sent by his employer to Transylvania to visit Count Dracula, who lives in a castle in the Carpathian Mountains and wants to complete a real estate deal in England through the law firm. Jonathan is confused by the frightened looks he gets when he tries to ask his innkeeper and others he meets on his journey about the Count, but once he arrives at the castle, the Count seems to be a polite and accommodating host.

Gradually, though, Jonathan realizes that something is not right, with the castle or with his odd host. He begins to notice that the Count never eats, he likes to keep Jonathan up all night long talking, and is never seen during the day. Eventually, these little oddities turn into something much more menacing, as the modern reader knows to expect but poor Jonathan is unsuspecting.

The action turns then to England, where Jonathan’s fiancé, Mina, is staying with her dear friend, Lucy, in Whitby. Lucy is inundated with three different marriage proposals, from Mr. Quincy Morris, an American, Dr. John Seward, a psychiatrist, and Arthur Holmwood. Lucy is fond of all three, but she accepts Arthur’s proposal, and they plan to marry. Despite her overflowing happiness, Lucy is dealing with a troublesome problem: she frequently sleepwalks. Mina tries to keep an eye on her and protect her, but one night, Lucy manages to walk all the way to a local churchyard; soon after, she becomes ill with a mysterious condition.

Meanwhile, Dr. Seward is dealing with one of the strangest patients he has ever encountered. Mr. Renfield collects – and eats – flies and spiders, gradually moving up the food chain to larger creatures. When Lucy becomes ill, Seward asks his old teacher, Abraham Van Helsing, to come over from the Netherlands to consult on her case. By this time, Jonathan is back in England, and the friends all combine their efforts to try to help Lucy. Dr. Van Helsing has some suspicions about what is going on, but it takes him a while to put together all the clues. Eventually, the group of friends must work together to try to combat the evil that has come among their own.

If this sounds like a complicated plot, it is, though I never found it hard to follow. It’s one of those suspense novels where the pieces come together slowly, gradually, as the tension builds. It was fun to listen to this classic novel now, today, when Count Dracula is such a permanent part of our collective culture. It actually added to the creepiness and suspense to know who Dracula really is, while the characters are struggling to figure that out, though I wondered what it must have been like for those first readers of the novel, back in the 1890’s, who were introduced to the character for the first time.

The audio production was absolutely excellent, with a full cast of seven different narrators joining in to represent all of the different characters. Hearing Count Dracula’s familiar Transylvanian accent for the first time sent chills through me! Despite the different accents (English, American, Dutch, Transylvanian), the audio was never difficult to understand. It was like listening to a full stage production from my own iPod, and I often found myself entranced (pun intended) by the well-told story.

My son wondered whether the language was archaic, given that Dracula was written in 1897, but I never found it to be difficult or plodding. The story is told through diary entries of the different characters, letters, ship’s logs, and newspaper clippings. Switching back and forth between different characters’ diaries and perspectives added to the interest and complexity of the tale and was especially engaging on audio. Although vampire fiction has been very popular this past decade, I’m not a big fan of the genre, but I thoroughly enjoyed being immersed in this compelling classic.

Naxos Audio Books

 

TV Tuesday: Red Oaks

Many of my reviews of new TV shows the past few weeks have been focused on suspense, thrillers, and drama. So how about something more light and fun?

I have been watching Amazon Prime's new original comedy series Red Oaks on my own at lunchtime, and I am really enjoying it. Set in 1985 suburban New Jersey, the show features David Meyer (played by Craig Roberts), a college student at NYU who is spending his summer at home working as an Assistant Tennis Pro at the local country club, Red Oaks. Many of David's friends from high school also work at the club as parking attendants, lifeguards, etc. His girlfriend, Karen, works there in true 80's fashion as an aerobics instructor. The members of the club are from a different (wealthy) world, including club President Mr. Getty, played by Paul Reiser (from Mad About You and Married). Adding to the fabulous cast are David's parents, played by Jennifer Grey (from Dirty Dancing - my all-time favorite!) and Richard Kind (from Spin City), who is always hilarious.

