Ohio Books

"Waiting for the World to End" by Nicole Hunter was a joy to read; one of those books that you can't put down once you've started it. I've never been to Ohio, but I felt like I was visiting as the story of teacher/basketball coach Tom Olsen, who is haunted by his past, unfolds. It reiterates that no matter how ideal a person's life may seem, they may be suffering from secrets they harbor. Several real-life issues bubble up that make the reader think while reading the novel, and long after the last page has been read. I think it's a home-run for a first-time novelist, and I look forward to reading more books from the talented Nicole Hunter.

As the Executive Director of the Mom's Choice Awards, many fine works of literature pass through my office on a daily basis. But, because I'm an administrator, and not a member of the jury, I rarely have an opportunity to read the books that are submitted for consideration.

I recently took a rare day-of-rejuvenation, and grabbed Waiting For The World To End from my "been meaning-to-read" pile and headed out to my deck to enjoy a perfect early-summer morning. Although I did struggle a bit with guilt-anxiety for taking the day off, by the second chapter I was completely committed to the book, and didn't think about work for the rest of the day. I finished Waiting in one seating. It's a thoroughly enjoyable read with a complex storyline and rich character development. I just kept thinking, "why isn't Nicole Hunter on the New York Times best-seller list?" Ms. Hunter is an extremely gifted writer.

When reading this book, I was reminded of when I first discovered John Grisham in 1989 with his debut novel, A Time To Kill. I couldn't understand why he wasn't better known. At the time, he was selling his debut novel out of the trunk of his car. Imagine it. Two years later, the world discovered The Firm and the rest is, of course, literary history.

Those who discover Nicole Hunter and Waiting For The World To End will have uncovered a great secret treasure for themselves. A perfect book for the classroom and reading groups, Waiting For The World To End will provoke readers of all ages to consider and clarify personal beliefs, and encourage them to keep their minds and hearts open to people who have made other choices or hold different opinions.

As I read the last page and closed the book cover, I felt a great sense of pride that our program honors such strong and important work.

Dawn Matheson
Executive Director
Mom's Choice Awards

Footnote: Nicole Hunter and Waiting For The World To End earned the prestigious gold medallion for adult fiction in the 2007 Mom's Choice Awards.

The Mom's Choice Awards® honors excellence in family-friendly media, products and services. An esteemed panel of judges includes education, media and other experts as well as parents, children, librarians, performing artists, producers, medical and business professionals, authors, scientists and others. A sampling of the panel members includes: Dr. Twila C. Liggett, Ten-time Emmy-winner, professor and founder of Reading Rainbow; Julie Aigner-Clark, Creator of Baby Einstein and The Safe Side Project; Jodee Blanco, New York Times Best-Selling Author; LeAnn Thieman, Motivational speaker and coauthor of seven Chicken Soup For The Soul books; Florrie Binford-Kichler, Founder of Patria Press, Inc.- an award-winning independent publisher and Member of The Children's Book Council; Tara Paterson, Certified Parent Coach, and founder of The Just For Mom Foundation(tm) and the Mom's Choice Awards®. Parents and educators look for the Mom's Choice Awards® seal in selecting quality materials and products for children and families. This book has been honored by this distinguished award.

The prose is fluid and beautiful. The characters are like people you may know. These are life stories, told across time and place, successfully drawing you in to consider various perspectives and possibilities. Like a prism, the book reveals many colors; no situation is black and white.

This is adult and young-adult fiction at its best. Finally, a book that invites discussion across the generations on real-life topics including moral dilemmas. The "open" ending is a reflection of the overarching theme: people write their own life stories.

I loved every second I got to spend with Tom and Mary, the main characters in Waiting for the World to End. Maybe it was because I could relate to both of them so much, maybe it was simply due to the writing. (It certainly didn't hurt that both Mary Oliver's poetry and Margaret Atwood's fiction showed up in the book.)

This book is for those of us with regrets, for those of us who understand the sadness of living with our own choices and the lonliness of not being connected to anything of real personal value, and for those of us who feel as though we've missed out on the important things in life.

I purchased the book because i really admire Richard Nourth Petterson for his book THE EXILE , though , reviewing Silent Witness has it's difficulties.

Of course , As in the former Petterson's book that i've read , toward the end I felt very intrested in whats about to happen , But im sorry to say that the book , in its complex didnt thrill me much , until the last 100 pages more or less.

