Book: Transcendent Kingdom

 Book: Transcendent Kingdom

Author: Yaa Gyasi

Pages: 288

This is my 133rd read for the year

What Amazon Says:

Gifty is a 6th year PhD Candidate in neuroscience at the Standford University School of Medicine studying reward-seeking behavior in mice and the neural circuits of depression and addiction.  Her brother, Nana, was a gifted high school athlete who died of a heroin overdose after an ankle injury left him hooked on OxyContin.  Her suicidal mother is living in her bed.  Gifty is determined to discover the scientific basis for the suffering she sees all around her.  But even as she turns to the hard sciences to unlock the mystery of her family's loss, she finds herself hungering for her childhood faith and grappling with the evengelical church in which she was raised, whose promise of salvation remains as tantalizing as it is elusive.  This is a portrait of a family of Ghanaian immigrants ravaged by depression and addiction and grif - a novel about faith, science, religion, love.

This was an interesting book.  I really liked her book, Homegoing, and glad I found this one.  It has a lot of relgious aspects to it - where a scientist is incorporating her religion into her everyday life and trying to find the balance.  The story was a bit all over the place, but the underlying theme was a good one.  It is a very sad read.

Stars: 4

Book: How To Stop Time

 Book: How To Stop Time

Author: Matt Haig

Pages: 336

This is my 132nd read for the year

What Amazon Says:

Tom Hazard has just moved back to London, his old home, to settle down and become a high school history teacher.  And on his first day at school, he meets a captivating French teacher at his school who seems fascinated by him.  But Tom has a dangerout secret.  He may look like an ordinary 41 year old but owing to a rare condition, he's been alive for centuries.  Tom has lived history - performing with Shakespeare, exporing the high seas with Captain Cook, and sharing cocktails with Fitzgerald.  Now he just wants an ordinary life.  Unfortunately for Tom, the Albatross Society, the secretive group which protect people like Tom, has one rule: Never fall in love.  As painful memories of his past and the erratic behavior of the Society's watchful leader threaten to erail his new life and romance, the one thing he can't have just happens to be the one thing that might save him.  Tom will have to decide once and for all whether to remain stuck in the past, or finally begin living in the present.  It tells a love story across the ages - and for the ages - about a man lost in time, the woman who could save him, and the lifetimes it can take to learn how to live.  

This was a pretty good book.  I like Matt Haig's books and this one did not disappoint.  I liked the main character and the idea of someone who could live for about 1000 years and what that would look like.  It was a neat idea that they aged one year old every 15 years and that started around age 11 (which was a good idea on Haig's part because I don't think anyone would want to do the baby stage for 15 years).  There are a lot of good characters, and the story moves along at a good pace, and it has a good ending.

Stars: 4

Book: The Charm Bracelet

 Book: The Charm Bracelet

Author: Viola Shipman

Pages: 304

This is my 131st read for the year

What Amazon Says:

Through an heirloom charm bracelet, three women will rediscover the importance of family and a passion for living as each charm changes their lives.  On her birthday each year, Lolly's mother gave her a charm, along with the advice that there is nothing more important than keeping family memories alive, and so Lolly's charm bracelet would be a constant reminder of that love.  Now seventy and starting to forgte things, Lolly knows time is running out to reconnect with a daughter and granddaughter whose lives have becoem too busy for Lolly or her family stories.  But when Arden, Lolly's daughter, receives an unexpected phone call about her mother, she and granddaughter Lauren rush home.  Over the course of their visit, Lolly reveals the story behind each charm on her bracelet, and one by one the family stories help Lolly, Arden, and Lauren reconnect in a way that brings each woman closer to finding joy, love, and faither.  

This book was overly syrupy sweet.   I have read of few of Shipman's book, but the first one was truly the only one I really liked (the Recipe Book).  It was okay for a small amount, but after about 1/3 of this book when it didn't let up - the sappiness - I was over it.  It was a good idea, just not well executed in my opinion.

