20. The Moses Expedition - Juan Gomez-Jurado

for: adults
Atria Books, 2007, translated to English (from Spanish) 2010
HC $24.99
386 pgs.
Rating: 2

The story is told in a way to keep even a person with major ADHD interested...short 2-3 page chapters, coming from different points-of-view. Characterization is a weak point, and almost every single character, including one of the two protagonists, is not very likable. Everyone argues with one another, is incredibly rude to each other, or likes each other for either no reason at all or for a ridiculous reason. The plot is predictable, a billionaire with Jewish roots is trying to find the Ark of the Covenant in the middle of the Jordanian desert in total secrecy. Of course, the leader of an Islamic terrorist cell is included in the top-secret, greatly guarded mission. No one is who they are supposed to be, and the selfish, stupid, "heroine" journalist that's asked to accompany the mission is the only survivor. Okay. I've given a lot away. I wish I'd never started the book, 'cause it over took a week's worth of major reading time, Once I was into it and wanted to stop, I felt I'd put too much time into it and should finish. So I did. I can't wait to begin something else.

MOVIE - Cedar Rapids

Funnnnneeeeee...and fun
Limited release 2/11/11
R (1:27)
Sat. 3/19/11 at El Con alone
RT: 84% cag 91%
Directed by Miguel Arteta
Ed Helms, John C. Reilly, Ann Hecht

Insurance Agent Tim Lippe (Lih' pee) is the epitome of naive, to the point of ridiculousness. He has never been out of his tiny Wisconsin town, never been to a hotel, never ridden on a plane, when he is sent to Cedar Rapids to a small insurance convention. His only foray into "love" has been with the newly single elementary school teacher (Sigourney Weaver) that just happen to have been his OWN elementary school teacher. He is supposed to schmooze the ultra-Christian president of the insurance board for the coveted Two Diamonds Award to take back to his boss.

Well. Everything he is warned to stay away from is put squarely in his path. All sorts of things he doesn't want to be involved in are impossible to avoid. It's all very hilarious, including the particularly crude John C. Reilly, his African American roommate, and a cocky female (Hecht) whose once-a-year trips to Cedar Rapids from Nebraska are like some people's trips to Vegas ('what happens in Cedar Rapids stays in Cedar Rapids").

The four become quite a team. And during the credits (SPOILER ALERT) we see them vacationing together, then starting an insurance business together. It's a story of friendship, innocence, and a whole lot of funny. I'd go see it again.

My, Oh My - A Butterfly! - Tish Rabe

All About Butterflies
Illustrated by Aristides Ruiz & Joe Mathieu
The Cat in the Hat Learning Library, Random House, 2007
HC $8.00
45 pgs.

I'm the Cat in the Hat
if you look in the sky,
you might see a butterfly
fluttering by.

This book takes a child through the stages that create a butterfly, from egg to caterpillar, growing and losing and eating its skin; to hanging and becoming a chrysalis and emerging as a butterfly. It shows the differences between a butterfly chrysalis and a moth cocoon. It teaches about color and camouflage and then starts telling about different species - ending with 10 pages describing the habits of the monarch butterfly.

A fascinating book for young kids!

The book ends with a glossary (antennae, chrysalis, cocoon, foe, nectar, nutritious, oyamel, proboscis, protein) and a list of other books for kids about butterflies.

19. Hush - Eishes Chayil

Walker & Co., 2010
for: young adults and adults
HC $16.99
360 pgs.
Rating: 4

Eishes Chayil is a pseudonym. This book is written by a member of the Hassidic community in New York, and is an eye-opening page-turner. The first half of the book flips back and forth between 2000, when Gittel was nine, and 2008, when she was 17. The second half of the book is set a bit later, after Gittel is out of high school, 18, and hoping to find a husband and marry. This is what her whole life has built towards, marriage, and children. A family of her own. We watch her become engaged....married....pregnant. But as this all happens, she is becoming more frequently visited by a ghost from her past, a ghost who won't let go until Gittel does something to help her.