The Exile is very different from this 1 , within every page I read ,I was consumed with suprise and shock so much I couldnt get my hands of the book so I must say im pretty dissapointed for this one .

to summon it in few lines

great ending chapters.
full of information about the characters and emotions but lack of suprises and didnt really thrill me as a reader.

This was my first Richard North Patterson book. I really liked it. Easy to read and easy to follow. I had trouble putting it down.

I can see that this author could become a favorite, depending on whether the errors of this book are common with him.

Beautifully written with great characterization, the first error of this book was a who-dunnit so obvious it couldn't possibly be true. Alas, it was. Laden with romance and a more realistic view of true love that just wasn't enough than I have seen in a long time. I found this well-done presenation very appealing. Treating a certain intimate act as enough of an anomaly to be a clue, however, had me wondering when the book was written. Ah, yes, even now enough of a no-no to effectively capture the readers' interest, it is perhaps easy to forget that what so many men fantasize about is likely what any rapist might do. Not trite, but ... more effective as an attention-getter than as a realistic clue.

Silent Witness is the first book I've read from Richard North Patterson. When I finished, I was left to wonder why I hadn't yet picked up any of his previous works. This book was fantastic. Patterson grabs the reader in the first few minutes and keeps him completely captivated throughout this legal thriller. I particularly liked the way he made effective use of movement back and forth in time to tell his story. Patterson pulls the story forward with strong character development, providing a range of emotions and motivations that spans the character set. Start to finish, this is a great story. Now, I'm off to tackle some more from Patterson that I have been missing.

This is one of those books you can't put down, and hate to see it end. I liked it so much, I bought one as a gift for my daughter. I read many novels. This one was in my top 10 of all time.

This book is a real-life account of growing up in a large family with limited financial means and often rocky family dynamics. The matriarch of this clan is the prizewinner of the title. While raising 10 kids and keeping the wolf from the door, she hits upon a way to generate income by entering any/every contest that comes along. She frequently does win, of course, very often in the nick of time. The book was written by a daughter, who ably recounts the challenges and rewards of growing up in a family that lives so close to the edge. Her mother is a gritty, funny, honest-to-god domestic goddess. She is a prize-winner in so many ways--it makes this book uplifting without being sappy--good read.

I saw the movie based on the book first. Once I found out it was a book, I had to read it. I couldn't put it down.

I thought this was a wonderful book that came to my attention only after the author had died. The story revolves around a family of 10 kids, an alcoholic father and how the mother (sporadically) supports them by winning contests and jingles she (Evelyn) has written.

While the story wouldn't hold up in this century - I thought it was a great slice of life of the 50's. Evelyn's journals and contest entrys are well preserved and entertaining to read. She must have kept everything!

Underneath all the entrys and journals is a smart woman. She knows the power of the written word and also hooks up with a group a ladies that also enter such contests. These women are smart as whips - yet somewhat stymied by their roles in life - housewives. Contesting offers them a way to challenge their wits and writing.

The father is a somewhat disappointing character - but somehow he even redeems himself, but you have to read the book to find out how!

I first heard of this book on the Today Show. Then I happened to run across the movie on HBO. It is a good quick read.

I typically enjoy fiction, but the title of this book caught my attention. And soon after starting the book, Evelyn Ryan became one of my heroes! I won't offer any spoilers, but the book generated within me, and many others who have read it, genuine feelings for Evelyn, including respect, compassion, sympathy, and encouragement. If the measure of a good story is the ability to arouse that many emotions, then this is a really good story!

Ok, bad - I wasn't really ever into the Vampire Erotica. Thankfully it only seemed to crop up once per novel a bit like it was the "obligatory erotica". Of course, that's the genre the book is supposed to be in so it's not like I wasn't warned or had the opportunity to not read it - nothing I consider offensive just not my thing. The good part of that aspect was, it seemed fairly well done and not excessive.

The good - there was quite a bit of it mostly in the stories. Some items were a bit abbreviated but it wasn't really until around the 5th book of the series that I began to catch on to the overall story line of this series. No, not dense, it's just that in the earlier books much of the story had the feel of "fire and forget"...complete stories that had a feeling of being done. I'd call it a lack of cliffhanger endings - again, however, the stories felt like they hadn't been condensed at the end nor were dozens of pages left on the editing room floor because it was too long. Call it "just right".

A few elements didn't fit well but seemed to be things that had to happen to get the main protagonist where she needed to be for the next book in the series. I'd label one of those as the death of her Vampire Boyfriend. It could be I was just disappointed because it seemed like a relationship that was intended to last, but it clearly made her available for what happened in the new few hundred pages (including in succeeding books).

