Sue

Pike’s Peak: Read 12 books from your TBR pile/s
Mt. Vancouver: Read 25 books from your TBR pile/s
Mt. Ararat: Read 40 books from your TBR piles/s
Mt. Kilimanjaro: Read 50 books from your TBR pile/s
El Toro: Read 75 books from your TBR pile/s
Mt. Everest: Read 100+ books from your TBR pile/s

(I’m signing up for Pike’s Peak, but hoping to climb higher)

Well, I’ve accomplished my first reading challenge of the year which was to climb Pike’s Peak. I did it by February 10th, so I’m thinking I can climb a couple more peaks this year, don’t you? Here’s the books I read for Pike’s Peak, and now I’m starting up Mt. Vancouver. (Scott is so happy to see me reading books from our shelves!)

#1-A Red Herring Without Mustard (A Flavia de Luce Mystery #3) by Alan Bradley
Flavia is such a fun character and she gets herself into, and out of, the oddest situations. This time she’s up against an obscure religious sect, Gypsies, antiques dealers, and the unflappable Inspector Hewitt. These are such fun stories!

#2-The Traitor (Golden Mountain Chronicles #4) by Laurence Yep
This details the friendship between an outcast American boy and an outcast Chinese boy in the coal mining town of Rock Springs, Wyoming. Their friendship is tender as they learn the things they have in common and yet the things that divide them. Then the town erupts in bloodshed as the author tells of the factual Chinese massacre that occurred there and how the townspeople react. Very interesting story.

#3-I Am Half-Sick Of Shadows (A Flavia De Luce Mystery #4) by Alan Bradley
Suffering cyanide! Another dose of Flavia awesomeness! Yay!

#4-Dear Mr. Henshaw (Leigh Botts, #1) by Beverly Cleary
A rather sad, pathetic story of a boy trying to deal with his parents’ divorce and a move to a new town. I thought it would end with some hope and the only glimmer is that he might write some more. I was disappointed.

#5-The Fighting Ground by Avi
Powerful anti-war novel set in Revolutionary War times. A 13-year-old dreams of the glory of being a soldier and 24 hours of it gives him a completely different idea. He is introduced to several new ideas, among them, how prisoners feel toward their captors, whether the ends justify the means, shame, fear, and disgust for killing. It’s a great novel for showing the reality of war. (mild language in the heat of battle)war. (mild language in the heat of battle)

#6-Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation by Joseph J. Ellis
This highly readable book tells a different story in each chapter that helps to shed light on some of the biggest names in American history. It centers on Adams and Jefferson but includes Washington, Madison, Hamilton, and Burr. I really enjoyed the style and the stories.

#7-The Witches of Worm by Zilpha Keatley Snyder
Creepy story that deftly teeters between fantasy and reality as a lonely teen with a neglectful mother tries to decide if her new cat is just a cat or an evil demon sent to posses her. Well-written.

#8-A Turn in the Road (Blossom Street, #8) by Debbie Macomber
Another installment in the Blossom Street series. Pure escapist chick-lit fun. This one is about second chances and who deserves one, and features Bethanne, one of the more engaging characters from the first book.

#9-Saving CeeCee Honeycutt by Beth Hoffman
CeeCee is a young teen with a terrible home life who is rescued by her great-aunt and taken to Georgia. There she discovers a host of wonderfully eccentric women who help her to heal and come to grips with her past. I enjoyed the plucky heroine and the supporting cast, and there were flashes of real wisdom throughout. Nice story of forgiveness and redemption. Few cases of mild language.

#10-The Cater Street Hangman (Charlotte & Thomas Pitt, #1) by Anne Perry
This series came highly recommended and I enjoyed the first installment in the Pitt series. The mystery was good, but the social commentary about class structure and women’s roles in Victorian England was so interesting. The three sisters were very different in how they reacted to social restrictions: Sarah tried to obey them all, Charlotte quietly chafed against them, and Emily worked around them and used them to her advantage. Quite interesting.

#11-Callander Square (Charlotte & Thomas Pitt, #2) by Anne Perry
Good mystery, but it’s really more about society and how crime affects the people in the square. This book is a commentary on how these society people all have secrets and try hard to cover them up. As Inspector Pitt and Charlotte try to uncover the truth behind some bodies found buried in the square, they dig up all kinds of other truth that becomes quite uncomfortable for the residents. How the different people react is fascinating.

#12- Under The Blood-Red Sun by Graham Salisbury
This book about a Nisei Japanese boy living in Hawaii when Pearl Harbor is attacked does a great job of evoking the boy’s innocence of world affairs and then his confusion after the attack. He thinks of himself as American and is shocked to discover that others think of him as Japanese and blame his family for helping with the attack. There are several poignant moments, such as when the Army orders the family’s pigeons destroyed because they might be carrying messages, and when the Grandfather is arrested by the FBI with no explanation. It’s a coming-of-age story in an era when boys playing baseball must grow up in a hurry and face a changed world. Well-written. (There is some mild language)

I toyed with the idea of doing this challenge last year, but then opted not to sign up for any at all, so it stayed in the back of my mind.  I already did a post on my 2012 challenges and decided not to sign up for this one because it seemed too challenging, but it’s been niggling at me all month, so I’ve decided to give in and add it to my list of challenges.  I don’t know if I’ll make all 50 states, but it’ll be fun to see where I read and I’ve already got some states done in 2012.

Today is the opening day of the Utah State Legislature and for the first time in 10 years, I’m not going to be there for the session.  I thought I might be a tiny bit morose, but actually I’d completely forgotten about it until a friend asked me last night at a choir rehearsal if I was in my busy time of the year now.  I looked blankly at her for a minute and realized she was talking about session and then told her, “No, I’m retired”.  That’s when I remembered it’s opening day today.  Ha!  With my health deteriorated as much as it has over the last year, there’s no way I could make it through a legislative session, anyway, so timing is everything.

The other big news of the day is that the American Library Association named the 2012 Youth Media Award winners today.  The link will get to the full list, but I’m happy to say that the wonderful “Inside Out & Back Again,” by Thanhha Lai and read this month by my book club was named a Newbery Honor book, along with “Breaking Stalin’s Nose,” written and illustrated by Eugene Yelchin.  The Newbery Medal winner is “Dead End in Norvelt,” by Jack Gantos, which also won the 2012 Scott O’Dell Award for Historical Fiction last week.

We read “Wonderstruck: A Novel in Words and Pictures,” by Brian Selznick in December and it received the Schneider Family Book Award for books that embody an artistic expression of the disability experience.  It was a great book and I liked it so much that I convinced Scott and Mark to read it, too.

So there you go, two completely different but noteworthy events today.  Happy reading!