Books Completed in May 2025

  Novel-in-the-Making, Mary O'Hara
Wyoming Summer is one of my comfort reads, but I didn't realize O'Hara had two more nonfiction books! This one is the story of writing her novel The Son of Adam Wyngate. It begins with her driving east with her collie after her divorce from Helge Sture-Vasa to re-establish herself in Connecticut, and thinking on what she wants to write next, a family drama based on her own father. I was heartened by reading about how many false starts she had! At one point, she envisioned it as a trilogy and began writing the second book first. It was quite encouraging to know that even as an experienced writer, she had so many false starts.

The book also makes me glad I live in the computer age: her talking about having to edit her drafts by cutting and taping multiple pages of typewritten manuscript together made me exhausted.

  Any Trope But You, Victoria Lavine
Margot Bradley's once-flourishing romance writer career has gone down the tubes: someone found her private file, the one the now-cynical author kept to herself because she wrote unhappy endings to all her famous rom-com epics after an epic breakup with her fiancé, and broadcast it to the world. Her sister Savannah, who has chronic autoimmune disease, proposes that she go away for six weeks to a lodge in Alaska and write in a new genre: mystery. But no sooner does Margot arrive in Alaska than she runs afoul of Forrest Wakefield, a former researcher who is now taking care of his invalid father and is guilty because he wasn't there to care for his mother.

Two cynics, in this genre, equal romance, although neither of them will admit it at first. Great fish-out-of-water protagonist who discovers the "cozy lodge" comes with physical challenges, and a hero with heart.

  The Rhine, Ben Coates
The Dutch are different, but then so are the Germans. And the Swiss, and all the other countries along the length of the Rhine River. Starting in Amsterdam, Ben Coates follows the path of the Rhine all the way to its source at Lake Toma, covering the history, sociology, and current political and social customs of the countries he travels through, comparing and contrasting the people, the food, and the treatment of the river.

Sometimes Coates has his tongue more firmly planted in his cheek than perhaps he should have, but I enjoyed his journey up...down?...along one of the most notable rivers in Europe. I bought this book because I was tired of all the good travel narratives being about France!

  Juneau, the Sleigh Dog, West Lathrop
Grosset & Dunlap's "Famous Dog Stories" series. I ate these up as a kid. Nope, didn't want to read about girls dating and gushing over boys, or, when I was younger, little girls simpering over their dollies and having tea parties. Adventures. I wanted adventures! These, along with Albert Payson Terhune's wonderful collie stories, captured my imagination.

Got this from a friend who knew I liked old dog books. It's a corker: an engineer and his son are on vacation in Alaska. Dad is called away unexpectedly for a few daysand wants to take son Pierre with him, but Pierre persuades him to leave him at the cabin with Juneau the husky, knowing a neighbor, Andy, will help him if there's a problem; besides, he's in the care of their Native-American guide Ka-uk, a member of the Tlingit tribe.

Alas, these books were not exactly enlightened: Ka-uk deserts the boy and proves to be treacherous, and Pierre and Juneau are obliged to fend for themselves. Considering when this was written, I was impressed that Ka-uk's problem didn't stem from being "naturally bad" due to his heritage, but because he was an outcast from both his own people and from white people. Pierre gains maturity and experience during his unfortunately long ordeal, and the dog is magnificent.

  Fake Heroes, Otto English
Nobody's perfect.

This is a book about ten heroes--historic and celebrity-- whose lives were not what the public believed. I admit, I bought this book because the first chapter was about Douglas Bader, a World War II pilot whose positive press covered up the fact that he wasn't who he seemed; my husband, the consummate fan of aviation heroes, had read about him and scorned his fame. My mother, the ultimate JFK fan, knew all about his peccadillos and, later in life, knew about his illnesses. Almost everyone knew he didn't write Profiles in Courage; Ted Sorenson did. And once Mother Teresa died, the word about her forcing people to suffer without painkillers because "suffering was good for them" became known. And how many people didn't know Coco Chanel was a Nazi collaborator?

English offers up as well, in each of ten chapters, people he believes more worthy of the honors.

  The Curse of Penryth Hall, Jess Armstrong
Ruby Vaughn had one chance at a good marriage, but was "ruined" by an in flagrante reveal. After serving in the first World War, she now lives in England working—and sharing a house with—an elderly bookseller, who unexpectedly asks her to travel to Cornwall to deliver some esoteric books to a folk healer. Ruby is reluctant to go because her old friend Tamsyn lives there after marrying an English aristocrat. Mr. Owens' client turns out to be the town Peller, a cross between a healer and, from what Ruby can gather, some type of witch.

When Tamsyn's husband turns up dead, everyone is under suspicion, including Tamsyn.

An atmospheric thriller set in the 1920s with lots of twists (although the characters seem to spend most of the book soaking wet).

  Re-read: The Selected Letters of Laura Ingalls Wilder, edited by William Anderson
There is some meat to this collection of Wilder letters, including some of the letters she and her daughter Rose Wilder Lane shared about the editing of the "Little House" books. Sadly, Rose burned most of the letters, especially those from the 1940s, so we will never know the full editorial partnership she shared with her mother. There is an impassioned letter of Laura's insisting that The Long Winter be confined to the Ingalls and Wilders with a few supporting characters rather than a full pallet of townspeople as Rose wanted to give full import of the isolation families faced during that hard winter of 1880-1881, which showed she did have the flair for storytelling that some literary scholars have denied her. But most of the letters are banal little responses to schoolchildren, with a few lovely gems.

The trouble is, I've read so many books about Wilder, including the recently published Pioneer Girl, that I've already seen many of these "surprise bits" (like the fact that a young couple and their baby lived with the family during the long winter), so the revelations aren't. It's also sad to read Wilder's last letters with her longing for her late husband clear even in the few paragraphs, and it's also obvious that the sisters did not remain very close after Ma and Pa and Mary died.

I've been a Laura "junkie" since I first saw the television series and wanted to know "the real story," so I'm glad I picked this up, but if you have less of an attachment to her, I would invest in one of the biographies instead.

  The Pocket, Barbara Burman & Ariane Fennetaux
What's the one thing women always complain about in modern clothing? Of course, not enough pockets. From 1660 through 1900, however, most women did have pockets, often capacious ones, which tied around the waist and went under their skirts (the skirts usually had a slit/slits to access the pocket(s).

This is a history of those pockets, most made of cotton, some of wool or leather or linen, some embroidered and many plain, and what women kept in them, from valuable things like coins and keys, to items for beauty (powder compacts, rouge), to things like snacks, books, visiting books, and sentimental objects. Often the pocket(s) were the only private places women had for their cherished items and they were often stolen by cutpurses who cut the tie strings or brazen thieves who reached under a sleeping women's pillow for her stash. Other women used their pockets as shoplifters hide things under their coats, to steal.

This is a scholarly study, but an interesting one.

