Well, it looks like our delightful weather is over. Temperatures are in the 90s, with high humidity. That means I’ll seldom leave the apartment because I get humidity headaches when I’m out in it too long. That’s why I preferred Arizona over Florida. I could handle Arizona’s high temperatures, but I can’t handle humidity. At least the evenings still accommodate lightning bugs. I went to my Mom’s for a couple days, and the fireflies in the field across from her put on quite a show in the evenings.
What have you done this week? Are you surviving your weather? Most important, what are you reading?
I’m sneaking in an August title that wasn’t on yesterday’s list. When I arrived home yesterday, Lucy Connelly’s fifth Scottish Isle mystery, Death at a Scottish Halloween was in the mail. I couldn’t resist. I love the cover, enjoy the series, and instead of a galley or an ARC, it’s a beautiful, shiny book. And, someone listened to me! It’s only 250 pages, not a mammoth tome.
Dr. Emilia McRoy and her assistant Abigail have fun in their room decorated as a mad doctor’s office in the local haunted house. But, when they help to close down the house, they find a body in the room across the hall. And, this one isn’t fake.
I like the small community and found family the Seattle doctor has found in Sea Isle. I’m enjoying this one. But, you won’t hear more from me about this book until it’s released in August.
What are you reading this week?
The only event of note this past week was having our 8-year-old granddaughter Evelyn for an overnight stay. Fun was had by all, books were bought (she’s enjoying The InvestiGators series of graphic novels and was SO excited to see the latest one in the store), David took her to the river (time was spent trying to construct a bridge of rocks to get across), pre-breakfast walk was taken (with stops at adult-sized exercise stations in the park where she tried all the equipment), she ‘helped’ me with Wordle and Connections, and snuggles were had. The thing I enjoyed the most was the feel of her little hand in mine; who knows how much longer she’ll want to do that.
Books this week:
LOOK BEFORE YOU LEAP by Virginia Heath
Second in the Miss Prentice’s Protégées series, after ‘All’s Fair in Love and War.’ The series follows the various graduates of Miss Prentice’s School for Young Ladies. This second book concerns Charlotte Travers, ‘Lottie’ to her friends. Having grown up on a farm with her four brothers, the attributes of duty, decorum, diligence, and discretion don’t come naturally to her although she does her best to try to curb her tomboyish nature.
But now, after having been dismissed from her latest governess position after she ‘borrowed’ the lord’s horse for an early morning ride, about which the lord’s awful son wouldn’t have tattled if she hadn’t vigorously defended herself against his unwanted advances – she’s back to living with Miss Prentice at the school.
The only job opportunity that’s available to Lottie now is that of lady’s companion to one Lady Almeria Winthrop, an elderly lady who has hired, chewed up, and spit out a series of companions so with Lottie’s temperament it’s not likely she’ll make a success of this job either. But with her father’s farm in dire straits, she will do her best so that she can help by sending her wages to him.
Meanwhile, Lady Winthrop’s sister Lady Wennington is planning a birthday party for her son Lord Guy. He is turning 30 and he had promised her she’d have a houseful of grandchildren by now but because of a very public romantic failure some time ago, poor Guy was hurt and humiliated so badly that he hasn’t approached another woman since. To remedy this situation his mother with the help of her sister, is organizing a week-long house party to which several eligible young debutantes will be invited. Surely one of them will tempt the grumpy Guy. Not going according to plan however, is that the only young lady he’s interested in is Lady Winthrop’s newest lady’s companion, Lottie.
Hi-jinks, competition between the invited debutantes, laughter, treachery, and horses ensue. All of which entertains immensely, while at the same time bestowing a warm, heartfelt story that had me rooting for Lottie and Guy the whole way.
COUNTY ROAD SIX by Kevin Hardcastle
This is a slow burn ‘rural family drama’ that takes place in Ontario, by a Canadian author.
From the book jacket: ‘It has been years since Mara O’Hare has come home to North Simcoe County. But she is forced to return after her father’s death. Arthur O’Hare – the meanest, most vicious man in the townships – laid low, isolated, angry, and sullen before he took his own life. Mara is reunited with her two sisters, Beth and Emma. Soon, the three women are fighting to retain ownership of the farm they have inherited from their father. But Arthur O’Hare’s legacy is not just land. He has also left his daughters an unanticipated inheritance of violence and terror, born out of a long-buried family secret.’
The story started off slowly, very gradually building a sense of menace. You know something bad is coming but you don’t know when or how. And when it does, you’re still not ready; but by then the characters mean something to you and you’re hoping the O’Hare sisters will make it through.
I wasn’t sure about this book to begin with but I became used to the atmospheric, dark, spare writing style. Without flowery descriptive passages it actually heightened the emotions in the story and distilled them to their essence – these carefully rendered feelings of grief, hope, fear, and the few fragile moments of something like the whisper of contentment. And you end up wondering about all the things from the past that make you who you are today, and how – and if – it’s possible to break free, heal, and make a new life for yourself.
This is not a jolly feel-good book by any means, and it’s certainly not fast-paced, and yet there’s something about it that compelled me to want to finish it.