Review: Postmortem by Patricia Cornwell

Postmortem by Patricia Cornwell
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Boy, times have changed since this book was written!

This is another reread for me, and another one that I was pretty bored with. The technology has changed so much, and at first it was laughable, and then it just got boring. I was hoping to get back into the series so I'd know what my next dozen books would be (I'm stuck in a rut with my reading right now, having a hard time getting into anything) and I'm just not feeling this one either, though when I first read it years ago, I enjoyed the series. According to goodreads, I reread this one at least once before, in 2009.

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The Red Queen by Philippa Gregory

The Red Queen by Philippa Gregory
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I didn't enjoy this one as much as I was expecting.

Margaret Beaufort was just written so unappealing. I don't believe any person is that one dimensional. I get obsession, I get being religious, but she was written in such a way that that was the only two things she cared about - getting her son (who she really didn't even know) on the throne, and God.

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Innocent Traitor

Innocent Traitor by Alison Weir
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I love Alison Weir, though I haven't read nearly as many of her books as I would have liked to.

I actually started reading this book last year, and didn't finish it before I had to return it to the library. This time, I started again from the beginning & finished in just a few days.

This is the story of Lady Jane Grey, the very young, naive queen of just 9 days. Forced to live her entire life under the rule of manulative, even abusive, parents, she ended up marrying a man she didn't love (or even like) and worse yet, convinced to become Queen of England.

The book is told in multiple voices (a story telling device I do not like). Most of the book, this is fine, but I had issues in the beginning, with Jane's voice being very adult, even when she was only a few years old. Yes, she was supposedly very mature as a child, but it was hard to like her as a child when she spoke with such an adult voice.

The book is pretty factual - there are a few interesting speculations in the book that Weir concludes, but for the most part, this is pretty true historical fiction & Weir takes on a new genre well (this is her first historical fiction novel).

Jane's story is especially compelling at the end - even though I know how her tragic tale will end, you still hope that Queen Mary will pardon her on the same.

(library)
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Royal Assassin by Robin Hobb

Royal Assassin by Robin Hobb
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is another reread for me.

I really struggled with finishing this one. Which was greatly disappointing as I loved, loved this series when I read them the first time, and wanted to reread them immediately. I waited for YEARS, savoring the thought of how much I would enjoy it a second time, and I could barely finish the book. What a disappointment.

I finally finished the last 250 pages, all in one sitting, refusing to do anything else until I finished.

I'll take a break before getting the next one.



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Review: Mastering Fermentation: Recipes for Making and Cooking with Fermented Foods

Mastering Fermentation: Recipes for Making and Cooking with Fermented Foods by Mary Karlin
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Mastering Fermentation: Recipes for Making and Cooking with Fermented Foods

by Mary Karlin

A beautifully illustrated and authoritative guide to the art and science of fermented foods, featuring 70+ recipes that progress from simple fermented condiments like vinegars and mustards to more advanced techniques for using wild yeast, fermenting meats, and curing fish.

Yup, it's another book that I had to read because of my garden!

A year ago was my first and only attempt at fermentation - an idea I'm fascinated by because I have IBS, and let's face it, fermented foods are my friend, and the idea of making my own fermented food is even nicer. I had a bunch of tomatoes from my garden that needed to be used up, no way to can, no more space in the garden, and I had just bought a bunch of garlic, onions, and various peppers from a farmer's market, so I decided to make salsa. I found a recipe online for making fermented salsa, spent hours dicing up the veggies and doing everything I was supposed to, only to find out our water had gotten infected by e.coli and the water was unsafe to drink without boiling first - which, of course, I hadn't done because I was trying to ferment the salsa. I had 6 pints and an odd quart jar of salsa that I had to toss because it just wasn't safe to try to eat the salsa.

All that to say I haven't forgotten the idea of fermenting foods. I even debating about taking a class on fermenting foods at my local trade school at night, but at $39, did I really need to take a class when I could just get a book from the library? Or heck, just do more googling? I liked the idea off hand holding, but $39 was a lot of money to spend on a night class for something like fermenting foods. and then this book fell into my lap, and I'm in love with this book and the ideas and information contained inside enough to purchase a copy for my own library. Okay, I'll probably wait & get a used copy, but still... I'm going to buy a copy.

Add all of that in, and then add recipes I haven't seen anywhere else - like mushroom ketchup - I mean, come on, mushroom ketchup!

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Assassin's Apprentice by Robin Hobb

Assassin's Apprentice by Robin Hobb
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I loved this book when I first read it years ago, and read many of Hobb's other books in the series. She's since written more, and I thought it would be fun to reread and catch up with the series.

I was a little disappointed.

I still really liked the book, the plot, and the characters, but I didn't like Hobb's writing as well as I had remembered.

