Show Us Your Books: January

My reading in the new year is off to a very slow start. I have some lame excuses for that -- I've been starting to plan a wedding, Sean moved in with me, and I'm trying to get my next novel edited and ready for publication in the next few months. Those aren't good excuses though. Especially not with such a good book started on my Kindle.

The Baker's Daughter

by Sarah McCoy

I'm only about two-thirds of the way through this book right now, but I plan to finish it in the next few days so I'm counting it as my January read. I haven't read a historical fiction book in a long time, but this one is fascinating. Reba, a newspaper reporter in a Texas border town, is contemplating her future with a border patrol officer. This proved to be a very timely storyline given all the current discussion about immigration in our country. She interviews Elsie, a woman who lived through WWII and hid a Jewish boy while being courted by a ranking officer in the Third Reich. Elsie's unease about her country and her life is clear in the writing. I was also shocked by the storyline of her sister, Hazel, who after becoming pregnant out of wedlock was sent away to become a "producer." Essentially, she's in a home where she and other women are being bred to produce the perfect race according to Hitler's standards. The author jumps back and forth between past and present, but the transitions are pretty smooth. I can't wait to see how it all ties together in the end.

What did you read this month?