A Few Favorites

As I mentioned last week, October is National Book Month! Each week this month I will be chatting about a few of my favorite books as well as a few new books I'm reading this month. If you want to join the movement you can grab our "Read America" button  to share on your blog. 

My sister-in-law introduced me to one of my very favorite books last summer. It's called A Long, Long Time Ago and Essentially True by Brigid Pasulka. It is a book surrounding two main story lines and it flips back and forth between them. The story is based on two women (a grandmother and a granddaughter) that live in Poland before WWII and then modern day. I usually don't like reading books based on or near WWII because they make me sad and can tend to be really graphic. This book is gorgeous! Seriously, one of the most moving and gorgeous books I have ever read. Here is the description from the back of the book:

"On the eve of World War II, in a place called Half-Village, a young man nicknamed the Pigeon falls in love with a girl fabled for her angelic looks. To court Anielica Hetmanskáhe offers up his “golden hands” and transforms her family’s modest hut into a beautiful home, thereby building his way into her heart. War arrives to cut short their courtship, delay their marriage, and send the young lovers far from home, to the promise of a new life in Kraków.

Nearly fifty years later, their granddaughter, Beata, repeats their postwar journey, seeking a new life in her grandmother’s fairy-tale city. But instead of the whispered prosperity of the New Poland, she discovers a Kraków caught between its future and its past.

Whimsical, wise, beautiful, magical, and at times heartbreaking, A Long, Long Time Ago and Essentially True weaves together two remarkable stories, reimagining half a century of Polish history through the legacy of one unforgettable love affair."

This review is beautiful but it also makes the book seem like a major love story. It is an amazing, amazing story about love. But it is a story about real love, trials, a torn up country and a family trying to put itself back together again.  I'd rate this book adult for language, drug reference and a violent scene (though not graphic or excessive).  

Book Number Two:

The second book I would highly recommend is My Grandfather's Blessings by Rachel Remen. Rachel Remen is a doctor that spent her career treating cancer patients and counseling terminally ill patients. Remen grew up in a scientific house of doctors but at a young age was heavily influenced by her spiritual grandfather who was a rabbi. Remen connects the experiences with her patients to not only the teachings of her grandfather but to ancient Hebrew beliefs and stories in order to weave a beautiful and moving book full of inspiration. This book is not a plot line but a makeup of hundreds of experiences and stories from her life that she uses to underline those blessings her grandfather spoke of. Chapter by chapter Remen unveils the blessings in our lives we don't receive, the gifts we we give to others, and how we all bless life. 

Danny read this book before me and he was so moved by it he bought a copy, wrote me a beautiful inscription and asked me to read it. I generally don't like books that come off sounding like "self-help" books or that don't have a plot line but I'm so grateful he gave me this book. It is gorgeous in its prose but mostly it makes me more and more grateful for the blessings that I never realized I had. 

I'd rate this book family friendly.