Greenwich Park

Thoughts by Katherine Faulkner,  Gallery Books 2022, 378 pages

Challenge: for Book Club and #ReadICT: Color category (perhaps also Villain category?)

Genre/Theme: Mystery/Thriller

Type/Source: eBook / Libby

What It’s About: Synopsis from the top result of googling:

GREENWICH PARK centers around two women, Helen and Rachel, who find their lives entangled when they meet at a prenatal class. Helen, our protagonist, is an instantly-sympathetic and relatable character: when we meet her, we immediately feel a sense of protectiveness towards her.

Thoughts: No, we didn’t. We did not feel any sense of protectiveness and not immediately. Um… The very first page had me confused and annoyed at adjectives and word choice. Then I saw that Laila didn’t like the main character and then my mother (also in my book club) said it failed to capture her interest in the first few pages. I started to read other 1 and 2 star reviews on goodreads — the kiss of death of whether or not I will like a book!

Someone called the protag “gormless”, other reviews said it was dry. Some praised the writing but I wasn’t impressed.

Back to the ebook (after searching for the word “pie”…), I decided to skip around and jump pages, and then read the ending. Blech. I have no desire to catch up what I might have missed. I really am not a good reader of mystery/thrillers. If they are mostly literary, I might like it but usually, I just can’t get interested!

Rating: Two slices of pie. Apricot tart means pie!

“There are no lines, so I take my time choosing serrano ham, hard cheeses, a glistening apricot tart.”

5%

Copyright © 2007-2023. Care’s Books and Pie also known as and originally created as Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care. It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

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Modern Critical Interpretations: Erich Maria Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front

Thoughts Edited and with an introduction by Harold Bloom, Chelsea House Publishers 2001, 224 pages

Challenge: none, mistakenly thought this WAS the novel it discusses…

Genre/Theme: Critical Analysis / Essays (… other way around?!)

Type/Source: Hardcover / Library

What It’s About: This was Harold, being –what seems to me– a pompous ass. I don’t doubt that he is 3x, 4x, 5x smarter than I am, but his style is major “white man being pompous ass about knowing WAY more about literature…. no, sorry CAPITAL “L” Literature, than you do.” and that is OK. Let Harold, GRHS*, have his respect for his literary prowess. But EYE ROLL – the intro had me laughing! He says,

“After I discussed the Harry Potter fad in the Wall Street Journal, the Journal received eighty negative letters and no positive. JK Rowling, like Stephen King and Danielle Steele, will join the thousands of other writers in the “lumber of libraries” and the dustbin of the ages. Popularity is an index to popularity and to nothing more.”

PS – I almost bought Fairy Tales today… fad?!

Thoughts: First, an admission. I thought I had checked out the classic WW1 novel by EMR. Apparently, no. This was Harold’s collection of essays of critical analysis of the novel that was just not as good as Hemingway’s Farewell to Arms, but the second most famous WW1 novel. I have NOT read FtA. And I likely will NOT. I will ONLY attempt, if ever, to read any more Ernie books, might read Moveable Feast. maybe.

I flipped through this, read the first few pages of most, some I read all the way through. I was fascinated by HOW LONG some of these essays were!

I had questions about how the author had “Maria” as a middle name, and why he was born with lastname Remark, but was known by Remarque… Then in the index, I saw Danielle Steele, –who is STILL publishing stories! I haven’t read her work in over 40 years.

I then started my googling and WIKI-ing and found out that EMR married Paulette Goddard! yikes and wowza. He dated some hot ladies before that, too. But that is the society pages… but still! INTERESTING (to me, don’t know why.)

I returned this to the library and picked up the actual novel. Reading it soon for the WiaN challenge of QZX.

Rating: Three slices of pie. No pie mentioned that I could find.

• _{GRHS – God Rest His Soul, I don’t mean to be an HB hater but he seriously writes just to annoy me.}

Copyright © 2007-2023. Care’s Books and Pie also known as and originally created as Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care. It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Notes on Your Sudden Disappearance

Thoughts by Alison Espach, Henry Holt & Company 2022, 340 pages

Challenge: for TOB and for #ReadICT: Grief category

Genre/Theme: Adult Fiction; grief, sister relationships

Type/Source: Hardcover / Library

What It’s About: A sister talks to her dead sister, the few years prior, the immediate aftermath, and the years following.

