A Maxine but not Stretch mystery. Maxie goes to Hawaii, without her dog, to help a friend Karen move. Stuff happens, nobody dies, we get a tour of Hawaii, and are told THREE times that Maxie keeps a shotgun in a secret compartment in her motor home. And her dead husband #2 keeps talking to her. But a pleasant little story, none the less. And there's a map.
Penny's mother starts a cupcake store in the small town of Hog's Hollow. Penny works there, decorating the cupcakes. She makes a few friends at middle school, but she makes a few enemies, too. I enjoyed the story very much, but the characters seem very mature for ninth graders.
Words I Had To Look Up:
only if my mother let's me (pg. 3) -- I thought that was a contraction for let us ?
Written by Frank Herbert, his son Brian, and Kevin J. Anderson, this volume of various stories, alternative versions, and the orginal version of Dune is pretty good, especially considering I was pretty tired of Dune after reading the first three books and also the serialized version of Dune, back in the day.
Lawyer Hank Sutherland prosecutes an Air Force officer accused of espionage. Pretty good.
QUOTE:
"The cancer was in remission, and his health was good so he probably had a few more years. Don't beg for more, he chided himself. Take however many good days you can get and enjoy them. The trick is knowing when you're having them."
A temporally-interlaced novel. Zack Pontowski in WWII and CMS Kamigami rescuing an American senator's daughter take turns having their stories told. Good book.
An F-4 wing trains and fights in the Middle East. Charactors include Jack Locke, Anthony "Muddy" Waters, General Cunningham. Very good story!
QUOTE:
Radar bomb deliveries were a delight for the doctor... After a few fumbling attempts and one extremely long bomb--the British range controller told hiim that he was supposed to bomb the island and not France, even though he thought it was a fine gesture.--Page 137
Juanito and his family keep moving from place to place, never setting down roots. He gets into trouble sometimes. They end up in San Diego in 1958. Told in a poem-like style.
First read this story of a new veterinarian joining a practice in the Yorkshire Dales in 1935 many years ago, several decades ago, in fact. Still charming.
A collection of Maynards magazine column, many concerning the mythical bike shop run by a guy named Bob. Most of stories hit the mark, some falter, maybe I did not "get" them because I am not a racer. I highly recommend it to any "bicycle fancier".
Brad and his wife, Amy, travel the U.S. in a motor home searching for the meaning of Faith, Hope, Inspiration, etc., in towns of the same name. Took me a while to get into it, but it was pretty good.
Quote:
As we stopped at Big Spy Mountain Overlook, elevation thirty-two hundred feet, a group of exhausted bikers peddled to stop near us. Today was the end of their nine-day journey. They had started in the Great Smoky Mountains. "That's where we came from," Amy offered. "only we came on four wheels." "Oh," responded a breathless biker. "That seems like an easy way. Don't know why I didn't think of it." He rode off, leaving us to ponder the fine line between humor and sarcasm.
Claire Malloy gets a phone call from a dead person. More or less. Adventures in Mexico!
QUOTE:
Most of the deck chairs were occupied by inert, sunburned bodies clad in everything from terrycloth robes to string bikinis. A heartening number of them were reading fat paperback books.
Claire Malloy subs at her daughter's high school, in the Journalism dept.
QUOTE:
The bell rang once again, and shortly thereafter the room swelled with Photo B, a.k.a. the newspaper photographers. We exchanged the necessary courtesies and they managed to talk among themselves until the class was over. Ho hum. Teaching wasn't all that hard.