Sunday Skim

 

Week of 10/10/2021:

Finished:

Currently Reading:

Looking Forward To:

Alice Hoffman can write no bad stories for me. I'm just disappointed to see the Owens' story come to an end. If you haven't read her, you should. 

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Julie's Review: The Matzah Ball

Author: Jean Meltzer
Series: None
Publication Date:  September 28, 2021
Publisher: MIRA
Pages: 416
Obtained: publisher via NetGalley
Genre:  Contemporary Romance
Rating: 5/5
Bottom Line: LOVED IT. Lived up to all the hype
Grab, Just get it at the library, or Remove from your TBR list? Grab

Summary: Rachel Rubenstein-Goldblatt is a nice Jewish girl with a shameful secret: she loves Christmas. For a decade she’s hidden her career as a Christmas romance novelist from her family. Her talent has made her a bestseller even as her chronic illness has always kept the kind of love she writes about out of reach. But when her diversity-conscious publisher insists she write a Hanukkah romance, her well of inspiration suddenly runs dry. Hanukkah’s not magical. It’s not merry. It’s not Christmas. Desperate not to lose her contract, Rachel’s determined to find her muse at the Matzah Ball, a Jewish music celebration on the last night of Hanukkah, even if it means working with her summer camp archenemy—Jacob Greenberg. Though Rachel and Jacob haven’t seen each other since they were kids, their grudge still glows brighter than a menorah. But as they spend more time together, Rachel finds herself drawn to Hanukkah—and Jacob—in a way she never expected. Maybe this holiday of lights will be the spark she needed to set her heart ablaze.  ~amazon.com 

Review: The Matzah Ball had been getting a lot of rave reviews in a book group I'm part of, so I went ahead and read it. I am so glad I did. It is a wonderfully written book about living with a debilitating disease and wanting to be nothing but "normal".  Rachel hides secrets in her personal life and she hides them in her professional life. You see Rachel is Jewish and she writes Christmas Romance novels (under a pen name of course). It's important to know that Rachel's dad is a famous Rabbi known for his views on Jewish law. No one in her family or close knit community know that she writes these novels on the flipside no one in her professional life knows she suffers from Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. 

As Rachel goes in to renew her contract with her publisher, she's thrown for a loop; they want her to write a Hanukkah romance! She really doesn't know how to process this since Hanukkah doesn't have the same magic as Christmas. Little does she know that this request will send her life on a path that she wasn't expecting.

Enter her arch nemesis from camp, Jacob Greenberg and his biggest party yet, The Matzah Ball. Rachel figures this is the key to her being able to right a new book about Hanukkah. Of course, Rachel and Jacob have very different views of how things happened at camp when they were 12 and it definitely muddies the water with their opinions of each other. 

I loved that Ms. Meltzer wrote this from both Rachel and Jacob's points of view. It gives you insight to both of their experiences when they were younger and how that shaped their adult lives. 

I really truly enjoyed this novel and can't say enough about it. I don't typically do Holiday books but this is my first of a few this season. 

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Sunday Skim

 

Week of 10/3/2021:

Finished:

Currently Reading:

Looking Forward To:

I absolutely loved The Matzah Ball and I typically don't read Holiday themed books but this one is worth all the hype! Of course I have to start October with the Queen, Alice Hoffman. 

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Julie's Review: The Sweetest Remedy

Author: Jane Igharo
Series: None
Publication Date:  September 28, 2021
Publisher: Berkley
Pages: 328
Obtained: publisher via NetGalley
Genre:  Contemporary Fiction, Contemporary Romance
Rating: 5/5
Bottom Line: Multi-cultural novel about finding where you fit in
Grab, Just get it at the library, or Remove from your TBR list? Grab

Summary: Hannah Bailey has never known her father, the Nigerian entrepreneur who had a brief relationship with her white mother. Because of this, Hannah has always felt uncertain about part of her identity. When her father dies, she's invited to Nigeria for the funeral. Though she wants to hate the man who abandoned her, she’s curious about who he was and where he was from. Searching for answers, Hannah boards a plane to Lagos, Nigeria. In Banana Island, one of Nigeria's most affluent areas, Hannah meets the Jolades, her late father's prestigious family—some who accept her and some who think she doesn't belong. The days leading up to the funeral are chaotic, but Hannah is soon shaped by secrets that unfold, a culture she never thought she would understand or appreciate, and a man who steals her heart and helps her to see herself in a new light. ~amazon.com

Review: Sibling relationships can be hard enough to deal with but imagine being thrust into them when you've known about their existence but they have no clue about you. This is the situation that Hannah finds her in when she travels to Nigeria to attend her father's funeral. 

Hannah has never known her father, except for the one meeting when she was 8 years old and then he disappeared again. Hannah and her mom were always a pair/a team so she's apprehensive meeting the other side of the family. The only positive, that Hannah sees immediately, is that the handsome man she met at a party happens to be aquainted with her family. Needless to say not everyone is thrilled to see her there or get to know her but Hannah expected that. What she didn't expect was for one of her siblings to want be so excited to get to know her. 

As Hannah learns about her father's side of the family and opens herself up to getting to know her siblings, she has to use her voice and stand up for herself. When doing this, she gains the respect of those hardest to let her in. 

While I throughly enjoyed the romance between Lawerence and Hannah, it was really the burdgening relationships between her sisters and brother that I adored. Each of them is so different but their father (and mother) allowed them to blossom into who they are and what they wanted to pursue. There were expectations but freedom within those boundaries. Hannah finds that she has more in common with her siblings than she thought. She's curious about her Nigerian roots and wants to understand more. She wants to embrace them while being respectful. 

I highly recommend The Sweetest Remedy to learn a bit about a different culture and for a wonderful story about finding your roots and family.  

Sunday Skim

 

Week of 9/26/2021:

Finished:

Currently Reading:

Looking Forward To:

I swear I'll get back to posting actual reviews but I've been so tired at night that I just feel like vegging out and watching some baseball or something. 

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Monthly Rewind: September 2021

I wanted to try a little something new here and see how it goes. I thought it might be fun to see how the books I read the previous month fell out. I'll include both books I've read and listened to for the month. 

* Denotes Audiobooks

Home Run (You should run and get this): 

Triple(You really don't want to miss it):

*

*

*

 

Double(You could get on the waiting list at the library and be ok):

*

Single(Wait it out): N/A

StrikeOuts(Don't bother):  N/A

It was a solid month for my reading. Now while I enjoydd Cloud Cuckoo Land I didn't find it as immersive as All the Light We Can Not See. That being said, I have a feeling it'll be a huge success. 

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