Thoughts: I loved it. Sally was such a devoted little sister, adoring her older sibling. How she grieves and attempts to understand and work through her parents grief, as well as be totally besotted with her sister’s boyfriend. Her outlook on life, attempting to throw humor at everything, only makes her feel odd and empty; it was just heartbreaking and felt very real to me.

Rating: Five slices of pie. Apple pie mentions.

“Then it was over and all the people came to our house and ate apple pie and swirled around our mother at the kitchen table, who was catatonic in her chair.”

Page 97

Copyright © 2007-2023. Care’s Books and Pie also known as and originally created as Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care. It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

The Patron Saint of Liars

Thoughts by Ann Patchett, Mariner Books (first pub’ 1992), 402 pages

Challenge: for #WiaN2023, category 7 Deadly Sins

Genre/Theme: Adult Fiction; mother-daughter relationships

Type/Source: eBook Libby

What It’s About: Rose accepts her sign from God to marry, but she prefers to drive.

Rose marries a fine man. She loves her mother. But she just cannot live the life as presented to her and she flees to a far corner and accepts where she lands. She is pregnant and accepts those terms, SORT OF. She finds a place for her in the midst of this somehow and . . .

SPOILER ahead –> just highlight to read it:

when the old life encroaches on the newly established, she drives off again. She leaves a daughter distraught with questions and confusions as to what comes next.

Heartbreaking!

Thoughts: Patchett knows “people”, knows the ache of longing and frustration against the pull of responsibility. I love her.

Rating: Four slices of pie. LOTS of pie mentions! Lots of whipped cream.

“”In the hospital,” Rose said, pinching in the edges of a pie crust, or maybe it was a tart. Nothing was a plain old pie with her anymore.”

many other pie mentions, including apple…

 

 

The Passenger

Thoughts by Cormac McCarthy, Knopf 2022, 385pages

Challenge: for March 2023 Tournament of Books, #ReadICT #Grief category

Genre/Theme: Adult Fiction; physics, mental health, grief

Type/Source: eBook Libby

What It’s About: Two divers investigate a plane crash, looking for survivors. The pilot’s case and the black box are missing. The whole scene feels “off”. Later, they find out that one of the passengers is unaccounted for. One of the divers turns up dead, and the other is hunted by the law and has to go on the lam; reliving memories of his dead sister, grieving her fiercely and wandering around having conversations about physics, mathematics and other existential stuff.

Thoughts: This was just … odd. I felt it meandered, opened plot paths and then confused me if they got closed or not. Characters, too. Just pop up conversations and happenings and if/how they were related, I couldn’t quite figure it out. I’m sure it was me.

Rating: Three slices of pie. One pie mention:

“They went down to the cafeteria and had coffee and pie. They sat at a table by the window. Outside a few people were walking the grounds. The first warm days. The trees still bare. Her skin was like paper. Eyes so pale. She sat at his left and ate with her left hand. Her right hand still holding his. Her forearm drawn and thin and blue.”

63%

 

 

The Rabbit Hutch

Thoughts by Tess Gunty, Alfred A Knopf 2022, 338 pages, National Book Award 2022

Challenge: for March 2023 Tournament of Books

Genre/Theme: Adult Fiction; decaying town

Type/Source: Hardcover, library

What It’s About: A decaying town, lack of industry, climate change effects such as flooding, lost people trying to survive, kids in the system, contrasts between poverty and privilege, mystics, and weird pie.

Thoughts: I didn’t really enjoy reading it and I was luckily enough to have time to make myself sit with the book and READ. “Just keep reading.” I was both repelled by the behaviors and attracted to any scraps of redemption. Some really great passages, and terrific turns of phrase.

And, OH. The last line. Good, really good.

Rating: Four slices of pie. A pie shop, sour cream pie with black licorice, butterscotch cream pie. Possibly a contender for Care’s 2022 Pie in Literature Award!

“Home is a pie in the oven, live saxophone downtown, and a backyard of fireflies.”

65%

 

 

⧫ November ⧫ 2022 ⧫ Recap

HA! WP just prompted me to share 5 things I’m good at…

1. Maintaining a passion for writing letters
2. Being a pie ambassador
3. Loving on the dogs
4. Keeping up with this blog, even if inconsistently
5. Picking myself back up when I fall

 Monthly Recap Time! November

• 5 books; 91 for the year
• 1317 pages, 21.75 hours | 25775 total pages, 217.8 hours for the year so far

I continue to have a flailing ability to focus on reading. I have managed to do more audiobooking due to being in a car more than ever, commuting to the J-O-B. It’s been cold and the old dog has been off & on with wanting to walk so that has diminished, AND!!!

