book club

Link up with Katie and Heather,too!

This week I read:

Blackberry Winter by Sarah Jio

The story, which takes its title from a late-season, cold-weather phenomenon, continues Jio’s rich exploration of the ways personal connections can transcend the boundaries of time.
Seattle, 1932. Single mother Vera Ray kisses her three-year-old son, Daniel, goodnight and departs to work the night-shift at a local hotel. She emerges to discover that a May snowstorm has blanketed the city, and that her son has disappeared into the heart of the storm. Outside, she finds his teddy bear lying face down in the cold snowy streets.
Seattle, 2010. Seattle Herald reporter Claire Aldridge is assigned to cover the May 1 “blackberry winter” storm and its predecessor that occurred on the same date nearly eighty years earlier. Learning of the unsolved abduction, Claire vows to unearth the truth—only to discover that she and Vera are linked in unexpected ways.
(thanks to her website)

I love Sarah's books and this was a wonderful book as well. Although there are moments where I felt like I was reading Sarah's Key but it was still an interesting,gripping read. I couldn't wait to get to the end to see how it all worked out and the ending sorta left you thinking about the future for the characters. However, I definitely say the ending coming rather quickly and I felt like there were a bit too many "coincidences" but it kept my attention. I would have liked to learn more about Josephine and why she hated everyone. I give it a B.


The Sins of the Mother by Danielle Steel

The Sins of the Mother captures the many sides of family love: complex, challenging, funny, passionate, and hopefully enduring. Along the way, we are enthralled by an unforgettable heroine, a mother strong enough to take more than her fair share of the blame, wise enough to respect her children for who they really are, and forgiving enough to love them unconditionally.
(thanks to her website)

I feel like this book was rather dull for the first half and then it was as though everything was thrown together at the end just to tie up loose ends. I never really cared for any of the characters, things felt rushed and forced...a fast skim/read for sure. I am starting to think that DS writes similar stories all the time...I give it a D.


Depth Perception by Linda Castillo

A killer is watching. . .
Nat Jennings nearly died the night her family was murdered--and spent the next three years wishing she had. Now, she is returning to the sleepy bayou town of Bellerose, Louisiana, driven by cryptic messages only she can hear--messages pleading for her help...
After serving six years for a crime he didn't commit, Nick Bastille is back in Bellerose, mourning his precious son, who drowned while Nick was away at prison, unable to protect him. But when Nat approaches him with a shocking revelation, his denial slowly turns to a desire for revenge...
Together, they will hunt for a merciless killer who nearly destroyed them both once before--and is now preparing to finish them off once and for all

An edge-of-your-seat-suspenseful-romance-thrown-in kind of read. Just another reason why I can't stop reading Linda's work! An interesting mystery and sad yet well-meaning characters. I give it an A.

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Happy Reading!