Average Girl Reads

A Heart for Home by Lauraine Snelling

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Genre: Christian, prairie romance
On my TBR list?: yes, since March 2011

Book 3 of 3 in the Home to Blessing series, 16th book set in the universe

Summary, from Goodreads:

Astrid Bjorklund is on the Red Bud Indian Reservation in South Dakota trying to stop the horrific epidemic that is ravaging the tribe. The elders are suspicious of her, but when they see some of their people beginning to recover, they allow Astrid to continue caring for the sick and to train others to help. She is overwhelmed by this need so close to home and wonders if this is the mission field God has planned for her.

Joshua Landsverk wants to repair his broken relationship with Astrid, but he is opposed to her present work and refuses to tell her why. When he encounters unexpected adversity, a surprising act of kindness brings healing to the grievous wrong inflicted years ago. Will it be enough to bring Joshua and Astrid together again?

If you've read all the other books in the series, then reading this one is like visiting your hometown and catching up on all the news. Snelling manages to work in most of the characters that fans met in previous books without it feeling like an obligatory roll call. There was nothing shocking in the plot, but it was comforting to spend some time in that city again.

A Heart for Home is the 16th book about the good people of Blessing, ND, and possibly the last. If so, I think that Lauraine Snelling ended on a good note. She left room for more characters to be added to this universe and more stories to be told, but the stories of all the existing characters are at a good stopping point. I don't have the desire to go read another prairie romance as a replacement for the fact that there are no more Blessing books, which is an indication that she did a good job wrapping things up.


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My daughter sent me a link to this video last night and said that it reminded her of me. There is good reason for this. I was reading Soulless last week, and every time I was really getting into it one of the kids would interrupt me with a question. By Friday I was growling at anyone who walked toward me while I had the book in my hand. Not good mum behavior at all!

This is why all the mothers in your life say they don't read. Technically, it isn't about not having time, although it is easier to tell people that. Even if I get a "free" 15 minutes to crack open a book, chances are that my kids will come up with some reason to talk to me. It's like my teenagers can't stand to see me reading. Considering that they are readers, too, I don't know why they can't just let me be.

UPCOMING: I wrote a post earlier this week about anthologies, and it inspired me to pick up a couple from the library.



Honestly, I checked these out more for my kids than myself, especially the anthology of fantastic tales. C2 loves a good mystery or scary story. I also have a couple novels waiting just for me.



They are more series novels, as usual. I'm having trouble jumping into anything else right now, despite my resolve to read more of the books that are heating up the literary zeitgeist.

Soulless by Gail Carriger

Genre: romance, light steampunk, fantasy
On my TBR list?: Yes, since Nov 2009

Book #1 of The Parasol Protectorate, 3 books published so far

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Summary, from Goodreads:

Without a morsel of exaggeration, its publisher describes this debut novel as "a comedy of manners set in Victorian London full of werewolves, vampires, dirigibles, and tea-drinking." At the center of Soulless's "parasol protectorate" is Miss Alexia Tarabotti, a young woman who lacks not only a suitor but also a soul. And those are not her only problems: When she accidentally kills a vampire, it begins a series of events that she must set out to resolve without the help of any proper authorities.

It has been quite a while since a book grabbed my attention from the very first page, but Soulless managed to do exactly that. It is a charming mix of 19th-century romance and the supernatural, with just enough steampunk thrown in to spice up the story without boring less science-inclined readers like me. This sense of balance is exhibited in several ways throughout the book.

The first example of Carriger's balanced writing style is our heroine, Alexia Tarabotti. She is feisty enough to appeal to a modern reader, yet none of her behavior steps so far outside the parameters of her 19th-century setting as to be unbelievable. Carriger also did an excellent job of writing the lovemaking scenes in a manner that does not jolt the reader out of the story. I've read more than one book that goes "literature, literature, literature, PORN, literature, literature"; the sex scenes were so shocking that they seemed to have been lifted from a different manuscript. In the case of Soulless, the author manages to construct the amorous passages in the same lilting style of the rest of the story, with a well-placed nudge and a wink.

All in all, I would say that this is a first-rate showing, especially for a debut novel. If you follow me on Goodreads, then you know that my 18-year old is already clamoring to read it. I wouldn't recommend it for anyone younger than that because the love scenes, while tastefully written, are still explicit enough that I would feel uncomfortable handing the book to my 14-year-old daughters. This book may be a tad too romantic for the hardcore steampunk or supernatural fans, but I think it could appeal to the readers who don't mind a touch of those fantastical elements in their romance stories.





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I was listening to an episode of the Bookrageous podcast from Oct 2010 today and it took me back to my childhood reading. They were talking about Houghton Mifflin's Best American anthology series. Collections played a big part in my reading life when I was younger but I haven't picked one up in years. I don't think I was even aware that current ones were being published.

