Bookends
In 2018, according to Goodreads, I read 96 books. I’m sure it’s more than that, because I know it didn’t count some of the books I re-read, but that’s neither here nor there.
No, since it’s the first day of 2019, I thought I’d share my “bookends” – the books that I began and ended the year with last year.
I rang in the new year with Amy C. Blake’s Whitewashed. Get your copy here.
Whitewashed is the first in a series of three novels that follows a set of young girls. Here’s the blurb from Amazon:
Eighteen-year-old Patience McDonough has a plan. Despite her parents’ objections, She will attend Verity College in Hades, Mississippi, and live with her grandparents. She’ll complete her degree in record time and go on to become a doctor. But things at the college are strangely neglected, her class work is unexpectedly hard. Grand gets called out-of-town, and Poppa starts acting weird─so weird she suspects he has Alzheimer’s. On top of that, she has to work extra hours at her student job inputting financial data for the college─boring! But soon her job gets more interesting than she’d like” she finds millions of dollars are unaccounted for and that something creepy is going on in the Big House basement. She discoveries secrets tying her family into the dark beginnings of Verity, founded on a slave plantation, and she is forced to question the characters of people she has always trusted. Finally, confronted with a psychotic killer, Patience has to face facts─her plans are not necessarily God’s plans. Will the truth set her free?
I loved Whitewashed. Amy did a great job with it and I couldn’t wait to see what happened to her friends in the following novels. Give it a try–you won’t regret it!
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I finished the year with The Miller’s Dance, the ninth Poldark novel by Winston Graham. I actually stumbled across Poldark when surfing through my Kindle for some videos to watch one day when I was home with a sick kiddo. Amazon video suggested Poldark as something I might like since I watch other British dramas (Victoria, The Crown, Downton Abbey and others). You all, I binge watched it. I found myself riding my exercise bike so I had an excuse to pop in earbuds and watch an episode undisturbed (Mama’s bike time is not to be interfered with, ha ha).
Anyway, I have really enjoyed reading the Poldark series of novels. There are differences from the televised version, naturally, as they found that they enjoyed specific actors and needed to modify roles to keep them present. I finished Miller’s Dance yesterday and started Loving Cup this morning. I really love how Winston Graham blends actual history with his fictional tale (right now, Napoleon Bonaparte has finally been defeated and it seems as though peace might finally be reached).
The Poldark novels follow many characters, but the central characters are Ross Poldark, a onetime soldier who fought in America with the Brits but came home to take his place at the head of the family and renew his family’s failing copper mines. Poldark, lower-level gentry, shocks the county when he weds a miner’s daughter that he had hired as a kitchen maid. However, Demelza soon shows her promise and fits in well with society (if not always easily).
I love the characters in the series, even if I’m not always pleased with their decisions. It’s been a great diversionary read, and I’m wondering if maybe I can’t find a way to have my seniors read some of Poldark next year.
What are you reading in this year? How many books do you hope to read? If you’re doing a Goodreads challenge, I’d love to know. I set mine at 100 books!
