It Happened at Christmas

First of all - yes, I am stilling reading Christmas stories after the holiday. So sue me. Sometimes one needs the extra lift. And some Christmas romance stories are not like the others. The anthology, It Happened at Christmas with pieces by Penny Jordan, Helen Brooks and Carol Wood is a great collection of different stories.

One can read romances set completely in the houses of the high and mighty and the folks go from one gala to the next. Don't get me wrong, those can be fun to read too, but these tales are set in out of the way places from the typical romance spot. One story is set on the Isle of Dogs in the East end of London. A new doctor comes to help out his uncle's practice with the poor in the neighborhood. The nurse and the doctor do not see eye to eye on remedies. Another story is set in a mill town where a girl needs to find out if a mill owner with a bad reputation - is really the ogre he is said to be. The other story is a about how a factory girl with a family to support gets a new job as a tenant on a farmer's land.

Definitely different Christmas stories. Take a look. A fun read.

Why Men Never Remember and Women Never Forget

Why Men Never Remember and Women Never Forget by Marianne J. Legato is not you’re usual "let's study the social differences between the sexes" book. There is more science than societal antidote here. Somethings I learned: facts like men's brains are bigger than women's but women's brains have more interconnectivity between the different sections. And the fact that men's ability to process language and to understand what is said to them starts to diminish as early as age 35, while women preserve this function until after menopause.

A great primer on the study of the brain and other gender differences and it is written in an easy to understand style - for the lay people out there. An interesting read.

Keeper of the Bride

Talk about having a bad day. Nina is left at the altar. She looked great, the church looked great, the groom decided he was a no show. Just as she is getting a ride home from the reverend, the church blows up. So now she gets to wait around in her bridal gown to have the investingating detective inform her - that it was not a gas leak. It was a bomb. And by the way, did she or her fiance have any enemies willing to kill them?

Thus begins the roller coaster ride in Tess Gerritsen's Keeper of the Bride. Nina just wants to go home and get out of her gown, but now she gets a ride home from the cop - Sam. Sam just wants to find out why some one would bomb this ER nurse. He doesn't want to get involved with an "emotional" ex-bride, but then more accidents happen, and more bombings. Just who is trying to kill this nice woman? And why?

Gerristen keeps the reader on the edge as the plot gets more twisted and the action gets faster. The more things are discovered, the more questions there are, and Sam, Nina and his team are trying to connect the dots before the killer strikes again. A fun and fantastic read.

Buried Bones

Carolyn Haines has a mystery series set in the Mississippi Delta. It is saturated with the essence of the South. Old money, old houses and a small town where everyone knows what everybody is up to. Buried Bones is her second book in the Sarah Booth Delaney series.

Sarah has just saved her family home from being sold by solving a case. Now it looks like she is going to be an investigator. But her investigations come very close to home, when several friends are suspected of murder. The victim, a writer, knew a lot of secrets about everyone. And he was going to put the truth in his biography. Sarah gets to sort out whose secret is whose and who was willing to kill to keep those secrets quiet.

This may sound similar to other mysteries but Haines livens things up with her wild eccentric cast of characters, and her willingness to let Sarah not take things too seriously. Humorously written and very dense - a huge cast of characters- Haines creates a winner. I read in a review that they called this series is a mix of the Ya- Ya Sisterhood meets Nancy Drew - and I think they are right. A fun read. Looking forward to more in the series.

To Go Gray or Not To Go Gray - That Is the Question

Does she dye her hair or doesn't she? That question was asked in an old advertisement for hair coloring. It is not a life and death social issue, but it matters to many people, many of them women. How much is our hair color tied into our self esteem and our vision of ourselves? Is it just one more fashion statement or an example of how our society values age? Or are we just fighting the aging process with all our might? Anne Kreamer brings up these issues and many more in Going Gray: What I Learned About Beauty, Sex, Work, Motherhood, Authenticity and Everything Else That Really Matters.

Kreamer starts her quest with her own hair. She sees a picture of herself taken by a friend and is appalled by how bad she looks with her dyed hair. She thought it made her look younger but instead she finds it makes her unnatural and she is tired of the constant upkeep it requires. As she makes her decision to go natural, she investigates society's view point of gray hair - from advertising, to Hollywood, the business world, politics and beyond.

Kreamer writes well, and as a result, this is a thought provoking book. So should one go gray? It becomes a very very personal choice. A great read.

Sizzle and Burn

She can touch an item and hear voices. He can touch something and see visions. But what they can see and hear is usually the traces of residual violence. Jayne Anne Krentz's latest, in her Arcane Society series, Sizzle and Burn, has these two people join forces to find out secrets from that past that can effect the Society's future.

Raine Tallentyre is recovering from her Aunt Vella's death and she is trying to get her aunt's affairs in order. Zach Jones is investigating a missing scientific researcher who disappeared the same day that her aunt died. He knows her family history and knows about her "gifts". He offers to join forces with her since she thinks there is something strange about her aunt's death. Raine is soon plunged into a crash course about the Society and it's enemies. As they investigate - it becomes murkier. Are their foes after him? Or her?

