nomadreader

The backstory:  I bought this audiobook in 2014 when it was a Daily Deal, but like so many of the Daily Deals I buy, it never rose to the top of my audiobook TBR. On Litsy, CareBear hosted a low stakes read-a-long: read the book in February and discuss it at the end of the month. I'm so glad that I read this book but also that I had people to discuss it with because there is SO MUCH to discuss. The basics: This novel is set in a country house West Hall, Vermont in 1908 and the present day. The town has had quite a few strange disappearances and deaths over the years. In 1908, Sarah Harrison Shea, who is struggling with the death of her daughter, Gertie, and writing in a diary. Her husband and doctor confuse her grief with psychosis. In present day, 19-year-old Ruthie and her little sister Fawn live in Sarah's house, and their mother is missing. When looking for clues, they find Sarah's diary. My thoughts: If I'm being honest, if I knew I was reading a paranormal gho...

narrated by Cassandra Campbell The basics: Set during the filming of Gone with the Wind , A Touch of Stardust  is the story of Julie Crawford, an aspiring screenwriter from Fort Wayne, Indiana, who finds a job as Carole Lombard's personal assistant. My thoughts: I'll admit it: I've never read Gone with the Wind , nor have I seen the film. Growing up in Atlanta, its story was hard to ignore, and I certainly feel like I knew enough about it to understand its role in this story. (And yes, it did make me want to both read and see it.) Julie is such a wonderful character, and she is the perfect somewhat starstruck Hollywood newcomer to serve as a window into this world. I'm a big fan of historical fiction about real people, and A Touch of Stardust  infuses the real people (Carole Lombard, Clark Gable, Vivian Leigh) with fictional characters like Julie. This mix works so well because while the general storyline of the filming of Gone with the Wind  and its stars are w...

narrated by Cassandra Campbell The backstory: Everything I Never Told You , Celeste Ng's first novel, is a 2014 New York Times  Notable Book . My thoughts: I had an e-galley of this book that I didn't get to this summer (when I was very, very pregnant.) When Amazon named it the best book of 2014, I knew I had to start it immediately. Thankfully, the week before, Ford had picked it for the next free audiobook in the Ford Audiobook Club (If you're on GoodReads and haven't joined this group--do. A free audiobook about once a month? So fun! The current pick, Tim Curry's narration of A Christmas Carol , is next in my audio queue.) I ended up listening to this one rather than reading it, and I'm so glad I did (although it's probably also lovely in print.) Beginning with the lines "Lydia is dead. But they don't know this yet..." firmly entrenches the reader in the narrative of this family. As the title indicates, they have their share of thin...

narrated by Cassandra Campbell The basics: Nora Eldridge, an aspiring artist and third-grade teacher in Cambridge, Massachusetts, tells the story of the year her utterly ordinary life becomes something more. The Shahid family, Skandar, a Lebanese visiting scholar, his wife Sirena, an Italian artist, and their son, Reza, arrive in town, and Nora finds herself drawn to all three of them. She shares a studio space with Sirena, teaches Reza, and looks forward to long talks with Skandar. My thoughts: Nora narrates this story from the future. She's a few years removed from the action, yet her storytelling is still filled with emotion. Her rage often seems just below the surface, and the pain is so fresh. The rawness of these emotions brings an air of mystery to this story. There's a haunting urgency to Nora's story, as though she's begging the reader to believe and understand her actions and emotions, even as she reflects on how some of her choices were not the best. ...

narrated by Cassandra Campbell The backstory: Orange is the New Black  has been adapted into a Netflix original comedy by Jenji Kohan (of Weeds. ) The basics: After graduating from Smith College, Piper Kerman was seeking adventure. She opted to stay in idyllic Northampton, Massachusetts, and she started dating Nora, an enchanting lesbian who turned out to be part of an international drug smuggling operation. Piper briefly participated too. Five years later, federal agents arrest her, and she must go to jail for fifteen months. Orange is the New Black  chronicles her time in a women's prison. My thoughts: I have a bizarre fascination and fear of prison. Not that I have a urge to break the law to begin with, but I am a poster child for doing all I can to avoid ever going to jail or prison. The first chapter of Orange is the New Black  is armchair adventure at its best: Piper and Nora travel the world, visit exotic places, and part of me started thinking--maybe it w...

The backstory: Because I'm spending more time driving than taking the bus semester, I decided to browse the audio book cds at my library and decided to start with Very Valentine . I also enjoyed the other Adriana Trigiani book I read, Big Stone Gap ( my review ). The basics: Very Valentine is the story of Valentine Roncalli, a young woman in her early thirties who lives with her grandmother and helps her grandmother run the Angelini Shoe Company, which makes custom wedding shoes. My thoughts: Going into this novel, I wasn't sure what to expect. I was surprised how much I enjoyed Big Stones Gap mostly because of how unexpectedly funny it was. I knew next to nothing going into this book, and I wasn't even sure if it was set in contemporary New York City (it is.) While Very Valentine wasn't funny like Big Stone Gap was, it did have good character development and a mostly interesting storyline. There were times the prose was overly descriptive, but as an infreque...