This is the premise of the story. Gittel is haunted by the best friend who committed suicide when they were 9. Devory had been sexually abused by her brother. The biggest problem - her community's "hushing up" of this sort of event. There are lots of great reviews out there in cyberspace, lots of raves for this book. I'll add a few links below.

I was, of course, appalled and upset by the premise of the book. But I was more distressed by the things I learned about the Hassidic community. The extreme hatred of "goyim." The absolute lack-of-knowledge about sex and sexuality. And the place of the female in this culture. More than extreme. Racism. Hatred. I realize that this sect of Judaism is very small, but it quite freaked me out.

Here's a review from a Jew in her blog, Bad for Shidduchim (and I learned, from reading Hush, the Shidduch means an engagement) I don't think she's an orthodox Jew, though. And then there's the review in The Curious Jew. And here's a third, from The Velveteen Rabbi.

Little White Rabbit - Kevin Henkes

Greenwillow Books, 2011
HC $16.99
for very young kids
32 pgs.
Rating: 4.5
Copyright information is on the bottom of the title page - this is the first time I've seen that.

Two 10 x 10ish square pages facing each other. One is a thick-green-line bordered illustration, the other is the text - just one or two lines - large green font on white-white page. Every so oftrn ther is an edge-to-edge illustration. All the illustrations look like they're outlined in green marker and colored in lightly with colored pencils. Lovely.

As the little white rabbit travels through the surrounding s near his home, he wonders. What would it be like to be green? to be tall? to be immobile? to fly? But he never wonders who loves him.

Gentle. Simple. Lovely.

MOVIE - Beastly

Enjoyed the book, enjoyed the movie
Released 3-4-11
PG-13
3-15-11 at PP alone, needed to celebrate finishing report cards
RT 21% cag 80%
Based on the book by Alex Flinn
Director: Daniel Barnz
Alex Pettyfer, Vanessa Hudgens, and Neil Patrick Harris

I read the book and blogged about it here. And the movie was probably not the best story ever told, but it was certainly entertaining. I'm glad I went!
The story was really a condensed version of the book except that Kyle Kingston, the beast, was not made hairy and clawed,, he was made tattooed, thickly scarred, open-looking gashes and slices, and what looked like a mass of bubbling lesions beside his nose.
The advertising poster makes him look fairly decent, you should see him head-on. I'm not a Vanessa Hudgens fan, but she is a really beautiful young lady. Short. Or Alex Pettyfer is pretty tall. Or both. I wonder if there was confusion when Alex and Alex were on the set?

I'm not going to rewrite the ploot, because I did that for the book. I just reread it, and it's not badly written at all, so I'll put the link above and leave it at that. Fun.

18. Killer View - Ridley Pearson

Sheriff Walt Fleming, Sun Valley, ID #2
Audio read by Christopher Lane
Brilliance Audio, 2008
8 unabridged cds
9 hrs.
HC 340 pgs.
Rating: 3.5

The setting was in multiple blizzards in the mountains of Colorado where the rich go to ski and have multi-million dollar homes. Since I love snow so much (not) even reading about it puts me into a dark mood. So I wasn't crazy about the setting. The protagonist, Walt Fleming, I liked.

Walt and two veterinary friends, brothers Randy and Mark Akers, go together up a nearby mountain during a blizzard to look for a possible lost skiier. A gunshot is heard, and Randy is dead. Then Mark disappears, a young girls is drugged and raped, and low-level radioactivity is found in some water. Local ranchers are keeping mysteriously quiet about dead sheep, and there's a rogue group of nutsos called the Samarands that are trying to terrorize the country for their own agenda. Throw in a glider airplane, two young twin daughters caught between a somewhat-nutty mother and an overworked dad, and there's the story....pretty much. It was interesting, but drawn out in places and rushed through in others. Oh well.

I consider Ridley Pearson a pretty decent storyteller. I met him once - at the Poisoned Pen Bookstore in Scottsdale when he and Dave Barry covered me in squirting Coke while trying to do a science experiment while talking up their book of that name. He was a really nice guy.