This is an excellent sequel to her earlier book, White Lies. Krentz has done some great work with the engaging characters - by balancing their "gifts" with their normal lives. And it is great to have a lead male character who is a hero - but doesn't take himself so seriously. A great read. Looking forward to more in the series.

Witchy Business

Witchy Business is a collection of short stories by Julie Leto, Rhonda Nelson and Mia Zachary. From the title, you can tell that the book does feature paranormal characters. The stories are centered around the fictional Sedona Rehab Center for the Magically Challenged. It is a school for witches to attend, if they have not come into their powers. But the reason they do not have their "gifts" has to do with love. They have either "denied love, never known love, or abused love." And then comes the rest of the story...

All three stories are fun, and the premise makes the stories connect. Perfect for a short burst of romance. A frothy good time.

Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant

Do you eat alone? Are you planning gourmet meals for yourself? Or are you regulated to frozen dinners for one? Or are you secretly eating something others might consider a bit wacky? Come join the discussion in the book, Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant: Confessions of Cooking for One and Dining Alone edited by Jenni Ferrari-Adler.

This is a great study of being alone vs being lonely and preparing food for one's self. Some of the writers long for the days they can be alone, some remember times when they were alone, but others rejoice in the simple meals that they make for themselves. And the meals range from normal, to cravings, to obsessions, to grabbing whatever is in the pantry. One of my favorite essays is the one where the author decides to eat asparagus every day during the fresh season - which is two months! She becomes her own asparagus superhero. Personally I hate the vegetable, but I admire her obsession with it - I get that way for zucchini and fresh ripe summer tomatoes - and her desire to experience it at it's peak.

What is also interesting - is how many of these foods are or become comfort foods. Are our taste buds truly formed by our childhood foods? Or are there memories intertwined with these dishes? This book will definitely provoke some thinking about your own comfort foods and the times and the people behind them. An excellent read.

Some favorite bits...

"Dinner alone is one of life's pleasures. Certainly cooking for oneself reveals man at his weirdest. People lie when you ask them what they eat when they are alone. A salad they tell you. But when you persist, they confess to peanut butter and bacon sandwiches deep fried and eaten with hot sauce or spaghetti with butter and grape jam." - Laurie Colwin

"Eating after all, is a matter of taste, and taste cannot always be good taste. The very thought of maintaining high standards meal after meal is exhausting. It discounts all the peanut butter that is available in the world." - Ann Patchett

Bento Box in the Heartland

As much as we like to think that society has changed how it views race, it really depends mostly on the individual - on your environment, your upbringing and sometimes where you live. In the book, Bento Box in the Heartland: My Japanese Girlhood in Whitebread America, A Food Memoir by Linda Furiya, she points out the situation when telling her story of growing up Japanese American in small town Indiana in the late1960s and 70's.

This book is as much a memoir of her childhood as it is of her family's. Her father was born in the U.S. but was sent back to Japan, in the late 20's, to stay with relatives after his mother's death. He was trapped in Japan when the war started and only made it back to the States in the 1950's. Her mother came to the U.S. in 1961 as an arranged marriage fiance. One of their commonalities was their love of food from their homeland. And it becomes a focus in her book as well - perhaps because she later became a food writer, or perhaps because she realized that their ethnic food brought them together as a family.

One of the most enjoyable parts of the book is when a Japanese family friend in Chicago tells them about the Japanese grocery stores and restaurants they have found in the area. The Furiya family makes a trek to the big city, with coolers for some authentic Japanese supplies. Her father is overwhelmed by the bounty. And her parents decide that if they drive all night home they can spend the money on fresh fish, that they had put aside for a hotel! It was the first of many treks to Chicago.

I was enthralled with her views of her family's life and their struggles. I grew up in an area in the Midwest that had an influx of Asian immigrants, and was curious to see the view from the other side. And her descriptions of the food they ate, made me look up ingredients and recipes. A wonderful book. And it will make you want to go out for some Japanese food.

It Is Gruesome, Morbid and Macabre - But a Real Good Read

Do you have the right stuff to read about something gruesome? Have you read true crime and murder mysteries? Have friends claimed you are a bit morbid in your tastes? Then I have the book for you - Necropolis: London and It's Dead by Catharine Arnold.

There is one certainty for most of us - death. And Arnold takes us on a tour of the death rituals and burial grounds of one of the world's most populous cities - London. She takes us from the pagans to modern day, with many side trips along the way.

Some interesting facts:

1) The Romans feared their dead and buried their deceased outside of the town limits. They are the first ones to wear black for mourning "as black garments were thought to confer invisibility upon the bereaved, protecting them from vengeful spirits."

