Category: Books



Fall and Winter Gardening 25 Organic Vegetables to Plant andFall and Winter Gardening 25 Organic Vegetables to Plant and by R.J. Ruppenthal

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

With a move from a tiny apartment to a nice sized home on a little land, I have been not just collecting but actually reading books about gardening and homesteading. I am more than a little excited that this may very well happen. And so it was that I read this book. After all, if it happens it will happen in the early Fall. Whether or not I will be able to follow through with a cool weather garden remains to be seen. Even so, I think this has been the best book on gardening I have read so far. It doesn’t just cover the cool weather work, it covers gardening in general.

Mr. Ruppenthal has written a book that is easy to read, easy to follow, edited much more than most. He not only covers the getting down and dirty in the yard, but covers how to eat or store what you may grow using his advise. And he has illustrations, charts and many clickable URLs to take you to websites and sales sites for so many things most greenhorns like me might not know how to find. Such a bonus!

This Kindle book will remain on hand as I get ready for putting my shovel into the ground. I will probably reread it again and again. Oh, and this wasn’t a book that took a couple hours to read. It took me a few days to get through. This was well worth the $3.99 that is being charged currently. I was lucky enough to find it for free. I highly recommend this to those who want to garden, especially using the Fall and Winter to extend growing time.

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DragonseyeDragonseye by Anne McCaffrey

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Could it be that an unexpected vacation and the possibility of moving in the next few months, flavored this read for me? Or could it be because Dick Hill narrated. I really don’t like his interpretations of these books. Well, whatever it was, I have come away from this book thinking it is probably the worst of all the Pern books. It was quite boring, full of discussions, arguments, whining. Very little flying with dragons or finding new discoveries on this planet.

This book does have a bit of a story in how it came to me. I found the CDs at the library and so I borrowed it with the others I recently read. But I found I didn’t have the hardback at home. I found an inexpensive version on Amazon so picked it up. Ah, but when it came I found it wasn’t any more than a hard backed version of a paperback. So the print was unbearably small. And then as I started to read, I realized that I already had the Audible version and so was able to return the CDs. So mostly I listened to the story as I couldn’t read it very well. It seemed to take forever to get through with it.

As usual, when I have trouble with a book, I like to make sure I don’t flavor anyone else’s experience. Try it. You may very well like it. I hope you do.

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Gardening: Gardening Techniques for Beginners: Secrets to Start You Organic Garden: (Gardening, Straw Bale Gardening, Gardening Techniques)Gardening: Gardening Techniques for Beginners: Secrets to Start You Organic Garden: by Mike Harris

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I read this one just before going to sleep last night. It was a VERY quick read.

This is so little to this book that it felt like a magazine article. Well, what do I want for free? As much of a greenhorn as I am, I felt I knew most of the information in this article. So, if you are looking for an overview of what organic gardening is all about and some minor ways to achieve it, here is a place to start.

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STRAW BALE GARDENING For BEGINNERS - How to Grow Vegetables, Fruits and Herbs in a Straw Bale Garden (Straw Bale Gardening, Urban Gardening)STRAW BALE GARDENING For BEGINNERS – How to Grow Vegetables, Fruits and Herbs in a Straw Bale Garden by Michael Stones

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

As a result of a recent visit to the central desert of Oregon, I may very well have a place for gardening. The timeline of when we will get there will be fall so gardening probably won’t happen right away. That doesn’t stop my sudden need to know about such things. And so it was I had to start reading about different types of gardens.

I had heard of straw bale gardening the last time I was a greenhorn, over 20 years ago. So I thought I would start with this book. It was free, so what the heck? (BTW, it is still free with Kindle Unlimited.)

This book was very general information and the bits that venture into deeper instructions were confusing for me. I think my biggest question was about the fire hazard of straw bales mixed with certain fertilizers… why wasn’t that addressed? I am still afraid to try to do this. And I know I will have to deal with rodents, how can I make it work?

There were a few pictures, but for this visual learner, not enough. I like the idea of a greenhouse built of the bales, but again, fires????

So, I suppose this is a great book to get an overview. I have so much more to read about now!

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Train to NowhereTrain to Nowhere by Kay Bratt

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Saw this sitting on my carousel, knew I have liked Kay Bratt’s stories before so started reading it last night. Nearly finished reading it before time to sleep. But sleep won. It didn’t take long for me to finish the story win I woke up this morning. It was well worth the read.

Imagine being forced to hop on a train away from you parents just to save you and your family’s lives. And then needing to stay on the train forever just to maintain the illusion that you are part of the Red Guard. It wasn’t something she wanted to do, but it was necessary. So scary. She knows no one, doesn’t know who she can trust. These are the feelings and situations that drive the story.

It was a well-written story. I loved the main character. My biggest complaint was that it was too short. I wanted more. It wasn’t a cliffhanger ending, but I could tell there must be more written about this young girl and her life elsewhere. It just ended too abruptly.

I picked it up for free a while back. It is still free with Kindle Unlimited.

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The Wee Free Men (Discworld, #30)The Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Serendipity. Do you want to know how lucky/blessed I am? Well, I’m going to tell you right here in this review as I can’t separate my life from my reading diet.

A week ago I had been invited to go on a potential road trip to see my foster daughter. There were so many things that could happen to prevent said trip. So I was calling it the ‘iffy trip’. But things didn’t go wrong. Somehow everything went right and I got to go. I hadn’t been in Oregon since I was in junior high. And I hadn’t seen my foster daughter for at least a decade. And who knows, that iffy trip may have me moving up to Oregon very soon! How cool is that?

