Book Club

[CANDLEQUEEN]

Just finished DO NOT BECOME ALARMED! It was very good. It was about two families/wives are cousins and very close and live near each other who decide to take a cruise, and on an off shore excursion, the children come up missing, they also meet another couple with two kids on the cruise and they all go on this offshore excursion, but the husbands go golfing, and the women and children decide to do something else, it is very good, and after a rather slower start, was a good and quick read. I am not sure what I will read next. I will post on Monday once I have decided.......I won this book on Goodreads........

[CareBears]

@CANDLEQUEEN After you mentioned it the first time I went ahead and requested it at the library, it intrigued me, glad you liked it!

[CLEM]

Ship of Fools.  Many years ago a friend told me about a movie by that name and recommended that I see it.  Not long ago it was on TV, but I hated it.  Don't like when Holliwood puts their spin on things.

I started the book and find it very interesting.  Downloaded it to my Kindle.

[chihuahuamom]

Found Chevy Steven's new book Never Let You Go at the library yesterday.  Am about half way through it, and it is very good. I like this author. 

[sunala]

I finished The Dry by Jane Harper. It's a new book that's got a lot of buzz.  I really enjoyed it and recommend it highly. 

Today I started Southland by Nina Revoyr. I've been wanting to read this for a while, and so far I'm enjoying it. 

A few of my ebooks came in from the library, two of which are Anything is Possible by Elizabeth Strout, and The Red Hunter by Lisa Unger. Plus, I will have to read My Grandmother Asked me to Tell You She's Sorry by Fredrik Backman, which will come off my Kindle in less than a week.  I hate when they get piled up like that because I want to read them all at the same time!

Happy reading everyone!

[vickie25]

This is my 1st time in this thread as most books I read are diet/fitness  or cookbooks.  I picked up The Sea House by Elisabeth Gifford, her 1st novel.  It came out in 2014 and B&N had it clearanced priced for $5.98.  I liked the cover art of a house perched on a hilltop overlooking the sea.  Hence the name.  When I read the inside cover, I was intrigued and purchased it.

This book would be classified as fiction.  From Amazon:

In 1860, Alexander Ferguson, a newly ordained vicar and amateur evolutionary scientist, takes up his new parish, a poor, isolated patch on the remote Scottish island of Harris. He hopes to uncover the truth behind the legend of the selkies―mermaids or seal people who have been sighted off the north of Scotland for centuries. He has a more personal motive, too; family legend states that Alexander is descended from seal men. As he struggles to be the good pastor he was called to be, his maid Moira faces the terrible eviction of her family by Lord Marstone, whose family owns the island. Their time on the island will irrevocably change the course of both their lives, but the white house on the edge of the dunes keeps its silence long after they are gone.

It will be more than a century before the Sea House reluctantly gives up its secrets. Ruth and Michael buy the grand but dilapidated building and begin to turn it into a home for the family they hope to have. Their dreams are marred by a shocking discovery. The tiny bones of a baby are buried beneath the house; the child's fragile legs are fused together―a mermaid child. Who buried the bones? And why? To heal her own demons, Ruth feels she must discover the secrets of her new home―but the answers to her questions may lie in her own traumatic past. The Sea House by Elisabeth Gifford is a sweeping tale of hope and redemption and a study of how we heal ourselves by discovering our histories.

The book is laid out by chapters.  Some chapters are only 4 pages, others 20+.  Each chapter is labeled with the character's name who is relating their story.  There can be 2 chapters in a row dealing with what happened during 1860, and then the next chapter will be present day.  Sometimes I have had to flip back to a prior chapter to read where the character left off.  Also, some of the language in the 1860 time was unfamiliar to me, so google was my friend.

I haven't been this engrossed in a story for a long time.  Some of the chapters would end and I wanted to know what happened next and had to wait several chapters to find out.  I have about 20 pages left so can't wait to see how this story wraps up for both Alexander in 1860 and Michael and Ruth in present day.

It is just over 300 pages, but "reads" fast.  And I am a slow reader.  Amazon has a few copies left.  Highly recommend.

[LoriLori]

@vickie25, welcome to the thread! 

I read "The Sea House" by Elisabeth Gifford and I liked it a lot.  (And that cover is beautiful, I'd forgotten how much I loved the cover!)  I got it on sale at The Book Depository having never heard of the author.  Have you read other books by her and if yes, what do you recommend? 

[Alter Ego]

I finished listening to LOTTERY by Patricia Wood, which I believe was recommended by @sunala a few months back.  I thought it was very well narrated and, overall, I enjoyed the book. 

I really hope there are not people like his family in the world and, if there are, I hope I never meet them.  

I am now listening to INTO THE WATER by Paula Hawkins and it is, so far, a chore.  It may read better than it listens.  There's just a lot of characters and, because I'm driving, I can't go back to remember who they are like I could if reading.  I do like the moody tone of the book and think I will end up liking it.  It's just taking more attention than Lottery.    

[CraftyTJ1]

I sure hope your arm gets better soon.  You need to read!!!

[Lilysmom]

I am about half way through a book called The Sisters of St. Croix (Diney Costeloe) which is a story about the French resistance in WWII.  There is at least one other book (The Lost Soldier) which is part of a series.  

Goodreads rates this at 4.28.  So far so good!  LM