JULY BOOK LIST

The Girl Who Came Home: A Titanic Novel by Hazel Gaynor (Mar 11, 2012)

I chose this book as it is a Titanic novel. I remember being at my Grandma Taylor's house in Moab when I was a child and finding a National Geographic issue she had about the ship.  I was instantly hooked.  The story provides such a heart-wrenching feeling of  "if - only".

This book received 4 1/2 stars on Amazon but I only gave it two.  It tells the story of an orphaned Irish young woman leaving her home and first love to travel to America with her Aunt.  They travel on the Titanic with others from the village, and the girl is the only survivor.  The problem I had with the book is that the telling of the girls story on the ship didn't add anything new or fresh. In fact several of the scenes written sounded suspiciously like descriptions of scenes from James Cameron's film Titanic.

The other problem I had with this book is that all of a sudden the story jumped to present time. Our Titanic survivor is in her 80's and has never told her family about her past experiences. She decides to tell the story to her granddaughter to help her write a great story which will win her acceptance back into college after dropping out years previously.Skip this one.

The Giver  by Lois Lowry / YA / ****

This is a re-read for me.  I am not sure, but this may be the first truly 'dystopian' novel I ever read.  It was either this one or "The City of Ember".  Anyway, this book is beautifully written and has all the classic themes of a society that has put so many rules in place for the protection of the health and happiness of it's citizens that there is no longer any choice or freedom. It shows the beautiful serene everyday life of a community that is hiding horrors below the surface. Using simple language it describes a whole world.

Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry (2002)  / YA / ***1/2

This is the second book in the "Giver Quartet".  Until I read the third book, "The Messenger", I was not sure how it tied with "The Giver".  It tells the story of a crippled orphan named Kira who lives in a dirty, deprived village that is the opposite of the village in "The Giver"... where people are cruel, selfish, and unaccepting.  They do have freedom but use it only in ways to benefit themselves. Kira fights first for her life, and then to make things better.

Messenger by Lois Lowry / YA / ***1/2

Another great story about a young person trying to make a difference. This book continues the story of Matty, the ragged urchin introduced in "Gathering Blue".  He has been living in the place of refuge found in the previous novel... a place where those fleeing persecution and poverty go to find safety and acceptance. The leader of this village is the boy from the first book, "The Giver", and he encourages people to be accepting, kind, responsible, and free.    But there is a new darkness in the land which is making the people change. They have voted to close the Village to newcomers in need. Matty must travel back through the dangerous forest to kind Kira from "Gathering Blue" before the Village is closed.

This author is amazing. The writing style is so simple but invokes vivid imagery.  I can't wait to read the final book.

 Princess of the Midnight Ball (Twelve Dancing Princesses) by Jessica Day George / JF or YA / **

In my opinion an author should never re-write a fairy tale unless they have something new to offer to the story. I distinctly remember reading "The Twelve Dancing Princesses" in my childhood from a big blue book of fairy tales from the library of Myton Elementary.  I returned to this story several times as I loved the idea of an enchanted land of silver and gold where the Princesses danced so long they wore out their slippers.

This book follows the Grimm version of the tale for the most part, but their was simply no magic in the telling. There was no character development.  The story was just flat and uninteresting. 

The Painted Girls: A Novel by Cathy Marie Buchanan / A / ***

This work of historical fiction focuses on the paintings of Degas and his ballerina girls. It takes the girl from his painting "The Dance Lesson" and his wax sculpture " Little Dancer aged Fourteen" and creates an imaginative story of her life inside and outside the ballet school.  

The story is one of poverty, destitution, and despair as well as hope and the resiliency of the human spirit.  Some sections of the book were light and joyful, others were dark and disturbing.  There were sections I quite enjoyed, especially those telling of the life in the classroom and the dream of the girls to be chosen to advance to the other levels. There were sections I did not like, as the story would be so detailed and then skip ahead years.  Ultimately I loved how it was a story of sisters and their bond with one another. 

The Dressmaker by Kate Alcott / A / ** 1/2

This is my second Titanic book this week, and it wasn't on purpose. I didn't realize this was a Titanic Novel.  It tells the story of an English servant girl named Tess who impulsively runs away from her unappreciative employer. She goes to the dock to see the launching of the great Titanic and  is hired last-minute by Lady Lucille Duff Gordan as a lady's maid. 

This story doesn't so much focus on the sinking of the Titanic (in fact I was only 11% in and the ship had already sunk) but rather the after-math. Apparently the Gordan's were in one of the many under-utilized lifeboats (there were 12 passengers in their boat which was made for sixty). The fact that Mr Gordan was rescued when he obviously was not a woman or a child was bad enough, but apparently Lord and Lady Gordan ordered the seaman with them to not go back and pick up survivors, and then paid bribes to several people to quiet down the story.  

I had not realized that after the Titanic disaster there were several government inquiries into the sinking and the way things were handled.  This book follows the story of this inquiries through the eyes of the maid Tess and her new friend in New York who happens to be a female reporter on the case.

The book was just so implausible... I know that America in those days was a total land of opportunity but I still can't believe that within a week our poor uneducated Tess was wandering New York on her own, designing dresses for Lady Gordan while also acting as her secretary, and being wooed by not one but two men, one of which was a millionaire.

So while I learned something new about the Titanic story, I would not recommend this book to anyone.

Mariana by Kearsley, Susanna / A / ****

Oh I liked this one.  I can see where it would be easy to pick it apart but I found the storyline enchanting, the characters engaging, and the love story fulfilling enough (it did have my pet peeve of people instantly falling madly in love to the point that their affection transcends time and I'm sorry that just bugs me).  The quote on the front of the book says, "Some Lives are Worth Reliving", and that my friends is a perfect synopsis.

The Five Love Languages: The Secret to Love that Lasts by Gary D Chapman / A / ***1/2

Okay people don't laugh.  It was my "free" book from Amazon Prime for June.  Several of my co-workers have taken the quizzes about what language they and their partners speak and have talked about it enough at work that I thought it would be interesting to know what they are talking about.  And what the author says TOTALLY makes sense.   I've even realized that the few disagreements and moments of contention in my own marriage could directly be related to speaking the different love languages. It really was worth reading.