Exceptional Read: Lord Ramsay's Return by Elisabeth Fairchild

I define an Exceptional Read as a well written book that shakes me up, emotionally or mentally. It stops me in my tracks for some reason; challenges me to consider things that really - in my ordinary existence -  make no difference. An Exceptional Read challenges my thoughts, emotions, and spirit. I'm convinced, even if only for the span of the book, it should matter to Every Being in the Universe.  There are qualifiers to exceptional reads.  The label I apply depends on my mental engagement and my emotional response.  Your mileage may vary.

My Experience: A-
Synopsis:  Prudish Prudence Stanhope tests the wisdom of her name seeking to cure headaches with the magical massage of the King’s official “body shampooer.” What she finds in the hands of the notorious Rash Ramsay, just returned from the Orient, is a seductive cure for heartbreak.


As a first experience of Ms. Fairchild's writing I was delightfully intrigued by the sample chapters and totally bowled over by all that followed.  Overall, the story is solid, the pacing excellent, the dialog sumptuously suited to the characters, and atmosphere -- ooh it is luscious.  Secondary characters are well drawn and essential to the tale without stealing the thunder or devolving to cut outs.  Ms. Fairchild's  writing involves all the senses, all of them, wow.  Some readers might find this distracting if they are used to staccato descriptions and rapid fire dialog mingled with introspection all of which seems to have a specific formula based on current marketing trends that I, as a mere reader, have yet to figure out.

[I believe there must be an algebraic equation out there that defines these parameters and many a ragged writer sits at her word processor trying to make the story fit the factors until she decides - screw this, I'm gonna go scrub the toilet]


No spoilers below the cut ...

Exceptional Read: Wealth and Privilege by Jeanette Watts

I define an Exceptional Read as a well written book that shakes me up, emotionally or mentally. It stops me in my tracks for some reason; challenges me to consider things that really - in my ordinary existence -  make no difference. An Exceptional Read challenges my thoughts, emotions, and spirit. I'm convinced, even if only for the span of the book, it should matter to Every Being in the Universe.  There are qualifiers to exceptional reads.  The label I apply depends on my mental engagement and my emotional response.  Your mileage may vary.

Note:  I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review
My Experience:  A+
Synopsis:  Money. Family. Love. Hate. Obsession. Duty. Politics. Religion - or the lack thereof. Sex -- or, once again, the lack thereof.
Thomas Baldwin finds himself married to a woman he can’t stand, while head-over heels in love with another woman he can’t have. Talk about bad planning. He is something of a kite, buffeted by circumstances which blow him not only through personal crises, but also through some of the most significant events of the late 1800s, including the railroad riots of 1877, the creation of the Homestead Steel Works, the assassination of President Garfield, and the Johnstown Flood. Over time, and with the help of his muse, who dances maddeningly just beyond his reach, he takes control of his life, wresting it from the winds attempting to control him.

Jeanette Watts' Web Page

Using a period of history that captures my imagination, Ms. Watts tapped in to a previously unrealized, but obviously primal, need of mine to affirm the truism that wealth and privilege is no guarantee of a happy life. I may have been the only person holding on to that quaint notion, look at the best seller lists these days:  Billionaires are The Answer to everything.  There may be no one left clinging to that Money Don't Buy Me Love nonsense.  I hope she's prepared for the psycho-social fall out....

Exceptional Read: The Big Tiny: A Built-It-Myself Memoir by Dee Williams

I define an Exceptional Read as a well written book that shakes me up, emotionally or mentally. It stops me in my tracks for some reason; challenges me to consider things that really - in my ordinary existence -  make no difference. An Exceptional Read challenges my thoughts, emotions, and spirit. I'm convinced, even if only for the span of the book, it should matter to Every Being in the Universe.  There are qualifiers to exceptional reads.  The label I apply depends on my mental engagement and my emotional response.  Your mileage may vary.

Note:  I received a copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review
My Experience:  Beyond A+
Synopsis:  Dee Williams’s life changed in an instant, with a near-death experience in the aisle of her local grocery store. Diagnosed with a heart condition at age forty-one, she was all too suddenly reminded that life is short, time is precious, and she wanted to be spending hers with the people and things she truly loved. That included the beautiful sprawling house in the Pacific Northwest she had painstakingly restored—but, increasingly, it did not include the mortgage payments, constant repairs, and general time-suck of home ownership. A new sense of clarity began to take hold: Just what was all this stuff for? Multiple extra rooms, a kitchen stocked with rarely used appliances, were things that couldn’t compare with the financial freedom and the ultimate luxury—time—that would come with downsizing.

Building a house 8.5 feet by 13.5 feet on a utility trailer doesn’t sound like a major accomplishment.  That is until you learn that an individual, not a factory, did so and lives there year round, all the time.  Oh, and the builder is a woman, 40ish, with a rhythmically challenged heart and more zest for life than many toddlers. Dee Williams’ story is about building her home and the transitions in life we all confront, and so, oh so much, more.  