  Modern Loss, Rebecca Soffer and Gabrielle Birkner
These are selections from a website called "Modern Loss," where stories of grief are shared. One of the stories from the co-authors sounds like it came out of a Law & Order episode: her father and stepmother were killed by a handyman who, a few weeks earlier, had done repair work at their home. He intended to just rob the house, but when he found them at home, he beat them both to death.

This book made me more depressed, so, obviously not what I needed to be reading at this time.

  A Musical in the Making, Mary O'Hara
This book was interesting to me not only about how she developed, then wrote and re-wrote, her musical play The Catch Colt, but how much work some of the process was. Since she was composing the music and writing the book, she had quite a load on her shoulders, but I never realized how laborious the orchestrations were! Fully half the book is about how she had to work and work on these orchestrations, and then she had to finally sell the play. I've seen behind-the-scenes of play production, but not ones that include the writing and the music. Pretty much just for O'Hara or play fans, though.

  Anything from Nothing, edited by Mercedes Lackey
The 2023 collection of Valdemar short stories. Much better than Shenanigans, which I really didn't like at all. The quality in this volume is pretty solid, from the opening story about a blacksmith's son who feels stifled in his small town and requests that a Herald take him away to Lackey's own tale of a small town under siege. Several of the stories are serial in nature, so we continue the stories of Healer Erenal and Nwah the kyree being held captive. One of my favorites was the story of a traveling carnival, "What a Chosen Family Chooses," and how they help a captive in a stifling village. "Needs Must When Evil Bides" is another good one, about a herbalist who helps a servant rescue a wealthy family taken hostage by bandits.

All the stories are worth reading.

Books Completed Since March 1

  The Wheel of Things: A Biography of Lucy Maud Montgomery, Mollie Gillen

There are newer biographies of Maud, as she preferred to be known, which go into many of the psychological difficulties she had due to her upbringing (not to mention the fact that it has recently come to light that she probably committed suicide), but I found this at a library sale and it's notable in that it seems to be the first Canadian-published adult biography of Montgomery (I could be wrong) and that it was published in 1975, long before Kevin Sullivan's production of Anne of Green Gables with Megan Follows and Colleen Dewhurst got the publicity machines rolling again and made Anne and Avonlea go from a cottage industry on Prince Edward Island to a global phenomenon.

Maud's mother died when she was not yet two years old and she was left to be raised by her maternal grandparents in Cavendish, PEI, while her father, Hugh, sought employment elsewhere. Her life is a lot like Emily Starr, including her imaginings (Maud always felt closer to Emily than Anne, and many times regretted creating the latter, as her publishers asked for endless Anne sequels—she wrote the last in 1938!), creative things which shocked her conservative grandparents. Like Anne Shirley, she found a friend in a reflection in a china cabinet, "Katie Maurice." She only lived with her father briefly when she was older, finding out to chagrin that her new stepmother, whom she hoped would love her, only wanted her as a child minder and housekeeper. Later she became a newspaper reporter, and in her thirties married a dour minister who suffered from depression. Nevertheless she took delight in life and especially in nature.

I haven't read the other bios of Montgomery, but this was enjoyable, especially considering it was pre-Sullivan, so to speak.

 

  Re-read: The Landscapes of Anne of Green Gables, Catherine Reid

I'd already read this as an e-book and electrons didn't do it justice; I was just waiting for an affordable copy! If you loved Marta McDowell's Gardening Life of Beatrix Potter or The World of Laura Ingalls Wilder, you will love Reid's book featuring beautiful glossy color photographs of the settings of Anne of Green Gables as well as pictures of the historic sites relating to L.M. Montgomery and photographs taken by Montgomery herself (some of them hand-colored by Montgomery). Reid not only tells us the stories of the settings, but how they gave solace to Montgomery, who had a sad childhood being cared for by indifferent grandparents and then returned to a stepmother who basically turned her into a baby-minder and servant; while her writing was a success, she also had a troubled adulthood, plagued by publishers' problems, a mentally unstable husband, and her own depression.. We are shown the original Green Gables and a recreation of the town of Cavendish, which was inspiration for Anne Shirley's Avonlea, and also her relatives' home Silver Bush, which contained some of the inspirational landscapes for the Anne books and also the two Pat books. Of interest are several photos of Montgomery's scrapbooks, which were always full of floral and botanical images, and excerpts from her journals. Anyone who has read Anne, Emily, Pat, or any of Montgomery books set on PEI who has wondered "what did it look like?" will love this beautiful volume!

 

  Death of an American Beauty, Mariah Fredericks

Jane Prescott is supposed to be on vacation, but when she's asked to help out with a pageant celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation being put on by the wife of wealthy department store owner George Rutherford, she finds herself drawn in to helping with the costumes. She still hopes to enjoy part of her vacation—until one of the "fallen women" that her minister uncle assists, teaching them new skills so they can quit prostitution, is murdered in front of the refuge. Her uncle's establishment has caused gossip for years, but now there are two groups saying the reverend is really running a whorehouse, and that he murdered Sadie Ellis. Sadie's gruesome death makes Jane recall a day years ago when a woman with a slashed face—a "negro" woman—was not turned away from her uncle's refuge because of her color, and she made the acquaintance of the truly exceptional Otelia Brooks.

 

I am in awe of how Fredericks captures the era without repeated use of the ethnic/racial/sexual slurs that would have been in common use at the time but still manages to capture the overwhelming venom of that society toward minorities and women. I love Jane because she is not a twenty-first century woman dressed up in early 20th century clothes, but even she is overshadowed in this mystery by Otelia. From her presence in this book you will know fear and sorrow, but also courage and determination.

With a supporting cast including Jane's employer Louise Tyler, the overwhelming Dolly Rutherford, Jane's old friend reporter Michael Behan, loveable pianist Leo Hirschfeld, Jane's best friend and anarchist Anna, and the ladies of her uncle's refuge, this is another winner in Fredericks' Jane Prescott series.

 

  Death of a Showman, Mariah Fredericks

Louise and William Tyler have returned from Europe (to Louise's relief) after her sister's wedding, and lady's maid Jane Prescott is relieved to get back to normal life. But the first thing she learns upon returning is that songwriter Leo Hirschfeld, who she'd come to love during the previous summer, but who told her he'd never be married, has wed a chorus girl. But she'll have to see Leo a lot more than she planned, since he convinces Louise to be a "Broadway angel" for his new musical, produced by the great empresario Sidney Warburton. Warburton is certainly no angel, and both Jane and Louise get an education as they negotiate rehearsals where there's cast in-fighting, personality conflicts, multiple script changes, and arguments galore.

And then Warburton is shot, and there's no end of suspects, including Leo, the older actress whose lover Warburton barred from the set, the aging dance couple, and even drunken Roland Harney, the dipsomaniac performer with the little dog (you may see in Harney echoes of W.C. Fields). In the meantime, history goes on behind the scenes: Archduke Francis Ferdinand has been assassinated, and the bloody Ludlow massacre in Colorado has Jane's best friend, anarchist and activist Anna, enraged.