Red Oaks manages to tackle some serious issues, while also being funny. David is ambivalent about the career his dad has chosen for him - accounting - when his real passion is videography and film, something his dad refers to as his hobby, even when he gets paying jobs in the field. Meanwhile, he and his girlfriend are drifting apart, though neither seems ready to admit that. This summer is something of a turning point for David and many of his friends, as they struggle on the brink of adulthood to figure out what they really want out of life. Meanwhile, David gets plenty of advice from his parents and various characters at the club, including Mr. Getty, whose gorgeous & rebellious daughter seems attracted to David (and vice-versa). One recent episode featured a Freaky Friday-like switch between David and his dad which was hilarious!

One of the fun things about this show is its 80's vibe - the clothing, the excess, the big hair. I was actually in college in 1985, so I am loving the nostalgic feel. Lest you think they overdid the 80's fashions, I actually wore outfits to aerobics classes almost identical to the ones David's girlfriend, Karen, wears on the show! Actually, I think they got the look spot-on: it's not everyone in neon or looking like Madonna, the way some shows and movies depict the 80's but more realistic. And the music! I am loving the music. I had "Love is Like Oxygen" in my head for days.

All in all, it's a fun, nostalgic romp, and I am thoroughly enjoying the ride. If you enjoyed John Hughes' movies in the 80's, you will love Red Oaks.

Red Oaks is available for free (and exclusively) on Amazon Prime.

What new shows are you enjoying?

Movie Monday: Dark Places

On Halloween night, our 17-year old son had some friends over for a Scary Movie party - they watched Children of the Corn and The Babadook, the latter which he and his girlfriend said was absolutely terrifying - too scary, in fact.

Upstairs, my husband and I decided to also watch a spooky movie, though much tamer, since neither of us really likes horror movies much. Amazon Prime had a great selection of creepy movies available on Halloween, and we chose Dark Places, based on a Gillian Flynn (author of Gone Girl) novel that my husband had read but I hadn't. He warned me that the book had been gory, but the movie was really not graphic. We both enjoyed this suspenseful thriller.

The story centers on 33-year old Libby Day, played by Charlize Theron, whose mother (played by Christina Hendricks of Mad Men fame) and two sisters were murdered when she was just eight years old. Her brother, Ben, was convicted of the three murders, in part based on Libby's testimony. As you might expect, that event ruined Libby's life, and she lives an isolated, haunted existence. Her lawyer informs her that the money from her mother's life insurance is running out, so Libby agrees to meet with a secret society called the Kill Club that want to hear her tell the story of that night and are willing to pay her. The Kill Club investigates notorious crimes, and this one is important to them, as it was particularly infamous and some of their members are convinced that Ben is innocent.

Libby is resistant to the club's efforts to look into her family's murders at first, but soon she begins to wonder if they are right and her brother might have been wrongly convicted. She feel responsible, so she begins to dig into the events of that night and the days and weeks leading up to it, peeling back layers bit by bit. The movie goes back and forth between Libby's present-day investigation and flashbacks to her childhood, as she allows herself to remember more. Meanwhile, Libby goes to visit Ben in prison - for the first time in 25 years - where he claims that he is innocent but won't tell her who really committed the murders, if he knows.

This movie does a great job of slowly building suspense, as the events of that fateful night are gradually revealed, both to Libby and to the viewers. We go along for the ride as she goes deeper and deeper into the events of the past, uncovers long-forgotten clues, and finds people long-forgotten. Since this is Gillian Flynn (I read her novels Gone Girl and Sharp Objects), I expected a really twisted ending and very little hope. I was pleasantly surprised, though. While the story is definitely dark and twisty, it is not nearly as hopeless as Gone Girl. We were spellbound by this gripping, unpredictable mystery/thriller.

Dark Places is currently available for free streaming on Amazon Prime and Netflix and is also available on DVD and through Redbox.

Did you see any spooky movies this week?

It's Monday 11/2! What Are You Reading?

November?? How can that possibly be? October went by in a flash - I am very sad to see my favorite month behind us. This weekend, we saw bare tree branches at our local Nature Center that had been full of color a week ago (though our neighborhood is still colorful), and the time change this weekend meant it was dark by dinnertime last night. I want fall to last forever!