I Can Name 50 Trees Today! - Bonnie Worth

All About Trees
Illustrated by Aristedes Ruiz & Joe Mathieu
from The Cat in the Hat's Learning Library
Random House, 2006
45 pgs.
HC $8.99

A new-to-me science/social studies series, hosted by The Cat in the Hat and his crew.

I'm the Cat in the Hat
and I want you to please
take a few moments
to look at the trees!

The Cat in the Hat uses his lilting rhyming verse to tell how trees grow, how roots and bark function, what fifty different trees look like (and what makes them special). Filled with all sorts of interesting facts and fairly clear illustrations, I'm sending this book to my grandson with the promise to go tree hunting this summer.

Get yourself a blank book
to press leaves that you find.
Glue them onto the pages.
Your mother wont's mind!

Note the tree's bark
and the shape of the crown
Note the shape of the leaves
and then write it all down.

Take a look at this book
or get a tree guide.
Match up your leaves
to the pictures inside.

(The book even shows a sample page.)

We can't have enough of these
wonderful trees.
So when you see bare spots...
...go plant a tree, please!

The book ends with a glossary (drought, germs, heartwood, lobes, minerals, quench, sapwood, spores, whorled) and a list of other tree books kids might enjoy.

This looks like a whole series of books by more than one author (but perhaps the same illustrators?). The hunt is on!

17. Mercy Kill - Lori Armstrong

#2 in Mercy Gunderson (SD) series
For: adults
Touchstone/Simon & Schuster, 2011
paper $15.00
296 pgs. & Reading group guide
Rating: 4.5

I saw this at a bookstore and was able to get it from the library. I didn't realize it was the second in a series. I figured it out right away, though, because there are lots and lots of characters mentioned with no previous reference to them. You can figure most everything out pretty quickly, but there's an antagonism between the protagonist, Mercy Gunderson, and a guy named Kit that's never explained at all. You could figure out the plot of the first book by the time you finished this one.

After I read the first short chapter I put the book aside and decided not to finish it. I was really turned off. Mercy Gunderson is a retired special ops sniper who loves guns and ammunition of any and every kind. She goes out into a field of prairie dogs and starts picking them off, one by one, for kicks. How could that not turn me off?

When I did pick up the book about a week later, I was not enamored of this protagonist. A hard-drinking, looking-for-trouble kind of person who is feeling sorry for herself is not the type of lead character that makes you want to read on. But read on I did. The story kept getting more and more interesting and about a third of the way through I was hooked.

Mercy is working tending bar and bouncing, which keeps her from drinking quite so much herself. A close friend from her Army past reappears in her life, but he has been employed as a spokesperson for the oil company that is trying to build a pipeline in the area and she is greatly opposed to this. However, Jason had saved her life and she feels she owes him. They have a huge history. But then he is murdered and she has no idea why or by whom.

Mercy is also having a secret affair with the sheriff, Mason Dawson. (The author, Lori Armstrong, says she'd have Josh Duhamel play him in a movie.) He was her father's hand-picked replacement for the job of sheriff when he died. However, when Mercy feels he is not attempting to investigate Jason's murder, she decides to run against him for sheriff. Okay.

Investigations proceed. The federal government is involved. There are all sorts of family and ranch things going on. The townspeople are always around and in her face. There are bad guys. Drugs and drug deals. Guns. Shooting. Interesting story. And yes, I'll read the next one, which is currently in the works.

Favorite Words: Cacophony

I am a word person. Give me a simile, a metaphor, alliteration, a snazzy verb and I'm happy. My friend, Sheila, loves the word flummoxed. Great word. The one I get a kick out of the most is cacophony. It's a word full of onomatopoeia, hard sounds, sounds that describe what it means. And every time I find it in a book or article I'm quite excited. Perhaps it's because a few years ago, when teaching 8th grade at Sonoran Science Academy, I had a dad come in to take issue with one of the words on the kids' weekly vocabulary list. He had never heard of cacophony and certainly never heard it used. Huh? So every time I see it, I can envision him standing on the other side of my desk smirking at me. So take this sir. I just found it again!

