Review: The Tidal Zone

The Tidal Zone by Sarah Moss
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Adam is a stay at home dad whose wife is a doctor and they have two daughters. He is an excellent father and homemaker, but he does do some teaching at the university so he does get out of the house and earns what he calls his pin money.

The story opens with his oldest daughter, Miriam, having some kind of allergic reaction and needing CPR and reviving. This incident is his undoing. She spends a couple of weeks in the hospital enduring tests and when she returns home, he becomes afraid to leave her alone and guards her faithfully.

This was a very human story, with little story sidelines. If you like being involved in the nitty gritty, day to day trials of a family, this book will blow you away.

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Review: The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend

The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend by Katarina Bivald
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Amy Harris of Broken Wheel Iowa and Sara Lindvist of Sweden have been pen pals for years, having in common their love for books. Sara travels to the US to visit Amy but on the day she arrives discovers that Amy has died. Sara is set up in Amy's house and in time she decides to stay since there is nothing for her at home in Sweden.

Amy owned a huge number of books and so Sara decided that she should set up a book shop and sell the books.

A sweet, predictable story.

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Review: Mean Streak

Mean Streak by Sandra Brown
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A great romance thriller by Sandra Brown. I listened to the audio of this book and it was excellent. A runner who is also a doctor has planned a run for charity and is in training. Her husband seems to have lost interest in accompanying her and so she goes off on her own. She wakes up later the next day with blood in her hair and in a strange cabin.

There are twists and turns and surprises in this story. Its a good one.

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Review: What alice forgot

What alice forgot by Liane Moriarty
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Alice is an efficient, 39 year old over achiever mother of three children. Her husband is a very successful businessman. Alice has a fall at the gym and bumps her head. When she regains consciousness, she has lost her memory of the last ten years and now believes that she is 29 years old and expecting her first child.

She discovers many things about her "mature" life that her "younger" self finds very hard to believe. Not the least of which is that she is separated from her husband and has lost her dearest friend in a terrible accident.

The story made me ask the question of myself. What was I doing ten years ago and how would I cope if that happened to me. Would it give me time to "fix" mistakes that I have made or make amends with people. The answer is, absolutely.

An excellent story and truly a "food for thought" reading experience.

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Review: Us

Us by David Nicholls
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I listened to the audio of this exceptional book. It starts with Connie and Douglas, a married couple and Connie telling him that she thinks she is going to leave him. This is out of the blue for him and especially more so since Connie has planned a month long trip to visit the capitals of Europe. They have a teenaged son named Albie who is planning on going off to college in the fall.

Regardless of Connie's announcement, they decide to go on their trip as planned as it will be the last family trip together seeing as how Albie will be out on his own very soon.

So the story begins. Douglas starts a thorough dissection of their whole life together, all the highs and lows right from the time that he met Connie. The story is intertwined with what is happening on their vacation and the trials and tribulations of being the parents of a teenager who is just starting to spread his wings.

I know that people have problems with them still going off on their holiday after the announcement from Connie and also allowing Albie to do everything he did and financing his misadventures. However, I felt it was a modern family situation.

I loved the locations around Europe where they visited. It did feel like I was there. My dream (at the moment) is to travel to Barcelona and the family stayed there while Douglas was having medical problems and it did inspire me.


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Review: Homegoing

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I will say right up front that this is the best book that I have read in many years. The story begins with two girls, Effia and Esi who are born in Ghana in the 18th century. It is the story of their successors and sweeps through centuries up to present times.

Each chapter could be a book in itself as each character is given full attention. We come out of the immersion of the chapters feeling like we truly know each character personally.

Books of this subject, the slave trade in particular, dredge up almost every emotion that I have on my personal menu ranging from frustration, shame, hatred, humility, fear. I can count on two fingers the number of books that have moved me in this way.

The ending was phenomenal.


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Review: The Girl From the Train

The Girl From the Train by Irma Joubert
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was a book that could knock your socks off. It was the kind of story that from the very beginning you were immersed in and it was very difficult to put down.

A full train is headed for Auschwitz when there is an explosion killing most aboard. A young six year old girl, Gretl, is thrown clear and found by Yakob, a 21 year old that was in the underground resistance movement in Poland. He takes her to his home and his family cares for her for four years, until he is told to take her to an orphanage as they don't have enough room or food to keep her.

Gretl is a very clever little girl and mature for her age. She seems to always make the best of her situation.

It was a book about the war but from a different perspective. A thoroughly enjoyable read.




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