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Allison Hewitt Is Trapped by Madeleine Roux

Allison Hewitt Is Trapped by Madeleine Roux
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I'm very divided about this book. On the one hand, I enjoyed it - it was a very "read that it and don't stop until you are done" kind of book - it's been a while for me since I read one of the books. On the other hand, there is just so, so much you have to just accept in the book - most of all, the fact that not only can Allison find internet (fairly easily), but that there's a great big military wi-fi signal that doesn't require a log-in or a password (yeah, right) AND the fact that she can hold onto her laptop while fighting zombies and killing people.

I also got a little frustrated at how perfect Allison is. She obsesses about finding her mom (naturally enough) but that's the only remotely negative thing about her. She's writing blog entries at a run, but yet she uses complete grammar, perfect spelling, and she's never frantic or even really scared.... Okay, that's really believable... (insert sarcasm).

Yes, she was a grad student majoring in lit, but please, you are running for your life! She of course is so brave and strong, she can use an AXE for crying out loud, perfectly, the first time she goes to swing through a zombie's head ? Isn't cutting through bone a little hard? Shouldn't she have missed at least the first time with something as ackward as an AXE?

And of course she finds love almost right away - and that relationship is less than perfect (without giving anything away) but of course she handles it so so well with barely a blimp on her radar ....

All in all, yes, it's a great read, but take it with a grain of salt.

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Falling to Earth

Falling to Earth: An Apollo 15 Astronaut's Journey to the Moon by Al Worden
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Al Worden writes a candid book about his life, becoming an astronaut, flying to the moon and back, the scandal that ended his career, and his life afterwards.

I'm a space geek - I'm the first to admit I don't understand most of the science, but being born in '76 and being a kid growing up with the Teacher in Space program - and the horrifying Challenger disaster, which is the Kennedy moment of my generation - I'm fascinated with the space program. I've read probably a dozen books by other astronauts and knew about the scandal with the postal books.

The book is interesting - growing up and working on a farm, his early career days, and how suddenly he ended up an astronaut. The reason I give this book 4 stars is because Worden makes excuses an awful lot for alot of things he does, rationalizing everything from being a bad father (well you know, I'm in training to fly to the moon) and being a bad husband (well, you know, I'm in training to fly to the moon) and rationalizes his way through the fact that he got paid money to bring souvenirs to the moon, something that naturally leaves a bad taste in this tax payer's mouth. He naturally was proved innocent in the end and his career was redeemed, along with his reputation, but the rationalizing still bothered me enough to rate this one 4 stars.



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Delivered from Evil

Delivered from Evil: True Stories of Ordinary People Who Faced Monstrous Mass Killers and Survived by Ron Franscell
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A series of stories about mass murderers/killers, and the people who survived.

Franscell's writing style is not my favorite - more a tabloid, sensationalist style, then plain face, but the subject is interesting. His writing style does make the book very readable, though this isn't a book you are going to read in one or two evenings - it's too horrible. There's a similarity between all of the murderers and the aftermath and how the survivors all coped.

Reading a book like this makes one wonder how quickly your whole life can change, and really makes me want to step up my game today, because tomorrow may never come.

--
borrowed from the library as an e-book



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Church of Lies by Flora Jessop

Church of Lies by Flora Jessop
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I sometimes have a really hard time writing a review of a memoir, because I feel like I'm critiquing the person's life, and not the book itself - isn't it one and the same? This one is no different.

I had a really, really hard time liking Flora Jessop, though naturally I felt sympathy for what she went through. But she's awfully big on martyrdom, the "poor me" syndrome (which I can't get, because I can't imagine what she went through), but she also constantly praises herself for how awesome she is, even when she's doing drugs and stripping. I understand that, too - lack of self confidence usually turns into a "look at me, look at how great I am!"

The big thing that really bugged me about the whole book, and made me doubt a lot of what Flora said, was the one line she devotes to quitting drugs - she basically just says "I decided to stop, so I did". I've never done drugs, never even smoked a cigarette, but I've never heard of anyone quitting drugs by just deciding to. You're telling me she never once looked back? She never once struggled with her addiction? I get that her drug abuse wasn't the story here - saving the kids from abuse is - but it really bugged me that she just casually mentions quitting drugs & never mentions it again. What else was she over simplifying?

She also makes out that she's the only person ever who tries to rescue the kids and she's the only one ever in the whole world who could possibly actually rescue a child - and that's just not true. She likes to paint CPS as the bad guys, but that's discrimination - claiming everyone who works there is a bad guy is as bad as any other discrimination/racism/etc. CPS is trying to work within the laws of our country - for better or for worse. I'm not saying that they are actually helping the kids - clearly, they aren't - but they are trying to follow the law, and that doesn't make someone working for CPS as evil, just someone who's trying to follow the law.

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Vampire Academy

Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

I've been long told to read this series, so I finally got around to it. I was pretty disappointed.

