It's 1926 in Achinson, Missouri and fifteen-year-old Iris feels like a shadow in her own home. Her mother died of tuberculosis when she was five and since then, her father has remained distant from her and has poured himself into his shoe store. Iris doesn't seem to fit anywhere in his life. Her father decides to send her away for the summer to be the companion of Dr. Nesbitt's elderly mother in rural Wellsford while he goes to Kansas City to open up a new shoe store in that booming town with his new fiance, Celeste. Iris and Mrs. Nesbitt soon learn they have much in common; they are both mourning lost loved ones in their lives, Iris her mother and Mrs. Nesbitt her other son Morris. Together they learn to " dust off the memories" and a deep friendship forms between them. Dr. Nesbitt is kind, calm, understanding and teaches Iris to drive his Model-T so that she may take Mr. Nesbitt on errands. Iris feels welcomed in their home but misses the companionship of her best friend from back home, Leroy. Cecil, the Nesbitt's tenant farmer, and his daughter Dot, who does their laundry every week, are disturbing elements in Iris' life. Cecil is menacing and makes Iris feel very uncomfortable when he is around. Dot is prickly and antagonistic to Iris. Dot says her mother, Pansy, has "passed on". Mrs. Nesbitt says Pansy has merely left Cecil and run away unable to stand living with Cecil any longer. When tragedy happens, Iris must look inside herself and find the courage, cunning and will it will take to stop this evil man from destroying his daughter's life. Warm and humorous, this story tells how one girl discovers her inner strength and beauty and ultimately finds new hope, a new home and love.
This story, by Ira Wagler, is a page turner from start to finish. Not only is it insightful into the Amish lifestyle, but it is a worthy and true account of a young man on a pursuit to finding himself and finding God. The story begins with 17 year old Ira Wagler, stealing out of the house at 2 a.m., leaving behind his family, and the Amish way of life. Ira eventually returns, but again leaves only to return again, and again and again. His experiences with the English and his turmoil and guilt with the Amish reveal a restless spirit and inner tug-of-war.
An honest account of a life reaching for that peace that puts a heart at rest. You'll grow to love Ira Wagler and want to know more about him!
When Frank Nichols inherits his family's old estate in Whitbrow, a rural Southern town in Georgia, he packs up his mistress Dora and moves to the country. His plans are to write a book about his family history and to make an attempt at moving past the haunted memories of his involvement in the Great War.
Frank and Dora soon discover that the townsfolk of Whitbrow have some particularly odd traditions, such as sending sacrificial pigs across the river and into a nearby woods. When the couple sit in on a town meeting and influence the vote regarding the sacrifice, the horror begins to slowly descend on the town and it's inhabitants.
A Stolen Life is a memoir by Jaycee Dugard who was normal kid until the summer of 1991 when she was abducted. For eighteen years she was a prisoner. She was an object for someone to use and abuse. For eighteen years she was not allowed to speak her own name.
Her life was stolen one ordinary Monday morning as she was walking up the hill to catch the school bus in June 1991. She was coming to the part of the hill at which she had been taught to cross to the other side by Carl (her step-father) and her mom who had decided this was the best place to stand and wait for the school bus. As Jaycee is walking she heards a car behind her, she looks back expecting the car to pass but to her surprise the car pulls up beside her. The driver (Phillip Garrido) rolls down his window and leans slightly out of his car and starts to ask her for directions. His hand shoots out of the window so fast she barely registers that he has something black in his hand. Jaycee hears a crackling sound and she feels paralyzed. She tries to get away but can only scoot away to the bushes at the side of the road. Jaycee's life will suddenly change not for the better. For eighteen years she was a prisoner. She was an object for someone to use and abuse.
Jaycee's story is refresing in that it's written by her, and not from a co-author. Much of the book are pages and pages taken from the actual journal entries she wrote while in her backyard prison.
On August 26, 2009, Jaycee took back her name. She doesn't think of herself as a victim. She survived to tell her story.
Eleanor Henderson's debut novel, Ten Thousand Saints, is a take on two unusual families living in Vermont and New York in the late 1980s whose lives become linked forever. We first meet Jude and Teddy, 16-year-old high school buddies who seem to spend much of their time getting high or figuring out how to get high. But don't judge the book just by that fact. We know from the beginning that Teddy will die from an overdose at the end of the day (New Year's Eve, 1987). After that occurs, the rest of the book is the story about how the survivors go on. Jude's adoptive parents are divorced, and his dad has moved to New York. His girlfriend's daughter comes to town on New Year's Eve and initiates the chain of events that leads to Teddy's death, and Jude's subsequent move to New York to live with his father. Another family member key to the story is Johnny, Teddy's older brother, a New York tattoo artist who Teddy and Jude had idolized. Jude soon takes up with Johnny and his friends, who are "straight edge," meaning no drugs, alcohol, meat, or sex. Are you thinking right now that this book is not for you? Well, I understand, because I was hesitant of the subject matter, too. But let me tell you that Henderson so skillfully devises her characters that I came to empathize and understand them, even though I didn't relate at all to their actions. She delves into issues such as tattooing, heavy metal music, music raves (at which people slam into each other as a form of dancing), straight-edge lifestyles, homosexuality, teenage pregnancy, and drug addiction--all big issues in and of themselves--with an approach that is nonjudgmental but cuts to the chase. I learned a lot about lifestyles that are completely foreign from my own and watched these characters live and learn and grow from it. Isn't that what a great novel should do? Read it, and I believe you won't be disappointed.
