Checked Out: The Witch's Daughter

My book this week on Checked Out is

 

The Witch's Daughter

 

By: Paula Brackston

 

This book literally took me four days to read, which is pretty amazing that a book captured my attention and held it until I finished it.  I read every chance I got and loved it.  This book really had several intense moments.  It began in the 1600's and, towards the end of the book, wound up in the 2000's.  Wild.  I loved reading about the main character's garden and planting and herbs and concoctions that she sold.  Some of the witchy part I didn't understand nor believe in and I wasn't truly impressed with the end of the book although it left the story well. 

 

I have to admit something I did.  I was more than three fourths of the way into this book when I went on GoodReads.com to see what else this author had written and happened on reviews of the book that I was reading.  I wish I hadn't done this.  I like to pick up a book, knowing nothing about it, and read it.  I don't even like to read the outside or inside flap that gives you a little insight to what the book is about.  I don't like to form opinions about the book before I have read every word and reading a couple of reviews on this book made me think different of it by the time I got to the end.  I think I would have found it more believable or interesting if I hadn't read a negative review from another reader.  BooHoo.  I like the book anyway!  I want to go back and read the gardening parts.  They really did inspire me to work in my own herb garden.  I love making oils and extracts and such and connected with the character in that way.  Therefore I give the book a high rating.

 

Checked Out Rating: 9

 



Book Review

Two weeks before Christmas I was wishing I had a good read to sink in to.  Something to keep my mind on track and semi away from the Holiday jumbo.  As luck would have it I logged on to the library's website and typed in Alan Bradley, the Flavia de Luce creator and found a fourth book in the Flavia series!  I was so tickled.  The book name is I Am Half-Sick of Shadows and it is based at Christmas time.  How ironic that was!  I requested it and picked it up in a few short days.  It feels so good to wrap my mind around a good story with twists and turns.  Here are a few of my favorite lines from the book.

Flavia: Most chemists, whether they admit it or not, have a favorite corner of their craft in which they are forever tinkering, mine is poisons.

Phyllis Wyvern: Kitchens are the hot beds of scandal.

Flavia: Grumblers are deaf to any voices but their own.

Dogger: I believe a man named Aristotle once said that we delight to contemplate things such as dead bodies, which in themselves would give us pain, because in them, we experience a pleasure of learning which outweighs the pain.

I recited that last one to myself when I was helping my husband gut a deer shortly after I finished the book. 

I currently have found myself hooked on another book to be reviewed soon.  And also I found a cool website called Goodreads from a friends blog who uses it.  I have desired to find a place to compile a list of books that I want to read and so forth without having to request them from the library before I am ready.  This seems to be partly what this website is all about.  I was hooked on it for over an hour last night.  Once I have finished my lists I plan to post them under the Reading tab of my blog.