Catching Up

Remember how my job was kicking my butt for months on end? And remember how I said there was light at the end of the tunnel, and after that, I would finally be able to breathe a little easier, relax a little more, and keep up a little better with the blog?

Blah.

Work is STILL kicking my butt. And yes the “end in sight” I was waiting for did come, but turns out I’m still working way more hours than I’d like to work and not spending my downtime doing anything at all blog-related. But at this point I’m so over the little, nagging feelings of guilt I was still holding onto about neglecting the blog. It’s just been neglected, and I’m completely okay with that. I’m doing my best here.

My brother and his girlfriend have been in town for just under two weeks now. It’s been an absolute blast having them around – we’ve done all four Disney parks, Universal Studios/Islands of Adventure, taken them to all of our favorite restaurants and hang-out spots, and at some point it became a good idea for them to adopt two kittens to take home to Chicago/Milwaukee where they both live and divide their time. And of course, over the course of their visit, I haven’t taken any vacation days! Just a couple of regular days off (which is nice in and of itself). So it’s been a whirlwind. They leave tomorrow and while I’m sad to see them go – it’s been really fantastic spending this much time with the two of them – I’m ready to carve out a little more of my so very valuable free time for myself.

I have two vacations planned this summer, and hope to spend a lot of my additional free time at the pool and beach (and of course, theme parks). So quite honestly I don’t know how often or in what capacity I’ll be blogging. But there’s no quitting happening here, things are just going to go at whatever pace I can handle. I’ve been reading and have quite a backlog of books I can talk about. Although I’m only reading about a book a week, maybe two in a good week, I have been reading some good stuff and I’d love to tell you guys about it.

Anyways. All that is to say that I am still here! Alive and well. Just busy. Life gets in the way sometimes, and I’m just lucky that I do have a great career, lovely family and friends, and great aspects of life to get in the way of blogging. I’m totally cool with it, and am ready to go with the flow and enjoy my summer.

What have you been up to?

Love Times Three by Joe, Alina, Vicki and Valerie Darger

Love Times Three: Our True Story of a Polygamous Marriage by Joe, Alina, Vicki and Valerie Darger
Published by HarperOne, an imprint of HarperCollins
Review copy received at SIBA

From the publisher:

He runs his own business and coaches Little League. She drives a minivan, and she’d be lost without her trusty BlackBerry. They go on date nights. Their kids attend public schools, play sports, and take music lessons. They live in a roomy house in the ‘burbs. They’re about as mainstream as families come.

They’re also polygamists.

Love Times Three, the first-ever memoir of a polygamous family, is a riveting inside look at a world most of us can hardly imagine, revealing the extraordinary workings of the Dargers’ day-to-day life.

In this intimate, inside story, the Dargers explain why they chose this path despite the pressures of keeping their relationships secret and the jealousy and personal challenges that naturally ensue, why they believe polygamy should be an accepted lifestyle, and, ultimately, why they hope that by revealing their way of life in public, laws that criminalize their lifestyle might change.

I’m not afraid to admit that the whole concept of polygamy is fascinating to me. I’d venture to say that I’m like most women in that the idea of sharing my husband with another woman is horrifying and not something I’d even consider. What’s fascinating about it is that I’m appalled by the idea, yet completely aware of the fact that there are women who actually choose this life, actually want to share their husbands with another woman, or in this case, with a couple of other women. And I have to admit, in this book the Dargers made me believe that they believe in it, that they truly believe that this is what God wants for them, and that this is the right choice for each one of them individually and for the four of them as a family.

While Love Times Three isn’t the most well-written book out there, the four members of the Darger family presented a compelling case for why their life is just like ours, except for the fact that they have more people in their household than most families. Once I got into the book, I was almost able to forget that I was reading about a polygamist family and instead felt like I was reading about how each of these couples (Joe with each of his wives) met and fell in love, and created a home, family, and life together. I have to say, the four of them come off as incredibly genuine, real, honest people who are just trying to be accepted for who they are, and for who they believe God has created them to be. I couldn’t help making a comparison in my mind to the concept of gay marriage, which I firmly believe should be legal. So many of the arguments the Dargers make for why they should be allowed to be legally married echoed those of the pro-gay marriage arguments that it woke me up and alerted me to the fact that, hey, these people just want their love recognized under the law just like you or I. I gotta say, I can see their point.

