Some People

I am not sure if more people are like Maggie or not like Maggie.  I think if we have the answer to that life would be a lot easier.  This book just completely messed with my understanding of morality and how I think (or thought) people see right and wrong.  This is How I Lied was pretty terrible regardless. 

I don't know...

I am feeling a little sad about John Sandford lately.  Extreme Prey is #26 in the Lucas Davenport series that I have loved from the start.  Okay.  Now I am feeling a little better!  I just read that there is a Virgil Flowers book coming out this year!  There wasn't one last year and that made me SUPER sad.  I thought that maybe Flowers was all done.
Sandford has made his way into the YA fiction gang with the series Singular Menace that he has written with Michelle Cook.  I couldn't get into it, but I will probably try again.  He also wrote Saturn Run last year, that came out when Virgil usually does, which is what scared me.  He wrote that with Ctein. I don't know who Ctein is, but I wonder if, in the science fiction world, Ctein is like Elvis or Dolly or Judy.  Oh wait!  Ctein is a photographer!  So I really don't want to listen to Saturn Run, I will have to read it!
Anyway...there is more political intrigue in Extreme Prey, which has been in some Lucas books and I wondered if he was taking Lucas in this direction.  I wasn't sure how I, personally, would like that, because I am not a political thriller kind of reader.  Not to say that they wouldn't be good!  It just isn't my thing.  But then, the end of Extreme has a REALLY good new direction for Lucas and I am SUPER excited about it.  Especially now that I know that Virgil is back, too.

I'll Fly Away....

Another great song.  Bird was a pretty beautiful book.  I was listening to it at the same time that I was reading Nightingale's Nest though, and that was a pretty dumb thing to do for me.   Both books are beautiful and powerful and really should have been given their own time in my mind and imagination.  I gave four stars to Bird but now that I look back on it, I think I am going to change it.  There is a lot going on here.  Grief.  Culture.  Intergenerational stuff.  This was a heavy, beautiful book.  Yes, I am going to change it to five stars.
Jewel is of Mexican and Jamaican descent and that figures into the story.
One thing I just can't believe about Bird is that this is Crystal Chan's first book.  Unreal.  Now I know that she probably has been writing for a long time.  But man, a first time author putting out a beauty like this?  If 2015 isn't 1954, Bird will be named as an Honor for sure.  Oh, also, I have to say I loved, loved, loved, loved Jewel's dad and her grandfather.  Chan really knows how to paint a soul with words.  Excellent.

A new state!

On my trip to Minneapolis went through a new state!  Iowa!  And so while I was there, I needed to listen to a book set in Iowa and I came across Grasshopper Jungle.  Wow!  What a find!
Somewhere I read this book as being described as one that takes on real-world problems in a Science Fiction setting.  No one could describe it any better.  This book is pretty darn wild.  Not for everyone, that is for sure.  But I did enjoy it a lot. I don't think I ever would have made it through, reading it, but listening to it was very enjoyable.
Yes, it is about the end of the world.  Yes, it is about giant, indestructible grasshoppers.  But it is so much more.  It's also about Polish immigrants.  It's also about discovering one's sexuality.  It's also about poverty.  Small towns.  Wow, it is just about a LOT of stuff!  Bizarre.  But pretty brilliant, I think.   This is my first Andrew Smith book, but I will try another one, for sure.