The Cephalopod Coffeehouse October 2013 meeting

OCTOBER MEETING 2013

The Cephalopod Coffeehouse is an online gathering of bloggers who love books. 

The idea is simple: on the last Friday of each month, post about the best book you've finished over the past month while visiting other bloggers doing the same.  In this way, we'll all have the opportunity to share our thoughts with other enthusiastic readers.  

I missed our September meeting as I was on holiday (a good excuse).

I have been quite poorly this month and lost about two weeks and only read half the amount of books I would usually read during this time frame.  

My review this month is for Blue Heaven by C.J. Box

I give this book a 5* review.

THEY WERE RUNNING AWAY FROM HOME, NOW THEY'RE RUNNING FOR THEIR LIVES –Amazon 

The setting is North Idaho, a community suffering from economic decline in businesses and farming, many retired law enforcement people are buying up houses in the country, all are not as honest as they should be.   Their past comes back to haunt them in ways they hadn’t envisioned. 

The action takes place over a few days, the time is given at the beginning of chapters. 

Young Annie and her brother William are on a secret fishing trip, leaving their house because they are angry with their mother. They witness a murder.  They are now on the run and can't go home; they can't trust the police as they were the killers.

Help comes from a lonely rancher, trying to maintain his farm after a divorce, with his own demons to contend with. 

The plot twists and turns and as with all C.J. Box’s works there is violence but it is never gratuitous.  The characters are well developed; the plot is fast paced and keeps you guessing.  People try to atone past sins by righting wrongs committed in their past.

I particularly liked the psychological aspects of this book and the various characters involved in this story. 

Amazon states the print length is 353 pages, an average sized book these days but a page turner that was hard to put down. 

WHO'S YOUR HERO

J.L. Campbell is hosting a blogfest entitled, Who's Your Hero?

October 22 - 24 2013

It's easy to participate. Write a maximum of 300 words in which you talk about someone who's encouraged or inspired you in some way. It may be a spouse, writing buddy, teacher, one of your kids or none of the above. You get the gist.

 

My Grandfather, My Hero

Frederick Robert Charles Davis

1902 – 1969

Fred came from a large family, seven brothers and one sister.  In 1920 he served as a soldier in the Army in India.  In 1929 he married my grandmother, Hetty.   They had two beautiful daughters who went on to have families of their own.

Fred wasn't a great talker but he always had time for his grandchildren.  Granddad could fix any toy, he re-glazed windows broken from wayward cricket balls hit by my brother and cousins.  He showed me how to pluck a turkey ready for Christmas, how to play cards and games and not be a sore loser.  

I remember the smell of paint, of putty and linseed oil, the special aroma of Brylcreem he used on his silver grey hair.   He had pale powder blue eyes encircled by a white ring outside which was a Davis family trait that has died out in future generations.  His hands were huge to a young girl, dotted with prominent blue veins that fascinated me.

We sat on the river bank; I read my book while my grandfather taught his grandsons, Bob, Richard and Nick to fish with patience and silence so that they didn't frighten the fish away.   I vividly remember the smell of the fish in the sink in the outhouse until my grandmother had time to gut them and de-scale them ready to cook them for tea.

My grandfather would call me ‘Princess’ which made me feel so special.  

He never talked about his time as a serving fireman during the Second World War while his family were evacuated to Somerset to safety from Hastings in the South East of England, a town pummelled by the Luftwaffe bombs and doodlebugs. 

Love and miss you Granddad.