Ahira's Hangar

I just read a classic YA novel I had never read before ~ The House of Dies Drear by Margaret Hamilton. An African American boy and his family move from the mountains of North Carolina to rural Ohio, so that they can live in a house which was a famous stop on the Underground Railroad and which is reputedly haunted. The boy's father is a history professor, and just got a job at the little local college in Ohio. It was an interesting story, and the little boy's reaction to the North in a time when the South was still integrated was very moving. He was so surprised and happy to see people of both races living next to each other and eating in the same restaurants and worshipping in the same churches.

You can forget how close in time the horror of integration used to occur - so much has changed in just my lifetime. It does give one hope for humanity.

Some fairly recent general reads:


Lady of Quality by Georgette Heyer is a Regency romance set in the city of Bath, England. A beautiful and very wealthy single woman named Annis Wychwood only wants to be as independent as restrictive Regency society will allow her to be. When she becomes entangled in the life of a young run away heiress, she finds Lucilla's guardian to be the most dangerous of men - someone who does not bore her to tears. Another charmer from Heyer!

Sprig Muslin by Georgette Heyer is a Regency romance novel set in the English countryside. Sir Gareth Ludlow finds a dashing young girl who has run away from home, while he is on his way to propose marriage to a well born woman who has been his friend for many years. He feels that he must take the girl under his wing in order to keep her safe from the many dangers a young girl would face out on her own, but huge complications set in when he must bring her along to the house of his intended and her family. This book was very witty and a lot of fun.

The Geographer's Library by Jon Fasman is a novel of intrigue and suspense. A young reporter for a weekly paper in a small Connecticut town is assigned to write the obituary of a local professor who has mysteriously died. The more Paul digs, the more oddness he finds - and the more connections to eastern Europe, Russia, international conspiracies, and ancient treasures. A little low on action for a novel of its sort, and I could never really suspend my disbelief.

Bitsy's Bait and Barbecue by Pamela Morsi was a charming novel set in the Ozarks of Missouri. Katy Dodson uses the divorce settlement she receives from her spoiled and immature wealthy ex-husband to buy a B&B on eBay, thinking that the rural atmosphere and small town will be a wholesome place to raise her little son. Her sister Emma comes along to get Katy and little Josh settled in. The sisters are shocked when they learn that, in this case, B&B stands for Bait & BBQ rather than Bed & Breakfast. Katy decides to make a go of it, and an interesting summer with all sorts of additional surprises awaits the sisters.

A Charmed Death by Madelyn Alt is the second book in her Bewitching Mystery series. Maggie O'Neill works in a gift shop in a charming small town in Indiana. She is one of the last people to see a customer before the teen aged girl is found dead. Maggie feels that the girl was murdered and is determined to find out who killed her and why.

Pressfield's Gates of Fire - the wife says that I will like it.

Just picked up Tolkien's The Children of Hurin. Haven't read much more than the dust jacket thus far but once I crack open the cover.....look out!

Have finished up that little mystery book. Will be reading Children of Hurin very soon.

A couple of recent general reads:

Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston is a classic of feminism and African American literature. I found it to be a very difficult read for many reasons - among them the heavy vernacular the book is written in (as cited in my last post), another being the disturbing racism and sexism in the book's content (one example being a group of men of color discussing how great it would be to beat up light skinned women because the bruises would show up better!). Just sheer stubbornness kept me going until the end...

Sweet and Deadly by Charlaine Harris is her original novel, recently republished. Catherine Linton has returned to her tiny hometown in rural Mississippi to wait for the murderer of her parents to strike again. She is going to find the killer and bring that person to justice. She figures that she is on the right track when one of her father's employees is found murdered...but what if the killer gets her first? A bit dated (the newspaper where Catherine works still uses typewriters) but still a very engrossing story!

