June 2019 Book Review

20 days into June, and I had only read ONE book. Now, granted, I was re-reading a lot of my favorite fluff books, but that is still unheard of for me. I pulled it together and read 3 more books before the month ended, ha.

When Life Gives you Lululemons by Lauren Weisberger - LOVED THIS BOOK! It was so fun. It follows 3 friends who are all going through some sort of life challenge - one is struggling to find her place as a new SAHM after working as a lawyer, one has been wrongfully arrested for a DWI and has her world rocked, and one is a PR genius who is seeing her business stolen by a younger girl. Their stories are intertwined and I just thought it was great. There were so many parts that made me laugh out loud or screenshot and send to friends. It was light, witty, nailed being a mom in so many ways, highlighted strong women and women friendships, showed great marriages (not all of them ha)...just a great read!

Lost Roses by Martha Hall Kelly - This is a follow-up story {sort of} to Lilac Girls which I read 3 years ago and loved! One of the characters in Lilac Girls is Caroline, and this story follows her mother and is set during WW1. Similar writing style in that it follows 3 female characters {one of whom I didn't like, just like Lilac Girls} - Eliza (Caroline's mother), Sofya (a friend of Eliza's who is a Russian aristocrat), and Varinka (the hired nanny to Sofya's little boy) and the things they endure during WW1. I thought this one was a lot harder to get into than Lilac Girls and while by the end I really enjoyed it, I'm not sure I would have enjoyed it as much without the connection. It was a lot slower, and I had a hard time connecting with Sofya because of her rich-girl attitudes (which I understand given the time period and the way she would have been raised but was SO annoyed by) and Varinka's behaviors (which I couldn't understand a lot of them). By the end, those annoyances had mostly settled out, and I was really happy, I just overall liked it less. I heard that Martha Hall Kelly is going to write another book about Eliza's grandmother (I think) and it'll cover the American Civil War!

World War II by Nathaniel Harris - With all the historical fiction books I read about WW2, I decided to start dipping my toe into some ACTUAL history of WW2 {and now I'm curious about WW1 after Lost Roses}, and this was a great way to ease in. This is a Young Nonfiction book that covers the timeline of the different battles. There was a small blurb about the Holocaust, so it really just focuses on the military conflicts - Battle of the Bulge, D-Day, Pearl Harbor, etc. It is very short and an easy read, and I'll be looking up more - now maybe I won't be quite so dumb about American history, ha.

The Forgetting Time by Sharon Guskin - This book was so unique and right up my alley. I have always loved, and have had a fascination with, ghost/supernatural stories. This follows a little 4-year-old boy who remembers vacations he hasn't taken, knows everything about Harry Potter even though his mother has never read the books or watched the movies, and is always asking when he's going to go home and where his mama is. He seems extremely troubled until his mother stumbles across an article written by a doctor who studies reincarnation. Could Noah be reincarnated? If so, can they find his previous life and what happened to him? I loved the characters in this story and the mystery of Noah. I also loved that there were real cases from a book about reincarnation sprinkled in - makes me want to read that book too!

In true Allena fashion, I'm reading 2 books and listening to a 3rd so July should be back to the 'regular' me!