The story line had potential to be exciting, and the book started off with action. Unfortunately the author developed the lead character, Rachel Morgan, into a sex starved witch who evaluated each male (elf, werewolf, vampire, even demon) she encountered from a sexual standpoint. It was really annoying when it became so pervasive, maybe she was writing to other women.

Additionally, the author allowed the lead character to squeak out of mistakes through luck instead of clever intelligence. And the constant whining by the lead character of negative events that were affecting her also annoyed me. I wanted the lead character to take charge and develop into a strong person, and kept listening to the book because of tantalizing moments of action in which the heroin succeeded in overcoming the challenge of the moment.

Still frustrating waiting for those moments, and having to listen to the constant whining and sexual evaluations of the males in the book.

I love the concept behind this series but, it seems to me that Rachel just gets dumber by the minute. How many deals can one person make with demons. It seems that she never thinks about the consequences of her actions. She only deals with the aftermath of what she has done after the fact.

I am not even going to comment on the "Ivy" factor. I feel bad for her and I don't think that Rachel takes into account her feelings or how the way she flaunts her "male" relationships in front of her affects her.

I do hope that as the series continues she finally gets a clue!

I am currently on the 5th book in the series (I am hooked), but this has been my favorite so far. I love the characters! I felt like I got a little closer to them when I read this one.

This series is a wonderful surprise. I read this in one gulp of fresh air - it's humorous, very real and the characters are so detailed that you actually feel that you know them in your real life!
So many reviews here compare it to Anita Blake, but I read the first few books in that series - and NOTHING compares to Rachel Morgan.
First off, Rachel Morgan is a much more complex individual, and Harrison creates a world of characters that you actually care for. In Anita Blake, I didn't feel any sympany for her or anything bad that happened to her . Moreover, the story is so stupidly plain and simple that leaves no room for imagination.
I also tried to read the Dresden files (read 2 books) - AWEFUL!!!!!!
The closest I could find to the style of writing and the intricate little things that happen all around in the book is the Sookie Stackhouse series which I also am thorouly enjoying right now. Can't wait for the next book in the Rachel Morgan series!!!

At first I resisted this book because it seemed to be written by an adult looking over his childhood from a very mature place. However, late in the book it is a revelatory experience to find that this is exactly what happened when an unfair accusation concerning Antwone at age 25 during his Navy experience 'caused' him to buy a dictionary, a thesorus and learn writing almost from scratch at this age. He soon found that he couldn't stop. Later he wrote this book that has become a best seller very deservedly. It is full of remarkable coincidences that could not be other than genuine because of hundreds of tiny clews that all add up to this person having been there. This is a profound work concerning human holistic Intelligence that Confirms Joseph Pierce's 'Magical Child Matures."

Wow..if you thought the movie was thought provoking..
the book is beyond that!
This book covers Antwone's childhood, where in the movie,
we only saw a taste of it.
This book tells the story of a little boy who beat the odds,
and used his innate ability to survive, extreme verbal, emotional
sexual and physical abuse.

Finding Fish, by Antwone Fisher, is a passionate and heart wrenching look into the life of the author as a ward of the state. Thankfully, he escapes the terrors of his childhood and eventually finds success. Fisher writes with a distinctive voice. He is able to convey the emotions of the young boy he portrays in the memoir, rather than telling the story through the voice of an adult. The memoir is an honest, and shocking, look into the world of an orphan without anyone to protect him. His father had been shot two months before his birth and his mom is in prison. Throughout his life with the Picketts,his foster parents, Antwone is forced through horrific events that are painful to read about. He is molested at a young age by a babysitter, beaten, mentally abused, and treated like a ghost. He becomes reserved and shy, lacking love and the comfort of a family. Even worse, his social workers are sadly oblivious to the abuse because the Picketts are able to transform into respectable and polite adults when in public. Remarkably, Antwone braves through his torturous childhood, as well as homelessness for a short time, and finds himself in the Navy. This becomes his miracle, and inspires him to do more with his life. He finds himself traveling around the world, educating himself about different cultures as well as teaching himself English with the help of a thesaurus. In comparison to his childhood, Antwone is in paradise. This transition from a hopeless child with no allies in the world to a strong, successful Navy officer illustrates a major theme in the memoir. No matter how horrible somebody's life is, with perseverance and hope it is possible to achieve anything. Although Antwone is thrown into a terrible life, he finds his own success and thankfully escapes his past and finds happiness. This book is an emotional rollercoaster and any reader will become attached to Antwone, rooting for him against the negativity in his life.

