Books, Fiction

Christmas at Little Beach Street Bakery by Jenny Colgan

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Reading Christmas at Little Beach Street Bakery with Beau in my favorite pajamas.

Read Yes
Length 320
Quick Review Christmas at Little Beach Street Bakery is the last book in Jenny Colgan’s trilogy. It’s a giggle worthy story about love and morality.

Christmas at Little Beach Street Bakery by Jenny Colgan is an adorable book. I don’t think you can read this without smiling a little bit. It’s the right combination of sweet, funny, and sassy.

Polly is the owner and baker behind the bakery in Mount Polbearne, a teeny island in Cornwall. She has a hunky, American fiancé named Huckle. A puffin named Neil decided to stick around. They all live in a very, very cold lighthouse. It’s Christmastime and everyone is bustling about dealing with family and friend drama.

I don’t want to give too much away because Christmas at Little Street Bakery is adorable. Jenny Colgan has a way of making a sweet story not Hallmark ridiculous. She is funny and smart in her usage of language. There’s a certain amount of conversational tone in her writing, which draws in the reader. It’s very enjoyable reading her writing; it’s not overdone nor underdone. I like that she includes a few recipes at the end of the book.

It’s a great read for Christmas.  

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Memorable Quotes
“Then he’d accidentally fallen madly in love with this strawberry-blond whirlwind of baking powder and capability”
“It sounds a thousand years ago, but it wasn’t really.”

Title: Christmas at Little Beach Street Bakery
Author: Jenny Colgan
Publisher: William Morrow (HarperCollins Publishers)
Copyright: 2017
ISBN: 9780062662996

Books, Fiction

The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock by Imogen Hermes Gowar

Read Yes
Length 496
Quick Review A tail of ruin and riches, love and heartbreak, joy and sorrow. History and fantasy entwine in Imogen Hermes Gowar’s debut novel The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock to completely captivate the reader.

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The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock || Fountain in Charleston

I was hesitant about this novel. I don’t read much historical fiction anymore because I have a tendency of getting caught up in the historical inaccuracies because I love history. So when The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock by Imogen Hermes Gowar arrived on my doorstep, well, I hoped the writing was as pretty as the cover. I was exceptionally surprised.

Set in London of 1785, Mr. Hancock is a middle-aged merchant widowered many years prior. Anjelica Neal is a courtesan with a tenuous position but a lot of confidence. They are both getting by without experiencing joy. Their lives have completely different trajectories and motivations. Due to circumstance, they are brought together.

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The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock by Imogen Hermes Gowar

Courtesans are often the subject and driving force behind historical fiction. It’s rarely done well or with any respect to the conditions sex workers were forced to live and work under. This is different. It’s gritty and real. It doesn’t use courtesans as a thinly veiled excuse to create sex and passion for women readers thirsting for a little jolt into their lives. Instead The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock uses courtesans and a brothel to critique modern day racism, sexism, and sex work. A staunchly feminist piece of piece of literature, it drags the reader into a plot of betrayal, obsession, and mysticism.

I’m not a huge fan of fantasy. I like my literature real and a little bit stressful. Imogen Hermes Gowar creates a completely believable fantasy for me because the mermaid isn’t a star in this. Though it motivates the plot, it sits in the backseat letting the more realistic plot play out.

The writing and narrative style is beautifully constructed. The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock focuses on the perspectives of Mr. Hancock and Anjelica Neal shifting from chapter to chapter. Every once in a while, a secondary character’s perspective will be explored to add layers and complexities to the world created.

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Memorable Quotes
Men are not fearful; they build one another to greatness. Women believe their only power is in tearing one another down.”
Treat them as if they are the centre of the world, and they do not hesitate to believe it. A charmed life these men lead…

Title: The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock
Author: Imogen Hermes Gowar
Publisher: Harper
Copyright: 2018
ISBN: 9780062859952

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The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock by Imogen Hermes Gowar
Books

The Bookshop on the Corner

Read Yes
Length
Quick Review A sweet story about a young librarian hitting a low point in her life decides to follow her dreams, which lead her to new places, a van, people, and even herself.

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I liked this novel a lot more than I thought I would. I set the bar pretty low. I wouldn’t call it canonical, but I would call it entertaining and sweet.

From the very beginning, it is obvious Colgan loves to read. Her first words are the dedication different from most, the book is to all readers. The introduction spends eight pages describing all the best places and ways to read. She is a bookworm like the best of us. It becomes even clearer she has a passion for books because they are not only a central theme but become a character in their own right.

Nina Redmond is an introverted librarian in a big city who has devoted her life to books: reading them, acquiring them, and making sure the right book finds the right person. Nina finds herself jobless due to layoffs. Between friends joking she should and telling her she can’t, she finds her way to Scotland where she buys a bus renovating it into a mobile bookstore to bring books to those who have gone without for so long. Nina finds herself loving and becoming a part of her new home in spite of herself.

Nina starts out incredibly shy to the point of meekness in her actions and her thoughts. Throughout the novel she becomes more brazen and confident as she is met with obstacles beginning with friends telling her she can’t to sexism to being underestimated to a rude and sullen landlord. Nina finds her inner strength along her journey spreading warmth, kindness, and books.

When Nina first moves to Scotland, she has always had a book as a companion. She has spent her life reading and living within the worlds books provide, she has forgotten to inhabit the world she physically resides in. Leaving the city and entering a small town life, she is able to stop using books as a fortress against the constant barrage of noise, people, and activity. She becomes a part of something for the first time.

