Author: sandys5

Hi! Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. I'm a huge reader, reading a variety of genres from children's to horror to historical fiction. If the book captures my attention, I'll read it. I'm an active volunteer at our public library performing many different roles. I'm also a mother and a Nana to some terrific grandchildren who I now watch during the day. I love to be outside, staying busy and enjoying nature. I write reviews for all the books that I read and I post the reviews on Amazon, B&N, Goodreads, BookLikes, Bloglovin', and here on WordPress. I also have a few book boards on Pinterest where I pin the book's cover. I am also a member of NetGalley. Thanks for stopping by today. I hope you found something that made your day. Please stop back again, or better yet, hit the "like" button or follow me. Have a terrific day and stay positive and read!

Lenny Marks Gets Away With Murder by Kerryn Mayne

4.5 stars Fiction

I have mixed feelings about this story. I liked the story, but I was confused with the anagrams that the character created in her mind. Lennie was a character who was content with her life, a well-constructed life that she had created. She keeps everyone at arm’s length, and she is in control. Lennie enjoys playing Scrabble so when she finds herself constructing the anagrams in her head, is it because she enjoys word playing? Or it is something else? I thought the use of the anagrams in the story felt too randomly used and they started to annoy me. I just didn’t know when they would pop up and as I read, the anagrams broke up the flow of the story and I started to skip them.

Lennie lives a very strict and structed life. A strict and structed life, alone. She hasn’t made any deep connections with anyone, and I think in the back of my mind, she was just used to that. She buys the same food week after week, and her bookshelf is lined with copies of The Hobbit. She played Scrabble with her imaginary friend, Monica (Lennie loved watching Friends), and her most recent addition is a dog that she rescued from the street. Lennie is now not walking down that street anymore, for she fears that she might run into some individuals who would not be happy about her newly “adopted” dog. Yes, Lennie leads a very strict and structured life, a life that Lennie is content in and she’s happy.

Lenny, the schoolteacher, would have loved to live this way forever but one day, she received a letter which changed her life. The return address, on this letter, stumps her. She doesn’t know anyone from the Adult Parole Board, or did she? Lennie is forced to remember her past, a past that she didn’t recall she had forgotten.

This book reminded me of a book I had read previously, up to a point. Lennie had suppressed her childhood, and it took the letter to start bringing back everything. As she finds the truth, I hoped that it was worth it and that she would finally be able to make some connections with individuals who were actually real. This was a good story that I enjoyed, and I was happy to see the new Lenny. 4.5 stars

Thank you to NetGalley, St. Martin Press, and the author for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Troubling Tonsils! By Aaron Reynolds

5 stars Children’s Picture Book

Charlie is a furry rodent. Like all furry rodents, he attends school. It’s fall and he has just returned from the pumpkin patch with his very own pumpkin! He’s got a sore throat, so Charlie is coughing, and coughing, and coughing. This sets off an alarm with his mother who checks Charlie out and finds that his adenoids are swollen. What adenoids!?! Charlie is alarmed at first, like what are they, but his mother calms him down and he realizes it’s not a death sentence and he’ll just needs to visit the doctor tomorrow.

Yep, the doctor confirms what his mother diagnosed and he’ll have to have them removed. WHAT?!? I liked Charlie’s reactions to all this new information that he hears about his body. Charlie’s vocal and dramatic which made me laugh. There’s a lengthy conversation between the doctor, his dad and Charlie and it’s decided that Charlie will be able to keep his tonsils after they are removed.

You can imagine the excitement and images that invade Charlie’s mind as he envisions bringing his own extracted tonsils to school to show everyone. As that surgery day approaches, Charlie starts to have mixed feelings. As Charlie is being prepped for surgery, a problem occurs. Situated on the table , Charlie enters the world of the unknown. He’s lost and confused. He is trying to escape but he can’t find his way out. Oh Charlie…it’ll be okay.

I liked the drama and the flow of this story, it had a lot of energy, and it moved quickly. Convincing the doctor into letting Charlie keep his tonsils was an unexpected twist in the book and it helped change his mood. Charlie’s emotions were felt, and the illustrations conveyed the book’s message. It was a fun story and not creepy for individuals who know reality from fiction. 4.5 stars

The House That Floated by Guojing

5 stars Children’s Picture Book

A wordless book. There once was a house on a cliff. There was a tree, some chairs, and a clothesline by the house. A weathervane was on top of the house. Inside the house, lived a lady and her son. Underneath the cliff, the ocean stretched on for miles. A woman and her son lived in the house. Walking down the cliff, the family would take their fishing boat out into the ocean. One afternoon, the family successfully rescues a trapped animal in the ocean.

