7. Women of the Silk

By Gail Tsukiyama
Rated 4.5 Stars
Library

This book was a very fast read.  It's listed as YA and I think that must translate into fewer pages (268) slightly larger font (although I don't know why young adults should need larger fonts ) and 1.5 line spacing.   I  enjoyed it and recommend it highly.  I have it's sequel, The Language of Threads and will be starting it this afternoon.  Between them they make one average size book.  Well, average for me that. is.


Why do reviewers say every book about China is reminiscent of Pearl S. Buck?  Is she the worlds standard for books about China?  She was certainly good but there have been other good authors who have written about China.  Why can't they say it's reminiscent of Lisa See (Snowflower and the Secret Fan) or can't they be bothered to try to remember anyone else's name who writes about China.  Hrrrumpf


LIBRARY REVIEW:When Pei Chung is eight years old, her father leaves her at the house of Auntie Yee so that she can work in the silk factory. Her grief at the unexplained abandonment is softened by the kindness of Yee and the other girls, and slowly she begins to thrive in her new independence. The friendship between Pei and Lin, who is the support of her once wealthy and powerful family, is forged with the lives of the silk workers who begin to demand better conditions. The China of 1919-1938, when the Japanese threat became a reality, is woven into the threads of factory life and that of families faced with ruin. The characters are drawn with fine detail. Small village life contrasts vividly with an exciting visit to Canton, and ceremonies are exquisitely described. This fascinating story is beautifully written and slightly reminiscent of Pearl Buck's The Good Earth .

6. The Independence of Miss Mary Bennet

Rated 4.5
From Library

When I saw this book my first thought was "why in the world is Colleen McCullough writing fan fiction?" I didn't get very far into the book before I figured it out. Having a good time is what she was doing. There is no law that says a writer, even one of Colleen McCullough's caliber can't stick her tongue firmly in her cheek and take a group of characters, loved by legions of Jane Austen fans, of which I am one, give them a good shaking up and come up with a completely new take on the story.

Interview with Colleen McCullough

I would have given this book a 5 star rating instead of a 4.5 if she had stuck to her guns and not tidied everything up so neatly at the end and tacked on a sticky sweet ending. Since she had already made most of the characters wonderfully dysfunctional I would have preferred that she left them still shooting (metaphorically of course) at each other at the end of the book. Except for Miss Mary Bennet. It was about time someone gave Mary a life, a grand adventure and a HEA.

From the Library Website:


Everyone knows the story of Elizabeth and Jane Bennet inPride and Prejudice. But what about their sister Mary? At the conclusion of Jane Austen's classic novel, Mary, bookish, awkward, and by all accounts, unmarriageable, is sentenced to a dull, provincial existence in the backwaters of Britain. Now, master storyteller Colleen McCullough rescues Mary from her dreary fate withThe Independence of Miss Mary Bennet, a page-turning sequel set twenty years after Austen's novel closes. The story begins as the neglected Bennet sister is released from the stultifying duty of caring for her insufferable mother. Though many would call a woman of Mary's age a spinster, she has blossomed into a beauty to rival that of her famed sisters. Her violet eyes and perfect figure bewitch the eligible men in the neighborhood, but though her family urges her to marry, romance and frippery hold no attraction. Instead, she is determined to set off on an adventure of her own. Fired with zeal by the newspaper letters of the mysterious Argus, she resolves to publish a book about the plight of England's poor. Plunging from one predicament into another, Mary finds herself stumbling closer to long-buried secrets, unanticipated dangers, and unlooked-for romance.Meanwhile, the other dearly loved characters ofPride and Prejudicefret about the missing Mary while they contend with difficulties of their own. Darcy's political ambitions consume his ardor, and he bothers with Elizabeth only when the impropriety of her family seems to threaten his career. Lydia, wild and charming as ever, drinks and philanders her way into dire straits; Kitty, a young widow of means, occupies herself with gossip and shopping; and Jane, naïve and trusting as ever, spends her days ministering to her crop of boys and her adoring, if not entirely faithful, husband. Yet, with the shadowy and mysterious figure of DarcyÕs right-hand man, Ned Skinner, lurking at every corner, it is clear that all is not what it seems at idyllic Pemberley. As the many threads of McCulloughÕs masterful plot come together, shocking truths are revealed, love, both old and new, is tested, and all learn the value of true independence in a novel for every woman who has wanted to leave her mark on the world.

