BOOK REPORT......

Sailor and Fiddler - Herman Wouk

Product Description(Amazon)
In an unprecedented literary accomplishment, Herman Wouk, one of America’s most beloved and enduring authors, reflects on his life and times from the remarkable vantage point of 100 years old.

Many years ago, the great British philosopher Sir Isaiah Berlin urged Herman Wouk to write his autobiography. Wouk responded, “Why me? I’m nobody.” Berlin answered, “No, no. You’ve traveled. You’ve known many people. You have interesting ideas. It would do a lot of good.”

Now, in the same year he has celebrated his hundredth birthday, Herman Wouk finally reflects on the life experiences that inspired his most beloved novels. Among those experiences are his days writing for comedian Fred Allen’s radio show, one of the most popular shows in the history of the medium; enlisting in the US Navy during World War II; falling in love with Betty Sarah Brown, the woman who would become his wife (and literary agent) for sixty-six years; writing his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, The Caine Mutiny; as well as a big hit Broadway play The Caine Mutiny Court Martial; and the surprising inspirations and people behind such masterpieces as The Winds of War, War and Remembrance, Marjorie Morningstar, and Youngblood Hawke.

Written with the wisdom of a man who has lived through two centuries and the wit of someone who began his career as professional comedy writer, the first part of Wouk’s memoir (“Sailor”) refers to his Navy experience and writing career, the second (“Fiddler”) to what he’s learned from living a life of faith. Ultimately, Sailor and Fiddler is an unprecedented reflection from a vantage point few people have lived to experience. 
Hardcover: 160 pages 
Publisher: Simon & Schuster (January 5, 2016) 
Language: English 
ISBN-10: 150112854X 
ISBN-13: 978-1501128547

MY THOUGHTS:  I must admit I was kind skeptical about reading this book.  I have never read any of this authors books, for the simple fact I don't like reading classic or old books.  The writing bothers me for some reason.  Anyway, I read this book in 1 day.  Very interesting info on how all those classic books came to be.  I give this book.....5

This book is for 3 of my reading challenges......
Outdo Yourself Challenge
Library Love Challenge
Memoir Challenge

BOOK REPORT........

Genevieve's War - Patricia Reilly Giff

Product Description(Amazon)
Thirteen-year-old American girl Genevieve has spent the summer of 1939 at her grandmother’s farm in Alsace, France. Then she makes an impulsive choice: to stay in France. It proves to be a dangerous decision. World War II erupts. The Nazis conquer Alsace and deport the Jews and others. A frightening German officer commandeers a room in Meme’s farmhouse. And when Gen’s friend Remi commits an act of sabotage, Gen is forced to hide him in the attic—right above the Nazi officer’s head. Genevieve’s War is a gripping story that brings the war in occupied France vividly to life. It is a companion work to Lily’s Crossing, a Newbery Honor Book. 
Hardcover: 240 pages 
Publisher: Holiday House (March 30, 2017) 
Language: English 
ISBN-10: 0823438007 
ISBN-13: 978-0823438006

MY THOUGHTS:  I started this book last night.  I couldn't put it down.  Watching this little girl help with war, making new friends, and losing friends and loved animals.  Really awesome book.  I give this book 5.......

This book is for 3 of my reading challenges........
Strolling Though Non-Fiction Challenge
Library Love Challenge
Outdo Yourself Challenge

BOOK REPORT......

Give Them Something Better - Sarah Fairn

Product Description(Amazon)
The Good Life is killing us. Chronic diseases have established a stronghold in our society representing 75% of our national health care costs. And the best modern medicine can do is to manage the symptoms of these modern killer diseases. But hope comes from Loma Linda, California, the capital of the American Blue Zone of long livers. Why do these people who represent not just a geographic Blue Zone but a cultural one, have only half the rates of heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, and excess weight, and why do they have lower risks for arthritis, colon and prostate cancer? Let this family- style cookbook reveal some of their secrets. Here you find delicious, inexpensive recipes that will contribute to better health and longer life. These are not recipes with outlandish ingredients. Instead, this book is offering families some of their favorite American foods but with a healthy twist. This book offers you something better. 
Spiral-bound: 175 pages 
Publisher: Sanare Life; Spi edition (September 12, 2011) 
Language: English 
ISBN-10: 0983559406 
ISBN-13: 978-0983559405

