Alphabetically Inclined

UPDATE: 2020. OK, I still haven't read a book starting with X or Z. So I'm going to start tracking again, on the theory that tracking something makes it more likely to happen.

***

So, as I was idly sorting my TBR bookshelf, I checked to see if I had a book for each letter of the alphabet, title-wise. And surprise, I nearly did! (I have no unread books starting with the letter Z). Clearly I should join an A-Z challenge to inspire me to read some of these. I picked the 2014 Alphabet Soup Reading Challenge  because I liked Dollycas's soup picture.

I'll start out only using books from my shelves, but I'll have no qualms about pulling in library books if I need them. 

UPDATE: Well, it's 2015 and I didn't finish. I also didn't use any of my library reads. Instead, I'm going to continue on with the count, but mark the books from my shelves that I read in 2015 in purple. So eventually I hope to finish, and in the meantime it will be a record of what I read that I own. And now 2016 will be in maroon. 2017, BLUE. 2018. 2020 black but bold, 2021 this color, 2022 here. But in 2022 I'm only doing one book per year, not looking to see which letters are more popular.. 


A: Attitude, Almost a Bride, Always Abigail, About that Night, Avatar the Last Airbender 6, Anna of Byzantium, Awakening to the Sacred, All-of-a-Kind Family Uptown, Afternoon of the Elves, Assassin's Salvation, Alpha, Adulthood Rites, All Systems Red, Aunt Dimity and the King's Ransom, America At War, All Boys Aren't Black, Artemis Fowl:The Graphic Novel, Assassination of John  F Kennedy, Ada Twist and Perilous Pants, Assassins of Thasalon, Almost American Girl, Arcadia, America for Americans, Apple Cider Slaying, Absolution By Murder, Arcane Heart, Art of Growing Up, Aurora Blazing, American Fairytale, Ambushed, Accepting the Lance, Aurora Rising, Amish Christmas Twins, And the Last Trump Shall Sound, Amazons, Abolitionists, and Activists

B: (Broken Homes) (Balanced on the Blade's Edge) Boy Who Dared, Blood and Betrayal, Big Nate Strikes Again, Bird Lake Moon, Big Nate on a Roll, Book Thief, Blake: Huts of America, Breakout, Bronze Gods, Blood Bound, Bet Me, Bone Crossed, But Can the Phoenix Sing?, Bearly Cooking, Black Wolves of Boston, The Body in the Library, Burn Bright, Buried Bones, Bone Dry, Beneath the Sugar Sky, Boys in the Boat, Beach Babe, Braiding Sweetgrass, Bill Martin Jr Big Book of Poetry, Books for Living, By Immortal Honor Bound, Becoming Kid Quixote, Becoming Muhammad Ali, Bone Witch, Body Talk, Bride's Story 9, Breaking Through, Bears, Brave Heroes Bold Defenders, Blood & Germs, Bears, Be My Guest, Burn Bright, Beyond the Hundred Kingdoms, Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, Bride's Story 10-12, Blue Castle, Black Butler 15-18, Bollywood Affair, Before the Sword (Mulan), Black Sun, Buried Pyramid, Beautiful Struggle (Young Reader) , Bi the Way, The Black Friend, Beowulf, Black Birds in the Sky, Burn

C: Catching Fire, Cryoburn, Cathedral of the Wild, Cyrano de Bergerac, Cupcakes Trinkets and Other Deadly Magic, Child of the Ghosts, Castle in the Air, Castaway Planet, Cruel Miracles, Coraline, Child of Fire, Comrade Don Camillo, Cry Wolf, Collapsing Empire, Catfishing on Catnet, Crush, Cities in Layers, Clap When You Land, Can You Hear the Trees Talking, Changing the Equation, Cy Young, Cog Citizenship Race & the Law, Call Me American, The Constitution: Decoded Annotated and Explained, Condor Comeback, Case of Possession, The Chai Factor, Chiggers, Class Act, Copycat Crook, Children of Time, Case for Climate Capitalism, Crogan's Vengeance, Castle Waiting 1 & 2, Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows, Crown Duel, Consuming Fire, Curse of Chalion, Cat Tricks, Curse of the Night Witch, Chaos on Catnet, Crystal Singer, Consider Phlebas, City We Became, Castle of Adventure, Come Tumbling Down, Cuckoo's Egg, Covid-19 and Other Pandemics, Can We Talk About Consent, Conductors, Child of Fire

D: The Dragon and the George, Developing Standards-Based Report Cards, Decider, The Danger, Dead Heat, Day Shift, Dead Man Walking, Dog Warrior, Day Shift, Dragon Bones, Discount Armageddon, Decider, The Deal of a Lifetime, Don't Call Us Dead, Deadly Sexy, Dark Lord Clementine, Doughnut Fix, Dragon in the Library, Dead Heat, Displacement, Dramacon, Duke of Olympia Meets His Match, Dancing At the Pity Party, Dear Justyce

