From the YA Bookshelf - In Sight of Stars by Gae Polisner (sponsored by @JB_Lynn_author)

This post is sponsored by JB Lynn, author of The Hitwoman in a Pickle.

by Kathleen Barker

Life's wounds come at us from many directions.  They are William Shakespeare's "slings and arrows of outrageous fate".  Sometimes they are delivered by those closest to us.  Sometimes they aren't even true.  The wound is real, but not the perceived hurt behind the arrow.

From the YA Bookshelf: Along for the Ride - A Review

by Kathleen Barker

Spring break signals the coming end of the school year as well as time off from classes.  Not every family has the resources to fly away for a mini-vacay, so I wanted to find a top-notch read for the teen reader.  My choice?  New York Times bestselling author Sarah Dessen's Along for the Ride.

Quintessential YA Reads : What Happened to Goodbye by Sarah Dessen

by Kathleen Barker

As I continue my perusal of YA novels in order to induce my 13-year-old granddaughter to increase her reading, this month's suggestion is Sarah Dessen's What Happened to Goodbye.

Screening the Young Teen's Reads

by Kathleen Barker

Choosing books for the budding teenage reader is like stepping gingerly through a minefield.  How can we tell when raw language and inappropriate sexual content will appear?  And what "clean" stories will lure the reluctant reader from relentless social media to discover the joys of literature?

Amazon affiliate links are used on this site.

I've spent the last year on a reading rampage - a quest for the holy grail of YA novels to entice my granddaughter to read more.  It hasn't been easy to alternate between my own perusals to those that might lure this typical just-turning thirteen year old.

My latest "find" on her behalf is Robyn Schneider's The Beginning of Everything.

Life was on target for popular athlete Ezra Faulkner as he finished his junior year in high school.  His coming senior year held such delicious promise for the guy who reigned supreme at the most popular kids' lunch table.  Then tragedy struck - a horrific car accident that left him in the hospital and rehab for the majority of the summer and ended his legendary tennis prowess.  Both physically and emotionally, Ezra limps through senior year.  He abandons and is abandoned by his school's "in" crowd.  Then he meets Cassidy Thorpe, a beautiful and strange girl who has just transferred from a boarding school to Eastwood High.

Ezra reconnects with his rather nerdy childhood friends, yet feels like he doesn't belong in their group either.  He struggles with his attraction for this oddly secretive girl, unable to understand her often inexplicable behavior.  It isn't until their relationship shatters that he learns that she too has experienced a personal disaster, the kind that either destroys or frees someone.  The central lesson for Ezra is that tragedy can allow him to choose a path that lets him live, not just exist.

Author Schneider's understanding of the teen psyche produces sharp, spot-on situations and conversations that are funny, acidic and bitingly real.

I enjoyed The Beginning of Everything and  hope my granddaughter will give it two thumbs up as well.

Buy The Beginning of Everything at Amazon

Kathleen Barker was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland. A graduate of Blessed Sacrament, the Institute of Notre Dame and Towson University, she spent twenty years as the much-traveled wife of a Navy pilot and has three children. While working for a Fortune 500 insurance company in New Orleans, she wrote feature and human interest articles for their magazine and received the Field Reporter of the Year award. After Hurricane Katrina, she returned to her beloved state of Maryland where she started work on "The Charm City Chronicles". All four volumes, "Ednor Scardens", "The Body War", "The Hurting Year", and "On Gabriel's Wings" are available in Amazon's Kindle store.

     

Get even more book news in your inbox, sign up today! Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

A Sure Way to Ignore Presidential Tweets - THE NIGHTINGALE

by Kathleen Barker

We tremble and hesitate to open a newspaper, turn on the news, or click on a link that details the events of the day. War, murder, and chaos are expected, everyday events. Should we despair or slog along, working diligently to make things better?

Amazon affiliate links are used on this site.

There is something to be said for aging, for having lived through the Civil Rights era, the Vietnam War, the Cold War, the Cuban Missile Crisis, Presidential resignations and assassinations.  Perspective is a powerful coping method. Yet there comes a point at which we need to escape the present day via a retreat, a massage, or a deeply engrossing book such as Kristin Hannah's The Nightingale.

This historical fiction novel is set during World War II, a time that many felt was the beginning of the end of peace and order on this earth. It tells the tale of two sisters, one in the city of Paris and another in the French countryside, who worked with the underground resistance. Filled with sorrow and despair over the death of their mother and the abandonment by their father, their lives take us on a roller coaster of love, danger, courage, and survival.

The opening line of the book eternally rings true: "If I have learned anything in this long life of mine, it is this: In love we find out who we want to be; in war we find out who we are."

One caveat - do not begin reading this just before bed. You will be up all night. You have been warned.

