Friday 5ive- A Trip to Napa Valley

Welcome to the Friday 5ive, a weekly post featuring five things that caught my attention this week.

It's been a few weeks since my last Friday 5ive, we've been to Boston, Rhode Island and last week we took our semi-annual Napa Valley trip to wine country. The weather was perfect and we had some great wines and delicious meals.

1) We visited one of our favorite wineries Del Dotto where we had the most delicious lunch. The highlight for me was a mini lobster roll that was just the perfect bite. The gardens are just spectacular, with playful statues along the walkway that made me smile. 

2) Old gas stations have been repurposed and turned into takeout pizza joints and wineries. We stopped into Tank winery and it was very cool. 

3) We celebrated a big birthday at Cliff Lede Vineyards, where we had a delightful luncheon in one of the caves. Pat went all out to decorate and we had wonderful time. We even had an impromptu sing along in the cave that was fun and beautiful. Cliff Lede is all about wine, art, and rock and roll, and they have a quite a collection of Beatles memorabilia, paintings by Grace Slick, and a guitar signed by some of the greats like Bruce Springsteen, Keith Richards, and Edge.

4) It was nearly harvest time and we got to taste grapes right off the vine. We were all surprised at how sweet they tasted, nothing like the grapes you get in the grocery store. 

5) This week's sign comes courtesy of a bar offering free Husband daycare while their spouses shop the cute little stores on Main Street. I'm proud to say we did not have any drop-offs that day but it was early in our trip. If it was towards the end of the trip, we may have lost a few good men.

I hope you enjoy the end of summer and have a safe and healthy Labor Day holiday. Cheers!

End of Summer Reading Roundup

Reprinted from auburnpub.com

End of Summer Reading Roundup

It doesn’t seem possible that the end of summer is fast approaching. it goes by more quickly each year. This month's Book Report features books I recently enjoyed and I hope you will as well.

Many of us have heard about the Magdalene laundries in Ireland where young pregnant teens were sent by their families to give birth, and then forced to give their babies up for adoption. While there, the young girls worked long days in the laundry for no money, and were generally treated poorly as free labor.

In the United States, there were 38 of these facilities. In her novel Wayward Girls, Susan Wiggs sets her story in a fictionalized version of a real-life home for wayward girls in Buffalo in the 1960s. Young girls and teens who were pregnant or whose parents could not care for them or were orphaned or sent by the court system ended up at this home. 

When Marin rebuffs the advances of her alcoholic stepfather, he sends her to Good Shepherd Home, labeled a “reform school". There she bonds with a group of other young girls, and while they try to survive the hardships they faced, they plot a way to escape. It’s a heartbreaking and yet eventually uplifting story.

Kathy Wang’s novel The Satisfaction Cafe opens with Joan, a Chinese immigrant stating she never thought life in America would lead her to stab her husband. How can you not want to read on after that? 

Joan divorces the first husband (the one she stabbed) and ends up married to a much older wealthy American man, and lives what many would call the American dream, even if her husband’s adult children do not trust her. 

It’s a moving story of Joan’s life in America, finding a family, and the clever way she overcame the loneliness that many people face, especially in today’s world. She’s an unforgettable character.

Jess Walter’s new novel, So Far Gone tackles a different kind of loneliness. After he punches his conspiracy theory-spouting son-in-law at Thanksgiving, Rhys Kinnick goes off the grid to a dilapidated family cabin the middle of nowhere in the Northwest.

Seven years later a woman shows up on his doorstep with his two young grandchildren and a note from his daughter asking him to care for them until she returns. He tries to bond with the grandchildren over his love of literature, and when his son-in-law shows up with members of an armed militia to take the children, he is forced into action. 

Rhys rounds up his only friends to rescue his grandchildren and then find his missing daughter. It’s a road trip family story and has a lot to say about where we are as a country. I liked that the characters are not black-and-white (except for one really bad guy), but shades of gray. It’s got humor and heart.

Beck Dorey-Stein’s novel Spectacular Things tells the story of two sisters, Mia and Cricket, who are raised by their single mother. Mom was a high school soccer superstar and headed for big things in college when she became pregnant with Mia.

She gave her girls their love of soccer, and when Cricket shows amazing talent at the game and a tragedy befalls the family, it’s Mia who sacrifices everything to give Cricket a shot at making her Olympic dream come true.

Just as Cricket is on the verge of soccer stardom, it’s Mia who needs her little sister to help her. Cricket has to decide what is more important to her- her sister or her dream. It’s a wonderful story that would make a great book club pick as there is so much to discuss here.

