Finished: When The Emperor Was Divine (Otsuka) A vivid, heartbreaking YA book that has been banned from middle and high school reading lists. A Japanese American mother and her two young children are ripped from their home in California, are reclassified as enemy aliens and sent to an incarceration camp. The father had already been taken in the middle of the night after Pearl Harbor was bombed, and imprisoned in Texas. The horrific conditions of the camp, and the terrible treatment of their belongings and home when they finally return are awful to read. Not to mention how former friends have turned their backs on them. What a terrible, terrible ordeal for these American people! The book could have had a bit more substance and character development, but there is no shading over the horror of the situation. What a terrible time in American history, a time that students today should definitely be learning about. I shake my head at so many of the banned books in this day and age! 

 Finished: The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo (Reid) I don't know why I waited so long to read this book! It was as good as everyone said. :-) Evelyn Hugo was a huge star in Hollywood, who made her way there in the 1950's from Hell's Kitchen, was the "it" girl in the 1960's and 70's, and then left show business in the 1980's. Along the way, some for love, and most for other reasons, Evelyn had seven husbands. Now, she's insisting that an unknown reporter for a magazine, Monique Grant, perform the only interview she's done in years. Monique's bosses are chomping at the bit...but why Monique? Evelyn says it's Monique or the deal is off. Monique meets with Evelyn and it comes to light that what Evelyn Hugo really wants is to narrate her biography and for Monique to write it. What ensues is Evelyn's story about how she made it to Hollywood and IN Hollywood; her competitors and her friends; her movie successes and her failures; how the studios were all about making money and would drop you in a dime; and, of course, about her seven husbands! The number one question that Monique wants answered is: Who was the love of your life? I won't spoil the book, but the answer is revealed in Evelyn Hugo's good time. Also, the answer as to why Evelyn wanted Monique and only Monique to write the book is answered at the end of the book. I love Taylor Jenkins Reid's writing, and this book was certainly another fun one! My favorite passage is below, but it does spoil the book, so don't read it yet if you want to be surprised. 

Spoiler below:

    "I would imagine, back then, it wasn't a conclusion you'd come to easily--being in love with someone of the same sex."

    "Of course not! Maybe if I'd spent my whole life fighting off feelings for women, then I might have had a template for it. But I didn't. I was taught to like men, and I had found--albeit temporarily--love and lust with a man. The fact that I wanted to be around Celia all the time, the fact that I cared about her enough that I valued her happiness over my own, the fact that I liked to think about that moment when she stood in front of me without her shirt on--now, you put those pieces together, and you say, one plus one equals I'm in love with a woman. but back then, at least for me, I didn't have that equation. And if you don't even realize that there's a formula to be working with, how the hell are you supposed to find the answer?"

 

 Finished: The Foundling (Leary) A pretty good book that I started reading at the beginning of vacation, and then finished after it was over. Based on a true story, it was horrific that women were treated this way and put in asylums so easily, for instance, if their husbands just wanted to be rid of them to be with a new woman. I'm just going to put the Amazon write up here, because I'm still exhausted. :-) 

It’s 1927 and eighteen-year-old Mary Engle is hired to work as a secretary at a remote but scenic institution for mentally disabled women called the Nettleton State Village for Feebleminded Women of Childbearing Age. She’s immediately in awe of her employer—brilliant, genteel Dr. Agnes Vogel.

Dr. Vogel had been the only woman in her class in medical school. As a young psychiatrist she was an outspoken crusader for women’s suffrage. Now, at age forty, Dr. Vogel runs one of the largest and most self-sufficient public asylums for women in the country. Mary deeply admires how dedicated the doctor is to the poor and vulnerable women under her care.

Soon after she’s hired, Mary learns that a girl from her childhood orphanage is one of the inmates. Mary remembers Lillian as a beautiful free spirit with a sometimes-tempestuous side. Could she be mentally disabled? When Lillian begs Mary to help her escape, alleging the asylum is not what it seems, Mary is faced with a terrible choice. Should she trust her troubled friend with whom she shares a dark childhood secret? Mary’s decision triggers a hair-raising sequence of events with life-altering consequences for all.