This book was honestly a kind of revelation for me. I am still fascinated by this concept, and cannot even imagine living this life myself, but I have to tell you that Love Times Three opened my eyes a bit. If these four people are all consenting adults in their relationship, what’s the harm in that? I think there’s definitely some questions in my mind as far as raising kids to believe that polygamy is the “right” way to do things, but what’s the difference between that and raising kids to believe any particular religion is “right”? Kids grow up and make their own choices anyway. I don’t know. Bottom line, I’m glad I read this one because it forced me to look inside myself and take apart my own preconceived notions, assumptions, and judgement about the polygamous culture and “lifestyle” (although I hate that word when used towards the LGBT community so I probably shouldn’t use it in this context either, but whatever). Anyway … recommended!

Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline

Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline
Published by William Morrow Paperbacks, an imprint of HarperCollins
Review copy provided by She Reads

From the publisher:

Between 1854 and 1929, so-called orphan trains ran regularly from the cities of the East Coast to the farmlands of the Midwest, carrying thousands of abandoned children whose fates would be determined by pure luck. Would they be adopted by a kind and loving family, or would they face a childhood and adolescence of hard labor and servitude?

As a young Irish immigrant, Vivian Daly was one such child, sent by rail from New York City to an uncertain future a world away. Returning east later in life, Vivian leads a quiet, peaceful existence on the coast of Maine, the memories of her upbringing rendered a hazy blur. But in her attic, hidden in trunks, are vestiges of a turbulent past.

Seventeen-year-old Molly Ayer knows that a community-service position helping an elderly widow clean out her attic is the only thing keeping her out of juvenile hall. But as Molly helps Vivian sort through her keepsakes and possessions, she discovers that she and Vivian aren’t as different as they appear. A Penobscot Indian who has spent her youth in and out of foster homes, Molly is also an outsider being raised by strangers, and she, too, has unanswered questions about the past.

Moving between contemporary Maine and Depression-era Minnesota, Orphan Train is a powerful tale of upheaval and resilience, second chances, and unexpected friendship.

When I found out the lovely ladies behind She Reads chose Orphan Train for our May read, I was beyond excited. I’d already been eyeing this title – ever since reading The Chaperone the concept of orphan trains has fascinated me, and I was looking forward to reading more about this interesting topic, something I’d never heard of before The Chaperone exposed me to the concept. So it goes without saying that my expectations for Orphan Train might have been a little on the high side.

Happily, this novel lived up to these too-high expectations! Orphan Train is my favorite kind of historical fiction – the kind that is built around a particular time in history, and teaches me something, but mostly is about the characters living inside the piece of history. And these characters were great. I particularly felt a connection with Molly, and truly I would have liked even more of her story to have been told in this novel. She was such a good person, deep down, who just needed an adult in her life to draw out her potential and show her what love looks like. It was such a pleasure to read as her character grew over the course of the novel and began to come into her own, inspired by the love she found in the few people around her who bothered to care.

And Vivian! The awful conditions she was forced to live with as a child astounded me, and how horrific that these adults who were charged to “take care of her” treated her in such vile, inhumane ways. It truly made me want to throw up. Or cry. Probably both. At the end of the book, when a few loose ends have finally been wrapped up for her, I wanted to sneak inside the pages and hug her like I would my own grandmother. What a sweet, but incredibly resilient and strong woman she was.

Christina Baker Kline’s writing is simple but incredibly effective. I found myself racing through the pages, desperate to get to the bottom of Vivian’s story and find out if Molly would, finally, find some peace within herself. I clung to these characters and, while I wanted to know how their stories ended, I didn’t want the book itself to end. I found so much to appreciate and enjoy about this book, I truly don’t feel that I’ve explained it well enough.

Orphan Train is a beautiful historical novel that I honestly could not put down. I loved these characters and if I have any complaints about the book, I would have liked it to be even longer. I could have easily spent another 100 pages curled up with this story, with these women, as I learned about them and from their lives. Once again, She Reads does a great job with choosing their monthly selection – this was an excellent choice. I’m so glad I got the opportunity to read it.

