Elderhood Review, Little Fires Everywhere on TV, How to Forget by Kate Mulgrew, Save Me the Plums by Ruth Reichl, The Scent Keeper by Erica Bauermeister, The 5th Gender by GL Carriger, The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal

I'm very late in getting this round of reviews up, but we had to get a new modem and deal with even more computer network issues, so between that and a spate of grief as my father was laid to rest two weeks ago (and I was unable to attend his funeral service in Iowa, for various reasons. However, my brother Kevin brought a song to the service that was one of dads favorites, "I Believe" and also read a poem that I think dad would have liked), I am only now able to sit here and write reviews of the 5 books I've read in the last 8 days. I will start with a review of a book that I would love to have a copy of, because it discusses the rampant ageism that is defining our society these days.

Review: Elderhood: Redefining Aging, Transforming Medicine, Reimagining Life

For many, old age is a far-off concern shuffled to the back of their minds, where it distorts under the societal obsession with youth and beauty. For Louise Aronson, thoroughly accomplished in both the medical (American Geriatrics Society Geriatrician of the Year) and literary (A History of the Present Illness http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40661124 fields, aging and the elderly are her passion. In Elderhood: Redefining Aging, Transforming Medicine, Reimagining Life, she gathers roughly three decades of case histories, criticism, curiosity and wisdom to offer readers a holistic, compassionate understanding of the third stage of life: elderhood.

From the beginning, Aronson is quick to point out how limited the dominant cultural understanding of old age is, as it distinguishes between the "successful aging" of some while bemoaning the illness and disability of others. She exposes the default of ageism time and again in her meticulous consideration of medical and family networks, political policy, municipal oversights, capitalist ambition and nearly every other sector of life that comes in contact with (or at the expense of) the elderly. Which is to say, society as a whole.

Older bodies aren't simply longer-lived versions of younger ones, just as adult bodies aren't simply bigger versions of children's. In Aronson's paradigm, each stage of life (childhood, adulthood, elderhood) requires a certain style of attention key to a person's quality of living, but the medical system regularly fails its oldest and most fragile patients by treating them in accordance with standards set by younger, whiter, straighter and maler norms.

Elderhood, like the life station it studies, is dynamic, multifaceted and full of wonder. Aronson's writing, too, flexes with vibrant energy as she discusses in lucid, candid detail the ways she has seen the healthcare system neglect the overall well-being of her patients, her colleagues and herself.

"When health care organizations proclaim value-based patient care is their top priority but institute productivity metrics that prioritize numbers of patients seen over whether those patients' needs are met, when they adopt electronic record systems that undermine the doctor-patient relationship, when their clinicians experience record levels of burnout and work dissatisfaction and they do nothing to alter the fundamental mechanics of daily life in their hospitals and clinics, an Orwellian story unfolds in the imaginations of patients and doctors alike."

Mixing empathy for the whole person and fury toward the systems that undermine that, Aronson draws on published studies and scientific data, as well as numerous literary sources (Rebecca Solnit, Vivian Gornick, Oliver Sacks, Bill Hayes et al.) to craft this monumental book. Intimidating as it may seem, elderhood becomes welcoming and generous in Aronson's deft care. --Dave Wheeler associate editor, Shelf Awareness

When I was attending Lesley College (now Lesley University) in Cambridge, MA, I used to visit the Harvard Co Op, and the Harvard Book Store.

A Favorite Bookseller Spring Moment: Harvard Book Store http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40798809 Cambridge Mass., shared a gorgeous photo on Facebook of the bookshop on a sunny weekend day http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40798810, noting:

" 'Sweet May hath come to love us,

Flowers, trees, their blossoms don;

And through the blue heavens above us

The very clouds move on.'

--Heinrich Heine, Book of Songs, New Spring, No. 5

My Library book group read Little Fires Everywhere, and while some liked it a bit more than others, most of us felt that the two main mother figure characters were annoying and frustrating in equal measure. The book got about 7 stars out of 10 from the group, but it was a grudging 7 stars. The discussion was lively, though, and I look forward to seeing this limited TV series based on the book.

TV: Little Fires Everywhere

Joshua Jackson (The Affair) is "set as a lead opposite Reese Witherspoon, Kerry Washington and Rosemarie DeWitt in Little Fires Everywhere http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40798824, Hulu's upcoming limited series based on Celeste Ng's book," Deadline reported.

Developed and written by Liz Tigelaar (Casual), the series comes from Witherspoon's Hello Sunshine, Washington's Simpson Street and ABC Signature Studios. The cast also includes Megan Stott, Jade Pettyjohn, Jordan Elsass, Gavin Lewis and Lexi Underwood.

Tigelaar is serving as executive producer and showrunner, with Witherspoon and Lauren Levy Neustadter executive producing for Hello Sunshine, along with Washington and Pilar Savone for Simpson Street, and Lynn Shelton. 

How to Forget: A Daughter's Memoir by Kate Mulgrew is her second memoir, after Born With Teeth, which was a celebrated and well received work by my fellow Iowan, iconic actress Kate Mulgrew, who played Captain Janeway on Star Trek Voyager and Red on Netflix's Orange is the New Black. Born With Teeth (BWT) was a charming and fascinating memoir of the early years of Kate's career, and her reunion with the daughter she gave up for adoption 30 years ago. How To Forget (HTF) by contrast, is a blistering memoir that is about growing up in the Mulgrew household with two idiosyncratic parents who were both struggling with mental illness and physical ailments that eventually dragged them to terminal diagnosis, from cancer (father) to Alzheimers (mother). Kate comes home to help her parents passing, and this book muses on the roles she played within her family and for her parents until their demise. 

While this limits the charm factor of the book, Kate is still a deft and incisive wordsmith who outlines her parents lives, and her childhood in evocative paragraphs that make you feel as if you're right there with her, roaming the fields around the family farmhouse in Dubuque. Though I lived and learned in Dubuque at Clarke College (now Clarke University) for 4 years, the rural and suburban areas (and bars) that Kate describes are mostly places I never saw or visited. Yet when she and her mother stop by one of the new homes being built near their farmhouse, because her mother wishes to see inside and nose around about how others live, I could easily see, in my minds eye, the lady of the house with her plate of fresh cookies and her white carpeting being kind and accomodating, but only so far, because the Mulgrews were invading her family's privacy, and her bedroom was just a bridge too far. That kind of reaction sums up most of the people I met while in DBQ to a T. Here's the blurb:

In this profoundly honest and examined memoir about returning to Iowa to care for her ailing parents, the star of Orange Is the New Black and bestselling author of Born with Teeth takes us on an unexpected journey of loss, betrayal, and the transcendent nature of a daughter’s love for her parents.

