A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson

by | Nov 3, 2017 | Jessie

Bill Bryson has been recommended to me by several friends and I recently had a chance to listen to A Walk in the Woods audiobook. It was great. Bryson gives an autobiographical account of his attempt to hike the 2,100 mile Appalachian Trail. The book was full of trail...

Bossypants by Tina Fey

by | Nov 3, 2017 | Jessie

I would highly recommend listening to this book, which is what I did. Tina reads it herself and is hilarious. This book is full of short funny stories about Tina Fey’s life and the circumstances which brought her to writing and starring in the TV show 30 Rock. She...

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

by | Nov 3, 2017 | Jessie

I have to be honest: I thought I had read enough books that were set in WWII. But I was wrong. This is a must read. Zusak beautifully tells this complex and difficult story with grace and tenderness. Our narrator is Death and the main character is Liesel, a girl who...

The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley by Hanna Tinti

by | Jun 2, 2017 | Jessie

I loved this book. Tinti magically draws the reader into this beautiful, complicated and somewhat gritty coming-of-age story. The plot focuses on father, Sam, and his daughter, Loo, who are both haunted by the loss of Lily, their wife and mother, as well as Sam’s...

To the Bright Edge of the World by Eowyn Ivey

by | Apr 5, 2017 | Jessie

This is Ivey’s second novel following her Pulitzer Prize finalist, The Snow Child, and I truly enjoyed it. Ivey, a native of Alaska, takes up snow-covered lands again in a story written mostly through letters. The characters are complex, unique and true and their...