The Age of Will

You know how it is. Your thoughts are whirling around in your head all day long. Think about it. Other people do the same thing. I wonder what they are thinking about?
Think about this. You have just arrived at the destination for the “destination wedding” of your niece. You have come to the conclusion that your husband is most likely having an affair with one of your neighbors back home–his new jogging partner. You make a decision that you are not going to confront him about it until after this wedding. You wouldn’t think of doing anything to spoil this happy occasion for your favorite niece. You spend the entire day avoiding your husband. At the same time you wonder what he is thinking, wondering what he thinks about why you are avoiding him. Of course, there are other things to think about. You meet the groom’s new boss and his wife. They are having a marital meltdown, and your sister has asked you to somehow keep that from disrupting the other guests and the happiness of her daughter’s wedding day. The bride’s paternal grandmother regales you with stories from her younger days and her marriage. All the while you are thinking that you should have a tape recorder. The grandchildren would enjoy hearing these stories of their family history someday. You wonder if the groom’s wealthy family and friends will welcome your niece or will they treat her like a poor relation…the way they look down their noses at the groom’s brother’s wife. Wow…that dress must have cost as much as your salary for six months.
And…On and on it goes…the thoughts that go through your mind in the course of one day. Of course, since it is a wedding day, many thoughts are wedding and marriage related.
This very creative novel by Melody Carlson tells the story of one day–a wedding day. The story is told through the thoughts of five women–1) the bride’s Aunt Elizabeth, 2) Suzette, the second wife of the groom’s new boss, 3) Margaret, the bride’s paternal grandmother, 4) Laura, the wife of the groom’s brother, and 5) Ingrid, the maid of honor.
An intriguing book.

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Like his other wonderful books, [David Sedaris'][author] book, ["When You Are Engulfed in Flames"][bookdetail] is hilarious, moving, disturbing and just plain wonderful!
In Chapter 2, “Keeping Up” he lists the fashion do’s and don’ts he has learned over the years, like the [Mrs. Beasley][beasley] glasses. Priceless information! His obsession, however, with a spider he named April was a bit disturbing.
He goes on, in one essay, talking about smoking, how he started and what it was like growing up in my generation. A very nostalgic section, with the harsh and hard hitting bite of that first cigarette in the morning.
This book may not be as side-splitting funny as some of David’s others, but each story is engaging, and the overall satirical, yet moving nature of the book is classic Sadaris.
If you have the option, listen to this book as an audio book. From Audible.com, the book is read by the author, and the experience is like a wonderful 8 hour long NPR [David Sedaris][author] marathon.
[bookdetail]: http://books.clubreading.com/book/bookdetail/book_id/2575
[author]: http://books.clubreading.com/book/browsebook/pagenum/1/author/David%20Sedaris
[audible]: http://www.audible.com/adbl/site/products/ProductDetail.jsp?productID=BK_HACH_000100&BV_UseBVCookie=Yes
[beasley]: http://www.backtobasicstoys.com/item/productid/5915

Back Home Again” is book one in the “Tales from Grace Chapel Inn” series by Melody Carlson.  Three mature sisters reunite at the old family home in Acorn Hill, Pennsylvania, following their father’s death.  They plan to renovate their large old home and list it on the local historical register…and then open a bed-and-breakfast.  They battle opposition from their own aunt and the townfolk.

The three sisters are so different from each other the townfolk have said it’s hard to believe they are sisters.  It is questionable whether or not they can work together to accomplish their goals with the bed-and-breakfast.  Louise has been a widow for 5 years.  She is an accomplished pianist and made her living in Philadelphia giving piano lessons and an occasional concert.  Jane, the youngest was divorced a year ago.  She was a highly respected chef in San Francisco.  Alice never married.  Instead she made her home with her father and remained with him until his death.  She is a nurse at the hospital in Acorn Hill.

Do you ever identify strongly with one of the characters in a book?  Of course!   We all do that!  I read books two and three of this seriest first.  Of the three sisters, I identified most with Alice, though I could not have said why.  In book one Alice is the main character.  I am learning a little more about her, and now I know why I identify with her.
First…Alice is the middle daughter–not the eldest or the baby.  Ditto here.
Second…Alice is relatively attractive (very relative here(, but does not play up her looks.  She wears her nurse’s uniform at work and jeans and a chambry shirt at home.  The other sisters call her dowdy, but she prefers to think of it as more concerned with others than herself.
Third…Alice is the peacemaker.  Maybe that comes along with being middle-born.  Who knows?
Fourth…Alice stresses over small t hings.  I’ll let this quote explain (italics are mine).

Alice sent up a silent prayer as she hurried toward home.  She didn’t feeling so alarmed over such a seemingly small thing, but she knew better than anyone her own tendency to worry too much about ‘small things.’  Her compulsion to fret was also one of the biggest reasons for Alice’s fervent and active prayer life.  She found herself constantly running to God with her worries–both large and small.  She reassured herself that she was doing exactly what the Scriptures taught.  Besides, as Vera was kind to point out, perhaps it was simply the way God had made her, a natural result of Alice’s very sensitive nature. She just tended to feel things more deeply and intensely than most people.  Alice liked to see it in this positive light, but to be perfectly honest, she felt it was both a blessing and a curse.”

Fifth..Alice feels personally responsible for everything that goes wrong.