E: Ella Enchanted, Exo, Avatar the Lost Scrolls: Earth, Every Heart a Doorway, Elfhome, Eye of Truth, Elysium, Education Race & the Law, Edgar Allen Poe's Tales of Death and Dementia, Elatsoe, Efren Divided, Ember in the Ashes, Eva Evergreen, Emiko Superstar, Equal Rites, Encyclopedia Brown Carries On, Echo Mountain, Extraordinary Union, Easy Death, Empress of Salt and Fortune, Even If We Break, Everything You Wanted to Know About Indians, Explore the Future Through Science Fiction,  Edge of Anything

F: Forbidden Rose, Fierce Reads Anthology, Flying Finish, Forged in Blood, Fire-Touched, Five Thousand Years of Slavery, Friendly Gables, Find Me, Firewing, Flowers of Adonis, Flag in Exile, Faro's Daughter, Fair Game, Frankenstein, Fledgling, Flowers of Vashnoi, A Farewell to Arms, The Fix, Front Desk, Fly Like a Girl, Free Lunch, Flowers in the Gutter, Flunked, Fearless Felines, Fledgling, Finder, Five Children and It, Future of Science is Female, Flight 3, Fold, Frankie Pickle and the Closet of Doom, Flight 4, Fugitive Telemetry, From the Desk of Zoe Washington, Faithless in Death, Flamer, Fake Dating the Prince, Fighting Words, From Scratch, Finna, Forever Strong, Future Home of the Living God, Fires of the Faithful, For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf, Field Guide to Getting Lost, From a Whisper to a Rallying Cry, Furia, Forgotten in Death, Fearing the Black Body

G: Great and Terrible Quest, General Theory of Love, Goblin Emperor X 2, Golden Leopard, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen, Galactic Derelict, Game of Cages, (George), Giant Pumpkin Suite, Ghosts Unveiled, The Gown, Grimoire Noir, Guardians of Liberty, Give All to Love, Games of Deception, Go With the Flow, Garden Museum Heist, Goblin Emperor, Gator Bait, Girl Who Drank the Moon, Gardens of the Moon, Galaxy and the Ground Within, Ghost Talkers, Good Kind of Trouble, Good Neighbors (Kin Kith Kind), Good Talk, Gift of the Magpie, The Guenevere Deception

H: Heart of a Woman, Heart of Steel, Horizon, How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy, How to Tell if Your Cat Is Trying to Kill You, Howl's Moving Castle, Hild, Havoc, Here Lies the Librarian, Hunting Ground, Harmful to Minors, Heavy, Honeybee, How We Got to the Moon, Her Naughty Holiday, History Smashers: The Mayflower, History Smashers: Women's Right to Vote, Hopeful Heart, How Oliver Olson Changed the World, House in the Cerulean Sea, The Hobbit, A Handful of Earth A Handful of Sky, High Cotton, Hidden Land, How to Raise an Honest Rabbit, Harrow the Ninth, Handling Depression, His Pretend Amish Bride

I: If I'm Jewish and You're Christian What Are the Kids?, I Lived on Butterfly Hill, I Could Do Anything, In the Black, Iron Kissed, I Go By Sea I Go By Land, Innocent,  Into the Fire, It's Trevor Noah, The Illustrated A Brief History of Time, Into the Deep, In the Dream House, Indian Removal Act and the Trail of Tears, Into The Volcano, Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, In the Red, I never saw another butterfly, In the Forest of Forgetting, In Bibi's Kitchen, In the Shadow of the Moon, Inheritance of Orquidea Divina

J: The Jury, The Just City, Julie of the Wolves, Judgment Day, Jubilee, Jane Against the World, John Lewis, Jukebox

K: The King's Name, Keep Me Forever, Knight-napped, King and Joker, Kenilworth, Kiss Number 8, Kat & Mouse 2-4, Kobe Bryant, Kiyo Sato, King and the Dragonflies, Knot of Shadows, Kiki Killari Breaks a Kingdom
L: Love Bites (My Sister the Vampire), Let's Pretend This Never Happened, Lost Enchantment, Last Holiday Concert, Lumberjanes, Laura's Wolf, Lock In, Little Plum, Liaden Universe Constellation Vol 3, The Long WInter, Little House In the Big Woods, Last Mirror on the Left, Lifting As We Climb, Lady's Code of Misconduct, Laika, Laura Ingalls Wilder Companion, Long Time Until Now, Lizzie Borden Ax Murders, Land of the Cranes, Life Sucks, Louisiana Longshot, Last Emperox, Last Dragon, Lost Orphan, Longer Fall, LGBTQ Rights & Activism, Last Witnesses, Light From Uncommon Stars
M: My Real Children, Matilda, Matter for Men, Mouse Called Wolf, The Martian, Mercenary Instincts, Midnight Crossroad, Midnight Blue, Mystic and Rider, Moon Called, Moonshiner's Son, The Marvels, Mira's Last Dance, Mrs. Pollifax On Safari, Meg Jo Beth & Amy, Minor Mage, Me and White Supremacy, Miscalculations of Lightning Girl, Marshmallow S'more Murder, More Than Friends, Mating the Huntress, More than Marmalade, My Name is Tani...and I Believe in MIracles, March Fong Eu, Many Lives of Eddie Rickenbacker, Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane, Marriage Race and the Law,  Marrow Thieves, Maybelle Goes to Tea, Murders of Tupac and Biggie, MIdnight Sun, Manson Family Murders, Medical Apartheid, Murder in Time, Minn of the Mississippi, Murder at Veronica's Diner, Murder Must Advertise, Meltdown, Monster and Boy, Monster's First Day of School, Maze Runner

