The Charm School

The Charm School by Nelson DeMille
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Great book, very suspenseful and full of unsuspecting twists and turns. It was brutal, sad, and unbelievable. Of course it was fictional, but wow, sure was realistic sounding.

I love the narration of Scott Brick but I found myself not liking the main female character and I think it was because of the way he portrayed her voice. I kind of felt like routing against her sometimes.

Nelson DeMille continues to amaze me with his writing and thought process. Crazy guy but he sure knows how to stretch the could-be-truth of the human psyche and conspiracy theories.

View all my reviews

The Screwtape Letters: First Ever Full-Cast Dramatization of the Diabolical Classic [With DVD]

The Screwtape Letters: First Ever Full-Cast Dramatization of the Diabolical Classic [With DVD] by C.S. Lewis
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Wow wow wow! Whether or not you have read The Screwtape Letters, you have to listen to this audio production. It was fantastic! The music, the different voices for each character, the drama, all so, so good. The book itself is amazing too of course, with it's reverse teaching method.

Andy Serkis, who is the voice of Gollum in The Lord of the Rings movies, voices Screwtape, a demon mentor. His nephew, Wormwood, is trying to turn his "patient" away from the "enemy", which is God with the guidance of Screwtape.

Screwtape tells Wormwood how to get ideas into the patients mind to turn him away from God by basically turning him into a cynic. Screwtape says that their jobs are to make spouses into a relationship of anger and sarcasm. To turn fear and anxiety to a hatred of God. To not let patients have too many lows in their life because that is how the "enemy" reaches His people. He, being God, wants people to be like Him through the bible and learn from Him. The devils want patients to rely on earthly goods and turn to sexual immorality and the like because it feels good, because it is selfish.

There was so much to this short book but the reverse learning was amazing. I found myself realizing that I fall into a lot of the traps that are set to turn away from God. It's just a complete eye opener!

View all my reviews

The Book Thief

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Ay yi yi, I don't know what to give this book. There is no denying that narrating a book by Death was both creepy but ingenious! He narrated the book during WWII, in Molching, Germany about an orphan girl named Liesel Meminger who is sent to live with foster parents during the height of Hitlers reign. She was not Jewish nor were her foster parents, but they were sympathetic towards them. Her story starts and ends with Death but this book focuses mostly on her few years with her foster parents. From dealing with being an orphan, making friends, protecting a Jew, discovery of books, Hitler youth, bombs, she deals with a lot in her youth; a side of WWII that I had not yet read about.

I tried reading this book a year or two ago and was so confused at the beginning that I stopped reading it. It's so highly rated that when I saw an audio book version was available, I borrowed it from the library.

Once I got over the initial weirdness that started with Death's narration and what he meant by the colors of the sky upon people's deaths, then I started following it just fine. Well, I mostly understood it, but I still got lost a time or two because it jumped around so much in time and place and characters. I couldn't remember what the current topic was and would have to scan backwards to figure it out.

The narrator was fantastic. I really enjoyed his voice, the books emotions were clearly conveyed by him. But oh my stars, I was getting annoyed by all the "Jesus, Mary, and Joseph" and "Crucify Christ" exclamations. It was almost a little offending. That's the book for you though, it had a lot of swearing. It fit for the theme of the book though.

I guess as far as how much I personally liked this book, I'd give it a three. For the creativity, I'd give it a five. So I guess averaging that out, I'll give it a four. Such a strange, strange book.

View all my reviews

Mine Till Midnight (The Hathaways, #1)

Mine Till Midnight by Lisa Kleypas
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I'd give this five stars but since I'm also rating the edition, audio, I'm giving it four. I truly liked the story but I think a lot was taken away from it by the way the narrator read it. Her British accent trying to imitate an American accent made it sound like Americans are super snotty sounding. And a woman trying to make her voice deep and sound like a man, ugh, annoying. A woman reading romantic scenes, um, well, made me feel a little creepy. I love my husband and I'd rather hear him read it to me than hear it from an audio book narrator! LOL!

Going on to the story itself, awesome, totally awesome. I love the gypsy portrayal and the scandalous way he got what he wanted from Amelia. The magic, the way of the gypsies, the aristocrats, the ghosts of past, familial relationships, etc. Such a great and interesting love story with great emotional feeling. Very, very good book! I truly look forward to READING more books in this series and finding out more of the story that was left unanswered in this book.

My first Lisa Kleypas book. Swoon, love her!

View all my reviews

Jacqueline Kennedy: Historic Conversations on Life with John F. Kennedy

Jacqueline Kennedy: Historic Conversations on Life with John F. Kennedy by Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Well, hmm. I suppose I listened to Jacqueline Kennedy's oral history out of sheer curiosity. I had read Mimi Alford's Once Upon a Secret: My Affair with President John F. Kennedy and Its Aftermath and became a little curious as to what Jackie Kennedy had to say after the death of her husband.

This audio recording stretched from March 1964, four months after JFK's assassination, to June 1964. There are seven conversations in total.

She came across as a doting wife who supported her husband in whatever venture or thought he had. She made it seem that his every thought was her thought, they agreed on nearly everything, he was such a good husband and truly cared about her. Historical recollections of others tells a completely different story. Perhaps he did love her, perhaps not. I'm sure he loved her beauty and poise and her rich background, but being married, I'm not convinced that JFK, whom I think was a scoundrel, liked being married. It was a political front I think.

I think a lot less of JFK, not that I had anything really to judge him on before. I think Jacqueline Kennedy worked with what she had but I think her eyes truly opened up in the years after his and Bobbie's deaths. They were political machines who had dirty agendas that were hidden from the unassuming public.

Going back to Jackie Kennedy's oral history, there was a lot of information that bored me. I hadn't heard of many, many of the people she and Mr. Schlessinger discussed nor did I really care. It was a gossip session of, "what did Jack think of so and so, or this or that". There were a few juicy bits and the one that I was most surprised by was her candid dislike of Martin Luther King Jr. She thought he was a horrible man because he often had orgy's. She thought him a fraud, phony. I had never heard that before! I find it ironic she thought him lowly for that, yet her husband had more romps than a rabbit in heat.

I can't imagine having these conversation so quickly after her husbands death. There is no doubt she was mortified and devastated by his death but there had to a great strength to be able to talk at that point of time. She never did discuss that horrific day or anything really leading up to it. No thoughts about it. I imagine it would be too soon for that.

In the recording you can hear the kids, their TV in the background, planes flying over head, her continuous lighting up and smoking and even the clinking of ice cubes in glass. I wonder what was in there? A stiff drink perhaps? I would need one!

Overall, I suppose I'm glad I listened to her oral history because I do like the subject. Did I come away feeling smarter and able to feel as though I knew Jackie Kennedy? Nope. Would I recommend this read to anyone. Not really. I think you'd have to be a real history nut or be looking for some gossip about the Kennedy white house years. I'm a little of both.

It makes me a little sad that Jackie Kennedy nearly completely withdrew from the public eye after JFK and Bobbie's death. I can't blame her though, but my curiousity is itching to know what she thinks of JFK looking back in the years before her death in 1994.

View all my reviews

Size 12 is Not Fat (Audio Book)

Size 12 is Not Fat: A Heather Wells Mystery by Meg Cabot

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

It was super cute to listen to until it got super annoying and having to listen to every single analyzing thought by the main character. And then I realized it was a series and I threw up a little in my mouth, what?! No closure?! I liked this book but it got to be too much pining over the love interest. Blech. This book could have been compressed quite a bit, if it had, I would have read the next books in the series. Well, I just might still, but I certainly won't do the audio version again, at least with reading I can skip parts!

View all my reviews