Hester by Laurie Lico Albanese

 

Hester

by

Laurie Lico Albanese

Most of us read The Scarlet Letter by Nathanial Hawthorne when we were in school.  I did, years ago, and have forgotten a lot of the story.   In the novel, Hester, by Laurie Lico Albanese,  Hawthorne's story is retold from the perspective of the woman he portrayed wearing the big red letter "A".  A young bride immigrant from Scotland settles in Salem, Massachusetts in the early 1800s.  Not long after their arrival her husband goes back out to sea leaving her alone in her new home.  Isobel Gamble is a seamstress who is especially gifted in the art of Tambour embroidery.  The book flashes back to the 1600s and scenes of the Salem witch trials and the persecution of witches in Scotland and then returns to the main story. It had me at page one.  Don't miss out on this novel.  It is a great October read.  Click on the book title and author's name above to follow the links to more information.  And enjoy the video at the link below.  

Video. 

The Whistling Season by Ivan Doig

 

The Whistling Season

by

Ivan Doig

Set in Montana in 1910, The Whistling Season is a story of the one room school house.  The novel actually begins in the 1950s during the beginnings of school consolidation.  The superintendent of Montana schools reminisces about his education in a one room school house.  Ivan Doig wrote this book in 2006 and does a good job of capturing life during that time and in that place.  It is the kind of book I would have snuggled up with my kids and read, one chapter at a time, when they were upper elementary aged and could easily be required reading for high school aged students.  Ivan Doig's sentence structure is a little challenging but I easily got accustomed to it and slid into the rhythm of the sentences.  There were words scattered throughout that I did not know.  I read it on my kindle so highlighted these new words as I read for the dictionary meaning to pop up. This is not an exciting, sit on the edge of your seat book.  It is a get comfortable and relax kind of book.  Click on the  book title above to follow the links to more information.  And enjoy the video about the author at the link that follows.  

Watch the video here.  

The Seven Sisters

by

Lucinda Riley

I was complaining to my brother that the wait list for this book was very long on Libby and he graciously sent me a copy in my kindle for my birthday so I was able to read it this week.  It had caught my eye because its premise sounded interesting to me.  It is based on a fictional family of sisters whose adoptive father names them after  the seven sisters constellation.  At the onset of the book the father passes away but leaves each daughter information about their biological parents.  This is a book series where every book covers one of the sister's search for her origins.  The book is a dual timeline novel.  One timeline being the eldest sister looking for her mother and father and the other timeline being the 1920s during her great grandmother's lifetime.  Most of the book takes place in Brazil and tells the story of the coffee plantations and the building of the statue of Christ, which is considered one of the seven modern wonders of the world and is on a mountain top over looking Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.  Two primary love stories also are weaved throughout the novel.  I am now on the wait list on Libby for the second novel in this series.  This book was one that I stayed up late at night reading.  I enjoyed it very much.  Please watch both videos at the links below and click on the book title and author's name above to follow additional links to more information.  

Statue info

Coffee barons info

 

My Name Is

Mary Sutter

by

Robin Oliveira

We got home from vacation and I came down with mild cold symptoms so it was a good excuse to stay curled up with a book.  Therefore  I finished My Name Is Mary Sutter quicker than I normally would have.  This novel is set during the Civil War and is about a young woman who has aspirations to be a surgeon at a time that women were not welcome in medical schools.  She is able to utilize the great need of medical personal during the war to obtain experience and achieve her goals.  She starts in housekeeping at the worst facility in Washington DC and works her way up from there.  The book really explains the horrible conditions soldiers had to endure at the onset of the war when they needed medical care and highlights some progress that was made.  Much of the progress in medical facilities and care occurred after the war was over as a result of the need the Civil War exposed.  Things were really dirty because germs had not been discovered.  Soldiers were drinking out of the same water sources they went to the bathroom and bathed in.  Disease killed more of them than bullets or cannon balls did.  Robin Oliveira did a lot of detailed research in writing this book.  Besides battles and disease there is family dynamics and romance.  The character of Mary Sutter is a very determined and strong willed woman.  The book held my interest and I highly recommend it.  Please watch the video that follows and click on the links above for more information.  

