Top Ten Tuesday

I have decided to give this blog hop at That Artsy Reader Girl another go. I did pretty well with it some time back. You know when I was a regular blogger and did regular posts each day. 

This week we are to list the books that you wanted to read in 2018 but didn't.  This will be an easy one because I had high expectations for 2018 and fell very short. 

1. My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult
2. Longbourn by Jo Baker
3. Middlemarch by George Eliot
4. Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
5. The Red and The Black by Stendhal (Maire Henri Beyle)
6. Villette by Charlotte Bronte
7. On the Road by Jack Kerouac
8. The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck
9. The House of Seven Gables by Nathaiel Hawthorne
10. At The Mountains of Madness by H. P. Lovecraft

Mostly a list of my Classics club challenge reads!  I have high expectations this year and hope to get these all read. Some are CHUNKSTERS!

The Witch's Daughter

The Witch's Daughter.  Paula Brackston. Thomas Dunne Books.  December 2008. 305 pages. Source: Audio library.

First Sentence: Bess ran.  The clear night sky and fat moon gave ample illumination for her flight.

Plot: My name is Elizabeth Anne Hawksmith, and my age is three hundred and eighty-four years. Each new settlement asks for a new journal, and so this Book of Shadows begins.
In the spring of 1628, the Witchfinder of Wessex finds himself a true Witch. As Bess Hawksmith watches her mother swing from the Hanging Tree she knows that only one man can save her from the same fate at the hands of the panicked mob: the Warlock Gideon Masters, and his Book of Shadows. Secluded at his cottage in the woods, Gideon instructs Bess in the Craft, awakening formidable powers she didn't know she had and making her immortal. She couldn't have foreseen that even now, centuries later, he would be hunting her across time, determined to claim payment for saving her life.

In present-day England, Elizabeth has built a quiet life for herself, tending her garden and selling herbs and oils at the local farmers' market. But her solitude abruptly ends when a teenage girl called Tegan starts hanging around. Against her better judgment, Elizabeth begins teaching Tegan the ways of the Hedge Witch, in the process awakening memories—and demons—long thought forgotten.

My thoughts:  I enjoyed this story of a young girl who was put in a position to either "become a witch" to escape burning or die for being one even though she was not.  

She lived saving lives working with herbs and medicines then into actual operating rooms and working as a Doctor in the earliest of times when this was not the norm for a woman to be practicing surgical procedures.  She tired to do nothing but good and not to use "magic" for crazy selfish things.  All her life as a witch was spent trying to hide from the warlock Gideon Masters.  Gideon loved her (or so he said) and pursued her for centuries.

Elizabeth (Bess) spent a lot of lonely years because she could not get close to anyone.  A life of mostly solitude.  

This is not a book promoting witchcraft.  I would recommend it to young adults as there are some light suggestive situations over the centuries.

If There Be Thorns

If There Be Thorns. V. C. Andrews. Published by Pocket. November 1981. 374 pages. Source: Purchased from Betterworldbooks.com

First sentence: In the late evening when the shadows were long I sat quiet and unmoving near one of Paul's marble statues.

Plot: Out of the ashes of evil Chris and Cathy made such a loving home for their splendid children...
Fourteen-year-old Jory was so handsome, so gentle. And Bart had such a dazzling imagination for a nine year old.

Then the lights came on in the abandoned house next door. Soon the Old Lady in Black was there, watching their home with prying eyes, guarded by her strange old butler. Soon the shrouded woman had Bart over for cookies and ice cream and asked him to call her "Grandmother."

And soon Bart's transformation began...

A transformation that sprang from "the book of secrets" the gaunt old butler had given him... a transformation fed by the hint of terrible things about his mother and father... a transformation that led him into shocking acts of violence, self-destruction and perversity.

And now while this little boy trembles on the edge of madness, his anguished parents, his helpless brother, an obsessed old woman and the vengeful, powerful butler await the climax to a horror that flowered in an attic long ago, a horror whose thorns are still wet with blood, still tipped with fire....

My thoughts:  This is a re-read for me.  I read this series as a teenager in the 80's.  I had forgotten much of it but if you can enjoy such a demented read I guess I did.  It makes me think just how messed up someone can be from not having a loving and caring environment while they are young children.  This story brings in a fourth generation of "mental illness" in my opinion.  The kind of mental illness brought on by greed and love of money and a twisted and false belief in God.

There are two more books in this series and I own them all so I am anxious to get on with this next generation.

Annihilation

Annihilation. Jeff Vandermeer. Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. February 2014. 195 pages.  Source:  Audio book.

First Sentence: The tower, which was not supposed to be there, plunges into the earth in a place just before the black pine forest begins to give way to swamp and then the reeds and wind-gnarled trees of the marsh flats.

