The Radium Girls

 

The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America's Shining Women by Kate Moore

Nonfiction

2016

Finished on November 12, 2026

Rating: 3.5/5 (Good)

Publisher's Blurb:

The Curies’ newly discovered element of radium makes gleaming headlines across the nation as the fresh face of beauty, and wonder drug of the medical community. From body lotion to tonic water, the popular new element shines bright in the otherwise dark years of the First World War.

 

Meanwhile, hundreds of girls toil amidst the glowing dust of the radium-dial factories. The glittering chemical covers their bodies from head to toe; they light up the night like industrious fireflies. With such a coveted job, these “shining girls” are the luckiest alive – until they begin to fall mysteriously ill.

But the factories that once offered golden opportunities are now ignoring all claims of the gruesome side effects, and the women’s cries of corruption. And as the fatal poison of the radium takes hold, the brave shining girls find themselves embroiled in one of the biggest scandals of America’s early 20th century, and in a groundbreaking battle for workers’ rights that will echo for centuries to come.

Written with a sparkling voice and breakneck pace, The Radium Girls fully illuminates the inspiring young women exposed to the “wonder” substance of radium, and their awe-inspiring strength in the face of almost impossible circumstances. Their courage and tenacity led to life-changing regulations, research into nuclear bombing, and ultimately saved hundreds of thousands of lives.

I had such high hopes for this book. My book group read it several years ago, but we were traveling so I left it on my shelf to read later. I was determined to read it for this year's Nonfiction November challenge. It started off very well and I think I read the first 75 pages or so in the first night. I couldn't put it down! Shortly thereafter, it started to drag and I found myself peeking ahead to see how many pages remained (never a good sign!).

I have a great appreciation for the history of this story, and my heart broke for the women who suffered such horrific symptoms (and deaths!) caused by radium poisoning, and grew angry with how they were lied to by their employers. But I didn't see the need to repeatedly describe the physical characteristics of each of the women (and some men). Some may think those specific facts helped personalize the story, but I felt like it was extra padding to the narrative. Even with all those details, I couldn't keep track of each woman's story. (There are thirty; the author includes a list of key characters that not only includes the dial-painters, but also the people who worked at The United States Radium Corporation and The Radium Dial Company, as well as all the doctors and investigators.) With that said, the author did a remarkable job with her research, but the book could have been a hundred pages shorter and still have achieved the same effect. With a 4.15 rating on Goodreads, I'm in the minority, so see what you think. Many of my friends loved the book.

Looking Back - The Age of Innocence

Looking Back... In an effort to transfer my book journal entries over to this blog, I'm going to attempt to post (in chronological order) an entry every Friday. I may or may not add extra commentary to what I jotted down in these journals.

The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton

Fiction/Classic

1920

Finished on July 24, 2002

Rating: 3.5/5 (Good)

Publisher's Blurb:

Winner of the 1921 Pulitzer Prize, The Age of Innocence is Edith Wharton’s masterful portrait of desire and betrayal during the sumptuous Golden Age of Old New York, a time when society people “dreaded scandal more than disease.”

This is Newland Archer’s world as he prepares to marry the beautiful but conventional May Welland. But when the mysterious Countess Ellen Olenska returns to New York after a disastrous marriage, Archer falls deeply in love with her. Torn between duty and passion, Archer struggles to make a decision that will either courageously define his life—or mercilessly destroy it.

My Original Thoughts (2002):

Re-read for book club. When I first read this several years ago, I fell in love with Wharton's prose and read everything by her that I could get my hands on. However, this second reading fell short of my expectations. It was a struggle to finish and I was easily distracted. I still believe it's a wonderful novel. It just didn't thrill me as it once did. Could be that I was just too busy with summer visitors. 

My Current Thoughts (2026):

I've since seen the movie starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Michelle Pfeiffer, and Winona Ryder, but can't remember if I enjoyed the film. I doubt I'll read the book a third time. However, an author (Laura Spence-Ash) who I discovered last year has a new book due out on June 1, 2027. It's titled The Thing You Most Wanted. Can't wait!

