Bookmarks Magazine May/June 2018

The only thing that makes getting coming home any more glorious is my Bookmarks magazine waiting for me in the mailbox - WOOHOO!  There were some unusual books in this edition that I am intrigued to read (The Friend is at the top of my list!) Here are my picks from this edition.

      
      

Already on my kindle:

Please share what your picks were so I can see which ones I missed and add them to my queue!

Young Jane Young by Gabrielle Zevin

My rating: 4.6

Aviva Grossman is a congressional intern who has an affair with the married congressman. When the affair comes to light it is a social media frenzy. She can't get a job or rebuild her life. Aviva quickly realizes she is a household name and the stigma will follow her.

This is a funny, sharp novel that captures women and their relationships. I really enjoyed the light easy writing style.

Love and Respect by Dr Emerson Eggerichs

My rating: 4.8

Women need love and men need respect. If you fight giving your spouse what they need, they won't give what you need. If you know what they need, give it and see what happens. I did and was pretty amazed at the results.

Although this is very Christian based, I feel that anyone of any religious or non-religious belief could benefit from this book. It is the type of book that is easy to skim over the scriptural sections if you wish and still glean the message of the book.

Force of Nature by Jane Harper

My Rating: 4.7

A Corporate team building event of hiking in the wilderness ends with one of the women not returning and the other women all telling a slightly different version of what happened. This flashes back and forth between the detectives interviewing the women and trying to piece together what happened and flashbacks to the events that unfolded of the women's hike. All the while, searchers are in the woods trying to find the missing woman.

This was phenomenal at capturing the emotional baggage of each woman and how the corporate boardroom dynamics don't translate out to the wilderness. If I had any doubt, this book has confirmed I don't want to do a hiking team building event with my co-workers!  Will definitely read more by Harper.

As Bright As Heaven by Susan Meissner

My rating: 3.5

After the recent loss of their baby son, Pauline, her husband and their daughters take an offer from an uncle to move to Philadelphia and become partners in the funeral business. While they are adjusting to their new life, they also have to deal with the outbreak of the Spanish flu. One day, while mother and daughter are delivering food to the sick, the daughter finds a young baby, his mother dead from the flu. They decide to keep him and he gives them all a purpose to hold on to in their chaotic world.

I enjoyed the alternating POV of the mother and the daughters. While I enjoyed the portion about the Spanish flu immensely the light fluffiness characters that were lacking in depth didn't seem to fit. There were also a LOT of coincidences at the end that allowed everything to be tied up in such a pretty neat bow it felt like a script for Hallmark Weekly Movie (hate that!) Definitely enjoyed the first portion more than the ending which is too bad as it had promise to be better.

The Likeness by Tana French

My Rating: 4.9

Cassie Maddox has transferred out of the Dublin Murder squad but an urgent phone call tells her to come to a grisly crime scene. The victim looks EXACTLY like Cassie and carries ID identifying herself as "Alexandra Madison", which is an alias Cassie once used as an undercover cop. Suddenly, Cassie must discover not only who killed this girl, but, more importantly, who is this girl?

Wow. Tana French hits it out of the park. With perfect pitch she captures every note of how it would feel to see your doppelganger dead before you, to have to go undercover and take on her life and be Cassie playing Lexie. I loved the audio version which captured hte Irish accents. You don't need to read the first book in this series Into the Woods to enjoy this book but, it was also excellent so, why not :-)