Tampa by Alissa Nutting

Hello my lovely readers! Oh, this book and its controversy...let's get into it. 

SYNOPSIS
Celeste Price, a smoldering 26-year-old middle-school teacher in Florida, unrepentantly recounts her elaborate and sociopathically determined seduction of a 14-year-old student. Celeste has chosen and lured the charmingly modest Jack Patrick into her web. Jack is enthralled and in awe of his eighth-grade teacher, and, most importantly, willing to accept Celeste’s terms for a secret relationship—car rides after dark, rendezvous at Jack’s house while his single father works the late shift, and body-slamming erotic encounters in Celeste’s empty classroom. In slaking her sexual thirst, Celeste Price is remorseless and deviously free of hesitation, a monstress of pure motivation. She deceives everyone, is close to no one, and cares little for anything but her pleasure. Tampa is a sexually explicit, virtuosically satirical, American Psycho–esque rendering of a monstrously misplaced but undeterrable desire.

199 Cemeteries to See Before You Die by Loren Rhoads

Hello my lovely readers! Two of my interests are combined into one book. Let's get into it!

SYNOPSIS

More than 3.5 million tourists flock to Paris's Père Lachaise cemetery each year. They are lured there, and to many cemeteries around the world, by a combination of natural beauty, ornate tombstones and crypts, notable residents, vivid history, and even wildlife. Many also visit Mount Koya cemetery in Japan, where 10,000 lanterns illuminate the forest setting, or graveside in Oaxaca, Mexico to witness Day of the Dead fiestas. Savannah's Bonaventure Cemetery has gorgeous night tours of the Southern Gothic tombstones under moss-covered trees that is one of the most popular draws of the city.

199 Cemeteries to See Before You Die features these unforgettable cemeteries, along with 196 more, seen in more than 300 photographs. In this bucket list of travel musts, author Loren Rhoads, who hosts the popular Cemetery Travel blog, details the history and features that make each destination unique. Throughout will be profiles of famous people buried there, striking memorials by noted artists, and unusual elements, such as the hand carved wood grave markers in the Merry Cemetery in Romania.

Dinner with the President by Alex Prud'homme

Hello my lovely readers!

I am really surprised by how much I enjoyed this book. Let's get into it.

SYNOPSIS
The American presidents have been hosts to some of the most significant moments in our history over meals at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. And during such occasions, our commanders-in-chief have understood the value of breaking bread with both friends and foes—Thomas Jefferson’s nation-building receptions in the new capital Washington, D.C.; Ulysses S. Grant’s state dinner for the king of Hawaii; Booker T. Washington’s groundbreaking supper with Teddy Roosevelt; Richard Nixon’s practiced use of chopsticks to pry open China; Jimmy Carter’s détente between Israel and Egypt at Camp David.

Here, Alex Prud’homme invites readers into the White House kitchen to reveal the sometimes curious tastes of twenty-six of America’s most influential presidents, how their meals were prepared and by whom, and the ways in which their food policies affected people around the world. As each president grew into his distinguished role, his personal tastes evolved White House menus over time—from simple eggs and black coffee for Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War and celebratory turtle soup after, to squirrel stew for Dwight Eisenhower, jelly beans and enchiladas for Ronald Reagan, and arugula for Barack Obama. What our leaders say about food touches on everything from our nation’s shifting diet and local politics to global trade, science, religion, war, class, gender, race, and so much more.

The Husband Hunters by Anne de Courcy

 Hello my lovely readers!

You ever get excited for a book because of the topic and then are severely let down because of the writing? 

Yeah, that was me with this book. Let's get into it.

SYNOPSIS

Towards the end of the nineteenth century and for the first few years of the twentieth, a strange invasion took place in Britain. The citadel of power, privilege and breeding in which the titled, land-owning governing class had barricaded itself for so long was breached. The incomers were a group of young women who, fifty years earlier, would have been looked on as the alien denizens of another world - the New World, to be precise. From 1874 - the year that Jennie Jerome, the first known 'Dollar Princess', married Randolph Churchill - to 1905, dozens of young American heiresses married into the British peerage, bringing with them all the fabulous wealth, glamour and sophistication of the Gilded Age.