Finding Fish was a good book. I first learned of Antowne Fisher a few years ago when he appeared on the Montell Williams show. After hearing his story on the show I immediately wanted to go out and buy his book to find out more about this wonderful young man but could never find the book. A few years went by and then a movie of his life was made. After seeing the movie, which I thought was very good, I decided that the movie did a good job of telling his story and that I no longer wanted to purchase the book. Some years later I was in a book store looking for some books to purchase and came across Finding Fish on the book shelf. Since I was in a thrift book store I said what the heck and purchased this book along with some others. Well needless to say it was meant for me to read this book. The movie just touched on a small portion of his life and did nothing to give us a better understanding of Antwone's full story. The book went into more detail and was just phenomenal. I have such respect and admiration for Mr. Fisher and all that he endured. The saying is true: "All things happen for a reason" were it not for his horrific
childhood I don't think Antwone would be the man he is today. Kudows for Mr. Fisher!! If you have not read this book I recommend you do.

and taught me something. It taught me how much we all share--the need to belong, for family, to search, to question. This book is unexpected tender and this boy's journey impacted my own journey, my own questions of family, of accceptance.
~Carol D. O'Dell
Author, MOTHERING MOTHER
Kunati Publishing, April 2007

As a book I will have to rate the writing five stars. It was easy to follow along and kept my attention. As a true story, this has been the most sickening book I have ever read considering I have read many true crime books and do read many of Anne Rule's books as well. What a twisted father? This family takes the word dysfunctional to a new height.

Whoa is all you need to say once you've started to get into this book. The crimes perpetrated by the mother & father of this family are so disturbing! I found this book to be so easy to read & so gripping. It's sad that it's a true crime story, but it does make for a seriously wild ride! Mr. Cauffiel is a great storyteller. He does not insult the average reader, he understands that not everyone is an investigative journalist or policeman. He writes in a very comprehensible style that is not dumbing down at all.

I READ THIS BOOK ABOUT 2 YEARS AGO ANDI STILL REMEMBER IT. THE TITLE IS DEFINATELY HOW THIS STORY GOES! IT'S UNBELIEVABLE HOW ONE PERSON RULED OVER COMPLETELY ONE WHOLE FAMILY. I'LL NEVER FORGET THIS BOOK!!!

Here is another Cauffiel book that I recently re-read and am left wondering what ever happened to the children of the Sexton family, and little Dawn & Shasta, and how are they doing these days?

This story is highly disturbing yet I find myself re-reading it about once every year or so.

I would love to see a cable special with interviews from the family members and an update on how their lives have fared since everything happened. There is virtually NOTHING on the internet and, like Cauffiel's book on the Alan Canty case, unfortunately both cases happened before things like this were really-super-highly publicized. The Sexton case broke out in the 90's, but I don't remember it much....just...want...updates.....!

I still remember this book very well. Maybe because it is that I never read about a dysfunctional family like the Sextons. They are a large family. Both parents are involved in horrific acts of child abuse. The House of Secrets have children so terrified to misbehave and suffer the frightening and painful consequences. I think the crime of killing a family member who married into the family and became a father of a young son was bad enough. When his infant son was also murdered, it made me cringe with anger over such behavior. Family members are disposable but the author paints a very clear family portrait about their upbringings and backgrounds in West Virginia and their migration to Ohio to get work. It is clearly the family patriarch of these Sextons who rules with an iron fist and a dark hand to torture his children. His wife is no better. I don't blame their backgrounds because the Uncle is reasonable and consciousable regarding his brother's behavior. The Sexton parents are just horrible people who should have never had children. Now these children who are adults by now are completely damaged like war victims or concentration camp survivors. Nothing in life could further damage them anymore even a prison. This is one of the worst cases of child abuse that I have read about in recent history. Why it wasn't reported to the authorities, because the children were so terrified of the punishment later on including the rapes, the incest, the physical abuse, etc. that went on in that home. The house of secrets Sextons migrated to Florida where they were finally caught and brought to somewhat justice. I still remember reading about the young boy who married one of the Sexton girls who was supposedly already married in a sick way to her own father. He would be killed along with his son. I remember reading about them being buried properly in Ohio together. It was just a sad, horrific story of child abuse and a family that should have never been.