The richly perceptive and moving story of a love held in secret and carried over the course of one woman’s life—a novel that explores what devotion asks us to surrender by brilliantly recentering the iconic dilemma at the heart of Wharton’s classic, The Age of Innocence.

 Definitely on my list to buy in the coming year!

William Tugman State Park (September 2026)

 

Back in September we spent a couple of weeks camping in two of Oregon's coastal state parks. The first, William Tugman, is one that we've been to several times. It was good to test out all of the systems in our new van while enjoying the nice weather. I got in some long walks along the lake and in the forest, as well as staying consistent with my workouts (Ladder app). We drove into Coos Bay for lunch and paid a visit to the Coos History Museum. I definitely like having the van, which makes exploring nearby towns much easier when we're traveling.

Looking Back - The Time Traveler's Wife

 Looking Back... In an effort to transfer my book journal entries over to this blog, I'm going to attempt to post (in chronological order) an entry every Friday. I may or may not add extra commentary to what I jotted down in these journals.

The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

Fiction

2003

Finished on December 26, 2003

Rating: 5/5 (Outstanding!)

Second Reading:

Finished on November 6, 2026

Rating: 4.5/5 (Excellent)

Publisher's Blurb:

Audrey Niffenegger's innovative debut, The Time Traveler's Wife, is the story of Clare, a beautiful art student, and Henry, an adventuresome librarian, who have known each other since Clare was six and Henry was thirty-six, and were married when Clare was twenty-three and Henry thirty-one. Impossible but true, because Henry is one of the first people diagnosed with Chrono-Displacement periodically his genetic clock resets and he finds himself misplaced in time, pulled to moments of emotional gravity in his life, past and future. His disappearances are spontaneous, his experiences unpredictable, alternately harrowing and amusing. The Time Traveler's Wife depicts the effects of time travel on Henry and Clare's marriage and their passionate love for each other as the story unfolds from both points of view. Clare and Henry attempt to live normal lives, pursuing familiar goals--steady jobs, good friends, children of their own. All of this is threatened by something they can neither prevent nor control, making their story intensely moving and entirely unforgettable.

My Original Thoughts (2003):

Wow! What a fantastic book. I'm so glad that it was long (500+ pages) since I didn't want it to end. I became so engrossed in Henry and Clare's lives, although the structure of the novel was a little confusing at the beginning. Well, maybe not the structure, but Henry's time travel jumps. I tried not to overanalyze those details and just went along with the story. I would love to see a movie adaptation. [Looks like one was released in 2009.] This ties for 1st place in my Top Ten for 2003 (with These Is My Words). No lyrical passages, but very imaginative. I borrowed the book from the library and after finishing, decided to buy a copy for my "keeper" shelf. I loved this book!

My Current Thoughts (2026):

I'm glad I bought a copy since whenever I saw it on the shelf, I was constantly reminded that I eventually wanted to reread it. When I learned that a sequel (Life Out of Order) was in the works, I requested an advance reader copy, which I received several months ago. Despite owning a copy of Niffenegger's debut, I decided to go with the audiobook after listening to a sample and enjoyed both readers (Fred Berman and Phoebe Strole). Plus, I do most of my reading in bed and a 500+ book is heavy!

I was happy that this story stood the test of time. I loved revisiting Henry and Clare's lives, most of which I'd long forgotten. It felt as if I was reading most of the book for the first time. I was very impressed with the author's prose; the dialogue is not at all simplistic, but rather filled with wonderfully rich language. Clare is very articulate!

And now I get to read the story of Henry and Clare's daughter, Alba. It's another hefty book, but I have a feeling the pages will fly!

A Month in Summary - October 2026

 

Point Hudson Marina & RV Park

Port Townsend, Washington

October 2026

The above photo was shot from our campsite in Port Townsend. It's basically a gravel parking area with hookups for RVs, so nothing special in that regard, but the views are what makes it so special. We had wonderful weather and sat outside in the sun most of the time we were there. I enjoyed watching the Washington ferry go back and forth to Coupeville (Whidbey Island), as well as all the sailboats, kayakers, and rowers. A seal was just off the shoreline for a couple of days, and an eagle landed on a nearby channel marker, giving me a great opportunity to get some close-up photos. I'll share more about the trip in a future post.