N: Nory Ryan's Song, (Night Broken), NERDS, Nine Princes in Amber, The New Queer Conscience, Normal, Nightshades, Network Effect, Not So Normal Norbert, Northanger Abbey, Nickel Boys, Nine Tailors, Nos4a2, Neogenesis, Notes from a Young Black Chef, Navigating Minefields, Never Fall For Your Fiance

O: One Week Girlfriend, Old Men at Midnight, Bone 1: Out of Boneville, October Country, Over Sea Under Stone, 101 Famous Poems, The Ordeal of Change, One False Note, Out of the Cold, Out of Tune, Ordinary Hazards, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous, Out of the Blue, On the Horizon, Outlaw, One Giant Leap, O J Simpson Murder Case, Outbreak, One Perfect Kiss, One Good Deed

P: The Prize in the Game, Perdition, Pickwick Papers, Paddington At Large, Penric's Demon, Plague of Doves, Prisoner, Parallax, Penric and the Shaman, Project Elfhome, Penric's Mission, Penric's Fox, The Price of Meat, Parasite, Parable of the Sower, Polaris, Paladin's Grace, Proper English, Paladin's Grace, Poisoned Water, Plasticus Maritamus, Puffin Plan, Plain Janes, La Perdida, Punching the Air, Parable of the Sower Graphic Novel, Piranesi, Playing With Fire, Paladin of Souls, Paladin's Strength, Persephone Station, Patience & Esther, Pleasant Profession of Robert A Heinlein, Pucker, Police Defunding and Reform, Paladin's Hope, Punching Bag, Power of Style, Princess for Christmas, Perks of Being a Wallflower

Q: Quatrain, Quantum Universe

R: The Robe of Skulls, Return of Tarzan, Raven Boys, Radio Fifth Grade, Rogue, Return of Santa Paws, Royal Airs, Rob Roy, Republic, Ruins of Karzelek, River Marked, The Rancher's Lady, Rebel, Rare Encounters With Ordinary Birds, Reunion in Death, Reaching for the Moon, Radium Girls, Rise and Fall of Charles Lindbergh, Return of the Thief, Runaway Princess, Rhinos!, Reckless, Rival Magic, Rattle His Bones, Riot Baby, Ruthless Lady's Guide to Wizardry, Ring Shout, Russian Cage, Raven Black, Race Against Time, Running on Empty, Red Madness, Rat Race, Rebellious Life of Rosa Parks, Reading and Learning to Read, Real Thing

S: The Second Spy, Shadows, Son of Neptune, Shadows and Dreams, Santa Paws to the Rescue, Sackett Brand, A Stranger's Gift, A Secret Soldier, Shades of Milk and Honey, Spilling Clarence, Starry River in the Sky, Star Nomad, Star Trek 2, Songs of the Gorilla Nation, Steal the Dragon, Sweep in Peace, Someone to Remember, Superheroes (Amelia Rules), Secret of Chimneys, Some Were in Time, Sorcerer of the Wildeeps, Stamped, Slippery Creatures, Surviving the City, Skylark and Wallcreeper, Sporting Chance, The Sugared Game, Sky Gazing, She Represents, Surviving the Angel of Death, Star-Spangled,  Sunset of the Sabertooth, Shadows In Death, Spies Lies and Disguise, Stolen Justice, Storm Cursed, Sal and Gabi Break the Universe, Sofia Valdez and the Vanishing Vote, Sucker Punch, Swordheart, Silver in the Wood, Superman Smashes the Klan, Stonekeeper's Curse, Someplace to Be Flying, Switchback, Son of Sam Killings, Stars Beyond, Secret Country, Something That May Shock or Discredit You, Snapdragon, Show Me a Sign, Stowed Away, Sunshine, Shadowghast, Secrets of Star Whales, Subtle Blood, Secret Garden (Graphic Novel), Switchback, Sia Martinez and the Moonlit Beginning of Everything, Singled Out, Shout of Honor, Straight

T: Tarzan of the Apes, Thousand Pieces of Gold, Tinker, Tell the Wind and Fire, The Time Traders The Thirteenth Unicorn, The Time Machine, Touching My Father's Soul, Three on the Run, The Three-Body Problem, The Twisted Path, Tinker, Tooth and Claw, To Dance, The Tree that Time Built, This Book Is Anti-Racist, This Promise of Change, That Can Be Arranged, Thousand Beginnings and Endings, The Talk, Tracking Pythons, They Called Us Enemy, Trash, Tender Morsels, This Is Your Brain on Stereotypes, Throw Like a Girl Cheer Like a Boy, This Place, Teacher Torture, Take a Hint Dani Brown, Taking on the Plastics Crisis, Tale Dark and Grimm, Talisman Ring, Tempest, Two Rogues Make a Right, Twelfth Night, Temporary, Three Shadows, Thirteens, Thousand Darknesses, Thursday Murder Club, To the Hilt, Twisted Ones, They Better Call Me Sugar, Take Up Thy Bed and Walk, Thrill Seekers, Taste of Blackberries, Tuck Everlasting