Buy The Nightingale at Amazon

Kathleen Barker was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland. A graduate of Blessed Sacrament, the Institute of Notre Dame and Towson University, she spent twenty years as the much-traveled wife of a Navy pilot and has three children. While working for a Fortune 500 insurance company in New Orleans, she wrote feature and human interest articles for their magazine and received the Field Reporter of the Year award. After Hurricane Katrina, she returned to her beloved state of Maryland where she started work on "The Charm City Chronicles". All four volumes, "Ednor Scardens", "The Body War", "The Hurting Year", and "On Gabriel's Wings" are available in Amazon's Kindle store.

 



Get even more book news in your inbox, sign up today!. Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

How EDNOR SCARDENS Prepared Me to Watch THE KEEPERS

by Kathleen Barker

I recently finished viewing all seven parts of the documentary film, "The Keepers" on Netflix.  Tears ran down my face as an immense well of anger overflowed.  Was is because I knew these women personally?  No.  Was it because I was a survivor of abuse?  Yes and no.

Amazon affiliate links are used in this post.

To explain that last answer, I'm going to do something that an author just doesn't do.  I'm going to review my own book, Ednor Scardens.

It all started when I went to a funeral a few years ago, and the eulogy that was delivered gave me pause because it didn't really capture the deceased.  I felt that the speaker didn't know much about her loved one's past.  Then a germ of fear took hold that my own kids didn't know many things about me before I was their mother.  So, I sat down to write down some facts as well as some anecdotes, and, before I knew it, I was typing into the night, and many more nights, as it poured out.

A story began to form, beginning with a girl in the sixth grade, who lived in a Catholic, blue-collar neighborhood, and attended Catholic school.  She gradually learns of the abuse of one of her friends by a parish priest, and then slowly realizes that she could become the next victim.  Some of the characters and material were autobiographical and some were fictitious, to provide a more cohesive story.  As Kate navigates middle school and high school, she moves through the minefield of friendship with her classmates.  Her physical maturity attracts the attention that her emotional immaturity is not equipped to deal with.  The scars slowly accumulate on her psyche.

When Kate moves past a puppy-love relationship with a boy named Gabe, and falls in love with his older brother Michael, her ghosts come out from hiding.  No one ever went to counseling in the 1960's.  No one spoke out against the Catholic Church.  You learned to stay quiet and bury it deep so you could act normal like everyone else. Until...

And the story just won't end.  So you write three more books to get it all out.

Buy Ednor Scardens at Amazon

Kathleen Barker was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland. A graduate of Blessed Sacrament, the Institute of Notre Dame and Towson University, she spent twenty years as the much-traveled wife of a Navy pilot and has three children. While working for a Fortune 500 insurance company in New Orleans, she wrote feature and human interest articles for their magazine and received the Field Reporter of the Year award. After Hurricane Katrina, she returned to her beloved state of Maryland where she started work on "The Charm City Chronicles". All four volumes, "Ednor Scardens", "The Body War", "The Hurting Year", and "On Gabriel's Wings" are available in Amazon's Kindle store.

   

Get even more book news in your inbox by signing up for our newsletter: http://eepurl.com/mHTVL. Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

"Hail, Hail, Rock 'n' Roll" - Chuck Berry Remembered

by Kathleen Barker

Chuck Barry, circa 1957, source Wikipedia

Remember John Travolta's and Uma Thurman's famous dance in the movie "Pulp Fiction"?  How about Michael J. Fox's stress-filled guitar riff onstage in "Back to the Future"?  Of course, you do!   If you missed the news lately, the man who wrote and sang those rocking tunes just died this month at the age of 90.  Chuck Berry, the rock and roll icon who influenced countless musicians and fans, is gone.  I'm always saddened when an integral part of my youth passes from this earth, so in typical book-nerd fashion, I checked out both his autobiography and his unofficial biography.

Chuck Berry: The Autobiography was written in 1989 and in his own words (with some input from none other than Bruce Springsteen), Berry describes his childhood, jail terms, rise to stardom, and creating his biggest hits.  As with many autobiographies, it is somewhat self-serving, showing what the subject himself feels is most important.  The impact of racial issues on his life is ever-present.  There were some topics that gave me more information than I wanted, especially about his relationships with women, but perhaps this is because he wrote the book while imprisoned.  Overall, it is a fascinating look into the mind and attitudes of a rock pioneer.

I also read Brown-Eyed Handsome Man: The Life and Hard Times of Chuck Berry by Bruce Pegg.  While this is an unofficial biography, it draws on public records and the author's interviews with Berry to provide a less luminous portrait of the man.  As a musician, Chuck Berry's influence is profound.  John Lennon famously stated, "If you had to give Rock 'n' Roll another name, you might call it Chuck Berry."  Unlike many musicians, Berry did not travel with an entourage.  He toured incessantly without the music industry's assistance.  His biggest hit song - and the only one to make the number one record spot was the infamous "My Ding-a-Ling".  Pegg's book spotlights many areas of Berry's life that the musician's own book does not delve into.

Although you may not wish to read both of these, together they offer the most balanced view of the duck-walking rocker.  If you are a fan of Chuck Berry, you will be pleased to know that before his death he finished recording his first new album in decades, "Chuck", which will be released later this year.  

