I have two questions for you: 1) Do you like to read? (If that answer was no, what's wrong with you?! :)) 2) Are you on Goodreads? If you answered yes and no, respectively, you need to get yourself on over to www.goodreads.com and start getting and sharing book recommendations! If you love to read AND you're a super organized person, you REALLLLLY need to get yourself over to Goodreads. I think my favorite part about the whole site is that I now have a place to "shelve" my "To Read" books ... other than that little piece of scrap paper that I always seem to lose.
In the last couple months, I've read two awesome books (actually, just two books period, which I feel like must be some sort of record in Lane World considering how little time I have to read! Let's just say I've been staying up waaaay too late):
The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender. I've been excited to read this book since I saw the mouthwatering cover at Joseph-Beth Booksellers. Yes, mouthwatering. I love cake! The inside pages didn't disappoint. The story follows a young girl who finds that she can taste feelings in food, and you learn how this "talent" affects her life, for good and bad. There's definitely a sense of magical realism in the story, which I'm generally not a huge fan of, but this is a quick and easy read that keeps you wanting more.
Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout. You know that feeling when you finish a good book and the thought of starting a new one is almost too overwhelming? OK, maybe it's just me, but after really getting into a good story, I have a hard time starting at square one again. That's how I felt when I picked up Olive Kitteridge, but after the first couple pages, I was already hooked. The novel is uniquely set up in that you learn who exactly Olive is from a number of connected and unconnected narrators. Each chapter starts almost all over with a story that loops Olive into the mix. I liked this perspective. Because each person has a different image of Olive, you really have to piece it all together and form your own opinion of the character.
Happy reading! :)