U: Unspoken. Untold, Ultra, Uprooted, Uncovering You: Contract, Under the Same Stars, Under the Egg, Unspoken Name, Unexpected Mrs Pollifax, Uprooted, Uncompromising Honor, Under the Eye of the Storm, Unbelonging

V: Vanguard, Voices of Young Heroes, Vanishing Half, Vanished Seas, Vulva Owner's Manual on Birth Control. Valley of the Shadow

W: Who Stole Grandma's Million-Dollar Pumpkin Pie?, Welcome to the Ark, War for the Oaks, We Are Not Eaten By Yaks, World Outside, Wide Open, Why Pro-Life?, What the Dormouse Said, Wildflower, Wrong Way Around Magic, Waiting For the Party, Whisper of Magic, White Night, World of Ptavvs, Water: Tales of Elemental Spirits, The War that Saved My Life, When Demons Walk, Wood Sprites, Wolf Who Rules, Wrinkle in Time, The Warden, We Are Power, Wind Gourd of La'amaomao, We Had To Be Brave, Who Gives a Poop, Women Win the Vote. Walk Toward the Rising Sun, Wolfpack (YA), Wolf Rebel, The War That Saved My Life, What the Eagle Sees, Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking, Winter's Orbit, Walk Two Moons, Wild Sign, Who Killed Jimmy Olsen, Wonder, White Bird, When Stars Are Scattered, When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain, Whim of the Dragon, Witness for the Dead, A Wish in the Dark, What Fresh Hell Is This, We Are Not Broken, Wish

X

Y: Yonder Comes the Other End of Time, Yes Please, Your Own Sylvia, You Call This Democracy?, Youth to Power, You Too?, Yotsuba& 4, You Bring Me the Ocean, Yang the Youngest and His Terrible Ear, You'll Never Believe What Happened to Lacey, You Should See Me in a Crown, Year of Wonders, You Can't Say That, You Don't Have to Be Everything

Z The Zodiac Killer

25/26:  X  

Zee End: American Indian Stories, Legends, and Other Writings

I received American Indian Stories, Legends, and Other Writings (Penguin Classics) as a gift a few summers ago, so I put it on my to-read pile, where it was promptly buried by an avalanche. Lucky for me the A-Z Challenge forced me to retrieve it, as the author, Zitkala-Sa, finished off my challenge nicely.

Zitkala was a Lakata who went to a government Indian school in the late 19th century at the age of eight, and spent the rest of her life mediating between her tribe and white society. When back home she felt isolated and different, but white acceptance came only as she validated their beliefs. The first half of the book is her autobiographical sketches, and the purple prose made them hard to take seriously. They were written to be published in literary magazines, and the style changes of the past century are huge. But the last part are stories from legends and events, and in them I can suspend belief and just enjoy the vivid images and strong portrayals of character and place.  B-

Zippidee-Do-Dah: Clover Twig and the Magical Cottage

Having panicked about the state of my A-Z challenge, I raced to the library and searched for my missing books. For reasons of both inclination and practicality I started in the kids' section, which gave me my missing "U" author: Kaye Umansky. Clover Twig and the Magical Cottage is an old-fashioned story about kids handling magic with aplomb and grace, with little angst or emotional peril. Physical peril is all right, what with the bad witches cottage-napping the flying domicile, and dungeons, and general clumsiness. It was fun an interesting, and I'll see if my nine year old wants a look. 

I Don't Want a Bad Romance: Siren's Call

I chose Siren's Call: A Dark Tides Novel by Devyn Quinn from the Q shelf so I can swoop on through the last letters of the Alphabet Challenge, but it was hard to finish.  The romance was annoying in that the main obstacles between the characters were 1) they had no reason to like each other and 2) her ex boyfriend (whom everyone hated) shows up, so the new boyfriend sinks all his money into a partnership with him.

The writing had a bad habit of telling rather than showing, and often telling the opposite of what it was showing.  I shall invent some lines to describe what I mean: "She looked at him uncertainly.  Although she had never been comfortable with men, this one left her hesitant, unsure what she wanted to say or do. She said, 'Take off all your clothes so we can have sex right now.'"

To make matters more annoying, the science fiction aspects had me banging my head against any sturdy surface.  She's a mermaid, he's a rich handyman, and her ex-boyfriend is a treacherous scientist, so they all join together in a archaeological dive looking for traces of mermaid civilization.  She swims down to an ancient temple and accidentally summons the two men to this underwater site.  No one worries how they are going to get the air-breathers out because obviously the most immediate concern is to start excavating what looks like a tomb but is actually a portal to the mermaid dimension.  Sadly, the mermaids in that dimension are mostly mean types who want to take over our world with their super-powered magic ray guns.  The only way to stop them seems to be for our heroine to cross back to the bad dimension, but that would interfere with her new wedding plans so it's not really an option.  The end!  D-.

