RED SKIES (KAY BRATT)

 

 

 

Story Description:

"I feel empty, as though I'm leaving behind a piece of myself." As the daughter of the town scavenger, Mari grew up knowing hardship, but she could have never anticipated the struggles facing her as an adult. Feeling alone and isolated, she dreams of a better life. On the other side of town, a little girl is forced to live on the streets, but silently she longs for the one thing she's never known - a family. Max, a struggling American photojournalist, arrives in China with only one goal in mind: to face his demons and put an end to his own unbearable suffering. In RED SKIES, the fate of three people who've never met will converge in profound and unexpected ways.

From the bestselling author of 'A Thread Unbroken' comes a fresh glimpse into the life of Benfu's remarkable family. Be swept up in this emotional yet hope filled story of RED SKIES, set in the world of Kay Bratt's 'Tales of The Scavenger's Daughters'.

RED SKIES is a companion novel to the series and can be enjoyed first, last, or in between the other books. It can stand alone or be read as part of the series. So dig in at any time!

My Review:

 

Not surprisingly, another beautifully written story by Kay Bratt. She never lets me down and when I pick up one of her novels, I know I'm in for the read of my life!

RED SKIES opens with, Marigold, otherwise known as, Mari, watching a young girl desparately panhandling for money. Mari felt so bad for the girl that she considered giving her the few yuan she had in her pocket and telling her husband, Bolin, that business was slow that day. However, she knew he wouldn't believe her so she kept the money.

Mari remembered her days of begging and panhandling from long ago before she was rescued and taken in by her father, Benfu. Just as she was thinking over those years, two teenage boys came along and stole the only coins the panhandling girl had in her cup. Mari was furious as she knew the girl would somehow have to make that money back or the girl would be badly beaten b her boss. Mari crossed the street and put a five-yuan bil in her cup. The girl was grateful but frightened. She wouldn't tell, Mari which gang she was associated with out of fear but did she her name was, An Ni which would mean, Annie in English.

Mari's job was to take photo's of tourists with her camel, Chu Chu at The Great Wall. Since her husband had hurt his back and was laid up at home spaced out on pain killers, the full responsibility of the job fell to, Mari alone.

One day as she trying to get a very stubborn, Chu Chu up the hill and back into his shed for the night, she was approached by two American tourists who begged her to return to the Wall so the boss could get a photo of himself on the camel to take back home to his daughter. Mari was dead tired but the one tourists, Max, said they would pay her well and it would make his boss very happy. Mari finally relented and they returned to the Great Wall. When they were done, Max stayed behind to help, Mari with Chu Chu and carried her camera and other equipment.

A few days later, Max returned by himself to thank, Mari for staying late the other day. He invited her out for a cup of tea but, Mari knew if Bolin found out he'd be absolutely livid. She thought about Max's offer and the lack of communication and intimacy between herself and Bolin and how lonely she'd been feeling lately. Plus, Max had just saved her about ninety minutes by helping her again put Chu Chu away so she decided go with him.

Over tea, Mari found out, Max was a photojournalist and that his daughter had taught him how to speak Mandarin. Suddenly during the conversation, Max became extremely quiet, asked Mari where the bathrooms were, and quickly left the table. She wondered what had made him turn so quiet all of a sudden.

Max needed to produce a piece of work to submit to his boss but he had writer's block. He knew if he didn't produce something soon he'd be officially washed up - "emotionally and professionally". The only thing that made, Max happy was the fact that, Mari had agreed to be his tour guide around Beijing and he would pay her wages for doing so. They met in the mornings at the tea shop.

Now we have the three main characters: Mari, Max, and An Ni. Believe me, as the story progresses their paths will cross in a way that is so totally unexpected. Mari must deal with some very deep-seated hardships, but all three are searching for something that means a lot to them, and you will not be able to stop yourself from reading once you get started.

RED SKIES evoked so many emotions in me that I laughed, I snickered, and I cried like a baby. There were parts of the story where I wish I could have hopped into the pages of the book. The characters and environment are so real that you forget you're reading fiction. The writing if flawless and so well done that I felt a part of the story, like I was in the book and following along behind them all and could see the sights, hear the sounds, and smell the odours.

RED SKIES is high on my recommendation list and I'll be touting it's virtues to all who'll listen.

I would like to thank Kay Bratt for sending me a .pdf file of the book to read in exchange for an honest review. Thank you, Kay! As usual you had me hooked from the first word to the last. Well done!!



THE PIECES WE KEEP (KRISTINA MCMORRIS)

Kensington | November 26, 2013 | Trade Paperback|ISBN: 978-0-7582-8116-6


In this richly emotional novel, Kristina McMorris evokes the depth of a mother's bond with her child, and the power of personal histories to echo through generations...