MY THOUGHTS:  My son bought this book from some kids selling them door to door.  They were trying to raise money for college.  It is sponsored through The Indiana Academy, which is located on Ball State University.     The book is all about eating healthy.  It has lots of great recipes and photos.  What's really great about this book, is you really don't need any thing special to fix the food.   I haven't tried any of them yet.  But I will be doing that.  Since we all need to eat healthier foods.  I give this book 5....

This book is for 1 of my reading challenges......
Outdo Yourself Challenge

BOOK REPORT......

Killers of the Flower Moon - David Grann

Product Description(Amazon)
In the 1920s, the richest people per capita in the world were members of the Osage Nation in Oklahoma. After oil was discovered beneath their land, the Osage rode in chauffeured automobiles, built mansions, and sent their children to study in Europe.
            Then, one by one, the Osage began to be killed off. The family of an Osage woman, Mollie Burkhart, became a prime target. One of her relatives was shot. Another was poisoned. And it was just the beginning, as more and more Osage were dying under mysterious circumstances, and many of those who dared to investigate the killings were themselves murdered.
            As the death toll rose, the newly created FBI took up the case, and the young director, J. Edgar Hoover, turned to a former Texas Ranger named Tom White to try to unravel the mystery. White put together an undercover team, including a Native American agent who infiltrated the region, and together with the Osage began to expose one of the most chilling conspiracies in American history. 
Paperback: 400 pages 
Publisher: Vintage; Reprint edition (April 3, 2018) 
Language: English 
ISBN-10: 0307742482 
ISBN-13: 978-0307742483

MY THOUGHTS: Really liked this book.  I like reading about history in our country.  This is a piece of history I didn't know anything about.  Everyone tried to help the Osage people.  But when someone tried to help, they mysteriously came up dead.  Then the FBI stepped in and they finally cracked the case.  I give this book 5......

This book is for 3 of my reading challenges......
Alphabet Soup Challenge
Library Love Challenge
Outdo Yourself Challenge

BOOK REPORT......

Same Beach, Next Year - Dorothea Benton Frank

Product Description(Amazon)
One enchanted summer, two couples begin a friendship that will last more than twenty years and transform their lives.
A chance meeting on the Isle of Palms, one of Charleston’s most stunning barrier islands, brings former sweethearts, Adam Stanley and Eve Landers together again. Their respective spouses, Eliza and Carl, fight sparks of jealousy flaring from their imagined rekindling of old flames. As Adam and Eve get caught up on their lives, their partners strike up a deep friendship—and flirt with an unexpected attraction—of their own.
Year after year, Adam, Eliza, Eve, and Carl eagerly await their reunion at Wild Dunes, a condominium complex at the island’s tip end, where they grow closer with each passing day, building a friendship that will withstand financial catastrophe, family tragedy, and devastating heartbreak. The devotion and love they share will help them weather the vagaries of time and enrich their lives as circumstances change, their children grow up and leave home, and their twilight years approach. 
Paperback: 400 pages 
Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks; Reprint edition (April 24, 2018) 
Language: English 
ISBN-10: 0062390791 
ISBN-13: 978-0062390790

MY THOUGHTS:  This is my book club's choice for June.  I don't usually read this kind of book.  It's what I consider Chick Lit.  Maybe it's not, but to me it is.  I finished the book, but didn't really enjoy it that much.  For one thing,  there is too much going on, and what's the obsession with all the food, who wants to know, they buy the food, cook the food and eat the food.  It's all through the book like this, not very interesting.  If your into this kind of book....I give this book 3.....

This book is for 2 of my reading challenges......
Alphabet Soup Challenge
Outdo Yourself Challenge

BOOK REPORT.....

