It would have been a lot more fun if Kevin was with me, but I still managed to enjoy myself. As a homeschooling mom whose husband is unemployed (and before he was laid off, he telecommuted), alone-time is not in my vocabulary. I am very rarely alone – and if I am alone at home, there are always plenty of chores and other obligations to draw my attention. To be alone in a city with restaurants, movie theaters, and Barnes & Noble – and with a fantastic hotel room with a soaking tub waiting for me – felt very decadent.

I saw two movies in the theater: The Descendants and One for the Money. For the first, let me just say that George Clooney’s Oscar nod is very well deserved. It was excellent. For the second – you’ll just have to wait for my review later this week. I also watched One Day in the hotel room – what a disappointment. That is definitely not a book that translated well onto the screen. Plus, as much as I love Anne Hathaway, she couldn’t decide if Emma’s accent was Scottish, Londoner, or someplace else.

After some deliciously unhurried time at Barnes & Noble, I came away with four titles – you can see them in tomorrow’s Mailbox Monday post, even though they didn’t really arrive in my mailbox. I soaked in the tub with a book (a review copy that I didn’t mind getting a bit water-logged), read a lot, and tried not to feel guilty about having all this luxury to myself. I was hoping that by Saturday morning Kevin would feel good enough to join me and I’d keep the room for a second night, but he is still sick, so I came home last night, bringing home Chinese food for Kevin and I to eat while watching Blue Bloods on DVD.

Today, I will spend the morning – the last of our kid-free time – with Kevin. This afternoon, the kids will be home with Kevin, and I, being the only person in the family interested in watching the big game, will be watching the Super Bowl at my folks’ house. Go, Giants!

Will you be watching the game today? Or will you be reading – and if so, what?

I’ll leave you with a wrap-up of my reading in January:

Thanks for the Memories by Cecilia Ahern (audiobook) – 4 stars – my review

Tipperary by Frank Delaney – 4 stars – my review

While My Sister Sleeps by Barbara Delisnky (audiobook) – 4 stars – my review

The Scorch Trials by James Dashner (read-aloud) – 5 stars

That Distant Land: The Collected Stories by Wendell Berry – 5 stars

Dust and Decay by Jonathan Maberry – 4 stars – my review

Plum Wine by Angela Davis-Gardner – 3 stars – my review

The Passage by Justin Cronin (audiobook) – 5 stars – my review

What He Must Be If He Wants to Marry My Daughter by Voddie Baucham Jr. – 4 stars

The Informationist by Taylor Stevens – 5 stars – my review

The Annotated Persuasion by Jane Austen – 5 stars (review to come)

The Death Cure by James Dashner (read-aloud) – 5 stars – my review

Moon Over Manifest by Clare Vanderpool (audiobook) – 5 stars (review to come)

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Yet the conversation, such as it was, revealed almost nothing. The only topics were location (at mall/at McDonald’s/at skate park) and mood. Everything is lame. Everyone is lame. Parents, friends, school, any activity. The jokes of the other texter are lame. Lord, is it any wonder that zombies are enjoying a resurgence in pop culture? This generation is the new walking dead, except they lumber away from brains, disdainful of anything that requires thought, passion, participation. He imagines his daughters vacant-eyed, arms stretched in front of them, tottering down the street, moaning: “No brains, no brains.” But still texting, all the while.

~ p. 220, The Most Dangerous Thing by Laura Lippman

Now, I don’t believe that all teenagers fall into this category, but I’ve certainly come across my share of them!

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The Yellow House by Patricia Falvey

Goodreads synopsis: “The Yellow House” delves into the passion and politics of Northern Ireland at the beginning of the 20th century. Eileen O’Neill’s family is torn apart by religious intolerance and secrets from the past, but she is determined to reclaim her ancestral home and reunite her family.

Remember, you don’t have to be participating in the Ireland Challenge to take part in the read-along – everyone is welcome. We will start on March 1st, and I will have a reading and discussion schedule up closer to that date. Hopefully that will give those of you who don’t already have the book a chance to get your hands on a copy. Looking forward to it!

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This review will not contain spoilers for The Death Cure, but may contain spoilers for the first two books in the series, The Maze Runner and The Scorch Trials.