Two years have done little to ease veterinarian Audra Hughes's grief over her husband's untimely death. Eager for a fresh start, Audra plans to leave Portland for a new job in Philadelphia. Her seven-year-old son, Jack, seems apprehensive about flying - but it's just the beginning of an anxiety that grows to consume him.

As Jack's fears continue to surface in recurring and violent nightmares, Audra hardly recognizes the introverted boy he has become. Desperate, she traces snippets of information unearthed in Jack's dreams, leading her to Sean Malloy, a struggling US Army veteran wounded in Afghanistan. Together they unravel a mystery dating back to World War II, and uncover old family secrets that still have the strength to wound - and perhaps, at last, to heal.

Intricate and beautifully written, THE PIECES WE KEEP illuminates those moments when life asks us to reach beyond what we know and embrace what was once unthinkable. Deftly weaving together past and present, herein lies a story that is at once poignant and thought-provoking, and as unpredictable as the human heart.
My Review:
 THE PIECES WE KEEP was a beautifully written story about a young boy whose night terrors unearth a relationship between two people during World War II. How does Jack know the names of these people? Did he live in a past life or is there something more that we don't know?

I absolutely couldn't put this book down. The chapters are written alternately between present time with Jack and Audra and the story of Vivan and her beaus during World War II. A lot of the information contained in the story pertaining to World War II actually happened at noted by the author at the end of her book.

This is one story I'll be recommending to friends and family.

MISTER OWITA'S GUIDE TO GARDENING (CAROL WALL)

Amy Einhorn Books|March 4, 2014|Hardcover|ISBN: 978-0-399-15798-1

MISTER OWITA'S GUIDE TO GARDENING is about a wonderful friendship between Carol Wall and Giles Owita. It's a book about illness and also how we need to learn to not make assumptions.

Carol Wall is a high school teacher living in the United States and is happily married with grown children. Giles Owita also lives in the United Sates, is happily married and has young children but is originally from Kenya.

Carol and her husband never much cared about how their garden looked, it just wasn't a priority in their lives. One day she was admiring a neighbours garden which was breathtaking when she began to have a change of heart. Why subject her community to their mess when everyone else had well maintained yards. Carol noticed a black man working in the neighbours yard and figured she'd ask him to come and speak with her about doing her garden. The woman who owned the home was a master gardener herself so Carol thought Giles must be good if she let him maintain her yard.

Carol assumed because Giles was a yard worker that he was automatically uneducated and probably not very bright. When Carol first met Giles she wasn't overly friendly and fought him on a lot of the ideas he had to improve her garden. Over time they became the best of friends even though Carol was occupied with worry over her cancer returning. She and Giles, although happily married to other people, enjoyed a completely platonic but intimate friendship. As their friendship blossomed and their complete trust in each other grew, they began to reveal private and tragic secrets to each other.

As Carol confided in Giles, Giles too confided in Carol further cementing their relationship. Carol said: "...my conversations with Giles Owita became my ideal postgraduate education, I even took notes..."

This memoir is a very personal account really of two people's lives. And, there is a lot more to Giles Owita than meets the eye. You'll be surprised at what you learn about this charming man from Kenya. We'd all be lucky to meet and befriend a Giles Owita.

I liked the line where Carol wrote: "Fate had sent a professor to my door, and my conversations with him were like a dream class..."

I enjoyed this book thoroughly and will be sharing it with friends and recommending it to other people.

THE CRANE WIFE (PATRICK NESS)

Story Description:
HarperCollins|January 13, 2014|Trade Paperback|ISBN: 978-1-44342-012-9

The extraordinary happens every day...

George Duncan is an American living and working in London. He is divorced, the owner of a small print shop, and lonelier than he realizes. One night he is woken by an extraordinary sound coming from his garden. Impossibly, a great white crane has tumbled to earth, shot through its wing by a giant arrow. Unexpectedly moved, George pulls out the arrow and frees the crane, and from the moment he watches it fly off, his life is transformed. Before he knows it, he meets and falls in love with the enigmatic Kumiko, an artist who changes the lives of everyone around her, including Amanda, George's angry-and very funny daughter, her adorable French son and George himself.

Wise, romantic, sublime and laugh-out-loud funny, THE CRANE WIFE is hugely entertaining, but it also resonates on a deep, dreamlike, mythic level. Above all, it is a celebration of the disruptive and redemptive power of love.
My Review:
 Wow, what a great read! Very unique and very interesting. I would love to have a huge crane land in my back-yard. George Duncan is such a giving and feeling man who cares a great deal about people and their interests. His other wives divorced him because he was "too nice." Can you imagine that?

I don't really have anything to add as I think the synopsis above does an excellent job of descriibing exactly what this novel is about.