Like so many other things in life, Alice felt personally responsible for this too.  If she hadn’t encouraged her sisters to develop the inn, or if she simply minded her own business and kept her mouth shut….  But then, Alice wondered, was keeping everything the same really for the best?”

“Tales from Grace Chapel Inn” is a pleasant, light-read series that I enjoyed.  I hope you will also.

Re-reading a series of books is always fun, but re-reading the Harry Potter series was exceptional. I read them as they came out, about 18 months between each book. I just recently re-read all seven of them in two weeks. I discovered I did not miss as much as I thought I did! I was afraid that I had forgotten so much from the earlier books that I missed references in book seven, Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows. (From now on, I’m skipping the “Harry Potter” in the book titles.)
The Sorcerer’s Stone was a wonderful start to the series, an easy and fun read. I think Rowling expected her audience to grow up with Harry, and the books not only got longer and more difficult but the themes became darker. And of course, more beloved, and not so beloved, characters died. If I learned anything from re-reading all seven books it was that Rowling seems to truly believe that there is no good/evil dichotomy. Instead, all of us have both good and evil in us and we are allowed to choose which path to follow. I found it interesting that the character I disliked the most wasn’t evil. And the character that most kids would dislike the most had his good moments as well. I found it most interesting that Draco Malfoy’s mother loved Draco as much as Harry Potter’s mother loved him and, like Lily Potter was willing to sacrifice everything for Draco.
Because I was immersed in Harry Potter for two weeks, I began to dream in that world, something that often happens when I’m engrossed in a series or, sometimes, even a very long book. It also happens when the book I’m reading captivates or disturbs me. This is why I’ve stopped reading most realistic physiological thrillers; I have nightmares. Though Harry’s world has it’s bad points, using magic in my dreams is fun and entertaining.

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This is a totally unexpected book.
While the book reviews I’ve read said this was a series of stories, I thought of it more as a novel told in several parts, over several years. There is one story which does not have the same protagonist, but only one.
Each of the stories concerns Jane, whom we first met as a teenager. Jane is learning how to become a woman, then how to be a woman, and, finally, how to be herself and still be happy. The title of the book doesn’t refer to actual hunting and fishing (which in many ways was a disappointment; I was looking for a stereotype-busting book), but rather to a book every woman has heard of: The Rules. The Rules was written several years ago, and supposedly told women the rules to catch a man. No one I know admits to having read The Rules; I have no idea how many women actually read them.
But long before Jane gets to The Rules, she goes through the break up of her brother and his girlfriend, a boss who’s manipulative, and a relationship with an older man. Although you may not have gone through these exact situations, chances are good that you have learned the same lessons through different experiences. Learning is the key to all of the stories. Although we all learn differently, we often learn the same lessons, like not getting too attached to our brother’s girlfriend. (I still miss Dee, my favorite of my brother’s girlfriends. If you are out there, Dee, drop me a line!)
In the end, whether you like this book or not (and I’m not sure if I liked it), it is thoughtful material. Because it is definitely written for women, it may not be appropriate for men. And it is not appropriate for younger girls, as there is much sexual content, and other adult themes.
[bookdetail]: http://books.clubreading.com/book/bookdetail/book_id/501
[author]: http://books.clubreading.com/book/browsebook/pagenum/1/author/Melissa%20Bank

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The publisher puts this book in the category of Essays/Memoir. The book is laid out as a chronological series of stories. [David Sedaris][author] takes us on a hilarious journey, a cathartic re-living of his growing up years.
When I first picked up the book and read the first couple of chapters (Chipped Beef, A Plague of Tics) I was certain the stories were either complete fabrications or such extreme colorizations that the real truth was so hidden that we may never be aware of it. But as I read further, I started realizing what the author was showing us. This is how we remember. We remember the outrageous, we tell those stories over and over again…if not to others, we tell them to ourselves. And in each re-telling, the stories seem more and more foreign, more like a dream.
In [Naked][bookdetail], the authors candor, his open re-telling of stories that range from sidesplitting funny to horrific and sad, easily captures the reader’s imagination. In just a few words, we are drawn into the world of a boy growing up in Raleigh, North Carolina. David shares with us his remembering of an outrageous mother to the more outrageous immigrant Greek grandmother who runs a newsstand/candy store.
I highly recommend this book. And I offer this caution; as you are reading and your mind starts to wander, you may at some point realize how healing and freeing this type of open and honest story telling must be for the author. When you are reading about the authors experience of making clocks out of jade in the shape of Oregon, or his trip/vacation to a nudist colony, and your thoughts lead to the strange/funny/sad/outrageous stories of your own life, write them down! Who knows? And what will you call your memoir? Perhaps ‘Twice Beaten Canoe Trip’, or ‘Karaoke Diva’…even if it isn’t book-worthy, you’re bound to have flushed a few daemons in the process.
[bookdetail]: http://books.clubreading.com/book/bookdetail/book_id/229
[author]: http://books.clubreading.com/book/browsebook/pagenum/1/author/David%20Sedaris

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A short introduction to the author’s family and the family’s food. I felt as though I was meeting my own slightly (or very) quirky relatives when the author introduced her family. The food wasn’t always up my alley, as it was definitely southern, but I loved reading the recipes anyway. I’ve marked three recipes: Fall Spice Cake, Chocolate Icing, and Georgia Gingersnaps, but there are plenty to pick from!
[bookdetail]: http://books.clubreading.com/book/bookdetail/book_id/1956