3 Stars. The Screwtape Letters is honestly not the kind of book I would choose on my own but it filled a reading challenge prompt, I love Narnia, and one of my old bosses recommended it to me years ago. So my review should be read with that in mind. This just was not the book for me. I’m a fast reader and simply cannot bring […]
4.5 Stars. Oh my goodness. Why do we pay less attention to Anne Brontë than the other sisters? I liked this book infinitely more than Wuthering Heights! I’ll still give Jane Eyre the edge as my favorite book by a Brontë, but it’s a closer thing than I expected. Anne wrote both a captivating story and a searing indictment of “bad boys” and [..
3 Stars. I read one of Ms. Birds earlier books, Adventures in the Rocky Mountains, during my blogging break and quite enjoyed it. I could only admire a woman who, in Victorian times, not only traveled alone, but managed to summit Longs Peak in a dress. When I needed a travel book as part of the 20201 Nonfiction Challenge, Ms. […]
We meet Lizzie and her sister Emma shortly after the notorious murder of their father and stepmother. The women are living in fear of an unnamed horror that is taking over their hometown. They’re trying to research it and combat it as best they can but Emma is an invalid and Lizzie is–well, notorious Lizzie Borden. The horrors […]
4.5 Stars. This is another desperate end-of-year reading challenge grab that paid off. I’d never even heard of this book but I started trolling through an “Epistolary novel” list, comparing it to what was available as an audio download from my library, and landed on this. I loved it. I don’t know exactly what my reaction would […]
A successful WWII columnist, Juliet Ashton, has just published a collection of her popular wartime columns. But now she’s looking to write a “meatier” book, she just can’t find a topic she wants to live with throughout years of research. Then she receives a letter from Dawsey Adams, a native of Guernsey. He shares with […]
Writer and bibliophile Helene Hanff strikes up a friendship through correspondence with the staff of a used bookshop in London. I think my expectations were too high. I remember other readers telling me, “Oh, if you liked The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, you will absolutely love 84, Charing Cross Road.” Well, I […]
Celie is only a young teen when her stepfather marries her off to their widowed acquaintance, Albert. Celie is little more than a slave to the family. Albert has several spoiled children who terrorize her and he regularly beats her himself. Celie just puts her head down, writes letters to God, and tries to go […]
I have somehow never seen “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” or any of the other movie incarnations of this book. In fact, I was surprised to read the back cover of this book and find out that the book is about Dracula moving to Enland to set up shop. So, I had no expectations going into it. […]