Most of my reading was done during our road trip, which is unusual for me. We were gone for almost two weeks, and I packed several memoirs, which are easy to get into while enjoying our travels. I've been listening to the same audiobook for weeks, but am hoping to wrap it up in the next day or two. Everything I read, with the exception of one book (good, but not great), was very good!

Books Read (click on the title for my review):

Life, & Death, & Giants by Ron Rindle (4/5)

Waiting for Birdy by Catherine Newman (4.5/5)

Buckeye by Patrick Ryan (4.5/5)

Ordinary Time: Lessons Learned While Staying Put by Annie B. Jones (3/5)

Still Life at Eighty: The Next Interesting Thing by Abigail Thomas (4.5/5)

Movies & TV Series:

World Series - We're Dodgers fans, but since they didn't make to the World Series, we were rooting for the Brewers. They played so well and deserved to win. The fourth game went into extra innings with a walk off win for Tampa Bay, which made the series even more fun to watch.

Marble Hall Murders - This was a good installment in the series. I enjoyed it more than Moonflower Murders.

Reacher (Season 4) - This is really just a silly excuse for Ritchson to show off his abs. The acting is pretty awful.

The Gentlemen (Season 2) - Entertaining, and Theo James is easy on the eyes, but quite violent. I do enjoy Susie Glass, too.

Trips:

As mentioned above, we were on another road trip for just shy of two weeks. We spent a couple of days near Mount St. Helens, a night near Seattle, three nights on Whidbey Island (Deception Pass), three nights in Port Townsend, a night in Montesano, and two nights in Cannon Beach. We had fun exploring new places, as well as returning to some old favorites. I'll start blogging about that trip in the coming weeks, but will leave you with a couple of favorite photos.

Mount St. Helens

Admiralty Head Light House at Fort Casey

Whidbey Island

Deception Pass

Point Hudson Marina

Port Townsend

Still Life at Eighty

 

Still Life at Eighty: The Next Interesting Thing by Abigail Thomas

Nonfiction/Memoir

2023

Finished on October 31, 2026

Rating: 4.5/5 (Very Good)

Publisher's Blurb:

In her new memoir, Abigail Thomas ruminates on aging during the confines of COVID-19 with her trademark mix of humor and wisdom, including valuable, contemplative writing tips along the way.

As she approaches eighty, what she herself calls old age, Abigail Thomas accepts her new life, quieter than before, no driving, no dancing, mostly sitting in her chair in a sunny corner with three dogs for company—three dogs, vivid memories, bugs and birds and critters that she watches out her window. No one but this beloved, best-selling memoirist, could make so much over what might seem so little.

Memories fall like confetti, as time contracts, shoots forward, dawdles, and there she is, back in her twenties in Washington Square Park, drinking, having sex with strangers, falling in and out of love, believing in a better world. Whole decades evaporate as she sits in her chair, and a spider takes up residence beside her, who will become her boon companion for the next week.

Sometimes dread arrives, inhabits her body like a shadow and all she can do is write it away, pay attention to what catches her eye, sticks in her brain. Whatever keeps her in the moment.

Pull up a chair, have a cup of tea and enter Abigail Thomas's funny, mesmerizing, generous world.

I have now read four of Abigail Thomas's memoirs beginning with A Three Dog Life back in 2007 (coincidentally for that year's nonfiction book challenge). In that memoir, the author's husband suffered a TBI (Traumatic Brain Injury) and Thomas had to create a new life in which her husband remained in a care facility. There is a lot in that memoir that resonated with me, and I was eager to read more by the author. I went on to read What Comes Next and How to Like It in 2016. I loved that memoir even more than the previous one. Unfortunately, the next book, Safekeeping: Some True Stories From a Life, fell short for me. As with her previous works, Safekeeping is comprised of short vignettes, but the shifting POV and timeline made for a bumpy read.

And now, a fourth memoir. I loved it. First, let's look at that gorgeous cover art. The vibrant colors in the sweater are so lovely. I am not familiar with the artist, so I did a little digging.

