Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty

 

Title:  Apples Never Fall

Author:  Liane Moriarty

Narrated by:  Caroline Lee

Publisher: Macmillan Audio

Length: Approximately 18 hours and 3 minutes

Source: Checked out with Libby through the Kewaunee Public Library.  Thank-you!

What is your favorite type of apple?

Joy Delaney has gone missing.  Her four children ponder on whether they should contact the police.  Their father, Stan, fought with Joy the last time he saw her.  Is that why she disappeared?  Does her disappearance have anything to do with Savannah, a young stranger, who appeared mysteriously and stayed with Stan and Joy one year ago?  Where is Joy and will she be found alive?

My thoughts:

·       This was the October pick for the Kewaunee Page-turners Book Club.  I read it back in September, but I sadly missed the meeting due to a work conflict.

·       Apples Never Fall was an expertly crafted story.  I was fully engaged and enjoyed all the twists and turns as I’ve grown to expect from author Liane Moriarty.

·       I love how the reader gets to know the entire family and all the characters.

·       Poor Joy so wants to be a grandmother.  She has four adult children who can’t seem to keep a serious relationship.

·       The audiobook had an excellent narrator who gave personality all the characters and their voices.  I also liked her Australian accent.

·       Tennis was definitely a large part of this story, but it didn’t overwhelm someone like me who doesn’t know much about tennis.

·       It was a great look a sibling rivalry and parent/child relationships.

·       The end of the novel details life during COVID.

·       What ultimately happened to Joy ended up being a bit of a let down at the end of the novel, but I liked the overall twist at the end.

·       The novel had moments of humor that I enjoyed.

Overall, Apples Never Fall was an engaging family drama and suspense story.

Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty

Trivia Night was supposed to be a fundraising event for Pirriwee Public School; it was not supposed to be the scene of a murder.  Big Little Lies starts with this event and then tells the story starting from months before this event to what lead up to it.  The constant question is, who was murdered and who was the murderer?

Three mothers live very different lives.  Madeline is a strong, funny woman who tells it like it is.  She feels like life is starting to spin out of control when her ex-husband and his new wife move into her community.  Even worse, her daughter Abigail is enamored with her stepmother Bonnie and wants to move in with her Dad’s family, even though he abandoned Madeline and Abigail when she was just an infant.  Madeline’s daughter Chloe is set to start kindergarten with her ex-husbands kindergarten aged daughter and it is the kindergarten class that starts off the troubles for the school.

Jane is new to town.  She is a single mother trying to get by, but she also has a terrible secret.  She is 24 and much younger than the rest of the kindergarten mothers, but she wants what is best for her son Ziggy and thinks that life in this ocean front community with the perfect elementary school will be just what she and Ziggy need.  Unfortunately on the day of kindergarten orientation, Ziggy is blamed for strangling a girl and the other kids and parents turn against Jane and Ziggy.

Fortunately Jane has made new friends in Madeline and Celeste.  Celeste is a beautiful woman with the perfect loving rich husband and twin boys that are a handful.  Celeste seems to live a perfect life, but there are dark secrets hiding under the façade.

I read this book on a road trip to Michigan to visit my family last weekend.  I couldn’t stop reading it when I was in the car, it was so good!  I stayed a bit too late when we got home to finish it up.  It was an interesting story.  I really wanted to know who was murdered and who the killer was, but I just loved reading more about the characters.  I thought it was also an interesting study in perceptions and gossip.  The end of each chapter would have other parents talking about what they thought was going on with events and each other and most were completely wrong.  

Overall, I really enjoyed this book with its fantastic characters and mystery. It is a perfect summer read.

Book Source:  The Kewaunee Public Library

Laura’s Top Ten Books of 2014

I read a lot of wonderful books every year.  When I first started this blog, I used to do a top ten books list each year.  I have such lists for 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2010 but then I started my new job as an instructor at NWTC and I fell off the list making wagon.  I decided this year, no matter how late in 2015 it became I would have my top ten list again!

When I make my top ten list, it is not of books published in 2014, but of books I read in 2014.  It also only includes books (or audiobooks) that I have read for the first time.  For example, I read A Lantern in Her Hand by Bess Streeter Aldrich for maybe the sixth or so time this past year.  It’s one of my all-time favorite novels, but I’ve read it before so it won’t be on this list.   I had a hard time narrowing down my favorites this year – but here goes in no particular order.

