Playing catch-up

I really, really, really need to play catch-up here. I can't believe I've read so many books since I last posted a review! I've read some really good books in that time - as well as a few duds. I read 7 books during the 7 weeks I was away from home (first for my daughter's wedding, then on a celebratory trip to Italy), finished another 11 through the end of 2023. I've already finished 10 books in 2024, with 4 more (yes, crazy) in the works.

You know how it's so overwhelming to catch up once you kind of lose the habit of getting things done. After 7 weeks away, I had a crazy time getting back into the swing of being home. (And wasn't home long due to an out-of-town family emergency less than 2 weeks after my return.) Writing book reviews was near the bottom of my list of things to get done. (But yes, seriously, it was - and is still - on my list. I guess I'll get to tick it off today. Yay!

I don't want to not share the books I've read here so I'm going to list them with the stars I gave them on Goodreads. I'm hoping to write at least one or two lines with my thoughts on each title. Yes, for all 28 books!

1. The Breakaway by Jennifer Weiner ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I really enjoyed this one about a young women learning so much about herself as a leader on a bike trip with some unexpected group members.

2. Recipe for Second Chances by Ali Rosen ⭐️⭐️⭐️ I read this in the days leading up to our departure for Italy because it took place in Italy. It was just okay.

3. The Villa Girls by Nicky Pellegrino ⭐️⭐️⭐️ Another just okay read for me. This novel told a story that came before The Italian Wedding (not sure the order of the books being published). The story was okay. What I did love were the bits of the story that took place in Italy. As usual, Nicky Pellegrino does a great job at evoking the location.

4. City People by Elizabeth Topp ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Seriously, until I looked at the synopsis of this novel, I couldn't remember what it was about. Having said that, it was a good read about a band of mothers experiencing the loss of one of their own. I was able to connect to this story on many levels even though my days of being a mom of young kids is way in the past.

5. Tom Lake by Ann Patchett ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ This book seems to have such mixed reviews. People either loved it or hated it. I loved Tom Lake, perhaps it was because I was really able to connect to this story. It's set during the early days of COVID which holds appeal to me and Lara's adult daughters have come home to quarantine. The daughters pass the time by listening to their mom share some stories from her younger life. One of Lara's defining moments in life was starring in the play Our Town. I saw my daughter in a minor role in that play years ago so I had that connection, too. This was a warm, comfortable read.

6. Woke Up Like This by Amy Lea ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I believe this was a free Amazon Prime First Read. Time travel. Two teens time travel to their 30s. I really enjoyed this one.

7. When We Were Enemies by Emily Bleeker ⭐️⭐️⭐️ This is one I really expected to love. It's about a young woman in 1943 Indiana working as a translator at a nearby Italian POW camp. It was simply okay.

8. Never Meant to Meet You by Alli Frank ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ This was another free Amazon Prime First Read that I did not expect to really like, but I did. It was a light enough story but one with a lot of substance about marriage, race, and religion. Plus one of the main characters was a kindergarten teacher. 

9. Paper Doll Lina by Robyn Lucas ⭐️⭐️⭐️ Another free Amazon Prime First Read, this one about a woman who has really lost herself in her marriage. It had promise, was enjoyable enough to read, but just okay.

10. Enough by Cassidy Hutchinson ⭐️⭐️⭐️ I listened to Cassidy Hutchinson read the book. I guess I was hoping to learn a little bit more than I did. Since so much of the story is already out there, I learned a few things and was reminded of just how awful the end of the last presidency and January 6th was. Not that I need a lot of reminders.

11. Israel: A Simple Guide to the Most Misunderstood Country on Earth by Noa Tishby ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I had started to read this highly recommended book before our family emergency. My son and I both flew across the country and were both reading Israel and boy did we have a lot to talk about. I learned many new things, I was reminded of many things I'd learned over the years, and I feel a bit better informed about what's going on in the Middle East right now. Whenever I read anything about Israel, I always wonder how accurate the information is. This seems accurate and I understand that Noa Tishby is a Zionist, but it didn't seem to me like she had some hidden agenda. Reading this reaffirmed most of what I'd already believed. There are no easy answers.

