ReadingGrrls Paper Safari

Title: The False Friend by Myla Goldberg Publisher: Doubleday 252 pages Genre: fiction Synopsis: Celia Durst decides, after 20 years, to come clean. At the age of 10, she was responsible for the disappearance of her unpredictable best friend, Djuna. Traipsing with their girlhood clique through an unfamiliar forest, only Celia saw Djuna fall into a hole in the ground, but hot-headed from the fight the two were having, she decided to tell everyone that Djuna was picked up by a stranger. Now thirtysomething and successful, Celia leaves Chicago to replant herself in her childhood home and confess to her family and the other girls involved. It turns into an agonizing process, however, when no one believes Celia’s “new” story—especially not the other three girls, who all claim to have seen the car Djuna got into. Newly obsessed with knowing what she was like as a child, Celia spends the bulk of the novel imploring her 10-year-old self to manifest at her side, but she first must real...

Title: Good Neighbors: A novel by Ryan David Jahn Publisher: Penguin Books 280 Pages Genre: Mystery Synopsis: At 4:00 A.M. on March 13, 1964, a young woman returning home from her shift at a local bar is attacked in the courtyard of her Queens apartment building. Her neighbors hear her cries; no one calls for help. Unfolding over the course of two hours, Good Neighbors  is the story of the woman's last night. It is also the story of her neighbors, the bystanders who kept to themselves: the anxious Vietnam draftee; the former soldier planning suicide; the woman who thinks she's killed a child and her husband, who will risk everything for her. Review: Great debut for this author.  Fast paced and suspenseful. I didn't want to put it down, I needed to find out what happened. Reading this book was like sitting on the edge of your seat just watching a car wreck.  As the lives of the neighbors intersect you find yourself totally absorbed and utterly horrified. ...

Title: Pray for Silence by Linda Castillo Publisher: Minotaur Books 322 Pages Genre: Mystery Synopsis: Someone slaughters all seven members of the Amish Plank family at their home in Painters Mill, Ohio. The bodies of the two teenage daughters show signs of torture. At first, it appears the father, Amos, killed his wife and five children, then shot himself. When clues point to a killer outside the family, Kate Burkholder, the local police chief who left the Amish community decades before, zeroes in on 15-year-old Mary, who may have flirted with the idea of living in the English world. Lending a hand is Kate's on-again/off-again boyfriend, John Tomasetti, an agent suspended from the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Apprehension and Identification for failing a recent drug test in the wake of his own family's murder about two years earlier. Review: The grisly murder of an entire Amish family really strikes a cord with Chief of Police Kate.  When she discovers that the daughter...

Title: Sleeping Angel by Greg Herren Publisher: Bold Stroke Books 228 pages Genre:  Young Adult Synopsis: Eric Matthews survives a near-fatal accident only to find his whole life has changed. Eric Matthews wakes up in the hospital with no memory of how he wound up there—and soon learns that it’s vital that he remember. Apparently, he was in a car accident—and the body of classmate Sean Brody was found in his car, shot to death. But nothing makes sense to Eric. He and Sean weren’t friends. In fact, they disliked each other--Sean was gay and Eric is...well, he's not sure of much right now! Except he is certain he didn’t shoot Sean, even though he can’t remember anything about the day of the accident. To make matters worse, he starts having psychic flashes about the people around him: his doctor, a nurse, his mother, and other visitors.  As Eric’s memories slowly start to come back to him, he becomes more and more certain that not only is he innocent, but that the rea...

Title: The Brave by Nicholas Evans Publisher: Little Brown and Co 353 pages Genre: Fiction Synopsis: As a student at the Ashlawn Preparatory School in 1959 England, eight-year-old, cowboy-crazy Tommy Bedford, the hero of Evans's latest outdoor soap opera, is teased for being a bed wetter and gets the shock of his young life when he learns that his sister, glamorous "Next Big Thing" actress Diane Reed, is really his mother. Soon afterwards, she and Tommy move to L.A., where Diane falls for TV cowboy Ray Montane, and their tortured relationship leads to a horrifying act of violence that has lifelong repercussions for Tommy. In a parallel, present-day plot, 50-ish Tom, now a writer and documentary filmmaker who specializes in the American West, lives in Montana, is divorced and estranged from his adult son, Danny, who has been accused of committing an atrocity while serving in Iraq, for which he will be tried in a military court. Review: I really like Nicolas Eva...