We had a very busy weekend, with Halloween and our usual family gathering for dinner on Sunday. Our sons are 17 and 21 now, so no more trick-or-treating (we used to all dress us as a family! Check out the photos on Saturday Snapshot), but they both dressed up on Saturday for their own parties (one of which was here) and got into the spirit. Lots of fun, but I am pretty exhausted today! Time to take down the pumpkins, skeletons, and spiders and put up the Indian corn, gourds, and turkeys.

As always, we enjoyed our books last week:

• I am currently reading Song Yet Sung by James McBride for one of my book groups this week. I was disappointed to have to give up my spooky October reading before the end of the month for historical fiction, but the novel does have a supernatural element. It's the story of a runaway slave, set in 1850 on Maryland's Eastern Shore (our region), who has visions where she sees glimpses of the future. It's excellent so far - I just need to find more time for reading!
• I am still listening to the spooky classic Dracula by Bram Stoker, a free download from SYNC this summer. It's been wonderful and perfect for the spooky season! I am almost finished.
• My husband, Ken finished Make Me, the latest Lee Child novel that I gave him for his birthday. It was a quick read, but he enjoyed it - he loves the Jack Reacher series.
• After that quick book, Ken has changed gears and started reading A Dance with Dragons, Book 5 in George R.R. Martin's A Song of Fire and Ice series and 1150 pages! He and our son LOVE these books.
• Jamie, 21, is reading The Bone Palace by Amanda Downum, Book 2 in The Necromancer Chronicles series, but I don't think he had much time for reading last week, between school and Halloween preparations.

I am still way behind on my reviews - just finished reviewing books I read in September and haven't even started on October yet! - but I managed a few blog posts last week:

Movie Monday: Take Me Home, starring Sam Jaeger (who played Joel on Parenthood)

TV Tuesday: Quantico, a new thriller we are loving!

Top Ten Books for Spooky October Reading

Teen/YA Book Review: All Fall Down by Ally Carter, a suspenseful thriller in a unique setting

Saturday Snapshot - highlights from our family Halloweens past

What are you and your family reading this week?    

What Are You Reading Monday is hosted by Kathryn at Book Date, so head over and check out her blog and join the Monday fun! You can also participate in a kid/teen version hosted by Unleashing Readers.      

Our older son as Hades from Disney's Hercules

Our younger son & his girlfriend: Tinkerbell & Peter Pan

Saturday Snapshot 10/31 - Happy Halloween!

Saturday Snapshot is hosted by West Metro Mommy Reads. 

I have some lovely photos of the fall colors, but I think I will save them for next week because today is Halloween! This is one of our favorite holidays, and I am feeling nostalgic today because our sons are older now and busy with their friends & parties today. I miss the days when we spent Halloween day getting our family costumes ready! We always liked to choose a theme and dress up together. So, here is a look back at some of our best:

Super Family

Robin Hood, Little John, Maid Marion & a Knight

Star Wars Family

Pirate Family, including the Grandparents!

Older Elvis & Younger Elvis

Rock Stars

If you have kids or grandkids, enjoy all this fun while it lasts! It all goes much too fast. Happy Halloween!

Teen/YA Review: All Fall Down

I listened to All Fall Down by Ally Carter on audio last month, the first book in her Embassy Row series. It is a suspenseful teen/YA thriller with a unique setting and plot.

Grace has just moved into the U.S. Embassy in Adria (a fictional country) with her grandfather who is the U.S. Ambassador. She has visited there many summers of her childhood, but now she is moving there for good, while her army father is deployed and her older brother is off to college. Grace’s mother died three years ago, but no one is comfortable talking about her death. Grace was there when her mother died in a fire, and she is certain she saw her mother shot and murdered…but no one believes her. In fact, she spent time in a psychiatric institution because everyone thought she was delusional, due to extreme grief over losing her mother.

