Mailbox Monday

Mailbox Monday~  
is hosted by A Sea of Books during the month of July.
We share what books that we found in our mailboxes last week. 

MAILBOX MONDAY

Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came into their house last week. (Library books don’t count, but eBooks & audiobooks do). Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles and humongous wish lists!

Mailbox Monday was created by Marcia at The Printed Page, who graciously hosted it for a long, long time, before turning it into a touring meme (details here).

This is what I received in my mailbox last week:

The Map of Time by Felix J Palma from Atria Books/Simon & Schuster

Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand from Paperbackswap

The Sunday Salon: Book Club Mini Reviews:

I mentioned in last weeks Sunday Salon post that I had gotten behind in sharing my book club reviews this past year. I've decided to highlight what we've read and discussed in a mini review format. I haven't done this before so we'll see how it works. I'd appreciate your feedback!

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

Rebecca Skloot is a science journalist and has been fascinated by HeLa cells since she first heard about them in her high school biology class.  Ms. Skloot does a fabulous job telling this true-to-life story that reads like a detective novel as she unravels the truth as to where the HeLa cells originated and shares the truth about Henrietta Lacks and  her family. Her research is impeccable and she explains it in a way that a layman can understand. I am a health professional and never heard about HeLa cells in my college courses. I've since asked friends that I know that are nurses and doctors and they said that they may have heard mention of HeLa cells but not the significance of them or the background story. Ms. Skloot fairly looks at the historical process of the HeLa cells and lets the reader know how this has effected our own health care and medical care, research and medical ethics. As a reader, it makes you wonder what happens to those samples that we give so freely without questiong when we are at the doctors office and sign the HIPPA privacy act forms at every doctor visit.  The story that centers around the uncovering of who Henrietta Lacks is, her children and family and interviewing them will touch your heart. Her story deserved to be told and Ms. Skloot has done an honor to her memory and her family in writing this book. This is an excellent book to discuss with a book club as there are many themes to talk about. 

The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton

This is a wonderful book that weaves the past and present in alternating chapters and voices as it uncovers a mystery that effects grandmother and grandaughter. A little girl is abandoned on a ship headed to Australia in 1913 with only her little white suitcase filled with clothes and a book of fairy tales. She is taken in by a kind man and woman and believed that she was their own until she was told the truth by her father on her 21st birthday. Her life was never the same, her identity as "Nell" was shaken and she was determined to find the truth someday. Over time, Nell is able to uncover some truths but it is her granddaughter Cassandra who learns on Nell's deathbed the story of Nell's life.  Cassandra is determined to unravel the mystery and is drawn into a story that has layers to reveal. The Forgotten Garden is  a story told through fairy tales related to the book that Cassandra finds in the little white suitcase that Nell has kept for so many years. I truly enjoyed this story, the setting and the characters and look forward to reading more novels by Kate Morton. This was an interesting book to discuss as there were varied opinions on the style of the writing and the story itself. Some had issues with the foundation of the novel being based on many stories already told but for me that was not a factor. I highly recommend this novel for your reading pleasure and as a book club discussion. 

Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson

Speak is a riveting novel written with prose that is unique and gripping. Laurie Halse Anderson has an amazing writing style that will grab your attention and won't let you go until you finish the last page. I felt the same way about this authors writing style when I read Wintergirls last year (read my review, here).  In Speak, Melinda is an outcast after she calls the police at an end of summer party but wouldn't tell anyone why or what happened. When high school starts in the fall, nobody wants to speak to Melinda and she has chosen not to speak about it and she becomes sullen and withdrawn.  Her parents know that something is wrong but for me, I couldn't relate to her parents who seemed very selfish and could have done more to help Melinda. An art teacher realizes something is wrong and tries to draw her out through her art assignments. Melinda has become self destructive as she keeps this secret inside and doesn't know how to handle the situation. Melinda is representative of so many young girls and young women who are affected by a traumatic event and don't know what to do. She must make a choice to let the sorrow destroy her or speak and get the help she so desperately deserves. Speak is an excellent book for teens, more likely a high school student who has the maturity to discuss and handle the themes shared in this novel. This would be a novel to read together and  discuss with your teen daughter and son as well as a book club. We had a fascinating book club discussion about Speak and the reality of how this type of situation can occur and does occur more often than we realize. 

Sara's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay 

This is a novel that brings to light the seldom mentioned, little known piece of French history the Vel d'Hiv round ups of the Jewish people in France in 1942. I've read many novels and non-fiction books about the Holocaust and this is one time period and event that I was unfamiliar with. This is a dark period of history when thousands of Jewish families were rounded up and held in the Velodrome d'Hiver and then transported to Auschwitz.This is a fictional account of this time period but reads as it could easily be a true-to-life story. The novel centers around a 10 year old girl Sarah, who is forced out of her home with her mother and father during these round ups and innocently leaves behind her 4 year old brother locked in a secret cupboard thinking that she would be back soon to let him out. The story alternates between Sarah's life starting at this time when she was 10 in 1942 and the life of Julia, an American journalist living in Paris starting and in 2002,  is assigned to cover the 60th anniversary of the Vel d'Hiv round ups. She finds herself fascinated and drawn to this time period and the story of Sarah and the parallels to her own life. She is compelled to uncover Sarah's story in which she finds secrets and truth about her family, about France and herself. This is a riveting and emotional novel that I found hard to read at first as parts of the story are heartbreaking. As I read the book in chunks at first, I then couldn't put the novel down and found myself researching the historical background of the Vel d'Hiv round ups.  This is a part of history that should not be forgotten as with the Holocaust it is a difficult topic to read about but one so important not to every forget. When my book club discussed this book, none of us had heard of the round ups in France and we were drawn into this novel. Some had difficulty getting past the initial part of the book but all but one persevered and read to the end. It is a book that we all agreed had an impact on us. There were parts of the story in the modern day sections with Julia that some felt were unnecessary or questionable and some had difficulty with the alternating chapters between past and present day. Overall, it is an excellent novel and one that I would highly recommend for anyone and is a good novel to discuss with a book club.

This month we will be discussing How To Be An American Housewife by Margaret Dilloway which I read and reviewed last year (read my review here),  it will be another great book to discuss with my book club. In August, we will be going to the movies and plan to see The Help. I am looking forward to this, we discussed this book last year and it was a favorite. We are all excited about seeing this movie. 

Review: The Kitchen Daughter by Jael McHenry

Description (from Simon & Schuster)

After the unexpected death of her parents, painfully shy and sheltered 26-year-old Ginny Selvaggio seeks comfort in cooking from family recipes. But the rich, peppery scent of her Nonna's soup draws an unexpected visitor into the kitchen: the ghost of Nonna herself, dead for twenty years, who appears with a cryptic warning ("do no let her…") before vanishing like steam from a cooling dish.

A haunted kitchen isn't Ginny's only challenge. Her domineering sister, Amanda, (aka "Demanda") insists on selling their parents' house, the only home Ginny has ever known. As she packs up her parents' belongings, Ginny finds evidence of family secrets she isn't sure how to unravel. She knows how to turn milk into cheese and cream into butter, but she doesn't know why her mother hid a letter in the bedroom chimney, or the identity of the woman in her father's photographs. The more she learns, the more she realizes the keys to these riddles lie with the dead, and there's only one way to get answers: cook from dead people's recipes, raise their ghosts, and ask them.

My Thoughts

From the very first page, I fell in love with The Kitchen Daughter. It has the perfect ingredients and blended together it forms a feast for the reader and exemplifies what I love about women's fiction. The Kitchen Daughter is a debut novel by Jael McHenry layered with the strength of complex and strong characters, a dash of magic, a unique story and a genuine and honest heroine in Ginny. The writing is beautiful and the story is engaging and endearing, I devoured it. I actually didn't want it to end so I savored it chapter by chapter. Ginny is in her mid-twenties, lives at home with her parents and is shy and socially awkward. Her life is turned upside down after the unexpected death of her parents. Ginny's mother taught her to cook at a young age and it is more than a hobby. Ginny most likely has Asperger's Syndrome and cooking is a way for her to cope, escape from the stresses of life. She is skilled at it and has a sixth sense about spices and ingredients and cooking is a sensory experience for her. After her parents death, she seeks comfort by making a recipe of her grandmother's and finds that as the scent fills the kitchen, she can invoke the ghost of the dead person whose recipe she is making. 

Not only is Ginny learning to live alone but her sister Amanda wants to sell the house and have Ginny move in with her family. This is the only home Ginny has ever known and is not ready to make these changes in her life. As she starts packing her parent's things she uncovers evidence about her parents past and family secrets that she is not sure how to find the answers to. She finds that  the way to find the answers is through her cooking, cook from her parents recipes and try to bring their ghosts to answer her questions.

What I appreciated about The Kitchen Daughter is that the author takes us into the fascinating unique mind of Ginny and how she experiences life with Asperger's.  As a reader you experience her social challenges, emotional challenges and how sensory experiences are overwhelming and comforting. Ginny learns how to deal with loss, new relationships, family and secrets. The writing was just beautiful, lyrical and a feast to read. I thoroughly enjoyed this experience and loved the magical realism elements to the story that are woven into the novel so well. The cooking flows with the magical elements that are whipped in to strengthen and blend effortlessly into the story. 

I loved the food elements of the story and many of the chapters had recipes at the beginning of them. This would be a great book for a book club discussion. There are so many elements to discuss and the recipes could be made as part of the discussion to go along with the theme of the book. Midnight Cry brownies would make a great dessert and The Georgia Peach would make an excellent cocktail (See recipe below). There is a Reading Group Guide for The Kitchen Daughter, here.  Ms. McHenry website states that she is even working on book club menus to correlate with the book, that is a great idea! 

Here is a recipe from the book that sounds like a perfect summer drink:

The Georgia Peach

2 ounces peach schnapps
2 ounces orange juice
1 ounce amaretto
Grenadine (splash)

Combine schnapps, juice, and amaretto. Pour over a single ice cube in a martini glass. Splash in grenadine. Serves one as written. This is one that will need to be multiplied and would make a great drink to accompany a book club discussion of The Kitchen Daughter. 




Check out this wonderful video with the author Jael McHenry talking about The Kitchen Daughter and a recipe from the book called Hot Hot Chocolate

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page. For more information, go to Beth Fish Reads.

Winner of Joy For Beginners by Erica Bauermeister

Ti from Book Chatter

Thanks to the publisher and TLC Book Tours  for sponsoring this giveaway.

Thanks to all who entered! Check my sidebar on the left to enter more giveaways! 

Mailbox Monday and It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

Mailbox Monday~  
is hosted by A Sea of Books during the month of July.
We share what books that we found in our mailboxes last week. 

MAILBOX MONDAY

Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came into their house last week. (Library books don’t count, but eBooks & audiobooks do). Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles and humongous wish lists!

Mailbox Monday was created by Marcia at The Printed Page, who graciously hosted it for a long, long time, before turning it into a touring meme (details here).

This is what I received in my mailbox last week:

The Gin & Chowder Club by Nan Rossiter from the author

The Food Allergy Cookbook by Carmel Nelson and Amra Ibrisimovic from Skyhorse Publishing

The Legacy by Katharine Webb  (Kindle) from Netgalley 

Notorious by Nicola Cornick  (Kindle) from Netgalley

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Hosted by Sheila from  Bookjourney

Where we share what we read this past week, what we hope to read this week…. and anything in between.

Here is what I reviewed last week: 

The Last Letter by Kathleen Shoop   is a fascinating novel inspired by actual letters written by the authors great-great grandparents. I found myself relishing details of life on the prairie in fascination and awe, and in some moments I found the brutal reality to be heartbreaking. The historical storytelling held my interest throughout the book. 

For this week My plan is to read:

The Kitchen Daughter by Jael McHenry

Once Upon a Time There Was You by Elizabeth Berg 

The Ninth Wife by Amy Stolls (on my Kindle) 

The Gin & Chowder Club by Nan Rossiter

Review: The Last Letter by Kathleen Shoop

About The Last Letter: 

For any daughter who thinks she knows her mother’s story… 

 Katherine Arthur’s mother arrives on her doorstep, dying, forcing her to relive a past she wanted to forget. When Katherine was ten, she had loved her mother fiercely, put her trust in her completely, but when her mother resorted to extreme measures on the prairie to save her family, she tore Katherine’s world apart. Now, seventeen years later, and far from the prairie, Katherine has found the truth – she has discovered the last letter.

My Thoughts: 

The Last Letter by Kathleen Shoop is a fascinating novel inspired by actual letters written by the authors great-great grandmother Jeanie and her great-great grandfather Frank. She used their names as the parents in this fictional novel about the well-to-do Arthur family who moves to the prairie of the Dakota Territory in 1887 due to financial turmoil and disgrace. The novel alternates between 1887 and 1888 from Jeanie, the mother's perspective and 1905 from the voice of Katherine, Jeanie's now adult daughter who has a family of her own. Katherine has never forgiven her mother for choices that she made and her perceptions of what happened during the time on the prairie and when they left. Jeanie is dying and is taking care of her adult daughter Yale and Katherine takes them in with hesitation and pressure from her husband. Katherine recalls the letters that her mother read while on the prairie, love letters from the courtship between her parents and other letters. Katherine believes that their marital troubles were all her mother's fault and is part of her reasons for not forgiving her now as an adult. As she takes care of her mother and sister, she searches for those letters and finds one last letter that explains things and allows Katherine to put the pieces of the puzzle together. 

As a reader, you are pulled into the reality of the prairie life as the Arthur's are unprepared to move from a wealthy civilized home to a crude, primitive and unfamiliar terrain and lifestyle living off the land. There is a parallel to the plot that fits what is known historically as the Children's Blizzard of 1888. I found myself relishing details of life on the prairie in fascination and awe, and in some moments I found the brutal reality to be heartbreaking. The historical storytelling held my interest throughout the book. I was moved by the gut-wrenching decisions the characters had to make. The secrecy of the mother-daughter relationship was one that unraveled to tell the truth of why mother's may hold their secrets in their hearts and how hard it is to reveal those to the ones they love, even their own children. The art of letter writing and the importance it makes in relationships shone throughout this novel. Letters are powerful tools to preserve our family histories and can share a past that we may not have known existed. 


I highly recommend The Last Letter written by Kathleen Shoop for summer reading. I was so impressed that this is her debut novel that was self published. I have read many self published novels and they did not have the polish, editing and strength that The Last Letter has. Ms. Shoop appears to have put her heart and soul into the writing of The Last Letter as it was part of her own family history with the inspiration of the letters her great-great grandmother left behind. You can read more about Kathleen Shoop and the inspiration behind writing The Last Letter on her website, HERE.  


Thanks to BookSparksPR for sending me an advanced copy of this book for review.