Annie, I loved 11/22/63! It was an interesting take on "what if".

I'm re-reading The Modigliani Scandal by Ken Follett. It's fairly short (around 200 pgs) and a fun story about many people on the hunt for a supposedly lost painting by Modigliani.

Donna

I was on the library waiting list for The Girl on the Train for months and finally was able to download it a few days ago. It was good not great. Fast moving but too many unlikable characters.

Yeah, I am definitely not on the Girl on the Train bandwagon. I didn't like the characters and I figured out the twist long before I was supposed to... which stole any surprise from me. And yet-- many loved it.

I am currently reading Moonglow by Michael Chabon ... my reading time has taken a hit lately so it's been a slow go. I am probably 60 pages in.. it's interesting but so far I enjoy the glimpses of life, the "moment in time" aspect more than his grandfather-- though he IS an interesting character and I am warming up to him. :)

"A lie that tells the truth, a work of fictional nonfiction, an autobiography wrapped in a novel disguised as a memoir, Moonglow is Chabon at his most moving and inventive."

Just finished "The Vegetarian"--a radical and strange/disturbing novel, translated from the Korean. Now reading "Words Will Break Cement" (about Pussy Riot) and "Kindred" by Octavia Butler, described as "part time-travel and part slave narrative" in which a woman shuttles between her California home in 1976 and a pre-Civil War plantation, it (according to Wikipedia) "explores the dynamics and dilemmas of antebellum slavery as well as its legacy in present American society." (These selections are all for my 2 book groups.) Also on my bedside table to read: Charcoal Joe (by Walter Mosley). Also just finished "North Water" by Ian McGuire, a very dark thriller in the spirit of Cormac McCarthy (a Christmas gift from my son). Really original, and rather beautifully written, but quite violent.

I just finished A Gentleman in Moscow a few days ago. A very unusual and delightful story.

I started reading The Girls of Atomic City yesterday while waiting for DH to have his Lasik & cataract surgery. Didn't really get very far with it since I kept getting interrupted for this or that, but so far I think I will really enjoy it.

I just got a notice that the new biography of Queen Victoria is waiting for me at the library. I decided to bail on The Whistler, the newest John Grisham, after starting it and being very bored--and after reading many reviews on Amazon that said it doesn't get any better!

Annie, I thoroughly enjoyed 11/22/63; it was a book club selection and very long; we actually read it as a summer choice. Great read.

I enjoyed 11/22/63 but my memories of it are "we can't do anything that will change history because we won't know the repercussions, oh wait never mind, let's go change history! It will be fine."

I read many books in January but none screamed SHARE ME! They all served their purpose of entertaining me so it's fine. I have another stack for February and I'm hoping for the best. For book club we'll be reading Dead Wake by Eric Larson. I'm told it non-fiction that reads like a novel. We'll see.

I'm interested in Dead Wake, hhireno. Let us know what you think once you've finished.

Just completed Lilac Girls (discovered through one or more recommendations here!). Enjoyed it, especially knowing that at least two characters were based on real people.

I also liked Hillbilly Elegy. J.D. Vance has a varied background that I found intriguing.

Next for me is The Tao of Bill Murray, as well as some eye candy in the form of decorating books. :)

I really enjoyed Hillbilly Elegy too.

I just this morning finished reading Kindred by Octavia Butler for book club. This is why I do book clubs. I never would have read the book which is classified as science fiction ( which I kind of avoid). It was a very good story and a good read. I can't say it was too believable but I was able to keep reading and enjoying it. I am waiting for the Rosie Project, Gentleman in Moscow, and 11/22/63 from the library.

In the meantime, I am reading The Importance of Being Earnest. which I have never read or seen. ( I am searching out some of the older reads that I have missed and really enjoying it. I did this last month with Anne of Green Gables and adored it.).

I finished the audio version of Hillbilly Elegy last week. For the most part I liked it, but one scene really annoyed me where I thought he stereotyped a group of Yale law students.

