Book review: The Royal We

Title:  The Royal We

Author: Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan

Format: ebook

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Summary:  American Bex Porter's life is changed forever when she goes overseas to Oxford for school and meets Nick, the heir to the British Throne.  Years later, on the eve of their wedding, Bex reflects on their love story and if past transgressions can be forgiven in time for one of the most anticipated events of the century.

Review:  This book, written by the Fug Girls, is pure, amazing fluff.  Like light, airy cotton candy.  If you ever wondered what Princess Kate's life was like as she met Prince William, this is the escape for you.  Sure, Kate is made an American and Pippa is a twin instead of a younger sister, but we all know what this book is about.  If anything, it makes Kate a little more interesting.  Kate is such a perfect princess, sometimes I want to see her break out of her shell a bit.

Time to write: 2:29

Book review: A God in Ruins

Title: A God in Ruins
Author: Kate Atkinson
Format: e-book
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Summary:  Ted Todd is a WWII pilot.  After the war, he marries his childhood sweetheart Nancy and they have a daughter, Viola.  Viola has two kids of her own--Sonny and Bertie.  This story rotates through history and characters to create the story that is A God in Ruins.

Review: Like We Were Liars, this is another book with a twist ending.  The twist startled me so much that when it happened, I had to re-read it to make sure I had read it correctly.  This book is also by the same woman that wrote Life After Life, which is about Ursula Todd.  I had tried to read Life After Life but I found it unreadable.  I'm sure it was good, but it wasn't the book for me at the time.

The reason I bring it up at all is that A God in Ruins focuses on Ted, Ursula's brother.  A God in Ruins was great but it could have used some editing.  For example, I didn't think the excerpts of the Augustus book were necessary.  It also jumped around quite a bit which could be jarring for my easily confused mind.  All that aside, it was still a great book.

Time to write: 5:36

Title: The Girl on the Train

Title: The Girl on the Train
Author: Paula Hawkins
Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Summary: Rachel commutes back and forth to London each day on the train. Her ride takes her past her old house where her ex-husband lives with his new wife and baby.  Rachel lost her job but rides the train anyways.  She also has a minor drinking problem.  Anna is the new wife and is tired of Rachel's drunk phone calls and late night stalking.

Rachel likes to make up stories about the people who live in the houses that are on the train line.  One woman in particular is Jess, who lives a few houses over from Rachel's old house. One day Rachel sees Jess with a man that isn't her husband.  These women's lives begin to intersect when Jess (real name, Megan) disappears.

Review: This was a great book.  I had my suspicions on certain characters but Rachel's alcoholism added a sad but great element to the story.  Rachel knew that there was more that met the eye to what was going on but she couldn't remember anything because of her blackouts.  None of these characters are what they seem, which makes the book so great.

Time to write: 4:04

Book review: The Paying Guests

Title: The Paying Guests
Author: Sarah Waters
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Summary:  After the war, times are tough for Mrs. Gray and her 26-year-old daughter Frances.  They take in boarders, Mr. and Mrs. Barber.  Frances and the Mrs. start up an affair.  The Mr. finds out.  Hilarity does not ensue from there.

Review:  Call me risk-averse, but no good can come from having an affair with your married boarder.   I listened to this book on CD and it was really, really long.  Sometimes when I'm listening to a book I wonder if my opinion of the book would have changed if I'd read it instead. I think I might have liked this one better if I'd read it.

There was some good anticipation around whether or not they were going to get away with killing Mr. Barber.  But then it really started to drag.  The trial could have been shortened. Besides being too long, one other thing that I didn't really like was the ending.  Without specifically giving it away, I just didn't buy it. I would have enjoyed hearing more about what happened to the two of them post-trial.

Time to write: N/A

Book Review: Edge of Eternity

Title: Edge of Eternity
Author: Ken Follett
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Summary:  This is is the final book in Follett's The Century trilogy.  Rather than summarize this book in my own words, I'm going to use Amazon's summary: "Ken Follett’s Century Trilogy follows the fortunes of five intertwined families—American, German, Russian, English, and Welsh—as they make their way through the twentieth century."

Review:  In the interest of full disclosure, I read this entire trilogy for a book club at work.  And I use the term "book club" loosely since we have yet to actually meet to discuss any book in this trilogy, although we are scheduled to meet and discuss in just a few weeks.  I've never read any of Follett's other books, so I can't speak to how this compares to his other books, but this book is so bad it's good.  There isn't a lot of depth to the characters, but I like to think it's educational (if I assume that the description of events in the books from the 60's on is actually true.  I was educated by the California Public School system and while I was in high school when the Berlin Wall fell, I don't actually remember learning about why the Wall going up in the first place).

There are a LOT of characters to keep track of.  Fortunately, there are character lists and family trees to help one remember who is who.  I wouldn't read this book on its own--if you're going to read this then start with the beginning of the series. 

Book review: The Silkworm

Title: The Silkworm
Author: Robert Galbraith
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Summary: This book is the second in a series about a detective named Cormoran Strike.  Owen Quine is an author of questionable skill who goes missing.  His wife approaches Cormoran because while he has disappeared in the past, he usually comes back.  This time he hasn't.  The wife asks Cormoran to find Quine.  Quine is found, but he's been murdered.  It turns out that Quine has just written a book that exposes secrets of players in the literary world.  To find a list of suspects, one just has to look to the book to see who was exposed the most.  It's a pretty long list but Cormoran, along with his assistant Robin, is on the hunt for Quine's killer.

Review: For those that don't know, Robert Galbraith is a pen name for JK Rowling.  Cuckoo's Calling was the first book in the Strike series and I had resisted it for a long time because of this.  I have never read the Harry Potter series and I have a tendency to avoid things that are so overexposed, like Harry Potter was in its heyday.  Yet every time I read about Cuckoo's Calling, I was drawn to it.

I finally gave in and I loved Cuckoo's Calling.  So I couldn't wait for this to come out and I wasn't disappointed.  I have a tendency to shy away from ongoing detective series because after awhile they become very formulaic.  This series is either still too young to be formulaic or Rowling is a good enough writer that they won't.  Plus, these books are fun.  I have immensely enjoyed these books for a few reasons:

1.  Rowling does a great job with the development of Strike and Robin's relationship.  Robin's engaged and her fiance isn't thrilled with her job.  This is causing a fair amount of tension in their relationship.  They end up having to postpone their wedding and you start to wonder if it will be postponed indefinitely.  I liked how Rowling resolved this (for now).
2. Maybe it's obvious to you, but I have yet to figure out who the killer is ahead of time.  This book kept me interested to read on and find out.
3. I couldn't help but wonder if Rowling modeled some of the characters about people she knows in the literary world, so that piqued my interest.

This is one of those books that is hard to put down and you can't wait to pick up again.  I can say for a fact that the book I'm reading now doesn't fit that description.  Stay tuned for the next review!