I did finish it, but I struggled to finish it & just couldn't get into the characters, the storyline, or the VA universe. It's well written, I just couldn't get into it. I'm not sure it's Mead's fault; just there was so much hype about how good this series was supposed to be, that it was never going to live up to its reputation.

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Cult Insanity

Cult Insanity: A Memoir of Polygamy, Prophets, and Blood Atonement by Irene Spencer
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is Spencer's second book, and you definitely have to read her first book to follow this one. There are a lot of characters to keep track of, and even her explanations of who characters were didn't really help me much.

Spencer seems to write her story without really sharing what she went through - she did this already in her first book - but the memoir comes across as detached because she's not sharing her memories and feelings so much as sharing dry facts as to what happened when she was a part of this crazy family.

It's a book worth reading, to be sure, if you are interested in polygamy, but it's not a book for someone who wants to read a casual memoir on any subject, and there are honestly a lot better books about polygamy out there (like Spencer's first book or Spencer's sister wife's book)

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Beyond Belief: My Secret Life Inside Scientology and My Harrowing Escape by Jenna Miscavige Hill

Beyond Belief: My Secret Life Inside Scientology and My Harrowing Escape by Jenna Miscavige Hill
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I read this book back in Oct 2013, but as always, I needed a little bit of time to think about the book before I wrote my review. I also youtubed Jenna Hill and got more of a personal insight by watching her on video (and I admit, I liked her less after watching her in person then after reading her book. On TV, she comes across as looking for her five minutes of fame; in the book, she seems more "real").

Jenna grows up in a scientology family - something I only had the vaguest ideas about before reading this book. After she becomes an adult, she marries and becomes a scientologist in her own right.

Her childhood is filled with a variety of abuses and things most people don't have to deal with in their every day lives: from chanting and lack of privacy, to controlled public punishment for imagined wrongdoings, to a uniform dress code, isolation from the rest of the world (and told that the rest of the world is "bad"), to doctrines that are never quite explained, to out and out abuse like slave labor, mental and physical abuse, public humiliation, and let's not forget brainwashing.

Jenna's writing throughout is a bit childish, as is her story, but as she was a child during most of the book, that makes sense & isn't necessarily a negative, as you really do feel for her. I do feel like she enjoyed throwing herself a pity party - not saying she didn't deserve our pity, mind you. My biggest point for mentioning this is that Jenna, sadly, does not seem to grow at all as a person within the pages of this book.







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Hidden Wives by Claire Avery

Hidden Wives by Claire Avery
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

it was okay, but the story was a little too neat and perfect (aka not realistic because the story just fell into place). I much prefer memoirs to fiction when it comes to polygamy books

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Divergent by Veronica Roth

1. Divergent by Veronica Roth

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The first book I read & finished in 2015 just for me :)

I read Divergent late to the game - last summer, maybe? and never managed to write up a review. I enjoyed it; not as much as Hunger Games, perhaps, but I definitely enjoyed the book. I admit I watched the movie first and liked the movie enough to try to tackle the book.

Roth creates a great, dystopian world from the first page. I like where the story starts; you get enough of Tris' family & her life before she decides to join Dauntless. I enjoyed the bit of "will they or won't they" romance between her and Four; surprised me, honestly, because I'm normally rather bored with romance in books, but Roth throws the romance at you in between the action scenes and makes me want to know what will happen next.



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His Favorite Wife

His Favorite Wife: Trapped in Polygamy by Susan Ray Schmidt
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book is one of a few similar books I read back in October on various religions/faiths/cults, and didn't review at the time - mostly because books like this I have to think about for a little while in order to get my thoughts into place. It's always very difficult for me to review a biography or a memoir because I feel like I'm reviewing someone's life and how can anyone do that? Or be so bold as to do that?

Susan's story is about how she marries at age 15 to a man twice her age, who already has many wives, and continues to marry and have more and more children. Her husband at times seems evil and cruel, yet at others seems to genuinely care for Susan as much as he is able - which isn't much, considering all the other wives, children, and demands on his attention.

He (I feel bad, I can't remember her husband's name) continually puts his faith, his brothers, and himself before any of his wives, including Susan the so called favorite wife.

That being said, Susan does a great job showing you her life and her horrors, but letting the reader draw their own conclusions. She ends up leaving her husband and takes her kids with her, makes a few mistakes but ends up happily married at the end.

Anyone who is interested in learning about other cultures or faiths should read this one.

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Winter of the World by Ken Follett

Winter of the World by Ken Follett
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I originally got this book from the library when it first came out, but only read the first few chapters before I had to return it, and I finally got around to re-requesting & reading it over the last couple of weeks.

Overall, I did enjoy the book, but definitely not as much as the first one.