The last book I really liked is an unusual one. Maria Reva’s Endling is about a Ukrainian scientist trying to keep a species of snail from going extinct. To fund this, she secretly works for an organization that matches Ukrainian women with Western men looking for brides.

Two sisters who also work for this organization have an ulterior motive- they plan to kidnap twelve of the men to protest the matchmaking company that they feel exploits these Ukrainian women.

The sisters recruit the scientist so they can use her research van, and when the Russians invade Ukraine, all the plans these women have go out the window, and now it’s just trying to avoid the war and keeping the men alive.

While it sounds crazy, the writing and the characters are impressive, and the tension ratchets up as they try to avoid becoming caught up in the war. It’s unique and brilliant and just nominated for the prestigious Booker Prize. 

Friday 5ive- August 8, 2025

Welcome to the Friday 5ive, a weekly post featurng five things that caught my attention this week.

The weekend was so beautiful, perfect weather to sit on my balcony and catch up on my reading.

1) We went to see Just in Time, a Broadway show about legendary 50s and 60s singer/songwriter Bobby Darin. The show is fantastic, with the staging as a nightclub setting. (Darin performed a great deal in clubs like the Copacabana. My companions didn't know anything about Bobby Darin and they loved the show. I knew a little about him, but I didn't realize that Connie Francis (who recently passed away) was his first love. Jonathan Groff gave an astonishing performance as Darin, winning a Tony nomination for it. If you're in NYC, I highly recommend going to see Just in Time. 

2) You see a lot of interesting things walking around the city, but I've never seen anything quite like the sight of an ad for a handyman. On top of his little car. On top of a gigantic box where I guess he keeps his tools? 

3) I like to try new items at Trader Joe's and this week it was Dark Chocolate Covered Cashews (with a  hidden layer of sweet caramel confectionary coating). Need I say more? They are delicious!

4) I binge-watched the sitcom Leanne on Neflix. It's a throwback to the traditional network TV sitcoms starring standup comic Leanne Morgan, with Kristen Johnston as her sister. Leanne portrays a woman married for 30+ years when her husband leaves her for another woman. It's very Southern and funny (if you've seen Leanne's comedy act you'll get it.) Leanne has to deal with her ex-husband, wild child daughter (who's almost 30), a son who is the light of her life, a beautiful grandbaby, nosy neighbor, and her elderly parents. The chemistry between Leanne and Kristen is perfection, and Tim Daly as Leanne's FBI agent love interest is terrific. There's  16 episodes and I hope we see season two. 

5) I read Beck Dorey-Stein's fantastic new novel Spectacular Things in one day this week (on my balcony). It's about two sisters, one of whom, Cricket, is on her way to becoming an Olympic soccer star. Older sister Mia has sacrificed much to help her talented sister realize her dreams. When Mia has a serious situation arise where she needs Cricket to make a choice that could put her career in jeopardy, the sisters face a crossroads in their relationship.

I devoured this story of sisters, it hooked me from the very beginning. We see the challenges their single mom faced to give them a good life, as well as the blessings and curses of being a star athlete with so much potential. 

The writing and characters draw you in, and if you are a soccer fan you will love this story even more. I'm always intrigued by athletes who perform at a high level, particularly if they begin as young children. Even though I don't follow soccer, I was captivated by that storyline.

Fans of Taylor Jenkins Reid's Carrie Soto Is Back will want to read Spectacular Things. It was a Reeses' Book Club pick.

Have a safe and healthy week- until next time.

The Cover Girl by Amy Rossi

The Cover Girl by Amy Rossi

Published by MIRA ISBN 9780778368267

Hardcover, $28.99, 336 pages

From the publisher:

Find them early enough, and they will always be her girls.

Birdie Rhodes was only thirteen when legendary modeling agent Harriet Goldman discovered her in a department store and transformed her into one of Harriet’s Girls. What followed felt like the start of something incredible, a chance for shy Birdie to express herself in front of the camera. But two years later, she meets a thirty-one-year-old rock star, and her teenage heart falls hard as he leads her into a new life, despite Harriet's warnings. Then, as abruptly as it began, it’s over, like a lipstick-smeared fever dream. Birdie tries hard to forget that time—starting over in Paris, in the dying embers of the LA punk scene, in Boston at the height of the AIDS crisis. She’s not that person anymore. At least, that’s what she’s been telling herself.