Grace is somewhat angry over this state of affairs, as you can imagine, and is still determined to find her mother’s murderer. She also has a long history of reckless behavior and accidents – broken bones, concussions, etc. – so everyone at the embassy is on edge, trying to keep her safe. Meanwhile, Grace is getting reacquainted with the kids she used to spend summers with on Embassy Row: Alexei, the Russian boy next door who is a friend of her brother’s and tasked by him to look out for Grace, and Megan, whom Grace played with as a child but with whom she feels she has nothing in common. There are also new teens on Embassy Row, including Noah, Grace’s self-proclaimed new best friend.

With this mix of kids between the ages of 12 and 16 from a wide range of nationalities, Grace is expected to fit in and take her proper place as the U.S. Ambassador’s grand-daughter, but she has a single-minded purpose of her own: to find her mother’s killer. This purpose takes Grace to some dangerous places and among some very dangerous people in this high-suspense, fast-paced story.

All Fall Down is a mystery and thriller set in a unique place, with a varied cast of characters. Readers get an inside view of the pomp and circumstance – and privilege – of the diplomatic lifestyle, while also rooting for Grace to stay safe and solve her mystery, even while almost everyone around her thinks she is crazy, or at least, delusional. There is also the ever-present chance that Grace’s secret investigation will cause an international incident. I really enjoyed listening to this intriguing thriller set in an exotic locale and look forward to the next book in the Embassy Row series.

Scholastic Audio

TV Tuesday: Quantico

One of our favorite new TV shows this season is Quantico, with an excellent ensemble cast and plenty of compelling suspense.

As the show opens in episode one, a group of new FBI recruits is making their way to Quantico, FBI headquarters, to start their training as agents. We get introduced to the main characters one by one, as they travel to Virginia and get settled into the dorms. There's Alex, played by Priyanka Chopra, a young woman of Indian descent who seems to be outgoing and fearless. Ryan, played by Jake McLaughlin, is ex-military and seems attracted to Alex. And so it goes, with the audience learning just a bit about each recruit at first. Josh Hopkins plays Special Agent Liam O'Connor who is in assisting with the recruits, and his boss, Miranda Shaw, played by Aunjanue Ellis, is in charge of the training program.

Then the show flashes forward to the present day, three years after that first day of training, when a terrorist has bombed Grand Central Station. Alex is rescued from the rubble and thinks that her old bosses, Liam and Miranda, are questioning her as a victim, but she soon learns that she is their prime suspect. When they search her apartment and find plans for the bombing and equipment for making the bombs, their suspicions are confirmed. Alex, though, claims she is innocent and manages to escape from custody.

She soon learns that whoever set her up must have been planning this since their first days at Quantico together. From there, the show goes back and forth in time, showing Alex on the run, visiting various Quantico classmates and trying to figure out who the real bomber is so she can clear her name and then flashing back to their training at Quantico. So, the audience gets to come along in recalling all that happened in their training and examining each of the recruits to try to figure out who the traitor and terrorist was. It's fast-paced, full of suspense, and very, very compelling. The characters are intriguing and complex. We watch all of our shows On Demand, and this is one of the first ones we rush to see the day after it airs. I can't wait to watch it tonight!

Five episodes of Quantico have aired so far, and they are all still available On Demand or at the ABC website. I think the show is also available on Netflix and Hulu, and episodes are $1.99 on Amazon Prime.

What are your favorite new shows this season?

Top Ten Books for Spooky October Reading

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. Stop over there to join the fun!

As you've probably noticed if you've been to my blog at all in the past month, I love to devote October to reading spooky, creepy books. Halloween is a favorite holiday at our house, so this helps me get in the spirit! This doesn't necessarily mean horror fiction or something truly frightening. There are a wide variety of books with just the right amount of creepiness for your tastes. Here are some that I've enjoyed over the years:

The Ghost Bride by Yangsze Choo is historical fiction with a supernatural twist, taking place in 1890’s Malaysia and also in the Chinese afterlife, with both a murder and plenty of ghosts adding to the spooky factor.

The Night Strangers by Chris Bohjalian is a super-creepy novel about a family who encounters some strange things in their new town – ghosts, weird rituals, and mysteries make this a supernatural, psychological thriller.

The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes is a thriller about a time-traveling serial killer. His ability to move through time adds a supernatural element (and makes him harder to catch). This one is a bit gruesome but, if that doesn’t bother you, it’s also riveting suspense.