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Colgan isn’t just writing about books. She is making astute observations on the changing world we live in. A recurring theme she touches on is how the job market is changing. In a very short amount of time, there is an emphasis on youth, media, technology, and extroversion. There is also less interest in paying people living wages or caring about the generations who have not yet caught up to the new world. Colgan drives home the fact that libraries and bookstores are disappearing at alarming rates.

I really enjoyed how Colgan made sure each character was different than what they appeared. She took the effort to make each character human. There was no evil. Every character had redeeming and less than admirable qualities. Colgan ensures each character’s faults can be understood because we all have our quirks, and there is always a reason for said quirks.

I enjoyed the emphasis of the novel was not on love or finding love. Romantic love was a part of the plot; however, it took a backseat to Nina’s search for herself. Romance was not even mentioned until page 87.

I found The Bookshop on the Corner to be evocative of Nina (coincidence!) George’s Little Paris Bookshop. They both have main characters owning nontraditional bookshops: a bus and a barge, respectively. Each character likes to think of themselves as a purveyor of more than books: a matchmaker or apothecary – setting each person up with the correct book at the correct time. Although the idea is not groundbreakingly original, I much preferred Colgan’s story. It focused less on love and more on books.

The only real downside of the story for me is the fact that Colgan made up book titles within the novel. I just think there are more than enough books currently in print or out of print that could have been name dropped instead of creating new ones. But I’m being nit-picky.

The Bookshop on the Corner by Jenny Colgan is not a book requiring a great deal of intense thought or deep contemplation. It is a lovely summer read or quiet afternoon read. It is a great novel to pick up when you want to follow along on a sweet story.

Memorable Quotes
“But sometimes she felt the world wasn’t built for people like her.”
“…she bought stationery the way other women bought lipsticks…”
“It’s like an entire generation has been thrown into a world they don’t understand and where nothing makes sense, and. they’ve just been told, tough luck, learn how to type or you can just starve to death.”
“There was a universe inside every human being every bit as big as the universe outside them.”
“Everyone’s love life went badly until the end.”

Title: The Bookshop on the Corner
Author: Jenny Colgan
Publisher: William Morrow Publishing (HarperCollins Publishers)
Copyright: 2016
ISBN: 9780062467256

 

Books

White Teeth

Read Read
Length 448
Quick Review A funny, smart glimpse into the melange of cultures residing within London and the young people growing up among them.

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I am ashamed to say, this is my first Zadie Smith novel. I’ve been hearing fabulous things about her for years, and yet I never got around to reading anything by her. I bought this book a few months back, and it had sat on my shelves untouched. I read her short story in The New Yorker and knew I had to read her book immediately. If you can’t tell by the Memorable Quotes section, I loved this book.

White Teeth follows the lives of two men Archie Jones and Samad Iqbal in suburban England, and their children as they struggle to find their place. Archie Jones is a white man who marries a young black Jamaican women; together they have a biracial daughter. Samad Iqbal is a Bangladeshi married to a woman from also from Bangladesh; they have twin boys. Archie and Samad served in the war together, and reconnect when Samad emigrates to the UK from Bangladesh. Their children deal with the difficulties of being mixed and Bangladeshi in a society predominately white.

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Smith dives into issues of race, religion, assimilation, and even hair products with depth, insight, and a sense of humor. She writes each character with so much profundity and sincerity it is easy to sympathize with even the least likable people.

I can’t wait to read more of her works.

Memorable Quotes
“This was a decided-upon suicide. In fact, it was a New Year’s resolution.”
“No matter what anyone says, suicide takes guts.”
“…making sure they didn’t get too close, scared they might catch religion like an infection.”
“Samad, when the male organ of a man stands erect, two third of his intellect go away.”
“If religion is the opiate of the people, tradition is an even more sinister analgesic, simply because it rarely appears sinister.”
“I think I have been cursed with two sons more dysfunctional than Mr. Cain and Mr. Abel.”
“Greeting cards routinely tell us even-handed deserves love. No. Everybody deserves clean water. Not everybody deserves love all the time.”
“Every moment happens twice: inside and outside, and they are two different histories.”

Title: White Teeth
Author: Zadie Smith
Publisher: Vintage Books
Copyright: 2000
ISBN: 9780375703867

 

Books, Fiction

A Christmas Carol

Read Yes
Length 112
Quick Review MUST if you live in the Western Hemisphere and/or celebrate Christmas. It’s referenced for one month every year. A ton of Christmas movies are adaptations or inspired by this classic. 

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Even if you don’t like Dickens, do yourself a favor and devote one week to starting, reading, and finishing this novel; it’s not long like a majority of Dickens works. For one month every year, you can be the person in the room who has actually read A Christmas Carol and therefore knows the actual story instead of having the gist of it from all the different adaptations and the like. Hey, you might like it, and it could become the book you return to every Christmas season to enjoy again and again for the rest of your eternity.

A Christmas Carol is the iconic tale about a grumpy, rich, white guy who hates everyone was visited by ghosts helping him to become a better person and epitomized the spirit of Christmas in a mere 150 pages if the typeset is big. Dickens’ inspiration came from his impoverished childhood full of hardship, like much of his other works. I don’t want to give any of the plot away, but you probably know it already.

Anyways the language Dickens uses flows. There are moments of subtle humor in a sea of seriousness. It is easy to see why he is regarded as a master of the English language through his descriptions and narrative.

I was lucky enough to read a beautifully illustrated edition, which makes it an even bigger pleasure to read.

My favorite movie version of this classic story is A Muppet Christmas Carol. Full of humor and nontraditional characters, it really does stick with the original story. A great deal of the narration is pulled right from the text.

Memorable Quotes
““And what is that upon your cheek?” Scrooge muttered, with an unusual catching in his voice, that it was a pimple.”

Title: A Christmas Carol
Author: Charles Dickens