MySpace

Mystery Maxed Considering those things unexplained

MySpace.com | rss | sign in
Marilynne



Last Updated: 12/17/2009

Send Message
Instant Message
Email to a Friend
Subscribe

Gender: Female
Status: Married
State: California
Country: US

My Subscriptions
Brandis Nicole
Laura!!!!
ask about me
Druanna
Mysterious Galaxy Bookstore
D. H. Dublin, a.k.a. Jon McGoran
Anne Carter
Rosemary
alicia
Sisters In Crime
Cindy
Kathleen
Woosi
Cindy
Way Out Sortie

Blog Archive
[Older      Newer]
 /  / 
September 23, 2009 - Wednesday 

Current mood:  thoughtful
Category: Life
I never saw it coming.  We had three good friends:  two men who were smoke jumpers and a woman who counseled troubled teens.  Put them together, add a bad fire, and a death, and you've got the start of a good book.

It gets better from there.  Put these three friends and the woman's daughter together, intertwine their lives, and you have the beginning of a very good story.

I thought it would be about smoke jumpers with lots of danger and lots of fires.  And it was, but the story wasn't just about the fires or smoke jumping, it was about these people and what happened in their lives.

Part way through the book it takes an unexpected twist as the man who lost the girl takes up photography in war zones as a way of forgetting.  We have some really intense stories of the war zones, a man trying to hide his feelings for the woman, and the man who got her whose live didn't turn out well.

I'm not going to tell you the plot of "The Smoke Jumper" by Nicholas Evans, I'll just advise you to buy it and keep reading it to the end.  I got it as a Barnes & Noble remnant.  If you go online you may get it at a good price.

Marilynne
10:47 PM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
July 8, 2009 - Wednesday 


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-hCuYjvw2I

I am putting this here for my brother who likes to do the Bay 2 Breakers in San Francisco every year. I think he'll empathize.

11:08 PM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
July 8, 2009 - Wednesday 

Current mood:  amused
Category: Life
I bought some books today and I plan to buy more.  There's an author I like to read:  Robert Fate who writes the Baby Shark books.  I adore his books, but I never find them in a book store.  Where do I find them?  Try his web site (http://www.robertfate.com/) . 

I also look on other authors web sites like Poe's Deadly Daughters (http://http://poesdeadlydaughters.blogspot.com/)  and Jungle Red  (http://www.jungleredwriters.com/) . 

Note:  When I did research for the URL for Jungle Red, I found also that it's a color of nail polish and the name of a salon.  You find out all sorts of things when you surf the web.

To continue, you can find lots of books and information on how to order them on the web.  I've given you three.  Next, go to my profile and click on the photos that look like books and those of the publishers.  Those clicks will take you to an author on MySpace who's also selling books, like Dana Stabenow's books about Alaska.  What fun it is to buy the book from an author, not just a book store.  This also works on my Facebook site.

Talking about book stores, another place to look for the multitude of books you don't see elsewhere is at Independent Bookstores (Indie books - http://www.indiebound.org/).  Yep, this is a listing of independent book stores.  These book stores cater to you the reader.  When you find an indie book store that caters to your kind of books, you're in reading for a long, long time.

So, it's summer.  Surely you'll have time for a book or two.  Check these people out and do some extra ordinary reading this summer.  Discover a new author.

Marilynne (whose next book is waiting for me)
Currently reading:
Improbable Cause
By J.A. Jance
Release date: 1988-02-01
12:59 AM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
July 3, 2009 - Friday 

Current mood:  sweaty
Category: Life
We are putting in solar to help with electricity costs.  If you want to know more, I'm blogging about it at http://marilynnesmith.com/blogging  .

Marilynne 
Currently reading:
Life Sentences: A Novel
By Laura Lippman
Release date: 2009-03-10
3:18 AM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
June 27, 2009 - Saturday 

Current mood:  amused
Category: Life
I just finished reading Borderline by Nevada Barr.  I am astonished how much this already great writer has improved.  Borderline is a real page turner from the puzzling "Confession" to the last page. 

