Dreaming in English by Laura Fitzgerald

 From Goodreads: Knowing she could never be happy in Iran, Tamila Soroush took her mother's advice to "Go and wake up your luck" and joined her sister in the United States. Now, after a spur-of-the-moment exchange of "I do"s with her true love, Ike Hanson, Tami is eager to start her new life. But not everyone is pleased with their marriage, and Tami's happily- ever-after is no sure thing. With an interview with Immigration looming, Tami wonders if she's got the right stuff when it comes to love, American-style. Maybe her luck is running out. Or maybe she'll stand up for herself and claim her American dream.

The first book, Veil of Roses, had a light hearted chick lit feel but this book was a soap opera. There are back stabbing villians and deceit and romance and ultimatums...it's Days of Our Lives/Guiding Light/TheYoung and the Restless...drama in the family! I could almost see the closeup contemplative head shots as one scene changed to another. That certainly doesn't mean I didn't like it, I enjoy a good opera (I am really sad that As The World Turns has gone off the air - I grew up with ATWT!). There were a few things I didn't like. First was the repeated scenes from the first book. Not a little thought about the past or a quick recap of important events - there was at least one word for word page long scene from the first book included in this one. That example I checked, there were other times I thought she might be repeating but I didn't go verify so am not one hundred percent certain - but I was one hundred percent sure that it was an annoying feeling. I also didn't like how harshly I felt like Ike treated Tami in some instances - it seemed out of character with the ultra sweet guy we fell in love with in the first book. But those two things were it. Other than that, I stayed up late wanting to now how it ends. I really wanted to see the mean girls get their butts kicked - you know, like a knock down cat fight in a water fountain - true soap opera stuff!

I read this book for the Library Thing Early Reviewers program.





It also counts for some of my other challenges....

Veil of Roses by Laura Fitzgerald

From Goodreads: Tamila Soroush wanted it all. But in the Islamic Republic of Iran, dreams are a dangerous thing for a girl. Tami abandons them…until her twenty-seventh birthday, when her parents give her a one-way ticket to America, hoping she will “go and wake up her luck.” If they have their way, Tami will never return to Iran…which means she has three months to find a husband in America. Three months before she’s sent back for good.

This book has been laying around here for one, two, maybe three years. I'd looked at it's lovely cover again and again and yet, still selected something else. Then Dreaming in English, the sequel, came out with an even more beautiful cover and despite not having read Veil of Roses, I found myself requesting it on Library Thing and I won! So I hurried up and read this one to get to the next one! I liked Veil of Roses and then when I went to look at reviews, I was so surprised to read some really vicious ones. Critics of the book think that Laura exaggerated the restrictions on women and girls in Iran and took her to task for writing in an Iranian voice without actually having lived in Iran. I have to admit when I read that it gave me pause, I really expected this to be written by a Middle Eastern woman. I had to ponder that a bit. But, this isn't a memoir, it's fiction, so who's to tell her what she's allowed to write? No one told Wally Lamb he shouldn't write She's Come Undone because he's not a teenage girl. So I went back to appreciating the book for what it is - a work of fiction. Tami is a delightful character so sweet and desperate to find love, you can't help but cheer for her and wish for the best. The story was somewhat predictable but overall the light fun tone made it a good read.

Laura Fitzgerald addresses some of the controversy at her website (author's website).

This book counts for a few challenges...

Rescue by Anita Shreve

From Goodreads: A rookie paramedic pulls a young woman alive from her totaled car, a first rescue that begins a lifelong tangle of love and wreckage. Sheila Arsenault is a gorgeous enigma--streetwise and tough-talking, with haunted eyes, fierce desires, and a never-look-back determination. Peter Webster, as straight an arrow as they come, falls for her instantly and entirely. Soon Sheila and Peter are embroiled in an intense love affair, married, and parents to a baby daughter. Like the crash that brought them together, it all happened so fast.

This was typical Anita Shreve in that it was all about the relationships within the family. When it comes to me and those relationship stories, the more dysfunctional the family, the better and Shreve did not disappoint! You usually think of the good girl falling for the bad boy so this upside down version with the steady, good dad and wild wife was a nice twist. I have to say Webster, the dad, was an appealing character - nothing is sexier to me than a man who is a good dad and holds down a steady job! I had a hard time getting started with this one. The narrator was just not my cup of tea. He is apparently just the right thing for a lot of other people because the back cover had all sorts of awards that he had won for his narration. I felt like he started every sentence with breathy excitement and then trailed off - even the most mundane of offerings was the same urgent beginning and waning ending - I almost gave up before I got through disc one because I found it such a distraction. But I persevered and I am glad I did. Once I got hooked into the story, I enjoyed it a lot.

Safe Haven by Nicholas Sparks

From Goodreads: When a mysterious young woman named Katie appears in the small North Carolina town of Southport, her sudden arrival raises questions about her past. Beautiful yet self-effacing, Katie seems determined to avoid forming personal ties until a series of events draws her into two reluctant relationships: one with Alex, a widowed store owner with a kind heart and two young children; and another with her plainspoken single neighbor, Jo. Despite her reservations, Katie slowly begins to let down her guard, putting down roots in the close-knit community and becoming increasingly attached to Alex and his family. But even as Katie begins to fall in love, she struggles with the dark secret that still haunts and terrifies her . . . a past that set her on a fearful, shattering journey across the country, to the sheltered oasis of Southport. With Jo's empathic and stubborn support, Katie eventually realizes that she must choose between a life of transient safety and one of riskier rewards . . . and that in the darkest hour, love is the only true safe haven.

