Book Review: When Light Breaks by Patti Callahan Henry

Synopsis (from Barnes & Noble):

Twenty-seven-year-old Kara Larson is bogged down in the stress of planning her elaborate wedding to a professional golfer. Still, to fulfill the requirements of the Palmetto Pointe Junior Society, she makes time in her busy schedule to visit an elderly woman at a nursing home facility. Soon she finds herself mesmerized by the singsong Irish lilt of ninety-six-year-old Maeve Mahoney as Maeve recounts the rambling story of her first love back in Ireland. Or, Kara begins to wonder, is she really retelling an ancient tale of myth and legend? Waiting for the story to unfold in bits and pieces, and trying to discern the underlying truth, Kara is drawn in—and driven to remember her own first love: childhood neighbor Jack Sullivan. Gradually she realizes that before she embarks on her new life, she must find out how her own story—with Jack—will end.…

My Thoughts:

I enjoyed this book - while it lasted. I thought the story was okay. It was predictable, but I was expecting that. It’s one of those first love, grow up and move on (kind of) go back to your first love type stories. I get where the author was going with throwing in visits to Maeve and how her stories worked with the larger story line of the whole book. I just wish it had been a little bit longer and more developed all around. There were so many stories, flashbacks and “Is it the truth? Or is it just a made up story?” going on simultaneously at times that it was a bit of a mess in such a short book. I think if the author had taken the time to really flesh out some of her ideas, some supporting characters and give the book some real meat I would have rated it higher. As it stands, the story is nice enough, I appreciated the author’s southern charm and it was an enjoyable summer read. 

Final Word: B

How To Get Rid of Violets

We just moved into a new house in December. The previous owners were older and, while the wife was an avid gardener, it seems as though she just couldn't keep up with the work around the house and grounds. Being the end of May and having been rather warm for the past two months, the garden has just completely exploded with new growth. Unfortunately, this includes the rebirth of certain "undesirables" as well...

Which leads me to my big question: How do you get rid of violets?!

I am starting to think that the previous owner planted these invasive little pests as a form of ground cover so she wouldn't have to do as much work to keep the weeds down. There was no mulch down and many beds throughout the property have various types of ground cover (pachysandra, "snow on the mountain," etc). In my book, the pachysandra can stay as it is fairly easy to contain despite its energetic will to spread.  I have begun the process of removing the "snow on the mountain" (aka "Bishop weed") and it is thankfully confined to one isolated bed. 

However, these violets are out of control. They're absolutely everywhere: in the lawn, in paving stones, between rocks dividing beds, choking out good plants. It seems like for every one violet leaf I pull (and why can I never seem to get much root?!), four more grow in its place! 

Everything I have read online basically says, "Good luck," or "Learn to love them - you'll never get rid of them." This can't be right. I refuse to accept it. The best advice I have seen for those of us who actually want to be rid of these pesky perennials is to put RoundUp on a cloth and rub each individual plant with it (to avoid hurting the plants I want to keep) or to just keep pulling them out by hand. Our yard is such a size where keeping up with them via hand pulling is not much of an option. I am about ready to try the RoundUp on a cloth suggestion, but I wanted to put it out there first:

Do you have any tricks, products or tips that will help me get rid of (and stay rid of!) this invasive weed without hurting my other plants?? 

Book Review: "So Far Away" by Meg Mitchell Moore

Synopsis (from Barnes & Noble):

Thirteen-year-old Natalie Gallagher is trying to escape: from her parents' ugly divorce, and from the vicious cyber-bullying of her former best friend. Adrift, confused, she is a girl trying to find her way in a world that seems to either neglect or despise her. Her salvation arrives in an unlikely form: Bridget O'Connell, an Irish maid working for a wealthy Boston family. The catch? Bridget lives only in the pages of a dusty old 1920s diary Natalie unearthed in her mother's basement. But the life she describes is as troubling - and mysterious - as the one Natalie is trying to navigate herself, almost a century later.

I am writing this down because this is my story. There were only ever two people who knew my secret, and both are gone before me.

Who was Bridget, and what became of her?

Natalie escapes into the diary, eager to unlock its secrets, and reluctantly accepts the help of library archivist Kathleen Lynch, a widow with her own painful secret: she's estranged from her only daughter. Kathleen sees in Natalie traces of the daughter she has lost, and in Bridget, another spirited young woman at risk.

