The Great and the Terrible Series by Chris Stewart

This was a very interesting series. Now, I am not an LDS fiction reader, but this came highly recommended from a friend, and although I didn't love it, I'm not sorry I read it.  It's about a group of the noble and great spirits who make their way through life during the last days of the world.

Likes:  It really made me think about how Satan works (sort of put me in the same mindset as reading C.S. Lewis's "The Screwtape Letters"--only that's a completely different book--and such a good one--maybe I'll re-read it!).  The first book takes place in the author's rendition of the pre-existence, where you get to know the main characters of the series.  Good dialogue, good writing style, and the guy definitely knows his military stuff.

Dislikes:  It's definitely packed with action and a bit too much blood and gore for my taste.  I don't like reading about people's brains getting blown out, etc--maybe if I were a guy I would have liked it more.  Also, the whole adversary and devil's helpers thing started to scare me a bit.  And all the evil that leads up to the end of the world was just too much for me.  I'm afraid I did a lot of skimming through so I could get to the end and find out what happens.  The first and last books were my favorites.

If you are interested and want to know more, DeseretBook.com has a great review summing up the entire series.

Fablehaven series by Brandon Mull

Fablehaven: a magical preserve where frogs eat people, fairy's turn big, and goblins go to school. When Kendra and Seth go to their grandparents house for a week they see some pretty strange things. Will they ever get to the bottom of it? And will they ever see their grandma again? Fablehaven is a great series of books.

Roots by Alex Haley

"It begins with a birth in 1750, in an African village; it ends seven generations later at the Arkansas funeral of a black professor whose children are a teacher, a Navy architect, an assistant director of the U.S. Information Agency, and an author. The author is Alex Haley. This magnificent book is his."

So states the back cover write-up of this magnificent book--doesn't it just give you the chills?My good friend Taryn, when I told her I hadn't read it before, told me I simply had to read it. I had seen the TV series with I was little and remembered it as being quite troubling. But I think it deserves to be read.

As I read it, I thought so much of my own family history, of our nation's history, of resiliency of the human soul, and of the human need to pass on to our children the things that we know. After so much struggle, heartache, love, and perseverance, when I read the final chapter of the book where the author himself comes into the story, I couldn't hold back the tears. Life is truly beautiful!

*Disclaimer: You should know (and probably do) that this book deals quite graphically with slavery and all its horrors. There are brutal beatings and wicked slave masters . . . I won't go on, but there were a couple of parts I skimmed over. Yet I still feel it is such an important book that it's worth reading--if it wasn't, I probably wouldn't have posted it!

Bleak House by Charles Dickens

"What connexion can there have been between many people in the innumerable histories of this world, who, from opposite sides of great gulfs, have, nevertheless, been very curiously brought together!" (p. 220)

I have been reading Charles Dickens' books since long before I could fully appreciate them. Even though I didn't grasp the social commentary at a younger age, I have always loved the webs he weaves between and around his characters. By the end of each novel, everyone has had some influence on everyone else. The world seems a much smaller, more significant place after reading one of his works.

"His novels are full of energy and are teaming with life," says Andrew Davies, one of my favorite screenwriters (who incidentally did an incredible screen adaptation of this book) "I love the way he makes such a rich mixture of humour, tragedy, sentiment and social indignation. You get so many different things rolled up into one great book. He had such a vivid imagination and some of his characters are just extraordinary. Bleak House combines a terrific mystery with a series of love stores."

Dickens had a huge influence for good on society of the 1800's through his writing, and in this novel he focuses a great deal on the British Court of Chancery. Yet to me, the most interesting characters were those not directly involved with the "infamous" Chancery suit of Jarndyce and Jarndyce: I loved (and despised) Mrs. Jellyby, a woman intent on helping children a thousand miles away in Boorioboola-Gha, Africa, with several latch-key, unkempt children of her own. The married life of the sweet Bagnets, the "deportment" or Mr. Turveydrop, the awkward, muddling, good-hearted Mr. Guppy, and the poor street-sweep, Jo, were more interesting even than the main characters. This story is told from two completely different perspectives: chapters told by an all-knowing narrator who can see the end from the beginning (and drops several hints of it along the way), and the autobiographical chapters of Esther Summerson, the sweet and kind orphan girl who ends up blessing countless lives. His jumping back and forth between these two voices keeps the story interesting.

If you don't think you can handle the book (although you really should try!), you must at least watch the BBC version. Even those skeptical husbands out there (like my own) will like it for its mystery and suspense.

"The vast majority of the fastidious critics [of Dickens] have . . . never read Dickens at all; hence their opposition is due to and inspired by a hearty innocence which will certainly make them enthusiastic Dickensians if they ever, by some accident, happen to read him." -G. K. Chesterton

Jane Austen Mystery Series by Stephanie Barron

Jane Austen--I love all of her books, each one more than the one I previously read, because each improves upon reading.  But sometimes I'm a little disappointed that she didn't live just a tiny bit longer . . .

So for someone who loves Jane Austen as much as I do, this series is a perfect goldmine.  It has been a while since I read them, (and there are two I haven't read yet) but I was completely enchanted by them.  Stephanie Barron has studied and perfected the voice of Jane Austen.  Based on a fictional "diary" found in a manor house years after her death, these books are a sort of record of her life in between her novel writing and letters to her sister and other family members.  Each one centers around some kind of mystery, some involving murder.  Barron includes a lot of actual instances and facts from Austen's life, and you travel with her on her real-life journeys, so you feel like the mysteries could actually have happened . . .

As I recall, these books are clean enough for older teenage readers and definitely recommended for any and all Jane Austen-fan grown-ups like myself!