Inspired by a true story about the author’s grandmother, The Foundling offers a rare look at a shocking chapter of American history. This gripping page-turner will have readers on the edge of their seats right up to the stunning last page…asking themselves, “Did this really happen here?”

 Finished: Trust (Diaz) I picked up Trust to read after I saw that Kate Winslet has signed to do the upcoming series. It is a book about capitalism in America in the 1920's with all the financial ups and downs, so I wasn't sure I'd really be that interested, but what a good book! It begins with a book inside a book. The book, written by Harold Vanner in 1937, is called Bonds and is the story of American finance tycoon Benjamin Rask and his equally brilliant wife, Helen. Both very antisocial, they appear to be a perfect match and live the wealthy life in New York as the genius Benjamin, able to constantly predict exactly what the market is going to do, proceeds to multiply his already vast family fortune. Meanwhile, Helen is enthralled with music and philanthropy and spends her time having world renowned musicians of all types to their mansion for private concerts for a very small group of people, and donating to vast charities that interest her. Right before the stock market crash of 1929, Benjamin suspects that the historical increase in the Dow Jones numbers in the past few years can't go on forever, and he begins liquidating most of his own stocks. This, many claim, actually starts the downward spiral of the stock market crash, but Benjamin doesn't see it that way. Soon, the reclusive couple is shunned by the few people in their inner circle and Helen falls into some sort of mental illness. Benjamin takes her to the best sanatorium in Switzerland, where she declines into delirium and develops debilitating eczema. Her renowned doctor convinces Benjamin that Helen can be cured with a new therapy that will eventually come to be known as shock therapy. After her third treatment, Helen's heart gives out and she dies. Benjamin is bereft. He goes back to New York, where he has actually let his business suffer, and people who once respected his financial prowess begin to think of him as getting old and losing his touch. 

So, just when you are getting into the story of the Rasks, part one is over! The book within in a book, which I forgot I was reading, was done. Part two of Trust is all about real financier, Andrew Bevel and his wife Mildred. Andrew, whose wife Mildred was lost to him years before, is livid when Bonds comes out and the author has let it be known that it is based on the Rasks. He doesn't like the way he is portrayed and he most definitely doesn't like the fact that Mildred, who died a painful death from cancer, is portrayed as having lost her mind and died from psychiatric experiments. He begins to write his own memoir, and you can tell that much of what he says does coincide with the Bonds book, but he paints himself in a much better light, insisting that he lives by his father's favorite saying which was, "The best kind of financial profit is the profit that also helps the community as a whole." He also paints Mildred as fascinated by music, for certain, but also meeker and less influential to Andrew than she actually was. Part two ends abruptly with Andrew deciding he'll need a ghostwriter. 

Part three picks up with the story of Ida Partenza, daughter of a widowed Italian immigrant who is a printer and barely makes ends meet. Ida has written fascinating stories since she was a young girl. Realizing she needs to earn more money than her jobs in the bakery and the supermarket afford her, she answers the ad for a secretarial position. The hiring process is several interviews worth, but the end result is that Ida is hired to be Andrew Bevel's ghostwriter. He insists that she find "his voice", which means, make something up that is nicer and more exciting than his true boring, reserved voice. He also insists that this story is to redeem his wife's "reputation", yet he can give Ida no details in particular regarding any kind of intimate stories with his wife. Even though Mildred famously wrote everything down in diaries, there are no diaries made available to Ida and Andrew tells her to just make up some nice stories. There's a push and pull between Ida and Andrew and she manages to stand up to him at times. When he is finally satisfied that the book is almost done and to his liking, and that both he and Mildred have been portrayed exactly as he wanted....he dies!! Ida isn't even officially notified, and there are no instructions given in his vast will about the memoir she'd been working on, so it goes unfinished. Ida puts all her notes and manuscripts aside, makes enough money being Andrew Bevel's former secretary to put herself through school, and does eventually become a journalist and an author. Decades later when she is 70 years old, years after the Bevel mansion has been made into a museum, Ida sees a notice that the personal papers and letters of Mildred Bevel are going to be put on display for the first time. Ida, always feeling like she'd never found the true Mildred in all of Andrew's edits, makes her way over to the mansion for the first time since Andrew's death. She's on the last of four boxes, searching and beginning to question whether Mildred ever even had a diary, when she comes upon it slipped inside an old ledger. She quickly slips it inside her own papers (yes, she steals it lol), because as it turns out, no one else has ever really been interested in finding out who the "real" Mildred was. 