I loved the book and have read quite a few of this author's books. It is worth taking the time to read in my opinion.

I'd never heard of Joy Feilding when a friend lent me this book. It's the story of 4 women and how their friendships evolve over the course of their lives. Characters are well developed, the plot is fast paced, and the storyline is mostly delicious. While reading this book, I was reminded of the novels "Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons," and "Saving Graces." All enjoyable reads.

The plot of "Grand Avenue" took sometimes wacky, rather unbelievable turns, which is why I didn't give it 5 stars.

When I picked up this novel by Joy Fielding, I did not have high expectations based on the cover blurb. However, I soon found myself absorbed in this story of four women and how their lives intersected and diverged. The characters are well developed and quite distinct, even though they are friends. At the outset we are told that two will die, one by foul play. From the onset you are misled into thinking that Chris, an abused wife, will die at the hand of her abusing husband, Tony. But this is not to be. All in all, this novel is a good read. I think I'll try another one of Fielding's novels to see if this is an anomaly or is characteristic of her work.

If you like melodramatic, soap opera-ey books, do NOT pass this one up! It has everything - marriage, kids, sex, friendship, betrayal (on several layers), mother-daughter relationships. You name it.

This book is an absolute tour de force. I loved (and lived) every page. Can't rate it high enough.

This is the 2nd Joy Fielding book I've read (you must read Whispers and Lies too). I'm on the lookout for more. Both of the novels I've read by Joy Fielding have had my jaw dropping at certain points.

Fantastic.

This book was absolutely amazing! I literally stayed up a full night to finish it, once I started I could not turn the pages fast enough. I found myself chuckling in one instant and then having to read a paragraph again due to blurred vision from crying. I grew to really care about the characters, finding myself rooting them on and feeling the emotions that were smoothly drawn out in the book. I truely believe that Ms. Fielding has a total masterpiece with this one! Although the book is finished I still feel myself thinking about the characters, so the book really stays with you long after the last page is turned. And, quite honestly..I feel I could read this book again, too..which is remarkable because I am usually not one to do that at all.

Very detailed and complete rendition of the chronology of his personal life as well as his military life. I learned details of both aspects of this era in history.

Written by the dying hand of one of the chosen men of his time. For any scholar of Grant, Civil War or Military History, these readings are a must. Grant's military genius was without equal. Had his superiors, early on, had his keen foresight, the Civil War could have ended a year or two earlier. Another great read is "Grant" by Jean Smith.

It is surprising that the most balanced and impartial view of U.S. Grant should be written by Grant himself. His style of writing is clear and sparse, recounting fact as fact and without lengthy editorializing. A must read for any civil war buff or serious historian.

I think this is the only real account you can get of the civil war. It's...Great!

Grant finished this lengthy memoir on the eve of his death from throat cancer. Impoverished at the time, the ex-President made his wife rich from the proceeds. Simple, straightforward, earnest narrative, sometimes ironic, sometimes colorful, always unpretentious. Inevitably self-justifying, but candid nonetheless.

The most memorable anecdote describes his first action in the 1861-65 war. Although he was a combat veteran of the Mexican War fourteen years earlier, he was scared, almost frozen, as he led his men against the enemy position. When he arrived, the enemy had evacuated. "The reb commander was as scared as I was. It was a lesson that served me well for the next four years."

Excellent general's-eye descriptions of the battles for Fort Donaldson, Shiloh, Vicksburg, Cold Harbor. His proudest contribution to the Union victory seems to be his strategy of "coordinated attack". He believed the early rebel success was due to the fragmentation of the National fources, which allowed the outmanned rebels to concentrate on one fragment at a time.

Grant is full of forthright and fascinating judgments: he revered Lincoln and Sherman, detested Hallek, disliked Stanton but respected him.

Civil war buff? Don't neglect this.

I enjoyed BEGINNER'S LUCK for it's delightful characters and clever dialogue. Most of all I loved the depiction of the American Midwest as a place where a lot has changed with the advent of technology, collapse of the family farm, and so many industries that provided jobs to Rust Belt city dwellers, but where life still hums away with the changing of each season and most people are friendly, proud, and involved in their communities. There was a time when, if you lived in the heartland, you really had to be neighborly because disaster could strike -- fire, flood, illness -- and it was the people who lived nearest who were going to rescue you (or not). But even with the advent of good fire departments, hospitals, and police, I find that this sensibility of helping others and spirit of generosity still prevails, if you turn off the ratings grabbing-fear instilling evening news and wander over to the baseball diamond, church potluck, synagogue, local theater group, etc.

