I
received a free copy of this book from Net Galley in exchange for an
honest review. It's hard to describe Children's Home so I'll start with a
brief description of the plot.
The story follows Morgan, a
recluse who lives in a giant mansion. He is scarred from a violent
childhood episode (physically) and one day a housekeeper named Engle
arrives to take care of him. After Engle arrives a bunch of children
start appearing at the house. There is no explanation for their origin,
they are just accepted as arrived and Engle and Morgan begin to take
care of them all. Morgan befriends a doctor named Crane who also moves
into the house, because why not.
A couple of times two men from a
"ministry" appear to find out where the kids have gone. Morgan then
decides to fix his father's car and go outside the gates of his estate.
They drive to a "factory" owned by Morgan's family and confront his
sister, who owns the family business.
They find a "potting shed"
filled with half buried children who they attempt to rescue but end up
killing in the process. Then they free more children from the fields
outside. It's all very strange. There is probably some greater allegory
going on here that I'm just too confused to pick up on. The book is
blessedly short, and I'm sure I could put together a lesson from the
story of children who are at once innocent and capable of terrible
deeds, as they are in the story. There is a reference to children in a
home being killed at the concentration camps after being evacuated.
I
know that's giving up basically the entire book, but I don't see the
harm in that. It's a confusing book to read and in the end the final
portion of the story is not very satisfying.
How
do you review a book in which more than 50% of the time you spend
inside the head of someone you aren't too keen on? I liked the book. I
liked the story. I liked the unfolding of the mystery. But I really
didn't like the lead protagonist, Rachel. She's a bit pathetic, and
whiny, and crazy.
The book opens with Rachel as the narrator.
She's sitting on the train. She's watching the homes slide by and she
makes up stories about the lives of the people who live within the
homes. She has no life of her own. She did, but now she doesn't. She's
an alcoholic. She makes terrible choices.
She gets drunks and
rings her ex-husband. She watches his home from the train like a real
voyeur. She injects herself into events that do not concern her to add
some interest to her life. And yes, you have to spend endless passages
inside this woman's head. It's frustrating. I guess it might be the kind
of frustration that comes with living with a real alcoholic. The
endless backsliding and promises not to repeat.
The next person
you spend that much time with is Megan. She's vague and doesn't seem to
really do much. She sees a therapist. She's got some issues. She has a
confession, a breath catching, eyes starting to water as I listen on my
long run, confession. It's heart breaking. I end up liking her despite
myself.
The last narrator is Anna, the new wife of Rachel's ex.
She's irritating and holier than thou, even though she snatched away
Rachel's husband and liked it. I liked her even less than Rachel.
I
think my main problem is that you spend so much time in melancholy with
Rachel and Megan that it starts to rub off on you. There's really no
joy in the book.
So, why did I like the book? The writing is
fantastic. The narrative voices of the three main characters are
distinct. The plot is great, although it does get a bit slow in some
parts. And I liked the mystery aspect to it.
4/5 Stars.
N is for Noose starts out with Kinsey playing house with Dietz, a one
time bodyguard turned lover who has commitment issues of his own. After
Dietz has recovered enough to mostly take care of himself, Kinsey drives
home with a stop over in Nota Lake to see about a job investigating the
last weeks of a detective's life at the request of the detective's
widow, Selma Newquist.
Nota Lake is a small mountain town in California and the
people there are descended from some escaped convicts who once called it
home. Kinsey's investigation keeps running into dead ends and
uncooperative people. She even gets attacked by a masked stranger in her
hotel room. Poor Kinsey.
She returns to Santa Theresa to run
down a few leads and then is chided back to Nota Lake by Selma to
finish the job. It all comes together in the final pages of the book as
is usual for the alphabet series, although this ending had a few
references to clues I didn't even remember reading (i.e. the main
villain's motivation which I must have completely missed reference to in
the beginning of the book).
The book does have some really
memorable minor characters, Olga Toth for one (the 60-ish widow of a
sometimes convict who likes to talk on an on about inappropriate
subjects) was a rare treat. Seeing Kinsey ostracized on her return to
Nota Lake was also an interesting move. All in all the book had some
weaknesses but was otherwise a good read.
3/5 Stars.
I
loved, loved, loved this book! I'm recommending it to everyone I know. I
think it's the best book I've read in 2015. It's smart. It made me WANT
to read about growing potatoes for 30 pages. It made me WANT to hear
about velocity, atmospheric pressure, etc.