The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman pulls back the curtain between the real world and the supernatural one, as a man remembers some strange things that happened when he was a child. It’s a coming-of-age story with elements of fairy tales, mythology, and the age-old battle between good and evil.

The Passage by Justin Cronin is the first volume of a post-apocalyptic trilogy about what happens when a secret government experiment to create super soldiers goes horribly wrong and unleashes blood-thirsty creatures on the public. There is a lot of action and suspense, but this novel also delves deeply into its characters.

Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffeneger is a gentle ghost story about twin American girls who move into their British aunt’s apartment, overlooking Highgate Cemetery, after her death.

Wicked by Gregory McGuire inspired the popular Broadway musical. What’s an October reading list without a witch or two? This fun, creative fantasy novel tells the back-story behind the Wicked Witch of the West from the Wizard of Oz.

The Heretic’s Daughter by Kathleen Kent is about an entirely different sort of witch, a historical novel set during the Salem witch trials. Nothing supernatural here, but this powerful, moving story about innocent people falsely accused is disturbing in a different way.

The Dark Half by Stephen King is a spooky, supernatural tale about a writer battling his own demons. Almost any Stephen King book will fit the bill in October, but this is one of my favorites.

Frankenstein by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley is, of course, a classic monster story, but the original novel is more about philosophy and human nature than the monsters that Hollywood has created. It is a fascinating, thoughtful book about how our experiences shape us.

What are your favorite spooky or creepy books?

Movie Monday 10/26: Take Me Home

Last week while my husband was out golfing, I watched Take Me Home, an uplifting road trip movie that I really enjoyed (free on Amazon prime).

Thom, played by Sam Jaeger (who played Joel on my favorite TV show, Parenthood), is a struggling artist in NYC, a photographer who can't find a job in his field. Thrown out of his apartment and desperate, Thom turns to running an illegal cab just to stay afloat. Meanwhile, across town, Claire finds her husband in what seems to be a compromising position with an associate on the same day that she hears her long-estranged father had a heart attack. On a whim, Claire jumps in Thom's cab and just tells him to drive, anywhere. Over the next 24 hours, the two decide to drive all the way to California to see Claire's father - well, Claire decides and Thom goes along because he needs the money.

Their road trip is difficult every step of the way, with Thom hiding all sorts of secrets (like his real name and the fact that it isn't even a legitimate cab), and Claire hiding secrets of her own while she struggles internally with both her relationship with her husband and with her father. They stop in Las Vegas to see Claire's mom and eventually make it to California, with more than a few rough spots along the way! And, of course, as the trip continues, they gradually get to know each better.

I was in the mood for a romantic comedy, so this fit the bill, and I'm a sucker for a road trip movie. We used to take a 3-week road trip cross-country every summer and didn't get much of a vacation this year, so I was drooling over the travel scenes! All in all, it's a fun movie about struggling with your personal demons and figuring out what you want out of life. I enjoyed it.

NOTE: I just discovered - thanks to IMDB, that amazing store of entertainment information! - that Claire was played by Amber Jaeger, who is married to Sam Jaeger, who not only stars in this movie but also wrote it and directed it. Cool.

Have you seen any good movies lately? What's your favorite road trip movie?

It's Monday 10/26! What Are You Reading?

Yikes, how'd we get to the last week of October already?? This is my favorite month - I don't want it to end! And I have really been enjoying my spooky October reading, too. I finally felt back to my normal baseline last week so jumped back into a more normal routine - more writing and able to take walks again and get out to see friends. What a thrill! Of course, I am exhausted this morning from a busy weekend, but it was a good one.


