Books Read in 2007

1. I Love Everybody (and Other Atrocious Lies): True Tales of a Loudmouth Girl by Laurie Notaro. A funny, light, quick read.
   
2. Ya Yas in Bloom- Rebecca Wells
   
3. The Sweet Potato Queens Big-Ass Cookbook (and Financial Planner) I like to read fluff this time of the year...
4. Gardenias - Faith Sullivan. I love all of Faith Sullivan's books. She writes engaging female characters and her slice of life novels are filled with simple beautiful writing. Some of my favorite lines are from her books.
   
5. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time- Mark Haddon. As recommended by the fabulous Ms. Huis. She was 100% right that this a cool and interesting book.
   
6. Not Buying It- by Judith Levine. Not what I thought it would be, and I can't really recommend it. I thought both the author and her writing style were very annoying.
   
7. The Memory Keeper's Daughter- by Kim Edwards - Not at all satisfied with the ending, but an engrossing and well written story.
8. Stealing Home- by Sheryl Woods. Cheap, forgettable schlock.
9. Rereading Harry Potter 1-6. It's amazing how much groundwork she has in book 1 & 2 for the later stories. Genius. #5 is still my favorite.
   
10. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows- not the best, not the worst. Mostly satisfied with how it all turned out.
    
11. The Glass Castle by Jeannette Wells - a bizarre true story. This memoir of her childhood completely sucked me in and made me feel like mother of the year in comparison.
    
12. I Don't Know How She Does it by Allison Pearson- library book thank goodness. I enjoyed the British humour- but the ending was trite.
    
13. Juno & Juliet by Julian Gough, an Irish writer I had not heard of before. For a man, he writes about the inner workings of an 18 year old female mind pretty well.
    
14. The Hippopotamus by Stephen Fry- I liked this one a lot better than I liked The Liar (though it was years ago that I read that, so I should maybe pick it up again).
    
15. A Wedding in December by Anita Shreve- good, this is the second book by her that I have read (and I think it was earlier this year and I forgot to write it down!) and she has a very wordy/ inner monolouge kind of style, and all the drama is interpersonal. This one is about a 'Big Chill' style reunion.
16. Ines of my Soul by Isabel Allende- Interesting, it's a fictionalized account of the history of Chile. I heard about it on MPR and the selections they read on the air sounded really intriguing. However, it's a slow read and I just didn't get really into it. I re-newed it once, but still didn't finish in time. I may have to go back and finish it someday.
    
17. Dragon's Keep - Janet Lee Carey. Technically this is young adult fiction, but it's an excellent premise (a princess who has one finger that is a dragon's claw, she and her mother (the Queen) both wear gloves to hide it.) It's good until about halfway and then clearly goes into "wrap up" mode and loses the momentum. Also, some of the plot "twists" are fairly obvious. I'll have to remember see if this author has any adult fiction.