This week I finished:
Let's just get right to it: The Sun Does Shine is one of the books this year that has affected me most. It had been on my radar since it came out (it was an Oprah pick), but I never really thought it would have such an impact on me. You can never know, and that is why it's so important to me to try all kinds of books. This is the memoir of a Anthony "Ray" Hinton who was convicted of killing two people in the 1980s, who spent 30 years (THIRTY YEARS) on Alabama's Death Row...and who was completely innocent. He had faith during all that time that his appeals would work, that someone would re-examine the facts of the case and fight for him. His trial had been a sham; he was seemingly convicted in the minds of the folks involved before it started. No character witnesses were called to testify on Hinton's behalf. No one asked how he could be checked into a secure work facility the nights of the crimes. Disturbingly, the ballistics expert who testified that the bullets found at the two crimes matched the gun found at Hinton's mother's home, was legally blind. Hinton says he was caught in a justice system that cares more about you if you're white and guilty than if you're black and innocent. But he never gave up. Though his faith in God wavered in his first few years in prison, he eventually picked his Bible back up, started a book group in prison, and did a kind of cell to cell mentoring to the other inmates on Death Row. Over his 30 years there, more than 50 men and women were ushered past his cell to their executions. Hinton's case turned around when Bryan Stevenson (yes, that Bryan Stevenson) took over his defense. Finally, in April of 2015, his conviction was overturned and he was released from prison. It's an amazing story of racism, justice, faith, forgiveness, and the strongest mother/son bond you've ever read about (my favorite quote from the book is Ray's mother's "God can do everything but fail."). If you read it, you'll never forget it. I plan to read Stevenson's book this fall. I want to know more. My rating: 5 stars. 
Ray Hinton's story took place in Birmingham, Alabama, and that's where Condoleezza Rice's story starts, too. Known as the last bastion of full-out racism, Birmingham during Rice's younger years was still segregated under Jim Crow law. Her parents told her that even though she was not allowed to eat a hamburger at the Woolworth's lunch counter, it didn't mean she couldn't be the president some day. And, of course, she almost was. Condoleezza Rice was a concert pianist, competitive figure skater, and provost of Stanford University; she served on the National Security Council as the Soviet and Eastern Europe affairs advisor in the President George H. W. Bush administration where she had a hand in the dissolution of the Soviet Union and reunification of Germany; and she served as President George W. Bush's National Security Advisor and Secretary of State. If you ask me the three women I admire most, Rice is on the list. Her memoir, Extraordinary, Ordinary People, is not only the story of her life, but also a loving tribute to her parents, both educators (or "education evangelists" as her father put it) in predominantly southern black schools before moving west to Denver. Her father was a preacher and a teacher. Her mother taught in black high schools and emphasized music and performance. She talks honestly about growing up in a segregated south, about racism, which she calls "America's birth defect," and about being a black woman in the highest echelons of academia and government. It's a remarkably wise account, told with such dignity and purpose. This was my second time reading it, and it has stood the test of time. It's wonderful. My rating: 5 stars. 
I live to be surprised by a book. It's truly one of my favorite things. Year of Yes surprised me. It started out as something I wasn't sure I'd finish, and it ended up being something I wanted to read again as soon as I finished. I'm late to this book, after all, it came out nearly four years ago; I don't know Shonda Rhimes from Adam, and I've never watched a single episode of the television shows she wrote, Grey's Anatomy, Scandal, and Private Practice. But I have a thing for "year of XYZ" books and books about women changing their lives for the better. I was expecting something fluffy and funny--and that's how it started out, it was annoyingly fluffy and funny--but it got deep quickly, and I ended up loving it. Rhimes and I don't agree on everything, but we do agree that your life is yours to change, and we don't have to be victim to saying "no" to opportunity. While I expected the things she says "yes" to to be tangible things like Hollywood engagements and risky behaviors with a little personal challenge thrown in (and there was a bit of that), what she ended up saying "yes" to were things like losing weight, staying single, and saying "no." In the early part of the book, she was light and bubbly and wise-cracking lame jokes that were too obvious to be funny. I thought to myself, this woman does not know who she is, and I'm not sure I can learn much from someone like that. As she got deeper into her project, though, she exhibited a self-awareness that was rather stunning. This ended up being one of the better "you go girl" books I've read, and I want to own a copy of it. Give it a try if you haven't; you might be surprised. I listened to the audio, read by the author, which was very good. My rating: 4 stars.
