Where the Crawdads Sing

All in all, I say: SKIP IT. After the first 5 chapters I felt like I've read it already. Turns out I haven't read it - it's just almost exactly like this independent film I saw. I can't remember the name, but it's almost scene by scene exactly like the book. Amazon writes, "For years, rumors of the "Marsh Girl" have haunted Barkley Cove, a quiet town on the North Carolina coast. So in late 1969, when handsome Chase Andrews is found dead, the locals immediately suspect Kya Clark, the so-called Marsh Girl. But Kya is not what they say. Sensitive and intelligent, she has survived for years alone in the marsh that she calls home, finding friends in the gulls and lessons in the sand. Then the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. When two young men from town become intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new life--until the unthinkable happens. Where the Crawdads Sing is at once an exquisite ode to the natural world, a heartbreaking coming-of-age story, and a surprising tale of possible murder. Owens reminds us that we are forever shaped by the children we once were, and that we are all subject to the beautiful and violent secrets that nature keeps."

Unholy Night

All in all, I say: SKIP IT. I thought it would be like his other books, but it didn't read the same at all. The style was different. I don't really like religious stuff either. It was strange. After 20-40 pages I gave up. Amazon writes, "They're an iconic part of history's most celebrated birth. But what do we really know about the Three Kings of the Nativity, besides the fact that they followed a star to Bethlehem bearing strange gifts? The Bible has little to say about this enigmatic trio. In Grahame-Smith's telling, the so-called "Three Wise Men" are infamous thieves, led by the dark, murderous Balthazar. After a daring escape from Herod's prison, they stumble upon the famous manger and its newborn king. The last thing Balthazar needs is to be slowed down by young Joseph, Mary and their infant. But when Herod's men begin to slaughter the first born in Judea, he has no choice but to help them escape to Egypt. It's the beginning of an adventure that will see them fight the last magical creatures of the Old Testament; cross paths with biblical figures like Pontius Pilate and John the Baptist; and finally deliver them to Egypt. It may just be the greatest story never told."

Time on My Hands

All in all, I say: SKIP IT. I tried - I read the first 20-40 pages and it was just all over the place in my opinion. I didn't like the topic or the writing style. Amazon writes, "When does a game stop being a game? And what would cause a young boy to commit an act of savage violence? In Time on My Hands by Giorgio Vasta, the year is 1978, and a chilling drama is unfolding in Rome. Members of a leftist terrorist group known as the Red Brigades have kidnapped the former Italian prime minister, Aldo Moro, and are holding him in a secret prison, while broadcasting their demands to the public. Far from Rome, in Palermo, Sicily, a trio of eleven-year-old schoolboys are following Moro's abduction with intense interest. To their minds, the terrorists are warriors, striking a blow at the stifling conformity and propriety of everyday Italian life. Just like the Red Brigades, the boys give themselves code names: Nimbus, Radius, and Flight. They shave their heads, develop a secret language, and begin a life of escalating crime in worshipful imitation of their heroes. But when Moro's body is discovered in the trunk of a car, riddled with bullets, and as the stakes of the friends' games grow higher, Nimbus, the most innocent of the three, must decide just how far he is willing to go."

Gone: A Girl, A Violin, A Life Unstrung

All in all, I say: READ IT An autobiography about a violin prodigy. She talks about her life growing up in London, her South Korean culture, her tutors, her loves, and her music. You have to get the album as well. As you read the book occasionally there are notes in the margin - musical notes - which direct you to a piece of music. It helps you understand her emotions, her music, and what she's describing tin the book when you also listen to the music. It's a clever way to write the book. I wish authors did this more often. Amazon writes, "Her first violin was tiny, harsh, factory-made; her first piece was “Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star.” But from the very beginning, Min Kym knew that music was the element in which she could swim and dive and soar. At seven years old, she was a prodigy, the youngest ever student at the famed Purcell School. At eleven, she won her first international prize; at eighteen, violinist great Ruggiero Ricci called her “the most talented violinist I’ve ever taught.” And at twenty-one, she found “the one,” the violin she would play as a soloist: a rare 1696 Stradivarius. Her career took off. She recorded the Brahms concerto and a world tour was planned. Then, in a London café, her violin was stolen. She felt as though she had lost her soulmate, and with it her sense of who she was. Overnight she became unable to play or function, stunned into silence. In this lucid and transfixing memoir, Kym reckons with the space left by her violin’s absence. She sees with new eyes her past as a child prodigy, with its isolation and crushing expectations; her combustible relationships with teachers and with a domineering boyfriend; and her navigation of two very different worlds, her traditional Korean family and her music. And in the stark yet clarifying light of her loss, she rediscovers her voice and herself."