The main plot of the book reminds me of a similar Perry Mason episode about a discontented acting troupe, except it takes place in Jane Prescott's universe at the time when ragtime was capturing the America's imagination. It's a glimpse into early 20th century life backstage, in which people who didn't quite fit into regular society found a home in theater society—but also the story of how some of these people were exploited. While I didn't find some aspects of the plot as compelling as in the previous three books, the theatre setting was intriguing and seeing Leo again was a treat, even, alas, if he wasn't fated to end up with Jane.

 

  Where the Girls Are, Susan J. Douglas

This is a fun study of the way the media portrayed girls and women during the baby boom era and how it tried to brainwash us into being the perfect woman: maternal, smart (but not too smart), clever (but not cleverer than the guys, of course), with a perfect figure, skin, clothes, makeup, and smiling, optimistic attitude. Well, it's fun at least  until the later chapters when the author gets into politics and turns it deathly boring, or when she seems honor-bound to dis any guy who comes along unless he's totally in favor of feminism. The sociological bits are fascinating. I never thought of Samantha Stephens as a feminist (Endora, yes, but not Samantha), because if that idiot Darrin told me I had to do housework by hand when I could wiggle my nose and do it, I'd have told him what he could with the broomstick! The chapter about the Shirelles and other girl groups was great. Also some good stuff about the rape storylines that suddenly proliferated on television drama in the 1970s that were just used for shock effect rather than to elicit any change in society, and the effect of negative ethnic stereotypes on children.

I guess politics had to enter into the mix, but I wish it hadn't.

 

  Eleanor Roosevelt: The War Years and After (Volume III, 1939-1962), Blanche Wiesen Cook

Volume one in Cook's biography came out in 1993, the second in 2000...and then nothing. I was quite despairing of ever seeing the rest when this was released, then I had to wait to afford it. This third volume carries Eleanor from the beginning of World War II in Europe to her death.

 

Or rather it carries, in depth, Eleanor from 1939 until Franklin dies in 1945 All that is great. We read of the punishing schedule she sets for herself during the war: her columns, her visits to the troops, her efforts to rescue Jewish Europeans from the Nazis, her work with the NAACP and other groups pushing for fair rights for those of African descent, hosting Crown Princess Marthe and her children after Norway is invaded by the Nazis, juggling her relationships with her children and her best friend Lorena Hickok and her male friends Earl Miller and Joseph Lash, the death of her brother and her mother-in-law, and the disillusion of the end of her friendship with Marion Dickerman and Nancy Cook. Like Eleanor, Cook handles this juggling act with aplomb.

 

Eleanor's life after 1945 is basically summed up in 28 pages. Those years when she came into her own as an independent woman not tied to her husband's reputation. When she worked for the United Nations. When she ceaselessly championed human rights, especially those of African-Americans. When she was seriously considered as a candidate, if not for President, but at least for Vice President (an alternate history novel Eleanor Vs. Ike came from this fact). Blanche, what happened? Did you get sick, or someone in the family got sick, and you just had to stop? I don't understand. I'd so looked forward to reading the rest!

 

  The Vanished Bride, Bella Ellis

Would you believe I have never read a novel by any of the Brontё sisters? Jane's relatives in the first chapter of Jane Eyre were so dreadful I couldn't keep reading, and that was the only one I tried.

However, a mystery as solved by the Brontё sisters, especially after watching the film To Walk Invisible was yet another thing altogether. Wealthy Elizabeth Chester vanishes from her bedroom at a Yorkshire estate, and the room is found doused in blood. Matilda French, an old friend of the Brontё sisters and nursemaid at the estate, is overcome with horror. The sisters, some years before taking on their aliases and writing Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, and Tenant of Wildfell Hall, take an interest in becoming "lady detectors" and finding out who did such a horrible thing.

 

As a whole I enjoyed this, especially the sisterly bickering, and the sisters' despair over clever brother Branwell, who seems determined to drink and fornicate himself to death. Ellis tries very hard to write in the manner of a 19th century author without getting too bogged down in the verbosity of the time period, and most of the time it works well. You can see the bleakness of the Haworth area where the sisters and brother grew up, the constrictions of the time (to inquire into the missing woman, the sisters must construct an inquiry agency made up of men before anyone will take them seriously, not to mention the excuses they keep having to make to poor papa Patrick Brontё to leave the house at all!), the deterioration of the dissolute Branwell. The feminist theme is front and center, but some traditionalists may not like the message involved in the mystery's solution. And in the telling of the tale you see the germ of ideas that later would be part of a Brontё sisters' novel: gypsies, bad-tempered masters of the estate, fearful governesses...

Looking forward to the next one.

 

  Re-read: The Horsemasters, Don Stanford

I found this book somewhere on a remainder pile long before the 1980s (and before discovering Disney made an inferior film of it). It's the story of Dinah Wilcox, a seventeen-year-old girl whose dream is to go to Wells, a small, expensive college, with her lifelong best friend, Bee-Bye Simms. But Dinah's parents are not well-to-do and it seems she will have to settle for the local state college—unless she can pass the intensive 15-week Horsemaster course at the Owen-Allerford Riding School on the English coast to get herself certified as a riding instructor so she can work her way through Wells. Funded by a bequest from her grandmother and with hope in her heart (since she's as green a horseback rider as can be), she joins three young men and ten young women for a summer not only of learning to ride well enough to do dressage, jumping, and cross-country, but how to care properly for a horse's health, knowing how to treat illness and feed the animal appropriate food.

I say this is the perfect book to give to a horse-loving child with stars in their eyes thinking owning a horse means galloping it forever on some candy-covered plain like in a Rainbow Brite cartoon without considering the care horses need. Written in an engaging style that teaches you the hard-work realities of owning and riding (there's a stirrup-less jumping exercise in something called "the Grid" that sounds gruesome), including treating illnesses like thrush, lampas, and lameness, with a cast of teens/twenties who each have their own personalities and weaknesses. We know Adrienne, the wealthy Swiss girl, is unused to hard work; Enzo, the Italian boy, is gallant and complimentary; Jill, the Scottish girl, likes to eat; Sally is practical; Bee Bye is proud, as is David; and Dinah is just doing her darnest to keep up with classmates who were either brought up on farms or with horses. In addition, although this book was written in 1957 and when the girls dress up they're all in dresses, and they're called "Miss" by the riding instructors, there's no other midcentury sexism lurking in the wings. The girls are expected to be able to do the same work as the boys (getting dirty in stable work is an equal-opportunity event!); there are no intimations that they are any less experienced riders because they are female, nor are they expected not to live up to the same standards because they are women. The author even addresses the individual personalities of the horses the young people are assigned, and how each horse is not a carbon copy of the next, and for any kids given this book, the adults are just as interesting as the Horsemasters: tough Major Brooke and meticulous Captain Pinski, the riding instructors; Mr. Ffolliott, the vet instructor; Jock Woods, the Scots stud groom at the nearby Vale School; and especially Mercy Hale, the hated head girl at Owen-Allerford, who makes the Horsemasters work hard for every achievement.

A grand, grand book in which everyone triumphs not due to how much money they have or their social status or how pretty they are, but due to effort and teamwork.