Louisa Matthíasdóttir was an Icelandic-American painter. Louisa was born in Reykjavík. From 1925 to 1937 she grew up in the famous Höfði house since her family resided there. She showed artistic ability at an early age, and studied first in Denmark and then under Marcel Gromaire in Paris. (Wikipedia)

The painting is called Self Portrait in Long Striped Sweater. Matthiasdottir did several self-portraits and paintings of Icelandic life, as well as that of Maine. Take a look here.

Back to the book. As with her earlier memoirs, Still Life at Eighty contains vignettes ranging from one paragraph to no more than three pages. The book is divided into four parts: Being This Old, Stay-at-Home Order, Wisteria, and A Few Thoughts About Writing. It's perfect for reading in fits and spurts, which I love. Of course, I had to restrain myself from reading the entire book in one evening. I wanted to read slowly, savoring Thomas's ruminations.

There were moments when I stopped short, thinking that Abigail sounds so much older than eighty. I have two dear friends who are 79 and much more active and involved than this author. But the book was written during the Covid lockdown, which as we all know created great isolation for everyone. (How fortunate I was to be with my husband and mother during those months. I can't imagine what it would have been like to be completely alone.) And, of course, we're all different. One person at eighty may be unable to care for themselves and suffer from various physical ailments, while another is perfectly capable of living a life much like a sixty-year-old. But there were moments when I felt sad for Abigail, and that her life seemed lonely and bleak. 

On Memory:

But I know I made chicken soup three days ago and ate the last of it yesterday. I know I had two pieces of toast this morning. I sent an essay to three places two weeks ago but only remember two of them. I know I fed the dogs. I watered the geraniums and my tiny eucalyptus tree. I can still figure out the long-sleeved pullover. As long as I can put it on successfully, I'm good to go. It's when you get your head stuck in the sleeve and keep on pulling, that's when your last marble rolls under the radiator. But still. What happened last week? I come up with nothing. But nothing happened, which is a point in my favor. Does losing memories presage losing my mind? It's odd that I'm not afraid. I'm curious, but I'm not afraid.

On Chronology:

My memory is full of gaps and tiny holes. But even if I remembered everything in its proper sequence, there's a lot of life that's interesting to live but not so interesting to write about, let alone read. I'm bored by chronology. I don't even believe in chronology. Time is too weird. It contracts, then it shoots forward (or back), it dawdles, stops still, and then suddenly we're twenty years down the road. Whole decades evaporate. 

Once I finished the book, I toyed with the idea of reading it again, but I think I'll hold off. It might be fun to read the three memoirs of hers that I loved back-to-back later next year.

A Three Dog Life (4/5)

What Comes Next and How to Like It (4.5/5)

Safekeeping: Some True Stories From a Life (3.5/5)

About the Author:

You can subscribe to Thomas's substack here.

Abigail Thomas worked as both a book editor and book agent before writing her first short story collection, Getting Over Tom. Her second and third books An Actual Life, and Herb's Pajamas, were works of fiction. Her memoir, A Three Dog Life, was named one of the Best Books of the Year by The Los Angeles Times and The Washington Post. She is also author of the memoirs Safekeeping, Thinking About Memoir, and What Comes Next and How to Like It.  The daughter of renowned science writer Lewis Thomas (The Lives of a Cell), Thomas has four children, twelve grandchildren, and two great grandchildren. She lives in Woodstock, New York, with her dogs. (Simon & Schuster)

Ordinary Time: Lessons Learned While Staying Put

 

Ordinary Time: Lessons Learned While Staying Put by Annie B. Jones

Nonfiction/Memoir

2025

Finished on October 27, 2026

Rating: 3/5 (Good)

Publisher's Blurb:

Can life be an adventure, even when it’s just… ordinary?

Annie Jones always assumed adulthood would mean adventure: a high-powered career; life in a big, bustling city; and travels to far-flung places she’d longed to see. But her reality turned out differently. As the years passed, Annie was still in the same small town running an independent bookstore —the kind of life Nora Ephron dreamed.