Kathleen Barker was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland. A graduate of Blessed Sacrament, the Institute of Notre Dame and Towson University, she spent twenty years as the much-traveled wife of a Navy pilot and has three children. While working for a Fortune 500 insurance company in New Orleans, she wrote feature and human interest articles for their magazine and received the Field Reporter of the Year award. After Hurricane Katrina, she returned to her beloved state of Maryland where she started work on "The Charm City Chronicles". All four volumes, "Ednor Scardens", "The Body War", "The Hurting Year", and "On Gabriel's Wings" are available in Amazon's Kindle store.

Get even more book news in your inbox by signing up for our newsletter: http://eepurl.com/mHTVL. Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

OD'ing on Gabaldon: "The Scottish Prisoner"

by Kathleen Barker

When you get hooked on a book series, feverishly reading each and every one, it can seem like a good friend has died when you finish (okay, after you finish re-reading the entire series three times).  That's how I felt when I finished Diana Gabaldon's "Outlander" series.  I was thrilled when I found the television series based on the novels and watched the first two seasons multiple times.  At that point, I discovered Winston Graham's "Poldark" books.  Read all of them.  Watched the PBS series.  Now what?

Gabaldon gave in to her legions of tormented fans and took up the task of writing yet another "Outlander" book, but it takes time.  I looked to see if she had written anything else, and discovered that she has taken one of the more popular men from the series, Lord John Grey, and written several books where he is the central character.  Although any "Outlander" devotee wants the focus on Scotsman James Fraser and his wife, Claire, I was willing to give it a go.  Gabaldon's mastery of the historical novel is impressive, and The Scottish Prisoner fills in gaps of time that exist for Fraser while it shows how Fraser and Grey's deep and richly complicated friendship developed.

While the crackling romance between Jamie and Claire isn't in this book, she is there is spirit as he sadly yearns for her.  No man spends twenty plus years doing nothing but pine for his lost (he believes) wife, and this book paints a fuller picture of the Scotsman's efforts to find reasons to continue to live.  It also helps me wait for both the next "Outlander" novel as well as season three of the television series.

Kathleen Barker was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland. A graduate of Blessed Sacrament, the Institute of Notre Dame and Towson University, she spent twenty years as the much-traveled wife of a Navy pilot and has three children. While working for a Fortune 500 insurance company in New Orleans, she wrote feature and human interest articles for their magazine and received the Field Reporter of the Year award. After Hurricane Katrina, she returned to her beloved state of Maryland where she started work on "The Charm City Chronicles". All four volumes, "Ednor Scardens", "The Body War", "The Hurting Year", and "On Gabriel's Wings" are available in Amazon's Kindle store.

Remember to enter our 6th Blogiversary Mystery Box giveaway.

Get even more book news in your inbox by signing up for our newsletter: http://eepurl.com/mHTVL. Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

Poppa Had a Brand New Bag.....The Godfather of Soul

by Kathleen Barker

As a teen of the 1960's, one of my more memorable evenings was a trip to Dixie Ballroom in Gwynn Oak Park, located in Baltimore Maryland.  A large number of my friends were excited to get inside for an evening of dancing with abandon to the music of James Brown and The Famous Flames.  We weren't just listening to recorded music.  The Godfather of Soul and his band were actually playing on the stage.  We moved, sang and celebrated his unique talents.  Yet we were young and ignorant of the struggles and discrimination that black artists faced every day.

Years later, we read of Brown's impoverished, hardscrabble youth.  He had boxed, sang gospel, went to a juvenile detention center after a robbery conviction, and worked as a janitor.  The gospel group he had originally joined while in prison also sang R&B, eventually performing at college campuses, until Brown contacted his idol, Little Richard.  Richard's manager auditioned Brown and his Flames and quickly agreed to act as their manager.  From there, he wrote and recorded his first hit song, "Please, Please Please".  Brown's dynamic dance moves and vocals were unequaled throughout his career.  His personal life was tumultuous:  multiple marriages, prison time, multiple instances of domestic violence, and drug use.

Anyone can lay down a Wikipedia-style stairstep history of an artist's life, and that's what I was expecting from author James McBride's Kill 'Em and Leave: Searching for James Brown and the American Soul.  That's not what I found in this book.  McBride offers lovely fruit of exhaustive research on Brown's background and complicated life.  His wit and passion reveal the cultural landscape of the U.S. from the Fifties until his death in 2006.  Brown had wished to leave a large amount of money to benefit the poor children of Georgia and South Carolina, but a legal battle has raged for over ten years among his numerous wives and children, consuming millions, while the Godfather's body lay in a gilded coffin in his daughter's backyard for much of that time.