Exceptional Read: The Adventures of Charlie Smithers by C.W. Lovatt

I define an Exceptional Read as a well written book that shakes me up, emotionally or mentally. It stops me in my tracks for some reason; challenges me to consider things that really - in my ordinary existence -  make no difference. An Exceptional Read challenges my thoughts, emotions, and spirit. I'm convinced, even if only for the span of the book, it should matter to Every Being in the Universe.  There are qualifiers to exceptional reads.  The label I apply depends on my mental engagement and my emotional response.  Your mileage may vary.

Note:  I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review (but no paper towels)
My Experience:  Beyond A+
Synopsis:    The time is the nineteenth century. The place, the Serengeti Plain, where one Charlie Smithers – faithful manservant to the arrogant bone-head, Lord Brampton (with five lines in Debrett, and a hopeless shot to boot) – becomes separated from his master during an unfortunate episode with an angry rhinoceros, thereby launching Charlie on an odyssey into Deepest Darkest Africa, and subsequently into the arms of the beautiful Loiyan…and that’s where the trouble really begins. 
Maasai warriors, xenophobic locals, or evil Arab slavers, the two forbidden lovers encounter everything that the unforgiving jungle can throw at them. 

If you ask me, it's daymn inconsiderate of C.W. Lovatt not to provide a roll of paper towels with his books in order that his humble readers might mop up the mess of tears from laughter *and* sorrow. And therefore, I can only give him five measly stars instead of the ten I actually see. Ack, I'm a snotty mess, I hope he's happy!

Exceptional Read: Josiah Stubb: The Siege of Louisbourg by C.W. Lovatt

I define an Exceptional Read as a well written book that shakes me up, emotionally or mentally. It stops me in my tracks for some reason; challenges me to consider things that really - in my ordinary existence -  make no difference. An Exceptional Read challenges my thoughts, emotions, and spirit. I'm convinced, even if only for the span of the book, it should matter to Every Being in the Universe.  There are qualifiers to exceptional reads.  The label I apply depends on my mental engagement and my emotional response.  Your mileage may vary.

Note:  I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review
My Experience:  A+ 
Synopsis:    It is 1758 and The Seven Years War is raging. The military might of the British and French empires collide in a desperate bid to control the key strategic Fortress of Louisbourg and, in turn, Quebec and French-held North America. 
One man caught amidst the bloodshed is the young grenadier, Josiah Stubb. Raised by a whore amidst poverty and incest, Josiah seemed doomed from birth to a life in the gutter. His attempt to leave his sordid past behind leads him to Louisbourg, but it comes back to haunt him in the form of a gifted officer, battling his own inner demons. 
As the siege blazes towards its inevitable bloody climax, will Josiah live to overcome the formidable obstacles that keep him chained to his past, or will his aspirations for a better life die with him on the brooding shores of Ile Royale?


“Louisbourg had fallen at last, and now it was time for the living to take stock.”

This is the end before the beginning, literally, but that is the way of historical fiction and the summation of this wonderful book. I’m no longer sure what I expected when I read the synopsis, a combination of Hornblower on land and African Queen is probably close enough. With all due respect to Mr. Forester, whom I adore, this book far surpassed my expectations, and then some. Josiah Stubb is a young man as determined to take back his life as the British forces were to take Louisbourg and thereby open the way inland. A character that should be as well known as Hornblower or Skywalker, though he’d rather not be, I’m sure; his story is as compelling as both combined.

Exceptional Read: A Gentleman's Gentleman by Sir Max Pemberton 1896

I define an Exceptional Read as a well written book that shakes me up, emotionally or mentally. It stops me in my tracks for some reason; challenges me to consider things that really - in my ordinary existence -  make no difference. An Exceptional Read challenges my thoughts, emotions, and spirit. I'm convinced, even if only for the span of the book, it should matter to Every Being in the Universe.  There are qualifiers to exceptional reads.  The label I apply depends on my mental engagement and my emotional response.  Your mileage may vary.

A Gentleman's Gentleman:  Being Certain Pages from the Life & Strange Adventures of Sir Nicolas Steele, Bart. as Related by His Valet Hildebrand Bigg, 1896

"They say no man is a hero to his valet.  Maybe they speak truth, though for my part, I wouldn't pass that for a good saying."

Sir Max Pemberton uses the voice of Hildebrand Bigg to speak about men, romance and life as the turn of the century approached.  He does so with his tongue in his cheek, the haze from his pipe gentling images and perhaps a bit of disdain for lesser mortals. His style of writing captures you from the first and there are times you aren't quite sure if this is actually fiction or not.  I think he was a bit of a rascal too....