5. Honey Moon

Rated 4 Stars
From:  My Shelves

While I liked it a lot, this is the darkest book that Phillips has written.  Honey Jane Moon is only 16 but has been her family's commanding force for years when she decides to drive her pretty cousin Chantal Booker from South Carolina to California to audition for TV's Dash Coogan Show. Dash, "the last of America's movie cowboy heroes" is indeed impressed--but by Honey, whom he picks to play his daughter. Although suddenly tossed into life's fast lane, Honey still wants just what she always wanted: a close-knit family and some affection. Her South Carolina kin live with her, but their closeness resembles the adhesion of leeches. Dash, who learned about relationships from his ex-wives, turns a cold shoulder to Honey, who desperately needs him to be a real-life father figure, while Eric Dillon, Honey's "dark, sullen, and gorgeous" co-star, stomps on the puppy love she has to offer. Yet it is only through their complicated relationships that Honey, Dash and Eric can finally exorcise their personal demons.

4. Glitter Baby

By Susan Elizabeth Phillips
Rated 3 Stars
Purchased from Amazon

I am not sorry I bought this book because it was the one book that SEP has written that I don't have.  So it rounded out my collection.  Also it show very clearly just how far she has come as an author.  Sometime around Fancy Pants or maybe it was Honeymoon she broke out of the pack of mediocre authors and started writing really outstanding romance novels.  So if for no other reason you might call this an inspirational novel that shows how much an author can improve over time.


Product Description

Welcome to the world of the Glitter Baby

Fleur Savagar is the most beautiful woman in the world . . . to everyone but herself. With her oversized hands and paddle-boat feet, her streaky blond hair and funny green eyes, she lives a life filled with secrets that began before she was born. That was when her bewitching mother left home to find James Dean and met Errol Flynn instead. Now Fleur has to grow up quickly, and life won't make that easy.
Jake Koranda is both New York's most brilliant playwright and Hollywood's hottest actor. Difficult, talented, and tormented, he has no patience for international glamour girls, not even ones with beautiful bodies and smart-aleck mouths. But there's more to the Glitter Baby than shine, and Fleur's tougher than Jake expects. Even with the odds stacked against her, she's fiercely determined to discover the woman she's destined to be.
An ugly duckling who can't believe she's turned into a swan . . . A tough-guy movie star with a haunted past . . . In a land of broken dreams, can two unlikely lovers trust their hearts?

3. Time of my LIfe

By Jillian Westfield
Rated 4 Stars
From Library

This book is one of those "if I could go back in time and change one thing" kind of books.  Jillian has the perfect suburban life straight out of the upscale women's magazines that she obsessively reads. She’s got the modern-print rugs of Metropolitan Home, the elegant meals fromGourmet, the clutter-free closets out ofReal Simple, and the elaborate Easter egg hunts seen inParents. With her successful investment banker husband behind the wheel and her cherubic eighteen-month-old in the backseat, hers could be the family in the magazines’ glossy Range Rover ads. Yet somehow all of the how-to magazine stories in the world can’t seem to fix her faltering marriage, banish the tedium of days spent changing diapers, or stop her from asking, “What if?” Then one morning Jillian wakes up seven years in the past. Before her daughter was born. Before she married Henry. Suddenly she’s back in her post–grad school Ikea-furnished Manhattan apartment. She’s back in her fast-paced job with the advertising agency. And she’s still with Jackson, the ex-boyfriend and star of her what-if fantasies. Armed with twenty-twenty hindsight, she’s free to choose all over again. She can use the zippy ad campaigns from her future to wow the clients and bosses in her present. She can reconnect with the mother who abandoned her so many years before. She can fix the fights at every juncture that doomed her relationship with Jackson. Or can she? With each new choice setting off a trajectory of unforeseen consequences, Jillian soon realizes that getting to happily ever after is more complicated than changing the lines in her part of the script. Happiness, it turns out, isn’t an either-or proposition. As she closes in on all the things she thought she wanted, Jillian must confront the greatest what-if of all: What if the problem was never Henry or Jackson, but her? Sharp, funny, and heartwarming,Time of My Lifewill appeal to anyone who has ever wanted to redo the past and will leave readers pondering, “Do we get the reality we deserve?”