The Sunday Salon

What a week it’s been. Another loooong work week for me but it was broken up in the middle by my spending Wednesday and Thursday at the Disney parks. My husband likes to spend several days at Disney for his birthday every year – he’s a kid at heart – and this year he spent a third day there with his mom and aunt while I went back to work on Friday. Those two days were great, though – we hit just about every ride, show, and attraction you can get to in two days. AND we actually bought annual passes this year, so we plan to spend much more time there in the months to come.

Besides work and Disney I haven’t been up to much. I have been reading (yay!!) but not writing about any of the books (sadface). And as we have plans for today, I doubt you’ll see any reviews this coming week either. Maybe I’ll write one or two. We’ll see. BUT tomorrow is the light at the end of my long, dark, difficult work tunnel so in the coming weeks and months I should be working fewer hours and feeling less stressed while I work them. I’m very, VERY excited for that to be the case.

This weekend has been a good one so far. Yesterday after getting home from work there was still enough sun for me to read poolside for an hour or so before going out to dinner at one of our absolute favorite restaurants, Funky Monkey Wine Company. And I ate some of the most delicious scallops I’ve EVER tasted. Yum. Today we are going to see Jurassic Park in 3-D! I’m looking forward to it. I remember seeing the movie for the first time as a kid and being TERRIFIED. So I’m pretty sure those feelings will come back and when the t-rex pops his massive, scary 3-D head right out of the movie screen I’ll be scared to death. Yay!

That’s all I got for today. What are you up to this Sunday? How has your week been? Ooh, I forgot, yesterday was Readathon day! Did you participate and how was it?

Mini-reviews: Cinder, Requiem and Anya’s Ghost

Cinder by Marissa Meyer
Published by Square Fish, an imprint of Macmillan

I have seen several raving reviews for Cinder and while I definitely liked it, I can’t say it was love for me. I definitely loved the concept, and thought that Meyer took the Cinderella story and crafted an incredibly unique re-telling, and I really liked the characters, especially Cinder herself. I listened to the audio and the narrator, Rebecca Soler, did an excellent job. Such a good job, in fact, that I made sure to get the second installment of this series, Scarlet, on audio as well. I’m definitely a fan of this novel and am excited to see what Meyer does with the series. I think dystopian novels are just becoming old hat for me these days. I haven’t fallen in LOVE with one in a long time. But Cinder is good, definitely well-written, thoughtful, great characters. I’d still recommend it for sure.

Requiem by Lauren Oliver
Published by HarperCollins

I FINALLY got Requiem from the library and cracked it open immediately upon returning home. For much of the novel, I must admit to feeling underwhelmed. I was, strangely, more interested in Hana’s story than in Lena’s. I found Lena’s portions of the novel more meandering, with too much happening. There was a revolution, there was a love triangle (sort of), there was the possibility of her mother being back in her life … it was too much, and because of all of that not enough attention was given to any one aspect of Lena’s story. Hana’s, on the other hand, was fascinating because she was living in the world as a Cured, engaged to one of the most prominent men in society, and she was learning major Important Things about this world. Overall, I was kept interested in the book but was disappointed in the ending and almost felt like it could have been four books instead of three.

Anya’s Ghost by Vera Brosgol
Published by First Second, an imprint of Macmillan

Sometimes a graphic novel is exactly the kind of book I need to entertain me without too much effort on my part. I really liked this one, in which a girl falls into a well, finds the ghost of a girl who fell in that same well many years ago, and befriends the ghost. The illustrations in this one were gorgeous, the story is one of those that has a light lesson within, and I was overall incredibly entertained and interested in this story that Brosgol told. For those of you who enjoy a graphic novel every now and again, like myself, Anya’s Ghost is not to be missed.

TSS: Catching Up

Yesterday I realized I’d neglected to write any reviews to post this past week … oops! Some of you know how crazy my life has been these past few months, and it’s just really starting to catch up with me. The little free time I do have these days has been spent doing many things, none of which include being in front of a computer writing reviews. So, at this point, it is what it is and I’m just going to do the best I can.

Last weekend was an excellent one, I must admit. Saturday I was blessed to find someone to fill in for me at work and was therefore able to attend the UCF Book Festival. I got to spend the day with blogger-friends, met a new-to-me blogger who also lives right here in Central Florida (hi, Kerry Ann!) and went to various author panels. After the festival was over, we went out for dinner and drinks with several of the authors and it was way too much fun. I’m telling you, there’s something about loving someone’s book and then getting to know them in person, only to find out they are just as awesome a person as you’d always hoped … it’s magic, I tell you. It was truly a fantastic day.