Decades later, Birdie lives a quiet life. She works modest gigs, takes Pilates and mostly keeps to herself. Maybe it’s not the glamor she once envisioned, but it’s peaceful. Comfortable. Then a letter arrives, inviting Birdie to celebrate Harriet’s fifty-year career. Except Birdie hasn’t spoken to her in nearly thirty years—with good reason.

Almost famous, almost destroyed, Birdie can only make her own future if she reckons with her past—the fame, the trauma, the opportunities she gave up for a man who brought her into a life she wasn't ready for. Just like she’s not ready now. But the painful truth waits for nobody. Not even Birdie Rhodes.

For fans of My Dark Vanessa and Taylor Jenkins Reid, this striking debut novel explores the dizzying fallout of being seen and not heard in a high-stakes industry that leaves no silhouette unscathed.

My thoughts:

At first glance, I wasn't sure I wanted to read this book, the modeling industry doesn't particularly intrigue me, but I was immediately captured by Birdie's story. Birdie was just a young teenager when her parents, who seemed not very interested in their own daughter, willingly allowed her to travel on a world tour with the much older rock star, even agreeing to give him what they thought was temporary guardianship of Birdie.

Birdie and the rock star are inseparable, and even though her mentor Harriet tries to move her away from this relationship and back towards her career, it's no use. Birdie is devastated when the rock star dumps her, as the life span of that relationship was doomed from the beginning.

Watching Birdie spiral is so awful; she has no support as she hasn't seen her parents in years and Harriet's past efforts to help Birdie were rebuffed. Thank goodness Birdie has a friend in Bernice, a fellow young model. As Bernice's star rises, Birdie's flames out.

This is a strong debut novel, Amy Rossi has created a memorable character in Birdie. The reader is so invested in her life, pulling for Birdie to get her life back on track even though the adults in her life failed her. I highly recommend The Cover Girl.

Thanks to Harlequin for putting on their Summer 2025 Blog Tours.

Friday 5ive- a Trip to Watkins Glen

Welcome to the Friday 5ive, a weekly post featuring five things that caught my attention this week.

We made a trip to Watkins Glen, home to the famous Watkins Glen International Raceway. 

1)  While two of our group drove their cars on the raceway, two of us walked around the town of Watkins Glen. There are many cute second hand stores, filled with nostalgic items. One store had bookcases filled with minature salt and pepper shakers, many of them holiday-themed.  The Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein ones caught my eye in particular.

2)  I got to visit my good friend Kelly who lives close by. It was so great to have a glass of Finger Lakes wine and catch up. 

3)  I grew up in the Finger Lakes and there are some items that I just can't find in NYC grocery stores so a trip to the local Tops Supermarket scored some key items. I got salt potatoes (why doesn't Wegmans sell them in their NYC stores?), Dinosaur Barbeque Sauce (hard to find in NYC for some reason) and Gianelli sweet sausage patties. (I have looked all over for sweet sausage patties to no avail- hot sausage yes, sweet, no.) While there, a customer told us to stop at a little place called Art & Nancy's for the best sandwiches in town. We picked up turkey subs to bring to the guys at the track and they were so good, we went back the next day again for lunch. If you ever go to Watkins Glen, stop into Art & Nancy's.

4) One night we had dinner at Nickel's Pit BBQ for delicious Carolina barbeque sandwiches. As I am fan of Prince's music (the best concert I ever saw was Prince at the Carrier Dome), I tried the Little Red Corvette, made with vodka, pineapple juice, vanilla, coconut, and cherry. I enjoyed it, but I was in the minority in our group in that opinion. 

Little Red Corvette

5) Our hotel (Glen Harbor Hotel) was located right on the shores of Seneca Lake, and every evening we had this beautiful view. 

Have a wonderful and safe week- until next week.

Friday 5ive- July 25, 2025

Welcome to the Friday 5ive, a weekly post featuring five things that caught my attention this week. It was a glorious weekend in New York City last week and I was able to spend much of it on my apartment balcony overlooking the East River reading good books. By luck, I chose several short books and was able to read one each day.

1) One of the best things about volunteering at the Book Cellar is that I get to meet authors. One of our frequent customers brought in his friend Ed A. Murray who wrote a novel titled Autumn in Wolf Valley. The description enticed me to read it and I'm glad I did.

Howard lives in Autumn Valley in Pennsylvania, and he has been bereft since his wife Amber died last year. He only has a dog named Coby for company, and an occasional drop by from his neighbor. When a storm approaches that leads to dangerous flooding, Howard refuses to leave his home for a shelter because he would have to leave Coby behind.