KETCHUP CLOUDS (ANNABEL PITCHER)

Story Description:
Little, Brown Books|November 12, 2013|Hard Cover|ISBN: 978-0-316-24676-7



Dear Mr. S. Harris,

Ignore the blob of red in the top left corner. It's jam, not blood, though I don't think I need to tell you the difference. It wasn't your wife's jam the police found on your shoe...

I know what it's like.

Mine wasn't a woman. Mine was a boy. And I killed him exactly three months ago.
 Zoe has an unconventional pen pal - Mr. Stuart Harris, a Texas Death Row inmate and convicted murderer. But then again, Zoe has an unconventional story to tell. A story about how she fell for two boys, betrayed one of them, and killed the other.

Hidden away in her backyard shed in the middle of the night with a jam sandwich in one hand and a pen in the other, Zoe gives a voice to her heart and her fears after months of silence. Mr. Harris may never respond to Zoe's letters, but at least somebody will know her story - somebody who knows what it's like to kill a person you love. Only through her unusual confession can Zoe hope to atone for her mistakes that have torn lives apart, and work to put her own life back together again.

Rising literary star Annabel Pitcher pens a captivating second novel, rich with her distinctive balance between humor and heart, Annabel explores the themes of first love, guilt, grief, introducing a character with a witty voice and true emotional resonance.
My Review:
 KETCHUP CLOUDS was a very interesting story. Zoe, after killing a young teenage boy, is suffering from such guilt and remorse that she just has to tell someone. She goes online and finds a website for ''death row inmates'' and chooses Stuart Harris who is slated to die from lethal injection for murdering his wife.

Using the ficticious name of Zoe, she begins writing a series of letters to Mr. Harris, slowly building up to the day she killed the boy in the hope it will assuage her guilt. Inbetween she is having a lot to contend with between her schoolwork, her father losing his job, her parents fighting and arguing all the time, and coping with her deaf sister whom she loves to death.

Zoe not only falls in the love with the boy she killed, Max but also his brother Aaron. She ends up killing Max but does she still end up with Aaron in the end?

And she goes on a campaign of writing to a Nun to try and get Mr. Harris's date for death of May 1st stopped. Is she successful in that endeavour?

A really well-written story, very interesting and well-done! Highly recommended

CHRISTMAS ON JANE STREET - A TRUE STORY (BILLY ROMP)

Story Description:
HarperCollins|October 27, 2008|Trade Paperback|ISBN: 978-0-06-162642-5

The warm, wonderful, real-life tale of the family that brings the Christmas spirit to life on a street corner in Manhattan.

Every holiday season for nearly twenty years, Billy Romp, his wife, and their three children have spent nearly a month living in a tiny camper and selling Christmas trees on Jane Street in New York City. They arrive from Vermont the day after Thanksgiving and leave just in time to make it home for Christmas - and for a few weeks they transform a corner of the Big Apple into a Frank Capra-esque small town alive with heartwarming holiday spirit.

CHRISTMAS ON JANE STREET is about the transformative power of love - love of parent and child, of merchant and customer, of stranger and neighbor. The ideal Christmas story, it is about the lasting and profound difference that one person can make to a family and one family can make to a community.

A lovely, lovingly illustrated little gem of a book, this delightful tenth anniversary edition of a beloved Christmas classic tells the poignant, inspiring story of an unforgettable family and the warm, wide circle of friends who have welcomed them to the neighborhood.
My Review:
 I can't really add much to the synopsis above that would tell you anything more other than to say the family learns a valuable lesson this particular Christmas. Especially the father. This was a really great feel good story and made for a perfect couple hours of reading. Highly recommended.

ICE DOGS (TERRY LYNN JOHNSON)

Story Description:
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt|February 4, 2014|Hardcover|ISBN: 978-0-547-89926-8

Victoria Secord, a fourteen-year-old Alaskan dogsled racer, loses her way on a routine outing with her dogs. With food gone and temperatures dropping, her survival and that of her dogs and the mysterious boy she meets in the woods is entirely up to her.

The author Terry Lynn Johnson is a musher herself, and her crackling writing puts readers at the reins as Victoria and Chris experience setbacks, mistakes, and small triumphs in their wilderness adventure.
My Review:
 ICE DOGS was a beautifully written story full of adventure and excitement. Fourteen-year-old Victoria Secord sets out on a routine sled ride with her team of dogs and gets lost. Along the way she spies a snowmobile smashed into a tree with a body laying a distance from the machine. She stops her team and rescues, Chris, a boy her own age who had recently moved to Alaska and had never even ridden a snowmobile before.

Together, Chris and Victoria try to find their way back home but not before experiencing many set-backs and upsets. I had some breath-holding moments while reading this book and thought for sure at one point it was all over for Victoria and her team of dogs.

An enjoyable read and highly recommended.