12. The Authenticity Project by Clare Pooley ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ The author of this one was the same author as Iona Iverson's Rules for Commuting. There were lots of similarities across the two books, although the premise of each plot was quite different. In The Authenticity Project, Julian Jessop, an older, lonely artist writes the true story about his life and leaves it in a cafe, suggesting that others do the same. Write their truths and pass it along. Six strangers are brought together and form unexpected friendships. I preferred Iona Iverson but this was a pleasant read, too.

13. The Apology Project by Jeanette Escudero ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I had to look at the synopsis of this one to remember the plot of this one. It's about a woman who gets fired when she's not willing to compromise her principles for a big case at her law firm. What next? While she attempts to figure that out, she is encouraged to apologize to people from her past (some who meant something to her, others that really didn't). That became her project. It was "fun" following along.

14. Only the Beautiful by Susan Meissner ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Susan Meissner always writes an interesting novel that isn't quite the kind of historical fiction where you learn a lot about the time period but which is set in a time period that makes the story especially meaningful. In this case, a key character was living through World War II in Austria. The main character, however, was a young woman whose parents worked on a vineyard when they were killed in an accident. The owners of the vineyard agree to care for her until she legally becomes an adult. She becomes pregnant and things fall apart for her after that. 

15. Our Town: A Play in Three Acts by Thornton Wilder ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ After reading Tom Lake, I decided to reread Our Town. Apparently, I wasn't the only person who had the same thought because there was quite a long waitlist to get the play. This is Thornton Wilder's most frequently performed play.

16. One Summer in Savannah by Torah Shelton Harris ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Sara Lancaster has left her home in Savannah, Georgia to protect her daughter, Alana who was born as the result of a rape. When her father becomes ill, she returns to Savannah and has to deal with the ghosts of the past. It's a bittersweet novel about motherhood and moving forward after something terrible. I loved the character of Alana who is exceptionally smart.

17. Shanda: A Memoir of Shame and Secrecy by Letty Cottin Pogrebin ⭐️⭐️⭐️ This memoir was recommended to me by several people. They were all slightly older than I am, and I wonder if that's what made me think this was just okay and not great. This memoir focuses on the secrets that Pogrebin and her family kept because the truth was "a shanda" or a shame or a disgrace (in Yiddish). I was able to identify some of the shandas in the life of family members.

18. The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I listened to this audiobook with my husband on a long car ride and it was perfect. An engaging story that we could both enjoy and the length of the audiobook matched the hours in day one of our road trip spent in the car. Hannah's husband has disappeared. She and her stepdaughter, Bailey, who don't have the greatest relationship, come together to figure out what could have possibly happened to Owen, husband and dad.

19. Looking for Alaska by John Green ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ After finishing one audiobook on day one of our road trip, I knew I wanted to find another "short" audiobook to listen to on day two of the trip. Looking for Alaska has been on my list of banned books to read and it was the perfect length. It's a coming of age story that takes place at a boarding school. At the end of the story (which coincided with us leaving the highway and just having the local roads to get us home - further than you'd think unless you, too, live in a rural area - my husband and I looked at each other and said, "How important is a book like this for a kid experiencing even a part of what was experienced by the characters in this novel. How wrong that a book like this is banned!"

20. The Surgeon's Daughter by Audrey Blake ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ My first finish for 2024 is the sequel to The Girl in His Shadow which I read as part of a Big Library Read in June 2022. While I gave both novels 4 stars, I much preferred The Girl in His Shadow to The Surgeon's Daughter. Both novels made me really think about what it would have been like to be a women with a brain and with some amibition in the 19th century. (I liked that Nora attended med school in Italy, of course!)

21. Must Love Flowers by Debbie Macomber ⭐️⭐️⭐️ We came home from our road trip to NY and my husband had COVID. Because I'm a strong believer in public health, that meant that I isolated unless I really needed to get out and do something (always wearing a well-fitted, high quality mask). It meant I had a lot of time for reading. I decided I wanted something light so looked for something new by Debbie Macomber. It fit the bill perfectly. It was a story about a young woman and an older woman coming together for convenience and helping each other move on to the next stages of their lives.

