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"Bonded", by Donna Jo Napoli was on my daughter's reading list for school. A short book, it is based on the Cinderella story, but revolves around a Chinese girl who never gets her feet bound, and her half sister and her bound feet. Since we are so "Disneyfied", it came as somewhat of a surprise to me how old the Cinderella story is and how there are several old Chinese "Cinderella" tales. This was a good book to read, even for an adult.

"Duncton Wood", by William Horwood, must have been sitting on my mother's shelf for more than 20 years because it was published in 1980. The writer spent several years secluded in the forest and emerged to write this entertaining family-saga about moles. It follows the lives of several moles, their births, their rise to leadership, their deaths, their loves, their journeys and their spirituality.

"Step on a Crack", by James Patterson. I read this in one day. It has a lot of short chapters and while I was reading it I was wondering why I wasting my time on another book like this. A short murder-mystery and I never did figure out what the title of the book had to do with the story. Sorry, that's all you get from me on this one.

"Trace", by Patricia Cornwell. I read this a month or two ago. Frankly, it was so memorable that I have to read the back cover to remember what it was about. Oh yes, another Scarpetta novel about her after she was fired from the Virginia as chief medical examiner. If you are following Scarpetta's life through all her other books, it's good to see she landed on her feet somewhere.

"Eat Pray Love", by Elizabeth Gilbert mostly follows a year in the life of Elizabeth Gilbert. She has a very natural, easy way of writing that makes it easy to fly through the book. She reveals a lot of personal history and personal everything...well, not sure if there is anything personal left that we don't know about from this year in her life. She runs off to Italy to learn the language and eat, then off to India to hang out in an ashram, and then over to Indonesia where she falls in love. I think I enjoyed reading more about the friends she made in all these places than anything else in the book.

Dean Koontz "Brother Odd" & Sophie Kinsellsa "Shopaholic & Baby"

"Brother Odd" is based on a character that was developed in an earlier book, one of which I read but remember nothing about! This was a good, interesting read set at a monastery but the ending leaves you to believe there may be another one! Thumbs up!

"Shopaholic & Baby" was just as enjoyable as the previous books! If you didn't read any of the earlier ones, you can still pick this one up to read. But if you do, it will make you want to go back and start at the beginning of the series. Thumbs up as usual for this book with its British humor.

Brad Meltzer "The Book of Fate"

"The Book of Fate" has some comparisons to a John Grisham's writing, but it seems more like a cross between Dan Brown and John Grisham. The history is Dan Brownish, but the constant running from someone trying to kill you is both. It was a great story, well-written and even though it was a book of fiction, it was weaved around even facts that what took place could seem quite plausible. I give it a thumbs up!

"The Millionaires" - I think this was one of those books I left up in Martha's Vineyard while on vacation! It was a great story about 2 brothers, one the high achiever, the other the somewhat struggler, and how innocent brothers are set up to take the fall for the "higher ups" in the firm. The brothers work for an investment firm for only the richest of the rich, and when they find something they were not supposed to find, it leads to a lot of mayhem and murder! If you are not one of the richest elite of the world, it will fascinate you to read about the large sums of money that are transferred around, and that even the rich are still greedy for more. I also give this one a thumbs up!

Latest Books

I took a book hiatus to catch up on old magazines that had piled up. A book or two slid into the mix of all that but I didn't bother to keep up with them.

However, I took 5 books on vacation in June and if I can remember what they were (I actually left them along the trip as I finished them), I'll list them here:

After reading 3 books on my trip that involved murders and pathologists, I wanted something without all that so I picked up Sandra Brown's "Ricochet", only to find one more book with a murder and some sleazy cops. It was a bit suspenseful but predictable at best for me. I had already started to feel like a pro after the other 3 books I had read:

Tess Gerritsen, "The Mephisto Club" was based in Boston (where we happened to be at the time) and was an interesting twist and turn into how people who study criminals can actually make them create gruesome crimes to get their attention. It was a bit different read than the others, but still involved murder and mayhem and autopsies. Ugh.

James Patterson and Andrew Gross' "Judge & Jury" was also about murder and mayhem and kept you interested to the very end. It involved a single mother as a jurist and brings to light how unsafe you can be if picked for the wrong jury. Very believable.

Frankly, the other book was so memorable that I cannot even remember what it was about, but the same theme as the 2 above.

A book I started back in May and recently finished was Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky. This book was started by Irene before she was taken to a concentration camp, never to return. It appears to be 2 parts to what was a "never-finished" novel. Because of the timing of the events in the book, which were June, 1940 to July, 1941, it appears that she was writing the book simultaneously to events that were happening at the very moment. Although the book doesn't really seem to end, it still gives you a very different perspective of living in France during WWII and the writings describing the various classes of society and their reactions to the war around them are fascinating. It gets a bit boring at the beginning of the 2nd section but if you stick with you will get wound up in the story.

Probably the best book I have read since "The Historian" is one I had on my bookshelf for quite some time, "The Life of Pi" by Yann Martel. This book was nothing like what I thought from the title (can't judge a book by its cover for certain on this one!). It was so fantastical that I gave it to my 13-year-old daughter to read and we are still commenting about parts of the book. It is not a long book but it is based on interviews of Pi (the person) that were recorded in the late 1970's and recollections of a short period of time back then. I don't want to tell anymore as to spoil the book for anyone else wanting to read it.

Sue Grafton, 'A' is for Alibi & Karin Slaughter, "Triptych"

I picked up the Sue Grafton book at a used book store because I have read several of the Kinsey Millhone mysteries, but didn't know how it all began! 'A' is for Alibi was entertaining, more so since I have read some already up to Q or R. If you like a series involving basically the same characters, this is a good series to pick up.

"TripTych" by Karin Slaughter, who I really just read a book or two of hers this past year for the first time, interested me more than the others since it was based in Atlanta. It manages to take a very clever, twisty turn of events and characters, enough that you finally figure out who is who. The character development is enough that it can get under your skin a bit, enough to really understand where the character is in his/her mind.