The Myth of You and Me by Leah Stewart

I enjoyed this book by Leah Stewart. Sonia and Cameron became friends when they were 14 years old and quickly became inseparable - in fact, they often referred to themselves collectively as "Cameronia." In the beginning of the book, Cameron is living in Oxford, Mississippi where she is the assistant for an aging historian. A letter from Sonia sparks the curiosity of Oliver, Cameron's boss, and, when Oliver dies, she finds herself charged with the task of delivering a wedding gift to Sonia from Oliver. Over the rest of the book, we learn all about Sonia and Cameron and the downfall of their friendship. Stewart does a fantastic job of recreating the love between two closer-than-close teenage girls, as well as the love between the girls and various other characters. I felt like I knew both Cameron and Sonia by the end of the book.

I listened to this on my commute, so this is my impression of the audiobook. The narrator was ok, but at times, the book felt a bit slow, and I think this was a product of the narration. I also didn't think the narrator's Southern accents were particularly convincing, but this was a minor complaint.

How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff

I listened to How I Live Now on my commute this week, and I have to say it wasn't really my cup of tea. Parts of it reminded me a bit of Life As We Knew It, but I liked Life As We Knew It much better. The basic plot is that Daisy, a 15-year-old American girl, is sent to live with cousins in England, due to family problems at home. While she is in England, war breaks out, and she and her cousins have to survive. The book starts out pretty well, but it becomes bleaker and bleaker as it goes on. This is the nature of the story, not a flaw with the book. There were a couple of very violent scenes, which I find harder to deal with in an audiobook than in print, because in print you can sort of skim over them. Not so easy with audio. Another major theme in the book was Daisy's eating disorder, which while it was important (it is used as a plot device in a couple of places) I sort of felt that it was shoved in in places that weren't necessary. Overall, I just didn't care much for this book.

If you've reviewed this one, let me know in the comments, and I'll link to your review.

Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Promote Peace...One School at a Time by Greg Mortensen

Three Cups of Tea is an inspiring book of how one man can make a big difference. Greg Mortensen, after an unsuccessful attempt at climbing K2, makes a promise to build a school in a small village in Pakistan. This goal of just one school becomes grander as suddenly he is being asked to build schools (mostly schools for Muslim girls) all over Pakistan and Afghanistan. Mortensen overcomes all kinds of odds to make this happen, including lack of funding and the changes in the world after 9/11.

This was another audiobook, and overall, it was pretty good. The narration wasn't the greatest, and the book does not have the best prose I've ever read. But then, Greg Mortensen doesn't pretend to be an author - he's just a man who is trying to spread the word about what a difference education can make in combatting radical fundamentalism. I highly recommend this book!

First Among Sequels by Jasper Fforde

I'm not sure how I got into the habit of listening to the Thursday Next series instead of reading it, but there ya go. First Among Sequels is the 5th in this series by Jasper Fforde. I read the first one, The Eyre Affair, about a year and a half ago while recovering from surgery (tip: don't try to read while on Vicodin) and have listened to all the others on my commute. I tend to try not to bog myself down in series, since there's so much else I want to read, so if I like the first in the series, I'll tend to listen to the others. There's no real system, though...

Fans of the other books in the Thursday Next series won't be disappointed with this most recent installment. Thursday is back, this time 14 years after the previous book ended. As always, the literary references are delightful, and Fforde's wordplay never fails to crack me up. The best in this one is "Ann Worthless Schitt." (This brings up one of the downsides of listening to the books - I have no idea how that is actually spelled.) We are re-introduced to Friday (and Friday and Friday) as a slacker teenager, and we meet Tuesday and Jenny. We hear about Sherlock Holmes, and we meet Tempe Brennan (from the Kathy Reichs books). Oh, and how could I forget, Thursday 1-4 and Thursday 5!

The one thing that was very aggravating, and it probably wouldn't have bothered me as much in print, was a particular technique Fforde used a couple of times involving time manipulation. If you read it (or have read it) you likely no what I'm talking about.

Overall, I recommend the book to any fans (and recommend the series to the uninitiated), but I highly recommend reading it in book form and finding other titles to listen to, if that's your thing.