I was excited on Tuesday to see that a kindle version of A Gentleman in Moscow from the library was finally in. However, by Wednesday morning, I became so sick from a virus with fever and massive headache that I was unable to read or even watch tv! Still bedridden on Friday but with a subsided headache, I got started. It was a small consolation for the fact that I had to bow out of a trip to NYC celebrate my friend's birthday. I never get sick and never have the chance to go for a girls' weekend so what are the odds that they would coincide. :( I have about 100 pages left. A unique story that I have thoroughly enjoyed so far.

I am reading All The Ugly and Wonderful Things which was discussed in a prior thread. The subject matter is upsetting but I think it is a wonderfully written book so far (I'm 2/3 of the way through). I am having a hard time putting it down, and the author is doing a wonderful job making a situation that should not have any moral ambiguity seem almost understandable and sympathetic.

Started the biography of Queen Victoria last night-great read!!

Beagles, I read that book a few months ago after several of my friends highly recommended it. As mom of two girls, one of whom is only 11, I just kept picturing my girls while reading it and really could not enjoy it once it got to a certain point. I could understand why the girl behaved the way she did, but found nothing understandable with the guy's decisions. Judging from its reviews, I'm in the minority.

4kids, I think I first saw the book title from your comment in a prior thread and then read the description and decided to read it, even though I think your initial comment said you didn't really like it.

I would not say that what the guy did was right... but at the same time, I don't know what would have been a better option. Leave her alone entirely with no one ? Walk away at what point ? I find myself thinking that would perhaps have been more damaging, although perhaps not... [Trying not to include spoilers in case anyone wants to read it]

I find the writing wonderful and I do find it thought-provoking, which is why I am enjoying it. I do find it disturbing that I've seen it classified as a romance in some places, which I decidedly do not think it is.

Beagles, it certainly would be a great book for book club discussion! Like you, I don't want to spoil it for anyone so don't want to say much more. And yes, I agree with your assessment about it being classified as a romance. And there was one scene which was too graphic to me. I'm no prude and certainly have read my share of sex scenes, but again, as mom of girls, one a preteen and one who is 17, I really had a hard time getting through that part of the book.

Just finished In Farleigh Field: A Novel of WWII by Rhys Bowen. I love the way she writes. I would characterize the book as a cozy mystery. Finished Escape Clause by John Sandford and the newest YA novel by Rick Riordan. Finished Echoes in Death by J.D. Robb. Moving on to Garden of Lamentations by P.D. James.

Way long, but I really enjoyed 11/22/63. It was not the type of book I'd ever pick up so I was glad the book group selected it.

I am almost finished with Lion by Saroo Brierley. It was first published as A Long Way Home. It's now a current movie but I don't plan on seeing it.They never live up to the book and am always disappointed.

Just finished Before the Fall, by Noah Hawley as suggested here. Good read, Starts with a private plane crash, then goes back over each passenger's life looking for the cause of the crash. Not morbid, just very interesting story telling.

Just finished The Girls of Atomic City and I really enjoyed it. I'm an engineer and have visited Oak Ridge a couple of times, so it was fascinating to read how really secret it was when it was getting started and the back stories about the development of the technology. It was very difficult to read about the living conditions at the time. And the segregation of course, with families separated. The author summed it up really well at the end by saying the people of that generation were not complainers.

Got to find something else to read now.

I'm reading Sue Grafton's X right now. Unlike so many authors of series where it turns out to be the same old same old, grafton continues to be very creative in her plots. Always a pleasure to read...I don't know what she'll do once she runs out of letters!

Am now reading The Whole Town's Talking, by Fannie Flagg. It's a slow slog. Am thinking of just skimming through the rest of it to follow the one interesting plot line. The book reads as though written for a 12-year old girl, perhaps even younger, considering the simple syntax and vocabulary. Is this how Flagg uesually writes? I loved the movie Fried Green Tomatoes!

Am enjoying reading other peoples' reactions to 11-22-63, though. This book knocked me out, and I really am uninterested in sci-fi or time travel. Probably living in that part of Texas around that time helped, as everything was easily visualized. One of my all-time favorites, a great book!

My friend enrolled me in Book of the Month as a birthday gift and I am LOVING it! You get an email with 4 or 5 titles to choose from, pick one, and a few days later it is on your doorstep, packaged up all cute! I accidentally clicked on the wrong title last month & ended up with a book of short stories that I would never have picked otherwise, Homesick for Another World. It was actually quite good!