EXCITING NEWS! We got another dog! Who is *not* leash-trained so managing an audiobook/walk is a future goal with this boy:

His name is Copper. He is a 3 yo Wirehaired Pointing Griffon. Esther is not amused…

I started an abandonning of more books lately, or acquired-and-not-even-started!! library books lately, … you may not even be able to call me a “reader”. Oh well, I still managed 5 titles, short as one might be. I finished the Bookclub pick (Into the Abyss) and did OK on adding in some Nonfiction, so I am reasonably satisfied with the results.

Into the Abyss, which I convinced club to read because it was #NonfictionNovember (yay me!) also gave me a pie mention which was delightful to encounter.

…, so he asked me if I would make pies out of them.

~80% in when sharing about Paul peeling a bunch of apples.

Write For Your Life was my favorite. It would be a good gift if you have a letter-writer/reader in your life.

and finally, we come to December. I know blogging has been hit or miss with me but I do love to track my books. The TOB Long List has been out a few weeks now and the Short List should be any day; I hope I get more excited but I do not think I will be as obsessed with the Tournament as much in 2023, what a new family member to work with and distract from sitting around and, well. SITTING. He is high energy!

What was YOUR favorite book of November? Especially NONFICTION so I can add to my list for next year.

Happy Holidays! Merry Christmas! Happy Hanukkah! Jolly Jolabokaflod!!!

Copyright © 2007-2022. Care’s Books and Pie also known as and originally created as Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care. It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

⬥OCTOBER⬥ 2022

 Monthly Recap Time! October

• 8 books; 86 for the year
• 2740 pages, 25.78 hours | 24462 total pages, 196.1 hours for the year so far

I have had a rollercoaster of an emotional month. But I read these! And they were all 4 or 5 slicers of pie reads: I gave 5s to World Piece, Address Unknown (a short story about how seemingly nice people buy into evil rhetoric and then join radical movements that justify other people as subhuman), and Fidelity. The rest got 4 slices. I didn’t even know who Tom Morello was – interesting guy. I do love the Audible musician stories. I wish I had read + listened to the Cruz, but that is all on me. I recommend it; definitely a terrific immigrant story with humor and love.

I had an increase in blogging, too. Thanks for the comments and support there.

October was the BRING BACK of audiobooks. I listened to some. I have a new job that gives me drive time in the car.

Of course, World PIEce had pie. And The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek had a lot of pie, too. How Not to Drown in a Glass of Water featured pastelitos, a fried handpie of goodness on many Dominican menus.

November is another month; I hope it brings you HOPE. Hope is the belief in things unseen.

What was YOUR favorite book of October? ARE YOU PLANNING ON READING FOR NONFICTION NOVEMBER? Tell me your recommendations.

Copyright © 2007-2022. Care’s Books and Pie also known as and originally created as Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care. It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Status ⬥ The Month After July ⬥ 2022

 Monthly Recap Time! August

• 7 books; 72 for the year
• 2740 pages, 28.5 hours | 21128 total pages, 169.3 hours for the year so far

“… a party being made better because of the pie you brought…”

LESSONS in CHEmistry

Pie for the win. EVERY BOOK I READ HAD PIE! Pretty impressive..

“Maria helped herself to the last bites of Eddie’s apple pie and unfolded her notes on the table, but instead of Devil’s Bargain she found herself thinking of the scale model of Mercury.”

– MERCURY PICTURES PRESENTS

And my audiobook game has returned. THREE audiobooks finished and meaty books, too — not just a 1 hour created-for-Audible nibble.

My favorite was Bonnie Garmus’ Lessons in Chemistry. Hands down, my kind of book. Strong female character, touches all the ugly bits of reality yet balanced with love and humor, plus a cool dog. Some reviews recommend print over the audio, though I didn’t catch the mispronunciations or chemical terms …. oops. I did notice a long “e” sound for the word “been” and something else with an eeeee sound that to me should be more of an “i” sound like “bin”.

I read French’s The Searcher for book club. It was good but not my favorite of hers. And another book that suffered I HOPE! from bad mood and poor timing, was Anthony Marra’s Mercury Pictures Presents. I want to try it again someday.

