The Words We Whisper

 Continuing the theme of WWII books, I began this book tonight.  It is about WWII in Rome.  I have not explored that location yet.  Here is the publisher's summary:

As a hospice nurse, Zara Mitchell has already seen more death than most people will experience in a lifetime. So when her older sister asks her to help care for their ailing grandmother, Zara agrees - despite strained family relationships.

Though pale and tired, Nonna has lost none of her sharp mind. She’s fixated on finding something long forgotten, and she immediately puts Zara to work cleaning out the attic. Unexpectedly, amid the tedium of sifting through knickknacks and heirlooms, Zara also reconnects with a man she’s attracted to but whose complicated past makes romance seem impossible.

But then Zara finds what Nonna was looking for: a wooden chest, an emerald broach, a leather-bound journal. As she immerses herself in stories of heroism and loss set against the backdrop of war-torn Italy in 1943, Zara finds answers to questions she didn’t know she had. And they change everything she thinks she knows about love, regret, and seizing the day.

I finished the book at the end of Crazy August.  Very entertaining....and a complicated finale.  But I did like the book and found it to be a good read.

Silver

 Kind of crazy, random book.  Dee Dee has had an exceptionally terrible life yet seems to be an exceptionally positive human being.  And the friendship between her and her employer that leads to the drive from Key West with destination of Disney World is crazy serendipity.  

The Women

 This has been a book that has stuck with me after I listened to the last word.  The first half of the book about the Vietnam War and Frankie McGrath's experience as an Army Nurse in Vietnam was the kind of listen/read that one just can not put down nor quit thinking about.  The second half of the book about her problems after returning to the shores of the USA was not as fascinating.  However, it was of interest to know the stories of those who returned and suffered from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and the suffering of the returning veterans.  And the end of the book offered hope that Frankie would have a happy life and a complete recovery.  I liked the fact that Kristin Hannah left the ending to each reader's imagination with just a suggestion of what might happen next. 

Winter Solstice

Oscar's grandmother's grand estate is now a hotel, but the former estate manager's house is vacant and still belongs to the family. It is in this house, on the shortest day of the year, that the lives of five people will come together and be forever changed. Rosamunde Pilcher's long-awaited return to the page will warm the hearts of readers both old and new. Winter Solstice is a novel of love, loyalty and rebirth.

A nice book....not very exciting....but a good book when one's life is very busy....and I was not tempted to stop reading.  No surprises.

Hello Beautiful

I am having trouble explaining all of the ins and outs of this book.  So I am going to copy and paste an excerpt from the description on Amazon:  

William Waters grew up in a house silenced by tragedy, where his parents could hardly bear to look at him, much less love him—so when he meets the spirited and ambitious Julia Padavano in his freshman year of college, it’s as if the world has lit up around him. With Julia comes her family, as she and her three sisters are inseparable: Sylvie, the family’s dreamer, is happiest with her nose in a book; Cecelia is a free-spirited artist; and Emeline patiently takes care of them all. With the Padavanos, William experiences a newfound contentment; every moment in their house is filled with loving chaos.

William's love of the sport of basketball is a highlight of the book.  

Oh, wow, I was not expecting to like this book so much.  I have barely started, but already I am drawn into the story of a young girl who has lost her mother.....and a relationship that has begun between this child and her grandmother.  

Here is a published review:

According to Confucius, "an educated woman is a worthless woman," but Tan Yunxian—born into an elite family, yet haunted by death, separations, and loneliness—is being raised by her grandparents to be of use. Her grandmother is one of only a handful of female doctors in China, and she teaches Yunxian the pillars of Chinese medicine, the Four Examinations—looking, listening, touching, and asking—something a man can never do with a female patient. 

From a young age, Yunxian learns about women's illnesses, many of which relate to childbearing, alongside a young midwife-in-training, Meiling. The two girls find fast friendship and a mutual purpose—despite the prohibition that a doctor should never touch blood while a midwife comes in frequent contact with it—and they vow to be forever friends, sharing in each other's joys and struggles. No mud, no lotus, they tell themselves: from adversity beauty can bloom. 