I just received this month's book, The Animators. I am just a couple of chapters in, but it is very interesting so far. It is the story of two women who meet in college and end up working in the male dominated world of animation. I'll let you know how it goes! I think I am going to keep my subscription to BotM after my gift runs out...I am really enjoying it.

I finished reading A Gentleman in Moscow just over a week ago. Though I found it a little slow in parts, I loved it. I really enjoyed the cast of characters and all the ways he made his life interesting living in the hotel.

I listened to The Widow by Fiona Barton last week. Not one I'd go out of my way to recommend, but it was enjoyable, especially for an audiobook. The narration was done well.

I also read Sisi, An Empress on her Own, an historical fiction novel about the empress of Austria-Hungary. It was average. It was pretty long and I found myself wondering when it was going to end. I didn't much care for her character, but I did like the historical setting and ended up doing some reading on the various ruling dynasties during that era.

Today on audio, I started listening to LaRose by Louise Erdrich. She also wrote The Round House which I really liked. I'm not far enough into it to be able to stay whether I'd recommend it but it seems good so far.

I'm also reading The Moon in the Palace by Weina Dai Randel. It takes place during 6th or 7th century China. The story is interesting but it's a debut author and her writing skills could use some improvement.

I just finished The Girls of Atomic City. The title gave me so much
hope...but what a hot mess of writing that was. The story was intriguing
and I learned a lot about the Manhattan Project, but the character
development was so poor (even though they were real people, they were
very one dimensional) and where was her editor??? One of my scientist
friends said some of the science wasn't correct (and there was way too
much scientific detail for the average reader, I think). She needed an
editor for the writing and and editor for the science, apparently.

In my
book group, we thought it would have been a much better story if she'd
have used all her facts about the women to develop some fictional
characters, and written a novel based on real people and events, so she could have rounded out some missing details and made
the story more readable/interesting.

I just posted this on another forum about what we're reading, so this is a duplicate post.

Sable: my good friend lent me two of Fannie Flagg's books. She loved them, I thought that they were awful: trite, predictable, and boring. She actually wrote "Fried Green Tomatoes"?!? I never read the book, but loved the movie. I didn't know that she was the author of it, but my opinion then is that she's a one-hit-wonder as a writer.

Lynn - Yes, Flagg wrote FGTs, and everyone I know loves this movie. Strange. I am over 2/3s finished with The Whole Town's Talking and will finish it, but that's it for Ms. Flagg. Next book will, I think, be one by John O'Hara.

I agree about Flagg's latest book....left no lasting impression. I did LOVE the one Lynn mentioned....Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk. Ordered The Girls of Atomic City, but may skip it now. Interested me because I grew up in Richland, WA where they were making Plutonium for the Manhattan Project. Most of our dads worked at the plant, & it was a unique place to grow up for sure. I am an avid reader & love these book threads. Another book I read a few months ago that I recommend is Jodi Picoult's new book & I can't name exact title at the moment....

lizzie, you should try Girls of Atomic City; just adjust your expectations. I was interested to learn about Richland from this book, because I am a WA native and always knew Hanford was a nuclear site , but never gave its history or origins a single thought. I never heard of Oak Ridge, Tennesee, just the Oak Ridge Boys band. I've heard of Alamogordo in New Mexico because my husband's uncle worked there for years as some kind of engineer, but I had no interest or curiosity about it. I had a dear friend who grew up near the nuclear test site in Nevada; she and all her siblings have died from cancer - likely due to exposure to the radiation from the tests. Very sad and maddening.

Flagg writes gems like FGT and Standing in the Rainbow. Funny, quirky stories. She also writes things that are just too precious for me. When a friend described The Whole Town's Talking as "sweet" I decided to give it a pass. My friend liked it a lot but she's into sweet and I'm not.

I decided I was rather tired of reading about families/relationships that were all sounding the same to me so I would spend some time reading non-fiction and science fiction. Read Dispatches from Pluto: Lost and Found in the Mississippi Delta by Richard Grant. Overall it was interesting. The complacent acceptance (at least the way it came across in the book to me) of racism, and active acceptance of the gun culture, in the south was a bit tough for me to bear though.

