Ocean City Free Public Library Book Blog

The Passage is a heady mix of all things that are currently hot in the reading world as of late: vampires, the end of the world, political tension and violence. So it makes sense that it would be a great book for summer, albeit lengthy at 700+ pages. What starts off in the not so distant future as a gov't science experiment quickly escalates into the apocalypse for mankind as the subjects of said experiment turn out to be bloodthirsty monsters. Fast forward nearly 100 years later to a small colony of humans struggling to stay alive. The key to all of this is a little girl named Amy. Intrigued? You should be.

The final novel in Larsson's trilogy is just as action packed as its 2 predecessors. Hacker genius Lisbeth Salander is stuck in the hospital after being shot and buried alive while on the outside, governmental agencies, police officers and ex spies are all pissed that she can't just DIE already. And so, they continue to plot even worse things against Lisbeth once she eventually does recover. Lisbeth's main defender against all evil-doers is journalist Mikael Blomkvist. The extremely interesting thing about this novel is that it is so fast paced despite the fact that the heroine is in the hospital 95% of the time. What's even better is that the action is completely believable - no one is jumping off of buildings or setting bombs off; everyone actually uses their brain and nothing more advanced than a computer. Larsson (who unfortunately died before finishing the complete saga) provides a very satisfying conclusion to his trilogy.

From Booklist : "Soli’s debut revolves around three characters whose lives are affected by the Vietnam War. Helen Adams comes to Vietnam in the hopes of documenting the combat that took her brother from her. She immediately attracts the attention of the male journalists in the region, and quickly falls into an affair with the grizzled but darkly charismatic war photographer Sam Darrow. As Helen starts to make her own way as a photographer in Vietnam, drawing as much attention for her gender as for her work, Darrow sends her his Vietnamese assistant, Linh, a reluctant soldier who deserted the SVA in the wake of his wife’s death. While Linh wants nothing more than to escape the war, Darrow and Helen are consumed by it, unable to leave until the inevitable tragedy strikes. The strength here is in Soli’s vivid, beautiful depiction of war-torn Vietnam, from the dangers of the field, where death can be a single step away, to the emptiness of the Saigon streets in the final days of the A...

Golden Richards is just like your average guy. He worries about money, getting older and trying to avoid a mid-life crisis. The kicker? Golden is the titular polygamist with 4 wives and 28 children (+ or - a few stillborns and miscarriages). And as one might expect, life in the Richards house (or houses as the case may be) can get a little chaotic. The book focuses on just a few characters in the house - Golden, his 4th wife Trish and son Rusty. Each family member has their own proverbial crosses in life to bear - Golden tries hard to live his life by the Principle, desparately trying to avoid an affair with his boss' wife. Trish struggles with the loneliness comes with being part of a polygamist family. And Rusty just wants to be noticed and not humilated on a daily basis by his obscenely large family. Udall's book is funny and just an overall a good story about the American family. Fans of the TV show Big Love will probably enjoy it.

I like Sarah Silverman in small doses because the potty humor can get old after awhile. I always thought she stole the show with her bit in the film The Aristocrats . So I picked up her memoirs with the notion that it'd have its fair share of snarky laughs and foul potty humor. In that sense, I was pretty dead on. Bedwetter starts out like standard memoirs - Silverman spends a lot of time talking about her childhood and zany family. What I found to be the most enlightening portion of the entire book was her adolescent battles with depression and yes, bedwetting. For once, Silverman uses just enough humor to relay how these traumatic experiences have affected her. My only gripe memoir was that once Silverman reached a certain level of fame, she resorts to a whole lot of name dropping (with one exception involving a sweet anecdote about Chris Farley) and not much else. There are also a lot of pretty gross photos of her and her TV show cohorts.

As a rule, I'm not a big fan of suspense and/or mysteries. However, once in awhile, it's nice to break out of a comfort zone and try something different. I had read Flynn's Sharp Objects awhile ago and enjoyed it, so it made sense to try her new book. Dark Places centers on the grim murders of the Day family back in 1985. Libby, our heroine and a young child at the time, managed to escape and her testimony was enough to convict her older brother Ben of the crime. The book shifts back and forth between the events that led up to that fateful day and the present day Libby. Everything is going along, until Libby gets involved with an underground crime group that wants to get to the truth of the murders. Did Ben really kill his entire family? Or was it someone else?? All in all, it was a very quick paced read and the tension held throughout the entire novel. As one could expect, adult Libby has some major psychological issues as a result of the murders. Despite being so flawed...

Even though I don't watch her show, I like Chelsea Handler. She's kind of bitchy and a little mean spirited and as long as it's not directed at me, I sort of enjoy that type of humor. In her latest book, Handler discusses playing mean tricks on her boyfriend, takes her big bodyguard on vacation to see if she can hook him up with a tourist, and spends a lot of time commiserating with her siblings about how awful their father is. Yes, it's mean and kind of juvenile, but still good for a chuckle.