BEGINNER'S LUCK displays the sharp-edged humor, quick dialogue, and modern social issues that anchor it as a 21st century novel more than one of the 19th or 20th centuries, but there is still something beautifully timeless in the action and people that harkens back to everything good about an earlier America. Main character Hallie Palmer continues to return home for more adventures with this entertaining cast of characters in HEART'S DESIRE and THE BIG SHUFFLE, and now the question is -- will she settle down in her hometown after college or move on to "bigger things." However, Pedersen has set things up nicely in that if Hallie does move away, she'll be taking all the best of growing up with her, and if she decides to stay, well, who wouldn't?

I liked this book. It took me a while to get used to Hallie's (the main character) lifestyle, but eventually I got into the swing. The Stockton family was just endlessly entertaining, and I thought the author did a terrific job of writing in the voice of a teenaged girl (though I haven't been one myself in almost 15 years, so I might not be the best judge).

I look forward to reading more by this author.

I started BEGINNER'S LUCK with some skepticism: I wasn't sure of the target audience for a small-town coming-of-age story about a 16-year-old high school dropout, runaway, semi-professional gambler/math genius.

How could the main character, Hallie (as in the Comet) Palmer be a good role model for impressionable teenage readers? And for older readers, what would be the compelling interest, having experienced adolescent angst and 'been there, done that' to one extent or another? (Although I'm not sure how many of us were teenage gamblers?)

By the end of Chapter 1, you'll be engaged by Laura Pedersen's straightforward, funny, clever writing style and turns-of-phrase, many having some allusion to poker or gambling, as do all the chapter titles.

By the end of Chapter 3, you'll be drawn in by Hallie herself, the first person narrator, who, in spite of her growing reputation as "the town miscreant" for various misadventures, turns out to be a very intelligent, deep-thinking, somewhat confused teenager. Not so much a hardened criminal as a hard worker with a good heart. Not so much a juvenile delinquent, at least in attitude or intent, as a typical teenager--impatient, naïve, self-conscious, and conflicted about everything: school, family, boys, sex, growing up and finding her place in the world.

By the end of Chapter 7, when the remainder of the cast of colorful characters is introduced, you'll be hooked into the wonderful world of Hallie Palmer.

The first book of a projected four-book series, in BEGINNER'S LUCK, we get to know Hallie as she drops out of high school, runs away from home (with six brothers and sisters, and more on the way, who could blame her?!), and finds refuge and the space to sort everything out as a live-in yard person in the truly out-of-the-ordinary Stockton home.

Life is never dull with Bernard Stockton, a flamboyant (yes, that's right, read: GAY) antiques dealer; his equally-charming, long-term boyfriend, Gil; his gracefully aging, revolutionary, free-spirited mother, Olivia; his father, the Judge, an ailing Alzheimer's patient; and an alcoholic Chimpanzee named Rocky. Eclectic, yes. Eccentric, definitely. These characters will make you wish for small town innocence (as claustrophobic as it can be), and long for the nostalgia that people and places like this might actually exist.

With such a colorful backdrop of characters, the plot is just as original, as Hallie matures and finds her way, even graduating from high school under the private tutelage of Olivia Stockton. She even kind of resolves the age-old Sex issue with her boyfriend, who is pressuring her, with a surprisingly explicit few pages toward the end of the book--explicit, yet very genuine, and she remains a virgin, which is a refreshing, intelligent choice in teenage literature. Congratulations to Laura Pedersen for handling this sensitive issue so well.

I look forward to continuing to read about Hallie's adventures, and this is a book I would love to have my someday-a-teenager daughter read, when she's ready for teenage issues.

Sherri Caldwell, co-author, The Rebel Housewife Rules: To Heck With Domestic Bliss!

This has to be the best book I read in 2005! The characters are endearingly funny and Hallie is a child to be admired. The Stockton household is one any child would be thrilled to inhabit. For a side dish, we get history lessons, literature classes and plenty of social conscience raising. The rich descriptions of Olivia, Bernard and even Rocky make us want to spend a summer with this family; even if we have to weed the garden!