The Spy Wore Silk by Andrea Pickens was an impulse buy. I loved the premise, where orphaned girl London street urchins in the Napoleanic War period, are brought to a special boarding school by a noble born British spy master. There the girls are raised safely and well, and given the skills of noble born ladies, assassins, courtesans, and spies. These young ladies are Britian's greatest secret weapon in the wars against Napolean. In this novel, projected first of a series of historical romances, Siena must find a highly placed and wealthy traitor who is thought to belong to a group of wealthy book collectors. The prime suspect is a very sexy Lord. Will her duty towards England beat out her love for Lord Kirtland? Well written and fun romance novel, and a great premise.

Angels and Demons by Dan Brown is another of his thrillers about an ancient conspiracy theory. Lightning paced, it keeps you glued to the page, even while keeping your eyes off the wildly implausible plot and improbable characters. Pure popcorn beach read with no real literary value, but still fast paced and engrossing.

Tall, Dark, and Hungry by Lynsay Sands is one of her fantasy romances about the Argeneau vampire family. These books are the literary equivalent of a chick flick. They are fast paced and fun. This one featured a romance that begins between the best man and maid of honor at an NYC wedding. The girl is a human and the guy is a very sexy vampire. The girl has already been through a lot in her life, and she is not sure she can go through more. While I enjoyed the story, the book was unfortunately marred by some pretty serious editing errors. And they have to be serious for me to notice them (I freely admit I am a poor typist, speller, and editor)! While there were no obvious spelling errors, a lot of words were substituted for words that would have made a lot more sense (such as though for thou). And at one point, the names of two of the characters are mixed up!

Ugh. Don't even get me started on crappy editing, one of my pet peeves about a lot of books that seem to sneak into print these days.

Tigers Essential by George Cantor is a book about the Detroit Tigers baseball team, through the decades, and especially in he year 2006 where they came from nowhere to win the American League Pennant. Lots of good historical trivia for fans of the team.

I am reading one of my birthday books. Murder in Astor Place by Victoria Thompson is set in NYC in about the year 1900. Sarah is a doctor's widow and a midwife who lives in Greenwich Village. After a routine delivery, she discovers that a young pregnant girl living in the same rooming house as the mother whose baby she safely delivered has been murdered. Sarah discovers the girl is a scion of one of the wealthiest and most aristocratic families of New York. That family, afraid of scandal, forbids an investigation. But Sarah, and the police detective who originally responded to the call, Frank Malloy, are not willing to let the murder of a young girl and her unborn baby go...

I Heard the Owl Call my Name by Margaret Craven. I'm reading Palladin of Souls at the same time.

So I finished I Heard the Owl Call my Name, right before Christmas. As a a point of comparison, around 1973 there was a made for TV movie based on this book, starring Dean Jaggers and Tom Courtney. The TV movie is extremely moving and very well done; however it differs significantly from the book. IIRC, the TV movie had as it's major plot line a conflict between the young Anglican priest sent to this remote village and the village's Native inhabitants; regarding, how the priest believed the Natives needed to give up their ways and traditions to live in a modern world (in the movie the priest says "The village is dying").

The above conflict does not really exist in the written text. In the original text the dominant conflict is humankind (the young priest, the Natives, the loggers, etc.) versus nature.

IMO, the original text is flawed, there are many places Ms. Craven is telling us something and not showing; therefore, some the exposition is a little tedious to slog through.

Historical fiction by Georgette Heyer - the novelization of the diary of an officer who served under Wellington in Potugal and Spain and who fought at Waterloo. It is called The Spanish Bride and tells how the young officer impulsively marries a pretty young teenaged tomboy he meets while on campaign. The girl rides right along with her husband and the British army all during the Penninsular Campaign. It has a romancy sort of book cover, but it is much more hard core historical fiction than an historical romance. The details of the battles and marches are amazing (in a good way).

Luncheon of the Boating Party by Susan Vreeland, one of my favorite historical fiction writers. It is about how the masterpiece of Renoir came to be and tells the story not only using the great French artist as a POV character, but also uses the POV's of several of his models for the painting.