I would have to say that this was not what I expected from Nicholas Sparks and then, a little bit of it was exactly what I expected. When I think of Sparks I think of love stories that are a bit over the top, too sappy for my taste but this book, Safe Haven,  had a bit of an edge to it. Sparks was able to write about domestic violence in such a convincing way that he had me scared. It was the same "edge of you seat, biting your fingernails" feeling I got with Backseat Saints, where you just want to scream at the woman, "Look out!" That suspense was a great surprise and made for an exciting read. But....it is still after all Nicholas Sparks so, yes, there was some drippy sentimentality at times that just made me want to puncture my own ear drum so it would stop. I am a married woman, I know a lot of other married women, none of us talk about our husbands with the gooey awe that the heroines in Sparks' books employ - we love them, we just don't worship them. I will be eager to hear what devoted Sparks fans think of this one.

Another one that counts for all sorts of challenges....

Milkweed by Jerry Spinelli

From Goodreads: He’s a boy called Jew. Gypsy. Stopthief. Runt. Happy. Fast. Filthy son of Abraham.

He’s a boy who lives in the streets of Warsaw. He’s a boy who steals food for himself and the other orphans. He’s a boy who believes in bread, and mothers, and angels. He’s a boy who wants to be a Nazi some day, with tall shiny jackboots and a gleaming Eagle hat of his own. Until the day that suddenly makes him change his mind. And when the trains come to empty the Jews from the ghetto of the damned, he’s a boy who realizes it’s safest of all to be nobody.

Newbery Medalist Jerry Spinelli takes us to one of the most devastating settings imaginable—Nazi-occupied Warsaw of World War II—and tells a tale of heartbreak, hope, and survival through the bright eyes of a young orphan.


How heartless do I sound when I say I didn't like the story because I found the orphaned boy and his little friend annoying? Written to be naive and sympathetic, the central character is an orphan boy who has been on his own so long that he doesn't know his name or any of his history. By day, he delights in the pageantry of the Nazis not understanding why others fear them and by night steals food and collects coal to give it to other orphans. He touches the heart of the people around him and they shelter him and care for him despite the danger he brings upon them because of his naivete. Ugh. It was just too much. The boy was too blind to the events around him and his little friend came across as whiny and spoiled. The bright light for me was some of the lesser characters who were interesting and had more range in their emotions. (I'd really like to read a book about Uri's story - how does he get from where he was an orphan on the streets to the life he leads at the end?) I read this one before giving it to my Youngest because I have heard great things about Jerry Spinelli. I'll have to give a different Jerry Spinelli book a try because this one didn't live up to my expectations.

http://myroundfile.blogspot.com/2011/01/books-read-2011.html

Change of Heart by Jodi Picoult

From the author's website: Shay Bourne - New Hampshire’s first death row prisoner in 69 years – has only one last request: to donate his heart post-execution to the sister of his victim, who is looking for a transplant. Bourne says it’s the only way he can redeem himself…but with lethal injection as his form of execution, this is medically impossible. Enter Father Michael Wright, a young local priest. Called in as Shay’s spiritual advisor, he knows redemption has nothing to do with organ donation – and plans to convince Bourne. But then Bourne begins to perform miracles at the prison that are witnessed by officers, fellow inmates, and even Father Michael – and the media begins to call him a messiah. Could an unkempt, bipolar, convicted murderer be a savior? It seems highly unlikely, to the priest. Until he realizes that the things Shay says may not come from the Bible…but are, verbatim, from a gospel that the early Christian church rejected two thousand years ago…and that is still considered heresy.

This is my third Jodi Picoult book and at this point, my least favorite. Loved My Sister's Keeper, in my pre-blogging days, was okay with The Tenth Circle, and this one was just okay too. I had the "big secret" figured out the minute she dropped the first clue so just had that waiting feeling for a good portion of the book - you know where it's going and you just want it to get there. I liked all the peripheral characters more than I liked the central character, Shay. I know the miracles Picoult has Shay performing were over the top, unbelievable because they are meant to mirror the miracles Christ performed and make us all question our stereotypes of who can be Christian but it all felt a little heavy handed. It was like you could see Picoult flipping through the Bible and choosing stories to tweak. I do have to give her credit for the research she did on the Gnostics. That's not an easy topic, one of my brothers is a religious scholar and everything he writes on the Gnostics is challenging to read. So, overall, I plowed through because it was interesting enough but I didn't love it.

False Impression by Jeffrey Archer

From Goodreads: "Why was an elegant lady brutally murdered the night before 9/11? Why was a successful New York banker not surprised to receive a woman's left ear in the morning mail? Why did a top Manhattan lawyer work only for one client, but never charge a fee? Why did a young woman with a bright career steal a priceless Van Gogh painting? Why was an Olympic gymnast paid a million dollars an assignment when she didn't have a bank account?" All these questions are answered in False Impression, but not before a journey of twists and turns that will take readers from New York to London to Bucharest and on to Tokyo, and finally to a sleepy English village, where the mystery of Van Gogh's last painting will finally be resolved.

Jeffrey Archer has written a lot, his website lists a dozen or more fiction titles, a handful of non-fiction, six collections of short stories, and three plays. Wow, I missed all of that. I just came across this audiobook in a local second hand shop and since I am an audio-addict, I bought it. It was great fun. The characters were all wealthy and smart and immersed in the art world so we got to follow them to interesting places in expensive cars! It reminded me of a James Bond movie. The villians were so memorable - a blowhard multi-millionaire who was completely over the top and a petite, blond crewcutted assasin both sexy and lethal (this was however a clean read - don't want to give you the wrong impression). You know starightaway who is good and who is bad so it is just a matter of the chase and who will win  (and, I guess, really, you know even that) but the journey is still fun.


Counts towards tons o' challenges....