Books 5 and 6 from my 20 Books of Summer

Two books featuring troubled young women from my 20 Books of Summer:

The Fifth of March by Ann Rinaldi (1993)

Rachel Marsh is an indentured servant to John and Abigail Adams, minding their children and becoming involved in the events leading up to and following the Boston Massacre on the Fifth of March in 1770.

False Colours by Georgette Heyer

Kit Fancot is a rising young diplomat, stationed in Vienna, when he senses something is wrong with his identical twin brother back in London. It’s 1817 so he can’t call or text – he uses the recent death of his godfather as an excuse to make the long journey home. 

The Last Apple Tree by Claudia Mills

Description: Moving to a new state, a new school, and into a house with family she barely knows is challenging for twelve-year-old Sonnet, especially when she begins to worry about Gramps’ memory issues, in this absorbing story by veteran author Claudia Mills.  Sonnet, her little sister Villie, and their mother moved to Indiana from Colorado recently to live with her grandfather after his wife died. 

The Holiday Swap by Maggie Knox (Review for Virtual Advent Tour)

Title: The Holiday Swap
Author: Maggie Knox
Publication: Putnam, hardcover, 2021
Genre: Contemporary romance

Sprite Writes invited me to share a tradition as part of her 2022 Virtual Advent Tour and one I always enjoy is reading some holiday-themed books as Christmas approaches. Last year I read The Matzah Ball by Jean Meltzer, about a romance writer of Christmas stories who is actually Jewish and is asked to come up with a Hanukah novel. This year, I thought I would review a light-hearted impersonation story.

"New" D.E. Stevensons from Furrowed Middlebrow

Scott at Furrowed Middlebrow published eleven “new” D. E. Stevenson books this month, some of which I had read from the library but a few I had never read at all, including the two below, which is very exciting. Each of these reprints includes an autobiographical essay from 1950 by Stevenson, originally created as promotional material for her novel Music in the Hills (which was also reprinted recently and is one of my favorites).

The Musgraves (1960)

The Musgraves are another DES family consisting of an attractive widow and three daughters, who have enough money for a servant or two but still need to be careful of expenses.

Six Degrees of Separation: From Stasiland to The Parent Trap

The award-winning Stasiland: Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall by Anna Funder is this month’s starting point for Six Degrees of Separation, which is organized by Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best.   The idea is to start with the same title, add six books, and see where you wind up. Kate's blog has links to other chains.

Stasiland is nonfiction by an Australian author which sounds interesting but the libraries that own copies locally are closed so it will have to wait.  I see the book is taught in the history department of Dean College which is part of my library network.

Stillwater (Book Review & Giveaway)

Title: Stillwater
Author: Nicole Helget

Publication Information: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, hardcover, 2014, ISBN 0547898207

Genre: Historical Fiction      

Setting: 19th century Minnesota

Plot: Clement and Angel are twins left at a small orphanage in the frontier town of Stillwater, Minnesota.   Angel, adopted by a wealthy local couple, is the victim of Munchausen by proxy syndrome, while her brother, Clement, left cruelly behind at the orphanage, is cared for by the headmistress nun and an elderly Indian, Big Waters.  Stillwater Home for Orphans is also an important stop on the Underground Railroad, and even as a child Clement becomes involved in the transport of this precious commodity – human lives.   Davis, the son of one unfortunate runaway slave, is taken in by the kindhearted women in Stillwater’s brothel, The Red Swan (their antics provide some humorous relief to the dark depiction of frontier life).  As the three children grow up, their lives remain connected although Angel’s marriage causes heartbreak to Davis, causing him to enlist with Clement in the Stillwater Guard of the First Minnesota (shades of Emily Webster’s grandfather!).  Depiction of life in the Union Army makes even the turmoil of Stillwater seem like a picnic.

Anne Belinda by Patricia Wentworth (book review)

In 1917, John Waveney, recently released from the hospital and headed back to the trenches in France, goes to visit the part of England his ancestors came from. He encounters a girl of 15, and when she learns he is all alone in the world, she tells him she would be sorry if anything happened to him.

Somehow John survives the war, and some years later he learns he has inherited the ancestral home. Wondering about the girl he met long ago, he learns she is a cousin but is mysteriously missing: no one will mention her name and he is warned not to discuss her. Even her own twin sister refuses to do anything but sob when Anne Belinda is discussed. John feels a strange sense of loyalty to the one person who sent him off to war with a kind word, and he becomes determined to find out what kind of trouble she is in and find a way to assist her. Of course, once he meets her he falls in love with her courage and the humor she is nearly always able to maintain, despite great trials. Not the least part of Anne’s appeal is her determination not to be rescued.