His Bloody Project - Graeme Macrae Burnet

Product Description(Amazon)
In the smash hit historical thriller that the New York Times Book Review calls “thought provoking fiction,” a brutal triple murder in a remote Scottish farming community in 1869 leads to the arrest of seventeen-year-old Roderick Macrae. There is no question that Macrae committed this terrible act. What would lead such a shy and intelligent boy down this bloody path? And will he hang for his crime?

Presented as a collection of documents discovered by the author, His Bloody Project opens with a series of police statements taken from the villagers of Culdie, Ross-shire. They offer conflicting impressions of the accused; one interviewee recalls Macrae as a gentle and quiet child, while another details him as evil and wicked. Chief among the papers is Roderick Macrae’s own memoirs where he outlines the series of events leading up to the murder in eloquent and affectless prose. There follow medical reports, psychological evaluations, a courtroom transcript from the trial, and other documents that throw both Macrae’s motive and his sanity into question. 
Hardcover: 300 pages 
Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing; First Edition edition (October 18, 2016) 
Language: English 
ISBN-10: 1510719210 
ISBN-13: 978-1510719217

MY THOUGHTS:  When I first started this book it didn't seem that I'd finish it.  But I kept with and finally got it done.  Very interesting story from the author's and the main character, Roderick Macrae.  The whole book is about Roderick and his telling of what happened to lead up to the murders.  I've got say I don't really blame him for what he done.  Considering the circumstances of the way he lived.  The lawyers tried their best to help Roderick.  Asking for Clemency for Roderick.  From the book I liked Roderick, but the circumstances of the way he lived and the people around him all contributed to murders.  I give this book 5....

This book is for 3 of my reading challenges.......
Memoir Reading Challenge
Library Love Challenge
Outdo Yourself Challenge

BOOK REPORT.......

Bright Purple - Melody Carlson

Product Description(Amazon)
Jessica LeCroix drops a bomb on her best friend, Ramie: “I’m a lesbian.” Ramie Grant cannot believe her ears. Jess!? Her best friend, her teammate . . . a homosexual? Before long other girls on the basketball team find out, and little jokes become vicious attacks. In the end, Ramie must decide if she will stand by Jessica’s side or turn her back on a friend in need. The tenth book in the teen fiction series TrueColors, Bright Purple examines the subjects of sexuality, identity, and forgiveness.
Paperback: 224 pages 
Publisher: TH1NK (September 5, 2006) 
Language: English 
ISBN-10: 1576839508 
ISBN-13: 978-1576839508

MY THOUGHTS:   This book had a chance to show people how to push aside biases and grow as a person, and how to use the resources around you. In my opinion this book  doesn't do all these things.  I didn't think the author gave the subject of Homosexuality a good explanation or the friends of the that person the right information.  I give this book 2.......

This book is for 2 of my reading challenges.......
Library Love Challenge
Outdo Yourself Challenge 
Read the Rainbow Challenges

GROUNDHOG BABIES......

We have groundhog's living in our barn.....well, under our barn.  Since Groundhog's make burrows, that's where they live.  A little information about Groundhogs.

"Groundhogs begin hibernation mid October and emerge in February. Their burrow system is located about 2-4 feet underground and may extend 15-25 feet horizontally. The main groundhog nest chamber is usually located at the end of the burrow. The main entrance is seen as a mound of fresh earth around the opening."

We have 3 Groundhog babies right now.  They usually come out in the morning and evening to eat.  We have a lot of Clover growing in our back yard, right in front of the barn.  The Groundhog's love clover.  

Want to see them close up?  Just click on the bigger to make it larger. 
 

BOOK REPORT......

