What Next???

I'm almost finished reading These Is My Words and I will be posting my review soon to add to my literary tour. Funny thing, thinking about that title always makes me sing Natasha Bettingfield in my head which is odd becuase I kind of don't like her. Anyway, I love the book but I'm having trouble deciding what to read next. So I thought I would just put it out there. After this one, I will have read two romances in like two weeks and I think I need to mix it up a little bit. Not to mention that I think my husband would enjoy me reading something less sappy for once. So here is what I'm thinking......

Into Thin Air by John Krakauer. This will make our next stop on the literary tour mount Everest. Should be thrilling, exciting and maybe a little dangerous! But most likely a little bit sad as well.

The Kite Runner by, Khaled Hosseini. By reading this one, we will make a stop in Afghanistan. We will experience friendship, war, fallen monarchies, being a refugee and kite flying (?). I'm very interested in reading this one and then maybe I'll see the movie adaptation.

The Patriots by, James Wesley Rawles. I don't know a lot about this book. It's about survivalist during an economic meltdown in the United States. This journey will take us from the midwest to Idaho and maybe a few places in between.

I'm really excited to read all of these books so I just can't decide and I'll be done with the other one really soon. So let me know what you all think. I'll post a poll on my side bar. First time I've ever done that.....

Picnic in the Park Tuesdays

Moving is a great excuse to start new traditions as a family. One of my favorites that we started as soon as we moved here is 'Picnic in the Park Tuesdays'. This is a tradition that was born out of the fact that my father in law works in the cannery every other tuesday so he can't be home for dinner. The plan is simple and fun. We find a park somewhere around Sandy (there are a million of them), take a picnic dinner and let the kids get their wiggles out. It's been really nice of the last few weeks when it's been too hot to go to the park during the day. When we get there are dinner time, everything is just starting to cool down to a pleasant temp. We've hit parks close to home, we went to a park that Carson would frequent when growing up and we even headed 'up the canyon' one week and made a fire to roast marshmallows for dinner. It has been a great way to come closer as a family and fun way to get to know our new home. It's also made dinner planning easier because it's super easy to plan a picnic meal!

These are pictures from Bywater Park near where Carson grew up.

Not only do the kids always have a great time, but we always end up with bonus performances by the kids. If there is any sort of hill at the park, it's usually the songs form Beauty and the Beast. So funny!

A Literary Tour-Beauford, North Carolina*

After I finally got my library card, I decided to take advantage of it and request a bunch of books at the library. The only problem, my literary knowledge doesn't go much further than Twilight, Harry Potter and Anita Stansfield LDS romance novels. Not much of a selection there, plus I've read most of those multiple times. So I went to facebook, asked for suggestions and got some great ones. I pretty much requested them all and ended up really far down on the waiting lists for almost all of them. So I wasn't expecting the text from the library on Monday night saying that there were six (6!) books waiting for me. They were A Walk to Remember, The Red Tent, The Secret Life of Bees, Into Thin Air, Water For Elephants, and These Is My Words. Hello! So that night I began my quest to become a little more familiar with something other than vampires, wizards and Australians.

Book #1 A Walk to Remember by, Nicholas Sparks

I had my reasons for choosing this book. First, every girl needs a little romance, right? Second, I love the movie! It's not the most masterful of cinematic works, but it's clean, realistic to a certain extent, and I think Shane West is super cute (plus I've always held a secret admiration for Many Moore...she's like the homely, four eyed, embarrassing step sister that nobody talks about when it comes to the Disney teen queens of the late 90's. She really made you root for her but you just couldn't admit it because she wasn't Brittany.) Anyway, I wanted to see how the book would measure up to a movie that I really like and always makes me cry......here goes.

I liked the book only okay. I felt that Nicholas Sparks kind of let the reader down with the amount of character development. In the movie you have a really clear understanding of why Landon Carter is such a rebel and while that it alluded to in the novel, the only thing he ever did wrong was loiter at the cemetery after hours. Really? It would have been better had he been portrayed as a greaser from the other side of the tracks, someone along the lines of John Milner or Fonzie. At least they got parking tickets and wore leather jackets. But no, Landon Carter just seemed like any other normal guy from 1958. Maybe not Ritchie Cunningham, but definitely Potsy Webber (I watched a lot of Nick a Nite growing up).

I was also disappointed with the quality of the writing. I know that is most people's complaint about Twilight, but Nicholas Sparks is supposed to be an accomplished writer and i would have expected more. In the first half of the book, he used the phrase 'If you know what I mean' (or some form of it) on every page and I'm not joking.

Then there was the climax which I think is the most important part of the story. If you haven't read it or seen the movie, I won't give a spoiler, just know that it's there. I feel that it happened way too late in the book and then there wasn't enough attention given to it. It was like BOOM! 20 pages later, the end.

However, there were some very good aspects of the book and I feel that i would be remiss if i left them out. I really do love the story, it has feel good moments and it will cause you to get a little emotional....but I cried more in the movie than the book. I love that it is clean in pretty much every aspect of the story and that is, of course, a huge plus. I also really loved the spiritual journey that all of the characters went on, but I would have loved more of that. It just falls into that whole climax thing that I was talking about before.

All in all, it was a quick easy read that did make me feel good when it was all said and done. I would recommend if you have nothing else to read or want something quick and easy.

*The book takes place in Beauford, North Carolina. Next up, Israel and Egypt for The Red Tent by Anita Diamant

** I will post about my future literary stops as soon as the book is finished and I've reconciled all of my feelings about it.

Post Edit-I'm canceling the trip to Israel and Egypt in favor of Arizona and These Is My Words by, Nancy E. Turner. For anyone who has read The Red Tent, I tried really hard to think it was a good book, but I ended up feeling conflicted by the subject matter so I stopped about 30 pages in. If you haven't read it, let me know if you want a more detailed description as to why I stopped reading it.