What I Read this Month

Courtroom drama, JAMES, code breakers, and a juicy memoir...

April was full of reading - and listening as I have finally (!) embraced the audiobook. I’ve been listening via the Hoolpa or Libby app and have a whole bunch of holds. Both apps are free through your local libraries - and at risk of disappearing with federal funding being cut. PLEASE SAVE THE BOOKS!

This month I recommend…

1. Presumed Guilty by Scott Turow, thriller: The third installment of Turow’s courtroom drama featuring Rusty, now a judge. This is a “ripped-from-the-headlines” story that you will recognize…

2. James by Percival Everett, fiction: um WOW. I wish I’d reread Huck Finn before reading this, but I remembered the story enough to be all in, right away. “When Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a man in New Orleans and separated from his wife and daughter forever, he runs away until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck has faked his own death to escape his violent father. As all readers of American literature know, thus begins the dangerous and transcendent journey by raft down the Mississippi River toward the elusive and unreliable promise of the Free States and beyond.”  This is MUST-READ, an amazing read. Percival James has written a masterpiece. Recommended: Libby app; wonderful audiobook narrator.

3. The Bletchley Riddle by Ruta Septys and Steve Sheinkin middle grade historical fiction: Based on the true story of the young mathematician code breakers of World War II, and the real life and super secret Bletchley Park - Britain’s top secret code-breaking center. Because of their remarkable work, historians estimate that the war against Hitler was shortened by as much as two years. Winston Churchhill said these hidden heroes were “the geese that laid the golden egg and never cracked.” Fascinating, funny, inspiring, and hard to put down! Septys and Sheinkin are most definitely a dynamic duo.

4. When Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, (now a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and professor), stumbled upon Martha Ballard’s diary, she spent the next eight years writing Martha's biography: A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard Based on Her Diary, 1785-1812.

   Last month I gobbled up The Frozen River by Ariel Lawhon and then had to go straight to the definitive source. It’s astonishingly good. (thank you, Cecily, for the push!)

"Martha Ballard ensured that she would not be forgotten. There was nothing in Christian tradition that said a midwife ought to keep a diary...For some complex of reasons, probably unknown even to her, Martha felt an intense need to re-create her own life day by day...she not only documented her prayers, her lost sleep, her deeds of charity and compassion, she savored and wrote down the petty struggles and small graces of ordinary life. The diary is a selective record, shaped by her need to justify and understand her life, yet is also a remarkably honest one...(it) tells us that Martha was a devout Christian and humble nurse whose intelligence sometimes made it difficult for her to attend church or defer to her town's physicians, a loving mother, a gentle woman with a sense of duty and an anatomical curiosity that allowed her to observe autopsies as well as cry over the dead, a courageous woman..."

5. The Mystery of the Locked Rooms by Lindsay Currie, middle grade mystery: Crack the codes. Find the treasure. Escape the house. The twists and turns make this really fun - and middle grade always has a happy and hopeful ending!

6. So Late in the Day by Claire Keegan, three short stories: If

   George Saunders
   says Claire Keegan is one of the best fiction writers in the world, I pay attention. With the sparest language, this short novella accomplishes what great fiction does: makes you care. Such simple stories, so powerful.

7. Be Ready When the Luck Happens by Ina Garten, memoir: I have no interest in celebrity memoirs, and definitely not cooking ones so it was a surprise even to me when I picked this in my Libby app. Maybe because it was short, or maybe because I’d heard it was good - and it was! What a delightful surprise to learn so much about Ina - her feminism, her difficult childhood home life, Jeffrey, working for the government, discovering cooking later in life, opening a store…I was inspired! She taken big risks her whole life and I feel I’ve met a mentor and friend.

What are you reading? I always love to hear…

Amy 💖

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Mailbag:

When I wrote “Love is a Handwritten Letter,” you delivered! Thank you for making my day - Patti, Connie, Maple Elementary, and Herbie <3

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The Last Part:

School visits: Looking for a class visit? Let’s talk creativity, brain and books, resilience and story, the power of reading and writing…be in touch.

I work with a literacy organization called CLIF. We bring books to low income and underserved communities. If you live in New Hampshire or Vermont, check it out - and request a visit. I WILL COME!

I Feel I’m Walking Off a Cliff: After TWENTY-SIX YEARS of mothering, my youngest is graduating from high school. I know I’ll always be a mom, but this year has been a year of “lasts.” We’ve had a really great time getting here (she weeps).

Mid-life Crisis: See above. Who am I now?

Boiled Eggs: I don’t like eggs but I eat them a couple times a week bc they’re healthy and make me feel better. Like I tell my kids, “you don’t have to like it, you just have to do it.” yay, mummy! (do you eat foods you hate b/c you “should”?)

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The Unforgettable Guinevere St. Clair is part-mystery, part understanding of the human heart 💖

Ten Thousand Tries is Golden’s quest to save his dad and the soccer team ⚽

The McNifficents is one summer with six rambunctious kids and their miniature-schnauzer nanny 🐕 New Hampshire’s 2024 Great Reads for Kids selection!