What could an Irish immigrant domestic servant from the 1920s teach them both? As the troubles of a very modern world close in around them, and Natalie's torments at school escalate, the faded pages of Bridget's journal unite the lonely girl and the unhappy widow - and might even change their lives forever.

My Thoughts:

I received this book as a GoodReads First Read - and I LOVED it. I enjoyed so many aspects of this book. The length was perfect - long enough for character development, but not so long that I got bored. The characters themselves were diverse and the situations realistic: a mother "losing" her daughter to drugs and the wrong crowd, a gay couple going through the international adoption process, a high school freshman being bullied and losing a best friend, a mother dealing with depression after a failed marriage, and to top it all off the scandalous story of a distant relative who no one even knew existed until finding a very old notebook buried in a basement. 

I thought the resolutions and outcomes were realistic and nothing was over-done or corny. In fact, another reason I enjoyed this read (and think it will be on my mind for a while - the sign of a great book!!) is that not all of the conflicts were blatantly resolved. Sure, there is an epilogue where a little bit more clarity and information was given, but several points were not resolved and were left fairly open to the readers to consider for themselves. 

While I received a pre-print copy and several typo's were to be expected, I thought the author's writing style was believable, flowing, cohesive and just the right tempo for my taste. I like my books to move quickly, but I want realistic details so that I can actually visualize places and enough character development so that they become real people in my head. This book delivered all of those things. 

I enjoyed this book so much, I am going to purchase more from this author. Highly recommended!

Final Word: A

THE Best Tinted Moisturizer!

I received Jouer’s Luminizing Moisture Tint in my Birchbox months ago. I don’t know why I didn’t try it when I first got it. I have been complaining about my bad luck with tinted moisturizers for so long, you’d think I would have jumped at the opportunity to try something new. Maybe I was just jaded and set it aside figuring it would be like all the others. Whatever the reason, I put it aside and just found it again a couple of weeks ago. My awful Cover Girl moisturizer had run out - thank God; I have a thing about throwing things away, unused - and I needed something to hold me over until I could start up the search again. I am really glad I went ahead and tried the Jouer product.

The fact that it got Allure’s “Best in Beauty” award should have gotten my attention. When that failed, I obviously didn’t read the packaging very closely because then I would have noticed that this product uses natural minerals to create even toned skin. It also has SPF of 20 (more than the typical 15) and is oil free. All of these SHOULD have gotten my attention, but didn’t. What DID however, is that when I used it, my skin looked PERFECT. I didn’t even have to use powder on top of it. 

The moderate coverage of this product is great for warmer weather. My skintone is pretty uneven no matter what I seem to do and I HATE wearing tons of makeup in the summer, so this was great for me. If you have a blemish, it reduces its visibility a LOT. 

Another great thing: unlike so many other tinted moisturizers that claim to be “lightweight and oil free” but make my skin feel super slippery, Jouer’s Luminizing Moisture Tint did not! I was so surprised. 

The color “Golden” is perfect for my skintone. They have a whole range of colors (however, they do seem to be lacking on the darker end of the spectrum a bit) and the color blends great with my skin and the makeup I already have. I did not mind spending the $38 for the 1.7oz tube because it doesn’t take a lot to get great coverage and I was paying that price for the Estee Lauder stuff that I didn’t even like! Buy it here!

Final Grade: A

This summer, I decided to set a goal for myself: read 20 books. As a member of GoodReads.com, I have participated for the past couple of years in their Reading Challenges. I set the goal of 50 books for the year and, last year, failed miserably. I set the same goal for myself this year and this time around, I will not go down so easily! 

As a graduate student, a lot of my time in the fall, winter and spring is taken up with classes, writing papers, large projects and internships. I am also a recruitment specialist for my sorority, Alpha Gamma Delta. This fall, I hope to add “part time job” to that list as well. Needless to say, reading for pleasure quickly slips under the radar. 

For these reasons, I have chosen to try to get ahead on my 2012 reading goal of 50 books. When I started my summer goal of 20 books, it was the end of April and according to my GoodReads counter, I was already 6 books behind my ideal yearly progress! Of course if I can read more than 20 books this summer, I will. I am determined to meet both summer and yearly goals! 

What summer reading goals do you have this year? Are you just hoping to get through that one hot summer read? Trying to read more classics this year? Or are you, like me, working your way through a whole laundry list of books? Which books top your summer reading list?