Let me quote part of "Confession"
"For purposes of mine own I have done many terrible things.  I have moved thousands of tons of rocks from . . . "

I read this short paragraph three times before I realized it was like an Acknowledgments page.  Nevada is telling us that for the purpose of her story she has changed the scenery around a bit.  I loved her amusing way of telling us so.  Most acknowledgments are pretty dry.

Nevada Barr is known for her books that feature park ranger Anna Pigeon.  They take place in the various National Parks.  Borderline, the book, takes place in Big Bends National Park.  Big Bend is on the border of Texas and Mexico and much of the story takes place IN the Rio Grand.  Or should I say the best parts do. 

Anna Pigeon has had a traumatic experience (told in the previous book) and has come to Big Bend with her husband Paul suffering from post traumatic stress syndrome.  She's in bad shape.  She and Paul plan a rafting trip through the park and down the Rio Grand.  Everything goes wrong, of course, and Anna finds herself not only caring for a newborn baby, but carrying it around during some of the most treacherous parts of the book.

I can't tell you more without giving things away.  This is such a good book and I hope you'll read it some day soon and find that you agree with me.

Marilynne
Currently reading:
Borderline (Anna Pigeon)
By Nevada Barr
1:27 AM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
June 9, 2009 - Tuesday 

Current mood:  focused
Category: Life
If you're a fan of the 1960s TV show, Dragnet, you'll find some similarities in Behind the Badge by Harry D. Penny.  This is a collection of funny stories about policemen at work.  That's right, I said funny.

One contributor,Claude Anderson, says:
"It seems that most of us [policemen] were blessed with a certain sense of humor that saw us through the stressful situations that working Firestone [a police station in LA] threw at us."

And that's what the book is about - the funny things that lighten the work hours of a police officer.  These are truly amusing stories.  They give you another view of the work of the police, often irreverent, usually hilarious.

I recommend this book as light reading in a year of tension for all of us.  You can read it straight through or, as I am, read a few chapters at a time.

The book is Behind the Badge:  The Funny Side of the "Thin Blue Line."   It's published by Truth Seeker of Escondido and is available on Amazon.com.

Marilynne 


Currently reading:
Behind the Badge: The Funny Side of the Thin Blue Line
By Harry Penny
11:25 AM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
June 6, 2009 - Saturday 

Current mood:  ditzy
Category: Life
This book is both a page turner and a hankie sniffer.  I've just finished reading My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult.  I am one of those crazy people who prefer to read a book before they see the movie.  I'm glad I did.

If you haven't read the jacket yet or seen the movie teasers, this is the story of a family trying to hold together while dealing with their daughter Kate's rare form of leukemia.  In order to  increase Kate's chances of survival (which aren't very good) the parents decide to have a baby that is genetically engineered to be a good donor for Kate.  That baby is Anna. 

The initial plan is to use the cord blood from the new baby to give stem cells to Kate, but they slide into using Anna as a donor for Kate whenever she needs one. 

When Anna is thirteen she rebels.  She states that no one ever asks her if it's OK, then hires a lawyer to ask the court to allow her to make medical decisions for herself.

This has so many threads I couldn't possibly tell you here without re-typing the book.  The ending is not predictable.  I can't imagine a movie telling you all the ins and outs of the book.  And, of course, the book can't tell you the things that a movie can. 

My advice is to read the book and see the movie.  It will keep you on the edge of your seat.

Marilynne 
Currently reading:
My Sister's Keeper - Movie Tie-In: A Novel
By Jodi Picoult
10:07 PM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
June 4, 2009 - Thursday 

Current mood:  thoughtful
Category: Life
I just finished The Book Thief by Markus Zusak.  I mentioned it in my last post where I was complaining (sort of) about books that read slowly.

