Saving CeeCee Honeycutt by Beth Hoffman

I just finished reading Saving CeeCee Honeycutt by Beth Hoffman.  Here's what the back of the book had to say:

Twelve-year-old CeeCee is in trouble.  For years, she's taken care of her mother, Camille, the town's tiara-wearing, lipstick-smeared laughingstock, a woman who is trapped in her long-ago moment of glory as the 1951 Vidalia Onion Queen.  When tragedy strikes, Tootie Caldwell, CeeCee's long-lost great-aunt, comes to the rescue and whisks her away to Savannah.  There, CeeCee is catapulted into a perfumed world of prosperity and Southern eccentricity--one that appears to be run entirely by strong, wacky women.  Both hilarious and heartbreaking, Saving CeeCee Honeycutt charts the journey of an unforgettale grils who loses one mother, but finds many others in the storybook city of Savannah.

I'm going to start with: overall, this book was good.  It wasn't great, but it was good.  I was able to set it down and forget about it for several days at a time so it isn't what I would consider very engaging.  But when I did sit down and read it, I enjoyed it.

It is a nice story about a girl who grows up with a hard life, experiences and tragedy, and takes a whole summer to get over said tragedy.  She's not exactly in a depressed state the whole summer because it takes that whole time for her to come to terms with her relationship with her mother and what happened to send her to Savannah.

The back of the book mentions that the town seems "to be run entirely by strong, wacky women" and that is definitely noticable in the story.  There might be four or five men in the story mentioned by name.  Most of the women are widows (one because her husband killed himself because she was so annoying), women who left their overbearing husbands, or women who were left by their no-good husbands.  The story isn't trying to put men down or anything, I just think it is strange that there aren't any strong men mention in the story.  Maybe Beth Hoffman just didn't know how to create male characters - this was her first novel - so she created a story that didn't need them.

On the back cover and the first few pages of the book there is tons of praise for the story but, personally, I think it is all a little over-rated.  One person said "I barely stopped laughing. . . " but I only laughed out loud a few times.  Another person said "I would not be surprised if [this book] becomes an American classic" which I think is a little extreme.

However, a lot of descriptions were thrown around that I do agree with: charming, sweet, delightful.  It was a good, easy read.  If you have some time on your hands, go ahead and read it.  If you are pressed for time, there are better books out there.

The True Story of Hansel and Gretel by Louise Murphy

I'm not sure why but this book caught my eye in Costco while my husband was trying to nonchalantly look at video games. I guess I liked the idea of where a fairy tale story could have really come from. So I picked up the book and read the description on the back:


In the last months of the Nazi occupation of Poland, two children are left by their father and stepmother to find safety in a dense forest. Because their real names will reveal their Jewishness, they are renamed "Hansel" and "Gretel". They wander in the woods until they are taken in by Magda, an eccentric and stubborn old woman called "witch" by the nearby villagers. Magda is determined to save them, even as a German officer arrives in the village with his own plans for the children.

A haunting novel of journey and survival, of redemption and memory, The True Story of Hansel and Gretel powerfully depicts how war is experienced by families and especially by children, and tells a resonant, riveting story.


Sounded interesting to me. The book started out interesting then had a slow patch. The beginning definitely wasn't a book that I couldn't put down. However, just over halfway through I got really into it and did have a hard time putting it down. It has everything you expect from a Hansel and Gretel story (Hansel, Gretel, a stepmother, bread crumbs, a witch, and ovens) plus everything you'd expect from a World War II Story. In case you don't read a lot of WWII stories, that means that there are scenes in the book that are very (I really mean very) disturbing. If you can't handle the more disturbing aspects of WWII, then don't read this book.

That said, it was a very interesting book and I quite enjoyed it. I'd like to share one of my favorite quotes. It takes place in the forest. There are a group of 'partisans' doing their best to fight the Nazi's out of Poland; they are a mixed group of Polish, Russian, Christian, and Jew. One member of the group was saying that he no longer believes in God because of everything that is happening. Another member of the group says,


God didn't come down and kill us. I don't see God shooting children and priests. None of us met God beating up Jews and shoving them into railroad cars. This is men doing the murdering. Talk to men about their evil, kill the evil men, but pray to God. You can't expect God to come down and do our living for us. We have to do that ourselves.


I thought there were a couple of great lessons in just that one paragraph.

1. Men make their own decisions, God doesn't make decisions for them.
2. God will help us out but he can't do our living for us.

Overall, I'd recommend this book to anyone who like realistic(ish) fairy tails and thinks they can handle those more disturbing scenes.