Please Stop Laughing At Me

This is a really good book that deals with the subject of bullying. I really related to this book because I was a victim of bullying when I was in school. I was picked on quite a bit and after reading this book I realize that it was because I refused to be mean to other students. This book will open your eyes to the problem of bulling and make you rethink the phrase "kids will be kids" I think that we should make school a place where a child is not singled out or brutally picked on. I was shocked at how the authors family and her teachers treated the author. Miss Blanco was not afraid to do the right thing she stuck up for others and took a lot of abuse because of that. This is a must read.

The Girls by Lori Lansens

This fictional story is about the oldest surviving cranio-something conjoined twin girls...two sisters joined at the head.

The pair are writing their life story. It's incredibly interesting. It even made me gasp a couple of times.

You should read it .

That's all I have to say.

This is an old book, but a good one. I was surprised although I knew I shouldn't have been. I have read many of his books and he is as always a great writer. I just got done reading this and it was well worth my time. I love books that are slightly creepy, and this book defenitly was.

The Birth House

I don't know if you American gals have heard of this book, but it's pretty big here in Canada.
It's set in rural Nova Scotia, around the time of the first World War. It pits Dora, a new young midwife, against a doctor who wants to bring a birthing hospital to the area.
It's a beautiful book, to read and to look at.
The author has an interesting website about it.
My monthly bookclub discussed it last night, and I got signed bookplates from the author for everyone, and made a recipe for groaning cake from the book. Needless to say, I was a hit!

The Book of Bright Ideas by Sandra Kring

I picked this up at the book store a few weeks ago and boy, oh boy, am I glad I did. If anyone wants to read it, let me know and we can pass it around.

Shy nine-year-old Evelyn "Button" Peters knows 1961 will be the biggest summer of her life the moment she sees wispy little Winnalee Malone and her fiery-spirited sister, Freeda, blow into town. Winnalee is like no girl Button's ever known: she carries an urn of her mother's ashes at all times, along with her "Book of Bright Ideas," which she claims will reveal to her the secrets of life-and the two girls quickly become best friends. Among the adults, things are more complicated; Freeda's temperament brings her as many enemies as friends, especially Button's mother, Jewel, and throughout a summer of dry heat and upheaval, loyalties will be tested, unlikely alliances formed, and devastating secrets revealed, after which Button fears nothing will ever be the same-or, worse, that it will.

It's one of those books that makes you smile and reminds you of people you know. Well, atleast it did for me. I got a kick out of the little girls and the way the were so different and yet they were "best friends forever." Remember as a child, how you found out all the really interesting stuff if you were all ears and blended into the woodwork? Remember that innocence, the things that made you laugh and what it felt like to spin in circles until you fell in an exhausted heap. I don't want to say to much, because I am afraid to give anything away....but thank goodness for Family like Aunt Verdella and Uncle Rudy..they are what I call "good people."

Letters For Emily

I just read one of the best books. If you liked Tuesdays with Morrie you will LOVE this book. I could not put it down until it was finished.

From Publishers Weekly
In this tearjerker of a debut novel, author Wright delves into a family's struggle with a dying parent's mental illness, a marriage breakup and a mysterious legacy left for a seven-year-old granddaughter. Widower Harry Whitney is old and dying. Alzheimer's disease is taking its toll, and he wants only two things to die with dignity and to be remembered as the good man he once was, not as the drooling, cranky old coot he is becoming. His children are estranged, their marriages on the rocks, and his only true friend is his granddaughter, Emily. After Harry dies, his daughter-in-law, Laura, finds three identical homemade books filled with Harry's poems and stories. As she and Emily discover, each poem and story contains a secret, coded password linked to computer files. The files each hold a special letter to Emily confessions, revelations, advice, even a hint of hidden gold. After Harry's son and daughter read the letters, too, they begin to realize that Harry was a pretty amazing father after all. Wright's word picture of old Harry slowly dying and knowing it is powerful and gripping, as are his vivid portrayals of nursing homes, adult children making tough decisions for elderly parents and the insensitivity of the medicare system. His melodramatic characterizations of husbands and wives involved in divorce proceedings are less successful, but Harry's letters to Emily are eloquent enough to make this a worthwhile read overall.


Reviewer: Vesta Irene (the Pacific Northwest) - See all my reviews

Harry enjoyed writing stories and poems before the Alzheimer's. Now he writes as much as he can during his few daily moments of lucidity. He has family, but it's Emily, who comes by and visits with her mother, that he loves the best. It's Emily he's going to miss.

After his death Emily's parents search through his things looking for important documents, but instead they find a book of his poems and they discover a hidden message in the first poem, then more. The messages lead to hidden files on Harry's computer. Each file is a letter to Emily and that's all I'm going to say about this extremely wonderful book that made me cry.

If you don't read anything else this year, you should at least read "Letters for Emily." It will warm your heart, bring tears to your eyes and joy to your soul. This novel gets five big, bright stars from me.

Whitethorn Woods

Reading Maeve Binchy is like slipping into a warm bath, or your favourite fuzzy slippers. Or maybe like getting a hug from your Nana. Comfortable.
Whitethorn is the fourth book, I believe, from Maeve since she announced her retirement a few years ago. It's a series of stories about people living near a shrine to St. Ann, in a small Irish town. The shrine is threatened by a new highway.
This isn't my favourite Maeve (that would be Scarlet Feather or Tara Road) but it's a pleasant, easy read, that Maeve fans should enjoy.