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Shotgun Lovesongs By Nickolas Butler This is a tale about five friends from Little Wing, a small town in Wisconsin near Eau Claire. Henry, Lee, Kip and Ronny are the four male characters in this novel. Beth, the only female, is married to Henry, but their lives are all intertwined. A wedding brings the now 30-somethings together again. A secret is shared, and lives begin to fall apart. Will a marriage persist? Will forever friends remain friends? You will find the answer when you read this well-written story. Having grown up in small town America, I was really able to …

After you By JoJo Moyes Book Review by Maureen Therou I read Moyes book Me Before You a couple of years ago, then saw the movie. Now Moyes has written a sequel called After You. I totally loved Louisa Clark after the first book, and I was even more impressed with her character in After You. This is a novel about coming through grief after the one you love has died. Sounds rather depressing, but Moyes has a way of making you chuckle throughout the entire book. You travel with Louisa as she takes on a troubled teen, Lily, an …

COMING HOME By Rosamunde Pilcher Book Review by Maureen Therou Don’t let the length of this novel scare you, if you pick it up to read; it is well worth the time spent. With our world in turmoil, it was wonderful for me to put myself in a very different world – an era when people took the time to spend with each other, when life was slower. The story takes place in Cornwall, England, pre- and post-WWII. It follows Judith Dunbar from the tender age of fourteen, when she attends boarding school, until adulthood. It was very interesting how …

SOOLEY By John Grisham Once again, I’ve picked a book by one of my favorite authors, John Grisham. This is his 36th novel and, believe it or not, I have read them all. However, this is not his usual courtroom story. The court he chooses to write about this time is a basketball court. The main character, Samuel (Sooley) Sooleymon, is a 17-year-old boy from South Sudan, who has been chosen to come to America to play basketball for a traveling team that showcases the skills of young Sudanese players for college coaches. The secondary tale is about Sooley’s family, …

NIGHT FALL By Nelson DeMille This book, written in 2004, is a work of fiction, but is based on events that actually happened. On July 17th, 1996, at 8:31p.m. E.D.T., TWA Flight 800 bound for Paris and then on to Rome, Italy, took off from New York and crashed into the Atlantic Ocean shortly after takeoff . All 230 on board died in the crash. Of the 258 witnesses who came forward and were interviewed, 38 of those reported a “streak of light” ascending from the ocean. There were many theories as to what actually happened:  was it bomb, missile …

The Pearl By John Steinbeck I recently re-read The Pearl and remembered why I enjoyed the book. Now that I’m older — quite a bit older — I realized what a phenomenal lesson there was written into such a small book. The pearl depicts two forces that shape human life — a world where humans shape their own destinies and a world where forces often beyond our control can occur, completely changing the course of our lives. In the beginning of the tale, Kino, his wife Juana, and their son Coyotito are a happy family. However, one day Kino, a …

Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem  at America’s Most Storied Hospital By: David Oshinsky This book was a gift from my son, and he picked a very riveting story. Being a retired registered nurse may have influenced my opinion of the book, but I feel all who read it will thoroughly enjoy the book, as Oshinsky weaves his way through three centuries of history of this famous New York hospital. Oshinsky takes us from the hospital’s rise from a almshouse infirmary to a public hospital that is now well-known as a great trauma center for visiting world leaders. Bellevue …

ASK AGAIN, YES By Mary Beth Keane The novel Ask Again, Yes is a story about two families, the Gleasons and the Stanhopes, and it spans over four decades. We learn about the lifelong friendship and love of Francis and Lena’s daughter, Kate, and Brian and Anne’s son, Peter. Author Mary Beth Keane weaves together all the things that happen in life–friendship, love, forgiveness, mental illness, alcoholism–and the tragedies that happen throughout a lifetime. Keane seems to understand the silence that surrounds so many problems that families deal with throughout their lives. Switching perspectives throughout the book, she gives us …

The Cold Dish By: Craig Johnson My nephew visited me from Washington this summer and presented me with a copy of The Cold Dish. Having been a long-time fan of Craig Johnson, he wanted to share his enthusiasm for this author. The Cold Dish is the first book in a series about Walt Longmire, a sheriff in Wyoming.  The book starts out with the murder of a man by the name of Cody Pritchard.  Two years earlier, Pritchard and three of his high school classmates were accused of raping a mentally-challenged Native American girl.  The group was convicted, but received …