Book Reviews for October

After my dreary review of the television schedule yesterday I thought I would cheer up my readers with some great book reviews.

Amazon offered up on Kindle for Thanksgiving the book “The Boston Girl” by Anita Diamant (author of “The Red Tent”) for a mere $2.99.  Since I loved The Red Tent I thought “why not” and I did not regret it.  The Boston Girl is a wonderful story about a young Jewish girl at the turn of the last century.  Addie Baum tells her life story to her granddaughter with humour even over the rough spots of her life.  The story is not particularly original but the character is strong, realistic and principled; just my kind of heroine.  She writes about poverty without being sordid (although there is certainly sordidness in the story), or perhaps I should say without being sensational about the poverty.  Sometimes writers get so carried away that they describes things to such an extent one is almost forced to throw up.  I highly recommend The Boston Girl as a quick, light read.

Costco had “The Underground Railway” on sale at a decent price so although I normally do not go for an Oprah recommended book because it is bound to be depressing I decided to give this one a go and I am really glad I did.  Colson Whitehead has written the book as a straightforward story of one woman’s escape from slavery in Georgia and although his visualization of creating a literal underground railway takes some getting used to it is a powerful story.  It’s well written and I can recommend this book as a good read.

Many of you may be surprised at my next recommendation which is “Christy” by Catherine Marshall.  This book first came out in 1967 and had another surge of popularity in the early 90’s when the movie and TV show aired.  For some odd reason I never bothered to read it despite the book being literally everywhere I went.  I recently came across it in the discarded bin in our library and decided it was time to read it.  I thought it would be overloaded with religion but either I am more in tune with “religious messages” or it simply is told in such a way you hardly notice “religion”.  It’s a lovely story about a sensitive young girl who is inspired to teach in the Smoky Mountains of Tennessee.  The characters are interesting, particularly the various children, and the author’s handling of language is amazing.  It’s a wholesome, uplifting read and I am only embarrassed that I didn’t read it many years ago.

It’s always rewarding when you discover books that make you feel “wow, that was a good one” and to find 3 in a row is like winning the lottery.  It’s been a good month!