Reviewed by Bev Scott Kristin Hannah has written a powerful historical novel with contemporary significance. Three members of the Martinelli family leave Texas during the Dust Bowl, which destroyed their farm and threatened their young son’s life. In search of a better life, they grab onto the California dream. Instead of the dream, they struggle […]
Book Reviews
Book Review: “The Rose Code” by Kate Quinn
Reviewed by Bev Scott For historical fiction at its best and for a fabulous read, consider The Rose Code. As Britain prepares to fight Nazi Germany, three very different women enter the fray as codebreakers. Working from the mysterious country estate, Bletchley Park they are Osla, a beautiful, vivacious debutante; dominating Mab, a product of […]
Book Review: “The Huntress” by Kate Quinn
Reviewed by Bev Scott In The Huntress, Kate Quinn has interwoven a spellbinding story of three characters. We find disciplined British war correspondent turned Nazi hunter, Ian Graham, with Nina Markova. Nina, a brazen Russian bomber pilot, joins the feared all-female Night Witches. Finally, young Jordan McBride is growing up in Boston shortly after World […]
Book Review: “The Good Ancestor” by Roman Krznaric
Reviewed by Bev Scott We live in a culture of short-term thinking. Such as: When can we stop wearing our masks? When is the next election? When is the next quarterly report? This is the “tyranny of the now,” says Roman Krznaric in his book The Good Ancestor. He argues that to be a “good ancestor,” we need […]
Book Review: “Caste, The Origins of Our Discontents” by Isabel Wilkerson
Reviewed by Bev Scott Do we have a class system or a caste system? When I studied sociology in college, I learned that we have a class system, and India has a rigid caste system. And, that the freedom of U.S. democracy gave opportunity for people in the lower class. They could work hard and raise themselves […]
Book Review: “The Vanishing Half” by Brit Bennett
Reviewed by Bev Scott Riveting from beginning to end, The Vanishing Half tells the story of identical twins who grow up in a small southern black community, called Mallard. Mallard is such a small town that it is not even on the map. However, it is a town founded for light-skinned African Americans. After running away together at […]
Book Review: “Girl, Woman, Other” by Bernardine Evaristo
Reviewed by Bev Scott Bernardine Evaristo writes about the African diaspora in her unique voice. Thus, she wrote this unusual novel about twelve British black women whose lives interconnect. Each chapter intensely portrays one of the women’s life stories. Plus, each chapter also introduces other women who become central characters in future chapters. The characters have […]
Book Review: “How to Be an Antiracist” by Ibram X. Kendi
Reviewed by Bev Scott I began learning to become an antiracist in the early 1970s. Living in Detroit then, I worked with a black and white team of facilitators. They were conducting antiracism workshops and education in organizations and neighborhoods. The City of Detroit still reeled from the 1967 “Rebellions.” I and other white facilitators immersed […]
Book Review: “Never Caught, the Washingtons’ Relentless Pursuit of Their Runaway Slave, Ona Judge” by Erica Armstrong Dunbar
Reviewed by Bev Scott Erica Armstrong Dunbar utilizes the details of history to create an engaging story of the life of a runaway slave owned by Martha Washington. Betty, Ona Judge’s mother, came to Mt. Vernon as a slave, when Martha accepted the hand of George Washington to marry him as her second husband in 1759. Betty […]
Book Review: “Homegoing” by Yaa Gyasi
Reviewed by Bev Scott Homegoing is an amazing book! It is an incredible example of how much we can learn from well-written fiction about culture, family dynamics, human emotions, history and so much more. Author YaaGyasi tells stories drawn from the lives of two ancestral family lines beginning in Ghana in the eighteenth century. The path of […]