Click Here To Watch The Video.

 

The Great Trouble

by

Deborah Hopkinson

I have not been reading for enjoyment this year.   I slipped away from my bedtime reading routine and the months flew by with no books enjoyed.  I decided to remedy that and chose an easy book to start.  The Great Trouble by Deborah Hopkinson is the sort of book I would have read to my kids when they were in grade school.  We would call them chapter books.   Or a youngster in the  upper elementary and middle school grades could easily read at this level.  It was a fun quick read.  It also is in my interest area.  It is a historical novel which is my genre and it covers medical history which always appeals to me since I am a retired RN.  The story takes place in London during the 1854 Cholera outbreak.  It explains how it was discovered that the disease was water borne instead of airborne and the process used to determine that.  It would be a great novel to teach kids about the scientific process.  The basic story of Dr John Snow and his work is true but the kids who help him with the scientific process are fiction.  Please take the time to watch the video below and click on the links above to learn more.  

Click here to watch video. 

 

Cardiac Cowboys Podcast

 

Cardiac Cowboys

A Podcast

A friend from my Tai Chi class, who is also a retired nurse, recommended the podcast Cardiac Cowboys to me and I have been recommending it to anyone I know who enjoys podcasts.  For those that prefer reading, it is based on the book of the same name by Dr. Gerald Imber. This podcast was especially interesting to me since I had open heart surgery in May of 2025.  My mitral valve was replaced with a pig valve along with a couple other repairs.  If it had not been for the doctors and patients who are featured in this podcast I would be in heart failure at this time instead of listening to the podcast during my afternoon walks.  This is a very entertaining podcast.  I highly recommend it to anyone who has any interest in medical history.  It is one season and seven episodes long.  I was sorry when I was done listening to it that there were not more episodes.  But there were two television shows mentioned in the series.  One is a movie, which I watched and enjoyed.   The other is a series and I have only watched the first episode but it promises to be a good series.  Below find the trailer for both those television shows and click on the the two parts of the title above to follow links to more information about the podcast.  If you don't listen to this podcast or whatch these shows you are missing out.  

Movie

 

TV Series 

Hawaii by James A Michener

 

Hawaii

by

James A. Michener

The historical fiction novel Hawaii by James A. Michener is a very long book.  It takes a commitment to get through it with only one renewal on Libby (the library ebook app allows one renewal).  But it is very much worth reading.  I had read his book Alaska prior to our trip to Alaska in 2024 and had regretted not reading Hawaii before our trip to Hawaii the year before.  But since I am returning to Hawaii for a shorter trip next month, I decided to not miss the opportunity again.  I was a little disappointed that Michener jumped from when the Polynesians arrived on the islands to when the missionaries arrived.  I would have liked to dig more into the history of the original inhabitants of the Hawaiian Islands.  But I have to admit the book was long enough.  The reader will need to look for another book about the earlier history of Hawaii.  The interesting thing about this particular historical novel is that it delves into the race relations of the various ethnic groups on the island.  There were several groups.  The Polynesian people that first arrived are considered Hawaiian.  The missionaries that came in the early to mid 1800s and proceeded to destroy the Hawaiin culture and take over control of the islands for more than one hundred years.  The Chinese, Japanese and Philippine people who were  brought to Hawaii by the descendants of the missionaries to be migrant workers in sugar cane and pineapple fields.  Michener brings into the story health crisis' such as plague and Hansen's disease.  And he weaves in the story the financial fabric that maintained the social hierarchy of the area.  Which used control of the land much like the feudal system in England centuries before.  There is a lot of meat to discuss in this book.  The only short coming I see is that it leaves out  the Hawaiian's history.  Please click on the author's name above to follow the links to more information.  And enjoy the video that follows.