Always be a first rate version of yourself...: Rhode Island

What's Going On Here?

There are SO MANY wonderful book review blogs out there and I can't compete with them, that is for sure. So this is not a book review blog. This is just a way for me to organize what I have read so that I can be better at matching the right book to the right person. The blog title comes from the brilliant mind of the most talented woman who ever lived, Ms. Judy Garland. The full quote is, "Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of someone else." That is what I hope to do here and in ever aspect of my life.

Thursday, January 17, 2013

Tightening of Screws

I still haven't read The Turn of the Screw by Henry James, but with Tighter, I have finished my second adaptation! The first was The Turning, which I did enjoy. I enjoyed Tighter, too. It was one of those quick reads and I finished it in a night, but it wasn't light and fluffy, it was disturbing and yeah, even though I read The Turning and knew that Tighter was a Turn of the Screwy book, I still didn't see the end coming! The whole big thing was a total shock, even though I knew Jamie was an unreliable narrator, and a pill-popper, too! So even if you have read TTOTS a million times, you will still enjoy the book. It is set in Rhode Island in a big old mansion where Jamie is spending the summer taking care of an eleven year old girl named Isa. Good book, even with Jamie being a very unlikable person!

Thursday, January 10, 2013

Where Oh Where

Where I Want to Be is written by the same author who did The Orange Houses and I really liked that one, so I wasn't surprised to like Where I Want to Be. I take that back. It is not written by the same author at all. But I am glad I didn't know this, because I liked TOH and so that is why I read WIWTB! But now that I look at The Orange Houses again I see that while the authors have the same last name, they are no more the same person than Demi Moore and Mary Tyler. TOH is written by Paul Griffin and WIWTB is by Adele Griffin, who is also not the same person as Adele or Merv.
WIWTB is a bleak and yet hopeful story. It is a tale of two sisters, Jane, speaking from the other side of life and Lily, about to start her senior year of high school. Jane was killed by a car during her high school graduation week and is still out there, hanging on, in the in-between, at her beloved grandparents' home. They also are deceased. Lilly is still holding on to much guilt and grief and uncertainty. Jane suffered from mental illness during her brief life and this is a tough book, but one you will understand if you have ever loved someone with a mental illness. Great, thought-provoking book.
Oh yeah, set in Rhode Island!