Thomas has endured the Maze. He has survived the Scorch. He is now faced with the ultimate decision – does he trust WICKED and go along with their plans? Are they “good,” as Teresa keeps saying they are? Can he even trust Teresa? And will he ever understand the full extent of his involvement in the Trials?

I know that’s not much of a plot synopsis, but, trust me, you don’t want this spoiled for you. Part of the genius of this series is the way Dashner doles out information, bit by bit, allowing the reader to attempt to put the pieces together for him- or herself.

Honestly, I had my doubts about this book. I wasn’t sure if Dashner would be able to wrap it up to my satisfaction, but he did. I finished reading the book aloud to my boys this morning, and during the last two chapters, I simply couldn’t read fast enough, stumbling over the words as Noah tapped his toe nervously and he and Jonathan and Josiah hung on my every word. We were all very happy with the way it ended, the way things were wrapped up – except for one plot point toward the end that it may take me years to forgive Dashner for, even if I understand his reason for going in that direction.

Did every single loose end get tied up in a neat little bow? No, and I think that is the basis of some of the dissatisfaction I’m seeing on the book’s Goodreads page. Do I understand why the subjects were sent through the Maze and the Scorch, what WICKED was trying to accomplish? Yes, absolutely. Do I know if WICKED is good or not? Well, I won’t spoil anything, except to say that good and evil are black and white, and the world is made up of grey areas.

I also think that Dashner will wrap up even more of those loose ends and answer a couple of my unanswered questions when the prequel, The Kill Order comes out this summer. The boys and I just might be ready for another roller-coaster read-aloud by then.

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This review was previously posted on my personal blog on April 12, 2007.

I chose Wendell Berry’s Collected Poems: 1957-1982 as my next poetry choice after finishing The Collected Works of Emily Dickinson. I was not crazy about the Dickinson. There were a few poems that really jumped out at me, but overall I found her poems morbid, depressing, and – sometimes – undecipherable. I know that’s heresy to Dickinson-lovers, but that’s my opinion.

Berry’s collection renewed my love of poetry. I enjoyed each and every page. Because the book includes poems in chronological order, you feel like you experience his life in order: his disillusionment with the Vietnam War and city life, his retreat to the country, his love-affair with his land, his marriage, his faith. I am very much looking forward to reading the two Berry books I checked out from the library yesterday: Sex, Economy, Freedom & Community: Eight Essays and That Distant Land: Collected Stories.

To Go By Singing

He comes along the street, singing,
a rag of a man, with his game foot and bum’s clothes.
He’s asking for nothing – his hands
aren’t even held out. His song
is the gift of singing, to him
and to all who will listen.

To hear him, you’d think the engines
would all stop, and the flower vendor would stand
with her hands full of flowers and not move.
You’d think somebody would have hired him
and provided him a clean quiet stage to sing on.

But there’s no special occasion or place
for his singing – that’s why it needs
to be strong. His song doesn’t impede the morning
or change it, except by freely adding itself.

~Wendell Berry

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Vanessa “Michael” Munroe is an informationist – she can find and combine information in ways that no one else can, and her services are highly valued by governments, multi-national corporations, and private clients. She has just finished a job in Turkey when her agent, Kate, calls with an interesting offer. Richard Burbank, a Texas oil tycoon, wants to hire her to look into the disappearance of his daughter Emily. Eighteen-year-old Emily disappeared in Africa four years ago, and all attempts to locate her have failed – in spite of unlimited financial backing by Burbank.

Munroe is tempted, even though this is a completely different kind of job than she usually takes. She hasn’t returned to Africa in nine years, and the memories of her childhood and adolescence on the dark continent have haunted her ever since. Munroe takes the job, determined to not only find Emily, but face the demons of her past.

Wow. Really, what more can I say? This book has been getting a lot of buzz (a lot of comparisons to The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo), and it is all well deserved. There are some similarities between Munroe and Lisbeth Salander of the Stieg Larsson trilogy, but Taylor Stevens has created her own emotionally damaged, kick-butt heroine and thrown her into the middle of a tangled web of a mystery, one in which the final strands aren’t separated until the page-turning final chapters.

The author has her own personal history with Africa, and it shows – she sets the reader right in the middle of the heat and dust and government corruption and violence that embody so many African countries. She also gives Munroe a couple of male characters to play against: Miles Bradford, a security consultant hired by Burbank to watch Munroe’s back while in Africa, against Munroe’s wishes; and Francisco Beyard, a dangerous man from Munroe’s past. The character of Beyard, especially, gives the reader a chance to explore more of Munroe’s history, to understand how she has become the woman she is.