From The Lost Sisterhood by Anne Fortier
pg. 63

"A remarkable vaqriety of insects and birds was already anticipating sunrise with hectic rustling and all manner of shrieks and quawks, and beyond this cacophony of wildlife, from somewhere out there, came the steady, pulsing sound of the sea."

From Mercy Kill by Armstrong
pg. 127

"I ducked through the barbed wire and heard the sputtering engine of the ATV beneath the cacophony of crackling wood."

From Biting the Moon by Grimes
pgs. 6

"Their voices were like ladders of sound - up several notches, down a few, up and up again, and in that queer syncopated rhythm that might have sounded cacophonous to somebody else but sounded to her like harmony."

From Pray for Silence by Linda Castillo
pg. 173

"As I start toward the front door, the forest around me comes alive with a cacophony of rickets and frogs from the creek."

Also From Pray for Silence by Linda Castillo
pg. 2

 "It was so quiet he could hear the cacophony of frogs from Wildcat Creek a quarter mile to the south."

From A Discovery of Witches by Harkness
pg. 371

"This remark earned me the sensation of my head splitting in two as a bloodcurdling shriek tore through the air.  A cacophony of horrifying sounds. followed.  They were so painful I sank to my knees and covered my head with my arms."

From Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Riggs
pg. 72

"Jet-lagged and exhausted, we went to sleep early - or rather we went to our beds and lay in them with pillows covering our heads to block out the thumping cacophony that issued through the floorboards, which grew so loud that at one point I thought surely the revelers had invaded my room."

From The Weird Sisters by Brown
Chapter 21, disc 9

"She slept poorly for months until it became part of her, until she had to listen consciously to hear the cacophony.  And now, back in the middle of nowhere, the silence seemed alien." 

From Available Dark by Elizabeth Hand
pg. 187

"There was a cacophony of breaking glass, furniture breaking glass, furniture being overturned, curses."

Also From Available Dark by Elizabeth Hand
pg. 131

"The song continued for another thirty seconds, ending in a cacophony of feedback, followed by a thunderclap."

From Pandemonium by Oliver
pg. 303

"Walkie-talkies cackle around us - buzzing, a cacophony."

Also From Pandemonium by Oliver
pg. 216

"It teeters, teeters, and then falls; the pots spill everywhere, a cacophony of ringing and dinging metal." 

From Dash and Lily's Book of Dares by Cohn & Levithan
pg. 44

"The theater was a cacophony of "wah wah" and "Mommy, I want..." and "NO1" and "Mine!"  I barely had a chance to pay attention to the movie, what with having Goldfish crackers and Cheerios thrown in my hair from the aisles behind me, watching Legos hurl through the air, and unsticking Great-aunt Ida's taps from the sippy cup liquid spillage on the floor."

From Gone Missing by Linda Castillo
pg. 43

     "The air is cool and clean and filled with a cacophony of birdsong."

From The Expats by Pavone
pg. 20

     "They settled at a brasserie table.  In the middle of the crowded leafy square, a ten-piece band -- teenagers -- and just struck up a cacophony." 

From Let the Devil Sleep by John Verdon
pg. 222

     "Listening to it became the price he willingly paid for listening to the cacophonous garbage he claimed to prefer." 

From Dualed by Chapman
pg. 27

"The voices are louder here behind the house, an angry cacophony of sound."

From Hand of Evil by Jance
Disc 6, Track 7

"Again she became aware of the cacophony of sound."

From Frame 232 by Mara
p. 62

"There was also the usual cacophony of street noise drifting up from below."

My fantastic 4th grade student, Berto, found this one:
In The New Kid on the Block by Jack Prelutsky
pg. 152  in the poem "Happy Birthday, Dear Dragon:

" Then they howled in cacophonous chorus,'HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DEAR DRAGON, TO YOU!"

