When The Lights Go Out

When The Lights Go Out is a mystery book written by Mary Kubica. Only she turns the R around in her first name like Toys R Us. The story is about a young woman named Jessica who is nearing the end of high school when her mother, Eden, discloses that her breast cancer has returned and she is now terminally ill. Jessica gets insomnia; really severe insomnia. She goes for a week without sleeping. This part of the story is told slowly and in great detail. I think there was too much of the insomnia symptoms. Also, Jessica goes to apply to college and is told her social security number lists her as deceased. She has no birth certificate. Jessica suspects her mother of stealing her as a child. The ending was ridiculous. Loose strings all over the place. 

 

 

Happy Equinox

 

Baking Cakes In Kilgali

Rwanda is a country that has many issues. Killing gorillas for bush meat, civil war between the Hutu and the Tutsis, HIV infections, female genital mutilation, and poverty. I learned much in reading the book Baking Cakes In Kilgali. In this story we learn what life is like through the eyes of Angel. Angel lives with her well educated husband who is a professor at the local university. The couple lives with their five grandchildren. Their son died of AIDS and their daughter, HIV positive, died of suicide. Now Angel makes money baking cakes for special occasions. She is like an artist with her cakes. Angel uses vast quantities of food coloring. She is big on being professional. She had a cake order form printed up using four local languages. She interviews each client looking for ideas that will give her inspiration. Her conversations with her clients remain private. Over the years she has learned how much to charge for the cakes so she can still make a profit. She thought about declining to make a cake celebrating female genital mutilation. In the end she makes the cake but is fearful to go to the celebration. This author used an amazing plot twist to make a good outcome on that day. I was amazed. While she is doing all that plus being a wife and a mother, Angel finds time to help her neighbors. She encourages a lonely diplomat's wife to teach literacy to some people in the neighborhood. She sponsors a wedding for the single mother/owner of local food mart down the street. She gives a talk at a local high school about her business and how to be an entrepreneur. She helps a young girl who is raising her siblings how to get out of prostitution and make money tailoring clothes. I loved reading about Angel and all her successes.

 

 

Pigs In Heaven

  I finally read Barbara Kingsolver's sequel to The Bean Trees called Pigs In Heaven. In The Bean Trees, Taylor Greer is driving to Tuscon from the east coast. As she stops for a break in a small town in Oklahoma, a woman hands her a 4 year old girl saying her mother is dead and her father is abusing her. So Taylor takes the girl and later adopts her. The girl is very clingy so she gets the name Turtle (because snapping turtles won't let go of a stick). She raises Turtle in Tuscon and gradually she recovers from her horrid past and begins to talk and to grow. Later Turtle and Taylor help a young guy and get national recognition for saving his life. People from the Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma can plainly see that Turtle is one of their clan. They take steps to reclaim Turtle. This panics Taylor into moving out of their  home and going on the run. Invoking the parable of King Solomon where two mothers are fighting over the same child and Solomon gives the child to the mother who does not agree it should be cut in half, Taylor and the Cherokee Nation work out their differences. This is an epic tale based on a grouping of true stories of children being taken from the Cherokee Nation and raised with Caucasians. 

 

 

History Day

This evening I volunteered to be a judge of history day projects for the southeast region of Minnesota. We met in the student ballroom at Winona State University. Winners get to go to the state history day on April 19th in Minneapolis. I was paired with another judge who has done this before.

First we read their paper. Then we looked over their board. Then we had a list of questions to ask. Our favorite project was this first one on the great flood on 1927. These were all middle school children participating today.

This one was on Rosie the Riveter. Most kids did a better job on the poster than following a theme, laying out a hypothesis, or getting enough research.

This guy even made a mock diorama in a pan with mud and boards and tiny soldiers.

The project on Somalia used only 3 sources.

White Rose was a group of young people living in Germany who resisted the Nazi's. They started out with three people but eventually the group swelled to 80 people. The three original members were killed by the Nazi's.

 

Doorman Wanted

Glenn R. Miller is an author living in Minneapolis. He published Doorman Wanted in 2024. This is a humorous story about a guy named Henry who tries to distance himself from his rich father. His father is rich because he is ruthless in business. Henry's father works in New York so Henry decides he will move to California and help people who are less fortunate than him. When his father dies Henry inherits a ten story apartment building. When he goes to the building to pick up the keys he is not ready to face the fact that he owns the building. He sees a sign on the window about a job opening for a door man so he applies. Henry gets the job as doorman during the day shift. He receives packages for others. He arranges entrance for catering companies when his tenants have parties. The building has a manager but she is quite useless. The evening doorman will do anything to avoid the manager because she is so rude to him. Henry tries to help all the building tenants. He even helps some homeless people who live in Central Park. The story moves along quickly and is very funny. 

 

 

In The Midst Of Winter

 I enjoy reading Isabel Allende's writing. This time I read In The Midst Of Winter which was published in 2015. After a fender bender car accident in New York City, the lives of three immigrants are linked forever. Robert is the one who hit the other car. He is from Brazil and is teaching at a local university. The person driving the car that was struck is Evelyn Ortega, a young undocumented immigrant from Guatemala. Robert gives Evelyn his card with his home address. Later that evening she arrives at his house upset. She stutters and English is not her first language, so he calls the woman who lives in the basement, Lucia, to come up and help him decipher what Evelyn is trying to say. Lucia is a lecturer at his university and she is from Chile. Robert and Lucia decide to help Evelyn with her problem. Along with solving the problem in New York, we learn about their lives growing up in Guatemala, Chile and Brazil. We learn why they immigrated. The story is simply mesmerizing.