Here's what we've been reading this past week:

• Last night, I finished The Unwanteds by Lisa McMann (one of my favorite authors!), a middle-grade dystopian fantasy about a world that favors usefulness where any child with a creative or artistic ability is labeled Unwanted and sent for Elimination, but there is a secret magical world focused on the arts. It was very good and I can't wait to read the next book in the series! This was another book for my R.I.P. X Challenge, hosted by The Estella Society. 
• I am still listening to the spooky classic Dracula by Bram Stoker, a free download from SYNC this summer. It is SO good! Surprisingly suspenseful and perfectly creepy - just right for the season.
• My husband, Ken, finished The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss. This is one of our son's favorite books and is being made into a movie AND a TV show! Ken loved it and is looking forward to book 2 (which I'm sure our son has here somewhere).
• Now, Ken is reading Make Me, the latest Lee Child novel that I gave him for his birthday. This is his favorite author so he is enjoying it, though it is set in Oklahoma, his home state, so he's annoyed by inaccuracies in the setting! Don't you hate that?
•  Jamie, 21, is reading The Bone Palace by Amanda Downum, Book 2 in The Necromancer Chronicles series. He is following in his mom's footsteps and chose something creepy for the end of October - that's my boy!

I was able to do a lot more writing last week but needed to focus on paying work, so I am still a bit behind in reviews for the blog....but catching up slowly! Here's what was on the blog last week:

Movie Monday: Redwood Highway, a warm, thoughtful film about family & aging

TV Tuesday: Blindspot, a compelling new thriller with a unique premise

Middle-grade Review: Doll Bones, a creepy ghost story & wonderful tale of friendship

Fiction Review: The Martian, a suspenseful sci fi thriller& now a new movie

Saturday Snapshot - we are finally seeing some fall colors here in Delaware

 
As you can see, I have added weekly reviews of TV shows and movies to my blog recently, so if like me, you also enjoy TV and movies as well as books, check out all of my media reviews!

What are you and your family reading this week?    

What Are You Reading Monday has a new host! It is now being hosted by Kathryn at Book Date, so head over and check out her blog and join the Monday fun! You can also participate in a kid/teen version hosted by Unleashing Readers.       

Fiction Review: The Martian

After hearing rave reviews of The Martian by first-time novelist Andy Weir last year, I bought copies for my father, stepfather, and husband for Father’s Day, and they all loved it! I finally had a chance to read this thriller set in space myself and really enjoyed the fast-paced suspense and humor.

As the novel opens, astronaut Mark Watney wakes up and discovers that he is alone on Mars. His crew was on the surface of the planet, but a storm forced them to evacuate. Mark doesn’t hold any grudges for them leaving him behind; he seemed to be dead, and even his suit’s automatic readouts of vital signs showed he was dead. He would have done the same thing in their shoes. But now he is left on Mars--alone--and figures it will be at least three years until the next manned mission lands there and is able to rescue him.

The problem (one of many problems) is that Mark can’t communicate with his crew or with anyone on Earth, so he has no way to let them know he is even alive…oh, and he will run out of food long before the next mission arrives. These are just the first of many serious survival issues that Mark faces throughout the course of the novel. Fortunately, Mark is really smart (he’s an astronaut, after all), his specialty is botany, and he has a strong will to live.

This novel is sort of like the movie Castaway, set in space, if the TV character McGyver were the lead character. Mark is on his own for much of the story, trying to survive and facing one obstacle after another. Each time he is faced with a life-or-death challenge, he figures out a clever way to overcome it. What keeps the story from becoming dry or dull is Mark’s dark sense of humor. The novel is written as Mark’s log of his adventures, and he is constantly cracking jokes.

Unlike Castaway, the action isn’t all just Mark. The reader also gets to see what is happening back on Earth at NASA and with his crew as they head home on their long journey. Someone at NASA eventually figures out that Mark is still alive, so that adds additional urgency to the story, as the engineers and scientists try to figure out how to rescue him, and the world watches and waits. The action flips back and forth between these different scenes, keeping the pace fast and helping to build the suspense.

Weir is a software engineer and a self-described “space nerd,” so there is a lot of science in this book, but it doesn’t bog the story down. The action, constant new challenges, and Mark’s sense of humor keep the narrative flowing smoothly and quickly (and you can just skim the science-y stuff if you like).  Real space experts at NASA have said that the science in the novel is accurate, so that adds to the intrigue and credibility of the story. I loved this warm, funny sci fi thriller just as much as the men in my family did, and I can’t wait to see the movie adaptation.