Time passes and the family grows. The illustrations do a wonderful job showing the progression of time as a baby is born and grows into a young child. It’s a fantastic day in the water when the family realizes that over time, their family is not the only family that has grown.

A violent storm develops and hits the cliff, unleashing its power on the house and everything around it. In its aftermath, the landscape has changed, and the family has some major decisions to make concerning their future. What was their home and their land is no longer sustainable, what now?

This was a powerful story, and I enjoyed the details of the illustrations. I enjoy the facial expressions yet this book being a wordless one, didn’t provide many of them. I was surprised how well the story flowed without them. There was plenty of color on the illustrations without them being loud and overpowering. Great story! 5 stars

Be Quiet! By Ryan T. Higgins

2 stars Children’s Picture Book

It’s supposed to be a wordless book, but two friends won’t stop talking. Rupert wants to write a wordless book, but his companions will NOT be quiet! Rupert gets angrier and angrier throughout the book until he’s screaming for Nibbs and Thistle to stop talking.

The friends are three mice. Rupert wants to write a wordless book but that would mean silence and Nibbs and Thistle cannot provide that to him. Nibbs and Thistle try to help Rupert in other ways with his book but what Rupert really wants is silence. The book tries to be funny, but I didn’t appreciate the humor. It got old for me. I was getting angry like Rupert. This book didn’t work for me.

Don’t Trust the Dog: Life Lessons From Chip the Dog by Dev Petty

3 stars Children’s Picture Book

I loved the illustrations inside this book. The illustrations are colorful, funny and are full of emotions. The facial expressions on both humans and animals are definitely something that you need to notice as you turn the pages of this book, the illustrator did a fantastic job capturing these sentiments. From the innocent, ecstatic dog to the devious eyes of the feline, you just never know what these two are up to.

Chip feels that he has a lot of knowledge to share with his readers. He has had his share of issues with cats and he’s here to share his experience. Chip, by the way, is a dog. Chip knows for sure that cats are not your friend, and they cannot be trusted. Chip would rather trust anyone but a cat, yet by looking at the situations that he gets into, I think he better start trusting cats. It’s funny watching Chip as he gets into some awkward and hilarious situations as the cats sit by and just watch him.

I think this is a book for older elementary school readers, as some younger readers might not understand the humor. 3.5 stars

Knight Owl and Early Bird by Christopher Denise

5 stars Children’s Picture Books

We loved Knight Owl and now, we get to experience Early Bird! Early Bird wants to be like Knight Owl but ……it’s complicated. No one can ever be like Knight Owl. Knight Owl is Captain of the Knight Night Watch. He has the night shift guarding the castle while others are sleeping plus he’s an owl. Early Bird is a bird; hence, he sleeps at night and he’s very noisy!

Knight Owl does teach Early Bird what he does during the Knight Night Watch in the afternoon but as the day turns to night, Early Bird falls asleep. When the sun rises, Early Bird arises and he’s ready for this new day, but Knight Owl is tired from working all night and he’s ready for bed.

After a few days of training and Early Bird’s overzealous behavior, Knight Owl can’t handle him any longer. He tells Early Bird that he has had enough, and he needs to “PLEASE, GO AWAY!” Broken hearted, Early Bird heads out into the forest outside the castle walls (sad picture). Knight Owl starts to have second thoughts and begins to worry about him. Knight Owl heads out to look for him. Now they are both outside the castle walls! Goodness!! They hear a sound and that’s not a good one!!

There’s an illustration of glowing eyes; owl is standing all alone with wolves starting to close in around him. What ?!?!

Yes, it’s that good! Check it out and the other books with Knight Owl.

The Monster in the Lake by Leo Timmers

5 stars Children’s Picture Book

Three ducks want to go to the lake but the mallard is worried about the monster. His friends say there is nothing to that story. When Mallard looks under the water at the lake he sees a huge monster fish. The monster fish smiles at him, and Mallard follows him under the water. Mallard finds at the bottom of the lake a huge party of monster fishes and Mallard has a good time down there. Mallards’ three friends are still swimming up above and don’t really notice that Mallard is gone until later. When they realize that Mallard is gone that are scared that he was taken by a monster until Mallard tells them that there’s no monster in the lake. Yet, as Mallard walks off on dry land, all the monsters from down below are making their way onland, happy smiling monsters.

