116. The Coal Gatherer

By Janet Woods
Rated 3 1/2 Stars


This book is written in the style of Catherine Cookson Novel,.

Set in the North of Victorian England, Calandra Ingram known as Callie meets Patricia Lazarus and her brother James whilst gathering sea coal at the waters edge, they strike up a friendship that will last for ever, despite their different backgrounds. When Callie is offered the post of companion to Patricia, it is the first step in her journey to a better life ... very predictable ending but still kind of fun.

113. A Place Beyond Courage

By Elizabeth Chadwick
Rated 5++++++ Stars!

No one comes as close to putting the reader in the position of being a fly on the wall so to speak of their stories as Elizabeth Chadwick does.

What I think is particularly wonderful about A Place Beyond Courage is that John Marshall is really not a very heroic figure as hero's are defined in novels. Susan has managed to breath life and humanity as well as creating sympathy for a character whom I suspect was pretty much a self serving cold fish of a person.

The real life John Marshall changed sides far to often for me to get any sense of his having the code of honor that was prevalent in his time. Many men died trying to live up to their code of honor while John Marshall seems to have honored only his own self interest. Also the way he dumped Aline really bothered me. A man of honor would not have notified her by letter that she has become an inconvenience.

The only self serving thing he did that I even come close to understanding was a.) surrendering William as a hostage since that was common practice at the time and b.) giving that little hammer and anvil speech (never let them see you sweat) since I agree with the author's conclusion that it was in Williams interest that John not show how much (if it was indeed much) that William meant to him. I am sure that he cared some, because he was human after all.

The tender love story between him and Sybilla is, IMO, all from the author's imagination as I don't think there is any real evidence that they did other than get married and have children together. It's lovely to think of her version as fact but I guess I am just too much of a skeptic. But it sure made for great reading.

The fact that the author managed to spin such a wonderful story while incorporating all these facts is a true testament to her as a writer. I love the John Marshall of her story. But I suspect that very few, if anyone from his time would recognize the man he was as the man she was writing about.

Now his son William, (The Greatest Knight) that is another thing entirely. Every thing she wrote about him was absolutely, positively true. I know this because my heart tells me so.

112. Shakespeare, The world a stage

By Bill Bryson
Rated 5+++++ Stars

Bill Bryson is an author whose books really resonate with me. I am sure that he could write a book on the Influence of Politics and Religion in Common Earth Worm colonys and I would not only rush out to buy it but would then also rate it 5 stars. There is something about his take on things combined with the way he uses languages that really appeals to me as a reader.

In this book he starts off explaining that virtually nothing aside from his published works is really known about Shakespeare's life except that records have been found documenting that he was a) born and b) who his parents were, c) that he married Ann Hathaway and fathered three children, d) lived at some point in London and e) died and is buried in Stratford.

Copied from a review on amazon: And then, because he is the writer he is, takes close to 200 pages to cover it. One would think that 200 pages covering "nothing" would grow tedious. One would be wrong!!! (three exclamatio points, if you please.) So charmigly does Bryson write; so entertainingly does he explicate WHY nothing is known, and how to best understand that nothing, that the book is an unending source of knowledge and delight. ANY writer can write about SOMETHING. It takes the massive talents of the Thunderbolt Kid to write this well about nothing. He makes "Seinfeld" look loquacious.

111. World Without End

by Ken Follett
Rated 5 Stars

Every once in a while, like in a Blue Moon maybe, a book comes along that is clearly way out ahead of most other books.

World Without End takes place in the same town of Kingsbridge, two centuries after the townspeople finished building the exquisite Gothic cathedral that was at the heart of The Pillars of the Earth. The cathedral and the priory are again at the center of a web of love and hate, greed and pride, ambition and revenge, but this sequel stands on its own. This time the men and women of an extraordinary cast of characters find themselves at a crossroad of new ideas--about medicine, commerce, architecture, and justice. In a world where proponents of the old ways fiercely battle those with progressive minds, the intrigue and tension quickly reach a boiling point against the devastating backdrop of the greatest natural disaster ever to strike the human race--the Black Death.

I went over to Amazon and looked closely at the reviews and noted that of 104 reviewers, 53% had given it 5 stars and 18 four stars. Obviously this is a love it or hate it kind of book.

