Review: All Roads Lead to Austen: A Yearlong Journey with Jane

All Roads Lead to Austen: A Yearlong Journey with Jane by Amy Elizabeth Smith

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



This book brought me back to Austen and I am so thankful for that.

The author is a professor in California, and goes on a trip through Latin America to host Austen book clubs and see how they resonate in different cultures. It's fun to hear of the people she meets along the way, who are very different from one another but are still open to sharing time and meals with her. She also finds love along the way. In some parts, it dragged a bit, but still I learned a lot about the different cultures through her travels and remembered the things I love about Austen's books: the relationships, the personalities, the slow themes that weave through her novels that can still be seen in families today.

If you are a fan of Jane Austen or of traveling new countries, you'll find a friend in "All Roads Lead to Austen."



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Review: Pride and Prejudice

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



After beginning "All Roads Lead to Austen," I was reminded of my love for Jane Austen novels when I was a preteen and teen leading me to pick up the book a reread it before even finishing the book that led me to it (which I am now almost done with).
What I learned from my rereading was that this classic, while lacking any real action, is still able to keep me reading from beginning to end without wanting to move onto anything else.
In its characters, I could see family members, friends and others.
The theme, of course, is what the title implies, spouting the major characteristics which keeps our hero and heroine apart for much of the novel.
Mr. Darcy's reservedness and his pride misjudges Elizabeth right away. And his snubbing her followed by a quiet, observed personality makes her assume that his pride is such that he is cruel and uncaring and judges carelessly.
Throughout the novel they misjudge one another, all the while a bit of matchmaking with Elizabeth's sisters moves one drama to another of the ways of marriage, especially in those days, but even relating to today's society in that making a good match can be factored on many things—false charms, real riches, character, one's place in society, relations and any number of things people deem important or unimportant in a spouse.
While a seemingly simple story, with a few surprises, this novel has inspired many 'copy cat' books, including "Bridget Jones' Diary" and "Clueless."
I now want to obsessively dive deeper into any and all things related to Jane Austen and shall be caught up in the obsession for a while perhaps.



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Review: Who Could That Be At This Hour?

Who Could That Be At This Hour? by Lemony Snicket

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



I had never read a Lemony Snicket book before, but was intrigued when a friend showed it to me at a Halloween party last night. The questions on the back cover were interesting and she said it was a quick read and I could borrow it. Less than a day later, I have finished it and can say I enjoyed the cleverness of the book and hope to finish the series when it comes out. While written for youth, I enjoyed the book and its way of introducing large words—known and unknown to myself and defining them without having it disrupt the flow of the book. The accompanying illustrations were done well and complemented the book well. If you aren't familiar with the series either, it is a mystery series with the main character Snicket, who chose the worst chaperone available on purpose. Snicket finds himself with a sleuth who is bad at her job, but is able to spend his time looking for answers to puzzles himself. I would recommend the book to anyone who enjoys Nancy Drew books.



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Review: Love Beyond Reason: Moving God's Love from Your Head to Your Heart

Love Beyond Reason: Moving God's Love from Your Head to Your Heart by John Ortberg

My rating: 5 of 5 stars



I love this book more the second time around than even the first. I am the first to admit, it is difficult to understand God's love. It's not like He is there in the flesh bending over to hug you when you are in tears. But somehow he loves each person just the same more than we can imagine. John Ortberg's book spells out, as well as it seems you can, God's love to someone. The hard part is accepting his love, because I know I am not worthy of it, yet I must receive it to become His. It's also a good reminder that we are all 'ragdolls' with our own problems, struggles and blemishes and we are here to show God's love to everyone—not just those easy to love.



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Review: The Last Page

The Last Page by Lacy Camey

My rating: 2 of 5 stars



This is a cute story, but it just wasn't all that well written. I would have definitely given it a 3 or 4 star if there had been a little more editing to it. There are a lot of places where text should have been cut because the main character was just saying the obvious over and over again. Even so, it was a free book and quick read.

Spoilers:

The plot is cute—A girl has been broken up with by her boyfriend because he is marrying a girl he got pregnant while cheating on her, so she goes to therapy. She meets a guy near her family's summer home, where she, her sister and her best friend are staying. She is supposed to be churning out a fashion line, but can't because she is depressed and later because she sprains her wrist. Somehow, however, she's able to make a line for dogs, which goes over splendidly in the rich neighborhood she is living in. The guy she meets ends up being her therapist's grandson and, after a bit of a mix up in which her ex comes back to her, she and the guy end up together and her doggy couture line goes national.



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Review: You Unstuck: Mastering the New Rules of Risk-Taking at Work and in Life

You Unstuck: Mastering the New Rules of Risk-Taking at Work and in Life by Libby Gill

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



This book had a lot of good ideas to get yourself "Unstuck" in a variety of areas including money, relationships and careers. The main idea of the book is that people get stuck through fear and that to get past that fear you must make small accomplishments toward your goal, therefore gaining confidence in that area and making the big goal easier and more attainable. I definitely gained some easy actions to take when something feels overwhelming to me. If you feel stuck or would like to improve in facing your fears, I would recommend this book.



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Review: The Accidental Creative: How to Be Brilliant at a Moment's Notice

The Accidental Creative: How to Be Brilliant at a Moment's Notice by Todd Henry

My rating: 5 of 5 stars



Many people believe that you're either creative or you're not, but Todd Henry's "The Accidental Creative" will challenge those beliefs.

In this book, not only does Henry argue that one can become more creative, he also says that building more structure in one's life will bring more creativity to those who are already creative.

Those of us who are creative would rather not hear those things as we usually identify ourselves as creative, as in it's a thing you are or aren't (although we really know that everyone can be creative). Also, hose of us who have creative-type jobs enjoy being messy and waiting for the ideas to just come to us.

However, I have to admit that Henry's ideas of adding more structure probably does allow you to come up with more ideas. After all, we all know our best ideas come when we are working on something else, so wouldn't it make sense that we'd need to schedule some of that time to "something else?"

Many of the concepts he uses is similar to the concepts in "Getting Things Done" by David Allen, such as having reviews, carrying a notebook for ideas, but he goes further in that he suggests we eliminate or "prune" some of our projects and activities so that we can focus on others.

I like the idea he has of setting up your year by quarters and deciding which projects should be focused on during each, even planning your reading activities by what you are focusing on to ensure the greatest ideas.

For someone who has a lot of ideas, this narrowing down ideas can prove a wonderful way to finally finish some projects and move on to others. I've noticed this in writing a children's book with friends. The further along we go, the more book ideas we have, but if we stopped and started on the other ideas right away we wouldn't be nearing the end of the process. Instead we each write down and tell each other the basic premise and then when we are done with this first book we will decide on our next two to three we would like to focus on in the next year and decide on one to actually write and illustrate next.

Some of the things I'd like to incorporate are meeting more often with creative friends to purposely discuss creative ideas, setting aside an hour a week to devote to new ideas and weeding out some of the ideas I don't yet have time to focus on. I'd also like to do some more long-term planning for my life, so I can determine which projects are most important.

If you're struggling to maintain the creative ideas you need to manifest in your career or daily life, then this book will inspire you to come up with the structure to ensure the ideas continue throughout your life.



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