From City of Ashes by Cassandra Clare
pg. 376

"Only now they stood in front of him, a cacophony of demons: the bone-white Raum that had attacked them at Luke's; Om demons with their green bodies, wide mouths and bodies, wide mouths and horns; the slinking black Kuri demons, spider demons with their eight pincer-tipped arms and the poison-dripping fangs that protruded from their eye sockets." 

From Sepulchre by Kate Mosse
near the beginning of disc 1

"A group of at least nine or ten men leapt to their feet in a cacophony of whistling and booking and slow hand clapping."

From Orphan Train by Kline
9% in

"Despite the landlord's disapproval, the sweltering heat, the gloomy rooms, and the cacophony of strange noises, so unfamiliar to my country ears, I felt another swell of hope."

Also From Orphan Train by Kline
pg. 62

"As if someone has turned a crank in my back, I am propelled forward, on foot in front of the cther.  The cacophony of the station becomes a dull roar in my ears."

From And the Dark Sacred Night by Glass
near the end of disc 5

"A minor cacophony of clicks, hums, and groans starts the return of the power."

From Unseen by Slaughter
Disc 1, Track 14

"The morning rush had arrived.  The cacophony of beeping monitors and machinery had started to rev."

From The Narrows by Michael Connelly
disc 2

"The cacophony rising from the room assaulted her as she descended."

From The One by Cassandra Cass
near the end...

"Guttural shouts of pain filled the room adding to the cacophony of chairs screeching.  Bodies hitting walls, and the stampede of people trying to escape as fast as they could in their heels and suits."

From Chill of the Night by James Hayman
pg. 92

"The woman slumped.  Abby's brain exploded in a cacophony of Voices.  She screamed."

From After the Storm by Linda Castillo
Ch. 4

"A sound reaches me over the cacophony, a tiny cry, like the mewling of a kitten."

From In the Blood: A Genealogical Mystery by Steve Robinson
14% in

"Their guests continued to stream into the room, everyone gazing at the happy couple and adding their remarks to the cacophony of words that circled the room."

From Ready Player One:
Disc 4, about halfway through...on the way to Tubac!

"Behind me I could hear a cacophony of digital combat coming from dozens of other vintage arcade games."

From Gun Games by Faye Kellerman

"At 6:30 in the morning, Gabe sat at the bus stop, head in hand, cursing the hour and the singing birds, whose current cacophony was giving him a headache." 

From Station 11 by Emily St. John Mandel

"Francoise heard the first notes, the cacophony of musicians practicing their sections and tuning up." 

From The Leaving of Things by Jay Antani

"A cacophony of cheering and garba music from loudspeakers radiated from the athletic field - I saw a stage had been set up there overhung with a battery of lights and a garba was in progress before an audience of maybe 300, clapping to the dandiya rhythm." 

From Age of Order by Julian North

"Sung noticed us, even while dashing around the kitchen.  "Four minutes," she declared before turning her attention back to the cacophony of pots, pans, fire, and smoke." 

From Lost Girls by Angela Marsons

"The room erupted into a cacophony of screams and exhalations." 

From Immoral by Brian Freeman

"Stride heard the overlapping cacophony of police radios buzzing like white noise." 

From Still Life by Louise Penny

"Faced with this cacophony of color, he couldn't remember what he had expected, but certainly not this." 

From Openly Straight by Bill Konigsberg 

"All around us families were unloading boxes and suitcases onto the sidewalk.  Guys were shaking hands and thumping fists like old friends.  It was a steamy day, and the huge oak tree near the front entrance was the only break from the hot sun.  A few parents sat on the grass there, watching the car to dorm caravan, cicadas buzzed and hissed, their invisible cacophony pressing into my inner ear."

MOVIE - The Fighter

Wow - Great accents - Great acting - Lowell, Mass!
Released 12-17-10
R (1:54)
3-6-11 (a gorgeous Sunday evening) at El con with Sheila & Terri
RT: 90 cag: 95
Director: David O. Russell
Amy Adams, Mark Wahlberg, Christian Bale

Both Christian Bale and Melissa Leo won Academy Awards for supporting actor & actress in this riveting true story about two brothers from Lowell, Massachusetts in the 1980's. They were wonderful, but so was Amy Adams. Wow.