There are a couple of things I think might be the reason for the bad reviews. One thing is that Folett is not primarily a historical fiction writer and a great many of his books have been thrillers. So his writing style tends to be pretty gritty. Also, while there is a strong love story (and a couple of minor ones) running through this book it is not a romance novel. It's the story of a 14th century community in a cathedral market town and at times his vision of 14 century life makes me a little uncomfortable. Plausible, but still a little uncomfortable. Especially what passed for justice and fairness.

I caught myself being sympathetic to be baddies in the book simply because it seemed to me that the only way someone of the "lower classes" might improve their circumstances was with either brawn and hopefully a few brains thrown in.Luck played a huge part in this and I found I couldn't really blame some of the characters who seized any and every opportunity that came their way, fair means or fowl. In fact, there is one female character who has, IMO, a definite Claire Frazer attitude towards survival.

One of the reviewers noted that Charis was a feminist and therefore out of place in the 14th century. Obviously this reviewer had never read anything about Eleanor of Aquitaine to name just one because there are many. She came immediately to mind because she is a particular favorite of mine. I think this reviewer was not much of a reader. Also there was a small incidence of lesbianism and as we all know the slightest whiff of anything homosexual drives the homophobes into an orgasmic frenzy.

110. Tomb of Zeus

By Barbara Cleverly
Rated 4 1/2 Stars

This is a new series for Cleverly and I am looking forward to reading the subsequent books. However I hope she doesn't abandon Inspector Joe Sandilands of Scotland Yard as I have become very fond of him. This book reminds me a tiny bit of Elizabeth Peter's heroine Vicky Bliss as I think there is more to her boyfriend than meets the eye.

--BOOK JACKET. "Born into a background of British privilege, Laetitia Talbot has been raised to believe there is no field in which she may not excel. She has chosen a career in the male-dominated world of archaeology, but she approaches her first assignment in Crete the only way she knows how - with dash and enthusiasm. Until she enters the Villa Europa, where something is clearly utterly amiss ..." "Her host, a charismatic archaeologist, is racing to dig up the fabled island's next great treasure - the tomb of the King of the Gods. But then a beautiful young woman is found hanged and a golden youth drives his Bugatti over a cliff. From out of the shadows come whispers of past loves, past jealousies, and ancient myths that sound an eerie discord with present events. Letty will need all her determination and knowledge to unravel the secrets beneath the Villa Europa's roof - and they will lead her into the darkest, most terrifying place of all."

109. License to Kill

By Robert Young Pelton
Rated 5 Chilling Stars

I got interested in this last book (here is where the boring part of this post starts) because as I may have complained about before, I have had a sleep disorder for a long time and have recently developed a sensitivity to my meds for it so I have been spending a lot of sleepless hours in the middle of the night. I have found this marvelous late night radio program called Coast to Coast AM that discusses all sorts of crazy stuff that is fun to listen to. Ghosts, Encounters with and abductions by extraterrestrial creatures, werewolves and anything paranormal in general. Lately they have started to discuss other topics as I think that even the seriously looney tunes folks have finally figured out that things in this country are maybe not going as well as they were led to believe.

The other night they had a serious duscussion with author and adventurer Robert Young Pelton discussed his latest book, Licensed to Kill: Hired Guns in the War on Terror. Usually I kind of doze through the programs as they are 3 hours long but that night it was so interesting that I was wide awake the whole time. So I immediately requested the book from the library.

Between the program and the book I now have a much better understanding
on the private security companies like Blackwater. On the program they opened the phone lines and many of these contractors called in and gave their sides of
the story and what had motivated them to go to work for these contractors in the first place and how the contractors fit into the big picture. It was an amazing look into something I knew nothing about before and hearing it from real people has a lot more impact that just reading it. I didn't know that there were many other contracting firms besides Blackwater and not all of them were American firms. Britain, Germany and France also have contractors there and on the
other hand, all of these contractors operate all over the world not just in the middle east. I guess the fact that the US has been handing out money (between May of 2003 and June of 2004 393 tons of $100 bills were shipped to Iraq and have to this day not been accounted for) like it was candy is a major factor for the proliferation these companies.