Hallie is a 16 year-old girl who despises the school that she goes to so much that she doesn't bother to show up to 90% of the classes. Most of the time you can find her down at the horse track betting on the ponies, aka earning money to buy a car. Since she lives in a house barely big enough to house the nine that it consists of now, not to mention the new baby on the way, she plans to head to Las Vegas. She is the second oldest and is overlooked up until now,when the attendence officer "Just Call Me Dick" begins to notice that she doesn't come to homeroom, or most of her other classes for that matter. He alerts the ultimate authorities; her parents. They simply retract their offer to help pay for the car and ground her until her grades pull up. Hallie thinks, "Well that's too bad because I'm gone, I'll gamble until I have the money to go to Vegas then, so long Ohio!" Hallie is a gifted card player that goes along with her innate sense of numbers. She doesn't have a gambling problem just does it for the money. An unfortunate loss at the track forces her to take a job as a lawn person in the eccentric household of the Stocktons. This quirky family includes Olivia, the head matron, The Judge her husband, Bernard their son, Gil Bernard's lover, and the ever persistent Rocky the chimp, who is between jobs. Not only are they paying her 12 dollars an hour they soon welcome her into their home with her own room. Her parents want her back but no such luck, she becomes a permanent fixture in the lives of the Stocktons. She is now learning things that she would not otherwise learn, like how to prepare exqusite dishes, little known facts about authors and figure heads. The sarcastic humor, intermixed with exquisite vocabulary, envelope her in Ms. Olivia's rabble rousing and protesting for a greater cause. Olivia soon becomes her tutor that way she will graduate and be able to go to college. Her boyfriend, Craig, even gets along with the Stocktons. This leads to a pinch or romance among all the gambling and clearing of her name. A household that will not be forgotten easily.

Slowly but surely, a quickwitted sarcastic humor takes you into this quirky world of Hallie Palmer. This hold is not relinquished throughout the entire novel. I laughed so hard I cried multiple times. The reader is faced with a gay couple that Hallie coexists with and not all romantic scenes are backstage. For those with improving vocabulary, I suggest a pocket dictionary nearby, just in case. Morals and prejudiced thoughts are faced and delt with making you think about your own beliefs.This book is for those willing to be open-minded to other's thoughts and ideas even though you may have originally rejected them as not part of your beliefs. Not everything is black and white as it might appear, and there are two sides to each argument. It helps to see both.

Reviewed by a student reviewer for Flamingnet Book Reviews
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Preteen, teen, and young adult book reviews and recommendations

I read this book in 1984 when it was first published in paperback. I loved it. I found a copy in the discard area at the Library (in good condition) and I am starting to read it again. The Berkley addition published in 1984 has everything the original hardcover edition had. The original front and back covers were beautiful and I am sorry that the reprint version put a different cover on it. This is a long story but it is more like a stroll through the park rather than a race down the hill. I loved the beginning of the chapters that list the old and new members of the Waynesboro Women's Club. It gave me a sense of excitement knowing that I was going to meet new characters. Give it a try - you might find it very enjoyable and hard to forget.

This sweeping saga not only entertains, but educates. I was sadly lacking in my knowledge of the post-civil war era, but after reading this book, I can no longer claim that.
The focus of the book on two main characters, their descendants, their friends, and their town provides a picture that is both intimate and broad. Basing the story in Ohio when most of the elected leaders hailed from that state gave national significance to the lives of the characters.
I was rather disappointed by the second half of the book. It just seemed very depressing and sad for quite a while there. I was also tempted to quit reading it, but fortunately, I did not. The last hundred pages or so really redeemed the second half. The amount of death and destruction in the second half was really just a realistic amount that I am not used to seeing in fiction, especially chick-lit!
I believe I caught a glimpse of the author, both in the main character, Anne, and in the young novelist, Tess Stevens. As the author wrote this book over a period of 50 years, Anne's meditations on growing old probably reflected Santmeyer's own feelings about her aging process. Tess notes that she wants to begin writing a sweeping saga in 1930...which is probably about when Helen began writing "...And Ladies of the Club." It would be gratifying to know more about the history of the author and find correlations between her real life experiences and that of her characters. Unfortunately, I have found little information about her thus far.
Ultimately, it was enjoyable to spend a month in Santmeyer's world.

I first read "And Ladies of the Club" during that short time when it was the book to read, in the summer of 1986. I remember going to Shopko and the store aisles stacked with copies of it in blue, green, yellow, and pink. It was over 1,400 pages and I had to have it. It was the first time I had read a historical novel that was not full of sensationalism surrounding major American events, but rather told the everyday story of everyday people. It captured the time period of my grandparents and great-grandparents and gave me insight into my own family history, even though I grew up in Marquette, Michigan, a small town, not too unlike Xenia, Ohio, or the Waynesboro of the novel.

When I started writing my own historical novels, this book was always in the back of my mind. In fact, the idea to name each chapter in my novels for a year I got from Helen Hooven Santmyer. When I wrote my third book, Superior Heritage, I paid tribute to the incredible influence Santmyer had on me by depicting the scene where a character purchases and reads a copy of "And Ladies of the Club" and the front quote to "Superior Heritage" was also based on Santmyer.

This book made me read all of Santmyer's other novels, which I have also enjoyed, but this novel is the one where twenty years after I read it, I can still remember the characters and scenes in the novel vividly as if I had read them, and after living with them for so long since the book is so long, it was almost as if they were my family and I lived in that golden yesterday Santmyer has preserved for us, perhaps better than any other writer of her generation.

READ THIS BOOK!

- Tyler R. Tichelaar, author of The Marquette Trilogy: Iron Pioneers, The Queen City, Superior Heritage

When I first read this novel back in the early 1980s, I was a young working mother who had just joined a professional secretarial organization or club. It was through my own club that I initially related to this huge novel. And as other reviewers have already mentioned, it was "the book to read" at the time.

But now, over 25 years later, I found that although I had forgotten much of the plotline outside of the two main characters, I hadn't forgotten the impact the novel had on me at the time. And so, I looked it up again at my local library. I'd originally purchased the novel in paperback and probably sold it at a yard sale many years ago. The library copy was hardback, heavy and with over 1100 pages of text. The central focus of the plot is on the life and times of Waynesboro, a small town located in southern Ohio from shortly after the Civl War until the early 1930s. And while the central characters are the townspeople themselves, the nucleus characters is that of the two young ladies who graduate from the town's Female Academy as the story begins. Upon graduation, they are invited to join a small group of ladies as the charter members of the town's literary club.

If you're interested in history and the ideals that made this nation great, Ms. Santmyer's novel brings both alive in her epic saga. This is not a story about extraordinary or heroic characters; and those that are known to us from history are revealed only as they effected the people who lived in Anytown, America from the post-Civil War era until the Great Depression. This novel is about everyday people - our own grandparents, great grandparents, and great-great grandparents - and the issues and struggles that America dealt with during those years.

I'm glad that I read this book a second time, even though it took me several weeks and one library renewal to do it. Being older helped me to identify more with the characters and what they were going through - raising their children, the changes in society, the nation's evolving religious, political and social evolution. I thought the timeframe of the novel and Ms. Santmyer's engrossing and thorough account of those issues reveals the initial eroding of our national conscience and the path that's led us to where we are today.

It's a long read and there are areas that tend to be difficult. I have to admit, there was more about rope making and late 19th century politics than I ever wanted to know.... But if you find that to be a problem, skim over those pages. As someone else mentioned, that doesn't hinder or affect the substance of the novel - and that is the cast of characters that inhabit Ms. Santmyer's Waynesboro, Ohio.

I first read "And Ladies of the Club" during that short time when it was the book to read, in the summer of 1986. I remember going to Shopko and the store aisles stacked with copies of it in blue, green, yellow, and pink. It was over 1,400 pages and I had to have it. It was the first time I had read a historical novel that was not full of sensationalism surrounding major American events, but rather told the everyday story of everyday people. It captured the time period of my grandparents and great-grandparents and gave me insight into my own family history, even though I grew up in Marquette, Michigan, a small town, not too unlike Xenia, Ohio, or the Waynesboro of the novel.

When I started writing my own historical novels, this book was always in the back of my mind. In fact, the idea to name each chapter in my novels for a year I got from Helen Hooven Santmyer. When I wrote my third book, Superior Heritage, I paid tribute to the incredible influence Santmyer had on me by depicting the scene where a character purchases and reads a copy of "And Ladies of the Club" and the front quote to "Superior Heritage" was also based on Santmyer.

This book made me read all of Santmyer's other novels, which I have also enjoyed, but this novel is the one where twenty years after I read it, I can still remember the characters and scenes in the novel vividly as if I had read them, and after living with them for so long since the book is so long, it was almost as if they were my family and I lived in that golden yesterday Santmyer has preserved for us, perhaps better than any other writer of her generation.

READ THIS BOOK!

- Tyler R. Tichelaar, author of The Marquette Trilogy: Iron Pioneers, The Queen City, Superior Heritage, all available on Amazon