And we're reading again...

Since I finished my paper, I was able to breathe a big sigh of relief and get back to my love of reading.  I felt suffocated by that Jodi Picoult book.  It was one of those books that I felt dread reading the entire time and when I read a book like that, as soon as it's over, I have to immediately read something else.  It drove me crazy because I couldn't, instead I had to delve even further into the book and pull out quotes and paraphrase passages and just completely immerse myself into it.  It's literally sitting in the fireplace right now, waiting for some prime cold weather to light it up and have a fire.  I missed sharing about books I've enjoyed reading.  On with the show...

The first novel is a story by Curtis Sittenfeld, whom I assumed was a boy until I looked at the book jacket and realized she was a girl.  This is a fictional account of the George W Bush family and his rise to presidency written from the perspective of his wife.  I am not sure how close to the truth it is, as someone from Texas, who has read quite a bit about the Bush family, I assume it is fairly close as a lot of things in the novel were true. I really enjoyed it.  I wasn't sure if I would, as I found this book sitting in a $5 bin at Walgreens, but it made me want to find more from Curtis Sittenfeld.  I loved how she wrote it through the eyes of the "Laura Bush" character.  It made you realize she certainly wasn't all she was portrayed to be, and it made you soften a bit toward George W.  Politically, I tend to lean republican (which drives my diedhard liberal husband crazy), but I did not like the Bush administration.  However, this book softened my views of them as people.  It's a wonderful story, and a definite page turner. I couldn't put it down.

I just finished this novel yesterday.  I thought it was wonderfully appropriate for the season.  It was very short, only 300 something pages, but I wanted it to go on and on.  It's by Amy Foster, who is a songwriter, and it was her first novel.  I am an atheist by nature, but I love pagan things, just can't get my head around a goddess.  The story is set in this wonderful little town called Avening.  It makes you want to live there.  The beginning of the story is about Autumn Avening, who is some what of a witch, though she hates that word, and she must choose her replacement because she has been called to leave.  You can just imagine her home and little store.  She is given a list of women to consider, and their stories are fascinating -- that was the part I would have loved to have delved further into.  Their stories were just enough to make you beg for more.  I wanted the tiny little plot lines of their lives to keep going, especially the woman who had breast cancer and was dying but was given the option to go some place else...very interesting....or the girl who could astral project.  She wrapped the story up nicely with truths about Autumn you suspected but ended up being much deeper than you realized, but I felt there was so much more to tell about each of the women in the story, and I'm still craving it. 

I've got a week to finish up 2 more novels from the library, The Red Queen and The Calligrapher's Daughter, historical fiction and asian fiction.  I read all of Phillipa Gregory's novels as I love Tudor historical fiction, so I'm excited to read The Red Queen as I finished up The White Queen several months ago.