During that time, she hosted friends’ goodbye parties and mailed parting gifts; wrote recommendation letters and wished former shop staffers well. She stayed in her small town, despite her love of big cities; stayed in her marriage to the guy she met when she was 18; and she stayed at her bookstore while the world outside shifted steadily toward digital retailers. And she stayed loyal to a faith she sometimes didn’t recognize.

After ten years, Annie realized she might never leave. But instead of regret, she had an epiphany. She awakened to the gifts of a quiet life spent staying put.

In Ordinary Time, Annie challenges the idea that loud lives matter most. Rummaging through her small-town existence, she finds hidden gifts of humor and hope from a life lived quietly. Staying, can itself be a radical act. It takes courage to stay in the places we’ve always called home, Jones argues, as she paints a portrait of possibility far away from thriving metropolises and Monica Gellar-inspired apartments.

We’ve long been encouraged to follow our dreams, to pack up and move to new places and leave old lives—and past selves—behind. While there is beauty in these kinds of adventures, Ordinary Time helps us see ourselves right where we are: in the middle of messy, mundane lives, maybe not too far from where we grew up. We don’t have to leave to find what we yearn—we can choose to stay, celebrating and honoring our ordinary lives, which might turn out to be bigger and better than we ever imagined.

I'm not a listener of podcasts, although I've tried a few out here and there over the years. The majority of those were book-related, and I found them enjoyable, but never seemed to find the time to listen. Audiobooks take priority when I'm in a situation where I want to listen to something on my walks or while running errands. This is to say that I've never listened to Annie Jone's podcast, From the Front Porch. I'm not sure when I learned about her memoir, Ordinary Time, but if I had to guess, it was from another blogger, perhaps during last year's Nonfiction November challenge.

Speaking of Nonfiction November, I got a jump start on this annual reading challenge while on our recent road trip. I especially enjoy memoirs and knew they'd be the sort of reading material that I could dip in and out of while enjoying our travels. Comprised of five sections (Staying Friends, Staying Put, Staying Faithful, Staying Grounded, and Staying You), each of which is led with an appropriate quote, Ordinary Time is exactly the sort of memoir that can be read in fits & spurts. Reading the following made me think that this book was really going to speak to me:

Everybody has a home team: It's the people you call when you get a flat tire or when something terrible happens. It's the people who, near or far, know everything that's wrong with you and love you anyways. These are the ones who tell you their secrets, who get themselves a glass of water without asking when they're at your house. These are the people who cry when you cry. These are your people, your middle-of-the-night, no-matter-what people. (Shauna Niequist, Bread and Wine) 

And yet, Ordinary Time fell short of my initial expectations. Several of the essays were repetitive, and the topic of the author's religious upbringing and current worship was more than I cared for. I did, however, appreciate her thoughts on the loss of bookstore customers, which sparked a lot of memories of those I came to know over the course of a decade while working at Barnes & Noble. I left the bookstore almost ten years ago, and yet I can still picture several of the "regulars" who frequented the store, many of whom sought me out for recommendations, as well as providing me with their own favorites. I wonder how they're doing today? Are they still alive? Do they quietly follow this blog? I guess I'll never know, which is a little sad.

If I am lucky and own The Bookshelf long enough, I will live through the deaths of countless Als and Paulas and Roses. And although I know such an outcome would be a privilege, the prospect makes me sad. It feels lonely, to keep loving people you don't really know, and depressing, to be forced to learn about their deaths through an internet search. I always believed my relationships would be deeper than this.

How naive, because the relationships that make life worth living are often the fleeting ones, the seasonal ones, the acquaintanceships we can't ever seem to define.

Overall, Ordinary Time is a fine read, but could have benefitted from more careful editing to deal with the overlap between essays.

Nonfiction November 2026

 

It's time for one of my favorite blogging challenges! I'm not terribly good about participating in the weekly prompts, but I love spending an entire month reading nothing but nonfiction. (So much so that I already started last week.) You can learn more about this challenge here. 

Click here for my previous Nonfiction November posts.

Buckeye

 

Buckeye by Patrick Ryan

Fiction

2025

Finished on October 26, 2026

Rating: 4.5/5 (Very Good)

Publisher's Blurb:

That, as he saw it now, was his life’s work: trying to make right what he’d gotten wrong. Wasn’t that a fair measure of a person, what they did with their mistakes?

