The Toss of a Lemon by Padma Viswanathan

Ok, it's long, 600 pages I think. It's got strange names in it. But it's mesmerizing. It follows an Indian woman for 70 years, first as a young girl briefly, then married and bearing children to a strange Brahmin man, well he disappears with naked men with long hair into the forest and casts horoscopes, other than that he's perfectly normal. They have two children who seem to almost be good and evil, the plump golden daughter whom everyone is drawn to and the scrawny slightly misshapen son who seems to repel most. The husband dies soon after as he had predicted but had hired a servant who is of a lower caste whom you soon have deep sympathy and admiration for despite his peculiarities. The tale soon has you in it's spell from this point forward. I thought oh boy a story about a widow, just what I wanted to read about. Then it turns out she can't touch anyone during the daylight hours because of some caste rule, by this time I was glad she wasn't being burned alongside her husband. She continues on and while upholding archaic harmful caste rules she manages to do good in the world and not only raise her own children but her grandchildren also.
It's a long book, if you don't like to read it's probably not for you, you're not finishing it in one sitting. But I do know so much more about India and it's culture from this book than I did before and I ENJOYED learning it. A great read, it kept me interested up to the end without much sex or intrigue other than basic family happenings albeit they were in India and tied up with caste and exotic foods and musical instruments it's a tale that is set from the late 1800s to the mid 1900s but is timeless in it's entertainment and enlightenment value.
Amazon link here.

Alexandra Penney Among Madoff Victims

CNN Link here to story.

She wrote "How to Make Love to a Man", I must confess I haven't read it, not that I wouldn't I just haven't, thought it sort of came natural? Anyway that said she was editor of Self Magazine too, evidently she thought up the pink ribbon for breast cancer with a friend.

Not that I've ever been rich but the woman was slammed in a blog called "The Bag Lady Papers" on the dailybeast.com, ( she wrote how she might have to sell a cottage and had ridden the subway etc, link here) The readers who blasted her called her a privileged princess. The woman did earn her money and lost it. I know the feeling, I've gone from hosting dinners for 12 people @ decent restaurants to having to sell things in a matter of months after that, coming out on top again and being worried about making payments a few months after buying my first designer purse. That is the one and only designer purse I own and I'm still carrying thank you very much. People do seem to be nicer @ least to your face when you are poor, when you get a little sucess people tend to talk badly about you, but if you fall from being sucessful from bad planning or circumstances people tend to jump like a bunch of vultures. I could have told Ms Penny this. I do feel for her though especially since I am now employed @ Wal Mart! The same Wal Mart where I used to go drop $300 @ a time for groceries and truck supplies and whatever else struck my fancy, sometimes more than once a week, chicken feed to some but exhorbitant in the midwest in 2004. Now I don't make that much in a week. Does this bother me, not really, I'm less stressed, or was till I started working the clearance dept which is a new experiment in our Wal Mart. I'm making MUCH less than I was charging for hourly free lance work a few years ago and less than I was charging for writing web pages but if I can make grocery money or my car payment now @ least I'm helping my husband not die early of trying too hard to keep our heads above water. I hope Ms Penny realizes it's all OK and I do admire her for writing about it, wish I had invested in jewels though instead of computers and books or do I? Computers and books are mighty comforting.

P. D. James The Private Patient

I read this book around new years and it was the best part of my new years, other than my husband was home and we had the day off! Yes I did sleep most of the day, no I didn't have a hangover but we did get in in the wee hours of the morning. My husband doesn't drink and I had to drive my car home, spent it with two of the kids and the oldest granddaughter in a typical Missouri fashion, in the shop, everyone has them that has a farm or a business, big tin building with a wood stove, handy for parties since most of them have plumbing now! Husband played cards with a bunch of guys, I'm not sure he knew when I came to the party? I hate pitch, did I tell you that? Back to the book.
It's a typical English whodunit but with twists, some of them modern, some of them hundreds of years old, a witch burning was one and a girl who had killed her sister but seemed to be completely without remorse. I can't recall if I had read any of P. D. James other books but I probably have. She has made a fan out of me. The freezer part was particularly horrifying to me and I don't have claustrophobia! Actually reading about the private lives of the detectives assigned to the case would have been a story in itself, maybe that's what makes P. D. James books so good, there's a story upon a story upon a story?
I'll tell you a secret, I can read Steven King on a dark stormy night, doesn't bother me. I can WATCH a scary movie alone if I want to see it and I am fine. I read a true crime book or a murder whodunit and I have nightmares? I guess the first two genres go into the file in my brain labeled fairy tale and the other two go into .....maybe this could happen..., I don't know but this didn't give me nightmares but it could have happened. I didn't see the final twist @ the end coming, the REAL motive but it does make me glad I haven't written an expose`. Saying I didn't have nightmares doesn't mean the whole thing wasn't plausible though.
If you like whodunit's or if you like England it's hard to put down and you find all sorts of reasons for continuing to read. The Private Patient is worth the read.
Once again I got mine @ the library, you can too or buy it @ amazon.com here.

The Last Lincolns by Charles Lachman

OK, I realize I'm weird, but to those of you who just like to read and perhaps have read a small set of encyclopedias for the fun of it or to prevent boredom The Last Lincolns is a treasure trove. I have read a couple books in between this and my last book review and one was an excellent English murder mystery but this is a cool book. Of course like I said you have to be a dedicated reader and somewhat of a history buff or just nosy perhaps but I actually know something of what became of the Lincoln family after the Presidents assassination now. The part about D. B. Cooper perhaps working for the family is totally weird but not why I finished the book, actually my mother had poisoned my view of Mary Todd Lincoln and I found myself more sympathetic towards the woman than I had been previously. I couldn't have told you before of Robert Lincolns involvement with the Pullman Company or that Mary Todd Lincoln exiled herself to Europe or was actually committed to an institution by her son for insanity. Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith was the last Lincoln and he just seemed like a regular Joe in a way, except for the estate of Woodstock Farms and having all the cars and women. He did describe himself as a spoiled brat earlier in life which seemed to have been true but he wasn't pretending to be something he wasn't. The quirks of the generations replicating themselves is fascinating, especially their aversion to publicity or even remembering Abraham Lincolns birthday, and the amount of historical paper which was lost is probably astounding, they burned some, some was used to prevent erosion?
Charles Lachman who wrote this is the producer of Inside Edition which perhaps made his point of view more interesting to this child of television. This book is just a good read, I couldn't sleep last night and got up to read it several times, a bad deal since I had to get up @ 5 am this morning but well worth the time.
I got my copy from the library, you can too or buy it here on Amazon.