2. Katherine

By Anya Seton
Rated 5+ Stars
From my shelves

This is a reread for me as it's one of my favorite books and it was time to revisit it.  Also, Alison Weir has a new book about Katherine Swynford coming out on January 27, 2009 titled Mistress of the Monarchy: The Life of Katherine swynford, Duchess of Lancaster

Katherine, by Anya Seton tells the true story of the love affair that changed history—that of Katherine Swynford and John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, the ancestors of most of the British royal family. Set in the vibrant 14th century of Chaucer and the Black Death, the story features knights fighting in battle, serfs struggling in poverty, and the magnificent Plantagenets—Edward III, the Black Prince, and Richard II—who ruled despotically over a court rotten with intrigue. Within this era of danger and romance, John of Gaunt, the king’s son, falls passionately in love with the already married Katherine. Their well-documented affair and love persist through decades of war, adultery, murder, loneliness, and redemption. This epic novel of conflict, cruelty, and untamable love has become a classic since its first publication in 1954.

1. The Wednesday Wars

By Gary Schmidt
Rated 4.5 Stars

From Booklist
*Starred Review* On Wednesday afternoons, while his Catholic and Jewish schoolmates attend religious instruction, Holling Hoodhood, the only Presbyterian in his seventh grade, is alone in the classroom with his teacher, Mrs. Baker, who Holling is convinced hates his guts. He feels more certain after Mrs. Baker assigns Shakespeare's plays for Holling to discuss during their shared afternoons. Each month in Holling's tumultuous seventh-grade year is a chapter in this quietly powerful coming-of-age novel set in suburban Long Island during the late '60s. The slow start may deter some readers, and Mrs. Baker is too good to be true: she arranges a meeting between Holling and the New York Yankees, brokers a deal to save a student's father's architectural firm, and, after revealing her past as an Olympic runner, coaches Holling to the varsity cross-country team. However, Schmidt, whose Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy (2005) was named both a Printz and a Newbery Honor Book, makes the implausible believable and the everyday momentous. Seamlessly, he knits together the story's themes: the cultural uproar of the '60s, the internal uproar of early adolescence, and the timeless wisdom of Shakespeare's words. Holling's unwavering, distinctive voice offers a gentle, hopeful, moving story of a boy who, with the right help, learns to stretch beyond the limitations of his family, his violent times, and his fear, as he leaps into his future with his eyes and his heart wide open. Engberg, Gillian

92. Netherfield Park Revisited, Book 3

By:  Rebecca Ann Collins
Rated 4 Stars
From:  Library

Like I said, I am addicted now.

The third book in the bestselling Pride and Prejudice sequel series from Australia."A very readable and believable tale for readers who like their romance with a historical flavor." Book NewsLove, betrayal, and changing times for the Darcys and the BingleysThree generations of the Darcy and the Bingley families evolve against a backdrop of the political ideals and social reforms of the mid-Victorian era.Jonathan Bingley, the handsome, distinguished son of Charles and Jane Bingley, takes center stage, returning to Hertfordshire as master of Netherfield Park. A deeply passionate and committed man, Jonathan is immersed in the joys and heartbreaks of his friends and family and his own challenging marriage. At the same time, he is swept up in the changes of the world around him.Netherfield Park Revisitedcombines captivating details of life in mid-Victorian England with the ongoing saga of Jane Austen's beloved Pride and Prejudice characters."Ms. Collins has done it again!"