This week was absolutely insane, with the Boston manhunt, the explosion in Texas, and all of the other tragedies that happened around the globe. I didn’t watch much of the news (not a huge TV news person) but I was following along online all week and just praying for the people who were dealing with this in their own backyards while I was safe at work and home here in Florida. All I can say is thank God there are more good people in the world than awful ones.

Personally my week was good. I worked a lot (as is par for the course these days), but did get to enjoy book club this week. We sort of discussed The Book Thief (I say sort of because that restaurant was LOUD), and ate delicious Mexican food. It was a fun evening. And last night, hubby and I enjoyed a lovely church service and after that, headed out to dinner with another couple at the yummy (and healthy!) Seasons 52.

This coming week is going to be a great one. My kid-at-heart husband loves spending a few days at the Disney parks for his birthday every year, and this is the week we’re doing that. We reserved a few nights at one of the resorts there, and we’ll be spending Wednesday and Thursday park-hopping to his heart’s content. Of course, every other day I’ll be slaving away at work, while he has the luxury of taking the entire week for vacation, but I can’t complain. I was able to get someone to take care of things for me so I spend a few days with him, so no negativity here! I’m just excited for those couple of days.

I might eke out a couple of reviews today. MIGHT. If not, the blog will be dead for another week and I’ll just have to be okay with that. I’m still reading, but not very much, so taking a week off here and there is actually helpful. We will just see how things go.

What about you? What do you have going on today?

The Memory Thief by Emily Colin

The Memory Thief by Emily Colin
Published by Ballantine Books, an imprint of Random House
Review copy received at SIBA

One devastating night, Maddie Kimble receives the news she’s been dreading ever since she met her husband, Aidan – his adventurous, thrill-seeking ways have finally caught up to him and he was killed in an avalanche while climbing Mount McKinley. Maddie is left alone to care for their young son, Gabe, and the only person who can even begin to understand what she’s feeling is Aidan’s best friend, J.C. – who also happens to have been in love with Maddie for years. Hundreds of miles away, Nicholas Sullivan, upon waking up in a hospital bed, learns he’s just barely survived a motorcycle crash. With no memories of his life accessible to him, he strangely begins taking on new habits and behaviors, as well as dreaming about a woman and young child he’s never met before. As Maddie’s and Nicholas’s worlds collide, their lives will both be changed in dramatic, unexpected ways.

I’ve had this one languishing on my shelves since I received it in September at SIBA, so the fact that Emily Colin will be at the UCF Book Festival THIS weekend was the exact kick in the pants I needed to read it.

So, I feel compelled to mention this right off the bat – there is a bit of a supernatural thing going on in this book. You kind of can’t let the stuff that is not actually possible get in your way of enjoying the book. You just have to go with it and let Colin take you on this beautiful journey. Which she does – but you need to suspend your disbelief for a while to go there.

That being said, I found The Memory Thief to be a wonderful novel with so much to love. Maddie tugged at my heartstrings and oh my gosh, Gabe! What an adorable, insightful child he was. The reader gets to know Aidan only through Maddie’s memories, so I can’t say that I got to know him very well, but I must admit that I liked J.C. quite a bit more than the Aidan Maddie presented to the reader. This of course made it much easier for me to appreciate the fact that J.C. is also in love with Maddie, but I’m sure that was a move on the author’s part to get the reader to feel more sympathy for Maddie and J.C.’s situation. Which I definitely did.

At its heart, this is a love story. It’s a story of Maddie and Aidan’s love, but it is also the story of how Maddie found love after his death. It’s a love story fraught with complications, so it definitely is more interesting than your typical romance, but I was pulled into the book most often by the romantic aspects of it. And I rooted for Maddie to find the peace and happiness she truly deserved the whole time I was reading the book – to the point where I wanted to stand up and cheer when things went the way I was banking on them going!

So. The supernatural stuff was difficult for me to swallow, but once I got past it (in my mind, not in the book), I was able to really enjoy this beautifully crafted story Emily Colin has put together. If you like women’s fiction, or romance, or a combination of the two, I’d highly recommend trying out The Memory Thief.