The cousin's war

The White Queen by Philippa Gregory

I'm not sure about this. Either I have read too many of these stories or this was simply not very good. I made something of a connection with the main character but after that connections was made & her husband died in the story, all I could think about was how tiring and trite this woman was, or became. I found it unappealing in how directly it was written & question if the author liked the character herself.

I also wonder if there was too little information about her husbands rise to power and all that surrounded that. Maybe the next novel will build on this one but I feel like this one was a little light and the main character got on my damn nerves.

Most likely I will make an attempt at the other books in this new series based in the cousin's war but I am not feeling very strongly that I will enjoy them. Again, maybe it is the genre, maybe I'm just done with these light hearted, romantic historic novels. We'll see.

Watch out, don't get stung!

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest by Steig Larsson.

Damn, yet another novel to make me grieve the loss of this fine storyteller. I love the continuation of the relationship between Lisbeth & Blomkvist, how it revolves and evolves. I especially enjoyed the continuation from The Girl Who Played With Fire, and the evolution of issues created in the novel. I hesitate to write too much in an effort to avoid giving the story away but there were several moments when I was cheering.

I am curious if another novel is to come out, I have read that there is another in the "Trilogy" series, that it was on Mr. Larsson's laptop at the time of his death but that his estate was being challenged yada yada yada.

So I'm curious if there will be another & overly curious about some of the characters and relationships that were created in this novel. For instance, Zalachenko had something like 9 children all together & we only know about three and one of them is still a mystery, Lisbeth's twin sister. I'm curious as to how Lisbeth may evolve, does she really have Asperger's Syndrome or has she been shit on so many times in life that she really did turn away from society & relationships within society in an effort to protect herself? What is going to happen to her relationship with Blomkvist & what's going to happen with his new relationship with Monica, I don't have a good feeling about this relationship by the way. She seems to have gotten caught up in him very quickly for a strong independent woman...somethings fishy.

Library post

Ooo oo oo. I went to the library & there were 5 books waiting for me. It was like Christmas!!!
What was I thinking to reserve all those books?

The God of the Hive, Laurie R. King

I don't believe I have written a review for all of the previous nine Mary Russell stories, but I know I have enjoyed them all. Some I have enjoyed more than others, some less. I remember when the last story ended it was not finished. This story finishes the last.

And I remember wishing that story had finished before it ended. So I was really looking forward to this new novel.

I think I enjoyed this as much as I did some of the early ones, better than some of the middle ones. I really enjoyed the character detail of Mycroft, this mysterious brother to Sherlock that has never really been delved into in the previous books. As in the last one I have enjoyed learning more about Sherlock & his son and the intricate details of his sons life and how it has evolved.

Telling Memories Among Southern Women, Susan Tucker

The Help brought me to this book. An edited collection of first person stories from both the black and white sides of the southern experience of life with domestic servants.

Like life in general this book was full of every imaginary take on domestic servility. Servants that hated white employers, were approached or molested by their white male employers, whites who didn't see anything wrong with the frighteningly low wages paid to servants, didn't see the truth that the servants felt obligated to agree to anything their white employers suggested, the trap that this whole position was. I find the explanations for the white employers ignorance of the black servants situations revealing and completely understandable. I can see how some white employers would have to live in ignorance, if only to be able to live with themselves.

This reminds me of the book American Pictures by Jacob Holdt. In his travels through the southern United States in the same time frame that these interviews were taken, Mr. Holdt found what he thought of as remnants of the Master/Slave environment. He found whites with serious alcohol problems and little soul, blacks with problems getting ahead, as if they didn't know how to grow or change with the times.

Both books wrote of changes and over twenty years has passed since both transpired, plus I lived in the deep south for ten years and witnessed a different world. I expect that times have changed for both groups by now but it is extremely interesting to read these edited first person accounts of life as they knew it. A little bit of history is always a good thing and so very important to our future as healthy human beings. I wish everyone could read both of these books and learn of a better way to live and think. I wish all of us could be forced to address our inner bigots.

The Help, Kathryn Stockett

This was recommended as a nice easy summer read and I have to say that it was. The story drew me in quickly. The personal account of domestic servants in the south was so moving. I have read similar stories in the past that touched on the lives that servants lived in the south but I don't think I have ever read one that seemed so complete.

It was heart renching to read of the love and caring that the servants had to supress for the children they raised, the hurt they had to live with when the children turned into bigoted tyrants like their parents.

I wanted more, I neede more. So I read the next....

The Alienist, Caleb Carr

This was first recommended to me a few years ago by my friend G, then I picked this up from a friend about six months ago. I really really enjoyed this novel. It seemed to be a mystery/historical novel. It covers the profiling and search for a serial murder around the turn of the century.

Theodore Roosevelt is police commissioner, trying to clean up New York City's polie regiments but with a mind that was open to trying new detective methodsHe allows a secret group to form a search for the killer of several children in New York City.

Reading this was like watching Law & Order, CSI or NCIS, of which I enjoy. I enjoy a story with twists and turns, that keeps my on my toes and keeps me questioning what is going on and when the various sub plots are going to come together.