22. The Air Raid Book Club by Annie Lyons ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ This novel by the same author as The Brilliant Life of Eudora Honeysett took a different spin on the kindertransport program during WWII. Hedy is a refugee from Germany. She's an older teen who goes to England unhappy to be parted from her parents and brother. She's taken in by Gertie is contemplating selling the bookstore that she owned with her recently deceased husband. The book club was really a very minor part of the novel. I think if there had been a little bit more focus on the book club, this could have been a 5-⭐️ read for me.

23. The Little Liar by Mitch Albom ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Lots of chatter about The Little Liar on many of the book websites and Facebook groups that I follow. "Truth" is the narrator of the story which at times felt a little contrived, but it worked. The main character of the story, Nico, is 11-years old when the story begins. He never lies. Ever. Until... the Nazis invade Salonika, Greece to deport the Jews.That's when lying becomes a method of self-preservation and eventually redemption. I'd previously had no knowledge of the vibrant Jewish community in Salonika (Thessalonika) prior to reading this book. 

24. The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Here's another novel by the author of Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. A.J. Fikry owns a book store that he'd started with his recently deceased wife. (Didn't I just write something similar for The Air Raid Book Club??) A.J. is still a young man, but he becomes a recluse and has difficulty figuring out what might be next for him. He becomes a recluse. Then he finds a package left behind at the bookstore which sets about a whole new life for A.J. and those in his rather limited circle.

25. The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride ⭐️⭐️⭐️ The premise of this story is that a skeleton is found in Pennsylvania in the neighborhood of Chicken Hill where years ago Jews and African Americans lived side-by-side. Chona runs the Heaven & Earth Grocery Store that was started by her father. The story was interesting, but it dragged on in many parts and I often had a hard time following things as there were so many characters who, to me, weren't all that distinct. Lots of readers have loved this one but it kind of fell flat with me.

26. Nora Goes Off Script by Annabel Monaghan ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I loved this book, most probably because I also love Hallmark movies. Nora writes screen plays for The Romance Channel (I see you, Hallmark!) and when she writes something more substantial, more or less the story of her marriage falling apart, it gets picked up to be a major motion picture. Then Nora is living in her own Hallmark movie. If you love Hallmark movies, you'll love this book.

27. Tales From The Cafe: A Novel by Toshikazu Kawaguchi ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ This is book 2 in the Before the Coffee Gets Cold series. Visitors to a small cafe in Tokyo are able to time travel, but there are several rules they must obey. And they must finish their coffee before it gets cold. In this installment, 4 patrons get to time travel to come to terms with the past and move on to the future. I think I liked the creativity of the first book a little better, but this was enjoyable, too. And I plan to read the next two books in the series as well.

28. No Visible Bruises: What We Don't Know About Domestic Violence Can Kill Us ⭐️⭐️⭐️ I only read this because this was a title my community book club selected. It was a difficult book to read because the subject matter is so difficult. I wish it touched upon spousal abuse in wealthier couples because I have a friend who experienced that and I was hoping I'd getting some insight into her experiences. As tough as it was to get through the book, we did have a great book club discussion.

29. Unorthodox Love by Heidi Sherlock ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Penina is an Orthodox Jewish woman who longs for love and marriage but is not what any Orthodox man would want as she is unable to have babies. At 29, Penina's life is all about going to work and then doing for others in her free time. She's the family fixer and she volunteers at a NICU at a local hospital. Life becomes more interesting when she's set up with a gay Orthodox Jew who would like a fake marriage to please his mother before she dies... and her boss takes a medical leave and his son comes in to run the show. Penina has a smart mouth which I enjoyed. A very pleasant book to read, especially after No Visible Bruises.

And now I'm caught up! Whew! I'm listening to two books and reading two e-books. Hoping to review each book as I finish it.