I understand why people are comparing this character to Lisbeth Salander, but there are some differences between this book and the Larsson series, differences I appreciate. While Munroe’s story is equally dark, it is told in a much less graphic way. I don’t mind dark stories with violence, but I like it when the author gives the reader just enough information without spelling out each and every gory, terrible detail. Also, the character seems to make some progress emotionally through the book. Yes, she is damaged, and her story is horrific, but when I closed the book, I didn’t feel like I’d just crawled out of a deep pit of despair, which is how the Larsson books made me feel.

The Innocent, the second book in the Vanessa Munroe series, is already out, and I will be listening to it on audio as soon as my name gets to the top of the hold list. I’m especially excited to read it, knowing that this one will deal with some of the author’s own history as a child of the Children of God/Family International cult. I always find stories about people who escape cults fascinating, and, while I would love to read Steven’s non-fiction memoir, I also am interested to see how she deals with her own history in a fictional way.

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Mailbox Monday is being hosted in January at At Home With Books. Click over to add your link and check out other bloggers’ mailboxes!

The Last Storyteller by Frank Delaney – Review copy from the publisher – this is the last volume in the Venetia Kelly series, and I can’t wait to read it!

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Post tags: mailbox monday, TBR list

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Yesterday, I stayed home and did laundry and watched Real Steel with the boys. I also finished The Informationist by Taylor Stevens – ho. ly. cow. Fantastic thriller – my review will go up later this week.

I haven’t talked about my TV viewing lately. Anyone else loving the current season of Grey’s Anatomy? I think it’s getting it’s mojo back. I also finished last season of Castle – sob – and will catch up on this season via Hulu. Kevin and I have been watching season one of Blue Bloods on disc, and enjoying it so far. What have you been watching lately?

Not sure if I’ll have time to read much today, but if I do, I will be cuddling up with The Annotated Persuasion. What are you reading today?

Bookish posts this week:
~ Book Review: The Way We Fall by Megan Crewe
~ Book Review: Plum Wine by Angela Davis-Gardner
~ Book-to-Movie Review: Children of Men by P.D. James
~ Book Review: Dust and Decay by Jonathan Maberry

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~ Jonathan Maberry, speculative fiction author, has a fantastic guest post up at Crowe’s Nest, in which he deftly explains the genres of pre-apocalyptic, apocalyptic, post-apocalyptic, and dystopian fiction.

~ Author Terri Guiliano Long, author of In Leah’s Wake: Thanks to you: How book bloggers sparked the indie publishing revolution

~ Neil Gaiman posted a speech he once gave on three authors who influenced his life and work: C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, and G.K. Chesterton.

Discussion starters:

~ Chrisbookarama: We Just Want to Read – Some excellent thoughts on the funding cuts currently plaguing libraries, along with publishers pulling out of electronic content sites like Overdrive.

~ My Friend Amy: The Growing Relationship Between Books and Television – About the new(ish) trend of TV series adapted from books.

~ Hey Lady! Whatcha Readin’?: Legit – Survey says people buy books after reading about them on book blogs. Who knew? ~wink~ All kidding aside, it’s nice to have some firm numbers to confirm the value of book blogging.

Reviews and blog posts that have me adding to my to-read list:

~ State of Wonder by Ann Patchett, reviewed by Sandy at You’ve Gotta Read This

~ The Orchard by Theresa Weir, reviewed by Kathy at Bermudaonion

~ The Invisible Ones by Stef Penney, reviewed by Jen at Devourer of Books

~ Foreign Correspondence by Geraldine Brooks, reviewed by Kristen at BookNAround

~ Silent in the Grave by Deanna Raybourn, reviewed by Tasha at Truth, Beauty, Freedom, & Books

~ The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl by Timothy Egan, reviewed by Melissa at The Avid Reader’s Musings

~ The Condition by Jennifer Haigh, reviewed by Sheila at Book Journey

Other bookish links:

~ Flavorwire: 15 Famous Authors’ Beautiful Estates

~ Three days left to vote for the March read-along book!

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Post tags: authors, book blogging, libraries, neil gaiman, TBR list, television

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