They say you can’t go home again. But when her father is diagnosed with aggressive lung cancer and her mother with atypical Alzheimer’s, New York-based actress Kate Mulgrew returns to her hometown in Iowa to spend time with her parents and care for them in the time they have left.
The months Kate spends with her parents in Dubuque—by turns turbulent, tragic, and joyful—lead her to reflect on each of their lives and how they shaped her own. Those ruminations are transformed when, in the wake of their deaths, Kate uncovers long-kept secrets that challenge her understanding of the unconventional Irish Catholic household in which she was raised.
Breathtaking and powerful, laced with the author’s irreverent wit, How to Forget is a considered portrait of a mother and a father, an emotionally powerful memoir that demonstrates how love fuses children and parents, and an honest examination of family, memory, and indelible loss.

While I can understand how Kate loved her parents, I personally did not like them at all after reading about their treatment of Kate and her 7 siblings. Her father is a cold and cruel, selfish, anorexic man who lives on cigarettes, alcohol and the occaisional hamburger without a bun. He refuses to admit to any physical ailments for himself or his wife, and he never bothers to support his most successful child by watching her on stage, screen or TV. Ever. His denial of the physical aspects of life lead to him having stage 4 cancer because he refuses to visit a doctor until Kate works with her siblings to force him to deal with his symptoms (he dies 3 weeks later). When his wife is diagnosed with dementia/Alzheimers, he refuses to believe it, though proof of her failing memory and health is right in front of him. Instead, he blames his daughter for working with doctors to try and mitigate her symptoms and bring in a housekeeper/home health aid to care for her so she doesn't have to wither and die in a nursing home. Kate's mother (whom Kate insists is a snob because of her East Coast upbringing) is also an anorexic person who constantly admonishes her daughter to watch what she eats so she doesn't gain any weight, while selfishly not attending to her children by cooking or cleaning for them, and when they are hungry, telling them to run outside to the surrounding farmland and figure it out for themselves. On top of this negligent behavior, Joan(her mother) forces her young teenage daughter to accept a secret pact to act as her mother, because her own mother died at a young age. What a horrific thing to foist on a child, forcing them to act mature and not allowing them to have a childhood devoid of horrible adult secrets, such as her mother's affair with a local Catholic priest. Joan Mulgrew also forces her daughter to watch her flush her miscarried fetuses down the toilet, a rather gag inducing thought, when Joan claims that she had 18 miscarriages out of 8 live births. I somehow felt that this was why when Kate's mother asks her to help her commit suicide, so that she doesn't have to descend into the final stages of her disease, where she has no mental cognition and can't do anything for herself, that Kate relies on Joan's vanishing memory to keep her from having to actually give her the pills and help her die with dignity. Because Joan hangs on for years, suffering until the very end. My own father died of Lewy Body Dementia two months ago, so I can understand how Kate felt in dealing with her mothers end of life decisions. While this wasn't an easy book to read, then, I'd still give it an A, and recommend it to anyone middle aged who has elderly parents and has to deal with their final journey. 

Save Me the Plums by Ruth Reichl is the 8th book that Reichl has written, and the 6th book of hers that I've read (along with my mother, who also loves her evocative food writing).  This memoir focuses on Ruth's 10 years as editor of Gourmet Magazine, a very swank glossy food mag that she revamps and revitalizes with the help of key staff members and the publisher, the infamous Si Newhouse. After working as the restaurant reviewer for the NY Times and the LA Times, Ruth writes of her astonishment at the riches she unlocks as an editor, including limousine service, clothing allowance, a huge office and a phalanx of people hired to help her create her visions for each issue. I would imagine she also got paid an annual salary well within six figures. Having been a regional magazine editor myself in my 20s, I can understand the lure, but only from the impoverished trenches, as I got none of those perks when I became an editor, and when I asked for a raise from the poverty wages of 22K, I was told that I make "enough for a girl" by the publisher. Still, it's fun to read about what you can do when you have financial and physical support and a whole world of possibilities for your publication. Here's the blurb: When Condé Nast offered Ruth Reichl the top position at America’s oldest epicurean magazine, she declined. She was a writer, not a manager, and had no inclination to be anyone’s boss. Yet Reichl had been reading Gourmet since she was eight; it had inspired her career. How could she say no?

This is the story of a former Berkeley hippie entering the corporate world and worrying about losing her soul. It is the story of the moment restaurants became an important part of popular culture, a time when the rise of the farm-to-table movement changed, forever, the way we eat. Readers will meet legendary chefs like David Chang and Eric Ripert, idiosyncratic writers like David Foster Wallace, and a colorful group of editors and art directors who, under Reichl’s leadership, transformed stately Gourmet into a cutting-edge publication. This was the golden age of print media—the last spendthrift gasp before the Internet turned the magazine world upside down, (blogger's note: in other words,before newspapers and magazines began to shut their doors forever).

Complete with recipes, Save Me the Plums is a personal journey of a woman coming to terms with being in charge and making a mark, following a passion and holding on to her dreams—even when she ends up in a place she never expected to be.
The prose is, as in all of RR's books, fantastic and drool-worthy, as she paints pictures of beautiful dishes and delicious lunches, and her book flies by with that unputdownable view into the Gourmet life. I'd give it an A, and recommend it to foodies everywhere.

The Scent Keeper by Erica Bauermeister is only her 4th book of fiction, but, as with all of her other novels, it's a gem. Though based on a fictional island in the PNW/BC area, EB uses her fine grasp of evocative prose to get readers to see and more importantly smell every forest glade, every clam freshly dug up on the beach, every salty tide that washes up Emmeline's wishes. Here's the blurb: Erica Bauermeister, the national bestselling author of The School of Essential Ingredients, presents a moving and evocative coming-of-age novel about childhood stories, families lost and found, and how a fragrance conjures memories capable of shaping the course of our lives.

Emmeline lives an enchanted childhood on a remote island with her father, who teaches her about the natural world through her senses. What he won’t explain are the mysterious scents stored in the drawers that line the walls of their cabin, or the origin of the machine that creates them. As Emmeline grows, however, so too does her curiosity, until one day the unforeseen happens, and Emmeline is vaulted out into the real world—a place of love, betrayal, ambition, and revenge. To understand her past, Emmeline must unlock the clues to her identity, a quest that challenges the limits of her heart and imagination.
Lyrical and immersive, The Scent Keeper explores the provocative beauty of scent, the way it can reveal hidden truths, lead us to the person we seek, and even help us find our way back home.

Though, SPOILER, Emmeline discovers that her father lied to her for her entire childhood, she also unearths her mother's secrets, and in so doing, eventually brings her mother back into her childhood world, and into understanding her daughter. Honestly, I was engrossed in the pages of this book from the start, and if reading this book doesn't make you appreciate the beauty of the forest or the sea or nature, then you're beyond hope, in my opinion. A well deserved A, with a recommendation for anyone who enjoyed Diane Ackerman's splendid A Natural History of the Senses, or any of EB's other wonderful volumes.

