Briar Rose

by Jane Yolen

Becca’s grandmother, “Gemma”, has always told the story of Sleeping Beauty (or Briar Rose). It’s her story. While Becca’s sisters, twins Sylvia and Shana, tire of the story, Becca never does.

On her deathbed, Gemma makes Becca promise to seek out her castle. Among the things Gemma kept at the nursing home was a wooden box with papers and photos that none of the family knew existed. These provide the clues for Becca to track down her Gemma’s past. It leads her to New York State and eventually Poland. There she finds a man who knew her Gemma during the war. And he knows why Gemma calls herself sleeping beauty.

This book was very engaging. At no point did Becca’s search become tedious, and I found myself getting quite excited when she finally finds out her Gemma’s true story (I was annoyed that my Mom wanted us to leave for lunch just as I got to that part).

A Christmas Story

by Jean Shepherd

Some of the stories from Shepherd’s books, In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash and Wanda Hickey’s Night of Golden Memories, were used to create the movie A Christmas Story. The relevant stories are collected in this volume.

Shepherd’s style is much like the move — funny, but not quite so absurd as to be unbelievable. This was a fun, quick read, and makes me want to check out the other collections for the other shorts written by Shepherd.

The Great War: The American Front

by Harry Turtledove

This is actually the second book in an alternate history series by Turtledove, in which the USA does not win the civil war..er..the war of succession (pardon me). I haven’t read the first book, but it’s not necessary to understanding this one. The only important part is that there is now a USA and a CSA (Confederate States of America) occupying what we know as the USA.

Due to alignments made during the war of succession, when World War I breaks out, the USA is on the side with Germany, while the CSA is on the side with Britain, France and Canada. The war is fought in North America.

This novel follows the lives of several characters in both the USA and CSA during the first part of WWI. These characters range from soldiers to farmers, factory workers to political figures. The novel is formed out of small bits of each character’s life. I was worried when I came to page 50 and there had been no repeats in the characters, but the characters do come back, and we follow their progress through the war. Unfortunately, the war is still going strong when the novel ends.

All of the stories were captivating, but yet the book felt really, really long. I can’t say why exactly. Still, I’m looking forward to reading the next book in the series, but am a bit disappointed that it covers the European Front, since I would have liked to know what happens to the characters I’ve gotten to know on the American Fronts.

Skipping Christmas

by John Grisham

With their daughter heading across the world, Luther and Nora Krank decide that Christmas just won’t be the same. In fact, after crunching some numbers, Luther discovers that last year they spent around $6000 on Christmas — more than enough to finance a holiday cruise. So he talks Nora into skipping Christmas. Skipping the presents, the tree, the decorations (even the obligatory neighborhood Frosty on the roof), the parties, the cookies, the dinners. Everything. Instead, they book a cruise to someplace warm that leaves Christmas day.

This was a fun, lighthearted book.

The Reptile Room (A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book the Second)

by Lemony Snicket

This is the second of the Series of Unfortunate Events books. The Baudelaire orphans are shipped off to live with their “Uncle Monty”. Montgomery Montgomery (not a typo) is a herpetologist living in the country with a large reptile room where the orphans can read and study and invent all they want — in fact, they need to in order to help Uncle Monty prepare for their trip to Peru to study new species of snakes.

Of course, this is the Baudelaire orphans we’re talking about, so the happiness can’t last.

The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortuate Events, Book the First)

by Lemony Snicket

While playing at the beach one gray day, the Baudelaire children, Violet, Klaus, and Sunny, get the bad news that their house has burned down and their parents died. This is not a good beginning for a story. Unfortunately things don’t get much better as the book continues. You see, the Baudelaire’s were very rich, so the orphans will inherit quite a fortune when they come of age. The first relative they are placed with, Count Olaf, has only this fortune in mind when he agrees to take the children in.

While the book does not start out or end happily, I found that I was drawn to the Baudelaire children, and I want to hope that eventually something good will happen for them. I look forward to see what happens in the next book.

I’ll admit that I got tired of the endless explanations of some of the words, but I can understand that most of the readers of these books are much, much younger than me, and probably need the extra help. I learned to just skim over those parts by the end of the book.

Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth

by E. L. Konigsburg

I read this book as a kid, and was reminded of it when I looked through CasualReader’s book relay page. I was too slow to pick up the copy that was offered there, but several weeks later, Andrew spied a copy at a garage sale.

Elizabeth and her parents moved to a new apartment building in a new town over the summer. When school starts, Elizabeth has no friends and no one to walk with to school. Then, while walking back to school after lunch on Halloween in her hand-me-down pilgrim costume, Elizabeth sees a girl up in a tree. This girl is also wearing a pilgrim costume, but hers looks older and more authentic that Elizabeth’s. Her name is Jennifer, and Jennifer is a witch. During the next several months, Jennifer takes Elizabeth on as an apprentice witch, as they collect the ingredients they need for a flying ointment.

I loved this book as a kid. Reading it again brought back some nostalgia for those days. This is a good book about friendships, and also very fun to read right near Halloween.

Goosebumps Books — #19 and #20

by R. L. Stine

I picked these up to release on Halloween, so I decided to read them through first. As with the other two I read, these were fun stories, especially for kids.

Deep Trouble (#19) Billy Deep Jr. and his sister visit their marine biologist uncle on his research boat every summer. The kids are supposed to stay away from the coral reef, but Billy is up for adventure. Adventure is what he gets…in the form of a half-human, half-fish.

The Scarecrow Walks at Midnight (#20) Jodie and Mark visit their grandparents’ farm every summer. Grandpa usually tells great scary stories, and Grandma makes the best chocolate chip pancakes nearly every morning. But this year, things are different. Stanley, the hired hand for nearly 20 years, had put up a whole army of evil-looking scarecrows. Grandma and Grandpa seem more than a year older than last summer. And Jodie spies the scarecrows twitching one night…all of them in unison.

The Frugal Bride

by Cynthia Clumeck Muchnick

The Frugal Bride has lots of tips on saving money on a wedding. One of the best parts of this book are the “Questions to Ask” sections — when hiring a wedding consultant, buying flowers, hiring a photographer, and hiring a caterer.

A Bride’s Book of Wedding Traditions

by Arlene Hamilton Stewart

The book catalogs some of the roots of our current wedding traditions. Many traditions date back to ancient times — for example, using the fourth finger on the left hand as the wedding ring finger originated in ancient Egypt. The other traditions date back to marriage by capture, marriage as a means of property transfer, marriage as a means to produce heirs, or superstitions about evil spirits.

I want to avoid any of the fertility traditions — there will be no baby’s breath at my wedding! However, the superstition traditions are more than welcome. I’m not superstitious, but it’s still fun to buy into a little of the hype. Andrew will not see the dress, or me in the dress, before the wedding! And I’ll certainly be wearing “something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue”! Though I won’t go so far as making my bridesmaids dress exactly like me (to confuse evil spirits).

Unfortunately, I was often left wanting more explanations on the traditions — the short paragraph or two was often not enough.