Micky Ward (Wahlberg) has always adored his older brother Dicky Eklund (Bale) who, for a short time, was "the pride of Lowell" after he beat Sugar Ray Leonard in a fight. Now, years later, Dicky is a crack addict and Micky is trying to work his way up the ladder as a fighter. However, he's not getting very far. Then he meets Charlene (Adams), a brassy bartender who helps him see that it's time he stop bailing his brother out and lying for him one more time. His world is centered around his outrageous mother, his seven grown sisters, and the young daughter whose mother is doing everything she can to poison their relationship.

Then Dicky goes to prison and cleans up while Micky is guided by a new trainer and manager....and begins to go places. And, oh how the family hates Charlene!

As the credits begin, the real-life Micky and Dicky are seen chatting about the film. I'd love to see more of them....

Totally entertaining. It's much more a story of family than a story about boxing. There are only a few fighting scenes, and those were quite acceptable to me - a person who seriously dislikes boxing.

Gloria Whelan

Gloria Whelan was born in 1923 in Michigan and has remained there throughout her life and writing career. She lives in a somewhat isolated cottage on the edge of a lake and writes (when the snow is not a couple of feet high) in her "Secret Garden." She was born six years before my own mother, which makes her 87 years old...and still writing prolificly! Bravo Gloria Whelan! I love your writing AND your stories....and so do my students!

• See What I See (2010)
• The Listeners (picture book) (2009)
• Waiting for Owl’s Call (picture book)
• K is for Kabuki (2009)
• The Locked Garden (2009)
• After the Train (2009)
• The Disappeared (2008)
• Yuki and the One Thousand Carriers (picture book) (2008)
• Parade of Shadows (2007)
• Yatandou (picture book) (2007)
• Summer of the War (2006)
• The Turning (Russian Saga / Book 4) (2006)
• Mackinac Bridge / The Story of the Five-Mile Poem (picture book) (2006)
• Listening for Lions (2005)
• Chu Ju's House (2004)
• Burying the Sun (Russian Saga / Book 3) (2004)
• Friend on Freedom River (picture book) (2004)
• The Impossible Journey (Russian Saga / Book 2) (2003)
• A Haunted House in Starvation Lake (Starvation Lake / Book 4) (2003)
• Are There Bears in Starvation Lake? (Starvation Lake / Book 3) (2002)
• The Wanigan: A Life on the River (2002)
• Fruitlands: Louisa May Alcott Made Perfect (2002)
• Jam and Jelly by Holly and Nellie (picture book) (2002)
• Rich and Famous in Starvation Lake (Starvation Lake / Book 2) (2001)
• Angel on the Square (Russian Saga / Book 1) (2001)
• Homeless Bird (2000)
• Welcome to Starvation Lake (Starvation Lake / Book 1) (2000)
• Return to the Island (Mackinac Island Trilogy / Book 3) (2000)
• Miranda's Last Stand (1999)
• Forgive the River, Forgive the Sky (1998)
• Farewell to the Island (Mackinac Island Trilogy / Book 2) (1998)
• The Shadow of the Wolf (1997)
• The Miracle of St. Nicholas (picture book) (1997)
• Friends (1997)
• The Indian School (1996)
• Once On This Island (Mackinac Island Trilogy / Book 1) (1995)
• That Wild Berries Should Grow (1994)
• Night of the Full Moon (Libby Mitchell Trilogy / Book 2) (1993)
• Goodbye, Vietnam (1992)
• Bringing the Farmhouse Home (picture book) (1992)
• Hannah (1991)
• The Secret Keeper (1990)
• Silver (1988)
• A Week of Raccoons (picture book) (1988)
• Playing With Shadows (adult book) (1988)
• The Ambassador's Wife (adult book)
• The President's Mother (adult book)
• Next Spring an Oriole (Libby Mitchell Trilogy / Book 1) (1987)
• The Pathless Woods (1981)
• A Time to Keep Silent (1979)
• A Clearing in the Forest (1978)

