Control Girl by Shannon Popkin

My Rating: 5.0

"Control Girl" is a penetrating look at how selfishness and self-protectiveness wreck lives--and why surrender and trust are God's life-giving pathways to true freedom and joy."

This book was so good. It takes 7 different women from the Bible and shows how they were controlling (or in some cases, being controlled). Shannon also inserts a lot of personal antidotes that were so helpful. It was uncomfortable to realize how we are all living out Eve's curse but, the awareness was so beneficial. EXCELLENT book that everyone in my Christian women's book club raved about.

The Magnificent Lives of Marjorie Post by Allison Pataki

 My Rating: 4.9

This book starts with Marjorie Post's father very ill and seeking treatment. The treatment center feeds him vegetables and he proceeds to deteriorate but, at the home near the center where his wife and daughter Marjorie are staying, the hostess believes in good old fashioned American cooking. Soon, C.W. Post starts to heal and understands the power of food. He also sees how much time women spend in the kitchen and decides to invent a convenience food for breakfast - which was the beginning of Post Cereal Company.

Marjorie's live definitely feels like many "lives" or chapters and they are all equally fascinating! I learned so much about her including that she built Mara-Lago. Allison Pataki unfolds Marjorie's life so beautifully that I couldn't wait to listen to more. This book was thoroughly delightful and got me to buy a box of grapenuts! I will definitely be reading more by this author.

The Ways We Hide by Kristina McMorris

My Rating: 4.5

Fenna Vos, orphaned young, has learned to focus on her own survival. Though she performs onstage as the assistant to an unruly escape artist, behind the curtain she's the mastermind of their act. Ultimately, controlling her surroundings and eluding traps of every kind helps her keep a lingering trauma at bay.

Yet for all her planning, Fenna doesn't foresee being called upon by British military intelligence. Tasked with designing escape aids to thwart the Germans, MI9 seeks those with specialized skills for a war nearing its breaking point. Fenna reluctantly joins the unconventional team as an inventor. But when a test of her loyalty draws her deep into the fray, she discovers no mission is more treacherous than escaping one's past. 

This was an intriguing novel based on true events. The first portion of the book seemed disconnected from her time in the British military until it all wove together with the past coming into the present. I enjoyed Sold On A Monday more than this book but I will continue to read more by this author.

The Murmur of Bees by Sofia Sogavia

 My Rating: 5.0

Old Nana Reja finds a baby abandoned under a bridge and the life of a small Mexican town changes forever. Disfigured and covered in a blanket of bees, little Simonopio is for some locals the stuff of superstition, a child kissed by the devil. But he is welcomed by landowners Francisco and Beatriz Morales, who adopt him and care for him as if he were their own. As he grows up, Simonopio becomes a cause for wonder to the Morales family, because when the uncannily gifted child closes his eyes, he can see what no one else can—visions of all that’s yet to come, both beautiful and dangerous. Followed by his protective swarm of bees and living to deliver his adoptive family from threats—both human and those of nature—Simonopio’s purpose in Linares will, in time, be divined. Set against the backdrop of the Mexican Revolution and the devastating influenza of 1918, The Murmur of Bees captures both the fate of a country in flux and the destiny of one family that has put their love, faith, and future in the unbelievable.   

I can't properly describe this book to do it justice. Translated from Spanish, it is so beautiful. All of the characters come to life as does the Mexican Revlution, the horror of the Spanish flu and dealing with the farm and raising children. Such a beautiful book and I will definitely be reading more by this author.

Whistling Past The Graveyard by Susan Crandall

My Rating: 4.6

In the summer of 1963, nine-year-old Starla runs away from her strict grandmother’s Mississippi home. Starla’s destination is Nashville, where her mother went to become a famous singer. Starla hasn't seen her mother since she was three but firmly believes her mother will reunite them with her father who works on an oil rig and they will be a happy family. Walking a lonely country road, Starla accepts a ride from Eula, a black woman traveling alone with a white baby. Now, on the road trip that will change her life forever, Starla sees for the first time life as it really is—as she reaches for a dream of how it could one day be.

While the story has a lot of the uncomfortable truth, this still had a wholesome feel. You feel for Starla but the people she encounters on her journey help to shield her even as she is exposed to the harsh realities of life.