 

  An Irish Hostage, Charles Todd

In 1916, nurse Bess Crawford saved fellow nurse Eileen Flynn's life when the ship they were on, transporting injured soldiers from the front lines of the Great War, was torpedoed. Now it's 1919, the war is over, and Eileen has asked Bess to be her maid of honor in her wedding to Michael Sullivan. But there are still terrible frictions between England and Ireland, and Bess' parents and her father's assistant Simon Brandon, are fearful of her traveling across Ireland by train. Instead, to assuage them all, Bess arranges to be flown to Eileen's home by Captain Arthur Jackson, an American still stationed in England. When Bess arrives at Eileen's house, she discovers Michael is missing, most probably kidnapped by Irish nationalists, possibly because, like Eileen, he "took the king's shilling" and worked on the side of the enemy. Are Bess and Michael's best man, another Englishman, Major Ellis Dawson, also in danger?

 

Historically it's easy to forget that 100 years ago the Irish were nearly rooting for the Germans, so terrible had been the English stewardship of Ireland, with its domineering landlords who sent thousands of starving Irish fleeing to the United States during the potato famine of 1849, the remaining population treated not much better than slaves. Three years after the bloody Easter Rising, the Irish nationalists still want revenge for the murder of the men who stood their ground at the Dublin post office, and you can understand their passions.

On the other hand, this really wasn't what I wanted in another Bess Crawford book. I know the war is over, and I know Bess will have a great lifestyle change now that her nursing duties appear to be complete. But I think I'd rather have her solving mysteries related to the Great War than making a detour into Irish politics. The ending of the story seems to come out of another book completely, like an espionage thriller. So—enjoyed and kept my interest, but like the WWI-set plots better.

And for those who keep asking: yes, there's the tiniest bit of progress with the Bess/Simon UST.

 

  Rescue, Jennifer Nielsen

Meg Kenyon was born in France, daughter of an English father and French mother. All her life, she and her father have played with secret codes which he taught her about from the time she could read. Two years ago, when war was declared, Meg's dad marched off to fight, and she hasn't seen him since. She only has a jar of codes he left her to remember him by, and she's solved all but one. Meg and her mother now live with her maternal grandmother and life is hard due to food and material shortages brought about by German occupation, but they've managed to dodge Nazi wrath until Meg finds a wounded English pilot in the barn. Not only could helping him bring death upon the family, but the Germans have also discovered Meg's book of codes. Meg's mother must get her out of the area, so, even though she is only twelve, she's deputized to take the place of the wounded pilot in helping to get a family (father, mother, and son) of Jews to safety, using a series of clues in code from her father. Although the family is supposed to go to Spain, Meg realizes it would be safer for them to head to Switzerland.

 

While I must admit this is a page-turner of a story with a mystery embedded in it, it still sort of niggled upon me that Meg is so young to be doing this job. Yes, I know the youngest known resistance fighter in France was a sixteen year old girl who handled a machine gun, but I'm thinking as an adult from the point of view of the two adults Meg is guiding: really, who's going to listen to her, especially when she changes their destination in mid-odyssey? It seems a bit improbable. I'm also not a person who's into codes, but supposedly Meg and her dad played code games for years, so it seems impossible to me that she misinterpreted the message he left for her in the long string of verse, since even a dim bulb like me made it out! It also seems to me that they sometimes seem to go great distances in a very short time!

Otherwise, this is a neat WWII adventure story for kids, with a good lesson on the hardships—hunger, cold, loneliness, fear of being killed or sent to a concentration camp—faced by those in occupied France and how they coped and survived, and the sheer grit required just to get through each day. The text is very fair to Germans, making it clear that not all of them were Nazis, and some risked their lives to help others, and that there were also French who collaborated with their foes to gain favor or power. Meg is a great protagonist: inventive, stubborn, and resolute despite her fears.

 

  The Sisters: The Saga of the Mitford Family, Mary S. Lovell

Except for the mention of a famed British book called Love in a Cold Climate, I'd never heard of the Mitford family until I saw Jessica Fellowes "Mitford Murders" mystery series. Author Lovell, who wrote the book in 2000, says most people under the age of 50 (which I was in 2000) wouldn't recognize the name, but older people probably would. Not sure about that, but they certainly were a strange and fascinating mob.

 

David Mitford, who became the 2nd Baron Redesdale, and his wife Sydney raised six daughters and a son, all of them with different passions and convictions. Nancy, the eldest and most sharp-tongued, became a noted author; Pamela was the most ordinary one, she was happy on her farm; Tom, the only son, became a lawyer; Diana, already married, fell in love with the leader of the British Facist Party, Oswald Mosley, and spent most of World War II in jail; Unity, the really strange one, had a crush on Adolf Hitler and like a fangirl, followed his appearances and became his friend—when England and Germany went to war in 1939 she tried to commit suicide; Jessica became a Communist and moved to the U.S.; and Deborah married the love of her life, Andrew Cavendish, and ended up as the Duchess of Devonshire. At one time or the other at least half of the family met Hitler early in his career and didn't think he was a bad fellow until after the war began and truths came to light. They gave each other odd nicknames: Jessica was "Decca," Unity was "Boud," their nursemaid was "Nanny Blor," David was "Farve." Jessica hated Diana for her political beliefs for the rest of her life. Nancy scandalized society by making her family the main characters in her novels (disguised and renamed, of course, but still identifiable). Even though David was "titled" the family had very little money and had to keep moving to smaller and smaller homes so the girls' "debuts" could be afforded. At one time one or the other of them was always in the British newspapers, and not always for good reasons.

I certainly didn't know what to make of these folks. For titled, rich people they certainly weren't dull. Sounded like it would be fun to talk to several of them, like Nancy or Debo, at a party, but certainly no one I'd want to be friends with. If this is "how the upper class lives," they can have it, thanks.

 

  Alibis & Angels, Olivia Matthews

The third, and presumably last, of the Sister Lou mysteries. As Lent approaches, Mayor Heather Stanley (who we've come to learn to hate in previous volumes) finds herself threatened by someone who doesn't want her to run for re-election. After she loans a co-worker her car and her coat to get to a meeting, the co-worker is found dead in the parking lot after the meeting, having broken her neck in a fall down the stairs. The two (terminally stupid) Briar Coast police officers Fran and Ted think it was an accident. So Mayor Stanley turns to Sister Louise LaSalle for help, telling her she doesn't want to inform the police of the threats. Of course Shari Henson, reporter for the local paper, and nephew Chris LaSalle become involved, as does Shari's editor, Diego DeVarona, who knew Heather back when she worked in El Paso. If having to work on this mystery doesn't make Sister Lou uneasy enough, especially when it looks like the culprit is one of the mayor's "loyal staff," Shari's gradual relaxation into her role as reporter is thrown a curve by Harold Beckett, who Shari sees as "normal" and more deserving of a newspaper job than a former despised foster kid like herself, so her once-lessening inferiority complex roars back with a vengeance.