When I was a kid, my library had volumes of collected plays. I can't remember the exact titles but they were something along the lines of "Best Broadway Musicals of 1966" or "Best Short Plays of 1970". Before touring companies came to Charlotte, the closest I got to a Broadway experience was checking out one of these books and reading the play while listening to the cast album. As far as books in my home, my mother used to buy the Reader's Digest Condensed Books. We only had a few volumes but I read them over and over.

My fondest memory of anthologies is of a gift from one of my maternal aunts. It was a giant book entitled The Arbuthnot Anthology of Children's Literature. (If you ever run across it at a book sale, I had the edition with the giant butterfly on the cover.) It had poetry, short stories, and excerpts of children's novels. I didn't realize until much later that it was meant as a resource for teachers. Oh, how I enjoyed that book! I owned it right up until my senior year in high school and then somehow lost it.

This trip down memory lane makes me realize that I should have more anthologies on my shelf at home. I don't buy a lot of fiction, but I think that anthologies might be worth the investment. Lately I've noticed that my reluctant readers, ABM and C2, will read something short. I found C2 reading sections of a home remedy book I have on the shelf, and ABM read several of the tiny chapters in the Jennifer Love Hewitt book. They won't seek out this stuff on their own so, as family media curator, it is my job to bring it to them.

I've posted here and in many comments on other book blogs that I have NO interest in buying a Kindle or any other e-reader. Well, in the past couple weeks I've adjusted my position on that issue. Although I still feel as though e-books are temporary and I wouldn't want to buy a lot of them, I've noticed that my public library is offering more YA e-books for lending via Overdrive. The NC Digital Library site is clunky and a hassle to navigate, in my opinion, so I never got a full sense of what books were being offered in audio and e-book format. However, our local library site recently updated its search function so that now when I look for a book, I get not only an option to reserve a copy of the physical book but also a direct link to download an audio or e-book version, if available. This has me thinking that I would like to find an inexpensive older model e-reader on eBay to use just for library books. This would be a great help on those weekends when all the computers in my house are taken and one of my kids (usually C1) is complaining that there is nothing left to read.

Since my last Sunday Salon post, I've managed to work my way through some nonfiction.

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother
The Day I Shot Cupid
Once-a-Month Cooking

Sadly, I did not get any further than a chapter and a half into the Keith Richards memoir. I'm still thinking about trying out the audio book version, but it has definitely moved to the bottom of my priority list.

The only fiction I have on hand at the moment is Soulless by Gail Carriger. That book captured my attention from the very first page. The only reason I haven't finished it is that my 18-year-old daughter keeps grabbing it! For the most part, however, this is the time of year where my reading list is filled with books about gardening and spring cleaning. It will be the same this year, at least until I can get my hands on a copy of How to Knit a Heart Back Home written by the lovely Rachael Herron.

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Genre: memoir, parenting
On my TBR list?: no


Summary, from Goodreads:


All decent parents want to do what's best for their children. What Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother reveals is that the Chinese just have a totally different idea of how to do that. Western parents try to respect their children's individuality, encouraging them to pursue their true passions and providing a nurturing environment. The Chinese believe that the best way to protect your children is by preparing them for the future and arming them with skills, strong work habits, and inner confidence. Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother chronicles Chua's iron-willed decision to raise her daughters, Sophia and Lulu, her way-the Chinese way-and the remarkable results her choice inspires.

I'm guessing that most of you reading this post have already read or at least heard about the Wall Street Journal article that Amy Chua wrote entitled Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior. It outlined a strict method of parenting that includes pushing your children to excel, picking out their hobbies for them, and not letting them participate in anything that wouldn't eventually result in some sort of medal or award. In this review I will be talking more about the style and format of the book; I'm saving my opinions of Chua's parenting style for a post on my other blog.

The article was excerpted from the book and it covers Chua's main points without the repetitiveness. There were so many anecdotes that followed the same formula: Chua would push her kids to practice their instruments, they would complain, she would yell, they would throw tantrums, but then in the end the audition/recital/performance would turn out brilliantly and the kids would get glowing compliments. I listened to part of this book on audio and it was read by the author, which made these anecdotes sound even more boastful than they did on paper. Also, there were sentences that I'm pretty sure were meant to be sarcastic or funny (like a comment about never dating drummers) but Chua's reading was so stilted that she sounded she was being serious. Her reading style loosened up and became more natural further on, thankfully.

Honestly, I think that if you read the WSJ article (which I did before reading this), then you don't really need to read this book. I read it because many of the podcasts I listen to did episodes discussing it, but I think you could jump into a conversation about Chua's parenting method without spending the extra time to wade through her entire memoir.


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