Title: Cutting For Stone by Abraham Verghese Publisher: Vintage 658 Pages Genre: General Fiction Synopsis: Marion and Shiva Stone are twin brothers born of a secret union between a beautiful Indian nun and a brash British surgeon. Orphaned by their mother’s death and their father’s disappearance, bound together by a preternatural connection and a shared fascination with medicine, the twins come of age as Ethiopia hovers on the brink of revolution. Moving from Addis Ababa to New York City and back again, Cutting for Stone is an unforgettable story of love and betrayal, medicine and ordinary miracles—and two brothers whose fates are forever intertwined. Review: I almost didn't read this because the synopsis made it seem boring and not very intriguing, boy am I glad I didn't judge a book by its blurb!  This book grabbed my attention from page 1 and didn't stop.  I couldn't put it down and didn't want to do anything but read.  Verghese has created an amazin...

Title: The Baby Thief: The untold story of Georgia Tann, the baby seller who corrupted adoption by Barbara Bisantz Raymond Publisher: Union Square 252 pages Genre: Biography Synopsis: The harrowing story of Georgia Tann, who from 1924 to 1950 stole or otherwise separated more than 5,000 children from their families. Whether abducting children outright or tricking new mothers still groggy from anesthesia into relinquishing their babies, Tann covered her tracks by replacing the names of birth parents on "amended" birth certificates. Her ploy was legitimized by officials who legalized closed adoption, claiming this would spare adoptees the taint of illegitimacy. Review: A fascinating, fast paced account of Georgia Tann and how she manipulated the system of adoption.  One of the only good things I can see that came from Georgia Tann's legacy was that she was responsible for removing the stigma that had been attached to children in foster care.  Adoption was rare w...

Title: The Twisted Thread by Charlotte Bacon Publisher: Voice 384 Pages Genre: Mystery/thriller This title is due to be release 6/14/11.  I received an advanced electronic copy through netgalley.com Synopsis: When beautiful but aloof Claire Harkness is found dead in her dorm room one spring morning, prestigious Armitage Academy is shaken to its core. Everyone connected to school, and to Claire, finds their lives upended, from the local police detective who has a personal history with the academy, to the various faculty and staff whose lives are immersed in the daily rituals associated with it. Everyone wants to know how Claire died, at whose hands, and more importantly, where the baby that she recently gave birth to is--a baby that almost no one, except her small innermost circle, knew she was carrying. At the center of the investigation is Madeline Christopher, an intern in the English department who is forced to examine the nature of the relationship between the scho...

Title: Who Dat Whodunnit by Greg Herren Publisher: Bold Stroke Books 288 Pages Genre: LGBT Synopsis: The Saints’ victory to get into the Super Bowl just prior to the start of Carnival season has everyone in New Orleans floating on Cloud Nine. But for Scotty Bradley, Carnival looks like it’s going to be grim yet again when his estranged cousin Jared—who plays for the Saints—becomes the number one suspect in the murder of his girlfriend, dethroned former Miss Louisiana Tara Bourgeouis. Scotty’s not entirely convinced his cousin isn’t the killer, but when he starts digging around into the homophobic beauty queen’s sordid life, he finds that any number of people wanted her dead. With the help of his friends and family, he plunges deeper and deeper into Tara’s tawdry world of sex tapes, fundamentalist fascists, and mind-boggling secrets—secrets some are willing to kill to keep! Review: I needed something new after reading so many ya romance novels - I guess this is as far away ...

Title: Hereafter by Tara Hudson Publisher: Harper Teen 419 Pages Genre: YA I received this book as an electronic advanced copy from Netgalley.com it is set to be released June 7, 2011. Synopsis: Can there truly be love after death? Drifting in the dark waters of a mysterious river, the only thing Amelia knows for sure is that she's dead. With no recollection of her past life—or her actual death—she's trapped alone in a nightmarish existence. All of this changes when she tries to rescue a boy, Joshua, from drowning in her river. As a ghost, she can do nothing but  will  him to live. Yet in an unforgettable moment of connection, she helps him survive. Amelia and Joshua grow ever closer as they begin to uncover the strange circumstances of her death and the secrets of the dark river that held her captive for so long. But even while they struggle to keep their bond hidden from the living world, a frightening spirit named Eli is doing everything in his power to destr...