On the other hand, my twelve year old quite liked it.  He read from the discovery of the portal, because he came to ask why I was beating my head on the side of the car.  He did have to skip the sex parts, but since they are completely divorced from anything happening to the plot or characters, that wasn't hard.  (Oh no, they got thrown in a bare cell.  Time to have sex for several pages before the mermaid can remember some more previously unmentioned powers.)  He gave it a B.

More Lies My Teacher Told Me: The Wordy Shipmates

I've had Sarah Vowell on my reading list ever since reading Nick Hornby's reading reviews, and the need for a "V" author propelled her up the stack. The Wordy Shipmateslooks at the early years of the Puritan settlements in America, reading the diaries of Winthrop, Williams, and others to see what they thought as well as what they did. Vowell doesn't hesitate to make judgements or call even her favorite players on inconsistency, but she also shows a hearty respect for the people involved.

It's definitely a second order book; it helps to have a good idea of the general sweep of the history, because she tends to focus in on specific events and people. I enjoyed the history lesson with the spoonful of humor to make it tasty.  B+

Peaceful Adventures: Sky Burial

I'm now in the mad rush to finish the A-Z challenge, which I've been ignoring.  So I went to the library and hunted up books for the authors I am missing, which was a fun way to choose my reading.  For X, I had slim pickings, but I'm pleased with my choice: Sky Burial: An Epic Love Story of Tibet, by Xinran.

All the books I've read that were translated from Chinese give me a sense of distance and calm, which I'm coming to associate with Chinese literature.  I have no idea whether the books read this way in the original, but I hope I'm getting a sense of the real story.  In this case, that effect is heightened by the many stories-within stories -- the frame of the book seems to be Xinran, but I'm not sure of that, and the book itself concerns itself with a woman's life story as told to her, which includes many of the stories of the people she meets.

The cover proclaims the book to be "an epic love story of Tibet" which I misunderstood as a romance between the narrator and her husband, but is really the love between Tibet and its inhabitants.  Shu Wen's husband is lost during the Tibet-Chinese war in the 1950's, but Wen hopes he may not be dead and goes to Tibet to looks for him. She suffers various misadventures in her first year, and is adopted by a wandering family. Thirty years later she continues her search.  In between and during the final search she learns to love the land and its religion, as well as the people she finds.

I know almost nothing of the conflict between China and Tibet, so I was as much in the dark as the rural people who barely know of the existence of China. And the distance of the text lulled me into a gentle read, so that I was a bit astonished to realize thirty years had gone by in the mountains. An interesting and lyrical story that I'm glad I stumbled into.  B+

Jumping Jellybeans: Jack of Clubs

Barbara Metzger loves to play with words, making jokes and twists with almost every sentence.  It's fun to read her books, which are mostly historical romances playing in the Regency.  But the setting in Jack of Clubs is so fragile that it's hard to keep the gossamer plot alive.  Even the characters don't seem to believe in their world, so their problems aren't big enough even to giggle at.

It's a fun book at the sentence level, but doesn't work at any scale bigger than that.  C-

Careful Prose: Never Less Than a Lady

Although I enjoy Mary Jo Putney's books and seek them out rather quickly, there is always a considerable distance between me and the characters. Her newest book, Never Less Than A Lady (Lost Lords), was no exception. I liked the characters -- Julia, who has been hiding from her life as high-ranking but abused lady of society, and Alexander, a romantic lover of chivalry who is ready to quit the army and settle down, if he can find a cause that is just. I liked the plot -- they meet, decide to marry to help each other (and because they have a lot of mutual friends), and then they confront their fears of a permanent relationship and their scars from previous bad times, as well as trusting in their growing affection.

The book follows Loving a Lost Lord (where their friends met), but I don't think you need to read that one to enjoy this one. What kept me from fully investing in the characters? For one thing, their attitudes and assumptions seemed very modern. While they understood the expectations of their Regency environment, they always seemed to find it antiquated, almost quaint. They talk seriously about psychological issues in ways that didn't really ring true, although it kept the plot moving along. And the sexual problems melted away amazingly quickly -- when they marry, Julia isn't sure she can ever touch a man again, after her brutal treatment by her first husband. But in a week or so she is ready to show off the sophisticated skills she learned from him. Admittedly this made the book much more readable (what kind of romance keeps the main couple from coupling for hundreds of pages?) but it was at a loss of credibility.

Still, I got what I expected -- those are known issues with most Putney books, which is one reason I prefer her books with a touch of magic -- if it's obviously an alternative universe, the transplanted modern people don't seem so out of place. I'll still read her next book in this series. I'm probably more enthusiastic than I sound -- I find my ratings go down a lot when I stay up too late to review things. B-

Essays on Love: Marriage and Other Acts of Charity

The gentle and loving essays in Kate Braestrups's Marriage and Other Acts of Charity were a calm and encouraging oasis in my reading life. Although she doesn't skimp on the awfulness of the rough years of her first marriage, she concentrates on the benefits to everyone when adults treat each other with respect and love. Or at least try to, since as a minister she notices how frequently she fails. The marriages covered in the book include her first, with its hard times and then more joyful years until her husband dies, her second, involving middle aged lovers instead of young idiots, two marriages of her co-workers, one just beginning and one trying to tear itself apart, and glancingly, her parents and other family and friends that she encounters.

