The Book Whisperer Reads About Lobster Fishing & Reality TV

If you had a chance to be part of a reality TV show, would you choose to participate? Why or why not? What do you think would happen among the participants? Lobster Wars by Mark E. Greene gives readers an in-depth look into the participants of a reality show about lobster fishermen in Maine.  Greene himself is a water sports enthusiast, so his experiences color the story and make it seem realistic. That’s especially true for me who has no experience with water sports, lobster fishing, or Maine.

The participants expect they will become rich and famous by being part of Lobster Wars on TV. The story is complicated by a newcomer who has chucked his corporate job and bought a lobster boat. Newcomers often have trouble fitting into a closed community. In addition, the lobster fishing is also facing difficulty with regulations and fewer lobsters in the water.

Readers have two stories, in essence: the scripts from the TV episodes and the interaction among the villagers on and off the water.

For book clubs, Lobster Wars will provide effective discussion points. The recognition that reality TV is not REAL, that it has been heavily edited for airing. The conflicts among the characters are not only for TV but also in the village itself.

For book clubs, Lobster Wars will provide effective discussion points. The recognition that reality TV is not REAL, that it has been heavily edited for airing. The conflicts among the characters are not only for TV but also in the village itself.

The Book Whisperer Reads Widely

As an eclectic reader, I enjoy delving into young adult books as well as books for children. Recently, I read Sure Signs of Crazy by Karen Harrington, written for readers aged 10 and up. The story follows Sarah Nelson as she leaves elementary school and is heading for seventh grade after the summer break.

Sarah’s life is complicated by the fact that when she was two, her mother tried to drown Sarah, and the mother was successful in drowning Sarah’s twin brother. Her mother now lives in a mental institution. Sarah rarely gets to see her mother. Even when she does see her mother, the visits are extremely unsatisfactory.

Sarah lives with her dad, a college professor. The two have moved frequently because her father feels compelled to leave a city once his wife’s actions are brought to light again. Approaching the tenth anniversary of the attempted murders, Sarah fears reporters will dredge up the information again. She is always watching over her shoulder for journalists who might ambush her to ask questions.

Another sad complication is that Sarah’s dad is a good man, but he often drinks to excess. Sarah is concerned about her dad and his drinking, but she usually bites her tongue rather than say what she is thinking. With summer on the horizon, Sarah knows her dad will pack her off to his parents’ home for the vacation. She begs him to let her stay with him, and he relents when Charlotte, the college student across the street, agrees to watch Sarah for the summer.

The title comes from Sarah’s worries that she may be like her mother, although crazy is not a word her father allows her to use. She also worries that she may be like her dad and abuse alcohol. These are very real concerns for Sarah, so she writes about them in her journal. In fact, she keeps two journals. Her fake journal is all sweetness and light; she leaves it out so that anyone could read it. Her real journal delves into the questions that plague her, and she keeps this one carefully hidden. Sarah’s journal is also a place for her to keep trouble words

When Sarah’s sixth-grade teacher is sending the children off for the summer, he challenges them to write whether they write letters or keep a journal. Sarah starts writing letters to Atticus Finch because To Kill a Mockingbird is one of her favorite books. Too, Atticus Finch is the perfect father, one who listens to his children and teaches them without being preachy. Sarah also wishes for someone like Calpurnia in her life.

Sure Signs of Crazy gives readers a moving story of a young girl and the trouble she faces without a mother and a nearly absent father. Readers will be glad to know that the story gives Sarah and readers hope.

The Book Whisperer Highly Recommends West With Giraffes

Once again, belonging to a book club has pushed me to read a book I had begun and then put aside: West With Giraffes by Lynda Rutledge. For whatever reason when I first started reading it several months ago, I did not become engaged in the story, so I stopped reading. Fast forward a few months and a friend chooses West With Giraffes for a book club, so I give it another try. And am I glad I did!

Woodrow Wilson Nickel, Woody, is now 105 years old and realizes he has a story to tell, one that is not his story alone. He recognizes that he needs to put the story on paper and quickly. As Woody writes, readers discover the full story and sympathize with Woody because of the silly interruptions from supposedly well-meaning attendants at Woody’s nursing home.

 In 1938, approaching 18, Woody finds himself at his father’s destitute farm in the Panhandle of Texas during the height of the Dust Bowl with the Great Depression adding its horrors. With his parents and little sister dead, Woody digs up his mother’s coins from the yard and heads west, to the land of sunshine and honey, California.  The trip is neither straightforward nor easy. Woody encounters one difficulty after another.

