#105: Tumbleweeds

Tumbleweeds, by Leila Meacham

(New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2012)

Summary:
"Recently orphaned, eleven-year-old Cathy Benson feels she has been dropped into a cultural and intellectual wasteland when she is forced to move from her academically privileged life in California to the small town of Kersey in the Texas Panhandle where the sport of football reigns supreme. She is quickly taken under the unlikely wings of up-and-coming gridiron stars and classmates John Caldwell and Trey Don Hall, orphans like herself, with whom she forms a friendship and eventual love triangle that will determine the course of the rest of their lives. Taking the three friends through their growing up years until their high school graduations when several tragic events uproot and break them apart, the novel expands to follow their careers and futures until they reunite in Kersey at forty years of age. Told with all of Meacham's signature drama, unforgettable characters, and plot twists, readers will be turning the pages, desperate to learn how it all plays out."

Opening Line:
"The call he'd been expecting for twenty-two years came at midnight when he was working late at his desk."

My Take:
Silly, entertaining, but forgettable fluff. We all have our guilty pleasures; this one wasn't the best of its kind I've read, but it wasn't the worst, either. That's all.

#106: Call Me Irresistible

Call Me Irresistible, by Susan Elizabeth Phillips (New York: William Morrow, 2011)

Summary:
"Lucy Jorik is the daughter of a former president of the United States.

"Meg Koranda is the offspring of legends.

"One of them is about to marry Mr. Irresistible -- Ted Beaudine -- the favorite son of Wynette, Texas. The other is not happy about it and is determined to save her friend from a mess of heartache.

"But even though Meg knows that breaking up her best friend's wedding is the right thing to do, no one else seems to agree. Faster than Lucy can say "I don't," Meg becomes the most hated woman in town -- a town she's stuck in with a dead car, an empty wallet, and a very angry bridegroom. Broke, stranded, and without her famous parents at her back, Meg is sure she can survive on her own wits. What's the worst that can happen? Lose her heart to the one and only Mr. Irresistible? Not likely. Not likely at all.

"Call Me Irresistible is the book Susan Elizabeth Phillips's readers have long awaited. Ted, better known as 'little Teddy,' the nine-year-old heartbreak kid from Phillips's first bestseller, Fancy Pants, and as 'young Teddy,' the hunky new college graduate in Lady Be Good, is all grown up now -- along with Lucy from First Lady and Meg from What I Did for Love. They're ready to take center stage in a saucy, funny, and highly addictive tale fans will love."

Opening Line:
"More than a few residents of Wynette, Texas, thought Ted Beaudine was marrying beneath himself."

My Take:
Maybe long-time faithful fans of the author would love and anticipate this book, but I'm not among them. My cardinal rule of sequels, or any books set in a universe the author's previously established, is that they need to work just as well as stand-alones for those who haven't read the others in the series. This one fails. Lots of stock, two-dimensional cardboard characters and ridiculous plot contrivances. Perhaps I've just read one chick lit book too many of late, but I feel a little like I just ate a full not-quite-half-gallon carton of ice cream by myself. The kind with rich but heavy little mix-ins in it.

#69: The Confession

The Confession, by John Grisham (New York: Doubleday, 2010).

Summary:
"An innocent man is about to be executed.

"Only a guilty man can save him.

"For every innocent man sent to prison, there is a guilty one left on the outside. He doesn't understand how the police and prosecutors got the wrong man, and he certainly doesn't care. He just can't believe his good luck. Time passes and he realizes that the mistake will not be corrected: the authorities believe in their case and are determined to get a conviction. He may even watch the trial of the person wrongly accused of the crime. He is relieved when the verdict is guilty. He laughs when the police and prosecutors congratulate themselves. He is content to allow an innocent person to go to prison, to serve hard time, even to be executed.

"Travis Boyette is such a man. In 1998, in the small East Texas city of Slone, he abducted, raped, and strangled a popular high school cheerleader. He buried her body so that it would never be found, then watched in amazement as police and prosecutors arrested and convicted Donte Drumm, a local football star, and marched him off to death row.

"Now nine years have passed. Travis has just been paroled in Kansas for a different crime; Donte is four days away from his execution. Travis suffers from an inoperable brain tumor. For the first time in his miserable life, he decides to do what's right and confess.

"But how can a guilty man convince lawyers, judges, and politicians that they're about to execute an innocent man?"

Opening Line:
"The custodian at St. Mark's had just scraped three inches of snow off the sidewalks when the man with the cane appeared."

My Take:
Sometimes fiction parallels real life just a little too closely. Odd to be reading this book while the Troy Davis case has been at the forefront of the news.

John Grisham is John Grisham. You know what you're going to get -- solid legal thrillers with (usually) a Southern flair and a fairly high can't-put-it-down quotient -- and yep, you pretty much get more of the same here. Unfortunately, he and his characters can't help doing a bit too much grandstanding here, which tends to get in the way of the story line. Grisham's a big supporter of the Innocence Project, an organization devoted to exonerating those who've been wrongfully convicted. And hey -- more power to him; it's nice to see celebrities legitimately using their fame to do good for a cause they believe in. But if I want to learn about that cause, I'll look for books and articles about wrongful conviction -- not extended diatribes in what's supposed to be a fun/ junk novel. (Doesn't mean it wasn't still a fun/ junk novel, though.)