Next was a horror/fantasy read. Lovecraft Country by Matt Ruff. It's set in the USA in the fifties. Freemasons, ghosts, secret rooms with booby traps. Fun tension. (ETA - Okay, maybe a bit disturbing too - racism is also a theme in this book.) I'll read more of his books.

Now I'm reading The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin. I have never been a huge SF fan but I do read some so I was surprised I hadn't read this Hugo and Nebula Award winning book. Sixty pages in, I'm really enjoying it.

I finally finished the bio of Queen Victoria last night. Although a great read, by the time I closed the last page (of the book; there are 100+ pages of what seem to be juicy end notes to explore ;) I sort of felt as if it had taken me her entire reign to plow through her life story!

Fascinating for sure and the author did a great job of humanizing her while also providing a broad overview of her world, the British empire, wars and political upheaval of the century etc.

I think I want to read something feather light next, have had my fill of quasi academic bedtime stories LOL

Following up on myself....my feather light read after the bio of Queen Victoria was Scrappy Little Nobody, a memoir (sorta) by actress Anna Kendrick. Loved this book! It was not a linear 'and then I got the role of' type book, more the modern young celebrity style of a series of thoughts, anecdotes and views of life a la Mindy Kaling, Lena Dunham etc. Anna's voice is sharp, observant and oh so funny. I really enjoyed it, especially because February is one of the two busiest peak times in my work life and I've also got a whole bunch of personal stuff going on. This was wonderful escapist entertainment.

So this month my quantity was way down, but quality definitely prevailed. I got to explore the lives of 2 very different but interesting women. Hoping March brings me more time to read and more good books to explore. Next on my reading list is Small Great Things by Jodi Piccault. A colleague loaned it to me and I need to get to it so she can recycle it to the next eager borrower.

Earlier this week, I finished LaRose by Louise Erdrich on audio. It was good, enjoyable, but I preferred her novel The Round House. I like her writing style and will probably read more of her novels.

I can't remember where I heard of it (perhaps on that gardenweb group for readers) but I also read Under the Harrow by Flynn Berry. It was pretty good, probably not one that I'd go out of my way to recommend, but as a mystery, it was a very quick read and perfect for a long winter day of reading. Not that the weather here has felt like winter, but...

I just started The One Man by Andrew Gross, a historical fiction/thriller. Several of my friends read it and recommended it.

I will be curious to hear what you think of Small Great Things. I used to love Picoult and I had high hopes for this book but I found it trite and terrible. Like she felt like she had to pack every single cliche and stereotype of racism into the book.

As the New York Times review described it in their review, and I agree: "The more we see of Ruth and her family, the more their characterization feels like black-people bingo — as if Picoult is working through a checklist of issues in an attempt to say everything about race in one book."

I found the characters to be one dimensional, the ending totally ridiculous, and the story neither interesting nor having anything profound to say about race relations.

I just finished My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry, by Fredrik-Backman, the author of A Man Called Ove and Britt-Marie Was Here. I loved the other two, so was anxious to read this one despite having found no one who liked it.

I actually found it to be a good read - I loved his quirky characters, even though I don't usually like too quirky because it always feels forced to me, like people who try too hard to be eccentric. This book approached them (and some of the story) in a "fantasy" type way; fantasy is not a genre I enjoy reading. So it kind of already had two strikes against it for me, but I couldn't wait to get back to it each night. I did skip over some of the fantasy passages; I knew they were metaphorical for what was really going on, but it still all came together in the end. I really liked that it had the back story of Britt-Marie, too.

Finally finished the slog through Fannie Flagg's The Whole Town's Talking, and TG for that! I don't regret reading it, as with the final pages you see her lovely take on the complete cycle of life, but nevertheless it's going straight to the donation box.

Now am reading John O'Hara's Appointment in Samarra, which, it turns out, is a great classic. It concerns a fictionalized version of O'Hara's hometown deep in Pennsylvania's "coal patch" country during the 1930s, and has me thinking about PA's part in the last election and Joe Biden's frequent references to his boyhood in Scranton. I had known almost nothing about this part of the country and JO'H describes it well. Its plot is about the alcohol- and depression-fueled downward spiral of one of the town's "important" men, and the effect he has on the people around him.