I like all the characters in these books (well, for the possible exception of Fran and Ted, who are really too stupid to be police officers) and I like that the situation revolves around a Catholic college and a group of sisters. Sister Lou is a saint, especially with people like Sister Marianna as compatriots. The mysteries are moderately interesting. But the author's way of describing things drives me crazy. In the opening of the book it states "Sharelle 'Shari' Henson gaped at Christian 'Chris' LaSalle." Who describes their characters and their nicknames so clumsily? Later it's "Sister Louise 'Lou' LaSalle" and "Harold 'Don't Call Me Hal' Beckett." Clothes, shoes, accessories, and furniture are described endlessly by brand name and color. If I heard one more time about Chris' and Sister Lou's "onyx eyes" I was going to scream. And what is with Sister Barbara, the prioress? Why does she allow Sister Marianna to ask questions that she has been requested not to ask, and badger Sister Lou? Just because you are a member of a religious order doesn't mean you can't be punished for being rude!

 

Plus you can tell these books are not proofread by a human. In one paragraph, the grounds of Sister Lou's college is being described and the text states "a ring of Burberry bushes surrounded a white plaster statue." Burberry is a brand of upscale British garments (several people in the story wear Burberry products). Perhaps they meant "barberry bushes"? Also, "plaster" statue? Outside? Stone, maybe, or concrete? Marble? Even resin, but...plaster? Out in the rain and snow? In another bit of description, a character uses a descriptive phrase used by denizens of that game where people hit little white balls along a fairway with a metal club. This is described as the character "using a gulfing term." My head hurts.

 

  Philomena, Kate Seredy

This was the very last of the Seredy books I had never read (thankfully I found Gypsy and Tenement Tree online), and it was reprinted a few years ago in a trade paperback format with cover art by another artist. Philomena lives in a small Bohemian town with her grandmother, Baboushka, who brought her up after her parents died. In her town, girls her age (twelve) journey to Prague and go "into service" for four years learning to be good workers before coming home at age sixteen to be married. Every woman in the small community has done so, except for Philomena's aunt, who wrote home saying she was marrying a wealthy man and not returning. So when it's time for Philomena to do the same, Baboushka bids her to go to Prague to find her aunt and work for her.

Alas, Philomena can't find her aunt, but she has many adventures with different employers before her journey comes to an end, and also makes many friends. Throughout her journey, although homesick, she works hard, remains friendly and optimistic, and is always ready to comfort the sad and rescue the abused. Sometimes her escapades are amusing, other times sad, and the text is illustrated by Seredy's lovely pre-World War I views of Prague and the traditional clothing of the time.

A sweet tale of faith, determination, and courage, although today's parents may find it horrifying that a twelve-year-old was allowed to go to a big city alone.

 

  Re-read: The Good Master, Kate Seredy

This was Seredy's first book, based on her childhood memories of growing up in Hungary, and Kate Nagy is one of the most delightful female protagonists in children's fiction ever. Spoiled by her widowed father and recovering from a bad case of the measles, Kate is sent to live in the country with her Uncle Marton (the titular "good master"), his wife, and their ten-year-old son Jancsi, who imagines Kate to be some sort of sweet invalid whom he can protect from fantastic dangers. Instead he discovers she's a headstrong, mischievous little girl with a stubborn streak a mile wide, full of pluck and admirable talents.

 

How Kate is "tamed" by Uncle Marton's wisdom, yet remains irrepressibly Kate and independent is the focus of this delightful story, in which she learns to ride horseback, garden, and take on some of the responsibilities on a big Hungarian farm in 1912. There's a big county fair, a horse stampede, and a river adventure. The only problematic chapter for a modern audience is one about the Romany (gypsies) in which they are portrayed as untrustworthy; this can be a good "teaching moment" about past perceptions of certain ethnic groups, and that there are good and bad in every group. Otherwise this is a wonderful portrayal of traditional Hungarian culture pre-World War I, with the colorful native costumes, ways of farming and raising animals, celebrations, and foods.

 

  Women Rowing North, Mary Pipher

I picked this up because the subtitle was "Navigating Life's Currents and Flourishing as We Age." Well, I'm aging, and I'd like to flourish.

 

I think I've received better advice from Gretchen Rubin's podcast and her book The Happiness Project. Although Pipher talks to many women during the course of the book, she focuses much of the text on four composite women. Two have ill spouses, one must take care of her careless daughter's children, one has built a wall around herself due to childhood abuse. All four women learn to take care of their needs while facing futures they had not seen for themselves. Self-care is emphasized in the text, as is not to allow changes in your planned future to bring you down. It is simply, the author says, a matter of adjusting to a new normal. These are subjects I've already read about in other books and in magazines like "Breathe."

Having already experienced a few of the situations portrayed in this book, I have to admit I learned nothing new. Being older is just like living life when you're younger: you must be ready to adapt to situations you didn't anticipate—there are just more geriatric medical issues. The woman who had looked forward to retirement is now raising her grandchildren, the woman who loved to work now finds her life wrapped around her husband's illness. Only in one case does the person actually find her life improved by the change in her life's path.

Pipher's text covers a very narrow group of women. While she says she talked with all races/ethnic groups in all walks of life, her subjects seem to be solidly white and middle class. There's very little about lower-income women coping with aging.

I wasn't bored, but it didn't do much for me, either. Best part of the book were the Eleanor Roosevelt quotations.

 

  Re-read: Stillmeadow Sampler, Gladys Taber

It's always good to end a month with a Stillmeadow book. This is the sixth in Taber's memoirs, this time divided into seasons beginning with spring.

 

Although she has always occasionally mentioned her eccentric father and nurturing mother in previous texts, this Stillmeadow outing provides more memories of Gladys' childhood, when, finally settled in one house in Wisconsin, her mother hosted all her school friends and only her father traveled, sometimes vanishing for months at time (he was a geologist) and once being held hostage in Mexico. She also devotes a few more paragraphs to the late 1950s fears of nuclear war. Otherwise it's the same wonderful stories of life in an old farmhouse, a place of the joys of nature and of owning dogs, to the sheer hard work of keeping up such a place, and of gardening, although the rewards of the latter are rich. Planting is followed by growth, then by harvest, then by eating of the fruits of their labor. One dog is called home and another receives an honor. Visitors come and go, including friend Barbara and her illustrator husband Ed Shenton, and Faith Baldwin, and even a visit from actress Shirley Booth.

Every season smiles over Stillmeadow, and there is much to smile at: buds, flowers, trees, grass, leaves, the Quiet Garden, the bumper crop of veg, snow, the turning of the year, bounding cocker spaniels and the always irrepressible Irish setter. Read slowly and savor: mindfulness began at Stillmeadow.

 

  Re-read: Wyoming Summer, Mary O'Hara

I can't remember ever not loving this book, which is a bit impossible since I didn't read it until I was twelve years old when I found it in the Hugh B. Bain library. It's not a children's book, so I'm a bit flummoxed what it was doing in a junior high school library (but then neither was Especially Dogs, Especially at Stillmeadow). But, like all the books I fell in love with there, it's now an intimate part of my life, of my heart. When I found a copy, despite the water-damaged dustcover, at a local booksale several years later, my heart was full.

