Amateur Book Clubber

I'm starting to read (or re-read in some cases) again. I'm thinking in these last couple of months I'll really need to get back on the train because my reading-for-fun days will soon wind down and be replaced with reading about why my baby won't sleep/eat/poop and how I can save my sanity/marriage/child's life. But maybe that's just me?

Anyway, this summer began with a newly formed book club group (thankfully). So far this summer I've enjoyed The Book Thief by Mark Zusak (again), Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns, and These Is My Words by Nancy E. Turner. I'm also concurrently reading Cleopatra by Stacy Schiff and Tipperary by Frank Delaney (both are great so far, but I'll put up a full review once done. Publishing this posts also helps make me accountable for my goal, so I'll probably actually finish reading them now. I'm so good at working psychology on myself!).

The Book Thief is one of my all-time favorite books. I love the narration, the imagery, and the writing. Who knew that a book narrated by death about the Holocaust could be so beautiful? Here is one of my favorite passages:

Cold Sassy Tree was okay. The plot is interesting enough, despite being pretty predictable. Burns really worked hard on writing it colloquially. The narrator is a boy (Will) in his early teens in the South and she writes just like how he would talk. That was tough for me to get into, but she found a nice rhythm with it. I like her theme of life vs. death and focus on family. When Will seems a little beyond his years, she puts in some great comedic relief to remind the reader that this really is a young boy with teenage thoughts and actions.

These Is My Words was wonderful. This goes down as a favorite, as I'm sure I will reread it. I love her characters, their trials, and their love story. Move over, Romeo and Juliet, Sarah and Captain Jack are in town. Her foreshadowing was well-written and not too obvious (in the form of dreams and other events), and I particularly latched onto her themes of endurance and education. Pick it up ASAP if you haven't read it - and if it's been over a year, pick it up again.