Several reads perfect for the dog days of summer

By Lynda Rego
Posted 8/18/17

You would think winter would be the peak reading season; but, I seem to fly through books during the summer months. Maybe it’s the long days. Once the garden has been weeded, the grass cut and …

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Several reads perfect for the dog days of summer

Posted

You would think winter would be the peak reading season; but, I seem to fly through books during the summer months. Maybe it’s the long days. Once the garden has been weeded, the grass cut and dinner planned, I’m free to sit on the deck and read for two or three hours straight on weekends. Heaven!
“The Hummingbird” (2015) by Stephen P. Kiernan is the best book I’ve read this summer. Deborah Birch is an experienced hospice nurse who is good at reaching people. She needs all her skills to deal with her husband, Michael, who came back from his third tour in the Middle East with PTSD, and her current patient, Barclay Reed, a crusty old history professor who is dying alone at home of kidney cancer. Sounds like a downer, huh? Not at all. It’s a very touching, realistic and empathetic look at growing old, dealing with the ghosts in your past (for both men) and how to deal with life, suffering, sacrifice, acceptance and death. Yes, I cried a couple of times; but, found this book so fulfilling and I couldn't put it down. The chapters alternate between the present and a book written by Professor Reed about the only attack on the mainland U.S. by Japan during World War II (yes, that really happened). As Deborah reads the book aloud to the professor, she sees that it might hold the key to reaching her husband.
“The Crossing Places” (2009) by Elly Griffiths. I’m not usually a fan of detective series. They become so by-the-numbers (my exceptions are Louise Penny’s Inspector Gamache, Charles Todd’s Inspector Rutledge and Laurie King’s Sherlock Holmes and Mary Russell books). But, I have found a new series to follow. Ruth Galloway is an archaeologist and university professor in Norfolk, England ‑ a single, overweight woman with cats as she describes herself. She lives on the edge of a lonely, large, flat saltmarsh and mudflats that stretch to the sea. Years earlier it was the site of a dig she participated in of an early Bronze Age henge. When bones are discovered nearby, Detective Chief Inspector Harry Nelson asks for her help is estimating their age. He’s still haunted by the disappearance of a child 10 years earlier. The body is a girl’s from the Iron Age; but, this is the beginning of a collaboration that will change both of their lives and solve two crimes. I loved the archaeology, the history of the area, how the landscape is as much a character as Ruth and Harry. I’ve read the second and third books since and I’m hooked.
"Tiny Little Thing" (2015) by Beatriz Williams features peripheral characters from one of her earlier books. Christina “Tiny” Schuyler has always done what is expected of her. She is a “good girl” who never disappoints her family and friends. But, it’s 1966 and she’s now married to Franklin Hardcastle, a congressional candidate for Massachusetts whose patrician family hopes to see him become president one day. (Yes, very Kennedyesque). Married to a handsome, charismatic man and living a life of luxurious leisure, doesn’t she have everything she could ever want? The action shuttles between the family compound on Cape Cod in 1966 and Boston in 1964, when, weeks before the wedding, Tiny is having second thoughts and meets someone who will complicate her life. When her sister Pepper shows up with problems of her own, along with Frank’s cousin, a recently returned Vietnam War hero, things get really complicated and Tiny will discover that she has to make decisions based on her own needs for once.
And, Williams’ next book featured Tiny’s sister, Pepper. I liked that one, too. These are perfect summer escapism.
"Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon – And the Journey of a Generation” (2008) by Sheila Weller is a massive research project masquerading as a novel. The ambitious undertaking to look at the lives of Joni Mitchell, Carole King and Carly Simon is a fascinating peek at the period, the times, and the sexual and social merry-go-round that connected so many of the people in the music business. But, where on earth was Weller’s editor? She offers so many asides and remarks in parentheses that huge run-on sentences need re-reading to get the original point.  Plus, copious footnotes in the back of the book with even more extraneous details. And, most of the bits on the side players aren’t that important except in a scholarly tome, which this is at 692 pages.
A great deal could have been eliminated with no loss to the story of these three dynamic women, who produced some of the best music of their times. I was a fan of all three and owned their albums, so I did enjoy the book. And, side characters include everyone from Hollywood characters like Warren Beatty and Jack Nicholson (who don’t come off looking great) to music’s James Taylor, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Crosby, Stills & Nash, Neil Young, and more. The chapters alternate among the three women, too, which makes it difficult to keep them straight at the beginning. But, if you’re a child of the ‘60s, like I am, and want to learn more, it’s a behind-the-scenes look at where the songs came from and how they were created.
“By Bread Alone” (2003) by Sarah Kate Lynch. This wasn't as much fun as her “Blessed are the Cheesemakers,” but it was still a fun read. Esme MacDougall Stack lives in a six-story House in the Clouds on the Suffolk coast in England with her husband Pog, son Rory, Pog’s father and Esme’s Granny Mac. A tragedy that no one speaks of brought the family to its current location. But, it wasn’t always so. Fifteen years earlier, at age 19, she lived a fairy tale, falling in love with Louis, a baker of sourdough bread in a boulangerie in Southwest France while on vacation. He taught her about love and how to make the authentic sourdough boule she’s been making ever since. When he comes back into her life it will force her to confront the past and decide what she really wants. There’s also a recipe for sourdough starter and boules in the back of the book.

Visit Lynda Rego on Facebook at www.facebook.com/lynda.rego where she shares tips on cooking, books, gardening, genealogy and other topics. Click on Like and share ideas for upcoming stories.

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Mike Rego

Mike Rego has worked at East Bay Newspapers since 2001, helping the company launch The Westport Shorelines. He soon after became a Sports Editor, spending the next 10-plus years in that role before taking over as editor of The East Providence Post in February of 2012. To contact Mike about The Post or to submit information, suggest story ideas or photo opportunities, etc. in East Providence, email mrego@eastbaymediagroup.com.