The 5th Gender by GL (Gail) Carriger is a science fiction/fantasy novel with gay and transgender/5th gender characters that delves into sexuality in a fairly frank manner. Though I've read most of Gail Carriger's steampunk fantasy novels, and more than a few of her novellas, I wasn't quite prepared for her zesty and lengthy descriptions of sex between the main characters, Detective Hastion and the transgendered Tristol, a purple alien with sentient hair who has both a womb and a penis. While I think it is great that trans/gay sex is portrayed in a novel as so wonderful and normal, I am generally not a fan of pornography, either in books or film. The only other thing that bothered me about the book was the possesiveness that Detective Drey shows toward Tris, who seems to want to be "kept" like a cat or dog by the station policeman. That doesn't seem like a healthy relationship power balance to me. Anyway, here's the blurb:

A species that has no word for murder, has a murderer aboard their spaceship.
ALIEN
Tristol lives in exile. But he’s built a life for himself aboard a human space station. He’s even started to understand the complex nuances of human courting rituals.
Detective Hastion is finally flirting back!
MURDER
Except that Tristol’s beloved space station is unexpectedly contacted by the galoi­ – a xenophobic species with five genders, purple skin, and serious attitude. They need the help of a human detective because there’s a murderer aboard their spaceship. Murder is so rare, the galoi don’t even have a word for it.
Tristol knows this because he is galoi.
ROMANCE
Which means that he and Detective Hastion are on the case… together.
Delicate Sensibilities?
Contains men who love other men in graphic detail, regardless of gender, biology, or skin color... and lots of emotively sexy tentacle hair.
New York Times best selling author Gail Carriger (writing as G.L. Carriger) brings you a light-hearted romantic cozy mystery featuring an adorable lavender alien and his human crush.

I really didn't feel that this book was as lighthearted or cozy mystery-oriented at all, it was much edgier than that, and there was less romance than there was actual graphic sex scenes that describe acts in excruciating detail....I've never read so much about  ejaculate in my life. That said, the actual story was pretty good, though if I had known about the sex scenes prior to buying the book I might not have made the purchase. So I'd give the book a B, and recommend it to gay or trans people who like science fiction.

The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal is an alternative history novel that posits the question of what would happen if the earth were struck by a meteorite in the 1950s and female WASPs and pilots from WWII, and their women human calculator counterparts had to figure out a way to get humanity into space and onto another planet before earth succumbs to greenhouse gasses and climate change and burns up? With vivid prose and unforgettable characters, Kowal weaves a story of triumph over misogyny, racism and anti semitism that had me turning pages into the wee hours. Here's the blurb:

On a cold spring night in 1952, a huge meteorite fell to earth and obliterated much of the east coast of the United States, including Washington D.C. The ensuing climate cataclysm will soon render the earth inhospitable for humanity, as the last such meteorite did for the dinosaurs. This looming threat calls for a radically accelerated effort to colonize space, and requires a much larger share of humanity to take part in the process.
Elma York’s experience as a WASP pilot and mathematician earns her a place in the International Aerospace Coalition’s attempts to put man on the moon, as a calculator. But with so many skilled and experienced women pilots and scientists involved with the program, it doesn’t take long before Elma begins to wonder why they can’t go into space, too.
Elma’s drive to become the first Lady Astronaut is so strong that even the most dearly held conventions of society may not stand a chance against her. Publisher's Weekly: Kowal’s outstanding prequel to her Hugo-winning novelette “The Lady Astronaut of Mars” shows the alternate history that created a mid-20th-century Mars colony. In 1952, mathematician and pilot Elma York is on vacation with her rocket scientist husband, Nathaniel, when a meteor strikes Chesapeake Bay, obliterating most of the East Coast. Elma quickly realizes that this is an extinction event, and that the only option for humanity’s survival is off-world colonization. In a compelling parallel to our own history, Elma, who is Jewish, fights to have women of all races and backgrounds included in the burgeoning space program, squaring off against patriarchal attitudes, her own anxiety, and an adversary from her past service as a war pilot. Kowal explores a wide range of issues—including religion, grief, survivor’s guilt, mental health, racism, misogyny, and globalism—without subsuming the characters and plot. Elma’s struggles with her own prejudices and relationships, including her relationship with herself, provide a captivating human center to the apocalyptic background. Readers will thrill to the story of this “lady astronaut” and eagerly anticipate the promised sequels.

I agree with Publisher's Weekly that Elma's journey is thrilling and eye-opening, lest those of us in the 21st Century forget what life was like for our mothers and grandmothers, who, despite their brilliant minds and skills, were faced with rampant sexism and closed doors to advancement at every turn. I also think it is easy for women and men today to forget that even though the Holocaust was a recent and horrible stain on humanity in the 50s, there were still those who snubbed or harassed Jewish people based solely on their religion. Even those who found the Nazis repugnant were willing to work with former Nazi scientists like Werner Von Braun (to whom my father claimed we were related by blood, which is a ghastly thought) to get a leg up in the space race. Though I loved Elma's attitude of doing her best to keep women in the center of the space race, and her efforts to help women of color become astronauts as well, I was put off my her constant anixiety-induced vomiting and fear of the press/media. It got to be a bit much the 4th or 5th time it happened, and it made an otherwise forward-thinking, intelligent woman seem like a weak and mousy housewife. I kept wanting to tell her to take the tranqs and kick Colonel Parker in the nuts. At any rate, this was a compelling, fascinating story that has me salivating for the sequel. I'd give it an A and recommend it to anyone who enjoyed Hidden Figures, the book or the movie, and any other women-driven books about the past.

A Raffle for A Night at the Bookstore, Tea, The Art of Racing in the Rain Trailer, Fields of Air, Fields of Iron and Fields of Gold by Shelley Adina and The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek by Kim Michele Richardson

I've been busy with a freelance assignment, and I've also had some computer issues these past two weeks, so that's why this blog post is late, but, better late than never, as the saying goes. First up is a great idea that I wish some bookstores around here, few though they may be, would adopt. I'd love to spend the night in a bookstore, surrounded by tantalizing new reads!

 Cool Idea: 'A Night at the Bookstore'

"Dropping $5 on a raffle ticket might give you the chance to spend the night http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40659533 with a friend or family member at Purple Crow Books http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40659534," the News of Orange County noted in showcasing a fundraising effort by the Hillsborough, N.C., Kiwanis "for Orange County students in need of eyeglasses and eye doctor appointments." The main prize winner receives a night at the bookstore, a $100 book gift certificate and breakfast for two at Cup A Joe.

"Besides helping students with vision issues I hope this encourages people to visit Purple Crow Books," said Hillsborough Kiwanis president Tom Carr. "I am a voracious reader and I am a great supporter of independent bookstores.... It's always been a fantasy for me--to spend a night at the bookstore or library with no one else there to bother me, no one looking over my shoulder."

