Timothy Egan

Audiobook(Narrated by Patrick Lawlor)

I’ve always been fascinated by The Great Depression. I am not sure exactly why but I it has always held a particular interest when I am choosing to read about history. However, in learning about The Great Depression, I had never taken the time to learn about The Dust Bowl. 
As I mentioned in a previous post, I thought The Dust Bowl was a brief incident that happened during the same time period as the depression but in reading The Worst Hard Time , I came to understand how little I knew. I must have been talking during that section of history class.

The Worst Hard Time  chronicles the events in areas of Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Colorado where the grasslands were plowed up during the wheat boom and the destruction that was left behind when the land was left blowing and desolate. After finishing the book I am amazed at the perseverance of the people who managed to hang on and at the same time I am horrified that they tried.  They seriously must have thought the world was ending with huge walls of dust descending upon them followed by hoards of grasshoppers. Every time they tried to plant something to sustain themselves it was killed either by dust, hot, dry, winds or grasshoppers.

Some of the other nightmares they faced:

• People went five years or more with absolutely no income and after selling off everything they owned, they resorted to pickling tumbleweed to avoid starving to death.
• Hungry livestock chewed on fence posts. They died because their digestive tracts were so full of dust that food couldn’t get through.
• People hung wet sheets and wore face masks made of sponge in an effort to keep the dust out of their homes and lungs yet people still died from “dust pneumonia.”
• Towns and counties were decimated by this tragedy and in some areas both the population and the land have never been the same.

One part, in particular, that touched me was when a woman was found burning a diary written during that time because it was such a bad time that there was nothing worth remembering. I am so glad that diary was rescued and parts of it are found in The Worst Hard Time. It’s hard to even imagine being in the writer’s circumstance and how hopeless he must have felt but at the same time, I am glad his voice survived for those of us who weren’t there to see the devastation. It is unimaginable but Timothy Egan helps to give us a glimpse.

I thought this book was so good that I plan on owning my own copy so I can read it again. I highly recommend The Worst Hard Time whether you are a fan of history, this particular era, or if you are just looking for a fascinating book to read. The writing is excellent and I absolutely didn’t want to stop listening. It’s very informative. The speculating that we saw in the recent housing boom has eery similarities to the wheat boom right before The Dust Bowl. There are lessons to be learned about human greed that runs unchecked. This is my favorite book, so far, of 2009 and I understand why it is a winner of the National Book Award.(5/5)

Michael Connelly
Audiobook

Jack McEvoy is a crime reporter for a Denver newspaper. He is good writer and a skilled investigator. However, the story hits too close to home when his twin brother, Sean apparently commits suicide. Jack refuses to believe it and begins to find evidence that supports his theory. What follows is a page-turning maze of twists and turns that kept me interested right through the ending.

I really enjoyed listening to this book. Toward the middle of the book I started to suspect that it was going in a certain direction. I was really disappointed when it appeared that I was right. Later on though, the story takes a sharp turn that I didn’t even suspect. I love when that happens! It makes me glad that I have more Connelly novels to look forward to. (4.5/5)

Thomas H. Cook
292 pages

Reason for Reading- Book Awards Challenge, Edgar Award Winner

Henry Griswald is a moody, solitary boy whose father is the Headmaster of Chatham School. He dreams of life beyond his existence in the village of Chatham but has no idea that his life and the lives of those around him will be irrevocably changed by the events that take place in Chatham and at Black Pond in 1927.

I had some difficulty getting into this book. I am not exactly sure why. I enjoyed the author’s writing style and I loved how the details of the story are handed out slowly making you want to learn just a little more. I can only attribute it to the fact that I am in a mid-winter funk. I am very glad I persevered though because I did enjoy it in the end.

There is a tragic air to this story that lets you know that a train wreck is inevitable. The reader can see that a chain of events is unfolding and wishes for the ability to alter circumstances for the characters and though things didn’t unfold the way I thought they would, the ending is tragic just the same. This book turned out to be much better than I felt it would be at the beginning. (3.5/5)

William Kent Krueger

William Kent Krueger
341 pages
Read for The Book Awards Challenge

A beautiful teen-aged girl disappears on New Year’s Eve and no one is able to explain why. She seems to have everything but looks can be deceiving.

Cork O’Connor is the former sheriff of Tamarack County, Minnesota. However, he just can’t help becoming involved in the tragic disappearance of Charlotte Kane or the apparent railroading of local bad boy, Solemn Winter Moon.

Cork doesn’t want anything to do with God or the Church but when Solemn claims to have seen Jesus in a vision and seems changed, Cork doesn’t think it’s true or that it can last:

He thought about Joan of Arc. If somehow she had managed to escape the burning and live to see wrinkles and the other slow wounds of time on her skin, would she have ceased to hear God speak, laid down her sword, become some man’s vessel carrying some man’s child? He wondered how long it would take Solemn’s certitude, his moment of grace to pass an leave him as empty and lost as everyone else. -pg 160, Blood Hollow

There are times when I could deeply empathize with Cork in his struggle of faith but I think that Father Mal Thorne, priest of the Catholic church in Cork’s hometown of Aurora, Minnesota, sums it up best in a statement that he makes to Cork even before we understand the depths of his doubt:

“It would be easy if we all had visions, or if we all believed in those who did. My own feeling is that faith was never meant to be easy.” -pg 130, Blood Hollow

And for all the doubt in both God and man that Cork wrestles with, he still remains a compassionate human being with a strong sense of justice:

“The dead can’t speak for themselves,” he said. “They’ve got no way to ask for justice. What’s left behind in the details of their deaths is the only hope they have for pointing the way toward the truth, and someone ought to pay attention. It’s called due diligence, Jo. It’s what a good cop does. He considers all the possibilities, turns over all the stones, and he tries to do it without prejudice.” - pg 138, Blood Hollow

I saved these two books by William Kent Krueger for last this month because I don’t usually have too much trouble breezing through a good mystery. However, I didn’t breeze through this one. There was a lot to mull over in the pages of this story and I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it.It’s easy to see why it’s an award winner and it will be among my best of 2007. (5/5)

Michael Connelly
391 pages
Read for: The Book Awards Challenge

Terry McCaleb used to be a top FBI profiler but the stress has taken it’s toll on him. He suffers a heart attack which leaves him him in need of a heart transplant. He receives his heart transplant and is recovering at his boat when Graciela, the sister of his heart donor, shows up and asks him to help her find her sister’s killer. Things get twisty from there.

I really enjoy reading mysteries. That’s what lured me to this title but I purposely tried not to find out too much about it because I didn’t want to accidentally come across any spoilers. I didn’t even realize that a movie had been made from this book. So I guess I was successful!

This was an easy and fun read for me. I found the characters very likable and I enjoyed the fact that there were a couple of plot twists. I also found the story to be pretty unique. It definately kept me turning the pages. I will be looking for more by Michael Connelly.(4/5)

Khaled Hosseini

Library Book

324 pages

I know that most everyone has already read this book(and probably the next one by this author as well) so I don’t really feel the need to give a synopsis. So, straight on with my thoughts.

This is an amazing book. The characters are vivid and the story is haunting. It is a story of how to love someone when they act unlovably, forgiveness, atonement, sacrifice, redemption, war, etc. There are so many enduring themes in this book that I could go on and on.

It helped me to understand Afghanistan and the Afghan people more and the author paints a clear picture of what life was like there before the strife and also shows us what it is like now. The sadness that the Afghan people must feel for their homeland is palpable.

Once I started reading this book, I did very little else. It was that good. It will, without a doubt, go down as one of the highlights of my reading year. I can’t wait for the movie. (5/5)