Wrapped Up in You by Jill Shalvis

Ivy Snow has a successful food truck business in San Francisco.  She has spent her lifetime constantly on the move around the country.  She is happy to finally be making friends and saving money for a stable place of her own.  When she meets Kel O’Donnell, an Idaho sheriff visiting his cousin, she immediately has her guard up, but their two hurt souls yearn for each other.  When Ivy’s past catches up with her, will the two be able to move on from their former hurts and have a happy ending?

I really loved the characters in Wrapped Up in You.  Shalvis writes wonderful three-dimensional realistic characters with all of their faults and virtues.  The romance was also very sensual, yet not too graphic.  I loved it.  I am not a fan of “swords and sheaths” type of romance that goes into too much detail.  There is just enough detail to be sexy, without losing the mystery of romance.

Overall, Wrapped up in You was what my Great Grandma would fondly call a good story with great characters and romance.  I think I’ve found a new favorite romance author.

Book Source:  Review Copy from William Morrow.  Thank-you!

The Trumpet of the Swan by E. B. White

A young boy, Sam Beaver, travels to the wilds of Canada to camp with his father.  While there, he discovers a trumpeter swan nest.  He returns later that summer to see the young baby swans, and discovers one of them is mute.  Their friendship begins and young Louis learns how to adapt to his world first by attending school and learning how to write, and later becoming a trumpet player in order to communicate with other swans while making beautiful music.  

My almost ten-year-old son Daniel and I read this book together for the Kewaunee Youth Book Club.  I read this when I was around Daniel’s age and I only remembered some of the story. It was a joy to reread it and Daniel loved the story.  He really loved when Louis went to camp and continued to have adventures.  He also loved Louis’s father, the Old Cobb, who liked to wax on in in very elaborate descriptions about items.  He thought he was pretty funny. My 12-year old son has just started reading it for book club, but is not enthused about it since his brother liked it.

Daniel and I loved how the tale was partially set in the wild and discussed the trumpeter swan.  Daniel is very curious about trumpeter swans now and really wants to see one.  We had to look them up when we finished the book and see where they are located in the U.S. and look at pictures.  We may be able to see one here in Wisconsin, but searching online lead me to the WK Kellogg Bird Sanctuary.  It is not far from where I grew up in Southwest Michigan and I went there as a kid.  They have provided a sanctuary for trumpeter swans in Michigan.  We have a new place to visit next time we are visiting my parents in Michigan.  Daniel is ready to go now especially when we read you get to feed the birds with buckets of corn.

I loved how the overall theme of the book was on a swan who was born with a disability, but through his own hard work and help from family and friends he was able to find ways to live a fulfilling life with his disability.  Even though Louis had a disability, he was a wonderful bird who had a great life and provided a lot of joy to a lot of people.

The drawings by Edward Frascino were delightful and added to the story.

Favorite Quotes:

“Remember that the world is full of youngsters who have some sort of handicap that they must overcome.  You apparently have a speech defect.  I am sure you will overcome it, in time.  There may even be some slight advantage, at your age, in not being able to say anything.  It compels you to be a good listener.  The world is full of talkers, but it is rare to find anyone who listens.”

“It scared him to be different.  He couldn’t understand why he had come into the world without a voice.”

“Darkness settled on woods and fields and marsh.  A loon called its wild night cry.  As Louis relaxed and prepared for sleep.  All his thoughts were of how lucky he had been to solve his problems with music, and how pleasant it was to look forward to another night of sleep and another day tomorrow, and the fresh morning, and the light that returns with the day.”

Overall, The Trumpet of the Swan is a wonderful tale that is enjoyable to both child and adult.  I loved the overall theme of overcoming adversity.

Book Source:  The Kewaunee Public Library – Thank-you!

Still Alice by Lisa Genova

What is it like to live with Alzheimer’s disease?  To know that you have it, and are forgetting the everyday matters of life?  To think that one day you will forget your children and your spouse?

Alice Howland is a psychology professor at Howard and has had great success in her field.  She loves teaching and being a partner with her husband, also a Harvard professor.  They have three beautiful children in their 20’s off on their own attending school or starting careers.  Alice starts to forget things more often, cumulating in going for a run and not recognizing the neighborhood that she has been running through and living in most her life.  She goes to a doctor to determine what is wrong and is diagnosed with early on-set Alzheimer’s disease.  Alice breaks the news to her family and tries to make the best choices to still be able to live her life to the fullest before it is too late.

Still Alice is the March pick for the Kewaunee Library book club and we will be discussing it this week.  I have been wanting to read this book for years and was glad to finally have an excuse to read it.  I’ve previously read and enjoyed Left Neglected and Inside the O-Briens both by Lisa Genova.  My Great-Grandpa Kile had Alzheimer’s Disease, and his daughter, my Grandma Stone had Dementia.  Watching them battle through these diseases and the changes it made on them and their loved ones was heart breaking.  My Great Grandpa and Grandma Kile were married for 67 years when he passed away.  The last year or so he didn’t recognize my Grandma but called another lady at the Alzheimer’s home “Norma,” my Grandma’s name.  I remember her softly crying when we would leave from a visit with Grandpa.

Alice has the disease at a much earlier age than my Great Grandpa who was in his 80’s battling the disease.  As a professor of psychology, she is keenly aware of what is going to happen to her.  I loved that she made her own group of other early on-set Alzheimer’s patients to support each other.I also enjoyed that the book was told from her point of view as she declined with the disease.  I was both amazed and infuriated by the reactions of her family.  I love that her strained relationship with her youngest daughter seems to strengthen with the disease.  I felt for her husband, but was also infuriated by decisions that he made.  It would be a very difficult situation to be in.

Favorite Quotes:

“Her mother had comforted her and told her not to be sad for the butterflies, that just because their lives were short didn’t mean they were tragic.  Watching them flying in the warm sun among the daisies in their garden, her mother had said to her, see they have a beautiful life. Alice liked remembering that.”

“Her sense of Alice – what she knew and understood, what she liked and disliked, how she felt and perceived – was also like a soap bubble, ever higher in the sky and more difficult to identify, with nothing by the thinnest lipid membrane protecting it from popping into thinner air.”

“There is no peace in being unsure of everything all of the time.  I miss doing everything easily.  I miss being a part of what’s happening.  I miss feeling wanted.  I miss my life and my family.  I loved my life and family.”

Overall, Still Alice was a touching look at Alice’s battle with early on set Alzheimer’s and how it affected her and her family.  I like that this book brings Alzheimer’s into focus and into discussion.  I feel like this disease and Dementia are not understood and the victims are often blamed for something they can’t control.  Or forgotten because it’s easier to deal with that way.

Book Source:  The Kewaunee Public Library