Rachel Kovaciny's Blog, page 25

"Peter Pan" by J. M. Barrie

It's been years and years since I read Peter Pan, and I was overdue for a reread.  In fact, I've never read it as an adult. That made it rather a different experience, I must say.
As a kid, I saw this as a story about the wonders of staying young forever and the meanness of adults who force kids to grow up.  But I don't think that's Barrie's point at all.  I think his point is that, as we mature into adulthood, we start to see the world as it really is, and we discover that the real world isn't n...

"The Mistletoe Murder" by P. D. James

This is a collection of four short Christmas mysteries by P. D. James.  I'm afraid I didn't actually love any of them, though I did enjoy three of the four.  Here's a bit of what each is about, and what I thought of them:
"The Mistletoe Murder" -- A crime novelist reminisces about the time she was invited to a traditional English country house Christmas, someone got murdered, and she eventually figured out how and why.  I liked the 1940s setting and atmosphere, but was overall meh about the way t...

Interview with Kendra E. Ardnek

There's a new Kendra E. Ardnek book launching today!   It's called Snowfield Palace, and it's a retelling of the fairy tale The Snow Queen mingled with the Jane Austen novel Mansfield Park.  I absolutely loved Emmazel , the previous book in Ardnek's Austen Fairy Tales series, and I greatly enjoyed the first two books ( Rose Petals and Snowflakes  and Crown and Cinder ), so you know I am looking forward to reading Snowfield Palace too.

I've had the privilege of interviewing Ms. Ardnek and, today, I'm ...

"The Snow Storm: A Christmas Story" by Catherine Gore

Although parts of this had that overblown purple prose too many Victorian authors were fond of, the story was a lovely one, and I especially enjoyed the last few chapters.
The story concerns a small British village next to a large estate.  The estate was purchased by some newly rich people and utterly renovated by them quite recently.  They plan to have a fancy Christmas party there and have invited a lot of friends from London to make merry there with them.
The renovations involved turning an old...

"Emmazel" by Kendra E. Ardnek

I really enjoyed the first two books in this series, Rose Petals and Snowflakes  and Crown and Cinder , but I LOVED Emmazel.  That surprised me, because Emma is one of my least-favorite Jane Austen books, and even though Rapunzel is one of my more-favorite fairy tales, I thought the Emma connection would possibly hold me away from this a bit.  But, instead, Ardnek adressed the things that bug me about Emma (Emma's incorrigible meddling, in particular) and tweaked them in ways that made the charact...

Top Ten Tuesday: Winter Wishes

Today's prompt from That Artsy Reader Girl for Top Ten Tuesday is "Books on My Winter 2022-2023 To-Read List."  I'm dividing this into five Christmas books I hope to read by the end of the month and five non-Christmas books I hope to read in January and February.

Jane and the Twelve Days of Christmas by Stephanie Barron
Catching Christmas by Terri Blackstock
Silent Night/Holy Night by Colleen Coble
The Mistletoe Murder by P. D. James
A Victorian Christmas by Catherine Palmer

The Gold in these Hills by...

"This Cursed Line" by Morgan Hubbard

This book has such a unique premise!  It's kind of like if the Devil went down to Georgia looking for a soul to steal, and he found one and stole it.  And then he doomed that person to go out finding other souls to steal until they paid him back the debt they owed, and their children and children's children and so on would have to keep doing that too.  Until the debt is paid in full.  Except, he went up to Washington instead of down to Georgia.
Kind of.  This is a tricky book to explain.  Let me ...

"All is Calm; All is Bright" by Colleen Coble

This book is two Christian fiction mystery novellas, All is Calm and All is Bright, and although they both belong to other series Coble has written, they stand on their own perfectly well too.  Which is good, because we read this for my church's book club this month, and none of us had read any of her other books before.  But I plan to look for more now!
All is Calm is part of the Lonestar series, which takes place in Texas (obviously).  A woman accused of helping sabotage a race horse runs away ...

Top Ten Tuesday: Old and Loving It (Dec 6)

I missed the August 16 Top Ten Tuesday prompt from That Artsy Reader Girl, so I'm doing it for this week's freebie.  It was "Books I love that were written over ten years ago."  Ahem.  That's actually ALL of my top ten favorite books of all time!  So, here they are, with their publication dates in case you are curious:


1. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte -- published in 1847
2.  The Count of Monte Cristo  by Alexandre Dumas -- published in 1844
3.  The Lord of the Rings  by J.R.R. Tolkien -- published in ...

"The Sign of the Beaver" by Elizabeth George Speare

I remember loving this book as a youngster.  Anything to do with American Indian life has always fascinated me, and when you add that to a story about a kid living off the land on his own, and I was destined to be a fan.
Happily, this book totally lived up to my memories of its excellence.  I read it aloud to my kids this fall, and all three of them were enthralled.  I suspect they'll be rereading it themselves now.
Twelve-year-old Matt went out into the Maine wilderness with his father and built ...