"Little Heathens"
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. There's something about that old-fashioned work ethic that inspires me to want to be better. As difficult as life was back during the time of the depression, the fight to survive tough times, life almost seemed simpler. Mildred's descriptions portrayed the stern grandparents, yet she didn't speak with bitterness and instead seemed to have a joyful childhood despite the challenges. Every time I picked up the book, I was smiling or laughing at something, and was always intrigued by meal preparations. I appreciated all of the details--it helped my understanding of "the olden days." I was inspired to be more frugal (how appropriate for these economic times!) by things like the way they swiped out the inside of eggshells to make certain they got all the eggwhites. I confess that in all my years of cracking eggs, this has never crossed my mind! In fact, I still might not (fingernails ya know?) but the idea that things weren't wasted, and that they made the most of what little they had, has stuck with me. This will be fun to read parts of it to my kids as they get older to teach them "see what life was like way back when."
The Survivors Club
Another great read! I liked that this book was more than just a compilation of experiences of people who had survived major traumas/accidents/attacks/etc. It used these experiences to point out ways that we can be better prepared to be survivors ourselves, whether it be surviving an accident, or surviving an economic depression, or whatever. There really are things we can do to increase our chances of surviving when faced with adversity. Sherwood (author) doesn't claim to know why some people die while others survive, he simply explores what those survivors did and lets the reader think through it. For example, he studies how some people have a strong will to live, how some people learn to manage fear, some of it is just luck, etc. I found it all quite interesting. The end of the book has a section for taking a test to determine your own survival personality, but since I checked this book out of the library I did not get to do this part (each book contains a single user code for the online test). I'm pretty sure I fall into whatever category includes "fearful" so one of my goals is to work on managing that fear.
Outlander
Gabaldon (author) can really tell a story! It was more than a story it was like some kind of epic romance/adventure. And then I wanted to take a trip to Scotland each time I picked up the book. While I got swept away in the first half of the book, I got annoyed with all the sex scenes in the last half. I mean, a honeymoon is one thing, but seriously I didn't need to read about all the details for EACH passionate encounter! Really wasn't there an editor around prior to publishing? Also I personally thought the evil Capt Randall gay lover bit was pretty icky too. TMI! The book was plenty long enough already, well written, descriptive, exciting, other than these two thumbs-down pieces so it begs the question of whether Gabaldon could have left out some of these details or not? As far as a "time travel" book, she did an amazing job at making it seem realistic and possible rather than fall into the "fantasy" category. (side note: I started to read "The Time Travelers Wife" last year and thought it was obnoxious--couldn't finish it) In doing so, I liked that I couldn't figure out how it was going to end, how everything was going to wrap up in the end, and kept you guessing right till the very end. I was glad that Claire chose to stay with Jamie---now I'm debating on whether or not to continue the series!