369 pages, Crown Publishers

Audible Studios

 

Note: This post contains affiliate links. Purchases from these links provide a small commission to me (pennies per purchase), to help offset the time I spend writing for this blog, at no extra cost to you.

Visit my YouTube Channel for more bookish fun!

 

Listen to a sample of the audiobook here, narrated by Wil Wheaton!, and/or download it from Audible.

 

You can buy the book through Bookshop.org, where your purchase will support the indie bookstore of your choice (or all indie bookstores)--the convenience of shopping online while still buying local!

      

 

Or you can order The Martian from Book Depository, with free shipping worldwide.

Saturday Snapshot 10/24

Saturday Snapshot is hosted by West Metro Mommy Reads. 

I am finally feeling better, back to my normal baseline, and so happy to be able to get outside and walk again! I enjoyed a couple of walks around my neighborhood plus a wonderful hike at a local park with friends yesterday, on a gorgeous fall day!

Much of my neighborhood is still green with splashes of color

Maple leaves just starting to turn red in the sunlight

A few trees have already lost their leaves!

I love the sunlight shining through yellow leaves (click to enlarge)

One brilliant red tree at the park

A lovely walk on a perfect fall day

Hope you are enjoying this lovely fall weekend!

Middle-Grade Review: Doll Bones

I enjoyed reading The Spiderwick Chronicles to my sons when they were younger, so I was eager to read a new(ish) middle-grade novel by Holly Black: the Newberry Honor-winning Doll Bones. Its blend of realistic friendship and a ghost story was perfect for this spooky season!

Twelve-year old friends Poppy, Zach, and Alice have been playing their game for years. They have an elaborate make-believe world, populated by an odd collection of action figures, old Barbies, plastic animals, and toy mermaids. When they play together after school, they work collectively and imaginatively to move the story forward, making up scenes, voicing the characters, and coming up with new ways to put their heroes in peril and have them overcome the villains. Overseeing their entire make-believe world is the Great Queen, an old bone china doll that sits in a glass-fronted cabinet in Poppy’s living room.

All of them, but especially Zach, know that they may soon outgrow their beloved game and pretend world, but none of them is ready for that just yet. Zach’s father, however, wants his son to give up his childish pursuits and focus on basketball, and one evening, he does something that forces Zach to give up the game. Angry and embarrassed, Zach doesn’t admit to his two friends what his father has done but just tells them that he doesn’t want to play anymore.

Their longtime friendship is on perilous ground when Poppy pulls the threesome together again to tell them that she’s been having frightening dreams. In her dreams, the Queen claims to be the ghost of a little girl who will not rest until the china doll is put into the grave where she belongs. Zach and Alice don’t know what to think. Is Poppy just making up stories to get the game restarted?

Poppy’s fear and urgency seems real, though, so the three friends set off on one last adventure together, to lay the Great Queen to rest, as she has instructed in Poppy’s dreams. Their short trip turns into a bigger journey than they bargained for, with challenges encountered at every turn, almost like one of their pretend games…but this is real life, and the friends might be in real danger. Besides, strange things keep happening with the china doll, making them wonder whether there really is a ghost.

I absolutely loved this fast-paced, supernatural adventure. The ghost story is perfectly creepy without being too scary, and the real-life challenges the kids face keep the story exciting and moving quickly. Best of all, Black writes about middle-grade friendship as if she clearly remembers her own adolescence. I especially loved the scenes of their pretend game because it reminded me exactly of the way my sons and their friends used to play – with a motley collection of animals, action figures, and other toys and a huge dose of imagination, making up amazing stories that went on and on. Poppy, Zach, and Alice come alive in these pages, and I was rooting for them to succeed in their quest and come home safely, with their friendship intact. Just describing it makes me want to read it all over again.

244 pages, McElderberry Books (an imprint of Simon & Schuster)

For middle-grade kids who enjoy not-too-scary ghost stories, you might also try these great books by renowned children's authors this Halloween season: Leisl & Po by Lauren Oliver, The Graveyard Book (another Newberry winner) by Neil Gaiman, and Ghost Hawk by Susan Cooper.