It's not a paean to the bliss of the married state, but an examination of the joy and work that family entails. I'll probably look for other works by her; her other memoir concentrates even more on her job as a game warden chaplain, I think. B+

This was supposed to be my "M" book, but I'm two weeks late. And it's not looking good for the letter "O" either.

Friends and Enemies: Free Fire (F Day!)

Today is Reading on the Beach's A-Z Wednesday, with F the starring letter. Every week bloggers are invited to spotlight a book starting with the letter of the week. You show the cover, tell the title, give a synopsis, and post a link. Just to be annoying, I like to actually read (sometimes just finish) the book on that day, so I include my little review. Makes things more interesting. Then I sign up on her page to see what everyone else came up with.

Last week I missed posting about my E book, because my internet started dying whenever I walked near with a book. I read Enemy Spy, a Shredderman series book by Wendelin Van Draanen. I know you were worried about it.

Today I finished Free Fire, a Joe Pickett book by C.J. Box. This seems to be a mystery series about a game warden up near Yellowstone (actually in Yellowstone for this book), and I picked it as part of my personal goal to read a book off every shelf in the local library. Which has just become the 2nd closest library, so I may restart this challenge closer to home. Anyway, so far I'm really enjoying the books I'm finding this way, especially the ones I wouldn't have ordinarily come across. Box builds the suspense slowly with the story of the small town lawyer who noticed that a quirk of law made a small section of the park a legal free zone, where no laws could apply. Not even murder. Meanwhile Pickett struggles with his new life since his dismissal from the state park service, until he gets a strange offer back in. The danger mounts but attention is also paid to family, new and old, and friendship. Betrayals and injustice sneak in from above and below the law, while true friendship and courage really shine. I'll probably try to pick up some more of these, although I seem to have started with the seventh so I'm not sure whether to go forward or back. B+

Duelling Dragons: Dragon Spear on D Day

Today is Reading on the Beach's A-Z Wednesday, with D the starring letter. Every week bloggers are invited to spotlight a book starting with the letter of the week. You show the cover, tell the title, give a synopsis, and post a link. Just to be annoying, I like to actually read (sometimes just finish) the book on that day, so I include my little review. Makes things more interesting. Then I sign up on her page to see what everyone else came up with.

This week is complicated by my need to read the stuff due tomorrow, but I found Dragon Spear, a children's book already started, as the perfect filler. It was good timing because some of my other books were about to get very depressing.

Dragon Spear is the third book in Jessica Day George's dragon setting, and it fits nicely with the others. Creel is the spunky seamstress who befriends the dragons; she alternates working on her wedding dress with helping the dragons deal with kidnapping and empire building from a splinter group of runty dragons. She occasionally does something silly (stops to tie her shoe while on a secret mission, and gets separate from her raiding party) but generally manages to get herself out of her fixes. There's no deep after glow, but a pleasant adventure story, garnished with some sewing challenges that get as much respect as any other subplot. It's fun to have a hero who doesn't start off by condemning sewing as boring. And I like the idea of somebody named George writing books about friendly dragons. B

Cute and Sad: The Clue of the Linoleum Lederhosen

Today is Reading on the Beach's A-Z Wednesday, with C the starring letter. Every week bloggers are invited to spotlight a book starting with the letter of the week. You show the cover, tell the title, give a synopsis, and post a link. Just to be annoying, I like to actually read (sometimes just finish) the book on that day, so I include my little review. Makes things more interesting. Then I sign up on her page to see what everyone else came up with.

This is a special week for me, because I think I started with the letter C. So I've come full circle. My kids are also now starting to play along, although sometimes they forget. So X has nothing this week, but P and I frantically rampaged around our picture books after piano lessons and came up with precious little. We only had fifteen minutes to read (P also believes in reading the text) so our options were limited. We looked at A Child's Garden of Verses, but only had time to read a couple (which P found much less painful than expected). But we also found Curious George's Are You Curious, an abridged board book featuring some scenes from the life of the monkey. P's review: Boring, but fast to read. The rhymes are lame.

My book was chosen because it's been out from the library the longest, and it is also short. M.T. Anderson writes edgy YA books which I keep meaning to read and also has a wacky middle school series floating along. X checked out

The Clue of the Linoleum Lederhosen, the second in a series involving kid superheroes and Lily, a would-be regular kid. The series satirises mystery series such as Nancy Drew, Hardy Boys, and the Boxcar Children, featuring a Tom Swift like boy inventor and a zombie fighting girl, along with regular kid Lily. They stumble into an old-fashioned luxury inn with wacky characters, including many other heroes of books series. There are Lemony Snicket like asides and authorial comments, but what I found most interesting were the occasional dips into real pathos. Kate, the zombie fighter, wrestles with a desire for a real life, which become more poignant later when the real fate of action heroes is revealed. She's trapped forever (or for the duration of her books' success) at her current age. In between the slapstick gags, that's a real tragedy. B (X liked this one a lot, but I didn't ask him if he also found it sad between the jokes.)

