bella books review

Sunday Salon: Watching Miss Marple

I recently watched two episodes of Miss Marple: Sleeping Murder and Moving Finger! I really enjoyed both movies, though, I admit to liking Moving Finger more because that happens to be one of my favorite Christie mysteries.

The Moving Finger is about a not-so-quiet village being plagued with poison pen letters--anonymous accusations sent through the mail. Almost everyone in the village--with one or two exceptions--has received one. Several murders occur before Miss Marple arrives to help solve the case. I love this mystery because of the characters and the added romance.

The Sleeping Murder is another mystery that I've read. But it wasn't memorable to me. I watched this one without remembering any of the clues or who did it! Which was nice, I suppose! It's tricky to know what to do. On the one hand, I like to be surprised when reading the actual mystery, I wouldn't really want to know who did it ahead of time. But I like to be surprised when watching the movie too.

Watch Miss Marple

If you're a fan of the books
If you enjoy mysteries
If you like mysteries set in the past

Mansfield Park Revisited

Mansfield Park Revisited. Joan Aiken. 1985/2005. Sourcebooks. 201 pages.

The sudden and unexpected death of Sir Thomas Bertram, while abroad engaged on business relating to his various properties in the West Indies, could be a cause of nothing but sorrow, dismay, and consternation to the baronet's friends in England.

I just LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Joan Aiken's Mansfield Park Revisited. I do. I love the characters, the story, and most of all the redemption. Susan Price, Fanny's younger sister, is the heroine of Joan Aiken's Mansfield Park Revisited. When the novel opens, Edmund and Fanny are on their way to the West Indies with their youngest child.
Susan's day are soon brightened up by the arrival of two people to the neighborhood. A sadder-but-wiser, Mary Crawford, whose health is in decline, and her ever-faithful brother, Henry. Though Susan never knew either Crawford personally, she can't help but be drawn to them--particularly Mary. She knows the two have history with those she loves best--Fanny, Edward, Tom, etc., but she can't help believing that these two have changed for the better through the years. These two are not seeking society in the neighborhood, just a quiet, peaceful place to simply be.

Aiken is great at relationships, and I definitely enjoyed seeing Susan interact with Mary Crawford, Henry Crawford, Tom Bertram, Lady Bertram, Julia Yates, etc. Readers don't know much about Susan from Austen's novel, but, Aiken did a great job giving her life in this sequel. While readers do know more about Mary and Henry Crawford from Austen's Mansfield Park, I can't help believing that Henry Crawford has been misunderstood until Aiken set the story straight. (I do LOVE Henry Crawford.) Mary's redemption was a beautiful thing as well. Aiken did not rewrite the past--or try to justify it exactly--but she has through circumstance after circumstance brought Mary to a reflective, repentant place and given her an opportunity to blossom into a sensitive, perceptive, loving person.

I loved every page of this one. I loved spending time with these characters. It was just a wonderful treat.

My first review.

Read Mansfield Park Revisited

If you love Mansfield Park, if you like Mansfield Park; even if you were bored with it, you may just find something to love in this historical romance
If you love Jane Austen
If you like historical romance

Four 2012 Board Books

1, 2, 3 in the Sea (With Big Flaps). Sue DiCicco. 2012. Scholastic. 10 pages.

1 one fin
2 two eyes
3 three fish

1 one tail
2 two faces
3 three sea horses

An ocean-themed board book about counting from one to three. It's bright, colorful, simple. The illustrations feature fish, turtles, sea horses, and whales. Overall, I like the "big flaps," however, I'm not sure about the biggest 'big flap' that unfolds more like a pop-up from a pop-up book. Flaps and little ones seem to do okay, pop-ups not as well with little hands. But for the most part, I think it works.

1, 2 at the Zoo (With Big Flaps). Sue DiCicco. 2012 Scholastic. 10 pages.

1 one foot
2 two flippers
2 two penguins

1 one neck
2 two faces
2 two giraffes

A zoo-themed board book about counting from one to two. It is bright, colorful, oh-so-simple. The animals in the illustrations are fun: penguins, giraffes, monkeys, and elephants. The final flap reveals a Mom and her son at the zoo having fun. Most of the flaps, I think, will be fine. There is the one pop-up flap which I'm less sure about, but, for the most part I think this one works well.