Buy Kill 'Em and Leave: Searching for James Brown and the American Soul at Amazon

Kathleen Barker was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland. A graduate of Blessed Sacrament, the Institute of Notre Dame and Towson University, she spent twenty years as the much-traveled wife of a Navy pilot and has three children. While working for a Fortune 500 insurance company in New Orleans, she wrote feature and human interest articles for their magazine and received the Field Reporter of the Year award. After Hurricane Katrina, she returned to her beloved state of Maryland where she started work on "The Charm City Chronicles". All four volumes, "Ednor Scardens", "The Body War", "The Hurting Year", and "On Gabriel's Wings" are available in Amazon's Kindle store.

Get even more book news in your inbox by signing up for our newsletter: http://eepurl.com/mHTVL. Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr - A Review

by Kathleen Barker

How do you choose a book to read?  Many of my friends laugh and tell me they simply pick up the next one in their "to-read" pile or list.  While some ask trusted friends for recommendations, many of us simply hit the "order" button when we read a post or a brilliant review.  While I have my own waiting stack, I recently chose a story because of the awards it had won and the nearly 25 thousand reviews on Amazon, which were overwhelmingly positive.  Indeed, many reviewers were rapturous.

The awards for Anthony Doerr's All the Light We Cannot See" are substantial:  2015 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, a finalist for the 2014 National Book Award, and a New York Times bestseller.  Despite all of these accolades, there are no guarantees that you will love it. And, let's face it, World War II stories can be weighty and depressing.  Can a story be both depressing and uplifting when it deals with the destruction of so many human beings?  In this case, I only wish that I had more than two thumbs to point upward.

Doerr's novel juxtaposes the story of a six-year-old French girl Marie-Laure who has gone blind with that of Wener, a German orphan with a near-genius understanding of science (particularly electrical engineering)).  For many chapters, we are not sure what one character has to do with the other as both lives are devastated by the Nazi war machine.  Marie-Laure's father is the curator of a museum, and he struggles to protect both his beloved daughter as well as a famous diamond known as the Sea of Flames from Hitler's destructive acquisition.  Werner is swallowed by the Hitler Youth organization as soon as he is old enough.  His genius is recognized and put to brutal use to seek out and destroy the source of broadcasts by the French Resistance.  

As the two characters move slowly to the point where their paths cross, Doerr's prose weaves a stunningly intricate tapestry of metaphor.  His poetic descriptions of feelings, thoughts and surroundings are a literary treasure.  Unlike many novels where we are carried on a juggernaut of action and plot to their inevitable conclusion, this is a story to read slowly - more than once, even - in order to savor its richness.  The author weaves the music of "Clair de Lune", Jules Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and the myth of a priceless diamond whose owner will purportedly live forever as long as he possesses it.  The story exudes richness in the midst of war's devastation.

Read it.  Treasure it.  It will make you an instant fan of Anthony Doerr's extraordinary talent.

Buy All the Light We Cannot See at Amazon

Kathleen Barker, features writer. Kathleen was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland. A graduate of Blessed Sacrament, the Institute of Notre Dame and Towson University, she spent twenty years as the much-traveled wife of a Navy pilot and has three children. While working for a Fortune 500 insurance company in New Orleans, she wrote feature and human interest articles for their magazine and received the Field Reporter of the Year award. After Hurricane Katrina, she returned to her beloved state of Maryland where she started work on "The Charm City Chronicles". All four volumes, "Ednor Scardens", "The Body War", "The Hurting Year", and "On Gabriel's Wings" are available in Amazon's Kindle store.

Get even more book news in your inbox by signing up for our newsletter: http://eepurl.com/mHTVL. Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

Think You Know Alexander Hamilton? Read This Before You Answer.

by Kathleen Barker

When looking for a kick-back summer read, most of us resist an 800+ page boulder of non-fiction.  Yet since I am unwilling to plunk down an ultra-serious chunk of change for an elusive ticket to Broadway's smash hit, "Hamilton", I decided to take the plunge into Pulitzer Prize-winning author Ron Chernow's best-selling biography of our country's most misunderstood and underrated Founding Father, Alexander Hamilton. 

Most of us know little about Hamilton other than that his face is featured on ten dollar bills and that he was shot by Aaron Burr.  He was more...so much more.  Brilliant, driven, and charismatic, he was likely the most influential figure to never serve as the President of our country.  Unlike nearly all other Founding Fathers, Hamilton burst onto the American scene from a most unfortunate childhood.  An illegitimate orphan born on a Caribbean Island, he read voraciously and wrote so well that he was employed at a very young age as a clerk by a trading company.  After the 1722 hurricane in St. Croix the then-fifteen year old Hamilton penned a summary of the ravaging storm which impressed the editor of the Royal Danish American Gazette.  A pastor took up a collection to fund his education in America where he entered King's College (now Columbia University).  The immensely-talented young man fought for independence from Britain and became General George Washington's chief aide.  He founded our nation's financial system, the United States Coast Guard, the Federalist Party, the New York Post newspaper, and more.

