Books #17-24

Tee hee... Remember me? :) I have read lots of books... In no particular order...







I've been on an Evanovich kick... All caught up except for one in the Plum books. The top one was based on a character from the between-the-numers holiday stories, Diesel. The monkey, Carl, was also featured. Totally different premise, but lots of fun.

The Sookie book, as usual, was a great read. The books are so much better than the show too.

I think I may be missing a couple, but if I figure out which they were, I'll add them later!

2 of my friends turn 30 today. It reminds me I'm almost there too. The bio-clock is RAGING today. I'm trying to distract myself, but it's not working very well.

Book #16

10 Big Ones- J. Evanovich

Book #15

Maus by Art Speiglman

The author/illustrator's father was a Holocaust survivor. This book is a graphic novel based on the journey Art takes personally while his father tells him HIS story.

Beautiful gray day
All is quiet in God's House
Peaceful and tranquil

Books #12-14

Mother Rant

Today is a day to reflect upon mothers. I have one. I'm fortunate to have had one that loved me very much and I never doubted it. I was also very fortunate to have her home with me in my younger years (not so for all of my siblings, but I was the oldest, and that's one of the pay-offs for being the guinea pig child) and when she went back to work she worked at a school so I still saw her all the time at home. I love my mom. Every day I see more and more how much she's impacted my life. Especially when Matt says things like "OK Ruth" to me. I'm her daughter in more ways than I could have understood as a teen. She raised me the best way that she knew how and I'm grateful for her love and sacrifices for me and my siblings over the years.

There's also a hard part of Mother's day for me. I'm LDS, will be 30 this year and married for almost 10 years. This makes me a bad person because I have no children. No one says it. No one hints directly to it, but it's the unspoken rule about being Mormon. No one asks WHY my husband and I don't have kids. They just ask when we're going to start. This is a REALLY personal question to be asking. This is when I feel like saying things like "we can't seem to figure out how, can you come over and teach us?" What? Why can't I say that? Because it's rude? So is asking me about starting a family. I started one when I married my husband in 2002.

I hate going to church on Mother's day. I love my religion, I love my congregation, I love my mother. I hate Mother's day at church. They have the kids get up and sing a song to their mothers (fine, and cute actually). They have speakers get up and talk about mothers, or being a mother (a little painful on the 2nd item, but I'm still OK). Then we have the closing hymn and prayers and this is where the torture starts. As a child, they used to have all the mothers stand up and the teenage girls would walk in with a flowerpot or chocolate or some small token to hand out to all the women standing. Then they'd make a contest in jest about the oldest mother, the newest mother, the mother with the most children etc. All that has been changed to "all women 18+" to stand because we're ALL mothers to children around us.

Guess what. I find the whole ritual insulting and painful. A person's relationship with their mother is a sacred, personal thing and shouldn't be paraded around. I'm not a mother to anyone in that room. No child on this earth calls me Mommy. Some days I wonder if anyone ever will, but at least I have my husband by my side to take that pain with me. There are many women in the church that never get married, or do so very late in life that having children isn't an option anymore. There are many women in the church that CAN'T for one reason or another have children. Are we lesser people? No. Stop insulting us. It's hard enough being in a faith that puts so much emphasis on having a family, and not "having one." I do have one. It's composed of 2 people. We may not be perfect, and may or may not grow in number, but it's the one I've chosen and love. I have a large extended family full of people, including children, that love me. I have children of good friends to be around. Those kids, I wouldn't trade them for the world. I love them and am thankful for them being in my life everyday.

But I'm still not their mother.

Alice I Have Been- Book #10

I've mentioned before that I'm an Alice in Wonderland fan. I've always loved the books, but the last several years has expanded my ability to kick my interest into borderline obsession. Isn't the internet great? Because of Netflix, I can now rent/stream film & TV adaptations that were hard to come by years ago. I can read fan fiction comics written by other fans- and their subsequent fandom. i can read reviews and easily access info on books and get them at the library or buy them. I can look at party, costume and collectible ideas. Crafting, photography, art. It's all at my fingertips.

I can't deny the excitement I felt when I first heard about Tim Burton's film long before it hit the theaters. I LOVED the SyFy channel's recent visit to Wonderland too.

I first heard the "darker side" of this story's legacy when I took a children's list class at Cerritos. I had to buy a copy of Gardner's Annotated Alice for the class and read the articles about dear Mr. Dodson and it broke my heart. How upsetting that a man by all means was a minor hear in my nerdasphere was so... icky. My only consolation was that it was a VERY long time ago and he wasn't benefiting from my patronage.

AS the years have gone by, I've read conflicting accounts and evaluations of the man. I prefer to choose to believe the better, more positive views. The poor lonely man. This book helped me see beyond all that and see the man for what I hope he was. Who knows the truth? Only a few people long gone, and I've come to realize that it doesn't' ruin Alice for me either way.

This book was ever-so-wonderful. It expanded the dreamworld of Alice. The author took the few known facts surrounding Alice Liddel's life, and common speculation, and wrote a beautifully heartbreaking story about a girl, and then woman, who lost her way along her life and was haunted by memories that she couldn't even remember. It was wonderful. It left me all dreamy for days after finishing it. FANTASTIC book! Favorite of the year so far!

Seven Up- Book #11

I feel a big burden on my shoulders
Emotions run deep & I cannot swim.
My life isn't perfect, as no one's is
But I have my partner & I love him.

