New Moon by Stephenie Meyer

This is the 2nd book in the Twilight series. Bella and Edward break up! He breaks her heart and leaves her severely depressed. She finally brings herself out of her depression by becoming better friends with Jacob Black. Jacob is a warm, understanding guy who Bella sees as her best friend--not in the romantic way. I won't give away anymore of the story because it would ruin it for you if you are interested in reading these. It was fun and quick despite the 500 pages. The Twilight movie comes out in November--yea!

Home: a memoir of my early years by Julie Andrews

I listened to Julie Andrews' autobiography. She actually performed the narration for it which was really neat. One of my all-time favorite muscials is "The Sound of Music" so I couldn't resist listening to this one. It's fun to learn of her childhood and how she first began singing with her mom and dad. She goes into great detail about her run as Eliza in "My Fair Lady". She ends at the point where she's almost ready to film "Mary Poppins". I hope she's not finished because I would love hear about her adventures filming MP and Sound of Music. If you're a fan of Julie's, I recommend this one.

Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult

Wow. Picoult's books are so intense. She's a great story teller and weaves such great stories. They are always on the ethical line and in most cases cross the ethical line many times over. This book is about a small town in NH where a school shooting takes place (mimicked after Columbine). The shooter who is a student, Peter, doesn't end his own life and is tried by the courts.

Picoult takes you back and forth through time to when Peter was little and shows a lot of his experiences through school. Of course he's constantly picked on and bullied by the other kids in school and he's a loner and likes video games. You also get to see his mom and dad's point of view. It's heartbreaking for them going through this and the mom keeps racking her brain as to what she could have done better. Picoult has obviously done tons of research on bullying, the court systems and traumatic events like these.

I won't give away more details in case some of the gals in book club read my blog before we meet in a couple of weeks. We'll have tons to talk about. I will say, get out your box of tissues and get ready for an emotional roller coaster ride.

This book made me reexamine Columbine and Ron and I actually went to the Columbine Memorial which is in Clement Park off of Bowles in Littleton (right by the school). It was moving--I couldn't stop the tears from streaming down my face. Talk about powerful...

Columbine for me will be like the assassination of JFK for my parents and now what 9/11 is like for our generation as well. You remember where you were when you found out about these events. I'll always remember watching on TV the images of kids running out of the school with their hands on top of their heads and just how shocking the whole thing was for not only the Denver community and the state of Colorado, but for our nation. It used to be that schools and churches were safe places to go, unfortunately that's just not the case anymore.

It was an intense read and I'm glad I read it.

"Twilight" by Stephenie Meyer

This is one of the most popular book series for teens right now. I had to give in and read it. It's about a vampire named Edward Cullen and a human girl, Bella Swan. Bella is in high school and has moved to live with her dad in a small town in Oregon. She meets the Cullen family who all eat by themselves at lunch and are kind of standoffish from the rest of the school. Then Bella meets Edward in her biology class and he's very different from all the other boys. Well you can guess she figures out that he's a vampire and so is the rest of his family. She ends up falling for him and well... guess you'll have to read it if you want to know more.

I liked Meyer's style--very conversational and contemporary. I can see why these books are such a hit with teens and adults right now.

The movie comes out in November (it's taking Harry Potter #6's spot since it's release was postponed to next July). I'm looking forward to the second installment called "New Moon". First I'll be reading or rather continuing with "Nineteen Minutes" by Jodi Piccoult (book club pick for September).

Fearless Fourteen by Janet Evanovich

I have to say, I wasn't really that impressed with this installment of the Stephanie Plum series. Sure there were some funny parts, but overall the plot was pretty thin and wrapped up quite nicely. Evanovich has had better plot lines in the previous books. It makes me wonder if she's on some pretty strict deadlines with these books afterall I think she cranks out about one every year. It's hard to stay original when you've had 13 previous installments. It was a quick read though.

On to "Nineteen Minutes" by Jodi Piccoult, our next book club pick.

Summer of Audiobooks

I finished listening to "Peony in Love" which was really good. I enjoyed Snowflower more, but Peony was worth reading or in my case listening to. Women in China had it pretty bad, but they learned to enjoy life through painting, writing, playing musical instruments and embroidery. They found activities to make life fun. They were so suppressed though--that part was sad to me. And what pressure to have sons!

After Peony, I listened to "Beach Road" by James Patterson. It was a short, predictable story. It was a story that takes place in the Hamptons and a young black athelete is accused of murdering his three friends. The lawyer who takes the case teams up with his ex--another attorney. They end up winning the case and the athelete gets off, but of course there's a twist at the end which you can see coming. Towards the end it seemed like Patterson just wanted to hurry up and wrap up the story which was a little dissapointing, but overall it was entertaining.

I'm now listening to Eric Clapton's autobiography, "Clapton". He grew up not knowing that his mother was actually his grandmother and his aunt turned out to be his mother. He talks about the affects this had on his childhood and how he really started to get interested in music in his pre-teenage years. So far it's good.

I finished reading "Echo Park" by Michael Connelly. This is the book club book for August at Jaci's house. This is actually a book in his Harry Bosch series. Harry Bosch is a detective on the LAPD and this book follows him through a case that originated in 1993. There's an inmate on death row who confesses to murdering the victim of the case in 1993 and well it goes on from there. I won't spoil it for anybody from book club, but I couldn't put the book down once I got to the confession part. I liked this mystery and would read more of Connelly's books in the future.

I never usually have more than one book going at a time, but at the moment I have three and I'm listening to one on CD.

Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson: I've written a little about this book before because I actually started it way back in January. It is interesting, but I've been in the mood for some fiction this summer. I will finish this book--it's fascinating.

A Room with a View by E.M. Forster: I recently watched the Masterpiece Theatre version and wanted to read the book--I know I'm doing it wrong. You're supposed to read the book before the movie comes out. Oh well. It's actually not that hard of a read, but I got sidetracked and started on...

Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince (AKA HP#6) by J.K. Rowling: one Saturday I spent watching HP movies and crocheting. I haven't read 6 and 7 but one time and I couldn't remember many of the details. So I am a little over halfway through this one. it's very entertaining and this book has a lot of little side stories about the crushes that Harry, Ron and Hermione have on various people. It's fun, easy and perfect for summertime and the week of your sister's wedding! :)

And finally, I'm listening to Peony in Love by Lisa See. She wrote Snowflower and the Secret Fan (see blog from last October). The story follows a girl who is betrothed to a man. She doesn't find out who he is until it's too late. In the meantime she meets a poet and falls in love with him, she becomes lovesick for him and well I won't spoil anymore of the story. It's well-written just like Snowflower and again I'm learning even more about Chinese culture through this book.