O'Hara reminds me a bit of Fitzgerald and Hemingway; he is hard and merciless. His characterizations are tremendous and his dialogue is truly "real". The man knew how to write a sentence!

Well I really adored the Whole Town's Talking... that Appointment in Samarra sounds interesting- will have to check it out.

I just finished The Boys in the Boat, (for book club) and I thought it was quite interesting but didn't think it was ALL that - as so many seemed to. So I guess this is what makes the world go round...

I just started Spill,Simmer, Falter Wither which is holding my attention nicely. Beautifully written. I am not sure who mentioned the book but pretty sure it was on these forums.

I gobbled up Small Great Things over the weekend. Beagles, I must agree it was extremely formulaic. There is a great theme there and were Picault a better writer it could have been a deep, very thought provoking story. Unfortunately she isn't and it wasn't.

And (spoiler alert) once I read the passage about the parents meeting with the lawyer, all trace of plausibility vanished, never to return. The idea that a risk management attorney for a hospital would encourage a couple of neo-Nazi openly racist bigot parents to go after a superbly qualified nurse with decades of spotless service....whew. I'm not a lawyer but I have been an HR officer and I have been to a couple of potential-lawsuit rodeos, and this is patently nonsense and would NEVER happen, not least of all because the lawyer would have been quite aware of deep pocket doctrine. And that's all I will say about that!

I finished reading The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime. It captured me from the first page and I found it intriguing all the way through. No idea how they made it into a play...

I'm flipping through the Short Stories by Saki (HHMunro) and am enjoying so many of them. I was inspired by 11/22/63 which mentioned The Open Window. Some are very much like alfred hitchcock stories. I'd never read any of the Reginald stories which are fun. I just wish I had a more modern printing of it...this one is old, the font is small and fancy and it's not so easy to read visually.

Next up is Turn Right at Machu Picchu which is for our book club.

I finished Chris Bohjalian's The Sleepwalker recently, and liked it a lot. Just enough suspense to keep me wanting to stay up late reading.

Now I'm reading This Is How It Always Is by Laurie Frankel, and I am liking it a lot, too. It's about a family with a transgender child -- a novel.

Finished The Left Hand of Darkness and understand why it won the Hugo and Nebula awards. Truly wonderful. I gave it 5 stars on Goodreads which is a rarity for me.

My February into March transition read is Tomorrow to be Brave by Susan Travers. The sub-title is A memoir of the only woman ever to serve in the French Foreign Legion. I am about half way through and Ms. Travers is currently the driver for a general with the free French forces at Bir Hakeim in north Africa in 1942. Under attack by the Germans and Italians. An interesting read.

Edited to add: As always, thanks to all who post to the reading threads. I have added several books to my TBR list from recommendations on this thread.

runninginplace, YES to your point about the hospital telling the parents to go after the nurse. Five seconds of research would have told Picoult that under agency rules, the nurse's "negligence" on duty would make the hospital liable for her conduct so they'd never admit she did something wrong even if she did! Good gracious! And the idea that a prosecutor would take the case! No way.

And that, of course, wasn't even close to the most completely unrealistic WTH moment.

I don't know what happened to Picoult. Her books used to be so good. 19 Minutes and My Sisters Keeper in particular I thought were thought provoking and excellent. I keep trying to read her new books and each one is worse than the one before. Think this one may have been the end for me.

"I don't know what happened to Picoult."

I think that many writers who churn out series just run out of steam. I loved Tom Clancy's initial books, but then he collapsed; characters became very foul-mouthed and cranky (esp. Jack Ryan) and the stories no longer flowed. Nelson De Mille, who really knew how to write a thriller, also lost it, with absurd plots and the ruining of great characters - gone are the days of The Charm School and The Lion's Game and Nightfall.

From what I've read, authors of series eventually often farm out their writing to others and just check the final work. John Sanford at least admitted it when he began teaming with his son and sometimes his wife.

I assume that this is not true of writers of fine literature and don't want to even entertain the idea that Stephen King did not write every word of 11-22-63!

I don't know about Picot; haven't read her.