2) "The custom of burying within the church derived from the concept of martyrdom. Christians revered those who had died for their faith, turning their tombs into shrines. The faithful clamoured to be buried alongside the martyrs, as close as possible to the venerable remains..."

3) During the Restoration when there was plague - they ran out of burial grounds, so open pits had to be made - a couple near the Houses of Parliament.

4) During Victorian times, the funeral procession and extravaganza was at its peak. There were even whole warehouses "devoted to the sale of mourning costumes and all the paraphernalia necessary for the funeral."

So do you think you will have the stomach for this? Try it. You might get weird looks from people on the train, but it is an excellent read. Not for the faint of heart.

One Drop

Anatole Broyard - a New York Times book critic- was dying of cancer. He told his children his secret. He was black. He had been "passing" for white for decades. How do you handle this kind of family secret? Does it destroy you? Do you put the information away in the recesses of you mind - never to bring it out again? Or do you explore your family's background and your father's decision? In the book, One Drop: My Father's Hidden Life - A Story of Race and Family Secrets, Bliss Broyard, Anatole's daughter, starts looking at her father's Creole origins in New Orleans.

This is a book about discovery. Bliss discovers more about her father and herself in the process of her search for answers. She delves deeply into the history of Creoles in New Orleans and how their story and lives changed throughout the centuries. And she reveals how New Orleans and its culture was a very unique place in America before the Civil War.

Although it may be a bit slow in places, the story of the Creoles of New Orleans is fascinating. And this book makes you think about the question of race and what would you do if faced with the same situation : to pass or not? A good read.

Color of Water

James McBride's book, The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to his White Mother is at first most, a tribute to his mother's tenacity to educate her children. It is a recognition of his mother's struggles to keep her life and her struggles from impeding her children's futures.

His mother was raised an Orthodox Jew in the South. Her childhood was fairly horrendous and her father although a Rabbi, was an abuser. The very fact that she escaped this environment, moved to New York and created a new life for herself among the Black Baptist community is pretty remarkable. She married and between being widowed and then remarried, had twelve children. The title comes from when her son asks her what color is God. She replies that God is the color of water - always changing...

McBride is proud to be her son, and it is reflected in his book. This book is written well and proves that truth is sometimes stranger than fiction. It is a selective memoir. The reader really only gets to hear about what he and what his mother reveals. And I think the author's struggles to bring this much of his mother's past out of her, reflects on his determination to tell her story.

I have discussed this book in conversation with others who have read it and have gotten mixed responses. Some have not liked the "character" of the mother. They say she should of not of had so many children when she was poor, and she that she abandoned her own mother and sister. But I think that anyone who looks at the time period this woman was in, and the limited choices that were available to her, they will realize that above all, this woman was a survivor. And sometimes to survive one must do "horrible" things in order to move on. These choices may be reprehensible in hindsight, but how do we know we might not have done the same? The human instinct to survive is not always a "pretty" one. A fascinating look inside an interesting life.

Get Out or Die - a Roman Britannia mystery

Did you ever wonder what life was like during Roman Times in Great Britain? Have you ever taken a look at the Roman ruins in Bath or London, and have seen just how permanent they are constructed? Those buildings were build to last. The Romans were there to stay.

Take a look at Jane Finnis' book Get Out or Die. It features a traveler's inn on the Roman roads to the city that would become York. Aurelia and her Roman family own the inn and stables, which is hard enough to keep going with the transportation costs of hauling wine from Gaul, but now someone is trying to kill Roman travelers. Not good when your livelihood depends on a frequent supply of guests. And each traveler that has been murdered, has the words "Get out or Die" on them.

Just who is trying to start a uprising of the natives? Most of the nearby town is pro-Roman or is it? Who can they trust? Which locals are friends and which are enemies? Aurelia is not some ninny - she's a centurion's daughter and she is not leaving her land with out a fight.

Finnis has a great sense of the early Britannia, but since there are only bits and pieces known about that time period - she fills in the holes skillfully. Aurelia and her hotel family are great characters, and it is an exciting story, as the danger keeps getting closer and closer to them. A great read.

Cheating Destiny: Living with Diabetes

Cheating Destiny: Living with Diabetes, America's Biggest Epidemic by James S. Hirsch is a serious sounding title for a serious book. Hirsch's study runs the gamut from a history of the "cures" to control diabetes, to the breakthroughs that still have to come. He chronicles the various folks who have made a difference with the treatment of the disease. And in between, he writes about his own life dealing with Type 1 himself and in his children.

Hirsch is very matter of fact about this disease, and it, quite frankly, really needs that approach. I found his chapter on the development of the Juvenile Diabetes Association and the infighting between the various diabetes organizations, extremely interesting and frightening at the same time. His chapter about how the most of the medical community went from a search for a cure to a search for how to "control" the disease in the "easiest" manner possible - i.e. medication, is personally an eye opener. He is a former writer for the Wall Street Journal and he makes this difficult and murky topic, clear. A must read for anyone suffering from the disease.