Bonded for Life: Black Angels

Today is Reading on the Beach's A-Z Wednesday, with B the starring letter. Every week bloggers are invited to spotlight a book starting with the letter of the week. You show the cover, tell the title, give a synopsis, and post a link. Just to be annoying, I like to actually read (sometimes just finish) the book on that day, so I include my little review. Makes things more interesting. Sadly, none of the library books that are due tomorrow begin with a B, so I kept trying to read two books at once. But I finished one. Now I'll sign up on her page to see what everyone else came up with.

I found Linda Beatrice Brown's Black Angels in my library pile, so I promoted it to the top (there was at least one other, but I had no hope of finishing it in a day, seeing as I'm also reading 65% of Kingsolver's Lacuna today). Set in the middle of the American Civil War, it follows three orphans about the age of my children as they stumble across each other and try to survive. I suddenly find myself trying to substitute in my kids in children's books I read, both as a sanity test for the books and to see how my kids are doing compared to these fictional types.

Luke, the twelve year old (in the book, not my house) escapes from slavery because he wants to join the Union army. He misses the meeting and heads north on his own, finding Daylily, nine (hmm, right about my youngest's age) who didn't so much escape as find herself adrift after unspecified soldiers attack her home. And the youngest, Caswell, matches up with my nephew at seven. Caswell is white, lost in the woods after union soldiers burn his house and all the neighbors. The children come together because the dark is too big for any of them, although it takes a while for Caswell to fit in. They find various refuges, from caves that shelter them for an evening to generous adults who try to add them to a family.

Interestingly, the last third of the book splits them up. They promise to reunite in ten years; Luke joins the army as a messenger, Daylily and Caswell are adopted by a black family until Caswell's father finally finds him and, horrified, yanks him out of the hands of the despised ex-slaves. Brown skims over the children's lives for the next decade, watching Daylily become a teacher, Luke working for true freedom and fairness, and Caswell refusing to accept his father's racism and deciding to enter a seminary. The last chapter finds them all making their rendezvous, relieved to find their family ties still strong.

The first part of the book is the strongest, as the children battle for survival, forge their friendship, and confront challenges that stretch them to their limits. But seeing the last section as an extended epilogue kept me happy -- it was interesting to see how their lives were shaped, and for a kids book, I appreciated the author grounding the book in what was possible and what was happening. I'll offer it to my kids, although the cover is a bit different than their usual fair; the children are paused, waiting for action, instead of leaping about doing something, preferably with dragons.

Queen Nerd and the Cripple: Are You Alone on Purpose?

Today is Reading on the Beach's A-Z Wednesday, with A the starring letter. We're starting over! Although I didn't start with A, so it wasn't a complete cycle. Every week bloggers are invited to spotlight a book starting with the letter of the week. You show the cover, tell the title, give a synopsis, and post a link. Just to be annoying, I like to actually read (sometimes just finish) the book on that day, so I include my little review. I pretend it makes things more interesting. It often makes my day more hectic, and I frantically read while walking through halls or while waiting for automatic doors to open or any other spare seconds I find. Then I sign up on her page to see what everyone else came up with.

This week I challenged my kids to play along. Their selections and comments were:

• Astronaut Handbook, Megan McCarthy. If you were planning to use it to actually train to be an astronaut, you should give it to your worst enemy. It doesn't really give much information on astronaution. It might be good for second graders. (P)
• Asterix Omnibus 1, Rene Goscinny & Albert Uderzo. It's a good graphic novel but the speech seems a bit misplaced. It is very funny. I recommend it for people of all ages. (X)

My book was Nancy Werlin's Are You Alone on Purpose?, a YA issue book. Alison has a problem -- her twin brother Adam has autism,

and somehow she has been relegated to the family role of Normal, Successful daughter, something she finds stifling. Harry also has a problem. At first his problem is that he's a bullying jerk mourning the death of his mother, but soon his bigger problem is that an accident left him paralyzed from the waist down. The two come together and help each other deal with their problems. It's a solid, well put together story, but never breaks free of the constraints of the young YA issue book. Alison is a finely drawn intellectual girl, but looking back it is hard to see what she values in Harry; his development is mostly interior and his outward behavior doesn't deserve that much loyalty. Oh well, one of the points is that emotions are complicated. Still, Werlin has written better books; I'm guessing it was an earlier effort (yes, from 1994). B-

Vile Village: Wednesday is Double V

Today is Reading on the Beach's A-Z Wednesday, with V the starring letter. I meant to read Vanished, by Kat Richardson, the fourth book in the Greywalker series, but life intervened. As I was chivvying the boys into bed, I realized I was on page 50 and doomed, so I jumped ship onto Lemony Snicket's seventh book, The Vile Village.

By the way, the challenge isn't actually to read the book in a day; that's my own goofy implementation. It's just to highlight a book, show the picture and give a synopsis. But that's not hard enough for me...

Fans of the series know what to expect -- doom, gloom, and a lot of vocabulary asides. The three orphans find themselves the wards of a village of nasty crow-lovers, who want the kids to do all the chores so they have more time to torch rule-breakers. Count Olaf lurks in the background, and the two lost triplets are crying out for help.