TV Tuesday 10/20: Blindspot

Now that we're a few weeks into the new fall TV season, I thought I'd start focusing on some of the newer shows we've tried. As I've mentioned here before, my husband and I usually watch two TV shows together each evening - that's our together time, and there are lots of shows we enjoy together. Our 21-year old son lives at college (about 20 min away), but each season, there are a couple of TV shows that he wants us to save and watch with him when he comes home on Sundays. One of those is the new NBC thriller, Blindspot.

Blindspot has a unique central plot: the first episode opens with a woman found in Times Square, naked and with no memory...and covered head to toe in mysterious tattoos. The FBI brings the Jane Doe, played by Jaimie Alexander (she was in both Thor movies), back to their field office and lab. One of her tattoos - placed prominently on her back - is the name of an FBI agent, so they call him in. Agent Kurt Weller, played by Sullivan Stapleton, doesn't recognize the woman, but he is intrigued by the mystery and especially why he was specifically called out.

From then on, the FBI agents, led by Weller, investigate her tattoos one at a time, aided by Agent Patterson in the lab, played by Ashley Johnson (whom I recognized from her roles as a child in Growing Pains and Phenom). For instance, they notice a date hidden in one of the tattoos that is that very day, so they focus on that one immediately. None of the tattoos are straight-forward - they are each unique and coded in some way. After a few episodes, you begin to see that each tattoo leads them to some sort of crime about to take place, but none of the crimes seem to be connected in any way.

With each episode focusing on a different crime, the show unfolds in some ways like your typical crime show, with the detectives/investigators trying to figure out the crime and catch the bad guys. But, woven throughout are the mysterious tattoos and Jane's and Weller's quest to figure out who she is, where she came from, and who did this to her (and why). She does begin to get flashes of memory here and there, but they don't make much sense at first. We have watched three episodes of Blindspot so far and are hooked! The long-term mysteries plus the new investigations each episode make it a compelling, action-packed show with plenty of suspense and intriguing characters.

Five episodes of Blindspot have aired so far, and all of them are still available On Demand and on the NBC website (though the first is scheduled to come off Demand in about a week). Episodes are $1.99 each on Amazon Prime and are also available on Netflix.

What new fall shows are you enjoying?

Movie Monday 10/19: Redwood Highway

My husband and I have been too busy during our TV time together, watching all the great new shows that just started (and some old favorites), so we haven't had much time left for movies. But I did what I have been doing lately and watched a quieter, mellower movie on my own while he was out golfing last week.

I chose Redwood Highway, a warm, thoughtful film about family and aging that won awards at several film festivals. Award-winning actress Shirley Knight stars as Marie, a woman in her 70's who is living in a retirement home - and is not very happy about it. James Le Gros stars as Michael, her adult son, whom she argues with frequently. Her grand-daughter is getting married soon, but Marie disapproves - she feels she is too young at 22 (and she's marrying a musician!). At first, Marie refuses to attend the wedding, but one night, thinking back over her own wedding and other events from her past, she abruptly changes her mind and decides to attend the wedding on the coast...and walk all the way there, 80 miles away.

Most of the movie follows Marie on her journey, as she heads down the Redwood Highway (Oregon) toward the coast, through gorgeous parks and forests. She starts out a little rough, with the expected problems - terrible blisters, exhaustion, frustration - but she meets a kind stranger in one town named Pete, played by Tom Skerritt, who helps her with both first aid and emotional support and gives her the strength to continue. Marie camps along the way (she is obviously an experienced backpacker from years past) and meets other interesting people - most of them very kind, some not so much.

As she walks, Marie has plenty of time to think (as one does while long-distance hiking!) and revisits her past, finally facing up to some haunting memories. Meanwhile, while she is on this journey of discovery, her son and grand-daughter are panicked that she has gone missing and have police and search parties looking for her. I really enjoyed this quiet, contemplative movie. As a past backpacker myself, I loved all the natural beauty and scenes of hiking and camping and was glad to go along with Marie on her journey of re-awakening. It's a lovely, thoughtful film.

Redwood Highway is currently available free on Amazon Prime and on Netflix, as well as on DVD.



Have you seen any good movies lately?