Rilla Askew, The Mercy Seat

Rilla Askew, The Mercy Seat. Two related families migrate to the Oklahoma frontier in grinding poverty amidst the family drama and tragedy that they had been fleeing. The environment is so alive that you can taste the dust and smell the mules, but the whole spirit and story didn't grab me.

Bill Bryson, Notes from a Small Island

Bill Bryson, Notes from a Small Island. Bryson can be engaging and chatty but this book was like being trapped on a greyhound bus with a dull and cantankerous old codger who will not shut up about how the world was so much more interesting and difficult in his youth and how people are so boring to talk to on buses nowadays.