Plot: Area X has been cut off from the rest of the world for decades. Nature has reclaimed the last vestiges of human civilization. The first expedition returned with reports of a pristine, Edenic landscape; the second expedition ended in mass suicide, the third in a hail of gunfire as its members turned on one another. The members of the eleventh expedition returned as shadows of their former selves, and within weeks, all had died of cancer. In Annihilation, the first volume of Jeff VanderMeer's Southern Reach Trilogy, we join the twelfth expedition.

The group is made up of four women: an anthropologist; a surveyor; a psychologist, the de facto leader; and our narrator, a biologist. Their mission is to map the terrain, record all observations of their surroundings and of one another, and, above all, avoid being contaminated by Area X itself.

They arrive expecting the unexpected, and Area X delivers—but it’s the surprises that came across the border with them and the secrets the expedition members are keeping from one another that change everything. 

My thoughts: This story is told from the perspective of the biologist whose husband was part of the eleventh expedition.  A lot of the story is her personal history as she ends up being the lone survivor of this expedition.  It doesn't end with her returning to her home.  Leaving it wide open for the next book in the series...Acceptance.  

I'm not a fan of science fiction, which is what is actually shelved as on Goodreads, but I think I would continue on with the series if nothing else but to find out what is actually in the "tower".

To Be Where You Are

To Be Where You Are. Jan Karon. G. P. Putnam's Sons. October 2017. 450 pages. Source - Audio book.

First sentence: It was the first day of October, and all things considered, Mitford was pretty quiet. 

Plot: After twelve years of wrestling with the conflicts of retirement, Father Tim Kavanagh realizes he doesn't need a steady job to prove himself. Then he's given one. As for what it proves, heaven only knows.

Millions of Karon fans will be thrilled that it's life as usual in the wildly popular Mitford series: A beloved town character lands a front-page obituary, but who was it, exactly, who died? And what about the former mayor, born the year Lindbergh landed in Paris, who's still running for office? All this, of course, is but a feather on the wind compared to Muse editor J.C. Hogan's desperate attempts to find a cure for his marital woes. Will it be high-def TV or his pork chop marinade?

In fiction, as in real life, there are no guarantees.

Twenty minutes from Mitford at Meadowgate Farm, newlyweds Dooley and Lace Kavanagh face a crisis that devastates their bank account and impacts their family vet practice.

But there is still a lot to celebrate, as their adopted son, Jack, looks forward to the most important day of his life--with great cooking, country music, and lots of people who love him. Happily, it will also be a day when the terrible wound in Dooley's biological family begins to heal because of a game--let's just call it a miracle--that breaks all the rules.

In To Be Where You Are, Jan Karon weaves together the richly comic and compelling lives of two Kavanagh families, and a cast of characters that readers around the world now love like kin.

My thoughts:  I was kind of disappointed in this one from Jan Karon.  Not sure what I expected but I don't feel it lived up to the hype prior to it being published.  To be fair maybe I waited too long to actually read it.

I feel like the story didn't flow very well. It seemed to jump around from person/family often times making me think, "who is this now?".  My favorite situation in this one is when Father Tim brings home a new dog from Dooley and Lacey's.  After the passing of Barnabus I didn't think Father Tim would have another.  But I was happy to see him with another.

New Beginnings... Again

Well it's a new year let's see if I can do better with my book reviews and challenges this year.

For the Good reads challenge I am aiming for 60 book again this year.  I missed that number by two books in 2018.

I have not committed to any other challenges yet this year other than my regular 1 million pages and the classic club challenge.  I hope to just keep up on my reviews and maybe the Sunday Post.

Seduction of a Highland Lass

Seduction of a Highland Lass. Maya Banks.  Ballantine Books. 2011. 323 pages.  Source: Audio Library.

First Sentence: Alaric McCabe looked out over the expanse of McCabe land and grappled with the indecision plaguing him.

Plot: Fiercely loyal to his elder brother, Alaric McCabe leads his clan in the fight for their birthright. Now he is prepared to wed for duty, as well. But on his way to claim the hand of Rionna McDonald, daughter of a neighboring chieftain, he is ambushed and left for dead. Miraculously, his life is saved by the soft touch of a Highland angel, a courageous beauty who will put to the test his fealty to his clan, his honor, and his deepest desires.

An outcast from her own clan, Keeley McDonald was betrayed by those she loved and trusted. When the wounded warrior falls from his horse, she is drawn to his strong, lean body. The wicked glint in his green eyes ignites a passion that will follow them back to Alaric’s keep, where their forbidden love draws them deeper into the pleasures of the flesh. But as conspiracy and danger circle closer, Alaric must make an impossible choice: Will he betray his blood ties for the woman he loves?

My thoughts: Book two in the Highlander series was just as exciting as the first.  A young lass done wrong by her family member  and banished from the clan but justice (of course) is served in the end.  The McCabe men are dreamy and loyal to their clan and family. They are rule their clan with a firm but just hand and they expect the same from other clans.  This series does contain adult content.  I have book three on hold!