“He finds a café and gets himself a slice of apple pie and more coffee to pass the time till his laundry is ready.”

the searcher

Perhaps, August was just meant to be devoted to nonfiction? I really liked Destiny of the Republic by Candace Millard. She’s good! and she wrote a lovely tribute to David McCullough, a favorite of mine for readable fascinating enjoyable history, who died August 7. I’ve not read near enough of his oeuvre and now I need to add all of Millard’s.

I read The Sum of Us. Fascinating and sad how systematic racism is sneakily argumented away and seems invisible to sum. Why don’t towns have a city pool? because they didn’t want to share with ALL the citizens of the town. Stupid. Evil.

Which brings me to share that I finally finished brown girl dreaming by the lovely Jacqueline Woodson! Here memoir in verse, my mid-year, many months, poem-a-day project. LOVELY.

“…Remember the time, they ask,
when we stole Miss Carter’s peach pie off her windowsill,…”

brown girl dreaming

Then I listened to Taste by Stanley Tucci, because I think celebrity memoirs are a great way to break a slump. Plus, the lack of audiobooks in prior months meant I had credits to burn. I have a print of this at the library to pick up so I can get the recipes. (His cookbooks have hold lists but this I got right away.)

What was YOUR favorite book of August?

September has a couple of pie days. The 15th is Butterscotch Cinnamon Pie Day! (A healing pie in the video game UnderTale.) Sept 23 is Pot Pie Day (Lessons in Chemistry has pot pie! and a terrific explanation of pie pastry. KFC’s chicken pot pie is decent, too. Look for a coupon.) Sept 26 is Key Lime Pie Day – read a book set in Florida! LOL — and Raspberry Cream Pie Day is Sept 28.

Today, as I write and prep this post, I’m contemplating a Grape Galette. You can see a photo (it’s readable! perhaps I should add a link to my pie page… Hmmmmm) of my recipe in a post from 2017; enjoy.

Copyright © 2007-2022. Care’s Books and Pie also known as and originally created as Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care. It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Status ⬥ July ⬥ 2022

 Monthly Recap Time! JULY

• 5 books; 65 for the year
• 1639 pages, ~0 hours | 18388 total pages, 140.8 hours for the year so far

What a great reading month! Quality over quantity? I think This Time Tomorrow has to be the most-recommendable but I liked Autumn AND Trust, too. Only the Tomorrow books had pie, sadly.

““And I thought ‘it’s the pie, it’s the pie’ so we had to establish a really firm rule about no pie during the week.” -Obama”

– Tomorrow Will Be different

Still no mood for audiobooks or maybe it is just too damn hot to walk the dog and that very much impacts (negatively) on my audio-listen time.

Maybe my favorite was Autumn, a buddy read with Nancy the Book Fool. We are avid penpals and both had this book on our shelves. Ali Smith intrigues me; I had quite a Twitter thread going of all the things I googled that were mentioned. It was almost historical fiction! Lots of stuff from a scandal in the 60s (or was it the 70s? either way, I wasn’t aware of any of it but made for interesting rabbit hole travels).

If you read Trust, stay with it! In fact, I would encourage you to watch some of the interview videos on Youtube of HD discussing his motivations. I like him. I might have to go see if his first book (OMG – he has only written 2 books?!?!?!) is available at the library.

I didn’t make any pie. Can’t even think if I ordered pie in a restaurant. WAIT! Yes, if you count empanadas. AND I DO COUNT THESE AS PIE, yes of course. We drove to Maria Empanadas in Aurora Colorado and picked up a 12 pack. Too hot to bake otherwise.

FYI Today, August 1, is Homemade Pie Day and also Raspberry Cream Pie Day. Get some if you can!

What was YOUR favorite book of July?

August has a lot of pie days. The 15th is Lemon Meringue Pie Day! One of my favorites, or at least it sounds pretty good right now.

But, maybe instead of pie, we should give $5 – $10 – $15, the price of a pie (or more), to the charities working hard to fight fires, rescue stranded residents of areas affected by floods, and address other wrongs throughout our country and world. On August 2nd in Kansas, I’m voting no. Abortion in healthcare. Do not change our state constitution.

Copyright © 2007-2022. Care’s Books and Pie also known as and originally created as Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care. It should not be reproduced without express written permission.