10 year old Keeper has messed everything up this time! She burned the special Crab Gumbo that Signe was preparing for their Blue Moon celebration which spoiled Dogie's two-word proposal song he was going to sing to Signe tonight, and then she broke the special flower that only blooms during the Blue Moon and now everyone was mad, mad, mad! All because she had heard the crabs talking to her! Now Keeper and her dog, B.D. (Best Dog), are on their way to the sandbar in a small boat looking for her mermaid mother, Meggie Marie, and hoping that she might grant her wish. Keeper needs some magic tonight, and maybe the Meggie Marie will make her wish come true. But when the rip current takes her farther and farther out into the rough waters of the Gulf of Mexico, panic sets in and the fairy tales that lured her out there go tumbling into the waves. Maybe the Blue Moon isn't magic and maybe the sandbar won't sparkle with mermaids and maybe Keeper may drift farther and farther away from the only family she knows and loves. But flying above them is their friend Captain, the seagull, and just maybe he can let everyone know where Keeper and B.D. are! This book will sweep readers away into a world where mermaids swim in the waves and 10 year old girls learn the true meaning of love. This book is on the JFic shelf in the Children's Room. Check it out!
The Dry Grass of August, By Anna Jean Mayhew, tells the simple story of thirteen-year old Jubie Watts, a privileged white Southern teen whose eyes will soon be opened to the racism of the 1950s.
Jubie leaves Charlotte, North Carolina, with her family for a Florida vacation. The year is 1954. Crammed into the car along with Jubie are her three siblings, her mother, and the family's black maid, Mary Luther. Jubie can't help but take note of the anti-integration signs they pass, and the racial tension that builds as they journey further south. When the trip takes a shocking turn, Jubie is faced with deciding where her own convictions lie.
This novel is many things: well-written, enjoyable, bearing a story line and well developed characters that live on long after the final chapter is laid aside, better than The Help, and finally, effective to remind us (shock us) of a time not so long ago. Glad I read it!
Getting away to Nantucket island to visit her one-time best friend may be just what Meredith Martin Delinn's needs. Meredith and her boys hae been living the "high life" for many years. Meredith's husband, Freddy, was one of those wonderful guys on Wall Street that got caught by the SEC making off with his clients' money and dragged his wife and family down with him. Freddy is now sitting in jail and his sons and wife are also under investigation. Merdith with little money left contacts her friend, Constance Fluke. Their friendship fizzled out when Constance and her husband took out their money with Freddy a fews years ago.
Connie has her own troubles for her husband, an architect, died of cancer and now her only daughter is no longer speaking with her. Connie and Meredith try to mend their relationship after Meredith moves in with her at Nantucket Island. Many themes present themselves in this novel--Greed, Betrayal, and Deceit. All three were ruining many lives. As you read this book, you will start to ask yourself: Do I really know the people I have in my life relationships? Hopefully we do.
Allison Glenn, once the golden girl in her parents eyes, is being released from a women's correctional facility after serving 5 years for a horrific crime that she committed at the age of fifteen. Reluctantly, she enters a halfway house that her attorney has found for her and soon finds employment at a local book store. Allison so desperately wishes to put her past behind her, but the taunting behavior of her fellow halfway house occupants and the indifference that her family portrays leaves her heavy-hearted and doubtful.
Allison's younger sister, Brynn, has always hovered in the shadow of her near-perfect sister. Yet after her sister's arrest and conviction, she shoulders the burden of her sister's sin alone and soon self-destructs. Brynn is sent packing to her grandparents where she begins to thrive. She wants to forget Allison, yet is unable to do so.
Claire Kelby owns the local book store and hires Allison Glenn as a part-time employee. Claire and her husband, Jonathan have an adopted five-year-old son, Joshua. As an infant, Joshua had been left abandoned at the Linden Falls fire station.
Charm Tullia, a young woman in her early twenties, lives with her stepfather, Gus, a retired fireman who is terminally ill with lung cancer. She chose to stay with her stepfather after her mother decided to leave Gus. Charm continues to care for him as his illness progresses, all the while attending nurses' training courses.
A heart-wrenching read in which four female characters weave a tale of secrets, secrets that entwine and eventually unravel.
When a mysterious young woman named Katie appears in the small North Caroline town of Southport, her sudden arrival raises questions about her past. Beautiful yet self-effacing, Katie seems determined to avoid forming personal ties until a series of events draws her into two reluctant relationships; one with Alex, a widowed store owner with a kind heart and two young children; and another with her plainspoken single neighbor, Jo. Despite her reservations, Katie slowly begins to let down her guard, putting down roots in the close-knit community and becoming increasingly attached to Alex and his family.
But even as Katie begins to fall in love, she struggles with the dark secret that still haunts and terrifes her. With Jo's empathic and stubborn support, Katie eventually realizes that she must choose between a life of transient safety and one of riskier rewards and that in the darkest hour, love is the only true safe haven.
Nicholas Sparks has done it again, Safe Haven, is a well written book with several surprises along the way.
I can't rave enough about this true story of a man going to Nepal for a 3 month stint working with orphans and making it his lifetime mission to rescue trafficked children from evil people. Connor Grennan tells his story in Little Princes, a story that will pull your heartstrings. You will learn about the country of Nepal, it's inner wars, it's poverty, it's people, and it's children! You will love the children. This book is special and lets you see how one ordinary young man, who had no clue his heart would be captured and used to make a difference in so many young lives, can be used for extraordiany things. It gives us hope.