EFR REVIEWS

To get the backstory on  Gone With The Wind , I read  Southern Daughter  by  Darden Asbury Pyron.  This bio is great for those academically interested in Mitchell and her writing process but as far  a s casual, leisure reading? Wooooo, is it dry! Still, I did get some interesting tidbits here and there.  "Georgia Peach" Margaret Mitchell came into the world on the day of her parents 8th wedding anniversary, November 8th, 1900. Mitchell was born into a family of book lovers, though some preferred to read only serious, non-fiction works. As a child, Margaret's mother was advised by Margaret's grandfather to focus on history and philosophy selections "to edify the mind" and "not waste your time in those little novels". Margaret pushed for more freedom in her reading choices while her mother tried to instill the same rigidity she was raised on, even trying to pay Margaret to read her classics: "Mother used to give me a nickel for eac

Gone With The Wind. That is one beautifully shot movie.  I've seen it dozens of times. The movie actually made me really curious about the original book, and then while reading the book I was also reading a bio on Margaret Mitchell  --- between these two books and the movie, I came across so much good stuff I wanted to hash over! I'm sure, given the iconic rep this book has, that I'm probably going to upset the mass majority here, but truthfully now ... I wasn't overly blown away by this book. There. I said it, hate mail be damned. I did not fall madly in love with Mitchell's opus here. But hear me out -- that's not to say that I failed to find anything good in this massive book, there were elements I really liked. I just ended up feeling like the book could have used some serious editing {btw, after reading the Mitchell bio, I found out that the book DID go through massive edits but sorry, to me it felt like some parts in there could have sti

Crazy For You  by Jennifer Cruise at first glance seems like one of those fluffy beach reads, and it mostly is but surprisingly it also features a dark element in the form of a  super creepy control-freak, stalker of an ex-boyfriend, and even  that  I could relate to! "Crazy For You" by Adele So what's it about? : Quinn McKenzie (does every chick book have those kind of names??) is a high school art teacher living the perfect life everyone else wants her to lead. Quinn has always been the safe, reliable daughter to her parents while her sister Zoe is the wild-child searching for passion and LIFE. Quinn also has what at first seems to be the perfect man to everyone - he never raises his voice, always keeps her gas tank filled up, makes all her meals, etc. He also happens to be the star citizen of the town, being the coach that took the local team to multiple championships. Cruise even goes so far as to describe him as a "6'5 Viking", so yeah, a

Well she asked for a lie...  In truth, this book was just sorta "meh" for me. Tell Me Lies  by Jennifer Cruise is basically the story Maddie Faraday, a woman who living in the town of Frog Point, thinking she has the perfect (albeit boring) life till she finds out her husband is embezzling funds from the family construction business... and possibly cheating on her with one, maybe two women. Around the same time,  another guy she hasn't seen since high school (also happens to be the guy she lost her virginity to) comes back into town as her marriage seems to be falling apart - and apparently he's aged very nicely.  Lots of plot points that you'd find in your average Dateline special - embezzlement, murder, possible kidnapping, town gossip, ill-timed romance... and of course a secret deposit box discovered too late.  Maddie finds her husband has been stashing money all over the place - his golf back, her car, her deposit box - but the mystery i

This is a memoir of sorts written by blogger Julie Powell, who at the time of writing, was working as a secretary for a 9/11 government agency in New York City. She makes it clear in the book that she is limited about how much she can talk about her employer, as far as specifics, but that much she does divulge. She's not all that satisfied with her job (who hasn't been there!), lamenting her dissatisfaction to her husband. She goes on about the grief of turning 30 and wondering where her life's going, trying to figure out what her real goals in life are. His response is an idea to take her love of cooking and Julia Child and make a blog out of it. Julie then runs with the idea and decides to start a year-long project in which she cooks her way through all the recipes in Child's  Mastering The Art Of French Cooking , blogging about her results. The book turns out to be more about what Julie learns about herself in the process than the recipes themselves, which is ofte

Whenever I feel my mind becoming cloudy with stress, frustration and the like, nothing seems to make me better faster than stepping away from all my "modern conveniences" (ie. tv, internet, cell phone, etc) and just sitting outside with a quiet kind of book and my dog or taking said dog for a long strolling walk. The answer always seems to be in the quiet of the woods around me. I do love living in the mountains! :-) Whereever I settle throughout my life, there better be at least one good rock formation somewhere nearby! These books today, one a nonfiction account of a real life person, one a novel, feature people letting go of modern technology (either by choice or out of necessity) and letting the land guide them as it did for our earliest ancestors. "Alaska is not the best site in the world for eremitic experiences or peace-love theatrics."  ~~ writer Edward Hoagland INTO THE WILD -- JON KRAKAUER You may recognize Krakauer's name from h