The story goes back in time as we relive Howard and Amber's love story, their marriage, the challenges that we all face in life. Love stories written by men are not all that common, and this one is wonderful.

The scenes of the flooding are realistic and frightening, especially given that so many people have been experiencing this recently all around the country. There is a secret revealed at the end of the story that I did not see coming, and it makes this a good book for book clubs to read. The discussion regarding that secret would be fascinating. I recommend Autumn in Wolf Valley. 

Ed A. Murray

2) Linda Dahl's novel Tiny Vices is a sibling story that draws comparisons to Anne Tyler and Jojo Moyes' books. Four middle-aged siblings are dealing with their own crises-and those of their siblings. Kathy is the oldest and the one who seems to take on responsibilities of others. Corina has early-onset Alzheimer's and Kathy decides that a family vacation needs to be taken now before it's too late.

Brother Pete has a lot of medical issues as well, many of them self-inflicted from years of drug and alcohol abuse. Youngest daughter Becca and her husband are struggling with financial troubles and their own son's addiction that caused them heartache.

The only place they can all travel is to a beach town in Mexico where years ago something awful happened to Kathy on spring break, something she has never told anyone. 

It's a road trip that also includes Kathy and Becca's husbands and Corina's caregiver and things get off to a difficult start and don't get better.

I raced through this story as I love a good family story, and Tiny Vices is surely one. The characters are vivid, and Kathy describes one thusly: "She knew him so well. Knew he was wearing his life like a musty old coat. And suspected that he wanted a new one." I highly recommend Tiny Vices to anyone who likes family stories. 

3) Katie Yee's new novel Maggie; Or A Man and A Woman Walk Into A Bar has been getting  a lot of buzz lately. Our unnamed narrator is at a restaurant when her husband tells her that he has fallen in love with a woman named Maggie. She goes to the buffet and fills up on samosas. They have two young children who prefer their father's entertaining bedtime stories to hers and now he wants out.

She feels a lump in her breast and discovers she has cancer (she names the lump Maggie). She turns to her best friend Darlene for support, and writes "The Guide to My Husband:  A User's Manual" for Maggie, alerting Maggie to her husband's many quirks. She eventually agrees to meet Maggie, resulting in an awkward scene at yet another restaurant. 

She turns to Chinese myths of her childhood to create bedtime stories for her children so they can better understand her culture- and theirs.  The novel is by turns funny and insightful. Katie Yee has drawn comparisons to Jenny Offill and Nora Ephron with her fantastic debut novel, and I look forward to reading more from her in the future. 

4) I first remembered Merrill Markoe as the head writer for David Letterman's Late Night with David Letterman. She was also in a romantic relationship with Letterman for years. In her collection of humorous essays Cool Calm and Contentious, she recounts in one essay her relationship with an unnamed talk show and how she learned that he had been cheating on her with young staff members. As someone who remembered this scandal, I found how she handled it in the essay brilliant. 

She also has essays about her narcassistic mother (oh wow, that woman is something), and maybe growing up with her mother helped her deal with a life in show business, and all the difficult personalities she encounters in her work. 

I picked this book up because I saw Markoe on HBO's Hacks this season and she is hilarious in her deadpan delivery. It was a good afternoon spent reading it. 

5) I caught uo with season four of Hulu's The Bear.  This season focuses less on the restaurant and more on the lives of Bear, Sydney and Ritchie. I found it a bit slow going at first, but as the season progressed, there were three standout episodes- Worms (Ayo Edebiri's Sydney shines here), Bears (a family wedding stuffed with great guest stars like Sarah Paulson, John Mulaney, and Oliver Platt among them) and the last episode Goodbye (with strong performances from Ayo Edebiri, Jeremy Allen White and Ebon Moss-Bachrach). I do agree with people who say they relied too much on music this season and not enough dialogue, but the last episode sets up season five beautifully. 

Have a safe and enjoyable week- until next time.

Friends to Lovers by Sally Blakely

Friends to Lovers by Sally Blakely

Published by Canary Street Press

Trade paperback, $18.99, 352 pages

From the publisher:

Always each other’s plus-ones, but never each other’s real dates, two childhood best friends have one last summer wedding to fall in love in this dual-narrative debut. 

One of The Washington Post’s ‘8 Romance Novels to Read this Summer’!