My friend brought this book, The Wee Free Men, narrated by Stephen Briggs. What a great road trip read! My friend and I were enthralled! We were laughing so hard at the late Terry Pratchett’s writing for most of the trip north and then most of the trip south. And, yes, the writing is the basis of this experience. But Mr. Briggs’s acting skills were truly fantastic. He had all the accents and voices for everyone and kept the story going.

Often while listening to this I pictured getting into Mr. Prachett’s head while he was writing this story. He must have laughed to himself often with the puns that seem to rolls from his fingers into the pages. Then I wished I could watch Stephen Briggs do his part in front of the mic doing his performance. There had to be quite a few faces for each of the characters that seem to jump out of his mouth.

Needless to say, I have this book on my Kindle and Audible wishlists. I want to read it over and over. It is easily as great as Alice in Wonderland or Wizard of Oz. It would be a great family read. SO fun!

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Girl on Horseback Volume II: The Journey of Abby Simmons and her horses continues as she grows from child to young experienced horsewoman.Girl on Horseback Volume II: The Journey of Abby Simmons and her horses continues as she grows from child to young experienced horsewoman. by Eileen Tidwell

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I don’t know. I liked the first one. There just wasn’t enough depth to this one. Since I listen to the Kindle text-to-speech while reading it on the tablet app I saw a lot of editing issues. There were places where there were strikethroughs followed by other ways to say the same thing. Often I thought the strikeout was a better way to say it. The TTS would speak both parts. Then near the end there was a lot of underlining. That didn’t change or interrupt the story, just a little distracting.

Still, I needed a little story about horses to join me on my week long vacation out in the country. It just wasn’t long enough to keep me going a couple days and the character only grew a little. I felt it would have been better to have parts one and two together and with a part three to make it feel deeper.

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Crossroads (Crossroads Saga, #1)Crossroads by Mary Ting
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I am on vacation and not near my computer so I’m having to write this on my tablet using speech to text feature. This is new to me so please be patient if I miss any mistakes that happen.

Let me start by saying, Crossroads is an interesting book. I think this may be the author, Mary Ting’s,  first book. If so, she did a nice job. Although, I think there was an awful lot of repetition. Since I read it on my Kindle app on my tablet with Whispersync, my experience includes the narration by Amanda Friday. I don’t know why, but Miss Friday’s voice was abrasive and her acting skills were nil. Maybe it was just the combination of both that left me in the dust. Or maybe I’m just not the audience it was written for. There are a lot of 5 star ratings for this stories so it may just be me.

Or maybe I’m just not in the mood for one more paranormal, forbidden romance between an angel and a human. Still there was something about the story that kept me coming back and not throwing it aside. I did liked the relationships between mother and daughter, daughter and the friends, and the main character and the person she calls Gamma. I also like the parts where she talked about riding her bike to work and that she worked retail. That’s not something you find often in fictional books.

Like I often say, don’t take my word for it. You may love this story and the narration. Last I looked both were free. Can’t beat the price for entertaining read!

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Sky DragonsSky Dragons by Anne McCaffrey

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This was a bittersweet book. Published after our Pern Queen, Anne McCaffrey passed. That acknowledgement is at the beginning of the book and set the tone. At least it did for me.

I already had the hardback so all I needed was the audio. I borrowed that from the library. Now I have this on my Audible wishlist. Once again, Emily Durante was the narrator. She is excellent! Her acting skills shine in this recording.

In this book, the McCaffrey’s join the 21st century breaking the dragon-glass ceiling for those who love differently, for women. Feminists erupted from Pern and showed they could do anything the guys could. With the framework set up by Fiona and Larana in the previous books Xhinna sets out to save Pern from total destruction by thread. Illnesses cut the human and dragon populations and in the following passes of thread all could die. Xhinna comes up with some solutions, much of it trial and error but she is strong and pushes the envelopes of what she should be able to do. Just as her ‘sisters’ before her, Xhinna loves deeply and uncommonly. From that love, she finds uncommon answers.

It makes me sad that this may be the last Pern novel. Of course, I still have a few in the middle that I haven’t read yet. But knowing the chronological ending of the series just makes me feel SO sad! I will have to make sure to reread all of these again later. Even still, it astonishes me at how much story Ms. McCaffrey was able to create from this one planet. The mass of world and personality maps and charts of information, she and Todd must have sitting around … well, it must be amazing!

If you get the chance to read the entire series, do so! If I had to narrow it down, I think these last three, starting with Stargirl written by both mother and son, with the narration of Emily Durante, are the best ones of all!

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Resignation (Worlds Apart #2)Resignation by Amanda Thome

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Cliffhanger me once, shame on you. Cliffhanger me twice and I am finished reading your books!

This is a second book in a series that had promise. I don’t know many authors that can write action scenes like Amanda Thome. But when I read the cliffhanger at the end of book one I was forced to wait a long time to read the next book. By then I couldn’t remember the people or even the world left behind in book one. I spent more time online researching other reviews and blurbs to see if I could finally recall anything. By the time I did remember I almost didn’t care anymore. That Ms. Thome was able to still make me breathless as I read her action scenes and I cared that the people involved might get hurt among the bombs didn’t help me care enough to want to go through this again.

If a person knows they are writing a series, I think they need to write ‘cliff’notes to remind us all where we were and how we got there. But, PLEASE! leave us in a place where we can breathe and know that our friends are safe enough to live without our eyes keeping them alive.

If you like that sort of ending given in the Worlds Apart series. The books do read quickly. The second does need a bit more editing. And if you’re lucky enough to read book one and two in quick succession it may be worth being left out in the cold.

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