What I Read Wednesday

One of these days, I would like to actually blog again. I always plan on it and then suddenly, it's Wednesday and I just have time to write about books. Oh, well. Maybe next week.

The Engagements
It's very rare for novels that switch perspectives to do it right, but this one did. This novel focused on Evelyn, an older married woman; James, a paramedic struggling to make ends meet; Kate, who is anti-marriage but living happily with her partner and child; Delphine who has seen stable love and exciting, daring love; and Frances Garety, who penned the well-known line "A Diamond is Forever." Although the novel bounces back and forth through the decades, it flows perfectly between the characters and their lives and I felt completely connected and engaged with each of their stories. It was a flawless transition and so wonderfully written. This was one book that I didn't want to end.


So Cold the River
I was drawn into this book at first because it was set in Chicago, then transition to Indiana, so the both settings were familiar to me. Primarily, it was set in French Lick, IN, which I've heard of but never visited. The main character stays at West Baden Springs Hotel in French Lick and refers to the how amazing the hotel is. I kept thinking, "Yeah, right. Indiana?" Until I googled it and okay, I can't believe I've lived in Indiana my entire life and had no idea something this beautiful existed. I asked Shane if we could visit, like TOMORROW, but he seemed to think that maybe that was a bit hasty. Aside from the setting, the book itself was a great read. The main character, Eric, is approached by a woman he meets a funeral (he puts together video montages for funerals) who asks him to look into her father-in-law's past. She gives him only a few scant details and a mysterious bottle of mineral water that carries the ability to remain cool when stored at room temperate and gets even colder when Eric arrives in French Lick. As the story unfolds, it becomes more supernatural in nature, but I wouldn't necessarily call it a horror story.


Sea Creatures
This was one of those gut-punch books. Georgia is married to a man who suffers from parasomnia, a sleep disorder that involves strange behavior while sleeping. Her son, Frankie, is 3.5 and doesn't speak. Not because he can't, but because he's selectively mute, possibly due to the stress of his father's condition--which has caused them to uproot from Illinois and move to Florida, where Georgia has taken a job for another lost soul, a hermit who lives on a stilt house while his wife ails in a nursing home. This was definitely a quick read because the book was full of conflicts and I wanted to see how they would be resolved by the end.