Best friends Joni and Ren have been inseparable since childhood. So when Joni moves across the country for her job, the two devise a creative way to stay in touch: they’ll be each other’s plus-ones every year for wedding season, no matter what else is happening in their lives.

It’s a tradition that works, until a line is crossed and the friendship they once thought was forever is ruined.

Now Joni is back at their families’ shared summer home for her sister’s wedding, and she’s determined to make the week perfect, even if it means faking a friendship with Ren—and avoiding the truth of why they have to fake it in the first place. How hard can it be to pretend to be friends with the person who once knew you best?

But as sunny beach days together turn into starry nights, Joni begins to question what her life is without Ren in it. And when the wedding arrives, bringing past heartaches to the surface, she’ll be forced to decide if loving Ren means letting him go, or if theirs is a love story worth fighting for.

My thoughts:

I was immediately drawn into Friends to Lovers from the first page. I felt for Joni, who lost her job in New York and hasn't told anyone in her family- or Ren, her best friend since childhood. Ren and Joni had spent every moment together growing up, and when Joni moved away for her dream job, they kept up by being each other's plus ones to the weddings of family and friends. Until something happened two years ago and they haven't texted or spoken since.

You can feel the discomfort leap off the page between Joni and Ren as family and friends gather for Joni's sister's wedding. They pretend to everyone that all is well even as they share a porch bedroom as they always have. 

I liked seeing their relationship through the lens of the weddings they have attended over the years, it's a unique and interesting way to tell their story.

The secondary characters of various family and friends are so well drawn, and in another author's hands it could have felt crowded or confusing, but here it only adds to this wonderful story. The reader feels like we are there at the family vacation home along with everyone else, participating in the week of wedding festivities.

We root for Ren and Joni to figure out their relationship- should they make the leap from friends to lovers? Read and find out, you'll be rewarded. I recommend Friends to Lovers.

Thanks to Harlequin Books for putting me on the Summer 2025 Blog Tours.

Friday 5ive- A Trip to Nantucket

Welcome to the Friday 5ive, a weekly post featuring five things that caught my attention this week.

We took a trip to Nantucket with our younger son and his fianceé. It was a glorious weekend, filled with good food and strolls around the pretty town.

1) We rented a Jeep (everyone in Nantucket has a Jeep) and went to Coskata-Coatue Wildlife Refuge where you could drive the Jeep right onto the beach. There were a lot of people fishing, and a sign that read 'Warning- Seals Attract Sharks. Do not swim near seals'. We saw a lot of seals close up to the shore, they must figure that sharks can't come that close to the beach. It was pretty cool!

2) Topper's is a famous restaurant on the island and we had a special engagement dinner there. My first course was a summer fruit and vegetable dish that had such a beautiful presentation, as did the pavlova desset. If you watch Hulu's The Bear, you would appreciate it.

3) One of the highlights for me was a visit to the popular The Club Car for their piano bar entertainment. My son and his fianceé manuevered us to get right up close to the piano where the large crowd sang along enthusiastically to songs like Tiny Dancer (a big fan favorite that night).

4) As we were walking near the waterfront we ran into a wedding party marching down the street, complete with musicians and everyone had a tambourine. I wanted to ask if I could have a tambourine, but I did not. It was like something you'd see in New Orleans. 

 
5) Our trip home took a little longer than planned. We were supposed to fly out of Nantucket on Monday, the day of the horrendous storms and flash flooding in New York City. Our 3:30pm flight kept getting delayed and we figured our best bet was to get off Nantucket and to Boston where we'd stay overnight and get a flight the next morning. 

The only flight to Boston was on Cape Air in a little eight-seater plane. It was kind of like being up in a hot air balloon, very peaceful and slow going over the water. You had to tell the Cape Air agent your weight and all I could think of was comedienne Leanne Morgan's story of going on a small plane and when asked her weight she lied and she knew everyone lied too and she was sure they were going to crash.

 When we went to get our luggage at the Boston airport, my bag was missing. (But my husband's golf clubs made it.) The other couple on our flight were also missing a bag, so we read a sign that said "If your bag is not here, wait 15-20 minutes before going to the Cape Air desk upstairs." The wife and and I waited while the husbands went upstairs and sure enough, our bags showed up 25 minutes later. They arrived on the following Cape Air flight. That made me laugh! 

After a 90 minute car ride from Newark airport to NYC, we were home. Our flight from Boston to NYC took 45 minutes. Only 22 hours behind schedule. What are you going to do?

Our trip to Nanticket was so lovely, we had a fantastic time and I would go back again. Have a great and safe week.