"The magnitude of Hamilton's feats as treasury secretary has overshadowed many other facets of his life: clerk, college student, youthful poet, essayist, artillery captain, wartime adjutant to Washington, battlefield hero, congressman, abolitionist, Bank of New York founder, state assemblyman, member of the Constitutional Convention and New York Ratifying Convention, orator, lawyer, polemicist, educator, patron saint of the New-York Evening Post, foreign-policy theorist, and major general in the army," writes Chernow.

In the most comprehensive telling of Alexander Hamilton's life, Chernow perused almost 22,000 pages of letters, manuscripts, and articles to reveal a man with unparalleled intellect  and ambition.  The comprehensive yet never-dull book inspired Lin-Manuel Miranda to create the award-winning Broadway musical that so many have seen and still wait to see.  You won't be disappointed by either.

Buy Alexander Hamilton at Amazon

Kathleen Barker, features writer. Kathleen was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland. A graduate of Blessed Sacrament, the Institute of Notre Dame and Towson University, she spent twenty years as the much-traveled wife of a Navy pilot and has three children. While working for a Fortune 500 insurance company in New Orleans, she wrote feature and human interest articles for their magazine and received the Field Reporter of the Year award. After Hurricane Katrina, she returned to her beloved state of Maryland where she started work on "The Charm City Chronicles". All four volumes, "Ednor Scardens", "The Body War", "The Hurting Year", and "On Gabriel's Wings" are available in Amazon's Kindle store.

Elena Who And What The Heck Is A Neapolitan Novel?

by Kathleen Barker

When I first stumbled across a mention of Italian author Elena Ferrante, I wondered what she had written to be crowned one of Italy's most renowned novelists.

I heartily agreed with an article in "The Economist", which called her "the best contemporary novelist you've never heard of."

Her series of Neapolitan Novels begins with My Brilliant Friend, the first in the multi-volume set.  I was intrigued as I have a deep love for Italy and its people.  And, at the risk of sounding shallow, I liked the cover art.

For some reason, I have been ensnared by multi-volume novels of late (such as Outlander and Poldark) so I decided to flip a coin.  After all, unlike the other two series, this one only has four books.
Set in the 1950's  near Naples, Italy, Ferrante tells the story of two young girls, Lila and Elena. Translated from the original Italian, it was not an easy book to read.  Even the best of translators cannot precisely duplicate the lilt and flow of the author's language.  My grammatical background did battle with the occasional run-on or incomplete sentence.  I had to force myself to chalk it up to artistic license. 

The story is deeply personal, often violent, and I felt that Ferrante's goal was to reach through the page and slap me, reminding me that this was her story to tell, not necessarily one that I would love to hear.  As I moved through the first hundred pages, I was irritated by the ever-shifting friendship of these girls as they matured.  Yet I was drawn back, wanting to know how they could possibly remain friends   The author captures the insecurities of girlhood in a male-dominated culture surrounded by grinding poverty with the honesty of first-hand experience. 

Though I fought valiantly to dislike this book, the characters repeatedly sucked me back in with their raw, honest descriptiveness.  I knew I could walk down any poor street in Naples and run into each and every one of them.  Damn it, now I'm going to have to buy book two, The  Story of a New Name.

Buy My Brilliant Friend at Amazon

Kathleen Barker, features writer. Kathleen was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland. A graduate of Blessed Sacrament, the Institute of Notre Dame and Towson University, she spent twenty years as the much-traveled wife of a Navy pilot and has three children. While working for a Fortune 500 insurance company in New Orleans, she wrote feature and human interest articles for their magazine and received the Field Reporter of the Year award. After Hurricane Katrina, she returned to her beloved state of Maryland where she started work on "The Charm City Chronicles". All four volumes, "Ednor Scardens", "The Body War", "The Hurting Year", and "On Gabriel's Wings" are available in Amazon's Kindle store.

Get even more book news in your inbox by signing up for our newsletter: http://eepurl.com/mHTVL. Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

Review: The Boys in the Boat by Daniel James Brown

by Kathleen Barker

I rarely read non-fiction, and I've never rowed.  I can count on one hand the number of crew races I've watched on television in my lifetime.  The books I choose to read are based on suggestions from a trusted circle of friends, and they are invariably fiction.  So, whatever possessed me to buy this book? 

A friend outside my reading circle raved about it on Facebook, so I decided to look it up.  I'd never heard of it and was knee-deep in my third re-reading of the Outlander books in preparation for the start of its second season in April.  Olympic rowers were not on my radar screen.  Yet when I checked on Amazon, there were over 17,000 reviews, and 81% were five stars.  The other 19% were four stars.  My interest was piqued.  How could so many people love a book that sounded kind of ho-hum to me?  I still had some money left on a holiday gift certificate, so that made it a little less painful to take a chance and check it out.

Yowza...I'm glad I did.

