Hello everyone. Welcome back to Bibliophilia Book Reviews. As a preview to this monthly wrap up, I would like to say thank you to Kindlepreneur for adding Bibliophilia Book Reviews to their table of top-notch book review blogs to reach out to. Their ultimate list of the best book review blogs can be found here, and I recommend anyone that is interested to check it out. There are so many of us wanting to read good books.
In this post, I will be doing a wrap up of all the books I read in October. This month I read five books again, and unfortunately none of them were books from any of the series I am currently reading even though I am still trying to catch up on them. There are just so many books I want to read, and so little time. But, I guess, that is the bane of every book lover.
Here are my thoughts on all the books I read this month:
1. BOOK CLUB BOOK: Green Rider by Kristen Britain
This book is the first book of the Green Rider series by Kristen Britain, and I really liked it. I had been wanting to read this book for a while now actually (the book was first published in 1998) but it wasn’t until I had to read it for one of my book clubs that I finally picked it up. And I wasn’t disappointed. There are a few things I need to say about it before I start singing its praises though. A full review for this book will be coming soon.
2. START A SERIES: When Christ And His Saints Slept by Sharon Kay Penman
This book is the first book of both the Plantagenets series and the Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine trilogy written by Sharon Kay Penmen. Serendipitously, I visited Paris when I was reading this series for the first time in 2015 and I was able to see several of the places referred to here, and that gave me an entirely different reading experience. It is needless to say then that I really enjoyed all five books of the series. This time around, I decided to pick them up again after reading The Plantagenets (read my review here) and The War of the Roses (read my review here) by Dan Jones a couple of months ago. And though my experience reading this book was completely different this second time, I still enjoyed it very much. It did take me over a month to finish it though. Just like any of Sharon Kay Penman’s books, When Christ And His Saints Slept is dense. This is the story of Empress Maud, the daughter of Henry I, who claimed the English throne after her father’s death in 1135. Her cousin Stephen of Blois, reluctant to see a woman in such a position of power, usurped the throne from her with the help of his brother Henry, the bishop of Winchester, and other disloyal barons. The civil war that ensued, also known as The Anarchy, lasted from 1138 to 1153 until Henry FitzEmpress, Empress Maud’s son by Geoffrey Plantagenet (hence the name of the dynasty), Count of Anjou, later to become Henry II, became king of England in 1154.
3. CLASSIC: Dracula by Bram Stoker
I am not a huge fan of horror. In fact, I hardly ever pick up a book of this genre. This book however was the pick of the month for one of my book clubs, and my husband was genuinely surprised I was reading it (he’s a major fan of H.P. Lovecraft and has been trying to get me to like the genre since we got together) and I have to admit that I liked this book a lot more than I had anticipated. I did not know that this book was an epistolary novel and that was a pleasant surprise, but what I liked the most about it was Bram Stoker’s writing. It is so rich in detail and vivid that you can’t help but experience all the horrors he is relating and you become immersed, quite literally, in the story that you cannot put it down. I do have a few negatives though. First, we hardly ever see Dracula and never get to be inside his head. Second, Van Helsing is completely different than the Hollywood version, though this is not in detriment to the book; I was just struck at just how utterly different they are, and third, the ending was too sudden and unimpressive. I admit I expected more. Nonetheless, I still really liked the book.
4. SPANISH: La Amortajada by María Luisa Bombal
The title of this book can be translated as The Shrouded Woman, and this is the second time I read this book. It is actually a novella (my edition consisted of 110 pages) and it is a book that made a significant impact at the time of its publication (1938). The book is the story of Ana María as she reminisces on her life the evening of her wake when she sees (because she can see) who has come to sit next to her coffin and pay their respects to the recently deceased woman. This way Ana María reminisces about her relationships with Ricardo, her first love, with her father and the death of her mother years before, with Fernando, the man who loves her but whom she does not love and yet cannot cut loose, with her daughter in-law, María Griselda, the most beautiful of women, and finally, Antonio, her husband, who loved her deeply early in their relationship but who cheated on her with countless women by the end. Ana María sees all of these people stand vigil next to her coffin, and it is through this remembering of life that the dead woman will learn to let go and accept death. The tranquility and silence of death. The death of the dead. I really liked this book and will read it again in the future.
5. NONFICTION: When Women Ruled The World by Kara Cooney
This book is an account of six female pharaohs who ruled Egypt at times of great need. It includes the reigns of famous queens such as Hatshepsut, Nefertiti, and Cleopatra. It is well-written and accessible to the general reader. I really liked this despite the fact that I finished the book wanting more and felt as if each chapter was only an introduction to the lives of each one of these queens. The book did make me want to read more about them, and I think that is the purpose of a good book.
That is everything for this month. Thank you for reading.