I can see why the
actual NASA astronauts have all read it. It's funny and well researched.
I can't think of anything Weir did not include in his piece by piece
structure of the novel.
If you've never heard of the book, that
is probably about to end, as it is being released on October 2, 2015 in
the theaters in movie form starring Matt Damon and directed by Ridley
Scott (Gladiator) (you can watch the trailer here). And oh, I'm so deliriously excited to see this movie.
The story follows Mark Watney, an astronaut on a mission to
Mars. Watney is lost during a massive storm on Mars and believed dead.
But, he's not. Because, as you'll see when you read it (seriously go
read it), Watney is AWESOME! This is a guy you can go have a beer with,
watch a ball game with, talk about plants with. He's a mechanical
engineer/botanist and he's hilarious. Following him around Mars is some
of the best moments I've spent in a fictional world.
Most
importantly, the book captures some of the magic of space exploration
that I felt as a kid watching shuttle launches on TV. I'm not sure how
Weir does it, but he does. And I followed along like a person reading
news accounts of the effort to bring Watney home. I so hope the movie
lives up to the book, because I want to like it and I want to spend more
time with Watney, even if it is on screen as Matt Damon (don't screw this up for me Matt!).
Love, love, love this book.
5/5 Stars.
This
was a fun book turned on a goofy premise. The story follows Emma, a 29
year old woman who is (understandably) a bit obsessed with one James
Alexander Malcolm Mackenzie Fraser of the Outlander series (and now TV
show - seriously, look up Sam Heughan and I dare you not to drool, see below and you're welcome).
Emma, having had no luck in love or life is in need of a serious life
shake up and decides to sell all her worldly possessions and head to
Scotland to find her very own Jamie.
Since Emma has very little
money and a vast lack of world experience, surprising given her living
in Chicago (see I'm totally biased, I think people from Chicago have to
have the world travel thing figured out), she is going to do the trip on
the cheap. Emma came across as a bit naive throughout the story,
although she does have enough self awareness to admit to this after the
fact.
I would be more annoyed with Emma's "need to find a man to
complete myself and save me" attitude if she didn't vocalize the fact
that women needed to be stronger characters in their own story. In the
end, this is what Emma becomes, a stronger protagonist in her own story.
I like the backdrop of using the Outlander books as a foothold for the
blog turned novel concept, which is not actually a blog turned novel.
The
book is fun and entertaining and a good summer read. I listened to this
one on audible though and I have to say the narrator's accents were a
bit forced and stereotypical. Let's just say one of the commenters on
Emma's blog is Japanese and well.......the butchered English in the fake
accent and what I can assume is the attempt at English as a Second
Language syntax are a tad on the offensive side.
I love that
Diana Gabaldon was pleased with this Outlander inspired work, since I've
read before that she dreads and disapproves of fan-fiction. This isn't
fan fiction in the strictest sense, so if Herself gives it a pass, all
to the better.
This book was a solid 3/5 Stars.
Wow!
Just, wow. This is a true crime story, which I didn't realize until I
was about a chapter into it, but it follows the deaths of three women in
Colorado in the 1980s and 1990s. It focuses on one man, Thomas Edward
Luther, as a ruthless serial killer and predator of women.
What a
scary dude. This book was endlessly researched and the narrative is
told in a thrilling combination of direct quotes from interviews and
statements as well as reconstructed observations from those sources.
There
is something completely fascinating about serial criminals that defies
logic and understanding, but this book really delves into all of this.
It also delves into the mind of a woman who loved Luther, despite
knowing of his heinous crimes. Debrah Snider met Luther when he was
serving time for a brutal sexual assault. She was working as a nurse in a
prison hospital at the time. She fell in love with this guy and
starting writing him. She somehow believed she could change him when he
came out of prison, so long as he stayed away from other women. Great.
At least she later admits that it doesn't make sense that she loves this
man.
The book delves the most into the death of Cher Elder in
1993 and follows the investigation by Detective Steve Richardson.
Richardson's dogged determination to put Luther behind bars was rewarded
during the trial for Cher Elder's murder.
Here is a picture of this brutal dude looking like a frumpy nobody. Good. He's evil and should rot and die in jail.
Thankfully, Luther is
serving a very long prison term and not eligible for parole until 2085.
This is seriously one of the best true crime novel's I've ever read.
I'm going to be looking up more by Steve Jackson.
4/5 Stars.