 

For 11 years, Mary O'Hara Alsop and her second husband, Helge Sture-Vasa, lived at Remount Ranch in Wyoming, 30 miles from Cheyenne, where they first raised sheep, then horses, and ran a boys' camp in the summer. A diarist from childhood, Mary's entries about the ranch, Wyoming, the horses, the boys, her husband, her study of music, the ranch hands, neighbors, and other animals found their way into her 1942 best-seller My Friend Flicka and its two sequels, as well as into a musical called The Catch Colt. Mary had tried to sell an adaptation of her diaries before Flicka, but her publisher suggested a novel instead, and it was only in the early 1960s that the manuscript that became Wyoming Summer saw the light again.

 

Early in the book Mary talks about certain combinations of musical notes sending her into a magical dream world she called Shinar. This book is my Shinar. Once I have passed the first sentence "I have walked down to the pasture to look at the bull" I am no longer in my chair with a book, I am with Mary in Wyoming, riding a horse along the continental divide, experiencing wild thunderstorms, studying counterpoint and thematic development, talking about the personalities of the horses, dogs, cats, and cows that populate the ranch (as well as the ranch hands and their rancher neighbors), counseling the teen boys who come to the ranch each summer to learn to ride and be independent, enjoying the majesty of the rolling grassland of Eastern Wyoming. I am with her as she copes with her husband's strong emotions, recalls her childhood, faces mercurial weather, trains a fearful setter, bakes bread, faces unreliable ranch hands, sleeps under the stars, and goes about the daily routine of a ranch without electricity and what the British would call "mod coms." To this day, two of her phrases have been with me: talking about memorable events which pass so quickly: "How fast the earth spins—" And the one that reminds me every day to be mindful, for we know not what comes: "Yes—happiness hangs by a hair–"

 

It is always a comfort to disappear into this beautifully-written book. Sometimes I am almost tempted to go back to page one and start all over again. Shinar calls.

A Baker's Dozen of Favorite Books for 2020

Well, something had to be decent in 2020...

Always hard to whittle these books down to even thirteen. Must give honorable mention points to all three Longmire mystery books (Another Man's Moccasins, The Dark Horse, Kindness Goes Unpunished) I devoured this year, plus my first read ever of Robert Heinlein's Tunnel in the Sky, with its POC protagonist who has been whitewashed on book covers for years, and to Linda Newbury, who managed to give me a decent sequel to Peyton's Flambards books.

 The Mutual Admiration Society, Mo Moulton (ARC, Dorothy Sayers and her friends at Oxford and beyond)

 The Olive Farm, Carol Drinkwater (book sale find, actor Drinkwater's memoir of the crumbling farm she and her partner bought in France)

 The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers, 1937-1943, From Novelist to Playwright (Volume 2), edited by Barbara Reynolds (book sale find, self-explanatory)

 The Moor, William Atkins (nonfiction look at the various moors of England; they're not all the same)

 The Narnian, Alan Jacobs (book sale find, story of C.S. Lewis as told by his writings)

 America's Women: 400 Years of Dolls, Drudges, Helpmates, and Heroines, Gail Collins (book sale find, overview of the women who did not make it into the history books)

 The Splendid and the Vile, Erik Larson (his newest about the Churchills during World War II)

 The Annotated Black Beauty, Anna Sewell, introductions/annotations by Ellen B. Wells and Anne Grimshaw (a book find from a friend thinning out her library, expands knowledge of the novel and the treatment of Victorian animals)

 Bryant & May: The Lonely Hour, Christopher Fowler (newest in Fowler's series; two elderly detectives look for a motive in unconnected murders)

 A Furious Sky, Eric Jay Dolin (ARC, history of hurricanes in the "new world")

 Something Wonderful: Rodgers and Hammerstein's Broadway Revolution, Todd S. Purdum (the team that was ahead of its time even thought they're thought by some to be "treacly" today)

 This Old Man, Roger Angell (book sale find, essays about life, sports, and everything in between by "New Yorker" editor and stepson of E.B. White)

 Olive Bright, Pigeoneer, Stephanie Graves (ARC, wartime mystery along similar lines as Poppy Redfern and the Midnight Murders, but, IMHO, better)

Books Completed Since January 1

 Christmas in the American Southwest

 The Carols of Christmas, The Oxford Book of Christmas Poems, The House Without a Christmas Tree, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever

 Reminisce Christmas

 The Humbug Murders

 The Family Way, Rhys Bowen
In this twelfth of the Molly Murphy mysteries, she and her husband Daniel Sullivan, a New York City police officer, are expecting their first child in less than three months. Independent Molly, who once ran her own detective agency, is bored silly making little clothes for the expected child and wilting during a hot NYC summer, but is reluctant to stay at Daniel's mother's country house since she feels the woman disapproves of her. When she goes out to mail a letter, she receives one addressed to her old detective agency about an Irish girl who came to the States and disappeared. A little while later, while talking with an old friend, shouts are heard in the street. A baby has been kidnapped from its carriage. If this wasn't enough, she runs into her brother Liam, now on the run from government agents.

Daniel doesn't want Molly following her old pursuits anymore, but the independent woman does so anyway, looking into the disappearance of the Irish girl and inadvertently becoming involved in the kidnapping case, all the while worrying about her brother, who supports the Irish Republican cause. There are some really odd coincidences in the story—which Daniel comments about in disbelief at the end, which helps!—and Molly, as always, overestimates her power to extricate herself from a situation and once again almost comes to grief over it.

This was a good read with the various plotlines woven together very neatly (except for those coincidences, of course) and I love when Molly's "Bohemian" friends Sid and Gus are involved with the story; in this one they actually help her sleuth. Several conventions of the era which are notable appear in the plot: the sending of unmarried pregnant girls to live in a convent (and an American version of "baby farming") until they gave birth and the common habit of sending unattractive daughters into the religious life since no one would want to marry them. I thoroughly enjoyed this installment of the series.

 Better Than Before, Gretchen Rubin
Rubin, who has written previously about improving your personal happiness and the happiness of your household, now talks about developing positive habits to improve your life. As always, Rubin states that what habits work for her will not work for other people, since we are all individuals. Based on that, she asks you to define your own personality as one of four types: Upholder, Questioner, Obliger, and Rebel. Once you have classified yourself, you can begin addressing how to form new habits based on personality type. Some people, for example, may choose to give up sweets altogether, since they cannot trust themselves around sweets, while others can restrict themselves to only a few a week without falling back into bad habits. Obligers, who often sacrifice their happiness for that of others, form habits differently than Rebels, who instinctively fight against any rules at all.

There is a quiz at the back of the book so you may classify yourself and Rubin even sells a workbook. I thought it was a unique approach to habit-changing as opposed to other books which tell you you definitely must abstain, or follow rigid procedure to change a bad habit into a better one. Happiness Project is still my favorite of her books, but I thought her habits process showed some alternative thinking.