He added that bookstore owner Sharon Wheeler has been supportive of the fundraiser idea from the start.

"Tom Carr has boundless energy for helping children, and boundless creativity," Wheeler said. "The store is right downtown and I know it'll feel very safe for our guest--it'll be wonderful."

 Another great idea, because I adore tea, and grew up with tea drinkers, like my mom and grandmothers and great grandmothers.

Cool Idea of the Day: Kya's Blend Tea Asheville Tea Co. http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40685504 has released Kya's Blend http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40685505, a limited-run tea blend inspired by the main character in the novel Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens, who recently appeared at an author event hosted by Malaprop's Bookstore/Cafe Asheville, N.C. The Citizen Times reported that Kya's Blend "pairs Ceylon black tea http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40685508> with native North Carolina coastal plants, including Yaupon, along with White Pine, Myrtle Leaf, Lemon Balm, Lemon Peel, Cedar Berry and Bay Leaf."

"Putnam Books were looking for a brand partner to promote the book and do a sweepstakes and specifically for a North Carolina-based tea company because the book is based in North Carolina," said Asheville Tea Co. owner Jessie Dean. "The original connection was reading and tea as a lifestyle, but it really became a custom blend that brings Kya's experience of living in the marsh to life with the tea, inspired by the native botanicals of the Carolina coast."

Dean said she met Owens for the first time May 8 at Malaprop's and gave her packages of the loose leaf tea: "It was really powerful and exciting and interesting to be able to hear more about her life story and background and how that brought the book into being....

"Our mission as a company is to source locally as much as possible and to promote environmental sustainability. So it was even more exciting to hear her background as a zoologist and conservationist and how those values really align with ours."

I loved this book, and interviewed the author, Garth Stein, for an article in the Mercer Island Reporter back in 2005. I am thrilled that this wonderful tale has finally made it to the big screen, with the fantastic Milo V heading it up, and with Kevin Costner as the voice of Enzo the golden retriever. My family had a golden retriever/terrier mix named Buddy who also had a great personality. I sincerely hope this movie succeeds, and that more people are drawn to the book.

Movies: The Art of Racing in the Rain Trailer

Milo Ventimiglia (This is Us) "is revving up his engines in the newly released official trailer for the upcoming man-and-dog family drama, The Art of Racing in the Rain http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40719080, from Fox 2000," Deadline reported. Based on Garth Stein's bestselling novel and directed by Simon Curtis, the film stars Amanda Seyfried, Gary Cole, Kathy Baker, Ryan Kiera Armstrong, Martin Donovan, as well as Kevin Costner as the voice of Enzo. It is scheduled to hit theaters August 9. Mark Bomback adapted the screenplay. Neal H. Moritz, Patrick Dempsey, and Tania Landau produced. 

Fields of Air, Fields of Iron and Fields of Gold, by Shelley Adina are the final three books in her Magnificent Devices steampunk series. I got book #10 at the library, though I had to buy the other two books, but they were well worth the trade paperback price. I was particularly excited to read Gloria Meriwether-Astor's final scenes, and know that she's happy and ready to begin her family life. Here are the three blurbs for the books: Book #10:Her father started a war. She intends to stop it.

Her father may have sacrificed his own life to save hers, but heiress Gloria Meriwether-Astor is finding it difficult to forgive him. After all, how many young ladies of her acquaintance will inherit wealth, beauty, and a legacy of arms dealing? Now the Royal Kingdom of Spain and the Californias is about to declare war on the Texican Territory and Gloria simply will not allow it.

In company with Alice Chalmers and the crew of Swan, along with a lost young Evan Douglas seeking reparation for his own sins, she takes to the air. Her intention--to stop the train carrying the final shipment of monstrous mechanicals into the Wild West. But they should have known that making a deal with air pirate Ned Mose in exchange for his help could never end well.
What is a lady of principle to do? For the lives of thousands may depend on her ability to stop the war ... even if it means losing everything and everyone she has come to love.

Book # 11:"What do you propose, sir?"
He held her astonished gaze as he went down upon one knee. "Why ... I propose.
Will you do me the honor of becoming my wife, so that I may accompany you to San Francisco de Asis and help you stop this war?"

Gloria Meriwether-Astor, determined to end the invasion her father and a power-hungry diplomat started, has found safety with the witches of the river canyons in the Wild West. But how can one young lady without so much as a hat to her name challenge a kingdom? Confronted with the solution--marriage--she has two choices: accept the help she needs, or return to Philadelphia alone and a failure.
So, in the company of riverboat captain Stan Fremont--the dashing rogue she must now call husband--she sets off for the capital to negotiate with the Viceroy. But with an entire country mobilizing between herself and her objective, the attempt could mean her life--and the life of the one person she is beginning to care for.

Book # 12:If a wedding won't stop a war, what will?

Gloria Meriwether-Astor's belief in doing the right thing has carried her across the world and through dangers that would have felled a lesser woman. She believed that if she married the dashing Captain Fremont, she could approach the Viceroy of the Royal Kingdom of Spain and the Californias with impunity. She could convince the prince to stop the war their fathers began, and then she could return to Philadelphia with her husband, her conscience clear at last. Sadly, belief and reality are two different things. The prince agrees to her proposal on one condition--that she annul her marriage and become his wife instead!
Every woman has a threshold she will not cross. Gloria has come to love her riverboat captain, and the price of peace is simply too high. But when the evil stalking the pleasant gardens of San Luis Obispo de Tolosa claims its victim, the time for belief is over and the time to act--daringly, outrageously--is at hand. Do the witches hold the key to a way out of this trap?
All Gloria has to do is take up the crown of roses and play for the highest stakes. All she has to do is become the iron dragon, and start a war of her own.

So I was not surprised, SPOILER, when Joe turns out to be the half sister/brother of Felipe, the king of the California territories, working as a spy (whose real name is Honoria) but I was delighted when they decided to pull a "prince and the pauper" scam so that the real king could recover from poisoning and Honoria/Joe could pretend to marry Gloria and make some long awaited changes in how things are run, not the least of which is stopping a civil war. I really felt Gloria's growth over the three books, though she still seemed a bit too silly and miss-ish at times, and the author kept making it clear that she was a blonde, with all the stereotypes that this entails in books and movies. That said, for the most part, the women in this series play against type, and are very smart and independent, though they do fall in love and have relationships with men, albeit mostly enlightened men. Adina's prose is fantastic and full of wit and whimsy, while her plots are always as swift as her airships/blimps that her characters use to get around in record time. I loved this series, and would give it an overall A, with a recommendation to anyone who enjoys Gail Carrigers Soulless series or Devon Monk's steampunk series or Lilith Saintcrow's Bannon and Clare series. 