There is a very disturbing thought that follows the logic of "Licensed To Kill". Back in the early 90's the U.S. government used sections of U.S. Code to prohibit militias from forming 'private armies'. Now Private companies can field a well equipped battalion at very short moment's notice. Since the U.S. Government is prohibited by law to use it's own militaries domestically could it then legally 'hire' a private force to quell a domestic disturbance? The question of what all can private armies be used for can be greatly expanded beyond foreign wars and conflicts. Can our own military be replaced by private contracts? How about our police forces across the country? I am not trying to sound conspiratorial here but I think that what the contractors have seen and what the author has written about is the very beginning of a long trend that will likely grow beyond what anyone thinks now. I am afraid that this particular "genie" that has been let out of the bottle might turn around and eat us.

So if you find you are getting too much sleep at night - Read This Book.

108. Garden Spells

By Sara Addison Allen
Rated 4 Stars

"In a garden surrounded by a tall fence, tucked away behind a small, quiet house in the smallest of towns, is an apple tree that is rumored to bear a very special sort of fruit. In this debut novel, Sarah Addison Allen tells the story of that enchanted tree, and the extraordinary people who tend it." "The Waverleys have always been a curious family, endowed with peculiar gifts that make them outsiders even in their hometown of Bascom, North Carolina. Even their garden has a reputation, famous for its feisty apple tree that bears prophetic fruit, and its edible flowers, imbued with special powers. Generations of Waverleys tended this garden. Their history was in the soil. But so were their futures." "A successful caterer, Claire Waverley prepares dishes made with her mystical plants - from the nasturtiums that aid in keeping secrets and the pansies that make children thoughtful, to the snapdragons intended to discourage the attentions of her amorous neighbor. Meanwhile, her elderly cousin, Evanelle, is known for distributing unexpected gifts whose uses become uncannily clear. They are the last of the Waverleys - except for Claire's rebellious sister, Sydney, who fled Bascom the moment she could, abandoning Claire, as their own mother had years before." "When Sydney suddenly returns home with a young daughter of her own, Claire's quiet life is turned upside down - along with the protective boundary she has so carefully constructed around her heart. Together again in the house they grew up in, Sydney takes stock of all she left behind, as Claire struggles to heal the wounds of the past. And soon the sisters realize they must deal with their common legacy - if they are ever to feel at home in Bascom - or with each other."--BOOK JACKET.

107. The Glass Castle

By Jeannette Walls
Rated 5 Stars

This was, in the words of my dreadful friend Stacy, a jaw dropping book. For one you assume there are social services that are supposed to catch kids like these but apparently the "safety net" if there is one anymore has large holes in it. Where was the school lunch program, the welfare people, the health department or the churches that are supposed to help kids that scrounge in garbage cans and live in shacks with no heat or plumbing and sleep in cardboard boxes with tarps over them because when it rains the roof leaks like a sieve? You have to wonder how many children live like this while
society frets about embryo's.

Then I also had to wonder what made the difference that allowed these particular children to rise up out of this and make something of their lives when so many others don't. I finally concluded that the only thing their parents did right was to encourage them to read and access the library. Knowing there was another way of life is the only thing I can think of that could have given them the motivation to bail out the first chance they got.

And last it made me realize that some people (the parents in this book certainly) actually choose to live like this because these particular parents certainly had the intelligence, education, and resources to live a decent life had they desired too. I think it was the resources part of this, the
mother's land worth a ton of money, her two carat diamond ring while thier children wore rags, froze and starved is what knocked me for a loop. Had this been fiction I would have considered it over the top.

In fact though, I went over to Amazon and read some of the reviews and there were a couple that people wrote who didn't believe this could possibly be true and then some guy from Welsh, W.V. who knew of the family corroborated it.

106. I am America (and so can you.)

By Stephen Colbert
Rated 5 Stars

Stephen Colbert makes this trying time we live in a tiny bit more bearable. His take on things helps me keep some of the things that are going on in perspective.


"This book contains all of the opinions that Stephen doesn't have time to shoehorn into his nightly broadcast, his most deeply held knee-jerk beliefs on The American Family, Race, Religion, Sex, Sports, and many more topics, conveniently arranged in chapter form. Stephen addresses why Hollywood is destroying America by inches, why evolution is a fraud, and why the elderly should be harnessed to millstones. You may not agree with everything Stephen says, but at the very least, you'll understand that your differing opinion is wrong."--From publisher description.

105. The Black Rose

By Thomas B. Costain
Rated 4 1/2 Stars

While looking for something else in my storage room I ran across a box of books by Thomas B. Costain that I had bought several years ago and then forgot I had. So I dragged them out and this morning I finished The Black Rose. It was published in 1945 and while the writing is a little dated (the herione is stupid in order to make the hero look good) it is still a darn good yarn.