The sport of crew (rowing) is, for the most part, Eastern elitist.  What kind of chance did Depression-era young men have in the Seattle, Washington area?  I wondered if I were in for a deadly dull read about Rowing Rocky-types.  Yet author Daniel James Brown knows how to weave everyday details and historical timelines into a magic carpet ride of hope, determination, team bonds and glorious triumph.   The magical alignment at that point in the 1930's of British boatmaker George Pocock, the brilliant University of Washington coach Al Ulbrickson, and an unlikely group of young men from economically-devastated America is nothing short of historical lightning. 

The story centers on Joe Rantz, a boy who had been abandoned by his family, but survived through his wits and ability to endure a daily amount of hard labor that would have crushed a lesser spirit.  Thrown together as freshmen, the assortment of young men from dairy farms and lumber mills soon coalesced into a very special crew.  As they learned to submit to the harsh master that is team rowing, they ascended to a level of excellence that allowed them to represent the United States triumphantly at the infamous 1936 Olympics, otherwise known as Adolph Hitler's plan to showcase German superiority. 

Author Brown's ability to tell the story by blending descriptive detail and the euphoric memories of a dying Rantz make this an extraordinary tale that will enchant and inspire readers for years to come.

Buy The Boys in the Boat at Amazon

Book info:
available formats: ebook, audio and print (416 pages)
published: May 2014 by Penguin Books
ISBN13: 978-0143125471
genres: non-fiction, sports
source: purchased

Born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland, Kathleen Barker attended Catholic elementary and high schools before graduating with a B.A. in English and Education from Towson University. She also attended Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana. After 20 years as the widely-traveled wife of a U.S. Navy pilot and mother of three, Ms. Barker worked in New Orleans, LA for a Forbes 500 company until just before Hurricane Katrina. During her tenure there she wrote multiple feature articles for the company magazine, and received the Field Reporter of the Year Award. She returned to her beloved home state of Maryland in 2006, where she still resides.  Her published works include "Ednor Scardens", "The Body War", "The Hurting Year" and "On Gabriel's Wings".  Barker maintains a blog, "Dashboard Confessions of an Undisciplined Mind" at http://kateinla51.blogspot.com/

Get even more book news in your inbox by signing up for our newsletter: http://eepurl.com/mHTVL. Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

The Summer of Letting Go by Gae Polisner - A Review

by Kathleen Barker

Navigating the murky waters of adolescence is difficult enough, but when your little brother drowns on your watch, your best friend transmutes into someone else's girlfriend and your father appears to be having an affair with a neighbor...

Life for Frankie (Francesca) Schnell is spinning out of control.  Choking on the guilt of her brother Simon's death, she feels invisible.  Her mother's grief drives her to devote her time to a drowning prevention foundation, while Frankie's best friend has acquired a swoon-worthy boyfriend. An unexpected summer job offer lands her face to face with a little boy who is the same age as Simon was before he died, a boy who unnervingly resembles him and says things that shake Frankie to her core.  Is she losing her mind, or is this boy a reincarnation of Simon?

Her father's friendship with a pretty neighbor across the street from her house begins to make Frankie suspicious.  And when her best friend goes out of town, she finds her self the knee-quaking object of her absent-friend's boyfriend.  Should she stay true to her best friend and resist or give in to his spectacular kiss?  Should she confront someone about her father's perceived infidelity?  Confront who...her father, the neighbor, her mother?

As much as I loved her previous book, The Pull of Gravity,  author Gae Polisner scores a home run with The Summer of Letting Go as she lovingly peels back the layers of a young teen's fears and vulnerabilities. Polisner allows Frankie to work through her multiple dilemmas without resorting to an unrealistic sitcom resolution.  As in real life, not every question is answered.

I read this book to screen it before gifting to my granddaughter, but found myself falling in love with the characters as well.  Polisner's understanding of the fragile young heart and mind is a gift that resonates, weaving a bond between the reader and the characters she has so lovingly created.        

Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

Related articles

• The Pull of YA Fiction (girl-who-reads.com)

The Pull of YA Fiction

by Kathleen Barker


Believe it or not, some writers are attracted to the Young Adult genre because they think this category is easier to write...that a child's or teen's mind is less demanding, easier to satisfy and, therefore, less demanding for an author.  I'm not making this up.  It has been privately admitted to me by a few.

Gae Polisner is NOT one of those authors.

Writing YA faction demands a special understanding of the young mind.   All of us have experienced the struggles that the teen years bring, but maturity erases the details.  We remember the most terrible and joyful events, but much of the everyday angst and embarrassment fades as we learn to deal with life as an adult.

Polisner's The Pull of Gravity shows that the author has an exquisite understanding of young minds.  Her characters Nick and Jaycee handle problems with siblings who torment and parents who disappear with an astounding authenticity.  Nick rages over a father who checks out physically by becoming grossly obese before abandoning his family.  His best friend, Scoot, is dying of progeria, and his brother, Jeremy, shoots holes in Nick's small bubbles of hope with snarky retorts.  When Scoot entrusts a valuable book to Jaycee, a journey to maturity begins.  Nick and Jaycee set off on a trip to find the now-deceased Scoot's father, unaware that it is all part of a plan.  Polisner also skillfully weaves Steinbeck's classic Of Mice and Men into the story.

