book club review

for the slow readers book club, our first book to read was Jeannette Walls' Half Broke Horses. i sped through the book and finished it quite a while ago, then realized i completely spaced writing a review.

when i first heard the name of the book, i thought "ugh. horses? really?" since one of the main reasons i joined the slow readers book club was to broaden my reading horizons, i read it anyway. and you know what? it was pretty good. the story follows Lily Casey Smith (Walls' grandmother) as she grew up learning to handle horses & a ranch, floods, teaching, raising a family and a number of other challenges. i liked that she was an extremely strong & driven woman and had no problem speaking her mind. however, i also saw that her strength was a weakness too. she seemed to have a lack of empathy for people and would force her opinion on others, especially her daughter. she could come across with the mentality that she is always right. she probably had to have that kind of stubborn attitude to survive the number of tragedies & troubles she handled. overall, i enjoyed the book and am looking forward to the next one: Alice I Have Been by Melanie Benjamin.

i'm not very good at writing reviews - in school, it was something awful. but that was my first one in quite some time. hopefully they will get better.

the slow readers book club

i didn't make any resolutions this year...however, i am interested in reaching a few little goals. i'm currently working on a list of things i would like to do (i LOVE lists) and one goals is to read more. read real books. for fun. i used to read all the time as a kid. i guess i stopped around the beginning of college - at that point, all of the reading i could handle was in textbooks & articles & homework.

in an effort to help reach this little goal, and to open up my reading list, i am joining "the slow readers book club".


i've never been involved with a book club...in fact, hearing "book club" invoked images of high tea, snooty people, and expensive personal home libraries (i have no idea why those images came to mind). this club is different - very low key and WAY more interesting & fun. i'm looking forward to reading for fun & reading something i normally wouldn't have picked up on my own accord.

the first book we are reading is: Jeannette Walls' Half Broke Horses to be read by March 4th. there will be a review posted along with some discussion of the book on the email list. if you are interested in joining, go here for more information.