Scarlet by A. C. Gaughen (library ebook) - I found this compelling, but it failed to have the happy ever after ending that I wanted. Also, the slang used and the lack of a history for our main character led me to madness by the end of the book. I wouldn't recommend it, but it's not awful.
The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate (library ebook) - The age recommendation for this book is 8 and up. I can't wait until my oldest niece turns 8 so I can give her this book. I really enjoyed it and thought it was well done and lovely.
The Good Nurse: A True Story of Medicine, Madness, and Murder by Charles Graeber (library ebook) - A nurse goes from hospital to hospital, killing patients in a seemingly random pattern and he is not stopped for decades. The story has promise, but in Graeber's hands, it becomes a dry recitation of stories which you could mistake for any old serial killer instead of quite possibly the most prolific murderer in the history of this country. I am no closer to understanding Cullen's motivation for his actions after reading 300 pages of this tome than I was after I read the back cover. Plus, he killed SO MANY PEOPLE, but you wouldn't really know from his pedantic tone. Incredibly disappointing.
Enna Burning by Shannon Hale (library ebook) - I was really looking forward to this after The Goose Girl, but it's like a completely different author wrote this book. I never figured out if I was supposed to like or hate Enna and the setting building that made The Goose Girl so amazing was nowhere to be found in this novel. I read the first three-quarters and just gave up. Thank you, Shannon Hale, for making me a quitter.
Summerland by Michael Chabon (library audiobook read by the author) - I should have known better. This book mentioned both baseball AND fairies on the back cover. The book was essentially a blending of lore and religions with too much baseball thrown in. Chabon writes beautifully - his use of metaphor is some of the best I've "read" recently - but this book almost killed me with its literary references and its boring ass baseball scenes. Plus, Chabon's pronunciation of the words "settlers," "rattling," and "dour" was incredibly distracting. I would have enjoyed this more if I could have read it and skimmed over the endless descriptions of ball games.
Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier (library ebook) - I appreciate the concept of this book - female fossil hunters who didn't really get the respect they deserved for the work they did - but I didn't really love the book. There's something cool and reserved about these types of Victorian novels that just doesn't cut it for me.
Caves of Steel by Isaac Asimov (library audiobook narrated by William Dufris) - I have enjoyed sci-fi in my days. Anne McCaffery is fun and I've even read some Robert Heinlein that didn't suck. But I don't get the adoration for Asimov. The writing is clunky, the dialogue is about as unrealistic as it gets, there is no character development, and the plot is so snooze inducing as to make it nearly impossible for me to keep my eyes open on my drives home from work at night. Ugh.
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And my Kindle is dead, so that is seriously cutting into my reading of trashy romance novels that I never tell anyone about. And school is starting up again tomorrow and so now all I'm reading is "work work work" and so I'm imagining that September's book list will say "I read the front page headlines of CNN.com and cried a little bit because my Kindle is broken." (My husband would currently be telling me that the great tragedy of my life is not much of a tragedy and he wouldn't be wrong. But man I miss Awesome K.)
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