Then, we get to Part four. This is all comprised of Mildred's diary. The notations begin when she is already at the sanatorium, but she is not mentally ill. She IS wracked with cancer and doesn't have very long to live. I'm not going into any more detail, because we finally hear in Mildred's words exactly  how the Bevel finances and household and social life and relationship truly were. In the midst of her every day entries of how she's feeling and what her treatments are for the day, we hear the anecdotes we've wanted to hear all along, and they are eye opening. :-) I really can't wait to see Kate Winslet portray who I'm sure will be both Helen and Mildred! 

Finished: The Latecomer (Korelitz) A very good book, that grew on me as I read it, because at the beginning, frankly, none of the characters were likable at all. I will never understand how brothers and sisters aren't close like I always have been with my own. This made three of the major characters very unappealing to me. However, by the end, and by the time the siblings grew the heck up, I'd say this was definitely a book that has enriched me and I'm so glad I read it. I don't have the wherewithal to give a good summary right now, so this will be one of those times that I totally cheat and use the Amazon summary. But, it's a really good summary. :-) 

"The Latecomer follows the story of the wealthy, New York City-based Oppenheimer family, from the first meeting of parents Salo and Johanna, under tragic circumstances, to their triplets born during the early days of IVF. As children, the three siblings – Harrison, Lewyn, and Sally – feel no strong familial bond and cannot wait to go their separate ways, even as their father becomes more distanced and their mother more desperate. When the triplets leave for college, Johanna, faced with being truly alone, makes the decision to have a fourth child. What role will the “latecomer” play in this fractured family?

A complex novel that builds slowly and deliberately, The Latecomer touches on the topics of grief and guilt, generational trauma, privilege and race, traditions and religion, and family dynamics. It is a profound and witty family story from an accomplished author, known for the depth of her character studies, expertly woven storylines, and plot twists."

 Finished: The Pact (Bolton) Six best friends, the cream of the crop academically at their private school in Oxford, are about to receive their A-level scores, hopefully propelling them on to Oxford University and other similar institutions, when their lives are all upended due to a stupid and dangerous dare which ends in the death of a woman and her two young daughters. Felix, Xavier, Daniel, Talitha , Amber and Megan are all wealthy, entitled teenagers who give very little thought to anyone but themselves. Correction...all of them are wealthy but Megan. Megan, not wealthy and being raised by just her mother, is at the private school on scholarship because she's the smartest one of them all. The dare is for the last member of the six (yes, five of them have already done it before) to take the wheel of a car as they all pile in, and then drive the wrong way down the M40 motorway for two exits. Miraculously, in their first five joyrides, no one had been close to being hurt. In this one, with the meek, Daniel at the wheel, a tragic accident occurs which causes the mother of the two girls to drive off the road trying to avoid them, her car exploding into flames, killing all three of them inside. As the six friends panic and then regroup, they are trying to figure out what to do to save their own hides. Megan, who unbeknownst to the others, has actually failed her A-levels and is reeling anyway, says that she will take the blame and say she was driving and do whatever prison time is assigned if they will all stay in touch with her and each owe her a favor of her choosing when she gets out. She also makes them sign a note stating they all took equal responsibility in the accident and she takes a picture of them all holding it. They all thought she'd get just a few years for accidental manslaughter, and out on good behavior sooner than that. None of them expected Megan to be charged with murder and sentenced to life in prison, not getting out until twenty years had been served. Once out, twenty years later, Megan descends upon the lives of her five former friends, none of whom visited her or wrote back to her a single day in twenty years. She holds the old written confession and picture as a threat over their heads, demanding outrageous actions from them all as her "favors".  There are a couple of surprise twists at the end. This was an unputdownable book! I had to know what happened next after each chapter! :-)