In the jubilant aftermath of the Allied victory in Europe, Cal Jenkins, a man wounded not in war but by his inability to serve in it, shares a single, life-altering moment with Margaret Salt, a woman determined to outrun her past. Cal is married to Becky, whose spiritual gifts help the living speak to the dead, while Margaret’s husband, Felix, is serving at sea, believed to be safe—until a telegram suggests otherwise.

What begins as a fleeting transgression becomes a complex secret that irrevocably binds all four of them in unexpected ways. As their small Ohio town remakes itself in the postwar boom, the Salt and Jenkins families remain in each other’s orbit, and the consequences of choices made long ago begin to emerge, reshaping their lives in ways that will forever impact the next generation.

Sweeping yet intimate, resplendent with moments of deep emotion and unforgettable characters, Buckeye is a transportive story of love, loyalty, sacrifice, and forgiveness.

Buckeye is the type of novel that I love to sink into. It's a big, immersive story about two families spanning four decades, with World War II and Vietnam playing key roles.  I was drawn in from the first chapter, and although the story gets a little bogged down with Becky's narrative, that's my only quibble. I'm looking forward to discussing this debut novel with my book group, and can see reading it a second time in the coming years.

For those who have read the book, did you happen to notice the dedication? It took me a moment to realize who Ann and Karl VanDevender are, but then it dawned on me.

Highly recommend!

“Omniscient, sweeping, almost defiantly sentimental, Buckeye is a reminder of the deep pleasure of following a cast of characters over their entire lives, through births, deaths, marriages, tragedies and, in this case, hard-won reconciliations…. Ryan’s wide-angle approach complements his evocative yet tranquil style. He rolls out braided stories with uncommon patience while creating instantly vivid characters… The author clearly loves these people, and he makes the safe bet that you will, too.” — The New York Times Book Review

Waiting for Birdy

 

Waiting for Birdy: A Year of Frantic Tedium, Neurotic Angst, and the Wild Magic of Growing a Family by Catherine Newman

Nonfiction/Memoir

2005

Finished on October 21, 2026

Rating: 4.5/5 (Very Good)

Publisher's Blurb:

To fifty thousand readers, Catherine Newman is the beloved author of Bringing Up Ben & Birdy, a weekly column on babycenter.com. Now in the delightfully candid, outlandishly funny Waiting for Birdy, Newman charts the year she anticipated the birth of her second child while also coping with the realities of raising a toddler. As she navigates life with her existentially curious and heartbreakingly sweet three-year-old, and her doozy of a pregnancy, she lends her irresistibly unique voice to the secret thoughts and fears of parents everywhere. Filled with quirky warmth and razor-sharp wit, Waiting for Birdy captures the universal wonder, terror, humor, and tenderness of raising a family.

My daughter turns forty-three in December, so I'm not exactly the target audience for this memoir, but having read (and loved) Catherine Newman's more recent works, I wanted to give Waiting for Birdy a read since I enjoy her humor so well. I was not disappointed. Newman shares her thoughts and feelings about her experiences as a soon-to-be mother of two, which had me stifling laughter as I read in bed, trying hard to not wake my husband as I snorted and chuckled with each new tale. Three-year-old Ben's questions and conversations with his mother are both sweet and hilarious. If you've read Newman's novels (We All Want Impossible Things, Sandwich and Wreck), you won't want to skip this book.

Highly recommend!

Links to my reviews:

We All Want Impossible Things (5/5)

Sandwich (5/5)

Wreck (4/5)

Looking Back - How to Be Good

 Looking Back... In an effort to transfer my book journal entries over to this blog, I'm going to attempt to post (in chronological order) an entry every Friday. I may or may not add extra commentary to what I jotted down in these journals.

How to be Good by Nick Hornby

Fiction

2001

Finished on July 24, 2002

Rating: 2/5 (OK)

Publisher's Blurb:

In Nick Hornby's How to Be Good, Katie Carr is certainly trying to be. That's why she became a GP. That's why she cares about Third World debt and homelessness, and struggles to raise her children with a conscience. It's also why she puts up with her husband David, the self-styled Angriest Man in Holloway.