When Woody sees a truck carrying two giraffes, he becomes intrigued. He also sees Augusta, Red, as he calls her. She is a beautiful, young woman carrying a camera. Hearing that the giraffes are being taken to San Diego’s Zoo, Woody decides to follow them. Unfortunately, he has no money and no transportation. Readers will have to read the story to see how Woody becomes the truck’s driver.

Based on the true story of a twelve-day journey across the US from NY to CA, West With Giraffes chronicles the trip with fictionalized characters. It is a moving story full of adventure, difficulty, and triumph.

The Book Whisperer Discovers a TRUE Winner

Dear Readers, for those of you seeking historical fiction, look no further than By Her Own Design by Piper Huguley. Many may know the story of Ann Lowe, a Black woman born in 1898 in Clayton, AL, who became a famous designer, designing and making Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy’s wedding dress. For me, the story was new, and it is a fascinating story about overcoming all odds to be renowned as a designer beginning well before the Civil Rights movement.

Ann began sewing with her mother and grandmother; they made an inaugural gown for the governor of AL’s wife along with other designer dresses for her and other wealthy women in AL. Ann takes scraps of fabric and starts making flowers to adorn her own clothing. Soon, others want those flowers on their dresses as well. Ann’s mother and grandmother do not think Ann is ready to take on larger sewing assignments, but Ann herself is itching to design and make clothes.

Ann starts by making clothes for herself. From an early age, she felt she should not call attention to herself, so her clothing was always beautifully tailored, but she chose muted colors. In a store in Montgomery, Ann caught the eye of Mrs. Lee, a wealthy woman visiting from FL. Mrs. Lee asked Ann who had made her dress. At first, Ann is too shy to promote herself, but she does finally admit that she is the dressmaker. Mrs. Lee gives Ann, who has married and has a son by now, an opportunity to make dresses for her and her five daughters, one of whom is getting married soon.

Ann’s husband, Lee, is a tailor. He marries Ann when she is twelve, not because he loves her, but because he wants her to sew with him in his business of making men’s suits. He is a drunken, abusive husband who ruled Ann’s life. Fortunately, Ann finds help from Lee’s mother who tells her to take Arthur, her son, and go to FL to work for Mrs. Lee. Luckily, too, Mrs. Lee offers Ann and Arthur a place to stay. In fact, Mrs. Lee becomes very like a fairy godmother for Ann and her career.

Mrs. Lee even sends Ann to design school in NYC where Ann excels in all the coursework. Sadly, the administrators of the school put Ann in an empty classroom adjacent to the classroom where the white students sit. Ann is clever, and she gets to class early and positions her desk in the cloakroom so that she can see the board as well as the other students.

By Her Own Design is a novel to cherish. Learn about Ann Lowe and her gorgeous designs for all manner of important, wealthy people including designing a dress for Olivia de Haviland to wear to the Academy Awards. For book club members, the story will provide a wealth of discussion topics: Jim Crow laws, domestic violence, child labor, and racial prejudice. It will also offer happier topics like success and generosity.

Olivia de Havilland in the dress Ann Lowe designed and made; John and Jacqueline Kennedy with Jacqueline wearing the dress Ann Lowe designed and made

The Book Whisperer Discovers a Story of Friendship

When I opened My Best Friend was Angela Bennett by Suzanne Hillier, I was not sure what to expect. The story is set in Newfoundland, so I was immediately intrigued by that alone. Newfoundland in 1942 is not yet a Canadian province. As a result, Hillier has an opportunity to impart some of the history of Newfoundland as part of the story.

The riveting part of the story is the friendship between Angela Bennett and Dorothy Butler. The two provide quite a contrast to one another—at least in Dorothy’s mind. Dorothy describes Angela as “tossing her thick curly chestnut mane that fell to her shoulders, her breasts swelling under her white blouse, her Bermuda shorts exposing milky, shapely legs.” Dorothy’s description of herself is less flattering: “too tall and too thin and too flat-chested, her straight dark hair clipped back in a roll high up from her forehead with the rest hanging lankly behind.”

Angela marries Edgar Clarke at the behest of her mother, primarily because he is a successful businessman and gives her lavish, expensive gifts. Dorothy marries her sweetheart Wills. They both become attorneys. While Dorothy has a happy marriage and a successful career, Angela suffers in a terrible marriage with an abusive man who had claimed to love and cherish her.

The friendship between Angela and Dorothy continues through their adult lives. Angela feels shame because of her husband’s treatment of her. Dorothy has to fight to be respected as a female lawyer. Writer Libby Creelman, author of Walking in Paradise, sums up My Best Friend was Angela Bennett this way: “This novel is harrowing, funny, tender, unforgettable. It will stay with you.”