From the Dust Jacket: This exciting historical novel moves from England after the Crusades to the Orient of Kublai Khan. It's the story of a young English nobleman who fights his way to the heart of the fabulous Mongol empire and returns to find that he must choose between an English heiress and an enchanting girl of the East.

After Walter of Gurnie, batard son of the Earl of Lessford, became embroiled in the Oxford riots of 1273 he left college and sailed east to seek further knowledge and riches along the spice trails leading into the land of Cathay. He left behind the lovely Lady Engaine who had decided to marry another, but with him went his best friend, the blond archer, Tristram Griffen.

In Antioch they had to deal with the fat, all-powerful merchant, Anthemus, who arranged to send them with one of his opulent caravans into China to meet Kublai Khan's great general, Bayan of the Hundred Eyes. With them as presents for the Khan went a harem of Antioch beauties, including Maryam, daughter of an English crusader and a Grecian woman. Both Walter and Tristram fell in love with her and under Bayan's very nose helped her to escape. For this, Walter was tortured by means of the ingenious Rope Walk, but he survived it, was restored to Bayan's favor, and was made an emissary to the city of Kinsai.

In Kinsai Walter met Maryam again and married her, but in trying to get away they were separated and Walter and Tristram made the long journey back to England where they were welcomed as rich and famous heroes. Walter waited for Maryam to make her way across half the globe, but as the months slid into years he began to give up hope and to turn to his first love, Engaine. How Walter overcame the stigma of his birth and resolved the conflict of his double love make a stirring and dramatic climax.

Although the course of the narrative is marked by breathless action, this is essentially a love story, and one of great warmth and tenderness. The characters are so completely alive and believable, and the tapestry of the period is so vividly woven in the fascinating background, that the reader emerges with the sense of having actually lived for many engaging hours in the Middle Ages.

104. Crawfish Mountain

By Ken Wells
Rated 5 Stars

Loved this book!

"Justin Pitre's marsh island, a legacy of his trapper grandfather, is a scenic rival to anything in the Everglades, and he has promised to protect it from all harm. But he hasn't counted on oil bigwig Tom Huff's plans to wreck this bayou paradise by ramming a pipeline through it. When cajolery doesn't sway Justin to sign the land over, Huff turns to darker methods. But Justin and his spirited wife, Grace, prove to be formidable adversaries - and the game is on." "Into the fray comes the charismatic Cajun governor, Joe T. Evangeline, who seems more interested in chasing skirts than saving Louisiana's eroding coast. The Guv, though, is a man on the edge, upended by a midlife crisis and torn between a secret political obligation to Big Oil and the persuasive powers of Julie Galjour, a feisty environmentalist. Julie is clearly out to reform more than the Guv's ecopolitics, but will his tragicomic Big Oil deals wreck both his career and his chances with the brash and beautiful activist?" "As Justin and Grace battle to stop this Big Oil assault, the plot thickens - and the Guv becomes snared in the web. Featuring a gumbo of eccentrics and lowlifes, a kidnapping, a sexy snitch, a toxic-waste-dumping scheme, a boat chase, and a fishing trip gone horribly awry, Crawfish Mountain, spiced with Ken Wells's keen eye for locale, showcases his adventurous storytelling."--BOOK JACKET.

103. Coming Home

By Rosamund Pilcher
Rated 4 1/2 Stars

This is another one of Golden Oldie rereads.

From the BOOK JACKET: "Against the backdrop of an elegant Cornwall mansion before World War II and a vast continent-spanning canvas during the turbulent war years, this involving story tells of an extraordinary young woman's coming of age, coming to grips with love and sadness, and in every sense of the term, coming home... In 1935, Judith Dunbar is left behind at a British boarding school when her mother and baby sister go off to join her father in Singapore. At Saint Ursula's, her friendship with Loveday Carey-Lewis sweeps her into the privileged, madcap world of the British aristocracy, teaching her about values, friendship, and wealth. But it will be the drama of war, as it wrenches Judith from those she cares about most, that will teach her about courage...and about love. Teeming with marvelous, memorable characters in a novel that is a true masterpiece, Coming Home is a book to be savored, reread, and cherished forever."