Recent Reads

One of the great joys of a vacation for me is the oodles of reading time available. I love curling up with a good book, and the sheer joy of being able to simply loose myself for hours in a good read is delightful.

1. Specimen Days by Michael Cunningham
My book club book for June. I love other works by the author, so was really looking forward to a great read. Was very disappointed. The idea of a story in 3 parts with the same characters is fun, but I simply could not get into this book - and when one of the characters turns up as a giant lizard from another planet in the 3rd story - he totally lost me.

2. Saving Fish From Drowning by Amy Tan
Took me a little time to get into this book - it needs a good solid couple of hours for the story to really start to gel, but once I was in, I was hooked. A fun read about the mishaps of adventure travel, with a dash of problems in Burma. Told in quintessential Amy Tan style.

3. Whitethorn Woods by Maeve Binchy
A quick read about characters in a little town in Ireland. Not as interesting as some of her other books, so would not recommend it, but is probably an good beach read - nothing too dark or complex.

4. The Secret by Rhonda Byrne
There is so much hype about this book I thought I'd give it a read. It's a New Age self-help book centered about the "Law of Attraction" - in a nutshell, you attract to you what you think about or focus on. Some interesting quotes, but the writing is atrocious - what is with all those exclamation marks?

5. A Wedding in December by Anita Shreve
A reunion story - best friends from high school gather 27 years later for a wedding in the Berkshires. Story of regrets, missed opportunities, lives contiued without each other. An interesting read, if only to imagine what it would be like to meet up with my high school buddies again.