The Pull of Gravity has already been incorporated into many classrooms as educators have realized its appeal to young readers.  I can't think of any other book that would shine more brightly in holiday gift wrap this season than this jewel of a story.  









Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

Cornwall and Coal, Mining for Romance in the 18th Century

by Kathleen Barker

Wallowing in 'tween-season of "Downton Abbey" and the aptly dubbed "Droughtlander", I stumbled across the PBS Masterpiece Theater gem,"Poldark".  Unlike the decadent binge-watching that usually follows my discovery of a long-overlooked television series, I was limited to a single season, since that's all that has been produced to date.

My compulsive tendencies, aided and abetted by Google, revealed that the series is based upon a treasure trove of novels by Winston Graham, first published in 1945.

Cover image from Goodreads.com

The main character, Ross Poldark, was born in the 1700's.  His youth was rather unremarkable before he joined the British Army and spent several years fighting in colonial America.  Poldark finally returns home to Nampara in Cornwall, anxious to claim the beautiful young Lady Elizabeth Chynoweth.  Although not formally engaged before he left for his stint at soldiering, they had a youthful understanding that they would be so, upon his return.  Rumors of Ross's death as well as the actual death of his father, Charles, have preceded his return, and Poldark arrives to find his beloved engaged to his cousin.  His home at Nampara has been sorely neglected, overrun with the remaining livestock as well as two drunken servants.  With little money and even less hope, he sets out to repair and rebuild both his life and the remnants of his country property.

While visiting the country market to purchase meager supplies, he comes across a lamentably dirty child being punched and kicked by a group of rowdy boys.  When no one intervenes, Ross steps forward and rescues her.  He takes her back to his home with the intention of returning her to her family in the morning, but she begs him to let her stay on as a kitchen maid.  The bruises and strap marks across her back bear testimony to her father's abuse, so Ross agrees with reluctance.  Gossip and rumors fly about as young Demelza stays on, gaining the novelty of enough to eat and new clothing sans beatings.  As she blossoms into a young woman, her gratitude develops into a desperate desire for Ross's affection, despite their difference in class.

Torn between his lingering desire for the gentile Elizabeth and the fiery Demelza, Ross finds himself at a crossroad as he works to revitalize his family's old, closed copper mine.  Should he follow the manners and conventions of polite society of the 18th century or seek the happiness that may ostracize him from everyone he knows?

Top image: English: Wheal Prosper near Rinsey. Prosper was a common name for Cornish Mines. This one worked only in the 1860s. It gained rather more fame in the 20th century when it was used as a set for the television programme "Poldark". (Photo credit: Wikipedia). Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

Related articles

• Poldark, Book Review (smkelly8.com)
• Cressida Bonas's 'unofficial step-sister' to join Poldark as new cast revealed (telegraph.co.uk)
• Aidan Turner to return as BBC's Poldark for five year run (ibtimes.co.uk)
• Book to TV adaptions to add to your read & watch lists (girl-who-reads.com)

READ, CLEAN, WRITE, REPEAT (@KathleenMBarker)

by Kathleen M. Barker

Most authors I know are also voracious readers.  We love beautifully crafted words that paint rich tapestries.  Yet life intrudes, in the form of jobs, families, and the day-to-day minutia that consumes us, leaving little time for us to pursue our own writing much less enjoy that of others.

I tend to get involved in books that are series, most recently Diana Gabaldon's Outlander (2004, Dell, Amazon).  After devouring roughly ten thousand pages, I felt lost when the most recent book ended.  Stories on a grand scale are what I want most, and my next reading project is Winston Graham's Poldark (2009, Sourcebooks Landmark, Amazon).  I'll let you know when I resurface from the complete 12-book narrative.

Needing a short fix while waiting for the Amazon Stork to Prime-drop Poldark, I discovered an unlikely candidate:  Marie Kondo's The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing (2014, Ten Speed Press, Amazon).  How on earth could a cleaning book make the New York Times' best seller list?  Why would anyone want to spend more time than necessary on cleaning, much less read about how someone else does?  There had to be a reason.

I have not finished testing her methods yet, but Kondo's weird little ideas are resonating with readers who have adopted her mantra that the things you own must give you happiness.  If they don't, you should get rid of them.  As I begin my journey of shedding decades of accumulated "stuff", I find myself happier.  Gone are the categories of clothing that were jammed in my closet...the fat clothing, the perfect size clothing (which is never quite achieved), and the sentimental items that haven't been worn since college.

Kondo's description of her younger self sounds downright obsessive-compulsive, as she searched to fine-tune her skills.  Her near-desperation feels foreign to the possession-loving Western world.  Yet it is these very things that make us dread the cleaning and organizing that those ever-growing amounts require.  It made me think of comedian George Carlin's routine about organizing our "stuff" so that we could make enough room to go out and buy more "stuff".

