Review: Poverty, by America

Poverty, by America by Matthew Desmond
My rating: 5 of 5 stars



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Review: More Than Enough

More Than Enough by Anna Quindlen
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Had a hard time connecting with this story in the beginning and considered not continuing, but pushed on and by the end was happy I stuck with it.

The novel is told from a first-person point of view and is almost a stream of consciousness type writing. There are all these people in Polly’s life at first it was hard to keep it all straight who and what was going on, as there are multiple threads.

One main theme is the infertility issues Polly and her perfect husband Mark are going through. A second is the DNA test she recently took that showed a close relative, a niece, but it couldn’t be. Her gay brother didn’t have any children. She obsesses with this while meeting with her book club and friends, visits to her father in a care facility for his dementia. Her mother just couldn’t take care of him any longer, which didn’t help Polly with her somewhat chilly relationship with mom. This is not all that’s going on either.

The book is about life and things that are thrown your way. For the most part it is not a happy story, but there are happy parts and it isn’t written in a depressing way at all, instead very upbeat.

Book rating: 3.25 stars


Thanks to Random House and NetGalley for an uncorrected electronic advance review copy of this book. However, I listened to a published audiobook copy of the book.

View all my reviews

Review: More Than Enough

More Than Enough by Anna Quindlen
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Had a hard time connecting with this story in the beginning and considered not continuing, but pushed on and by the end was happy I stuck with it.

The novel is told from a first-person point of view and is almost a stream of consciousness type writing. There are all these people in Polly’s life that it was hard to keep it all straight who and what was going on, as there are multiple threads.

One main theme is the infertility issues Polly and her perfect husband Mark are going through. A second is the DNA test she recently took that showed a close relative, a niece, but it couldn’t be. Her gay brother didn’t have any children. She obsesses with this while meeting with her book club and friends, visits to her father in a care facility for his dementia. Her mother just couldn’t take care of him any longer, which didn’t help Polly with her somewhat chilly relationship with mom. This is not all that’s going on either.

The book is about life and things that are thrown your way. For the most part it is not a happy story, but there are happy parts and it isn’t written in a depressing way at all, instead very upbeat.

Book rating: 3.25 stars


Thanks to Random House and NetGalley for an uncorrected electronic advance review copy of this book. However, I listened to a published audiobook copy of the book.


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Review: More Than Enough

More Than Enough by Anna Quindlen
My rating: 3 of 5 stars



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Review: Black-Owned: The Revolutionary Life of the Black Bookstore

Black-Owned: The Revolutionary Life of the Black Bookstore by Char Adams
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A history of black-owned bookstores, starting with the very beginning in the 1830s with David Ruggles and his pushcart selling books at a time when many blacks were enslaved and forbidden to read. Then the turbulent 60's and 70's, and through the decades to today. There are only a few people and stores profiled. The book could not be comprehensive for all stores that existed at one time

In the late 60s there weren’t many black-owned stores, and the FBI kept tabs on those that did exist. Unfortunately, they were also targeted. Drum and Spear was one such store and worker Ralph Featherstone was killed in a car bomb likely planted by the FBI. Another store, Liberation, had been sent a package of dynamite that killed a bookstore employee and injured the owner Una Mulzac.
Later, in the aughts Karibu Bookstore was profiled as the chain of stores didn’t last long. Among other problems, it also was up against what all bookstores have a problem with, the big box stores and the online giant amazon.

More recently black-owned bookstores had a surge of sales for a while when the Black Lives Matter protests and movement was started. That surge has since eased off back to the usual level of bookselling and activity.

Listed in the back of the book are over 50 black-owned bookstores by state and around 40 online stores that were once brick and mortar stores. This type of list can only be a snapshot in time. Likely more stable is the list of 10 books black booksellers want everyone to read.


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