April Reading

Books-April 2011
1. Action starboard! By Victor Mays (gender study)
2. Singing for Mrs. Pettrigrew by Michael Morpurgo
3. Growing up bin Laden by Najwa bin Laden and Omar bin Laden and Jean Sasson
4. The mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
5. One of us by Mark Osteen
6. La's orchestra saves the world by Alexander McCall Smith (audio book)
7. Compulsion by Heidi Ayarbe (SLJ review)
8. One was a soldier by Julia Spencer-Fleming
9. The Lucky One by Nicholas Sparks (audio book)
10. The scent of rain and lightning by Nancy Pickard
11. How to talk to an autistic kid by David Stefanski
12. Bad Samaritan by Aimee and David Thurlo
13. The virgin of small plains by Nancy Pickard
14. The other Wes Moore by Wes Moore
15. Fearless: Imagine your life without fear by Max Lucado
16. Great expectations by Charles Dickens
17. The Wyoming kid by Debbie Macomber
18. Anya's war by Andrea Alban
19. Odysseus the wanderer by Aubrey de Selincourt (gender study)


1. Another gender study book from the 1950s, main character: male, predominate character: male. Only four females in the cast of hundreds. Same old same old!
2. A rare gem of short stories written by Britain’s one time children’s laureate. Great stories and nice essays in between telling about the writing.
3. A friend recommended this book several months ago; just getting around to reading it now. It gives some good background on who bin Laden is/was and how he treated his own family. Pretty scary guy who started off as a mild mannered, family loving young boy.
4. The final book in the Hunger Games trilogy. These books go from violence to more violence; lots of blood and gore in this one. After much death and devastation, the wars are over and all live in a peace paid for with a very high price.
5. I loved this book about a family’s struggle to live with a child severely affected by autism. One thing that is too clear here: parents will do anything for their children, follow any advice and are often taken in by charlatans, all because they would love to alleviate the effects of this disorder, and give their children a normal life.
6. Great book to listen to. Not a part of a series and I have to agree with most reviewers who say that Smith does best with his series books. Maybe because this covered too much time, the reader did not get as intimate a look into La’s life as happens in the minutia written in his series books.
7. Hard to read and not very reader friendly, although it probably did give a fairly good picture of what it is like to live with OCD.
8. The long-awaited next installment in Julia Spencer-Fleming’s mystery series. She has written much in blogs and talked in interviews about the pressure to publish a book a year in this type of series. I have to say it did not live up to my expectations. That does not mean I won’t stop reading this series if she keeps writing. But, she focused too much on the issues in this book to the detriment of the human story that she tells so well.
9. We started listening to this on our way to Boston and couldn’t hear the second half on the way home because the battery died in the ipod. Typical Sparks. I knew someone would die, but he did fool me briefly in the end.
10. Another stand alone book by a great series writer. I was impressed with how she used weather in this book throughout the present day story as well as the flash-backs, almost as another character. Very nice story and lots of red-herrings.
11. Short and sweet, written by an autistic kid. Could be useful for a parent or classroom teacher to use, but only when talking to/about a high functioning autistic kid.
12. A sister Agatha mystery. Had not read any of these, and was not impressed, although the image of a nun, in habit riding a motorcycle with a big dog in the side car is one that I find quite amusing.
13. After reading Pickard’s latest book, I searched for and found this one at the library. Again, an old mystery, re-opened and solved 15 years later. She does romance well, in that it is a part of the story, but does not overwhelm the story.
14. Great book; see description of book club.
15. I have been reading this off and on for about two months. Lucado does a good job of finding passages related to fear in the Bible and making them relevant to present day life. The discussion section is something I will re-read to keep these ideas in front of my memory for a longer period of time.
16. Had never read this as a kid, although Miss Havisham is such an iconic character, I felt I knew part of the story already. Amazed at Dickens’ story telling ability and the way he gets the reader’s sympathy right where he wants it!
17. Second story about Wyoming by MaComber. Typical romance novel.
18. Set in the late 1930s, this tells the story of Anya’s Jewish family who have come to Shanghai from Odessa to escape oppression. Many great historical moments here. Not the greatest writing, but still worth reading.
19. A retelling of the Odyssey. Another great book I had never read. This was also written in the 50s and part of the gender study. Lots of men, just a few women. A losing battle!