Sheila's Guests and Reviews

I've been to Texas at last, in fiction and in fact, though not to Defiance, Texas. Still, it's kind of appropriate that I was catching up on the first book of Mary DeMuth's Defiance Texas trilogy during my travels. The third book in this trilogy has just come out. It's called Life in Defiance and it's a wonderful stand-alone book even if you haven't read the others. I feel like I'm qualified to make that claim since I read books two and three before book one. And it's probably a tribute to the author's wonderful writing that knowing the end of a mystery made me long to read the beginning. But Life in Defiance isn't just a mystery. There's a missing girl and the question of what happened to her. There are strange events and strangers and growing threats. But over all there's the personal story of the narrator, Ouisie Pepper, bound to a man who wounds her in actions and words, determined to do whatever it takes to tame her defiant spirit ...

I finally got around to totalling April's points for the Reading Journey , so I'm feeling pretty good about how much I'm reading, even though it seems like I never have time. I guess graduation weekends gave me a good excuse to be busy, but they also meant I was hanging around waiting for things to happen quite a lot, so maybe that's how I managed to read so many long books recently. Admission by Jean Hanff Korelitz, was an appropriate book for the season. The author paints a very authentic picture of the admissions process, while including an intriguing mystery as her protagonist tries not to admit the secrets of her past or of present emotions. The Mysterious Benedict Society , by Trenton Lee Stewart, is another relatively long book that I borrowed from a friend's grandson - yes, a long children's book, and an excellent read. The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton was a wonderful read (also long), set in Australia, London and Cornwall, and spanning the last cen...