 Crucible: All-New Tales of Valdemar, edited by Mercedes Lackey
This is a pretty enjoyable collection of short stories in Lackey's Valdemar universe. I found fewer of what I think of as "unfinished stories," ones that are more vignettes than actual short stories. Right off I was charmed by the story of the partnership between one of the little lizard hertasi of the Vales and a blind gryphon who help a change-child, although I wish it had been much longer, followed by a tense story about an innkeeper using a Gift in an evil way. There are also further stories featuring Lady Cerantha, Herald Will and his daughter Ivy, Healer Kade and Nwah the kyree, and the Haven Guards. Other stories feature not only Heralds, but Bards and Healers, and of course the fabulous Companions, one who chooses an elderly woman who resented her daughter being chosen, another who will die if her Chosen does not escape a fantasy world. The final story, written by Mercedes Lackey, involves a canny Healer kidnapped by a band of renegades. All in all, a satisfactory read.

 The Fairy Tale Girl, Susan Branch
This is the first volume in Branch's two-volume autobiography, crammed with vintage family photographs, diary excerpts, journal scribblings, quotations, maps, Susan's hand-lettered text, and of course her exquisite watercolors. It's simply a gorgeous volume just to look at. The book opens with her best friend putting her on a plane for Boston where she heads to the place she lives today, Martha's Vineyard, after her divorce, and then takes us on a flashback through time. She tells of her happy childhood as one of eight children in 1950s California, then moving out on her own with her best friend Diana in the 1960s, learning to cook from Julia Child's cookbook and discovering how much she loved cooking and baking, and then meeting her first love, Cliff Branch, owner of a music store. It is Cliff who encourages her early artistic efforts, but it's also Cliff who eventually breaks her heart by taking up with other women.

The book is like a wonderful scrapbook of Branch's life. If you are a Susan Branch fan, you will enjoy her memories, both happy and sad. The photographs of the past, the story of her 1960s lifestyle in California, the heartbreak of her split with Cliff were all quite absorbing. (Frankly, I wanted to slap Cliff silly several times, although I understand he and Branch are still friends.) I have to say, as much as I enjoyed this one, I'm looking forward more to the Martha's Vineyard volume, though, since it takes place close to my home town.

 Gone West, Carola Dunn
Investigating a crime is the furthest thing from Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher's mind when she gets together with her old schoolmate Sybil Sutherby. Sybil has been acting as a typist and editor for the novelist Humphrey Birtwhistle, who has kept the old family estate going by writing romances of the Old West, having lived there as a young man and brought his American wife back home with him. Sybil confides to Daisy that she thinks someone is drugging her employer to keep him under the weather, since when Sybil took over writing the books from Humphrey's outlines they have been making a great deal more money. So under the guise of visiting Sybil, Daisy once again gets herself involved in a mystery—as Birtwhistle dies not soon after she meets the rest of his not-always-lovely family.

Once again Daisy must try to sort out who might want to kill the victim: perhaps it's the man's younger brother or sister, who worked the estate hard most of their lives only to have him come home and claim it; or the flibbertigibbet niece with no money of her own or her two suitors, a straitlaced type or an Irish poet; it might even be his American wife. Even Sybil and her beau, the estate's physician, are not free of suspicion—and of course Daisy must cooperate when her husband DI Fletcher and his associates Tom Tring and Ernie Piper are called onto the case. A nice atmospheric country house mystery with a couple of twists.

 The Smithsonian's History of America in 101 Objects, Richard Kurin
In an American response to the seminal BBC production The History of the World in 100 Objects, this is a lush volume that covers the pre-Columbian (Burgess shale points) all the way to the present (the man-made Giant Magellan Telescope) and just a bit of everything in between: Pocahontas' authentic portrait (all of them), Thomas Jefferson's Bible (which he disassembled and rearranged), Abraham Lincoln's beaver hat, gold from Sutter's fort and furniture from Appamattox, the Wright flyer and an authentic Eisenhower jacket, the Salk vaccine and the AIDS quilt. It's a giant candy box of historical choices, illustrated in color, and a nice overview of American history which tries to be inclusive of other points of view besides the usual historical narrative. The only minus of this volume is its price, but if you're a history buff, a nice used or remainder copy will do. Plus, if you dislike it, it can be used as a burglar basher. At 760 pages of heavyweight paper, it would make a nice leaf press, too. ☺

 The Laws of Murder, Charles Finch
Charles Lenox and his four colleagues, including his protege Jack Dallington, have now formed their investigative agency and are hoping for consultation work from the police. Except, to Lenox's astonishment, his good friend at Scotland Yard, Inspector Thomas Jenkins, badmouths him and his agency to the press. Yet when Inspector Jenkins is murdered, he clearly leaves clues that Lenox recognizes, but cannot quite put together because they have been compromised. Lenox is also certain that one of his old nemises, the Marquess of Wakefield, is involved in the mystery—only to discover the peer also dead. But as distrust of Lenox spreads after the newspaper reports, he finds his new agency may no longer want him as one of the partners.

A ship of smuggled items, a convent on an otherwise busy street, the scandalous Wakefield who meets his doom in a most mysterious way, and a charming young Frenchman figure in this latest Lenox mystery in paperback. I'm so glad Lenox has dropped the Parliamentary seat; his part-time sleuthing wasn't really interesting, even if it allowed Jack Dallington to blossom as a detective and his old butler Graham to fill his place and use his unique skills. Needless to say, with a lascivious lord, murder, and smuggling, there are further revelations of the seamy underside of London. Sadly, Lady Jane doesn't have a lot to do in the story.

 Never Turn Your Back on an Angus Cow, Dr. Jan Pol/David Fisher
This is the story of Jan Pol, the Michigan veterinarian whose cases are shown on the National Geographic Wild channel's The Incredible Dr. Pol. Pol was born in the Netherlands and was helping with animals at an early age. His family endured Nazi rule during World War II and later he studies in Michigan where he meets his wife Diane, charmed by the fact that she plays tag with a pet duck, and you learn about his early mentors.

The remainder of the book is about memorable animal patients or why/how he uses a certain treatment, very like the television series. I only watch the series occasionally, so most of the stories weren't familiar to me. Plus he talks about how the television series came about.

Pol's co-writer tries to write as his subject talks, so the narrative is rather cut-and-dried. Those looking for the poetic feel of James Herriott about the landscape and the people will be disappointed. But there are a wide variety of cases covered, from horses to cows to dogs and cats, and it's enjoyable enough. Plus there's a center section of photographs, where you can see what Pol looked like as a younger man.

 A Pattern of Lies, Charles Todd
In England after escorting a group of wounded soldiers from the front, Great War battlefield nurse Bess Crawford is looking forward to a few days' leave with her family. Unfortunately she cannot get a train and there are no places to stay, until she meets an old patient of hers, Major Mark Ashton, who is home on leave until his hearing problem from concussion resolves. He invites her to his home for the night, where Bess discovers the family is being systematically harassed about a devastating accident that happened at the family munitions plant two years earlier. Although the explosion was determined to be an accident, out of nowhere accusations are resurfacing that the family was behind the deaths. Bess likes the family immediately and soon is determined to get to the bottom of the accusations, especially after Mark's father is arrested.