I work and live in an environment so liberal that I often feel stifled and silenced. I have to make a conscious effort to keep my beliefs to myself almost all of the time. It's a terrible feeling, so occasionally I'll read a book by an unabashed conservative just to feel a part of my tribe for a sustained period of time. With Judge Jeanine Pirro's new book just released, I decided to try her old book (from July 2018), Liars, Leakers, and Liberals on audio. I expected a way-slanted right, no holds barred, hard-hitting account of all that is wrong with liberals, the media, and the White House leakers who want to take down President Trump. And that's exactly what I got. There is zero nuance in this book. And frankly, I didn't like it at all. It was too full of conservative bias, too condemnatory, and just made me feel bad for being a part of it all. Here's a good rule of thumb in politics: if there is not one thing the other side is doing right, if you cannot say one thing about the other side or a member of the other side, you aren't being honest. If I don't like it when the left does it, why should I tolerate it from the right? I did not know that the judge is a good friend of the president's, going back decades. Several chapters near the end of the book dealt with her glowing opinions of the president's intentions and his wonderful family. While these read rather like a long campaign ad for President Trump, it was interesting to hear it from someone who's had a front-row seat to his life for years and years. If you're looking for a u-rah-rah for the right, you might like it. If you enjoy Judge Jeanine's take-no-prisoners approach to politics, you will like it. But if you're looking for a balance of thoughts and ideas, you won't find it here. I found this too partisan to enjoy. My rating: 3 stars. 
You all know I'll read anything by or about a Kennedy, so some time ago when I found out that the nannie to Caroline and John Kennedy Jr., Maud Shaw, had written a memoir in 1966 that Mrs. Kennedy read and approved, I had to get my hands on a copy. Little did I know until recently (how did I miss it?), our university library had a copy! How much do you want to bet I'm the first to have checked it out in decades? This is the gentle account of Miss Shaw's seven (or eight?) years with the Kennedy children, having been hired shortly after Caroline was born, and leaving a couple of years after the president's assassination. She has great esteem for the President and Mrs. Kennedy (you'll get no dirt, remember that Jackie read the manuscript before it was printed), and she talks with great fondness of shy, bookish, and bright Caroline, and naughty little John Jr. It's an honest account, though you can often tell there are things she isn't saying. I believe Christopher Andersen used this book as a primary source for his book Sweet Caroline, which I reviewed recently. In other accounts, I'd read that Miss Shaw was asked to leave the family because Mrs. Kennedy was uncomfortable with how close the children were getting to certain staff members and secret service agents. Miss Shaw indicates that she thought it was time to leave and return to England to care for her ailing siblings. I'm not sure I buy it, but who knows. It was a sweet book, full of practical hints for raising (someone else's) children (I liked her "sense of fair play" rule), charming stories of the Kennedy kids, her life at the White House and at Jackie's Fifth Ave. home, and her life prior to taking the Kennedy job. A must-read for the Kennedy-phile. My rating: 4 stars.
This week I'll finish:
I'm liking this one more than I expected.
My evening reads:
I'll finish the Anna Quindlen book this week, and hopefully the poetry book. I'm enjoying them all, but I don't feel like I'm making great progress, and the month is half gone.
This week I abandoned:
I'm deciding I just don't like travelogue books. Something about meeting tons of people who matter only in the moment makes my reading brain itchy. I got one CD in, and I just couldn't continue.
My next audiobook:
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