Saving Grace

Saving Grace by Tom McGregor

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"What is Grace growing in her greenhouse?

"Grace Trevethan has a wonderful life, living with her husband in their beautiful house and grounds in the Cornish village of St Liac. Then one day, Grace's dream-like existence is shattered as her husband dies suddenly by jumping out of a plane without a parachute (nearly taking out an unsuspecting morris dancer in the process). Faced with huge debts that mean she will lose her beloved home, Grace is at her wits' end, under she and her gardener, Matthew, come up with a perfect, if highly illegal, solution that they believe can save her ...

"Gradually Grace becomes embroiled in a daring scheme that can either save her home or end with disastrous consequences. The events that ensue make life in the usually sleepy village more complex, nerve-wracking and entertaining than anything a city has to offer."
~~back cover

A charming, well-written, funny, understated, laugh-out-loud funny book. Nor is it your typical English village recap -- it takes place in an English village, but you'll not met Miss Marple or Miss Silver round any of the corners.

I can't wait for the movie to come up on my Netflix queue!

Reflections From the North Country

Reflections from the North Country by Sigurd F. Olson

My rating: 1 of 5 stars

"These are reflections, and the philosophy, of a man who has traveled the wilderness most of his life. 'I hope.' writes Sigurd Olson, 'those who travel with me may hear an almost imperceptible note of harmony that runs through the grand symphony of the land I have known.'

"His book is alive with anecdote and insight, born of his long familiarity with rivers, lakes, and primitive terrain, from the northern United States and the mountains of Alaska to the Northwest Territories of Canada and the arctic tundra.

"He evokes the soaring grace of raven, osprey and eagle, the call of the loon and the song of the hermit thrush. He sharpens our awareness of the beauty around us -- gently warning us to leave behind our excess baggage of scientific sophistication and open ourselves to wonder. He reflects on our frontier heritage, ponders the meaning of solitude--its freedoms and cleansing powers. He meditates on wholeness, cosmic rhythms, and the slow cycles of seasonal change, and once again offers eloquent testimony to the inherent joys and truths he has found."
~~front flap

Oh BOY! This is going to be one of my all time very favoritest of books, thinks I. Don't I have a special connection with ravens? Isn't the song of the hermit thrust burned forever in my memory after that magical hike at dusk along the North Rim of the Grand Canyon? Don't I thirst after wholeness, and the slow cycles of seasonal change? Doesn't my heart sing for rivers, lakes, and primitive terrain?

So I rubbed my hands together in glee, and dove right in.

I hated it.

This book says "Me me me -- look at me! See how environmentally and woodsy I am? Aren't I wonderful?" Well he may have been wonderful, and the back flap of the dust jacket says he was: "one of America's distinguished ecologists and interpreters of wilderness, and one of the best-loved writers in his field." But what I wanted from this book was to see what he'd seen, go where he'd been, travel and watch and wonder with him. Instead, I got lectured on every page about the danger of losing wilderness, and how we should all care, and do something about it. I do care, I do do as much as I can about it, and if I didn't already know all that, do think I'd be reading a book about wilderness?

Quarry

Quarry by Susan Cummins Miller

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

"With crimes of passion striking the quiet University of Del Rio campus, geologist Frankie MacFarlane is enmeshed in the case of a fragile psyche pushed to the edge ...
"Just as Frankie arranges her doctoral dissertation's long-awaited defense, a police investigation has reopened -- alongside unhealed wounds. When her ex-fiance Geoff Travers vanished, expelled by the university for plagiarizing Frankie's research, she should've deduced that his remains -- found later in the desert -- couldn't be legit, either.

"Now an unknown assailant is preying on high-profile geologists. Two members of her dissertation defense board have been attacked, one of them fatally. A fellow student has been abducted from her fieldwork site and, trapped amid the volcanic mesas of the Cady Mountains, has little time left. As Frankie sorts clues, she'll need to keep perspective -- or she'll swiftly become a psychopath's latest quarry."

~~back cover

I thought I would like this book more. It has lots of elements I like: university life, being a graduate student, being a graduate geology student (which in many ways is like being an archaeology graduate student), field work, a mystery, etc. Unfortunately, the plot revolves around a psychopath and trying to figure out what he will do next. And why. Not my cup of tea.


The book is very well written. The plot is clever and excellent for its genre. The characters are believable and interesting. Frankie, our hero, is not a lovely woman thrown into harm's way, who doesn't quite know what to do about it except plunge ahead into very predictable danger. She's a competent, self-assured young woman who is independent and quite used to solving problems and taking care of herself.

I wish I could give this book more stars. It deserves more stars. It's just that I'm not a fan of the psychopathic murder genre. If you are, you'll probably love this book.