The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek by Kim Michele Richardson was recommended to me by several people who know I like unusual women-lead stories and tales that take place in small villages or towns full of characters. Unfortunately, though this book does contain all those things, it's mainly a difficult story about racism, sexism and ignorant, nearly illiterate mountain people of Kentucky in the 1930s. The first half of the book has the protagonist, Cussy Mary, or "Bluet" as the townspeople have nicknamed her because her skin is blue, constantly under threat of rape from the local minister, or actually being raped by the minister's brother, whom her father insists on her marrying for her 'safety.' Her husband subsequently verbally and physically abuses her and rapes her until she's nearly dead. Fortunately he dies of a heart attack before he can finish her off. Now that she's a widow, she's under threat of rape again while she completes her rounds on her mule as a librarian, bringing books and newspapers to people who, if they don't read themselves, at least want their children to learn to read and write. During the rest of the book we are treated to more abuse and a lot of death by starvation, especially of children, and we learn how far most of the white skinned townspeople will go to keep 'colored' people separate and away from their business, their public festivities and even their toilets. Here is the blurb:

The hardscrabble folks of Troublesome Creek have to scrap for everything—everything except books, that is. Thanks to Roosevelt's Kentucky Pack Horse Library Project, Troublesome's got its very own traveling librarian, Cussy Mary Carter.
Cussy's not only a book woman, however, she's also the last of her kind, her skin a shade of blue unlike most anyone else. Not everyone is keen on Cussy's family or the Library Project, and a Blue is often blamed for any whiff of trouble. If Cussy wants to bring the joy of books to the hill folks, she's going to have to confront prejudice as old as the Appalachias and suspicion as deep as the holler.
Inspired by the true blue-skinned people of Kentucky and the brave and dedicated Kentucky Pack Horse library service of the 1930s, The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek is a story of raw courage, fierce strength, and one woman's belief that books can carry us anywhere — even back home. 

I wanted to like this book so badly that I soldiered on through the horrific first half of the book, which was grotesque and depressing, only to realize that it just wasn't going to get any better until the end, and even then, I found that there wasn't a whole lot to recommend this book unless you are not prone to depression and are willing to suspend disbelief about a group of people with a medical condition that turned their skin blue due to under oxygenated blood. The Pack Horse Librarian program sounded wonderful in the beginning, but the main character, Cussy Mary, could only get the most ratty and reused books and old newspapers to share, and had to make her own 'scrapbooks' of recipes and Bible quotes and old fashioned remedies  to supplement the dearth of material she was allowed (colored people weren't allowed newer items or recent newspapers due to prejudice). In the end, SPOILER, though Cussy Mary marries a white man who loves her just as she is, he ends up being jailed under the backwards racist laws of Kentucky that don't allow the races to mix. The two have to meet in secret once he's out of jail, and it is never clear if they do end up together as a family in another state where they won't be persecuted. While all this is painful to read, Richardson's prose is full of Southern charm, and her plot never strays from the path. I'd give this book a B-, and though I can't really say that I enjoyed the book, I would recommend it to those who want to know more about this small group of genetically blue skinned people and how they lived and died in the 1930s American South. 

Watchmen on TV, Mrs Everything Review, The Strange Library by Haruki Murakami, The Tuscan Child by Rhys Bowen, Lost Roses by Martha Hall Kelly, A Gentleman of Means and Devices Brightly Shining by Shelley Adina, and the Glass Ocean by Williams, Willig and White

Happy Mother's Day tomorrow to all you hard working moms out there! I plan on delving into my TBR and doing a little shopping with my son. Meanwhile, I've been in a reading frenzy, and I've got 6 books to review today, in addition to posting a review from Shelf Awareness of a book that I want to read that isn't even on the shelves yet. 

My husband and I have both read Moore's Watchmen graphic novel, and we watched the original movie made from it, but with today's CGI technology, I think this latest TV adaptation will be spectacular.

TV: Watchmen

HBO released a teaser trailer for Watchmen http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40633330, based on the comic book epic by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons. Deadline reported that "even as Game of Thrones winds down, HBO has been ramping up another sprawling adaptation of a genre epic that defies almost every traditional expectation about episodic television.... Set in an alternate history where superheroes are viewed as outlaws, the new drama from executive producer Damon Lindelof is rooted in the same universe as the source material but strikes out in new directions with unfamiliar characters and a different story to tell."

The cast includes Regina King, Jeremy Irons, Don Johnson, Jean Smart, Tim Blake Nelson, Louis Gossett Jr., Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Hong Chau, Andrew Howard, Tom Mison, Frances Fisher, Jacob Ming-Trent, Sara Vickers, Dylan Schombing, and James Wolk.

The "tick, tock, tick, tock" chant in the teaser "is an effectively unsettling way to introduce a show that may end up with a reputation for memorable sonic moments that get in the ear and stay in the head," Deadline noted. "That's because Nine Inch Nails musicians Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross (who first worked together as film composers on The Social Network) will be creating the original music for the series." Watchmen will debut on HBO in the fall.

I really want to read this book, and I am so excited that I had to post this review from Shelf Awareness, an email newsletter for booksellers, librarians and bibliophiles.

Review: Mrs. Everything

Jennifer Weiner (Good in Bed; Hungry Heart http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40633343) has created a novel for the ages in Mrs. Everything, which is as impressive as it is ambitious.

Just shy of 500 pages, Mrs. Everything is a skillfully rendered and emotionally rich family saga capturing 70 years of American life as experienced by two Jewish sisters. The novel begins in the 1950s in Detroit, where Jo and Bethie grow up in a Jewish suburb. Bethie is the apple of her mother's eye, while Jo, the oldest and more unconventional in her appearance and interests, clashes with her mother's expectations. Jo realizes from a young age that she's gay, and this sets up conflict not only with her mother, but with society in general, and Jo struggles to fit in. In her early chapters, Weiner crafts a compelling Bildungsroman. The two sisters form an unbreakable bond when their father dies prematurely, leaving their mother in financial hardship. The sisters' relationship is further tested when an uncle begins abusing Bethie and the two girls must form a plan to fight back.

With vibrant descriptive powers and a potent sense of history, Weiner delineates her protagonists' college years. She reveals the 1960s in alltheir heady psychedelic delirium. Jo becomes a progressive activist and meets the love of her life, Shelley, while Bethie becomes a drug-imbibing hippie and vagabond of sorts. The two sisters take much different paths into the '70s and '80s. Sick of having her heart broken by women, Jo settles down with a husband and raises three daughters.

After traveling, emotionally scarred Bethie ends up in a women's commune outside Atlanta. She marries a former classmate, an African American man named Harold, and eventually turns the commune's homemade goods into a business empire, completing a curious arc from hippie to entrepreneur.

