Judy Benedict

A Long Fatal Love Chase by Louisa May Alcott

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
This book was not published until 1995 and was considered not appropriate to be published at the time is was written in 1866. The editor purchased the rights to the book and put it back together to include chapters in the book taken out by Louisa when she thought it would have more of a chance to be published.

I did not know that the family actually depended upon her writing income from the time she was a little girl.

View all my reviews.

“The Friday Night Knitting Club,” by Kate Jacobs, was not as enjoyable a read for me as the rest of the world. I cannot put my finger on it, but I could not wait to finish it so I would be done with it. I had no desire to read it to begin with but did so for the book club. I hope that it was just the mood I was in when I read the book since everyone else seemed to like it so much.

“Full of Grace,” was another book by Dorthea Benton-Frank, and although I enjoyed the setting of Charleston and Hilton Head, it reminded me of another book I had just read by Patricia Cornwell.

“Coming Out,” by Danielle Steel, was actually somewhat enjoyable, although I had sworn off reading any more of her books.

“Vegas Rich,” by Fern Michaels is a family saga book that spans several generations. It is the first in a series of 3, but I only have the first 2. I didn’t think I would enjoy it but I am still trying to clear off my bookshelf upstairs!

I read all four of these books at the beach, and started on Fern Michaels, “Hey Good Looking” which is based on Baton Rouge and is about the old guard of citizens, historic preservation and is generally quite light reading. “Book of the Dead” was another Patricia Cornwell, Scarpetta novel and it is based on Charleston, SC. It was very interesting to read about places I am very familiar with and the story is also quite good.

“a spot of bother” by mark haddon reminded me of the old man in “Michael Clayton.” The guy retires and goes through a series of panic attacks but all ends up well in the end. It is based in England.

Sandra Browns, “white hot” was also based in New Orleans pre-hurricane Katrina. It involves a daughter who hates her father and has moved away, only to return because of the death of a brother (similar theme to the “Hey Good Looking” book.

“Stone Cold” by David Baldacci seemed more interesting to me than the last book I read. It also involved a daughter who hates her father only to reconcile in the end, amongst all the high technology and hidden government facilities that we are not supposed to know about.

“She’s Come Undone” by Wally Lamb reminded me of “Running with Scissors” that I felt like I had to hide the book while I read it on an airplane because I was embarrassed by the subject matter. The main character in the book, a girl, had a disfunctional childhood, not as crazy as Augusten Burroughs, but very similar. Despite the love affair details, the book overall was a good page turner as you tried to find out if the girl actually ever really found herself.

“The Thirteenth Tale,” by Dianne Setterfield started off slow for me. There was so much descriptive writing and musings by the main character. However, if you hang with it, the book turns into a real “page-turner.” An antique book seller and a reclusive writer come together in a tale to discover the secrets behind the writer’s past. Written in the true “Gothic” style, the book itself becomes the writer’s thirteen tale.

“The Chronicles of Narnia, The Magician’s Nephew” and “The Horse and His Boy,” are the only two books of seven that I have read so far. We are missing “The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe,” but I feel that I have seen the movie so many times that it doesn’t really matter if I read the book now. However, anyone who has not read the first book, “The Magician’s Nephew,” will thoroughly enjoy this introduction to Narnia and it explains a few things about the “The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe.”

Sophie Kinsella’s, “Remember Me” was right in line with all the previous Kinsella books with that great British humour and twisting, turning ending whereby the main character isn’t as ‘dumb’ as she seems! I do recommend this to anyone who has enjoyed the previous books, but it is not quite up to par as the other ones. Still enjoyable though.

Tess Gerritsen’s, “The Bone Garden” was a great twist and turn of present day and history. It was even more interesting to me since we visited Boston last summer and I could place in my mind where the setting took place. It was the most enjoyable of Gerritsen’s books I have read. A woman buys a house that is neglected, finds some bones in the backyard and this starts her on a journey to find out who the bones belong to.

“Quickie,” by James Patterson was such a quick read that I am now trying to remember what is was about…Oh yeah, a ‘quickie’ that turns into a mistake and gets the ball rolling on all kinds of other things. It shows you how one lie can snowball into more lies. It was obviously a quick read, but enjoyable nonetheless.

“A Thousand Splendid Suns,” another winner by Khaled Hosseini, is based in his home country of Afghanastan and followed the lives of a few families as it depicts what we in the United States would think of as a more normal life, what happens when Russia invades the country and then, of course, the Taliban takes over. It is amazing to read how any people could survive in such conditions, but then if you read “Surviving the Extremes” by Dr. Kenneth Kamler, you will read about how amazingly adaptable the human body is to extreme conditions. Dr. Kamler was the doctor on the Mt. Everest team when the storm hit that is chronicled in “In Thin Air”. Most of the stories are about the places he has been – climbing, diving and traveling as the “doc” for various extreme expeditions such as into the depths of the Amazon to help observe crocodiles.

I read “Shakespeares Secret” because my daughter liked it so much she wanted me to read it. The story is based around a 6th grade girl that moves to a new town and finds out about Edward de Vere, who is speculated as being the “real” Shakespeare.

“The Color of Water, A Black Man’s Tribute to His White Mother” by James McBride chronicles the life of James as one of 12 African American/Jewish children growing up in New York. His mother is a white Jewish woman who marries an African American, who then dies, and she meets and marries another African American man. Each chapter is interspered between actual interviews with his mother. As he grows up, it shows the struggles between being African American and having a white mother and the contrast between his world and his mother’s Jewish upbringing. What is totally fascinating about this book, and seeing that this mother practically raised these 12 children on her own and in poverty, is that every one of these children have at least a college degree.

