Historical Novel – Reading for you

Historical novel set in San Francisco

Under the Ashes by Cindy Rankin
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Wow. Wonderful middle school historical novel. Well researched and what a great spunky protagonist as well as a guest appearance of Caruso. Truly captures the feeling of being in San Francisco on the morning of April 18th 1906.

I have not been on such a huge disaster as the 1906 earthquake though I have lived through two major ones in my lifetime. The author has caught the feel and comradely and fear that comes with it.

Would highly recommend it.

Thanks to netgalley for making this book available for an honest review.

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Souring through the skies

Nothing But Sky by Amy Trueblood
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A good historical novel doesn’t make you stop and want to look up things, or perhaps it does. There were several times that I wanted to know if the person in the story, that had just been introduced, was real, and was pleased when I found out they were. That is the best kind of historical novel, to me, spinning in real events, around your fictional story.

This is a story about wing-walking and barnstorming. These are feats done by men and women after the first world war, hanging from bi-planes, while people watched from below. That is the main plot, of Grace, who is a wing-walker, who performs these stunts in the midwest, in the 1920s. This part is all realistic, and a bit of fun. There is also a sub-plot involving her two waitress friends at the diner, who want to go to Hollywood, and are running from an arranged marriage.

The only problem I have with this book, and it is relatively minor one, is that while you can tell she did some amazing work on getting the barnstorming part of the story correct, she doesn’t seem to have done as much research on the Hollywood part. And this probably won’t bother most people.

But it bothers me.

You see, my grandmother worked for Disney and Warner Brothers. My father worked for RKO, (which became Universal), and Warner Brothers. There is some amazing history there, some amazing people, especially in the 1920s, when this story took place. If she can throw in real people in Chicago, why can’t she throw in real studios in Hollywood? Why can’t she name areas of Los Angeles? It would make the story just as real when it was in Lincoln, Nebraska.

So, good, strong protagonist, and good strong story. So, other than that minor thing with the movie studios, I would recommend this good, and exciting, and surprising story.

Thanks to Netgalley for making this book available for an honest review.

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Amazing adoption of time travel in slave times

Kindred: A Graphic Novel Adaptation by Damian Duffy
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Good books make you cry. Great books make you think. Fantastic books stay with you long after you read them, and haunt you with their story. This book, this book has all those factors. If the story is this good in graphic novel form, it makes me feels I should run right out and read the original.

I thought, when I got it, I would flip through a few pages, and then go back to work. Well, 200 something pages later, I had not gone back to work.

Very moving story of a young, black woman from 1976, going back in time to save an ancestor. This happens several time, each time, returning seconds, or hours after she left. She only knows it is happening when she gets dizzy. And the time she is send back to has to be one of the worse times to be black, as she finds herself on a plantation in pre-civil war Maryland. And the ancestor she has to save, is the son of the plantation owner.

Worse, then having to keep saving the white man, is that the woman who would be her great-great-great-something grandmother is black, and wants nothing to do with the son.

And in between, we see a non-whitewashed, so to speak, story of life as a slave. This graphic novel makes this book available to many more people, people who should read it. This should be offered in schools, in libraries, and anywhere people need to read this, and understand the history of the black people in the US. Very sad, very moving, and very compelling.

Thanks to Netgalley for making this book available for an honest review.

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Historical novel, done well

Freedom’s Just Another Word by Caroline Stellings
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I was a little too young in 1970 when this book takes place, so I don’t remember too well the things that were going on then and I certainly was not a young black woman living in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. And yet this novel felt so real so true to the time that once I got past the introduction I was hocked on her voice and her dream of becoming a blues singer

This is the story of how Louisiana meets Janis Joplin and is offered a chance to audition if she can get down to Austin Texas in time.

And you would think that would be enough to the story but this is not a simple road trip, but a journey of thoughts as well as places. The world is changing in 1970, sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse.

I throughly enjoyed this story and felt the author got everything right including Janis Joplin. I highly recommend this book. Well done historical fiction.

Thanks to Netfalley for providing this book for an honest review.

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