Stars: 2.5

Book: Pike Island

 Book: Pike Island

Author: Tony Wirt

Pages: 269

This is my 130th read for the year

What Amazon Says:

What happens at the cabin stays at the cabin.  Right?  Andrew Harrison "Harry" Leonard is destined for politics.  Getting his start on the Rochester City Council, he quickly rose to become the youngest representative in Congress.  Now the up-and-comer from Minnesota is on the brink of something big.  If all goes well, he'll be in perfect position to aim for the presidency.  Then a postcard arrives, blank except for the name on the address: Andy Leonard.  Harry hasn't used that name since high school.  Krista Walsh, Harry's chief of staff, recognizes his old moniker, and when he dodges qustions about it, she wonders what he's trying to hide.  She soon discovers the lake pictures on the postcard holds secrets too.  Krista's investigation into Harry's past uncovers the truth of what happened one fateful teenage summer.  But as distrubing details come to light, how far will Krista go to keep Harry's career-and her own - headed to the top?

This was a pretty good read.  It was one of my Kindle free reads I am trying to work through.  It was an interesting enough murder mystery, characters were pretty good, and I was curious to see where it was going.  The ending was just okay.

Stars: 3.5

Book: It's Not Her

 Book: It's Not Her

Author: Mary Kubica

Pages: 352

This is my 129th read for the year

What Amazon Says:

A scream shatters the silence - Courtney Gray's peaceful vacation turns into a nightmare when she discovers her brother and sister-in-law dead in their lakeside cottage.  Her niece Reese is missing.  Her nephew Wyatt is asleep upstairs - unharmed.  A town full of secrets - as police swarm the uiet resort, dark truths about Courtney's family - and the town itself - begin to surface.  Is REese a victim or the Killer?  A truth no one saw coming - with everyone hiding something, Courntey races to uncover the terrible mystery.  But the closer she gets, the harder it is to know who - or what - to trust.

I have 2 words to describe this book: Verbal diarrhea.  So much nonsense mixed in with the actual story that I had a hard time caring.  Hated all the characters.  The twist was a bit surprising, but by the time we got to the killers, I didn't care any more.

Stars: 2 

Book: Talking to Strangers

 Book: Talking to Strangers

Author: Malcolm Gladwell

Pages: 416

This is my 128th read for the year

What Amazon Says:

How did Fidel Castro fool the CIA for a generation?  Why did Neville Chamberlain think he could trust Adolf Hitler? Why are campus sexual assaults on the rise?  Do television sitcoms teach us something about the way we relate to one another that isn't true?  Talking to Strangers is a classically Gladwellian intellectual adventure, a challenging, and controversial excusion through history, psychology, and scandals taken straight from the news.  He revisits the deceptions of Bernie Madoff, the trial of Amanda Know, the suicide of Sylvia Plath, the Jerry Sandusky pedophilia scandal at Penn State, and the death of Sandra Bland - throwing our understanding of thsee and other stories into doubt.  Something is very wrong, Gladwell argues, with the tools and strategies we use to make sense of people we don't know.  And because we don't know how to talk to strangers, we are inviting conflict and misunderstanding in ways that have a profound effect on our lives and our world.  

This was a great book.  I read it for a reading challenge, but I am glad I found this one.  It was well written, well researched, and gives you a lot to think about.  There are a lot of tough cases in this book that will make you cringe - especially as you hear from victims.  There are also a lot of case studies that had interesting results.  Very very good read.

Stars: 5

Book: Antimatter Blues

 Book: Antimatter Blues

Author: Edward Ashton

Pages: 298

This is my 127th read for the year

What Amazon Says: 

Summer has come to Niflheim.  The lichens are growing, the 6-winged bat-things are chirping, and much to his own surprise, Mickey Barnes is still alive - that last part thanks almost entirely to the fact that Commander MArshall believes that the colony's creeper neighbors are holding an antimatter bomb, and that Mickey is the only one who'se keeping them from using it.  Mickey's just another colonist now.  Intead of cleaning out the reactor core, he spends his time these days cleaning out the rabbit hutches.  It's not a bad life.  It's not going to last.  It may be sunny now, but winter is coming.  The antimatter that fuels the colony is running low, and Marshall wants his bomb back.  It Mickey agrees to retrieve it, he'll be giving up the only thing that's kept his head off of the chopping block. If he refuses, he might doom the entire colony.  Meanwhile, the creepers have their own worries, and they're not going to surrender the bomb without getting something in return.  Once again, Mickey finds the fate of 2 species resting in his hands.  If something goes wrong this time, though, he won't be coming back.

This was a decent book.  It is a second in a series (and last I believe), and there was also a movie based on the 1st book (even though the movie changed a bit).  This is an easy read with several likable characters.  There is a bit of humor (especially from our main character Mickey).  Has a decent ending.

Stars: 4