16. HeartSick - Chelsea Cain

#1 Archie Sheridan/Gretchen Lowell
Audio read by Carolyn McCormick
Audio Renaissance, 2007
7 unabridged cds
10.5 hrs.
336 pages
Rating: 5

This was quite an unusual story. Archie Sheridan is a savvy Portland, Oregon police detective who spent ten years heading up the task force looking for the Beauty Killer. But then, she caught him. Gretchen Lowell is gorgeous. She is also psychopathic. She mutilates her victims while they are awake and feeling. She is loving to them.....and kills them slowly. She does the same to Archie Sheridan. She feeds him all sorts of drugs, including hallucinogens. She breaks ribs with nails and a hammer. She removes his spleen. She carves up his chest with an Exacto knife. And then she poisons him by having him drink drain cleaner. All this without anesthesia.

Gretchen has always killed her victims, numbering 200. However, she spares Archie and allows herself to be caught and jailed. Now, two years later, Archie, totally addicted to various pain killers in large quantities, goes back to work heading another task force, to find a new serial killer that's killing 15 year-old schoolgirls.

The story weaves in and around Archie's current investigations, his memories of the time he was abused by Gretchen, his Sunday visits with Gretchen in prison, and the thoughts and life of Susan Ward, the mid-twenties journalist who has been assigned to profile Archie for the Portland Herald. Pink-haired, frisky, smart, and flawed by her father's death when she was 14, she is a character that pulls us in and makes us like her whether we want to or not.

And what a story this is. It was absolutely mesmerising. I can't wait to find out what's in store for the next installment. It looks like Chelsea Cain has just published her fourth about Archie Sheridan and Gretchen Lowell. I hope they all include Susan, too.

Next books in the series: Sweetheart, Evil at Heart, and Night Season, which was just published four days ago.

MOVIE: Gnomeo and Juliet

Ho Hum
Released 2-11-11
G (1:24)
3-1-11 at El Con with Rachel G.
RT: 54 cag: 58
Director: Kelly Asbury
Voices include James McAvoy and Emily Blunt
the music's by Elton John, and if I remember right, he produced it, too.

Next door to each other, in contemporary England, live the garden gnomes of the Capulets and the garden gnomes of the Montagues. They come to life whenever there's no human in the vicinity. They, too, hate each other for no remembered reason, just as the humans do. They are constantly trying to outdo and out race each other. Then Gnomeo and Juliet meet and fall in love. I more or less follows the same story, but they don't die at the end, they life happily ever after.

It wasn't boring, but it sure wasn't great. It was rated G and a movie I could take a ten-year-old lady to see. So it served its purpose.

15. Gods in Alabama - Joshilyn Jackson

Audio read by Catherine Taber
Hachette Audio, 2005
7 unabridged cds
320 pgs.
Rating: 4.5

I love the reader of this audio book. Her southern accent is soft and lovely...a great pleasure to listen to, helping create the setting and the protagonist solidly.

Arlene Fleet left Possett, Alabama the minute she graduated from high school, vowing to never return. Actually, she'd made a deal with God that she would never again lie, fornicate, or return to Possett Alabama, if he would help her out by keeping the body of the guy she killed hidden forever. (!!) Ten years have passed, she's a doctoral candidate in Chicago with an African American boyfriend who's pretty special. She's kept in close touch with her family by phone, but whe hasn't seen them in those ten years. But now, she feels she must break all her promises and return home.

Filled with humor and great storytelling, this book was a gem. Arlene tells the story of the murder and its surrounding in flashbacks throughout the story, beautifully woven in. This was Joshilyn Jackson's first book, she's written three since: Between, Georgia; Backseat Saints, and the Girl Who Stopped Swimming. I've orderd Between, Georgia to see if it's even half as good as this one.