In truth, it turned out to be a good book to read when I had only a little time.  A few pages and I'd read a scene or two.  They were connected, but not dependent on each other.

Final opinion?  I loved it.  It will stay on my book shelf to be re-read.  Since this book is also listed for Young Adults I would recommend it for them.  It gives a pretty clear view of what life was like for a young German girl during World War II.  At the beginning of the book, Liesel and her brother are being sent away on a train.  Their mother is ill and cannot take care of them.  The children are being taken in by foster parents.

Liesel's brother dies on the train and it flavors all of her childhood.  She is allowed to attend his funeral, and at the funeral she finds her first book "The Gravediggers Handbook."  She can't read it yet, but the book becomes a connection between her and her dead brother.  She takes comfort from the book.  It is the first book she learns to read.

I'd say go for it and buy a copy.  This is a book worth reading.

Marilynne
Currently reading:
The Book Thief
By Markus Zusak
Release date: 2007-09-11
1:14 AM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
May 23, 2009 - Saturday 

Current mood:  determined
Category: Life
I've found a new category of books - those that are SLOOOWWWW reading.  It drives me crazy because I'm used to racing through a book with intense interest.  Now I'm finding books you have to read slowly, are very interesting, but never seem to be making much progress.

Edgar Sawtelle.  Have you read this book?  Have you begun reading it?  Where are you in the reading?  I got the book for Christmas.  Now May is winding down.  I haven't given up and given it to the library, but I'm close.  However, I'm fascinated with the way Edgar solves his problems and learns to train dogs using sign language.  But the plot just slogs along - if there is a plot.  So, I'm interested in what's happening, but not in the entire book.  If I finish, and that's a big IF, it will be because of the small happenings in the book and not the plot.

I'm also reading The Book Thief, which I understand is a young adult book.  I don't see why it should be confined to that category, it's really a good book, even if it's a slow one.  The book is set in Nazi Germany during World War II.  It's about a little girl sent to live with someone else because her mother is ill.  Her foster parents call her the German equivalent of little pig, but come to love her. 

The story is about the little girl and how she manages to live through the war.  It also tells about the people of her town.  It's a good story, but again, the interest is in the little things, not the big thing that hovers over them.  In an interesting twist, the story is narrated by Death - which would make me wonder if death will get the little girl before the story ends.

And then there are two books of short stories:  one is of British short stories, and some of those stories are VERY British; the other is a book of short stories by Laura Lippman, who is a fine writer whatever genre.

What's wrong with short stories?  Nothing, but I usually read novels and short stories get over so soon.

So, I'm stuck in books with slooowww reading.  Hopefully, I'll be glad I stuck with them.

Marilynne 
Currently reading:
The Book Thief
By Markus Zusak
Release date: 2007-09-11
6:54 PM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
May 18, 2009 - Monday 

Current mood:  breezy
Category: Writing and Poetry
I've just finished reading the Blue Corn Murders.  This book was written by Nancy Pickard based on a character created by Virginia Rich.  This unusual teaming of authors really worked.

Mrs. Potter, a nice lady, decides to go to camp at an archeological dig in the southwest.  She shares a hogan with three other campers, one who is outspoken and misinformed (Mrs. Potter's assessment) about the plight of the Native Americans. 

Mrs. Potter tries to keep everyone on an even keel in spite of their varying opinions and ages.  Then the murders begin.

This is a great novel for learning a little about the Native Americans of the Southwest, while watching Mrs. Potter help unravel the mystery and find the murderer.

The Blue Corn Murderers was published by Delacorte Press in 1998.  Delacorte Press is a division of Bantum Doubleday Dell Publishing Group Inc.  These divisions of publishers get confusing don't they?  Usually a division focuses on a certain type of book and has its own editors and staff.

Marilynne
Currently reading:
The Book Thief
By Markus Zusak
Release date: 2007-09-11
1:03 AM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate