The Bohemian Flats

"Compiled by the Workers of the Writers' Program of the Works Projects Administration in the State of Minnesota."  "With an (sic) new introduction by Thaddeus Radzilowski"

Originally published 1941. This is a 2004 reprint of 1986 edition.

Hennepin County Library paperback 48 pages plus recipes, index, and foreward (approx 80 pages total)

Genre: non-fiction history

I was curious about this book after reading William Kent Krueger's This Tender Land. As I looked back on my entry for that book, I realized that it referenced the West Side Flats in St. Paul, not the Bohemian Flats in Minneapolis! The www.mnopedia.org/place/west-side-flats-st-paul site has more relevant info on the area Krueger's novel deals with. 

Besides learning about the history of these immigrant homes on the Mississippi River, I learned about the Writers' Program during the Depression. I mostly think of the WPA building structures! How cool that people who could write were paid to do so. I got The Dream and the Deal: The Federal Writers Project 1935-1943 from the library as well. I just skim-read it, though. I'm not that big of a history buff!

I love the old photographs and the stories of people's lives. The descriptions of celebrations were my favorite. I'm so sad that money, greed, and industry won out over these hard-working people who had lived along the river for so many years. I most definitely want to go visit the public park that is there now! I don't remember this area from my days as a University of Minnesota student! (Minneapolis Park System)

Red Rover: Curiosity on Mars

By: Richard Ho

Illustrated by: Katherine Roy

Hennepin County picture book

Published: 2019

Genre: children's picture book, space program

This is another book I saw while working. I got it from the library thinking that I'd read it to decide if I wanted to buy it for my grandson. 

Joshua and I enjoyed reading it, but he told me that Perseverance is newer. So I had to read the book and look online to find that Curiosity was sent to Mars in 2012, but Perseverance went in 2020. That five year old knows more about the space program than I realized! The book is lovely and interesting, but I won't buy a copy. The diagrams and information were interesting, but the parts where the author anthropomorphizes the technology is a bit much . . . I'm pretty sure the rover isn't feeling lonely.

How Do You Spell Unfair? MacNolia Cox and the National Spelling Bee

By: Carole Boston Weatherford

Illustrated by: Frank Morrison

 Scott County Library picture book

Published: 2023

Genre: children's picture book, history

I saw this while working at Mackin and was curious enough to request it from the library. This is a beautifully written and drawn book about a heart-breakingly sad time in our history.

As a black girl in the national spelling bee in 1936, MacNolia wasn't allowed to stay in the same hotel as the other contestants because of her skin color. She and another black girl weren't allowed to sit at the same table as the white kids for the contest. It was almost hard to read this book thinking of how hard it must have been for her to be treated so awfully. What a strong and smart young woman she was!

Then in the afterword, we find that she couldn't afford to go to college after graduating high school and became a domestic servant for a doctor in Ohio. She died of cancer at age 53. So incredibly sad.

The Comfort of Ghosts

By: Jacqueline Winspear 

Libby audiobook 10 hours

Read by: Orlagh Cassidy

Published: 2024

Genre: historical fiction

Maisie Dobbs was a nurse and ambulance driver during WWI (The Great War). She has also worked as an investigator and psychologist. Now, just after WWII, she is trying to help pick up the pieces of another horrible war in her native Great Britain. 

When a friend's son shows up at her family's mansion and is "taken in" by four young squatters, Maisie stumbles upon him almost by accident. She ends up connecting with Mary, Jim, Archie, and Grace and figuring out lots of mysterious circumstances about war time efforts.

I like her as a character. I like that the book deals with questions of alcoholism, war, grief, pain, and more without becoming maudlin. The British "stiff upper lip" and Keep Calm and Carry On mentality is strong in this book!

The title refers loosely to the balm from remembering the past while living life moving forward. The murder (and life) of Jonathan Hawkins Price was not what I expected! Also, as I was just looking for the spelling of his name, I found that this is book 18! in a series of Maisie Dobbs books! I would read more of these, but am trying to catch up on what I already have right now.

 

Also, her first husband's "back story" and what she learned was super interesting. This was an interesting and well-written book.

The vocal work was excellent.

Moonflower Murders

by Anthony Horowitz

Libby audiobook 18 hours

Read by: Lesley Manville and Allan Corduner

Published: 2020

Genre: murder mystery

I re-listened to Magpie Murders to be ready for this second book in the series. Again, it was a story-within-a-story. We start in Crete with Susan Ryeland and Andreas running the hotel. Susan is invited back to England to try to find Cecily Trehearne at her parents' request. Right before disappearing, Cecily had read an Alan Conway book loosely based upon a murder that had happened at the Trehearnes' hotel on Cecily's wedding day. She called her parents to tell them she knew what happened. The novella-length book Atticus Pund Takes the Case, is embedded within the larger story.

I didn't enjoy this book as much as Magpie. I don't really care for Susan as a protagonist that much. Conway's clever wordplay and the many, many clues (find the lions!) doesn't outweigh the negatives of the story. The bonding over cigarettes and smoking (in the first book and this one) is unappealing. The idea of a place retaining a "feel" or "aura" after a violent crime is interesting, but also creepy. The idea of a detective novel without a detective . . . is frustrating. Though technically, Miss Marple isn't a detective either and I like her! 

The more the story built up Conway's book about the murder eight years earlier, the more frustrated I got. Why on earth did Susan wait so darn long to re-read the book and try to figure out what Cecily saw?!

I'm glad Susan and her sister Katie finally talked, but I misunderstood what Katie had seen in Martin and Joann Williams . . . I was certain that Joanne and her brother Frank had killed her pathetic husband Martin and bashed his face in so people mistook him for Frank. Why did Martin's personality change so much? Susan's assumptions were wrong, too . . . 

There is commentary on the penal system and the pointlessness of locking people up. Just like with the first book, many characters, many clues, many connections. I think I'll go back to Agatha Christie and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Double Dutch (from Reading Log)

by Sharon Draper

Hennepin County Library audiobook on 5 CDs

 277 pages (the school library I worked at then?)

 

This review from 11.19.2007 (my Excel "reading" sheet before I started blogging) cut / paste what I wrote:

 

Tells the story of Delia, Yolanda, Randy, and the Tolliver Twins. Delia can't read, Randy's dad is missing, everyone's afraid of the Tollivers. A tornado trashes their school. They win awards at the Double Dutch Nationals.

In some ways, it was a very cool story that I could sell easily to my students. In other ways, it seemed kind of hokey. I'm not sure our kids would really "get" the jump-roping competitions - I don't think many of them have been exposed to that type of sport.

 

Floyd, Patricia R. - she had a great voice for this & was able to pull off the differentiation between guy & girl characters. The way she said "tournament" bugged me, though.

 

Crime and Punishment

by Fyodor Dostoevsky

 

At book club last month, we were talking about books (obvs) and what we intend to read vs what actually gets read. One person remarked that she's been trying to tackle War and Peace for a while, but typically only makes it to chapter three. I once pushed myself through Crime and Punishment but I cannot find an entry for it!

 

Part of the reason I like this blog is because I can search for author or title and jog my memory. (My reading pensieve - I've been relistening to Harry Potter books.)  After searching this blog for an entry, I turned to the Excel spreadsheet that I used to use for making notes about books. Not there, either. Yet I vividly remember pushing myself through Crime and Punishment and deciding that I really don't like Russian literature very much. 

While in the Excel sheet, I decided to start moving titles to this blog. Since the list is currently sorted by author, I was in the Ds (Dostoevsky). I'll make a separate entry for the book I grabbed (a Sharon Draper title). I don't really remember much about Crime and Punishment other than it felt like a punishment for me to force myself to read it!

Oh . . . and there are 285 more titles on my Excel "Reading Log" from the mid-2000s . . .

Murder at the Piccadilly Playhouse

(A Cleopatra Fox Mystery)

by C.J. Archer

Libby audiobook  8 hours

Read by: Marian Hussey

Published: 2021

Genre: historical fiction, murder mystery

I enjoyed this story EXCEPT for the fact that Cleo continues to treat hunches as facts. Her assumptions turning into assertions is crazy-making! Other than that, I like the characters (and how she is in the middle of the staff and the fancy folk). I like the clues. I really like Mr. Armitage (though he's not in this story as much as the first one. 

In this one, an actress has died at the theatre. Suicide is determined, but Cleo is hired by the actress' wealthy (and married) patron. In addition, there's something fishy happening at the Mayfair and Cleo wants to identify some of the strangers she keeps running into.

I don't think I'll continue with this series. I like it but don't love it.