But when Yunxian is sent into an arranged marriage, her mother-in-law forbids her from seeing Meiling and from helping the women and girls in the household. Yunxian is to act like a proper wife—embroider bound-foot slippers, pluck instruments, recite poetry, give birth to sons, and stay forever within the walls of the family compound, the Garden of Fragrant Delights. 

How might a woman like Yunxian break free of these traditions, go on to treat women and girls from every level of society, and lead a life of such importance that many of her remedies are still used five centuries later? How might the power of friendship support or complicate these efforts? Lady Tan's Circle of Women is a captivating story of women helping other women. It is also a triumphant reimagining of the life of a woman who was remarkable in the Ming dynasty and would be considered remarkable today.

I finished the book the first week of February, 2024.  I liked it as much at the end as I did in the beginning. Quite a bit of gore and "bad stuff", but done in a way that I didn't have to put the book down and leave it alone for a while as I have so many of the WWII books.  I find myself wishing for more pages and haven't yet started a new book.

 

The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store

My kind of book.....I like this a lot.  I will put some of the reviews and etc in later.

Tonight I am listening to a part that speaks to me a bit because it makes fun of me.  Moshe Ludlow is the

main character of the book.  He owns at least one theatre/dance hall?/place that hosts dances/events...

I just read about sometimes he hosts events that are attended by Colonial Dames...etc...and the men in their top hats...and the couples dance ....very staid...very boring....well let me just say that it is the opposite of events that happen when his Black clientele or his Jewish clientele have an event....Do we who are the ones who attend Gypsy wish to be those who attend the Negro or Jewish events?  Could I do that?  I like when books make me think!  The descriptions of the events attended by the Jewish and the Black are just plain fun.  But there is no doubt in my mind that I would be more comfortable attending the Colonial Dames event.  

 Here is a review that I liked.  It is from a reader:  I want to put this in your hands and promise you a magnificent reading experience. It starts off in a shaggy dog kind of way, with an ensemble of characters, several who possess whimsical names like Fatty, Big Soap, Monkey Pants, Dodo. And their names fit flawlessly to their nature. The story starts with a 1972 prologue—a human skeleton is found in an old abandoned well, and then the body of the story begins in 1936 in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, a place called Chicken Hill, where Jews, immigrants, and Black folks lived side by side, sometimes in harmony, other times in discord, but here’s the thing—the goodness of people, the kindness of their hearts—that is what ultimately rises to the top.

For the story to unfold, there has to be some sinister aspects, too—aren’t we still fighting the fight of ignorance, bigotry, corruption, meanness? But, in the McBride world, well, we also follow the long stretch of yarn as it wends around this way and that, through streets and backyards, dirt roads, onto hills and a shul and a church, through tunnels and a dance hall. And The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store.

I don’t need to rehash the plot, but there are a few fun facts about this book worth mentioning in a review. Such as, there are an abundance of characters introduced early on, and then again later on, before the plot actually launches. That’s the shaggy part. We don’t get to the plot too quickly—instead, Mcbride takes his time, builds the characters. They are already leaping off the pages by the time the plot rolls in.

There are subplots, too, but in the end, they all weave their chords and come together. McBride may slow your roll at first, but it’s a winning bonanza of breadth and depth, from the smallest detail to the broadest design. Scenes that seem initially inconsequential become key notes later on.

Early on, we meet the arresting Jewess, Chona. Chona is an unforgettable female protagonist—I’m keeping her in my journal of best. female. characters. ever. She is handicapped with a limp—but her limp doesn’t stop her strength of purpose, her fierce dignity, her bounteous benevolence, her gentle grace, and her consummate integrity. You will fall in love with her, just like Moshe, the theater and dance hall owner, did. Moshe and Chona dared to welcome change and inclusivity to their part of the world.

So I didn't add much as I read the middle part. However I want to add something tonight.  I believe it likely that Chona is dead.  Need to read a few more pages to know that for sure.  But the author speaks about devices in Chapter 18 which is labelled The Hot Dog.  

I finished the book late January.  There were a few rough places.  And the fact of whose body was in the well was a mystery until the very end of the book.  But by the time the book got to the end, there were enough people who deserved to be at the bottom of the well that you knew for sure it would be one of them.