As a cleaning consultant in Japan, Ms. Kondo has lists of clients who wait breathlessly for their turn to secure her guidance in their own homes.  I WILL eventually reach my goal of possessions that spark joy, but I cannot do it all in one fell swoop as she recommends.  A dark 18th century Englishman from Cornwall beckons, promising his own sort of joy, and I'm answering his call first.  













Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

Buried Alive (@KathleenMBarker)

by Kathleen Barker

I've often wondered if the love of reading is a result of genetics or environment.  As the daughter of a woman who never read for pleasure and a man who made weekly treks to a public library, hauling home multiple books each trip, I landed squarely in the read-to-excess group. Still, I'm not sure it just happened out of the clear blue.  In addition to seeing Dad sitting on the couch, reading every night, I also attended schools with rigorous, year-round reading lists.  What began as an annoying academic requirement soon blossomed into a love affair.

My father knew the importance of good grades, so he gave me a quarter for every "A" I brought home on periodic report cards (yes, I am that old). Of course, twenty-five cents is unlikely to incentivize many students today, but researchers found long ago that avid readers develop superior skills that far surpass good spelling and larger vocabularies. Grammar, writing and speaking ability, general knowledge and I.Q. all expand with reading.

Curling up on my sofa with a book is such a deep pleasure that the seat cushion has developed Dad's telltale depression that my brother and I once snickered at.  Yet where my father's stack of library books was quite modest, I have a coffee table with multiple sloping piles, patiently waiting their turn.  My to-read Everest is out of control.  Magazines are relegated to in-flight reading to spare myself the agony of tossing unread print material into the trash.

Those of you who are yelling at this page, telling me to get a Kindle...yeah, I have one, and it only exacerbates the problem.  Towers of books can, at least, physically rebuke me by their visual presence.  Downloaded ebooks are imprisoned in a thin, black orphanage, emitting no sense of urgency.

For decades at my house, spring cleaning did not apply to books.  Until Hurricane Katrina.  Although my treasured books were not damaged, I decided to move from a four bedroom house with two large attics to a townhouse with no attic.  It became clear that I must learn to survive without my textbooks and anthologies from college at the very least.   Potential loading and unloading friends could be enticed with the promise of no 100-pound boxes of books to lift.

Seven garage sales followed over a two month period.   The ten-cent books flew off the table.

As I continue to downsize, it's become easier to part with things. I was actually doing quite well...very well indeed...until I started to write books as well as read them.

So, just let me know if you'd like a German 101 book from 1968.

BOOK vs MOVIE by @KathleenMBarker

English: Movie tapes in a abandoned theatre (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

When a new movie that is based upon a book hits the big screen, do you watch the movie or read the book first?

Of course, if you are reading this post on a blog titled "Girl Who Reads", then you'd likely to choose the book. Yet the chicken-or-egg process of a good story should evoke a moment's hesitation. My own answer? It depends.

Unlike many of my bookaholic friends, I do not keep an eagle eye on the New York Times bestseller list. My never-ending to-read list comes from a select group of guinea pig acquaintances who have given a book a big thumbs up.

Don't get me wrong. I love a good movie too, but it's rare to find one that captures the images that my mind has conjured from the book that it is based on. Usually films have difficulty compressing the story satisfactorily into the 90-120 minute attention span of the average movie audience.

Recently, I had two completely different book vs. movie experiences. The first evolved from a former classmate and Facebook friend who raved about a book that involved a historical romance AND time travel. Normally I hate time travel tales, but she carried on so that I bought the book just to shut her up. How good could it be if it had been written over 22 years ago and I'd never heard of it? I had no idea what I was getting myself into.

Photo credit: STARZ

As I became more entangled in the story of Jamie Fraser and Claire Randall, I dreaded reaching the end of Diana Gabaldon's Outlander. Yet I need not have worried...there are 8 books in the series that range from 848 to 1488 pages each. I plowed through them all at a record pace. Much to my delight, I discovered that a television series began last fall on the STARZ channel. I quickly added it to see how disappointed I would be at the small screen version of such a tale. I have watched these first eight shows several times in anticipation of the next new installments that start April 4th. Reading these books has enriched my appreciation for the televised series, which is done very well, indeed. In fact, I plan to read all 8 of the books again, more slowly, to appreciate what I devoured quickly in the first go-round.

Photo credit: IMDb

This scenario is not always the case.

Not too long ago, I watched the movie Gone Girl.  It was so entertaining and smartly made, that I felt sure the book by Gillian Flynn would be terrific. SO wrong (cue the Debbie Downer music here). After nearly 100 pages - and hating every paragraph - I'm not sure I'll finish it. All I can do is wonder how the book was ever a bestseller. Clearly, I am in the minority here as there are over 37,000 reviews on Amazon with an average rating of 4 out of 5 stars.

A great book won't always be a great movie, and a mediocre book can be a very good movie. Where do you stand: book or movie first?

Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon through the above link.