91. The Women of Pemberly, Book 2

By Rebecca Ann Collins
Rated 4 Stars
From Library

I decided to continue on with this series.  While still a little dry it is becoming slightly addictive.

The Women of Pemberley follows the lives of five women, some from the beloved works of Jane Austen, some new from the author’s imagination, into a new era of post industrial revolution England, at the start of the Victorian Age. Vast changes are in motion, as they were throughout this dynamic century. The women, like many of Jane Austen’s heroines, are strong, intelligent individuals, and the depth and variety of the original characters develop into a series of episodes linked together by their relationship to each other and to Pemberley, which is the heart of their community. The central themes of love, friendship, marriage, and a sense of social obligation remain as do the great political and social issues of the age. "The stories are so well told one would enjoy them even if they were not sequels to any other novel."

90. Second Time Around

By:  Marcia Willett
Rated 4 Stars
From:  Library

Marcia Willett is very much a hit and miss author with me.  Fortunately this book was a hit.

LIBRARY SUMMARY:  Mathilda Rainbird bequeaths her home to three unknown relatives: twenty-two-year-old Tessa, who misses her dead parents and brother but has learned to live alone; Will, a widower, who is drawn to Mathilda’s housekeeper, Isobel; and Beatrice, a retired prep-school matron who thinks the idea of living with her cousins is preposterous.Deeply moving and utterly real,Second Time Aroundfeatures the shining honesty that Willett’s fans have come to love.

89. The Pemberly Chronicles Book 1

By Rebecca Ann Collins
Rated 4 Stars
From:  Library

Overall I would recommend it for any Austen fan. It did kind of drag a little because there was a lot of  detail given to the political and economic situation of Regency England. Jane Austen herself chose to ignore the world events of her time: i.e. Napoleonic wars but these were important factors in a rich landowner's life  and the author researched very well.  This book certainly wasn't the steamy kind of read many authors have chosen when writing a P&P pistache, I myself enjoyed it.  It left Jane Austen's characters with their dignity intact.

PUBLISHER'S SUMMARY:  "Those with a taste for the balance and humour of Austen will find a worthy companion volume."-Book News The weddings are over. The guests (including millions of readers and viewers) wish the two happy couples health and happiness. As the music swells and the credits roll, two things are certain: Jane and Bingley will want for nothing, while Elizabeth and Darcy are to be the happiest couple in the world! The couples' personal stories of love, marriage, money, and children are woven together with the threads of social and political history of nineteenth century England. As changes in industry and agriculture affect the people of Pemberley and the neighboring countryside, the Darcys strive to be progressive and forward-looking while upholding beloved traditions. Rebecca Ann Collins follows them in imagination, observing and chronicling their passage through the landscape of their surroundings, noting how they cope with change, triumph, and tragedy in their lives. "A lovely complementary novel to Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. Austen would surely give her smile of approval." -Beverly Wong, author of Pride & Prejudice Prudence

88. The King's Daughter

By Sandra Worth
Rated 4.5 Stars
From:  Library

Seventeen-year-old Elizabeth of York trusts that her beloved father's dying wish has left England in the hands of a just and deserving ruler. But upon the rise of Richard of Gloucester, Elizabeth's family experiences one devastation after another: her late father is exposed as a bigamist, she and her siblings are branded bastards, and her brothers are taken into the new king's custody, then reportedly killed. But one fateful night leads Elizabeth to question her prejudices. Through the eyes of Richard's ailing queen she sees a man worthy of respect and undying adoration. His dedication to his people inspires a forbidden love and ultimately gives her the courage to accept her destiny, marry Henry Tudor, and become Queen. While her soul may secretly belong to another, her heart belongs to England…