I found this an interesting and absorbing novel in the Bess Crawford series. Probably I should have guessed the identity of the culprit earlier, but I was too busy enjoying Bess' relationship with the Ashtons and her efforts to solve the mystery of the sabotaged factory. I found that Bess' transport back and forth to the front and Britain made sense in her duties as a nursing sister. It does seem a bit unusual that her Australian soldier friend can keep popping up when she needs him, but I guess that's no less unlikely than a nursing sister getting involved with murder mysteries in the first place. I like Bess; she's capable and doesn't need a man to help her make the conclusions she comes to, for all that Simon Brandon does pop up once again just in time.

 Melody Ellison: No Ordinary Sound, Denise Lewis Patrick
After reading the less-than-inspiring Maryellen books, I was worried about this newest series of American Girl novel, which features an African-American family in Detroit in 1963.

This is more like it! Melody and her family seem very real; the family dynamics are wonderful (there's a warm atmosphere that I love, especially between Melody and her sisters), and every family member has a role, unlike Maryellen's very superficial father. There are occasional "info dumps" for the modern child about the early 1960s attitude toward people of color, but they aren't too intrusive. This is what I was expecting from the Maryellen story, something that would make a 1950s Florida girl come alive, not a dumb kid painting the front door red.

The story: Melody and her family live in Detroit. Her father works on an auto assembly line, her grandfather is a florist whom she helps occasionally (Melody loves to garden), and her grandmother teaches music. Melody has been asked to sing a solo at her church in the fall and must make the important decision of which song to sing over the summer. In the meantime, her older brother is trying to break into the Motown scene, and her cousin from Alabama is moving to Detroit with her family because of racial conditions in Alabama.

I loved that the book addressed not only overt bigotry (when her cousins try to buy a house, they are told the house isn't available—although it is available to whites; when her sister tries to get a summer job at a bank, she are told there are no more jobs, although the bank manager tells a white girl positions are still open), but more subtle things: Melody and brother Dwayne go looking for new clothes in a department store and are promptly accused of shoplifting for just looking at things; Melody's cousin Val is surprised that black people can walk into the front door of the library in Detroit.

I can't wait until the second volume is out, but now I really resent that Mattel has gone cheap on the books. I would have loved to have illustrated volumes of Melody's story. I would have loved three illustrated "Inside Melody's World" features in three books instead of a measly two pages: info about the faces of bigotry, the events in Birmingham, behind the scenes at Motown, the story of "Lift Every Voice and Sing." The new "Beforever" line is a cheat.

 Dear America: Land of the Buffalo Bones, Marion Dane Bauer
This is labeled "special edition" and I don't know why unless it is the first "Dear America" book I've read that is based on an actual family. The young lady who is the protagonist was the great-grandaunt of the author and she derived the story in this novel from the memories of older relatives who remembered "Polly."

Mary Ann Elizabeth Rodgers accompanies her siblings, half-siblings, father and stepmother to the United States, where her minister father has arranged for them to found an English colony in 1873 Minnesota. He has come home with tales of green and verdant fields and the members of his Baptist congregation, unwelcome by the Church of England, are eager to come. Tragedy strikes early: the small brother of Polly's best friend Jane dies on the ship during the Atlantic voyage. When they arrive at their new home, there is no infant town as they were promised and it is snowing heavily on Easter Sunday. This is only the beginning of their trials.

This is a excellent primer to the pioneer experience, but be aware that very sensitive children may find this one chilling. It is not a happy experience for the Rodgers family. The story begins with the death of little Timmy and other deaths occur, and something else upsetting happens near the end. Keep in mind that the events that happen are nothing different than what you might read in the "Little House" books, but they are different than the experiences of most children today. Some parents may be dismayed that the godly Reverend Rodgers is not the steadfast leader he needs to be (he reminds me somewhat of Bronson Alcott) to survive in the Minnesota wilderness, but he is typical of many of the people who went west with misconceptions and believed promoters' tales of the area. I was particularly impressed by how Polly's stepmother learned to cope with the situation and how Polly's perception of her changed from the beginning of the book when she was a despised stepmother.

 The Annotated Little Women, Louisa May Alcott with annotations by John Matteson
Yes, I have yet another annotated version of this classic. I read so much about this volume on a blog that I wanted it, and James obliged for Christmas (thanks to a wonderful Barnes & Noble before-Christmas sale). Matteson, an Alcott scholar, received permission to use photos of items from Alcott's "Orchard House, including personal items like Anna Alcott Pratt's (the original of "Meg") wedding dress, the newly-discovered New Testament belonging to Lizzie (the original of "Beth"), books published by May Alcott Nieriker, and never-before-seen family photographs.

In this volume Matteson uses Alcott's original text for Little Women, only briefly mentioning the revision that her publishers requested when the two parts of the text were put together to make the one book we know today, to correct the slang that the girls and Laurie use (it was considered detrimental to the readers of the 19th century!). Instead he talks more about the different "sections" of the first part. Initially Alcott wrote only the first twelve chapters, which are episodic scenes in the lives of the girls, unsure that anyone would want to read "dull" stuff; her publisher agreed, but his niece loved the story so much that Alcott continued, with the next chapters providing a more cohesive whole to the story. Also, the story was originally supposed to end when Mr. March came home at Christmas, the story running one year from one Christmas to the next. It was Alcott's publisher who asked that she write "Aunt March Settles the Question," which suggests a future (i.e. a sequel) might be in order for these characters. I knew Alcott didn't think much of the book until her publisher's niece said she loved it—she basically wrote her children's books and stories to make money—but I had no idea of the actual "construction" of the book until now.

I'm hard pressed to tell you which volume is "better." I liked this one for its biography of Alcott and the importance of Lizzie Alcott and May Alcott Nieriker to what happened to Louisa in later life; also the new photographs (since when you visit Orchard House they don't allow you to take photos). But the other book by Daniel Shealy was good, too. If you're an Alcott fan, you'll want both, so check the used book stores!

 The Lost Art of Reading Nature's Signs, Tristan Gooley
I don't hike (I'd like to, but not in the tropics, thankyouverymuch), I don't camp, and I sure don't want to eat some of the things author Gooley did during a hike in Borneo. On the other hand, this is a fascinating book about the nature signs that our ancestors used to survive, whether as hunters or farmers before the advent of the Weather Bureau or explorer. Gooley covers all types of signs, from in which direction plants grow and which plants grow near settled areas and which prefer wild spaces, which animals you may see on your hikes (not just the native creatures of an area, but which animals will come out in the daytime and which at night, which prefer wet places, which prefer dry), weather signs, determining your direction by charting the stars (he goes way beyond finding Polaris by using the two stars on the cup of the Big Dipper), seeing things differently when you hike at night and finding your way in the dark via temperature, animal sounds, etc.

It makes you a bit wistful for all the ancient knowledge we have lost. If I lived out in the country I would definitely try learning one of more of these techniques.