Funny, cute story. The illustrations are amazing! It’s a simple story with few words but the story is good and has a good message. 5 stars

The Beat I Drum by Dusti Bowling

5 stars Middle School

“Positive: It’s great that none of us are perfect, because perfection is boring.”

He was trapped inside his own body, and he didn’t know the way out. It was just the way it was. He tries to control things, but it never worked. It was just the way it was.

“how about when you take a drink of something that goes down the wrong pipe, and you instantly start hacking and coughing and your eyes water and you can’t stop. Next time that happens, concentrate every bit of energy you have on NOT coughing. Just ignore that searing tickle in your lung. Can you image feeling that way all the time? I mean All. The. Time. Welcome to my life.” Welcome to the life of Connor who has Tourette’s Syndrome with Tics.

Connor lives with his mother in an apartment and when the landlord arrives at their door, Connor answers it. Mother and son know the apartment rules, yet the landlord knows firsthand that they are in violation of one of the rules. The landlord has also received a complaint from another resident. The threat of eviction looms over the family. How can they deny this violation when the landlord himself has witnessed it? They can’t. Welcome to the life of Connor who has Tourette’s Syndrome with Tics. Connor tic: barking like a dog.

Connor does have a handful of friends, but his attitude and emotions are hard on their relationship. When Connor finds himself under a peer’s radar, everyone around him is fair game, when the pressure gets too much. It takes time, patience, love, and understanding for Connor to finally put the pieces all together. The pieces that he had within himself, the whole time.

I felt for Connor on page one of this book. He wanted to be a normal child doing normal things yet here he was barking and letting his emotions get the best of him. His friends try to include him and yet, Connor can’t let go how much he is different from everyone else. Connor puts his own mark on his back while those that really like him, see Connor for Connor. I liked it when Connor started to unwrap the layers that had trapped him inside himself, and he allowed others in, and he allowed himself to be open. His family and friends finally get to see the real Connor then. Another fantastic book by Dusti Bowling !!

The Teacher of Nomad Land: A Story of World War II

5 stars Middle School

The apple never falls far from the tree. Another cover love title for me and I’m so glad I picked this book up. He was once a blackboard teacher with the nomads, and now, he is dead. An accident leaves Babak (age 13) and Sana (age 8) orphaned and the tribe without a teacher.

Its 1941 and we’re in Iran. Their father has just passed away, and the siblings are waiting for their aunt to pick them up. The children’s life is turned upside down when their aunt informs them of the new lifestyle that awaits them. I loved how Babak secretly kept an eye on his sister and how both of them tried to hide the reality of their lives from one another. They had dreams and even when other individuals were attempting to smash their dreams, they kept reaching for them.

Deciding to find the nomads, they set off, to make a life for themselves. They needed a safe haven, and they knew the nomads could provide that, but what could they offer in return? Their father had set the foundation and now, the siblings decided to follow in his footsteps. They would attempt to become the nomad’s teacher.

They hit a few snags along the way, including meeting Ben. The relationship with Ben provides the sibling strength and growth within themselves and strengthens the bond between them. I liked Ben as a character; he played his part well and was beneficial to the dynamics of the book.

A great book. The author’s notes at the end of the book are definitely worth reading as they’re informative, covering different topics addressed in the book: alliances, alphabet, territories, and language barriers.

“Never give up on your dreams, no matter how painful and difficult your journey is.” (Lisa).

The Grey Wolf by Louise Penny

4 stars Fiction

I admit this is my first Louise Penny novel I fell in love with the cover since I first laid eyes upon it. I love a great mystery, and I know she’s a very popular writer, but I was nervous jumping into a series without reading any of the previous books. In all honestly, I was a bit confused listening to this book on audio. I felt as if discussions were repeated and conversations were just too many. Regardless, I did enjoy reading The Grey Wolf. I enjoyed the realistic and true characters who were trying to piece together fragments of a mystery.

It begins with a phone call. Then comes the break-in. Too many things are happening and they’re happening fast. The discovery of the small slip of paper inside the jacket. It’s a small piece of paper which might not seem like much, but it is just the beginning. Water. Something we all need and unfortunately, take for granted. When this resource is threatened, Gamache is quick to act. The how, where, and why are the questions Gamache needs to answer quickly as individuals’ lives are at risk. Reaching across the globe the team begins to try to piece this puzzle all together.

I liked how Gamache worked to get this case under control. Reaching across the globe, many individuals were connected , grasping at anything they could find. Did they finally get the answers they were searching for? Time will tell as we wait for the next book. 4 stars