 Finished: For the Throne (Whitten) The sequel to For the Wolf, I was greatly looking forward to this book, but was not nearly as crazy about it as I was the first book. For the Wolf was the story of royal twin sisters born in the kingdom of Valleyda who both had destinies to fulfill being the first and second born daughters. Neverah (Neve) is the first born twin, so is marked to be the next queen. Redarys (Red) is the second born daughter and is marked to be sacrificed to the wolf who is one with the magical Wilderwood forest. By the end of For the Wolf, Red and Eammon (the wolf whose really a man infused with the Wilderwood) have fallen in love and are battling together with their powers from the Wilderwood to save the trees that are mysteriously disappearing. Neve, who has unfortunately put her trust in an evil priestess to try and get Red back, is helping those who want the five kings to return, i.e., the kings who went down under to the Shadowlands and gave their souls for power, only to become Shadow Monsters. So, Neve and Red are at cross purposes, working against each other without knowing it. At the end of that book, Eammon and Red manage to save the Wilderwood, but as they are doing so, Neve finally sees Red and believes that Red is going to die if Neve doesn't become one with the Shadowlands that are trying to destroy the Wilderwood. Throughout both books, each of the sisters cares desperately about the other one being safe and back home, and will sacrifice nearly anything to make that happen. The second book, For the Throne is Neve's story. It's the story of how she ends up in the Shadowlands with only a single being that she knew from up above, Solmir. Solmir is one of the kings who'd gone down to the Shadowlands to garnish more power, but then wanted to find a way for all the kings to come back to Valleyda. He worked with the evil priestess and took over the body of Arrick, good friend to Neve and Red, to trick Neve into helping. At the end of the first book, Neve realizes that Solmir has killed Arrick to take over his body, and now in the second book, this is the person she's trapped with in the Shadowlands. It is apparently her destiny to become the Shadow Queen. She just wants to get back home. Solmir swears to her that he can get her home, and that he's just trying to get the evil kings, now shadow monsters, to come back through to the real world so that he can kill them and do away with their evil once and for all. What he doesn't tell her is that she is going to be the vessel that all their powers will flow into as they are physically killed, and that to completely wipe them out, he'll have to turn around and kill Neve. The problem is, Solmir has fallen in love with Neve, and in the process of their adventure to make all this happen, Neve falls in love with him as well. Meanwhile, in the Wilderwood, we see bits of Red and Eammon's story as Red fights to get to a Heart Tree which she believes will bring Neve back to her from the Shadowlands. When it works, and the sisters come face to face and embrace, it doesn't go as Red planned. Neve chooses to go back to the Shadowlands to finish her battle against the kings/monsters with Solmir. We end up with another huge climax in this book, but it wasn't as compelling for me because I honestly didn't care as much about Neve or Solmir as I did Red and Eammon in the first book. I'm still glad I read it though, and happy with the outcome of the story! :-) 

