March 2013 Reads

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I love this graphic, books are very powerful.

Mar	16	A Tale for the Time Being	Ruth Ozeki
	17	Earth Girl	Janet Edwards
	18	The Last Child	John Hart
	19	No One Could Have Guessed the Weather	Anne-Marie Casey
	20	How To Get Filthy Rich In Rising Asia	Mohsin Hamid
	21	The Death of Bees	Lisa O'Donnell
	22	Under and Alone	William Queen
	23	Little Green	Walter Mosley
	24	Second Shot	Zoe Sharp

I'd been wanting to read Under and Alone by William Queen for a long time.  Working at B&N, for 12 years, I always knew what the guys wanted, it was always guys, when they asked for the book about the cop who went undercover in a motorcycle gang.  I so glad I finally took the time to read this memoir.  It's outstanding.  It takes place right here in SoCal, so I recognized the locales, and remembered some of the events.  My husband was LAPD for over 28 years, and some of his friends went undercover in the motorcycle gangs.  It was always very rough.  Not only did you have to convince the bad guys that you were the real deal, you had to act like a gangster to the cops.  Not easy.

Most of what I read in March was fiction.  One, Earth Girl by Janet Edwards, is geared toward teens.  Earth Girl is Edwards debut novel, and I thought it was outstanding.  "Earth Girl delivers a shiny future you'll actually want to live in—perhaps the first true utopian YA", says the publisher, and I agree.

Another great debut is The Death of Bees by Lisa O'Donnell.  It's a coming of age story, set in Glasgow.  Two young sisters attempt to cope and hold the world at bay after their parents mysteriously die.  O'Donnell tells their story with fierce compassion and great sympathy   It's told in alternating voices, which usually drives me bonkers, but in this book it worked beautifully.

I do love debut novels; the third one I read this month is No One Could Have Guessed the Weather by Anne-Marie Casey.  I thoroughly enjoyed this upscale chick-lit.  Every once in awhile you need a reading break and when I can find a good chick-lit novel, I dive right in.  Read this one, too.

I was so excited to receive the ARC of Little Green by Walter Mosley.  Mosley is one of my favorite authors.  His voice is lyrical and authentic.  I think I've read all his books with the exception of his Sci-Fi novels.  He's one of those authors, like Grisham, that just gets better with each new project.  I loved Little Green.  It will be released May 14, be sure to read it.

Three books that I really liked are Second Shot by Zoe Sharp, The Last Child by John Hart and How To Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia by Mohsin Hamid.  While I didn't read it this month, Hamid's Reluctant Fundamentalist is outstanding.

A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki is getting tons of well deserved press.  It was the first book I read in March and I still think about it.  It's a very well written, richly drawn novel, had to put down and easy to love.

What are you reading?