The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest by Stieg Larsson

If you wanna see a girl do some hellacious butt kicking, this book is for you!  Not since Kill Bill 2 have I seen such a powerful female character.  Lisbeth Salander is the heart and soul of this exciting trilogy.  I did read these books in order.  For some reason, I struggled just a tiny bit with the first book in the series, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.  But perserverance pays off in the end, because that was the set-up for the second book (The Girl Who Played With Fire) and this final one.  Since Stieg Larsson is no longer among us, we are lucky to have The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest to tie things up.  We want closure, right!  And I got it in spades with this one.  A great murder mystery for men and women both!

I'm Down by Mishna Barton

If you ever felt like you were the wrong color or class as a kid, you might enjoy this amusing memoir, now out in paperback.  If you listen to the free library audio, as I did, you'll get to hear this story in the author's own voice, including her hilarious impressions of her own father, who, although he was White, thought he was very, very Black.  Set in a Black neighborhood of Seattle, Mishna and her younger sister Anora are also like black and white, apples and oranges.  While Mishna is a meek, gawky kid worried about everything and everyone,  Anora is by contrast, innately charming and fearless, and lives in the present moment.  Anora continues to assimilate easily to her surroundings (think corn rows), including the revolving cast of characters brought into their home by their Dad's love life.   This is really a story of Mishna though, and how she moves through adolescence.  When Mishna does very well on some aptitude tests, her hippie mother gets her transferred to a wealthy white school where once again, Mishna is traversing alien territory.  She learns tricks along the way, such as claiming she is allergic to raisins when asked why her lunch ticket (subsidized) is a different color than everyone else's.    Mishna's values are in stark contrast to that of the most influential person in her life, her dad.  In the end, she gets by on her brains, her heart, and her competitive spirit.   This book could easily have gone astray to one extreme or another, but somehow we see different sides of each character, just the way we are in real life.  A good summer read!

Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simonson

This book is every bit as charming as it's cover.  Step into a quaint and bucolic English Village, and settle in with a cup of tea.  Major Pettigrew is an older widower, a very proper Brit, who has just lost his brother Bertie.  Bertie and Major P. inherited a pair of hunting rifles that were originally awarded to their father in Colonial India by a grateful Maharajah (he saved a Princess).  So we have a bit of frustration over Bertie's estate and greedy relatives, including the Major's own son.  Mix in the lovely Pakistani widow who runs the local shoppe, and a voracious developer, and you already have a good story.   British, American and Pakistani cultures collide and some riotous behavior ensues.  With all the heavy reading we do, this is really a light, fun read for summer.  Lest you think it's too light, the plot is surprisingly dense.  Don't forget the crumpets.  Good O.

WATER FOR ELEPHANTS by Sara Gruen

Even if you've never been to a circus, this book will take you there.  Step Right Up, Ladies and Gentlemen--we've got Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!  Throw in the early years of the Great Depression, trains and tracks, the Big Top, a dwarf clown, the Fat Lady, and our hero, Jacob (both as a very young man and a very old man).  The beautiful equestrienne Marlena, and the Lewd Barbara,  Roustabouts and Hobos, a paranoid schizophrenic Ringmaster, and of course, a big, beautiful,brilliant Elephant who only understands Polish.

If a Circus is all Illusion, this book gives you a ticket to go behind the scenes and see what really went on back then, behind the smoke and mirros, and the flashing sequins.  Cut to a modern-day nursing home, and let Jacob tell you his amazing story, of Love and Compassion and Adventure.  Of taking what life hands you and making it into something beautiful.  So wonderfully written that you can smell the popcorn and cotton candy.  I came away with my heart and eyes more open to the ethics of entertainment, and having an even greater love for animals.

I listened to this book on my Sandisk Sansa MP3 player, through a free library download, and it was quite an experience, complete with different voices and piano music to set the moods.

The 19th Wife: A Novel by David Ebershoff

I read this book when it came out last summer, and really enjoyed it, thought it was one of the best books I read last year. It's unique in that it combines an antique memoir called Wife No. 19 by Ann Eliza Young, who was pressured into marrying the infamous polygamist Brigham Young. The new fiction novel half of this book features the main character of Jordan, a young gay male who was abandoned on the roadside by his own mother, out of her misguided "duty" to the Mormon church. This practice of abandonment is used in real life, as a way to get rid of eligible boys of dating age, so that these boys don't get in the way of the older men, who are pursuing young girls in the church to add to their harems. I don't want to spoil the book for you, but it's like a triple treat; with a fascinating nonfiction memoir, a well-written modern-day novel, and a murder mystery, all rolled up into one good read! There's a little video on the web site here. http://www.19thwife.com/

THE TORTILLA CURTAIN by T. C. BOYLE

This book is the journey of several characters, but mostly two men. One is white, and living in the exclusive gated community of Arroyo Blanco, at the top of Topanga Canyon in California. The other is a modern-day Job; Candido Rincon, a Mexican immigrant who only wants to work and have a few simple comforts such as a roof, and a refrigerator and running water. This book brilliantly uses metaphor and circumstance to illuminate two juxtaposed worlds. You will be forced to feel and think and you won't come away without opinions, although they may be jumbled. Having lived in California for a few years in my youth, it brought that golden place of contrast into sharp focus for me again. Although Drop City is my favorite T. C. Boyle book, this is the one I consider his most important. With Tortilla Curtain, Boyle has placed himself as a modern-day Steinbeck (in my opinion). Ok, my favorite Latin-American movies to go with this book are: My Family starring Jimmy Smits; The Perez Family starring Marisa Tomei; and Under the Same Moon.

Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith

I listened to this book through a library download, and it's a good listen. The voices are done in English but with Russian accents that add to the atmosphere of your read. The beginning was extremely bleak and chilling, so I had to steel myself to keep going. However, once you get into it, the book pulls you along with the suspense and mystery of the plot. It's a great "guy" book, but I know other women who have really enjoyed it as well. Hey, women love to read Grisham and other male authors too! After reading this book, I was reminded of an older movie that I saw in this same vein; a movie called Citizen X. This movie is out in DVD and is based on the true story of a hunt for the most notorious serial killer in Soviet history. I highly recommend both the book and the movie.