Mrs. Everything is an unapologetic feminist novel. In lesser hands, the male characters in the book could come off as villainous clichés. Weiner, however, shows convincing command of her material, fully fleshing out the pernicious effects of patriarchy. There's the aforementioned abusive uncle. There's a rape that takes place in the supposedly free-love culture of the '60s. There's the abortion doctor who slut-shames Bethie. There's rampant sexism, body shaming, clueless cheating husbands and one obstacle after another as the sisters push to define themselves in the new millennium. Weiner risks the narrative collapsing under the weight of so many issues, but she largely succeeds due to her overarching vision and her commitment to the reality of her characters.

That the novel's timeline ends with the 2016 presidential election and the MeToo movement is fitting. Events come full-circle, and Jo's daughters have more options, thanks to the women before them. That doesn't stop Jo from worrying about the pressures placed upon them. "Women had made progress--Jo only had to look as far as the television set to see it--but she wondered whether they would ever not try to have it all and do it all and do all of it flawlessly," Weiner writes.

Mrs. Everything defines a formative period for women in the U.S. Weiner shows that big, expansive social novels are not only still possible in our fragmented society but perhaps necessary. Mrs. Everything is a great American novel, full of heart and hope. --Scott Neuffer 

The Strange Library by Haruki Murakami is exactly that, strange in format and bizarre in content. This tiny novella has about 50-75 pages to tell the story of a boy who visits a library wherein the librarian imprisons him and tries to force him to read so that the librarian can eventually eat his brain, which would be enriched by difficult reading. It's illustrated with unusual drawings/paintings that don't really illuminate the text at all. The front cover of the book flips up like a notepad, and the books text looks like it was typed on an old fashioned manual typewriter. There are no page numbers, and it reads like a weird, drug-fueled anecdote that someone would tell you at a party after having too much to drink. I didn't like the story or understand its significance, so I will give this tiny novella a D, and I would only recommend it to those who find weird stories entertaining.

The Tuscan Child by Rhys Bowen, author of the Molly Murphy mysteries, was a real treat. A story with chapters that alternate between 1944-45, the end of World War II, and 1973, when the daughter of one of the main characters goes back to Italy to find out the truth about her father, who had an affair with a woman from a small Italian village. The prose is smooth and sweet, like a fine wine, while the plot moves along rapidly and without delay. Here's the blurb:

“Pass the bread, the olives, and the wine. Oh, and a copy of The Tuscan Child to savor with them.” —NPR
In 1944, British bomber pilot Hugo Langley parachuted from his stricken plane into the verdant fields of German-occupied Tuscany. Badly wounded, he found refuge in a ruined monastery and in the arms of Sofia Bartoli. But the love that kindled between them was shaken by an irreversible betrayal.
Nearly thirty years later, Hugo’s estranged daughter, Joanna, has returned home to the English countryside to arrange her father’s funeral. Among his personal effects is an unopened letter addressed to Sofia. In it is a startling revelation.
Still dealing with the emotional wounds of her own personal trauma, Joanna embarks on a healing journey to Tuscany to understand her father’s history—and maybe come to understand herself as well. Joanna soon discovers that some would prefer the past be left undisturbed, but she has come too far to let go of her father’s secrets now.

This book is worth the price for the delicious descriptions of Italian cuisine alone, but the fact that it's a real page turner only adds to reader's enjoyment. I loved Hugo's tragic tale, and Joanna's investigation that leads to solving several mysteries about what happened in the village during the war. That said, we never do find out what really happened to poor Sofia, or why (SPOILER) she left the village with a German officer. that was my only real qualm with the novel, other than the reliance on the trope of the beautiful, petite, irresistible blond heroine in Joanna. Other than that, I'd give this delicious tale an A, and recommend it to anyone who enjoys WWII stories set in Italy, and who loves Italian wines and cuisine.

Lost Roses by Martha Hall Kelly, who also wrote the excellent Lilac Girls (which I read and enjoyed), is yet another war time novel, but this time it's focused on WW1, the Great War, rather than the horrors of WWII. The fact that there's also a focus on the Russian Revolution and the horrors that preceded it, and the deaths of the Romanovs and displacement of many "White" Russians afterward, truly takes this book into unexpected, unexplored corners of the Great War.  Here's the blurb: Now Lost Roses, set a generation earlier and also inspired by true events, features Caroline’s mother, Eliza, and follows three equally indomitable women from St. Petersburg to Paris under the shadow of World War I.
It is 1914, and the world has been on the brink of war so often, many New Yorkers treat the subject with only passing interest. Eliza Ferriday is thrilled to be traveling to St. Petersburg with Sofya Streshnayva, a cousin of the Romanovs. The two met years ago one summer in Paris and became close confidantes. Now Eliza embarks on the trip of a lifetime, home with Sofya to see the splendors of Russia: the church with the interior covered in jeweled mosaics, the Rembrandts at the tsar’s Winter Palace, the famous ballet.
But when Austria declares war on Serbia and Russia’s imperial dynasty begins to fall, Eliza escapes back to America, while Sofya and her family flee to their country estate. In need of domestic help, they hire the local fortune-teller’s daughter, Varinka, unknowingly bringing intense danger into their household.
On the other side of the Atlantic, Eliza is doing her part to help the White Russian families find safety as they escape the revolution. But when Sofya’s letters suddenly stop coming, she fears the worst for her best friend.
From the turbulent streets of St. Petersburg and aristocratic countryside estates to the avenues of Paris where a society of fallen Russian émigrés live to the mansions of Long Island, the lives of Eliza, Sofya, and Varinka will intersect in profound ways. In her newest powerful tale told through female-driven perspectives, Martha Hall Kelly celebrates the unbreakable bonds of women’s friendship, especially during the darkest days of history. 

While I enjoy historical novels and understand the huge amount of work/research that goes into them, I was surprised that Kelly allowed every tedious detail to slow down the plot at various points in the novel, so much so that I almost abandoned it during the first quarter of the 432 pages out of sheer boredom. Fortunately, things began to move more swiftly in the second half of the book. I will note right away that I loathed the character of  Varinka, an impoverished maid who steals Sofya's baby and never intends on giving the child back to his mother. SPOILER, while I knew that Taras was her brother before the big reveal, and that he was forcing her to have sex with him, I still didn't feel that gave her the right to first of all expose the baby to Tara's violence and hatred (he kept telling Varinka that he was going to 'get rid of' the poor child) and secondly to keep him from his mother, who, though she was originally spoiled and stupid about the world, soon grew to understand the plight of her fellow Russian exiles. There were still some unanswered questions at the end of the book, but it was, for the most part, a satisfying read. I'd give it a B, and recommend it to anyone who has an interest in Russia and America during the Great War.