Read 1, 2, 3 in the Sea and 1, 2 At the Zoo

If you have little ones who love animals, zoos, aquariums, etc.
If you want a very basic, very simple counting book

Go! Go! Go! Nicola Bird. Illustrated by Fiona Land. 2012 Scholastic. 10 pages.

Baby, say
scooter
motorbike
what a long car!
limousine
ding! ding! bicycle
trailer

A touch-and-feel book about transportation. There is no story to this board book, just vocabulary--words identifying each method of transportation (ambulance, fire engine, police car, truck, van, hot air balloon, plane, etc.) The book is large--more the size of a traditional picture book than a board book. It's a very busy book.

My Race Car. Ace Landers. Illustrated by David A. White. 2012. Scholastic. 10 pages.

Race car, race car, zoom, zoom, go!
Around the racetrack, never slow.
Turn left, turn right, now just fly!
Take the lead and speed on by.

A simple, rhyming text about the thrill of racing. Fun size and shape, colorful, and the rhyming isn't bad at all. This would be a fun one to share with little ones. Perhaps easier to share with little ones that Go! Go! Go! since it actually has a story to it.

Read Go! Go! Go! and My Race Car

If you have little ones always on the go! If your little ones like cars, trucks, and other vehicles
If your little ones need another book to chew

Lady Susan

Lady Susan. Jane Austen 1794?/1871. 64 pages.

I recently reread Jane Austen's Lady Susan. I remembered it as being a quick, light read full of gossip and scandal. Lady Susan Vernon is not a "nice" woman; she's a still-quite-beautiful widow with a near-grown daughter, Frederica, who sometimes forgets her place. After creating a mess--or scandal--she invites herself to her brother-in-law's estate. Of course, she's not completely honest about it--not admitting that it is her last resort and that she really has no interest in his company or the company of his wife, Catherine Vernon. If readers get an honest glimpse of the woman at all, it is in her letters to Alicia Johnson, but, even then I think she's not being completely honest all of the time.

Lady Susan is a tricky, manipulative woman who likes to keep her options open. The other women that readers get to know in this little novel are Catherine and Frederica. Catherine would find it difficult to say anything positive about her sister-in-law, Lady Susan. Though she could probably admit that Lady Susan is quite beautiful and charming--when she wants to be. Catherine thinks Lady Susan is a horrible mother--and she is. And Catherine thinks she is PLOTTING to get her brother, Reginald De Courcy--and she is. Reginald starts strong, but, within a day or two he's convinced that Lady Susan is THE ONE. In other words, he becomes horribly stupid. Frederica, Catherine's daughter, also falls for Reginald. Lady Susan is all about DRAMA. Gossip. Scandal. Lies. Manipulation. Tension. Lady Susan is a divisive woman--breaking apart families, the cause of endless quarrels.

Lady Susan isn't really like Austen's other novels. Lady Susan, Catherine, and Frederica aren't really like Jane Austen's other heroines. And that is definitely true with the heroes as well. Reginald is not like Tilney, Darcy, Wentworth, or Knightley. Lady Susan is not a swoon-worthy romance. It is fun, lively, gossipy.

Here's my first review.

My favorite quotes:

Where there is a disposition to dislike, a motive will never be wanting. (7)

In short, when a person is always to deceive, it is impossible to be consistent. (27)

Facts are such horrid things! (54)

Read Lady Susan

If you are looking for a classic that is a quick, lively read
If you like stories where what is not being said is just as important as what is being said
If you like not-so-nice heroines; true Lady Susan is no Moll Flanders, but, she's no Fanny Price either! She just really, really likes it when men--single or married--fall in love with her.
If you like Jane Austen

August Plans

This August, I am participating in two exciting events! One focuses on all things Jane Austen; the second on all things dystopian/post-apocalyptic!!!