The Virgin Suicides- Book #9

Feeling a bit bitter. I'm trying to focus on staying positive. But it's hard some days, like today.

ArchEnemy- Book #8

Hot Six- Book #7

The Other Boleyn Girl- Book #6

Plum Lucky- Book #5

I was still waiting on Hot Six and Seven Up when I grabbed this one (at the same time as Spooky). As you can guess, it's another holiday Plum book.

I liked this one better than Spooky. As you can see, it revolves around St. Patrick's Day and felt a little more like a regular numbers book. More bounty hunting (I think I forgot to mention that Stephanie is a bounty hunter... a really bad one that somehow still manages to find her FTA's) in this one than in Spooky, which means more of her usual side-kicks and wackiness.

I finished this one a couple weeks ago and have in my possession a copy of Hot Six from the BPL now. It and a copy of Archenemies have been sitting there on my table for 2 weeks while I work my way through The Other Boleyn Girl. That will be my next review. I wanted a break, and the Tudors are a VERY different world than Stephanie Plum!!

Words to Live By

"As he died to make men holy, let us live to make men free." Battle Hymn of the Republic

Plum Spooky- Book #4

We're back to Stephanie Plum books! I still haven't picked up with the numbers yet (they only have 1 paperback copy of #7 and I'm on a waiting list for it) so I grabbed one of the "between-the-numbers" books (they're all holidays).

Trena told me that they're not needed to read the number books. They're not, but I think I wish I had done a weensy bit more research before reading them. If you haven't started any of the Plum books, I think I'd start from One and go through but find out the publication dates of the between books and read them in the order they were written. They're not quite as good because Stephanie has two men in her life that make you gooey. The pull between the 2 makes for some great reading and tension and that isn't present in the holiday books. There's a 3rd guy in them and Stephanie pretty much writes him off because she's got enough complications. There IS a supernatural theme/twist to them though.

Any who- I believe this is the newest of the holiday books, but I read it first. It wasn't necessary to the plot but there are characters in it that I wish I had met before I read this one. Also it gives tiny spoilers to the number books if you play close attention (they overall have no plot clues, just the "current" dynamic in Steph's love life).

This one was a bit spookier than normal which was nice for a Halloween themed book, but don't let that hold you back if you're a 'fraidy-cat. It's not like a horror book at all!

Overall, I'd say a B+ for this one.

Kingdom Come- Book #3

This book (YES IT'S A BOOK!) was a Christmas gift from my friend Allen. I've always liked comics but never been as into them as I have been the last few years (we can all happily blame Allen). I still don't read many, but that's mostly because it takes a lot of disposable income to read the ones I'm really interested in, and who has that these days? Not me!

As I'm unwrapping this, Allen says to me "I hope this doesn't end our friendship." You have to understand something... me, not a Superman fan. I feel like he's taking all the glory and totally cheating... he's a freaking alien! Wonder Woman? Boring! Batman on the other hand... HE'S THE MAN! I mean, assuming they were real...

Animated cartoon wise, I was never a fan of the Justice League either (did you watch it? HOW?). I've always considered myself more of a Marvel girl that made exceptions for Batman.

I think I kinda like DC a bit more now. Allen knows me well though. He knows I like post-apocalyptic stuff. This book is more like what would happen if the superheroes ACTUALLY WERE the cause of the apocalypse. So you can imagine how I'd probably be interested right there. I found it somewhat similar to The Watchmen if you want to draw comparisons, but it is totally different. I really enjoyed the art and the story was great!

Thanks Al!

Motor Mouth- Book #2

Another Alex Barnaby Book. This is the 2nd (there are 3 so far) and I thought more fun than Metro Girl!

Sam Hooker (NASCAR Guy) returns with Alex and they manage to get themselves in another pile of trouble. RV chases, missing dogs and stolen microchip technology... what else can a girl want to do in Florida?

Metro Girl- Book #1

This year I resolved to read a book a week. I doubt it will happen exactly that way, but I plan to TRY to read more at least!

First book... Metro Girl by Janet Evonovich

Years ago Trena got me hooked on her Stephanie Plum books (One for the Money, Finger Lickin' Fifteen etc). I LOVED them but didn't have a heck of a lot of time to read them as I was in school and felt that if I could make time to read, I could read my textbooks. So, for many years I only read for pleasure around Christmas and the summer! Harry Potter and Twilight took a lot of that time, but I borrowed the odd Plum book.

Flash forward to a couple months back, where I finally got tired of not getting my hands on books and FINALLY made the trip to the Buena Park Library and got myself a card! I started the Plum books, in order this time, resolving to read them now! The BPL is small, so not all the books I want are readily available 100% of the time. Metro Girl was sitting next to the Plum books and the next one that I needed wasn't in, so I grabbed it and what I thought was just another Evanovich book. Turns out it was the sequel to MG and I happened to read them in order.

Alex Barnaby (aka Barney) is this series' heroine. She's girly, but knows her way around a car as she was practically raised in her dad's mechanic shop. She comes to Miami in search of her brother after a disturbing phone call from him. She's now running around south Florida and the Keys looking for him with a NASCAR driver. Craziness ensues. If you like the Stephanie Plum books, I'd recommend these as well! Alex is a little more confident than Stephanie, but she's great at getting herself into trouble too.

Men!

The fan pointed at my head is for air circulation for me. Not for your sweaty BO drenched body to stand in front of. PEE-YEW!