A Gentleman of Means and Devices Brightly Shining by Shelley Adina are books 8 and 9 in her Magnificent Devices Steampunk series. I've been devouring this series for the past month or so, and I have to say that they get better with each new book. Adina's prose is rich and riveting without being too embroiled in the technical details, and her plots zing along at a gallop. Here's the blurb for book 8:How much must one sacrifice for the sake of friendship? Lady Claire Trevelyan has had to deal with betrayal before, in small ways and large. But none is quite so painful as the belief that Gloria Meriwether-Astor had deserted her and her friends and left them to die under the waters of Venice. When she learns that Gloria has inexplicably vanished, she has no choice but to follow her heart and attempt to find the missing heiress.

But the decisions of the heart do not sit well with the gentlemen in her life, who had every reason to believe she planned to settle down at last--and suddenly Claire finds herself without a career, a fiancé, or the confidence in her own abilities that has carried her this far. Captain Ian Hollys is suffering from the megrims and cannot seem to recover from his dreadful experience as a prisoner. Alice's dream of captaining her own ship in England is scuttled. Tigg is struggling with a revelation that has turned his life upside down--and may result in a betrayal more harrowing than any the flock has yet seen.
Will the bond of friendship that has brought Claire and the flock together be the very thing that separates them for good? Or will love tip the balance and prove that what really defines a gentleman of means is none other than a lady of resources?

Book 9: On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me,
Dreadful relations, high expectations,
And a sudden urge to pull up ropes and flee.
It is the event of the season-on Twelfth Night, the Dunsmuirs have invited the cream of London society to celebrate the marriage of Lady Claire and Andrew Malvern at a reception to which the Prince Consort himself is expected. Captain Ian Hollys brings his fiancée Alice Chalmers to London to attend and to meet his family-people who cannot see past her flight boots to the woman who stands by his side as an equal.

While adjusting to life as a newlywed, seeing to her business affairs, and preparing the Mopsies to return to school in Munich, Lady Claire is settling into her new life with joy. When two young cousins of Gloria Meriwether-Astor arrive in London, the inhabitants of Carrick House are happy to welcome them. Sydney and Hugh Meriwether-Astor are completing a world tour, and the Dunsmuirs' ball is just the thing to cap it off in splendid fashion. But Maggie learns that Sydney has his own plans for the family business-and they don't include cutting off the supply of arms to the Royal Kingdom of Spain and the Californias, as Gloria is determined to do.
It's time for someone with a spine, an airship of her own, and reasons to put fields of air between herself and decisions about her future to pull up ropes and warn Gloria that betrayal is closer than she thinks.

These two books cleared up many questions that were developing about the relationships fostered between various characters, while also moving the story arc closer to its conclusion. Though I love Lady Claire and the Mopsies and Andrew, I never quite warmed up to Alice Chalmers for some reason. Now that she's in a developing relationship, I feel a warming trend coming on! Meanwhile, though, I'd give both of these books an A, and recommend them to anyone who has read the previous 7 books. Onward, Steampunk fans!

The Glass Ocean by Beatriz Williams, Lauren Willig and Karen White was a sumptuous novel of the events leading up to, and the aftermath of the sinking of the Lusitania during the Great War in 1915 by German UBoats. This story is told from the POV of three women, some in the past and one in modern times, and while that transition can be jarring at times, I did enjoy the historical view of life aboard ship and the class distinctions kept even while afloat. Here's the blurb:

From the New York Times bestselling authors of The Forgotten Room comes a captivating historical mystery, infused with romance, that links the lives of three women across a century—two deep in the past, one in the present—to the doomed passenger liner, RMS Lusitania.
May 2013
Her finances are in dire straits and bestselling author Sarah Blake is struggling to find a big idea for her next book. Desperate, she breaks the one promise she made to her Alzheimer’s-stricken mother and opens an old chest that belonged to her great-grandfather, who died when the RMS Lusitania was sunk by a German U-Boat in 1915. What she discovers there could change history. Sarah embarks on an ambitious journey to England to enlist the help of John Langford, a recently disgraced Member of Parliament whose family archives might contain the only key to the long-ago catastrophe. . . .
April 1915
Southern belle Caroline Telfair Hochstetter’s marriage is in crisis. Her formerly attentive industrialist husband, Gilbert, has become remote, pre-occupied with business . . . and something else that she can’t quite put a finger on. She’s hoping a trip to London in Lusitania’s lavish first-class accommodations will help them reconnect—but she can’t ignore the spark she feels for her old friend, Robert Langford, who turns out to be on the same voyage. Feeling restless and longing for a different existence, Caroline is determined to stop being a bystander, and take charge of her own life. . . .
Tessa Fairweather is traveling second-class on the Lusitania, returning home to Devon. Or at least, that’s her story. Tessa has never left the United States and her English accent is a hasty fake. She’s really Tennessee Schaff, the daughter of a roving con man, and she can steal and forge just about anything. But she’s had enough. Her partner has promised that if they can pull off this one last heist aboard the Lusitania, they’ll finally leave the game behind. Tess desperately wants to believe that, but Tess has the uneasy feeling there’s something about this job that isn’t as it seems. . . .
As the Lusitania steams toward its fate, three women work against time to unravel a plot that will change the course of their own lives . . . and history itself.

I found Caroline to be somewhat tedious in her oblivious attitude to those around her  who didn't have all the money and power that she had, and at the same time I grew weary of Tess's inability to extract herself from her vile sister's schemes. Sarah's story felt more authentic and interesting to me, probably because I know what it is like to be an impoverished writer looking for a good story to sell.All in all the three Ws acquit themselves well as authors, and manage to blend their styles nearly seamlessly. I would give this novel a B+, and recommend it to anyone who is interested in the Lusitania and what befell her guests and crew in 1915.

May the 4th Be With You/RIP Peter Mayhew/Chewbacca, Protests at Bookstores by White Nationalists/Fascists, Lovely War by Julie Berry, A Lady of Resources, A Lady of Spirit and A Lady of Integrity by Shelley Adina

May the 4th be with you! This past week we lost one of the original cast members of Star Wars, Peter Mayhew, who played Chewbacca the Wookie, towering alongside his buddy Han Solo in their adventures across a galaxy far, far away. RIP Mr Mayhew, I hope that you and Princess Leia (Carrie Fischer) are having a great reunion in heaven. 

Meanwhile, in the "world going to hell in a hand basket" category, we have these idiots who claim to be Christians, who are NOT doing God's work, but are instead spreading intolerance and hatred during a children's story time, of all things. Jesus never said a word about homosexuality being wrong, BTW, so they are basing their hatred on ancient prejudice written into documents by men, not God. White Nationalism is fascism, plain and simple, and we fought wars to keep this evil from infecting our society with its hatred and murderous cruelty. I agree with the Councilman who said that children need to learn to embrace diversity and acceptance of differences.

Two Protest Drag Queen Storytime in N.J.

On Saturday, two men who said they were members of a Catholic group called American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property protested the drag queen story hour http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40546225 appearance by Harmonica Sunbeam at Little City Books http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40546226 in Hoboken, N.J., the Jersey Journal reported.

