In this book, Henry's parents went to the Sweetheart Dance. Henry and Mudge went to stay at Mrs. Hopper's house. While they were there they played with all her costumes. Henry dressed up like a man and Mudge was a poodle. They had so much fun. Henry's parents came back and were surprised to see them dressed up!

Although I read to the end, I disliked this book very much, and I'm surprised it has so many great reviews. The writing is stiff and cliched and the characters are the same. The narrator Anna is a missing persons detective with a troubled past that’s revealed bit by bit through flashbacks as she works on multiple cases in an "unofficial" capacity while on leave from her job. It's clear that we're expected to see Anna as compelling and sympathetic, but I found her to be unlikable and her backstory was so dragged out that it became boring. The plot jumps from one case to another without a coherent connection and there are so many characters and events jammed into the past and present scenes that it's easy to lose track of things. I was also put off by the way the author weaves the real life case of Polly Klaas into the story - this feels sensationalistic and inappropriate, and it does nothing to make the fictional part of the story seem more real.

I learned what color eggs were. The dad's carry the eggs and in 3-6 week weeks they hatch. Very good book!

We love love love Hippos at our house! This was such a fun book to read and learn through. And I always love the AV options to go online and learn even more!! I am so happy I found this book because before it I had no idea about hippos being able to close their noses and ears when going in the water!!!

Louise Erdrich's novel speaks of her ancestors and Chippewa culture. Her grandfather fought termination bringing his fight to Washington DC to help defeat the proposed dispossession of the Chippewa from Turtle Mountain in North Dakota. At points the book dulls and could have been shorter, though her characters come to life and her story teachers.

Henry and Mudge were spies and they found a spy kit with a password. After doing a lot of detective work, Henry and Mudge solved the mystery. The code was from another boy with the same spy kit and they all became friends, My favorite part of this book was that they found a new friend.

At first I thought this book would have everything I was looking for. I like Lisa Jewell's writing style, and this one started out with all the ingredients for a great domestic thriller. But then nothing happened. The happy family wasn't really happy, the socially awkward 33 year old man wasn't a criminal and the missing girl wasn't missing. I didn't find any of the characters to be sympathetic or likable, and the story was slow and ultimately sort of boring.

This is another one of those books where the journey is really fun, but then the author proves that writing endings is really challenging. You can have a great idea for an atmospheric mystery, but you also need to have a great idea for how you are going to close things out, which Sarah Pearse didn't seem to have. The book follows Detective Elin Warner, who isn't really a detective anymore after a case went wrong and she decided to take some extended leave. Elin and her boyfriend, Will, have arrived at a hotel in the Swiss Alps to celebrate her brother's engagement. The hotel just happens to also be a really creepy former sanatorium, because the designer thought that would be a super cool place to build a fancy hotel. To continue with wonderful decision making skills, Elin also decides that this would be a fitting trip to accuse her brother of possibly killing their younger sibling during a childhood vacation. Because, hey, nothing says "happy engagement!" like "did you kill our brother, though? You can totally tell me if you did." There are just a few problems with this plan - first, Elin doesn't really talk to her brother anymore, so finding time to accuse him of this is a challenge. Second, his fiancée just went missing, and it may or may not be in poor taste to accuse him of anything given those circumstances. Third, there is an avalanche approaching the hotel, so they really all need to leave. And, of course, fourth, some people are starting to get murdered. After staying behind and getting trapped from the avalanche, Elin has to really deal with all her personal issues at once because she is the only cop-like person on the mountain who can investigate anything. No one can come help until the weather clears, which probably won't be for a while. There were a few issues I had with the book, two of which I found to be major issues. The first is that this was a fun crime novel, but ultimately it seems like no one could ever be punished for the murders that happened here. Elin isn't a detective in this area, as she points out again and again, and she tends to disobey the orders she is given (or just hides what she is doing because if she doesn't ask permission, she isn't doing anything wrong?) so it seems like everything she has gathered would be utterly useless. She also has a weird tendency to tell everyone around her everything she has discovered. Like, maybe they don't all need to know every piece of evidence you have gathered? You know someone around here is killing people, maybe stop telling everyone everything and you'd have better luck. The second is that the ending was just really dumb. The culprit didn't really make any sense, and it seemed like a massive overreaction for that person to be the one responsible for everything. I think it's worth it for the fun atmosphere of being trapped in the mountains with a killer, as long as you keep your expectations in line for the ending.

I loved the book!! I wasn't sure if I was going to, but it was a book club choice and I found it really interesting and engaging. It made me question all the ways we love and how it important it is to be honest when approaching various relationships.

One of the best books I have ever read!