By the time I started reading Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight, I had forgotten what it was about, and I’m glad I had because otherwise, I would have had my defensives up. I added it to my library queue after reading badkittyuno’s review last month. Cannonball Read: the system works. There’s not much I can add here. badkittyuno did a killer job summarizing the experience of the read, and the broad strokes of the story that Alexander Fuller tells. It’s a memoir of […]
Darn Hooch
This is the fourth book in the Sweet Pepper Fire Brigade series by JJ Cook. The story centers around fire chief Stella Griffin, some ghosts and a hooch war. By the way, that’s hooch as in moonshine, not any of the other terms you might be thinking of (money, female private parts, a loose woman, a scuzzy man or half of a K-9/cop duo). There’s also some stereotypical small town stuff (romance or the lack thereof, family issues, politics, misogyny and food) to round out […]
This is not your father’s Lassie…
I embarked on reading Edgar, knowing only that it was a story about “a boy and his dog”. In fact, in the author’s own words: The Story of Edgar Sawtelle is a boy and his dog story for grownups. If I were looking for this book, the way I once did, that’s all I would want to know. Hide the dust jacket away. Don’t look at it again until you close the book for the last time. Read the blurbs afterward, like I do, when […]
A Tail-Wagging Tale
I’m a sucker for stories that involve dogs saving their human owners and this tale is a true one. Dan Dye tells the story of how adopting a deaf and partially blind, albino Great Dane puppy named Gracie changes his life and the life of his roommate, Mark Beckloff. Dan has spent months mourning the loss of his dog, Blue, but a friend, Anne, who recently adopted a Great Dane puppy, calls on Dan to rescue her dog’s sister-who desperately needs a loving home. Gracie […]
Forget the past when it’s too terrible to face
Knocking out another VF book club review with Deerskin. Instead of aliens and greek-like gods, we read a dark fairytale about a princess named Lissar whose mother was the most beautiful queen of all the kingdoms. Her beauty so captivating that all the land including the King hardly remember the princess exists. But alas the queen cannot live forever, so she captures her beauty in a striking painting before her death. It’s almost as if she curses her daughter to live behind her shadow even after death. [MILD […]
The Happiest Dog in Town
Because of Winn-Dixie is an amazing book about a girl named Opal who moves to Florida with her father and finds a dog in a supermarket. She names him after the store and claims he is hers. She immediately falls in love with him because of his toothy grin and his fun-loving nature. She brings him home and introduces him to the preacher, her father. His father is unsure about Winn-Dixie at first but Opal talks him into keeping him. He has bald spots, smells […]