The men stood across the street from the bookstore holding signs that read "God made them male & female" and "honk to protect our children."

The protest occurred the same day that a group of white nationalists interrupted an appearance at Politics & Prose http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40546227, Washington, D.C., by Jonathan M. Metzl, a psychiatrist and author of Dying of Whiteness: How the Politics of Racial Resentment Is Killing America's Heartland (Basic Books).

Harmonica Sunbeam told the Journal: "It's surprising that two men would take a beautiful Saturday afternoon to go to another town and protest, instead of living their own lives." She added that the event was "overwhelmingly positive. It's a very simple situation. If you don't like it, don't come." She does story times at Little City Books and WORD in Jersey City.

According to the newspaper, Hoboken Councilman Mike DeFusco, who is gay, called the protest the "kind of divisive language and intolerance [that] has no place in Hoboken, Hudson County or anywhere in our country.... We should be teaching children to embrace diversity and acceptance, not spreading hateful rhetoric that aims to set us back on the strides we have made to get closer to full equality."

Lovely War by Julie Berry was a refreshing surprise of a novel that was packaged in a very sexist "chick lit" fashion, with a pink-coated pretty woman holding an Eiffel Tower in her hands on the cover, while the top of her head was cut off, for some bizarre reason. The book looked like a breezy romance novel, which is not what the text was about at all, thereby giving weight to the "never judge a book by its cover" truism. This book was actually an engaging tale about Aphrodite, (goddess of love) after getting caught having an affair with Ares (god of war) by Vulcan, (god of the forge, Aphrodite's husband) telling the gods present (including Hades, god of the underworld) about how vital and important her work is, via the tale of two people she's brought together out of the horrors of  WWII. Here's the blurb: They are Hazel, James, Aubrey, and Colette. A classical pianist from London, a British would-be architect-turned-soldier, a Harlem-born ragtime genius in the U.S. Army, and a Belgian orphan with a gorgeous voice and a devastating past. Their story, as told by goddess Aphrodite, who must spin the tale or face judgment on Mount Olympus, is filled with hope and heartbreak, prejudice and passion, and reveals that, though War is a formidable force, it's no match for the transcendent power of Love.
The prose was, pun intended, divine, and the plot engaging and swift. This was one of those books I could not put down until the final page was read. I really do wish the publisher, Viking, had done a better job of the cover art, so that more lovers of classic mythology would find this charming and emotional novel. I'd give it an A, and recommend it to anyone who loves ancient myths and modern war/love stories combined in a clever fashion.

A Lady of Resources, A Lady of Spirit, and A Lady of Integrity, by Shelley Adina are the 5th, 6th and 7th book in the Magnificent Devices steampunk series that I am thoroughly hooked on (and I blame you, Gail Carriger! LOL). In fact, I have the 8th and 9th books on their way to my doorstep right now. I read these three wonderfully well written stories in the space of about 4 days, because their sparkling prose and meticulously timed plots had me reading until the wee hours. Adina never wastes a word of prose and her paragraphs are lean and clean and all business, which is a great relief to those, like myself, who read a lot of books that are full of puffed up paragraphs and meandering plots that go nowhere, as if the author was being paid by the word to bore the reader. Here are the blurbs: Lady of Resources: Now sixteen, the twins Lizzie and Maggie are educated young ladies who have not been called "the Mopsies" in years ... except by their guardian, Lady Claire Trevelyan. With the happy prospect of choosing their own future, the girls can leave their dodgy past behind, and Lizzie can bury her deepest childhood memories where they can do no harm.
Upon her graduation from school, Lizzie is awarded an enormous honor--but can she pay the price? Is she ready to be separated from Maggie and become the woman she believes she was meant to be--or will old habits tempt her into defiance and plunge her into disaster? On a dare, Lizzie picks the wrong man's pocket and nearly loses her life. But these frightening events bear unexpected fruit: The dream Lizzie holds closest to her heart comes true in a most unexpected way. But this dream, too, comes with a price. Lizzie must decide whether her true family is the one she was born to ... or the one she chose that long-ago day when the Lady of Devices steamed into their lives.

 Lady of Spirit:Under normal circumstances, Maggie and Lizzie would be delighted to meet their long-lost relatives and be reunited with those who had believed them dead, but when are the Mopsies' circumstances ever to be considered normal? With her half-brother Claude Seacombe, Lizzie travels to Cornwall to meet her mother's parents. Maggie goes along, too, since she is part of the family ... or so one might assume. But the more time she spends in her grandparents' clifftop mansion, the more she realizes that something is not right, and the events surrounding her own mother's death are more mysterious-and dangerous-than anyone alive suspects.
For an old nemesis is preying on the weak and proud, and no matter how well dressed or well educated a young lady might be, she cannot stand by and watch evil destroy a beloved cousin's future. Maggie must straighten her spine and plunge into danger for Lizzie's sake ... and prove that no matter the name she bears, she is first and foremost what the Lady of Devices believes her to be ... a lady of spirit.  

Lady of Integrity: Lady Claire Trevelyan and renowned scientist Andrew Malvern are looking forward to domestic felicity in London when they are surprised by an unexpected visitor. A desperate and fugitive Alice Chalmers seeks their help--her ship has been seized in the Duchy of Venice and worse, her navigator Jake has been thrown into the dreaded underwater prison from which no one ever escapes. Even the innocent.
Lady Claire is about to embark on her career in Munich at the Zeppelin Airship Works. The Mopsies are beginning their final year at school. Andrew Malvern begins to despair of his fiancée ever choosing a wedding gown ... but when help is denied from official quarters, the close bonds of friendship and shared adventure trump all these considerations with an urgency that cannot be ignored.
But there is a brooding evil waiting for them in Venice ... an evil that would just as soon put an end to the flock's interference once and for all. With an innocent friend's unexpected return and a pair of secret agents who would prefer that women not become involved ... the situation clearly calls for the inner resources of a lady of integrity. I must say that though I enjoyed all three books, I enjoyed the 5th and 6th books more than the 7th, mainly because they were about the "Mopsies" finding their family heritage and finding their inner strength, while the 7th book was about a character I find rather charmless, Alice Chalmers and her rescue of Jake, who has been thrown into an underwater jail and forced to labor cleaning the dead bodies left by the "kracken" out of the cogs and wheels that keep Venice moving along the waters, like a mechanical island. So though (SPOILER) they do rescue Jake and Captain Holly, they leave this horrific jail/slavery system in place, knowing that hundreds of other people are going to die beneath Venice, and that one of the captains of industry is trying to get the Italian government to agree to buy prisoners from him to use as slave labor in the future.  I really hope that this situation is rectified in books 8 and 9, and that Lady Claire and Andrew Malvern are finally able to tie the knot. I'd give all these books an A, and recommend them to anyone who has read the previous books and enjoys the Steampunk genre of fiction.