The Kingdom of Ohio

All in all, I say: SKIP IT. It needed to be about one thing or another, but not both. Be a historical book about that time in NY or it needed to be a love story. The author tries to mix the two in an interesting way, but I was bored out of my mind. I gave it five chapters and the last chapter, and couldn't see my myself reading it all. Amazon writes, "After discovering an old photograph, an elderly antiques dealer living in present-day Los Angeles is forced to revisit the history he has struggled to deny. The photograph depicts a man and a woman. The man is Peter Force, a young frontier adventurer who comes to New York City in 1901 and quickly lands a job digging the first subway tunnels beneath the metropolis. The woman is Cheri- Anne Toledo, a beautiful mathematical prodigy whose memories appear to come from another world. They meet seemingly by chance, and initially Peter dismisses her as crazy. But as they are drawn into a tangle of overlapping intrigues, Peter must reexamine Cheri-Anne?s fantastic story. Could it be that she is telling the truth and that she has stumbled onto the most dangerous secret imaginable: the key to traveling through time? Set against the mazelike streets of New York at the dawn of the mechanical age, Peter and Cheri-Anne find themselves wrestling with the nature of history, technology, and the unfolding of time itself."

Behold the Dreamers

All in all, I say: SKIP IT It's predictable and not written in an interesting enough way to make me read what I already know I'm going to read. An immigrant family will work for a wealthy family. They will discover their secrets and be mistreated. Eventually, they will have too hard a time finding new jobs once the recession hits and they have no choice but to go back "home". Amazon writes, "Jende Jonga, a Cameroonian immigrant living in Harlem, has come to the United States to provide a better life for himself, his wife, Neni, and their six-year-old son. In the fall of 2007, Jende can hardly believe his luck when he lands a job as a chauffeur for Clark Edwards, a senior executive at Lehman Brothers. Clark demands punctuality, discretion, and loyalty—and Jende is eager to please. Clark’s wife, Cindy, even offers Neni temporary work at the Edwardses’ summer home in the Hamptons. With these opportunities, Jende and Neni can at last gain a foothold in America and imagine a brighter future. However, the world of great power and privilege conceals troubling secrets, and soon Jende and Neni notice cracks in their employers’ façades. When the financial world is rocked by the collapse of Lehman Brothers, the Jongas are desperate to keep Jende’s job—even as their marriage threatens to fall apart. As all four lives are dramatically upended, Jende and Neni are forced to make an impossible choice."

The Hearts Invisible Furies

Amazon writes, "From the beloved New York Times bestselling author of The Boy In the Striped Pajamas, a sweeping, heartfelt saga about the course of one man's life, beginning and ending in post-war Ireland. Cyril Avery is not a real Avery -- or at least, that's what his adoptive parents tell him. And he never will be. But if he isn't a real Avery, then who is he? Born out of wedlock to a teenage girl cast out from her rural Irish community and adopted by a well-to-do if eccentric Dublin couple via the intervention of a hunchbacked Redemptorist nun, Cyril is adrift in the world, anchored only tenuously by his heartfelt friendship with the infinitely more glamourous and dangerous Julian Woodbead. At the mercy of fortune and coincidence, he will spend a lifetime coming to know himself and where he came from - and over his many years, will struggle to discover an identity, a home, a country, and much more. In this, Boyne's most transcendent work to date, we are shown the story of Ireland from the 1940s to today through the eyes of one ordinary man. The Heart's Invisible Furies is a novel to make you laugh and cry while reminding us all of the redemptive power of the human spirit." 

 It felt like he was trying to make the characters strange on purpose to make it seem like he's creative. I read 5 chapters and just didn't give a crap. I didn't care that the character wanted to find himself. It was long and for no apparent reason. All in all, I say: SKIP IT