1.       The Husband’s Secret Liane Moriarty – We read this for my book club, but sadly I had to miss the book club and discussion that month.  Moriarty wrote a fabulous multi-faceted novel that keep you intrigued and involved in the lives of all of the characters.

2.      The Innovators by Walter Isaacson – The Best Non-fiction book of the year for me.  I was fascinated by the lives of all of the individuals who through sacrifice, hard work, and a bit of luck were able to make the technology we take for granted today possibly.  This is a must read.

3.      You by Caroline Kepnes – I am still a little frightened thinking about this book.  The main narrator makes his love and the psychopathic choices he makes for this love seem like they make sense.  This is how a good love story can go very, very wrong.

4.      Divergent & Insurgent by Veronica Roth – Stay up all night to read kind of books.  Divergent and Insurgent were exciting adventures.  I just read the third book Allegiant in 2015. . . it was not nearly so good.

5.      Written in My Own Heart’s Blood by Diana Gabaldon – Gabaldon is a master story teller and her books defy genres.  I loved getting to read more of Jamie and Claire’s tale, but yearn for more.  If you haven’t read this series, start with book one, Outlander.  You will not be sorry!

6.      Silent Spring by Rachel Carson – Even though I am an environmental engineer, I have never read this classic.  The disturbing part about reading it was discovering that although a lot has changed for the good since the 1960’s, a lot still hasn’t changed.  It was eye opening and still very relevant to today’s world.

7.      The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd – A great historical fiction novel about a real historical abolitionist that I had never heard of and the relationship with her slave.  Riveting and a great book club selection.

8.      The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert – Another great historical fiction novel, I loved the depths, the botany, and the struggle for a woman to find herself in middle age.  This was a great adventure and absorbing read.

9.      Me Before You by JoJo Moyes – Another book club favorite from 2014.  We still talk about this book and I still think about the ethical and emotional discussions it led to.  It was a wonderful love story, but so much more.  It really brought about a great discussion on what makes life worth living.  I really need to read more books by this author.  I read a lot of books last year, but I’ll admit that this was my favorite.

10.  The Book of Life by Deborah Harkness – I loved Deborah Harkness’s All Souls Trilogy.  This final book in the trilogy was very satisfying.  The trilogy has historical fiction, time travel, witches, vampires, demons, and how to accept that we are all different but from the same fabric of life.  A great fantasy romance.

Some other fantastic books I read this year that wanted to be in my top ten, but didn’t quite make it were A Good Marriage by Stephen King, A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold, The Museum of Extraordinary Things by Alice Hoffman, Netherwood and Ravenscliffe by Jane Sanderson, After I’m Gone by Laura Lippman, and Bellman & Black by Diane Setterfield.

What were your favorite books of 2014?  Did you enjoy any of the selections above?

The Husband’s Secret by Liane Moriarty

The Husband’s Secret is our January FLICKS Book and Movie Club pick.  I knew there were a lot of holds on it at the library so I put mine on as well . . . and it came very early!  I read it and really enjoyed it.  I can’t wait to discuss it in January.

Cecelia Fitzpatrick is a very successful Tupperware saleswomen in Sidney, Australia and runs her family life with precision.  One day while her husband John-Paul is on a business trip in America, she discovers a letter addressed to her to be opened upon his death.  When Cecelia reads the letter, it makes her world implode.  Tess has recently discovered that her husband and her best friend / cousin have fallen in love.  She takes her son Liam and returns to Sidney to help her mother out and also to get away from the situation and have time to think.  Rachel is nearing retirement, but still works at the Catholic school that her children attended.  She loves her grandson, but his parents are about to move with him to New York City.  She also can’t stop thinking about her daughter Janie that was murdered twenty years previous. When the worlds of these three women collide, there will be much drama.

The Husband’s Secret was a book that I literally could not put down.  I guessed the “secret” early on, but it did not lessen the impact of the story to me.  How one secret would affect and change so many lives was intriguing.  Moriarty also wrote the characters in such a way that I really identified with them and was very interested in their lives.  I enjoyed the ending when Moriarty showed how different choices and secrets could have led to a very different story and ending.  I thought it was interested to contemplate.

Overall, if you are looking for a great character driven story, look no further.  This is the book for you.  I can’t wait to read more by this author.

We have recently read other books with the book club that I had read previously and did not re-read.  This included Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult for October and The Life of Pi by Yann Martel for November.

Book Source:  The Kewaunee Public Library