The Help by Kathryn Stockett

I love reading a book that I'm sorry to finish.  Usually books that fall into that category are the classics, like a good Jane Austen or Charles Dickens.  In fact, it used to be that I didn't trust modern writers to come up with anything half as good.  But I absolutely loved this book, in spite of its being a national bestseller (and it looks like they're making it into a movie).  It's just about perfect for a book club (luckily that's how I was introduced; I don't often read books unless they come highly recommended by people I trust!).

Set in Jackson, Mississippi, in the midst of the Civil Rights movement, surrounded by Jim Crow laws, lynchings, and all kinds of racial issues, this novel explores the lives of two types of women; the white women of "society" and the black "help" they employ.  Stockett unfolds the experiences of three strong women; Skeeter Phelan, a white girl raised on a plantation, and Aibileen and Minny, two maids to her white friends.

Kathryn Stockett writes this book from three different and distinct viewpoints, reminiscent of Barbara Kingsolver's style in The Poisonwood Bible.  I couldn't pinpoint one I looked forward to hearing from the most--each had a lovable personality and faults a-plenty.  Perhaps that's what makes this story was so real and human.

I must warn you that it does have some swearing; not every-other-word or anything, but enough to discourage me from ever hearing it on tape . . . and there is a chapter with a "flasher" (I don't know how to put it more delicately) that I thought could have been left out.  But I still think it's a beautiful story well worth reading.

Once Upon a Time: Before Midnight & The Storyteller's Daughter by Cameron Dokey

I find that I have to intersperse my heavy reading with lighter books so my brain doesn't start to hurt . . .  and this series was a perfect "'tweener."  It was recommended to me my my lovely sister-in-law, Amy (who has excellent taste in books).  The series has several titles, all of them retold fairy tales, and three or four of them are written by Cameron Dokey.  Now they aren't life-changing and tend to be a bit predictable (because of course we all know how the fairy tale ends, right?), but they are clean and fun--and who doesn't like a nice happy ending once in a while?

Before Midnight is a retelling of the Cinderella story.  There is an unusual twist on the father and step-mother relationship that makes it different from the familiar Disney version, and I really liked it.

Another title I read was The Storyteller's Daughter.  You'll find a lot of stories out there about Beauty & the Beast, Cinderella, etc., but you don't often hear about Sharazad, and I found her tale quite intriguing.

I would really recommend this series (hopefully all the others are as good!) for any preteen daughters you might have who are perhaps too caught up in vampire series books. . . .  You are safe with these, and they're still interesting and have enough romance (but not too much) to keep them reading.

The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place: The Mysterious Howling by Maryrose Wood

"All books are judged by their covers until they are read."

Such is the claim of Agatha Swanburn, founder of the Swanburn Academy for Poor Bright Females. The prize student from this school, Miss Penelope Lumley, is the governess and heroine of the story, and often refers to such "pithy kernels of truth," another being, "If it were easy to resist, it would not be called chocolate cake."

I tend to judge books by their covers. Even more so, I judge them by their "opening act"--the first page usually has to grab my attention and delight me, and this book was a winner on both counts. The cover has a macabre look to it, and the story was delightful. A young governess is sent to instruct three "incorrigible" children (which incidentally becomes their last name) on how to behave--but unfortunately they appear to have been raised by wolves, making her task difficult and hilarious. It was a sort of Jane Eyre for kids--minus Mr. Rochester and the romance--written with a voice not unlike a modern Jane Austen:

"As you may have already had cause to discover, a statement can be both completely true and completely misleading at the same time. This is called 'selective truth telling,' and it is frequently used in political campaigns, toy advertisements, and other forms of propaganda." (p. 166)

"If you have ever opened a can of worms, boxed yourself into a corner, ended up in hot water, or found yourself in a pretty pickle, you already know that life is rarely (if ever) just a bowl of cherries. It is far more likely to be a bowl of problems, worries, and difficulties. This is normal and you should not be alarmed." (p. 119)

Clean, fun, witty (and even mildly instructive about literature and poetry), this book makes a good read for young adults and adults alike. It has a cliffhanger ending, which luckily means there are more to come!

The Magician's Elephant by Kate DiCamillo

Lydia's Take: This is a very sad and happy book, all at the same time. What I mean by that is that it has a sad beginning and a happy ending.

Jessica's Take: Charming isn't a word I use very often--it seems to belong to a more Jane Austen-ish time. But it is just the word to describe this book (as well as The Tale of Despereaux, also by Kate DiCamillo). I think I read this in just one day, so it's definitely a quick read. Still, I enjoyed the style of prose she uses. She seems to leave out anything unnecessary, yet still keeps the charm (there's that word again . . . ) and carries you without your knowing it through a beautiful, sweet, touching story.


I was pleasantly surprised by the way she wove together the lives of seemingly unrelated characters. It was like reading Dickens (on a much smaller scale), and for me, that's really saying something.

Sarah's Quilt by Nancy E Turner

A sequel to These is My Words by Nancy E. Turner, Sarah's Quilt had so much that I loved in it. It changes the way you look at our easy life nowadays, as the main character goes through drought and loss of cattle, land, etc. If you have read and enjoyed the first book, I'm sure you'll like this one. I did think it was a bit unrealistic that so many major things happen in such a short amount of time, but it's still believable and very interesting to read. I can't decide if I liked this or the first one better; in the second, Sarah Prine has been through so much and has become an amazingly strong woman, but I think I liked her better young, bold, and naive. Still, this one was clean, and you can't argue with that! (If you're interested, here's a good review of the series.)