Left Neglected

 

 

I think some small part of me knew I was living an unsustainable life. Every now and then, it would whisper, Sarah, please slow down. You don't need all this. You can't continue like this. But the rest of me, powerful, smart, and determined to achieve, achieve, achieve, wasn't hearing a word of it. If, once in a while these kinds of thoughts did manage to wiggle into my consciousness, I shushed them, scolded them, and sent them to their room. Quiet, little voice, can't you see I have a million things to do?

Left Neglected

Lisa Genova

 

This year I'm tracking my reading on my Instagram account (@Marielle1949); wondering if I'll continue to update this blog. I will.

There will sometimes be that special book; a book I want to shout about, recommend far and wide. This is definitely one such.

I love all the business and family references. The whole work balance dilemma. The driven, highly-intelligent Sarah Nickerson. Her loving, competitive, supportive marriage. This fascinating condition--Left Neglect. Sarah's highly complex relationship with her mother; her all encompassing devotion and love for Charlie, Lucy, and Linus.

I'm looking forward to reading Still Alice (2014 motvie version a Best Actress Oscar win for Julianne Moore) and the rest of Genova's backlist.

,

 

The Forgotten Waltz

 

Seán.

He is, for a moment, completely himself. He is about to turn around, but he does not know this yet. He will look around and see me as I see him and, after this, nothing will happen for many years. There is no reason why it should.

It really feels like night-time. The light is wonderful and wrong--it's like I have to pull the whole planet around in my head to get to this garden, and this part of the afternoon and to this man, who is the stranger I sleep beside now.

The Forgotten Waltz

Anne Enright

Pg. 13

 

Beautifully written. The heart wants... No matter the devastation. Looking forward to reading The Gathering.

 

A Long Time Gone

 

We are all separate boats on this river of years, never expecting to see the boat before or behind us except when the current of time unexpectedly pushes us together, touching but never altering our course. We are born to fight the bends and curves of our own rivers, pushing back that which will not give, understanding where we are meant to be only when we let go and let the river take us back to the place where we began.

Pg. 417

A Long Time Gone

Karen White

 

This is actually the last paragraph in the book. Doesn't it just say it all? It just takes a lot of living before most of us can "let go."

 

I like this quote a bunch, too.

 

He gave me a lopsided grin as I turned and headed toward the stairs. "Good night, Booger," he called after me.

If I'd had something to fling in his direction, I would have. Instead I was left to contemplate the relationship between siblings, and how even though we would always get older, our relationship never really would.

Pg. 125

 

 

Whistling in the Dark

 

I never heard exactly who it was that found Sara Heinemann's dead body over at the lagoon. But it was Willie O'Hara who told us that she was lying neatly on the grass between those rotting red rowboats you could rent for a dollar if you wanted to do a little fishing. Sara's pink undies were wrapped around her neck like a bow and she was naked. And some of her blond hair had been cut off just like Junie Piaskowski's had the summer before.

Something like that wasn't supposed to happen on a Vliet Street. But like Daddy always said...things can happen when you least expect them. Things that can change your whole life. How right he was. Because after they found Sara's body, it seemed like our nightly games of red light, green light and the Fourth of July parade and even cooling off in the Honey Creek on days so hot they'd curl the hair on the back of your neck might become part of the good old days that Granny always talked about. Because one dead girl was one thing. But two dead girls...everybody started wondering who would be next. Except for me. I knew I was next.

Whistling in the Dark

Leslie Kagen

 

It seems Leslie Kagen always writes in the voice of a young girl. I love Sally O'Malley--her wild imagination and her wise-beyond-her-years insights. There's a lot going on in the O'Malley Girls world this summer. Dramatic and scary things. But, Sally and Troo squeeze the best out of their world; charming the neighbors and finding adventure, intrigue, and empathy in every nook and cranny of Vliet Street and the neighborhood.

 

Sea Change

 

St. Simons Island, Georgia

September 1804

Storms bring the detritus of other people's lives into our own, a reminder that we are not alone, and of how truly insignificant we are. The indiscriminating waves had brutalized the shore, tossing pieces of splintered timber, an intact China teacup, and a gentleman's watch--still with its cover and chain--onto my beloved beach, each coming to rest as if placed gently in the sand as a shopkeeper would display his wares. As I rubbed my thumb over the smooth lip of the China cup, I thought of how someone's loss had become my gain, of how the tide would roll in and out again as if nothing had changed, and how sometimes the separation between endings and beginning is so small that they seem to run together like the ocean's waves.

Sea Change

Karen White

 

Great storytelling; loved the alternating stories--early 1800s and 2011. Interesting characters; well drawn. Makes me excited that we're going to be on St. Simon's Island for a few days in September. We'll be celebrating your SIL's 65th birthday, and I've already ordered a copy of this book for her.

 

Island of Lost Girls

Rhonda Farr had two Peters in her life: the Peter she lived but could not have, and now the white rabbit, which she, not unlike Alice in Wondetland,sneezed destined to chase down the joke. But Alice's rabbit was nit named Peter. The only Peter a Rabbit Rhonda had known was the one in the storybook by Beatrix Potter, a common brown rabbit with a white fluffy tail, who just couldn't stay out of poor Mr. McGregor's garden.

On the other hand, Rhonda's Peter Rabbit was Ernestine Florucci's rabbit: all white and, as she would tell the police, about six feet fall.

"A rabbit?" the state troopers would ask, hands poised to scribble notes in black pads. "Six feet tall? Are you sure?"

Though the police were skeptical, Ernestine's mother, Trudy, believed Rhonda's story; she believed her but refused to forgive her.

The lives of Ernestine, Trudy, Rhonda--maybe the lives of everyone in Pike's Crossing--had changed forever in about three minutes. The time it takes to soft-boil an egg.

Island of Lost Girls

Jennifer McMahon

 

The Bright Side of Disaster

 

 

The end began with a plane crash. Just before midnight on a Tuesday in February. A girl I'd never met or even heard of died, along with her miniature dachshund (under the seat) and a plane load of passengers in the kind of commuter plane I'll never fly in again. I've pictured it a hundred times now: the quiet hum of the motor, the sleeping passengers, the sudden jolt, the cabin steward thrown sideways before he could finish his instructions. In my mind, it always looks like a movie, because I have nothing else to go on.

The Bright Side of Disaster

Katherine Center

 

Another in my list of summer reads. Light, told with humor and uncommon perspective. I'm looking forward to reading more from this author, too.