The discussion of My Best Friend Was Angela Bennett in book clubs will cover a wide range of topics: chauvinism, education for women, domestic abuse, and most of all friendship.

The Book Whisperer Discovers a New (to Her) Author

Iron Curtain: A Love Story by Vesna Goldsworthy takes readers into the life of Milena Urbanska, a princess who lives in an unnamed Soviet satellite in the 1980s. While she lives in luxury, she chafes against her lack of freedom.

Meeting Jason, a British poet, Milena immediately falls in love and begins to look toward a future with him and with freedom. Despite her mother’s warnings about Jason’s unsuitability, Milena marries him. They are madly in love, at least so Milena thinks. They live in poverty since Jason considers himself a poet, not a man who works a day-to-day job. Milena takes a job at the Royal Entomological Society, translating from Russian into English for a research project.

Milena discovers she is pregnant with twins and Jason is overjoyed. Milena’s joy is short-lived when she learns Jason has a mistress. The story takes readers through the ups and downs, many downs, of Milena and Jason’s relationship. The story ends satisfactorily for this reader. For book clubs, the story will provide many topics of conversation: marital strife, poverty, the Cold War, and freedom.

The Book Whisperer Is Intrigued by a Literary Novel

I was intrigued by the title of Ellen Pall’s latest novel: Must Read Well. The story involves two women: Beth Miller and Anne Taussig Weil. Beth is a poor PhD candidate in English working on her dissertation, but she has hit several roadblocks. Anne Taussig Weil wrote a bestselling novel in 1965; none of her other books achieved much success. Now, 90, Weil is almost blind and can barely walk. She advertises for someone to rent a room in her home in Greenwich Village for a nominal charge and read to her once a day for an hour.

Beth has written several letters to Weil previously because Beth is including Weil in her dissertation. Weil refused to meet with Beth. Now, Beth recognizes the woman advertising for someone “who reads well” to rent a room in her home is none other than Anne Taussig Weil.

Beth thinks this will be the perfect opportunity to get the information she needs firsthand from Weil so she can finish her dissertation. Beth gets the opportunity to rent the room and to read to Weil, thinking Weil does not know Beth is the person who wrote to her so many times.

Thus begins a relationship between the two women with deception on both sides. The story keeps readers enthralled as the secrets pile up. Yet, Beth does learn about Weil and what led her to write the bestselling novel.

Will Beth find the information she needs to complete her dissertation? She had to sign a nondisclosure agreement when she took the room. Will that preclude her from using anything she learns while living with Weil? These questions all will be answered.

The Book Whisperer Discovers WWII in Iran

Being in a book club does open doors to books I would not likely choose for myself. Such is the case with Love and War in the Jewish Quarter by Dora Levy Mossanen. To be candid, when I first began reading the book, I wasn’t sure what to expect. The story is set in Tehran, Iran starting in 1941. This is a place and a period during WWII about which I knew nothing.

Jews living in Iran are thought to be unclean by the Muslim leaders of Iran. Yet when Queen Fawzia Pahlavi needs a dentist, she calls upon Soleiman Yaran, a Jewish dentist educated in Paris, to treat her decayed tooth. From that successful encounter, Soleiman is then engaged by the Governor General, a cruel and dangerous man, to treat the Governor’s teeth.

Soleiman tries to delay going to the Governor General because Ruby, Soleiman’s beloved wife, is in labor. He wants to be there to help deliver the baby even though Shamsi, his aunt is a well-known midwife. Unable to deny the Governor’s demand, Soleiman goes, leaving Ruby in Aunt Shamsi’s hands.

This original treatment of the Governor General sets in motion a series of events which hold Soleiman in the Governor’s grips. Because of his opium addiction, the Governor’s teeth are in terrible condition. That also means that giving the new-found Novocaine would endanger the Governor’s life. Soleiman has developed what he calls Ruby Magic, a potion that numbs the gums without endangering the opium addict.

The story involves war, betrayal, death, and superstition. Readers learn about how the Jewish people live in Tehran at the time. They also learn about the treacherous path Soleiman must tread as he continues to treat the Governor.

For book clubs, the story will provide much for discussion. The war itself with its occupation by Russian troops along with the constant threat of invasion by Nazi soldiers keeps people on edge. Soleiman and his friends are also trying to save a number of orphaned Jewish children and get them to safety. The treatment of women is another hot topic in the story.