My Life With Bob - Pamela Paul

Product Description(Amazon)
Imagine keeping a record of every book you’ve ever read. What would this reading trajectory say about you? With passion, humor, and insight, the editor of The New York Times Book Review shares the stories that have shaped her life.
Pamela Paul has kept a single book by her side for twenty-eight years – carried throughout high school and college, hauled from Paris to London to Thailand, from job to job, safely packed away and then carefully removed from apartment to house to its current perch on a shelf over her desk – reliable if frayed, anonymous-looking yet deeply personal. This book has a name: Bob.
Bob is Paul’s Book of Books, a journal that records every book she’s ever read, from Sweet Valley High to Anna Karenina, from Catch-22 to Swimming to Cambodia, a journey in reading that reflects her inner life – her fantasies and hopes, her mistakes and missteps, her dreams and her ideas, both half-baked and wholehearted. Her life, in turn, influences the books she chooses, whether for solace or escape, information or sheer entertainment.
But My Life with Bob isn’t really about those books. It’s about the deep and powerful relationship between book and reader. It’s about the way books provide each of us the perspective, courage, companionship, and imperfect self-knowledge to forge our own path. It’s about why we read what we read and how those choices make us who we are. It’s about how we make our own stories. 
Hardcover: 256 pages 
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co. (May 2, 2017) 
Language: English 
ISBN-10: 1627796312 
ISBN-13: 978-1627796316

MY THOUGHTS: This is a book every book reader should read.  I personally don't have a list of books I've read, except for the ones I've kept here at my blog, under my "My Library" tab.  Some of the early books I read as a child are gone from my memory, but I can still remember reading some.  If only I would have knew about this book way back then.  So do you keep track of your book reading?  If so, how do you do it?  I give this book 5.....

This book is for 3 of my reading challenges....
Epistolary Challenge
Library Love Challenge
Outdo Yourself Challenge

BOOK REPORT.......

The Devil Wears Kilts - Suzanne Enoch

Product Description(Amazon)
Determined to rescue his sister from a satin-clad British society he holds in contempt, Scotsman Ranulf MacLawry descends on the ballrooms of London only to fall head over heels for sharp-tongued Lady Charlotte Hanover, who believes she prefers docile men. 
Series: Thorndike Press Large Print Romance 
Hardcover: 473 pages 
Publisher: Thorndike Press; Large Print edition (March 19, 2014) 
Language: English 
ISBN-10: 1410467724 
ISBN-13: 978-1410467720

MY THOUGHTS:  This is a re-read for me.  But it was just as good the second time around.  Ranulf hates English Society, and everything it stands for.  Ranulf is Scottish.  Rowena, the only girl among 5 brothers, wants a season in England like her mother had.  Ranulf doesn't want her to.  Rowena sneaks of to London with a friend.  Ranulf goes London to get her back.  And mets Lady Charlotte Hanover.  Who is sharp tongued and thinks she likes docile men.  But Lady Charlotte and Ranulf clash and fireworks goes off.  Do they fall in love?  Or do they hate each other?  Read the book, it's really good even on the second reading.  I give this book.......

This book is for 4 of my reading challenges......
Alphabet Soup Challenge
Library Love Challenge
Outdo Yourself Challenge
The Backlist Challenge

ANOTHER NEW PROJECT......

as if I need another project.  But I was blog hopping yesterday, and ran across Linda's blog, Notes From Studio B.  She is doing a different leaf a week.  You really need to check out her leaves.  They are awesome!  So I went searching at Google for leaves.  I have enough to do a year's worth of leaves.  Some will be applique and some will be embroidered.  The first leaf....

I think I'll applique this one, with some embroidery added.  What do you think?  Want to join in, find some leaves and get going.

STITCHING ON THE PORCH......

It has finally cooled off here.  Been in the high 90's for more than a week.  With the humidity way up there.  So outside stitching was out .  But have started a new embroidery project.  Working on Sunbonnet Sue.  Going to make a quilt for my grand daughter.  Pink is her favorite color.  I've got 2 blocks done.

Block 1

Block 2

I'm going to take block 3 out to the porch and do some stitching and enjoy this cooler weather.  I'm linking up with Kathy for Slow Stitching Sunday.  Hop over and check out what everyone is working on.