 Finished: One Italian Summer (Serle) A very moving book about a thirty year old woman who goes into an emotional tailspin when she loses her mother, who is her everything. Katy is happily married to Eric, but she has counted on her mother her entire life for advice, companionship, wisdom, how to everything from cooking to party planning to interior design. An only child, Katy and her mother are extremely close. So, when her mother dies after a lengthy illness, Katy decides to go on the final trip they had planned together to Positano, Italy, her mother's dream spot. Her mother, Carol, had spent time there before meeting her father, and it had been the most magical place and magical time of her life. Carol had planned the entire itinerary (of course) and planned to show Katy around and tell her about all her memories. Katy, in her tailspin, tells her husband before she goes that she's not even sure she wants to be married to him any more. It's only been five years, but Katy is suddenly questioning everything. When she gets to Positano, she falls in love with the town, the beauty, and mostly the feeling she gets of how the old world has come crashing into her life. She is enamored, but still heavily grieving. She meets a very charming man, Adam, who is there to possibly buy the Poseidon Hotel, the family owned hotel her mother had fallen in love with, and where she is staying. They have a pretty instant chemistry, but Katy does have Eric on her mind and still isn't sure where her marriage is going. As Katy begins to explore, with plans to follow her mother's itinerary, she can't believe it when she comes face to face with her own mother...her mother thirty years ago, when she herself was thirty!! Katy can't believe it, but it is definitely Carol and Katy is mesmerized. They become friends quickly as Katy gets to know this incarnation of her mother. As different facts come to light about Carol and her future desires, and as Katy grows closer to both Carol and Adam, things come to an emotional head and take a very surprising turn. In the end, Katy at last figures out who she wants to be as a woman and realizes she actually CAN do that and make a path forward for herself without her mother there to guide her. Is that path with Eric or Adam? It's a great story and beautifully written! 

 Finished: Abigail Adams: The President's Lady (Kelly) Loved reading this biography about Abigail Adams that was written in the 1960's and looks so similar to one I read when I was young. I remember doing a book report on Abigail Adams and this very well could have been the book I read. :-) Obviously a super easy read now, but a good general history from the time Abigail Smith was a girl, until the time she married and had a family with John Adams, through the America Revolution, and then, of course, as the 1st lady to the second president of the United States of America. It was definitely an interesting read! :-)

Finished: The Night Watchman (Erdrich) This year's Pulitzer Prize winner, and a beautiful book about the Turtle Mountain community of the Chippewa Tribe in North Dakota in the year 1953. They live on the land that the government promised them when Native Americans were forced to live on reservations, and live on very little of the money they were promised by the government. Most are in poverty, but they still find a way to live and still steal your heart reading about their daily lives and spirituality. The story is based on letters written and left behind by the author's Chippewa grandfather. The night watchman in this story is Thomas, a middle-aged man who is one of the few with a steady paying job at the jewel factory, where most of the workers are female Chippewa, hired due to their superior dexterity over men. They work making tiny holes in tiny jewels all day long, for not even a dollar an hour. When Thomas, who is the spokesperson for the community, is made aware of a bill that is going to be voted on in the senate pertaining to the Turtle Creek community, he rallies the troops to go to Washington D.C. and try and stop the bill. The bill is all about the government doing the Chippewa a "favor" and breaking ties with them so they can stand on their own two feet. However, what it truly is is an attempt to terminate the deal that was struck with their Chippewa ancestors so the government can have the land. Along with Thomas and his family, the story follows Patrice (Pixie) a nineteen year old young woman who works diligently at the jewel factory. She's pretty and smart and brings in the money for her mother, Zhaanat and her brother, Pokey. We follow her as she takes a week off to go to Minneapolis to try and find her older sister, Vera, who went there with the man she was going to marry. Vera's story turns out to be a sad one of the horrible exploitation of women from reservations who travel to the big city. Patrice almost falls into the same trap, but Wood Mountain, the young Chippewa boxer who is in love with her from afar, comes to find her and insists that they go home. They don't find Vera, but they do find her baby, who Wood Mountain immediately makes a bond with! They take him home and it eases Zaahnet's heart just a bit. Vera is alive, and we get snippets of her story, and thankfully she does end up back at home to be reunited with her baby at the end of the story. Many of the characters have visions of their ancestors or have near out of body experiences in nature which is fascinating. From Thomas, to Patrice, to Wood Mountain, to Vera, to Zhannat, to Juggie, to Valentine, to Doris, to Roderick, to Biboon, to Millile and more, there are just so many characters who make a huge impression as you read their bits, and I think they'll stay with me awhile. :-)