But one fateful day, she finds herself in a Leeds parking lot, having just slept with another man. What Katie doesn't yet realize is that her fall from grace is just the first step on a spiritual journey more torturous than the interstate at rush hour. Because, prompted by his wife's actions, David is about to stop being angry. He's about to become good--not politically correct, organic-food-eating good, but good in the fashion of the Gospels. And that's no easier in modern-day Holloway than it was in ancient Israel.

Hornby means us to take his title literally: How can we be good, and what does that mean? However, quite apart from demanding that his readers scrub their souls with the nearest available Brillo pad, he also mesmerizes us with that cocktail of wit and compassion that has become his trademark. The result is a multifaceted jewel of a book: a hilarious romp, a painstaking dissection of middle-class mores, and a powerfully sympathetic portrait of a marriage in its death throes.

My Original Thoughts (2002):

I enjoyed the British side to this novel, but didn't really like the characters. Katie & David have a horrid relationship and speak to each other, in front of their two children, with such lack of respect that I was turned off immediately. I think the premise of the novel is good, but I didn't see the humor. Really doubt I'll read more by Hornby.

My Current Thoughts:

I have yet to read another book by Nick Hornby. Was it a matter of poor timing? Am I missing something?

Looking Back - The Lovely Bones

 Looking Back... In an effort to transfer my book journal entries over to this blog, I'm going to attempt to post (in chronological order) an entry every Friday. I may or may not add extra commentary to what I jotted down in these journals.

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

Fiction

2002

Finished July 16, 2002

Rating: 4/5 (Very Good)

Publisher's Blurb:

"My name was Salmon, like the fish; first name, Susie. I was fourteen when I was murdered on December 6, 1973."

So begins the story of Susie Salmon, who is adjusting to her new home in heaven, a place that is not at all what she expected, even as she is watching life on earth continue without her -- her friends trading rumors about her disappearance, her killer trying to cover his tracks, her grief-stricken family unraveling. Out of unspeakable tragedy and loss, The Lovely Bones succeeds, miraculously, in building a tale filled with hope, humor, suspense, even joy.

My Original Thoughts (2002):

An interesting perspective on the afterlife of a murdered teen. Susie Salmon is raped and murdered in the first few pages of Sebold's remarkable novel. Susie narrates the story, allowing the reader to see through her eyes how family and friends deal with their loss while they attempt to discover who killed her in such a violent manner. Extremely well-written, yet disturbing to this mother of a teenage daughter. I did enjoy the little glimpses of "heaven" through Susie's eyes. It was easy to care about the characters. Great storytelling!

My Current Thoughts:

I think I watched the movie version of this, which came out in 2009. Despite the great storytelling, this is not one that I'd like to read a second time.

Favorite Novels with Older Characters

 

I feel as if I've shared a similar list of books with favorite "older" characters in the past, but decided to put together a visual for future reference. Every one of these books is worth reading more than once. I've re-read a few and look forward to re-visiting the others in the not-too-distant future. 

The Correspondent by Virginia Evans (read twice) (5/5)

Fellowship Point by Alice Elliott Dark (5/5)

Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout (read twice) (4.5/5 and 4/5)

Our Souls at Night by Kent Haruf (4.5/5)

Sipsworth by Simon Van Booy (4/5)

Winter Solstice by Rosamunde Pilcher (read twice) (5/5)

Olive, Again by Elizabeth Strout (read twice) (5/5 and 4.5/5)

Henry, Himself by Stewart O'Nan (5/5)

We Spread by Iain Reid (4.5/5)

Emily, Alone by Stewart O'Nan (4.75/5)

Still Life with Bread Crumbs by Anna Quindlen (4/5)

Evensong by Stewart O'Nan (3/5)*

Night of Miracles by Elizabeth Berg (5/5)

A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman (4.5/5)

Evenings at Five by Gail Godwin (read twice) (4/5)

The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery (4.5/5)

A Year of Pleasures by Elizabeth Berg (5/5)

Update:

Mad Mabel by Sally Hepworth (4.5/5)

*So odd. I thought I enjoyed this one better until I re-read my review!