I knew which way things were going before every twist, but the story isn't about the route, it's about the scenery along the way. And don't think that the characters don't mature and grow -- Sunny especially makes great strides in this book. I can't read two of these too closely together, so I'll continue my slow progress through the series. B

A-Z Challenge

Becky is hosting an A-Z Reading Challenge, and I'm signing up. I'm hoping to just accidentally read most of what I need; I am doing A-Z Wednesdays, after all. To raise the stakes, I'm trying to do the challenge at the 52 book level, with 26 titles and 26 authors. Since I read a lot of kidlit, this seems reasonable -- picture books count. I definitely don't have a list of books ready, so I'll keep a list running and fill in (and shift about) as needed.

Here are the rules:

~ align the author's last name or the title of a book (excluding "the", "a", etc.) with its corresponding letter in the alphabet

~ enter a different book for each author and title (total of 52 books)

~ complete the alphabet lists anyway that suits your fancy

(i.e.: complete each list separately in alphabetical order, read both "A" entries, then "B" entries, fit whatever you're reading into either list, etc.)

~ complete the challenge in the year 2010

~ enjoy the experience!

So, here are the letters, and I'll be filling them in with my books:

Titles

A: Are You Alone on Purpose, Nancy Werlin
B: Black Angels, Linda Beatrice Brown
C: Countdown to Summer, J. Patrick Lewis
D: Dragon Spear, Jessica Day George
E: The Eternal Kiss, Trisha Telep, ed.
F: The First Part Last, Angela Johnson
G: Game of Cages, Harry Connolly
H: How To Teach Physics To Your Dog, Chad Orzel
I: Irreligion, John Allen Paulos
J: Jack of Clubs, Barbara Metzger
K: Kindred in Death, by J. D. Robb
L: A Local Habitation, Seanan McGuire
M: Marriage and Other Acts of Charity, Kate Braestrup
N: Never Less Than a Lady, Mary Jo Putney
O: Oath of Fealty, Elizabeth Moon
P: Powers, Ursula K. Le Guin
Q: Quirky Yes, Hopeless No, Cynthia La Bria Norall
R: Roar, Emma Clayton
S: Soulless, by Gail Carriger
T: Tongues of Serpents, Noami Novik
U: Unwind, Neal Shusterman
V: Vile Village, by Lemony Snicket
W: Wanting Mor, by Rukhsana Khan
X: X-Men: Watchers On the Walls, by Christopher Bennett
Y: You Had Me At Goodbye, Jane Blackwood
Z: Zen in the Art of Archery, Eugen Herrigal

Authors:
A: Kelly Armstrong, Exit Strategy
B: Christopher Buckley, Supreme Courtship
C: Kristin Cashore, Fire
D: David Drake, When the Tide Rises
E: Rafe Esquith, Lighting Their Fires
F: Jerramy Fine, Someday My Prince Will Come

G: Neil Gaiman, American Gods
H: Mary Downing Hawn, Deep and Dark and Dangerous,
I: Kazuo Ishiguro, Noctures: Five Stories of Music and Nightfall
J: P.D. James. The Private Patient.
K: Jon Krakauer: Where Men Win Glory
L: Grace Lin, Where the Mountain Meets the Moon
M: Leonard Mlodonow: The Drunkard's Walk
N: Patrick Ness, Knife of Never Letting Go
O: Anne Osterlund, Academy 7
P: Arturo Perez-Reverte, Captain Alatriste
Q: Devyn Quinn: Siren's Call
R: Kat Richardson: Vanished
S: Maria Snyder, Sea Glass
T: Megan Whelan Turner, Conspiracy of Kings
U: Kaye Umansky: Clover Twig and the Flying Cottage
V: Sarah Vowell, The Wordy Shipmates
W: Diana Welch, (with siblings Amanda, Liz, & Dan), The Kids Are All Right
X: Xinran, Sky Burial
Y: Lisa Yee, So Totally Emily Ebers
Z: Zitkala-Sa, Indian Stories, Legends, and Other Writings

OK, December, and I finished off the titles.  Now to fill in those last pesky authors.

Wanting Mor: Hard Times in Afghanistan

Rukhsana Khan's Wanting Mor's front jacket promised a journey of unremitting misery. It's not enough that the narrator, Jameela, loses her extended family to an American bombing raid, or that her mother dies of illness, or that her dad is a boozing loser. She also has a cleft lip. So it was with considerable trepidation that I opened the first page of this book, expecting an educational lesson in how bad life can get.

Khan's touch is much more deft than that though. Yes, Jameela's life is unimaginably hard compared to the cushy lives of my kids, but she doesn't see herself as a victim. Her voice is authentic and hopeful, striving to follow her ideals and her mother's code but not always succeeding. Her commitment to Islam rings true, as do her attempts to honor her father even when it's painfully obvious that he doesn't deserve it. I really enjoyed this book, and I'll look around to see if Khan has other books available. The dangers and heartbreak of war show clearly, but so does Jameela's individuality and strength of spirit. A-.

Challenges: Well, I feel quite accomplished. This book starts off the 100 Books Challenge, the A-Z Challenge, Support Your Library Challenge, Take Another Chance Challenge (#5), and the Young Reader Challenge. I'll come back and edit those as links when I get the challenge posts up.