One Hundred Names

One Hundred Names by Cecelia Ahern
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Kitty Logan’s career has hit rock bottom – she followed wrong information and falsely accused a popular teacher of wrongdoing on her TV show. Now fired and ashamed, Kitty has to face the fact that her mentor, friend, and head of the famous magazine Etcetera, Constance, is dying from cancer. Upon asking the question of was there a story you wish you’d written but for whatever reason never wrote, Constance tells Kitty to check her files at home under “Names”. After her funeral, Kitty returns to Etcetera and digs through the files, and as a tribute to her late mentor, follows up on a very confusing list of one hundred names. With only two weeks until the magazine goes to print, Kitty must hunker down and find clues.
Warm-hearted, but more down to earth and less magical than her other books, Cecelia Ahern has written another goodie.


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The Friday Night Knitting Club

The Friday Night Knitting Club by Kate Jacobs
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I suppose being a crafty woman, thanks to my Gma Fazenbaker and my momma, I enjoyed this book. I am a new knitter, knitting scarfs for presents with eyelash yarn combined with a sturdier second and the pull of the women sitting around the shop, knitting, making mistakes and pulling them out, chatting, eating munchies made by shop owner Georgia Walker's teen daughter Dakota sucked me right into the storyline. Georgia is a strong, independent woman - making a living for herself and Dakota in the second story above a Manhattan meat market. Third floor, right up the steps, is their digs. Work is life and life is work when Georgia's ex walks back into the picture, ready to pursue a relationship with his only daughter, throwing everything in a tailspin. Georgia's clients/friends have her back but who can help when the doctors give her an unexpected diagnosis?

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The Supremes at Earl's All-You-Can-Eat

The Supremes at Earl's All-You-Can-Eat by Edward Kelsey Moore
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Talk about a sense of outrageous humor - this book is laugh right out loud funny, braying like a donkey until your eyes tear up funny! The Supremes are three best friends, now in their fifties, who talk daily and meet at their local diner, Big Earl's, for lunch every Sunday after church. The women have always been there for each other through the many ups and downs that life has handed their way. Barbara Jean has faced the horrifying loss of her only child, Clarice is still dealing with her husband's affairs, and Odette will soon learn she is facing her life's biggest challenge. The ladies and their spouses, who know each other's strengths and weaknesses, go from wanting to strangle the other to crying and hugging their neck.

Edward Kelsey Moore has previously written short stories and this successful novel is his very first.



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Circle of Grace

Circle of Grace: A Novel by Penelope J. Stokes
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

What is truth? A midterm exam question that got four college students together and their answer: Truth is the core of human experience, the center point which keeps us balanced and aligned, the hub which connects us to all we value. It goes by many names - faith, beauty, love, justice - but whatever we call it, however we experience it, it is the source of meaning and purpose in our lives. 4 college friends; 4 different views on life; 4 different careers planned - but things don't always turn out the way we plan them and college friends do not always stay in touch...

When 50-something Grace gets the results of her testing, she rethinks getting in touch with the college friends Grace hasn't seen in 30 years. But, Grace will have to come clean with the lies she's written in the journal passed around to each of them over the years.



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The Reason

The Reason by William Sirls
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

During a horrible storm, lightning strikes the huge wooden cross outside of St. Thomas' Church - Pastor Jim Lindy and his almost nonexistent congregation do not have the funds to replace it. When little five year old Alex Thomas and his mother Brooke, who live with Pastor Lindy, his wife Shirley and grown son Charlie, mention it at the hospital where he's having tests done, Dr. Macey Lewis rounds up a few people to lend a hand. They include her co-worker Dr. Zach Norman, NP Kaitlyn Harby , and carpenter and volunteer Kenneth, who keeps oddly repeating, "only believe." Dr. Lewis makes quick friends with Alex and his family and although dismayed when the test conclude Alex has aggressive leukemia - she knows as a oncologist, she is the best at what she does - finding answers and helping children like Alex beat cancer. But, what do you do when leukemia will not respond to the strongest medication and treatments. Kenneth repeats, "only believe."

A compelling look at faith, doubts, and miracles...

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One Mountain Away

One Mountain Away by Emilie Richards
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A story of pain and forgiveness, attrition and healing..Charlotte Hale is fighting cancer but fighting it alone. Charlotte is estranged from her ex-husband and daughter, definitely not a favorite at her church or the business she built from the ground up. Friends - none. Charlotte swore when she left the mountain the day after graduation that she would never be poor or looked down upon ever again - to be in total control has made her enemies and lost her family. But when she receives the diagnosis of cancer and sees a "nurse" in the hospital that others have never seen, Charlotte begins to make amends for poor treatment of others. But forgiveness from her ex and daughter, who now has a small daughter of her own, seems to be out of reach.

Quote: "The way we nurture and protect our memories of people who lived before us. The good they did? Like those seeds of your grandmother's, it doesn't die. It's passed from person to person. It lives on in other forms, in other places, but the essence of what it was at the beginning never changes."

Have a box of tissues nearby!

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The Wishing Trees

The Wishing Trees by John Shors

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


A lovely, moving book about a father and daughter who are struggling at moving on after the death of the woman they both love. Years ago an Australian boy, Ian falls in love with an American girl, Kate, while working in Japan. Tramping around Asia, the couple decide to marry and move back to America, where they produce a daughter, Mattie, who has her mother's artistic skills. As Ian and Kate's 15th anniversary draws nearer, they plan another romp around Asia, but cancer interrupts their plans. However, 10 months after Kate's death, Ian opens a box, with a letter from Kate imploring him to continue with the trip to Asia in hopes that he and Mattie will learn to be happy and laugh again. Needed: plenty of tissues.



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Belong to Me

Belong to Me by Marisa de los Santos

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


A wonderful, funny, emotional, amazing book of fiction - I'm not sure how to even begin the review. Can you tell that I really enjoyed this book? At 388 pages, it is not a small book or a quick read, but for me, it was so hard to put down and I found myself reading into the wee hours of the morning - and yes, I had to be up early that same day. Of course every life touches another and in ways sometimes we never see. Cornelia and Teo move from their beloved city to life in suburbia, where Cornelia hopes to find close friendship with her neighbors. It was that same kind of idyllic life that her and Teo had grown up with as children together. Her hopes are dashed as her neighbors live to judge others and Cornelia feels a horrible loneliness set in upon her. Her saving grace comes into play when she bumps into a vibrant woman named Lake in the grocery store, who introduces her to Dev, her gifted teenage son. Cornelia and Teo come to adore Dev, but as bewildering events unfold, can they continue to be true to themselves and each other?



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The Beach House

The Beach House by Mary Alice Monroe

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This would be a wonderful summer read - however I read it in the dead of winter! Maybe I needed to feel a hot summer breeze and pretend I was at the ocean after all the cold and snow we have had here in Western MD. Did you know that a loggerhead is called Caretta caretta in Latin? I've always been interested in those big old sea turtles and how they travel what seems like millions of miles to lay their eggs. This wonderful book of fiction about a lovely older woman nicknamed Lovie, who loves loggerheads and who is hiding the fact that she is dying from cancer from her two adult children, is mixed with factual tidbits about the Caretta caretta. Lovie wants her last summer in South Carolina to be one to remember.



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