There are too many characters to keep track of, and that was a huge turn off for me. Yes, there's a cheat sheet, but if there are so many characters in the book that the author feels there's a need for a cheat sheet, then that should have been his first clue that there are TOO many characters! Because there were so many "main" characters in the book, I felt like I didn't really get to know any of them & really didn't upset when any of them would get killed off (instead I felt relief that it was one less character). The book jumps from character to character (and as such, from different parts of the world) and was just one more thing to keep track of in this large volume (which for the record, I'm a HUGE fan of big books / big series).

Another turn off for me is that WWII events that the average American knows about - such as Pearl Harbor and the Holocaust - are barely mentioned in the book. This actually wasn't as big a turn off for me once I thought about it - I wouldn't have wanted to read a book that spent 100 pages on Pearl Harbor when I know a decent amount about Pearl Harbor. Instead Follett does a great job writing about the world's involvement in the war in general - which is exactly the point of this series, isn't it? So what started as a turn off ended up a positive.

A "neutral" point I'd like to make is that Follett does NOT do a lot of rehashing of the first book like most series books do. Usually there's a little brief mention of a plot point or a little reminder of who the character is, and he doesn't do this. Usually that's a good thing, but again see my first point - there's a LOT of characters to keep track of, and a little bit of reminding would have helped. Not that you can't figure out who everyone is fast enough - the first mention of Maud made me go "who?" but within a sentence or two I remembered who she was, who she married & why she was living in a country that wasn't her own.

So what's good about the book? Well... this book quite neatly talks about so so many events & ties them together realistically. Yes, a few plot points you are going to see happening - which I won't give an example of for spoiling the book. But it's a historical fiction book & anyone who knows their history is going to see some of these plots happening. Follett is such an excellent author - and quite frankly one of my top ten favorite authors - that you want to read the next page, and the next, and the next.



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Mary Boleyn

Mary Boleyn: The Mistress of Kings by Alison Weir
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I've been wanting to read this for quite a while, and was finally able to sit down and spend the time to read.

Mary Boleyn has always fascinated me, mostly because she is usually portrayed so badly - as a whore, or as someone a little slow-witted and unwilling to stand up for herself.

Weir's book is I believe, the first full length biography on Mary. I especially enjoyed reading about Mary's early years at French court, something I don't know a whole heck of a lot about, but certainly reads like a soap opera! There's a lot of background information about the era Mary lives in as well (most of which I already was familiar with).

Because there is not a lot of factual information about Mary Boleyn, there is a certain amount of text devoted to her family, other families who lived near them, etc., but I feel it does serve to help balance out what otherwise might be too short of a book.

I did have to rate the book 4 stars because there is a lot of repetition in the book, especially on issues (to me) that are minor - for example, a good 20 pages on whether Anne or Mary is the elder - does this really matter at all?

All in all, this book is good, just not a great read.



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Shattered Dreams: My Life as a Polygamist's Wife by Irene Spencer

Shattered Dreams: My Life as a Polygamist's Wife by Irene Spencer
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I read Irene's book after reading her sister-wives book. Irene's story is heart breaking in her own right, but because she was older than Susan and an earlier wife, poor Irene has to live through so much more.

I enjoyed Irene's writing style, which was down to earth and straight forward. The book does seem to drag a bit, only because so much is similar - "Hey, I want to marry another wife" "No, I don't want you to marry again" "Tough luck", oh look another wife. Over and over again.

OK let's move to another dirt poor area and live where there's no heat... "NO, I don't want to" "Tough luck" oh look, another move.

Poor Irene, Through it all you really do feel bad for her. Irene really struggles with jealously throughout the book, natural enough, and by then end you are really rooting for her. You do have to question why she stays with her husband so long. But how she manages to survive is why this book is worth reading.







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Edge of Eternity

Edge of Eternity by Ken Follett
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I enjoyed the final book in the series overall.

Most of the book is set in the 60's - and most of that is spent talking about Civil Rights - which unfortunately, is what I know the most about during the time period. I was really hoping for more about Vietnam - even though one of the characters goes & fights in Vietnam, there's not a lot of time spent in Vietnam & I didn't really "learn" anything or "get" any new impressions.

I was also disappointed that there was so little that took place during the 80's, and other than literally ONE sentence, nothing was mentioned about the space race / going to the moon. I knew there wasn't going to be much mentioned about it, but I thought there'd be more than one sentence, too.

I didn't like the characters as much this time around - most of them just seemed very one sided, and none of them really grew, changed, or had any character development as time went on.

Bad things of course did happen to the characters throughout the book, but overall everything just seemed to work out a little too perfectly - I would have liked to have seen at least one truly horrific thing happen to one of the characters during the course of the 1200 + page book. Yes, there's things like violence, drug abuse, etc., but you'd think in a book revolving around Civil Rights, at least one of the Civil Rights characters would have died. I don't know; maybe I'm just too negative in general this go round.

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