I bought The Kite Runner about 1 year ago and finally picked it up to read, almost never being able to put it down and it ran into my time I was supposed to be reading the Omnivore’s Dilemma for my book club. However, this book by Khaled Hosseini took me back to wanting to re-read “Lay Down with Lions” by Ken Follett, as his book follows more of the war and Hosseini’s book is strictly from the perspective of an Afghanistan family. After reading this book, I was able to understand a bit more of the Taliban, Pakistan and Afghanistan, but the family and friendship and corresponding guilt are underlying every aspect of this novel as the narrator grows older and has to deal with his own and his family’s demons.

The Ominvore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan is something that every American should read. Although the book contains a lot of Mr. Pollan’s musings about the subject at hand, when you read about corn for 119 pages, you start to get tired of corn. However, if you get past the first 60 pages, it gets more and more interesting. Anyone who has watched or read “Fast Food Nation” only got about 1/5th of the information about our nation’s food supply. The more people I have told about this book, the more that want me to pass it along when I finished. The organic section of the book was about 150 pages and it makes you want to seek out all the local sustainable farmers in the area and just buy your food from them. This book is on the top of my list of books that everyone should read.

Pillars of the Earth, by Ken Follett, was my second time around with this book. It was just as amazing and fascinating as the first time, almost 20 years ago. It something for everyone in it…love, death, war, God, all woven around the building of cathedrals. I actually picked this one up again so I could read the sequel that just came out.

Simple Genius by David Baldacci: This book was interesting but I should have picked up something simpler to read after reading Pillars of the Earth, because my mind was not ready to try to figure out what was going on with the characters, the secret, government operations and brainy mathematicians. However, this was an enjoyable book and would make a great movie.

Fool me Once by Fern Michaels was sitting on my shelf and I wanted something I could read in a day. I didn’t realize that Ms. Michaels lived in South Carolina and although the overall ending was predictable, there were some great surprises preceding the ending of the story. It is a good book to pick and read quickly.

The Looking Glass by Richard Evans was a bit too poetic for my tastes, but it is short enough and the story was good enough to keep me reading for two nights. I have read a few other of his books and they seem to all make good stories for the Hallmark Hall of Fame movies.

What Matters Most, by Luanne Rice: This book was a sequel to “Sandcastles” and followed the lives of the Nun and the caretaker of the convent and takes place mostly in Ireland. What impressed me more about the previous book is that after I read it, I started seeing some articles about the “real-life” artist that makes temporary sculptures all over the world, takes photographs of his creations, then destroys them. Although this person has a minor role in this book, the story seamlessly pulled you into the new one using the same characters and adding a few new ones.

“Bonded”, by Donna Jo Napoli was on my daughter’s reading list for school. A short book, it is based on the Cinderella story, but revolves around a Chinese girl who never gets her feet bound, and her half sister and her bound feet. Since we are so “Disneyfied”, it came as somewhat of a surprise to me how old the Cinderella story is and how there are several old Chinese “Cinderella” tales. This was a good book to read, even for an adult.

“Duncton Wood”, by William Horwood, must have been sitting on my mother’s shelf for more than 20 years because it was published in 1980. The writer spent several years secluded in the forest and emerged to write this entertaining family-saga about moles. It follows the lives of several moles, their births, their rise to leadership, their deaths, their loves, their journeys and their spirituality.

“Step on a Crack”, by James Patterson. I read this in one day. It has a lot of short chapters and while I was reading it I was wondering why I wasting my time on another book like this. A short murder-mystery and I never did figure out what the title of the book had to do with the story. Sorry, that’s all you get from me on this one.

“Trace”, by Patricia Cornwell. I read this a month or two ago. Frankly, it was so memorable that I have to read the back cover to remember what it was about. Oh yes, another Scarpetta novel about her after she was fired from the Virginia as chief medical examiner. If you are following Scarpetta’s life through all her other books, it’s good to see she landed on her feet somewhere.

“Eat Pray Love”, by Elizabeth Gilbert mostly follows a year in the life of Elizabeth Gilbert. She has a very natural, easy way of writing that makes it easy to fly through the book. She reveals a lot of personal history and personal everything…well, not sure if there is anything personal left that we don’t know about from this year in her life. She runs off to Italy to learn the language and eat, then off to India to hang out in an ashram, and then over to Indonesia where she falls in love. I think I enjoyed reading more about the friends she made in all these places than anything else in the book.

“Brother Odd” is based on a character that was developed in an earlier book, one of which I read but remember nothing about! This was a good, interesting read set at a monastery but the ending leaves you to believe there may be another one! Thumbs up!

“Shopaholic & Baby” was just as enjoyable as the previous books! If you didn’t read any of the earlier ones, you can still pick this one up to read. But if you do, it will make you want to go back and start at the beginning of the series. Thumbs up as usual for this book with its British humor.

“The Book of Fate” has some comparisons to a John Grisham’s writing, but it seems more like a cross between Dan Brown and John Grisham. The history is Dan Brownish, but the constant running from someone trying to kill you is both. It was a great story, well-written and even though it was a book of fiction, it was weaved around even facts that what took place could seem quite plausible. I give it a thumbs up!

“The Millionaires” – I think this was one of those books I left up in Martha’s Vineyard while on vacation! It was a great story about 2 brothers, one the high achiever, the other the somewhat struggler, and how innocent brothers are set up to take the fall for the “higher ups” in the firm. The brothers work for an investment firm for only the richest of the rich, and when they find something they were not supposed to find, it leads to a lot of mayhem and murder! If you are not one of the richest elite of the world, it will fascinate you to read about the large sums of money that are transferred around, and that even the rich are still greedy for more. I also give this one a thumbs up!