Africatown by Nick Tabor

 Hello my lovely readers!

While in the library last year, I picked this book up because I had already read Barracoon by Zora Neale Hurston and had recently watched two documentaries about the survivors of the Clotilda and its lineage and legacy. 

When I saw this book on the shelves, I knew I had to read it. Let's get into it!

SYNOPSIS

In 1860, a ship called the Clotilda was smuggled through the Alabama Gulf Coast, carrying the last group of enslaved people ever brought to the U.S. from West Africa. Five years later, the shipmates were emancipated, but they had no way of getting back home. Instead they created their own community outside the city of Mobile, where they spoke Yoruba and appointed their own leaders, a story chronicled in Zora Neale Hurston’s Barracoon .

That community, Africatown, has endured to the present day, and many of the community residents are the shipmates’ direct descendants. After many decades of neglect and a Jim Crow legal system that targeted the area for industrialization, the community is struggling to survive. Many community members believe the pollution from the heavy industry surrounding their homes has caused a cancer epidemic among residents, and companies are eyeing even more land for development.

At the same time, after the discovery of the remains of the Clotilda in the riverbed nearby, a renewed effort is underway to create a living memorial to the community and the lives of the slaves who founded it.

Blitzed by Norman Ohler

Hello my lovely readers!

I actually finished this book last year, but am finally getting around to reviewing it. I checked it out from the library, but then also listened to it on Audible. Books in any form, am I right? Let's get into it!

SYNOPSIS
Author Norman Ohler investigates the murky, chaotic world of drug use in the Third Reich.  Readers delve into the world of the entire Nazi regime that was permeated with drugs - cocaine, heroin, morphine and methamphetamines, the last of these crucial to troops' resilience and partly explaining German victory in 1940. Ohler is explicit that drugs cannot explain Third Reich ideology, but their promiscuous use impaired and confused decision-making, with drastic effects on Hitler and his entourage, who, as the war turned against Germany, took refuge in ever more poorly understood cocktails of stimulants. This chemical euphoria changes how we should think about the Nazi high command and its ability to understand the situation it found itself in by 1944-45. 

HAPPY NEW YEAR! Plus, 2025 Book Goals

 HAPPY NEW YEAR MY LOVELY READERS!

We have finally made it to 2025

The last two months have been super hectic with closing on our house, catching COVID for Thanksgiving, moving in, then moving out due to a supply line break, traveling to Boston for Christmas, getting sick AGAIN and then moving into our rental house.

Needless to say, I'm behind on my reviews but it's OK! 

I've still been able to get some reading done which is the most important thing. Anyway, here are my book goals for 2025.

1. Read more
   Last year, my goal was to read 15 books and I did! However...it was a huge drop compared to years before. Plus, since becoming a mom, my reading intake has also plummeted. I'm not giving myself a numerical goal this year as it will just add more pressure and leave me disappointed if I don't make it. 
   
   What I DO want to ensure is that I read MORE. When my daughter is napping on me, in the waiting room, stuck in traffic, I want to ensure that I'm always reading.
   
   
2. Consume books in any form
   I'll admit, I was a physical book snob. I believed that physical books were superior to audio books and e-books, but you know what...the words are still the same no matter how you consume them. Audiobooks have helped me when I'm doing dishes, driving or walking. I just got a Kindle and now I can use that to read e-books and put down the phone. 
   
   I obviously still love my physical books and they still reign supreme! But if I can finish a 1,000 page book using all three forms of books....it's a win for me!
   
   
3. Visit the library more
   Since having my daughter, we've visited the library a lot more and I can't believe I ever stopped going! I've always had a library card, but I never made it a priority to visit. That all changes this year. I'm making it a point to stop buying so many books and check out what's in the library.

Those are my goals for the year. Simple and to the point. I can't wait to update this blog more with my reviews. :-)