Austen in August hosted by Roof Beam Reader. Master Post for Linking all Reviews. I will be reading:

Edmund Bertram's Diary by Amanda Grange
Lady Susan by Jane Austen
Jane Vows Vengeance by Michael Thomas Ford

Captain Wentworth's Diary by Amanda Grange
Emma by Jane Austen (if all goes well!)
???

I have dozens of novels that I *could* read for this it's just a matter of time and balancing everything I want to read.

I will definitely be keeping up with LIZZIE BENNET'S VIDEO DIARY. This is an online project by Hank Green and Bernie Su. (Though I really just watch the videos and don't follow the other social media aspects of it. Lydia also has a video diary.)

Dystopian August hosted by Presenting Lenore. Master Post for linking all reviews. I will be reading or trying to read:

Mothership by Martin Leicht
Once by Anna Carey
For Darkness Shows the Stars by Diana Peterfreund
Unwholly by Neal Shusterman (if my library gets it in time! otherwise it will be for September)
This is Not a Test by Courtney Summers
Monument 14 by Emmy Laybourne
The Forsaken by Lisa M. Stasse
Under the Never Sky by Veronica Rossi
Insignia by S.J. Kincaid

There are others I might try as well.

© 2012 Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews

Lucid (YA)

Lucid. Adrienne Stoltz and Ron Bass. 2012. Penguin. 288 pages.

Right now, I'm Maggie.

Maggie enters the same dream world every single night. Every single night she lives a day in Sloane's life. Sloane is a teenager living in Connecticut with her Mom, Dad, and younger brother. (She also has an older brother who has gone away to college.) Is Sloane's life perfect? Not exactly. True, she has some great friends, true, there's a new boy whom she has a love/hate interest in. His name is James. But she's still mourning the loss of her best friend, Bill. In fact, when the reader first meets Sloane she has just been asked to speak at a memorial celebration. Sloane also has a secret--a big secret. Every single night, she dreams a day in Maggie's life. No one would mistake Maggie's life for the perfect life. Her dad is dead, her younger sister, Jade, is having some health problems, and her mom, Nicole, is more of a hindrance than a help. But her Manhattan life is certainly far removed from Connecticut. Maggie is an actress. She is always auditioning for new roles and following her dreams. She's met two men Andrew and Thomas. One tempts her with auditions, the other offers only honest companionship: a willingness to listen, to respond with sincerity and honesty. As Maggie falls for Andrew, Sloane falls for James...will either girl get her happily ever after?

This book is certainly memorable! And it's definitely better than I expected!!! I would definitely recommend it. It was a compelling read--impossible to put down. And I cared about both Sloane and Maggie. While Andrew was my favorite love interest, James was also a good choice...at least for Sloane. I loved how their relationship began with debating literature.

I would have to say that this is one of my favorite YA reads of the year.

Read Lucid

If you like compelling YA Fiction
If you like the premise of lucid dreaming and dream worlds
If you were intrigued by the movie Inception
If you like fiction that questions the nature of reality

Library Loot: First Trip in August

New Loot:

Quarantine: The Loners by Lex Thomas
Titanic: Voices from the Disaster by Deborah Hopkinson
The Story of the Trapp Family Singers by Maria Augusta Trapp
When the Stars Go Blue by Caridad Ferrer
The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore by William Joyce

Leftover Loot:

Blood and Roses: One Family's Struggle and Triumph During England's Tumultuous Civil War by Helen Castor
Insignia by S.J. Kincaid
Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury
Under the Never Sky by Veronica Rossi
The Clocks by Agatha Christie
Death in the Clouds by Agatha Christie
The Mirror Crack'd From Side to Side by Agatha Christie
Freddy and the Dragon by Walter Brooks
Freddy and Mr. Camphor by Walter R. Brooks
The Red Queen by Philippa Gregory
The King's Speech by Mark Logue and Peter Conradi
The Rise and Fall of Mount Majestic by Jennifer Trafton

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted by Claire and Marg that encourages bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. If you’d like to participate, just write up your post-feel free to steal the button-and link it using the Mr. Linky any time during the week. And of course check out what other participants are getting from their libraries.

© 2012 Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews