Pirate Hunters

Treasure, Obsession, and the Search for a Legendary Pirate Ship
By Robert Kurson

I’m not all that interested in pirates.  I’m not into scuba diving.  But from the first sentence, I couldn’t pull this book out of my hands.  The author takes you on an adventure to find a pirate shipwreck.  You can feel the frustration of the searchers, share in their excitement, and get lost in the history of Captain Bannister.  It was a different kind of story for me to read, but the writing style is so easy to read you’re through the book in no time.  Give this one a try if you want a little adventure!

~Becky

Hollywood Vampires

A CD review!

If you love good old classic rock, this will be a fun listen for you.  (Originally, the Hollywood Vampires were a drinking club formed by Alice Cooper in the 1970s)  All the songs are covers, such as “I Got a Line on You”, “School’s Out”, and “Break on Through.”  Most of them have Alice Cooper doing the main vocals, but he’s not alone—Sir Paul McCartney, Brian Johnson, and Perry Farrell join in, with musicians like Joe Perry, Kip Winger, and Johnny Depp.  This is awesome rockin’ music, dude.

~Becky

Letters to the Lost

by Iona Grey

A woman hiding from an abusive boyfriend stumbles across a letter from someone trying to find a lover from World War II.  She can’t ignore the plea for help to reunite the two—and time is not a luxury.  The book waffles between the past and present, and even as the reader, you desperately want to find out what happened all those years ago.  A review on the back cover encompasses it perfectly: “An epic story of love and loss that will break your heart.”

~Becky

500 Words You Should Know

By Caroline Taggart

Words are beautiful and versatile things, but when used incorrectly they can lose a lot in transition, and the more complex the word, the more misused it can become. And as words eternally evolve in their everyday use, they can begin to be interpreted as something other than their original meaning. This book will inspire the reader to use uncommon words in their correct context, to utilize the English language to its full potential, and to test themselves on the words they think they already know.

~Crystal

The Wife's Tale

By Lori Lansens

On the eve of their Silver Anniversary, Mary Gooch is waiting for her husband Jimmy to come home. As night turns to day, it becomes clear to Mary that he is gone. Through the years, disappointment and worry have brought Mary's life to a standstill, and she has let her world shrink to the path from the bedroom to the refrigerator. But her husband's disappearance startles her out it and she begins a desperate search. For the first time in her life, she boards a plane and flies across the country to find her lost husband. So used to hiding from the world, Mary finds that in the bright sun and broad vistas of California, she is forced to look up from the pavement. And what she finds fills her with inner strength she's never felt before.

Despite my best efforts, I could not get into this book. It’s just not my kind.

~Crystal

Hot Chocolate

By Michael Turback

‘Tis the season for hot cocoa. This book has many different hot chocolates, you will find your favorite in here. Spicy, old world, different countries, adult; so many variations on my favorite thing during cold weather.

~Crystal

Garden of Lies

By Amanda Quick

This book is full of mystery and intrigue and a fair amount of sizzle.  Ursula Kern, the heroine, wants to discover who killed her good friend and employee Anne Clifton.  But what was Anne involved in that got her killed?  Ursula goes undercover to solve the mystery and discovers some unexpected truths.  Ursula owns a temp agency for secretarial work and accepts help from one of her employers.  While she and Slater Roxton, the previously mentioned employer are un-covering clues, she falls in love. I’m sure you will be very entertained by this book (or book on CD).

~Beckie

The making of home: the 500-year story of how our houses became our homes

By Judith Flanders

This fascinating work discusses the change of how a dwelling to provide shelter morphed into what we now call home. It examines the technological advances that came along, i.e. chimneys, indoor plumbing, sewers, public water supplies, heating, cooking space, lighting, household appliances, etc. and how they affected the structure of houses.

Flanders also considers the emotional and sociological changes of what describes a family and the effect they had on the home/house. She discusses the changing role of wife as partner to wife as housewife, an economic non-entity, due to the Industrial Revolution.

An interesting look at the past with the focus on HOME.

~ Rochelle

Drones For Dummies

By Mark LaFay

Packed with information, photos, screen shots, and websites, this edition of the "Dummies" series will not disappoint. With the current popularity of drones as well as their place in the evening news, the timing of this book is right on target.

Some topics that are covered include:

• How to choose the right drone for you 
• Getting started with your drone 
• Taking pictures & videos 
• Following FAA regulations (including creating a flight log) 

I bought my husband a drone for Christmas from the mall and it didn't come with very many instructions. I am checking this book out for him and my son.

~ Paula

Family Ties

By Danielle Steel

Annie Ferguson was a bright young Manhattan architect with the world in the palm of her hand—until a single phone call altered the course of her life forever. Overnight, she became the mother to her sister’s three orphaned children.

Now, at forty-two, as independent as ever, with a satisfying career and a family that means everything to her, Annie is comfortable being single and staying that way. With her nephew and nieces now young adults and confronting major challenges of their own, Annie is navigating a parent’s difficult passage between lending them a hand and letting go. The eldest, twenty-eight-year-old Liz, an overworked, struggling editor in a high-powered job at Vogue, has never allowed any man to come close enough to hurt her. Ted, at twenty-four a serious and hardworking law student, is captivated by a much older, much more experienced woman with children, who is leading him much further than he wants to go. And the youngest, twenty-one-year-old Katie—impulsive, artistic, rebellious—is an art student about to make a choice that will lead her to an entirely different world she is in no way prepared for but determined to embrace. Then, just when least expected, a chance encounter changes Annie’s life yet again in the most unexpected direction of all.

~Crystal