My Two Blessings

  For September, I ready 6 books for a total of 2233 pages in which 2 were new to me authors  1) Every Summer After by Carly Fortune:  304 pages   3 stars  "“I fell in love with you when I was thirteen, and I never stopped. You’re it for me.” Sam closes his eyes for three long seconds, and when he opens them, they are glittering pools under a starry sky.” 2) The Book that Wouldn't Burn by Mark Lawrence:  559 pages   3 Stars “All of us steal our lives. A little here, a little there. Some of it given, most of it taken. We wear ourselves like a coat of many patches, fraying at the edges, in constant repair. While we shore up one belief, we let go another. We are the stories we tell to ourselves. Nothing more.” 3) Neuromancer by William Gibson  304 pages   4 Stars “His teeth sang in their individual sockets like tuning forks, each one pitch-perfect and clear as ethanol.” 4)  Bel Canto by Ann Patchett  318 pages  ...

  Neuromancer by William Gibson, a science fiction published in 1984 (304) was supposedly a reread but I didn't remember a single thing. Of course that was only 12 years ago which seems like a lifetime. I made the mistake of reading this at bedtime so it kept me up several nights in a row until 1 - 2 a.m. engaged and immersed in this weird cyber world. Reminded me completely of the matrix movies. People could hack into the internet and be somewhere else, bodily present yet not. A world of artificial intelligence, space travel, espionage, secrets, double crossing, intelligent computers, and of course, body hacking.  Is it real or is it an illusion? Are the characters real or constructs? Is Case actually alive or in the real world at the ending? Hell of a story!  4 Stars  "Case was the best interface cowboy who ever ran in Earth’s computer matrix. Then he double-crossed the wrong people…"

  In Seanan McGuire's Silver and Lead, 19th Installment in the October Daye series, as ridiculous as it may seem, in typical beaten and bloody fashion, at 8 1/2 months pregnant October finds the culprits, has the baby on the warehouse floor with May doing a c section, then continues on until she save the day. 4 stars  "Something is rotten in Faerie. In the aftermath of Titania's reality-warping enchantment, things are returning to what passes for normal in the Kingdom in the Mists―until it's discovered that the royal vaults have been looted, and several powerful magical artifacts are missing. None are things that can be safely left unsecured, and some have the potential to do almost as much damage as Titania did, and having them in the wrong hands could prove just as disastrous At least the theft means that Sir October "Toby" Daye, Knight errant and Hero of the Realm, finally has an excuse to get out of the house. Sure, she's eight and a half months pregn...

  Bel Canto by Ann Patchett is a closed room tale, a microcosm of what happens when a bunch of disparate people are thrown together.  It was interesting and engaging and so sad.   Bonds are formed, lessons are taught,  different languages learned. Some learn to be more self reliant, some grow a spine. But in the end, the guerillas who would never bend, want their demands to be met no matter what. 4 stars "Somewhere in South America, at the home of the country's vice president, a lavish birthday party is being held in honor of the powerful businessman Mr. Hosokawa. Roxane Coss, opera's most revered soprano, has mesmerized the international guests with her singing. It is a perfect evening—until a band of gun-wielding terrorists takes the entire party hostage. But what begins as a panicked, life-threatening scenario slowly evolves into something quite different, a moment of great beauty, as terrorists and hostages forge unexpected bonds and people from different co...

  Framed in Death is the 61st book in the In Death series by J.D. Robb (aka Nora Roberts) (355)  Excellent as always with Eve pursuing an artist who kills and dresses up the corpse in authentic clothes to look like masterpiece paintings.  Also Maeve and Peabodies joint house is finally done and reflects their personalities.  Beautifully written and engaging. "Manhattan is filled with galleries and deep-pocketed collectors who can make an artist's career with a wave of a hand. But one man toils in obscurity, his brilliance unrecognized while lesser talents bask in the glory he believes should be his. Come tomorrow, he vows, the city will be buzzing about his work. Indeed, before dawn, Lt. Eve Dallas is speeding toward the home of the two gallery owners whose doorway has been turned into a horrifying crime scene overnight. A lifeless young woman has been elaborately costumed and precisely posed to resemble the model of a long-ago Dutch master, and Dallas plunges into h...

  The Book That Wouldn’t Burn by Mark Lawrence (559) is a convoluted story that turned into a slog towards the third half of the book and the continued spiral turned me off. I didn’t care whether I finished it or not, but did just to find out what happened. Definitely won’t be reading the rest of the trilogy.  An alternative world where life sized bugs were the enemy and life kept recycling.  The centerpiece, a library, which was a maze and a portal to different world. A brother and sister are stuck in the world of books, an assistant and a soldier with a mechanism that took one in the world of the book.  Librarians and apprentices, the keeper of the books and many, many secrets.  Books that would turn one into a ghost, floating through the stories.  At the end I didn't know if any of the characters were real or ghosts. 3 stars “The boy has lived his whole life trapped within a book-choked chamber older than empires and larger than cities. The girl has been...

  Every Summer After by Carly Fortune, a romance story published in 2022 (304 pages) You know those stories in which the past haunts you until you fix it, then everything is okay after that. Years go by and old hurts, old wounds are opened, examined, and broken, new wounds are created, until all is forgiven. Yep, this is one of those.  2.5 stars  "They say you can never go home again, and for Persephone Fraser, ever since she made the biggest mistake of her life a decade ago, that has felt too true. Instead of glittering summers on the lakeshore of her childhood, she spends them in a stylish apartment in the city, going out with friends, and keeping everyone a safe distance from her heart. Until she receives the call that sends her racing back to Barry’s Bay and into the orbit of Sam Florek—the man she never thought she’d have to live without. For six summers, through hazy afternoons on the water and warm summer nights working in his family’s restaurant and curling up to...